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1868 was produced the most elaborate of all his works, 'The Ring and the Book,' an Italian story of the seventeenth century concerning certain assassins

Put to death

By heading or hanging, as befitted ranks,
At Rome on February twenty-two,
Since our salvation sixteen ninety eight.

The latest works of Mr. Browning are Balaustion's Adventure, including a Transcript from Euripides,' (1871)-which is another recital of the story of Alcestes, supposed to be told by a Greek girl who had witnessed the performance; Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society' (1871); a name under which is thinly vailed the name of Louis Napoleon; Fifine at the Fair' (1872); 'Red Cotton Night-cap Country' (1873); and Aristophane's Apology, including a Transcript from Euripides, being the last Adventure of Balaustion' (1875). Aristophanes

Splendour of wit that springs a thunder ball-
Satire--to burn and purify the world,
True aim, fair purpose-

we have this bright pen-and-ink portrait:

And no ignoble presence! on the bulge

Of the clear baldness-all his head one brow

True, the veins swelled, blue network, and there surged

A red from cheek to temple-then retired

As if the dark-leaved chaplet damped a flame

Was never nursed by temperance or health.

But huge the eyeballs rolled black native fire,

Imperiously triumphant, nostrils wide

Waited their incense; while the pursed mouth's pout
Aggressive, while the beak supreme above,

While the head, face, nay, pillared throat thrown back,
Beard whitening under like a vinous foam-
These made a glory of such insolence,

I thought, such domineering deity

Hephaistos might have carved to cut the brine
For his gay brother's prow, imbrue that path
Which, purpling, recognised the conqueror
Impudent and majestic: drunk, perhaps,
But that's religion; sense too plainly snuffed:
Still, sensuality was grown a rite.

Of

In 1875 also appeared from the prolific pen of the poet The Inn Album.'

A fertile and original author with high and generous aims, Mr. Browning has proved his poetic power alike in thought, description, passion, and conception of character. But the effect of even his happiest productions is marred by obscurity, by eccentricities of style and expression, and by the intrusion of familiar phrases and Hudibrastic rhymes or dry metaphysical discussions. His choice of subjects-chiefly Italian-his stories of monastic life, 'repulsive crimes, and exceptional types of character-are also against his popularity. The Ring and the Book' is prolix: four volumes of blank verse, in which the same tale of murder is told by various interlocu.

tors, with long digressions from old chronicles and other sources— such a work must repel all but devoted poetical readers. These, however, Mr. Browning has obtained, and the student who perseveres, digging for the pure untempered gold' of poetry, will find his reward in the pages of this master of psychological monologues and dramatic lyrics.

Mr. Browning is a native of Camberwell in Surrey, born in 1812, and educated at the London University. He is also an honorary Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford. In November 1846 he was married, as already stated, to Miss Elizabeth Barrett. Of Mr. Browning's many descriptions of the sunny south,' the following is a favourable specimen, and Miss Mitford states that it was admired by Mr. Ruskin for its exceeding truthfulness:

Picture of the Grape-harvest.

But to-day not a boat reached Salerno,

So back to a man

Came our friends, with whose help in the vineyards
Grape-harvest began:

In the vat half-way up on our house-side

Like blood the juice spins,

While your brother all bare-legged is dancing

Till breathless he grins,

Dead-beaten, in effort on effort

To keep the grapes under,

For still when he seems all but master,

In pours the fresh plunder

From girls who keep coming and going
With basket on shoulder,

And eyes shut against the rain's driving,
Your girls that are older-

For under the hedges of aloe,

And where, on its bed

Of the orchard's black mould, the love-apple
Lies pulpy and red,

All the young ones are kneeling and filling

Their laps with the snails,

Tempted out by the first rainy weather

Your best of regales,

As to-night will be proved to my sorrow,

When, supping in state,

We shall feast our grape-gleaners—two dozen,

Three over one plate

Macaroni, so tempting to swallow,

In slippery strings,

And gourds fried in great purple slices,

That colour of kings.

Meantime, see the grape-bunch they've brought you

The rain-water slips

O'er the heavy blue bloom on each globe

Which the wasp to your lips

Still follows with fretful persistence.

Nay, taste while awake,

This half of a curd-white smooth cheese-ball,

That peels, flake by flake,

Like an onion's, each smoother and whiter;

Next sip this weak wine

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At last the people in a body

To the Town Hall came flocking.

