had ever seen. Mr. Sharpe's description of him from hearsay is more definite. As a young man he appears to have had a certain ivory delicacy of coloring. He appeared taller than he was, partly because of his rare grace of movement and partly from a characteristic high poise of the head when listening intently to music or conversation. Even then he had the expressive wave of the hand which in later years was as full of various meanings as the Ecco of an Italian.

A swift alertness pervaded him noticeably as much in the rapid change of expression, in the deepening and illuming colors of his singularly expressive eyes, and in his sensitive mouth as in his greyhound-like apprehension, which so often grasped the subject in its entirety before its propounder himself realized its significance. His hair- then of a brown so dark as to appear black - was so beautiful in its heavy, sculpturesque waves as frequently to attract attention. His voice then had a rare flute-like tone, clear, sweet, and resonant.

The influence of Macready turned the poet's thoughts toward writing for the stage. A drama, 'Narses,' was discussed, but for some reason abandoned, and the subject of Strafford was decided upon in its place.

The occasion upon which the decision was made gives an attractive glimpse of the young Browning receiving his first social honor. It was at a dinner at Talfourd's after the performance of 'Ion,' in which Macready acted. Mr. Sharpe says:

"To his surprise and gratification, Browning found himself placed next but one to his host and immediately opposite Macready, who sat between two gentlemen, one calm as a summer evening, the other with a tempestuous youth dominating his sixty years, whom the young poet at once recognized as Wordsworth and Walter Savage Landor. When Talfourd rose to propose the toast of 'The Poets of England,' every one probably expected that Wordsworth would be named to respond; but with a kindly grace, the host, after flattering remarks upon the two great men then honoring him by sitting at his table, coupled his toast with the name of the youngest of the poets of England, Mr. Robert Browning, the author of 'Paracelsus.' According to Miss Mitford, he responded with grace and modesty, looking even younger than he was."

The conversation turning upon the drama, Macready said, "Write a play, Browning, and keep me from going to America." The reply came, "Shall it be historical and English? What do you say to a drama on Strafford?"

'Sordello' had already been begun, but 'Strafford' and a journey to Italy were to intervene before it was finished. 'Strafford' was performed at Covent Garden, May 1, 1837, with Macready as Strafford and Helen Faucit as Lady Carlisle, was well received, and would probably

have had a long run had it not been for difficulties which arose in the theatre management.

If Shelley was the paramount influence of his youthful years, from the time of his Italian journey in 1838, Italy became an influence which was henceforth to exert its magic over his work. He liked to call Italy his university. In 'Sordello' he had already chosen an Italian subject, and his journey was undertaken partly with the idea of gaining personal experience of the scenes wherein the tragedy of Sordello's soul was enacted.

It was published in 1840, and except for a notice in the Eclectic Review, and the appreciation of a few friends, was ignored. A world not over sensitive to the beauties of his previous work, could hardly be expected to welcome enthusiastically a poem so complex in its historical setting and so full of philosophy. Even the keenest intellects approach this poem with the feeling that they are about to attack a problem; for in spite of undoubted power and many beauties, it must be confessed that the luxuriance of the poet's mental force often unduly overbalances his sense of artistic proportion. Evidently the world was frightened. The little breeze, with which Browning's career began, instead of developing as it normally should into a strong wind of universal recognition, died out, and for twenty years nothing he could do seemed to win for him his just deserts, though his very next poem, 'Pippa Passes,' showed him already a consummate master of his forces both on the artistic side and in the special realm which he chose, the development of the soul.

'Pippa Passes,' 'King Victor and King Charles,' and 'The Return of the Druses' lay in his desk for some time without a publisher. He finally arranged with Edward Moxon to bring them out in pamphlet form, using cheap type, each issue to consist of a sixteen-page form, printed in double columns. This was the beginning of the now celebrated series, Bells and Pomegranates.' They were issued from 1841 to 1846, and included all the dramas and a number of short poems.

