strong ale set running that minute and his own mouth to be _tied_
under it'--the exquisiteness of the delight was to be in the security
upon security,--the being 'tied.' Now, Ba says I shall not be
'chained' if she can help!

But now--here all the jesting goes. You tell me what was observed in
the 'moment's' visit; by you, and (after, I suppose) by your sisters.
First, I _will_ always see with your eyes _there_--next, what I see I
will _never_ speak, if it pain you; but just this much truth I ought
to say, I think. I always give myself to you for the worst I am,--full
of faults as you will find, if you have not found them. But I _will_
not affect to be so bad, so wicked, as I count wickedness, as to call
that conduct other than intolerable--_there_, in my conviction of
_that_, is your real 'security' and mine for the future as the
present. That a father choosing to give out of his whole day some five
minutes to a daughter, supposed to be prevented from participating in
what he, probably, in common with the whole world of sensible men, as
distinguished from poets and dreamers, consider _every_ pleasure of
life, by a complete foregoing of society--that he, after the Pisa
business and the enforced continuance, and as he must believe,
permanence of this state in which any other human being would go
mad--I do dare say, for the justification of God, who gave the mind to
be _used_ in this world,--where it saves us, we are taught, or
destroys us,--and not to be sunk quietly, overlooked, and forgotten;
that, under these circumstances, finding ... what, you say, unless he
thinks he _does_ find, he would close the door of his house instantly;
a mere sympathizing man, of the same literary tastes, who comes
good-naturedly, on a proper and unexceptionable introduction, to chat
with and amuse a little that invalid daughter, once a month, so far as
is known, for an hour perhaps,--that such a father should show
himself '_not pleased_ plainly,' at such a circumstance ... my Ba, it
is SHOCKING! See, I go _wholly_ on the supposition that the real
relation is not imagined to exist between us. I so completely could
understand a repugnance to trust you to me were the truth known, that,
I will confess, I have several times been afraid the very reverse of
this occurrence would befall; that your father would have at some time
or other thought himself obliged, by the usual feeling of people in
such cases, to see me for a few minutes and express