PR 
 
 ra62L 
 
 wm 
 
 SELECT POE 
 
 OF 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 LONGMANS' ENGLISH CLASSICS 
 
Class /(J'i^ O , 
 
 Book C' ^7 
 
 CopyrightN? /^ /c5l 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSrr 
 
LONGMANS' ENGLISH CLASSICS 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 GEORGE RICE CARPENTER, A.B. 
 
 PROFESSOR OF RHETORIC AND ENGLISH COMPOSITION IN COLUMBIA 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 SELECT POEMS 
 
lotiffmanfi' C^nfflislb Clasfiicg 
 
 SELECT POEMS 
 
 OF 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 EDITED 
 
 WITH NOTES AND AN INTRODUCTION 
 
 BY 
 
 PERCIVAL CHUBB 
 
 FORMERLY DIRECTOR OF ENGLISH, ETHICAL CULTURE SCHOOLS, 
 NEW YORK CITY 
 
 LOlS'GMAISrS, GKEEK, AND CO. 
 
 FOURTH AVENUE AND SOth STREET, NEW YORK 
 PRAIRIE AVENUE & 25th STREET, CHICAGO 
 

 
 Copyright, 1905, 
 
 BY 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 Copyright, 1915 
 
 BY 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 First printed. December, 1905 
 
 Reprinted August, 1909 
 
 Reprinted with additions, June, 1915 
 
 OCT 21 1915 
 
 S)CI,A416024 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introduction 
 
 I. Browning's Poetry vii 
 
 II. Browning's Life and Personality xvii 
 
 Suggestions to Teachers xxiii 
 
 Chronological Table xxvi 
 
 Poems — ■ 
 
 Incident of the French Camp 1 
 
 How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix . 2 
 
 Through the Metidja to Abd-el-Kadr 5 
 
 Muleykeh 6 
 
 Tray 13 
 
 Donald 14 
 
 Herve Riel 23 
 
 Pheidippides ' 29 
 
 Echetlos 35 
 
 The Patriot 37 
 
 Count Gismond 39 
 
 The Twins 43 
 
 The Boy and the Angel 44 
 
 My Last Duchess 47 
 
 A Face 49 
 
 Song from Pippa Passes 50 
 
 Cavalier Tunes 50 
 
 Home-Thoughts, from Abroad 53 
 
 Home-Thoughts, from the Sea 53 
 
 "De Gustibus— " 54 
 
 Up at a Villa— Down in the City 55 
 
 Memorabilia 59 
 
 The Lost Leader 60 
 
 Life in a Love 61 
 
 Youth and Art 63 
 
 Evelyn Hope 64 
 
 Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister 66 
 
 A Grammarian's Funeral 68 
 
 One Word More 73 
 
 Prospice 81 
 
 Epilogue to Asolando 83 
 
vi CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Italian in England 83 
 
 Instans Tyrannus 88 
 
 The Pied Piper of Hamelin 90 
 
 Notes 101 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 I. Browning's Poetry 
 
 The editor undertakes this task of his with a double 
 ambition: first, with the hope that this little collection 
 may introduce " to many a youth and many a maid " a 
 few poems that hold an honored place in the hearts of 
 those who love noble verse, and, secondly, that this 
 taste may be appetizing enough to lead them farther 
 into that world of varied humanity which is peopled by 
 one of the most fertile and subtle creators of human 
 character and personality. 
 
 Although Tennyson and Browning are commonly 
 coupled in popular references as the two primates of 
 English poetry in the Victorian epoch, Browning still 
 remains — all the ladies' Browning Clubs notwithstanding 
 — little more than a name to the general reading public. 
 This ignorance and neglect are reflected in our schools. 
 While the little child of the primary grades knows Ten- 
 nyson's "Brook" and other simple lays; while ''The 
 Charge of the Light Brigade," "The Revenge," and half 
 a dozen other ballads and lyrics find their way into the 
 Elementary Readers and Anthologies; while the high 
 school student has for years had to labor over "The 
 Princess," and is now required to know "The Idylls of 
 the King," — Browning's name is but scantily repre- 
 sented in the texts by "The Pied Piper of Hamelin" and 
 "How they Brought the Good News." At last a tardy 
 
 vii 
 
Viii INTRODUCTION 
 
 justice is being meted out to him by offering the college- 
 bound student an inducement to read a short dozen of 
 his representative poems. We who find in Browning an 
 inspiring poet and a great master of insight into the 
 problems of human life to whom we may turn for help, 
 welcome this concession, and will try to make the most 
 of it. 
 
 Let me be frank with my readers and say that there 
 are some plausible reasons for this neglect of Brown- 
 ing. His manner has been against him: it is frequently 
 unconventional and abrupt; it takes for granted an 
 unusually alert intelligence. His matter, too, is more 
 than commonly difficult: it implies a vivid interest in 
 human character, in many types of the human soul, 
 and in the conduct of men and women placed in per- 
 plexing circumstances, — on spiritual trial, in short. In 
 this, he suggests a quite common experience in social 
 intercourse : our meeting with some one who is, as we say, 
 "a trifle difficult to get on with," — brusque, reticent, 
 or what not, — who yet, as we discover later, hides a 
 heart of gold or a mind of piercing clearness behind his 
 idiosyncrasy. Browning's unwonted ways may be easily 
 made light of; and it is the purpose of this " Introduction" 
 to him to play the part of a tactful host in smoothing out 
 little surface difficulties that handicap an honored and 
 distinguished guest. 
 
 For instance, in the very first selection given here, the 
 poet seems to take his reader familiarly by the arm, 
 and unceremoniously to open up on him: "You know, 
 we French stormed Ratisbon." "Indeed, sir, I don't 
 know," says the surprised auditor; "and pray, sir, who 
 are 'we French'?" This is Browning's little habit of 
 monologing. He is dramatically assuming the role of 
 some old cuirassier of Napoleon's guard, and asks you 
 
INTRODUCTION ix 
 
 to imagine his addressing other scarred veterans who 
 are comparing notes over many a glorious victory. The 
 reader of Browning must at the outset get accustomed 
 to this monologing habit and all that it takes for 
 granted — little unexpected interpolations and asides on 
 the part of the speaker; the sort of interruptions we get 
 in Coleridge's " Ancient Mariner/' when we are suddenly 
 recalled to the lank, lean-fingered mariner with his glit- 
 tering eye, and the spellbound wedding-guest whom he 
 has transfixed by it. The notes to the poems try to 
 make this imaginative task easy. 
 
 Browning; in short, exacts of his readers an active 
 dramatic imagination. He asks of us, by the peculiar 
 form of his poems, to visualize and realize the scene, the 
 speaker, his gestures, his broken and elliptical speech, 
 and so on. It is those who lack this imaginative capacity 
 (a very important and precious endowment), who find 
 Browning hard reading. The best advice, for those who 
 would speedily overcome any difficulties on this account, 
 is, first to read each new poem carefully, in order to seize 
 the salient features of the dramatic situation which it 
 presupposes; then to read it a second time aloud, identi- 
 fying oneself dramatically with the person who speaks. 
 
 For example, — to take a small point in one of the 
 pieces cited, " My Last Duchess," — we gather from the 
 first reading that the Duke and his guest, having left 
 the company below, have been discussing a marriage 
 contract on the floor above. Their discussion is ended; 
 they are passing on their way to rejoin the company, 
 when the guest's eye falls on the striking portrait of a 
 beautiful woman. The Duke's vanity is flattered; that 
 was his wife, painted by a great painter whom he had 
 the wit and resources to employ; and so he proposes a 
 halt, "Will't please you sit and look at her." So they 
 
X INTRODUCTION 
 
 sit; and the silent reader of the poem must visualize the 
 scene, and in imagination will sit down with the pair. 
 We look and listen, absorbed in the story and the picture. 
 Then (in 1. 47) the attention is brought back from these 
 to the two sitting talkers: "Will't please you rise?'' 
 They rise. "We'll meet the company below then." 
 They proceed to the great stairway, talking the while. 
 The visitor prepares to take his leave at the head of the 
 stairs: "Nay, we'll go together down, sir. But, before 
 we descend," he seems to imply, as he points a finger, 
 "just notice that Neptune, in the alcove over there." 
 This is a fairly palpable instance of the kind of imagi- 
 native demand which Browning continually makes upon 
 his readers. We must be ready to exercise this drama- 
 tizing faculty. Perhaps I am laboring the point; but 
 the elaboration may serve to help out in other cases, — 
 in "Tray," for instance, with its unusual opening. 
 
 So, then, the main recommendation I would make to the 
 beginner, to enable him to overcome the chief difficulty of 
 Browning's form, is to realize the dramatic suppositions 
 of Browning's monologs. Dramatically conceived, the 
 poems — so many of them — must be dramatically ap- 
 proached and interpreted. 
 
 Passing now to related difficulties in the subject- 
 matter, the key is still the word "dramatic." Brown- 
 ing has been aptly called the poet of situations, of crises 
 in human lives. Many of his poems assume a moment 
 of choice, a dramatic turning-point, in some one's life. 
 Now it is the opportunity of love between the young 
 singer and the sculptor in "Youth and Art." Now it is 
 the patriot on his way to the scaffold to be tried as .to 
 his faith, despite failure, in his vision of the past; his 
 faith in the populace which has turned upon him whom 
 it had lauded a short year ago, and in the trustworthi- 
 
INTRODUCTION xi 
 
 ness of a God which could bring to naught his heroic 
 effort after human improvement. And now it is the 
 sportsman Donald, on trial when his humanity is put 
 to the test by his "sportsmanlike" prompting to kill. 
 Yes, Browning's dominating interest is the behavior of 
 the human soul in moments of stress, when sore beset 
 by temptation, when it is difficult to be brave. He 
 conceives of us all as being, at some crucial moment, 
 when our action will determine our whole future, tasked 
 to fight the great fight of our lives. It is a supreme 
 moment of trial, when we are to prove ourselves either 
 heroes or cowards, either men and women of faith and 
 fortitude or lost creatures of fear and despair. No, we 
 must not use these words; ^^lost" is not in Browning's 
 vocabulary. "We fall to rise." Our defeats may be 
 turned to splendid spiritual victories, if we but conduct 
 ourselves worthily in our adversity, and resolve to con- 
 tinue the fight and to profit by the lesson. Equally, our 
 victories may turn to inglorious spiritual defeats, if they 
 relax our energies, or breed over-confidence or pride or 
 selfishness. The hero of heroes is the battered and 
 bowed victim of his own cowardice or meanness, who, 
 having had a moment for the truth to flr.sh out upon 
 him, gathers and reknits his energies for further battle. 
 This is a high and exacting moral athleticism: who shall 
 be equal to it? Browning's answer is: "You may be, 
 must be. Ultimately there is no escape; the universe 
 exists to discipline men's souls to that result of spiritual 
 renewal." 
 
 This is an evangel for youth. Do you not, you young 
 man or woman who begin to understand, feel the invig- 
 orating appeal and challenge of this message? At no time 
 in life does this old-time gospel with its ultimate question 
 — What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world 
 
xii INTRODUCTION 
 
 and lose his own soul? — meet with such a ready response 
 as it does in youth, the springtime of generous enthusiasm 
 and idealism. At no time in the world's history has it 
 been so important that this question should echo and 
 reecho through the soul of youth, to keep it loyal, as it 
 is now, when so rich and tempting a world lies stretched 
 at the feet of every enterprising and ambitious youth. 
 Hence the hope which the present editor indulges that 
 an increasing number of high school and college students 
 may be brought into the tonic atmosphere of Browning's 
 stalwart and unfaltering faith, his rapturous recognition 
 of the joy of deep living and heroic attainment, of true, 
 noble love, of unbeaten endeavor and unquenchable 
 aspiration. 
 
 It is only a few of the simpler poems that can be given 
 here, with some suggestion of what there is in the un- 
 quarried remaii^ider. These longer and more complex 
 studies of temperament and situation present the most 
 varied types of manhood and womanhood in numerous 
 nationalities, the good and the evil, the great and the 
 lowly, the healthy and the diseased. Browning's opti- 
 mism is so confident* that he does not hesitate to 
 grapple with the greatly erring, the criminal and the 
 sinning, by way of revealing the soul of goodness in 
 things evil, and the subtle, devious ways by which every- 
 thing is either in process of conversion into ultimate 
 good, or hints the promise of fair weather after foul. 
 To convey an idea of the scope of his work, the follow- 
 ing rough classification may be made. We have a group 
 of great dramas, — " Luria," "A Blot on the Scutcheon" 
 (recently staged in New York), "Colombe's Birthday" 
 (frequently presented), etc.; shorter pieces like "In a 
 
 *See Song from Pippa Passes, and note thereon, pp. 50 
 and 85. 
 
INTRODUCTION Xill 
 
 Balcony" and "A Sours Tragedy"; the vast structure of 
 the "Ring and the Book," in which Browning presents a 
 crime seen from several distinctive points of view; a 
 group of poems dealing with the arts (chiefly painting) 
 arid great artists, "Andrea del Sarto," "Fra Lippo 
 Lippi," "Old Pictures in Florence"; another group 
 dealing in profound ways with music, "Abt Vogler," 
 "A Toccata of Galuppi's," etc.; a larger group, with 
 deeds of heroism, — well represented in this volume; a 
 much larger one w4th love in innumerable aspects and 
 forms of manifestation (Browning's master-theme); and 
 a rich feast of poems which may be called religious, 
 "Christmas Eve" and "Easter Day," "Caliban upon 
 Setebos," "Rabbi ben Ezra," "Saul," " Cleon " — these 
 last two dealing with a subject very near to the poet's 
 heart, the problem of personal immortality. 
 
 Only one more cautioning word must 'be said to those 
 who would advance from the small enclosure of this 
 volume of selections into the more spacious field: don't 
 expect the ordinary kind of dramatic excitement. It is 
 the caution one would administer to those who should 
 expect the ordinary type of play in a presentation of one 
 of Browning's dramas. These dramas have been pro- 
 nounced failures by theater-goers — although some have 
 been acceptably performed. Expect to find, we caution, 
 the drama of deliberation rather than of action. Brown- 
 ing's supreme interest is less in the outward acts than 
 in the drama within the mind. It is the inner struggle, 
 the storm of thought and emotion which drives the soul 
 now this way and now that, to which he attaches cen- 
 tral importance. The long soliloquy and debate of the 
 troubled mind, the dialog of the two selves at strife in 
 us, the pathetic and tragic plea of the angelic with the 
 demonic powers in us — that it is which it is the aim of 
 
xiv INTRODUCTION 
 
 his art to lay bare and interpret. In his attempt to do 
 this we shall find either the strength or the weakness 
 of Browning, according to the intensity of our interest 
 in what we must call the psychology of the human soul. 
 In emphasizing this supreme concern of Browning's 
 with human character, and in preparing the young reader 
 to pass on from the simple studies here given to the 
 subtle analyses of all sorts and conditions of men and 
 women in the longer poems, we must not neglect Brown- 
 ing's more general accomplishments as a poet. Although 
 his gaze is bent chiefly upon the inward world, he has a 
 keen eye for the outward, and for the sensuous beauties 
 of nature. Consider the sensitiveness to human beauty 
 shown in such poems as "A Face," and the feeling for 
 nature in "Home Thoughts from Abroad," or " De 
 Gustibus." Several other instances tempt citation; this 
 autumn scene, "Among the Rocks," for instance: 
 
 Oh, good gigantic smile o' the brown old earth, 
 This autumn morning! How he sets his bones 
 
 To bask i' the sun, and thrusts out knees and feet 
 
 For the ripple to run over in its mirth; 
 
 Listening the while, where on the heap of stones 
 
 The white breast of the sea-lark twitters sweet. 
 
 Or this little seascape, with its lilting charm: 
 
 The gray sea and the long black land; 
 And the yellow half-moon large and low; 
 And the startled little waves that leap 
 In fiery ringlets from their sleep, 
 As I gain the cove with pushing prow. 
 And quench its speed i' the slushy sand. 
 
 Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach; 
 Three fields to cross till a farm appears. 
 
 Or this quiet evening scene: 
 
INTRODUCTION XV 
 
 Where the quiet-colored end of evening smiles 
 
 Miles and miles 
 On the solitary pastures where our sheep • 
 
 Half-asleep 
 Tinkle homeward through the twilight, stray or stop 
 
 As they crop. 
 
 Now, — the single little turret that remains 
 
 On the plains, 
 By the caper overrooted, by the gourd 
 
 Overscored, 
 While the patching houseleek's head of blossom winks 
 
 Through the chinks, 
 Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time 
 
 Sprang sublime. 
 
 Nor must we fail to note the pure lyric quality of the 
 songs, like that from "Pippa Passes," "Wanting is — 
 What?" and "Pisgah Sights." Then, like every pas- 
 sionate poet, Browning in his narrative verse will fre- 
 quently pass over into a lyric vein. What can be more 
 beautiful than this passage in his early poem, " Paracel- 
 sus," from which we cite a few lines? 
 
 Then all is still: earth is a wintry clod: 
 
 But spring-wind, like a dancing psaltress, passes 
 
 Over its breast to waken it. . . . 
 
 Above birds fly in merry flocks, the lark 
 
 Soars up and up, shivering for very joy: 
 
 Afar the ocean sleeps: white fishing-gulls 
 
 Flit where the strand is purple with its tribe 
 
 Of nesting limpets : savage creatures seek 
 
 Their loves in wood and plain — and God renews 
 
 His ancient rapture. 
 
 Of some of the striking features of Browning's poetic 
 art much might be said. In spite of too much of harsh 
 and halting colloquialism, and of a tendency towards the 
 grotesque, and a love of surprise, his versification (and 
 
xvi INTRODUCTION 
 
 his blank verse in particular) has a quality of rhythm 
 which is all its own, and may be profitably compared 
 with Tennyson's — in, say, the "Idylls of the King." 
 But even more noticeable than his blank verse is Brown- 
 ing's rimed verse. He has extraordinary facility in rim- 
 ing; double and triple rimes abound. For an example you 
 may look into one of the most fascinating of his poems, 
 " The Flight of the Duchess," — a deliberate attempt at 
 the grotesque. What jocularity in rime is this! 
 
 Blessed was he whose back ached with the jerkin 
 
 His sire was wont to do forest-work in; 
 
 Blesseder he who nobly sunk " Ohs " 
 
 And " Ahs " while he tugged on his grandsire's trunk-hose. 
 
 Which should lead us on to say something concerning 
 Browning's humor — a very pervasive quality in his 
 poems, jetting 'out upon us in most unexpected ways. 
 We have been able to give only one familiar example, 
 the "Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister." Many others 
 may be found; indeed, it is the poet's underlying sense 
 of humor which makes possible such a masterpiece of 
 ironic portraiture as "The Bishop Orders his Tomb at 
 Saint Praxed's Church," of which Ruskin says, paying a 
 tribute to Browning's profound insight into the Renais- 
 sance, that he knows no other piece of modern English 
 " in which there is so much told of the Renaissance spirit 
 — its worldliness, inconsistency, pride, hypocrisy, igno- 
 rance of itself, love of art, of luxury, and of good Latin." 
 
 Finally, much might be said of the definitely auto- 
 biographical parts of Browning's work, and more espe- 
 cially of the traces to be found in it of the marriage which 
 links his name with that of the great woman-poet whose 
 heart was as passionate and whose mind was almost as 
 brilliant as his own. 
 
INTRODUCTION xvii 
 
 here, we have the most striking of his addresses to his 
 wife; but her influence, her presence in his life, even after 
 his bereavement, is felt in many a poem: it gives a 
 quality to his love-poems which finds a parallel only in 
 Elizabeth Barrett Browning's unapproached "Sonnets 
 from the Portuguese." But of this we shall say more in 
 the short biographical section which follows. 
 
 II. Browning's Life and Personality 
 
 We feel Browning's stalwart, buoyant personality 
 everywhere in his work. It is commonly remarked that, 
 be the dramatic figure what it may, man or woman, 
 ancient or modern, the voice that speaks through it is 
 the voice of Robert Browning. There is much truth in 
 this; most of his personages have a Browning manner and 
 bearing. But this must not mislead us to the conclusion 
 that his "fifty men and women," and more, have no dis- 
 tinct and individual qualities of their own, — his Fra 
 Lippo Lippi, and Andrea del Sarto, for example. Never- 
 theless, the various " dramatis personse " are so conceived 
 and handled that they illuminate Browning's own fun- 
 damental conclusions about life. In a large sense he 
 is a preaching poet; a rimer of "morality plays." 
 
 Thus it may be said that his life is in his work. True 
 of him more than of most poets are the following words 
 from a letter which the present writer received from 
 Browning's distinguished contemporary, William Morris: 
 " For my part I think any biography of men engaged in 
 art and literature is absolutely worthless: their works are 
 their biography." This was Browning's general feeling, 
 too, as some of his poems declare. The few facts that 
 call for record here are these: 
 
 Robert Browning was born May 7, 1812, in Camberwell, 
 
xviii INTRODUCTION 
 
 London, a suburb in the locality made famous by Ruskin, 
 who lived at Heme Hill nearby, of which he has left a 
 fascinating description in his " Praeterita." His father 
 was a great lover of books, and the boy caught the pas- 
 sion. He went to school; then at fourteen studied under 
 tutors; and at eighteen was matriculated at London 
 University, where he spent two years. This schooling 
 and formal studying was the least part of his education. 
 He had developed in a wholesome, all-round fashion: 
 knew Latin and French well, and was becoming proficient 
 in Greek too. He had loved nature; had roamed woods 
 and fields; had kept pet animals of various kinds, being 
 always a lover of animals (as the poems here show) , and 
 had made collections of one sort and another. He had 
 studied music and art to some purpose — in fact, wavered 
 as to whether these arts or that of poetry should claim 
 his life-devotion; He learned also to ride, dance, box, 
 and fence. Also he browsed and meditated much; and 
 we have a striking word-picture of him lying for hours 
 on the grass and looking out from a high spot near his 
 home upon the great city whose swarming humanity 
 lent it its chief interest for him. 
 
 He began early to versify, and received encouragement 
 from his proud parents. But it was not until his genius 
 caught fire from contact with another poet who made 
 a profound impression upon him, that he produced any- 
 thing really individual. He accidentally picked up from 
 a bookstall a copy of Shelley. He had never heard the 
 name, but soon found out the main facts about the dead 
 poet; and his mother bought him a set of Shelley. The 
 result was his first notable poem, "Pauline" (January, 
 1833). A little later followed "Paracelsus,'' which 
 brought him some recognition from people of note — 
 among them the actor Macready, for whom he proceeded 
 
INTRODUCTION xix 
 
 to write a play, "Strafford/' which was produced at 
 Covent Garden theater by that actor and Miss Helen 
 Faucit. The most difficult of his poems followed, "Bor- 
 dello," while writing which he made his first visit to 
 Italy, the country which he has spoken of as his 
 "University." He then wrote his other dramas one after 
 another (see Chronological Table, p. xxvi), and many of 
 his famous short poems, which he published in the very 
 unusual form of thin paper-covered volumes, called 
 "Bells and Pomegranates," now among the book- 
 collector's great treasures. 
 
 Suddenly into his life of free and varied enjoyment 
 came the great change that followed upon his meeting 
 a fellow-poet of whom he had heard something, Elizabeth 
 Barrett — then a fragile, couch-ridden invalid. They 
 loved, and Browning proposed marriage. Although a 
 physician held out hopes that removal to Italy might 
 restore the invalid to health, Mr. Barrett objected to his 
 daughter's marrying. The affianced pair took the matter 
 into their own hands. They were quietly married, with- 
 out her father's knowledge, September 12, 1846. Then 
 they met by agreement and went to Paris and thence to 
 Italy, where they lived — for the most part at Florence, 
 in the famous old palace of Casa Guidi — during the fif- 
 teen years of their married life, journeying occasionally 
 to England and Paris. Two sons were born to them, one 
 of whom died. Husband and wife worked at their craft 
 very independently, and the story of their life and labors 
 and friendships in Florence is an engaging chapter in our 
 literary history. Of the intercourse of these two great 
 lovers and poets the great memorial is their correspond- 
 ence, published a few years ago — with not a little pro- 
 test against this laying bare of such sacred intimacies — 
 by their surviving son, Robert Barrett Browning. 
 
XX INTRODUCTION 
 
 Mrs. Browning died in 1861. Browning then left Italy 
 for England and made his home in London. By this 
 time his long-neglected work began to make its way with 
 the public. There was an increasing demand for his 
 books, and for volumes of selections from them. Honors 
 came to him from the Universities. Then he began in 
 1868 the publication of his longest work, " The Ring and 
 the Book/' completed in six volumes. Thereafter he 
 continued to produce one work after another until his 
 output was prodigious. All this while he was more and 
 more of a favorite in cultivated circles, and was seen 
 much at social gatherings and functions — a most genial, 
 lovable man, who shared in the life about him with the 
 zest and the unaffected simplicity that won him a host 
 of friends. 
 
 It was in 1882, while negotiating for the purchase of 
 a villa at Asolo, that he was taken ill, and died at his 
 son's home in Venice on December 12, 1889. His country- . 
 men insisted upon his being brought home to rest in his 
 native country, and he was buried in Westminster Abbey 
 on the last day of the year. Italy did not fail to honor 
 him also: on the wall of the Rezzonico Palace where he 
 died she has placed a memorial tablet upon which appear 
 the lines from "De Gustibus": 
 
 Open my heart and you will see 
 Graved inside of it, "Italy." 
 
 The best generalized impression of the poet's vigorous 
 personality is that contained in the following lines by his 
 great and admiring contemporary, Walter Savage Landor, 
 whose name and fame are so clearly associated with his 
 younger friend's beloved Italy: 
 
INTRODUCTION xxi 
 
 Browning! Since Chaucer was alive and hale 
 
 No man has walked along our roads with step 
 
 So active, so inquiring eye, or tongue 
 
 So varied in discourse. But warmer climes 
 
 Give brighter plumage, stronger wing: the breeze 
 
 Of Alpine heights thou playest with, borne on 
 
 Beyond Sorrento and Amalfi, where 
 
 The Siren waits thee, singing song for song. 
 
SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS 
 
 The poetry is the thing! If you do not like that — 
 and like it greatly — do not touch it. You are not 
 obliged to, for Browning is an elective in the groups 
 of readings for college entrance. Take him up for the 
 joy of the thing, so to speak; because you believe, as the 
 writer has expressed himself in the foregoing Intro- 
 duction, that he will make blood, — brain and heart, — 
 heroism and love and aspiration, — a deeper insight 
 into human nature, for boys and girls in the susceptible 
 adolescent period. 
 
 If you have chosen this edition of the Selections, it is 
 presumably because you agree with the editor's general 
 point of view and method of approach. The main article 
 of his belief is that Browning must be dramatically ap- 
 prehended and rendered. Some other poets demand oral 
 interpretation because of the music of their verse; Brown- 
 ing, because of the dramatic and colloquial form of his. 
 This dramatic rendering may be and must be done without 
 the staginess and the vocal ceremony that touches the 
 risibles of our youth. There are no recipes for the good 
 taste and the sense of proportion which are needed here 
 in conjunction with the deep, sincere feeling of genuine 
 poetic appreciation. The teacher must be an artist, 
 that's all. Nothing further need be said by way of help 
 than what is said with reference to specific poems in the 
 Introduction and the Notes. 
 
 It will pay the teacher to be sure, as soon as a poem has 
 xxiii 
 
Xxiv SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS 
 
 been read, that the imagination of the pupils has been 
 quickened: that scene, situation, persons, stand out for 
 the visualizing faculty with appropriate distinctness. 
 
 The philosophy of those poems that have an obvious 
 philosophy must, of course, be brought home concretely 
 or dramatically — that is, in terms of personality. The 
 word becomes flesh, takes on the hue and color of life. 
 It must live, not as an abstraction, but incorporate in 
 the individuality which the poet creates. 
 
 It is necessary, of course, that the teacher should be 
 thoroughly familiar with most of Browning's work; so 
 that other poems and passages may be drawn upon to 
 throw light upon those here given. 
 
 The editor has chosen, instead of grouping together 
 the few poems given in the college entrance list, to place 
 them in a setting that will help both to develop their 
 wider relations to Browning's work as a whole, and to 
 keep in the back-ground the fact that the reading of 
 Browning subserves college entrance purposes. There is 
 method in the grouping, although here and there con- 
 siderations other than those of likeness of literary species 
 have led to a departure from strict classification. The 
 Notes seek to indicate the nature of the special relation- 
 ships. The teacher will, of course, use his own judgment 
 as to the order of attack according to his own general 
 habits and the quality of his class. He will also find it 
 expedient, doubtless, now to ignore, now to dissent from, 
 and now to amplify the Notes. 
 
 It is advised that the large Browning literature be 
 sparingly used. Let not the encyclopedias, handbooks, 
 and guides be generally or indiscriminately used. Sharp's 
 Life (Great Writers Series) is a good and indispensable 
 general guide and contains a full bibliography. Mrs. On 
 will do for the students, in outlining a poem, what the 
 
SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS XXV 
 
 teacher may wish them to do for themselves; and the 
 same may be said of other primers and handbooks. 
 All, however, may find occasional use, for particular 
 purposes. Special essays, like Dowden's Comparison of 
 Tennyson and Browning (in his "Studies in Literature"), 
 the teacher, with the aid of the bibliography, will consult 
 as occasion demands. Cooke, Corson, Hutton, Nettle- 
 ship, Stedman, Symons, are the most important names 
 in the bibliography. The editions are numerous: the 
 one-volume "Cambridge" edition (Houghton, Mifflin) 
 very convenient; the ''Camberwell" edition (Crowell), 
 the most fully annotated. 
 
 NOTE 
 
 The poems specified in the College Entrance Requirements are: 
 "Cavalier Tunes," "The Lost Leader," "How They Brought the 
 Good News from Ghent to Aix," "Home-Thoughts, from Abroad," 
 ■'Home-Thoughts, from the Sea," "Licident of the French Camp," 
 "Herve Riel," "Pheidippides," "My Last Duchess," "Up at a 
 Villa— Down in the City," "The Italian in England," "The 
 Patriot," " DeGustibus— ," " The Pied Piper," " InstansTyrannus." 
 But, as suggested above, these poems, while they may receive 
 special attention, should have their setting in at least as many more 
 poems as have been included in this volume. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE 
 
 Browning. 
 
 Contemporary Literature. 
 
 1812. 
 
 Born in London, 
 berwell.) 
 
 (Cam- 
 
 1826. 
 
 1829. 
 
 (Mrs. Browning's first 
 writings — Essay on 
 Mind, etc.) 
 
 Attends University Col- 
 lege, then first opened. 
 
 1832. Pauline written, 
 lished 1833. 
 
 pub- 
 
 Elizabeth Barrett, Dar- 
 win, and Tennyson, born 
 in 1809; Thackeray, 1811; 
 Dickens, 1812. In 1812 
 Wordsworth was 40; 
 Scott, 41; Coleridge, 42; 
 Lamb, 45; Byron, 24; 
 Shelley, 20; Keats and 
 Coleridge, 17. 
 
 1813. Shelley's Queen Mab. 
 Southey, laureate. 
 
 1814. Scott's Waverley. 
 
 1816. Bryant's Thanatopsis. 
 Byron's Childe Harold. 
 
 1818. Irving's Sketch-Book. 
 
 1819. Ruskin born. 
 
 1820. George Eliot, Spencer, 
 Tyndall born. Keats, im- 
 portant poems. 
 
 1821. Cooper's Spy. Keats 
 died. 
 
 1822. Irving's Bracebridge Hall. 
 Arnold born. Shelley 
 died. 
 
 1824. Byron died. 
 
 1825. Carlyle's Life of Schiller. 
 
 1830. Tennyson's Poems, chiefly 
 Lyrical. 
 
 1831. Foe's Raven. Whittier's 
 Legends of New England. 
 
 1832. Goethe and Scott died. 
 
 XXVI 
 
CHRONOLOGIC A L TA BLE — Continued 
 
 xxvii 
 
 Browning. 
 
 Contemporary Literature. 
 
 1833. 
 
 1835. 
 
 1S37. 
 
 1838. 
 
 1840. 
 1841. 
 
 1842. 
 1843. 
 
 1844. 
 1845. 
 1846. 
 
 1847. 
 
 1849. 
 1850. 
 
 1851. 
 1855. 
 1856. 
 
 Travels to Russia and 
 first visits Italy. (Mrs. 
 Browning's translation of 
 Prometheus Bound.) 
 Paracelsus. 
 
 Strafford acted. 
 Again visits Italy. (Mrs. 
 Browning's Seraphim and 
 Other Poems.) 
 
 Sordello. 
 Pippa Passes. 
 
 King Victor and King 
 Charles. Dramatic Lyrics. 
 Return of the Druses. A 
 Blot on the 'Scutcheon. 
 Colombe's Birthday. 
 
 (Mrs. Browning's Poems.) 
 
 Dramatic Romances and 
 Lyrics. 
 
 Luria. A Soul's Tragedy. 
 (These published in eight 
 numbers of Bells and 
 Pomegranates.) Married 
 to Elizabeth Barrett. 
 Settles in Florence at 
 Casa Guidi. 
 
 His mother dies. A son 
 born — Robert Wiede- 
 mann Browning. 
 Christmas Eve and Easter 
 Day. (Mrs. Browning's 
 Sonnets from the Portu- 
 guese.) 
 
 (Mrs. Browning's Casa 
 Guidi Windows.) 
 Men and Women. 
 
 (Mrs. Browning's Aurora 
 Leigh.) 
 
 1833. Carlyle's Sartor Resartus. 
 Tennyson's Poems. 
 
 1836. Dickens's Boz and Pick- 
 wick. 
 
 1837. Victoria queen. 
 
 1839. Longfellow's Hyperion. 
 
 1 84 1 . Dumas 's Monte Crista and 
 Longfellow's Voices of the 
 Night. 
 
 1842. Macaulay's Lays of An- 
 cient Rome. 
 
 1843. Wordsworth, laureate. 
 Dickens's Christmas 
 Carol. Ruskin's Modern 
 Painters (vol. i). 
 
 1844. Thackeray's Barry Lyn- 
 don. 
 
 1845. Hawthorne's Mosses from 
 an Old Manse. 
 
 1846. Dickens's Dombey and 
 Son. 
 
 1847. Tennyson's Princess. 
 
 1848. Thackeray's Vanity Fair. 
 (Revolution abroad.) 
 
 1849. Emerson's Representative 
 Men. 
 
 1850. Wordsworth died. Tenny- 
 son, laureate. 
 
 1851. 
 1855. 
 
 1856. 
 
 Hawthorne's House of the 
 Seven Gables. 
 Matthew Arnold's Poems. 
 Longfellow's Hiawatha. 
 Motley's Dutch Republic. 
 Emerson's English Traits. 
 
XXVIU 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE — Condndedi 
 
 Browning. 
 
 Contemporary Literature. 
 
 1860. 
 
 1861. 
 
 1862. 
 
 1863. 
 
 1864. 
 1866. 
 1867. 
 
 1868. 
 1871. 
 
 1872. 
 1873. 
 
 1875. 
 
 (Mrs. Browning's Poems 
 he] ore Congress.) 
 
 Mrs. Browning dies. 
 Browning leaves Italy 
 and settles in London. 
 (Mrs. Browning's Last 
 Poems.) 
 
 Complete Edition of his 
 works. 
 
 Dramatis Personae. 
 His father dies. 
 Honorary M.A. of Ox- 
 ford. 
 
 The Ring and the Book. 
 Balaustion's Adventure. 
 Prince H ohenstiel- 
 Schwarzgau. 
 
 Fifine at the Fair. 
 
 Red Cotton 
 Country. 
 Aristophanes' 
 The Inn Album. 
 
 Nightcap 
 Apology. 
 
 1876. Pacchiarotto. 
 
 1877. Agamemnon of Aeschylus. 
 
 1878. La Saisiaz. The Two 
 Poets o/ Croisic. 
 
 1879-80. Dramatic Idylls. 
 
 1883. Jocoseria. 
 
 1884. Ferishtah's Fancies. 
 1887. Parlcyings with Certain 
 
 People. 
 1889. Asolando. Dies at Venice. 
 
 Buried in Westminster 
 
 Abbey. 
 
 1860. George Eliot's Mill on 
 the Floss. Holmes's Pro- 
 fessor at the Breakfa.st 
 Table. 
 
 1 86 1 . George Eliot 's Silas Mar- 
 
 1862. Ruskin's Unto this Last. 
 
 1863. George Eliot's Romola. 
 
 1864. Tennyson's Enoch Arden. 
 
 1866. George Eliot's Felix Holt. 
 
 1867. Longfellow's translation 
 of Dante's Divine Comedy 
 
 1868. Morris's Earthly Paradise. 
 
 1871. Darwin's Descent of Man. 
 Meredith's Harry Rich- 
 mond. Swinburne's *Songfs 
 before Sunrise. 
 
 1872. Hardy's Under the Green- 
 wood Tree. 
 
 1873. Mill's Autobiography. 
 
 1875. Tennyson's Queen Mary. 
 Arnold's God and the 
 Bible. 
 
 1876. Morris's Sigurd the Vol- 
 sung. 
 
 1877. Tennyson's Harold. 
 
 1878. Morley's Diderot and the 
 Encyclopedists. 
 
 1879. Henry James's Daisy 
 Miller. 
 
 1883. Correspondence of Carlyle 
 and Emerson. Steven- 
 son's Treasure Island. 
 
 1884. Tennyson's Becket. 
 1887. Stevenson's Underwoods. 
 
 1889. Tennyson's Demeter and 
 other Poems. 
 
SELECT POEMS 
 
 OP 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP 
 
 You know, we French stormed Ratisbon: 
 
 A mile or so away, 
 On a little mound, Napoleon , 
 
 Stood on our storming-day; 
 With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 5 
 
 Legs wide, arms locked behind. 
 As if to balance the prone brow 
 
 Oppressive with its mind. 
 
 Just as perhaps he mused " My plans 
 
 That soar, to earth may fall, 10 
 
 Let once my army-leader Lannes 
 
 Waver at yonder wall," — 
 Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew 
 
 A rider, bound on bound 
 Full-galloping; nor bridle drew 15 
 
 Until he reached the mound. 
 
 Then off there flung in smiling joy, 
 
 And held himself erect 
 By just his horse's mane, a boy: 
 
 You hardly could suspect — 20 
 
 1 
 
2 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 (So tight he kept his lips compressed, 
 
 Scarce any blood came through) 
 You looked twice ere you saw his breast 
 
 Was all but shot in two. 
 
 "Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace 25 
 
 We've got you Ratisbon! 
 The Marshal's in the market-place, 
 
 And you'll be there anon 
 To see your flag-bird flap his vans 
 
 Where I, to heart's desire, 30 
 
 Perched him!" The chief's eye flashed; his plans 
 
 Soared up again like fire. 
 
 The chief's eye flashed ; but presently 
 
 Softened itself, as sheathes 
 A film the mother-eagle's eye 35 
 
 When her bruised eaglet breathes; 
 " You're wounded! " " Nay," the soldier's pride 
 
 Touched to the quick, he said: 
 "I'm killed, Sire!" And his chief beside, 
 
 Smiling the boy fell dead. 40 
 
 "HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS 
 FROM GHENT TO AIX" 
 
 [16-] 
 
 I SPRANG to the stirrup, and Joris, and he; 
 
 I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three; 
 
 "Good speed!" cried the watch, as the gate-bolts 
 
 undrew ; 
 "Speed!" echoed the wall to us galloping through; 
 Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, 5 
 
 And into the midnight we galloped abreast. 
 
"HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS" 3 
 
 Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace 
 Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our 
 
 place; 
 I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight, 
 Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique right, 10 
 Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit. 
 Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit. 
 
 Twas moonset at starting; but while we drew near 
 Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned clear; 
 At Boom, a great yellow star came out to see; 15 
 
 At Diiffeld, 'twas morning as plain as could be; 
 And from Mecheln church-steeple we heard the half- 
 chime. 
 So Joris broke silence with, " Yet there is time ! '' 
 
 At Aershot, up leaped of a sudden the sun, 
 
 And against him the cattle stood black every one, 20 
 
 To stare through the mist at us galloping past, 
 
 And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last, 
 
 With resolute shoulders, each butting pway 
 
 The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray: 
 
 And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear bent 
 
 back 25 
 
 For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track; 
 And one eye's black intelligence, — ever that glance 
 O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance! 
 And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon 
 His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on. 30 
 
 By Hasselt, Dirck groaned; and cried Joris, "Stay spur! 
 Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in her. 
 
4 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 We'll remember at Aix" — for one heard the quick 
 
 wheeze 
 Of her chest, saw the stretched neck and staggering 
 
 knees, 
 And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank, 35 
 
 As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank. 
 
 So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, 
 
 Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky; 
 
 The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh, 
 
 'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like 
 
 chaff; 40 
 
 Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white, 
 And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is in sight!" 
 
 "How they'll greet us!" — and all in a moment his 
 
 roan 
 Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone; 
 And there was my Roland to bear the whole weight 45 
 Of the news which alone could save Aix from her fate, 
 With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the brim, 
 And with circles of red for his eye-sockets' rim. 
 
 Then I cast loose my buff coat, each holster let fall. 
 Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all, 50 
 
 Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his ear. 
 Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse without peer; 
 Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, any noise, bad 
 
 or good, 
 Till at length into Aix Roland galloped and stood. 
 
 And all I remember is — friends flocking round 55 
 
 As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the ground; 
 And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine, 
 
THROUGH THE METIDJA TO ABD-EL-KADR 5 
 
 As I poured down his throat our last measure of wine, 
 Which (the burgesses voted by common consent) 
 Was no more than his due who brought good news from 
 Ghent. 60 
 
 THROUGH THE METIDJA TO ABD-EI^KADR 
 
 As I ride, as I ride, 
 
 With a full heart for my guide, 
 
 So its tide rocks my side, 
 
 As I ride, as I ride, 
 
 That, as I were double-eyed. 
 
 He, in whom our Tribes confide. 
 
 Is descried, ways untried, 
 
 As I ride, as I ride. 
 
 As I ride, as I ride 
 
 To our Chief and his Allied, 10 
 
 Who dares chide my heart's pride 
 
 As I ride, as I ride? 
 
 Or are witnesses denied — 
 
 Through the desert waste and wide 
 
 Do I glide unespied 
 
 As I ride, as I ride? 15 
 
 As I ride, as I ride, 
 
 When an inner voice has cried, 
 
 The sands slide, nor abide 
 
 (As I ride, as I ride) 20 
 
 O'er each visioned homicide 
 
 That came vaunting (has he lied?) 
 
 To reside — where he died, 
 
 As I ride, as I ride. 
 
6 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 As I ride, as I ride, 25 
 
 Ne'er has spur my swift horse plied, 
 
 Yet his hide, streaked and pied, 
 
 As I ride, as I ride. 
 
 Shows where sweat has sprung and dried, 
 
 — Zebra-footed, ostrich-thighed — 30 
 
 How has vied stride with stride 
 
 As I ride, as I ride! 
 
 As I ride, as I ride, 
 
 Could I loose what Fate has tied, 
 
 Ere I pried, she should hide 35 
 
 (As I ride, as I ride) 
 
 All that's meant me — satisfied 
 
 When the Prophet and the Bride 
 
 Stop veins I'd have subside 
 
 As I ride, as I ride! 40 
 
 MULEYKEH 
 
 If a stranger passed the tent of Hoseyn, he cried "A 
 
 churl's!" 
 Or haply "God help the man who has neither salt nor 
 
 bread!" 
 — "Nay," would a friend exclaim, "he needs nor pity 
 
 nor scorn 
 More than who spends small thought on the shore-sand, 
 
 picking pearls. 
 Holds but in light esteem the seed -sort, bears instead 5 
 On his breast a moon-like prize, some orb which of night 
 
 makes morn. 
 
 "What if no flocks and herds enrich the son of Sinan? 
 They went when his tribe was mulct, ten thousand camels 
 the due, 
 
MULEYKEH 7 
 
 Blood-value paid perforce for a murder done of old. 
 'God gave them, let them go! But never since time 
 
 began, 10 
 
 Muleykeh, peerless mare, owned master the match of you, 
 And you are my prize, my Pearl: I laugh at men^s land 
 
 and gold!' 
 
 " So in the pride of his soul laughs Hoseyn — and right, 
 
 I say. 
 Do the ten steeds run a race of glory? Outstripping all, 
 Ever Muleykeh stands first steed at the victor's staff. 15 
 Who started, the owner's hope, gets shamed and named, 
 
 that day. 
 * Silence,' or, last but one, is ^ The Cuffed,' as we use to call 
 Whom the paddock's lord thrusts forth. Right, Hoseyn, 
 
 I say, to laugh!" 
 
 *' Boasts he Muleykeh the Pearl?" the stranger replies: 
 
 " Be sure 
 On him I waste nor scorn nor pity, but lavish both 20 
 On Duhl the son of Sheyban, who withers away in heart 
 For envy of Hoseyn's luck. Such sickness admits no 
 
 cure. 
 A certain poet has sung, and sealed the same with an 
 
 oath, 
 'For the vulgar — flocks and herds! The Pearl is a 
 
 prize apart.'" 
 
 Lo, Duhl the son of Sheyban comes riding to Hoseyn's 
 tent, 25 
 
 And he casts his saddle down, and enters and "Peace!" 
 bids he. 
 
 " You are poor, I know the cause : my plenty shall mend 
 the wrong. 
 
8 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Tis said of your Pearl — the price of a hundred camels 
 
 spent 
 In her purchase were scarce ill paid: such prudence is far 
 
 from me 
 Who proffer a thousand. Speak! Long parley may last 
 
 too long." 30 
 
 Said Hoseyn, " You feed young beasts a many, of famous 
 
 breed, 
 Slit-eared, unblemished, fat, true offspring of Muzennem: 
 There stumbles no weak-eyed she in the line as it climbs 
 
 the hill. 
 But I love Muleykeh's face: her forefront whitens indeed 
 Like a yellowish wave's cream-crest. Your camels — 
 
 go gaze on them! 35 
 
 Her fetlock is foam-splashed too. Myself am the richer 
 
 still." 
 
 A year goes by: lo, back to the tent again rides Duhl. 
 " You are open-hearted, ay — moist-handed, a very prince. 
 Why should I speak of sale? Be the mare your simple 
 
 gift! 
 My son is pined to death for her beauty : my wife prompts 
 
 'Fool, 40 
 
 Beg for his sake the Pearl! Be God the rewarder, since 
 God pays debts seven for one: who squanders on Him 
 
 shows thrift.' " 
 
 Said Hoseyn, " God gives each man one life, like a lamp, 
 
 then gives 
 That lamp due measure of oil : lamp lighted — hold high, 
 
 wave wide 
 Its comfort for others to share! once quench it, what 
 
 help is left? 45 
 
MULEYKEH 9 
 
 The oil of your lamp is your son: I shine while Muleykeh 
 
 lives. 
 Would I beg your son to cheer my dark if Muleykeh died? 
 It is life against life: what good avails to the life-bereft?" 
 
 Another year, and — hist! What craft is it Duhl designs? 
 He alights not at the door of the tent as he did last 
 
 time, 50 
 
 But, creeping behind, he gropes his stealthy way by the 
 
 trench 
 Half-round till he finds the flap in the folding, for night 
 
 combines 
 With the robber — and such is he : Duhl, covetous up to 
 
 crime. 
 Must wring from Hoseyn's grasp the Pearl, by whatever 
 
 the wrench. 
 
 " He was hunger-bitten, I heard : I tempted with half my 
 
 store, 55 
 
 And a gibe was all my thanks. Is he generous like Spring 
 
 dew? 
 Account the fault to me who chaffered with such an one! 
 He has killed, to feast chance comers, the creature he 
 
 rode : nay, more — 
 For a couple of singing-girls his robe has he torn in two: 
 I will beg! Yet I nowise gained by the tale of my wife 
 
 and son. 60 
 
 " I swear by the Holy House, my head will I never wash 
 Till I filch his Pearl away. Fair dealing I tried, then 
 
 guile, 
 And now I resort to force. He said we must live or die: 
 Let him die, then, — let me live! Be bold — but not 
 
 too rash! 
 
10 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 I have found me a peeping-place : breast, bury your 
 breathing while 65 
 
 I explore for myself! Now, breathe! He deceived me 
 not, the spy! 
 
 ''As he said — there lies in peace Hoseyn — how happy! 
 
 Beside 
 Stands tethered the Pearl: thrice winds her headstall 
 
 about his wrist: 
 Tis therefore he sleeps so sound — the moon through the 
 
 roof reveals. 
 And, loose on his left, stands too that other, known far 
 
 and wide, 70 
 
 Buheyseh, her sister born: fleet is she yet ever missed 
 The winning tail's fire-flash a-stream past the thunderous 
 
 heels. 
 
 "No less she stands saddled and bridled, this second, in 
 
 case some thief 
 Should enter and seize and fly with the first, as I mean 
 
 to do. 
 What then? The Pearl is the Pearl: once mount her we 
 
 both escape." 75 
 
 Through the skirt-fold in glides Duhl, — so a serpent 
 
 disturbs no leaf 
 In a bush as he parts the twigs entwining a nest: clean 
 
 through, 
 He is noiselessly at his work: as he planned, he performs 
 
 the rape. 
 
 He has set the tent-door wide, has buckled the girth, has 
 
 clipped 
 The headstall away from the wrist he leaves thrice bound 
 
 as before, 80 
 
mulSykeh 11 
 
 He springs on the Pearl, is launched on the desert like 
 
 bolt from bow. 
 Up starts our plundered man: from his breast though 
 
 the heart be ripped, 
 Yet his mind has the mastery: behold, in a minute 
 
 more, 
 He is out and off and away on Buheyseh, whose worth 
 
 we know! 
 
 And Hoseyn — his blood turns flame, he has learned 
 
 long since to ride, 85 
 
 And Buheyseh does her part, — they gain — they are 
 
 gaining fast 
 On the fugitive pair, and Duhl has Ed-Darraj to cross 
 
 and quit. 
 And to reach the ridge El-Saban, — no safety till that be 
 
 spied ! 
 And Buheyseh is, bound by bound, but a horse-length 
 
 off at last. 
 For the Pearl has missed the tap of the heel, the touch 
 
 of the bit. 90 
 
 She shortens her stride, she chafes at her rider the strange 
 
 and queer: 
 Buheyseh is mad with hope — beat sister she shall and 
 
 must, 
 Though Duhl, of the hand and heel so clumsy, she has 
 
 to thank. 
 She is near now, nose by tail — they are neck by croup 
 
 — joy! fear! 
 What folly makes Hoseyn shout ^^Dog Duhl, Damned 
 
 son of the Dust, 95 
 
 Touch the right ear and press with your foot my Pearl's 
 
 left flank!" 
 
12 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 And Duhl was wise at the word, and Muleykeh as prompt 
 perceived 
 
 Who was urging redoubled pace, and to hear him was to 
 obey, 
 
 And a leap indeed gave she, and evanished forevermore. 
 
 And Hoseyn looked one long last look as who, all be- 
 reaved, 100 
 
 Looks, fain to follow the dead so far as the living may: 
 
 Then he turned Buheyseh's neck slow homeward, weeping 
 sore. 
 
 And, lo, in the sunrise, still sat Hoseyn upon the ground 
 Weeping: and neighbors came, the tribesmen of Benu- 
 
 Asad 
 In the vale of green Er-Rass, and they questioned him 
 
 of his grief; 105 
 
 And he told from first to last how, serpent-like, Duhl had 
 
 wound 
 His way to the nest, and how Duhl rode like an ape, so 
 
 bad! 
 And how Buheyseh did wonders, yet Pearl remained 
 
 with the thief. 
 
