We got your letter yesterday here among the peaceful mountain-tops. After ascending gradually (in a carriage) for nearly four hours, we found ourselves in a region of grass, corn, and pine woods, so beautifully varied that we seem to be walking in a great park laid out for our special delight. The monks, as usual, found out the friendly solitude, and this place of St. Märgen was originally nothing but an Augustinian monastery. About three miles off is another place of like origin, called St. Peter's, formerly a Benedictine monastery, and still used as a place of preparation for the Catholic priesthood. The monks have all vanished, but the people are devout Catholics. At every half-mile by the roadside is a carefully kept crucifix; and last night, as we were having our supper in the common room of the inn, we suddenly heard sounds that seemed to me like those of an accordion. "Is that a zittern?" said Mr. Lewes to the German lady by his side. "No—it is prayer." The servants, by themselves—the host and hostess were in the same room with us—were saying their evening prayers, men's and women's voices blending in unusually correct harmony. The same loud prayer is heard at morning, noon, and evening, from the shepherds and workers in the fields. We suppose that the believers in Mr. Home and in Madame Rachel would pronounce these people "grossly superstitious." The land is cultivated by rich peasant proprietors, and the people here, as in Petersthal, look healthy and contented. This really adds to one's pleasure in seeing natural beauties. In North Germany, at Ilmenau, we were constantly pained by meeting peasants who looked underfed and miserable. Unhappily, the weather is too cold and damp, and our accommodations are too scanty, under such circumstances, for us to remain here and enjoy the endless walks and the sunsets that would make up for other negatives in fine, warm weather. We return to Freiburg to-morrow, and from thence we shall go on by easy stages through Switzerland, by Thun and Vevay to Geneva, where I want to see my old friends once more.
We shall be so constantly on the move that it might be a vain trouble on your part to shoot another letter after such flying birds.
Journal, 1868.
July 23.—Arrived at home (from Baden journey).
Letter to John Blackwood, 24th July, 1868.
We got home last night—sooner than we expected, because we gave up the round by Geneva, as too long and exciting. I dare say the three weeks since we heard from you seem very short to you, passed amid your usual occupations. To us they seem long, for we have been constantly changing our scene. Our two months have been spent delightfully in seeing fresh natural beauties, and with the occasional cheering influence of kind people. But I think we were hardly ever, except in Spain, so long ignorant of home sayings and doings, for we have been chiefly in regions innocent even of Galignani. The weather with us has never been oppressively hot; and storms or quiet rains have been frequent. But our bit of burned-up lawn is significant of the dryness here. I believe I did not thank you for the offer of "Kinglake," which we gratefully accept. And will you kindly order a copy of the poem to be sent to Gerald Massey, Hemel-Hempstead.
A friendly gentleman at Belfast sends me a list of emendations for some of my verses, which are very characteristic and amusing.
I hope you have kept well through the heat. We are come back in great force, for such feeble wretches.
Letter to John Blackwood, 28th July, 1868.
As to the reviews, we expected them to be written by omniscient personages, but we did not expect so bad a review as that Mr. Lewes found in the Pall Mall. I have read no notice except that in the Spectator, which was modest in tone. A very silly gentleman, Mr. Lewes says, undertakes to admonish me in the Westminster; and he thinks the best literary notice of the poem that has come before him is in the Athenæum. After all, I think there would have been good reason to doubt that the poem had either novelty or any other considerable intrinsic reason to justify its being written, if the periodicals had cried out "Hosanna!" I am sure you appreciate all the conditions better than I can, after your long experience of the relations between authors and critics. I am serene, because I only expected the unfavorable. To-day the heat is so great that it is hardly possible even to read a book that requires any thought. London is a bad exchange for the mountains.