James is a very good fellow, better and better as we see him
more. Something shy and skittish in the man; but a brave
heart intrinsically, with sound, earnest sense, with plenty
of insight and even humor. He confirms an observation of mine,
which indeed I find is hundreds of years old, that a stammering
man is never a worthless one. Physiology can tell you why. It
is an excess of delicacy, excess of sensibility to the presence
of his fellow-creature, that makes him stammer. Hammond l'Estrange
says, "Who ever heard of a stammering man that was a fool?" Really
there is something in that.--James is now off to the Isle of Wight;
will see Sterling at Ventnor there; see whether such an Isle or
France will suit better for a winter residence.

W.E. Channing's _Poems_ are also a kind gift from you. I have
read the pieces _you had cut up for me:_ worthy indeed of
reading! That Poem _on Death_ is the utterance of a valiant,
noble heart, which in rhyme or prose I shall expect more news of
by and by. But at bottom "Poetry" is a most suspicious affair
for me at present! You cannot fancy the oceans of Twaddle that
human Creatures emit upon me, in these times; as if, when the
lines had a jingle in them, a Nothing could be Something, and the
point were gained! It is becoming a horror to me,--as all speech
without meaning more and more is. I said to Richard Milnes, "Now
in honesty what is the use of putting your accusative _before_
the verb, and otherwise entangling the syntax; if there really
is an image of any object, thought, or thing within you, for
God's sake let me have it the _shortest_ way, and I will so
cheerfully excuse the _omission_ of the jingle at the end:
cannot I do without that!"--Milnes answered, "Ah, my dear fellow,
it is because we have no thought, or almost none; a little