5124. RB to Isa Blagden
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 30, 143–147.
19. Warwick Crescent, Harrow Road.
Oct. 18. ’62
Dearest Isa,
I shall not again tell you that your letter arrived & made me happy: understand without more telling, as I think you do, that I look for it thro’ the long month as I never looked for anything else in the letter way: it is a comfort I depend upon till the end—it & you, Isa! I stayed a week in Paris then crossed over, finding all much as I left it & very black & blank: the weather which had been very fine till then, broke up next day—oh, the light by which I try & write, this afternoon, with a memory of poor Casa Guidi, which I thought black! Arabel Barrett was—& is still in the country—& Pen felt lonely for a day or two: however things grow more propitious, there is much to make him comfortable, some better weather allowed him to row (his especial passion) & other good things are in store. Last night, Hal Cottrell [1] came, to our great delight, slept at night, & has just gone away (this moment) with his Father (who came early & spent the morning) & his mother, who did not leave the carriage, the rain pelting: I was glad to see them: Hal is a sweet fellow, to my mind: Pen has outgrown him by half a head. She appeared better than I expected, but C. assures me that much is yet wrong with her, poor thing! He takes to you two photographs of Pen, [2] —very good, I think—and a little parcel of which this is the history: it is a book & testimonials which Annunziata gave me to keep for her once on a time: when I left Florence, it got packed up among my own things by mistake: I promised to send it, as it is valuable to her. If you have any opportunity of sending it to her, at the B. di Lucca, [3] you will greatly oblige me. Thank you most truly for attending to my request so promptly, in the matter of the Account of the Murder &c which I found on my return [4] —pray thank Mrs Baker for her kindness, & say it will be particularly useful to me: it would be of little use to anybody without my documents, nor is it correct in several respects,—but it contains a few notices of the execution &c. subsequent to my account that I can turn to good: I am going to make a regular poem of it. I hope to print a new book of “Men & Women” (or under some such name) in April or May [5] —& next year, this which shall be a strong thing, if I can manage it. Cottrell takes also with him the Drawings [6] —which I should like you to see: it is my idea, (I think I told you about it) carried beautifully out, I think. I have not seen Romola, [7] nor any illustrations to it, except the first number, which, he told me, were a failure thro’ the engraver’s fault. I will get & read the story, which I shall like, I am sure—yet Chapman told me, two days ago, that it was considered a complete failure in point of attractiveness. Who values that, I wonder, unless those who make money by it!
Dearest Isa, you know what I feel about that Tablet: I have two letters from Villery, [8] written perhaps ten months ago, telling me in the most circumstantial matter [sic] that the Decreto was issued, and the Tablet sent to the Stone cutters, and the Inscription—what you have read, and the thing done: I am sure he, at least believed so,—it is not for me to ask the people concerned to remember my feelings, at hearing month after month, that nothing has been done, after all: Villeri will help, I know. It does not seem to me exactly the concern of the Matteuccis, who are of another country. I think a word from Villeri, would advance the thing: it is all great pain to me.
This is a discouraging business, the substitution of Drouin de l’Huis for Thouvenel: [9] I was the other night at Lady W. R’s who told me the talk of the Town was a visit Panizzi [10] had just paid to Biarritz, whence he had returned persuaded that L. Napoléon meant the very best for Italy and would do it the moment he could. It’s weary waiting, however.
Poor perverse Mr Landor has sent me the big case of his Picture—the “Sebastian del Piombo,” bless him! I shall be sure to offend him, whether I sell the picture for £5 or buy it in for £6. The “attention” of his sons would be praiseworthy were it in less evident connection with attempts to get money out of the Brothers: I have forwarded an application from Mr L. & hear in reply that he twice spent the money himself, [11] and only now, when the burthen is clearly off his shoulders, begins to be alive to the interest of the “younger children”. So demeans himself in his sad old age one of the greatest geniuses England ever produced! I don’t think the end is near, or so very near—he can’t keep on so to the end!
I wrote to Lytton as I told you I would—the return is a huge letter exceeding all its predecessors in warmth & overflowing! [12] He desires to be lovingly remembered to you: has been studying, rather than writing—reading Greek Books—& has had (of this I had heard before) quite a diplomatical success from his late little mission, receiving the thanks of the Government. He is coming to England, to make a long stay, and will be with Forster—who wants me to go & meet him on Christmas day– Forster writes in good spirits, [13] his wife,—who, you remember was in a very unsatisfactory state,—is so much better that she can already walk four or five miles: they are at Bangor, till mid-november. I shall not forget your message to Forster.
Monday 20/ No post yesterday—so I would not close this but have the feeling of writing one day later, & bringing the time till I hear again nearer by that much. I told Miss Smith of your love-sending, but she had just heard from yourself. Pen is drawing with her while I write,—it did me good to see him row past the window this (fine) morning. —I don’t think it is my way to be over hopeful or anything but nervously apprehensive & suspicious of what comes in the likeness of good & success to me now—but I do believe Pen is doing as well morally & intellectually as physically: he is slow in development, but sure—retains all he has learnt & digests it, as I am surprised to find: is undemonstrative but feels deeply: as I have had occasion to observe: I cannot know what will come of it, but I incline to hope nothing till something—that is, no clever precocious immaturity to be admired and then forgotten—which it unluckily never is, but binds its author to many a crude, wrong & untrue profession of faith which seriously hampers him after & long after. I shall be able to manage him easily, I believe, and already have not half the difficulty that I had last year. I know you will be glad to hear this for all our sakes—as for me, I see increasingly every day, that were he not here, I should be “no where”: life is, as you describe Mr Landor’s dressing-gown, “all the color washed out of it”—but, with the particular incentives I retain, I hope to fight a good fight & [“]finish my course.” [14] You suppose I was dull at Ste Marie—on the contrary I stayed a week longer than the allotted term, and could have done well there for ever: it was in my scheme to read, walk, & do nothing but think there—here, my way is to do many other things—among others go out a good deal—just as now it suits me to stay at home—& I no more think of accepting an invitation (to the country) now than four months hence, I shall of refusing one: I do it all with a purpose, & don’t care for one course more than another. My health is much improved, I should tell you—for I was regularly ill when I left town.
