Yet I have no confidence that the book will ever be worthily written. And now I have something else to ask. It is that if anything strikes you as untrue in cases where my drama has a bearing on momentous questions, especially of a public nature, you will do me the great kindness to tell me of your doubts.
On a few moral points, which have been made clear to me by my experience, I feel sufficiently confident—without such confidence I could not write at all. But in every other direction I am so much in need of fuller instruction as to be constantly under the sense that I am more likely to be wrong than right.
Hitherto I have read my MS. (I mean of my previous books) to Mr. Lewes, by forty or fifty pages at a time, and he has told me if he felt an objection to anything. No one else has had any knowledge of my writings before their publication. (I except, of course, the publishers.)
But now that you are good enough to incur the trouble of reading my MS., I am anxious to get the full benefit of your participation.
Letter to Mrs. Congreve, 28th Jan. 1866.
We arrived here on Tuesday, and have been walking about four hours each day, and the walks are so various that each time we have turned out we have found a new one. George is already much the better for the perfect rest, quiet, and fresh air. Will you give my thanks to Mr. Congreve for the "Synthèse" which I have brought with me and am reading? I expect to understand three chapters well enough to get some edification.
George had talked of our taking the train to Dover to pay you a "morning call." He observes that it would have been a "dreadful sell" if we had done so. Your letter, therefore, was providential—and without doubt it came from a dear little Providence of mine that sits in your heart.
Letter to Frederic Harrison, 31st Jan. 1866.
I have received both your precious letters—the second edition of the case, and the subsequent note. The story is sufficiently in the track of ordinary probability; and the careful trouble you have so generously given to it has enabled me to feel a satisfaction in my plot which beforehand I had sighed for as unattainable.
There is still a question or two which I shall want to ask you, but I am afraid of taxing your time and patience in an unconscionable manner. So, since we expect to return to town at the end of next week, I think I will reserve my questions until I have the pleasure and advantage of an interview with you, in which pros and cons can be more rapidly determined than by letter. It seems to me that you have fitted my phenomena with a rationale quite beautifully. If there is any one who could have done it better, I am sure I know of no man who would. Please to put your help of me among your good deeds for this year of 1866.