I have been in the meadows all the day,
And gathered there the nosegay that you see;
Singing within myself as bird or bee
When such do fieldwork on a morn of May.
_Irreparableness_
[Illustration: ELIZABETH B. BROWNING]
Writers of biography usually begin their preachments with the rather
startling statement, "The subject of this memoir was born"----Here follows
a date, the name of the place and a cheerful little Mrs. Gamp anecdote:
this as preliminary to "launching forth."
It was the merry Andrew Lang, I believe, who filed a general protest
against these machine-made biographies, pleading that it was perfectly
safe to assume the man was born; and as for the time and place it mattered
little. But the merry man was wrong, for Time and Place are often masters
of Fate.
For myself, I rather like the good old-fashioned way of beginning at the
beginning. But I will not tell where and when Elizabeth was born, for I do
not know. And I am quite sure that her husband did not know. The
encyclopedias waver between London and Herefordshire, just according as
the writers felt in their hearts that genius should be produced in town or
country. One man, with opinions pretty well ossified on this subject,
having been challenged for his statement that Mrs. Browning was born at
Hope End, rushed into print in a letter to the "Gazette" with the
countercheck quarrelsome to the effect, "You might as well expect
throstles to build nests on Fleet Street 'buses, as for folks of genius
to be born in a big city." As apology for the man's ardor I will explain
that he was a believer in the Religion of the East and held that spirits
choose their own time and place for materialization.
Mrs. Ritchie, authorized by Mr. Browning, declared Burn Hill, Durham, the
place, and March Sixth, Eighteen Hundred Nine, the time. In reply, John H.
Ingram brings forth a copy of the Tyne "Mercury," for March Fourteenth,
Eighteen Hundred Nine, and points to this:
"In London, the wife of Edward M. Barrett, of a daughter."
Mr. Browning then comes forward with a fact that derricks can not budge,
that is, "Newspapers have ever had small regard for truth." Then he adds,
"My wife was born March Sixth, Eighteen Hundred Six, at Carlton Hall,
Durham, the residence of her father's brother." One might ha' thought that
this would be the end on't, but it wasn't, for Mr. Ingram came out with
this sharp rejoinder: "Carlton Hall was not in Durham, but in Yorkshire.
And I am authoritatively informed that it did not become the residence of
S. Moulton Barrett until some time after Eighteen Hundred Ten. Mr.
Browning's latest suggestions in this matter can not be accepted. In
Eighteen Hundred Six, Edward Barrett, not yet twenty years of age, is
scarcely likely to have already been the father of the two children
assigned to him." And there the matter rests. Having told this much I
shall proceed to launch forth.
The earlier years of Elizabeth Barrett's life were spent at Hope End, near
Ledbury, Herefordshire. I visited the place and thereby added not only one
day, but several to my life, for Ali counts not the days spent in the
chase. There is a description of Hope End written by an eminent clergyman,
to whom I was at once attracted by his literary style. This gentleman's
diction contains so much clearness, force and elegance that I can not
resist quoting him verbatim: "The residentiary buildings lie on the ascent
of the contiguous eminences, whose projecting parts and bending
declivities, modeled by Nature, display astonishing harmoniousness. It
contains an elegant profusion of wood, disposed in the most careless yet
pleasing order; much of the park and its scenery is in view of the
residence, from which vantage-point it presents a most agreeable
appearance to the enraptured beholder." So there you have it!
Here Elizabeth Barrett lived until she was twenty. She never had a
childhood--'t was dropped out of her life in some way, and a Greek grammar
inlaid instead. Of her mother we know little. She is never quoted; never
referred to; her wishes were so whisperingly expressed that they have not
reached us. She glides, a pale shadow, across the diary pages. Her
husband's will was to her supreme; his whim her conscience. We know that
she was sad, often ill, that she bore eight children. She passed out
seemingly unwept, unhonored and unsung, after a married existence of
sixteen years.
Elizabeth Barrett had the same number of brothers and sisters that
Shakespeare had; and we know no more of the seven Barretts who were
swallowed by oblivion than we do of the seven Shakespeares that went not
astray.
Edward Moulton Barrett had a sort of fierce, passionate, jealous affection
for his daughter Elizabeth. He set himself the task of educating her from
her very babyhood. He was her constant companion, her tutor, adviser,
friend. When six years old she studied Greek, and when nine made
translations in verse. Mr. Barrett looked on this sort of thing with much
favor, and tightened his discipline, reducing the little girl's hours for
study to a system as severe as the laws of Draco. Of course, the child's
health broke. From her thirteenth year she appears to us like a beautiful
spirit with an astral form; or she would, did we not perceive that this
beautiful form is being racked with pain. No wonder some one has asked,
"Where then was the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children?"
