Little Grange, Woodbridge.
February 28/78.
My dear Sir,
I ventured to send you Keats’ Love Letters to Miss—Brawne! a name in which there is much,
as you say of his, and other names. . . . Well, I thought you might—must—wish to see these Letters, and, may be, not get them so readily in Spain. So I made bold. The Letters, I doubt not, are genuine: whether rightly or wrongly published I can’t say: only I, for one, am glad of them. I had just been hammering out some Notes on Catullus, by our Cambridge Munro, Editor of Lucretius, which you ought to have; English Notes to both, and the Prose Version of Lucretius quite readable by itself. Well, when Keats came, I scarce felt a change from Catullus: both such fiery Souls as wore out their Bodies early; and I can even imagine Keats writing such filthy Libels against any one he had a spite against, even Armitage Brown, had Keats lived two thousand years ago. . . .
I had a kind letter lately from Mr. Norton: and have just posted him some Carlyle letters about that Squire business. If you return to America before very long you will find them there. How long is your official Stay in Spain? Limited, or Unlimited? By the bye of Carlyle, I heard from his Niece some weeks ago that he had been poorly: but when she wrote, himself again: only taking his daily walk in a Carriage, and sitting up till past Midnight with his Books, in spite of Warnings to Bed. As old Voltaire said to his Niece on like occasion, ‘Qu’est ce que cela fait si je m’amuse?’ I have from Mudie a sensible
dull Book of Letters from a Miss Wynn: with this one good thing in it. She has been to visit Carlyle in 1845: he has just been to visit Bishop Thirlwall in Wales, and duly attended Morning Chapel, as a Bishop’s Guest should. ‘It was very well done; it was like so many Souls pouring in through all the Doors to offer their orisons to God who sent them on Earth. We were no longer Men, and had nothing to do with Men’s usages; and, after it was over, all those Souls seemed to disperse again silent into Space. And not till we all met afterward in the common Room, came the Human Greetings and Civilities.’ [237] This is, I think, a little piece worth sending to Madrid; I am sure, the best I have to offer.
I have had read to me of nights some of Sir Walter’s Scotch Novels; Waverley, Rob, Midlothian, now the Antiquary: eking them out as charily as I may. For I feel, in parting with each, as parting with an old Friend whom I may never see again. Plenty of dull, and even some bad, I know: but parts so admirable, and the Whole so delightful. It is wonderful how he sows the seed of his Story from the very beginning, and in what seems barren ground: but all comes up in due course, and there is the whole beautiful Story at last. I think all this Fore-cast is to be read in Scott’s shrewd, humorous, Face: as one sees it in Chantrey’s Bust; and as he seems meditating on
his Edinburgh Monument. I feel a wish to see that, and Abbotsford again; taking a look at Dunbar by the way: but I suppose I shall get no further than Dunwich.
Some one (not you) sent me your Moosehead Journal: but I told Mr. Norton I should tell you, if I wrote, that I did not like the Style of it at all; all ‘too clever by half.’ Do you not say so yourself after Cervantes, Scott, Montaigne, etc.? I don’t know I ought to say all this to you: but you can well afford to be told it by one of far more authority than yours most sincerely,
E. FitzGerald.