that brings up Tidings of the Sea twice in the twenty-four hours, and on which I sail in my Boat whenever I can.
I must add a P.S. to say that having written my half-yearly Letter to Carlyle, just to ask how he was, etc., I hear from his Niece that he has been to his own Dumfries, has driven a great deal about the Country: but has returned to Chelsea very weak, she says, though not in any way ill. He has even ceased to care about Books; but, since his Return, has begun to interest himself in them a little again. In short, his own Chelsea is the best Place for him.
Another reason for this other half Sheet is—that—Yes! I wish very much for your Translation of the Vita Nuova, which I did read in a slovenly (slovenly with Dante!) way twenty or thirty years ago, but which I did not at all understand. I should know much more about it now with you and Mr. Lowell.
I could without ‘roaring’ persuade you about Don Quixote, I think; if I were to roar over the Atlantic as to ‘Which is the best of the Two Parts’ in the style of Macaulay & Co. ‘Oh for a Pot of Ale, etc.,’ rather than such Alarums. Better dull Woodbridge! What bothered me in London was—all the Clever People going wrong with such clever Reasons for so doing which I couldn’t confute. I will send an original Omar if I find one.
Woodbridge. October 5/76.
My dear Cowell,
. . . I bought Clemencin’s Quixote after all: but have looked little into him as yet, as I had finished my last Reading of the Don before he came . . . I fear his Notes are more than one wants about errors, or inaccuracies of Style, etc. Cervantes had some of the noble carelessness of Shakespeare, Scott, etc., as about Sancho’s stolen Dicky. [202] But why should Clemencin, and his Predecessors, decide that Cervantes changed the title of his second Part from ‘Hidalgo’ to ‘Caballero’ from negligence? Why should he not have intended the change for reasons of his own? Anyhow, they should have printed the Title as he printed it, and pointed out what they thought the oversight in a Note. This makes one think they may have altered other things also: which perhaps I shall see when I begin another Reading: which (if I live) won’t be very far off. I think I almost inspired Alfred Tennyson (who suddenly came here a Fortnight ago) to begin on the Spanish. Yes: A. T. called one day, after near twenty years’ separation, and we were in a moment as if we had been together all that while. He had his son Hallam with him: whom I liked much: unaffected and unpretentious: so attentive to his Father, with a humorous sense of his Character as well as a loving
and respectful. It was good to see them together. We went one day down the Orwell and back again by Steamer: but the weather was not very propitious. Altogether, I think we were all pleased with our meeting.
To C. E. Norton.