trary standard, wholesome for our mental condition? I believe not; for I have never known one who adopted it fully, who had not, at times, a most uneasy consciousness that no one could possibly be entirely secure from its stings. "Then there is a restless emulation, felt in a greater or less degree by all who have thrown themselves on the arena of fashionable life, which is, in my sober view, the enemy of repose. I am not now attempting to assign a cause for that particular fit of the blues which gave such a dark colouring to the beginning of your letter. I am only like the physician who recalls to his patient's mind the atmospheric influences that may have had an unfavourable effect upon his symptoms. You will conclude I must be determined to retort upon you in some degree the scorn which you cannot help feeling for the stupidity of a country life, by taking the first opportunity to hint that there are some evils from which the dweller in the wilds is exempt. "On the other hand, I admit that, in solitude, we are apt to become mere theorists, or dreamers if you will. Ideal excellence is very cheap; theory and sentiment may be wrought up to great accuracy and perfection; and it is an easy error to content ourselves with these, without seeking to ascertain whether we are capable of the action and sacrifice which must prove that we are in earnest. You are right, certainly, in thinking that in society we have occasion for more strenuous and energetic virtues; but yet, even here, there is no day which does not offer its opportunities for effort and self-denial, and in a very humble and unenticing form too. But we shall never settle this question, for the simple reason that virtue is at home everywhere alike; and I will spare you further lecture. "Do not give yourself the least uneasiness lest I should become a mere bookwoman. I have no idea of making myself so tiresome, as I will soon convince you when you come and shine upon our shades, or when I crawl forth timidly into your lamp-light at some future day. There is an excellent hint in a comic song I picked up somewhere (founded on fact,' I doubt not), There was ink on her thumb when I kiss'd her hand.' I would forswear the pen and all its concomitants, rather than subject myself to such an imputation. But even you allow that a lady may be literary if she can keep the fact profoundly secret; so I suppose I may occasionally venture upon the Black Sea, if I put on gloves. You remember Mr.-, who always wrote in gloves, lest he should write too fair a hand for a gentleman. We thought he need not have been particularly solicitous on that point; but I have my suspicions that he was more afraid of the pollution of a chance ink-spot upon his lily-white fingers : how he used to sit admiring them! "You say my pleasures are ideal; - my dearest dear, are your own less so? Take away from your happiness all that touches upon the imaginative, and you leave a duller round than that which you suppose to be our fate in the woods. Imagination heightens every pleasure, and we give way to its illu The sions more entirely in the country. uniformity which you represent to yourself as so tiresome is conducive to equanimity, which certainly is one of the materials of happiness. If calmness of mind preserve beauty, you will find me anything but faded as you prophesy. Take care of late hours, and wasp-like waists, and artificial modes of life in all respects! If I find your bloom decayed prematurely, I shall have a powerful argument against you. "I do own to a feeling of envy at your description of Madame 's concert. The lack of fine music is a real evil, and an irremediable one here. It is one of the pleasures which is to be sought far from home. But I hear a concert every morning from my favourite seat on the other side of the hill, when I look down upon a circular hollow, so shut in by hills on every side, and so shaded by great oaks, that it seems always twilight there, except at noon. I do not speak now of the concert of innumerable birds, which you would, I know, condemn as commonplace. This is so universal at this season, that one almost forgets its sweetness. But in addition to this endless variety of soaring trebles, I hear, from my rustic throne, a bass of such peculiar character and force, that I doubt whether anything but a trombone could match it for depth, while it would require a dozen other instruments to imitate its other characteristics. It proceeds from the centre of the hollow, where the brilliant green and rich luxuriance of the long grass betrays the presence of water, though it is only here and there that a small glassy streak throws back the sunbeams. This cool retreat seems to be the home of all the frogs that were banished from Ireland, and they have at times the air of berating the cruel expatriation in no measured terms. The prevailing tone is the rich bass I have mentioned; another resembles the creaking of a grindstone, and still others the ceaseless rattling of cog-wheels in a cotton-factory; the water vibrating all the while, I suppose by the action of indefatigable throats. At times it is so like a scolding-match, that I cannot forbear laughing aloud, solitary as I am; |