GE to Mr. Charles Bray and Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray and Sara Sophia Hennell, Geneva, [22 December 1849]
Title
GE to Mr. Charles Bray and Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray and Sara Sophia Hennell, Geneva, [22 December 1849]
Title
GE to Mr. Charles Bray and Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray and Sara Sophia Hennell, Geneva, [22 December 1849]
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Mr. Charles Bray and Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray and Sara Sophia Hennell
Date(s)
- 1849-12-22
Place
Geneva
Letter Content
GE to Mr. Charles Bray and Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray and Sara Sophia Hennell, Geneva, [22 December 1849]
MS: Yale. Endorsed: Dec. 1849. Extracts published: Cross, I, 241-242.
Chez M. D'Albert Durade. | 107 Rue des Chanoines.
Dear Friends all
A thousand Christmas pleasures and blessings to you -- good resolutions and bright hopes for the New Year! Amen. People who can't be witty exert themselves to be pious or affectionate. Henceforth I tell you nothing whatever about myself, for if I speak of agreeables and say I am contented, Mr. Bray writes me word that you are all trying to forget me. If I were to tell you of disagreeables and privations and sadness, he would write that he should like me to go to hell for a few months that I might learn to be contented -- also Sara would write, [If you are unhappy now, you will be so 'e0 fortiori ten years hence.] Now since I have a decided objection to doses sent by post which upset one's digestion for a fortnight, I am determined to give you no pretext for sending me either blue pill or bitters. You shall not know whether I am well or ill, contented or discontented, warm or cold, fat or thin. But remember that I am so far from being of the same mind as Mr. Bray, that good news of you is necessary to my comfort. I walk more briskly and jump out of bed more promptly after a letter that tells me you are well -- comfortable -- that business is promising -- that men begin to speak well of you, etc. "I am comforted in your comfort" as saith St. Paul to his troublesome Corinthians. 874 When one is cabin'd, cribbed, confined 875 in oneself, it is good to be enlarged in one's friends. Good Mr. Marshall! 876 We wish to keep even unamiable people when death calls for them -- much more good souls like him. I am glad he had had one more pleasant visit to Cara for her to think of. Dear Sara's letter is very charming, not at all physicky -- rather an agreeable draught of vin sucré. I thank her for the extracts, and above all for the rejected leader 877 at which I have laughed aloud again and again, at the risk of being thought mad by Mde. D'Albert on the other side of the wall. The proposal to leave out the foreign news and advertisements is delicious
I do not know exactly the expense from Geneva to Paris, but I am told it is certainly about 90 frs. per malle poste. The newspapers come and do not cost more than 10 c. I have not inquired about the cause of the variations, but I think it was probably the omission of the printing office people to put on the stamps. Mde. de Ludwigsdorff had recommended Mr. Munroe to me -- in vain -- for I do not want grocery and if I wanted anything else that want would be extinguished by a greater -- the want of money.
I am attending a course of lectures on Experimental Physics by M. le professeur de la Rive, 879 the inventor amongst other things of the electro-plating. I do not tell you whether I enjoy them or not. The lectures occur every Wednesday and Saturday. 880 It is time for me to go. I am distressed to send you this shabby last fragment of paper and to write in such a hurry, but the days are really only two hours long, and I have so many things to do that I go to bed every night miserable because I have left out something I meant to do. Good bye dear souls -- Forget me, if you like, you cannot oblige me to forget you, and the active is worth twice of the passive all the world over.
Mary Ann. The earth is covered with snow and the government is levelling the fortifications. This last fact will do to put among your "Varieties." 881
MS: Yale. Endorsed: Dec. 1849. Extracts published: Cross, I, 241-242.
Chez M. D'Albert Durade. | 107 Rue des Chanoines.
Dear Friends all
A thousand Christmas pleasures and blessings to you -- good resolutions and bright hopes for the New Year! Amen. People who can't be witty exert themselves to be pious or affectionate. Henceforth I tell you nothing whatever about myself, for if I speak of agreeables and say I am contented, Mr. Bray writes me word that you are all trying to forget me. If I were to tell you of disagreeables and privations and sadness, he would write that he should like me to go to hell for a few months that I might learn to be contented -- also Sara would write, [If you are unhappy now, you will be so 'e0 fortiori ten years hence.] Now since I have a decided objection to doses sent by post which upset one's digestion for a fortnight, I am determined to give you no pretext for sending me either blue pill or bitters. You shall not know whether I am well or ill, contented or discontented, warm or cold, fat or thin. But remember that I am so far from being of the same mind as Mr. Bray, that good news of you is necessary to my comfort. I walk more briskly and jump out of bed more promptly after a letter that tells me you are well -- comfortable -- that business is promising -- that men begin to speak well of you, etc. "I am comforted in your comfort" as saith St. Paul to his troublesome Corinthians. 874 When one is cabin'd, cribbed, confined 875 in oneself, it is good to be enlarged in one's friends. Good Mr. Marshall! 876 We wish to keep even unamiable people when death calls for them -- much more good souls like him. I am glad he had had one more pleasant visit to Cara for her to think of. Dear Sara's letter is very charming, not at all physicky -- rather an agreeable draught of vin sucré. I thank her for the extracts, and above all for the rejected leader 877 at which I have laughed aloud again and again, at the risk of being thought mad by Mde. D'Albert on the other side of the wall. The proposal to leave out the foreign news and advertisements is delicious
I do not know exactly the expense from Geneva to Paris, but I am told it is certainly about 90 frs. per malle poste. The newspapers come and do not cost more than 10 c. I have not inquired about the cause of the variations, but I think it was probably the omission of the printing office people to put on the stamps. Mde. de Ludwigsdorff had recommended Mr. Munroe to me -- in vain -- for I do not want grocery and if I wanted anything else that want would be extinguished by a greater -- the want of money.
I am attending a course of lectures on Experimental Physics by M. le professeur de la Rive, 879 the inventor amongst other things of the electro-plating. I do not tell you whether I enjoy them or not. The lectures occur every Wednesday and Saturday. 880 It is time for me to go. I am distressed to send you this shabby last fragment of paper and to write in such a hurry, but the days are really only two hours long, and I have so many things to do that I go to bed every night miserable because I have left out something I meant to do. Good bye dear souls -- Forget me, if you like, you cannot oblige me to forget you, and the active is worth twice of the passive all the world over.
Mary Ann. The earth is covered with snow and the government is levelling the fortifications. This last fact will do to put among your "Varieties." 881
Signature
Mary Ann.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Mr. Charles Bray and Caroline [Mrs. Charles] Bray and Sara Sophia Hennell, Geneva, [22 December 1849], Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/93129