And do not talk again of what you would ‘sacrifice’ for me.  If you affect me by it, which is true, you cast me from you farther than ever in the next thought. That is true.

The poems ... yours ... which you left with me,—­are full of various power and beauty and character, and you must let me have my own gladness from them in my own way.

Now I must end this letter.  Did you go to Chelsea and hear the divine philosophy?

Tell me the truth always ... will you?  I mean such truths as may be painful to me though truths....

May God bless you, ever dear friend.

E.B.B.

R.B. to E.B.B.

Friday Afternoon.
[Post-mark, August 8, 1845.]

Then there is one more thing ‘off my mind’:  I thought it might be with you as with me—­not remembering how different are the causes that operate against us; different in kind as in degree:—­so much reading hurts me, for instance,—­whether the reading be light or heavy, fiction or fact, and so much writing, whether my own, such as you have seen, or the merest compliment-returning to the weary tribe that exact it of one.  But your health—­that before all!... as assuring all eventually ... and on the other accounts you must know!  Never, pray, pray, never lose one sunny day or propitious hour to ’go out or walk about.’  But do not surprise me, one of these mornings, by ‘walking’ up to me when I am introduced’ ... or I shall infallibly, in spite of all the after repentance and begging pardon—­I shall [words effaced].  So here you learn the first ‘painful truth’ I have it in my power to tell you!

I sent you the last of our poor roses this morning—­considering that I fairly owed that kindness to them.

Yes, I went to Chelsea and found dear Carlyle alone—­his wife is in the country where he will join her as soon as his book’s last sheet returns corrected and fit for press—­which will be at the month’s end about.  He was all kindness and talked like his own self while he made me tea—­and, afterward, brought chairs into the little yard, rather than garden, and smoked his pipe with apparent relish; at night he would walk as far as Vauxhall Bridge on my way home.

If I used the word ‘sacrifice,’ you do well to object—­I can imagine nothing ever to be done by me worthy such a name.

God bless you, dearest friend—­shall I hear from you before Tuesday?

Ever your own

R.B.

E.B.B. to R.B.

Friday.
[Post-mark, August 8, 1845.]

It is very kind to send these flowers—­too kind—­why are they sent? and without one single word ... which is not too kind certainly.  I looked down into the heart of the roses and turned the carnations over and over to the peril of their leaves, and in vain!  Not a word do I deserve to-day, I suppose!  And yet if I don’t, I don’t deserve the flowers either.  There should have been an equal justice done to my demerits, O Zeus with the scales!