Correspondence

2233.  EBB to Mary Russell Mitford

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 12, 115–117.

[London]

[ca. 1] [March 1846] [1]

Ever dearest Miss Mitford, how wonderfully the winter does forget itself & seem inclined to go on dreaming of summer into summer back again. I have been down stairs several times, & with no disadvantage—& perhaps some day when it is not damp, besides being warm, I may get out into the carriage .. or walk a little in the street .. who knows? In the meanwhile, not a word do you say about the arrowroot. Is it good, bad, or indifferent? Will you have some more?– I have ordered some oysters for you. And now I am going to talk of Mr Russell [2] & the ‘refrain’–

I have considered my ever dear kind friend, & certainly it does seem to me, that the natural refrain of that poem should be the first line repeated

 

‘Do you hear the children weeping, o my brothers?’

or if a reference to the machinery is absolutely desirable why there are the four lines ending

 

‘O ye wheels (breaking out in a mad moaning)

Stop!—be silent for today.’

It does seem to me that it would be difficult to graft in your refrain on the body of the poem—but I yield to reasonable remonstrance, if necessary, & leave it in your hands. The probability is that Mr Russell will not care for either my thoughts or my rhymes. Your goodness has the habit, I know, of running miles before ordinary probabilities.

Did I tell you of George Sand’s last book, ‘Le Peché de M. Antoine’– [3] If I mentioned him it was as ‘M. Thomas’ through a mistake: & now I have the book & am deep in the first volume, liking it exceedingly. It is the organ of her social doctrine of the evil of accumulated riches quand même, [4] & is full of fine open sympathies towards the masses, such as I love & delight in. I go very far with her, the more I think—& little as her opinions make harmony with what we have taken for good music in these British islands, with their proprietors & operatives, ever so long. But it is an idealism after all, .. that divine œconomy she teaches, .. & men are not near enough to the angels to act it out. Do get the book. It seems full of excellence in many ways—though I have not finished the first volume as I said, & should be modest in giving an opinion.

Oh, I see now that you like the arrowroot. I look again to the letter. The first time I thought you mentioned without speaking of the quality. Well—you shall have more then.

And for Mr Chorley, the worse thing you told me of him was his observation about the De Kocks. I do admit & consider that for a man to hold two persons to be “the most charming in Paris,” & to offer an introduction to them with the warning that they should be cast off & disowned in common conversation,—never mentioned however associated with, .. that, I do consider bad & disloyal .. yes, & so bad & disloyal, that I almost doubt whether you must not have misunderstood what he said—it seems incredible for the word of so loyal a man. [5] I for my part, would never make a charming acquaintance whom I was too lâche [6] to acknowledge openly: & I think ill of any person who would do so. De Kock is a coarse, animal writer .. a conventional beast of the very cleverest. To name him with such a writer as Balzac is what I could not—inasmuch as passion is not after all appetite .. & then De Kock takes in all the conventions of low life,—with him it is not even nature at the lowest. Grandeur he never sees at a distance even—he eats drinks sleeps, laughs & is fat. [7] Still, he can write very amusing (as amusement goes) books sometimes, & now & then rather decent books—& he may be a kind jovial man enough … ‘charming’ as people fancy .. he would not charm me, I may answer for myself.

‘Teverino’ preceded ‘Le Peché’ [8] —but I have not read it.

How do you get on with the French? Tell me honestly if I can get you a book which wd be of use—& say how Mr Buckingham is, & whether you feel within you no recoiling at the approach of the time fixed for going to Paris.

Ever your affectionate

EBB

Publication: EBB-MRM, III, 163–165 (as [early March 1846]).

Manuscript: Wellesley College.

1. Dated by EBB’s reference in the following letter to Henry Russell’s proposal that “The Cry of the Children” be set to music.

2. Henry Russell (1812–1900), singer and composer, who gave “one-man entertainments” (DNB), had studied with Rossini in Naples. In the following letter to RB, EBB includes the refrain that Russell had sent for her “approval,” along with a fairly unflattering description of him as a performer. Miss Mitford’s opinion of him was somewhat more positive. In a letter to Charles Boner, she called Russell “a great tragic actor” (Memoirs and Letters of Charles Boner, ed. R.M. Kettle, 1871, I, 93).

3. See letter 2221, note 7.

4. “All the same.”

5. In a brief description of a meeting with Paul de Kock in 1837, quoted in Chorley’s Autobiography (ed. H.G. Hewlett, 1873, I, 259–264), Chorley makes no mention of de Kock’s unacceptability in Parisian society; however, de Kock remarked to Chorley that critics mistreated him “because he belonged to no coterie, and would not do service for service.” Chorley wrote that the French author was “twice the worth of Byron as a husband, a father, and a friend.”

6. “Cowardly.”

7. Cf. The Shirburn Ballads (1585–1616), XXI, stanzas 2 and 6. EBB’s opinion of de Kock had remained consistent; e.g., see letters 1567 and 1585.

8. Teverino and Le Péché de Monsieur Antoine were both written during the first half of 1845, but the latter was not published until 1846.

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