My sisters likewise are pretty well.'
TO MISS WOOLER
'HAWORTH, _March_ 31_st_, 1848.
'MY DEAR MISS WOOLER,--I had been wishing to hear from you for some
time before I received your last. There has been so much sickness
during the last winter, and the influenza especially has been so
severe and so generally prevalent, that the sight of suffering around
us has frequently suggested fears for absent friends. Ellen Nussey
told me, indeed, that neither you nor Miss C. Wooler had escaped the
influenza, but, since your letter contains no allusion to your own
health or hers, I trust you are completely recovered. I am most
thankful to say that papa has hitherto been exempted from any attack.
My sister and myself have each had a visit from it, but Anne is the
only one with whom it stayed long or did much mischief; in her case
it was attended with distressing cough and fever; but she is now
better, though it has left her chest weak.
'I remember well wishing my lot had been cast in the troubled times
of the late war, and seeing in its exciting incidents a kind of
stimulating charm which it made my pulse beat fast only to think
of--I remember even, I think, being a little impatient that you would
not fully sympathise with my feelings on this subject, that you heard
my aspirations and speculations very tranquilly, and by no means
seemed to think the flaming sword could be any pleasant addition to
the joys of paradise.
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