 And they jeered him, one and all: "Poor Hoseyn is 
 
 crazed past hope! 
 How else had he wrought himself his ruin, in fortune's 
 
 spite? 110 
 
 To have simply held the tongue were a task for boy or 
 
 girl. 
 And here were Muleykeh again, the eyed like an antelope. 
 The child of his heart by day, the wife of his breast by 
 
 night!" — 
 "And the beaten in speed!" wept Hoseyn. "You never 
 
 have loved my Pearl." 
 
TRAY 13 
 
 TRAY 
 
 Sing me a hero! Quench my thirst 
 Of soul, ye bards! 
 
 Quoth Bard the first: 
 *' Sir Olaf, the good knight, did don 
 His helm and eke his habergeon" . . . 
 Sir Olaf and his bard ! 5 
 
 "That sin-scathed brow" (quoth Bard the second), 
 
 "That eye wide ope as though Fate beckoned 
 
 My hero to some steep, beneath 
 
 Which precipice smiled tempting death" . . . 
 
 You too without your host have reckoned! 10 
 
 "A beggar-child" (let's hear this third!) 
 
 "Sat on a quay's edge: like a bird 
 
 Sang to herself at careless play. 
 
 And fell into the stream. ' Dismay! 
 
 Help, you the standers-by!' None stirred. 15 
 
 " Bystanders reason, think of wives 
 
 And children ere they risk their lives. 
 
 Over the balustrade has bounced 
 
 A mere instinctive dog, and pounced 
 
 Plumb on the prize. 'How well he dives! 20 
 
 "'Up he comes with the child, see, tight 
 In mouth, alive too, clutched from quite 
 A depth of ten feet — twelve, I bet! 
 Good dog! What, off again? There's yet 
 Another child to save? All right! 25 
 
14 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 " ' How strange we saw no other fall ! 
 
 It's instinct in the animal. 
 
 Good dog! But he's a long while under: 
 
 If he got drowned I should not wonder — 
 
 Strong current, that against the wall ! 30 
 
 " ' Here he comes, holds in mouth this time 
 
 — What may the thing be? Well, that's prime! 
 
 Now, did you ever? Reason reigns 
 
 In man alone, since all Tray's pains 
 
 Have fished — the child's doll from the slime!' 35 
 
 " And so, amid the laughter gay. 
 
 Trotted my hero off, — old Tray, — 
 
 Till somebody, prerogatived 
 
 With reason, reasoned : ' Why he dived, 
 
 His brain would show us, I should say. 40 
 
 " ' John, go and catch — or, if needs be, 
 
 Purchase — that animal for me! 
 
 By vivisection, at expense 
 
 Of half-an-hour and eighteenpence, 
 
 How brain secretes dog's soul, we'll see!''' 45 
 
 DONALD 
 
 " Will you hear my story also, 
 
 — Huge Sport, brave adventure in plenty?" 
 The boys were a band from Oxford, 
 
 The oldest of whom w^as twenty. 
 
 The bothy we held carouse in 5 
 
 Was bright with fire and candle; 
 Tale followed tale like a merry-go-round 
 
 Whereof Sport turned the handle. 
 
DONALD 15 
 
 In our eyes and noses — turf -smoke : 
 
 In our ears a tune from the trivet, 10 
 
 Whence " Boiling, boiling," the kettle sang, 
 
 "And ready for fresh Glenlivet." 
 
 So, feat capped feat, with a vengeance: 
 Truths, though, — the lads were loyal: 
 
 "Grouse, five-score brace to the bag! 15 
 
 Deer, ten hours' stalk of the Royal!" 
 
 Of boasting, not one bit, boys! 
 Only there seemed to settle 
 Somehow above your curly heads, 
 
 — Plain through the singing kettle, 20 
 
 Palpable through the cloud, 
 
 As each new-puffed Havana 
 Rewarded the teller's well-told tale, — 
 
 This vaunt " To Sport — Hosanna ! 
 
 " Hunt, fish, shoot, 25 
 
 Would a man fulfil life's duty! 
 Not to the bodily frame alone 
 
 Does Sport give strength and beauty, 
 
 " But character gains in — courage? 
 
 Ay, sir, and much beside it! 30 
 
 You don't sport, more's the pity; 
 
 You soon would find, if you tried it, 
 
 " Good sportsman means good fellow, 
 
 Sound-hearted he, to the centre; 
 Your mealy-mouthed mild milksops 35 
 
 — There's where the rot can enter! 
 
16 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 '' There's where the dirt will breed 
 
 The shabbiness Sport would banish! 
 Oh no, Sir, no! In your honored case 
 
 All such objections vanish. 40 
 
 " 'Tis known how hard you studied : 
 
 A Double-First — what, the jigger! 
 Give nie but half your Latin and Greek, 
 
 I'll never again touch trigger! 
 
 "Still, tastes are tastes, allow me! 45 
 
 Allow, too, where there's keenness 
 For Sport, there's little likelihood 
 
 Of a man's displaying meanness!" 
 
 So, put on my mettle, I interposed. 
 
 "Will you hear my story?" quoth I. 50 
 
 " Never mind how long since it happed, 
 
 I sat, as we sit, in a bothy; 
 
 " With as merry a band of mates, too, 
 
 Undergrads all on a level: 
 (One's a Bishop, one's gone to the Bench, 55 
 
 And one's gone — well, to the Devil.) 
 
 "When, lo, a scratching and tapping! 
 
 In hobbled a ghastly visitor. 
 Listen to just what he told us himself 
 
 — No need of our playing inquisitor!'^ 60 
 
 Do you happen to know in Ross-shire 
 
 Mount Ben . . . but the name scarce matters: 
 
 Of the naked fact I am sure enough. 
 Though I clothe it in rags and tatters. 
 
DONALD 17 
 
 You may recognize Ben by description; 65 
 
 Behind him — a moor's immenseness: 
 
 Up goes the middle mount of a range, 
 Fringed with its firs in denseness. 
 
 Rimming the edge, its fir-fringe, mind! 
 
 For an edge there is, though narrow; 70 
 
 From end to end of the range, a strip 
 
 Of path runs straight as an arrow. 
 
 And the mountaineer who takes that path 
 
 Saves himself miles of journey 
 He has to plod if he crosses the moor 75 
 
 Through heather, peat, and burnie. 
 
 But a mountaineer he needs must be, 
 
 For, look you, right in the middle 
 Projects bluff Ben — with an end in ich — 
 
 Why planted there, is a riddle: 80 
 
 * 
 Since all Ben's brothers little and big 
 
 Keep rank, set shoulder to shoulder, 
 
 And only this burliest out must bulge 
 
 Till it seems — to the beholder 
 
 From down in the gully, — as if Ben's breast, 85 
 
 To a sudden spike diminished, 
 Would signify to the boldest foot 
 
 " All further passage finished ! " 
 
 Yet the mountaineer who sidles on 
 
 And on to the very bending, 90 
 
 Discovers, if heart and brain be proof, 
 
 No necessary ending. 
 
18 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Foot up, foot down, to the turn abrupt 
 
 Having trod, he, there arriving, 
 Finds — what he took for a point was breadth, 95 
 
 A mercy of Nature's contriving. 
 
 So, he rounds what, when 'tis reached, proves straight, 
 
 From one side gains the other: 
 The wee path widens — resume the march. 
 
 And he foils you, Ben my brother! 100 
 
 But Donald — (that name, I hope, will do) — 
 
 I wrong him if I call " foiling " 
 The tramp of the callant, whistling the while 
 
 As blithe as our kettle's boiling. 
 
 He had dared the danger from boyhood up, 105 
 
 And now, — when perchance was waiting 
 
 A lass at the brig below, — 'twixt mount 
 And moor would he stand debating? 
 
 Moreover this Donald w^as twenty-five, 
 
 A glory of bone and muscle: 110 
 
 Did a fiend dispute the right of way, 
 
 Donald would try a tussle. 
 
 Lightsomely marched he out of the broad 
 
 On to the narrow and narrow; 
 A step more, rounding the angular rock, 115 
 
 Reached the front straight as an arrow. 
 
 He stepped it, safe on the ledge he stood, 
 
 When — whom found he full-facing? 
 What fellow in courage and wariness too. 
 
 Had scouted ignoble pacing, 120 
 
DONALD . 19 
 
 And left low safety to timid mates, 
 
 And made for the dread dear danger, 
 And gained the height where — who could guess 
 
 He would meet with a rival ranger? 
 
 Twas a gold-red stag that stood and stared, 125 
 
 Gigantic and magnific, 
 By the wonder — ay, and the peril — struck 
 
 Intelligent and pacific: 
 
 For a red deer is no fallow deer 
 
 Grown cowardly through park-feeding; 130 
 
 He batters you like a thunderbolt 
 
 If you brave his haunts unheeding. 
 
 I doubt he could hardly perform volte-face 
 
 Had valor advised discretion: 
 You may walk on a rope, but to turn on a rope 135 
 
 No Blondin makes profession. 
 
 Yet Donald must turn, would pride permit, 
 
 Though pride ill brooks retiring: 
 Each eyed each — mute man, motionless beast — 
 
 Less fearing than admiring. 140 
 
 These are the moments when quite new sense, 
 
 To meet some need as novel. 
 Springs up in the brain: it inspired resource: 
 
 — " Nor advance nor retreat but — grovel ! " 
 
 And slowly, surely, never a whit 145 
 
 Relaxing the steady tension 
 Of eye-stare which binds man to beast, — 
 
 By an inch and inch declension, 
 
20 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Sank Donald sidewise down and down: 
 
 Till flat, breast upwards, lying 150 
 
 At his six-foot length, no corpse more still, 
 
 — "If he cross me! The trick's worth trying." 
 
 Minutes were an eternity'; 
 
 But a new sense was created 
 In the stag's brain too; he resolves! Slow, sure, 155 
 
 With eye-stare unabated. 
 
 Feelingly he extends a foot 
 
 Which tastes the way ere it touches 
 Earth's solid and just escapes man's soft, 
 
 Nor hold of the same unclutches 160 
 
 Till its fellow foot, light as a feather whisk. 
 
 Lands itself no less finely : 
 So a mother removes a fly from the face 
 
 Of her babe asleep supinely. 
 
 And now 'tis the haunch and hind-foot's turn 165 
 
 — That's hard: can the beast quite raise it? 
 Yes, traversing half the prostrate length, 
 
 His hoof-tip does not graze it. 
 
 Just one more lift! But Donald, you see, 
 
 Was sportsman first, man after: 170 
 
 A fancy lightened his caution through, 
 
 — He wellnigh broke into laughter: 
 
 " It were nothing short of a miracle ! 
 
 Unrivalled, unexampled — 
 All sporting feats with this feat matched 175 
 
 Were down and dead and trampled!" 
 
DONALD 21 
 
 The last of the legs as tenderly 
 
 Follows the rest : or never 
 Or now is the time! His knife in reach, 
 
 And his right-hand loose — how clever! 180 
 
 For this can stab up the stomach's soft, 
 
 While the left-hand grasps the pastern. 
 A rise on the elbow, and — now's the time 
 
 Or never: this turn's the last turn! 
 
 I shall dare to place myself by God 185 
 
 Who scanned — for he does — each feature 
 
 Of the face thrown up in appeal to him 
 By the agonizing creature. 
 
 Nay, I hear plain words: "Thy gift brings this!" 
 
 Up he sprang, back he staggered, 190 
 
 Over he fell, and with him our friend 
 
 — At following game no laggard. 
 
 Yet he was not dead when they picked next day 
 From the gully's depth the wreck of him; 
 
 His fall had been stayed by the stag beneath, 195 
 
 Who cushioned and saved the neck of him. 
 
 But the rest of his body — why, doctors said. 
 
 Whatever could break was broken; 
 Legs, arms, ribs, all of him looked like a toast 
 
 In a tumbler of port-wine soaken. 200 
 
 "That your life is left you, thank the stag!" 
 Said they when — the slow cure ended — 
 They opened the hospital-door, and thence 
 
 — Strapped, spliced, main fractures mended, 
 
22 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 And minor damage left wisely alone, — 205 
 
 Like an old shoe clouted and cobbled, 
 Out — what went in a Goliath wellnigh, — 
 
 Some half of a David hobbled. 
 
 ''You must ask an alms from house to house: 
 
 Sell the stag's head for a bracket, ' 210 
 
 With its grand twelve tines — I'd buy it myself — 
 And use the skin for a jacket!" 
 
 He was w^iser, made both head and hide 
 
 His win-penny: hands and knees on, 
 Would manage to crawl — poor crab — by the roads 215 
 
 In the misty stalking-season. 
 
 And if he discovered a bothy like this, 
 
 Why, harvest was sure: folk listened. 
 He told his tale to the lovers of Sport: 
 
 Lips twitched, cheeks glowed, eyes glistened. 220 
 
 And when he had come to the close, and spread 
 
 His spoils for the gazers' wonder. 
 With " Gentlemen, here's the skull of the stag 
 
 I was over, thank God, not under!" — 
 
 The company broke out in applause; 225 
 
 "By Jingo, a lucky cripple! 
 Have a munch of grouse and a hunk of bread, 
 
 And a tug, besides, at our tipple!" 
 
 And "There's my pay for your pluck!" cried This, 
 "And mine for your jolly story!" 230 
 
 Cried That, while T'other — but he was drunk — 
 Hiccupped "A trump, a Tory!" 
 
HERVE KIEL 23 
 
 I hope I gave twice as much as the rest; 
 
 For, as Homer would say, " within grate 
 Though teeth kept tongue," my whole soul growled, 235 
 
 "Rightly rewarded, — Ingrate!" 
 
 HERVE RIEL 
 
 I 
 
 On the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen hundred ninety- 
 two. 
 Did the English fight the French, — woe to France! 
 And, the thirty-first of May, helter-skelter through the 
 
 blue. 
 Like a crowd of frightened porpoises a shoal of sharks 
 pursue. 
 Came crowding ship on ship to Saint Malo on the 
 Ranee, 5 
 
 With the English fleet in view. 
 
 II 
 
 Twas the squadron that escaped, with the victor in full 
 chase; 
 First and foremost of the drove, in his great ship, 
 Damfreville ; 
 Close on him fled, great and small, 
 Twenty-two good ships in all; 10 
 
 And they signalled to the place 
 "Help the winners of a race! 
 
 Get us guidance, give us harbor, take us quick — or, 
 
 quicker still. 
 Here's the English can and will!" 
 
24 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 III 
 
 Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and leapt on 
 
 board; 15 
 
 "Why, what hope or chance have ships like these to 
 
 pass?" laughed they: 
 
 " Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all the passage scarred 
 
 and scored. 
 Shall the 'Formidable^ here with her twelve and eighty 
 guns 
 Think to make the river-mouth by the single narrow way, 
 Trust to enter where 'tis ticklish for a craft of twenty 
 tons, 20 
 
 And with flow at full beside? 
 Now, 'tis slackest ebb of tide. 
 Reach the mooring? Rather say, 
 While rock stands or water runs, 
 
 Not a ship will leave the bay!" 25 
 
 IV 
 
 Then was called a council straight. 
 
 Brief and bitter the debate : 
 
 "Here's the English at our heels; would you have them 
 
 take in tow 
 All that's left us of the fleet, linked together stern and 
 
 bow. 
 For a prize to Plymouth Sound? 30 
 
 Better run the ships aground!" 
 
 (Ended Damfreville his speech). 
 "Not a minute more to wait! 
 Let the Captains all and each 
 
 Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels on the 
 beach ! 35 
 
 France must undergo her fate. 
 
HERVE KIEL 25 
 
 V 
 
 *' Give the word!" But no such word 
 Was ever spoke or heard ; 
 
 For up stood, for out stepped, for in struck amid all 
 these 
 — A Captain? A Lieutenant? A Mate — first, second, 
 third? 40 
 
 No such man of mark, and meet 
 With his betters to compete! 
 
 But a simple Breton sailor pressed by Tourville for 
 the fleet, 
 A poor coasting-pilot he, Herve Riel the Croisickese. 
 
 VI 
 
 And "What mockery or malice have we here?" cries 
 Herve Riel: 45 
 
 " Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cowards, fools, 
 or rogues? 
 Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the sound- 
 ings, tell 
 On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell 
 Twixt the offing here and Greve where the river 
 disembogues? 
 Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's 
 for? 50 
 
 Morn and eve, night and day, 
 Have I piloted your bay. 
 Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor. 
 Burn the fleet and ruin France? That were worse 
 than fifty Hogues! 
 Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, believe me 
 there's a way! 55 
 
 Only let me lead the line, 
 
26 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Have the biggest ship to steer, 
 Get this ' Formidable ' clear, 
 Make the others follow mine, 
 
 And I lead them, most and least, by a passage I know 
 well, 60 
 
 Right to Solidor past Greve, 
 
 And there lay them safe and sound; 
 And if one ship misbehave, 
 — Keel so much as grate the ground, 
 Why, I've nothing but my life, — here's my head!" cries 
 Herve Riel. 65 
 
 VII 
 
 Not a minute more to wait. 
 
 ^' Steer us in, then, small and great! 
 
 Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron!" cried 
 its chief. 
 Captains, give the sailor place! 
 
 He is Admiral, in brief. 70 
 
 Still the north-wind, by God's grace! 
 See the noble fellow's face 
 As the big ship, with a bound, 
 Clears the entry like a hound. 
 
 Keeps the passage, as its inch of way were the wide sea's 
 profound ! 75 
 
 See, safe through shoal and rock, 
 
 How they follow in a flock, 
 Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the 
 ground, 
 
 Not a spar that comes to grief! 
 The peril, see, is past, 80 
 
 All are harbored to the last, 
 
 And just as Herve Riel hollas "Anchor!" — sure as fate. 
 Up the English come — too late! 
 
HERVE KIEL 27 
 
 VIII 
 
 So, the storm subsides to calm: 
 
 They see the green trees wave 85 
 
 On the heights o'erlooking Greve. 
 Hearts that bled are stanched with balm. 
 " Just our rapture to enhance, 
 
 Let the English rake the bay, 
 Gnash their teeth and glare askance 90 
 
 As they cannonade away! 
 'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the Ranee!" 
 How hope succeeds despair on each Captain's countenance I 
 Out burst all with one accord, 
 
 "This is Paradise for Hell! 95 
 
 Let France, let France's King 
 Thank the man that did the thing!'' 
 What a shout, and all one word, 
 
 "HerveRiel!" 
 As he stepped in front once more, 100 
 
 Not a symptom of surprise 
 
 In the frank blue Breton eyes, 
 Just the same man as before. 
 
 IX 
 
 Then said Damfreville, " My friend, 
 
 I must speak out at the end, 105 
 
 Though I find the speaking hard. 
 Praise is deeper than the lips: 
 You have saved the King his ships, 
 
 You must name your own reward. 
 'Faith, our sun was near eclipse! 110 
 
 Demand whate'er you will, 
 France remains your debtor still. 
 
 Ask to heart's content and have! or my name's not 
 Damfreville." 
 
28 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 X 
 
 Then a beam of fun outbroke 
 
 On the bearded mouth that spoke, 115 
 
 As the honest heart laughed through 
 
 Those frank eyes of Breton blue: 
 
 " Since I needs must say my say, 
 
 Since on board the duty's done. 
 
 And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, what is it but 
 a run?— 120 
 
 Since 'tis ask and have, I may — 
 
 Since the others go ashore — 
 Come! A good whole holiday! 
 
 Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the Belle 
 Aurore!" 
 
 That he asked and that he got, — nothing more. 125 
 
 XI 
 
 Name and deed alike are lost: 
 Not a pillar nor a post 
 
 In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell; 
 Not a head in white and black 
 
 On a single fishing-smack, 130 
 
 In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack 
 
 All that France saved from the fight whence England 
 bore the bell. 
 Go to Paris: rank on rank 
 
 Search the heroes flung pell-mell 
 On the Louvre, face and flank! 135 
 
 You shall look long enough ere you come to Herve 
 Kiel. 
 So, for better and for worse, 
 Herve Riel, accept my verse! 
 
PHEIDIPPIDES 29 
 
 In my verse, Herve Riel, do thou once more 
 Save the squadron, honor France, love thy wife the Belle 
 Aurore ! 140 
 
 PHEIDIPPIDES 
 
 Xaipere, viKw/xev 
 
 First I salute this soil of the blessed, river and rock! 
 Gods of my birthplace, daemons and heroes, honor to all! 
 Then I name thee, claim thee for our patron, co-equal in 
 
 praise 
 — Ay, with Zeus the Defender, with Her of the aegis and 
 
 spear! 
 Also, ye of the bow and the buskin, praised be your 
 
 peer, 5 
 
 Now, henceforth and forever, — O latest to whom I 
 
 upraise 
 Hand and heart and voice! For Athens, leave pasture 
 
 and flock! 
 Present to help, potent to save, Pan — patron I call! 
 
 Archons of Athens, topped by the tettix, see, I return! 
 See, 'tis myself here standing alive, no spectre that 
 
 speaks! 10 
 
 Crowned with the myrtle, did you command me, Athens 
 
 and you, 
 "Run, Pheidippides, run and race, reach Sparta for aid! 
 Persia has come, we are here, where is She?" Your 
 
 command I obeyed, 
 Ran and raced: like stubble, some field which a fire runs 
 
 through, 
 Was the space between city and city: two days, two 
 
 nights did I burn 15 
 
 Over the hills, under the dales, down pits and up peaks. 
 
30 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Into their midst I broke: breath served but for "Persia 
 has come! 
 
 Persia bids Athens proffer slaves'-tribute, water and earth; 
 
 Razed to the ground is Eretria — but Athens, shall 
 Athens sink, 
 
 Drop into dust and die — the flower of Hellas utterly 
 die, 20 
 
 Die, with the wide world spitting at Sparta, the stupid, 
 the stander-by? 
 
 Answer me quick, what help, what hand do you stretch 
 o'er destruction's brink? 
 
 How, — when? No care for my limbs! — there's light- 
 ning in all and some — 
 
 Fresh and fit your message to bear, once lips give it birth!" 
 
 O my Athens — Sparta love thee? Did Sparta re- 
 spond? 25 
 
 Every face of her leered in a furrow of envy, mistrust. 
 
 Malice, — each eye of her gave me its glitter of gratified 
 hate! 
 
 Gravely they turned to take counsel, to cast for excuses. 
 I stood 
 
 Quivering, — the limbs of me fretting as fire frets, an 
 inch from dry wood: 
 
 "Persia has come, Athens asks aid, and still they de- 
 bate? 30 
 
 Thunder, thou Zeus! Athene, are Spartans a quarry 
 beyond 
 
 Swing of thy spear? Phoibos and Artemis, clang them 
 'Ye must'!" 
 
 No bolt launched from Olumpos ! Lo, their answer at last ! 
 *' Has Persia come, — does Athens ask aid, — may Sparta 
 befriend? 
 
PHEIDIPPIDES 31 
 
 Nowise precipitate judgment — too weighty the issue at 
 
 stake ! 35 
 
 Count we no time lost time whicii lags through respect 
 
 to the gods! 
 Ponder that precept of old, 'No warfare, whatever the 
 
 odds 
 In your favor, so long as the moon, half-orbed, is unable 
 
 to take 
 Full-circle her state in the sky!' Already she rounds to 
 
 it fast: 
 Athens must wait, patient as we — who judgment 
 
 suspend." 40 
 
 Athens, — except for that sparkle, — thy name, I had 
 
 mouldered to ash! 
 That sent a blaze through my blood; off, off and away 
 
 was I back, 
 — Not one word to w^aste, one look to lose on the false 
 
 and the vile! 
 Yet "0 gods of my land!" I cried, as each hillock and 
 
 plain. 
 Wood and stream, I knew, I named, rushing past them 
 
 again, 45 
 
 "Have ye kept faith, proved mindful of honors we paid 
 
 you erewhile? 
 Vain was the filleted victim, the fulsome libation! Too 
 
 rash 
 Love in its choice, paid you so largely service so slack! 
 
 "Oak and olive and bay, — I bid you cease to enwreathe 
 Brows made bold by your leaf! Fade at the Persian's 
 
 foot, 50 
 
 You that, our patrons were pledged, should never adorn 
 
 a slave! 
 
32 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Rather I hail thee, Parnes, — trust to thy wild waste 
 
 tract ! 
 Treeless, herbless, lifeless mountain! What matter if 
 
 slacked 
 My speed may hardly be, for homage to crag and to cave 
 No deity deigns to drape with verdure? at least I can 
 
 breathe, 55 
 
 Fear in thee no fraud from the blind, no lie from the 
 
 mute!" 
 
 Such my cry as, rapid, I ran over Parnes' ridge; 
 Gully and gap I clambered and cleared till, sudden, a bar 
 Jutted, a stoppage of stone against me, blocking the way. 
 Right! for I minded the hollow to traverse, the fissure 
 
 across: 60 
 
 "Where I could enter, there I depart by! Night in the 
 
 fosse? 
 Athens to aid? Though the dive were through Erebos, 
 
 thus I obey — 
 Out of the day dive, into the day as bravely arise! No 
 
 bridge 
 Better!" — when — ha! what was it I came on, of 
 
 wonders that are? 
 
 There, in the cool of a cleft, sat he — majestical Pan! 65 
 Ivy drooped wanton, kissed his head; moss cushioned his 
 
 hoof : 
 All the great god was good in the eyes grave-kindly — 
 
 the curl 
 Carved on the bearded cheek, amused at a mortal's awe, 
 As, under the human trunk, the goat-thighs grand I 
 
 saw. 
 ''Halt, Pheidippides ! " — halt I did, my brain of a 
 
 whirl: 70 
 
PHEIDIPPIDES 33 
 
 "Hither to me! Why pale in my presence?" he gracious 
 
 began : 
 " How is it, — Athens, only in Hellas, holds me aloof? 
 
