GHL to Lord Lytton, London, [21-22 February 1875]
Title
GHL to Lord Lytton, London, [21-22 February 1875]
Title
GHL to Lord Lytton, London, [21-22 February 1875]
Sender
George Henry Lewes
Recipient
Lord Lyt
Date(s)
- 1875-02-21–<br /> 1875-02-22
Place
London
Letter Content
GHL to Lord Lytton, London, [21-22 February 1875]
MS: Lady Hermione Cobbold.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
Sunday.
My dear Lytton
Last night the "Fables" came back having been lent to a sympathetic reader; and this morning I have been rereading some of my special favorites. This naturally carries my thoughts to Paris and from Paris to Earlswood Common with memories of the too brief visit you paid us there 272 and the promise you then made to send me a proof of your new poem. 273 I don't reproach you for not having done so because of course hurried and harried as you must have been since then you could not think of such matters, and as I see no advertisement of the poem as forthcoming I suppose you haven't even been able to read the proof yourself.
The news of your being appointed to Constantinople was contradicted but that of your appointment to Lisbon 274 has not been contradicted, so we conclude it is true. You will come to England of course before going to Cintra and if you have any shred of decent friendship left, you won't be so niggardly of yourself and donna as you were last year, but let us have a good spell of you if you can.
My second volume is out at last, 275 and I shall be curious to know what impression the final problem makes on you with its complete turning the tables on the materialist hypothesis of Feeling as a mode of Motion. 276 I am now hard at work and at the subject nearest my heart -- indeed I compare myself now to a duck which after painfully and ungracefully picking its way over the stony bank glides on to the water and expresses its complacency at once more finding itself in the proper element by a conceited wagging of the tail. I wag continuously!
Madonna is also at work but, unlike her duck is not to be induced to wag her tail or feel anything but the misery of misgiving and a profound sense of her own impotence. She bids me send her love to your donna, whose sweet hands I also kiss.
You generally send me a good story. Here is one I send as a bait. The frightful poisonings of the Borgias were being talked of in presence of a papal nuncio, and on his being asked how it was that such horrors could be committed, he rubbed his unctuous hands and blandly said, Monsieur, 'e7a peut simplifier bien des choses.
Ever yours
G. H. L.
I open this (Monday morning) to say your note, just come in, has answered it.
MS: Lady Hermione Cobbold.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
Sunday.
My dear Lytton
Last night the "Fables" came back having been lent to a sympathetic reader; and this morning I have been rereading some of my special favorites. This naturally carries my thoughts to Paris and from Paris to Earlswood Common with memories of the too brief visit you paid us there 272 and the promise you then made to send me a proof of your new poem. 273 I don't reproach you for not having done so because of course hurried and harried as you must have been since then you could not think of such matters, and as I see no advertisement of the poem as forthcoming I suppose you haven't even been able to read the proof yourself.
The news of your being appointed to Constantinople was contradicted but that of your appointment to Lisbon 274 has not been contradicted, so we conclude it is true. You will come to England of course before going to Cintra and if you have any shred of decent friendship left, you won't be so niggardly of yourself and donna as you were last year, but let us have a good spell of you if you can.
My second volume is out at last, 275 and I shall be curious to know what impression the final problem makes on you with its complete turning the tables on the materialist hypothesis of Feeling as a mode of Motion. 276 I am now hard at work and at the subject nearest my heart -- indeed I compare myself now to a duck which after painfully and ungracefully picking its way over the stony bank glides on to the water and expresses its complacency at once more finding itself in the proper element by a conceited wagging of the tail. I wag continuously!
Madonna is also at work but, unlike her duck is not to be induced to wag her tail or feel anything but the misery of misgiving and a profound sense of her own impotence. She bids me send her love to your donna, whose sweet hands I also kiss.
You generally send me a good story. Here is one I send as a bait. The frightful poisonings of the Borgias were being talked of in presence of a papal nuncio, and on his being asked how it was that such horrors could be committed, he rubbed his unctuous hands and blandly said, Monsieur, 'e7a peut simplifier bien des choses.
Ever yours
G. H. L.
I open this (Monday morning) to say your note, just come in, has answered it.
Signature
G. H. L.
Citation
George Henry Lewes, GHL to Lord Lytton, London, [21-22 February 1875], Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/94879