... and considerate for me always: and at once I agree with you that for
this interval it will be wise for us to set the visits, ... ‘our days’
... far apart, ... nearly a week apart, perhaps, so as to escape the
dismal evils we apprehend. I agree in all you say—in all. At the same
time, the cloud has passed for the present—nothing has been said more,
and not a word to me; and nobody appears out of humour with me. They will
be displeased of course, in the first movement ... we must expect _that_
... they will be vexed at the occasion given to conversation and so on.
But it will be a passing feeling, and their hearts and their knowledge
of circumstances may be trusted to justify me thoroughly. I do not fear
offending them—there is no room for fear. At this point of the business
too, you place the alternative rightly—their approbation or their
disapprobation is equally to be escaped from. Also, we may be certain
that they would press the applying for permission—and I might perhaps, in
the storm excited, among so many opinions and feelings, fail to myself
and you, through weakness of the body. Not of the _Will_! And for my
affections and my conscience, they turn to you—and untremblingly turn.
Will you come on _Wednesday_ rather than Tuesday then? It is only one
day later than we meant at first, but it nearly completes a week of
separation; and we can then go to next week for the next day. Also, on
Wednesday we secure Mr. Kenyon’s absence. He will be still at Richmond.
Your letter which startled me by coming early, yet came too late for you
to receive the answer to it to-night. But I will send it to the post
to-night; and I write hurriedly to be in time for that end.
My own beloved, you shall not be uneasy on my account.—I send you
foolishnesses and you are daunted by them—but see! What affects me in
those churches and chapels is something different, quite different,
from railroad noises and the like. You do not understand, and I never
explained, ... you could not understand—but the music, the sight of the
people, the old tunes of hymns ... all these things seem to suffocate
my very soul with the sense of the past, past days, when there was one
beside me who is not here now—I am upset, overwhelmed with it all. I
think I should have been quite foolishly, hysterically ill yesterday if I
had persisted in staying. Next Sunday I shall go to the vestry, and see
nobody, and get over it by degrees.
Well—but for the sea-voyage, it seems to me that the great thing for us
to ascertain is the precise _expense_. I should not at all mind going by
sea, only that I fear the expense, and also that it is necessary to take
our passages some time before, ... and then, if anything happened ...
I mean any little thing ... an obstacle for a day or two! Consider our
circumstances.
I shall write again perhaps. Do not rely, though, on my writing.
_Perhaps_ I shall write. I shall think of your goodness certainly! May
God bless you, dearest beloved, I love, love you! I cannot be more
Your own.
Don’t forget to bring the paper on ‘Colombe’s Birthday,’—and say
particularly how you are—and how your mother is. In such haste I write!—
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Tuesday.
[Post-mark, August 25, 1846.]
When your letter came, my love, I could have easily borne the over-ruling
its objections to a visit to-day, for all my cautious philosophy! But
it seems best arranged as at present ... indeed it must be best, if you
agree. To-morrow repays me: nor is very long to wait!
I will only write briefly because I want to go to Town, (since there is
nothing better practicable), and enquire precisely about that steamboat
and the prices. I see that one may go to Trieste, a much greater
journey, for ‘£12 and £15,’ according to Mr. Waghorn’s bill. Besides, the
advertisement speaks of the ‘economy’ of this way—and certainly under
ordinary circumstances anybody would prefer the river-voyage with its
picturesqueness. There is a long account, in the paper to-day, of the
earthquakes in Tuscany—which have really been formidable enough to keep
away the travelling English for the next month or two—whole villages were
overthrown, Leghorn has suffered considerably, the inhabitants bivouac
outside the walls—and at Pisa the roof of a church fell in ... also the
villas in the vicinity have been damaged. Do you fear, dearest? If you do
not,—_I fear_ that the eligibility of Pisa as our place of abode is only
doubled and tripled by all this. Think; there is a new lake risen, just
by! and great puffs of sulphureous smoke came up through chinks in the
plains. How do these wonders affect you?
