The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett Part 35

_R.B. to E.B.B._

[Post-mark, November 28, 1845.][1]

Take it, dearest; what I am forced to think you mean--and take _no more_ with it--for I gave all to give long ago--I am all yours--and now, _mine_; give me _mine_ to be happy with!

You will have received my note of yesterday.--I am glad you are satisfied with Miss Bayley, whom I, too, thank ... that is, sympathize with, ... (not wonder at, though)--for her intention.... Well, may it all be for best--here or at Pisa, you are my blessing and life.

... How all considerate you are, _you_ that are the kind, kind one!

The post arrangement I will remember--to-day, for instance, will this reach you at 8? I shall be with you then, in thought. 'Forget you!'--_What_ does that mean, dearest?

And I might have stayed longer and you let me go. What does _that_ mean, also tell me? Why, I make up my mind to go, always, like a man, and praise myself as I get through it--as when one plunges into the cold water--ONLY ... ah, _that_ too is no more a merit than any other thing I do ... there is the reward, the last and best! Or is it the 'lure'?

I would not be ashamed of my soul if it might be shown you,--it is wholly grateful, conscious of you.

But another time, do not let me wrong myself _so_! Say, 'one minute more.'

On Monday?--I am _much_ better--and, having got free from an engagement for Sat.u.r.day, shall stay quietly here and think the post never intending to come--for you will not let me wait longer?

Shall I dare write down a grievance of my heart, and not offend you?

Yes, trusting in the right of my love--you tell me, sweet, here in the letter, 'I do not look so well'--and sometimes, I 'look better' ...

_how do you know_? When I first saw you--_I saw your eyes_--since then, _you_, it should appear, see mine--but I only _know_ yours are there, and have to use that memory as if one carried dried flowers about when fairly inside the garden-enclosure. And while I resolve, and hesitate, and resolve again to complain of this--(kissing your foot ... not boldly complaining, nor rudely)--while I have this on my mind, on my heart, ever since that May morning ... can it be?

--No, nothing _can be_ wrong now--you will never call me 'kind' again, in that sense, you promise! Nor think 'bitterly' of my kindness, that word!

Shall I _see_ you on Monday?

G.o.d bless you my dearest--I see her now--and _here_ and _now_ the eyes open, wide _enough_, and I will kiss them--_how_ gratefully!

Your own

R.B.

[Footnote 1: Envelope endorsed by E.B.B. 'hair.']

_E.B.B. to R.B._

Friday.

[Post-mark, December 1, 1845.]

It comes at eight o'clock--the post says eight ... _I_ say nearer half past eight ... it _comes_--and I thank you, thank you, as I can. Do you remember the purple lock of a king on which hung the fate of a city? _I_ do! And I need not in conscience--because this one here did not come to me by treason--'ego et rex meus,' on the contrary, do fairly give and take.

I meant at first only to send you what is in the ring ... which, by the way, will not fit you I know--(not certainly in the finger which it was meant for ...) as it would not Napoleon before you--but can easily be altered to the right size.... I meant at first to send you only what was in the ring: but your fas.h.i.+on is best so you shall have it both ways. Now don't say a word on Monday ... nor at all. As for the ring, recollect that I am forced to feel blindfold into the outer world, and take what is nearest ... by chance, not choice ... or it might have been better--a little better--perhaps. The _best_ of it is that it's the colour of your blue flowers. Now you will not say a word--I trust to you.

It is enough that you should have said these others, I think. Now _is_ it just of you? isn't it hard upon me? And if the charge is true, whose fault is it, pray? I have been ashamed and vexed with myself fifty times for being so like a little girl, ... for seeming to have 'affectations'; and all in vain: 'it was stronger than I,' as the French say. And for _you_ to complain! As if Haroun Alraschid after cutting off a head, should complain of the want of an obeisance!--Well!--I smile notwithstanding. n.o.body can help smiling--both for my foolishness which is great, I confess, though somewhat exaggerated in your statement--(because if it was quite as bad as you say, you know, I never should have _seen you_ ... and _I have_!) and also for yours ... because you take such a very preposterously wrong way for overcoming anybody's shyness. Do you know, I have laughed ... really laughed at your letter. No--it has not been so bad. I have seen you at every visit, as well as I could with both eyes wide open--only that by a supernatural influence they won't stay open with _you_ as they are used to do with other people ... so now I tell you. And for the rest I promise nothing at all--as how can I, when it is quite beyond my control--and you have not improved my capabilities ... do you think you have? Why what nonsense we have come to--we, who ought to be 'talking Greek!' said Mr. Kenyon.

