GE to Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray, Foleshill, [25 May 1845]
Title
GE to Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray, Foleshill, [25 May 1845]
Title
GE to Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray, Foleshill, [25 May 1845]
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray
Date(s)
- 1845-05-25
Place
Foleshill
Letter Content
GE to Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray, Foleshill, [25 May 1845]
MS: Yale. Endorsed: 1845. Extracts published: Cross, I, 147, 129, 146.
Foleshill | Sunday.
My dear Friend,
I did think you slow to write, I confess, though I am not at all ready to answer you, for I can tell you nothing of Baby 558 or the Cow or the cleaning. On Friday I was busy all day, yesterday it rained incessantly and I was not well, and today I have been almost wet through since dinner in getting as far as Mr. Berry's 559 lime trees. I am afraid there is no chance of my being able to get to Rosehill this evening so I must make the house affairs the subject of my note to Mr. Bray tomorrow. So you are at Hastings! I cannot at all imagine your whereabout, you write so vaguely. I should like to know whether you have an upstairs room or a down-stairs one, whether there is a plenty or a paucity of easy chairs and sofas, what books you read together and what alone, and what was Mr. Hennell's last. Does a certain gentleman stretch and yawn frequently, or in Mr. D'Israeli's style, "extend his arms in the air and emit an exclamation indicative of weariness," or is he tolerably placid under the too great abundance of water? I wish it could be fair at Hastings and rain everywhere else for a few weeks that you might all get some good from the trip. I am sorry to hear that Sara wants it so much. She must have done herself harm with poring over my papers.
I have no news to tell you for I have scarcely heard any one speak since you left except Mr. and Mrs. Pears and a brace of clergymen at church this morning. I had a lecture from Mr. Pears on Friday, as well as a sermon this morning, so you need be in no alarm for my moral health. Do you never think of those Caribs who by dint of flattening their foreheads can manage to see perpendicularly above them without so much as lifting their heads? There are some good people who remind me of them. They see everything so clearly and with so little trouble, but at the price of sad self-mutilation.
Your books are come for the school and I have covered them, at least those that I think you will like for the children -- two or three are quite for grown-up people. [Hoary Head] seems to be a book against infidelity. [Three experiments of living] is all about a physician and his wife living too extravagantly, very good in its way, but not fit for our urchins. [The log cabin] 560 is another large book also very good but too mature. I cannot think how Miss A. G. 561 could recommend them for children. What an exquisite little thing that is of Harriet Martineau's -- The Crofton Boys. I have had some delightful crying over it. There are two or three lines in it that would feed one's soul for a month. Hugh's mother says to him, speaking of people who have permanent sorrows, "They soon had a new and delicious pleasure which none but the bitterly disappointed can feel -- the pleasure of rousing their souls to bear pain, and of agreeing with God silently, when nobody knows what is in their hearts." 562
Tell Mr. Bray I received Sybil 563 yesterday quite safely. I am not utterly disgusted with D'Israeli. The man hath good veins, as Bacon would say, but there is not enough blood in them. I shall get into disgrace for having a Committee book when I am no committee body. Mr. Bray forgets that I cannot enter it in my name without making worse of the matter but I suppose a forfeit is the extreme consequence and as Schiller's Capuchin says [Auf das Unrecht folgt das Uebel Wie Thr'e4nen auf den herben Schwiebel,] 564 which may be freely interpreted Sorrow follows wrong As tears the onion strong.
Do not stay longer than is necessary to do you good, lest I should lose the pleasure of loving you, for my affections are always the warmest when my friends are within an attainable distance, contrary to the general rule. I think I can manage to keep respectably warm towards you for three weeks without seeing you but I cannot promise more. Of Baby you shall hear to-morrow, but do not be alarmed. You will not have to chant "O ever thus" over her. Tell Sara I shall write to her on Tuesday. I have a great yearning of heart towards her that is my love-fit just now.
Love to everybody and Heaven bless you all. Tell Mr. Bray I am getting too amiable for this world, and Mr. Donovan's wizard hand would detect a slight corrugation of the skin on my organs 5 and 6: 565 they are so totally without exercise. Good bye, my dear love, and remember the duty of getting fat.
