"In two or three days we return to Paris, where I hope to live more at my ease, and shall pass my time with really great men; for there are such at present amongst the literati of France. Certainly there is something perverse, either in the structure of our mind, or in the incidents of life. My present situation ought naturally to appear an object of envy; for besides those circumstances of an universal good reception from all ranks of people, nothing can be more amiable than the character of the family with whom I live, and nothing can be more friendly than their behaviour to me. My fortune has already received a considerable increase by a pension procured me by Lord Hertford, and settled as they tell me for life. Mr. Bunbury has been told that he must not go to Paris, which my lord considers as a sure prelude to my being soon secretary to the embassy; an office which will expose me to little expense, and bring me a thousand a-year increase of revenue, and puts me in the road to all the great foreign employments. Yet I am sensible that I set out too late, and that I am misplaced; and I wish, twice or thrice a-day, for my easy chair and my retreat in James's Court! Never think, dear Ferguson, that as long as you are master of your own fireside and your own time, you can be unhappy, or that any other circumstance can make an addition to your enjoyment. "When I think of my own house, you may believe I often reflect on Josey, who I am afraid will be more a loser by my absence, than ever I shall be a gainer by it; I mean in point of his education. I beg of you to have some inspection over him, and as often as my sister shall send to you to ask your advice, that you will be sure to give it. I am afraid that there occurs a difficulty at present about entering him to the Greek. He is too far advanced by his learning for the class in the High School to which he is put, and yet he is too young to go to the college: for this reason I thought that he might learn something of the Greek before he finished his Latin course, as is the practice in England; and, accordingly, Murray in Musselburgh gave him some lessons in that language. I propose that he should continue on the same footing in Edinburgh; but I am at a loss how it may be done. A master to himself alone, would not give him any emulation; and were he put to any other school for this purpose, the hours would interfere with those of the High School. Be so good as speak to Mathison, and then give your opinion to my sister. "Please remember me to Mr. and Mrs. Adams.[174:1] I saw Willie a moment at Fontainbleau: he had arrived a quarter of an hour after Jemmy left it, whom I did not see. These two brothers have been hunting one another in vain through all France; but I hope they have met at last in Paris.