g so ill-grounded and bad a scholar: I
can get at the broad sense: but all the delicacies (in which so much of
the beauty and character of an author lie) escape me sadly. The more I
read, the more I feel this. But what does it all signify? Time goes on,
and we get older; and whether my idleness comprehends the distinctions of
the 1st and 2nd Aorist will not be noted much in the Book of Life, either
on this or the other side of the leaf. Here is a letter written on this
Sunday Night, July 12, 1840. And it shall go to-morrow. My kind
remembrances to Mrs. Allen: and (I beg you to transmit them) to all my
fore-known friends at Freestone. And believe me yours now as I have been
and hope to be ever affectionately,

E. FITZGERALD.

I shall be here till the end of the month.

N.B. I am growing bald.

BOULGE, _July_ 25/40.

MY DEAR FELLOW,

Many thanks for your kind long letter. It brought me back to the green
before the house at Freestone, and the old schoolroom in it. I have
always felt within myself that if ever I did go again to Freestone, I
should puzzle myself and every one else by bringing back old associations
among existing things: I should have felt awkward. The place remains
quite whole in my mind: Anne Allen's damask cheek forming part of the
colouring therein. I remember a little well somewhere in the woods about
a mile from the house: and those faint reports of explosions from towards
Milford, etc., which we used to hear when we all walked out together. You
are to thank Mary Allen for her kind wishes: and tell her she need not
doubt that I wish her all good things. I enclose you as you see a little
drawing of a Suffolk farm house close here: copied from a sketch of poor
Mr. Nursey. If you think it worth giving to Mary Allen, do: it seems,
and perhaps is, very namby-pamby to send this: but she and I used to talk
of drawings together: and this will let her know that I go on just the
same as I did eight years ago. N.B. It is not intended as a nuptial
present.

Now, you need not answer this letter: as you have done remarkably well
already. I am living (did I tell you this before?) at a little cottage
close by the lawn gates, where I have my books, a barrel of beer which I
tap myself (can you tap a barrel of beer?), and an old woman to do for
me. I have also just concocted two gallons of Tar water under the
directions of Bishop Berkeley: it is to be bottled off this very day
after a careful s