Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series

by Robert Browning

  They did not linger on their way to Asolo and Venice, except for a night’s rest on the Lake of Como and two days at Verona. In their successive journeys through Northern Italy they visited by degrees all its notable cities, and it would be easy to recall, in order and detail, most of these yearly expeditions. But the account of them would chiefly resolve itself into a list of names and dates; for Mr. Browning had seldom a new impression to receive, even from localities which he had not seen before. I know that he and his sister were deeply struck by the deserted grandeurs of Ravenna; and that it stirred in both of them a memorable sensation to wander as they did for a whole day through the pinewoods consecrated by Dante. I am nevertheless not sure that when they performed the repeated round of picture-galleries and palaces, they were not sometimes simply paying their debt to opportunity, and as much for each other’s sake as for their own. Where all was Italy, there was little to gain or lose in one memorial of greatness, one object of beauty, visited or left unseen. But in Asolo, even in Venice, Mr. Browning was seeking something more: the remembrance of his own actual and poetic youth. How far he found it in the former place we may infer from a letter to Mrs. Fitz-Gerald.

  Sept. 28, 1878.

  And from ‘Asolo’, at last, dear friend! So can dreams come false. — S., who has been writing at the opposite side of the table, has told you about our journey and adventures, such as they were: but she cannot tell you the feelings with which I revisit this — to me — memorable place after above forty years’ absence, — such things have begun and ended with me in the interval! It was too strange when we reached the ruined tower on the hill-top yesterday, and I said ‘Let me try if the echo still exists which I discovered here,’ (you can produce it from only one particular spot on a remainder of brickwork — ) and thereupon it answered me plainly as ever, after all the silence: for some children from the adjoining ‘podere’, happening to be outside, heard my voice and its result — and began trying to perform the feat — calling ‘Yes, yes’ — all in vain: so, perhaps, the mighty secret will die with me! We shall probably stay here a day or two longer, — the air is so pure, the country so attractive: but we must go soon to Venice, stay our allotted time there, and then go homeward: you will of course address letters to Venice, not this place: it is a pleasure I promise myself that, on arriving I shall certainly hear you speak in a letter which I count upon finding.

  The old inn here, to which I would fain have betaken myself, is gone — levelled to the ground: I remember it was much damaged by a recent earthquake, and the cracks and chasms may have threatened a downfall. This Stella d’Oro is, however, much such an unperverted ‘locanda’ as its predecessor — primitive indeed are the arrangements and unsophisticate the ways: but there is cleanliness, abundance of goodwill, and the sweet Italian smile at every mistake: we get on excellently. To be sure never was such a perfect fellow-traveller, for my purposes, as S., so that I have no subject of concern — if things suit me they suit her — and vice-versa. I daresay she will have told you how we trudged together, this morning to Possagno — through a lovely country: how we saw all the wonders — and a wonder of detestability is the paint-performance of the great man! — and how, on our return, we found the little town enjoying high market day, and its privilege of roaring and screaming over a bargain. It confuses me altogether, — but at Venice I may write more comfortably. You will till then, Dear Friend, remember me ever as yours affectionately, Robert Browning.

  If the tone of this does not express disappointment, it has none of the rapture which his last visit was to inspire. The charm which forty years of remembrance had cast around the little city on the hill was dispelled for, at all events, the time being. The hot weather and dust-covered landscape, with the more than primitive accommodation of which he spoke in a letter to another friend, may have contributed something to this result.

  At Venice the travellers fared better in some essential respects. A London acquaintance, who passed them on their way to Italy, had recommended a cool and quiet hotel there, the Albergo dell’ Universo. The house, Palazzo Brandolin-Rota, was situated on the shady side of the Grand Canal, just below the Accademia and the Suspension Bridge. The open stretches of the Giudecca lay not far behind; and a scrap of garden and a clean and open little street made pleasant the approach from back and side. It accommodated few persons in proportion to its size, and fewer still took up their abode there; for it was managed by a lady of good birth and fallen fortunes whose home and patrimony it had been; and her husband, a retired Austrian officer, and two grown-up daughters did not lighten her task. Every year the fortunes sank lower; the upper storey of the house was already falling into decay, and the fine old furniture passing into the brokers’ or private buyers’ hands. It still, however, afforded sufficiently comfortable, and, by reason of its very drawbacks, desirable quarters to Mr. Browning. It perhaps turned the scale in favour of his return to Venice; for the lady whose hospitality he was to enjoy there was as yet unknown to him; and nothing would have induced him to enter, with his eyes open, one of the English-haunted hotels, in which acquaintance, old and new, would daily greet him in the public rooms or jostle him in the corridors.

