Chapter XVI: Florence and Spezzia 1866 (1)

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _Jan_. 3,1866.

“I came back from Spezzia this morning to find your pleasant letter and its enclosure. I thank you much for both. I wanted the money not a little, but half suspect I wanted the kind assurances of your satisfaction just as much. I was not content with your opinion of the last ‘O’Dowds,’ most probably from some lurking suspicion that you might be right, and that they were not as good as they ought to be, or as I meant them to be. Now I am easier on that score,--and since I have seen them in print I am better pleased also.

“My Xmas was cut in two: I was obliged to go down to Spezzia the day after Christmas Day and stay there ever since, idling, far from pleasantly, and living at a bad inn somewhat dearer than the Burlington. I could not write while there; but I have turned over a couple of ‘O’Dowds’ in my head, and if they be heavy don’t print them, and I’ll not fret about it. It’s not very easy, in a place like this, where the only conversation is play or intrigue, to find matters of popular interest.

“I often wish I could break new ground; but I’m too old, perhaps, to transplant. But I’ll not grumble now: it’s Christmas, and I wish you and all around you every happiness that Christmas should bring.

“I hope you like my last envoy of ‘Sir B.’ which I trust to see in proof in a few days.

“I was half tempted to make an ‘O’Dowd’ on the recent installation of a Knight of St Patrick, as described in an Irish paper: ‘The mantle is worn over one shoulder and falls gracefully on the ground, the legend _Quis Separabit_ being inscribed on the decoration of the collar.’ What with the trailing garment, I was sorely tempted to translate Quis Separabit ‘Who’ll tread on me?’

“I was right glad to read of Fergusson’s honours. What a manly bold letter that was of his about the Negro atrocities. I vow to God I have not temper to write of them.

“I hear young Lytton is likely to lose his sight,--some terrible inflammation of the iris, I believe, and it is feared must end in total blindness.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _Jan_. 5,1866.

“I am so ‘shook’ by a bad train and a [? wetting] that I can scarcely hold a pen, and my head is still addled with the crash and reverberation of big guns, for I have been ‘assisting’ at the trial of armour-plates, with steel shot, for the Italian Navy,--though what they have to do with the subject, seeing that they neither fire at the enemy or wait to be fired at, is more than I know.

“Persano was so overcome by terror that he was literally carried down the ladder to his gig, when he changed his flag to the _Affondatore_. The _on dit_ is he will be dismissed from the service. Quite enough, God knows, for any shortcoming; for bravery, after all, as Dogberry says of reading and writing, is ‘the gift of God.’

“We have had a sombre Xmas here: my wife very ill, and the rest of us poorly enough.

“There is not a word of news. A small squabble with the Turks, who fired at one of the ships, has made the Italians warlike once more, and they are crying out, ‘Hold me, for you know my temper!’ But it will blow over after some un-grammatical interchange of despatches, and be forgotten.

“Hardman was dining with me the other day, when an Italian admiral--the ablest man they have--launched out fiercely against ‘The Times’ and its Italian correspondent. The thing was too late for remedy, but Hardman’s good sense prevented further embarrassment.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, _Jan_. 7, 1866.

“I hope long ere this your face-ache has left you. I dread these neuralgic things, having had one or two seizures of them: and they are so infernally treacherous; they come back just when one is triumphing over being rid of them.

“I send you some O’Ds. One, I hope, will please you--the ‘Two Rebellions.’ I know you will go with me in the d------d cowardice of the newspaper fellows talking to a man in a pinch and saying how he should behave. I had one of these men out in my boat at Spezzia, and such a pluckless hound I never saw, and yet if you read his Garibaldian articles in the paper, you’d have thought him a paladin!

“I read this O’D. aloud here, and it was thought the best I had done for some time. The ‘Extradition’ is not bad, the rest are so-so.

“You will see I am right in condemning the conduct of the Catholic party about Fenianism, and also as to the intentions of the Government of rewarding their loyalty! It will be a great parliamentary fight, and my paper will be well timed.

“Is Mrs Blackwood coming to town this spring? I’d like to think we could see the Burlington repeat itself, and be as jolly as it was last year. It did me a world of good as to spirits and courage that trip, though it made a hole in my time--and my pocket.

“I am afraid I must go down to Spezzia again, and for a week too. The cares of office are heavy, and I am afraid I serve a country ungrateful enough not to appreciate me.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _Jan_. 20, 1866.

“I have been obliged to put off Spezzia till the 20th, but shall have to pass a week or ten days there _then_. Meanwhile I am at work thinking over (not writing) ‘Sir Brook.’ I want to do the thing well, but I have not yet got the stick by the handle.

“From what I can pick up from those who read O’D., no paper ought to have more than one joke. One plum to a pudding is the English taste. All the rest must be what the doctors call ‘vehicle,’ and drollery be administered in drop doses. Of course I get public opinion in a very diluted form here,--but such is the strength in which it reaches me.

“Robt. Lytton is better,--one eye safe, and hopes of the other. Have you heard that Oliphant has been dangerously ill, at N. York?--a menace of softening of the brain having declared itself, and of course such a malady is never a mere threat. I am sincerely sorry for him, and so will you be.

