5089. RB to Isa Blagden
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 30, 98–100.
19. Warwick Crescent, Harrow Road,
June 19. ’62.
Dearest Isa,
It is the greatest of comforts that I have thus secured to myself, by a word to your kindness, a certainty to the end of one of our lives of knowing something about you every month, wherever you are, however you are. [1] I shall never try to even amuse you,—on the other hand, writing the little note or long letter will be so pleasant to me that you may possibly sometimes get some of my pleasure thro’ the poor words. If you were here & I could see you alone for a few minutes every now & then, I suppose there would be always a little to interest you in what I saw or heard the day or night before: but there’s too much, & the various sorts of noticeable matters kill each other: I keep going out & forgetting all about it next morning: when I can save a thing that I think would interest you on your own account, (not as a thing happening to me merely) you shall have it. Let’s see: I dined two days ago with Mrs Fitz-Patrick: [2] I sate by my old friend Mrs Cust [3] —who confirmed what I had heard six months before of Gertrude [4] having refused Mr Beaumont [5] & 80,000 a-year. At the same place I found Made B. de Bury, [6] of whom I have a fear, besides an unanswered letter praying me to go & see her she having been daily with Lytton at Vienna, consumed with the study of my things, and all that. Kinglake [7] sat next her—sucking in authentic news about new cessions of territory & so on. Yesterday I met the Storys at a dinner, & afterward went with them to the Athenæum, where I saw nothing worth the trouble of going but the Parsee girls,—prettier to my corrupt & rotten cheese-loving taste than any of the English fineness & loveliness (aquiline nose between two pudding cheeks with lightish hair & eyes, & “fine” complexion—give me these coal black little bitter-almonds!) To day I dine at the Martins—as I did last week [8] —charming people they are; Thackeray & his girls to be there– I was at a House four days ago, where an English young bride of a years standing began the dinner by getting hold of her husband’s hands, [9] with other significa[n]cies before us all,—me, an entire stranger; by the evening she was resting her head on his shoulder, & I did not stay for the little more that could well happen, & which probably did, for the edification of boys & girls: Thackeray was there too, & I mean to ask him what he thought of it—expecting to hear great plainness of speech: she was very pretty, too. I saw Rossetti on Monday,—mean to go & see him soon, & meet his sister & mother. Hatty & Gibson arrive in a week. Story’s success continues: he refuses £1500 for the Sibyl (I know) & there is a talk about his getting £2000 for the Cleopatra: such prices mean nothing, properly understood—but I like his being able to give just the answer most folks require when they ask “what are the works worth?”
Mrs Story would gladly give you the Photograph were a single copy obtainable—there has not been such a chance this long while, as I feared. She will give you, if you please, the last done of the boys—good but not so good. She got your letter & thanks you cordially. I see very little of the party,—just a little at somebody else’s house every other evening or two.
My sister went away last Friday [10] —is safe at Paris & found my Father in great force. I am heartily glad you like her, you dear Isa, & can assure you that she feels very warmly for you. Miss Haworth is here, but I have not yet seen her. I want particularly to mention a circumstance to you, that I feel sorry about: Forster expressed, when I saw him last, about the day after you left, the greatest astonishment and regret at your having been here & his missing you: he maintains it was my fault, which it certainly was not,—says he fancied you had stayed at Paris, &c. I suppose that when you were here, he was always or mostly away—it was so at the beginning: anyhow, he evidently is very sorry to have missed you, & I promised to acquaint you with the fact. Just think of little Alessandro, [11] the red-headed boy Peni liked so to play with, coming here on a visit,—to his grandmother who lives at Highgate! He walked over a fortnight ago, & I was amazed at hearing a chatter of Tuscan & seeing emerge his unmistakeable locks! Lady Lyell’s mother is dead in Florence, [12] & poor Annunziata must be in want of a place again! Do always what you can for her, won’t you? Pen is quite well—tho’ he caught cold on Saturday at a picnic in the vile weather at St George’s Hill, Weybridge: I’ve stopped the rowing till it’s remedied. He’s at his German, but shall confirm the love I send you. For you,—I don’t wonder at your friends being anxious to get what they can out of you during your stay: next time, I may be three-parts “the aged snake” [13] & have house-room for you! Heart-room, meanwhile! Sarianna will come every year, I dare say. Now, Good Bye, dearest Isa, my truest & best of friends,—I may get queer, I shall get white, I shall not get one whit farther from you than where you now stay with
Your affectionate
R Browning
To begin & to end,—these notes are always private, you know, & I trust– No setting me right, please, if I’m ever so wrong—as in Mrs Baker’s affair about the letter of praise, [14] —I’ll knock under at once—but no more referring to the best sources of information & so on: I tell you what I think true, but may be wrong, & don’t in the least care about being thought so—but let an end be there!
Publication: DI, pp. 105–109.
Manuscript: British Library.
1. RB and Isa had agreed to write each other once a month, he on the 19th, as evidenced by the dates of his letters to her, and she on the 12th, as indicated in letter 5146, where RB complains of the late arrival of Isa’s letter: “Three days after time (postage-mark, ‘Firenze 15. Dicembre’).”
2. Augusta Mary FitzPatrick (née Douglas, 1810–99), wife of John Wilson FitzPatrick (1807–83), later (1869) 1st Baron Castletown.
3. Sarah Jane Cust (née Cookson, formerly Streatfeild, 1821–67); see vol. 18, pp. 353–356.
4. Gertrude FitzPatrick (afterwards Smyth, 1831–1912), Mrs. FitzPatrick’s eldest daughter.
5. Unidentified. Possibly one of three unmarried sons of Thomas Wentworth Beaumont (1792–1848).
6. Marie Blaze de Bury (née Stuart, 1813–94); see letter 3703, note 4, where her maiden name is mistakenly given as “Stewart.”
7. Alexander William Kinglake (1809–91).
9. We have been unable to identify the “young bride,” the husband, or the house.
10. The 13th; see letter 5087.
12. Anne Susanna Horner (see letter 5024, note 4) died on 22 May 1862.
14. We are unable to clarify this remark. Presumably, it refers to Georgina Baker (née Crossman); see letter 3711, note 4. A few years earlier, RB had written for her a letter of recommendation to W.H. Ainsworth (see letter 4437).
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