I suppose it must seem strange to you that I should like writing letters: and indeed I don't know that I do like it in general. However, here I see no companions, so I am pleased to talk to my old friend John Allen: which indeed keeps alive my humanity very much. . . . I have been about to divers Bookshops and have bought several books--a Bacon's Essays, Evelyn's Sylva, Browne's Religio Medici, Hazlitt's Poets, etc. The latter I bought to add to my Paradise, which however has stood still of late. I mean to write out Carew's verses in this letter for you, and your Paradise. As to the Religio, I have read it again: and keep my opinion of it: except admiring the eloquence, and beauty of the notions, more. But the arguments are not more convincing. Nevertheless, it is a very fine piece of English: which is, I believe, all that you contend for. Hazlitt's Poets is the best selection I have ever seen. I have read some Chaucer too, which I like. In short I have been reading a good deal since I have been here: but not much in the way of knowledge. . . . As I lay in bed this morning, half dozing, I walked in imagination all the way from Tenby to Freestone by the road I know so well: by the water-mill, by Gumfreston, Ivy tower, and through the gates, and the long road that leads to Carew. Now for the poet Carew: 1. Ask me no more where Jove bestows, When June is past, the fading rose: For in your beauty's orient deep, The flowers, as in their causes, sleep. 2. Ask me no more whither do stray The golden atoms of the day: For in pure love did Heav'n prepare Those powders to enrich your hair. 3. Ask me no more whither doth haste The nightingale when June is past: For in your sweet dividing throat She winters, and keeps warm her note. 4. Ask me no more where those stars light That downward fall at dead of night: For in your eyes they sit, and there Fixed become, as in their sphere. 5. Ask me no more if east or west The phoenix builds her spicy nest: For unto you at last she flies, And in your fragrant bosom dies. These lines are exaggerated, as all in Charles's time, but very beautiful. . . . Yours most affectionately, E. LONDON, _Nov_. [27, 1832.] MY DEAR ALLEN,