Dolby and Osgood, who do the most ridiculous things to keep me in spirits (I am often very heavy, and rarely sleep much), have decided to have a walking-match at Boston, on Saturday, February 29th. Beginning this design in joke, they have become tremendously in earnest, and Dolby has actually sent home (much to his opponent's terror) for a pair of seamless socks to walk in. Our men are hugely excited on the subject, and continually make bets on "the men." Fields and I are to walk out six miles, and "the men" are to turn and walk round us. Neither of them has the least idea what twelve miles at a pace is. Being requested by both to give them "a breather" yesterday, I gave them a stiff one of five miles over a bad road in the snow, half the distance uphill. I took them at a pace of four miles and a half an hour, and you never beheld such objects as they were when we got back; both smoking like factories, and both obliged to change everything before they could come to dinner. They have the absurdest ideas of what are tests of walking power, and continually get up in the maddest manner and see _how high they can kick_ the wall! The wainscot here, in one place, is scored all over with their pencil-marks. To see them doing this--Dolby, a big man, and Osgood, a very little one, is ridiculous beyond description. PHILADELPHIA, _Same Night._ We came on here through a snowstorm all the way, but up to time. Fanny Kemble (who begins to read shortly) is coming to "Marigold" and "Trial" to-morrow night. I have written her a note, telling her that if it will at all assist _her_ movements to know _mine_, my list is at her service. Probably I shall see her to-morrow. Tell Mamie (to whom I will write next), with my love, that I found her letter of the 10th of this month awaiting me here. The _Siberia_ that brought it is a new Cunarder, and made an unusually slow passage out. Probably because it would be dangerous to work new machinery too fast on the Atlantic. _Thursday, 30th._ My cold still sticks to me. The heat of the railway cars and their unventilated condition invariably brings it back when I think it going. This morning my head is as stuffed and heavy as ever! A superb sledge and four horses have been offered me for a ride, but I am afraid to take it, lest I should make the "true American catarrh" worse, and should get hoarse. So I am going to give Osgood another "breather" on foot instead.