4644. EBB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 27, 266–269.
[Rome]
[Postmark: 7 April 1860]
Dearest Sarianna, it is impossible to have a regret for dear Lady Elgin– She has been imprisoned here under double chains too long– To be out of the dark & the restraint is a blessing to that spirit, & must be felt so by all who love her– Of course I shall write to Lady Augusta Bruce–
I dont know what Robert will say to you about the summer– Switzerland is out of the question, I think, for us– In fact if we do as we ought, take the journey out of Italy, we must go to England, & therefore might as well go to Paris. My people are crying out hysterically for me. But Robert is very averse to (he has been frightened about me, observe) to my undertaking any farther journey than just into Tuscany for the summer, in order to return here for the winter– He wants to put me under a glass, he says for a year, where I cant hear anybody speak .. even himself. Certainly I could not cross the Alps without risk—it would be dangerous. And going round by Marseilles & Lyons, would make as long a journey as to London—not to say that one cant see Switzerland without travelling about. You would find yourselves more crippled than you imagine, by attempting such a thing. Fanny Haworth lived comparatively cheaply when she put herself to live en pension [1] —but she never spent less than five francs each a day, for herself & her maid .. (no, perhaps it might be four for the maid),—a degree of cheapness, you see offered by Paris pensions every day to those who bear such a way of living, in Galignani– Then, Fanny did this only at intervals, & when she had seen whatever she came to see in Switzerland. The travelling about there is very expensive, & she found it so, though maintaining that the north of Italy was worse. In fact, since the railroads, travelling expences have increased .. even in out of the way places– Fanny Haworth has double your income even at present, and I know how crippled she used to feel, & how she wondered at the money that “went somehow,” she scarcely knew how. And she is not careless in money-matters, still less does she travel in an extravagant manner– Our journey north costs us always two hundred pounds, at least, with all Robert’s exactness & prudence.
Still, I know we ought to go to you this year—we owe ourselves to you–
‘Love the gift is love the debt’ [2] —and there is time to consider it all– Our plans are by no means made up– Our apartment here is taken for two months—which was Robert’s arrangement,—not mine—&, being taken, we cant give it up– Then we must go to Florence for a week or two, when the heat will necessarily rout us out– Robert’s man of business is dead, [3] & all our possessions in Tuscany are floating there, with no one by, in case of wreck. There is much to arrange—–
I hear of a friend of ours having almost died of milliary [4] fever at Florence so that I am glad to be away just now– Peni is quite well & radiant– He was ill though, for one day, & had to lie in bed throughout it, with cataplasms to his feet, & vinegar to his head– We were frightened & called in the doctor. It was a sun-stroke. The child caught it by getting off his poney on the Campagna & gathering flowers for me. He was very feverish. The March-sun is peculiarly dangerous throughout Italy, & we have a proverb about it at Florence. Edith Story two years ago was paralyzed by some small indiscretion of letting the sun touch her; (& not a March-sun!–) she fell on the floor, paralyzed down one side. The leg, side, & half the head were struck so—& half the tongue, .. so that she spoke inarticulately. This for some days– Pen is well-acclimated—but still, we must be careful for him it appears– When he was ill his Abbé came & sate by his bed to tell him stories. This Abbé gets him on most wonderfully, besides being so kind & amiable, & of excellent politics as we have found out. He does not understand English, but Pen showed him the Milsand version of “Villafranca.” He spoke to me of it in glowing terms, observing, “Those are my views– I am sorry of course that the Holy Father is “scontento,” [5] but I must rejoice in the liberation of Italy.”
No—I dont think there is much to be forgiven by my countrymen, in my book– What I reproach them for, none of them deny. They certainly took no part in the war—nor will they, if there is more war—and certainly the existence of the Rifle Clubs is a fact–
Robert & I began to write on the Italian question together,—& our plan was (Robert’s own suggestion!) to publish jointly– When I showed him my Ode on Napoleon, he observed that I was gentle to England in comparison to what he had been—but after Villafranca, (& the Palmerston ministry having come in) he destroyed his poem & left me alone—& I determined to stand alone– What Robert had written, no longer suited the moment,—but the poetical devil in me burnt on for an utterance. I have spoken nothing but historical truths, as far as the outline is concerned– But the spirit of the whole, is, of course, opposed to the national feeling—or I shd not in my preface, suppose it to be offended.
