Robert Browning - The Complete Works of Robert Browning - Poems, Plays, Letters & Biographies in One Edition

Portrait of Robert Barrett Browning

(“Penini”), as a Child.

Painted at Siena, by Hamilton Wild, 1859.

On the façade of the palace two stately entrances open upon the broad flight of marble steps that lead down to the water, and on the architraves are carved river-gods. In the spacious court was placed his own statue of “Dryope.” Ascending one marble flight of the grand escalier, one entered a lofty apartment whose noble proportions and richness of effect were most impressive. The floor, of red marble, in its rich, Byzantine hue, harmonized with a richly painted ceiling, which was one celebrated in Venetian art. From this vast salon opened, through richly carved doors, a series of rooms, each made vital with the portraits, sketches, busts, and other memorials of the poets. There were Story’s busts of Browning and of his wife; there was Robert Barrett Browning’s bust of his father,—one of the most remarkable among portrait busts in contemporary art; the portraits of Robert and Elizabeth Browning painted by Gordigiani of Rome, about 1855; a lovely pastel of Mrs. Browning when she was a child, representing her as standing in a garden, holding up her apron filled with flowers; there was her little writing-desk, and other intimate personal mementoes about. The immense array of presentation copies from other authors to the poets made an interesting library of themselves, as did the various translations of their own poems into many languages. There was a portrait of Browning painted when a young man, with a troubadour cloak falling over his shoulders; and a most interesting portrait of Milsand, painted by Barrett Browning, as a gift to his father.

There was also a picture of himself as a lad, the “Penini” of Siena days, mounted on his pony, and painted by Hamilton Wild (a Boston artist), in that most picturesque of hill-towns, during one of those summers that the Brownings and the Storys had passed in the haunts of Santa Caterina.

By Mrs. Browning’s little writing tablet was placed the last manuscript she had ever written; and on a table lay a German translation of “Aurora Leigh,” with an inscription of presentation to Browning.

From one of these salons, looking out on the Grand Canal, is an alcove, formerly used as the private chapel of the Rezzonico. It was all white and gold, with a Venetian window draped in the palest green plush, while on either side were placed tall vases encrusted with green. In this alcove Mr. Barrett Browning had caused to be inscribed, in golden letters, surrounded with traceries and arabesques in gold, a copy of the inscription that was composed by the poet, Tommaseo, and placed by the city of Florence on the wall of Casa Guidi, near the grand portal:

qui scrisse e mori

ELISABETTA BARRETT BROWNING

che in cuore di donna conciliava

scienza di dotto e spirito di poeta

e fece del suo verso aureo anello

fra italia e inghilterra

pone questo memoria

firenze grata

1861.

On the first floor was the room in which the poet wrote when the guest of his son in the palace; a sala empaneled with the most exquisite decorated alabaster, panels of which also formed the doors, and opening from this was his sleeping-room, also beautifully decorated.

In one splendid sala , with rich mural decorations, and floor of black Italian marble, were many choice works of art, rare souvenirs, pictures of special claim to interest, wonderful tapestries, and almost, indeed, an embarras de richesse of beauty.

In 1906 Robert Barrett Browning sold the Rezzonico; and now, beside his casa and studios in Asolo, he has one of the old Medici villas, near Florence,—“La Torre all’ Antella,” with a lofty tower, from which the view is one of the most commanding and fascinating in all Tuscany. The panorama includes all Florence, with her domes and campanile and towers; and the Fiesolean hills, with the old town picturesquely revealed among the trees and against the background of sky, and with numerous other villages and hamlets, and a mountain panorama of changing color always before the eye. Mr. Browning is one of the choicest of spirits, with all that culture and beauty of spiritual life that characterized his parents. He is a great linguist, and is one of the most interesting of men. No one knew his father, in that wonderful inner way, as did his son. He was twelve years old at the time of his mother’s death, and from that period he was the almost constant companion of his father, until Browning’s death, twenty-eight years later. Robert Barrett Browning has also purchased the massive Casa Guidi, thus fitly becoming the owner of the palace in which he was born, and that is forever enshrined in literary history and poetic romance. It is, also, one of those poetic sequences of life, that Casa Guidi and Palazzo Peruzzi, near each other, in the Via Maggiore in Florence, are respectively owned by Mr. Browning and the Marchesa Peruzzi di’ Medici, under which stately title Mr. Story’s daughter Edith, the childhood friend and companion of “Penini,” is now known.

After the return to London of Browning and his sister Sarianna, from St. Moritz, his constant letters to Mrs. Bronson again take up the story of a poet’s days.

In the early winter he thus writes to his cherished friend—the date being December 4, 1887:

“Now let us shut the gondola glasses (I forget the technical word) and Talk, dear Friend! Here are your dear labors of love,—the letters and enclosures, and here is my first day of leisure this long fortnight, for, would you believe it? I have been silly enough to sit every morning for three hours to one painter, who took an additional two hours yesterday, in order to get done; before which exercise of patience I had to sit to another gentleman, who will summon me again in due time,—all this since my return from Venice and the youthful five ! However, when, two days ago, there was yet another application to sit, the bear within the ‘lion’ came out, and I declined, as little gruffly as I was able. And so the end is I can talk and enjoy myself—even at a distance—with a friend as suddenly dear as all hands from the clouds must needs be. I will not try and thank you for what you know I so gratefully have accepted,—and shall keep forever, I trust.

“Well, here is the Duke’s letter; he is a man of few words, and less protestation; but feels, as he should, your kindness, and will gladly acknowledge it, should you come to England, and it seems that you may. But what will Venice be without you next year, if we return there as we hope to do?

“... Mrs. Bloomfield Moore passed through London some three weeks ago, and at once wrote to me about what pictures of Robert’s might be visible? She at once bought the huge ‘Delivery to the Secular Arm,’ for the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts, and the ‘Dinard Market Woman’ for herself, and this so spontaneously, and I did hear in a day or two that she was convinced I had not asked half enough for the pictures! She had inquired at the Gallery where the larger one was exhibited, and they estimated its value at so much. I told her their estimate was not mine, and that Robert was thoroughly remunerated—to say nothing of what he would think of all this graciousness; and since her departure I have had an extremely gratifying letter full of satisfaction at her purchases,...”

On the death of Lord Houghton, Mr. Browning had been prevailed upon to accept the office of Foreign Correspondent to the Royal Academy; he was much beloved by the Academicians, many of whom were among his familiar friends, and that his son was an artist endeared to him all art.