about to lead with you ... (‘chosen,’ because you have often suggested
drawbacks, harms to my interest &c. which I have really been forced to
take up and try to think over seriously, lest I should be unawares found
treating what had undoubtedly come from you with disrespect), I never,
after all the considering in my power, was yet able to _fancy_ even the
possibility of their existence. I will not revert to them now—nor to the
few _real_ inconveniences which I _did_ apprehend at the beginning, but
which never occurred to _you_: at present I take you, and with you as
much happiness as I seem fit to bear in this world,—the one shadow being
the fear of its continuance. Or if there is one thing I shall regret
... it is just that which I should as truly lose if I married any Miss
Campbell of them all—rather, _then_ should _really_ lose, what now is
only modified,—transferred partly and the rest retainable. There was
always a great delight to me in this prolonged relation of childhood
almost ... nay altogether—with all here. My father and I have not one
taste in common, one artistic taste ... in pictures, he goes, ‘souls
away,’ to Brauwer, Ostade, Teniers ... he would turn from the Sistine
Altar piece to these—in music he desiderates a tune ‘that has a story
connected with it,’ whether Charles II.’s favourite dance of ‘Brose and
butter’ or—no matter,—what I mean is, that the sympathy has not been an
intellectual one. I hope if you want to please me especially, Ba, you
will always remember I have been accustomed, by pure choice, to have
another will lead mine in the little daily matters of life. If there are
two walks to take (to put the thing at simplest) you must say, ‘_This_
one’ and not ‘either’ ... because though they were before indifferently
to be chosen—after _that_ speech, one is altogether better than the
other, to _me_ if not to you. When you have a real preference which I
can discern, you will be good enough to say nothing about it, my own Ba!
Now, do you not see how, with this feeling, which God knows I profess
to be mine without the least affectation,—how much my happiness would
be disturbed by allying myself with a woman to whose intellect, as well
as goodness, I could _not_ look up?—in an obedience to whose desires,
therefore, I should not be justified in indulging? It is pleasanter to
lie back on the cushions inside the carriage and let another drive—but
if you suspect he cannot drive?
Nothing new at Mr. Kenyon’s yesterday—I arrived late to a small
party—Thackeray and Procter—pleasant as usual. I took an opportunity of
mentioning that I had come straight from home. Did you really look from
the window, dearest? I was carried the other way, by the new road, but I
thought of you till you may have felt it!
And indeed you are ‘out’ again as to my notions of your notions, you
dearest Ba! I know well enough that by ‘calmness’ you did not mean
absence of passion—I spoke only of the foolish popular notion.
To-morrow there would seem to be no impediment whatever—and I trust to
be with you, beloved—but before, I can kiss you as now,—loving you as
ever—ever—
Your own.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Saturday Morning.
[August 15, 1846.]
A bright beautiful day this is, on which you do not come—it seems as if
you ought to have come on it by rights. Dearest, you did not meet Mr.
Kenyon yesterday after you left me? I fancied that you might, and so be
detected in the three hours, to the fullest length of them—it seemed
possible. Now I look forward to the driving instead of to you—and he has
just sent to desire me to be ready at a quarter to three, and not later,
as was fixed in your hearing. And why, pray, should you be glad that I am
going on this excursion? I _should_ have liked it, if we had been living
in the daylight; but with all these ‘shadows, clouds and darkness,’ it is
pleasanter to me to sit still and see nobody—and least, Mr. Kenyon. Oh,
that somebody would spirit him away gently, very gently, so as to do him
no manner of harm in achieving the good for me!—for both you and me. Did
you say ‘Do you pity me’ to _me_? I did not tell you yesterday that I
have another new fear ... an American lady who in her time has reviewed
both you and me, it seems, comes to see me ... is about to come to see me
... armed with a letter of introduction from Mr. Mathews—and in a week, I
may expect her perhaps. She is directed, too, towards Mr. Horne. Observe
the double chain thrown across the road at my feet—I am entreated to
show her attention and introduce her to my friends ... things out of the
question as I am situated. Yet I have not boldness to say ‘I will not see
you.’ I almost _must_ see her, I do fear. Mr. Mathews ought to have felt
his way a little, before throwing such a weight on me. He is delighted
with your ‘Bells and Pomegranates’ (to pass from his frailties to his
merits) and the review of them is sent to me, he says—only that I do not
receive it.
