 Ladies and gentlemen, the railroad hour. And here comes our star-studded show train. Tonight, the Association of American Railroads presents a new play with music by Lawrence and Lee, The Browning, starring Gordon MacGray and his celebrated guest, Dorothy Warren-Show. Our choir is under the direction of Norman Lubbock, and our music is prepared and conducted by Carmen Dragon. Yes, tonight another delightful musical first is brought to you transcribed by the American Railroads, the same railroads that bring you most of the food you eat, the clothes you wear, the fuel you burn, and all the other things you use in your daily life. And now, here is our star, Gordon MacGray. Thank you, Marvin Miller, and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Some of the music you will hear tonight is familiar, and some has been composed, especially for our play by Carmen Dragon. Dorothy Warren-Show is Elizabeth, and I am Robert, as we bring you the story of The Brownings. I didn't fall in love with her at first sight. It didn't take that long. I happened onto a thin little volume of poems by Elizabeth Moulton Barrett, and immediately fell in love with the author. So, there was nothing to do but write her a letter and tell her so. To Miss Elizabeth Barrett, 15 Wimples. Elizabeth? Yes, Papa? You've just received a letter from some impertinent young man signed RB, and I've opened it, because I do not think you're strong enough to read it yourself. Oh, please, Papa, let me read it. Perhaps for identification purposes, so we can silence him. Here. RB? What? Where's from Robert Browning, the famous poet? Oh? Hear what he says, Papa. I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett. Your cheeks are flushed, Elizabeth. Lie back. Rest. Too much excitement. Oh, Papa, he wants to come and visit me. I forbid it. You, Mr. Browning, must never set foot in your sick room, Elizabeth. Oh, Papa. Never. Oh, Papa, please, just once. Here in my room, I dream I hear voices. Friends I have yet to. So unknown. What I dream meet someday, Mr. Browning, I know we shall meet. But it was more than a year before we did meet. Every day I'll let her spend across London, sometimes twice a day. And finally I convinced her that we must meet. While her father was away in business, I was hustled up the servant's stairway and stood at last in front of the couch, which held her prisoner. Oh, quiet flush. Dear Mr. Browning, I'm so pleased you could come. You're a servant, ma'am. I know this first meeting must be short to spare your health. Therefore, we must dispense with formalities. Will it please you to call me, Robert? Ah, then you must call me Bar. It's a childish name, I know, but somehow it suits me. Bar, we must drink at toast to our meeting. Oh, we do not have strong beverage in this house. Papa forbids it. Well, then we shall drink with our eyes, dear Bar. The lyric fashion is it for this moment by O'Rare Ben Johnson. For the toast and for all the lovely flowers you've sent me. Bar, you shall have flowers every day. Why do they keep you in this stuffy room? I'll raise a window. Is it wise? Well, it's a warm summer night. There's nothing out there that can hurt you. You can't stay shut up like this. Your heart is too big. You've got to let life in here, Bar. What is it that doctors say is wrong with you? Well, there was an injury to my back. When I was a child, it's kept me from walking. And I haven't been able to find the strength to make myself get well. Then we'll find that strength together. We shall chop off your couch for firewood and whisk you into the sunshine. And we can do it because we love each other. You do love me, don't you, Bar? Well, Mr. Browning, I... I like you very much. I admire you. I think I shall write a poem about you. But then you must love me. Because nobody can really write poetry unless they're in love. Good morning, Miss Barrett. Good morning, Mr. Browning. Oh, good heavens, you must have robbed a florist shop. Took every pink rose I could find in the city of London. Oh, you shouldn't have. Those you sent yesterday are still fresh enough. Nonsense. Why, their petals are falling all over your couch. I like them that way, Robert. I like to sleep under a blanket of rose petals. Oh, my dearest, can rose petals keep you warm? No, only the ones that are sent to me by Robert Browning. Robert, would you be a critic, dear? For me, I've done a little sonnet. A translation, of course, from the Portuguese. By whom? Oh, some not very well-known Portuguese girl. I just happened on it and translated it. Well, let me see it. Oh, bar. Why, it's a love sonnet. As they turn from prey. Do you dare to tell me that an unknown Portuguese made and wrote those lines and you merely translated them? Robert, I... Why, it's your poem, your sonnet. There is no Portuguese and no translation. You've invented that because you were timid and afraid. Oh, Robert. No longer. No more fear, bar. You have a voice that can sing with the greatest poets of this world. And a voice like that shall not be muffled. Bar, I'm going to marry you. No, it's not possible. I'm not well. I'll make you well. We're going to be married and then sail for Italy where no one can stay ill for long. And we'll be the happiest pair of poets whoever made love in Iambic pantameter. I think I shall have something to say about that. Oh, father. I have only recently been informed, Mr. Browning, of your clandestine meetings with my daughter. Otherwise, they should have been stopped sooner. You'll force your presence on her. You've jeopardized her health. Oh, father. I ask, Mr. Browning, I shall give you two minutes to leave this house. And if you're discovered on the premises again, you shall be disposed of as a common trespasser. Oh, Robert. No use. No tears. No defeats. We are young and we're in love and we'll find a way. Listen to me. I have a philosophy, Ba, which I've made into kind of a song to sing every morning. The world should happen to look a little dark. It's my philosophy, Ba, and I give it to you. The years at the spring and days at the morn mornings at seven the hillsides dupe rest of the Brownings. Or pit in one part of the country, a limestone quarry in another section, and a coal mine in yet another. At first they sound unrelated, don't they? Actually, however, these products of pit quarry and mine are basic in the manufacture of steel. But it takes dependable low-cost railroad transportation, lots of it, to bring together all the raw materials