to have the dust blown out of me, and my mad nerves rested (there
is nothing else quite gone wrong): this unblest _Life of
Frederick_ is now actually to get along into the Printer's hand;
--a good Book being impossible upon it, there shall a bad one be
done, and one's poor existence rid of it:--for which great object
two months of voluntary torpor are considered the fair
preliminary. In another year's time, (if the Fates allow me to
live,) I expect to have got a great deal of rubbish swept into
chaos again. Unlucky it should ever have been dug up, much
of it!--

Your Mrs. --- should have had our best welcome, for the sake of
him who sent her, had there been nothing more: but the Lady
never showed face at all; nor could I for a long time get any
trace--and then it was a most faint and distant one as if by
_double_ reflex--of her whereabout: too distant, too difficult
for me, who do not make a call once in the six months lately. I
did mean to go in quest (never had an _address_); but had not
yet rallied for the Enterprise, when Mrs. --- herself wrote that
she had been unwell, that she was going directly for Paris, and
would see us on her return. So be it:--pray only I may not be
absent next! I have not seen or distinctly heard of Miss Bacon
for a year and half past: I often ask myself, what has become of
that poor Lady, and wish I knew of her being safe among her
friends again. I have even lost the address (which at any rate
was probably not a lasting one); perhaps I could find it by the
eye,--but it is five miles away; and my _non-plus-ultra_ for
years past is not above half that distance. Heigho!

My time is all up and more; and Chaos come again is lying round