5296. RB to Emelyn Story
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 30, 311–315.
19. Warwick Crescent, Upper Westbourne Terrace.
Nov. 26. ’63.
My dear Mrs Story,
I was certainly going to write to you this day: how pleasantly your letter pushes me into my writing-room where I begin what you see, I can’t tell you, but suppose you guess. Probably a scrawl of mine, got through at the Club amid comers & goers, in utmost hurry & worry, [1] —will have reached you by the Russells: I had not time to do more than scrawl. I repeat: well, I have to re-assure William about a fear expressed in it, and say that the appendix on the Population of Old Rome can be got in, to my great satisfaction:—I could only act, you know, on Chapman’s assertion that the book must, in your interest as well as his, be somehow reduced—and if so, I preferred lightening drapery and pedestal and letting the real Story-Statue alone: as it is,—there is really no harm done,—only a few corroborative passages postponed (as I like to call it) and the book runs along more sprightly than ever: as for corrections,—if what I made, be but attended to,—the text will be faultless,—pretty nearly. So much for that—be sure that I really like doing it for its own sake, beside yours: and if the treatise on Proportions [2] wants me,—mind, I shall much more want, & expect it. Next, Hume! look for no explosions from me, any more than from a spent squib: why? “That’s tellings,” as schoolboys say. Of course, William could do nothing but attend to Mr Mitchell’s [3] recommendation—equally of course he will keep Hume within the studio’s bounds, and introduce him to the modelli [4] if he wants improving company– Tho after all this is unfair to such of them as I have known. I saw the fellow’s face, for one minute, last year, at a party—Lady Salisbury’s [5] —and can’t help flattering myself that the sonorous announcement of my name had something to do with his prompt disappearance. By the bye, Mrs. Bruen wrote to me most kindly—I never got her letter & Invitation to go to Boulogne till long after she must have left: thank her cordially for me, if you please. She mentioned Sophy’s story, [6] and promised to convince you of its truth whenever she should see you,—tell her, with my love and with proper frankness, that anyone who has ever believed in Sophy, as she undoubtedly did, should lay that enormous mistake to heart. I decline entertaining, much more, believing, the evidence, unless absolutely ocular, of any such person: why, they have once taken chalk for cheese, or rather prussic acid for primrose-essence, and should ever after go into a corner when chemicals are to be tested. That Eckley has found her out, chosen to open his poor infatuated eyes and see what was staring him in the face, and,—horrified thereat,—changed one devil for another,—that is in itself possible enough: but Miss Eckley’s opinion of Sophy’s declaration, even backed by Mrs Bruen’s acceptance of the same, is as good as the shopboy’s assurance that his master, this time, has made no blunder about the bottles. If I be judged to give myself airs of superiority, the simplest answer would be, I am demonstrably superior in this, seeing that I cried “poison” at first sniff—and suffered more, from maintaining it, than from any incident in my whole life: is one to get no good out of that?
Most capital is your description of Ly A. [7] whom I exactly fancy! He would have it so, & has got it: I always liked him much, & liked his wife much.
