the deliverer of Genoa, at the moment when every
faculty of her heart and mind was absorbed in the contemplation of all
the noble qualities with which she believed him endowed.

The love of different women is, of course, made up of various elements,
according to their natural temperament, mental endowments, and educated
habits of thought; and it seems to me the sort of sentiment Leonora
describes herself as feeling towards Fiesco at the moment of their
marriage is eminently characteristic of such a woman. So much for the
Countess Lavagna.

I think you are quite mistaken in calling Thekla a "merely ideal" woman;
she is a very _real_ German woman--rarely perhaps, but to be found in
all the branches of the Anglo-saxon tree, in England certainly, and even
in America.

To these subjects of very pleasing interest to me succeeds in your
letter the exclamation elicited by poor Mrs. D----'s misfortune,
"Blessed are they who die in the Lord!" to which let me answer, "Yea,
rather, blessed are they who live in the Lord!" Our impatience of
suffering may make death sometimes appear the most desirable thing in
all God's universe; yet who can tell what trials or probations may be
ordained for us hereafter? The idea that there "may be yet more work to
do," probably _must_ be (for how few finish their task here before the
night cometh when "no man can work," as far as this world is concerned,
at any rate!), is a frequent speculation with me; so that whenever, in
sheer weariness of spirit, I have been tempted to wish for death, or in
moments of desperation felt almost ready to seize upon it, the thought,
not of what I may have to suffer, but what I must have to do, _i.e._ the
work left undone here, checks the rash wish and rasher imagination, and
I feel as if I must sit down again to try and work. But weariness of
life makes the idea of existence prolonged beyond death sometimes almost
oppressive, and it seems to me that there are times when one would be
ready to consent to lie down in one's grave and become altogether as the
clods of the valley, relinquishing one's immortal birthright simply for
rest. To be sure you will answer that, for rest to be pleasurable,
consciousness must accompany it; but oh, how I should like to be
_consciously unconscious_ for a little while!--which possibly may strike
you as nonsense.

I dare say women are, as you say, like cats in a great many respects. I
acknowledge myself like one, only in the degree o