top
of the house; the ceiling being conical, and the little bedrooms built
round the spring of its arch. You will observe that we make no
pretension to architectural magnificence, but that we have abundance of
room. And here I am, beholding only vines and the sea for days
together. . . . Good Heavens! How I wish you'd come for a week or two, and
taste the white wine at a penny farthing the pint. It is excellent.". . .
Then, after seven days: "I have got my paper and inkstand and figures
now (the box from Osnaburgh-terrace only came last Thursday), and can
think--I have begun to do so every morning--with a business-like air, of
the Christmas book. My paper is arranged, and my pens are spread out in
the usual form. I think you know the form--Don't you? My books have not
passed the custom-house yet, and I tremble for some volumes of
Voltaire. . . . I write in the best bedroom. The sun is off the corner
window at the side of the house by a very little after twelve; and I can
then throw the blinds open, and look up from my paper, at the sea, the
mountains, the washed-out villas, the vineyards, at the blistering white
hot fort with a sentry on the drawbridge standing in a bit of shadow no
broader than his own musket, and at the sky, as often as I like. It is a
very peaceful view, and yet a very cheerful one. Quiet as quiet can be."

Not yet however had the time for writing come. A sharp attack of illness
befell his youngest little daughter, Kate, and troubled him much. Then,
after beginning the Italian grammar himself, he had to call in the help
of a master; and this learning of the language took up time. But he had
an aptitude for it, and after a month's application told me (24th of
August) that he could ask in Italian for whatever he wanted in any shop
or coffee-house, and could read it pretty well. "I wish you could see
me" (16th of September), "without my knowing it, walking about alone
here. I am now as bold as a lion in the streets. The audacity with which
one begins to speak when there is no help for it, is quite astonishing."
The blank impossibility at the outset, however, of getting native
meanings conveyed to his English servants, he very humorously described
to me; and said the spell was first broken by the cook, "being really a
clever woman, and not entrenching herself in that astonishing pride of
ignorance which induces the rest to oppose themselves to the receipt of
any information through any channel, and which