wn Family, his
Generosity to them, and his own sturdy refusal of help from others, one
cannot doubt.

_To C. E. Norton_.

WOODBRIDGE. _Dec._ 20, [1882].

MY DEAR NORTON,

. . . You may have read somewhere of an 'Ajax' at our Cambridge over
here. Thirty years ago did I tell the Greek Professor (now Master of
Trinity), 'Have a Greek Tragedy in (what you call) your Senate-house.'
But I was not sufficiently important to stir up the 'Dons.' Cowell
invited me to see and hear 'Ajax'; but I remained here, content to snuff
at it from the Athenaeum of England, not of Attica. And on the very day
that Ajax fretted his hour on the stage, my two old Housekeepers were
celebrating their Fiftieth, or Golden, wedding over a Bottle of Port wine
in the adjoining room, though in that happier Catastrophe I did not
further join.

Now, to end with myself; I have hitherto escaped any severe assault from
my 'Bosom-Enemy,' Bronchitis, though he occasionally intimates that he is
all safe in his Closet, and will reappear with the Butterflies, I dare
say. 'Dici Beatus' let no one in this country boast till May be over.

What you put off, and what you put on,
Never change till May be gone,

says an old Suffolk Proverb concerning our Clothing. Five of my friendly
contemporaries have been struck with Paralysis during this 1882: and here
am I with only Bronchitis to complain of.

WOODBRIDGE. _March_ 7/83.

MY DEAR NORTON,

I wrote to you some little while before Christmas, praying you, among
other things, not to put yourself to the trouble of sending me your
Emerson-Carlyle Correspondence, inasmuch as I could easily get it over
here; and, by way of answer, your two Volumes reached me yesterday, safe
and sound from over the Atlantic. I had not time (a strange accident
with me) to acknowledge the receipt of them yesterday: but make all speed
to do so, with all gratitude, to-day. As you are simply the Editor of
the Book, I may tell you something of my thoughts on it by and by. I
doubt not that I shall find Emerson's Letters the more interesting,
because the newer, to me. The Portrait at the head of Vol. II. assures
me that one will find only what is good in them.

. . . I was glad to find from Mozley's Oriel Reminiscences that Newman
had been an admirer of my old Crabbe; and Mr. L. Stephen has very kindly
written out for me a passage from some late work, or Lecture, of Newman's
own, in which he says that, after fifty years,