What I am now meditating from under it is to spare time to do well and leisurely the Indian article (my favourite subject) for your next number.

Besides, I shall not reckon myself less a founder from its having been only the fault of my previous engagements that my first article for you appears only in the second number, and not in the first part of your work." Another contributor whom Mr.Murray was desirous to secure was Mrs.
Inchbald, authoress of the "Simple Story." The application was made to her through one of Murray's intimate friends, Mr.Hoppner, the artist.
Her answer was as follows: _Mrs.Inchbald to Mr.Hoppner_._December_ 31, 1808.
My dear Sir, As I wholly rely upon your judgment for the excellency of the design in question, I wish you to be better acquainted with my abilities as a reviewer before I suffer my curiosity to be further gratified in respect to the plan of the work you have undertaken, or the names of those persons who, with yourself, have done me the very great honour to require my assistance.

Before I see you, then, and possess myself of your further confidence, it is proper that I should acquaint you that there is only one department of a Review for which I am in the least qualified, and that one combines plays and novels.

Yet the very few novels I have read, of later publications, incapacitates me again for detecting plagiary, or for making such comparisons as proper criticism may demand.

You will, perhaps, be surprised when I tell you that I am not only wholly unacquainted with the book you have mentioned to me, but that I never heard of it before.