1031. EBB to Julia Martin
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 6, 116–119.
50 Wimpole Street.
Octr 22. 1842–
My dearest Mrs Martin,
Waiting first for you to write to me & then waiting that I might write to you cheerfully has ended by making so long a silence that I am almost ashamed to break it. And perhaps, even if I were not ashamed, you wd be angry,––perhaps you are angry, .. & dont much care now whether or not you ever hear from me again! Still I must write. & [1] I must moreover ask you to write to me again—and I must in particular assure you that I have continued to love you sincerely, notwithstanding all the silence which might seem to say the contrary. What I shd like best just now, is to have a letter speaking comfortable details of your being comparatively quite well again; yet I hope on without it that you really are so much better as to be next to quite well– It was with great concern that I heard of the indisposition which hung about you, dearest Mrs Martin, so long,—I who had congratulated myself when I saw you last on the promise of good health in your countenance. May God bless you & keep you better! And may you take care of yourself & remember how many love you in the world from dear Mr Martin, down to … EBB–
Well—now I must look around me & consider what there is to tell you. But I have been uneasy in various ways, sometimes by reason & sometimes by fantasy—and even now, altho’ my dear old friend Dr Scully is something better, he lies I fear in a very precarious state,—while dearest Miss Mitford’s letters from the deathbed of her father, make my heart ache as surely almost as the post comes. There is nothing more various in character nothing which distinguishes one human being from another more strikingly, than the expression of feeling, the manner in which it influences the outward man. If I were in her circumstances I shd sit paralyzed—it wd be impossible to me to write or to cry. And she who loves & feels with the intensity of a nature warm in everything, seems to turn to sympathy by the very instinct of grief, & sits at the deathbed of her last relative writing there in letter after letter, every symptom physical or moral, even to the very words of the raving of a delirium, & those, heart-breaking words! I could not write such letters—but I know she feels as deeply as any mourner in the world can. And all this reminds me of what you once asked me about the inscriptions in Ld Brougham’s villa at Nice. [2] There are probably as many different dialects for the heart as for the tongue,—are there not?
George, dear fellow, came home on friday, we expecting him on saturday; but he resisted the temptation of dear Mr Martin’s kindness & other kindnesses besides of less strength in drawing, & true to his Liege lady of Law, wd be at home with the first lawyers. His devotion is rewarded by a light scattering of briefs—quite as many as we have any right to expect for him considering his professional youth & not advanced age otherwise. But there never was, to be sure, such a devoted lawyer. I who like devotion in everything, quite admire him for it.
Henrietta is pleased all over just now—she both looks & speaks pleased. Papa has given her a new guitar which is called by the seller & not uncalled by the buyer “the queen of guitars”—and this, with the prospect of a new harp-piano, [3] .. that is, a piano shaped like a harp, thus–– Illus. . I hear it is a fine instrument besides being an ornamental piece of furniture,—rosewood & gold. There does not appear to be any more home news– Occy works hard & successfully at his architectural drawings & is anxious to go to Barry as a pupil, [4] which not improbably he may do– Do you know that Bummy is to pass this winter at Cheltenham? I am very glad of it on account of my cousins as well as on her own, as they are not simply buried at Frocester but buried & frozen. In the meantime they are forced to remain there longer than she intended (the house at Cheltenham being actually taken) by the illness of uncle James who has probably walked into wet grass after the last partridges he meant to shoot, & caught a rheumatic cold. Poor Bummy wrote to me about it a little in despair,—& under the obvious delusion that perhaps the house agent might forgive them the rent & keep the house open for them at the same time!
I hope when you write to me, dearest Mrs Martin, you will mention how the poor Peytons continue to be. You may feel how that dreadful event struck & moved me! [5] Poor poor Mrs Peyton! Will she not go away? Is it possible that she shd choose, that she shd bear to stay on in that place? I hoped for her that she might go back with her relatives to Ireland for a time at least, but nothing appears to be thought of such a thing as far as we can hear,—& Willie [6] has dined here once or twice since his return to town. He speaks simply of their all being well & tranquil. God’s upholding power is great,—and it is wonderful how we can live on quietly sometimes on the surface of the earth, with at least half a heart in the grave.
And now you will kindly like to have a word said about myself & it need not be otherwise than a word to give your kindness pleasure– The long splendid summer, exhausting as the heat was to me sometimes, did me essential good; & left me walking about the room, & equal to going down stairs (which I achieved four or five times) & even to going out in the chair, without suffering afterwards. And best of all, the spitting of blood (I must tell you) which more or less kept by me continually, stopped quite some six weeks ago,—and I have thus more reasonable hopes of being really & essentially better than I cd have with such a symptom loitering behind accidental improvements– Weak enough & with a sort of pulse which is not excellent, I certainly remain—but still, if I escape any decided attack this winter,—and I am in garrison now,—there are expectations of further good for next summer, & I may recover some moderate degree of health & strength again & be able to do good instead of receiving it only–
I write under the eyes of Wordsworth! Not Wordsworth’s living eyes!—altho’ the actual living poet had the infinite kindness to ask Mr Kenyon twice last summer when he was in London, if he might not come to see me! Mr Kenyon said ‘No’—I could’nt have said ‘no’ to Wordsworth—though I had never gone to sleep again afterwards– But this Wordsworth who looks on me now is Wordsworth in a picture. Mr Haydon the artist, with the utmost kindness has sent me the portrait he was painting of the great poet—an unfinished portrait! and I am to keep it until he wants to finish it. Such a head! such majesty!—and the poet stands musing upon Helvellyn! And all that,—poet Helvellyn & all,—is in my room!!–
Give my kind love to Mr Martin! our kind love, indeed, to both of you! and believe me my dearest Mrs Martin,
Your ever affectionate
Ba–
Is there any hope for us of you before the winter ends? Do consider.
Publication: LEBB, I, 110–113 (in part).
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. EBB has added the ampersand in the left-hand margin, without changing the period to a comma.
2. Lord Brougham had built a large house in Cannes, hoping that the climate there would benefit his daughter Eleanor, but she died shortly after the house was completed. “On the walls were inscribed poems in honour of Eleanor, written by Brougham himself, by Lord Wellesley, and by the Earl of Carlisle” (Henry Brougham, by Frances Hawes, 1957, p. 278).
3. Later identified as a melophonion made by Mardon (see letter 1065).
4. Charles Barry (1795–1860), later (1852) Sir Charles, was the winner of a competition for designs for a new building to replace the Houses of Parliament destroyed by fire in 1834. Drawings made by Octavius Moulton-Barrett during construction, while he was studying under Barry, are extant (see vol. 1, p. 296).
5. The death of Mrs. Martin’s neighbour, Charlotte Peyton, on 6 September.
6. Charles William Peyton (b. 1823), Charlotte’s younger brother.
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