without end,’ and not better the matter; if they do tear up the system, then shall we all have reason to rejoice at these disasters, apart from our sympathy with individual sufferings.  More good will have been done by this one great shock to the heart of England than by fifty years’ more patching, and pottering, and knocking impotent heads together.  What makes me most angry is the ministerial apology.  ’It’s always so with us for three campaigns,’!!! ’it’s our way,’ ‘it’s want of experience,’ &c. &c.  That’s precisely the thing complained of.  As to want of experience, if the French have had Algerine experiences, we have had our Indian wars, Chinese wars, Caffre wars, and military and naval expenses exceeding those of France from year to year.  If our people had never had to pay for an army, they might sit down quietly under the taunt of wanting experience.  But we have soldiers, and soldiers should have military education as well as red coats, and be led by properly qualified officers, instead of Lord Nincompoop’s youngest sons.  As it is in the army, so it is in the State.  Places given away, here and there, to incompetent heads; nobody being responsible, no unity of idea and purpose anywhere—­the individual interest always in the way of the general good.  There is a noble heart in our people, strong enough if once roused, to work out into light and progression, and correct all these evils.  Robert is a good deal struck by the generous tone of the observations of the French press, as contradistinguished from the insolences of the Americans, who really are past enduring just now.  Certain of our English friends here in Florence have ceased to associate with them on that ground.  I think there’s a good deal of jealousy about the French alliance.  That may account for something....

Dearest, kindest Sarianna, remember not to think any more about me, except that I love you, that I am your attached

BA.

FOOTNOTES: 

[15] Life and Letters of Robert Browning, by Mrs. Sutherland Orr, p. 216.

[16] The late Earl Lytton.

[17] Auguste Brizieux

[18] Uncle Tom’s Cabin, published in 1852.

[19] Mrs. Jameson’s Legends of the Madonna.

[20] General Franklin Pierce.

[21] ‘Tamerton Church Tower, and other Poems.’

[22] In a letter to Miss Mitford, written four days later than this, Mrs. Browning alludes again to the performance of ‘Colombe’s Birthday:’  ’Yes—­Robert’s play succeeded, but there could be no “run” for a play of that kind; it was a succes d’estime and something more, which is surprising, perhaps, considering the miserable acting of the men.  Miss Faucit was alone in doing us justice.’

[23] A few lines have been cut off the letter at this place.

[24] A letter to the Athenaeum on July 2, 1853, giving the result of some experiments in table-turning, the tendency of which was to show that the motion of the table was due to unconscious muscular action on the part of the persons touching the table.