THE LETTERS
OF
ROBERT BROWNING
AND
ELIZABETH BARRETT BARRETT
1845-1846
_WITH PORTRAITS AND FACSIMILES_
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II.
SECOND IMPRESSION
LONDON
SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE
1899
[All rights reserved]
[Illustration: Walker & Boutall ph. sc.
=_Elizabeth Barrett Browning_=
_From an oil painting by Gordigiani_
London: Published by Smith, Elder & Co. 15, Waterloo Place.]
ILLUSTRATIONS
PORTRAIT OF ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING _Frontispiece_
_After the picture by Gordigiani_
FACSIMILE OF LETTER OF ELIZABETH BARRETT BARRETT 566
THE LETTERS OF
ROBERT BROWNING
AND
ELIZABETH BARRETT BARRETT
1845-1846
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Wednesday.
[Post-mark, March 25, 1846.]
You were right to bid me never again wish my poor flowers were
‘diamonds’—you could not, I think, speak so to my heart of any diamonds.
God knows my life is for you to take just as you take flowers:—these last
please you, serve you best when plucked—and ‘my life’s rose’ ... if I
dared profane _that_ expression I would say, you have but to ‘stoop’ for
it. Foolish, as all words are.
You _dwell_ on that notion of your being peculiarly isolated,—of
any kindness to you, in your present state, seeming doubled and
quadrupled—what do I, what could anyone infer from _that_ but, most
obviously, that it was a very fortunate thing for such kindness, and that
the presumable bestower of it got all his distinction from the fact that
no better ... however, I hate this and cannot go on. Dearest, believe
that under ordinary circumstances, with ordinary people, all operates
differently—the _imaginary_ kindness-bestower with his ideal methods of
showing and proving his love,—_there_ would be the rival to fear!
Do not let us talk of this—you always beat me, beside, turn my own
illustrations into obscurations—as in the notable case of the _cards_ and
stakes and risks—I suppose, (to save my vanity!) that if I knew anything
about cards, I might go on, a step at least, with my argument. I once
heard a dispute in the street between the proprietor of an oyster-stall
and one of his customers—_who_ was in the wrong ... that is, _who_ used
the clenching argument you shall hear presently, I don’t remember; but
_one_ brought the other to this pass—‘_Are_ there three shells to an
oyster?’—Just that! If there _were not_—he would clearly be found in the
wrong, that was all!—‘_Why_,’ ... began the other; and I regret I did
not catch the rest—there was such a clear possibility contained in that
‘_Why_ ... an oyster _might_ have three shells!’
Note the adroitness,—(calm heroic silence of the _act_ rather than
a merely attempted _word_,) the mastery with which, taking up Ba’s
implied challenge, I _do_ furnish her with both ‘amusement and
instruction’—moreover I will at Ba’s bidding amuse and instruct the world
at large, and make them know all to be known—for my purposes—about ‘Bells
and Pomegranates’—yes, it will be better.
I said rather hastily that my head ‘ached’ yesterday: that meant, only
that it was more observable because, after walking, it is usually
well—and I had been walking. To-day it is much better; I sit reading
‘Cromwell,’ and the newspaper, and presently I shall go out—all will be
better now, I hope—it shall not be my fault, at least, depend on that.
All my work (work!)—well, such as it is, it is done—and I scarcely care
_how_—I shall be prouder to begin one day—(may it be soon!—) with your
hand in mine from the beginning—_that_ is a very different thing in
its effect from the same hand touching mine _after_ I had begun, with
no suspicion such a chance could befall! I repeat, both these things,
‘Luria’ and the other, are _manqué_, failures—the life-incidents ought to
have been acted over again, experienced afresh; and I had no inclination
nor ability. But one day, my siren!
Let me make haste and correct a stupid error. I spoke to my father
last night about that tragedy of the _studs_—I was wholly _out_ in the
story—the sufferer was his _uncle_, and the scene should have been laid
on the Guinea coast. À propos of errors—the copyright matter is most
likely a case of copy-_wrong_ by reporters—I never heard of it before—to
be sure, I signed a petition of Miss Martineau’s superintending once on a
time—but long ago, ‘I, I, I’—how, dear, all important ‘I’ takes care of
himself, and issues bulletins, and corrects his wise mistakes, and all
this to ... just ‘one of his readers of the average intelligence.’ Are
you that, so much as that, Ba? I will tell you—if you do not write to
me all about _your_ dear, dearest self, I shall sink with shame at the
recollection of what this letter and its like prove to be—_must_ prove to
be! Dear love, tell me—that you walk and are in good spirits, and I will
try and write better. May God bless my own beloved!—Ever her own
R.
I think, am all but sure, there is a _Mrs._ Hornblower something!
Just a minute to say your second note has come, and that I _do_ hate
_hate_ having to write, not kiss my answer on your dearest mouth—kindest,
dearest—to-morrow I will try—and meantime—though Ba by the fire will not
be cold at heart, cold _of_ heart, at least, and I will talk to _her_ and
more than talk—My dearest, dearest one!
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Wednesday Evening.
[Post-mark, March 26, 1846.]
But if people half say things,—intimate things, as when your disputant in
the street (you are felicitous, I think, in your street-_experiences_)
suggested the possible case of the ‘three oyster shells to an
oyster,’—why you must submit to be answered a little, and even confuted
at need. Now just see—
... ‘Got all his distinction from the fact that no better’ ... That is
precisely _the fact_ ... _so_ ... as you have stated it, and implied ...
‘The fact that no better’ ... _is to be found in the world—no better_ ...