  He and his sister remained at the Universo for a fortnight; their programme did not this year include a longer stay; but it gave them time to decide that no place could better suit them for an autumn holiday than Venice, or better lend itself to a preparatory sojourn among the Alps; and the plan of their next, and, though they did not know it, many a following summer, was thus sketched out before the homeward journey had begun.

  Mr. Browning did not forget his work, even while resting from it; if indeed he did rest entirely on this occasion. He consulted a Russian lady whom he met at the hotel, on the names he was introducing in ‘Ivan Ivanovitch’. It would be interesting to know what suggestions or corrections she made, and how far they adapted themselves to the rhythm already established, or compelled changes in it; but the one alternative would as little have troubled him as the other. Mrs. Browning told Mr. Prinsep that her husband could never alter the wording of a poem without rewriting it, indeed, practically converting it into another; though he more than once tried to do so at her instigation. But to the end of his life he could at any moment recast a line or passage for the sake of greater correctness, and leave all that was essential in it untouched.

  Seven times more in the eleven years which remained to him, Mr. Browning spent the autumn in Venice. Once also, in 1882, he had proceeded towards it as far as Verona, when the floods which marked the autumn of that year arrested his farther course. Each time he had halted first in some more or less elevated spot, generally suggested by his French friend, Monsieur Dourlans, himself an inveterate wanderer, whose inclinations also tempted him off the beaten track. The places he most enjoyed were Saint-Pierre la Chartreuse, and Gressoney Saint-Jean, where he stayed respectively in 1881 and 1882, 1883 and 1885. Both of these had the drawbacks, and what might easily have been the dangers, of remoteness from the civilized world. But this weighed with him so little, that he remained there in each case till the weather had broken, though there was no sheltered conveyance in which he and his sister could travel down; and on the later occasions at least, circumstances might easily have combined to prevent their departure for an indefinite time. He became, indeed, so attached to Gressoney, with its beautiful outlook upon Monte Rosa, that nothing I believe would have hindered his returning, or at least contemplating a return to it, but the great fatigue to his sister of the mule ride up the mountain, by a path which made walking, wherever possible, the easier course. They did walk down it in the early October of 1885, and completed the hard seven hours’ trudge to San Martino d’Aosta, without an atom of refreshment or a minute’s rest.

  One of the great attractions of Saint-Pierre was the vicinity of the Grande Chartreuse, to which Mr. Browning made frequent expeditions, staying there through the night in order to hear the midnight mass. Miss Browning also once attempted the visit, but was not allow
ed to enter the monastery. She slept in the adjoining convent.

  The brother and sister were again at the Universo in 1879, 1880, and 1881; but the crash was rapidly approaching, and soon afterwards it came. The old Palazzo passed into other hands, and after a short period of private ownership was consigned to the purposes of an Art Gallery.

  In 1880, however, they had been introduced by Mrs. Story to an American resident, Mrs. Arthur Bronson, and entered into most friendly relations with her; and when, after a year’s interval, they were again contemplating an autumn in Venice, she placed at their disposal a suite of rooms in the Palazzo Giustiniani Recanati, which formed a supplement to her own house — making the offer with a kindly urgency which forbade all thought of declining it. They inhabited these for a second time in 1885, keeping house for themselves in the simple but comfortable foreign manner they both so well enjoyed, only dining and spending the evening with their friend. But when, in 1888, they were going, as they thought, to repeat the arrangement, they found, to their surprise, a little apartment prepared for them under Mrs. Bronson’s own roof. This act of hospitality involved a special kindness on her part, of which Mr. Browning only became aware at the close of a prolonged stay; and a sense of increased gratitude added itself to the affectionate regard with which his hostess had already inspired both his sister and him. So far as he is concerned, the fact need only be indicated. It is fully expressed in the preface to ‘Asolando’.

