We have been looking and waiting for your being well enough to propose yourself for a mouthful of fresh air. Are you well enough to come on Sunday? We shall be coming down from Charing Cross on Sunday morning, and I shall be going up again at nine on Monday morning. It amuses me to find that you don't see your way with a certain "Mutual Friend" of ours. I have a horrible suspicion that you may begin to be fearfully knowing at somewhere about No. 12 or 13. But you shan't if I can help it. Your note delighted me because it dwelt upon the places in the number that _I_ dwell on. Not that that is anything new in your case, but it is always new to me in the pleasure I derive from it, which is truly inexpressible. Ever cordially yours. [Sidenote: Mrs. Procter.] GAD'S HILL PLACE, HIGHAM BY ROCHESTER, KENT, _Wednesday, Feb. 15th, 1865._ MY DEAR MRS. PROCTER, Of course I will do it, and of course I will do it for the love of you and Procter. You can give me my brief, and we can speak about its details. Once again, of course I will do it, and with all my heart. I have registered a vow (in which there is not the least merit, for I couldn't help it) that when I am, as I am now, very hard at work upon a book, I never will dine out more than one day in a week. Why didn't you ask me for the Wednesday, before I stood engaged to Lady Molesworth for the Tuesday? It is so delightful to me to sit by your side anywhere and be brightened up, that I lay a handsome sacrifice upon the altar of "Our Mutual Friend" in writing this note, very much against my will. But for as many years as can be made consistent with my present juvenility, I always have given my work the first place in my life, and what can I do now at 35!--or at least at the two figures, never mind their order. I send my love to Procter, hoping you may appropriate a little of it by the way. Affectionately yours. [Sidenote: Mr. W. C. Macready.] OFFICE OF "ALL THE YEAR ROUND," _Wednesday, March 1st, 1865._ MY DEAREST MACREADY, I have been laid up here with a frost-bitten foot (from hard walking in the snow), or you would have heard from me sooner. My reply to Professor Agassiz is short, but conclusive. Daily seeing improper uses made of confidential letters in the addressing of them to a public audience that have no business with them, I made not long ago a great fire in my field at Gad's Hill, and burnt every letter I possessed. And now I always destroy every letter I receive not on absolute business, and my mind is so far at ease. Poor dear Felton's letters went up into the air with the rest, or his highly distinguished representative should have had them most willingly.