After all, you are too right. The less amused I am, clearly the better for me. I should live ever so many years more by being shut up in a hermitage, if it were warm and dry. More’s the pity, when one wants to see and hear as I do. The only sort of excitement and fatigue which does me no harm, but good, is travelling. The effect of the continual change of air is to pour in oil as the lamp burns; so I explain the extraordinary manner in which I bear the fatigue of being four-and-twenty hours together in a diligence, for instance, which many strong women would feel too much for them.
All this talking of myself when I want to talk of you and to tell you how touched I was by the praises of your winning little Letitia! Enclosed is a note to Chapman & Hall which will put her ‘bearer’ (if she can find one in London) in possession of the two volumes in question. I shall like her to have them, and she must try to find my love, as the King of France did the poison (a ‘most unsavoury simile,’ certainly), between the leaves. I send with them, in any case, my best love. Ah, so sorry I am that she has suffered from the weather you have had. She is a most interesting child, and of a nature which is rare....
Robert’s warm regards, with those of your
Ever affectionate and grateful
Ba.
Madame Viardot is George Sand’s heroine Consuelo. You know that beautiful book.
With the last days of June the long stay in Paris came to an end, and the Brownings paid their second visit to London. Their residence on this occasion was at 58 Welbeck Street (‘very respectable rooms this time, and at a moderate price’), and here they stayed until the beginning of November. Neither husband nor wife seems to have written much poetry during this year, either in Paris or in London.
To Miss Mitford
[London], 58 Welbeck Street: Saturday,
[June-July 1852].
... We saw your book in Paris, the Galignani edition, and I read it all except the one thing I had not courage to read. Thank you, thank you. We are both of us grateful to you for your most generous and heartwarm intentions to us. As to the book, it’s a book made to go east and west; it’s a popular book with flowers from the ‘village’ laid freshly and brightly between the critical leaves. I don’t always agree with you. I think, for instance, that Mary Anne Browne should never be compared to George Sand in ‘passion,’ and I can’t grant to you that your extracts from her poems bear you out to even one fiftieth degree in such an opinion. I agree with you just as little with regard to Dr. Holmes and certain others. But to have your opinion is always a delightful thing, and ‘it is characteristic of your generosity,’ to say the least, we say to ourselves when we are ‘dissidents’ most.
I am writing in the extremest haste, just a word to announce our arrival in England. We are in very comfortable rooms in 58 Welbeck Street, and my sister Henrietta is some twenty doors away. To-morrow Robert and I are going to Wimbledon for a day to dear Mr. Kenyon, who looks radiantly well and has Mr. Landor for a companion just now. Imagine the uproar and turmoil of our first days in London, and believe that I think of you faithfully and tenderly through all. I am overjoyed to see my sisters, who look well on the whole ... and they and everybody assure me that I show a very satisfactory face to my country, as far as improved looks go.
What nonsense one writes when one has but a moment to write in. I find people talking about the ‘facts in the “Times”’ touching Louis Napoleon. Facts in the ‘Times’!
The heat is stifling. Do send one word to say how you are, and love me always as I love you.
Your most affectionate
Ba.
To Miss Mitford
58 Welbeck Street: Friday, July 31, 1852 [postmark].
I want to hear about you again, dear, dearest Miss Mitford, and I can’t hear. Will you send me a line or a word.... I mean to go down to see you one day, but certainly we must account it right not to tire you while you are weak, and not to spoil our enjoyment by forestalling it. Two months are full of days; we can afford to wait. Meantime let us have a little gossip such as the gods allow of.
Dear Mr. Kenyon has not yet gone to Scotland, though his intentions still stand north. He passed an evening with us some evenings ago, and was brilliant and charming (the two things together), and good and affectionate at the same time. Mr. Landor was staying with him (perhaps I told you that), and went away into Worcestershire, assuring me, when he took leave of me, that he would never enter London again. A week passes, and lo! Mr. Kenyon expects him again. Resolutions are not always irrevocable, you observe.
