em_ to another, It is better, perhaps, to keep a stricter
_identity_, by calling only our thoughts our own.

Was there anybody in the world who ever loved London for itself? Did
Dr. Johnson, in his paradise of Fleet Street, love the pavement and
the walls? I doubt _that_--whether I ought to do so or not--though I
don't doubt at all that one may be contented and happy here, and love
much _in_ the place. But the place and the privileges of it don't mix
together in one's love, as is done among the hills and by the seaside.

I or Henrietta must have told you that one of my privileges has been
to see Wordsworth twice. He was very kind to me, and let me hear
his conversation. I went with him and Miss Mitford to Chiswick, and
thought all the way that I must certainly be dreaming. I saw her
almost every day of her week's visit to London (this was all long ago,
while you were in France); and she, who overflows with warm affections
and generous benevolences, showed me every present and absent
kindness, professing to love me, and asking me to write to her. Her
novel is to be published soon after Christmas, and I believe a new
tragedy is to appear about the same time, 'under the protection of Mr.
Forrest.' Papa has given me the first two volumes of Wordsworth's new
edition. The engraving in the first is his _own face_. You might think
me affected if I told you all I felt in seeing the living face.
His manners are very simple, and his conversation not at all
_prominent_--if you quite understand what I mean by _that_. I do
myself, for I saw at the same time Landor--the brilliant Landor!--and
_felt_ the difference between great genius and eminent talent; All
these visions have passed now. I hear and see nothing, except my doves
and the fireplace, and am doing little else than [_words torn out_]
write all day long. And then people ask me what I _mean_ in [_words
torn out_]. I hope you were among the six who understood or half
understood my 'Poet's Vow'--that is, if you read it at all. Uncle
Hedley made a long pause at the first part. But I have been reading,
too, Sheridan Knowles's play of the 'Wreckers.' It is full of passion
and pathos, and made me shed a great many tears. How do you get on
with the reading society? Do you see much or anything of Lady Margaret
Cocks, from whom I never hear now? I promised to let her have 'Ion,'
if I could, before she left Brighton, but the person to whom it was
lent did not return it to me in time.