Category: Uncategorized

[Postmark: May 25, 1846]

Sunday.

When you came yesterday I had scarcely done my
grumbling over the AthenÊum, which really seems to me
to select its subjects from the things least likely to interest
and elevate. It goes on its own level perhaps — but to
call itself a Journal of Art and Literature afterwards, is too
much to bear patiently when one turns it over and considers.
Lady Hester Stanhope’s physician, antiquities of the mayors
of London, stories re-collected from the magazines by Signor
Marcotti— and this is literature . . art ! Without thinking
of ‘ Luria,’ it is natural and righteous to be angry even after
the sun has gone down. These are your teachers, O Israel !
Mr. Dilke may well fly to the Daily News for congenial
occupation and leave literature behind him, and nobody
hang on the wheels of his chariot, crying, ‘ Come back, Mr.
Dilke.’

Talking of chariots, George met you, he said, yesterday,
wheeling down Oxford Street, . . (this he told me when he
came in . .) going as fast as an express train, and far too
fast, of course, either to recognize or be recognized.

Oh — I forgot to tell you one thing about the review in
the Methodist Quarterly. You observe there some very
absurd remarks about Tennyson — but, just there, is an
extract from the ‘ Spirit of the Age,’ about his ‘ coming out
of himself as the nightingale from under the leaves,’ . . you
see that ? Well . . it is curious that precisely what is
quoted there is some of my writing, when I contributed to
Mr. Home’s book. It amused me to recognize it, (as you
did not George) . . but I was vexed too at the foolish
deduction, because. …

In the midst I had to hold my Sunday-levee, when for
the only day in the week and for one half hour I have to
see all my brothers and sisters at once : on the week days,
one being in one place and one in another, and the visits to
me only coming by twos and threes. Well, and Alfred,
who never had said a word to me before, gave me the
opportunity of saying ‘ no, no, it is not true ‘ — followed hard
by a remark from somebody else, that ‘ of course Ba must
know, as she and Mr. Browning are such very intimate
friends,’ and a good deal of laughter on all sides : on which,
without any transition and with an exceeding impertinence,
Alfred threw himself down on the sofa and declared that
he felt inclined to be very ill, . . for that then perhaps
(such things being heard of) some young lady might come
to visit him^ to talk sympathetically on the broad and
narrow gauge ! Altogether, I shall leave you for the future
to . . . contradict yourself ! I did not mean to do it this
time, only that Alfred forced me into it. But he said . . .
‘ How the Miss Cokers praised him ! …” It was delightful,”
they cried, ” to see a man of such a great genius condescend
to little people like them.” ‘ So they are better than the
AthenÊum, and I shall not have them spoken of ungently,
mind, even if they do romance a little wildly, and marry me,
next time, to the man in the moon.

In the meantime, dearest, it is no moonshine that I was
out walking to-day again, and that I walked up all these
stairs with my own feet on returning. I sate down on the
stairs two or three times, but I could not rest in the
drawing-room because somebody was there, and I was not carried,
as usual — see how vain-glorious I am. And what a summersense
in the air — and how lovely the strips of sky between
the houses ! And yet I may tell you truly, that, constantly,
through these vivid impressions, I am thinking and feeling
that mournful and bitter would be to me this return into
life, apart from you, apart from the consideration of you.
How could ever I have borne it, I keep feeling constantly.
But you are there, in the place of memory. Ah — you said
yesterday that you were not ungrateful ! I cannot say so.
I blame myself often. And yet again I think that the wrong
may be pardoned to me, for that those affections had
worked out on me their uttermost pang — nearly unto death
I had felt them — and now if I am to live, it must be by
other means — or I should die still, and not live. Also I
owe you gratitude —— do I not owe you gratitude ? Then,
I cannot help it . . right or wrong, I cannot help it . . you
are all to me, and, beloved — whichever way I look, I only
can see you. If wrong, it is not for you to be severe on
me —

Your own
Ba.

