And then I actually wonder if you have an earthly form! It will be very strange to see you and touch you, I sometimes wake up with a start at the thought of it! XXVI Thyrsis: Here I am, the most restless and miserable and uncomfortable and pining of creatures--a very Dido! Are you satisfied, now that you have made it almost impossible for me to put my mind on anything but you, you? I spend hours reading one page of my book. I was reading peaceably just now, and I suddenly thought how I would feel if I saw you coming in at the door. I started and could hardly believe that I will really see you--in something besides visions. When night comes I usually get fidgety, and can hardly realize I do not need to worry over phantoms. Then I go on with “Classicism and Romanticism in Music,” and I think of you--and read a line and think of you! You see, it doesn’t do for me to be too intense, for I just devour myself, and that is all. My only idea of a vent is to knock my head against something. I suppose it is the inevitable result of caring for someone you cannot see. Here I might be studying now, but what do I do? I go around seeking rest--and I write you a dozen times a day, and use up all the stamps in the house. Oh well, I dare say if you wished me to love you, you have accomplished your purpose most successfully. There is nothing in life but you, and to suddenly acquire a new self is most startling, and something hard to believe. Thyrsis, I simply cannot realize that I may go to you and find peace and security. XXVII MY DEAREST CORYDON: I have just a few words to say. I have two weeks left in which to shake off my shoulders the fearful animal that has been tearing me. _For just three weeks to-day,_ not a line written! The task seems almost beyond my powers. God, will people ever know how I have worked over this book! But unless you develop some new doubt, or I persist in writing letters, I ought to get it done now. I shall see you as soon as I have finished, and meantime I shall write no letters. XXVIII DEAR THYRSIS: I would give a great deal to let you know how I have struggled and suffered. I have had almost _more_ than I could bear--the more horrible because the more unreasonable. You must know it. If it disturbs you, please put the letter away until a favorable time. I account my trouble greatly physical--I have never been in such a nervous state. The murky despair that has come over me--that I have writhed and struggled in, as in the clutches of some fiend! It seems to me I have experienced every torment of each successive stage of Dante’s Inferno. I know what is the emotion of a soul in all the bloom and hope of youth, condemned _to die_. I woke up in the middle of the night last night--and felt as if a monster sat by to throw a black cloth over me and smother me. I got up and shook myself, and my heart was beating violently.