Miss Leigh's notions of female education | Upon his own head in strong martyrdom, differed widely from her brother's. She In order to light men a moment's space. seems to have thought both love and grief But stay!-who judges?-who distinguishes? were weeds or flowers that need no cultivat- Twixt Saul and Nahash justly, at first sight, And leaves King Saul precisely at the sin, ing, but spring up readily enough in every To serve King David? Who discerns at once woman's heart. Here is Aurora's English The sound of the trumpets, when the trumpets school programme, which, with many hundreds of lines like them, have certainly no right to be called verse:

And various popular synopses of
Inhuman doctrines never taught by John,
Because she liked instructed piety.
I learnt my complement of classic French
(Kept pure of Balzac and neologism),
And German also, since she liked a range
Of liberal education,-tongues, not books.
I learnt a little algebra, a little

Of the mathematics; brushed with extreme
flounce

The circle of the sciences, because

She misliked women who were frivolous.

I learnt the royal geneaologies
Of Oviedo, the internal laws

Of the Burmese empire, by how many feet
Mount Chimborazo outsoars Himmeleh,
What navigable river joins itself

To Lara, and what census of the year five
Was taken at Klagenfurt."

Aurora had a cousin, Romney Leigh, the owner of the family estate, Leigh Hall. The

blow

For Alaric as well as Charlemagne?
Who judges prophets, and can tell true seers
From conjurors?"

The delineation of her mind at this period gives occasion to the following remarkable passage:

"The cygnet finds the water, but the man
Is born in ignorance of his element,
And feels out blind at first, disorganized
By sin i' the blood, his spirit-insight dull'd
And crossed by his sensations. Presently
We feel it quicken in the dark sometimes;
Then mark, be reverent, be obedient-
For those dumb motions of imperfect life
Are oracles of vital Deity

Attesting the Hereafter. Let who says
'The soul's a clean white paper,' rather say,
A palimpsest, a prophet's holograph
Defiled, erased and covered by a monk's,-
The Apocalypse, by a Longus! poring on
With obscene text, we may discern perhaps
Some fair, fine trace of what was written once,
Some upstroke of an alpha and omega
Expressing the old scripture."

From reading poetry, she became a writer two children saw much of each other, but of it, and gives us scores of pages of "her were of dispositions and tastes so opposite, highest convictions upon art," all more or that their intercourse consisted chiefly of less acute, and worth considering, but which disputes. As they grew up they diverged would be more in place in a review than an further from one another. Romney became epic. The development of her powers as a philanthropic socialist, bent on utilitarian a poetess is elaborately depicted; but as plans of action, and pondering on the dregs Mrs. Browning is herself almost the only of humanity; while Aurora grew into a modern example of such development, the poetess, for ever musing on the ideal and story is uninteresting from its very singubeautiful. She discovered, in an attic, piles larity. of books marked with her father's name, and from this sanctuary would steal spiritual food, unknown to her aunt. She read "books good and bad;" and makes the following admirable remarks upon the perils of such a course of study

Aurora wrote and read on in secret, her aunt only half suspecting this development, of which she would have disapproved with all her might.

"She said sometimes, Aurora, have you done
Your task this morning-have you read that
book,

And are you ready for the crochet here?'
As if she said, I know there's something wrong;
I know I have not ground you down enough
To flatten and bake you to a wholesome crust
For household uses and proprieties."

The poetess did her work meekly, her "soul singing at a work apart," and all went on without let or hindrance, till one June morning, when Aurora arose upon her twentieth birthday. She got up early, and left the house, brushing a green track along the grass," and finding that the world would

not, or rather could not, crown her, seeing man's; that poetry, unless of the very best, that she was a poetess only in secret, she is frivolous work; that there is earnest work took a sudden fancy to crown herself; and to do, for him to do, and for her to do, if after hesitating between bay, myrtle, ver- she will become his helper and his wife. bena, and guelder roses, she turned to a wreath of ivy, and twisted it round her head. At this moment she beheld her cousin beside her,

"You will not compass your poor ends
Of barley feeding and material ease
Without the Poet's individualism
To work your universal. It takes a soul
To move a body,—it takes a high-souled man
To move the masses-even to a cleaner stye:
It takes the ideal, to blow an inch inside

The young poetess, indignant at being sought as a mere helpmate, refuses the offer. Her aunt, on hearing of Romney's offer and rejection, expresses great grief, and tells Aurora that she will inherit no money, all her father's and all her aunt's being settled on Romney, by a clause in a former deed, excluding offspring by a foreign wife. She told her further, that Romney's father had wished that the cousins should marry, in order to repair this injustice, and that her wish, all of which strengthened Aurora in own father had known and approved the

her determination to adhere to her refusal.

