its style, and grand in teachings that find few followers among nations in these enlightened days.

Some are prone to moralize over precious stones, and see in them the petrified souls of men and women. There is no stone so sympathetic as the opal, which one might fancy to be a concentration of Mrs. Browning's genius. It is essentially the woman- stone, giving out a sympathetic warmth, varying its colors from day to day, as though an index of the heart's barometer. There is the topmost purity of white, blended with the delicate, perpetual verdure of hope, and down in the opal's centre lies the deep crimson of love. The red, the white, and the green, forming as they do the colors of Italy, render the opal doubly like Mrs. Browning. It is right that the woman-stone should inclose the symbols of the "Woman Country."

Feeling all these things of Mrs. Browning, it becomes the more painful to place on record an account of those last days that have brought with them so universal a sorrow. Mrs. Browning's illness was only of a week's duration. Having caught a severe cold of a more threatening nature than usual, medical skill was summoned; but, although anxiety in her behalf was necessarily felt, there was no whisper of great danger until the third or fourth night, when those who most loved her said they had never seen her so ill; on the following morning, however, she was better, and from that moment was thought to be improving in health. She herself believed this; and all had such confidence in her wondrous vitality, and the hope was so strong that God would spare her for still greater good, that a dark veil was drawn over what might be. It is often the case, where we are accustomed to associate constant suffering with dear friends, that we calmly look danger in the face without misgivings. So little did Mrs. Browning realize her critical condition, that, until the last day, she did not consider herself sufficiently indisposed to remain in bed, and then the precaution was accidental. So much encouraged did she feel with regard to herself, that, on this final evening, an intimate female friend was admitted to her bedside and found her in good spirits, ready at pleasantry and willing to converse on all the old

"

loved subjects. Her ruling passion had prompted her to glance at the "Athenæum and "Nazione"; and when this friend repeated the opinions she had heard expressed by an acquaintance of the new Italian Premier, Ricasoli, to the effect that his policy and Cavour's were identical, Mrs. Browning "smiled like Italy," and thankfully replied, "I am glad of it; I thought so." Even then her thoughts were not of self. This near friend went away with no suspicion of what was soon to be a terrible reality. Mrs. Browning's own bright boy bade his mother goodnight, cheered by her oft-repeated, “I am better, dear, much better." Inquiring friends were made happy by these

assurances.

One only watched her breathing through the night, he who for fifteen years had ministered to her with all the tenderness of a woman. It was a night devoid of suffering to her. As morning approached, and for two hours previous to the dread moment, she seemed to be in a partial ecstasy; and though not apparently conscious of the coming on of death, she gave her husband all those holy words of love, all the consolation of an oft-repeated blessing, whose value death has made priceless. Such moments are too sacred for the common pen, which pauses as the womanpoet raises herself up to die in the arms of her poet-husband. He knew not that death had robbed him of his treasure, until the drooping form grew chill and froze his heart's blood.

At half-past four, on the morning of the 29th of June, Elizabeth Barrett Browning died of congestion of the lungs. Her last words were, "It is beautiful!" God was merciful to the end, sparing her and hers the agony of a frenzied parting, giving proof to those who were left of the glory and happiness in store for her, by those few words, "It is beautiful!" The spirit could see its future mission even before shaking off the dust of the earth.

Gazing on her peaceful face with its eyes closed on us forever, our cry was her "Cry of the Human."

"We tremble by the harmless bed
Of one loved and departed;
Our tears drop on the lips that said
Last night, Be stronger-hearted!'
O God! to clasp those fingers close,
And yet to feel so lonely!

To see a light upon such brows,
Which is the daylight only!
Be pitiful, O God!"

