The Life and Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley Volume Ii Part 13

Hamilton Browne's illness, the death of many English, the return of every other from Greece, filled me with gloomy apprehensions.

But you live,--what kind of life your letters will, I trust, inform me,--what possible kind of life in a cavern surrounded by precipices,--inaccessible! All this will satisfy your craving imagination. The friends.h.i.+p you have for Odysseus, does that satisfy your warm heart?... I gather from your last letter and other intelligence that you think of marrying the daughter of your favourite chief, and thus will renounce England and even the English for ever.

And yet,--no! you love some of us, I am sure, too much to forget us, even if you neglect us for a while; but truly, I long for your letters, which will tell all. And remember, dear friend, it is about yourself I am anxious. Of Greece I read in the papers. I see many informants, but I can learn your actions, hopes, and, above all valuable to me, the continuation of your affection for me, from your letters only.

_27th February._

I now close my letter--I have not yet received yours.

Last night Jane and I went with Gamba and my Father to see Kean in _Oth.e.l.lo_. This play, as you may guess, reminded us of you. Do you remember, when delivering the killing news, you awoke Jane, as Oth.e.l.lo awakens Desdemona from her sleep on the sofa? Kean, abominably supported, acted divinely; put as he is on his mettle by recent events and a full house and applause, which he deserved, his farewell is the most pathetic piece of acting to be imagined. Yet, my dear friend, I wish we had seen it represented as was talked of at Pisa. Iago would never have found a better representative than that strange and wondrous creature whom one regrets daily more,--for who here can equal him? Adieu, dear Trelawny, take care of yourself, and come and visit us as soon as you can escape from the sorceries of Ulysses.--In all truth, yours affectionately,

M. W. S.

At Pisa, 1822, Lord Byron talked vehemently of our getting up a play in his great hall at the Lanfranchi; it was to be _Oth.e.l.lo_. He cast the characters thus: Byron, Iago; Trelawny, Oth.e.l.lo; Williams, Ca.s.sio; Medwin, Roderigo; Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley, Desdemona; Mrs. Williams, Emilia. "Who is to be our audience?" I asked. "All Pisa," he rejoined. He recited a great portion of his part with great gusto; it exactly suited him,--he looked it, too.

All this time Miss Clairmont was pursuing her vocation as a governess in Russia, and many interesting glimpses into Russian family and social life are afforded by her letters to Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley and Mrs. Williams. She was a voluminous letter-writer, and in these characteristic epistles she unconsciously paints, as no other hand could have done, a vivid portrait of herself. We can see her, with all her vivacity, versatility, and resource, her great cleverness,--never at a loss for a word, an excuse, or a good story,--her indefatigable energy, her s.h.i.+fting moods and wild caprices, the bewildering activity of her restless brain, and the astonis.h.i.+ng facility with which she transferred to paper all her pa.s.sing impressions. In narration, in description, in panegyric, and in complaint she is equally fluent. Unimpeachably correct as her conduct always was after her one miserable adventure, she had, from first to last, an innate affinity for anything in the shape of social gossip and scandal; her really generous impulses were combined with the worldliest of worldly wisdom, and the whole tinctured with the highest of high-flown sentiment.

Fill in the few details wanting, the flat, sleek, black hair,--eyes so black that the pupil was hardly to be distinguished from the iris (eyes which seemed unmistakably to indicate an admixture of Portuguese, if not of African, blood in her descent),--a complexion which may in girlhood have been olive, but in later life was sallow,--features not beautiful, and depending on expression for any charm they might have,--and she stands before the reader, the unmanageable, amusing, runaway schoolgirl; a stumbling-block first, then a bugbear, to Byron; a curse, which he persistently treated as a blessing, to Sh.e.l.ley; a thorn in the side of Mary and of every one who ever was responsible for her; yet liked by her acquaintance, admired in society, commiserated by her early friends, and regarded with well-deserved affection and grat.i.tude by many of her pupils and _proteges_.

CLARE TO JANE.

MOSCOW, _27th October 1825_.

