It is a satisfaction to you, I hope, that your son is about to be initiated in George Street. I trust he will one day carry on the good traditions of the name "John Blackwood."
[Sidenote: Letter to Madame Bodichon, 5th Mch. 1879.]
Your letter, which tells me that you are benefiting by the clear, sunny air, is very welcome. Yes, here too the weather is more merciful, and I drive out most days. I am better bodily, but I never feel thoroughly comfortable in that material sense, and I am incredibly thin. As to my mind, I am full of occupation, but the sorrow deepens down instead of diminishing. I mean to go to Witley in a few months, that I may look again on the spots that he enjoyed, and that we enjoyed together, but I cannot tell beforehand whether I shall care to go again afterwards.
Everybody is very kind to me, and by and by I shall begin to see a few intimate friends. I can do or go through anything that is business or duty, but time and strength seem lacking for everything else. You must excuse my weakness, remembering that for nearly twenty-five years I have been used to find my happiness in his. I can find it nowhere else. But we can live and be helpful without happiness, and I have had more than myriads who were and are better fitted for it.
I am really very busy, and have been sadly delayed by want of health. One project I have entered on is to found a studentship, which will be called after his name. I am getting help from experienced men.
[Sidenote: Letter to John Blackwood, 5th Mch. 1879.]
I send the corrected sheets of "Theophrastus," and shall be much obliged if you will order a complete revise to be sent me before they are struck off. Whenever the book is published (I cannot contemplate its appearing before June, and if that is a bad time it must stand over till the autumn season) I beg you kindly to write for me a notice, to be printed on the fly-leaf, that the MS. was placed in your hands last November, or simply last year.
I think you will enter into my feeling when I say that to create a notion on the part of the public of my having been occupied in writing "Theophrastus" would be repugnant to me. And I shrink from putting myself forward in any way.
I hope you are benefiting by the milder weather. I drive out a little now, but you must be prepared to see me a much changed creature. I think I should hardly know myself.