2739. EBB to Arabella Moulton-Barrett
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 15, 102–111.
Florence.
July 4– [1848] [1]
My ever loved Arabel, I am writing on a day which brings you closer to me than ever & makes my heart fuller than usual of the love with which it is always full to you. [2] How can I make you feel this as I do, through the mountains & the sea. Yet it would scarcely be easier if I were nearer. May God bless you my dear dearest Arabel, as I love you—or better than I love you, since He must always in His blessings be beyond us when we try most to bless one another in our poor love– Dear darling Arabel, what I would give to see you, to be with you, to talk to you face to face! Next year at this time, we shall be together again– A few months, and then a meeting, if God pleases. Meanwhile you all seem bent on punishing me for not going sooner to England– Oh, if this were another day than it is, I should not have the heart to write on it to you .. so very long is it since I first wished in vain for a letter from you. Now, calculate. Here is the fourth of July .. and the last letter is dated April—and I have written & written, four, .. five times .. this is the fifth time .. and not a movement in reply? Is it right, I ask of you both!—— Certainly, twice, through Mr Kenyon, I have had little strips of paper with a few words to tell me bad news: but not one letter, have I had!—and most seriously frightened I should be (I am at moments, as it is!) if Robert had not talked it into my head that, by failure of your direction, the letter has gone astray. Whenever you write, .. and I do beseech you for pity’s sake to be more regular in writing, let it be with the utmost precision of your pen in the address. Take care of the great Bs and the little double u s; and remember that we by no means read as well in Italy as you do in England. Think, beside, that even if you have written one letter between you, you & dearest Henrietta, the letter which is astray, .. one swallow does’nt make a summer, nor one letter my full right. Surely you shd write oftener than once in two months. If I did only that, what would you say?
Yet, today, there shall be no more reproaches. Robert has been very unwell with influenza, till I was a little uneasy at his feverish hands & distressed eyes—but he is better again & the weather is somewhat cooler .. which is good for him .. and for me too, though I have been quite well, through heat & coolness. We keep our rooms bearable & at seventy five or six, when it is unbearable out of doors, between eighty & ninety in the shadiest places, by just shutting the windows close, .. the glass windows I mean! It’s the only way– In England you wd suffocate rather faster by doing such a thing, but here the light air saves you. Then at six oclock, there’s always a sort of breeze & freshness .. and so, we throw open every window in a moment, & Robert draws my arm-chair close to a wide open one & sits down by me on a heap of cushions, and we have the tea tray on two chairs, & sometimes kneadcakes of Wilson’s making, .. and so we talk & have tea, & then either walk up & down on the terrace, or put on our hats & wander out of doors fairly. But we have had thunder & rain, & the thermometer stands at seventy this morning—delightfully cool, that is, in Italy—and after all, I have been able to dress as usual, corset & all, every morning this year—whereas last year, you know how I abandoned myself to a dressing-gown, which is the manner of men & women here in Florence. Bearable as it is however, we scheme seriously about getting away for a few weeks, .. just a month, perhaps, .. for Fano & the Adriatic, and the great Fair of Sinigaglia. Ravenna is given up for the sake of the expence—we cant afford such a round, we fear: and Ravenna will do for another excursion, beside. Now Fano will not cost much, or if we find on enquiry that it does, we shall probably go to Siena or some, nearer place. The mountain-monasteries, we have clung to, as a necessary part of our summer-tour:—but there will be a great deal of riding on horseback, or mule-back, or ass-back at best, and if I dont feel supernaturally strong, it may very likely end in nothing just now. Oh, I dont say—but 36 miles of road “impossible to wheels”, one looks at consideringly before one attempts! Still, it would be most delightful—& there are resting-places .. sleeping-places even, I suppose .. where one may lie on a mat & eat the biscuit out of one’s knapsack, here & there in the hills & chesnut forests. Oh, if you were with us, how delightful!– The road to Fano, itself, takes us over the Appenines, & abounds, they say, in wonders of beauty! Supposing we go at all, it will be towards the end of the present month—we shall see.