I must tell you what Landor said about Louis Napoleon. You are aware that he loathed the first Napoleon and that he hates the French nation; also, he detests the present state of French affairs, and has foamed over in the ‘Examiner’ ‘in prose and rhyme’ on the subject of them. Nevertheless, he who calls ‘the Emperor’ ‘an infernal fool’ expresses himself to this effect about the President: ‘I always knew him to be a man of wonderful genius. I knew him intimately, and I was persuaded of what was in him. When people have said to me, “How can you like to waste your time with so trifling a man?” I have answered: “If all your Houses of Parliament, putting their heads together, could make a head equal to this trifling man’s head it would be well for England.”
It was quite unexpected to me to hear Mr. Landor talk so.
He, Mr. Landor, is looking as young as ever, as full of life and passionate energy.
Did Mr. Horne write to you before he went to Australia? Did I speak to you about his going? Did you see the letter which he put into the papers as a farewell to England? I think of it all sadly.
Mazzini came to see us the other day, with that pale spiritual face of his, and those intense eyes full of melancholy illusions. I was thinking, while he sate there, on what Italian turf he would lie at last with a bullet in his heart, or perhaps with a knife in his back, for to one of those ends it will surely come. Mrs. Carlyle came with him. She is a great favorite of mine: full of thought, and feeling, and character, it seems to me.
London is emptying itself, and the relief will be great in a certain way; for one gets exhausted sometimes. Let me remember whom I have seen. Mrs. Newton Crosland, who spoke of you very warmly; Miss Mulock, who wrote ‘The Ogilvies’ (that series of novels), and is interesting, gentle, and young, and seems to have worked half her life in spite of youth; Mr. Field we have not seen, only heard of; Miss —— , no — but I am to see her, I understand, and that she is an American Corinna in yellow silk, but pretty. We drove out to Kensington with Monckton Milnes and his wife, and I like her; she is quiet and kind, and seems to have accomplishments, and we are to meet Fanny Kemble at the Procters some day next week. Many good faces, but the best wanting. Ah, I wish Lord Stanhope, who shows the spirits of the sun in a crystal ball, could show us that! Have you heard of the crystal ball? We went to meet it and the seer the other morning, with sundry of the believers and unbelievers — among the latter, chief among the latter, Mr. Chorley, who was highly indignant and greatly scandalised, particularly on account of the combination sought to be established by the lady of the house between lobster salad and Oremus, spirit of the sun. For my part, I endured both luncheon and spiritual phenomena with great equanimity. It was very curious altogether to my mind, as a sign of the times, if in no other respect of philosophy. But I love the marvellous. Write a word to me, I beseech you, and love me and think of me, as I love and think of you. God bless you. Robert’s love.
Your ever affectionate
Ba.
To Mrs. Jameson
58 Welbeck Street: Tuesday, [July-October 1852].
Dearest Monna Nina, — Here are the verses. I did them all because that was easiest to me, but of course you will extract the two you want.
It has struck me besides that you might care to see this old ballad which I find among my papers from one of the Percy or other antiquarian Society books, and which I transcribed years ago, modernising slightly in order to make out some sort of rhythm as I went on. I did this because the original
poem impressed me deeply with its pathos. I wish I could send you the antique literal poem, but I haven’t it, nor know where to find it; still, I don’t think I quite spoilt it with the very slight changes ventured by me in the transcription.
God bless you. Let us meet on Wednesday. Robert’s best love, with that of your ever affectionate
Ba.
Stabat Mater
Mother full of lamentation, Near that cross she wept her passion, Whereon hung her child and Lord. Through her spirit worn and wailing, Tortured by the stroke and failing, Passed and pierced the prophet’s sword.
Oh, sad, sore, above all other, Was that ever blessed mother Of the sole-begotten one; She who mourned and moaned and trembled While she measured, nor dissembled, Such despairs of such a son!
