3449. EBB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 20, 261–262
[Florence]
[Postmark: 5 July 1854]
My dearest Sarianna you see the suspense is over at last! I feel rather glad than otherwise, though we shall be straightened all the summer, that the case should be a complete one—so as to leave no room for a doubt or a possibility. As it is, the question is how to live—& how to get a little into the shadow of the mountains for our Penini—and Robert calls Lucca impossible for the present, even if we contrive presently (should a more active heat come on) to go there for a month or six weeks. Mr Kenyon says “Of course you will go to Lucca,” but he does not seem to consider the difficulty of even a residence at Lucca under the circumstances. Robert is horribly vexed—because, though he had apparently made up his mind to the improbability of being able to reach Paris & London, he had made sure of at least fifty pounds from the ship to make us comfortable in Tuscany. And not a penny!– I had a letter from my poor darlingest Arabel yesterday—so melancholy, & so leading to melancholy on my side, that I had rather not have read it. Henrietta’s regiment is ordered to Plymouth & she has had to let her pretty cottage & go into lodgings by the sea—which is’nt so bad a thing after all– She talked of making a great effort to come to London & meet me—but Arabel says that if I dont arrive, she wont .. in all probability—all that’s left to poor Arabel, being double occupation in the Ragged Schools, which she declares she shall have recourse to in order to put her disappointment as far out of sight as possible. Never had it occurred to her that we might not come! Oh, it is sad altogether.
The comfort is that Penini is quite well & getting fatter day by day. Mrs Sartoris is “tearing her hair” at Lucca—to use the picturesque expression of a sympathizing bystander .. because of our giving up the house she had thought to secure for us– Still, when the heat sets in here .. which it certainly must do in spite of the delicious coolness hitherto (thermometer not much above seventy this morning!) I shall carry off my Penini to Lucca if all the seven sages [1] spoke against it, & Robert at their head. Not but that he will help me .. even against his own instinct towards caution in such matters.
Mr Story wrote to Robert that our apartment at Mr Byrne’s .. the one we paid two hundred francs for .. is to be let at three hundred & fifty or rather four hundred &c. That, I take the liberty of doubting—because I have seen lately in Galignani a ten room apartment of Mr Byrne’s advertised for that very sum [2] —our’s had only six rooms, you know. Tell me how it is—— Mr Story also said that prices in Paris were double those in Rome—whereas I hear of persons just arrived from Paris at Florence who give very different accounts, & even complain of our prices here!– Now the prices here are exactly a third less—that is, our weekly expenses amount to exactly a third less here, .. than they did in Rome. I wish I had never seen Rome for my part. There’s nothing genuine about it except a pestilential climate which does’nt pretend much to be otherwise– Talk of ruins & grand associations! .. it’s pitiful,—with that great, vulgar, modern watering-place roaring over the footsteps of the Cæsars– The very Coliseum is hedged in & “Kept in order” like a hen-house.
How spiteful I am– But Rome made my Penini ill, & Rome used up all our money & prevented our going to you. Dearest Sarianna, we must bear up however as cheerfully as we can—for there are worse evils than this disappointment. I believe what vexes me most of all is to think that Penini is growing, & that you will lose the sight probably, of some of his infantine innocency & grace– Still, at six, next year, he wont be very old– If you were to see him now you would’nt think him a bit altered, except that he is taller & that his ringlets hang lower down his back. The old sweetness & ingenuousness are untouched. He’s more a baby than children usually are at his age, with all his quickness & intelligence. Then there’s not a touch of the bad sort of naughtiness—no perverseness. I was reproaching him for not doing his lesson well yesterday .. “Oh—I know I did it velly, velly bad—but tomollow I will tly to do it more better.” What could you answer to that but twenty kisses?
Here is Robert who is ready for my letter. May God bless you my dearest dear Sarianna– Write to us, & let us be as near as we can. Tell us everything as we shall tell you. We shall come early in the spring, be sure—if we can be sure of anything in this world except of being vexed when vexing is good for us. Penini’s love to the dearest Nonno & you–
Your ever affectionate Ba–
Address, in RB’s hand: France / Mademoiselle Browning, / chez M. Byrne, / Avenue des Champs Elysées, 138. / Paris.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum and Lilly Library.
1. Seven legendary philosophers of ancient Greece, named in Plato’s Protagoras.
2. An advertisement in Galignani’s Messenger of 1 July 1854 reads: “An Apartment, furnished, No. 138, Champs-Elysées, on the 1st floor, 10 rooms, rent 400fr.; terrace and garden.”
___________________
