2873. EBB to Arabella Moulton-Barrett
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 16, 175–177.
[Florence]
Tuesday. [13 August 1850] [1]
My very dearest Arabel, at last I am let write to you—but it is to be the shortest of letters, Robert says, and so it cant be the longest, as I fain wd have it. I do hope & trust you have not been uneasy about me, Arabel, because all this time I have been just recovering strength which is’nt a very alarming operation at the worst, you know, however tedious it may be for patient & bystanders. Now I am in the drawingroom, in my own chair, & shall be able to walk in a day or two, & to be out in the carriage, & Dr Harding who has left us a minute ago “thinks it likely that he will be able to send us out of Florence in the early part of next week”– I myself scarcely expect that. I really dont see the use of going away before one has attained a little to the power of comfortable independency of body—but the change of air will be good for all of us, & I shall be relieved & delighted to have a little coolness & silence. My darling Arabel, since Robert wrote to you ten days ago, our baby has been ill, & seriously .. to catch us up from one trouble to a higher. He has had a sort of sun-stroke .. or rather sun-pat .. we ought’nt to use exaggerated expressions .. and you may fancy what painful anxiety we were in, when he came home from his walk one day with crimson cheeks & hot heavy head, & eyes with that unnatural, pitiful, glassy stare which there was no mistaking. He had a great deal of fever one night & day, & lay in a sort of half stupor, & would not touch a single thing except the balia’s milk—how I thanked God that he was not weaned! Dr Harding treated him with the utmost skill … (I cant tell you how high an opinion we have of his skill, .. his quietness, goodsense & decision:) and as soon as ever the medecines had had time, the fever went away, and the darling patient called for his drum. The attack ended in a bad cough & cold, seeming like a common cough & cold, but Dr H. said it was the development of the previous symptoms, the passing out of the system, of the malady, & that nothing more was to be feared. Now he is quite well .. only demoniacally cross, I must say .. getting into such passions .. stamping with his feet, dashing his hands about, insisting on having the whole world to do what he likes with .. a half-world wont serve– At one moment, we have a rebellion, because I dont take my medecines twice over (he likes to see people take medecines) & at another moment, there’s a fury because the great picture over the chimney piece is not taken down for him to play with. Henrietta made me laugh in her last letter by most pathetic exhortations ‘not to spoil Wiedeman’. If she were to see him just now, she might enforce the pathos. You see, poor little darling, he feels himself rather pulled down by his illness, & this irritates him—he does’nt understand how it is, & struggles against it: he has never been used to any feeling of illness. Ah—but indeed, he is well now, & quite well—even the cold has gone away, & he takes no more medecine—and, although a little paler & thinner, the difference in his looks is very inconsiderable– It is a great mercy from God’s unspeakable goodness. Dont imagine that we are careless with the child, because of this accident with the sun– While I was so ill, Wilson could not go out with him, & the poor balia went alone—she declares that she avoided the sunshine .. but Italians naturally are less apprehensive of the evils of their climate– In any case, Dr Harding says there can be no doubt of the character & cause of the indisposition, &, that we must look to it in future. In general, our friends laugh at Baby’s train .. “two maids & a dog” .. so careful are we in our usual ways.
Thursday
Beloved Arabel, it is a two days silence that I have put between the forgoing & what must succeed. I could not help fancying at the time of beginning this letter, that Robert had heard some bad news—it is difficult for him to keep anything from me– So at last he told me—& I have of course been dreadfully shocked & affected, & could’nt have the heart to go on with my letter all yesterday. You have seen probably in the papers the late tragedy—& how our dear friend Madme Ossoli, with her husband & child, were lost in their passage to America [2] —lost within sight of shore .. of home .. oh, gracious God, what an awful manifestation of thy divine will!– We had a note from her off Gibralter [sic], (did I tell you?) saying how they had been in trouble through the Captain’s illness, which had ended in the worst species of confluent smallpox .. “never had she recoiled before from any shape of human suffering”– They had tried to get a medical man from Gibralter to verify the desease .. but the authorities wd not allow even so much intercourse between the ship & the shore, & had placed them in the strictest quarantine– There was a touching & poetical description of the “consignment of the body to the deep”.– I, in my foolishness, exclaimed to Robert, when we received the note, to burn it directly– You know me & my cowardice, Arabel– “Do burn it,” said I, “the complaint may be plague, for what anybody knows”. “Indeed”, replied he, “I will not burn it. How are you sure that it may not be the last note we ever may have from her”. At which, I laughed in my folly, but he put the letter away.– I remember she called us in it, “Dear precious friends”, and it was the last indeed:—how seldom we know when the last time comes! The last evening in Italy they spent in this room– Jestingly they told us it had been prophecied to the Marquis Ossoli, “that the sea wd be fatal to him, & that he shd avoid travelling by it”——and then, she said, turning to me with that peculiar smile which lighted up her plain, thought-worn face, “I accept as a good omen that our ship should be called the Elizabeth”–
<…> [3]
But to write all this to you is worse than foolish & profits neither of us. You are not to think that I am hurt in body .. oh no—and Robert could not do otherwise than tell me. The first newspaper or first letter or first visit wd have been sure to tell me,—& then I was certain that something had moved him .. I could see it in his eyes. I am recovering strength, & Wiedeman’s temper is better, & I hope to be out in the carriage before the week is at an end.
You were startled at the news Robert sent you? I meant to wait till the precarious time (for me) was over, because, I am so uncertain, that it does not become me to speak of Januaries & Februaries like people in general. Everything however seemed going on well .. I took every possible precaution .. & was full of hope & joy in the prospect of a little creature to match Henrietta’s– Ah—what a vexation! <Only one ought’nt to talk of vexations, even vexations, just now—it is a shame. I was very ill—far worse than on my former occasion—(though it was most like Pisa) & Dr Harding means to set to with all force of his will to prevent its happening again, he says—because four times in less than four years, to say nothing of Wiedeman, is exhausting to the constitution. And then, they are not common accidents– You see my constitutional tendencies &c, & their> [4]
<…> [5]
How is our dear Minny? Tell me—and give her my kindest love. Write to me, I beseech you, & mention Papa always. God bless you my beloved. Hold me to your heart & in your prayers as your Ba.
I dont forget Baby’s hair. You shall have it next time.
Publication: EBB-AB, I, 335–337.
Manuscript: Gordon E. Moulton-Barrett.
1. Dated by EBB’s reference to RB’s writing “ten days ago.” His last letter (2872) was written on 4 August 1850; 13 August fell on a Tuesday.
2. When their ship (the Elizabeth) wrecked off the coast of Long Island on 19 July 1850.
3. Two and a half lines have been obliterated by EBB.
4. Passage in angle brackets is reconstructed, having been obliterated after receipt, probably by Arabella.
5. Two or more pages are missing. The balance of the text is written on the side and top of the first page.
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