“My trip to town will depend on the events in the House. If our friends come in I will certainly go over. Tell Mrs Blackwood to read O’Dowd on ‘Thrift ‘: she will see that there are certain people it will never do with.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _Feb_. 3, 1866.

“If what I hear be true, our friends have made a precious ‘fiasco’ of it in their game of politics. They have so palpably shown Lord Russell all the weak points of his Bill--every damaging ingredient in it--that he has deliberately changed the whole structure, enlarged its provisions, and made it (appear at least) such a measure as may settle the question of Reform for some years to come. It is so like the Conservatives! They certainly are more deficient in the skill required to manage a party than any section in the House. Why, in Heaven’s name, show their hand? and above all, why show it before the trump-card was turned? If their cause were twice as good as it is, and if the men who sustain it were fourfold as able, the press of the Party would reduce it to insignificance and contempt. Never was such advocacy in the world as ‘The Herald’ and ‘Standard.’

“A few days ago, and even his own papers declared Lord R. was rushing to his ruin; but the Conservatives cried out ‘Take care!’ and he has listened to the warning. A mere franchise reform must have inevitably wrecked him. The very carrying it would have been a success that must have been worse than any defeat. I don’t think that men so inept as the Tories deserve power, and I’m sure they could not retain it if they got it.

“I hear Mill was a failure, and I own I’m not sorry. I hate the men he belongs to, either in letters or politics. Bright was certainly good. It was Bow-wow! but still a very good Bow-wow!--better than the polished platitudes of Gladstone, which the world accepts as philosophy.

“But confound their politics. I send you ‘B. F.,’ and I send it early, because I want the proof back as soon as you can. I am going to idle, but whether at Rome or across to Sardinia, or only over to Elba, I have not decided. I am hipped and want some change,--the real malady being I’m growing old, and don’t like it, and revenge my own stupidity by thinking the people I meet insupportably dull and tiresome.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _Feb_. 6, 1866.

“I begin a short note to you now that I have just got back, full sure that I shall have to acknowledge one from you before I finish.

“I am glad to see ‘The Times’ extract largely from the ‘Two Rebellions.’ The Jamaica affair, I hear, will be the _acrimonious_ fight of the session. What I am told is that the country will stand at present no Ministry of which Gladstone is not a part, and that if Lord R. goes (as he may), it must be some patchwork of Stanley, Gladstone, and some mild members of the Conservative party. One thing I am _assured_ is certain,--Gladstone is far less liberal than he was.

“I own I am more puzzled than enlightened by all this, but I give it as I get it.

“Jamaica is a bad business. Had they lynched Gordon it would have been all right; but the mock justice was dreadful! Besides, it really pushes High Churchism too far to hang a man because he has not attended a vestry.

“The post is in, and no letter from you. No matter! I meant to idle to-day; and so I’ll stroll into Florence and gossip at the Legation, where I can post you the three ‘O’Dowds’ I have done for next month,--a short paper, but perhaps long enough. I wrote ‘The Tiger’ under the infliction of a d------d old Indian, who’ll kill _me_ if this paper doesn’t kill _him_.

“Do you know anything of a new magazine which Cholmondeley Pennell is going to edit? Bulwer and Browning are, I believe, in his interest. He writes me a long yarn about it, but I think he has too many poets on his list for success.

“It struck me last night what a good _Noctes_ might be made out of your corps,--with Lytton, Hamley, Oliphant, and O’Dowd all talking after their several ways. Wouldn’t it be a rare bit of fun?

“A millionaire countryman of yours has actually beggared me at whist, and the d------d ass can’t play at all.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Florence, _March_ 10,1866.

“I have corrected this without my wife’s aid, for she is too weak and poorly to help me, and it will require careful looking over. I am glad you like it; I rather think well of it on re-reading.

“I believe my holiday is knocked up, and a chance of O’Dowding the Pope to be deferred, for I must hasten off to Spezzia to meet a Royal Commission on the Arsenal. I hope I may have the O’D. proof before I go, as I may be detained a week.

“Have you any weekly [‘Saturday Review,’ ‘Examiner,’ Spectator,’ or other) that has literary news, reviews, &c. disposable? if so, and perfectly convenient, send it to me occasionally, for I get too much ‘bent’ in politics,--_malgré moi._

“I really would rather be porter to the House than a lord-in-waiting.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, _March_ 14, 1866.

“A patchwork quilt is cakes and gingerbread compared to this blessed proof, but I’m in and out a Georges Dandin! You said, and said truly, that the sketch of the House was meagre, and I have dilated--I hope not diluted--it; but my writing is open to that rendering.

“I have made the ‘Fenian Pest’ also a little fatter. Will you try and see that the slips come on at their proper places.

“I am not well. It may be gout, it may be fifty things, but it _feels_ d------ly like breaking up. I ought to be at Spezzia, but I am so out of sorts that I don’t like leaving home. After all, I have no right to complain. I have been a good many years in commission, and never docked yet for repairs!

“Dizzy is going to let Gladstone have a walk over for the first racing, but I suspect that the real jockeyship will be to make the first and last heats the race.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, _March_ 26, 1866.

“It is only to-day that I feel able to write a line and thank you. Your letter and cheque reached me two days ago, but I did not like to make my daughter write to you lest you should feel alarmed at it.

