ed literary man." But of many interesting acquaintances perhaps the
most highly valued were Fanny Kemble and her sister Adelaide
Sartoris--Fanny Kemble magnificent, "with her black hair and radiant
smile," her sympathetic voice, "her eyes and eyelids full of
utterance"--a very noble creature indeed; Mrs Sartoris, genial and
generous, more tolerant than Fanny of Mrs Browning's wayward
enthusiasms, eloquent in talk and passionate in song. "The Kembles,"
writes Mrs Browning, "were our gain in Rome."
Towards the end of May 1854 farewells were said, and the Brownings
returned from Rome, to Florence by vettura. They had hoped to visit
England, or if this should prove impracticable, to take shelter among
the mountains from the summer heat. But needful coin on which they had
reckoned did not arrive; and they resolved in prudence to sit still at
Florence and eat their bread and macaroni as poor sensible folk should
do. And Florence looked more beautiful than ever after Rome; the
nightingales sang around the olive-trees and vineyards, not only by
starlight and fire-fly-light but in the daytime. "I love the very stones
of Florence," exclaims Mrs Browning. Her friend Miss Mitford, now in
England, and sadly failing in health, hinted at a loan of money; but the
answer was a prompt, "Oh no! My husband has a family likeness to Lucifer
in being proud." There followed a tranquil and a happy time, and both
_Men and Women_ and _Aurora Leigh_ maintained in the writers a deep
inward excitement of the kind that leaves an enduring result. A little
joint publication; _Two Poems by E.B.B. and R.B_., containing _A Plea
for the Ragged Schools of London_ and _The Twins_, was sold at Miss
Arabella Barrett's Ragged School bazaar in 1854. It is now a waif of
literature which collectors prize. There is special significance in the
_Date_ and _Dabitur_, the twins of Browning's poem, when we bear in mind
the occasion with which it was originally connected.
In the early weeks of 1855 Mrs Browning was seriously ill; through
feverish nights of coughing, she had in her husband a devoted nurse. His
sleepless hours were troubled not only by anxiety on her account but by
a passionate interest in the heroisms and miseries, of his fellow
countrymen during the Crimean winter: "when he is mild _he_ wishes the
ministry to be torn to pieces in the streets, limb from limb." Gradually
his wife regained health, but she had not long recovered when tidings of
the death
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