_R.B. to E.B.B._
[Post-mark, March 11, 1846.]
Dear, dear Ba, but indeed I _did_ return home earlier by two or three
good hours than the night before--and to find _no_ letter,--none of
yours! _That_ was reserved for this morning early, and then a rest
came, a silence, over the thoughts of you--and now again, comes this
last note! Oh, my love--why--what is it you think to do, or become
'afterward,' that you may fail in and so disappoint me? It is not very
unfit that you should thus punish yourself, and that, sinning by your
own ambition of growing something beyond my Ba even, you should 'fear'
as you say! For, sweet, why wish, why think to alter ever by a line,
change by a shade, turn better if that were possible, and so only rise
the higher above me, get further from instead of nearer to my heart?
What I expect, what I build my future on, am quite, quite prepared to
'risk' everything for,--is that one belief that you _will not alter_,
will just remain as you are--meaning by '_you_,' the love in you, the
qualities I have _known_ (for you will stop me, if I do not stop
myself) what I have evidence of in every letter, in every word, every
look. Keeping these, if it be God's will that the body passes,--what
is that? Write no new letters, speak no new words, look no new
looks,--only tell me, years hence that the present is alive, that what
was once, still is--and I am, must needs be, blessed as ever! You
speak of my feeling as if it were a pure speculation--as if because I
_see somewhat_ in you I make a calculation that there must be more to
see somewhere or other--where bdellium is found, the onyx-stone may be
looked for in the mystic land of the four rivers! And perhaps ... ah,
poor human nature!--perhaps I _do_ think at times on what _may_ be to
find! But what is that to you? I _offer_ for the _bdellium_--the other
may be found or not found ... what I see glitter on the ground, _that_
will suffice to make me rich as--rich as--
So bless you my own Ba! I would not wait for paper, and you must
forgive half-sheets, instead of a whole celestial quire to my love and
praise. Are you so well? So adventurous? Thank you from my heart of
hearts. And I am quite well to-day (and have received a note from
Procter _just_ this _minute_ putting off his dinner on account of the
death of his wife's sister's husband abroad). Observe _this_ sheet I
take as I find--I mean, that the tear tells of no improper speech
repented of--what English, what sense, what a soul's tragedy! but
then, what real, realest love and more than love for my ever dearest
Ba possesses her own--
_E.B.B. to R.B._
[Post-mark, March 12, 1846.]
When my Orpheus writes '[Greek: Peri lithôn]' he makes a great mistake
about onyxes--there is more true onyx in this letter of his that I
have just read, than he will ever find in the desert land he goes to.
And for what 'glitters on the ground,' it reminds me of the yellow
metal sparks found in the Malvern Hills, and how we used to laugh
years ago at one of our geological acquaintances, who looked
mole-hills up that mountain-range in the scorn of his eyes, saying ...
'Nothing but mica!!' Is anybody to be rich through 'mica', I wonder?
through 'Nothing but mica?' 'As rich as--as rich as' ... _Walter the
Pennyless_?
Dearest, best you are nevertheless, and it is a sorry jest which I can
break upon your poverty, with that golden heart of yours so
apprehended of mine! Why if I am 'ambitious'--is it not because you
love me as if I were worthier of your love, and that, _so_, I get
frightened of the opening of your eyelids to the _un_worthiness? 'A
little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to
sleep'--_there_, is my 'ambition for afterward.' Oh--you do not
understand how with an unspeakable wonder, an astonishment which keeps
me from drawing breath, I look to this Dream, and 'see your face as
the face of an angel,' and fear for the vanishing, ... because dreams
and angels _do_ pass away in this world. But _you_, _I_ understand
_you_, and all your goodness past expression, past belief of mine, if
I had not known you ... just _you_. If it will satisfy you that I
should know you, love you, love you--why then indeed--because I never
bowed down to any of the false gods I know the gold from the mica, ...
I! 'My own beloved'--you should have my soul to stand on if it could
make you stand higher. Yet you shall not call me 'ambitious.'
To-day I went down-stairs again, and wished to know whether you were
walking in your proportion--and your letter does call you 'better,'
whether you walked enough or not, and it bears the Deptford post-mark.
