252 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. IX. 



of depression, but these he concealed so well that they 

 were often unsuspected. " Cheer up, my good friend/' he 

 replies to a desponding letter, U I can say, ' De profundis 

 clamavi ; ' I look back with great horror at some of the 

 dark and dreary images which an overworked brain doomed 

 me to have for daily and nightly visitants, for weeks together, 

 since Christmas onwards. Only now [in April] is the heaving 

 black sea of gloom beginning to smooth its waves, and the 

 horror of great darkness to pass away. The fault lies in 

 great part with the body, and that I hope to mend by a 

 week in the country." " My roving fancy," he tells John 

 Cairns, "is ever building castles in the air, or digging dun- 

 geons in the nether depths. Well ! well ! there is a cure 

 even for that, and for the benefit of poor dreamers like me 

 it has been written, that ' neither height nor depth ' shall be 

 able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our 

 Lord. You need not tell me I am wrong in my exegesis ; 

 if I were right, I should not say it to such a dweller in the 

 Interpreter's house as you. But I am right, so far as regards 

 myself, at this present moment." 



The two letters which follow are given nearly entire, the 

 first being addressed to a literary friend, and the second to 

 Mr. Daniel Macmillan : 



" It is always difficult to write to a distant friend, for one 

 cannot know but very generally how he is, and the tone of 

 a letter may be all out of keeping with his condition. 



" A strong feeling of this makes me reluctant to write 

 this evening, for I remember too well my own risings and 

 fallings, and wayward changes when ill, to be at all con- 

 fident that I can say anything that will be acceptable to you. 

 Yet if I should fail, you will give me credit I know for good 

 intent, and I will on my side lay claim to a deep and sincere 