The only one of these poems with a story other than literary, is 'The Blot in the 'Scutcheon,' written for Macready, and performed at Drury Lane, on February 11, 1843. A favorite weapon in the hands of the Philistines has been the often reiterated statement that the performance was a failure. A letter from Browning to Mr. Hill, editor of the Daily News, at the time of the revival of 'The Blot' by Lawrence Barrett in 1884, drawn out by the same old falsehood, gives the truth in regard to the matter, and should silence once for all the ubiquitous Philis. tines.

"Macready received and accepted the play, while he was engaged at the Haymarket, and retained it for Drury Lane, of which I was ignorant that he was about to become the manager: he accepted it at the instigation of nobody. . . . When the Drury Lane season began, Macready informed me that he would act the play when he had brought out two others, 'The Patrician's Daughter' and 'Plighted Troth.' Having done so, he wrote to me that the former had been unsuccessful in moneydrawing, and the latter had 'smashed his arrangements altogether': but he would still produce my play. In my ignorance of certain symptoms better understood by Macready's professional acquaintances — I had no notion that it was a proper thing, in such a case, to release him from his promise; on the contrary, I should have fancied that such a proposal was offensive. Soon after, Macready begged that I would call on him he said the play had been read to the actors the day before, and laughed at from beginning to end'; on my speaking my mind about this, he explained that the reading had been done by the prompter, a grotesque person with a red nose and wooden leg, ill at ease in the love scenes, and that he would himself make amends by reading the play next morning, which he did, and very adequately, — but apprised me that in consequence of the state of his mind, harassed by business and various troubles, the principal character must be taken by Mr. Phelps; and again I failed to understand, . . . that to allow at Macready's theatre any other than Macready to play the principal part in a new piece was suicidal, and really believed I was meeting his exigencies by accepting the substitute. At the rehearsal, Macready announced that Mr. Phelps was ill, and that he himself would read the part: on the third rehearsal, Mr. Phelps appeared for the first time . . . while Macready more than read, rehearsed the part. The next morning Mr. Phelps waylaid me to say that Macready would play Tresham on the ground that himself, Phelps, was unable to do so... He added that he could not expect me to waive such an advantage, — but that if I were prepared to waive it, 'he would take ether, sit up all night, and have the words in his memory by next day.' I bade him follow me to the greenroom, and hear what I decided upon - which was that as Macready had given him the part, he should keep it: this was on a Thursday; he rehearsed on Friday and Saturday, the play being acted the same evening,- of the fifth day after the reading' by Macready. Macready at once wished to reduce the importance of the play tried to leave

...

out so much of the text, that I baffled him by getting it printed in four and twenty hours, by Moxon's assistance. He wanted me to call it 'The Sister!' and I have before me . . the stage-acting copy, with two lines of his own insertion to avoid the tragical ending - Tresham was to announce his intention of going into a monastery! all this, to keep up the belief that Macready, and Macready alone, could produce a veritable 'tragedy' unproduced before. Not a shilling was spent on scenery or dresses. If your critic considers this treatment of the play an instance of 'the failure of powerful and experienced actors' to insure its success, I can only say that my own opinion was shown by at once

breaking off a friendship . . . which had a right to be plainly and simply told that the play I had contributed as a proof of it would, through a change of circumstances, no longer be to my friend's advantage. Only recently, . . . when the extent of his pecuniary embarrassments at that time was made known, could I in a measure understand his motives — less than ever understand why he so strangely disguised them. If 'applause,' means success, the play thus maimed and maltreated was successful enough; it made way' for Macready's own Benefit and the theatre closed a fortnight after."

Browning's second visit to Italy took place in the autumn of 1844, from which he returned to meet with the supreme spiritual influence of his life. 'Lady Geraldine's Courtship' had just been published, and Browning expressing his enthusiasm for it to Mr. Kenyon, a dear friend of his and a cousin of Miss Barrett's, the latter immediately suggested that Browning should write and tell her of his delight in it. The correspondence soon developed into a meeting which was at first refused by Miss Barrett in a few self-depreciative words, "There is nothing to see in me, nothing to hear in me, I am a weed fit for the ground and dark

ness.

