Month: February 2018

Thursday Evening.

February 20, 1846.

And I offended you by praising your letters — or rather mine, if you please — as if I had not the right! Still, you shall not, shall not fancy that I meant to praise them in the way you seem to think — by calling them ‘graphic,’ ‘philosophic,’ — why, did I ever use such words? I agree with you that if I could play critic upon your letters, it would be an end! — but no, no  . . . I did not, for a moment. In what I said I went back to my first impressions — and they were vital letters, I said — which was the résumé of my thoughts upon the early ones you sent me, because I felt your letters to be you from the very first, and I began, from the beginning, to read every one several times over. Nobody, I felt, nobody of all these writers, did write as you did. Well! — and had I not a right to say that now at last, and was it not natural to say just that, when I was talking of other people’s letters and how it had grown almost impossible for me to read them; and do I deserve to be scolded? No indeed.

And if I had the misfortune to think now, when you say it is a fine day, that that is said in more music than it could be said in by another — where is the sin against you, I should like to ask. It is yourself who is the critic, I think, after all. But over all the brine, I hold my letters — just as Camoens did his poem. They are best to me — and they are best. I knew what they were, before I knew what you were — all of you. And I like to think that I never fancied anyone on a level with you, even in a letter.

What makes you take them to be so bad, I suppose, is just feeling in them how near we are. You say that! — not I.

Bad or good, you are better — yes, ‘better than the works and words’! — though it was very shameful of you to insinuate that I talked of fine speeches and passages and graphical and philosophical sentences, as if I had proposed a publication of ‘Elegant Extracts’ from your letters. See what blasphemy one falls into through a beginning of light speech! It is wiser to talk of St. Petersburg; for all Voltaire’s  . . . ‘ne disons pas de mal de Nicolas.’

Wiser — because you will not go. If you were going  . . . well! — but there is no danger — it would not do you good to go, I am so happy this time as to be able to think — and your ‘mission of humanity’ lies nearer — ‘strictly private and confidential’? but not in Harley Street — so if you go there, dearest, keep to the ‘one hour’ and do not suffer yourself to be tired and stunned in those hot rooms and made unwell again — it is plain that you cannot bear that sort of excitement. For Mr. Kenyon’s note,  . . . it was a great temptation to make a day of Friday — but I resist both for Monday’s sake and for yours, because it seems to me safer not to hurry you from one house to another till you are tired completely. I shall think of you so much the nearer for Mr. Kenyon’s note — which is something gained. In the meanwhile you are better, which is everything, or seems so. Ever dearest, do you remember what it is to me that you should be better, and keep from being worse again — I mean, of course, try to keep from being worse — be wise  . . . and do not stay long in those hot Harley Street rooms. Ah — now you will think that I am afraid of the unicorns! —

Through your being ill the other day I forgot, and afterwards went on forgetting, to speak of and to return the ballad — which is delightful; I have an unspeakable delight in those suggestive ballads, which seem to make you touch with the end of your finger the full warm life of other times  . . . so near they bring you, yet so suddenly all passes in them. Certainly there is a likeness to your Duchess — it is a curious crossing. And does it not strike you that a verse or two must be wanting in the ballad — there is a gap, I fancy.

Tell Mr. Kenyon (if he enquires) that you come here on Monday instead of Saturday — and if you can help it, do not mention Wednesday — it will be as well, not. You met Alfred at the door — he came up to me afterwards and observed that ‘at last he had seen you!’ ‘Virgilium tantum vidi!’

As to the thing which you try to say in the first page of this letter, and which you ‘stop’ yourself in saying  . . . I need not stop you in it . . ..

And now there is no time, if I am to sleep to-night. May God bless you, dearest, dearest.

I must be your own while He blesses me.

 

[Post-marks, Mis-sent to Mitcham. February 19 and 20, 1846.]

