LIVERPOOL, August 16, 1830. 
     MY DEAR MRS. JAMESON,

Were it not that I have a great opinion both of your kindness and reasonableness, I should feel rather uncomfortable at the period which has elapsed since I ought to have written to you; but I am very sorry not to have been able sooner to reply to your last kind letter.  I shall begin by answering that which interested me most in it, which you will easily believe was what regarded my dear A——­ and the person into whose hands she is about to be committed.  In proportion to the value of the gem is the dread one feels of the flaws and injuries it may receive in the process of cutting and polishing; and this, of course, not in this case alone, but that of every child who still is parent to the man (or woman).  My mother said in one of her letters, “I have engaged a lady to be A——­’s governess.”  Of course the have must make the expression of regret or anxiety undesirable, since both are unavailing.  I hope it is the lady you spoke of in your letter to me, for I like very much the description you give of her, and in answer to the doubt you express as to whether I could be pleased with a person wanting in superficial brilliancy and refinement of intellect, I can reply unequivocally yes.  I could be well pleased with such a person for my own companion, if the absence of such qualities were atoned for by sound judgment and sterling principle; and I am certain that such a person is best calculated to undertake the task which she is to perform in our house with good effect.  The defect of our home education is that from the mental tendencies of all of us, no less than from our whole mode of life, the more imaginative and refined intellectual qualities are fostered in us in preference to our reasoning powers.  We have all excitable natures, and, whether in head or heart, that is a disadvantage.  The unrestrained indulgence of feeling is as injurious to moral strength as the undue excess of fancy is to mental vigor.  I think young people would always be the better for the influence of persons of strong sense, rather than strong sensibility, who, by fortifying their reason, correct any tendency to that morbid excitability which is so dangerous to happiness or usefulness.

I do not, of course, mean that one can eradicate any element of the original character—­that I believe to be impossible; nor is direct opposition to natural tendencies of much use, for that is really cultivating qualities by resistance; but by encouraging other faculties, and by putting aside all that has a tendency to weaken and enervate, the mind will assume a robust and healthy tone, and the real feelings will acquire strength by being under reasonable control and by the suppression of factitious ones.  A——­’s education in point of accomplishments and general cultivation of taste and intellect is already fairly advanced; and the lady who is, I hope,