nspect it with eyes, proved to
be too rough an undertaking: upholsterers, expense and
confusion,--the Cynic snarled, "Give me a whole Tub rather! I
want nothing but shelter from the elements, and to be let alone
of all men." After a little groping, this little furnished
cottage, close by the beach of the Solway Frith, was got hold of:
here we have been, in absolute seclusion, for a month,--no
company but the corn-fields and the everlasting sands and brine;
mountains, and thousand-voiced memories on all hands, sending
their regards to one, from the distance. Daily (sometimes even
nightly!) I have swashed about in the sea; I have been perfectly
idle, at least inarticulate; I fancy I feel myself considerably
sounder of body and of mind. Deeply do I agree with you in the
great unfathomable meaning of a colloquy with the dumb Ocean,
with the dumb Earth, and their eloquence! A Legislator would
prescribe some weeks of that annually as a religious duty for all
mortals, if he could. A Legislator will prescribe it for
himself, since he can! You too have been at Nantasket; my
Friend, this great rough purple sea-flood that roars under my
little garret-window here, this too comes from Nantasket and
farther,--swung hitherward by the Moon and the Sun.

It cannot be said that I feel "happy" here, which means joyful;--
as far as possible from that. The Cave of Trophonius could not
be grimmer for one than this old Land of Graves. But it is a
sadness worth any hundred "happinesses." _N'en parlons plus._
By the way, have you ever clearly remarked withal what a
despicable function "view-hunting" is. Analogous to
"philanthropy," "pleasures of virtue," &c., &c. I for my part,
in these singular circumstances, often find an honestly ugly
country the preferable one. Black eternal peat-bog, or these
waste-howling sands with mews and seagulls: you meet at least no
Cockney to exclaim, "How charming it is!"

One of the last things I did in London was to pocket Bookseller
Brown's L38: a very honest-looking man, that Brown; whom I was
sorry I could not manage to welcome better. You asked in that
Letter about some other item of business,--Munroe's or Brown's
account to acknowledge?--something or other that I was to _do:_
I only remember vaguely that it seemed to me I had as good as
done it. Your Letter is not here now, but at Chelsea.

Three sheets of the _Essays_ lay waiting me at my Mother's, for
correction; needing as go