Where’s the man could hold from weeping, If Christ’s mother he saw keeping Watch with mother-heart undone? Who could hold from grief, to view her, Tender mother true and pure, Agonising with her Son?
For her people’s sins she saw Him Down the bitter deep withdraw Him ‘Neath the scourge and through the dole! Her sweet Son she contemplated Nailed to death, and desolated, While He breathed away His soul.
E.B.B.
Ballad — Beginning of Edward II.’s Reign
‘Stand up, mother, under cross, Smile to help thy Son at loss. Blythe, O mother, try to be!’ ‘Son, how can I blythely stand, Seeing here Thy foot and hand Nailèd to the cruel tree?’
‘Mother, cease thy weeping blind. I die here for all mankind, Not for guilt that I have done.’ ‘Son, I feel Thy deathly smart. The sword pierces through my heart, Prophesied by Simeon.’
‘Mother, mercy! let me die, Adam out of hell to buy, And his kin who are accurst.’ ‘Son, what use have I for breath? Sorrow wasteth me to death — Let my dying come the first.’
‘Mother, pity on thy Son! Bloody tears be running down Worse to bear than death to meet!’ ‘Son, how can I cease from weeping? Bloody streams I see a-creeping From Thine heart against my feet.’
‘Mother, now I tell thee, I! Better is it one should die Than all men to hell should go.’ ‘Son, I see Thy body hang Foot and hand in piercèd pang. Who can wonder at my woe?’
‘Mother, now I will thee tell, If I live, thou goest to hell — I must die here for thy sake.’ ‘Son, Thou art so mild and kind, Nature, knowledge have enjoined I, for Thee, this wail must make.’
‘Mother, ponder now this thing: Sorrow childbirth still must bring, Sorrow ‘tis to have a son!’ ‘Ay, still sorrow, I can tell! Mete it by the pain of hell, Since more sorrow can be none.’
‘Mother, pity mother’s care! Now as mother dost thou fare, Though of maids the purest known.’ ‘Son, Thou help at every need All those who before me plead — Maid, wife — woman, everyone.’
‘Mother, here I cannot dwell. Time is that I pass to hell, And the third day rise again.’ ‘Son, I would depart with Thee. Lo! Thy wounds are slaying me. Death has no such sorrow — none.’
When He rose, then fell her sorrow. Sprang her bliss on the third morrow. A blythe mother wert thou so! Lady, for that selfsame bliss, Pray thy Son who peerless is, Be our shield against our foe.
Blessed be thou, full of bliss! Let us not heaven’s safety miss, Never! through thy sweet Son’s might. Jesus, for that selfsame blood Which Thou sheddest upon rood, Bring us to the heavenly light.
To Mrs. Martin
58 Welbeck Street: Thursday, [September 2, 1852].
My dearest Mrs. Martin, — Your letters always make me glad to see them, but this time the pleasure was tempered by an undeniable pain in the conscience. Oh, I ought to have written long and long ago. I have another letter of yours unanswered. Also, there was a proposition in it to Robert of a tempting character, and he put off the ‘no’ — the ungracious-sounding ‘no’ — as long as he could. He would have liked to have seen Mrs. Flood, as well as you; she is a favorite with us both. But he finds it impossible to leave London. We have had no less than eight invitations into the country, and we are forced to keep to London, in spite of all ‘babbling about’ and from ‘green fields.’ Once we went to Farnham, and spent two days with Mr. and Mrs. Paine there in that lovely heathy country, and met Mr. Kingsley, the ‘Christian Socialist,’ author of ‘Alton Locke,’ ‘Yeast,’ &c. It is only two hours from town (or less) by railroad, and we took our child with us and Flush, and had a breath of fresh air which ought to have done us good, but didn’t. Few men have impressed me more agreeably than Mr. Kingsley. He is original and earnest, and full of a genial and almost tender kindliness which is delightful to me. Wild and theoretical in many ways he is of course, but I believe he could not be otherwise than good and noble, let him say or dream what he will. You are not to confound this visit of ours to Farnham with the ‘sanitary reform’ picnic (!) to the same place, at which the newspapers say we were present. We were invited — that is true — but did not go, nor thought of it. I am not up to picnics — nor down to some of the company perhaps; who knows? Don’t think me grown, too, suddenly scornful, without being sure of the particulars....
