Oh. V.] 1828—1831. Ill 



J should havo allowed you to remain till you thought it worth 

 while to treat me like a gentleman. And now having vented 

 my spleen in scolding you, and having told you, what you must 

 know, how very much and how anxiously I want to hear how 

 you and your family are getting on at Clifton, tho purport of 

 this letter is finished. If you did but know how often I think 

 of you, and how often I regret your absence, I am suro I should 

 have heard from you long enough ago. 



I find Cambridge rather stupid, and as I know scarcely any 

 one that walks, and this joined with my lips not being quito 

 so well, has reduced me to a sort of hybernation. . . I have 



caught Mr. Harbour * letting have tho first pick of the 



beetles ; accordingly we have made our final adieus, my part 

 in the affecting scene consisted in telling him he was a d — d 

 rascal, and signifying I should kick him down the stairs if 

 ever he appeared in my rooms again. It seemed altogether 

 mightily to surprise the young gentleman. I havo no news to 

 tell you ; indeed, when a correspondence has been broken off 

 like ours has been, it is difficult to make the first start again. 

 Last night there was a terrible fire at Linton, eleven miles 

 from Cambridge. Seeing the reflection so plainly in the 

 sky, Hall, Woodyeare, Turner, and myself thought we would 

 ride and see it. We set out at half-past nine, and rode like 

 incarnate devils there, and did not return till two in the 

 morning. Altogether it was a most awful sight. I cannot 

 conclude without telling you, that of all the blackguards I ever 

 met with, you are the greatest and the best. 



In July 1829 he had written to Fox : — 



" I must read for my Little-go. Graham smiled and bowed 

 so very civilly, when he told mo that he was one of the six 

 appointed to make the examination stricter, and that they were 

 determined this would make it a very different thing from any 

 previous examination, that from all this I am sure it will bo 

 the very devil to pay amongst all idle men and entomologists." 



But things were not so bad as he feared, and in March 1830, 

 he could write to the same correspondent : — 



" I am through my Little-go ! ! ! I am too much exalted to 

 humblo myself by apologising for not having written before. 

 But I assure you before I went in, and when my nerves were 

 in a shattered and weak condition, your injured person often 

 rose before my eyes and taunted me with my idleness. But I 

 am through, through, through. I could write the whole sheet 

 full with this delightful word. I went in yesterday, and have 



* No doubt a paid collector. 



