ome day of the generous appreciation which you and your
friends have paid me in advance.

Tennyson is a great poet, I think, and Browning, the author of
'Paracelsus,' has to my mind very noble capabilities. Do you know Mr.
Horne's 'Orion,' the poem published for a farthing, to the wonder of
booksellers and bookbuyers who could not understand 'the speculation
in its eyes?' There are very fine things in this poem, and altogether
I recommend it to your attention. But what is 'wanting' in Tennyson?
He can think, he can feel, and his language is highly expressive,
characteristic, and harmonious. I am very fond of Tennyson. He makes
me thrill sometimes to the end of my fingers, as only a true great
poet can.

You praise me kindly, and if, indeed, the considerations you speak of
could be true of me, I am not one who could lament having 'learnt in
suffering what I taught in song.' In any case, working for the future
and counting gladly on those who are likely to consider any work of
mine acceptable to themselves, I shall be very sure not to forget my
friends at Enfield.

Dear Mr. Westwood, I remain sincerely yours,
ELIZABETH B. BARRETT.

_To Mrs. Martin_
September 4, 1843. Finished September 5.

My dearest Mrs. Martin, ... I have had a great gratification within
this week or two in receiving a letter--nay, two letters--from Miss
Martineau, one of the last strangers in the world from whom I had any
right to expect a kindness. Yet most kind, most touching in kindness,
were both of these letters, so much so that I was not far from crying
for pleasure as I read them. She is very hopelessly ill, you are
probably aware, at Tynemouth in Northumberland, suffering agonies from
internal cancer, and conquering occasional repose by the strength of
opium, but 'almost forgetting' (to use her own words) 'to wish for
health, in the intense enjoyment of pleasures independent of the
body.' She sent me a little work of hers called 'Traditions of
Palestine.' Her friends had hoped by the stationary character of some
symptoms that the disease was suspended, but lately it is said to be
gaining ground, and the serenity and elevation of her mind are more
and more triumphantly evident as the bodily pangs thicken....

And now I am going to tell you what will surprise you, if you do not
know it already. Stormie and Georgie are passing George's vacation on
the Rhine. You are certainly surprised if you did not know it. Papa
signed and sealed them