Your Dialogues have been delayed some three weeks by an involuntary fault of mine, in not sending a passage for that between Cicero & his brother to Julius Hare.

It is not worth explaining how this happened, & how the wrong passage was forwarded to me in London. It is remedied now; the first thing I did on my return home from a long absence, was to transmit the insertion,

the last sheet has probably by this time been struck off, & you may perhaps receive news of its publication as early as this will reach you.

I ascertained in London that by a neglect in no fewer than three different quarters, the books which I supposed had been lost on their way to you, had never been sent. I have now given directions that they should be sent to Taylor & Hessey,

to be forwarded with your own.

I had not been from home since the summer of 1820. Even since that time London has been so altered as to have almost the appearance of a new city. Nothing that I have seen elsewhere can bear comparison with the line of houses from the Regents Park to Carleton House.

A stranger might imagine that our shopkeepers were like the merchants of Tyre, & lived in palaces. I wish the buildings were as substantial as they are splendid; but every thing is done in the spirit of trade; durability never enters into the builders speculations, & the unsubstantial brick walls are covered with a composition which seems to have the bad property of attracting moisture in a remarkable degree. In Regents Park before the houses are finished the cornices are perfectly green with slimy vegetation.

The most impressive sight to me was S^t Pauls by gas light.

I do not think any thing could be more sublime than the effect of that strong light upon the marble statues, – & the darkness of the dome, which the illumination from below served only to render visible. They have attempted to warm this enormous building by introducing heated air, – but after expending 800 £ in stoves & flues, the effect was to render the quire unendurably cold; for the whole body of cold air from the dome came rushing down, – so that the attempt has been given up as hopeless.

In London I scarcely went out of the circle of my own immediate friends. But as I went East & West upon a round of flying visits to old friends & familiar acquaintances, some of whom I had not seen for more than twenty years, – I had opportunity enough of perceiving a more general disposition to be satisfied with things as they are, than ever existed within my memory at any former time. There happened to be no question afloat with which any party feeling could be connected, & the people were sensible of their general prosperity. Few indeed are they who apprehend the momentous consequences of the changes which are taking place. One effect of general education (such as that education is) is beginning to manifest itself. The twopenny journals of sedition & blasphemy

lost their attraction when they had no longer found discon hunger & discontent to work upon. But they had produced an appetite for reading. Some journeymen printers who were out of work tried what two a weekly two-pennyworth of miscellaneous extracts would do, – it answerd so well that there were presently between 20 & 30 of these weekly publications, the sale of which is from 1 to 15,000 each.

– How I should like to talk with you concerning the prospects of the old world & of the new

I found the box of books, on my return, – they had escaped all damage from the seas. As yet I have only had time to place them upon my shelves, & to see that many of them are very curious. At present I am going on with the second volume of the Peninsular War, – & with my Tale of Paraguay.

My little boy has just begun to learn the Greek alphabet