To the Same.
NEW BEDFORD, Sep. 14, 1830,
DEAR WARE,--I write down the good old compellation here, not because
I have anything in particular to say [142] to you, but just to assure
myself in the agreeable conviction that you are again within sixty
miles of me. When you get a little quiet, when matters have taken some
form with you, when you have seen some hundreds of people, and answered
some thousands of questions, then take your pen for the space of ten
minutes, and tell me of your "whereabouts," and how your strength and
spirits hold out, and what is the prospect.
I hope you will not disappoint me of the visit this autumn, for I want
to talk the sun down and the stars up with you. I suppose you have
tales enough for "a thousand and one nights." You have made friends
here, moreover, even in Rome,--some by hearsay, and others who will
be here probably in a fortnight or three weeks. Kind Mrs. Ware has
admirers here. Think of that, sir! That while Mr. W. is spoken of only
with a kind of reverence, the lady carries off all the charms and
fascinations of epithet. But alas! Such is the hard fate of us of the
wiser sex. There are other senses than Saint Paul's in which we may
say, "Where I am weak, there am I strong."
Pray excuse the levity (specific) of this letter, on two
rounds,--first, that I am very heavy, and should sink in any other
vessel; and, secondly, that I cannot take in any of the weighty
matters, because I have no room for them.
Mrs. Dewey joins me in the regards to you and Mrs. Ware, with which I
am,
Most truly yours,