“I am a little better,--I am, that is to say, in less pain, but very weak and low. I believe I shall rub through it, but it must be a close thing. It was, after all, only what Curran called ‘a runaway knock.’ but it sounded wonderfully as if I was wanted.

“They don’t talk any more of knife-work, and, so far, I am easier in mind; but my nerves are so shaken by pain and bad nights that whatever promised relief would be welcome.

“I have two chaps, of ‘Sir B.’ ready, but perhaps next week--I hope so--I will be able to go on. It would be a comfort to me to be at work.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _April_ 5,1866.

“I send you enough to make the May ‘Sir Brook,’--at least it will be wellnigh a sheet. I am gaining, but slowly. My debility is excessive, partly from all the blood I have lost; but my head is free, and I think I could work better than usual if I had the strength for it.

“All my thanks for your kindest of notes and the O’D. enclosure. I could not acknowledge them earlier, for I kept all my pen-power for the story. Try and let me have it back soon; and, meanwhile, I mean to change the air and go to Carrara. The doctors think that I must have patience, and abstain from all treatment for a while. It is evidently as hard to launch me (into the next world) as to get the _Northumberland_ afloat. I stick on the ‘ways,’ and the best they can say of me is that I have, up to this, received ‘no fatal damage.’

“I wish I was near enough to talk to you: my spirits are not bad, and when out of pain I enjoy myself much as usual.

“What a fiasco the Derby party are making of the situation! At a time when it is all-important to conciliate the outlaying men of all parties they single them out for attack, as [? for example] Whiteside’s stupid raid against Sir Robert Peel for the escape of Stephens. There never was a party in which the man-of-the-world element was so lamentably omitted....

“After all, it is a party without a policy, and they have to play the game like the fellows one sees punting at Baden, who, when they win a Louis, change it at once and go off to the silver table.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _April_ 16,1866.

“It was a great relief to my mind to know that ‘Sir B.’ was up to the mark, as your note tells me, for I felt so shaken by illness that very little would have persuaded me the whole craft was going to pieces; and all they said to me _here_ I took as mere encouragement, though, sooth to say, my home critics do not usually spoil me by flatteries. I am better, but not on the right road somehow. I am deplorably weak, and my choice seems to be between debility and delirium tremens, for to keep up my strength I drink claret all day long.

“How the Conservatives must have misplayed the game! To show the Ministry the road out of the blunder was as stupid a move as ever was made, and yet it is what they have done. They ought, besides, to have widened their basis at once by making Lord Stanley a _pont du diable_ to reach Lowe and Horsman. There is a current hypocrisy in English public opinion--about admitting new men--sharing the sweets of office and such like. Why not cultivate it?

“From men who ought to know, I am told war is _certain_ between Prussia and Austria.

“There is a rumour here that Italy offered terms to Austria for the cession of Venice, even to the extent of troops! It is hard to believe it. The Austrian alliance, if it were possible, would be the crowning policy of Italy and the only barrier against France; but national antipathies are hard to deal with, and here they are positively boundless.”

_To Dr Burbidge_

“Florence, _Friday, April_ 1866.

“My thanks for your most kind note. My attack was only a ‘runaway knock’ after all I believe when the _pallida mors_ does come, he gives a summons that there’s no mistaking. But I was only ill enough to suggest to _myself_ the way by which I might become worse, and now it’s all over.

“I cannot make up my mind about the house till I go down and see in what state I receive it. There is, I suspect, _very_ little furniture; but I mean to see, and decide soon, if I can. I assure you I look on £90 for a very poor quarter in a very poor place as a large rent, though you do persist in knocking my head off on account of my extravagance, which is a mere tradition, and you might as well bring up against me my idleness at school. The worst is, I used formerly to make money as easily as I spent it. I now find a great disinclination to work--that is, I am well aware, an expression for a disability.”

_To Dr Burbidge._

“Casa Capponi, Florence, _Thursday, May_ 1866.

“By a telegram from Sanders, received too late to reply to by post yesterday, I learned that our funds had amounted to sixty-five pounds, and I accordingly wrote to ‘My Lord’ to state as much, and also that the congregation, alike in grateful recognition of the gratuitously afforded services of Doctor Burbidge, as in the very fullest desire to secure his services, had appointed him to the chaplaincy,--a nomination which, in the event of any subsidy from the F. Office, they earnestly hoped his lordship would confirm.

“I believe I said it in rather choice phrase, but that was the substance, and I am very hopeful that he will do all that we ask.

“My wife had another attack of the _rigor_ and fever yesterday, and Wilson apprehends some tertian character has inserted itself into the former illness. She is very ill indeed, so much so that although my married daughter is confined to bed and seriously ill at a hotel only a few hundred yards off, Julia cannot leave the house to see her. You see how impossible it would be for me to be away.

“I write very hurriedly, but I wished you to know that all, so far as we can do it, is now done, and if F. O. will only be as gracious as I hope, we shall have accomplished our great wish, and the Spezzia chaplaincy be a fact.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Florence, _May_ 2, 1866.

“Herewith goes the next ‘Sir B.’ I was very glad indeed to get your last few lines, for I am low, low! I can’t pick up, somehow. But I don’t want to bore you with myself or _mes maux_.

