Part 10 (2/2)

BRANTWOOD, _22d April, 1881_.

I'm not able to scratch or fight to-day, or I wouldn't let you cover me up with this heap of gold; but I've got a rheumatic creak in my neck, which makes me physically stiff and morally supple and unprincipled, so I've put two pounds sixteen in my own ”till,” where it just fills up some lowering of the tide lately by German bands and the like, and I've put ten pounds aside for Sheffield Museum, now in instant mendicity, and I've put ten pounds aside till you and I can have a talk and you be made reasonable, after being scolded and scratched, after which, on your promise to keep to our old bargain and enjoy spending your little ”Frondes” income, I'll be your lovingest again. And for the two pounds ten, and the ten, I am really most heartily grateful, meaning as they do so much that is delightful for both of us in the good done by this work of yours.

I send you Spenser; perhaps you had better begin with the Hymn to Beauty, page 39, and then go on to the Tears; but you'll see how you like it. It's better than Longfellow; see line 52--

”The house of blessed G.o.ds which men call skye.”

Now I'm going to look out Dr. Kendall's crystal. It _must_ be crystal,[33] for having brought back the light to your eyes.

[Footnote 33: For a present to Dr. Kendall.]

BRANTWOOD, _12th July, 1881_.

How delightful that you have that nice Mrs. Howard to hear you say ”The Ode to Beauty,” and how nice that you can learn it and enjoy saying it![34] I do not know it myself. I only know that it should be known and said and heard and loved.

I _am_ often near you in thought, but can't get over the lake somehow.

There's always somebody to be looked after here, now. I've to rout the gardeners out of the greenhouse, or I should never have a strawberry or a pink, but only nasty gloxinias and glaring fuchsias, and I've been giving lessons to dozens of people and writing charming sermons in the ”Bible of Amiens”; but I get so sleepy in the afternoon I can't pull myself over it.

I was looking at your notes on birds yesterday. How sweet they are!

But I can't forgive that young blackbird for getting wild again.[35]

[Footnote 34: I learnt the whole of it by heart, and could then say it without a break. I have always loved it, and in return it has helped me through many a long and sleepless night.--S. B.]

[Footnote 35: Pages 101 _et seqq._]

_Last Day of 1881. And the last letter I write on it, with new pen._

I've lunched on _your_ oysters, and am feasting eyes and mind on _your_ birds.

What birds?

Woodc.o.c.k? Yes, I suppose, and never before noticed the _sheath_ of his bill going over the front of the lower mandible that he may dig comfortably! But the others! the glory of velvet and silk and cloud and light, and black and tan and gold, and golden sand, and dark tresses, and purple shadows and moors and mists and night and starlight, and woods and wilds and dells and deeps, and every mystery of heaven and its finger work, is in those little birds' backs and wings. I am so grateful. All love and joy to you, and wings to fly with and birds' hearts to comfort, and mine, be to you in the coming year.

_Easter Day_, 1882.

I have had a happy Easter morning, entirely bright in its sun and clear in sky; and with renewed strength enough to begin again the piece of St. Benedict's life where I broke off, to lose these four weeks in London,--weeks not wholly lost neither, for I have learned more and more of what I should have known without lessoning; but I _have_ learnt it, from these repeated dreams and fantasies, that we walk in a vain shadow and disquiet ourselves in vain. So I am for the present, everybody says, quite good, and give as little trouble as possible; but people _will_ take it, you know, sometimes, even when I don't give it, and there's a great fuss about me yet. But _you_ must not be anxious any more, Susie, for really there is no more occasion at one time than another. All the doctors say I needn't be ill unless I like, and I don't mean to like any more; and as far as chances of ordinary danger, I think one runs more risks in a single railway journey, than in the sicknesses of a whole year.

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