As applied to Browning the poems represent the indignation with which he regarded such personal revelations, such utterance of sighs and groans, as characterized Byron (the "Last King" of "At the Mermaid"); but they overstate the impersonal nature of Browning's own work which is frequently a very direct statement of his own emotions and views, while even from his dramatic work it is not difficult to find his "hopes and fears, beliefs and doubts." In stanzas 10-12 of "At the Mermaid," for example, just after he has protested against "leaving bosom's gate ajar," he fully sets forth the joy, the optimism, of his own outlook on life. "Shop" is an indirect protest against the assumption that Shakspere wrote mainly for money, caring merely for the material success of his work. (See Poet-Lore, Vol. III, pp. 216-221, April, 1889, for Browning's tribute to Shakspere.) More directly the poem represents the starved life of the man whom "shop," the business necessary to earn a living, occupies "each day and all day long" with no spirit-life behind.
This poem was written during Browning's second visit to Le Croisic in Brittany, in September, 1867. It was published in The Cornhill Magazine, March, 1871, the proceeds of one hundred guineas being sent by Browning to the Paris Relief Fund, to provide food for the people after the siege of Paris. The story is historic. Mrs. Lemoyne, in 1884, read "Hervé Riel" to Browning and he then told her that it was his custom to learn all about the heroes and legends of any town that he stopped in and that he had thus, in going over the records of the town of St. Malo, come upon the story of Hervé Riel, which he narrated just as it happened in 1692, except that in reality the hero had a life holiday. "The facts of the story had been forgotten, and were denied at St. Malo; but the reports of the French Admiralty were looked up, and the facts established." (Dr. Furnivall quoted in Berdoe, Browning Cyclopædia.)
This little poem was written and printed as the Prologue to La Saisiaz in 1878, but in the Selections it appeared as No. 3 of "Pisgah-Sights."
Prefatory stanzas to The Two Poets of Croisic.
This fate of the musician and the cricket has the same fundamental idea as the prefatory stanzas, the power of love to soften what is gruff and brighten what is somber in life.
64. Music's son. Goethe. The "Lotte" of the next line, the heroine of Goethe's Sorrows of Werther, was modeled in part on Charlotte Buff, with whom Goethe was at one time in love.
Χαιρετε, νικωμεν. Rejoice we conquer!
2. Dæmons. In Greek mythology a superior order of beings between men and the gods.
4. Her of the ægis and spear. Athena, whose ægis was a scaly cloak or mantle bordered with serpents and bearing Medusa's head.
5. Ye of the bow and the buskin. Artemis or Diana, the huntress. Ancient statues represent her as wearing shoes laced to the ankle.
8. Pan. The god of nature, half goat and half man. To him was ascribed the power of causing sudden fright by his voice and appearance. He came suddenly into the midst of the Persians on the field of Marathon—so the legend runs—and threw them into such a "panic" that, for this reason, they lost the battle.
9. Archons of Athens, topped by the tettix. Archon. One of the nine rulers of Athens. Tettix. A grasshopper. "The Athenians sometimes wore golden grasshoppers in their hair as badges of honor, because these insects are supposed to spring from the ground, and thus they showed they were sprung from the original inhabitants of the country." (Berdoe, Browning Cyclopædia, p. 336.)
12. Reach Sparta for aid. The distance between Athens and Sparta is about 135 miles.
18. Persia bids Athens proffer slaves'-tribute, water and earth. The Persians sent to those states which they wished to subject, messengers who were to ask earth and water as symbols of submission.
19. Eretria. An important city on the island of Eubœa.
20. Hellas. Greece.
38. The moon, half-orbed. Spartan troops finally came to Athens after the full moon.
47. Filleted victim. A victim whose head was decked with ribbons.
52. Parnes. Herodotus refers in this connection to the Parthenian mountain.
62. Erebos. Hades, the abode of shades or departed spirits.
83. Fennel. The Greek word Marathon means fennel.
89. Miltiades. One of the ten Athenian generals.
105. Unforeseeing one. The poet finishes the story, which he has hitherto allowed Pheidippides to tell for himself.
105. Marathon day. In the month of September, B. C. 490.
106. Akropolis. The stronghold of Athens.
The love of the Arab for his horse is traditional. "The story is a common one and seems adapted from a Bedouin's anecdote told in Rollo Springfield's The Horse and His Rider." (Berdoe, Browning Cyclopædia, p. 280.)
