3500. RB to William Page

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 21, 31.

[Florence]

Tuesday, Dec. 12. ’54.

My dear Page,

Your picture arrived yesterday [1] —admirable as ever: and you have treated the crack in the pannel properly, no doubt: best thanks for all your goodness. Did you get a note from me, sent a few weeks ago? I wish I could know a little about you, how you are and what you work upon. Don’t care to write, however—(I mean, that I know you and should not misunderstand you because of a little silence, or a great one.) I shall get Hatty to spy into your ways and tell me, I think.

This is only a word in haste. Love to you all from my wife and

Yours ever affectionately

R Browning.

Address, on integral page: (Sigr William Page,) / Pakenham, Hooker et Cie / Piazza di Spagna, / Roma. Redirected: 20 S. Basilio.

Publication: None traced.

Source: Microfilm at Smithsonian Institution.

1. Page’s portrait of RB.

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