manage to post myself what shall be written, too early to permit the
possibility (almost) of your being without a letter to-morrow. Dearest,
how you were with me yesterday, after you went away!—I thought, thought,
thought of you,—and the books I took up one by one ... (I tried a
romance too ‘Les Femmes’ by a writer called Desnoyers ... quite new, and
weak and foolish enough as a story, but full of clever things about shoe
tyes ... philosophy in small:) the books were all so many _lorgnons_
through which I looked at you again and again. Did you ever hear a story
of the late Lord Grey, that he was haunted by a head, a head without a
body? If he turned to the right or left there it was—if he looked up in
the air, there it hung ... or down to the floor, there it lay—or walked
up or down stairs, there it bounded before him—flop ... flop ... just
on its chin. ‘Alas, poor ghost?’ And just such another, as far as the
haunting goes, were you to me, dearest, yesterday—only that _you_ were of
the celestial rather than ghastly apparitionery, and bore plainly with
you airs from Heaven full against my forehead. How did I ever deserve
you—how ever? Never indeed! And how can it seem right to submit to so
much happiness undeservedly, as the knowledge of your affection gives,
you who are ‘great in everything,’ as Mr. Kenyon said the other day!
Shall I tell you how I reconcile myself to the good? Thus it is. First I
think that no woman in the world, let her be ever so much better than I,
could quite be said to deserve you—and that therefore there may not be
such harm in your taking the one who will owe you most with the fullest
consciousness! If it may not be merit, it shall be gratitude—_that_ is
how I look at it when I would keep myself from falling back into the old
fears. Ah! you may prevent my rising up to receive you ... though I did
not know that I did ... it was a pure instinct!—but you cannot prevent my
sinking down to the feet of your spirit when I think of the love it has
given me from the beginning and _not_ taken away. Dearest, dearest—I am
content to owe all to you—it is not too much humiliation!
While I was writing, came Mr. Kenyon ... the spectacles mended, and
looking whole catechisms from behind them. The first word was, ‘Have you
seen Browning lately?’ I, taken by surprise, answered _en niaise_, ‘Yes,
yesterday.’ ‘And did he tell you that he was coming on Wednesday, next
Wednesday?’ ‘He said something of it.’
A simpleton would have done better—to call me one were too much
honour!—yet it seemed impossible to be adroit under the fire of the full
face, spectacles included. The words came without the will. And now,
what had we better do? Take Tuesday, that you may be able to say on
Wednesday, ‘I was not there to-day’...? or be frank for the hour and let
it all pass? Think for us, Robert—I am quite frightened at what I have
done. It seemed to me too, afterwards, that Mr. Kenyon looked grave.
Still he talked of Miss Mitford and Mr. Buckingham, and Landor, and of
going to the Lakes himself for a few days, and laughed and jested in
great good humour, the subject being turned—he asked me too if I had ever
discussed your poetry with Miss Mitford, on which I said that she did
not much believe in you—‘Not even in “Saul”?’ said he. I don’t know what
to think. I am in a fog off the Nore. And he proposed coming to-morrow
with a carriage, to drive me up the Harrow road to see the train coming
in, and then to take me to his house, and, so, home,—all in his infinite
kindness. He comes at half-past three—let me have your thoughts with me
then—and the letter, farther on. Two letters, I am to have to-morrow. If
Sunday is the worst day, Monday is the best,—of those I mean of course,
on which I do not see you. May God bless you, my own beloved. I love you
in the deepest of my heart; which seems ever to grow deeper. I live only
for you; and feel that it is worth while.
Your BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Monday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 10, 1846.]
