uthor's name is Stendhal, or so he calls himself. I
think that he was either a musician or a musical critic, and that he is
dead.... My visitor has not yet arrived (6 o'clock, p.m.), frightened
no doubt by the abruptness of the two notes which I wrote in reply to
hers yesterday morning; and indeed nobody could fancy the hurry in which
one is forced to write by this walking post....

Tell my visitors of yesterday with my kind love that they did me all the
good in the world, as indeed everybody of your house does.

--Ever, dear Miss Priscilla, very affectionately yours,

M. R. MITFORD.

In the present writer's own early days, when the now owner of
Swallowfield was a very young, younger son, she used to hear him and his
sister, Mrs. Brackenbury (the Miss Priscilla of the note), speaking with
affectionate remembrance of the old friend lately gone, who had dwelt at
their very gates; through which friendly gates one is glad, indeed, to
realise what delightful companionship and loving help came to cheer the
end of that long and toilsome life; and when Messrs. Macmillan suggested
this preface the writer looked for her old autograph-book, and at its
suggestion wrote (wondering whether any links existed still) to ask for
information concerning Miss Mitford, and so it happened that she found
herself also kindly entertained at Swallowfield, and invited to visit
the scenes of which the author of 'Our Village' had written with so much
delight.

I think I should like to reverse the old proverb about letting those who
run read, my own particular fancy being for reading first and running
afterwards. There are few greater pleasures than to meet with an
Individuality, to listen to it speaking from a printed page, recounting,
suggesting, growing upon you every hour, gaining in life and presence,
and then, while still under its influence, to find oneself suddenly
transported into the very scene of that life, to stand among its
familiar impressions and experiences, realising another distinct
existence by some odd metempsychosis, and what may--or rather, what
MUST have been. It is existing a book rather than reading it when this
happens to one.

The house in Swallowfield Park is an old English country home, a
fastness still piled up against time; whose stately walls and halls
within, and beautiful century-old trees in the park without, record
great times and striking figures. The manor was a part of the dowry
of Henry the VIII.'s luckl