, a pilgrimage was made to
Vaucluse, in honour of Petrarch and his Laura; and there, as Mrs.
Macpherson has recorded in an often quoted passage of her biography of
her aunt, 'there, at the very source of the "chiare, fresche e dolci
acque," Mr. Browning took his wife up in his arms, and carrying her
across the shallow, curling water, seated her on a rock that rose
throne-like in the middle of the stream. Thus love and poetry took
a new possession of the spot immortalised by Petrarch's loving
fancy.'[146]

[Footnote 144: _Memoirs of Anna Jameson_, by G. Macpherson, p. 218.]

[Footnote 145: Afterwards Mrs. Macpherson, and Mrs. Jameson's
biographer.]

[Footnote 146: _Memoirs_, p. 231.]

So at the beginning of October the party reached Pisa; and there
the newly wedded pair settled for the winter. Here first since the
departure from London was there leisure to renew the intercourse with
friends at home, to answer congratulations and good wishes, to explain
what might seem strange and unaccountable. From this point Mrs.
Browning's correspondence contains nearly a full record of her life,
and can be left to tell its own story in better language than the
biographer's. The first letter to Mrs. Martin is an 'apologia pro
connubio suo' in fullest detail; the others carry on the story from
the point at which that leaves it.

With regard to this first letter, full as it is of the most intimate
personal and family revelations, it has seemed right to give it
entire. The marriage of Robert and Elizabeth Browning has passed into
literary history, and it is only fair that it should be set, once for
all, in its true light. Those who might be pained by any expressions
in it have passed away; and those in whose character and reputation
the lovers of English literature are interested have nothing to fear
from the fullest revelation. If anything were kept back, false and
injurious surmises might be formed; the truth leaves little room for
controversy, and none for slander.

_To Mrs. Martin_
Collegio Ferdinando, Pisa; October 20(?), 1846.[147]

My dearest Mrs. Martin,--Will you believe that I began a letter to you
before I took this step, to give you the whole story of the impulses
towards it, feeling strongly that I owed what I considered my
justification to such dear friends as yourself and Mr. Martin, that
you might not hastily conclude that you had thrown away upon one
who was quite unworthy the regard of years? I had begun suc