the correspondence of thomas carlyle and ralph waldo emerson - volume i. "to my friend i write a letter, and from him i receive a letter. it is a spiritual gift, worthy of him to give, and of me to receive."--emerson "what the writer did actually mean, the thing he then thought of, the thing he then was."--carlyle editorial note the trust of editing the following correspondence, committed to me several years since by the writers, has been of easy fulfilment. the whole correspondence, so far as it is known to exist, is here printed, with the exception of a few notes of introduction, and one or two essentially duplicate letters. i cannot but hope that some of the letters now missing may hereafter come to light. in printing, a dash has been substituted here and there for a proper name, and some passages, mostly relating to details of business transactions, have been omitted. these omissions are distinctly designated. the punctuation and orthography of the original letters have been in the main exactly followed. i have thought best to print much concerning dealings with publishers, as illustrative of the material conditions of literature during the middle of the century, as well as of the relations of the two friends. the notes in the two volumes are mine. my best thanks and those of the readers of this correspondence are due to mr. moncure d. conway, for his energetic and successful effort to recover some of emerson's early letters which had fallen into strange hands. --charles eliot norton cambridge, massachusetts january , --------- note to revised edition the hope that some of the letters missing from it when this correspondence was first published might come to light, has been fulfilled by the recovery of thirteen letters of carlyle, and of four of emerson. besides these, the rough drafts of one or two of emerson's letters, of which the copies sent have gone astray, have been found. comparatively few gaps in the correspondence remain to be filled. the letters and drafts of letters now first printed are those numbered as follows:-- vol. i. xxxvi. carlyle xli. emerson xlii. carlyle xlvi. " xlvii. " lxviii. " vol. ii. c. emerson civ. carlyle cv. " cvi. " cvii. " cviii. " cix. " cxii. " cxvi. " cxlix. emerson clii. " clxv. " clxxxvi. " emerson's letter of may, (clxiv.), of which only fragments were printed in the former edition, is now printed complete, and the extract from his diary accompanying it appears in the form in which it seems to have been sent to carlyle. --c.e.n. december , ----------- contents of volume i. introduction. emerson's early recognition of carlyle's genius. --his visit at craigenputtock, in .--extracts concerning it from letter of carlyle, from letter of emerson, and from english traits. i. emerson. boston, may, . first acquaintance with carlyle's writings.--visit to craigenputtock.--_sartor resartus,_ its contents, its diction.--gift of webster's _speeches_ and sampson reed's _growth of the mind._ ii. carlyle. chelsea, august, . significance of emerson's gift and visit.--sampson reed.--webster.-- teufelsdrockh, its sorry reception.--removal to london.--article on the diamond necklace.--preparation for book on the french revolution.--death of coleridge. iii. emerson. concord, november, . death of his brother edward.--consolation in carlyle's friendship.--pleasure in receiving stitched copy of teufelsdrockh.--goethe.-- swedenborgianism.--of himself.--hope of carlyle's coming to america.--gift of various publications. iv. carlyle. chelsea, february, . acknowledgments and inquiries.--sympathy for death of edward emerson.--unitarianism. --emerson's position and pursuits.--goethe.-volume of french revolution finished.--condition of literature.--lecturing in america.--mrs. austin. v. emerson. concord, march, . appreciation of sartor. --dr. channing.--prospect of carlyle's visit to america.--his own approaching marriage.--plan of a journal of philosophy in boston.--encouragement of carlyle. vi. emerson. concord, april, . apathy of english public toward carlyle.--hope of his visit to america.--lectures and lecturers in boston.--estimate of receipts and expenses.--esteem of carlyle in america. vii. carlyle. chelsea, may, . emerson's marriage. --astonishing reception of teufelsdrockh in new england. --boston transcendentalism.--destruction of manuscript of first volume of _french revolution._--result of a year's life in london.--wordsworth.--southey. viii. carlyle. chelsea, june, . visit to america questionable.--john carlyle.--tired out with rewriting _french revolution._--a london rout.--o'connell.--longfellow.--emerson and unitarianism. ix. emerson. concord, october, . mrs. child.--public addresses.--marriage.--destruction of manuscript of _french revolution._--notice of _sartor_ in _north american review._ --politics.--charles emerson. x. emerson. concord, april, . concern at carlyle's silence.--american reprint of _sartor._--carlyle's projected visit.--lecturing in new england. xi. carlyle. chelsea, april, . weariness over _french revolution._--visit to scotland.--charm of london.--letter from james freeman clarke.--article on _sartor_ in _north american review._--quatrain from voss. xii. emerson. concord, september, . death of charles emerson.--solicitude concerning carlyle.--urgency to him to come to concord.--sends _nature_ to him.--reflections. xiii. carlyle. chelsea, november, . charles emerson's death.--concord.--his own condition.--_french revolution_ almost ended.--character of the book.--weariness.--london and its people.--plans for rest.--john sterling.--articles on mirabeau and the _diamond necklace._--mill's _london_ review.--thanks for american teufelsdrockh.--mrs. carlyle.--might and right, canst and shalt.--books about goethe. xiv. carlyle. chelsea, february, . teufelsdrockh in america and england.--_nature._--miss martineau on emerson. --mammon.--completion of _french revolution._--scheme of lecturing in london.--america fading into the background. xv. emerson. concord, march, . receipt of the mirabeau and diamond necklace.--their substance and style.--proof-sheet of _french revolution._--society in america.--renewed invitation. --mrs. carlyle.--his son waldo.--bronson alcott.--second edition of _sartor._ xvi. carlyle. chelsea, june, . lectures on german literature.--copy of _french revolution_ sent.--review of himself in _christian examiner._--george ripley.--miss martineau and her book on america.--plans. xvii. emerson. concord, september, . _the french revolution._--sale of carlyle's books.--lectures. xviii. emerson. concord, november, . introduction given to charles sumner.--reprint of _french revolution._--lectures. xix. carlyle. chelsea, december, . visit to scotland. --mrs. carlyle's ill-health.--his own need of rest.--john sterling; his regard for emerson.--emerson's oration on the american scholar.--proposed collection of his own miscellanies. xx. emerson. concord, february, . lectures on human culture.--carlyle's praise of his oration.--john sterling. --reprint of _french revolution._--profits from it.--american selection and edition of carlyle's _miscellanies._ xxi. emerson. boston, march, . sale of _french revolution._--arrangements concerning american edition of _miscellanies._ xxii. carlyle. chelsea, march, . prospect of cash from yankee-land.--poverty.--american and english reprints of _miscellanies._--sterling's _crystals from a cavern._--miss martineau on emerson.--lectures.--plans. xxiii. emerson. concord, may, . american edition of _miscellanies._--invitation to concord.--his means and mode of life.--sterling.--miss martineau.--carlyle's poverty. xxiv. carlyle. chelsea, june, . american _french revolution._--london edition of teufelsdrockh.--miscellanies. --lectures, their money result.--plans.--emerson's oration. --mrs. child's _philothea._ xxv. emerson. boston, july, . encloses bill for l . --_miscellanies_ published. xxvi. emerson. concord, august, . publication of _miscellanies._--two more volumes proposed.--orations at theological school, cambridge, and at dartmouth college.--carlyle desired in america. xxvii. carlyle. scotsbrig, ecclefechan, september, . visit to his mother.--remittance from emerson of l .-- _miscellanies_ again.--another course of lectures.--sterling.-- miss martineau. xxviii. emerson. concord, october, . business.--outcry against address to divinity college.--injury to carlyle's repute in america from association with him.--article in _quarterly_ on german religious writers.--sterling. xxix. carlyle. chelsea, november, . emerson's letters.-- dyspepsia.--use of money from america.--arrangements concerning publication of _miscellanies._--emerson's orations.--tempest in a washbowl concerning divinity school address.--john carlyle-- postscript by mrs. carlyle. xxx. carlyle. chelsea, november, . arrangements concerning miscellanies.--employments, outlooks.--concord not forgotten, but emerson to come first to england.--john carlyle. --miss martineau and her books. xxxi. carlyle. chelsea, december, . arrival of american reprint of _miscellanies._--english and american bookselling.-- proposed second edition of _french revolution._--reading horace walpole.--sumner.--dartmouth oration.--sterling.--dwight's german translations. xxxii. emerson. concord, january, . business.-- remittance of l .--lectures on human life.--dr. carlyle. xxxiii. carlyle. chelsea, february, . acknowledgment of remittance.--arrangements for new edition of _french revolution._--london.--wish for quiet.--ill-health.--suggestion of writing on cromwell.--mr. joseph coolidge.--divinity school address.--mrs. carlyle.--gladstone cites from emerson in his church and state. xxxiv. emerson. concord, march, . account of sales.-- second series of _miscellanies._--ill wind raised by address blown over.--lectures.--birth of daughter.--_the onyx ring._ --alcott. xxxv. emerson. concord, march, . need of copy to fill out second series of _miscellanies._--john s. dwight. xxxvi. carlyle. chelsea, april, . solicitude on account of emerson's silence.--gift to mrs. emerson.