re out of print before the Dublin booksellers shall have
heard of them. Now here is really a very long letter, and what is more,
written with a pen of my own mending--more consolatory to me than to you.
Mr. Macnish's inscription {65} for Milton is--

His lofty spirit was the home
Of inspirations high,
A mighty temple whose great dome
Was hidden in the sky.

Who Mr. Macnish is, I don't know. Didn't he write some Essays on
Drunkenness once? or on Dreams?

Farewell for the present, my dear Sir. We shall soon shake hands again.
Ever yours,

E. FITZGERALD.

_To John Allen_.

BOULGE, WOODBRIDGE,
[4 _April_, 1840]

MY DEAR ALLEN,

. . . The country is now showing symptoms of greenness and warmth.
Yesterday I walked (not a common thing for me) eleven miles; partly over
a heath, covered with furze bushes just come out into bloom, whose odour
the fresh wind blew into my face. Such a day it was, only not so warm as
when you and I used to sit on those rocks overlooking the sea at Tenby,
just eight years ago. I am afraid you are growing too good a Christian
for me, Master Allen, if you know what I mean by that. Don't be alarmed
however. I have just read the first number of Dickens' new work {66a}:
it does not promise much, I think.

Love to all Coram Street. {66b}

_To Frederic Tennyson_.

THE CORPORATE TOWN OF BEDFORD,
_June_ 7, 1840.

DEAR FREDERIC,

Your letter dated from the Eternal City on the 15th of May reached me
here two days ago. Perhaps you have by this time left Naples to which
you bid me direct: or will have left it by the time my letter gets there.
. . . Our letters are dated from two very different kinds of places: but
perhaps equally well suited to the genius of the two men. For I am
becoming more hebete every hour: and have not even the ambition to go up
to London all this spring to see the Exhibitions, etc. I live in general
quietly at my brother-in-law's in Norfolk {67} and I look with tolerable
composure on vegetating there for some time to come, and in due time
handing out my eldest nieces to waltz, etc., at the County Balls. People
affect to talk of this kind of life as very beautiful and philosophical:
but I don't: men ought to have an ambition to stir, and travel, and fill
their heads and senses: but so it is. Enough of what is now generally
called the subjective style of writing. This word has made considerable
progress in England during the year you have