You tell my Father you mean to write a Poem about my invisibility--and
somehow it seems strange to myself that I have been so long absent from
Woodbridge. It was a toss up (as boys say--and perhaps Gods) whether I
should go now:--the toss has decided I should not. On the contrary I am
going to see Donne at Mattishall: a visit, which having put off a
fortnight ago, I am now determined to pay. But if I do not see you
before I go to London, I shall assuredly be down again by the latter part
of February: when toasted cheese and ale shall again unite our souls. You
need not however expect that I can return to such familiar intercourse as
once (in former days) passed between us. New honours in society have
devolved upon me the necessity of a more dignified deportment. A letter
has been sent from the Secretary of the Ipswich Mechanics' Institution
asking me to Lecture--any subject but Party Politics or Controversial
Divinity. On my politely declining, another, a fuller, and a more
pressing, letter was sent urging me to comply with their demand: I
answered to the same effect, but with accelerated dignity. I am now
awaiting the third request in confidence: if you see no symptoms of its
being mooted, perhaps you will kindly propose it. I have prepared an
answer. Donne is mad with envy. He consoles himself with having got a
Roman History to write for Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopaedia. {99} What a
pity it is that only Lying Histories are readable. I am afraid Donne
will stick to what is considered the Truth too much.
This is a day like May: I and the children have been scrambling up and
down the sides of a pit till our legs ache.
_Jan_. 24/42.