visit to Ireland. He was anxious to write a book
on the subject. He noted down what he had seen, and 'then dismissed the
unhappy subject from his mind,' giving his manuscript to a friend, which
was published after his death.

The 7th of August found Carlyle among his 'ain folk' at Scotsbrig, and
this was his soliloquy: 'Thank Heaven for the sight of real human
industry, with human fruits from it, once more. The sight of fenced
fields, weeded crops, and human creatures with whole clothes on their
back--it was as if one had got into spring water out of dunghill
puddles.' Mrs Carlyle had also gone to Scotland, and 'wandered like a
returned spirit about the home of her childhood.' Of her numerous lively
letters, room must be found for a characteristic epistle to her
brother-in-law, John Carlyle. His translation of Dante's _Inferno_ was
just out, and her uncle's family at Auchtertool Manse, in Fife, where
she was staying, were busy reading and discussing it. 'We had been
talking about you,' she says, 'and had sunk silent. Suddenly my uncle
turned his head to me and said, shaking it gravely, "He has made an
awesome plooster o' that place." "Who? What place, uncle?" "Whew! the
place ye'll maybe gang to, if ye dinna tak' care." I really believe he
considers all those circles of your invention. Walter [a cousin, just
ordained] performed the marriage service over a couple of colliers the
day after I came. I happened to be in his study when they came in, and
asked leave to remain. The man was a good-looking man enough, dreadfully
agitated, partly with the business he was come on, partly with drink. He
had evidently taken a glass too much to keep his heart up. The girl had
one very large inflamed eye and one little one, which looked perfectly
composed, while the large eye stared wildly, and had a tear in it.
Walter married them very well indeed; and his affecting words, together
with the bridegroom's pale, excited face, and the bride's ugliness, and
the poverty, penury, and want imprinted on the whole business, and above
all fellow-feeling with the poor wretches then rushing on their
fate--all that so overcame me that I fell crying as desperately as if I
had been getting married to the collier myself, and, when the ceremony
was over, extended my hand to the unfortunates, and actually (in such an
enthusiasm of pity did I find myself) I presented the new husband with a
snuff-box which I happened to have in my hand, being just about