“This intercourse to a man like myself was of great value, removed as I was from the opinions of the moving world of clubs and society: it was of immense advantage to have the concentrated budget of the world in the words of a friend who feels interested also in the success I could obtain. For years and years Mortimer O’Sullivan continued to criticise me month by month, and when he died the blank so discouraged and depressed me that I felt like one writing without a public--till you replaced him; and that same renewal of energy which some critics ascribed to me in ‘Tony’ and ‘Sir B.’ was in reality the result of that renewed vigour imparted by your healthful and able advice. “Now do not be angry at my selfishness if I try to exalt my wares. I tell you candidly I do it in the way of trade: it is a mere expedient to keep my duns off, for--an honest truth--I think hardly enough of what I have done and of myself for doing it. “I shall not be able to open till the latter end of the year, as I want a mass of material I must get by correspondence. I can’t leave my wife: she grew so anxious after the assassination of M’Gee, that she owned she thought I’d never return to England alive. For this she has, of course, no reason beyond mere terror, aided by the fact that some Fenian friend always sends us the worst specimens of Fenian denunciation in the press, with all the minatory passages underlined. “I have a month’s leave at my disposal (and suppose I could easily extend it) whenever I like to take it; and if all should go well in autumn, we might do worse than take a flying ramble through the south and west of Ireland. “I am going now to look at some of the islands in the Adriatic: they are as little known as the Fijis, and about as civilised. “When you print my story, ‘Fred Thornton,’ you’ll see it will look better than you think it. I hope you’ll put it in your next.” _To Mr John Blackwood._ “Trieste, _June_ 15, 1868. “One would have thought that you had a vision of the devil dancing in my breeches pocket when you sent me a cheque in advance. Sooth to say, my ‘sooty friend’ does perform many a _pas seul_ there; but as I seldom put my hand in, I don’t disturb him. “I take your hint and send you an O’D. for the House, and I suppose the one on ‘Labouchere’ will reach me to-morrow or next day. “I don’t know what is the matter with me. Hitherto I have divided my life pretty equally between whist and sleep; now, as I get no whist here, I have fallen back on my other resource, but with such a will that I rarely awake at all. I’ll back myself against anything but a white bear, and give odds.