The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning Volume I Part 25

My dearest Mrs. Martin, ... To-day I perceive in the 'contents' of the new 'Westminster Review' that my poems are reviewed in it, and I hope that you will both be interested enough in my fortunes to read at the library what may be said of them. Did George tell you that he imagined (as I also did) the 'Blackwood' paper to be by Mr. Phillimore the barrister? Well, Mr. Phillimore denies it altogether, has in fact quarrelled with Christopher North, and writes no more for him, so that I am quite at a loss now where to carry my grat.i.tude.

Do write to me soon. I hear that everybody should read Dr. Arnold's 'Life.' Do you know also 'E[=o]then,' a work of genius? You have read, perhaps, Hewitt's 'Visits to Remarkable Places' in the first series and second; and Mrs. Jameson's 'Visits and Sketches' and 'Life in Mexico.' Do you know the 'Santa Fe Expedition,' and Custine's 'Russia,' and 'Forest Life' by Mrs. Clavers? You will think that my a.s.sociative process is in a most disorderly state, by all this running up and down the stairs of all sorts of subjects, in the naming of books. I would write a list, more as a list should be written, if I could see my way better, and this will do for a beginning in any case.

You do not like romances, I believe, as I do, and then nearly every romance now-a-days sets about pulling the joints of one's heart and soul out, as a process of course. 'Ellen Middleton' (which I have not read yet) is said to be very painful. Do you know Leigh Hunt's exquisite essays called 'The Indicator and Companion' &c., published by Moxon? I hold them at once in delight and reverence. May G.o.d bless you both.

I am ever your affectionate BA.

_To Mrs. Martin_ 50 Wimpole Street: Tuesday, November 26, 1844 [postmark].

My dearest Mrs. Martin,--I thank you much for your little notes; and you know too well how my sympathy answers you, 'as face to face in a gla.s.s,' for me to a.s.sure you of it here. Your account of yourselves altogether I take to be satisfactory, because I never expected anybody to gain strength very _rapidly_ while in the actual endurance of hard medical discipline. I am glad you have found out a trustworthy adviser at Dover, but I feel nevertheless that you may _both trust_ and _hope_ in Dr. Bright, of whom I heard the very highest praises the other day....

Now really I don't know why I should fancy you to be so deeply interested in Dr. Bright, that all this detail should be necessary.

What I _do_ want you to be interested in, is in Miss Martineau's mesmeric experience,[118] for a copy of which, in the last 'Athenaeum,' I have sent ever since yesterday, in the intention of sending it to you. You will admit it to be curious as philosophy, and beautiful as composition; for the rest, I will not answer. Believing in mesmerism as an agency, I hesitate to a.s.sent to the necessary connection between Miss Martineau's cure and the power; and also I am of opinion that unbelievers will not very generally become converts through her representations. There is a tone of exaltation which will be observed upon, and one or two sentences are suggestive to scepticism. I will send it to you when I get the number. I understand that an intimate friend of hers (a lady) travelled down from the south of England to Tynemouth, simply to try to prevent the public exposition, but could not prevail. Mr. Milnes has, besides, been her visitor. He is fully a believer, she says, and affirms to having seen the same phenomena in the East, but regards the whole subject with _horror_. This still appears to be Mrs. Jameson's feeling, as you know it is mine. Mrs. Jameson came again to this door with a note, and overcoming by kindness, was let in on Sat.u.r.day last; and sate with me for nearly an hour, and so ran into what my sisters call 'one of my sudden intimacies' that there was an embrace for a farewell. Of course she won my affections through my vanity (Mr. Martin will be sure to say, so I hasten to antic.i.p.ate him) and by exaggerations about my poetry; but really, and although my heart beat itself almost to pieces for fear of seeing her as she walked upstairs, I do think I should have liked her _without the flattery_. She is very light--has the lightest of eyes, the lightest of complexions; no eyebrows, and what looked to me like very pale red hair, and thin lips of no colour at all. But with all this indecision of exterior the expression is rather acute than soft; and the conversation in its princ.i.p.al characteristics, a.n.a.lytical and examinative; throwing out no thought which is not as clear as gla.s.s--critical, in fact, in somewhat of an austere sense. I use 'austere,' of course, in its intellectual relation, for nothing in the world could be kinder, or more graciously kind, than her whole manner and words were to me. She is coming again in two or three days, she says. Yes, and she said of Miss Martineau's paper in the 'Athenaeum,' that she very much doubted the wisdom of publishing it now; and that for the public's sake, if not for her own, Miss M. should have waited till the excitement of recovered health had a little subsided. She said of mesmerism altogether that she was inclined to believe it, but had not finally made up her convictions.

She used words so exactly like some I have used myself that I must repeat them, 'that if there was _anything_ in it, there was _so much_, it became scarcely possible to limit consequences, and the subject grew awful to contemplate.' ...

On Sat.u.r.day I had some copies of my American edition, which dazzle the English one; and one or two reviews, transatlantically transcendental in 'oilie flatterie.' And I heard yesterday from the English publisher Moxon, and he was 'happy to tell me that the work was selling very well,' and this without an inquiry on my part. To say the truth, I was _afraid_ to inquire. It is good news altogether. The 'Westminster Review' won't be out till next month.

