Baby’s letter is very merry indeed.  I long to see his little face
    and curly locks again.

I am going to have a meeting at twelve and of twelve on the affairs of Ireland.  It is a thorny point, and vexes me more than the Corn Laws.  Lord Bessborough and Lansdowne are too much inclined to coercion, and I fear we shall not agree.  But on the other hand, if we show ourselves for strong measures without lenitives, I fear we shall entirely lose the confidence of Ireland.

    February 22, 1846

We are much occupied with the affairs of Ireland—­I am engaged in persuading Lansdowne to speak out upon the affairs of that unhappy country, where a Bill called an Insurrection Act seems the ordinary medicine.

    Lady John to Lord John Russell

    Minto, February 23, 1846

You were quite right to send the children out in spite of the remains of their coughs, but how hard it is for you to have all those domestic responsibilities added to your numerous public ones.  It is more than your share, while I linger away my hours on the sofa, without so much as a dinner to order for anybody.  Your Coercive measures for Ireland frighten me.  I do not trust any Englishman on the subject except yourself, and you cannot keep to your own opinion in favour of leniency and act upon it.  I often think how unfortunate it is that there should be that little channel of sea between England and Ireland.  It prevents each country from considering itself a part of the other, and a bridge across it would make it much more difficult for Orange or Repeal bitterness to be kept up.  I send you Lord William’s [26] letter.  But first I must tell you that in a former letter from him he compared you to Antony throwing away the world for Cleopatra....  I read one of Lord Campbell’s Lives aloud yesterday evening—­Sir Christopher Hatton—­a short and entertaining one; but from which it would appear that a man can make a respectable Lord Chancellor without having seriously studied anything except dancing....

[26] Lord John Russell’s brother.

    Lord William Russell to Lady John Russell

    Genoa, February 12, 1846

My dear Sister—­I thank you much for your letter of the 4th from Minto, but regret to find my letters make you not only angry, but very angry.  If I was within reach I should have my ears well cuffed, but at this distance I am bold....  You will not have to get into a towering passion in defending your husband from my accusation of loving you too much and dashing the world aside and bid it pass, that he might enjoy a quiet life with his Fanny.  I begin by obeying you and asking pardon and saying you did quite right not to think me in earnest, and to “know that I often write what I do not mean,” a fault unknown to myself, and one to be corrected, for it is a great fault, if not worse.  The letter