Rome: May 10, 1854.

My ever dearest Miss Mitford,--Your letter pained me to a degree which I
will not pain you by expressing farther. Now, I do not write to press
for another letter. On the contrary, I _entreat_ you not to attempt to
write a word to me with your own hand, until you can do so without
effort and suffering. In the meanwhile, would it be impossible for K. to
send me in one line some account of you? I don't mean to tease, but I
should be very glad and thankful to have news of you though in the
briefest manner, and if a letter were addressed to me at Poste Restante,
Florence, it would reach me, as we rest there on our road to Paris and
London. In any case I shall see you this summer, if it shall please God;
and stay with you the half hour you allow, and kiss your dear hands and
feel again, I hope, the brightness of your smile. As the green summer
comes on you must be the better surely; if you can bear to lie out under
the trees, the general health will rally and the local injury correct
itself. You must have a strong, energetic vitality; and, after all,
spinal disorders do not usually attack life, though they disable and
overthrow. The pain you endure is the terrible thing. Has a local
application of chloroform been ever tried? I catch at straws, perhaps,
with my unlearned hands, but it's the instinct of affection. While you
suffer, my dear friend, the world is applauding you. I catch sight of
stray advertisements and fragmentary notices of 'Atherton,' which seems
to have been received everywhere with deserved claps of hands. This will
not be comfort to you, perhaps; but you will feel the satisfaction which
every workman feels in successful work. I think the edition of plays and
poems has not yet appeared, and I suppose there will be nothing in
_that_ which can be new to us. 'Atherton' I thirst for, but the cup will
be dry, I dare say, till I get to England, for new books even at
Florence take waiting for far beyond all necessary bounds. We shall not
stay long in Tuscany. We want to be in England late in June or very
early in July, and some days belong to Paris as we pass, since Robert's
family are resident there. To leave Rome will fill me with barbarian
complacency. I don't pretend to have a rag of sentiment about Rome. It's
a palimpsest Rome--a watering-place written over the antique--and I
haven't taken to it as a poet should, I suppose; only let us speak the
truth, above all things. I am strongly a creature of association, and
the associations of the place have not been personally favorable to me.
Among the rest my child, the light of my eyes, has been more unwell
lately than I ever saw him in his life, and we were forced three times
to call in a physician. The malady was not serious, it was just the
result of the climate, relaxation of the stomach, &c., but the end is
that he is looking a delicate, pale, little creature, he who was radiant
with all the roses and stars of infancy but two months ago. The
pleasantest days in Rome we have spent with the Kembles--the two
sisters--who are charming and excellent, both of them, in different
ways; and certainly they have given us some exquisite hours on the
Campagna, upon picnic excursions, they and certain of their friends--for
instance, M. Ampere, the member of the French Institute, who is witty
and agreeable; M. Gorze, the Austrian Minister, also an agreeable man;
and Mr. Lyons, the son of Sir Edmund, &c. The talk was almost too
brilliant for the sentiment of the scenery, but it harmonised entirely
with the mayonnaise and champagne. I should mention, too, Miss Hosmer
(but she is better than a talker), the young American sculptress, who is
a great pet of mine and of Robert's, and who emancipates the eccentric
life of a perfectly 'emancipated female' from all shadow of blame by the
purity of hers. She lives here all alone (at twenty-two); dines and
breakfasts at the _cafes_ precisely as a young man would; works from six
o'clock in the morning till night, as a great artist must, and this with
an absence of pretension and simplicity of manners which accord rather
with the childish dimples in her rosy cheeks than with her broad
forehead and high aims. The Archer Clives have been to Naples, but have
returned for a time. Mr. Lockhart, who went to England with the Duke of
Wellington (the same prepared to bury him on the road), writes to Mrs.
Sartoris that he has grown much better under the influence of the native
beef and beer. To do him justice he looked, when here, innocent of the
recollection even of either. I wonder if you have seen Mrs. Howe's
poems, lately out, called 'Passion Flowers.' They were sent to me by an
American friend but were intercepted _en route_, so that I have not set
eyes on them yet, but one or two persons, not particularly reliable as
critics, have praised them to me. She is the wife of Dr. Howe, the deaf
and dumb philanthropist, and herself neither deaf nor dumb (very much
the contrary) I understand--a handsome woman and brilliant in society. I
gossip on to you, dearest dear Miss Mitford, as if you were in gossiping
humour. Believe that my tender thoughts, deeper than any said, are with
you always.

Robert's love with that of your attached
BA.

We go on the 22nd of this month. You have seen Mr. Chorley's book, I
daresay, which I should like much to see.