MRS. ORR fully agreed with Miss Hickey. She thought the pretence of compunction was like the pretence of paternal emotion, one lie the more. Count Franceschini was taking the line of defence he thought most likely to tell with his judges. The history of the case proved him to be throughout cruel, cowardly, and cunning; and she believed Mr. Browning had conceived him so. She recognized Mr. Browning's optimism, but could not admit that it coloured his dramatic insight, and prevented his accepting a thorough villain as such. If it did, he would not be a great dramatic poet, as she contended that he was. He had seldom described a thorough villain, because few exist; but where he found one, his optimism was large enough to embrace the fact; and if his optimism could not be reconciled with facts he would cease to be an optimist. Truth was all in all to him.

She concurred, however, warmly in the Chairman's admiration of the paper as judged from the writer's point of view, as also in many of his comments upon the subject of it.

DR. BERDOE said that as Browning was a scientific poet, so of necessity he must be an optimist-a true poet of scientific culture must needs be that. He thought from his experience of pathology, that evil was often the result of disease or malformation of the brain or skull or of defect of the nervous system. Taking this as the fact, he thought we should be more kind to villains-making them more of objects of pity. If we had better conditions of life here, the race would improve, and villany die out. He confessed to a little sympathy with Guido--he certainly had a dreadful mother-in-law; and it was not a pleasant thing to see a priest running off with his wife, however platonic the attachment might have been. MONS. J. MILSAND thought that Browning's love for life—or, as he might express it, his greediness for life—was the common source of the delight he took in analyzing villains, as well as any other sort of characters, and of what was called his optimism, which did not seem so theological as it was represented. Browning was so sure that life itself could not finish.

May 27th, 1883.

"HAVING just received a proof sheet of the Discussion which followed the reading of my Paper on April 27th, I avail myself of the Society's kind permission to reply to any of the objections made to what I said therein.

"I wish in reply to make an apology, using that word in its later, not its older significance. I do not altogether care to defend certain positions of mine which Mr. Furnivall attacked, but rather to apologize for having given the Society a Paper containing arguments which to myself became manifest as unfair in the act of thinking out my subject.

"My Paper failed to satisfy my judgment; but at the time I was hindered by pressure of circumstances from re-writing it; and I accordingly consoled myself with the notion that its dullness would have a soporific effect on the audience, and that its fallacies in logic would thereby escape detection.

"I am rather pleased to find that Mr. Furnivall was kept sufficiently awake by the Paper to detect its weak points. These occur chiefly, I am well aware, in my contrasted views of Shakspere's and Browning's villains. These passages represent rather thought in process of formation than ultimately formed; and have a good deal of the unfairness in reasoning, which characterizes the pleadings of the different sides of a question, as carried on in one's own mind, before one's judgment strikes the balance between them.

"But towards my unfairness Mr. Furnival is a little unfair. He says that I cut the ground from under my feet in what I say of Browning's treatment of the Intendant in Pippa Pusses; for that exactly the same would be applicable to Iago.

"Now, my point is that Browning in this scene of the Bishop' and the 'Intendant' is merely giving an instantaneous picture of a single temptation scene, in which there are grouped, in their respective attitudes, the tempter, the

tempted, and the deliverer; whereas, in the play where Shakspere shows Iago, the character is presented in scenes many, whose variety in circumstances would seem to afford occasions for variations of moral attitude. And when Mr. Furnivall says, that a character which is drawn out at such length is only of use in the play to bring out the character of Othello, and that except with reference to Othello and Desdemona, 'who cares twopence what Iago was or was not?' does not he in these words concede my very point, that this villain is merely the agent required to bring about the misfortunes in the tale which evoke the tragic and beautiful manifestation of character in the other actors?

"It was Guido and the Inn Album villain that I opposed to Iago, because on them Browning dwells as long as Shakspere does on Iago; and he, I think, imparts to these characters of evil an individuality of interest, which (Mr. Furnivall says) Iago has not. Had Browning dwelt as long on the Intendant's character, very probably he would have done the like for it.

