My dear Bailey--The only day I have had a chance of seeing you when you were last in London I took every advantage of--some devil led you out of the way--Now I have written to Reynolds to tell me where you will be in Cumberland--so that I cannot miss you. And when I see you, the first thing I shall do will be to read that about Milton and Ceres, and Proserpine--for though I am not going after you to John o' Grot's, it will be but poetical to say so. And here, Bailey, I will say a few words written in a sane and sober mind, a very scarce thing with me, for they may, hereafter, save you a great deal of trouble about me, which you do not deserve, and for which I ought to be bastinadoed. I carry all matters to an extreme--so that when I have any little vexation, it grows in five minutes into a theme for Sophocles. Then, and in that temper, if I write to any friend, I have so little self-possession that I give him matter for grieving at the very time perhaps when I am laughing at a Pun. Your last letter made me blush for the pain I had given you--I know my own disposition so well that I am certain of writing many times hereafter in the same strain to you--now, you know how far to believe in them. You must allow for Imagination. I know I shall not be able to help it. I am sorry you are grieved at my not continuing my visits to Little Britain--Yet I think I have as far as a Man can do who has Books to read and subjects to think upon--for that reason I have been nowhere else except to Wentworth Place so nigh at hand--moreover I have been too often in a state of health that made it prudent not to hazard the night air. Yet, further, I will confess to you that I cannot enjoy Society small or numerous--I am certain that our fair friends are glad I should come for the mere sake of my coming; but I am certain I bring with me a vexation they are better without--If I can possibly at any time feel my temper coming upon me I refrain even from a promised visit. I am certain I have not a right feeling towards women--at this moment, I am striving to be just to them, but I cannot--Is it because they fall so far beneath my boyish Imagination? When I was a schoolboy I thought a fair woman a pure Goddess; my mind was a soft nest in which some one of them slept, though she knew it not. I have no right to expect more than their reality--I thought them ethereal above men--I find them perhaps equal--great by comparison is very small. Insult may be inflicted in more ways than by word or action--One who is tender of being insulted does not like to think an insult against another. I do not like to think insults in a lady's company--I commit a crime with her which absence would not have known. Is it not extraordinary?--when among men, I have no evil thoughts, no malice, no spleen--I feel free to speak or to be silent--I can listen, and from every one I can learn--my hands are in my pockets, I am free from all suspicion and comfortable.