"I am domiciliated in the south for the residue of my days; and so far
as residence, pursuit, and the home of those most dear to me may be
supposed to impress local preferences, I am and long have been a
southern man. But we all love our dear common country better than all
that belongs to district and climate; and so loving my country, and so
being proud of its best fame and honor, its literary advancement, I was
decidedly pleased with your periodical. The writing, the printing, _the
revision of the proofs_, the _ensemble_, are all unquestionably
creditable to you. I am too old and too much hackneyed in the style of
periodicals to compliment. The Richmond Messenger gives respectable
promise. Periodicals have to me a kind of physiognomy. Some look sickly
and death-doomed from their birth. Yours give signs of a vigorous and
healthful vitality. May it live long and prosper."