Dearest, when I told you yesterday, after speaking of the many coloured
theologies of the house, that it was hard to answer for what _I_ was,
... I meant that I felt unwilling, for my own part, to put on any of
the liveries of the sects. The truth, as God sees it, must be something
so different from these opinions about truth—these systems which fit
different classes of men like their coats, and wear brown at the elbows
always! I believe in what is divine and floats at highest, in all these
different theologies—and because the really Divine draws together souls,
and tends so to a unity, I could pray anywhere and with all sorts of
worshippers, from the Sistine Chapel to Mr. Fox’s, those kneeling and
those standing. Wherever you go, in all religious societies, there is a
little to revolt, and a good deal to bear with—but it is not otherwise in
the world without; and, _within_, you are especially reminded that God
has to be more patient than yourself after all. Still you go quickest
there, where your sympathies are least ruffled and disturbed—and I
like, beyond comparison best, the simplicity of the dissenters ... the
unwritten prayer, ... the sacraments administered quietly and without
charlatanism! and the principle of a church, as they hold it, _I_ hold
it too, ... quite apart from state-necessities ... pure from the law.
Well—there is enough to dissent from among the dissenters—the Formula
is rampant among them as among others—you hear things like the buzzing
of flies in proof of a corruption—and see every now and then something
divine set up like a post for men of irritable minds and passions to rub
themselves against, calling it a holy deed—you feel moreover bigotry
and ignorance pressing on you on all sides, till you gasp for breath
like one strangled. But better this, even, than what is elsewhere—_this_
being elsewhere too in different degrees, besides the evil of the place.
Public and social prayer is right and desirable—and I would prefer, as
a matter of custom, to pray in one of those chapels, where the minister
is simple-minded and not controversial—certainly would prefer it. Not
exactly in the Socinian chapels, nor yet in Mr. Fox’s—not by preference.
The Unitarians seem to me to throw over what is most beautiful in the
Christian Doctrine; but the Formulists, on the other side, stir up a
dust, in which it appears excusable not to see. When the veil of the body
falls, how we shall look into each other’s faces, astonished, ... after
one glance at God’s!
Have I written to you more than too much about my doxy? I was a little,
little, uncomfortable in the retrospect of yesterday, lest my quick
answer should have struck you as either a levity or an evasion—and have
you not a right to all my thoughts of all things? For the rest, we will
be married just as you like ... _volo quod vis_: and you will see by
this profession of faith that I am not likely much to care either way.
There are some solemn and beautiful things in the Church of England
Marriage-service, as I once heard it read, the only time I was present
at such a ceremony—but I heard it then in the abbreviated customary form
... and not as the Puseyites (who always bring up the old lamps against
a new) choose to read it, they say, in spite of custom. Archdeacon Hale
with an inodorous old lamp, displeased some of the congregation from
Fenton’s Hotel, I hear. But we need not go to the Puseyites at least. And
after all, perhaps the best will be what is easiest. Something is sure to
happen—something must surely happen to put an end to it all ... before I
go to Greece!
May God bless you, ever dearest: Tell me if you get this letter to-day,
Saturday.
Your very own BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Saturday.
[Post-mark, August 15, 1846.]
My very, very dearest—many, if not all, of those things for which I
want the words when too close to you, become quite clear at a little
distance. How simple, for instance, it is to admit, that in our case,—my
own, only Ba once discovered, the circumstances of the weakness and
retirement were, on the whole, favourable rather than otherwise! Had
they been unfavourable ... I do not think a few obstacles would have
discouraged me ... but this way has been easier—better—and now all is
admitted! _By themselves_, the circumstances could never obtain more
than the feeling properly due to them—do you think one particle of love
goes with the pity and service to a whole Hospital of Incurables? So
let all the attraction of that kind pass for what it is worth, and for
no more. If all had been different, and I had still perceived you and
loved you, then there _might_, perhaps,—or probably—be as different an
aim for me,—for my own peculiar delight in you ... I should want to feel
and be sure of your love, in your happiness ... certainly in your entire
happiness then as now—but I should aspire to find it able to support
itself in a life altogether different from the life in which I had first
seen you—if you loved me you would need to be happy in quiet and solitude
and simplicity and privation ... then I should _know_ you loved me,
knowing _how_ you had been happy before! But now, do you not see that my
utmost pride and delight will be to think you are happy, as _you were
not_,—in the way you were not: if you chose to come out of a whirl of
balls and parties and excursions and visitings—to my side, I should love
you as you sate still by me,—but now, when you stand up simply, much
more walk ... I will consider, if you let me, every step you take that
brings you pleasure,—every smile on your mouth, and light on your eyes—as
a directest _obedience_ to me ... all the obedience you _can_ ever pay
me ... you shall say in every such act ‘this I do on purpose to content
you!’ I hope to know you have been happy ... that shall prove you loved
me, at the end.
