CHAPTER XXII.

LETTERS For 1853.

To the REV. HUGH PEARSON,* Sonning.

New Year's Day, 1853.

I THANK you, dearest Mr. Pearson, for your most kind note. I know you will come and see me when you can, just as you would any other poor old woman in similar plight, or rather sooner; because you can do me more good.

So you really like "Esmond." But I can not quarrel with one of the things that I love best in you—the faculty of finding, in every thing, all that there is to like. For my part, I thought it painful, and unpleasant, and false-I mean the lovestory; and which, I suppose, is still worse in a novel, tedious and long. I demur, too, to much of the criticism. Did you ever observe how much Macaulay has studied Bolingbroke? But the modern author has the great fault of constantly drawing attention to his style. We are always thinking, How brilliant! Whereas, in reading his far greater predecessor, one never stops to exclaim and admire, the medium is so pellucid that we see straight to the thought. The words and their arrangement are so exquisite, that it seems as if no other were possible. No: I can not take pleasure in modern English novels. Luckily, we have French ones, and although Balzac be gone, we have Dumas in his place. I was pleased and surprised to find him, Dumas, in the midst of such depreciation of Casimir Delavigne (according to the old quarrel of classic and romantic), quoting those charming ballads, which I have been collecting for two or three years past, and of which not one-half are published in his Poesies. Do you know them? They are worth all Lamartine and Alfred de Vigny, and almost all of Victor Hugo.

Adieu, dear friend. I am going on very well, and am quite

*The Rev. Hugh Pearson was preferred in 1841 to the Rectory of Sonning. A kindred taste for literature attracted him to Miss Mitford, and he became one of her most valued friends.

a pattern of quietness and obedience. Always affectionately yours. All happiness to you and yours.

M. R. MITFORD.

To MRS. JENNINGS, Portland Place.

Swallowfield, Jan. 3, 1853. All that love-story in "Esmond" is detestable; and, which is still worse, the book seems to me long and tedious. A clever young man, writing to me about it from Trinity College, Cambridge, said: "I took it with me into the Theological Hall, and listened to the Professor by preference." I dare say he did. Then I demur to the criticism,-holding with Hazlitt, that Steele is worth twenty Addisons. And he underrates Bolingbroke (of course I am not speaking of his infidelity, but of his style); as a prose writer he was one of the greatest of his day.

You are quite right about the "Blithedale Romance." Hawthorne is writing another, which I hope will redeem his reputation. I had the pleasure of sending him word a month ago of a Russian translation of the "House of the Seven Gables." Mrs. Stowe, from the poorest of the poor, is become quite a millionaire, having purchased a fine house and grounds with part of her book money. She, too, is at work on another tale. I never read "Uncle Tom's Cabin," having stopped short at a hundred pages. They were so painful, so unpleasant, so exaggerated, and so sure to injure their own cause, that I had no taste for the matter. That slavery is the great difficulty of a great nation, and it must not be treated by appeals to the passions. Mr. Bentley is pressing me of all things for another series. If it please God that I recover, I suppose I must try. I knew you would come round to Louis Napoleon-the only great man since his uncle. How graciously and gratefully he does every thing and says every thing. Adieu, dear friend. I am going on well. Ever affectionately yours, M. R. MITFORD.

I send you the best poem I have seen on the death of the duke. The new duke has not yet signed his title; he still writes "Douro"-rather a good sign.

TO MISS GOLDSMID, Summerhill, Tonbridge.

Swallowfield, Jan. 4, 1853. No; I have not yet read the "Life and Letters of Thomas Moore." Very many years ago I used to see much of him in a house which gathered together all that was best of the great Whig party-Mr. Perry's, the editor and proprietor of the "Morning Chronicle;" a man so genial and so accomplished, that, even when Erskine and Romilly and Tierney and Moore were present, he was the most charming talker at his own table. I saw Mr. Moore many years afterward at Mr. Walter's of the "Times." Such a contrast! I am speaking of old Mr. Walter-the shyest and awkwardest of men-who could not bear to hear the slightest allusion to the journal from which he derived both his fortune and his fame. The poet had arrived with Mr. Barnes, the editor, and put his host and his introducer into an agony by talking all through the dinner as frankly of the "Times" as he used to do at Mr. Perry's of the "Chronicle." It was a most amusing scene; and I think when I enlightened him upon the subject he was very glad of the mistake he had made. "They deserve it," said he to me," for being ashamed of what, rightly conducted, would be an honor." Two or three months afterward the paper had turned completely round.

