EDINBURGH, JANUARY 1876.

MY DEAR KATHARINE, - The prisoner reserved his defence. He has
been seedy, however; principally sick of the family evil,
despondency; the sun is gone out utterly; and the breath of the
people of this city lies about as a sort of damp, unwholesome fog,
in which we go walking with bowed hearts. If I understand what is
a contrite spirit, I have one; it is to feel that you are a small
jar, or rather, as I feel myself, a very large jar, of pottery work
rather MAL REUSSI, and to make every allowance for the potter (I
beg pardon; Potter with a capital P.) on his ill-success, and
rather wish he would reduce you as soon as possible to potsherds.
However, there are many things to do yet before we go


GROSSIR LA PATE UNIVERSELLE
FAITE DES FORMES QUE DIEU FOND.


For instance, I have never been in a revolution yet. I pray God I
may be in one at the end, if I am to make a mucker. The best way
to make a mucker is to have your back set against a wall and a few
lead pellets whiffed into you in a moment, while yet you are all in
a heat and a fury of combat, with drums sounding on all sides, and
people crying, and a general smash like the infernal orchestration
at the end of the HUGUENOTS. . . .

Please pardon me for having been so long of writing, and show your
pardon by writing soon to me; it will be a kindness, for I am
sometimes very dull. Edinburgh is much changed for the worse by