Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol I (1901).djvu/378

 Henry and Lady Layard, of Mr. and Mrs. Curtis of Palazzo Barbazo, and of Mr. and Mrs. Frederic Eden, for most of his social pleasure and comfort'. In 1884 Browning was made an hon. LL.D. of the university of Edinburgh; for a third time he declined to be elected lord rector of the university of St. Andrews. There had been a suggestion in 1876 that he should stand for the professorship of poetry at Oxford; this idea was now revived, and greatly attracted him; he said that if he were elected, his first lecture would be on 'Beddoes: a forgotten Oxford Poet.' It was discovered, however, that not having taken the ordinary M. A. degree, he was not eligible. He wrote much in this year, for besides the sonnets, 'The Names' and 'The Founder of the Feast,' and an introduction to the posthumous sermons of Thomas Jones, he composed a great number of the idyls and lyrics collected in the winter of 1884 as 'Ferishtah's Fancies.' The summer of 1884 was broken up by an illness of Miss Browning, and the poet did not get to Italy at all, contenting himself with spending August and September in her villa at St.-Moritz with Mrs. Bloomfield Moore, a widow lady from Philadelphia with whom Browning was at this time on terms of close friendship.

In 1885 Browning accepted the honorary presidency of the Five Associated Societies of Edinburgh, and in April wrote the fine 'Inscription for the Gravestone of Levi Thaxter.' In the summer he went again to Gressoney St.-Jean, thence proceeding for the autumn and winter to Venice. He was now settled in the Palazzo Giustiniani Recanati, but his son, who joined him, urged the purchase of a house in Venice. Accordingly, in November 1885 Browning secured, or thought that he had secured, the Palazzo Manzoni, on the Grand Canal; but the owners, the Montecuccule, raised so many claims that he withdrew from the bargain just in time — happily, as it proved, for the foundations of the palace were not in a safe condition; but the failure of the negotiations annoyed and distressed him to a degree which betrayed his decrease of nerve power. Early in 1886 Browning succeeded Lord Houghton as the foreign correspondent to the Royal Academy, a sinecure post which he accepted at the earnest wish of Sir Frederic Leighton. Venice having ceased to attract him for a moment, in 1886 he made the poor state of health of his sister his excuse for remaining in England, his only absence from London being a somewhat lengthy autumnal residence at the Hand Hotel in Llangollen, close to the house of his friends. Sir Theodore and Lady Martin at Brintysilio. After his death a tablet was placed in the church of Llantysilio to mark the spot where the poet was seen every Sunday afternoon during those weeks of 1886. On 4 Sept. of this year his oldest friend passed away in the person of Joseph Milsand, to whose memory he dedicated the 'Parleyings' which he was now composing. This volume, the full title of which was 'Parleyings with certain People of Importance in their Day,' consisted, with a prologue and an epilogue, of seven studies in biographical psychology. In June 1887 the threat of a railway to be constructed in front of the house in which he had lived so long (a threat which was not carried out) induced him to leave 19 Warwick Crescent and take a new house in Kensington, 29 De Vere Gardens. While the change was being made he went to Mrs. Bloomfield Moore at St.-Moritz for the summer, but, instead of proceeding to Venice, returned in September to London. This winter ' he was often suffering; one terrible cold followed another. There was general evidence that he had at last grown old'. But he was still writing; 'Rosny' belongs to December of this year, and 'Flute-Music' to January 1888. He now began to arrange for a uniform edition of his works, which he lived just long enough to see completed.

In August his sister and he left for Italy; they stayed first at Primiero, near Feltre. By this time his son (who had married in October 1887) had purchased the Palazzo Ilezzonico in Venice, with money given him for the purpose by his father, and this he was now fitting up for Browning's reception. Browning stayed first in Ca'Alvise, and had on the whole a very happy autumn and winter in Venice. He did not return to London until February 1889. 'He still maintained throughout the season his old social routine, not omitting his yearly visit, on the anniversary of Waterloo, to Lord Albemarle, its last surviving veteran'. In the summer he paid memorable visits to Jowett at Balliol College, Oxford, and to Dr. Butler at Trinity College, Cambridge. But his strength was visibly failing, and when the time came for the customary journey to Venice, he shrank from the fatigue. However, in the middle of August he was persuaded to start for Asolo, where Mrs. Bronson was, instead of Venice. He was extremely happy at Asolo, and 'seemed possessed by a strange buoyancy — an almost feverish joy in life, which blunted all sensations of physical distress.' He tried to purchase a small house in Asolo; he meant to call it Pippa's Tower