_Foxholes, October 20th_.--I am glad the article on Shelley [Footnote: 'Shelley and Mary,' _Edinburgh Review_, October 1882.] has interested you. The perusal of these private letters and correspondence has considerably altered and raised my estimate of Shelley as a man. As to his poetry, it produces on me exactly the effect of delicious music, which enchants the ear even when you can't understand it. But these papers, which Lady Shelley has had printed in order to secure their preservation, are a sealed book. I believe she never can show them again to anyone--at least not at present. The copy she lent me has been returned to her and I do not possess it. Nobody else does. It is, therefore, impossible to ask her for a copy. I undertook to compile an article--as I did for Lady Dorchester, on her father--_omissis omittendis_. But that is all. I think the history of Allegra is in great part new, and one of the difficulties in this matter is the connexion existing between these papers and the papers of Lord Byron, which are unpublished. Are you going to stay in London? I hope so. I shall return to town on November 6, and should be very glad to find you there. And the Journal accordingly has:-- _November 6th_.--Returned to London. _18th_.--The troops came back from Egypt. _December 3rd_.--Archbishop of Canterbury (Tait) died. _4th_.--The Law Courts opened. _16th_.--To Foxholes till the end of the year. Gambetta died just as the year expired. _To Lord Derby_ _Foxholes, December 23rd_.--The Club has lost one of its most respected members in the Archbishop, and all parties seem now to feel how great and wise a man he was. Huxley would be rather an odd successor to an archbishop; but I am inclined to think that he ought to be one of our next additions. I am a very old and fervent supporter of the Anglo-French alliance, but in the present state of France I doubt whether anything is to be gained by making sacrifices to her pretensions. In justice to other States, such as Italy and Austria, I see no reason for conceding to France any exceptional position in Egypt, and I think all countries should be treated with equal justice and liberality. It is probable that a firm though friendly attitude towards the French will answer best for them and for us. Their expeditions to Congo, Tonkin, and Madagascar will do more harm to themselves than to anyone else; but they prove the weakness of the present French Government. _From Lord Derby_ _Knowsley, December 25th_.--I agree in what you say about France, if you mean that the dual control is dead and cannot be revived; nor ought it, if it could. Other nations may fairly claim a voice in Egyptian affairs. What I lay stress upon is that we should make it clear that we are not going to take Egypt for ourselves; which nearly all foreigners suppose to be our intention, and give us credit for disguising it so well.