The rain poured all day and precluded the possibility of our moving an inch. So that I made the best of it and commenced reading Rollin’s Maniere d’etudier les Belles Lettres.1 The critic in the French Dictionnaire Historique thinks it superficial and confused,2 yet so far as I have gone it strikes me there is great merit and clearness. His method is perhaps not perfect, but in a work like this which is to give mere advice perhaps the best way to give it is the pleasantest or most agreeable manner. Not a regular course which must be studied but an easy one with occasional variety to keep up the attention. I pursued it nearly all day with little or no cessation as I had not any means to vary it properly. Took up however a book upon Gardening which I exam-316ined with a view to some improvement in the cultivation of the garden here in future, and to the cultivation of an Orchard at Mount Wollaston, a project entertained by my father and myself. Evening, Conversation with my Mother and having no work retired early.