He quotes with approbation the newspaper comparison of her to the Princess Lieven. She disparages the famous ambassadress; he sets her right. Let her read the “Correspondence,” by his friend Mr. Guy Le Strange, and she will see how large a part the Princess played in keeping England quiet during the war of 1828–29. She did not convert her austere admirer, Lord Grey, to approval of the Russian designs, nor overcome the uneasiness with which the Duke of Wellington regarded her intrigues; but the Foreign Minister, Lord Aberdeen, was apparently a fool in her hands; and, whoever had the merit, the neutrality of England continued. That was, he repeats more than once, a most critical time for Russia; it was an object almost of life and death to the Czar to keep England dawdling in a state of actual though not avowed neutrality. It is, he argued, a matter of fact, that precisely this result was attained, and “I shall be slow to believe that Madame de Lieven did not deserve a great share of the glory (as you would think it) of making England act weakly under such circumstances; more especially since we know that the Duke did not like the great lady, and may be supposed to have distinctly traced his painful embarrassment to her power.” So the letters go, interspersed with news, with criticisms of notable persons, with comments enlightening or cynical on passing political events: with personal matters only now and then; as when he notes the loss of his two sisters; dwells with unwonted feeling on the death of his eldest nephew by consumption; condoles with her on her husband’s illness; gives council, wise or playful, as to the education of her son. “I am glad to hear that he is good at Greek, Latin, and Mathematics, for that shows his cleverness; glad also to hear that he is occasionally naughty, for that shows his force. I advise you to claim and exercise as much control as possible, because I am certain that a woman—especially so gifted a one as you—knows more, or rather feels more, about the right way of bringing up a boy than any mere man.”