I was very glad indeed to get a letter from you this morning. You here
may judge, by the very nature of things, that I lose no time in answering
it. I did not receive your Sicilian letter: and have been for a year and
half quite ignorant of what part of the world you were in. I supposed
you were alive: though I don't quite know why. De non existentibus et
non apparentibus eadem est ratio. I heard from Morton three months ago:
he was then at Venice: very tired of it: but lying on such luxurious
sofas that he could not make up his mind to move from them. He wanted to
meet you: or at all events to hear of you. I wrote to him, but could
tell him nothing. I have also seen Alfred once or twice since you have
gone: he is to be found in certain conjunctions of the stars at No. 8
Charlotte Street. . . . All our other friends are in statu quo: Spedding
residing calmly in Lincoln's Inn Fields: at the Colonial all day: at the
play and smoking at night: occasionally to be found in the Edinburgh
Review. Pollock and the Lawyer tribe travel to and fro between their
chambers in the Temple and Westminster Hall: occasionally varying their
travels, when the Chancellor chooses, to the Courts in Lincoln's Inn. As
to me, I am fixed here where your letter found me: very rarely going to
London: and staying there but a short time when I do go. You, Morton,
Spedding, Thackeray, and Alfred, were my chief solace there: and only
Spedding is now to be found. Thackeray lives in Paris.
From this you may judge that I have no such sights to tell of as you
have. Neither do _mortaletti_ ever go off at Boulge: which is perhaps
not to be regretted. Day follows day with unvaried movement: there is
the same level meadow with geese upon it always lying before my eyes: the
same pollard oaks: with now and then the butcher or the washerwoman
trundling by in their carts. As you have lived in Lincolnshire I will
not further describe Suffolk. No new books (except a perfectly insane
one of Carlyle, {82} who is becoming very obnoxious now that he is become
popular), nor new pictures, no music. A game at picquet of two hours
duration closes each day. But for that I might say with Titus--perdidi
diem. Oh Lord! all this is not told you that you may admire my
philosophic quietude, etc.; pray don't think that. I should travel like
you if I had the eyes to see that you have: but, as Goethe says, the eye
can but see what it brings with it the power of seeing. If anything I
had seen in my short travels had given me any new ideas worth having I
should travel more: as it is, I see your Italian lakes and cities in the
Picturesque Annuals as well as I should in the reality. You have a more
energetic, stirring, acquisitive, and capacious soul. I mean all this
seriously, believe me: but I won't say any more about it. Morton also is
a capital traveller: I wish he would keep notes of what he sees, and
publish them one day.
I must however tell you that I am becoming a Farmer! Can you believe in
this? I hope we shall both live to laugh over it together. When do you
mean to come back? Pray do not let so long a time elapse again without
writing to me: never mind a long letter: write something to say you are
alive and where. Rome certainly is nearer England than Naples: so
perhaps you are coming back. Bring Morton back with you. I will then go
to London and we will smoke together and be as merry as sandboys. We
will all sit under the calm shadow of Spedding's forehead. People talk
of a war with America. Poor dear old England! she makes a gallant shew
in her old age. If Englishmen are to travel, I am glad that such as you
are abroad--good specimens of Englishmen: with the proper fierte about
them. The greater part are poor wretches that go to see oranges growing,
and hear Bellini for eighteen-pence. I hope the English are as proud and
disagreeable as ever. What an odd thing that the Italians like such
martial demonstrations as you describe--not at all odd, probably--their
spirit begins and goes off in noise and smoke. It is like all other
grand aspirations. So ---'s Epics crepitate in Sonnets. All I ask of
you is to write no Sonnets on what you see or hear--no sonnets can sound
well after Daddy Wordsworth, ---, etc., who have now succeeded in quite
spoiling one's pleasure in Milton's--and they are heavy things. The
words 'subjective and objective' are getting into general use now, and
Donne has begun with _aesthetics_ and _exegetical_ in Kemble's review.
Kemble himself has written an article on the Emperor Nicholas which must
crush him. If you could read it, no salvos of _mortalletti_ could ever
startle you again. And now my paper is almost covered: and I must say
Good bye to you. This is Sunday March 21--a fine sunny blowing day. We
shall dine at one o'clock--an hour hence--go to Church--then walk--have
tea at six, and pass rather a dull evening, because of no picquet. You
will be sauntering in St. Peter's perhaps, or standing on the Capitol
while the sun sets. I should like to see Rome after all. Livy's lies
(as the aesthetics prove them to be) do at least animate one so far--how
far?--so far as to wish, and not to do, having perfect power to do.
Oh eloquent, just, and mighty Theory of Mortaletti!
_To W. H. Thompson_.
BOULGE HALL, WOODBRIDGE,
_March_ 26/41.