Browning would readily make intimates
of. And I think I see in memory's magic glass that the men used to be
rather afraid of him. Not that I ever saw him rough or uncourteous
with the most exasperating fool that ever rubbed a man's nervous
system the wrong way; but there was a quiet, lurking smile which,
supported by very few words, used to seem to have the singular
property of making the utterers of platitudes and the mistakers of
_non-sequiturs_ for _sequiturs_, uncomfortably aware of the nature of
their words within a very few minutes after they had uttered them. I
may say, however, that I believe that in any dispute on any sort of
subject between any two men in the place, if it had been proposed to
submit the matter in dispute for adjudication to Mr. Browning, the
proposal would have been jumped at with a greater readiness of
_consensus_ than in the case of any other man there.
CHAPTER XI
The Italians, I believe, were "thinking" at a considerably earlier
period than that which in the second letter transcribed in the
preceding chapter Mrs. Browning seems to have considered as the
beginning of their "cogitating" existence, and thinking on the
subjects to which she is there adverting. They were "thinking,"
perhaps, less in Tuscany than in any other part of the peninsula, for
they were eating more and better there. They were very lightly taxed.
The _mezzeria_ system of agriculture, which, if not absolutely the
same, is extremely similar to that which is known as "conacre,"
rendered the lot of the peasant population very far better and more
prosperous than that of the tillers of the earth in any of the other
provinces.
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