“So they won’t resign! I think, on the whole, it’s as well,--I mean, that seeing what sort of composite thing a new Government must be, and how the Whigs have been beaten by a ‘byblow’--not in a fair fight by the regular Opposition,--it’s better to wait and see.

“Here we are going to war and to bankruptcy together. The only question is, Which will be first? That infernal knave L. Nap. has done it all, and the Italians are always cheated by him through thinking that they are greater cheats than himself. But an old boatman of mine at Spezzia said, ‘There are three _nations_ that would out-rogue the devil,--the Calibrese, the Corsicans, and the _Pigs_.’ How the last came to their nationality I can’t explain.

“You have seen notice of the Bishop of Limerick’s death. I don’t think he has, in one respect, left his equal behind him in the Irish Bench. He was the most thoroughly tolerant man I ever knew, and half a dozen men like him would do more to neutralise the acrimony of public feeling in Ireland than all the Acts of Parliament. His intellect was just as genial as his heart.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Florence, _May_ 15, 1866.

“I wish I could pack myself up in the envelope that holds this and join you at breakfast in that pleasant parlour in the Old Burlington, where we laughed so much last spring; but there are good reasons for not saluting the General, beginning with the small one, ‘no powder.’

“Here we are in ruin. Gold and silver are all withdrawn from circulation, and the small notes promised by the Government delayed in issue to enable a set of scoundrelly officials to sell the reserve gold at 10 per cent and silver at 12. The banks will not discount, nor will they advance (the latter of most moment to _me_), and we are in all the pains of bankruptcy without that protection which a prison affords against dunning.

“I sent off ‘Sir B.’ proof to-day to W. B. I am sincerely glad you like it.

“I make no way towards strength or spirits. I believe with _me_ they mean the same thing.

“If we have no war, we shall have a revolution here. All the good powder will not be wasted!”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _June_ 11,1866.

“Is it ignorant or wilful stupidity in the English papers that ignores the part L. Nap. is playing in the foreign imbroglio? It is one or the other. The whole machinery is his; and the very hot enthusiasm we see here was first excited by P. Napoleon’s visit and the encouragement the ‘Reds’ got from him.

“If Elliot were worth a sou, England would have been able to avert the war. There was one moment in which Austria would have listened, _if only warned of the treachery_ planned against her. Hudson would have been the man here.

“Don’t send me any bill or cheque, for we are deluged with paper money here, and are obliged to pay from 5 to 8 per cent to change large notes into small. Even the 100-f. note costs this. I must try and get money out in gold (Naps., not sovereigns) through F. O. Any of the messengers will take it. Could you find out for me if it would be more profitable to buy Naps, in London, or change notes or sovereigns for them in Paris? Already this new form of robbery is half ruining us all here.

“I have been living on loans from my wife for six months, and she has at last stopped the supplies, though I have willingly offered to raise the rate of interest. Perhaps she suspects I shall not be able to raise the wind.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Croce di Malta, Spezzia, _June_ 15, 1866.

“Here I am at my post. Spezzia is about to receive a new accession of greatness and become the station for transmitting the post to England and France, as the Bologna line will have to be given up entirely to the army to advance or retreat on, as events may determine.

“I have been three days here. I am the only _stranger_ (!) in the place. All the hotels empty, and I have the Gulf to my own swimming.

“There’s a pretty little girl, a granddaughter of Lord Byron, here--Lady Arabella Nash--on a visit to the Somervilles.

(“By the way, has granddaughter two d’s or one? I have left it both ways in the proof which I send you by this post.)

“I wish I could get a house down here, and retire from the pomps and short whists of life, the odd tricks and all the honours!

“There is one--only one; but the scoundrel asks me an iniquitous rent. He knows, Italian like, that I have a fancy for it, and he’ll keep it unlet to torture me.

“I shall be back in time for the O’D. proof (if it should be sent out), and you shall have it by return.

“One comfort--at least we are promised it--of the new postal line will be an express train down here, for at present the railroad is only something above a fast walking pace, and the cabs at the station always announce to the late arrivals that they can overtake the train at will.

“Do you believe in war yet? And how long do you believe you can keep out of it? The French Emperor’s real reluctance is not knowing what England might do with a change of Government, what Tory counsels might advise, and what possible alliance with Russia might ensue if it was once clearly seen what the aggressive designs of France meant. Many here assert (and not fools either) that L. Nap. has decided on taking the old ‘Cisalpine Gaul’ (with Turin, &c.).”

_To Mr Alexander Spencer._

“Florence [or Spezzia], _June 17_,1866.

“I am in the midst of great difficulties. Chapman & Hall, after years of intercourse, have shown the cloven foot, and are displaying [tactics] which, if successful, will wrest from me all my copyrights and leave me ruined. The story is long and intricate, nor could I at all events bore you with a recital which nothing but time, temper, and good management may conduct to a good result. My present anxiety is [to know] if [ ] remitted to you £60 to go towards the insurances. He says he did, but he is well capable of deceiving me. I had half a mind to go over to England the other day and put the affair into a lawyer’s hands, but my difficulty was to know how, having begun such litigation, I was to bear its charges and at the same time earn my daily bread.

