3811. EBB to Angela Owen
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 23, 1–2.
39. Devonshire Place.
Wednesday. [July 1856] [1]
My dearest Angela
I did not write directly. I should be glad to be able to go to you, & show you my husband, & hear you talk, you & dear Mr Owen,—but we had one engagement already for friday, & I find now that we are shut out from you on all sides. If you knew how I am beaten upon with business .. things to be done in a fixed time. One can do anything with time enough—but to lie at full length on the point of a needle would be hard for even a schoolman’s angel. [2]
Still we shall try to get to you some day—though it is’nt possible to fix a day & hour just now– My husband is given to accept invitations and not to keep them .. as he did last night and the night before. But I am more minorly moral, observe .. & that’s why I was so hard the other morning–
Oh—I shall come. You will see– Some day when you have left off wishing for me perhaps—which would be dreadful. I, too, want you to know Robert, & that he is worth loving & being loved by– He is in fact a hundred times better than I am, better in the head, better in the heart,—and I ought to be ashamed of not having been too humble to consent to be his wife, all those years ago– That’s the fault, it seems to me–
Oh—I thank you so for the two pamphlets, [3] & for the kind words beside in one of them– The address especially interested me– I am considering how much worse you must think of my position than I think of yours–
My true love to all of you till we meet again. Dearest Angela
Your ever most affectionate
Ba–
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library.
1. Dating suggested by reference to the return address and by EBB’s remark, “we shall try to get to you some day,” indicating an early period in the Brownings’ residence at 39 Devonshire Place.
2. EBB alludes to the question, “How many angels can dance on the head of a pin (or point of a needle)?” and variations thereof. While not appearing in the written records of medieval theologians, it is associated with a particular brand of early Christian metaphysical and ontological conjecture popularly thought to have been debated during that period. The question suggests scholarly pedantry or metaphysical impossibility.
3. Unidentified, but possibly they were related to the Catholic Apostolic Church, in which Mrs. Owen’s husband, Henry John Owen, was a minister.
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