3124. EBB to Euphrasia Fanny Haworth
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 18, 230–231.
58 Welbeck Street
Monday morning. [Postmark: 27 September 1852]
“Nothing else could”– Not shame on my part, do you think? causing that indisposition to write, which made me accept the heaps of ready excuse on all sides .. the idea that you might be engaged in the circumstances of your moving, and the fact that I was preparing for mine?– Believe me or not—I do solemnly assure you that such a notion as your “presumption”! or any form of a defective appreciation of you never entered into my mind, nor my sin that day, when I suffered my sister to take me from the house for half an hour, in absolute oblivion of the time of day & condition of engagements. When I returned I found another lady waiting for me—not you. I was so confounded at the sight of your sketch & letter, [1] that Arabel could’nt make out at first what was the matter—I could not articulate a rational sentence.
See how wrong you were, not to let me know of your remaining so long in London—yes, wrong! because you did not mean it for a vengeance. A revenge of the kind, the gods might have approved of & man called righteous—but revenge was not in your thoughts, I know. Well—do forgive me, & do try to understand me a little better. I am the most rash, helter skelter & headlong of careless creatures—but I am not arrogant or ungrateful .. no, nor inclined to be unaffectionate towards you. Forgive me therefore, & dont thrust back my book [2] on me .. be gracious & accept it.
I am profoundly vexed at not having seen you. Now—here is a letter from Mrs Tennyson to ask us to be present at the christening of her child on the 3d [sic, for 5th] of October. We shall probably stay for that—and then we go to Paris en-route to Florence & Rome. Sarianna goes with us as far as Paris, where she will remain with her father– After we have seen to their comfortable settlement we proceed on our journey– That you should be thinking of Paris this winter completes my misadventure as relates to you.
Write to me & say that you are taking courage & not giving way to evil fancies, & determined to work out your unmistakeable talents.
How I should have liked to see those other Tennyson illustrations!–
Dearest Fanny’s
sincerely affectionate Ba.
Surely I sent you back Mr Bethune’s verses– [3] But I will ask Robert when he comes in–
Address: Miss Haworth / 1. Marine Parade– / Herne Bay.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum.
1. See the first paragraph of letter 3122.
2. Poems (1850).
3. EBB may be referring to poetry by George W. Bethune (1805–62), American divine, whose Lays of Love and Faith was published in 1848. The British Female Poets, with Biographical and Critical Notices, edited by Bethune, appeared the same year. It contains a lengthy chapter on EBB (pp. 452–487).
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