 "Athens, she only, rears me no fane, makes me no feast! 
 Wherefore? Than I what godship to Athens more 
 
 helpful of old? 
 Ay, and still, and forever her friend! Test Pan, trust 
 
 me! 75 
 
 Go, bid Athens take heart, laugh Persia to scorn, have 
 
 faith 
 In the temples and tombs! Go, say to Athens, ^The 
 
 Goat-God saith: 
 When Persia — so much as strews not the soil — is cast 
 
 in the sea. 
 Then praise Pan who fought in the ranks with your most 
 
 and least, 
 Goat-thigh to greaved-thigh, made one cause with the 
 
 free and the bold!' 80 
 
 " Say Pan saith : ' Let this, foreshowing the place, be the 
 
 pledge!'" 
 (Gay, the liberal hand held out this herbage I bear 
 — Fennel — I grasped it a-tremble with dew — whatever 
 
 it bode) 
 "While, as for thee" . . . But enough! He was gone. 
 
 If I ran hitherto — 
 Be sure that, the rest of my journey, I ran no longer, but 
 
 flew. 85 
 
 Parnes to Athens — earth no more, the air was my 
 
 road: 
 Here am I back. Praise Pan, we stand no more on the 
 
 razor's edge! 
 Pan for Athens, Pan for me! I too have a guerdon rare! 
 
34 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Then spoke Miltiades. " And thee, best runner of Greece, 
 Whose limbs did duty indeed, — what gift is promised 
 
 thyself? 90 
 
 Tell it us straightway, — Athens the mother demands of 
 
 her son!" 
 Rosily blushed the youth: he paused: but, lifting at length 
 His eyes from the ground, it seemed as he gathered the 
 
 rest of his strength 
 Into the utterance — '' Pan spoke thus : ' For what thou 
 
 hast done 
 Count on a worthy reward! Henceforth be allowed thee 
 
 release 95. 
 
 From the racer's toil, no vulgar reward in praise or in 
 
 pelf!' 
 
 '' I am bold to believe, Pan means reward the most to my 
 
 mind! 
 Fight I shall, with our foremost, wherever this fennel 
 
 may grow, — 
 Pound — Pan helping us — Persia to dust, and, under 
 
 the deep. 
 Whelm her away forever; and then, — no Athens to 
 
 save, — 100 
 
 Marry a certain maid, I know keeps faith to the brave, — 
 Hie to my house and home: and, when my children shall 
 
 creep 
 Close to my knees, — recount how the God was awful 
 
 yet kind, 
 Promised their sire reward to the full — rewarding him 
 
 — so!" . 
 
 Unforseeing one! Yes, he fought on the Marathon 
 day: 105 
 
 So, when Persia was dust, all cried "To Akropolis' 
 
ECHETLOS 35 
 
 Run, Pheidippides, one race more! the meed is thy due! 
 
 * Athens is saved, thank Pan/ go shout!" He flung 
 down his shield, 
 
 Ran like fire once more: and the space 'twixt the Fennel- 
 field 
 
 And Athens was stubble again, a field which a fire runs 
 through, 110 
 
 Till in he broke: "Rejoice, we conquer!'' Like wine 
 through clay, 
 
 Joy in his blood bursting his heart, he died — the bliss! 
 
 So, to this day, when friend meets friend, the word of 
 
 salute 
 Is still "Rejoice!" — his word which brought rejoicing 
 
 indeed. 
 So is Pheidippides happy forever, — the noble strong 
 
 man 115 
 
 Who could race like a god, bear the face of a god, whom 
 
 a god loved so well; 
 He saw the land saved he had helped to save, and was 
 
 suffered to tell 
 Such tidings, yet never decline, but, gloriously as he 
 
 began, 
 So to end gloriously — once to shout, thereafter be mute: 
 "Athens is saved!" — Pheidippides dies in the shout for 
 
 his meed. 120 
 
 ECHETLOS 
 
 Here is a story, shall stir you! Stand up, Greeks dead 
 
 and gone. 
 Who breasted, beat Barbarians, stemmed Persia rolling on. 
 Did the deed and saved the world, for the day was 
 
 Marathon ! 
 
36 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 No man but did his manliest, kept rank and fought 
 
 away 
 In his tribe and file: up, back, out, down — was the 
 
 spear-arm play: 5 
 
 Like a wind-whipt branchy wood, all spear-arms a-swing 
 
 that day! 
 
 But one man kept no rank, and his sole arm plied no 
 
 spear. 
 As a flashing came and went, and a form i' the van, the 
 
 rear, 
 Brightened the battle up, for he blazed now there, now 
 
 here. 
 
 Nor helmed nor shielded, he! but, a goat-skin all his 
 wear, 10 
 
 Like a tiller of the soil, with a clown's limbs broad and 
 bare, 
 
 Went he ploughing on and on: he pushed with a plough- 
 man's share. 
 
 Did the weak mid-line give way, as tunnies on whom the 
 shark 
 
 Precipitates his bulk? Did the right-wing halt when, 
 stark 
 
 On his heap of slain lay stretched Kallimachos Pole- 
 march? 15 
 
 Did the steady phalanx falter? To the rescue, at the 
 
 need, 
 The clown was ploughing Persia, clearing Greek earth of 
 
 weed, 
 As he routed through the Sakian and rooted up the Mede. 
 
THE PATRIOT 37 
 
 But the deed done, battle won, — nowhere to be de- 
 scried 
 
 On the meadow, by the stream, at the marsh, — look far 
 and wide 20 
 
 From the foot of the mountain, no, to the last blood- 
 plashed sea-side, — 
 
 Not anywhere on view blazed the large limbs thonged 
 
 and brown, 
 Shearing and clearing still with the share before which 
 
 — down 
 To the dust went Persia's pomp, as he ploughed for 
 
 Greece, that clown! 
 
 How spake the Oracle? "Care for no name at all! 25 
 Say but just this: 'We praise one helpful whom we call 
 The Holder of the Ploughshare.' The great deed ne'er 
 grows small." 
 
 Not the great name ! Sing — woe for the great name 
 
 Miltiades 
 And its end at Paros isle! Woe for Themistokles 
 — Satrap in Sardis court! Name not the clown like 
 
 these! 30 
 
 THE PATRIOT 
 
 AN OLD STORY 1 
 
 It was roses, roses, all the way. 
 
 With myrtle mixed in my path like mad: 
 
 The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway. 
 The church-spires flamed, such flags they had, 
 
 A year ago on this very day. 
 
38 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 The air broke into a mist with bells, 
 
 The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries. 
 
 Had I said, " Good folk, mere noise repels — 
 But give me your sun from yonder skies!" 
 
 They had answered, "And afterward, what else?'* 10 
 
 Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun 
 
 To give it my loving friends to keep! 
 Naught man could do, have I left undone: 
 
 And you see my harvest, what I reap 
 This very day, now a year is run. 15 
 
 There's nobody on the house-tops now — 
 
 Just a palsied few at the windows set; 
 For the best of the sight is, all allow. 
 
 At the Shambles' Gate — or, better yet, 
 By the very scaffold's foot, I trow. 20 
 
 I go in the rain, and, more than needs, 
 
 A rope cuts both my wrists behind ; 
 And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds, 
 
 For they fling, whoever has a mind. 
 Stones at me for my year's misdeeds. 25 
 
 Thus I entered, and thus I go! 
 
 In triumphs, people have dropped down dead. 
 *' Paid by the world, what dost thou owe 
 
 Me?" — God might question; now instead, 
 'Tis God shall repay : I am safer so. 30 
 
COUNT GISMOND 39 
 
 COUNT GISMOND 
 
 AIX IN PROVENCE 
 
 Christ God who savest man, save most 
 Of men Count Gismond who saved me! 
 
 Count Gauthier, when he chose his post, 
 Chose time and place and company 
 
 To suit it; when he struck at length 5 
 
 My honor, 'twas with all his strength. 
 
 And doubtlessly ere he could draw 
 
 All points to one, he must have schemed! 
 
 That miserable morning saw 
 
 Few half so happy as I seemed, 10 
 
 While being dressed in queen's array 
 
 To give our tourney prize away. 
 
 I thought they loved me, did me grace 
 To please themselves; 'twas all their deed; 
 
 God makes, or fair or foul, our face; 15 
 
 If showing mine so caused to bleed 
 
 My cousins' hearts, they should have dropped - 
 
 A word, and straight the play had stopped. 
 
 They, too, so beauteous! Each a queen 
 
 By virtue of her brow and breast; 20 
 
 Not needing to be crowned, I mean. 
 As I do. E'en when I was dressed. 
 
 Had either of them spoke, instead 
 
 Of glancing sideways with still head ! 
 
 But no: they let me laugh, and sing 25 
 
 My birthday song quite through, adjust 
 
 The last rose in my garland, fling 
 A last look on the mirror, trust 
 
40 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 My arms to each an arm of theirs, 
 
 And so descend the castle-stairs — 30 
 
 And come out on the morning-troop 
 Of merry friends who kissed my cheek, 
 
 And called me queen, and made me stoop 
 Under the canopy — (a streak 
 
 That pierced it, of the outside sun, 35 
 
 Powdered with gold its gloom's soft dun) — 
 
 And they could let me take my state 
 
 And foolish throne amid applause 
 Of all come there to celebrate 
 
 My queen's-day — Oh I think the cause 40 
 
 Of much was, they forgot no crowd 
 Makes up for parents in their shroud! 
 
 Howe'er that be, all eyes were bent 
 
 Upon me, when my cousins cast 
 Theirs down; 't was time I should present 45 
 
 The victor's crown, but . . . there, 'twill last 
 No long time . . . the old mist again 
 Blinds me as then it did. How vain! 
 
 See! Gismond's at the gate, in talk 
 
 With his two boys: I can proceed. 50 
 
 Well, at that moment, who should stalk 
 
 Forth boldly — to my face, indeed — 
 But Gauthier, and he thundered, "Stay!" 
 And all stayed. " Bring no crowns, I say! 
 
 " Bring torches ! Wind the penance-sheet 55 
 
 About her! Let her shun the chaste, 
 
 Or lay herself before their feet ! 
 Shall she whose body I embraced 
 
COUNT GISMOND 41 
 
 A night long, queen it in the day? 
 
 For honor's sake no crowns, I say!" 60 
 
 I? What I answered? As I live, 
 
 I never fancied such a thing 
 As answer possible to give. 
 
 What says the body when they spring 
 Some monstrous torture-engine's whole 65 
 
 Strength on it? No more says the soul. 
 
 Till out strode Gismond; then I knew 
 
 That I was saved. I never met 
 His face before, but, at first view, 
 
 I felt quite sure that God had set 70 
 
 Himself to Satan; who would spend 
 A minute's mistrust on the end? 
 
 He strode to Gauthier, in his throat 
 
 Gave him the lie, then struck his mouth 
 
 With one back-handed blow that wrote 75 
 
 In blood men's verdict there. North, South, 
 
 East, West, I looked. The lie was dead. 
 
 And damned, and truth stood up instead. 
 
 This glads me most, that I enjoyed 
 
 The heart of the joy, with my content 80 
 
 In watching Gismond unalloyed 
 
 By any doubt of the event: 
 God took that on him — I was bid 
 Watch Gismond for my part: I did. 
 
 Did I not watch him while he let 85 
 
 His armorer just brace his greaves, 
 Rivet his hauberk, on the fret 
 
 The while! His foot . . . my memory leaves 
 
42 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 No least stamp out, nor how anon 
 
 He pulled his ringing gauntlets on. 90 
 
 And e'en before the trumpet's sound 
 Was finished, prone lay the false knight, 
 
 Prone as his lie, upon the ground: 
 Gismond flew at him, used no sleight 
 
 O' the sword, but open-breasted drove, 95 
 
 Cleaving till out the truth he clove. 
 
 Which done, he dragged him to my feet 
 And said, " Here die, but end thy breath 
 
 In full confession, lest thou fleet 
 
 From my first, to God's second death! 100 
 
 Say, hast thou lied?" And, "I have lied 
 
 To God and her," he said, and died. 
 
 Then Gismond, kneeling to me, asked 
 
 — What safe my heart holds, though no word 
 
 Could I repeat now, if I tasked 105 
 
 My powers forever, to a third 
 
 Dear even as you are. Pass the rest 
 
 Until I sank upon his breast. 
 
 Over my head his arm he flung 
 
 Against the world; and scarce I felt 110 
 
 His sword (that dripped by me and swung) 
 
 A little shifted in its belt: 
 For he began to say the while 
 How South our home lay many a mile. 
 
 So 'mid the shouting multitude 115 
 
 We two walked forth to never more 
 Return. My cousins have pursued 
 
 Their life, untroubled as before 
 
THE TWINS 43 
 
 I vexed them. Gauthier's dwelling-place 
 
 God lighten! May his soul find grace! 120 
 
 Our elder boy has got the clear 
 
 Great brow; though when his brother's black 
 Full eye shows scorn, it . . . Gismond here? 
 
 And have you brought my tercel back? 
 I just was telling Adela 125 
 
 How many birds it struck since May. 
 
 THE TWINS 
 
 " Give " and " It-shall-be-given-unto-you " 
 
 Grand rough old Martin Luther 
 Bloomed fables — flowers on furze, 
 
 The better the uncouther: 
 Do roses stick like burrs? 
 
 A beggar asked an alms 5 
 
 One day at an abbey-door, 
 Said Luther, but, seized with qualms, 
 
 The Abbot replied, "We're poor! 
 
 " Poor, who had plenty once. 
 
 When gifts fell thick as rain: 10 
 
 But they give us naught, for the nonce, 
 
 And how should we give again?" 
 
 Then the beggar, " See your sins ! 
 
 Of old, unless I err, 
 Ye had brothers for inmates, twins, 15 
 
 Date and Dabitur. 
 
44 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 " While Date was in good case 
 
 Dabitur flourished too: 
 For Dabitur's lenten face 
 
 No wonder if Date rue. 20 
 
 "Would ye retrieve the one? 
 
 Try and make plump the other! 
 When Date's penance is done, 
 
 Dabitur helps his brother. 
 
 "Only, beware relapse!" 25 
 
 The Abbot hung his head. 
 This beggar might be perhaps 
 
 An angel, Luther said. 
 
 THE BOY AND THE ANGEL 
 
 Morning, evening, noon and night, 
 "Praise God!" sang Theocrite. 
 
 Then to his poor trade he turned. 
 Whereby the daily meal was earned. 
 
 Hard he labored, long and well; 5 
 
 O'er his work the boy's curls fell. 
 
 But ever, at each period, 
 
 He stopped and sang, "Praise God!" 
 
 Then back again his curls he threw, 
 
 And cheerful turned to work anew. 10 
 
 Said Blaise, the listening monk, "Well done; 
 I doubt not thou art heard, my son: 
 
THE BOY AND THE ANGEL 45 
 
 " As well as if thy voice to-day 
 
 Were praising God, the Pope's great way. 
 
 "This Easter Day, the Pope at Rome 15 
 
 Praises God from Peter's dome." 
 
 Said Theocrite, " Would God that I 
 
 Might praise him that great way, and die ! '* 
 
 Night passed, day shone. 
 
 And Theocrite was gone. 20 
 
 With God a day endures alway; 
 A thousand years are but a day. 
 
 God said in heaven, " Nor day nor night 
 Now brings the voice of my delight." 
 
 Then Gabriel, like a rainbow's birth, 25 
 
 Spread his wings and sank to earth; 
 
 Entered, in flesh, the empty cell. 
 
 Lived there, and played the craftsman well; 
 
 And morning, evening, noon and night, 
 
 Praised God in place of Theocrite. 30 
 
 And from a boy, to youth he grew: 
 The man put off the stripling's hue: 
 
 The man matured and fell away 
 Into the season of decay: 
 
 And ever o'er the trade he bent, 35 
 
 And ever lived on earth content. 
 
46 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 (He did God's will; to him, all one 
 If on the earth or in the sun.) 
 
 God said, " A praise is in mine ear; 
 
 There is no doubt in it, no fear: 40 
 
 " So sing old worlds, and so 
 
 New worlds that from my footstool go. 
 
 •' Clearer loves sound other ways : 
 I miss my little human praise." 
 
 Then forth sprang Gabriel's wings, off fell 45 
 
 The flesh disguise, remained the cell. 
 
 Twas Easter Day: he flew to Rome, 
 And paused above Saint Peter's dome. 
 
 In the tiring-room close by 
 
 The great outer gallery, 50 
 
 With his holy vestments dight, 
 Stood the new Pope, Theocrite: 
 
 And all his past career 
 Came back upon him clear, 
 
 Since when, a boy, he plied his trade, 55 
 
 Till on his life the sickness weighed; 
 
 And in his cell, when death drew near, 
 An angel in a dream brought cheer: 
 
 And rising from the sickness drear, 
 
 He grew a priest, and now stood here. 60 
 
MY LAST DUCHESS 47 
 
 To the East with praise he turned, 
 And on his sight the angel burned. 
 
 " I bore thee from thy craftsman's cell. 
 And set thee here; I did not well. 
 
 "Vainly I left my angel-sphere; 65 
 
 Vain was thy dream of many a year. 
 
 "Thy voice's praise seemed weak; dropped — 
 Creation's chorus stopped! 
 
 " Go back and praise again 
 
 The early way, while I remain. 70 
 
 " With that weak voice of our disdain, 
 Take up creation's pausing strain. 
 
 " Back to the cell and poor employ: 
 Resume the craftsman and the boy!'' 
 
 Theocrite grew old at home; 75 
 
 A new Pope dwelt in Peter's dome. 
 
 One vanished as the other died: 
 They sought God side by side. 
 
 MY LAST DUCHESS 
 
 FERRARA 
 
 That's my last Duchess painted on the wall, 
 Looking as if she were alive. I call 
 That piece a wonder, now: Era Pandolf's hands 
 Worked busily a day, and there she stands. 
 
48 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Wiirt please you sit and look at her? I said 5 
 
 "Fra Pandolf" by design; for never read 
 
 Strangers like you that pictured countenance, 
 
 The depth and passion of its earnest glance, 
 
 But to myself they turned (since none puts by 
 
 The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) 10 
 
 And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst, 
 
 How such a glance came there; so, not the first 
 
 Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 't was not 
 
 Her hiusband's presence only called that spot 
 
 Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps 15 
 
 Fra Pandolf chanced to say, " Her mantle laps 
 
 Over my lady's wrist too much," or " Paint 
 
 Must never hope to reproduce the faint 
 
 Half-flush that dies along her throat:" such stuff 
 
 Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough 20 
 
 For calling up that spot of joy. She had 
 
 A heart — how shall I say? — too soon made glad, 
 
 Too easily impressed : she liked whate'er 
 
 She looked on, and her looks went everywhere. 
 
 Sir, 'twas all one! My favor at her breast, 25 
 
 The dropping of the daylight in the West, 
 
 The bough of cherries some officious fool 
 
 Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule 
 
 She rode with round the terrace — all and each 
 
 Would draw from her alike the approving speech, 30 
 
 Or blush, at least. She thanked men, — good ! but thanked 
 
 Somehow — I know not how — as if she ranked 
 
 My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name 
 
 With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame 
 
 This sort of trifling? Even had you skill 35 
 
 In speech — (which I have not) — to make your will 
 
 Quite clear to such an one, and say, " Just this 
 
 Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss, 
 
A FACE 49 
 
 Or there exceed the mark " — and if she let 
 
 Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set 40 
 
 Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse, 
 
 — E'en then would be some stooping; and I choose 
 
 Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt. 
 
 Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without 
 
 Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands; 45 
 
 Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands 
 
 As if alive. Will't please you rise? We'll meet 
 
 The company below, then. I repeat. 
 
 The Count your master's known munificence 
 
 Is ample warrant that no just pretence 50 
 
 Of mine for dowry will be disallowed; 
 
 Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed 
 
 At starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go 
 
 Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though, 
 
 Taming a sea-horse,^ thought a rarity, 55 
 
 Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me! 
 
 A FACE 
 
 If one could have that little head of hers 
 
 Painted upon a background of pale gold. 
 
 Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers ! 
 
 No shade encroaching on the matchless mould 
 
 Of those two lips, which should be opening soft 5 
 
 In the pure profile ; not as when she laughs, 
 
 For that spoils all : but rather as if aloft 
 
 Yon hyacinth, she loves so, leaned its staff's 
 
 Burden of honey-colored buds to kiss 
 
 And capture 'twixt the lips apart for this. 10 
 
 Then her lithe neck, three fingers might surround, 
 
 How it should waver on the pale gold ground 
 
50 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Up to the fruit-shaped, perfect chin it hftsi 
 
 I know, Correggio loves to mass, in rifts 
 
 Of heaven, his angel faces, orb on orb 15 
 
 Breaking its outline, burning shades absorb: 
 
 But these are only massed there, I should think, 
 
 Waiting to see some wonder momently 
 
 Grow out, stand full, fade slow against the sky 
 
 (That's the pale ground you'd see this sweet face by), 20 
 
 All heaven, meanwhile, condensed into one eye 
 
 Which fears to lose the wonder, should it wink. 
 
 SONG FROM PIPPA PASSES 
 
 The year's at the spring 
 
 And day's at the morn; 
 
 Morning's at seven; 
 
 The hillside's dew-pearl'd; 
 
 The lark's on the wing; 5 
 
 The snail's on the thorn: 
 
 God's in his heaven — 
 
 All's right with the world! 
 
 CAVALIER TUNES 
 I. Marching Along 
 
 Kentish Sir Byng stood for his King, 
 
 Bidding the crop-headed Parliament swing: 
 
 And, pressing a troop unable to stoop 
 
 And see the rogues flourish and honest folk droop, 
 
 Marched them along, fifty-score strong, 5 
 
 Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. 
 
 God for King Charles ! Pym and such carles 
 
 To the Devil that prompts 'em their treasonous paries! 
 
CAVALIER TUNES 51 
 
 Cavaliers, up! Lips from the cup, 
 
 Hands from the pasty, nor bite take nor sup 10 
 
 Till you're — 
 
 Chorus. — Marching along, fifty-score strong, 
 
 Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. 
 
 Hampden to hell, and his obsequies' knell. 
 Serve Hazelrig, Fiennes, and young Harry as well! 15 
 England, good cheer! Rupert is near! 
 Kentish and loyalists, keep we not here, 
 Cho. — Marching along, fifty-score strong, 
 
 Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song? 
 
 Then, God for King Charles! Pym and his snarls 20 
 
 To the Devil that pricks on such pestilent carles! 
 Hold by the right, you double your might; 
 So, onward to Nottingham, fresh for the fight, 
 Cho. — March we along, fifty-score strong, 
 
 Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song ! 25 
 
 II. Give a Rouse 
 
 King Charles, and who'll do him right now? 
 King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now? 
 Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now, 
 King Charles! 
 
 Who gave me the goods that went since? 5 
 
 Who raised me the house that sank once? 
 
 Who helped me to gold I spent since? 
 
 Who found me in wine you drank once? 
 
 Cho. — King Charles, and who'll do him right now? 
 
 King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now? 10 
 Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now, 
 King Charles! 
 
52 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 To whom used my boy George quaff else, 
 
 By the old fool's side that begot him? 
 
 For whom did he cheer and laugh else, 15 
 
 While Noll's damned troopers shot him? 
 
 Cho. — King Charles, and who'll do him right now? 
 King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now? 
 Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now, 
 King Charles! 20 
 
 III. Boot and Saddle 
 
 Boot, saddle, to horse, and away! 
 Rescue my castle before the hot day 
 Brightens to blue its silvery gray. 
 Cho. — Boot, saddle, to horse, and awa^ 
 
 Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you'd say; 5 
 
 Many's.the friend there, will listen and pray 
 " God's luck to gallants that strike up the lay — 
 Cho. — Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!" 
 
 Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay. 
 Flouts Castle Brancepeth the Roundheads' array: 10 
 
 Who laughs, " Good fellows ere this, by my fay, 
 Cho. — Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!" 
 
 Who? My wife Gertrude, that, honest and gay, 
 Laughs when you talk of surrendering: "Nay! 
 I've better counsellors; what counsel they? 15 
 
 Cho. — Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!" 
 
HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM THE SEA 53 
 
 HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM ABROAD 
 
 Oh, to be in England 
 
 Now that April's there; 
 
 And whoever wakes in England 
 
 Sees, some morning, unaware, 
 
 That the lowest boughs and the brush-wood sheaf 5 
 
 Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, 
 
 While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough 
 
 In England — now ! 
 
 And after April, when May follows. 
 
 And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows! 10 
 
 Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge 
 
 Leans to the field and scatters on the clover 
 
 Blossoms and dewdrops — at the bent spray's edge — 
 
 That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over. 
 
 Lest you should think he never could recapture 15 
 
 The first fine careless rapture! 
 
 And though the fields look rough with hoary dew, 
 
 All will be gay when noontide wakes anew 
 
 The buttercups, the little children's dower 
 
 — Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower! 20 
 
 HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM THE SEA 
 
 Nobly, nobly Cape Saint Vincent to the Northwest died 
 
 away; 
 Sunset ran, one glorious blood-red, reeking into Cadiz 
 
 Bay; 
 Bluish 'mid the burning water, full in face Trafalgar lay; 
 In the dimmest Northeast distance dawned Gibraltar 
 grand and gray; 
 
54 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 ''Here and here did England help me: how can I help 
 England?" — say, 5 
 
 Whoso turns as I, this evening, turn to God to praise and 
 pray. 
 
 While Jove's planet rises yonder, silent over Africa. 
 
 "DE GUSTIBUS— '' 
 
 Your ghost will walk, you lover of trees, 
 
 (If our loves remain) 
 
 In an English lane. 
 By a cornfield-side a-flutter with poppies. 
 Hark, those two in the hazel coppice — 5 
 
 A boy and a girl, if the good fates please. 
 
 Making love, say, — 
 
 The happier they! 
 Draw yourself up from the light of the moon, 
 And let them pass, as they will too soon, 10 
 
 With the beanfiowers' boon, 
 
 And the blackbird's tune, 
 
 And May, and June! 
 
 What I love best in all the world 
 
 Is a castle, precipice-encurled, 15 
 
 In a gash of the wind-grieved Apennine. 
 
 Or look for me, old fellow of mine, 
 
 (If I get my head from out the mouth 
 
 O' the grave, and loose my spirit's bands. 
 
