4838. EBB to Isa Blagden
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 29, 1–5.
126 Via Felice. Rome
Feb 25– [1861] [1]
Ever dearest Isa, we receive the papers & take great comfort in them .. I do at least– There are all sorts of impossible rumours here—of the “Piedmontese coming directly” for instance– Is it impossible I wonder? I have a floating dream that Napoleon may both “leave his sword” to protect the Holy father, & that he may open the gate to Victor Emmanuel’s. What if French & Italian fraternize in asserting Italy & protecting the pope?–. It’s a wild notion of mine– I cant help thinking anyhow that something is in the wind–
The “people” of the King of Naples here maintain that it was simply the “treason” of France which ruined them at Gaeta. France set her fleet there pretending to protect the King, & by these means hindered the real protection of other powers who were resolved on occupying that post– “Napoleone ha fatto tutto il male”– [2]
As to the papal reception of the Guerronniere pamphlet [3] ––you see! I enclose the official retort. It pleases me rather more than the pamphlet did, which struck a doubtful note at last– But the present situation is untenable,—while there’s a diplomatical form of words to pass through before you arrive at action–
The rage here is immense– The Giornale di Roma goes on to deny with indignation the possibility of transaction between Turin & the pope—& certainly the latter will do nothing till forced to it– Ampère [4] was with us yesterday, just from Paris– You know he is an intense Napoleon-hater in the Academy vein,—but still with a feeling for Italy, through having lived here so much. Robert asked the meaning of the attitude of Guizot & others– Said he, “It is vexatious to see Napoleon consolidating his power by such means!– He who destroyed liberty in France had not the right to free Italy– We shall see presently what he means by it. Moreover Guizot & the rest cannot believe that outside of the ambition of Piedmont & the schemes of Napoleon & anarchy, there is a national movement in Italy, .. on ne comprend pas cela—” [5]
Ampère is full of talent, but I never talk of France with him, because he is insane with hatred of the Emperor. Years ago, for instance, he told me that the imperial intention was to turn on the English in the Crimea & destroy them,—he only wanted to get them into that trap.!
He said yesterday that the pope had been “trompè et trahi” [6] & was wrong in not going away– Yet he has no sympathy with the papacy as such–
The government has exiled, it is said, above a hundred persons on account of the peaceable Corso demonstration– [7] Stabbing & robbing are every day events—which makes me a little nervous when Robert is out at nights–
There have been ‘tableaux’ (to go to another subject) at Mrs Cholmondeley’s, [8] —& Penini performed ‘Ishmael’ in the desert, [9] and a priests acolyte, at the ‘death of St Valerius’. [10] He made a little fuss .. (even shed a tear or two) at the necessity of Ishmael’s appearing indecently in a scanty shirt, & no shoes & stockings—but was reconciled to the situation, I think, chiefly by the circumstance of Mrs Cholmondeley herself showing both her own bare feet & ankles (as Desdemona) to an applauding public– Very pretty she was said to look too– Pen also did his part well– He liked it .. all but the exposure—& got over even that after a while.
