Voila assez sur ce sujet la. I think that you will one day give us an account of your Spanish Consulship, as Hawthorne did of his English: a noble Book which I have just been reading over again. His 'Our old Home' is out of print here; and I have asked Mr. Norton to send me any handy Edition of it, as also of the Italian Journal, my Copies having been lent out past recovery. I am going to begin again with his Scarlet Letter and Seven Gables; which (oddly to myself) I did not take to. And yet I think they are not out of my line, or reach, I ought to say. We have had such a long, and mortal Winter as never do I remember in my seventy years, which struck 70 on March 31 last. I have just lost a Brother--75. Proximus ardet, etc. But I escaped through all these seven months Winter, till a week or ten days ago, when a South Wind and Sunshine came for a Day, and one expatiated abroad, and then down comes a North Easter, etc. I was like the Soldier in Crabbe's Old Bachelor (now with you), who compares himself to the Soldier stricken by a random Shot, when resting on his Arms, etc. {267} So Cold, Cough, Bronchitis, etc. And To-day Sunshine again, and Ruisenor (do you know him?) in my Shrubs only just be-greening, and I am a Butterfly again. I have heard nothing of Carlyles, Tennysons, etc., save that the latter had written some Ballad about Lucknow. I shall be glad to hear a word of yourself, Calderon, and Don Quixote, the latter of whom [Greek text] from my Bookshelf. Yes, yes, I am soon coming. WOODBRIDGE. _June_ 13/79. MY DEAR SIR, I had just written a Letter to Tennyson, a thing I had not done these two years, when one was brought to me with what I thought his Subscription, which I have not seen for twice two years, I suppose. Well, but the Letter was from you. I ought not to write again so quick: but you know I never exact a Reply: especially as you never will answer what I ask you, which I rather admire too. To be sure you have so much filled your Letter with my Crabbe that you have told me nothing of yourself, Calderon, and Cervantes, both of whom, I suppose, are fermenting, and maturing, in your head. Cowell says he will come to this coast this Summer with Don Quixote that we may read him together: so, if you should come, you will find yourself at home. I have said all I can say about your taking any such trouble as coming down here only to shake hands with me, as you talk of. I never make any sort of 'hospitality' to the few who ever do come this way, but just put a fowl in the Pot (as Don Quixote's _ama_ might do), and hire a Shandrydan for a Drive, or a Boat on the river, and 'There you are,' as one of Dickens' pleasant young fellows says. But I never can ask any one to come, and out of his way, to see me, a very ancient, and solitary, Bird indeed. But you know all about it. 'Parlons d'autres choses,' as Sevigne says.