At Genoa, during several days he was deeply depressed by the illness of his wife, who lay on the sofa and seemed to waste away.

But Casa Guidi was reached at last, where it was more like summer than November; the pleasant nest had its own peculiar welcome for wanderers; again they enjoyed the sunsets over the Arno, and Mrs Browning was able to report herself free from cough and feeling very well and very happy: "You can't think how we have caught up our ancient traditions just where we left them, and relapsed into our former soundless, stirless, hermit life.

Robert has not passed an evening from home since we came--just as if we had never known Paris."[52] The political condition of Italy was, indeed, a grief to both husband and wife.

It was a state of utter prostration--on all sides "the unanimity of despair." The Grand Duke, the emancipator, had acquired a respect and affection for the bayonets of Austria.

The Pope was "wriggling his venom into the heart of all possibilities of free-thought and action." Browning groaned "How long, O Lord, how long ?" His home-thoughts of England in contrast with Italy were those of patriotism and pride.