You should know this of him:  he has been the dearest possible of human beings to me since I lost you.  I am almost not unblessed when I have him to speak to.  Yet we can say so little together.  I guess all he means.  An endless wish to give me comfort:—­and I stay selfish.  The knowledge that he would stolidly die to serve me hardly touches me.

Oh, look kindly in his eyes if you see him:  mine will be looking at you out of his!

LETTER LXXXV.

Good-morning, Beloved; there is sun shining.  I wonder if Arthur is with you yet?

If faith could still remove mountains, surely I should have seen you long ago.  But if I were to see you now, I should fear that it meant you were dead.

That the same world should hold you and me living and unseen by each other is a great mystery.  Will love ever explain it?

I wish I could bid the sun stand still over your meeting with Arthur so that I might know.  We were so like each other once.  Time has worn it off:  but he is like what I was.  Will you remember me well enough to recognize me in him, and to be a little pitiful to my weak longing for a word this one last time of all?  Beloved, I press my lips to yours, and pray—­speak!

LETTER LXXXVI.

Dearest:  To-day Arthur came and brought me your message:  I have at my heart your “profoundly grateful remembrances.”  Somewhere else unanswered lies your prayer for God to bless me.  To answer that, dearest, is not in His hands but in yours.  And the form of your message tells me it will not be,—­not for this body and spirit that have been bound together so long in truth to you.

I set down for you here—­if you should ever, for love’s sake, send and make claim for any message back from me—­a profoundly grateful remembrance; and so much more, so much more that has never failed.

Most dear, most beloved, you were to me and are.  Now I can no longer hold together:  but it is my body, not my love that has failed.

* * * * *

[Transcriber’s Notes: 

—­Though this book was published anonymously, it was later revealed to be by Laurence Housman.

—­In Letter XLIII “roughtly” was corrected to “roughly”

—­In Letter XXXVI “sort” was corrected to “short”

—­In Letter LXX, “elder’s” was corrected to “elders’”

—­In Letter LXXVIII “unforgetable” was corrected to “unforgettable”]