[Postmark: May 25, 1846]

Sunday Morning.

My own Ba is entreated to observe, that when she sends
me reviews about herself, and songs by herself, and a make-
weight book about ‘ Junius ‘ happens to be sent also . . I
do not ordinarily plunge into the Junius-discussion at
once — perhaps from having made up my mind that the
Author is Miss Campbell : — at all events, while the review
was read and re-read and the music done justice and in-
justice to, the Junius was opened for the first time this
morning, at eight of the clock, and Ba’s letter which lay
between pages 16 and 17, ‘ came to hand’ — was brought to
me by my mother, from my father ! but for whose lucky
inspiration of curiosity the said note had perhaps lain shut
in till the book’s secret was found out . . certainly I should
never have touched the book before then ! And from this
note, duly studied, I learn that yesterday I must have
appeared to Ba touched by a general mental paralysis — inasmuch
as I was surprised, over and above the joyfulness,
to hear that she was in the Park on Thursday, as well as
Friday . . (oh, I know the letter I did receive mentioned it,
but it seems as if one of the two excursions were unrecorded)
— and seeing that I enquired whether Ba had heard with
her own ears the song . . and altogether omitted thanking
her for the gift of it : and lastly, brought no Statesmen,
even on Ba’s request ! Of all which matters I ought to have
been made acquainted by the note : what must you think of
me, you Ba ; dearest-dearest, that expect me to know the
face through the bonnet, and the letter through the book
covers — (Ba sitting in the Bookseller’s shop was a type, I
see !). What did you think of me yesterday, I want to know ?
Well, and now my letter does come I thank you — (for
all the trouble this precedent will give me — next time a
parcel comes — of poking into all impossible places to see
and to see !) You are the dearest, dearest, impossibly dear
Ba that heart ever adored,

‘ And the roses which thou strowest,
All the cheerful way thou goest,
Would direct to follow thee,’

as Shirley sings — and every now and then the full sense
of the sweetness collects itself and overcomes me entirely,
as now, on the occasion of this note that I find ; I am
blessed by you in the hundred unspeakable ways — but
were it only for this and similar pure kindness, I find it in
my heart to give you my life could it profit you ! Here
ought I, by every law and right and propriety . . ask Miss
Campbell ! . . to be ministering to you, caring for you ;
and . . oh, Ba, do please, please, throw a coffee cup at me !
— (giving some grounds for complaint !) — and after it the
soucoupe (‘ glaring with saucer eyes’) — and see what you
shall see, and hear what you shall hear ! You ‘ strongest
woman that has written yet’ ! Have they found that out?
I know it, I think, by this ! So I will go and think over it
in the garden, and tell you more in the afternoon.

12 o’ clock ! — What strange weather ! — but pleasant, I
think — you have been out, or will go out, perhaps. Tell
me all, dearest, and how you feel after it. To-morrow I
will send you the Review and some of the other books you
have spoken of from time to time — but, I almost dare to
keep the Statesmen, spite of your positive request. Why,
dear, want to see what I desire to forget altogether ? So
my other poems, ‘ Sordello ‘ &c. — I most unaffectedly
shudder at the notion of your reading them, as I said
yesterday. My poetry is far from the ‘ completest expression
of my being ‘ — I hate to refer to it, or I could tell you
why, wherefore, . . prove how imperfect (for a mild word),
how unsatisfactory it must of necessity be. Still, I should not
so much object, if, such as it is, it were the best, the flower of
my life . . but that is all to come, and through you, mainly,
or more certainly. So will it not be better to let me write
one last poem this summer, — quite easily, stringing every
day’s thoughts instead of letting them fall, — and laying them
at the dear feet at the summer’s end for a memorial ? I
have been almost determining to do this, or try to do it, as
I walked in the garden just now. A poem to publish or
not to publish ; but a proper introduction to the afterwork.
What do you think, my Ba, my dearest siren, and muse,
and Mistress, and . . something beyond all, above all and
better . . shall I do this? And what are you studying
about Amalfi, my Ba ? Will you please keep that Naples’
Note-book till I ask for it — at Amalfi. Till holy church
incorporate two in one ; and I take the degree of my
aspiration. Rt. Bg. B.A. — in earnest of which, kiss me dear,
‘ earnest, most earnest of poets,’ and let me kiss you as I do
. . loving you as I love you. Bless you, best and dearest.

