4921. RB to Sarianna Browning
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 29, 164–168.
[Florence]
Sunday. June 30. ’61.
Dearest, I know I have shocked you deeply, and perhaps more than was need—but you must forgive me and consider the need of doing something at once—as the news might have reached you even more abruptly,—& my own stupid state of mind yesterday. I can’t even yet say of myself whether I was surprised or not, by this calamity; there is such a balance of reasons for fear, reasons for reassurance as they seemed then, that I don’t know what I feel nor felt. She had been gravely affected by a series of misfortunes moral & physical; or united, as they always were. The Villafranca Peace & the illness with it thro’ the summer at Siena the year before last,—last year’s still worse trial for six months together, the daily waiting for news from Henrietta & the end—(stopping as it did all chance of good & reparation from the summer) rendered her weaker—weaker—she did nothing at Rome, took some three or four little drives, never walked two paces out of the room so, could not but be in a worse state to meet an illness; yet, on the other hand, her cheerfulness, & the quick succeeding of good & quiet looks to the suffering, and the quiet of the last six months, made everyone say “how wonderfully she recovers,—she will soon be strong again, another quiet summer & then”, &c &c. Also her own impressions were in furtherance of this hope—& when I determined to forego the journey to Paris, in opposition to her expressed wishes, I not only knew but got her to confess candidly that for herself the reprieve from going & the trials it would entail on her would be an inestimable advantage—only “still,” “for my sake,” &c she would run the risk. I would not, however. We travelled, as I have told you, easily & with as little fatigue as possible, and on reaching here I let her repose at will, not asking her to go out, but take the air & exercise of the large rooms to begin with. She saw no one, two or three friends at most, had no one to tea (except when intimates looked in once or twice) and began to look well, everybody said. But the weather was suffocatingly hot, and she said to me– “My cough has got well at once, as is always the way in such weather, but, curiously, it begins to affect me, as usual”– I said– “Let us go at once”—we talked of places, the choice being with respect to her different requirements. When last Thursday week it seems that, while I was away at the news room, Miss Blagden came—say at six or seven in the evening: the windows which had been closely shut all day (as the only way of excluding the burning external air, were opened to the ground to admit the breeze which usually springs up after such days, and she placed her chair, I am told, in the door way, between cross draughts of many windows—all the rooms opening into each other,—whereupon Isa B. remonstrated—but Ba said “Oh, the cushion at the back of the chair prevents my suffering”– It was her constant way, besides. I came in and we had tea—& then she remarked “I think I have a sore throat.” Next day was past just as usual, only she told me she had a cold: at night she coughed much & sate up, restlessly, a good deal—& next morning took two Cooper’s pills, [1] I afterwards heard, with a view of staving off the attack she felt imminent—still, nothing happened unusual in the day—but toward night she felt so oppressed that she said, “I think you shall go & get me a blister & a little Ipecacuanha wine, to relieve the oppression[”]: I find the medicine had acted inordinately,—she rarely had recourse to it, but had taken this dose before with benefit—this time, the effects were beyond her expectation. I ran (at 10. p.m.) to the chemist’s, got & applied the blister, and administered the wine—but she seemed little relieved till at 1 o’clock about or later she began to suffer distressingly from the accumulation of phlegm, which she had no power to cough up: I left her with Annunziata, dressed & knocked up (with difficulty) Dr Wilson, a physician of great repute here, and specially conversant in maladies of the chest: He followed with me—& we found her worse, laboring most distressingly & ineffectually: Wilson prescribed promptly—got two prescriptions made up by two chymists (our porter & I got them) put a sinapism to breast & back & hot water with mustard to the feet. [2] For a long while she continued unrelieved—he remained till nearly five.—at last she recovered and we hoped all was over—but this was the second night she had passed in violent exertion without a minute’s sleep. From this time things went on thus,—the symptoms were said to be always “a little better”—but Wilson examined carefully and reported, with a very serious face, that one lung was condensed (the right) and that he suspected an abscess in it—but he was aware of her long previous experience of the possibility of making shift with damaged lungs, and could not say how it might be—“it would require a long time to get well”– I told part of this to Ba who repeatedly answered “It is the old story—they don’t know my case—I have been tapped & sounded so, and condemned so, repeatedly: this time it is said the right is the affected lung while the left is free– Dr Chambers said just the contrary. This is only one of my old attacks. I know all about it and I shall get better.” “It was not so bad an attack as that of two years ago,” and so she continued: every day I carried her into the drawingroom where she sate only in her nightgown in her own chair, for the airiness of the room– She read newspapers, a little—saw nobody of course—going to bed about seven, I sate up most nights,—lay down by her only once, I think, or twice at most, when I was up so often that I discontinued it, which she seemed not to notice—for we brought her small bed into the drawingroom & placed her in it—& she began to doze very much, restlessly, and seemed unaware I was not in bed on a sopha behind: from the first the prescription was “Nourishment, even wine, a little, often if in small quantities.” But Ba never could or would try to take solid nourishment: she had strong brodo (clear soup) but would take nothing else—so we went on, “rather better—but still with the unfavorable symptoms”—was I told twice a day. She was cheerful as ever, with voice all but extinct—still “it would be nothing” she repeated. On Thursday night we tried asses’ milk, with success—“had a better night decidedly”—always much expectoration however, and her feet swelled a little. I let Isa Blagden come & kiss her—she whispered. “I am decidedly better”—& gave that impression to Isa.