This poem is in the nature of a prelude to the group of poems published under the title Jocoseria, 1883. Each poem in this volume shows the lack of some element that would have brought the human action or experience to perfection.
8. Comer. The invocation probably refers to the spirit of love with its inspiring, transforming power.
This poem was published in Jocoseria in 1883. It is doubtless to be grouped with the poems that refer directly to Mrs. Browning.
Browning says that this poem has no direct historical reference. He calls it "An Old Story," because in all ages men have experienced this unjust reversal of public approval. The poem is merely an imaginative, dramatic representation of the fickleness of popular favor.
The title of this poem means "Threatening Tyrant." It comes from Horace's "Ode on the Just Man," in Odes, III, 3, i. The just man is not frightened by the frown of the threatening tyrant—non vullus instantis tyranni. Archdeacon Farrar refers the incidents to persecution of the early Christians. The poem certainly deals with some period when the ruler of a great realm had unlimited power to follow out his most insignificant animosities, and when just men and just causes had no human recourse.
The general idea of the poem is clear and forcible, but there are many minor difficulties of interpretation.
6. What was his force? An ironic question. The man groveled because he was powerless to resist, and (line 10) because resistance might bring even worse punishment.
11. Were the object, etc. If the man could be made rich, if his life could be crowded with pleasures, if there could be found relatives or friends whom he loved, then there would be obvious ways of hurting him, he would stand forth in sufficient importance to make the swing of the tyrant's hand effective. But as it is, the man's poverty and friendlessness and meagerness of life render it difficult to find out vulnerable points of attack. He remains hidden (perdue) and, like the midge of the egg of an insect (nit), is safe through his very insignificance.
21. spilth. That which is poured out profusely. The flagon is a vessel with one handle and a long narrow neck or spout.
35. Then a humor, etc. The tyrant goes through various changes of mood in his attitude toward his enemy. In lines 35-43 he feels a moment of contemptuous compunction at the man's suffering, and recognizes the absurdity of a contest between a great king and a person as insignificant as a tricksy elf, a toad, or a rat. But in line 44 his mood turns. He perceives that the burden (gravamen) of the whole matter lies in the incredibly petty nature of this unconquerable, baffling opposition to his will. He sees how the situation would awaken the wonder of the great lords who abjectly obey his lightest word, but he concludes that, after all, the small becomes great if it vexes you.
53. I soberly, etc. Even the tyrant sees a kind of grotesque humor as he narrates first the elaborate plans to entrap and crush so seemingly powerless a foe, and then the striking reversal of position when the man proves to have God on his side, and the tyrant becomes the one to cower in fear.
At the Congress of Vienna, in 1815, Lombardy and Venetia were assigned to Austria. Most of the inhabitants submitted to the foreign rule, but there were always small bands of patriots who stirred up revolutions against Austria. The chief revolution was that led by Mazzini in 1848, and when he was in exile he read this poem with much appreciation. In Pippa Passes (1840), in the story of Luigi and the Austrian police, Browning had already given a picture based on Italy's struggle for freedom. In 1844 he visited Italy and then wrote "The Italian in England," which appeared in 1845. This poem does not represent a definite historic incident, but such a one as might have occurred in the life of some Italian patriot. For a similar feeling towards Italian independence see Mrs. Browning's Casa Guidi Windows (written 1848-1851). For earlier poems see Byron's "Ode" beginning "O Venice, Venice, when thy marble walls," Shelley's "Lines Written Among the Euganean Hills," and the following sonnet by Wordsworth:
8. Charles. Carlo Alberto, King of Sardinia. He had used severe measures against "Young Italy," the party founded by Mazzini.