"I thoroughly agree with what Professor Dowden says as to Browning's most characteristic creations of evil, not being his strong criminals, but rather those who have sinned by failure, by the unlit lamp and ungirt loin.' Any full study of Browning's treatment of evil ought to give most prominent place to these; but within the limits of a paper so short as mine, and one which had engaged to bear the title of Browning's Villains,' it seemed more natural to make immediate mention of those who had sinned by commission rather than by omission.

"As to Louscha the Russian Mother-I suspect that Mr. Browning himself would hardly have scrupled to play the part of the carpenter if necessary! If her struggles to save the children of which she tells had been real, would she have felt that sense of complacent peace in the safety of her own life when they had perished?

"To show a long weaving of humbug, suddenly cut through by a swift blow of truth, is one of Mr. Browning's most characteristic methods of dealing in his poems.

"E. DICKINSON WEST.'

SCRAPS.

1867. "New Poems by Matthew Arnold," p. 243. Notes. Empedocles on Etna. I cannot deny myself the pleasure of saying that I reprint (I cannot say republish, for it was withdrawn from circulation before fifty copies were sold) this poem at the request of a man of genius, whom it had the honour and the good fortune to interest,- Mr. Robert Browning.

1870. "Alibone's Critical Dictionary of English Literature,” vol. i. Notice of Br. and his wife, and of Mr. Kenyon's bequests to them: Robert B. £6500; Mrs. E. B. B. £4000.

1883. "Literary World.” Boston, U.S.A. March 24, p. 98, col. 1.-Dodd,. Mead & Co. will publish very soon Selections from the Poetry of Robert Browning. The impression has gone abroad that the compiler of this collection is Mr. Richard Grant White; but it seems that Mr. White has only been one of the many who have had to do with the gathering of the poems. The whole story of the book he tells in his introduction, from which we learn that the original selection was made by Mr. Browning himself, and filled two volumes. The poet's admirers went over this collection, made suggestions, and struck out a large number of verses. Finally, Mr. White took the matter in hand, made more suggestions, and stamps it with his approval and an introduction to match.

74*

Sixteenth Meeting, Friday, May 25, 1883..

DR. MARK PATTISON, Rector of Lincoln Coll., Oxford, in the Chair.

The REV. MR. BULKELEY read a Paper on James Lee's Wife.

The CHAIRMAN thought they had all been very much helped by the paper read by Mr. Bulkeley. For his own part, he certainly saw more connection between the nine poems of which the work is composed than he had done before. He would not criticize the situation in which the poet had placed James Lee's wife; but he thought the poet had lost a great opportunity by the way in which he had constructed his work. The poem was simply the story of a superior woman making a mistake in allying herself with a common-place man. She, however, tries to make something of him; but, after repeated attempts, has to confess at last that she can do nothing with him. It appeared to the Chairman that this was a pathetic situation entirely spoilt by the poet. You are led on in each poem by seeing that the woman's eyes are opened to the worthless character of her husband; that she can endure things as they are no longer; and that when she at length makes up her mind to leave him, and to begin a new chapter of life in another sphere apart from him-you find out that she really loves him after all, and longs for him back! To his view, this last canto of the poem seems to show that the poet has spoiled the whole situation.

