" Thus I
said, and thus I wished, in my blindness. Yet even in that very northern
region it was, even in that very valley, nay, in that very house to which
my erroneous wishes pointed, that this second birth of my sufferings
began, and that they again threatened to besiege the citadel of life and
hope. There it was that for years I was persecuted by visions as ugly,
and as ghastly phantoms as ever haunted the couch of an Orestes; and in
this unhappier than he, that sleep, which comes to all as a respite and a
restoration, and to him especially as a blessed {7} balm for his wounded
heart and his haunted brain, visited me as my bitterest scourge. Thus
blind was I in my desires; yet if a veil interposes between the
dim-sightedness of man and his future calamities, the same veil hides
from him their alleviations, and a grief which had not been feared is met
by consolations which had not been hoped. I therefore, who participated,
as it were, in the troubles of Orestes (excepting only in his agitated
conscience), participated no less in all his supports. My Eumenides,
like his, were at my bed-feet, and stared in upon me through the
curtains; but watching by my pillow, or defrauding herself of sleep to
bear me company through the heavy watches of the night, sate my Electra;
for thou, beloved M.
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