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Life and Letters of Robert Browning-Part38_Mrs.Sutherland Orr(1828-1903)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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I was welcomed on arriving by a Fellow who installed me in my rooms, --

then came the pleasant meeting with Jowett who at once took me to tea



with his other guests, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Bishop of London,

Dean of Westminster, the Airlies, Cardwells, male and female.



Then came the banquet -- (I enclose you the plan having no doubt

that you will recognise the name of many an acquaintance: please return it)



-- and, the dinner done, speechifying set in vigorously.

The Archbishop proposed the standing `Floreat domus de Balliolo' --



to which the Master made due and amusing answer, himself giving

the health of the Primate. Lord Coleridge, in a silvery speech,



drank to the University, responded to by the Vice-Chancellor.

I forget who proposed the visitors -- the Bishop of London,



perhaps Lord Cardwell. Professor Smith gave the two Houses of Parliament, --

Jowett, the Clergy, coupling with it the name of your friend Mr. Rogers --



on whom he showered every kind of praise, and Mr. Rogers returned thanks

very characteristically and pleasantly. Lord Lansdowne drank to the Bar



(Mr. Bowen), Lord Camperdown to -- I really forget what:

Mr. Green to Literature and Science delivering a most undeserved eulogium



on myself, with a more rightly directed one on Arnold, Swinburne,

and the old pride of Balliol, Clough: this was cleverly and almost touchingly



answered by dear Mat Arnold. Then the Dean of Westminster

gave the Fellows and Scholars -- and then -- twelve o'clock struck.



We were, counting from the time of preliminary assemblage,

six hours and a half engaged: FULLY five and a half nailed to our chairs



at the table: but the whole thing was brilliant, genial,

and suggestive of many and various thoughts to me -- and there was a warmth,



earnestness, and yet refinement about it which I never experienced

in any previous public dinner. Next morning I breakfasted



with Jowett and his guests, found that return would be difficult:

while as the young men were to return on Friday there would be no opposition



to my departure on Thursday. The morning was dismal with rain,

but after luncheon there was a chance of getting a little air,



and I walked for more than two hours, then heard service in New Coll. --

then dinner again: my room had been prepared in the Master's house.



So, on Thursday, after yet another breakfast, I left by the noon-day train,

after all sorts of kindly offices from the Master. . . .



No reporters were suffered to be present -- the account in yesterday's Times

was furnished by one or more of the guests; it is quite correct



as far as it goes. There were, I find, certain little paragraphs

which must have been furnished by `guessers': Swinburne, set down as present



-- was absent through his Father's illness: the Cardinal also excused himself

as did the Bishop of Salisbury and others. . . .



Ever yours

R. Browning.



==

The second letter, from Cambridge, was short and written in haste,



at the moment of Mr. Browning's departure; but it tells the same tale

of general kindness and attention. Engagements for no less than six meals



had absorbed the first day of the visit. The occasion was that

of Professor Joachim's investiture with his Doctor's degree;



and Mr. Browning declares that this ceremony, the concert given

by the great violinist, and his society, were `each and all'



worth the trouble of the journey. He himself was to receive

the Cambridge degree of LL.D. in 1879, the Oxford D.C.L. in 1882.



A passage in another letter addressed to the same friend,

refers probably to a practical reminiscence of `Red Cotton Nightcap Country',



which enlivened the latter experience, and which Mrs. Fitz-Gerald




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