 And come again to the land of lands) — 20 
 
 In a sea-side house to the farther South, 
 
 Where the baked cicala dies of drouth. 
 
 And one sharp tree — 'tis a cypress — stands 
 
 By the many hundred years red-rusted, 
 
 Rough iron-spiked, ripe fruit-o'ercrusted, 25 
 
UP AT A VILLA — DOWN IN THE CITY 55 
 
 My sentinel to guard the sands 
 
 To the water's edge. For, what expands 
 
 Before the house, but the great opaque 
 
 Blue breadth of sea without a break? 
 
 While, in the house, forever crumbles 30 
 
 Some fragment of the frescoed walls, 
 
 From blisters where a scorpion sprawls. 
 
 A girl bare-footed brings, and tumbles 
 
 Down on the pavement, green-flesh melons, 
 
 And says there's news to-day — the king 35 
 
 Was shot at, touched in the liver-wing, 
 
 Goes with his Bourbon arm in a sling: 
 
 — She hopes they have not caught the felons. 
 
 Italy, my Italy! 
 
 Queen Mary's saying serves for me — 40 
 
 (When fortune's malice 
 
 Lost her, Calais) 
 Open my heart and you will see 
 Graved inside of it, " Italy." 
 
 Such lovers old are I and she: 45 
 
 So it always was, so shall ever be! 
 
 UP AT A VILLA — DOWN IN THE CITY^ 
 
 (as distinguished by an ITALIAN PERSON OF QUALITY.) 
 
 I 
 
 Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare, 
 The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city- 
 square; 
 Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window 
 
 there ! 
 
 I See note on page 113 
 
56 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 II 
 
 Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, at least ! 
 There, the whole day long, one's Hfe is a perfect feast; 5 
 While up at a villa one Hves, I maintain it, no more than 
 a beast. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Well now, look at our villa! stuck Hke the horn of a bull 
 Just on a mountain edge as bare as the creature's skull. 
 Save a mere shag of a bush with hardly a leaf to pull! 
 — I scratch my own, sometimes, to see if the hair's 
 turned wool. 10 
 
 IV 
 
 But the city, oh the city — the square with the houses! 
 
 Why! 
 They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there's something 
 
 to take the eye! 
 Houses in four straight lines, not a single front awry; 
 You watch who crosses and gossips, who saunters, who 
 
 hurries by; 
 Green blinds, as a matter of course, to draw when the 
 
 sun gets high; 15 
 
 And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted 
 
 properly. 
 
 V 
 
 What of a villa? Though winter be over in March by 
 
 rights, 
 'Tis May perhaps ere the snow shall have withered well 
 
 off the heights: 
 You've the brown ploughed land before, where the oxen 
 
 steam and wheeze. 
 And the hills over-smoked behind by the faint gray 
 
 olive-trees. 20 
 
UP AT A VILLA — DOWN IN THE CITY 57 
 
 VI 
 
 Is it better in May, I ask you? You've summer all at 
 
 once; 
 In a day he leaps complete with a few strong April suns. 
 'Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, scarce risen three 
 
 fingers well. 
 The wild tuhp, at end of its tube, blows out its great red 
 
 bell 
 Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the children to pick 
 
 and sell. 25 
 
 VII 
 
 Is it ever hot in the square? There's a fountain to spout 
 and splash! 
 
 In the shade it sings and springs; in the shine such foam- 
 bows flash 
 
 On the horses with curHng fish-tails, that prance and 
 paddle and pash 
 
 Round the lady atop in her conch — fifty gazers do not 
 abash, 
 
 Though all that she wears is some weeds round her waist 
 in a sort of sash. 30 
 
 VIII 
 
 All the year long at the villa, nothing to see though you 
 
 finger. 
 Except yon cypress that points fike death's lean fifted 
 
 forefinger. 
 Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix i' the corn and 
 
 mingle, 
 Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a- 
 
 tingle. 
 Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is 
 
 shrill, • 35 
 
58 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resin- 
 ous firs on the hill. 
 
 Enough of the seasons, — I spare you the months of the 
 fever and chill. 
 
 IX 
 
 Ere you open your eyes in the city, the blessed church- 
 bells begin : 
 
 No sooner the bells leave off than the dihgence rattles in : 
 
 You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never a 
 pin. 40 
 
 By and by there's the travelHng doctor gives pills, lets 
 blood, draws teeth 
 
 Or the Pulcinello-trumpet breaks up the market beneath. 
 
 At the post-office such a scene-picture — the new play, 
 piping hot! 
 
 And a notice how, only this morning, three liberal thieves 
 were shot. 
 
 Above it, behold the Archbishop's most fatherly of re- 
 bukes, 45 
 
 And beneath, with his crown and his Hon, some httle new 
 law of the Duke's! 
 
 Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverend Don 
 So-and-so 
 
 Who is Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarca, St. Jerome, and 
 Cicero, 
 
 ''And moreover" (the sonnet goes rhyming), " the skirts 
 of Saint Paul has reached, 
 
 Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more unctu- 
 ous than ever he preached." 50 
 
 Noon strikes, — here sweeps the procession ! our Lady 
 borne smiling and smart, 
 
 With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords 
 stuck in her heart! 
 
UP AT A VILLA— DOWN IN THE CITY 59 
 
 Bang-whang-whang goes the drum, tootle-te-tootle the fife; 
 No keeping one's haunches still: it's the greatest pleasure 
 in life. 
 
 X 
 
 But bless you, it's dear — it's dear! fowls, wine, at double 
 
 the rate. 55 
 
 They have clapped a new tax upon salt, and what oil pays 
 
 passing the gate 
 It's a horror to think of. And so, the villa for me, not 
 
 the city ! 
 Beggars can scarcely be choosers: but still — ah, the pity, 
 
 the pity! 
 Look, two and two go the priests, then the monks with 
 
 cowls and sandals, 
 And the penitents dressed in white shirts, a-holding the 
 
 yellow candles; 60 
 
 One, he carries a flag up straight, and another a cross 
 
 with handles, 
 And the Duke's guard brings up the rear, for the better 
 
 prevention of scandals: 
 Bang-whang-whang goes the drum, tootle-te-tootle the fife. 
 Oh, a day in the city-square, there is no such pleasure in 
 
 life! 
 
 MEMORABILIA 
 
 Ah, did you once see Shelley plain, 
 And did he stop and speak to you, 
 
 And did you speak to him again? 
 How strange it seems and new! 
 
 But you were living before that, 5 
 
 And also you are living after; 
 And the memory I started at — 
 
 My starting moves your laughter! 
 
60 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 I crossed a moor, with a name of its own 
 
 And a certain use in the world no doubt, 10 
 
 Yet a hand's-breadth of it shines alone 
 ^Mid the blank miles round about: 
 
 For there I picked up on the heather, 
 
 And there I put inside my breast 
 A moulted feather, an eagle-feather! 15 
 
 Well, I forget the rest. 
 
 THE LOST LEADER 
 
 Just for a handful of silver he left us. 
 
 Just for a riband to stick in his coat — 
 Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us, 
 
 Lost all the others she lets us devote; 
 They, with the gold to give, doled him out silver; 5 
 
 So much was theirs who so little allowed: 
 How all our copper had gone for his service! 
 
 Rags — were they purple, his heart had been proud! 
 We that had loved him so, followed him, honored him, 
 
 Lived in his mild and magnificent eye, 10 
 
 Learned his great language, caught his clear accents, 
 
 Made him our pattern to live and to die! 
 Shakespeare was of us, Milton was for us. 
 
 Burns, Shelley, w^ere with us, — they watch from their 
 graves! 
 He alone breaks from the van and the freemen, 15 
 
 — He alone sinks to the rear and the slaves! 
 
 We shall march prospering, — not through his presence; 
 
 Songs may inspirit us, — not from his lyre; 
 Deeds will be done, — while he boasts his quiescence, 
 
 Still bidding crouch whom the rest bade aspire: 20 
 
LIFE IN A LOVE 61 
 
 Blot out his name, then, record one lost soul more, 
 
 One task more declined, one more footpath untrod. 
 One more devils'-triumph and sorrow for angels. 
 
 One wrong more to man, one more insult to God! 
 Life's night begins: let him never come back to us! 25 
 
 There would be doubt, hesitation and pain; 
 Forced praise on our part — the glimmer of twilight, 
 
 Never glad confident morning again! 
 Best fight on well, for we taught him — strike gallantly, 
 
 Menace our heart ere we master his own; 30 
 
 Then let him receive the new knowledge and wait us, 
 
 Pardoned in heaven, the first by the throne! 
 
 LIFE IN A LOVE 
 
 Escape me? 
 Never — 
 Beloved ! 
 While I am I, and you are you, 
 
 So long as the world contains us both, 5 
 
 Me the loving and you the loth. 
 While the one eludes, must the other pursue. 
 My life is a fault at last, I fear: 
 
 It seems too much like a fate, indeed! 
 
 Though I do my best I shall scarce succeed. 10 
 But what if I fail of my purpose here? 
 It is but to keep the nerves at strain, 
 
 To dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall. 
 And baffled, get up and begin again, — 
 
 So the chase takes up one's life, that's all. 15 
 
 While, look but once from your farthest bound 
 
 At me so deep in the dust and dark. 
 No sooner the old hope goes to ground 
 
ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Than a new one, straight to the selfsame mark, 
 I shape me — 20 
 
 Ever 
 Removed I 
 
 YOUTH AND ART 
 
 It once might have been, once only: 
 
 We lodged in a street together, 
 You, a sparrow on the housetop lonely, 
 
 I, a lone she-bird of his feather. 
 
 Your trade was with sticks and clay, 5 
 
 You thumbed, thrust, patted and polished, 
 
 Then laughed " They will see some day 
 Smith made, and Gibson demolished." 
 
 My business was song, song, song; 
 
 I chirped, cheeped, trilled and twittered; 10 
 
 " Kate Brown's on the boards ere long, 
 
 And Grisi's existence embittered! 
 
 I earned no more by a warble 
 
 Than you by a sketch in plaster; 
 You wanted a piece of marble, 15 
 
 I needed a music-master. 
 
 We studied hard in our styles. 
 
 Chipped each at a crust like Hindoos, 
 
 For air, looked out on the tiles, 
 
 For fun, watched each other's windows. 20 
 
 You lounged, like a boy of the South, 
 
 Cap and blouse — nay, a bit of beard too; 
 
 Or you got it, rubbing your mouth 
 With fingers the clay adhered to. 
 
YOUTH AND ART 63 
 
 And I — soon managed to find 25 
 
 Weak points in the flower-fence facing, 
 
 Was forced to put up a blind 
 And be safe in my corset-lacing. 
 
 No harm! It was not my fault 
 
 If you never turned your eye's tail up 30 
 
 As I shook upon E in alt., 
 
 Or ran the chromatic scale up: 
 
 For spring bade the sparrows pair, 
 
 And the boys and girls gave guesses, 
 And stalls in our street looked rare 35 
 
 With bulrush and watercresses. 
 
 Why did not you pinch a flower 
 
 In a pellet of clay and fling it? 
 Why did not I put a power 
 
 Of thanks in a look, or sing it? 40 
 
 I did look, sharp as a lynx, 
 
 (And yet the memory rankles,) 
 When models arrived, some minx 
 . Tripped up-stairs, she and her ankles. 
 
 But I think I gave you as good ! 45 
 
 " That foreign fellow, — who can know 
 
 How she pays, in a playful mood. 
 For his tuning her that piano?" 
 
 Could you say so, and never say, 
 
 " Suppose we join hands and fortunes, 50 
 
 And I fetch her from over the way. 
 
 Her, piano, and long tunes and short tunes"? 
 
G4 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 No, no: you would not be rash, 
 
 Nor I rasher and something over: 
 You've to settle yet Gibson's hash, 55 
 
 And Grisi yet lives in clover. 
 
 But you meet the Prince at the Board, 
 
 I'm queen myself at hals-pare, 
 I've married a rich old lord, 
 
 And you're dubbed knight and an R. A. 6.0 
 
 Each life unfulfilled, you see; 
 
 It hangs still, patchy and scrappy: 
 We have not sighed deep, laughed free. 
 
 Starved, feasted, despaired, — been happy; 
 
 And nobody calls you a dunce, 65 
 
 And people suppose me clever: 
 This could but have happened once, 
 
 And we missed it, lost it forever. 
 
 EVELYN HOPE 
 
 Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead ! 
 
 Sit and watch by her side an hour. 
 That is her book-shelf, this her bed ; 
 
 She plucked that piece of geranium-flower, 
 Beginning to die too, in the glass; 5 
 
 Little has yet been changed, I think: 
 The shutters are shut, no light may pass 
 
 Save two long rays through the hinge's chink. 
 
 Sixteen years old when she died ! 
 
 Perhaps she had scarcely heard my name; 10 
 
 It was not her time to love; beside. 
 
 Her life had many a hope and aim, 
 
EVELYN HOPE G5 
 
 Duties enough and little cares, 
 
 And now was quiet, now astir, 
 Till God's hand beckoned unawares, — 15 
 
 And the sweet white brow is all of her. 
 
 Is it too late then, Evelyn Hope? 
 
 What, your soul was pure and true, 
 The good stars met in your horoscope, 
 
 Made you of spirit, fire and dew — 20 
 
 And, just because I was thrice as old 
 
 And our paths in the world diverged so wide, 
 Each was naught to each, must I be told? 
 
 We were fellow mortals, naught beside? 
 
 No, indeed! for God above 25 
 
 Is great to grant, as mighty to make, 
 And creates the love to reward the love: 
 
 I claim you still, for my own love's sake! 
 Delayed it may be for more lives yet. 
 
 Through worlds I shall traverse, not a few: 30 
 
 Much is to learn, much to forget 
 
 Ere the time be come for taking you. 
 
 But the time will come, — at last it will, 
 
 When, Evelyn Hope, what meant (I shall say) 
 In the lower earth, in the years long still, 35 
 
 That body and soul so pure and gay? 
 Why your hair was amber, I shall divine, 
 
 And your mouth of your own geranium's red — 
 And what you would do with me, in fine, 
 
 In the new life come in the old one's stead. 40 
 
 I have lived (I shall say) so much since then, 
 
 Given up myself so many times. 
 Gained me the gains of various men, 
 
 Ransacked the ages, spoiled the climes; 
 
66 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Yet one thing, one, in my soul's full scope, 45 
 
 Either I missed or itself missed me : 
 And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope! 
 
 What is the issue? let us see! 
 
 I loved you, Evelyn, all the while! 
 
 My heart seemed full as it could hold; 50 
 
 There was place and to spare for the frank young smile, 
 
 And the red young mouth, and the hair's young gold. 
 So, hush, — I will give you this leaf to keep : 
 
 See, I shut it inside the sweet cold hand! 
 There, that is our secret: go to sleep! 55 
 
 You will wake, and remember, and understand. 
 
 SOLILOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER 
 
 Gr-r-r — there go, my heart's abhorrence! 
 
 Water your damned flower-pots, do! 
 If hate killed men, Brother Lawrence, 
 
 God's blood, would not mine kill you! 
 What? your myrtle-bush wants trimming? 5 
 
 Oh, that rose has prior claims — 
 Needs its leaden vase filled brimming? 
 
 Hell dry you up with its flames! 
 
 At the meal we sit together: 
 
 Salve tibif I must hear 10 
 
 Wise talk of the kind of weather, 
 
 Sort of season, time of year: 
 Not a plenteous cork-crop: scarcely 
 
 Dare we hope oak-galls, I doubt: 
 What's the Latin name for ^' parsley" P 15 
 
 What's the Greek name for Swine's Snout? 
 
SOLILOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER 67 
 
 Whew! We'll have our platter burnished, 
 
 Laid with care on our own shelf! 
 With a fire-new spoon we're furnished, 
 
 And a goblet for ourself, 20 
 
 Rinsed like something sacrificial 
 
 Ere 'tis fit to touch our chaps — 
 Marked with L for our initial! 
 
 (He-he ! There his lily snaps !) 
 
 Saint, forsooth! While brown Dolores 25 
 
 Squats outside the Convent bank 
 With Sanchicha, telling stories, 
 
 Steeping tresses in the tank, 
 Blue-black, lustrous, thick like horsehairs, 
 
 — Can't I see his dead eye glow, 30 
 
 Bright as 't were a Barbary corsair's? 
 
 (That is, if he'd let it show!) 
 
 When he finishes refection, 
 
 Knife and fork he never lays 
 Cross-wise, to my recollection, 35 
 
 As do I, in Jesu's praise. 
 I the Trinity illustrate. 
 
 Drinking watered orange-pulp — 
 In three sips the Arian frustrate; 
 
 While he drains his at one gulp. 40 
 
 Oh, those melons! If he's able 
 
 We're to have a feast! so nice! 
 One goes to the Abbot's table, 
 
 All of us get each a slice. 
 How go on your flowers? None double? 45 
 
 Not one fruit-sort can you spy? 
 Strange! — And I, too, at such trouble 
 
 Keep them close-nipped on the sly! 
 
68 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 There's a great text in Galatians, 
 
 Once you trip on it, entails 50 
 
 Twenty-nine distinct damnations, 
 
 One sure, if another fails : 
 If I trip him just a-dying, 
 
 Sure of heaven as sure can be. 
 Spin him round and send him flying 55 
 
 Off to hell, a Manichee? 
 
 Or, my scrofulous French novel 
 
 On gray paper with blunt type! 
 Simply glance at it, you grovel 
 
 Hand and foot in Belial's gripe: 60 
 
 If I double down its pages 
 
 At the woeful sixteenth print, 
 When he gathers his greengages, 
 
 Ope a sieve and slip it in't? 
 
 Or, there's Satan! — one might venture 65 
 
 Pledge one's soul to him, yet leave 
 Such a flaw in the indenture 
 
 As he'd miss till, past retrieve. 
 Blasted lay that rose-acacia 
 
 We're so proud of! Hy, Zy, Hine ... 70 
 
 'St, there's Vespers! Plena gratia, 
 
 Ave, Virgo! Gr-r-r — you swine ! 
 
 A GRAMMARIAN'S FUNERAL 
 
 SHORTLY AFTER THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING IN EUROPE 
 
 Let us begin and carry up this corpse, 
 
 Singing together. 
 Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar thorpes 
 
 Each in its tether 
 
A GRAMMARIAN'S FUNERAL 09 
 
 Sleeping safe on the bosom of the plain, 5 
 
 Cared-for till cock-crow: 
 Look out if yonder be not day again 
 
 Rimming the rock-row! 
 That's the appropriate country; there, man's thought, 
 
 Rarer, intenser, 10 
 
 Self-gathered for an outbreak, as it ought, 
 
 Chafes in the censer. 
 Leave we the unlettered plain its herd and crop; 
 
 Seek we sepulture 
 On a tall mountain, citied to the top, 15 
 
 Crowded with culture! 
 All the peaks soar, but one the rest excels; 
 
 Clouds overcome it; 
 No! yonder sparkle is the citadel's 
 
 Circling its summit. 20 
 
 Thither our path lies; wind we up the heights; 
 
 Wait ye the warning? 
 Our low life was the level's and the night's; 
 
 He's for the morning. 
 Step to a tune, square chests, erect each head, 25 
 
 'Ware the beholders! 
 This is our master, famous, calm and dead, 
 
 Borne on our shoulders. 
 
 Sleep, crop and herd! sleep, darkling thorpe and croft, 
 
 Safe from the weather! 30 
 
 He, whom we convoy to his grave aloft. 
 
 Singing together. 
 He was a man born with thy face and throat, 
 
 Lyric Apollo! 
 Long he lived nameless: how should Spring take note 35 
 
 Winter would follow? 
 
70 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Till lo, the little touch, and youth was gone! 
 
 Cramped and diminished. 
 Moaned he, "New measures, other feet anon! 
 
 My dance is finished"? 40 
 
 No, that's the world's way: (keep the mountain-side. 
 
 Make for the city!) 
 He knew the signal, and stepped on with pride 
 
 Over men's pity; 
 Left play for work, and grappled with the world 45 
 
 Bent on escaping: 
 "What's in the scroll," quoth he, "thou keepest furled? 
 
 Show me their shaping, 
 Theirs who most studied man, the bard and sage, — 
 
 Give!" — So, he gowned him, 50 
 
 Straight got by heart that book to its last page : 
 
 Learned, we found him. 
 Yea, but we found him bald too, eyes like lead. 
 
 Accents uncertain: 
 "Time to taste life," another would have said, 55 
 
 "Up with the curtain!" 
 This man said rather, "Actual life comes next? 
 
 Patience a moment! 
 Grant I have mastered learning's crabbed text, 
 
 Still there's the comment. 60 
 
 Let me know all! Prate not of most or least. 
 
 Painful or easy ! 
 Even to the crumbs I'd fain eat up the feast. 
 
 Ay, nor feel queasy." 
 Oh, such a life as he resolved to live, 65 
 
 When he had learned it. 
 When he had gathered all books had to give ! 
 
 Sooner, he spurned it. 
 Imagine the whole, then execute the parts — 
 
 Fancy the fabric 70 
 
A GRAMMARIAN'S FUNERAL 71 
 
 Quite, ere you build, ere steel strike fire from quartz, 
 Ere mortar dab brick! 
 
 (Here's the town-gate reached: there's the market-place 
 
 Gaping before us.) 
 Yea, this in him was the peculiar grace 75 
 
 (Hearten our chorus!) 
 That before living he'd learn how to live — 
 
 No end to learning: 
 Earn the means first — God surely will contrive 
 
 Use for our earning. 80 
 
 Others mistrust and say, " But time escapes : 
 
 Live now or never!" 
 He said, ''What's time? Leave Now for dogs and apes! 
 
 Man has Forever," 
 Back to his book then: deeper drooped his head: 85 
 
 Calculus racked him: 
 Leaden before, his eyes grew dross of lead : 
 
 Tussis attacked him. 
 "Now, master, take a little rest!" — not he! 
 
 (Caution redoubled, 90 
 
 Step two abreast, the way winds narrowly!) 
 
 Not a whit troubled. 
 Back to his studies, fresher than at first, 
 
 Fierce as a dragon 
 He (soul-hydroptic with a sacred thirst) 95 
 
 Sucked at the flagon. 
 Oh, if we draw a circle premature, 
 
 Heedless of far gain. 
 Greedy for quick returns of profit, sure 
 
 Bad is our bargain! 100 
 
 Was it not great? did not he throw on God, 
 
 (He loves the burthen) — 
 
72 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 God's task to make the heavenly period 
 
 Perfect the earthen? 
 Did not he magnify the mind, show clear 105 
 
 Just what it all meant? 
 He would not discount life, as fools do here, 
 
 Paid by instalment. 
 He ventured neck or nothing — heaven's success 
 
 Found, or earth's failure: 110 
 
 *'Wilt thou trust death or not?" He answered "Yes! 
 
 Hence with life's pale lure!" 
 That low man seeks a little thing to do, . 
 
 Sees it and does it: 
 This high man, with a great thing to pursue, 115 
 
 Dies ere he knows it. 
 That low man goes on adding one to one, 
 
 His hundred's soon hit: 
 This high man, aiming at a million, 
 
 Misses an unit. 120 
 
 That, has the world here — should he need the next, 
 
 Let the world mind him! 
 This, throws himself on God, and unperplexed 
 
 Seeking shall find him. 
 So, with the throttling hands of death at strife, 125 
 
 Ground he at grammar; 
 Still, through the rattle, parts of speech were rife: 
 
 While he could stammer 
 He settled Holies business — let it be ! — 
 
 Properly based Oun — 130 
 
 Gave us the doctrine of the enclitic De, 
 
 Dead from the waist down. 
 
 Well, here's the platform, here's the proper place: 
 Hail to your purlieus. 
 
ONE WORD MORE 73 
 
 All ye highfliers of the feathered race, 135 
 
 Swallows and curlews! 
 Here's the top-peak; the multitude below 
 
 Live, for they can, there : 
 This man decided not to Live but Know — 
 
 Bury this man there? 140 
 
 Here — here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds 
 form, 
 
 Lightnings are loosened, 
 Stars come and go! Let joy break with the storm; 
 
 Peace let the dew send! 
 Lofty designs must close in like effects: 145 
 
 Loftily lying. 
 Leave him — still loftier than the world suspects, 
 
 Living and dying. 
 
 ONE WORD MORE 
 
 TO E. B. B. 
 
 London, September, 1855 
 
 There they are, my fifty men and women 
 Naming me the fifty poems finished! 
 Take them. Love, the book and me together: 
 Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also. 
 
 II 
 
 Rafael made a century of sonnets, 5 
 
 Made and wrote them in a certain volume 
 
 Dinted with the silver-pointed pencil 
 
 Else he only used to draw Madonnas : 
 
 These, the world might view — but one, the volume. 
 
 Who that one, you ask? Your heart instructs you. 10 
 
74 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Did she live and love it all her lifetime? 
 
 Did she drop, his lady of the sonnets, 
 
 Die, and let it drop beside her pillow 
 
 Where it lay in place of Rafael's glory, 
 
 Rafael's cheek so duteous and so loving — 15 
 
 Cheek, the world was wont to hail a painter's, 
 
 Rafael's cheek, her love had turned a poet's? 
 
 Ill 
 
 You and I would rather read that volume, 
 
 (Taken to his beating bosom by it) 
 
 Lean and list the bosom-beats of Rafael, 20 
 
 Would we not? than wonder at Madonnas — 
 
 Her, San Sisto names, and Her, Foligno, 
 
 Her, that visits Florence in a vision. 
 
 Her, that's left with lilies in the Louvre — 
 
 Seen by us and all the world in circle. 25 
 
 IV 
 
 You and I will never read that volume. 
 
 Guido Reni, like his own eye's apple 
 
 Guarded long the treasure-book and loved it. 
 
 Guido Reni dying, all Bologna 
 
 Cried, and the world cried too, "Ours, the treasure!" 30 
 
 Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished. 
 
 V 
 
 Dante once prepared to paint an angel : 
 
 Whom to please? You whisper "Beatrice." 
 
