Complete Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

  May God bless you, my dear cousin.

  Affectionately yours always,

  E.B.B.

  This note is not to be answered.

  I am thinking of writing to Moxon, as there does not seem much to arrange. The type and size of Tennyson’s books seem, upon examination, to suit my purpose excellently.

  To John Kenyan

  March 21, 1844.

  No, you never sent me back Miss Martineau’s letter, my dear cousin; but you will be sure, or rather Mr. Crabb Robinson will, to find it in some too safe a place; and then I shall have it. In the meantime here are the other letters back again. You will think that I was keeping them for a deposit, a security, till I ‘had my ain again,’ but I have only been idle and busy together. They are the most interesting that can be, and have quite delighted me. By the way, I, who saw nothing to object to in the ‘Life in the Sick Room,’ object very much to her argument in behalf of it — an argument certainly founded on a miserable misapprehension of the special doctrine referred to in her letter. There is nothing so elevating and ennobling to the nature and mind of man as the view which represents it raised into communion with God Himself, by the justification and purification of God Himself. Plato’s dream brushed by the gate of this doctrine when it walked highest, and won for him the title of ‘Divine.’ That it is vulgarised sometimes by narrow-minded teachers in theory, and by hypocrites in action, might be an argument (if admitted at all) against all truth, poetry, and music!

  On the other hand, I was glad to see the leaning on the Education question; in which all my friends the Dissenters did appear to me so painfully wrong and so unworthily wrong at once.

  And Southey’s letters! I did quite delight in them! They are more personal than any I ever saw of his; and have more warm every-day life in them.

  The particular Paul Pry in question (to come down to my life) never ‘intrudes.’ It is his peculiarity. And I put the stop exactly where I was bid; and was going to put Gabriel’s speech, only — with the pen in my hand to do it — I found that the angel was a little too exclamatory altogether, and that he had cried out, ‘O ruined earth!’ and ‘O miserable angel!’ just before, approaching to the habit of a mere caller of names. So I altered the passage otherwise; taking care of your full stop after ‘despair.’ Thank you, my dear Mr. Kenyon.

  Also I sent enough manuscript for the first sheet, and a note to Moxon yesterday, last night, thanking him for his courtesy about Leigh Hunt’s poems; and following your counsel in every point. ‘Only last night,’ you will say! But I have had such a headache — and some very painful vexation in the prospect of my maid’s leaving me, who has been with me throughout my illness; so that I am much attached to her, with the best reasons for being so, while the idea of a stranger is scarcely tolerable to me under my actual circumstances.

  The ‘Palm Leaves’ are full of strong thought and good thought — thought expressed excellently well; but of poetry, in the true sense, and of imagination in any, I think them bare and cold — somewhat wintry leaves to come from the East, surely, surely!

  May the change of air be rapid in doing you good — the weather seems to be softening on purpose for you. May God bless you, dear Mr. Kenyon; I never can thank you enough. When you return I shall be rustling my ‘proofs’ about you, to prove my faith in your kindness.

  Ever affectionately yours,

  E.B.B.

  To H.S. Boyd

  March 22, 1844.

  My dearest Mr. Boyd, — I heard that once I wrote three times too long a letter to you; I am aware that nine times too long a silence is scarcely the way to make up for it. Forgive me, however, as far as you can, for every sort of fault. When I once begin to write to you, I do not know how to stop; and I have had so much to do lately as scarcely to know how to begin to write to you. Hence these faults — not quite tears — in spite of my penitence and the quotation.

