d, that could not be. You know I do not
flatter. . . .

I declare I should like to go to India as well as any where: and I
believe it might be the best thing for me to do. But, always slow at
getting under way as I have been all my Life, what is to be done with one
after fifty! I am sure there is no longer any great pleasure living in
this Country, so tost with perpetual Alarms as it is. One Day we are all
in Arms about France. To-day we are doubting if To-morrow we may not be
at War to the Knife with America! I say still, as I used, we have too
much Property, Honour, etc., on our Hands: our outward Limbs go on
lengthening while our central Heart beats weaklier: I say, as I used, we
should give up something before it is forced from us. The World, I
think, may justly resent our being and interfering all over the Globe.
Once more I say, would we were a little, peaceful, unambitious, trading,
Nation, like--the Dutch! . . .

Adieu, My Dear Cowell; once more, Adieu. I doubt if you can read what I
have written. Do not forget my Love to your Wife. I wonder if we are
ever to meet again: you would be most disappointed if we were!

_To W. H. Thompson_.

MARKET HILL, WOODBRIDGE.
_Dec._ 9/61.

MY DEAR THOMPSON,

The MS. came safe to hand yesterday, thank you: and came out of its
Envelope like a Ray of Old Times to my Eyes. I wish I had secured more
leaves from that old '_Butcher's Book_' torn up in old Spedding's Rooms
in 1842 when the Press went to work with, I think, the Last of old
Alfred's Best. But that, I am told, is only a 'Crotchet.' However, had
I taken some more of the Pages that went into the Fire, after serving in
part for Pipe-lights, I might have enriched others with that which AT
{29} himself would scarce have grudged, jealous as he is of such sort of
Curiosity.

I have seen no more of Tannhauser than the Athenaeum showed me; and
certainly do not want to see more. One wonders that Men of some Genius
(as I suppose these are) should so disguise it in Imitation: but, if they
be very young men, this is the natural course, is it not? By and by they
may find their own Footing.

As to my own Peccadilloes in Verse, which never pretend to be original,
this is the story of _Rubaiyat_. I had translated them partly for
Cowell: young Parker asked me some years ago for something for Fraser,
and I gave him the less wicked of these to use if he chose. He kept them
for two years without using: and as I saw