Yet he
is to me a source of ineffable joys,--far purer, deeper, than anything
I ever felt before,--like what Nature had sometimes given, but more
intimate, more sweet. He loves me very much; his little heart clings
to mine. I trust, if he lives, to sow there no seeds which are not
good, to be always growing better for his sake. Ossoli, too, will be
a good father. He has very little of what is called intellectual
development, but unspoiled instincts, affections pure and constant,
and a quiet sense of duty, which, to me,--who have seen much of the
great faults in characters of enthusiasm and genius,--seems of highest
value.
When you write by post, please direct "Marchesa Ossoli," as all the
letters come to that address. I did not explain myself on that point.
The fact is, it looks to me silly for a radical like me to be carrying
a title; and yet, while Ossoli is in his native land, it seems
disjoining myself from him, not to bear it. It is a sort of thing that
does not naturally belong to me, and, unsustained by fortune, is but a
_souvenir_ even for Ossoli. Yet it has appeared to me, that for him
to drop an inherited title would be, in some sort, to acquiesce in
his brothers' disclaiming him, and to abandon a right he may passively
wish to maintain for his child.
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