You asked me about Ossian—now here is truth—the first book I ever bought
in my life was Ossian ... it is now in the next room. And years before
that, the first _composition_ I ever was guilty of was something in
_imitation_ of Ossian, whom I had not read, but _conceived_, through two
or three scraps in other books—I never can recollect _not_ writing rhymes
... but I knew they were nonsense even then; _this_, however, I thought
exceedingly well of, and laid up for posterity under the cushion of a
great arm-chair. ‘And now my soul is satisfied’—so said one man after
killing another, the death being suggested, in its height of honour, by
stars and stars (* * * *). I could not have been five years old, that’s
one consolation. Years after, when I bought this book, I found a vile
dissertation of Laing ... all to prove Ossian was not Ossian ... I would
not read it, but could not help knowing the purpose of it, and the pith
of the hatefully-irresistible arguments. The worst came in another shape,
though ... an after-gleaning of real Ossianic poems, by a firm believer
whose name I forget—‘if this is the _real_’—I thought! Well, to this
day I believe in a nucleus for all that haze, a foundation of truth to
Macpherson’s fanciful superstructure—and I have been long intending to
read once again those Fingals and Malvinas.
I remember that somewhere a chief cries ‘Come round me, my
thousands!’—There is an Achilles! And another, complaining of old
age remarks ‘_Now_—I feel the weight of my shield!’ Nestor; and both
beautifully perfect, are they not, _you_ perfect Ba?
I will go now. To-morrow I trust to see you face to face; dearest that
you are!
Ever your own.
My poor mother suffers greatly. I am much better.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Tuesday, 6 p.m.
[Post-mark, August 26, 1846.]
I have just had a note from Mr. Kenyon, who, after his absence at
Richmond, promises to come and see me on _Thursday afternoon_. Now ...
would it be quite ‘unco guid’ of us ... and wise ‘above what is written’
(in your letter) if we put off our day to Friday, and gave me the power
to answer to Mr. Kenyon’s certain question, ... ‘no, I have not seen him
since I saw _you_.’? If you think it would be wise, my own dearest, why
do not come to-morrow; do not come till Friday. See—to-day is Tuesday,
and only two days more will intervene,—and we are agreed on the necessity
of prudence for the coming weeks—particularly when my brothers have
nothing particular to do, at this time of vacation, but to watch us on
all sides. I am so nervous that my own footsteps startle me. But _quite
well_ I am, and you shall not have fancies about me—as to strength, I
mean—as to what I cannot do, bear, and the like.
To-night I shall write a letter as usual. This is a bare _line_, which
Henrietta will throw into the post, to speak to you of to-morrow. The
letter follows.
How I miss you, and long for Friday. If you have an engagement for
Friday, there is Saturday. ‘_Understand_’ ... as you say, and I repeat.
To-night I will tell you where I went to-day.
Your own I am always
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Tuesday Evening.
[Post-mark, August 26, 1846.]
‘_Nor is it very long to wait_’—Alas!—My note went two hours ago to cross
out the application of that phrase, and now it _is_ very long to wait,
... all the days to Friday. Tell me, dearest, if you think it wise, at
least, to make such an unhappy arrangement, ... considering, you know,
Mr. Kenyon and my brothers. It ought to be wise, _I_ think ... it is so
unhappy and disappointing. Consider what I am without you all this long
dreary while; and how little ever so much sense of wisdom can console
anybody.
Friday will come however,—and I may as well go on to tell you that Mrs.
Jameson came yesterday. ‘Anything settled?’ she asked; as she walked into
the room. She looked at me with resolute, enquiring eyes. I wonder if she
ever approaches to the divination of something like the truth—_not_ the
truth, but like it. Either she must see indistinctly ‘something new and
strange,’ or attribute to me a strange delight in the mysterious. She
half promised to see me again before she leaves England, and begged me to
write and tell her all whenever I shall have it in my power to make the
communication. Affectionate she was, as always.
To-day I have seen nobody, except Mr. Boyd for a little, after driving
through street upon street, where I might have met you if I had been
happy enough. Albemarle Street ... were you _there_? I sate there, in the
carriage, opposite to the York Hotel, while Henrietta paid her visit to
old Lady Bolingbroke, a full half hour ... Flush and I—Flush staring out
of the window, and I ... doing what I generally do in this room, do you
ask what it was? At the end of some twenty minutes, a boy passed, who
had the impertinence to look full at Flush and whistle, whereupon Flush
growled, and appealed to me with two immense eyes ... both seeming to say
‘I hope you observe how I am insulted.’ So my reverie was broken in the
middle—but being better tempered, rather, than Flush, or having larger
resources, I did not growl, but took your latest letter out instead,
which lasted for the whole remainder of the time. Then at Mr. Boyd’s ...
oh, I must tell you ... he began to tell me some romantic compliments
of several young ladies who desired to be disguised in servant’s
accoutrements, just to open the door to me (to have a good stare, I
suppose) or, in good earnest, to be my maid! (to go with us to Pisa,
dearest ... how would you like _that_?—Seriously now _do_ just calculate
the wonderful good fortune of such a person, in falling upon two lions
instead of one—nay, on a great wild forest-lion, this time, in addition
to the little puny lioness of the original bargain!) Well!—but when Mr.
