rtality, or journalize the
parish quarrels about the repairs of the stove-funnel in Mr. Clifton's
church.

I was well pleased to find that the little notes of acknowledgment
which I despatched after the receipt of these leviathans seemed to
be considered a sufficient representation of capital to justify the
enormous rate of epistolary interest which the Colonel bestowed. I liked
the style of my correspondent. It did me good to meet with the strong
old expressions of our ancestors that were turning up in unexpected
places. If the dear old phrases were sometimes better or worse than the
fact they expressed, they must have improved what was good, and gibbeted
more effectually what to the times seemed evil. Who would now think of
designating a parcel of serious savages "the praying Indians of Natick"?
And yet there is a sound and a power about the words that would go far
to convert the skeptical aborigines in their own despite. Why, there
was something rich and nervous in the talk of the very lawmakers. "The
accursed sect of the Quakers,"--what a fine spirit such an accusative
case gives to the dry formula of a legal enactment! the beat of the drum
by which the edict was proclaimed in the streets of Boston seems only an
appropriate accompaniment to so stirring a denunciation. Then to invite
a brother to "exercise prophecy,"--as Winthrop used to call the business
of preaching,--there is really something soul-invigorating in the very
sound. No wonder the people could stand a good two-hours' discourse
under so satisfactory a title!

I suppose, then, that much of my original relish for the communications
of my Foxden correspondent came from his mastery over the antique
glossary, and perhaps the rather ancient style of thought that fitted
well the method of conveyance. Indeed, a good course of Bishop
Copleston's "magic-lanthorn school" made me peculiarly susceptible to
the refreshment of changing the gorgeous haze of modern philosophers for
the sharpness and vitality with which old-fashioned people clothe such
ideas as are vouchsafed to them.

I soon found that my friend had that passion for what may be called
petty antiquarian research which is so puzzling to those who escape its
contagion. Also that a pride of family, that lingers persistently in
some parts of New England, seemed to concentrate itself and envelop him
as in a cloud. He had attained the age of sixty a bachelor,--perhaps
from finding no person in Foxden of suf