"Robson's Constructive Latin Exercises … are used in the school…. Give him" (Harry) "my very kind regards, and say that his little bedroom here looks to me desolate until he comes; but I cannot flatter him that I have anything to fill up the emptiness of heart he will feel when he loses not only papa and mamma, but also his faithful coadjutor in study— Annie! Seriously, you will have to consider about his evening amusements, for it will not do to be studying morning and night. What think you of giving a well defined time to drawing every evening? He has so much taste for drawing insects that he cannot fail in outline. We have a little room which we call 'the boy's room,' where he can put any of his Natural History collections which you think it well he should try, but we have _no butterflies to catch,—few even in summer."
* * * * *
At the end of July, Newman went to stay with Dr. Nicholson and his family at Penrith, and there are one or two notes concerning his journey tither. The next letter is dated 24th Aug., 1856. He wrote therefore when the Crimean War was still going forward. That war which, amongst mistaken policies, blundering Government tactics, and aimless ambitions, holds a foremost place. It was not till the end of the year 1855 that it came to an end. After the attack on Sebastopol, the French—whose army had suffered quite as much from the terrible winter and from disease, etc., as our own—succeeded in taking the Malakoff Tower. This made it impossible for the Russians to defend Sebastopol any longer, and in March, 1856, peace was proclaimed. Then followed Russian promises, which were made as easily as they were broken.
"7 Park Village, East. "24th August, 1856.
"My dear Nicholson,
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"Events have proved that Russia, too, painfully knew her own weakness. Probably he" (Louis Napoleon) "already in December knew that she knew it, and the war was far too unpopular with the French to be continued except on a different policy, with new necessities and new prizes to be won. Our policy from March, 1853, to March, 1855, was so hollow and so silly, that no wisdom could afterwards bring things right, or make the results of the war worthy of the cost; but the comparative result in March, 1856, is so vast a gain over what nine out of ten of our statesmen (so called) were projecting to accept in March, 1855, that I cannot open my lips against the peace in itself. I could not in any case wish the war continued, except on new principles for worthier objects. However, Russia has really had a terrible lesson, and a great humiliation. That she could not take Silistria or Kars against Turkish troops, except by the accident of famine, will never be forgotten by German armies or statesmen…. The native Russian peasants and low persons do not yet know that the Czar was beaten; they suppose him to have conquered with immense cost; but the nobility knew the truth, and it will leak through to the lowest people, I expect, in the course of a few years. I think Europe has a respite of a quarter of a century from the incubus of Russia; and if in that interval the Hapsburgs are overthrown, all will yet come right. I fear we are still forced again (in spite of Mazzini and Kossuth) to regard the French as having the initiative of revolutions. I have resolved to give up all extra and needless effort of the brain, until I can really get rid of certain morbid symptoms, quite chronic, which distress me, so that my projected Latin analysis lies in embryo.
"… I have had satisfactory approval of my Iliad from my brother, Dr. Newman, a fastidious critic and practical poet, as also from other private quarters which I count much on; but reviews as yet do not notice me…. I have no high expectation of the very existence of the book becoming known, except slowly to many who might perhaps be glad of it if they knew it….
"Ever your faithful friend,
"F. W. Newman."