Thank you deeply for your goodness to George—I expected something like it, however. He is what you say of him: over-refined, I suppose, for bustling barristery, which he threw up three years ago,—also for country life, which he seems sick of: he wrote to me from Rome, before seeing you—full of delight in it, which was a good sign. Oh, you in Rome! The very words are music to my heart: if I live, in Italy I will finish living and die to my content. I keep it steadily in view, and rather liked to hear a not overwise Italian reply to me, the other day, “What are five or six years, to wait?”– Not that I regret one step I have taken since: so far my object in coming here really seems to have been attained as nearly as under human conditions is possible: Pen is in a very satisfactory state: his health, growth, words and ways, I am bound to be more than contented with, ambitious and nervously anxious as I am. He has now been two years at work—my desire having been that he should advance generally, not at the expense of any faculty mental, moral or physical—and he is advanced enough: his temper and character I accept—thankfully: he is increasingly attentive & observant, with a reserve, self respect, and even (let me say) dignity of bearing which strikes others more than myself. Dr Mussy, [8] the clever French doctor in vogue just now, happened to meet him at dinner and told me afterward he had been greatly struck by his attentiveness. “I should expect” he said “that he never loses a minute of his time,—is always observing, no matter what—and I consider that the most valuable characteristic in a youth of his age.” The private tuition certainly succeeds so far– I believe that he will be a good Latin & Greek Scholar: indeed I was surprised yesterday to be shown by his grave teacher, [9] (the earnestest of pedagogues) what a considerable series of sentences he had just translated viva voce into Greek without a fault: our system would be impossible at a school—it is oral: Pen translates orally,—using grammar and dictionary on the spot,—latin & greek into English or vice versa—two hours of this, three times a week, are worth the whole week spent in “stewing” over books, after schoolboy fashion,—it is condensed work: of course he prepares other exercises with me; and I find the general character of his studies come into use now: for instance, he has great aptitude at scanning and verse-making from his musical sense—will scan twenty lines of Virgil without a mistake: three years more of this, surely will send him to Oxford ripe for action. Then his drawing is very good, his music sufficiently so, considering the poor hour a day he can give it—while French, German & Italian are in good forwardness. I have clever masters, & Pen really loves them all. (Tell Edie, I bought a first rate piano the other day and would give my ears to hear her sing with its accompaniment– I can listen from this distance to her voice.) I told you all this, knowing you will like to have it—also, the realization of it is the one pleasure I have. I hope & trust you will tell me all about your fine boys as freely: I want one thing, you may want another, and there are various ways to even the same end, [10] —but I shall be anxious to watch any way to any end,—and always open to criticism on mine.
The Russells will soon be with you: I saw little of Odo, but found him most kind & cordial: Arthur is a dear and admirable person, unjust to himself in not coming into fuller prominence. Lady W. is all you say of her. I wish I could be with her every day of my life—but at nights, the day’s resolve goes, too often, because of sheer weariness,—soul and body halting under social requirements. I wish I could register the dinners—because I like to draw out your notice of such—but sufficient for the day is the dinner. I get through & get done with it, pleasant as it often is. I did read that “Macbeth”-article—capital, [11] & with a compliment to me in it, moreover, after William’s inveterate habit!—the funnier because of a criticism on “Mr B.” that followed,—noticeable for its mixed nature,—over-laudatory, perhaps, and candid in the main point of giving to me the exact canon of composition whereby I live, move & have my being– He says, I seek a central effect, and only wish the details to be subordinate and seen by a reflected light from the whole: exactly! [12] simply, it is wrong, he holds—and “right,” I maintain. Then he overlooks whole poems & plays written to exemplify the very things he says I never even try to do: people used to ignore all I had done,—now they recognize a bit and ignore the rest—“pazienza”! [13] And the “bit” is absurdly accounted for—my “long acquaintance with Priests & the Confessional” [14] —I who never spoke to any other priest than our little Abbè for two minutes in my life!
What is this “new Cleopatra” [15] —a new conception? good luck to it & us! That is a shameful calumny against Hatty: [16] I have seen her working at it, in various stages—not that I want that assurance of Hatty’s honesty,—knowing her as I knew Sophie. O Rome, O Story, my master!– I have just finished the fitting up my little studio, lying waste since you saw it—there is clay in, and modelling tools, and I shall set to work at once—letting the memories curl round me while I preposterously meddle and make! I seem as if it would solace me beyond gin & water—some people try that. Our clay is white, not the rich Roman brown. Now, is this a letter or no? Write to me soon, for charity. Take my true love, all three of you! Pen has got his old friend Willie Bracken in the next room– Mother & son settle close by, that the boy may go to the London University: there is therefore a good, gentle, intelligent companion for Pen—a desideratum obtained. I bring out a book in the spring [17] —it is delayed a little to take advantage of the sort of success (for me) that the edition is getting. There are reviews reported in progress which will better come out first. [18] I’ll send the new things, be sure—and did not send the Edition because a prettier one is in prospect. [19] Good bye—once more all love to you all from yours ever affectionately
R Browning.
