ABSTRACT
First pub!. in Michelmore Catalogue 21, item 66; repr. P. Kelley and R. Hudson, 'Elusive Browningiana', BIS vii (1979) p. ISJ. Our text is taken from the recently rediscovered MS, now at ABL. Collections (E292, p. 422) questions the attribution of the lines to B.; the handwriting, however, is sufficiently close to B.'s, and the style is compatible with the jocular manner of his early letters (esp. to women) and versejeux d'esprit. In Michelmore, the lines are cited as deriving 'From the Flower Collection', a collection of material associated with the circle of the Flower sisters and W. J. Fox, to which B. belonged in the early r83os: see pp. 3-4, 21. In the MS a line is drawn below the second stanza, followed by: 'What is the reason of my being treated with silent contumely, 0, niger cygne! [black swan)' The last phrase alludes to Juvenal, Satires vi 165: 'Rara avis in terris nigroque simillima cycno'; hence, a loved or admired woman. It may refer to Eliza Flower, with her 'dark eyes, long dark hair in streaming ringlets' (Maynard 183). If, as seems probable, 'Alfred' in 1. 7 is Tennyson, the date is probably 1833 or 1834 (see ll. s-6n.); B. renewed his acquaintance with the Flowers at around this time, and Tennyson's 1830 and 1832 collections, which he knew and admired, would almost certainly have been a topic of discussion. If, however, the lines do not concern the Flower sisters, then another possible candidate would be Alfred Domett (see headnote to Waring, II 143).
