Read it through once

On January 7, 1855, Miss Mitford wrote to a friend:—“It has pleased Providence to preserve to me my calmness of mind, clearness of intellect, and also my power of reading by day and by night, and which is still more, my love of poetry and literature, my cheerfulness, and my enjoyment of little things. This very day, not only my common pensioners, the dear robins, but a saucy troop of sparrows, and a little shining bird of passage, whose name I forget, have all been pecking at once at their tray of bread-crumbs outside the window. Poor pretty things! how much delight there is in these common objects, if people would but learn to enjoy them: and I really think that the feeling for these simple pleasures is increasing with the increase of education.” On the next day she wrote to Mr. Pearson, urging him to decide when he would come and dine with a mutual friend, for “if you wish for another cheerful evening with your old friend, there is no time to be lost.”