I don't pretend to know whether I am an object for ridicule or an object for pity.

Of one thing only I am certain: I mean to win you back, a man vindicated before the world, without a stain on his character or his name--thanks to his wife.
"Write to me, sometimes, Eustace; and believe me, through all the bitterness of this bitter business, your faithful and loving "VALERIA." There was my reply! Poor enough as a composition (I could write a much better letter now), it had, if I may presume to say so, one merit.

It was the honest expression of what I really meant and felt.
I read it to Benjamin.

He held up his hands with his customary gesture when he was thoroughly bewildered and dismayed.

"It seems the rashest letter that ever was written," said the dear old man.