But I understood from Robert.
* * * * * _To Mrs.Martin_ [Paris], 138 Avenue des Ch.-Elysees: February 27, [1852].
I get your second letter, my dearest Mrs.Martin, before I answer your first, which makes me rather ashamed.
...

Dearest friend, it is true that I have seldom been so upset as by this act of poor dear Miss Mitford's, and the very impossibility of being vindictive on this occasion increased my agitation at the moment....
There are defects in delicacy and apprehensiveness, one cannot deny it, and yet I assure you that a more generous and fervent woman never lived than dear Miss Mitford is, and if you knew her you would do her this justice.

She is better in herself than in her books--more large, more energetic, more human altogether.

I think I understand her better on the whole than she understands me (which is not saying much), and I admire her on various accounts.

She talks better, for instance, than most writers, male or female, whom I have had any intercourse with.