8vo. viii, [2], 65, [3], 32pp. With half-title and publisher's catalogue at rear. Original publisher's blind-stamped red cloth, gilt-titled. Rubbed, darkening to spine. With Stopford Brooke's bookplate to FEP, and ownership inscription dated March 1860 to head of half-title.

Stopford Brooke's copy of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's (1806-1861) poetry collection Poems before Congress. Much of the verse deals with Italian politics - Barrett Browning spent her final fifteen years in Italy, where she also wrote Aurora Leigh (1857). The closing poem, 'A Curse for a Nation', was deemed controversial after being mistaken for an attack against Britain, despite actually targeting U.S. slavery. Brooke later wrote The Poetry of Robert Browning (1903), a critical exploration of her husband's work.