3774. EBB to Isa Blagden
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 22, 202.
[Paris]
Tuesday. [May 1856] [1]
My dearest Isa, your note found me in an agony of composition– Now I write to say that I have nothing to say against thursday, except that its not tuesday or wednesday—you may rely on my always being pleased when you will come, dearest Isa.
No—I am not ill—but weak—& the open air will make me strong I suppose. There is need—for I would give anything to be going to bed now, at seven, instead of looking out for company.
Seeing that I am not to have yours!
But, dear, you are very right not to come out with a sore throat—& then, tomorrow you’ll have an Evans, [2] I understand– So it must be for thursday.
The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places & I have a goodly heritage [3] .. in Barnaby Rudge [4] .. which Harriet has tossed out for me from the literature she brought over with her from England for consolation among strangers.
Think of me never having read that book!– It slipped out of my life when I was very ill & very miserable—& here I find it. [5]
Your ever affectionate Ba.
Publication: B-IB, p. 105.
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum.
1. Dated by EBB’s references to Barnaby Rudge and Isa’s ill health, both of which subjects are further mentioned in letter 3775.
2. A liquid medicine or a plaster, manufactured by the firm of Evans Sons & Co., Liverpool.
3. Cf. Psalm 16:6.
4. Barnaby Rudge (1841) by Charles Dickens.
5. EBB alludes to her time at Torquay, when she was seriously ill, and to her emotional state following the death of her brother Edward in July 1840.
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