2048. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 11, 103–104.
[London]
Tuesday. [30 September 1845] [1]
Between relief almost & regret quite, my dearly loved friend, I received your resolution about monday. [2] If I go at all it will probably be early in the next week—& yesterday I saw another medical man, a consulting surgeon of long experience, [3] who confirmed Dr Chambers’s judgment in the strongest words possible. If I had gone years ago, I should have been well now, he says—& the prospect (as it is) is the best prospect. The nervous system is said to be much prostrated .. but everything is recoverable if I go—there is no question in good sense—it is said to be ‘matter of perception.’
Yet I am disquieted within me still, & cannot enter on the subject, my ever dearest Miss Mitford, even to you.
Before I go, I shall remember Rolandi—so do not let him apply to you for payment. [4]
Your parcel (from Miss Cushman probably) has only just arrived [5] —& I send it to you without delay, lest you should attribute the delaying to me. But believe that I cannot be forgetful of you, even while I am so little calm as to shrink from this farewell.
I may go to Madeira perhaps after all—the place is so little fixed.
May God bless you. You shall hear again. See what Mr Chorley has had the goodness to write to me! Is it not kind of him?
Ever your affectionate & grateful
EBB.
Publication: EBB-MRM, III, 138 (as [2 September 1845]).
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. This letter follows one of 29 September (no. 2047) in which EBB mentions “doctors,” implying that someone in addition to Dr. Chambers had examined her. In a letter to RB (no. 2046) written on the same day, EBB mentions Madeira as a possible destination.
2. i.e., to cancel her visit to London.
3. Probably Dr. Francis Robert Jago (d. 1862) whom EBB mentions in a letter to RB on 4 February 1846 as giving medical advice.
4. EBB had begun a subscription for Miss Mitford to the bookseller, Pietro Rolandi, in April 1844 (see letter 1601).
5. Charlotte Cushman had recently visited Miss Mitford at Three Mile Cross (see letter 1998).
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