1317. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 7, 231–234.
[London]
July 10. 1843.
Poor, poor Bishop Baines! [1] It must have shocked you I think! A comparatively young man too, .. & active, I suppose, mentally at least!–
What Mr Horne will say of your Ben I do not know, but he amuses me with his fashion of reigning over you, .. & does not, I suspect, displease the subject– The name of Kerenhappuch (what a singular name!) will not dishonor his geranium, .. the signification being or appearing to be “a horn or ray of Beauty” in the Hebrew, & the Greek Septuagint translating it by “Amalthæa’s horn” [2] rather poetically than literally. Has your K .. (I do not wonder now at your calling her K .., the rest of the letters lying in such an Orientalism!) two sisters with the designations of the two other daughters of Job, [3] —taking the names by seniority before she fell into the unenunciatable estate of the third?– It is the most curious name, I shd think, in Christendom; & I scarcely know what Sterne & you would make of your theory in relation to it. [4] Well!—I wish a happy floral good-luck to the new seedling by whatever name you set it a-flourishing! If it’s a Jew, may the rose of Sharon be a type of its prosperity, & the dew which falls upon Lebanon, fall ever freshly in the blessing of it!—— [5] <N.B. ‘I have such a bad pen that I cant spell’.> [6]
Yes, I think that Pride & Prejudice is one of the very best of the Austen novels—and yet I do not quite rank it with Mansfield Park,—it seems to take the line just below. Sense & Sensibility is inferior, by my impression, to every one of them .. & I am inclined to call that weak & commonplace occasionally. The higher however Pride & Prejudice stands with you, the further goes the working of Mr Kenyon’s criticism. [7] I am so glad it crossed your letter, pricking you through my innocence!
Poor Mr Haydon! I have been quite grieved for him!– He is satisfied however with the decision, except as far as relates to the first prize, which was given to a young man called Armitage, a pupil of the French artist Paul Delároche; [8] & which he considers a mere throwing of the sop to Continental criticism in Art, & a preference very unjust in its reflection upon English art. Mr Kenyon too did not much admire the Invasion (Armitage’s) & the Morning Chronicle (I think) & certainly the Athenæum & Examiner [9] think more highly of other works. Nobody however says much, or anything indeed, of poor Mr Haydon’s Entrance of the Black prince & King John captive into London––but I am hoping that two good words dropped by the Examiner on “The Expulsion out of Paradise,” & “The Curse,” may one of them apply to his Adam & Eve. [10] I can only hope this—knowing only the subject & not the distinctive name & number adopted by the artist. Poor Mr Haydon! He seemed much excited at first, & I was afraid that he wd be imprudent & expansive with the public after his fashion—but there is a generous nature under all his personal susceptibilities, and he has attained to saying nobly instead, “I am satisfied.” And this up-bearing makes one still more full of sympathy for him!– It is a hard stroke—& there is something in the adversity, which humiliates,—as adversities do not necessarily. The Athenæum you will observe, is by no means exultant over this new insight into the artistic power of England, .. speaking scornfully of the want of intellectual power & originality, [11] & distrustfully of our purpose & intention of compassing great ends with means so narrow. But then the Athenæum is in a jaundice upon certain subjects. Mr Darley has distilled a morbid despondency into the very heart of it with regard to poetry [12] —& the Melancholy leans in an attitude, over into the next art-division of painting! and to believe some of those writers, not only are all our great lights of genius gone out in England, but our pyro-technical matches are soaked into an estate of everlasting wetness. Only in music, is the Athenæum heart-full & vivid—Mr Chorley does that for them. Therefore I hope, I hope that the cartoons have greatness,—& promise hereafter more! That Mr Haydon shd applaud them in his disappointment sounds well .. at least would, .. if it did not sound so melancholy. Poor Mr Haydon.
