Letter Proposing the Decoration of the Attic Chest
Madam,
It has been a subject of no small surprise to me, that in a society replete with talents of the highest order in affairs of taste, the receptacle devoted for compositions that reflect so much credit on their authors, should have been originally made, and so long suffered to remain in a form, so uncouth, and unclassic, as that which has been dignified by a Greek name.
Surely a Praxiteles, a Michel-Angelo, or a Vitruvius, might have exerted their energies to have designed something more graceful than a clumsy square box, and I cannot for a moment imagine that they consider the subject as unworthy their attention.
We see every day, noble monuments of their individual merit arising, and shall the genius of the Attic Chest be neglected!!!
I have the happiness occasional of attending your Society, and always fancy I hear complaints issuing from the unfortunate inhabitant being thus immured in a place so little corresponding with her innate elegance of sentiment.
I leave it to you, to decide on the course to be adopted, and shall feel highly gratified if I succeed in rousing the dormant talents of the members, at the same time assuring you of every assistance in my power to render the Attic Chest as conspicuous for external embellishment, as it now is for internal merit, and which will prove the best commemoration of the day on which I have the satisfaction of addressing you.
With every felicitous wish for your present and future welfare, believe me to remain
your obedient servant,
Alpha