“Fred Chapman is now here, having come out to induce me to give him an assignment of all my copyrights as security for a debt they claim against me of £2500, but which I utterly deny and dispute.

“Drop me one line to say if the £60 has reached you.

“How are you all, and how does time treat you? I am growing terribly old--older than I ever thought or feared I should feel myself. Does my last book please you? Some of my critics call it my best; but I have lost faith in them as in myself, and I write as I live--from hand to mouth.

“My poor old friend James has just died at Venice, an utter break-up of mind having preceded the end.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, _June_ 24, 1866.

“I see by the telegram that the Whigs have resigned, and it is [Lord Dunkellin’s] jaw-bone has slain the giant. Oh dear, do you know him? He dined here with us some short time ago, with Gregory and some others, and we thought him the poorest thing of the lot.

“I have great doubts that our people can form an Administration. They have the cane too, it is true, to help them; but they may have to give all the plums to their supporters, and their old friends won’t like eating the ‘dough’ for _their_ share of the pudding.

“Worse than this is the miserable press of the Party. Can’t men see that the whole tone of public opinion in England has taken the Italian side of the Venetian question? There is no longer a right and wrong in these things when sympathies--and something stronger than sympathies--come in; and the stupid ‘Standard’ goes on raving about treaties scarcely a rag of which remain, and which every congress we have held since ‘13 has only demolished some part of. If Austria be wise and fortunate she will take Silesia and make peace with Italy, ceding Venice. What every one wants is securities against France; but we have converted the brigand into a sheriffs officer, and thrown an air of legality over all his robberies.

“That Europe endures the insolence of his late letter is the surest evidence of the miserable cowardice of the age.

“The scene of the king’s departure here was very touching. He left at 3 o’clock on Monday, just as day was breaking, but the whole city was up and in the streets to take leave of him. All the ladies in their carriages, and the great squares crammed as I never saw them on Monday. The king was so moved that he could not speak, and the enthusiasm was really overwhelming. If this army gets a first success it will dash on gallantly and do well; if it be repulsed----

“Should the Conservatives come in, will they have the wit to offer the mission here to Hudson? It would do more for them as a party than forty votes in the House. It would stop at once the lurking suspicion as to their retrograde tendencies in Italy, on which Palmerston taunted them, and by which he kept them out of office for years.

“I own I have no confidence in the world-wisdom of Conservatives. They know the Carlton, and they know, not thoroughly but a good deal of, the ‘House’; but of Englishmen at large and the nation,--of what moderate, commonplace, fairly educated and hard-headed people say and think,--they know nothing. But one has only to look at them to see that they represent idiosyncrasies, not classes. Lytton and Disraeli are only types of two families.

“How well the Yankees have behaved in this Fenian brawl! Let us not be slow to acknowledge it. If I were a man in station I would say, now is the time to pay all Alabama claims, and not higgle whether we owe them or not. Now is the moment not to be outdone in generosity, but say let us have done once and for ever with this miserable bickering--let us criticise each other frankly and fairly, but in the spirit of men who wish each other well. As for _us_, we want one ally who will really understand _us_, and if we could once get the Yankee to see that we meant to be civil to him, we _might_ make a foundation for a friendship that would serve us in our day of need.

“We are actually deluged now with war correspondents--‘Times,’ ‘Post,’ ‘Telegraph,’ ‘D. News,’ &c. By the way, what a series might be made of M’Caskey’s advices for the war: insolent braggart notices of what was and what ought to have been done, &c. I thought of it yesterday when I had a lot of these war Christians at dinner.

“Only think, there is a Queen’s messenger called Nigor Hall (Byng Hall, or, as the Frenchmen call him, ‘Bunghole’) who, criticising Tony Butler, said I had made a gross blunder in making him lose his despatches. Now the same B. H. has just lost the whole Constantinople bag on arriving at Marseilles, and Louis Nap. is diligently conning over Lyons’ last missives to F. O. and seeing what game we are ‘trying on’ to detach Russia from France.

“P.S.--I send an instalment of ‘Sir B.’ and let me have it early, as I am drawing towards the ‘Tattenham corner of the race.’ I want to see how it looks. Read it carefully, and give me your shrewdest criticism.

“I have just heard that there is a plot here to carry off Cook’s excursionists for ransom by the brigands. What a good ‘O’Dowd’ it would make to warn them!

“The first shot is to be fired by the Italians tomorrow, the anniversary of ‘St Martin’s,’ which they think they won!”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, _June_ 28, [1866].

“I begin this at midnight, the first cool moment of the twenty-four hours, to finish to-morrow some time before post hour. I see that you have learned our disaster here already--a sore blow, too, to a young army: but _que voulez-vous?_ La Marmora is an ass, with a small head and a large face like Packington. You might make a first lord of him, but never a general. The attack of the first division had never been intended to do more than draw out the Austrians and encourage the belief that the _grand_ attack was to follow: meanwhile Cialdini was to have crossed the Po and moved on Rovigo. The blundering generals made a real movement of it, and got a real thrashing for their pains. The division was all but cut to pieces. They fought well--there’s no doubt of it; they even bore beating, which is more than one would have said of them. The king was twice surrounded and all but made prisoner, and the princes behaved splendidly.

