I had, afterward, some talk with Mrs. C., whom hitherto I had only _seen_, for who can speak while her husband is there? I like her very much;--she is full of grace, sweetness, and talent. Her eyes are sad and charming. * * *
After this, they went to stay at Lord Ashburton's, and I only saw them once more, when they came to pass an evening with us. Unluckily, Mazzini was with us, whose society, when he was there alone, I enjoyed more than any. He is a beauteous and pure music; also, he is a dear friend of Mrs. C.; but his being there gave the conversation a turn to "progress" and ideal subjects, and C. was fluent in invectives on all our "rose-water imbecilities." We all felt distant from him, and Mazzini, after some vain efforts to remonstrate, became very sad. Mrs. C. said to me, "These are but opinions to Carlyle; but to Mazzini, who has given his all, and helped bring his friends to the scaffold, in pursuit of such subjects, it is a matter of life and death."
All Carlyle's talk, that evening, was a defence of mere force,--success the test of right;--if people would not behave well, put collars round their necks;--find a hero, and let them be his slaves, &c. It was very Titanic, and anti-celestial. I wish the last evening had been more melodious. However, I bid Carlyle farewell with feelings of the warmest friendship and admiration. We cannot feel otherwise to a great and noble nature, whether it harmonize with our own or not. I never appreciated the work he has done for his age till I saw England. I could not. You must stand in the shadow of that mountain of shams, to know how hard it is to cast light across it.
Honor to Carlyle! _Hoch!_ Although in the wine with which we drink this health, I, for one, must mingle the despised "rose-water."
And now, having to your eye shown the defects of my own mind, in the sketch of another, I will pass on more lowly,--more willing to be imperfect,--since Fate permits such noble creatures, after all, to be only this or that. It is much if one is not only a crow or magpie;--Carlyle is only a lion. Some time we may, all in full, be intelligent and humanly fair.