James Parton, Horace Greeley, T. W. Higginson, J. S. C. Abbott, E. M. Hoppin, William Winter, Theodore Tilton, Fanny Fern, Grace Greenwood, Mrs. E. C. Stanton, Women of the age; being natives of the lives and deeds of the most prominent women of the present gentlemen

[222] theory of poetry, too, was that it was but the expression of the poet's inner nature. Hence, as might be expected, her poems are but transparent media for the revelation of herself. Her queenly soul shines through them as wine through a crystal vase. Her friendships, her love, her grief, her patriotism, her philanthropy, her religion — all are in them simply and unaffectedly revealed to us. To obtain a correct conception of Mrs. Browning, therefore, we must study her character as revealed in her poems, aided, of course, by the light which our scanty knowledge of the events of her outward life will afford. As the result of our study we shall find that whatever fault we may be compelled to find with the artist, we cannot withhold our entire and hearty admiration for the character of the woman. We shall find that her genius, far from marring, exalted and ennobled her womanhood. We shall feel that the poet was greater than her poems.

Elizabeth Barrett Barrett was born in London, in 1809. Her father was a private gentleman in opulent circumstances. Her early life was passed partly in London, partly in the county of Herefordshire, in sight of the Malvern Hills. One of her minor poems, “The lost bower,” describes with her peculiar power of graphic picturing the scenery surrounding hex early home.

Green the land is where my daily
Steps in jocund childhood played,
Dimpled close with hill and valley,
Dappled very close with shade;
Summer snow of apple blossoms running up from glade to glade.

Far out, kindled by each other,
Shining hills on hills arise,
Close as brother leans to brother,
When they press beneath the eyes
Of some father praying-blessings
From the gifts of Paradise.