SD2769. Thomas Arnold to Julia Arnold
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 31, 320–321 (in part).
77 George Street [Oxford]
Sunday [12 June 1865]
My dearest Julia
<***> I wish you could have been at Jowett’s last night; it was a strange gathering. Colenso first of all—that arch limb of Satan, who with his bronzed complexion and wiry wild grey hair and deep set glittering eye, must appear to many a pious soul, I am sure, in the light of an emissary direct from the pit. Then there was Woolner the sculptor, the author of My Beautiful Lady. Then there was Browning the poet, to whom I was introduced, and talked a good deal about Alfred Domett, whom he used to know intimately, as I have heard Domett say. Then there was Mrs Pattison, the wife of Mark the Essayist (who was not there himself) and Frank Palgrave and his wife, and the ex-Jesuit, and Mrs Tom Acland and her pretty daughter, and the Henry Aclands, and Ferguson the architect, a singular character, and Henry Smith and his sister. There was also a daughter of Earl Russell, Lady Georgina Russell, a nice pretty looking little thing, reminding me much of what the Queen was when a girl; I was introduced to her and liked her. Then there was Roundell, and Price the mathematician with his wife, and several other minor individuals whose names I did not know. Colenso is going out to Natal next month, and a nice hornets’ nest he is likely to find it. I dine with Sidney Owen today, as I think I told you. …
Ever dearest your most affecte husband
T. Arnold
Text: Letters of Thomas Arnold the Younger 1850–1900, ed. James Bertram (Oxford, 1980), p. 153.
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