different;
some, I suppose, are born sound and musical, others are born
uncertain and unmusical, and are at best a mere tinkling cymbal.
Yours, I have no doubt, has blessed and cheered and delighted the
soul of the mother who bore you from the very first opening of your
eyes upon the world, and that dear heart has gone on with that
cheering influence from that time to the present, and it will go on
cheering everybody around you who have loved you, and it will go on
cheering among the rest your loving brother Bramwell and your
devoted General right away to the end; nay, will go on endlessly,
for there is to be no conclusion to our affection.

"I want it to be so. I want it to be my own experience. Love, to be
a blessing, must be ambitious, boundless, and eternal. O Lord, help
me! and O Lord, destroy everything in me that interferes with the
prosperity, growth, and fruitfulness of this precious, Divine, and
everlasting fruit!

"I have been ill--I have been very ill indeed. I have had a return
of my indigestion in its most terrible form. This spasmodic feeling
of suffocation has so distressed me that at times it has seemed
almost impossible for me to exist. Still, I have fought my way
through, and the doctors this afternoon have told me, as bluntly
and plainly as an opinion could be given to a man, that I must
struggle on and not give way, or the consequences will be very
serious.

"Then, too, the eye has caused me much pain, but that has very
much, if not entirely, passed off, and the oculist tells me that
the eye will heal up. But, alas! alas! I am absolutely blind. It is
very painful, but I am not the only blind man in the world, and I
can easily see how, if I am spared, I shall be able to do a good
deal of valuable work.

"So I am going to make another attempt at work. What do you think
of that? I have sat down this afternoon, not exactly to the desk,
but any way to the duties of the desk, and I am going to strive to
stick to them if I possibly can. I have been down to some of my
meals; I have had a walk in the garden, and now it is proposed for
me to take a drive in a motor, I believe some kind soul is loaning
me. Anyhow, I am going to have some machine that will shuffle me
along the street, road, and square, and I will see how that