Best and kindest of all that ever were to be loved in dreams, and wondered at and loved out of them, you are indeed! I cannot make you feel how I felt that night when I knew that to save me an anxious thought you had come so far so late — it was almost too much to feel, and is too much to speak. So let it pass. You will never act so again, ever dearest — you shall not. If the post sins, why leave the sin to the post; and I will remember for the future, will be ready to remember, how postmen are fallible and how you live at the end of a lane — and not be uneasy about a silence if there should be one unaccounted for. For the Tuesday coming, I shall remember that too — who could forget it? . . . I put it in the niche of the wall, one golden lamp more of your giving, to throw light purely down to the end of my life — I do thank you. And the truth is, I should have been in a panic, had there been no letter that evening — I was frightened the day before, then reasoned the fears back and waited: and if there had been no letter after all — . But you are supernaturally good and kind. How can I ever ‘return’ as people say (as they might say in their ledgers)  . . . any of it all? How indeed can I who have not even a heart left of my own, to love you with?

I quite trust to your promise in respect to the medical advice, if walking and rest from work do not prevent at once the recurrence of those sensations — it was a promise, remember. And you will tell me the very truth of how you are — and you will try the music, and not be nervous, dearest. Would not riding be good for you — consider. And why should you be ‘alone’ when your sister is in the house? How I keep thinking of you all day — you cannot really be alone with so many thoughts  . . . such swarms of thoughts, if you could but see them, drones and bees together!

George came in from Westminster Hall after we parted yesterday and said that he had talked with the junior counsel of the wretched plaintiffs in the Ferrers case, and that the belief was in the mother being implicated, although not from the beginning. It was believed too that the miserable girl had herself taken step after step into the mire, involved herself gradually, the first guilt being an extravagance in personal expenses, which she lied and lied to account for in the face of her family. ‘Such a respectable family,’ said George, ‘the grandfather in court looking venerable, and everyone indignant upon being so disgraced by her!’ But for the respectability in the best sense, I do not quite see. That all those people should acquiesce in the indecency (according to every standard of English manners in any class of society) of thrusting the personal expenses of a member of their family on Lord Ferrers, she still bearing their name — and in those peculiar circumstances of her supposed position too — where is the respectability? And they are furious with her, which is not to be wondered at after all. Her counsel had an interview with her previous to the trial, to satisfy themselves of her good faith, and she was quite resolute and earnest, persisting in every statement. On the coming out of the anonymous letters, Fitzroy Kelly said to the juniors that if anyone could suggest a means of explanation, he would be eager to carry forward the case,  . . . but for him he saw no way of escaping from the fact of the guilt of their client. Not a voice could speak for her. So George was told. There is no ground for a prosecution for a conspiracy, he says, but she is open to the charge for forgery, of course, and to the dreadful consequences, though it is not considered at all likely that Lord Ferrers could wish to disturb her beyond the ruin she has brought on her own life.

Think of Miss Mitford’s growing quite cold about Mr. Chorley who has spent two days with her lately, and of her saying in a letter to me this morning that he is very much changed and grown to be ‘a presumptuous coxcomb.’ He has displeased her in some way — that is clear. What changes there are in the world.

Should I ever change to you, do you think,  . . . even if you came to ‘love me less’ — not that I meant to reproach you with that possibility. May God bless you, dear dearest. It is another miracle (beside the many) that I get nearer to the mountains yet still they seem more blue. Is not that strange?

Ever and wholly

Your Ba.

 

Thursday Morning.

February 19, 1846.

My sweetest, best, dearest Ba I do love you less, much less already, and adore you more, more by so much more as I see of you, think of you  – – I am yours just as much as those flowers; and you may pluck those flowers to pieces or put them in your breast; it is not because you so bless me now that you may not if you please one day  – – you will stop me here; but it is the truth and I live in it.

I am quite well; indeed, this morning, noticeably well, they tell me, and well I mean to keep if I can.

When I got home last evening I found this note  – – and I have accepted, that I might say I could also keep an engagement, if so minded, at Harley Street  – – thereby insinuating that other reasons may bring me into the neighbourhood than the reason  – – but I shall either not go there, or only for an hour at most. I also found a note headed ‘Strictly private and confidential’  – – so here it goes from my mouth to my heart  – – pleasantly proposing that I should start in a few days for St. Petersburg, as secretary to somebody going there on a ‘mission of humanity’  – – grazie tante!

Did you hear of my meeting someone at the door whom I take to have been one of your brothers?

