P.S. My housekeeper’s got the “tissick,” and gone away, and Lizzie Is at home for the vacation, with flounce and trimmings busy; The snow lies white about us, the birds again are dumb,-- The lying blue-frocked rascals who told us Spring had come; But in the woods of Folly-Mill the sweet May-flowers are making All ready for the moment of Nature’s glad awaking. Come when they come; their welcome share:--except when at the city, For months I’ve scarce seen womankind, save when, in sheerest pity, Gail Hamilton came up, beside my lonely hearth to sit, And make the Winter evening glad with wisdom and with wit And fancy, feeling but the spur and not the curbing bit, Lending a womanly charm to what before was bachelor rudeness;-- The Lord reward her for an act of disinterested goodness! And now, with love to Mrs. F., and Mrs. S. (God bless her!), And hoping that my foolish rhyme may not prove a transgressor, And wishing for your sake and mine, it wiser were and wittier, I leave it, and subscribe myself, your old friend, JOHN G. WHITTIER. TO MRS. J. T. FIELDS. BEVERLY, June 21, 1866. DEAR ANNIE,--Here I am once more by the salt sea, and out of the beautiful retreat of the Shakers, where we said “Good-by.” “Aunt Mary” told me I might come again, and if it were not for the vision of that great dining-room, and the “two settings” of brethren and sisters, and the general wash-basin, I should almost be tempted to go also, and steep myself in that great quietness: only one would need a book now and then, and literature seems to be tabooed among them. Mr. Whittier was much interested to hear of our adventures. I think I must have been eloquent about cider, for he said, “I wish I had some of it this minute,” so earnestly that I wished I had my hand upon that invisible Shaker barrel.... TO MRS. CELIA THAXTER. BEVERLY, July 16, 1867. MY DEAR FRIEND,--To think that yesterday I was among the Enchanted Isles, and to-day here, with only the warm murmur of the west wind among the elms! The glory of the day and the far eastern sea lingers with me yet. How I do thank you for those three bright days! The undercurrent of memory would have been too much but for your kindness.