I have sent one or two more lyrics to America, [11] & in that only sense have been out yet– One must get to it however—the weather leaves no excuse– Beautiful weather– I have had the windows open for days–
Rome has saved me from much this winter, I am confident—& though very feeble & languid, I am free from bad symptoms .. have had no regular attack .. which is wonderful, considering all. Also I feel better in spirits, thank God, .. feeling better able to live from the beginning to the end of a day, which a little while ago appeared every morning almost impossible. I suppose I shall have to go to Paris this summer for a few months—and that looks impossible now—so I dont think of it at present. One shuts one’s eyes & does a thing, when one knows that it’s right,—& the strength comes somehow– For my own self I should like never to set foot out of Italy again. Italy draws the curtain round one, & keeps one hushed from the noise outside,—and the work I have to do, I can best do here in the silence. But Robert ought to see his father—and I would not for many strong reasons that his father should be induced to come here. [12]
I shall look out anxiously for your book [13] in advertisements– Does Mr Trollope’s novel come out soon? [14]
I see quantities of newspapers now—the Debats, for instance, in which I have read all the diplomatical correspondence– Its close fencing on the part of the French government, & you see Prussia & Russia at the point of the sword– I remark that France considers the Venetian question the necessary [15] complement of the Neapolitan– Mark that– She has said so both to England & Austria—& both England & Austria dissented– In the most equivocal of the acts of France (as when she asked England whether they two had not better enforce a truce of six months by keeping Garibaldi from the main-land) [16] she simply proposed putting on a drag down hill for the greater safety of the vehicle. If indeed the whole were not a feeling of the pulse of England, .. Lord John having loudly declared up to that moment that the two Kingdoms of Italy presented a better solution than one Kingdom– “Then remember”, says Thouvenel, “Venetia must follow Naples.” [17] A declaration repeated elsewhere, & inte<nded> [18] to be referred back to <…> events arise. We <…> There must be war at last, if Austria will not cede—and be certain that both at Turin & Paris it is forseen & prepared for– If Austria would but take the first step– There are movements on the frontier, & she is very mad– But mad enough for that, can she be?
I am anxious for a great majority in our favor in the French senate & Legislative Body,—& then Napoleon will act here, I fancy– I observe in the pamphlet two things—that the desire of Italy to appropriate Rome as <the> capital is mentioned without <being legi>timatized—also, that the Emperor <intends to sa>crifice Italy to the papacy. <It is very e>lusive of course.
I always forget to tell you, Isa– Robert protests at his loudest against your Florence plans of architectural development of piazzas &c while we are at the present point in Italy– And, this time, I do agree with him entirely. When we have made Italy, we will build piazzas—when we have acted out Dante’s idea for his country, we will print gorgeous editions of his works. Now, the truest lover of the poet & his Italy will give his last paul to the liberation & consolidation of the nation– Any other expense is quite premature, & the effect of proposing it will not be good in England, Mrs Trollope may be sure– And if the money were successfully raised there, it ought not to be spent so here– [19]
Is it true, as reported in the Nazione, that the first edition of her book is exhausted? [20] I shall be glad if it is so, though I consider her wrong and unjust in many things– All I can say is (of knowledge) that its strictly an English view, & not the view accepted either by the masses here or by the national leaders– Cavour’s own newspapers for instance present the case very differently—and the leaders .. men like Matteucci (who is moderatissimo) or Pantaleone here, or the Duca di Sermoneta (conspicuous for intelligence) are very far off from her anti-Gallicanism .... almost as far off as she herself was at the beginning of the war. Now one would think that it was England who made the war of independence, & tore up bad treaties,—England assisted by the immortal fourteen of the Prussian Chamber—! [21] France has done nothing but mischief– Let her go to the devil for it.
Still, there’s so much which excites to sympathy with Italy in Mrs Trollope’s book, that I wish it success, & am resigned even to its unlawful flattery of our people, as that seems to be the direct way to their hearts.
Yes, I do feel a little malignantly towards Prussia. These things rile me. She stopped the war [22] —she has turned over every stone to get at a viper to slay us—& now she’s praised all round! So with all, I suppose, who come in late to the Kingdom of Heaven. [23]
In truest love your Ba–
Say how you are–
Publication: B-IB, pp. 416–420.
Manuscript: Fitzwilliam Museum.
1. Year provided by reference to the return address; 1861 was the only year the Brownings resided at 126 Via Felice in February.
2. “Napoleon caused all the trouble.”
3. La France, Rome et l’Italie (1861) by Arthur de la Guéronnière was published on 16 February 1861. There were various responses to the pamphlet, but “it was the role of Antonelli, obstinate, persistent, and thorough, to go systematically through the La Guéronnière pamphlet, sentence by sentence, and to instruct the Papal Nuncios in the different capitals what were the facts and what arguments they might well use in combating Napoleon’s apologia” (E.E.Y. Hales, Pio Nono, 1954, p. 238).
4. Jean-Jacques Ampère (1800–64), French historian.
5. “They do not understand that.”
6. “Deceived and betrayed.”
