t
refer to _him_. Still, whatever you say will be worth hearing, and the
_guide_ through 'Pompeii' will be better than many of the ruins. 'The
Pleader's Guide' I never heard of before. Praed has written some
sweet and tender things. Then I shall like to hear you on Beaumont and
Fletcher, and Andrew Marvell.

I have seen nothing of Tennyson's new poem. Do you know if the
echo-song is the most popular of his verses? It is only another proof
to my mind of the no-worth of popularity. That song would be eminently
sweet for a common writer, but Tennyson has done better, surely; his
eminences are to be seen above. As for the laurel, in a sense he is
worthier of it than Leigh Hunt; only Tennyson can wait, that is the
single difference.

So anxious I am about your house. Your health seems to me mainly
to depend on your moving, and I do urge your moving; if not there,
elsewhere. May God bless you, ever dear friend!

I dare say you will think I have given too much importance to the
rococo verses you had the goodness to speak of; but I have a horror of
being disinterred, there's the truth! Leave the violets to grow
over me. Because that wretched school-exercise of a version of the
'Prometheus' had been named by two or three people, wasn't I at the
pains of making a new translation before I left England, so to erase a
sort of half-visible and half invisible 'Blot on the Scutcheon'? After
such an expenditure of lemon-juice, you will not wonder that I should
trouble you with all this talk about nothing....

I am so delighted that you are to lift up your voice again, and so
grateful to Mr. Chorley.

Ah yes, if we go to Paris we shall draw you. Mr. Chorley shan't have
all the triumphs to himself.

Not a word more, says Robert, or the post will be missed. God bless
you! Do take care of yourself, and _don't_ stay in that damp house.
And do make allowances for love.

Your ever affectionate
BA.

How glad I shall be if it is true that Tennyson is married! I believe
in the happiness of marriage, for men especially.

[Footnote 203: These are the papers subsequently published under the
title _Recollections of a Literary Life_. Among them was an article
on the Brownings, giving biographical detail with respect to Mrs.
Browning's early life, especially as to the loss of her brother,
which caused extreme pain to her sensitive nature, as a later letter
testifies.]

Through the greater part of the summer of 1850 the Brownings held f