London: Dramatis Personae The grief of the desolate man was an uncontrollable passion; his heart was strong and all its strength entered into its sorrow.

Miss Blagden, "perfect in all kindness," took motherly possession of the boy, and persuaded his father to accompany Penini to her villa at Bellosguardo.
When all that was needful at Casa Guidi had been done, Browning's first thought was to abandon Italy for many a year, and hasten to London, there to have speech for a day or two at least with Mrs Browning's sister Arabel.

"The cycle is complete," he said, looking round the sitting-room of Casa Guidi.

"I want my new life," he wrote, "to resemble the last fifteen years as little as possible." Yet while he stayed in the accustomed rooms he held himself together; "when I was moved," he says, "I began to go to pieces."[84] Yet something remained to sustain him.
To one who has habitually given as well as received much not the least of the pangs of separation arises from the incapacity to render any further direct service.

It fortified Browning's heart to know that much could be done, and in ways which his wife would have approved and desired, for her child.