V7T3 few I63S UC-NRLF 5 3 315 51 A FEW WORDS ON ROBERT BROWNING LEON H VINCENT Digitized by tine Internet Archive in 2008 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/fewwordsonrobertOOvincrich •S»^ Js, ^.^ V>%X.^^^% ^^\^v.^S^v^V>^\'^^ A FEW WORDS ON ROBERT BROWNING A FEW WORDS ON ROBERT BROWNING BY LEON H VINCENT PHILADELPHIA ARNOLD AND COMPANY 1895 Copyright 1890 by Leon H Vinxent \^^ ^"-'^' p K Second Edition To JESSIE THOMAS VINCENT iv;i8(]913 CONTENTS I How not to read Browning II Obscurity Again III The Verdict of the Critical IV A Glimpse of the Poet V Conclusion How Not to Read Browning THAT curious phenomenon of an intellectual sort commonly and irreverently known as the Browning craze reached its climax just before the death of the distinguished poet whose writings were the innocent cause of it all. It had an exceedingly grotesque side. As a man of humor, Browning must have enjoyed the oddities of what was in large degree a fashionable interest in his poetry. It is even possible that his worshippers were aware of the fact that they were contributing to his amusement. There was room for a suspicion that the genial, bluff, unpretentious man might be in- wardly laughing at the extraordinary genuflections and prostrations of his devotees. He gave no outward sign of this inward laughter, but the thought of 8 B 3Fe\v THIlorDs its possible existence must have been disquieting. Perhaps the simplest form which the adoration of Browning took was an unqualified assertion of the high merit of his poetry, with a generous use of superlatives. It is a method which, if it does not antagonize, carries an enor- mous weight of conviction. Browning, himself, knew how to praise. He could speak of Tennyson as one who in poetry was ' illustrious and consummate,' and this was praise fittingly bestowed. But many of Browning's friends were posi- tively intemperate in their use of admir- ing epithets. Mr. Kingsland entitled a pleasant Httle book ' Robert Browning, Chief Poet of the Age.' This is an illustration of the debauch of eulogistic phrases in which many of the poet's friends indulged themselves. Frederick Gard Fleay dedicated a book to Brown- ing as ' the Shakespeare of our days' ; but he had previously dedicated a book on IRobcrt JBrownlng 9 to Tennyson as ' the greatest poet of his time.' Adapting a remark of a dis- tinguished English critic, • Mr. Fleay may, if he ever meets them, feel quite at ease both with the shade of Browning and with the shade of Tennyson.' Another and more subtile form of worship found expression in the making of elaborate and sometimes profound commentaries on Browning's poetry. These were not mere book-reviews, which examine the credentials of an author with a view to determining whether his writings belong to perma- manent or ephemeral literature ; they were careful studies, which, for the most part, assumed that all of Browning's work had become an inalienable part of English letters. Many essays and books of this sort appeared while the poet was yet living, and there was unusual activity just after his death. These critical works are now so numerous that they consti- tute a library of respectable size. 10 B jfew "CaorDs Such past and continued fertilit}' on the part of the pundits suggests the thought that many people, instead of being attracted to Browning, are, and are going to be, repelled by the appear- ance of so much critical and interpreta- tiv'e literature ; and that, while the con- dition of the thinking few is becoming better, the condition of the unconverted many is becoming worse ; and that, instead of popularizing Browning, these books are exerting a pernicious influ- ence in tending to make him more and more the poet of a clique. His admirers can hardly do other than lament that he has to so great a degree been handed over to experts. Most amusing notions prevail with respect to his poetry. The difficulties which lie in the path of one who desires to understand it are popularly thought to be enormous. The following extract from a letter will illustrate a not uncommon phase of the prevailing misconception : on TRobert JGrownlng u ' Dear . ... I remember * that you are what is satirically described *in this family as a " Browningite." ' You will rejoice to know that, after ' some years of railing at your pet poet, I * have determined to take up the study ' of his works. Send me a list of intro- ' ductions and helps for the beginner. I 'have Mrs. Orr's Handbook, but I want ' a half dozen volumes in addition. I 'propose to be well fortified for this ' undertaking.' How utterly mistaken is this idea of * fortifying ' oneself for a study of Brown- ing ; and yet, after all, how entirely natural in the light of the critical litera- ture which has sprung up. The man who gets together a quantity of introduc- tory essays, and worries over them before he reads the living words of the poet, is not unlike the man who prepares himself for a climb in the Alps by strapping on his back all the luggage he can possibly carry. Surely, the only introduction 12 B 3few ^Mor^s needed to Browning is Browning. If he did not intend his poetry to be a substi- tute for a game of dominoes or an after- dinner cigar, Browning probably as little dreamed of a time when that poetry would be thought to need prolegomena and an introductory dissertation on his use of English. The shortest way with beginners is to turn them loose with copies of the ' selections ' made by Browning himself, and let them find out the things they ought to know. Browning is getting encrusted with this parasitical literature, not a little of which seems to assume that the reader is incapable of taking a single step by himself. More than that, the commen- tators have begun to prey upon one another. It makes one think of certain pages in the Verheyk Eutropius, where there will be one pica line of text, and ninety brevier lines of comment, to say nothing of the variae Icctiones, and the notes on notes. In like fashion we have on "Kobctt JGrownino 13 first Browning ; then Corson on Brown- ing ; then Nettleship on Corson on Browning ; and presently there will be somebody on Nettleship — at which junc- ture the simple-minded reader may be ex- pected to throw his Browning and intro- duction together into the waste places of his library', and betake himself to the Psalm of Life and the Bab Ballads, within the charmed circle of which verse the commentator hath no power