You dearest Ba, do you write thus to put all thoughts of fear out of my
head, and make me confident nothing can go ill with us if you feel so for
me? I seem to have a presentiment that this afternoon, before this letter
reaches you, Mr. Kenyon will have spoken—and if the whole world spoke
its loudest, your words would be all I should hear. Or are they trials,
every such word, of my vanity and weakness,—do you think, ‘if anything
can call them up, this will?’ No, I very well know your entire truth
in this and the other assurances I make my life bright with,—through
any darkness that can come. What you choose to assert of yourself, _I_
feel of myself every hour. But there must be this disproportionateness
in a beloved object—before I knew you, women seemed not so much better
than myself,—therefore, no love for them! There is no love but from
beneath, far beneath,—that is the law of its nature—and now, no more of
words—will there indeed be need of no more,—as I dare hope and believe,
will the deeds suffice?—not in their own value, no! but in their plain,
certain intention,—as a clear advance beyond mere words? We shall soon
know—if you live, you will be mine, I must think—you have put these dear
arms too surely round my neck to be disengaged now. I cannot presume to
suggest thoughts to you resolutions for the future—you must impart to me
always,—but I do lift up my heart in an aspiration to lead the life that
seems accorded by your side, under your eyes.—I cannot write on this,
dear Ba,—to say, I will live and work as I ought, seems too presumptuous.
Understand all, and help me with your dearest hand, my own love!
As I say, I fancy Mr. Kenyon will speak—I only hope, the caution will
act both ways, and that he will see as much inexpediency in altogether
opposing as in encouraging such a step. That you should pass another
winter and the risk of it—and perhaps many—_that_ seems the _worst_ fate.
Can he apprehend any worse evil than that?
I observe in the _Times_ to-day that the Peninsular & Oriental Steam
Company have advertised a ship from Southampton to Genoa, Leghorn, Civita
Vecchia and Naples on the 30th September, and that ‘thenceforth the
company will despatch a first-class steamer to those ports on the 15th of
every month. One more facility, should circumstances require it. Are you
sure that the France journey with the delays and fatigue is preferable to
this—where if the expenses are greater, yet the _uncertain_ expenses are
impossible? You are to think, beloved.
Now, will you write to-night? I may come to-morrow? Say one word—you
have heard why I wanted to come, even if Mr. Kenyon’s questions had not
been put—otherwise, Friday will be impossible—I can say, ‘I called on
Saturday, and think of doing so next Friday—’ I must see you to-morrow
indeed, love!
Let me leave off here—I love you wholly, and bless you ever as now—Your
own R.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Monday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 11, 1846.]
Then let it be Tuesday. It will correct, too, my stupidity to Mr. Kenyon,
for easily you may reply to his certain question, that you had not been
here on Wednesday but meant to go on Friday instead. Ah well! By the
time all this is over we shall be fit to take a degree in some Jesuits’
college—we shall have mastered all the points of casuistry. To wash one’s
hands of it, and then throw away the water, will be something gained at
least.
Dearest, no, indeed!—there is nothing for your goodness to do in that
badness I told you of, and which you describe so precisely in your
word, ‘drunkenness’ of mind. It is precisely _that_, and no more nor
less—a throwing off of moral restraint ... a miserable degradation.
One may get angry, frightened, disgusted—but, after all, compassion
comes in:—and who would think of fighting a delirious man with a sword?
It would be a cruelty, like murder. There is a fine nature too, under
these ruins of the will; and a sensibility which strikes inwards and
outwards—(no one else should have any sensibility, within a thousand
miles.) Think of a sort of dumb Rousseau,—with the ‘Confessions’ _in_
him, pining evermore to get out! A miserable man, first by constitution
and next by fortune—seeing only the shadow, for the sun,—the nettles
in the field,—and breathing hard when he stands among garden-roses, to
attain to smelling the onions over the wall. I have told him sometimes
that he had a talent for anger!—‘indignatio facit orationes’ and _that_
is his pleasure, ‘par excellence,’—to be let talk against this abuse
or that abuse, this class of men or that class of men, this or that
world’s misery or offence:—he will rise up in it and be eloquent and
happy. Otherwise ... mécréants we must be, he thinks, who dare to be
happy in this vale of tears. Life is a long moan to him. And is not such
a man enough punished? For me, I have not had the heart to take quite
the position I ought to have done, looking only to his most outrageous
bearing towards myself—although he talks of my scorn and sarcasms, as
if I had shown myself quite equal to self-defence. An old, old friend,
too!—known as a friend these twelve or thirteen years! And then, men
are nearly all the same in the point of _wanting generosity to women_.
