83

LETTER XI.

A PHYSICIAN TO HIS WIFE.

San Remo March 1, 18-3.

WHAT news will be most welcome to you first?

That I am daily stronger, and expect

To be in England on the day of fools,-
The birthday of the greatest fool of all,

Who thought to find a lover in a man

'Of bottles all compact?' Shall this come first? And then what next? That I have read ten times,

And twenty times, my son-and-heir's epistle,

Walking along his pothooks like a man

Who threads the zigzags of a garden path?

And then what next? To threaten John that if

He overdrives the chestnut, I shall hold

Himself responsible? How should poor Wright,

Who, notwithstanding all his cleverness

And hospital experience, does not know

A cab-horse from a hunter,-how should he
Be confident to contradict the tide

Of plausible John's assurances? So, thus,
My letter gets a start,-the flag has fallen;-
But which of these three horses will come in
First at the end, I know not; some outsider,
Not in the betting, may perhaps turn out

The winner after all. Why, my dear Charles,

'What nonsense are you talking!' No, my dear;

It is not nonsense to myself; I want
An antidote to sadness. Laugh yourself
Over these first two pages of my letter

;

Then, if the end of it should make you sad,
Write back such nonsense as I write to you;

The contrast will be useful.

You remember

That some two months ago, as à propos

Of Mary Cheetham's case, I mentioned one

Much similar which I had met with here,

Only before the birth, instead of after.
You will remember, for you scolded me
For running counter to my promises

Of perfect rest; well, 'tis the only case
I have so much as thought of; and in this
I acted rather as a friend than as

Professionally. I am glad I did so;—

Glad, not for any profit to myself,

Unless it be of more humility.

The lady whom I spoke of died last week;

It

may be that the absence of all others

Has led my mind to rest upon this case

More than it ever dwelt on one before;

Unless it be that story of the time

When first I walked the hospitals, and saw

The dying mother recognise her child

In the next bed, a fever-stricken girl

Long lost to home, and raving of such things As one life only could have made her know.

The lady died last week; sane or insane
God only knows, with whom most certainly
She rests at last. She was not, so I find,

(And, finding so, am trebly glad that I
Kept good discretion and concealed her name)
She was not mad in that she charged herself
With having wrongfully assumed the name

Of wedded wife; and how far mad she was
In casting off the title, you shall judge.
I can say nothing; conscientiousness

Is one, they say, of God's most precious gifts;

Can conscientiousness be strained so far

As to become destructive? Is there not

A point at which its usefulness may end,
As is the case with almost every force
Of mind or matter, and the abuse begin?
This is the problem, one of them, at least,
Suggested to me by the case in point.

Let me trace out her history. These two

Were both romantic, as the world would say,

To madness; he, the husband, is a man
Whom, if I understand him, I should wish
To see more widely copied ; (you must trust
My word in this; the tale abounds in puzzles;)
And she was,-what she was; the memory
Of her death-bed is far too fresh with me
To let me sit in judgment; only this

I needs must say,—that if she was not one
Of God's most pure and sainted messengers,
She was a deeper, bolder hypocrite

Than ever pen depicted. Well, these two,
Being romantic, married, to themselves,

But not before the world, although they issued The usual wedding-cards, which is the point The whole thing turns upon. I can't make out Who knew the truth, if any one; I think

Her mother knew it, who, poor thing, arrived

In time to see her daughter's funeral.

They came here in the summer, so I hear,