to annoy. No disrespectful thought of com- mentators is implied in these words. Some of their productions are magnifi- cently virile and thought-producing. It is impossible not to buy these books. One cannot help putting them in a con- spicuous place on his shelves. They have a tremendously intellectual look. They promise all sorts of mental pleas- ure. A satisfaction is to be had in them akin to that which Bagehot professed to have in his volumes of Gibbon, not by reading them, but by looking at them 14 B 3few "QGlorOs from outside, in the bookcase, and think- ing how much there is within. For the reader may well hesitate before begin- ning a certain stout buckram-clad tome containing nearly five hundred pages of intelligent criticism, all devoted to Browning's poetry, while he puts the question whether the time needed for the reading of these five hundred pages will not be better spent in reading as many pages of Browning himself. Why should a man wish to know what the critic says of Pippa Passes if this beautiful play is still beautiful to him, and he feels that he has not got out of it all that he can without the help of note or introductory essay ? The most sug- gestive sentence of the greatest of critics is of less value to a reader than that idea which becomes his through actual con- tact with a poetical work. There is nothing new in this doctrine. It has been enunciated again and again, on IRobert :fi3rownlnfl 15 but it may be of use to some one if it shall here find a new application. All great imaginative works have given rise to this literature of literature. Sometimes the secondary literature busies itself with the text of an author, some- times with his form and spirit, sometimes with both. This critical literature is intensely fascinating. These books are so well done that they are accepted as ends in themselves. In fact, they are apt to be too well done. Where they reveal an interesting personality in the critic their seductiveness is increased. They dazzle by their brilUancy and wit, or startle by paradox, or cause a feeling of pleasure from the justness of the critical estimate. There is every possible excuse for reading them. The man is but human who is inclined to think Lowell on Wordsworth more interesting than Wordsworth ; who will read what Churton Collins has to say about Dryden, though the Absolom and Achito- 16 B ^ew Moros p/ie/ and the Hind a?id tlie Pantlier make a heavy strain upon his patience ; who can be charmed with Leslie Stephen's essay on Richardson while he naturally shrinks from twenty-five hundred pages of Clarissa Harlowe. It is a misfortune that people have fallen into the habit of always using the word ' study ' in connection with Browning. There is too much time spent in formally studying the great poets, and too little time spent in reading them. It is a commonplace of literary criticism that one should never ' study ' a play of Shakespeare until he has read it at least a dozen times. We ought to read the comedies as we read Pickwick Papers, — for the story ; the tragedies as we read the Ordeal of Richard Feverel, for the story ; the histories as we read — well, Mr. Froude's England — for the story. Then will it be time to study the text, and learn what the different critics think of Hamlet. This is a favorite \ on "Robert SSrownltifl 17 theory of that brilliant scholar, Richard Grant White. What he says in his Studies in Shakespeare will apply equally well to Browning. To be sure, Richard Grant White, being Richard Grant White, is always radical. He says : ' Throw the commentators and editors to the dogs,' — a sentence worth considering, since it comes from the pen of one of the best of Shakespeare's editors. We may not care to go this length with him, but may cry a hearty ' Amen ' when he urges the importance of keeping the mind ' entirely free from the influence of what the various eminent critics have had to say.' After a thorough reading of the best plays of Shakespeare, there will come, as he has shown, the suitable moment for taking up the minutiae of textual and aesthetic criticism. So, too, after a care- ful and thoughtful reading of the more important poems of Robert Browning, it is well enough, and even of great advan- tage, to study Corson and Symons, 18 B 3few Traor^s Fotheringham and Nettleship, Furnivall, Henry Jones, and the essays published in the Browning Society's papers. This higher criticism undoubtedly frightens timid readers away. A glance into one of these learned studies reveals rather formidable expressions. The critics love to talk about ' centripetal and centrifugal forces,' about ' a universal and harmonizing synthesis.' One of them brackets Hegel and Browning and says ' Knowledge (thought) tends to integrate Love (being), which Power had dif- ferentiated, and it is ever bringing back the manifold centrifugal productions of Power to the centrality of Love, and thus progressing in the realization of a unity in which Power, and the accompanying Falsehood and Evil, will be a suspended moment.' Will not the plain reader be inclined to lift up hands and eyes in reverent astonishment, and to exclaim ' Great is Browning ; what must the poem be if this be the explanation !' on "Kobcrt SJrownlno 19 In brief the way riot to read Brown- ing is by means of the commentary and the annotation. One should naturally begin with the simpler poems. He who begins with Sordello is not likely to make great progress.' Let the non-reader beware of getting his introduction to Browning through Sordello! That poem may wait until the last. Then it may wait a little longer ; for the time that is needed to extract poetic gold from the ore of Sordello may be put to better use on the Ring and the Book. The simpler poems first. Let the beginner read that ' pretty tale ' entitled A Tale. Let him read the Boy a?id the Angel, Prospice, Apparitions, A Face, My Last Duchess, Confessions. Then those noble poems, Satd, Rabbi Ben Ezra, The Epistle of Karshisk. If he has read this iln 1867 it was customary to speak of "Sordello" as being wholly unintelligible ; and although it may now be con- sidered more correct to speak of it as a model of lucidity. I have a suspicion that many people still find it hard to under- stand. — Edward Dowdbn. 