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Page 6
It is man's arrogant certainty of his future which makes him impatient
of the word "friendship": it cools life to his lips, he so confident
that the headier nectar is his due!
I came upon a little phrase the other day that touched me so deeply: it
said so well what I have wanted to say since we have known each other.
Some peasant rhymer, an Irishman, is singing his love's praises, and
sinks his voice from the height of his passionate superlatives to call
her his "share of the world." Peasant and Irishman, he knew that his
fortune did not embrace the universe: but for him his love was just
that--his share of the world.
Surely when in anyone's friendship we seem to have gained our share of
the world, that is all that can be said. It means all that we can take
in, the whole armful the heart and senses are capable of, or that fate
can bestow. And for how many that must be friendship--especially for how
many women!
My dear, you are my share of the world, also my share of Heaven: but
there I begin to speak of what I do not know, as is the way with happy
humanity. All that my eyes could dream of waking or sleeping, all that
my ears could be most glad to hear, all that my heart could beat faster
to get hold of--your friendship gave me suddenly as a bolt from the
blue.
My friend, my friend, my friend! If you could change or go out of my
life now, the sun would drop out of my heavens: I should see the world
with a great piece gashed out of its side,--my share of it gone. No, I
should not see it, I don't think I should see anything ever again,--not
truly.
Is it not strange how often to test our happiness we harp on sorrow? I
do: don't let it weary you. I know I have read somewhere that great love
always entails pain. I have not found it yet: but, for me, it does mean
fear,--the sort of fear I had as a child going into big buildings. I
loved them: but I feared, because of their bigness, they were likely to
tumble on me.
But when I begin to think you may be too big for me, I remember you as
my "friend," and the fear goes for a time, or becomes that sort of fear
I would not part with if I might.
I have no news for you: only the old things to tell you, the wonder of
which ever remains new. How holy your face has become to me: as I saw it
last, with something more than the usual proofs of love for me upon
it--a look as if your love troubled you! I know the trouble: I feel it,
dearest, in my own woman's way. Have patience.--When I see you so, I
feel that prayer is the only way given me for saying what my love for
you wishes to be. And yet I hardly ever pray in words.
Dearest, be happy when you get this: and, when you can, come and give my
happiness its rest. Till then it is a watchman on the lookout.
"Night-night!" Your true sleepy one.
LETTER VIII.
Now _why_, I want to know, Beloved, was I so specially "good" to you in my
last? I have been quite as good to you fifty times before,--if such a
thing can be from me to you. Or do you mean good _for_ you? Then, dear, I
must be sorry that the thing stands out so much as an exception!
Oh, dearest Beloved, for a little I think I must not love you so much,
or must not let you see it.
When does your mother return, and when am I to see her? I long to so
much. Has she still not written to you about our news?
I woke last night to the sound of a great flock of sheep going past. I
suppose they were going by forced marches to the fair over at Hylesbury:
It was in the small hours: and a few of them lifted up their voices and
complained of this robbery of night and sleep in the night. They were so
tired, so tired, they said: and so did the muffawully patter of their
poor feet. The lambs said most; and the sheep agreed with a husky
croak.
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