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Flush

Virginia Woolf,

Trekkie Ritchie (Introduction)

3.85 · Rating details · 5,677 ratings · 649 reviews

This story of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s cocker spaniel, Flush, enchants right from the opening pages. Although Flush has adventures of his own with bullying dogs, horrid maids, and robbers, he also provides the reader with a glimpse into Browning’s life. Introduction by Trekkie Ritchie.

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Paperback, 204 pages

Published October 4th 1976 by Mariner Books (first published October 1933)

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Jul 06, 2017 Dolors rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Dolors by: My insatiable hunger for Woolf

Shelves: read-in-2017

I never thought I would be so absorbed with the biography…of a dog!
But what was I thinking? Woolf’s writing works its magic with no exception, of course.
Are you in the mood for the ideal dose of ironic, playful humor?
Do you crave for those intricately woven phrases that sing the English language with exquisite intonation? Or for a literary game of original subtlety?

“Flush” is the described above plus a surrogate biography of the poetess Elizabeth Barrett-Browning and a jocular satire on the s I never thought I would be so absorbed with the biography…of a dog!
But what was I thinking? Woolf’s writing works its magic with no exception, of course.
Are you in the mood for the ideal dose of ironic, playful humor?
Do you crave for those intricately woven phrases that sing the English language with exquisite intonation? Or for a literary game of original subtlety?

“Flush” is the described above plus a surrogate biography of the poetess Elizabeth Barrett-Browning and a jocular satire on the social conventions and the assumption of purity that is generally attached to the British ~~snobbery~~ aristocracy.
It’s through the eyes, or maybe mostly through the snout of Elizabeth’s dog that we follow her life as a young woman confined first by a mysterious illness at her father’s house in Wimpole Street and the developing epistolary romance with Robert Browning prior to their elopement to Florence.

This novella is partly a reconstruction of the life of the Brownings through real documents, basically the poems and letters of Elizabeth, and partly a divertimento that brings the world alive with delightful descriptive passages vibrant with the smells, noises, flavors and fragmentary sights that constitute the perceptions of this special dog. Flush absorbs the mood of his mistress and vice versa, establishing a chord of communication that transcends language, the laws of nature and Victorian rationality.
Flush rises above the concept of the spoiled pet dog and loyal companion. He becomes the recipient of Elizabeth’s states of mind and the mysterious accord between these opposed beings, woman and animal, which culminates, with Shakespearean satire galore, into a rarefied but incredibly honest account of the poetess’ life, internalized and intensified by his doggish observations.

It’s impossible to read “Flush” and not imagine Virginia’s own dog laying drowsily under the shade of a pear tree in the exotic garden of the Woolfs’ summer residence in East Sussex, taking in all the aromas of flowers and plants, the sound of swarming bees and the sweet scent of figs about to burst out with ripeness and wonder which experiences, those of dog or man, are closer to artistic sensibilities.
Woolf seems to be of the opinion that, sometimes, the feelings of animals are more genuine, if not more human than humans themselves. And after reading this delightful novella and sitting under the shade of that fig tree, how can I disagree?

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Monk’s House, East Sussex ...more

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May 02, 2015 Fionnuala added it · review of another edition

Shelves: review-may-contain-comic-content, woolf-reviews, woolf-and-related

..the Victorians loved biographies, especially biographies of eminent people such as kings, queens and other distinguished members of society. Flush is the biography of such an eminent Victorian. Or rather Flush is a parody of a biography of an eminent Victorian. We might even say that Flush is a parody of a parody of a biography of an eminent Victorian because Flush is in fact the biography of a dog. But not just any dog, an Eminent Dog, the pure bred Cocker Spaniel belonging to another eminent ..the Victorians loved biographies, especially biographies of eminent people such as kings, queens and other distinguished members of society. Flush is the biography of such an eminent Victorian. Or rather Flush is a parody of a biography of an eminent Victorian. We might even say that Flush is a parody of a parody of a biography of an eminent Victorian because Flush is in fact the biography of a dog. But not just any dog, an Eminent Dog, the pure bred Cocker Spaniel belonging to another eminent Victorian, the poet Elizabeth Barrett who eventually married Eminent Victorian Robert Browning after they’d exchanged an entire volume of love letters; they then went to live in Italy, taking Flush along with them. (view spoiler)

That a dog-lover wrote this biography is clear from the outset. The reader even wonders if the book might have been written by a dog, so marvellously done is the dog point of view: the action revolves entirely around sounds, smells and scamperings. But needless to say, Flush wasn’t written by a dog but by Virginia Woolf who it turns out would have loved to have been a dog. In his biography of his aunt, her nephew Quentin Bell, tells us: Flush is not so much a book by a dog lover as a book by someone who would love to be a dog.