Pen’s deep gratitude for the slippers which are not yet received but shall be acknowledged,—he bids me say.
Publication: BAF, pp. 132–137.
Manuscript: Keats-Shelley Memorial Association.
1. See the preceding letter.
3. Patrick Waddington suggests the probability of one of two Mitchells: either Alexander Mitchell (1831–73) “of 6 Great Stanhope Street, London, and Carolside, Berwickshire, or … the theatre manager John Mitchell” (1806–74); see Waddington, p. 494.
4. “Models.”
5. See the third to last paragraph in letter 5206.
7. Lady Ashburton, Lord Ashburton’s second wife. His first was Lady Harriet Baring (née Montagu, 1805–57).
8. Henri Guéneau de Mussy (1814–92), French-born physician, who came to England with Louis Philippe in 1848 and stayed 23 years before returning to France. He is listed in RB’s address book of this period (AB-5) at 4 Cavendish Place.
9. George Knox Gillespie.
10. Both Thomas Waldo Story (1854–1915) and his younger brother, Julian Russell Story (1857–1919), were educated at Eton and Oxford.
11. RB refers to an unsigned review of The Works of William Shakespeare, ed. William George Clark and John Glover (Cambridge, 1863), entitled “Distortions of the English Stage: ‘Macbeth’,” that appeared in the October issue of The National Review (pp. 292–322). The reviewer noted that “on the stage a strong reaction is taking place against the stilted conventionalism and elaborate artifice of the last generation. Such plays as the Nina Sforza of Mr. Troughton, the Legend of Florence of Mr. Leigh Hunt, and The Blot on [sic] the Scutcheon and Colombe’s Birthday by Mr. Browning, are vigorous protests against the feeble pretensions and artificial tragedies of the previous century. The poems and plays of Mr. Browning breathe a new life; and if as yet they have only found ‘fit audience though few,’ they are stimulating the best thought of this age, and slowly infusing a new life and spirit into it” (pp. 292–293).
13. “Patience.”
14. In Richard Holt Hutton’s review of RB’s Poetical Works (1863), he writes: “It is evident how much a long residence in the country of Machiavelli and Cavour, and a close study of the ecclesiastical wisdom, craft, and subtlety produced by the system of the confessional, must intensify his interest in this border-land between the supernatural and the worldly wisdom” (The National Review, October 1863, p. 433). For the full text of this review, see pp. 386–397.
15. Story revised his “Cleopatra” (1858) in 1863 and 1864 and considered it “greatly improved” (see Jan M. Seidler, “A Critical Reappraisal of the Career of William Wetmore Story (1819–1895), American Sculptor and Man of Letters,” Ph.D. thesis, Boston University, 1985, p. 529).
16. In an obituary of Alfred Gatley (1816–63), English sculptor, that appeared in The Art-Journal of September 1863. The obituarist reasoned that two of Gatley’s works shown at the International Exhibition of 1862 had “attracted little attention” because of the “more meretricious charms of … the ‘Zenobia’—said to be by Miss Hosmer, but really executed by an Italian workman at Rome” (p. 181). Harriet Hosmer was prepared to bring a libel suit against The Art-Journal and The Queen, a weekly that carried the original version of the item, but later settled for a public retraction and apology (see Dolly Sherwood, Harriet Hosmer: American Sculptor, 1830–1908, Columbia, Missouri, 1991, pp. 218–223).
17. Dramatis Personæ.
18. One of these was Moncure Daniel Conway’s; see letter 5275, note 5.
19. Evidently, a “prettier” version of Poetical Works (1863) never materialized. The next collected edition was Poetical Works (1865), a reprint of the 1863 edition.
___________________