“It is a great misfortune that they should have met a repulse at first. I say this because they _must_ have Venice, and I think the great thing is that they should have it without French intervention. I hope if the Conservatives come in that they will see this, and see that Italy cannot go back without being a French province. If we have a policy at all,--sometimes I doubt it,--it is to prevent or _delay_ French aggrandisement. That stupid bosh of volunteer soldiering has so bemuddled English brains that they fancy we have an army. Why, a costermonger with his donkey might as well talk of his ‘steed.’ I wouldn’t say this to a foreigner, nor let them say it to _me_, but it’s true. If we could patch up the Italian quarrel and get Venice for them, and arrange an alliance between Italy and Austria, we should do more than by following the lead of Louis Napoleon and playing ‘cad’ to him through Europe.

“Are the Derbys really coming in? Who will be F. Secretary? I was going to say, ‘Who wants me?’

“I was thinking of keeping a running comment on the war in ‘O’Dowd,’ the events jotted as they occurred, with such remarks as suggested themselves--a hotch-potch of war, morals, politics, &c. What think you? Of course, with a certain seriousness; it is no joking matter, in any view one takes of it.

“What a wonderful book ‘Felix Holt’ is! I read much of it twice over, some of it three times, and throughout there is a restrained power--a latent heat--far greater than anything developed. She at least suggests to _me_ that her _dernier mot_ is not there on _anything_. It is not a pleasant book as to the effect on the mind when finished; but you cannot forget it, and you cannot take up another after it. It is years since anything I read has taken the same hold upon me.

“Here has just come news that General Chiera has been shot by court-martial for treason, having betrayed the Italian plans to the Austrians. What next? The Neapolitans have earned a dark fame for themselves in all their late history. I don’t know yet if the story is authentic.

“I have little confidence in the Tories’ hold of office, and I have less still that they will do anything for me, though there is scarcely a man of the Party who has not given me pledges or assurances of remembrance.

“Malmesbury will, I hear, go to Ireland, and he will _do_ there. There is not a people in the world who can vie with the Irish in their indifference to _real_ benefits, and their intense delight in _mock_ ones! When will you Saxons learn how to govern Ireland? When you want a treaty with King Hoolamaldla in Africa, you approach him not with a tariff and a code of reduced duties, but with strings of beads, bell-wire, and brass buttons, and why won’t you see that Ireland can be had by something cheaper than Acts of Parliament!

“And my old friend Whiteside is to [be] Chief-Justice if Baron Lendrick (I mean Lefroy) will consent to retire! It is a grand comment on our judicial system, that when a man is too old for public life he is always young enough for the Bench.

“They once thought of putting me forward for Trinity Col. If I were ten years younger and ten pounds richer, I’d like to try my chance. I think I could do the light-comedy line in the House better than Bernai Osborne, and I’d like to _say_, before I die, some of the things that I now can only write.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _July_ 2,1866.

“This Italian defeat was even worse than we thought it: the loss of men was tremendous, and a great number of officers were killed. Of course there are all sorts of stories of treason, treachery, &c,--nothing Italian ever happens without these; but I believe the whole mishap was bad generalship, a rash over-confidence, and a proportionate contempt for the Austrians, whom they believed to be all inferior troops, the best being sent to the north under Benedek.

“You are not likely to have any very accurate information in England, as La Marmora positively refuses to permit newspaper writers to accompany the army; and Hardman, though known to him, fares no better than the rest.

“I have learned, from what I know to be a good source of information, that the French mean to come in at once if the next battle be unfavourable to the Italians. This is the worst thing that can happen. It seals the vassalage of this people to France, and places the question of Rome and the Pope for ever out of Italian hands and in those of their ‘magnanimous ally,’ whom may God confound! Ricasoli sees this plainly enough; but what can he do, or where turn him for aid?

“And so Lord Stanley’s in F. O.! I suspect he knows very little of the Continent,--but it matters little. The limits of ‘English policy’ are fixed by the homilies of the Church, and we are to hope and pray, &c., and to get any one who likes it to believe it signifies what we do. We hear here of a great Prussian victory over Benedek: I hope it’s not true. These Prussians, in their boastful audacity, coarse pretension, and vulgar self-sufficiency, are the Yankees of Europe, and, if they have a success, will be unendurable.

“I am sorry for the fate of the ‘Reform’ O’Dowd. I have begun one about the war here, and agree with you it is a theme to be _grave_ upon. Indeed, I think any unseasonable levity would utterly spoil the spirit of these papers, and being separated, as they are, under various headings, it is always easy to give the proper tint and colour to each.

“Lowe ought to have the Colonies, not Lytton. _He_ knows the subject well, and has infinitely more House of Commons stuff in him than the bewigged old dandy of Knebworth. If Lord Derby gives all the ‘plums’ to the Tories, the Administration will fall; and Naas, as Irish Secretary, is another blunder. Where are the ‘_under_’ Sees, to be found? I fear that the Cabinet, like the army, will be a failure for want of non-commissioned officers. Serjeant Fitzgerald is not in the House, and a great loss he is. Gregory would not ill replace him, and the opportunity to filch votes from the other side by office should not be lost sight of. It can be done _now_. It will be impossible later on.