And our furnishing is nearly done—that is, everything essential is nearly provided, & waits for the arranging—the man to polish the carved wood & to put up beds & bookcases, curtains, bellropes & the like. This morning, a side board arrived—about a hundred years old .. looking like a chest of drawers, but with groupes of figures at the sides, and old men’s heads for handles, & locks of gilt bronze– Beautiful it will be, when polished & done up. And with it came a seat of carved wood, all in grinning heads & arabesque, for the drawing room. Illus. Let your fancy set a crimson velvet cushion in it, & a band of crimson velvet for the back behind .. no wood, observe, but just the velvet. [3] [ART] This comes from a convent in Urbino, & is of the most curious antiquity, & extremely beautiful & highly wrought. Robert got them yesterday, and I applaud them today—four pounds the two! But of all our purchases, I am not at all sure that I dont enjoy the armchairs most, .. particularly one which Robert calls mine, because it’s the most luxurious of possible chairs, very low, very languid looking .. as if the back of it were drooping from the softness of the seat. Here’s my chair, Arabel! Illus. No—it looks uncomfortable as I have drawn it—so rather take my word for it than my work. You sink into it as into a nest of air, I assure you, & find a difficulty in getting up. The two new sofas are not stuffed yet, & stretch their skeleton arms. Illus. They, too, are very low, & we mean to fill them with springs & cover them with crimson satin. You will wonder if after all this, we should still have a few pounds free for our excursion, but I hope we shall, nevertheless. Did I tell you what the learned say of our bookcase, .. that, “when finished, it will be worth from sixty to eighty pounds, even at Florence”? and we gave six for it, I think.
For the packages you are to send, I did not mention, but I do hope your discretion discerned that I wd rather not have any of the busts sent .. supposing that the busts are to be considered mine. They are heavy, easily broken, & would not find their exact place in this land of statuary. Perhaps somebody will give them room somewhere. Wilson too has directions to give to her sister about her box—as she wants certain things in it .. some things of mine among them, which might as well accompany the rest. Dearest Arabel, I give you, not only trouble, but perhaps unpleasant trouble—but after all, it will be wrong of you not to understand the design of the whole, & how it is calculated to bring us nearer. One of our plagues is .. “conrispetto” [4] .. the fleas .. which are worse than usual, say the Florentines, just now. Robert’s & my first work every morning after breakfast is to sit on the floor with a basin of water & small tooth comb & “do” Flush, who otherwise wd infallibly be eaten up bodily, all but his teeth. Robert holds him, and I comb—and the basin looks blackly at the end—but poor Flush, we have brought him out here, and we cant leave him to be a victim. He is in great spirits, & knows Florence so well that he is at perfect liberty to run out whenever he likes, which he enjoys to the uttermost. Then his duties as guardian of the house, are fulfilled to the horror of my ears. He barks whenever the doorbell rings, most vehemently, & makes violent assaults upon the coats of visitors in his old way. Mr Ware, the American, author of the ‘Letters from Palmyra’, ‘Last Days of Aurelian’ &c, who is a very nervous invalid, was siezed upon without remorse a few evenings ago, when he came to have coffee with us, and pathetically complained of the “agitation” &c. So Flush had to be locked up in Wilson’s room, & was taken away crying. Mr Ware has epileptic fits, and because “he could’nt bear to be watched by his family”, left America for Italy without one of them, & without the help of friend or servant. How terrified they must be—& what a strange hallucination! But he is an interesting person, .. with a face of striking intelligence, .. deep depression in every tone of his voice. I think you read the ‘Letters from Palmyra’, at least– We had them in the house when we were at Sidmouth, I think.
