Day: June 8, 2018

[Postmark: June 8, 1846]

Monday.

My ‘ recommendation ‘ to dearest Ba was properly
interpreted by her when she regarded the spirit and not the
letter of it.

The day was hot — even I thought who thrive in heat —
and yesterday you did well to keep the house — but last
night’s rain, and this comfort of cloudiness may allow you
to resume the exercise, — only with all ease, darling ! Mrs.
Jameson told me she called the other day on Miss Barrett,
and was informed that lady was ‘walking before her door’
— for I went last night, and deserved to be amused, perhaps,
for the effort, . . and so I was, I never liked our friend as
I now like her, I more than like the good nature and good
feeling and versatility of ready intelligence and quick general
sympathy. She is to see you to-day. She told this to a
Miss Kindersley who had been reading the ‘ Drama of Exile ‘
to her complete delight — but in listening silently, — and after,
when Mrs. J. obligingly turned and said ‘ How I should like
to introduce you to Miss Barrett . . did you ever see her?’
. . to which I answered in the old way, ‘ that nobody, as
she knew, saw you.’ At all these times did not I feel the
‘ mask ‘ you speak of ! I am, fortunately, out of the way of
enquiries . . but if the thing were of constant occurrence,
it would be intolerable. Shall it indeed end soon ? May I
count by months, by weeks ? It is not safe — beginning to
write on this subject — I can do nothing moreover.

Well, Lough has some good works, and you will be
pleased I daresay : but of all things, hold him to his bond
of maintaining the strictest privacy — for Mr. Powell or his
kith and kin go there, and his impudence and brazen
insensibility are dreadful to encounter beyond all belief!
He would book-make about ‘the meeting,’ and in his
ordinary talk, be supplied with a subject to tell lies about
for the next year or two, — unless he got a lesson earlier.
But Lough will understand and keep his promise, no doubt,
if you exact it strictly.

My mother is decidedly better, . . I am quite well—
considering Thursday is so far off ! — considering the end
of summer is so far off. Would it be profane to think of
that lament . . ‘the Summer is ended and we are not
saved ‘ ?

I am obliged to leave off here — I love you ever my best

dearest, own Ba !

[Postmark: June 8, 1846]

Sunday.

One thing you said yesterday which I want to notice
and protest against, my Ba — you charged me with speaking
depreciatingly of myself because you had set the example—
‘ I should not have thought of it but that you began.’ Now
I am tired, just at this moment, and submissive altogether,
and hopeful besides, on the whole, — so I will let you off with
a simple but firmest of protests, — I did not think of imitating
you, but spoke as I felt and knew, — and feel and know
still. The world, generally, will inform you of this in its
own good time and way, so . . taceo ! (The last opinion
of the world’s on the respective value of people and people,
is unhappily too decisive. ‘ And, after all, Mr. Langton is
quite as good as the Duke’s daughter . . for he will have
full twenty thousand a year ! ‘) I suspect I was going to
turn a pretty phrase and tell you I have only a heart, as
the play-books prescribe, — when the said heart pricks me as
if I reserved something — so I will confess to owning a
‘ forehead and an eye ‘ — one advantage over Pope, to whom
folks used to remark ‘ Sir, you have an eye ‘ — and no more
— whereas yesterday evening after leaving Ba, while I settled
myself in the corner of our omnibus to think of her, a
spruce gentleman stretched over, and amid the rumbling
begged my pardon for being forced to remark that my forehead
and eye interested him deeply, phrenologist as he was ;
and he was sure I must needs be somebody . . besides a
passenger to Greenwich ! So if Ba will trust in phrenology !
— I will at least not be unkind to her as to the learned man
— who left the vehicle in due time, lamenting that in return
for his own confidence and pink bill (‘Mr. Hamilton,
phrenologist and lecturer ‘ &c. &c.) I would not break my
obstinate reserve and augustly pronounce ‘ Am I a Beefeater
now?’

Assez de sottises : Ba, my Ba, I am happy in you beyond
hope of expression — you know how happy . . And have not
I some shade of a right, — I who loved the dear, dear pale
cheek and the thin hand, — a right to be blessed in the
wonders I see . . so long as I continue to be thankful to
God whose direct doing I know it to be : how can I ever
doubt the rest . . the so easy matters remaining — I will not
doubt more, I think.

Tell me, write of yourself, love : remember the fierce
heat . . and never go up the long stairs — or, at least, rest
at proper intervals. I think of the Homeric stone heaved
nearly to the hill-top and then ! . . An accident now would
be horrible, — think, and take every precaution — because it
is my life, (if that will influence you) my whole happiness
you are carrying safely or letting slip. May God over-watch
all and care for us !

Good bye, best beloved, — I fear I ought to go to Mrs.
Jameson’s to-night : there is a breakfast engagement for
Wednesday, to meet – this and the other notable ; and a
simple ‘ at home ‘ promised to anybody calling this evening
— and my pride won’t let me accept one nor my liking to
Mrs. J. suffer me to refuse both . . Yet the fatigue ! I
have been at church to-day, seeing people faint.

Your own, your own R.