_none_. There, is the peculiar combination. The isolation on one side,
and the best in the whole world, coming in for company! And I ‘dwell’
upon it, never being tired ... and if _you_ are tired already, you must
be tired of _me_, because the ‘dwelling’ has grown to be a part of me and
I cannot put it away. It is my especial miracle _à moi_. ‘No better?’ No,
indeed! not in the seven worlds! and just _there_, lies the miraculous
point.
But you mean it perhaps otherwise. You mean that it is a sort of _pis
aller_ on my part. A _pis aller_ along the Via lactea ... is _that_ what
you mean?
Shall I let you off the rest, dearest, dearest? though you deserve ever
so much more, for implying such monstrous things, and treading down all
my violets, so and so. What did I say to set you writing so? I cannot
remember at all? If I ‘dwell’ on anything, beloved, it is that I feel
it strongly, be sure—and if I feel gratitude to you with the other
feelings, you should not grudge what is a happy feeling in itself, and
not dishonouring (I answer for _that_) to the object of it.
Now I shall tell you. I had a visitor to-day—Mrs. Jameson; and when she
went away she left me ashamed of myself—I felt like a hypocrite—_I_, who
was not born for one, I think. She began to talk of you ... talked like
a wise woman, which she is ... led me on to say just what I might have
said if I had not known you, (she, thoroughly impressed with the notion
that we two are strangers!) and made me quite leap in my chair with a
sudden consciousness, by exclaiming at last ... ‘I am really glad to
hear you speak so. Such appreciation’ &c. &c. ... imagine what she went
on to say. Dearest—I believe she rather gives me a sort of credit for
_appreciating you_ without the jealousy ‘_de métier_.’ Good Heavens ...
how humiliating some conditions of praise are! She _approved_ me with
her eye—indeed she did. And this, while we were agreeing that you were
the best ... ‘none better’ ... none so good ... of your country and age.
Do you know, while we were talking, I felt inclined both to laugh and to
cry, and if I had ‘given way’ the least, she would have been considerably
astounded. As it was, my hands were so marble-cold when she took leave
of me, that she observed it and began making apologies for exhausting
me. Now here is a strip of the ‘world,’ ... see what colour it will turn
to presently! We had better, I think, go farther than to your siren’s
island—into the desert ... shall we say? Such stories there will be! For
certain, ... I shall have seen you just once out of the window! Shall you
not be afraid? Well—and she talked of Italy too—it was before she talked
of _you_—and she hoped I had not given up the thoughts of going there.
To which I said that ‘I had not ... but that it seemed like scheming
to travel in the moon.’ She talked of a difference, and set down the
moon-travelling as simple lunacy. ‘And simply lunatical,’ ... I said, ...
‘my thoughts, if chronicled, would be taken to be, perhaps’—‘No, no, no,!
...’ she insisted ... ‘as long as I kept to the earth, everything was to
be permitted to me.’
How people talk at cross-purposes in this world ... and act so too! It’s
the very spirit of worldly communion. Souls are gregarious in a sense,
but no soul touches another, as a general rule. I like Mrs. Jameson
nevertheless—I like her _more_. She appreciates you—and it is _my_ turn
to praise for that, now. I am to see her again to-morrow morning, when
she has the goodness to promise to bring some etchings of her own, her
illustrations of the new essays, for me to look at.
Ah—your ‘_failures_ in “Luria” and the “Tragedy”’—Proud, we should all
be, to fail exactly so.
Dearest, are you better indeed? Walk ... talk to the Ba in the chair ...
go on to be better, ever dearest. May God bless you! Ah ... the ‘I’s.’
You do not see that the ‘I’s’—as you make them, ... all turn to ‘yous’
by the time they get to me. The ‘I’s’ indeed! How dare you talk against
my eyes? For me, I was going down-stairs to-day, but it was wet and
windy and I was warned not to go. If I am in bad or good spirits, judge
from this foolish letter—foolish and wise, both!—but not melancholy,
_anywise_. When one drops into a pun, one might as well come to an end
altogether—it can’t be worse with one.
Nor can it be better than being
Your own
‘_No better_’!!.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Thursday Morning.
[Post-mark, March 26, 1846.]
Sometimes I have a disposition to dispute with dearest Ba, to wrench her
simile-weapons out of the dexterous hand (that is, try and do so) and
have the truth of things my way and its own way, not hers, if she _be_
Ba—(observe, I say nothing about ever meeting with remarkable success in
such undertakings, only, that they _are_ entered on sometimes). But at
other times I seem as if I must lie down, like Flush, with all manner of
coral necklaces about my neck, and two sweet mysterious hands on my head,
and so be forced to hear verses on me, Ba’s verses, in which I, that am
but Flush of the lower nature, am called loving friend and praised for
not preferring to go ‘coursing hares’—with ‘other dogs.’ So I will lie
now, as you will have it, and say in Flush-like tones (the looks that
are dog’s tones)—I don’t _don’t_ know how it is, or why, or what it all
will end in, but I am very happy and what I hear must mean right, by the
music,—though the meaning is above me,—and here _are_ the hands—which
I may, and will, look up to, and kiss—determining not to insist any
more this time that at Miss Mitford’s were sundry dogs, brighter than
‘brown’—See where, just where, Flush stops discreetly! ‘Eternity’ he
would have added, ‘but stern death’ &c. &c.
I treat these things lightheartedly, as you see—instead of seriously,
which would at first thought seem the wiser course—‘for after all, she
will find out one day’ &c. _No_, dearest,—I do not fear that! Why make
uneasy words of saying simply I shall continue to give you my best
flowers, all I can find—if I bring violets, or grass, when you expected
to get roses,—you will know there were none in my garden—that is all.
