3986. EBB to Julia Martin
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 24, 51–55.
Florence–
March [sic, for April] [9–] 10– [1857] [1]
Ah dearest friend, how much I thank you. Your letter came to me at dinner, and the first glance at it completed the dining for me on that day.
But how I thank you. How good you are, how kind, how disinterested, to have ventured such an uncomfortable step for me & Henrietta! how kind!
It is strange—but precisely about that time, last August, my aunt Jane had herself the goodness to try for us the same thing. [2] She was unduly impressed by the state of my father’s health, having seen him (as she passed through London) on a particular evening when he suffered from an accidental attack .. not of at all a dangerous character, but which made him look wretchedly ill,—&, when she returned to Sidbrook, she wrote a letter which Arabel caught sight of afte<rwa>rds (very strong & straightforward, Arabel said <…>) and the answer to which was shown to Henrietta by my aunt herself. The contents of it seemed the counterpart of the answer to you—except that there were some bitter things said of us (said to you, however, also, I dare say) about our disgracing his family &c &c– For the rest, he professed to having forgiven us, & to wishing us well.
Which did not prevent his sending his family out of town a month after my arrival there .. that is, the very moment he had heard of my arrival, and so cutting off as fast as he could, the rare opportunity of Arabel’s & my being together. Which did not prevent, either, his refusal a week or two ago to give poor Henrietta’s address to Mr Kenyon[’]s executor [3] who applied for it in order to the payment of her legacy of a hundred pounds. Arabel had, herself, to write– A second application had to be made to Arabel,—and the impression was left of course, on a stranger, of ineffaceable crime & unpardonable offence on the part of his daughter.
Is it forgiveness? is it forgiveness?– Still, the word even, is good to hear– That he prays for us, & does not curse us, is good to hear– And I thank & bless you, my beloved friend, .. from whom I do hear it now.
We are put into mourning again, just as we were thinking to quit it .. for our dear, dear old friend, Miss Tripsack .. the friend of my father’s infancy as well as our’s—very old of course, & long infirm .. so long, that the shock at last was real, as such things are apt to be. (How useless is all preparation, as it is called! The only effect of that is to lengthen an anguish.) You have heard of “Trippy”, I am certain– She was unwell for some days– Arabel was with her twice on sunday. (Three weeks ago.) [4] On Monday it snowed & hailed, & she was persuaded not to go in person, but to send a messenger instead, nobody apprehending anything. On tuesday afternoon she went, intending to sit up during the night,—but on opening the door .. the dear spirit had just passed,—just passed—it was all over. [5] Arabel who wrote this account to me & who was always devoted to her as a nurse & constant visitor, admits that the shock together with a great deal of painful confusion about last arrangements & dispositions, upset her, (Arabel) & made her really unwell for some days, adding however that at the time of her writing she was well again. Papa, (not from this cause, she said) had had an attack to an extent which induced him to call in a physician (for the first time this winter) .. but that it was merely a bilious attack, & that he was now well, and preparing at that moment to set out for the Jamaica coffeehouse .. where he has been several times lately. In fact he has had an excellent winter, looking another man– Bummy was surprised to see him, Arabel says,—so improved are his looks from last year.
Dont tell anybody, dearest Mrs Martin, but in spite of our promises to go back this summer to Paris & England, we are dreaming of perjuries, & of staying here till next spring. The journey is very long, & the conditions of living in furnished lodgings very expensive– Then we have had two successive summers in London, with all the toil & moil [6] of it, .. we shall find vacant places, to add to the sadness—and the physical & moral weight upon me in England, you none of you can judge of .. nor much more of my dread of “imaginary conversations” [7] concerning legacies and Auroras. While I am away, I dont care to excess that the Dublin University magazine, for instance, should in the number just out, compare me to ‘Afra Behn’! & talk of my book as ‘sealed to my own sex,” [8] though I should hate to hear the charges on it from a quantity of friendly persons sure to come to condole with me on that head. I should like to wait till all this dust has past a little—though dust is bearable after all– There are worse things than dust. As soon as ever we were heard of, Wimpole St wd move out of town, & our only resource wd be to follow under disguise .. a position to which my husband (who will do everything for my sake) should scarcely be invited into summer after summer. If we wait here till next spring, we shall be able to spend two successive summers in England, & the intervening winter in Paris, without much risk or strain– This year, though our legacy will be paid, we are cut off from above three hundred & fifty pounds of income [9] which came to us from other sources last year—& travelling & house-rent will be heavy on us– Therefore, we mean to try to get off, & we want repose really– I worked my nerves to pieces last year, & the winter is only now over,—so unless Arabel insists on our coming, (and my pleasure with her is, more than half of it, pain to both of us) I shall propose going next year instead, when we can stay, more comfortably & at less cost of life & spirits. Every year spent in the north drops me lower into the socket. This winter has past well—but if we bustle off directly again, there will be no time to gather my summer efflorescence of flame, such as one warms into from Italy. Still, of none of this reasonableness, have I heard a word yet. It’s better to wait, I think, till the year advances rather, & “next spring” does’nt look so far off.
You dont think with the reviewer in the ‘Deux Mondes,’ that the poetry of society is dead now a days. May God forbid. The opinion seems to me, too, illogical, seeing that he admits that the “human soul is poetical always.” [10] The soul makes the human being.
