raphy, which has been most
pleasantly occupying all my leisure these three days; and you must
permit me to write you a word upon it, out of the fulness of the
heart, while the impulse is still fresh to thank you. This good
book, in every sense one of the best I have read this long while, has
awakened many old thoughts which never were extinct, or even properly
asleep, but which (like so much else) have had to fall silent amid the
tempests of an evil time--Heaven mend it! A word from me once more, I
know, will not be unwelcome, while the world is talking of you.

"Well, I call this an excellent good book, by far the best of the
autobiographic kind I remember to have read in the English language;
and indeed, except it be Boswell's of Johnson, I do not know where we
have such a picture drawn of a human life, as in these three volumes.

"A pious, ingenious, altogether human and worthy book; imaging, with
graceful honesty and free felicity, many interesting objects and
persons on your life-path, and imaging throughout, what is best of
all, a gifted, gentle, patient, and valiant human soul, as it buffets
its way through the billows of the time, and will not drown though
often in danger; cannot _be_ drowned, but conquers and leaves a track
of radiance behind it: that, I think, conies out more clearly to me
than in any other of your books;--and that, I can venture to assure
you, is the best of all results to realise in a book or written
record. In fact, this book has been like an exercise of devotion to
me; I have not assisted at any sermon, liturgy or litany, this long
while, that has had so religious an effect on me. Thanks in the name
of all men. And believe, along with me, that this book will be welcome
to other generations as well as to ours. And long may you live to
write more books for us; and may the evening sun be softer on you (and
on me) than the noon sometimes was!

"Adieu, dear Hunt (you must let me use this familiarity, for I am an
old fellow too now, as well as you). I have often thought of coming up
to see you once more; and perhaps I shall, one of these days
(though horribly sick and lonely, and beset with spectral lions, go
whitherward I may): but whether I do or not believe for ever in my
regard. And so, God bless you,

"Prays heartily,

"T. CARLYLE."

On the other hand Leigh Hunt had an enthusiastic reverence for
Carlyle. There are several incidental allusions to the latter, of more
or less conse