3012. EBB to Julia Martin
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 18, 40–45.
138 Avenue des Ch. Elysées.
Feb. 27. [1852] [1]
I get your second letter, my dearest Mrs Martin, before I answer your first, which makes me rather ashamed. I hope in any case that you received ‘Darien,’ sent to you immediately on its publication. Galignani said, the Leipsic edition of the second volume of “My Novel” had not yet appeared. [2] Also, the separate numbers of the Revue des deux mondes seem hard to get at– I asked Ibbit Jane to enclose to you a slip of a newspaper containing the extract from Miss Mitford’s book, because Robert took & left it with the Hedleys as soon as he had read it– [3] The Athenæum is always to be seen in Paris, but you cant buy it. I am afraid we have done your business very imperfectly altogether.
As to Miss Mitford, I have not seen her book, I have not even read the extracts from it which relate to myself. A newspaper containing them, I could not make up my mind, when it came to the point to look at—so Robert cut them out & went away with them to the Hedleys.
Dearest friend, it is true that I have seldom been so upset as by this act of poor dear Miss Mitford’s—and the very impossibility of being vindictive on the occasion, increased my agitation at the moment. It was only, after all, you see, a grasp of the hand which broke one’s fingers, through the very vehemence of affectionate feeling. I could not, and cannot lose sight of the intention. If we dont forgive what is meant as kindness, how shall we forgive what is meant as injury? I could not conceal, however, when I wrote to her, that she had given me extreme pain. In her reply she says, that she would rather her “whole book had perished, than have caused me a moment’s pain by it”– How am I to feel after that? how was I to answer? I answered by an affectionate letter, [4] & it seems to me that I could’nt in any justice, do otherwise–
And, do you know, she had a motive which perhaps neither you nor I could have guessed at. It appears that, before I married, I had scandalized horribly a portion of my beloved public, & that it was necessary that my reputation should be washed clear by a brush-sweep of the master. Persons of the “highest” rank in letters & otherwise, had attributed to me, “as of knowledge,” a most desperate state of love-affairs, & an habitual wearing of “widow’s weeds” which was anything but respectable. Therefore to the rescue of my character, my dear friend thought it expedient to come—and she came accordingly.
Oh—I did not even laugh at all this absurdity in my answer. I did not even say that the distinguished persons in question were absolutely welcome to their talk & inventions, & that her piece of biography had wounded me more than ten thousand pieces of such gossip could. I said nothing to her of this—only that I thanked her for her intention & loved her for her affection– That was enough, I thought, indeed.
There are defects in delicacy & apprehensiveness—one cannot deny it—and yet I do assure you that a more generous & fervent woman never lived than dear Miss Mitford is .. and if you knew her, you would do her this justice. She is better in herself than in her books—more large, more energetic, more human altogether. I think I understand her better on the whole than she understands me, (which is not saying much) and I admire her on various accounts. She talks better, for instance, than most writers, male or female, whom I have had any intercourse with. And affectionate in the extreme, she has always been to me.
So I have mystified you & disgusted you with my politics—and my friends in England have put me in the corner just so. And yet I do maintain that I am more consequent than you all, .. accepting a decision of the people as such, & willing to follow out a democratical principle to the end .. to its extreme consequences, .. without being stopped by various things which are as hateful to me as to any of you. As to the president, I am no Buonapartist, I beg you to understand fully. I thought nevertheless that the coup d’etat was justified. I think so still. The alternative was a scramble for France, between two monarchies [5] & a socialist republic—not one of these being as acceptable to the mass of the nation as the presidential movement proved itself. The actual state of things, nobody thought tenable .. from M. Thiers to Louis Blanc:—and because nobody thought it tenable, everybody was full of hope—schismatic hope .. hope attached to distinctive parties, hope full of peril to the public.
