I therefore recommend that you would keep a regular journal, enough to make me an immense letter once a month; and don’t be particular about a subject, so as you talk about what is actually going on amongst you. If “Molly Morley be brave to what she war,” it is very interesting to hear so, and if you still keep your taste for barley sugar! which I doubt not! But Brookes’ exploits must always be productive, with his badgers and things, and I thank you again for those anecdotes. I wrote the lad a letter some time ago. How I long to see him! Nobody makes me laugh half so much as he does, and I love a hearty laugh.
But my home letters feel always so skinny between the finger and thumb that I am always sure there cannot be much in them, and every line I read I grudge, for fear of coming to the end. When once I do get home what a zest will my absence give to every blessing; for whereever I go or whatever I see, I may say with the feeling Goldsmith—
My heart, untravelled, fondly turns to thee,
Still wanders o’er the peaceful scenes I love,
And drags a lengthening chain at each remove.
I long incessantly to return to the bosom of that family to which may be applied the words of a less celebrated poet—
Nor last, tho’ noticed last by me,
Appears that happy family,
No pen can do strict justice by,
And mine should be the last to try—