1272. Richard Hengist Horne to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 7, 167–168.
[London]
June 1/43
My dear Miss Barrett, I assure you that any pleasure you may derive from “Orion” and any sympathy you may feel, are to me far more gratifying than a good hundred of gentle readers. [1]
I was amused with your incredibility, in your first note. [2] But no wonder.
You speak of wishing for ‘sundry copies.’ I fear you may have been disappointed, as my orders to the publisher were very strict—not to allow any one to have more than a single copy. You see, I have no other check against people going with bags. It is less than the value of waste paper. [3] The other check is in the nature of the experiment, and operates with ludicrous force—I mean the incredulity and vanity of the Londoners. They are afraid of being hoaxed.
So there is no other way of getting copies but to make people go for them. They must pay by going. I will not even answer for sending a servant, unless he has a note from a sender.
The article on “Turkish Travellers” is by Miss Pardoe, interpolated by the Ed. to her great rage—I heard. [4]
“Festus” is written by J. B. Rogerson, [5] a man whom I consider to possess pre-eminent powers of graphic thought, and ungoverned passion in composition. Great ideality of mind.
I know Heraud—very fond of him.
I still do not comprehend why you “withdrew” your intended Vol. of Poems.
Excuse all this abruptness. But it is because I really do write to reply to all questions while they are hot.
I am still very much out of health. Some stupidity of the liver, I believe. I do not have a fever.
Yours truly dear E.B.
H.
Address: Miss E. B. Barrett / 50 Wimpole St / Cavendish Sq.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Pierpont Morgan Library.
1. Cf. Wordsworth, “Simon Lee, the Old Huntsman” (1798), ix, 3.
3. Orion was being sold for a farthing.
4. In letter 1265, EBB had speculated that Horne might be the author of this article in The Foreign and Colonial Quarterly Review. However, as Miss Pardoe’s own book, The City of the Sultan, was one of ten works reviewed under that heading, his attribution is suspect.
5. John Bolton Rogerson (1809–59), actor, playwright and poet, was the editor of The Oddfellows’ Magazine, but did not write Festus. Published anonymously in 1839, this was the work of Philip James Bailey (1816–1902).
___________________
