w _know_,--what you meant _should be_, and
did all in your power to prevent) that I have _not_ received the
picture, if anything short of an adequate likeness. 'Nil nisi--te!'
But I have set my heart on _seeing_ it--will you remember next time,
next Saturday?

I will leave off now. To-morrow, dearest, only dearest Ba, I will
write a longer letter--the clock stops it this afternoon--it is later
than I thought, and our poor crazy post! This morning, hoping against
hope, I ran to meet our postman coming meditatively up the lane--with
_a_ letter, indeed!--but Ba's will come to-night--and I will be happy,
already _am_ happy, expecting it. Bless you, my own love,

Ever your--

_E.B.B. to R.B._

Tuesday Evening.
[Post-mark, March 25, 1846.]

Ah; if I '_do_' ... if I '_should_' ... if I _shall_ ... if I _will_
... if I _must_ ... what can all the 'ifs' prove, but a most
hypothetical state of the conscience? And in brief, I beg you to
stand convinced of one thing, that whenever the 'certain time' comes
for to 'hate writing to me' confessedly, 'avowedly,' (oh what words!)
_I shall not like it at all_--not for all the explanations ... and the
sights in gondola chairs, which the person seen is none the better
for! The [Greek: eidolon] sits by the fire--the real Ba is cold at
heart through wanting her letter. And that's the doctrine to be
preached now, ... is it? I 'shrink,' shrink from it. That's your
word!--and mine! Dearest, I began by half a jest and end by
half-gravity, which is the fault of your doctrine and not of me I
think. Yet it is ungrateful to be grave, when practically you are good
and just about the letters, and generous too sometimes, and I could
not bear the idea of obliging you to write to me, even once ...
when.... Now do not fancy that I do not understand. I understand
perfectly, on the contrary. Only do _you_ try not to dislike writing
when you write, or not to write when you dislike it ... _that_, I ask
of you, dear dearest--and forgive me for all this over-writing and
teazing and vexing which is foolish and womanish in the bad sense. It
is a way of meeting, ... the meeting in letters, ... and next to
receiving a letter from you, I like to write one to you ... and, so,
revolt from thinking it lawful for you to dislike.... Well! the
Goddess of Dulness herself couldn't have written _this_ bet