MY DEAREST JANE--It is now so long since I heard from you that I begin to think you have quite forgotten me. I wrote twice to you during the summer; both letters went by private hand, and to neither of which have I received your answer. I enclosed also a letter or letters for Trelawny, and I hope very much you have received them. Whenever some time elapses without hearing from England, then I begin to grow miserable with fear. In a letter I received from Mary in the autumn, she mentions the approaching return of the Hunts from Italy, and I console myself with believing that you are both so much taken up with them that you have delayed from day to day to write to me. Be that as it may, I have never been in greater need of your letters than for these last two months, for I have been truly wretched. To convince you that I am not given to fret for trifles, I will tell you how they have been pa.s.sed. I spent a very quiet time, if not a very agreeable one, until the 12th of August; then a French newspaper fell into my hands, in which it mentioned that Trelawny had been dangerously wounded in a duel on the 13th of June. You who have known the misery of anxiety for the safety and wellbeing of those dear to us may imagine what I suffered. At last a letter from Mary came, under date of 26th of July, not mentioning a word of this, and I allowed myself to hope that it was not true, because certainly she would have heard of it by the time she wrote. Then, a week after, another newspaper mentioned his being recovered. This was scarcely pa.s.sed when our two children fell ill; one got better, but the other, my pupil, a little girl of six years and a half old, died. I was truly wretched at her loss, and our whole house was a scene of sorrow and confusion, that can only happen in a savage country, where a disciplined temper is utterly unknown. We came to town, and directly the little boy fell sick again of a putrid fever, from which he was in imminent danger for some time. At last after nights and days of breathless anxiety he did recover. By the death of the little girl, I became of little or no use in the house, and the thought of again entering a new house, and having to learn new dispositions, was quite abhorrent to me. Nothing is so cruel as to change from house to house and be perpetually surrounded by strangers; one feels so forlorn, so utterly alone, that I could not have the courage to begin the career over again; so I settled to remain in the same house, to continue the boy's English, and to give lessons out-of-doors. I do not know whether my plan will succeed yet, but, at any rate, I am bent upon trying it. It is not very agreeable to walk about in the snow and in a cold of twenty, sometimes thirty degrees; but anything is better than being a governess in the common run of Moscow houses. But you have not yet heard my greatest sorrow, and which I think might well have been spared. I had one Englishwoman here, to whom I was attached--a woman of the most generous heart, and whom misfortune, perhaps imprudence, had driven to Russia. She thought with me that nothing can equal the misery of our situation, and accordingly she went last spring to Odessa, hoping to find some means of establis.h.i.+ng a boarding-house in order to have a home. If it succeeded, she was to have sent for me; but, however, she wrote to me that, after well considering everything, she found such a plan would not succeed, and that I might expect her shortly in Moscow, to resume her old manner of life. I expected her arrival daily, and began to grow uneasy, and at length some one wrote to another acquaintance of hers here that she had destroyed herself. I, who knew her thoughts, have no doubt the horror of entering again as governess made her resolve upon this as the only means to escape it. You see, dearest Jane, whether these last two months have been fruitful in woes. I cannot tell you what a consolation it would have been to have received a letter from you whilst I have been suffering under such extreme melancholy. The only amelioration in my present situation is that I can withdraw to my room and be much more alone than I could formerly, and this solitude is so friendly to my nature that it has been my only comfort. I have heard all about the change in my mother's situation, and am truly glad of it. I am sure she will be much better off than she was before. As for Mary, her affairs seem inexplicable. Nothing can ever persuade me that a will can dispose of estates which the maker of it never possessed. Do clear up this mystery to me. What a strange way of thinking must that be which can rely on such a hope!

Yet my brother, my mother, and Mary never cease telling me that one day I shall be free, and the state of doubt, the contradiction between their a.s.sertions and my intimate persuasion of the contrary, that awakens in my mind, is very painful. You are almost quite silent upon the subject, but I wish, my dear Jane, that you would answer me the following questions. Has any professional man ever been consulted on the subject? What is Hogg's opinion? Why in this particular case should the law be set aside, which says that no man can dispose of what he has never possessed? Do have the goodness to ask these questions very clearly and to give me the answers, which no one has ever done yet. They simply tell me, "Whitton has come forward,"

