_Boston_, Jany. 1st, 1840. 6 o'clock P.M.
_Belovedest wife_,
Your husband's heart was exceedingly touched by that little backhanded
note, and likewise by the bundle of allumettes--half a dozen of which
I have just been kissing with great affection. Would that I might kiss
that poor dear finger of mine! Kiss it for my sake, sweetest Dove--and
tell naughty Sophie Hawthorne to kiss it too. Nurse it well, dearest;
for no small part of my comfort and cheeriness of heart depends upon
that beloved finger. If it be not well enough to bear its part in
writing me a letter within a few days, do not be surprised if I send
down the best surgeon in Boston to effect a speedy cure. Nevertheless,
darlingest wife, restrain the good little finger, if it show any
inclination to recommence its labors too soon. If your finger be
pained in writing, your husband's heart ought to (and I hope would)
feel every twinge.
Belovedest, I have not yet wished you a Happy New Year! And yet I
have--many, many of them; as many, mine own wife, as we can enjoy
together--and when we can no more enjoy them together, we shall no
longer think of Happy New Years on earth, but look longingly for the
New Year's Day of eternity. What a year the last has been! Dearest,
you make the same exclamation; but my heart originates it too. It has
been the year of years--the year in which the flower of our life has
bloomed out--the flower of our life and of our love, which we are to
wear in our bosoms forever. Oh, how I love you, belovedest wife!--and
how I thank God that He has made me capable to know and love you!
Sometimes I feel, deep, deep down in my heart, how dearest above all
things you are to me; and those are blissful moments. It is such a
happiness to be conscious, at last, of something real. All my life
hitherto, I have been walking in a dream, among shadows which could
not be pressed to my bosom; but now, even in this dream of time, there
is something that takes me out of it, and causes me to be a dreamer no
more. Do you not feel, dearest, that we live above time and apart from
time, even while we seem to be in the midst of time? Our affection
diffuses eternity round about us.
My carefullest little wife will rejoice to know that I have been free
to sit by a good fire all this bitter cold day--not but what I have a
salt-ship on my hands, but she must have some ballast, before she can
discharge any more salt; and ballast cannot be procured till the day
after tomorrow. Are not these details very interesting? I have a mind,
some day, to send my dearest a journal of all my doings and
sufferings, my whole external life, from the time I awake at dawn,
till I close my eyes at night. What a dry, dull history would it be!
But then, apart from this, I would write another journal of my inward
life throughout the self-same day--my fits of pleasant thought, and
those likewise which are shadowed by passing clouds--the yearnings of
my heart towards my Dove--my pictures of what we are to enjoy
together. Nobody would think that the same man could live two such
different lives simultaneously. But then, as I have said above, the
grosser life is a dream, and the spiritual life a reality.
Very dearest, I wish you would make out a list of books that you would
like to be in our library; for I intend, whenever the cash and the
opportunity occur together, to buy enough to fill up our new
book-case; and I want to feel that I am buying them for both of us.
When I next come to Salem, you shall read the list, and we will
discuss it, volume by volume. I suppose the book-case will hold
about two hundred volumes; but you need not calculate upon making such
a vast collection all at once. It shall be accomplished in small lots;
and then we shall prize every volume, and receive a separate pleasure
from the acquisition of it.
Does it seem a great while since I left you, dearest? Truly, it does
to me. These separations lengthen our earthly lives by at least
nine-tenths; but then, in our brief seasons of communion, there is the
essence of a thousand years. Was it Thursday that I told my Dove would
be the day of my next appearance?--or Friday? "Oh, Friday, certainly!"
says Sophie Hawthorne. Well; it must be as naughty Sophie says.
Oh, belovedest, I want you. You have given me a new feeling,
blessedest wife--a sense, that strong as I may have deemed myself, I
am insufficient for my own support; and that there is a tender little
Dove, without whose help I cannot get through this weary world at all.
God bless you, ownest wife.