In a word I feel as if you were not engrossed by your subject, but were sufficiently aloof from it to contemplate it as a spectator, which is an error in art.

Many of the remarks are delicately felt and finely written.

The whole book comes from a noble nature, and so it impresses the reader.

But I may tell you what Mrs.Carlyle said last night, which will in some sense corroborate what I have said.

In her opinion you would have done better to make two books of it, one the love story, and one a description of Florentine life.