--book business. --new edition of _french revolution._--new lectures.--better circumstances, better health.--arthur buller urges a visit to america.--milnes.--emerson's growing popularity. xxxvii. carlyle. chelsea, april, . nothing in manuscript fit for _miscellanies._--essay on varnhagen.--translation of goethe's _mahrchen._--cruthers and jonson.--dwight's book. --lectures.--discontent among working people. xxxviii. emerson. boston, april, . proposals of publishers concerning _french revolution._--introduction of miss sedgwick. xxxix. emerson. concord, april, . account.--sales of books. xl. emerson. concord, april, . proposals of publishers and accounts. xli. emerson. concord, may, . arrangements with publishers.--matter for completion of fourth volume of _miscellanies._--stearns wheelers faithful labor.--arthur buller's good witnessing.--plans for carlyle's visit to america. --milnes.--copy of _nature_ for him. xlii. carlyle. chelsea, may, . lectures happily over.-- sansculottism.--horse must be had.--extempore speaking an art.-- must lecture in america or write a book.--wordsworth.--sterling. --messages. xliii. carlyle. chelsea, june, . delay in arrival of _miscellanies._--custom-house rapacities.--accounts..--no longer poor.--emerson's work.--miss sedgwick.--daniel webster.--proposed visit to scotland.--sinking of the vengeur. xliv. emerson. concord, july, . proof-sheet of new edition of _french revolution_ received.--gift to mrs. emerson of engraving of guido's aurora.--publishers' accounts.--sterling.-- occupations.--margaret fuller. xlv. emerson. concord, august, . _miscellanies_ sent. --daniel webster.--alcott.--thoreau. xlvi. carlyle. scotsbrig, ecclefechan, september, . rusticating.--arrival of _miscellanies._--errata.--reprint of _wilhelm meister._--estimate of the book.--copies of _french revolution_ sent.--eager expectation of emerson's book.-- sterling.--plans. xlvii. carlyle. chelsea, december, . long silence.--stay in scotland.--chartism.--reprint of _miscellanies._--stearns wheeler.--_wilhelm meister._--boston steamers.--speculations about hegira into new england.--visitor from america who had never seen emerson.--miss martineau.--silence and speech.-- sterling.--southey.--no longer desperately poor. xlviii. emerson. concord, december, . copies of _french revolution_ arrived.--lectures on the present age.--letter from sterling, his paper on carlyle.--friends. xlix. carlyle. chelsea, january, . _chartism._-- sterling.--monckton milnes, paper by him on emerson. l. carlyle. chelsea, january, . export and import of books.--new editions.--books sent to emerson.--cromwell as a subject for writing.--no appetite for lecturing.--madame necker on emerson. li. emerson. new york, march, . new york.--loss of faith on entering cities.--margaret fuller to edit a journal.--lectures on the present age.--his children.--renewed invitation. lii. carlyle. chelsea, april, . count d'orsay, his portrait of carlyle.--wages for books, due to emerson.--milnes's review.--heraud.--landor.--lectures in prospect on heroes and hero-worship. liii. emerson. concord, april, . introduction of mr. grinnell.--chartism.--reprint of it.--at work on a book.-- booksellers' accounts.--_the dial._--alcott. liv. emerson. concord, june, . _wilhelm meister_ received.--landor.--letter to milnes.--lithograph of concord. --_the dial,_ no. . lv. carlyle. chelsea, july, . bibliopoliana.--lectures about great men.--lecturing in america.--milnes and his _poems._ --controversial volume from ripley. lvi. emerson. concord, august, . booksellers' accounts. --faith cold concerning carlyle's coming to america.-- transcendentalism and _the dial._--social problems.--character of his writing.--charles sumner. lvii. carlyle. chelsea, september, . not to go to america for the present.--_heroes and hero-worship._--journey on horseback.--reading on cromwell.--_dial_ no. .--puseyism.--dr. sewell on carlyle.--landor.--sterling. lviii. emerson. concord, october, . booksellers' accounts.--projects of social reform.--studies unproductive. --hopes to print a book of essays. lix. carlyle. chelsea, december, . booksellers' carelessness and accounts.--puseyism.--dial no. .--goethe. --miss martineau's _hour and man._--working in cromwellism. lx. carlyle. chelsea, february, . to mrs. emerson.-- london transmuted by her alchemy.--hope of seeing concord. --miss martineau.--toussaint l'ouverture.--sheets of _heroes and hero-worship_ sent to emerson. lxi. emerson. concord, february, . accounts.--essays soon to appear.--lecture on reform. lxii. emerson. boston, april, . remittance of l .-- accounts.--piratical reprint of _heroes and hero-worship._-- _dial_ no. . lxiii. carlyle. chelsea, may, . visit to milnes.--to his mother.--emerson's _essays._--his own condition. lxiv. carlyle. chelsea, may, . acknowledgment of remittance of l .--unauthorized american reprint of _heroes and hero-worship._--improvement in circumstances.--desire for solitude.--article on emerson in _fraser's magazine._ lxv. emerson. concord, may, . accounts.--book by jones very.--_heroes and hero-worship._--thoreau. lxvi. carlyle. chelsea, june, . proposed stay at annan. --motives for it.--london reprint of emerson's essays.--rio. lxvii. emerson. concord, july, . london reprint of _essays._--carlyle in his own land.--writing an oration. lxviii. carlyle. newby, annan, scotland, august, . speedy receipt of letter.--stay in scotland.--seclusion and sadness.--reprint of emerson's _essays._--shipwreck. lxix. emerson. concord, october, . pleasure in english reprint of _essays._--lectures on the times.--opportunities of the lecture-room.--accounts. lxx. emerson. concord, november, . remittance of l .-- his banker.--gambardella.--preparation for lectures on the times. lxxi. carlyle. chelsea, november, . gambardella.-- lawrence's portrait.--emerson's essays in england.--address at waterville college.--_the dial._--emerson's criticism on landor. lxxii. carlyle. chelsea, december, . acknowledgment of remittance of l .--american funds.--landor.--emerson's lectures. lxxiii. emerson. new york, february, . remittance of l .--american investments.--death of his son.--alcott going to england. lxxiv. carlyle. templand, march, . sympathy, with emerson.--death of mrs. carlyle's mother.--at templand to settle affairs.--life there.--a book on cromwell begun. lxxv. emerson. concord, march, . bereavement.--alcott going to england.--editorship of _dial._--mr. henry lee.-- lectures in new york. --------------------- correspondence of carlyle and emerson at the beginning of his "english traits," mr. emerson, writing of his visit to england in , when he was thirty years old, says that it was mainly the attraction of three or four writers, of whom carlyle was one, that had led him to europe. carlyle's name was not then generally known, and it illustrates emerson's mental attitude that he should have thus early recognized his genius, and felt sympathy with it. the decade from to was a period of unusual dulness in english thought and imagination. all the great literary reputations belonged to the beginning of the century, byron, scott, wordsworth, coleridge, shelley, keats, had said their say. the intellectual life of the new generation had not yet found expression. but toward the end of this time a series of articles, mostly on german literature, appearing in the edinburgh and in the foreign quarterly review, an essay on burns, another on voltaire, still more a paper entitled "characteristics," displayed the hand of a master, and a spirit in full sympathy with the hitherto unexpressed tendencies and aspirations of its time, and capable of giving them expression. here was a writer whose convictions were based upon principles, and whose words stood for realities. his power was slowly acknowledged. as yet carlyle had received hardly a token of recognition from his contemporaries. he was living solitary, poor, independent, in "desperate hope," at craigenputtock. on august , , he makes entry in his journal as follows: "i am left here the solitariest, stranded, most helpless creature that i have been for many years..... nobody asks me to work at articles. the thing i want to write is quite other than an article... in _all_ times there is a word which spoken to men; to the actual generation of men, would thrill their inmost soul. but the way to find that word? the way to speak it when found?" the next entry in his journal shows that carlyle had found the word. it is the name "ralph waldo emerson," the record of emerson's unexpected visit. "i shall never forget the visitor," wrote mrs. carlyle, long afterwards, "who years ago, in the desert, descended on us, out of the clouds as it were, and made one day there look like enchantment for us, and left me weeping that it was only one day." at the time of this memorable visit emerson was morally not less solitary than carlyle; he was still less known; his name had been unheard by his host in the desert. but his voice was soon to become also the voice of a leader. with temperaments sharply contrasted, with traditions, inheritances, and circumstances radically different, with views of life and of the universe widely at variance, the souls of these two young men were yet in sympathy, for their characters were based upon the same foundation of principle. in their independence and their sincerity they were alike; they were united in their faith in spiritual truth, and their reverence for it. their modes of thought of expression were not merely dissimilar, but divergent, and yet, though parted by an ever widening cleft of difference, they knew, as carlyle said, that beneath it "the rock-strata, miles deep, united again, and their two souls were at one" two days after emerson's visit carlyle wrote to his mother:-- "three little happinesses have befallen us: first, a piano-tuner, procured for five shillings and sixpence, has been here, entirely reforming the piano, so that i can hear a little music now, which does me no little good. secondly, major irving, of gribton, who used at this season of the year to