September 29, 1845.
Then first, . . . first, I ask you not to misunderstand. Because we do not . . . no, we do not . . . agree (but disagree) as to ‘what is your true good’ . . . but disagree, and as widely as ever indeed.
The other asking shall come in its season . . . some day before I go, if I go. It only relates to a restitution — and you cannot guess it if you try . . . so don’t try! — and perhaps you can’t grant it if you try — and I cannot guess.
Cabins and berths all taken in the Malta steamer for both third and twentieth of October! see what dark lanterns the stars hold out, and how I shall stay in England after all as I think! And thus we are thrown back on the old Gibraltar scheme with its shifting of steamers . . . unless we take the dreary alternative of Madeira! — or Cadiz! Even suppose Madeira, . . . why it were for a few months alone — and there would be no temptation to loiter as in Italy.
Don’t think too hardly of poor Papa. You have his wrong side . . . his side of peculiar wrongness . . . to you just now. When you have walked round him you will have other thoughts of him.
Are you better, I wonder? and taking exercise and trying to be better? May God bless you! Tuesday need not be the last day if you like to take one more besides — for there is no going until the fourth or seventh, . . . and the seventh is the more probable of those two. But now you have done with me until Tuesday.
Ever yours,
E.B.B.