Correspondence

4567.  EBB & RB to Isa Blagden

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 27, 124–129.

Thursday [5 January 1860] [1]

Ever dearest Isa, your letter comes—thank you, thank you. But how terrible is this death of Agnes Alexander [2] —I mean terrible as an idea—& in reference to her unhappy mother & family– I did not know that “Charlotte” was her sister– [3] What a force of love there must have been, & what a force of grief, to overset a young strong life so soon– It is very rare,—death through grief. Mr Bracken’s [4] letter has the trace of deep feelings in it. But Isa dearest, as to your going to England, I hope that is altogether out of the question, though your proposing it or any other mode of suicidically disposing of yourself for the benefit of your friends, is perfectly natural & characteristic.

In relation to your morning-visit [5] –––“How could” I? Yes, how could I? Run knives into me. Prick me with avenging pins. I deserve more even than I suffer– The worst is a horrible idea which haunts me; that peradventure .. (who knows the secrets of the heart?) the extravagant flattery lavished on me may have helped to darken my eyes. It gave me pain, it humiliated me, as I often said [6] ––but still, but still .. there may have been a tendency in consequence, to a sweet sleep of credulity on my part–. Well—if it is so the more I deserve what came. For the rest, dear, I have written once, the briefest of notes [7] —unfortunately I must avoid an explosion– I never overvalued her intellect, but the morals seemed to me the purest & most beautiful– How could I? how could I?

But quite apart from “flattery”, it’s fate with me to draw certain kinds of women,—women of straw, women of false lives & hearts. How I came to know & love you seems “out of the text”– [8] I really mean to try to have no more female friends– It does’nt do for me– Dont read this to anybody though– Burn it rather– And I value Kate Field for her truth & transparency in a particular manner; and am most heartily glad that her uncle has come to his senses & his right affections at last. [9]

For the medallion of Pen, [10] Robert thought it horrible– Pen has a child’s nose, and I have .. what I dont deny–

—Grande est la princesse,

Mais petit est le néz,

Qui t’a tant etonné? [11]

Still as you observe, the degree is important. Those amateur things are always wonderfully well considering, and wonderfully ill essentially. But the vanity in that quarter is ineffable & perhaps at the root of all the evil. The self consciousness & self over-valuation were visible to me early– I thought it the shadow on the wall–

With regard to the ms. [12] I never offered my services. It is’nt my way– And my impression was that the idea of printing at all (which only seemed in the air) was not to be encouraged. I did not encourage it. Certainly once, or perhaps twice, when she told me that she showed me nothing, “lest she should seem to take advantage of our intimacy in order to use me,” I replied that I should be glad to be useful to her in that or any other way. But I hate playing critic, & am shy of the responsibility of advising publication to mere amateurs. I know she cant write a good book. It is’nt in her. And she walks so in silk [13] in her family that the least criticism is sure to be felt in a way most out of proportion to any possible pleasure. So that whatever I said was on the other side–

Dearest dear Isa, we received the “opusculo,” [14] but no fragment of other Nazione– Mr Russell takes it in himself (though he does’nt send it here) and I suppose the people at Rome wont allow him two for fear of dissemination– How admirable that pamphlet is! The fever excited by it in the papal government has been even more than you might expect. The article on it in the Giornale di Roma calling it an abomination ‘vomitato’ &c &c, was written by the pope’s own hand. [15] And on new year’s day his impertinence to General Goyon has left everyone talking, & far exceeds what was reported in the newspapers. The General offered his little compliment that he & his troops consoled themselves for being deprived of the glory of fighting with their comrades in the north of Italy, by the honor of guarding the person of his Holiness– On which the pope blessed them all—blessed the army in France .. (carefully excluding the troops in the north of Italy, it was observed)—blessed the empress & the prince Impérial .. and prayed for the emperor that “God would grant him Grace to avoid the influence of the evil principles abroad, & to have his feet kept from the paths of hypocrisy.” [16] Two different persons present took the words down in pencil, though there is a denial among others that the word “hypocrisy” was used. Still the expressions were so strong that some of the French officers present were indignant with General Goyon for not replying that he was not there to hear insults addressed to the emperor– The pope said besides that he had letters from Napoleon in contradiction with a certain pamphlet. They are nearly mad with rage at the Vatican. A very intelligent Englishman was here the other day who heard a cardinal call the emperor a “briccone”. [17] “By which,” added my Englishman, “he certainly did’nt mean a great brick.” The Romans are in an ecstasy– Our hero’s popularity is all up again– But the position is still most difficult for him .. as the aspect of the Bourse proves. [18] I repeat, he has risked everything for the Italians, except their cause,—and we should all remember it for ever–

Monday–

Also I must tell you one thing, Isa—though it must not be quite made public. Odo Russell says he has seen the letters of Napoleon referred to by the pope—& that there is nothing compromising in them. If you repeat this, don’t name Odo Russell– That’s all–

