nce--when you
make the man a long speech against some enormity he is about to
commit, and adjure and beseech and so forth, till he throws down the
aforesaid carbine, falls on his knees, and lets the Frederic go
quietly on his way to keep on killing his thousands after the fashion
that moved your previous indignation. Now is that right,
consequential--that is, _inferential_; logically deduced, going
straight to the end--_manly_?

The accessories are not the Principal, the adjuncts--the essence, nor
the ornamental incidents the book's self, so what matters it if the
portraits are admirable, the descriptions eloquent, (eloquent, there
it is--that is her characteristic--what she _has_ to speak, she
_speaks out_, speaks volubly _forth_, too well, inasmuch as you say,
advancing a step or two, 'And now speak as completely _here_'--and she
says nothing)--but all _that_, another could do, as others have
done--but 'la femme qui parle'--Ah, that, is _this_ all? So I am not
George Sand's--she teaches me nothing--I look to her for nothing.

I am ever yours, dearest friend. How I write to you--page on page! But
Tuesday--who could wait till then! Shall I not hear from you?

God bless you ever

R.B.

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

Saturday.
[Post-mark, August 16, 1845.]

But what likeness is there between opposites; and what has 'M.
l'Italien' to do with the said 'elderly German'? See how little! For
to bring your case into point, somebody should have been playing on a
Jew's harp for the whole of the orchestra; and the elderly German
should have quoted something about 'Harp of Judah' to the Venetian
behind him! And there, you would have proved your analogy!--Because
you see, my dear friend, it was not the expression, but the thing
expressed, I cried out against--the exaggeration in your mind. I am
sorry when I write what you do not like--but I have instincts and
impulses too strong for me when you say things which put me into such
a miserably false position in respect to you--as for instance, when in
this very last letter (oh, I _must_ tell you!) you talk of my
'correcting your verses'! My correcting your verses!!!--Now is _that_
a thing for you to say?--And do you really imagine that if I kept that
happily imagined phrase in my thoughts, I should be able to tell you
one word of my impre