is something noble and touching in that feeling of brotherhood among men of letters, which he invokes.  I am so glad to hear you say that I am right, glad for your sake and glad for mine.  In fact, there is something which is attractive to me, and which has been attractive ever since I was as high as this table, even in the old worn type of Grub Street authors and garret poets.  Men and women of letters are the first in the whole world to me, and I would rather be the least among them, than ’dwell in the courts of princes.’

Forgive me for writing so fast and far.  Just as if you had nothing to do but to read me.  Oh, for patience for the novel.

I am, faithfully yours,
ELIZABETH B. BARRETT.

To Miss Thomson[136] 50 Wimpole Street:  Friday, May 16, 1845 [postmark].

I write one line to thank you, dear Miss Thomson, for your translation (so far too liberal, though true to the spirit of my intention) of my work for your album.  How could it not be a pleasure to me to work for you?

As to my using those manuscripts otherwise than in your service, I do not at all think of it, and I wish to say this.  Perhaps I do not (also) partake quite your ‘divine fury’ for converting our sex into Greek scholarship, and I do not, I confess, think it as desirable as you do.  Where there is a love for poetry, and thirst for beauty strong enough to justify labour, let these impulses, which are noble, be obeyed; but in the case of the multitude it is different; and the mere fashion of scholarship among women would be a disagreeable vain thing, and worse than vain.  You, who are a Greek yourself, know that the Greek language is not to be learnt in a flash of lightning and by Hamiltonian systems, but that it swallows up year after year of studious life.  Now I have a ‘doxy’ (as Warburton called it), that there is no exercise of the mind so little profitable to the mind as the study of languages.  It is the nearest thing to a passive recipiency—­is it not?—­as a mental action, though it leaves one as weary as ennui itself.  Women want to be made to think actively:  their apprehension is quicker than that of men, but their defect lies for the most part in the logical faculty and in the higher mental activities.  Well, and then, to remember how our own English poets are neglected and scorned; our poets of the Elizabethan age!  I would rather that my countrywomen began by loving these.

Not that I would blaspheme against Greek poetry, or depreciate the knowledge of the language as an attainment.  I congratulate you on it, though I never should think of trying to convert other women into a desire for it.  Forgive me.

To think of Mr. Burges’s comparing my Nonnus to the right Nonnus makes my hair stand on end, and the truth is I had flattered myself that nobody would take such trouble.  I have not much reverence for Nonnus, and have pulled him and pushed him and made him stand as I chose, never fearing that my naughty impertinences would be brought to light.  For the rest, I thank you gratefully (and may I respectfully and gratefully thank Miss Bayley?) for the kind words of both of you, both in this letter and as my sister heard them.  It is delightful to me to find such grace in the eyes of dearest Mr. Kenyon’s friends, and I remain, dear Miss Thomson,