Yes--he came and talked of you, and told me how you had been speaking of ... me; and I have been thinking how I should have been proud of it a year ago, and how I could half scold you for it now. Ah yes--and Mr.

Kenyon told me that you had spoken exaggerations--such exaggerations!--Now should there not be some scolding ... some?

But how did you expect Mr. Kenyon to 'wonder' at _you_, or be 'vexed'

with _you_? That would have been strange surely. You are and always have been a chief favourite in that quarter ... appreciated, praised, loved, I think.

While I write, a letter from America is put into my hands, and having read it through with shame and confusion of face ... not able to help a smile though notwithstanding, ... I send it to you to show how you have made me behave!--to say nothing of my other offences to the kind people at Boston--and to a stray gentleman in Philadelphia who is to perform a pilgrimage next year, he says, ... to visit the Holy Land and your E.B.B. I was naughty enough to take _that_ letter to be a circular ... for the address of various 'Europ_a_ians.' In any case ... just see how I have behaved! and if it has not been worse than ...

not opening one's eyes!--Judge. Really and gravely I am ashamed--I mean as to Mr. Mathews, who has been an earnest, kind friend to me--and I do mean to behave better. I say _that_ to prevent your scolding, you know. And think of Mr. Poe, with that great Roman justice of his (if not rather American!), dedicating a book to one and abusing one in the preface of the same. He wrote a review of me in just that spirit--the two extremes of laudation and reprehension, folded in on one another. You would have thought that it had been written by a friend and foe, each stark mad with love and hate, and writing the alternate paragraphs--a most curious production indeed.

And here I shall end. I have been waiting ... waiting for what does not come ... the ring ... sent to have the hair put in; but it won't come (now) until too late for the post, and you must hear from me before Monday ... you ought to have heard to-day. It has not been my fault--I have waited. Oh these people--who won't remember that it is possible to be out of patience! So I send you my letter now ... and what is in the paper now ... and the rest, you shall have after Monday. And you _will not say a word_ ... not then ... not at all!--I trust you. And may G.o.d bless you.

If ever you care less for me--I do not say it in distrust of you ... I trust you wholly--but you are a man, and free to care less, ... and if ever you _do_ ... why in that case you will destroy, burn, ... do all but send back ... enough is said for you to understand.

May G.o.d bless you. You are _best_ to me--best ... as I see ... in the world--and so, dearest aright to

Your

E.B.B.

Finished on Sat.u.r.day evening. Oh--this thread of silk--And to post!!

After all you must wait till Tuesday. I have no silk within reach and shall miss the post. Do forgive me.

_E.B.B. to R.B._

Sat.u.r.day Evening.

This is the mere postscript to the letter I have just sent away. By a few minutes too late, comes what I have all day been waiting for, ...

and besides (now it is just too late!) now I may have a skein of silk if I please, to make that knot with, ... for want of which, two locks meant for you, have been devoted to the infernal G.o.ds already ...

fallen into a tangle and thrown into the fire ... and all the hair of my head might have followed, for I was losing my patience and temper fast, ... and the post to boot. So wisely I shut my letter, (after unwisely having driven everything to the last moment!)--and now I have silk to tie fast with ... to tie a 'nodus' ... 'dignus' of the celestial interposition--and a new packet shall be ready to go to you directly.

At last I remember to tell you that the first letter you had from me this week, was forgotten, (not by _me_) forgotten, and detained, so, from the post--a piece of carelessness which Wilson came to confess to me too frankly for me to grumble as I should have done otherwise.

For the staying longer, I did not mean to say you were wrong not to stay. In the first place you were keeping your father 'in a maze,' as you said yourself--and then, even without that, I never know what o'clock it is ... never. Mr. Kenyon tells me that I must live in a dream--which I do--time goes ... seeming to go round rather than go forward. The watch I have, broke its spring two years ago, and there I leave it in the drawer--and the clocks all round strike out of hearing, or at best, when the wind brings the sound, one upon another in a confusion. So you know more of time than I do or can.

Till Monday then! I send the 'Ricordi' to take care of the rest ... of mine. It is a touching story--and there is an impracticable n.o.bleness from end to end in the spirit of it. How _slow_ (to the ear and mind) that Italian rhetoric is! a language for dreamers and declaimers. Yet Dante made it for action, and Machiavelli's prose can walk and strike as well as float and faint.

The ring is smaller than I feared at first, and may perhaps--

Now you will not say a word. My excuse is that you had nothing to remember me by, while I had this and this and this and this ... how much too much!

If I could be too much

Your

E.B.B.