"We shall obey Mr. Trollope's injunctions to write again from Perugia or elsewhere, according to our route homeward. But pray warn him, that when my throat is not sore, and my head not stagnant, I am a much fiercer antagonist. It is perhaps a delight to one's egoism to have a friend who is among the best of men with the worst of theories. One can be at once affectionate and spit-fire. Pray remember me with indulgence, all of you, and believe, dear Mrs. Trollope, "Most truly yours, "M.E. LEWES." * * * * * It will be seen from the above that George Eliot had very quickly fraternised--what is the feminine form?--with my second wife, as I, without any misgivings, foresaw would be the case. Indeed subsequent circumstances allowed a greater degree of intimacy to grow up between them than had been possible in the case of my Bice's mother, restricted as her intercourse with the latter had been by failing health, and the comparative fewness of the hours they had passed together. Neither she nor Lewes had ever passed a night under my roof until I received them in the villa at Ricorboli, where I lived with my second wife. What was the subject of the "antagonism" to which the above letter alludes, I have entirely forgotten. In all probability we differed on some subject of politics,[1] by reason of the then rapidly maturing Conservatism which my outlook ahead forced upon me. Nevertheless it would seem from some words in a letter written to me by Lewes in the November of 1869, that my political heresies were not deemed deeply damning. There was a question of my undertaking the foreign correspondence of a London paper, which came to nothing till some four years later, under other circumstances; and with reference to that project he writes:-- [Footnote 1: My wife, on reading this passage, tells me that according to her recollection the differences in question had no reference to politics at all, but to matters of higher interest relating to man's ultimate destinies.] * * * * * "Polly and I were immensely pleased at the prospect for you. She was rejoiced that you should once more be giving yourself to public affairs, which you so well understand.... We are but just come back from the solitudes of a farm-house in Surrey, whither I took Polly immediately after our loss [of his son], of which I suppose Anthony told you. It had shaken her seriously. She had lavished almost a mother's love on the dear boy, and suffered a mother's grief in the bereavement. He died in her arms; and for a long while it seemed as if she could never get over the pain. But now she is calm again, though very sad. But she will get to work, and _that_ will aid her.