It is a sin of sex, be sure—and we have our counter-sins and should be
merciful. So I have been furiously angry, and then relented—by turns;
as I could. Oh yes—it was he who followed you up-stairs. There was an
explosion that day among the many—and I had to tell him as a consequence,
that if he chose to make himself the fable and jest of the whole house,
he was the master, but that I should insist upon his not involving
my name in the discussion of his violences. Wilson said he was white
with passion as he followed you, and that she in fear trembled so she
could scarcely open the door. He was a little ashamed afterwards, and
apologized in a manner for what sufficiently required an apology. Before
a servant too!—But that is long ago—and at that time he knew nothing for
a certainty. Is it possible to be continuously angry with any one who
proves himself so _much the weaker_? The slave of himself ... of his own
passions—is too unhappy for the rod of another—man or woman.
Mr. Chorley—Mr. Chorley!—how could he utter such words! Men seem imbecile
sometimes—understandings have they, and understand not.
Monday Night.
Dearest, I have your last letter. Thank you out of my heart—though you
are not a prophet, dear dearest—not about Mr. Kenyon at least. See how
far you are from the truth-well, with that divining hazel which you wave
to and fro before my eyes. Mr. Kenyon, instead of too much remembering
us, has forgotten me to-day. I waited an hour with my bonnet on, and he
did not come. And then came a note! He had had business—he had forgotten
me—he would come to-morrow. Which I, thinking of you, wrote back a word
against, and begged him to come rather on Thursday or Saturday, or
Monday. Is _that_ right, dearest? Your coming to-morrow will be very
right.
But when you say that there can be no love except ‘_from beneath_’ ...
is it right? is it comforting to hear of? No, no—indeed! How unhappy
I should be if I accepted your theory! So I accept rather your love,
beloved....
Trusting to be yours.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Wednesday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 12, 1846.]
I have been putting all the letters into rings—twenty together—and they
look now as they should—‘infinite treasure in a little room’—note, that
they were so united and so ranged from the beginning, at least since
I began to count by twenties—but the white tape I used (no red tape,
thank you!) was vile in its operation,—the untying and retying (so as to
preserve a proper _cross_ [Illustration]) hard for clumsy fingers like
mine:—these rings are perfect. How strange it will be to have no more
letters! Of all the foolishnesses that ever were uttered that speech of
mine,—about your letters strewing the house,—was the most thoroughly
perfect! yet you have nothing to forgive in me, you say!
Just now I took up a periodical and read a few lines of a paper on the
charm that there is in a contrariety of tempers and tastes, for friends
and lovers—and there followed platitudes in a string—the clever like
the stupid, the grave choose the lively, and so forth. Now, unless,
the state of the liker and chooser is really considered by him as a
misfortune,—what he would get rid of if he could in himself, so shall
hardly desire to find in another—except in this not very probable case,
is there not implied by every such choice, an absolute despair of any
higher one? The grave man says (or would if he knew himself)—‘except
on my particular grounds such a serious humour would be impossible and
absurd ... and where can I find another to appreciate them? Better
accept the lower state of ignorance that they exist even, and consequent
gaiety,—than a preposterous melancholy arising from no adequate cause.’
And what man of genius would not associate with people of no talent at
all, rather than the possessors of _mere_ talent, who keep sufficiently
near him, as they walk together, to give him annoyance at every step?
Better go with Flush on his four legs, avowedly doglike, than with a
monkey who will shuffle along on two for I don’t know how many yards. Now
for instance, is the writer of that wise notice of Landor in last week’s
_Athenæum_, one whit nearer your sympathy _in that precise matter_,
than somebody who never heard of Landor or supposed him to have usually
written under the signature of L.E.L.? With the exception of a word or
two about the silly abuse of Plato, and on the occasional unfairness of
statement, is there one word right and seasonable?
Here am I letting the words scratch themselves one after another while
my thought as usual goes quite another way. Perhaps my wits are resting
because of the great alacrity they are to display at Mr. Kenyon’s this
evening ... I shall take care not to be first comer, nor last goer.
Dearest, you are wrong in your fancy about my little caring whether he
knows or does not. I see altogether with your eyes ... indeed, now that
you engage to remove any suspicion of unkindness or mistrust which might
attach to me in his thoughts (all I ever apprehended for _myself_), there
is no need to consider him—at all. He can do no good nor harm. Did you
ever receive such a letter? The dull morning shall excuse it—anything
but the dull heart—for you fill it, however the _heat_ may keep within,
sometimes.