"Whitton thinks the will valid," etc. etc., all of which cannot prove to me that it is so. I know you will excuse my giving you so much trouble, but really when you consider the painful uncertainty which hangs on my mind, you will think it very natural that I should wish to know the reasons of what is a.s.serted to me. To say the truth, I daily grow more indifferent about the issue of the affair. The time is past when independence would have been an object of my desires, and I am now old enough to know that misery is the universal malady of the human race, and that there is no escaping from it, except by a philosophic indifference to all external circ.u.mstances, and by a disciplined mind completely absorbed in intellectual subjects. I fas.h.i.+on my life accordingly to this, and I often enjoy moments of serenest calm, which I owe to this way of thinking. Do not mistake and think that I am indifferent to seeing you again; so far from this, I dream of this as one dreams of Paradise after death, as a thing of another world, and not to be obtained here. It would be too much happiness for me to venture to hope it. I endeavour often to imagine the circle in which you live, but it is impossible, and I think it would be equally difficult for you to picture to yourself my mode of life. I often think what in the world Mary or Jane would do in the dull routine I tread; no talk of public affairs, no talk of books, no subject do I ever hear of except cards, eating, and the different manner of managing slaves. Now and then some heroic young man devotes himself like a second Marcus Curtius to the public good, and, in order to give the good ladies of Moscow something new to talk of, rouses them from their lethargic gossipings by getting himself shot in a duel; or some governess disputes with the mother of her pupils, and what they both said goes over the town. Mary mentioned in her last that she thought it very likely you might both go to Paris. I hope you may be there, for I am sure you would find the mode of life more cheerful than London. As I have told you so many of my sorrows, I must tell you the only good piece of news I have to communicate. I have lately made acquaintance with a German gentleman, who is a great resource to me. In such a country as Russia, where nothing but ignorant people are to be met, a cultivated mind is the greatest treasure. His society recalls our former circle, for he is well versed in ancient and modern literature, and has the same n.o.ble, enlarged way of thinking. You may imagine how delighted he was to find me so different from everything around him, and capable of understanding what has been so long sealed up in his mind as treasures too precious to be wasted on the coa.r.s.e Russian soil. I talk to you thus freely about him, because I know you will not believe that I am in love, or that I have any other feeling than a most sincere and steady friends.h.i.+p for him. What you felt for Sh.e.l.ley I feel for him. I feel it also my duty to tell you I have a real friend, because, in case of sickness or death happening to me, you would at least feel the consolation of knowing that I had not died in the hands of strangers.

I talk to him very often of you and Mary, until his desire to see you becomes quite a pa.s.sion. He is, like all Germans, very sentimental, a very sweet temper, and uncommonly generous. His attachment to me is extreme, but I have taken the very greatest care to explain to him that I cannot return it in the same degree. This does not make him unhappy, and therefore our friends.h.i.+p is of the utmost importance to both. I hope, my dear Jane, that you will one day see him, and that both you and Mary may find such an agreeable friend in him as I have had. I must now turn from this subject to speak of Trelawny, which comes naturally into my mind with the idea of friends.h.i.+p; you cannot think how uneasy I am at not hearing from him. I am not afraid of his friends.h.i.+p growing cold for me, for I am sure he is unchangeable on that point, but I am afraid for his happiness and safety. Is it true that his friend Ulysses is dead? and if so, do pray write to him and prevail upon him to return. I should be at ease if I were to know him near you and Mary. Do think if you can do anything to draw him to you, my dearest Jane. It would render me the happiest of human beings to know him in the hands of two such friends. If this could be, how hard I should work to gain a little independence here, and return perhaps in ten years and live with you. As yet I have done nothing, notwithstanding my utmost exertions, towards such a plan, but I am turning over every possible means in my brain for devising some scheme to get money, and perhaps I may. That is my reason for staying in Russia, because there is no country so favourable to foreigners.

Pray, my dear Jane, do write to me the moment you receive this, and answer very particularly the questions I have asked you. I have filled this whole letter, do you the same in your answer, and tell me every particular about Percy, Neddy, and Dina; they little guess how warm a friend they have in this distant land, who thinks perpetually of them, and wishes for nothing so much as to see them and to play with them.

Give my love to Mary. I will write soon again to her. In the meantime do some of you pray write. These horrid long winters, and the sky, which is from month to month of the darkest dun colour, need some news from you to render life supportable. Kiss all the dear children for me, and tell me everything about them.--Ever your affectionate friend,

CLARE.

Pray beg Mary to tell my mother that I wrote to her on or about the 22d of August; has she had this letter? and do tell me in yours what you know of her. I have just received your letter of the 3d of September, for which I thank you most cordially. Thank heaven, you are all well! What you say of Trelawny distresses me, as it seems to me that you are unwilling to say what you have heard, as it is of a disagreeable nature. You could do me a great benefit if you could make yourself mistress of the Logier's system of teaching music, and communicate it to me in its smallest details. I am sure it would take here. Do, pray, make serious inquiries of some one who has been taught by him. If any one would undertake to write me a very circ.u.mstantial account of his method, I would cheerfully pay them. It might be the means of my making a small independence here, and then I could join you soon in Italy without fear for the future. Do think seriously of this, my dear Jane, and do not take it into your head that it is an idle project, for it would be of the greatest use to me. As to your admirer, I think he is mad, and his society, which would otherwise be a relief, must now be a burthen. You are very right in saying you only find solace in mental occupation; it is the only thing that saves me from such a depression of spirits taking hold of me when I have an instant to reflect upon the past that I am ready for any rash act; but I am occupied from 6 in the morning until 10 at night, and then am so worn out I have no time for thinking. Once more farewell. My address is--Chez Monsieur Lenhold, Marchand de Musique, a Moscow.