19. Metternich. A noted Austrian diplomat and one of the most powerful enemies of Italian freedom.
75. Duomo. The most famous church in Padua.
78. Tenebræ. Darkness. A religious service commemorative of the crucifixion. Fifteen lighted candles are put out one at a time, symbolizing the growing darkness of the world up to the time of the crucifixion.
The first interlude in Ferishtah's Fancies. These interludes are love lyrics which follow the separate Fables and Fancies of the Persian Dervish Ferishtah, and state in terms of the affections the truth embodied in didactic or philosophical fashion in the fables. In the first fable, "The Eagle," the Dervish observes an eagle feeding some deserted ravens. His first inference is that men will be cared for as the ravens, without effort of their own; later he sees that men should be as eagles and provide for the weak. The Dervish at once seeks the largest sphere of human usefulness with the words
The lyric protests against the temptation to self-centered seclusion on the part of those who are entirely satisfied in each other's love.
The volume of poems entitled Asolando was, by a strange chance, published on the day of Browning's death. Most of these poems were written in 1888-1889. The book was dedicated to Mrs. Arthur Bronson. The "Prologue" should be compared with Wordsworth's "Ode on Intimations of Immortality."
13. Chrysopras. The ruby and the emerald of this passage stand for rich red and green. The chrysopras is also green (an apple green variety of Chalcedony), but the first part of the word is from the Greek χρνσος, "gold," and that may be the color intended here.
The title means, The Chief Good. The poem came out in Asolando in 1889.
In the Pall Mall Gazette, Feb. 1, 1890 the following incident is given concerning the third stanza of this poem:
"One evening just before his death illness, the poet was reading this from a proof to his daughter-in-law and sister. He said: 'It almost looks like bragging to say this, and as if I ought to cancel it; but it's the simple truth; and as it's true, it shall stand.'"
Compare this poem and Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar."
Mrs. Sutherland Orr writes that while Browning was one day strolling through Dulwich Wood "the image flashed upon him of someone walking ... alone through life; one apparently too obscure to leave a trace of his or her passage, yet exercising a lasting though unconscious influence at every step of it; and the image shaped itself into the little silk-winder of Asolo, Felippa, or Pippa."
Asolo in the Trevisan. Asolo, a fortified medieval town at the foot of a hill surmounted by the ruins of a castle, and situated in the center of the silk-growing and silk-spinning industries, is in the province of Treviso about thirty-three miles northwest of Venice.
62. Monsignor. A title conferred upon prelates in the Roman Catholic church. This Monsignor is the chief personage in Part III, or Night.
88. Martagon. A kind of lily with light purplish flowers. The common name is Turk's Cap. Perhaps that suggested to Browning his comparison to the round bunch of flesh on the head of a Turk bird, or turkey.
131. Possagno church. Designed by Canova, who was born at Possagno, an obscure village near Asolo.
181. The Dome. The Duomo, or Cathedral, in the center of the town. The palace of the Bishop's brother is close by.
28. St. Mark's. There is an extensive view from Asolo. Venice, with its cupolas and steeples, is seen to the east. Ottima detects the belfry of the Church of St. Mark. The towns of Vicenza and Padua are also discernible.
59. The Capuchin. A branch of the Franciscan order of monks. Their habit is brown.
170. Campanula chalice. The flower of any one of a large genus of flowers with bell-shaped corollas.
27. El canibus nostris. Virgil, Eclogues iii, 67. "Notior ut jam sit canibus non Delia nostris"—"So that now not Delia's self is more familiar to our dogs." The boy Giovacchino of whose poetry they are making fun evidently had ideals not in harmony with the ways of these Venetian art students. These "dissolute, brutalized, heartless bunglers," as Jules calls them, attack with quick, clever, merciless tongues whatever savors of idealism, aspiration, purity. Their revenge for the scornful superiority manifested towards them by Jules is to secure, by a well-managed trick, a marriage between him and a paid model.