live and shoot at craigenvey, came in one day to us, and after some clatter offered us a rent of five pounds for the right to shoot here, and even tabled the cash that moment, and would not pocket it again. money easilier won never sat in my pocket; money for delivering us from a great nuisance, for now i will tell every gunner applicant, 'i cannot, sir; it is let.' our third happiness was the arrival of a certain young unknown friend, named emerson, from boston, in the united states, who turned aside so far from his british, french, and italian travels to see me here! he had an introduction from mill, and a frenchman (baron d'eichthal's nephew) whom john knew at rome. of course we could do no other than welcome him; the rather as he seemed to be one of the most lovable creatures in himself we had ever looked on. he stayed till next day with us, and talked and heard talk to his heart's content, and left us all really sad to part with him. jane says it is the first journey since noah's deluge undertaken to craigenputtock for such a purpose. in any case, we had a cheerful day from it, and ought to be thankful." on the next sunday, a week after his visit, emerson wrote the following account of it to his friend, mr. alexander ireland. "i found him one of the most simple and frank of men, and became acquainted with him at once. we walked over several miles of hills, and talked upon all the great questions that interest us most. the comfort of meeting a man is that he speaks sincerely; that he feels himself to be so rich, that he is above the meanness of pretending to knowledge which he has not, and carlyle does not pretend to have solved the great problems, but rather to be an observer of their solution as it goes forward in the world. i asked him at what religious development the concluding passage in his piece in the edinburgh review upon german literature (say five years ago), and some passages in the piece called 'characteristics,' pointed. he replied that he was not competent to state even to himself,--he waited rather to see. my own feeling was that i had met with men of far less power who had got greater insight into religious truth. he is, as you might guess from his papers, the most catholic of philosophers; he forgives and loves everybody, and wishes each to struggle on in his own place and arrive at his own ends. but his respect for eminent men, or rather his scale of eminence, is about the reverse of the popular scale. scott, mackintosh, jeffrey, gibbon,--even bacon, --are no heroes of his; stranger yet, he hardly admires socrates, the glory of the greek world; but burns, and samuel johnson, and mirabeau, he said interested him, and i suppose whoever else has given himself with all his heart to a leading instinct, and has not calculated too much. but i cannot think of sketching even his opinions, or repeating his conversations here. i will cheerfully do it when you visit me here in america. he talks finely, seems to love the broad scotch, and i loved him very much at once. i am afraid he finds his entire solitude tedious, but i could not help congratulating him upon his treasure in his wife, and i hope he will not leave the moors; 't is so much better for a man of letters to nurse himself in seclusion than to be filed down to the common level by the compliances and imitations of city society." * ------------- * _ralph waldo emerson. recollections of his visits to england_ by alexander ireland. london, , p. . ------------ twenty-three years later, in his "english traits," emerson once more describes his visit, and tells of his impressions of carlyle. "from edinburgh i went to the highlands. on my return i came from glasgow to dumfries, and being intent on delivering a letter which i had brought from rome, inquired for craigenputtock. it was a farm in nithsdale, in the parish of dunscore, sixteen miles distant. no public coach passed near it, so i took a private carriage from the inn. i found the house amid desolate heathery hills, where the lonely scholar nourished his mighty heart. carlyle was a man from his youth, an author who did not need to hide from his readers, and as absolute a man of the world, unknown and exiled on that hill-farm, as if holding on his own terms what is best in london. he was tall and gaunt, with a cliff-like brow, self-possessed and holding his extraordinary powers of conversation in easy command; clinging to his northern accent with evident relish; full of lively anecdote, and with a streaming humor which floated everything he looked upon. his talk, playfully exalting the most familiar objects, put the companion at once into an acquaintance with his lars and lemurs, and it was very pleasant to learn what was predestined to be a pretty mythology. few were the objects and lonely the man, 'not a person to speak to within sixteen miles, except the minister of dunscore'; so that books inevitably made his topics. "he had names of his own for all the matters familiar to his discourse. blackwood's was the 'sand magazine'; fraser's nearer approach to possibility of life was the 'mud magazine'; a piece of road near by that marked some failed enterprise was 'the grave of the last sixpence.' when too much praise of any genius annoyed him, he professed hugely to admire the talent shown by his pig. he had spent much time and contrivance in confining the poor beast to one enclosure in his pen; but pig, by great strokes of judgment, had found out how to let a board down, and had foiled him. for all that, he still thought man the most plastic little fellow in the planet, and he liked nero's death, _qualis artifex pereo!_ better than most history. he worships a man that will manifest any truth to him. at one time he had inquired and read a good deal about america. landor's principle was mere rebellion, and _that,_ he feared, was the american principle. the best thing he knew of that country was, that in it a man can have meat for his labor. he had read in stewart's book, that when he inquired in a new york hotel for the boots, he had been shown across the street, and had found mungo in his own house dining on roast turkey. "we talked of books. plato he does not read, and he disparaged socrates; and, when pressed, persisted in making mirabeau a hero. gibbon he called the splendid bridge from the old world to the new. his own reading had been multifarious. tristram shandy was one of his first books after robinson crusoe and robertson's america, an early favorite. rousseau's confessions had discovered to him that he was not a dunce; and it was now ten years since he had learned german, by the advice of a man who told him he would find in that language what he wanted. "he took despairing or satirical views of literature at this moment; recounted the incredible sums paid in one year by the great booksellers for puffing. hence it comes that no newspaper is trusted now, no books are bought, and the booksellers are on the eve of bankruptcy. "he still returned to english pauperism, the crowded country, the selfish abdication by public men of all that public persons should perform. 'government should direct poor men what to do. poor irish folk come wandering over these moors; my dame makes it a rule to give to every son of adam bread to eat, and supplies his wants to the next house. but here are thousands of acres which might give them all meat, and nobody to bid these poor irish go to the moor and till it. they burned the stacks, and so found a way to force the rich people to attend to them.' "we went out to walk over long hills, and looked at criffel, then without his cap, and down into wordsworth's country. there we sat down and talked of the immortality of the soul. it was not carlyle's fault that we talked on that topic, for he has the natural disinclination of every nimble spirit to bruise itself against walls, and did not like to place himself where no step can be taken. but he was honest and true, and cognizant of the subtile links that bind ages together, and saw how every event affects all the future. 'christ died on the tree that built dunscore kirk yonder: that brought you and me together. time has only a relative existence.' "he was already turning his eyes towards london with a scholar's appreciation. london is the heart of the world, he said, wonderful only from the mass of human beings. he liked the huge machine. each keeps its own round. the baker's boy brings muffins to the window at a fixed hour every day, and that is all the londoner knows or wishes to know on the subject. but it turned out good men. he named certain individuals, especially one man of letters, his friend, the best mind he knew, whom london had well served." such is the record of the beginnings of the friendship between carlyle and emerson. what place this friendship held in the lives of both, the following correspondence shows. --------- i. emerson to carlyle boston, massachusetts, may, my dear sir,--there are some purposes we delay long to execute simply because we have them more at heart than others, and such an one has been for many weeks, i may say months, my design of writing you an epistle. some chance wind of fame blew your name to me, perhaps two years ago, as the author of papers which i had already distinguished (as indeed it was very easy to do) from the mass of english periodical criticism as by far the most original and profound essays of the day,--the works of a man of faith as well as intellect, sportive as well as learned, and who, belonging to the despairing and deriding class of philosophers, was not ashamed to hope and to speak sincerely. like somebody in _wilhelm meister_, i said: this person has come under obligations to me and to all whom he has enlightened. he knows not how deeply i should grieve at his fall, if, in that exposed england where genius always hears the devil's whisper, "all these kingdoms will i give thee," his virtue also should be an initial growth put off with age. when therefore i found myself in europe, i went to your house only to say, "faint not,--the word you utter