I am not vain or touchy; it takes a lot to offend me; but when I am hurt the scar remains.  I feel differently about people who have hurt me; my confidence has been shaken; I hope I am not ungenerous, but I fear I am not really forgiving.  Worldly people say that explanations are a mistake; but having it out is the only chance any one can ever have of retaining my love; and those who have neither the courage, candour nor humbleness to say they are wrong are not worth loving.  I am not afraid of suffering too much in life, but much more afraid of feeling too little; and quarrels make me profoundly unhappy.  One of my complaints against the shortness of life is that there is not time enough to feel pity and love for enough people.  I am infinitely compassionate and moved to my foundations by the misfortunes of other people.

“As I said in my 1888 character-sketch, truthfulness with me is hardly a virtue, but I cannot discriminate between truths that need and those that need not be told.  Want of courage is what makes so many people lie.  It would be difficult for me to say exactly what I am afraid of.  Physically and socially not much; morally, I am afraid of a good many things:  reprimanding servants, bargaining in shops; or to turn to more serious matters, the loss of my health, the children’s or Henry’s.  Against these last possibilities I pray in every recess of my thoughts.

“With becoming modesty I have said that I am imaginative, loving and brave!  What then are my faults?

“I am fundamentally nervous, impatient, irritable and restless.  These may sound slight shortcomings, but they go to the foundation of my nature, crippling my activity, lessening my influence and preventing my achieving anything remarkable.  I wear myself out in a hundred unnecessary ways, regretting the trifles I have not done, arranging and re-arranging what I have got to do and what every one else is going to do, till I can hardly eat or sleep.  To be in one position for long at a time, or sit through bad plays, to listen to moderate music or moderate conversation is a positive punishment to me.  I am energetic and industrious, but I am a little too quick; I am driven along by my temperament till I tire myself and every one else.

“I did not marry till I was thirty.  This luckily gave me time to read; and I collected nearly a thousand books of my own before I married.  If I had had real application—­as all the Asquiths have—­ I should by now be a well-educated woman; but this I never had.  I am not at all dull, and never stale, but I don’t seem to be able to grind at uncongenial things.  I have a good memory for books and conversations, but bad for poetry and dates; wonderful for faces and pitiful for names.