1373. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 7, 314–315.
[London]
Sept 5. 1843.
Oh my dearest friend I feel as if I were in sackcloth. I feel as if I had betrayed you into this ambush of ill luck, & had to bear the blame of the sortie. Forgive me, do, on the credit of the innocence of my intentions!
For the rest you need not be uneasy; I wrote some days ago. And although I had not the heart to repeat your praise of the music, as, to be sure, I might have done, he certainly could not infer from anything said or left unsaid, that you were vexed or that I was vexed, or that the heiress intended to refuse him. [1] Be satisfied on this point! You shall not be plunged into deeper mud through an indiscretion of mine .. an indiscretion too against which you have forewarned me. Perhaps I am to blame more than enough already. I feel as if I were.
Do you reproach me my dearest friend? Frankly the case was this! I thought from the beginning that he was essentially disenchanting, & had stayed too long, & given too much trouble,—& that the hard opinion which he had managed to deserve, had generated upon your mind (always ardent whether in approbation or disapprobation) a harder opinion, which he did not deserve. I thought in fact that you were carried away by the impulse he himself had applied, into extending the objection from his manners to his character—and your subsequent letters seemed to justify my idea. I think still that he is benevolent & generous, & that if he could serve you, he would be ready & active in doing so, & that the necessity of a sacrifice wd not be an obstacle with him. Thinking so, & thinking very highly of his powers as a poet, I yet am far from understating to myself the extent of the annoyance which you have suffered & are likely to suffer from intercourse with him,—I am far from reconciling myself to the fact of your being annoyed so—I am very angry, very vexed, very restless about the whole business. I beseech you, be rude if it shd be necessary. Be decided in the manner of stating the impossibility of your receiving him again at your house. If he takes offence, you will have the advantage of being done with him. If not, the impending evil is turned aside for the moment. I beseech you to be quite decided. Supposing your supposition to be the true one, & that his object is to win & wear “the pretty Bessie”, [2] let him go on to do it as he began, .. in poetry, .. (which, if he shd be successful, she will understand at last)—and for that, it is not at all necessary that he shd muse in your garden or take baths three times a day in your house, or even shoot rabbits under Ben’s patronage, at Bearwood. Surely if the Walters’s [3] want him, they will settle it with him, .. invite him plainly—I do beseech you not to suffer yourself to be oppressed any more. You have done more than it was needful to do already; and the most decided ‘no’ could not be considered wonderful under the circumstances, from you to him.
Poor Araminta! After all, vexed as I am, I am conscious of a regard for him—a strong sense of all the interest he has shown towards me, .. & a high respect for his powers of mind. The Death of Marlowe, Cosmo de’ medici, Orion, plead for him with me, using melodious voices!– And then, towards myself, he has acted as a gentleman, losing no opportunity to offer me a kindness, & abusing no tact in offering it delicately. These things are facts as much as anything can be which has happened lately, & in forming an aggregate judgment of the man, I, at least, ought to recollect them. If he cd win some ‘pretty Bessie’ not engaged to you & with four thousand a year, I should certainly be glad,—and, considering the guitar & Orion, such a thing might be perhaps, in a strong abstraction of the bald head embroidered with roseleaves! After you have been resolute in keeping him out, be generous, dearest friend, in trying to forgive him. If it should be shyness, … why then, all these gesticulations are separate agonies!——consider!– Forgive him, be lenient in your thoughts of him—shutting the door fast all the time. Above all things I wd have you shut the door.
Of course it was “natural” for me to be vexed in my particular process of disenchantment; but, vexed that you told me in candour the whole breadth & length of your impression of our friend, I most certainly & surely was not. Do me justice I beg of you! You cannot suppose that between you & him, my bias cd be otherwise than to you—you cannot! No, no! I am satisfied that you cannot.
For the little packet, my only sigh is that it shd be so little! I was very vexed about the cayenne, but shall struggle to make amends for that vacancy. Tell me if the chocolate is as good as the last—for it appears to me that the ship-people have been rather stupified this voyage; & I shd be surprised to hear nothing bad of anything. Papa was glad to think of your finding it acceptable—& for you to thank anybody is the very vanity of gratitude!
No more for today, because there is no more time! Do write to me! I hang in suspence upon the crisis.
Your attached
EBB.
Publication: EBB-MRM, II, 296–298.
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum.
2. Bessie Browne, of Wyfold Court, Checkendon, near Henley, was one of the heiresses Horne was alleged to be pursuing.
3. The daughter of John Walter, proprietor of The Times, was the other heiress to have captured Horne’s interest.
___________________