required to meet the nation's steel needs. Yes, mass railroad transportation is a vital element in steelmaking. And as it is in the case of steel, so it is in the case of virtually everything else we produce and use. For America, with its vast distances and abundant production, must have the big transportation that only the railroads can provide. Transportation that can and does move anything, anywhere, anytime, for anybody. But what this mass movement really means is almost beyond imagination. Can you visualize, for instance, one million loaded freight cars? Well, last year alone, the railroads moved almost one-and-a-half million cars of grain, six-and-a-half million cars of coal, almost 13 million cars of manufactured products. Altogether, they handled more than 40 million carloads of freight of all kinds. And every bit of this freight, remember, moved over the railroads' own highways of steel. Just imagine the conditions that would exist if this freight had to be handled on the public roads, built for your use with your tax money. Think of the traffic conditions, the highway damage, and you can see how important it is to you that the bulk of America's freight traffic moves by rail. And the more that moves over the specially constructed, privately-owned steel highways of the railroads, the greater will be your safety and satisfaction every time you drive your car. And the less will be the expense to you in rebuilding and replacing your highways. Now here is act two of the new Lawrence and Lee play with music, the Browning, starring Gordon Macrae as Robert and Dorothy Warren-Schold as Elizabeth. We love so much, Bob and I. We had a need so great, each to each. One night I stole back and found my boss sick and wretched on her couch. Robert, you should not have come. Bob, I'm taking you away from here. We're getting married and going to Italy. Robert, I can't travel. I can't even walk. I'll carry you. We'll be married around the corner at St. Mary Le Bon Church. We were married secretly on the 12th of September in the year of our Lord, 1836. Each time I think of our trip to Italy, I remember a line that Bob wrote. The sweet years, the dear and wistful years. Italy, Florence. I think if you go there now, you can still feel in the air some of the love we pour out. Love for that wonderful city. Love for each other. Oh, Robert, breathe that air. Is it really November? The sunshine feels like music. All of Italy is music, dear Bob. Each child here is born with a pitch pipe in his mouth, and parents are disappointed if their children do not grow up to be opera singers. Listen. How I'd love to walk through this city, feel the cobblestones under my feet, climb to the very top of Giotto's Campanile and look out over all the red rooftops. You can't walk. You can if you try, Bob. If you believe, if you know that love is all around you. Oh, Robert. Try. Stand up, my dearest. Steady now. Stand. I will try. I will. Walk to me. You have love supporting you, Bob. You can't fall. Walk to me. I will. I can. Of course you can. One foot, the other foot. Oh, Robert, I took a step. Take another, Bob. Don't stop. Oh, Robert. One more step, and you're in my arms. Bob, that's wonderful. Oh, you've done it, Robert. It's your love that makes me strong. How can I thank you? How can I tell my husband how much I love him? You know, once in my younger days, I met a Portuguese maiden named Elizabeth Barrett. Oh, she had a way with words. Oh, Robert. I said, are you a man of absurd taste? Oh, how so? Every day I grow older, and this young man loves me still. You know, once long ago, Bob, a great Hebrew scholar named Rabbi Ben Ezra wrote that you isn't lonely, but the greatest joy is growing old with somebody you love, growing old together. It seems to me that Bar and I had only a day together, and the time since has been a century. That's one of my complaints, that the happy years go like ours, and the sad ones are each a decade. Bar and I travel all over Italy, and then we finally settled in Casa Guidi, where she wrote Casa Guidi Windows and Aurora Lee, and the last poems. You who read my words, if you should travel to Italy, and if by chance you visit Casa Guidi, would you do me a special favor? There's a little grave, quite apart from the others, by itself, with a wrought iron fence around it. Would you take a handful of roast petals and toss them over the grass as a particular favor to me? Bar always loved to sleep beneath the blanket of roast petals. We shall be together soon and forever. So I don't take my... Lovely Dorothy Warren Scholl will be back in just a moment. Meanwhile, our thanks to John McIntyre and to our entire company. New music for the Brownings was composed by our maestro, Carmen Dragan. The libretto and special lyrics were written by Lawrence and Lee. The railroad hours brought to you each week at the same time by the American railroads. Ever think how railroad freight trains contribute to your safety and enjoyment when you're driving along the public highway? You'll see the answer right away if you consider the fact that most of America's freight is hauled along those privately owned steel highways of the railroads. Just imagine what it would be like if any large part of that freight were to move over the public highways you use. And just imagine what would happen to the highway which you help pay for with your taxes. Dorothy, it was a thrill singing with you tonight. As always, you were radiant. Thank you, Gordon. I must say it's fun falling in love with you every week. Tell me, where are we to rendezvousing next Monday night? Well, we're going to rendezvousing right here in the good old USA. We're doing a modern version of an age-old story. Dorothy, it's called Miss Cinderella and we'll be singing a brand-new Cinderella cantata. Well, if you're Prince Charming Gordon, I'll be here. Well, bring a pumpkin, Dorothy, and we'll be seeing you. Good night, everybody. Good night, Dorothy. All aboard. Well, dear friends, it looks as though we're ready to pull out and so until next Monday night in our new musical Miss Cinderella, this is Gordon McRae saying goodbye. The railroad hour was transcribed in Hollywood. Gordon McRae can be seen starring in Warner Brothers about face. Our choir is under the direction of Norman Luboff and our music is prepared and conducted by Carmen Dragon. This is Marvin Miller saying goodbye until next week for the American Railroads. Now, stay tuned for your Monday night of music on NBC.