Ever your grateful and affectionate
E.B.B.

I shall have room for praising Gregory in these papers.

[Footnote 61:  The series of papers on the Greek Christian Poets appeared in the Athenaeum for February and March 1842; they are reprinted in the Poetical Works, v. 109-200.]

[Footnote 62:  This scheme took shape in the series of papers on the English Poets which appeared in the Athenaeum in the course of June and August 1842 (reprinted in Poetical Works, v. 201-290).]

To H.S.  Boyd February 4, 1842.

My dear Friend,—­You must be thinking, if you are not a St. Boyd for good temper, that among the Gregorys and Synesiuses I have forgotten everything about you.  No; indeed it has not been so.  I have never stopped being grateful to you for your kind notes, and the two last pieces of Gregory, although I did not say an overt ‘Thank you;’ but I have been very very busy besides, and thus I answered to myself for your being kind enough to pardon a silence which was compelled rather than voluntary.

Do you ever observe that as vexations don’t come alone, occupations don’t, and that, if you happen to be engaged upon one particular thing, it is the signal for your being waylaid by bundles of letters desiring immediate answers, and proof sheets or manuscript works whose writers request your opinion while their ‘printer waits’?  The old saints are not responsible for all the filling up of my time.  I have been busy upon busy.

The first part of my story about the Greek poets went to the ‘Athenaeum’ some days ago, but, although graciously received by the editor, it won’t appear this week, or I should have had a proof sheet (which was promised to me) before now.  I must contrive to include all I have to say on the subject in three parts.  They will admit, they tell me, a fourth if I please, but evidently they would prefer as much brevity as I could vouchsafe.  Only two poets are in the first notice, and twenty remain—­and neither of the two is Gregory.

Will you let me see that volume of Gregory which contains the ‘Christus Patiens’?  Send it by any boy on the heath, and I will remunerate him for the walk and the burden, and thank you besides.  Oh, don’t be afraid!  I am not going to charge it upon Gregory, but on the younger Apollinaris, whose claim is stronger, and I rather wish to refresh my recollection of the height and breadth of that tragic misdemeanour.

It is quite true that I never have suffered much pain, and equally so that I continue most decidedly better, notwithstanding the winter.  I feel, too—­I do hope not ungratefully—­the blessing granted to me in the possibility of literary occupation,—­which is at once occupation and distraction.  Carlyle (not the infidel, but the philosopher) calls literature a ‘fireproof pleasure.’  How truly!  How deeply I have felt that truth!