is heard, though in the ends of the earth and by humblest men; it works, prevails." drawn by strong regard to one of my teachers i went to see his person, and as he might say his environment at craigenputtock. yet it was to fulfil my duty, finish my mission, not with much hope of gratifying him,--in the spirit of "if i love you, what is that to you?" well, it happened to me that i was delighted with my visit, justified to myself in my respect, and many a time upon the sea in my homeward voyage i remembered with joy the favored condition of my lonely philosopher, his happiest wedlock, his fortunate temper, his steadfast simplicity, his all means of happiness;--not that i had the remotest hope that he should so far depart from his theories as to expect happiness. on my arrival at home i rehearsed to several attentive ears what i had seen and heard, and they with joy received it. in liverpool i wrote to mr. fraser to send me magazine, and i have now received four numbers of the _sartor resartus,_ for whose light thanks evermore. i am glad that one living scholar is self-centred, and will be true to himself though none ever were before; who, as montaigne says, "puts his ear close by himself, and holds his breath and listens." and none can be offended with the self-subsistency of one so catholic and jocund. and 't is good to have a new eye inspect our mouldy social forms, our politics, and schools, and religion. i say _our,_ for it cannot have escaped you that a lecture upon these topics written for england may be read to america. evermore thanks for the brave stand you have made for spiritualism in these writings. but has literature any parallel to the oddity of the vehicle chosen to convey this treasure? i delight in the contents; the form, which my defective apprehension for a joke makes me not appreciate, i leave to your merry discretion. and yet did ever wise and philanthropic author use so defying a diction? as if society were not sufficiently shy of truth without providing it beforehand with an objection to the form. can it be that this humor proceeds from a despair of finding a contemporary audience, and so the prophet feels at liberty to utter his message in droll sounds. did you not tell me, mr. thomas carlyle, sitting upon one of your broad hills, that it was jesus christ built dunscore kirk yonder? if you love such sequences, then admit, as you will, that no poet is sent into the world before his time; that all the departed thinkers and actors have paved your way; that (at least when you surrender yourself) nations and ages do guide your pen, yes, and common goose-quills as well as your diamond graver. believe then that harp and ear are formed by one revolution of the wheel; that men are waiting to hear your epical song; and so be pleased to skip those excursive involved glees, and give us the simple air, without the volley of variations. at least in some of your prefaces you should give us the theory of your rhetoric. i comprehend not why you should lavish in that spendthrift style of yours celestial truths. bacon and plato have something too solid to say than that they can afford to be humorists. you are dispensing that which is rarest, namely, the simplest truths,--truths which lie next to consciousness, and which only the platos and goethes perceive. i look for the hour with impatience when the vehicle will be worthy of the spirit,--when the word will be as simple, and so as resistless, as the thought,--and, in short, when your words will be one with things. i have no hope that you will find suddenly a large audience. says not the sarcasm, "truth hath the plague in his house"? yet all men are _potentially_ (as mr. coleridge would say) your audience, and if you will not in very mephistophelism repel and defy them, shall be actually;* and whatever the great or the small may say about the charm of diabolism, a true and majestic genius can afford to despise it. ------------ * this year, , seventy thousand copies of a sixpenny edition of _sartor resartus_ have been sold. ------------- i venture to amuse you with this homiletic criticism because it is the sense of uncritical truth seekers, to whom you are no more than hecuba, whose instincts assure them that there is wisdom in this grotesque teutonic apocalyptic strain of yours, but that 't is hence hindered in its effect. and though with all my heart i would stand well with my poet, yet if i offend i shall quietly retreat into my universal relations, wherefrom i affectionately espy you as a man, myself as another. and yet before i come to the end of my letter i may repent of my temerity and unsay my charge. for are not all our circlets of will as so many little eddies rounded in by the great circle of necessity, and _could_ the truth-speaker, perhaps now the best thinker of the saxon race, have written otherwise? and must not we say that drunkenness is a virtue rather than that cato has erred? i wish i could gratify you with any pleasing news of the regeneration, education, prospects, of man in this continent. but your philanthropy is so patient, so far-sighted, that present evils give you less solicitude. in the last six years government in the united states has been fast becoming a job, like great charities. a most unfit person in the presidency has been doing the worst things; and the worse he grew, the more popular. now things seem to mend. webster, a good man and as strong as if he were a sinner, begins to find himself the centre of a great and enlarging party and his eloquence incarnated and enacted by them; yet men dare not hope that the majority shall be suddenly unseated. i send herewith a volume of webster's that you may see his speech on foot's resolutions, a speech which the americans have never done praising. i have great doubts whether the book reaches you, as i know not my agents. i shall put with it the little book of my swedenborgian druggist,* of whom i told you. and if, which is hardly to be hoped, any good book should be thrown out of our vortex of trade and politics, i shall not fail to give it the same direction. -------------- * _observations on the growth of the mind,_ by sampson reed, first published in . a fifth edition of this thoughtful little treatise was published in . mr. reed was a graduate of harvard college in ; he died in , at the age of eighty. --------------- i need not tell you, my dear sir, what pleasure a letter from you would give me when you have a few moments to spare to so remote a friend. if any word in my letter should provoke you to a reply, i shall rejoice in my sauciness. i am spending the summer in the country, but my address is boston, care of barnard, adams, & co. care of o. rich, london. please do make my affectionate respects to mrs. carlyle, whose kindness i shall always gratefully remember. i depend upon her intercession to insure your writing to me. may god grant you both his best blessing. your friend, r. waldo emerson ii. carlyle to emerson great cheyne row, chelsea, london august, my dear sir,--some two weeks ago i received your kind gift from fraser. to say that it was welcome would be saying little: is it not as a voice of affectionate remembrance, coming from beyond the ocean waters, first decisively announcing for me that a whole new continent _exists,_--that i too have part and lot there! "not till we can think that here and there one is thinking of us, one is loving us, does this waste earth become a peopled garden." among the figures i can recollect as visiting our nithsdale hermitage,--all like _apparitions_ now, bringing with them airs from heaven or else blasts from the other region,--there is perhaps not one of a more undoubtedly supernal character than yourself: so pure and still, with intents so charitable; and then vanishing too so soon into the azure inane, as an apparition should! never has your address in my notebook met my eye but with a friendly influence. judge if i am glad to know that there, in infinite space, you still hold by me. i have read in both your books at leisure times, and now nearly finished the smaller one. he is a faithful thinker, that swedenborgian druggist of yours, with really deep ideas, who makes me too pause and think, were it only to consider what manner of man he must be, and what manner of thing, after all, swedenborgianism must be. "through the smallest window look well, and you can look out into the infinite." webster also i can recognize a sufficient, effectual man, whom one must wish well to, and prophesy well of. the sound of him is nowise poetic-rhythmic; it is clear, one-toned, you might say metallic, yet distinct, significant, not without melody. in his face, above all, i discern that "indignation" which, if it do not make "verses," makes _useful_ way in the world. the higher such a man rises, the better pleased i shall be. and so here, looking over the water, let me repeat once more what i believe is already dimly the sentiment of all englishmen, cisoceanic and transoceanic, that we and you are not two countries, and cannot for the life of us be; but only two _parishes_ of one country, with such wholesome parish hospitalities, and dirty temporary parish feuds, as we see; both of which brave parishes _vivant! vivant!_ and among the glories of _both_ be yankee-doodle-doo, and the felling of the western forest, proudly remembered; and for the rest, by way of parish constable, let each cheerfully take such george washington or george guelph as it can get, and bless heaven! i am weary of hearing it said, "we love the americans," "we wish well," &c., &c. what in god's name should we do else? you thank me for _teufelsdrockh;_ how much more ought i to thank you for your hearty, genuine, though extravagant acknowledgment of it! blessed is the voice that amid dispiritment, stupidity, and contradiction proclaims to us, _euge!_ nothing ever was more ungenial than the soil this poor teufelsdrockhish seed-corn has been thrown on here; none cries, good speed to it; the sorriest nettle or hemlock seed, one would think, had been more welcome. for indeed our british periodical critics, and especially the public of _fraser's_ magazine (which i believe i have now done with), exceed all speech; require not even contempt, only oblivion. poor teufelsdrockh!