The passions that sometimes agitate these maidens
of his verso are the surprises of noble hearts unprepared for evil;
and even their mistakes cannot cost bitter tears to their attendant
angels.
The girl in the "Return of the Druses" is the sort of nature Byron
tried to paint in Myrrha. But Byron could only paint women as they
were to him. Browning can show what they are in themselves. In "A Blot
in the 'Scutcheon," we see a lily, storm-struck, half-broken, but
still a lily. In "Colombe's Birthday," a queenly rose-bud, which
expands into the full-glowing rose before our eyes. It is marvellous
in this drama how the characters are unfolded to us by the crisis,
which not only exhibits, but calls to life, the higher passions and
the thoughts which were latent within them.
We bless the poet for these pictures of women, which, however the
common tone of society, by the grossness and levity of the remarks
bandied from tongue to tongue, would seem to say to the contrary,
declare there is still in the breasts of men a capacity for pure and
exalting passion,--for immortal tenderness.
Of Browning's delicate sheaths of meaning within meaning, which must
be opened slowly, petal by petal, as we seek the heart of a flower,
and the spirit-like, distant breathings of his lute, familiar with the
secrets of shores distant and enchanted, a sense can only be gained by
reading him a great deal; and we wish "Bells and Pomegranates" might
be brought within the reach of all who have time and soul to wait and
listen for such!
CHRISTMAS.
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