_The Last Man_, Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley's third novel, was published early in 1826.

It differed widely from its predecessors. _Frankenstein_ was an allegorical romance; _Valperga_ a historical novel, Italian, of the fifteenth century; the plot of the one depends for its interest chiefly on incident, that of the other on the development of character, but both have a definite purpose in the inculcation of certain moral or philosophical truths. The story of _The Last Man_ is purely romantic and imaginary, probabilities and possibilities being entirely discarded. Its supposed events take place in the twenty-first century of our era, when a devouring plague depopulates by degrees the whole world, until the narrator remains, to his own belief, the only surviving soul. At the book's conclusion he is left, in a little boat, coasting around the sh.o.r.es of the sea-washed countries of the Mediterranean, with the forlorn hope of finding a companion solitary. He writes the history of his fate and that of his race on the leaves of trees,--supposed to be discovered and deciphered long afterwards in the Sibyl's Cave at Baiae,--the world having been (as we must infer) repeopled by that time. It is not difficult to understand the kind of fascination this curious, mournful fancy had for Mary in her solitude. Much other matter is, of course, interwoven with the leading idea. The characteristics of the hero, Adrian, his benevolence of heart, his winning aspect, his pa.s.sion of justice and self-devotion, and his fervent faith in the possibilities of human nature and the future of the human race, are unmistakably sketched from Sh.e.l.ley, and the portrait was at once recognised by Sh.e.l.ley's earliest friend, the value of whose appreciation was, if anything, enhanced by the fact of the great unlikeness between his temperament and Sh.e.l.ley's.

T. J. HOGG TO MRS. Sh.e.l.lEY.

YORK, _22d March 1826_.

MY DEAR MARY--As I am about to send a frank to dearest Jane, I enclose a note to you to thank you for the pleasure you have given me. I read your _Last Man_ with an intense interest and not without tears. I began it at Stamford yesterday morning as soon as it was light; I read on all day, even during the short time that was allowed us for dinner, and, if I had not finished it before it was dark, I verily believe that I should have bought a candle and held it in my hand in the mail.

I think that it is a decided improvement, and that the character of Adrian is most happy and most just.--I am, dear Mary, yours ever faithfully,

T. J. HOGG.

The appearance of Mary's novel had for its practical consequence the stoppage of her supplies. The book was published anonymously, as "by the author of _Frankenstein_," but Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley's name found its way into some newspaper notices, and this misdemeanour (for which she was not responsible) was promptly punished by the suspension of her allowance.

Peac.o.c.k's good offices were again in request, to try and avert this misfortune, but it was not at once that he prevailed. He impressed on Whitton (the solicitor) that the name did not appear in the t.i.tle-page, and that its being brought forward at all was the fault of the publisher and quite contrary to the wishes of the writer, who, solitary and despondent, could not be reasonably condemned for employing her time according to her tastes and talents, with a view to bettering her condition. This Whitton acknowledged, but said, "the name was the matter; it annoyed Sir Timothy." He would promise nothing, and Peac.o.c.k could only a.s.sure Mary that he felt little doubt of her getting the money at last, though she might be punished by a short delay.

It may be a.s.sumed that this turned out so. Late in the year, however, another turn was given to Mary's affairs by the death of Sh.e.l.ley's eldest boy.

_Journal, September 1826._--Charles Sh.e.l.ley died during this month.

Percy is now Sh.e.l.ley's only son.

Mary's son being now direct heir to the estates, and her own prospects being materially improved by this fact, she at once thought of others whom Sh.e.l.ley had meant to benefit by his will, and who, she was resolved, should not be losers by his early death, if she lived to carry out for him his unwritten intentions. She did not think, when she wrote to Leigh Hunt the letter which follows, that nearly twenty years more would elapse before the will could take effect.

MARY Sh.e.l.lEY TO LEIGH HUNT.