With every deference to you, dearest Sarianna, I cannot think that you who live, as the English usually do, quite aside & apart from French society, can judge of the interest in France for Italy– I see French letters .. letters of Frenchmen & women, giving a very contrary impression– The French newspapers give a very contrary impression. And the statistics of books & pamphlets published & circulated in France on the Italian question this year, are in most prodigious disaccord with such a conclusion– Compare them with the same statistics in England—& then judge–
Besides the English, to do them justice can be active & generous on any cause in which they are really interested—and it is a fact that we could not get up a subscription in England even for Garibaldi’s muskets lately—while France is always giving–
Not that there are not & have not been many English of generous sympathies towards Italy– That, I well know– But it is a small, protest minority– Lord John has done very well .. as far as words can go—but it has been simply in giving effect to the intentions of France who wanted much a respectable conservative Power like England to endorse her bill of revolution, with the retrograde European governments–
I will spare what I think of the treatment in England of the Savoy question– We are losing all moral prestige in the eyes of the world, with our small jealousies, & factional struggles for power–
Ah dear Sarianna I dont complain for myself of an unappreciating public– I have no reason. But, just for that reason, I complain more about Robert—only he does not hear me complain. To you I may say, that the blindness deafness & stupidity of the English public to Robert are amazing. Of course Milsand had “heard his name”—!!– Well, the contrary wd have been strange. Robert is. All England cant prevent his existence, I suppose. But nobody there, except a small knot of pre-Raffaelite men, pretends to do him justice. Mr Forster has done the best,—in the press– As a sort of lion, Robert has his range in society,—and … for the rest, you shd see Chapman’s returns!—— While, in America, he’s a power, a writer, a poet—he is read—he lives in the hearts of the people. “Browning readings” here in Boston,—“Browning evenings” there.– For the rest, the English hunt lions too, Sarianna—but their favorite lions are chosen among “lords” chiefly, or “railroad Kings”. “Its worth eating much dirt,” said an Englishman of high family & character here, [6] “to get to Lady .. soirée.” Americans will eat dirt to get to us. There’s the difference– English people will come & stare at me sometimes, but physicians, dentists, who serve me & refuse their fees, artists who give me pictures, friends who give up their carriages & make other practical sacrifices, are not English—no—though English Woolner [7] was generous about a bust– Let me be just at least.
There is a beautiful photograph of Wilde’s picture of Pen on horseback, which shall go to you—the likeness better than in the picture.
I can scarcely allude to the loss of my loved friend Mrs Jameson. It’s a blot more on the world to me. Best love to you & the dear Nonno from Pen & Myself– Editor of the Atlas writes to thank me for the justice & truth of my international politics. [8] An English clergyman [9] stops at the door, to say to the servant “He does not know me but applauds my sentiments.” So there may be ten persons who agree with me.
P.S. Fanny Haworth has not sent me her address even—so that I heard nothing of tables &c– Those are facts, Sarianna. I doubt them no more than I do any patent fact.
Address, in RB’s hand: France. / Mademoiselle Browning, / 151. Rue de Grenelle / Faubourg St Germain, / Paris.
Publication: LEBB, II, 368–370 (in part, as [about March 1860]).
Manuscript: Lilly Library.
1. “In a boardinghouse.”
2. Tennyson, “The Miller’s Daughter” (1842), line 207.
4. Sic, for miliary. We have been unable to identify the “friend.”
5. “Displeased.”
6. Unidentified.
7. EBB probably has in mind Alexander Munro and his bust of Pen (see the fourth paragraph in letter 4273). In 1856 Thomas Woolner presented the Brownings a plaster cast of a medallion portrait of RB’s head, which was later executed in bronze (see letter 3864, note 2). He also gave them a plaster cast of a medallion portrait of Alfred Tennyson (see SD1947 in vol. 23).
8. EBB refers to Edmund Ollier; see letter 4641 for her reply.
9. Unidentified.
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