I read in the evenings a great deal of English, French, and Italian; and a little Spanish.  I have picked up Portuguese enough to read Camoens with care; and I want no more.  I have adopted an opinion about the Italian historians quite different from that which I formerly held, and which, I believe, is generally considered as orthodox.  I place Fra Paolo decidedly at the head of them, and next to him Davila, whom I take to be the best modern military historian except Colonel Napier.  Davila’s battle of Ivry is worthy of Thucydides himself.  Next to Davila I put Guicciardini, and last of all Machiavelli.  But I do not think that you ever read much Italian.

The English poetry of the day has very few attractions for me.  Van Artevelde is far the best specimen that I have lately seen.  I do not much like Talfourd’s Ion; but I mean to read it again.  It contains pretty lines; but, to my thinking, it is neither fish nor flesh.  There is too much, and too little, of the antique about it.  Nothing but the most strictly classical costume can reconcile me to a mythological plot; and Ion is a modern philanthropist, whose politics and morals have been learned from the publications of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.

I do not know whether the noise which the lawyers of the Supreme Court have been raising against our legislative authority has reached, or will reach, England.  They held a public meeting, which ended,—­or rather began, continued, and ended,—­in a riot; and ever since then the leading agitators have been challenging each other, refusing each other’s challenges, libelling each other, swearing the peace against each other, and blackballing each other.  Mr. Longueville Clarke, who aspires to be the O’Connell of Calcutta, called another lawyer a liar.  The last-mentioned lawyer challenged Mr. Longueville Clarke.  Mr. Longueville Clarke refused to fight, on the ground that his opponent had been guilty of hugging attorneys.  The Bengal Club accordingly blackballed Longueville.  This, and some other similar occurrences, have made the opposition here thoroughly ridiculous and contemptible.  They will probably send a petition home; but, unless the House of Commons has undergone a great change since 1833, they have no chance there.

I have almost brought my letter to a close without mentioning the most important matter about which I had to write.  I dare say you have heard that my uncle General Macaulay, who died last February, has left me L10,000 This legacy, together with what I shall have saved by the end of 1837, will make me quite a rich man; richer than I even wish to be as a single man; and every day renders it more unlikely that I should marry.

We have had a very unhealthy season; but sickness has not come near our house.  My sister, my brother-in-law, and their little child, are as well as possible.  As to me, I think that, as Buonaparte said of himself after the Russian campaign, J’ai le diable au corps.