 As I live in a place where even the ordinary tattle of the town arrives not till it is stale , and which produces no events of its own , you will not desire any excuse from me for writing so seldom , especially as of all people living I know you are the least a friend to letters spun out of one 's own brains , with all the toil and constraint that accompanies sentimental productions . I have been here at Stoke a few days ( where I shall continue good part of the summer ) ; and having put an end to a thing , whose beginnings you have seen long ago . I immediately send it you . You will , I hope , look upon it in light of a thing with an end to it ; a merit that most of my writing have wanted , and are like to want , but which this epistle I am determined shall not want . 