--creature of mischance, miscalculation, and thousand-fold obstruction! here nevertheless he is, as you see; has struggled across the stygian marshes, and now, as a stitched pamphlet "for friends," cannot be _burnt_ or lost before his time. i send you one copy for your own behoof; three others you yourself can perhaps find fit readers for: as you spoke in the plural number, i thought there might be three; more would rather surprise me. from the british side of the water i have met simply one intelligent response,--clear, true, though almost enthusiastic as your own. my british friend too is utterly a stranger, whose very name i know not, who did not print, but only write, and to an unknown third party.* shall i say then, "in the mouth of two witnesses"? in any case, god be thanked, i am done with it; can wash my hands of it, and send it forth; sure that the devil will get his full share of it, and not a whit more, clutch as he may. but as for you, my transoceanic brothers, read this earnestly, for it _was_ earnestly meant and written, and contains no _voluntary_ falsehood of mine. for the rest, if you dislike it, say that i wrote it four years ago, and could not now so write it, and on the whole (as fritz the only said) "will do better another time." with regard to style and so forth, what you call your "saucy" objections are not only most intelligible to me, but welcome and instructive. you say well that i take up that attitude because i have no known public, am alone under the heavens, speaking into friendly or unfriendly space; add only, that i will not defend such attitude, that i call it questionable, tentative, and only the best that i, in these mad times, could conveniently hit upon. for you are to know, my view is that now at last we have lived to see all manner of poetics and rhetorics and sermonics, and one may say generally all manner of _pulpits_ for addressing mankind from, as good as broken and abolished: alas, yes! if you have any earnest meaning which demands to be not only listened to, but _believed_ and _done,_ you cannot (at least i cannot) utter it _there,_ but the sound sticks in my throat, as when a solemnity were _felt_ to have become a mummery; and so one leaves the pasteboard coulisses, and three unities, and blair's lectures, quite behind; and feels only that there is _nothing sacred,_ then, but the _speech of man_ to believing men! this, come what will, was, is, and forever must be _sacred;_ and will one day, doubtless, anew environ itself with fit modes; with solemnities that are _not_ mummeries. meanwhile, however, is it not pitiable? for though teufelsdrockh exclaims, "pulpit! canst thou not make a pulpit by simply _inverting the nearest tub?_" yet, alas! he does not sufficiently reflect that it is still only a tub, that the most inspired utterance will come from _it,_ inconceivable, misconceivable, to the million; questionable (not of _ascertained_ significance) even to the few. pity us therefore; and with your just shake of the head join a sympathetic, even a hopeful smile. since i saw you i have been trying, am still trying, other methods, and shall surely get nearer the truth, as i honestly strive for it. meanwhile, i know no method of much consequence, except that of _believing,_ of being _sincere:_ from homer and the bible down to the poorest burns's song, i find no other art that promises to be perennial. --------- * in his diary, july , , carlyle writes--"in the midst of innumerable discouragements, all men indifferent or finding fault, let me mention two small circumstances that are comfortable. the first is a letter from some nameless irishman in cork to another here, (fraser read it to me without names,) actually containing a _true_ and one of the friendliest possible recognitions of me. one mortal, then, says i am _not_ utterly wrong. blessings on him for it! the second is a letter i got today from emerson, of boston in america; sincere, not baseless, of most exaggerated estimation. precious is man to man." fifteen years later, in his _reminiscences of my irish journey,_ he enters, under date of july , : "near eleven o'clock [at night] announces himself 'father o'shea'! (who i thought had been _dead_); to my astonishment enter a little gray-haired, intelligent-and-bred-looking man, with much gesticulation, boundless loyal welcome, red with dinner and some wine, engages that we are to meet tomorrow,--and again with explosions of welcomes goes his way. this father o'shea, some fifteen years ago, had been, with emerson of america, one of the _two_ sons of adam who encouraged poor bookseller fraser, and didn't discourage him, to go on with teufelsdrockh. i had often remembered him since; had not long before _re_-inquired his name, but understood somehow that he was dead--and now." --------------- but now quitting theoretics, let me explain what you long to know, how it is that i date from london. yes, my friend, it is even so: craigenputtock now stands solitary in the wilderness, with none but an old woman and foolish grouse-destroyers in it; and we for the last ten weeks, after a fierce universal disruption, are here with our household gods. censure not; i came to london for the best of all reasons,--to seek bread and work. so it literally stands; and so do i literally stand with the hugest, gloomiest future before me, which in all sane moments i good-humoredly defy. a strange element this, and i as good as an alien in it. i care not for radicalism, for toryism, for church, tithes, or the "confusion" of useful knowledge. much as i can speak and hear, i am alone, alone. my brave father, now victorious from his toil, was wont to pray in evening worship: "might we say, we are not alone, for god is with us!" amen! amen! i brought a manuscript with me of another curious sort, entitled _the diamond necklace._ perhaps it will be printed soon as an article, or even as a separate booklet,--a _queer_ production, which you shall see. finally, i am busy, constantly studying with my whole might for a book on the french revolution. it is part of my creed that the only poetry is history, could we tell it right. this truth (if it prove one) i have not yet got to the limitations of; and shall in no way except by _trying_ it in practice. the story of the necklace was the first attempt at an experiment. my sheet is nearly done; and i have still to complain of you for telling me nothing of yourself except that you are in the country. believe that i want to know much and all. my wife too remembers you with unmixed friendliness; bids me send you her kindest wishes. understand too that your old bed stands in a new room here, and the old welcome at the door. surely we shall see you in london one day. or who knows but mahomet may go to the mountain? it occasionally rises like a mad prophetic dream in me, that i might end in the western woods! from germany i get letters, messages, and even visits; but now no tidings, no influences, of moment. goethe's posthumous works are all published; and radicalism (poor hungry, yet inevitable radicalism!) is the order of the day. the like, and even more, from france. gustave d'eichthal (did you hear?) has gone over to greece, and become some kind of manager under king otho.* ----------- * gustave d'eichthal, whose acquaintance emerson had made at rome, and who had given him an introduction to carlyle, was one of a family of rich jewish bankers at paris. he was an ardent follower of saint-simon, and an associate of enfantin. after the dispersion of the saint-simonians in , he traveled much, and continued to devote himself to the improvement of society. ---------- continue to love me, you and my other friends; and as packets sail so swiftly, let me know it frequently. all good be with you! most faithfully, t. carlyle coleridge, as you doubtless hear, is gone. how great a possibility, how small a realized result! they are delivering orations about him, and emitting other kinds of froth, _ut mos est._ what hurt can it do? iii. emerson to carlyle * concord, mass., november, my dear sir,--your letter, which i received last week, made a bright light in a solitary and saddened place. i had quite recently received the news of the death of a brother** in the island of porto rico, whose loss to me will be a lifelong sorrow. as he passes out of sight, come to me visible as well as spiritual tokens of a fraternal friendliness which, by its own law, transcends the tedious barriers of custom and nation; and opens its way to the heart. this is a true consolation, and i thanked my jealous [greek] for the godsend so significantly timed. it, for the moment, realizes the hope to which i have clung with both hands, through each disappointment, that i might converse with a man whose ear of faith was not stopped, and whose argument i could not predict. may i use the word, "i thank my god whenever i call you to remembrance." ---------- * this letter was printed in the _athenaeum,_ london, june , . it, as well as three others which appeared in the same journal, is now reprinted, through the courtesy of its editor, from the original. ** edward bliss emerson, his next younger brother, "brother of the brief but blazing star," of whom emerson wrote _in memoriam:_-- "there is no record left on earth, save in tablets of the heart, of the rich, inherent worth, of the grace that on him shone, of eloquent lips, of joyful wit; he could not frame a word unfit, an act unworthy to be done. on his young promise beauty smiled, drew his free homage unbeguiled, and prosperous age held out his hand, and richly his large future planned, and troops of friends enjoyed the tide,-- all, all was given, and only health denied." ---------- i receive with great pleasure the wonderful professor now that first the decent limbs of osiris are collected.