E.B.B. to R.B.
Tuesday Evening.
[Post-mark, June 25, 1845.]
What will you think when I write to ask you not to come to-morrow, Wednesday; but ... on Friday perhaps, instead? But do see how it is; and judge if it is to be helped.
I have waited hour after hour, hoping to hear from Miss Mitford that she would agree to take Thursday in change for Wednesday, — and just as I begin to wonder whether she can have received my letter at all, or whether she may not have been vexed by it into taking a vengeance and adhering to her own devices; (for it appealed to her esprit de sexe on the undeniable axiom of women having their way ... and she might choose to act it out!) just as I wonder over all this, and consider what a confusion of the elements it would be if you came and found her here, and Mr. Chorley at the door perhaps, waiting for some of the light of her countenance; — comes a note from Mr. Kenyon, to the effect that he will be here at four o’clock P.M. — and comes a final note from my aunt Mrs. Hedley (supposed to be at Brighton for several months) to the effect that she will be here at twelve o’clock, M.!! So do observe the constellation of adverse stars ... or the covey of ‘bad birds,’ as the Romans called them, and that there is no choice, but to write as I am writing. It can’t be helped — can it? For take away the doubt about Miss Mitford, and Mr. Kenyon remains — and take away Mr. Kenyon, and there is Mrs. Hedley — and thus it must be for Friday ... which will learn to be a fortunate day for the nonce — unless Saturday should suit you better. I do not speak of Thursday, because of the doubt about Miss Mitford — and if any harm should happen to Friday, I will write again; but if you do not hear again, and are able to come then, you will come perhaps then.
In the meantime I thank you for the better news in your note — if it is really, really to be trusted in — but you know, you have said so often that you were better and better, without being really better, that it makes people ... ‘suspicious.’ Yet it is full amends for the disappointment to hope ... here I must break off or be too late. May God bless you my dear friend.
E.B.B.
R.B. to E.B.B.
12. Wednesday.
[Post-mark, June 25, 1845.]
Pomegranates you may cut deep down the middle and see into, but not hearts, — so why should I try and speak?
Friday is best day because nearest, but Saturday is next best — it is next near, you know: if I get no note, therefore, Friday is my day.
Now is Post-time, — which happens properly.
God bless you, and so your own
R.B.
E.B.B. to R.B.
Thursday Evening.
[Post-mark, June 27, 1845.]
After all it must be for Saturday, as Mrs. Hedley comes again on Friday, to-morrow, from New Cross, — or just beyond it, Eltham Park — to London for a few days, on account of the illness of one of her children. I write in the greatest haste after Miss Mitford has left me ... and so tired! to say this, that if you can and will come on Saturday, ... or if not on Monday or Tuesday, there is no reason against it.
Your friend always,
E.B.B.
R.B. to E.B.B.
Friday Morning.
[Post-mark, June 27, 1845.]
Let me make haste and write down To-morrow, Saturday, and not later, lest my selfishness be thoroughly got under in its struggle with a better feeling that tells me you must be far too tired for another visitor this week.
What shall I decide on?
Well — Saturday is said — but I will stay not quite so long, nor talk nearly so loud as of old-times; nor will you, if you understand anything of me, fail to send down word should you be at all indisposed. I should not have the heart to knock at the door unless I really believed you would do that. Still saying this and providing against the other does not amount, I well know, to the generosity, or justice rather, of staying away for a day or two altogether. But — what ‘a day or two’ may not bring forth! Change to you, change to me —
Not all of me, however, can change, thank God —
Yours ever
R.B.
Or, write, as last night, if needs be: Monday, Tuesday is not so long to wait. Will you write?
E.B.B. to R.B.
Friday Evening.
[Post-mark, June 28, 1845.]