One thing vexed me in your letter  – – I will tell you, the praise of my letters. Now, one merit they have  – – in language mystical  – – that of having no merit. If I caught myself trying to write finely, graphically &c. &c., nay, if I found myself conscious of having in my own opinion, so written, all would be over! yes, over! I should be respecting you inordinately, paying a proper tribute to your genius, summoning the necessary collectedness,  – – plenty of all that! But the feeling with which I write to you, not knowing that it is writing,  – – with you, face and mouth and hair and eyes opposite me, touching me, knowing that all is as I say, and helping out the imperfect phrases from your own intuition  – – that would be gone  – – and what in its place? ‘Let us eat and drink for to-morrow we write to Ambleside.’ No, no, love, nor can it ever be so, nor should it ever be so if  – – even if, preserving all that intimate relation, with the carelessness, still, somehow, was obtained with no effort in the world, graphic writing and philosophic and what you please  – – for I will be  – – would be, better than my works and words with an infinite stock beyond what I put into convenient circulation whether in fine speeches fit to remember, or fine passages to quote. For the rest, I had meant to tell you before now, that you often put me ‘in a maze’ when you particularize letters of mine  – – ‘such an one was kind’ &c. I know, sometimes I seem to give the matter up in despair, I take out paper and fall thinking on you, and bless you with my whole heart and then begin: ‘What a fine day this is?’ I distinctly remember having done that repeatedly  – – but the converse is not true by any means, that (when the expression may happen to fall more consentaneously to the mind’s motion) that less is felt, oh no! But the particular thought at the time has not been of the insufficiency of expression, as in the other instance.

Now I will leave off  – – to begin elsewhere  – – for I am always with you, beloved, best beloved! Now you will write? And walk much, and sleep more? Bless you, dearest  – – ever  – –

Your own,

 

6-1/2 Tuesday Evening.

My dearest, your note reaches me only now, with an excuse from the postman. The answer you expect, you shall have the only way possible. I must make up a parcel so as to be able to knock and give it. I shall be with you to-morrow, God willing  – – being quite well.

Bless you ever  – –

Monday Evening.

[In the same envelope with the preceding letter.]

Now forgive me, dearest of all, but I must teaze you just a little, and entreat you, if only for the love of me, to have medical advice and follow it without further delay. I like to have recourse to these medical people quite as little as you can — but I am persuaded that it is necessary — that it is at least wise, for you to do so now, and, you see, you were ‘not quite so well’ again last night! So will you, for me? Would I not, if you wished it? And on Wednesday, yes, on Wednesday, come — that is, if coming on Wednesday should really be not bad for you, for you must do what is right and kind, and I doubt whether the omnibus-driving and the noises of every sort betwixt us, should not keep you away for a little while — I trust you to do what is best for both of us.

And it is not best  . . . it is not good even, to talk about ‘dying for me’  . . . oh, I do beseech you never to use such words. You make me feel as if I were choking. Also it is nonsense — because nobody puts out a candle for the light’s sake.

Write one line to me to-morrow — literally so little — just to say how you are. I know by the writing here, what is. Let me have the one line by the eight o’clock post to-morrow, Tuesday.

For the rest it may be my ‘goodness’ or my badness, but the world seems to have sunk away beneath my feet and to have left only you to look to and hold by. Am I not to feel, then, any trembling of the hand? the least trembling?

May God bless both of us — which is a double blessing for me notwithstanding my badness.

I trust you about Wednesday — and if it should be wise and kind not to come quite so soon, we will take it out of other days and lose not one of them. And as for anything ‘horrible’ being likely to happen, do not think of that either, — there can be nothing horrible while you are not ill. So be well — try to be well — use the means and, well or ill, let me have the one line to-morrow  . . . Tuesday. I send you the foolish letter I wrote to-day in answer to your too long one — too long, was it not, as you felt? And I, the writer of the foolish one, am twice-foolish, and push poor ‘Luria’ out of sight, and refuse to finish my notes on him till the harm he has done shall have passed away. In my badness I bring false accusation, perhaps, against poor Luria.

So till Wednesday — or as you shall fix otherwise.

Your

Ba.

 

Monday Morning.

February 17, 1846.

Méchant comme quatre! you are, and not deserving to be let see the famous letter — is there any grammar in that concatenation, can you tell me, now that you are in an arch-critical humour? And remember (turning back to the subject) that personally she and I are strangers and that therefore what she writes for me is naturally scene-painting to be looked at from a distance, done with a masterly hand and most amiable intention, but quite a different thing of course from the intimate revelations of heart and mind which make a living thing of a letter. If she had sent such to me, I should not have sent it to Mr. Kenyon, but then, she would not have sent it to me in any case. What she has sent me might be a chapter in a book and has the life proper to itself, and I shall not let you try it by another standard, even if you wished, but you don’t — for I am not so bête as not to understand how the jest crosses the serious all the way you write. Well — and Mr. Kenyon wants the letter the second time, not for himself, but for Mr. Crabb Robinson who promises to let me have a new sonnet of Wordsworth’s in exchange for the loan, and whom I cannot refuse because he is an intimate friend of Miss Martineau’s and once allowed me to read a whole packet of letters from her to him. She does not object (as I have read under her hand) to her letters being shown about in MS., notwithstanding the anathema against all printers of the same (which completes the extravagance of the unreason, I think) and people are more anxious to see them from their presumed nearness to annihilation. I, for my part, value letters (to talk literature) as the most vital part of biography, and for any rational human being to put his foot on the traditions of his kind in this particular class, does seem to me as wonderful as possible. Who would put away one of those multitudinous volumes, even, which stereotype Voltaire’s wrinkles of wit — even Voltaire? I can read book after book of such reading — or could! And if her principle were carried out, there would be an end! Death would be deader from henceforth. Also it is a wrong selfish principle and unworthy of her whole life and profession, because we should all be ready to say that if the secrets of our daily lives and inner souls may instruct other surviving souls, let them be open to men hereafter, even as they are to God now. Dust to dust, and soul-secrets to humanity — there are natural heirs to all these things. Not that I do not intimately understand the shrinking back from the idea of publicity on any terms — not that I would not myself destroy papers of mine which were sacred to me for personal reasons — but then I never would call this natural weakness, virtue — nor would I, as a teacher of the public, announce it and attempt to justify it as an example to other minds and acts, I hope.

How hard you are on the mending of stockings and the rest of it! Why not agree with me and like that sort of homeliness and simplicity in combination with such large faculty as we must admit there? Lord Bacon did a great deal of trifling besides the stuffing of the fowl you mention — which I did not remember: and in fact, all the great work done in the world, is done just by the people who know how to trifle — do you not think so? When a man makes a principle of ‘never losing a moment,’ he is a lost man. Great men are eager to find an hour, and not to avoid losing a moment. ‘What are you doing’ said somebody once (as I heard the tradition) to the beautiful Lady Oxford as she sate in her open carriage on the race-ground — ‘Only a little algebra,’ said she. People who do a little algebra on the race-ground are not likely to do much of anything with ever so many hours for meditation. Why, you must agree with me in all this, so I shall not be sententious any longer. Mending stockings is not exactly the sort of pastime I should choose — who do things quite as trifling without the utility — and even your Seigneurie peradventure . . .. I stop there for fear of growing impertinent. The argumentum ad hominem is apt to bring down the argumentum ad baculum, it is as well to remember in time.

For Wordsworth  . . . you are right in a measure and by a standard — but I have heard such really desecrating things of him, of his selfishness, his love of money, his worldly cunning (rather than prudence) that I felt a relief and gladness in the new chronicle; — and you can understand how that was. Miss Mitford’s doctrine is that everything put into the poetry, is taken out of the man and lost utterly by him. Her general doctrine about poets, quite amounts to that — I do not say it too strongly. And knowing that such opinions are held by minds not feeble, it is very painful (as it would be indeed in any case) to see them apparently justified by royal poets like Wordsworth. Ah, but I know an answer — I see one in my mind!

So again for the letters. Now ought I not to know about letters, I who have had so many  . . . from chief minds too, as society goes in England and America? And your letters began by being first to my intellect, before they were first to my heart. All the letters in the world are not like yours  . . . and I would trust them for that verdict with any jury in Europe, if they were not so far too dear! Mr. Kenyon wanted to make me show him your letters — I did show him the first, and resisted gallantly afterwards, which made him say what vexed me at the moment,  . . . ‘oh — you let me see only women’s letters,’ — till I observed that it was a breach of confidence, except in some cases,  . . . and that I should complain very much, if anyone, man or woman, acted so by myself. But nobody in the world writes like you — not so vitally — and I have a right, if you please, to praise my letters, besides the reason of it which is as good.

