1513. EBB to Richard Hengist Horne
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 8, 175–177.
[London]
Monday. [29 January 1844] [1]
I could almost quarrel with you & be sure of being right withal in defiance of prophecy, [2] (if I had the heart) for sending me this (far too expensive) present. How cd you do so my dear Mr Horne? It is a splendid book: but, instead of “poetical suggestions,” [3] it suggests thoughts & murmurings over your hyperboles in generosity. To me, who have so many books from you already—to say nothing of Sybilline wood-leaves!!! [4] It’s too bad .... or good of you—for I must come to thanking you earnestly after all,—and you are too kind to me, .. not beginning now to be so. What visions of beauty! “There is a spirit in the leaves”. [5] But the spirit of the kindness is the over-mastering one.
I think from a far remembrance that Mrs Norton’s first poem was called “The Undying One”. Her chief poem .. that is, the principal one,—in her last volume, is “The Dream”. Have you read these? to be of opinion still, as said the Quarterly, that she is a modification of Byron?. [6] The only poems which cd have suggested such a likeness, are the personal ones, I fancy,—& they, with some intensity & much pathos, are very unlike Byron, I must hold as my own particular “doxy”. “Less vindictive”.! [7] Ah Mr Horne– Do you too call Byron vindictive?– I do not. If he turned upon the dart, it was by the instinct of passion, not by the theory of vengeance, I believe & am assured. Poor, poor Ld Byron! Now wd I lay the sun & moon against a tennis-ball that he had more tenderness in one section of his heart, than Mrs Norton has in all her’s,—though a tenderness misunderstood & crushed, ignorantly, profanely & vilely, by false friends & a pattern wife. His blood is on our heads—on us in England! even as Napoleon’s is!– Two stains of the sort have we in one century—& what will wash them out?
There is a poem, much shorter than the first, & yet longer than the mere lyrics,—(in “The Dream & other poems”) the title of which I forget,—with a domestic subject, & written in stanzas; which has to my apprehension, more power than any other composition of Mrs Norton’s. [8] Find it out, & read it. Some of her songs for music are very lovely .. and her lyrics of more body have the qualities of sweetness & pathos to a touching & thrilling degree. “The Dream” you may like better than I do. The personal references in the miscellaneous poems go deep & true, & are as tenderly written as ink mixt with tears can write anything. My wager of the sun & moon intended no depreciation of their tenderness,—& referred to the character of the writer under a personal & general aspect.
Do find out the domestic poem .. which is not, by the way, a personal poem. It will strike you I think; & your critics may say that it is “almost masculine” in characteristic power.
You shd remember moreover that she composes music, published with her own words– Also .. did she not edit at one time either the Court Journal or the Belle Assembleè? [9] And she has contributed prose tales of full colour & expression to various of the annuals..
My earnest request to you is, not [10] to take for granted anything I say—but to look into the poems yourself. Mary Howitt’s ballads are nearer & dearer to me, & suggestive of a far higher species of poetical power, according to my view, than any volume I ever saw of Mrs Norton’s,—& then you know how prejudices work, & I confess to you in confidence a little disinclination towards the woman herself which may vibrate, in spite of me, thro’ my estimate of her writings. Now mind—I do not say it is so—but that it may be so—and I put you on your guard lest it be so. She has the face of an angel & the tongue of a wit—but tender & pitiful to woman as a woman shd be, she is not, .. & for this I cannot easily pardon her. I do not speak out of personal experience—& I do speak in confidence to you——& you wont tell Mr Reade–
With thanks once again, believe me
Ever & truly yours
EBB
I shd have forgotten Mrs S C Hall too—only just as I was writing to you, comes a note from her to me with some proposition about a new magazine—a lady’s magazine!! So I bethought me of naming her to you. Oh—and you must make room for her. [11]
Publication: EBB-RHH, I, 225–231 (in part, as 30 January 1844).
Manuscript: Pierpont Morgan Library.
1. According to EBB-RHH, this letter originally had a postmark of 30 January 1844, a Tuesday.
2. See the postscript to letter 1500.
3. EBB is quoting from Horne’s letter (no. 1511) sending her the book she now thanks him for.
4. The Sibylline Books were a collection of oracular utterances consulted by the Roman Senate in times of emergency or disaster.
5. Cf. Wordsworth’s “Nutting” (1799), line 56. EBB follows Christopher North, who substituted “leaves” for “woods” when quoting the line in his Recreations (1842).
6. Mrs. Norton published The Sorrows of Rosalie in 1829, followed by The Undying One in 1830 and The Dream in 1840. The Quarterly Review of September 1840, in its notice of The Dream (pp. 374–382), said Mrs. Norton “has very much of that intense personal passion by which Byron’s poetry is distinguished … She also has Byron’s beautiful intervals of tenderness, his strong practical thought, and his forceful expression” (p. 376). Horne gives an extract from the poem in A New Spirit (II, 136–137).
7. EBB is again quoting from letter 1511.
8. Assumed to be “Twilight,” (pp. 99–108 in The Dream), “a striking composition” (A New Spirit, II, 140).
9. Mrs. Norton edited The Court Magazine and Belle Assemblée 1832–37.
10. Underscored four times.
11. Horne did include a brief comment on Mrs. Hall’s works in the chapter on Irish Novelists (II, 150–151).
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