Brief description
Letter from Charles Dickens to Thomas Beard, 14 February 1844
Label
In this letter, Dickens writes to one of his oldest and closest friends, Thomas Beard. Beard has evidently asked Dickens to introduce another man, Mr McCabe, to his publishers Chapman & Hall. William Bernard McCabe was an Irish author who worked with Beard at the newspaper The Morning Herald. All three men had worked at another newspaper, The Morning Chronicle in their youths, although Dickens here confesses he does not remember McCabe very well. Dickens is reluctant to make the introduction as he had fallen out with his publishers. He would leave them later that year and join with other publishers, Bradbury & Evans.
Collection
Archives & Manuscripts
Object number
A46
Object type
letter
Production person
Dickens, Charles
Production date
14/02/1844
Inscription content
Thomas Beard Esquire | Morning Herald Office | Shoe Lane | Fleet Street.
Devonshire Terrace | Fourteenth February 1844.
My Dear Beard
I need not tell you how truly glad I am at any time to comply with any wish of yours. And although that disposition cannot be strengthened by any circumstance, I should be really glad to oblige Mr. McCabe in so small a matter; for I entertain (I think I do, at least?) a very pleasant recollection of him as an especially cheerful and good natured old colleague. But I am in this difficulty--that I have recently stood in relations towards Chapman and Hall, which are not perfectly agreeable, and which have limited our correspondence to affairs of business. I have had no distinct quarrel with them; but this vague kind of barrier has arisen between us; and I do not entertain the least desire to throw it down.
To the best of my recollection it is more than a year since I introduced anybody to them. And my doing so now, would consequently seem an unusual proceeding--rather out of my way, and against my ordinary course.
I leave it to you to tell Mr. Mc Cabe as little or as much of this, as you think proper; merely bearing in mind that I mention the plain Truth in confidence, because I do not wish him to suppose that I evade or slight his wish.
I have every reason to believe--I may add--that they are surrounded by translators. There is the whole Corps of the Foreign Quarterly; and there are other linguists who do not write in it, to my personal knowledge.
My Dear Beard | Always Faithfully Yours
CHARLES DICKENS
Thomas Beard Esquire

Letter from Charles Dickens to Thomas Beard, 14 February 1844