i R III!.'!" ,(,,, 
 
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CJotnell Mttiiieraitg Slihratra 
 
 Sttfutu, JSitat Ijark 
 
 BOUCHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE 
 
 SAGE ENDOWMENT FU^JD 
 
 THE GIFT OF 
 
 HENRY W. SAGE 
 
 1891 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PR 4238.P48 1908 
 
 Inductive studies in Browning for second 
 
 013 444 926 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013444926 
 
Inductive Studies 
 
 BROWNING 
 
 SECONDARY SCHOOLS, 
 COLLEGES 
 
 AND 
 
 LITERATURE CLUBS. 
 
 Second Edition, Revised. 
 
 BV H C. PETERSON, Ph. D. 
 
 
 ;• *j»i. 
 
 ■Asa" 
 
 AINSWORTH & CO., 
 
 Chicago, 
 
 1908. 
 
COPXRIGHTBb 
 
 1903 
 
 BY AiNSWORTH & CO., CHICAGO. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 It has become necessary to make new plates of this book ; and I 
 seize the occasion to revise the editorial matter In the light of the 
 experiences I have undergone with It, since the first edition ap- 
 peared. 
 
 The foot-notes have been Increased In number and have been 
 restricted to explanations of the author's language; all purely 
 antiquarian or historical comment has been omitted. The Questions 
 have, I think, been made more Inductive ; each set of them has 
 been Introduced by a short paragraph or two in elucidation of the 
 poem under treatment. A number have been left out ; this has made 
 the lessons less cumbrously exhaustive and more teachable. 
 
 The aim in making ready the first edition has been kept with 
 still greater fixity; that was to furnish something definite for the 
 pupils to do in preparing a "lesson" In Browning. Students of 
 literature in schools are continually discouraged by lack of deflnlte- 
 ness In the requirements made of them. Shall they be told to 
 prepare on linguistic peculiarities, on historical allusions, on the 
 general subject-matter? Yet they have no way of knowing what a 
 peculiarity of language is ; no way of knowing what is salient and 
 what commonplace in the external allusions ; no way of judging 
 what must be scrutinized and what may be let pass. 
 
 Teachers of languages and mathematics, on the other hand, are 
 much more pleasantly situated. Their students have definite exer- 
 cises set them from day to day ; they can know precisely when 
 they have "got" their lesson, can know what it is they do not 
 grasp, can know how much of their dally work they fall to do. 
 In all this, there is a certain satisfaction. On the contrary, "I 
 don't know what you want us to do" is the perplexed complaint 
 that accompanies most work In literature. 
 
 To furnish something specific for students of Browning to pre- 
 pare each day, Just as text-books in Latin or Algebra furnish It 
 for students in these subjects, Is what this book attempts to do. 
 There are, no doubt, questions that many students will be unable 
 to answer ; but such unevenness of work is characteristic of all 
 teaching. It Is not primarily Intended that the questions shall 
 form the basis for the recitation ; let the teacher teach as he 
 always has — in his Individual way. This book furnishes merely 
 
vJ PREFACE. 
 
 work for the students to do ; It does not propose any special method 
 for the teacher — who, If he teach at pll, must teach out of his own 
 Inner self. 
 
 Browning Is hard — ^no doubt ! But he Is also very satisfying ; 
 always excepting Shakespeare, no poet In our literature so richly 
 rewards the work put upon him. Yet no mistake can be greater 
 than to think that our author Is uniformly difficult ; no poems 
 can be found In English that are simpler In thought or In struc- 
 ture than the first few In this collection. Moreover, the arrange- 
 ment here followed is strictly Inductive ; and In the end, the stu- 
 dent win find that he has unconsciously — and therefore out of him- 
 self and for himself — built up a conception of the poet and of his 
 place In modern literature. To begin the study of Browning with 
 Saul, Aht Vogeler, CaUban, the Epistle of Karshish Is poor peda- 
 gogy. 
 
 Browning's poetry divides Itself Into certain classes — love poems, "^ 
 music poems, humorous, satirical poems, poems personal to himself ; 
 studies In art. In medieeval Christianity, in religion. In the spiritual 
 life «f the Renascence. All these classes are represented here by 
 some of the simpler examples. 
 
 It Is suggested that the poems which are too long for one lesson 
 be not divided, but be taken as a whole two or three times, and 
 that the student be required to answer, for each lesson, as many 
 of the entire set of questions as he can. 
 
 With these few remarks I confide the book to the favor of those 
 who hare used It In the past and to the kindness of those who are 
 striving to get the young people of our land Into companionship 
 with the greater poets of our literature. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGES 
 
 Preface v-vi 
 
 The Patriot 1-2 
 
 "How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to 
 Aix" 3-7 
 
 The Laboratory ^ 7-11 
 
 Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister 11-16 
 
 The Italian in England y 15-28 
 
 A Toccata of Galuppi's 22-27 
 
 The Lost Leader 27-29 
 
 Holy-Cross Day 30-35 
 
 Andrea Del Sarto 87-48 
 
 Fra Lippo Lippi _4gri^ 
 
 Porphyria's Lover J '66-68 
 
 The Last Ride Together 69-75 
 
 The Heretic's Tragedy 75-81 
 
 My Last Duchess 81-85 
 
 Up at a Villa— Down in the City 85-90 
 
 The Guardian Angel 91-93 
 
 Prospice 94-96 
 
 Count Gismond 96-104 
 
 The Bishop Orders His Tomb at Saint Praxed's 
 
 Church 105-111 
 
 "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" 112-123 
 
INDUCTIVE STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 THE PATRIOT. 
 
 AN OLD STORY. 
 I. 
 
 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. 
 
 II. 
 
 The air broke into a mist with bells, 
 
 The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries. 
 Had T said, "Good folk, mere noise repels — 
 
 But give me your sun from yonder skies !" 
 They had answered, "And afterwards, what else ?" lo 
 
 III. 
 
 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. 
 
 IV. 
 
 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 
 
STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 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. 
 
 VI. 
 
 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, 
 'T is God shall repay : I am safer so. 30 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1855, in a collection of flfty- 
 one pieces called Men and Women.^ It does not refer to any 
 one In partlculac.J 
 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. [St. IV.] Why is there nobody on the house-tops? 
 
 2. Who are the only persons that are not In the street? Why 
 
 are they not? 
 
 3. How must the "palsied" few have gotten to the windows? 
 
 4. Why could they not just as well have been left back in their 
 
 beds? 
 
 5. [St. v.] What words Increase the dismainess of this picture? 
 
 6. How has the rope come to cut the captive's wrists more 
 
 than needful t 
 
 7. Why can he not be sure his forehead bleeds? 
 
 8. [St. I.] Where was everybody a year ago? Why? 
 
 9. Why were there roses and myrtle in the patriot's path? 
 
 10. What statement indicates most strongly the boundless love 
 
 of the populace? 
 
 11. In what way is the sub-title fitting? 
 
 12. What Is the grammatical relation of the sentence quoted 
 
 [St. VI, 1. 3.] to the verb "question"? 
 
 13. What philosophy is Indicated in the last three lines? 
 
 1 It is hoped that the student will remember the few bits of bio- 
 graphy a«id bibliography, given from time to time, tliroughout the 
 
"HOW THEY BROUGHT THE NEWS." 
 
 "HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS 
 FROM GHENT TO AIX." 
 [i6-.] 
 
 I SPRANG to the stirrap, 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. 
 And into the midnight we galloped abreast. 
 
 II. 
 
 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^ ic 
 
 right, 
 Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit, 
 Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit. 
 
 III. 
 
 'T was 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 ; 
 At Diiffeld, 'twas morning as plain as could be ; 
 
 i- The pommel of the saddle. 
 
4 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 And from Mechein church-steeple we heard the 
 
 half-chime, 
 So Joris broke silence with, "Yet there is time !" 
 
 IV. 
 
 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 away 
 
 The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray: 
 
 V. 
 
 And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear 
 
 bent back 
 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 
 
 VI. 
 
 By Hasselt, Dirck groaned ; and cried Joris "Stay 
 
 spur! 
 four Roos^ galloped bravely, the fault's not in her. 
 We '11 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. 
 As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank. 
 
 1 In the authorized edition of 1S72, tbrougb and tbougb vrerc nni- 
 formlj spelled tbro* and tbo*. The traditional spelling was, however, 
 aubsequentlj restored. 
 
 2 Horse — a Dutch word. 
 
"HOW THEY BROUGHT THE NEWS." 6 
 
 VII. 
 
 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 !" 
 
 VIII. 
 
 "How they '11 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 
 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. 
 
 IX. 
 
 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 
 As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the 
 
 ground ; 
 And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine. 
 
« STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 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. 6c 
 
 [This poem first appeared In a series of sixteen-page, double- 
 column pamphlets, called Belle and Pomegranates, which be- 
 gan to issue in 1841 and ran through eight numbers to 1846. 
 This publication was started at the suggestion of Mr. Brown- 
 ing's printers, because the poet's early volumes would not sell. 
 It was in No. VII, entitled Dramatic Romances and Lyrics, 
 1845, that the present piece first saw the light. 
 
 How they Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aim has no 
 basis in fact. The ride was across what is now Belgium from 
 Ghent to Aachen in Germany. The intervening places may be 
 found on any map.] 
 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. Who is the person referred to by the pronoun "he" In the 
 
 first line? 
 
 2. How did the speaker mount? 
 
 3. Why did he mount in that manner? 
 
 4. Why did not the wall re-echo the word "Good" also? 
 
 5. In what way does the sound of line 2 fit the sense? 
 
 6. In what way does the metre of the poem suit the story? 
 
 7. Why did the men not talk as they rode? 
 
 8. What was the condition of the saddle and the saddle-girths? 
 
 9. What does this show of the way the men had begun their 
 
 ride? 
 
 10. Why did the speaker loosen the bit? 
 
 11. How do Stanzas III and IV show us the passing of the 
 
 night and the approach of morning? 
 
 12. Under what conditions, as shown by the words "at last" 
 
 [St. IV, 1, 4], must the men have been riding? 
 
 13. What Is the most picturesque and suggestive expression In 
 
 this stanza? 
 
 14. What points of description In Stanza V Idealize the- horse? 
 
 15. How many accented words can you find In Stanza V. 
 
 16. How does the author affect your opinion of Roland by per- 
 
 mitting the other horses to give out? 
 
 17. What bits of graphic description in Stanza VI? 
 
 18. What time of day has It now, in Stanza VII, grown to be? 
 
 19. What verb, in this stanza, Is used very strikingly to show 
 
 the speed with which the riders approached the city? 
 
 20. What statement, Stanza VIII, serves the end suggested by 
 
 question 16? 
 
THE LABORATORY. 
 
 31. What points of description show the great strain Roland 
 was under? 
 
 22. Why did the speaker cast off coat, boots, etc.? 
 
 23. Why did he not care what he shouted? 
 
 24. What statement. Stanza X, shows how he loved his horse? 
 
 25. What statement shows how the citizens regarded the horse? 
 
 26. How do you figure to yourself the situation, so as to recon- 
 
 cile the last word of Stanza IX with line 2 of Stanza X? 
 
 27. Did Roland survlye the effort? [Compare the last line of 
 
 Stanza IX.] 
 
 28. How do you feel over this? 
 
 29. Who Is the hero of the poem? 
 
 30. Where Is this ride supposed to have taken place, and when? 
 
 31. What was the state of the country at that time? 
 
 THE LABORATORY. 
 
 ANCIENT REGIME. 
 
 NOW that I, tying thy glass mask tightly. 
 May gaze through these faint smokes curling 
 whitely/ 
 As thou pliest thy trade in this devil's-smithy — 
 Which is the poison to poison her, prithee? 
 
 II. 
 
 He is with her, and they know that I know 
 Where they are, what they do: they believe my 
 
 tears flow 
 While they laugh, laugh at me, at me fled to the 
 
 drear 
 Empty church, to pray God in, for them! — I am 
 
 here. 
 
 1 Arsenic gives o£F such white fumes, when subjected to chemical pro- 
 
8 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 III. 
 Grind away, moisten and mash up thy paste. 
 Pound at thy powder, — I am not in haste ! lo 
 
 JBetter sit thus and observe thy strange things, 
 JThan go where men wait me, and dance at the 
 King's. 
 
 IV. 
 
 That in the mortar — ^you call it a gum ? 
 
 Ah, the brave tree whence such gold oozings come ! 
 
 And yonder soft phial, the exquisite^ blue. 
 
 Sure to taste sweetly, — is that poison too ? 
 
 V. 
 
 Had I but all of them, thee and thy treasures. 
 
 What a wild crowd of invisible pleasures }- 
 
 To carry pure death in an earring, a casket 
 
 A signet, a fan-mount, a filigree basket !^ 20 
 
 VI. 
 
 Soon at the King's, a mere lozgnge to give. 
 
 And Pauline should have~justthirty minutes to 
 
 live! 
 But to light a pastile, and Elise, with her head 
 And her breast and her arms and her hands, should 
 
 drop dead! 
 
 VII. 
 
 Quick — is it finished ? The color 's too grim ! 
 Why not soft like the phial's, enticing and dim ? 
 Let it brighten her drink, let her turn it and stir, 
 And try it and taste, ere she fix and prefer ! 
 , VIII. ,p 
 
 jWhat a drop ! She 's not little, noajjinjohUike me ! 
 That 's why she ensnared him : this never will free 30 
 
 1 It -was quite common, in those days, for murderers to so skillfully 
 conceal poisonous powders or fluids in fans, rin^, signets, and so forth, 
 that the victim would, in using these objects, unconsciously inhale or 
 absorb the drug and thus mysteriously die. 
 
THE LABORATORY. 9 
 
 The soul from those masculine eyes, — say, "no !" 
 To that pulse's magnificent come-and-go. 
 
 IX. 
 
 For only last night, as they whispered, I brought 
 My own eyes to bear on her so, that I thought 
 Could I keep them one half minute fixed, she would 
 
 fall 
 Shrivelled ; she fell not ; yet this does it all ! 
 
 X. 
 
 Not that I bid you spare her the pain; 
 
 Let death be felt and the proof remain : 
 
 Brand, burn up, bite into its grace — 
 
 He is sure to remember her dying face ! 40 
 
 XI. 
 
 Is it done? Take my mask off! Nay, be not 
 
 morose; 
 It kills her, and this prevents seeing it close : \ 
 The delicate droplet, my whole fortune's fee ! ' 
 If it hurts her, beside, can it ever hurt me ? i 
 
 XII. 
 
 Now, take all my jewels, gorge gold to your fill. 
 You may kiss me, old man, on my mouth if you 
 
 will! 
 But brush this dust off me, lest horror it brings 
 Ere I know it — ^next moment I dance at the King's ! 
 
 [TUb poem was first published In Hood's Magazine, for June, 
 18i4. The following year It was Inclufled in No. VII of Bells 
 and Pomegranatee. It Is a study of Jealousy.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. What do you suppose Is the use of the glass mask ? 
 
 2. Where do you get your first hint of what the story is to be ? 
 
10 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 3. Do "they" care whether they conceal their doings from the 
 
 speaker 1 
 
 4. Where does she think they fancy she Is foolish enough to be ! 
 
 5. And what does she suppose they think her foolish enough 
 
 to do? 
 
 6. But where does she vindictively say she isf 
 
 7. What seems to exasperate her the more : that "they" are 
 
 together, or that they do not care If she knows it ? 
 
 8. What should yon say [St. Ill] had made her quiet and "not 
 
 in haste" ! 
 
 9. What additional bits of the story do this and the preceding 
 
 stanzas give you? 
 
 10. What are her feelings [St. IV] toward the tree, and why 
 
 does she feel thus towards it? 
 
 11. What are her feelings towards the phial, and why does it 
 
 rouse such sentiments in her ? 
 
 12. How comes it that she rejoices so greatly in thinking of 
 
 these secret poisonings? 
 
 13. Which of the women [St. YI] does she dwell on, as possess- 
 
 ing charms of special potency? 
 
 14. Does Klise seem to be large and plump, or small? 
 
 15. But bow does the speaker, In Stanza VIII, describe herself? 
 
 16. Which of the two women, in Stanza VI, is it then, against 
 
 whom the speaker is plottinigi 
 
 17. What does the speaker [St. VII] fancy she sees Eiise doing? 
 
 18. Read line 3, emphasizing the first word, and see what the 
 
 effect is. 
 
 19. What animal, with its victim, are you, at this point, re- 
 
 minded of? 
 
 20. What sort of look must the speaker [St. IX] have bent on 
 
 Elise? 
 
 21. What is there about Elise that would make the speaker like 
 
 especially well to see her shrivelled? 
 
 22. In Stanza X, try emphasizing the first word of line 2 and 
 
 see what the effect is. 
 
 23. What part of her rival's body Is it that the speaker seems 
 
 most eager to see shrivelled! 
 
 24. And for whose benefit! 
 
 25. Emphasize "dying" in the last line. What then would "his" 
 
 last memory of Eiise be like? 
 
 26. What is the speaker's feeling in Stanza XI, since she wishes 
 
 to see the poison oloseT 
 
 27. What do you suppose it is that msikes the chemist "morose" ? 
 
 28. How much is she paying him for this poison? 
 
 29. Is this because he has asked so much ; or is there Bome 
 
 other reason to be sought for In her feelings? 
 
 30. Why does she ask the old man to kiss her? 
 
 31. What do you see [St. XII, 1. 1] is the chemist's only object 
 
 In life! 
 
SOLILOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER. 11 
 
 32. Does she mean she is going to dance, even though she says 
 
 so? With what feeling does she say this? 
 
 33. In what country and In what period, do we, from the sub- 
 
 title, see that the scene is laid? 
 
 SOLILOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER. 
 
 t 
 
 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? 
 
 Oh, that rose has prior claims — 
 Needs its leaden vase filled brimming? 
 Hell dry you up with its flames I 
 
 II. 
 
 At the meal we sit together : 
 
 Salve tibi!^ I must hear lo 
 
 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"?" 
 
 What's the Greek name for Swine's Snout ? 
 
 , III. / 
 
 Whew! We'll, have our, platter burnished, 
 
 Laid with care op out own shplf ! 
 With a fire-new spcion we, 're furnished. 
 
 And a goblet for ourself, 20 
 
 1 Hail to you. 
 
 2 The italics in this stanza are apparently intended to represent that 
 [t is Brother Lawrence who spealcs. 
 
13 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Rinsed like something sacrificial 
 
 Ere 't is fit to touch our chaps — 
 Marked with L for our initial ! 
 
 (He-he! There his lily snaps!) 
 
 IV. 
 
 Saint, forsooth ! While brown Dolores 
 
 Squats outside the Convent bank 
 With Sanchicha, telling stories. 
 
 Steeping tresses in the tank, 
 Blue-black, lustrous, thick like horse hairs, 
 
 — 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). 
 
 V. 
 
 When he finishes refection. 
 
 Knife and fork he never lays 
 Cross-wise, to my recollection, 
 
 As do I, in Jesu's praise. 
 \l the Trinity illustrate. 
 
 Drinking watered orange-pulp — 
 In three sips the Arian^ frustrate ; 
 
 While he drains his at one gulp. 40 
 
 VI. 
 
 Oh, those melons ? If he 's able 
 We 're to have a feast : so nice ! 
 
 1 Arius and Athanasius were two priests of Alexandria in the fourth 
 centuiT, who set up opposing doctrines concerning the relation of Christ 
 to God. Arius hdd that Christ, the Son of God, was inferior to the 
 Deity and dependent upon him; this established the doctrine of God's 
 Unity. Athanasius taught that Christ was of identical substance with 
 and equal to God. thus establishing the doctrine of the Trinity. The 
 conncu of Nicaea in 325 pronounced for Athanasius. But the Ger- 
 manic tribes had, in part, been conrerted to Arianism before this; and 
 thus the dispute was prolonged far into the middle ages. To the un- 
 spiritnal view of those times, being an Arian was a horrible sin. 
 
SOULOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER. 18 
 
 One goes to the Abbot's table, 
 
 All of us get each a slice. 
 How go on your flowers ? None double ? 
 
 Not one fruit-sort can you spy? 
 Strange ! — And I, too, at such trouble 
 
 Keep them close-nipped on the sly 1 
 
 VII. 
 
 There's a gre^t 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 
 
 Off to hell, a Manichee P^ 
 
 VIII. 
 
 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 ? 
 
 IX. 
 
 Or, there's Satan ! — one might venture 
 Pledge one's soul to him, yet leave 
 
 1 The only text that seems to ttieet this description is found in X, 3: 
 "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things Tvhich are written 
 in the book of the law to do them." 
 
 2 A follower oJ Manes, a Persian theologian and philosopher. Being 
 a Manichee was a sin second in gravity only to being an Arian, 
 
A STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 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, Mine" ... 7° 
 
 'St, there's Vespers ! Plena gratia 
 Ave, Virgo !^ Gr-r-r — you swine! 
 
 [This poem was first published In No. Ill of Bells and Pome- 
 granates with the title Camp and Cloister. It is Intended to 
 ?how what much of the cloister Christianity Is like in southern 
 countries.] 
 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. Do you find any strong language In the first stanza? 
 
 2. What would the spealter do to Brother Lawrence, if he only 
 
 might? 
 
 3. What Is Brother Lawrence's favorite occupation in his lei- 
 
 sure hours? 
 
 4. What Is the character of each as now already revealed? 
 
 5. How, In Stanza II, does the author let us know this Is 
 
 Spain ? 
 
 6. In what mood does the speaker utter the words, "Wise 
 
 talk" ? 
 
 7. What does he mutter to himself after Lawrence stops 
 
 speaking? What name does he, by Implication, call Law- 
 rence ? 
 
 8. In Stanza III, whose Initial Is the Lt 
 
 9. Who Is meant by "We'll," "we're," "our"? 
 
 10. What uncommon luxury does the speaker deride? 
 
 11. What word might he have used Instead of "chaps"? 
 
 12. What talk in the cloister about Lawrence does the speaker 
 
 [St. IV, 1. 1] next scoff at? 
 
 13. And In disproof of this possibility, what iniquity does he try 
 
 to fasten on Lawrence? 
 
 14. But what does the parenthesis, closing the stanza, tell us? 
 35. What great want of piety Is Lawrence next said to be guilty 
 
 of? 
 
 16. Is the speaker, however, impious In this particular? 
 
 17. What dreadful sin must Lawrence be guilty of, to judge 
 
 from the way he drinks his orange pulp? 
 
 1 An indenture -was a written contract or agreement. 
 
 2 This is apparently meant to represent the sound of the Vesper bell, 
 
 s Hail I Virgin, full of grace. The commencement of the Vesper ser- 
 Tlce. 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND. 15 
 
 18. And how does the speaker carefully avoid falling Into the 
 
 same hideous sin? 
 
 19. What Indication of character do you And towards the end 
 
 of Stanza VI? 
 
 20. Why does the speaker wish to trip Lawrence just a-iyingT 
 
 21. What trap does he, in Stanza VIII, meditate settlne for 
 
 Lawrence ? 
 
 22. With what object does he contemplate making an agreement 
 
 with Satan? 
 
 23. But who does he think will be the sharper, he himself, or 
 
 Satan 7 
 
 24. Where are his thoughts as he begins to chant his vesper 
 
 service ? 
 
 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, — 
 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 : lo 
 
 — ^How long it seems since Charles was lost ! 
 Six days the sdldiers crossed and crossed 
 The country in my very sight ; 
 And when that peril ceased at night, 
 The sky broke out in red dismay 
 With signal fires ; well, there I lay 
 Close covered o'er in my recess, 
 Up to the neck in ferns and cress, 
 Thinking on Mettemich^ our friend. 
 And Charles's* miserable end, 20 
 
 1 Prince Clemens von Mettemicli, Austrian prime minister. 
 
 2 Charles Albert, an Italian prince, who, in the earlier part of his 
 career, was in full sympathy with the popular movement. 
 
16 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 And much beside, two days ; the third. 
 
 Hunger o'ercame me when I heard 
 
 The peasants from the village go 
 
 To work among the maize ; you know. 
 
 With us in Lombardy, they bring 
 
 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. 
 
 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, 
 
 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 : 
 
 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 ; 5c 
 
 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, 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND. 1? 
 
 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 
 
 They fix the price, because I hate 
 
 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 I shall write 
 
 To Padua, which you'll reach at night 
 
 Before the duomo^ shuts ; go in. 
 
 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 
 
 Our mother service — I, the son, 
 
 As you the daughter of our land !" 
 
