our noble Dandies and "Cooks' sons," and of that wise old man Lord Roberts forgetting his own over- whelming grief, to plan victory and moderation and success for his country. And then. I thought of over- riding, conquering Kitchener working with him so loyally, and the people waiting so courageously and patiently, and Zebul coming at last. I do thank God that life is not only bad and hard, but strong and kind and enduring.
36, Grosvenor Road [ 1900].
Half a loaf is better than no bread, and your kind letter extracts a penny roll from me. If each of your many admirers send a guinea, you will have more than enough.
We are all preparing to return home on Monday week and then I shall come soon. Hester and I got to Florence and got back again, with such a luggage of rivers, delicious hills and galleries and marble steps. How lovely things are, and curiously enough it seems to me that the five minutes of later life and the passing glances, are worth all the nice bountiful twelve hours at a time of one's youth.
I'm so glad I was such a young idiot, and left something for now--I brought back Leonardo da Vinci's "Cena" from Milan among other things, which I declare I never saw before, though I have looked at it at intervals all my life long.
Hester radiated, and I often thought of your sight of the Flower City, but we never got to the Certosa.
I am now preparing to go off to the Gosse-Crewe- Burghclere luncheon. I suppose a Wetsuntide is good for the country but as soon as the trees have drunk enough I do hope it will leave off raining.
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