E.B.B. to R.B.

                              Monday.
                              [Post-mark, January 27, 1846.]

You have had my letter and heard about the penholder.  Your fancy of ‘not seeming grateful enough,’ is not wise enough for you, dearest; when you know that I know your common fault to be the undue magnifying of everything that comes from me, and I am always complaining of it outwardly and inwardly.  That suddenly I should set about desiring you to be more grateful,—­even for so great a boon as an old penholder,—­would be a more astounding change than any to be sought or seen in a prime minister.

Another mistake you made concerning Henrietta and her opinion—­and there’s no use nor comfort in leaving you in it.  Henrietta says that the ‘anger would not be so formidable after all’!  Poor dearest Henrietta, who trembles at the least bending of the brows ... who has less courage than I, and the same views of the future!  What she referred to, was simply the infrequency of the visits.  ’Why was I afraid,’ she said—­’where was the danger? who would be the informer?’—­Well!  I will not say any more.  It is just natural that you, in your circumstances and associations, should be unable to see what I have seen from the beginning—­only you will not hereafter reproach me, in the most secret of your thoughts, for not having told you plainly.  If I could have told you with greater plainness I should blame myself (and I do not) because it is not an opinion I have, but a perception.  I see, I know.  The result ... the end of all ... perhaps now and then I see that too ... in the ‘lucid moments’ which are not the happiest for anybody.  Remember, in all cases, that I shall not repent of any part of our past intercourse; and that, therefore, when the time for decision comes, you will be free to look at the question as if you saw it then for the first moment, without being hampered by considerations about ‘all those yesterdays.’

For him ... he would rather see me dead at his foot than yield the point:  and he will say so, and mean it, and persist in the meaning.

Do you ever wonder at me ... that I should write such things, and have written others so different? I have thought that in myself very often. Insincerity and injustice may seem the two ends, while I occupy the straight betwixt two—­and I should not like you to doubt how this may be!  Sometimes I have begun to show you the truth, and torn the paper; I could not.  Yet now again I am borne on to tell you, ... to save you from some thoughts which you cannot help perhaps.