  At last my book is in the press. My great poem (in the modest comparative sense), my ‘Masque of Exile’ (as I call it at last), consists of some nineteen hundred or two thousand lines, and I call it ‘Masque of Exile’ because it refers to Lucifer’s exile, and to that other mystical exile of the Divine Being which was the means of the return homewards of my Adam and Eve. After the exultation of boldness of composition, I fell into one of my deepest fits of despondency, and at last, at the end of most painful vacillations, determined not to print it. Never was a manuscript so near the fire as my ‘Masque’ was. I had not even the instinct of applying for help to anybody. In the midst of this Mr. Kenyon came in by accident, and asked about my poem. I told him that I had given it up, despairing of my republic. In the kindest way he took it into his hands, and proposed to carry it home and read it, and tell me his impression. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘I have a prejudice against these sacred subjects for poetry, but then I have another prejudice for you, and one may neutralise the other.’ The next day I had a letter from him with the returned manuscript — a letter which I was absolutely certain, before I opened it, would counsel against the publication. On the contrary! His impression is clearly in favour of the poem, and, while he makes sundry criticisms on minor points, he considers it very superior as a whole to anything I ever did before — more sustained, and fuller in power. So my nerves are braced, and I grow a man again; and the manuscript, as I told you, is in the press. Moreover, you will be surprised to hear that I think of bringing out two volumes of poems instead of one, by advice of Mr. Moxon, the publisher. Also, the Americans have commanded an American edition, to come out in numbers, either a little before or simultaneously with the English one, and provided with a separate preface for themselves.

  There now! I have told you all this, knowing your kindness, and that you will care to hear of it.

  It has given me the greatest concern to hear of dear Annie’s illness, and I do hope, both for your sake and for all our sakes, that we may have better news of her before long.

  But I don’t mean to fall into another scrape to-day by writing too much. May God bless you, my very dear friend!

  I am ever your affectionate

  E.B.B.

  To H.S. Boyd

  April I, 1844.

  My very dear Friend, — Your kind letter I was delighted to receive. You mistake a good deal the capacities in judgment of ‘the man.’ The ‘man’ is highly refined in his tastes, and leaning to the classical (I was going to say to your classical, only suddenly I thought of Ossian) a good deal more than I do. He has written satires in the manner of Pope, which admirers of Pope have praised warmly and deservedly. If I had hesitated about the conclusiveness of his judgments, it would have been because of his confessed indisposition towards subjects religious and ways mystical, and his occasional insufficient indulgence for rhymes and rhythms which he calls ‘Barrettian.’ But these things render his favourable inclination towards my ‘Drama of Exile’ still more encouraging (as you will see) to my hopes for it.

  Still, I do tremble a good deal inwardly when I come to think of what your own thoughts of my poem, and poems in their two-volume development, may finally be. I am afraid of you. You will tell me the truth as it appears to you — upon that I may rely; and I should not wish you to suppress a single disastrous thought for the sake of the unpleasantness it may occasion to me. My own faith is that I have made progress since ‘The Seraphim,’ only it is too possible (as I confess to myself and you) that your opinion may be exactly contrary to it.

  You are very kind in what you say about wishing to have some conversation, as the medium of your information upon architecture, with Octavius — Occy, as we call him. He is very much obliged to you, and proposes, if it should not be inconvenient to you, to call upon you on Friday, with Arabel, at about one o’clock. Friday is mentioned because it is a holiday, no work being done at Mr. Barry’s. Otherwise he is engaged every day (except, indeed, Sunday) from nine in the morning to five in the afternoon. May God bless you, dearest Mr. Boyd. I am ever

  Your affectionate

  ELI
ZABETH B. BARRETT.

  To Mr. Westwood

  April 16, 1844.

  ... Surely, surely, it was not likely I should lean to utilitarianism in the notice on Carlyle, as I remember the writer of that article leans somewhere — I, who am reproached with trans-trans-transcendentalisms, and not without reason, or with insufficient reason.

