1948. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 10, 269–272.
[London]
Saturday morng [21 June 1845] [1]
It makes my heart leap [2] my beloved friend to think of you as coming so soon. Would it be quite the same thing if you were to come instead on thursday—by the way? Answer freely—only at once. [3] And, to keep you in countenance, here am I going to speak out freely in a matter for which perhaps you will reprehend me. But I appeal to your known goodness & indulgence my dear dear friend, & open my heart to you, & entreat you (taking courage from the imagination of your smile) to forgive me if I do not see Mr Chorley—though of course you shall see him, & he is as welcome as the air to this house. Now here is my case. I am weak & morbid—be it so!—I confess fully .. if you give me your absolution afterwards & leave me to the free enjoyment of my favorite sins. But it is not all weakness & morbidness—& to prove it—listen to me!–
Here is the summer, & for the last fortnight or longer (except for the want of sleep ..) I have been growing & growing just like the trees—it is miraculous, the feeling of sprouting life in me & out of me—& now I begin to sleep again & to look altogether like another person. But to get on & make progress such as I hope to make this summer, I must be quiet—& if you did but know the effect of seeing one person, or of talking to people I am accustomed to see, on the whole night’s rest after, you wd say as all my medical advisers have always said .. that “repose was my life.” Well then—just now is the turning point of the summer; & besides I am in the most peculiar circumstances you can fancy .. & persecuted on all sides, beyond your fancy, by letters & messages, & entreaties in each & all, of people who want to come in “for one moment.” As a statistical fact I will just mention to you that forty of our relations are at this time in London, [4] —everyone of them with an especial claim in his or her right hand—& male cousins (to boot) constantly in this house, & never seeing me!– Add to these my friends—infinitely more zealous, to do them justice—& the whole flock of sighing Aramintas! [5] Now a line must be drawn—or my sepulchre must be prepared—do you not see the necessity? I confided to you as a secret & in my trust in you [6] —that I had indeed .. after a struggle .. seen Mr Browning—but then, writing about poetry & criticism, in a correspondence we had, had made us personal friends, in a manner, before he came—& I honour his genius, & cd not refuse a request he thought it worth while to press so kindly on me .. when the circumstance of his living seven miles out of London made him exceptional, in itself,—& when he promised, in all faith, that the fact of his having seen me shd never escape his lips. Mr Kenyon too, whose friend he is, will not betray it—& you will not, I know——, but, you know, it wd be too ludicrous to administer such qualifying oaths of secrecy to one’s visitors all round,—& I neither could nor would do such a thing. I see the ridiculous side of it too quickly—if there were nothing else. No—. And thus, altogether, you will take pity on me & let me draw my line just now as I feel myself forced!—& my dear friend, I must confide to you besides that a peculiar reason why, just now, I object to receiving Mr Chorley, (whom, for the rest, I honour for many reasons & to whose acquaintance I look forward with hope for another brighter day,) is, .. that if Mr Horne were ever to know of my having given a welcome to his critic before I had done so to him, he would think it (not unnaturally) a mark of extreme unkindness on my part. You know I am grateful with reason to Mr Horne—he is my friend .. & I owe him my regard—. Well! I could not, comfortably to my own consciousness, receive Mr Chorley without receiving him—and really & really I am not equal to receiving all those men (if I quite liked it otherwise) in this room, on this sofa—the penalty being, after every interview, that I never can sleep in the night. Think a little of all this—& smooth those massive brows of yours my dear indulgent friend—& remember besides (what is truth) that to have room & strength for all the joy you bring me for so many hours of the day, it is a physical necessity for me to see only you that day .. unless it shd be Mr Kenyon who is at once nobody & everybody. And now be kind, & get me off just for the