Your woods are in full beauty, I suppose, about this time. There is something visible of autumnal richness even here in the Regent’s Park.
Thackeray is off to Paris. He seems restless and uneasy after his Transatlantic travel. Europe feels small to him.
To Charles E. Norton, Esq.
[On hearing of his father’s death.]
London: October 13, 1853.
The news your letter brought was no surprise. The change in your father between the day when you first brought me to Shady Hill, and that when he bade me good-bye before going to Newport, was too great not to give some warning. And, quite recently, the accounts which I had had made me expect that your next letter would be to this purpose.
My own feeling is really, rather than anything else, that of your happiness in having so long and so much enjoyed the blessing of your father’s society. This is all the more striking to me, as I was parted from my father at nine years old, and hardly had begun to know him properly again before his death, soon after I had taken my degree at Oxford. I am truly glad that my visit to America was early enough to let me know your father.
To the same.
London: November 29, 1853.
It grieved me to the heart to think of my hostages being returned; and my books, &c. (much as I want them), being already embarked. But thank you very much for discharging that painful duty. I send you M. Arnold’s poems. I myself think that the Gipsy Scholar is the best. It is so true to the Oxford country.