""Tis clear,' cried they, our Mayor's a noddy;

And as for our Corporation-shocking

To think we buy gowns lined with ermine
For dolts that can't or won't determine
What's best to rid us of our vermin !
You hope, because you're old and obese,
To find in the furry civic robe ease?
Rouse up, sirs! Give your brains a racking
To find the remedy we're lacking,

Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing!'
At this the Mayor and Corporation
Quaked with a mighty consternation.

IV.

An hour they sat in council,

At length the Mayor broke silence:
For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell;
I wish I were a mile hence!
It's easy to bid one rack one's brain-
I'm sure my poor head aches again,
I've scratched it so, and all in vain;

O for a trap, a trap, a trap!'

Just as he said this, what should hap
At the chamber-door but a gentle tap!
'Bless us,' cried the Mayor, 'what's that ?'
(With the Corporation as he sat,

Looking little, thongh wondrous fat;
Nor brighter was his eye, nor mister,
Than a too-long-opened oyster,

Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous
For a plate of turtle green aud glutinous),
Only a scraping of shoes on the mat?
Anything like the sound of a rat
Makes my heart go pit-a-pat!'

V.

'Come in '-the Mayor cried, looking bigger:
And in did come the strangest figure.
His queer long coat from heel to head
Was half of yellow and half of red;
And he himself was tall and thin,
With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin,
And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin,
No tufi on cheek nor beard on chin,
But lips where smiles went out and in-
There was no guessing his kith and kin!
And nobody could enough admire
The tall man and his quaint attire.

Quoth one: 'It's as my great grandsire,

Starting up at the Trump of Doom's tone,

Had walked this way from his painted tombstone.

VI.

He advanced to the Council-table:

And, Please your honours,' said he, 'I 'm able,
By means of a secret charm, to draw

All creatures living beneath the sun,
That creep, or swim, or fly, or run,
After me so as you never saw!
And I chiefly use my charm

On creatures that do people harm,

The mole, and toad. and newt, and viner;

And people call me the Pied Piper.'

(And here they noticed round his neck

A scarf of red and yellow stripe,

To match with his coat of the self-same check;
And at the scarf's end hung a pipe:

And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying,

As if impatient to be playing

Upon this pipe, as low it dangled

Over his vesture so old-fangled.)

'Yet,' said he, poor piper as I am,

In Tartary I freed the Cham,

Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats;

I eased in Asia the Nizam

Of a monstrous brood of vampyre bats:

And, as for what your brain bewilders,

If I can rid your town of rats,

Will you give me a thousand guilders?"

'One? fifty thousand!'-was the exclamation Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation.

VII.

Into the street the Piper stept,
Smiling first a little smile,
As if he knew what magic slept
In his quiet pipe the while;

Then, like a musical adept,

To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled,
And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled,
Like a candle flame where salt is sprinkled;
And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered,
You heard as if an army muttered;

And the muttering grew to a grumbling;
And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling
And out of the house the rats came tumbling.
Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats,
Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats
Grave old plodders, gay young friskers,
Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins,
Cocking tails and pricking whiskers,
Families by tens and dozens,
Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives-
Followed the Piper for their lives.
From street to street he piped advancing,
And step by step they followed dancing,
Until they came to the river Weser,
Wherein all plung d and perished
-Save one, who. stout as Julius Cæsar,
Swam across. and lived to carry

(As he the ma uscript he cherished)

To Rat-land home his commentary,

Which was At the first shril notes of the pipe,
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe,
And putting appl s. wondrous ripe,

Into a cider-press's gripe;

And a moving away of pickle-tub boards,
And a leaving ajar of conserve cupboards,
And a drawing the corks of train-oil flasks,
And a breaking the hoops of butter casks;
And it seemed as if a voice

(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery
Is breathed) called out: O rats, rejoice!
The world is grown to one vast drysaltery!
To munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon,
Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon !"
And just as a bulky sugar puncheon,
All ready staved, like a great sun shone
Glorious scarce an inch before me,

Just as methought it said, "Come, bore me !"
-I found the Weser rolling o'er me.'

VIII.

You should have heard the Hamelin people
Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple.
'Go,' cried the Mayor, and get long poles!
Poke out the nests and block up the holes!
Consult with carpenters and builders,
And leave in our town not even a trace
Of the rats --when suddenly up the face
Of the Piper perked in the market-place,

With a, 'First, if you please, my thousand guilders l

IX.

A thousand guilders! The Mayor looked blue;

So did the Corporation too.

For Council dinners made rare havoc

With Claret, Moselle. Vin-de-Orave, Hock

And half the money would replenish

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