“I have so full a conviction of _your_ judgment and such a thorough distrust of my own, that I send you a brief bit of M’Caskey _for your opinion_. If you like it, if you think it is what it ought to be and the sort of thing to take, just send me one line by telegraph to say ‘Go on.’ I shall continue the narrative in time to reach you by the 18th at farthest, and enough for a paper. Remember this--the _real war narrative_ is already given and will continue to be given by the newspapers, and it is only by a _mock_ personal narrative, with the pretentious opinions of this impudent blackguard upon all he sees, hears, or meets with, that I could hope for any originality. “My eldest daughter is very eager that I should take your opinion at once, and I am sure you will not think anything of the trouble I am giving you for both our sakes.” _To Mr William Blackwood._ “Trieste, _Sep_. 2, 1870. “What a kind thought it was to send me the slip with Corkhardt’s paper! It is excellent fun, and I send it to-day to the Levant to a poor banished friend on a Greek island. “I regard the nation that thrashes France with the same sort of gratitude I feel for the man who shoots a jaguar. It is so much done in the interests of all humanity, even though it be only a blackguard or a Bismarck who does it. “I send you an O’D. to make enough for a short paper with the other sent on Monday last. “I sent your uncle a specimen page of M’Caskey, but by bad luck I despatched it on my birthday, the 31st August,* and, of course, it will come to no good. It was Dean Swift’s custom to read a certain chapter of Job on his birthday, wherein the day is cursed that a man-child was born. I don’t go that far, but I have a very clear memory of a number of mishaps (to give them a mild name) which have taken this occasion to date from. It would be very grateful news to me to learn I was not to see ‘another return of the happy event,’ but impatience will serve me little, and I must wait till I’m asked for.” * The statement here as to his birthday is sufficiently explicit See vol. i p. 2.--E. D. the credit of reviewing ‘Lothair,’ I am determined to say that these papers were written by Colonel Humbug! _To Mr John Blackwood._ “Trieste, _Sept_ 11,1870. “Since I got your ‘go on’ I have never ceased writing about M’Caskey. Upon you I throw all the responsibility, the more as it has very nearly turned my _own_ brain with its intrinsic insanity. “I suppose I have sent you folly enough for the present month; and if you will write me one line to say you wish it, I will set to work at once at the next part and to the extent you dictate. “Pray look fully to the corrections, and believe me [to be] not very sane or collected.” _To Mr John Blackwood._ “Trieste, _Sept_. 13, 1870.