3055. EBB to Eliza Anne Ogilvy
An amended verion of the text that appeared in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 18, 155–157.
138 Avenue des Champs Elysées
June 18 [sic, for 17]– [1852] [1]
My dear friend, I was delighted to have your letter—quite thankful & relieved. Yes, and I sympathize deeply with your burst of patriotism, and with that admirable interpretation of the phrase, “mal du pays,” [2] for which you should be honored among interpreters. Certainly that peculiar form of the “mal” is the very one I am subject to myself. “Hence these tears,” [3] would say a classical writer. Hence this cough & all manner of evil, must I say, who have the misfortune of being romantic & a modern Briton.
Your letter found us in sunshine, but for the last five days we have been humiliated, I confess to you, in our weather, .. the thunder having at last succeeded in upsetting the summer. We have had a great deal of rain, in fact, with lucid intermissions of April skies,—& rather a cool April too, which has not done me much good, especially since I went out one night when I should have staid in the house. Not one of the five days was absolutely a rainy one, although yesterday it rained till three, & then let the sun shine. Now it shines beautifully .. but there are questionable clouds in the horizon which may be swept up by the south wind. We cant trust this sun of ours.
I am afraid of hearing that you are to leave London on such a day. We shall not be there until the beginning of July, & our chances of finding you must be small. [4] Which vexes me to think of. Yet I dont at all feel as if I should’nt see you soon—indeed I do feel as if I should: and Robert has the same sort of presentiment, happily for both of us. So, we agreed as we passed your house the other day, consoling one another for having to pass it. Kiss the darling children for me. A “sposa” [5] lately was proposed to Wiedeman—but he said .. “No. Lis” (this) “no bella– Peninni Lilla. Lilla bella e lane” [6] (grande.) Peninni would have Louisa, Louisa being both “bella e grande.” After such a proof of constancy, I am ashamed to spoil all by admitting that he finally proposed an arrangement of having two wives. He suggested that it would cut the difficulty. Tell me if Alexander’s cough has teazed him again or not. Wiedeman’s is perfectly gone.
We went to Ary Scheffer’s again two evenings ago, to hear music in the atelier. Madame Viardot, the great ‘prima donna,’ was there .. but “her voice was still in bed” she told us, to quench all hope of her singing. No wonder—as she had a baby about three weeks ago. [7] She accompanied on the piano, however, M. Léonard, the first player on the violin, from the Conservatoire—a wonderful performer indeed. And Madame Léonard sang—and altogether it was very pleasant. Madame Viardot was the original ‘Consuelo’ of George Sand– She is plain—a large face with irregular features, but capable of extraordinary expression of course .. although in society one does not see it much. You know she has always been absolutely pure of reputation .. which does not hinder a strong friendship between her & George Sand, of whom she spoke warmly to me as “so good” and “such a thorough woman.” Another friend of Madame Sand was there also,— .. M. Martin, the ex-montagnard. [8] He asked me if I did not find Paris “changed and saddened.” I evaded the question by saying that I knew Paris only from last autumn. I really could’nt flatter him by any appearance of sensibility to the profound melancholy of the Parisians. Not even the rain (much less the president) has prevented the nightly dances at the Château des fleurs [9] —& although I remember a tragic situation in Ford (which has been much admired,) of a woman who dances on, dances on, while one misery after another is announced to her, & then suddenly drops & dies, [10] .. I dont quite expect a like catastrophe of despair from the Parisian population in the middle of the Cancans dance. Do even you, who are anti-presidential?
Talking on which subject, let me record my protestation against the intended paper-tax– [11] I hope it may never be more than a threat & a fear, but I quite disapprove of it, tell Mr Ogilvy.
I think we shall not follow your example in taking the long passage, notwithstanding your prosperity as it happened. Robert talks of Dover & Calais in a ‘signorile’ [12] sort of way—that is, in the way of a man who has been very sick. I dread it all .. that is, I dread the end of the journey. I shall have the nightmare all the time I am in England.
Tell me. Did Mr Ogilvy pay more duty than a penny for every engraving .. which Mrs Jameson says is the tariff?. We should like to know. Mrs Jameson particularly desired me to remember her to both of you, “because she liked you very much–” I quote the exact words. Probably she will remain till we go, & travel back with us—it seems to me likely to end so. God bless you both, & everyone—& give you a happy meeting with your mother! [13] I, who shall meet mine only in Heaven, may say it earnestly. Be well & happy, & be kind in telling me soon that you are. Robert’s love with that of your ever affecte
EBB.
My love to your sister,—if she is near you now.
Address: Mrs David Ogilvy / 18. Keppel Street. / Russell Square. / London.
Publication: EBB-EAHO, pp. 77–80.
Manuscript: Eton College Library.
1. Day and year provided postmark.
2. “Homesickness.”
3. Cf. Terence, Andria, line 126, trans. John Sargeaunt.
4. EBB told Henrietta in letter 3051 that the Ogilvys had “set off for London” on 8 June and planned to remain there a “fortnight” before proceeding to Perth.
5. “Bride.”
6. “Beautiful and large.”
7. Claudie Viardot (1852–1914), Mme. Viardot’s second daughter, was born on 21 May.
8. François Louis Silvestre Fulbert Martin (1809–64), a lawyer from La Chatre. He may have been one of the friends of George Sand saved from exile to Cayenne when she met with Louis Napoleon in February; see the fifth to the last paragraph in letter 3012. Martin was currently under house arrest in Paris but had previously been allowed to visit Mme. Sand at Nohant. Montagnards were members of a radical political party known as La Montagne (The Mountain); see letter 3039, note 7.
9. On the Avenue des Champs Élysées near the Barrière de l’Étoile, an open air summertime ballroom with a “profusion of flowers of every kind. … The company met with here is generally good, and the pleasures of the dance are enjoyed with every regard to decorum” (Galignani’s New Paris Guide, 1852, pp. 504–505).
10. In The Broken Heart (1633) by John Ford (1586–1640?), the Spartan princess Calantha dances on while hearing reports of several deaths, including those of her betrothed, Ithocles, and her father, the King. In the next and final scene she dies when confronted with the corpse of Ithocles. EBB’s copy of the 1831 edition of Ford’s play sold as lot 690 in Browning Collections (see Reconstruction, A980).
11. The Times of 12 June 1852 noted that the French government was “at present occupied with a bill for establishing a sumptuary tax on … the manufacture of paper and cardboards of all kinds” (p. 6).
12. “Gentlemanly,” for considering the shorter and hence the more expensive crossing. The previous autumn, the Brownings had crossed the English Channel between Newhaven and Dieppe (a much longer route than Dover-Calais), and the rough seas had made everyone seasick, especially RB and Wilson.
13. Louisa Jane Dick (née Wintle, 1796–1870).
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