Part 18 (1/2)

Mrs. Browning died at Casa Guidi on June 29, 1861, soon after their return to Florence. She had had a return of the bronchial affection to which she was subject; and a new doctor who was called in discovered grave mischief at the lungs, which she herself had long believed to be existent or impending. But the attack was comparatively, indeed actually, slight; and an extract from her last letter to Miss Browning, dated June 7, confirms what her family and friends have since a.s.serted, that it was the death of Cavour which gave her the final blow.

'... We come home into a cloud here. I can scarcely command voice or hand to name 'Cavour'. That great soul which meditated and made Italy has gone to the diviner Country. If tears or blood could have saved him to us, he should have had mine. I feel yet as if I could scarcely comprehend the greatness of the vacancy. A hundred Garibaldis for such a man!'

Her death was signalized by the appearance--this time, I am told, unexpected--of another brilliant comet, which pa.s.sed so near the earth as to come into contact with it.

Chapter 14

1861-1863

Miss Blagden--Letters from Mr. Browning to Miss Haworth and Mr.

Leighton--His Feeling in regard to Funeral Ceremonies--Establishment in London--Plan of Life--Letter to Madame du Quaire--Miss Arabel Barrett--Biarritz--Letters to Miss Blagden--Conception of 'The Ring and the Book'--Biographical Indiscretion--New Edition of his Works--Mr. and Mrs. Procter.

The friend who was nearest, at all events most helpful, to Mr. Browning in this great and sudden sorrow was Miss Blagden--Isa Blagden, as she was called by all her intimates. Only a pa.s.sing allusion to her could hitherto find place in this fragmentary record of the Poet's life; but the friends.h.i.+p which had long subsisted between her and Mrs. Browning brings her now into closer and more frequent relation to it. She was for many years a centre of English society in Florence; for her genial, hospitable nature, as well as literary tastes (she wrote one or two novels, I believe not without merit), secured her the acquaintance of many interesting persons, some of whom occasionally made her house their home; and the evenings spent with her at her villa on Bellosguardo live pleasantly in the remembrance of those of our older generation who were permitted to share in them.

She carried the boy away from the house of mourning, and induced his father to spend his nights under her roof, while the last painful duties detained him in Florence. He at least gave her cause to deny, what has been so often affirmed, that great griefs are necessarily silent. She always spoke of this period as her 'apocalyptic month', so deeply poetic were the ravings which alternated with the simple human cry of the desolate heart: 'I want her, I want her!' But the ear which received these utterances has long been closed in death. The only written outbursts of Mr. Browning's frantic sorrow were addressed, I believe, to his sister, and to the friend, Madame du Quaire, whose own recent loss most naturally invoked them, and who has since thought best, so far as rested with her, to destroy the letters in which they were contained. It is enough to know by simple statement that he then suffered as he did.

Life conquers Death for most of us; whether or not 'nature, art, and beauty' a.s.sist in the conquest. It was bound to conquer in Mr.

Browning's case: first through his many-sided vitality; and secondly, through the special motive for living and striving which remained to him in his son. This note is struck in two letters which are given me to publish, written about three weeks after Mrs. Browning's death; and we see also that by this time his manhood was reacting against the blow, and bracing itself with such consoling remembrance as the peace and painlessness of his wife's last moments could afford to him.

Florence: July 19, '61.

Dear Leighton,--It is like your old kindness to write to me and to say what you do--I know you feel for me. I can't write about it--but there were many alleviating circ.u.mstances that you shall know one day--there seemed no pain, and (what she would have felt most) the knowledge of separation from us was spared her. I find these things a comfort indeed.

I shall go away from Italy for many a year--to Paris, then London for a day or two just to talk with her sister--but if I can see you it will be a great satisfaction. Don't fancy I am 'prostrated', I have enough to do for the boy and myself in carrying out her wishes. He is better than one would have thought, and behaves dearly to me. Everybody has been very kind.

Tell dear Mrs. Sartoris that I know her heart and thank her with all mine. After my day or two at London I shall go to some quiet place in France to get right again and then stay some time at Paris in order to find out leisurely what it will be best to do for Peni--but eventually I shall go to England, I suppose. I don't mean to live with anybody, even my own family, but to occupy myself thoroughly, seeing dear friends, however, like you. G.o.d bless you. Yours ever affectionately, Robert Browning.

The second is addressed to Miss Haworth.

Florence: July 20, 1861.

My dear Friend,--I well know you feel as you say, for her once and for me now. Isa Blagden, perfect in all kindness to me, will have told you something perhaps--and one day I shall see you and be able to tell you myself as much as I can. The main comfort is that she suffered very little pain, none beside that ordinarily attending the simple attacks of cold and cough she was subject to--had no presentiment of the result whatever, and was consequently spared the misery of knowing she was about to leave us; she was smilingly a.s.suring me she was 'better', 'quite comfortable--if I would but come to bed,' to within a few minutes of the last. I think I foreboded evil at Rome, certainly from the beginning of the week's illness--but when I reasoned about it, there was no justifying fear--she said on the last evening 'it is merely the old attack, not so severe a one as that of two years ago--there is no doubt I shall soon recover,' and we talked over plans for the summer, and next year. I sent the servants away and her maid to bed--so little reason for disquietude did there seem. Through the night she slept heavily, and brokenly--that was the bad sign--but then she would sit up, take her medicine, say unrepeatable things to me and sleep again. At four o'clock there were symptoms that alarmed me, I called the maid and sent for the doctor. She smiled as I proposed to bathe her feet, 'Well, you _are_ determined to make an exaggerated case of it!' Then came what my heart will keep till I see her again and longer--the most perfect expression of her love to me within my whole knowledge of her. Always smilingly, happily, and with a face like a girl's--and in a few minutes she died in my arms; her head on my cheek. These incidents so sustain me that I tell them to her beloved ones as their right: there was no lingering, nor acute pain, nor consciousness of separation, but G.o.d took her to himself as you would lift a sleeping child from a dark, uneasy bed into your arms and the light. Thank G.o.d. Annunziata thought by her earnest ways with me, happy and smiling as they were, that she must have been aware of our parting's approach--but she was quite conscious, had words at command, and yet did not even speak of Peni, who was in the next room. Her last word was when I asked 'How do you feel?'

--'Beautiful.' You know I have her dearest wishes and interests to attend to _at once_--her child to care for, educate, establish properly; and my own life to fulfil as properly,--all just as she would require were she here. I shall leave Italy altogether for years--go to London for a few days' talk with Arabel--then go to my father and begin to try leisurely what will be the best for Peni--but no more 'housekeeping'

for me, even with my family. I shall grow, still, I hope--but my root is taken and remains.

I know you always loved her, and me too in my degree. I shall always be grateful to those who loved her, and that, I repeat, you did.

She was, and is, lamented with extraordinary demonstrations, if one consider it. The Italians seem to have understood her by an instinct.

I have received strange kindness from everybody. Pen is very well--very dear and good, anxious to comfort me as he calls it. He can't know his loss yet. After years, his will be worse than mine--he will want what he never had--that is, for the time when he could be helped by her wisdom, and genius and piety--I _have_ had everything and shall not forget.

G.o.d bless you, dear friend. I believe I shall set out in a week. Isa goes with me--dear, true heart. You, too, would do what you could for us were you here and your a.s.sistance needful. A letter from you came a day or two before the end--she made me enquire about the Frescobaldi Palace for you,--Isa wrote to you in consequence. I shall be heard of at 151, rue de Grenelle St. Germain. Faithfully and affectionately yours, Robert Browning.