it is not worth spending 28_s._
upon.

Macready would have made a better Scholar--or Divine--than Actor, I
think: a Gentleman he would have been in any calling, I believe, in spite
of his Temper--which he acknowledges, laments, and apologizes for, on
reflection.

Now, here is enough of my small writing for your reading. I have been
able to read, and admire, some Corneille lately: as to Racine--'_Ce n'est
pas mon homme_,' as Catharine of Russia said of him. Now I am at Madame
de Sevigne's delightful Letters; I should like to send you a Bouquet of
Extracts: but must have done now, being always yours

E. F.G.

XXIX.

LOWESTOFT: _May_ 16/75

DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,

I have been wishing to send you Carlyle's Norway Kings, and oh! such a
delightful Paper of Spedding's on the Text of Richard III. {74} But I
have waited till I should hear from you, knowing that you _will_ reply!
And not feeling sure, till I hear, whether you are not on your way to
England Eastward ho!--even as I am now writing!--Or, I fancy--should you
not be well? Anyhow, I shall wait till some authentic news of yourself
comes to me. I should not mind sending you Carlyle--why, yes! I _will_
send him! But old Spedding--which is only a Proof--I won't send till I
know that you are still where you were to receive it--Oh! such a piece of
musical criticism! without the least pretence to being Musick: as dry as
he can make it, in fact. But he does, with utmost politeness, smash the
Cambridge Editors' Theory about the Quarto and Folio Text of R. III.--in
a way that perhaps Mr. Furness might like to see.

Spedding says that Irving's Hamlet is simply--_hideous_--a strong
expression for Spedding to use. But--(lest I should think his
condemnation was only the Old Man's fault of depreciating all that is
new), he extols Miss Ellen Terry's Portia as simply _a perfect
Performance_: remembering (he says) all the while how fine was Fanny
Kemble's. Now, all this you shall read for yourself, when I have token
of your Whereabout, and Howabout: for I will send you Spedding's Letter,
as well as his Paper.

Spedding won't go and see Salvini's Othello, because he does not know
Italian, and also because he hears that Salvini's is a different
Conception of Othello from Shakespeare's. I can't understand either
reason; but Spedding is (as Carlyle {75a} wrote me of his Bacon) the
'invincible, and victorious.' At any rate, I can't beat him. Irving I
never could