as ineffable in beauty in the early
spring as was their Florence. "It's rather dangerous to let the charm of
Paris work," laughed Mrs. Browning; "the honey will be clogging our feet
soon, and we shall find it difficult to go away."

They had a delightful winter socially, as well; they went to Ary
Scheffer's and heard Madame Viardot, then in the height of her artistic
fame; George Sand sent them tickets for the _premiere_ of "Les Vacances de
Pandolphe"; they went to the Vaudeville to see the "Dame aux Camellias,"
of which Mrs. Browning said that she did not agree with the common cry
about its immorality. To her it was both moral and human, "but I never
will go to see it again," she says, "for it almost broke my heart. The
exquisite acting, the too literal truth to nature...." They met Paul de
Musset, but missed his brother Alfred that winter, whose poems they both
cared for.

The elder Browning retained through his life that singular talent for
caricature drawing that had amused and fascinated his son in the poet's
childhood; and during his visit to the Brownings in Paris he had produced
many of these drawings which became the delight of his grandson as well.
The Paris streets furnished him with some inimitable suggestions, and
Robert Barrett Browning, to this day, preserves many of these keen and
humorous and extremely clever drawings of his grandfather. Thierry, the
historian, who was suffering from blindness, sent to the Brownings a
request that they would call on him, with which they immediately complied,
and they were much interested in his views on France. The one
disappointment of that season was in not meeting Victor Hugo, whose fiery
hostility to the new _regime_ caused it to be more expedient for him to
reside quite beyond possible sight of the gilded dome of the Invalides.

In June the Brownings returned to London, where they domiciled themselves
in Welbeck Street (No. 58), Mrs. Browning's sisters both being near, Mrs.
Surtees Cook having established herself only twenty doors away, and Miss
Arabel Barrett being in close proximity in Wimpole Street. They were
invited to Kenyon's house at Wimbledon, where Landor was a guest, whom
Mrs. Browning found "looking as young as ever, and full of passionate
energy," and who talked with characteristic exaggeration of Louis Napoleon
and of the President of the French nation. Landor "detested" the one and
"loathed" the other; and as he did not accept Talleyrand's ideal of