of their first parts; the pieces of more serious character and higher
pretension as dramatic works were supplanted by burlesques and parodies
of themselves; the school of acting of the Kembles, Young, the Keans,
Macready, and their contemporaries, gave place to no school at all of
very clever ladies and gentlemen, who certainly had no pretension to act
tragedy or declaim blank verse, but who played low comedy better than
high, and lowest farce best of all, and who for the most part wore the
clothes of the sex to which they did not belong. Shakespeare's plays
_all_ became historical, and the profession was decidedly the worse for
the change; I am not aware, however, that the public has suffered much
by it.

GREAT RUSSELL STREET, March 5, 1831.
MY DEAREST H----,

I am extremely obliged to you for your long account of Mrs. John
Kemble, and all the details respecting her with which, as you knew
how intensely interesting they were likely to be to me, you have so
kindly filled your letter. Another time, if you can afford to give
a page or two to her interesting dog, Pincher, I shall be still
more grateful; you know it is but omitting the superfluous word or
two you squeeze in about yourself.

As for the journal I keep, it is--as what is not?--a matter of
mingled good and bad influences and results. I am so much alone
that I find this pouring out of my thoughts and feelings a certain
satisfaction; but unfortunately one's book is only a recipient, and
not a commentary, and I miss the sifting, examining, scrutinizing,
discussing intercourse that compels one to the analysis of one's
own ideas and sentiments, and makes the society of any one with
whom one communicates unreservedly so much more profitable, as well
as pleasurable, than this everlasting self-communion. I miss my
wholesome bitters, my daily dose of contradiction; and you need not
be jealous of my book, for it is a miserable _pis aller_ for our
interminable talks.

I had a visit from J---- F---- the other day, and she stayed an
hour, talking very pleasantly, and a little after your fashion; for
she propounded the influence of matter over mind and the
impossibility of preserving a sound and vigorous spirit in a weak
and suffering body. I am blessed with such robust health that my
moral shortcomings, howev