You are very kind and always — but really that does not seem a good reason against your coming to-morrow — so come, if it should not rain. If it rains, it concludes for Monday ... or Tuesday; whichever may be clear of rain. I was tired on Wednesday by the confounding confusion of more voices than usual in this room; but the effect passed off, and though Miss Mitford was with me for hours yesterday I am not unwell to-day. And pray speak bona verba about the awful things which are possible between this now and Wednesday. You continue to be better, I do hope? I am forced to the brevity you see, by the post on one side, and my friends on the other, who have so long overstayed the coming of your note — but it is enough to assure you that you will do no harm by coming — only give pleasure.
Ever yours, my dear friend,
E.B.B.
E.B.B. to R.B.
Monday.
[June 30, 1845.]
I send back the prize poems which have been kept far too long even if I do not make excuses for the keeping — but our sins are not always to be measured by our repentance for them. Then I am well enough this morning to have thought of going out till they told me it was not at all a right day for it ... too windy ... soft and delightful as the air seems to be — particularly after yesterday, when we had some winter back again in an episode. And the roses do not die; which is quite magnanimous of them considering their reverses; and their buds are coming out in most exemplary resignation — like birds singing in a cage. Now that the windows may be open, the flowers take heart to live a little in this room.
And think of my forgetting to tell you on Saturday that I had known of a letter being received by somebody from Miss Martineau, who is at Ambleside at this time and so entranced with the lakes and mountains as to be dreaming of taking or making a house among them, to live in for the rest of her life. Mrs. Trollope, you may have heard, had something of the same nympholepsy — no, her daughter was ‘settled’ in the neighbourhood — that is the more likely reason for Mrs. Trollope! and the spirits of the hills conspired against her the first winter and almost slew her with a fog and drove her away to your Italy where the Oreadocracy has gentler manners. And Miss Martineau is practising mesmerism and miracles on all sides she says, and counts on Archbishop Whately as a new adherent. I even fancy that he has been to see her in the character of a convert. All this from Mr. Kenyon.
There’s a strange wild book called the Autobiography of Heinrich Stilling ... one of those true devout deep-hearted Germans who believe everything, and so are nearer the truth, I am sure, than the wise who believe nothing; but rather over-German sometimes, and redolent of sauerkraut — and he gives a tradition ... somewhere between mesmerism and mysticism, ... of a little spirit with gold shoebuckles, who was his familiar spirit and appeared only in the sunshine I think ... mottling it over with its feet, perhaps, as a child might snow. Take away the shoebuckles and I believe in the little spirit — don’t you? But these English mesmerists make the shoebuckles quite conspicuous and insist on them broadly; and the Archbishops Whately may be drawn by them (who can tell?) more than by the little spirit itself. How is your head to-day? now really, and nothing extenuating? I will not ask of poems, till the ‘quite well’ is authentic. May God bless you always! my dear friend!
E.B.B.
After all the book must go another day. I live in chaos do you know? and I am too hurried at this moment ... yes it is here.
R.B. to E.B.B.
Tuesday Morning.
How are you — may I hope to hear soon?
I don’t know exactly what possessed me to set my next day so far off as Saturday — as it was said, however, so let it be. And I will bring the rest of the ‘Duchess’ — four or five hundred lines, — ’heu, herba mala
crescit’ — (as I once saw mournfully pencilled on a white wall at Asolo) — but will you tell me if you quite remember the main of the first part — (parts there are none except in the necessary process of chopping up to suit the limits of a magazine — and I gave them as much as I could transcribe at a sudden warning) — because, if you please, I can bring the whole, of course.
After seeing you, that Saturday, I was caught up by a friend and carried to see Vidocq — who did the honours of his museum of knives and nails and hooks that have helped great murderers to their purposes — he scarcely admits, I observe, an implement with only one attestation to its efficacy; but the one or two exceptions rather justify his latitude in their favour — thus one little sort of dessert knife did only take one life.... ‘But then,’ says Vidocq, ‘it was the man’s own mother’s life, with fifty-two blows, and all for’ (I think) ‘fifteen francs she had got?’ So prattles good-naturedly Vidocq — one of his best stories of that Lacénaire — ’jeune homme d’un caractère fort avenant — mais c’était un poète,’ quoth he, turning sharp on me out of two or three other people round him.
