I felt that you would be deeply disappointed. I thought it better not to make the first sign while you were depressed, but my mind has been constantly with you. And not mine alone. You cannot think with what affection and sympathy you have been made the subject of our family dinner talk at Gad's Hill these last three days. Nothing could exceed the interest of my daughters and my sister-in-law, or the earnestness of their feeling about it. I have been really touched by its warm and genuine expression. Cheer up, my dear fellow; cheer up, for God's sake. That is, for the sake of all that is good in you and around you. Ever your affectionate Friend. [Sidenote: Mr. W. C. Macready.] GAD'S HILL, _Monday, Oct. 18th, 1869._ MY DEAREST MACREADY, I duly received your letter nearly a fortnight ago, with the greatest interest and pleasure. Above all things I am delighted with the prospect of seeing you here next summer; a prospect which has been received with nine times nine and one more by the whole house. You will hardly know the place again, it is so changed. You are not expected to admire, but there _is_ a conservatory building at this moment--be still, my soul! This leaves me in the preliminary agonies of a new book, which I hope to begin publishing (in twelve numbers, not twenty) next March. The coming readings being all in London, and being, after the first fortnight, only once a week, will divert my attention very little, I hope. Harry has just gone up to Cambridge again, and I hope will get a fellowship in good time. Wills is much gratified by your remembrance, and sends you his warm regard. He wishes me to represent that he is very little to be pitied. That he suffers no pain, scarcely inconvenience, even, so long as he is idle. That he likes idleness exceedingly. He has bought a country place by Welwyn in Hertfordshire, near Lytton's, and takes possession presently. My boy Sydney is now a second lieutenant, the youngest in the Service, I believe. He has the highest testimonials as an officer. You may be quite sure there will be no international racing in American waters. Oxford knows better, or I am mistaken. The Harvard crew were a very good set of fellows, and very modest. Ryland of Birmingham doesn't look a day older, and was full of interest in you, and asked me to remind you of him. By-the-bye, at Elkington's I saw a pair of immense tea-urns from a railway station (Stafford), sent there to be repaired. They were honeycombed within in all directions, and had been supplying the passengers, under the active agency of hot water, with decomposed lead, copper, and a few other deadly poisons, for heaven knows how many years! I must leave off in a hurry to catch the post, after a hard day's work. Ever, my dearest Macready, Your most affectionate and attached. FOOTNOTES: