ourt's low wall
Like the chine of some extinct animal
Half-turned to earth and flowers; and through the haze,
(Save where some slender patches of grey maize
Are to be over-leaped) that boy has crossed
The whole hill-side of dew and powder-frost
Matting the balm and mountain camomile.
Up and up goes he, singing all the while
Some unintelligible words to beat
The lark, God's poet, swooning at his feet.

As alive, and even clearer in outline than these natural descriptions,
are the portraits in _Sordello_ of the people of the time. No one can
mistake them for modern folk. I do not speak of the portrait of
Sordello--that is chiefly of the soul, not of the body--but of the
personages who fill the background, the heads of noble houses, the
warriors, priests, soldiers, singers, the women, and chiefly Adelaide
and Palma. These stand before us as Tintoret or Veronese might have
painted them had they lived on into the great portrait-century. Their
dress, their attitudes, their sudden gestures, their eyes, hair, the
trick of their mouths, their armour, how they walked and talked and read
and wrote, are all done in quick touches and jets of colour. Each is
distinct from the others, each a type. A multitude of cabinet sketches
of men are made in the market-places, in castle rooms, on the roads, in
the gardens, on the bastions of the towns. Take as one example the
Pope's Legate:

With eyes, like fresh-blown thrush-eggs on a thread,
Faint-blue and loosely floating in his head,
Large tongue, moist open mouth; and this long while
That owner of the idiotic smile
Serves them!

Nor does Browning confine himself to personages of Sordello's time.
There are admirable portraits, but somewhat troubled by unnecessary
matter, of Dante, of Charlemagne, of Hildebrand. One elaborate portrait
is continued throughout the poem. It is that of Salinguerra, the man of
action as contrasted with Sordello the dreamer. Much pains are spent on
this by Browning. We see him first in the streets of Ferrara.

Men understood
Living was pleasant to him as he wore
His careless surcoat, glanced some missive o'er,
Propped on his truncheon in the public way.

Then at the games at Mantua, when he is told Sordello will not come to
sing a welcome to him. What cares he for poet's whims?

The easy-natured soldier smiled assent,
Settled his portly person, smoothed his chin,