I went to hear the "Huguenots" on Saturday evening. It was a rich treat. Mario and Grisi and Formes, and that finest of orchestras under Costa. I am going to a concert to-night. This is all very fine, but, in the meantime, I am getting as haggard as an old witch under London atmosphere and influences. I shall be glad to have sent me my Shakespeare, Goethe, Byron, and Wordsworth, if you will be so good as to take the trouble of packing them.
[Sidenote: Letter to the Brays, Monday, 12th(?) May, 1852.]
My days have slipped away in a most mysterious fashion lately--chiefly, I suppose, in long walks and long talks. Our Monday evenings are dying off--not universally regretted--but we are expecting one or two people to-night. I have nothing to tell except that I went to the opera on Thursday, and heard "La Juive," and, moreover, fell in love with Prince Albert, who was unusually animated and prominent. He has a noble, genial, intelligent expression, and is altogether a man to be proud of. I am going next Thursday to see Grisi in "Norma." She is quite beautiful this season, thinner than she was, and really younger looking.
[Sidenote: Letter to Miss Sara Hennell, 27th May, 1852.]
My brightest spot, next to my love of _old_ friends, is the deliciously calm, _new_ friendship that Herbert Spencer gives me. We see each other every day, and have delightful _camaraderie_ in everything. But for him my life would be desolate enough. What a wretched lot of old, shrivelled creatures we shall be by and by. Never mind, the uglier we get in the eyes of others the lovelier we shall be to each other; that has always been my firm faith about friendship, and now it is in a slight degree my experience. Mme. d'Albert has sent me the sweetest letter, just like herself; and I feel grateful to have such a heart remembering and loving me on the other side of the Jura. They are very well and flourishing.
[Sidenote: Letter to Miss Sara Hennell, Wednesday, 2d June, 1852.]
I am bothered to death with article-reading and scrap-work of all sorts: it is clear my poor head will never produce anything under these circumstances; _but I am patient_. I am ashamed to tease you so, but I must beg of you to send me George Sand's works; and also I shall be grateful if you will lend me--what I think you have--an English edition of "Corinne," and Miss Austen's "Sense and Sensibility." Harriet Martineau's article on "Niebuhr" will not go in the July number. I am sorry for it; it is admirable. After all, she is a _trump_--the only Englishwoman that possesses thoroughly the art of writing.