 While he mused and traced it and retraced it, 
 
 (Peradventure with a pen corroded 35 
 
 Still by drops of that hot ink he dipped for, 
 
 When, his left-hand i' the hair o' the wicked, 
 
 Back he held the brow and pricked its stigma. 
 
ONE WORD MORE 75 
 
 Bit into the live man's flesh for parchment, 
 
 Loosed him, laughed to see the writing rankle, 40 
 
 Let the wretch go festering through Florence) — 
 
 Dante, who loved well because he hated, 
 
 Hated wickedness that hinders loving, 
 
 Dante standing, studying his angel, — 
 
 In there broke the folk of his Inferno. 45 
 
 Says he — " Certain people of importance " 
 
 (Such he gave his daily dreadful line to) 
 
 "Entered and would seize, forsooth, the poet." 
 
 Says the poet — "Then I stopped my painting." 
 
 VI 
 
 You and I would rather see that angel, 50 
 
 Painted by the tenderness of Dante, 
 Would we not? — than read a fresh Inferno. 
 
 VII 
 
 You and I will never see that picture. 
 
 While he mused on love and Beatrice, 
 
 While he softened o'er his outlined angel, 55 
 
 In they broke, those "people of importance:" 
 
 We and Bice bear the loss forever. 
 
 VIII 
 
 What of Rafael's sonnets, Dante's picture? 
 
 This: no artist lives and loves, that longs not 
 
 Once, and only once, and for one only, 60 
 
 (Ah, the prize!) to find his love a language 
 
 Fit and fair and simple and sufficient — 
 
 Using nature that's an art to others. 
 
 Not, this one time, art that's turned his nature. 
 
 Ay, of all the artists living, loving, 65 
 
76 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 None but would forego his proper dowry, — 
 
 Does he paint? he fain would write a poem, — 
 
 Does he write? he fain would paint a picture, 
 
 Put to proof art alien to the artist's, 
 
 Once, and only once, and for one only, 70 
 
 So to be the man and leave the artist. 
 
 Gain the man's joy, miss the artist's sorrow. 
 
 IX 
 
 Wherefore? Heaven's gift takes earth's abatement! 
 
 He who smites the rock and spreads the water, 
 
 Bidding drink and live a crowd beneath him, 75 
 
 Even he, the minute makes immortal. 
 
 Proves, perchance, but mortal in the minute. 
 
 Desecrates, belike, the deed in doing. 
 
 While he smites, how can he but remember, 
 
 So he smote before, in such a peril, 80 
 
 When they stood and mocked — " Shall smiting help us?" 
 
 When they drank and sneered — "A stroke is easy!" 
 
 When they wiped their mouths and went their journey. 
 
 Throwing him for thanks — " But drought was pleasant." 
 
 Thus old memories mar the actual triumph; S5 
 
 Thus the doing savors of disrelish; 
 
 Thus achievement lacks a gracious somewhat; 
 
 O'er-importuned brows becloud the mandate. 
 
 Carelessness or consciousness — the gesture. 
 
 For he bears an ancient wrong about him, 90 
 
 Sees and knows again those phalanxed faces. 
 
 Hears, yet one time more, the 'customed prelude — 
 
 "How shouldst thou, of all men, smite, and save us?" 
 
 Guesses what is like to prove the sequel — 
 
 " Egypt's flesh-pots — nay, the drought was better/' 95 
 
ONE WORD MORE 11 
 
 X 
 
 Oh, the crowd must have emphatic warrant! 
 Theirs, the Sinai-forehead's cloven brilUance, 
 Right-arm's rod-sweep, tongue's imperial fiat. 
 Never dares the man put off the prophet. 
 
 XI 
 
 Did he love one face from out the thousands, 100 
 
 (Were she Jethro's daughter, white and wifely, 
 
 Were she but the ^Ethiopian bondslave,) 
 
 He would envy yon dumb patient camel, 
 
 Keeping a reserve of scanty water 
 
 Meant to save his own life in the desert; 105 
 
 Ready in the desert to deliver 
 
 (Kneeling down to let his breast be opened) 
 
 Hoard and life together for his mistress. 
 
 XII 
 
 I shall never, in the years remaining, 110 
 
 Paint you pictures, no, nor carve you statues, 
 
 Make you music that should all-express me; 
 
 So it seems : I stand on my attainment. 
 
 This of verse alone, one life allows me; 
 
 Verse and nothing else have I to give you. 
 
 Other heights in other lives, God willing: 115 
 
 All the gifts from all the heights, your own. Love! 
 
 XIII 
 
 Yet a semblance of resource avails us — 
 
 Shade so finely touched, love's sense must seize it. 
 
 Take these lines, look lovingly and nearly, 
 
 Lines I write the first time and the last time. 120 
 
78 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 He who works in fresco steals a hair-brush, 
 
 Curbs the liberal hand, subservient proudly, 
 
 Cramps his spirit, crowds its all in little, 
 
 Makes a strange art of an art familiar, 
 
 Fills his lady's missal-marge with flowerets. 125 
 
 He who blows through bronze may breathe through silver, 
 
 Fitly serenade a slumbrous princess. 
 
 He who writes, may write for once as I do. 
 
 XIV 
 
 Love, you saw me gather men and women. 
 
 Live or dead or fashioned by my fancy: 130 
 
 Enter each and all, and use their service; 
 
 Speak from every mouth, — the speech, a poem. 
 
 Hardly shall I tell my joys and sorrows, 
 
 Hopes and fears, belief and disbelieving: 
 
 I am mine and yours — the rest be all men's; 135 
 
 Karshish, Cleon, Norbert, and the fifty. 
 
 Let me speak this once in my true person. 
 
 Not as Lippo, Roland, or Andrea, 
 
 Though the fruit of speech be just this sentence: 
 
 Pray you, look on these my men and women, 140 
 
 Take and keep my fifty poems finished; 
 
 Where my heart lies, let my brain lie also! 
 
 Poor the speech; be how I speak, for all things. 
 
 XV 
 
 Not but that you know me! Lo, the moon's self! 
 
 Here in London, yonder late in Florence, 145 
 
 Still we find her face, the thrice-transfigured. 
 
 Curving on a sky imbrued with color. 
 
 Drifted over Fiesole by twilight, 
 
 Came she, our new crescent of a hair's-breadth. 
 
ONE WORD MORE 79 
 
 Full she flared it, lamping Samminiato, 150 
 
 Rounder 'twixt the cypresses and rounder, 
 
 Perfect till the nightingales applauded. 
 
 Now, a piece of her old self, impoverished. 
 
 Hard to greet, she traverses the house-roofs, 
 
 Hurries with unhandsome thrift of silver, 155 
 
 Goes dispiritedly, glad to finish. 
 
 XVI 
 
 What, there's nothing in the moon noteworthy? 
 
 Nay: for if that moon could love a mortal, 
 
 Use, to charm him (so to fit a fancy), 
 
 All her magic ('tis the old sweet mythos), 160 
 
 She would turn a new side to her mortal, 
 
 Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman — 
 
 Blank to Zoroaster on his terrace. 
 
 Blind to Galileo on his turret. 
 
 Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats — him, even! 165 
 
 Think, the wonder of the moonstruck mortal — 
 
 When she turns round, comes again in heaven, 
 
 Opens out anew for worse or better! 
 
 Proves she like some portent of an iceberg 
 
 Swimming full upon the ship it founders, 170 
 
 Hungry with huge teeth of splintered crystals? 
 
 Proves she as the paved work of a sapphire 
 
 Seen by Moses when he climbed the mountain? 
 
 Moses, Aaron, Nadab and Abihu 
 
 Climbed and saw the very God, the Highest, 175 
 
 Stand upon the paved work of a sapphire. 
 
 Like the bodied heaven in his clearness 
 
 Shone the stone, the sapphire of that paved work, 
 
 When they ate and drank and saw God also ! 
 
80 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 XVII 
 
 What were seen? None knows, none ever shall 
 
 know. 180 
 
 Only this is sure — the sight were other; 
 Not the moon's same side, born late in Florence, 
 Dying now impoverished here in London. 
 God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures 
 Boasts two soul-sides: one to face the world with; 185 
 One to show a woman when he loves her! 
 
 XVIII 
 
 This I say of me, but think of you, Love! 
 
 This to you — yourself my moon of poets! 
 
 Ah, but that's the world's side, there's the wonder; 
 
 Thus they see you, praise you, think they know you! 190 
 
 There, in turn I stand with them and praise you — 
 
 Out of my own self, I dare to phrase it. 
 
 But the best is when I glide from out them, 
 
 Cross a step or two of dubious twilight, 
 
 Come out on the other side, the novel 195 
 
 Silent silver lights and darks undreamed of, 
 
 Where I hush and bless myself with silence. 
 
 XIX 
 
 Oh, their Rafael of the dear Madonnas; 
 
 Oh, their Dante of the dread Inferno, 
 
 Wrote one song — and in my brain I sing it; 200 
 
 Drew one angel — borne, see, on my bosom! 
 
 R, B. 
 
PROSPICE 81 
 
 PROSPICE 
 
 Fear death? — to feel the fog in my throaty 
 
 The mist in my face, 
 When the snows begin, and the blasts denote 
 
 I am nearing the place, 
 The power of the night, the press of the storm, 5 
 
 The post of the foe; 
 Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form, 
 
 Yet the strong man must go: 
 For the journey is done and the summit attained. 
 
 And the barriers fall, 10 
 
 Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, 
 
 The reward of it all. 
 I was ever a fighter, so — one fight more. 
 
 The best and the last! 
 I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and for- 
 bore, 15 
 
 And bade me creep past. 
 No! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers 
 
 The heroes of old. 
 Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears 
 
 Of pain, darkness, and cold. 20 
 
 For sudden the w^orst turns the best to the brave, 
 
 The black minute's at end, 
 And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave. 
 
 Shall dwindle, shall blend, 
 Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, 25 
 
 Then a light, then thy breast. 
 thou soul of my soul ! I shall clasp thee again, 
 
 And with God be the rest! 
 
82 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 EPILOGUE TO ASOLANDO 
 
 At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, 
 
 When you set your fancies free, 
 Will they pass to where — by death, fools think, im- 
 prisoned — 
 Low he lies who once so loved you, whom you loved so, 
 
 — Pity me? 5 
 
 Oh to love so, be so loved, yet so mistaken! 
 
 What had I on earth to do 
 With the slothful, with the mawkish, the unmanly? 
 Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I drivel 
 
 — Being — who? 10 
 
 One who never turned his back but marched breast 
 forward. 
 Never doubted clouds would break, 
 Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would 
 
 triumph. 
 Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, 
 
 Sleep to wake. 15 
 
 No, at noonday in the bustle of man's work-time 
 
 Greet the unseen with a cheer! 
 Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be, 
 "Strive and thrive!" cry " Speed, — fight on, fare ever 
 There as here!'' 20 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND 83 
 
 THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND 
 
 That second time they hunted me 
 
 From hill to plain, from shore to sea, 
 
 And Austria, hounding far and wide 
 
 Her blood-hounds through the country-side, 
 
 Breathed hot and instant on my trace, — 5 
 
 I made six days a hiding-place 
 
 Of that dry green old aqueduct 
 
 Where I and Charles, when boys, have plucked 
 
 The fire-flies from the roof above. 
 
 Bright creeping through the moss they love: 10 
 
 ■ — How long it seems since Charles was lost! 
 
 Six days the soldiers crossed and crossed 
 
 The country in my very sight; 
 
 And when that peril ceased at night, 
 
 The sky broke out in red dismay 15 
 
 With signal fires; well, there I lay 
 
 Close covered o'er in my recess, 
 
 Up to the neck in ferns and cress, 
 
 Thinking on Metternich our friend. 
 
 And Charles's miserable end, 20 
 
 And much beside, two days; the third, 
 
 Hunger overcame me when I heard 
 
 The peasants from the village go 
 
 To work among the maize; you know, 
 
 With us in Lombardy, they bring 25 
 
 Provisions packed on mules, a string 
 
 With little bells that cheer their task. 
 
 And casks, and boughs on every cask 
 
 To keep the sun's heat from the wine; 
 
 These I let pass in jingling line, 30 
 
 And, close on them, dear noisy crew, 
 
84 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 The peasants from the village, too; 
 
 For at the very rear would troop 
 
 Their wives and sisters in a group 
 
 To help, I knew. When these had passed, 35 
 
 I threw my glove to strike the last. 
 
 Taking the chance : she did not start, 
 
 Much less cry out, but stooped apart, 
 
 One instant rapidly glanced round. 
 
 And saw me beckon from the ground; 40 
 
 A wild bush grows and hides my crypt; 
 
 She picked my glove up while she stripped 
 
 A branch off, then rejoined the rest 
 
 With that; my glove lay in her breast. 
 
 Then I drew breath : they disappeared : 45 
 
 It was for Italy I feared. 
 
 An hour, and she returned alone 
 Exactly where my glove was thrown. 
 Meanwhile came many thoughts; on me 
 Rested the hopes of Italy; 50 
 
 I had devised a certain tale 
 Which, when 't was told her, could not fail 
 Persuade a peasant of its truth ; 
 I meant to call a freak of youth 
 This hiding, and give hopes of pay, 55 
 
 And no temptation to betray. 
 But when I saw that woman's face. 
 Its calm simplicity of grace, 
 Our Italy's own attitude 
 
 In which she walked thus far, and stood, 60 
 
 Planting each naked foot so firm. 
 To crush the snake and spare the worm — 
 At first sight of her eyes, I said, 
 *' I am that man upon whose head 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND 85 
 
 They fix the price, because I hate 65 
 
 The Austrians over us : the State 
 
 Will give you gold — oh, gold so much! — 
 
 If you betray me to their clutch. 
 
 And be your death, for aught I know, 
 
 If once they find you saved their foe. 70 
 
 Now, you must bring me food and drink, 
 
 And also paper, pen and ink. 
 
 And carry safe what shall I write 
 
 To Padua, which you'll reach at night 
 
 Before the duomo shuts; go in, 75 
 
 And wait till Tenebrse begin; 
 
 Walk to the third confessional. 
 
 Between the pillar and the wall. 
 
 And kneeling whisper. Whence comes peace? 
 
 Say it a second time, then cease; 80 
 
 And if the voice inside returns, 
 
 From Christ and Freedom; what concerns 
 
 The cause of Peace? — for answer, slip 
 
 My letter where you placed your lip; 
 
 Then come back happy we have done 85 
 
 Our mother service — I, the son. 
 
 As you the daughter of our land! '[ 
 
 Three mornings more, she took her stand 
 In the same place, with the same eyes : 
 I was no surer of sunrise 90 
 
 Than of her coming. We conferred 
 Of her own prospects, and I heard 
 She had a lover — stout and tall. 
 She said — then let her eyelids fall, 
 " He could do much ''—as if some doubt 95 
 
 Entered her heart, — then, passing out, 
 " She could not speak for others, who 
 
86 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 Had other thoughts; herself she knew: '' 
 
 And so she brought me drink and food. 
 
 After four days, the scouts pursued 100 
 
 Another path ; at last arrived 
 
 The help my Paduan friends contrived 
 
 To furnish me : she brought the news. 
 
 For the first time I could not choose 
 
 But kiss her hand, and lay my own 105 
 
 Upon her head — " This faith was shown 
 
 To Italy, our mother; she 
 
 Uses my hand and blesses thee.'' 
 
 She followed down to the sea-shore; 
 
 I left and never saw her more. 110 
 
 How very long since I have thought 
 Concerning — much less wished for — aught 
 Beside the good of Italy, 
 For which I live and mean to die! 
 I never was in love; and since 115 
 
 Charles proved false, what shall now convince 
 My inmost heart I have a friend? 
 However, if I pleased to spend 
 Real wishes on myself — say, three — 
 I know at least what one should be. 120 
 
 I would grasp Metternich until 
 I felt his red wet throat distil 
 In blood through these two hands. And next 
 — Nor much for that am I perplexed — 
 Charles, perjured traitor, for his part, 125 
 
 Should die slow of a broken heart 
 Under his new employers. Last 
 — Ah, there, what should I wish? For fast 
 Do I grow old and out of strength. 
 If I resolved to seek at length 130 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND 87 
 
 My father's house again, how scared 
 
 They all would look, and unprepared! 
 
 My brothers live in Austria's pay 
 
 — Disowned me long ago, men say; 
 
 And all my early mates who used 135 
 
 To praise me so — perhaps induced 
 
 More than one early step of mine — ■ 
 
 Are turning wise : while some opine 
 
 '' Freedom grows license," some suspect 
 
 *' Haste breeds delay,'' and recollect 140 
 
 They always said, such premature 
 
 Beginnings never could endure! 
 
 So, with a sullen '' All's for best," 
 
 The land seems settling to its rest. 
 
 I think then, I should wish to stand 145 
 
 This evening in that dear, lost land, 
 
 Over the sea the thousand miles, 
 
 And know if yet that woman smiles 
 
 With the calm smile; some little farm 
 
 She lives in there, no doubt : what harm 150 
 
 If I sat on the door-side bench. 
 
 And, while her spindle made a trench 
 
 Fantastically in the dust, 
 
 Inquired of all her fortunes — just 
 
 Her children's ages and their names, 155 
 
 And what may be the husband's aims 
 
 For each of them. I'd talk this out, 
 
 And sit there, for an hour about, 
 
 Then kiss her hand once more, and lay 
 
 Mine on her head, and go my way. 160 
 
 So much for idle wishing — how 
 It steals the time! To business now. 
 
88 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 INSTANS TYRANNUS 
 
 Of the million or two, more or less, 
 I rule and possess, 
 One man, for some cause undefined, 
 Was least to my mind. 
 
 II 
 
 I struck him, he grovelled of course — 5 
 
 For, what was his force? 
 
 I pinned him to earth with my weight 
 
 And persistence of hate: 
 
 And he lay, would not moan would not curse. 
 
 As his lot might be worse. 10 
 
 III 
 
 " Were the object less mean, would he stand 
 
 At the swing of my hand! 
 
 For obscurity helps him and blots 
 
 The hole where he squats.'' 
 
 So, I set my five wits on the stretch 15 
 
 To inveigle the wretch. 
 
 All in vain! Gold and jewels I threw, 
 
 Still he couched there perdue; 
 
 I tempted his blood and his flesh, 
 
 Hid in roses my mesh, 20 
 
 Choicest cates and the flagon's best spilth: 
 
 Still he kept to his filth. 
 
INSTANS TYRANNUS 89 
 
 IV 
 
 Had he kith now or kin, were access 
 
 To his heart, did I press : 
 
 Just a son or a mother to seize! 25 
 
 No such booty as these. 
 
 Were it simply a friend to pursue 
 
 'Mid my million or two. 
 
 Who could pay me in person or pelf 
 
 What he owes me himself! 30 
 
 No: I could not but smile through my chafe: 
 
 For the fellow lay safe 
 
 As his mates do, the midge and the nit, 
 
 — Through minuteness, to wit. 
 
 Then a humor more great took its place 35 
 
 At the thought of his face, 
 
 The droop, the low cares of the mouth. 
 
 The trouble uncouth 
 
 Twixt the brows, all that air one is fain 
 
 To put out of its pain. 40 
 
 And, '' no! " I admonished myself, 
 
 " Is one mocked by an elf. 
 
 Is one baffled by toad or by rat? 
 
 The gravamen's in that! 
 
 How the lion, who crouches to suit 45 
 
 His back to my foot. 
 
 Would admire that I stand in debate! 
 
 But the small turns the great 
 
 If it vexes you,— that is the thing! 
 
 Toad or rat vex the king? 50 
 
 Though I waste half my realm to unearth 
 
 Toad or rat, 'tis well worth! '[ 
 
90 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 VI 
 
 So, I soberly laid my last plan 
 
 To extinguish the man. 
 
 Round his creep-hole, with never a break, 55 
 
 Ran my fires for his sake; 
 
 Over-head; did my thunder combine 
 
 With my underground mine : 
 
 Till I looked from my labor content 
 
 To enjoy the event. 60 
 
 VII 
 
 When sudden . . . how think ye, the end? 
 Did I say " without friend '' ? 
 Say rather, from marge to blue marge 
 The whole sky grew his targe 
 
 With the sun's self for visible boss, 65 
 
 While an Arm ran across 
 Which the earth heaved beneath like a breast 
 Where the wretch was safe prest! 
 Do you see? Just my vengeance complete, 
 . The man sprang to his feet, 70 
 
 Stood erect, caught at God's skirts, and prayed! 
 • — So, / was afraid! 
 
 THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN 
 
 A child's story 
 (Written for, and inscribed to, W. M. the Younger) 
 
 Hamelin Town's in Brunswick, 
 By famous Hanover city; 
 
 The river Weser, deep and wide. 
 
 Washes its wall on the southern side; 
 
 A pleasanter spot you never spied; 5 
 
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN 91 
 
 But, when begins my ditty, 
 Almost five hundred years ago, 
 To see the townsfolk suffer so 
 From vermin, was a pity, 
 
 II 
 
 Rats! 10 
 
 They fought the dogs and killed the cats. 
 
 And bit the babies in the cradles, 
 And ate the cheeses out of the vats, 
 
 And licked the soup from the cooks' own ladles. 
 Split open the kegs of salted sprats, 15 
 
 Made nests inside men's Sunday hats, 
 And even spoiled the women's chats 
 
 By drowning their speaking 
 
 With shrieking and squeaking 
 In fifty different sharps and flats. 20 
 
 III 
 
 At last the people in a body 
 
 To the Town Hall came flocking: 
 " 'T is clear," cried they, " our Mayor's a noddy; 
 
 And as for our Corporation — shocking 
 To think we buy gowns lined with ermine 25 
 
 For dolts that can't or won't determine 
 What's best to rid us of our vermin! 
 You hope, because you're old and obese. 
 To find in the furry civic robe ease? 
 Rouse up, sirs! Give your brains a racking 30 
 
 To find the remedy we're lacking, 
 Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing! [[ 
 At this the Mayor and Corporation 
 Quaked with a mighty consternation, 
 
92 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 IV 
 
 An hour they sat in council; 35 
 
 At length the Mayor broke silence: 
 '' For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell, 
 
 I wish I were a mile hence! 
 It's easy to bid one rack one's brain — 
 I'm sure my poor head aches again, 40 
 
 I've scratched it so, and all in vain. 
 Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap! " 
 Just as he said this, what should hap 
 At the chamber-door but a gentle tap? 
 '' Bless us," cried the Mayor, '' what's that? '' 45 
 
 (With the Corporation as he sat, 
 Looking little though wondrous fat; 
 Nor brighter was his e3^e, nor moister 
 Than a too-long-opened oyster, 
 
 Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous 50 
 
 For a plate of turtle green and glutinous) 
 '' Only a scraping of shoes on the mat? 
 Anything like the sound of a rat 
 Makes my heart go pit-a-pat! " 
 
 /'Come in!" — the Mayor cried, looking bigger: 55 
 
 And in did come the strangest figure! 
 
 His queer long coat from heel to head 
 
 Was half of yellow and half of red. 
 
 And he himself was tall and thin. 
 
 With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin, 60 
 
 And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin, 
 
 No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin. 
 
 But lips where smiles went out and in; 
 
 There was no guessing his kith and kin: 
 
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN 93 
 
 And nobody could enough admire 65 
 
 The tall man and his quaint attire. 
 
 Quoth one: " It's as my great-grandsire, 
 
 Starting up at the Trump of Doom's tone, 
 
 Had walked this way from his painted tomb-stone! " 
 
 VI 
 
 He advanced to the council-table: 70 
 
 And, " Please your honors," said he, " I'm able, 
 
 By means of a secret charm, to draw 
 
 All creatures living beneath the sun. 
 
 That creep or swim or fly or run. 
 
 After me so as you never saw! 75 
 
 And I chiefly use my charm 
 
 On creatuies that do people harm. 
 
 The mole and toad and newt and viper; 
 
 And people call me the Pied Piper." 
 
 (And here they noticed round his neck 80 
 
 A scarf of red and yellow stripe, 
 
 To match with his coat of the self-same cheque; 
 
 And at the scarf's end hung a pipe; 
 
 And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying 
 
 As if impat ent to be playing 85 
 
 Upon this pipe, as low it dangled 
 
 Over his vesture so old-fangled.) 
 
 " Yet," said he, " poor piper as I am. 
 
 In Tartary I freed the Cham, 
 
 Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats; 90 
 
 I eased in Asia the Nizam 
 
 Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats: 
 
 And as for what your brain bewilders. 
 
 If I can rid your town of rats 
 
 Will you give me a thousand guilders? " 95 
 
94 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 '^ One? fifty thousand! " — was the exclamation 
 Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation. 
 
 vii 
 
 Into the street the Piper stept, 
 
 Smiling first a little smile, 
 As if he knew what magic slept 100 
 
 In his quiet pipe the while; 
 Then, like a musical adept, 
 To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled. 
 And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled. 
 Like a candle-flame where salt is sprinkled; 105 
 
 And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered, 
 You heard as if an army muttered; 
 And the muttering grew to a grumbling; 
 And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling; 
 And out of the houses the rats came tumbling. 110 
 
 Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats. 
 Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats, 
 Grave old plodders, gay young friskers, 
 
 Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins, 
 Cocking tails and pricking whiskers, 115 
 
 Families by tens and dozens. 
 Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives — 
 Followed the Piper for their lives. 
 From street to street he piped advancing, 
 And step for step they followed dancing, 120 
 
 Until they came to the river Weser, 
 Wherein all plunged and perished! 
 — Save one who, stout as Julius Csesar, 
 Swam across and lived to carry 
 (As he, the manuscript he cherished) 125 
 
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN 95 
 
 To Rat-land home his commentary: 
 
 Which was, '' At the first shrill notes of the pipe, 
 
 I heard a sound as of scraping tripe, 
 
 And putting apples, wondrous ripe. 
 
 Into a cider-press's gripe : 130 
 
 And a moving away of pickle-tub-boards. 
 
