n twenty years. But all the past (before that) comes
upon me: I cannot help thinking of him while I wake; and when I do wake
from Sleep, I have a feeling of something lost, as in a Dream, and it is
J. S. I suppose that Carlyle amused himself, after just losing his Wife,
with the Records he has left: what he says of her seems a sort of
penitential glorification: what of others, just enough in general: but in
neither case to be made public, and so immediately after his Decease. . . .
I keep wondering what J. S. would have said on the matter: but I
cannot ask him now, as I might have done a month ago. . . .

Dear old Jem! His Loss makes one's Life more dreary, and 'en revanche'
the end of it less regretful.

_To Mrs. Alfred Tennyson_. {308a}

WOODBRIDGE: _March_ 22, [1881].

MY DEAR MRS. TENNYSON,

It is very, very [good] of you to write to me, even to remember me. I
have told you before why I did not write to any other of your Party, as I
might occasionally wish to do for the sake of asking about you all: the
task of answering my Letter was always left to you: and I did not choose
to put you to that trouble. Laurence had written me some account of his
Visit to St. George's: all Patience: only somewhat wishful to be at home:
somewhat weary with lying without Book, or even Watch, for company. What
a Man! as in Life so in Death, which, as Montaigne says, proves what is
at the bottom of the Vessel. {308b} I had not seen him for more than
twenty years, and should never have seen him again, unless in the Street,
where Cabs were crossing! He did not want to see me; he wanted nothing,
I think: but I was always thinking of him, and should have done till my
own Life's end, I know. I only wrote to him about twice a year: he only
cared to answer when one put some definite Question to him: and I had
usually as little to ask as to tell. I was thinking that, but for that
Cab, I might even now be asking him what I was to think of his Cousin
Froude's Carlyle Reminiscences. I see but one Quotation in the Book,
which is 'of the Days that are no more,' which clung to him when his
Sorrow came, as it will to many and many who will come after him.

I certainly hope that some pious and judicious hand will gather, and
choose from our dear Spedding's Letters: no fear of indelicate
personality with him, you know: and many things which all the world would
be the wiser and better for. Archdeacon Allen sent me the other day a
Letter a