r
days, and no water. Pretty, dimpled ground, covered with low vineyards;
purple hills, not high, with the sunsets clothing them. But I like the
place, and feel loth to return to Florence from this half-furnished
villa and stone floors. The weather is still very hot, but no longer
past bearing, and we are enjoying it, staying on from day to day. Robert
proposed Palermo instead of Rome, but I shrink a little from the
prospect of our being cut up into mincemeat by patriotic Sicilians,
though the English fleet (which he reminds me of) might obtain for you
and for England the most 'satisfactory compensation' of the pecuniary
kind. At Rome I shall not be frightened, knowing my Italians. Then there
will be more comfort, and, besides, no horrible sea-voyage. Some
Americans have told us that the Mediterranean is twice as bad as the
Atlantic. I always thought it _twice as bad as anything_, as people say
elegantly. We shall not leave Florence till November. Robert must see W.
Landor (his adopted son, Sarianna) settled in his new apartment, with
Wilson for a duenna. It's an excellent plan for him, and not a bad one
for Wilson. He will pay a pound (English) a week for his three rooms,
and she is to receive twenty-two pounds a year for the care she is to
take of him, besides what is left of his rations. Forgive me if Robert
has told you this already. Dear darling Robert amuses me by talking of
his 'gentleness and sweetness.' A most courteous and refined gentleman
he is, of course, and very affectionate to Robert (as he ought to be),
but of self-restraint he has not a grain, and of suspiciousness many
grains. Wilson will run certain risks, and I for one would rather not
meet them. What do you say to dashing down a plate on the floor when you
don't like what's on it? And the contadini at whose house he is lodging
now have been already accused of opening desks. Still, upon that
occasion (though there was talk of the probability of Landor's throat
being 'cut in his sleep'), as on other occasions, Robert succeeded in
soothing him, and the poor old lion is very quiet on the whole, roaring
softly, to beguile the time, in Latin alcaics against his wife and Louis
Napoleon. He laughs carnivorously when I tell him that one of these
days he will have to write an ode in honour of the Emperor, to please
_me_.

Little Pen has been in the utmost excitement lately about his pony,
which Robert is actually going to buy for him. I am said to be the
sp