autumn. It is very wrong of you not to come too, and the reasons you
give against it are by no means conclusive. My opinion is that, whatever
the term of your natural life may be, you would probably have an
additional ten years fastened on to it by coming to the Continent, and
so I tease you and tease you, as is natural to such an opinion. People
twirl now in their arm-chairs, and the vitality in them kindles as they
rush along. Remember how pleased you were when you were at Como! Don't
draw a chalk circle round you and fancy you can't move. Even tables and
chairs have taken to move lately, and hats spin round without a giddy
head in them. Is this a time to stand still, even in the garden at
Wimbledon? 'I speak to a wise man; judge what I say.'

We tried the table experiment in this room a few days since,
by-the-bye, and failed; but we were impatient, and Robert was playing
Mephistopheles, as Mr. Lytton said, and there was little chance of
success under the circumstances. It has been done several times in
Florence, and the fact of the possibility seems to have passed among
'attested facts.' There was a placard on the wall yesterday about a
pamphlet purporting to be an account of these and similar phenomena
'scoperte a Livorno,' referring to 'oggetti semoventi' and other
wonders. You can't even look at a wall without a touch of the subject.
The _circoli_ at Florence are as revolutionary as ever, only tilting
over tables instead of States, alas! From the Legation to the English
chemist's, people are 'serving tables' (in spite of the Apostle)
everywhere. When people gather round a table it isn't to play whist. So
good, you say. You can believe in table-moving, because _that_ may be
'electricity;' but you can't believe in the 'rapping spirits,' with the
history of whom these movements are undeniably connected, because it's
'a jump.' Well, but you will jump when the time comes for jumping, and
when the evidence is strong enough. I know you; you are strong enough