inestimable_,
and should be gratefully rendered thanks for. There is something
charming and _pathetic_ in the _profusion_ with which the young love; it
is touching, as one of the magnificent superabundances, one of the
generous extravagances, of their prodigal time of life. But the love of
the old is as precious as the beggared widow's mite; and in bestowing it
they know what they give, from a store that day by day diminishes. The
affections of the young are as sudden and soft, as bright and bounteous,
as copious and capricious as the showers of spring; the love of the old
is the one drop in the cruse, which outlasts the journey through the
desert.

You may perhaps see in the papers a statement of the disastrous winding
up of the season at Covent Garden, or rather its still more disastrous
abrupt termination. After our all protesting and remonstrating with all
our might against my father's again being involved in that
Heaven-forsaken concern, and receiving the most positive and solemn
assurances from those who advised him into it for the sake of having his
name at the head of it that _no_ responsibility or liability whatever
should rest upon or be incurred by him; and that if the thing did not
turn out prosperously, it should be put an end to, and the theatre
immediately closed;--they have gone on, in spite of night after night of
receipts below the expenses, and now are obliged suddenly to shut up
shop, my poor father being, as it turns out, personally involved for a
considerable sum.

This, as you will well believe, is no medicine for his malady. I spend
every evening with him, and generally see him in the morning besides.
These last few days he suffers less acute pain, but complains more of
debility, and hardly leaves his sofa, where he lies silent, with his
eyes closed, apparently absorbed in painful sensations and reflections.
Yet, though he neither speaks to nor looks at me, he likes to have me
there; and, as Horace Twiss said, "to hear the scissors fall" now and
then, by way of companionship; and certainly derives some comfort from
the mere consciousness of my presence.

My sister has gone to Brighton for a few days, her health having quite
given way, what with hard work and harder worry. She returns on Monday,
but it is extremely doubtful whether she will resume her performances at
all, so that I fear the expectations of the clan Cavendish will be
disappointed.

She did act most charmingly in the "Matrimoni