Page:Elizabeth Barrett Browning (Ingram, 5th ed.).djvu/54

38 among the conditions of recurrence to every book with the mass even of cultivated readers—I do not mean the few."

Much as the poetess loved and admired this experienced correspondent, she never allowed her ideas or advice to influence the thought or—save in the Tableaux—even the theme of her works, and continued to write poems in which the story, if any, was subordinated to the sentiment, and in which the ending was as far removed from happiness as possible.

The slow months dragged on at Torquay, and no great improvement took place in the invalid's condition; indeed, she went from bad to worse, and at last seemed scarcely to have any hold on life, so far as physical power was concerned. According to Miss Mitford, writing in March 1810, since the 1st of October she had not been dressed, "only lifted from her bed to the sofa, and for the last month not even taken out of bed to have it made. Yet she still writes to me," says her friend, "and the physicians still encourage hope; but her voice has not for six months been raised above a whisper." Then again, writing about the same time to another correspondent, Miss Mitford says of the invalid: "The physicians at their last consultation said it was not only possible, but probable, that she would so far recover as to live for many years in tolerable comfort. In the meanwhile she writes to me long letters at least twice a week, reads everything, from the magazines of the day to Plato and the Fathers, and has written (vide the Athenæum of three weeks ago) the most magnificent poem ever written by woman on the Queen's Marriage. Great as is her learning, her genius is still more remarkable, and it is beginning to be felt and