20 B 3few TSflorOs much, some of Browning's grostesques will not come amiss, such as Holy Cross Day, A Heretic's Tragedy, Caliban upon Setebos. The poems which concern themselves with music and art are splen- did illustrations of Browning's power, Abt Vogler, Andrea del Sarto, Fra Lippo Lippi. Browning wrote dramas, too, and one may venture the statement that those hours will be happy ones which are given to the reading of Colombc's Birthday, Pippa Passes, A Blot in the 'Scutcheon. These ought to be more than enough to make a convert, not necessarily to the belief that Browning is a star of the first magnitude in a constellation which in- cludes Chaucer, Rabelais, Shakespeare and Goethe, but to the reasonable belief that he is one of the most stimulating and inspiring authors of his day, a man whose verse ' swells resolve, breeds hardihood ' and is, in truth, ' stuff for strength.' This is all that is asked, that there shall be increase in the number of on TRobert asrownlna 21 people who read his books for pleasure and inspiration. Of * Browningites ' and specialists, who make a religion and a mystery of the study of his works, we are likely to have too many rather than too few. 22 a jpew TimorDs II Obscurity Again MUCH of Browning's poetry seems obscure because it is obscure ; nevertheless it is rather pleasant to hear this charge of obscurity brought against his verse by people who do not read it. There is a naive humor in the accusation. It illustrates the fact that a large part of the world is still quite content to take its views from sources outside itself, is satis- fied merely to echo the opinions of others. Slang is prevalent largely because people are too lazy to think, or rather, to do that part of thinking which consists in finding appropriate words for such thoughts as they have. The youth who expresses his positive admiration by call- ing the thing he likes a ' Dandy '; and his en IRobcrt S3ro\vnino 23 superlative delight by the even more start- ling phrase a 'Jim Dandy,' is quite as much a sinner through indolence as vul- garity. It is partly from laziness that people say Browning is obscure. At any rate the charge of incomprehensibility, coming from persons who do not read him at all, is only a joke, and may be treated as such. But if the charge of obscurity comes from people who do not read a great deal of poetr>% it is hardly a serious charge. When a man says that he can't understand Browning, and it turns out that he, at best, never reads much poetry, that he hasn't read two pla}'s of Shake- speare in eighteen months, that he hasn't looked into Paradise Lost since he used to hunt through it for rhetorical figures in college, that he never has read the Adonais or the E7idy}nion, and that he knows nothing at all of Rossetti — in short, that he has taken up Browning only because it is the fashion, there is no occa- 24 B 3fcw TimorOs sion for surprise that he finds his task difficult. To understand poetry one must be in the habit of reading poetry. Poetiy, to be enjoyed, must be one's daily bread, not an occasional indulgence as in a highly-seasoned gastronomic puzzle which isn't exactly palatable and the digestion of which is not to be compassed without a violent effort. Poetry demands much of the reader who would enjoy it. A sort of 'technique' is required for the com- prehension of good poetry as for the playing of the piano or the violin ; and the person who runs over the pages of the great poetical masters only at long intervals will have but a poor ' technique.' The charge of obscurity coming from people who have taken up Browning only as they would take up any other fad, need not disturb admirers of the poet. But the charge comes from yet another class of readers, those who do continually familiarize themselves with what is best on IRcbert :Kro\vning 25 worth knowing in the world of books ; and who have no foolish prejudices against a genius of marked originality, but are willing to take him for what he is worth and to make the most of what he has to give. These people say that Browning is obscure. The advice given in the introduction to the Browning Bibli- ography is to the effect that earnest students of the poet should look for the short-comings in themselves rather than in their master. If the shortcomings are in the readers, it follows that many a so-called obscurity is not an obscurity at all, or at best a pseudo-obscurity. Two sorts of difficulties are to be met with in Robert Browning's poetry, which, it seems, may be referred directly to the readers. They are : — I. Difficulties arising from recondite allusions. II. Difficulties arising from the pro- fundity of the subject. Take the first, the seeming obscurity 26 B 3fe\v TMorDs arising from the use of many recondite allusions. Browning was a wide reader, a profound scholar, and also thoroughly- versed in that knowledge which comes by constant intercourse with men in their various conditions. He was at the same time a bookworm, and a man of the world ; a denizen of libraries, and a keen- eyed observer of the ways of the human animal. He was a ' lover of populous pavements,' and he recognized the virtue of an occasional residence ' far from the clank of crowds.' He knew many lan- guages and many literatures. He under- stood music and art, philosophy and his- tory. He lived much in the past and much in the present. There are to be found in his poems allusions to scenes, incidents and characters, with which many a reader is not acquainted. But these things are all the legitimate sub- stance of poetry according to Browning's theory, and if he saw fit to use them the reader must take his point of view. If on "Kobert asrownlng 27 we do not understand his allusions the fault is not his. He is under no obliga- tion to confine himself to the merely com- monplace and familiar, because the major- ity of people understand the common- place and that alone. In a Western paper there was once a sarcastic little review of Parleyings in which the writer expressed considerable disgust because Browning had seen fit to make a poem about George Bubb Doddington. ' Dod- dington, Doddington 1 ' plaintively ex- claimed the reviewer. ' Is there anybody who knows who this Doddington was ? ' There were probably very few at the time. But however dense the ignorance may have been, it was considerably les- sened as the weeks passed ; for there was an immediate rush on the part of the devout to post up upon Doddington ; while in the book shops, second-hand copies of Lord Melcombe's diary were dusted, placed on a conspicuous shelf and the price raised twenty-five per cent. 2S a