Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 1.djvu/327

 MD, and love poor poor Presto, who has not had one happy day since he left you, as hope saved. It is the last sally I shall ever make, but I hope it will turn to some account. I would make MD and me easy, and I never desired more." And in some months after, he expresses his impatience of this long absence in the strongest terms; where addressing himself to Stella, he says — "You say you are not splenetick; but if you be, faith you will break poor Presto's, I won't say the rest; but I vow to God, if I could decently come over now, I would, and leave all schemes of politicks and ambition for ever." In the whole course of his letters it appears that not all the homage paid him by the great, the society of the choicest spirits of the age, and the friendship of some of the worthiest characters of both sexes; not the daily increase and spreading of his fame, and the most flattering prospects before him of fortune and preferment, could compensate for the want of that companion, who was the supreme delight of his heart. In the midst of all these he tells her, that his best days here are trash to those which he passed with her. In order to soften in some measure the rigour of absence, he had settled a plan at parting, that they should keep a regular journal, in which they should set down the transactions of the day, and once a fortnight transmit it to each other. The writing and receiving of these constituted the chief pleasure of his life during his residence in England. It was his first employment, when he awoke in the morning; the last, before he closed his eyes at night. He makes frequent