Now the actor of the coup d’etat knew well that he had the mass of the nation with him—yes, and we all knew it—his enemies & victims knew it—nobody, no frenchman, doubted the result of the election. We had here in this room, the chief writers for the ‘Presse’ and the ‘National’ [6] in absolute despair, .. men who cursed aloud the name of Napoleon & the Empire .. & these very men were prepared for the vote, & have since received it as a free tho’ lamentable expression of popular opinion. Perfectly true, of course it is, that a large proportion of the voters voted as for a “pis aller”– [7] But a “pis aller” my dearest friend, is not the “pis,” [8] you must observe, & therefore is nothing to the question. Why, I myself accepted the “coup d’etat” as a “pis aller”—as the best thing to be done under bad circumstances.
But tell me—was the election of 48 a “pis aller” .. when by six thousand [9] votes, the people chose this man for their president?
Would the election of 52 have been a “pis aller” when it was apprehended by all political thinkers in France, that he would be chosen again even in defiance of the law?
Yes—there was probably something of ‘pis aller’ in the idea of these elections also. “Pis aller” was one of the motives for the choice.
The French nation is very peculiar. We choose to boast ourselves of being different in England, but we have simply les qualités de nos defauts [10] after all. The clash of speculative opinions is dreadful here—practical men catch at the ideal as if it were a loaf of bread—and they literally set about cutting out their Romeos “into little stars” [11] as if that were the most natural thing in the world. As for the socialists, I quite agree with you that various of them, yes, & some of their chief men, are full of pure & noble aspiration—the most virtuous of men & the most benevolent. Still, they hold in their hands, in their clean hands, ideas which kill, .. ideas which defile .. ideas, which if carried out, would be the worst & most crushing kind of despotism. I would rather live under the feet of the Czar, than in those states of perfectibility imagined by Fourier [12] & Cabet, if I might choose my “pis aller”! All these speculators (even Louis Blanc who is one of the most rational) would revolutionalize, not merely countries, but the elemental conditions of humanity, it seems to me,—none of them seeing that antagonism is necessary to all progress. A man, in walking, must set one foot before another—and in climbing, (as Dante observed long ago) the foot behind “é sempre il piu basso.” [13] Only the gods (Plato tells us) keep both feet joined together in moving onward. [14] It is not so, & cannot be so, with men.
But I think that not only in relation to the socialists but to the monarchies, is L N. the choice of the French people. I think that they will not bear the monarchies—they will not have either of them—they put them away. It seems to me that the French people is essentially democratical, & that by the vote in question they never meant to give away either rights or liberties. The extraordinary part of the actual position is, that the government, with these ugly signs of despotism in its face, .. stands upon the democracy—(is no “military despotism” therefore in any sense, as the English choose to say [15] ) & may be thrown & will be thrown, on that day when it disappoints the popular expectation. For my part, I am hopeful both for this reason .. & for others. I hope we shall do better .. when there is greater calm .. that presently there will be relaxation where there is stringency, & room to breathe & speak. At present it is a dictatorship, & we cant expect at such a time the ease & liberty of a regular government. The constitution itself may be modified .. as the very terms of it imply; & the laws of the press, not carried out– Even as it is, all the English papers, infamous in their abuse of the government, (because of their falsifications & exaggerations properly called infamous) & highly immoral in their tone towards France generally, come in as usual, without an official finger being lifted up to hinder them. Louis Phillippe would not admit Punch, you remember, on account of a few personal sarcasms.
I am not a Buonapartist by any means—but it is fair to tell you that I have heard the president called “bon enfant,” “homme de conscience,” [16] & “so much in earnest as to be fanatical,” by the two deepest thinkers & keenest observers we have known in France—one, an ultra-republican, & the other a man of the most pure & elevated moral nature. [17] I hear also that Guizot has a like opinion. [18] Take it for as much as it is worth. I certainly would not bind myself for any truth contained in it.
So much there is to say, & the post going. Can you read as I write on at full gallop? Dont be out of heart. Do let us trust France .. not L. Napoleon, but France.
Cormenin is said to have been the adviser of the Orleanistic decrees. The worse for him.
