“I got back here last night late to find your note, and I may own that I never ‘touched’ money that didn’t belong to me with more pleasure than your cheque, plucked by innkeepers and cleared out by whist as I have been while away. “Only think of my going to see Flynn in prison at Venice! I hope I’ll be able some day to give you an account of our meeting. I have taken charge of the scoundrel’s petition for pardon, and believe I shall succeed in obtaining it, though what society is to gain by his liberation is more a matter for speculation than hope; but I am really curious to know what resources of knavery he has in his budget, all the more since his rival swindler, L. Napoleon, would seem at the end of _his_ rogueries, and stands fully exposed and found out by all Europe. I saw some most astounding correspondence of his on the Mexican affair, and it will be published one of these days. “I’ll go over ‘The Fenian’ the moment I am rested. Now my hand is shaking terribly, and I am a good deal fatigued. “Trieste was a fatal blunder of mine. If you could hear of [any one who] would exchange with me, put him in ‘relations’ at once: I’ll pay liberally the ‘difference.’ “Of course I was not in London, though I read I was, in a Scotch paper. I hope you and Mrs B. will not let May go over without a run to Paris and a peep at us here. It would be a great pleasure to see you. “I am, as you may believe, very down in the mouth about my move. I feel as might a vicar leaving a snug parsonage to become bishop in the Cannibal Islands.” _To Mr Alexander Spencer._ “Villa Morelli, Florence, _May_ 7,1867. “I suspect my Trieste appointment is a bit of a white elephant. There will be a great deal to do, a large staff necessary, and the place is generally costly to live in. In fact, I believe it would have been fully as well for me to have retained my humble post at Spezzia, where, if I received little, I did less. But I was tired of being a country mouse, and began to fancy that I had a right to some more generous diet than hard peas. “My poor wife has gone back sorely in health. I have many causes for uneasiness, but this is the worst of all.” _To Mr John Blackwood._ “Villa Morelli, _June_ 18,1867. “I enclose you the proof and a few pages to wind up ‘The Adieu.’ “You will see ere long that I am right about L. Nap. He means to play us a slippery trick about the East. He bamboozled us into the Crimean War, and he is now going to juggle us out of its small benefits. “My wife is at last a little better. I got to bed last night after twelve nights of half-sleep on the sofa. I am fairly knocked up, and for this and other reasons do look to the proof, and don’t trust me. “You have heard that Elliott has been appointed Ambassador to Constantinople. He is about the greatest ass in diplomacy,--a big word when one remembers Loftus at Berlin and Howard at Munich. Here is an epigram I made on his appointment:--