Dear Miss Wordsworth,--I had just written the above endearing words when
Monkhouse tapped me on the shoulder with an invitation to cold goose
pie, which I was not bird of that sort enough to decline. Mrs. Monkhouse,
I am most happy to say, is better Mary has been tormented with a
rheumatism, which is leaving her, I am suffering from the festivities of
the season. I wonder how my misused carcase holds it out. I have played
the experimental philosopher on it, that's certain. Willy shall be
welcome to a mince-pie and a bout at commerce whenever he comes. He was
in our eye. I am glad you liked my new year's speculations; everybody
likes them, except the author of the "Pleasures of Hope." Disappointment
attend him! How I like to be liked, and _what I do_ to be liked! They
flatter me in magazines, newspapers, and all the minor reviews; the
Quarterlies hold aloof. But they must come into it in time, or their
leaves be waste paper. Salute Trinity Library in my name. Two special
things are worth seeing at Cambridge,--a portrait of Cromwell at Sidney,
and a better of Dr. Harvey (who found out that blood was red) at Dr.
Davy's; you should see them. Coleridge is pretty well; I have not seen,
him, but hear often of him, from Allsop, who sends me hares and
pheasants twice a week; I can hardly take so fast as he gives. I have
almost forgotten butcher's meat as plebeian.
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