1631. EBB to Richard Hengist Horne
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 9, 19–21.
[London]
June [16–] 17. 1844 [1]
Certainly .. mark as much as you please! [2] They will all be marks of kindness, coming from you, whether depreciative or otherwise.
You intended me to show your yesterday’s letter to Miss Mitford––you know you did—but I did not show it, because she had been reproaching me for having allowed everybody under sun except herself, to see ‘Dead Pan,’ and I was unwilling to suggest the occasion of another reproach. The fact is that I have not shown it, although it has been shown——I never do [3] , of choice & desire, show my m∙s. poems. But this poem has had a sort of circulation independent of any impulse of mine, & more than equal to the general periodical-paper publicity. Still, I wd rather that you did not quote from it in the “New Spirits”, unless I preceded you by a step—or unless you had any particular wish about it. But why shd I not precede you? When do you come out? Tell me! I am in the middle of my second volume, & mean to make haste.
A second reason against showing the letter, related to Mr Chorley; who is a great favorite, .. & stands full in the “Dear sunshine” [4] properly called! I explained everything to her. I sympathize with you fully. Mr Powell passes for having the whole of his hand in the work to its detriment,—& indeed once somebody told me, that he was “very rich though a fool, & Mr Horne cd not help himself.” The circumstance of his being mentioned in the “Spirits of the Age” in combination with such a name as Browning, or even Marston, gave weight to the persuasion of his influence being “in it[’]’—because, you see, the real fact is that nobody beyond his personal friends has ever heard Mr Powell’s name, nor having heard it, cd possibly admit the force of a poetical claim. His “poetry” is the sort of amiable & indefinite melody which shd never have sounded past the home-threshold. It has smoothness, & grace, & is, good & holy—but any sign of the “divine faculty”, [5] even the most remote, it has not—& that, you are aware of, in your secret soul, as much as I am–
Oh no! Dont go to Germany & Spain! What do you mean by it? What nonsense! People will say triumphing, that you are running away—and I shall think .. that I am very sorry you are going away.
You made me laugh by your resolute determination against my “not being well enough”. So I shall be forced to see you—shall I? And I am not to mind whom I offend in passing? A forlorn hope of uncles & aunts & cousins has been repulsed these two years—but then, they did not blow such a trumpet of “should & would”. And do you know (in confidence!) that only a fortnight since, I refused to see Mrs Jameson? And I have refused various intellectual royalties besides, whose crowns I recognized, in falling back from the glitter of them—to say nothing of a New York bookseller [6] who promised to tell me (if I wd let him in) all the news of America,—& to verify to me that my ‘Seraphim’ had been written out in manuscript from the first page to the last, for the benefit of the backwoodsmen! Still, if you are so resolute, we must think of it—and if you do really go to Spain (which I do hope & trust you wont do!! To go! oh what nonsense!—) we must think more seriously of it. If I do see you, it must be quietly & silently, without anybody knowing enough of it to be aggrieved—for you know enough of the world to be aware that these straws (worthless trifles in themselves) will prick sometimes even through cloth of gold—& I am too seriously grateful for the offered attentions of many persons, to wish to appear ungrateful or capricious to any. The truth is, I am very weak,—& in a nervous, excitable state, which renders me quite & unaffectedly unequal to the ordinary intercourse of society. If any medical man had his finger on my pulse, heart or hand, while I am talking even to my dear friend Miss Mitford, whom I love so,—& am so familiar with, .. he wd tell you that it is strictly & literally thus. My blood is not ichor, yet runs as quick as Jove’s lightening, .. which is a fatal inconsistency. My whole illness has arisen from this excessive rapidity of the circulation,—medical watches being often put aside in despair of catching the uncountable time! Repose, therefore, is a necessity of my existence—and, to let in a flood of people, though they were the gods of Plato’s vision, [7] wd sweep my soul out of the window. Do you see? There is no affectation in it—it is a necessity. Still, there are other necessities in the “shds & wds”,—& we shall see. But dont go to Spain or Germany! Stay in England, & write Orions!
Also! Oh yes, yes, yes! Do, do, tell me the “first impressions.” [8] I will hear them confidentially.
Again—when is your book to be out? [9]
Ever & truly yours
EBB–
There is some power in Patmore after all .. he has a heart that can beat I think. Still the want of harmony is to the jarring degree,—& I cannot believe that his book is likely to make much impression. It is raw & uncouth .. you can call it no otherwise—& shd have been left to ripen. Of plagiarism from Tennyson I acquit the author—only that here & there one perceives that he has read that great poet & artist studiously. This, in extenuation or modification of a hasty programme of opinion written the other day!
Monday.
Dearest Miss Mitford goes away today—much to my loss & grief. She is both sunshine & moonshine, .. in her gaiety & kindness:—&, by the way, she was regretting very much having missed you on saturday. She wd tell Mr Chorley, she said.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: University of Texas.
1. The postscript headed “Monday” indicates that the letter was begun on Sunday, 16 June.
2. EBB had sent Horne the manuscript of “The Dead Pan” for his criticism. Letter 1635 contains her response to his comments.
3. Underscored three times.
4. Again a reference to Miss Mitford.
5. Cf. Wordsworth, The Excursion (1814), I, 79.
6. Charles Welford (1815–85), an English bookseller who had migrated to America about 1833, was a junior partner in the New York firm of Bartlett and Welford; he returned to England in 1864 to represent Scribner, Welford Co. (see letter 1518).
7. “The Dead Pan,” line 57. Cf. Plato, Phaedrus, 247, trans. B. Jowett.
8. In letter 1630, Horne had offered to give his first impressions of Chorley.
9. It appeared in late July (see letter 1671, note 5).
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