'. . . We are enjoying the mountains here--riding the donkeys in the footsteps of the sheep, and eating strawberries and milk by basinsful. The strawberries succeed one another throughout the summer, through growing on different aspects of the hills. If a tree is felled in the forests, strawberries spring up, just as mushrooms might, and the peasants sell them for just nothing. . . . Then our friends Mr. and Mrs. Story help the mountains to please us a good deal. He is the son of Judge Story, the biographer of his father, and for himself, sculptor and poet--and she a sympathetic graceful woman, fresh and innocent in face and thought. We go backwards and forwards to tea and talk at one another's houses. '. . . Since I began this letter we have had a grand donkey excursion to a village called Benabbia, and the cross above it on the mountain-peak. We returned in the dark, and were in some danger of tumbling down various precipices--but the scenery was exquisite--past speaking of for beauty. Oh, those jagged mountains, rolled together like pre-Adamite beasts and setting their teeth against the sky--it was wonderful. . . .' Mr. Browning's share of the work referred to was 'In a Balcony'; also, probably, some of the 'Men and Women'; the scene of the declaration in 'By the Fireside' was laid in a little adjacent mountain-gorge to which he walked or rode. A fortnight's visit from Mr., now Lord, Lytton, was also an incident of this summer. The next three letters from which I am able to quote, describe the impressions of Mrs. Browning's first winter in Rome. Rome: 43 Via Bocca di Leone, 30 piano. Jan. 18, 54.