Probably you _will_ not hear anything to-day from Mr. Kenyon, as your
sister is to be present: do you really imagine that those eyes and
spectacles are less effective than the perceptions of your ‘Treppy’?
By the way, hear an odd coincidence—you heard that foolish story of
Thackeray and Mr. ‘Widdicombe’ ... which I told just to avoid a dead
silence and guilty blankness of face. As I was returning I met Thackeray
(with Doyle—H.B.) and was energetically reminded of our dinner ... he
is in very earnest, Mr. Kenyon may assure himself. Presently I reached
Charing Cross—and stood waiting for my omnibus. There is always a crowd
of waiters—in a moment there passes an extraordinary looking personage—a
policeman on duty at this police-requiring spot saunters up to _me_,
of all others, and says (on some miraculous impulse, no doubt)—with
an overflowing impressible grin, ‘D’ye know _him_, Sir?’ ‘No—who may
he be?’ ‘He’s Widdicombe!—He goes now to Astley’s, and afterwards to
Vauxhall—there’s a good likeness of him in the painting of the Judge and
Jury Club.’ Here my omnibus arrives ... ‘Thank you’ I said—and there was
an end of the communication. How for many thousand years may I walk the
street before another inspired policeman addresses me without preface
and tells me, _that_ is the man I have just been talking of to somebody
else? Let me chronicle Mr. W.’s glories ... his face is just Tom Moore’s,
_plus_ two painted cheeks, a sham moustache, and hair curled in wiry long
ringlets; Thackeray’s friend was a friend indeed, ‘warning every man and
teaching every man’—the _tête-à-tête_ would have been portentous.
Now, dearest, you cannot return me such delectabilities, so must even
be content to tell me what happens to-day and what is said and done and
surmised—and how you are ... three times over, how you are, dearest
dearest! And I will write to-morrow, and kiss you meanwhile, as now as
ever. Bless you, love—
Your R.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Saturday Evening.
[Post-mark, August 17, 1846.]
How I thank for your letter, ever beloved. You were made perfectly to
be loved—and surely I have loved you, in the idea of you, my whole life
long. Did I tell you _that_ before, so often as I have thought it? It is
_that_ which makes me take it all as visionary good—for when one’s Ideal
comes down to one, and walks beside one suddenly, what is it possible to
do but to cry out ... ‘a dream’? You are the best ... best. And if you
loved me only and altogether for pity, (and I think that, more than _you_
think, the sentiment operated upon your generous chivalrous nature), and
if you confessed it to me and proved it, and I knew it absolutely—what
then? As long as it was _love_, should I accept it less gladly, do you
imagine, because of the root? Should I think it less a gift? should I be
less grateful, ... or _more_? Ah—I have my ‘theory of causation’ about
it all—but we need not dispute, and will not, on any such metaphysics.
Your _loving_ me is enough to satisfy me—and if you did it because I
sate rather on a green chair than a yellow one, it would be enough still
for me:—only it would not, for _you_—because your motives are as worthy
always as your acts.—Dearest!
So let us talk of the great conference in Mr. Kenyon’s carriage, in which
joined himself, Arabel, Flush and I. First he said ... ‘Did Browning stay
much longer with you?’ ‘Yes—some time.’ This was as we were going on
our way toward some bridge, whence to look at the Birmingham train. As
we came back, he said, with an epical leap _in medias res_ ... ‘What an
extraordinary memory our friend Browning has.’ ‘Very extraordinary’—said
I—‘and how it is raining.’ I give you Arabel’s report of my reply, for I
did not myself exactly remember the full happiness of it—and she assured
me besides that he looked ... looked at me ... as a man may look ... And
this was everything spoken of you throughout the excursion.
But he spoke of _me_ and observed how well I was—on which Arabel said
‘Yes—she considered me quite well; and that nothing was the matter now
but _sham_.’ Then the railroads were discussed in relation to me ... and
she asked him—‘Shouldn’t she try them a little, before she undertakes
this great journey to Italy?’ ‘Oh’ ... he replied—‘_she_ is going on no
great journey.’ ‘Yes, she will, perhaps—Ba is inclined to be a great deal
too wild, and now that she is getting well, I do assure you, Mr. Kenyon.’