Mr. Browning's fate was sealed at the first meeting, we are told, but Miss Barrett, conscious of the obstacle offered by her ill-health, was not easily won, and only consented, at last, with the proviso that their marriage should depend upon improvement in her health.

Though the new joy in her life seemed to give her fresh strength, her doctor told her, in the summer of 1846, that her only hope of recovery depended upon her spending the coming winter in Italy. Her father having absolutely refused to hear of such a course, she was persuaded to consent to a private marriage with Mr. Browning, which took place on September 12, 1846, at St. Pancras Church. A week later they started for Italy. Mrs. Orr writes:

:

"In the late afternoon or evening of September 19, Mrs. Browning, attended by her maid and her dog, stole away from her father's house. The family were at dinner, at which meal she was not in the habit of joining them; her sisters, Henrietta and Arabel, had been throughout in the secret of her attachment and in full sympathy with it; in the case of the servants she was also sure of friendly connivance. There was no difficulty in her escape, but that created by the dog, which might be expected to bark its consciousness of the unusual situation. She took him into her confidence. She said, 'O Flush, if you make a sound, I am lost.' And Flush understood, as what good dog would not, and crept after his mistress in silence."

Mr. Barrett never forgave her and never saw her again. The surprise and consternation of Mr. Browning's family was soon transformed

into love for Mrs. Browning, while Mr. Kenyon, who had not been told because, as Mrs. Browning said, she did not wish to implicate any one in the deception she was obliged to practise against her father, was overjoyed at the result of his kindly offices in bringing the two poets together.

After a journey full of suffering for Mrs. Browning and the tenderest devotion on the part of Mr. Browning, they halted at Pisa, memorable as the spot where Mrs. Browning presented her husband with the matchless 'Sonnets from the Portuguese.' Mrs. Browning's health improved greatly in the genial climate. The whole of their married life, with the exception of occasional summers in England and two winters in Paris, was spent in Italy, and what that married life was in its harmonious blending of two unusually congenial souls we have abundant evidence in the glimpses obtained from Mrs. Browning's letters, and the recollections of it in the minds of their many friends.

In the summer of 1847 they established themselves in Florence in the Casa Guidi. It became practically their Italian home, varied by sojourns in Ancona, at the baths of Lucca, Venice, and winters in Rome in 1854 and 1859.

In Florence, March 9, 1849, their son was born, and to Mrs. Browning's life, especially, was added one more element of intense happiness. Mrs. Orr thinks that in Pompilia in 'The Ring and the Book,' is reflected the maternal joy as Browning saw it revealed in Mrs. Browning's relation to her son. A shadow was at the same time cast over Browning's life by the death of his mother, who died just as the news was received of the birth of her grandchild. Mrs. Browning, writing to a friend, said, "My husband has been in the greatest anguish.. He has loved his mother as such passionate natures only can love, and I never saw a man so bowed down in an extremity of sorrow,- never.

The first effect of Browning's marriage seems to have been to put his muse to sleep. Up to 1850 the only events in his literary career were the performance of 'The Blot' at Sadler's Wells in 1848, and the issue of a collected edition of his works in 1849. In 1850, in Florence, he wrote 'Christmas Eve' and 'Easter Day,' and in Paris, 1857, the 'Essay on Shelley' to be prefixed to twenty-five letters of Shelley's, that afterwards turned out to be spurious.

The fifty poems in 'Men and Women 'complete the record of Browning's work during his wife's life. They appeared in 1855, and reflect very directly new sources of inspiration which had come into his life with his marriage.

Though Mr. and Mrs. Browning led a comparatively quiet life, they gathered around them, wherever they were, a distinguished circle of