114
Whitehall 120
Westminster Hall 157
The Tower, London 170
The Tower, Traitors' Gate 183
An English Manor House 222
An English Park 240
John Bunyan 274
An English Inn 288
Cardinal Wiseman 336
Sacred Heart 342
The Nativity 351
The Transfiguration 366
Handel 426
Avison's March 446

BROWNING'S ENGLAND

CHAPTER I

ENGLISH POETS, FRIENDS AND ENTHUSIASMS

To any one casually trying to recall what England has given Robert
Browning by way of direct poetical inspiration, it is more than likely
that the little poem about Shelley, "Memorabilia" would at once occur:

I

"Ah, did you once see Shelley plain,
And did he stop and speak to you
And did you speak to him again?
How strange it seems and new!

II

"But you were living before that,
And also you are living after;
And the memory I started at--
My starting moves your laughter!

III

"I crossed a moor, with a name of its own
And a certain use in the world, no doubt,
Yet a hand's-breadth of it shines alone
'Mid the blank miles round about:

IV

"For there I picked up on the heather
And there I put inside my breast
A moulted feather, an eagle-feather!
Well, I forget the rest."

It puts into a mood and a symbol the almost worshipful admiration felt
by Browning for the poet in his youth, which he had, many years before
this little lyric was written, recorded in a finely appreciative passage
in "Pauline."

"Sun-treader, life and light be thine forever!
Thou are gone from us; years go by and spring
Gladdens and the young earth is beautiful,
Yet thy songs come not, other bards arise,
But none like thee: they stand, thy majesties,
Like mighty works which tell some spirit there
Hath sat regardless of neglect and scorn,