4092. EBB to Sophia Eckley
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 24, 206–208.
Casa Guidi.
November 7. [1857] [1]
How am I to speak before these dear letters, & these flowers, & say what I feel to see how far your love reaches? Dearest Sophie, it reaches deep as well as far. I have the touch of it here at the bottom of my heart– Did she think of me at Leghorn, I thought, in all that worry & commotion of going away– Did she think of me again at Naples? Then came the heliotropes after the letter to say yes. And again from Malta?– [2] Ah, you are too good, too kind, too tender– Tears in the eyes say ‘yes’ to that.
But what I write here will be read only at Cairo, [3] and the flowers are almost dead, and it seems so far, so far! Still, I know you love me, dear, and you know I love you–. May God bless you & love you, .. He who is love Itself .. may He love you & yours– Dear little Doady: my Peni talks of him. Tell me how he gets on in the strange new East. And tell him from me that Peni admires his sword so much that in an aspiration after the customary Christmas presents, he said to me yesterday “only give me a sword like Doady’s! It has a handle of gold and silver; & when you draw it from the sheath, the glitter of it hurts your eyes!– Oh!” … (covering over his eyes with both his hands at the very remembrance.)
Since you were here Mrs Newton Crosland whose book on spiritualism [4] you saw reviewed in the Waverley Journal, [5] has visited, passing through to Rome,—& I have read the book & talked with her. She is religious & true, without being very discreet, I think, in certain things brought before the public in this book, giving too much weight to spiritual communications as spiritual, without reference to their essential value. My husband laughs to scorn some of these fantastic revelations, and I cant altogether blame him. She does not prove her facts enough; and even if she had proved them enough she ought not to have presumed on them so much. What is wanted on the subject is a severe exposition of the facts, well-authenticated—and nobody gives us this. I have spoken very truthfully to Mrs Crosland my whole mind, and she bore it as well as a truthful woman would. She is a seeing medium, she says, but of a weak order– She sees (awake) glories, lights & colours, and is very susceptible to the atmospheres of different persons– Also she has had the sounds, and touches. Many mediums of whom she has told me, are naval & military officers .. English, .. some high in the service & now in India. But she told me besides of an extraordinary medium, a young girl, [6] a friend of her own, for whom the spirits make out of the air strange & delicious fruits & flowers … (such fruits & such flowers as are not found on the earth,) which she has leave to taste & smell with her natural organs– She spreads out a sheet of white paper, & the fruit is formed gradually upon it.
I called on the Crosmans [7] the other day, & they are expecting Hume– He has not promised however yet to come, and the result of their invitation sent a fortnight ago, seems to me uncertain. In the meantime the spirits are not slack,—and on the night of the second of November, “il giorno dei morti,” [8] neither Miss Crosman nor her sister could sleep, through the continual sounds in the walls and the pillow, the steps on the floor, and the rustling of silks round the bed. Does this signify the approach of Hume? I will tell you whatever I hear.
Robert is beginning to talk coldly of the journey to Rome, and I should not wonder if we remained at Florence this winter after all. When we hear of your prosperous calm seas we are tempted into deep regrets .. But what avails regret now? Tell me—of what dog do you speak when you name Doady’s? Do you mean that after all you left behind Miss Eckley’s [9] dog? If you were forced to do that, I shall be sorry for all of you–
Is’nt Mrs Stisted wonderful? More wonderful than the spirits, I think, ten times over–
Think of me on the Nile– How often I am with you in thoughts of love. If I could get some kind spirit to touch you softly and say so! But no one minds me– You who are in the body, [10] write to me. Let me hold your dear warm hand.
Robert joins with me in love to all of you—to Mr Eckley, your mother, [11] all of you– Peni loves Doady–
Dearest Sophie’s ever affectionate
Ba–
Did I tell you how sad it was, & how sweet it was, that gift of flowers, which your servant brought—& which did not come from your hand, only from your heart? I do thank you.
Address: À Madame / Madame David Eckley / Aux soins de M. Fenzi / Piazza Gran Duca.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Berg Collection.
1. Year provided by EBB’s reference to the Eckleys’ voyage to Egypt.
2. On 25 October the Eckleys had sailed from Leghorn in a steamer of the Messageries Impériales line. They passed close to Naples and anchored off Messina on their way to Malta, which they reached on the 29th. They left Malta on 4 November aboard the French steamer Clyde, arriving in Alexandria a few days later (see Sophia Eckley, The Oldest of the Old World, 1860, pp. 7–19).
3. The Eckleys reached Cairo on 8 November, having travelled that day from Alexandria by train (see Eckley, p. 24).
4. Light in the Valley: My Experience of Spiritualism (1857).
5. The Waverley Journal (1856–58), a fortnightly magazine for women, was at this time being edited by Bessie Parkes, who would go on to edit its successor, The English Woman’s Journal (1858–64). We have been unable to locate an issue of The Waverley Journal that contained a review of Camilla Crosland’s book.
6. Presumably, the Miss Andrews EBB mentions in connection with Mrs. Crosland in a September 1858 letter to Fanny Haworth (ms at Fitzwilliam). She was Annie Elizabeth Shaw Andrews (afterwards Acworth, 1841–1903), a well-known English medium of the 1860’s and 1870’s.
7. Anne Crossman and her daughters (see letter 3711, note 4).
8. “The day of the dead.”
9. Frances Augusta Eckley (1823–82), David’s sister, one of eight children and the only daughter of David Eckley (1786–1848) and his wife, Caroline Staunton (née Amory, 1798–1866).
10. Cf. II Corinthians 12:2.
11. Sophia Tuckerman (née May, 1784–1870).
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