Usk, 1819.

YOUR letter came to me, covered all over with post-marks and directions; but a letter gives a fillip to one's spirits, even though the news in it be six weeks old. I don't know when I shall be in London again-perhaps never. I always hated leaving any place with a consciousness that I must, at a given time, come back again. Thank Heaven, there is now no living creature to whom my moments are of much consequence! East, west, north, or south-to death, or to present enjoyment-I am free to take my course. I may push right on without injuring any one to the very extremity of this world; and there are almost as few whom it would concern materially, if I were to drop over into the next.

I am here will you understand why?-hiding my light under a bushel. A simple, unpretending, well-dressed, captain of cavalry, with half-pay, and two horses, and one servant for all. I have my gun, and my flute, and my fishing-rod; and (to play with) my German pipe; and poor Venus, who makes love to all the women, and so introduces her master.-Poor Venus! A dog is a being that there is no safe providing for. I hope she'll die before me-for I can't make her a ward of Chancery; and, though there is no cruelty in extinguishing life, I should not like the kindness of having her killed.

Straying, for the last month, through Oxfordshire, and Herefordshire, and Somersetshire-revisiting localities in leisure and independence, which I had beheld under circumstances of danger or privation. In some places I sought for objects that had ceased to exist. I walked (as I thought) towards a particular house in Oxford; and the very street had disappeared. Where the views still remained, my new medium did not help the prospect. Eight years has made a change in the remains of Ludlow Castle, or in the remains of Charles Edwards. I rode past the gate of Leamington barracks.-Do you recollect anything, Fletcher, here?-I saw the old stables, in which I had fagged over a splashed troop horse for many a weary hour. And the "post,” VOL. XVI.

at the commandant's door, where I had often stood sentry, and been as hungry as a wolf. And the school, in which I had drawn tears and curses from many a raw Irish recruit, when I was a "rough-rider." I felt almost as if I had a sort of affection for the place; and yet, Heaven knows, I had little cause to have any !-But there was one house which I did not care to see, (when it came to the point,) although I thought I had come to Leamington for little other purpose!-Is it not strange, when a man feels that he cannot live either with a particular woman or without her? And yet such an infernal sensation did come over me as I approached the cottage that was Levine's, that I wheeled short up the back lane that leads to the river-how many times I had rode up it, to water, with the troop! and almost stumbled over a little creature, (a soldier's wife,) who had been kind to me when kindness was an object!-I threw some money down, and galloped off, for I thought, by her eye, that she knew me.-If she did what a tale there was, within ten minutes, through every washerwoman's in Leamington! -Do you remember when I "drew," in the open market-place, and rescued our roast meat from the militiamen!

Heighho!-Your letter came in excellent season. It is a rainy afternoon. No trout-fishing-which serves to keep me walking, at least; and the views about the deep valley of the Usk, here, are delicious.

Why, it is not so fine a stream, to be sure, as the Suir between Carrick and Clonmel; but you ought to relish liberty anywhere. And I should be the better of a companion, if he were such a one as I could converse with. I am as free as the veriest American savage! and have the advantage of civilization all round me at the same time. I live in inns, and avoid large towns; and find a welcome-and a real one-wherever I come. And I have just got the right calibre too, as regards station and equipage, about me. Sufficient to make me the equal of a Duke; and yet not enough to raise me out of the reach of a reason3 E

able being. I have been here three days. I rode away in a vile fit of spleen from Abergavenny. The place was getting what people call "full"-attorneys of fashion coming in to bathe; and citizens over from Bristol to drink butter milk. It was nine at night when I abandoned-a moonlightworth all the day! So bright that theeye travelled for miles-across-to the very horizonover river, mountain, and meadow, all clear, and cold, and in deep stillness! One cannot see in the sunshine, for the noise and business that the world seems in. This was like looking at objects in a picture. Like looking through a lens, or into a bed of deep, clear, glassy water. It reminded me of the bright nights in which I had sailed upon an Atlantic sea. When the calm was perfect-neither breath nor swell upon the water. The sails flapping gently, to and fro, against the mast. And the dolphins, in such dazzling blue, as puts even the king-fisher to shame, playing, and plunging, and chasing each other round the vessel! Each new comer to the sports detected, while still at half-mile distance--not by the fiery train which marks his progress in a gale, when your ship dashes, head on, ten knots an hour through the foam, and he curvets, and bounds, and repasses, before your prow, like a Danish harlequin dog before the state carriage of a duchessbut by his own bold graceful figure, seen to fifty fathoms depth, and shining like a huge image of silver, strangely chased and painted! It reminded me of my West India service, and of my night guards in that beautiful St Lucie; when I used to leave the segars, and the mosquitoes, and the yellow ladies, and the Sangaree, to run along in a canoe over reefs as green as a May field, all living with shells and weeds, and "parrot" fishes and "seatree," and through water so bright, as, in the moonshine, to be invisible ! Drawing six inches, where there was ten feet, you seemed to rake the bottom every moment!-I rode along living upon the view and the sensation -as slow as foot could fall. Getting, by degrees, into a delicious calmness, recollecting, and thinking, acutely, and yet not painfully. Half willing to be in kindness with myself, and almost dreaming about it with the world.-I thought of the times, and almost came back to the "good spirits," in which

