What am I doing, to tell you of? Nothing! The winter is kind, and this divine 'muggy' weather (is _that_ the technical word and spelling thereof?), which gives all reasonable people colds in their heads, leaves _me_ the hope of getting back to the summer without much injury. A friend of mine--one of the greatest poets in England too--brought me primroses and polyanthuses the other day, as they are grown in Surrey![140] Surely it must be nearer spring than we think. Dearest Mrs. Martin, write and say how you are. And say, God bless you, both the yous, and mention Mr. Martin particularly, and what your plans are. Ever your affectionate BA. [Footnote 140: Beloved, them hast brought me many flowers Plucked in the garden, all the summer through, And winter, and it seemed as if they grew In this close room, nor missed the sun and showers. _Sonnets from the Portuguese_, xliv.] _To Mrs. Martin_ Tuesday [end of June 1846]. So, my dearest Mrs. Martin, you are quite angry with all of us and with me chiefly. Oh, you need not say no! I see it, I understand it, and shall therefore take up my own cause precisely as if I were an injured person. In the first place, dearest Mrs. Martin, when you wrote to me (at last!) to say that we were both guilty correspondents, you should have spoken in the singular number; for I was not guilty at all, I beg to say, while you were on the Continent. You were uncertain, you said, on going, where you should go and how long you should stay, and you promised to write and give me some sort of address--a promise never kept--and where was I to write to you? I heard for the first time, from the Peytons, of your being at Pau, and then you were expected at home. So innocent I am, and because it is a pleasure rather rare to make a sincere profession of innocence, I meant to write to you at least ten days ago; and then (believe me you will, without difficulty) the dreadful death of poor Mr. Haydon,[141] the artist, quite upset me, and made me disinclined to write a word beyond necessary ones. I thank God that I never saw him--poor gifted Haydon--but, a year and a half ago, we had a correspondence which lasted through several months and was very pleasant while it lasted. Then it was dropped, and only a few days before the event he wrote three or four notes to me to ask me to take charge of some papers and pictures, which I acceded to as once I had done before. He was constantly in pecuniary difficulty, and in apprehension of the seizure of goods; and nothing of _fear_ suggested itself to my mind--nothing. The shock was very great. Oh! I do not write to you to write of this. Only I would have you understand the real case, and that it is not an excuse, and that it was natural for me to be shaken a good deal. No artist is left behind with equal largeness of poetical conception! If the hand had always obeyed the soul, he would have been a genius of the first order. As it is, he lived on the _slope_ of greatness