MR. FURNIVALL was much pleazd with the paper. His friend Miss RochfortSmith had often told him that no one since Shakspere had understood woman as Browning does. He (Mr. F.) considerd James Lee's wife had acted as every true woman would act, and felt as every true woman would feel. The whole character of the poem was intensely true to Nature. No true woman believes in the theory that if a man is bad, she must go and live by herself; she holds to him only the closer certain. The whole thing was true to Nature. Shakspere would have made a wife come to the same result as Browning does. Mr. F. considerd Mr. Bulkeley had given them a good helpful paper. The only thing he contested was, Mr. B.'s complaint as to the change of title in the later editions. Browning frequently sets us puzzles; and he thought the former title had added a puzzle to the poem. The truth was, that most readers were not up to Browning's level-he sees things plain enough; we dullards can't. He considerd the poetic qualities of the poem, as a whole, not quite up to the mark: there was not sufficient music in it. But possibly this was intentional on Browning's part, who hardly ever does give us sufficient music in his work. He evidently wants us to attend to the thought, not the music, of his poems. He wants us to go to the heart of his subject, and so will not give us mere ornament. He (Mr. Furnivall) regretted this, and was afraid posterity would judge Browning hardly for it. He certainly thought more grace and music should have been infused into lines expressing the feelings of James Lee's wife. Still, they must most gratefully accept whatever Browning was pleazd to give them.

The CHAIRMAN said he could not be persuaded that Browning, of set purpose, will not use grace of expression and music in his lines. This grace and music never detracts from the sense of any verse, but is indeed necessary to it; and no poet could be insane enough to dispense with it. He had heard one critic say that James Lee's Wife exhibited Browning's lyrical power. Now he saw nothing lyrical in it. He mentioned Milton's Lycidas, Allegro, and Il Penseroso as

'Lyrical' has two senses, one broad, as in Goethe's division of all poetry into the classes of epic, dramatic and lyrical; another narrow, in which the (often short) lyric' is distinguisht from other forms of lyrical poetry like the Ode, &c.-F.

75* examples of lyrical verse; also Gray's Progress of Poesy; but he saw nothing akin to these in James Lee. He thought there was much harshness and obscurity in the work—an unnecessary obstacle interposed between author and reader. The style should have been such as would pass on the meaning of the writer to the mind of the reader. Browning's style interposed a veil which could hardly be seen through.

MRS. ORR thought the great obstacle to our not quite understanding the poem was not the expression, but the intense personality. The poem was certainly lyrical in so far as it was throughout inspired by a continual strain of feelingemotion being the link between the various parts of the poem. The story was simply that of a woman, loving truly, disappointed in her love, disposed to meet disappointment half-way one whose mind was open to all the influences of nature, and pursued by the analogies of natural and human life; and whose own overwrought feelings were constantly reacting upon them. She said that Mrs. Alfred Hunt had just remarkt what fine touches of landscape painting the poem contained. She should like to appeal to Mr. Alfred Hunt on this subject.

MR. ALFRED HUNT said that he had always felt and admired the suggestions of wild landscape, which formed the background of the poem. With respect to the lyrical quality of the poem, he thought that Mrs. Orr came nearer the truth than the Chairman, While he fully recognized the truth of the remarks made by the Chairman with respect to the vital connection in poetry, as in all art, between thought and qualities of expression, he would maintain that Browning's finest and most characteristic poems were especially distinguished by their perfect aptness of style, and that, when the meaning was fairly grasped, the verse would be found to possess a lasting charm and value of its own. He thought the chief difficulty and obscurity of the poem arose from the change of moods, It was certainly one of the greatest puzzles Browning had set them. He felt that Mr. Bulkeley had done much in his paper towards helping to explain it. He should go home and study the poem with the help of what he had heard that evening.

DR. BERDOE thought the fact was patent to all that the poem was not, as a whole, satisfactory. It seemed to him there was a great deal of the grotesque in it. A woman forces her love on a man who does not care for her-and it was not, after all, pleasant to be loved so passionately by a woman with " coarse hanks of hair," and skin like "the bark of a gnarled tree." He had some sympathy with James Lee. He remembered an old Spanish proverb which said that "a little hate is the best beginning for a happy married life." Too demonstrative a love was apt to drive a man away. Still there were many beauties in the poem, and especially beautiful was the analysis of what the wind says.

