2622. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 14, 18–20.
Moulins
Oct. 2. [1846] [1]
I began to write to you, my beloved friend, earlier, that I might follow your kindest wishes literally .. & also to thank you at once for your goodness to me .. for which may God bless you. But the fatigue & agitation have been very great, & I was forced to break off .. as now I dare not revert to what is behind—I will tell you more another day. At Orleans, with your kindest letter I had one from my dearest generous friend Mr Kenyon, who, in his goodness, does more than exculpate .. even approves—he wrote a joint letter to both of us. But oh, the anguish I have gone through!– You are good—you are kind .. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for saying to me that you wd have gone to the church with me. Yes—I knew you would. And for that very reason I forbore involving you in such a responsibility & drawing you into such a net. I took Wilson with me. I had courage to keep the secret to my sisters for their sakes—though I will tell you in strict confidence that it was known to them potentially .. that is, .. the attachment & engagement were known,—the necessity remaining, that, for stringent reasons affecting their own tranquillity, they shd be able to say at last <…> “we were not instructed in this & this.” The dearest, fondest, most affectionate of sisters, they are to me—and if the sacrifice of a life .. or of all prospect of happiness, .. would have worked any lasting good to them, .. it should have been made even in the hour I left them. I knew that, by the anguish I suffered in it. But a sacrifice, without good to anyone … I shrank from it! And also, it was the sacrifice of two. And he, as you say, had done everything for me—had loved me for reasons which had helped to weary me of myself .. loved me heart to heart, persistently .. in spite of my own will .. drawn me back to life & hope again when I had done with both. My life seemed to belong to him & to none other, at last, & I had no power to speak a word– Have faith in me, my dearest friend, till you can know him. The intellect is so little in comparison to all the rest .. to the womanly tenderness, the inexhaustible goodness, the high & noble aspiration of every hour. Temper, spirits, manners, .. there is not a flaw anywhere– I shut my eyes sometimes & fancy it all a dream of my guardian angel. Only if it had been a dream, the pain of some parts of it, would have awakened me before now: it is not a dream. I have borne all the emotion & fatigue miraculously well, though of course a good deal exhausted at times– We had intended to hurry on to the South at once, but at Paris we met Mrs Jameson, who opened her arms to us with the most literal affectionateness, kissed us both, & took us by surprise by calling us “wise people .. wild poets or not”. Moreover she fixed us in an apartment above her own, in the Hotel de la ville de Paris, [2] that I might rest for a week, .. & crowned the rest of her goodnesses by agreeing to accompany us to Pisa where she was about to travel with her young niece. Therefore we are five, travelling together––Wilson being with me! Oh yes!—Wilson came .. her attachment to me never shrank for a moment– And Flush came—and I assure you that nearly as much attention has been paid to Flush as to me from the beginning, so that he is perfectly reconciled, & would be happy, if the people at the railroads were not barbarians & immoveable in their evil designs of shutting him up in a box when we travel that way–
You understand now, ever dearest Miss Mitford, how the pause has come about writing. The week at Paris. Such a strange week, it was!—altogether like a vision. Whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell scarcely. [3] Our Balzac shd be flattered beyond measure by my thinking of him at all– Which I did—but of you, more. I will write & tell you more about Paris. You should go there indeed. And to our hotel, .. if at all. Once we were at the Louvre——but we kept very still of course, & were satisfied with the idea of Paris. I could have borne to live on there—it was all so strange & full of contrast.
Now you will write—I feel my way on the paper to write this– Nothing is changed between us—nothing can ever interfere with sacred confidences, remember I do not show letters .. you need not fear my turning traitress. Do tell me all of yourself– You shall hear, on your side. We go down the Rhone from Lyons .. & give a day to Vaucluse. Mrs Jameson is a kind, delightful travelling companion, & as she professes to be very much “in love” with Robert for her own part, we agree perfectly well—& her niece is a charming little girl just seventeen, & looking fifteen .. enjoying the sun & the rain like a child. For ourselves we are altogether happy—he loves me a good deal more, he says, than when we first set out a fortnight ago—there is perfect knowledge & sympathy on each side, to begin & go on with. Pray for me, dearest friend, that the bitterness of old affections may not be too bitter with me—& that God may turn those salt waters sweet again [4] —pray for your grateful & loving
EBB
Is it really needful to say that he is ready to love you .. helping me? And we both thank you from our hearts, for his beginning. May God bless you, dearest Miss Mitford. Write to Pisa—Poste Restante. I am so tired—so tired!
Address: Angleterre / Miss Mitford / Three Mile Cross / near Reading.
Publication: EBB-MRM, III, 190–193.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Year provided by postmark.
2. On 19 September, the Brownings, Wilson, and Flush began their journey from England to Italy. From London they crossed to Le Havre and then on to Paris. Soon after their arrival RB called on Mrs. Jameson and her niece, Gerardine. According to the latter, “Mrs. Jameson lost no time in going to the hotel [Hotel Messageries] where her friends were staying, and induced them to come at once to the quiet pension [Hotel de la Ville de Paris] in the Rue Ville l’Eveque, where she herself was staying” (Gerardine Macpherson, Memoirs of the Life of Anna Jameson, 1878, p. 230).
3. Cf. II Corinthians 12:2.
4. Cf. Exodus 15:23–25.
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