both, when you go to courts, where they are very necessary, and where you
will have good masters and good models for both. Your exercises of
riding, fencing, and dancing, will civilize and fashion your body and
your limbs, and give you, if you will but take it, 'l'air d'un honnete
homme'.

I will now conclude with suggesting one reflection to you; which is, that
you should be sensible of your good fortune, in having one who interests
himself enough in you, to inquire into your faults, in order to inform
you of them. Nobody but myself would be so solicitous, either to know or
correct them; so that you might consequently be ignorant of them
yourself; for our own self-love draws a thick veil between us and our
faults. But when you hear yours from me, you may be sure that you hear
them from one who for your sake only desires to correct them; from one
whom you cannot suspect of any, partiality but in your favor; and from
one who heartily wishes that his care of you, as a father, may, in a
little time, render every care unnecessary but that of a friend. Adieu.

P. S. I condole with you for the untimely and violent death of the
tuneful Matzel.




LETTER XLIII

LONDON, July 1, O. S. 1748.

DEAR Boy: I am extremely well pleased with the course of studies which
Mr. Harte informs me you are now in, and with the degree of application