To sit upon thorns, would express rather a ‘velvet cushion’ than where I
was sitting, while she talked this foolishness. I have been upbraiding
her since, very seriously; and I can only hope that the words were taken
for mere jest—_du bout des lèvres_.
Moreover Mr. Kenyon is _not_ going away on Thursday—he has changed his
plans: he has put off Cambridge till the ‘spring’—he meets Miss Bayley
nowhere—he holds his police-station in London. ‘When _are_ you going’
I asked in my despair, trying to look satisfied. He did not know—‘not
directly, at any rate’—‘I need not hope to get rid of him,’ he said aside
perhaps.
But we saw the great roaring, grinding Thing ... a great blind mole, it
looked for blackness. We got out of the carriage to see closer—and Flush
was so frightened at the roar of it, that he leapt upon the coach-box.
Also it rained,—and I had ever so many raindrops on my gown and in my
face even, ... which pleased me nearly as much as the railroad sight. It
is something new for me to be rained upon, you know.
As for happiness—the words which you use so tenderly are in my heart
already, making me happy, ... I am happy by you. Also I may say solemnly,
that the greatest proof of love I could give you, is to be happy because
of you—and even _you_ cannot judge and see how great a proof _that_ is.
You have lifted my very soul up into the light of your soul, and I am not
ever likely to mistake it for the common daylight. May God bless you,
ever ever dearest!
I am your own—
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Sunday.
[Post-mark, August 17, 1846.]
No, my own dearest, your letter does not arrive on Saturday, but this
morning—what then? You will not be prevented from your usual ways of
entire goodness to me by _that_? You will continue to write through the
remainder of the writing-time? This one letter reaches me,—if another
was sent, it stays back till to-morrow—so I _do_ get a blessing by your
endeavour, and am grateful as ever, my own Ba! After all, neither of
us loses,—effectually loses—anything—for my letter always comes in its
good time,—it is not cast hopelessly away—and do you suppose that _you_
lose any of the gladness and thanks? Rather, you get them doubly—for all
along, all through the suspense, I have been (invariably) sure of the
deed when promised, and of the unchanging love, when only expected ...
so that when the letter finds me at last, the joy being unaccountably
unabated do you not see that there is a _gain_ somehow? I told you on
Friday I loved you more at that instant than at any previous time—I
will show you why, because I _can_ show you, I think—though it seems at
first an irrational word ... for always having loved you wholly, how
can I, still _only_ loving you wholly, speak of ‘more’ or ‘less’?—This
is why—I used to see you once a week, to sit with you for an hour and
a half—to receive a letter, or two, or three, during the week—and I
loved you, Ba, wholly, as I say, and reckoned time for no time in the
intervals of seeing you and hearing from you. Now I see you twice in
the week, and stay with you the three hours, and have letter on dear
letter,—and the distance is, at least, the _same_, between the days, and
between the letters—I will only affirm it is the _same_—so I must love
you more—because if you were to bring me back to the old allowance of
you,—the one short visit, the two or three letters,—I should be starved
with what once feasted me! (If you do not understand Flush does!)
Seriously, does not that go to prove, I love you more! Increased strength
comes insensibly thus,—is only ascertained by such process of induction
... once you crossed the room to look out Shelley’s age in a book, and
were not tired—now you cross London to see the trains arrive, and (I
trust) are not tired.... _So_—you are stronger.
Dearest, I know your very meaning, in what you said of religion, and
responded to it with my whole soul—what you express now, is for us both
... those are my own feelings, my convictions beside—instinct confirmed
by reason. Look at that injunction to ‘love God with all the heart, and
soul, and strength’—and then imagine yourself bidding any faculty, that
arises towards the love of him, be still! If in a meeting house, with
the blank white walls, and a simple doctrinal exposition,—all the senses
should turn (from where they lie neglected) to all that sunshine in
the Sistine with its music and painting, which would lift them at once
to Heaven,—why should you not go forth?—to return just as quickly, when
they are nourished into a luxuriance that extinguishes, what is called,
Reason’s pale wavering light, lamp or whatever it is—for I have got into
a confusion with thinking of our convolvuluses that climb and tangle
round the rose-trees—which might be lamps or tapers! See the levity!
No—this sort of levity only exists because of the strong conviction, I do
believe! There seems no longer need of earnestness in assertion, or proof
... so it runs lightly over, like foam on the top of a wave.
