Isn’t it a shame that nobody comes from the north to the south, after a hundred oaths?  I hear nothing of dear Mr. Kenyon.  I hear nothing from you of your coming.  You won’t come, any of you....

I am much relieved by hearing that Mazzini is gone from Italy, whatever Lord Malmesbury may say of it.  Every day I expected to be told that he was taken at Milan and shot.  A noble man, though incompetent, I think, to his own aspiration; but a man who personally has my sympathies always.  The state of things here is cruel, the people are one groan.  God deliver us all, I must pray, and by almost any means.

As to your Ministry, I don’t expect very much from it.  Lord Aberdeen, ‘put on’ to Lord John, is using the drag uphill.  They will do just as little as they can, be certain.

Think of my submitting at last to the conjugal will and cod’s liver oil—­yes, and think of its doing me good.  The cough was nearly, if not quite, gone because of the climate, before I took the oil, but it does me good by making me gain in flesh.  I am much less thin, and very well, and dearest Robert triumphant.

* * * * *

To Mrs. Jameson

Florence:  April 12, [1853].

The comfort is, my ever loved friend, that here is spring—­summer, as translated into Italy—­if fine weather is to set you up again.  I shall be very thankful to have better news of you; to hear of your being out of that room and loosened into some happy condition of liberty.  It seems unnatural to think of you in one room. That seems fitter for me, doesn’t it?  And the rooms in England are so low and small, that they put double bars on one’s captivity.  May God bring you out with the chestnut trees and elms!  It’s very sad meanwhile.

Comfort yourself, dear friend!  Admire Louis Napoleon.  He’s an extraordinary man beyond all doubt; and that he has achieved great good for France, I do not in the least doubt.  I was only telling you that I had not finished my pedestal for him—­wait a little.  Because, you see, for my part, I don’t go over to the system of ‘mild despotisms,’ no, indeed.  I am a democrat to the bone of me.  It is simply as a democratical ruler, and by grace of the people, that I accept him, and he must justify himself by more deeds to his position before he glorifies himself before me.  That’s what I mean to say.  A mild despot in France, let him be the Archangel Gabriel, unless he hold the kingdom in perpetuity, what is the consequence?  A successor like the Archangel Lucifer, perhaps.  Then, for the press, where there is thought, there must be discussion or conspiracy.  Are you aware of the amount of readers in France?  Take away the ‘Times’ newspaper, and the blow falls on a handful of readers, on a section of what may be called the aristocracy.  But everybody reads in France.  Every fiacre driver who waits for you at a shop door, beguiles the time with a newspaper.  It is on that account that the influence of the press is dangerous, you will say.  Precisely so; but also, on that account too, it is necessary.  No; I hold, myself, that he will give more breathing room to France, as circumstances admit of it.  Else, there will be convulsion.  You will see.  We shall see.  And Louis Napoleon, who is wise, foresees, I cannot doubt.