fferent parts of England; and, I
suppose, forgetful of such a little matter, though their Estate-agent,
and Lawyer, represented it to them long ago.

I stayed at Cambridge some three hours on my way, so as to look at some
of the Old, and New, Buildings, which I had not seen these dozen years
and more. The Hall of Trinity looked to me very fine; and Sir Joshua's
Duke of Gloucester the most beautiful thing in it. I looked into the
Chapel, where they were at work: the Roof seemed to me being overdone:
and Roubiliac's Newton is now nowhere, between the Statues of Bacon and
Barrow which are executed on a larger scale. {161} And what does
Spedding say to Macaulay in that Company? I never saw Cambridge so
empty, but not the less pleasant.

[1873.]

MY DEAR POLLOCK,

Two or three years ago I had three or four of my Master-pieces done up
together for admiring Friends. It has occurred to me to send you one of
these instead of the single Dialogue which I was looking in the Box for.
I think you have seen, or had, all the things but the last, {162} which
is the most impudent of all. It was, however, not meant for Scholars:
mainly for Mrs. Kemble: but as I can't read myself, nor expect others of
my age to read a long MS. I had it printed by a cheap friend (to the
bane of other Friends), and here it is. You will see by the notice that
AEschylus is left 'nowhere,' and why; a modest proviso. Still I think
the Story is well compacted: the Dialogue good, (with one single little
originality; of riding into Rhyme as Passion grows) and the Choruses
(mostly 'rot' quoad Poetry) still serving to carry on the subject of the
Story in the way of Inter-act. Try one or two Women with a dose of it
one day; not Lady Pollock, who knows better. . . . When I look over the
little Prose Dialogue, I see lots that might be weeded. I wonder at one
word which is already crossed--'_Emergency_.' 'An Emergency!' I think
Blake could have made a Picture of it as he did of the Flea. Something
of the same disgusting Shape too. . . . Blake seems to me to have fine
things: but as by random, like those of a Child, or a Madman, of Genius.
Is there one good whole Piece, of ever so few lines? . . .

What do you think of a French saying quoted by Heine, that when 'Le bon
Dieu' gets rather bored in Heaven, he opens the windows, and takes a look
at the Boulevards? Heine's account of the Cholera in France is
wonderful.

[1873.]

MY DEAR POLLOCK,

I