But this brave spirit did not much complain. She had a will as strong as
her father's, and felt a Spartan pride in doing all that he asked and a
little more. She studied, wrote, translated, read and thought.
And to spur her on and to stimulate her, Mr. Barrett published several
volumes of her poems. It was immature, pedantic work, but still it had a
certain glow and gave promise of the things yet to come.
One marked event in the life of Elizabeth Barrett occurred when Hugh
Stuart Boyd arrived at Hope End. He was a fine, sensitive, soul--a poet by
nature and a Greek scholar of repute. He came on Mr. Barrett's invitation
to take Mr. Barrett's place as tutor. The young girl was confined to her
bed through the advice of physicians; Boyd was blind.
Here at once was a bond of sympathy. No doubt this break in the monotony
of her life gave fresh courage to the fair young woman. The gentle,
sightless poet relaxed the severe hours of study. Instead of grim digging
in musty tomes they talked: he sat by her bedside holding the thin hands
(for the blind see by the sense of touch), and they talked for hours--or
were silent, which served as well. Then she would read to the blind man
and he would recite to her, for he had the blind Homer's memory. She grew
better, and the doctors said that if she had taken her medicine regularly,
and not insisted on getting up and walking about as guide for the blind
man, she might have gotten entirely well.
In that fine poem, "Wine of Cyprus," addressed to Boyd, we see how she
acknowledges his goodness. There is no wine equal to the wine of
friendship; and love is only friendship--plus something else. There is
nothing so hygienic as friendship.
Hell is a separation, and Heaven is only a going home to our friends.
Mr. Barrett's fortune was invested in sugar-plantations in Jamaica.
Through the emancipation of the blacks his fortune took to itself wings.
He had to give up his splendid country home--to break the old ties. It was
decided that the family should move to London. Elizabeth had again taken
to her bed. The mattress on which she lay was borne down the steps by four
men; one man might have carried her alone, for she weighed only
eighty-five pounds, so they say.
* * * * *
Crabb Robinson, who knew everything and everybody, being very much such a
man as John Kenyon, has left on record the fact that Mr. Kenyon had a face
like a Benedictine monk, a wit that never lagged, a generous heart, and a
tongue that ran like an Alpine cascade.
A razor with which you can not shave may have better metal in it than one
with a perfect edge. One has been sharpened and the other not. And I am
very sure that the men who write best do not necessarily know the most;
Fate has put an edge on them--that's all. A good kick may start a stone
rolling, when otherwise it rests on the mountain-side for a generation.
Kenyon was one type of the men who rest on the mountain-side. He dabbled
in poetry, wrote book-reviews, collected rare editions, attended first
nights, spoke mysteriously of "stuff" he was working on; and sometimes
confidentially told his lady friends of his intention to bring it out when
he had gotten it into shape, asking their advice as to bindings, etc. Men
of this type rarely bring out their stuff, for the reason that they never
get it into shape. When they refer to the novel they have on the stocks,
they refer to a novel they intend to write. It is yet in the ink-bottle.
And there it remains--all for the want of one good kick--but perhaps it's
just as well.
Yet these friendly beings are very useful members of society. They are
brighter companions and better talkers than the men who exhaust
themselves in creative work and at odd times favor their friends with
choice samples of literary irritability. John Kenyon wrote a few bright
little things, but his best work was in the encouragement he gave others.
He sought out all literary lions and tamed them with his steady glance.
They liked his prattle and good-cheer, and he liked them for many
reasons--one of which was because he could go away and tell how he advised
them about this, that and the other. Then he fed them, too.
And so unrivaled was Kenyon in this line that he won for himself the title
of "The Feeder of Lions." Now, John Kenyon--rich, idle, bookish and
generous--saw in the magazines certain fine little poems by one Elizabeth
Barrett. He also ascertained that she had published several books. Mr.
