[Postmark: June 17, 1846]
Tuesday. 6 o’clock.
Beloved, this weather, which makes Flush cross, perhaps
helped to make me depressed this morning. I had not
slept well, and ought not to have written to you till the
effect of it had gone off. Now I feel more as if I had been
with you yesterday. Ah well ! I don’t, can’t remember
what I wrote . . and some of it was wise . . for I ought
not to have promised that, . . and you must loose me, that
I may be loosed in Heaven, from the bands of it. Only
you are not to go to Greenwich (you go to Greenwich
to-morrow, do you not ?) thinking that I wanted to teaze you.
There is just one meaning to all my words, let them be sad
or gay . . and it is, that your happiness is precious. For
myself, if we were to part now and for ever, I should still owe
you the only happiness of my life. But nobody is talking of
parting, you know – I am yours, and cannot be put away from
you except by your own hand. Which is decided ! What
I ask of you, is to spare me the pang of causing you to
suffer on my account, . . and you may suffer sometimes, I
fear, through all your affection for me, . . and indirectly, if
not directly.
Two visitors I have had to-day – dear Mr. Kenyon, and
Lady Margaret Cocks. She is going to Italy – (oh, of
course !) to Rome. He came to tell me that the books
came to me from Landor himself, and that I must write
to him to thank him properly. Mrs. Jameson I do not see,
nor Miss Bayley.
How hot it will be for you to-morrow ! Try to be
amused and not too tired, dearest beloved, and tell me in
your letters how the head is.
While the heart beats (mine !) I am your own.
I am going in the carriage presently and shall write
again to-night. Won’t that be three times in a day according
to order?