illness, and had no alarm.  The Doctor himself, specially applied to, made answer as if there was no danger:  his poor Patient, in whose character the like of that intimately lay, had rigorously charged him to do so:  her poor Daughter was far off, confined to her room by illness of her own; why alarm her, make her wretched?  The danger itself did seem over; the Doctor accordingly obeyed.  Our first intimation of alarm was despatched on the very day which proved the final one.  My poor Wife, casting sickness behind her, got instantly ready, set off by the first railway train:  traveling all night, on the morrow morning at her Uncle’s door in Liverpool she is met by tidings that all is already ended.  She broke down there; she is now home again at Chelsea, a cheery, amiable younger Jane Welsh to nurse her:  the tone of her Letters is still full of disconsolateness.  I had to proceed hither, and have to stay here till this establishment can be abolished, and all the sad wrecks of it in some seemly manner swept away.  It is above three weeks that I have been here; not till eight days ago could I so much as manage to command solitude, to be left altogether alone.  I lead a strange life; full of sadness, of solemnity, not without a kind of blessedness.  I say it is right and fitting that one be left entirely alone now and then, alone with one’s own griefs and sins, with the mysterious ancient Earth round one, the everlasting Heaven over one, and what one can make of these.  Poor rustic businesses, subletting of Farms, disposal of houses, household goods:  these strangely intervene, like matter upon spirit, every day;—­wholesome this too perhaps.  It is many years since I have stood so in close contact face to face with the reality of Earth, with its haggard ugliness, its divine beauty, its depths of Death and of Life.  Yesterday, one of, the stillest Sundays, I sat long by the side of the swift river Nith; sauntered among woods all vocal only with rooks and pairing birds.* The hills are often white with snow-powder, black brief spring-tempests rush fiercely down from them, and then again the sky looks forth with a pale pure brightness,—­like Eternity from behind Time.  The Sky, when one thinks of it, is always blue, pure changeless azure; rains and tempests are only for the little dwellings where men abide.  Let us think of this too.  Think of this, thou sorrowing Mother!  Thy Boy has escaped many showers.

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* “Templand has a very fine situation;  old Walter’s walk, at the
south end of the house, was one of the most picturesque and
pretty to be found in the world.   Nith valley (river half a mile
off, winding through green holms, now in its border of clean
shingle, now lost in pleasant woods and rushes) lay patent to the
South.   “Carlyle’s Reminiscences,” Vol.  II. p. 137.
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In some three weeks I shall probably be back at Chelsea.  Write thitherward so soon as you have opportunity; I will write again before long, even if I do not hear from you.  The moneys, &c. are all safe here as you describe:  if Fraser’s’ Executors make any demur, your Bookseller shall soon hear of it.