The Trial of Mary Blandy

Dear Mr. Roughead,

I devoured the tender Blandy in a single feast; I thank you most kindly for having anticipated so handsomely my appetite ; and I highly appreciate the terms in general, and the concluding ones in particular, in which you serve her up. You tell the story with excellent art and animation, and it's quite a gem of a story in its way, History herself having put it together as with the best compositional method, a strong sense for sequences and the proper march,...
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Dear Mr. Roughead,

I devoured the tender Blandy in a single feast; I thank you most kindly for having anticipated so handsomely my appetite ; and I highly appreciate the terms in general, and the concluding ones in particular, in which you serve her up. You tell the story with excellent art and animation, and it's quite a gem of a story in its way, History herself having put it together as with the best compositional method, a strong sense for sequences and the proper march, order and time. The only thing is that, as always, one wants to know more, more than the mere evidence supplies - and wants it even when as in this case one feels that the people concerned were after all of so dire a simplicity, so primitive a state of soul and sense, that they exhibition they make tells or expresses about all there was of them. Dear Mary must have consisted but of two or three pieces, one of which was a strong and simple carnal affinity, as it were, with the stinking little Cranstoun. Yet, also, one would like to get a glimpse of how an apparently normal young woman of her class, at that period, could have viewed such a creature in such a light. The light would throw itself on the Taste, the sense of proportion, of the time. However, dear Mary was a clear barbarian, simply. Enfin! - as one must always wind up these matters by exhaling. I continue to have escaped a further sense of...and as I think I have told you I cultivate the exquisite art of ignorance. Yet not of Blandy, Pritchard and Co., - there, perversely, I am all for knowledge. Do continue to feed in me that languishing need, and believe me all faithfully yours,

Henry James