[Postmark: July 17, 1846]
Thursday.
Dearest, if you feel that, must I not feel it more deeply ?
Twice or three times lately he has said to me ‘ my love ‘
and even ‘ my puss,’ his old words before he was angry
last year, . . and I quite quailed before them as if they were
so many knife-strokes. Anything but his kindness, I can
bear now.
Yet I am glad that you feel that . . The difficulty,
(almost the despair !) has been with me, to make you understand the two ends of truth . . both that he is not stone . .
and that he is immovable as stone. Perhaps only a very
peculiar nature could have held so long the position he
holds in his family. His hand would not lie so heavily,
without a pulse in it. Then he is upright faithful to
his conscience. You would respect him, . . and love him
perhaps in the end. For me, he might have been king and
father over me to the end, if he had thought it worth while
to love me openly enough yet, even so, he should not
have let you come too near. And you could not (so) have
come too near for he would have had my confidence from
the beginning, and no opportunity would have been permitted to you of proving your affection for me, and I should
have thought always what I thought at first. So the nightshade and the eglantine are twisted, twined, one in the
other, . . and the little pink roses lean up against the pale
poison of the berries — we cannot tear this from that, let us
think of it ever so much !
We must be humble and beseeching afterwards at least,
and try to get forgiven — Poor Papa ! I have turned it
over and over in my mind, whether it would be less offensive, less shocking to him, if an application were made first.
If I were strong, I think I should incline to it at all risks
but as it is, . . it might . . would, probably, . . take away the
power of action from me altogether. We should be separated, you see, from that moment, . . hindered from writing . .
hindered from meeting . . and I could evade nothing, as I
am not to say that I should have fainting fits at every
lifting of his voice, through that inconvenient nervous
temperament of mine which has so often made me ashamed
of myself. Then . . the positive disobedience might be a
greater offence than the unauthorised act. I shut my eyes
in terror sometimes. May God direct us to the best.
Oh — do not write about this, dearest, dearest? — I
throw myself out of it into the pure, sweet, deep thought of
you . . which is the love of you always. I am yours . . your
own. I never doubt of being yours. I feel too much
yours. It is might and right together. You are more to
me, beside, than the whole world.
Write nothing of this, dearest of all ! — it is of no use.
To-day . . this morning . . I went out in the carriage, and
we drove round the Park ; and Mrs. Jameson did not come
afterward. Will she put it off till Saturday ? I have heard
nothing against Saturday, by the way, worse than that con-
jecture of mine.
And I have written you, perhaps, a teazing, painful
letter . . I, who love you to-day ‘ as much as ever.’ It is
my destiny, I sometimes think, to torment you. And let
me say what I will, remember how nothing that I say can
mean a doubt you never shall have reason to reproach me
for the falseness of cowardice that double falseness . .
both to me and to you. Only I wish this were Christmas day, and we … even at Salerno . . in the ‘ bad air ‘ ! There’s
no harm in such a wish now is there ?
Ever and ever I am your own
BA.