him? Will my own dear, dearest Ba please
and help me here, and fancy Chorley's concessions, and tributes, and
recognitions, and then, at the very end, the 'plain words,' to
counterbalance all, that have been to overlook and pardon?

Oh, my own Ba, hear _my_ plain speech--and how this is _not_ an
attempt to frighten you out of your dear wish to '_hear_ from me'--no,
indeed--but a whim, a caprice,--and now it is out! over, done with!
And now I am with you again--it is to _you_ I shall write next. Bless
you, ever--my beloved. I am much better, indeed--and mean to be well.
And you! But I will write--this goes for nothing--or only _this_, that
I am your very own--

_R.B. to E.B.B._

Monday.
[Post-mark, February 16, 1846.]

My long letter is with you, dearest, to show how serious my illness
was 'while you wrote': unless you find that letter too foolish, as I
do on twice thinking--or at all events a most superfluous bestowment
of handwork while the heart was elsewhere, and with you--never more
so! Dear, dear Ba, your adorable goodness sinks into me till it nearly
pains,--so exquisite and strange is the pleasure: _so_ you care for
me, and think of me, and write to me!--I shall never die for you, and
if it could be so, what would death prove? But I can live on, your own
as now,--utterly your own.

Dear Ba, do you suppose we differ on so plain a point as that of the
superior wisdom, and generosity, too, of announcing such a change &c.
at the eleventh hour? There can be no doubt of it,--and now, what of
it to me?

But I am not going to write to-day--only this--that I am better,
having not been quite so well last night--so I shut up books (that is,
of my own) and mean to think about nothing but you, and you, and still
you, for a whole week--so all will come right, I hope! _May_ I take
Wednesday? And do you say that,--hint at the possibility of that,
because you have been reached by my own remorse at feeling that if I
had kept my appointment _last_ Saturday (but one)--Thursday would have
been my day this past week, and this very Monday had been gained?
Shall I not lose a day for ever unless I get Wednesday and
Saturday?--yet ... care ... dearest--let nothing horrible happen.

If I do not hear to the contrary to-morrow--or on Wednesday early--

But write and bless me dearest, most dear Ba. God bless you ever--

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