Ah — you made me laugh about Mr. Chorley’s free speaking — and, without the personal knowledge, I can comprehend how it could be nothing very ferocious  . . . some ‘pardonnez moi, vous êtes un ange.’ The amusing part is that by the same post which brought me the Ambleside document, I heard from Miss Mitford ‘that it was an admirable thing of Chorley to have persisted in not allowing Harriet Martineau to quarrel with him’  . . . so that there are laurels on both sides, it appears.

And I am delighted to hear from you to-day just so, though I reproach you in turn just so  . . . because you were not ‘depressed’ in writing all this and this and this which has made me laugh — you were not, dearest — and you call yourself better, ‘much better,’ which means a very little perhaps, but is a golden word, let me take it as I may. May God bless you. Wednesday seems too near (now that this is Monday and you are better) to be our day  . . . perhaps it does, — and Thursday is close beside it at the worst.

Dearest I am your own

Ba.

 

Monday.
February 16, 1846.

My long letter is with you, dearest, to show how serious my illness was ‘while you wrote’: unless you find that letter too foolish, as I do on twice thinking  – – or at all events a most superfluous bestowment of handwork while the heart was elsewhere, and with you  – – never more so! Dear, dear Ba, your adorable goodness sinks into me till it nearly pains,  – – so exquisite and strange is the pleasure: so you care for me, and think of me, and write to me!  – – I shall never die for you, and if it could be so, what would death prove? But I can live on, your own as now,  – – utterly your own.

Dear Ba, do you suppose we differ on so plain a point as that of the superior wisdom, and generosity, too, of announcing such a change &c. at the eleventh hour? There can be no doubt of it,  – – and now, what of it to me?

But I am not going to write to-day  – – only this  – – that I am better, having not been quite so well last night  – – so I shut up books (that is, of my own) and mean to think about nothing but you, and you, and still you, for a whole week  – – so all will come right, I hope! May I take Wednesday? And do you say that,  – – hint at the possibility of that, because you have been reached by my own remorse at feeling that if I had kept my appointment last Saturday (but one)  – – Thursday would have been my day this past week, and this very Monday had been gained? Shall I not lose a day for ever unless I get Wednesday and Saturday?  – – yet  . . . care  . . . dearest  – – let nothing horrible happen.

If I do not hear to the contrary to-morrow  – – or on Wednesday early  – –

But write and bless me dearest, most dear Ba. God bless you ever  – –

Sunday Afternoon.

February 16, 1846.

Here is the letter again, dearest: I suppose it gives me the same pleasure, in reading, as you  – – and Mr. K. as me, and anybody else as him; if all the correspondence which was claimed again and burnt on some principle or other some years ago be at all of the nature of this sample, the measure seems questionable. Burn anybody’s real letters, well and good: they move and live  – – the thoughts, feelings, and expressions even,  – – in a self-imposed circle limiting the experience of two persons only  – – there is the standard, and to that the appeal  – – how should a third person know? His presence breaks the line, so to speak, and lets in a whole tract of country on the originally inclosed spot  – – so that its trees, which were from side to side there, seem left alone and wondering at their sudden unimportance in the broad land; while its ‘ferns such as I never saw before’ and which have been petted proportionably, look extravagant enough amid the new spread of good honest grey grass that is now the earth’s general wear. So that the significance is lost at once, and whole value of such letters  – – the cypher changed, the vowel-points removed: but how can that affect clever writing like this? What do you, to whom it is addressed, see in it more than the world that wants to see it and shan’t have it? One understands shutting an unprivileged eye to the ineffable mysteries of those ‘upper-rooms,’ now that the broom and dust pan, stocking-mending and gingerbread-making are invested with such unforeseen reverence  . . . but the carriage-sweep and quarry, together with Jane and our baskets, and a pleasant shadow of Wordsworth’s Sunday hat preceding his own rapid strides in the direction of Miss Fenwick’s house  – – surely, ‘men’s eyes were made to see, so let them gaze’ at all this! And so I, gazing with a clear conscience, am very glad to hear so much good of a very good person and so well told. She plainly sees the proper use and advantage of a country-life; and that knowledge gets to seem a high point of attainment doubtless by the side of the Wordsworth she speaks of  – – for mine he shall not be as long as I am able! Was ever such a ‘great‘ poet before? Put one trait with the other  – – the theory of rural innocence  – – alternation of ‘vulgar trifles’ with dissertating with style of ‘the utmost grandeur that even you can conceive’ (speak for yourself, Miss M.!)  – – and that amiable transition from two o’clock’s grief at the death of one’s brother to three o’clock’s happiness in the ‘extraordinary mesmeric discourse’ of one’s friend. All this, and the rest of the serene and happy inspired daily life which a piece of ‘unpunctuality’ can ruin, and to which the guardian ‘angel’ brings as crowning qualification the knack of poking the fire adroitly  – – of this  – – what can one say but that  – – no, best hold one’s tongue and read the ‘Lyrical Ballads’ with finger in ear. Did not Shelley say long ago ‘He had no more imagination than a pint-pot’  – – though in those days he used to walk about France and Flanders like a man? Now, he is ‘most comfortable in his worldly affairs’ and just this comes of it! He lives the best twenty years of his life after the way of his own heart  – – and when one presses in to see the result of the rare experiment  . . . what the one alchemist whom fortune has allowed to get all his coveted materials and set to work at last in earnest with fire and melting-pot  – – what he produces after all the talk of him and the like of him; why, you get pulvis et cinis  – – a man at the mercy of the tongs and shovel!

