“Instead of a little closet (according to the unwholesome custom of most people) I chuse this spacious room for all my small affairs, reading books or writing letters; where I am never in the least tired, by the help of stretching my legs sometimes in so large a room, and of looking into the pleasantest park in the world just underneath it. “Visits, after a certain hour, are not to be avoided; some of which I own to be a little fatiguing (tho’ thanks to the town’s laziness, they come pretty late) if the garden was not so near, as to give a seasonable refreshment between those ceremonious interruptions. And I am more sorry than my coachman himself, if I am forced to go abroad any part of the morning. For though my garden is such, as by not pretending to rarities or curiosities, has nothing in it to inveagle ones thoughts; yet by the advantage of situation and prospect, it is able to suggest the noblest that can be; in presenting at once to view a vast town, a palace, and a magnificent cathedral. I confess the last, with all its splendor, has less share in exciting my devotion, than the most common shrub in my garden; for though I am apt to be sincerely devout in any sort of religious assemblies, from the very best (that of our own church) even to those of Jews, Turks, and Indians: yet the works of nature appear to me the better sort of sermons; and every flower contains in it the most edifying rhetorick, to fill us with admiration of its omnipotent Creator. After I have dined (either agreeably with friends, or at worst with better company than your country neighbours) I drive away to a place of air and exercise; which some constitutions are in absolute need of: agitation of the body and diversion of the mind, being a composition of health above all the skill of Hippocrates. “The small distance of this place from London, is just enough for recovering my weariness, and recruiting my spirits so as to make me better than before I set out, for either business or pleasure. At the mentioning the last of these, methinks I see you smile; but I confess myself so changed (which you maliciously, I know, will call decayed) as to my former enchanting delights, that the company I commonly find at home is agreeable enough to make me conclude the evening on a delightful terrace, or in a place free from late visits except of familiar acquaintance.