5850. RB to George Goodin Moulton-Barrett
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 32, 156–157.
19. Warwick Crescent,
Upper Westbourne Terrace, W.
Jan: 28. ’67.
My dear George,
I was very sorry indeed to get your letter two days ago; the proceeding of Mr Forster in the matter of the book, [1] I was quite ignorant of—but, unluckily, so well informed of certain circumstances, apparently unknown to Mr Locker, which would influence Mr Forster in such a proceeding, that my first notion was to mention them, in reply to you, at once—without addressing him at all. However, not to throw away a chance of help, I did address him yesterday, with just the result I expected. The case is briefly this. Last October Mr Payne, under no matter what impression of wrong received, insulted Mr Procter and Mr Forster grossly—to that degree that it is inconceivable how he could suppose that Mr Forster would do him the minutest favour even should Mr Payne bring himself to ask it. [2] He ought to have warned Mr Locker– “There must be a mistake,—Mr Forster cannot have allowed a line of his property to appear in any publication of mine who have just chosen to suppress a few words of grateful dedication to him in Mr Procter’s book, on the ground that, being my property, it should not contain any mention of Mr Forster.” —Through whatever blindness, he has omitted this, and must take the consequences—I hope & trust, not involving Mr Locker therein: Forster told me he was very sorry at Mr Locker’s likelihood to suffer for Mr Payne’s fault, but that nothing should alter his resolution,—and probably nothing will—certainly no proposal of money-indemnification; either Mr Payne will have, this day, engaged to withdraw all the copies at the booksellers’, as well as to cancel the offending sheets in any future editions; or an injunction will be applied for; and assuredly attained, since Forster’s right is unquestionable. [3]
I don’t moralize on all this: we say, and not in Church only, “and forgive us as we forgive those &c” [4] —and, in the same breath, declare that there is to be no forgiveness for trespassers. But, once leave Gospel and go to Law—even social Law—and, in this instance, Forster is blameless. But that is what I don’t feel disposed to say of Chapman, if I at all understand what he has said and done, or rather left undone. He knew nothing of the quarrel, I believe, and may have acted in a careless, irregular fashion, which by no means surprises me. Mr Locker will have difficulty in getting an explicit acknowledgement of the statement: which amounts to a permission, out of him,—if it is Frederick; he had no sort of right to make it. And now I come to the end of what I can say about this regrettable business,—the end of all, like the beginning, being true sorrow for and sympathy with Locker—so tell him, however unnecessarily: Lady Charlotte, too, will know that could I hope to do the least good in the matter, I most joyfully would.
There is little home news: Arabel,—Ocky, his wife, and children, [5] —Pen—all are well. Pen has skated diligently while skating-time was: to-day we have a sickly mild day, better for people’s lungs and worse for their spirits—if they resemble mine, at least. It is good, and too good of you, to expend gold for ugly marble, [6] —but there is no hindering your kindness. Give my love to the Storys. Oh, my book, [7] that you enquire about, is in the main done—and, I hope, will be off my mind and out of my hands before long. By the bye,—should you happen to come across any old postal map of the road between Arezzo and Rome, viâ Perugia,—containing the names of all the little villages by the way,—of the year 1700, a little earlier or later,—I should be glad to have such a thing—not glad to make you hunt for it,—because it is not of much importance,—but only glad, as I say, should such a thing turn up without trouble. With Pen’s best love, dear George,
ever affectionately yours
Robert Browning.
Address: George Goodin Moulton-Barrett, Esq. / Reform Club.
Publication: B-GB, pp. 287–290.
Manuscript: Pierpont Morgan Library.
1. Lyra Elegantarium: A Collection of Some of the Best Specimens of Vers de Société and Vers d’Occasion in the English Language by Deceased Authors, ed. Frederick Locker (1867), was published by Edward Moxon & Co. in the first week of January.
2. James Bertrand Payne (1833–98), at this time manager of Edward Moxon & Co., had omitted a dedication to John Forster from Procter’s Charles Lamb: A Memoir (1866) without telling the author before publication in early August. In a letter to Forster, dated 9 August 1866, Procter included the dedication and wrote: “The Life of Charles Lamb was dedicated to you, in the above words. I received a proof—and also a revise of the Dedication, which I returned to Payne’s house. I knew nothing of the omission … until this morning … This seems to me the most impudent fraud upon an author which a publisher can be guilty of; and must damage the house of Moxon with all right thinking people” (Richard Willard Armour, Barry Cornwall: A Biography of Bryan Waller Procter, Boston, 1935, p. 313).
3. In Lyra Elegantarium, Locker had included 40 poems by Walter Savage Landor. But Payne failed to secure permission to publish them from the copyright owner, John Forster, who threatened legal action unless the book was withdrawn, which it was and re-issued without Landor’s poems (see letter 5868).
4. Cf. The Lord’s Prayer.
5. Octavius was visiting Arabella with his son, Charles Graham (1860–1925), by his first wife, Charlotte (1829–61), and his daughter, Frances Maria (1866–1935), by his second wife, Maria Elizabeth (1842–1931).
6. Referring to Story’s bust of RB; see letter 5807, note 1.
7. The Ring and the Book (1868–69).
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