1835. EBB to Ellen Stansfeld
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 10, 63–65.
50 Wimpole Street. London.
February. 10. 1845.
Dear Madam [1]
I desire to offer through you to the Ladies Committee in Leeds for the Anti Corn Law Bazaar, & through them to the Council of the League, my very grateful sense of the honour they have conferred on me in selecting me as the writer of a poem with the high object in question. That the Cause is in my eyes, just & righteous, & to my heart, interesting & dear, they do me no more than justice in believing,—& also that my first impulse would have led me to accept gladly & proudly that office of giving exponency to a great popular wrong, to which they invite me in association with themselves. But I am obliged after all—and I cannot write the words without pain, .. to decline their invitation. I decline it in submission to the opinions of some of my friends whom it was my duty to consult, & whom I consulted the more readily in this case, because I knew them to be as much attached to the popular cause as they are affectionate to me. [2] I am forced by their representations to consider, that whatever slight influence for good, & <…> [3] for the kind of good contemplated by the League, may be looked for in my poetry, .. is to be rendered more diffusive & penetrating by keeping the poetry separated nominally & outwardly from all political associations, even the highest & purest. <In support of which view> [4] I venture to remind my sisters in Leeds, that when King Alfred went as a minstrel into the camp of his enemies, he did not go with the crown on his head & in the midst of an heroic squadron: if he had, the harp in his hand would have been useless. [5] And I who am no king but a very humble minstrel of the people, & a very loyal servant of that people from whom kingly power proceeds, .. I, .. if I put away from me the crown (of the honour now offered to me), I do it .. not that I may hide myself in safety, sit at ease in silence, but that I may go forward where I might not otherwise go and give the fullest expression <I can—with weak means,> [6] to those social & human Truths which are the foundations of the Rights for which patriots strive. And I request you to render acceptable to the Committee & also to the Council (if such words as mine be thought worth repeating there) an assurance that I shall carry in my heart to sustain me on the path of future duty, some permitted pride both as a woman & a writer, to have been considered by patriotic women & noble men of my country, [7] not altogether unworthy of a trust which I desire never essentially & when the principle is in question & not the form, in any measure to disappoint–
I am
dear Madam
Your’s faithfully
Elizabeth Barrett Barrett.
Publication: None traced.
Source: EBB’s draft, Armstrong Browning Library.
1. Possibly Ellen Stansfeld (1780–1861), eldest unmarried sister of Hamer Stansfeld (1797–1865), of Headingley Lodge, Leeds, Chairman of the Leeds Anti-Corn Law Association. “Miss Stansfeld, Headingley Lodge” is listed as “Secretary” in an advertisement for the “League Bazaar,” Leeds Mercury, 22 February 1845 (p. 4).
3. Here, EBB has deleted the word “especially.”
4. Inserted above the line.
5. A reference to the tradition that King Alfred, when preparing for battle with the Danes, infiltrated the Danish camp disguised as the always-welcomed minstrel, and, using his musical talent, was able to learn what he needed to know in order to defeat the Danes.
6. EBB substituted this phrase for “possible to my weakness,” which she crossed out.
7. EBB originally wrote “of my country & noblemen,” then made a transposition by use of numerals.
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