Kenyon bought one of these volumes and sent it by a messenger with a
little note to Miss Barrett telling how much he had enjoyed it, and craved
that she would inscribe her name and his on the fly-leaf and return by
bearer. Of course she complied with such a modest request so gracefully
expressed; these things are balm to poets' souls. Next, Mr. Kenyon called
to thank Miss Barrett for the autograph. Soon after, he wrote to inform
her of a startling fact that he had just discovered: they were kinsmen,
cousins or something--a little removed, but cousins still. In a few weeks
they wrote letters back and forth beginning thus: Dear Cousin.
And I am glad of this cousinly arrangement between lonely young people.
They grasp at it; and it gives an excuse for a bit of closer relationship
than could otherwise exist with propriety. Goodness me! is he not my
cousin? Of course he may call as often as he chooses. It is his right.
But let me explain here that at this time Mr. Kenyon was not so very
young--that is, he was not absurdly young: he was fifty. But men who
really love books always have young hearts. Kenyon's father left him a
fortune, no troubles had ever come his way, and his was not the
temperament that searches them out. He dressed young, looked young, acted
young, felt young.
No doubt John Kenyon sincerely admired Elizabeth Barrett, and prized her
work. And while she read his mind a deal more understandingly than he did
her poems, she was grateful for his kindly attention and well-meant
praise. He set about to get her poems into better magazines and to find
better publishers for her work. He was not a gifted poet himself, but to
dance attendance on one afforded a gratification to his artistic impulse.
He could not write sublime verse himself, but he could tell others how. So
Miss Barrett showed her poems to Mr. Kenyon, and Mr. Kenyon advised that
the P's be made bolder and the tails to the Q's be lengthened. He also
bought her a new kind of manuscript paper, over which a quill pen would
glide with glee: it was the kind Byron used. But best of all, Mr. Kenyon
brought his friends to call on Miss Barrett; and many of these friends
were men with good literary instincts. The meeting with these strong minds
was no doubt a great help to the little lady, shut up in a big house and
living largely in dreams.
Mary Russell Mitford was in London about this time on a little visit, and
of course was sought out by John Kenyon, who took her sightseeing. She was
fifty years old, too; she spoke of herself as an old maid, but didn't
allow others to do so. Friends always spoke of her as "Little Miss
Mitford," not because she was little, but because she acted so. Among
other beautiful sights that Mr. Kenyon wished to show gushing little Mary
Mitford was a Miss Barrett who wrote things. So together they called on
Miss Barrett.
Little Miss Mitford looked at the pale face in its frame of dark curls,
lying back among the pillows. Little Miss Mitford bowed and said it was a
fine day; then she went right over and kissed Miss Barrett, and these two
women held each other's hands and talked until Mr. Kenyon twisted
nervously and hinted that it was time to go.
Miss Barrett had not been out for two months, but now these two insisted
that she should go with them. The carriage was at the door, they would
support her very tenderly, Mr. Kenyon himself would drive--so there could
be no accidents and they would bring her back the moment she was tired.
So they went, did these three, and as Mr. Kenyon himself drove there were
no accidents.
I can imagine that James the coachman gave up the reins that day with only
an inward protest, and after looking down and smiling reassurance Mr.
Kenyon drove slowly towards the Park; little Miss Mitford forgot her
promise not to talk incessantly; and the "dainty, white-porcelain lady"
brushed back the raven curls from time to time and nodded indulgently.
Not long ago I called at Number Seventy-four Gloucester Place, where the
Barretts lived. It is a plain, solid brick house, built just like the ten
thousand other brick houses in London where well-to-do tradesmen live. The
people who now occupy the house never heard of the Barretts, and surely do
not belong to a Browning Club. I was told that if I wanted to know
anything about the place I should apply to the "Agent," whose name is
'Opkins and whose office is in Clifford Court, off Fleet Street. The house
probably has not changed in any degree in these fifty years, since little
Miss Mitford on one side and Mr. Kenyon on the other, tenderly helped Miss
Barrett down the steps and into the carriage.
I lingered about Gloucester Place for an hour, but finding that I was
being furtively shadowed by various servants, and discovering further that
a policeman had been summoned to look after my case, I moved on.
That night after the ride, Miss Mitford wrote a letter home and among
other things she said: "I called today at a Mr. Barrett's. The eldest
daughter is about twenty-five. She has some spinal affection, but she is a
charming, sweet young woman who reads Greek as I do French. She has
published some translations from Æschylus and some striking poems. She is
a delightful creature, shy, timid and modest."
