GE to Florence Cross, Milan, 25 May 1880
Title
GE to Florence Cross, Milan, 25 May 1880
Title
GE to Florence Cross, Milan, 25 May 1880
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Florence Cross
Date(s)
- 1880-05-25
Place
Milan
Letter Content
GE to Florence Cross, Milan, 25 May 1880
MS: Yale. Extracts published: Cross, III, 396-398.
Milan, May 25. 80.
Dearest Florence
Our life since we wrote to you has been a chapter of delights, worthy of paragraphs with sensational headings of American enthusiasm -- Grenoble, insurpassable position! Grande Chartreuse, inexpressible sublimity and beauty! Chamb'e9ry, paradisiacal walk to Les Charmettes! 423 Roses gathered in Jean Jacques' garden! Modane, illustrative of Dante's Purgatorio! Souls in penance eating an infant chicken, the size of a lark! Mont Cenis tunnel and emergence into Italian sunshine! Turin, and an apartment of palatial splendour with blue satin draperies and marble baths! Milan, H'f4tel Grande Bretagne, comfortable apartment, delicious privacy, very good eating, and great minds condescending to relax themselves!
We got here a little after one o'clock yesterday, and of course our first walk after we had washed and fed was to the Post, where we found your delightful budget and other letters, which we took to a caf'e9 in a grand Galleria and read at our ease to the accompaniment of tea. First, about Redcliffe Gardens. We are both delighted with this position for you, and much prefer it to Kent Terrace. Henry's masterly plan puts us in perfect possession of your relative whereabouts, and Cremorne is now a truly moral scene where you can go and meditate on the transitory nature of earthly grandeur. {I have just made three blots, which we will call "purple patches"}.
Two of my letters yesterday touched me very gratefully. One was from "Brother Jimmy" 424 -- the prettiest letter possible, though there was another to Johnnie written, we suppose, immediately after seeing the announcement of our marriage, when he (Jimmy) was naturally a little hurt at having had no word of it beforehand, and expressed this just pique by signing himself [Yours truly]!
The other letter that moved me was one from my own Brother. Then Johnnie had a graceful letter of congratulation from Mr. Henry
James, 425 who is still at Florence, and Mr. Benson's business letters were altogether propitious. An epistle from Brett who begs me to [except] my servants' duty closed the satisfactory series. I think you did not send that letter of Mr. Edmund Gurney's which you mention. (Yes, you did, unless he wrote a second.) I am fond of seeing the letters which put my friends in an amiable light for my imagination and now I have had that charming letter from my new Brother in America I feel that my family initiation is complete. No woman was ever more sweetly received by brothers and sisters than I have been, and it is a happy new longing in my life that I may return into their bosoms some of the gladness they have poured into mine. Pens, 426 for example, which a dear nymph of a sister thought to send me of the best -- but behold these strokes on this furrowed paper, in contrast with the wiry spider-crawlings on the preceding pages. Johnnie has taken cold and, like me, is a little hoarse this morning. Otherwise he is altogether bright though feelingly reminded that he is thinner, by putting on last summer's clothes. He should not have sent you word that I was ailing. It was but a transient headache that I was suffering from, and since it went away I have been uninterruptedly well, and feel quite strong with all sorts of strength except strong-mindedness.
We are going to hear the music in the Duomo at eleven, and after that we intend to pay our first visit to the Brera gallery. It is our present plan to stay here for some days, and we enjoy the thought of a little stationary life, such as we have not had since we left Paris. What can I say to give your affectionate hearts a sense of our happiness? Only that we seem to love each other better than we did when we set out, which seemed then hardly possible, and we often talk of our Sisters, oftener think of them. You are our children, you know. I want to hear that Berthe and the Baby are going on well, and that Lisa begins to think her sister's person less in need of apology and a possible bonnet. Johnnie wrote to Emily the other day, so I hope we shall have direct news from her by and by.
Pity your Sister's feminine sorrows. I ought to have brought a third bonnet, for the dust makes one look like a strolling mendicant as to everything black in one's costume. But I must get a dust veil.
