a kind greeting as they pass.  I inquired considerably about Concord, and a certain man there; one of the fair pilgrims told me several comfortable things.  By the bye, how very good you are, in regard to this of Unitarianism!  I declare, I am ashamed of my intolerance:—­and yet you have ceased to be a Teacher of theirs, have you not?  I mean to address you this time by the secular title of Esquire; as if I liked you better so.  But truly, in black clothes or in white, by this style or by that, the man himself can never be other than welcome to me.  You will further allow me to fancy that you are now wedded; and offer our united congratulations and kindest good wishes to that new fair Friend of ours, whom one day we shall surely know more of,—­if the Fates smile.

My sheet is ending, and I must not burden you with double postage for such stuff as this.  By dint of some inquiry I have learnt the law of the American Letter-carrying; and I now mention it for our mutual benefit.  There are from New York to London three packets monthly (on the 1st, on the 10th, on the 20th); the masters of these carry Letters gratis for all men; and put the same into the Post-Office; there are some pence charged on the score of “Ship-letter” there, and after that, the regular postage of the country, if the Letter has to go farther.  I put this, for example, into a place called North and South American Coffee-house in the City here, and pay twopence for it, and it flies.  Doubtless there is some similar receiving-house with its “leather bag” somewhere in New York, and fixed days (probably the same as our days) for emptying, or rather for tying and despatching, said leather bag:  if you deal with the London Packets (so long as I am here) in preference to the Liverpool ones, it will all be well.  As for the next Letter, (if you write as I hope you may before hearing from me again,) pray direct it, “Care of John Mill, Esq., India House, London”; and he will forward it directly, should I even be still absent in the North.—­Now will you write? and pray write something about yourself.  We both love you here, and send you all good prayers. Vale faveque!

Yours ever,
       T. Carlyle

IX.  Emerson to Carlyle*

Concord, 7 October, 1835

My Dear Friend,—­Please God I will never again sit six weeks of this short human life over a letter of yours without answering it.

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* The original of this letter is missing;  what is printed here
is from the rough draft.
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I received in August your letter of June, and just then hearing that a lady, a little lady with a mighty heart, Mrs. Child,* whom I scarcely know but do much respect, was about to visit England (invited thither for work’s sake by the African or Abolition Society) and that she begged an introduction to you, I used the occasion to say the godsend was come, and that I would acknowledge it as soon as three then impending tasks were ended.  I have now learned that Mrs. Child was detained for weeks in New York and did not sail.  Only last night I received your letter written in May, with the four copies of the Sartor, which by a strange oversight have been lying weeks, probably months, in the Custom-House.  On such provocation I can sit still no longer.