1. Irving, Washington, “The Author's Account of Himself,” The Sketch Book, in The Works of Washington Irving, 10 vols. (1868; rpt. New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1880), V, 16–17.Google Scholar

2. Elizabeth Clementine Kinney, “Journal of Elizabeth Clementine Kinney From Oct. '54 to Jan. 1st 1866 & with Occasional notes to '75” and “Personal Reminiscences of Elizabeth C. Kinney,” MSS. For such information as is cited concerning Mrs. Kinney's literary interests and their sources, as well as for significant details developed in this study on the Browning-Kinney relationship, I am indebted to these MSS which are in the Edmund Clarence Stedman Collection in the Columbia University Library. Hereafter, all citations from and references to these MSS will be incorporated within the text and will be cited as either “Journal” or “Reminiscences.” I wish here to express my thanks to the authorities of the Columbia University Library for permission to consult these MSS and to quote from them in this study, and particularly to Mr. Bernard Crystal for supplying helpful information.

3. Letter dated 16–18 July 1853, in Letters of the Brownings to George Barrett, ed. Landis, Paul (Urbana: Univ. of Illinois Press, 1958), p. 188Google Scholar. Hereafter this edition will be cited as Letters to George Barrett.

4. See letter dated 21 July 1853, in Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Letters to Mrs. David Ogilvy, ed. Heydon, Peter N. and Kelley, Philip (New York: Quadrangle and the Browning Institute, 1973), p. 102Google Scholar; and letter to Isa Blagden, 26 July 1853, in The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, ed. Kenyon, Frederic G., 2 vols. (New York: Macmillan, 1898), II, 126Google Scholar. Hereafter the Kenyon edition will be cited as Letters of EBB.

5. Letters to George Barrett, pp. 189, 192–93. The lines from Casa Guidi Windows which refer to Charles Albert (1798–1849) appear toward the end of the poem and include the following:

Yea, verily, Charles Albert has died well;

And if he lived not all so, as one spoke,

The sin pass softly with the passing bell.

For he was shriven, I think, in cannon-smoke,

And, taking off his crown, made visible

A hero's forehead.

6. Although Mrs. Kinney was into what she called her “middle years” at the time she first met the Brownings, she was very pleased by her youthful appearance. Her frequent references to this circumstance and her definition of herself as having led a “romantic life history” in both her “Journal” and her “Reminiscences” suggest a form of vanity which probably was apparent to those around her and which surely would have been offensive to Elizabeth. A typical example of Mrs. Kinney's preoccupation with these matters and the vanity which that preoccupation suggests is found in the following lines from the opening pages of her “Journal”: “I have now reached what is called a middle life; tho' looking & feeling so much younger than I really am, that strangers never take me for over twenty-five;–seldom for more than twenty, or twenty-two.”

7. Letter dated 3 Nov. 1857, in Life and Letters of Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. Stedman, Laura and Gould, George H., 2 vols. (New York: Moffat, Yard, 1910), I, 144.Google Scholar

8. Letter dated 22 Dec. 1859, in Life and Letters of Edmund Clarence Stedman, I, 198.

9. Life and Letters of Edmund Clarence Stedman, I, 199.

10. “A Day with the Brownings at Pratolino,” Scribner's Monthly, 1 (1870), 186.Google Scholar

11. “Written on the Fly-leaf of Mrs. Browning's Poems,” Poems (New York: Hurd and Houghton, 1867), p. 209.Google Scholar

12. Catalogue of the Library Association and the Autograph Collection of Edmund Clarence Stedman (New York: Anderson Auction Co., 1911). See in particular pp. 44–49.Google Scholar

13. Letters to George Barrett, p. 189.

14. Published previously in Letters of Robert Browning, collected by Wise, Thomas J., ed. Hood, Thurman L. (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1933), pp. 40–41Google Scholar. The MS is in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University. In the case of Letter 1, as with all other previously published Browning correspondence to Mrs. Kinney, I have compared the edited version against the MS and have reproduced the letter without editorial “improvement.” Thus, in Letter 1 and in each letter that follows peculiarities in spelling, punctuation, and the like are the Brownings' own. It should also be noted that while an ellipsis in quoted material indicates an omission, the double period in Mrs. Browning's correspondence is her own. I wish here to express my thanks to the authorities of the Yale University Library for permission to consult and publish from their Browning correspondence.

