d Oriental-looking
decorations, was most picturesque. That the scenery which surrounded her
in her youth made on Elizabeth an impression which remained with her all
her life is shown clearly in various passages in her poems:

"Green the land is where my daily
Steps in jocund childhood played,
Dimpled close with hill and valley,
Dappled very close with shade;
Summer-snow of apple-blossoms running up from glade to glade."

Of all the brothers and sisters, Elizabeth was her father's favorite,
and he encouraged her constantly in her precocious studies and in her
childish attempts at composition. Long before she was able to read Homer
in the original, she came upon Pope's translation of the _Iliad_, and it
took a rare hold upon her. She showed its influence and her own bent
toward poetry by composing, before she was fourteen, an epic on the
"Battle of Marathon," of which her father, to whom it was dedicated,
thought so highly that he had it printed and circulated it among his
friends. But she also showed the influence of her beloved _Iliad_ in a
much more childish way, of which she has written delightfully in a poem
called _Hector in the Garden_. A great flower bed, roughly shaped like a
man and bordered about with turf, was made for her, and this she named
after Hector, the Trojan hero and her great favorite.

"Eyes of gentianellas azure,
Staring, winking at the skies;
Nose of gillyflowers and box;
Scented grasses put for locks,
Which a little breeze at pleasure
Set a-waving round his eyes."

"Brazen helm of daffodillies,
With a glitter toward the light;
Purple violets for the mouth,
Breathing perfumes west and south;
And a sword of flashing lilies,
Holden ready for the fight."

"And a breastplate made of daisies,
Closely fitting, leaf on leaf;
Periwinkles interlaced
Drawn for belt about the waist;
While the brown bees, humming praises,
Shot their arrows round the chief."

[Illustration: ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING
1806-1861]

It was natural enough that Elizabeth should have wanted to begin the
study of Greek; and with the help of her father and of Mr. Boyd, a blind
friend of her father's, she became a most proficient Greek scholar.

When she was fifteen years old she met with an accident which deprived
her in part of the out-of-door life and rambles which she had loved, and
threw her more than ever u