at night, and save them. For it was necessary, I thought, to
the bringing-out of my thought, that Romney should be mulcted in his
natural sight. The 'Examiner' saw that. Tell me if, on looking into the
book again, you modify your feeling at all.

Dearest Mona Nina, you are well now, are you not? Your last dear letter
seems brighter altogether, and seems to promise, too, that quiet in
Italy will restore the tone of your spirits and health. Do you know, I
almost advise you (though it is like speaking against my heart) to go
from Marseilles to Rome straight, and to give us the spring. The spring
is beautiful in Florence; and then I should be free to go and see the
pictures with you, and enjoy you in the in-door and out-of-door way,
both....

You will have heard (we heard it only three days ago) how our kindest
friend, who never forgot us, remembered us in his will. The legacy is
eleven thousand pounds; six thousand five hundred of which are left to
Robert, marking delicately a sense of trust for which I am especially
grateful Of course, this addition to our income will free us from the
pressure which has been upon us hitherto. But oh, how much sadness goes
to making every gain in this world! It has been a sad, sad Christmas to
me. A great gap is left among friends, and the void catches the eyes of
the soul, whichever way it turns. He has been to me in much what my
father might have been, and now the place is empty twice over.

You are yet _unconvinced_. You will be convinced one day, I think. Here
are wide-awake men (some of them most anti-spiritual to this hour, as to
theory) who agree in giving testimony to facts of one order. You shall
hear their testimony when you come. As to the 'supernatural,' if you
mean by that the miraculous, the suspension of natural law, I certainly
believe in it no more than you do. What happens, happens according to a
natural law, the development of which only becomes fuller and more
observable. The movement, such as it is, is accelerated, and the whole
structure of society in America is becoming affected more or less for
good or evil, and very often for evil, through the extreme tenacity or
slowness of those who ought to be leaders in every revolution of
thought, but who, on this subject, are pleased to leave their places to
the unqualified and the fanatical. Wise men will be sorry presently.
When Faraday was asked to go and see Hume, to see a heavy table lifted
without the touch of a fing