such as a Professor of History in Oxford ought to give, cannot be prepared in a year. I could give fifty, on the other hand, or any number which might be required, if I made my course an abridgment of all Modern History, . . collected apparently from some popular book like Russell. My object would be to give eight Lectures every year like Guizot's on French History, for the history, chiefly the internal history of England, beginning at the fifteenth century. It would be a work for my life, and eight Lectures a year would be, I am sure, as much as any man could give with advantage. My present course will be introductory, on the method of reading History; and this too, will consist of eight Lectures. Now I am willing to go on with the present regulations, if the University think it advisable, provided always, that I am required to take no oath about them; because then as much of the salary may be forfeited now, as the Vice-Chancellor may think proper, and the question of reducing the number of Lectures may be considered at leisure, before I come to leave Rugby. But feeling earnestly desirous to do the duty of the Professorship efficiently, and believing that I can do it, I think I may ask the sanction of the University authorities for an application to the Government about the regulations, to have them altered as regards the number of Lectures, and, I think, also, to take away the oath, if such a thing be not required of other Professors. In the last century, there was a sad recklessness in requiring oaths on all occasions worthy or unworthy; but there is a better feeling now prevalent. . and I should hope to show that without the oath the duty might be done effectually.

In the mean time this uncertainty is very inconvenient, because we have actually engaged our house in Oxford, and I shall have enough to do to finish my Lectures in time if they are wanted, and, if they are not wanted, I can ill afford the time to work upon them. . . . But this cannot be helped, only the oath is a serious matter; and if I am required to take it to the regulations attached to my

patent, I have no alternative but to refuse it most positively. We are all well here, and have the most beautiful weather; the mountain tops all covered with snow, and all their sides and the valleys rich with the golden ferns and the brown leaves of the oaks.

[The regulations in question were found not to be in force.]

CCLXIX. TO MR. JUSTICE COLERIDGE.

Fox How, December 31, 1841. [After explaining the difficulties about the Professorship.] I do not like undertaking more than I can do, or being thought to do the work of my place inefficiently. And I would rather give up the Professorship a hundred times than be thought to make a job of it. Yet I do value it very much, and look forward to having great parties of the young men of the various great schools with no small pleasure. I shall ask our Rugby men to bring their friends of other schools, when they are good men. And I hope to see some of my boys and girls well bogged in the middle of Bagley Wood. It is the last night of the year. May the new year begin and go on happily with us both, and I think that at our age, we begin to feel that the word "happy" has no light meaning, and requires more than mere worldly prosperity or enjoyment to answer to its signification. Our family greetings to all yours.

CCLXX. TO THE SAME.

Fox How, January 9, 1842.

I have nearly finished six Lectures, although

I scarcely know whether I shall deliver them. If I do go up to Oxford, many things, I can assure you, have been in my thoughts, which I wished gradually to call men's attention to; one in particular, which seems to me a great scandal, the debts contracted by the young men, and their

backwardness in paying them. I think that no part of this evil is to be ascribed to the tradesmen, because so completely are the tradesmen at the mercy of the undergraduates, that no man dares refuse to give credit; if he did, his shop would be abandoned. The Colleges take care to secure themselves by requiring caution money, and other expedients; and I cannot but think, that their authority might be exerted to compel payment to tradesmen with nearly the same regularity, as they exact their own battells.

CCLXXI. TO THE REV. J. HEARN.

Fox How, January 17, 1842.

I do not like to leave your kind letters unanswered, lest you should think that I am indifferent to receiving them, which would be most far from the truth; and yet I have been so busy, and still am, that it not only makes it difficult to find time to write letters, but it makes them not worth reading when they are written, because it so engrosses me with one or two pursuits that it leaves me nothing to communicate which can be of interest to others. Next week, I suppose, our life will have variety and excitement enough, when we go up to Oxford, with all our family, and are established at our house in Beaumont Street, which we have taken for three weeks. Nevertheless, I prefer writing from the delicious calm of this place, where the mountains raise their snowy tops into the clear sky by this dim twilight, with a most ghost-like solemnity; and nothing is heard far or near, except the sound of the stream through the valley. I have been walking to-day to Windermere, and went out on a little rude pier of stones into the lake, to watch what is to me one of the most beautiful objects in nature, the life of blue water amidst a dead landscape of snow; the sky was bright, and the wind fresh, and the lake was dancing and singing as it were, while all along its margin lay the dead snow, covering every thing but

the lake, plains and valleys and mountains.

I have ad

mired the same thing more than once by the sea side, and there the tide gives another feature in the broad band of brown shingles below high-water mark, interposed between the snow and the water. We have been here more than

three weeks, and, as it always does, the place has breathed a constant refreshment on me, although I have never worked harder; having done six of my Lectures, besides a large correspondence about the school matters, as usual in the holidays. I have, in all, written seven Lectures, and leave one more to be written in Oxford, and this last week I hope to devote to my History.. We have been all well, and as my children grow up, we are so large and companionable a party, that we need no society out of ourselves. This is a great change in later married life, when your table is always full without company, and you live in the midst of a large party. And I am sure that its effect is to make you shrink from other society, which is not wanted to enliven you, and which, added to a large family in the house, becomes almost fatiguing.

I will say nothing of my deep interest in this Oxford election, and in the progress of the Newmanite party, on which so many seem to look either complacently or stupidly, who yet cannot really sympathise with it. But I shall see and hear enough, and more than enough, of all this during my stay in Oxford. I half envy you your farming labours, and wish you all manner of success in them, I could enter with great delight into planting, but I am never here at the right season, and at Rugby I have neither the time nor the ground.

CCLXXII. TO REV. HERBERT HILL.

Oxford, February 9, 1842.

If Mrs. Nicholls a is alive and sensible, both my

wife and I would wish to give her our affectionate remema A poor woman near Fox How.

brances. I can quite feel what you say, as to the good of sitting by, and watching her patience. It is a great lesson to learn how to die. . . . . . Our stay here has even surpassed my expectations, and the country is more beautiful than my recollections, but my keen enjoyment of it makes me satisfied that my dislike of the Rugby country proceeds from no fond contrast with Westmoreland, but from its own unsurpassable dulness. I was to-day in the valley behind S. Hinksey, and in the thickets of Bagley Wood. I went up to town to see the King of Prussia at Bunsen's, and there met both Maurice and Carlyle. We go down on Friday. All join in kindest regards to Mrs. Hill, and in love to the babies, begging Katie's pardon for the affront of so calling her.

CCLXXIII. TO AN OLD PUPil. (k.)

Oxford, February 9, 1842.

.. I think the question of the expediency of your residing for some time at Oxford is rather difficult. But on the whole, unless you have some special object in coming here which I do not know, I think that I should advise against it. This place appears, at this moment, to be overridden with one only influence, which is so predominant that one must either yield to it, or be living in a state of constant opposition to those around one, a position not very agreeable. Besides, are you not already engaged more usefully both to yourself and others, than you could be here, and reading what you do read in a healthier atmosphere? I say this, but yet there is not a man alive who loves this place better than I do, and I have enjoyed our fortnight's stay here even more than I expected. I have been in no feuds or controversies, and have met with nothing but kindness; but then my opinions are so well known, that they are allowed for as a matter of course, so that my difficulty here is less than that of most men. We go down to Rugby on Friday, when the school meets. It always gives me real pleasure to hear from you, nor would I an