Part 2 (2/2)

I live here in a narrow street ten feet wide only, winding up a hill, and it was full this morning of sheep as close as they could pack, at least a thousand, as far as the eye could reach,--tinkle tinkle, bleat bleat, for a quarter of an hour.

[Footnote 9: Cimabue.]

IN PARADISE.

a.s.sISI, SACRISTAN'S CELL, _25th June_ (1874).

This letter is all upside down, and this first page written last; for I didn't like something I had written about myself last night when I was tired, and have torn it off.

That star you saw beat like a heart must have been a dog star. A planet would not have twinkled. Far mightier, he, than any planet; burning with his own planetary host doubtless round him; and, on some speckiest of the specks of them, evangelical persons thinking our sun was made for _them_.

Ah, Susie, I do not pa.s.s, unthought of, the many sorrows of which you kindly tell me, to show me--for that is in your heart--how others have suffered also.

But, Susie, _you_ expect to see your Margaret again, and you will be happy with her in heaven. I wanted my Rosie _here_. In heaven I mean to go and talk to Pythagoras and Socrates and Valerius Publicola. I shan't care a bit for Rosie there, she needn't think it. What will gray eyes and red cheeks be good for _there_?

These pious sentiments are all written in my sacristan's cell.

This extract book[10] of yours will be most precious in its help to me, provided it is kept within somewhat narrow limits. As soon as it is done I mean to have it published in a strong and pretty but _cheap_ form, and it must not be too bulky. Consider, therefore, not only what you like, but how far and with whom each bit is likely to find consent and service. You will have to choose perhaps, after a little while, among what you have already chosen. I mean to leave it _wholly_ in your hands; it is to be Susie's choice of my writings.

Don't get into a flurry of responsibility, but don't at once write down all you have a mind to; I know you'll find a good deal! for you are exactly in sympathy with me in all things.

[Footnote 10: ”Frondes Agrestes.”]

a.s.sISI, _9th July, 1874_.

Your lovely letters are always a comfort to me; and not least when you tell me you are sad. You would be far less in sympathy with me if you were not, and in the ”everything right” humor of some, even of some really good and kind persons, whose own matters are to their mind, and who understand by ”Providence” the power which particularly takes care of _them_. This favoritism which goes so sweetly and pleasantly down with so many pious people is the chief of all stumbling-blocks to _me_. I must pray for everybody or n.o.body, and can't get into any conceptions of relation between Heaven and _me_, if not also between Heaven and earth, (and why Heaven should allow hairs in pens I can't think).

I take great care of myself, be quite sure of that, Susie; the worst of it is, here in a.s.sisi everybody else wants me to take care of them.

Catharine brought me up as a great treat yesterday at dinner, ham dressed with as much garlic as could be stewed into it, and a plate of raw figs, telling me I was to eat them together!

The sun is changing the entire mountains of a.s.sisi into a hot bottle with no flannel round it; but I can't get a ripe plum, peach, or cherry. All the milk turns sour, and one has to eat one's meat at its toughest or the thunder gets into it next day.

<script>