Correspondence

1473.  Thomas Westwood to EBB

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 8, 114–116.

Chase Side, Enfield

Decr 27th 1843.

Dear Miss Barrett,

On my return from a long, weary walk through mud & mist, yesterday morning, my eyes were gladdened by the sight of your letter [1]  .. and very glad, I am sure they must have looked, for I had begun to fear—not any of the wrong, impossible things, you have alluded to, but that you might be ill, & unable to write, which Heaven forfend!

Thank you for those lines of Wordsworth’s, & also for thinking to send me them– I always speak & think of Wordsworth—with becoming timidity, & distrust of my own judgement—therefore I fear to tell you, whether I admired them very much, or not— The world went mad about him in times past, & it has not, I think, quite recovered its sober senses yet. Certainly all my literary friends are either blind admirers of his poetry, or unjust despisers of it, and I—I will confess so far—though I turn my back upon the one party, as a matter of course, cannot, conscientiously, rank myself with the former. But talking of him, why did you not answer my other question, anent your Review—was it an embarras[s]ing one? If so, you must of course say me nay,—and forgive me, if you can, in the saying—but if I may read it, do pray tell me where it is to be found. We have shelves full of Quarterlies, Edinburghs, British Critics, & the like—in which of them am I to hunt for it? [2]

That is the best of good news—and throws a kind of hearth-light over my pleasantest lookings forward—that you are really about to give us this long looked-for book. Do pray, in despite of elegance, & utter forgetfulness of drawing-room tables, make it a sort of prize-book, for thickness, as I am sure it will be in every other particular– I hope it will contain all your scattered poems—the “Brown Rosary’[’], & that glorious ‘Napoleon,’ & also those unfortunate verses, which you compelled to be ‘fugitive’, condemning them to transportation, in favour of those disreputable Americans—

With respect to my own book let me say what little I have to say now, as I may not be able when I send it to you– It has been written then, as you say, “not because there is a public”, but because I have certain dear & good friends, who have frequently expressed a wish, that I would write another book, while we were all together .. as a memorial of our intercourse. “On this hint, I spake,” [3] & was progressing gradually, when the probability of our speedy disunion, made me stop short, & hurry to press at once. Hence the book, will be a very brief one (but that is a virtue, with scribblers of my class)—and will I fear exhibit manifold weaknesses, which, with a knowledge of its history, I hope you will try, at least, to forgive– You must not think me neglectful, by the by, should you not receive it this week, in accordance with the next advertisement, which will probably proclaim it “just published”– I believe it will not be completed before next Monday or Tuesdy–

With respect to the ‘Sketches’—indeed it was not an “impossible boon.” As I hope I shall one day be able to shew you. I do not think, however, that the finished copies of the designs are commenced yet, [4] for the poor fellow is working his very life out, to get up a set, from the ‘Fairy Queen’ for the Art-Union, the ensuing year, [5] —& this, I believe, is the only reason why he has not given his attention to them– I should be much pleased if he succeeded, but I have my fears—he is very clever, but like so many of his craft, he has all sorts of odd, & strange notions about beauty, which stand very much in the way of his advancement in his profession. He is a writer of verses also,—if I can find you some he sent me the other day, I will enclose them.

Notwithstanding what you have said about modern Theologians, I should like you to look over one or two of Melvill’s Sermons, for I cannot help thinking you would like them– When I send my own book, his shall accompany it– [6] You can glance at it, at your leisure–—

The weather is quite dull & doleful enough now, to justify my wishing you sufficient merriment indoors, to resist its influence. For my own part, I am quite innocent of laughter this Christmas– My friends are all runagates and have left me alone. So for want of better companionship, I am obliged to talk to my dog—(I have known duller converse, many a time & oft) [7] —& listen to the crackling of my fire, in the absence of blyther sounds. Flossy tells me, confidentially, that he thinks Flush must be a very taciturn little dog, for he can’t wheedle a word out of him, and I tell him that little dogs are not all such rattlepates as he is, & that perhaps Flush sometimes thinks of him though he says nothing—whereupon, Flossy puts on a demure look, and is satisfied. Forgive me, dear Miss Barrett, for my trifling, for the sake of the season, & also because I have no one else whereon to extend my foolishness.

Believe that I am very grateful for your kind good wishes and that I [am],

Sincerely yours

T. Westwood.

P.S. I must not forget to thank you for your recommendation of ‘Orion’– I have read it again & again, & like it exceedingly—I thought it a little cold at first, but lost sight of that in the second reading– I was prejudiced against Horne, by the dramatic sketch in the Volume of the Tableaux, you lent me which I did not like at all– [8] His other dramas, I have not seen. I am grieved to hear of Tennyson’s illness—has he been overwriting himself?

Address: Miss E. B. Barrett / 50 Wimpole St / London.

Publication: None traced.

Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library.

1. Letter 1470.

2. EBB’s review appeared in The Athenæum of 27 August 1842 (no. 774, pp. 757–759).

3. Cf. Othello, I, 3, 166.

4. Illustrations of “The Legend of the Browne Rosarie” and “The Romaunt of Margret” (see letters 1409 and 1411).

5. No such designs appeared in The Art-Union in the course of 1844–45, but EBB saw them and commented on them in a letter to Westwood dated 11 December 1844.

6. EBB acknowledges receipt of these in letter 1485.

7. The Merchant of Venice, I, 3, 106.

8. “The Fetches,” Horne’s contribution to the 1840 Findens’ Tableaux.

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