The next day Mr. Kenyon gave a little dinner in honor of Miss Mitford, who
was the author of a great book called, "Our Village." That night when Miss
Mitford wrote her usual letter to the folks down in the country, telling
how she was getting along, she described this dinner-party. She says:
"Wordsworth was there--an adorable old man. Then there was Walter Savage
Landor, too, as splendid a person as Mr. Kenyon himself, but not so full
of sweetness and sympathy. But best of all, the charming Miss Barrett, who
translated the most difficult of the Greek plays, 'Prometheus Bound.' She
has written most exquisite poems, too, in almost every modern style. She
is so sweet and gentle, and so pretty that one looks at her as if she were
some bright flower." Then in another letter Miss Mitford adds: "She is of
a slight, delicate figure, with a shower of dark curls falling on either
side of a most expressive face; large tender eyes, richly fringed by dark
lashes; a smile like a sunbeam, and such a look of youthfulness that I had
some difficulty in persuading a friend that she was really the translator
of Æschylus and the author of the 'Essay on Mind.'"
When Miss Mitford went back home, she wrote Miss Barrett a letter 'most
every day. She addresses her as "My Sweet Love," "My Dearest Sweet," and
"My Sweetest Dear." She declares her to be the gentlest, strongest,
sanest, noblest and most spiritual of all living persons. And moreover she
wrote these things to others and published them in reviews. She gave
Elizabeth Barrett much good advice and some not so good. Among other
things she says: "Your one fault, my dear, is obscurity. You must be
simple and plain. Think of the stupidest person of your acquaintance, and
when you have made your words so clear that you are sure he will
understand, you may venture to hope it will be understood by others."
I hardly think that this advice caused Miss Barrett to bring her lines
down to the level of the stupidest person she knew. She continued to write
just as she chose. Yet she was grateful for Miss Mitford's glowing
friendship, and all the pretty gush was accepted, although perhaps with
good large pinches of the Syracuse product.
Of course there are foolish people who assume that gushing women are
shallow, but this is jumping at conclusions. A recent novel gives us a
picture of "a tall soldier," who, in camp, was very full of brag and
bluster. We are quite sure that when the fight comes on this man with the
lubricated tongue will prove an arrant coward; we assume that he will run
at the first smell of smoke. But we are wrong--he stuck; and when the flag
was carried down in the rush, he rescued it and bore it bravely so far to
the front that when he came back he brought another--the tawdry, red flag
of the enemy!
I slip this in here just to warn hasty folk against the assumption that
talkative people are necessarily vacant-minded. Man has a many-sided
nature, and like the moon reveals only certain phases at certain times.
And as there is one side of the moon that is never revealed at all to
dwellers on the planet Earth, so mortals may unconsciously conceal certain
phases of soul-stuff from each other.
Miss Barrett seems to have written more letters and longer ones to Miss
Mitford than to any of her other correspondents, save one. Yet she was
aware of this rather indiscreet woman's limitations and wrote down to her
understanding.
To Richard H. Horne she wrote freely and at her intellectual best. With
this all-round, gifted man she kept up a correspondence for many years;
and her letters now published in two stout volumes afford a literary
history of the time. At the risk of being accused of lack of taste, I wish
to say that these letters of Miss Barrett's are a deal more interesting to
me than any of her longer poems. They reveal the many-sided qualities of
the writer, and show the workings of her mind in various moods. Poetry is
such an exacting form that it never allows the author to appear in
dressing-gown and slippers; neither can he call over the back fence to his
neighbor without loss of dignity.
Horne was author, editor and publisher. His middle name was Henry, but
following that peculiar penchant of the ink-stained fraternity to play
flimflam with their names, he changed the Henry to Hengist; so we now see
it writ thus: R. Hengist Horne.
He found a market for Miss Barrett's wares. More properly, he insisted
that she should write certain things to fit certain publications in which
he was interested. They collaborated in writing several books. They met
very seldom, and their correspondence has a fine friendly flavor about it,
tempered with a disinterestedness that is unique. They encourage each
other, criticize each other. They rail at each other in witty quips and
quirks, and at times the air is so full of gibes that it looks as if a
quarrel were appearing on the horizon--no bigger than a man's hand--but
the storm always passes in a gentle shower of refreshing compliments.
Meantime, dodging in and out, we see the handsome, gracious and kindly
John Kenyon.
Much of the time Miss Barrett lived in a darkened room, seeing no one but
her nurse, the physician and her father. Fortune had smiled again on
Edward Barrett--a legacy had come his way, and although he no longer owned
the black men in Jamaica, yet they were again working for him. Sugar-cane
mills ground slow, but small.
