This I wrote in some cornfields near Liverpool, on one of our few fine days.
To J. P. Gell, Esq.
New Year’s Day, 1840 (To Hobart Town, V. D. L.)
Liverpool: January 16, 1840.
Of the three principal theological appearances spoken of for this past autumn, two have appeared—‘Arnold on Prophecy,’ as you know, I suppose, and two fresh volumes of ‘Froude’s Remains’; the third, ‘Julius Hare’s Sermons,’ are still only in preparation. Oxford is, as usual, replete with Newmanism and Newmanistic gossip, from which it is one blessing for you that you are preserved. I saw a letter from Arnold, dated Fox How, January, in which he said that not the schoolhouse only but the school would be, he believed, full next half-year.
To J. N. Simpkinson, Esq.
26 Castle Street, Liverpool: August 27, 1840.
The English verse disappointment, as you suppose, was no heavy burden to bear, and if Burbidge has sent you the specimen line he threatened to do, you will say that it should have been no disappointment at all. I have been since the vacation three weeks at Grasmere with Ward, not very far from Thorney How; the rest of the time here studying the ethics, &c., for November. I shall go for a day or two to Rugby at the beginning of October, and then to Oxford about a fortnight before term commences, to effect the removal I must undergo from College to lodgings; indeed, I should go earlier for the sake of better reading, but my two brothers are going out to America together (the younger for the first time), and will hardly be off sooner than October.
That I have been a good deal unsettled in mind at times at Oxford, and that I have done a number of foolish things, is true enough, and I dare say the change from Rugby life to its luxury and apparent irresponsibility has had a good deal of ill effect upon me.
To the same.
Oxford: Feb. 16, 1841.