 And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards, 
 
 And a drawing the corks of train-oil-flasks. 
 
 And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks: 
 
 And it seemed as if a voice 135 
 
 (Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery 
 
 Is breathed) called out, ' Oh rats, rejoice! 
 
 The world is grown to one vast drysaltery! 
 
 So munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon. 
 
 Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon! ' 140 
 
 And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon, 
 
 All ready staved, like a great sun shone 
 
 Glorious scarce an inch before me, 
 
 Just as methought it said. ' Come, bore me! ' 
 
 — I found the Weser rolling o'er me." 145 
 
 VIII 
 
 You should have heard the Hamelin people 
 
 Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple. 
 
 '' Go," cried the Mayor, ^' and get long poles, 
 
 Poke out the nests and block up the holes! 
 
 Consult with carpenters and builders, ' 150 
 
 And leave in our town not even a trace 
 
 Of the rats! " — when suddenly, up the face 
 
 Of the Piper perked in the market-place, 
 
 With a, '' First, if you please, my thousand guilders!" 
 
96 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 IX 
 
 A thousand guilders! The Mayor looked blue; 155 
 
 So did the Corporation too. 
 
 For council dinners made rare havoc 
 
 With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, Hock; 
 
 And half the money would replenish 
 
 Their cellar's biggest butt with Rhenish. 160 
 
 To pay this sum to a wandering fellow 
 
 With a gypsy coat of red and yellow! 
 
 '' Beside/' quoth the Mayor with a knowing wink, 
 
 '' Our business was done at the river's brink; 
 
 We saw with our eyes the vermin sink, 165 
 
 And what's dead can't come to life, I think. 
 
 So, friend, we're not the folks to shrink 
 
 From the duty of giving you something "for drink, 
 
 And a matter of money to put in your poke; 
 
 But as for the guilders, what w^e spoke 170 
 
 Of them, as you very well know, was in joke. 
 
 Beside, our losses have made us thrifty. 
 
 A thousand guilders! Come, take fifty! " 
 
 The Piper's face fell, and he cried, 
 
 " No trifling! I can't wait, beside! 175 
 
 I've promised to visit by dinner time 
 
 Bagdat, and accept the prime 
 
 Of the Head-Cook's pottage, all he's rich in, 
 
 For having left, in the Caliph's kitchen, 
 
 Of a nest of scorpions no survivor: 180 
 
 With him I proved no bargain-driver, 
 
 With you, don't think I'll bate a stiver! 
 
 And folks who put me in a passion 
 
 May find me pipe after another fashion.'' 
 
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN 97 
 
 XI 
 
 " How? " cried the Mayor, '' lV ye think I brook 185 
 
 Being worse treated than a Cook? 
 
 Insulted by a lazy ribald 
 
 With idle pipe and vesture piebald? 
 
 You threaten us, fellow? Do your worst, 
 
 Blow your pipe there till you burst! ^\ 190 
 
 XII 
 
 Once more he stept into the street, 
 
 And to his lips again 
 Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane; 
 
 And ere he blew three notes (such sweet 
 Soft notes as yet musician's cunning 195 
 
 Never gave the enraptured air) 
 There was a rustling that seemed like a bustling 
 Of merry crowds justling at pitching and hustling; 
 Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clattering, 
 Little hands clapping and little tongues chattering, 200 
 And, like fowls in a farm-yard when barley is scattering, 
 Out came the children running. 
 All the little boys and girls, 
 With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls, 
 And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls, 205 
 
 Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after 
 The wonderful music with shouting and laughter. 
 
 XIII 
 
 The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood 
 As if they were changed into blocks of wood, 
 Unable to move a step, or cry 210 
 
 To the children merrily skipping by, 
 
I ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 — Could only follow with the eye 
 
 That joyous crowd at the Piper's back. 
 
 But how the Mayor was on the rack, 
 
 And the wretched Council's bosoms beat, 215 
 
 As the Piper turned from the High Street 
 
 To where the Weser rolled its waters 
 
 Right in the way of their sons and daughters! 
 
 However, he turned from South to West, 
 
 And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed, 220 
 
 And after him the children pressed; 
 
 Great was the joy in every breast. 
 
 '' He never can cross that mighty top! 
 
 He's forced to let the piping drop, 
 
 And we shall see our children stop! " 225 
 
 When, lo, as they rea<3hed the mountain-side, 
 
 A wondrous portal opened wide, 
 
 As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed ; 
 
 And the Piper advanced and the children followed. 
 
 And when all were in to the very last, 230 
 
 The door in the mountain-side shut fast. 
 
 Did I say, all? No! One was lame. 
 
 And could not dance the whole of the way; 
 
 And in after years, if you would blame 
 
 His sadness, he was used to say, — 235 
 
 " It's dull in our town since my playmates left! 
 
 I can't forget that I'm bereft 
 
 Of all the pleasant sights they see, 
 
 Which the Piper also promised me. 
 
 For he led us, he said, to a joyous land, 240 
 
 Joining the town and just at hand. 
 
 Where waters gushed and fruit-trees grew 
 
 And flowers put forth a fairer hue, 
 
 And everything was strange and new; 
 
 The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here, 245 
 
THE PIED PIPER OF IIAMELIN 99 
 
 And their dogs outran our fallow deer, 
 
 And honey-bees had lost their stings, 
 
 And horses were born with eagles' wings: 
 
 And just as I became assured 
 
 My lame foot would be speedily cured, 250 
 
 The music stopped and I stood still, 
 
 And found myself outside the hill. 
 
 Left alone against my will, 
 
 To go now limping as before, 
 
 And never hear of that country more! \[ 255 
 
 XIV 
 
 Alas, alas for Hamelin! 
 
 There came into many a burgher's pate 
 
 A text which says that heaven's gate 
 
 Opes to the rich at as easy rate 
 As the needle's eye takes a camel in! 260 
 
 The Mayor sent East, West, North and South, 
 To offer the Piper, by word of mouth. 
 
 Wherever it was men's lot to find him, 
 Silver and gold to his heart's content. 
 If he'd only return the way he went, 265 
 
 And bring the children behind him. 
 But when they saw 't was a lost endeavor. 
 And Piper and dancers were gone forever. 
 They made a decree that lawyers never 
 
 Should think their "records dated duly 270 
 
 If, after the day of the month and year. 
 These words did not as well appear, 
 *' And so long after what happened here 
 
 On the Twenty-second of July, 
 Thirteen hundred and seventy-six : '\ 275 
 
 And the better in memory to fix 
 
100 ROBERT BROWNING 
 
 The place of the children's last retreat, 
 
 They called it, the Pied Piper's Street — 
 
 Where any one playing on pipe or tabor 
 
 Was sure for the future to lose his labor. 280 
 
 Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern 
 
 To shock with mirth a street so solemn; 
 But opposite the place of the cavern 
 
 They wrote the story on a column. 
 And on the great church-window painted 285 
 
 The same, to make the world acquainted 
 How their children were stolen away, 
 And there it stands to this very day. 
 And I must not omit to say 
 
 That in Transylvania there's a tribe 290 
 
 Of alien people who ascribe 
 The outlandish ways and dress 
 On which their neighbors lay such stress. 
 To their fathers and mothers having risen 
 Out of some subterraneous prison 295 
 
 Ihto which they were trepanned 
 Long time ago in a mighty band 
 Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land, 
 But how or why, they don't understand. 
 
 XV 
 
 So, Willy, let me and you be wipers 300 
 
 Of scores out with all men — especially pipers! 
 And, whether they pipe us free from rats or from mice, 
 If we've promised them aught, let us keep our promise! 
 
NOTES 
 
 Incident of the French Camp 
 
 This poem serves to introduce the form into which Browning 
 throws so many of his narratives, the dramatic monolog. The 
 speaker and the scene must be vividly imagined. In this case we 
 may suppose a httle group of French veterans smoking their pipes 
 over a glass of wine at an inn, and recalling incidents in their glorious 
 campaigning with the Little General. The speaker is standing, 
 and begins in familiar story-telling fashion, "You know we French 
 stormed Ratisbon"; and, continuing, he insensibly assumes dra- 
 matically Napoleon's customary attitude, "legs wide, arms 
 locked behind." The poem, then, is essentially one for free dra- 
 matic interpretation; it needs careful handling, especially in the 
 fourth and fifth stanzas — the last desperate effort of the dying 
 lad to deliver his message — and the transition to the quieter, slower, 
 tenderer manner of the concluding stanza. It is a true story, save 
 that the real hero was a man. 
 
 How They Brought the Good News 
 
 Again, essentially a poem for dramatic realization. The 
 rhythm is the chief factor. The pauses of the opening stanza are 
 important, until, as the more even swing of the lines intimates, the 
 horses settle down to a steady gallop. 
 
 Note the changes in time and tone in the following stanzas. 
 How does the meter compare with that of other poems describing 
 rides? The poem is not based upon fact; but the geography is 
 real enough, and we can easily imagine circumstances under which 
 the saving of Aix became a matter of such desperate necessity, 
 as, e.g., that it had been determined to set the city on fire at a 
 certain time rather than deliver it into the hands of the enemy. 
 The case has been compared to that of Mitylene when it had revolted 
 from ancient Athens. But this is, after all, a matter of quite 
 secondary importance (say why). Browning gives us the leading 
 clue when he tells us that the poem was written when he had been 
 on a sea-voyage "long enough to appreciate even the fancy of a 
 gallop on the back of a certain good horse, 'York,' then in my 
 stable at home." 
 
 101 
 
102 NOTES 
 
 Through the Metidja 
 
 This tour de force is given for its contrasting movement. The 
 lilt of the riding rhythm differs, as the circumstances differ, from 
 that of the preceding poem. Can you justify the difference? Note 
 also how slight is the scenic allusion here. What emotion domi- 
 nates the rider? The strange fancies of this fanatical Arab, as he 
 rides across the lonely desert to his great chief, Abd-el-Kadr, are 
 somewhat impalpable, but suggestive of one of those wild upris- 
 ings of the fierce Arab tribes against their modern French "civili- 
 zers." The main thing, however, is the impression of that swinging 
 desert ride, and its passionately meditative rider. 
 
 MULEYKEH 
 
 The rhythm is irregular and difficult; read aloud until you 
 catch it. Note the rime scheme. The story is a touching expres- 
 sion of the Arab's love of his steed. (Tell it briefly in your own 
 words.) How is Hoseyn's character delineated? The construction 
 is difficult at times, as in 11. 4-6; be sure of the meaning. Some of 
 the touches are very striking, e.g., 11. 34-5. What others do you 
 note? 
 
 Tray 
 
 Another poem showing Browning's interest in animals, and 
 the side he took in the controversy about vivisection. He protested 
 against what he called "an infamous practice," and took an active 
 part in the movement against it. He had no sympathy with the 
 man who, as he says elsewhere, would 
 
 "have no end of brutes 
 Cut up alive to guess what suits 
 My case, and saves my toe from shoots." 
 
 The story is true; a friend of the poet's saw this instance of 
 what Browning believes to be animal "heroism" in Paris. 
 
 Donald 
 
 Another "true" animal story, told with the same motive as 
 "Tray," but criticised as being unfair, because no true "sports- 
 man" such as is spoken of in the first part of the poem would be 
 guilty of such mean, unsportsmanlike conduct. What do you 
 think? Do you approve of the story-teller's silence (1. 235)? Do 
 you know the meaning of bothy, trivet, Glenlivet douhle-first, heather, 
 peat, burnie, Ben, fallow dser (as distinguished from red deer), volte- 
 face, pastern, Goliath ? Which have local color? Characterize the 
 meter: the stanza. 
 
NOTES 103 
 
 Herve Riel 
 
 We may think of this as in some respects a companion poem 
 to Tennyson's ballad of the Revenge (note the correspondences and 
 differences in form — stanza, rhythm, direct narration, etc. — and 
 in substance). Browning graciously wrote this tribute to French 
 heroism in order that he might contribute the hundred guineas 
 which it brought him to the fund for the relief of the starving 
 citizens of Paris after the siege (1871). The story is a true one, 
 but it curiously remained for an Englishman to blazon the for- 
 gotten deed in verse. The poem was written at Le Croisic, a small 
 fishing village at the mouth of the Loire, and the home of the brave 
 Breton sailor who asked, as his reward for his valor, that he might 
 have a whole day's holiday to go ashore to see his wife! 
 
 Be careful to pronounce the hero's name as French, not German; 
 I.e., Ri-el. 
 
 The Ranee (5) : the river which flows into the English channel 
 at Saint-Malo, Brittany. Twelve and eighty (18): following the 
 French, quatre-vingt-douze. Tourville (43): the French admiral. 
 Croisickese (44): native of Le Croisic. Malouins (46): natives of 
 St. Malo. dreve (49) : sands round Mont Saint Michel. Bay (52) : 
 that of Saint-Michel. Disembogues (49): enters the sea. Solidor 
 (53): old fort on mainland. Rampired (92): ramparted, fortified. 
 Louvre (135): great picture-gallery and museum in Paris. 
 
 Pheidippides 
 
 Based, with much skilful suggestiveness, on the story told by 
 Herodotus (look it up in Rawlinson's translation), a mixture of 
 fact and legend, of the Athenian runner who in forty-eight hours 
 ran the one hundred and fifty miles between Athens and Sparta 
 with a request for aid against the invading Persians. Note how 
 the story is told: first by the hero him.self (when, is explained by 
 1. 9), who then leaves for Marathon ("Fennel-field": it is a sprig 
 of fennel Pan presents, see 1. 81); and then it is brought to a close 
 in 11. 105-112, with an epilog explaining the Greek salutation 
 born of Marathon Day, "Rejoice, we conquer" (given in Greek as 
 sub-title). There is a spirit of Hellenic blitheness and grace in 
 the poem, felt at once in the opening religious salutation. The 
 character of Pheidippides — notably his patriotism and his mod- 
 esty — is worthy of study. 
 
 The hexameter verse is rough: some lines are almost unscanable; 
 others (e.g., 64) charmingly smooth. The predominant foot is 
 the dactyl, varied by the foot of two equal stresses — sometimes 
 light, and at other times having the weight of the true spondee — 
 thus (1. 2): 
 
104 NOTE'S 
 
 \j y^ — — — w w — —vyvy 
 
 Gods of my ] birth-place 1 de-mons and | he-roes J honor to ] all. 
 
 or a uniformly dactyllic line like this (26): 
 
 Ev-e-ry [ face of her | leered in a ] furrow of ] envy mis ] trust. 
 
 Sometimes the line is not catalectic, as it is in the examples just 
 given, thus (1. 21): 
 
 K^ \y \y KJ \^ KJ \^ 
 
 Die, with the | wide world | spitting at | Spar-ta the | stupid 
 
 ^ WW 
 
 the I stander by. 
 
 Sometimes an iambus takes the place of a dactyl or spondee 
 (1. 53): 
 
 W W W — W W WW 
 
 Treeless | herbless 1 lifeless | mountain! What ] matter if | 
 
 slacked, 
 
 unless, indeed, a special value is given to the syllable "less" in 
 the first three words. Note the caesura after "mountain," and 
 its incidence elsewhere. What about rime? 
 
 For the classical allusions consult Gay ley's Classic Myths in 
 English Literature. Be sure of the meaning of dcemons (2); buskin 
 (5); Archons (9); tettix (9); filleted (47); fosse (61); fane (73); 
 guerdon (88). On the razor's edge (87) means a critical situation; 
 have we a corresponding idiom? Parnes (52 et seq.) seems to be 
 a slip of Browning's; it is a mountain between Attica and Boeotia; 
 whereas, according to Herodotus, it was on Mount Parthenium in 
 Arcadia that the hero met the god. 
 
 Browning, who from his childhood, under his scholarly father's 
 inspiration, kept his Greek studies agoing, returned to classic 
 themes from time to time, and made some translations from the 
 Greek dramatists. You will find them in his complete works. 
 Try first his delightful Balaustion's Adventure, with its rendering 
 of Euripides's Alkestis. His amusing account of his first steps in 
 Greek is to be found in his poem. Development. His wife, too, 
 loved and was learned in these old themes, and translated the 
 Prometheus Bound of iEschylus. 
 
 ECHETLOS 
 
 In the same meter ; about Marathon, too. Note the abounding 
 energy of the narrative, and the graphic quality of the descriptions. 
 Don't misunderstand the meaning of clown. Tunnies are large 
 fish found in the Mediterranean. Polemarch, the nominal comman- 
 der-in-chief at Athens, the actual commander at Marathon being 
 
NOTES 105 
 
 Miltiades. Kallimachos had given his casting-vote at the council 
 of war in favor of fighting. In the last stanza the poet's comment 
 on the great words of the oracle — "The great deed ne'er grows 
 small" — is, "Not the great name," alas! — as the careers of 
 Miltiades and Themistocles sadly show. What cast these in 
 eclipse? 
 
 The Patriot 
 
 This is a more characteristically Browningesque study of a 
 patriot — the close especially so. We return to the monolog; 
 the speaker, his whereabouts and predicament (stanzas 4 and 5), 
 must be clearly imaged. Note the method of the story: 1. a 
 year ago (1-10); 2. the cause of the reaction (11-15); 3. now; 
 4. reflection. What is the victim's mood? Why does not he 
 rail against the fickle populace? In what sense is this "An Old 
 Story"? 
 
 Count Gismond 
 
 Browning finds his heroes and heroines in all times, climes, 
 and conditions. Here we have a story of the period of chivalry,— 
 not an uncommon theme; but is it not old in an uncommon way? 
 It is a monolog; does this restrict the speaker? What does she 
 contrive to tell about herself? Is she vain? What is her charac- 
 ter? To whom does she talk (11. 105-7)? Note the beautifully 
 chaste quality about the poem. 
 
 The poem is, of course, one for a girl to recite and interpret 
 dramatically. At 1. 46 Browning introduces one of those little 
 incidents, indicative of some act of the speaker's, which may puzzle 
 the beginner. What happens here? Where is the narrative 
 taken up again? Note the transition in the closing stanza. What 
 effect does the poet gain by it? 
 
 The Twins 
 
 A PARABLE told in Luther's Table Talk. Published in 1854 
 in a pamphlet sold at a bazaar for the benefit of a Refuge for Young 
 Destitute Girls. Mrs. Browning contributed a poem, entitled A 
 Plea for the Ragged Schools of London. How her woman's heart 
 responded to the appeal of the suffering young may best be seen 
 in her passionate Cry of the Children. The Latin students will 
 explain the Date and Dabitur. 
 
 The Boy and the Angel 
 
 This poem, with its simple story, yields some deeper meanings. 
 It presents, says a commentator, "one of Mr. Browning's deepest 
 convictions in a popular form": this conviction is embodied in 
 
106 NOTES 
 
 the idea — which it may not be easy to grasp — that the simple 
 praise of the curly-haired lad, Theocrite, singing at his work, had 
 a quality which the praise of the Pope, in his "great way" at Rome, 
 and even that of the angel Gabriel, lacked: there was "no doubt 
 in it, no fear" (40). When the boy leaves his work to become a 
 priest, God misses his praise; so Gabriel takes his place. But it 
 is not the same: "I miss my little human praise," says God. So 
 Gabriel hastens to Rome to enable Theocrite, who is now Pope, 
 to return to his early cell to "resume the craftsman and the boy." 
 When the two, the lad and the new Pope now in his place, died, 
 "they sought God side by side," the human and the angelic, the 
 lofty and the lowly. 
 
 The form of the poem is curious: it varies frequently, the 
 tetrameter changing to trimeter in 1. 8, and to dimeter in 1. 19. 
 Are these and other following changes expressive? 
 
 My Last Duchess 
 
 This tells a story in the most condensed form, many of the 
 facts being indicated by implication and suggestion. It repre- 
 sents the monolog in its developed phase. Thus we gather at the 
 outset that the speaker, a Duke of Ferrara, is primarily an art con- 
 noisseur; his "last Duchess" (how many may there have been?) is 
 memorable as having furnished a marvelous subject for Fra Pan- 
 dolf's skill, and so he is now the proud possessor of a masterpiece. 
 Then he meets the question always suggested to the beholder by the 
 beauty of the pictured lady, — a beauty she was too lavish of. Her 
 smiles were too easily and indiscriminately bestowed; she did not 
 honor her lord exclusively enough. As proud as he was jealous, he 
 would not stoop to chide or question; all this displeased him. So, 
 after the brutal manner of so many of those great criminals of the 
 Renaissance period, he gave his murderous command, and she was 
 removed. He knows no shame: "there she stands as if alive" 
 — one of art's triumphs! The visitor is evidently an ambassador 
 come to negotiate another marriage (49-51). A bargain has to be 
 made by this cultivated ruffian, who now seeks another good match. 
 As they descend to rejoin the company below after their negotiating, 
 the polite and polished and heartless connoisseur points with pride 
 to another possession, a masterly "Neptune" by the famous Glaus 
 of Innsbruck. 
 
 A Face 
 
 It is pleasant to turn now to this little attempt to do justice to a 
 beautiful childlike face, as the poet imagines one of those old Tuscan 
 painters might have painted it, upon a background of pale gold — • 
 something more beautiful than even Correggio's art could compass. 
 
NOTES 107 
 
 The allusion will not have much meaning unless you can turn to 
 a reproduction of one of Correggio's masterpieces. 
 
 Song from Pippa Passes 
 
 This delicious snatch of rapturous song is a strain out of Brown- 
 ing's own happy heart. Nothing is more expressive of his assured 
 and exultant faith that the world is sound at the core, and that 
 life means well, than the concluding couplet, so often quoted. This 
 epitomizes what is called — especially by those who cannot con- 
 front so buoyantly and joyously the too obvious and distressing 
 sorrow and suffering of the world — Browning's optimism. George 
 Eliot preferred to call herself a meliorist. 
 
 Cavalier Tunes 
 
 Very different from the pure, clear treble of little Pippa are 
 the strong, burly tones of the great-hearted Cavaliers; but they 
 echo a chiming mood of unconquerable confidence and courage — 
 Browning's two conspicuous quahties. The singers are, of course. 
 Royalists, who side with Charles I in the great Civil War; and 
 these lusty, contemptuous country gentlemen, who rallied almost 
 to a man to the King, mince no words over such "carles" as 
 Pym, Hampden, Hazelrig, Fiennes, Vane, ''Noll" (Oliver Crom- 
 well), and the crop-headed Parliamentary leaders. How the 
 choruses ring out! 
 
 Home-Thoughts from Abroad 
 
 After this pronouncedly English strain the transition is natural 
 to one or two poems that reflect Browning's love of his native land. 
 He lived much in Italy, which shared, as a poem we shall cite 
 presently will show, his heart's devotion. No more beautifully 
 colored piece of description is to be found in Browning. The 
 thrush is, of course, the English bird of that name, whose song is 
 more flute-like and more varied perhaps than that of our own 
 delightful wood-thrush. This gaudy melon-flower (20) is one which 
 he is gazing upon in Italy. 
 
 Home-Thoughts from the Sea 
 
 Not England's beauty, but her prowess and the service of her 
 great sons, are celebrated. At sea, off the southern coast of Spain, 
 the poet gazes at once upon the scenes of five great naval victories. 
 So, impressed by the thought of what England through her heroes 
 has done for him, he asks, in a solemn religious mood, "How 
 can I help England?'.' 
 
108 NOTES 
 
 De Gustibus- 
 
 Here the poet's double devotion to England and Italy is voiced. 
 Here, in the first section, it is an English corn field (i.e., wheat field) 
 and an English blackbird, one of the most velvet-toned of English 
 singers, which are referred to. The Italian landscape in the second 
 section is most masterfully done; and the closing lines, oft-quoted, 
 sing an unmistakable close. The title is the beginning of a Latin 
 adage; complete it. How does it apply here? 
 
 Memorabilia 
 
 Mingled with Browning's tributes to his native country should 
 go this tribute to her poet, to whom more than to any other he was 
 indebted for the kindling of his own poetic fires, — Shelley. Else- 
 where Browning has paid his homage to this "Sun-treader," as 
 he called him. This is an unconventional little lyric — full of 
 the sense of surprise and wonder at meeting one who had actually 
 known Shelley; for it was crossing a certain gray space in life 
 that the poet had picked up the eagle-feather that had winged 
 Shelley's sunward flight, and had put it "inside his breast." That 
 was the memory he "started at" — the sun-spot in his life. In the 
 poem Popularity will be found his tribute to another poet, Keats, — 
 Shelley's " Adonais," — whom also he early admired. 
 
 The Lost Leader 
 
 Here we may well introduce this poem, contrasting by its 
 note of detraction with the foregoing, and commonly supposed 
 to allude to another great English poet, — Wordsworth, — who, 
 from being the enthusiastic prophet of liberty and progress in his 
 youth, became sobered by the French Revolution and its wild 
 excesses into a cautious Conservative, disposed to frown upon all 
 reform. Browning, when asked about the rumor, replied: "I 
 did in my hasty youth presume to use the great and venerated 
 personality of Wordsworth as a sort of painter's model; one from 
 which this or that particular feature may be selected and turned 
 to account; had I intended more, — above all, such a boldness 
 as portraying the entire man, I should not have talked about 
 'handfuls of silver and bits of ribbon.' These never influenced 
 the change of pohtics in the great poet, whose defection, never- 
 theless, accompanied as it was by a regular face-about of his special 
 party, was to my juvenile apprehension, and even mature con- 
 sideration, an event to deplore .... So, though I dare not deny 
 the original of my little poem, I altogether refuse to have it con- 
 sidered as the 'very effigies' of such a moral and intellectual su- 
 periority." 
 
NOTES 109 
 
 Note the confident tramp of the rhythm, carrying a young 
 man's proud assurance of the might of his cause: "We shall 
 march prospering"; "Deeds will be done." To be sure, Browning's 
 own Liberalism was of a mild and respectable sort: his poetry 
 nowhere reveals a vital social enthusiasm. He was the poet of 
 the individual, not of causes and movements. For this social 
 enthusiasm we turn rather to his wife, who in several short poems, 
 and in her Aurora Leigh, sounded the note of an impassioned 
 humanitarianism. 
 
