Letter – John Somers to Thomas Wentworth Beaumont – 2 Nov 1838

To Thomas Wentworth Beaumont Esq.					Long’s Hotel, Nov 2, 1838



Sir,

	I have just been informed by Mr. Dillon Browne, who communicated with you on my part, that you have refused to retract expression used in a letter to Mr. White, and reflecting upon me, and declared that I am unworthy of having further intercourse held with me. I therefore intend to seek a personal interview with you, when I may have an opportunity of convincing you that you were in error; but before I do so, I think it just to remind you of certain facts connected with your own life, which may lead you to a rational re-consideration of the decision you have to respecting me, and guide you in an estimation of your own position, both as to your assumption of superiority over others, and as to the safety of your trifling any farther with your reputation.

	When first I had the honour of your acquaintance, you had withdrawn your name from Brooke’s Club, and had withdrawn from you the acquaintance of your nearest friends. Under those circumstances you had sought my assistance, that satisfaction which you deny to me having been refused to you by Earl Grey and Mr. Swinburne, for reasons not depending, as your’s are, upon a full determination of public opinion! This allusion puts you in possession of yourself without entering into further details, which I shall be willing to submit to you whenever your memory or honour require it; and I shall only ask in conclusion, is it reconcileable to those feelings over which time can have no control in the breast of any man of honour, your having sought at one period as an humble ally a man who you refuse to recognise at another as an honourable opponent? Does that timidity which induced you to seek the friendship of a stranger – because you knew him to be a man of firmness – now deter you knowing him still to be the same, from encountering his hostility?

	I have the honour to be your very obedient servant

		J.P.Somers