For all the new emotional satisfactions in her life, Julia was far from forgetting Robert Browning. Her mother, too, had not given up hope that the courtship might be resumed. In May 1867, without consulting her daughter, she invited him to dinner. Browning replied not to Fanny but to Julia, making little attempt to conceal his continuing anger and hurt over her earlier decision to end his calls.

But though he refused to come to Cumberland Place, he was keen to show her the long poem he expected to finish later that year. Julia's reply was graceful and affectionate: she was sorry not to see him but excited to hear about his new work. Privately, she was far more disappointed than she admitted to Browning about his decision to stay away. Aunt Rich was quick to offer sympathy.

Julia would have to wait more than a year before Browning was able to send her advance copies of The Ring and the Book, and as he admitted, by the time he got them to her, it was too late to make substantial revisions to his text in the light of her comments. Nonetheless, he was keen to know what she thought of it. Julia looked forward expectantly to seeing his new long poem: ‘I so long that this shall be your best gift to the world.’ She was even more excited by the chance to re-engage with Browning himself. ‘I only look for you in your work, and find so much of you, that all judgment is quenched as absolutely as when after long exile in some barbarous land one should hear English spoken once more.’ The question of how far Browning's poetic voice was Browning himself, rather than an attempt to animate a wide range of characters, would become one of the major points at issue between them.