jfcw "CClorDs In the second place there are diffi- culties arising from the profundity of the theme under discussion in a particular poem. Obscurity from this source may generally be referred to the reader. Browning was emphatically a thinker, fond of knotty problems, skillful in deal- ing with the weightier questions that burden the soul. He writes of God, of immortality. He studies the human heart, the conscience, the innermost springs of action. In such poems he makes upon his readers, demands to which many are un- equal. He requires continuous and sus- tained thinking. But obscurity which grows out of the reader's incapacity for hard thinking is not obscurity at all. Here, for example, is a person who has been in the habit of reading nothing more exacting than the novels of James Fenimore Cooper, — hand him a copy of the Egoist, and, ten to one, he will tell you that he can't read it, that it is difficult, obscure. Yonder is a man on IRobcrt 318cownlng 29 whose highest climb into the regions of verse has been to that vast plateau where bloom such flowers of poetry as Gone with a Handsojner Mart ; tell him that the Epipsychidion is to be found well up the mountain's. side and you will hardly tempt him. He is not in training for such a climb. It is plain, then, that many people who call Browning 'obscure' are only saying in another way that their own mental equipment is inadequate for the demands that his verse makes. But there is a sort of obscurity to be met with in Browning for which the poet is wholly responsible. It may not be correct to speak of it as verbal obscurity, but let that phrase stand for an attempt at a definition. It means those difficul- ties which grow out of mannerism, both in choice of words and in style ; every- thing that comes from a singularity in the use of the verbal material of verse. Here the critics are often right. Extraordinary grammatical puzzles are 30 a 3Few "CClorDs to be met with on many a page of Browning. The man wrote a language of his own. It is called English, to be sure, but it is not even second cousin to the English of Addison, or Macaulay, of DeQuincey, or of Newman. To enjoy Browning's books one must learn his language. The question, of course, is whether the pleasure to be had from the books pays for the trouble of master- ing the tongue in which the books are written. Many people say not. Perhaps if the thought is worth the having, readers ought not to permit themselves to be baffled because of the strange garb in which the thought is presented. It would seem that original writers must express themselves as they can, and not as we should like to have them. The censors of literature scolded royally about Carlyle's style, his half-German, half- English jargon. But the jargon got itself domesticated in time. People hardly even wonder at it now. Then on "Kobcrt :»3ro\vn(nfl 31 came Browning ; he, like the other, with a ' wind-in-the-orchard style that tumbled down here and there an appreci- able fruit with uncouth bluster.' There is no help for the reader but to take this just as he finds it. He must be content to see ' learned dictionary words giving a hand to street-slang, and accents falling upon them hap-hazard, like slant rays from driving clouds.' If he is having a hard time, he must extract comfort from the thought that Browning sympathizes with him in his struggles. The poet smiles quizzically, and says with a half- satiric, half-earnest tone that he knows it 's rough, but there 's no doubt about its being wholesome. If the lines lack smoothness, think of the sense, ' Ye gods, the weighty sense.' It is a question, however, whether there were not times in which Browning \vearied of this praise of the thought in his verse at the expense of its beauty, just as there are moments in which a 32 B 3few 'CClorOs plain woman finds no compensation for her excessive plainness in overhearing people say apologetically, * But, you know, she's very intellectual.' It is cer- tainly true that many a seeming difficulty in Browning's verse drops away when the reader has familiarized himself with the poet's peculiar mode of expression. It is also true that he has given us a large body of original and fascinating English poetry, which may be read and enjoyed without help of comment or note. on TRobert JSrowntng 33 III The Verdict of the Critical IN a letter addressed to Lady Violet Lebas, Mr. Andrew Lang com- mends her ' undefeated resolution to admire only the right things,' but pro- fesses his own inability to accommodate his taste to the ' verdict of the critical.' He is quite content to admire the things which nature made him prefer. Com- fortable is the doctrine of Mr. Lang ; and if we were all gifted with tastes as discriminating, we should be doing very well in casting authority to the winds. Many of us, however, are incapacitated by nature and training to judge accu- rately what is and what is not the admi- rable thing ; and we must, therefore, accept with becoming meekness the * verdict of the critical.' 34 B few mor£)6 The verdict to which Mr. Lang refers in his letter is that settled and almost infallible one which adepts in literature have reached after most serious and long-continued deliberation. It is a con- sensus of the best judgment ; the laity- are expected to receive it without a murmur. Another and more modern verdict is by no means unanimously gracious with respect to Robert Browning, The parti- sans of his verse sing its praises some- what loudly ; but the detractors are wide awake, and thoroughly cognizant of its defects. These hostile critics are a worthy folk, and serve an excellent pur- pose in acting as a damper to check the blazing enthusiasm of all who have gone Browning-mad. It is possible to be sony for the individual who doesn 't like to read Browning, but it is also possible not to quarrel with him. We do not all enjoy the same dishes, the same pictures, the on IRobcrt JBcowning 35 same music. There are fellow-creatures who object to olives, and who see no reason for the existence of a lobster- salad. A man may cherish such preju- dices while he stays at home, but when he goes abroad he cannot take his non- conformity along. He must eat what is set before him, or starve. The human stomach has shown itself, in the long run, astonishingly docile. It will be at peace with the sustenance it finds, on no matter what social desert island. But people's literary tastes are not so well