Oh, if our friends would but put off anatomising one till after one was safely dead, and call to mind that, previously, we have nerves to be agonised and morbid brains to be driven mad! I am morbid, I know.

I can't bear some words even from Robert.

Like the lady who lay in the grave, and was ever after of the colour of a shroud, so I am white-souled, the past has left its mark with me for ever.

And now (this is the worst) every newspaper critic who talks of my poems may refer to other things.

I shall not feel myself safe a moment from references which stab like a knife.
But poor dear Miss Mitford, if we don't forgive what's meant as kindness, how are we to forgive what's meant as injury?
In my first agitation I felt it as a real vexation that I couldn't be angry with her.