Be as kind as she might, Amy could
not set him strutting Malvolio-wise; she viewed him as a poor
devil who often had to pawn his coat--a man of parts who would
never get on in the world--a friend to be thought of kindly
because her dead husband had valued him. Nothing more than that;
he understood perfectly the limits of her feeling. But this could
not put restraint upon the emotion with which he received any
most trifling utterance of kindness from her. He did not think of
what was, but of what, under changed circumstances, might be. To
encourage such fantasy was the idlest self-torment, but he had
gone too far in this form of indulgence. He became the slave of
his inflamed imagination.
In that letter with which he replied to her praises of his book,
perchance he had allowed himself to speak too much as he thought.
He wrote in reckless delight, and did not wait for the prudence
of a later hour. When it was past recall, he would gladly have
softened many of the expressions the letter contained. 'I value
it more than the praises of all the reviewers in existence'--
would Amy be offended at that? 'Yours in gratitude and
reverence,' he had signed himself--the kind of phrase that comes
naturally to a passionate man, when he would fain say more than
he dares.
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