trained. Browning is unpalatable to many, and try how they will, they cannot relish him. Perhaps the readers who like him least are those accustomed to select their poets for the smoothly-flowing line, and for an exactness of rhythm. With these graces Browning is able to adorn his verse, as numerous extracts would show. But he has certainly employed them far less than his poetic contempor- aries. Nevertheless is he a poet, though 36 B 3few TOorDs he turns off at right angles from the broad highway of conventional form, and makes a path for himself. It has been imputed to Browning for a want of right- eousness that he does not hesitate to be uncouth, awkward, abrupt, unmusical, frightfully involved in his construction, much given to intoxicating his verse with parentheses, — which is true, and some- times painfully true. Yet is he a poet, with these sins at his door. In this pro- gressive day the boundaries of our defini- tions of poetiy must be enlarged. Much that Dr. Johnson called poetry, is, in our eyes, only dull and respectable verse ; while if he, in turn, could be questioned about many a famous poem of our day, he would reply, ' Sir, it is the raving of a disordered imagination.' But if we grant him his dull and respectable verse, he must not be harsh at the expense of our favorite ravings. We ought to be liberal in our judgments of poetry. We should have room in our hearts for many verses on IRobert JSrowning 37 of many men. ' The kingdom of poesy hath many mansions.' It is a privilege to be allowed to wander in the outer courts of them all. If one be granted an entrance into the state apartments of a few, so much greater the privilege. The Browning ' fad ' is pernicious wherever it tends chiefly to make readers of Brown- ing, and not readers of all good poetry. This little volume has been written in the hope that some amiable Philistine may be turned from his false gods, and led to embrace the true faith. The religion here preached is a sort of gospel of poetry, but it has for no part of its creed the doc- trine that Browning is the only true prophet. There are many prophets, and it is becoming in us to have reverence unto each. Not one of them has been without his hours of exaltation in which he has uttered words transcending the earthly and the fleeting. A man should be able to make a lit- erary creed for himself in which he \ 38 H 3fcvv TXlorOs declares his faith in all the best poetry, in Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare and Mil- ton, in Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats and Tennyson, and in yet other poets besides these. How is culture possible without a knowledge of the great authors, with- out a love for them ? Or let us take the lower motive and say that it is a part of literary good breeding to read and enjoy the best poets. We may say that we do not like Milton. But in truth we have no business not to like Milton, though what poems of his we shall like the best, and how great the intensity of our liking is to be, may be left to us to decide. In the simple matter of liking // Pcnscroso, L Allegro and Lycidas there is no alterna- tive. Not to like them is to be and to acknowledge oneself a barbarian. So, too, of that noble poem in which Shelley honors the memory of John Keats — it is a thing so supremely enjoyable that it would have a thousand readers for every one that it now has were it not that most on "Kobcct :{6ro\vnin0 39 people are lazily content to get their knowledge of poetry by proxy. You may hear a man say that he hasn't time to read long poems, and at the very instant he makes the remark he is engaged in taking serenest comfort with the five-hundred-and-forty-six readable pages of Marcella. If it were merely a question of time he could read the Adonais twice in the time it takes to read the first chapter and a half of the popu- lar novel. It is clearly not a question ot time. We prefer fiction because even the thoughtful novel ' lulls us as a luxury.' In reading the fine poem we must, as Thoreau phrases it, ' stand on tip-toe to read,' and this means effort. After readers have learned that it is worth while to cut down a little on fiction in order to give more time to poetry, at once a new difficulty arises. People find it very hard to be catholic in their attitude toward poets and poetry. They are as partisan in their poetic affinities and 40 21 3fcw liflorOs repugnances as in their political likes and dislikes. One must be of Paul, another of Apollas, another of Cephas. And he who enlists himself for Paul, can see no possible good in the other two. The most uncomfortable phase of the Brown- ing agitation was that it led to the saying of intensely depreciatory things about Tennyson. James Thomson, author of the The City of Dreadftd Night, cannot make a passing allusion to Browning without declaring that ' Tennyson is immeasurably inferior to Browning in depth and scope and power and subtlety of intellect.' But why be quite so vio- lent? It is possible to speak, with no uncertain sound, of the gifts of a poet one loves without assailing the gifts of a neighboring poet. The better way is to avoid exclusive- ness in reading. In course of time a reader is pretty sure to settle down with a few good things of a few first-rate authors ; but it is a pity to settle before on "Robert JSrowning 4i one has made long journeys in the repub- lic of letters. The fact that a man greatly enjoys the Ode on the bitiviations of hnmortality ought not to preclude his finding pleasure in a poem as unlike it as Rosserti's Je?iny. One subject may appeal to him more than another; but there is poetic virtue in each of these widely contrasting poems, and it is this which the reader should hold himself willing to recognize. The poetic quality is the thing which he is bound to enjoy, wherever he finds it. Poets are closely related. ' Many the songs but song is one.' So while one may be suspicious of that phase of literary culture which finds the beginning and the end of all poetry in Browning, he cannot but question the judgment of the critic whose verdict is entirely or largely antagonistic. This verdict, as was remarked before, gener- ally comes from those who find in per- fection of form the only true criterion of 42 B 3few TimorOs poetry. A man may take Tennyson as his standard, and measure every other poet by certain characteristics of Tenny- son's art. He may say that all is poetry which fulfills