From their agreeable excursion to Shrewsbury, my dearest friends are by this time returned to their thrice-beloved Lichfield. Once again have they beheld those fortunate _spires_, the constant witnesses of all their pains and pleasures. I can well conceive the emotions of joy which their first appearance, from the neighboring hills, excites after absence; they seem to welcome you home, and invite you to reiterate those hours of happiness, of which they are a species of monument. I shall have an eternal love and reverence for them. Never shall I forget the joy that danced in Honora's eyes, when she first showed them to me from Needwood Forest on our return with you from Buxton to Lichfield. I remember she called them the _Ladies of the Valley_--their lightness and elegance deserve the title. Oh, how I loved them from that instant! My enthusiasm concerning them is carried farther even than yours and Honora's, for every object that has a pyramidal form recalls them to my recollection, with a sensation that brings the tear of pleasure into my eyes. How happy must you have been at Shrewsbury! only that you tell me, alas! that dear Honora was not so well as you wished during your stay there. I always hope the best. My impatient spirit rejects every obtruding idea which I have not fortitude to support. Dr. Darwin's skill and your tender care will remove that sad pain in her side, which makes writing troublesome and injurious to her; which robs her poor _cher Jean_[86] of those precious pages with which, he flatters himself, she would otherwise have indulged him. So your happiness at Shrewsbury scorned to be indebted to public amusements. Five virgins, united in the soft bonds of friendship! how I should have liked to have made the sixth! But you surprise me by such an absolute exclusion of the beaux. I certainly thought that when five wise virgins were watching at midnight, it must have been in expectation of the bridegroom's coming. _We_ are at this instant five virgins, writing round the same table--my three sisters, Mr. Ewer, and myself. I beg no reflections injurious to the honor of poor _cher Jean_. My mother is gone to pay a visit, and has left us in possession of the old coach; but as for nags, we can boast only of two long-tails, and my sisters say they are sorry cattle, being no other than my friend Ewer and myself, who, to say the truth, have enormous pig-tails. My dear Boissier is come to town; he has brought a little of the soldier with him, but he is the same honest, warm, intelligent friend I always found him. He sacrifices the town diversions, since I will not partake of them. We are jealous of your correspondents, who are so numerous. Yet, write to the Andrés often, my dear Julia, for who are they that will value your letters quite so much as we value them?