 1 The Cathedral. 
 
 2 An evening service. 
 
18 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Three mornings more, she took her stand 
 In the same place, with the same eyes: 90 
 
 I was no surer of sunrise 
 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 
 Entered her heart, — then, passing out, 
 "She could not speak for others, who 
 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 
 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. 1 10 
 
 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 
 Charles proved false, what shall now convince 
 My inmost heart I have a friend ? 
 
 1 This is a direct quotation and would, in most cases, have been 
 written: — 
 
 "I cannot speak for others, who 
 Have other thoughts; myself I know." 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND. 19. 
 
 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, 
 
 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. 130 
 
 If I resolved to seek at length 
 
 My father's house again, how scared 
 
 They all would look, and unprepared I 
 
 My brothers live in Austria's pay 
 
 — ^Disowned me long ago, men say ; 
 
 And all my early mates who used 
 
 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 
 
 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, 
 
 1 These are the usual objections of dull and timid minds 
 
^0 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 And, while her spindle made a trench 
 
 Fantastically in the dust. 
 
 Inquired of all her fortunes — ^just 
 
 Her children's ages and their names, 
 
 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. l6o 
 
 So much for idle wishing — how 
 It steals the time ! To business now. 
 
 [This poem also was first publlshecJ In No. VII of the Bells 
 and Pomegranates, 1845. 
 
 After the downfall of Napoleon, the map of Europe was re- 
 stored, as far as possible, to Its former lines. The governments 
 were reconstructed, and the deposed princes were returned to 
 power. This was accomplished by a bod; of statesmen, called 
 the Congress of Vienna. 
 
 It was In Italy that the principles of the French Reyolution 
 survived most vigorously ; hence the Congress treated her with 
 especial harshness. The many petty and insignificant govern- 
 ments that had existed before were revived ; and the old foreign 
 tyrants — French and Austrian — were restored. Lombardy and 
 Venice were turned over bodily to Austria, and she was invested 
 with a supervision over the whole peninsula. Victor Emanuel 
 was the only ruler of native birth, and he was cooped up in the 
 island of Sardinia. The Austrian rule was extremely harsh, 
 and the Italians suffered greatly. 
 
 But this was the XIX century, and the people were deter- 
 mined on liberty and unity. The struggle began about 1820 
 and continued for fifty years, gaining ground steadily, until 
 Victor Emanuel II, in 1871, was placed upon the throne of a 
 united and independent Italy. The movement did not confine 
 Itself to the upper classes, but came to embrace men, women, 
 and even children, of all ages and conditions. The names Car- 
 bonari, Garibaldi, and Cavour have come to be household words 
 synonymous with _ freedom. It was to the sternness and sin- 
 cerity of the Italian peasantry that success was mainly due 
 
 It is into this depth of the national character that Browni'ne 
 
 n™!, ^.^^^ "^^ * fll"?^*- v^"^ " »*>°"'^ "« remembered that he 
 lived in Italy, with but short Intermissions, from 1846 to 1861 
 and that he thus saw much of this great movement with his 
 own cyGSi J 
 
THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND. 21 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. Where does the title tell us that the speaker Is? What Is 
 
 he narrating? 
 
 2. Emphasize "second" and note what this shows? 
 
 3. Who had been the spealier's boyhood friend? 
 
 4. What sort of life had the speaker been leading? 
 
 5. Who was Prince Metternich? 
 
 6. How was he connected with Italy? 
 
 7. What seem to -have been the feelings of the speaker towards 
 
 him? (li. 121-123.) 
 
 8. What was the reason for tiis? 
 
 9. How must we then take the expression, "Metternich our 
 
 friend," line 19? 
 
 10. What Is meant by lines 11 and 20? 
 
 11. What feeling is shown here towards Charles — malice, regret, 
 
 Joy, or pity? 
 12'. How did the Austrians bunt the speaker? 
 
 13. What were the signal fires for? 
 
 14. How important must the speaker have been? 
 
 15. Do you take him to be a nobleman or a peasant? 
 
 16. What is his attitude towards his peasant countrymen? (11. 
 
 24-34.) 
 
 17. Is this the feeling that men of his class usually entertain 
 
 towards inferiors? 
 
 18. What "chance" did he feel he was taking in throwing his 
 
 glove ? 
 
 19. What trait of character is shown in the woman by the fact 
 
 that she did not start or cry out? 
 
 20. What do you suppose she did with the branch, when she had 
 
 rejoined her companions? (Compare II. 2ii-29.) 
 
 21. Why did she break the branch off, in the first place? 
 
 22. Did she show the glove to anyone? 
 
 23. Who or what was it the speaker did not fear for ? 
 
 24. How does line 50 corroborate the Inferences from questions 
 
 14 and 16? 
 
 25. What had the speaker, against the woman's return, decided 
 
 to tell her? 
 
 26. But what did he tell her? 
 
 27. How could he so recklessly have endangered himself? 
 
 28. Emphasize "peasant," in line 53, and note the feeling that is 
 
 thus shown. 
 
 29. Indicate some points, directly descriptive of the woman, that 
 
 appeal to you. 
 
 30. Did she, upon returning, look weary, or excited, or curious, 
 
 or in any other way, abnormal? 
 
 31. How could the speaker have been so sure of her coming? 
 
 (1. 91.) 
 
33 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 32. What do you suppose it was that led him, after her report, 
 
 to enter Into conversation with her about her private 
 life? • 
 
 33. Did she not thlnli her lover would be an excellent acquisi- 
 
 tion to their cause? 
 
 34. Yet why bad she not confided in him? 
 
 35. What was the feeling which impelled her to bring the addi- 
 
 tional news that the Paduan friends were coming? — Was 
 the spealier not saved already? 
 
 36. Was she really needed any more after getting help? 
 
 37. Then what was it that impelled her to follow the crowd 
 
 down to the sea-shore? 
 
 38. If she had been needed, would she have followedt 
 
 39. [L. 115.] Why do you suppose the speaker had never been 
 
 in love? 
 
 40. What feeling is indicated by the certainty with which he 
 
 knew what his first wishes should be? 
 
 41. Yet, if he might have bad but one wish, which would it 
 
 have been? 
 
 42. Which of the two personages in the poem Is idealized by 
 
 this circumstance? 
 
 43. Would the speaker have been Impelled to kiss the woman's 
 
 band solely because she had saved him? [Compare lines 
 106-107.] 
 
 44. Is it the man or the woman in the story for whose sake the 
 
 poem has been written? 
 
 45. What may consequently have been Browning's opinion as to 
 
 the degree of patriotic fervor shown by the sexes rela- 
 tively to each other in this struggle? 
 
 46. What does this woman's constancy tell us concerning the 
 
 nature of the struggle that was carried on against Aus- 
 tria? 
 
 A TOCCATA^ OF GALLUPPI'S. 
 
 OH Galuppi, Baldassaro, this is very sad to find ! 
 I can hardly misconceive you ; it would prove 
 me deaf and blind; 
 But although I take your meaning, 't is with such a 
 heavy mind! 
 
 1 A Toccata is a light prelude or overture to a piece of music, wliich 
 merely suggests or touches the central idea, here and there. A sonata, 
 on the other hand, is a deliberate workiiig out of the feeling or the 
 thought of the piec& 
 
A T0CCAT4 OF GALUPPI'S. 28 
 
 II. 
 
 Here you come with your old music, and here's all 
 
 the good it brings. ' 
 What, they lived once thus at Venice where the 
 
 merchants were the kings. 
 Where St. Mark's^ is, where the Doges" used to 
 
 wed the sea with rings ?^ 
 
 III. 
 
 Aye, because the sea 's the street there ; and 't is 
 
 arched by . . . what you call 
 . . . Shylock's bridge with houses on it, where 
 
 they kept the carnival : 
 I was never out of England — it 's as if I saw it all. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Did young people take their pleasure when the sea 
 
 was warm in May? lo 
 
 Balls and masks begun at midnight, burning ever to 
 mid-day, 
 
 When they made up fresh adventures for the mor- 
 row, do you say ? 
 
 Was a lady such a lady, cheeks so round and lips so 
 red, — 
 
 On her neck the small face buoyant, like a bell- 
 flower in its bed. 
 
 O'er the breast's superb abundance where a man 
 might base his head? 
 
 1 The great cathedral at Venice. 
 
 2 The Doge was the head of the Venetian government. The word has 
 sprung from the same root as our "duke" and means much the same. 
 
 8 This stately and solemn cermony of throwing a ring into the sea 
 was kept annually to commemorate the old naval victories of the 
 Venetians. 
 
24 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Well, and it was graceful of them : they'd break 
 
 talk oS and afford 
 — She, to bite her mask's black velvet — ^he, to finger • 
 
 on his sword. 
 While you sat and played Toccatas, stately at the 
 
 clavichord. 
 
 VII. 
 
 What? Those lesser thirds so plaintive, sixths 
 
 diminished, sigh on sigh, 
 Told them something? Those suspensions, those 
 
 solutions — "Must we die?" 20 
 
 Those commiserating sevenths^ — "Life might last! 
 
 we can but try !" 
 
 VIII. 
 
 "Were you happy?" — "Yes." — "And are you still 
 as happy?" — "Yes. And you?" 
 
 — ^"Then, more kisses?" — "Did / stop them, when 
 a million seemed so few ?" 
 
 Hark, the dominant's'' persistence till it must be ans- 
 wered to! 
 
 IX. 
 
 So, an octave struck the answer. Oh, they praised 
 
 you, I dare say! 
 "Brave Galuppi! that was music! good alike at 
 
 grave and gay! 
 I can always leave off talking when I hear a master 
 
 play!" 
 
 1 These are teclinical combinations of tones in music, each producing' 
 on the hearer pretty much the effect indicated by the adjective. 
 
 2 The dominant is the characteristic basic tone or chord that runs 
 through a piece; it also represents the particular feeling or mood that 
 pervades the composition. 
 
A TOCCATA OF GALUPPI'S. 35 
 
 Then they left you for their pleasure: till in due 
 
 time, one by one, 
 Some with lives that came to nothing, some with 
 
 deeds as well undone, 
 Death stepped tacitly and took them where they 
 
 never see the sun. 30 
 
 XI. 
 
 But when I sit down to reason, think to take my 
 
 stand nor swerve. 
 While I triumph o'er a secret wrung from nature's 
 
 close reserve, 
 In you come with your cold music till I creep 
 
 through every nerve. 
 
 XII. 
 
 Yes, you, like a ghostly cricket, creaking where a 
 
 house was burned : 
 "Dust and ashes, dead and done with, Venice spent 
 
 what Venice earned. 
 The soul, doubtless, is immortal — where a soul can 
 
 be discerned. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 "Yours for instance : you know physics, something 
 
 of geology, 
 Mathematics are your pastime; souls shall rise in 
 
 their degree; 
 Butterflies may dread extinction, — ^you'll not die, it 
 
 cannot be! 
 
 XIV. 
 
 "As for Venice and her people, merely bom to 
 
 bloom and drop, 40 
 
 Here on earth they bore their fruitage, mirth and 
 folly were the crop : 
 
26 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 What of soul was left, I wonder, when the kissing 
 had to stop? 
 
 XV. 
 
 "Dust and ashes!" So you creak it, and I want 
 the heart to scold. 
 
 Dear dead women, with such hair, too — what's be- 
 come of all the gold 
 
 Used to hang and brush their bosoms ? I feel chilly 
 and grown old. 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1855, In Men and Women. 
 Galuppl Baldassaro was a prolific Venetian composer. He was 
 born In 1706, lived for a time in London, and died In his native 
 town, as organist at 8t. Mark's. Very little of his music has 
 been preserved. 
 
 Galuppl must, however, have been a great composer : for the 
 Englishman, as he plays, seems to see old Venice with Its friv- 
 olity, and to hear the master's sad. Ironical comments on the 
 life of the time.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. What Is the nationality of the speaker and of Galuppl? 
 
 2. What do you understand the Englishman to be doing as he 
 
 speaks ? 
 S. And what does he mean, at various places In the poem, by 
 the expressions : "I can hardly misconceive you," "I take 
 your meaning," and [1. 3, St. IV] "do you say" ? 
 
 4. What Is the feeling that the toccata at onae produces on 
 
 him? 
 
 5. Does the music speak plainly or vaguely? 
 
 6. Where does the picture of old Venice begin to shape Itself 
 
 In the player's imagination? 
 
 7. Why Is Stanza III written In such an uncertain, hesitating 
 
 manner ? 
 
 8. What clause again Indicates the excellence of Galuppl's toc- 
 
 cata? 
 
 9. What scenes does the music now call forth In the English- 
 
 man's mlndV 
 
 10. So It seems [St. VI] that Galuppl originally played this 
 
 toccata under what circumstances? 
 
 11. What Is the character of the thirds and sixths? 
 
 12. To Judge by what the revellers of old Venice said, what was 
 
 the character of the "suspensions and solutions," and of 
 the "commiserating sevenths" In the toccata? 
 
 13. Who are the speakers In this Imaginary dialogue, and what 
 
 does each say? 
 
THE LOST LEADER. 27 
 
 13. What must be the character o( the dominant In this piece 
 of music — grave or gay, sad, Ironical, or cynical? 
 
 16. Emphasize "master," in Stanza IX, and notice what feeling 
 
 Is thus shown. 
 
 17. What feeling does the toccata produce on the player In 
 
 Stanza XV 
 
 18. What expression in Stanza XI describes the music? 
 
 19. What sarcasm [St. XII] does Galuppl seem to utter through 
 
 his music? 
 
 20. And in Stanzas XIII and XIV? 
 
 21. What women does the spealser mean In Stanza XV? 
 
 22. What Is the general and final effect of the toccata on the 
 
 player ? 
 
 THE LOST LEADER. 
 
 JUST for a handful of silver he left us,^_p»**^ 
 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. 
 
 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, lo 
 
 Learned his great language, caught his clear ac- 
 cents. 
 Made him our pattern to live and to die ! 
 Shakespeare was of us, Milton was for us. 
 
 Burns, Shelley, were with us, — they watch from 
 their graves ! 
 He alone breaks from the van and the freemen. 
 He alone sinks to the rear and the slaves ! 
 
STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 II. 
 
 We shall march prospering, — not through his pres- 
 ence; 
 Songs may inspirit us, — not from his lyre ; 
 Deeds will be done, — while he boasts his quies 
 cence. 
 Still bidding crouch whom the rest bade aspire : 20 
 Blot out his name, then, record one lost soul more, 
 — -QseL^ask more declined, one more footpath un- 
 
 trod. 
 One more devil's-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 ! 
 
 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 gal- 
 lantly, 
 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 ! 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1845, In No. VII of Bella and 
 Pomegranates. 
 
 The former half of the XIX century was marked by agita- 
 tions and uprisings, in favor of popular rights. This was a 
 world phenomenon, of which we saw one phase in The Italian 
 in England. The years 1820, 1830, 1848, and even 1871. are 
 specially noted in history, as marking the fulfillment of many 
 hopes. 
 
 In poetry this new enthusiasm, this new spirit, is known as 
 the Romantic Eevolution ; it was represented in England by 
 Coleridge. Wordsworth, Southey, Shelley, Keats, and Byron. 
 
 In politics it was this spirit that battled for Catholic emanci- 
 pation, for the abolition of the duty on grain, for Irish repre- 
 sentation in Parliament, for the reform of the poor-laws, for the 
 establishment of free, public schools. The poets mentioned 
 above, especially the first three, were very active in these social 
 reformatory movements also. 
 
 1 That is: Best /or bim to fight on well. 
 
THE LOST LEADER. 29 
 
 But Wordsworth, wnen years began to tell on him, abandoned 
 the good cause, and ended by om)08lng reform as energetically 
 as he had before advocated It. Browning, haying been born in 
 1812, was but a youth in those days. He was a great admirer 
 of these intense, progressive spirits ; and It was Wordsworth's 
 defection that Inspired the present poem.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. Emphasize the first word and note the thought that Is thus 
 
 brought out. 
 
 2. Whom does the poet mean by "us]' ? 
 
 3. What is the "riband to stlclc in his coat" Intended to sig- 
 
 nify? 
 
 4. What, then, was the "one gift," which they did not have 
 
 to give? 
 
 5. And what were "all the others," which they did have to 
 
 bestow upon their leader? 
 
 6. How highly do the leader's new companions value him? 
 
 7. How would his old friends' copper have been better than his 
 
 new companions' silver? 
 
 8. How had his old friends always felt towards him? 
 
 9. What had his character been? 
 
 10. What line shows that he had been a leader t 
 
 11. What do you now see had been the calling of the leader and 
 
 his band.? 
 
 12. [St. II.] What does the speaker thlnls will be the future of 
 
 the cause, now that tiie leader has betrayed It? 
 
 13. But what touch of sadness blends with this belief? 
 
 14. Does the band grieve for themselves, or for him? 
 
 15. Do they hate him for deserting them? 
 
 16. What Is meant by line 22? 
 
 17. Why should there be "doubt, hesitation, and pain," if he 
 
 came bacls to them? 
 
 18. What is meant by line 28? 
 
 39. What does the speaker say they had taught him? 
 
 20. What would they dislike to see In their old leader, even 
 
 thdugh he be on the other side? 
 
 21. But which side do they know will conquer? 
 
 22. How will they, in the end, feel toward their "Lost Leader" 7 
 
So STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 HOLY-CROSS DAY.^ 
 
 ON WHICH THE JEWS WERE FORCED TO ATTEND AN 
 
 ANNUAL CHRISTIAN SERMON IN ROME. 
 
 ["Now was come about Holy-Cross Day, and now must my 
 lord preach his first sermon to the Jews ; as it was of old 
 cared for In the merciful bowels of the Church, that, so to 
 speak, a crumb at least from her conspicuous table here in 
 Home, should be, though but once yearly, cast to the famish- 
 ing dogs, under-trampled and bespltten-upon beneath the feet 
 of the guests. And a moving sight in truth, this, of so many 
 of the besotted blind restif and ready-to-perish Hebrews ! now 
 maternally brought — ^nay, (for He salth, 'Compel them to come 
 in') haled, as it were, by the head and hair, and against their 
 obstinate hearts, to partake of the heavenly grace. What 
 awakening, what striving with tears, what working of a yeasty 
 conscience ! Nor was my. lord wanting to himself on so apt an 
 occasion ; witness the abundance of conversions which did in- 
 continently reward him : though not to my lord be altogether 
 the glory." — Diary hy the Bishop's Secretary, 1600.]' 
 
 What the Jews really said, on thus being driven to church, 
 was rather to this effect : — 
 
 FEE, faw, fum ! bubble and squeak ! 
 Blessedest Thursday's the fat of the week. 
 Rumble and tumble, sleek and rough, 
 Stinking and savoury, smug and gruff, 
 Take the church-road, for the bell's due chime 
 Gives us the summons — 't is sermon time ! 
 
 II. 
 
 Boh, here's Barnabas! Job, that's you? 
 
 Up stumps Solomon — ^bustling, too? 
 
 Shame, man ! greedy beyond your years 
 
 To handsel the bishop's shaving-shears? lo 
 
 1 September 14— Commemorating Constantine's vision of the Cross 
 in the sky at midday, 
 
 2 This is not meant to be taken as an actual extract from a real 
 diary. 
 
HOLY-CROSS DAY. 81 
 
 Fair play's a jewel ! Leave friends in the lurch ? 
 Stand on a line ere you start for the church ! 
 
 III. 
 Higgledy, piggledy, packed we lie, 
 Rats in a hamper, swrne in a stye. 
 Wasps in a bottle, frogs in a sieve. 
 Worms in a carcass, fleas in a sleeve. 
 Hist 1 square shoulders, settle your thumbs 
 And buzz for the bishop — here he comes. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Bow, wow, wow — a bone for the dog! 
 
 I liken his Grace to an acorned hog. 20 
 
 What, a boy at his side, with the bloom of a lass, 
 
 To help and handle my lord's hour-glass 1 
 
 Did'st ever behold so lithe a chine ?^ 
 
 His cheek hath laps like a fresh-singed swine. 
 
 V. 
 
 Aaron's asleep — shove hip to haunch, 
 
 Or somebody deal him a dig in the paunch ! 
 
 Look at the purse with the tassel and knob. 
 
 And the gown with the angel and thingumbob ! 
 
 What's he at, quotha ? reading his text ! 
 
 Now you've his curtsey — and what comes next? 30 
 
 VI. 
 
 See to our converts — you doomed black dozen — 
 
 No stealing away — nor cog nor cozen ! ^ 
 
 You five, that were thieves, deserve it fairly ; 
 
 You seven, that were beggars, will live less sparely ; 
 
 You took your turn and dipped in the hat, 
 
 Got fortune — and fortune gets you ; mind that 1 ' 
 
 1 The spine or back bone. 
 
 2 No tricks or flatteries. 
 
 S This seems to show that the "black dozen" had received pardon for 
 their crimes on condition of becoming Christians. 
 
83 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Give your first groan — compunction 's at work ; 
 
 And soft ! from a Jew you mount to a Turk. 
 
 Lo, Micah, — the selfsame beard on chin 
 
 He was four times already converted in ! 4° 
 
 Here's a knife, clip quick — it's a sign of grace — 
 
 Or he ruins us all with his hanging-face. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Whom now is the bishop a-leering at? 
 
 I know a point where his text falls pat. 
 
 I'll tell him to-morrow, a word just now 
 
 Went to my heart and made me vow 
 
 I meddle no more with the worst of trades — 
 
 Let somebody else pay his serenades. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Groan altogether now, whee — ^hee — ^hee! 
 It 's a-work, it 's a-work, ah, woe is me ! 50 
 
 It began, when a herd of us, picked and placed, 
 Were spurred through the Corso,^ stripped to the 
 
 waist ; 
 Jew brutes, with sweat and blood well spent 
 To usher in worthily Christian Lent. 
 
 X. 
 
 It grew, when the hangman entered our bounds. 
 
 Yelled, pricked us out to his church like hounds : 
 
 It got to a pitch, when the hand indeed 
 
 Which gutted my purse, would throttle my creed : 
 
 And it overflows, when, to even the odd, 
 
 Men I helped to their sins help me to their God.^ 60 
 
 1 A Roman street. 
 
 2 Such ill-treatment oi the Jews was a common practice throu£^out 
 the middle ages. 
 
HOLY-CROSS DAY. S3 
 
 XL 
 
 But now, while the scapegoats leave our flock, 
 And the rest sit silent and count the clock. 
 Since forced to muse the appointed time 
 On these precious facts and truths sublime, — 
 Let us fitly employ it, under our breath, 
 In saying Ben Ezra's Song of Death. 
 
 XII. 
 
 For Rabbi Ben Ezra, the night he died. 
 
 Called sons and sons' sons to his side. 
 
 And spoke , " This world has been harsh and 
 
 strange ; 
 Something is wrong : there needeth a change. 70 
 
 But what, or where? at the last or first? 
 In one point only we sinned, at worst. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 " The Lord will have mercy on Jacob yet. 
 And again in his border see Israel set. 
 When Judah beholds Jerusalem, 
 The stranger-seed shall be joined to them: 
 To Jacob's House shall the Gentiles cleave. 
 So the Prophet saith and his sons believe. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 " Ay, the children of the chosen race 
 Shall carry and bring them to their place : 80 
 
 In the land of the Lord shall lead the same. 
 Bondsmen and handmaids. Who shall blame, 
 When the slaves enslave the oppressed ones o'er 
 The oppressor triumph for evermore ? 
 
 XV. 
 
 " God spoke, and gave us the word to keep : 
 
 Bade never fold the hands nor sleep 
 
 'Mid a faithless world, — at watch and ward, 
 
84 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Till Christ at the end relieve our guard. 
 
 By his servant Moses the watch was set : 
 
 Though near upon cock-crow, we keep it yet. 90 
 
 XV. 
 
 "Thou ! if thou wast he, who at mid-watch came. 
 By the starlight, naming a dubious name ! 
 And if, too heavy with sleep — too rash 
 With fear — O thou, if that martyr-gash 
 Fell on thee coming to take thine own, 
 And we gave the Cross, when we owed the 
 Throne — 
 
 XVII. 
 
 " Thou art the Judge. We are bruised thus. 
 But, the Judgment over, join sides with us ! 
 Thine too is the cause 1 and not more thine 
 Than ours, is the work of these dogs and swine, 100 
 Whose life laughs through and spits at their creed, 
 Who maintain thee in word, and defy thee in 
 deed ! 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 " We withstood Christ then ? Be mindful how 
 At least we withstand Barabbas now 1 
 Was our outrage sore ? But the worst we spared. 
 To have called these — Christians, had we dared ! 
 Let defiance to them pay mistrust of thee. 
 And Rome make amends for Calvary ! 
 