these conditions, but any- thing which does not fulfill them is at best but rhymed prose. This will not do. The boundaries of our definitions must be made liberal enough to take in a great variety of poetry, even the most unconventional. We may not construct a gilded couch of Procrustes which fits Tennyson, and then stretch or lop off from the other bards in order to adapt them to it. Yet a certain eminent critic has done something not unlike this in his published estimate of Browning. Nor is it right to overlook the simple mass and volume of Browning's work. We may not lament the existence of these more than two thousand pages of closely wrought, highly concentrated verse. We may not wish that Browning had written less, thereby implying that on IRobcrt :ffiro\vninfl 43 the ' less ' might hav^e been better done. I like to think that what Maurice Thomp- son once said about Shakespeare has some applicability' to Browning. ' Quan- tity as well as quality — when the quality is always high — goes to prove great genius,' says Maurice Thompson ; and he is right. In thinking of Browning's genius, one may no more leave out the idea of quantity, than in thinking of the Cologne Cathedral he may leave out the idea of gigantic size. Browning's power of sustained and immense effort was one of the most splendid of his gifts. Many a man has gathered his powers together and done a magnificent thing once. Browning seemed to be of those who could do a magnificent thing not once, but many times. Now and then ' the critical ' bring in a verdict to the effect that Browning is sometimes wrong and often unfortunate in his choice of subject. This is only another way of expressing regret that 44 B 3fevv "mHorOs the poet is as nature made him. Admit- ting that poets are liable to make occa- sional mistakes, it is generally true that a man works upon a given subject because that subject fits his mind. The poet and his theme are made for one another. The critic who has shown most clearly why Browning's intellect is adapted to handling the grotesque in art, has also been inclined to take the poet to task for applying his powers to the grotesque. He uses an ugly word to describe Brown- ing's conception of Caliban, though it is curious to note that any Englishman would use precisely the same word to characterize a wet day or an uncomforta- ble journey. If Browning's Caliban is so detestable, and the poem in which the creature figures so repulsive, readers of to-day are not so conscious of it as Mr. Bagehot was. We have read the poem too often. Familiarity has bred, not contempt, but complacency. Still, it would seem that a man like Walter on "Kobert asrowning 45 Bagehot, a literary critic in whose work love of the humorous and the paradoxi- cal is at once the strongest and raciest flavor, might have been more tolerant towards his brother humorist, Robert Browning. It was hardly just to say that ' the delineation of Caliban will show that Mr. Browning does not wish to take undue advantage of his readers by a choice of nice subjects.' The subject is well enough, if we have a mind to it. Bagehot can ' mingle praise and blame ;' and if the praise does not come beclouded with incense, it is almost positive enough to deceive the elect. Here are a few of his sentences : ' No ' one ever read Browning without seeing ' not only his great ability, but his great ' mind. He not only possesses super- ' ficial useable talents, but the strong ' something, the inner secret something, ' which uses them and controls them ; he ' is great not in mere accomplishments, * but in himself. He has applied a hard, 46 21 ffevv *CClorJ)0 ' strong intellect to real life ; he has * applied the same intellect to the prob- ' lems of his age. He has striven to ' know what is : he has endeavored not * to be cheated by counterfeits, not to be ' infatuated by illusions. His heart is in ' what he says. He has battered his ' brain against his creed till he believes 'it.' on IRoDect 3i3ro\vntnfl 47 IV A Glimpse of the Poet IX was the writer's good fortune, a few years ago, to meet Robert Browning at St. Moritz, in the Engadine, and later at his home in Warwick Crescent, Lon- don. Not a httle fortitude is needed to confess having joined that vast army of Americans who took advantage of the faintest excuse for inflicting themselves upon the great man, bothering him with questions about his poetry, taking men- tal inventory of the contents of his parlor and devouring him with their eyes. Perhaps the gods, whose special function it is to protect distinguished authors from tourists, will forgive this particular sinner, if he pleads that the temptation was very great, and if he promises upon his honor as a lover of 48 :a few IKIlorDs books and a collector of Baskervilles, never again to hunt a great man. Mr. Browning was short and stout, and plainly enough the original of his photographs. His face was ruddy, his hair very Avhite, his manner animated. He was noticeably well dressed , there was a comfortable and easy elegance about him. It has long been a matter of common report that Browning looked like a business man, rather than a poet and scholar. He might have been a banker, a lawyer, a physician, so far as his appearance w^as concerned. But if a physician, certainly a well-to-do one ; if a lawyer, then a lawyer accustomed to good fees ; if a banker, connected with an institution which is not going to give its depositors cause for anxiety. But while markedly ' stylish,' he wore his good clothes with the air of one who had never worn anything else. In his youth I fancy that he might have been something of a dandv. There was a on IRobcrt JBtownino 49 pleasant atmosphere of large prosperity about him. His manner was simple, kind, cheery. He made one feel at home, and time went rapidly. That blessed saint of American literature, Henry W. Longfel- low, made each of his chance visitors happy by his cordial and unaffected manner. But Longfellow's sweetness was the sweetness of resignation. A young woman who had called upon him told me that he was so amiable that she felt actually guilty ! Browning, fasci- nating hypocrite that he was, made the stranger feel that his visit was not only agreeable, but positively opportune. If visitors stayed longer than they ought, the fault was quite as much his as theirs. He should have known that many of the people who came hundreds of miles to see him were not in their right minds when that