Tuesday morn [29th January 1788]
I cannot go out today, my dearest Love, without sending you half a
line by way of a sin offering; but believe me, ‘twas the sin of
Ignorance.—Could you think that I intended to hurt you by
anything ! said yesternight? Nature has been too kind to you for
your happiness—Your Delicacy, your Sensibiity—0 why should
such glorious qualifications be the fruitful source of woe!—You have
“murder’d sleep” to me last night—I went to bed, impress’d with an
idea that you were unhappy; and every start I closed my eyes,
busy Fancy painted you in such scenes of romantic misery that I
would almost be persuaded you are not well this morning.—
—“If I unweeting have offended,
“Impute it not”—-
—“But while we live,
“But one short hour perhaps, between us two
“Let there be peace”.—
If Mary is not gone by this reaches you, give her my best
Compliments—She is a charming girl, and highly worthy of the
noblest love.—
I send you a Poem to read, till I call on you this night, which will be
about nine—I wish I could procure some potent spell, some fairy
charm, that would protect from injury, or restore to rest, that
bosom-chord, “tremblingly alive all o’er,” on which hangs your
peace of mind—I thought, vainly, I fear, thought, that the devotion
of Love, Love strong as even you can feel; Love guarded,
invulnerably guarded, by all the purity of Virtue, and all the pride of
Honor; I thought such a love might make you happy—will I be
Mistaken? I can no more, for hurry.—
Thine,
Sylvander
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