And for you—as I may have told you once,—as I tell myself always—you are
_entirely_ what I love—not just a rose plucked off with an inch of stalk,
but presented as a rose should be, with a green world of boughs round:
all about you is ‘to my heart’—(to my mind, as they phrase it)—and were
it not that, of course, I know _when_ to have done with fancyings and
merely flitting permissible ‘inly-sayings with heart-playing,’ and when
it is time to look at the plain ‘best’ through the lock of ‘good’ and
‘better’ in circumstances and accident—I _do_ say—were the best blessing
of all, the blessing I trust and believe God intends, of your perfect
restoration to health,—were _that_ not so palpably best,—I should catch
myself desirous that your present state of _unconfirmed_ health might
never pass away! Ba _understands_, I know! After all, it will always
stay, that luxury,—if but through the memory of what has been, and _may_
recur, that deepest luxury that makes my very heartstrings tremble in the
thought of—that I shall have a right, a duty—where in another case, they
would be uncalled for, superfluous, impertinent. Tapers ordinarily burn
best _let alone_, with all your light depending on the little flame, the
darkest night but for it—why, stand off—what good can you do, so long as
there is no extraordinary evil to avert, breaking down of the candlestick
to prevent? But _here_—there will be reason as well as a delight beyond
delights in always learning to close over, all but holding the flame in
the hollow of one’s hand! I shall have a right to think it is not mere
pleasure, merely for myself, that I care and am close by—and that which
thus is called ‘not for myself’ _is_, after all, in its essence, _most_
for myself,—why it is a luxury, a last delight!—
In the procurement of which there will be this obstacle, or grave matter
to be first taken into consideration,—that the world will ‘change
colour’ about it, will have its own thoughts on the subject I have my
own thoughts, on _its_ subject, the affairs of the world and pieces of
perfect good fortune it approves of, and stamps for enviable—and on the
whole the world has quite a right to treat me unceremoniously,—I having
begun it. As for the ‘seeing out of the window once’—those who knew
nothing about us but our names had better think _that_ was the way, than
most others; and the half-dozen who knew a little more, may hear the true
account if they please, when they hear anything—those who know _all_, all
necessary to know, will understand my 137 letters here and my 54 visits
... see, I write as if this were to be pleaded to-night—would it were! As
if you had to write the _meeting_ between Hector and Andromache, not the
parting! By the way, dearest, what enchanted poetry all your translations
for Miss Thomson are—as Carlyle says! ‘Nobody can touch them, get at
them!’ How am I the better for Nonnus, and Apuleius? Now, do you serve me
well _there_?
I shall hear to-morrow of Mrs. Jameson’s etchings and discourses? and
more good news of you, darling? I am _quite_ well to-day—going out with
my sister to dine next door—then, over to-morrow, and the letter, will
come Saturday, my day.
Bless you, my own best, dearest—I am your own.
R.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Thursday.
[Post-mark, March 27, 1846.]
Not the ‘dexterous hand’—say rather the good cause. For the rest, when
you turn into a dog and lie down, are you not afraid that a sorcerer
should go by and dash the water and speak the formula of the old tales.
‘If thou wert born a dog, remain a dog, but if not’.... If not ... _what_
is to happen? Aminè whipped her enchanted hounds ever so often in the day
... ah, what nonsense happens!
Dear, dearest, how you ‘take me with guile,’ or with stronger than guile,
... with that divine right you have, of talking absurdities! You make it
clear at last that I am so much the better for being bad ... and _I_ ...
shall I laugh? _can_ I? is it possible? The words go too deep ... as deep
as death which cannot laugh! And I am forbidden to ‘dwell’ on the meaning
of them—I! There are ‘_I’s_’ to match yours!
I shall have the right of doing one thing, ... (passing to _my_ rights).
I shall hold to the right of remembering to my last hour, that _you_, who
might well have passed by on the other side if we two had met on the road
when I was riding at ease, ... _did not_ when I was in the dust. I choose
to remember _that_ to the end of feeling. As for _men_, you are not to
take me to be quite ignorant of what they are worth in the gross. The
most blindfolded women may see a little under the folds ... and I have
seen quite enough to be glad to shut my eyes. Did I not tell you that I
never thought that any man whom _I_ could love, would stoop to love _me_,
even if I attained so far as the sight of such. Which I _never attained_
... until ... until! Then, that _you_ should care for me.!! Oh—I hold
to my rights, though you overcome me in most other things. And it is my
right to love you better than I could do if I were more worthy to be
loved by you.
Mrs. Jameson came late to-day, ... at five—and was hurried and could
not stay ten minutes, ... but showed me her etchings and very kindly
left a ‘Dead St. Cecilia’ which I admired most, for its beautiful
lifelessness. She is not to be in town again, she said, till a month
has gone—a month, at least. Oh—and ‘quite uneasy’ she was, about my
‘cold hands’—yesterday—she thought she had put me to death with
over-talking!—which made me smile a little ... ‘subridens.’ But she
is very kind and affectionate; and you were right to teach me to like
her—and now, do you know, I look in vain for the ‘steely eyes’ I fancied
I saw once, and see nothing but two good and true ones.
Well—here is an end till Saturday. It is too late ... or I could go on
writing ... which I do not hate indeed. Talking of hating, ... ‘what you
love entirely’ means _that you love entirely_ ... and no more and no
less. If it did not mean so, I should be unhappy about the _mistake_ ...
but to ‘love entirely’ is not a mistake and cannot pass for one either on
earth or in Heaven. May God bless you, ever dearest. Such haste I write
in—as if the angels were running up Jacob’s ladder!—or _down_ it, rather,
at this close!