 XIX. 
 
 " By the torture, prolonged from age to age, 
 
 By the infamy, Israel's heritage, 
 
 By the Ghetto's^ plague, by the garb's^ disgrace, 1 10 
 
 1 The Jewish quarter in Rome. Here the Jews were shut up under 
 Tarious restrictions, many extremely oppressire. 
 
 2 This was a special dress that they were compelled to wear. 
 
HOLY-CROSS DAY. 35 
 
 By the badge of shame, by the felon's place. 
 By the branding-tool, the bloody whip, 
 And the summons to Christian fellowship, — 
 
 XX. 
 
 " We boast our proof that at least the Jew 
 Would wrest Christ's name from the Devil's crew. 
 Thy face took never so deep a shade 
 But we fought them in it, God our aid ! 
 A trophy to bear, as we march, thy band 
 South, East, and on to the Pleasant Land ! " 
 
 [Pope Gregory XVI. abolished this bad busi- 
 ness of the Sermon. — R. B.] 
 
 [This poem was first published In Men and Women, 1855.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. What Is the speaker's opinion of this compulsory attend- 
 
 ance at church? 
 
 2. Have the Jews "dressed up" for the occasion? 
 
 3. Which one of the men mentioned, Stanza II, Is anxious to 
 
 attend ? 
 
 4. What Is the real reason for this zeal? 
 
 5. What Is Solomon doing, that the speaker should utter the 
 
 last two lines? 
 
 6. Where Is the crowd, as Stanza III opens? 
 
 7. How much space has apparently been allowed these Jews 
 
 to get settled in, for the sermon? 
 
 8. What does the language, IQ general, of this stanza show 
 
 as to the mental attitude of the speaker towards the 
 church-going ? 
 
 9. What have you to say as to the atmosphere and decoruni 
 
 of this church corner? 
 
 10. Why should their thumbs need settling? 
 
 11. [St. IV.] Who Is the dog? What Is the bone that is being 
 
 flung to him? Who Is flinging It? 
 
 12. Then why does the speaker say, "Bow, wow, wow — "? 
 
 13. What expressions reveal the speaker's opinion of the 
 
 bishop? 
 
 14. What, Stanza IV, does Aaron think of this business? 
 
36 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 15. What expressions In this stanza show the speaker's opinion 
 
 of the entire procedure? 
 
 16. How has the service been progressing from the last line 
 
 of Stanza III to the last of Stanza VI 
 
 17. What had the "black dozen" been before their conversion? 
 
 18. Vhat is It the speaker thinks that the thieves fairly de- 
 
 serve ? 
 
 19. Since the beggars have become Christians what advantage 
 
 may they look for? 
 
 20. What [St. VII] does the speaker think it is now about 
 
 time to do? 
 
 21. What do you think of the sincerity with which MIcah has 
 
 been previously converted? 
 
 22. And what do you see, from the last word of the stanza, 
 
 that he is again getting ready for? 
 
 23. What [Stanza VIII] was this "worst of trades" that the 
 
 speaker seems to have meddled with for the bishop's 
 benefit? (Note carefully the word serenades.) 
 
 24. What does the speaker think it is again time to do? 
 
 25. What Is it that Is "a-work" ? 
 
 26. How then does the speaker utter the last four lines — 
 
 seriously or Ironically? 
 
 27. [St. X.] Who was charged with the task of getting the 
 
 Jews to church? 
 
 28. What common practice Is alluded to in line 4? 
 
 29. Whom does the speaker have in mind at line 6? 
 
 30. [St. XI.] Is the speaker one of the scape-goats? 
 SI. Find two sarcastic expressions in this stanza. 
 
 32. How, Stanza XII, do the speaker's feelings change? 
 
 33. What hope of the Jews is alluded to In Stanzas XIII and 
 
 XIV? 
 
 34. What distinctive belief of theirs Is mentioned in Stanza 
 
 XV? 
 
 35. Who is meant by "Thou," in Stanza XVI? What is sig- 
 
 nified by their being "too heavy with sleep" and by the 
 "martyr-gash" ? 
 
 36. [St. XVII, 1. 3.] What cause is both Christ's and the 
 
 Jews', as the speaker thinks? 
 
 37. Whom does he mean by Barabbas? 
 
 38. What outrage, worse than the Crucifixion, had the Jews 
 
 not Infilcted on Christ? 
 
 39. What does line 6 of this stanza mean? 
 
 40. Judging from the climax arrangement of Stanza XIX, 
 
 what should you say was deemed the worst persecution 
 of all? 
 
 41. Now what do you think, after ail, of this unruly crowd? 
 
 42. What do you think of the extract from the diary of the 
 
 Bishop's Secretary? 
 
ANDREA DEL SARTO. 37 
 
 ANDREA DEL SARTO.^ 
 (called the "faultless painter."7 
 
 BUT do not let us quarrel any more, 
 No, my Lucrezia ; bear with me for once : 
 Sit down and all shall happen as you wish. 
 You turn your face, but does it bring your heart ? 
 I'll work then for your friend's friend, never fear, 
 Treat his own subject after his own way, 
 Fix his own time, accept too his own price. 
 And shut the money into this small hand 
 When next it takes mine. Will it ? tenderly 1^ 
 Oh, I'll content him, — ^but to-morrow. Love ! lo 
 
 I often am much wearier than you think. 
 This evening more than usual, and it seems 
 As if — forgive now — should you let me sit 
 Here by the window, with your hand in mine 
 And look a half-hour forth on Fiesole,' 
 Both of one mind, as married people use. 
 Quietly, quietly the evening through, 
 I_3Jght get up to-morrow to my work 
 Cheerful and fresh as ever. Let us try. 
 To-morrow, how you shall be glad for this ! 20 
 
 Your soft hand is a woman of itself. 
 And mine the man's bared breast she curls inside. 
 Don't count the time lost, neither ; you must serve 
 For each of the five pictures we require : 
 It saves a model. So ! keep looking so — 
 My serpentining beauty, rounds on rounds ! 
 
 1 "Del Sarto" means "of the tailor," del being the sign of the geni- 
 tive. The name, then, would be in English, "'The Tailor's Andrew." 
 S That is: "Will your hand take mine? Will it take mine tenderly ?" 
 S A small dty near Florence in Italy. 
 
88 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 — How could you ever prick those perfect ears. 
 
 Even to put the pearl there ! oh, so sweet — 
 
 My face, my moon, my everybody's moon. 
 
 Which everybody looks on and calls his, 30 
 
 And, I suppose, is looked on by in turn. 
 
 While she looks — no one's : very dear, no less. 
 
 You smile ? why, there's my picture ready made, 
 
 There 's what we painters call our harmony ! 
 
 A common grayness silvers everything, — 
 
 All in a twilight, you and I alike 
 
 — You, at the point of your first pride in me 
 
 (That's gone, you know) — ^but I, at every point; 
 
 My youth, my hope, my art, being all toned down 
 
 To yonder sober pleasant Fiesole. 40 
 
 There 's the bell clinking from the chapel-top ; 
 
 That length of convent-wall across the way 
 
 Holds the trees safer, huddled more inside ; 
 
 The last monk leaves the garden ; days decrease. 
 
 And autumn grows, autumn in everything. 
 
 Eh ? the whole seems to fall into a shape. 
 
 As if I saw alike my work and self 
 
 And all that I was born to be and do, . 
 
 A twilight-piece. Love, we are in God's hand/ 
 
 How strange now, looks the life he makes us le^ ; 50 ; 
 
 So free we seem, so fettered fast we are ! 
 
 I feel he laid the fetter : let it lie ! 
 
 This chamber for example — turn your head — 
 
 All that's behind us ! You don't understand 
 
 Nor care to understand about my art. 
 
 But you can hear at least when people speak : 
 
 And that cartoon, the second from the door 
 
 — It is the thing, Love ! so such things should be — 
 
 Behold Madonna ! — I am bold to say. 
 
 I can do with my pencil what I know, 6q 
 
 What I see, what at bottom of my heart 
 
 I wish for, if I ever wish so deep — 
 
ANDREA DEL SARTO. 39 
 
 Do easily, too — what I say, perfectly, 
 
 I do not boast, perhaps : yourself are judge, 
 
 Who listened to the Legate's talk last week; 
 
 And just as much they used to say in France. 
 
 At any rate 't is easy, all of it ! 
 
 No sketches first, no studies, that 's long past : 
 
 I do what many dream of, all their lives, 
 
 — ^Dream ? strive to do, and agonize to do, 70 
 
 And fail in doing. I could count twenty such 
 
 On twice your fingers, and not leave this town. 
 
 Who strive — ^you don't know how the others strive 
 
 To paint a little thing like that you smeared 
 
 Carelessly passing with your robes afloat, — 
 
 Yet do much less, so much less, Someone says, 
 
 (I know his name, no matter) — so much less ! 
 
 Well, less is more, Lucrezia : I am judged. 
 
 There burns a truer light of God in them, 
 
 In their vexed beating stuffed and stopped-up 
 
 brain, 80 
 
 Heart, or whate'er else, than goes on to prompt 
 This low-pulsed forthright craftsman's hand of 
 
 mine. 
 Their works drop groundward, but themselves, I 
 
 know. 
 Reach many a time a heaven that 's shut to me. 
 Enter and take their place there sure enough. 
 Though they come back and cannot tell the world. 
 My works are nearer heaven, but I sit here. 
 The sudden blood of these men ! at a word — ' 
 Praise them, it boils, or blame them, it boils too. 
 I, painting from myself and to myself, 90 
 
 Know what I do, am unmoved by men's blame 
 Or their praise either. Somebody remarks 
 Morello's^ outline there is wrongly traced, 
 
 1 A. mountain viable from Fiesole. 
 
40 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 His hue mistaken ; what of that ? or else, 
 
 Rightly traced and well ordered ; what of that ? 
 
 Speak as they please, what does the mountain care ? 
 
 Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp. 
 
 Or what's a heaven for? All is silver-gray. 
 
 Placid and perfect with my art : the worse ! 
 
 I know both what I want and what rnight gain, loo 
 
 And yet how profitless to know, to sigh 
 
 "Had I been two, another and myself, 
 
 Our head would have o'erlooked the world !" No 
 
 doubt. 
 Yonder's a work now, of that famous youth 
 The Urbinate^ who died five years ago. 
 ('T is copied, George Vasari^ sent it me.) 
 Well, I can fancy how he did it all. 
 Pouring his soul, with kings and popes to see, 
 Reaching, that heaven might so replenish him. 
 Above and through his art — for it gives way ; no 
 
 That arm is wrongly put — and there again — 
 A fault to pardon in the drawing's lines, 
 Its body, so to speak : its soul is right. 
 He means right — ^that, a child may understand. 
 Still, what an arm ! and I could alter it : 
 But all the play, the insight and the stretch — 
 Out of me, out of me ! And wherefore out ? 
 Had_you«i joined them on me, given me soul, 
 "We mighthave risen to Rafael, I and you! 
 Nay, Love, you did give all I asked, I think — 129 
 
 More than I merit, yes, by many times. / 
 
 But had you — oh, with the same perfect brow, ^ 
 And perfect eyes, and more than perfect mouth,- 
 And the low voice my soul hears, as a bird / 
 The fowler's pipe, and follows to the snare — 
 Had you, with these the same, but brought a mind ! 
 
 1 Raphael; so named from his birth-place, UrbixidT He died in 1526. 
 s The biographer of both Raphael and AndreaV 
 
 bine; ; 
 
ANDREA DEL SARTO. 41 
 
 Some women do so. Had the mouth there urged 
 
 "God and the glory ! never care for gain. 
 
 The present by the future, what is that? 
 
 Live for fame, side by side with Agnolo! 130 
 
 Rafael is waiting : up to God, all three !" 
 
 I might have done it for you. So it seems : 
 
 Perhaps^ not. All is as God over-rules. , 
 
 Beside, incentives^come from the soul's self ; 
 
 The rest avail not. Why do I need you ? 
 
 What wife had Rafael, or has Agnolo ? 
 
 In this world, who can do a thing, will not ; 
 
 And who would do it, can not, I perceive : 
 
 Yet the will's somewhat — somewhat, too, the 
 
 power — 
 And thus we half-men Struggle. At the end, 140 
 
 God, I conclude, compensates, punishes. 
 'T is safer for me, if the award be strict, 
 That I am something underrated here. 
 Poor this long while, despised, to speak the truth. 
 I dared, not, do you know, leave home all day. 
 For fear of chancing on the Paris lords. 
 The best is when they pass and look aside ; 
 But they speak sometimes ; I must bear it all. 
 Well may they speak! That Francis, that first 
 
 time, 
 And that long festal year at Fontainebleau !^ 150 
 
 I surely then could sometimes leave the ground. 
 Put on the glory, Rafael's daily wear. 
 In that humane great monarch's golden look, — 
 One finger in his beard or twisted curl 
 Over his mouth's good mark that made the smile, 
 One arm about my shoulder, round my neck, 
 The jingle of his gold chain in my ear, 
 I painting proudly with his breath on me, 
 
 1 The palace of King Frances near Paris, wUtlier Andrea had been 
 summoned. This was seven years before the tune of the poem. 
 
43 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 All his court round him, seeing with his eyes, 
 
 Such frank French eyes, and such a fire of souls i6o 
 
 Profuse, my hand kept plying by those hearts, — 
 
 And, best of all, this, this, this face beyond. 
 
 This in the background, waiting on my work, , 
 
 To crown the issue with a last reward ! 
 
 A good time, was it not, my kingly days ? 
 
 And had you not grown restless . . . but I 
 
 know — 
 'T is done and past ; 't was right, my instinct said ; 
 Too live^ the life grew, golden and not gray. 
 And I 'm the weak-eyed bat no sun should tempt _ 
 Out of the grange whose four walls make his 
 
 world. 170 
 
 How could it end in any other way ? 
 You called me, and I came home to your heart. 
 The triumph was — to reach and stay there ; since 
 I reached it ere the triumph, what is lost ? 
 Let my hands frame your face in your hair's gold. 
 You beautiful Lucrezia that are mine ! 
 "kafael did this, Andrea painted that ; 
 The Roman's^ is the better when you pray, 
 But still the other's Virgin was his wife — •/ 
 Men will excuse me.* I am glad to judge 180 
 
 Both pictures in your presence ; clearer grows 
 My better fortune, I resolve to think. 
 For, do you know, Lucrezia, as God lives. 
 Said one day Agnolo*, his very self, 
 To Rafael . . . I have known it all these years . . . 
 (When the young man was flaming out his 
 
 thoughts 
 Upon a palace-wall for Rome to see, 
 
 1 This is the adjecti-re, not the verb. 
 S Raphael's. He lived in Some from 1508 to 1520. 
 
 8 The quotation is the ditect object of "excuse." Men 'will excuse me 
 by saying, "But still the other's Virgin was his wife.'* 
 4 Michael Angelo. 
 
ANDREA DEL SARTO. 43 
 
 Too lifted up in heart because of it) 
 
 ^"Friend, there 's a certain sorry Httle scrub 
 
 Goes up and down our Florence, none cares how, 190 
 
 Who, were he set to plan and execute 
 
 As you are, pricked on by your popes and kings, 
 
 Would bring the sweat into that brow of yours !" 
 
 To Rafael's — and indeed the arm is wrong. 
 
 I hardly dare . . . yet, only, you to see, 
 
 Give the chalk here — quick, thus the line should 
 
 gol 
 Ay, but the soul ! he 's Rafael ! rub it out ! 
 Still, all I care for, if he spoke the truth, 
 (What he? why, who but Michel Agnolo? 
 Do you forget already words like those?) 200 
 
 If really there was such a chance so lost, — 
 Is, whether you 're — ^not grateful — ^but more 
 
 pleased. 
 Well, let me think so. And you smile indeed ! 
 This hour has been an hour ! Another smile ? 
 If you would sit thus by me every night 
 I should work better, do you comprehend ? 
 I mean that I should earn more, give you more. 
 See, it is settled dusk now ; there 's a star ; 
 Morello's gone, the watch-lights show the wall. 
 The cue-owls speak the name we call them by. 210 
 
 Come from the window, love, — come in, at last, 
 Inside the melancholy little house 
 We built to be so gay with. God is just. 
 King Francis may forgive me : oft at nights 
 When I look up from painting, eyes tired out. 
 The walls become illumined, brick from brick 
 Distinct, instead of mortar, fierce bright gold. 
 That gold of his I did cement them with ! 
 Let us but love each other. Must you go ? 
 
 1 Tbis is what Angelo said to Raphael, referring to Andrea. 
 
44 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 That Cousin here again? he waits outside? 220 
 
 Must see you — ^you, and not with me? Those 
 
 loans ? 
 More gaming debts to pay ? you smiled for that ? 
 Well, let smiles buy me ! have you more to spend ? 
 While hand and eye and something of a heart 
 Are left me, work 's my ware, and what 's it worth ? 
 I'll pay my fancy. Only let me sit 
 The gray remainder of the evening out, 
 Idle, you call it, and muse perfectly 
 How I could paint were I but back in France, 
 One picture, just one more — ^the Virgin's face, 230 
 Not yours this time ! I want you at my side 
 To hear them^ — that is, Michel Agnolo — 
 Judge all I do and tell you of its worth. 
 Will you? To-morrow, satisfy your friend. 
 I take the subjects for his corridor, _^ 
 Finish the portrait out of hand — there, there, 
 An4 throw hira.yi another thing or two 
 If he demurs ; tfie whole should prove enough 
 To pay for this same Cousin's freak. Beside, 
 What 's better and what 's all I care about. 
 Get you the thirteen scudi for the ruff 1 240 
 
 Love, does that please you ? Ah, but what does he. 
 The Cousin ! what does he to please you more ? 
 
 I am grown peaceful as old age to-night. 
 I regret little, I would change still less. 
 Since there my past life lies, why alter it ? 
 The very wrong to Francis ! — it is true 
 I took his coin, was tempted and complied. 
 And built this house and sinned, and all is said. 
 My father and my mother died of want. 250 
 
 Well, had I riches of my own ? you see 
 How one gets rich ! Let each one bear his lot. 
 
'ANDREA DEL SARTO. 45 
 
 They were born poor, lived poor, and poor they 
 
 died; 
 And I have labored somewhat in my time 
 And not been paid profusely. Some good son 
 Paint my two hundred pictures — let him try ! 
 No doubt, there's something strikes a balance. 
 
 Yes, 
 You loved me quite enough, it seems to-night. 
 This must suffice me here. What would one have ? 
 In heaven, perhaps, new chances, one more 
 
 chance — 260 
 
 Four great walls in the New Jerusalem, 
 Meted on each side by the angel's reed. 
 For Leonard, Rafael, Agnolo and me 
 To cover — the three first without a wife. 
 While I have mine ! So — still they overcome 
 Because there's still Lucrezia, — as I choose. 
 
 Again the Cousin's whistle ! Go, my Love. 
 
 [This poem was first published In Men and Women, 1855. 
 
 Andrea del Sarto was a painter famous for his great tech- 
 nical skill. In external matters, such as drawing, coloring, 
 grouping, shading, his pictures are faultless. Raphael, Leon- 
 ardo da Vinci, and Michael Angelo, his contemporaries, were, 
 no doubt, the greatest painters In the whole history of art ; 
 yet, great as they were, Andrea surpassed them In technique. — 
 Indeed, bis work has. In this respect, probably never been ex- 
 celled. 
 
 But Andrea had no Ideals, no inspiration, no enthusiasm ; 
 he could never rise to a higli conception, could never respond 
 inwardly to a lofty thought. This great discord in his per- 
 sonality was tragic; and it Is this that forms the main theme 
 of the present poem. 
 
 The portraits of Andrea reveal a thin, and probably a small 
 man, with a sad, despondent face, and shy, almost frightened 
 eyes. Lucrezia, who appears in most.of his pictures, was a 
 large, handsome, full-blooded woman./ The union of two such 
 opposite natures would necessarily De-Draught with evil con- 
 sequenqesJ and this forms one of Browning's subptdl&ate 
 themes»_^ ^^_^^ ._— - 
 
 The external, fiTitDrffiaL and biographicaLdetails are brought 
 out, with suificient clcarnSss^n th^-poem Itself. In reading 
 it, the student should assume,~aureasy, conversational tone, 
 sliould study where to put iiis'empfiaseg, and should throw a 
 sad, despondent quality ihto his volceT"^^^ 
 
 Andrea del Sarto ig" one of the very best p&emathat Brovm- 
 ing has written.! 
 
46 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. Where was Andrea born? (See 1. 190.) 
 
 2. Was he of wealthy parentage? (II. 250-253.) 
 
 3. What social station did his family occupy? 
 
 4. What does his nickname mean? 
 
 5. What were his educational advantages? (U. 189-190.) 
 
 6. How great skill In painting did he nevertheless acquire? 
 
 (11. 190-195, 60-66, 255-256.) 
 
 7. Was this like the ability of his contemporaries merely ; 
 
 or was It something beyond what they could eyer hope 
 to reach? (Compare the aub-title, the references under 
 the last question, and lines 69-71, 115-116.) 
 
 8. Who were bis three great contemporaries? (11. 260-265.) 
 
 9. Which one is It he calls the Roman, the TTrblnate? 
 
 10. What had Andrea long since gotten beyond? (1. 68.) 
 
 11. Whither had he, at one time, been summoned to do some 
 
 work? (11. 145-165.) 
 
 12. How did he value King Francis' friendship? (11. 214-219, 
 
 247-249.) 
 
 13. Did he have Lncrezia with him at the time? (11. 162-164.) 
 
 14. What relative of his wife's plays a part in the story? 
 
 15. What is his chief occupation? (11. 221-222, 289.) 
 
 16. What pecuniary relations does he stand In to a friend of 
 
 Lucrezla's? (11. 234-239, 222.) 
 
 17. What have the two been doing, as the poem opens? 
 
 18. Emphasize the second word of line 1, and note what this 
 
 shows you of Andrea's character. 
 
 19. What attitude has Luerezia just assumed, and why? 
 
 20. What hour Is it, and where are they? 
 
 21. What does Luerezia do, line 4? 
 
 22. Whither had she been looking, and why? 
 
 23. What does Andrea, line 9, try to make Luerezia do? 
 
 24. What description of Andrea's personality is contained in 
 
 line 11? 
 
 25. Find some expressions, before this, which show that An- 
 
 drea had great skill, as a painter. 
 
 26. What little kindness does he beg of his wife? Is this so 
 
 very much to ask? 
 
 27. What does his manner of doing this show us of their life 
 
 and character? 
 
 28. Emphasize "might," in line 18, and note what this shows. 
 
 29. What Is It that Andrea feels he needs, and does not get 
 
 to make him work cheerfully? 
 
 30. What does line 20 mean? 
 
 81. Where do we find an indication that they are poor? Is 
 this Andrea's fault, do you think? 
 
 32. Where do we see that Andrea has an artist's eye? 
 
 33. Find some expressions showing that Luerezia Is beautiful. 
 
 34. What causes Andrea's rapture about the moon? 
 
ANDREA DEL SARTO. 47 
 
 35. How does Lucrezia take this? (1. 33.) 
 
 36. How Is Andrea's favorite color characteristic of his life? 
 
 37. What expression, In the nezt line and In line 39, suggests 
 
 the same? 
 
 38. What hint at their past life Is given in line 38? 
 
 39. What do you find to show that Andrea might have been a 
 
 great landscape painter? 
 
 40. Find two expressions, up to line 50, that corroborate the 
 
 thought of questions 36 and 37. 
 
 41. What negligence of Lucrezla's causes the exclamation of 
 
 line 46? ' 
 
 42. What Is there in lines 51-53 that corroborates the thought 
 
 of questions 36, 37, and 40? 
 
 43. How is Lucrezia behaving, to judge from line 53?^^ 
 
 44. What indication of her character in the followTng few 
 
 lines ? 
 
 45. What state of mind. In regard to his art, do Andrea's 
 
 words, lines 58-76, indicate? 
 
 46. Where, in these lines, do you find another hint at Lucre- 
 
 zla's indifference? 
 
 47. If his skill is so superior to the ability of his contempo- 
 
 raries, how can he (1. 78) say that their "less" is more 
 than he possesses? 
 
 48. What is the "truer light of God" that burns In them? 
 
 49. What does he mean when he says that their brain is vexed, 
 
 beating, stuffed, and stopped up? 
 
 50. What does Andrea, in describing himself, say he Is ; and 
 
 what, by implication, does he say he lacks? 
 