5 BARTHOLOMEW PLACE, KENTISH TOWN, _30th October 1826_.

MY DEAR HUNT--Is it, or is it not, right that these few lines should be addressed to you now? Yet if the subject be one that you may judge better to have been deferred, set my _delay_ down to the account of over-zeal in writing to relieve you from a part of the care which I know is just now oppressing you; too happy I shall be if you permit any act of mine to have that effect.

I told you long ago that our dear Sh.e.l.ley intended on rewriting his will to have left you a legacy. I think the sum mentioned was 2000. I trust that hereafter you will not refuse to consider me your debtor for this sum merely because I shall be bound to pay it you by the laws of honour instead of a legal obligation. You would, of course, have been better pleased to have received it immediately from dear Sh.e.l.ley's bequest; but as it is well known that he intended to make such an one, it is in fact the same thing, and so I hope by you to be considered; besides, your kind heart will receive pleasure from the knowledge that you are bestowing on me the greatest pleasure I am capable of receiving. This is no resolution of to-day, but formed from the moment I knew my situation to be such as it is. I did not mention it, because it seemed almost like an empty vaunt to talk and resolve on things so far off. But futurity approaches, and a feeling haunts me as if this futurity were not far distant. I have spoken vaguely to you on this subject before, but now, you having had a recent disappointment, I have thought it as well to inform you in express terms of the meaning I attached to my expressions. I have as yet made no will, but in the meantime, if I should chance to die, this present writing may serve as a legal doc.u.ment to prove that I give and bequeath to you the sum of 2000 sterling. But I hope we shall both live, I to acknowledge dear Sh.e.l.ley's intentions, you to honour me so far as to permit me to be their executor.

I have mentioned this subject to no one, and do not intend; an act is not aided by words, especially an act unfulfilled, nor does this letter, methinks, require any answer, at least not till after the death of Sir Timothy Sh.e.l.ley, when perhaps this explanation would have come with better grace; but I trust to your kindness to put my writing now to a good motive.--I am, my dear Hunt, yours affectionately and obliged,

MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT Sh.e.l.lEY.

It was admitted by the Sh.e.l.ley family that, Percy being now the heir, some sort of settlement should be made for his mother, yet for some months longer nothing was done or arranged. Apparently Mary wrote to Trelawny in low spirits, and to judge from his reply, her letter found him in little better plight than herself.

TRELAWNY TO MRS. Sh.e.l.lEY.

ZANTE, _16th December 1826_.

DEAR MARY--I received your letter the other day, and nothing gives me greater pleasure than to hear from you, for however a.s.sured we are of a friend's durability of affection, it is soothing to be occasionally rea.s.sured of it. I sympathise in your distresses. I have mine, too, on the same score--a bountiful will and confined means are a curse, and often have I execrated my fortunes so ill corresponding with my wishes. But who can control his fate? Old age and poverty is a frightful prospect; it makes the heart sick to contemplate, even in the mind's eye the reality would wring a generous nature till the heart burst. Poverty is the vampyre which lives on human blood, and haunts its victims to destruction. h.e.l.l can fable no torment exceeding it, and all the other calamities of human life--wars, pestilence, fire--cannot compete with it. It is the climax of human ill. You may be certain that I could not write thus on what I did not feel. I am glad you say you have better hopes; when things are at the worst, they say, there is hope. So do I hope. Lord Cochrane and his naval expedition having so long and unaccountably been kept back, delayed me here from month to month till the winter has definitively set in, and I am in no state for a winter's voyage; my body is no longer weatherproof. But I must as soon as possible get to England, though my residence there will be transitory. I shall then most probably hurry on to Italy.

The frigate from America is at last arrived in Greece, but whether Cochrane is on board of her I know not. With the loss of my friend Odysseus, my enthusiasm has somewhat abated; besides that I could no longer act with the prospect of doing service, and toiling in vain is heartless work. But have I not done so all my life? The affairs of Greece are so bad that little can be done to make them worse. If Cochrane comes, and is supported with means sufficient, there is still room for hope. I am in too melancholy a mood to say more than that, whatever becomes of me.--I am always your true and affectionate

E. TRELAWNY.

Mary answered him at once, doing and saying, to console him, all that friends.h.i.+p could.

KENTISH TOWN, _4th March 1827_.

[Direct me at W. G.o.dwin, Esq., 44 Gower Place, Gower Street, London.]

MY DEAR TRELAWNY--Your long silence had instilled into me the delusive hope that I should hear you sooner than from you. I have been silly enough sometimes to start at a knock,--at length your letter is come.