Here your letter breaks in, and sunshine too.
Why do you send me that book — not let me take it? What trouble for nothing!
An old French friend of mine, a dear foolish, very French heart and soul, is coming presently — his poor brains are whirling with mesmerism in which he believes, as in all other unbelief. He and I are to dine alone (I have not seen him these two years) — and I shall never be able to keep from driving the great wedge right through his breast and descending lower, from riveting his two foolish legs to the wintry chasm; for I that stammer and answer hap-hazard with you, get proportionately valiant and voluble with a mere cupful of Diderot’s rinsings, and a man into the bargain.
If you were prevented from leaving the house yesterday, assuredly to-day you will never attempt such a thing — the wind, rain — all is against it: I trust you will not make the first experiment except under really favourable auspices ... for by its success you will naturally be induced to go on or leave off — Still you are better! I fully believe, dare to believe, that will continue. As for me, since you ask — find me but something to do, and see if I shall not be well! — Though I am well now almost.
How good you are to my roses — they are not of my making, to be sure. Never, by the way, did Miss Martineau work such a miracle as I now witness in the garden — I gathered at Rome, close to the fountain of Egeria, a handful of fennel-seeds from the most indisputable plant of fennel I ever chanced upon — and, lo, they are come up ... hemlock, or something akin! In two places, moreover. Wherein does hemlock resemble fennel? How could I mistake? No wonder that a stone’s cast off from that Egeria’s fountain is the Temple of the God Ridiculus.
Well, on Saturday then — at three: and I will certainly bring the verses you mention — and trust to find you still better.
Vivi felice — my dear friend, God bless you!
R.B.
JULY, 1845
E.B.B. to R.B.
Wednesday-Thursday Evening
[Post-mark, July 4, 1845.]
Yes — I know the first part of the ‘Duchess’ and have it here — and for the rest of the poem, don’t mind about being very legible, or even legible in the usual sense; and remember how it is my boast to be able to read all such manuscript writing as never is read by people who don’t like caviare. Now you won’t mind? really I rather like blots than otherwise — being a sort of patron-saint of all manner of untidyness ... if Mr. Kenyon’s reproaches (of which there’s a stereotyped edition) are justified by the fact — and he has a great organ of order, and knows ‘disorderly persons’ at a glance, I suppose. But you won’t be particular with me in the matter of transcription? that is what I want to make sure of. And even if you are not particular, I am afraid you are not well enough to be troubled by writing, and writing and the thinking that comes with it — it would be wiser to wait till you are quite well — now wouldn’t it? — and my fear is that the ‘almost well’ means ‘very little better.’ And why, when there is no motive for hurrying, run any risk? Don’t think that I will help you to make yourself ill. That I refuse to do even so much work as the ‘little dessert-knife’ in the way of murder, ... do think! So upon the whole, I expect nothing on Saturday from this distance — and if it comes unexpectedly (I mean the Duchess and not Saturday) let it be at no cost, or at the least cost possible, will you? I am delighted in the meanwhile to hear of the quantity of ‘mala herba’; and hemlock does not come up from every seed you sow, though you call it by ever such bad names.
Talking of poetry, I had a newspaper ‘in help of social and political progress’ sent to me yesterday from America — addressed to — just my name ... poetess, London! Think of the simplicity of those wild Americans in ‘calculating’ that ‘people in general’ here in England know what a poetess is! — Well — the post office authorities, after deep meditation, I do not doubt, on all probable varieties of the chimpanzee, and a glance to the Surrey Gardens on one side, and the Zoological department of Regent’s Park on the other, thought of ‘Poet’s Corner,’ perhaps, and wrote at the top of the parcel, ‘Enquire at Paternoster Row’! whereupon the Paternoster Row people wrote again, ‘Go to Mr. Moxon’ — and I received my newspaper.
