Page:Masterpieces of German literature volume 10.djvu/50

 gard, however, as sent for slumber, not for writing. I see with regret that I write English still more illegibly than German. Once more, farewell, my heart. Tomorrow noon I am invited to be the guest of Frau Brauchitsch, presumably so that I may be duly and thoroughly questioned about you and yours. I'll tell them as much as I please. Je t'embrasse mille fois.

Your own

B.

Schönhausen, February 7, '47.

My Heart,—Just returned through a wild, drifting snowstorm from an appointment (which unfortunately was occasioned by the burning out of a poor family). I have warmed myself at your dear letter; in the twilight, even, I recognized your "Right honorable." All my limbs are twitching with eagerness to be off to Berlin again today, and to characterize the dikes and floods in terms of the unutterable Poberow dialect. The inexorable thermometer stands at 2 below freezing-point, accompanied with howling wind and large flakes, as though it would soon rain. What is duty? Compare Falstaff's expressions touching honor. At any rate, I shall write you straightway, even if I ruin myself in postage, and no sensible thoughts find their way through the debris of the fire that still has possession of my imagination. After reading your last remark I have just lit my cigar and stirred the ink. First, like a businessman, to answer your letter. I begin with a request smacking of the official desk—namely, that when you write you will, if you please, expressly state what letters you have received from me, giving their dates; otherwise one is uncertain as to the regular forwarding of them, as I am in doubt whether you have received my first letter, which I wrote the day of my arrival here, while on a business trip, in Jerichow, if I mistake not, on very bad paper, Friday, the 29th