------------
* Dr. Le Baron Russell; Theodore Parker.
------------

As for myself, dear Emerson, you must ask me no questions till—­ alas, till I know not when!  After four weary years of the most unreadable reading, the painfulest poking and delving, I have come at last to the conclusion—­that I must write a Book on Cromwell; that there is no rest for me till I do it.  This point fixed, another is not less fixed hitherto, That a Book on Cromwell is impossible. Literally so:  you would weep for me if you saw how, between these two adamantine certainties, I am whirled and tumbled.  God only knows what will become of me in the business.  Patience, Patience!

By the bye, do you know a “Massachusetts Historical Society,” and a James Bowdoin, seemingly of Boston?  In “Vol.  II. third series” of their Collections, lately I met with a disappointment almost ludicrous.  Bowdoin, in a kind of dancing, embarrassed style, gives long-winded, painfully minute account of certain precious volumes, containing “Notes of the Long Parliament,” which now stand in the New York Library; poises them in his assaying balance, speculates, prophesies, inquires concerning them:  to me it was like news of the lost Decades of Livy.  Good Heavens, it soon became manifest that these precious Volumes are nothing whatever but a wretched broken old dead manuscript copy of part of our printed Commons Journals! printed since 1745, and known to all barbers!  If the Historical Society desired it, any Member of Parliament could procure them the whole stock, Lords and Commons, a wheelbarrowful or more, with no cost but the carriage.  Every Member has the right to demand a copy, and few do it, few will let such a mass cross their door-threshold!  This of Bowdoin’s is a platitude of some magnitude.—­Adieu, dear Emerson.  Rest not, haste not; you have work to do.

—­T.  Carlyle

LXXXVII.  Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, London, 17 November, 1843

Dear Emerson,—­About this time probably you will be reading a Letter I hurried off for you by Dr. Russell in the last steamer; and your friendly anxieties will partly be set at rest.  Had I kept silence so very long?  I knew it was a long while; but my vague remorse had kept no date!  It behoves me now to write again without delay; to certify with all distinctness that I have safely received your Letter of the 30th October, safely the Bill for L25 it contained;—­that you are a brave, friendly man, of most serene, beneficient way of life; and that I—­God help me!—­