Elizabeth Barrett to Mary Russell Mitford, 5 April 1845: 'A most singular book of Eugene Sue's [sic] I have read lately, the whole front of which is directed against slave-emancipation & the part which England has played in it [...] The scene is laid in a sugar plantation in the West Indies, & the book, from its very imbecility, is worth your looking into -- Very weak it is, to be sure, -- & outrageously absurd -- and you will see at once that a philanthropist & liberal who advocates the slave-trade, can scarcely be [italics]thorough[end italics] & consistently cordial in free opinions.'