Men and Women

90

Antonelli: Cardinal, secretary of Pope Pius IX.

91

Naples' liquefaction: the supposed miracle of the liquefaction of the blood of Saint Januarius the Martyr. A small quantity of it is preserved in a crystal reliquary in the great church at Naples, and when brought into the presence of the head of the saint, it melts.

92

Decrassify: make less crass or gross.

93

Fichte: (1761-1814), celebrated German metaphysician, who defined God as the "moral order of the universe."

94

"<Pastor est tui Dominus>": the Lord is your shepherd.

95

Anacreon: Greek lyric poet of the sixth century B. C.

96

<In partibus Episcopus>, etc.: "In countries where the Roman Catholic faith is not regularly established, as it was not in England before the time of Cardinal Wiseman, there were no bishops of sees in the kingdom itself, but they took their titles from heathen lands."

97

Sprinkled isles: probably the Sporades, so named because they were scattered, and in opposition to the Cyclades, which formed a circle around Delos.

98

Phare: light-house. The French authority, Allard, says that though there is no mention in classical writings of any light-house in Greece proper, it is probable that there was one at the port of Athens as well as at other points in Greece. There were certainly several along both shores of the Hellespont, besides the famous father of all light-houses, on the island of Pharos, near Alexandria. Hence the French name for light-house, phare.

99

Poecile: the portico at Athens painted with battle pictures by Polygnotus the Thasian.

100

Combined the moods: in Greek music the scales were called moods or modes, and were subject to great variation in the arrangement of tones and semitones.

101

Rhomb . . . lozenge . . . trapezoid: all four-sided forms, but differing as to the parallel arrangement of their sides and the obliquity of their angles.

102

Terpander: musician of Lesbos (about 650 B. C.), who added three strings to the four-stringed Greek lyre.

103

Phidias: the Athenian sculptor (about 430 B. C.) —and his friend: Pericles, ruler of Athens (444-429 B.C.). Plutarch speaks of their friendship in his Life of Pericles.

104

Sappho: poet of Lesbos, supreme among lyricists (about 600 B. C.). Only fragments of her verse remain.

105

AEschylus: oldest of the three great Athenian dramatists (525-472 B. C.).

106

Paulus; we have have heard his fame: Paul's mission to the Gentiles carried him to many of the islands in the AEgean Sea as well as to Athens and Corinth (Acts 13-21).

107

Century of sonnets: Rafael is known to have written four love sonnets on the back of sketches for his wall painting, the "Disputa," which are still preserved in collections, one of them in the British Museum. The Italian text of these sonnets with English translations are given in Wolzogen's Life of him translated by F. E. Bunn<e`>tt. Did he ever write a hundred? It is supposed that the lost book once owned by Guido Reni, apparently the one referred to in stanza iv, was a book of drawings. Perhaps these also bore sonnets on their backs, or Browning guessed they did.

108

Who that one: Margarita, a girl Rafael met and loved in Rome, two portraits of whom exist—one in the Barberini Palace, Rome, the other in the Pitti, in Florence. They resemble the Sistine and other Madonnas by Rafael.

109

Madonnas, etc.: "San Sisto," now in Dresden; "Foligno," in the Vatican, Rome; the one in Florence is called "del Granduca," and represents her appearing in a vision; the one in the Louvre, called "La Belle Jardini<e`>re," is seated in a garden among lilies.

110

Dante once, etc.: "On that day," writes Dante, "Vita Nuova," xxxv, "which fulfilled the year since my lady had been made of the citizens of eternal life, remembering of her as I sat alone, I betook myself to draw the resemblance of an angel upon certain tablets." That this lady was Beatrice Portinari, as Browning supposes, Dante's devotion to her, in both "The New Life" and "The Divine Comedy," should leave no doubt. Yet the literalness of Mr. W. M. Rossetti makes him obtuse here, as he and other commentators seem to be in their understanding of Browning throughout this stanza. Browning evidently contrasts Dante's tenderness here towards Beatrice with the remorselessness of his pen in the "Inferno" (see Cantos 32 and 33), where he stigmatized his enemies as if using their very flesh for his parchment, so that ever after in the eyes of all Florence they seemed to bear the marks of the poet's hate of their wickedness. It was people of this sort, grandees of the town, Browning fancies, who again "hinder loving," breaking in upon the poet and seizing him unawares forsooth at this intimate moment of loving artistry. "Chancing to turn my head," Dante continues, "I perceived that some were standing beside me to whom I should have given courteous greeting, and that they were observing what I did: also I learned afterwards that they had been there a while before I perceived them." The tender moment was over. He stopped the painting, simply saying, "Another was with me."

111

He who smites the rock: Moses, whose experience in smiting the rock for water (Exodus 17.1-7; Numbers 20.1-11) is likened to the sorrow of the artist, serving a reckless world.

112

Sinai-forehead's . . . brilliance: Exodus 19.9, 16; 34.30.

113

Jethro's daughter: Moses' wife, Zipporah (Exodus 2.16, 21).

114

AEthiopian bondslave: Numbers 12.1.