3200. EBB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 19, 87–89.
[Florence]
[14 May 1853] [1]
My dearest Sarianna I am afraid our excursion to England for this summer is dispersing away, much like many another such a vision!– Robert seemed to set it down as impossible that we should go to Rome upon our actual means, & now the weather seems to say the same—for it has grown very hot, & we have taken to all lawful & usual means of summer for keeping ourselves cool, such as opening windows, walking out in the evening & wearing dresses as diaphanous as may be decent. It disappoints & vexes me extremely to have to give up our English scheme, & when I think of my poor Arabel there’s a pain at my heart– But what is to be done. Robert talks of a winter at Rome & of going north in the spring—but its a long way to look when we look over such a tract of months, & I feel that you & the dear Nonno will be vexed, & I am vexed myself, & so is Robert—& I would willingly give up Rome now & determine to come back again, only I suppose we could scarcely show our faces to Mr Kenyon without having seen Rome. Could we? Ah, if he had sent the money in time! But if he had, Robert thinks we should have had difficulty without the ship-money–. Well– My difficulty is to understand how, under these circumstances, we are to compass Rome next winter. Rome is much dearer than Florence– We must be patient & see. Among my many credulities, as I say, is a belief in the skies falling & the consequent catching of larks. [2]
Meantime we are trying to move tables, as Robert will tell you. I hear it has been done twice in Florence, but it is easy for people to deceive themselves, & we are not satisfied .. even I am not .. about the doings here, though I believe in the possibility of this & greater things. With regard to the manifestations in America, Mr Chorley is “fretted,” he says, that Mrs Browning should believe in such “mountebankery”—and Mr Kenyon cant make such a “jump” as to believe in spirit-movements, he says, when he does’nt believe in spirits at all. Still, the most fretful & sensible of men cant “pooh pooh” away facts, if they are facts– If they are facts they will force themselves on the world—they are making way, even now .. & perhaps presently there will be a still more startling development. The Americans who flow in upon us bring one story more extraordinary than another. A very cultivated & pleasing woman was here last night & kept me dreaming till morning of what she had told me with tears overflowing her own eyes. [3]
Yes, I was & am delighted about our dearest Robert’s Colombe. If it is not a vulgar, money-bringing success, it is something much better,—& it is likely to carry off the edition of poems. I am not only pleased with the applause, but with the sort of applause——are not you?
The winter has been as bad as possible everywhere on the continent—better here & at Pau than anywhere else, I do believe. An old acquaintance (an hereditary acquaintance) of mine came to see us on her way through Florence, & swore that Rome & Naples were both much colder than she had ever felt it in England—which Robert bore pretty well, till she post-swore that all the trees in Italy were pollarded .. & then he was so rude that I trembled on my chair. Her fatal name was Deffell, & he has sent her to the Devil ever since.
Dearest Sarianna, it does please me to think of you in the new old rooms. [4] I wish you were here—but Robert says we might as well put you into a nunnery as bring you to Italy, & that he chooses you to have other destinies &c &c! By the way, he wished the other day he had a daughter ...... to marry her to M. Milsand!!—— We can’t help thinking of marriages just now because we are reading so many novels. We have read Henry Esmond—beautiful things in it indeed! I never thought a conception so high and noble would come from Thackeray—his previous books, with all their cleverness, had not prepared me for it– Then Robert is lying on the sofa this moment, reading the first volume of Villette. Bleak House does not please me & Robert wont go on with it, not caring to be displeased. [5]
Penini said to us the other night, “Dood night, mine darlings! I hope gentle Jesus & all the angels will tate tare of Papa & Mama.” I cant fancy where the child finds his turns of thought. I assure you I had not been reading to him concerning the angels, out of Swedenborg. He is rationally interested in the moving tables, but makes no marvel of it, nor would be startled at all if the chairs took to dancing a cellarius. By the way, I wish you could see him dance with his tamb[o]urine. His attitudes, his little steps, his time-keeping to the music—it is really pretty!–
Mr Byrne is very dislocated in his household economy, we know of old– If I were you I would have your plate over—those forks are frail! We had broken ours at the end of the winter. Ah—but the fog you describe, did not force you to light candles as the fogs do in London—did it? I never saw anything like a London fog in Paris. What you have in Paris is white & fleecy, of a different character altogether. I never spent a winter in London without being forced to light a candle to read by in the day. My cousin is cashiered. [6] Prince Albert could or would do nothing. My poor uncle is dreadfully vexed, as he may well be, but has borne himself towards his son with a most tender patience. I have had a letter from Fanny Haworth full of affectionate enquiry about you … and the rapping spirits!– God bless you both. Best love to nonno from Penini & me.
Your ever affectionate Ba
My love to dear Mrs Corkran—yes, & to Mr Corkran.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Lilly Library.
1. Dating based on EBB’s reference to Sara Jane Clarke at the end of the second paragraph; see note 3.
3. EBB refers to Sara Jane Clarke (see letter 3075, note 11), who paid three or four visits to the Brownings at Casa Guidi between 12 and 16 May 1853. On the second of these visits (on the 13th—see the fourth to last paragraph in letter 3201), she related her spiritualist experiences, which are described at length by EBB in letter 3210. In Haps and Mishaps of a Tour in Europe (Boston, 1854, pp. 357–358 and 363–364), Miss Clarke gives her impressions of the Brownings (see SD1654 and SD1656).
4. At 138 Avenue des Champs Élysées; see letter 3197, note 2.
5. Bleak House, by Charles Dickens, was in the latter stages of its serial publication, which ran in twenty numbers from March 1852 to September 1853. The most recent number, fifteen, was issued on 30 April. The novel appeared in book form on 10 September 1853.
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