Mr Tulk has come back but we have not seen him yet. Count Cottrell was here an evening or two ago & told us of his arrival, & that of the Miss Tulks who have been six weeks in travelling from Venice to Florence .. delayed by illness at various places. Louisa Ley is on the sofa—& Sophia expecting her confinement daily. Count Cottrell improves on us most agreeably, and indeed there is much to like in him in many ways—a groundwork of natural affectionateness & goodness, & a superstructure of a various knowledge of the world, which does not however render him a refined man. ‘Savoir vivre’, [5] he has; but it is a different thing from refinement. A sort of abruptness of manner is in his disfavour with strangers: he was a sailor before he was a chamberlain, .. an Englishman before he was an Italian, and the intermixtures never attain quite to harmonious combinations. Still, we like him increasingly, and I am certain that his wife is perfectly happy– What puzzles me is, .. how he could ever have read Swedenborg & called him “divine,” as Mr Tulk said. He is not quite the man for spiritual & ecstatic speculations.– Oh, this dreadful news from France! It makes one’s heart ache to think of the gulf of misery yawning before poor France! before & behind. Military despotism is a bad preparation for republican institutions, and, having made itself necessary, I for my part, believe now that a kingship of some sort must succeed. Robert does not think so—we “divide on the question”. Socialism has tripped up republicanism .. that, at least, is a thing to agree on. Impossible aspiration is imminent ruin in great games like this of government—and the theories of socialism are not only impossible in any state of human society, but ought to be impossible in order to the heroic growth & development of men.– I wonder if Blackwood will do anything with my poem [6] —I have not heard yet. Should it appear in the magazine, tell me whether the magazine appears in Wimpole Street, & whether Papa is seen to read it .. or shuffle it away. Tell me how it all passes in Wimpole Street, & how you like it .. you who do read it. Robert’s new edition is to come out in the autumn, [7] being in the press now: and Moxon is bade let us know when my first edition is quite out in order to our looking round for a purveyor of a second. Whenever I bring out a second, I shall attach the Seraphim as a third volume, and by the way there was a copy of the Seraphim in my room, covered with erasures & in preparation for reprint [8] —was it put among my books, so that I shall have it here with them. Look about & see if by any chance it is left in Wimpole Street, & let it come to me with the other books, Arabel. And, darling Arabel, will you remember to send my shawl left behind, and the worsted couvre-pied [9] which aunt Jane worked for me? Remember not to send the busts, nor the green box of papers, nor the narrow deal box [10] which came from Hope End & never was opened by me. And put together & seal up for me all the papers in the drawers &c of my sittingroom .. there were papers, I know, .. & take care of them for me, you! Some of this I have said before, & repeat, that you may have it clear & in one view.– The other day I heard from Nelly still Bordman, & she wrote in most cheerful spirits. But Arabel, what do you mean to say about green & blue bridesmaids? She says that her friends entreat her for gaieties, but that she feels a gay wedding under the circumstances would be unbecoming & keeps to her own first decision. She is to be married, or was to be married (for it’s over now) [11] in white muslin —& makes no excursion from Hammersmith, at which last resolve I do really wonder a little. And do you know, she, on the other hand, wonders at me for liking railroads? She says that the railroad to Cheltenham made her quite ill! A railroad, which is the next best thing to flying!! I think I could glide by day & night on a railroad, & never feel tired! And then you see the country so much more than I had expected! Oh, when we have the railroad quite through France, I shall feel as if I touched England with one foot. How are the dear Hedleys making up their minds about France. Would’nt it be the best opportunity in the world of coming to Florence where we are perfectly tranquil & likely to be tranquil, and, where under every possible contingency, English residents wd be provided with money uninterruptedly? Lord Vernon [12] who lives here & has been received as member of the Tuscan academy, .. he is a very cultivated man, .. has just gone to England to bring back his wife, who went there some months ago to see her daughter, & took fright & stayed. He says that if she wont return with him, he shall come back by himself—for as to living in England, he would’nt do it on any consideration–! We hear of fugitives being about to return. The Baths of Lucca are quite full—& the panic ends dishonorably. I never could make out indeed why people were frightened at all. At the worst, there was Leghorn .. and Malta with open English arms!