
          It is now nearly two months since I became a resident
 of Paris and as you may suppose am pretty well acquainted with
 the more striking objects and peculiar manners of this really
 wonderful city. I am living in the most [added with caret: comfortable] manner, for notwithstanding
 John Bull's boasted comforts, Paris is the place to live
 in, whether it be the mind or the body that you may wish to
 indulge. I am as nearly as possible in the center of all business
 & dissipation, though with respect to the latter I have not found
 this so dangerous a place as I expected. Perhaps this may be because
 I have something to learn yet. I have hitherto been too much
 occupied out of doors with sights & novelties, which you know
 can only be seen in Paris, to allow me to attend to study, which
 can be done nearly as well in New York. The Garden of Plants
 is nearly three miles from my Hotel, so that it is next to impossible
 to attend the lectures there regularly. I have however been there often
 to hear Thenard [Louis Jacques Th�nard] & Gay Lussac [Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac], the former of Chem'y [Chemistry] the latter on Nat. Phi'y [Natural Philosophy].
 The lectures on Nat. History are given in the spring & summer. As for
 the Garden itself, with the Museum & Library attached to it, I think
 it best not to persuade you to come & see it, for if you did, there
 would be little hopes of ever seeing you again in the Pine Barrens,
 [added with caret: provided][crossed out: if] you could become reconciled to living among the Gentiles.


 I was present some time since at a sitting of the Academy of
 Sciences. Almost all the great naturalists were there and were pointed
 out to me. You may imagine how interesting it must be to find
 yourself in the presence of so many men whom you have been
        