anticipated. In view of the danger of being blocked up by
another snow-storm, I shall probably think it best to return by another
route, which they all say is the best. I hope you and my precious
children keep well.

No picture of Mrs. Prentiss' life would be complete, in which her
sister's influence was not distinctly visible. To this influence she
owed the best part of her earlier intellectual training; and it did much
to mould her whole character. Mrs. Hopkins was one of the most learned,
as well as most gifted, women of her day; and had not ill-health early
disabled her for literary labors, she might, perhaps, have won for
herself an enduring name in the literature of the country. There were
striking points of resemblance between her and Sara Coleridge; the same
early intellectual bloom; the same rare union of feminine delicacy and
sensibility with masculine strength and breadth of understanding; the
same taste for the beautiful in poetry, in art, and in nature, joined to
similar fondness for metaphysical studies; the same delight in books of
devotion and in books of theology; and the same varied erudition. Only
one of them seems to have been an accomplished Hebraist, but both were
good Latin and Greek scholars; and both were familiar with Italian,
Spanish, French, and German. Even in Sara Coleridge's admiration and
reverence for her father, Mrs. Hopkins was in full sympathy with her.
She lacked, indeed, that poetic fancy which belonged to the author of
"Phantasmion;" nor did she possess her mental self-poise and firmness of
will; but in other respects, even in physical organization and certain
features of countenance, they were singularly alike. And they both died
in the fiftieth year of their age.

Louisa Payson was born at Portland, February 24, 1812. Even as a child
she was the object of tender interest to her father on account of her
remarkable intellectual promise. He took the utmost pains to aid and
encourage her in learning to study and to think. The impression he made
upon her may be seen in the popular little volume entitled "The Pastor's
Daughter," which consists largely of conversations with him, written out
from memory after his death. She was then in her sixteenth year. The
records of the next eight years, which were mostly spent in teaching,
are very meagre; but a sort of literary journal, kept by her between
1835 and 1840, shows something of her mental quality and character, as
also of her course of