ake
you a bouquet of myrtle every day. Sooner than the time I mention the
country will not be in complete beauty.

And I will tell you what you shall find at your first entrance.
Imprimis, as soon as you have entered the vestibule, if you cast a
look on either side of you, you shall see on the right hand a box of
my making. It is the box in which have been lodged all my hares, and
in which lodges Puss at present; but he, poor fellow, is worn out with
age, and promises to die before you can see him. On the right
hand stands a cupboard, the work of the same author; it was once a
dove-cage, but I transformed it. Opposite to you stands a table,
which I also made; but a merciless servant having scrubbed it until it
became paralytic, it serves no purpose now but of ornament; and all
my clean shoes stand under it. On the left hand, at the farther end
of this superb vestibule, you will find the door of the parlour,
into which I will conduct you, and where I will introduce you to Mrs.
Unwin, unless we should meet her before, and where we will be as happy
as the day is long. Order yourself, my Cousin, to the Swan at Newport,
and there you shall find me ready to conduct you to Olney.

My dear, I have told Homer what you say about casks and urns, and have
asked him whether he is sure that it is a cask in which Jupiter keeps
his wine. He swears that it is a cask, and that it will never be
anything better than a cask to eternity. So if the god is content with
it, we must even wonder at his taste, and be so too.

Adieu! my dearest, dearest Cousin.

TO THE SAME

_Commissions and thanks_

The Lodge, 24 _Dec_. 1786.

You must by no means, my dearest Coz, pursue the plan that has
suggested itself to you on the supposed loss of your letter. In
the first place I choose that my Sundays, like the Sundays of other
people, shall be distinguished by something that shall make me look
forward to them with agreeable expectation, and for that reason desire
that they may always bring me a letter from you. In the next place,
if I know when to _expect_ a letter, I know likewise when to _inquire
after_ a letter, if it happens not to come; a circumstance of some
importance, considering how excessively careless they are at the Swan,
where letters are sometimes overlooked, and do not arrive at their
destination, if no inquiry be made, till some days have passed since
their arrival at Olney. It has happened frequently to me to receive
a lett