[Postmark: May 22, 1846]

Friday.

I have a great mind to retract , , I do retract altogether
whatever I said the other day in explanation of Miss Heaton’s
story. I make no doubt, now, it was a pure dream to which
my over-scrupulousness of conscience gave a local habitation
and name both, through the favourable dimness and illusion
of ‘ a good many years ago ‘ — because this last charge about
‘ Miss Campbell’ — briefly — I never in my life saw, to my
knowledge, a woman of that name — nor can there be any
woman of any other name from my acquaintance with whom
the merest misunderstanding in the world could possibly
arise to a third person . . I mean, that it must be a simple
falsehood and not gossip or distortion of fact, as I supposed
in the other case. I told you of the one instance where
such distortion might take place,— (Miss Haworth, to avoid
mistake). This charge after the other . . I will tell you of
what it reminds me – in my early boyhood I had a habit of
calling people ‘ fools,’ with as little reverence as could be,
. . and it used to be solemnly represented to me after such
offences that ‘ whoso calleth his brother ” fool,” is in danger
&c. for he hath committed murder in his heart already ‘ &c. in
short,— there was no help for it, — I stood there a convicted
murderer . . to which I was forced penitently to agree . .
Here is Miss Heaton’s charge and my confession. Now, let
a policeman come here presently to ask what I know about
the ‘ Deptford Murder ‘ or the ‘ Marshalsea Massacre ‘ — and
you will have my ‘ intimate friend’s ‘ charge. By the way,
did your brother overhear this, or was it spoken to someone
in his company, or is my friend his acquaintance also ?
Because in either of the latter cases I can interfere easily.
(There is a Mr, Browning — Henry I think — living in, or
near the Regent’s Park.) At all events, please say that I
know no such person, nor ever knew, — that the whole is a
pure falsehood — (and I only use so mild a word because I
write to you, and because on reading the letter again I see
the speakers were women).

It is a fact that I have made myself almost ridiculous by
a kind of male prudery with respect to ‘ young ladies ‘ . .
that I have seemed to imply — ‘ If I gave you the least
encouragement something would be sure to follow.’ In fact
never seeing any attractiveness in the class, I was very little
inclined to get involved in troubles and troubles for nothing
at all. And as for marrying . . that is a point on which I
have certainly not chosen to dilate before you, nor shall I
now dilate on it.

Well, I shall see you to-morrow, that remedies everything.
And that is your way of letting me see the Review, —
you send it ! Not that it has arrived yet. Dear Ba, hown
ever good you are !

All about the lady enthusiasts makes me laugh — don’t
think I fail of the proper respect to them, however — it is
only once in a week that one sees a real painted Emperor
settle on a flower, and then perhaps for a few minutes —
while at all times, if you look, you will find a good half
dozen of earnest yet sleepy drones living there, working
away at the sweet, — after all, these get the most out of the
flower.

Did you really go out yesterday ? I was not sure, for
the wind was Easterly — but it appears to have done you no
harm, — you may ‘go into the street’ to-day — I am most
happy, — most happy — and always entirely happy in you,—
in thinking of you, and hoping, — my life is in you now —

Bless you, dearest — I am your own.

2 o’clock, the parcel arrives . . thank you, best of Ba’s !
I will read and tell you — (only what on earth do you mean
by sending back those sketches ?)

Thursday.

