Now briefly,—I am unwell and entirely irritated with this sad 'Luria'—I thought it a failure at first, I find it infinitely worse than I thought—it is a pure exercise of cleverness, even where most successful; clever attempted reproduction of what was conceived by another faculty, and foolishly let pass away. If I go on, even hurry the more to get on, with the printing,—it is to throw out and away from me the irritating obstruction once and forever. I have corrected it, cut it down, and it may stand and pledge me to doing better hereafter. I say, too, in excuse to myself, unlike the woman at her spinning-wheel, 'He thought of his flax on the whole far more than of his singing'—more of his life's sustainment, of dear, dear Ba he hates writing to, than of these wooden figures—no wonder all is as it is?
Here is a pure piece of the old Chorley leaven for you, just as it reappears ever and anon and throws one back on the mistrust all but abandoned! Chorley knows I have not seen that Powell for nearly fifteen months—that I never heard of the book till it reached me in a blank cover—that I never contributed a line or word to it directly or indirectly—and I should think he also knows that all the sham learning, notes &c., all that saves the book from the deepest deep of contempt, was contributed by Heraud (a regular critic in the 'Athenæum'), who received his pay for the same: he knows I never spoke in my life to 'Jones or Stephens'—that there is no 'coterie' of which I can, by any extension of the word, form a part—that I am in this case at the mercy of a wretched creature who to get into my favour again (to speak the plain truth) put in the gross, disgusting flattery in the notes—yet Chorley, knowing this, none so well, and what the writer's end is—(to have it supposed I, and the others named—Talfourd, for instance—are his friends and helpers)—he condescends to further it by such a notice, written with that observable and characteristic duplicity, that to poor gross stupid Powell it shall look like an admiring 'Oh, fie—so clever but so wicked'!—a kind of D'Orsay's praise—while to the rest of his readers, a few depreciatory epithets—slight sneers convey his real sentiments, he trusts! And this he does, just because Powell buys an article of him once a quarter and would expect notice. I think I hear Chorley—'You know, I cannot praise such a book—it is too bad'—as if, as if—oh, it makes one sicker than having written 'Luria,' there's one comfort! I shall call on Chorley and ask for his account of the matter. Meantime nobody will read his foolish notice without believing as he and Powell desire! Bless you, my own Ba—to-morrow makes amends to R.B.
E.B.B. to R.B.
Tuesday.
[Post-mark, March 24, 1846.]
How ungrateful I was to your flowers yesterday, never looking at them nor praising them till they were put away, and yourself gone away—and that was your fault, be it remembered, because you began to tell me of the good news from Moxon's, and, in the joy of it, I missed the flowers ... for the nonce, you know. Afterward they had their due, and all the more that you were not there. My first business when you are out of the room and the house, and the street perhaps, is to arrange the flowers and to gather out of them all the thoughts you leave between the leaves and at the end of the stalks. And shall I tell you what happened, not yesterday, but the Thursday before? no, it was the Friday morning, when I found, or rather Wilson found and held up from my chair, a bunch of dead blue violets. Quite dead they seemed! You had dropped them and I had sate on them, and where we murdered them they had lain, poor things, all the night through. And Wilson thought it the vainest of labours when she saw me set about reviving them, cutting the stalks afresh, and dipping them head and ears into water—but then she did not know how you, and I, and ours, live under a miraculous dispensation, and could only simply be astonished when they took to blowing again as if they never had wanted the dew of the garden, ... yes, and when at last they outlived all the prosperity of the contemporary white violets which flourished in water from the beginning, and were free from the disadvantage of having been sate upon. Now you shall thank me for this letter, it is at once so amusing and instructive. After all, too, it teaches you what the great events of my life are, not that the resuscitation of your violets would not really be a great event to me, even if I led the life of a pirate, between fire and sea, otherwise. But take you away ... out of my life!—and what remains? The only greenness I used to have (before you brought your flowers) was as the grass growing in deserted streets, ... which brings a proof, in every increase, of the extending desolation.
Dearest, I persist in thinking that you ought not to be too disdainful to explain your meaning in the Pomegranates. Surely you might say in a word or two that, your title having been doubted about (to your surprise, you might say!), you refer the doubters to the Jewish priest's robe, and the Rabbinical gloss ... for I suppose it is a gloss on the robe ... do you not think so? Consider that Mr. Kenyon and I may fairly represent the average intelligence of your readers,—and that he was altogether in the clouds as to your meaning ... had not the most distant notion of it,—while I, taking hold of the priest's garment, missed the Rabbins and the distinctive significance, as completely as he did. Then for Vasari, it is not the handbook of the whole world, however it may be Mrs. Jameson's. Now why should you be too proud to teach such persons as only desire to be taught? I persist—I shall teaze you.
This morning my brothers have been saying ... 'Ah you had Mr. Browning with you yesterday, I see by the flowers,' ... just as if they said 'I see queen Mab has been with you.' Then Stormie took the opportunity of swearing to me by all his gods that your name was mentioned lately in the House of Commons—is that true? or untrue? He forgot to tell me at the time, he says,—and you were named with others and in relation to copyright matters. Is it true?
Mr. Hornblower Gill is the author of a Hymn to Passion week, and wrote to me as the 'glorifier of pain!' to remind me that the best glory of a soul is shown in the joy of it, and that all chief poets except Dante have seen, felt, and written it so. Thus and therefore was matured his purpose of writing an 'ode to joy,' as I told you. The man seems to have very good thoughts, ... but he writes like a colder Cowley still ... no impulse, no heat for fusing ... no inspiration, in fact. Though I have scarcely done more than glance at his 'Passion week,' and have little right to give an opinion.
If you have killed Luria as you helped to kill my violets, what shall I say, do you fancy? Well—we shall see! Do not kill yourself, beloved, in any case! The ιοστεφανοι Μουσαι had better die themselves first! Ah—what am I writing? What nonsense? I mean, in deep earnest, the deepest, that you should take care and exercise, and not be vexed for Luria's sake—Luria will have his triumph presently! May God bless you—prays your own
Ba.