Well! Let us despair at nothing, but, wishing success to the newer aspirant, expect better things from Miss M. when the ‘knoll,’ and ‘paradise,’ and their facilities, operate properly; and that she will make a truer estimate of the importance and responsibilities of ‘authorship’ than she does at present, if I understand rightly the sense in which she describes her own life as it means to be; for in one sense it is all good and well, and quite natural that she should like ‘that sort of strenuous handwork’ better than book-making; like the play better than the labour, as we are apt to do. If she realises a very ordinary scheme of literary life, planned under the eye of God not ‘the public,’ and prosecuted under the constant sense of the night’s coming which ends it good or bad  – – then, she will be sure to ‘like’ the rest and sport  – – teaching her maids and sewing her gloves and making delicate visitors comfortable  – – so much more rational a resource is the worst of them than gin-and-water, for instance. But if, as I rather suspect, these latter are to figure as a virtual half duty of the whole Man  – – as of equal importance (on the ground of the innocence and utility of such occupations) with the book-making aforesaid  – – always supposing that to be of the right kind  – – then I respect Miss M. just as I should an Archbishop of Canterbury whose business was the teaching A.B.C. at an infant-school  – – he who might set on the Tens to instruct the Hundreds how to convince the Thousands of the propriety of doing that and many other things. Of course one will respect him only the more if when that matter is off his mind he relaxes at such a school instead of over a chess-board; as it will increase our love for Miss M. to find that making ‘my good Jane (from Tyne-mouth)’  – – ‘happier and  – – I hope  – – wiser’ is an amusement, or more, after the day’s progress towards the ‘novel for next year’ which is to inspire thousands, beyond computation, with the ardour of making innumerable other Janes and delicate relatives happier and wiser  – – who knows but as many as Burns did, and does, so make happier and wiser? Only, his quarry and after-solace was that ‘marble bowl often replenished with whiskey’ on which Dr. Curry discourses mournfully, ‘Oh, be wiser Thou!’  – – and remember it was only after Lord Bacon had written to an end his Book  – – given us for ever the Art of Inventing  – – whether steam-engine or improved dust-pan  – – that he took on himself to do a little exemplary ‘hand work’; got out on that cold St. Alban’s road to stuff a fowl with snow and so keep it fresh, and got into his bed and died of the cold in his hands (‘strenuous hand work’  – – ) before the snow had time to melt. He did not begin in his youth by saying  – – ‘I have a horror of merely writing ‘Novum Organums’ and shall give half my energies to the stuffing fowls’!

