GE to Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon, London, 4 December 1863
Title
GE to Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon, London, 4 December 1863
Title
GE to Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon, London, 4 December 1863
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon
Date(s)
- 1863-12-04
Place
London
Letter Content
GE to Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon, London, 4 December 1863
MS: Mr. Philip Leigh-Smith. Extracts published: Cross, II, 370-372.
The Priory, 21 North Bank | December 4. 1863.
Dearest Barbara
Your good news about your double self rejoiced us the other night and your letter was duly sent on to Lea Hurst. 209 Miss Hennell is staying there and writes me word that Miss Remond is a fellow guest lecturing (par parenth'e8se) on Slavery. I am rather ashamed to hear of anyone trying to be useful just now, for I am doing nothing but indulge myself -- enjoying being petted very much, enjoying great books, enjoying our new pretty quiet home and the study of Beethoven's Sonatas for piano and violin with the mild-faced old Jansa -- and not being at all unhappy, as you imagined me.
We had a house-warming celebration of Charlie's birthday on the 24th: it was a birthday extraordinary introducing a new era for him, for he became twenty-one! Our youngest lad Bertie seems to have had his wits a little sharpened by change of circumstances and writes as if he liked his Scotch farming and Scotch domesticity. Of Thornie we cannot well hear until the end of January or beginning of February, so that our parental minds are for the moment at ease.
The "Life of Goethe" is about to appear in one handsome volume, and George is correcting the proofs of the "Aristotle." The correction is a slow business, because the proofs are read by several people: our friend Mr. Clark 210 of Cambridge reads them to make us easy about the Greek accents, and Huxley and Tyndal read some of them for the sake of scientific criticism. Meanwhile George sits in a comfortable room delightfully free from irritation of organs and street cries, making further studies for his History of Science, and I sit in another room taking deep draughts of reading -- Politique positive, Euripides, Latin Christianity and so forth, and remaining in glorious ignorance of "the current literature." Such is our life: and you perceive that instead of being miserable, I am rather following a wicked example and saying to my soul, "Soul, take thine ease." 211
We have not seen or heard anything of the Websters and are wondering whether they have yet left Algiers. I am sorry to think of you without any artistic society to help you and feed your faith. It is hard to believe long together that anything is "worth while" unless there is some eye to kindle in common with our own, some brief word uttered now and then to imply that what is infinitely precious to us is precious alike to another mind. I fancy that, to do without that guarantee, one must be rather insane -- one must be a bad poet, or a spinner of impossible theories or an inventor of impossible machinery. However it is but a brief space either of time or distance that divides you from those who thoroughly share your cares and joys -- always excepting that portion which is the hidden private lot of every human being. In the most entire confidence even of husband and wife there is always the unspoken residue -- the undivined residue, perhaps of what is most sinful, perhaps of what is most exalted and unselfish.
All blessings on you and yours, dear Barbara. George is gone into town, or he would send his message.
Ever your loving
Marian.
MS: Mr. Philip Leigh-Smith. Extracts published: Cross, II, 370-372.
The Priory, 21 North Bank | December 4. 1863.
Dearest Barbara
Your good news about your double self rejoiced us the other night and your letter was duly sent on to Lea Hurst. 209 Miss Hennell is staying there and writes me word that Miss Remond is a fellow guest lecturing (par parenth'e8se) on Slavery. I am rather ashamed to hear of anyone trying to be useful just now, for I am doing nothing but indulge myself -- enjoying being petted very much, enjoying great books, enjoying our new pretty quiet home and the study of Beethoven's Sonatas for piano and violin with the mild-faced old Jansa -- and not being at all unhappy, as you imagined me.
We had a house-warming celebration of Charlie's birthday on the 24th: it was a birthday extraordinary introducing a new era for him, for he became twenty-one! Our youngest lad Bertie seems to have had his wits a little sharpened by change of circumstances and writes as if he liked his Scotch farming and Scotch domesticity. Of Thornie we cannot well hear until the end of January or beginning of February, so that our parental minds are for the moment at ease.
The "Life of Goethe" is about to appear in one handsome volume, and George is correcting the proofs of the "Aristotle." The correction is a slow business, because the proofs are read by several people: our friend Mr. Clark 210 of Cambridge reads them to make us easy about the Greek accents, and Huxley and Tyndal read some of them for the sake of scientific criticism. Meanwhile George sits in a comfortable room delightfully free from irritation of organs and street cries, making further studies for his History of Science, and I sit in another room taking deep draughts of reading -- Politique positive, Euripides, Latin Christianity and so forth, and remaining in glorious ignorance of "the current literature." Such is our life: and you perceive that instead of being miserable, I am rather following a wicked example and saying to my soul, "Soul, take thine ease." 211
We have not seen or heard anything of the Websters and are wondering whether they have yet left Algiers. I am sorry to think of you without any artistic society to help you and feed your faith. It is hard to believe long together that anything is "worth while" unless there is some eye to kindle in common with our own, some brief word uttered now and then to imply that what is infinitely precious to us is precious alike to another mind. I fancy that, to do without that guarantee, one must be rather insane -- one must be a bad poet, or a spinner of impossible theories or an inventor of impossible machinery. However it is but a brief space either of time or distance that divides you from those who thoroughly share your cares and joys -- always excepting that portion which is the hidden private lot of every human being. In the most entire confidence even of husband and wife there is always the unspoken residue -- the undivined residue, perhaps of what is most sinful, perhaps of what is most exalted and unselfish.
All blessings on you and yours, dear Barbara. George is gone into town, or he would send his message.
Ever your loving
Marian.
Signature
Marian.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon, London, 4 December 1863, 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/93062