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The Letters of Katherine Mansfield: Volume II

— Monday — March 14, 1921

To Lady Ottoline Morrell


I have been in bed for six weeks with my lungs and heart; then “They” have decided that my heart trouble is caused by a very swollen gland which presses, with intense pain, on an artery. This the surgeon tapped on Saturday and intends to tap 2 or 3 times again. And so on and so on and so on. L. M. is in England pendant cette crise—But I'll not go on.

The weather is really exquisite. To-day was perfection. Radiant, crystal clear, one of those days when the earth seems to pause, enchanted with its beauty, when every new leaf whispers: “Am I not heavenly fair!” The sun is quite warm. It is tame again. It comes and curls up in your arms—Beautiful Life! In spite of everything one cannot but praise Life. I have been watching the peach tree outside my window from the very first moment, and now it is all in flower and the leaves are come, small shy clusters like linnets' wings.

page 97

Even now I can't explain. Something happened, a kind of earthquake that shook everything and I lost faith and touch with everybody. I cannot write what it was. And perhaps I shall never meet you again so that I can tell you. This is sad. Blame me if you must. How can you do otherwise? I expect this all sounds fantastic. I hate people who hint at secrets in letters. You will hate this. Let me say I was almost out of my mind with misery last year—

M. is here for the moment. He goes back to England at the end of April. His typewriter ticks away here. I have just been looking at the Keats Memorial Volume. It is simply indescribable in its vulgarity. But there's a letter by Keats in it—so full of power, gaiety, ‘fun’ that it mocks the book as he would have mocked it!