4813. EBB to Isa Blagden
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 28, 281–285.
126 Via Felice
Monday– [21 January 1861] [1]
Ever dearest Isa how you grieve me by this news of your being unwell– Dear, I wondered at having no letter—& now with the letter & all the proofs of your remembering me (newspaper & pens) comes the bad word of your being ill– Dear, you were wrong in not going to Casa Guidi in spite of the splendid furniture, (O Isa!) and you will be doubly wrong—if you dont go now. Not that I suppose in the house any immunity from cold, but because the town has some advantages in the winter,—& also if you use braziers (which I increasingly believe in) & heap up the fires, you can warm the rooms pretty well– Do let Dr Grisonowsky cure you as soon as possible, & write me a word or two to say you are satisfactorily better. Perhaps, Isa, a crisis may be good in such affections of the liver. The volcanic presence had better explode than seethe & grumble within– You may be all the better for this evil, when it is once past– But in the meanwhile do let it pass, & be good to me, & tell me by a word, for I am anxious.
I myself am not very well– I thought I was going to have a bad attack of the oppression, but this morning it seems to have almost gone––& without a blister! I had one night very bad– Probably a sudden call from the tramontana brought it—even frost we had! Only, on the whole, & considering accounts from other places, Rome has distinguished itself for mildness this year,—& I hope I shall keep from bad attacks, having not much strength in body, nerve, or spirit to bear up resistingly against them–
Dear, dear Isa, I deeply sympathize with you about Emilia, [2] without in the least seeing why this painful circumstance should hinder your going to Casa Guidi– You are not bound, you know, to confess yourself to the porter– “Emilia was not well & went home” is enough for the world in the way of explanation– But, Isa, do you mean to say that it was an immediate, evident necessity for her to go? I am very, very sorry both for her & for you—it is melancholy– There was a wild-fruit flavour about that poor girl with her sudden radiance of a smile– Oh, that wretched man. But, Isa, I am afraid you dont sufficiently realize to yourself the physical tendencies of the sexes– Oh—you may laugh– But I do verily believe that you who are not spiritualist by profession are too spiritual in your way of apprehending the economy of sexual love,—& are unaware of certain dangers. You are in the other extreme from the man who put a padlock on his wife’s body & never left her without locking up his “honor”–
Dear, don’t quote this pretty story as coming from me.
Certainly the more I know of the world the grosser it looks to me, & the less I wonder that pure & high souls should have fallen into the mistake of asceticism. That is a mistake as much made of repulsion as of aspiration perhaps–
I dare say you will take her back again, my Isa. [3] It will be so like you– Poor, poor Emilia.
Dearest Isa, I am seriously vexed about the subscription [4] —but Robert .. you know him .. he is like a rock– He is wrong, I think. We see differently. He looks at the claim of the sisters—while I look entirely to the memory of my dear friend Mrs Jameson– It would be a token of love to her, I think, which she would have appreciated, could she have forseen it—& might appreciate even now perhaps. Robert thinks the sisters weighed her down while she lived—therefore his regard expresses itself in a sort of indignation—which is a natural mode of love with him– I am sorry– Also, people wont understand it at all—not they. Say as little as you can to Miss Hayes.
Do you observe how the spirit-question is taking hold of the public in England? All the periodicals catch it up in turn—to abuse & sneer generally—but the notice is significant. Robert heard some commonplace fine people, just from London, lamenting the other day how these ideas were infecting persons who ought to know better—& there was a dreadful story about the suicide of a clergyman & his son .. which simply proved (if true) that their brains were in that state of high preparation for madness, which might as well have developped tragically because it was epiphany sunday as because the table floated– Did you read the Saturday Review on spiritualism? And men who reason so, pretend to believe in any sort of Revelation? Either they deceive themselves, or lie– [5]
Sir John Bowring [6] has been to see us– Yes, he speaks with great authority & conviction—& it carries the more emphasis because he is not without anti-Gallican prejudice I observed. He told me that the panic in England about invasion had reached at one time a point of phrenzy which would be scarcely credible to any one who had not witnessed it– People were in terrors, expecting their houses to be burnt, & sacked directly– Placards of the most inflammatory character calling passionately on the riflemen to arm! arm, arm! He himself was hissed at Edinburgh for venturing to say that the riflelocks would be very rusty, if only used against invading Napoleons.
He told me that the emperor’s intentions towards Italy had been undeviatingly good, & that whatever had seemed equivocal, had been misunderstood, or was the consequence of misunderstanding, .. or of the press of some otherwise great difficulty– The Italian question was only beginning to be understood in England– I said (in my sarcastic way) that at first they had seemed to understand it upside down– To which he replied that when at the opening of the revolution he came over with several English officers from India, they were all prepared (in case England did’nt fight on the Hapsburgh side) to enter the Austrian army as volunteers, & help them to keep down Italy–
But men like Mr Trollope find it easy to ignore all this– [7] It is we who have done the most for Italy—we who did nothing! Yes, I admit so far– We abstained from helping the Austrians with an open force.
