ers which I may have forgotten, he was heard of, during the
earlier part of this decade, as the guest of Lord Carnarvon at Highclere
Castle, of Lord Shrewsbury at Alton Towers, of Lord Brownlow and his
mother, Lady Marian Alford, at Belton and Ashridge. Somewhat later,
he stayed with Mr. and Lady Alice Gaisford at a house they temporarily
occupied on the Sussex downs; with Mr. Cholmondeley at Condover, and,
much more recently, at Aynhoe Park with Mr. and Mrs. Cartwright. Kind
and pressing, and in themselves very tempting invitations of this nature
came to him until the end of his life; but he very soon made a practice
of declining them, because their acceptance could only renew for him the
fatigues of the London season, while the tantalizing beauty and
repose of the country lay before his eyes; but such visits, while they
continued, were one of the necessary social experiences which brought
their grist to his mill.

And now, in addition to the large social tribute which he received, and
had to pay, he was drinking in all the enjoyment, and incurring all the
fatigue which the London musical world could create for him. In Italy
he had found the natural home of the other arts. The one poem, 'Old
Pictures in Florence', is sufficiently eloquent of long communion with
the old masters and their works; and if his history in Florence and Rome
had been written in his own letters instead of those of his wife, they
must have held many reminiscences of galleries and studios, and of the
places in which pictures are bought and sold. But his love for music
was as certainly starved as the delight in painting and sculpture was
nourished; and it had now grown into a passion, from the indulgence of
which he derived, as he always declared, some of the most beneficent
influences of his life. It would be scarcely an exaggeration to say that
he attended every important concert of the season, whether isolated or
given in a course. There was no engagement possible or actual, which did
not yield to the discovery of its clashing with the day and hour fixed
for one of these. His frequent companion on such occasions was Miss
Egerton-Smith.

Miss Smith became only known to Mr. Browning's general acquaintance
through the dedicatory 'A. E. S.' of 'La Saisiaz'; but she was, at the
time of her death, one of his oldest women friends. He first met her as
a young woman in Florence when she was visiting there; and the love
for and proficiency in music soon