“I see by ‘The Telegraph’ that Lord Clarendon has joined the Government and Stansfield left. There is a twofold game in that, for I don’t despair of seeing them beaten if the Queen does not put pressure on Lord Derby, for there is a sentiment in his class that, with regard to the Crown, rises above all party considerations, and represents that old feudal feeling by which nobles stood round the monarchy at any personal loss or peril. “That letter to ‘The Times’ about the Italian Government seizing Garibaldi’s balance at his banker’s is all rot. The Government simply sequestrated a revolutionary fund subscribed by revolutionists for public disturbance, and openly, flagrantly so done. Why will _patriots_ never be truthful?” _To Dr Burbidge_. “Casa Capponi, _Thursday_, 10 [1864]. “These questionable publishers who say, ‘Buy my share and I’ll give you a book,’ represent the contract by which Sanders obtained Marola. That is, _he_ bought the shares--viz., the house, and _they_ gave him the book, meaning the ‘Arsenal.’ All fair and right so far! But nobody ever supposed that the share was connected with the book, had a market value, or was worth more to a purchaser than its price as a _share_. Now the opposite is precisely the mistake Sanders has fallen into. The rent of Marola represents in pounds the eagerness of M. Bolla to sign a certain agreement, but _I_ have no such eagerness; for _me_ no docks are digged, no mud excavated, no roads cut up and trees cut down; _I_ have no interest in all the filth, dirt, drunkenness, or small assassinations introduced into a once lonely spot; I neither derive ten per cent profits or sixty per cent frauds. I have no part in the honest gains of Sanders or in the wholesale robberies of Bolla,--I merely want a house at the price of a house. Hence to pay £60 to £70 for a two-floor villa, furnished!--three chairs and the bath,--is certes too dear, not to add the Mackie difficulty. I have nothing definitely about my villa here, nor need I for some days. “Is the wretched little toy-house under the Cappucines still unlet? and if so, what rent does M. Torri expect for it?--for, though _he_ has _no straw_, he has more than the equivalent in the pestilent rascality of a true Spezzino. “I hear from ‘The Morning Post’ people that Pam has at length got the Emperor’s consent to be warlike. _A la remarque de la France_ is a tune we know better nowadays than ‘Rule Britannia.’ The story goes: _he_, L. N., is to have the _freyen deutschen Rhein_, and we are to be permitted to fill up again M. Lessep’s canal at Suez--_suum caique._ “Who is to say _l’Alliance_ brings no gain? One clears a river, t’other fills a drain. “It is absurd to revile--as ‘The Times’ does--the Derbys for not announcing a policy. It is only a wise precaution in a bather who has once been robbed to hide his clothes when he next goes for a swim. This is all Dizzy is doing. “I am now in a rare mess about ‘Luttrell,’ and cannot write a word.”