[Venice—Wednesday, 31 October 1883]
Mr Browning came to our garden, Villa Vendramin, at the Giudecca, with his sister, and walked for half an hour under the grape-trellises. He said they had arranged to go to Greece this week—and had so written to friends and servants in London– But, considering the sea-voyages and the lateness of the Season, they had decided to defer their plan to another year, when they could set out from Venice a month earlier—‘for we are both bad sailors. But I am glad we have had this idea; that our thoughts have been turned to it—for now it will seem easier. To go to Greece has always seemed something too remote, impossible! Now it is no longer so, and next year we shall hope to go.[’] (They did not go, and seem to have dropped the idea altogether. ’89)
