"Southampton, Wednesday,
"_8th Oct._ 1851.

"My dear Martineau,

"Your interesting letter was sent to me by Monday afternoon, and first
told me that Miss Bremer was in London, which I learned only by a pencil
note on the outside, '142 Strand.' That evening I was going to see my two
sisters--one returned from the Continent, and one come from Derby. And on
Tuesday morning I was engaged to come hither to meet Kossuth! So I fear I
have missed Miss Bremer. But, from to-day's news, I fear there is no
chance of K. arriving till next Monday or Tuesday; and I shall probably go
back to-morrow. I will _try_ to see Miss Bremer immediately, but am much
disappointed.

"I have had a little correspondence with Mr. Kingsley lately--rising out
of a recent lecture of his, the practical results and practical principles
of which gave me great pleasure. He says he has 'done his work' of
protesting and denouncing capitalists, and now hopes to give himself to
_construction_ and practical creation; and much as I fear some of his
generalizations, I hope great good from his purely excellent aims, and the
amount of aid he can command. He agrees most heartily with my denunciation
of large towns as the monster evil, and takes the matter up agriculturally
thus: _No country can be underfed while it returns to the soil what it
takes out of it_"--[The italics are my own. Is not this sentence of
infinite value to us to-day?]--"for, in the long run, the soil will always
give back as much as it receives. Every country impoverishes itself which
pours into the rivers and sea the animal refuse which ought to be restored
to the soil.