t add to the
List you have sent of Elizabeth's Poems.

Maria C[harlesworth] was staying with my Brother at Boulge in the Autumn,
and sent a very kind message to me; I now am sorry I did not see her; but
I keep out of the way of the _Company_ at Boulge, though I am glad to see
my Brother here. So I wish I had asked her to take the Trouble to come
and see me in my Den. Alas! if ever you do come back, you will have to
come and see me; for I really go nowhere now. Frederic Tennyson came to
me for a few Days, and talked of you two: he was looking very well; and
was grand and kind as before. I hear little of Alfred. Spedding's Bacon
seems to hang fire; they say he is disheartened at the little Interest,
and less Conviction, that his two first volumes carried; Thompson told me
they had only convinced _him_ the other way; and that _Ellis_ had long
given up Bacon's Defence before he died.

Now my sheet is filled on the strength of my own Glass of Porter--all at
a heat. So Good Bye: ever yours, E. F. G.

_To S. Laurence_.

MARKET HILL: WOODBRIDGE.
_April_ 23/64.

DEAR LAURENCE,

I only got home last Night, from Wiltshire, where I had been to see Miss
Crabbe, daughter of the old Vicar whom you remember. I found your two
Letters: and then your Box. When I had unscrewed the last Screw, it was
as if a Coffin's Lid were raised; there was the Dead Man. {55} I took
him up to my Bedroom; and when morning came, he was there--reading;
alive, and yet dead. I am perfectly satisfied with it on the whole;
indeed, could only have suggested a very, very, slight alteration, if
any. . .

As I passed through London, I saw that wonderful Collection of Rubbish,
the late Bishop of Ely's Pictures; but I fell desperately in Love with a
Sir Joshua, a young Lady in white with a blue Sash, and a sweet blue Sky
over her sweet, noble, Head; far above Gainsboro' in its Air and
Expression. I see in the Papers that it went for 165 pounds; which, if I
thought well to give so much for any Picture, I could almost have given,
by some means, for such a delightful Work.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_April_ 27/64.

DEAR LAURENCE,

. . . I will send back the Gainsboro' copy {56a} at once; I think the
Original must be one of the happiest of the Painter's; while he had
Vandyke in his Eye, with whom he was to go to Heaven. {56b} I will not
argue how far he was superior to Reynolds in Colour; but in the Air of
Dignity and Gentility (in the better Se