The Charles Dickens Letters Project

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Dickens, Charles. To [addressee], [date of letter]. Charles Dickens Letters Project, ed. Leon Litvack, Emily Bell, Lydia Craig and Jeremy Parrott (London: Dickens Fellowship). [URL of individual letter], [date of access].

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Charles Dickens Letters Project, ed. Leon Litvack, Emily Bell, Lydia Craig and Jeremy Parrott (London: Dickens Fellowship), DickensLetters.com.

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1841-1850

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To WASHINGTON IRVING,1 12 APRIL 1845

Facsimile in Christie’s online catalogue, June 2013

Palazzo Peschiere, Genoa,

Twelfth April 1845

My Dear Irving.

Captain Cunynghame2 of the English army who was aide-de-camp to Lord Saltoun3 in China, is leaving this place for a short trip to Spain; and I cannot forbear giving him this note to you. You will like him very much, I am sure; and it will be a happiness to me to see some one who has been in recent communication with you – as I hope he will have been, when he and I meet in England next Midsummer.

I wish I could hope to meet you there, or anywhere, my dear Irving, were it only for as short a time as would suffice for the dispatch of such another Mint Julep as we disposed of at Baltimore.4 But I don’t despair of seeing your face, and shaking your hand again, one of these days in some remote place or other.

Mrs. Dickens sends you her love, and hopes you have not forgotten her. I hope you have not forgotten Clarke’s5 twin-brother either.

Ever Faithfully Yours,

CHARLES DICKENS

His Excellency

Washington Irving

1. Washington Irving (1783-1859), American author and diplomat. His Sketch-Book provided an important model for CD’s Sketches by Boz. CD met him on his American tour in 1842, during which Irving supported CD’s call for an international copyright agreement for authors.
2. Thus in MS. Sir Arthur Augustus Thurlow Cunyngham (1812-84), who held the rank of Captain in the Buffs (3rd [East Kent] Regiment of Foot) in 1845; afterwards General. He had evidently met CD in Genoa; see Pilgrim Letters 4, p. 360n (To Cunyngham, 21 August 1845).
3. Alexander Fraser, 17th Lord Saltoun (1785-1853), Scottish peer who fought in the Napoleonic wars and the first Anglo-Chinese War.
4. Footnote to Pilgrim Letters 3, p. 70 observes that CD’s first words on meeting Irving were: ‘What will you drink, a mint juleep [sic] or a gin cocktail?’ and that, having said goodbye to CD in Washington, followed him to Baltimore for a further farewell.
5. CD’s mis-spelling of Lewis Gaylord Clark, editor of The Knickerbocker, with whom CD and Irving dined together (Pilgrim Letters 3, p. 79n). He was twin brother of Willis Gaylord Clark (1808–41), poet and editor.