The next description is not an illustration of man by means of Nature.  It is almost the only set description of Nature, without reference to man, which occurs in the whole of Browning’s work.  It is introduced by his declaration (for in this I think he speaks from himself) of his power of living in the life of all living things.  He does not think of himself as living in the whole Being of Nature, as Wordsworth or Shelley might have done.  There was a certain matter of factness in him which prevented his belief in any theory of that kind.  But he does transfer himself into the rejoicing life of the animals and plants, a life which he knows is akin to his own.  And this distinction is true of all his poetry of Nature.  “I can mount with the bird,” he says,

    Leaping airily his pyramid of leaves
    And twisted boughs of some tall mountain tree,
    Or like a fish breathe deep the morning air
    In the misty sun-warm water.

This introduces the description of a walk of twenty-four hours through various scenes of natural beauty.  It is long and elaborate—­the scenery he conceives round the home where he and Pauline are to live.  And it is so close, and so much of it is repeated in other forms in his later poetry, that I think it is drawn direct from Nature; that it is here done of set purpose to show his hand in natural description.  It begins with night, but soon leaves night for the morning and the noon.  Here is a piece of it: 

    Morning, the rocks and valleys and old woods. 
    How the sun brightens in the mist, and here,
    Half in the air, like[5] creatures of the place,
    Trusting the elements, living on high boughs
    That sway in the wind—­look at the silver spray
    Flung from the foam-sheet of the cataract
    Amid the broken rocks!  Shall we stay here
    With the wild hawks?  No, ere the hot noon come
    Dive we down—­safe!  See, this is our new retreat
    Walled in with a sloped mound of matted shrubs,
    Dark, tangled, old and green, still sloping down
    To a small pool whose waters lie asleep,
    Amid the trailing boughs turned water-plants: 
    And tall trees overarch to keep us in,
    Breaking the sunbeams into emerald shafts,
    And in the dreamy water one small group
    Of two or three strange trees are got together
    Wondering at all around—­

This is nerveless work, tentative, talkative, no clear expression of the whole; and as he tries to expand it further in lines we may study with interest, for the very failures of genius are interesting, he becomes even more feeble.  Yet the feebleness is traversed by verses of power, like lightning flashing through a mist upon the sea.  The chief thing to say about this direct, detailed work is that he got out of its manner as fast as he could.  He never tried it again, but passed on to suggest the landscape by a few sharp, high-coloured words; choosing out one or two of its elements and flashing them into prominence.  The rest was left to the imagination of the reader.