Violet Trefusis regarded François Mitterrand as a man with a great future. He was a member of the French National Assembly almost continuously from 1946, and in 1971 became leader of the new Socialist party, becoming president of France in 1981. He was a frequent visitor to Violet in Florence and at St. Loup and his admiration of her spirit and fortitude in the face of her illness is evident in this letter. He wrote movingly in his memoirs, La Paille et le Grain (Paris, 1975), of his last visit to L'Ombrellino just before she died in March 1972. Even then, he wrote, 'She had not made any confidences to me. There appeared occasionally... the signs of ancient storms and torments of half a century ago which had not been entirely dispelled'.