4852. Walter Savage Landor to RB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 29, 25–26.
[Florence]
[mid-March 1861] [1]
My dear Browning,
Your kind note has been puzzling and perplexing me the whole hour since I read it. I must transcribe from it what I mean. Your words are “I will make you as comfortable as I can. But you must remember that our power is very limited by circumstances. Strict economy is enjoined on us, and, in my anxiety to trouble you as little as possible, I perhaps have not mentioned this distinctly enough. Mme R has very little latitude allowed her—and one must be content with one’s restricted means.”
My dear Browning, this shocks and overthrows me. It makes me fear that I have caused you to assist me in money matters out of your limited means. I did believe, and never doubted, that my brother Henry, with whom you were in correspondence, had offered to advance the very little I wanted. In an extremely short time I shall want nothing, and my brother would recieve from my rents what he had sent for me here in Italy. In the many years since my mother’s death [2] there must have been some savings. These it was proposed to be reserved for the younger children. On this consideration I lived on little. But my eldest son, [3] since, agreed to divide between his two brothers half what would fall on to him on his mother’s death. Thus they and their sister, who have already near seven thousand pounds, will have sufficient to keep house handsomely together. I am resolved to confine my expenses to 120£ a year. I entreat and implore you to forward this letter to my brother Henry at Tachbrooke near Leamington Warwickshire.
Having lost all my serviceable teeth I am beginning to live on broth for dinner. I never complained of Mrs Romagnoli’s cooking, never having wanted more than one dish. We continue good friends.
With kindest remembrances to Mrs Browning and brave little Robert,
I remain,
dear Browning,
your ever obliged
and affectionate
W S. Landor
Publication: BBIS-5, p. 37.
Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library.
1. Dating based on Landor’s begging RB “to forward this letter” to his “brother Henry”; see the first sentence in letter 4856.
2. Elizabeth Landor (née Savage, 1743–1829).
3. Arnold Savage Landor (1818–71), eldest son of Walter Savage Landor and his wife, Julia (née Thuillier, 1793–1879). The other children were Julia Elizabeth Savage (1820–84), Walter Savage (1822–99), and Charles Savage (1825–1917).
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