own
personal interests, whether sad or gay; and as in their most prosperous
and happy hours they would have sympathy to spare to the sufferings of
others, so the sickness and sorrow of these members of their family
circle, and the consequent depression they all labor under (for where
was a family more united?), does not prevent our enjoying every day
delightful seasons of intercourse with them....

Pray write me whatever you hear about my people. Lady Dacre wrote me a
kind and very interesting account of my sister the other day. Poor
thing! her ordeal is now drawing near, if anybody's ordeal can properly
be said to be "drawing near," except before they are born; for surely
from beginning to end life is nothing but one long ordeal.

I am glad you like Lady M----; she is a person whom I regard very
dearly. It is many years since I first became acquainted with her, and
the renewal of our early intimacy took place under circumstances of
peculiar interest. Is not her face handsome; and her manner and
deportment fine?... I must stop. I see my young ladies coming home from
their afternoon drive, and am going with them to spend the hours between
this and bed-time at Mrs. Charles Sedgwick's. Pray continue to write to
me, and

Believe me ever yours very truly,
F. A. B.

Begun at LENOX, ended at PHILADELPHIA,
Sunday, October 29th, 1838.
DEAREST HARRIET,

... Since the receipt of your last letter, one from Emily has reached
me, bringing me the intelligence of my mother's death!... There is
something so deplorable in perceiving (what one only fully perceives as
they are ceasing forever) all the blessed uses of which these mysterious
human relations are capable, all their preciousness, all their
sweetness, all their holiness, alas! alas!...

Cecilia and Mr. Combe arrived in this country by the _Great Western_
about a fortnight ago. On their road from New York to Boston they passed
a night within six miles of Lenox, and neither came to see nor sent me
word that they were so near, which was being rather more phrenological
and philosophically phlegmatical than I should have expected of them.
For my heart had warmed to Cecilia in this pilgrimage of hers to a
foreign land, where I alone was of kin to her; and I felt as if I both
knew and loved her more than I rea