The new pope is more liberal than popes in general, and people write odes to him in consequence.

Robert is going to bring out a new edition of his collected poems, and you are not to read any more, if you please, till this is done.  I heard of Carlyle’s saying the other day ’that he hoped more from Robert Browning, for the people of England, than from any living English writer,’ which pleased me, of course.  I am just sending off an anti-slavery poem for America,[155] too ferocious, perhaps, for the Americans to publish:  but they asked for a poem and shall have it.

If I ask for a letter, shall I have it, I wonder?  Remember me and love me a little, and pray for me, dearest friend, and believe how gratefully and ever affectionately

I am your

ELIBET,

though Robert always calls me Ba, and thinks it the prettiest name in the world! which is a proof, you will say, not only of blind love but of deaf love.

[Footnote 155:  ‘The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point’ (Poetical Works, ii. 192).  It was first printed in a collection called The Liberty Bell, for sale at the Boston National Anti-slavery Bazaar of 1848.  It was separately printed in England in 1849 as a small pamphlet, which is now a rare bibliographical curiosity.]

It was during the stay at Pisa, and early in the year 1847, that Mr. Browning first became acquainted with his wife’s ’Sonnets from the Portuguese.’  Written during the course of their courtship and engagement, they were not shown even to him until some months after their marriage.  The story of it was told by Mr. Browning in later life to Mr. Edmund Gosse, with leave to make it known to the world in general; and from Mr. Gosse’s publication it is here quoted in his own words.[156]

[Footnote 156:  ‘Critical Kit-Kats,’ by E. Gosse, p. 2 (1896).]

’Their custom was, Mr. Browning said, to write alone, and not to show each other what they had written.  This was a rule which he sometimes broke through, but she never.  He had the habit of working in a downstairs room, where their meals were spread, while Mrs. Browning studied in a room on the floor above.  One day, early in 1847, their breakfast being over, Mrs. Browning went upstairs, while her husband stood at the window watching the street till the table should be cleared.  He was presently aware of some one behind him, although the servant was gone.  It was Mrs. Browning, who held him by the shoulder to prevent his turning to look at her, and at the same time pushed a packet of papers into the pocket of his coat.  She told him to read that, and to tear it up if he did not like it; and then she fled again to her own room.’