[Postmark: July 6, 1846]JH
You will have known by my two or three words that I
received your letter in time to set out for Mrs J.’s — she said
to me, directly and naturally, ‘you have missed a great
pleasure ‘ — and then accounted for your absence. Do not
be sorry, Ba, at my gladness . . for I was I hope glad
. . yes, I am sure, glad that you ran no risk if you will not
think of that, think of my risk if you had ‘fainted’ .. should
I have kept the secret, do you suppose ? Oh, dearest of
all dreamt-of dearness, – incur no unnecessary danger now,
at . . shall I dare trust, – the end of the adventure ! I
cannot fear for any mischance that may follow once let my}
arms be round you . . I mean, the blow seems then to fall
on both alike – now, what dismal, obscure months might be
prolonged between us before we meet next by a caprice
where the power is ! When have I been so long without
the blessing of your sight ! Yet how considerately you
have written, what amends you make, all that the case
admits of ! If I were less sure of my own mind, and what
it knows for best, I might understand the French lover’s
fancy of being separated from his mistress that he might be
written to and write .. but the very best I know, and have
ever in sight, and constantly shall strive after .. to see you
face to face, to live so and to die so – which I say, because it
ends all, all that can be ended .. and yet seems in itself so encountered – no death no end.
After all, I may see you to-morrow may I not ? There
is no more than a danger, an apprehension, that we may lose to-morrow also, is there ? You cannot tell me after this is
read . . I shall know before. If I receive no letter, mind, I go to you .. so that if the Post is in fault after its custom, and your note arrives at 3 o’clock you will know
why I seem to disobey it and call .. and I shall understand why you are not to be seen – but I will hope.
When you say these exquisitely dear and tender things, you know Ba, it is as if the sweet hand were on my mouth –
I cannot speak .. I try to seem as if I heard not, for all the
joy of hearing .. you give me a jewel and I cannot repeat, ‘you, you do give me a jewel.’ I am not worthy of any gift,
you must know, Ba, – never say you do not – but what you press on me, let me feel and half-see, and in the end, carry
away, but do not think I can, in set words, take them. At
most, they are, and shall be, half-gift half-loan for adornment’s sake, — mine to wear, yours to take back again.
Even this, all this ungracefulness, is proper, appropriate in
its way — I am penetrated with shame thinking on what you
say, and what my utmost devotion will deserve . . so
infinitely less will it deserve ! You are my very, very
angel.
Mrs Jameson showed me the lines you had sent her,
Horne’s very beautiful poem, — very earnest, very solemn
and pathetic, — worthy of Horne and the subject — and you
will do well to reward him as you propose. I think I will
also write two or three lines, — telling him that you called
my attention to the poem, — so that he may understand the
new friend does not drive out the old, as the old proverb
says. I will wait a day or two and write. And you are
herein, too, a dear good Ba, — to write me out the verses
in the characters I love best of all ! I may keep them,
I hope.
The weather is hot as ever : Ba, remember how I believe in you — is the indisposition ‘ nothing to signify ‘ ?
And remember the confidence I make you of every
slightest headache or what looks like it — tell me frankly as
Ba should, and will if she loves me ! I am very well . .
and my mother much better. I observe while I write, the
clouds gather propitiously for coolness if not rain — may| all
be as is best for you — ‘ and for me ? ‘ Then kiss me, really,
through the distance, and love me, my sweetest Ba !
I am your own —