Mary Ann.
MS: Yale. Endorsed: 1845. Extracts published: Cross, I, 147, 129, 146.
Foleshill | Sunday.
My dear Friend,
I did think you slow to write, I confess, though I am not at all ready to answer you, for I can tell you nothing of Baby 558 or the Cow or the cleaning. On Friday I was busy all day, yesterday it rained incessantly and I was not well, and today I have been almost wet through since dinner in getting as far as Mr. Berry's 559 lime trees. I am afraid there is no chance of my being able to get to Rosehill this evening so I must make the house affairs the subject of my note to Mr. Bray tomorrow. So you are at Hastings! I cannot at all imagine your whereabout, you write so vaguely. I should like to know whether you have an upstairs room or a down-stairs one, whether there is a plenty or a paucity of easy chairs and sofas, what books you read together and what alone, and what was Mr. Hennell's last. Does a certain gentleman stretch and yawn frequently, or in Mr. D'Israeli's style, "extend his arms in the air and emit an exclamation indicative of weariness," or is he tolerably placid under the too great abundance of water? I wish it could be fair at Hastings and rain everywhere else for a few weeks that you might all get some good from the trip. I am sorry to hear that Sara wants it so much. She must have done herself harm with poring over my papers.
I have no news to tell you for I have scarcely heard any one speak since you left except Mr. and Mrs. Pears and a brace of clergymen at church this morning. I had a lecture from Mr. Pears on Friday, as well as a sermon this morning, so you need be in no alarm for my moral health. Do you never think of those Caribs who by dint of flattening their foreheads can manage to see perpendicularly above them without so much as lifting their heads? There are some good people who remind me of them. They see everything so clearly and with so little trouble, but at the price of sad self-mutilation.
Your books are come for the school and I have covered them, at least those that I think you will like for the children -- two or three are quite for grown-up people. [Hoary Head] seems to be a book against infidelity. [Three experiments of living] is all about a physician and his wife living too extravagantly, very good in its way, but not fit for our urchins. [The log cabin] 560 is another large book also very good but too mature. I cannot think how Miss A. G. 561 could recommend them for children. What an exquisite little thing that is of Harriet Martineau's -- The Crofton Boys. I have had some delightful crying over it. There are two or three lines in it that would feed one's soul for a month. Hugh's mother says to him, speaking of people who have permanent sorrows, "They soon had a new and delicious pleasure which none but the bitterly disappointed can feel -- the pleasure of rousing their souls to bear pain, and of agreeing with God silently, when nobody knows what is in their hearts." 562
Tell Mr. Bray I received Sybil 563 yesterday quite safely. I am not utterly disgusted with D'Israeli. The man hath good veins, as Bacon would say, but there is not enough blood in them. I shall get into disgrace for having a Committee book when I am no committee body. Mr. Bray forgets that I cannot enter it in my name without making worse of the matter but I suppose a forfeit is the extreme consequence and as Schiller's Capuchin says [Auf das Unrecht folgt das Uebel Wie Thr'e4nen auf den herben Schwiebel,] 564 which may be freely interpreted Sorrow follows wrong As tears the onion strong.
Do not stay longer than is necessary to do you good, lest I should lose the pleasure of loving you, for my affections are always the warmest when my friends are within an attainable distance, contrary to the general rule. I think I can manage to keep respectably warm towards you for three weeks without seeing you but I cannot promise more. Of Baby you shall hear to-morrow, but do not be alarmed. You will not have to chant "O ever thus" over her. Tell Sara I shall write to her on Tuesday. I have a great yearning of heart towards her that is my love-fit just now.
Love to everybody and Heaven bless you all. Tell Mr. Bray I am getting too amiable for this world, and Mr. Donovan's wizard hand would detect a slight corrugation of the skin on my organs 5 and 6: 565 they are so totally without exercise. Good bye, my dear love, and remember the duty of getting fat.
Mary Ann.
Signature
Mary Ann.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray, Foleshill, [25 May 1845], 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/93238