Casa Tolomei, Alia Villa, Bagni di Lucca:
September [1853].

As to Patmore's new volume of poems, my husband and I had the pleasure
of reading in MS. the poem which gives its title to the book. He has a
great deal of thought and poetry in him. Alexander Smith I know by
copious extracts in reviews, and by some MSS. once sent to us by friends
and readers. Judging from those he must be set down as a true poet in
opulence of imagery, but defective, so far (he is said to be very young)
in the intellectual part of poetry. His images are flowers thrown to him
by the gods, beautiful and fragrant, but having no root either in Enna
or Olympus. There's no unity and holding together, no reality properly
so called, no thinking of any kind. I hear that Alfred Tennyson says of
him: 'He has fancy without imagination.' Still, it is difficult to say
at the dawn what may be written at noon. Certainly he is very rich and
full of colour; nothing is more surprising to me than his favourable
reception with the critics. I should have thought that his very merits
would be against him.

If you can read novels, and you have too much sense not to be fond of
them, read 'Villette.' The scene of the greater part of it is in
Belgium, and I think it a strong book. 'Ruth,' too, by Mrs. Gaskell, the
author of 'Mary Barton,' has pleased me very much. Do you know the
French novels? there's passion and power for you, if you like such
things. Balzac convinced me that the French language was malleable into
poetry. We are behindhand here in books, and elderly ones seem young to
us. For instance, we have not caught sight yet of 'Moore's Life,' the
extracts from which are unpropitious, I think. I had a fancy, I cannot
tell you how it grew, that Moore, though an artificial, therefore