My beloved friend, you are pleased & troubled by your visitors .. & I hope that you will let it remain a pleasing trouble, & not be driven into a larger vexation. You who are an offshoot of Jupiter Hospitalis [13] may, to be sure, sustain twofold daily tea parties, where I, [14] who am far from being divine, wd sink into a swooning away from my sublunary good temper, & call the whole irruption, .. a bore. But even for you a continuation of the crowding in on you may be too much—you may be tired before you are ‘’ware’ [15] —& then, if a habit is established, it will be a little awkward to have to stoop & take up your thunderbolts. If I were you, I would set limits, & name days, & establish a discipline even before you are tired, that you may not be ultimately &, by surprise, worn out. And then I want you not to talk away the bloom of your mind. I want to lay sheets of paper under the rose-leaves– I dont want them to fly off upon the gusty garden winds & be nevermore seen—& nothing more said except perhaps “Miss Mitford was agreeable tonight”! So I mean to teaze .. how I mean to teaze you! as much as if I drank tea with you three times on one night, & promised to come again the next!–
The reason why I have not teazed you for several days is that I have caught cold in some inscrutable manner & been unwell in consequence––uncomfortable .. in pain & feverishness. Now I am much better if not quite well again—& perhaps ‘quite well’ may be too strong language even with the modification .... “for me”: I only mean to be so tomorrow!
Mr Horne is evidently delighted with you & your cordiality, & I hope that in some sufficient measure you may return the compliment. I understand that he plays well on the piano, & “like a professor” on the guitar, besides singing with much character & expression. Do you care much for music? Do you? That I shd ask the question so doubtingly almost seems as if you did’nt very much! Well but I think you must care something for it by this poetry for which you do care .. & even if you care only something, you will like to hear Spanish romances sung to the guitar under the bay tree by a voice & hand skilful in the art! Oh .. I shd like it! Ask me—& then I shall wish to fly!—& so be more particularly sensible than usual.
Your ever affectionate
EBB.
Publication: EBB-MRM, II, 264–267.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. He had died on 6 July, aged 57.
2. Amalthæa fed Jupiter with goat’s milk. From this, some ancient authors held her to be a goat, one of her horns being given by Jupiter to the nymphs who had watched over his infant years. This horn had the power of giving them whatever they desired.
3. The two elder daughters were called Jemima and Kezia; Miss Mitford’s maid had the misfortune to be named after the third, Kerenhappuch (Job, 42:14).
4. In Tristram Shandy (1759–67), Sterne writes that Tristram’s father’s opinion “was, that there was a strange kind of magick bias, which good or bad names, as he called them, irresistibly impressed upon our characters and conduct” (bk. I, ch. 19). Miss Mitford shared this view (see letter 727).
5. Cf. The Song of Solomon, 2:1 and Psalms, 133:3.
6. This passage is squeezed in at the conclusion of the page to explain the crossing out of EBB’s first attempt to spell “blessing.”
7. EBB had quoted Kenyon’s opinion of Jane Austen in letter 1313.
9. The Morning Chronicle of 3 July, The Athenæum of 1 July and 8 July, and The Examiner of 8 July all commented on the judges’ decision. The Chronicle did not dissent, but The Athenæum of 8 July thought Armitage’s choice of subject “a grave mistake. Its import is the degradation, not the exaltation of England.” “First Trial by Jury” (no. 105), by Charles West Cope (1811–90), was held to be “the finest work in the collection.” The Examiner found Armitage’s cartoon “deficient in those highest qualities which the highest premiums should probably have exacted” and preferred “Caractacus Led in Triumph Through the Streets of Rome” (no. 84), by George Frederic Watts (1817–1904). Cope and Watts, together with Armitage, each received £300.
10. Not so, unfortunately. “The Curse” (no. 33) and “The Expulsion out of Paradise” (no. 55) had no connection with Haydon.
11. “The disposition courageously to grapple with compositions on a great scale is as manifest as we had anticipated; but greatness is not a question of scale alone, and we should have been startled by the general absence of intellectual power and originality had we not foreknown that in boudoir art and book illustration—hitherto the staple occupation of our artists—the higher faculties are but sparingly demanded” (8 July, p. 633).
12. See letter 927 for EBB’s earlier comments on Darley’s view of the state of English poetry.
13. The name given to Jupiter in his capacity as god of hospitality.
14. Underscored twice.
15. Romeo and Juliet, II, 2, 103.
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