privilege was vouchsafed them. When a man with ever>' indication of sincerit>' in his face and in the tones 50 ;b 3few XUorOs of his voice says, ' Come and see me at my home in London,' and then adds, ' I mean it, I ask you because I want you to come,' — how can one refuse to believe that the invitation is as hearty and honest as it seems to be ? Naturally, I went, the time for the call having been previously arranged by letter. My recollection of the room in which I found Mr. Browning and his sister is indistinct. It was a large room, irregu- lar in shape, and was upon the second floor. There was a grand piano stand- ing open and looking as though it had been used that morning. A musician will understand this look to which I refer. A marble bust of Mrs. Browning was a conspicuous object in the room. Little else is clear to me now with res- pect to furniture, books or pictures. The poet was as hearty and cordial in his greeting as though I had been somebody whose friendship was precious to him. This generosity in giving of on IRobert JBcownlng 51 himself has made many people love the man ; but it has also given the point for a sneer at his want of exclusiveness. The writer of a flashy book on English society holds it up as a matter of re- proach to Browning that he was so democratic ; intimating that when he couldn't be seen at the tables of the great, he was willing to be a guest at the tables of the small, and that when he hadn't a lord to talk with, he was will- ing to talk with a very common com- moner. This is only a mis-reading ol the plain and wholesome text of his life. If all the testimony of those people who knew him well goes to prove anything, it is this, that no more sensible, matter- of-fact and amiable gentleman has graced this age of the world. Readers of his poetr}^ may differ by whole diameters with respect to his meaning, his style, his merits and defects. There can be but one opinion as to his life and character. A talker needs the inspiration of 52 a 3fcw TMoxbe the right listener. Browning was a great converser, but it was not to be expected that he would talk with one of his many chance callers as he would have talked with a brother poet or an intimate friend. He was simple and unpretending in what he said. He did not disdain the topic of the weather, or the subject of hotels in Italy. He impressed one most forcibly as being a man who never posed, and who was utterly incapable of playing the role of a great poet, or of being con- scious that he was the great man his admirers believed him to be. A few of his remarks come to mind, though I made no memoranda at the time, and afterwards tried hard to persuade myself that I had not been hunting a Hon. Tennyson was spoken of, and I remarked how inaccessible he was. To which Mr. Browning replied, ' I think that Tennyson likes admiration as well as anyone else, but he wants his admiration filtered.' V on "Kobert JSrowninfl 53 Matthew Arnold was at that time lecturing in America. Browning was curious to know how he was succeeding, and inquired minutely. He wondered if ' Mat,' as he called him, would be able to make himself heard in a large hall. He related how he went to one of Mr, Arnold's lectures in London, and could not understand him, though sitting at no great distance from the platform. Said Browning : ' I went up to him afterwards and said, " Why, Mat, we can't hear you." ' He seemed in- terested in the possible financial outcome of Mr. Arnold's visit, for he laughingly expressed himself as glad that such a countr}' as America existed. A poor Eng-lish man of letters could write a lecture, take it over there, and bring home a pocketful of money. He spoke of Mary Anderson, whom he had met at a dinner not long before, — sat next her at table, I think he said, — 54 a 3few imor5s and pronounced her ' charming.* He seemed to find satisfaction in having dis- covered that she was a very ' sensible ' young woman. This suggested the drama, and he began at once to inquire minutely about Lawrence Barrett, who was producing A Blot in the 'Scutcheon — what style oi actor was he, what impression was the play making ? He evidently wanted an opinion at first hand from some one who had seen the performance. Mr. Barrett had plentifully supplied him with news- paper reports. The topic of American novels came up, and I spoke of F. Marion Crawford and George W. Cable. He had heard of neither of them, and said : ' I wonder if Crawford is the son of my old friend Crawford, the sculptor ? ' I begged per- mission to send him a copy of Old Creole Days, and to indicate a story which seemed to me especially powerful. This en TRobcrt aSrowning 55 I did, and a few days later came the following note, dated from Warwick Crescent. You are good indeed. I received the little book, and have at once read the tale you recom- mended, and, I think, recom- mended very justly. I shall read the rest with every expectation of being gratified. Ever truly yours, Robert Browning. The open piano caught my eyes, and with AM Vogler in mind, I said, ' I have always had the feeling, from read- ing your poems on musical subjects, that you were a piano player, Mr. Brown- ing.' To which Miss Browning replied, quite quickly, ' Oh, he does play.' I had hoped that he would talk about music ; but he only remarked his great 56 21 3fc\v "MorOs fondness for the piano sonatas of Beetho- ven, which, he said, he knew ' by heart.' One could hardly understand by this that he had them at the ends of his fingers, and was prepared to execute any one of them, when he should be so minded ; but rather that he ' knew ' them music- ally, as the perfectly intelligent and trained listener knows them. He was, however, able to judge of musical com- positions by playing them, and it would be a source of gratification if someone who knew him would tell us about the extent of his ability in this direction. How much did he play ? Was he able, for example, to execute that good old family piece, the Opus 1 3 of Beethoven ? Did he play it like a man, or like a school-girl ? Could he play the so- called ' Moonhght ' Sonata, or the No. 3 of Opus 3 1 , or any of those well-known works which form the indispensable of a pianist's repertory ? On the other hand, did he merely ' read ' them from the on IRobcrt JBrowning 57 notes, playing in the sense in which many a cultivated musical person plays, not pretending to go into detail, nor striving for finish, merely, as