IS,
_Sunday Night, Dec. 27th, 1846._

MY VERY DEAR FORSTER,

Amen, amen. Many merry Christmases, many happy new years, unbroken
friendship, great accumulation of cheerful recollections, affection on
earth, and heaven at last, for all of us.

I enclose you a letter from Jeffrey, which you may like to read. _Bring
it to me back when you come over._ I have told him all he wants to
know. Is it not a strange example of the hazards of writing in numbers
that a man like him should form his notion of Dombey and Miss Tox on
three months' knowledge? I have asked him the same question, and advised
him to keep his eye on both of them as time rolls on.

We had a cold journey here from Boulogne, but the roads were not very
bad. The malle poste, however, now takes the trains at Amiens. We missed
it by ten minutes, and had to wait three hours--from twelve o'clock
until three, in which interval I drank brandy and water, and slept like
a top. It is delightful travelling for its speed, that malle poste, and
really for its comfort too. But on this occasion it was not remarkable
for the last-named quality. The director of the post at Boulogne told me
a lamentable story of his son at Paris being ill, and implored me to
bring him on. The brave doubted the representations altogether, but I
couldn't find it in my heart to say no; so we brought the director,
bodkinwise, and being a large man, in a great number of greatcoats, he
crushed us dismally until we got to the railroad. For two passengers
(and it never carries more) it is capital. For three, excruciating.

Write to ---- what you have said to me. You need write no more. He is
full of vicious fancies and wrong suspicions, even of Hardwick, and I
would rather he heard it from you than from me, whom he is not likely to
love much in his heart. I doubt it may be but a rusty instrument for
want of use, the ----ish heart.

My most important present news is that I am going to take a jorum of hot
rum and egg in bed immediately, and to cover myself up with all the
blankets in the house. Love from all. I have a sensation in my head, as
if it were "on edge." It is still very cold here, but the snow had
disappeared on my return, both here and on the road, except within ten
miles or so of Boulogne.

Ever affectionately.

FOOTNOTE:

[6] "The Battle of Life."

1847.

NARRATIVE.

At the beginning