I have now your letter. This has been waiting by me for two or three days, because I am swallowed up of business in getting off a thin slice of a book called ‘Poems before Congress’. Containing the ode on Napoleon—the poem on Villafranca, & one or two besides. [19] People will hate me in England—but, never mind. And by way of being strictly impartial I take the opportunity of reprinting my “Curse for a Nation” (for America.) It has only been printed in flying leaves [20] by the Abolitionists, & will come in well in relation to the bad, bad Brown affair. [21] I am sorry for Kate, but give her my love & tell her she must bear with me. She must see that I am not very patient with my own country when she falls into sins. [22]

I do wonder at Chapman’s silence to you. But if he meant ‘no,’ he would surely say ‘no’. The ‘yes’ might take more consideration—and it is a busy time of year. [23]

I have the kindest of letters from Dr Grisonowsky,—with perfect satisfaction about diphtheria. There are no more cases here.

The pope’s speech, as printed, is tolerably impertinent—is’nt it? Yet, as spoken, it was still worse, they say–

A friend of ours heard Goyon say the other day, when somebody enquired .. “if Madame de Goyon would soon return from Paris” (where she is at present) … “Je ne sais pas. [24] We are standing here on a volcano just now.”

We hear of disturbances at Ancona too– [25] How good you are to Mr Landor, & what a picturesque account of him you send– Not a word of Rome. Let me tell you Isa you will offend Miss Cushman if you refuse her after all– Hatty is better but then I think you & I & Kate have a right to blow our silver trumpets. Roberts & Peni’s best love—your’s in all love–

Peni has had three falls from his poney which has turned suddenly to a tiger—taken to bucking—& kicking– They say it came from a mare left in the stable. Oh—I have been frightened. We had to send him away to be placed under discipline before Pen tried him again– The child was not at all hurt.

[Continued by RB]

Dearest Isa: All thanks for your letter & the kind things it is full of. It was like your good nature to take a second taste of dear old Landor, and I am glad indeed that he was in a state to appreciate the trouble you had given yourself to get at him. He writes to me every week, and oftener, indeed—& seems pretty well. Dr Grisanowsky has been particularly benevolent in making the call he did, and writing so satisfactorily about it. And now, why do I ill use Ba’s envelope in this way? Because I want to trouble you still further, of course. It is for a friend’s sake, but the favor will be gratefully felt by myself. There will arrive in Florence by the middle of the week, a messenger from England to Rome: can you (oh, the shame of teazing you!) but can you get “The Council of Trent” by Paolo Sarpi, published by Barbera (opposite the Palazzo non-finito[)], in 4 vols [26] —also, Lemonnier’s edition of Ariosto’s Orlando [27] (if there is one) and send them to Odo Russell Esq. by the intervention of Mr Corbett? [28] Will you also, on pain of giving me a pang indeed, instantly repay yourself thro’ Wilson? Else .. dreadful threat .. I will not easily ask you such a favor again. The “Sarpi” would be confiscated here; coming by ordinary means. Good bye, t’abbraccio, ti striiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiingo, [29] as emphatic opera singers accent it. Ba is quite well.

Yours affectionately ever

RB

Address, in EBB’s hand: Toscana / Mademoiselle Blagden / Casa Guidi / Via Maggio. / Firenze.

Publication: B-IB, pp. 273–278.

Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library and Fitzwilliam Museum.

1. Dated by EBB’s reference in her last paragraph to Pen’s “three falls from his poney.” In the fifth paragraph of letter 4571 she writes: “Pen has been thrown three times.”

2. Agnes Henrietta Alexander (1832–59), the youngest child of Josias Du Pré Alexander and his wife, Mary (née Bracken), died at Brooke House, Clapton, on 24 December 1859. According to her death certificate, she died as a result of “exhaustion from mania 3 weeks.” She left legacies to her sisters and Alexander cousins, but the bulk of her estate went to her cousin Annette Emma Bracken, who was named residuary legatee.

3. Charlotte Maria Alexander (1813–59), one of Agnes Alexander’s elder sisters, died on 3 December at Stone House, Broadstairs, Kent, from congestion of the lungs.

4. Referring to William Bracken (1809–91), Isa and Annette’s uncle.

5. As this and the next paragraph make clear, the visitor was Sophia Eckley.

6. See for example letter 4432, in which EBB explains to Mrs. Eckley: “I have felt humiliated often, while touched always—and yet this is the simple truth—you have done too much for me, thought too much of me– … Not that obligation towards you is a burden to me, but that it is founded on an exaggerated apprehension of what I am.”

7. This note has not surfaced. Doubtless, it was intended to ease EBB out of the relationship. She wrote it sometime after letter 4558, in which she told Isa: “I must write, one day.”