 51. What does he mean when he says that their works drop 
 
 groundward, while his are nearer heaven? 
 
 52. What place that is open to Raphael, Angelo, and da Vinci, 
 
 can he not enter? What does he mean by this? 
 
 53. Why can they not tell the world their visions? 
 
 54. How are lines 90-91 characteristic of Andrea's personality? 
 
 55. Was it reach, or was It grasp (1. 96) that Andrea had In 
 
 full perfection? 
 
 56. What Is there In the next lines that corroborates the 
 
 thought of questions 36, 37, 40, 42? 
 
 57. What would the ability of the "other" (1. 102) have need- 
 
 ed to be, in order that he and Andrea combined might 
 have "o'erlooked the world" ? 
 
 58. What Is the artistic rank of the man Andrea now criti- 
 
 cizes, and what is it he finds wrong In the picture? 
 
 59. With what confidence does he speak of his own skill? 
 
 60. Then what does line 113 mean? 
 
 61. What reproach of Lucrezia does Andrea next utter? 
 
 62. Judging by line 120, how shall you say she takes It? 
 
 63. In what respect is Lucrezia not a fitting wife for him? 
 
 64. What does he feel she should have always urged? 
 
48 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 65. What note of despondent fatalism comes next? 
 
 66. Tet does he, upon second thought, think Lncrezla could 
 
 have helped him ; where does he feel that inspiration 
 must, after all, come from? 
 
 67. In what sense (1. 140) is Andrea a "half-man"? (Com- 
 
 pare question 57.) 
 
 68. What sad commentary on life just before this? 
 
 69. What had Andrea done, that the Paris lords should "pass 
 
 and look aside" ? 
 
 70. Whose face was it "beyond in the background" ? 
 
 71. What makes Andrea so quickly change his tone in line 
 
 166? (Compare question 62.) 
 
 72. What do you again find, that supplements questions 36, 
 
 37, 40, 42, 56, 57, 67? 
 
 73. Whom had Andrea always used as the model for his Ma- 
 
 donnas? (Compare line 23.) 
 
 74. What does he mean when he says Raphael's Virgin is 
 
 "better when you pray"? 
 
 75. Considering the reputation of Angelo and Raphael, what 
 
 should you say as to the value of this praise that An- 
 drea tells of? 
 
 76. What does Lucrezia, at about line 199, say? What does 
 
 this show of her character as a wife? 
 
 77. How can Andrea presume to meddle with the work of an 
 
 artist like Raphael? 
 
 78. Why does he rub out his alterations of Raphael's picture? 
 
 79. Why does Lucrezia smile? Does Andrea perceive the real 
 
 reason ? 
 
 80. What does line 207 tell us of her? 
 
 81. What does it seem they have done with King Francis' 
 
 money ? 
 
 82. What change now occurs in the situation? 
 
 83. What is there morally improper in what Lucrezia prepares 
 
 to do? 
 
 84. What does Andrea suddenly see was the reason for her 
 
 smiling? How does he take it? 
 
 85. What does It seem, from lines 199 and 203, that he has 
 
 never had from his wife? 
 
 86. What has Lucrezia been calling Andrea's musings? 
 
 87. What does line 240 tell us about Lucrezia? Do you think 
 
 Andrea tells the truth about himself in this sentence? 
 
 88. How is Lucrezia behaving since the cousin's appearance, 
 
 to judge from lines 236 and 241? 
 
 89. Find a touch of despondency in the next few lines. 
 
 90. In what way is line 254 modest? 
 
 91. Emphasize "good" in line 255 and note what the sentence 
 
 thus comes to mean. 
 
 92. Find another touch of sadness. 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. 49 
 
 93. What does Andrea, ' at the close, give as the reason for 
 the continued superiority of his contemporaries V 
 
 fl4. What do you infer were Andrea's spiritual, and physical, 
 characteristics ? 
 
 95. And what Lucrezia's? 
 
 96. To what extent is she to be blamed for net feeling satis- 
 
 fied with Andrea? 
 
 97. Do you think Andrea accounts fully for his lite, in line 
 
 51? 
 
 98. What does the word "faultless" of the sub-title mean, and 
 
 What does it not mean? 
 
 FRA LIPPO LIPPI.i 
 
 I AM poor brother Lippo, by your leave ! 
 You need not clap your torches to my face. 
 Zooks, what 's to blame ? you think you see a monk ! 
 What, 't is past midnight, and you go the rounds. 
 And here you catch me at an alley's end 
 Where sportive ladies leave their doors ajar ? 
 The Carmine 's^ my cloister : hunt it up, 
 Do, — harry out, if you must show your zeal. 
 Whatever rat, there, haps on his wrong hole. 
 And nip each softling of a wee white mouse, lo 
 
 Weke, weke, that 's crept to keep him company ! 
 Aha, you know your betters ! Then, you'll take 
 Your hand away that 's fiddling on my throat. 
 And please to know me likewise. Who am I ? 
 Why, one, sir, who is lodging with a friend 
 Three streets off — ^he 's a certain . . . how d' ye 
 
 call? 
 Master — a . . . Cosimo of the Medici,^ 
 r the house that caps the comer. Boh ! you were 
 best! 
 
 1 The painter's full name was Filippo di Tommaso Lippi. Fra means 
 "brother" — a title applied to monks. 
 
 2 A Carmelite monastery in Florence. 
 
 8 The great statesman and patron of art and learning in. Florence- 
 called the "Father of his Country." 
 
60 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Remember and tell me, the day yoM 're hanged, 
 
 How you affected such a gullet's%ripe ! 20 
 
 But you, sir, it concerns you that your knaves 
 
 Pick up a manner nor discredit you : 
 
 Zooks, are we pilchards,^ that they sweep the streets 
 
 And count fair prize what comes into their net ? 
 
 He 's Judas to a tittle, that man is ! 
 
 Just such a face ! Why, sir, you make amends. 
 
 Lord, I 'm not angry 1 Bid your hangdogs go 
 
 Drink out this quarter-florin to the health 
 
 Of the munificent house that harbors me 
 
 (And many more beside, lads ! more beside!) 30 
 
 And all 's come square again. I 'd like his face — 
 
 His, elbowing on, his comrade in the door 
 
 With the pike and lantern, — for the slave that holds 
 
 John Baptist's head a-dangle by the hair 
 
 With one hand ("Look you, now," as who should 
 
 say)^ 
 And his weapon in the other, yet unwiped ! 
 It 's not your chance to have a bit of chalk, 
 A wood-coal or the like ? or you should see ! 
 Yes, I'm the painter, since you style me so. 
 What, brother Lippo's doings, up and dowfl, 40 
 
 You know them and they take you ? like enough ! 
 I saw the proper twinkle in your eye — 
 'Tell you, I liked your looks at very first. 
 Let 's sit and set things straight now, hip to haunch. 
 Here's spring come, and the nights one makes up 
 
 bands 
 To roam the town and sing out carnival. 
 And I 've been three weeks shut within my mew, 
 A-painting for the great man, saints and saints 
 And saints again. I could not paint all night — 
 
 1 A ■worthless kind of fish. 
 
 2 Th^t is : as if he would say, "Look you, now." 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. \ 51 
 
 I 
 
 Ouf ! I leaned out of the^ window for frfesh air. 50 
 
 There came a hurry of feet and little feet, 
 
 A sweep of lute-strings, laughs, and whifts of 
 
 song,— 
 Flower o' the broom,^ 
 Take away love, and our earth is a tomb ! 
 Flower 0' the quince, 
 I let Lisa go, and what good in life since? 
 Flower 0' the thyme — and so on. Round they went. 
 Scarce had they turned the corner when a titter 
 Like the skipping of rabbits by moonlight, — three 
 
 slim shapes, 
 And a face that looked up . . . zooks, sir, flesh and 
 
 blood, 60 
 
 That 's all I 'm made of ! Into shreds it went.* 
 Curtain and counterpane and coverlet. 
 All the bed-furniture — a dozen knots. 
 There was a ladder ! Down I let myself. 
 Hands and feet, scrambling somehow, and so 
 
 dropped, 
 And after them. I came up with the fun 
 Hard by Saint Laurence,* hail fellow, well met, — 
 Flower 0' the rose, 
 
 If I 've been merry, what matter who knows? 
 And so as I was stealing back again 70 
 
 To get to bed and have a bit of sleep 
 Ere I rise up to-morrow and go work 
 On Jerome knocking at his poor old breast 
 With his great round stone to subdue the flesh. 
 You snap me of the sudden. Ah, I see ! 
 
 1 The American edition omits "the." 
 
 2 A peasant song of Italy, consisting of two parts. First the flower 
 is mentioned in fonr syllables, and the hearer is then required to inTent 
 a reply about love, in ten syllables, that shall rhyme. We must assume 
 that Lippo, throughout the poem, sings these passages. 
 
 3 It is related that de Medici, knowing Lippo's propensities, locked 
 hiTii up to keep him at work. 
 
 4 The famous church of San Lorenzo in Florence. 
 
63 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Though your eye twinkles still, you shake your 
 
 ■head — 
 Mine 's shaved — a monk, you say — ^the sting 's in 
 
 that! 
 If Master Cosimo announced himself, 
 Mum 's the word naturally ; but a monk ! 
 Come, what am I a beast for ? tell us, now ! 80 
 
 I was a baby when my mother died 
 And father died and left me in the street. 
 I starved there, God knows how, a year or two 
 On fig-skins, melon-parings, rinds and shucks, 
 Refuse and rubbish. One fine frosty day, 
 My stomach doubled me up and down I went. 
 Old Aunt Lapaccia^ trussed me with one hand, 
 (Its fellow was a stinger as I knew) 
 And so along the wall, over the bridge, 90 
 
 By the straight cut to the convent. Six words 
 
 there. 
 While I stood munching my first bread that month : 
 "So, boy, you 're minded," quoth the good fat father 
 Wiping his own mouth, 't was refection-time, — 
 "To quit this very miserable world ? 
 Will you renounce" . . . "the mouthful of bread ?" 
 
 thought I ; 
 By no means ! Brief, they made a monk of me ; 
 I did renounce the world, its pride and greed. 
 Palace, farm, villa, shop, and banking-house, 
 Trash, such as these poor devils of Medici 100 
 
 Have given their hearts to — all at eight years old. 
 Well, sir, I found in time, you may be sure, 
 'T was not for nothing — the good bellyful. 
 The warm serge and the rope that goes all round. 
 And day-long blessed idleness beside ! 
 
 1 Fra Lippo's aunt, In fact. 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. 53 
 
 "Let 's see what the urchin 's fit for"* — that came 
 
 next. 
 Not overmuch their way, I must confess. 
 Such a to-do! They tried me with their books : 
 Lord, they 'd have taught me Latin in pure waste ! 
 Flower o' the clove, no 
 
 All the Latin I construe is, "amo" I love! 
 But, mind you, when a boy starves in the streets 
 Eight years together, as my fortune was. 
 Watching folk's faces to know who will fling 
 The bit of half-stripped grape-bunch he^ desires. 
 And who will curse or kick him" for his pains, — 
 Which gentleman processional and fine, 
 Holding a candle to the Sacrament, 
 Will wink and let him'' lift a plate and catch 
 The droppings of the wax to sell again, 120 
 
 Or holla for the Eight* and have him" whipped, — 
 How say I ? — ^nay, which dog bites, which lets drop 
 His bone from the heap of offal in the street, — 
 Why, soul and sense of him" grow sharp alike, 
 He" learns the look of things, and none the less 
 For admonition from the hunger-pinch 
 I had a store of such remarks,* be sure, 
 Which, after I found leisure, turned to use. 
 I drew men's faces on my copy-books. 
 Scrawled them within the antiphonary's" marge, 130 
 Joined legs and arms to the long music-notes. 
 Found eyes and nose and chin for A's and B's 
 And made a string of pictures of the world 
 Betwixt the ins and outs of verb and noun, 
 
 1 A subsequent remark of the "good, fat father" in respect to the 
 boy's career. 
 
 8 These pronouns refer to "boy" in line 112. Lippo, of course, means 
 himself. 
 
 S The city magistrates. 
 
 4 That is, observations. 
 
 i Song-book's. 
 
54 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 On the wall, the bench, the door. The monks 
 
 looked black. 
 "Nay," quoth the Prior, "turn him out, d' ye say ? 
 In no wise. Lose a crow and catch a lark. 
 What if at last we get our man of parts, 
 We Carmelites, like those Camaldolese^ 
 And Preaching Friars,^ to do our church up fine 140 
 And put the front on it that ought to be !" 
 And hereupon he bade me daub away. 
 Thank you ! my head being crammed, the walls a 
 
 blank. 
 Never was such prompt disemburdening. 
 First, every sort of monk, the black and white," 
 I drew them, fat and lean : then, folk at church. 
 From good old gossips waiting to confess 
 Their cribs of barrel-droppings, candle-ends, — 
 To the breathless fellow at the altar-foot. 
 Fresh from his murder, safe and sitting there 150 
 
 With the little children round him in a row 
 Of admiration, half for his beard and half 
 For that white anger of his victim's son 
 Shaking a fist at him with one fierce arm, 
 Signing himself with the other because of Christ 
 (Whose sad face on the cross sees only this* 
 After the passion of a thousand years) 
 Till some poor girl, her apron o'er her head, 
 (Which the intense eyes looked through) came at 
 
 eve 
 On tiptoe, said a word, dropped in a loaf, 160 
 
 Her pair of ear-rings and a bunch of flowers 
 (The brute took growling), prayed, and so was 
 
 gone. 
 
 1 Monks of rival monasteries. 
 
 S That is ! the order of monks wearing a black robe, and the Carmel- 
 ites, -who -wore a -white robe, 
 8 The arm making the sign of the cross. 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPL 53 
 
 I painted them all, then cried " 'T is ask and have ; 
 
 Choose, for more 's ready !" — laid the ladder flat. 
 
 And showed my covered bit of cloister-wall. 
 
 The monks closed in a circle and praised loud 
 
 Till checked, taught what to see and not to see. 
 
 Being simple bodies, — "That's the very man ! 
 
 Look at the boy who stoops to pat the dog! 170 
 
 That woman 's like the Prior's niece who comes 
 
 To care about his asthma : it 's the life !" 
 
 But there my triumph's straw-fire flared and 
 
 funked ; 
 Their betters took their turn to see and say : 
 The Prior and the learned pulled a face 
 And stopped all that in no time. "How ? what 's 
 
 here? 
 Quite from the mark of painting, bless us all ! 
 Faces, arms, legs, and bodies like the true 
 As much as pea and pea ! it 's devil's-game 1 
 Your business is not to catch men with show. 
 With homage to the perishable clay, 180 
 
 But lift them over it, ignore it all. 
 Make them forget there 's such a thing as flesh. 
 Your business is to paint the souls of men — 
 Man's soul, and it 's a fire, smoke ... no, its 
 
 not . . . 
 It 's vapour done up like a new-bom babe — 
 (In that shape when you die it leaves your mouth) 
 It 's . . . well, what matters talking, it 's the soul ! 
 Give us no more of body than shows soul ! 
 Here 's Giotto,^ with his Saint a-praising God, 
 That sets us praising,^ — why not stop with him ? 190 
 Why put all thoughts of praise out of our head 
 With wonder at lines, colours, and what not ? 
 Paint the soul, never mind the legs and arms ? 
 
 1 A famous painter of the centnry before Uppo, As a matter of fact, 
 the pictures of this school set us smiling. 
 
56 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Rub all out, try at it a second time ! 
 
 Oh, that white smallish female with the breasts, 
 
 She 's just my niece . . . Herodias, I would say, — 
 
 Who went and danced and got men's heads cut off ! 
 
 Have it all out !" Now, is this sense, I ask ? 
 
 A fine way to paint soul, by painting body 
 
 So ill, the eye can't stop there, must go further 200 
 
 And can't fare worse 1 Thus, yellow does for white 
 
 When what you put for yellow 's simply black, 
 
 And any sort of meaning looks intense 
 
 When all beside itself means and looks naught. 
 
 Why can't a painter lift each foot in turn. 
 
 Left foot and right foot, go a double step. 
 
 Make his flesh liker and his soul more like. 
 
 Both in their order ?^ Take the prettiest face. 
 
 The Prior's niece . . . patron-saint — is it so pretty 
 
 You can't discover if it means hope, fear, 210 
 
 Sorrow or joy? won't beauty go with these? 
 
 Suppose I've made her eyes all right and blue. 
 
 Can't I take breath and try to add life's flash. 
 
 And then add soul and heighten them threefold ? 
 
 Or say there's beauty with no soul at all — 
 
 (I never saw it — put the case the same — ) 
 
 If you get simple beauty and naught else, 
 
 You get about the best thing God invents : 
 
 That 's somewhat : and you '11 find the soul you 
 
 have missed. 
 Within yourself, when you return him thanks. 220 
 "Rub all out!" Well, well, there's my life, in 
 
 short. 
 And so the thing has gone on ever since. 
 I 'm grown a man no doubt, I 've broken bounds :^ 
 
 1 The left foot, or.firat step, means painting the otttward body; the 
 right foot, or second step, signifies putting m the expression, deling 
 and character, which is what Xippo means by "soul." 
 
 3 That is, broken the rules of the monastery. 
 
FkA LIPPO LIPPt. 61 
 
 You should not take a fellow eight years old 
 
 And make him swear to never kiss the girls. 
 
 I 'm my own master, paint now as I please — 
 
 Having a friend, you see, in the Corner-house ! 
 
 Lord, it 's fast holding by the rings in front — 
 
 Those great rings serve more purposes than just 
 
 To plant a flag in, or tie up a horse ! 230 
 
 And yet the old schooling sticks, the old grave eyes 
 
 Are peeping o'er my shoulder as I work, 
 
 The heads shake still — "It 's art's decline, my son ! 
 
 You 're not of the true painters, great and old ; 
 
 Brother Angelico 's^ the man, you '11 find ; 
 
 Brother Lorenzo^ stands his single peer : 
 
 Fag on at flesh, you '11 never make the third !" 
 
 Flower o' the pine, 
 
 You keep your mistr . . . manners, and I 'II stick 
 
 to mine! 
 I 'm not the third, then : bless us, they must know ! 240 
 Don't you think they 're the likeliest to know, 
 They with their Latin ? So, I swallow my rage. 
 Clench my teeth, suck my lips in tight, and paint 
 To please them — sometimes do and sometimes 
 
 don't ; 
 For, doing most, there 's pretty sure to come 
 A turn, some warm eve finds me at my saints — 
 A laugh, a cry, the business of the world — 
 {Flower o' the peach, 
 
 Death for us all, and his own life for each!) 
 And my whole soul revolves, the cup runs over, 250 
 The world and life 's too big to pass for a dream. 
 And I do these wild things in sheer despite. 
 And play the fooleries you catch me at, 
 
 1 A painter of the generation preceding and partly contemporary 
 ■with Lippo — who -was an idealist and Lippo's direct opposite. 
 
 s One of the Camaldolese mentioned above. Like Angelico, an ideal- 
 ist, and Lippo's opposite. 
 
68 STUDIES IN BROWUING. 
 
 In pure rage ! The old mill-horse, out at grass 
 After hard years, throws up his stiff heels so, 
 Although the miller does not preach to him 
 The only good of grass is to make chaff. 
 What would men have? Do they like grass^ or 
 
 no — 
 May they or may n't they ? all I want 's the thing 
 Settled for ever one way. As it is, 260 
 
 You tell too many lies and hurt yourself : 
 You don't like what you only like too much. 
 You do like what, if given at your word. 
 You find abundantly detestable. 
 For me, I think I speak as I was taught ; 
 I always see the garden and God there 
 A-making man's wife : and, my lesson learned. 
 The vfilue and significance of flesh, 
 I can't unlearn ten minutes afterwards. 
 
 You understand me : I 'm a beast I know. 270 
 
 But see, now — ^why, I see as certainly 
 As that the morning-star 's about to shine. 
 What will hap some day. We 've a yoiuigster here 
 Comes to our convent, studies what I do. 
 Slouches and stares and let's no atom drop : 
 His name is Guidi — he '11 not mind the monks — 
 They call him Hulking Tom,^ he lets them talk — 
 He picks my practice up — ^he '11 paint apace, 
 I hope so — ^though I never live so long, 
 I know what 's sure to follow. You be judge! 280 
 You speak no Latin more than I, belike ; 
 However, you 're my man, you 've seen the world 
 — The beauty and the wonder and the power. 
 The shapes of things, their colors, lights and shades, 
 
 I By grass, I/ippo means nocturnal escapades, like his own. 
 3 Tommaso Guidi, according to Browning and his source, Vasati, a 
 pupil of Lippo's, hutreally his master. 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. 69 
 
 Changes, surprises, — ^and God made it all ! 
 
 — For what ? Do you feel thankful, ay or no. 
 
 For this fair town's face, yonder river's line, 
 
 The mountain round it and the sky above, 
 
 Much more the figures of man, woman, child. 
 
 These are the frame to ? What 's it all about ? 290 
 
 To be passed over, despised ? or dwelt upon. 
 
 Wondered at ? oh, this last of course ! — ^you say. 
 
 But why not do as well as say, — ^paint these 
 
 Just as they are, careless what comes of it ? 
 
 God's works — ^paint any one, and count it crime 
 
 To let a truth slip. Don't object, "His works 
 
 Are here already ; nature is complete : 
 
 Suppose you reproduce her — (which you can't) 
 
 There 's no advantage ! you must beat her, then." 
 
 For, don't you mark ? we 're made so that we love 300 
 
 First when we see them painted, things we have 
 
 passed 
 Perhaps a hundred times nor cared to see ;* 
 And so they are better, painted — ^better to us, 
 Which is the same thing. Art was given for that ; 
 God uses us to help each other so. 
 Lending our minds out. Have you noticed, now, 
 Your cullion's hanging face ? A bit of chalk, 
 And trust me but you should, though ! How much 
 
 more 
 If I drew higher things with the same truth ! 
 That were to take the Prior's pulpit-place, 310 
 
 Interpret God to all of you ! Oh, oh, 
 It makes me mad to see what men shall do 
 And we in our graves ! This world 's no blot for us 
 Nor blank ; it means intensely, and means good : 
 To find its meaning is my meat and drink. 
 "Ay, but you don't so instigate to prayer !" 
 
 1 And thtts it comes that -we say certain colors or shades in a picture 
 are nnnatttral — we have simply nerer noticed them in nature. 
 
60 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Strikes in the Prior : "when your meaning's plain 
 It does not say to folk — remember matins, 
 Or, mind you fast next Friday 1" Why, for this 
 What need of art at all ? A skull and bones, 320 
 
 Two bits of stick nailed crosswise, or, what 's best, 
 A bell to chime the hour with, does as well. 
 I painted a Saint Laurence^ six months since 
 At Prato, splashed the fresco in fine style : 
 "How looks my painting, now the scaffold's down ?" 
 I ask a brother : "Hugely," he returns — 
 "Already not one phiz of your three slaves 
 Who turn the Deacon off his toasted side. 
 But 's scratched and prodded to our heart's content. 
 The pious people have so eased their own 330 
 
 With coming to say prayers there in a rage : 
 We get on fast to see the bricks beneath. 
 Expect another job this time next year. 
 For pity and religion grow i' the crowd — 
 Your painting serves its purpose!" Hang the 
 fools! 
 
 — That is — ^you'll not mistake an idle word 
 Spoke in a huff by a poor monk. Got wot, 
 Tasting the air this spicy night which turns 
 The unaccustomed head like Chianti wine ! 
 Oh, the Church knows ! don't misreport me, now ! 340 
 It's natural a poor monk out of bounds 
 Should have his apt word to excuse himself ; 
 And hearken how I plot to make amends. 
 I have bethought me : I shall paint a piece 
 . . . There 's for you ! Give me six months, then 
 
 go, see 
 Something in Sant' Ambrogio's !" Bless the nuns ! 
 
