Chapter CXCI: PARIS, March 24, 1859

Were you free to-day? To my distress, I supposed I was engaged for the whole day, which prevented me from writing and asking to see you. At the last moment I found myself perfectly free, with all the chagrin that you may imagine.

I am glad if my article on Prescott’s work has pleased you. I am not too well satisfied with it myself, because I have not said half of what I wished to say, in accordance with the aphorism of Philip II, that one should speak only well of the dead. The work is really mediocre, and not even interesting. It seems to me that if the author had been less of a Yankee he might have done something better....