GE to Charles Lee Lewes, Milan, 28 May 1880
Title
GE to Charles Lee Lewes, Milan, 28 May 1880
Title
GE to Charles Lee Lewes, Milan, 28 May 1880
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Charles Lee Lewes
Date(s)
- 1880-05-28
Place
Milan
Letter Content
GE to Charles Lee Lewes, Milan, 28 May 1880
MS: Yale, Published: Paterson, pp. 223-226.
Milan, May 28. 430 80.
Dearest Boy
Many thanks for your delightful letter, which came to me yesterday, with a loving though brief letter from Mrs. Congreve to keep it company in making the day agreeable.
While I think of it let me ask you to send a line to the confused Mrs. Bishop, seeing that she regards her letter to G.E. as a trust to be cared for by Mrs. Cross. When you write to me again I wish you would send me Mrs. Stowe's letter. Finally, in the way of business, the notice of transfer from the Odessa Waterworks 431 is quite correct, and the document may be put in the fire.
The arrangement Gertrude has made for Marian is very satisfactory, and I trust that Eliza is finding her Brighton life more cheery than that in her Hampstead lodgings. It is a comfort to think of Marian getting under good influences, and perhaps after all we may see her grow into a nice girl.
We arrived here on Monday and have been induced by a nice quiet apartment and pleasant attendance at the Hotel Gran Bretagna to carry out our plan of resting here and deliberately seeing what is to be seen in this cheerful, prosperous city. I am glad to find that the Luini pictures come up to my remembrance of them, and that Johnnie is much impressed by his introduction to them. I continue remarkably well and am every day surprizing myself by the amount of walking standing and looking that I can go through. Tomorrow or the next day we intend to go on to Verona, then after a sufficient pause to enjoy that glorious place we shall move on to Padua and Venice, where it will be best for you to send me anything you may have to send. I like to see the letters. They make one realize the fact of one's home and little world there amid the dreaminess of foreign travel.
We take our meals in our own apartment and see nothing of our fellow guests in the Hotel -- only hear their British and American voices when they air themselves in the Cortile after their dinner. Last evening, to satisfy J's curiosity, we went to see Rossi 432 in Hamlet. I had seen him in the part in London and thought him sufficiently bad then, but he is certainly far worse when he is intending to enrapture his own countrymen.
Anything so unintelligent, so -- drunken as the performance last night I never saw on-any stage English or foreign. In the scene with his mother he roared (hoarsely) and stamped, and pulled the poor woman's arms as if he meant to put them out of joint. One would be prepared to enjoy Irving after seeing Rossi.
I hope you will be able to send me word that poor Constance 433 goes on well with her babe and that Aunt Susanna is less of an invalid. Your account of poor Mrs. Stuart is alarming, but we can hardly wonder that such persistent pain and sleeplessness as she has had to endure should make her snatch at any chance of relief. We cannot be tender and indulgent enough to those who are going through bodily suffering.
I have had a very nice letter from the Master of Balliol 434 -- which was more than I expected. And so is your account of Herbert Spencer's sympathy. The only thing I missed in your first letter was some little description of your interview with Mrs. Congreve. You usually manage to give a good idea of everything you have seen and done in a masterly sketch with a few lines rightly chosen. -- The decline of merit in your State Paper after you had finished writing it is an inherited experience. I am wondering what it can be about.
The weather has hitherto been delicious, not excessively warm, always with a pleasant movement in the air; but this morning there is a decided advance in heat, and we shall both have our theory of great heat being the best thing for us well tested in the next month. The haste with which I made my preparations hindered me from preparing quite perfectly for the needs of travel in the way of costume, and in foreign towns one can never supply omissions made before starting. By the way, the friends who blame me for not giving them notice of my marriage beforehand should know that it was not decided for more than a fortnight before it took place and that half that fortnight I was a mere incorporation of influenza. Else I should certainly have told one or two a little earlier than I did.
I am glad to hear that Gertrude is better. My love to her and the children and desire for all blessing to you all from
Mutter.
I suppose you told the gardener to plant more ivy, when necessary.
