morning. I do not know what to think. Do you mean to say that you
are seriously half in love with a woman whom you have never seen--
with a shadow, a chimera? for what else can Miss Daw to be you? I
do not understand it at all. I understand neither you nor her. You
are a couple of ethereal beings moving in finer air than I can
breathe with my commonplace lungs. Such delicacy of sentiment is
something that I admire without comprehending. I am bewildered. I
am of the earth earthy, and I find myself in the incongruous
position of having to do with mere souls, with natures so finely
tempered that I run some risk of shattering them in my awkwardness.
I am as Caliban among the spirits!

Reflecting on your letter, I am not sure that it is wise in me to
continue this correspondence. But no, Jack; I do wrong to doubt the
good sense that forms the basis of your character. You are deeply
interested in Miss Daw; you feel that she is a person whom you may
perhaps greatly admire when you know her: at the same time you bear
in mind that the chances are ten to five that, when you do come to
know her, she will fall far short of your ideal, and you will not
care for her in the least. Look at it in this sensible light, and I
will hold back nothing from you.

Yesterday afternoon my father and myself rode over to Rivermouth
with the Daws. A heavy rain in the morning had cooled the
atmosphere and laid the dust. To Rivermouth is a drive of eight
miles, along a winding road lined all the way with wild barberry
bushes. I never saw anything more brilliant than these bushes, the
green of the foliage and the faint blush of the berries intensified
by the rain. The colonel drove, with my father in front, Miss Daw
and I on the back seat. I resolved that for the first five miles