it difficult to bear up
against that and the permanent causes of depression I always have to
struggle against. The air here is undoubtedly freer and purer, but even
here we do not escape from that deadly hot wind, that blast, that I
should think came straight from hell, it is so laden with despair.

I liked those pretty lasses, the Ladies T----, very much. All young
people interest me, and must be wonderfully displeasing if they do not
please me. I met them frequently, but they were naturally full of gayety
and life and spirits, which I naturally was not. The little society I
went into in Rome oppressed me dreadfully with its ponderous vapidity,
and beyond exchanging a few words with these bonnie girls, and admiring
their sweet pleasant faces, I had nothing to do with them. There was
much talk about the chances of a marriage between Lord W---- and Lady
M----, but though her father left no stone unturned to accomplish this
great blessing for his pretty daughter, the matter seemed extremely
doubtful when the season ended and they all went off to Naples.

As for Mrs. H----, if she had chronicled me, I am afraid it would
scarcely have been with good words. I met her at a party at Mrs.
Bunsen's (whose husband is the son of Arnold's friend).... The young
lady impressed me as one of that numerous class of persons who like to
look at a man or woman whose name, for any reason, has been in the
public mouth, and probably her curiosity was abundantly satisfied by my
being brought up and shown to her. She made no particular impression
upon me, but I have no doubt that in sorrow, or joy, or any real genuine
condition, instead of what is called society, she might perhaps have
interested me. It takes uncommon powers of fascination, or what is even
rarer, perfect simplicity, to attract attention or arouse sympathy in
the dead atmosphere of modern civilized social intercourse. All is so
drearily dry, smooth, narrow, and commonplace that the great deeps of
life below this stupid stagnant surface are never seen, heard, or
thought of.

If your nieces' constancy in following the round of monotonously
recurring amusements of a Dublin season amazes me, they would certainly
think it much more amazing to pass one's time as I do, wandering about
the country alone, dipping one's head and hands into every wayside
fountain one comes to, and sitting down by it only to get up again and
wander on to the next spring of living water. The symbol is com