Soon after this, the aunt was found dead by her bedside, with an unopened letter in her hand. On the reading of the will, it was found that she had left Aurora three hundred pounds, "and all other monies of which she died possessed." Romney, who, as heir, attended the funeral, told Aurora that the

The dust of the actual: and your Fouriers failed, old lady died possessed of £30,000, of which

Because not poets enough to understand
That life develops from within."

no mention was made in the will; but Aurora, suspecting that her cousin was by

And, as she eloquently says, in another some means bestowing upon
place:-

"the thrushes sang
And shook my pulses and the elm's new leaves,
And then I turned, and held my finger up,
And bade him mark, that howsoe'er the world
Went ill, as he related, certainly

The thrushes still sang in it.—At which word
His brow would soften,-and he bore with me
In melancholy patience, not unkind,
While breaking into voluble ecstacy,
I flattered all the beauteous country round,
As poet's use... the skies, the clouds, the fields,
The happy violets, hiding from the roads.
The primroses run down to, carrying gold,—
The tangled hedgerows, where the cows push out
Their tolerant horns, and patient churning mouths
"Twixt dripping ash boughs,-hedgerows all alive,
With birds, and gnats, and large white butterflies,
Which look as if the May-flower had caught life
And palpitated forth upon the wind,-
Hills, vales, woods, netted in a silver mist;
Farms, granges doubled up among the hills,
And cattle grazing in the watered vales,
And cottage chimneys smoking from the woods,
And cottage gardens smelling everywhere,
Confused with smell of orchards. See,' I said,
And see, is God not with us on the earth?
And shall we put Him down by aught we do?
Who says there's nothing for the poor and vile,
Save poverty and wickedness? behold!'
And ankle-deep in English grass I leaped,
And clapped my hands, and called all very fair."

her this money, insisted on seeing deeds to prove her aunt's possession of it. A little inquiry showed aunt, and that the unopened letter found in that Romney had presented this sum to his her hand, contained the deed of gift, which, though made, had never been accepted. Aurora tore the deed in shreds and went to lodgings in London.

Seven years later, we find her an established authoress, with piles of literary letters; solitary and poor, hard-worked, but uncomplaining. One day a stranger enters, and announces herself as Lady Waldemar. With little prelude, she declared herself to be a widow, and in love with Romney Leigh. She told Aurora that her cousin was on the point of espousing a beggar's daughter from St. Giles's, and asked her help in breaking off, or at any rate, postponing the marriage. Aurora ascertained that Lady Waldemar was commissioned by Romney to tell her the news, and introduce her to his bride-elect, and to get her countenance to the marriage, which marriage Lady Waldemar to him appeared to approve and promote. She would have nothing to say to this double dealing on the part of Lady Waldemar, to whom she plainly says as much, in not very courteous terms. Aurora then hastened to St. Margaret's Court, The burden of Romney's argument was, to see the woman whom her cousin was to that women write at best but such poetry as marry. "An ineffable face" met her on the gains for highest eulogy, comparison to a threshold of a wretched room, and being

soon assured by Aurora's friendly manner, | The marriage-day arrived, and its owner, Marian Erle, told her story.

She was the daughter of a drunken poaching tramper, who beat her mother, her mother turning in anger to beat her:

"Her first cry in our strange and strangling air, When cast in spasms out from the shuddering womb,

Was wrong against the social code, forced

"Half St. Giles in frieze

Was bidden to meet St. James in cloth of gold ;
And, after contract at the altar, pass
To eat a marriage-feast on Hampstead Heath."

The congregation assembled early, and chatted long, expecting the bride, but she came not; and at the last moment, a letter is delivered to Romney in Marian's hand. In this letter, Marian states her conviction that she best shows her love to Romney by saving him the unhappiness that must follow a union with her:

She grew up neglected and ill-used, till some ladies got her to a Sunday-school. There she learned to read and write, also to understand the wickedness of her parents, but little else. She found, however, a more profitable school in "Heaven's high blue," which she would steal away to gaze at; and in sundry fragments of the English poets which chanced to come into her hands: thus, we are to suppose, she learned the high whom Romney loves: code of morality and virtue which she after

"It would be dreadful for a friend of yours To see all England thrust you out of doors, And mock you from the windows."

She hints at there being some one else

house,

"You might say,

I miss and love still! Dreadful!"

She then goes on to say she shall go
where no one can find her :-
«I never could be happy as your wife,—.

