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 place this year. Now, I receive your little note
and write at once to say how sad _that_ makes me. It is the first time
that the expression of your love, my beloved friend, has made me sad,
and I start as from an omen. On the other hand, the character you write
in is so firm and like yourself, that I do hope and trust you are not
sensibly worse. Let me hear by a word, if possible, that the change of
weather has done you some little good. I understand there has scarcely
been any summer in England, and this must necessarily have been adverse
to you. A gleam of fine weather would revive you by God's help. Oh, that
I could look in your face and say, 'God bless you!' as I feel it. May
God bless you, my dear, dear friend.

Our reason for not going to England has not been from caprice, but a
cross in money matters. A ship was to have brought us in something, and
brought us in nothing instead, with a discount; the consequence of which
is that we are transfixed at Florence, and unable even to 'fly to the
mountains' as a refuge from the summer heat. It has been a great
disappointment to us all, and to our respective families, my poor
darling Arabel especially; but we can only be patient, and I take
comfort in the obvious fact that my Penini is quite well and almost as
rosy as ever in spite of the excessive Florence heat. One of the worst
thoughts I have is about _you_. I had longed so to see you this summer,
and had calculated with such certainty upon doing so. I would have gone
to England for that single reason if I could, but I can't; we can't
stir, really. That we should be able to sit quietly still at Florence
and eat our bread and maccaroni is the utmost of our possibilities this
summer.

Mrs. Trollope has gone to the Baths of Lucca, and thus I have not seen
her. She will be very interested about you, of course. How many hang
their hearts upon your sickbed, dearest Miss Mitford! Yes, and their
prayers too.

The other day, by an accident, an old number of the 'Athenaeum' fell into
my hands, and I read for the second time Mr. Chorley's criticism upon
'Atherton.' It is evidently written in a hurried manner, and is quite
inadequate as a notice of the book; but, do you know, I am of opinion
that if you considered it more closely you would lose your impression of
its being depreciatory and cold. He says that the _only fault_ of the
work is its _shortness_; a rare piece of praise to be given to a work
nowadays. You see, your reputation is at the height; neither he nor
another could _help_ you; such books as yours make their own way. The
'Athenaeum' doesn't give full critiques of Dickens, for instance, and it
is arctical in general temperature. I thought I would say this to you.
Certainly I _do know_ that Mr. Chorley highly regards you in every
capacity--as writer and as woman--and in the manner in which he named
you to me in his last letter there was no chill of sentiment nor recoil
of opinion. So do not admit a doubt of _him_; he is a sure and
affectionate friend, and absolutely high-minded and reliable; of an
intact and even chivalrous delicacy. I say it, lest you might have need
of him and be scrupulous (from your late feeling) about making him
useful. It is horrible to doubt of one's friends; oh, I know _that_, and
would save you from it.

We had a letter from Paris two days ago from one of the noblest and most
intellectual men in the country, M. Milsand, a writer in the 'Deux
Mondes.' He complains of a stagnation in the imaginative literature, but
adds that he is consoled for everything by the 'state of politics.' Your
Napoleon is doing you credit, his very enemies must confess.

As for me, I can't write to-day. Your little precious, melancholy note
hangs round the neck of my heart like a stone. Arabel simply says she
is afraid from what you have written to her that you must be very ill;
she does not tell me what you wrote to her--perhaps for fear of paining
me--and now I am pained by the silence beyond measure.

Robert's love and warmest wishes for you. He appreciates your kind word
to him. And I, what am I to say? I love you from a very sad and grateful
heart, looking backwards and forwards--and _upwards_ to pray God's love
down on you!

Your ever affectionate
E.B.B., rather BA.

Precious the books will be to me. I hope not to wait to read them till
they reach me, as there is a bookseller here who will be sure to have
them. Thank you, thank you.