“Of all the things the Party want, there is nothing they need like a press. I think that the advocacy of ‘The Standard’ would actually put Heaven in jeopardy, and ‘The Herald’ seems a cross between Cassandra and Moore’s Prophetic Almanac.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _July_ 12, 1866.

“I am rather eagerly--half-impatiently--looking out for O’D. in proof, and some tidings from yourself in criticism. I have gone over ‘Sir B.,’ and send it off corrected by this post. I more than suspect that I think it better than you do, or rather, that I think it is better than some parts you approved more of; but it’s no new error of mine to find good in things of my writing that nobody but myself has ever discovered. With respect to the present part, I think probably it is too long for one paper, and might advantageously stop at chap, xx., leaving the ‘Starlight’ to begin Sept. No.

“If you agree with me, it will save me writing so much in this great heat (the thermometer is now 94° in my room), and I shall be free to watch the war notes.

“I want money, but don’t cross your bill to Magnay for two reasons. I _might_ get better exchange elsewhere; and second, I have overdrawn him damnably, and he might be indelicate enough to expect payment.

“I hope the Party mean to do somewhat for me. It’s an infernal shame to see Earle in the list and me--nowhere. For thirty years I have done them good service in novels and other ways, and they have given me what an under butler might hesitate over accepting.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _July_ 16, 1866.

“I send you by this post the corrected proof of O’D. and a portion to add to the war notes. It’s ticklish work prophesying nowadays; but so far as I can see, the imbroglio with France promises to become serious. We hear here that a strong fleet is at Toulon ready to sail for the Adriatic, and coupling this with the flat refusal of the Prince Napoleon to interfere (he being intensely Italian in his leanings), one may see that the French policy will not be over regardful of the feelings of this people. Genoa is being armed in haste, the sea-forts all munitioned and mounted with heavy guns; and as these cannot be intended against Austria, it is pretty clear that at last the Italians mean to strike a _real_ blow for freedom. Spezzia, too, is arming, and the inaction heretofore observable in the Italian fleet may not improbably be ascribed to the fact that tougher work is before them than a petty fight with the Austrian flotilla. The Italians have fourteen ironclads, some of them really splendid ships, and one, the _Affondatore_, lately built in England, the equal of almost any afloat. They are well armed and well manned; and though I don’t think they could _beat_ the French, they could make a strong fight against the _French Mediterranean squadron_, and would, I am sure, not bring discredit on their service. I am sure the ‘country’--I mean the people of England--would go with the Government that would succour a young nation struggling to assert its liberty. I do not mean that we should rashly proclaim war, but simply show that the national sympathy of England was opposed to all coercion of Italy and averse to seeing the Peninsula a French province. I feel certain Louis Napoleon would listen to such remonstrances coming from a _Conservative_ Cabinet, where ‘meddling and muddling’ were not traditions.

“The Emperor counts so completely on English inaction that the mere show of a determined policy would arrest his steps. The complexity of the game increases every hour, and any great battle fought in Germany may decide the fate of Italy.

“You will see how my first part of O’D. predicted the cession of Venice. I am rather proud of my foresight.

“There is great dissatisfaction here felt about the inaction of the Italian fleet. Some allege they want coals, some say courage. I don’t believe either: I think they were sent off so undisciplined and so hastily ‘conscripted,’ they are mobs and not crews.

“P. S.--I only wanted to say, not to be afraid of my anti-Napism. I am sure I have the right measure of the man, and I am sure that when Lord Palmerston called him ‘a d------d scoundrel,’ he said what Lord Derby thinks, and what almost every man of the same station in England feels about him. When the day comes that he will turn upon us, there will be no surprise felt whatever by the great number of _statesmen_ in England.

“What of my Yankee paper? It was so _well-timed_, I’m sorry it should be lost.

“What a fiasco the Garibaldians have made of it! They are drunk all day, and it is next to impossible to get them under fire. Poor old Garibaldi is half heartbroken at the inglorious ending of his great career, and no fault of his. For the nation at large it is perhaps the best thing that could happen. Democracy cannot now go on asserting its monopoly of courage.”

_To Mr John Blackwood._

“Villa Morelli, Florence, _July_ 18, 1866.

“Our post is so very irregular now that your letter--13th--which should have been with me yesterday, only reached to-day.

“I don’t think I am wrong as to Louis Nap. The immense preponderance in Europe that will accrue to Prussia after this war will be heavily felt by him,--for, after all, he has no other hold on Frenchmen than the supremacy he has obtained for France on the Continent.

“I am ashamed to find Lord Stanley falling into the Whig cant about our ‘faithful ally,’ &c. Why, the whole world knows that he first traded on the English alliance, and, once assured of her own safety, has spared no means to depreciate English power and disparage her influence in Europe.

“Lord Derby spoke more truthfully and more boldly when he disclaimed all over-close alliance with any nation of Europe, but friendship and good relations with all. The _point_ of the speech was aimed at France.

“What the French Emperor wanted to do was to employ Plonplon to mediate between himself and Italy, so that, while seeming to France to be the Great Disposer of Continental destinies, he should not so far insult Italy as to stimulate another Orsini. Plonplon refused: he too aspires to Italian popularity, and is a d------d coward besides. He declined the Italian commission, and would not leave Paris. The Emperor has scores of agents here. Pepoli (step-father of the Hohenzollern hospodar) is always on the watch for him, and keeps him warned, and he has now shown him the necessity of great caution, so that his next move will be well considered before taken.