we some- times say, playing to amuse oneself? If the person who shall give us this information is also able to speak with authority concerning George Eliot's musical powers, he will confer a favor on many interested listeners by speaking. Strange it is that so many writers who have touched her career at various points, have also shown consummate skill in avoiding this one. Mr. Browning made many kind refer- ences to his friends and readers in Amer- ica. Hardly a day passed, he said, in which he did not get a letter from the other side of the Atlantic. He had had five that morning, not all of a cheerful nature, however. One was from a man who wanted to know what Browning * really and truly ' thought of his own 58 B 3few 1IUor&0 poetry ; and as a preliminary to getting at that inner and private opinion, he made the request that the poet would prepare a list of those things which he himself liked best, arranging the titles in order of preference. The poet seemed heartily amused at this idea ; but it was plain to see that the only attention this letter would receive had been already received, in the shape of the laugh it called forth. It is an excellent plan for an inex- perienced hunter of celebrities to sit where he can watch the clock. He will be astonished at the rapidity with which the hands move, and will also discover an opportunity for a new application of the proverb that brevity is the soul of wit. Other things being equal, when one goes to see a great man, the great man's joy of the visit is largely deter- mined by the shortness thereof. In the memory of the visitor who writes these lines, the little visit was on IRobert JSrowntng 59 without a flaw ; and he came away with the feeling that, say what men would, Robert Browning was one of the finest gentlemen alive. 60 H 3few morOs V . Conclusion THE best that could be imagined for a romance of married life was real- ized in the history of Robert and Eliza- beth Barrett Browning. Fiction has much which charms, but fiction contains nothing so perfect. The world with an eager eye for dra- matic effect likes to have its warriors look very military, its poets exceedingly poet- ical and its artists altogether ' artistic' The world is much of the opinion of John Ruskin who wishes that ' kings should keep their crowns upon their heads, and bishops their crosiers in their hands.' The world desires, too, that a lover shall love magnificently, and if she whom he loves dies, shall remain faith- ful to her memory. The world is sur- prised when this happens, but none the on "Robert :Bro\vning 61 less continues to wish for it as something not hkely to happen often. To Elizabeth Barrett was given the power of calling forth most ardent per- sonal love on the part of her readers. She lives in the hearts of many as an ideal of womanhood. In some instances her memory has been cherished with an intensity which bordered on passion. These lovers have almost invariably been of her own sex. So jealous are tliey for her perfect fame, that the faintest shadow upon it, no matter how remotely derived, is suffi- cient to cause them anxiet}'- and alarm. Such a shadow appeared, from time to time, in the rumors that Robert Brown- ing was about to marry again. Without meaning to imply anything derogatory of second marriages — which are often so brilliantly successful that a nameless cynic has been led to say ' Ever)" man should marry at least twice ' — one may feel that here was a beautiful love storj' brought to an idyllic conclusion by virtue of the 62 B Sfcw TlClorDs fact that no second marriage took place. Who, after reading the poem entitled One Word More, could look for any other ending to the story ? If the memory of Elizabeth Barrett is so precious to the readers of her verse, how infinitely prec- ious it must have been to him who made this sweet woman -poet his wife. He has sung his devotion to her in lines of matchless splendor. She, in the Sonnets from the Portuguese , ' counts the ways ' in which she loves, promising that, if it be God's will, her love for him shall grow still deeper and stronger after she is taken from him. There is a fine satisfaction to be had from the thought that in all the years since her death, he was no less the lover than when he wrote of her as ' half- angel and half-bird, and all a wonder and a wild desire.' A hundred voluntary tributes have been paid to the beauty of Mrs. Brown- ing's life and character. One of the best is to be found in Thomas Trollope's book on TRobcrt :fi3rowntno 63 of his memories ; it is, perhaps, not too familiar for quotation. TroUope was a frequent visitor at the home of the Brown- ings in Florence. ' I was conscious even then,' he says, ' of coming away from those visits a better man, with higher aims and views. And pray, reader, understand, that such effect was not produced by any talk or look or word of the nature of preaching, or anything approaching to it, but simply by the perception and appreciation of what Elizabeth Barrett Browning was ; of the immaculate purity of every thought that passed through her pellucid mind, and the indefeasible nobility of her every idea, sentiment and opinion. I hope my reader is not so much the slave of conventional phraseology as to imagine that I use the word " purity " in the above sentence in its restricted and one may say technical, sense. I mean the purity of the upper spiritual atmosphere in which she habitually dwelt ; the 64 B 3Few "OaorOs * absolute disseverance of her moral as ' well as her intellectual nature from all * those lower thoughts as well as lower ' passions which smirch the human soul. ' In mind and heart she was zvliitc — ' stainless. This is what I mean by ' purity.' It has been the fashion, in eveiy age of the world, for the pessimist to lift up his voice, and bewail the hardness of the times in which he lives, to declare that women are no longer so beautiful nor men so knightly as they once were. This is the expression of a sort of drawing- room pessimism, not very serious and not at all dangerous. But if one were inclined to lament what seemed to be an ' inhuman dearth of noble natures ' he could restore his faith in the good which is in humanity by reading the history of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Each had genius, but of each it may be said that the life was greater than the works. MiS0943 i:: <^V •/'^f^" THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA UBRARY