I never could be harmless as your friend:
I never will look more into your face
Till God says 'Look.'-I charge you seek me
not,

wards adhered to, for no one taught or spoke Or think, (that worse,) 'There's some one in the to her but her brutish parents, and the unprofitable Sunday teacher. When she reached early womanhood, her mother attempted to betray her to a drunken squire, from whom she fled in terror. Swooning, she was picked up and taken to an hospital. She had a long illness, and it was on her recovery that she first saw Romney Leigh, who was visiting the sick people, and on hearing that she was about to leave, inquired what her future plans were, and by degrees. learned her history. "He sent her to a famous sempstress house far off in London," and there she worked well till one of her companions fell sick. Marian then left the house to nurse her, and after the death of the girl, stayed to watch and nurse the crazy ney, it was still more so to the congregated Inexplicable as the mystery was to Rommother, who was now alone. Romney hundreds of St. Giles's who did not read the found her at this work. "He was not angry letter, and were too much exasperated at that she had left the house wherein he their missed triumph to listen to Romney, placed her." "He did not say 'twas well, yet Marian thought he did not take it ill," and on the day her last patient died, Romney asked her to be his helpmate and

wife.

Nor vex yourself with lamentable thoughts
That, peradventure, I am come to grief:
Be sure I'm well, I'm merry, I'm at ease!
But such a long way, long way, long way off,
I think you'll find me sooner in my grave."

who wished to address them. "Pull him down, strike him, kill him!" was called out from the crowd, some of whom suggested foul play on the part of the bridegroom; that the church could be cleared and order and it was not till the police were called in, restored.

but could find no trace of her. He then left Romney made long search for Marian, London, and Aurora again lost sight of him. On his return to the country, Romney be came more than ever engrossed in his schemes of philanthropy. He turned his family seat into a Phalanstery, and devoted himself to the reformation of the thieves and poachers, who took up their abode. there.

Aurora now wrote a great poem, in

Open mouth,

which, after long feeling dissatisfied with her productions, she at last had a consciousness And such a noise will follow, the last trump's of having in some degree conveyed in words, Will scarcely seem more dreadful, even to her. the things she had thought and felt. She These letters sent, Aurora proceeded with went soon after to a party, and refused an offer from a man of birth and fortune, and Marian and her child to Florence. A letter from a friend tells her that her poem has heard that Romney was engaged to Lady Waldemar. Almost immediately after this, won all suffrages, and is doing the work of she left her new poem with a publisher, and an evangelist; and then speaks of Romney in words which Aurora misunderstands into set out for Florence. On her way, Aurora was detained a few conveying news of his marriage with Lady days in Paris; and walking one day in the Waldemar. The natural effect of the first flower market, she met Marian Erle. Ma- news is counterbalanced by the second, and rian has a child, and would gladly avoid Aurora sinks into a state of melancholy, Aurora, but Aurora persists in going to her which lasts till the concluding scene. home, and succeeds at last in learning the ting alone in the garden, she sees Romney On looking up one evening, as she is sitmystery of Marian's flight and present standing before her. By this time, it is clear to every one but Aurora herself, and perhaps to her, that she loves him deeply. She is too much agitated to notice, either down, that he is blind. Romney believes from his manner of greeting her or sitting that she has heard of his misfortune, for it was indeed an allusion to it that she had misunderstood for a notice of his marriage; they, therefore, talk for some time at cross purposes. Romney, however, says one thing in a straightforward way :-

condition.

"I have read your book,

*

*

*

*

Lady Waldemar had been often to her, and had contrived to make her believe that misery would follow her marriage with Romney; that Romney had loved her, Lady Waldemar, and she him; that his offer to Marian was prompted by principle only, and would be followed up in a spirit of mar tyrdom. Lady Waldemar then offered to send her in the charge of a respectable person, who had formerly been her maid, to Australia. Marian gladly accepted the offer, and went with the woman, who, instead of taking her to Australia, had brought her to an infamous house in Paris, where drugs and force were used to accomplish her ruin. She had fled from this place in delirium, was taken in by a farmer's wife; obtained employment, but lost it on its appearing that she was about to become a mother; and refers to their old argument on Aurora's and had, since then, supported herself and birthday, confessing himself a convert to all her child, now a year old, by needlework. she then urged. He also tells her of the Aurora took both mother and child to her failure of his labours at Leigh Hall, where own home; and, after long debate, wrote the people had risen up and burnt the old . two letters, one to a mutual friend of her's house to the ground; of an illness which had and Romney's, telling him all, and asking attacked him afterwards; and speaks so him only to communicate this story to her plainly, in the course of his narrative, of his cousin should he not be married to Lady unchanged love to Aurora, that she, believWaldemar; and the other to that lady, re-ing him to be the husband of another woman, proaching her for having