So if we're wondering about the unusual choice of biographical subject, the dog rather than his mistress, Quentin's quote seems to give us the answer. But there is also the parody aspect already mentioned. In 1933, Woolf wrote to a friend: I was so tired after finishing 'The Waves' that I lay in the garden and read the Browning love letters, and the figure of the dog made me laugh so I couldn’t resist making him a Life. I wanted to play a joke on Lytton. Lytton Strachey was Woolf’s long time friend and a rather irreverent biographer himself; his Eminent Victorians is a parody of the serious biographical style so beloved of the Victorians.

So now that we’ve chased our tail sufficiently, we are back where we started. The Victorians loved biographies.. ...more

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Mar 15, 2020 Jean-Luke rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

The dog, a mutt, at last gave up trying to tear her master away from his book. This from the man who dismissed and avoided dog stories as a rule. Blink her blue eyes as she might, it was in vain. She could whine, bark, but he would merely tell her to shush. She could claim no superior breeding, the blue eyes were a happy accident, and she had always thought her master above such prejudices, being that he himself had no exceptional heritage, but she was beginning to have her doubts. Never again w ...more

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Dec 15, 2019 Paul rated it really liked it

Shelves: woolf

4.5 stars
This, on the surface is an oddity: a biography of a dog, Elizabeth Barrett’s cocker spaniel, Flush. It is a stream of consciousness novella, written straight after The Waves. Inevitably, because of the subject matter it is treated as a less serious work. Woolf certainly worried about it:
“I open this to make one of my self-admonishments previous to publishing a book. Flush will be out on Thursday and I shall be very much depressed, I think, by the kind of praise. They’ll say it’s ‘charmi 4.5 stars
This, on the surface is an oddity: a biography of a dog, Elizabeth Barrett’s cocker spaniel, Flush. It is a stream of consciousness novella, written straight after The Waves. Inevitably, because of the subject matter it is treated as a less serious work. Woolf certainly worried about it:
“I open this to make one of my self-admonishments previous to publishing a book. Flush will be out on Thursday and I shall be very much depressed, I think, by the kind of praise. They’ll say it’s ‘charming,’ delicate, ladylike … I must not let myself believe that I’m simply a ladylike prattler.”
Woolf felt that the point she was making would not be understood and said so to her friend Sybil Colfax when she appreciated the novel:
“I’m so glad that you liked Flush. I think it shows great discrimination in you because it was all a matter of hints and shades, and practically no one has seen what I was after.”
There are a number of themes addressed by Woolf. One of these is class, Flush is a pedigree dog whose antecedents are approved by the kennel club and who is above other mongrel dogs. He knows this, but over time he changes, through experience, and begins to realize that he is no different from the dogs on the street.
It is also by its nature a commentary on the life of Barrett both before and after her involvement with Browning. Woolf’s obsession with London and its various glories and horrors also takes centre stage.
Woolf scholar Jane Goldman makes some interesting points about Flush. It needs to be noted that although Barrett herself was an abolitionist, her family wealth came from plantations in Jamaica. The point is made that the collars and chains Flush wears can be seen as referencing those worn by slaves. A walk along Wimpole Street is seen as a slave arriving in a new country:
“he stopped, amazed: defining and savouring until a jerk at his collar dragged him on”
Flush has a previous existence in the country before he was given to Barrett:
“the old hunting cry of the fields hallooed in his ears and he dashed forward to run as he had run in the fields at home … But now a heavy weight jerked at his throat; he was thrown back on his haunches. Why was he a prisoner here?”
Flush was also intended to parody Lytton Strachey’s work on Queen Victoria. In addition there is the more obvious point that dogs were considered property in the same way that women were and are and links are drawn between the tyrannies each suffer. There’s plenty of sharp social comment here, although Woolf’s worries that it might be dismissed as sweet and sentimental; which given the attitude of the English towards animals was probably a credible worry.
There is a philosophical element to Flush as well, consider the problem of what is real:
“Then she would make him stand with her in front of the looking-glass and ask him why he barked and trembled. Was not the little brown dog opposite himself? But what is ’oneself’? Is it the thing people see? Or is it the thing one is? So Flush pondered that question too, and, unable to solve the problem of reality, pressed closer to Miss Barrett and kissed her ’expressively’. That was real at any rate.”
There are recollections of Proust and collective memory:
“Then with all her poet’s imagination Miss Barrett could not divine what Wilson’s wet umbrella meant to Flush; what memories it recalled, of forests and parrots and wild trumpeting elephants; nor did she know, when Mr Kenyon stumbled over the bell-pull, that Flush heard dark men cursing in the mountains; the cry, ‘Span! Span!’ rang in his ears, and it was in some muffled, ancestral rage that he bit him.”
As there usually is with Woolf, there is much more going on than meets the eye and I suspect a second reading will be required. It can be read as a rather cute biography of a dog as Woolf feared: but it really is so much more than that. ...more