* we greet him well to cape cod and boston bay. the rigid laws of matter prohibit that the soul imprisoned within the strait edges of these types should add one syllable thereto, or we had adjured the sage by every name of veneration to take possession by so much as a salve! of his western world, but he remained inexorable for any new communications. ------------- * the four copies of _sartor_ which carlyle had sent were a "stitched pamphlet," with a title-page bearing the words: "sartor resartus: in three books. reprinted for friends, from fraser's magazine. london, ." ------------- i feel like congratulating you upon the cold welcome which you say teufelsdrockh* has met. as it is not earthly happy, it is marked of a high sacred sort. i like it a great deal better than ever, and before it was all published i had eaten nearly all my words of objection. but do not think it shall lack a present popularity. that it should not be known seems possible, for if a memoir of laplace had been thrown into that muck-heap of fraser's magazine, who would be the wiser? but this has too much wit and imagination not to strike a class who would not care for it as a faithful mirror of this very hour. but you know the proverb, "to be fortunate, be not too wise." the great men of the day are on a plane so low as to be thoroughly intelligible to the vulgar. nevertheless, as god maketh the world forevermore, whatever the devils may seem to do, so the thoughts of the best minds always become the last opinion of society. truth is ever born in a manger, but is compensated by living till it has all souls for its kingdom. far, far better seems to me the unpopularity of this philosophical poem (shall i call it?) than the adulation that followed your eminent friend goethe. with him i am becoming better acquainted, but mine must be a qualified admiration. it is a singular piece of good-nature in you to apotheosize him. i cannot but regard it as his misfortune, with conspicuous bad influence on his genius, that velvet life he led. what incongruity for genius, whose fit ornaments and reliefs are poverty and hatred, to repose fifty years on chairs of state and what pity that his duke did not cut off his head to save him from the mean end (forgive) of retiring from the municipal incense "to arrange tastefully his gifts and medals"! then the puritan in me accepts no apology for bad morals in such as he. we can tolerate vice in a splendid nature whilst that nature is battling with the brute majority in defence of some human principle. the sympathy his manhood and his misfortunes call out adopts even his faults; but genius pampered, acknowledged, crowned, can only retain our sympathy by turning the same force once expended against outward enemies now against inward, and carrying forward and planting the standard of oromasdes so many leagues farther on into the envious dark. failing this, it loses its nature and becomes talent, according to the definition,--mere skill in attaining vulgar ends. a certain wonderful friend of mine said that "a false priest is the falsest of false things." but what makes the priest? a cassock? o diogenes! or the power (and thence the call) to teach man's duties as they flow from the superhuman? is not he who perceives and proclaims the superhumanities, he who has once intelligently pronounced the words "self-renouncement," "invisible leader," "heavenly powers of sorrow," and so on, forever the liege of the same? ------------ * emerson uniformly spells this name "teufelsdroch." ------------ then to write luxuriously is not the same thing as to live so, but a new and worse offence. it implies an intellectual defect also, the not perceiving that the present corrupt condition of human nature (which condition this harlot muse helps to perpetuate) is a temporary or superficial state. the good word lasts forever: the impure word can only buoy itself in the gross gas that now envelops us, and will sink altogether to ground as that works itself clear in the everlasting effort of god. may i not call it temporary? for when i ascend into the pure region of truth (or under my undermost garment, as epictetus and teufelsdrockh would say), i see that to abide inviolate, although all men fall away from it; yea, though the whole generation of adam should be healed as a sore off the face of the creation. so, my friend, live socrates and milton, those starch puritans, for evermore! strange is it to me that you should not sympathize (yet so you said) with socrates, so ironical, so true, and who "tramped in the mire with wooden shoes whenever they would force him into the clouds." i seem to see him offering the hand to you across the ages which some time you will grasp. i am glad you like sampson reed, and that he has inspired some curiosity respecting his church. swedenborgianism, if you should be fortunate in your first meetings, has many points of attraction for you: for instance, this article, "the poetry of the old church is the reality of the new," which is to be literally understood, for they esteem, in common with all the trismegisti, the natural world as strictly the symbol or exponent of the spiritual, and part for part; the animals to be the incarnations of certain affections; and scarce a popular expression esteemed figurative, but they affirm to be the simplest statement of fact. then is their whole theory of social relations--both in and out of the body--most philosophical, and, though at variance with the popular theology, self-evident. it is only when they come to their descriptive theism, if i may say so, and then to their drollest heaven, and to some autocratic not moral decrees of god, that the mythus loses me. in general, too, they receive the fable instead of the moral of their aesop. they are to me, however, deeply interesting, as a sect which i think must contribute more than all other sects to the new faith which must arise out of all. you express a desire to know something of myself. account me "a drop in the ocean seeking another drop," or god-ward, striving to keep so true a sphericity as to receive the due ray from every point of the concave heaven. since my return home, i have been left very much at leisure. it were long to tell all my speculations on my profession and my doings thereon; but, possessing my liberty, i am determined to keep it, at the risk of uselessness (which risk god can very well abide), until such duties offer themselves as i can with integrity discharge. one thing i believe,--that utterance is place enough: and should i attain through any inward revelation to a more clear perception of my assigned task, i shall embrace it with joy and praise. i shall not esteem it a low place, for instance, if i could strengthen your hands by true expressions of the hope and pleasure which your writings communicate to me and to some of my countrymen. yet the best poem of the poet is his own mind, and more even than in any of the works i rejoice in the promise of the workman. now i am only reading and musing, and when i have any news to tell of myself, you shall hear them. now as to the welcome hint that you might come to america, it shall be to me a joyful hope. come and found a new academy that shall be church and school and parnassus, as a true poet's house should be. i dare not say that wit has better chance here than in england of winning world-wages, but it can always live, and it can scarce find competition. indeed, indeed, you shall have the continent to yourself were it only as crusoe was king. if you cared to read literary lectures, our people have vast curiosity, and the apparatus is very easy to set agoing. such 'pulpit' as you pleased to erect would at least find no hindrance in the building. a friend of mine and of yours remarked, when i expressed the wish that you would come here, "that people were not here, as in england, sacramented to organized schools of opinion, but were a far more convertible audience." if at all you can think of coming here, i would send you any and all particulars of information with cheerfulest speed. i have written a very long letter, yet have said nothing of much that i would say upon chapters of the _sartor._ i must keep that, and the thoughts i had upon 'poetry in history',' for another letter, or (might it be!) for a dialogue face to face. let me not fail of _the diamond necklace._ i found three greedy receivers of teufelsdrockh, who also radiate its light. for the sake of your knowing what manner of men you move, i send you two pieces writ by one of them, frederic henry hedge, the article on swedenborg and that on phrenology. and as you like sampson reed, here are one or two more of his papers. do read them. and since you study french history do not fail to look at our yankee portrait of lafayette. present my best remembrances to mrs. carlyle, whom that stern and blessed solitude has armed and sublimed out of all reach of the littleness and unreason of london. if i thought we could win her to the american shore, i would send her the story of those godly women, the contemporaries of john knox's daughter, who came out hither to enjoy the worship of god amidst wild men and wild beasts. your friend and servant, r. waldo emerson iv. