Ihave, my dear friend, something to tell you, which I own hurts me much; and I even feel I shall not have resolution to talk to you myself of a scheme, which, believe me, will cost my heart as much as yours. I am again obliged to separate myself from you, and for a long time. I shall spend the winter at Paris; but we set out in the spring for Italy, not to return for eighteen months. You will doubtless say, that my children are very young to travel; yet you must allow their reason far exceeds their years. Moreover, it is neither men nor laws that we are to study in Italy: my children will acquire a taste for the polite arts, and perfect themselves in drawing. Whilst they amuse themselves in admiring the monuments and ruins of Roman grandeur, they will gain a complete knowledge of that interesting history. In short, my son, conducted by a father, whose tenderness can only be equalled by his knowledge, will learn to write a good journal, and in it nothing frivolous; in a word, reap all the fruits of travelling. I shall bring back Adelaide at fourteen, an excellent musician, an adept in drawing, talking and singing like a native Italian; and intirely divested of all those little feminine delicacies, which nothing but travelling can radically cure. She will neither fear the sea, nor bad roads; sleep as well in an alehouse, as in her own apartment. She will learn to be contented with a bad supper, and to do without a thousand things she now looks on as absolutely necessary. I also see in this project many more advantages than I can enumerate in one letter, but which you shall be informed of, and I am sure will feel their importance. Do not, my dear friend, add to the grief I experience in separating myself from you, the chagrin of seeing you fretful and unjust.