To Mrs. Riddel

I am thinking to send my "Address" to some periodical publication, but it has not yet got your sanction, so pray look at it. As to the Tuesday's play, let me beg of you, my dear madam, to give us, "The Wonder, a Woman keeps a Secret!" to which please add, "The Spoilt Child"—you will highly oblige me by so doing. Ah, what an enviable creature you are! There now, this cursed, gloomy, blue-devil day, you are going to a party of choice spirits— "To play the shapes Of frolic fancy, and incessant form Those rapid pictures, assembled train Of fleet ideas, never join'd before, Where lively wit excites to gay surprise; Or folly-painting humour, grave himself, Calls laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve." THOMSON. But as you rejoice with them that do rejoice, do also remember to weep with them that weep, and pity your melancholy friend. R. B.