we honoured the truth and courage in her,
rare in woman or man. The work she was preparing upon Italy would
probably have been more equal to her faculty than anything previously
produced by her pen (her other writings being curiously inferior to
the impressions her conversation gave you); indeed, she told me it was
the only production to which she had given time and labour. But,
if rescued, the manuscript would be nothing but the raw material. I
believe nothing was finished; nor, if finished, could the work
have been otherwise than deeply coloured by those blood colours of
Socialistic views, which would have drawn the wolves on her, with a
still more howling enmity, both in England and America. Therefore it
was better for her to go. Only God and a few friends can be expected
to distinguish between the pure personality of a woman and her
professed opinions. She was chiefly known in America, I believe, by
oral lectures and a connection with the newspaper press, neither of
them happy means of publicity. Was she happy in anything, I wonder?
She told me that she never was. May God have made her happy in her
death!

Such gloom she had in leaving Italy! So full she was of sad
presentiment! Do you know she gave a _Bible_ as a parting gift
from her child to ours, writing in it '_In memory of_ Angelo Eugene
Ossoli'--a strange, prophetical expression? That last evening a
prophecy was talked of jestingly--an old prophecy made to poor Marquis
Ossoli, 'that he should shun the sea, for that it would be fatal to
him.' I remember how she turned to me smiling and said, 'Our ship is
called the "Elizabeth," and I accept the omen.'

Now I am making you almost dull perhaps, and myself certainly duller.
Rather let me tell you, dearest Miss Mitford, how delightedly I look
forward to reading whatever you have written or shall write. You write
'as well as twenty years ago'! Why, I should think so, indeed. Don't I
know what your letters are? Haven't I had faith in you always? Haven't
I, in fact, teased you half to death in proof of it? I, who was a sort
of Brutus, and oughtn't to have done it, you hinted. Moreover, Robert
is a great admirer of yours, as I must have told you before, and has
the pretension (unjustly though, as I tell _him_) to place you still
higher among writers than I do, so that we are two in expectancy here.
May Mr. Chorley's periodical live a thousand years!

As my 'Seagull' won't, but you will find it in my new edition, an