704. Mary Russell Mitford to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 4, 179.
Three Mile Cross
[late] July, [1839] [1]
My beloved Friend,
I am in great anxiety again. My dearest father has had in the past week two several attacks of English cholera. They have reduced him exceedingly, more than you can fancy, and I am now sitting on the ground outside his door, with my paper on my knee, watching to hear whether he sleeps. Oh! my dearest love, at how high a price do we buy the joy of one great undivided affection, such as binds us heart to heart! For the last two years I have not had a week without anxiety and alarm, so that fear seems now to be a part of my very self; and I love him so much the more tenderly for this clinging fear, and for his entire reliance upon me! You, with so many to love, and so many to love you, can hardly imagine what it is to be so totally the whole world to each other as we are. And oh! when sickness comes, when one attack of a different kind follows another, so that the insecurity of our treasure is pressed upon our attention every hour—oh! how tremblingly, throbbingly, sensible do we become to the consciousness of that insecurity! I hardly now dare leave him for half an hour. I have not left him for a drive, or to drink tea with a friend, for years. But I must not worry you with my depression. Heaven bless you!
Ever yours,
M. R. M.
Address: Miss Barrett, Torquay.
Text: L’Estrange (2), III, 79–80 (as July, 1837).
1. This letter, addressed to Torquay, was dated 1837 by L’Estrange; as EBB did not go to Torquay until August 1838, 1839 is a more probable date. If this inference is correct, the letter must have been written very late in July, as EBB would surely have referred to Dr. Mitford’s health in her letter of 3 August, had she already known of his illness. She does mention Miss Mitford’s anxiety about him in her next letter, dated 11 August.
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