snowstorm (of which we have had abundance) except the first ended with rain, by which means the snow was so hardened that strong gales at N.W. soon turned it and all above ground to ice, which this day seven-night was from one to three, four, and, they say, in some places five feet thick, in the streets of this town. Last Saturday morning we had a snowstorm come on, which continued till 4 o’clock, p.m., when it turned to rain, since which we have had a warm air with many showers of rain, one this morning a little before day, attended with thunder. The streets have been very wet, the water running like rivers all this week, so that I could not possibly go to school.” In spite of the weather Anna and Aunt Deming go to “meeting” with great frequency, sometimes favoured by kind neighbours like Mr. Soley and “Mr. Wales” with seats in their chaise. Anna is always supposed to write down the text and as much of the sermon as she can in her diary, and as sometimes Aunt Deming puts in her pen, the effect is slightly like that produced by the elder Mr. Weller’s letter to Sam. She likes Mr. Hunt’s sermons best, though she does not “understand all he said about the external and internal evidence” for the authenticity of the Bible. On an occasion when Mr. Hunt preached on “The Decrees of God” Anna had “set down some of his observations on a loose sheet of paper. But my Aunt says that a Miss of 12 years’ old can’t possibly do justice to the nicest subject in Divinity, and therefore had better not attempt a repetition of particulars, that she finds lie (as may be easily concluded) somewhat confused in my young mind. She also says that in her poor judgment, Mr. Hunt discoursed soundly, as well as ingeniously, upon the subject, and very much to her instruction and satisfaction.” I am sorry to have to add that Anna was a dreadfully bigoted young person, and would not keep Christmas, “as the Pope and his associates have ordained.” Moreover, she has a horror of anything savouring of “episcopacie.” She is properly contemptuous of Dr. Pemberton’s and Dr. Cooper’s “gowns.” “In the form of episcopal cassocks we hear the Docts. design to distinguish themselves from the inferior clergy by these strange habits (at a time too when the good people of New England are threatened with and dreading the coming of an episcopal bishop).” She pokes irreverent fun at the doctors’ sleeves: “I don’t know whether one sleeve would make a full-trimmed negligee as the fashion is at present, though I can’t say but it might make one of the frugal sort, with but scant trimming ... Aunt says when she saw Dr. P. roll up the pulpit stairs, the figure of Parson Trulliber recorded by Mr. Fielding occurred to her mind, and she was really sorry a congregational divine should, by any instance, give her so unpleasing an idea.”