e, of my health. And shall
I tell you what is 'not to be put in doubt _ever_'?--your goodness,
_that_ is ... and every tie that binds me to you. 'Ordained, granted
by God' it is, that I should owe the only happiness in my life to you,
and be contented and grateful (if it were necessary) to stop with it
at this present point. Still I _do not_--there seems no necessity yet.

May God bless you, ever dearest:--

Your own BA.

_E.B.B. to R.B._

Saturday.
[In the same envelope with the preceding letter.]

Well I have your letter--and I send you the postscript to my last one,
written yesterday you observe ... and being simply a postscript in
some parts of it, _so_ far it is not for an answer. Only I deny the
'flying out'--perhaps you may do it a little more ... in your moments
of starry centrifugal motion.

So you think that dear Mr. Kenyon's opinion of his 'young
relative'--(neither young nor his relative--not very much of either!)
is to the effect that you couldn't possibly 'escape' her--? It looks
like the sign of the Red Dragon, put _so_ ... and your burning
mountain is not too awful for the scenery.

Seriously ... gravely ... if it makes me three times happy that you
should love me, yet I grow uneasy and even saddened when you say
infatuated things such as this and this ... unless after all you mean
a philosophical sarcasm on the worth of Czar diamonds. No--do not say
such things! If you do, I shall end by being jealous of some ideal
Czarina who must stand between you and me.... I shall think that it is
not _I_ whom you look at ... and _pour cause_. 'Flying out,' _that_
would be!

And for Mr. Kenyon, I only know that I have grown the most ungrateful
of human beings lately, and find myself almost glad when he does not
come, certainly uncomfortable when he does--yes, _really_ I would
rather not see him at all, and when you are not here. The sense of
which and the sorrow for which, turn me to a hypocrite, and make me
ask why he does not come &c. ... questions which never came to my lips
before ... till I am more and more ashamed and sorry. Will it end, I
wonder, by my ceasing to care for any one in the world, except,
except...? or is it not rather that I feel trodden down by either his
too great penetration or too great unconsciousness, both being
overwhelming things from him to me. From a similar cause I hate
writing letters to any of my ol