LETTER?!. 233 



fore friends ; now, I hope, likely to be still more em- 

 phatically so. But I must not anticipate. 



I left Nottingham without seeing my brother Neville, 

 who arrived there two days after me. This is a cir- 

 cumstance which I must regret ; but I hope he will come 

 this way, when he goes, according to his intention, to a 

 watering place. Neville has been a good brother to 

 me, and there are not many things which would give me 

 mere pleasure than, after so long a separation, to see 

 him again. 1 dare not hope that I shall meet you and 

 him together, in October, at Nottingham. 



My days flow on here in an even tenor. They are, 

 indeed, studious days, for my studies seem to multiply 

 on my hands, and I am so much occupied by them that 

 I am becoming a mere book worm running over the ruies 

 of Greek versification in my walks, instead of expatiat- 

 ing on the beauties of the surrounding scenery. Win- 

 teringham is, indeed, now a delightful place ; the trees 

 are in full verdure, the crops are bronzing the fields, 

 and my former walks are become dry under foot, which 

 I have never known them to be before. The opening 

 vista, from our churchyard, over the Humber, to the 

 hills and receding vales of Yorkshire, assumes a thousand 

 new aspects. I sometimes watch it at evening, when the 

 sun is just gilding the summits of the hills, and the low- 

 lands are beginning to take a browner hue. The showers 

 partially falling in the distance, while all is serene above 

 me ; the swelling sail rapidly falling down the river ; 

 and, not least of all, the villages, woods, and villas on 

 the opposite bank, sometimes render this scene quite en- 

 chanting to me ; and it is no contemptible relaxation, 

 after a man has been puzzling his brains over the in- 

 tricacies of Greek choruses all the day, to come out and 

 unbend his mind with careless thought, and negligent 

 fancies, while he refreshes his body with the fresh air 

 of the country. 



I wish you to have a taste of these pleasures with me ; 

 and if ever I should live to be blessed with a quiet par- 

 sonage, and that great object of my ambition, a garden, 

 T have no doubt but we shall be, for some short intervals 



