Will _you_ not write again? 'Write _to_ thee, or _for_ the public', wilt thou not ask? _To_ me and _for_ as many as love and can discern the union of strength and simplicity, purity and good sense. _Our_ feeling and _our_ hearts is the language you can adopt. Alas, _I_ cannot with propriety use it--_our_ I too could once say; but I am alone now; and since my removing into a busy town among the multitude, the loneliness is but more apparent and more melancholy. But this is only at certain times; and then I have, though at considerable distances, six female friends, unknown to each other, but all dear, very dear, to me. With men I do not much associate; not as deserting, and much less disliking, the male part of society, but as being unfit for it; not hardy nor grave, not knowing enough, nor sufficiently acquainted with the every-day concerns of men. But my beloved creatures have minds with which I can better assimilate ... Think of you I must; and of me, I must entreat that you would not be unmindful. [Footnote 1: Cp. letter, p. 283.] TO THE SAME _Comparisons_ Trowbridge, 7 _Sept._ 1818. A description of your village society would be very gratifying to me--how the manners differ from those in larger societies, or in those under different circumstances. I have observed an extraordinary difference in village manners in England, especially between those places otherwise nearly alike, when there was and when there was not a leading man, or a squire's family, or a manufactory near, or a populous, vitiated town, all these, and many other circumstances have great influence. _Your_ quiet village, with such influencing minds, I am disposed to think highly of. No one, perhaps, very rich--none miserably poor. No girls, from six years to sixteen, sent to a factory, where men, women, and children of all ages are continually with them breathing contagion. Not all, however: we are not so evil--there is a resisting power, and it is strong; but the thing itself, the congregation of so many minds, and the intercourse it occasions, will have its powerful and visible effect. But these you have not; yet, as you mention your schools of both kinds, you must be more populous and perhaps not so happy as I was giving myself to believe....