Johnnie comes to say that I must get ready to go to the Duomo. Packets full of love from
Sister.
MS: Yale. Extracts published: Cross, III, 396-398.
Milan, May 25. 80.
Dearest Florence
Our life since we wrote to you has been a chapter of delights, worthy of paragraphs with sensational headings of American enthusiasm -- Grenoble, insurpassable position! Grande Chartreuse, inexpressible sublimity and beauty! Chamb'e9ry, paradisiacal walk to Les Charmettes! 423 Roses gathered in Jean Jacques' garden! Modane, illustrative of Dante's Purgatorio! Souls in penance eating an infant chicken, the size of a lark! Mont Cenis tunnel and emergence into Italian sunshine! Turin, and an apartment of palatial splendour with blue satin draperies and marble baths! Milan, H'f4tel Grande Bretagne, comfortable apartment, delicious privacy, very good eating, and great minds condescending to relax themselves!
We got here a little after one o'clock yesterday, and of course our first walk after we had washed and fed was to the Post, where we found your delightful budget and other letters, which we took to a caf'e9 in a grand Galleria and read at our ease to the accompaniment of tea. First, about Redcliffe Gardens. We are both delighted with this position for you, and much prefer it to Kent Terrace. Henry's masterly plan puts us in perfect possession of your relative whereabouts, and Cremorne is now a truly moral scene where you can go and meditate on the transitory nature of earthly grandeur. {I have just made three blots, which we will call "purple patches"}.
Two of my letters yesterday touched me very gratefully. One was from "Brother Jimmy" 424 -- the prettiest letter possible, though there was another to Johnnie written, we suppose, immediately after seeing the announcement of our marriage, when he (Jimmy) was naturally a little hurt at having had no word of it beforehand, and expressed this just pique by signing himself [Yours truly]!
The other letter that moved me was one from my own Brother. Then Johnnie had a graceful letter of congratulation from Mr. Henry
James, 425 who is still at Florence, and Mr. Benson's business letters were altogether propitious. An epistle from Brett who begs me to [except] my servants' duty closed the satisfactory series. I think you did not send that letter of Mr. Edmund Gurney's which you mention. (Yes, you did, unless he wrote a second.) I am fond of seeing the letters which put my friends in an amiable light for my imagination and now I have had that charming letter from my new Brother in America I feel that my family initiation is complete. No woman was ever more sweetly received by brothers and sisters than I have been, and it is a happy new longing in my life that I may return into their bosoms some of the gladness they have poured into mine. Pens, 426 for example, which a dear nymph of a sister thought to send me of the best -- but behold these strokes on this furrowed paper, in contrast with the wiry spider-crawlings on the preceding pages. Johnnie has taken cold and, like me, is a little hoarse this morning. Otherwise he is altogether bright though feelingly reminded that he is thinner, by putting on last summer's clothes. He should not have sent you word that I was ailing. It was but a transient headache that I was suffering from, and since it went away I have been uninterruptedly well, and feel quite strong with all sorts of strength except strong-mindedness.
We are going to hear the music in the Duomo at eleven, and after that we intend to pay our first visit to the Brera gallery. It is our present plan to stay here for some days, and we enjoy the thought of a little stationary life, such as we have not had since we left Paris. What can I say to give your affectionate hearts a sense of our happiness? Only that we seem to love each other better than we did when we set out, which seemed then hardly possible, and we often talk of our Sisters, oftener think of them. You are our children, you know. I want to hear that Berthe and the Baby are going on well, and that Lisa begins to think her sister's person less in need of apology and a possible bonnet. Johnnie wrote to Emily the other day, so I hope we shall have direct news from her by and by.
Pity your Sister's feminine sorrows. I ought to have brought a third bonnet, for the dust makes one look like a strolling mendicant as to everything black in one's costume. But I must get a dust veil.
Johnnie comes to say that I must get ready to go to the Duomo. Packets full of love from
Sister.
Signature
Sister.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Florence Cross, Milan, 25 May 1880, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/92328