. B. Cowell_.

12 MARINE TERRACE, LOWESTOFT.
_Feb._ 2/75.

MY DEAR COWELL,

. . . I hope you have read, and liked, the Paper on the old Kings of
Norway in last Fraser. I bought it because the Athenaeum told me it was
Carlyle's; others said it was an Imitation of him: but his it must be, if
for no other reason than that the Imitator, you know, always exaggerates
his Master: whereas in this Paper Carlyle is softened down from his old
Self, mellowed like old Wine. Pray read, and tell me you think so too.
It is quite delightful, whoever did it. I was on the point of writing a
Line to tell him of my own delight: but have not done so. . . .

I have failed in another attempt at Gil Blas. I believe I see its easy
Grace, humour, etc. But it is (like La Fontaine) too thin a Wine for me:
all sparkling with little adventures, but no one to care about; no
Colour, no Breadth, like my dear Don; whom I shall resort to forthwith.

_To W. F. Pollock_.

LOWESTOFT, _Sept._ 22, [1878].

MY DEAR POLLOCK,

You will scarce thank me for a letter in pencil: perhaps you would thank
me less if I used the steel pen, which is my other resource. You could
very well dispense with a Letter altogether: and yet I believe it is
pleasant to get one when abroad.

I dare say I may have told you what Tennyson said of the Sistine Child,
which he then knew only by Engraving. He first thought the Expression of
his Face (as also the Attitude) almost too solemn, even for the Christ
within. But some time after, when A. T. was married, and had a Son, he
told me that Raffaelle was all right: that no Man's face was so solemn as
a Child's, full of Wonder. He said one morning that he watched his Babe
'worshipping the Sunbeam on the Bedpost and Curtain.' I risk telling you
this again for the sake of the Holy Ground you are now standing on.

Which reminds me also of a remark of Beranger's not out of place. He
says God forgot to give Raffaelle to Greece, and made a 'joli cadeau' of
him to the Church of Rome.

I brought here some Volumes of Lever's 'Cornelius O'Dowd' Essays, very
much better reading than Addison, I think. Also some of Sainte Beuve's
better than either. A sentence in O'Dowd reminded me of your Distrust of
Civil Service Examinations: 'You could not find a worse Pointer than the
Poodle which would pick you out all the letters of the Alphabet.' And is
not this pretty good of the World we live in? 'You ask me if I am going
to "_The M