"Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach; Three fields to cross till a farm appears; A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch And blue spurt of a lighted match, And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears, Than the two hearts beating each to each!" Yes--we can meet at night. . . . But we must part at morning. "Round the cape of a sudden came the sea, And the sun looked over the mountain's rim; And straight was a path of gold for him, And the need of a world of men for me."[205:1] These are plainly not wedded lovers, though some commentators so describe them; and indeed Browning sings but seldom of wedded love. When he does so sing, he reaches heights of beauty beyond any in the other lyrics, but the poems of marriage are not in our survey. In nearly all his other love-poetry, it is the "trouble of love," in one form or another, which occupies him--the lovers who meet to part; those who love "in vain" (as the phrase goes, but never _his_ phrase); those who choose separation rather than defiance of the "world, and what it fears"; those who do defy that world, and reckon up their gains. "Dear, had the world in its caprice Deigned to proclaim 'I know you both, Have recognised your plighted troth, Am sponsor for you: live in peace!'-- How many precious months and years Of youth had passed, that speed so fast, Before we found it out at last, The world, and what it fears? How much of priceless life were spent With men that every virtue decks, And women models of their sex, Society's true ornament-- Ere we dared wander, nights like this, Thro' wind and rain, and watch the Seine, And feel the Boulevard break again To warmth and light and bliss?" That old quarrel between the ideals of Bohemia and of "respectability"! They could have done these things, even as a married pair, but the trouble is that then they would not have "dared" to do them. "People would have talked." . . . Well, people may talk now, but they _have_ gained something. They have gained freedom to live their lives as they choose--rightly or wrongly, but at any rate it is not "the world" that sways them. They have learnt how much that good word is worth! What is happening, this very hour, in that environment--here, for instance, in the Institute, which they are just passing? "Guizot receives Montalembert!" The two men are utterly opposed in everything that truly signifies to each; yet now are exchanging empty courtesies. See the courtyard all alight for the reception! Let them escape from it all, and leave respectability to its false standards. _They_ are not included--they are outcasts: "put forward your best foot!"