Here is a very flattering letter from Mr. Hill written a few years later, on receipt of a copy of my Italics:—
“The Hawthorns,
“Edgbaston, Birmingham,
“25th Oct., 1864.
“My dear Miss Cobbe,
“Although I am kept out of court to-day at the instance of my physician, who threatens me with bronchitis if I do not keep house, yet it has been a day not devoid of much enjoyment. Your charming book which, alas, I have nearly finished, is carrying me through it only too rapidly. What a harvest of observation, thought, reading, and discourse have you brought home from Italy! But I am too much overwhelmed with it to talk much about it, especially in the obfuscated state of my intellect to which I am just now reduced. But I must just tell you how I am amused in midst of my admiration, with your humility as regards your sex; said humility being a cloak which, opening a little at one page, discloses a rich garment of pride underneath (vide page 438 towards the bottom). I say no more, only as I don’t mean to give up the follies of youth for the next eight years, that is until I am eighty, I don’t choose to be called ‘venerable.’ One might as well consent to become an Archdeacon at once!
“Your portraits are delightful, some of the originals I know, and the likeness is good, but alas, idealized!
“To call your book a ‘trifling’ work is just as absurd as to call me ‘venerable.’ It deals nobly, fearlessly, and I will add in many parts profoundly, with the greatest questions that can employ human intellect or touch the human heart, and although I do not always agree with you, I always respect your opinions and learn from the arguments by which they are supported. But certainly in the vast majority of instances I do agree with you, and more than agree, which is a cold, unimpressive term.
“Most truly yours,
“M. D. Hill.”