d of the Perrys.
'She is almost as much followed in the gardens as the Princess,' she
says, pouring out her wonders, her pleasures, her raptures. She begins
to read Burns with youthful delight, dilates upon his exhaustless
imagination, his versatility, and then she suggests a very just
criticism. 'Does it not appear' she says, 'that versatility is the true
and rare characteristic of that rare thing called genius--versatility
and playfulness;' then she goes on to speak of two highly-reputed novels
just come out and ascribed to Lady Morley, 'Pride and Prejudice' and
'Sense and Sensibility.'

She is still writing from Bertram House, but her pleasant gossip
continually alternates with more urgent and less agreeable letters
addressed to her father. Lawyers' clerks are again calling with notices
and warnings, tax-gatherers are troubling. Dr. Mitford has, as usual,
left no address, so that she can only write to the 'Star Office,'
and trust to chance. 'Mamma joins in tenderest love,' so the letters
invariably conclude.

Notwithstanding the adoration bestowed by the ladies of the family and
their endearing adjectives, Mr. Harness is very outspoken on the
subject of the handsome Doctor! He disliked his manners, his morals,
his self-sufficiency, his loud talk. 'The old brute never informed his
friends of anything; all they knew of him or his affairs, or whatever
false or true he intended them to believe, came out carelessly in his
loose, disjointed talk.'

In 1814 Miss Mitford is living on still with her parents at Bertram
House, but a change has come over their home; the servants are gone,
the gravel turned to moss, the turf into pasture, the shrubberies to
thickets, the house a sort of new 'ruin half inhabited, and a Chancery
suit is hanging over their heads.' Meantime some news comes to cheer
her from America. Two editions of her poems have been printed and sold.
'Narrative Poems on the Female Character' proved a real success. 'All
who have hearts to feel and understandings to discriminate, must wish
you health and leisure to complete your plan,' so write publishers in
those golden days, with complimentary copies of the work....

Great things are happening all this time; battles are being fought and
won, Napoleon is on his way to St. Helena; London is in a frenzy of
rejoicings, entertainings, illuminations. To Mary Mitford the appearance
of 'Waverley' seems as great an event as the return of the Bourbons;
she is certain th