MISS DREWRY was of opinion that James Lee's wife was looking beyond this world; she was perfectly natural and consistent all through; and she only gave him up now with the strong conviction of the possibility of a change in the course of other lives, not in the life of this world.

MR. JONES questioned the certainty of the fourth poem being a soliloquy. It was a sort of direct remonstrance, and seemed to him to be hardly in the nature of a soliloquy. Browning's characteristic was his dealing in sudden transitions, in which we seem to see and hear another speaker. Though we only actually hear one voice, there may be another figure present.

MR. FURNIVALL said he thought the words "The man was my whole world" in v. vi. of Poem IV. made it certain that the poem was a soliloquy. In fact, it

was so.

MISS HICKEY could not see anything in the poem warranting the theory that the wife was looking to the future world for the good to come. She knows there is nothing in her looks, or words, or deeds that her husband will care to dwell on now he is set free from her. But such things have been as a mutual flame. Love's key might unlock his soul, It is not an expectation, scarcely a hope; it is a

supposition, a dream. And if this great gift were to come to her, why she would die of joy. Surely the words, "When I should be dead of joy," preclude the supposition that she is thinking of the righting of things in a future world.

MR. BULKELEY, in reply, had nothing specially to say except to thank them. A question had been asked as to the meaning of "souls' hands palm." Well, granting that the soul grasps, you have the thought of a hand, and a hand has a palm. He considered that many of Browning's soliloquies were expressed in most natural language—indeed, suggestive language,—and when we have solved it we get right to the heart of the character.

On the motion of MR. FURNIVALL, a vote of thanks to the Chairman was past. Dr. Pattison, in reply, said he deserved no thanks for having spent a very profitable evening: that he would not on any account have missed the paper or discussion of that evening; and if they all went away with his experience, they would have spent the evening well.

SCRAPS.

When at Padua in May, the Rev. John Sharpe found a stone set in the wall of the Vestibule of the Sacristy of the Church of the Eremitani, to Pietro of Abano. It differs in dates from the notice appended by Mr. Furnivall to Mr. Sharpe's Paper.

PETRI APONI

CINERES

OB. AN. 1315
AET. 66

1883. 66 Literary World" (Boston, U.S.A.), April 21: Prof. Corson's Letter on 'Browning Clubs in the United States.' May 5: Mr. Furnivall's letter showing (against H.' in no. of March 10) that it was Innocent XII, and not Innocent XI, who "peeled-off that last scandal-rag of Nepotism" (Ring and Book, I. 318-19, vol. i, p. 17). The last edition of the Encycl. Britannica, in its article on Innocent XI, wrongly makes Br. sketch the character of that Pope with much artistic power as well as with historical fidelity.'

1883. "Literary World" (Boston, U.S.A.). June 2. The [Mrs.] Browning Room at Wellesley College.' As the room has been named in honor of Mrs. Browning, the three large windows, elegantly designed in rich cathedral glass by Macdonald of Boston, represent well-known subjects from the pen of that gifted poetess. On one is a portrait of Lady Geraldine. . . On another is Aurora Leigh. On the third is the Romance of the Swan's Nest. . . But the most interesting attractions of this wonderful room are yet to be mentioned. The students look with joy and pride on the beautiful marble bust of Mrs. Browning, by Story, the distinguished sculptor, and friend of the Brownings. On a stand near the bust, in a modest frame, is a letter from Robert Browning, which contains the following sentence: "I beg to present to Wellesley College the original manuscript of the first poem in the collection of Last Poems by Elizabeth Barrett Browning,'" and beside the letter, in the delicate handwriting of its author, is the poem, "Little Mattie." (In the Lit. World of June 16, Elizabeth P. Gould urges the formation of young women's Browning Clubs to study Mrs. Browning.)

1883.

·

"The Literary World" (Boston, U.S.A.). Review of Agamemnon, La Saisiaz, and Dramatic Idyls. Houghton, Mifflin, & Co. $1.50.