I have written to Mr. Gilmore by the same post as will take this, and have just told him the bare truth. What else could I tell him? I have said something horribly stilted about esteem and friendship, which I would have left out, only that my letter seemed to be heartless without it. He has been to me as good as a man could be; but was it my fault that I could not love him? If you knew how I tried,--how I tried to make believe to myself that I loved him; how I tried to teach myself that that sort of very chill approbation was the nearest approach to love that I could ever reach; and how I did this because you bade me;--if you could understand all this, then you would not scold me. And I did almost believe that it was so. But now--! Oh, dear! how would it have been if I had engaged myself to Mr. Gilmore, and that then Walter Marrable had come to me! I get sick when I think how near I was to saying that I would love a man whom I never could have loved. Of course I used to ask myself what I should do with myself. I suppose every woman living has to ask and to answer that question. I used to try to think that it would be well not to think of the outer crust of myself. What did it matter whether things were soft to me or not? I could do my duty. And as this man was good, and a gentleman, and endowed with high qualities and appropriate tastes, why should he not have the wife he wanted? I thought that I could pretend to love him, till, after some fashion, I should love him; but as I think of it now, all this seems to be so horrid! I know now what to do with myself. To be his from head to foot! To feel that nothing done for him would be mean or distasteful! To stand at a washtub and wash his clothes, if it were wanted. Oh, Janet, I used to dread the time in which he would have to put his arm round me and kiss me! I cannot tell you what I feel now about that other he. I know well how provoked you will be,--and it will all come of love for me; but you cannot but own that I am right. If you have any justice in you, write to me and tell me that I am right. Only that Mr. Gilmore is your great friend, and that, therefore, just at first, Walter will not be your friend, I would tell you more about him,--how handsome he is, how manly, and how clever. And then his voice is like the music of the spheres. You won't feel like being his friend at first, but you must look forward to his being your friend; you must love him--as I do Mr. Fenwick; and you must tell Mr. Fenwick that he must open his heart for the man who is to be my husband. Alas, alas! I fear it will be long before I can go to Bullhampton. How I do wish that he would find some nice wife to suit him!