SOLON ROBINSON, 1851 489 



with study or work, I write poetry. It is my play, almost 

 my only amusement. Sometimes I address my lines to 

 some Julia or Jessie or Mary, and sometimes to some ideal 

 personage that never existed except in the creation of my 

 muse. It is not likely I shall ever suffer any serious 

 inconvenience from falling in love with the substance or 

 shadow of either. I sent a paper from Charleston con- 

 taining some poetry of a diferent order — an address from 

 the South to the North. I hope you will get & read & 

 approve it. 



I am very sorry to hear of your cousin's sickness. She 

 is fully sensible I hope, not only by what I have said but 

 written to her that I remember her most affectionately. 

 How I wish I was under the same roof to day, that you 

 might vie with each other in seeing which should love me 

 most sweetly. 



You can have no idea how much I pine after the warm 

 affection so congenial to my nature, that I never meet 

 with away from home. There is a sweet girl in the house 

 where I am spending the day, but what is her sweetness 

 to me since I cannot taste it? My life that I am leading 

 is not certainly such an one as I would choose, but what 

 else can I do? I have no idea I should have been alive 

 now if I had remained at Crown Point. I doubt whether 

 I shall ever be able to spend another winter there, if I do 

 anywhere north of Charleston. 



You speak as though your mother repines at my ab- 

 sence as though it were voluntary or because it is more 

 pleasant to me thus to be separated from her and my chil- 

 dren. If she says she would like to hear me say I calcu- 

 late to stay at home in future, I should likely only gratify 

 her at the expense of a separation more final than the 

 present one. The charms of home are as strong for me 

 as any living being, but not strong enough to induce me 

 to give up the enjoyment of such health as I have been 

 favored with for two or three years, to suffer such tor- 

 ments as I did several years before I left home. 



Besides I am with people who appreciate me for the 