Boyd had done his report, I asked naturally, ‘And what am I to say to
all this?’ ‘Why you are to say that you will be goodnatured, and give
somebody pleasure at the cost of no pain to yourself, and go to the room
down-stairs and speak three words to Miss Smith who is there, waiting.’
Imagine anybody having a Miss Smith ready in the drawing-room to let out
upon one! Imagine _me_ too (to be less abstract) walking in to that same
Miss Smith, ... to the effect of—! ‘Here I am! just come to be looked at.
Is it at all what you expected, Miss Smith’?
The worst was, that dear Mr. Boyd would have set it down to a species of
malignancy, if I had refused—so I took my courage up with both hands, and
remembering that I had seen two or three times, years ago, the stepmother
of the said Miss Smith, I thought I might enquire after her with a sort
of propriety. And I got through it somehow. ‘Will you let me shake hands
with you and ask how Mrs. Smith is? Does she remember me, I wonder? I
am Elizabeth Barrett.’—‘Is it possible? Ah! I thought you were one of
your sisters at first! Dear me! Why how much better, you must be, to be
sure!—Oh dear me, what an illness you have had! Ah, quite shut up so
long! How very, very interesting, to be sure.’—If Flush had swallowed her
up in the middle, I might have forgiven him, to be sure. So interesting
too, that catastrophe would have been! But you shall not set me down as a
savage—it was all kindness on her side, of course—but one may be savage
to a _situation_ ... (which is just the way with me, ...) without being a
born barbarian woman.
As to Miss Martineau, the expression which sounds so rampant with
conceit, may yet be the plainest proof of a mere instinct of
self-preservation. If three Smiths would be mob enough to mob _me_ to
death (and they may make a mob, as three fine days, a summer!), let
us have some feeling for _her_, exposed, from various causes, to the
thirties ... at the lowest comparative computation.
For Ossian, you admit the _nucleus_. Which is only like your Ba, dearest
... you will not stand higher as an Ossianic critic unless you believe
the verbal authenticity, ‘nothing extenuating.’ The cushion of the
armchair! _My_ place of deposit used to be between the mattresses of my
crib—a little mahogany crib with cane sides to it. You were like Lord
Byron (another point of likeness!) in imitating Ossian, but you were
still earlier at the work than he was.
It is very well to ascertain the prices by the steamers; though my
expectation is that you will find them higher than you fancy them.
_Nineteen guineas_ was the charge last year, as far as Gibraltar only.
Then, if you charmed ever so eloquently with the voice of the charmer,
you never, as a passenger, would induce those people to diminish the
rate, because of our being _three_; and a female servant is charged for
at the higher rate ... if not the highest. Altogether the expenses will
be, out of all comparison, beyond that of the passage through France
... see if it will not. Ten pounds, as far as the travelling goes, seem
to cover everything, in going from hence to Leghorn ... to Pisa ...
taking Rouen and Orleans—and meaning of course, for one person. And if
the advantages are, as you describe, besides ... why should we forego
them? _Is_ the fatigue so much greater? If there are more changes and
shiftings, there is also more absolute rest—and the rivers are smoother
than the seas. Still, it is well to consider—and there are good reasons
on each side, worthy of consideration.
So much more I had to say—I break off suddenly, being benighted. How you
write to me! how you wrote to me on Sunday and yesterday! How I wish for
two hearts to love you with, and two lives to give to you, and two souls
to bear the weight worthily of all you have given to _me_. But if one
heart and one life will do, ... they are yours ... I cannot give them
again.
Beloved, if your mother should be ill, we must not think of your leaving
her, surely?
May God bless you, dearest beloved.
I am your BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
Wednesday Morning.
[Post-mark, August 26, 1846.]
