wife shall read this and let it stand if I have told her so these twelve
years--and certainly I have not grown intellectually an inch over the
good and kind hand you extended over my head how many years ago! Now it
goes over my wife's too.

How was it Tottie never came here as she promised? Is it to be some
other time? Do think of Florence, if ever you feel chilly, and hear
quantities about the Princess Royal's marriage, and want a change. I
hate the thought of leaving Italy for one day more than I can help--and
satisfy my English predilections by newspapers and a book or two.
One gets nothing of that kind here, but the stuff out of which books
grow,--it lies about one's feet indeed. Yet for me, there would be one
book better than any now to be got here or elsewhere, and all out of a
great English head and heart,--those 'Memoirs' you engaged to give us.
Will you give us them?

Goodbye now--if ever the whim strikes you to 'make beggars happy'
remember us.

Love to Tottie, and love and gratitude to you, dear Mr. Fox, From yours
ever affectionately, Robert Browning.


In the summer of this year, the poet with his wife and child joined his
father and sister at Havre. It was the last time they were all to be
together.