This is not to be called a letter, please to understand,
because to write a letter to you once a day is enough in all
reason. But I want to send you the review you asked for
at the same time with the drawings which I kept too long
I thought months ago, — but I have looked over them again
and again. Then there is the book on Junius — and lastly,
the song which I want you to have . . the ‘ Toll Slowly ‘-
that is my gift to you, for as much as it is worth, and not
to be sent back to me if you please. As for the Notes on
Naples, I shall keep them for the present, having need to
study about Amalfi.

Now I am going out in the carriage, and shall drive
round the park perhaps. You will not think much of the
Aiusic — but it being the first music I had heard for years
and years, and in itself so overwhelmingly melancholy, it
affected me so that I should scarcely hear it to the end. I
went down-stairs on purpose to hear it and be able to thank
the composer rightly. But she has done better things, I
am sure.

Your own

Ba.

Observe — I disobey in nothing by sending this parcel.
There is too much for you to carry. Don’t forget to bring
me my Statesmen which is a lawful burden.

[Postmark: May 22, 1846]

Thursday.

Dearest, when your letter came I was cutting open the
leaves of Dickens’ ‘ Letters from Italy ‘ which Papa had
brought in — so I am glad to have your thoughts of the
book to begin with. Before your letter came I had sent
you the review, as you will find. What changes, what
changes ! And the sonnet was purely manuscript, and for
the good of the world should remain so. Oh — you cannot
care for all this trash- such trash ! Why I had a manu-
script sonnet sent to me last autumn by ‘ person or persons
unknown,’ … ‘ To EBB on her departure from England
to Pisa.’ Can you fancy that melodious piece of gossipping ?
Then a lady of the city, famous, I believe, for haberdashery,
used to address all her poems to me — which really was
original . . for she would write five or six ‘ poems ‘ on an
evening, and sweep them up and send them to me once a
fortnight, upon faith, hope and charity, seaweed and moonshine,
cornlaws and the immortality of the soul, and take
me for her standing muse, properly thou’d and thee’d all
through. What a good vengeance it would be upon your
unjust charges, if I set you to read a volume or two of those
‘ poems ‘ . . . which all went into the fire — so you need
not be frightened.

And to-day I had a rose-tree sent to me by somebody
who has laid close siege to me this long while, and whom I
have escaped hitherto . . but who has encamped, she says,
’till July ‘in 16 Wimpole Street. She writes too on her
card . . ‘ When are you going to Italy ? ‘

Ah ! you, who blame me (half blame me) for ‘ seeing
women,’ do not know how difficult it is to help it sometimes,
without being in appearance ungrateful and almost brutal.
Just because I am unwell, they teaze me more, I believe.
Now that Miss Heaton . . oh, I need not go back, but it
was not of my choice, be sure. You being a man are
different, — and perhaps you make people afraid and keep
them off. They do not thrust their hands through the bars
where the lion is, as they do with the giraffe. Once I had
this proposition — ‘ If we mayn’t come in, will you stand up
at the window that we may see ? ‘ Now ! — And there’s the
essence of at least ten MS. sonnets ! —— so don’t complain
any more.

As for Mr. Kenyon, he had his ‘ collation,’ I understand —
and he said that he was expecting Mrs. Jameson and sundries
— but he referred to some ‘ friends from the country who
would not be so mad as to come,’ and whom I knew to be
yourselves. You were quite, quite right not to come.
To-day you are right too . . in thinking that I — was out.
I was in the park nearly an hour, Arabel and Flush and I :
and perhaps if to-morrow should be fine, I may walk in the
street ; so think of me and help me. This is my last letter
before I see you again, dear dearest. Oh — but I heard
yesterday . . and it was not a tradition of the elders this
time . . it was ‘ vivid in the pages of contemporary history ‘
… in fact one of my brothers heard it at the Flower Show
and brought it home as the newest news, . . that ‘ Mr.
Browning is to be married immediately to Miss Campbell.’
The tellers of the news were ‘ intimate friends ‘ of yours,
they said, and knew it from the highest authority —

Laugh ! — Why should not they talk, being women ?
My brother did not tell me, but he told it down-stairs — and
Arabel was amused, she said, at some of the faces round.
At that turn of the road they lost the track of the hare.
Not an observation was made by anybody.