Your own
BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Friday.
[Post-mark, March 27, 1846.]
‘Qui laborat, orat’; so they used to say, and in that case I have been
devotional to a high degree this morning. Seven holes did I dig (to keep
up inversions of style)—seven rose-trees did I plant—(‘Brennus’—and
‘Madame Lafarge’! are two names I remember; very characteristic of old
Gaul and young France—) and, for my pains, the first fruits, first
blossoms some two or three months hence, will come, and will go to
dearest Ba who first taught me what a rose really _was_, how sweet it
might become with superadded memories of the room and the chair and the
vase, and the cutting stalks and pouring fresh water ... ah, my own
Ba!—And did you think to warn me out of the Flush-simile by the hint of
Aminè’s privilege which it would warrant? If the ‘ever so much whipping’
should please you!... And beside it was, if I recollect, for the
creature’s good, those poor imprisoned sisters, all the time. Moreover, I
_was_ ‘born’ all this and more, that you _will_ know, at least—and only
walked glorious and erect on two legs till dear Siren, an old friend of,
and deep in the secrets of Circe, sprinkled the waters ... perhaps on
those roses—No, before that!—
Well, to-morrow comes fast now—and I shall trust to be with you my
beloved—and, first, you are to show me the portrait, remember.
I am glad you like Mrs. Jameson—do not _I_ like her all the better, much
the better! But it is fortunate I shall not see her by any chance just
now—she would be sure to begin and tell me about _you_—and if my hands
did not turn cold, my ear-tips would assuredly turn red. I daresay that
St. Cecilia is the beautiful statue above her tomb at Rome; covered with
a veil—affectingly beautiful; I well remember how she lies.
Now good-bye; and to-morrow! Bless you, ever dear, dearest Ba—
Your own
R.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Sunday Afternoon.
Now, I think, if I had been ‘pricked at the heart’ by dear, dearest Ba’s
charge yesterday,—if I did not _certainly_ know why it might sometimes
seem better to be silent than to speak,—should I not be found taking
out three or four sheets of paper, and beginning to write, and write!
My own, dearest and best, it is _not_ so,—not wrong, my heart’s self
tells me,—and tells you! But, for the rest, there shall never pass a day
till my death wherein I will not write to you, so long as you let me,
excepting those days I may spend with you, partly or ... altogether—Love,
shall I have very, very long to be hating to write, yet writing?
You see sometimes how I _talk_ to you,—even in mere talking what a
strange work I make of it. I go on thinking quite another way; so,
generally, I often have thought, the little I _have_ written, has been
an unconscious scrawling with the mind fixed somewhere else: the subject
of the scrawl may have previously been the real object of the mind on
some similar occasion,—the very thing which _then_ to miss, (finding in
its place _such another_ result of a still prior fancy-fit)—which then to
see escape, or find escaped, was the vexation of the time! One cannot,
(or _I_ cannot) _finish up_ the work in one’s mind, put away the old
projects and take up new. Well, this which I feel on so many occasions,
do you wonder if—if!
I should write on _this_ for ever! It is all so strange, such a dream as
you say!
Indeed, love, the picture is not like, nor ‘flattered’ by any means,
yet I don’t know how it is, I cannot be cross with it—there is a touch
of truth in the eyes,—would one have believed _that_? I know my own way
with portraits; how I let them master eventually my most decided sense
of their _unlikeness_—and _this_ finds me very prepared—still—it seems
already more faithful than last night ... how do I determine where the
miraculousness ends? (My Mother was greatly impressed by it—and my
sister, coming (from my room) into the room where I was with a visitor,
before whom she could not speak English, said ‘_È molto bella_’!)
Here is my ‘proof’—I found it as I expected. I fear I must put you
to that trouble of sending the other two acts—I hate to think of so
troubling you! But do not, Ba, hurry yourself—nor take extraordinary
pains—what is worth your pains in these poor things? I like Luria
better now,—it may do, now,—probably because it _must_; but, as I said
yesterday, I seriously hope and trust to shew my sense of gratitude for
what is promised my future life, by doing some real work in it; work of
yours, as through you. I have felt, not for the first time now, but from
the beginning vexed, foolishly vexed perhaps, that I could not without
attracting undesirable notice, ‘dedicate,’ in the true sense of the word,
this or the last number to you. But if any really worthy performance
_should_ follow, then my mouth will be unsealed. All is forewritten!
I wonder if you have ventured down this sunny afternoon—tell me how you
are, and, once again, do not care about those papers; any time will do.
So, bless you, my own—my all-beloved Ba.
Your R.B.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Sunday Evening.
[Post-mark, March 30, 1846.]
Dearest, I have been trying your plan of thinking of you instead of
writing, to-day, and the end is that I am driven to the last of the
day and have scarcely room in it to write what I would. Observe if you
please, how badly ‘the system works,’ as the practical people say. Then
Mr. Kenyon came and talked,—asked when I had seen you, ... and desired,
‘if ever I saw you again,’ (ah, what an ‘if ever’!) that I would enquire
about the ‘blue lilies’ ... which I satisfied him were of the right
colour, on your authority.
