The homage paid to Shelley, whose higher influence Browning already perceived to be in large measure independent of his creed of revolution, has in it certainly something of the spirit of autobiography.

In this enthusiastic admiration for Shelley there is nothing to regret, except the unhappy extravagance of the name "Suntreader," which he invented as a title for the poet of _Alastor_ and _Prometheus Unbound._ The attention of Mr W.J.Fox, a Unitarian minister of note, had been directed to Browning's early unpublished verse by Miss Flower.

In the _Monthly Repository_ (April 1833) which he then edited, Mr Fox wrote of _Pauline_ with admiration, and Browning was duly grateful for this earliest public recognition of his genius as a poet.

In the _Athenaeum_ Allen Cunningham made an effort to be appreciative and sympathetic.

John Stuart Mill desired to be the reviewer of _Pauline_ in _Taifs Magazine_; there, however, the poem had been already dismissed with one contemptuous phrase.