On Saturday I shall see how you are looking. So pale you were last
time! I know Mr. Kenyon must have observed it, (dear Mr. Kenyon ...
for being 'kinder and kindest') and that one of the 'augurs'
marvelled at the other! By the way I forgot yesterday to tell you how
Mr. Burges's 'apt remark' did amuse me. And Mr. Kenyon who said much
the same words to me last week in relation to this very Wordsworth
junior, writhed, I am sure, and wished the ingenious observer with the
lost plays of Æschylus--oh, I seem to see Mr. Kenyon's face! He was to
have come to tell me how you all behaved at dinner that day, but he
keeps away ... you have given him too much to think of perhaps.
I heard from Miss Mitford to-day that Mr. Chorley's hope is at an end
in respect to the theatre, and (I must tell you) she praises him
warmly for his philosophy and fortitude under the disappointment. How
much philosophy does it take,--please to instruct me,--in order to the
decent bearing of such disasters? Can I fancy one, shorter than you by
a whole head of the soul, condescending to '_bear_' such things? No,
indeed.
Be good and kind, and do not work at the 'Tragedy' ... do not.
So you and I have written out all the paper in London! At least, I
send and send in vain to have more envelopes 'after my kind,' and the
last answer is, that a 'fresh supply will arrive in eight days from
Paris, and that in the meanwhile they are quite _out_ in the article.'
An awful sign of the times, is this famine of envelopes ... not to
speak of the scarcity of little sheets:--and the augurs look to it all
of course.
For _my_ part I think more of Chiappino--Chiappino holds me fast.
But I must let _you_ go--it is too late. This dearest letter, which
you sent me! I thank you for it with ever so much dumbness. May God
bless you and keep you, and make you happy for me.
Your BA.
_R.B. to E.B.B._
[Post-mark, March 12, 1846.]
How I get to understand this much of Law--that prior possession is
nine points of it! Just because your infinite adroitness got first
hold of the point of view whence our connection looks like 'a dream'
... I find myself shut out of my very own, unable to say what is
oftenest in my thought; whereas the dear, miraculous dream _you_ were,
and are, my Ba! Only, _vanish_--_that_ you will never! My own, and for
ever!
Yesterday I read the poor, inconceivably inadequate notice in the
_People's Journal_. How curiously wrong, too, in the personal guesses!
Sad work truly. For my old friend Mrs. Adams--no, I must be silent:
the lyrics seem doggerel in its utter purity. And so the people are to
be instructed in the new age of gold! I _heard_ two days ago precisely
what I told you--that there was a quarrel, &c. which this service was
to smooth over, no doubt. Chorley told me, in a hasty word only, that
all was over, Mr. Webster would not have anything to do with his play.
The said W. is one of the poorest of poor creatures, and as Chorley
was certainly forewarned, forearmed I will hope him to have been
likewise--still it is very disappointing--he was apparently nearer
than most aspirants to the prize,--having the best will of the
actresses on whose shoulder the burthen was to lie. I hope they have
been quite honest with him--knowing as I do the easy process of
transferring all sorts of burthens, in that theatrical world, from
responsible to irresponsible members of it, actors to manager, manager
to actors, as the case requires. And it is a 'hope deferred' with
Chorley; not for the second or third time. I am very glad that he
cares no more than you tell me.
Still you go down-stairs, and still return safely, and every step
leads us nearer to _my_ 'hope.' How unremittingly you bless me--a
visit promises a letter, a letter brings such news, crowns me with
such words, and speaks of another visit--and so the golden links
extend. Dearest words, dearest letters--as I add each to my heap, I
say--I _do_ say--'I was _poor_, it now seems, a minute ago, when I had
not _this_!' Bless you, dear, dear Ba. On Saturday I shall be with
you, I trust--may God bless you! Ever your own
_E.B.B. to R.B._
Sunday.
[Post-mark, March 16, 1846.]
