Identifier: countryofringb00trev (find matches)
Title: The country of The ring and the book
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Treves, Frederick, Sir, 1853-1923
Subjects: Browning, Robert, 1812-1889
Publisher: London : Cassell
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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Washes the parchment white, and thanks the blow.We shall not meet in this world nor the next,But where will God be absent ? In His faceIs light, but in His shadow healing too :Let Guido touch the shadow and be healed ! From the manner of the telling of her story, fromthe words spoken by her friends, Pompilia stands re-vealed as a woman exquisitely feminine, lovable andloving, gentle, patient, submissive and self-effacing,generous and noble-hearted, tender as a child and yetpossessed, when the safety of her babe was threatened,with the courage of a lioness. One circumstance inher life—her flight from her husbands house—needs tobe explained and justified, while the merits of herrelationship with Caponsacchi stand forth for judgment. From one point of view we have here a girl, who,although married very young, was wedded to a man ofher parents choosing. These two old people, foolishand deluded as they may have been, were held to beof good repute in the eyes of the world. Pompilias 256
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Pompilia husband treated her with persistent cruelty and con-tempt, so that for three years and more her life wasone of unabating misery. Would not her conduct havebeen more commendable, and, indeed, even heroic, ifshe had patiently endured this torture, and had withoutflinching fulfilled her duties as a wife ? Instead ofbeing steadfast to the end, she flies away secretly in thedark of the night with a sprightly and handsome manof twenty-three. If there be no more in the story thanthis, how is it possible that Pompilias deliberate stepcan be regarded not only as justifiable, but as worthyof praise and, indeed, of fervid admiration? Viewed, however, from another and fuller point ofview the case stands thus. She was little more than achild when the chronicle opens. She was, as she says, in a strange town with no familiar face. Not only wasevery day of her existence a day of misery, but her lifewas in danger. She was convinced beyond all arguingthat in some fashion or another she would b

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