15. Throughout the Brownings' friendship with the Kinneys, Mr. Kinney suffered from a variety of ailments. Readers will notice, for instance, a number of references to Mr. Kinney's poor health in several of Elizabeth's letters to Mrs. Kinney. Although Mrs. Kinney addresses the subject of her husband's health on numerous occasions in her “Journal,” the precise nature of his illness or illnesses is not made clear. On one occasion, however, Mrs. Kinney observes that “the gout” has forced Mr. Kinney to curtail his social activities. Mrs. Kinney attributes to ill-health Mr. Kinney's inability to complete his history of the Medicis.

16. William Wetmore Story (1819–1895), American sculptor, poet, and critic. With his wife, Edith, and two children, he went to Italy in 1847 to study sculpture, and in 1848 he began a friendship with Browning which continued until the poet's death. Story lived in Rome from 1850 on, and his studio there became a center for conversation and artistic influences among the Anglo-American writers and artists in Italy. For details of the relationship between Browning and Story see James, Henry, William Wetmore Story and his Friends, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: Blackwood, 1903)Google Scholar, and Browning to His American Friends, ed. Hudson, Gertrude Reese (New York: Barnes and Noble, 1965).Google Scholar

17. Mrs. Kinney's letter to the Brownings is an incomplete MS in the Stedman Collection at Columbia University Library. In a hand much like Mrs. Kinney's, the year 1855 appears in the bottom right-hand corner of the first page of the MS. Clearly, that date is incorrect, for the letter answers in identical terms the invitation offered by Robert to the Kinneys in 1853. In her letter to George Barrett which was quoted earlier, Elizabeth notes the following about the Kinneys' first days in Florence: “[The Kinneys] inaugurated their arrival in Florence by being cheated … to the extent of twelve pounds sterling in payment for luggage” (Letters to George Barrett, p. 189). This event could be the source of Robert's comment in Letter 1 on the “good long bill” of the host at Bagni di Lucca and of Mrs. Kinney's answer that she now knows how “to escape his ‘long bill.’”

18. See Taplin, Gardner B., The Life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1957), pp. 288–91Google Scholar, and Hudson, Ronald, “Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Her Brother Alfred: Some Unpublished Letters,” Browning Institute Studies, 2 (1974), 144-49CrossRefGoogle Scholar, for extended discussions of the Brownings' difficulties during the early stages of their 1855 journey to England.

19. Unpublished; MS in the Beinecke Library.

20. A devastating cholera epidemic spread rapidly through Florence shortly after the Brownings left for Paris in June 1855. Within the Brownings' circle of friends, Thomas Buchanan Read's family was the most affected by the epidemic. In her “Reminiscences” Mrs. Kinney provides the following information on the disaster Read experienced: “[The] family of our poet-artist, Thomas Buchanan Read, was attacked. … First, his youngest child, ‘fairy Lilian,’ four years old, showed the fatal symptoms, and the mother in her terror removed both their little girls to a hotel on the Arno, hoping the change to stay the disease. Alas! it was only to hurry its progress; the little one soon passed away, with the words on her lips, ‘Mother, come!’ and the poor bereaved woman,–the next victim,–tarried not to obey the last call of her child. The poet was desolate. He seized his only remaining one and fled with her to the Baths of Lucca, where he assuaged his grief in the contemplation of Beautiful Nature in that loveliest Tuscan retreat, and in composing the most ideal of his poems, ‘A House by the Sea,’–which was written, strange to say, in the midst of mountains, far away from the coast.”

21. Louisa Alexander (d. 1858), Isa Blagden's invalid companion. While the details of the relationship between Isa and Louisa Alexander are unclear, it is known that Isa brought her from England to rest at her home in Italy in 1852 and that Isa was devoted to her companion's needs until 1855. In 1855 Louisa left Italy for India, where she died in 1858. See Dearest Isa: Robert Browning's Letters to Isabella Blagden, ed. McAleer, Edward C. (Austin: Univ. of Texas Press, 1951), pp. xxiii, 22Google Scholar, and Letters of EBB, II, 290. Hereafter the McAleer edition will be cited as Letters to Isabella Blagden.

