“Read the following letter: ‘I arrived in town
near a fortnight ago, my dear girl, but having previously weaned my child on
account of a cough, I found myself extremely weak. I have intended writing to
you every day, but have been prevented by the impossibility of determining in
what way I can be of essential service to you. When Mr Imlay and I united our fate together, he was without
fortune; since that, there is a prospect of his obtaining a considerable one;
but though the hope appears to be well founded, I cannot yet act as if it were
a certainty. He is the most generous creature in the world, and if he succeed,
as I have the greatest reason to think he will, he will, in proportion to his
acquirement of property, enable me to be useful to you and Everina. I wish you and her would adopt any
plan in which five or six hundred pounds would be of use. As to myself, I
cannot yet say where I shall live for a continuance. It would give me the
sincerest pleasure to be situated near you. I know you will think me
| 224 | WILLIAM GODWIN |
“This I have just received. My Everina, what I felt, and shall for ever
feel! It is childish to talk of. After lingering above a fortnight in such
cruel suspense. Good God! what a letter! How have I merited such pointed
cruelty? When did I wish to live with her? At what time wish for a moment
to interrupt their domestic happiness? Was ever a present offered in so
humiliating a style? Ought the poorest domestic to be thus insulted? Are
your eyes opened at last, Everina? What do you now say
to our goodly prospects? I have such a mist before my lovely eyes that I
cannot now see what I write. Instantly get me a situation in Ireland, I
care not where. Dear Everina, delay not to tell me you
can procure bread, with what hogs I eat it, I care not, nay, if exactly the
Uptonian breed. Remember I am serious. If you disappoint me, my misery will
be complete. I have enclosed this famous letter to the author of the
‘Rights of
Women’ without any reflection. She shall never hear from
poor Bess again.
Remember, I am as fixed as my misery, and nothing can change my present
plan. This letter has so strongly agitated me that I know not what I say;
but this I feel, and know, that if you value my existence you will comply
with my requisition, for I am positive I will never tor-
| ESTRANGEMENT OF THE SISTERS | 225 |
