Eleven at night
I am delighted with the idea of revisiting dear England , and seeing friends whom I so tenderly love : yet I feel a regret , which I had no idea I should have felt , at leaving the scenes of a thousand past pleasures ; the murmuring rivulets to which Emily and I have sat listening , the sweet woods where I have walked with my little circle of friends : I have even a strong attachment to the scenes themselves , which are infinitely lovely , and speak the inimitable hand of nature which formed them : I want to transport this fairy ground to England . I sigh when I pass any particularly charming spot ; I feel a tenderness beyond what inanimate objects seem to merit . I must pay one more visit to the naiads of Montmorenci . Eleven at night . I am just come from the general 's assembly ; where , I should have told you , I was this day fortnight announced _ Madame Fitzgerald _ , to the great mortification of two or three cats , who had very sagaciously determined , that Fitzgerald had too much understanding ever to think of such a flirting , coquetish creature as a wife . I was grave at the assembly to-night , in spite of all the pains I took to be otherwise : I was hurt at the idea it would probably be _ the last _ at which I should be ; I felt a kind of concern at parting , not only with the few I loved , but with those who had till to-night been indifferent to me . There is something affecting in the idea of _ the last time _ of seeing even those persons or places , for which we have no particular affection .