  During the first and fresher period of Mr. Browning’s visits to Venice, he found a passing attraction in its society. It held an historical element which harmonized well with the decayed magnificence of the city, its old-world repose, and the comparatively simple modes of intercourse still prevailing there. Mrs. Bronson’s ‘salon’ was hospitably open whenever her health allowed; but her natural refinement, and the conservatism which so strongly marks the higher class of Americans, preserved it from the heterogeneous character which Anglo-foreign sociability so often assumes. Very interesting, even important names lent their prestige to her circle; and those of Don Carlos and his family, of Prince and Princess Iturbide, of Prince and Princess Metternich, and of Princess Montenegro, were on the list of her ‘habitues’, and, in the case of the royal Spaniards, of her friends. It need hardly be said that the great English poet, with his fast spreading reputation and his infinite social charm, was kindly welcomed and warmly appreciated amongst them.

  English and American acquaintances also congregated in Venice, or passed through it from London, Florence, and Rome. Those resident in Italy could make their visits coincide with those of Mr. Browning and his sister, or undertake the journey for the sake of seeing them; while the outward conditions of life were such as to render friendly intercourse more satisfactory, and common social civilities less irksome than they could be at home. Mr. Browning was, however, already too advanced in years, too familiar with everything which the world can give, to be long affected by the novelty of these experiences. It was inevitable that the need of rest, though often for the moment forgotten, should assert itself more and more. He gradually declined on the society of a small number of resident or semi-resident friends; and, due exception being made for the hospitalities of his temporary home, became indebted to the kindness of Sir Henry and Lady Layard, of Mr. and Mrs. Curtis of Palazzo Barbaro, and of Mr. and Mrs. Frederic Eden, for most of the social pleasure and comfort of his later residences in Venice.

  Part of a letter to Mrs. Fitz-Gerald gives an insight into the character of his life there: all the stronger that it was written under a temporary depression which it partly serves to explain.

  Albergo dell’ Universo, Venezia, Italia: Sept. 24, ‘81.

  ‘Dear Friend, — On arriving here I found your letter to my great satisfaction — and yesterday brought the ‘Saturday Review’ — for which, many thanks.

  ‘We left our strange but lovely place on the 18th, reaching Chambery at evening, — stayed the next day there, — walking, among other diversions to “Les Charmettes”, the famous abode of Rousseau — kept much as when he left it: I visited it with my wife perhaps twenty-five years ago, and played so much of “Rousseau’s Dream” as could be effected on his antique harpsichord: this time I attempted the same feat, but only two notes or thereabouts out of the octave would answer the touch. Next morning we proceeded to Turin, and on Wednesday got here, in the middle of the last night of the Congress Carnival — rowing up the Canal to our Albergo through a dazzling blaze of lights and throng of boats, — there being, if we are told truly, 50,000 strangers in the city. Rooms had been secured for us, however: and the festivities are at an end, to my great joy, — for Venice is resuming its old quiet aspect — the only one I value at all. Our American friends wanted to take us in their gondola to see the principal illuminations after the “Serenade”, which was not over before midnight — but I was contented with that — being tired and indisposed for talking, and, having seen and heard quite enough from our own balcony, went to bed: S. having betaken her to her own room long before.

  ‘Next day we took stock of our acquaintances, — found that the Storys, on whom we had counted for company, were at Vallombrosa, though the two sons have a studio here — other friends are in sufficient number however — and last evening we began our visits by a very classical one — to the Countess Mocenigo, in her palace which Byron occupied: she is a charming widow since two years, — young, pretty and of the prettiest manners: she showed us all the rooms Byron had lived in, — and I wrote my name in her album on the desk himself wrote the last canto of ‘Ch. Harold’ and ‘Beppo’ upon. There was a small party: we were taken and introduced by the Layards who are kind as ever, and I met old friends — Lord Aberdare, Charles Bowen, and others. While I write comes a deliciously fresh ‘bouquet’ from Mrs. Bronson, an American lady, — in short we shall find a week or two amusing enough; though — where are the pinewoods, mountains and torrents, and wonderful air? Venice is under a cloud, — dull and threatening, — though we were apprehensive of heat, arriving, as we did, ten days earlier than last year. . . .’

