Autograph letter signed : [London], to George Goodin Moulton-Barrett, [1846 September 17-18].

Asking George to take this letter to his room to read, and begging for his love and forbearance; telling him the history of Robert Browning's courtship of her, her initial doubts, and his persistence: "He was too good for me, I knew, but I tried to be as generous. I showed him that I was altogether bruised & broken--that setting aside my health, which, however improved, was liable to fail with every withdrawing of the sun,--that the common advantages of youth & good spirits had gone from me & that I was an undone creature for the pleasures of life, as for its social duties. His answer was--not the common gallantries which come so easily to the lips of men--but simply that he loved me--he met argument with fact. He told me--that with himself also, the early freshness of youth had gone by, & that throughout it he had not been able to love any woman--that he loved now for the first time & the last"; describing their deepening relationship: "Then we have one mind on all subjects--& the solemner they are, the nearer we seem to approach. If poets, we are together, still more we are Christians. For these nearly two years we have known each other's opinions & thoughts & feelings, weakness & strength, as few persons in the like position have had equal opportunity of doing"; claiming all responsibility for hiding the relationship and not asking her father's permission to marry: "I could not physically bear to encounter agitating opposition from those I tenderly loved--& to act openly in defiance of Papa's will, would have been more impossible for me than to use the right which I believe to be mine, of taking a step so strictly personal, on my own responsibility"; explaining that no one in the family, nor John Kenyon, knew about the relationship; writing that she has seen Browning "only in this house & openly--except the day of our meeting in the church of this parish in order to becoming [sic] his wife"; telling him that they plan to travel to France and then down to Pisa for the winter; discussing their financial situation and her decision to take the family money that belongs to her, so as not to be a burden on Browning, thinking especially of her medical expenses; asking George to read a letter she has enclosed for their father and then to give it to him, along with this letter: "I wish him in justice, & beseech him in affection to understand the whole bearings of this case"; giving further reasons for the elopement: "And if in this crisis I were to do otherwise than what I am about to do, there would be a victim without an expiation, & a sacrifice without an object. My spirits would have festered on in this enforced prison, & none of you would have been happier for what would have [been] bitter to me. Also, I should have wronged another. I cannot do it"; asking George, "if you have any affection for me", to write to her in Orleans.