ABSTRACT
Never was there any book in the world which gained so much by repeated perusals as that most inestimable of all works ‘The Excursion’. I have not read anything since I returned to town, but the Excursion is the first book I shall have recourse to. Scott’s Lord of the Isles I tried before I left Edin: but could make nothing of it. I expect more from his Guy Mannering which is on our table at present, but wch I have not yet looked into. – Jeffrey’s friends occasionally insist that his taste is not really depraved & that he knows perfectly well that every thing he has said of your poetry only proves its superiority. I am however perfectly convinced that his real character is exactly what you have described.