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Dec 09, 2016 Duane rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2016-book-challenge, reviewed-books, english-calssics, rated-books

This is the biography of a dog, a cocker spaniel named Flush who was owned by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. And through the eyes of Flush, and the writing of Virginia Woolf, we get a look at the life of the poetess herself. It's an interesting way to write about someone, but the talented pen of VW is up to the challenge.

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Sep 23, 2019 Kenny rated it it was amazing

Shelves: people, virginia-woolf, brits

"Do words say everything? Can words say anything? Do not words destroy the symbol that lies beyond the reach of words?"
Virginia Woolf ~~ Flush

...more

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Oct 16, 2017 Lori rated it liked it

Dogs are color blind.

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May 15, 2019 classic reverie rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 1900, dogs, blondie-s-birthday-month-may-reads, romance, english-writer, favorites, own, virginia-woolf, short-stories, poems

In 2018, I found Virginia Woolf's Flush and added it to my to read list but somewhere I thought I read, that Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Flush had died around 14 years old, being superstitious enough, I wanted to not read it for a couple years. I decided early this year, 2019, in reading this during my May-Blondie's birthday dog reads which I started doing annually several years ago. Why was I so concerned about Flush's age at death? At that time our little dog, Blondie was alive and nearing Fl ...more

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Apr 30, 2019 WhatIReallyRead rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: physical-book, great-writing, owned, classics, favorites, fiction, read-in-english, historical-fiction, animals

Flush by Virginia Woolf - Oxford World's Classics series

Flush is a biography of a dog. To be more precise, Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s dog. I picked this book up knowing nothing about it, as is my habit and was pleasantly surprised.

First of all, I loved the writing. When it comes to Virginia Woolf, it seems, I always do. I bought this particular volume about a decade ago, among her other books, for that very reason.

Second of all, the subject matter got to me. I love dogs and I love poetry. Reading a book about a female Victorian poet from her dog's perspective was all I need. The first time I found out about Elizabeth & Robert Browning's fascinating love story was while reading their letters in the Love Letters anthology. It was a lovely surprise to have a different glimpse into their lives. I am now so invested in this I bought Browning: Poems - a collection of both Elizabeth & Robert's works.

The book itself tugged at my heart. Some view Flush as a humorous work, but I'm sentimental enough to really worry along with all the dog's worries, be scared for him, root for him, and generally be a mess and cry at all the appropriate and inappropriate times. I cared about Flush so much!

Others view this book as one kind of metaphor or another, a veiled commentary on women's rights, social commentary, etc. The unusual form of the book did open up a lot of possibilities and angles, turning it multifaceted and as deep as the reader makes it out to be. I mostly took the book at face value - as a clever way to write a biography of Elizabeth Browning, an intriguing look at Victorian England and simply as a book about a dog. Woolf did a great job here in all ways.