Chorley came and was very agreeable and communicative. You shall tell
me more about Mr. Mathews and his review. And with respect to his
lady-friend, you will see her, I think. But first tell me of Mr. Kenyon,
and yourself—how you are, and what I am to do, when to see you.
Now goodbye, my own Ba—‘goodbye.’ Be prepared for all fantasticalness
that may happen! Perhaps some day I shall shake hands with you, simply,
and go ... just to remember the more exquisitely where I once was, and
where you let me stay now, you dearest, dearest heart of my heart, soul
of my soul! But the shaking-hands, at a very distant time! _Now_—let me
kiss you, beloved—and so I do kiss you—
Ever your own.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Sunday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 17, 1846.]
Your sight of Widdicombe was highly dramatic—and the policeman ‘intersit
nodo’ as well as any god of them all. What a personage Widdicombe must
be! Think of the mental state of a man, who could gravely apply to his
own face false moustachios and rouge before a looking-glass. There is
something in it to wonder over, as over the megalosaurie and prodigions
of ridicules. Mind—when I talked of rouge improving a complexion for
the nonce, I was thinking of women; not of men, in whom that sort of
colouring (even if it were natural) is detestable, or, to measure one’s
language, very ugly indeed. I have seen a man, of whom it was related
that he _painted his lips_—so that at dinner, with every course, was
removed a degree of bloom; the lips paled at the soup, grew paler at the
mutton, became white at the fricandeau and ghastly at the pudding—till
with the orange at dessert, his nearest neighbours drew back their chairs
a little, expecting him to fall flat in a fainting-fit. But he was very
rich, and could only talk charmingly out of those painted lips. There
were women who ‘couldn’t conceive why people should call him a fool.’ To
every Bottom’s head (not to wrong Bottom by such a comparison), there
will be a special Titania—see if there will not!
So you go on Wednesday to this club-dinner, really. And you come to me
also on Wednesday. Does _that_ remain decided? I have had a letter from
that poor Chiappino, to desire a ‘last interview’ ... which is promised
to be ‘pacific.’ Oh—such stuff! Am I to hold a handkerchief to my eyes
and sob a little? Your policeman is necessary to the full development
of the drama, I think. And I forgot to tell you that there were _two_
things in which I had shown great want of feeling—one, the venturing to
enclose your verses—the other ... (now listen!) the other ... the having
said that ‘I was sincerely sorry for all his real troubles.’ Which I do
remember having said once, when I was out of patience—as how can any one
be patient continually? and how was I especially to condole with him in
lawn and weepers, on the dreadful fact of your existence in the world?
Well—he has real troubles unfortunately, and he is going away to live in
a village somewhere. Poor Chiappino! A little occupation would be the
best thing that could happen for him; it would be better than prosperity
without it. When a man spins evermore on his own axis, like a child’s
toy I saw the other day, ... what is the use of him but to make a noise?
No greater tormentor is there, than self-love, ... even to self. And no
greater instance of this, than _this_!
Dearest beloved, to turn away from the whole world to you ... _when_ I
do, do I lose anything ... or not rather gain all? Sometimes I feel to
wish that I had more to sacrifice to you, so as to prove something of
what is in me—but you do not require sacrifice ... it is enough, you
say, that I should _be happy through you_. How like those words are to
you!—how they are said in your own idiom! And for myself, I am contented
to think that, ... if such things can really satisfy you, ... you would
find with difficulty elsewhere in the world than here, a woman as
perfectly empty of life and gladness, except what comes to her from your
hands. Many would be happy through you:—but to be happy through only you,
is my advantage ... my boast. In this, I shall be better than the others.
Why, if you were to drive me from you after a little, in what words could
I reproach you, but just in these ... ‘You might have left me to die
_before_.’ Still I should be your debtor, my beloved, as now I am
Your very own
BA.
I told you that I was going to the chapel one Sunday—but I have not been
yet. I had not courage. May God bless you!—
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Monday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 17, 1846.]
I come home from Town for my letters ... the _two_ I ventured to expect,
and here they meet me. As I said, you _had_ written, and I thanked you
_then_, and _now_, too, just as if I had been despairing all along—and
over and above, there are some especial thanks to pay,—for when I
could not otherwise disengage myself from a dinner a little way out of
town,—having unawares confessed to the day’s being at my disposal, ... I
said—‘I expect letters at home which _must_ be answered’—and here I am.