 1 Broiled to death on a gridiron, A. D. 258. 
 S St. AmbroK's— a nonnety at Florence. 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. 61 
 
 They want a cast o' my office. I shall paint 
 God in the midst, Madonna and her babe/ 
 Ringed by a bowery, flowery angel-brood, 
 Lilies and vestments and white faces, sweet 350 
 
 As puff on puff of grated orris-root 
 When ladies crowd to church in midsummer. 
 And then i' the front, of course a saint or two — 
 Saint John, because he saves the Florentines, 
 Saint Ambrose,^ who puts down in black and white 
 The convent's friends and gives them a long day, 
 And Job, I must have him there past mistake, 
 The man of Uz (and Us without the z. 
 Painters who need his patience). Well, all these 
 Secured at their devotion, up shall come 360 
 
 Out of corner when you least expect. 
 As one by a dark stair into a great light, 
 Music and talking, who but Lippo! I — ^ 
 Mazed, motionless, and moon-struck — ^I'm the 
 
 man! 
 Back I shrink — ^what is this I see and hear ? 
 I, caught up with my monk's things by mistake, 
 My old serge gown and rope that goes all round, 
 I, in this presence, this pure company ! 
 Where 's a hole, where 's a corner for escape ? 
 Then steps a sweet angelic slip of a thing 370 
 
 Forward, puts out a soft palm — "Not so fast !" 
 — Addresses the celestial presence, "nay — 
 He made you and devised you, after all. 
 Though he 's none of you ! Could Saint John there, 
 
 draw — 
 His camel-hair make up a painting-brush ? 
 We come to brother Lippo for all that, 
 
 1 TUs pictnie is owned by the Florence Academy of Fine Arts. 
 S A great chtirclunan of the fourth centnry — Archbishop of Milan. 
 S It was not unnsnal ibr the old painters to put themselves into 
 their pictures, in some humble relation. 
 
62 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Iste per fecit opus!" So, all smile — 
 I shuffle sideways with my blushing face 
 Under the cover of a hundred wings 
 Thrown like a spread of kirtles when you 're gay 380 
 And play hot cockles, all the doors being shut, 
 Till, wholly unexpected, in there pops 
 The hothead husband ! Thus I scuttle off 
 To some safe bench behind, not letting go 
 The palm of her, the little lily thing 
 That spoke the good word for me in the nick. 
 Like the Prior's niece . . . Saint Lucy, I would say. 
 And so all 's saved for me, and for the church 
 A pretty picture gained. Go, six months hence ! 
 Your hand, sir, and good-bye : no lights, no lights ! 390 
 The street 's hushed, and I know my own way back, 
 Don't fear me! There 's the gray beginning. 
 Zooksl 
 
 [Tbia poem first appeared In Men and Women, 1855. 
 
 In . Italy art was tlie servant of religion, with the duty of 
 stimulating piety by portraying the soul. But the body had 
 always been looked upon as the antithesis to the soul and was 
 therefore despised and neglected. Moreover, no one seemed 
 to have a clear conception of what the soul was ; hence the 
 painters supposed that by making the body degraded and hid- 
 eous, they would show the soul to be beautiful and noble. 
 The result was hundreds of lean and cadaverous saints, hun- 
 dreds of woe-begone figures of Christ on the Cross. These 
 pictures are, as a rule, devoid of expression, feeling and char- 
 acter ; we are made to smile at the grotesque idealism which 
 they strive to set forth. 
 
 About the middle of the XV century, just before the birth 
 of Kaphael and his contemporaries, a reaction against this 
 mode began to set in. It was admitted as before that it is 
 the first duty of art to portray the soul ; but It came to be seen 
 that It Is the body which gives It expression — that It Is from 
 the lineaments of the face, from the attitudes, from the clothes, 
 the hands and feet, the hair and beard that we gain onr con- 
 ception of what the soul is like. 
 
 It was Fra Llppo LlppI who headed this movement. He 
 was a man of great mental vigor and of an independent per- 
 sonality. He first saw that an artist must get the details of 
 expression, of attitude, and so forth, from a close study of 
 real men and things. He delighted In life. He possessed the 
 artist's ability to see the character — ^the soul — lying hidden 
 beneath the outward details. It is his eftort to justify his 
 beliefs and deeds, against the conservatism of his age, that 
 forms the theme of the poem.] 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. 63 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. What has Just happened? (Note lines 12 and 13.) 
 
 2. Where, a few lines farther on, do you find the same occur- 
 
 rence mentioned? 
 
 3. With what object do the guards, line 2, clap their torches 
 
 to Llppo's face? 
 
 4. What kind of an adventure has Llppo been on? 
 
 5. What word of line 3 shows that this adventure la deemed 
 
 especially bad? 
 
 6. Yet does Llppo, line 1, care at all to conceal his identity? 
 
 What trait of character is thus shown from the very 
 first? 
 
 7. What manner does Llppo assume, as he says the first half 
 
 of line 7? 
 
 8. What causes him to utter the first half of line 12 in the 
 
 way he does? 
 
 9. What question Is asked him, line 14? 
 
 10. What is the effect of the great man's name on the guards, 
 
 as shown by Lippo's words in the second part of line 
 18? 
 
 11. What rank does the man apparently bold to whom Llppo 
 
 turns in line 21? 
 
 12. Where do you find the first Indication of Llppo's artistic 
 
 instincts ? 
 
 13. Is this art of his dreamy and mystical, or does It delight 
 
 In real men and things? 
 
 14. Wliat does the officer do at line 26? 
 
 19. What trait of character does the first half of line 27 re- 
 veal? 
 
 16. With what manner does Llppo bestow his quarter florin? 
 
 17. But what Impressive suggestion does he take care to re- 
 
 peat? 
 
 18. Where do you again see that Llppo Is an artist? 
 
 19. What does the officer say at line 89? 
 
 20. Was this the first of Llppo's escapades? 
 
 21. How does the officer regard them? 
 
 22. How is Llppo's keen perception of character shown in his 
 
 attitude toward the officer? 
 
 23. What account is now given of the events that have pre- 
 
 ceded the opening of the poem? 
 
 24. What word, line 51, do you think Llppo especially empha- 
 
 sizes ? 
 
 25. What do you think was Lippo's opinion of his saints, to 
 
 Judge from line 48? 
 
 26. Where, towards the end of his account, do you see the 
 
 same? 
 
 27. Where do you find a second reference to the thought of 
 
 question 5? 
 
«4 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 28. What kind of art subjects do you think Llppo delights In? 
 
 29. What biographical details does he now give about him- 
 
 self? 
 
 30. What bit of good-humored irony do you find at about line 
 
 100? 
 
 31. What experiences did the monks at first have with Lippo? 
 
 32. How did Lippo acquire his first knowledge of faces and 
 
 expressions 7 
 
 33. How did he make his first attempts to portray them? 
 
 34. Did the prior or the monks have the best eye for the boy's 
 
 abilities ? 
 
 35. Where is there another touch of good-humored sarcasm in 
 
 reference to Lippo's first paintings? 
 
 36. What do you think of his picture representing the mur- 
 
 derer at the altar's foot? 
 
 37. What great contrast in it of innocence to guilt? 
 
 38. What instance of devotion in It? 
 
 39. What instance of devotion unappreciated? 
 
 40. How does Lippo criticize the conventional picture of Christ 
 
 on the Cross that he has put into his own painting? 
 To what, by implication, was that particular face of the 
 Savior blind? 
 
 41. What did the monks think of the painting? 
 12. Was this verdict spontaneous or deliberate? 
 
 43. Was It true or false? 
 
 44. What do you think of the verdict passed by the "Prior and 
 
 the learned?" 
 
 45. Did the Prior know what the soul is? 
 
 46. How much sense was there in his commands to "paint the 
 
 souls of men"? 
 
 47. How was he himself, in spite of his theories, caught by a 
 
 portion of the picture? 
 
 48. What is Lippo's opinion of the usual ways in which artists 
 
 have tried to paint the soul? 
 
 49. Was his picture devoid of soul? 
 
 60. What does the enthusiasm of the monks say on this point? 
 
 61. Is the command of the prior to paint soul, without paint- 
 
 ing anything that shall show feeling or expression or 
 character, capable of execution? 
 
 62. Can a painter paint "soul" ; or can he portray only some 
 
 special manifestation of the soul, as purity, villainy, 
 hypocrisy, etc? 
 
 B3. What trait of Lippo's character is shown in line 209? 
 
 54. But going a step further (line 219), where Is the soul, — 
 
 in the paint on the canvas, or in the beholder? 
 
 55. What note of sadness Is now heard? 
 
 56. And what note of humorous sarcasm? 
 
 57. What Is the old criticism Lippo fancies he hears? 
 
 58. How does he take it? 
 
FRA LIPPO LIPPI. 65 
 
 59. What sarcasm In lines 240-241? 
 
 60. Find a remark corroborating the thought of question 25. 
 
 61. What is Lippo's opinion of the moral strictures preached 
 
 by men ? 
 
 62. What especially good thing does he say In excuse of his 
 
 amatory escapades ? 
 
 63. What, line 277, la the most promising trait In Guldi? 
 
 64. Where Is there a further slur on the "learning" of the 
 
 monks ? 
 
 65. Where do we again see Lippo's great love for the world, 
 
 for life, for men and things? 
 
 66. What should you, yourself, answer to the questions In lines 
 
 290-292 ? 
 
 67. What common obtuse criticism of painting does Lippo now 
 
 quote ? 
 
 68. How does he next very keenly and truthfully answer this? 
 
 69. How does he at once give the officer a practical proof of 
 
 the truth in his remark? 
 
 70. What does line 315 mean? 
 
 71. What sarcasm follows? 
 
 72. How did Lippo's picture of St. Laurence suffering martyr- 
 
 dom show his greatness? 
 
 73. What lines, however, ridicule the whole thing? 
 
 74. How does LIppo feel about his bold speech, line 335? 
 
 75. What action accompanies the first half of line 345? 
 
 76. What docs Lippo feel he must put Into the picture he next 
 
 plans? (Compare questions 25 and 60.) 
 
 77. Why can he not leave Job out? 
 
 78. What indication of belief in himself, and approval of his 
 
 course comes out in the description of this picture? 
 
 79. What characteristic little adventure does he propose to 
 
 put in? 
 
 80. Anything humorous In line 387? 
 
 81. What politeness does the officer at the close wish to show 
 
 Lippo ? 
 
 82. Wliat Is contained in the last word? 
 
STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 PORPHYRIA'S LOVER.^ 
 
 THE rain set early in to-night. 
 The sullen wind was soon awake. 
 It tore the elm-tops down for spite. 
 
 And did its worst to vex the lake : 
 I listened with heart fit to break. 
 When glided in Porphyria ; straight 
 
 She shut the cold out and the storm, 
 And kneeled and made the cheerless grate 
 
 Blaze up, and all the cottage warm ; 
 Which done, she rose, and from her form lo 
 
 Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl. 
 
 And laid her soiled gloves by, untied 
 Her hat and let the damp hair fall. 
 
 And, last, she sat down by my side 
 And called me. When no voice replied. 
 She put my arm about her waist. 
 
 And made her smooth white shoulder bare, 
 And all her yellow hair displaced. 
 
 And, stooping, made my cheek lie there. 
 And spread, o'er all, her yellow hair, 20 
 
 Murmuring how she loved me — she 
 
 Too weak, for all her heart's endeavour. 
 To set its struggling passion free 
 
 From pride, and vainer ties dissever. 
 And give herself to me forever. 
 But passion sometimes would prevail. 
 
 Nor could to-night's gay feast restrain 
 A sudden thought of one so pale 
 
 For love of her, and all in vain : 
 
 1 The following two poems should be studied together and com- 
 pared; each represents an unsuccessful loTer. Questions designed to 
 fadlitate comparison have been added at the close of The Last Ride, 
 
PORPHYRIA'S LOVER. 67 
 
 So, she was come through wind and rain. 30 
 
 Be sure I looked up at her eyes 
 
 Happy and proud ; at last I knew 
 Porphyria worshipped me ; surprise 
 
 Made my heart swell, and still it grew 
 While I debated what to do. 
 That moment she was mine, mine, fair, 
 
 Perfectly pure and eood : I found 
 A thing to do, and all her hair 
 
 In one long yellow string I wound 
 Three times her little throat around, 40 
 
 And strangled her. No pain felt she ; 
 
 I am quite sure she felt no pain. 
 As a shut bud that holds a bee, 
 
 I warily oped her lids : again 
 Laughed the blue eyes without a stain. 
 And I untightened next the tress 
 
 About her neck ; her cheek once more 
 Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss : 
 
 I propped her head up as before. 
 Only, this time my shoulder bore 50 
 
 Her head, which droops upon it still : 
 
 The smiling rosy little head, 
 So glad it has its utmost will, 
 
 That all it scorned at once is fled. 
 And I, its love, am gained instead ! 
 Porphyria's love : She guessed not how 
 Her darling one wish would be heard. 
 And thus we sit together now. 
 
 And all night long we have not stirred. 
 And yet God has not said a word ! 60 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1836, In a London magazine 
 called The MontMy Repository. It stood, together with Jo- 
 hannes Agricola {n Meditation, under the title Madhouse Cells, 
 the present piece being No. II, Porphyria. This would seem 
 to show that It Is to be looked upon as the monologue of a 
 madman, recounting, perhaps, the events that unbalanced big 
 mind. Originally it appeared In flve-Une stanzas.] 
 
«8 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. What were the conditions outside this house? 
 
 2. What was the condition of the man's mind? 
 
 3. Who was Porphyria? 
 
 4. What did she do first on entering? 
 
 5. What did she do next? 
 
 6. What does this reveai concerning her? 
 
 7. Why had the man aiiowed the room to become coid and 
 
 cheerless ? 
 
 8. What was Porphyria's station in life? (11. 22-27.) 
 
 9. What were the "vainer ties" she could not dissever? 
 
 10. What was the pride she could not free her love from? 
 
 11. What was the man's social station? 
 
 12. Why was his heart "fit to break"? 
 
 13. Where bad she come from and why} 
 
 14. How was she dressed? (11. 17 and 27.) 
 
 15. What was the man doing that he (1. 15) should fail to 
 
 answer her? (Compare 11. 31-32.) 
 
 16. What did she know from this? 
 
 17. Then what did she do? (from line 15, on.) 
 
 18. What was it that had compelled her to come to him ? 
 
 19. What did the man at last know? 
 
 20. But considering their different social stations and Por- 
 
 phyria's weakness, what would their future life, of 
 necessity, be 7 
 
 21. Then what did he think it best to do? 
 
 22. Why did she not resist? 
 
 23. Which of Porphyria's two lives — that lived in society, or 
 
 that spent with him — ^was her true one? 
 
 24. What then did he, wish to forestall by his act? 
 
 25. What did he seem to be especially glad over? 
 
 26. What does the fact that her eyes laughed show? (Com- 
 
 pare question 22.) 
 
 27. What made her cheek once more blush? 
 
 28. What were her "utmost will" and her "darling one wish" 
 
 that had at last been granted? 
 
 29. What very pathetic act was he compelled to perform? 
 
 30. How can he say that her head droops on his shoulder atillt 
 
 31. What does Browning seem to insinuate by making the 
 
 speaker say, Ood had kept stmt 
 
 32. The original title of this poem was Porvhyria only. Do 
 
 you think this better than the present heading? 
 
THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER. 69 
 
 THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER. 
 
 I SAID — ^Then, dearest, since 't is so, 
 Since now at length my fate I know. 
 Since nothing all my love avails. 
 Since all, my life seemed meant for, fails. 
 
 Since this was written and needs must be — 
 My whole heart rises up to bless 
 Your name in pride and thankfulness! 
 Take back the hope you gave, — I claim 
 Only a memory of the same, 
 — And this beside, if you will not blame, lo 
 
 Your leave for one more last ride with me. 
 
 II. 
 
 My mistress bent that brow of hers ; 
 Those deep dark eyes where pride demurs 
 When pity would be softening through. 
 Fixed me a breathing-while or two 
 
 With life or death in the balance : right I 
 The blood replenished me again ; 
 My last thought was at least not vain : 
 I and my mistress, side by side 
 
 Shall be together, breathe and ride, 20 
 
 So, one day more am I deified. 
 
 Who knows but the world may end to-night ? 
 
 III. 
 
 Hush ! if you saw some western cloud 
 
 All billowy-bosomed, over-bowed 
 
 By many benedictions — sun's 
 
 And moon's and evening star's at once — 
 
70 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 And so, you, looking and loving best, 
 Conscious grew,^ your passion drew 
 Cloud, sunset, moonrise, star-shine too, 
 Down on you, near and yet more near, 30 
 
 Till flesh must fade for heaven was here ! — 
 Thus leant she and lingered — joy and fear 1 
 
 Thus lay she a moment on my breast. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Then we began to ride. My soul 
 Smoothed itself out, a long-cramped scroll 
 Freshening and fluttering in the wind* 
 Past hopes already lay behind. 
 
 What need to strive with^ a life awry ? 
 Had I said that, had I done this. 
 
 So might I gain, so might I miss. 40 
 
 Might she have loved me ? just as well 
 She might have hated, who can tell ! 
 Where had I been now if the worst befell ?* 
 
 And here we are riding, she and I. 
 
 Fail I alone, in words and deeds? 
 Why, all men strive, and who succeeds ? 
 We rode ; it seemed my spirit flew. 
 Saw other regions, cities new. 
 
 As the world rushed by on either side. 
 I thought, — All* labour, yet no less 50 
 
 Bear up beneath their unsuccess. 
 Look at the end of work, contrast 
 The petty done, the undone vast, 
 
 1 Supply tile word "that" here, and the sense will be plainer. 
 
 3 This participial double phrase modifies scroll. 
 8 "With," here, means against. 
 
 4 Had befallen. 
 
 s That is : all persons, everybody. 
 
THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER. Ti 
 
 This present of theirs^ with the hopeful past 1 
 I hoped she would love me ; here we ride. 
 
 VI. 
 
 What hand and brain went ever paired ? 
 What heart alike conceived and dared ? 
 What act proved all its thought had been ? 
 What will but felt the fleshly screen P^ 
 
 We ride and I see her bosom heave. 60 
 
 There's many a crown for who' can reach. 
 Ten lines, a statesman's life in each 1 
 The flag stuck on a heap of bones, 
 A soldier's doing! what atones?* 
 They scratch his name on the Abbey-stones." 
 
 My riding is better, by their leave. 
 
 VII. 
 
 What does it all mean, poet ? Well, 
 
 Your brains beat into rhythm, you tell 
 
 What we felt only;* you expressed' 
 
 You hold things beautiful the best, 70 
 
 And pace them in rhyme so, side by side. 
 'T is something, nay 't is much ; but then. 
 Have you yourself what's best for men ? 
 Are you — ^poor, sick, old ere your time — 
 Nearer one whit your own sublime 
 Than we who never have turned a rhyme ? 
 
 Sing, riding 's a joy ! For me, I ride. 
 
 1 The antecedent of this pronoun is "All," aboTe, 
 
 S What will "was ever free and unhampered by the cares of life ? 
 
 8 The one, who. 
 
 * What does it all amount to; what reward is there in it ? 
 
 5 The stones of Westminster Abbey; here England's great men are 
 buried and their deeds inscribed. Browning, himself, lies buried here. 
 
 6 "What we felt only" is the object of both "beat" and "tell." 
 1 You expressed the opinion that beautiful things are the best. 
 
7a STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 And you, great sculptor — so, you gav^ 
 A score of years to Art,^ her slave, / 
 
 And that 's your Venus, whence we turn 80 
 
 To yonder girl that fords the burn !^ 
 
 You acquiesce, and shall I repine? 
 What, man of music, you grown gray 
 With notes and nothing else to say. 
 Is this your sole praise from a friend 
 "Greatly his opera's strains intend^ 
 But in music we know how f ashioire end !" 
 
 I gave my youth ; but we ride, in fine. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Who knows what 's fit for us ? Had fate 
 Proposed bliss here should sublimate 90 
 
 My being* — ^had I signed the bond — 
 Still one must lead some life beyond. 
 
 Have a bliss to die with, dim-descried. 
 This foot once planted on the goal. 
 This glory-garland round my soul. 
 Could I dpeixili^b^ Try and test ! 
 I sink ba3cShuddering from the quest. 
 Earth being so good, would heaven seem best? 
 
 Now, heaven and she are beyond this ride. 
 
 X. 
 
 And yet — she has not spoke so long ! 100 
 
 What if heaven be that, fair and strong. 
 At life's best, with our eyes upturned 
 Whither life's flower is first discerned, 
 
 1 Insert "being" here and the sense will be plainer. 
 : Brook. 
 
 8 His opera's strains aim at, or intend, great things. 
 4 Had fate proposed that bliss should here complete or fulfill his 
 existence. 
 Such goal or gloxy-garland; or perhaps *'bliss to die with." 
 
THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER. 73 
 
 We, fixed so, ever should so abide ?^ 
 What if we still ride on, we two, 
 With life for ever old yet new, 
 Changed not in kind but in degree. 
 The instant made eternity, — 
 And heaven just prove^ that I and she 
 
 Ride, ride together, forever ride! no 
 
 [This poem was first published In Men and Women, 1855. 
 This ride that the speaker takes with his lady Blgnlfies the 
 abiding memory of her and the inspiring love for her, which, 
 though unrequited, will never lose its Influence over him or fade 
 away.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. What does the speaker mean "Is so"? 
 
 2. What Is his fate? 
 
 3. What had been written? 
 
 4. How great is his love? 
 
 5. What hope had she given? 
 
 6. What does the word "then," in line 1, show? Had the 
 
 conversation been long or short? Does he consider it 
 final ; or does he hope to resume it 7 
 
 7. What does "at length" tell us of the speaker's existence 
 
 hitherto ? 
 
 8. How does he, in spite of his fate, feel towards his lady? 
 
 9. How does he, as we see from line 8, wish her to leave him? 
 
 10. What win he be content with? 
 
 11. What will this be to him through the future? 
 
 12. What does line 14 show us of the lady's nature? 
 
 13. What is she debating in her mind, line 15? 
 
 14. How is this hesitation affecting him? 
 
 15. What causes the blood to replenish him again? 
 
 16. What, by inference, have his feelings been, just before? 
 
 17. What was his "last thought"? 
 
 18. What does he almost hope will happen? Why should he 
 
 hope this? 
 
 19. If this should happen, what would he be spared? 
 
 20. What words [St. Ill] descriptive of the cloud, are also de- 
 
 scriptive of his lady? 
 
 1 What if heaven consist in this : viz., that being fair and strong, at 
 life's best, we should so abide, forever! 
 
 2 And heaven prove to be just this : that I and she ride in spirit 
 forever. 
 
U STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 21. As they "begin to ride," how Is he affected by the fresh 
 
 wind? 
 
 22. What has he already gotten free from? 
 
 23. What spirit breathes through line 38? 
 
 24. What thought does he next take comfort from? 
 
 25. What is the worst that might have befallen? How, at 
 
 least, does his lady not feel? 
 
 26. What does he, at the opening of Stanza V, comfort himself 
 
 with? 
 
 27. Is the thought of lines 50-51 true? 
 
 28. What, then, are the "other regions" that his spirit is, for 
 
 the first time, seeing? 
 
 29. What answer should you, yourself, give to the questions in 
 
 lines 56-59? 
 
 30. What spheres of greatness does the speaker now review, 
 
 up to Stanza IX? 
 
 31. What do they all teach him? 
 
 32. What does the life of the statesman and the soldier, in the 
 
 end, amount to? 
 
 33. In what way does the speaker think he is better off? 
 
 34. What, after all bis toil, does the poet fail to gain ? 
 
 35. Has the speaker reached it? 
 
 36. What do you now begin to see that this riding with the 
 
 lady signifies? 
 
 37. What Is the sculptor's fate also — and the musician's? 
 
 38. Read the latter half of line 88 in a tone of exultation and 
 
 see what this brings out in answer to question 36. 
 
 39. How should you, yourself, answer the question in line 89? 
 
 40. Suppose one should here in this life reach the highest of 
 
 everything, how would that be unsatisfactory? 
 
 41. In what does happiness consist — in reaching out after 
 
 things hoped for, or in gaining them? 
 
 42. Would the garland of glory, once obtained, be such any 
 
 more? 
 
 43. What is the speaker's reason for thinking that earth should 
 
 not be too good? 
 
 44. What does the speaker. Stanza X, say heaven is? 
 
 45. What do you now clearly see that this ride means? 
 
 16. Who will the speaker have with him to bis death-day? 
 
 1. Comparing this lover with Porphyrla's, which do you see 
 
 has the greater force of character? 
 
 2. Which loves the more? 
 
 3. Which controls the passion and turns It to good? 
 
 4. Which In reality never parts from his lady? 
 
 a. Which proceeds on the principle of self-sacrifice? 
 6. With which lover Is the good of the beloved object para- 
 mount ? 
 
THE HERETIC'S TRAGEDY. 75 
 
 7. Which ol the two Is loved in return and Is, consequently, 
 
 the one that should be content? 
 
 8. Which looks on love as Implying duties ; and which, as 
 
 Implying only rights? 
 
