To-day I was looking at the Carpenters, etc., carrying away Chips, etc., of a Tree I had cut down: and, coming home, read—
δρυος πεσουσης πας ανηρ ξυλευεται [74]—
Whose Line?—Certainly not of
Yours ever sincerely, E. F. G.
To John Allen.
Market hill: Woodbridge,
March 19 [1866].
My dear Allen,
You shall hear a very little about me; and you shall tell me a very little about yourself? I forget when I last wrote to you, or heard from you: I suppose, about the end of Autumn. Here have I been ever since, without stirring further than Ipswich: and seeing nobody you know except R. Groome once. He wrote me the other day to announce that Thompson was Master of Trinity; an Honour quite unexpected by Thompson himself, I conclude, seeing that he himself had written to me only a Fortnight before, telling me of Whewell’s Disaster, and sincerely hoping for his Recovery, from a Dread of a new King
Log or King Stork, he said. He also said something of coming here at Easter: which now, I suppose, he won’t be able to do. I have written to congratulate him in a sober way on his Honours; for, at our Time of Life, I think exultation would be unseasonable on either side. He will make a magnanimous Master, I believe; doing all the Honours of his Station well, if he have health.
Spedding wrote me a kind long Letter some while ago. Duncan tells me Cameron has had a slight Paralysis. Death seems to rise like a Wall against one now whichever way one looks. When I read Boswell and other Memoirs now, what presses on me most is—All these people who talked and acted so busily are gone. It is said that when Talma advanced upon the Stage his Thought on facing the Audience was, that they were all soon to be Nothing.