The Savannah morning news., 1903-07-12
STORY OF ELOPEMENT
OF THE BROWNINGS

appearances, on his side phalanX or
all the sanities and responsibilities,
there came suddenly a new develop
ment, destined to bring matters to a
crisis indeed, and to weigh at least
three souls in the balance. Upon fur
Their examination of Miss Barrett's con-
dition, the physicians declared that it
was absolutely necessary that she
should be taken to Italy. This may,
without any exaggeration, be called the
turning point and the last great earth
ly opportunity of Barrett's character.
He had not originally been an evil man
only a man who, being stoical In
practical things, permitted himself, to
his great detriment, self-indulgence
in moral things. He had grown to
regard his pious and dying daughter as
a part of the furniture of the house
and of the universe. And as long as
the great mass of authorities were on
his side, his illusion waA quite pardon
able. His crisis came when the author
tiles changed their front, and, with one
accord, asked his permission to send
his daughter abroad. 1t was his crisis,
and he refused.
The TyrannicaI Father.
He had, if we may Judge from what
we know of him, his own peculiar and
somewhat detestable way of refusing
| Once when his daughter had asked a
| perfectly simple favor in the matter
of xpediency-permissi that is, to
keep her favorite brother with her dur
ing an illness-her singular parent re-
J marked that "she might keep him if
she liked, but that he had looked for
greater self-sacrihce." These were the
weapons with which he ruled his peo-
pie. He with his terrible appeal
to the vibrating consciences of women
was, with regard to one of them, very
near to the end of his reign. When
Browning heard that the Italian jour
ney was forbidden, he proposed def
nitely that they should marry and go
on the journey together.
Many other persons had taken cog
nizance of the fact. and were active in
the matter. Kenyon, the gentlest and
most universally complimentary of
mortals. had married into the house
and given Arabella Barrett, the sister
of the sick woman, his opinion of her
fathers conduct with a degree of fire
and frankness which must have been
perfectly amazing in a man of his al
most antiquated social delicacy Mrs.
Jameson, an old and generous friend
of the family, had Immediately stepped
in and offered to take Elizabeth to
Italy herself, thus removing all ques-
tions of expense or arrangement. She
would appear to have stood to her
guns in the matter with splendid per-
sistence and magnanlmity. She called
day after day seeking for a change of
mind, and delayed her own journey to
the continent more than once. At
length, when it became evident that
the extraction of Mr.. Barrett's consent
was hopeless, she reluctantly began
her own tour in Europe alone. She
went to Paris, and had not been there
many days when she received a formal
call from Robert Browning and Eliz-
abeth Barrett Browning, who had been
married for some days, Her astonish-
ment is rather picturesque thing to
think about.
The manner in which this sensational
lopement-which was, of course, the
talk of the whole literary world-had
been affected, is narrated, as every one
knows, in the Browning Letters"
Browning had decided that an imme-
date marriage was the only solution:
and having put his hand to the plow,
did not decline even when it became
obviously necessary that it should be
a secret marriage. To a man of his
somewhat stormily candid and casual
disposition this necessity of secrecy
was really eXasperating; but any one
with any imagination of chivalry will
rejoice that he accepted the evil con-
ditions. He had always had the cour-
age to tell the truth; and now it was
demanded of him to have the greater
courage to tell a lie, and he told It
with perfect cheerfulness and lucidity.
In thus disappearing surreptitiously
with an invalid woman he was doing
something against which there were
undoubtedly hundred things to be
said, only it happened that the most