  Oh, and I should say also that Mr. Home, in his kindness, has enlarged considerably in his annotations and reflections on me personally. My being in correspondence with all the Kings of the East, for instance, is an exaggeration, although literary work in one way will bring with it, happily, literary association in others.... Still, I am not a great letter writer, and I don’t write ‘elegant Latin verses,’ as all the gods of Rome know, and I have not been shut up in the dark for seven years by any manner of means. By the way, a barrister said to my barrister brother the other day, ‘I suppose your sister is dead?’ ‘Dead?’ said he, a little struck; ‘dead?’ ‘Why, yes. After Mr. Home’s account of her being sealed up hermetically in the dark for so many years, one can only calculate upon her being dead by this time.’

  ELIZABETH BARRETT.

  Several of the letters to Mr. Boyd which follow refer to that celebrated gift of Cyprus wine which led to the composition of one of Miss Barrett’s best known and most quoted poems.

  To H.S. Boyd

  June 18, 1844.

  Thank you, my very dear friend! I write to you drunk with Cyprus. Nothing can be worthier of either gods or demi-gods; and if, as you say, Achilles did not drink of it, I am sorry for him. I suppose Jupiter had it instead, just then — Hebe pouring it, and Juno’s ox-eyes bellowing their splendour at it, if you will forgive me that broken metaphor, for the sake of Aeschylus’s genius, and my own particular intoxication.

  Indeed, there never was, in modern days, such wine. Flush, to whom I offered the last drop in my glass, felt it was supernatural, and ran away. I have an idea that if he had drunk that drop, he would have talked afterwards — either Greek or English.

  Never was such wine! The very taste of ideal nectar, only stiller, from keeping. If the bubbles of eternity were on it, we should run away, perhaps, like Flush.

  Still, the thought comes to me, ought I to take it from you? Is it right of me? are you not too kind in sending it? and should you be allowed to be too kind? In any case, you must, not think of sending me more than you have already sent. It is more than enough, and I am not less than very much obliged to you.

  I have passed the middle of my second volume, and I only hope that critics may say of the rest that it smells of Greek wine. Dearest Mr. Boyd’s

  Ever affectionate

  E.B. BARRETT.

  To Mr. Westwood

  June 28, 1844.

  My dear Mr. Westwood, — I have certainly and considerably increased the evidence of my own death by the sepulchral silence of the last few days. But after all I am not dead, not even at heart, so as to be insensible to your kind anxiety, and I can assure you of this, upon very fair authority, neither is the book dead yet. It has turned the corner of the felo de se, and if it is to die, it will be by the critics. The mystery of the long delay, it would not be very easy for me to explain, notwithstanding I hear Mr. Moxon says: ‘I suppose Miss Barrett is not in a hurry about her publication;’ and I say: ‘I suppose Moxon is not in a hurry about the publication.’ There may be a little fault on my side, when I have kept a proof a day beyond the hour, or when ‘copy’ has put out new buds in my hands as I passed it to the printer’s. Still, in my opinion, it is a good deal more the fault of Mr. Moxon’s not being in a hurry, than in the excessive virtue of my patience, or vice of my indolence. Miss Mitford says, as you do, that she never heard of so slow-footed a book.

  To H.S. Boyd

  50 Wimpole Street:

  Wednesday, August I, 1844 [postmark].

