3360. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 20, 141–144.
Rome. 43. Via Bocca di Leone.
March 19. [1854] [1]
My dearest Miss Mitford, your letter made my heart ache. It is sad sad indeed that you should have had this renewed cold just as you appeared to be rallying a little from previous shocks, and I know how depressing & enfeebling a malady this influenza is. It’s the vulture finishing the work of the wolf. I pray God that, having battled through this last attack, you may be gradually strengthened & relieved by the incoming of the spring—(though an English spring makes one shiver to think of generally—) & with the summer come out into the garden, to sit in a chair & be shone upon, dear, dear friend. I shall be in England then, & get down to see you this time, & I tenderly hold to the dear hope of seeing you smile again & hearing you talk in the old way– About mesmerism I hold you to be wrong. Even unbelievers in the spiritual phenomena will admit the good done physically by such means—and, as Mr May seems to have exhausted his resources & to promise nothing very confidently, I cant conceive why you should not make an experiment attended with no risk to you .. for, observe, if you fail to get benefit from mesmerism, you at least can get no injury. Mr Spencer Hall, as you say, may have suffered—but that’s from mesmerizing .. the active putting-forth—& not being mesmerized .. the passive recipiency. [2] I do earnestly wish you would give the thing a trial .. for the sake of those who love you, if for no other reason– I have heard of wonderful cures in cases of a similar character—and really with every respect for the ancient medical authorities, one cant go so far as to reverence them for their failures—can one now, with reason? Dearest Miss Mitford think no more of writing letters to me, but send me three lines of bulletin now & then, with very brief pauses between—because you see I have no other means of hearing of you & it makes me very anxious not to hear–
For our own parts I have scarcely much heart to write to you of ourselves while thinking of you so sadly—but we are well in this air of miasma, I thank God– Those poor friends of ours, the Storys, have been forced to take away their remaining child at last (I wonder they did’nt do it months ago) by the persistent fever & ague, & have been interrupted on their journey to Naples, at Velletri, through an access of illness which I fear is threatening to life– They write in great distress, & I am anxious for the post today. A continued residence at Rome is perilous for children, to say nothing of men & women,—& I would’nt for California spend another winter here, in spite of my little Penini’s ruddy cheeks hitherto. As to myself the climate agrees with me of course, because of the mildness of it. But let me cough, so that my husband & child run no risk– I choose Cheapside rather than anxiety for them!
We see a good deal of the Kembles here, & like them both, especially the Fanny who is looking magnificent still, with her black hair & radiant smile– A very noble creature, indeed. Somewhat unelastic, unpliant to the age .. attached to the old modes of thought & convention .. but noble in qualities & defects– I like her much– She thinks me credulous & full of dreams, but does not despise me for that reason .. which is good & tolerant of her .. & pleasant too, for I should not be quite easy under her contempt– Mrs Sartoris is genial & generous—her milk has had time to stand to cream, in her happy family relations, which poor Fanny Kemble’s has not had. The Sartoris house has the best society at Rome, & exquisite music of course. We met Lockhart there, & my husband sees a good deal of him .. more than I do .. because of the access of cold weather lately which has kept me at home chiefly. Robert went down to the seaside in a day’s excursion with him & the Sartoris[e]s, [3] &, I hear, found favour in his sight– Said the critic, “I like Browning—he is’nt at all like a damned literary man”. That’s a compliment I believe, according to your dictionary– It made me laugh & think of you directly. I am afraid Lockhart’s health is in a bad state—he looks very ill, & every now & then his strength seems to fail–
Robert has been sitting for his picture to Fisher the English artist, [4] who painted Mr Kenyon & Landor—you remember those pictures in Mr Kenyon’s house? [5] Landor’s was praised much by Southey. [6] Well—he has painted Robert, & it is an admirable likeness. The expression is an exceptional expression but highly characteristic—it is one of Fisher’s best works– Now he is about our Wiedeman,—and if he succeeds as well in painting angels as men, will do something beautiful with that seraphic face– [7] You are to understand that these works are done by the artist for the artist. Oh—we could’nt afford to have such a luxury as a portrait done for us. But I am pleased to have a good likeness of each of my treasures extant––in the possession of somebody. Robert’s will of course be eminently saleable—and Wiedeman’s too perhaps, for the beauty’s sake, with those blue far-reaching eyes, & that innocent angel face emplumed in the golden ringlets!– [8] Somebody told me yesterday that she never had known, in a long experience of children, so attractive a child. He is so full of sweetness & vivacity together, of imagination & grace. A poetical child really, & in the best sense– Such a piece of innocence & simplicity, with it all too! A child you could’nt lie to if you tried! I had a fit of remorse for telling him the history of Jack & the beanstalk, when he turned his earnest eyes up to me at the end & said, .. “I think, if Jack went up so high, he must have seen God.”
