ight then not indeed have been happy,
but at least I might have passed my life in peace, and have sunk into
forgetfulness without a pang.--The noble scenery in this country mixes
with my passion, and refines, but does not relieve it. I was at
Stirling Castle not long ago. It gave me no pleasure. The declivity
seemed to me abrupt, not sublime; for in truth I did not shrink back
from it with terror. The weather-beaten towers were stiff and formal:
the air was damp and chill: the river winded its dull, slimy way like a
snake along the marshy grounds: and the dim misty tops of Ben Leddi, and
the lovely Highlands (woven fantastically of thin air) mocked my
embraces and tempted my longing eyes like her, the sole queen and
mistress of my thoughts! I never found my contemplations on this
subject so subtilised and at the same time so desponding as on that
occasion. I wept myself almost blind, and I gazed at the broad golden
sunset through my tears that fell in showers. As I trod the green
mountain turf, oh! how I wished to be laid beneath it--in one grave with
her--that I might sleep with her in that cold bed, my hand in hers, and
my heart for ever still--while worms should taste her sweet body, that I
had never tasted! There was a time when I could bear solitude; but it
is too much for me at present. Now I am no sooner left to myself than I
am lost in infinite space, and look round me in vain for suppose or
comfort. She was my stay, my hope: without her hand to cling to, I
stagger like an infant on the edge of a precipice. The universe without
her is one wide, hollow abyss, in which my harassed thoughts can find no
resting-place. I must break off here; for the hysterica passio comes
upon me, and threatens to unhinge my reason.

LETTER XI

My dear and good Friend, I am afraid I trouble you with my querulous
epistles, but this is probably the last. To-morrow or the next day
decides my fate with respect to the divorce, when I expect to be a free
man. In vain! Was it not for her and to lay my freedom at her feet,
that I consented to this step which has cost me infinite perplexity, and
now to be discarded for the first pretender that came in her way! If
so, I hardly think I can survive it. You who have been a favourite with
women, do not know what it is to be deprived of one's only hope, and to
have it turned to shame and disappointment. There is nothing in the
world left that can afford me one drop of com