4105. EBB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 24, 228–229.
[Florence]
[ca. 18 December 1857] [1]
My dearest Sarianna, Robert bids me write—just at the last moment. Dear, I have been living in a sort of moral fog since we wrote last—very dully, & somewhat sadly—only Penini (& Robert too) is quite well, growing fatter & looking rosy, & getting still more good, which is pleasanter still to think of. The weather is very cold– You seem to have the advantage of us in warmth– But if I were in Paris it would immediately begin to freeze, in compliment to me, I dare say– Here there has been no frost of consequence, only a wind like a frost, cutting & hacking. We pile up wood, & I keep by the fire.
Fanny Haworth is living in Wilson’s apartment. By way of sharing the expense, she has admitted a co-lodger, an English lady– [2] Think of a tête à tête with a perfect stranger! She helps to pay for the lamp, the tea, the sofa,—and is herself a tremendous tax. I would rather live in a cellar alone, for my part. She is double-triple English, from the provinces, .. frightened of “the spirits,” and the “banditti,” shy of going to church for fear of being “stabbed”, & doubtful whether Naples is’nt on the road to Rome– Poor Fanny begins to doubt how long she shall bear it– The house in London does not let, [3] the consequence of which is that perhaps this year she may have only two hundred a year,—a probability fatal to more journeys, of course. She told me last night that, if it should be possible, she means to get to Paris in the spring & make her ultimate home there. I think it will be very wise. She will be there in the midst of advantages, social & artistic, & within reach of England while free of certain uneasy neighbourhoods. A most amiable woman she is, certainly,—too pliable, .. her solitary fault– She is so tractable & attractable that she gets into false situations & wastes her various talents. That sort of creeper should have something to grow against,—if not a tree, a stick. Any marriage is better than none, with some women. “And this is of them.” [4]
Poor Jessie is of another order. She could not but use the money of “the party,” seeing she had not a sou of her own. Was she to starve in prison through disinterestedness? [5] Poor thing! It is enough punishment (whether consciously endured or not) that she has been the cause of cruel evil here, where she would have given her life (I know) to cause good– I feel bitterly towards Mazzini.
Peni performs prodigies in music. He had taken a fancy to the ‘Cats’ Minuet’ [6] which Robert played to him,—& besought Robert to write it out that he might learn it– “Indeed I am tenderly attached to that cats’ music! I could even marry myself to it.”!– So angry he was, when we laughed. Music is quite a passion with him just now.
Ferdinando is still with us, & not likely I imagine, to be soon rich enough to leave us. Annunciata continues to please us much,—with a sort of vocation for excess of work—very convenient to certain other members of the establishment. We pay her between thirteen & fourteen pounds English.
May God bless both of you– I wish you showers of good & joy– My love to dear M. Milsand, who will be with you on Christmas day, I know– Robert will have asked you to ask about the translation– [7] Peni’s kisses to you & the dear Nonno.
Your ever & truly affecte.
sister Ba.
Publication: Letters to Robert Browning and Other Correspondents, by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, ed. Thomas J. Wise (London, 1916), pp. 29–33 (as 2 July 1857).
Manuscript: British Library.
1. Approximate dating based on EBB’s references to Christmas Day and the translation of Aurora Leigh, which was proposed in letter 4104.
2. Miss W.
3. The house at 45 Onslow Square, Brompton, where she and her mother resided until the latter’s death in June 1856. In a letter of 25 January 1858 to Harriet Thiébault, Miss Haworth writes: “I have unfortunately the home in Onslow Square, where we lived on my hands, the furniture was sold & it has never been let. This is a great loss to me, & till something is done with it I cannot at all know what my income will be” (ms with Meredith).
4. Cf. Macbeth, I, 3, 80.
5. Doubtless, funds from the Mazzinian party had been used to make Jessie White’s imprisonment at Genoa (see letter 4017, note 6) more comfortable. In her letter published in Reynolds’s Newspaper, 6 December 1857, she compared her treatment with that of the other men and women who had been arrested in the uprising: “Allotting me a large airy room, which I furnished at pleasure … I was entirely separated from the other prisoners, male and female” (p. 7).
6. “The Cats’ Minuet” (ca. 1800) by an unknown composer.
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