white; so that, when you come up, you will find it, like the trees, in full blossom. The country is beginning to look lovely; the buds and blossoms are just putting forth; the birds are in full song; so that, unless you come up soon, you will miss the overture of the season-the first sweet notes of the year.

You tell me Pierre was quite distressed lest any "thoughtless word of his should have marred my happy literary mood." Tell him not to be uneasy. Authors are not so easily put out of conceit of their offspring. Like the good Archbishop of Granada, that model and mirror of authorship, I knew "the homily in question to be the very best I had ever composed;" so, like my great prototype, I remained fixed in my self-complacency, wishing Pierre "toda felicidad con un poco de mas gusto." When I once get you up to Sunnyside, I shall feel sure of an occasional Sunday visit from Pierre. I long extremely to have a sight of him; and as there seems to be no likelihood of my getting to New York much before next autumn, I do not know how a meeting is to be brought about unless he comes up here. I shall see him with the more ease and confidence now, as, my improvements being pretty nigh completed, he cannot check me, nor cut off the supplies.

Tell him I promise not to bore him about literary matters when he comes up. I have as great a contempt for these things as anybody, though I have to stoop to them occasionally for the sake of a livelihood; but I want to have a little talk with him about stocks, and railroads, and some mode of screwing and jewing the world out of more interest than one's money is entitled to.

God bless you and him, prays your affectionate uncle,

WASHINGTON IRVING.

Late in the winter Mr. Irving had commissioned his brother-in-law, Mr. Henry Van Wart, then on a visit to this country, to purchase a saddle-horse for him. He had not mounted a horse since he went to Spain, but be

gan to feel the necessity of this sort of exercise. March 5th, Mr. Van Wart writes him: "I have at last succeeded in finding a horse which I think will suit you, and purchased him for $110. He is handsome, and the besttempered, gentle creature I ever saw; and I think you will take much pleasure in riding him." The horse, after being kept in a stable in New York for several weeks, and used and trained by Mr. Van Wart and his son Irving, was brought to Sunnyside toward the close of April. Here is the first report to me of his qualifications by the long-dismounted equestrian, dated April 26th :

The horse purchased by Mr. Van Wart is a very fine animal, and very gentle, but he does not suit me. I have ridden him once, and find him, as I apprehended, awkward and uncomfortable on the trot, which is the gait I most like. He is rather skittish also, and has laid my coachman in the dust by one of his pirouettes. This, however, might be the effect of being shut up in the stable of late, and without sufficient exercise; but he is quite a different horse from the easy, steady, quiet "parson's" nag that I wanted. I shall give him one more good trial, but rather apprehend I shall have to send him to town, to be sold for what he will fetch.

April 28th, he writes me :

In my letter, the other day, I spoke rather disparagingly of my new horse. Justice to an injured animal induces me to leave the inclosed letter open for your perusal, after which you will hand it to I. V. W.

Here follows the letter inclosed :

MY DEAR IRVING:

SUNNYSIDE, April 28, 1847.

In a letter to Pierre M. Irving, the other day, I gave an unfavorable opinion of the horse, as it regarded my peculiar notions and wishes. That opinion was founded on a slight trial. I yesterday took a long ride on him among the hills, and put him through all his paces, and found him fully answering the accounts given of him by your father and yourself. His trot is not what I could wish; but that will improve, or will be less disagreeable as we become accustomed to each other, and get into each other's ways. He shies a little now and then, but that is probably the result of having him kept in the stable of late, without use. Daily exercise will in a great measure cure him of it. He canters well, and walks splendidly. His temper appears to be perfect. He is lively and cheerful, without the least heat or fidgetiness, and is as docile as a lamb. I tried him also in harness in a light wagon, and found him just as gentle and tractable as under the saddle. He looks well and moves well in single harness, and a child might drive him. However, I mean to keep him entirely for the saddle. To conclude: when you write to your father, tell him I consider the horse a prize; and if he only continues to behave as well as he did yesterday, I hardly know the sum of money would tempt me to part with him.

I now look forward to a great deal of pleasant and healthy exercise on horseback-a recreation I have not enjoyed for years for want of a good saddle-horse. It is like having a new sense.

And he did enjoy his first rides wonderfully. "Instead," he says, "of being pinned down to one place, or forced to be trundled about on wheels, I went lounging and cantering about the country, in all holes and corners, and over the roughest roads."

In less than a month, however, the same horse was conducted to the city by the nephew to whom the preceding letter was addressed, and sold at Tattersall's; and here is the closing chapter of his equestrian experience with the animal whom he had hoped to find such a prize :

You are pleased to hear (he writes to his niece in Paris, Mrs. Storrow, June 6) that I have a saddle-horse. Unfortunately I have him no longer. Your uncle Van Wart purchased one for me, which appeared to be all that I could wish-handsome, young, gentle, and of excellent movement. I rode him two or three times, and was delighted with him, when, one day, the lurking fault came out. As I was taking a sauntering ride over the Sawmill River, and had gone a couple of miles, he all at once stopped, and declined to go any farther. I tried all manner of means, but in vain; he would do nothing but return home. On my way homeward, I tried him by different roads, but all to no purpose; home he would go. He was not restive, but calmly stubborn, and, when I endeavored to force him round, would quietly back against the fence, or get on two legs. So, as I did not care to waste time or temper on a sullen beast, home I did gogot off his back, and never mounted him again. He balked twice in like manner, but not so bad, with my coachman; so I gave him over to I. V. W., to be sold at auction, and was glad to get rid of him with the loss of twenty or thirty dollars. I shall not indulge in another saddle-horse at present.

The new building being finished and inhabited, and the alterations and additions having turned out beyond his hopes, both as to appearance and convenience, Mr. Irving, in felicitating himself upon his internal improvements, writes to the same correspondent, June 6th :

The north end of my study has been shelved like the other parts; the books, which so long were exiled to the garret, have been brought down and arranged, and my library now makes a very respectable appearance. VOL. III.-9

Then passing from the internal to the external improve

ments :

As to my grounds, I have cut down and transplanted enough trees to furnish two ordinary places, and still there are, if anything, too many; but I have opened beautiful views, and have given room for the air to circulate. The season is now in all its beauty; the trees in full leaf, but the leaves fresh and, tender; the honeysuckles are in flower, and I think I never saw the place look so well.

August 13th, 1847, he writes to a niece recently severed from his household by marriage, in her new home on Cayuga Lake :

For a month past I have been busy and bothered in an unexampled manner, in the improvement of my farm-yard, building of outhouses, etc., which has been altogether the most fatiguing and irksome job I have had in the whole course of my additions and improvements. I have now nearly got through, but it has almost made me fit to lie by again on the sofa. However, this job finished, I shall have my place in tolerable order, and will have little more to do than to see that my men keep it so.

Some days later, he writes, after alluding to the improved beauty of the country in that neighborhood :

My own place has never been so beautiful as at present. I have made more openings by pruning and cutting down trees, so that from the piazza I have several charming views of the Tappan Zee and the hills beyond, all set, as it were, in verdant frames; and I am never tired of sitting there in my old Voltaire chair, of a long summer morning, with a book