How kindly you write & think! Yes—the attacks produce discussion, & provoke contradiction of course– “Afra Behn” on one side, and “the Bible of the age” [11] on another.! But there are pretty pleasant letters from women .. young, I should think, .. who write to thank me for “help” .. for new views of “love, truth, & purity”, [12] —that’s very comforting. And the second edition is said to be nearly out, & the third is in course of preparation. Only the elections may mar a little this sale. [13]
Oh—I should like to hear Mr Martin’s views of Palmerston & the Chinese War– [14] The war, I dont like,—Palmerston, I do, .. as men & politicians go nowadays. There’s no better man, it seems to me, anywhere.
Let me tell you now of the lioness we have in Florence– No less a beast, or rather queen of the beasts, than Mrs Stowe. She brought letters to us, & we saw her yesterday & today– Very simple, very gentle, a sweet voice, .. & not too American. In the face, nice-looking, with dusky wavy hair,—a brow not very wide, and a mouth which does not open well or frankly—that may be my fancy about mouths– But I like her: so does Robert—& I dare say when we see her more, we shall see still more to like. It is great praise that the most popular writer in the world, should be so very simple a woman.
Now I must go—not to miss the post.
Think of my little dot of a Penini determining not to touch meat these three days. Because he’s an Italian, & the Italians eat ‘magro’.! [15] When I had exhausted myself in persuasion, Robert burst in with a philosophical remark on the absurdity of this fancy. “But papa” said Peni very gravely, “people have different pinions.” I am happy to say that the controversy ended in pigeon pie. The child’s glory is in being a Florentine. Presently, I suppose, we shall have him a boasting Briton.
Not a word do you say of your health– Do speak of it– And dont go to England too soon this year– And write to
your ever affecte & grateful
Ba–
The weather is divine. We had tea out of doors on the 6th of April, on a terrace looking down onto Florence– [16]
Robert’s love.
Address: France. / À Madame / Mde Martin / Turençon / Pau / Basses Pyrenées.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. This letter is postmarked 10 April 1857. The beginning date is based on EBB’s mention of seeing Harriet Beecher Stowe “yesterday & today”; i.e., on 8 and 9 April (see the second paragraph in letter 3985).
3. Either James Booth or Robert Hawthorn, the executors of John Kenyon’s estate.
4. The Sunday just prior to Mary Trepsack’s death was 8 March, nearly five weeks before the date of this letter.
5. EBB indicates that Treppy died on 10 March, a Tuesday, but her death certificate reads: “Ninth March 1857,” a Monday.
6. Cf. Aurora Leigh, VIII, 676.
7. EBB alludes to Walter Savage Landor’s Imaginary Conversations of Literary Men and Statesmen (5 vols., 1824–29) and Imaginary Conversations of Greeks and Romans (1853).
10. In his review of Aurora Leigh for the Revue des Deux Mondes of 15 March 1857 (pp. 322–353), Émile Montégut wrote: “Mrs. Browning’s poem confirms the two points we wanted to bring to light:—the sight of modern society does not, so to speak, offer the poet any possibilities;—the only poetry of our time is and should be lyrical, individual, intimate. If, instead of saying that the world was always poetic, Mrs. Browning had said that the human soul was always poetic, perhaps her language would have rung truer, and would have been more connected to the facts of her poem.” For the full text of this review, see pp. 302–314.
11. We have been unable to trace this expression in any reviews of Aurora Leigh. However, a notice in The Christian Inquirer of 28 February 1857 (p. 2) observed that EBB had written in “the spirit of the New Testament.” For the full text of this review, see pp. 289–291. Additionally, EBB told Arabella a few months earlier that people were calling the poem “a gospel” (see letter 3935, note 13).
12. The “pleasant letters from women” containing these expressions are not extant; however, see letter 3987, in which EBB writes: “I thank you for … this news that I have in some degree helped you.”
13. A general election was held after the Palmerston government’s defeat on a motion of censure (3 March 1857), regarding its conduct in the Arrow affair (see note 14 below). Polling began on 27 March 1857 and resulted in a clear victory for the Liberal party and a vote of confidence for the government. On 4 April, The Examiner announced: “The battle is won, and the government of Lord Palmerston will have a majority quite as large as is good for it, and which will require of the Minister a truly Liberal policy” (p. 209).
14. The Arrow War (1856–60), also known as the Second Opium War, resulted from an incident aboard the Arrow, a Chinese vessel sailing under British registry (though expired), anchored in Canton harbor. On 8 October 1856, its Chinese crew, nominally commanded by a British national, was arrested for piracy. At the same time, it was later alleged, the Union Jack was pulled down. The British consul, Harry Parkes, demanded the return of the crew from the Cantonese authorities and later an apology for insulting the British flag, which he followed with a demand to open the city to foreign trade (pursuant to an agreement made in 1847). None of these demands was met. Consequently, the British minister at Hong Kong, Sir John Bowring, ordered that a Chinese vessel be seized in retaliation. After this failed to move the Cantonese, Bowring gave the British naval commander a free hand to take more aggressive action, which culminated in a bombardment of the city on 27 October. When word of the affair reached England, Palmerston supported the steps his ministers had taken in the field, despite the apparent inconsistencies in their official dispatches (see J.Y. Wong Deadly Dreams: Opium, Imperialism, and the Arrow War (1856–1860) in China, Cambridge, 1998, pp. 1–40).
15. “No meat,” for Lent.
16. At Villa Brichieri, as reported in letter 3985.
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