But think not I hate thee; my heart is too high
To prey on the spoil of so abject a foe;
I deem thee unworthy a curse or a sigh,
For pity too base, and for vengeance too low.
Then away, unregretted, unhonored thy name,
In my moments of scorn recollected alone,—
Soon others shall wake to behold thee the same
As I have beheld thee, and thou shalt be known.
When at last he spoke reservedly on the subject to his confidential friend, he said he had begun life a very poor boy, had struggled hard to reach a pinnacle, and it now seemed severe to be struck down from all his happiness by one individual, and that one the woman whom he had loved the most of all on earth. And when the listener to whom he spoke replied with praises of the physical and spiritual beauty of Mrs. Forrest, he exclaimed, “She now looks ugly to me: her face is black and hideous.” This friend, Lawson, wrote these words at the time: “I am persuaded that both parties are still warmly attached to one another. He, judging by his looks, has suffered deeply, and has grown ten years older during the last few months. She is not less affected.”
At length a natural but unfortunate incident carried their alienation to the point of a violent and final rupture. In indignant reply to some cutting remarks on her sister, Mrs. Forrest inconsiderately said to her husband, “It is a lie!” If there was one point on which he had always been proudly scrupulous, as every friend would testify, it was that of being a man of the uttermost straightforward veracity, whatever might betide. The words, “It is a lie!” fell into his irascible blood like drops of molten iron. He restrained himself, and said, “If a man had said that to me he should die. I cannot live with a woman who says it.” From that moment separation was inevitable and irrevocable.