86. Canova's gallery. Possagno was the birthplace of the sculptor Canova, and the circular church there was designed by him. In the gallery at Possagno is his Psyche (Psiche-fanciulla, or Psyche the young girl); his Pietà (the mother with the dead Christ in her arms) is in the church.
111. Malamocco. A little town on an island near Venice.
111. Alciphron. A Greek writer (about 200 A. D.) of fictitious letters famous for the purity of their style and for the knowledge they give of Greek social customs.
115. Lire. Plural of lira, an Italian coin equal to 18.6 cents in our money.
117. A scented letter. Forged letters have represented this fourteen year old, ignorant model as delicate, shy, reserved, intellectually alert, with lofty poetic and artistic ideals.
117. Tydeus. One of the Seven Allies in the enterprise against Thebes. Jules is supposed to have modeled a statue of him for the Venetian Academy of Fine Arts. From Scene II, 14, we see that it is still in clay.
120. Paolina. Some actress at the Phenix, the leading theater of Venice.
140. Hannibal Scratchy. In jest they burlesque the name of Annibale Caracci, a famous Italian artist, and apply it to one of their number.
39. This minion. This favorite. Bessarion (1395-1472), a learned Greek cardinal, discovered a poem, "The Rape of Helen," written by a Greek epic poet, Coluthus, in the sixth century, and Bessarion's scribe copied it out on parchment with blue, red, and dark-brown lettering.
43. Odyssey. Homer's account of the adventures of Ulysses. The quoted passage is in the Odyssey, Bk. XXII, 10. When Ulysses reached home he wreaked vengeance on the suitors of his wife. Antinous was the first to fall. The story of the "bitter shaft" blotted out by a flower is symbolic of the story of the hatred of Lutwyche, which was robbed of its bitterness by Phene's love.
50. Almaign Kaiser. The German Emperor. Swart-green is really "black-green"; here it means the "dark-green" of bronze. The Emperor's truncheon is a short staff, the emblem of his office.
54. Hippolyta. The Queen of the Amazons on a fine horse from Numidia.
59. Bay-filleted. The bay or laurel with which victors were crowned was supposed to be an antidote against thunder because it was the tree of Apollo. Pliny says that Tiberius and some other Roman emperors wore a wreath of bay leaves as an amulet, especially in thunder-storms. (See Brewer, Dictionary of Phrase and Fable; also Byron, Childe Harold, IV, 41.)
61. Hipparchus. In B. C. 514 Harmodius and Aristogeiton conspired against the tyrants Hippias and Hipparchus, and carrying swords hid in myrtle, they slew Hipparchus. Cf. Byron, Childe Harold, III, 20.
75. Parsley. An aromatic herb used in ancient time in crowns worn at feasts.
86. Archetype. The original pattern or model. Beautiful colors and shapes in flowers, in flames, trees, and fruit suggested to the poet the beauty of perfect human forms. The rosy bloom of the peach bending close over the bough and nestled among the leaves is sufficient to suggest rosy limbs, and from that suggestion comes the whole imaginative picture of the dryad, the nymph of the woods.
95. Facile chalk. Jules exults in the facility with which the artist, in any realm of art, manipulates his implements and his materials. His especial enthusiasm is for marble, which he has come to regard as an original, primitive substance, containing in itself all other substances. It may be made to seem as light and clear as air, as brilliant as diamonds. Sometimes as his chisel strikes, it seems to be metal. Again it seems to be actual flesh and blood. At moments when the sculptor works with swift intensity it seems to flush and glow like flame.
181. I am a painter, etc. The poem by Lutwyche is professedly "slow, involved, and mystical." But Jules gradually perceives the purport of the words. Lutwyche's hate is to have its most hideous possible aspect because it is to appear suddenly through Love's rose-braided mask.
272. The Cornaro. Catharine Cornaro was the wife of James, King of Cyprus. After his death she was induced to abdicate in favor of the Republic of Venice, which took possession of Cyprus in 1487. She was assigned a palace and court at Asolo. She was generous, kind, just, and deeply beloved. Her life seemed to hold all possible external conditions of happiness. The song is further explained in lines 275-279.
