2918. Bryan Waller Procter to RB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 17, 38–39.
13 Upper Harley Street
Cavendish Square.
May 23. 1851.
My dear Browning,
Have you quite forgiven me?– I hope that you have—for it would give me real pain to be thought of otherwise than kindly by you. And after all my want of friendship & good will towards you has been more seeming than real. I received your Letter—your kind letter, (which I have wished at least 100 times to answer—when it was too late)—in the mountains of Wales—amidst the snow & cold & other annoyances—but as soon as I returned to London, I went to Moxon, & consulted with him, as to an immediate republication of your poems: & to say truth I agreed thus far with him, that it would be unwise to publish a new edition whilst the existing edition was in a course of sale. He said that he would write to you on the subject,—& there the matter ended. [1]
But it ought not to have ended so,—for in your letter you expressed a desire to hear from me—& I thoroughly meant to have written to you a letter full of news, at the very first opportunity– Ah! that cursed ‘opportunity’! It never came—& so I delayed, day after day, to write to you, until in truth I was ashamed to write. If I could have been sure that you would have admitted me to your good graces, after this,—I should have written– I have wished to write—a hundred times. —It will serve me little to say that this Infirmity of mine has shewn itself towards all persons– I have now half a dozen letters to write, which ought to have been written a year or two ago. It is too late– I cannot write them now. Even in your own case, I do not know that I should have ventured, but that our friend Kenyon tells me that you will receive my little verse letter [2] kindly,—& that you will perhaps write to me. Do so; & make the good act complete.
I rejoice to hear that you are likely to come & look at our great glass House, [3] in the course of the Autumn. Be assured that there will not be other persons in England more glad to see you than I shall be. I often think of you—& if good wishes availed, you would now be here (crowned with all sorts of laurel,) with your hand—not your foot—upon the neck of Fortune—but perhaps as Fortune is a lady, Mrs Browning might object to this.
You know already that Tennyson has been appointed Poet Laureat[e]—the Office having been previously declined by Rogers. For my own part, I wish it were abolished. Tennyson’s last book [4] has had a wonderful sale—yet it is all in one metre & on one subject—& is moreover (tho’ good in parts) not overladen with either poetry or fine thought. I hope that he will not be spoiled by the excess of admiration lavished upon him by a clique of friends. He is very clever, & has written some exceedingly good things—& has very wisely (a word in your ear) taken the trouble of finishing & polishing off some of the poems till they are sure of being approved. Nevertheless, he is a little lower than the angels; & I think that a friend of mine has more of the material of a great poet in him, & if he will condescend to do his best—I mean in the outward visible form—the world will agree with me. I do not know whether Mrs Browning will accept of my kind Compts from this corner of the paper.
Always my dear Browning
Your sincere
B. W. Procter
Publication: Luther A. Brewer, My Leigh Hunt Library, the Holograph Letters (Iowa City, 1938), pp. 311–312.
Manuscript: University of Iowa.
1. The letter that Procter failed to answer was probably written in late 1846. Moxon’s letter to RB must have been written about the same time. In his reply to Moxon on 24 February 1847 (letter 2657), RB explained: “I delayed answering … in the expectation of a note from Procter … he does not write, however, so I must.
2. This poem, “A Familiar Epistle to Robert Browning,” appeared for the first time in the third edition of English Songs, and Other Small Poems which was published in October 1851. The manuscript copy of the poem to RB, evidently enclosed by the author, is no longer with the letter.
3. i.e., the Crystal Palace, the immense iron and glass hall that housed the Great Exhibition.
4. In Memoriam (1850).
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