On the evening of July 1st, the lovely English burying-ground without the walls of Florence opened its gates to receive one more occupant. A band of English, Americans, and Italians, sorrowing men and women, whose faces as well as dress were in mourning, gathered around the bier containing all that was mortal of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Who of those present will forget the solemn scene, made doubly impressive by the grief of the husband and son? "The sting of death is sin," said the clergyman. Sinless in life, her death, then, was without sting; and turning our thoughts inwardly, we murmured her prayers for the dead, and wished that they might have been her burial-service. We heard her poet-voice saying,

"And friends, dear friends, when it shall be
That this low breath is gone from me,
And round my bier ye come to weep,
Let one most loving of you all
Say, Not a tear must o'er her fall,
He giveth His beloved sleep.'"

But the tears would fall, as they bore her up the hill, and lowered "His beloved" into her resting-place, the grave. The sun itself was sinking to rest behind the western hills, and sent a farewell smile of love into the east, that it might glance on the lowering bier. The distant mountains hid their faces in a misty veil, and the tall cypress-trees of the cemetery swayed and sighed as Nature's special mourners for her favored child; and there they are to stand keeping watch over her.

"Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little

birds sang west,

Toll slowly!

And I said in under-breath, All our life is mixed with death,

And who knoweth which is best?

"Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little

birds sang west,

Toll slowly!

And I paused' to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness, Round our restlessness, His rest."

Dust to dust, and the earth fell with a dull echo on the coffin. We gathered

round to take one look, and saw a double grave, too large for her;- may it wait long and patiently for him!

And now a mound of earth marks the spot where sleeps Elizabeth Barrett Browning. A white wreath to mark her woman's purity lies on her head; the laurel wreath of the poet lies at her feet; and friendly hands scatter white flowers over the grave of a week as symbols of the dead. We feel as she wrote,

"God keeps a niche

In heaven to hold our idols; and albeit
He brake them to our faces, and denied
That our close kisses should impair their
white,

I know we shall behold them raised, com

plete,

The dust swept from their beauty, glorified, New Memnons singing in the great Godlight."

It is strange that Cavour and Mrs. Browning should have died in the same month, within twenty-three days of each other, the one the head, the other the heart of Italy. As head and heart made up the perfect life, so death was not complete until Heaven welcomed both. It seemed also strange, that on the night after Mrs. Browning's decease an unexpected comet should glare ominously out of the sky. For the moment we were superstitious, and believed in it as a minister of woe.

Great as is this loss, Mrs. Browning's death is not without a sad consolation. From the shattered condition of her lungs, the physician feels assured that existence could not at the farthest have been prolonged for more than six months. Instead of a sudden call to God, life would have slowly ebbed away; and, too feeble for the slightest exertion, she must have been denied the solace of books, of friends, of writing, perhaps of thought even. God saved her from a living grave, and her husband from protracted misery. Seeking for the shadow of Mrs. Browning's self in her poetry, (for she was a rare instance of an author's superiority to his work,) many an expression is found that welcomes the thought of a change which would free her from the suffering inseparable from her mortality. There is a yearning for a more fully developed life, to be found most frequently in her sonnets. She writes at

times as though, through weakness of the body, her wings were tied :

"When I attain to utter forth in verse

Some inward thought, my soul throbs audibly

Along my pulses, yearning to be free,
And something farther, fuller, higher re
hearse,

To the individual true, and the universe,
In consummation of right harmony!
But, like a wind-exposed, distorted tree,
We are blown against forever by the curse
Which breathes through Nature. Oh, the
world is weak;

The effluence of each false to all;

Add what we best conceive, we fail to speak!

Wait, soul, until thine ashen garments fall, And then resume thy broken strains, and seek

Fit peroration without let or thrall!"
The "ashen garments" have fallen, -
"And though we must have and have had
Right reason to be earthly sad,
Thou Poet-God art great and glad!"