you and I had ridden, (when we had only them to "feed and clothe" us,) so many night marches through the Peninsula-in front-in the rear-asideany way to escape the turmoil and uproar of the division. And my Spanish servant, enjoying the scene almost as much as I did myself. Humming "The Fight of Ronscevalles," and puffing white paper for a segar!—A man is entitled to be luxurious in the minor arrangements of life; and really, a foreign servant is one of the luxuries of domestic detail. I can talk to José, and let him talk to me, without the danger of a mistake. The rogue has a tact an intuitive perception-a mode of his own, of arriving at one's meaning. A foreigner manages to be perfectly familiar, and yet, at the same time, perfectly respectful-a point at which you Englishmen (though with more brains, perhaps) never, by any chance, arrive. Many a hen has this very José stolen for me--and cooked when he had done! And with a manner, too-an absence of grossiereté-a view of the correct mode in which the thing should be done!-Not like my great two-handed Thomas-shall you ever forget him?-that went out to steal turkeys; and that we met, in broad day, with a live one under each arm, pursued by a whole village !— But we rode along, I tell you, as gently as horse's foot could step--past farmhouses, and cottages, and apple orchards, (even the dogs all asleep!) not having the most distant determination when, or where, we should stop; and so came into Usk about one o'clock in the morning. Pavement being no part of the parish arrangements, our arrival disturbed nobody. It was as light as it could have been at noon, and yet not even a stray cat was in notion. The white muslin curtains were drawn at the low bed-chamber windows; shutters did not seem to be thought necessary anywhere ;-things looked as though you might carry off the whole village, if you were strong enough to take it up, and walk away with it. I should have ridden on to Chepstow; but-" Great events," you know!-the door of the inn stood ajar; and yet not a creature was moving near it. I dismounted; entered on tiptoe; walked through three apartments without seeing a soul; and at last found a party of a dozen—all women but three-seated, the snug

gest in the world, in a parlour behind the "bar" at supper.

And here I have been ever since, in peace, and half forgetfulness-idling, and dozing, and letting myself drop into love with the landlord's niece the most celestial—(talk of “angels!" there never was anything but woman half so handsome!)-the most exquisite girl of fifteen that you ever be held in your existence! An expression, something in the Charles-the-2d taste; but more delicious a thousand times than the handsomest of all his school! Hair, dark brown; but not black-I am tired of the teint de feu. Large, long, blue, mild, half-melancholy eyes, and eyelashes as soft as silk. Á skin-Oh! such a hand-like the flesh of the fair Flemings in Mieris the elder's pictures! And such lips, and teeth! not the dead ivory white -but almost transparent-the lips, living! And the figure-the shape even finer than the face! So full, and perfect! the bust !-carve it yourself, and there isn't a line that you would alter! The dress too!-all in the fashion-(new here)-of ten years ago. The bodice fitting square, like the Roman corslet, upon the neck and shoulder-the hair, in ringlets upon the throat-the waist, a little longthe frock-(that is, the "best," you know)-rather short upon the ankle -the whole, almost making you laugh about "Fashions for Wales" and the "print in the Lady's Magazine, for 1796;" and yet convincing you that any fashion-the ugliest-is pretty upon a pretty woman; and that the style before you is incomparably the most becoming that ever was invented!-And then, over the whole of this girl's attractions, Fletcher, there is a charm-Do you conceive?-of softness-a soothing placidness-a vo luptuous repose-that, to me, is ruin past resistance! a voice, that you know belongs to beauty, even before you see the owner of it! and not a point of angularity, or even what people call "smartness," in feature, tone, or manner. No boldness, yet no retenue -and even the bashfulness, nothing harsh, or stiff, or repelling! I left my forage-cap (at breakfast) in her mother's room this morning, and came back, for an excuse, to fetch it, about a minute after.-And, if you could have seen the smile she was just putting it on-when she looked at

herself in the glass! And the neck turned half round, to judge of it in another direction! And the smooth, round, white arms, naked almost to the shoulder-how any woman can ever wear long sleeves, unless she is hideous, I cannot conceive !-Imagine the arms making a hundred circles in order to adjust it-and then the curls to be a little parted on the foreheadand then the glance down at the feetand then the looking round, and—! kisses Venus all day; and breaks the tea-cups instead of washing them!

