The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning Volume Ii Part 9

_To Miss Mitford_

58 Welbeck Street: Sat.u.r.day, September 14, 1852 [postmark].

My dearest Miss Mitford,--I am tied and bound beyond redemption for the next fortnight at least, therefore the hope of seeing you must be for _afterwards_. I dare say you think that a child can be stowed away like other goods; but I do a.s.sure you that my child, though quite capable of being amused by his aunts for a certain number of half-hours, would break his little heart if I left him for a whole day while he had not Wilson. When she is here, he is contented. In her absence he is sceptical about happiness, and suspicious of complete desolation. Every now and then he says to me, 'Will mama' (saying it in his pretty, broken, unquotable language) 'go away and leave Peninni all alone?' He won't let a human being touch him. I wash and dress him, and have him to sleep with me, and Robert is the only other helper he will allow of.

'There's spoiling of a child!' say you. But he is so good and tender and sensitive that we can't go beyond a certain line. For instance, I was quite frightened about the effect of Wilson's leaving him. We managed to prepare him as well as we could, and when he found she was actually gone, the pa.s.sion of grief I had feared was just escaped. He struggled with himself, the eyes full of tears, and the lips quivering, but there was not any screaming and crying such as made me cry last year on a like occasion. He had made up his mind.

You see I can't go to you just now, whatever temptations you hold out.

Wait--oh, we must wait. And whenever I do go to you, you will see Robert at the same time. He will like to see _you_; and besides, he would as soon trust me to travel to Reading alone as I trust Peninni to be alone here. I believe he thinks I should drop off my head and leave it under the seat of the rail-carriage if he didn't take care of it....

I ought to have told you that Mr. Kingsley (one of the reasons why I liked him) spoke warmly and admiringly of you. Yes, I ought to have told you that--his praise is worth having. Of course I have heard much of Mr.

Harness from Mr. Kenyon and you, as well as from my own husband. But there is no use in measuring temptations; I am a female St. Anthony, and _won't_ be overcome. The Talfourds wanted me to dine with them on Monday. Robert goes alone. You don't mention Mr. Chorley. Didn't he find his way to you?

Mr. Patmore told us that Tennyson was writing a poem on Arthur--_not_ an epic, a collection of poems, ballad and otherwise, united by the subject, after the manner of 'In Memoriam,' but in different measures.

The work will be full of beauty, whatever it is, I don't doubt.

I am reading more Dumas. He never flags. I _must_ see Dumas when I go again to Paris, and it will be easy, as we know his friend Jadin.

Did you read Mrs. Norton's last book--the novel, which seems to be so much praised? Tell me what it is, in your mind....

I will write no more, that you may have the answer to my kind proposition as soon as possible. _After the fortnight._

G.o.d bless you.

Your ever affectionate E.B.B.

_To Miss Mitford_

58 Welbeck Street: Tuesday, [September 1852].

Alas, no; I cannot go to you before the Sat.u.r.day you name, nor for some days after, dearest friend. It is simply impossible. Wilson has not come back, nor will till the end of next week, and though I can get away from my child for two or three hours at once during the daytime, for the whole day I could not go. What would become of him, poor darling?...

And I can't go to you this week, nor next week, probably. How vexatious!

My comfort is that you seem to be better--much, much better--and that you have courage to think of the pony carriages and the Kingsleys of the earth. That man impressed me much, interested me much. The more you see of him, the more you will like him, is my prophecy. He has a volume of poems, I hear, close upon publication, and Robert and I are looking forward to it eagerly.

Mr. Ruskin has been to see us (did I tell you that?)... We went to Denmark Hill yesterday by agreement, to see the Turners--which, by the way, are divine. I like Mr. Ruskin much, and so does Robert. Very gentle, yet earnest--refined and truthful. I like him very much. We count him among the valuable acquaintances made this year in England....

Mr. Kenyon has come back, and most other people are gone away; but he is worth more than most other people, so the advantage remains to the scale. I am delighted that you should have your dear friend Mr. Harness with you, and, for my own part, I do feel grateful to him for the good he has evidently done you. Oh, continue to be better! Don't overtire yourself--don't use improvidently the new strength. Remember the winter, and be wise; and let me see you, before it comes, looking as bright and well as I thought you last year. G.o.d bless you always.

Love your ever affectionate BA.

Robert's love.

_To Miss Mitford_

London: Friday, [October 6, 1852].

My dearest Miss Mitford,--I am quite in pain to have to write a farewell to you after all. As soon as Wilson had returned--and she stayed away much longer than last year--we found ourselves pushed to the edge of our time for remaining in England, and the acc.u.mulation of business to be done before we could go pressed on us. I am almost mad with the amount of things to be done, as it is; but I should have put the visit to you at the head of them, and swept all the rest on one side for a day, if it hadn't been for the detestable weather, and my horrible cough which combines with it. When Wilson came back she found me coughing in my old way, and it has been without intermission up to now, or rather waxing worse and worse. To have gone down to you and inflicted the noise of it on you would have simply made you nervous, while the risk to myself would have been very great indeed. Still, I have waited and waited, feeling it scarcely possible to write to you to say, 'I am not coming this year.' Ah, I am so very sorry and disappointed! I hoped against hope for a break in the weather, and an improvement in myself; now we must go, and there is no hope. For about a fortnight I have been a prisoner in the house. This climate won't let me live, there's the truth. So we are going on Monday. We go to Paris for a week or two, and then to Florence, and then to Rome, and then to Naples; but we shall be back next year, if G.o.d pleases, and then I shall seize an early summer day to run down straight to you and find you stronger, if G.o.d blesses me so far. Think of me and love me a little meanwhile. I shall do it by you. And do, _do_--since there is no time to hear from you in London--send a fragment of a note to Arabel for me, that I may have it in Paris before we set out on our long Italian journey. Let me have the comfort of knowing exactly how you are before we set out. As for me, I expect to be better on crossing the Channel. How people manage to live and enjoy life in this fog and cold is inexplicable to me. I understand the system of the American rapping spirits considerably better....

