These friends in chivalry are always faithful through the dark
hours to the bright. The Douglas motto, "tender and true,"
seems to me most worthy of the strongest breast. To borrow
again from Spencer, I am entirely satisfied with the fate of
the three brothers. I could not die while there was yet life
in my brother's breast. I would return from the shades and
nerve him with twofold life for the fight. I could do it, for
our hearts beat with one blood. Do you not see the truth and
happiness of this waiting tenderness? The verse--
"Have I a lover
Who is noble and free,
I would he were nobler
Than to love me,"--
does not come home to my heart, though _this_ does:--
"I could not love thee, sweet, so much,
Loved I not honor more."
* * * '_October 10th, 1840._--I felt singular pleasure in
seeing you quote Hood's lines on "Melancholy." I thought
nobody knew and loved his serious poems except myself, and
two or three others, to whom I imparted them.[A] Do you like,
also, the ode to Autumn, and--
"Sigh on, sad heart, for love's eclipse"?
It was a beautiful time when I first read these poems.
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