2814. RB to William Etty
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 16, 7.
Bagni di Lucca,
Sepr 21. ’49.
My dear Mr Etty.
I was duly informed by my sister of your very kind call of inquiry at Hatcham; yet surely you must have divined I could not be in England these three years past, or I should not have been so neglectful of my privilege as to leave you unvisited so long. It was always too great a delight to me, when near your quarter, to knock at your door and convince myself that a great painter and poet could realize his conceptions as exquisitely in London at this latter day, as in Venice when the Doges were there. I see noble pictures often now, but a noble painter I do not hope to see again before I return to England,—as I shall probably do next year,—when it will be indeed an honour and a pleasure to shake his hand instead of being forced to content myself, as at the present, with saying simply that I am, Dear Mr Etty,
Yours very faithfully as admiringly ever,
Robert Browning
May I venture to send my wife’s homage along with mine?– We have often remembered your grand Sirens. [1]
Address, on integral page: William Etty, Esqre R.A.
Publication: LRB, p. 26.
Manuscript: Eton College Library, Michael Meredith Collection.
1. Presumably a reference to Etty’s “Ulysses and the Sirens.” This immense painting, which measures nearly 10 by 15 ft., was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1837. EBB complained of its “hideousness” to RB in letter 2388 after he had called “abominable” a later work by Etty that also featured sirens (see letter 2387). RB may be using “grand” in a quantitative rather than qualitative sense.
___________________