22. MrsBrownell, Anna (Murphy) Jameson, (1794–1860)Google Scholar, author and close friend of the Brownings. Mrs. Jameson's offer to take Elizabeth to Italy before her marriage to Robert was refused; however, after the Brownings' marriage she met them in France and accompanied them to Italy. Her friendship with Elizabeth was particularly close, and at one time Mrs. Jameson lived in the apartment above the Brownings' in Casa Guidi.

23. Scheffer, Ary (1795–1858)Google Scholar, French painter of Dutch extraction known for his dreamy, sentimental pictures mostly on biblical and literary subjects.

24. M. Simert. I have not been able to discover the particulars of his talent and career beyond what Elizabeth reports to Mrs. Kinney.

25. Gibson, John (1790–1866)Google Scholar, English neoclassical sculptor. His attempt to revive polychromed sculpture caused much controversy, although his work was admired by, among others, Hiram Powers.

26. Rosalie, Marie “Rosa” Bonheur (1822–1899)Google Scholar, French painter of animal subjects. Rosa would, indeed, have reminded Elizabeth of Harriet Hosmer, for like Harriet, she was a strong, unconventional personality who liked to wear men's trousers and smocks and often smoked cigarettes in public.

27. Hosmer, Harriet Goodhue (1830–1908)Google Scholar, American sculptor. In 1852 she went to Rome with her friend Charlotte Cushman. Although Rome remained her principal residence until a few years before her death, she travelled extensively and was a frequent visitor to Florence. A friend of both Brownings, she and Robert fell out in later years over his proposal to Lady Ashburton.

28. Count Henry Cottrell, a young English artist and member of the household of the last Duke of Lucca, from whom he received his title, and Sophia Augusta (Tulk) Cottrell, his wife. The Cottrells were long-standing friends of the Brownings in Florence. Shortly after their arrival in Florence, the Kinneys too formed a close friendship with the Cottrells.

29. The signature and preceding paragraph are written on the inside back flap of Elizabeth's envelope.

30. Porter, Katherine H., Through a Glass Darkly: Spiritualism in the Browning Circle (1958; rpt. New York: Octagon Books, 1972), pp. 28–71.Google Scholar

31. Letters of EBB, I, 243.

32. MrsBrowning, to Arabel, , 28 04 1852Google Scholar, MS in the New York Public Library, as quoted in Porter, , p. 39.Google Scholar

33. Porter, , p. 39.Google Scholar

34. Porter, , p. 45.Google Scholar

35. Letter to Blagden, Isa, 3 03 1853, in Letters of EBB, II, 104.Google Scholar

36. Published previously in Phelps, William Lyon, “Robert Browning on Spiritualism,” Yale Review, NS 23 (1933), 129–35. The MS is in the Beinecke Library.Google Scholar

37. Years later, Mrs. Kinney wrote the following comment on Robert's letter and on her agreement with him on its subject in her “Reminiscences”: “Not only did Hiram Powers, & Elizabeth Browning, but others among poet-prophets, believe in [Home], though Robert Browning–be it said to his credit–never from the first countenanced Hume or his pretences, & I have a letter from Browning full of his energetic indignation against the medium, after an interview with him. Indeed, Mr. Browning [once confessed] to having shown the ‘imposter,’ as he calls him, the door, in consequence of his attempt to proselyte Mrs. Browning, whose tendencies to credit the Supernatural, were always distasteful to her better balanced husband.”

38. Allingham, William, A Diary, ed. Allingham, H. and Radford, D. (London: Macmillan, 1907), pp. 101–02Google Scholar. Another account, based upon Home's recollection of the episode, is offered by Taplin, , Life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, p. 295Google Scholar. Still another account of the episode is offered by Mrs. Kinney in her “Journal.” Although she does not describe the encounter between Robert and the medium in as violent terms as Allingham does, she does write that Robert showed Home “the door” and “insulted [him] in the presence of others, & called him an ‘imposter!’” She adds, “Dear Mrs. Browning cried when he did so; for she believes in all these things.”