 9. Which can rejoice in love for its own sake? 
 
 10. Which of the two women exercises the more lasting power 
 over her lover? 
 
 [Browning has written a unmber of other love poems. The 
 student is referred to Evelyn Hope, Christina, By the Fireside, 
 Love in a Life, Life in a Love, and, above all, to One Word 
 More.} 
 
 THE HERETIC'S TRAGEDY. 
 
 A MIDDLE-AGE INTERLUDE.^ 
 
 BOSii MUNDI ; SBO, FULCITH MB FLOEIBUS, A CONCEIT OF 
 MASTER GYSBKECHT, CANON-EBGULiK OF SAINT JODOCUS-BI- 
 THB-BAE, TPBES CITY. CANTUQUH, VirgiUuS. AND HATE 
 OFTEN BEEN BUNG AT HOCK-TIDB AND FESTIVALS. GAVISUS 
 
 EBAM, Jessides. 
 
 (It would seem to be a glimpse from the burning of Jacques 
 du Bourg-Molay, at Paris, A. D. 1314 ; as distorted by the re- 
 fraction from Flemish brain to brain, during the course of a 
 couple of centuries.) 
 
 PREADMONISHETH THE ABBOT DEODAET. 
 
 THE Lord, we look to once for all, 
 Is the Lord we should look at, all at once; 
 He knows not to vary, saith Saint Paul, 
 
 Nor the shadow of turning, for the nonce. 
 See him no other than as he is ! 
 Give both the infinitudes their due — 
 
 1 An interlude -was a short musical or theatrical performance, inter- 
 posed between the parts of a larger entertainment. The present speci- 
 men is supposed to be directed by the abbot and to be performed by a 
 leader and a choir. 
 
76 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Infinite mercy, but, I wis. 
 As infinite a justice too. 
 
 [Organ: plagal-cadence.^] 
 As infinite a justice too. 
 
 II. 
 
 ONE SINGETH. 
 
 John, Master of the Temple of God, lo 
 
 Falling to sin the Unknown Sin, 
 What he bought of Emperor Aldabrod,^ 
 
 He sold it to Sultan Saladin •? 
 Till, caught by Pope Clement, a-buzzing there. 
 
 Hornet-prince of the mad wasps' hive. 
 And dipt of his wings in Paris square, 
 They bring him now to be burned alive. 
 
 [And wanteth there grace of lute or clavici- 
 thern* ye shall say to confirm him who 
 singeth-—^ 
 We bring John now to be burned alive. 
 
 III. 
 
 In the midst is a goodly gallows built ; 
 
 'Twixt fork and fork, a stake is stuck ; 20 
 
 But first they set divers tumbrils a-tilt. 
 
 Make a trench all round with the city muck ; 
 Inside they pile log upon log, good store; 
 
 Fagots not few, blocks great and small, 
 Reach a man's mid-thight, no less, no more, — 
 
 For they mean he should roast in the sight of all. 
 
 1 A form of mediacTal church music. 
 
 2 A fictitious name, but intended for one of the emperors at Constan- 
 tinople, who were Christians. 
 
 8 The famous Saladin of Scott's noTel, The Talisman. 
 
 * A zither with keys. 
 
 The bracketed remarks throughout the poem are stage directions, 
 intended to aid the performers. 
 
THE HERETIC'S TRAGEDY. 11 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 We mean he should roast in the sight of all. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Good sappy bavins that kindle forthwith ; 
 
 Billets that blaze substantial and slow ; 
 Pine-stump split deftly, dry as pith ; 30 
 
 Larch-heart that chars to a chalk-white glow : 
 Then up they hoist me John in a chafe. 
 
 Sling him fast like a hog to scorch. 
 Spit in his face, then leap back safe. 
 
 Sing "Laudes" and bid clap-to the torch. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Laus Deo — ^who bids clap-to the torch.^ 
 
 V. 
 John of the Temple, whose fame so bragged. 
 
 Is burning alive in Paris square ! 
 How can he curse, if his mouth is gagged? 
 
 Or wriggle his neck, with a collar there? 40 
 
 Or heave his chest, which a band goes round? 
 
 Or threat with his fist, since his arms are spliced ? 
 Or kick with his feet, now his legs are bound ? 
 
 — Thinks John, I will call upon Jesus Qirist. 
 
 [Here one crosseth himself. 
 
 VI. 
 Jesus Christ — John had bought and sold, 
 
 Jesus Christ — ^John had eaten and drunk; 
 To him, the Flesh meant silver and gold. 
 
 (Salva reverentia.^) 
 Now it was, "Savior, bountiful lamb, 
 
 I have roasted thee Turks, though men roast me ! 
 
 1 That is : it is God -who bids clap to the torch. 
 
 2 Saving reverence — an apology. This some one says, horrified at the 
 mention of Christ's Body in such a connection. 
 
78 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 See thy servant, the plight wherein I am ! 50 
 
 Art thou a saviour? Save thou me!" 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 'T is John the mocker cries, "Save thou me !" 
 
 VII. 
 
 Who maketh God's menace an idle word? 
 
 — Saith, it no more means what is proclaims. 
 Than a damsel's threat to her wanton bird? — 
 
 For she too prattles of ugly names. 
 — Saith, he knoweth but one thing — what he 
 knows ? 
 
 That God is good and the rest is breath ; 
 Why else is the same styled Sharon's rose? 
 
 Once a rose, ever a rose, he saith. 60 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Oh, John shall yet find a rose, he saith ! 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Alack, there be roses and roses, John ! 
 
 Some, honeyed of taste like your leman's 
 tongue : 
 Some, bitter; for why? (roast gayly on!) 
 
 Their tree struck root in devil's dung. 
 When Paul once reasoned of righteousness 
 
 And of temperance and of judgment to come. 
 Good Felix trembled, he could no less : 
 
 John, snickering, crook'd his wicked thumb. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 What cometh to John of the wicked thumb ? 70 
 
 IX. 
 
 Ha, ha, John plucketh now at his rose 
 To rid himself of a sorrow at heart ! 
 
THE HERETIC'S TRAGEDY. 79 
 
 Lo, — ^petal on petal, fierce rays unclose ; 
 
 Anther on anther, sharp spikes outstart; 
 And with blood for dew, the bosom boils ; 
 
 And a gust of sulphur is all its smell ; 
 And lo, he is horribly in the toils 
 
 Of a coal-black giant flower of hell ! 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 What maketh heaven. That maketh hell. 
 
 So, as John called now, through the fire amain, 80 
 
 On the Name, he had cursed with, all his life — 
 To the Person, he bought and sold again — 
 
 For the Face, with his daily buffets rife — 
 Feature by feature It took its place: 
 
 And his voice, like a mad dog's choking bark, - 
 At the steady whole of the Judge's face — 
 
 Died. Forth John's soul flared into the dark. 
 
 SUBJOINETH THE ABBOT DEODAET. 
 
 God help all poor souls lost in the dark! 
 
 [This poem was first published In Men and Women, 1855. 
 
 The Knights-Templars were a powerful military order, or- 
 ganized In Jerusalem, 1118, for the purpose of guarding the 
 Holy Land and of protecting pilgrims against the infldels. ' In 
 the course of time, they acquired Immense wealth and influence. 
 
 But Philip IV. of France and Pope Clement V., attracted by 
 their treasure, and frightened by their radical religious and 
 political doctrines, determined to suppress them ; and they were 
 accused of the most indec'ent and criminal practices. There Is 
 no question that these charges were largely trumped up ; still 
 they were believed with piety and horror by the people for 
 centuries. The last master of the Templars was the present 
 Jacques du Bourg-Molay ; and with his death at the stake, 
 1314, the order came to an end. 
 
 As Browning says In his note appended to the title, the poem 
 describes conditions that prevailed some two hundred years 
 after the disBolution of the Templars. As such, it does not 
 deal primarily with Jacques du Bourg-Molay, but Is, like Holy- 
 Cross Day, a study of mediaeval Christianity. It Is upon the 
 abbot, the leader, the chorus, and the by-atanders that we 
 should fix our eyes. The structure and sentiments of the song 
 characterize the age ; it is these we should study.] 
 
80 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. Bearing the note to the title in mind, how must we, to 
 
 begin with, suppose that this song corresponds with the 
 facts of John's life? 
 
 2. Is the command of the abbot, lines 6-8, possible of execu- 
 
 tion? 
 
 3. What was, apparently, the nature of the sin John is flrst 
 
 accused of? 
 
 4. Is the sentiment of line 17 such that it needs to be accom- 
 
 panied by "grace of lute or claTicithern" 1 
 6. How is the character of the age indicated by the gleeful 
 way in which the chorus repeats line 26? 
 
 6. And by the fact that the abbot directs such a song? 
 
 7. What is meant by "in the midst,' Stanza III? (Compare 
 
 St. II.) And why in such a location? 
 
 8. What is shown by the circumstance that the song dwells 
 
 on such details as now follow? 
 
 9. Find three expressions in this stanza, which, to a degree, 
 
 indicate the coarseness pervading the age. 
 
 10. Find two similar expressions in Stanza IV. 
 
 11. Why should the bavins be "good" and "sappy," and why 
 
 should the billets blaze "substantial and slow"? 
 
 12. What was the fact about the larch-heart that especially 
 
 pleased all concerned? 
 
 13. What characteristic of medisevai Christianity do all these 
 
 details indicate? 
 
 14. What belief of the age does line 36 show? 
 
 15. Find some expressions in Stanza V corroborating the 
 
 thought of questions 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12. 
 
 16. Why is one of the performers made to cross himself? 
 
 17. What was a characteristic of mediseval Christianity in re- 
 
 spect to outward observances? 
 
 18. What was, in all probability, John's actual character, in 
 
 part, since he called ^pon Christ in his extremity ? 
 
 19. But how does the song ridicule this? 
 
 20. Why does the leader stop in the middle of his song to in- 
 
 terject "Salva reverentia"? (Compare questions 16 and 
 
 21. What virtue does the song cause John to urge as a reason 
 
 why Christ should be merciful? 
 
 22. Who was it that originally uttered the words of line 51? 
 
 23. Then why is John called a "mocker"? 
 
 24. What do you think of John's confession of faith, as eiven 
 
 in lines 57-58? 
 
 25. What do you think John may really have said as a basis 
 
 for the statement Just preceding? 
 
 26. Do you accept the opinion of John that the song gives, or 
 
 do you feel impelled to modify it? 
 
 27. What is gleefully meant by line 61 ? 
 
MY LAST DUCHESS. 81 
 
 28. What Is meant by the rose, the petals, the anthers, and so 
 
 forth, of Stanza 1X7 (Compare question 27.) 
 
 29. What Is meant by John's plucking "at his rose"? 
 
 30. Do you accept, without question, the accusations of Stanza 
 
 31. What character is indicated by the abbot's praying at the 
 
 close of such a song as this? 
 
 32. Who do you think came the nearer to realizing the true 
 
 Ideal of Christianity — John or the performers of this 
 interlude? 
 
 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 : Fra Pandolf 's^ hands 
 Worked busily a day, and there she stands. 
 Will 't please you sit and look at her ? I said 
 "Fra Pandolf" fey 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) lo 
 
 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 husband's presence only, called that spot 
 Of joy into the Duchess' cheek : perhaps 
 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 
 
 1 A city in Northern Italy between Venice and Bologna. 
 2 An entirely imaginary character. 
 
83 STUDIFS IN BROWNING. 
 
 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, 't was all one ! My f avor^ at her breast. 
 
 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.if- Who'd stoop to blame 
 This sort of trifling ? Even had you skill 
 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, 
 Or there exceed the mark" — and if she let 40 
 
 Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set 
 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 com- 
 mands ; 
 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 ; 
 
 1 A spedal present lie had given her, either at the time of their engage- 
 ment, or in commemoration of their marriage. 
 
MY LAST DUCHESS. 83 
 
 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. 
 Which Claus of Innsbruck^ cast in bronze for me 1 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1842, In the third number 
 of Bells and Pomegranates, which bore the title Dramatic 
 Lyrics. Here It was called Italy and had a companion piece, 
 France. 
 
 The speaker is an Italian duke, who has but recently lost his 
 wife, and who Is now negotiating another marriage with the 
 daughter of a neighboring count. An envoy has come to com- 
 plete the arrangements, and the duke Is showing him over his 
 palace. They stop, by design no doubt, before the portrait of 
 the last duchess, while the duke in very polite, diplomatic, and 
 unmistakable language indicates what he expects his new wife 
 to be. 
 
 The poem portrays the worldllness and Intellectuallsm that, 
 in part, (■haraptorl^pgthp Rt-nnnngTirp in Italy. It Is greatly 
 admired by students of Browning for the cold, clear, definite 
 manner In which it delineates the duke's personality.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. To whom Is the duke speaking? (1. 49.) 
 
 2. What has the person addressed come for? 
 
 3. What has the duke brought the envoy to see? 
 
 4. Emphasize "last," in line 1, and note what this suggests 
 
 In respect both to the duke's character and to ante- 
 cedent events. 
 
 5. What Is there in the second line that indicates this is a 
 
 great painting? 
 
 6. Find an indication that Fra Pandolf was a great painter. 
 
 7. For what does the duke love the picture — for its memories 
 
 or for its artistic excellences? 
 
 8. What do lines 9 and 10 show In respect to the duke and 
 
 his household? 
 
 9. What characterization of the dead duchess is there In the 
 
 picture ? 
 
 10. What two little compliments had Pandolf paid the duchess 
 
 while she was sitting for the picture ? 
 
 11. Emphasize the second and fourth words of line 14. How 
 
 does the duke now account for the "spot of Joy" In her 
 cheek ? 
 
 12. How do you think the "spot of joy" came there? Had she 
 
 not been used to compliments? 
 
 13. Why do you suppose nobody had dared to ask, as In line 
 
 15? 
 
 ILike Pandolf, imaginaty. 
 
84 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 14. What is Indicated by the circumstance that others had 
 
 evidently had the question in mind? 
 
 15. How does the duke regard Pandolf's compliments 7 
 
 16. What does he next object to In his former duchess? 
 
 17. But how does this characterize her to yout 
 
 18. Where does he think she should have kept her looks? 
 
 19. What criticism of her does he make in the next five lines? 
 
 20. How does he characterize the fellow that broke off the 
 
 cherries for her ? 
 
 21. But what do you think it was that impelled this Individual 
 
 to do so? 
 
 22. How do lines 30-31 characterize the duchess? 
 
 23. What would she, on such occasions, do, if her husband was 
 
 by and she did not dare speak? 
 
 24. In what way was the manner of the duchess, as "she thank- 
 
 ed men," repugnant to the duke? 
 
 25. What indication of character in lines 34-35? 
 
 26. What does the duke feel gratified at not possessing? 
 
 27. Find two expressions before this which he inserted to show 
 
 the same lack. 
 
 28. What expression of contempt in line 38? 
 
 29. What did the duke think woman's sphere was! 
 
 30. From the tone of "forsooth," line 42, what appears to be 
 
 his opinion of a woman's right to offer excuses? 
 
 31. What characteristic is Indicated by lines 43-44? 
 
 32. What does the duke think she, of course, would do? 
 
 33. But how did she. In his opinion, overdo this? 
 
 34. What indication of her character in this? 
 
 35. Does the duke suspect be is describing his dead wife in 
 
 the way he really is? 
 
 36. What was It that grew? (1. 46.) 
 
 37. How completely do yon suppose the smiles stopped ; that 
 
 is, what were the commands he gave? 
 
 38. Did he give the commands, whatever they were, to his 
 
 wife or to others? Of what is the former half of line 
 36 a polite and gentle equivalent? 
 
 39. What does the envoy, at this point, do and say? 
 
 40. Does he rise in response to the duke's request, or is the 
 
 duke's question merely a polite remark, indicating slight 
 surprise, and following upon the envoy's rising? 
 
 41. If the latter, what causes him to rise? 
 
 42. Find a remark after line 50 that is said merely for the 
 
 sake of politeness. 
 4S. In starting to descend, which of the two would naturally 
 give precedence? 
 
 44. Fmphasize "together," line 54, and note what is thus 
 
 brought out. 
 
 45. What is the duke's object In this? 
 
UP AT A VILLA— DOWN IN THE CITY. 85 
 
 46. What remark shows that he is a connoisseur of art? 
 
 47. May there be anything ccfvertly meant by this? 
 
 48. la there any doubt of his getting the new duchess? 
 
 49. What has been his object in discussing his last duchess? 
 
 50. Do you envy the new wife? 
 
 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 hfe, such a life, as one leads at the win- 
 dow there! 
 
 II. 
 Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, 
 
 at least! 
 There, the whole day long, one's life is a perfect 
 
 feast ; 
 While up at a villa one lives, I maintain it, no more 
 
 than a beast. 
 
 in. 
 Well now, look at our villa ! stuck like 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. lo 
 
 1 Country residence. 
 
86 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 IV. 
 
 But the city, oh the city — th^ square with the 
 houses ! Why ? 
 
 They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there's some- 
 thing 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 ; 
 
 And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted 
 properly."^ 
 
 V. 
 
 What of a villa ? Though winter be over in March 
 by rights, 
 
 'T is May perhaps ere the snow shall have with- 
 ered 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 
 
 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 tulip, 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. 
 
 1 That is: evenly and concctly. 
 
UP AT A VILLA— DOWN IN THE CITY. 87 
 
 VII. 
 
 Is it ever hot in the square? There 's a fountain 
 
 to spout and spiash! 
 In the shade it sings and springs ; in the shine such 
 
 foambows flash 
 On the horses with curling 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 linger, 
 Except yon cypress that points like death's lean 
 
 lifted 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, 
 And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the 
 
 resinous 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 diligence 
 
 rattles in : 
 You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never 
 
 a pin. 40 
 
88 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 By-and-by there 's the travelling 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 
 
 rebukes. 
 And beneath, with his crown and his lion, some 
 
 little new law of the Duke's ! 
 Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverend 
 
 Don So-and-so 
 Who is Dante, Boccacio, Petrarca, Saint Jerome 
 
 and Cicero, 
 "And moreover," (the sonnet goes rhyming,) "the 
 
 skirts of Saint Paul has reached, 
 Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more 
 
 unctuous 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 ! 
 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. 
 They have clapped a new tax upon salt, and what 
 
 oil pays passing the gate' 
 
 1 Punch and Judy show. 
 
 2 une for each of her seven legendary sorrows. 
 
 S The gate of the city where the Italian revenue was collected- 
 
UP AT A VILLA— DOWN IN THE CITY. 89 
 
 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 pleas- 
 ure in life ! 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1855, In Men and Women. 
 
 Browning wrote a great deal of humorous-satirical poetry 
 Most of the pieces that would come in this category are long 
 and somewhat abstruse. It is in them, chiefly, that we And 
 those linguistic yiolences, with which the toet has boen, quite 
 Justly, charged. Yet it is here that we most clearly see also 
 his remarkable control of rhyme. Of this the present poem 
 atCords a few minor illustrations.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. Where had the speaker lived all his life? 
 
 2. What was his financial standing? 
 
 3. What has he noticed to suggest line 3? 
 
 4. What is It that he probably most admires in this? 
 
 5. Do you think this existence at the window would, after a 
 
 while, be all he thinks It is? 
 
 6. How does he describe the situation of his villa? 
 
 7. What is your opinion of this on the score of pieturesqnei 
 
 ness? 
 
 8. How does it affect him? 
 
 9. Do you see any reason why he should think of wool? 
 10. Find an Instance of almost childish joy. 
 
 1 Yellow, because carried by penitents — a ceremony. 
 
90 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 11. Find a word that seems to hint at one of his occupations 
 out on the estate. 
 
 'i2. What do you think of his taste In admiring the stralgbtness 
 and regularity of the houses? 
 
 .13. Where does he imagine lie Is, lines 14-15? (Compare ques- 
 tion 4.) 
 
 14. Find another instance of child-like lore for regularity and 
 
 precision, 
 
 15. How does he feel towards his villa? 
 
 16 Find two bits of very picturesque and attractive description 
 that he does not appreciate. 
 
 17. Find two expressions which show that he does not value 
 
 his surroundings at their proper worth. 
 
 18. Find a further jumble of the commonplace and the pic- 
 
 turesque. 
 
 19. Find another. In paragraph VII. 
 
 20. What remark at the end of this division Is pointedly char- 
 
 acteristic, the world over, of country people? 
 
 21. What very striking picture in the first two lines of section 
 
 VIII? 
 
 22. Yet what unfitting descriptive word does he use? 
 
 23. Emphasize the first word of line 33 and note the trait of 
 
 character that Is thus brought out. 
 
 24. What should you, yourself, say about the picture suggested 
 
 In line 36? 
 23. But what word shows how he feels In respect to it? 
 
 26. In what manner is line 37 spoken? 
 
 27. How does he, on the whole, feel towards the villa? 
 
 28. And how does he feel towards the city? 
 
 29. How greatly should you enjoy the clangor of a city's 
 
 church-bells In the early morning, "ere you open your 
 eyes" ? 
 
 30. What Ihdlcation of character In line 40 ? 
 
 31. What next is a source of great joy to him ? 
 
 32. What, In line 43, is it he enjoys? 
 
 83. What Is it that makes line 46 so humorous? 
 34. What sarcasm does Browning, seemingly on his own ac- 
 count, bring In at this point? 
 36. What are the humorous elements in lines 61-54? 
 
 36. What character hint at the opening of section X7 
 
 37. Pick out the particular humorous expressions in the re- 
 
 mainder of the poem. 
 
 88. What Is the effect of the rhymes here? 
 
 89. What does the speaker's open-mouthed manner of gazing at 
 
 the procession show? 
 40. What Is there sarcastic In the Eut>-title7 
 
THE GUARDIAN-ANGEL. 91 
 
 THE GUARDIAN-ANGEL. 
 
 A PICTURE AT FANO. 
 I. 
 
 DEAR and great Angel, wouldst thou only 
 leave 
 That child, when thou hast done with him, for 
 me! 
 Let me sit all the day here, that when eve 
 
 Shall find performed thy special ministry, 
 And time come for departure, thou, suspending 
 Thy flight, may'st see another child for tending, 
 Another still, to quiet and retrieve. 
 
 II. 
 
 Then I shall feel thee step one step, no more, 
 
 From where thou standest now, to where I gaze. 
 — ^And suddenly my head is covered o'er lo 
 
 With those wings, white above the child who 
 prays 
 Now on that tomb — and I shall feel thee guarding 
 Me, out of all the world ; for me, discarding 
 Yon heaven thy home, that waits and opes its 
 door. 
 
 III. 
 
 I would not look up thither past thy head 
 
 Because the door opes, like that child, I know. 
 
 For I should have thy gracious face instead. 
 Thou bird of God ! And wilt thou bend me low 
 
 Like him, and lay, like his, my hands together. 
 
 And lift them up to pray, and gently tether 20 
 
 Me, as thy lamb there, with thy garment's 
 spread ? 
 
93 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 IV. 
 If this was ever granted, I would rest 
 
 My head beneath thine, while thy healing hands 
 Close-covered both my eyes beside thy breast, 
 Pressing the brain, which too much thought ex- 
 pands. 
 Back to its proper size again, and smoothing 
 Distortion down till every nerve had soothing. 
 And all lay quiet, happy and suppressed. 
 
 V. 
 
 How soon all worldly wrong would be repaired ! 
 
 I think how I should view the earth and skies 30 
 And sea, when once again my brow was bared 
 
 After thy healing, with such different eyes. 
 O world, as God has made it ! All is beauty : 
 And knowing this, is love, and love is duty. 
 
 What further may be sought for or declared? 
 
 VI. 
 
 Guercino drew this angel I saw teach 
 
 (Alfred, dear friend!) — ^that little child to pray. 
 
 Holding the little hands up, each to each 
 
 Pressed gently, — ^with his own head turned away 
 
 Over the earth where so much lay before him 40 
 
 Of work to do, though heaven was opening o'er 
 him. 
 And he was left at Fano by the beach. 
 
 VII. 
 
 We were at Fano, and three times we went 
 
 To sit and see him in his chapel there. 
 And drink his beauty to our soul's content 
 
 — My angel with me too: and since I care 
 For dear Guercino's fame (to which in power 
 And glory comes this picture for a dower. 
 
 Fraught with a pathos so magnificent) — : 
 
THE GUARDI4N -ANGEL. 93 
 
 VIII. 
 
 And since he did not work thus earnestly 50 
 
 At all times, and has else endured some wrong — 
 
 I took one thought his picture struck from me. 
 And spread it out, translating it to song. 
 
 My love is here. Where are you, dear old friend ? 
 
 How rolls the Wairoa at your world's far end? 
 This is Ancona, yonder is the sea. 
 