And talking of poetesses, I had a note yesterday (again) which quite touched me ... from Mr. Hemans — Charles, the son of Felicia — written with so much feeling, that it was with difficulty I could say my perpetual ‘no’ to his wish about coming to see me. His mother’s memory is surrounded to him, he says, ‘with almost a divine lustre’ — and ‘as it cannot be to those who knew the writer alone and not the woman.’ Do you not like to hear such things said? and is it not better than your tradition about Shelley’s son? and is it not pleasant to know that that poor noble pure-hearted woman, the Vittoria Colonna of our country, should be so loved and comprehended by some ... by one at least ... of her own house? Not that, in naming Shelley, I meant for a moment to make a comparison — there is not equal ground for it. Vittoria Colonna does not walk near Dante — no. And if you promised never to tell Mrs. Jameson ... nor Miss Martineau ... I would confide to you perhaps my secret profession of faith — which is ... which is ... that let us say and do what we please and can ... there is a natural inferiority of mind in women — of the intellect ... not by any means, of the moral nature — and that the history of Art and of genius testifies to this fact openly. Oh — I would not say so to Mrs. Jameson for the world. I believe I was a coward to her altogether — for when she denounced carpet work as ‘injurious to the mind,’ because it led the workers into ‘fatal habits of reverie,’ I defended the carpet work as if I were striving pro aris et focis, (I, who am so innocent of all that knowledge!) and said not a word for the poor reveries which have frayed away so much of silken time for me ... and let her go away repeating again and again ... ‘Oh, but you may do carpet work with impunity — yes! because you can be writing poems all the while.’!
Think of people making poems and rugs at once. There’s complex machinery for you!
I told you that I had a sensation of cold blue steel from her eyes! — And yet I really liked and like and shall like her. She is very kind I believe — and it was my mistake — and I correct my impressions of her more and more to perfection, as you tell me who know more of her than I.
Only I should not dare, ... ever, I think ... to tell her that I believe women ... all of us in a mass ... to have minds of quicker movement, but less power and depth ... and that we are under your feet, because we can’t stand upon our own. Not that we should either be quite under your feet! so you are not to be too proud, if you please — and there is certainly some amount of wrong — : but it never will be righted in the manner and to the extent contemplated by certain of our own prophetesses ... nor ought to be, I hold in intimate persuasion. One woman indeed now alive ... and only that one down all the ages of the world — seems to me to justify for a moment an oppos
ite opinion — that wonderful woman George Sand; who has something monstrous in combination with her genius, there is no denying at moments (for she has written one book, Leila, which I could not read, though I am not easily turned back,) but whom, in her good and evil together, I regard with infinitely more admiration than all other women of genius who are or have been. Such a colossal nature in every way, — with all that breadth and scope of faculty which women want — magnanimous, and loving the truth and loving the people — and with that ‘hate of hate’ too, which you extol — so eloquent, and yet earnest as if she were dumb — so full of a living sense of beauty, and of noble blind instincts towards an ideal purity — and so proving a right even in her wrong. By the way, what you say of the Vidocq museum reminds me of one of the chamber of masonic trial scenes in ‘Consuelo.’ Could you like to see those knives?
I began with the best intentions of writing six lines — and see what is written! And all because I kept my letter back ... from a doubt about Saturday — but it has worn away, and the appointment stands good ... for me: I have nothing to say against it.
But belief in mesmerism is not the same thing as general unbelief — to do it justice — now is it? It may be super-belief as well. Not that there is not something ghastly and repelling to me in the thought of Dr. Elliotson’s great bony fingers seeming to ‘touch the stops’ of a whole soul’s harmonies — as in phreno-magnetism. And I should have liked far better than hearing and seeing that, to have heard you pour the ‘cupful of Diderot’s rinsings,’ out, — and indeed I can fancy a little that you and how you could do it — and break the cup too afterwards!
Another sheet — and for what?
What is written already, if you read, you do so meritoriously — and it’s an example of bad writing, if you want one in the poems. I am ashamed, you may see, of having written too much, (besides) — which is much worse — but one writes and writes: I do at least — for you are irreproachable. Ever yours my dear friend, as if I had not written ... or had!
Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series Page 319