I am so glad that I can be comfortable in your comfort: I fancy exactly how you feel & see how you live: it is the Villa Geddes [15] of old days, I find: I well remember the fine view from the Kinneys’ upper-room—that looking down the steep hill, by the side of which runs the road you describe: that path was always my preferred walk, for its shortness (abruptness) and the fine old wall to your left (from the Villa) which is overgrown with weeds & wild flowers—violets & ground-ivy, I remember. Oh, me—to find myself there, some late sun-shiny Sunday afternoon, with my face turned to Florence,—“ten minutes to the Gate, ten minutes home!” I think I should fairly end it all on the spot. If Cottrell is right in his calculations I shall have to go there in the autumn: [16] do you know it will be most to my present feeling to go to some crowded Hôtel in the middle of the Town? But I won’t think of it till the time comes. Well, Isa—what do you forbode from the changes in Paris? The more I reflect, the more hopeful I grow, on account of the very circumstances that make the papers here overboil: I seem to have observed a wise principle in Louis Napoléon: wise in anyone who is strong enough to command his servants and get the precise work done which he needs: he entrusts it invariably to a man of opposite feeling if not principle—and thereby secures himself from the danger of too much zeal, and by the procedures of the unwilling instrument,—his manners, representations & diplomacy in accordance with his personal predilections,—breaks the blow and half conciliates the party that has to suffer from the naked measures themselves—which are of course quite enough to sat<isf>y the other party which benefits by them: thus when he <s>ent Benedetti [17] to Turin, Lavellette [18] to Rome—you had conservative measures, liberal agents and mollifiers of the refusal to le<a>ve Rome: is it not conceivable that having to adopt liberal measures he employs those agents who will do what they are enjoined with all those sympathies & consideratenesses which ensure the success of a difficult enterprise—in short, do just what they are told,—forced to do,—& not more: this would not be the course taken by a half-powerful government, only anxious to procure the evacuation of Rome, for instance—then, the way would be to get a zealous liberal to help all he could: but here, no help that way is wanted—but immense help toward inducing Pope & Cardinals to “bear” the blow with decency: in short, when a landlord with power & will determines to eject an old lady from her half century of tenancy—he gets her best friend to go & tell her—may it not be so?
See what a letter I have written you?– I, who hate writing a word, and wait for months before I can make up my mind to do so! Do you write to me as your good heart shall persuade.
I am glad to hear Made Brecker, Brini, & the others still think of me & mine. You may safely give my love to everybody in Florence. Do you see Kirkup? Esp<ecial>ly my kind regards to Dr Grisanowsky, the Trollopes, Mig<n>atys—but you know.
God bless you, dearest Isa: Pen, returned, gives you his best love. Can I ever do anything for you here? I shall go & call on the kind Mackays–
E<ve>r yours affectionately
R Browning.
Publication: DI, pp. 127–133.
Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library.
1. Henry (“Hal”) Edward Plantagenet Cottrell (1851–1938).
2. Two of the four photographs that were taken earlier in the month in Paris at the studio of C.L. Leblanc (ca. 1806–74), 33 Avenue d’Antin. Copies of all four are reproduced facing page 144.
3. Bagni di Lucca, where Annunziata’s family lived and where the Brownings first engaged her.
5. The “new book” was Dramatis Personæ, published in late May 1864.
6. Frederic Leighton’s design for EBB’s monument (see letter 5097). Undated sketches of his designs are reproduced facing p. 272.
7. Romola, a historical novel by George Eliot set in late fifteenth-century Florence, appeared serially in The Cornhill Magazine from July 1862 to August 1863. The illustrations, generally two to a number, were provided by Frederic Leighton. Romola was published in book form by Smith, Elder & Co. on 14 July 1863.
8. Sic, for Villari. See letters 5032 and 5041.
9. The Times of 17 October 1862 reported that on 15 October Edouard Drouyn de Lhuys (1805–81) was appointed French “Minister of Foreign Affairs in the place of M. Thouvenel, whose resignation is accepted” (p. 10). Edouard Antoine Thouvenel (1818–66), a liberal friend to Italy, had served as foreign minister since 1860. Robert Holmes Edleston describes Drouyn de Lhuys as “a Minister far less gently disposed [than Thouvenel] towards the designs of the Cabinet of Turin” (Napoleon III. in Italy, Darlington, Durham, 1911, p. 406).
10. Anthony Panizzi (1797–1879), librarian of the British Museum.
14. Cf. II Timothy 4:7.
15. i.e., Villa Giglioni.
16. For the completion of EBB’s monument, which did not occur until 1865.
17. Comte Vincente Benedetti (1817–1900), Corsican-born French diplomat, ambassador to Italy from 1861 to 1862. He was replaced by the Comte de Sartiges (1809–92).
18. Charles Jean Marie Félix, Marquis de La Vallette (1826–81), French ambassador at Rome (1861–62), was replaced by the Prince de La Tour d’Auvergne (1823–71).
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