Words to that effect,
and I believe better,--but I do not quite remember them. They might be
easily ascertained by reference to Peel's Coffee-house, and the words
of the _Post_, too.
Besides the fine, my imprisonment cost me several hundred pounds (I
can't exactly say how many) in monstrous _douceurs_ to the gaoler
for _liberty to walk in the garden_, for help towards getting me
permission to fit up rooms in the sick hospital, and for fitting
up said rooms, or rather converting them from sorts of
washhouses, hitherto uninhabited and unfloored, into comfortable
apartments,--which I did too expensively,--at least as far as papering
the sitting-room with a trellis of roses went, and having my ceiling
painted to imitate an out-of-door sky. No notice, however, could
be taken, I suppose, of any of _this_ portion of the expenses,
governments having nothing to do with the secret corruptions of
gaolers or the pastorals of incarcerated poets: otherwise the
prosecutions cost me altogether a good bit beyond a thousand pounds.
But perhaps it might be mentioned that I went to prison from all but
a sick bed, having been just ordered by the physician _to go to the
seaside_, and _ride_ for the benefit of my health (pleasing dramatic
contrast to the _verdict_!). I also declined, as I told you, to try
avoiding the imprisonment by the help of Perry's offer of the famous
secret 'Book'; and I further declined (as I think I also told you)
to avail myself of an offer on the part of a royal agent (made, of
course, in the guarded, though obvious manner in which such offers are
conveyed), to drop the prosecution, provided we would agree to
drop all future hostile mention of the Regent.
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