It was better, I thought, to hide my African taint, forsooth, for awhile.

So the wise New Yorkers have been feting, as Maria Cordifiamma, the white woman (for am I not fairer than many an Italian signora ?), whom they would have looked upon as an inferior being under the name of Marie Lavington: though there is finer old English blood running in my veins, from your native Berkshire, they say, than in any a Down-Easter's who hangs upon my lips.

Address me henceforth, then, as La Signora Maria Cordifiamma.

I am learning fast, by the by, to speak Italian.

I shall be at Quebec till the end of the month.