I am reading Alexandre Dumas-I mean his "Mémoires." He is a strange, outspoken man, giving things their coarsest names, as our authors did in the Augustan age of Queen Anne; but the book is exceedingly amusing, and full of curious revelations. There is all the history of Marie-Stella, who pretended to be-perhaps was-changed for Louis Philippe. She, after marrying Lord Newborough, married, after his death, a Baron de Sternberg, and died in Paris, leaving many children by her first and one son by her second husband. Now this summer I have had several letters (about my own last work) from a Baroness de Sternberg, who dates from Belsfield, Windermere-most likely the wife, or widow, of this son.

I continue much as when I wrote; my arm still confined, and no power of the lower limbs; but I think I mend a little. Heaven bless you! Ever gratefully yours, M. R. M. P.S.—I had a letter to-day from an intimate friend of old

Mr. Croker, who says that he (Croker) is reading "Moore's Life" with huge delight. According to one's knowledge of the man, I should think that, in some future volume, Mr. Croker may chance to light upon something which will lessen the enchantment he now feels; unless, indeed, Lord John should pursue in literature, as in politics, the old Whiggish policy of treating his enemies better than his friends.

To the REV. WILLIAM HARNESS, Kensington Gore. Swallowfield, Jan., 1853. MY DEAR FRIEND,-I can quite conceive your tribulation amongst Christmas-trees and enthusiastic Tennysonians. Even in my youth I always detested the noise and nonsense of Christmas parties-a noise which, in my mind, whilst pretending to be gay but really killing all honest cheerfulness, makes me melancholy; and which is not improved by the dash of German sentimentality hanging, amongst other cloying tinsel, on the branches of the Christmas-tree.

As to the adorers of Alfred Tennyson, they unluckily haunt one at all seasons. I am well used to such speeches. Mrs. Browning used to say things very like it about her own. poetry. I like some of Alfred Tennyson's earlier poems; but I confess that I like them much less since all these pretended enthusiasts have made such a cry of him.

I have had a magnificent packet of portraits and autographs from America-a view of the house inhabited by Professor Longfellow, formerly Washington's head-quarters. Mr. Fields makes very light of this munificent present; but I am enchanted. What is very curious is, that the portrait of David Webster (the brother) is far more like Daniel than the one which bears the name of the great statesman. Mr. Fields says that he must know you when he returns to England.

I suppose I must look about for a garden-chair upon springs, easy and strong, that Sam may draw me about. It will not be thrown away; because, if I do my book, I shall like to write out of doors in the spring and summer, and Sam could deposit me in it, in the copse or under a tree, without danger of chill. As yet I have seen nobody except Mr. May and the Russells. How Lady Russell contrives to wade through the dirt I can't imagine, and it rains every

day. We have had no damp; but I fear that her side of Swallowfield must feel the constant inundations. One stream overflows one day and subsides another, the flood never staying. Ours is the Whitewater, theirs is the Blackwater, which rests upon the ground.

Did I tell you that Miss Goldsmid writes me word that the Jews are now pretty sure to get into Parliament! Several circumstances have combined, especially the death of the duke and the new ministry. I forget whether you are for or against. I, for my part, think that every one has a claim to the enjoyment of civil rights, were he Hindoo.or Mohammedan; and I shall be very glad that poor Sir Isaac, who has been the real worker of the movement, should live to see it accomplished. The very prospect has revived him greatly.

I had a long letter to-day from John Ruskin, who is in the Highlands with two young friends, the pre-Raphaelite painter and his brother, and his own beautiful wife. They are living in a hut on the borders of Loch Achray, playing at cottagers, as rich people like to do. His new volume of the "The Stones" is most beautiful. I am expecting Hawthorne in a week or two-his first visit out of Liverpool.

Adieu, my very dear friend. Say every thing for me to your dear people, and be sure to send back the ballads, with the check. Ever most affectionately yours,

M. R. MITFORD.

To the REV. WILLIAM HARNESS, Kensington Gore.

Swallowfield, Feb. 25, 1853.

I rejoice to hear of you, my dear friend, although the news be not so good as I could wish. I do trust that when the thaw really comes (here it has frozen again) your cough will disappear and your voice return. For my part, about a month ago I was getting on favorably-that is to say, I could just stand upon both feet for half a minute and drag one foot after the other for a yard or two by way of walking; but the moment the cold came the helplessness returned just as bad as at first, and the pain far worse.

Don't you like the Emperor's marriage? I shall transcribe for you a part of a letter which I have just received from *For the pension which Mr. H. received for her.