306. Ancona. A lovely city in eastern Italy.
1. Bluphocks. Browning's note on this character reads, "He maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." (Matthew v, 45.)
2. Your Bishop's Intendant. The Bishop's Superintendent (whose real name is Maffeo) has charge of the estate the Bishop has just inherited from his brother. The money Bluphocks has is the bribe given him by Maffeo to destroy Pippa, who is really the heir to the estate. Maffeo expects the Bishop to reward him well for this service.
11. Prussia Improper. "The arm of land bounded on the north by the Baltic and on the south by Poland was long called 'Prussia Proper' to distinguish it from the other provinces of the kingdom. Königsberg is just over the boundary of Brandenberg." (Rolfe, Select Poems of Browning.)
14. Chaldee. A Semitic dialect.
21. Celarent, Darii, Ferio. Coined words used in logic to designate certain valid forms of syllogism.
24. Posy. A brief inscription or motto originally in verse, and suitable for a ring or some trinket.
25. How Moses, etc. For the story of Moses and the plagues of Egypt see Exodus viii and x. For the story of Jonah (who was commanded, however, not to go to Tarshish) see Jonah i. For Balaam and his ass see Numbers xxii, 22.
33. Bishop Beveridge. There was a Bishop of that name, but of course Bluphocks is making a pun.
35. Charon's wherry. Charon was a god of hell. It was his business to carry the dead across the river Styx. People thus carried over the Stygian ferry paid Charon by a small coin put between their lips.
36. Lupine-seed. "In plant-lore 'lupine' means wolfish, and is suggestive of the Evil One." (Berdoe, Browning Cyclopædia.)
36. Hecate's supper. Hecate was a goddess of hell to whom offerings of food were made. An obolus is a silver coin worth about fifteen cents.
39. Zwanziger. A twenty-kreuzer piece of money.
47. Prince Metternich. A celebrated Austrian statesman. (1773-1859.)
54. Panurge. A prominent character in Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais. Hertrippa is a magician who gives Panurge advice on the subject of marriage. Bluphocks is simply racking his brain for words to rhyme with "Pippa," so that he may write doggerel poetry to or about her. For "King Agrippa" see Acts xxvi, 27.
77. Carbonari. All persons leaving a city had to have a passport officially signed giving the destination and the date of departure. Luigi had obtained such a passport for Vienna for that night. It was, however, suspected that this was a mere trick to give a wrong notion of his whereabouts. If the passport should prove to be a pretense, other suspicions against Luigi would be confirmed; it would be taken for granted that he belonged to the Carbonari, a secret society of Italian patriots; he would be arrested and sent to the prison at Spielberg. But if he should go to Vienna he is to be let alone. The officers are, of course, on the wrong track. If Luigi goes to Vienna it is to carry out his purpose of killing the tyrant. If he stays in Asolo it means that he has abandoned that purpose.
6. Lucius Junius. This name comes easily to Luigi's lips because Lucius Junius Brutus inspired the Romans against Tarquin.
14. Old Franz. The Austrian Emperor, Francis, I. Luigi's fancy is caught by the echoes and the flowers, but they play into his dominant idea of the freedom of Italy.
19. Pellicos. Silvio Pellico was an Italian patriot who had suffered a long imprisonment in Spielberg Castle.
122. Andrea, etc. Three former Italian patriots who had conspired against Austria.
135-143. Note in these lines how little Luigi really understands of the point at issue. His emotional temperament has been stirred to the point of desperate action, but the "ground for killing the King" he hardly knows.
152. Jupiter. The largest of the planets. When a planet rises after midnight it becomes a morning star.
163. Titian at Treviso. Treviso is seventeen miles from Venice. Its cathedral contains a fine Annunciation by Titian which Luigi and his betrothed Chiara had planned to see together.
