Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

436 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD.
three days on which my political article claimed my most
undivided attention—been obliged to diminish the remaining
time, so precious as it had become, by writing long and elabor-
ate letters suggesting remedies upon each particular grievance
which she stated, and endeavouring to tranquillise her mind.
By this direct abstraction of time I have been thrown back
greatly in my article, and still more by the anxious and
corroding thoughts and suffering state of mind under which
I have written.
Hence I have still not arrived at the end of my paper. Now,
under a full persuasion that I should have reached that point
by Friday night at latest, I assured her in my letters of Tuesday
and "Wednesday that upon Saturday morning I would call
upon you and state so much of the case as would obtain from
you whatever the paper might seem to warrant. Not that any
sum that in any reason you could give for a better paper than
this would meet the demands of the case ; but I promised
myself that it would enable her to pause a little until I could
write to my mother, which I resolved. to do without delay as
' soon as my Maga ' duty was over. Meanwhile, in my letter of
to-morrow night I shall briefly mention my intention, and my
certainty of receiving as much as she wants from that quarter
within a week ; and it would have been very agreeable to me if
I could so far have kept my former promise as to send at the
same time some small sum to meet the most pressing of her
immediate occasions, though I am aware how small a one it is
that an article can really merit which has been written in so
hurried and distracted a way. In this manner I should at least
know that I have omitted nothing in my power.
This letter evidently elicited a favourable reply. It
is curious to touch and smooth out the old-fashioned
cumbrous sheet, black outside with dust, faded in
ink, and full of the passionate perturbation, the
anxieties so long over and done, the trouble and
strain of the gifted mind and delicate nervous hand
formed for better things, which, as one care after
another arose and fell, however he was inspired when