Volume I Part 9 (1/2)
My dearest, do not expect me very fervently till I come. I am glad you were so careful of your inestimable eyes as not to write to me yesterday. Mrs. Hillard says that Elizabeth made her a call.
Good-bye. I am very well to day, and unspeakably happy in the thought that I have a dearest little wife, who loves me pretty well. G.o.d bless her.
Miss Sophia A. Peabody, Care of Dr. N. Peabody, Salem, Ma.s.s.
TO MISS PEABODY
_Boston_, March 11th, 1840--2 P.M.
_Blessedest_,
It seems as if I were looking back to a former state of existence, when I think of the precious hours which we have lived together. And now we are in two different worlds--widowed, both of us--both of us deceased, and each lamenting ...
(Portion of letter missing)
Belovedest, almost my first glance, on entering our parlor after my return hither, was at the pictures--my very first glance, indeed, as soon as I had lighted the lamps. They have certainly grown more beautiful during my absence, and are still becoming more perfect, and perfecter, and perfectest. I fancied that Sophie Hawthorne, as she stands on the bridge, had slightly turned her head, so as to reveal somewhat more of her face; but if so, she has since turned it back again. I was much struck with the Menaggio this morning;--while I was gazing at it, the suns.h.i.+ne and the shade grew positively real, and I agreed with you, for the time, in thinking this a more superlative picture than the other. But when I came home about an hour ago, I bestowed my chiefest attention upon the Isola; and now I believe it has the first place in my affections, though without prejudice to a very fervent love for the other.
... Dove, there is little prospect for me, indeed; but forgive me for telling you so, dearest--no prospect of my returning so soon as next Monday; but I have good hope to be again at liberty by the close of the week. Do be very good, my Dove--be as good as your nature will permit, naughty Sophie Hawthorne. As to myself, I shall take the liberty to torment myself as much as I please.
My dearest, I am very well, but exceedingly stupid and heavy; so the remainder of this letter shall be postponed until tomorrow. Has my Dove flown abroad, this cold, bright day? Would that the wind would s.n.a.t.c.h her up, and waft her to her husband.
How was it, dearest? And how do you do this morning? Is the wind east?
The sun shone on the chimney-tops round about here, a few minutes ago; and I hoped that there would be a pleasant day for my Dove to take wing, and for Sophie Hawthorne to ride on horseback; but the sky seems to be growing sullen now. Do you wish to know how your husband will spend the day? First of the first--but there rings the bell for eight o'clock; and I must go down to breakfast.
After breakfast;--First of the first, your husband will go to the Post-Office, like a dutiful husband as he is, to put in this letter for his belovedest wife. Thence he will proceed to the Custom House, and finding that there is no call for him on the wharves, he will sit down by the Measurers' fire, and read the Morning Post. Next, at about half past nine o'clock, he will go to the Athenaeum, and turn over the Magazines and Reviews till eleven or twelve, when it will be time to return to the Custom-House to see whether there be a letter from Dove Hawthorne--and also (though this is of far less importance) to see whether there be any demand for his services as Measurer. At one o'clock, or thereabouts, he will go to dinner--but first, perhaps, he will promenade the whole length of Was.h.i.+ngton street, to get himself an appet.i.te. After dinner, he will take one more peep at the Custom-House, and it being by this time about two o'clock, and no prospect of business to-day, he will feel at liberty to come home to our own parlor, there to remain till supper-time. At six o'clock he will sally forth again, to get some oysters and read the evening papers, and returning between seven and eight, he will read and re-read his belovedest's letter--then take up a book--and go to bed at ten, with a blessing on his lips for the Dove and Sophie Hawthorne.
THINE OWNEST.
Miss Sophia A. Peabody, Care of Dr. N. Peabody, Salem, Ma.s.s.
TO MISS PEABODY
_Boston_, March 15th, 1840--Forenoon.