May God bless you — Think of me. I am ever and
ever

Your own

Ba.

[Postmark: May 21, 1846]

Thursday.

Just as I write, the weather is a little more proper for
this ‘ the blest ascension-day of the cheerful month of May ‘ :
may you not go out therefore, my Ba ? Or down-stairs, at
all events. We were sorry, Sarianna and I, to see the bright
afternoon yesterday . . we ought to have gone, perhaps —
but Mr. Kenyon is good and will understand ; spite of the
spectacles. But what sonnet is that, you perverse Ba, of
which you give me the two or three words, — in print,— how,
where ? And if I do not request and request I shall be sure
to hear nothing of that American review again, — so, I do
request, Ba !

Last night brought Dickens’ ‘ Pictures from Italy ‘ — which
I read this morning. He seems to have expended his power
on the least interesting places, —and then gone on hurriedly,
seeing or describing less and less, till at last the mere names
of places do duty for pictures of them, and at Naples he
fairly gives it up . . the Vesuvius’ journey excepted. But
the book is readable and clever – shall I bring it ? — (or next
week when everybody here has done with it).

I know, dearest, you did not promise me that beatific
vision by the gate — but was not enough said to justify me
in waiting for you there ? Indeed, yes — only the rain and
wind seemed to forbid you ; as they did. Were your sisters
pleased ? I am not sure I should have been glad to meet
them so — I could not have left my sister (whom nobody
would have known) — and then, with that, unspoken secret
between us. Also I please myself by hoping that Mr.
Kenyon was only relieved of a great trouble and annoyance
in the present state of his anxieties by our keeping away.
Poor Captain Jones — really a fine, manly, noble fellow — I
am heartily sorry. As for me, since Ba asks, I am pretty
well, — much better in some points, and no worse in the rest
— all is right but the little sound in the head which will be
intrusive — but I must walk it away presently, or think it away
at worst.

For, dearest, dearest Ba, I can cure all pains at once
with you to think of, and to love, and to bless. So, bless
you !

Your R.

Wednesday, May 20.

Was it very wrong of me that never did I once think of
the possibility of your coming here with Mr. Kenyon ?
Never once had I the thought of it. If I had, I should
have put it away by saying aloud ‘ Don’t come ‘ ; because as
you say, it would have prevented Saturday’s coming, the
coming to-day would, . . and also, as you do not say, it would
have been infinitely hard for me to meet you and Mr. Kenyon
in one battalion. Oh no, no ! The gods forefend that you
should come in that way ! It was bad enough as it was,
to-day, when while he sate here his ten minutes, (first showing
me a sonnet from America, which began ‘ Daughter of
GrÊcian Genius ! ‘) he turned those horrible spectacles full
on me and asked, ‘ Does Mrs. Jameson know that Mr.
Browning comes here?’ ‘No,’ said I, — suddenly abashed,
though I had borne the sonnet like a hero. ‘ Well, then !
I advise you to give directions to the servants that when she
or anyone else asks for you, they should not say Mr.
Browning is with you — as they said the other day to Miss
Bayley who told me of it.’ Now, wasn’t that pleasant to
hear? I thanked him for his advice, and felt as uncomfortable
as was well possible — and am, at this moment, a
little in doubt how he was thinking while he spoke. Perhaps
after the fashion of my sisters, when they cry out ‘ Such a
state of things never was heard of before ! ‘ Not that they
have uttered one word of opposition . . not, from the first
they knew, . . understand ! — but that they are frightened
at what may be said by people who take for granted that we
are strangers, you and I, to one another. Ah ! — a little
more, a little less . . of what consequence is it ?

