1079. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 6, 209–211.
[London]
Dec. 8. 1842–
My heart is with you my beloved friend .. beside that curtain! and it must make a little movement, just as Flush wd do, to assure you of its presence!
Your letter is very affecting to me. May God make this change like ‘sleep’ to him, even as the Son of God called it. [1] May he pass softly as in a sleep, from your true & tender love to God’s love—the only love fit to replace it!– And you—you! It is for you we have to grieve, my dearest dearest friend!–
I shall go on writing a little, altho’ my thoughts about you hang heavily on my pen—and the paper will do, to hold in your hand, or to shut up in a drawer, (I always fancy so) supposing you to be in no mind to read it.
I was going to write of Tennyson since you mentioned him—but I think of you so, that even poetry seems strange to me. This farmhouse plan—I think of it & you quite painfully. All this time, & thro’ all my silence, I have thought, thought, thought, what you wd determine in regard to residence,—& I dare’nt speak of it first, lest I shd grieve you—& I have spun on silently & vainly, therefore, my thinking, thinking, thinking. And now you speak—& now I must cry out, … Why a farmhouse near Reading? I forewarn you my beloved friend. There is a conspiracy here in London, at the head of which stands Mr Harness, & near the head of which stands Mr Kenyon, to draw you into a residence in London! For myself, I am not of it,—I am too interested in the success of it!– I shd feel like a judge with a bribe in his pocket if I took an active part in it! Think of the happiness your residence here wd bring to me! Ah I dare not think of it– And besides .. my business & (to do myself justice) my desire is, to think of your happiness!–
Mr Kenyon said to me (among a hundred other arguments) “She wd adapt herself to London as you have done, & we wd all pet her until she was forced to like London”–
Well!—but if she wont like London,—why not settle at Hampstead, or Kensington—where she cd have a garden, & the advantages of town & country—and where we shd be so close together. …! Ah Selfishness!—, indeed you shdnt talk so loud. That was past an aside.
Forgive me—I shd not talk yet of these things .. I may (talking in the dark) strike against some painful string, without knowing how I did it. Only since you did mention the farmhouse near Reading, I WD just whisper (by way of a balancing of thin air) [2] a cottage at Hampstead,—& say how pretty the cottages are, & how Arabel walks backwards & forwards across the park through fields all the way at the other side of the park to the site of them—& how we cd enquire of rents & prices,—& how the farmhouse at Reading wd be noisy with pigs & cows, as all farmhouses out of a picture-book are,—& how … oh! there are a hundred other whispers, but I abbreviate them for the moment in these suggestive ones.
Do you really object to the re-iteration of Oriana? Do you think it affected? To my mind, it is highly artistic, & effective instead! It rang all day in my head when first I read it—‘Oriana Oriana’. [3] You hear the Norland wind wail in it! [4] As to certain of the Eleonoras & Adelines there may be certain affectations here & there among them [5] ––but I do agree with you, heart & soul, cordially & earnestly, in the true, great poethood of Tennyson.
The post, the post. I must go—that is, end!
Mrs Dupuy’s letter returns to you without its envelope which belongs to me by virtue of your dear writing on it—and indeed, I admit that she speaks worthily & rightly of the threatened evil—& not a word too much! May the evil (admitted to be great) only threaten. Mr Kenyon told my sisters that all her legal friends were sure of a favorable result & that in the meanwhile the money cd not be fraudfully touched: & these were better arguments for hope than the mere surety of a just cause which alas, will secure very little in a court of Law, as all victims know–
Are we like in destiny, in anything, my beloved friend? If so, I may be satisfied indeed! Only we differ widely & certainly … in my faults—and upon that point, I require consolation.
You will never make out either the letter or the spirit [6] of my MS. today, it having been flown through rather than written, with the fear of the post before my eyes.
Ever dearest Miss Mitford—may God bless you!– Believe how deeply I felt that “alone in the room”. Ah yes, yes!– I feel that bitter distinction. And because I feel it, & because I love & estimate you wholly & fully, understand & admire all your excellence & sympathize in your griefs, .. let me be as a sister in heart to you, my beloved friend .. let me be admitted as a real, close, true relation, & so destroy for you that idea of being ‘alone’.
Your attached, at least,
EBB–
Publication: EBB-MRM, II, 111–113.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Cf. John, 11:11–13.
2. Cf. The Tempest, IV, 1, 150.
3. The review of Tennyson’s Poems in The Church of England Quarterly echoed Miss Mitford’s view rather than EBB’s: “four ‘Orianas’ to every stanza, in the ballad of that name, amounting to forty-four in all, burlesque all music and feeling, and become a parrot-cry instead of a melody” (October 1842, p. 362). (EBB, in letter 1065, ascribed authorship of this review to Leigh Hunt.) The poem was originally published in 1830.
4. Cf. lines 6 and 91 of “Oriana.”
5. “Eleänore” and “Adeline” were first published in 1832 and 1830 respectively; both were reprinted in Poems (1842).
6. Cf. II Corinthians, 3:6.
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