Chapter I: Facts to Know

This little poem is very different from the poems of Longfellow, which we read a few pages back. It is very nervous and tense, and as you read it, it seems jerky in movement, not smooth as the waters of the Charles. Then again, sometimes words are omitted that make it a little difficult to understand at first reading. Moreover, Browning uses words in curious ways that Longfellow would not have thought about.

There are many interesting things to learn about this incident, however, and after we have learned them, we appreciate the poem very much better. First we need to know the following facts:

_Ratisbon_, or _Regensburg_, is a city in Bavaria, on the Danube River.

Napoleon Bonaparte, the great Emperor of the French, was much the man the poem shows us.

_Prone brow_ means that Napoleon's brow was inclined forward, that his head was drooping.

_Lannes_ was a famous French marshal, who showed remarkable powers of leadership. Both his legs were shot away at the Battle of Aspern, and he died a few days later at Vienna.

_Out-thrust full-galloping, flag-bird_, are compound words which Browning has formed for his own use.

_Fancy_ in the fifth line means _can imagine_.

_Vans_ in the fourth stanza is an old word no longer in use. It means _wings_.

The eagle has what is really a third eyelid, a thin translucent membrane, which naturalists call the nictitating, or winking, membrane. It may be drawn over the eye independently of the other lids. You may have seen ducks, chickens or other birds drawing this milky film back and forth over their eyes as they looked at you.

_Nor bridle drew_, and _his chief beside_, are phrases in which Browning has used the words out of their natural order. Can you find other similar expressions?