ment, which, I think, as he says, "is
pretty well for an old man in his seventy-seventh year."

I am wonderfully well--having no pain of back, or limb, or head. I am
careful of my living and exercise; but during the last three years I
have worked fifteen hours each day. I have every possible facility of
books, retirement, and an amanuensis; and am doing what I would have to
do under less favourable circumstances on my return to Canada. It is
singular that your History and other books are almost the only ones
which have been furnished to the British Museum, and are found on its
catalogue. I have read every word of your essay on a Central University
and think it admirable, exhibiting much research, acute observation, and
profound thought.

_December 14th._--My present purpose is to finish and publish my purely
Canadian History of the United Empire Loyalists as soon as possible, and
leave the other to my executors--yourself and others--to do as you
please. I am assured that my two volumes on the Puritans in Old and New
England will raise a storm on both sides of the Atlantic. I wish to
have nothing more to do with controversy, and I do not wish to die in a
storm. I am now popular with all parties. I am sure I am right and just
on the character and relation of the Puritans and their opponents; but I
am strongly inclined to believe what I have written in regard to them
(for I am done with them) will perhaps take better if left as a legacy,
than if now put forth by myself. My reputation, and the pleasure to my
country, will chiefly depend upon my United Empire Canadian History, and
to that my all of strength and time is now directed until I finish it.

_December 26th._--I heard Dean Stanley preach in Westminster Abbey, on
Christmas Day. His sermon was able and eloquent, but disappointed me by
the absence of all mention of the guilt and depravity of man, and the
"good tidings," including an atonement for the pardon of guilt, and the
power of the Holy Spirit to regenerate and sanctify. He is a very
amiable man, and looks at the good side of everything. He enumerated ten
blessings brought to man by the Incarnation of Christ, as distinguished
from all the advantages of science and philosophy; but I felt, if I had
not received through Christ the two blessings he omitted to mention, I
should never have received the blessings, to which I owe my all, of
renewal, pardon, strength and comfort and hope, in the religion of our
Lord Jes