Oxford [August 1835]

It was—past experience of a very peculiar kind, the agitations of many lives crowded into the compass of a year or two, in combination with a peculiar structure of mind—offered one explanation of the very remarkable and unsocial habits which the author adopted at college: but there was another not less powerful and not less unusual. In stating this, the author shall seem, to some persons, covertly designing an affront to Oxford. In some parts, then, having even a profound knowledge of our literature, in all parts having some, the author felt it to be impossible that she should familiarly associate with those who had none at all; not so much as a mere historical knowledge of the literature in its capital names and their chronological succession. The Greek language, mastered in any eminent degree, is the very rarest of all accomplishments, and precisely because it is unspeakably the most difficult.