671. EBB to Theodosia Garrow
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 4, 106.
[Torquay]
[late November 1838] [1]
I cannot return the Book of Beauty to Miss Garrow without thanking her for allowing me to read in it sooner than I should otherwise have done, those contributions of her own which help to justify its title, and which are indeed sweet and touching verses. [2]
It is among the vexations brought upon me by my illness, that I still remain personally unacquainted with Miss Garrow, though seeming to myself to know her through those who actually do so. And I should venture to hope that it might be a vexation the first to leave me, if a visit to an invalid condemned to the peine forte et dure [3] of being very silent, notwithstanding her womanhood, were a less gloomy thing. At any rate I am encouraged to thank Miss Fisher [4] and Miss Garrow for their visits of repeated inquiry, and their other very kind attentions, by these written words, rather than by a message. For I am sure that wherever kindness can come thankfulness may, and that whatever intrusion my note can be guilty of, it is excusable by the fact of my being Miss Garrow’s
Sincerely obliged,
E. Barrett.
Text: What I Remember, T.A. Trollope (1887), II, 189–190.
1. Dated by Miss Garrow’s gifts, mentioned in the previous letter.
3. “Intense and severe punishment.” A torture, not abolished until 1772, in which the accused was subjected to increasing pressure while placed between two boards.
4. Harriet Fisher (d. 1848) was Miss Garrow’s half-sister, being the daughter of Mrs. Garrow’s first marriage.
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