Bless you, Ba, my dearest, perfect love—now I will begin thinking of you
again—let me kiss you, my own!
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Wednesday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 12, 1846.]
Shall you pass through this street to Mr. Kenyon’s, this evening? I
have been sitting here these five minutes, wondering. But no answer is
possible now, and if I go to the window of the other room and look up
and look down about half-past five or a little later, it will be in vain
perhaps. Just now I have heard from Mr. Kenyon, who cannot come to-day to
drive with me though he may come to talk. He does not leave London, he
says, so soon as he thought!—more’s the pity. Ah! What unkind things one
learns to write and meditate in this world, even of the dear Mr. Kenyons
in it!—I am ashamed. Instruct your guardian angel to cover me with the
shadow of his wings,—dearest.
Now I will tell you a curious thing which _Treppy_ said to Arabel
yesterday while you and I were together. Arabel was walking with her,
and she was in one of her ill humours, poor Treppy, sighing and moaning
over the wickedness of the people in Wimpole Street—she ‘should go and
live at Ramsgate,’ she thought, as nobody paid her the right attention!
_That’s_ the intermittent groan, when she is out of humour, poor Treppy.
‘And besides’ said she, ‘it is much better that I should not go to
Wimpole Street at this time when there are so many secrets. Secrets
indeed! You think that nobody can see and hear except yourselves, I
suppose; and there are two circumstances going on in the house, plain
for any eyes to see! and those are considered _secrets_, I suppose.’
‘Oh, Treppy’—interpolated Arabel ... ‘you are always fancying secrets
where there are none.’ ‘Well, I don’t fancy anything now! I _know_—just
as _you_ do.’—Something was said too about ‘Ba’s going to Italy.’ ‘And,
Treppy, do you think that she _will_ go to Italy?’ ‘Why there is only one
way for her to go—but she may go that way. If she marries, she may go.’
‘And you would not be surprised?’ ‘_I!_ not in the least—_I_ am never
surprised, because I always see things from the beginning. Nobody can
hide anything from _me_.’ After which fashion she smoothed the darkness
till it smiled, and boasted herself back into a calmer mood. But just
observe how people are talking and inferring! It frightens me to think of
it. Not that there is any danger from Treppy. She would as soon cut off
her hand, as bring one of us into a difficulty, and _me_, the last. Only
it would not do to _tell her_,—she must have it in her power to say ‘I
did not know this’ ... for reasons of the strongest. To occasion a schism
between her and this house, would be to embitter the remainder of her
days.
Here is a letter from a lady in a remote district called Swineshead, who
sends me lyrical specimens, and desires to know if _this be Genius_. She
does not desire to publish; at any rate not for an indefinite number of
years; but for her private and personal satisfaction, she would be glad
to be informed whether she is a Sappho or George Sand or anything of
that kind. What in the world is to be answered, now, to an application
of _that_ kind! To meddle with a person’s opinion of himself or herself
(quite a private opinion) seems like meddling with his way of dressing,
with her fashion of putting in pins—like saying you _shall_ put your
feet on a stool, or you _shan’t_ eat pork. It is an interference with
private rights, from which I really do shrink. Unfortunately too it is
impossible to say what she wants to hear—I am in despair about it. When
we are at Pisa we shall not hear these black stones crying after us any
more perhaps. I shall listen, instead, to my talking bird and singing
tree, and repose from the rest. How did you get home? And tell me of Mr.
Kenyon’s dinner! So nervous I am about Mr. Kenyon, when you or I happen
to be _en rapport_ with him.
Not only I loved you yesterday, but even to-day I love you; which is
remarkable. To-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow, what will _you_ do? Is
_that_ an ‘offence?’ Nay, but it is rather reasonable that when the hour
strikes, the fairy-gold should turn back into leaves, and poor Cinderella
find herself sitting in her old place among the ashes, just as she had
touched the hand of the king’s son.
Don’t think I mean anything by _that_, ever dearest—not so much as to
teaze you—Robert!
I only love you to-day—that is, I love you and do nothing more. And the
Fairy Tales are on the whole, I feel, the most available literature for
illustration, whenever I think of loving you.