Dearest, I _do_ think it will be only prudent to stay away till Friday
for those reasons. Oh, how I feel _what_ a Ba, mine is ... how truly
peerless a lady ... when I find instinctively at this minute while I
write, that the proper course will be to seem as little affected by
this enforced absence as possible ... that knowing my love she would
understand any comfort I take from the eventful good of the arrangement—I
have not to dwell on the present sorrow of it, lest she disbelieve me! I
am your very own, dearest dearest, with you or away from you. Both your
notes came together just now ... how can I thank and love you enough?
I might have guessed that at the end you would thank _me_ for my own
letters ... that is your ‘trick of fence,’ discovered, remember! But when
you read the ‘red-leaved tablets of the heart’ ... then be satisfied ...
‘praise,’ nothing in me to you can deserve.
I have learned all particulars about the steamer. There are only two
classes of passengers ... _Servants_ being the second. The first pay,
for the voyage to Leghorn 21_l._—the second, 14_l._ 5_s._ all expenses
included except during the stay at Genoa. No reduction ‘it is feared’
could be made in the case of so small a party—but by booking early, a
separate cabin might be secured, at no additional expense. In the event
of any obstacle, the passage paid for may be postponed till the departure
of the next, or any future vessel of the company. Now, you see, these
rates, though moderate, I think—(the ordinary term of the passage to
_Genoa_ is eleven days)—are yet considerably above those of the other
method by at least 20_l._, I should say. The voyage is long, supremely
tiresome, and in all respects so much less interesting than the French
route, that the whole scheme _can_ only be constructed for those to whom
any other mode of travel is impossible. The one question to be asked
therefore is ... are you really convinced that you need not be treated
as one of these? And on further consideration, there arise not a few
doubts as to whether the sea-voyage be not the more _difficult_ of the
two—the roughness is all between here and Gibraltar—and in the case of
_that_ affecting you more seriously than we hope, there would be no
possibility of escaping from the ship—whereas, should you be indisposed
on the other route, we can stop at once and stay for any period. Then,
the ‘shiftings’ are only three or four, and probably accompanied by no
very great fatigue beyond the _notion_ that a shifting there _is_. Above
all, you would get the first of the sea in a little experiment, soon
made and over,—so that if it proved unfavourable to you there might be
an end of the matter at once. So that after all, the cheaper journey may
be the safer. But all does _not_ rest with you _quite_, as I was going
to say ... all my life is bound up with the success of this measure ...
therefore, think and decide, my Ba!
Would there be an advantage in Mrs. Jameson accompanying us—to Orleans,
at least? Would the circumstances of our marriage alter her desire, do
you think? She has wished to travel with _me_, also—she must suspect
the truth—I doubt whether it is not in such cases as hers, where no
responsibility is involved, whether it is not better policy, as well
as the more graceful, to communicate what is sure to be discovered—so
getting thanks and sympathy instead of neither. All is for you to
consider.
And now, dearest, I will revert, in as few words as I can, to the account
you gave me, a short time since, of your income. At the beginning, if
there had been the necessity I supposed, I should have proposed to myself
the attainment of something like such an amount, by my utmost efforts,
before we could marry. We could not under the circumstances begin with
less—so as to be free from horrible contingencies,—not the least of which
would be the application for assistance afterward. After we marry, nobody
must hear of us. In spite of a few misgivings at first I am not proud, or
rather, am proud in the right place. I am utterly, exclusively proud of
you—and though I should have gloried in working myself to death to prove
it, and shall be as ready to do so at any time a necessity shall exist,
yet at present I shall best serve you, I think, by the life by your side,
which we contemplate. I hope and believe, that by your side I shall
accomplish something to justify God’s goodness and yours—and, looking
at the matter in a worldly light, I see not a few reasons for thinking
that unproductive as the kind of literature may be, which I should aim
at producing, yet, by judicious management, and profiting by certain
favourable circumstances,—I shall be able to realise an annual sum quite
sufficient for every purpose—at least in Italy.
