She was
ready to sympathize with every form of emancipation; but for herself,
her poet's life was her life, and his necessity was her great
opportunity.
I recall Mrs. Browning once saying to me, "Ah, Tennyson is too much
indulged. His wife is too much his second self; she does not criticise
enough." But Tennyson was not a second Browning. The delicate
framework of his imagination, filled in by elemental harmonies, was
not to be carelessly touched. She understood his work and his nature,
and he stood firm where he had early planted himself by her side in
worshiping affection and devotion. "Alfred carried the sheets of his
new poem up to London," she said one day, "and showed them to Mr.
Monckton Milnes, who persuaded him to leave out one of the best lines;
but I persuaded him to replace it when he came home. It is a mistake
in general for him to listen to the suggestions of others about his
poems."
All this was long ago, and the finger of memory has left faint
tracings for me to follow; but I recall her figure at dinner as she
sat in her soft white muslin dress, tied with blue, at that time
hardly whiter than her face or bluer than her eyes, and how the boys
stood sometimes one on either side of her in their black velvet
dresses, like Millais' picture of the princes in the tower, and
sometimes helped to serve the guests. By and by we adjourned to
another room, where there was a fire and a shining dark table with
fruit and wine after her own picturesque fashion, and where later the
poet read to us, while she, being always delicate in health, took her
accustomed couch.
Pages:
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305