LONDON, _British Museum_, _June 6, 1862_.
DEAR FRIEND: I begin to catch a glimpse of the end of my troubles. My
report to the International Jury, written in the purest Anglo-Saxon,
without a single word derived from the French, was read by me yesterday,
and the matter is concluded in that quarter. There remains another
report for me to make to my own Government. I think I shall be free in a
few days, and I may be able, probably, to leave for Paris from the 15th
to the 20th of this month. It will be well for you to write to me before
the 15th, where you will be then and what your plans are.
I think, decidedly, that the Exhibition is a _fiasco_. In vain do the
Commissioners advertise extensively and sound the trumpet; they cannot
succeed in attracting a crowd. To pay expenses, they need fifty thousand
visitors a day, and they are far from realising their expectations.
Fashionable people do not attend since the admission has been reduced to
a shilling, and common people do not seem to feel any interest in it.
The restaurant is detestable. The American restaurant is the only one
that is interesting. There you may order drinks more or less diabolical,
which are taken with straws: mint julep, or “corpse reviver.” All these
drinks are made of gin, more or less disguised.
I have invitations to dinner for every day until the 14th. After that I
shall make a visit to Oxford, in order to see Mr. Max Müller, and to
examine some old manuscripts in the Bodleian Library. I shall then
leave. I am tired to death with British hospitality and with its
dinners, all of which seem to have been prepared by the same
inexperienced cook. You cannot imagine how eagerly I long to eat my own
plain soup. By the way, I do not remember if I told you that my old cook
was to leave me, to go to live on her property. She has been with me for
thirty-five years. This is exasperating to the last degree, for nothing
is so disagreeable to me as new faces.
I do not know which of two important events of the last few days has
produced the greater effect: one, the defeat of two favourites at the
Derby by an unknown horse; the other, the over-throw of the Tories in
the House of Commons. These have overspread London with gloomy
countenances, all extremely unpleasant to behold. A young lady in a box
swooned away on learning that Marquis was beaten a head’s length by a
rustic horse minus a pedigree. M. Disraeli puts on a better countenance,
for he shows himself at all the balls. Good-bye, dear friend.