ant I can
almost feel myself becoming an ecstatical hermit, and my soul
getting ready to

'smooth itself out a long cramped scroll.
Freshening and fluttering in the wind.'

What a solid satisfaction it is to have a few days free from
railroad travel! I have made a roundabout journey, coming
here by way of Dresden, Leipsic, Cologne, Bonn, Frankfort,
Heidelberg, Strasburg, Freiburg, Basel, and Zurich. It was
all pleasant, but I am glad it is over. Please never
advertise the Halden as a health-resort; let it remain a
complete secret between us two, so that when we wish to leave
everything and hermitize we may have the opportunity. If it
were not for betraying this secret, I should like to
recommend the castle for its generosity. At breakfast I have
put beside my plate a five-pound loaf of bread, one slice of
which is fifteen inches long by six wide, and thick _ad
libitum_ dimensions, the delicacy of which even a Prussian
soldier would call into question.

"I haven't attempted to tell you what I think of your Halden.
It is impossible. I simply give myself over to a few days of
happiness and rest; all too soon I shall have to face the
busy world again.

"Most gratefully yours,

"MORRIS DAVIDSON.

"P.S.--I have not yet seen the ghost-lady. I thought I heard
her footstep last night in the hall and a rustling at my
door. I opened it, half expecting to find a rose upon the
threshold. I found nothing, saw nothing."

The letter was dated March 13th, and contained a pressed hepatica. Some
two months later another letter came. It said:

"I am still here. My Italian journey melted into a Swiss
sojourn. If I stay much longer I shall not dare to go away, I
feel so safe under the care of these wonderful mountains.
What words has one to describe them, with their fulness of
content, of majesty and mystery? I go daily up the time-worn
steps behind the castle, throw myself on the grass, count the
poplar-trees rising from the plain below, try to make out
where earth ends and heaven begins as the white May clouds
meet the snow-drifts on the mountain-tops. I am working a
little again, but tramping a good deal more. I have not been
so happy since I was a boy. In a certain sense I have died
here, unaided by