‘Windsor: May 1, 1765. ‘Dear Sir,—Your last kind pacquet was conveyed to me here by our much esteemed friend Mrs. Allen, whom I hope to see at Bath in about twelve days. I am now to thank you for entertaining me with so much and so good matter relating to Harrows, and look upon your improvement to be a most sensible and most ingenious one at the same time. This is the happy perfection in writing which Horace mentions: ‘Omne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile dulci. ‘In the same manner I have also read with delight and improvement your remarks upon broad-wheeled waggons, in the Museum for last March: but why, my good friend, do you bury such dissertations as yours in blue-paper Periodical Essays? Or why rather do you not throw them together in one book, or large pamphlet? I return you my best thanks for your Technical Terms of Art in the Suffolk Husbandry, and the provincial words, which latter, one time or other, shall be considered by me in a more extensive and critical view respecting the English language in general. Many of these provincial words[35] are the truly classical words of our nation. Some of them are elegant and musical, and most of them in general express the sense in their sound. In one word, from a thorough knowledge of the provincial words of our language, one might venture to explain Shakespear, B. Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, &c., better and safer than all his editors and conjectural critics. If you have a friend tolerably skilled in husbandry, who lives in any part of England except the southern and western, be so obliging to me as to solicit his assistance, and convey the list of words to me; for by what I have before suggested, you see I have views that extend beyond husbandry. ‘When you go to London, will you not be tempted to make a flying excursion to Bath? ’Tis a digression, but it can hardly be called an episode. If I have any skill, or knowledge of the world, Mrs. Allen’s conversation alone will indemnify you for your trouble, and that most amply. He also who subscribes his name to this letter has a private ambition to be better known to you than upon paper. ‘I am, dear Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant, ‘W. HARTE.‘ ‘Kintbury, Berks: May 7, 1765. ‘Dear Sir,—If gratitude did not operate strongly upon me (and that towards a friend whom I never saw but hope to see, know, and cultivate his friendship) I should not trouble you with another letter so quick upon the heels of my last from Windsor; but finding by chance here, in a lone village, the Museum Rusticum, I see you have done justice to the Essays on Husbandry. I wish they had half the merit which your partiality to the author fancies they have.