I have not put Leigh Hunt quite high enough for your sentiments respecting him; but no more genuine characterization and criticism (so far as the writer’s purpose to be true goes) was ever done.  It is very slight.  I might have made more of it, but should not have improved it.

“I mean to write two more of these articles, and then hold my hand.  I intend to come to Boston before the end of this week, if the weather is good.  It must be nearly or quite six months since I was there!  I wonder how many people there are in the world who would keep their nerves in tolerably good order through such a length of nearly solitary imprisonment?”

I advised him to begin to put the series in order for a volume, and to preface the book with his “Consular Experiences.”  On the 18th of April he writes:—­

“I don’t think the public will bear any more of this sort of thing....  I had a letter from ——­, the other day, in which he sends me the enclosed verses, and I think he would like to have them published in the Atlantic.  Do it if you like, I pretend to no judgment in poetry.  He also sent this epithalamium by Mrs. ——­, and I doubt not the good lady will be pleased to see it copied into one of our American newspapers with a few laudatory remarks.  Can’t you do it in the Transcript, and send her a copy?  You cannot imagine how a little praise jollifies us poor authors to the marrow of our bones.  Consider, if you had not been a publisher, you would certainly have been one of our wretched tribe, and therefore ought to have a fellow-feeling for us.  Let Michael Angelo write the remarks, if you have not the time.”

("Michael Angelo” was a clever little Irish-boy who had the care of my room.  Hawthorne conceived a fancy for the lad, and liked to hear stories of his smart replies to persistent authors who called during my absence with unpromising-looking manuscripts.) On the 30th of April he writes:—­

“I send the article with which the volume is to commence, and you can begin printing it whenever you like.  I can think of no better title than this, ‘Our Old Home; a Series of English Sketches, by,’ etc.  I submit to your judgment whether it would not be well to print these ‘Consular Experiences’ in the volume without depriving them of any freshness they may have by previous publication in the magazine?

“The article has some of the features that attract the curiosity of the foolish public, being made up of personal narrative and gossip, with a few pungencies of personal satire, which will not be the less effective because the reader can scarcely find out who was the individual meant.  I am not without hope of drawing down upon myself a good deal of critical severity on this score, and would gladly incur more of it if I could do so without seriously deserving censure.

“The story of the Doctor of Divinity, I think, will prove a good card in this way.