Page 71.
... Consign
To the low ground once more the ignoble Term,
And raise the Genius on his orb again.
The term was a statue representing the Roman term, the god who presides over boundaries. The genius was the image that represented the guardian spirit. Mr. Browning commenting on this passage has said: "Suppose the enemies of a man to have thrown down the image and replaced it by a mere Term, and you have what I put into Stratford's head." "Putting the Genius on the pedestal usurped by the Term means—or tries to mean—substituting eventually the true notion of Strafford's endeavor and performance in the world for what he conceives to be the ignoble and distorted conception of these by his contemporary judge."
Page 90. Bocafoli and Plara.
"Purely supposititious poets. Browning chooses to invent them as types of two opposite poetic defects; Bocafoli as the writer of stark-naked or totally jejune and inartistic psalms: Plara as the writer of petted and over-finikin sonnets." [W. M. Rossetti.]
Page 101. Patron-friend. Walter Savage Landor.
Page 101. Eyebright.
"Stands for 'Euphrasia,' its Greek equivalent, and refers to one of Mr. Browning's oldest friends," Miss Euphrasia Fanny Haworth. [Mrs. Orr.]