7. Odo Russell, in a dispatch dated 20 February 1861, reported that nearly 23,000 people gathered in the Corso on 14 February to celebrate the capitulation of Gaeta: “The crowd, though enthusiastic, was orderly. … I regret to have to add that the Pontifical Government mistaking this spontaneous national and harmless demonstration for a conspiracy had a large number of persons arrested on the following day whom they accused of being the leaders of the movement. Some were again released, some sent to prison and thirteen were exiled” (The Roman Question, ed. Noel Blakiston, 1962, pp. 164–165).
8. Isabel Charlotte Cholmeley (b. 1830), youngest daughter of John Curtis, R.N., and his wife, Julia, was born at St. Pancras, London. She married in 1855 Hugh Edward Cholmeley (1822–70), son of Francis Cholmeley (1783–1854), of Brandsby Hall, Yorkshire, and his wife, Barbara (née Darell, 1796–1861). He was a partner in the banking firm of Plowden, Cholmeley, and Co., which is listed at 234 Corso in Murray’s A Handbook of Rome and Its Environs (1862, p. xvii). After the death of her husband, Mrs. Cholmeley evidently remarried and styled herself “Contessa Isobel Curtis-Cholmeley in Bermani.”
9. The story of Ishmael (Abraham’s first son—see Genesis 16:15), in the wilderness is told in Genesis 21:9–21.
10. We have been unable to determine which St. Valerius, of the many so named, was depicted in the tableau. Two probabilities are Valerius (d. 315), Bishop of Saragossa, and Valerius (d. 453), Bishop of Sorrento.
11. EBB had actually sent three poems: “Parting Lovers,” published in The Independent on 21 March 1861 (p. 1), “The King’s Gift” (18 July 1861, p. 1), and “A View Across the Roman Campagna” (25 July 1861, p. 1).
12. RB had not seen his father since October 1858.
13. Agnes Tremorne.
14. La Beata (1861) by Thomas Adolphus Trollope; see letter 4815, note 2.
15. Underscored three times.
17. In Lord John Russell's dispatch of 26 July 1860 (see letter 4833, note 7), Edouard Antoine Thouvenel (1818–66), French foreign minister from 1860 to 1862, was reported to have written: “It could not be doubted that the end of the present Italian agitation would be an attack on Venetia” (Further Correspondence Relating to the Affairs of Italy, British Parliamentary Papers, 1861, p. 40).
18. A corner of the sheet is missing, affecting text here and below.
19. In The Athenæum for 2 February 1861 (no. 1736, p. 158), Theodosia Trollope reported that plans had been drawn up for “the transformation of the Piazza della Signoria into an Italian Pantheon by the extension of the Loggia d’Orgagna around two more of its sides.” The total cost of the work was estimated at “7,365,980 fr.” She added that “the learned and distinguished Dantophile, Dr. Barlow, has placed himself in communication with the Tuscan Commission for the above great project.” Henry Clark Barlow (1806–76), physician and distinguished Dante scholar, was the English representative for the proposed “National Edition of the Poet’s works” (The Athenæum, 5 January 1861, no. 1732, p. 21).
20. Theodosia Trollope’s Social Aspects of the Italian Revolution, published in January (see letter 4823, note 4), did not go into a second edition.
21. EBB is presumably referring to a vote taken on 6 February in the Prussian legislature on a proposal friendly to Italy that passed by a margin of thirteen rather than “fourteen.” News of the vote was reported in The Times of 7 February 1861: “In to-day’s sitting of the Chamber of Deputies … the following amendment was proposed by M. Von Vincke:—‘That we do not consider it to be either for the interest of Prussia or of Germany to place obstacles in the way of the consolidation of the unity of Italy.’ After a discussion of six hours’ duration, this amendment was agreed to by 159 against 146 votes” (p. 9).
22. The previous summer, Prussia threatened war if French and Piedmont forces advanced further into Austrian territory. This, along with other factors, led Napoleon III to sue for peace at Villafranca (see letter 4608, note 5).
23. An allusion to the parable of the laborers in the vineyard (see Matthew 20:1–16).
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