present with your Mr Chorley .. will you .. dear dearest friend? ah! I shall coax you into letting me have my own way. All women shd have their own way .. should’nt they? It’s an axiom. And for Mr Chorley, I will see him some time … you will see. [7] Let me take breath in a little more summer—& I shall get used to being down stairs & to going out. If I do but go on to make progress as I have felt to have done, in the last week .. day by day!! I am a different creature, as it is––& I am going to make a great effort & try the carriage .. if it goes slowly—slowly—& Mr Kenyon invites me to spend an hour or two in his house & I am making up a packet of courage for it. So that when you come to spend some days in London .. & you will do it in the course of the summer .. surely!! why then, we shall see how heroic & bold I shall have grown; & how I shall be fit for your Mr Chorley & for our Mr Horne perhaps together—. But you would not vex me I know .. not in the least thing—& indeed I wd not vex you! and if I had not faith in your generosity I shd not lean on it thus. In the case however that you are angry with me ....… I cannot, you know, let you be angry with me, … though I had to pay the cost in gold of Ophir. [8] So write & say that you will be generous—or I shall have to be submissive! There’s no choice for me. Only you will be generous? pas vrai? [9] And you will explain to Mr Chorley how my relations do congregate [10] at present, & how the fat bulls of Bashan [11] do shut me in on every side—& how my pleasure in knowing him must be delayed. For the rest, you will see him of course .. and I shall take care for you to see him in the backdrawingroom alone, where you may have your talk out uninterruptedly. And (if you are generous) prepare him for not seeing me. Tell him at once. Let there be no fuss. My heart is drawing knots through my back, at the very idea of a fuss!– I beseech you!–
Also & furthermore to prove my selfwill, I shall send by this day’s conveyance, a cape & some little things for you—& I shall wait to wring out about the size of the table when I see you.
Really you praise Zoe!– [12] Nevertheless I do not call her sister a fanatic—but honour, on the contrary, her memory as that of a highhearted & stronghearted christian woman. Surely there is nothing approaching to fanaticism in the tone of her writings, or of her mind as we learn it by the testimony of her private correspondence & friendships. She married a missionary—true!—& probably from the impulse towards missionary labour. Do you call that fanaticism, or philanthropy? I say, the last.
I shall send off this letter .. that you may receive it as early as possible. May God bless you—& do let me hear on monday morning, whether you can come on thursday next. Praise me for not falling into wailing & gnashing of teeth [13] because you come for “a few hours” instead of abiding by the bond. But I was half prepared for a temporary disappointment of the kind—& you wont let it be a final one—& then I cannot bear to teaze you when your goodness brings you to me at all.
Ever dearest Miss Mitford’s
gratefully affectionate
EBB.
Poor Catiline [14] is dead of sudden illness– The bloodhound you remember. It makes us all melancholy.
Address: Miss Mitford / Three Mile Cross / near Reading.
Publication: EBB-MRM, III, 119–122.
Manuscript: Eton College Library and Wellesley College.
1. Letter is postmarked 23 June 1845.
2. Cf. Wordsworth, “My Heart Leaps Up” (1807), line 1.
3. See letter 1951 in which EBB tells RB about Miss Mitford’s visit.
4. See letter 1940, note 2.
5. See letter 1364, note 1, for the first reference to Horne as “Araminta”; however, here EBB seems to use the name to describe other correspondents who pressured her to be admitted as visitors.
6. See letter 1930.
7. EBB did not see Chorley until after her marriage during a return visit to England in 1851.
8. Cf. I Kings 10:11.
9. “Is it not true?”
10. Cf. The Merchant of Venice, I, 3, 48.
11. Cf. Psalm 2:12.
12. See letter 1943, notes 9 and 10.
13. Cf. Matthew 8:12.
14. One of the two dogs (the other was called Resolute) that belonged to EBB’s brothers, Charles John and Henry (see letter 856). EBB’s cousin recorded that he “walked out with Alfred & Bell to see the stuffed skin of the dog poor Catiline” (Surtees, 1 July 1845). See illustrations on facing page.
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