It contains more detailed accounts than anything I ever saw, except Wodrow, without being so portentously tiresome and so desperately overborne with footnotes, proclamations, acts of Parliament, and citations as that last history.
I have been reading a good deal of Herbert. He’s a clever and a devout cove; but in places awfully twaddley (if I may use the word). Oughtn’t this to rejoice papa’s heart—
| “Carve or discourse; do not a famine fear. Who carves is kind to two, who talks to all.” |
You understand? The “fearing a famine” is applied to people gulping down solid vivers without a word, as if the ten lean kine began to-morrow.
Do you remember condemning something of mine for being too obtrusively didactic. Listen to Herbert—
| “Is it not verse except enchanted groves And sudden arbours shadow coarse-spun lines? Must purling streams refresh a lover’s loves? Must all be veiled, while he that reads divines Catching the sense at two removes?” |
You see, “except” was used for “unless” before 1630.
Tuesday.—The riots were a hum. No more has been heard; and one of the war-steamers has deserted in disgust.
The Moonstone is frightfully interesting: isn’t the detective prime? Don’t say anything about the plot; for I have only read on to the end of Betteredge’s narrative, so don’t know anything about it yet.