How I do wish for you this summer. My little place is so green, my flowers so sweet, my strawberries so delicious--the garden produces six quarts or more a day. The cow gives delicious cream. I even make a sort of cream cheese which is not by any means to be despised. Do you eat _ricotta_ nowadays? Chev gave me a little French dessert set yesterday, which made my table look so pretty. White with very rich blue and gold. Oh, but it was bunkum! Dear old Wevie, you must give me one summer, and then I will give you a winter--isn't that fair? Chev promises to take me abroad in five years, if we should sell Green Peace well. They talk of moving the Institution, in which case I should have to leave my pretty Green Peace in two years more, but I should be sad to leave it, for it is very lovely. I don't know any news at all to communicate. The President[31] has just made a visit here; he was coolly but civilly received. His whole course has been very unpopular in Massachusetts, and nobody wanted to see the man who had brought this cursed Mexican War upon us. He was received by the Mayor with a brief but polite address, lodgings were provided for him, and a dinner given him by the city. But there was no crowd to welcome him, no shouts, no waving of handkerchiefs. The people quietly looked at him and said, "This is our chief magistrate, is it? Well, he is _très peu de chose_." I of course did not trouble myself to go and see him.... I send you an extract from a daily paper. Can you tell me who is the authoress? It has been much admired. Uncle John was very much tickled to see _somebody_ in print. Try it again, Blue Jacket. [31] James K. Polk. * * * * * The wayward moods shown in these letters sometimes found other expression. In those days her wit was wayward too: its arrows were always winged, and sometimes over-sharp. In later life, when Boston and everything connected with it was unspeakably dear to her, she would not recall the day when, passing on Charles Street the Charitable Eye and Ear Infirmary, she read the name aloud and exclaimed, "Oh! I did not know there was a charitable eye or ear in Boston!" Or that other day, when having dined with the Ticknors, a family of monumental dignity, she said to a friend afterward, "Oh! I am so cold! I have been dining with the _Tête Noir_, the _Mer(e) de Glace_, and the _Jungfrau_!" It may have been in these days that an incident occurred which she thus describes in "A Plea for Humour": "I once wrote to an intimate friend a very high-flown and ridiculous letter of reproof for her frivolity. I presently heard of her as ill in bed, in consequence of my unkindness. I immediately wrote, 'Did not you see that the whole thing was intended to be a burlesque?' After a while she wrote back, 'I am just beginning to see the fun of it, but the next time you intend to make a joke, pray give me a fortnight's notice.' It was now my turn to take to my bed."