The Tennysons in their kindest words pressed us to be present at their child's christening, which took place last Tuesday, but I could not go; it was not possible. Robert went alone, therefore, and nursed the baby for ten or twelve minutes, to its obvious contentment, he flatters himself. It was christened Hallam Tennyson. Mr. Hallam was the G.o.dfather, and present in his vocation. That was touching, wasn't it? I hear that the Laureate talks vehemently against the French President and the French; but for the rest he is genial and good, and has been quite affectionate to us....

So I go without seeing you. Grieved I am. Love me to make amends.

Robert's love goes with me.

Your ever affectionate BA.

_To John Kenyon_

[Paris,] Hotel de la Ville-l'eveque, Rue Ville-l'eveque: Thursday, [November 1852].

My dearest Mr. Kenyon,--I cannot do better to-day than keep my promise to you about writing. We have done our business in Paris, but we linger from the inglorious reason that we, experienced travellers as we are, actually left a desk behind us in Bentinck Street, and must get it before we go farther. Meanwhile, it's rather dangerous to let the charm of Paris work--the honey will be clogging our feet very soon, and make it difficult to go away. What an attractive place this is, to be sure!

How the sun shines, how the blue sky spreads, how the life lives, and how kind the people are on all sides! If we were going anywhere but to Italy, and if I were a little less plainly mortal with this disagreeable cough of mine, I would gladly stay and see in the Empire with M.

Proudhon in the tail of it, and sit as a watcher over whatever things shall be this year and next spring at Paris. As it is, we have been very fortunate, as usual, in being present in a balcony on the boulevard, the best place possible for seeing the grandest spectacle in the world, the reception of Louis Napoleon last Sat.u.r.day. The day was brilliant, and the sweep of sunshine over the streaming mult.i.tude, and all the military and civil pomp, made it difficult to distinguish between the light and life. The sunshine seemed literally to push back the houses to make room for the crowd, and the wide boulevards looked wider than ever. If you had cursed the sentiment of the day ever so, you would have had eyes for its picturesqueness, I think, so I wish you had been there to see.

Louis Napoleon showed his usual tact and courage by riding on horseback quite alone, at least ten paces between himself and his nearest escort, which of course had a striking effect, taking the French on their weak side, and startling even Miss Cushman (who had been murmuring displeasure into my ear for an hour) into an exclamation of 'That's fine, I must say.' Little Wiedeman was in a state of ecstasy, and has been recounting ever since how he called '"Vive Napoleon!" _molto molto duro_,' meaning _very loud_ (his Italian is not very much more correct, you know, than his other languages), and how Napoleon took off his hat to him directly. I don't see the English papers, but I conclude you are all furious. You must make up your minds to it nevertheless--the Empire is certain, and the feeling of all but unanimity (whatever the motive) throughout France obvious enough. Smooth down the lion's mane of the 'Examiner,' and hint that roaring over a desert is a vain thing. As to Victor Hugo's book, the very enemies of the present state of affairs object to it that _he lies_ simply. There is not enough truth in it for an invective to rest on, still less for an argument. It's an inarticulate cry of a bird of prey, wild and strong irrational, and not a book at all. For my part I did wave my handkerchief for the new Emperor, but I bore the show very well, and said to myself, 'G.o.d bless the people!' as the man who, to my apprehension, represents the democracy, went past. A very intelligent Frenchman, caught in the crowd and forced to grope his way slowly along, told me that the expression of opinion everywhere was curiously the same, not a dissenting mutter did he hear. Strange, strange, all this! For the drama of history we must look to France, for startling situations, for the 'points' which thrill you to the bone....

May G.o.d bless you meantime! Take care of yourself for the sake of us all who love you, none indeed more affectionately and gratefully than

R.B. and E.B.B.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The Holy Scriptures.

[2] Miss Haworth was a friend of Mr. Browning from very early days, and was commemorated by him in 'Sordello' under the name of 'Eyebright' (see Mrs. Orr's _Life_, p. 86). Her acquaintance with Mrs. Browning began with this visit to London, and ripened into a warm friendship. One subject of interest which they had in common was mesmerism, with the attendant mysteries of spiritualism and Swedenborgianism; and references to these are frequent in Mrs. Browning's letters to her.

[3] So spelt in the earlier letters, but subsequently modified to 'Penini.'

[4] Miss Mitford had lately moved into her new home at Swallowfield, about three miles from the old cottage at Three Mile Cross, commemorated in 'Our Village.'

[5] The article was by M. Joseph Milsand, and led to the formation of the warm friendship between him and Mr. Browning which lasted until the death of the former in 1886.

[6] The May edict restricted the franchise to electors who had resided three years in the same district. In October Louis Napoleon proposed to repeal it, and the refusal of the a.s.sembly no doubt strengthened his hold on the democracy.

[7] The _coup d'etat_ took place in the early morning of December 2.

[8] The const.i.tution of 1848.