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, london february, my dear sir,--i owe you a speedy answer as well as a grateful one; for, in spite of the swift ships of the americans, our communings pass too slowly. your letter, written in november, did not reach me till a few days ago; your books or papers have not yet come,--though the ever-punctual rich, i can hope, will now soon get them for me. he showed me his _way-bill_ or invoice, and the consignment of these friendly effects "to another gentleman," and undertook with an air of great fidelity to bring all to a right bearing. on the whole, as the atlantic is so broad and deep, ought we not rather to esteem it a beneficent miracle that messages can arrive at all; that a little slip of paper will skim over all these weltering floods, and other inextricable confusions, and come at last, in the hand of the twopenny postman, safe to your lurking-place, like green leaf in the bill of noah's dove? let us be grateful for mercies; let us use them while they are granted us. time was when "they that feared the lord spake _often_ one to another." a friendly thought is the purest gift that man can afford to man. "speech" also, they say, "is cheerfuler than light itself." the date of your letter gives me unhappily no idea but that of space and time. as you know my whereabout, will you throw a little light on your own? i can imagine boston, and have often seen the musket volleys on bunker hill; but in this new spot there is nothing for me save sky and earth, the chance of retirement, peace, and winter seclusion. alas! i can too well fancy one other thing: the bereavement you allude to, the sorrow that will so long be painful before it can become merely sad and sacred. brothers, especially in these days, are much to us: had one no brother, one could hardly understand what it was to have a friend; they are the friends whom nature chose for us; society and fortune, as things now go, are scarcely compatible with friendship, and contrive to get along, miserably enough, without it. yet sorrow not above measure for him that is gone. he is, in very deed and truth, with god,--_where_ you and i both are. what a thin film it is that divides the living from the dead! in still nights, as jean paul says, "the limbs of my buried ones touched cold on my soul, and drove away its blots, as dead hands heal eruptions of the skin." let us turn back into life. that you sit there bethinking yourself, and have yet taken no course of activity, and can without inward or outward hurt so sit, is on the whole rather pleasing news to me. it is a great truth which you say, that providence can well afford to have one sit: another great truth which you feel without saying it is that a course wherein clear faith cannot go with you may be worse than none; if clear faith go never so slightly against it, then it is certainly worse than none. to speak with perhaps ill-bred candor, i like as well to fancy you _not_ preaching to unitarians a gospel after their heart. i will say farther, that you are the only man i ever met with of that persuasion whom i could unobstructedly like. the others that i have seen were all a kind of halfway-house characters, who, i thought, should, if they had not wanted courage, have ended in unbelief; in "faint possible theism," which i like considerably worse than atheism. such, i could not but feel, deserve the fate they find here; the bat fate: to be killed among the rats as a bird, among the birds as a rat.... nay, who knows but it is doubts of the like kind in your own mind that keep you for a time inactive even now? for the rest, that you have liberty to choose by your own will merely, is a great blessing: too rare for those that could use it so well; nay, often it is difficult to use. but till _ill health_ of body or of mind warns you that the moving, not the sitting, position is essential, _sit_ still, contented in conscience; understanding well that no man, that god only knows _what_ we are working, and will show it one day; that such and such a one, who filled the whole earth with his hammering and troweling, and would not let men pass for his rubbish, turns out to have built of mere coagulated froth, and vanishes with his edifice, traceless, silently, or amid hootings illimitable; while again that other still man, by the word of his mouth, by the very look of his face, was scattering influences, as _seeds_ are scattered, "to be found flourishing as a banyan grove after a thousand years." i beg your pardon for all this preaching, if it be superfluous impute it to no miserable motive. your objections to goethe are very natural, and even bring you nearer me: nevertheless, i am by no means sure that it were not your wisdom, at this moment, to set about learning the german language, with a view towards studying _him_ mainly! i do not assert this; but the truth of it would not surprise me. believe me, it is impossible you can be more a puritan than i; nay, i often feel as if i were far too much so: but john knox himself, could he have seen the peaceable impregnable _fidelity_ of that man's mind, and how to him also duty was _infinite,_--knox would have passed on, wondering not reproaching. but i will tell you in a word why i like goethe: his is the only _healthy_ mind, of any extent, that i have discovered in europe for long generations; it was he that first convincingly proclaimed to me (convincingly, for i saw it _done_): behold, even in this scandalous sceptico-epicurean generation, when all is gone but hunger and cant, it is still possible that man be a man! for which last evangel, the confirmation and rehabilitation of all other evangels whatsoever, how can i be too grateful? on the whole, i suspect you yet know only goethe the heathen (ethnic); but you will know goethe the christian by and by, and like that one far better. rich showed me a compilation* in green cloth boards that you had beckoned across the water: pray read the fourth volume of that, and let a man of your clearness of feeling say whether that was a parasite or a prophet.--and then as to "misery" and the other dark ground on which you love to see genius paint itself,--alas! consider whether misery is not _ill health_ too; also whether good fortune is not worse to bear than bad; and on the whole whether the glorious serene summer is not greater than the wildest hurricane,--as light, the naturalists say, is stronger a thousand times than lightning. and so i appeal to philip sober;--and indeed have hardly said as much about goethe since i saw you, for nothing reigns here but twilight delusion (falser for the time than midnight darkness) on that subject, and i feel that the most suffer nothing thereby, having properly nothing or little to do with such a matter but with you, who are not "seeking recipes for happiness," but something far higher, it is not so, and _therefore_ i have spoken and appealed; and hope the new curiosity, if i have awakened any, will do you no mischief. ------------ * obviously carlyle's _specimens of german romance,_ of which the fourth volume was devoted to goethe. ------------ but now as to myself; for you will grumble at a sheet of speculation sent so far: i am here still, as rob roy was on glasgow bridge, _biding tryste;_ busy extremely, with work that will not profit me at all in some senses; suffering rather in health and nerves; and still with nothing like dawn on any quarter of my horizon. _the diamond necklace_ has not been printed, but will be, were this _french revolution_ out; which latter, however, drags itself along in a way that would fill your benevolent heart with pity. i am for three small volumes now, and have one done. it is the dreadfulest labor (with these nerves, this liver) i ever undertook; all is so inaccurate, superficial, vague, in the numberless books i consult; and without accuracy at least, what other good is possible? add to this that i have no hope about the thing, except only that i _shall be done with it:_ i can reasonably expect nothing from any considerable class here, but at _best_ to be scolded and reproached; perhaps to be left standing "on my own basis," without note or comment of any kind, save from the bookseller, who will lose his printing. the hope i have however is sure: if life is lent me, i shall be _done with_ the business; i will write this "history of sansculottism," the notablest phenomenon i meet with since the time of the crusades or earlier; after which my part is played. as for the future, i heed it little when so busy; but it often seems to me as if one thing were becoming indisputable: that i must seek another craft than literature for these years that may remain to me. surely, i often say, if ever man had a finger-of-providence shown him, thou hast it; literature will neither yield thee bread, nor a stomach to digest bread with: quit it in god's name, shouldst thou take spade and mattock instead. the truth is, i believe literature to be as good as dead and gone in all parts of europe at this moment, and nothing but hungry revolt and radicalism appointed us for perhaps three generations; i do not see how a man can honestly live by writing in another dialect than that, in england at least; so that if you determine on not living dishonestly, it will behove you to look several things full in the face, and ascertain what is what with some distinctness. i suffer also terribly from the solitary existence i have all along had; it is becoming a kind of passion with me, to feel myself among my brothers. and then, how? alas! i care not a doit for radicalism, nay i feel it to be a wretched necessity, unfit for me; conservatism being not unfit only but false for me: yet these two are the grand categories under which all english spiritual activity that so much as thinks remuneration possible must range itself. i look around accordingly on a most wonderful vortex of things; and pray to god only, that as my day, is so my strength may be. what will come out of it is wholly uncertain: for i have possibilities too; the possibilities of london are far from exhausted yet: i have a brave brother, who invites me to come and be quiet with him in rome; a brave friend (known to you) who opens the door of a new western world,--and so we will stand considering and consulting, at least till the book be over. are all these things interesting to you? i know they are. as for america and lecturing, it is a thing i do sometimes turn over, but never yet with any seriousness. what your friend says of the people being more persuadable, so far, as having no tithe-controversy, &c., &c. will go, i can most readily understand it. but apart from that, i should rather fancy america mainly a new commercial england, with a fuller pantry,--little more or little less. the same unquenchable, almost frightfully unresting spirit of endeavor, directed (woe is me!) to the making of money, or money's worth; namely, food finer and finer, and