Oh– I want to tell you that I have seen George Sand twice– Now’s the time for my reputation to go .. is’nt it? & not when I was shut up in a room on the second floor of 50 Wimpole Street. Oh—but I cant tell you about her this time. She is very interesting to me.
She came to Paris to see the president, as you may have seen in the papers, to intercede for certain of her friends sentenced to Cayenne—was most cordially received, .. gained her cause.
I have been very uneasy about our darling. Through over excitement of temperament, he has had slight attacks of hysteria at night– Think! a little child, not three years old yet. But it is said to be unimportant, & he now is much better.
We are to see George Sand again, & then I shall tell you. She kissed me & was kind to us– We hear that she “liked us” .. which makes me proud.
God bless you both– Robert’s warm regards. No– I never heard a word about Hope End from Wimpole Street– Depend upon it, it’s only something said, “as of knowledge,” by various distinguished persons in rank & letters. [19]
Dearest friends, think of me
as your ever affectionate
Ba–
Publication: LEBB, II, 60–62 (in part).
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Year provided by reference to the return address; the only February in which the Brownings resided at 138 Avenue des Champs Élysées occurred in 1852.
2. The second volume of the Leipzig (or Tauchnitz) edition of My Novel; or Varieties in English Life by Pisistratus Caxton by Edward Bulwer-Lytton was published in 1851. Darien; or, The Merchant Prince (1852) was by Eliot Warburton. “Galignani” refers to Galignani’s reading room and circulating library at 18 Rue Vivienne.
5. i.e., the House of Bourbon, as represented by Henri Charles Ferdinand, Comte de Chambord (1820–83), called “Henri Cinq” by his supporters; and the House of Orleans, as represented by Louis Philippe, Comte de Paris (1838–94), grandson of King Louis Philippe.
6. EBB refers to Paul Émile Forgues of Le National and Eugène Pelletan of La Presse.
7. “Last resort”; or “lesser of two evils.”
8. “Worst.”
9. Sic, for million. The total number of votes cast for Louis Napoleon in the 1848 presidential election, as reported in The Times of 25 December 1848 (p. 5), was 5,534,520. His nearest opponent, General Cavaignac, drew 1,448,302 votes.
10. “The good side of our defects.”
11. Cf. Romeo and Juliet, III, 2, 22.
12. Charles Fourier (1772–1837), French social reformer who created an egalitarian socio-economic system known as Fourierism.
13. “Is still in the lower place.” Cf. Dante, Inferno, i, 30, trans. Laurence Binyon.
14. We have been unable to trace this idea in the works of Plato.
15. The Times had previously referred to the government of France as a “military despotism” on 24 December and 1 January. In the issue of 19 February 1852, the leader writer complained: “When Louis Philippe was on the throne of France we had the pacific policy of an enlightened Prince to rely on; in the days of the Republic we were safe in the national sympathy of the French for freedom; and now, in the gloomy dawn of military despotism, we are recommended to rely upon the high honour of the French army, which butchered its fellow-citizens in its drunken Saturnalia, and sold the liberty of the French people” (p. 4).
16. “Good-natured,” “man of conscience.”
17. Joseph Milsand; the “ultra-republican” is Eugène Pelletan.
18. According to Nassau William Senior, Guizot met Louis Napoleon on the occasion of Montalembert’s reception into the Academy. At that time he described Louis Napoleon’s manner as “exceedingly good, simple, mild, and gentleman-like” and added: “It is impossible to deny him courage, perseverance, and dissimulation … he is master of the charlatanerie which carries away the French people” (Nassau William Senior, Conversations with M. Thiers, M. Guizot, and Other Distinguished Persons, During the Second Empire, ed. M.C.M. Simpson, 1878, I, 220).
19. This is probably a reference to a change of occupants at Hope End. In letter 3051 EBB shares recent news from Mrs. Martin that “Hope End is let for three years to Lady Sherbrooke & her sister Miss Pyndar.” The current owner was Thomas Heywood (1797–1866). The estate remained in the possession of his family until 1867 when it was acquired by Charles Archibald Hewitt (1837–1910).
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