3512. EBB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 21, 59–63.
[Florence]
[late January 1855] [1]
My dearest Sarianna I dare say Robert will send you a lamentable story about me, but dont fancy it above half as bad as he makes it out. Also I am getting through—the cough is decidedly in abeyance, & the feverishness at night (which is my usual symptom) has diminished to nothing. If the weather would change I should be well directly & get back my strength—but certainly never in Italy did I suffer from the chest, so before. We have had most exceptional cold for Tuscany– There has been snow even at Pisa—snow lying in the streets till evening, here,—& in such a state of things I am sure to suffer—there’s a mechanical necessity for it. The worst has been that for one week, when I slept scarcely at all, Robert could’nt either of course, .. & felt unwell, too, accordingly. He is so very unreasonable (dear affectionate darling that he is!) as not to choose the sensible part of going into another room till the evil should be passed. Indeed it was quite unfeeling of me to propose such a thing–!! Well—I hope our common miseries have a little subsided. Such severe days could only come in a parenthesis at Florence—& even on most of these, there has been brilliant sunshine enough to please most people. Penini is perfectly well & in ecstatical spirits—it’s a great comfort to look at his bright face. You should have seen that child’s delight at the snow. He stood before me, squeezing his eyes with his two hands in excess of rapture, & crying out .. “Oh! that beautiful sight on Piazza Pitti! All snow!” He begged that he might have “a few showers of snow to keep in his tea-things”, & was much disappointed when the treasure melted before his eyes. “But why? But why? It keeps white on the terrace.” Poor Peni has a few things to learn in life yet, with all his erudition–
I am very downhearted just now from the loss of my dear kind friend Miss Mitford—though it is gain to her– [2] Also, there is constant apprehension about the next news from England– Arabel thinks she may (dear Trippy, I mean) linger long—there are days on which she even seems stronger– What is very painful is the irritation of her temper .. which (always morbid in her) does not become placid under the fatigue of illness– She constantly supposes that people mean to poison her .. the people in the house .. the servants: and now she has begun to distrust Arabel!– You would call this lunacy: but it’s only the natural disposition, morbidly excited. Poor dear kind loving heart—distorted by early associations & a narrow education. What Arabel has to go through you may suppose. Only she has a nature great enough in its affections, for any wrong or other endurance, however at the cost of many & bitter tears– Think of it’s being said to her the other day, “If Ba knew your wickedness!”
Indeed, dearest Sarianna, I not only understand but absolutely agree with you in what you say of Mrs Corkran. What I like in her, after her kindness & generous impulses, is her instinct for spiritual relations, which is rare, & which charms me always. The logical faculty she has’nt in the least degree, as far as I know—and no opinion of her’s on any subject would have weight with me. In my mind she misjudged everything she attempted to form an opinion on—the whole French nation to begin with, & individuals in particular, to end with. The misfortune of instinct (apart from reason) is, that, although when left to its own free healthy operation, it will hit the truth more directly & certainly than reason itself, yet that, from our human constitution, it scarcely ever is left to it’s free operation, .. but warped by moods, & distracted by circumstances, degenerates into getting as wrong as possible, & encrusts itself into prejudice with the most invincible self-satisfaction. Milsand, as you say, is the very opposite of her—it would require great tolerance in either to appreciate the other entirely. He wants .. the only want of that noble nature .. he wants, I think, the sense of spiritual relation which she has—and also he puts under his feet too much the worth of impulse & passion, in considering the powers of human nature– For the rest, I dont know such a man. He has intellectual conscience, .. or say, .. the conscience of the intellect, in a higher degree than I ever saw in any man of any country—and this is no less Robert’s belief than mine– When we hear the brilliant talkers & noisy thinkers here & there & everywhere, we go back to Milsand with a real reverence. Also .. I never shall forget his delicacy to me personally .. nor his tenderness of heart about my child– The coolness between him & the Corkrans began in our time—in our room .. something about the coup d’etat. Milsand lost his temper .. that’s true .. but it’s as true that I could not wonder. He said to me afterwards—“French blood cannot keep cool in the veins to hear such imputations– It is too hard.” He can speak strongly (overstrong! even) himself of French defects, but he does not like quite the same words to be said by others. Also, these were not the same words, but worse words–
Talking of people, I think that Mrs Carmichael Smith is as given to form worthless opinions as anybody, from a very different reason– She is good, conscientious, & narrow & bigotted in proportion.
Indeed it is no feeling of mine that the immorality of the catholic countries in which I have lived, is so inferior to my own– The contadini [3] of Tuscany are on the contrary much superior in morals to the English agricultural districts among which I have lived: for I know something of the state of morals in our agricultural districts, & nothing can be more hideous. Here the people are gentle, good, domestic, honest,—they are quite free from our brutal vices– Also, I hear that the English engineers who superintend the railroads, [4] speak highly of the superiority of the Italian workmen to English workmen of the same class. Well-conducted & courteous—wanting some of the energy of our labourers, but making up for it in other qualities. The statistics of Florence prove it to be the most moral of any Europæan city in proportion to its population.