164. A king lived long ago. This song was published in 1835 and later adapted for this poem. The song has a great effect on Luigi because beside his mental picture of the hated Austrian ruler he now places his old folk-king who judged his people wisely, whose dignity and grace awed even a python, and whom the gods loved. The possibility of having good kings stirs his waning determination to rid the earth of evil ones.
6. The same treat. The feast of the girl is made up of fig-peckers (birds that feed on figs), lampreys (eel-like fish esteemed a delicacy), and red wine from Breganze, a town noted for its wines.
17. Spring's come, etc. These girls are well differentiated. The "first girl" is set apart from the others by her superior refinement, by her longing for her country home, and by her unhappiness with Cecco. The "third girl" seems to be the leader in the plan against Pippa.
22. Deuzans, etc. Varieties of apples.
64. Ortolans. Birds about the size of larks, and an expensive delicacy.
66. Polenta. A coarse corn-meal pudding.
89. Great rich handsome Englishman. Bluphocks, who has been hired by the Intendant to lure Pippa into evil courses.
1. Monsignor. The Bishop has come from Messina in Sicily to take possession of his dead brother's estate. The "Ugo" to whom he speaks is the Intendant mentioned at the beginning of Interlude II.
4. Benedicto benedicatur. A form of blessing for the repast. "Let it be consecrated with a good saying."
9. Assumption Day. The festival of the Assumption of the Virgin into Heaven comes August 25.
36. Jules. This is the Jules of Noon. His history is thus carried on beyond the point where we left him at the close of his interview with Phene.
51. Correggio. An Italian artist (1494-1534).
72. Podere. (Plural, poderi.) A small farm or manor.
83. Cesena. An Episcopal city about twelve miles from Forli.
108. Millet-cake. A cake made of an Italian grain and eaten only by the poorest classes.
135. Letter No. 3. The information from Rome is based on a wrong assumption. The elder brother had an infant heir whom the second brother endeavored to put out of the way in order that he might himself inherit the estate. He hired Maffeo to destroy the child, and, according to the information from Rome, Maffeo did so. On this assumption Maffeo is to be arrested and the money and land given him by the second brother to keep the deed a secret are now to revert to the church.
154. So old a story. In reality Maffeo has been more astute than they thought. He did not kill the child but kept it ready to produce as the heir to the estates if the second brother at any time proved delinquent in the required payments.
174. Let us understand one another. He believes that when the Bishop sees himself about to lose the estate, he too will show himself ready for a bargain. The Bishop is simply to keep still and Maffeo will see that the heir—who is Pippa—shall be finally brought to shame and death. The Bishop is to have the estates, and Maffeo is to keep his ill-gotten gains and be given a chance to escape. The Bishop is apparently listening to the tempter when he hears Pippa's song. Its fresh lilting sweetness, and especially, perhaps, the wording of the last line, touch his heart and his conscience, and he suddenly orders Maffeo's arrest, at the same time uttering the prayer, "Have mercy upon me, O God."
7. My Zanze. Zanze was evidently the "third girl" who took Pippa in charge at the end of Interlude III.
30. Monsignor's people. Zanze was apparently talking to Pippa under the Monsignor's window. Pippa broke off the unwelcome talk by her song, and Zanze had hardly time to begin again when there came the noise of the arrest of Maffeo.
The following changes have been made to the text:
Page 44: "Rabbi Ben Erza" changed to "Rabbi Ben Ezra".
Page 89: Numbered line 25.
Page 199: Numbered line 90.
Page 323: Numbered line 5.
Page 392: "opposed such beginings" changed to "opposed such beginnings".
Page 395: "Baldasarre Galuppi" changed to "Baldassare Galuppi".
Page 417: "name to to the volume" changed to "name to the volume".
Page 419: "Voglers masterly playing" changed to "Vogler's masterly playing".
Page 423: "deveolpment of art" changed to "development of art".
Page 425: "Pacchiarotte" changed to "Pacchiarotto".
Page 436: "Chiari" changed to "Chiara".
Page 436: "Breganza" changed to "Breganze".