the fact of his having lived so much abroad must have put him somewhat out of touch with any English life, save that of London society, and even that he was not much conversant with till his declining years. Beautiful as was his married life, we can fancy that his long residence in Florence with an invalid wife was somewhat enervating; to a less inherently robust nature it might have been ruinous. It is a little startling to find Matthew Arnold writing, after meeting Mrs. Browning in Florence, that she was "hopelessly confirmed in her aberration from health, nature, beauty, and truth." Such an influence can scarcely have been altogether wholesome. It is remarkable how few of Browning's subjects are distinctly English; of the longer works none almost, except Strafford and The Blot (for Christmas Eve and Easter Day is cosmopolitan). What a possession for ever would it have been for us had the genius that culminated so splendidly in The Ring and the Book wrought out its marvellous power on a home-suggested subject, rather than upon an obscure "Roman murder story," that chanced to touch a chord of curiosity or sympathy. Then, indeed, would we have had to-day an age-marking epic of our Englandthe England of Chaucer and Shakespeare.

And for this reason, if for no other, Tennyson will probably remain more popular than Browning. He lived in England, and the life of England lives in his poems. The May Queen, The Grandmother, The Northern Farmer, Locksley Hall, reproduce varying phases of our manifold English life. Enoch Arden tells what may well be a true story, and in language that might justify the assumption of Sordello's description

The lowest hind should not possess a hope,
A fear, but I'd be by him, saying better

Than he, his own heart's language.

In Memoriam is essentially English, since even its most far-reaching speculations and subtlest introspections are interwoven with local associations and indissolubly blended with the personality of the author and that of his friend. It may be that the England of the Idylls is a somewhat hazy region, and more like to fairy-land than to the busy England of to-day. But still, there is the feeling of historic continuity, and we readily make allowance for those mystic efforts which the long perspective of the ages evolves. After all, we do not lose the consciousness of our own persistent individuality, even though memory takes us back to days when we too walked in fairy-land in the glory of a light such as never was on land or sea!

But in truth, England yet awaits the advent of her Robert Burns-of a great national poet-a man with eyes to see the splendour of national achievement, and with a heart to throb consonant with the persistence and pathos of our multiform modern life. Surely "our island story" has not been so eventless and obscure but that some part of it might be found proper to kindle and sustain the epic fervour of a true poet! And who shall dare affirm that the common life of to-day does not afford themes worthy of poetic treatment? Was ever life so varied, so ample in its self-determination, and yet so beset by casualty, so free, so fearless, so arduous, so aspiring? Day by day, hour by hour, the vast and complex mechanism that directs an empire is kept in order by the skill, the patience, the fidelity, often the heroism of men who are unknown, unnamed, unhonoured, and unsung. Things are done every day, and as a matter of course, by rough men and women which, were they done once in a lifetime by a peeress or a bishop, would set us all agape and agasp till we found words superlative enough to utter forth our adulation and amazement! There is poetry in

the coal mine, in the locomotive, in the fire brigade, in the lifeboat, in the great ocean steamer. Occasionally the lyric cry goes forth from some unknown or but halfrecognized singer. We listen, approve, applaud, then straightway go our way and remark, when opportunity occurs, that this is a prosaic age!

But speculations such as these would lead us far; and, after all, it is our business to take our poet as he has been given to us. Were he otherwise than he was, he would not have been Robert Browning, and it is of Robert Browning and his work that I have presumed to speak to-night. Should I, in some, have revived pleasant memories; should I, in others, have kindled a spark of appreciative sympathy, and therewith a determination towards further study, then the object of this Paper shall have been attained. Such study will not weary, and it will be amply repaid. It will bring you face to face with a man on whose like we may not quickly look again; it will bring you into touch with one of the formative influences of this age, into communion with a thinker, a seer, and a poet, of whose work, as a whole, I, at least, would say, as the Athenæum said of his opus magnum, The Ring and the Book, that "it is not merely beyond all parallel the supremest poetic achievement of the time, but the most precious and profound spiritual treasure that England has produced since the days of Shakspere."

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183

ON SOME RUNIC REMAINS.

BY THE REV. J. SEPHTON.

(In the following lecture, figures in brackets refer to the diagrams of inscriptions at the end. "R. M." refers to Dr. Stephens's Runic Monuments of Scandinavia and England; "H." to the Handbook of Runic Monuments, by the same author.)

In my lecture this evening I purpose bringing to your notice, by the help of photographic slides, some ancient objects left to us by our Teutonic ancestors of the early middle ages. Some of these would attract notice for several reasons; others would probably be passed over by a casual observer; but they are all particularly interesting to students of old Northern literature, because they are inscribed with words or sentences in old Northern languages or dialects written in peculiarly-shaped characters or letters known as Runes. They have been found in different countries, though chiefly in Scandinavia, Denmark, and England.

The relics on which Runes are inscribed are of many kinds rings, swords, bracteates, amulets, combs, horns, and other such moveable property. They are inscribed on a large number of standing stones, set up as memorial stones of the dead, Christian and heathen, or as commemorative of some great event; on fonts and bells in churches, crosses and slabstones in Christian churchyards; caskets, coffins, and even on rocks in situ. In point of date the latest remains are probably the many memorial stones called Bautasteinar, or way-stones, found on the borders of Lake Mælar, and in other parts of