“I cannot thank you enough for all your kindness in writing to me--a kindness that does not need the force of contrast (in others’ neglect) to make it dearer. I am a bankrupt in thanks, and have coolly resolved to die in your debt.”
“Villa Lima, Lago de Como, _Sept._ 20, 1847.
“We could never think of pushing Curry to a bankruptcy. If others take this upon them we must abide by it, but I hope, for the poor man’s sake, it may not be so.... M’Glashan scarcely deserves a paragraph.... O’Sullivan’s letter was in so far only an allusion to the affair at issue--that is, he said, M’G. has, it appears, an MS. of yours in his hands, which he will write to you about by this post or the following. Four months ago he (M’G.) wrote to me asking, in eager terms, to see this MS., and promising a reply upon it without the least delay,--since which he has never once written, not even an acknowledgment of its arrival.
“I would beg of you to keep the MS. by you--that is, if it should not have already been forwarded to [catch] Maxwell in London. As to the printed story,--‘Carl Stelling,’--will you scratch out the title at top, and the words ‘by the editor’ carefully, and cross out the Introduction, letting the tale begin by the words of the narrator--“There are moments in life,” &c.,--and send it to Mr Chapman with a line to say that this printed matter comes in after the MS. pages of chapter xi. of ‘Horace Templeton’? I may here add that the aforesaid H. T. is already--so far at least as eleven chapters go--in the printer’s hands. It is precious bad stuff, and, worse still, very lachrymose and depressing--I mean, so far as such very powerless trash can be--_Mais que vovlez-vous?_ And in the present case I have laid the child at another man’s door, and will never own him--if he doesn’t grow up more thrivingly than I hope for.
“You wouldn’t believe what difficulties the authorities here make about the unhappy document. The Podesta is afraid of it! The Legation trembles at it--the Commessario says it is ‘Peri-colosissimo!’ and how I am to find an _employé_ courageous enough to look on while I sign it, I cannot tell. I fear that in the end I must go up to Milan, where the functionaries will possibly have more hardihood.