On Friday she had asses milk, broth twice, some bread & butter: we talked about our plans—about the house, Casa Guidi, which had suddenly grown distasteful to both of us, noisy, hot, close—poor place we have liked so for fourteen years! I said “it would be best to take a Villa—you decide on Rome for the winter, & properly,—what good of coming in the summer to a town house you cannot stay in.” She said—“Ah, but I can’t leave Florence, I like Florence,—you would like to establish ourselves in Rome.[”] I said—[“]no, there’s Villa Niccolini, [3] for instance—that would just suit”. She said “that would suit—try [to] enquire”—and after, seemed so interested about it, that I said “There’s no hurry,—we can get in there at once if you like—& it will be just as cool as Siena, with the convenience of being near the city.[”] “Oh” she said “that’s not it”—we must change the air now, that is my one chance,—I meant, that if you take it for three years you can send up our furniture and we can enter at once in it when we return next spring.’[’] I observed a tendency to light headedness in all this—as she did—complaining of it to the doctor, and telling me how she had strange thoughts, about the windows, which “seemed to be hung in the Hungarian colours–” And she smiled to Isa Blagden, at eight on Friday, as she took the glass, “Oh, I not only have asses’ milk but asses’ thoughts– I am so troubled with silly politics and nonsense.” Isa told her some thing she had heard about the politics of Ricasoli which interested her so much that I interposed—“No talking, come, go Isa–” & I pushed her out—but Isa says that while my back was turned for a moment to pour out some medicine she whispered “Did you say Ricasoli said his politics were identical with those of Cavour, only they took different views of the best way of carrying them out?” Yes– “Ah, so I thought—” Isa left convinced she was better,—the doctor came—“perhaps a little better.” We talked over her aversion to food– I caused to be made a very strong fowl-jelly—placed in ice in readiness—and then asked if she would not try it during the night– “No”—I did not know how little good it would do—the weakness came from other causes, and these were important—the other could be easily got rid of. I sat by her at night—she coughed little, took the emulgent duly, and another medicine, and dozed constantly: if I spoke she looked, knew me—smiled, said she was better, and relapsed– I continued this till past three in the morning, when the dozing made me very uneasy– She said “You did right not to wait—what a fine steamer—how comfortable.’[’] I called Annunziata, bade her get hot water, as the Doctor had done, and send the porter for himself. I bade her sit up for the water—she did with little help—smiling letting us act & repeating “well, you do make an exaggerated case of it![”] “My hands too” she said & put them in another basin. I said “you know me?[”] “My Robert—my treasure, my beloved—kissing me (but I can’t tell you) she said “Our lives are held by God”– I asked, “will you take jelly for my sake?” “Yes”– I brought a saucerful and put it by spoonfuls into her mouth. I then brought a second, and poured some into a glass—she took all– She put her arms round me “God bless you” repeatedly—kissing me with such vehemence that when I laid her down she continued to kiss the air with her lips and several times raised her own hand & kissed them; I said, “Are you comfortable?” “Beautiful.” I only put in a thing or two out of the many in my heart of hearts. Then she motioned to have her hand sponged—some of the jelly annoying her—this was done, and she began to sleep again—the last, .. I saw. I felt she must be raised, took her in my arms—I felt the struggle to cough begin, and end unavailingly—no pain, no sigh,—only a[t] first light—her head fell on me. I thought she might have fainted—but presently there was the least knitting of the brows—and A. cried “quest’ anima benedetta é passata!” [4] It was so. She is with God, who takes from me the life of my life in one sense,—not so, in the truest. My life is fixed & sure now– I shall live out the remainder in her direct influence, endeavoring to complete mine, miserably imperfect now, but so as to take the good she was meant to give me. I go away from Italy at once, having no longer any business there: I have our child about whom I shall exclusively employ myself, doing her part by him. I shall live in the presence of her, in every sense, I hope & believe—so that so far my loss is not irreparable—but the future is nothing to me now, except inasmuch as it confirms & realizes the past. I cannot plan now, or at least talk about plans—but I shall leave Italy at once, only staying to take away the necessity of a return, for years at least. Pen has been perfect to me: he sate all yesterday with his arms round me; said things like her to me. I shall try & work hard, educate him, and live worthy of my past fifteen years’ happiness. I do not feel paroxysms of grief—but as if the very blessing, she died giving me, insensible to all beside, had begun to work already. She will be buried to-morrow– Several times in writing this I have for a moment referred in my mind to her– “I will ask Ba about that”– The grief of everybody is sincere, I am told. Everybody is kind in offers of help—all is done for us that can be; and it is not a little just now. Isa came at the early morning & stayed till night, taking away Pen. I shall now go in & sit with herself—my Ba, for ever. The service will be that of the Ch. of En. that I may hear those only words at the beginning. [5] Bless you both, dearest papa & sis. I will write after tomorrow. Dont be in any concern for me, I have some of her strength, really, added to mine. Love to dear Milsand.
Ever your own
R Browning.
How she looks now—how perfectly beautiful!
Address: France. / Miss Browning / 151. Rue de Grenelle / Faubourgh St. Germain / Paris. Redirected: Hotel St Jacques / Cheureuse. Redirected: 151 Rue de Grenelle / St Germain / Paris.
Publication: LRB, pp. 58–63.
Manuscript: British Library.
2. Kate Field wrote to her aunt on 29 June 1861 about EBB’s death: “I cannot help perceiving that Dr. Wilson, who was called in owing to the absence of Gresanowsky [sic], and who is most forbidding in physiognomy and is said by some to be a humbug, has hastened Mrs. Browning’s death by resorting to a violent practice which her weak body was thoroughly incapable of enduring. He began by frightening her, telling her what a fearful state her entire system was in,—a fine way to treat an imaginative person” (see SD2452).
3. A villa in the neighborhood of Bellosguardo, with a fine view of Florence.
4. “This blessed soul has passed.”
5. “I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die” (“The Order for the Burial of the Dead,” The Book of Common Prayer).
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