* * * * *
_27th January_ (1877).
Joanie tells me you are writing her such sad little letters. How _can_
it be that any one so good and true as my Susie should be sad? I am
sad, bitterly enough and often, but only with sense of fault and folly
and lost opportunity such as you have never fallen into or lost. It is
very cruel of Fate, I think, to make us sad, who would fain see
everybody cheerful, and (cruel of Fate too) to make so many cheerful
who make others wretched. The little history of Venice is well on, and
will be clear and interesting, I think,--more than most histories of
anything. And the stories of saints and nice people will be plenty.
Such moonlight as there is to-night, but nothing to what it is at
Coniston! It makes the lagoon water look brown instead of green, which
I never noticed before.
* * * * *
VENICE, _4th February, 1877_.
Your praise and sympathy do me double good, because you could not
praise me so nicely and brightly without pleasure of your own. I'm
always sure a Fors will be good if I feel it will please Susie;--but I
can only write them now as they're given me; it all depends on what
I'm about. But I'm doing a great deal just now which you will
enjoy--I'm thankful to say, I know you will. St. Theodore's horse is
delightful[20]--and our Venetian doggie--and some birds are coming too!
This is not a letter--but just a purr.
[Footnote 20: St. Theodore had a contest with a Dragon, and his horse
gave considerable help, trampling it down with its four feet. The
Saint spoke first to the horse as to a man--"Oh thou horse of Christ
comfort thee, be strong like a man, and come that we may conquer the
contrary enemy." See "Fors," vol. vii. also "St. Mark's Rest,"]
* * * * *