GE to Francois D'Albert-Durade, London, 21 September 1866
Title
GE to Francois D'Albert-Durade, London, 21 September 1866
Title
GE to Francois D'Albert-Durade, London, 21 September 1866
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Francois D'Albert-Durade
Date(s)
- 1866-09-21
Place
London
Letter Content
GE to Francois D'Albert-Durade, London, 21 September 1866
MS: The late Mr. Arthur Pforzheimer. A copy by M. D'Albert-Durade is in the Tinker Collection, Yale. Hitherto unpublished.
North Bank | September 21. 66.
My dear Friend
I was glad to have some news of you and yours after the long silence, though the news is clouded by your prospect of a parting such as must become more frequent to most of us as life advances. I remember well Madame Covelle's 534 graceful person and pretty features. It must be a comfort to Madame d'Albert under this family sorrow to have her sister's presence with her.
With us, all is happy. We have just said goodbye, under cheerful circumstances, to our youngest son, who is gone to join his brother in Natal, according to their mutual wish. Charles expects to be a father at the end of this month, and our sweet daughter-in-law bears the malaise of her condition well enough to make us altogether hopeful. For ourselves we are, as usual, delicate in health, but we were reinforced by a long holiday on the Continent during the months of June and July. It was not a time when we should have chosen to be seeking pleasure, (for the war was making too many hearts heavy,) but that Mr. Lewes had been suffering so much during the winter and spring as to make change absolutely a duty for us, since it was not an impossibility. Accordingly when my new book "Felix Holt" was fairly through the press, we set out for Holland first, spending the larger part of our subsequent time among the Taunus Hills at Schwalbach, and then at Schlangenbad, which we left just in time to avoid witnessing the entrance of the Prussians and to get our passage down the Rhine to Bonn! On our way home we lingered a little in the famous old Belgian towns, and finished by tasting the sea breeze for a few days on the broad firm sands of Ostend. Mr. Lewes has certainly benefited by this holiday, and so have I -- who also was in a miserable condition beforehand. But for the frailty of our bodies, we should be as happy as it seems possible for two mortals to be in this confused state of human things; indeed, I think we have more than our share of good. Mr. Lewes continues to edit the "Fortnightly Review," but it is not improbable that he will give it up by and by, if he can do so without injury to the proprietors. His own studies are of course a good deal interrupted by the demands of editorial work, and besides, we are less free to move about and make flights away from London while he has such a responsibility upon him. "Felix Holt" has been a great success to me both in fame and money -- two things called good, but which vary much in quality according to their uses. I dare say you will not be able to read it, if you were inclined to take that trouble, as my publisher Blackwood has declined to sell it to Tauchnitz, finding by experience that the Tauchnitz editions are injurious to the cheaper English editions. 535
We shall be happy to welcome the young sculptor of whom you speak. I may just mention, in case you should wish to introduce any other friend of yours to us, that our day of reception is Sunday, from 2 o'clock till 5. We find it a great economy of time, and a means of saving our friends from calling in our absence, to have a fixed day of reception.
I hope you do not get all your conceptions of English journalism and the state of our literature from the Athenaeum, which is strong in its advertising interest and therefore impossible to supplant except by a scarcely possible application of capital and time, but is very low in character as a critical organ. The Saturday Review is the best weekly paper in point of talent -- the Pall Mall Gazette, the best of the daily evening papers. But the aspect of culture shown in journalism is never very lofty or cheering.
I like to imagine you at play with the little grand-daughter, and to believe that Madame d'Albert's life also is much cheered by these fresh objects of interest. I am afraid Mr. Lewes and I enjoy our t'eate-'e0-t'eate too much to be very open to the pleasures which may be found in our personal share of the grand-parents' joy. But we rejoice on behalf of our children, hoping that their life will be enriched.
Give my best and most affectionate regards to dear Madame d'Albert, and let me offer Mr. Lewes's kind remembrances both to her and yourself. For me, I am unchangeably yours with affectionate memory,
M. E. Lewes.
MS: The late Mr. Arthur Pforzheimer. A copy by M. D'Albert-Durade is in the Tinker Collection, Yale. Hitherto unpublished.
North Bank | September 21. 66.
My dear Friend
I was glad to have some news of you and yours after the long silence, though the news is clouded by your prospect of a parting such as must become more frequent to most of us as life advances. I remember well Madame Covelle's 534 graceful person and pretty features. It must be a comfort to Madame d'Albert under this family sorrow to have her sister's presence with her.
With us, all is happy. We have just said goodbye, under cheerful circumstances, to our youngest son, who is gone to join his brother in Natal, according to their mutual wish. Charles expects to be a father at the end of this month, and our sweet daughter-in-law bears the malaise of her condition well enough to make us altogether hopeful. For ourselves we are, as usual, delicate in health, but we were reinforced by a long holiday on the Continent during the months of June and July. It was not a time when we should have chosen to be seeking pleasure, (for the war was making too many hearts heavy,) but that Mr. Lewes had been suffering so much during the winter and spring as to make change absolutely a duty for us, since it was not an impossibility. Accordingly when my new book "Felix Holt" was fairly through the press, we set out for Holland first, spending the larger part of our subsequent time among the Taunus Hills at Schwalbach, and then at Schlangenbad, which we left just in time to avoid witnessing the entrance of the Prussians and to get our passage down the Rhine to Bonn! On our way home we lingered a little in the famous old Belgian towns, and finished by tasting the sea breeze for a few days on the broad firm sands of Ostend. Mr. Lewes has certainly benefited by this holiday, and so have I -- who also was in a miserable condition beforehand. But for the frailty of our bodies, we should be as happy as it seems possible for two mortals to be in this confused state of human things; indeed, I think we have more than our share of good. Mr. Lewes continues to edit the "Fortnightly Review," but it is not improbable that he will give it up by and by, if he can do so without injury to the proprietors. His own studies are of course a good deal interrupted by the demands of editorial work, and besides, we are less free to move about and make flights away from London while he has such a responsibility upon him. "Felix Holt" has been a great success to me both in fame and money -- two things called good, but which vary much in quality according to their uses. I dare say you will not be able to read it, if you were inclined to take that trouble, as my publisher Blackwood has declined to sell it to Tauchnitz, finding by experience that the Tauchnitz editions are injurious to the cheaper English editions. 535
We shall be happy to welcome the young sculptor of whom you speak. I may just mention, in case you should wish to introduce any other friend of yours to us, that our day of reception is Sunday, from 2 o'clock till 5. We find it a great economy of time, and a means of saving our friends from calling in our absence, to have a fixed day of reception.
I hope you do not get all your conceptions of English journalism and the state of our literature from the Athenaeum, which is strong in its advertising interest and therefore impossible to supplant except by a scarcely possible application of capital and time, but is very low in character as a critical organ. The Saturday Review is the best weekly paper in point of talent -- the Pall Mall Gazette, the best of the daily evening papers. But the aspect of culture shown in journalism is never very lofty or cheering.
I like to imagine you at play with the little grand-daughter, and to believe that Madame d'Albert's life also is much cheered by these fresh objects of interest. I am afraid Mr. Lewes and I enjoy our t'eate-'e0-t'eate too much to be very open to the pleasures which may be found in our personal share of the grand-parents' joy. But we rejoice on behalf of our children, hoping that their life will be enriched.
Give my best and most affectionate regards to dear Madame d'Albert, and let me offer Mr. Lewes's kind remembrances both to her and yourself. For me, I am unchangeably yours with affectionate memory,
M. E. Lewes.
Signature
M. E. Lewes.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Francois D'Albert-Durade, London, 21 September 1866, 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/92352