w Year's Day you shall have it before
you. This, with the journey to Switzerland and three weeks of
indisposition afterwards, are an excuse for my silence.

It always gives me great and inexpressible pleasure when you _talk_ to me
by letter and _think aloud_. And this time I have been deeply touched by
it. I am convinced you have since then yourself examined the
considerations which oppose themselves to your bold and noble wish with
regard to the Punjab. What would become of your great work? I will not
here say what shall we in Europe do without you? Also; do you mean to go
_alone_ to Hapta Hendu, or as a married man? There you will never find a
wife. And would your intended go with you? And the _children_? All
Englishmen tell me it is just as unbearably hot in Lahore as in Delhi; in
_Umritsir_ there is no fresh air. No Sing goes to Cashmir because he who
reigns there would soon dispatch him out of the world at the time of the
fever.

By the by, what has become of your convert? Does he still smoke without
any scruple?

Your gorgeous Rig-veda at Brockhaus' frightens people here because of its
extent (they would have given up the Sanhita, satisfied with various
readings) and the exorbitant price. Others would willingly have had your
own Veda Grammar besides the Indian grammatical treatise, especially on
account of the Vedic forms. In fact you are admired, but criticised. You
must not allow this to annoy you. I find that Haug thinks about the
mythology nearly as I do.

Everything in Germany resolves itself more and more into pettinesses and
cliques, and the pitiful question of subsistence. "The many princes are
our good fortune, but poverty is our crime." Had not _Brunn_ offered
himself to take Braun's place, giving up his private tutorship, we must
have given up the Archaeological Institute at Rome! With difficulty Gerhard
has found _one_ man in Germany who could undertake the Italian printing of
the "Annali" (appearing, as you know, in Gotha). "Resta a vedere se lo
puo!" All who can, leave Prussia--and only blockheads or hypocrites are let
in, with the exception of physical science; whoever can do so turns
engineer, or goes into a house of business, or emigrates. My decided
advice on this account therefore is, reserve yourself for better times,
and stay at present in England, where you have really won a delightful
position for yourself.

Now for various things about myself. Every possible thing is done to draw
me a