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James Henry Leigh Hunt (1784-1859) was a writer and editor, but is perhaps now best remembered as a friend of the circle of Romantic Poets, including Shelley and Keats. The University of Iowa Libraries holds a comprehensive gathering of books and manuscripts by and about Hunt: the Brewer-Leigh Hunt Collection. The collection is nearly complete in first and subsequent editions of books by Hunt. There are also presentation copies, association copies, periodicals edited by Hunt, as well as his contributions to journals, writings of Hunt's friends, and other volumes, plus manuscripts and letters by, or associated with, Hunt. The core of the collection was purchased from the estate of Luther Brewer, a Cedar Rapids publisher, in 1934. A number of articles about Hunt and the collection appeared in Books at Iowa, 1964-1996.

This recently acquired one-page letter, with a clipping pasted to the lower left corner, has Hunt writing to an unidentified gentleman, sending payment, and asking that further business be transacted "in town": "One should keep the country, as much as possible, for one's enjoyment."

The letter was acquired through the Desmond and Mary Bruce Leigh-Hunt Fund created by a 1997 bequest from the estate of Desmond Leigh-Hunt, a descendent of James Henry Leigh Hunt.