relinquish it again. Chorley, who had long been her intimate friend, alludes to the fact that her friendship for him, though it continued through life, was interrupted by "serious differences of opinion concerning a matter which she took terribly to heart-the strange, weird questions of Mesmerism, including clairvoyance, -for all these things were combined and complicated with the mysteries of Spiritualism." "To the marvels of these two phenomena (admitting both as incomplete discoveries)," says Chorley, "she lent an ear as credulous as her trust was sincere and her heart highminded. But with women far more experienced in falsity than one so noble and one who had been so secluded from the world as herself, after they have once crossed the threshold, there is seldom chance of after retreat. Only they become bewildered by their tenacious notions of loyalty. It is over these very best and most generous of their sex that impostors have the most power."

"I have never seen one more nobly simple, more entirely guiltless of the feminine propensity of talking for effect, more earnest in her assertion, more gentle yet pertinacious in differences, than she was," pursues Chorley; adding, "like all whose early nurture has chiefly been from books, she had a child's curiosity regarding the life beyond her books, co-existing with opinions accepted as certainties, concerning things of which (even with the intuition of genius) she could know little. She was at once forbearing and dogmatic, willing to accept differences, resolute to admit no argument; without any more practical knowledge of social life than a nun might have when, after long years, she emerged from her cloister and her shroud."

E. D(owden?), writing with respect to Mrs. Brown

ing's apparently inscrutable admiration for the Napoleonic régime, utters views so corroborative of Chorley, and, save some exaggeration, coincident with our own, that they may be cited from the article in Macmillan's Magazine: "All her feelings on political subjects were intensified not only by her woman's impetuosity, but by the circumstances of her secluded life. To me her judgments, both for good and bad, seemed oftentimes like those of a dweller in some city convent. Out of the cloister windows she could see the world moving without, but in its active life she had neither share nor portion. For many years past the days had been few in number, almost to be counted upon the fingers, throughout the long year, on which she was carried down into the open air, to gaze upon the world from a carriage-seat. All, indeed, that one of more than common intellect, and who watched over her with more than a woman's care, could bring her of gleanings from the outer world, she had to aid her in her thoughts; all that books, written in almost every modern language, could bring her of instruction, she sought for eagerly; but still no aid of books or friends could supply what daily contact with active life alone can give. It was thus that the views of the world had something of the unreality of cloister visions."

Mrs. Browning's interest in the cause of Italian freedom continued to increase with her increase of knowledge of the people. To her English friends she wrote in the hopes of arousing in them something of the sympathy she felt for her unfortunate neighbours, but as yet with slight success. To Miss Mitford she

said, "I see daily a people who have the very life crushed out of them, and yet of their oppressions the English press says nothing;" and Miss Mitford's

comment to a friend on these and similar complaints was "fancy Mrs. Browning thinking Louis Napoleon ought to take up the cause of those wretched Italians; and I hear from all quarters that they get into corners and slander each other. It is an extinct people, sending up nothing better than smoke and cinders and ashes; a mere name, like the Greeks."

Such opinions as this conservative old English lady uttered were entertained by the great majority of her country-people, and by the people of most countries, and the aspirations of Mrs. Browning and her Italian friends regarded as the idle dreams of poets. poets' time was as yet to come.

The

During the hot summer of 1853 the Brownings sojourned at the Baths of Lucca. They returned to Florence in the autumn, and thence proceeded to Rome for the winter. Their stay in the latter city was somewhat prolonged, and their son, the little Robert, suffered from malaria, but seems to have rapidly recovered. During this stay in Rome Mrs. Browning became acquainted with Harriet Hosmer, the wellknown American sculptor. Miss Hosmer was a favourite pupil of Gibson, and allowed to occupy a portion of the English sculptor's studio where, during work time, she might be found, "a compact little figure, five feet two in height, in cap and blouse, whose short, sunny, brown curls, broad brow, frank and resolute expression of countenance, gave one at the first glance the impression of a handsome boy." Naturally, Mrs. Browning informed Miss Mitford of the new acquaintance she had made, and that dear, prejudiced, insular-minded old lady wrote in a horrified tone to a correspondent, "Mrs. Browning has taken a fancy to an American female sculptor-a girl

of 22—a pupil of Gibson, who goes with the rest of the fraternity of the studio to breakfast and dine at a café, and keeps her character!"

The Brownings returned to the quietude of their Florentine home, and during the remainder of the year made no history to speak of. In December, Miss Mitford speaks of having been advised by the poetess to try mesmerism for her health, which was now completely broken up, and on the 10th of the following January, 1855, the poor, kindly-hearted, if timeserving old lady, was released from her long suffering. The death of her old friend and correspondent must have been a severe blow for Mrs. Browning, but her hands and brain were now so full of her longest and most important poem that doubtless her sorrow was mitigated, if not stifled, by the excitement of the work's approaching completion.

CHAPTER VIII.

AURORA LEIGH.

THE original conception of a celebrated poem can rarely be traced. The "most mature" of her works, as Mrs. Browning terms Aurora Leigh, had evidently been germinating in its author's mind for several years before it was deemed fit to face the fierce glare of publication. As early as 1843, Mrs. Browning intimated to Horne the possibility that she could and, in certain circumstances might, write her own autobiography. Did not those words embody the germ idea of the" fictitious autobiography" which, after so many years and modified by so many causes, she called Aurora Leigh?

Years before her work saw the light or, indeed, was much beyond the embryo stage, Mrs. Browning had given intimation of her intentions with respect to it, to friends. Early in 1853 Miss Mitford had mentioned to Fields, the American publisher, that Mrs. Browning was engaged upon "a fictitious autobiography in blank verse, the heroine a woman artist, I suppose singer or actress," says the old lady, "and