Charles Allen? Pray write, and let me hear of this from yourself. Another thing also: are you to become our Rector in Sussex? This is another of Lusia's scandals. I rather hope it is true: but not quite. Lusia is pretty well: better, I think, than when she first came down from London. . . . She makes herself tolerably happy down here: and wishes to exert herself: which is the highest wish a FitzGerald can form. I go on as usual, and in a way that needs no explanation to you: reading a little, drawing a little, playing a little, smoking a little, etc. I have got hold of Herodotus now: the most interesting of all Historians. But I find the disadvantage of being so ill-grounded and bad a scholar: I can get at the broad sense: but all the delicacies (in which so much of the beauty and character of an author lie) escape me sadly. The more I read, the more I feel this. But what does it all signify? Time goes on, and we get older; and whether my idleness comprehends the distinctions of the 1st and 2nd Aorist will not be noted much in the Book of Life, either on this or the other side of the leaf. Here is a letter written on this Sunday Night, July 12, 1840. And it shall go to-morrow. My kind remembrances to Mrs. Allen: and (I beg you to transmit them) to all my fore-known friends at Freestone. And believe me yours now as I have been and hope to be ever affectionately, E. FITZGERALD. I shall be here till the end of the month. N.B. I am growing bald. BOULGE, _July_ 25/40. MY DEAR FELLOW, Many thanks for your kind long letter. It brought me back to the green before the house at Freestone, and the old schoolroom in it. I have always felt within myself that if ever I did go again to Freestone, I should puzzle myself and every one else by bringing back old associations among existing things: I should have felt awkward. The place remains quite whole in my mind: Anne Allen's damask cheek forming part of the colouring therein. I remember a little well somewhere in the woods about a mile from the house: and those faint reports of explosions from towards Milford, etc., which we used to hear when we all walked out together. You are to thank Mary Allen for her kind wishes: and tell her she need not doubt that I wish her all good things. I enclose you as you see a little drawing of a Suffolk farm house close here: copied from a sketch of poor Mr. Nursey. If you think it worth giving to Mary Allen, do: it seems, and perhaps is, very namby-pamby to send this: but she and I used to talk of drawings together: and this will let her know that I go on just the same as I did eight years ago. N.B. It is not intended as a nuptial present.