Mr. Tennyson has a little son, and wrote me such three happy notes on the occasion that I really never liked him so well before. I do like men who are not ashamed to be happy beside a cradle. Monckton Milnes had a brilliant christening luncheon, and his baby was made to sweep in India muslin and Brussels lace among a very large circle of admiring guests. Think of my vanity turning my head completely and admitting of my taking Wiedeman there (because of an express invitation). He behaved like an angel, everybody said, and looked very pretty, I said myself; only he disgraced us all at last by refusing to kiss the baby, on the ground of his being ‘troppo grande.’ He has learnt quantities of English words, and is in consequence more unintelligible than ever. Poor darling! I am in pain about him to-day. Wilson goes to spend a fortnight with her mother, and I don’t know how I shall be comforter enough. There will be great wailing and gnashing of teeth certainly, and I shall be in prison for the next two weeks, and have to do all the washing and dressing myself....
Your ever affectionate
Ba.
To Miss Mitford
58 Welbeck Street:
Saturday, September 14, 1852 [postmark].
My dearest Miss Mitford, — I am tied and bound beyond redemption for the next fortnight at least, therefore the hope of seeing you must be for afterwards. I dare say you think that a child can be stowed away like other goods; but I do assure you that my child, though quite capable of being amused by his aunts for a certain number of half-hours, would break his little heart if I left him for a whole day while he had not Wilson. When she is here, he is contented. In her absence he is sceptical about happiness, and suspicious of complete desolation. Every now and then he says to me, ‘Will mama’ (saying it in his pretty, broken, unquotable language) ‘go away and leave Peninni all alone?’ He won’t let a human being touch him. I wash and dress him, and have him to sleep with me, and Robert is the only other helper he will allow of. ‘There’s spoiling of a child!’ say you. But he is so good and tender and sensitive that we can’t go beyond a certain line. For instance, I was quite frightened about the effect of Wilson’s leaving him. We managed to prepare him as well as we could, and when he found she was actually gone, the passion of grief I had feared was just escaped. He struggled with himself, the eyes full of tears, and the lips quivering, but there was not any screaming and crying such as made me cry last year on a like occasion. He had made up his mind.
You see I can’t go to you just now, whatever temptations you hold out. Wait — oh, we must wait. And whenever I do go to you, you will see Robert at the same time. He will like to see you; and besides, he would as soon trust me to travel to Reading alone as I trust Peninni to be alone here. I believe he thinks I should drop off my head and leave it under the seat of the rail-carriage if he didn’t take care of it....
I ought to have told you that Mr. Kingsley (one of the reasons why I liked him) spoke warmly and admiringly of you. Yes, I ought to have told
you that — his praise is worth having. Of course I have heard much of Mr. Harness from Mr. Kenyon and you, as well as from my own husband. But there is no use in measuring temptations; I am a female St. Anthony, and won’t be overcome. The Talfourds wanted me to dine with them on Monday. Robert goes alone. You don’t mention Mr. Chorley. Didn’t he find his way to you?
Mr. Patmore told us that Tennyson was writing a poem on Arthur — not an epic, a collection of poems, ballad and otherwise, united by the subject, after the manner of ‘In Memoriam,’ but in different measures. The work will be full of beauty, whatever it is, I don’t doubt.
I am reading more Dumas. He never flags. I must see Dumas when I go again to Paris, and it will be easy, as we know his friend Jadin.
Did you read Mrs. Norton’s last book — the novel, which seems to be so much praised? Tell me what it is, in your mind....
I will write no more, that you may have the answer to my kind proposition as soon as possible. After the fortnight.
God bless you.
Your ever affectionate
E.B.B.
Complete Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning Page 194