  My very dear Friend, — Have you expected to hear from me? and are you vexed with me? I am a little ambitious of the first item — yet hopeful of an escape from the last. If you did but know how I am pressed for time, and how I have too much to do every day, you would forgive me for my negligence; even if you had sent me nectar instead of mountain, and I had neglected laying my gratitude at your feet. Last Saturday, upon its being discovered that my first volume consisted of only 208 pages, and my second of 280 pages, Mr. Moxon uttered a cry of reprehension, and wished to tear me to pieces by his printers, as the Bacchantes did Orpheus. Perhaps you might have heard my head moaning all the way to St. John’s Wood! He wanted to tear away several poems from the end of the second volume, and tie them on to the end of the first! I could not and would not hear of this, because I had set my mind on having ‘Dead Pan’ to conclude with. So there was nothing for it but to finish a ballad poem called ‘Lady Geraldine’s Courtship,’ which was lying by me, and I did so by writing, i.e. composing, one hundred and forty lines last Saturday! I seemed to be in a dream all day! Long lines too — with fifteen syllables in each! I see you shake your head all this way off. Moreover it is a ‘romance of the age,’ treating of railroads, routes, and all manner of ‘temporalities,’ and in so radical a temper that I expect to be reproved for it by the Conservative reviews round. By the way, did I tell you of the good news I had from America the third of this month? The ‘Drama of Exile’ is in the hands of a New York publisher; and having been submitted to various chief critics of the country on its way, was praised loudly and extravagantly. This was, however, by a private reading only. A bookseller at Philadelphia had announced it for publication — he intended to take it up when the English edition reached America; but upon its being represented to him that the New York publisher had proof sheets direct from the author and would give copy money, he abandoned his intention to the other. I confess I feel very much pleased at the kind spirit — the spirit of eager kindness indeed — with which the Americans receive my poetry. It is not wrong to be pleased, I hope. In this country there may be mortifications waiting for me; quite enough to keep my modesty in a state of cultivation. I do not know. I hope the work will be out this week, and then! Did I explain to you that what ‘Lady Geraldine’s Courtship’ was wanted for was to increase the size of the first volume, so as to restore the equilibrium of volumes, without dislocating ‘Pan’? Oh, how anxious I shall be to hear your opinion! If you tell me that I have lost my intellects, what in the world shall I do then — what shall I do? My Americans — that is, my Americans who were in at the private reading, and perhaps I myself — are of opinion that I have made great progress since ‘The Seraphim.’ It seems to me that I have more reach, whether in thought or language. But then, to you it may appear quite otherwise, and I shall be very melancholy if it does. Only you must tell me the precise truth; and I trust to you that you will let me have it in its integrity.

  All the life and strength which are in me, seem to have passed into my poetry. It is my pou sto — not to move the world; but to live on in.

  I must not forget to tell you that there is a poem towards the end of the second volume, called ‘Cyprus Wine,’ which I have done myself the honor and pleasure of associating with your name. I thought that you would not be displeased by it, as a proof of grateful regard from me.

  Talking of wines, the Mountain has its attraction, but certainly is not to be compared to the Cyprus. You will see how I have praised the latter. Well, now I must say ‘good-bye,’ which you will praise me for!

  Dearest Mr. Boyd’s affectionate

  E.B.B.

  P.S. — Nota bene — I wish to forewarn you that I have cut away in the text none of my vowels by apostrophes. When I say ‘To efface,’ wanting two-syllable measure, I do not write ‘T’ efface’ as in the old fashion, but ‘To efface’ full length. This is the style of the day. Also you will find me a little lax perhaps in metre — a freedom which is the result not of carelessness, but of conviction, and indeed of much patient study of the great Fathers of English poetry — not meaning Mr. Pope. Be as patient with me as you can. You shall have the volumes as soon as they
are ready.

  To H.S. Boyd

  August 6, 1844.

  My very dear Friend, — I cannot be certain, from my recollections, whether I did or did not write to you before, as you suggest; but as you never received the letter and I was in a continual press of different thoughts, the probability is that I did not write. The Cyprus wine in the second vial I certainly did receive; and was grateful to you with the whole force of the aroma of it. And now I will tell you an anecdote.

  In the excess of my filial tenderness, I poured out a glass for papa, and offered it to him with my right hand.

  ‘What is this?’ said he.

  ‘Taste it,’ said I as laconically, but with more emphasis.

  He raised it to his lips; and, after a moment, recoiled, with such a face as sinned against Adam’s image, and with a shudder of deep disgust.

  ‘Why,’ he said, ‘what most beastly and nauseous thing is this? Oh,’ he said, ‘what detestable drug is this? Oh, oh,’ he said, ‘I shall never, never, get this horrible taste out of my mouth.’