To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia, May 16, 1863.
“Thanks for your note and its enclosure, which reached me this morning.
“I am glad you have understood what, after I had sent it off, appeared to me a very unintelligible note, being in fact an attempt to explain what even to myself is not explicable—the [only] mode in which I can write a story.
“You are perfectly right as to looking at the thing in proof: it is the same test as the artists’ one of seeing their drawing in a looking-glass,—all that is good is confirmed, and all that is out of drawing or wrong in perspective is just as sure of being displayed strongly.
“If your opinion be favourable, the point which will most interest me to know is the time of publishing; for, seeing that I want some material which I can only obtain by personal intercourse, the longer the interval, moderately speaking, the better for me.
“Secondly. Should we travel this road together, I want to beg that you will be as free to tell me what you think of what I send as though I was the rawest recruit in literature. I never write with the same spirit as under such criticism—given when not too late to amend; and if anything reaches you that you think ill of, do not hesitate to say so at once. I can change—in fact, it is the one compensation for all the inartistic demerits of my way of work—I can change as easily as I can talk of changing. These are all that I want to stipulate for on my part; the rest is with you. I am so eager to get on, that when you send me a proof (I cannot till then) I’ll have at it at once. Meanwhile I lie in the sun and suck oranges.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Hôtel d’Odessa, Spezzia, May 28, 1863.
“Though I have been, not without some anxiety, waiting for a proof of my story, or some tidings of it,—for I cannot go on without a clue,—I now write to send you a paper on ‘Why Italy has not Done More,’ knowing from my own experiences the benefit of being early in Mag. ‘make up.’