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Life and Letters of Robert Browning-Part42_Mrs.Sutherland Orr(1828-1903)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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but did not oppose it when once he understood it to be serious.



His only proviso was that he should remain neutral

in respect to its fulfilment. He refused even to give Mr. Furnivall



the name or address of any friends, whose interest in himself or his work

might render their co-operation probable.



This passiveassent sufficed. A printed prospectus was now issued.

About two hundred members were soon secured. A committee was elected,



of which Mr. J. T. Nettleship, already well known as a Browning student,

was one of the most conspicuous members; and by the end of October



a small Society had come into existence, which held its

inaugural meeting in the Botanic Theatre of University College.



Mr. Furnivall, its principalfounder, and responsible organizer,

was Chairman of the Committee, and Miss E. H. Hickey, the co-founder,



was Honorary Secretary. When, two or three years afterwards,

illness compelled her to resign this position, it was assumed



by Mr. J. Dykes Campbell.

Although nothing could be more unpretending than the action



of this Browning Society, or in the main more genuine than its motive,

it did not begin life without encountering ridicule and mistrust.



The formation of a Ruskin Society in the previous year

had already established a precedent for allowing a still living worker



to enjoy the fruits of his work, or, as some one termed it,

for making a man a classic during his lifetime. But this fact was not yet



generally known; and meanwhile a curious contradiction developed itself

in the public mind. The outer world of Mr. Browning's acquaintance



continued to condemn the too great honour which was being done to him;

from those of the inner circle he constantly received condolences



on being made the subject of proceedings which, according to them,

he must somehow regard as an offence.



This was the last view of the case which he was prepared to take.

At the beginning, as at the end, he felt honoured by the intentions



of the Society. He probably, it is true, had occasional misgivings

as to its future. He could not be sure that its action



would always be judicious, still less that it would be always successful.

He was prepared for its being laughed at, and for himself being included



in the laughter. He consented to its establishment for what seemed to him

the one unanswerable reason, that he had, even on the ground of taste,



no just cause for forbidding it. No line, he considered, could be drawn

between the kind of publicity which every writer seeks, which,



for good or evil, he had already obtained, and that which the Browning Society

was conferring on him. His works would still, as before, be read, analyzed,



and discussed `viva voce' and in print. That these proceedings

would now take place in other localities than drawing-rooms or clubs,



through other organs than newspapers or magazines, by other and larger

groups of persons than those usually gathered round a dinner- or a tea-table,



involved no real change in the situation. In any case,

he had made himself public property; and those who thus organized



their study of him were exercising an individual right.

If his own rights had been assailed he would have guarded them also;



but the circumstances of the case precluded such a contingency.

And he had his reward. How he felt towards the Society



at the close of its first session is better indicated

in the following letter to Mrs. Fitz-Gerald than in the note to Mr. Yates



which Mr. Sharp has published, and which was written with more reserve and,

I believe, at a rather earlier date. Even the shade of condescension



which lingers about his words will have been effaced by subsequent experience;

and many letters written to Dr. Furnivall must, since then,



have attested his grateful and affectionateappreciation of kindness intended




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