To MRS CHARLES DICKENS, 1 NOVEMBER 1838

MS British Museum. Address: Mrs. Charles Dickens | 48 Doughty Street | London.

Lion Hotel. Shrewsbury.³ | Thursday November 1st. 1838.

My dearest Love.

I received your welcome letter on arriving here last night, and am rejoiced to hear that the dear children are so much better. I hope that in your next or your next but one I shall learn that they are quite well. A thousand kisses to them—I wish I could convey them myself.

We found a roaring fire, an elegant dinner, a snug room, and capital beds all ready for us at Leamington after a very agreeable (but very cold) ride. We started in a postchaise next morning for Kenilworth with which we were both enraptured, and where I really think we must⁴ have lodgings next summer, please God that we are in good health and all goes well. You cannot conceive how delightful it is. To read among the ruins in fine weather would be perfect luxury. From here we went on to Warwick Castle (which is an ancient building newly restored and possessing no very great attractions beyond a fine view and some beautiful pictures) and thence to Stratford upon Avon where we sat down in the room where Shakespeare was born and left our autographs, and read those of other people, and so forth.

We remained at Stratford all night, and found to our unspeakable dismay that father's plan of proceeding by Bridgenorth was impracticable as there were no coaches. So we were compelled to come here by way of Birmingham and Wolverhampton, starting at eight o'Clock through a cold wet fog, and travelling when the day had cleared up, through miles of cinder-paths and blazing furnaces and roaring steam engines, and such a mass of dirt gloom and misery as I never before witnessed. We got pretty well accomodated here when we arrived at half past four, and are now pg 448going off in a post-chaise to Llangollen—30 miles—where we shall remain to-night, and where the Bangor Mail will take us up tomorrow. Such are our movements up to this point, and when I have received your letter at Chester I shall write to you again and tell you when I shall be back. I can say positively that I shall not exceed the fortnight, and I think it very possible that I may return a day or two before it expires.

We were at the play last night. It was a bespeak¹—The Love Chace,² a ballet (with a phenomonon!)³ divers songs, and a Roland for an Oliver.⁴ It is a good theatre, but the actors are very funny. Browne laughed with such indecent heartiness at one point of the entertainments that an old gentleman in the next box suffered the most violent indignation. The bespeak party occupied two boxes; the ladies were full dressed and the gentlemen, to a man, in white gloves with flowers [in]⁵ their button holes. It amused us mightily, and was real[ly] as like the Miss Snevellicci business as it could well be.⁶

My side has been very bad since I left home, although I have been very careful not to drink much—remaining to the full as abstemious as usual—and have not eaten any great quantity, having no appetite. I suffered such an ecstacy⁷ of pain all night at Stratford that I was half dead yesterday, and was obliged last night to take a dose of henbane.⁸ The effect was most delicious. I slept soundly and without feeling the least uneasiness, and am a great deal better this morning; neither do I find that the henbane has affected my head, which from the great effect it had upon me—exhilirating⁷ me to the most extraor[din]⁹ary degree, and yet keeping me sleepy—I feared it would. I suppose all this is the penalty for sticking so close to Oliver; whatever the cause is, the effect is a very sad one. If I had not got better I should have turned back to Birmingham, and come straight home by the railroad. As it is, I hope I shall make out the trip.

If you see Forster, my love, tell him that I am [ ]¹⁰ an end of this letter, and hope my next may be a longer and more entertaining one. God bless you my darling—I long to be back with you again, and to see the sweet Babs—Your faithful and most affectionate Husband.

Charles Dickens