As to France Robert & I never call France a catholic country at all–
The truths we have secured access to by Protestantism should produce of course larger moral fruits—but there’s a great gulf between the real holders of a truth & those who profess to hold it. Half Oxford is Puseyite, & the other half infidel. That’s a fact– In society it’s much worse– Among the mass of the people, as Maurice tells us, & as is obvious from other sources, it’s beginning to be a question whether there’s a God or not. [5] Our decencies & decorums are thick veils drawn over an ordure which stinks in Heaven’s face.
My belief is strongly, that the very smallest quantity of dogmatic truth held in conscience will make a more moral life .. place the individual man in a higher rank of virtue .. than the largest quantity of truth held loosely.
One thing is too sure—that the women most talked of for scandalous morals in the places of Italy where I have been, are English & American women—and that if you want to be cheated here, you will go straight to an English tradesman. It’s notorious. Yet we stand upon pedestals & talk of our morals. “The English call themselves moral. Dio mio!,” [6] .. say the Italians in astonishment. I cant tell you the impression made in our exhibition-year [7] when, droves of these Tuscans went to London & were imposed upon in the most cruel way by everybody– Oh—it was’nt simply the dearness of our prices!—but they were worried on all sides like sheep by dogs–
There—I have written myself out of breath. You will say—“Certainly there’s not much the matter with her, or she could’nt fire up so”– Dearest Sarianna, it’s generous of me too, when my Florence has been treating me so scurvily– If you passed Christmas day without fire you were much warmer than we—but I fancy you must have had the head of this tail of Frost. Mr Kenyon writes from a “black .. blackest fog– Driving dangerous”––a letter we had from him yesterday.
Give my best love to dear Mrs Corkran & thank her for her kind, welcome letter which I will answer very soon.
The gloom in England is terrible. I heard from Mrs Jameson the other day, & she who always exults & blows trumpets, [8] is in the lowest state of spirits about the “want of head” shown everywhere, & the consequent sufferings of our poor troops. The intentions have been the best, the most generous even,—yet for want of organization which is our bane, all this trouble has come—private letters tugging at the hearts of families everywhere. She says, we never shall go to war again, being entirely disgusted at the cost of human suffering. I rather hope that we shall learn to face any necessary evil (such as this or a little war) with more adroitness– By this time surely much of the suffering is corrected—but lives have been lost through oversights—Florence Nightingale seems to have found even the hospital at Scutari in a dreadful state. [9] Fanny Haworth (from whom we have had a few lines) says she does not remember such a Christmas for gloom. People will be easier perhaps when parliament has opened–
How is the dearest Nonno? Penini is meditating another letter .. talks of it .. & when I shall be right again so as to bear the emotion of sympathizing with the words he writes wrong, you shall have it– Now dont fancy that we are not prospering– Dont make us out a sort of Crimea-crew!
We mean to go to you when the weather will admit of it—early in May at latest. The ship-money is to reach us in February—neither too soon nor too late. May God bless you both– We think of you tenderly & always–
Your most affectionate Ba.
Publication: Orr, p. 175 (in part).
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum.
1. Approximate dating suggested by EBB’s reference to Miss Mitford’s death, which occurred on 10 January 1855, and by her implication in the last paragraph that the month of February is in the future.
2. Cf. Philippians 1:21.
3. “Peasants,” or “farmers.”
4. EBB’s information probably came from Marianne Fell (née Offor, 1821–1903) via her husband John Barraclough Fell, an engineer and railway contractor (see letter 3671, note 2). Another possible source was James Montgomery Stuart (see letter 3530, note 12).
5. In the essay “On Regeneration” in Theological Essays (2nd ed., 1853), which EBB had been reading the previous year (see letter 3428), F.D. Maurice writes: “An able and benevolent man has complained that we have been talking and arguing about Baptismal Regeneration, while our brethren of the working classes are discussing the question, whether there is a God. … I cannot believe, finally, that they will ever come to the settlement of that primary question, whether they have a God to believe in and worship, till they are taught whether He has done anything, or is doing anything, for their regeneration” (pp. 247–248).
6. “My God!”
7. EBB refers to the Great Exhibition of 1851.
8. Cf. the “Exsultet,” or “Exultet,” a hymn in praise of the Resurrection sung at Easter in Roman Catholic and Anglican churches. In Times and Seasons (2006), a publication of the Church of England, the hymn is presented in various forms, one of which begins: “Rejoice, heavenly powers! Sing, choirs of angels! / O Universe, dance around God’s throne! / Jesus Christ, our King, is risen! / Sound the victorious trumpet of salvation!” (p. 410).
9. On 14 November 1854, soon after her arrival at Scutari, Florence Nightingale wrote to John Bowman: “Of the horror & misery (in a military Hospl.) … a London Hospl. is a garden of flowers to it … I have no doubt that Providence is quite right and that the Kingdom of Hell is the best beginning for the Kingdom of Heaven, but that this is the Kingdom of Hell no one can doubt” (“I have done my duty”: Florence Nightingale in the Crimean War, 1854–56, ed. Sue M. Goldie, Manchester, 1987, p. 36).
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