—— And the worst was next to impossible. The Baron de Poillet, the French chargé d’affaires from whom we bought the best of our furniture, our beautiful mirror, sofa & secretaire, [13] .. yes, & armchairs, .. still lingers in Florence on the bed we did not buy, .. because, on account of the Parisian disturbances, nobody is sent to take his place. I dare say he wishes now that he had not been in such haste to sell—for he is likely enough to keep his position. Arabel, did I ever tell you—why yes, I certainly must have told you .. of Mademoiselle de Fauveau? the celebrated French scu[l]ptress, who was maid of honour to the Duchess of Berry, & being an exile from her country on account of attachment to the Bourbons, & falling into consequent adversity, [14] threw herself on the resources of her genius which is something surprising & celebrated all over Europe. Her sculpture is middle age, & full of grace & life. She has just finished a work for the Emperor of Russia– [15] Well—this extraordinary woman has lived in Florence these twelve years with her mother & an elder brother [16] who assists her in her works. She has called upon us—& Robert has been to see her once or twice (—as I did one cool morning ..) & he admires her so much that as I tell him I am on the verge of being jealous .. though she has not a trace of youth or beauty left– A large masculine looking woman, with chesnut hair, a little silvered with grey, cut in short curls all over her head like a man’s—wearing in her atelier sometimes, a small black velvet cap, (Robert wants me to have one the same!) and a sort of half-man’s costume, half-woman’s riding-habit. The mixture of vivacity & melancholy, of genius & manly frankness in her manner, very much strikes him—and I take my revenge by being struck by the brother too, who has a head like an apostle and the gentle dignity of a French nobleman.– [ART] A beard just so, Illus. I assure you—and the courtly manners go curiously with it, for I never saw a more polished gentleman. These interesting people wanted us very much to take an apartment in the house they occupy, and it wd have been an attraction strong enough for everything except the damp & cold we heard of there. She has ever so many male workmen employed in her atelier .. just like an ordinary scu[l]ptor.– Oh—to look up & see what a horrible caricature I have sent you! Rather more like our last but one landlord, than apostle or noble, I do confess—only the beard may stand for a beard .. or must.
Dearest Arabel, mention my loved Papa .. mention dearest Trippy—how is she, this summer? Able to walk & have pic nic parties with you all? mention her particularly, & kiss her particularly, particularly, with the kiss which I send you for the purpose. It is large enough for two, indeed. Oh, I long so to hear of you all, dear, dear things. And, Arabel, do remember how it was last year, & how Papa said that somebody shd remind him of your going out of town. Now dont let it be put off till the winter, as it was last year, but speak in time, & go somewhere to have fresh air & distraction at the right time. It runs in my head that some of you will see Tunbridge Wells—and if so, tell me all about the little colony there .. about the Bevans’ house, & the new baby,—& whether Bummy got my letter, .. & how they all are, Ibbit & all. They had much better come to Florence at once—that’s my opinion. Being better than Tours, it must be still better than Tunbridge, I think. How is dear Minny? Give her my love, & tell me how she is– As to Crow, you never say a word—was the second baby as pretty as the first—and is there a third? and does the baking get on pretty prosperously–? Oh Arabel, another thing!