Tell me if it is true that Harriet Martineau has seceded again from her atheism?
We heard so the other day.

Dearest Mrs.Martin, do write to me; and do, both of you, remember me, and think of both of us kindly.

With Robert's true regards, I am your as ever affectionate BA.
Tell me dear Mr.Martin's mind upon politics--in the Austrian and Prussian question, for instance.

We have no fears, in spite of Dr.
Cumming and the prophets generally, of ultimate results.
* * * * * _To Miss Mitford_ Florence: December 11, 1854.
I should have written long ago, my dearest Miss Mitford, to try to say half the pleasure and gratitude your letter made for me, but I have been worried and anxious about the illnesses, not exactly in my family but nearly as touching to me, and hanging upon posts from England in a painful way inevitable to these great distances....
I understand that literature is going on flaggingly in England just now, on account of nobody caring to read anything but telegraphic messages.
So Thackeray told somebody, only he might refer chiefly to the fortunes of the 'Newcomes,' who are not strong enough to resist the Czar.

The book is said to be defective in story.