The edition I own is an Oxford World's Classics series, so there were an extensive introduction and commentary about all the ways one can interpret this work. I appreciate this kind of stuff, it adds context and helps not to miss out on things that lie beneath the surface. I only own a few other editions like this, and will probably get more, since I like their layouts, covers, and composition. ...more

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Feb 24, 2013 Michael rated it liked it

Shelves: historical-fiction, italy, fiction, england, biography, london, dog

This was too tempting to resist. The great stream-of-consciousness novelist pulls off a “biography” of the beloved dog of Victorian poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning. It was a nice trifle, though missing some of the emotional engagement that comes from direct knowledge of the animal by the author.

Flush was a cocker Spaniel who grew up in the country, and then was brought to the London household of Barrett. Their first encounter give you some of the flavor of Woolf’s approach to capturing his exper ...more

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Apr 03, 2016 Ronald Morton rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: by-women

This is one of my wife's favorite books. Prior to having children, when we used to go used book shopping together, she would buy any copy of this she came across to gift to friends. Up until now I'd never read it (in my defense, she's read almost none of my favorite books, and I've read many of hers through the years, and will continue to do so).

Flush is a sweet little book, beautifully written, about Elizabeth Barrett Browning's dog Flush (and, in the margins, it is also about EBB). It manages ...more

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Aug 23, 2017 Kyriakos Sorokkou added it · review of another edition

This was the 6th book I read by Virginia Woolf and her easiest, so far. It's a peculiar little book with a cute theme. I don't want to downgrade it by using the word cute but when the protagonist is a dog than there's some cuteness in it.

This is a biography of a dog called Flush. Flush was Elizabeth Barrett Browning's beloved dog. She was a Victorian poet and her husband was a poet as well, Robert Browning. He was the one who wrote the epic poem that inspired Stephen King's The Dark Tower Series ...more

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Mar 23, 2020 Dannii Elle rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classic-captivaton, non-fiction-nuances, authorial-advice

This is the semi-fictional biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's beloved Spaniel, Flush. Told partially through his eyes, this details the events of his life, that of his owner's, and gives an insight to the society surrounding them. This story was as adorable as it was heart-breaking and provided a vivid and unique rendering of one small pup's life and the insurmountable amount of love he had to give the world.

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Nov 15, 2020 Luís rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: relogio-d-agua, female-writers, classics, british-literature, historical-fiction, animals

My first Virginia Woolf on a dog biography, Wouaf!
Flush is a spaniel living in England in the 19th century. From Miss Mitford to Miss Barret, he finds happiness in the look his mistress has on him, unwelcome lover or baby. And even if his instincts are suddenly reduced to a domesticated space, it doesn't matter to him; he makes it his flash. A doggie what, you will tell me.
The novel surfs on the ambivalence of the gaze focused on the world, is it that of a human or a dog, or a humanized dog? "Ce ...more

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Sep 20, 2008 Jesse rated it it was amazing

Shelves: women-writers, literary-modernism, 1930-s, bloomsbury, brit-lit, my-virginia-woolf-obsession

After completing the groundbreaking experiment The Waves, Woolf “rested” by working on what she considered a mere trifle—a short novel that would eventually become Flush: A Biography, a version of the courtship of poets Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning as seen through the eyes of their omnipresent cocker spaniel. Using historical facts as a platform, what emerges is a witty and unusual take on one of the most famous real-life romances of all time, and even if it comes off as rather slight w ...more

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Sep 01, 2020 Gizem-in-Wonderland rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: world-classics

“To be nothing - is that not, after all, the most satisfactory state in the whole world?”

Woolf’s genius resurfaces once again with an awe-inspiring biography. If you read and loved Orlando, an amazing jaw-dropping fake-biography, you will absolutely fall for Flush, a spanial trying to attribute meaning to life. The biography of Flush revolves around her owner Miss Mitford, a later Mrs. Browning and how their relationship buckles and bends with a myriad of emotions. We observe human society and r ...more

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Nov 26, 2018 Smiley rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

3.50 stars

We can find this very brief synopsis enticingly informative, "This playful, witty biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's pet spaniel - involving Italian travels and kidnappings - asks what it is to be a dog, and a human." (back cover) The dog in question called Flush, a corker/spotted spaniel, is one of the key characters brilliantly narrated by Virginia Woolf with her sense of humor, we simply can't help wondering how she has written so understandingly that few writers, I think, co ...more

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Mar 08, 2019 Emma rated it really liked it

Shelves: classics

This is a biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's red cocker spaniel named Flish. Woolf does an amazing job of telling the story from Flush's perspective.
This book suprised me quite alot, this was an excellent and powerful story that made you conect with the dog.

