The
answer, which might well have consisted of a succinct statement of all
the difficulties of the position with which Italy was then struggling,
had to confine itself to the limits of an article in _All The Year
Round_, and needed in truth to be pointed. I have observed that, in
all our many conversations on Italian matters, Dickens's views and
opinions coincided with my own, without, I think, any point of
divergence. Very specially was this the case as regards all that
concerned the Vatican and the doings of the Curia. How well I remember
his arched eyebrows and laughing eyes when I told him of Garibaldi's
proposal that all priests should be summarily executed! I think
it modified his ideas of the possible utility of Garibaldi as a
politician.
Then comes an invitation to "my Falstaff house at Gadshill."
Here is a letter of the 17th February, 1866, which I will give _in
extenso_, bribed again by the very flattering words in which the
writer speaks of our friendship:--
* * * * *
"MY DEAR TROLLOPE,--I am heartily glad to hear from you. It was such
a disagreeable surprise to find that you had left London" [I had been
called away at an hour's notice] "on the occasion of your last visit
without my having seen you, that I have never since got it out of my
mind. I felt as if it were my fault (though I don't know how that can
have been), and as if I had somehow been traitorous to the earnest and
affectionate regard with which you have inspired me.
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