39. Letter dated 17 Aug. 1855, Elizabeth Barrett Browning: Letters to Her Sister, 1846–1859, ed. Huxley, Leonard (1929; rpt. London: John Murray, 1931), p. 219Google Scholar. Hereafter this edition will be cited as Letters to Her Sister.

40. Letters to Her Sister, pp. 220–21.

41. See DeVane, William C., A Browning Handbook, 2nd ed. (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1955), pp. 218–19.Google Scholar

42. Unpublished; MS in the Beinecke Library.

43. According to Mrs. Kinney's “Journal,” the Kinneys, the Cottrells, and Powers moved to the country outside Florence, and there, “upwind” from the epidemic-ridden city, they passed much of their time continuously praying for “deliverance from” the “Plague.”

44. Letter dated 5 Nov. 1855, in Letters of EBB, II, 219.

45. Trollope, T. A., “Some Recollections of Hiram Powers,” Lippincott's Magazine, 15 (1875), 213.Google Scholar

46. Clark, Willis Gaylord (1808–1841)Google Scholar, American poet, editor, and publicist. His friendship with Mrs. Kinney dates from her young adult years, and during the 1830's their friendship intensified as she contributed articles to the Knickerbocker, which was then edited by Clark's brother, Lewis. His pen-name, Ollapod, was used to caption his column in the Knickerbocker, “Ollapodianna.”

47. Letters to Her Sister, p. 237.

48. Unpublished; MS in the Beinecke Library.

49. Kirkup, Seymour Stocker (1788–1880)Google Scholar, English artist, resident of Italy from the early 1820's until his death. Kirkup was a vocal believer in “the spirits,” and he was one of the first to champion Home's mediumship when the medium arrived in Italy in 1855. See Porter, , pp. 44, 53–54, 87, 104, 137.Google Scholar

50. See above, n. 40.

51. Unpublished; MS in the Beinecke Library.

52. Hiram Powers' “Melancholy” or “Il Penseroso” was executed in 1856 with the figure fully costumed according to the specifications furnished by Milton in the lines beginning “Come, pensive Nun,” and ending “Forget thyself to marble” (DAB).

53. Letter dated 3 Aug. 1856, in Letters to Her Sister, p. 253.

54. Letter dated 11 Oct. 1856, in Letters to Her Sister, p. 258.

55. Letter dated 27 Oct. 1856, in Letters to George Barrett, pp. 219, 221.

56. Letter dated 18 Nov. 1856, in Letters to Her Sister, pp. 261–62.

57. See Taplin, , Life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, pp. 310–13Google Scholar, for expanded comment on the critical and popular reception of Aurora Leigh and the effect of the reception on Elizabeth.

58. Published previously in New Letters of Robert Browning, ed. DeVane, W. C. and Knickerbocker, K. L. (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1950), p. 98Google Scholar. MS in the Beinecke Library.

59. Published previously in Letters of EBB, II, 244. MS in the Aldrich Collection in the Historical Department of Iowa.

60. Letter dated 18 Nov. 1856, in Letters to Her Sister, p. 263.

61. Letters to Isabella Blagden, p. 352.

62. Published previously in Phelps, , “Robert Browning on Spiritualism,” pp. 137–38Google Scholar, and New Letters of Robert Browning, pp. 198–200. MS in the Beinecke Library.

63. Letters to Isabella Blagden, p. 355.

64. See Porter, , “Appendix B: The Browning-Home Exchange of Literary Brickbats,” pp. 147–48Google Scholar, for an extended discussion of the periodic public surfacings of the animosity between the poet and the medium.

65. Quoted in Phelps, , “Robert Browning on Spiritualism,” p. 136.Google Scholar

66. Letters of EBB, II, 126.

67. Letters of EBB, II, 257.

68. MS in the Houghton Library. I wish here to express my thanks to the authorities of the Houghton Library for their permission to print this letter in its entirety.

69. Letters of EBB, II, 256–57.

70. Letters to Her Sister, pp. 271–73.