Letter LII

To Mrs. Fielder

Philadelphia, December 16.

It is not improbable that, as soon as you recognise the hand that wrote this letter, you will throw it unread into the fire; yet it comes not to soothe resentment, or to supplicate for mercy. It seeks not a favourable audience. It wishes not--because the wish would be chimerical--to have its assertions believed. It expects not even to be read. All I hope is, that, though neglected, despised, and discredited for the present, it may not be precipitately destroyed or utterly forgotten. The time will come when it will be read with a different spirit.

You inform me that Miss Jessup has denied her letter, and imputes to me the wickedness of forging her name to a false confession. You are justly astonished at the iniquity and folly of what you deem my artifice. This astonishment, when you look back upon my past misconduct, is turned from me to yourself; from my folly to your own credulity, that was, for a moment, made the dupe of my contrivances.