– Dont send the pictures in my room. Cant .. dare’nt .. some of you hang them up in yours? But run no risks. Nelly Jago wd take care of them perhaps, if you asked her. Only dont send them out to me, because that wd be foolish. Is it possible, Arabel, that you never hear from Mary Hunter? Tell me whenever you have a sign of life from either herself or her father; and you may tell them truly, if you like, that I am continually enquiring after them in my letters to you. I should be very glad to be sure that the school or seminary or whatever the thing may be, is going on in prosperity—for the hint you dropped about Mary’s not “appearing” to like Worthing [17] as much as she did, struck me with some fearful significance. How many pupils are they, & of what ages? Cant you tell me anything? And Mr Hunter .. has he never been to London since the winter? does he never write? never speak of me when you see & correspond with him? —Another person you have ceased to mention, Arabel, is your own friend, Emma. Surely there’s no reason for this silence– Now, if you get into the way of not telling me everything, what am I to do, pray? Nelly Bordman told me one thing which you passed over without a word .. namely that Annie Hayes recoiled before the insults of that woman (whom I cannot praise) into the church of Rome. The absurdity of such a motive of conversion or aversion, is flagrant, of course .. but why did’nt you tell me? Say what you know of her, & whether she is definitively parted from her husband. The Peytons .. what of them? Did Berry get my note? and is she happy in her prospects still? A hundred questions I have to ask you, Arabel, and a hundred & fifty answers with which to receive yours—but I write with a weight of lead round my neck, through this extraordinary silence of yours, which I have too much faith in you, dearest, to call an unkind silence– There is fault somewhere, but it cant be with you. What would I not give, to see you all in vision, Papa & all of you—for first I think uneasily of one & then of another. Does Storm write regularly—dear Stormie who has not repeated his gift of a kind note. Tell me of him always. Flush has a new accomplishment. When he wants anything we tell him to scratch with his paw on the table—and most ridiculously does he leap up at once & scratch with his paw. Robert is so struck with admiration that he forgets his own proprietory feelings & how infallibly there will be a hole anon in all our new table-cloths. Arabel,—I am going to ask you to do something for me. It’s impertinent of me, and a taking undue advantage of your excess of kindness already .. but I really will ask you to make a pair of slippers for Robert– A pair which his sister worked for him, is just falling into ruins, and as he always wears slippers in the house & has an impotent wife, I cant help coming to you for help. Make them of Storm’s size—that wd do perfectly, I think—but dont have them made up, lest it should not. Besides, the making up is done for nothing almost, in Florence. If you make them, Mr Keny<on may> be coming, .. or somebody in the autumn, .. and they wd be ready for the winter. My own slippers are not nearly done for yet; so dont fancy (in an hallucination of the imaginative powers) that I [18] want any– Mine will take me through the winter warm-shod– Do you see the Strattens, often? Give my kind regards, always. And the Claypones [19] .. do you ever come together by a clash of the elements? Forgive me for enclosing this note to Miss Mitford—she is very unwell with an attack of rheumatism & nervous debility, and has been frightened out of her wits by a kicking poney when K. was driving her out. I want to persuade her to go to the seaside– Very much depressed she is, poor thing, .. being so little used to illness.
Did I tell you that Mr Kenyon is about to bring out a new volume of poems, and a dedication to me? [20] Miss Bayley says … shall I tell you what she says, in her last letter .. oh no, I did tell you in my last. Write I beseech you my dear beloved Arabel .. Henrietta! Not a voice among you!—— Where are the Reynolds’s? Are the Cooks as much with you as ever? When is Susan to be married? [21] Give them both my love.
And dear little Lizzie Barrett? Not a word of her? Write, write, write!– Arabel—dont suffer yourself to be put off on any pretext, on the point of my letters in the hands of Mrs Smith. [22] I shall be easier when you have them in yours—and after all, I think I may trust her delicacy & generosity– Tell her so, if there shd be occasion. Robert’s very best love– I am in such haste that I can look over nothing, even by a glance– Love me, my own dear Arabel—and give my love to those around you who will hold out their hands for the poor gift– May God love you, beloveds!——
Your ever most attached
.. & very anxious
Ba——
Robert’s letter to New Cross not being ready, I send this to you straight in spite of his reproaches! You wont mind the postage I know.
Mind you speak to Papa about going out of town—& force Trippy to go with you this time!
