I hardly think that any critic can have so keen a sense of the short-comings in my works as that I groan under in the course of writing them, and I cannot imagine any edification coming to an author from a sort of reviewing which consists in attributing to him or her unexpressed opinions, and in imagining circumstances which may be alleged as petty private motives for the treatment of subjects which ought to be of general human interest. GEORGE ELIOT: _Letters_, quoted by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, in ‘Last Words from George Eliot,’ _Harper’s Magazine_, for March, 1882. * * * * * [Sidenote: George Eliot in 1864.] It was at Villino Trollope, [the Florentine residence of Mr. T. Adolphus Trollope] that we first saw ... George Eliot. She is a woman of forty, perhaps, of large frame and fair Saxon coloring. In heaviness of jaw and height of cheek-bone she greatly resembles a German; nor are her features unlike those of Wordsworth, judging from his pictures. The expression of her face is gentle and amiable, while her manner is particularly timid and retiring. In conversation, Mrs. Lewes is most entertaining, and her interest in young writers is a trait which immediately takes captive all persons of this class. We shall not forget with what kindness and earnestness she addressed a young girl who had just began to handle a pen, how frankly she related her own literary experience, and how gently she _suggested_ advice. True genius is always allied to humility, and in seeing Mrs. Lewes do the work of a good Samaritan so unobtrusively, we learned to respect the woman as much as we had ever admired the writer. “For years,” said she to us, “I wrote reviews because I knew too little of humanity.” KATE FIELD: ‘English Authors in Florence,’ _The Atlantic Monthly_, December, 1864. * * * * * [Sidenote: Mr. Cross’s first impression in 1869.] I still seem to hear, as I first heard them, the low, earnest, deep, musical tones of her voice; I still seem to see the fine brows, with the abundant auburn-brown hair framing them, the long head, broadening at the back, the gray-blue eyes, constantly changing in expression, but always with a very loving, almost deprecating look at my mother, the finely-formed, thin, transparent hands, and a whole _Wesen_ that seemed in complete harmony with everything one expected to find in the author of ‘Romola.’ J. W. CROSS: ‘George Eliot’s Life.’ * * * * * [Sidenote: The Priory.] [Sidenote: Receptions.] [Sidenote: Manner of life.] [Sidenote: Recreations.]