Wordsworth is so excited about the railroad that his wife persuaded him to go away to recover his serenity, but he has returned raging worse than ever. He says that fifty members of Parliament have promised him their opposition. He is wrong, I think, but I also consider that if the people remembered his genius and his age, and suspended the obnoxious Act for a few years, they would be right....

May G.o.d bless you both.

Most affectionately yours, BA.

[Footnote 118: The _Athenaum_ of November 23 contained the first of a series of articles by Miss Martineau, giving her experiences of mesmerism.]

_To James Martin_ December 10, 1844.

I have been thinking of you, my dear Mr. Martin, more and more the colder it has been, and had made up my mind to write to-day, let me feel as dull as I might. So, the vane only turns to _you_ instead of to dearest Mrs. Martin in consequence of your letter--your letter makes _that_ difference. I should have written to Dover in any case....

You are to know that Miss Martineau's mesmeric experience is only peculiar as being Harriet Martineau's, otherwise it exhibits the mere commonplaces of the agency. You laugh, I see. I wish I could laugh too. I mean, I seriously wish that I could disbelieve in the reality of the power, which is in every way most repulsive to me....

Mrs. Martin is surprised at me and others on account of our 'horror.'

Surely it is a natural feeling, and she would herself be liable to it if she were _more credulous_. The agency seems to me like the shaking of the flood-gates placed by the Divine Creator between the unprepared soul and the unseen world. Then--the subjection of the will and vital powers of one individual to those of another, to the extent of the apparent solution of the very ident.i.ty, is abhorrent from me. And then (as to the expediency of the matter, and to prove how far believers may be carried) there is even now a religious sect at Cheltenham, of persons who call themselves advocates of the 'third revelation,' and profess to receive their system of theology entirely from patients in the sleep.

In the meantime, poor Miss Martineau, as the consequence of her desire to speak the truth as she apprehends it, is overwhelmed with atrocious insults from all quarters. For my own part I would rather fall into the hands of G.o.d than of man, and suffer as she did in the body, instead of being the mark of these cruel observations. But she has singular strength of mind, and calmly continues her testimony.

Miss Mitford writes to me: 'Be sure it is _all true_. I see it every day in my Jane'--her maid, who is mesmerised for deafness, but not, I believe, with much success curatively. As a remedy, the success has been far greater in the Martineau case than in others. With Miss Mitford's maid, the sleep is, however, produced; and the girl professed, at the third _seance_, to be able to _see behind her_.

I am glad I have so much interesting matter to look forward to in the 'Eldon Memoirs' as Pincher's biography. I am only in the first volume.

Are English chancellors really made of such stuff? I couldn't have thought it. Pincher will help to reconcile me to the Law Lords perhaps.

And, to turn from Tory legislators, I am vainglorious in announcing to you that the Anti-Corn-Law League has taken up my poems on the top of its pikes as ant.i.thetic to 'War and Monopoly.' Have I not had a sonnet from Gutter Lane? And has not the journal called the 'League' reviewed me into the third heaven, high up--above the pure ether of the five points? Yes, indeed. Of course I should be a (magna) chartist for evermore, even without the previous predilection.

And what do you and Mrs. Martin say about O'Connell? Did you read last Sat.u.r.day's 'Examiner'? Tell her that I welcomed her kind letter heartily, and that this is an answer to both of you. My best love to her always. May G.o.d bless you, dear Mr. Martin! Probably I have written your patience to an end. If papa or anybody were in the room, I should have a remembrance for you.

I remain, myself,

Affectionately yours, BA.

_To Mrs. Martin_ Wednesday [December 1844].

My dearest Mrs. Martin,--Hardly had my letter gone to you yesterday, when your kind present and not _et_ arrived. I thank you for my boots with more than the warmth of the worsted, and feel all their merits to my soul (each sole) while I thank you. A pair of boots or shoes which 'can't be kicked off' is something highly desirable for me, in Wilson's opinion; and this is the first thing which struck _her_.

But the 'great idea' 'a propos des bottes,' which occurred to myself, ought to be unspeakable, like Miss Martineau's great ideas--for I do believe it was--that I needn't have the trouble every morning, _now_, of putting on my stockings....

My voice is thawing too, with all the rest. If the cold had lasted I should have been dumb in a day or two more, and as it was, I was forced to refuse to see Mrs. Jameson (who had the goodness to come again) because I couldn't speak much above my breath. But I was tolerably well and brave upon the whole. Oh, these murderous English winters. The wonder is, how anybody can live through them....

Did I tell you, or Mr. Martin, that Rogers the poet, at eighty-three or four years of age, bore the bank robbery[119] with the light-hearted bearing of a man 'young and bold,' went out to dinner two or three times the same week, and said witty things on his own griefs. One of the other partners went to bed instead, and was not likely, I heard, to 'get over it.' I felt quite glad and proud for Rogers. He was in Germany last year, and this summer in Paris; but he _first_ went to see Wordsworth at the Lakes.

