PARKER HOUSE, BOSTON, _Sunday, Dec. 1st, 1867._ I received yours of the 18th November, yesterday. As I left Halifax in the _Cuba_ that very day, you probably saw us telegraphed in _The Times_ on the 19th. Dolby came back from another run to New York, this morning. The receipts are very large indeed, far exceeding our careful estimate made at Gad's. I think you had best in future (unless I give you intimation to the contrary) address your letters to me, at the Westminster Hotel, Irving Place, New York City. It is a more central position than this, and we are likely to be much more there than here. I am going to set up a brougham in New York, and keep my rooms at that hotel. The account of Matilda is a very melancholy one, and really distresses me. What she must sink into, it is sad to consider. However, there was nothing for it but to send her away, that is quite clear. They are said to be a very quiet audience here, appreciative but not demonstrative. I shall try to change their character a little. I have been going on very well. A horrible custom obtains in these parts of asking you to dinner somewhere at half-past two, and to supper somewhere else about eight. I have run this gauntlet more than once, and its effect is, that there is no day for any useful purpose, and that the length of the evening is multiplied by a hundred. Yesterday I dined with a club at half-past two, and came back here at half-past eight, with a general impression that it was at least two o'clock in the morning. Two days before I dined with Longfellow at half-past two, and came back at eight, supposing it to be midnight. To-day we have a state dinner-party in our rooms at six, Mr. and Mrs. Fields, and Mr. and Mrs. Bigelow. (He is a friend of Forster's, and was American Minister in Paris). There are no negro waiters here, all the servants are Irish--willing, but not able. The dinners and wines are very good. I keep our own rooms well ventilated by opening the windows, but no window is ever opened in the halls or passages, and they are so overheated by a great furnace, that they make me faint and sick. The air is like that of a pre-Adamite ironing-day in full blast. Your respected parent is immensely popular in Boston society, and its cordiality and unaffected heartiness are charming. I wish I could carry it with me. The leading New York papers have sent men over for to-morrow night with instructions to telegraph columns of descriptions. Great excitement and expectation everywhere. Fields says he has looked forward to it so long that he knows he will die at five minutes to eight.