8. Cf. Twelfth Night, I, 5, 232.

9. A reference to Milton H. Sanford (1813–83), a wealthy Bostonian, married to Kate Field’s maternal aunt, Cordelia (née Riddle, 1822–94). We are unable to clarify EBB’s remark concerning her uncle. However, given Sandford’s conservative political nature (he sympathized with the South) and his niece’s radical tendencies, disagreements were inevitable. A few years later, he offered Kate a substantial income and the promise of a more substantial inheritance if she gave up the public advocacy of her views. When Kate refused, she was disinherited (see Gary Scharnhorst, Kate Field: The Many Lives of a Nineteenth-Century American Journalist, Syracuse, New York, 2008, p. 40).

10. Possibly a work by Sophia Eckley that has not survived. See letter 4548, note 7.

11. “The princess is grand, / But her nose is small, / Who astonished you so?” Cf. verse that appears in Alexandre Dumas (père), Le Chevalier d’Harmental (1842), chap. 26.

12. The Oldest of the Old World, published on 1 May 1860 (see letter 4478, note 3).

13. Cf. “The Siller Croun,” line 1, in The Poetical Works of Miss Susanna Blamire (Edinburgh, 1842). Susanna Blamire (1747–94) was a Cumberland poet, little published in her lifetime.

14. “Pamphlet.” Le Pape et le Congrès, published anonymously on 22 December 1859, was written by Louis Étienne Arthur de La Guéronnière at Napoleon III’s request. It suggested that the Pope’s temporal rule should be limited to Rome.

15. In the issue of 30 December 1859. Among other criticisms of Le Pape et le Congrès, the article stated that the arguments contained in the pamphlet were a reproduction of the errors and insults that had so often been “vomited” against the Holy See.

16. In Odo Russell’s report of this exchange on 1 January, he quoted Pius IX as follows: “Prostrate before the Almighty, I pray that He will bless the French nation. I throw myself at the feet of the God of Mercy and I pray that He will send grace and light to the Head of the Nation, that he may have the courage to condemn those perverse principles contained in a pamphlet lately published, which are not in harmony with the Church and which are a monument of hypocrisy and of ignoble contradictions. I hope, nay, I am sure that the Emperor will receive the light of God to condemn the principles contained in that pamphlet. I may add that I have in my possession letters which the Emperor wrote to me and which are in contradiction with those principles. With this certainty and under this condition I bless him, I bless his august Consort, the Prince Imperial and with him the whole Nation” (The Roman Question, ed. Noel Blakiston, 1962, p. 74).

17. “A rogue.”

18. The Times of 31 December 1859 reported a “heavy fall … yesterday afternoon on the Paris Bourse” (p. 5) and three days later noted a “great discouragement” there (p. 5). By the 9 January issue, the situation on the Bourse had shown “considerable improvement” (p. 5).

19. Poems Before Congress, published 12 March 1860, contained eight poems and a preface. Among the eight poems were “Napoleon III in Italy” and “A Tale of Villafranca.” Including front matter, back matter, and blank pages, the book totalled 80 pages. The poems themselves took up 65 pages.

20. “A Curse for a Nation” was originally published in The Liberty Bell (Boston, 1856, pp. 1–9), an abolitionist annual edited by Maria Weston Chapman. As printer’s copy for Poems Before Congress (1860), EBB used a broadside, entitled “Hymns and Songs for the Anti-Slavery Celebration of the Declaration of Independence, at Framingham, July 5, 1858,” that contained “A Curse for a Nation” with her corrections. The broadside sold as part of lot 151 in Browning Collections and is now at ABL. It is reproduced facing p. 145.

21. John Brown (1800–59), an American abolitionist, and a small band of raiders, including ex-slaves, captured the United States arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now in West Virginia), on 16 October 1859. It was recaptured by United States Marines on 18 October. Brown was tried, convicted of murder, and hanged on 2 December.

22. Cf. “A Curse for a Nation,” lines 18–19.

23. Isa had submitted her novel Agnes Tremorne (1861), or “the first seven chapters” of it, to Chapman and Hall (see letter 4486), who eventually turned it down.

24. “I don’t know.”

25. The Morning Chronicle of 13 January 1860 ran the following report, dated Bologna, Wednesday [11 January]: “The Revolutionary Committee has organised manifestations in the neighbouring Papal provinces. Those that took place in the theatres of Ancona and Pesaro are specially mentioned. On the authorities appearing in their boxes all the spectators left the theatres, as if in accordance with a preconcerted arrangement” (p. 4).

26. Istoria del Concilio Tridentino by Paolo Sarpi (1552–1623) was published in four volumes in 1858 by the Florentine publishing firm Barbèra and Bianchi. The Palazzo Non-Finito, begun at the end of the sixteenth century by Alessandro Strozzi and built mostly to the designs of Bernardo Buontalenti, is located on the corner of Via del Proconsolo and Via degli Albizi. Today it houses the National Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology.

27. Le Monnier published editions of Orlando Furioso (1516) in 1849 and 1854.

28. Edwin Corbett (1819–88) was the English chargé d’affaires in Tuscany from 1858 until the position was abolished in March 1860.

29. “I embrace you; I hold you close.”

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