nd me down the first convenient precipice, only to avoid
carrying me to the next.

I spent Thursday evening with Mrs. Jameson; she had a whole heap of
people at her house, and among them the American minister and his
niece--Philadelphians....

I do not pity Mrs. Jameson very much in her relations with Lady Byron. I
never thought theirs a real attachment, but a connection made up of all
sorts of motives, which was sure not to hold water long, and never to
hold it after it had once begun to leak. It was an instance of one of
those relationships which are made to _wear out_, and as it always
appeared so to me, I have no great sympathy with either party in this
foreseen result.

I pity Mrs. Jameson more because she is mortified than because she is
grieved, and I pity Lady Byron because she is more afraid of mortifying
than of giving her pain. It is all very _uncomfortable_; but real sorrow
has as little to do with it now as real love ever had.... I am writing
to you at Mr. Scott's, where I arrived yesterday afternoon, the
beginning of my letter having been written in London, the middle at
Bradford, and the end here.

It is Sunday afternoon: our morning service is over. I am sorry to say I
find both Mr. and Mrs. Scott quite unwell, the former with one of those
constitutional headaches from which he has suffered so much for many
years. They incapacitate him for conversation or any mental exertion,
and I am a great loser by it, as well as grieved for his illness....
Farewell.

Ever as ever yours,
FANNY.

[Lucy Austin, the clever and handsome daughter of a cleverer and
handsomer mother--Mrs. John Austin, wife of the eminent lawyer and
writer--excited a great deal of admiration, as the wife of Sir
Alexander Duff Gordon, in the London society of my day. Loss of
health compelled her to pass the last years of her life in the East;
and the letters she wrote during her sojourn there are not only full
of charm and interest, but bear witness to a widespread personal
influence over the native population among whom she lived, the
result of her humane benevolence towards, and kindly sympathy for,
them.

One or two amusing incidents occurred with regard to my reading of
the "Midsummer Night's Dream" at Manchester. The gentleman who had
the management of the performance wrote to me offe