That now we wish well to the Italian cause, is true I hope—but, at best, it is a noble inconsistency,—& that we should set up a claim to a nation’s gratitude on these grounds, seems to me worse than absurd. The more we are in earnest now the more ashamed we should be for what has been.
I have been sorry about Gaeta,—but there is somewhere a cause, & perhaps not hard to find. That the Emperor is ready to do for Italy whatever will not sacrifice France, I am convinced more than ever. And even the Romans (who have benefitted least) think so– One of the patriots here, a watchmaker, was saying to Ferdinando the other day, that he had subscribed to Garibaldi’s fund, & had given his name for Viterbo, [8] but that there was one man in whom he believed most, & never ceased to believe .. Louis Napoleon– And this is the common feeling. Mr Trollope said that they only ventured to unbosom themselves to the English. [9] Now my belief is that the Italians seldom do this to the English—as far as Napoleon is concerned– The Italians are “furbi assai” [10] & wish to conciliate us, & are perfectly aware of our national jealousies– I myself have observed the difference in an Italian when speaking to my own husband before me & speaking to me alone–
Since we came here I have had a letter from Ruskin written in a very desponding state about his work & life & the world– [11]
I sent your parcel & letter directly. The pens are quite right—and the newspapers were three times welcome. No—we must give it up, Isa, for the present– These people are too strong for us– Also the third Ahn [12] has not come. I have the second. Tell me of one or two French books. Robert has subscribed for me here.
Life goes on heavily with me—but it goes on:—it has rolled into the ruts again, & goes.
No, my Isa. I wont wait for your book—so dont imagine it. I must have it– [13]
I have seen Mrs Eckley once. And written to her once. Such “a kind note.”!– May God keep me from such– She wrote for forgiveness, oblivion & the rest—& I answered that if there had been cause for such things I shd forgive of course—but that one could not feel the same “confidence” after a departure from the straight line, as before–
Think of my saying that to you! Would you think it “kind”? I tell you in strict confidence– Dont write of it even to me–
I dont think she knows what truth is, & why it shd be cared for. In order to conciliate me she says she has given up her mediumship!! “Because mediums are always suspected”–
Write to me, my Isa, & love me–
I am your ever loving Ba.
Do not speak of it—but I had a fancy the Ariadne was by Mrs Sartoris & the illustration by Leighton. [14] Love to Kate. I am anxious about America.
Publication: B-IB, pp. 388–392.
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum.
1. EBB’s reference to Anna Jameson and Matilda Hays indicates that this letter accompanied letter 4814.
2. Isa Blagden’s maid.
3. She did eventually. In a letter to Kate Field of 4 April [1864], Isa reported: “That rebellious individual Emilia has returned to my service” (ms at Boston PL).
4. There is no evidence that a subscription was raised for Mrs. Jameson’s sisters after her death. RB may have assumed that it was for their benefit, but the only documented subscription associated with Mrs. Jameson after her death was raised for a commemorative bust by John Gibson (see letter 4836, note 3).
5. An article entitled “Spiritualism,” in The Saturday Review for 22 December 1860 (pp. 794–795), questioned the credulity of “educated men and women” who without evidence accept spiritual manifestations as fact. EBB would have certainly disagreed with one of the article’s more dismissive observations: “Spiritualism belongs to a set of subjects which have always been discredited, and respecting which no discovery has ever been made. It is related to witchcraft, apparitions, and other nests of imposture, and therefore is not to be believed” (p. 794).
6. John Bowring (1792–1872), writer, linguist, and editor of The Westminster Review (1824–36). According to the DNB, “in 1860 he was deputed by the English government to inquire into the state of our commercial relations with the newly formed kingdom of Italy. He had interviews with Count Cavour; but at Rome he was seized with illness.”
7. Referring to his article in The Cornhill Magazine; see letter 4805, note 4.
8. i.e., presumably, he cast a ballot in the unofficial vote for annexation (see letter 4784, note 7).
9. In “The Pope’s City and the Pope’s Protectors” (The Cornhill Magazine, December 1860), T.A. Trollope writes: “The most hopeful [Romans] only permit themselves to look to a better time coming … when these things shall come to an end. Nor would any such hope be whispered into any stranger’s ear, save an Englishman’s” (p. 722).
10. “Very clever.”
12. Johann Franz Ahn (1796–1865), author of numerous popular texts and readers for learning foreign languages and stenography.
13. Agnes Tremorne.
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