It was meet that Mrs. Browning should come home to die in her Florence, in her Casa Guidi, where she had passed her happy married life, where her boy was born, and where she had watched and rejoiced over the second birth of a great nation. Her heart-strings did not entwine themselves around Rome as around Florence, and it seems as though life had been so eked out that she might find a lasting sleep in Florence. Rome holds fast its Shelley and Keats, to whose lowly graves there is many a reverential pilgrimage; and now Florence, no less honored, has its shrine sacred to the memory of Theodore Parker and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

The present Florence is not the Florence of other days. It can never be the same

to those who loved it as much for Mrs.

Browning's sake as for its own. Her reflection remains and must ever remain; for,

"while she rests, her songs in troops Walk up and down our earthly slopes, Companioned by diviner hopes."

The Italians have shown much feeling at the loss which they, too, have sustained,more than might have been expected, when it is considered that few of them are conversant with the English language, and that to those few English poetry (Byron excepted) is unknown.

A battalion of the National Guard was to have followed Mrs. Browning's remains to the grave, had not a misunderstanding as to time frustrated this testimonial of respect. The Florentines have expressed great interest in the young boy, Tuscanborn, and have even requested that he should be educated as an Italian, when any career in the new Italy should be open to him. Though this offer will not be accepted, it was most kindly meant, and shows with what reverence Florence regards the name of Browning. Mrs. Browning's friends are anxious that a tablet to her memory should be placed in the Florentine Pantheon, the Church of Santa Croce. It is true she was not a Romanist, neither was she an Italian, yet she was Catholic, and more than an Italian. Her genius and what she has done for Italy entitle her to companionship with Galileo, Michel Angelo, Dante, and Alfieri. The friars who have given their permission for the erection of a monument to Cavour in Santa Croce ought willingly to make room for a tablet on which should be inscribed,

SHE SANG THE SONG OF ITALY. SHE WROTE "AURORA LEIGH."

Edwin of Deira. By ALEXANDER SMITH. London: Macmillan & Co. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 16mo.

A THIRD Volume of verse by Alexander Smith certainly claims a share of public attention. We should not be at all surprised, if this, his latest venture, turn out his most approved one. The volcanic lines in his earlier pieces drew upon him the wrath of Captain Stab and many younger officers of justice, till then innocent of inkshed. The old weapons will, no doubt, be drawn upon him profusely enough now. Suffice it for us, this month, if we send to the printer a taste of Alexander's last feast and ask him to "hand it round."

BERTHA.

"So, in the very depth of pleasant May, When every hedge was milky white, the lark A speck against a cape of sunny cloud, Yet heard o'er all the fields, and when his heart

Made all the world as happy as itself,-
Prince Edwin, with a score of lusty knights,
Rode forth a bridegroom to bring home his
bride.

Brave sight it was to see them on their way,
Their long white mantles ruffling in the wind,
Their jewelled bridles, horses keen as flame
Crushing the flowers to fragrance as they
moved!

Now flashed they past the solitary crag, Now glimmered through the forest's dewy gloom,

Now issued to the sun. The summer night Hung o'er their tents, within the valley pitched, Her transient pomp of stars. When that had

paled,

And when the peaks of all the region stood
Like crimson islands in a sea of dawn,
They, yet in shadow, struck their canvas
town;

For Love shook slumber from him as a foe,
And would not be delayed. At height of noon,
When, shining from the woods afar in front,
The Prince beheld the palace-gates, his heart
Was lost in its own beatings, like a sound
In echoes. When the cavalcade drew near,
To meet it, forth the princely brothers pranced,
In plume and golden scale; and when they

met,

Were gathered fair as flowers upon the sward, While in the distant chambers women wept, And, crowding, blessed the little golden head, So soon to lie upon a stranger's breast,

And light that place no more. The gate stood wide:

Forth Edwin came enclothed with happiness; She trembled at the murmur and the stir That heaved around, then, on a sudden, shrank,

When through the folds of downcast lids she felt

Burn on her face the wide and staring day,
And all the curious eyes. Her brothers cried,
When she was lifted on the milky steed,
'Ah! little one, 't will soon be dark to-night!
A hundred times we 'll miss thee in a day,
A hundred times we 'll rise up to thy call,
And want and emptiness will come on us!
Now, at the last, our love would hold thee
back!

