SD1918. Frederick Tennyson to Mary Brotherton
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 22, 270 (in part).
[Florence]
[early April 1856]
My dear Mrs Brotherton,
This morning I have read in Galignani that the cannon from the Tower of London have announced the conclusion of the Peace so anxiously expected & I too hasten to despatch my missive which I hope may have the effect of making my peace with you after my long an[d] unwarrantable silence. … Since our return from England—the end of October—we have given up the villa Torrigiano—sold our furniture—& got rid of the remainder of the lease, 3 year’s & a half—by paying half a years bloodmoney– … We saw the Brownings while in England. Since they have been in Paris we have heard nothing of them—just before I got your last letter we were told that Miss Blagden had written to friends of hers here to have an apartment taken for her in Florence—however she has not yet made her appearance. I have only seen the Extracts in the Athenæum from ‘Men & Women.’ Though I admire Browning & think him wonderful in some respects[,] a real gentleman, and true friend whose ‘heart reverbs no hollowness’ I did not expect from him any poetry of a different order from that already published—which between ourselves I think perfectly untackleable—with first-rate resources he seems to me a man who has mistaken his function. Something great he was created to accomplish but not in this walk. I never sit down to read him without losing my temper—Lycophron is an electric light in comparison. His writings have the same effect upon my spiritual particles, that a midnight banquet of cold pork has upon the stomach. But breathe it not in Gath– If any body should succeed in convincing him that his talents lie in a different direction it would be at the risk of his own life—or B[’]s—or both—so impregnable is B on that ground. He holds himself preeminent among the peaks of Parnassus—the Head of a school—and so he is—but it is the school of ‘Confusion worse confounded.’ God bless the Brownings however—& poor dear Mrs B. I certainly dont class in the same category with her husband as a Poet– I think her an artist of a high order. …
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Lilly Library.
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