_Best-belovedest_,
Thy letter by Elizabeth came, I believe, on Thursday, and the two which thou didst entrust to the post reached me not till yesterday--whereby I enjoyed a double blessing in recompense of the previous delay. Nevertheless, it were desirable that the new Salem postmaster be forthwith ejected, for taking upon himself to withhold the outpourings of thy heart, at their due season. As for letters of business, which involve merely the gain or loss of a few thousand dollars, let him be as careless as he pleases; but when thou wouldst utter thyself to thy husband, dearest wife, there is doubtless a peculiar fitness of thy communications to that point and phase of our existence, at which they ought to be received. However, come when they will, they are sure to make sweetest music with my heart-strings.
Blessedest, what an ugly day is this!--and there thou sittest as heavy as thy husband's heart. And is his heart indeed heavy? Why no--it is not heaviness--not the heaviness, like a great lump of ice, which I used to feel when I was alone in the world--but--but--in short, dearest, where thou art not, there it is a sort of death. A death, however, in which there is still hope and a.s.surance of a joyful life to come. Methinks, if my spirit were not conscious of thy spirit, this dreary snow-storm would chill me to torpor;--the warmth of my fireside would be quite powerless to counteract it. Most absolute little wife, didst thou expressly command me to go to Father Taylor's church this very Sabbath?--(Dinner, or luncheon rather, has intervened since the last sentence)--Now, belovedest, it would not be an auspicious day for me to hear the aforesaid Son of Thunder. Thou knowest not how difficult is thy husband to be touched or moved, unless time, and circ.u.mstances, and his own inward state, be in a ”concatenation accordingly.” A dreadful thing would it be, were Father Taylor to fail in awakening a sympathy from my spirit to thine. Darlingest, pray let me stay at home this afternoon. Some suns.h.i.+ny Sunday, when I am wide awake, and warm, and genial, I will go and throw myself open to his blessed influences; but now, there is but one thing (thou being absent) which I feel anywise inclined to do--and that is, to go to sleep. May I go to sleep, belovedest? Think what sweet dreams of thee may visit me--think how I shall escape this snow-storm--think how my heavy mood will change, as the mood of mind almost always does, during the interval that withdraws me from the external world. Yes; thou bidst me sleep. Sleep thou too, my beloved--let us pa.s.s at one and the same moment into that misty region, and embrace each other there.
Well, dearest, I have slept; but Sophie Hawthorne has been naughty--she would not be dreamed about. And now that I am awake again, here are the same snow-flakes in the air, that were descending when I went to sleep. Would that there were an art of making suns.h.i.+ne!
Knowest thou any such art? Truly thou dost, my blessedest, and hast often thrown a heavenly suns.h.i.+ne around thy husband's spirit, when all things else were full of gloom. What a woe--what a cloud it is, to be away from thee! How would my Dove like to have her husband continually with her, twelve or fourteen months out of the next twenty? Would not that be real happiness?--in such long communion, should we not feel as if separation were a dream, something that never had been a reality, nor ever could be? Yes; but--for in all earthly happiness there is a but--but, during those twenty months, there would be two intervals of three months each, when thy husband would be five hundred miles away--as far away as Was.h.i.+ngton. That would be terrible. Would not Sophie Hawthorne fight against it?--would not the Dove fold her wings, not in the quietude of bliss, but of despair? Do not be frightened, dearest--nor rejoiced either--for the thing will not be. It might be, if I chose; but on mult.i.tudinous accounts, my present situation seems preferable; and I do pray, that, in one year more, I may find some way of escaping from this unblest Custom-House; for it is a very grievous thraldom. I do detest all offices--all, at least, that are held on a political tenure. And I want nothing to do with politicians--they are not men; they cease to be men, in becoming politicians. Their hearts wither away, and die out of their bodies. Their consciences are turned to India-rubber--or to some substance as black as that, and which will stretch as much. One thing, if no more, I have gained by my Custom-House experience--to know a politician. It is a knowledge which no previous thought, or power of sympathy, could have taught me, because the animal, or the machine rather, is not in nature.
Oh my darlingest wife, thy husband's soul yearns to embrace thee! Thou art his hope--his joy--he desires nothing but to be with thee, and to toil for thee, and to make thee a happy wife, wherein would consist his own heavenliest happiness. Dost thou love him? Yes; he knoweth it.