[By] that indeed I entertain more reasonable hopes of seeing you. You will come--Ah, indeed you must; if you are ever the kind-hearted being you were--you must come to be consoled by my sympathy, exhilarated by my encouragements, and made happy by my friends.h.i.+p. You are not happy!

Alas! who is that has a n.o.ble and generous nature? It is not only, my n.o.ble-hearted friend, that your will is bountiful and your means small,--were you richer you would still be tormented by ingrat.i.tude, caprice, and change. Yet I say Amen to all your anathema against poverty, it is beyond measure a torment and despair. I am poor, having once been richer; I live among the needy, and see only poverty around.

I happen, as has always been my fate, to have formed intimate friends.h.i.+ps with those who are great of soul, generous, and incapable of valuing money except for the good it may do--and these very people are all even poorer than myself, is it not hard? But turning to you who are dearest to me, who of all beings are most liberal, it makes me truly unhappy to find that you are hard pressed: do not talk of old age and poverty, both the one and the other are in truth far from you,--for the one it will be a miracle if you live to grow old,--this would appear a strange compliment if addressed to another, but you and I have too much of the pure spirit of fire in our souls to wish to live till the flickering beam waxes dim;--think then of the few present years only. I have no doubt you will do your fortunes great good by coming to this country. A too long absence destroys the interest that friends take, if they are only friends in the common acceptation of the word; and your relations ought to be reminded of you. The great fault to us in this country is its expensiveness, and the dreadful ills attendant here on poverty; elsewhere, though poor, you may live--here you are actually driven from life, and though a few might pity, none would help you were you absolutely starving. You say you shall stay here but a short time and then go to Italy--alas! alas!

It is impossible in a letter to communicate the exact state of one's feelings and affairs here--but there is a change at hand--I cannot guess whether for good or bad as far as regards me. This winter, whose extreme severity has carried off many old people, confined Sir Tim.

for ten weeks by the gout--but he is recovered. All that time a settlement for me was delayed, although it was acknowledged that Percy now being the heir, one ought to be made; at length after much parading, they have notified to me that I shall receive a magnificent 250 a year, to be increased next year to 300. But then I am not permitted to leave this cloudy nook. My desire to get away is unchanged, and I used to look forward to your return as a period when I might contrive--but I fear there is no hope for me during Sir T.'s life. He and his family are now at Brighton. John Sh.e.l.ley, dear S.'s brother, is about to marry, and talks of calling upon me. I am often led to reflect in life how people situated in a certain manner with regard to me might make my life less drear than it is--but it is always the case that the people that might--won't, and it is a very great mistake to fancy that they will. Such thoughts make me anxious to draw tighter the cords of sympathy and friends.h.i.+p which are so much more real than those of the world's forming in the way of relations.h.i.+p or connection.

From the ends of the world we were brought together to be friends till death; separated as we are, this tie still subsists. I do not wonder that you are out of heart concerning Greece; the mismanagement here is not less than the misgovernment there, the discord the same, save that here ink is spilt instead of blood. Lord Cochrane alone can a.s.sist them--but without vessels or money how can he acquire sufficient power? at any rate except as the Captain of a vessel I do not see what good you can do them. But the mischief is this,--that while some cold, unimpressive natures can go to a new country, reside among a few friends, enter into the interests of an intimate and live as a brother among them for a time, and then depart, leaving small trace, retaining none,--as if they had ascended from a bath, they change their garments and pa.s.s on;--while others of subtler nature receive into their very essences a part of those with whom they a.s.sociate, and after a while they become enchained, either for better or worse, and during a series of years they bear the marks of change and attachment. These natures indeed are the purest and best, and of such are you, dear friend; having you once, I ever have you; losing you once, I have lost you for ever; a riddle this, but true. And so life pa.s.ses, year is added to year, the word youth is becoming obsolete, while years bring me no change for the better. Yet I said, change is at hand--I know it, though as yet I do not feel it--you will come, in the spring you will come and add fresh delight for me to the happy change from winter to summer. I cannot tell what else material is to change, but I feel sure the year will end differently from its beginning. Jane is quite well, we talk continually of you, and expect you anxiously. Her fortunes have been more s.h.i.+fting than mine, and they are about to conclude,--differently from mine,--but I leave her to say what she thinks best concerning herself, though probably she will defer the explanation until your arrival. She is my joy and consolation. I could never have survived my exile here but for her. Her amiable temper, cheerfulness, and never ceasing sympathy are all so much necessary value for one wounded and lost as I.