But, to go to the ‘Tragedy’—I am not to admire it ... am I? And you
really think that anyone who can think ... feel ... could help such an
admiration, or ought to try to help it? Now just see. It is a new work
with your mark on it. That is ... it would make some six or sixteen
works for other people, if ‘cut up into little stars’—rolled out ...
diluted with rain-water. But it is your work as it is—and if you do not
care for _that, I_ care, and shall remember to care on. It is a work
full of power and significance, and I am not at all sure (not that it
is wise to make comparisons, but that I want you to understand how I am
impressed!)—I am not at all sure that if I knew you now first and only by
these two productions, ... ‘Luria’ and the ‘Tragedy,’ ... I should not
involuntarily attribute more power and a higher faculty to the writer
of the last—I _should_, I think—yet ‘Luria’ is the completer work....
I know it very well. Such thoughts, you have, in this second part of
the Tragedy! a ‘Soul’s Tragedy’ indeed! No one _thinks_ like you—other
poets talk like the merest women in comparison. Why it is full of hope
for both of us, to look forward and consider what you may achieve with
that combination of authority over the reasons and the passions, and
that wonderful variety of the plastic power! But I am going to tell
you—Certainly I think you were right (though you know I doubted and cried
out) I think now you were right in omitting the theological argument you
told me of, from this second part. It would clog the action, and already
I am half inclined to fancy it a little clogged in one or two places—but
if this is true even, it would be easy to lighten it. Your Ogniben (here
is my only criticism in the ways of objection) seems to me almost too
wise for a crafty worldling—tell me if he is not! Such thoughts, for the
rest, you are prodigal of! That about the child, ... do you remember how
you brought it to me in your first visit, nearly a year ago?
Nearly a year ago! how the time passes! If I had ‘done my duty’ like the
enchanted fish leaping on the gridiron, and seen you never again after
that first visit, you would have forgotten all about me by this day. Or
at least, ‘that prude’ I should be! Somewhere under your feet, I should
be put down by this day! Yes! and my enchanted dog would be coursing
‘some small deer’ ... some unicorn of a ‘golden horn,’ ... (_not_ the
Kilmansegg gold!) out of hearing if I should have a mind to whistle ever
so, ... but out of harm’s way perhaps besides.
Well, I do think of it sometimes as you see. Which proves that I love
you better than myself by the whole width of the Heavens; the sevenfold
Heavens. Yet I think again how He of the heavens and earth brought us
together so wonderfully, holding two souls in His hand. If my fault was
in it, my _will_ at least was not. Believe it of me, dear dearest, that
I who am as clear-sighted as other women, ... and not more humble (as
to the approaches of common men), was quite resolutely blind when _you_
came—I could not understand the possibility of _that_. It was too much
... too surpassing. And so it will seem to the end. The astonishment, I
mean, will not cease to be. It is my own especial fairy-tale ... from the
spells of which, may you be unharmed...! How one writes and writes over
and over the same thing! But day by day the same sun rises, ... over, and
over, and nobody is tired. May God bless you, dearest of all, and justify
what has been by what shall be, ... and let me be free of spoiling any
sun of yours! Shall you ever tell me in your thoughts, I wonder, to get
out of your sun? No—no—Love keeps love too safe! and I have faith, you
see, as a grain of mustard-seed!
Your own
BA.
_Say how you are ... mind!_
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Monday.
[Post-mark, March 30, 1846.]
‘The system,’ Ba?—Were _you_ to stop writing, as if for my reasons? Could
_I_ do without your letters, on any pretence? You say well—it was a
foolish fancy, and now—have done with it!
And do you think you _could_ have refused to see me after that visit? I
mean, do you think I did not resolve so to conduct myself; so to ‘humble
myself and go still and softly all my days’; that your suspicion should
needs insensibly clear up ... (if it had been _so_ pre-ordained, and that
no more was in my destiny,) and at last I should have been written down
your friend for ever, and let come and stay, on that footing. But you
really think the confirmation of that sentence must have been attended
with such an effect—that I should have forgotten you or _so_ remembered
you? You think that on the strength of such a love as _that_, I would
have ventured a month of my future life ... much less, the whole of it?
_Not you_, Ba,—my dearest, dearest!
How you surprise me (what ever may you think) by liking that ‘Tragedy’!
It seems as if, having got out of the present trouble, I shall never fall
into its fellow—I will strike, for the future, on the glowing, malleable
metal; afterward, _filing_ is quite another process from hammering, and a
more difficult one. Note, that ‘filing’ is the wrong word,—and the rest
of it, the wrong simile,—and all of it, in its stupid wrongness very
characteristic of what I try to illustrate—oh, the better, better days
are before me _there_ as in all else! But, do you notice how stupid I am
to-day? My head begins again—that is the fact; it is better a good deal
than in the morning—its œconomy passes my comprehension altogether, that
is the other fact. With the deep joy in my heart below—this morning’s
letter here—what _does_ the head mean by its perversity? I will go out
presently and walk it back to its senses.
Dearest, did you receive my ‘proof’ this morning? Do not correct nor
look at it, nor otherwise trouble yourself—there is plenty of time. But
what day is ours to be? Of that you say nothing, and of my poems a great
deal, ‘O _you_ inverter!’ But _I_ am, rather, a _re_verter—and _you_
shall revert, and mind the natural order of things, and tell me first of
all—(in to-night’s letter, dearest?)—that it is to be on—?
Now let me kiss you here—my own Ba! Being stupid makes _some_ difference
in me—I am no poet, nor prose-writer, nor rational ‘Christian, pagan
nor man’ this afternoon—but I _am_ now—as yesterday—as the long ‘year
ago’—your own, utterly your own! May God bless you! (I wondered yesterday
if you had gone down-stairs—‘_no_’ I infer!)
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Monday.
