Compiègne, January 22, 1855.
It was a long time since I had seen your handwriting, my dear Senior, and
I was beginning to complain of you; your letter therefore was a double
pleasure.
I see that you have resumed your intention of visiting Algiers, and I am
anxious that you should carry it into effect.
I hope that we shall be in Paris when you pass through. We put off our
departure from day to day; not that we are kept by the charms of our
present abode; the house is too small for us and scantily furnished, but
I find it such a favourable retreat for study, that I have great
difficulty in tearing myself away from it.
I hear, as you do, with great satisfaction of the mutual good feeling of
our armies in the Crimea. It far exceeds my expectations.
But I am not equally pleased with your management of the war. The English
ought to know that what has passed and is passing there has sensibly
diminished their moral force in Europe. It is an unpleasant truth, but I
ought not to conceal it from you. I see proofs of it every day, and I
have been struck by it peculiarly in a late visit to Paris, where I saw
persons of every rank and of every shade of political opinion. The heroic
courage of your soldiers was everywhere and unreservedly praised, but I
found also a general belief that the importance of England as a military
Power had been greatly exaggerated; that she is utterly devoid of
military talent, which is shown as much in administration as in fighting;
and that even in the most pressing circumstances she cannot raise a large
army.
Since I was a child I never heard such language. You are believed to be
absolutely dependent on us; and in the midst of our intimacy I see rising
a friendly contempt for you, which if our Governments quarrel, will make
a war with you much easier than it has been since the fall of Napoleon.
I grieve at all this, not only as endangering the English alliance,
which, as you well know, I cherish, but as injuring the cause of liberty.
I can pardon you for discrediting it by your adulation of our despotism,
but I wish that you would not serve despotism more efficaciously by your
own faults, and by the comparisons which they suggest.
It seems also difficult to say what may not be the results of your long
intimacy with such a Government as ours, and of the contact of the two
armies. I doubt whether they will be useful to your aristocracy.
Remember me to Lord Lansdowne and to the Lewises, who added such pleasure
to our German tour.
Compiègne, February 15, 1855.
I conclude that this frightful weather is still keeping you in London, my
dear Senior. I am comforted by the fact that I myself shall not reach
Paris before the 28th.
I do not wish to act the part of the pedagogue in the fable who preaches
to people when his sermon can no longer be of any possible use, but I
cannot help telling you that it is a great imprudence on your part to
allow yourself to be caught in this way by the winter in England. What
you now suffer from is only a trifling malady, but it may become a real
illness if you persist in preferring pleasure to health. Pray think of
this in the future and do not tempt the devil.