Address, on integral page: Angleterre viâ France. / (To the care of Miss Tripsack) / Miss Arabel Barrett, / 12 Upper Gloucester St / Dorset Square, / New Road. / London.
Publication: EBB-AB, I, 183–192.
Manuscript: Gordon E. Moulton-Barrett.
1. Year provided by postmark.
2. i.e., on Arabella’s birthday, her 35th.
3. This mahogany folding chair, which was later re-covered in green velvet, sold as lot 1307a in Browning Collections (see Reconstruction, H391). The “very low” chair that EBB describes further on sold as lot 1382 in Browning Collections (see Reconstruction, H376; now at Wellesley). Both pieces of furniture are illustrated facing p. 113.
4. “With respect,” meaning “pardon the expression.”
5. “Good breeding,” or “good manners.”
6. “A Meditation in Tuscany”; see letter 2734, note 3.
7. An advertisement for “The Poetical Works of Robert Browning. A New Edition, with numerous Alterations and Additions” appeared in The Athenæum for 16 December 1848 (no. 1103, p. 1253).
8. This revised copy of “The Seraphim” served as printer’s copy for Poems (1850); see Reconstruction, D840. “The Seraphim” did not appear “as a third volume,” but rather in volume I, pp. 93–136.
9. “Coverlet,” or “quilt.”
11. Nelly Bordman and Francis Robert Jago were married on 30 June 1848 at St. Mary’s, Fulham.
12. George John (1803–66), 5th Baron Vernon, was an English Dante scholar who went to Italy when he was very young and “lived much in Florence, where he studied the Italian language and history. His whole life was devoted to Dante, to whom he erected a noble literary monument. … He was a socio corrispondente of the Academia della Crusca [1847], and was a member of many other literary societies” (DNB). In 1824 he married Isabella Caroline (née Ellison, d. 1853) by whom he had two sons and three daughters: Caroline Maria (1826–1918), Adelaide Louisa (d. 1913), and Louisa Warren (d. 1894).
13. This Italian escritoire sold as lot 1305 in Browning Collections; see Reconstruction, H397; see also illustration facing p. 112.
15. Untraced; see letter 2727, note 12.
16. Hippolyte de Fauveau. Isa Blagden noted that he was “also an artist of merit, lives with her [i.e., his sister], and is devoted to her. He assists her in most of her works, and is the support and comfort of her life” (The English Woman’s Journal, October 1858, p. 93).
17. Sic, for Ramsgate; see letters 2716 and 2731.
18. Underscored twice.
19. Possibly a reference to Joseph Claypon (d. 1859), a banker, and his wife Susannah (d. 1881, aged 74). The Claypons were Non-Conformists who lived in Westbourne Street near Hyde Park Gardens.
20. The dedication in John Kenyon’s A Day at Tivoli (1849) reads: “To / Elizabeth Barrett Browning, / And to / Robert Browning, / This poem, / Referring to the land which they now inhabit, / Is affectionately inscribed.”
21. Susan Cook did not marry until 1855; see letter 2670, note 9.
22. Mary Ann Smith (d. 1862), youngest daughter of theologian Adam Clarke (1762?–1832), wrote the second and third volumes of her father’s biography, An Account of the Infancy, Religion and Literary Life of Adam Clarke, ed. J.B.B. Clarke (3 vols., 1833). A close friend of Hugh Stuart Boyd’s, Mrs. Smith was present at his death and subsequently, in accordance with the terms of his will, took possession of his manuscripts and all the letters he had received “from literary and other persons,” including those from EBB (Public Record Office, London). When EBB learned of the disposition of her letters, she asked for their return. But Mrs. Smith would not comply, evidently intending to use them in a memoir of Boyd, which she hoped to improve with a chapter by EBB. The letters were not recovered during EBB’s lifetime. They were returned to RB in 1863 after Mrs. Smith’s death.
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