Your own BA.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Wednesday Evening.
[Post-mark, August 13, 1846.]
‘Did I ever receive such a letter?’ Never—except from _you_. It is a
question easily answered.
As to [the] other question, about the communion of contrarieties, I agree
with you, thought for thought, in all your thinking about it—only adding
one more reason to the reasons you point out. There is another reason at
the bottom of all, _I_ think—I cannot but think—and it is just that, when
women are chosen for wives, they are not chosen for companions—that when
they are selected to be loved, it is quite apart from life—‘man’s love
is of man’s life a thing apart.’ A German professor selects a woman who
can merely stew prunes—not because stewing prunes and reading Proclus
make a delightful harmony, but because he wants his prunes stewed for him
and chooses to read Proclus by himself. A fulness of sympathy, a sharing
of life, one with another, ... is scarcely ever looked for except in a
narrow conventional sense. Men like to come home and find a blazing fire
and a smiling face and an hour of relaxation. Their serious thoughts,
and earnest aims in life, they like to keep on one side. And this is the
carrying out of love and marriage almost everywhere in the world—and
this, the degrading of women by both.
For friendship ... why Like seeks Like in friendship very openly. To
‘have sympathy’ with a person, is a good banal current motive for
friendship. Yet (for the minor points) a man with a deficiency of animal
spirits may like the society of a man who can amuse him, and the
amusing man may have pleasure again in the sense of using a faculty and
conferring a benefit. It is happily possible to _love down_, and even
across a chasm—or the world would be more loveless than it is. I have
loved and still love people a thousand souls off—as you have and do, of
course;—but to love them _better_ on that account, would be strange and
difficult.
Always I know, my beloved, that I am unworthy of your love in a hundred
ways—yet I do hold fast my sense of advantage in one,—that, as far as
I can see, I see after you ... understand you, divine you ... call you
by your right name. Then it is something to be able to look at life
itself as you look at it—(I quite _sigh_ sometimes with satisfaction at
that thought!): there will be neither hope nor regret away from your
footsteps. Dearest—I feel to myself sometimes, ‘Do not move, do not
speak—or the dream will vanish,’ So fearfully like a dream, it is! Like
a reflection in the water of an actual old, old dream of my own, too ...
touching which, ... now silent voices used to say “That romantic child.”’
What did _you_ mean to say about my not believing in your nature ...
in your feelings ... what did you and could you mean yesterday? Was it
because of my speech about the ‘calm eyes’? Ah—_you!_—I did not think to
make so impressive a speech when I made it ... for this is not the first
time, Robert, you have quoted Hansard for it. Well! I shall not rise to
explain after all. Only I do justice to the whole subject ... _eyes_
inclusively ... ‘whatever you may think’ as you said yesterday with ever
such significance.
No—yes—now I will ask you one thing. Common eyes will carry an emotion
of a soul—and, so, not be calm, of course. Calm ones, I know, will carry
the whole soul and float it up against yours, till it loses footing, and
... _That_ is a little of what I meant by the calm in the eyes, and so
I will ask you whether I could wrong, by such meaning, any depth in the
nature.
At this moment you are at Mr. Kenyon’s—and you did not, I think, go up
this street. Perhaps you will go home through it—but I shall not see—I
cannot watch, being afraid of the over-watchers. May God bless you, my
own dearest! You have my heart with you as if it lay in your hand! I told
you once that I never could love (in _this_ way of love) except _upward_
very far and high—but you are not like me in it, I thank God—since you
can love _me_. Love me, dearest of all—do not tire. I am your very own
BA.
Another Bennett!!—yet the same! _To Friday._
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Thursday.
[Post-mark, August 13, 1846].
Dearest Ba, I love you wholly and for ever! How shall the charm ever
break?
My two letters! I think we must institute solemn days whereon such
letters are to be read years hence ... when I shall ask you,—(all being
known, many weaknesses you do not choose to see now, and perhaps some
strength and constancy you cannot be sure of—for the charm may break, you
think) ... ‘If you stood _there_’ ... at Wimpole Street in the room ...
would you whisper ‘Love, I love you, as before?’ Oh, how fortunately,
fortunately the next verse comes with its sweetest reassurance!