Life and Letters of Robert Browning [5]
assured
in the strongest terms that the story has no foundation,
and this by a gentleman whose authority in all matters concerning
the Browning family Dr. Furnivall has otherwise accepted as conclusive.
If the anecdote were true it would be a singular circumstance
that Mr. Browning senior was always fond of drawing negro heads,
and thus obviously disclaimed any unpleasant association with them.
I do not know the exact physical indications by which a dark strain
is perceived; but if they are to be sought in the colouring of eyes,
hair, and skin, they have been conspicuously absent in the two persons
who in the present case are supposed to have borne them.
The poet's father had light blue eyes and, I am assured by those
who knew him best, a clear, ruddy complexion. His appearance
induced strangers passing him in the Paris streets to remark,
`C'est un Anglais!' The absolute whiteness of Miss Browning's skin
was modified in her brother by a sallow tinge sufficiently explained
by frequent disturbance of the liver; but it never affected
the clearness of his large blue-grey eyes; and his hair,
which grew dark as he approached manhood, though it never became black,
is spoken of, by everyone who remembers him in childhood and youth, as golden.
It is no less worthy of note that the daughter of his early friend Mr. Fox,
who grew up in the little social circle to which he belonged,
never even heard of the dark cross now imputed to him;
and a lady who made his acquaintance during his twenty-fourth year,
wrote a sonnet upon him, beginning with these words:
Thy brow is calm, young Poet -- pale and clear
As a moonlighted statue.
The suggestion of Italian characteristics in the Poet's face may serve,
however, to introduce a curious fact, which can have no bearing
on the main lines of his descent, but holds collateral possibilities
concerning it. His mother's name Wiedemann or Wiedeman
appears in a merely contracted form as that of one of the oldest families
naturalized in Venice. It became united by marriage with the Rezzonico;
and, by a strange coincidence, the last of these who occupied the palace
now owned by Mr. Barrett Browning was a Widman-Rezzonico.
The present Contessa Widman has lately restored her own palace,
which was falling into ruin.
That portrait of the first Mrs. Browning, which gave so much umbrage
to her husband's second wife, has hung for many years
in her grandson's dining-room, and is well known to all his friends.
It represents a stately woman with an unmistakably fair skin;
and if the face or hair betrays any indication of possible dark blood,
it is imperceptible to the general observer, and must be
of too slight and fugitive a nature to enter into the discussion.
A long curl touches one shoulder. One hand rests upon
a copy of Thomson's `Seasons', which was held to be
the proper study and recreation of cultivated women in those days.
The picture was painted by Wright of Derby.
A brother of this lady was an adventurous traveller,
and was said to have penetrated farther into the interior of Africa
than any other European of his time. His violent death will be found recorded
in a singular experience of the poet's middle life.
Chapter 2
Robert Browning's Father -- His Position in Life --
Comparison between him and his Son -- Tenderness towards his Son --
Outline of his Habits and Character -- His Death --
Significant Newspaper Paragraph -- Letter of Mr. Locker-Lampson --
Robert Browning's Mother -- Her Character and Antecedents --
Their Influence upon her Son -- Nervous Delicacy imparted
to both her Children -- Its special Evidences in her Son.
It was almost a matter of course that Robert Browning's father
should be disinclined for bank work. We are told, and can easily imagine,
that he was not so good an official as the grandfather;
we know that he did not rise so high, nor draw so large a salary.
But he made the best of his position for his family's sake,
and it was at that time both more important
in the strongest terms that the story has no foundation,
and this by a gentleman whose authority in all matters concerning
the Browning family Dr. Furnivall has otherwise accepted as conclusive.
If the anecdote were true it would be a singular circumstance
that Mr. Browning senior was always fond of drawing negro heads,
and thus obviously disclaimed any unpleasant association with them.
I do not know the exact physical indications by which a dark strain
is perceived; but if they are to be sought in the colouring of eyes,
hair, and skin, they have been conspicuously absent in the two persons
who in the present case are supposed to have borne them.
The poet's father had light blue eyes and, I am assured by those
who knew him best, a clear, ruddy complexion. His appearance
induced strangers passing him in the Paris streets to remark,
`C'est un Anglais!' The absolute whiteness of Miss Browning's skin
was modified in her brother by a sallow tinge sufficiently explained
by frequent disturbance of the liver; but it never affected
the clearness of his large blue-grey eyes; and his hair,
which grew dark as he approached manhood, though it never became black,
is spoken of, by everyone who remembers him in childhood and youth, as golden.
It is no less worthy of note that the daughter of his early friend Mr. Fox,
who grew up in the little social circle to which he belonged,
never even heard of the dark cross now imputed to him;
and a lady who made his acquaintance during his twenty-fourth year,
wrote a sonnet upon him, beginning with these words:
Thy brow is calm, young Poet -- pale and clear
As a moonlighted statue.
The suggestion of Italian characteristics in the Poet's face may serve,
however, to introduce a curious fact, which can have no bearing
on the main lines of his descent, but holds collateral possibilities
concerning it. His mother's name Wiedemann or Wiedeman
appears in a merely contracted form as that of one of the oldest families
naturalized in Venice. It became united by marriage with the Rezzonico;
and, by a strange coincidence, the last of these who occupied the palace
now owned by Mr. Barrett Browning was a Widman-Rezzonico.
The present Contessa Widman has lately restored her own palace,
which was falling into ruin.
That portrait of the first Mrs. Browning, which gave so much umbrage
to her husband's second wife, has hung for many years
in her grandson's dining-room, and is well known to all his friends.
It represents a stately woman with an unmistakably fair skin;
and if the face or hair betrays any indication of possible dark blood,
it is imperceptible to the general observer, and must be
of too slight and fugitive a nature to enter into the discussion.
A long curl touches one shoulder. One hand rests upon
a copy of Thomson's `Seasons', which was held to be
the proper study and recreation of cultivated women in those days.
The picture was painted by Wright of Derby.
A brother of this lady was an adventurous traveller,
and was said to have penetrated farther into the interior of Africa
than any other European of his time. His violent death will be found recorded
in a singular experience of the poet's middle life.
Chapter 2
Robert Browning's Father -- His Position in Life --
Comparison between him and his Son -- Tenderness towards his Son --
Outline of his Habits and Character -- His Death --
Significant Newspaper Paragraph -- Letter of Mr. Locker-Lampson --
Robert Browning's Mother -- Her Character and Antecedents --
Their Influence upon her Son -- Nervous Delicacy imparted
to both her Children -- Its special Evidences in her Son.
It was almost a matter of course that Robert Browning's father
should be disinclined for bank work. We are told, and can easily imagine,
that he was not so good an official as the grandfather;
we know that he did not rise so high, nor draw so large a salary.
But he made the best of his position for his family's sake,
and it was at that time both more important