It is a fine thing when a light burns so clear down into the socket, isn't it? I, who am not a devout admirer of the 'Pleasures of Memory,'

do admire this perpetual youth and untired energy; it is a fine thing to my mind. Then, there are other n.o.ble characteristics about this Rogers. A common friend said the other day to Mr. Kenyon, 'Rogers hates me, I know. He is always saying bitter speeches in relation to me, and yesterday he said so and so. _But_,' he continued, 'if I were in distress, there is one man in the world to whom I would go without doubt and without hesitation, at once, and as to a brother, and _that_ man is _Rogers_.' Not that I would choose to be obliged to a man who hated me; but it is an ill.u.s.tration of the fact that if Rogers is bitter in his words, which we all know he is, he is always benevolent and generous in his deeds. He makes an epigram on a man, and gives him a thousand pounds; and the deed is the truer expression of his own nature. An uncommon development of character, in any case.

May G.o.d bless you both!

Your most affectionate BA.

I am going to tell you, in an ant.i.thesis, of the popularising of my poems. I had a sonnet the other day from Gutter Lane, Cheapside, and I heard that Count d'Orsay had written one of the stanzas of 'Crowned and Buried' at the bottom of an engraving of Napoleon which hangs in his room. Now I allow you to laugh at my vaingloriousness, and then you may pin it to Mrs. Best's satisfaction in the dedication to Dowager Majesty. By the way--no, out of the way--it is whispered that when Queen Victoria goes to Strathfieldsea[120] (how do you spell it?) she means to visit Miss Mitford, to which rumour Miss Mitford (being that rare creature, a sensible woman) says: 'May G.o.d forbid.'

[Footnote 119: A great robbery from Rogers' bank on November 23, 1844, in which the thieves carried off 40,000 worth of notes, besides specie and securities.]

[Footnote 120: Strathfieldsaye, the Duke of Wellington's house.]

_To John Kenyan_ Wednesday morning [about December 1844].

I thank you, my dear cousin, and did so silently the day before yesterday, when you were kind enough to bring me the review and write the good news in pencil. I should be delighted to see you (this is to certify) notwithstanding the frost; only my voice having suffered, and being the ghost of itself, you might find it difficult to _hear_ me without inconvenience. Which is for _you_ to consider, and not for _me_. And indeed the fog, in addition to the cold, makes it inexpedient for anyone to leave the house except upon business and compulsion.

Oh no--we need not mind any scorn which a.s.sails Tennyson and _us_ together. There is a dishonor that does honor--and 'this is of it.' I never heard of Barnes.[121]

Were you aware that the review you brought was in a newspaper called the 'League,' and laudatory to the utmost extravagance--praising us too for courage in opposing 'war and monopoly'?--the 'corn ships in the offing' being duly named. I have heard that it is probably written by Mr. Cobden himself, who writes for the journal in question, and is an enthusiast in poetry. If I thought so to the point of conviction, _do you know, I should be very much pleased_? You remember that I am a sort of (magna) chartist--only going a little farther!

Flush was properly ashamed of himself when he came upstairs again for his most ungrateful, inexplicable conduct towards you; and I lectured him well; and upon asking him to 'promise never to behave ill to you again,' he kissed my hands and wagged his tail most emphatically. It altogether amounted to an oath, I think. The truth is that Flush's nervous system rather than his temper was in fault, and that, in that great cloak, he saw you as in a cloudy mystery. And then, when you stumbled over the bell rope, he thought the world was come to an end.

He is not accustomed, you see, to the vicissitudes of life. Try to forgive him and me--for his ingrat.i.tude seems to 'strike through' to me; and I am not without remorse.

Ever most affectionately yours, E.B.B.

I inclose Mr. Chorley's note which you left behind you, but which I did not see until just now. _You_ know that I am not ashamed of '_progress_.' On the contrary, my only hope is in it. But the question is not _there_, nor, I think, for the public, except in cases of ripe, established reputations, as I said before.

[Footnote 121: William Barnes, the Dorsetshire poet, the first part of whose _Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect_ appeared in 1844.]

_To Mr. Westwood_ (On returning some ill.u.s.trations of Spenser by Mr. Woods) December 11, 1844.

... With many thanks, cordial and true, I thank you for the pleasure I have enjoyed in connection with these proofs of genius. To be honest, it is my own personal opinion (I give it to you for as much as it is worth--not much!) that many of the subjects of these drawings are unfit for graphic representation. What we can bear to see in the poet's vision, and sustained on the wings of his divine music, we shrink from a little when brought face to face with, as drawn out in black and white. You will understand what I mean. The horror and terror preponderate in the drawings, and what is sublime in the poet is apt to be extravagant in the artist--and this, not from a deficiency of power in the latter, but from a treading on ground forbidden except to the poet's foot. I may be wrong, perhaps--I do not pretend to be right. I only tell you (as you ask for them) what my impressions are.

I need not say that I wish all manner of success to your friend the artist, and laurels of the weight of gold while of the freshness of gra.s.s--alas! an impossible vegetable!--fabulous as the Halcyon!