As I never calculated on such a change in my life, I had the less
repugnance to my father’s generosity, that I knew that an effort at some
time or other might furnish me with a few hundred pounds which would
soon cover my very simple expenses. If we are poor, it is to my father’s
infinite glory, who, as my mother told me last night, as we sate alone,
‘conceived such a hatred to the slave-system in the West Indies,’ (where
his mother was born, who died in his infancy), that he relinquished
every prospect,—supported himself, while there, in some other capacity,
and came back, while yet a boy, to his father’s profound astonishment
and rage—one proof of which was, that when he heard that his son was a
suitor to _her_, my mother—he benevolently waited on her uncle to assure
him that his niece would be thrown away on a man so evidently born to be
hanged!—those were his words. My father on his return had the intention
of devoting himself to art, for which he had many qualifications and
abundant love—but the quarrel with his father,—who married again and
continued to hate him till a few years before his death,—induced him to
go at once and consume his life after a fashion he always detested. You
may fancy, I am not ashamed of him.
I told my mother, who told _him_. They have never been used to interfere
with, or act for me—and they trust me. If you care for any love, purely
love,—you will have theirs—they give it you, whether you take it or
no. You will understand, therefore, that I would not _accept_ even the
100_l._ we shall want: I said ‘you shall lend it me—I will pay it back
out of my first literary earnings—I take it, because I do not want
to sell my copyrights, or engage myself to write a play, or any other
nuisance. Surely I can get fifty pounds next year, and the other fifty in
due course!’
So, dearest, we shall have plenty for the journey—and you have only to
determine the when and the how. Oh, the time! Bless you, ever dearest! I
love you with all my heart and soul—
R.
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Wednesday.
[Post-mark, August 27, 1846.]
‘_If I care for any love_’—‘_whether I take it or no._’ Now ought I not
to reproach you a little, for bearing to write such words of me, when
you could not but think all the while, that I should feel a good deal in
reading what you wrote beside? Will you tell me that you did not know I
should be glad and grateful for _tolerance_ even?—the least significance
of the kinder feeling affecting me _beyond_, perhaps, what you could know
of me. I am bound to them utterly.
And if it is true, as it is true, that they have much to pardon and
overlook in me, ... and among the rest, the painful position imposed on
you by my miserable necessities, ... they yet never shall find me, I
trust, unworthy of them and you by _voluntary_ failures, and, least of
all, by failures of dutiful affection towards themselves—‘IF THEY CARE
FOR ANY LOVE.’
For the rest of what you tell me, it is all the purest kindness—and
you were perfectly, perfectly right in taking so, and as a loan, which
we ought, I think, to return when our hands are free, without waiting
for the completion of other projects. By living quietly and simply,
we shall surely have enough—and more than enough. Then among other
resources is Blackwood. I calculated once that without unpleasant
labour, with scarcely an effort, I could make a hundred a year by
magazine-contributions—and this, without dishonour either. It does
‘fugitive poems,’ observe, no harm whatever, to let them fly through a
periodical before they alight on their tree to sing. Then _you_ will send
perhaps the sweepings of your desk to Blackwood, to alternate with my
sendings! Shall we do _that_, when we sit together on the ragged edge of
earthquake chasms, in the midst of the ‘sulphurous vapour.’ I, afraid? No
indeed—I think I should never be afraid, if you were near enough. Only
that you never must go away in _boats_. But there is time enough for such
compacts.
As to the sea voyage, _that_ was _your_ scheme, and not mine, from
the beginning: and your account of the expenses, if below my fear ...
(although I believe that ‘servants’ do not mean ‘female servants’ and
that the latter are subject to additional charges), yet seems to me to
leave the Rhone and Saône route as preferable as ever. And do you mark,
dear dearest, that supposing me to be unfit for the short railroad
passage from Rouen to Paris and from Paris to Orleans, I must be just
as unfit for the journey to Southampton, which is necessary to the
sea-voyage. Then ... supposing me to be unfit for the river-passage, I
must be still more unfit for the sea. So don’t suppose _either_. I am
stronger than you fancy. I shall shut my eyes and think of you when there
is too much noise and confusion,—the things which try me most,—and it
will be easy to find a quiet room and to draw down the blinds and take
rest, I suppose, ... which one might in vain long for in that crowded
steamer at sea. Therefore, dearest, if I am to think and decide, I have
decided ... let us go through France. And let us go quick, quick, and not
stop anywhere within hearing of England ... not stop at Havre, nor at
Rouen, nor at Paris—_that_ is how _I_ decide. May God help us, and smooth
the way before and behind. May your father indeed be able to love me a
little, for _my_ father will never love me again.