 [This poem was first published in Men and Women, 1855. 
 
 Fano is situated on the Adriatic in central Italy. There are 
 many excellent paintings preserved in the churches of the little 
 town — among them. The Guardian Angel. Guerelno was a 
 contemporary of Raphael and a painter of much power.] 
 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. In the poems, so far studied, has the speaker been real or 
 
 Imaginary ? 
 
 2. Who Is the speaker here? 
 
 3. Who is the "child," of line 2? 
 
 4. What does the author imagine the angel will do, when 
 
 evening comes? 
 
 5. Who is the "other child" that needs tending? 
 
 6. What tomb is it that is mentioned in Stanza II? 
 
 7. What does the author in this stanza imagine the angel will 
 
 do? 
 
 8. Whither is the child looking? 
 
 9. How Is the angel's face described? 
 
 10. What does the child not appreciate? 
 
 11. How would the author look? 
 
 12. What is the angel doing to the child? 
 
 13. What does the author imagine the angel might do to him? 
 
 14. And what would the effect of this be on his troubled spirit ? 
 
 15. What adjective of Stanza IV describes the angel's touch? 
 
 16. What two words, in their very sound, seem quieting and 
 
 full of peace? 
 
 17. What does line 29 mean? — all the wrong in the world, for 
 
 Instance ? 
 
 18. How would the earth, skies, and sea seem different? 
 
 19. Whither was the angel in the picture looking? 
 
 20. What was the work that lay before him to do? 
 
 21. What Is meant by "though heaven was opening"? 
 
 22. What is meant by "we" [St. VII] and by "my angel"? 
 
 23. What was the "magnificent pathos" of the picture? 
 
 24. Where was the author's friend? 
 
 25. What might the picture suggest in reference to this friend 
 
 — otE at the "world's far end"? 
 
M STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 PROSPICE. 
 
 FEAR death?— to feel the fog in my throat. 
 The mi&t in my face. 
 When the snows begin, and the blasts denote 
 
 I am Hearing the place. 
 The power of the night, the press of the storm. 
 
 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, in 
 
 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 
 forbore. 
 
 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 worst 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, 
 
 Then a light, then thy breast, 
 O thou soul of my soul ! I shall clasp thee again, 
 
 And with God be at rest ! 
 
 1 Prise, 
 
PROSPICE. 96 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1864, In a small collection 
 entitled Dramatis Peraonae. 
 
 Mrs. Browning died In June, 1861. She, no less than her 
 husband, achieved distinction In poetry. Her work represents, 
 no doubt, the highest eminence reached by women In verse. 
 
 Proapice was written the autumn following Mrs. Browning's 
 death. It shows us, as does no other poem, the deep and 
 powerful currents of feeling that made up the poet's inner 
 life. A strenuous belief In God and Immortality, and In him- 
 self, was fundamental In his character. 
 
 It may be well to subjoin another tribute to his wife, which 
 the poet wrote, probably, the same year. It Is found at the 
 close of the first part of his great work. The Ring and the 
 Book, which was begun, 1861. 
 
 O lyric Love, half angel and half bird, 
 
 And all a wonder and a wild desire, — 
 
 Boldest of hearts that ever braved the sun. 
 
 Took sanctuary within the holler blue. 
 
 And sang a kindred soul out to his face, — 
 
 Yet human at the red-ripe of the heart — 
 
 When the first summons from the darkling earth 
 
 Reached thee amid thy chambers, blanched their blue. 
 
 And bared them of the glory — to drop down. 
 
 To toll for man, to suffer or to die, — 
 
 This Is the same voice : can thy soul know change ? 
 
 Hall then and hearken from the realms of help ! 
 
 Never may I commence my song, my due 
 
 To God who best taught song by gift of thee, 
 
 Except with bent head and beseeching hand — 
 
 That still, despite the distance and the dark. 
 
 What was, again may be; some Interchange 
 
 Of grace, some splendor once thy very thought. 
 
 Some benediction anciently thy smile : 
 
 — ^iNever conclude, but raising hand and head 
 
 Thither where eyes, that cannot reach, yet yearn 
 
 For all hope, all sustainment, all reward. 
 
 Their utmost up and on, — so blessing back 
 
 In those thy realms of help, that heaven thy home. 
 
 Some whiteness which, I judge, thy face makes proud. 
 
 Some wanness where, I think, thy foot may fall ! 
 
 The student Is further referred to One Word More, the last 
 poem in the volume. Men and Women, published, 1855.] 
 
96 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. Under what description is the approach towards death 
 
 figured ? 
 
 2. What two nouns stand for Death? 
 
 3. What Is meant by "the journey," "the summit," "the bar- 
 
 riers," and the "battle" ? 
 
 4. What description does Browning give of himself? 
 
 5. What is the "one fight more"? What does the author 
 
 mean by calling It "the best" flght? 
 
 6. What is meant by the next sentence? 
 
 7. To whom does Browning compare himself? 
 
 8. What are the arrears that a "glad life" fails to pay? 
 
 9. To whom does the worst turn Into the best at death? 
 
 10. What happens at death? 
 
 11. What would come to Browning at death? 
 
 12. In what tone is Fear deathT to be read? 
 
 13. The title means, Look forward. What should we, ourselves, 
 
 look forward to? 
 
 COUNT GISMOND. 
 
 AIX IN PROVENCE.^ 
 
 CHRIST God whosajvest raanJ save- most 
 Sf men Ccfinit Gismohd wro saved me"! 
 Count Gauthier, when he chose his post, 
 
 Chose time and place and company 
 To suit it ; when he struck at length 
 My honour, 't was with all his strength. 
 
 1 In southern France, thirty miles iVom Marseilles. 
 
COUNT GISMOND. 97 
 
 II. 
 
 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, lo 
 
 While being dressed in queen's array 
 
 To give our tourney prize away. 
 
 III. 
 
 I thought they^ loved me, did me grace 
 To please themselves ; 't was all their deed ; 
 
 God makes, or fair or foul, our face; 
 If showing mine so caused to bleed 
 
 My cousins' hearts, they should have dropped 
 
 A word, and straight the play had stopped. 
 
 IV. 
 
 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 
 
 My birthday song quite through, adjust 
 
 The last rose in my garland, fling 
 A last look on the mirror, trust 
 
 My arms to each an arm of theirs. 
 
 And so descend the castle-stairs — 30 
 
 1 The cousins. 
 
98 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 VI. 
 
 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, 
 
 Powdered with gold its gloom's soft dun) — 
 
 VII. 
 
 And they could let me take my state 
 And foolish throne amid applause 
 Of all come there to celebrate 
 
 i My queen's-day — Oh I think the cause 40 
 
 Of much was, they forgot no crowd 
 Makes up for parents in their shroud ! 
 
 VIII. 
 
 However that be, all eyes were bent 
 
 Upon me, when my cousins cast 
 Theirs down; 't was time I should present 
 
 The victor's" crown, but . . . there, 't will last 
 No long time . . . the old mist again 
 Blinds me as then it did. How vain ! 
 
 IX. 
 
 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 I" 
 And all stayed. "Bring no crowns, I say! 
 
 1 Queen of the tournament, 
 
 S The -rictor in the tournament. 
 
 8 The lines from "there, 't-will last no long time," are an interrup- 
 tion, due to the speaker's emotion, and are not a part of the story she 
 is telling. 
 
COUNT GISMOND 
 
 "Bring torches 1 Wind the penance-sheet 
 
 About her! Let her shun the chaste, 
 Or lay herself before their feet ! 
 
 Shall she whose body I embraced 
 A night long, queen it in the day ? 
 For honor's sake no crowns, I say!" 60 
 
 XI. 
 
 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 1 
 
 Some monstrous torture-engine's whole 
 Strength on it ? No more says the soul. 
 
 XII. 
 
 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? 
 
 XIII. 
 
 He strode to Gauthier, in his throat 
 Gave him the lie, then struck his mouth 
 
 With one back-handed blow that wrote 
 
 In blood men's verdict there. North, South, 
 
 East, West, I looked. The lie was dead. 
 
 And damned, and truth stood up instead. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 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: 
 
100 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 God took that on him — I was bid 
 Watch Gismond for my part : I did. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Did I not watch him while he let 
 
 His armourer just brace his greaves,^ 
 Rivet his hauberk, on the fret 
 
 The while ! His foot ... my memory leaves 
 No least stamp out, nor how anon 
 He pulled his ringing gauntlets on. 90 
 
 XVI. 
 
 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, 
 
 Cleaving till out the truth he clove. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 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. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Then Gismond, kneeling to me, asked 
 
 — What safe my heart holds, though no word 
 Could I repeat now, if I tasked 
 
 My powers for ever, to a third 
 \ Dear even as you are. Pass the rest 
 ; Until I sank upon his breast. 
 
 1 Tigliteii the straps tliat held on the steel armor for the legs. 
 
 2 In a combat such as this -was, the antagonists -wotild retire to oiipo- 
 site ends of the enclosed field and, at the signal, charge upon each otiier 
 with levelled lance, each striving to unhorse his adversary. 
 
 8 Kot caring about his own guard, having flung awaj his shield. 
 
COUNT GISMOND. 101 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Over my head his arm he flung 
 
 Against the world; and scarce I felt no 
 
 His sword (that dripped by me and swung) 
 
 A little shifted in his belt: 
 For he began to say the while 
 How South our home lay many a mile. 
 
 XX. 
 
 So, 'mid the shouting multitude 
 
 We two walked forth to never more 
 Return. My cousins have pursued 
 
 Their life, untroubled as before 
 I vexed them. Gauthier's dwelling place 
 God lighten ! May his soul find grace ! 120 
 
 XXI. 
 
 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 
 How many birds it struck since May. 
 
 [This Is the poem that appeared, originally, In No. Ill ot 
 Bella and Pomegranates as the companion piece to My Last 
 Duchess. — See page 83. It was there called France and was 
 intended as a contrast to Italy. Perhaps no more pronounced 
 difference In character Is conceivable than this which appears 
 from a comparison of the two noblemen. However, the poems 
 do not portray contemporary conditions ; Count Qismona is a 
 tale of chivalry, while My Last Duchess deals with the spirit 
 of the Renascence. 
 
 The Countess Gismond tells Adela, a friend, of the circum- 
 stances under which she first met her husband and of the 
 events that led to their union. The two women are alone in 
 a room of the castle, the count with his sons being temporarily 
 absent.] 
 
 1 A. hawk trained to porsne and strike game birds. 
 
103 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. How is the speaker related to Count Gismond? 
 
 2. To whom is she speaking? 
 
 3. What is she narrating? 
 
 4. How long, approximately, is this after the events she tells 
 
 of? [St. IX.] 
 
 5. Where is Count Gismond meanwhile? 
 
 6. How does the opening clause rank with all possible speech 
 
 for sublimity of content? 
 
 7. What makes the speaker, at the very beginning, so serious 
 
 and high-strung? 
 
 8. What do you, by the middle of line 3, know about Count 
 
 Gauthler? 
 
 9. What additional information concerning this matter does 
 
 "at length" give you? 
 
 10. When you read that it was the speaker's honor as a woman 
 
 which had been Impeached, do you find yourself sus- 
 pecting her or, nevertheless, believing in her? 
 
 11. How comes it that you so instinctively take this attitude 
 
 towards her? 
 
 12. Does she seem to think that Gauthier's villainy was in- 
 
 stinctive with him, or that he had spent time and effort 
 in perfecting it? 
 
 13. Is there any special reason why he might not have been a 
 
 born villain? 
 
 14. How is it an indication of character that she cannot con- 
 
 ceive of such a possibility? (Emphasize "must.") 
 
 15. Do you suppose the morning was really miserable to her 
 
 then? Why does she now call it so? 
 
 16. And, similarly, why does she say she seemed happy? — 
 
 Was she not? 
 
 17. What additional points of the story does this stanza give? 
 
 18. [St. III.] Emphasize "thought" and note what this shows. 
 
 19. Who is not included In the term "they"? 
 
 20. What word In the second halt of line 2 receives special 
 
 emphasis ? 
 
 21. Whom does the speaker, consequently, omit from her accu- 
 
 sation? How can she? 
 
 22. What do you already, at line 3, know as to her looks? 
 
 23. How do you know this, — because she says so? 
 
 24. What word does she emphasize in this line? 
 
 25. What trait of character causes her to put special stress 
 
 on it? 
 
 26. What iB her opinion of show? 
 
 27. [St. IV.] What word should be emphasized in line 1? 
 
 28. Yet what had been the attitude of the cousins towards the 
 
 speaker ? 
 
COUNT GISMOND. 108 
 
 29. What trait of character Is then shown by the stress she 
 
 puts on this word? 
 
 30. And what by her next sentence! 
 
 31. What does she here imply as to their relative degrees of 
 
 beauty? Do we believe her? 
 
 32. Why did the cousins not say anything? 
 
 33. What made them glance sideways? 
 
 34. What would the speaker have done If they had spoken? 
 
 35. [St. v.] Do the first lines correspond In thought with 
 
 Stanza II, lines 3 and 4? (Compare questions 15 and 
 16.) 
 
 36. Was her happiness the happiness of a woman or of a 
 
 child? 
 
 37. What trait of character In the cousins Is Indicated by their 
 
 letting her do everything to the endt 
 
 38. And by their escorting her down the stairs? 
 
 39. [St. VI.] Did she have any real girl friends? 
 
 40. Emphasize "could" and note what this shows us of her 
 
 character. 
 
 41. What were the canopy and throne? 
 
 42. Why does the speaker call the latter "foolish"? 
 
 43. What do we now learn is her position in the world? 
 
 44. She excuses the cousins tor much, — for what not? 
 
 45. Why not? (Compare St. Ill, 11. 1-2.) 
 
 46. [St. VIII.] Why did they cast their eyes down? 
 
 47. What does the pronoun it in " 'twill" refer to ? 
 
 48. What happens with the speaker at this point In her story? 
 
 What causes this attack? 
 
 49. What does she mean by "how vain"? (Compare question 
 
 42.) 
 
 50. [St. IX.] What gate is meant In line 1? 
 
 51. What makes her think it strange that Gauthler should 
 
 have come forth to her very faeet 
 
 52. What is conveyed by the word "stalk"? — How could she, 
 
 before the accusation, have had the contempt for Gau- 
 thier that this word seems to indicate? 
 
 53. What does the vigor of Gauthler's language tell us con- 
 
 cerning his character? 
 
 54. [St. XI.] What must Adela have asked at this point? 
 
 55. What is your opinion of her for asking such a question? 
 
 56. What is Indicated by the speaker's uttering the exclama- 
 
 tory pronoun first? 
 
 57. [St. XII.) How was GIsmond's advance different from 
 
 Gauthler's? 
 
 58. What difference In character does this show? 
 
 59. How was the speaker Impressed by each, to Judge from the 
 
 two verbs? 
 
 60. How could she "at once" know she was saved? 
 
 61. How certain was she of the end? 
 
104 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 62. What causes her, even after all these years, to make the 
 
 highly-colored comparison of God to Satan? 
 
 63. [St. XIII.] How many words of the last four lines can be 
 
 made to take emphasis? 
 
 64. How do you, in your mind's eye, see the two men so that 
 
 the blow could have been backhanded? 
 
 65. Does this show anything of their mind also? 
 
 66. What made the speaker look around? 
 
 67. [St. XIV.] What was the "heart of the joy"? 
 
 08. What caused her to have no doubt of the outcoine? 
 
 69. Who bade her "watch Gismond" as she imagines? 
 
 70. How can she have such a fancy now, so many years after? 
 
 71. [St. XV.] Why does Gismond have his armor "just braced" V 
 
 72. And what caused him to be "on the fret"? 
 
 73. What did his foot do? 
 
 74. What made his gauntlets ring as he pulled them on? 
 
 75. What does her ability to give these details so minutely 
 
 after all these years show? 
 
 76. [St. XVI.l As the lists were constructed how far would 
 
 each knight have to ride before he could meet bis an- 
 tagonist ? 
 
 77. What indication of character, consequently, in the first 
 
 two lines? 
 
 78. Why did Gismond not use tricks of fencing? 
 
 79. Why did he not care about his guard? 
 
 80. [St. XVII.] What effect does Gauthier's confession have 
 
 on your opinion of him? 
 
 81. [St. XVIII.] What indication of refinement and delicacy 
 
 in this stanza? 
 
 82. [St. XIX.] What realistic touch in this stanza? 
 
 83. What do you infer from line 4? 
 
 84. [St. XX.] In what way had the speaker's superior beauty 
 
 troubled the cousins? 
 
 85. What may she then mean to suggest that their station 
 
 still is? 
 
 86. Why does she not pray for them as for Gauthler? (Com- 
 
 pare question 21.) 
 
 87. How can she pray for him? 
 
 88. [St. XXI.] Do her remarks to Gismond correspond with 
 
 the facts? 
 
 89. What does this show of her ? — Is this not dreadful ? 
 
 90. What was it that caused Gismond to believe in her. even 
 
 to the extent of taking her for his wife, and even though 
 she spoke no word in her defense? 
 
 91. Suppose she had protested her innocence, — what then? 
 
 92. What do you think this poem is meant to show? 
 
 93. Can you find anything in her character, pure as it Is, which 
 
 reflects the coarser and more brutal life of the middle 
 ages? 
 
THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB. 106 
 
 THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT 
 SAINT PRAXED'S CHURCH.^ 
 
 ROME, 15 . 
 
 VANITY, saith the preacher, vanity ! 
 Draw round my bed: is Anselm keeping 
 
 back ? 
 Nephews — sons mine ... ah God, I know not ! . 
 
 Well— ^ 
 
 She, men would have to be your mother once, 
 Old Gandolf envied me, so fair she was! 
 What's done is done, and she is dead beside. 
 Dead long ago, and I am Bishop since, 
 And as she died so must we die ourselves. 
 And thence ye may perceive the world 's a dream. 
 Life, how aijd what is it? As here I lie 10 
 
 In this state-chamFer7~dying by-deg¥ees. 
 Hours and long hours in the dead night, I ask 
 "Do I live, am I dead ?" Peace, peace seems all. 
 Saint Praxed's ever was the church for peace ; 
 And so about" this tomb of mine. I fought 
 With tooth and nail so save my niche, ye know : 
 — Old Gandolf cozened* me, despite my care ; 
 Shrewd was that snatch f rom out the corner South 
 He graced his ^^rrinr) with, God curse the same ! 
 Yet still my niche is not so cramped but thence 20 
 
 One sees the pulpit o' the epistle-side,* 
 And somewhat of the choir, those silent seats. 
 
 -1 An old church in Rome. 
 
 2 Concerning. 
 
 8 Tricked. 
 
 ^ There ^erere two pulpits, one on each side of the central aisle. 
 
106 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 And up into the aery dome where live 
 The angels, and a sunbeam 's sure to lurk: 
 And I shall fill mv slab of basalt^ there. 
 And 'neath my tabernacle^ take my rest, 
 With those nine columns* round me, two and two. 
 The odd one at my feet where Anselm. stands : 
 Peach-blossom marble* all, the rare, the ripe 
 As fresh-poured red wine of a mighty pulse. 
 
 — Old Gandolf with his paltry onion-stonej 30^ 
 
 Put me where I may look at hiiHT^ Truepeach,' i/P^ 
 Rosy and flawless : how I earned the prize ! . \ 
 Draw close : that conflagration of my church 
 — What then ? So much was saved if aught were 
 
 missed ! 
 My sons, ye would not be my death ? Go dig 
 The white-grape vineyard where the oil-press stood, 
 Drop water gently till the surface sink. 
 And if ye find . . . Ah God, I know not, I . . . 
 Bedded in store of rotten fig-leaves sojtj___ _ _40_ 
 
 And corded up in a tight qUye-f rail, ^ , — - -- — 
 
 Some lump, ah God, of lapis lazuli,^ 
 
 Bjg-as -a Tew's head cu.t_QflE at t he jiape, 
 
 "Slue as a vem o er the Madonna^ breast . . . 
 Q^ne -fW lioirg J b p.qii<?athetj vnii^ villaSj all. 
 Tha t brav gjjasc ati villa -yw ^Li g-bath, 
 So, let the blue lump poise between my knees, 
 Like God the Father's globe on both his hands 
 
 1 X common grayish rock. The slab formed the cover of the sarco- 
 phagus and Tras to support the reclining marble image of the bishop. 
 
 2 The marble roof over the image on the sarcophagus. 
 
 8 The columns supporting the tabernacle over the slab, on which the 
 image was to he. 
 
 4 A red variety of marble used for ornamentation. 
 
 B A cheap variety of marble that often scaled off like an onion. 
 
 fl That is: at the carved, reclining image of Gandolf lying on top of 
 his tomb. 
 
 7 Olive basket. 
 
 8 A beautiful blue stone used in ornamentation. 
 
THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB. 107 
 
 Ye worship in the Jesu Church^ so gay, 
 
 For Gandolf shall not choose but see and burst ! 50 
 
 Swift as a weaver's shuttle fleet our years : 
 
 Man goeth to the grave, and where is he ? 
 
 Did I say basalt for my slab, sons ? Black — 
 
 'T was ever antique-bfeck*"! meant ! How else 
 
 Shall ye contrast my frieze to come beneath ?^ 
 
 The bas-relief in bronze* ye promised me, 
 
 Those Pans and Nymphs ye wot of, and perchance 
 
 Some tripod", thyrsus^, with a vase or so, 
 
 The Saviour at his sermon on the mount. 
 
 Saint Praxed in a glory, and one Pan 60 
 
 R«ady to twitch the Nymph's last garment off. 
 
 And Moses with the tables . . . but I know 
 
 Ye mark me not ! What do they whisper thee. 
 
 Child of my bowels, Anselm? Ah, ye hope 
 
 To revel down my villas while I gasp 
 
 Bricked o'er with beggar's mouldy travertine' 
 
 Which Gandolf from his tomb-top chuckles at 1 
 
 Nay, boys, ye love me — all of jasper, then ! 
 
 'T is jasper ye stand pledged to, lest I grieve. 
 
 My bath must needs be left behind, alas ! 70 
 
 One block, pure green as a pistachio-nut, 
 
 There 's plenty jasper somewhere in the world — 
 
 And have I not Saint Praxed's ear to pray 
 
 Horses for ye, and brown Greek manuscripts. 
 
 And mistresses with great smooth marbly limbs? 
 
 — That 's if ye carve my epitaph aright, 
 
 1 Another chani in Rome. 
 
 S An specially fine Tarietj, much prized. 
 
 S The narrow ornament extending around the sarcophagus under the 
 slab. 
 
 4 Tliis and so forth is -what the frieze is to consist of. 
 
 £ The insigninm of the oracle at Delphi. 
 
 fi The spear stack in a pine cone and -wreathed vrith ivy, always car- 
 ried by Bacchns. ^ 
 
 7 A crumbly, grayish limestone formed by deposit from water. 
 
108 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Choice Latin, picked phrase, TuUy's^ every word. 
 
 No gaudy ware like Gandolf's second line — 
 
 Tully, my masters? Ulpian? serves his need! 
 
 And tlren how I shall lie' through centuries, 80 
 
 And near the blessed mutter of the mass, 
 
 And seeGod made and eaten all day long,* 
 
 And feel the steady candle-flame, and taste 
 
 Good strong thick stupefying incense-smoke! 
 
 For as I lie here, hours of the dead night, 
 
 Dying in state and by such slow degrees, 
 
 I fold my arms as if they clasped a crook. 
 
 And stretch my feet forth straight as stone can 
 
 point" — -- ' ■■-■■ — 
 
 And let the bedclothes, for a mortcloth, drop 
 
 Into great laps and folds of sculptor's work : 90 
 
 And as yon tapers dwindle, and strange thoughts 
 
 Grow, with a certain humming in my ears. 
 
 About the life before I lived this life. 
 
 And this life too, po pes, cardin als and priests. 
 
 Saint Praxed at his ^rmon ogThg- mount ^ 
 
 Your tall pale' mother with herlalEng^eyes , 
 
 And new-found agate urns as fresh as day. 
 
 And marble's language, Latin pure, discreet, 
 
 —Aha ELUCESCEBAT* quoth our friend ? 
 
 No Tully, said I, Ulpian at the best ! 100 
 
 Evil and brief hath been my pilgrimage. 
 
 All lapis, all, sons ! Else I give the Pope 
 
 My villas ! Will ye ever eat my heart ? 
 
 Ever your eyes were as a lizard's quick, 
 
 1 Marcus TulUus Cicero's. 
 
 3 A Roman writer onjtuispmdence of the second century, when style 
 had begun to degenerate. 
 
 8 That is, as the sculptured image. 
 
 * That is, in the form of the Holy Wafer used in the Communion 
 Service. 
 
 ff Imitating the image on the slab. 
 
