than pleasures, the
answer may be short too; an imaginative mind has almost always a
tendency to be a melancholy one. Shakespeare is the glorious exception
to this, but then he is an exception to everything. I must bid you
good-bye now....

God bless you, dear.

Ever your affectionate,
FANNY.

[After seeing Mademoiselle Rachel, as I subsequently did, in all her
great parts, and as often as I had an opportunity of doing so, the
impression she has left upon my mind is that of the greatest
dramatic genius, except Kean, who was not greater, and the most
incomparable dramatic artist I ever saw. The qualities I have
mentioned as predominating in her performances still appear to me to
have been their most striking ones; but her expressions of
tenderness, though rare, were perfect--one instance of which was the
profound pathos of the short exclamation, "_Oh, mon cher, Curiace!_"
that precedes her fainting fit of agony in "Camille," and the whole
of the last scene of "Marie Stuart," in which she excelled Madame
Ristori as much in pathetic tenderness as she surpassed her in
power, in the famous scene of defiance to Elizabeth. As for any
comparison between her and that beautiful woman and charming
actress, or her successor on the French stage of the present day,
Mademoiselle Sarah Bernhardt, I do not admit any such for a moment.]

Bannisters, July 28th, 1841.
DEAREST HARRIET,

You certainly have not thought that I was never going to write to you
again, but I dare say you have wondered when I should ever write to you
again. This seems a very fitting place whence to address you, who are so
affectionately associated with the recollection of the last happy days I
spent here.

How vain is the impatience of despondency! How wise, as well as how
pleasant, it is to hope! Not that all can who would; but I verily
believe that the hopeful are the wisest as well as the happiest of this
mortal congregation; for, in spite of the credulous distrust of the
desponding, the accomplishment of our wishes awaits us in the future
quite as often as their defeat, and the cheerful faithful spirit of
those who can hope has the promise of this life as well as of that which
is to come.

At the end of four years, here I am again with my dear frien