s at having taken the medicine
which is producing these ugly effects, I am more grateful to my Nitrate
of Silver than words can say. If you ask for the secret of this
extraordinary exhibition of philosophy on my part, I can give it in one
line. For the last ten days, I have not had a fit. In other words, for
the last ten days, I have lived in Paradise. I declare I would have
cheerfully lost an arm or a leg to gain the blessed peace of mind, the
intoxicating confidence in the future--it is nothing less--that I feel
now.

"Still there is a drawback which prevents me from enjoying perfect
tranquillity even yet. When was there ever a pleasure in this world,
without a lurking possibility of pain hidden away in it somewhere?

"I have lately discovered a peculiarity in Lucilla which is new to me,
and which has produced a very unpleasant impression on my mind. My
proposed avowal to her of the change in my personal appearance, has now
become a matter of far more serious difficulty than I had anticipated
when the question was discussed between you and me at Browndown.

"Have you ever found out that the strongest antipathy she has, is her
purely imaginary antipathy to dark people and to dark shades of color of
all kinds? This strange prejudice is the result, as I suppose, of some
morbid growth of her blindness, quite as inexplicable to herself as to
other people. Explicable, or not, there it is in her. Read the extract
that follows from one of her letters to her father, which her father
showed to me--and you will not be surprised to hear that I tremble for
myself when the time comes for telling her what I have done.

"Thus she writes to Mr. Finch:--

"'I am sorry to say, I have had a little quarrel with my aunt. It is all
made up now, but it has hardly left us such good friends as we were
before. Last week, there was a dinner-party here; and, among the guests,
was a Hindoo gentleman (converted to Christianity) to whom my aunt has
taken a great fancy. While the maid was dressing me, I unluckily inquired
if she had seen the Hindoo--and, hearing that she had, I still more
unfortunately asked her to tell me what he was like. She described him as
being very tall and lean, with a dark brown complexion and glittering
black eyes. My mischievous fancy instantly set to work on this horrid
combination of darknesses. Try as I might to resist it, my mind drew a
dreadful picture of the Hindoo, as a kind of monster in human form. I
would ha