It is drawn to illustrate some remote point in the argument, and is far too magnificent for the thing it illustrates.

Yet how few in this long poem, how remote from Browning's heart, are these touches of Nature.
Again, in _The Inn Album_ there is a description of an English elm-tree, as an image of a woman who makes marriage life seem perfect, which is interesting because it is the third, and only the third, reference to English scenery in the multitude of Browning's verses.

The first is in _Pauline_, the second in that poem, "Oh, to be in England," and this is the third.

The woman has never ceased to gaze On the great elm-tree in the open, posed Placidly full in front, smooth hole, broad branch, And leafage, one green plenitude of May.
...

bosomful Of lights and shades, murmurs and silences, Sun-warmth, dew-coolness, squirrel, bee, bird, High, higher, highest, till the blue proclaims "Leave Earth, there's nothing better till next step Heavenward!" This, save in one line, is not felt or expressed with any of that passion which makes what a poet says completely right.
Browning could not stay altogether in this condition, in which, moreover, his humour was also in abeyance; and in his next book, _Pacchiarotto, &c._, he broke away from these morbid subjects, and, with that recovery, recovered also some of his old love of Nature.