 The measures have fine sonorous quality — "Lived in his mild 
 and magnificent eye." What is the meter? Render and scan, 
 e.g., II. 11, 13, 14, 21, 31. Find the long vowel values. 
 
 Life in a Love 
 
 These little lyrics will serve to carry us from the thought of 
 the celebration of one great poet's fame by another to that mighty 
 theme, by their handling of which most of the great poets are to 
 be appraised. In what way, with what nobility and splendor, 
 does the emotion of love live in him and his works? Perhaps this 
 is a test question not only for the poet, but for all artists — for all 
 men and women. Browning will assuredly stand the test. For 
 him pure, passionate love is the sacred fire on the altar of life; 
 and fortunate was he, in his marriage with another great poet- 
 soul, to find the fulfilment of his own highest ideal. His poems 
 treat of love in many aspects — foiled and defeated love as well 
 as love triumphant over every obstacle; courageous love and cowardly 
 love; base love and "lyric love, half-angel and half-bird." Here 
 we have it sung as the dominating and endlessly pursued purpose of 
 a life. Failure? — 
 
 "It is but to keep the nerves at strain 
 To dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall 
 And, baffled, get up and begin again." 
 
 Youth and Art 
 
 This poem, on the contrary, tells the story of two who failed 
 to see in love, when it first budded in their hearts, the lord and 
 master of life. They dallied, were over-cautious; and looking back 
 to those "Bohemian" days, the now great singer confesses to the 
 equally famous sculptor that she missed the golden opportunity 
 that might have brought joys of which she has never tasted, and 
 that life seems unfulfilled, hangs patchy and scrappy. 
 
110 NOTES 
 
 Evelyn Hope 
 
 This poem is a general favorite. Read it through once to gain 
 an outlook upon the scene — the elderly man seated in the dark- 
 ened room beside the beautiful young girl, lying dead, whom he 
 has loved unknown to her. He can wait for love to blossom in 
 her soul. Here again we have Browning's large, forward-looking 
 faith that all will come right, — if not in this chapter of our life, 
 then in some one yet to come (1. 29); the faith naively expressed 
 by the lover when he folds the leaf in the "sweet cold hand," so 
 that on waking the young girl shall remember and understand. 
 
 Again the test of comprehension and appreciation must be the 
 reading aloud, which should give us the hush of the room, the 
 tenderly quiet, pausing, deeply moved manner of the speaker. 
 Especially the pauses (sometimes occasioned by an omitted syl- 
 lable) must be appropriate and adequate. The rhythm varies, and 
 the scansion is not easy: be careful, for instance, with such lines as 
 9, 31, 54. Full value must be given to the long vowel effects, 
 which will often yield us spondees in scanning. 
 
 Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister 
 
 Refer the Latin difficulties to the Latin students. For the 
 rest, imagine yourself to be a surly, sour, jealous bid monk. 
 
 A Grammarian's Funeral 
 
 This poem carries us back to the period of the Renaissance, 
 when men were consumed by an enthusiasm for the rediscovered 
 art and literature of antiquity, and worked upon the recovered 
 and corrupt texts of the great Greek and Latin authors with a 
 zeal that was little short of heroic. Browning tries to rescue here, 
 from the scorn usually poured out upon the pedants who waste 
 a life upon the minutiae of grammar and philology, an old gram- 
 marian who brings to his scholarship a temper and philosophy 
 that has its larger outlook and nobler meaning. It is a notable 
 instance of the poet's effort to see beneath surface appearances 
 to the obscure heart of human purpose and hope. There is some- 
 thing grandiose in the quiet confidence of the toiling scholar who, 
 with all time for his inheritance, refuses to be hurried and perturbed 
 in his laborious and thorough scholarship. Men find him at his 
 books bald and hazy-eyed: "Time to taste life!" they urge. "Not 
 so," he protests; "all is not yet learned from the text." 
 
 "Oh, such a life as he resolved to live 
 When he had learned it, 
 When he had gathered all books had to give! 
 Sooner, he spurned it." 
 
NOTES 111 
 
 The time would come; he trusted God for that. Meantime 
 he will not be tempted by any smaller, hastier aim. And the 
 poet comments: 
 
 "That low man seeks a little thing to do, 
 Sees it and does it: 
 This high man with a great thing to pursue, 
 Dies ere he Icnows it." 
 
 Does such a way of looking upon life and its tasks actually 
 give a certain greatness to the personality? What is to be said 
 for and against this high, impractical idealism? Browning exag- 
 gerates, doubtless. Does he make his point? 
 
 The poem has imaginative and poetic merit of a high order. 
 Imagine well the scene: the little band of young scholars, who have 
 caught their old master's spirit, carrying the body up the mountain- 
 side to give it fitting burial on the heights, singing as they go the 
 requiem of their revered leader. The requiem? No, the matin- 
 song; that alone becomes him: 
 
 "Our low life was the level's and the night's, 
 He's for the morning." 
 
 To their young, idealizing hearts he is no spent, bent figure; 
 rather one of those noljle figures of whom we catch a glimpse in 
 the pictures of the great painters of the period. Upon these youths, 
 at any rate, it is the vision of the departed man in his prime that 
 now returns: 
 
 "He was a man l>orn with thy face and throat, 
 Lyric Apollo!" 
 
 As they ascend, their meditations mingle with their songs; 
 and the poet continually reminds us of that upward climb in the 
 night to greet the dawn, by many a comment on the difficulties 
 of the climb — 
 
 " (Caution redoubled, 
 Step two abreast, the way winds narrowly)" 
 
 until at last the platform, the top-peak there among the sky-questing 
 birds, is reached: 
 
 "Here, here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form, 
 Lightnings are loosened, 
 Stars come and go! Let joy break with the storm. 
 Peace let the dew send ! ' ' 
 
 A few words are unusual, and must be looked up: crofts, queasy, 
 calculus (the disease of that name, not the mathematical delight); 
 hoti, ouriy de — Greek particles; soul-hydroptic means a soul suf- 
 
112 NOTES 
 
 fering, as it were, from a disease that produces an insatiable thirst — 
 the passion to know. Some of the phrases are condensed, e.g., 
 "rimming the rock-row" (8), meaning making a rim beyond the 
 row of rocks which are seen against the sky. 
 
 One Word More 
 
 This is the most intimate word that Browning has allowed us 
 to overhear. It is a love-tribute offered to his wife before her 
 death, as the allusion in the following poem came after it. It is the 
 best response to the passionate outpourings of his wife's heart in 
 her Sonnets from the Portuguese. After the introductory lines, the 
 poet uses his allusion to the one unique expression of love which 
 Rafael the painter found in a ''century of sonnets," and Dante the 
 poet sought in the figure of an angel which he drew. How would 
 these two lovers prize a sight of those privacies of soul! And how 
 does he, unapt at painting, sculpture, and music, long as these great 
 lovers did, "once and once only . . . to be the man and leave the 
 artist." (Stanzas ix-xi are difficult, and their clear understanding 
 may be postponed.) But writer only as he is, he may once put his 
 talent to a similarly unique purpose. All he has written — all his 
 fifty men and women are hers, though "all men's" too; but hers in 
 a different way, as coming from him in a different way, is this dedi- 
 cation. "Let me speak this once in my true person." "Poor 
 the speech" — yet she knows him, as he knows her. How he 
 knows her he indicates by the beautiful imagery of the moon — 
 seen on one side only by the common eye, but by the rarer soul 
 on the other side. 
 
 "God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures 
 Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with, 
 One to show a woman when he loves her!" 
 
 This, said of himself, he applies to her, his "moon of poets." 
 The world sees her and praises, but he: 
 
 "There in turn I stand with them and praise you — 
 But the best is when I glide from out them, 
 Cross a step or two of dubious twilight, 
 Come out on the other side, the novel 
 Silent silver lights and darks undreamed of, 
 Where I hush and bless myself with silence." 
 
 Prospice 
 
 This "look forward," under the very grip of death, is very 
 intensely personal, charged with that spiritual athleticism, that 
 hardy battling faith which we meet again and again in Browning. 
 
NOTES 113 
 
 ''I was ever a fighter, so — one fight more, the best and the last!" 
 Death shall yield its full revelations. Note the change beginning 
 at 1. 21; the beautiful diminue7ido to the exquisite quiet rapture 
 of the close. This is very intimately personal; the allusion is, 
 of course, to his wife; one of the few expressions the poet has al- 
 lowed himself of the love in his own life which was stronger than 
 death. 
 
 Epilogue to Asolando 
 
 The same mood is in this last word and testament of the man 
 who was ever a fighter, and inspired others to fight the good fight 
 in the interest of their own highest spiritual blessedness and devel- 
 opment : 
 
 "One who never turned his back, but marched breast forward. 
 Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better." 
 
 It was a propos of this third stanza that Browning, one evening 
 just before his last and fatal illness, said to his daughter-in-law 
 and sister, when reading the printer's proof-sheets to them: "It 
 almost looks like bragging to say this, and as if I ought to cancel 
 it; but it's the simple truth; and as it's true, it shall stand." 
 
 One naturally compares this valedictory (which closes the 
 volume published in London on the very day on which Browning 
 died) with Tennyson's Crossing the Bar. There is a very charac- 
 teristic difference between the two, in no particular more obviously 
 shown than in Browning's last words of unconquerable resolve, his 
 first and last evangel: 
 
 " 'Strive and thrive!' cry: 'Speed, — fight on, fare ever 
 There as here!'!' 
 
 Up at a Villa — Down in the City 
 
 Yet another Italian poem ! If you look up the volumes (or groups) 
 of " Dramatic Lyrics " and " Dramatic Romances " in Browning's 
 complete works, you will note evidences not only of the spell of 
 Italy, but of wider international interests on the poet's part. 
 Humanity in all its variety is his theme. 
 
 Thus, British insularity gets no support from him. He is the 
 poet of internationalism. Italian Galuppi is the fellow, in his 
 volumes, of German Abt Vogler and Master Hugues. When 
 Tennyson glorified English naval heroism in his ballad of " The 
 Revenge," Browning seemed to be saying to himself — " Well, 
 other nations, too, have their heroes of the sea, — our old enemies, 
 the French, for example. Here is this story of Herve Riel, for a 
 sample." You might call off, from the titles, the different nations 
 represented in his works. 
 
114 NOTES 
 
 Browning has a pronounced habit of comparison and contrast. 
 His " look on this picture and on this," is conspicuous in many- 
 pairs -of poems. This poem is in itself a striking example of his 
 method as applied to description. You might explain how he 
 " composes " his picture; and distinguish his verbal way of dealing 
 with his masses from the painter's way in his very different me- 
 dium. Indeed, this is a good opportunity to seize the qualities of 
 his descriptive work. What part do sight, hearing, movement, 
 color, form, the clear image or the vague suggestion play in this 
 and other poems? The employment of onomatopceia is very obvious 
 in spots. Is it a conspicuous feature in Browning's works generally? 
 
 There are no allusions here which a second or third year high 
 school student should find strange. The great men referred to 
 belong to the literature of the world (with one exception), and not 
 merely to that of Italy. The facts connected with " Pulcinello " 
 are interesting and entertaining — worth while looking up. 
 
 But the main matter is to feel carried along by the vivid color- 
 ing and picture-evoking quality of the poem. Enjoy these, and 
 other by-products of study may be added to enhance the pleasure, 
 — never to discount or endanger it. 
 
 The Italian in England 
 
 Both this poem and a companion poem, " The Englishman 
 in Italy," were written after Browning's visit to Italy in 1844. 
 They were originally entitled " Italy in England " and " England 
 in Italy." The dramatic incident in this poem does not reproduce 
 any particular historic incident. 
 
 Does the poem carry its own sufficient meaning on its face to the 
 general reader? Do you understand it without looking up. the 
 few facts of Italian history to which it alludes, — that is, what was 
 Italy's relation to Austria, — who Metternich was, — who was the 
 great Italian patriot who found refuge in England? Or is the 
 chief incident everything, and the historic framework neghgible? 
 *' Tenebrw: " certain services of the Roman Cathohc Church, — • 
 which should at once be plain to any student of Latin. The word 
 is worth looking up; but note especially why this particular ser- 
 vice should be selected by the poet. 
 
 Is the title apt? Some writers have a genius for titles: how 
 about Browning? Could you suggest an alternative title in this 
 case? 
 
 Instans Tyrannus 
 
 This is a difficult poem for young minds. If it does not come 
 clear after two readings, let it go. Poems are not meant to be 
 puzzles. The title of the poem should be deciphered by some 
 
NOTES 115 
 
 Latin student in the class. It is reminiscent of a phrase in the 
 opening of one of the Odes of Horace (III-3): 
 
 Justum et tenacem proposti virum 
 Non civium ardor prava jubentium 
 Non vultus instantis tyranni. 
 
 Obviousl}'' it is, at least, a study of unreasoning, instinctive 
 dislike and contempt: of what else? See if you can get at the 
 poet's underlying motive. This belongs with other psychological 
 studies of abnormal humanity (see Introduction, xii). Both 
 the tyrant and his victim are unusual types; but does that detract 
 from the striking climax? The humor of the piece has been called 
 " boisterous, sardonic humor." (What, by the way, is the mean- 
 ing of " sardonic " ?) Try teUing the story in its simplest terms, — 
 just the action, as a third party might report it. Then try to tell 
 it as " the wretch " might. Of course, the imagery of the closing 
 stanza, — with the figure of the Arm, — must be ap{)reciated. Such 
 words as " perdue " and " spilth " are worth notation and expla- 
 nation by some connoisseur of words in the class. There is nothing 
 like dividing up the work of commenting upon the text among 
 the members of the class according to their special interests, — 
 philological, historical, and so on. 
 
 The Pied Piper of Hamelin 
 
 As the eldest child of the great English actor, Macready, wa? 
 confined to the house by illness. Browning wrote this jeu d' esprit 
 to amuse the boy and to give him a subject for illustrative draw- 
 ings. It was thrown into the volume of '' Dramatic Lyrics " at 
 the last moment, for the purpose of filling up the sheet. 
 
 It is to be hoped that the poem will be a delightful memory to 
 every high school boy and girl, — a reminder of those days in one 
 of the grades of the elementary school when the poem was read, 
 reread, recited, and acted with keen enjoyment. There is only 
 one other poem by Browning, familiar to j^oung people, which can 
 compete with it in popularity. Can you say which? 
 
 An editor asks himself, what can be added in the way of notes 
 to accomplish the only purpose which justifies annotation, namely, 
 the heightening of appreciation and enjoyment? Perhaps in this 
 case some consideration of Browning's humor, both here and else- 
 where, and the comedy-characters and incidents which are to be 
 found in his works? Could you characterize what is distinctive 
 of Browning's humor, as you might of the humor — let us say — of 
 Mark Twain, or the gentler humor of Washington Irving? Com- 
 pare, for instance, what may be characterized as the element of 
 pure " fun and freak " in this poem with the quality of the humor 
 
116 KOTES 
 
 in the " Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister " and " Holy-Cross 
 Day "; or with the less obvious humor of " Up at a Villa — Down 
 in the City." Some American youths may see no " humor " at 
 all in that; and like honest lads, they will say so. What part 
 does Browning's grotesque rhyming play in producing his effects? 
 
 Another consideration which might help to set the poem in 
 relief, and establish relations between it and other stories, is that 
 which has to do with the musical magic of the Pied Piper. He is 
 one of the musicians who illustrate the power of music, as does 
 Orpheus, for example, or the charmers of wolves of which you may 
 have heard in connection with Longfellow's allusion to the Loup- 
 garou in " Evangeline " (line 280). There is a picture of a strange 
 " charmer ", piping to a herd of hungry beasts who follow him, 
 by our great artist Lafarge. 
 
 Then there are other stories which tell of the opening and closing 
 of a mountain-side, and the expectation that those who enter 
 will some day emerge again. Some you surely know: can you recall 
 them? 
 
 We shall refrain from explaining various geographical words. 
 Don't assume that this is because we consider that the locality is 
 of no importance. Some are allusions which " every schoolboy 
 should know." 
 
 You will note that the poem is called a " child's story." Do you 
 think it would greatly interest any high school student who should 
 read it for the first time, and for whom it had no charm of recol- 
 lection? 
 
Longmans' English Classics 
 
 Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems. 
 
 Edited by Ashley H. Thorndike, Professor of English in 
 Columbia University. $0.25. [For Reading] 
 Browning's Select Poems. 
 
 Edited by Percival Chubb, formerly Director of English, 
 Ethical Culture School, New York. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. 
 
 Edited by Charles Sears Baldwin, Professor of Rhetoric in 
 r Columbia University. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America. 
 
 Edited by Albert S. Cook, Professor of English Language 
 and Literature, Yale Univ. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 Byron's Childe Harold, Canto IV, and Prisoner of Chillon. 
 Edited by H. E. Coblentz, Principal of The South Division 
 High School, Milwaukee, Wis. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Carlyle's Essay on Burns, with Selections from Burns's 
 Poems. 
 
 Edited by Wilson Farrand, Head Master of the Newark 
 Academy, Newark, N. J. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 Coleridge's Ancient Mariner, Christabel and Kubia Khan. 
 Edited by Herbert Bates, Brooklyn Manual Training High 
 School, New York. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans. 
 
 Edited by Charles F. Richardson, Professor of English in 
 Dartmouth College. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities. 
 
 Edited by Frederick William Roe, Assistant Professor of Eng- 
 lish, Univ. of Wisconsin. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 Eliot's Silas Marner. 
 
 Edited by Robert Herrick, Professor of Rhetoric, University 
 of Chicago. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Emerson's Essays on Manners, Self=reliance, etc. 
 
 Edited by Eunice J. Cleveland. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 Franklin's Autobiography 
 
 Edited by W. B, Cairns, Ass't Professor of American Literature, 
 Univ. of "Wisconsin. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Qaskell's Cranford. 
 
 Edited by Franklin T. Baker, Professor of the English Lan- 
 guage and Literature in Teachers College, Columbia University. 
 $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Goldsmith's The Traveller and The Deserted Village. 
 
 Edited by J. F. Hosic, Head of the Department of English, 
 Chicago Normal School. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield. 
 
 Edited by Mary A. Jordan, Professor of English Language 
 and Literature, Smith College. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Huxley's Autobiography and Selections from Lay Sermons. 
 Edited by E. fl. Kemper A/IcComb, Manual Training High 
 School, Indianapolis, Ind. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 
Longmans^ English Classics 
 
 Irving's Life of Goldsmith. 
 
 Edited by L. B. Semple, Instructor in English, Bushwick 
 High School, Brooklyn, N. Y. $0.30. [For Reading,] 
 Irving's Sketch Book. 
 
 With an Introduction by Brander Matthews, Professor of 
 Dramatic Literature, Columbia University, and with notes 
 by Armour Caldwell. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 Lincoln, Selectionsfrom. "' 
 
 Edited by Daniel K. Dodge, Professor of English in the Uni- 
 versity of Illinois. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Lowell's Vision of Sir Launfal, and Other Poems. 
 
 Edited by Allari Abbott, Department of English, Horace Mann 
 High School, New York City. ^0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Macaulay's Essay on Addison. 
 
 Edited by James Grcenleaf Croswell, Head Master of the 
 Brearley School, New York. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Macaulay's Essay on Lord Clive. 
 
 Edited by P. C. Farrar, Instructor of English in Erasmus 
 Hall High School, Brooklyn, N. Y. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Macaulay's Essay on Milton. 
 
 Edited by James Greenleaf Croswell, Head Master of the 
 Brearley School, New York. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome, and Other Poems. 
 
 Edited by Nott Flint, late Instructor in English in the Uni- 
 versity of Chicago. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Macaulay's Life of Samuel Johnson. 
 
 Edited by Huber Gray Buehler, Head Master, Hotchkiss 
 School, Lakeville, Conn. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 Macaulay's Johnson and Addison. 
 
 1. Life of Samuel Johnson, edited by Huber Gray Buehler, 
 Hotchkiss School. [For Study.] 
 
 2. Addison, edited by James Greenleaf Croswell, Brear- 
 ley School. I0.40. [For Reading.] 
 
 Macaulay's Speech on Copyright and Lincoln's Speech at 
 Cooper Union. 
 
 Edited by Dudley H. Miles, Head, Department of English, 
 EvanderChilds High School, New York City. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 Macaulay's Warren Hastings. 
 
 Edited by Samuel M. Tucker, Professor of English, Brook- 
 lyn Polytechnic Institute. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Milton's L'AUegro, II Penseroso, Comus and Lycidas. 
 
 Edited by William P. Trent, Professor of English Litera- 
 ture in Columbia University. $0.25. [For Study, either "Lyci- 
 das" or "Comus'.' to be omitted.] 
 Palgrave's The Golden Treasury. 
 
 Edited by Herbert Bates, Manual, Training High School, 
 Brooklyn, N. Y. $0.30. [For Study and Reading.] 
 Parkman's The Oregon Trail. 
 
 Edited by O. B. Sperlin, Tacoraa High School, Washing- 
 ton. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 
Longmans'* English Classics 
 
 Ruskin's Sesame and Lilies. 
 
 Edited by Gertrude Buck, Professor of English in Vassar 
 College. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Scott's Ivanhoe. 
 
 Edited by Bliss Perry, Professor of English Literature in 
 Harvard University. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 Scott's Lady of the Lake. 
 
 Edited by G. R. Carpenter. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Scott's Marmion. 
 
 Edited by Robert Morss Lovett, Professor of English in the 
 University of Chicago. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 Scott's Quentin Durward. 
 
 Edited by Mary E. Adams, Head of the Department of Eng- 
 lish in the Central High School, Cleveland, O. $0.30. [For 
 Reading.] 
 Scott's Woodstock. 
 
 Edited by Bliss Perry, Professor of English Literature in 
 Harvard University. $0.40. [For Reading.] 
 Shakspere's A Midsummer Night's Dream. 
 
 Edited by George Pierce 33aker, Professor of English in Har- 
 vard University. $0.25. [For Reading,] 
 Shakspere's As You Like It. 
 
 With an Introduction by Barrett Wendell, Professor of Eng- 
 lish in Harvard University; and Notes by William Lyon Phelps, 
 Lampson Professor of English Literature in Yale University. 
 $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Shakspere's Hamlet. 
 
 Edited by David T. Pottinger, Teacher of English, Thayer 
 Academy, South Braintree, Mass. $0.25. [For Study or 
 Reading.] 
 Shakspere's Julius Caesar. 
 
 Edited by George C. D. Odell, Professor of English in Co- 
 lumbia University. $0.25. [For Study or Reading.] 
 Shakspere's King Henry V. 
 
 Edited by George C. D. Odell, Professor of English in Co- 
 lumbia University. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Shakspere's Macbeth. 
 
 Edited by John Matthews Manly, Professor and Head of 
 the Department of English in the University of Chicago. $0.25. 
 [For Study or Reading.] 
 Shakspere's The Merchant of Venice. 
 
 Edited by Francis B. Gummere, Professor of English Literature 
 in Haverford College. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Shakspere's Twelfth Night. 
 
 Edited by J. B. Henneman, late Professor of English, Uni- 
 versity of the South. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Southey's Life of Nelson. 
 
 Edited by E. L. Miller, Head, English Department, Central 
 High School, Detroit, Mich, $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 
Longmans'^ English Classics 
 
 Stevenson's Treasure Island. 
 
 Edited by Clayton Hamilton, Extension Lecturer in Eng- 
 lish, Columbia University. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Tennyson's Qareth and Lynette, Launcelot and Elaine, Tha 
 Passing of Arthur. 
 
 Edited by Sophie C. Hart, Professor of Rhetoric in Wellesley 
 College. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Tennyson's The Coming of Arthur, The Holy Grail and The 
 Passing of Arthur. 
 Edited by Sophie C. Hart. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 
 Tennyson's The Princess. 
 
 Edited by G. E. Woodberry, formerly Prof, of Comparative 
 Literature, Columbia Univ. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 The Sir Roger de Coverley Papers. 
 
 Edited by D. O. S. Lowell, Head Master of the Roxbury Latin 
 School, Boston, Mass. $0.25. [For Reading.] 
 Thoreau's Walden. 
 
 Edited by Raymond M. Alden, Professor of English, Uni- 
 versity of Illinois. $0.30. [For Reading.] 
 Washington's Farewell Address and Webster's First Bunker 
 Hill Oration. 
 
 Edited by Fred Newton Scott, Professor of Rhetoric in the 
 University of Michigan. $0.25. [For Study.] 
 
 Carlyle's Heroes, Hero=Worship, and the Heroic in History. 
 
 Edited by Henry David Gray, Assistant Professor of English, 
 Leland Stanford Jr. University. $0.30. 
 De Quincey's Flight of a Tartar Tribe. 
 
 Edited by Charles Sears Baldwin, Professor of Rhetoric in 
 Columbia University. $0.40. 
 De Quincey's Joan of Are and The English Mail Coach. 
 
 Edited by Charles Sears Baldwin. $0.25. 
 Dryden's Palamon and Arcite. 
 
 Edited by William Tenney Brewster, Professor of English in 
 Columbia University. $0.40. 
 Irving's Tales of a Traveller. 
 
 With an Introduction by Brander Matthews and Explanatory 
 Notes by George R. Carpenter. $0.40. 
 Milton's Paradise Lost. Books \. and H. 
 
 Edited by Edward Everett Hale, Jr., Professor of the English 
 Language and Literature in Union College. $0.40. 
 Pope's Homer's Iliad. Books I., VI., XXII. and XXIV. 
 Edited by William H. Maxwell, Superintendent of New York 
 City Schools, and Percival Chubb, formerly Director of EngUsh, 
 Ethical Culture School, New York. $0.40. 
 Spenser's The Faerie Queene. (Selections.) 
 
 Edited by John Erskine, Professor of English in Columbia 
 University. $0.25. 
 
Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
 Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
 Treatment Date: March 2009 
 
 PreservationTechnologies 
 
 A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATION 
 
 111 Thomson Park Drive