Leigh Hunt letter to Marianne Kent Hunt, April 22, 1803

              Friday. April 22d. 1803,  
My dearest Marian,  
You see I have more regard for my own pleasure than for your eyes in writing you a letter of such amazing length; but you will consider, that epistolary correspond-dence is a species of conversation; and what is a conversation of half an hour between two of the best friends in the world? - I should have written last night, but the rascal of a postman would not give me time; and as there is no post going out in the morning, I thought it better to defer writing till this afternoon, that you might know, I was in the land of the living another day. My journey from town was terrifically uncomfortable; I ascended the coach-top in a heavy shower of hail, and though wrapt in a stout military cloak, lined with wool, was assaulted by rain, wind, and dust the whole of the way to Oxford, where it was raining bitterly when I arrived; a cup of strong tea and some warm toast put an end to my cold and my lamentations, and after three hours chat with my friend Papendieck I dropt into bed "alike - forgetting and forgot" - I was going to say; but you know very well that neither of those words will hold good. My abode in the University has hitherto been pleasant; and, I hope, will be much more so when April chuses to give us some of his smiles as well as tears, but the weather has really been extremely disagreeable, especially for my amusements on the water;  Papendieck and I went up the Isis yesterday in a sailing boat, and we were so beaten about by the wind, and washed by the water,  had such hard labour with the sails, and got such terrible peltings from the hail, that I was never less disposed in my life to agree with the Greek poet in his ariston men udor, his good opinion of water, which you so well recollect:  this morning however I again paid my devoirs to Mrs. Isis, and rowed by myself up the river Charwell, a small branch of the classic stream, in which trip I had the felicity of filling my boots with water by taking too far a spring from my boat to the shore; the fact was, I neglected to fasten the boat-chain in the bank, so that when I sprang from /---/ the head it took the liberty of slipping from under me and left your humble servant very