Letter: TO MISS MONROE



SKERRYVORE, BOURNEMOUTH, MAY 25TH, 1886.

DEAR MISS MONROE, - (I hope I have this rightly) I must lose no
time in thanking you for a letter singularly pleasant to receive.
It may interest you to know that I read to the signature without
suspecting my correspondent was a woman; though in one point (a
reference to the Countess) I might have found a hint of the truth.
You are not pleased with Otto; since I judge you do not like
weakness; and no more do I. And yet I have more than tolerance for
Otto, whose faults are the faults of weakness, but never of ignoble
weakness, and who seeks before all to be both kind and just.
Seeks, not succeeds. But what is man? So much of cynicism to
recognise that nobody does right is the best equipment for those
who do not wish to be cynics in good earnest. Think better of
Otto, if my plea can influence you; and this I mean for your own
sake - not his, poor fellow, as he will never learn your opinion;
but for yours, because, as men go in this world (and women too),
you will not go far wrong if you light upon so fine a fellow; and
to light upon one and not perceive his merits is a calamity. In
the flesh, of course, I mean; in the book the fault, of course, is
with my stumbling pen. Seraphina made a mistake about her Otto; it
begins to swim before me dimly that you may have some traits of
Seraphina?