nd are in very good plight, and I am not in flesh. I used to
be a hard hitter, and my arms are very long for my height (5 feet 8-1/2
inches). At any rate, exercise is good, and this the severest of all;
fencing and the broad-sword never fatigued me half so much.

"Redde the 'Quarrels of Authors' (another sort of _sparring_)--a new
work, by that most entertaining and researching writer, Israeli. They
seem to be an irritable set, and I wish myself well out of it. 'I'll not
march through Coventry with them, that's flat.' What the devil had I to
do with scribbling? It is too late to enquire, and all regret is
useless. But, an' it were to do again,--I should write again, I suppose.
Such is human nature, at least my share of it;--though I shall think
better of myself, if I have sense to stop now. If I have a wife, and
that wife has a son--by any body--I will bring up mine heir in the most
anti-poetical way--make him a lawyer, or a pirate, or--any thing. But,
if he writes too, I shall be sure he is none of mine, and cut him off
with a Bank token. Must write a letter--three o'clock.

"Sunday, March 20.

"I intended to go to Lady Hardwicke's, but won't. I always begin the day
with a bias towards going to parties; but, as the evening advances, my
stimulus fails, and I hardly ever go out--and, when I do, always regret
it. This might have been a pleasant one;--at least, the hostess is a
very superior woman. Lady Lansdowne's to morrow--Lady Heathcote's
Wednesday. Um!--I must spur myself into going to some of them, or it
will look like rudeness, and it is better to do as other people
do--confound them!

"Redde Machiavel, parts of Chardin, and Sismondi, and Bandello--by
starts. Redde the Edinburgh, 44, just come out. In the beginning of the
article on 'Edgeworth's Patronage,' I have gotten a high compliment, I
perceive. Whether this is creditable to me, I know not; but it does
honour to the editor, because he once abused me. Many a man will retract
praise; none but a high-spirited mind will revoke its censure, or _can_
praise the man it has once attacked. I have often, since my return to
England, heard Jeffrey most highly commended by those who know him for
things independent of his talents. I admire him for _this_--not because
he has _praised me_, (I have been so praised elsewhere and abused,
alternately, that mere habit has rendered me as indifferent to both as a
man at twenty-six can be to any thing,) but because he is, perhap