There is nothing in her appearance bout "perfect "rest. You, would" suppose her quietly asleep. But Tam sure she every ill, and T cannot encourage You with much hope of her recovery. 1 hot—why should Tsay Ido, to you my dearing do not think her recovery T do for Vike to leave home. 1 can do nothing here, but T think it right te stay here. You will not Tike Sway, T know, and T cannot reconcile It'to myself to Keep you away. Forster with his usual affection, for" us, comes Ever affectionately.
A tragic letter!—not only because the child had died before it was written, but because it reveals so grimly the character of the mother and the distrust of the husband in her capa-jetty to bear trouble. Not long before Dickens had lost his father, who, after the most terrible operation known In surgery," had been "wonderfully cheerful and strong-hearted."
From Bath Dickens sends, together with Forster's kind regards, "Landor's Jaitto" This is one of the few oc-Jeasions on which any of his distingu-{shed contemporaries are mentioned, though in Paris he had "a very merry Jday with Regnier at Fontainebleau." Regnier "persisted in paying for Joverything—saying it was but a poor acknowledgement of the kindness we thad shown him in London." Dickens believed him to be "a very good little fellow," but says nothing of his acting.
The people who do not fail to get messages in all the holiday letters—from Italy, Switzerland, and France [are the little people. Dickens never forgets his own children: Charley, on Victorian Prudery From Paris in July, 1850, came an account of an affair by which Dickens had been 'a good deal vexed." His perturbation may strike some modern Teaders a8 sheer Victorian prudery, but it was evidently sincere. Judging from the context, Mrs. Dickens also had been in Paris, where she had made one ata dinner party with a Young French actress. "This actress, Dickens "now learns, "made a small faut pos some indefinite time azo. and would not have' been brought to the party had it been understood that other ladies were to be present. So far Dickens would have been willing to pass over the error, but on learn-Ing further that the actress was now the mistress of an English peer, and in Paris, he is moved to send. Mrs. Dickens the following instruction:
Now I cannot remember what ladies ined with us that day, but T am satis= fed sou ought to call upon them, and, without: making too much. of it, Just tay that her history 's not quite cor-Feat, you ind, and that Rogers was mistaken. in presenting' her, but you never mean to tell him so—though you feel you owe this explanation to, them, whom you, asked to meet her." This You mist do at once In the same letter Dickens says that he is to meet D'Orsay at dinner, ant that he has not called at the Embassy (Maclise objecting to go), but intends doing #% presently. He' goes on to express some heterodox opinions on the theatre We have Deen to the Frangyis where the acting was" edicts. including Rachel's, who "was very ike Celeste) and to Francon!'s, which was delightful
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.