Dearest, I send you back the two parts of the ‘Soul’s Tragedy,’ and the
proof. On a strip of paper are two or three _inanities_ in the form of
doubts I had in reading the first part. I think upon the whole that you
owe me all gratitude for the help of so much high critical wisdom—of
which this paper is a fair proof and expression.
The proof, the printed ‘Luria’ I mean, has more than pleased me. It
is noble and admirable; and grows greater, the closer seen. The most
exceptionable part, it seems to me, is Domizia’s retraction at the last,
for which one looks round for the sufficient motive. But the impression
of the whole work goes straight to the soul—it is heroic in the best
sense.
I write in such haste. Oh—I should have liked to have read again the
second part of the ‘Tragedy,’ but dare not keep it though you give me
leave. I think of the printers—and you will let me have the proof, in
this case also.
Your letter shall be answered presently. Your sister’s word about the
picture proves very conclusively how wonderfully like it must be as a
portrait! _That_ would settle the question to any ‘Royal Commission’ in
the world—only we need not go so far.
Dearest I end here—to begin again in another half hour. Ah—and you
promise, you promise—
No time—but ever your own
BA.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Monday Evening.
[Post-mark, March 31, 1846.]
Ah now, now, you _see_! Held up in _that_ light, it _is_ ‘a foolish
fancy,’ and unlawful, besides! ‘Not on any _pretence_’ will you do
without letters ... _you_! And you count it among the imaginations of
your heart that _I_ could do without them better perhaps ... _I_ ... to
whom they are sun, air, and human voices, at the very lowest calculation?
Why seriously you don’t imagine that your letters are not a thousand
times more to _me_, than letters ever in the world were before, ... since
‘Heaven first brought them to some wretch’s aid.’ If you _do_, that _is_
the foolishest fancy of all.
So foolish as to be unspeakable. We will ‘have done with it,’ as you say.
I only ‘revert’ and innocently,—I do not reproach, even ignorantly,—I
am grateful rather. What you said in the letter this morning made me
grateful, ... and oh, so glad! so glad! what you said, I mean, of writing
to me on every day that we did not meet on otherwise. That promise seemed
to bring us nearer (see how I think of letters!), nearer than another
word _could_, though you went for it to the end of the universe, ...
that other word. So I accept the promise as a promise of pure gold, and
thank _you_, as pure gold too, which you are, or rather far above. Only
my own dearest, you shall not write long letters ... long letters are out
of the agreement.... I never feel the need of length _as long as_ the
writing is _there_ ... just the little shred of the Koran, to be gathered
up reverently ... (Inshallah!)—and then, you shall not write at all when
you are not well ... no, you shall not. So remember from henceforth!
Shall I whip my enchanted dog when he is so good and true?—not to say
that the tags of the lashes (do you call them _tags_?) would swing round
and strike me on the shoulders? Dearest, you are the best, kindest in
the world—such a very, very, _very_ ‘little lower than the angels!’ If
ever I could take advantage of your goodness and tenderness, to teaze and
vex you, ... what should _I_ be, I have been seriously enquiring to-day,
head on hand, when I had sent away ‘Luria.’ For I sent it away, and the
‘Tragedy’ with it, and I hope you will have all to-morrow morning at the
furthest, ... before you get this letter. There was a note too in the
parcel.
As to dedications ... believe me that I would not have them if I could
... that is, _even if there were no dangers_. I could not bear to have
words from you which the world might listen to ... I mean, that to be
commended of you in _that_ way, on _that_ ground, would make me feel cold
to the heart. Oh no, no, no! It is better to have the proof-sheet as I
had it this morning: it is the better glory ... as glory!
‘Not worthy of my pains’ ... you are right! But infinitely worthy of my
_pleasures_—such pleasure as I could gather from nothing else, except
from your letters and your very presence. Do you think that anything
beside in the whole world could bring pleasure to me, as pleasure goes,
... anything like reading your poetry? My ‘pains’ indeed! It is a
felicitous word—‘je vous en fais mon compliment.’
And all this time, while I write lightly, you are not well perhaps—you
were unwell when you wrote to me; you were unwell a little yesterday
even. Say how you are to-morrow—do not forget. For the cause of the
unwellness, _I_ see it, if _you_ do not. It was _the proof-correcting_—I
expected that you would be unwell—it is no worse than was threatened to
my thoughts. The comfort is that all this wrong work is coming to an
end, and that it is covenanted between us for you to _rest absolutely_
from henceforth. Say how you are, dearest dearest. And walk, walk. For
me, I have not been down-stairs. It has been cold—too cold for _that_, I
thought.
Oh—but I wanted to say one thing! That wonderful picture, which is
not much like a unicorn or even ‘a whale’ ... but rather more perhaps
than like _me_, you may keep for weeks or months, if you choose; if it
continues ‘not to make you cross.’ Because _it_ does not flatter, and
because _you_ do not flatter (in such equal proportions!): the sympathy
accounts for the liking ... or absence of dislike; on your part.
Now I must end. _Thursday_ is our day, I think:—and it is easier to say
‘Thursday’ on Monday than on Saturday ... a discovery of mine, _that_, as
good as Faraday’s last!
Say how you are. Do not forget. I had to say.... What I cannot, to-night.
But I am your own
BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Tuesday
[Post-mark, March 31, 1846.]