  The evening’s programme was occasionally varied by a visit to one of the theatres. The plays given were chiefly in the Venetian dialect, and needed previous study for their enjoyment; but Mr. Browning assisted at one musical performance which strongly appealed to his historical and artistic sensibilities: that of the ‘Barbiere’ of Paisiello in the Rossini theatre and in the presence of Wagner, which took place in the autumn of 1880.

  Although the manner of his sojourn in the Italian city placed all the resources of resident life at his command, Mr. Browning never abjured the active habits of the English traveller. He daily walked with his sister, as he did in the mountains, for walking’s sake, as well as for the delight of what his expeditions showed him; and the facilities which they supplied for this healthful pleasurable exercise were to his mind one of the great merits of his autumn residences in Italy. He explored Venice in all directions, and learned to know its many points of beauty and interest, as those cannot who believe it is only to be seen from a gondola; and when he had visited its every corner, he fell back on a favourite stroll along the Riva to the public garden and back again; never failing to leave the house at about the same hour of the day. Later still, when a friend’s gondola was always at hand, and air and sunshine were the one thing needful, he would be carried to the Lido, and take a long stretch on its farther shore.

  The letter to Mrs. Fitz-Gerald, from which I have already quoted, concludes with the account of a tragic occurrence which took place at Saint-Pierre just before his departure, and in which Mr. Browning’s intuitions had played a striking part.

  ‘And what do you think befell us in this abode of peace and innocence? Our journey was delayed for three hours in consequence of the one mule of the village being requisitioned by the ‘Juge d’Instruction’ from Grenoble, come to enquire into a murder committed two days before. My sister and I used once a day to walk for a couple of hours up a mountain-road of the most lovel
y description, and stop at the summit whence we looked down upon the minute hamlet of St.-Pierre d’Entremont, — even more secluded than our own: then we got back to our own aforesaid. And in this Paradisial place, they found, yesterday week, a murdered man — frightfully mutilated — who had been caught apparently in the act of stealing potatoes in a field: such a crime had never occurred in the memory of the oldest of our folk. Who was the murderer is the mystery — whether the field’s owner — in his irritation at discovering the robber, — or one of a band of similar ‘charbonniers’ (for they suppose the man to be a Piedmontese of that occupation) remains to be proved: they began by imprisoning the owner, who denies his guilt energetically. Now the odd thing is, that, either the day of, or after the murder, — as I and S. were looking at the utter solitude, I had the fancy “What should I do if I suddenly came upon a dead body in this field? Go and proclaim it — and subject myself to all the vexations inflicted by the French way of procedure (which begins by assuming that you may be the criminal) — or neglect an obvious duty, and return silently.” I, of course, saw that the former was the only proper course, whatever the annoyance involved. And, all the while, there was just about to be the very same incident for the trouble of somebody.’

  Here the account breaks off; but writing again from the same place, August 16, 1882, he takes up the suspended narrative with this question:

  ‘Did I tell you of what happened to me on the last day of my stay here last year?’ And after repeating the main facts continues as follows:

  ‘This morning, in the course of my walk, I entered into conversation with two persons of whom I made enquiry myself. They said the accused man, a simple person, had been locked up in a high chamber, — protesting his innocence strongly, — and troubled in his mind by the affair altogether and the turn it was taking, had profited by the gendarme’s negligence, and thrown himself out of the window — and so died, continuing to the last to protest as before. My presentiment of what such a person might have to undergo was justified you see — though I should not in any case have taken that way of getting out of the difficulty. The man added, “it was not he who committed the murder, but the companions of the man, an Italian charcoal-burner, who owed him a grudge, killed him, and dragged him to the field — filling his sack with potatoes as if stolen, to give a likelihood that the field’s owner had caught him stealing and killed him, — so M. Perrier the greffier told me.” Enough of this grim story.