Such a day, to-day ! — it was finer last year I remember !
and Tuesday, instead of Wednesday ! Your sister was right,
very right — though mine went — but the distance was less,
with us. A party of twelve went from this house — ‘ among
us but not of us.’ For my part, I have not stirred from my
room of course — the carriage was out of the question. And,
if you please, I never ‘ promised’ to be at the park gate— oh
indeed, I never meditated seeing you even from afar — I
thought only that I should hear a little distant music and
remember that, where it sounded, you were, that was all,
. . and too much, the stars made out, and so drove down the
clouds.

Poor Mr. Kenyon was grave — depressed about his
friend, who is in a desperate state — dying in fact. He
returns to Portsmouth to-morrow to be with him till the
change comes.

Dearest, how are you ? Never now will you condescend
to say how you are. Which is not to be allowed in this
second year of our reign. I am very well. Yesterday I
heard some delightful matrimonial details of an ‘ establishment’
in Regent’s Park, quite like an old pastoral in the
quickness of the repartee. ‘ I hate you ‘ — ‘ I abhor you ‘
— ‘ I never liked you ‘ — ‘ I always detested you.’ A cup and
saucer thrown bodily, here, by the lady ! On which the
gentleman upsets her, . . chair and all, . . flat on the floor.
The witness, who is a friend of mine, gets frightened and
begins to. cry. She was invited to the house to be godmother
to their child, and now she is pressed to stay longer to witness
the articles of separation.

Oh, I suppose such things are common enough ! — But
what is remarkable here, is the fact that neither party is a
poet, by the remotest courtesy.
Goodnight, dear dearest —

I am your

Ba.

[Postmark: May 20, 1846]

Wednesday.

My Ba, I can just kneel down to you and be kissed, — I
cannot do more, nor speak, nor thank you — and I seem to
have no more chance of getting new love to give you, — all is
given, — so I have said before, and must keep saying now —
all of me is your very own.

My sister (whose engagement, and not mine, this was)
decides to act according to the letter of Mr. Kenyon’s kind
instructions, and keeps at home on account of the rain.
She is very subject to colds and sore-throat which the
least dampness underfoot is sure to produce in her. So I
am not near you ! You would not go, however, — I think,
would not go, — to the Park gate as you conditionally promised
— I do not, therefore, miss my flower-show, my ‘ rose
tree that bareth seven times seven.’ But the other chance
which your last letter apprises me of, — the visit of Mr.
Kenyon, — which, by going in time to him, I might perhaps
make my own too — that, on a second thought, I determine
to forego . . because it jeopardizes my Saturday, which will
be worth so many, many such visits, — does it not ? There
is no precedent in our golden year for three visits taking
place in a single week — not even in that end of October
when all the doubt was about the voyage — how I
remember !

I shall be more with you than if in the presence of
people before whom I may not say ‘ Miss Barrett ‘ with
impunity while professing to talk of Miss — I forget who !
But ‘ more with you ‘ I who am always with you !

Always with you in the spirit, always yearning to be with
you in the body, — always, when with you, praying, as for
the happiest of fortunes, that I may remain with you for
ever. So may it be, prays your

own, own R.

[Postmark: May 20, 1846]

Tuesday Evening.

Do you remember how, when poor Abou Hassan, in the
Arabian story, awakens from sleep in the Sultan’s chamber,
to the sound of instruments of music, he is presently
complimented by the grand vizier on the royal wisdom displayed
throughout his reign . . do you remember ? Because just
as he listened, do I listen, when you talk to me about ‘he
course I have taken ‘… I, who have just had the wit
to sit still in my chair with my eyes half shut, and dream
. . dream ! — Ah, whether I am asleep or awake, what do I
know . . even now ? As to the ‘ course I have taken,’ it
has been somewhere among the stars . . or under the trees
of the Hesperides, at lowest. . .

