5259. RB to Alicia Bayne

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 30, 273.

19. Warwick Crescent,

Upper Westbourne Terrace,

July 17. ’63

My dear Mrs Bayne,

I accept very gratefully on the part of Robert your kind invitation for to-morrow: he will be punctually with you at 2. o’clock.

Thank you much for the seal—the arms are altogether different from ours: [1] but, depend on it, that shall hinder nothing of our kinship, if you please, so that I shall proudly as well as

faithfully yours ever

Robert Browning!

Publication: NL, p. 151.

Manuscript: Yale University.

1. “Evidently my great grandmother had sent Browning the seal of the Browning family of Coaley-Gloucestershire. Her mother-in-law was Isabella Browning, heiress of that family which was one of the oldest in the county. Their crest was a ‘chapeau d’honneur’ bestowed on them by Richard II” (letter from Robert Bayne Powell to Philip Kelley, 23 May 1961).

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