Dear, dear, Ba, what shall I say or not say? On a kind of principle, I
have tried before this to _subdue_ the expression of gratitude for the
material, _worldly_ good you do me—for my poor store of words would all
pay themselves away here, at the beginning, and so leave the higher,
peculiar, _Ba’s own_ gifts even without a _cry_ of _acknowledgment_, not
to say of thanks. But somehow you, you my dearest, my Ba, look out of
all imaginable nooks and crevices in the materiality—I see you through
your goodness,—I cannot distinguish between your acts now,—the greater,
indeed, and the lesser! Which _is_ the ‘lesser’? _With you_ all their
heap of work seems no more than——. (I cannot even think of what may serve
for some lesser act of kindness! _That_ is just what I wanted to say—‘the
effect defective comes by cause’ here—there _is_ no ‘lesser’ blessing in
your power, as I said!)
Now, darling,—it is late in the afternoon, as posts go—I have been out
all the morning in town, and while I was happy with one letter (found
waiting my return)—the parcel comes—so I will just say this much, (this
_little_, this _least_)—this word now—and by to-night all shall be
corrected, I hope, and got rid of fairly. And to-morrow, I will have you
to myself, my best one, and will write till you cry out against me. I go
now. God bless you and reward you—prays your very own
R.B.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Tuesday Evening,
[Post-mark, March 31, 1846.]
If people were always as grateful to other people for being just kind
to _themselves_, ... what a grateful world we should have of it! The
actual _good_ you get out of me, may be stated at about _two commas and a
semi-colon_—do I overstate it, I wonder? _You_, on the other side, never
overstate anything ... never enlarge ... never exaggerate! In fact, the
immense ‘worldly’ advantages which fall to you from _me_, are plain to
behold. Dearest, what nonsense you talk some times, for a man so wise!
nonsense as wonderful in its way for ‘Robert Browning’ as the dancing
of polkas! The worst is, that it sets me wishing impotently, to do some
really good helpful thing for you—and I cannot,—cannot. The good comes to
me from you, and will not go back again. Even the loving you, ... which
is all I can, ... have I not had to question of it again and again....
“Is _that_ good?” Now see.
I shall be anxious to hear your own thoughts of the ‘Soul’s Tragedy’ when
you have it in print. You liked ‘Luria’ better for seeing it printed—and
I must have you like the ‘Tragedy’ in proportion. It _strikes_ me.
It is original, as they say. There is something in it awakening ...
striking:—and when it has awakened, it won’t let you go to sleep again
immediately.
And of yourself, not a word. You might have said _one_ word—but you
have been in London which makes me hope that you are perhaps a little
better ... or at least not worse. Oh, I do not hope _much_ while you are
about this printing. You are sure not to be well. That is to be accepted
as a necessary consequence—it cannot be otherwise. The comfort is,
that the whole will be put away in a week or ten days, and that then
I may set myself to hope for you, as the roses to blow in June. Fit
summer-business, _that_ will be! And you will help me, and walk and take
care.
What do you think I have been doing to-day to Mr. Kenyon? Sending him
the ‘enchanted poetry’ which such as _you_ are never to see ... the
translation about Hector and Andromache!—yes, really. Yet after all it
is not that I like him so much better than you ... I do not indeed ...
it is just that Miss Thomson and her book are of consequence to him, and
that he hears through Miss Bayley and herself of the attempt here and the
failure there, ... and so, being interested altogether, he asked me to
let him see what I did with Homer. And it is not much. Old Homer laughs
his translators to very scorn ... and he does not spare _me_, for being
a woman. Surpassingly and profoundly beautiful that scene is. I have
tried it in blank verse. About a year ago, when I had a sudden fit of
translating, I made an experiment on the first fifty lines of the Iliad
in a rhymed measure which seemed to me rather nearer to the Greek cadence
than our common heroic verse. Listen to what I remember—
Thus he spake in his prayer: and Apollo gave ear to the whole;
And came down from the steep of Olympus, with wrath in his soul;
On his shoulder the bow, and the quiver fast woven by fate,
And the darts hurtled on, as he trod, with the thrill of his hate
And the step of his godhead. Like night did he travel below—
And he sate down afar from the ships, and drew strong to the bow—
And so we get to the arrows you talked of ... ah, do you remember ... do
you remember? ... which were to kill dogs and mules, you said! But they
didn’t. I have an enchanted dog (‘which nobody _can_ deny’!) and am not
far to seek in my Apollo.
To-day I had a letter from Miss Mitford who says that, inasmuch as she
does not go to Paris, she shall come for a fortnight to London and ‘see
me every day.’!! No time is fixed—but I look a little aghast. _Am I not
grateful and affectionate?_ Is it right of you, not to let me love anyone
as I used to do? Is it in _that_ sense that you kill the dogs and mules?
Perhaps. The truth is, I would rather she did not come—far rather. And
she may not, after all— ... now I am ashamed of myself thoroughly
I have not been down-stairs to-day—the weather seemed so doubtful.
To-morrow, if it is possible, I will ... must ... do it. So ... goodbye
till the day after—Thursday. May God bless you every day! and if only as
I think of you ... you would not lose much!
Your BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
[Post-mark, April 1, 1846.]
