Wednesday August 17th.
I left my Seven chiefs at Mr. Boyd’s yesterday. Now there are sundry notes in it, which I shd. prefer the readers there, not reading; therefore my first precaution this morng. was to send for it. I sent at the same time my Neapolitan vocabolario[1] for Miss Boyd,—& Miss Steers’s books.
Finished Cebes; & began Theophrastus.[2]
Clouds—& an imitation of yesterday’s thunderstorm; and fortunately for my nerves, Virgil to Homer![3] Mr Cuzon came at three, & when I went down stairs to see him, I found Mrs. Martin in the drawingroom—, Mr. Martin at the window! A little talking. When we went in to dinner, they sate down near us—& were not very agreable. Mr. Martin dumb & deaf to Mr. Curzon. Mrs. Martin rather icy to me! At least I fancied it, & did’nt care!— Talking to Mr. Curzon all the evening. He wont admit Mr. Boyd’s interpretation of Colossions—so I suppose I am not to write. I sighed as I wrote that; & not because I cannot send Mr. Curzon’s receipt in full, of the interpretation.
A note from Mrs. Boyd, with my Seven chiefs. A note too, from Miss Steers, with Keats & Shelley. Poets wont do me much good just now,—I believe,—& yet,—I am glad to have them.
A great deal of conversation, with Mr. Curzon, altogether religious. He sleeps here, to our surprise!— No letter.
1. Lot 1194 of Browning Collections: Vocabolario Italiano-Latina et Latino-Italiano, 2 vols. (Napoli, 1818), a gift to E.B.B. from her father.
2. Theophrastus of Eresus (ca. 371–287 B.C.). His major works were two botanical treatises, but later entries indicate that E.B.B. was reading his Ethical Characters.
3. In her letter to H.S.B. of 3 March 1828, E.B.B. said of critics who compare Virgil and Homer “they may as well compare the mouse with the mountain!” (BC, 2, 106–110).
