“I thank you heartily for the offer of a mount, but I have grown marvellously heavy, in more ways than one, this last year or two; and the phrase of my daughter when ordering my horse to be saddled may illustrate the fact, as she said, ‘Put the howdah on papa’s elephant.’
“Don’t fancy the Italians are not athletes. All the great performers of feats of strength come from Italy. Belzoni the traveller was one. They have a game here called Paettone, played with a ball as large as a child’s head and flung to an incredible distance, which combines strength, skill, and agility. Then as to swimming, I can only say that I and my two eldest daughters can cross Spezzia—the width is three miles,—and yet we are beaten hollow every season by Italians. They swim in a peculiar way, turning from side to side and using the arms alternately; and when there is anything of a sea they never top the waves, but shoot through them, which gives immense speed, but it is a process I never could master. We had a swim last year with old General Menegaldo, who swam the Lido with Byron: he is now eighty-four years old, and he swam a good mile along with us. I intend, if I can throw off my gout, to have a day or two in the blue water next week, though I suspect in your regions the idea would suggest a shiver. The weather is fine here now—in fact, too hot for many people.”
To Dr Burbidge.
“Casa Capponi, Florence, March 30, 1864.
“I was sorry to find last night that my proofs had not reached you, and as I want your opinion greatly, I send you mine, which I have not looked over yet.
“If it had not been for this detestable weather (and I can fancy how Spezzia looks in it, for even Florence is dismal) I’d have gone down to-day, for my wife has been a shade better since Sunday, and I want to have a good conscience and be assured that I cannot possibly find a house at Spezzia before I close for a little nook of a villa here—a small crib enough, but, like everything else, very dear.
“I have my misgivings, my more than misgivings, about the Derbys coming in. It is evident Lord D. does not wish power, and he is rather impatient at the hungry eagerness of poorer men, and so I suspect my own chances, if not to be tried now, will not be likely to survive for another occasion. I therefore resign myself, as people call what they cannot do more than grumble over, and ‘make my book’ to scribble on for a subsistence to the end.”
To Mr John Blackwood.
“Croce di Malta, Spezzia, April 6, 1864.
“Here I am visiting the authorities and being visited by them, playing off—and quite seriously too—the farce that we are all dignitaries, and of essential consequence to the States we severally serve. ‘How we apples swim!’ My only consolation is that there is no public to laugh at us—all the company are on the stage.