Oh! I can't come to town at all; and I am very well where I am at present. For I am just falling off into a most sweet and "gentlemanlike" dejection. I have not seen a coxcomb these three days, except myself (for there is not a lawyer in the place, and the apothecary keeps no

assistant;") and my long-tailed horses, and Jose's mustachoes, are the delight of all the village. And it is so agreeable to find one's self a person of importance! A guest at "The White Horse," Usk, who stays a week, and to whom ten pounds are not a consideration! who has half a dozen dishes for dinner, and dines upon the plainest-orders wine for his servants, and drinks coffee for himself-is goodtempered, sober, satisfied, and leaves everything to the decision of the landlady! why, I am being the most extravagant man in all the world; and saving three-fourths of my income all the while! Come down, my friend, come down! I am in exceeding good humour, and will let you come. will be Sunday in a day or two; and then I shall go to church, and ask the parson home to dinner. Meantime I have my half-dozen shots on the hill in a morning-(I hate shooting in a preserve-killing "ninety-five pheasants" with my own hand in the day!

It

I would as soon walk into a farmyard, and fire among the ducks and chickens)-two hours' trout-fishing towards sun-set-(they are not large, but they amuse me)-and, in the evening, my flute-and my window-and this beautiful girl to look at!

And what is it you talk of "town," that you even fancy you have to set against a life like this? Don't speak of society, pray!-of all spots on the face of the earth, St James's street, to me, is the dullest. As for books, I get them here; besides, I am sure

none of your friends ever read. Billiards you play but seldom; and chess you have not brains for. The dinners, and the wine?-why, there you have the advantage, certainly,-though not even there, be it understood, when you dine (absolute) in Bond Street. Messrs L- and S may do for those to whom it is "Life!" to be at Messrs L- or S's; but they certainly won't do for anybody who has pretensions even to a palate. And, after all (give me only a little of the French wine) and I never was so well for these seven years past, as I am now upon boiled fowl and broiled Severn salmon-and, in your whole circle take it all round-Park, and Opera, and Almack's included,-can you find anything-do you think you can?-to compare with this beautiful Eliza here?-who, with nothing ever, I'll lay my existence, beyond a country boarding-school education-swinging, or "making cheeses," in the garden, all day, and arguing about the prettiest colour for garters, with some other incipient plague of one's life, all night-has a thousand times more delicacy of perception-ten thousand times more captivatingness and natural taste-than half your women (of one class) who think only about how they shall manage to marry one, or all your women (of another class) whom I have no nerves to think of at all!

For your friend's prattle of their "fortune," with whom, and where, tell me, is the "fortune" found? Not much among the girls, you know,even as regards notice; for they fall in love with the dancing-master-or the popular preacher. Then the ladies of a certain age-take them, vice and folly and all-are caught (and again you know it) by a very different kind of people. Is not the "fortune,” in truth, found, where, in the end, most of the fortune is lost? Among ladies with thin legs, who are divine because they dance at the Academie de Musique; or others who have risen into estimation by successively disgusting some dozen different people? I do protest, I give thanks every morning when I get up, that I succeeded to an estate of five thousand a-year, instead of being born to one-so have I escaped some of the asinosities of those "strange flies" who swarm past your door every day about three o'clock! The gamblers

are perhaps the most reasonable of them; and yet what shocking dogs they are! Then the drinking men-who get up about dusk! And the "Fancy" gentlemen-who are worse to me than all! I saw a "lord" of your particular acquaintance, just before I left town, sitting in a "coffee-shop," by Covent-Garden, "talking dogs," as the French idiom would be, with the keeper of it. There was the "Turn out," standing at the door-servants in red coats and white hats.-Peer buying foundered curs, as dogs" of highest market."

Flash," and familiar.-The vulgarity of the "coaching stables," but not the wit.-Fancied he was astonishing, and condescending at the same time; and, really, viewed with almost undisguised contempt, even by the rascal who was cheating him!-Oh! that exquisite Sir Giles Overreach !-Had not the dog feeder, now, here the best of it?-And this same man shall get you up in the House of Lords, and

oppose" (if he be bit that way) "the views of the minister!"

And I detest this regardlessness to decencies and received opinions, for the sickening trick of heartlessness that it generally brings along with it. It is dangerous sometimes to get over one's prejudices; they often prevent an ill beginning. The drover who strikes at a sheep very heavily to-day, would scarcely strike very lightly at his own child, on occasion, to-morrow. The truth is, that our " ingenuous youth"-I am turning pedagogue, you will think are ill educated. We fog a boy through the classics; and then turn him out to inhabit among men. From seventeen to twenty-five we allow him for folly and extravagance; and the odds are great, but he does some act within that time, which he repents to the last hour of his life. Since the day of Chesterfield, I know of no writer on the education of MEN, who is worth a farthing. If he was a "courtly scoundrel," and I don't think he was,-why, if he was, he was only so much better than an uncourtly one. The feeling of a gentleman, next to a pure moral feeling, is the best check upon that excess which forms the atrocity of vice. Habits have changed since Chesterfield's time; and the detail of his precepts, had he lived, would have altered with them: But the principle upon which he set out was a correct one. He legislated for