The brilliant daughter had blossomed in intellect until she was beyond her
teacher. She was so far ahead that he called to her to wait for him. He
could read Greek; she could compose in it. But she preferred her native
tongue, as every scholar should. Now, Mr. Barrett was jealous of the fame
of his daughter. The passion of father for daughter, of mother for
son--there is often something very loverlike in it--a deal of whimsy! Miss
Barrett's darkened room had been illumined by a light that the gruff and
goodly merchant wist not of. Loneliness and solitude and physical pain and
heart-hunger had taught her things that no book recorded nor tutor knew.
Her father could not follow her; her allusions were obscure, he said,
wilfully obscure; she was growing perverse.
Love is a pain at times. To ease the hurt the lover would hurt the
beloved. He badgers her, pinches her, provokes her. One step more and he
may kill her.
Edward Barrett's daughter, she of the raven curls and gentle ways, was
reaching a point where her father's love was not her life. A good way to
drive love away is to be jealous. He had seen it coming years before; he
brooded over it; the calamity was upon him. Her fame was growing: some one
called her the Shakespeare of women. First, her books had been published
at her father's expense; next, editors were willing to run their own
risks, and now messengers with bank-notes waited at the door and begged to
exchange the bank-notes for manuscript. John Kenyon said, "I told you so,"
but Edward Barrett scowled. He accused her foolishly; he attempted to
dictate to her--she must use this ink or that. Why? Because he said so. He
quarreled with her to ease the love-hurt that was smarting in his heart.
Poor, little, pale-faced poet! Earthly success has nothing left for thee!
Thy thoughts, too great for speech, fall on dull ears. Even thy father,
for whom thou first took up pen, doth not understand thee! and a mother's
love thou hast never known. And fame without love--how barren! Heaven is
thy home. Let slip thy thin, white hands on the thread of life and glide
gently out at ebb of tide--out into the unknown. It can not but be better
than this--God understands! Compose thy troubled spirit, give up thy vain
hopes. See! thy youth is past, little woman; look closely! there are gray
hairs in thy locks, thy face is marked with lines of care, and have I not
seen signs of winter in thy veins? Earth holds naught for thee. Come, take
thy pen and write, just a last good-by, a tender farewell, such as thou
alone canst say. Then fold thy thin hands, and make peace with all by
passing out and away, out and away--God understands!
* * * * *
Elizabeth Barrett was thirty-seven, and Miss Mitford, up to London from
the country for a couple of days, wrote home that she had lost her winsome
beauty.
John Kenyon had turned well into sixty, but he carried his years in a
jaunty way. He wore a moss-rose bud in the lapel of his well-fitting coat.
His linen was immaculate, and the only change people saw in him was that
he wore spectacles in place of a monocle.
The physicians allowed Mr. Kenyon to visit the darkened room whenever he
chose, for he never stayed so very long, neither was he ever the bearer of
bad news.
Did the greatest poetess of the age (temporarily slightly indisposed) know
one Browning--Robert Browning, a writer of verse? Why, no; she had never
met him, but of course she knew of him, and had read everything he had
written. He had sent her one of his books once. He was surely a man of
brilliant parts--so strong and farseeing! He lives in Italy, with the
monks, they say. What a pity the English people do not better appreciate
him!
"But he may succeed yet," said Mr. Kenyon. "He is not old."
"Oh, of course, such genius must some day be recognized. But he may be
gone then--how old did you say he was?"
Mr. Kenyon had not said; but he now explained that Mr. Browning was
thirty-four, that is to say, just the age of himself, ahem! Furthermore,
Mr. Browning did not live in Italy--that is, not now, for at that present
moment he was in London. In fact, Mr. Kenyon had lunched with him an hour
before. They had talked of Miss Barrett (for who else was there among
women worth talking of!) and Mr. Browning had expressed a wish to see her.
Mr. Kenyon had expressed a wish that Mr. Browning should see her, and now
if Miss Barrett would express a wish that Mr. Browning should call and see
her, why, Mr. Kenyon would fetch him--doctors or no doctors.
And he fetched him.
And I'm glad, aren't you?
