ever heard of them till I named them to him. They seem to me very
fine and classical, just like the best translations from some great
Latin writer. And I have been most struck with Edgar Poe, who has
been republished, prose and poetry, in a shilling volume called
"Readable Books." What a deplorable history it was!--I mean his
own,--the most unredeemed vice that I have met with in the annals of
genius. But he was a very remarkable writer, and must have a niche
if I write again; so must your two poets, Stoddard and Taylor. I am
very sorry you missed Mrs. Trollope; she is a most remarkable woman,
and you would have liked her, I am sure, for her warm heart and her
many accomplishments. I had a sure way to Beranger, one of my dear
friends being a dear friend of his; but on inquiring for him last
week, that friend also is gone to heaven. Do pick up for me all you
can about Louis Napoleon, my one real abiding enthusiasm,--the
enthusiasm of my whole life,--for it began with the Emperor and has
passed quite undiminished to the present great, bold, and able ruler
of France. Mrs. Browning shares it, I think; only she calls herself
cool, which I don't; and another still more remarkable
co-religionist in the L.N. faith is old Lady Shirley (of Alderley),
the writer of that most interesting letter to Gibbon, dated 1792,
published by her father, Lord Sheffield, in his edition of the great
historian's posthumous works. She is eighty-two now, and as active
and vigorous in body and mind, as sixty years ago.

Make my most affectionate love to my friend in the Avenue des Champs
Elysees, and believe me ever, my dear Mr. Fields, most gratefully
and affectionately yours,

M.R.M.

(No date)

Ah, my dearest Mr. Fields, how inimitably good and kind you are to
me! Your account of Rachel is most delightful, the rather that it
confirms a preconceived notion which two of my friends had taken
pains to change. Henry Chorley, not only by his own opinion, but by
that of Scribe, who told him that there was no comparison between
her and Viardot. Now if Viardot, even in that one famous part of
Fides, excels Rachel, she must be much the finer actress, having the
horrible drawback of the music to get over. My other friend told me
a story of her, in the modern play of Virginie; she declared that
when in her f