I therefore wrote a set of legislative
enactments purporting to be from the ladies of the society, forbidding
all such allusions in future. It made some sport at the time. I try
not to be personal, and to be courteous, even in satire.
"But I have written a piece this week that is making me some disquiet.
I did not like it that there was so little that was serious and
rational about the reading. So I conceived the design of writing a
_set of letters_, and throwing them in, as being the letters of a
friend. I wrote a letter this week for the first of the set,--easy,
not very sprightly,--describing an imaginary situation, a house in the
country, a gentleman and lady, Mr. and Mrs. Howard, as being pious,
literary, and agreeable. I threw into the letter a number of little
particulars and incidental allusions to give it the air of having been
really a letter. I meant thus to give myself an opportunity for the
introduction of different subjects and the discussion of different
characters in future letters.
"I meant to write on a great number of subjects in future. Cousin
Elisabeth, only, was in the secret; Uncle Samuel and Sarah Elliot were
not to know.
"Yesterday morning I finished my letter, smoked it to make it look
yellow, tore it to make it look old, directed it and scratched out the
direction, postmarked it with red ink, sealed it and broke the seal,
all this to give credibility to the fact of its being a real letter.
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