Your letter has done me so much good that I have nearly forgotten all the evils of physique & morale.
| 228 |
|
|
| LADY BYRON AND MRS LEIGH (II) |
Your views and mine entirely coincide—I shall enclose, probably to-morrow, a letter to Augusta to your care (with a note you can show her), as I am very anxious she should have it before the conference with Hobhouse—I must regret that she means to have one—I know not whether his be the perversion of wilfulness or weakness, but he has a morbid delight in the worst parts of human nature, and a bitter spirit of infidelity which even supposing him honest, (and I have doubts) render him likely to do more harm than good—She disliked & mistrusted him, and suddenly, after I left Lord B—changed—I have never understood why—
The principal points of my letter to her will be—To press still more on her delusion—for else her eyes may close again, and I feel it would be a false delicacy that might lead me to abstain from probing the wound—My tenderness will however naturally increase with the pain I give, and will in her present temper, obtain forgiveness for my motives—I shall concede as much as possible for her good intentions towards me—She says—“I have not wronged you—I have not abused your generosity”—When Delusion has once been carried so far, it is difficult to say to what it may not extend—but surely by these assertions she must mean that she has been innocent since my marriage—I have a little difficulty in accounting for some things on this supposition, but they certainly are not strong enough to justify a contrary opinion. . . .