The book is in my heart;
Lives in me, wakes in me, and dreams with me:
Which has no smack of it, I pour it out;
My daily bread tastes of it, and my wine
It seems unnatural drinking,"

rebukes him. All this misunderstanding
and beating about the bush, is tedious,
though it gives occasion to a magnificent
simile-Aurora, bidding her cousin look at
the stars,-

"I signed above, where all the stars were out,
As if an urgent heat had started there
A secret writing from a sombre page,
A blank last moment, crowded suddenly
With hurrying splendours."

The éclaircissement comes at last. Aurora,
mentioning Lady Waldemar as her cousin's
wife;-

"Are ye mad? He echoed-Wife! mine! Lady Waldemar!'"

and this half of the mistake is rectified; and | This is all Marian required. She would Romney gives a letter from Lady Walde- fain have her own consciousness of innocence mar to Aurora, in which that lady repudi- ratified by such proof from the man she ates the charge of having sent Marian "to a wicked house in France." She explains that Marian's conductor was an old servant who had lived "five months" in her house, and had money for the voyage to Australia, the embezzlement of which had probably tempted her to stop short on the way. Having finished the letter, which related also how all was broken off between Romney and its writer, Aurora exclaims,—

"Ah, not married!

'You mistake,' he said, 'I'm married,—Is not Marian Erle my wife? As God sees things, I have a wife and child; And I, as I'm a man who honours God, Am here to claim them as my wife and child.'

"I felt it hard to breathe, much less to speak. Nor word of mine was needed. Some one else Was there for answering. 'Romney,' she began,

'My great good angel, Romney."

Then at first

I knew that Marian Erle was beautiful.
She stood there still and pallid as a saint,
Dilated like a saint in ecstacy,
As if the floating moonshine interposed
Betwixt her foot and the earth, and raised her

up,

To float upon it. I had left my child,
Who sleeps,' she said, 'and having drawn this

way

I heard you speaking... friend, confirm me

now.

You take this Marian, such as wicked men
Have made her, for your honourable wife?'

The thrilling, solemn, proud, pathetic voice! He stretched his arms out towards the thrilling voice,

As if to draw it on to his embrace.

'I take her as God made her, and as men

Must fail to unmake her, for my honoured wife.'

"She never raised her eyes nor took a step,

most revered; but sorrow has driven love from her heart; she cannot re-awaken in herself an interest for any but her child; she gratefully but firmly refuses to marry Romney, who believing his love to Aurora unreturned, is taking his leave, when on her alluding again to the stars, he tells her of his blindness, and relates how the illness which produced it, was caused by an assault from Marian Erle's father, whom Romney had endeavoured to save from justice, at the time of the riots at Leigh Hall: he then again says farewell, but is stopped by Aurora, who confesses her love to him and so the story ends-considerably to the vexation, we should think, of those readers, who may be such thorough-going haters of “ conventions" as to wish to have had Romney actually married to Marian Earle.

The command of imagery shown by Mrs. Browning, in this poem, is really surprising, even in this day when every poetaster seems to be endowed with a more or less startling amount of that power; but Mrs. Browning seldom goes out of her way for an image, as nearly all our other versifiers are in the habit of doing continually. There is a vital continuity, through the whole of this immensely long work, which is thus remarkably, and most favourably distinguished from the sand-weaving of so many of her contemporaries. The earnestness of the authoress is, also, plainly, without affectation, and her enthusiasm for truth and beauty, as she appre hends them, unbounded. A work upon such a scale, and with such a scope, had it been faultless, would have been the greatest work of the age; but unhappily there are faults, and very serious ones, over and above those which we have already hinted. The poem has evidently been written in a very small proportion of the time which a work so very

But stood there in her place and spoke again-ambitiously conceived ought to have taken. You take this Marian's child which is her shame,

The language which in passionate scenes is
simple and real, in other parts becomes very
turgid and unpoetical; for example :—

"What if even God
Were chiefly God by working out himself
To an individualism of the Infinite,
Eterne, intense, profuse, still throwing up
The golden spray of multitudinous worlds
In measure to the proclive weight and rush
Of his inner nature, the spontaneous love
Still proof and outflow of spontaneous life?"

Or, in a different style, the style, unfortu nately, of hundreds of lines :

"In those days, though, I never analyzed
Myself even all analysis comes late."