3996. RB to Julia Martin
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 24, 64–65.
Florence.
May 3. ’57.
My dear Mrs Martin,
Truest thanks for your letter. We had the intelligence from George last Thursday week, having been only prepared for the illness by a note received from Arabel the day before. Ba was sadly affected at first,—miserable to see & hear. After a few days, tears came to her relief. She is now very weak and prostrated, but improving in strength of body & mind: I have no fears for the result. I suppose you know at least the very little that we know—& how unaware poor Mr Barrett was of his imminent death: “he bade them,” says Arabel “make him comfortable for the night, but a moment before the last.” And he had dismissed her, and her Aunt, [1] about an hour before, with a cheerful or careless word about “wishing them good-night.” So it is all over now, all hope of better things, or a kind answer to entreaties such as I have seen Ba write in the bitterness of her heart. There must have been something in the organization, or education, at least, that would account for & extenuate all this: but it has caused grief enough, I know—& now here is a new grief, not likely to subside very soon. Not that Ba is other than reasonable & just,—to herself,—in the matter: she does not reproach herself at all—it is all mere grief, as I say,—that this should have been so: and I sympathise with her there.
George wrote very affectionately to tell me,—and dear, admirable Arabel sent a note the very next day to prove to Ba that there was nothing to fear on her account. Since then, we have heard nothing. The funeral was to take place in Herefordshire. [2] We had just made up our minds to go on no account to England this year– Ba felt the restraint on her too horrible to bear. I will—or she will, no doubt,—write and tell you of herself—and you must write, dear Mrs Martin, will you not?
Kindest regards to Mr Martin, and all gratitude to you–
Yours faithfully ever
Robert Browning–
Publication: LEBB, II, 263–264.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Arabella Sarah (“Bummy”) Graham-Clarke, who had been staying at 50 Wimpole Street (see the sixth paragraph in letter 3976).
2. The funeral service for Edward Moulton-Barrett was conducted on 24 April 1857 at the Parish Church of St. Michael and All Angels, Ledbury, Herefordshire. He was buried in the northeast corner of the church, near the altar, in the same vault that held the remains of his wife, Mary Moulton-Barrett (née Graham-Clarke, 1781–1828), and daughter Mary Barrett Moulton-Barrett (1810–14). The Moulton-Barrett memorial above the vault, executed by John Graham Lough (1798–1876), is illustrated facing p. 80. For further details of the funeral, see Surtees Cook’s account in SD2068.
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