The Charles Dickens Letters Project

To MR LLOYD,1 [?4 DECEMBER 1839]

Text from Heritage Auctions online catalogue, Oct 2017.
Date: handwriting confirms late 1839. Presumably refers to the Shakespeare Club dinner of 7 Dec; previous Wednesday was 4 Dec.

Doughty Street
Wednesday afternoon

Sir

    I am exceedingly sorry to tell you that all my ladies’ tickets for the dinner2 have been long disposed of, and that I have been obliged to refuse very many friends as I refuse you — not from want of inclination to comply with their request (for I should have been most happy to oblige you in so small a matter, if I could) but from sheer inability.

    I am Very truly Yours

        CHARLES DICKENS

____3 Lloyd Esquire.

• 1. Unidentified.
• 2. The final dinner of the Shakespeare Club, on 7 Dec, at the Piazza Coffee House in Covent Garden; CD chaired the proceedings.
• 3. CD did not know Lloyd’s first name.