Let this kiss snap the cord! Cheer up, my girl!

We'll come and see thee when thou hast a boy

To toss up proudly to his father's face,

To let him hear it crow!' Away they rode; And still the brethren watched them from the

There burned upon the mountain's craggy top
Their journey's rosy signal. On they went;
And as the day advanced, upon a ridge,
They saw their home o'ershadowed by a cloud;
And, hanging but a moment on the steep,
A sunbeam touched it into dusty rain;
And, lo, the town lay gleaming 'mong the
woods,

And the wet shores were bright. As nigh they drew,

The town was emptied to its very babes,
And spread as thick as daisies o'er the fields.
The wind that swayed a thousand chestnut

cones,

And sported in the surges of the rye,
Forgot its idle play, and, smit with love,
Dwelt in her fluttering robe. On every side
The people leaped like billows for a sight,
And closed behind, like waves behind a ship.
Yet, in the very hubbub of the joy,

A deepening hush went with her on her way;
She was a thing so exquisite, the hind
Felt his own rudeness; silent women blessed
The lady, as her beauty swam in eyes
Sweet with unwonted tears. Through crowds
she passed,

Distributing a largess of her smiles;

And as she entered through the palace-gate, The wondrous sunshine died from out the air, And everything resumed its common look. The sun dropped down into the golden west, Evening drew on apace; and round the fire The people sat and talked of her who came That day to dwell amongst them, and they praised

Her sweet face, saying she was good as fair.

"So, while the town hummed on as was its wont,

With mill, and wheel, and scythe, and lowing

steer

In the green field,-while, round a hundred

hearths,

Brown Labor boasted of the mighty deeds Done in the meadow swaths, and Envy hissed Its poison, that corroded all it touched,

Rusting a neighbor's gold, mildewing wheat,
And blistering the pure skin of chastest maid,—
Edwin and Bertha sat in marriage joy,
From all removed, as heavenly creatures
winged,

Alit upon a hill-top near the sun,

When all the world is reft of man and town By distance, and their hearts the silence fills. Not long: for unto them, as unto all,

Down from love's height unto the world of

men

Occasion called with many a sordid voice. So forth they fared with sweetness in their hearts,

That took the sense of sharpness from the thorn.

Sweet is love's sun within the heavens alone,
But not less sweet when tempered by a cloud
Of daily duties! Love's elixir, drained
From out the pure and passionate cup of
youth,

Is sweet; but better, providently used,
A few drops sprinkled in each common dish
Wherewith the human table is set forth,
Leavening all with heaven. Seated high
Among his people, on the lofty dais,
Dispensing judgment,

ring

making woodlands

Behind a flying hart with hound and horn,—
Talking with workmen on the tawny sands,
'Mid skeletons of ships, how best the prow
May slice the big wave and shake off the
foam,-

Edwin preserved a spirit calm, composed,
Still as a river at the full of tide;
And in his eye there gathered deeper blue,
And beamed a warmer summer. And when

sprang

The angry blood, at sloth, or fraud, or wrong,
Something of Bertha touched him into peace
And swayed his voice. Among the people
went

Queen Bertha, breathing gracious charities,
And saw but smiling faces; for the light
Aye looks on brightened colors. Like the

dawn

(Beloved of all the happy, often sought
In the slow east by hollow eyes that watch)
She seemed to husked and clownish gratitude,
That could but kneel and thank. Of industry
She was the fair exemplar, as she span
Among her maids; and every day she broke
Bread to the needy stranger at her gate.
All sloth and rudeness fled at her approach;
The women blushed and courtesied as she
passed,

Preserving word and smile like precious gold; And where on pillows clustered children's heads,

A shape of light she floated through their dreams."