is that of a good memory ; this has stood me in good stead in the present work , for such diaries as I have kept are the reverse of voluminous , recording little but the work of each day — some place visited, or other matter of private interest. Writing one's Recol- lections trams and improves the memory greatly. When thinking over what would be suitable for these pages , either in odd moments of the day or in the silent watches of those nights when the inestim- able boon of sleep is denied , and hour after hour is tolled from neighbouring steeples with ghastly irrita- tion (a terrible time), — it is, I say, at such moments that I have been surprised to find how a face , a rhyme, a scene , or incident, that had long been for- gotten, has been recalled with an accuracy as strange as it was vivid. This may not be a novel experience to others , nor do I offer it as a profound or original observation.
George D. Leslie , whose "Letters to Marco" I hope all my readers have read, and admired for their love of nature and the simple unaffected style in which they are written, is the only friend to whom / have read passages from this book. Though not one of my oldest friends, we were very intimately connected at one time, when we occupied the upper
