writer, and I was deeply gratified in every way
to have his approbation. His 'Seven Lamps' I have not read yet. Books
come out slowly to Italy. It's our disadvantage, as you know. Ruskin and
art go together. I must tell you how Rome made me some amends after all.
Page, the American artist, painted a picture of Robert like an Italian,
and then presented it to me like a prince. It is a wonderful picture,
the colouring so absolutely _Venetian_ that artists can't (for the most
part) keep their temper when they look at it, and the breath of the
likeness is literal.[35] Mr. Page has _secrets_ in the art--certainly
nobody else paints like him--and his nature, I must say, is equal to his
genius and worthy of it. Dearest Miss Mitford, the 'Athenaeum' is always
as frigid as Mont Blanc; it can't be expected to grow warmer for looking
over your green valleys and still waters. It wouldn't be Alpine if it
did. They think it a point of duty in that journal to shake hands with
one finger. I dare say when Mr. Chorley sits down to write an article he
puts his feet in cold water as a preliminary. Still, I oughtn't to be
impertinent. He has been very good-natured to _me_, and it isn't his
fault if I'm not Poet Laureate at this writing, and engaged in cursing
the Czar in Pindarics very prettily. 'Atherton,' meanwhile, wants nobody
to praise it, I am sure. How glad I shall be to seize and read it, and
how I thank you for the gift! May God bless and keep you! I may hear
again if you write soon to Florence, but don't pain yourself for the
world, I entreat you. I shall see you before long, I think.

Your ever affectionate
E.B.B.

Robert's love.

* * * * *

_To Miss Mitford_

Florence: July 20, [1854].

My dearest Miss Mitford,--I this moment receive your little note. It
makes me very sad and apprehensive about you, and I would give all this
bright sunshine for weeks for one explanatory word which might make me
more easy. Arabel speaks of receiving your books--I suppose
'Atherton'--and of having heard from yourself a very bad account of
your state of health. Are you worse, my beloved friend? I have been
waiting to hear the solution of our own plans (dependent upon letters
from England) in order to write to you; and when I found our journey to
London was definitively rendered impossible till next spring, I deferred
writing yet again, it was so painful to me to say to you that our
meeting could not take pl