All this it is my amusement, of an indifferent kind, to put down solely on the pleasant assurance contained in that postscript, of the one way of never quarrelling with Miss M.  – – ‘by joining in her plan and practice of plain speaking’  – – could she but ‘get people to do it!’ Well, she gets me for a beginner: the funny thing would be to know what Chorley’s desperate utterance amounted to! Did you ever hear of the plain speaking of some of the continental lottery-projectors? An estate on the Rhine, for instance, is to be disposed of, and the holder of the lucky ticket will find himself suddenly owner of a mediæval castle with an unlimited number of dependencies  – – vineyards, woods, pastures, and so forth  – – all only waiting the new master’s arrival  – – while inside, all is swept and garnished (not to say, varnished)  – – the tables are spread, the wines on the board, all is ready for the reception but  . . . here ‘plain speaking’ becomes necessary  – – it prevents quarrels, and, could the projector get people to practise it as he does all would be well; so he, at least, will speak plainly  – – you hear what is provided but, he cannot, dares not withhold what is not  – – there is then, to speak plainly,  – – no night cap! You will have to bring your own night cap. The projector furnishes somewhat, as you hear, but not all  – – and now  – – the worst is heard,  – – will you quarrel with him? Will my own dear, dearest Ba please and help me here, and fancy Chorley’s concessions, and tributes, and recognitions, and then, at the very end, the ‘plain words,’ to counterbalance all, that have been to overlook and pardon?

Oh, my own Ba, hear my plain speech  – – and how this is not an attempt to frighten you out of your dear wish to ‘hear from me’  – – no, indeed  – – but a whim, a caprice,  – – and now it is out! over, done with! And now I am with you again  – – it is to you I shall write next. Bless you, ever  – – my beloved. I am much better, indeed  – – and mean to be well. And you! But I will write  – – this goes for nothing  – – or only this, that I am your very own  – –

 

Saturday Evening.

February 16, 1846.

Ever dearest, though you wanted to make me say one thing displeasing to you to-day, I had not courage to say two instead  . . . which I might have done indeed and indeed! For I am capable of thinking both thoughts of ‘next year,’ as you suggested them: — because while you are with me I see only you, and you being you, I cannot doubt a power of yours nor measure the deep loving nature which I feel to be so deep — so that there may be ever so many ‘mores,’ and no ‘more’ wonder of mine! — but afterwards, when the door is shut and there is no ‘more’ light nor speaking until Thursday, why then, that I do not see you but me, — then comes the reaction, — the natural lengthening of the shadows at sunset, — and then, the ‘less, less, less’ grows to seem as natural to my fate, as the ‘more’ seemed to your nature — I being I!

Sunday. — Well! — you are to try to forgive it all! And the truth, over and under all, is, that I scarcely ever do think of the future, scarcely ever further than to your next visit, and almost never beyond, except for your sake and in reference to that view of the question which I have vexed you with so often, in fearing for your happiness. Once it was a habit of mind with me to live altogether in what I called the future — but the tops of the trees that looked towards Troy were broken off in the great winds, and falling down into the river beneath, where now after all this time they grow green again, I let them float along the current gently and pleasantly. Can it be better I wonder! And if it becomes worse, can I help it? Also the future never seemed to belong to me so little — never! It might appear wonderful to most persons, it is startling even to myself sometimes, to observe how free from anxiety I am — from the sort of anxiety which might be well connected with my own position here, and which is personal to myself. That is all thrown behind — into the bushes — long ago it was, and I think I told you of it before. Agitation comes from indecision — and I was decided from the first hour when I admitted the possibility of your loving me really. Now, — as the Euphuists used to say, — I am ‘more thine than my own’  . . . it is a literal truth — and my future belongs to you; if it was mine, it was mine to give, and if it was mine to give, it was given, and if it was given  . . . beloved . . ..

So you see!

Then I will confess to you that all my life long I have had a rather strange sympathy and dyspathy — the sympathy having concerned the genus jilt (as vulgarly called) male and female — and the dyspathy — the whole class of heroically virtuous persons who make sacrifices of what they call ‘love’ to what they call ‘duty.’ There are exceptional cases of course, but, for the most part, I listen incredulously or else with a little contempt to those latter proofs of strength — or weakness, as it may be: — people are not usually praised for giving up their religion, for unsaying their oaths, for desecrating their ‘holy things’ — while believing them still to be religious and sacramental! On the other side I have always and shall always understand how it is possible for the most earnest and faithful of men and even of women perhaps, to err in the convictions of the heart as well as of the mind, to profess an affection which is an illusion, and to recant and retreat loyally at the eleventh hour, on becoming aware of the truth which is in them. Such men are the truest of men, and the most courageous for the truth’s sake, and instead of blaming them I hold them in honour, for me, and always did and shall.

