River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1888-09-13
THE BROWNING FAMILY.
How the Poets Impressed Their House
keeper at Florence, italy.


How the Poets Impressed Their House.
Keeper at Florence, Italy.
A friend in Philadelphiar-a lady
sends me an anecdote that tends to
show what mice people" the Brown
ings have always been: 1--WE were
staying in the house where they had
lived, in Florence occupied their
suite, IN fatt-and thought 1t would be
interesting to get some anecdotes of
their everyday life. The family had
consisted of Mr.. Browning, Elizabeth
Barrett Browning and their small son
(now married to an American lady)J
So we gently led up to the subject to
our landlady, an Englishwoman who
had married Russian (Baranowski
by namel, and who had been recom=
mended to us as thoroughly honest
woman. She was very reticent, not
only speaking seldom, but never even
using superAous words. However, we
thought surely she must with
taetfll handling, be beguiled into
telling us something worth hear
ing on such a fruitful topic. So
we began: Well, madame. you
had the Brownings with you good
while; how interesting they must have
been" oh, yes, they were very nice
people We waited for further de-
velopments, but madame went on dust
ing the room. Seeing that she had no
intention of volunteering any informa-
ton, we ventured another question::
What kind of man is Mr. Browning
personally; inadaIheP Is he very
agreeable?' oh, yes indeed said
madame, cheerfully; he is very nice
man. with which she turned away
and went on with her work-not as if
she did not wish to impart what she
knew, but as if she had impaired all
she knew. Our ardor was dampened, :"
continues +. NJ. L., "but still we tried
again, as she remained in the room
and did not seem unwilling to be i'm
terviewed' i suppose yOu knew Mrs.
Browning quite well, madame; she
must have been very charitable and
kind to the Florentine poor, as they
have put a tablet over your door to her
memoryp oh, yes said madame,
quietly, she was very nice woman
This, indeed, was discouraging; but.
as last hope, We thought we would
try question about the little boy,
as she had a beloved grandson of whom
she was very proud, and might have
some anecdOte in connection with both
of the children. Was there only one
boy, madame?' Yes, only one What
kind of child was he-brightp oh,
yes answered Madame Baranowski,
he was very nice little boy With
this she left the room, and we never
had the energy to tackle her again on
the subject. She had had great many
interesting people in her house. having
then lived there over thirty years. She
used to talk about the Misses Horner,
who wrote a book on Florence, some
thing in the style of Hare's Walks.
| They had lived with her for some time.
One day when | was reading their
book, copy of which she had in the
strange collection of books given her
by her different dodgers, | came across
a quotation from the Italian which had
a very slight mistake in it. Some
Italian who knew little English had
marked the sentence with star. and
on the margin had written, in very
Italian hand: Il think that the Misses
| Horner does not seems to know well the
| Italianr ~ Critic.