Life and Letters of Robert Browning | Page 9

proneness to deranged liver, and the
asthmatic conditions which he believed, rightly or wrongly, to be
produced by it. He was perhaps mistaken in some of his inferences, but
he was not mistaken in the fact. He had the pleasures as well as the
pains of this nervous temperament; its quick response to every
congenial stimulus of physical atmosphere, and human contact. It
heightened the enjoyment, perhaps exaggerated the consciousness of
his physical powers. It also certainly in his later years led him to
overdraw them. Many persons have believed that he could not live
without society; a prolonged seclusion from it would, for obvious

reasons, have been unsuited to him. But the excited gaiety which to the
last he carried into every social gathering was often primarily the result
of a moral and physical effort which his temperament prompted, but his
strength could not always justify. Nature avenged herself in recurrent
periods of exhaustion, long before the closing stage had set in.
I shall subsequently have occasion to trace this nervous impressibility
through various aspects and relations of his life; all I now seek to show
is that this healthiest of poets and most real of men was not
compounded of elements of pure health, and perhaps never could have
been so. It might sound grotesque to say that only a delicate woman
could have been the mother of Robert Browning. The fact remains that
of such a one, and no other, he was born; and we may imagine, without
being fanciful, that his father's placid intellectual powers required for
their transmutation into poetic genius just this infusion of a vital
element not only charged with other racial and individual qualities, but
physically and morally more nearly allied to pain. Perhaps, even for his
happiness as a man, we could not have wished it otherwise.
Chapter 3
1812-1826
Birth of Robert Browning--His Childhood and Schooldays--Restless
Temperament--Brilliant Mental Endowments--Incidental
Peculiarities--Strong Religious Feeling--Passionate Attachment to his
Mother; Grief at first Separation--Fondness for Animals--Experiences
of School Life--Extensive Reading--Early Attempts in Verse--Letter
from his Father concerning them--Spurious Poems in
Circulation--'Incondita'--Mr. Fox--Miss Flower.

Robert Browning was born, as has been often repeated, at Camberwell,
on May 7, 1812, soon after a great comet had disappeared from the sky.
He was a handsome, vigorous, fearless child, and soon developed an
unresting activity and a fiery temper. He clamoured for occupation
from the moment he could speak. His mother could only keep him

quiet when once he had emerged from infancy by telling him
stories--doubtless Bible stories--while holding him on her knee. His
energies were of course destructive till they had found their proper
outlet; but we do not hear of his ever having destroyed anything for the
mere sake of doing so. His first recorded piece of mischief was putting
a handsome Brussels lace veil of his mother's into the fire; but the
motive, which he was just old enough to lisp out, was also his excuse:
'A pitty baze [pretty blaze], mamma.' Imagination soon came to his
rescue. It has often been told how he extemporized verse aloud while
walking round and round the dining-room table supporting himself by
his hands, when he was still so small that his head was scarcely above
it. He remembered having entertained his mother in the very first walk
he was considered old enough to take with her, by a fantastic account
of his possessions in houses, &c., of which the topographical details
elicited from her the remark, 'Why, sir, you are quite a geographer.'
And though this kind of romancing is common enough among
intelligent children, it distinguishes itself in this case by the strong
impression which the incident had left on his own mind. It seems to
have been a first real flight of dramatic fancy, confusing his identity for
the time being.
The power of inventing did not, however, interfere with his readiness to
learn, and the facility with which he acquired whatever knowledge
came in his way had, on one occasion, inconvenient results. A lady of
reduced fortunes kept a small elementary school for boys, a
stone's-throw from his home; and he was sent to it as a day boarder at
so tender an age that his parents, it is supposed, had no object in view
but to get rid of his turbulent activity for an hour or two every morning
and afternoon. Nevertheless, his proficiency in reading and spelling
was soon so much ahead of that of the biggest boy, that complaints
broke out among the mammas, who were sure there was not fair play.
Mrs.----was neglecting her other pupils for the sake of 'bringing on
Master Browning;' and the poor lady found it necessary to discourage
Master Browning's attendance lest she should lose the remainder of her
flock. This, at least, was the