quently
thought that a copy might be acceptable to you, loving both Greek and
Dante as you do. Had not I bidden the London Publishers to send it
direct to you, I should have written your name and my own on the
fly-leaf. But you can do this for us both.

I have not as yet read much of it: for my Eyes are impatient of the Greek
letter; but the Language comes out before me as the worthiest
representative of the Italian: provided it be pronounced as we have
learned to pronounce it, not as the modern Greek man is said to do. I
always maintain that a Language is apt to sound better from a Foreigner,
who idealises the pronunciation. As to the structure of the language, I
doubt that I may prefer the modern to the ancient because of being
cleared of many [Greek text], etc., particles. I think I shall send a
Copy to Professor Goodwin. This is nearly all that I have to send across
the Atlantic to-day, which reminds me that I have just been quoting (in a
little thing {327} I may send you),

The fleecy Star that bears
Andromeda far off Atlantic Seas.

What a Line!

. . . It is, I think, worth your while to look at Dean Stanley's Volume
of Bishop Thirlwall's Letters; nay, even Dean Perowne's earlier volume,
if but to show how the pedantic Boy grew into the large-hearted Man, and
even Bishop: but, from the first, always sincere, just, and not
pretentious. I remember him at Cambridge: he, Fellow and Tutor, and I
undergraduate: and he took a little fancy to me, I think.

_To Hallam Tennyson_. {328}

WOODBRIDGE. _May_ 28 [1882].

MY DEAR HALLAM,

I believe I ought to be ashamed of reviving the little thing which
accompanies this Letter. My excuse must be that I have often been askt
for a copy when I had no more to give; and a visit to Cambridge last
summer, to the old familiar places, if not faces, made me take it up once
more and turn it into what you now see. I should certainly not send a
copy to you, or yours, but for what relates to your Father in it. He did
not object, so far as I know, to what I said of him, though not by name,
in a former Edition; but there is more of him in this, though still not
by name, nor, as you see, intended for Publication. All of this you can
read to him, if you please, at pp. 25 and 56. I do not ask him to say
that he approves of what is said, or meant to be said, in his honour; and
I only ask you to tell me if he disapproves of its going any further. I
owed you a let