The lowest woman in the poems is she who is described in _Time's Revenges_-- So is my spirit, as flesh with sin, Filled full, eaten out and in With the face of her, the eyes of her, The lips, the little chin, the stir Of shadow round her mouth; and she -- I'll tell you--calmly would decree That I should roast at a slow fire, If that would compass her desire And make her one whom they invite To the famous ball to-morrow night Contrasted with this woman, from whose brutal nature civilisation has stripped away the honour and passion of the savage, the woman of _In a Laboratory_ shines like a fallen angel.

She at least is natural, and though the passions she feels are the worst, yet she is capable of feeling strongly.

Neither have any conscience, but we can conceive that one of these women might attain it, but the other not.

Both are examples of a thing I have said is exceedingly rare in Browning's poetry--men or women left without some pity of his own touched into their circumstances or character.
_In a Laboratory_ is a full-coloured sketch of what womanhood could become in a court like that of Francis I.; in which every shred of decency, gentlehood and honour had disappeared.

Browning's description, vivid as it is, is less than the reality.