N.W. SENIOR.
February 27, 1853.
My dear Tocqueville,—I profit by Sir H. Ellis's visit to write, not venturing to trust the post.
We are grieved to hear that both you and Madame de Tocqueville have been suffering. We have borne this disagreeable winter better than perhaps we had a right to expect; but still we have suffered.
Mrs. Grote tells me that you rather complain that the English newspapers approve of the marriage;[5] a marriage which you all disapprove.
The fact is that we like the marriage precisely because you dislike it. We are above all things desirous that the present tyranny should end as quickly as possible. It can end only by the general alienation of the French people from the tyrant; and every fault that he commits delights us, because it is a step towards his fall. To say the truth, I wonder that you do not take the same view, and rejoice over his follies as leading to his destruction.
Our new Government is going on well as yet. As the Opposition has turned law reformers, we expect law reform to go on as rapidly as is consistent with the slowly-innovating temper of the English. Large measures respecting charities, education, secondary punishments, and the transfer of land are in preparation, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer is at work on the difficult—I suspect the insoluble—problem of an equitable income tax. I foresee, however, a rock ahead.
This is reform of the constituencies. Lord John Russell, very sillily, promised two years ago a new Reform Bill.
Still more sillily he introduced one last year, and was deservedly turned out for it.
Still more sillily the present Government has accepted his responsibility, and is pledged to bring in a measure of reform next year.