To see those two works [9] through the press must be a fatigue to you in your present weak state, dearest friend, and I keep wishing vainly I could be of use to you in the matter of the proof sheets—I might, you know, if I were in England. I do some work myself, but doubt much whether I shall be ready for the printers by July—no indeed—it is clear I shall not. If Robert is, it will be well. [10] Does’nt it surprise you that Alexander Smith should be already in a third edition? [11] I cant make it out for my part—I “give it up” as is my way with riddles. He is both too bad & too good, to explain this phenomenon, which is harder to me than any implied in the turning tables or involuntary writing. By the way, a lady whom I know here, writes Greek without knowing or having ever known a single letter of it. [12] The unbelievers writhe under it.
Oh—I have been reading poor Haydon’s biography– There is tragedy! The pain of it one can hardly shake off. Surely, surely, wrong was done somewhere, when the worst is admitted of Haydon. For himself, .. looking forward beyond the grave, .. I seem to understand that all things when most bitter, worked ultimate good to him—for that sublime arrogance of his would have been fatal perhaps to the moral nature, if developped further by success. But for the nation, we had our duties—& we should not suffer our teachers & originators to sink thus– It is a book written in blood of the heart– Poor Haydon!
May God bless you my own dear friend. I think of you & love you dearly. Robert’s love, put to mine, & Penini’s love put to Robert’s. I give away Penini’s love as I please just now.
Your ever attached
EBB.
Send me my bulletins—only two lines if you will!–
Address: Miss Mitford / Swallowfield / near Reading.
Publication: EBB-MRM, III, 404–407.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Year provided by postmark.
2. See letter 3285 in which Miss Mitford tells EBB that Spencer Hall gave up mesmerism after it “nearly killed him.”
3. As indicated by RB in letter 3377, this was to Ostia, the ancient port of Rome about 16 miles S.W. of the city. According to Murray’s A Handbook for Travellers in Central Italy (1853), “the chief interest of Ostia at the present time is derived from the excavations begun among the ruins of the ancient city at the close of the last century” (part II, p. 300).
4. RB’s portrait by William Fisher (1817–95), Irish painter, sold as lot 60 in Browning Collections (see Reconstruction, G7). It is reproduced facing p. 146.
5. According to R.H. Super, Fisher painted three portraits of Landor in 1838, each commissioned by a different person: John Kenyon, Mrs. Paynter, and Lady Bulwer (see Walter Savage Landor: A Biography, New York, 1954, p. 297). The one commissioned by Kenyon, which EBB had evidently seen, is now in the National Portrait Gallery, London (it is reproduced in vol. 4, facing p. 255). We have been unable to trace the whereabouts of Fisher’s portrait of Kenyon.
6. In an 18 February 1839 letter, Southey wrote: “I heard of Landor during my last transit through London, and saw one of the very best portraits of him by a young artist that I ever remember to have seen. The picture, too, was as good as the likeness. The artist did not succeed so well with Kenyon, whose head upon the canvas might very well have passed for the Duke of York’s” (The Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey, ed. Charles Cuthbert Southey, 1849–50, 6, 383).
7. We have been unable to trace a likeness of Pen Browning by William Fisher.
8. Cf. the poem that EBB was writing for her sister Arabella around this time, “A Plea for the Ragged Schools of London,” lines 83–84: “Such rose angelhoods, emplumed / In such ringlets of pure glory!”
10. RB continued adding to the poems that would be published as Men and Women (2 vols., 1855). In letter 3458, he states that he will have “a collection of new Poems, containing about 5000 lines.” The total number of lines in the two volumes came to over 7,000, and the last poem “One Word More” was written in September 1855. EBB was a long way from completing Aurora Leigh (1857). By January 1855, she had composed only 4,500 lines of what would be close to an 11,000-line poem.
11. Of his Poems (1853).
12. i.e., Mrs. Brotherton.
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