Now Robert Browning was not at all of the typical poet type. In stature,
he was rather short; his frame was compact and muscular. In his youth, he
had been a wrestler--carrying away laurels of a different sort from those
which he was to wear later. His features were inclined to be heavy; in
repose his face was dull, and there was no fire in his glance. He wore
loose-fitting, plain, gray clothes, a slouch-hat and thick-soled shoes. At
first look you would have said he was a well-fed, well-to-do country
squire. On closer acquaintance you would have been impressed with his
dignity, his perfect poise and his fine reserve. And did you come to know
him well enough you would have seen that beneath that seemingly phlegmatic
outside there was a spiritual nature so sensitive and tender that it
responded to all the finer thrills that play across the souls of men. Yet
if there ever was a man who did not wear his heart upon his sleeve for
daws to peck at, it was Robert Browning. He was clean, wholesome, manly,
healthy, inside and out. He was master of self.
Of course, the gentle reader is sure that the next act will show a tender
love-scene. And were I dealing with the lives of Peter Smith and Martha
the milkmaid, the gentle reader might be right.
But the love of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett is an instance of
the Divine Passion. Take off thy shoes, for the place whereon thou
standest is holy ground! This man and woman had gotten well beyond the
first flush of youth; there was a joining of intellect and soul which
approaches the ideal. I can not imagine anything so preposterous as a
"proposal" passing between them; I can not conceive a condition of
hesitancy and timidity leading up to a dam-bursting "avowal." They met,
looked into each other's eyes, and each there read his fate: no coyness,
no affectation, no fencing--they loved. Each at once felt a heart-rest in
the other. Each had at last found the other self.
That exquisite series of poems, "Sonnets From the Portuguese," written by
Elizabeth Barrett before her marriage and presented to her husband
afterward, was all told to him over and over by the look from her eyes,
the pressure of her hands, and in gentle words (or silence) that knew
neither shame nor embarrassment.
And now it seems to me that somewhere in these pages I said that
friendship was essentially hygienic. I wish to make that remark again, and
to put it in italics. The Divine Passion implies the most exalted form of
friendship that man can imagine.
Elizabeth Barrett ran up the shades and flung open the shutters. The
sunlight came dancing through the apartment, flooding each dark corner and
driving out all the shadows that lurked therein. It was no longer a
darkened room.
The doctor was indignant; the nurse resigned.
Miss Mitford wrote back to the country that Miss Barrett was "really
looking better than she had for years."
As for poor Edward Moulton Barrett--he raved. He tried to quarrel with
Robert Browning, and had there been only a callow youth with whom to deal,
Browning would simply have been kicked down the steps, and that would have
been an end of it. But Browning had an even pulse, a calm eye and a temper
that was imperturbable. His will was quite as strong as Mr. Barrett's.
And so it was just a plain runaway match--the ideal thing after all. One
day when the father was out of the way they took a cab to Marylebone
Parish Church and were married. The bride went home alone, and it was a
week before her husband saw her; because he would not be a hypocrite and
go ask for her by her maiden name. And had he gone, rung the bell and
asked to see Elizabeth Barrett Browning, no one would have known whom he
wanted. At the end of the week, the bride stole down the steps alone,
leading her dog Flush by a string, and met her lover-husband on the
corner. Next day, they wrote back from Calais, asking forgiveness and
craving blessings, after the good old custom of Gretna Green. But Edward
Moulton Barrett did not forgive--still, who cares!
Yet we do care, too, for we regret that this man, so strong and manly in
many ways, could not be reconciled to this exalted love. Old men who nurse
wrath are pitiable sights. Why could not Mr. Barrett have followed the
example of John Kenyon?
Kenyon commands both our sympathy and admiration. When the news came to
him that Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett were gone, it is said that
he sobbed like a youth to whom has come a great, strange sorrow. For
months he was not known to smile, yet after a year he visited the happy
home in Florence. When John Kenyon died he left by his will fifty thousand
dollars "to my beloved and loving friends, Robert Browning and Elizabeth
Barrett, his wife."
The old-time novelists always left their couples at the church-door. It
was not safe to follow further--they wished to make a pleasant story. It
seems meet to take our leave of the bride and groom at the church: life
often ends there. However, it sometimes is the place where life really
begins. It was so with Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning--they had
merely existed before; now, they began to live.
Much, very much has been written concerning this ideal mating, and of the
life of Mr. and Mrs. Browning in Italy. But why should I write of the
things of which George William Curtis, Kate Field, Anthony Trollope and
James T. Fields have written? No, we will leave the happy pair at the
altar, in Marylebone Parish Church, and while the organ peals the
wedding-march we will tiptoe softly out.