cessful of all, and the prime favorite
was "Lady Geraldine's Courtship." Of this poem of ninety-two stanzas, with
eleven more in its "Conclusion," thirty-five of the stanzas, or one
hundred and forty-four lines, were written in one day.

Though lack of health largely restricted Miss Barrett to her room, her
sympathies and interests were world-wide. She read the reviews of the
biography of Dr. Arnold, a work she desired to read, entire, and records
that "Dr. Arnold must have been a man in the largest and noblest sense."
She rejoices in the refutation of Puseyism that is offered in the
_Edinburgh Review_; she reads "an admirable paper by Macaulay" in the same
number; she comments on the news that Newman has united himself with the
Catholic Church; and in one letter she writes that Mr. Horne has not
returned to England and adds: "Mr. Browning is not in England, either, so
that whatever you send for him must await his return from the east, or
west, or south, wherever he is; Dickens is in Italy; even Miss Mitford
talks of going to France, and the 'New Spirit of the Age' is a wandering
spirit."

In her "Lady Geraldine's Courtship" had occurred the lines:

"Or from Browning some 'Pomegranate,' which, if cut deep down the
middle,
Shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity."

A certain consciousness of each other already stirred in the air for
Browning and Miss Barrett, and still closer were the Fates drawing the
subtle threads of destiny.

It was in this November that Mrs. Jameson first came into Miss Barrett's
life, coming to the door with a note, and "overcoming by kindness was let
in." This initiated a friendship that was destined in the near future to
play its salient part in the life of Elizabeth Barrett. In what orderly
sequence the links of life appear, viewed retrospectively!

She "gently wrangles" with Mr. Boyd for addressing her as "Miss Barrett,"
deprecating such cold formality, and offering him his choice of her little
pet name "Ba" or of Elizabeth.

She reads Hans Christian Andersen's "Improvisatore," and in reply to some
expressed wonder at her reading so many novels she avows herself "the most
complete and unscrupulous romance reader" possible; and adds that her love
of fiction began with her breath, and will end with it; "and it goes on
increasing. On my tombstone may be written," she continued, "'_Ci git_ the
greatest novel reader in the world,' and nobody will forbid the
ins