SD2103. John Forster to Robert Bulwer Lytton
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 24, 266 (in part).
46 Montagu Square W.
15th August 1857
My dearest Robert
Do you think I could have delayed answering your first letter if you had sent me your address?– I so regretted not knowing where to write to you.
But all is for the best—since here is your second letter which goes far, by far, with me, to clear away altogether the pain & gloom of the first. …
Now I dont know what you said of this young lady, or whether you named her to my wife, on the day we dined at Greenwich (for I have just received your letter, a couple of hours ago, on arriving in town from Kent where we are staying, and where I left her)—but something you must have said on which she formed a conclusion, for on my telling her the announcement in your first letter she did not take quite the view I did, but rather foreshadowed, and by no means indistinctly, the view & feelings you now express. She was as full of hope as I then was of fear—and would not but believe that all might be for the best, & that not even a scar would be left. If she were here, & knew I was writing to you, I should be charged with all kinds of most affectionate regard to you. …
You are at this moment, judging from your letter, in the very best temper for what is likely to be the best & safest judgment—and to that, with all earnest prayers & affectionate wishes, I leave you.
But don’t be long before you write to me—and say to the Brownings, oh how much! Among the books we took into Kent last week was Aurora Leigh which I am again reading through: and two or three days ago I was saying to my wife that not another week should pass before I wrote to those dear friends. …
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Lord Cobbold.
___________________
