We have made the acquaintance of Mr. Powers,[[161]] who is delightful—of a most charming simplicity, with those great burning eyes of his. Tell me what you think of his boy listening to the shell. Oh, your Raphaels! how divine! And M. Angelo's sculptures! His pictures I leap up to in vain, and fall back regularly. Write of your book and yourself, and write soon; and let me be, as always, your affectionate BA.

We are here for two months certain, and perhaps longer. Do write.

Dear Aunt Nina,—Ba has said something for me, I hope. In any case, my love goes with hers, I trust you are well and happy, as we are, and as we would make you if we could. Love to Geddie. Ever yours, [R.B.]

To Mrs. Martin

Florence: August 7, 1847.

My dearest Mrs. Martin,—How I have been longing to get this letter, which comes at last, and justifies the longing by the pleasure it gives!... How kind, how affectionate you are to me, and how strong your claim is that I should thrust on you, in defiance of good taste and conventions, every evidence and assurance of my happiness, so as to justify your faith to yourselves and others. Indeed, indeed, dearest Mrs. Martin, you may 'exult' for me—and this though it should all end here and now. The uncertainties of life and death seem nothing to me. A year (nearly) is saved from the darkness, and if that one year has compensated for those that preceded it—which it has, abundantly—why, let it for those that shall follow, if it so please God. Come what may, I feel as if I never could have a right to murmur. I have been happy enough. Brought about too it was, indeed, by a sort of miracle which to this moment, when I look back, bewilders me to think of; and if you knew the details, counted the little steps, and could; compare my moral position three years and a half ago with this, you would come to despise San Gualberto's miraculous tree at Vallombrosa, which, being dead, gave out green leaves in recognition of his approach, as testified by the inscription—do you remember? But you can't stop to-day to read mine, so rather I shall tell you of our exploit in the mountains. Only one thing I must say first, one thing which you must forgive me for the vanity of resolving to say at last, having had it in my head very often. There's a detestable engraving, which, if you have the ill luck to see (and you may, because, horrible to relate, it is in the shop windows), will you have the kindness, for my sake, not to fancy like Robert?—it being, as he says himself, the very image of 'a young man at Waterloo House, in a moment of inspiration—"A lovely blue, ma'am."' It is as like Robert as Flush. And now I am going to tell you of Vallombrosa. You heard how we meant to stay two months there, and you are to imagine how we got up at three in the morning to escape the heat (imagine me!)—and with all our possessions and a 'dozen of port' (which my husband doses me with twice a day because once it was necessary) proceeded to Pelago by vettura, and from thence in two sledges, drawn each by two white bullocks up to the top of the holy mountain. (Robert was on horseback.) Precisely it must be as you left it. Who can make a road up a house? We were four hours going five miles, and I with all my goodwill was dreadfully tired, and scarcely in appetite for the beef and oil with which we were entertained at the House of Strangers. We are simple people about diet, and had said over and over that we would live on eggs and milk and bread and butter during these two months. We might as well have said that we would live on manna from heaven. The things we had fixed on were just the impossible things. Oh, that bread, with the fetid smell, which stuck in the throat like Macbeth's amen! I am not surprised, you recollect it! The hens had 'got them to a nunnery,' and objected to lay eggs, and the milk and the holy water stood confounded. But of course we spread the tablecloth, just as you did, over all drawbacks of the sort; and the beef and oil, as I said, and the wine too, were liberal and excellent, and we made our gratitude apparent in Robert's best Tuscan—in spite of which we were turned out ignominiously at the end of five days, having been permitted to overstay the usual three days by only two. No, nothing could move the lord abbot. He is a new abbot, and; given to sanctity, and has set his face against women. 'While he is abbot,' he said to our mediating monk, 'he will be abbot. So he is abbot, and we had to come back to Florence.' As I read in the 'Life of San Gualberto,' laid on the table for the edification of strangers, the brothers attain to sanctification, among other means, by cleaning out pigsties with their bare hands, without spade or shovel; but that is uncleanliness enough—they wouldn't touch the little finger of a woman. Angry I was, I do assure you. I should have liked to stay there, in spite of the bread. We should have been only a little thinner at the end. And the scenery—oh, how magnificent! How we enjoyed that great, silent, ink-black pine wood! And do you remember the sea of mountains to the left? How grand it is! We were up at three in the morning again to return to Florence, and the glory of that morning sun breaking the clouds to pieces among the hills is something ineffaceable from my remembrance. We came back ignominiously to our old rooms, but found it impossible to stay on account of the suffocating heat, yet we scarcely could go far from Florence, because of Mr. Kenyon and our hope of seeing him here (since lost). A perplexity ended by Robert's discovery of our present apartments, on the Pitti side of the river (indeed, close to the Grand Duke's palace), consisting of a suite of spacious and delightful rooms, which come within our means only from the deadness of the summer season, comparatively quite cool, and with a terrace which I enjoy to the uttermost through being able to walk there without a bonnet, by just stepping out of the window. The church of San Felice is opposite, so we haven't a neighbour to look through the sunlight or moonlight and take observations. Isn't that pleasant altogether? We ordered back the piano and the book subscription, and settled for two months, and forgave the Vallombrosa monks for the wrong they did us, like secular Christians. What is to come after, I can't tell you. But probably we shall creep slowly along toward Rome, and spend some hot time of it at Perugia, which is said to be cool enough. I think more of other things, wishing that my dearest, kindest sisters had a present as bright as mine—to think nothing at all of the future. Dearest Henrietta's position has long made me uneasy, and, since she frees me into confidence by her confidence to you, I will tell you so. Most undesirable it is that this should be continued, and yet where is there a door open to escape?[[162]] ... My dear brothers have the illusion that nobody should marry on less than two thousand a year. Good heavens! how preposterous it does seem to me! We scarcely spend three hundred, and I have every luxury, I ever had, and which it would be so easy to give up, at need; and Robert wouldn't sleep, I think, if an unpaid bill dragged itself by any chance into another week. He says that when people get into 'pecuniary difficulties,' his 'sympathies always go with the butchers and bakers.' So we keep out of scrapes yet, you see....

Your grateful and most affectionate
BA.

We have had the most delightful letter from Carlyle, who has the goodness to say that not for years has a marriage occurred in his private circle in which he so heartily rejoiced as in ours. He is a personal friend of Robert's, so that I have reason to be very proud and glad.

Robert's best regards to you both always, and he is no believer in magnetism (only I am). Do mention Mr. C. Hanford's health. How strange that he should come to witness my marriage settlement! Did you hear?

To Miss Mitford