ffered, with readiness and frankness. The
Italians have a proverb, which I hope you have not forgot poor
Pierrotti's lessons so far as not to comprehend--'_Volto sciolto e
pensieri stretti_.' There is no occasion to let any one see what you
exactly think of him; and it is the less prudent, as you will find
reason, in all probability, to change your opinion more than once.

"I shall be glad to hear of your being fitted with a good servant.
Most of the Irish of that class are scapegraces--drink, steal, and lie
like the devil. If you could pick up a canny Scot it would be well.
Let me know about your mess. To drink hard is none of your habits, but
even drinking what is called a certain quantity every day hurts the
stomach, and by hereditary descent yours is delicate. I believe the
poor Duke of Buccleuch laid the foundation of that disease which
occasioned his premature death in the excesses of Villar's regiment,
and I am sorry and ashamed to say, for your warning, that the habit of
drinking wine, so much practised when I was a young man, occasioned, I
am convinced, many of my cruel stomach complaints. You had better
drink a bottle of wine on any particular occasion, than sit and soak
and sipple at an English pint every day.

"All our bipeds are well. Hamlet had an inflammatory attack, and I
began to think he was going mad, after the example of his great
namesake, but Willie Laidlaw bled him, and he has recovered. Pussy is
very well. Mamma, the girls, and Charlie join in love. Yours
affectionately,

"W. S.

"P.S.--Always mention what letters of mine you have received, and
write to me whatever comes into your head. It is the privilege of
great boys when distant, that they cannot tire papas by any length of
detail upon any subject."

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

(1770-1850)

[Illustration: William Wordsworth.]

William Wordsworth, the poet, was born at Cockermouth, on the Derwent,
in Cumberland, on April 7, 1770. His parentage offers a curious
parallel to Scott's; he was the son of an attorney, law-agent to the
Earl of Lonsdale, a prosperous man in his profession, descended from
an old Yorkshire family of landed gentry. On the mother's side, also,
Wordsworth was connected with the middle territorial class; his
mother, Anne Cookson, was the daughter of a well-to-do mercer in
Penrith; but her mother was a Crackanthorpe, whose ancestors had been
lords of the ma