And while I write, you are ‘very ill’ — very ill! — how it looks, written down so! When you were gone yesterday and my thoughts had tossed about restlessly for ever so long, I was wise enough to ask Wilson how she thought you were looking,  . . . and she ‘did not know’  . . . she ‘had not observed’  . . . ‘only certainly Mr. Browning ran up-stairs instead of walking as he did the time before.’

Now promise me dearest, dearest — not to trifle with your health. Not to neglect yourself  . . . not to tire yourself  . . . and besides to take the advice of your medical friend as to diet and general treatment: — because there must be a wrong and a right in everything, and the right is very important under your circumstances  . . . if you have a tendency to illness. It may be right for you to have wine for instance. Did you ever try the putting your feet into hot water at night, to prevent the recurrence of the morning headache — for the affection of the head comes on early in the morning, does it not? just as if the sleeping did you harm. Now I have heard of such a remedy doing good — and could it increase the evil? — mustard mixed with the water, remember. Everything approaching to congestion is full of fear — I tremble to think of it — and I bring no remedy by this teazing neither! But you will not be ‘wicked’ nor ‘unkind,’ nor provoke the evil consciously — you will keep quiet and forswear the going out at nights, the excitement and noise of parties, and the worse excitement of composition — you promise. If you knew how I keep thinking of you, and at intervals grow so frightened! Think you, that you are three times as much to me as I can be to you at best and greatest, — because you are more than three times the larger planet — and because too, you have known other sources of light and happiness  . . . but I need not say this — and I shall hear on Monday, and may trust to you every day  . . . may I not? Yet I would trust my soul to you sooner than your own health.

May God bless you, dear, dearest. If the first part of the ‘Soul’s Tragedy’ should be written out, I can read that perhaps, without drawing you in to think of the second. Still it may be safer to keep off altogether for the present — and let it be as you incline. I do not speak of ‘Luria.’

Your own

BA.

If it were not for Mr. Kenyon, I should say, almost, Wednesday, instead of Thursday — I want to see you so much, and to see for myself about the looks and spirits, only it would not do if he found you here on Wednesday. Let him come to-morrow or on Tuesday, and Wednesday will be safe — shall we consider? what do you think?

 

Friday Morning.

February 13, 1846.

Two nights ago I read the ‘Soul’s Tragedy’ once more, and though there were not a few points which still struck me as successful in design and execution, yet on the whole I came to a decided opinion, that it will be better to postpone the publication of it for the present. It is not a good ending, an auspicious wind-up of this series; subject-matter and style are alike unpopular even for the literary grex that stands aloof from the purer plebs, and uses that privilege to display and parade an ignorance which the other is altogether unconscious of  – – so that, if ‘Luria’ is clearish, the ‘Tragedy’ would be an unnecessary troubling the waters. Whereas, if I printed it first in order, my readers, according to custom, would make the (comparatively) little they did not see into, a full excuse for shutting their eyes at the rest, and we may as well part friends, so as not to meet enemies. But, at bottom, I believe the proper objection is to the immediate, first effect of the whole  – – its moral effect  – – which is dependent on the contrary supposition of its being really understood, in the main drift of it. Yet I don’t know; for I wrote it with the intention of producing the best of all effects  – – perhaps the truth is, that I am tired, rather, and desirous of getting done, and ‘Luria’ will answer my purpose so far. Will not the best way be to reserve this unlucky play and in the event of a second edition  – – as Moxon seems to think such an apparition possible  – – might not this be quietly inserted?  – – in its place, too, for it was written two or three years ago. I have lost, of late, interest in dramatic writing, as you know, and, perhaps, occasion. And, dearest, I mean to take your advice and be quiet awhile and let my mind get used to its new medium of sight; seeing all things, as it does, through you: and then, let all I have done be the prelude and the real work begin. I felt it would be so before, and told you at the very beginning  – – do you remember? And you spoke of Io ‘in the proem.’ How much more should follow now!

And if nothing follows, I have you.

I shall see you to-morrow and be happy. To-day  – – is it the weather or what?  – – something depresses me a little  – – to-morrow brings the remedy for it all. I don’t know why I mention such a matter; except that I tell you everything without a notion of after-consequence; and because your dearest, dearest presence seems under any circumstances as if created just to help me there; if my spirits rise they fly to you; if they fall, they hold by you and cease falling  – – as now. Bless you, Ba  – – my own best blessing that you are! But a few hours and I am with you, beloved!

Your own