The Complete Works of Robert Browning: Poems, Plays, Letters & Biographies in One Edition. Robert Browning

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СКАЧАТЬ 'la femme qui parle'—Ah, that, is this all? So I am not George Sand's—she teaches me nothing—I look to her for nothing.

      I am ever yours, dearest friend. How I write to you—page on page! But Tuesday—who could wait till then! Shall I not hear from you?

      God bless you ever

      R.B.

      E.B.B. to R.B.

      Saturday.

       [Post-mark, August 16, 1845.]

      But what likeness is there between opposites; and what has 'M. l'Italien' to do with the said 'elderly German'? See how little! For to bring your case into point, somebody should have been playing on a Jew's harp for the whole of the orchestra; and the elderly German should have quoted something about 'Harp of Judah' to the Venetian behind him! And there, you would have proved your analogy!—Because you see, my dear friend, it was not the expression, but the thing expressed, I cried out against—the exaggeration in your mind. I am sorry when I write what you do not like—but I have instincts and impulses too strong for me when you say things which put me into such a miserably false position in respect to you—as for instance, when in this very last letter (oh, I must tell you!) you talk of my 'correcting your verses'! My correcting your verses!!!—Now is that a thing for you to say?—And do you really imagine that if I kept that happily imagined phrase in my thoughts, I should be able to tell you one word of my impressions from your poetry, ever, ever again? Do you not see at once what a disqualifying and paralysing phrase it must be, of simple necessity? So it is I who have reason to complain, ... it appears to me, ... and by no means you—and in your 'second consideration' you become aware of it, I do not at all doubt.

      As to 'Consuelo' I agree with nearly all that you say of it—though George Sand, we are to remember, is greater than 'Consuelo,' and not to be depreciated according to the defects of that book, nor classified as 'femme qui parle' ... she who is man and woman together, ... judging her by the standard of even that book in the nobler portions of it. For the inconsequency of much in the book, I admit it of course—and you will admit that it is the rarest of phenomena when men ... men of logic ... follow their own opinions into their obvious results—nobody, you know, ever thinks of doing such a thing: to pursue one's own inferences is to rush in where angels ... perhaps ... do not fear to tread, ... but where there will not be much other company. So the want of practical logic shall be a human fault rather than a womanly one, if you please: and you must please also to remember that 'Consuelo' is only 'half the orange'; and that when you complain of its not being a whole one, you overlook that hand which is holding to you the 'Comtesse de Rudolstadt' in three volumes! Not that I, who have read the whole, profess a full satisfaction about Albert and the rest—and Consuelo is made to be happy by a mere clap-trap at last: and Mme. Dudevant has her specialities,—in which, other women, I fancy, have neither part nor lot, ... even here!—Altogether, the book is a sort of rambling 'Odyssey,' a female 'Odyssey,' if you like, but full of beauty and nobleness, let the faults be where they may. And then, I like those long, long books, one can live away into ... leaving the world and above all oneself, quite at the end of the avenue of palms—quite out of sight and out of hearing!—Oh, I have felt something like that so often—so often! and you never felt it, and never will, I hope.

      But if Bulwer had written nothing but the 'Ernest Maltravers' books, you would think perhaps more highly of him. Do you not think it possible now? It is his most impotent struggling into poetry, which sets about proving a negative of genius on him—that, which the Athenæum praises as 'respectable attainment in various walks of literature'—! like the Athenæum, isn't it? and worthy praise, to be administered by professed judges of art? What is to be expected of the public, when the teachers of the public teach so?—

      When you come on Tuesday, do not forget the MS. if any is done—only don't let it be done so as to tire and hurt you—mind! And good-bye until Tuesday, from

      E.B.B.

      E.B.B. to R.B.

      Sunday.

       [Post-mark, August 18, 1845.]

      I am going to propose to you to give up Tuesday, and to take your choice of two or three other days, say Friday, or Saturday, or to-morrow ... Monday. Mr. Kenyon was here to-day and talked of leaving London on Friday, and of visiting me again on 'Tuesday' ... he said, ... but that is an uncertainty, and it may be Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday. So I thought (wrong or right) that out of the three remaining days you would not mind choosing one. And if you do choose the Monday, there will be no need to write—nor time indeed—; but if the Friday or Saturday, I shall hear from you, perhaps. Above all things remember, my dear friend, that I shall not expect you to-morrow, except as by a bare possibility. In great haste, signed and sealed this Sunday evening by

      E.B.B.

      R.B. to E.B.B.

      Monday, 7 P.M.

       [Post-mark, August 19, 1845.]

      I this moment get your note—having been out since the early morning—and I must write just to catch the post. You are pure kindness and considerateness, no thanks to you!—(since you will have it so—). I choose Friday, then,—but I shall hear from you before Thursday, I dare hope? I have all but passed your house to-day—with an Italian friend, from Rome, whom I must go about with a little on weariful sight seeing, so I shall earn Friday.

      Bless you

      R.B.

      E.B.B. to R.B.

      Tuesday.

       [Post-mark, August 20, 1845.]

      I fancied it was just so—as I did not hear and did not see you on Monday. Not that you were expected particularly—but that you would have written your own negative, it appeared to me, by some post in the day, if you had received my note in time. It happened well too, altogether, as you have a friend with you, though Mr. Kenyon does not come, and will not come, I dare say; for he spoke like a doubter at the moment; and as this Tuesday wears on, I am not likely to have any visitors on it after all, and may as well, if the rain quite ceases, go and spend my solitude on the park a little. Flush wags his tail at that proposition when I speak it loud out. And I am to write to you before Friday, and so, am writing, you see ... which I should not, should not have done if I had not been told; because it is not my turn to write, ... did you think it was?

      Not a word of Malta! except from Mr. Kenyon who talked homilies of it last Sunday and wanted to speak them to Papa—but it would not do in any way—now especially—and in a little time there will be a decision for or against; and I am afraid of both ... which is a happy state of preparation. Did I not tell you that early in the summer I did some translations for Miss Thomson's 'Classical Album,' from Bion and Theocritus, and Nonnus the author of that large (not great) poem in some forty books of the 'Dionysiaca' ... and the paraphrases from Apuleius? Well—I had a letter from her the other day, full of compunction and ejaculation, and declaring the fact that Mr. Burges had been correcting all the proofs of the poems; leaving out and emending generally, according to his own particular idea of the pattern in the mount—is it not amusing? I have been wicked enough to write in reply that it is happy for her and all readers ... sua si bona norint ... if during some half hour which otherwise might have been dedicated by Mr. Burges to patting out the lights of Sophocles and his peers, he was satisfied СКАЧАТЬ