Johnnie sends best love. He is find[ing] his last summer's clothes a world too wide for his shrunken form 435 -- he is so much thinner, that I am even wishing him to make flesh which after all is a good basis for spirit.
MS: Yale, Published: Paterson, pp. 223-226.
Milan, May 28. 430 80.
Dearest Boy
Many thanks for your delightful letter, which came to me yesterday, with a loving though brief letter from Mrs. Congreve to keep it company in making the day agreeable.
While I think of it let me ask you to send a line to the confused Mrs. Bishop, seeing that she regards her letter to G.E. as a trust to be cared for by Mrs. Cross. When you write to me again I wish you would send me Mrs. Stowe's letter. Finally, in the way of business, the notice of transfer from the Odessa Waterworks 431 is quite correct, and the document may be put in the fire.
The arrangement Gertrude has made for Marian is very satisfactory, and I trust that Eliza is finding her Brighton life more cheery than that in her Hampstead lodgings. It is a comfort to think of Marian getting under good influences, and perhaps after all we may see her grow into a nice girl.
We arrived here on Monday and have been induced by a nice quiet apartment and pleasant attendance at the Hotel Gran Bretagna to carry out our plan of resting here and deliberately seeing what is to be seen in this cheerful, prosperous city. I am glad to find that the Luini pictures come up to my remembrance of them, and that Johnnie is much impressed by his introduction to them. I continue remarkably well and am every day surprizing myself by the amount of walking standing and looking that I can go through. Tomorrow or the next day we intend to go on to Verona, then after a sufficient pause to enjoy that glorious place we shall move on to Padua and Venice, where it will be best for you to send me anything you may have to send. I like to see the letters. They make one realize the fact of one's home and little world there amid the dreaminess of foreign travel.
We take our meals in our own apartment and see nothing of our fellow guests in the Hotel -- only hear their British and American voices when they air themselves in the Cortile after their dinner. Last evening, to satisfy J's curiosity, we went to see Rossi 432 in Hamlet. I had seen him in the part in London and thought him sufficiently bad then, but he is certainly far worse when he is intending to enrapture his own countrymen.
Anything so unintelligent, so -- drunken as the performance last night I never saw on-any stage English or foreign. In the scene with his mother he roared (hoarsely) and stamped, and pulled the poor woman's arms as if he meant to put them out of joint. One would be prepared to enjoy Irving after seeing Rossi.
I hope you will be able to send me word that poor Constance 433 goes on well with her babe and that Aunt Susanna is less of an invalid. Your account of poor Mrs. Stuart is alarming, but we can hardly wonder that such persistent pain and sleeplessness as she has had to endure should make her snatch at any chance of relief. We cannot be tender and indulgent enough to those who are going through bodily suffering.
I have had a very nice letter from the Master of Balliol 434 -- which was more than I expected. And so is your account of Herbert Spencer's sympathy. The only thing I missed in your first letter was some little description of your interview with Mrs. Congreve. You usually manage to give a good idea of everything you have seen and done in a masterly sketch with a few lines rightly chosen. -- The decline of merit in your State Paper after you had finished writing it is an inherited experience. I am wondering what it can be about.
The weather has hitherto been delicious, not excessively warm, always with a pleasant movement in the air; but this morning there is a decided advance in heat, and we shall both have our theory of great heat being the best thing for us well tested in the next month. The haste with which I made my preparations hindered me from preparing quite perfectly for the needs of travel in the way of costume, and in foreign towns one can never supply omissions made before starting. By the way, the friends who blame me for not giving them notice of my marriage beforehand should know that it was not decided for more than a fortnight before it took place and that half that fortnight I was a mere incorporation of influenza. Else I should certainly have told one or two a little earlier than I did.
I am glad to hear that Gertrude is better. My love to her and the children and desire for all blessing to you all from
Mutter.
I suppose you told the gardener to plant more ivy, when necessary.
Johnnie sends best love. He is find[ing] his last summer's clothes a world too wide for his shrunken form 435 -- he is so much thinner, that I am even wishing him to make flesh which after all is a good basis for spirit.
Signature
Mutter.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Charles Lee Lewes, Milan, 28 May 1880, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/92215