They were very hard letters, those from dearest Papa and dearest George—To the first I had to bow my head—I do not seem to myself to have deserved that full cup, in the intentions of this act—but he is my father and he takes his own view, of course, of what is before him to judge of. But for George, I thought it hard, I confess, that he should have written to me so with a sword. To write to me as if I did not love you all,—I who would have laid down my life at a sign, if it could have benefited one of you really and essentially—with the proof, you should have had life and happiness at a sign.
It was hard that he should use his love for me to half break my heart with such a letter—Only he wrote in excitement and in ignorance. I ask of God to show to him and the most unbelieving of you, that never, never did I love you better, all my beloved ones, than when I left you—than in that day, and that moment.
…
… My dearest, dearest Arabel! Understand both of you, that if, from the apparent necessities of the instant, I consented to let the ceremony precede the departure by some few days, it was upon the condition of not seeing him again in that house and till we went away.
We parted, as we met, at the door of Marylebone Church—he helped me at the communion table, and not a word passed after. I looked like death, he has said since. You see we were afraid of a sudden removal preventing everything… or at least, laying the unpleasantness on me of a journey to London previous to the ceremony, which particularly I should have hated, for very obvious rea