heart,
Or bid it, shuddering, recoil at crime;
The fond illusions of the youth and maid,
At which so many world-formed sages sneer,
When by thy altar-lighted torch displayed,
Our natural religion must appear.
All things in thee tend to one polar star,
Magnetic all thy influences are!'

'Some murmur at the "want of system" in Richter's writings.

'A labyrinth! a flowery wilderness!
Some in thy "slip-boxes" and "honey-moons"
Complain of--_want of order_, I confess,
But not of _system_ in its highest sense.
Who asks a guiding clue through this wide mind,
In love of Nature such will surely find.
In tropic climes, live like the tropic bird,
Whene'er a spice-fraught grove may tempt thy stay;
Nor be by cares of colder climes disturbed--
No frost the summer's bloom shall drive away;
Nature's wide temple and the azure dome
Have plan enough, for the free spirit's home!'

'Your Schiller has already given me great pleasure. I have
been reading the "Revolt in the Netherlands" with intense
interest, and have reflected much upon it. The volumes are
numbered in my little book-case, and as the eye runs over
them, I thank the friendly heart that put all this genius and
passion within my power.

'I am glad, too, that you thought of lending me "Bigelow's
Elements." I have studied the Architecture attentively, till
I feel quite mistress of it all. But I want more engravings,
Vitruvius, Magna Graecia, the Ionian Antiquities, &c.
Meanwhile, I have got out all our tours in Italy. Forsyth,
a book I always loved much, I have re-read with increased
pleasure, by this new light. Goethe, too, studied architecture
while in Italy; so his books are full of interesting
information; and Madame De Stael, though not deep, is
tasteful.'

* * * * *

'American History! Seriously, my mind is regenerating as to
my country, for I am beginning to appreciate the United States
and its great men. The violent antipathies,--the result of an
exaggerated love for, shall I call it by so big a name as
the "poetry of being?"--and the natural distrust arising from
being forced to hear the conversation of half-bred men, all
whose petty feelings were roused to awkward life by the paltry
game of local politics