nise.
I hope you like your own Mr. Rose, and that you will forgive me for
jilting Grace for Helena, which I could not help any more than Walter
could. But now, may I venture to ask a question? Would it not have
been wise of you if, on the point of _reserve_, you had thrown a
deeper shade of opposition into the characters or rather manners of
these women? Helena sits like a statue (and could Grace have done
more?) when she wins Walter's heart in Italy. Afterwards, and by fits
at the time, indeed, the artist fire bursts from her, but there was a
great deal of smouldering when there should have been a clear heat to
justify Walter's change of feeling. And then, in respect to _that_,
do you really think that your Grace was generous, heroic (with the
evidence she had of the change) in giving up her engagement? For her
own sake, could she have done otherwise? I fancy not; the position
seems surrounded by its own necessities, and no room for a doubt.
I write on my own doubts, you see, and you will smile at them, or
understand all through them that if the book had not interested me
like a piece of real life, I should not find myself _backbiting_ as if
all these were 'my neighbours.' The pure tender feeling of the closing
scenes touched me to better purpose, believe me, and I applaud from
my heart and conscience your rejection of that low creed of 'poetical
justice' which is neither justice nor poetry which is as degrading
to virtue as false to experience, and which, thrown from your book,
raises it into a pure atmosphere at once.

I could go on talking, but remind myself (I do hope in time) that I
might show my gratitude better. With sincere wishes for the success
of the work (for just see how practically we come to trust to poetical
justices after all our theories--_I_, I mean, and _mine_!), and with
respect and esteem for the writer,

I remain very truly yours,
ELIZABETH BARRETT BARRETT.

[Footnote 137: A novel by Mr. Chorley, a copy of which he had
presented to Miss Barrett.]

_To Mrs. Jameson_
50 Wimpole Street: December 1, 1845.

My dear Mrs. Jameson,--I receive your letter, as I must do every sign
of your being near and inclined to think of me in kindness, gladly,
and assure you at once that whenever you can spend a half-hour on me
you will find me enough myself to have a true pleasure in welcoming
you, say any day except next Saturday or the Monday immediately
following.

As soon as I heard of your return to