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Mar 13, 2020 JK rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: little-black-classics

Elizabeth Barrett was a Victorian poet with a gorgeous little cocker spaniel called Flush. I was curious about Woolf’s decision to write his biography, and found this gorgeous quote from one of her letters to Lady Ottoline Morrell: ‘I was so tired after the Waves, that I lay in the garden and read the Browning love letters, and the figure of their dog made me laugh so I couldn’t resist making him a Life’.. I mean, that’s as good a reason as any.

Flush is a city dog, raised in the streets of Londo ...more

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Jun 23, 2019 Raquel Baggins rated it liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Raquel by: Evilreads

Shelves: historical-fiction, cute-stories, virginia-woolf

3.5 ★★★☆☆

«The fact was that they could not communicate with words, and it was a fact that led undoubtedly to much misunderstanding. Yet did it not lead also to a peculiar intimacy? (…) After all, she may have thought, do words say everything? Can words say anything? Do not words destroy the symbol that lies beyond the reach of words?»

Review in English | Reseña en español (abajo)

A short, entertaining and very enjoyable novel in which Virginia Woolf puts us into Flush’s shoes (or rather paws), the ...more

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Oct 13, 2014 Hana rated it really liked it

Shelves: lit-fic, britain-ireland, historical-fiction, 2014-reads, animals-nature

Ha! So you thought this was a book about a dog?

Nope. It's by Virginia Woolf, so it is really clever social satire: a dog's eye view of Victorian mores, the absurdities of class consciousness, the stultifying life of London ladies (and dogs), the joys of running free in Italy, and the delights of sexual liberation. Of course Woolf has great fun writing from the point of view of one who experiences life as a sequence of vast and varied scents and we get some interesting insights into Elizabeth Bar ...more

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Apr 03, 2019 MK rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 0100-picked-up-from-library

My first Virginia Woolf novel, read b/c one of my groups chose it as a monthly read. Really easy to read! and enjoyable, as well.

Having had 3 cocker spaniels in the past, I enjoyed it all the more. :)

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Nov 02, 2017 Jeff Jackson rated it really liked it

Shelves: book-club-2

This concise biography of Elizabeth Barrett-Browning's spaniel is super charming, surprisingly dramatic, and beautifully crafted. For fans of "Orlando," this is wonderful in a similarly fantastical vein. It's mostly known as a trifle today, though for many readers it might serve as an ideal introduction to Virginia Woolf.

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Jun 28, 2020 Marjolein rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-english, biography, little-black-classics, copy-to-bl

Read all my reviews on http://urlphantomhive.booklikes.com

I had never read Virginia Woolf before. But I had heard a lot about her, so I was glad to see she was included in the expansion of the series.

Flush is the biography, of a dog, a spaniel. This was rather unexpected, but I took a liking to it right from the start. Flush has indeed quite the life and is certainly fit for a biography. It is also written in a very compelling way. Interesting style, and a surprising story.

~Little Black Clas ...more

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Nov 24, 2016 Xandra rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: woolf-and-joyce, british, by-women, 1900-1949, european

I just read a biography of a dog, that’s how much I love Virginia Woolf. (I’m in too deep, help)

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Nov 29, 2020 Minnie rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2-language-original-in-english, 5-provenance-owned, unique-premise, 1-year-of-publication-20th-century, biography-and-autobiography, 4-format-print, 2-language-read-in-original, nonfiction, 7-review-reviewed, 8-goodreads-reading-challenge-2020

4*

This is certainly the most unusual book I read this year - the semi-fictional biography of a dog. Virginia Woolf was reading the love letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning and was apparently so amused by their obsession with her dog Flush that she set out to write his biography.
Now, the point of the whole exercise was that up until the early 20th century, biographies were only written of "eminent" personalities, often by their personal friends, and often with a very laissez ...more

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Jul 06, 2016 Ali rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I have been looking forward to reading Flush for months, and I really wasn’t disappointed. Written in the period after Virginia Woolf had completed writing The Waves; which she had found so draining Flush, is a complete joy. Flush – for those who don’t know – is a biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s dog, a cocker spaniel that was her constant companion, both before and after her marriage to Robert Browning. The book is a combination of fiction and non-fiction, through which we meet the two ...more

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Jan 16, 2016 Lady Clementina ffinch-ffarowmore rated it really liked it

Shelves: biography, dog, elizabeth-barret-browning

A very sweet little book- Woolf captures the world and EBB's life through Flush's eyes (and thoughts) perfectly.