 6 He was iamoas. 
 
THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB. 109 
 
 They glitter like your mother's for my soul, 
 
 Or ye would heighten my impoverished frieze, 
 
 Piece out its starved desi^, and fill my vase 
 
 With grapes, and add a vizor^ and a Term,' 
 
 And to the tripod ye would tie a Ijmx 
 
 That in his struggle throws the thyrsus down, i lo 
 
 To comfort me on my entablature* 
 
 Whereon I am to lie till I must ask 
 
 "Do I live, am I dead ?" There, leave me, there ! 
 
 For ye have stabbed me with ingratitude 
 
 To death — ^ye wish it — God, ye wish it ! Stone — 
 
 Gritstone, a-crumble! Qammy squares which 
 
 sweat 
 As if the corpse they keep were oozing through — 
 And no more lapis to delight the world ! 
 Well, go ! I bless ye. Fewer tapers there. 
 But in a row : and, going, turn your backs 120 
 
 — ^Ay, like departing altar-ministrants. 
 And leave me in my church, the church for peace. 
 That I may watch at leisure if he leers — 
 Old Gandolf, at me, from his onion-stone. 
 As still he envied me, so fair she was ! 
 
 TThis poem was flrst published in Hood's Utagaaine, 1845, 
 wltb the title The Tomh at 8t. Praxed's. The same year It 
 was Included in No. VII of Bells and Pomejranatea. 
 
 It may best be understood by observing how the hints and 
 suggestions, throughout the piece, group themselves about cer- 
 tain distinct centres as follows : — 
 
 1. The conventional pious death-bed meditations of the 
 bishop. 
 
 2. Accidental revelations of the bishop's past life and true 
 character. 
 
 3. The superficial Insincerity of his religion. 
 
 4. His love for the art, the mythology, and the learning of 
 the ancients more than for the truths of Christianity. 
 
 1 The grinmng or gaping maslcs carved as ornaments. 
 
 8 The square pillars ending in a bast, set np as boundary stones, and 
 reoresentitie Terminas. the eod of boundaries. 
 
 « r3e narrow strip on top orthe columns and Just beneath the slop- 
 jtg sides of ^e rooi^or tabernacle. 
 
110 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 5. His consequent frivolousness, his enjoyment of the volup- 
 tuousness, the luxury, and the ceremonial that characterized 
 the central phase of the Italian Renascence. 
 
 G. The Imminence of death.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. Which of the threads running through the poem do we, line 
 
 1, grasp first? 
 
 2. What Is It In lines 3-4 that the bishop does not know? 
 
 3. What Is the trait of character that we thus get a glimpse 
 
 of? 
 
 4. Was "Old Gandolf" any better than the bishop? 
 
 5. What circumstances In respect to both himself and Gan- 
 
 dolf does the speaker most enjoy dwelling upon? 
 
 6. Where do his pious meditations again begin, and where do 
 
 they end? 
 
 7. Does the conclusion that the world is a dream follow from 
 
 his preceding remarks? — Or is this merely sanctimonious 
 talk? 
 
 8. What is about to happen with the bishop? 
 
 9. Find two or three expressions that show death to be very 
 
 near. 
 
 10. Where do you find an instance of his uttei un-Chrlstlan 
 
 type of mind? 
 
 11. Find an indication of the artistic instincts that dominated 
 
 everything at this period. 
 
 12. Where does the bishop's sense for style in architecture 
 
 show itself? 
 
 13. What trait of character is indicated by line 30? 
 
 14. Where Is the bishop lying? (See Hues 2 and 11.) 
 
 15. Where does he imagine he Is at line 31? 
 
 16. Which of the generalizations given above would seem to 
 
 account for this mistake? 
 
 17. How does the speaker balf confess that he obtained the 
 
 money to pay for this expensive marble? 
 
 18. What other treasure has he hidden away? 
 
 19. Find an expression or two suggesting that he Is wealthy. 
 
 20. What function of the mediseval church does line 43 sug- 
 
 gest? 
 
 21. Find a suggestion that corroborates the thought of ques- 
 
 tion 19. 
 
 22. What Is the bishop thinking of at lines 44 and 46? 
 
 23. What trait of character again comes uppermost. In line 50? 
 
 24. What does he how again bring himself around to? (Com- 
 
 pare question 1.) 
 
 25. But where really is his mind all the time? 
 
 26. What detail about the basalt does he suddenly remember 
 
 that be has not specified? 
 
THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB. Ill 
 
 27. What argument does he advance in support of his demand ! 
 
 28. What does he, consequently, suspect his sons — or nephews 
 
 — may Intend? 
 
 20. Find a passage corroboi-atlng the fourth generalization 
 above. 
 
 SO. What about the suggestlveness of line 61? 
 
 31. Where do his suspicions return with terrifying force? 
 
 32. What sort of sarcophagus Is it he fears? 
 
 33. What seems to be his chief reason for fearing it? 
 
 34. What variety of stone does he suddenly demand? Would 
 
 this demand be possible of fulflllment? 
 
 35. What Is happening with him that he thus forgets what 
 
 he has been saying? 
 
 36. What regret breaks in here on his meditations? 
 
 37. What does his mind, the next moment, revert to? 
 
 38. What rewards does he promise his sons? 
 
 39. Which of them Is characteristic of the Renascence more 
 
 than of the times preceding or following? 
 
 40. Where does he forget what these rewards were for? 
 
 41. What side of his personality is revealed In lines 77-79? 
 
 42. Where does his pagan love of luxury and ceremonial again 
 
 appear ? — - — 
 
 43. Find a line that shows he is vain even In his manner of 
 
 dying. 
 
 44. Find a passage that corroborates the thought of questions 
 
 11-12. 
 
 45. What is happening with the bishop at line 91? 
 
 46. How do you account for the confusion of Ideas shown In 
 
 Itae 95? 
 
 47. And for the jumble of thoughts that follows? 
 
 48. What thought rouses him for a moment out of his stupor? 
 
 49. Find a confusion of Ideas similar to line 95. 
 
 50. To what does he revert In line 100? How long does this 
 
 mood last ? 
 
 51. What has he forgotten at line 102? 
 
 52. How can he make a demand so preposterous? 
 
 53. What memory comes upon him next? 
 
 54. What trait of his personality next comes uppermost? 
 
 55. What is there confused about the thought of lines 111-1127 
 
 How do you account for this? (Compare question 46.) 
 
 56. What causes the many breaks In line 115? 
 
 57. Where does the horror of death come upon him? 
 
 58. What do you now see Is the purpose for which his soue 
 
 are present? 
 
 59. Why has the bishop delayed this so long? 
 
 60. How does line 120 show his vanity? 
 
 61. With what two thoughts does he die? 
 
m ' STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 "CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER 
 
 CAME " 
 
 I. 
 
 MY first thought was, he lied in every word, 
 That hoary cripple, with malicious eye 
 Askance to watch the working of his lie 
 On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford 
 Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored 
 Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby. 
 
 II. 
 What else should he be set for, with his staff ? 
 What save to waylay with his lies, ensnare 
 All travelers who might find him posted there, 
 And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like 
 
 laugh lo 
 
 Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph 
 For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare, 
 
 III. 
 
 If at his counsel I should turn aside 
 
 Into that ominsys tract which, all agree. 
 Hides theTOark Tower. Yet acquiescingly 
 
 I did turn as he pointed: neither pride 
 
 Nor hope rekindling at the end descried. 
 
 So much as gladness that some end might be. 
 
 IV. 
 For, what with my whole world-wide wandering. 
 What with my search drawn out through years, 
 
 my hope 20 
 
 Dwindled into a ghost not fit to c.^e_ 
 With that obstreperous joy success would bring, — 
 I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring 
 My heart made, finding failure in its scope. 
 
CHILDE ROLAND. US 
 
 V. 
 
 As when a sicJc man very near to death 
 
 Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end 
 The tears, and takes the farewell of each friend. 
 And hears one bid the other go, draw breath 
 Freelier outside, (since all, is o'er," he saith, 
 "And the blow fallen no grieving can amend ;") 30 
 
 VI. 
 
 VVTiile some discuss if near the other graves 
 Be room enough for this, and when a day 
 Suits best for carrying the corpse away. 
 With care about the banners, scarves, and staves : 
 And still the man hears all, and only craves 
 He may not shame such tender love and stay. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest, 
 Heard failure prophesied so oft,^ been writ 
 So many times among "The Band" — ^to wit. 
 
 The knights who to the Dark Tower's search ad- 
 dressed 40 
 
 Their steps — ^that just to fail as they, seemed best. 
 And all the doubt was now — should I be fit ? 
 
 VIII. 
 
 So, quiet as despair, I turned from him. 
 That hateful cripple, out of his highway 
 Into the path he pointed. All the day 
 Had been a dreary one at best, and dim 
 Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim 
 Red leer to see the plain catch its astray. 
 
 " IX. 
 
 For mark ! no sooner was I fairly fotmd 
 
 Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, 50 
 
 ^ Supply "bad" htrt and the thongbt ^U be deaser. 
 
114 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Than, pausing to throw backward a last view 
 O'er the safe road, 't was gone; gray plain all 
 
 round : 
 Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. 
 
 I might go on ; naught else remained to do. 
 
 So, on I went. I think I never saw 
 Such starved ignoble nature ; nothing throve : 
 For flowers — ^as well expect a cedar grove ! 
 But cockle, spurge, according to their law 
 Might propagate their kind, with none to awe, 
 You'd think; a burr had been a treasure trove. 6c 
 
 XI. 
 
 No! penury, inertness, and grimace. 
 
 In some strange sort, were the land's portion. 
 "See 
 
 Or shut your eyes," said Nature peevishly, 
 "It nothing skills : I cannot help my case : 
 'T is the Last Judgment's fire must cure this place. 
 
 Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free." 
 
 XII. 
 
 If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk 
 Above its mates, the head was chopped; the 
 
 bents^ 
 Were jealous else. What made those holes and 
 rents 
 In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to 
 
 balk 70 
 
 All hope of greenness ?'t is a brute must walk 
 Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents. 
 
 1 A Tariety of grass. 
 
CHILDE ROLAND. 118 
 
 XIII. 
 
 As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair 
 In leprosy ; thin dry blades pricked the mud 
 Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood. 
 One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare, 
 Stood stupefied, however he came there : 
 Thrust out past service from the devil's stud. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Alive ? he might be dead for aught I know, 80 
 
 With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain. 
 And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane ; 
 
 Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe ; 
 
 I never saw a brute I hated so; 
 He must be wicked to deserve such pain. 
 
 XV. 
 
 I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart. 
 As a man calls for wine before he fights, 
 I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights. 
 
 Ere fitly I could hope to play my part. 
 
 Think first, fight afterwards — ^the soldier's art : 
 One taste of the old time sets all to rights. go 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Not itP I fancied Cuthbert's r^ddsningjace 
 
 Beneath its gai;yiiture of curly gold. 
 
 Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold 
 An arm in mine to fix me to the place. 
 That way he used. Alas, one night's disgrace ! 
 
 Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold. 
 
 ^ That is: the speaker thrusts from him the picture of Cuthbert- and 
 his fate, which is given in the neyt few lines. 
 
116 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 Giles then, the soul of honor — ^there he stands 
 Frank as ten years ago when knighted first. 
 What honest man should dare (he said) he durst. 
 
 Good — ^but the scene shifts — faugh! what hang- 
 man hands loo 
 
 Pin to his breast a parchment ? His own bands 
 Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst ! 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Better this present than a past like that; 
 
 Back therefore to my darkening path again ! 
 
 No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain. 
 Will the night send a howlet or a bat? 
 I asked : when something on the dismal flat 
 
 Came to arrest my thoughts and change their 
 train. 
 
 XIX. 
 A sudden little river crossed my path 
 
 As unexpected as a serpent comes. i lo 
 
 No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms ; 
 This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath 
 For the fiend's glowing hoof — to see the wrath 
 Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and 
 spumes. 
 
 XX. 
 
 So petty yet so spiteful ! All along. 
 
 Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it ; 
 Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit 
 Of mute despair, a suicidal throng: ' 
 The river which had done them all the wrong, 
 
 Whate'er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit. 120 
 
 XXI. 
 
 Which, while I forded, good saints, how I feared. 
 To set my foot upon a dead -man's cheek, 
 
CHILDE ROLAND. Il7 
 
 Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek 
 For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard ! 
 — It may have been a water-rat I speared, 
 
 But, ugh! it sounded like a baby's shriek. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 Glad was I when I reached the other bank. 
 
 Now for a better country. Vain presage! 
 
 Who were the strugglers, what war did they 
 wage 
 Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank 130 
 Soil to a plash ? Toads in a poisoned tank. 
 
 Or wild cats in a red-hot iro n cage — 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque. 
 
 What penned them there, with all the plain to 
 choose? 
 
 No foot-print leading to that horrid mews. 
 None of it. Mad brewage set to work 
 Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk^ 
 
 Pits for his pastime. Christians against Jews. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 And more than that — a furlong on — why, there! 
 What bad use was that engine for, that wheel, 140 
 Or brake, not wheel — that harrow fit to reel 
 Men's bodies out like silk? with all the air 
 Of Tophet's tool, on earth left unaware. 
 
 Or brought to sharpen ilo rusty teeth of steel. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood, 
 Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere 
 
 earth 
 Desperate and done with ; (so a fool finds mirth, 
 
 1 That is, whicb the Toric 
 
118 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood 
 Changes and off he goes !) within a rood — 
 
 Bog, clay, and rubble, sand and stark black 
 dearth. 150 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 Now blotches rankling, colored gay and grim. 
 Now patches where some leanness of the soil's 
 Broke into moss or substances like boils; 
 
 Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him 
 
 Like a distorted mouth that split its rim 
 Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 And just as far as ever from the end ! 
 
 Naught in the distance but the evening, naught 
 
 To point my footstep further! At the thought, 
 
 A great black bird, ApoUyon's bosom-friend, 160 
 
 Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned 
 
 That brushed my cap — ^perchance the guide I 
 
 sought. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 For, looking up, aware I somehow grew, 
 
 'Spite of the dusk, the plain had g^ven place 
 All round to mountains — with such name to 
 grace 
 
 Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view. 
 
 How thus they had surprised me, — solve it, you! 
 How to get from them was no clearer case. 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 Yet half I seemed to recognize some trick 
 
 Of mischief happened to me, God knows when — 170 
 In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then. 
 Progress this way. When, in the very nick 
 Of giving up, one time more, came a click 
 As whai a trap shuts — you 're inside the den. 
 
CHILDE ROLAND. 119 
 
 XXX. 
 
 Burningly it came on me all at once. 
 
 This was the place 1 those two hills on the right, 
 Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in 
 fight, 
 While, to the left, a tall scalped mountain . . . 
 
 Dunce, 
 Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce. 
 
 After a life spent training for the sight! 180 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 What in the midst lay but the Tower itself? 
 The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart, 
 Built of brown stone, without a counterpart 
 In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf 
 Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf 
 He strikes on, only when the timbers start. 
 
 XXXII.. 
 
 Not see? because of night perhaps? — why, day 
 Came back again for that! before it left. 
 The dying sunset kindled through a cleft: 
 The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay, 190 
 
 Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay, — 
 "Now stab and end the creature — to the heft !"* 
 
 XXXIIl. 
 
 Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled 
 Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears 
 Of all the lost adventurers my peers, — 
 
 How such a one was strong, and such was bold. 
 
 And such was fortunate, yet each of old 
 
 Lost, lost ! one moment knelled the woe of years. 
 
 1 TTliat the hills secmea to ac^ . 
 
130 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 ■i 
 There they stood, ranged along the hill-sides, met 
 To view the last of me, a living frame 200 
 
 For one more picture ! in a sheet of flame 
 I saw them and I knew them all. And yet 
 Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set. 
 
 And blew, "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower 
 came." 
 
 [This poem was first published, 1855, in Men and Women. 
 It is, in all probability, Browning's most difficult piece. 
 
 Childe Roland is a knight who has spent many years search- 
 ing for a tower hidden somewhere in the world. It is dark 
 and mysteriously attractive, and Roland has sought It along 
 the comfortable highways. He stops, on one occasion, to ask 
 the way of a cripple whom he meets beside the road. This 
 man, much to Roland's surprise, directs him, not along the well- 
 beaten street, but off into the pathless wilderness that skirts 
 it. There is something so insistent and compelling in the 
 cripple's eye that Roland, though he hates him, cannot choose 
 but obey. 
 
 As the knight picks his way across the desert, the plain 
 changes, becoming ever more desolate. Horrible scenes en- 
 compass him ; frightful suggestions crowd upon him. If he, 
 nevertheless, presses on, it is not that he is Impelled by any 
 ambition or guided by any hope, but because of the sheer 
 inertia, the sheer IndiflEerence, that comes with endless failure. 
 
 But Roland seems, at length, to recognize his surroundings ; 
 his dulled mind becomes aware by degrees that the tower is 
 in sight. Yet so hopeless have his life-long disappointments 
 made him that he sees only a "low squat turret," surrounded 
 by the multitudes of his peers that have failed. But he has 
 been equipped for the guest with a little more endurance, a 
 little more steadfastness than they. He raises the "slug-horn" 
 to bis lips and, with his last strength, blows the note of suc- 
 cess achieved. 
 
 Attempts to find a meaning in this poem have very generally 
 been met by the statement, from Browning himself, that It 
 has none. But with us the term "meaning'" Is apt to stand 
 for some added social or personal signification ; in our criti- 
 cism we are overmuch given to searching for expressions, 
 phrases, and suggestions with which we may construct our 
 interpretation. Attempts after this manner to attach a mean- 
 ing to the horse, the marsh, the little river, will always be 
 futile ; Childe Roland contains no definite schematic allegory. 
 
 Still — and this is a doctrine unacceptable as yet to most 
 Saxon minds — poetry may, as music does, convey deep, spirit- 
 
CHILDB ROLAm. m 
 
 ual truth without the employment of definite situations and 
 specific declarations. Furthermore, good poetry cannot be pro- 
 duced at the will of the writer ; it must lirst exist potentially 
 within him as a state of mind. If we succeed in identlfylne 
 the mood vfhlch found its expression In Ohilde Bolana, we shall 
 have the iiey to the poem. 
 
 With our author, success was slow in coming. Many of his 
 first poems were published in obscure London magazines. Bor- 
 dello and Straffora were, at their first appearance, failures. The 
 series of pamphlets tnown as Bells and Pomegranates was 
 printed because his volumes would not sell. It was not until 
 1855, when Men and Women appeared, that the foundations 
 of his fame were laid. His discourage ments, his despondeg:, 
 cles, his doubts of himself, his outlook uponurenttron^ietit'Thls 1 
 long period of comparative failure are mirrored In GlMde 
 Roland. This poem was written In 1852 ; and Just as ther 
 knight's despair was greatest Immediately before the end of 
 the guest,^80 the gloom that overshadowed the poet's mind was 
 deepest on the eve of success. 
 
 But Roland's experiences are ours also— they belong, at any 
 rate, to those of us who have actually or through sympathy 
 known what a life-work is. The Great Goal, like the Dark 
 Tower, is hidden in the unknown. Like the knight, we mis- 
 takenly think we can reacli It along beaten paths. But it is 
 only beyond untrodden wildernesses that the New Thing Is 
 ever found. The decisive circumstance, the Insistent Idea, the 
 strange Inner bent, that lays hold of us and turns us away 
 from safe ventures Into unexplored uncertainties. Is, of course, 
 hateful ; yet these unknown realms are what we must traverse ; 
 Roland's cripple was his best friend. Columbus, that critical 
 last day, Luther, that winter In the Wartburg, and Lincoln, 
 when he visited Grant In the trenches about Richmond, had 
 ■och a spiritual wilderness about them. The first two, at 
 least, saw, like Roland, only failure In their scope; saccesa, 
 though so near, was undlscerned. 
 
 It Is strange that this poem should seem so obscure — ^to 
 those of us at least who may, at some time, have brooded upon 
 the eternal mysteries. May this not be because It is aymiol- 
 istio and thus almost unique in our literature ; Poe's The 
 Raven and Coleridge's Tlte Ancient Mariner are the only other 
 poems that here suggest themselves? Symbolism Is a phase 
 of the Allegory ; but whereas, in the latter form of literary 
 art, we select—quite mechanically — the needed details, and 
 thus construct a logical Interpretation consistent within Itself; 
 in the former, we must proceed in a direction the reverse of 
 this — must proceed outward from the inner mood to an iden- 
 tification of the external, objective, art-elements. To do this 
 easily and fluently seems to be beyond the power of the ordi- 
 nary Saxon mind. Yet is it this freedom from definite imag- 
 ery, this intangible suggestlveness that Is the secret of supreme 
 power In art ; it is this that places symbolism alongside of 
 music as a vehicle of pure feeling. 
 
123 STUDIES IN BROWNING. 
 
 SymboIiBm has flourished to some extent in Gennany and 
 much in Scandinavia. In the literatures of the latter countries, 
 specimens, fully as intense as Childe Rolandj may be found as 
 early as the year 1000. May this form of literature not have 
 been more richly developed with these peoples because the 
 German and the Scandinavian temperament is profounder, more 
 Introspective, more mystic — but also less brilliant, less artistic, 
 less correct, less objectively dramatic than the Saxon? Placed 
 beside a poem like Ibsen's Vp on the Mountain Meadows, 
 Childe Roland, from its resemblance in method, seems scarcely 
 English ; and yet it appears to touch profounder and more 
 hidden depths of the soul than any other poem in our litera- 
 ture.] 
 
 QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS. 
 
 1. What was Roland seeking; what had he just asked the 
 
 cripple? 
 
 2. What counsel did the cripple give him? Was this what 
 
 Roland had expected? 
 
 3. Why; did he hate the cripple? Did he appreciate his ad- 
 
 vice? 
 
 4. Why should Roland assume that the cripple would write 
 
 his epitaph in the thoroughfare? 
 
 5. Why, on the whole, does the cripple seem so hateful tn 
 
 the knight's eyes? 
 
 6. If Roland distrusted the cripple so much, why did he fol- 
 
 low his directions? 
 
 7. Why is the tract which hides the Dark Tower said to be 
 
 jj minous T 
 
 8. wESTdo we now find [St. IV-VIII.] that Roland has been 
 
 doing all his life? 
 
 9. What does line 21 ^ell us? 
 
 10. What does the knight think is better than the life he has 
 
 been leading? 
 
 11. What does he compare himself to? [St. V-VI.] 
 
 12. What had he often heard prophesied of him? 
 
 13. What, on the side of real life, is meant by the thought of 
 
 lines 39-40? 
 
 14. What does Roland assume will be the result of his quest ?~^ 
 13. What bad he always been afraid to do, and what had the. — 
 
 cripple forced him to do? 
 
 16. What success had he gained up to meeting the cripple ? ~* 
 
 17. Could the tower be reached by any other route than across -_ 
 
 the "ominous tract"? 
 
 18. What class of Individuals In real life always keep to the 
 
 beaten track? 
 
 19. What Is the state of Roland's mind as he turns aside into 
 
 the indicated path? 
 
 20. Was there any getting back to the safe road? What is 
 
 meant by this? 
 
CHILDE ROLAND. las 
 
 21. What state of mind Is shown In the last line of Stanza IX? 
 
 22. What is the general character of this tract that hid the 
 
 dark tower? 
 
 23. In real life, bow do the years spent within this ominous 
 
 tract look? 
 
 24. Find a dozen items Inserted to deepen the horror of this 
 
 region. 
 
 25. What two memories come to oppress Roland? 
 
 26. What are the characteristics of the "little river" that make 
 
 it fit the environment? 
 
 27. Does the country improve as Roland penetrates farther 
 
 Into it? What may this signify in lite? 
 
 28. In what climax do these horrors end? 
 
 29. Yet at this very culmination of Roland's misfortunes what 
 
 happens? 
 
 30. [St. XXIX.] How does fate step in to aid Roland? 
 
 31. Why should the knight not have recognized the place "after 
 
 a Ufe spent training for the sight"? 
 
 32. What Is meant by saying that the recognition came to him 
 
 Itumingly f 
 
 33. Yet how did the tower look to him when he at last reached 
 
 it? What does this signify? 
 
 34. What is the significant thought in line 3 of Stanea XXXI f 
 
 35. What memories surge over Roland at the last? 
 
 36. What does he fear? 
 
 37. Tet what does be do? 
 
 38. What do you suppose then happens? 
 
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