Correspondence

5534.  RB to Mary Ford

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 31, 210.

19. Warwick Crescent,

Upper Westbourne Terrace, W

Jan: 30, ’65.

Dear Mrs Ford, [1]

You are good indeed to remember me: thank you much for your invitation [2] which I accept with great pleasure.

Yours very faithfully

Robert Browning.

Publication: None traced.

Manuscript: Armstrong Browning Library.

1. Mary Ford (née Molesworth, 1816–1910), daughter of Sir Arscott Ourry Molesworth (1789–1823), 7th Baronet, and his wife, Mary (née Brown, 1780–1877). She married on 12 June 1851, as his third wife, Richard Ford (1796–1858), Hispanophile. Mrs. Ford is listed in RB’s address book of this period (AB-5) at 123 (later renumbered 17) Park Street, Grosvenor Square. In March of the following year, RB presented her with a number of letters and manuscripts, the latter including drafts of “A Woman’s Last Word” (1855), the last line of “A Toccata of Galuppi’s” (1855), and lines 15–28 of “Beatrice Signorini” (1889). For a discussion of these manuscripts, see Michael Meredith, “Foot Over the Threshold: Browning at Work,” BSN, 26 (May 2000), 48–54.

2. Evidently, for 11 February (see the following letter).

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