1421. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 8, 26–28.
[London]
Nov. 2. 1843.
So it is no dream! And I shall really really see you! Dearest friend, how glad I am. Oh yes—come, come next week, any day you please without giving me warning. I want no warnings at all. I shall expect you on monday, on tuesday, on wednesday & so on, .. & thus nothing is so certain as that you will not take me unprepared. And if I wait to friday or saturday, I shall not be sick of hope,—the fact of your coming some day being secured to me. Come as soon as you can,—& stay as long as you can, and you shall be troubled by nobody except me, & by Mr Kenyon, if I can get him,—but I am afraid of Mr Kenyon .. of his not being in the way I mean, .. of his not being visible I mean,—for the preceding phrases were not what he deserved or I meant to say. More ominous too they were, than your bad spelling, .. which might be lucky as you suggest, .. only I am subject to the like,—I, who never had any luck belonging to me—ungrateful to say so, when you are coming next week!–
I will return the paper in a day or two. I clap my hands to hear you praised, & to think how you wore & waved the purple over the Mayor. Forgive me that I smiled a little besides, to read about “this noble edifice,” & “this glorious work,” with the engraving to illustrate it at the top of the column,—& then in the art-criticism, that particular notice of (oh! “we particularly noticed” ..) the fine water-colour painting by the great local artist, of … the queen’s arms! [1] Forgive me for Reading! but all this did really & irrepressibly remind me of the glories of “Little Pedlington” as chronicled by Poole. [2] Do you remember?– Did Mr Talfourd make one of the twenty who took coffee at your house?– [3] Well—there is a comfort in asking questions now! It puts one in mind so of the answers.
And Mrs Cox is Mary Duff,—is she not?—Ld Byron’s Mary. [4] She [5] is the person who cannot abide poetry!—oh desecration of associations! You retorted with the pith of a thousand arguments in one sentence, in what you said; and if she had gone to Grenada for an evasion, she wd not have found it. And she, Mary Duff!–
Mr Reade, my dearest friend, I consider a “literary curiosity” [6] —neither more nor less. The wonderful idiosyncrasy which enables him to adopt & adapt other people’s poems, makes me open my eyes. If there was any danger of his approving of me enough to adopt my poems, I shd open them wide with fear, which is wider than with astonishment—for he wd certainly & forthwith write a poem called ‘The Cherubim,’ & another called ‘Isobel’s baby,’ & circulate them as his own productions. [7] He is in literature what he wd be in morals, if he talked heroically about virtue, walking up & down with other people’s teaspoons obliquely glittering from his waistcoat-pocket. That wd be rather curious!—and he is a phenomenon, is this Mr Reade of yours.
I had a letter this morning from Mr Mathews; New York; & he is going to send you, through me, a certain work of his—and he tells me to publish far & wide that a Copyright club is established in America for the protection of all poor authors, Mr Bryant being the president & he, secretary thereof. [8]
Oh—do let Mr Chorley meet you here. You shall have a room to yourself to meet anybody.
Thank you dearest friend, for letting me see the inscription,—which seems indeed to be beautifully executed. [9]
In the greatest haste & a dense twilight, ever & ever your
EBB.
You will bring K. will you not?
Publication: EBB-MRM, II, 335–337.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. The Reading Mercury and The Berkshire Chronicle both carried full reports of the 24 October dinner in their 28 October issues; the former mentioned a depiction of the Royal Arms by a local artist, John White. The Mayor and Chief Magistrate of Reading was Alderman William Blandy.
2. John Poole (1786?–1872) delineated this imaginary village in Little Pedlington and the Pedlingtonians (1839).
3. Talfourd proposed a toast to Miss Mitford in the course of the dinner.
4. EBB is confusing Mrs. Cox with Miss Mitford’s friend Mary Cockburn, Byron’s childhood sweetheart (see letter 1013, note 8).
5. Underscored three times.
6. An oblique reference to Isaac D’Israeli’s Curiosities of Literature (1791–1834).
7. A further gibe at Reade’s propensity for plagiarism.
8. See letter 1405.
9. The final form of the inscription for her parents’ tomb, previously discussed in letter 1353.
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