“The Emperor has never outgrown the Carbonari. Talking of outgrowing, what rot was that of Dizzy’s to say England had outgrown the Continent, and hence her grand pacific policy, &c, &c.? If so, why at the instigation of the Continent order 100,000 breechloaders? This was talk for a few old ladies at a social science tea,--not language to be listened to by the world at large.

“How much less adroit was Dizzy, too, than Lord Derby at ‘reform.’ The plain assertion that it was a measure only to be approached after due and weighty consideration was enough; but Dizzy must go on to say why, if they should touch it, they were the best of all possible reformers. The palpable want of tact reveals in this man how the absence of the true ‘gentleman element’ can spoil a great intellect.

“And, since I sent off my O’D. on ‘The American Alliance,’ I have read Lord Derby’s speech, full of complimentary things to the Yankees and plainly indicating the wish to draw closer to them. I think my paper will be well-timed--that is, if it has reached you, for I despatched it ten days ago by F. O., and have heard nothing of it since.

“I cannot write to Bulwer, nor indeed to any one, about myself. Three or four of the present Cabinet know me well enough, and what I’m good for; and if they do not improve the acquaintance, it is because they don’t want me.

“I own to you I think it hard--d------d hard; but I have grown so used to see myself passed by donkeys, that I begin to think it is the natural thing. If I were not old and pen-weary, with paroxysms of stupidity recurring oftener than is pleasant, and a growing sense besides that these disconnected links of muddle-headedness will one day join and become a chain of downright feebleness,--if not for all this, I say, ‘I’d pitch my blind gods to the devil’ (meaning Ministers and Sees. of State), and take my stand by the broadsheet, and trust to my head and my hands to take care of me.

“I like Lord Derby’s allusion to Ireland. Let him only discard the regular traders on party,--disconnect himself with the clique who, so to say, farmed out Ireland for the benefit of a party,--and he has a better chance of _governing the country_--I mean real government--than any of his predecessors.

“Spenser [‘Fairy Queen’ Spenser) once said, ‘No people love Justice more than your Irish.’ Probably because it was always a rarity. If Lord D. will ignore religious differences,--not ask more than each man’s fitness for office, and appoint him,--he will do much towards breaking down that terrible barrier that now separates the two creeds in the island.

“It is lucky for you that I’m at the end of my paper, or you were ‘in’ for a ‘sixteenthly.’ But, oh where, and oh where, is my Yankee paper gone? I want the sheets of ‘Sir B.’ collectively from the part where the last missive ended. I am re-reading and pondering.

“I half suspect my old friend Whiteside must be in some tiff with the Cabinet. He has not resigned, and yet men are canvassing for his seat for the University. It all looks very odd. It may be that he is bargaining for the Chancellorship, which he is certainly _not_ fit for. I might as well ask to be Mistress of the Robes,--and old Lefroy will not resign unless his son be promoted to the Bench! And this is the man they accuse of senility and weak intellect!

“How like flunkies, after all, are these great gentlemen when it becomes a question of place. There is a dash of ‘Jeames’ through Cabinet appointments positively frightful.

“Wasn’t it cunning to send Garibaldi where he could do nothing? It was the way they muzzle a troublesome man in the House by putting him on a committee. He (G.) grumbles sorely, says he ought to be in Istria, &c.; but there is always the _dessous des cartes_ in this war, and France has had to be consulted or conciliated everywhere.”

_To Dr Burbidge._

“Villa Morelli, _July_ 21, 1866.

“I take shame to myself for not having sooner replied to your kindest of notes and thanked you for all your trouble at Malta; but first of all I was obliged to go to Spezzia, and then came the wondrous turn-out of the Whigs, which has kept me in close correspondence with scores of people,--no other good result, however, having come of the advent of my friends to power.

“Malta, at all events, is out of the question; for though they have got no further than civil messages to me, common report (a common liar, says Figaro) says that I _ought_ to get something.

“The war absorbs fortunately thoughts that might under other circumstances have taken a more personal turn, and the war resolves itself pretty much into what that arch scoundrel, L. N., may do next. For the moment he is all but stalemated--that is, he can scarcely move without a check. If he aid Prussia, it will be to strengthen the great Germany that he dreads, and aggrandise the Power that threatens to be more than his rival. If he assist Austria, it is to throw off Italy and undo the past. If he remain neutral, it is to let France subside into the position of seeing Europe able to do without her.

“The armed intervention which he desired with us and Russia we will have none of. He is, as Bright said of somebody the other day, ‘a bad fellow to hunt a tiger with.’

“Now, Prussia was so manifestly in the wrong at first, and had contrived to be so unpopular with us besides, and Bismarck’s views were so palpably false and tricky, he could have no sympathy with us at all,--and yet success (that dear idol of Englishmen) has done fully as much as the best principles and the purest ambition could, and we are rapidly becoming Prussian.

“I own that I am extremely Prussian. I see no hope of any barrier against France but a strong-big-ambitious-non-scrupulous Germany.