ut
nine months they pitched their tent at No. 138 Avenue des
Champs-Elysees. It was a fortunate time to be in Paris for those who had
no personal nervousness, and liked to be near the scene of great
events--a most anxious time for any who were alarmed at disturbances, or
took keenly to heart the horrors of street fighting. Fortunately for the
Brownings, they, whether by temperament or through their Italian
experiences, were not unduly disturbed at revolutions, while the horrors
of Louis Napoleon's _coup d'etat_ were, no doubt, only partly known to
Mrs. Browning at the time, and were palliated to her by the view she
took of Napoleon's character. She had not, it is true, raised him as yet
to the pinnacle on which his intervention on behalf of Italy
subsequently caused her to place him, but (perhaps owing to what Mr.
Kenyon called her 'immoral sympathy with power') she was always disposed
to put a favourable construction on his actions, and the _coup d'etat_
was finally whitewashed for her by the approbation which the
_plebiscite_ of December 20 gave to his assumption of supreme power. Her
views are, however, so fully set forth in her own letters that they need
not be detailed here. For her husband's opinion of the character of
Louis Napoleon, at least as it appeared to him when looking back after
the lapse of years, it is only necessary to refer to 'Prince
Hohenstiel-Schwangau.'

* * * * *

_To Mrs. Jameson_

[Paris,] 138 Avenue des Champs-Elysees:
October 21, [1851].

But didn't you, dearest friend, get 'Casa Guidi' and the portrait of
Madme de Goethe, left for you in the London house? I felt a _want_ of
leaving a word of adieu with these, and then the chaotic confusion in
which we left England stifled the better purpose out of me.

With such mixed feelings I went away. Leaving love behind is always
terrible, but it was not all love that I left, and there was relief in
the state of mind with which I threw myself on the sofa at Dieppe--yes,
indeed. Robert felt differently from me for once, as was natural, for it
had been pure joy to him with his family and his friends, and I do
believe he would have been capable of never leaving England again, had
such an arrangement been practicable for us on some accounts. Oh
England! I love and hate it at once. Or rather, where love of country
ought to be in the heart, there is the mark of the burning iron in mine,
and the depth of the scar shows