I have thrown together these few observations from my long experience of the married life, not by way of counsel, which you do not want; but in confirmation of those excellent resolutions which your good sense has suggested to you, and as a testimony of my regard, and of my sincere wishes for your prosperity.

By this time, I suppose, you begin to think of quitting the country, and returning to your winter quarters in town; Cambridge is but a little out of your road, where we should be proud to receive you at our house. We may plead some kind of right to expect this favour from you both, since this University had the honour of Mr. Montagu's education, and claims some share also in yours.

I did not know that your sister was with you, or I should have added our compliments to her, which I desire you to make; and with our wishes of all happiness to Mr. Montagu and yourself, I beg leave to subscribe myself, madam,

Your affectionate friend,

CONYERS MIDDLETON.

LETTERS OF FRIENDSHIP.

Dr. Franklin to Mrs. Hewson.

Passy, January 27, 1783. THE departure of my dearest friend, which I learn from your last letter, greatly affects me. To meet with her once more in this life was one of the principal motives of my proposing to visit England again before my return to America. The last year carried off my friends Dr. Pringle and Dr. Fothergill, and Lord Kaimes and Lord Le Despencer: this has begun to take away the rest,

and strikes the hardest. Thus the ties I had to that country, and indeed to the world in general, are loosened one by one, and I shall soon have no attachment left to make me unwilling to follow.

I intended writing when I sent the eleven books, but lost the time in looking for the first. I wrote with that, and hope it came to hand. I therein asked your counsel about my coming to England: on reflection, I think I can, from my knowledge of your prudence, foresee what it will be; viz. not to come too soon, lest it should seem braving and insulting some who ought to be respected. I shall, therefore, omit that journey until I am near going to America, and then just step over to take leave of my friends, and spend a few days with you. I purpose bringing Ben with me, and perhaps may leave him under your care.

At length we are in peace, God be praised! and long, very long, may it continue! All wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones. When will mankind be convinced of this, and agree to settle their differences by arbitration? Were they to do it even by the cast of a die, it would be better than by fighting and destroying each other.

Spring is coming on, when travelling will be delightful. Can you not, when your children are all at school, make a little party, and take a trip hither? I have now a large house, delightfully situated, in which I could accommodate you and two or three friends, and I am but half an hour's drive from Paris.

In looking forward, twenty-five years seem a long period; but in looking back, how short! Could you imagine that it is now full a quarter of a century since we were first acquainted? It was

in 1757. During the greatest part of the time, I lived in the same house with my dear deceased friend, your mother; of course, you and I saw and conversed with each other much and often. It is to all our honours that, in all that time, we never had among us the smallest misunderstanding. Our friendship has been all clear sunshine, without any, the least, clouds in its hemisphere. Let me conclude by saying to you what I have had too frequent occasion to say to my other remaining old friends, the fewer we become, the more let us love one another! Adieu, &c.

B. FRANKLIN.

Henry Kirke White to Mr. B. Maddock.

MY DEAR BEN,

Winteringham, August 3, 1804.

I AM all anxiety to learn the issue of your proposal to your father. Surely it will proceed; surely a plan laid out with such fair prospects of happiness to you, as well as me, will not be frustrated. Write to me the moment you have any information on the subject.

I think we shall be happy together at Cambridge; and in the ardent pursuit of Christian knowledge and Christian virtue, we shall be doubly united. We were before friends; now, I hope, likely to be still more emphatically so. But I must not anticipate.

I left Nottingham without seeing my brother Neville, who arrived there two days after me. This is a circumstance which I much regret; but I hope he will come this way, when he goes, according to his intention, to a watering-place. Neville has been a good brother to me, and there are

not many things which would give me more pleasure than, after so long a separation, to see him again. I dare not hope that I shall meet you and him together, in October, at Nottingham.

My days flow on here in an even tenor. They are, indeed, studious days; for my studies seem to multiply on my hands; and I am so much occupied with them, that I am becoming a mere bookworm, running over the rules of Greek versification in my walks, instead of expatiating on the beauties of the surrounding scenery. Winteringham is indeed now a delightful place: the trees are in full verdure, the crops are bronzing the fields, and my former walks are become dry under foot, which I have never known them to be before. The opening vista, from our churchyard over the Humber, to the hills and receding vales of Yorkshire, assumes a thousand new aspects. I sometimes watch it at evening, when the sun is just gilding the summits of the hills, and the lowlands are beginning to take a browner hue. The showers partially falling in the distance, while all is serene above me; the swelling sail rapidly falling down the river; and, not least of all, the villages, woods, and villas on the opposite bank, sometimes render this scene quite enchanting to me; and it is no contemptible relaxation, after a man has been puzzling his brains over the intricacies of Greek choruses all the day, to come out and unbend his mind with careless thought and negligent fancies, while he refreshes his body with the fresh air of the country.

I wish you to have a taste of these pleasures with me; and if ever I should live to be blessed with a quiet parsonage, and that great object of my ambition, a garden, I have no doubt but we shall be for some short intervals, at least-two

quiet, contented bodies. These will be our relaxations; our business will be of a nobler kind. Let us vigilantly fortify ourselves against the exigencies of the serious appointment we are, with God's blessing, to fulfil; and if we go into the church prepared to do our duty, there is every reasonable prospect that our labours will be blessed, and that we shall be blessed in them. As your habits generally have been averse to what is called close application, it will be too much for your strength, as well as unadvisable in other points of view, to study very intensely; but regularly you may and must read; and, depend upon it, a man will work more wonders by stated and constant application, than by unnatural and forced endeavours.

Ir is again midnight, and I am again alone. With what meditation shall I amuse this waste hour of darkness and vacuity? If I turn my thoughts upon myself, what do I perceive but a poor helpless being, reduced by a blast of wind to weakness and misery? How my present distemper was brought upon me, I can give no account; but impute it to some sudden succession of cold to heat, such as, in the common road of life, cannot be avoided, and against which no precaution can be taken.

Of the fallaciousness of hope and the uncertainty of schemes, every day gives some new proof; but it is seldom heeded till something rather felt than