374. EBB to Hugh Stuart Boyd

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 2, 244–245.

[Hope End]

Sunday. [May 1830] [1]

My dear Mr Boyd,

I am very much obliged to you for taking the trouble of writing the note which I have just received. I have been extremely uncomfortable, ever since yesterday, at the idea of having displeased you,—& it was a real relief to me to find that I did not do so as much as I feared. At the same time, you must let me exculpate Miss Price. She was not “selfish” in keeping me with her against my will, as you have heard. I did not tell her of my wish to go & see you; but, as the gratification of that wish would, in the opinion of some of our party, have appeared a neglect of her,—and as I could not, at any rate, have remained long with you, I decided upon practising a severe kind of self-denial yesterday, & of rewarding myself for it by visiting you on Friday. I was thinking all the time I was at Malvern, of my own costs; but, to speak sincerely, it never once struck my vanity that you were likely to be annoyed.

<…> [2]

Without any vanity, tho’ with a little reflection, I might have remembered, that people are sometimes & naturally annoyed by a want of attention,—even when the attention is of little real value to them.

Ann was quite right & kind in telling me exactly what she did tell me.

I will remember Ion. [3] Give my love to Mrs Boyd, & believe me to remain

Your sincere friend

E B Barrett.

Address, on integral page: H S Boyd Esqr

Publication: EBB-HSB, p. 102.

Manuscript: Wellesley College.

1. Dated by reference to Miss Price’s stay at Hope End (see letters 371 and 375).

2. Over half a line obliterated with loops, apparently by EBB.

3. Son of Apollo. Euripides made him the subject of a drama (418 B.C.).

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