Life and Letters of Robert Browning [75]
one's associations when not too strong, and I have arrived
at almost enjoying some things -- the climate, for instance,
which, though pernicious to the general health, agrees particularly with me,
and the sight of the blue sky floating like a sea-tide through the great gaps
and rifts of ruins. . . . We are very comfortably settled in rooms turned
to the sun, and do work and play by turns, having almost too many visitors,
hear excellent music at Mrs. Sartoris's (A. K.) once or twice a week,
and have Fanny Kemble to come and talk to us with the doors shut,
we three together. This is pleasant. I like her decidedly.
`If anybody wants small talk by handfuls, of glittering dust
swept out of salons, here's Mr. Thackeray besides! . . .'
==
==
Rome: March 29.
`. . . We see a good deal of the Kembles here, and like them both,
especially Fanny, who is looking magnificent still, with her black hair
and radiant smile. A very noble creature indeed. Somewhat unelastic,
unpliant to the age, attached to the old modes of thought and convention --
but noble in qualities and defects. I like her much. She thinks me
credulous and full of dreams -- but does not despise me for that reason --
which is good and tolerant of her, and pleasant too, for I should not be
quite easy under her contempt. Mrs. Sartoris is genial and generous --
her milk has had time to stand to cream in her happy family relations,
which poor Fanny Kemble's has not had. Mrs. Sartoris' house
has the best society in Rome -- and exquisite music of course.
We met Lockhart there, and my husband sees a good deal of him --
more than I do -- because of the access of cold weather lately
which has kept me at home chiefly. Robert went down to the seaside,
on a day's excursion with him and the Sartorises -- and I hear
found favour in his sight. Said the critic, "I like Browning --
he isn't at all like a damned literary man." That's a compliment,
I believe, according to your dictionary. It made me laugh
and think of you directly. . . . Robert has been sitting for his picture
to Mr. Fisher, the English artist who painted Mr. Kenyon and Landor.
You remember those pictures in Mr. Kenyon's house in London.
Well, he has painted Robert's, and it is an admirable likeness.
The expression is an exceptional expression, but highly characteristic. . . .'
==
==
May 19.
`. . . To leave Rome will fill me with barbarian complacency.
I don't pretend to have a ray of sentiment about Rome.
It's a palimpsest Rome, a watering-place written over the antique,
and I haven't taken to it as a poet should I suppose.
And let us speak the truth above all things. I am strongly
a creature of association, and the associations of the place
have not been personally favourable to me. Among the rest, my child,
the light of my eyes, has been more unwell than I ever saw him. . . .
The pleasantest days in Rome we have spent with the Kembles, the two sisters,
who are charming and excellent both of them, in different ways,
and certainly they have given us some excellent hours in the Campagna,
upon picnic excursions -- they, and certain of their friends;
for instance, M. Ampere, the member of the French Institute,
who is witty and agreeable, M. Goltz, the Austrian minister,
who is an agreeable man, and Mr. Lyons, the son of Sir Edmund, &c.
The talk was almost too brilliant for the sentiment of the scenery,
but it harmonized entirely with the mayonnaise and champagne. . . .'
==
It must have been on one of the excursions here described that an incident
took place, which Mr. Browning relates with characteristic comments
in a letter to Mrs. Fitz-Gerald, of July 15, 1882. The picnic party
had strolled away to some distant spot. Mrs. Browning was not strong enough
to join them, and her husband, as a matter of course, stayed with her;
which act of consideration prompted Mrs. Kemble to exclaim
that he was the only man she had ever known who behaved like a Christian
to his