Ever dearest I am going to say one word first of all lest I should
forget it afterward, of the two or three words which you said
yesterday and so passingly that you probably forget to-day having said
them at all. We were speaking of Mr. Chorley and his house, and you
said that you did not care for such and such things for yourself, but
that for others--now you remember the rest. And I just want to say
what it would have been simpler to have said at the time--only not so
easy--(I _couldn't_ say it at the time) that you are not if you please
to fancy that because I am a woman I have not the pretension to do
with as little in any way as you yourself ... no, it is not _that_ I
mean to say.... I mean that you are not, if you please, to fancy that,
because I am a woman, I look to be cared for in those outside things,
or should have the slightest pleasure in any of them. So never wish
nor regret in your thoughts to be able or not to be able to care this
and this for _me_; for while you are thinking so, our thoughts go
different ways, which is wrong. Mr. Fox did me a great deal too much
honour in calling me 'a religious hermit'; he was 'curiously' in
fault, as you saw. It is not my vocation to sit on a stone in a
cave--I was always too fond of lolling upon sofas or in chairs nearly
as large,--and this, which I sit in, was given to me when I was a
child by my uncle, the uncle I spoke of to you once, and has been
lolled in nearly ever since ... when I was well enough. Well--_that_
is a sort of luxury, of course--but it is more idle than expensive, as
a habit, and I do believe that it is the 'head and foot of my
offending' in that matter. Yes--'confiteor tibi' besides, that I do
hate white dimity curtains, which is highly improper for a religious
hermit of course, but excusable in _me_ who would accept brown serge
as a substitute with ever so much indifference. It is the white light
which comes in the dimity which is so hateful to me. To 'go mad in
white dimity' seems perfectly natural, and consequential even. Set
aside these foibles, and one thing is as good as another with me, and
the more simplicity in the way of living, the better. If I saw Mr.
Chorley's satin sofas and gilded ceilings I should call them very
pretty I dare say, but never covet the possession of the like--it
would never enter my mind to do so. Then Papa has not kept a carriage
since I have been grown up (they grumble about it here in the house,
but when people have once had great reverses they get nervous about
spending money) so I shall not miss the Clarence and greys ... and I
do entreat you _not_ to put those two ideas together again of _me_ and
the finery which has nothing to do with me. I have talked a great deal
too much of all this, you will think, but I want you, once for all, to
apply it broadly to the whole of the future both in the general view
and the details, so that we need not return to the subject. Judge for
me as for yourself--_what is good for you is good for me_. Otherwise I
shall be humiliated, you know; just as far as I know your thoughts.
Mr. Kenyon has been here to-day--and I have been down-stairs--two
great events! He was in brilliant spirits and sate talking ever so
long, and named you as he always does. Something he asked, and then
said suddenly ... 'But I don't see why I should ask _you_, when I
ought to know him better than you can.' On which I was wise enough to
change colour, as I felt, to the roots of my hair. There is the
effect of a bad conscience! and it has happened to me before, with Mr.
Kenyon, three times--once particularly, when I could have cried with
vexation (to complete the effects!), he looked at me with such
infinite surprise in a dead pause of any speaking. _That_ was in the
summer; and all to be said for it now, is, that it couldn't be helped:
couldn't!
Mr. Kenyon asked of 'Saul.' (By the way, you never answered about the
blue lilies.) He asked of 'Saul' and whether it would be finished in
the new number. He hangs on the music of your David. Did you read in
the _Athenæum_ how Jules Janin--no, how the critic on Jules Janin (was
it the critic? was it Jules Janin? the glorious confusion is gaining
on me I think) has magnificently confounded places and persons in
Robert Southey's urn by the Adriatic and devoted friendship for Lord
Byron? And immediately the English observer of the phenomenon, after
moralizing a little on the crass ignorance of Frenchmen in respect to
our literature, goes on to write like an ignoramus himself, on Mme.
Charles Reybaud, encouraging that pure budding novelist, who is in
fact a hack writer of romances third and fourth rate, of questionable
purity enough, too. It does certainly appear wonderful that we should
not sufficiently stand abreast here in Europe, to justify and
necessitate the establishment of an European review--journal
rather--(the 'Foreign Review,' so called, touching only the summits of
the hills) a journal which might be on a level with the intelligent
readers of all the countries of Europe, and take all the rising
reputations of each, with the national light on them as they rise,
into observation and judgment. If nobody can do this, it is a pity I
think to do so much less--both in France and England--to snatch up a
French book from over the Channel as ever and anon they do in the
_Athenæum_, and say something prodigiously absurd of it, till people
cry out 'oh oh' as in the House of Commons.
Oh--oh--and how wise I am to-day, as if I were a critic myself!
Yesterday I was foolish instead--for I couldn't get out of my head all
the evening how you said that you would come 'to see a candle held up
at the window.' Well! but I do not mean to love you any more just
now--so I tell you plainly. Certainly I will not. I love you already
too much perhaps. I feel like the turning Dervishes turning in the sun
when you say such words to me--and I _never shall_ love you any
'less,' because it is too much to be made less of.
And you write to-morrow? and will tell me how you are? honestly will
tell me? May God bless you, most dear!