4072. EBB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 24, 182–184.
[Florence]
[Postmark: 11 October 1857]
My dearest Sarianna Everything is going on excellently, & it is right that you should know it. Our darling rallied with wonderful quickness from his fever, as only a child can,—and indeed the only difficulty now is to keep him back from taking too long walks & exciting himself beyond what he can bear, seeing that of course he cant be expected to be quite as strong as he was before his illness, though you might think so to look at him! Our friends here can scarcely believe in this tradition of illness! Yet he was nearly a fortnight in bed, & subjected to very strict discipline–
Did I tell you that while he was yet ill, the new maid Annunciata who had helped to nurse him, was siezed also with gastric symptoms? She was in bed three or four days, but the complaint in her yielded to very strong remedies. Poor Peni ended by having a whole drove of girls in his bedroom, one coming to help another, Maria, Giuseppina, Estere, & Pistolina .. till at last he protested .. “Ma andate via tutte. Io non voglio essere vestito da tutte le donne nel mondo!” [1] He kept up his spirits all the time, darling child, except on one or two nights—once his cries (he was in pain, Sarianna!) almost distracted me. We heard afterwards that the doctor had apprehended at first that it was milliary [sic] fever—a fever of the country very dangerous: a sort of typhus, in fact. He told us (the doctor did) that he was a remarkably healthy child, & amenable to remedies therefore. His power of rallying was certainly wonderful—(to compare his case with Lytton’s!) & it was the same gastric fever– There were several cases at the Bagni just at the turn of the year—(from August to the end of November is the feverish time in Italy) but at Florence & Pisa this fever has been much worse & much more fatal. Generally gastric fever is the complaint of unacclimated foreigners, but for the last two or three years it has attacked the natives also, & been much more frequent throughout Tuscany, .. the Italians say, from the failure of the vintage [2] & its effect on the diet– An American family which has lately arrived in Florence, has been sorely tried—in a house close by: the eldest son dead, & the two daughters recovering by almost a miracle, when hope was at an end. [3]
Now you are to be quite easy about Peni– He goes every day to take his music-lesson just as usual—only I dont like him to walk too far, & am more cautious of course, about exposing him to the sun. The cause of his attack was perfectly clear. You see we have been rather careless about our Peni, because of his being always well, never apparently affected by sun or shade, or even by indiscriminate peaches & pears. But what undid us, was that run by my portantina– [4] I know & feel it was.
I made a sacrifice in my soul of German verbs & music, thinking he would have forgotten everything. But he rises up just as if he had been at hard study all the time, doing all his lessons better!– There’s a phenomenon for you. Peni deduces from it the moral that holidays are good for him, & that he ought to have frequent holidays for the future. Robert is very proud of his music.
About Rome I dont know– Robert wants to go I think—but we shall not go till quite the end of November, if then.
We find Lytton transmigrated into quite a fat body. [5]
I am glad to get home to carpets & sofas—but I come with an undiminished passion for the mountains. Oh—so happy we are that dear M. Milsand is successful, after all, with his vines– [6] Give to him when you write, our very best love. And dont let the dear Nonno be uneasy about his “pup”– He would’nt if he could see him. May God bless both of you. Dearest Sarianna’s
ever affecte Ba–
Address, in RB’s hand: France. / À Mademoiselle / Madlle Browning, / 151. Rue de Grenelle, Faubg St Germn / Paris.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Lilly Library.
1. “Go away, all of you. I don’t want to be dressed by all the women in the world.”
2. As EBB explains in letter 4074, oidium, a powdery mildew, had attacked the wine grapes in Italy, resulting in several failed harvests during the mid-1850’s. The fungus, native to North America, could be controlled by dusting with sulphur. Grape harvests in France had also been affected, especially in 1854 (see The Oxford Companion to Wine, ed. Jancis Robinson, 4th ed., Oxford, 2015, pp. 577–578).
3. Unidentified.
4. “Sedan chair.”
5. In a letter dated 7 October, Lytton assured his father that his health was improving and that he was “getting so fat—that my clothes hardly meet about the waist” (ms with Cobbold).
6. Joseph Milsand oversaw the harvests of his mother’s vineyards, which were located at Morey (now Morey-Saint-Denis), one of the great wine-producing areas of Burgundy. The Milsand harvests had also been affected by oidium, beginning in 1854.
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