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Nov 28, 2019 Esmay rated it liked it · review of another edition

"She loved Flush, and Flush was worthy of her love."

2.5 Stars.

I borrowed this book from a very good friend who loves Virginia Woolf in the hope I'll love this one more than Mrs. Dalloway. To be honest that's not that difficult, because I hated Mrs. Dalloway with a fiery passion, but I'll get back to this book. I do have to say I enjoyed this one more, but the same thing I had with the other works I've read by Virginia Woolf it seems so incredibly pointless. It was cute, but whenever ...more

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May 09, 2020 Andy rated it really liked it

The biography of small dog,quirky, but only Virginia Woolf could bring genius to such a simple concept. A brilliant read

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About Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf

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(Adeline) Virginia Woolf was an English novelist and essayist regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century.

During the interwar period, Woolf was a significant figure in London literary society and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Her most famous works include the novels Mrs. Dalloway (1925), To the Lighthouse (1927), and Orlando (1928), and the book-length e ...more

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Quotes from Flush: A Biography

“Twice Flush had done his utmost to kill his enemy; twice he had failed. And why had he failed, he asked himself? Because he loved Miss Barrett. Looking up at her from under his eyebrows as she lay, severe and silent on the sofa, he knew that he must love her for ever. Things are not simple but complex. If he bit Mr. Browning he bit her too. Hatred is not hatred; hatred is also love.” — 11 likes

“As for describing the smell of a spaniel mixed with the smell of torches, laurels, incense, banners, wax candles and a garland of rose leaves crushed by a satin heel that has been laid up in camphor, perhaps Shakespeare, had he paused in the middle of writing Antony and Cleopatra — But Shakespeare did not pause. Confessing our inadequacy, then, we can but note that to Flush Italy, in these the fullest, the freest, the happiest years of his life, meant mainly a succession of smells. Love, it must be supposed, was gradually losing its appeal. Smell remained. Now that they were established in Casa Guidi again, all had their avocations. Mr. Browning wrote regularly in one room; Mrs. Browning wrote regularly in another. The baby played in the nursery. But Flush wandered off into the streets of Florence to enjoy the rapture of smell. He threaded his path through main streets and back streets, through squares and alleys, by smell. He nosed his way from smell to smell; the rough, the smooth, the dark, the golden. He went in and out, up and down, where they beat brass, where they bake bread, where the women sit combing their hair, where the bird-cages are piled high on the causeway, where the wine spills itself in dark red stains on the pavement, where leather smells and harness and garlic, where cloth is beaten, where vine leaves tremble, where men sit and drink and spit and dice — he ran in and out, always with his nose to the ground, drinking in the essence; or with his nose in the air vibrating with the aroma. He slept in this hot patch of sun — how sun made the stone reek! he sought that tunnel of shade — how acid shade made the stone smell! He devoured whole bunches of ripe grapes largely because of their purple smell; he chewed and spat out whatever tough relic of goat or macaroni the Italian housewife had thrown from the balcony — goat and macaroni were raucous smells, crimson smells. He followed the swooning sweetness of incense into the violet intricacies of dark cathedrals; and, sniffing, tried to lap the gold on the window- stained tomb. Nor was his sense of touch much less acute. He knew Florence in its marmoreal smoothness and in its gritty and cobbled roughness. Hoary folds of drapery, smooth fingers and feet of stone received the lick of his tongue, the quiver of his shivering snout. Upon the infinitely sensitive pads of his feet he took the clear stamp of proud Latin inscriptions. In short, he knew Florence as no human being has ever known it; as Ruskin never knew it or George Eliot either.” — 10 likes

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