152 A Century of Family Letters CHAP, xn 



all are beloved, but I have a great pleasure in giving and 

 receiving the endearing terms from you. I have great- 

 hopes that this will be one of my golden years, who knows, 

 perhaps your dear face may shine upon me ? I do not see 

 why I may not see you at Chene. I like to think it probable, 

 and the little improvements we are making give me so much 

 the more pleasure because I think it possible you may look 

 in upon them. For my own part I feel vexed to have lost 

 so entirely all taste for travelling. A journey weighs upon 

 my mind as a penance more than a pleasure, and though I 

 remain alone, I am glad not to have to go to Paris with 

 Sismondi this April ; thus pleasures drop from us like leaves, 

 one by one, till we arrive to feeling that repose is the greatest 

 of all pleasures. Poor Emma [Allen] is confined with broken 

 chilblains. It is not for want of fires that she has them, for 

 I endeavour to keep up a continual blaze, and our winter 

 rooms are very warm. What could John mean by keeping 

 himself and his friends without fire such an October as we 

 have had ? How I detest the economy of the rich, always 

 falling meanly on the necessaries of life. You shall want 

 bread and fire in a house where you may be gorged with 

 dainties. I remember feeling hungry all through the day 

 at Dunster Castle till 6 o'clock, when a glutton's dinner was 

 put before one of two dozen dishes. . . . 



I saw a letter the other day from Mr Mallet to Mrs Marcet, 

 which said Mackintosh's history was in great forwardness, 

 that he had this winter read parts of the first volume to 

 Lord Holland, who liked it very much, and it would be 

 published in the spring. How much I wish the news were 

 true. 



My Thursday evenings are in great repute, so that I even 

 receive solicitations of admittance, but this more embarrasses 

 than pleases me, because it is ill-natured, pedantic, and a 

 thousand evil things to refuse, yet their convenience and 

 agreeableness is completely destroyed by admitting num- 

 bers. It is a great fashion and a great pride to admit as 

 many men as possible in the soirees and I am the only one 

 who exclude or rather limit them, and it is one of the great 