_Now_—dear, dearest Ba—let me begin the only way!—And so you are kissed
whether you feel it or not—through the distance, what matter? Dear love,
I return from town—my writing has gone away—you remain, and we are
together—as I said, it _would_ be, so it is! And here is your letter,
and here are recollections of all the letters for so long, all the
perfect kindnesses which I did not answer, meaning to answer them one
day—and, one day, look to receive (I may write you) a huge sheetful of
answers to bygone interrogatories,—sins of omission remedied according
to ability—and you will stare like a man, I read of somewhere, who asked
his neighbour ‘how he fed that mule of his, so as to keep it in such
good case?’—and then, struck by some other fancy, went on to talk of
other matters till the day’s end—when, on alighting at their Inn (for
these two were journeying, and the talk began with the stirrup-cup)—the
other, who had been watching his opportunity, breaking silence for the
first time, answered—‘With oats and hay.’ Observe that the only part of
the story I parallel is the _surprise_ at the end—for I am not going
to get whipped before I deserve, Aminè (_Ba mine_). At all events I
will answer this last dear note. The ‘good’ you do me, I see you cannot
see nor understand _yet_—there is my answer! Here, in this instance, I
corrected everything,—altered, improved. Did you notice the alterations
(curtailments) in ‘Luria’? Well, I put in a few phrases in the second
part of the other,—where Ogniben speaks—and hope that they give a little
more insight as to his character—which I meant for that of a man of wide
speculation and narrow practice,—universal understanding of men and
sympathy with them, yet professionally restricted claims for himself,
for his own life. _There_, was the theology to have come in! He should
have explained, ‘the belief in a future state, with me, modifies every
feeling derivable from this present life—I consider _that_ as dependent
on foregoing _this_—consequently, I may see that your principles are
perfectly right and proper to be embraced so far as concerns this world,
though I believe there is an eventual gain, to be obtained elsewhere,
in either opposing or disregarding them,—in not availing myself of the
advantages they procure.’ Do you see?—as a man may not choose to drink
wine, for his health’s sake, or from a scruple of conscience &c.—and
yet may be a good judge of what wine should be, how it _ought_ to
taste—something like this was _meant_—and when it is forgotten almost,
and only the written thing with a shadow of the meaning stays,—you
wonder that the written thing gets to look better in time? Do you think
if I could forget _you_, Ba, I should not reconcile myself to your
picture—which already I love better than yesterday—and which, to revenge,
I know I shall by this time to-morrow like less, so far less. Well, and
then there is Domizia—I _could not_ bring her to my purpose. I left the
neck stiff that was to have bowed of its own accord—for nothing graceful
could be accomplished by pressing with both hands on the head above! I
meant to make her leave off her own projects through love of Luria. As
it is, they in a manner fulfil themselves, so far as she has any power
over them, and then, she being left unemployed, sees Luria, begins to
see him, having hitherto seen only her own ends which he was to further.
Oh, enough of it! I have told you, and tell you and will tell you, my Ba,
because it is simple truth,—that you have been ‘helping’ me to cover a
defeat, not gain a triumph. If I had not known you _so far_ THESE works
might have been the _better_:—as assuredly, the greater works, I trust
will follow,—they would have suffered in proportion! If you take a man
from prison and set him free ... do you not probably cause a signal
interruption to his previously all ingrossing occupation, and sole labour
of love, of carving bone-boxes, making chains of cherry-stones, and
other such time-beguiling operations—does he ever take up that business
with the old alacrity? No! But he begins ploughing, building—(castles he
makes, no bone-boxes now). I may plough and build—but there,—leave them
as they are!
Here an end till to-morrow—my best dearest. I am very well to-day—I
forgot to say anything yesterday. You did not go down-stairs, for all
your good intentions, I hope—this morning I mean: observe how the days
are made—the mornings are warm and sunny—after gets up such a wind as now
howls—what a sound! The most melancholy in the whole world I think.
No—I can’t do what I had set down—keep my remonstrance and upbraiding on
the Homer-subject till to-morrow and then speak arrows. What do you mean,
Ba, by ‘remembering’ those lines you give me—have you no more written
down, _Quite_ happy and original they are—but to-morrow this is waited
for—dearest, bless you ever! your
R.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Friday
[Post-mark, April 3, 1846.]
Dearest, your flowers make the whole room look like April, they are
so full of colours ... growing fuller and fuller as we get nearer to
the sun. The wind was melancholy too, all last night—oh, _I_ think the
wind melancholy, just as _you_ do,—or _more_ than you do perhaps for
having spent so many restless days and nights close on the sea-shore in
Devonshire. I seem now always to hear the sea _in_ the wind, voice within
voice! But I like a sudden wind not too loud,—a wind which you hear the
rain in rather than the sea—and I like the half cloudy half sunny April
weather, such as we have it here in England, with a west or south wind—I
like and enjoy _that_; and remember vividly how I used to like to walk
or wade nearly up to my waist in the wet grass or weeds, with the sun
overhead, and the wind darkening or lightening the verdure all round.
But none of it was happiness, dearest dearest. Happiness does not come
with the sun or the rain. Since my illness, when the door of the future
seemed shut and locked before my face, and I did not tire myself with
knocking any more, I thought I was happier, happy, I thought, just
because I was tranquil _unto death_. Now I know life from death, ... and
the unsorrowful life for the first time since I was a woman; though I
sit here on the edge of a precipice in a position full of anxiety and
danger. What matter, ... if one shuts one’s eyes, and listens to the
birds singing? Do you know, I am glad—I could almost thank God—that Papa
keeps so far from me ... that he has given up coming in the evening ...
I could almost thank God. If he were affectionate, and made me, or _let_
me, feel myself necessary to him, ... how should I bear (even with my
reason on my side) to prepare to give him pain? So that the Pisa business
last year, by sounding the waters, was good in its way ... and the pang
that came with it to me, was also good. He feels!—he loves me ... but it
is not (this, I mean to say) to the _trying_ degrees of feeling and love
... trying to _me_. Ah, well! In any case, I should have ended probably,
in giving up all for you—I do not profess otherwise. I used to think I
should, if ever I loved anyone—and if the love of you is different from,
it is greater than, anything preconceived ... divined.