Why how can I write to you such foolishness ? Rather
I should be serious, grave, and keep away from myths and
images, and speak the truth plainly. And speaking the
truth plainly, I, when I look back, dearest beloved, see that
you have done for me everything, instead of my doing anything
for you — that you have lifted me . . . Can I speak ?
Heavens ! — how I had different thoughts of you and of
myself and of the world and of life, last year at this hour !
The spirits who look backward over the grave, cannot feel
much otherwise from my feeling as I look back. As to
your thanking me, that is monstrous, it seems to me. It is
the action of your own heart alone, which has appeared to
do you any good. For myself, if I do not spoil your life, it
is the nearest to deserving thanks that I can come. Think
what I was when you saw me first . . laid there on the
sofa as an object of the merest compassion ! and of a
sadder spirit than even the face showed ! and then think
of all your generosity and persistence in goodness. Think
of it !— shall I ever cease ? Not while the heart beats,
which beats for you.

And now as the year has rounded itself to ‘ the perfect
round,’ I will speak of that first letter, about which so many
words were, . . just to say, this time, that I am glad now,
yes, glad, . . as we were to have a miracle, . . to have
it so, a born-miracle from the beginning. I feel glad, now,
that nothing was between the knowing and the loving . .
and that the beloved eyes were never cold discerners and
analyzers of me at any time. I am glad and grateful to you,
my own altogether dearest ! Yet the letter was read in pain
and agitation, and you have scarcely guessed how much. I
could not sleep night after night, — could not, — and my fear
was at nights, lest the feverishness should make me talk deliriously
and tell the secret aloud. Judge if the deeps of my
heart were not shaken. From the first you had that power
over me, notwithstanding those convictions which I also had
and which you know.

For it was not the character of the letter apart from you,
which shook me, — I could prove that to you — I received
and answered very calmly, with most absolute calmness, a
letter of the kind last summer . . knowing in respect to the
writer of it, (just as I thought of you) that a moment’s
enthusiasm had carried him a good way past his discretion.
I am sure that he was perfectly satisfied with my way of
answering his letter . . as I was myself. But you . . you
. . I could not escape so from you. You were stronger than
I, from the beginning, and I felt the mastery in you by the
first word and first look.

Dearest and most generous. No man was ever like you,
I know ! May God keep me from laying a blot on one day
of yours ! — on one hour ! and rather blot out mine !

For my life, it is yours, as this year has been yours.
But how can it make you happy, such a thing as my life ?
There I wonder still. It never made me happy, without
you ! — .

Your very own

Ba.

Mrs. Jameson was here to-day and brought a message
from Mr. Kenyon, who comes to-morrow at one. The sun
does not promise to come besides — does he ?

Mrs. Jameson goes to Brighton on Thursday, and returns
in a day or two to spend another month or six weeks in
town, changing her lodgings.

[Postmark: May 19, 1846]

Tuesday.

With this day expires the first year since you have been
yourself to me — putting aside the anticipations, and prognostications,
and even assurances from all reasons short of
absolute sight and hearing, — excluding the five or six
months of these, there remains a year of this intimacy. You
accuse me of talking extravagantly sometimes. I will be
quiet here, — is the tone too subdued if I say, such a life —
made up of such years — I would deliberately take rather
than any other imaginable one in which fame and worldly
prosperity and the love of the whole human race should
combine, excluding ‘ that of yours — to which I hearken ‘ —
only wishing the rest were there for a moment that you
might see and know that I did turn from them to you.
My dearest, inexpressibly dearest. How can I thank
you ? I feel sure you need not have been so kind to me, so
perfectly kind and good, — I should have remained your own,
gratefully, entirely your own, through the bare permission
to love you, or even without it — seeing that I never dreamed
of stipulating at the beginning for ‘ a return,’ and ‘ reward,’ —
but I also believe, joyfully, that no course but the course
you have taken would have raised me above my very self,
as I feel on looking back. I began by loving you in com-
parison with all the world, — now, I love you, my Ba, in the
face of your past self, as I remember it.

All words are foolish — but I kiss your feet and offer you
my heart and soul, dearest, dearest Ba.

I left you last evening without the usual privilege — you
did not rise, Ba ! But, — I don’t know why, — I got nervous
of a sudden, it seemed late and I remembered the Drawing-
room and its occupants.