gigmanic renown higher and higher: nay, must not your gigmanity be a _purse_-gigmanity, some half-shade worse than a purse-and-pedigree one? or perhaps it is not a whit worse; only rougher, more substantial; on the whole better? at all events ours is fast becoming identical with it; for the pedigree ingredient is as near as may be gone: _gagnez de l'argent, et ne vous faites pas pendre,_ this is very nearly the whole law, first table and second. so that you see, when i set foot on american land, it will be on no utopia; but on a _conditional_ piece of ground where some things are to be expected and other things not. i may say, on the other hand, that lecturing (or i would rather it were _speaking_) is a thing i have always had some hankering after: it seems to me i could really _swim_ in that element, were i once thrown into it; that in fact it would develop several things in me which struggle violently for development. the great want i have towards such an enterprise is one you may guess at: want of a _rubric,_ of a title to name my speech by. could any one but appoint me lecturing professor of teufelsdrockh's science,-- "things in general"! to discourse of poets and poetry in the hazlitt style, or talk stuff about the spirit of the age, were most unedifying: one knows not what to call himself. however, there is no doubt that were the child born it _might_ be christened; wherefore i will really request you to take the business into your consideration, and give me in the most rigorous sober manner you can some scheme of it. how many discourses; what towns; the probable expenses, the probable net income, the time, &c., &c.: all that you can suppose a man wholly ignorant might want to know about it. america i should like well enough to visit, much as i should another part of my native country: it is, as you see, distinctly possible that such a thing might be; we will keep it hanging, to solace ourselves with it, till the time decide. have i involved you in double postage by this loquacity? or what is your american rule? i did not intend it when i began; but today my confusion of head is very great and words must be multiplied with only a given quantity of meaning. my wife, who is just gone out to spend the day with a certain "celebrated mrs. austin," (called also the "celebrated translatress of puckler-muskau,") charged me very specially to send you her love, her good wishes and thanks: i assure you there is no hypocrisy in that. she votes often for taking the transatlantic scheme into contemplation; declares farther that my book and books must and will indisputably prosper (at some future era), and takes the world beside me--as a good wife and daughter of john knox should. speaking of "celebrated" persons here, let me mention that i have learned by stern experience, as children do with fire, to keep in general quite out of the way of celebrated persons, more especially celebrated women. this mrs. austin, who is half ruined by celebrity (of a kind), is the only woman i have seen not wholly ruined by it. men, strong men, i have seen die of it, or go mad by it. _good_ fortune is far worse than bad! will you write with all despatch, my dear sir; fancy me a fellow-wayfarer, who cordially bids you god-speed, and would fain keep in sight of you, within sound of you. yours with great sincerity, t. carlyle v. emerson to carlyle concord, march, my dear sir,--i am glad of the opportunity of mr. barnard's* visit to say health and peace be with you. i esteem it the best sign that has shone in my little section of space for many days, that some thirty or more intelligent persons understand and highly appreciate the _sartor._ dr. channing sent to me for it the other day, and i have since heard that he had read it with great interest. as soon as i go into town i shall see him and measure his love. i know his genius does not and cannot engage your attention much. he possesses the mysterious endowment of natural eloquence, whose effect, however intense, is limited, of course, to personal communication. i can see myself that his writings, without his voice, may be meagre and feeble. but please love his catholicism, that at his age can relish the _sartor,_ born and inveterated as he is in old books. moreover, he lay awake all night, he told my friend last week, because he had learned in the evening that some young men proposed to issue a journal, to be called _the transcendentalist,_ as the organ of a spiritual philosophy. so much for our gossip of today. --------- * mr. henry barnard, of hartford, connecticut, to whom emerson had given a note of introduction to carlyle. --------- but my errand is yet to tell. some friends here are very desirous that mr. fraser should send out to a bookseller here fifty or a hundred copies of the _sartor._ so many we want very much; they would be sold at once. if we knew that two or three hundred would be taken up, we should reprint it now. but we think it better to satisfy the known inquirers for the book first, and when they have extended the demand for it, then to reproduce it, a naturalized yankee. the lovers of teufelsdrockh here are sufficiently enthusiastic. i am an icicle to them. they think england must be blind and deaf if the professor makes no more impression there than yet appears. i, with the most affectionate wishes for thomas carlyle's fame, am mainly bent on securing the medicinal virtues of his book for my young neighbors. the good people think he overpraises goethe. there i give him up to their wrath. but i bid them mark his unsleeping moral sentiment; that every other moralist occasionally nods, becomes complaisant and traditional; but this man is without interval on the side of equity and humanity! i am grieved for you, o wise friend, that you cannot put in your own contemptuous disclaimer of such puritanical pleas as are set up for you; but each creature and levite must do after his kind. yet do not imagine that i will hurt you in this unseen domain of yours by any boswellism. every suffrage you get here is fairly your own. nobody is coaxed to admire you, and you have won friends whom i should be proud to show you, and honorable women not a few. and cannot you renew and confirm your suggestion touching your appearance in this continent? ah, if i could give your intimation the binding force of an oracular word!--in a few months, please god, at most, i shall have wife, house, and home wherewith and wherein to return your former hospitality. and if i could draw my prophet and his prophetess to brighten and immortalize my lodge, and make it the window through which for a summer you should look out on a field which columbus and berkeley and lafayette did not scorn to sow, my sun should shine clearer and life would promise something better than peace. there is a part of ethics, or in schleiermacher's distribution it might be physics, which possesses all attraction for me; to wit, the compensations of the universe, the equality and the coexistence of action and reaction, that all prayers are granted, that every debt is paid. and the skill with which the great all maketh clean work as it goes along, leaves no rag, consumes its smoke,-- will i hope make a chapter in your thesis. i intimated above that we aspire to have a work on the first philosophy in boston. i hope, or wish rather. those that are forward in it debate upon the name. i doubt not in the least its reception if the material that should fill it existed. through the thickest understanding will the reason throw itself instantly into relation with the truth that is its object, whenever that appears. but how seldom is the pure loadstone produced! faith and love are apt to be spasmodic in the best minds: men live on the brink of mysteries and harmonies into which yet they never enter, and with their hand on the door-latch they die outside. always excepting my wonderful professor, who among the living has thrown any memorable truths into circulation? so live and rejoice and work, my friend, and god you aid, for the profit of many more than your mortal eyes shall see. especially seek with recruited and never-tired vision to bring back yet higher and truer report from your mount of communion of the spirit that dwells there and creates all. have you received a letter from me with a pamphlet sent in december? fail not, i beg of you, to remember me to mrs. carlyle. can you not have some _sartors_ sent? hilliard, gray, & co. are the best publishers in boston. or mr. rich has connections with burdett in boston. yours with respect and affection, r. waldo emerson vi. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear sir,--i received your letter of the d of february on the th instant, and am sorry that hitherto we have not been able to command a more mercantile promptitude in the transmission of these light sheets. if desire of a letter before it arrived, or gladness when it came, could speed its journey, i should have it the day it was written. but, being come, it makes me sad and glad by turns. i admire at the alleged state of your english reading public without comprehending it, and with a hoping scepticism touching the facts. i hear my prophet deplore, as his predecessors did, the deaf ear and the gross heart of his people, and threaten to shut his lips; but, happily, this he cannot do, any more than could they. the word of the lord _will_ be spoken. but i shall not much grieve that the english people and you are not of the same mind if that apathy or antipathy can by any means be the occasion of your visiting america. the hope of this is so pleasant to me, that i have thought of little else for the week past, and having conferred with some friends on the matter, i shall try, in obedience to your request, to give you a statement of our capabilities, without indulging my penchant for the favorable side. your picture of america is faithful enough: yet boston contains some genuine taste for literature, and a good deal of traditional reverence for it. for a few years past, we have had, every winter, several courses of lectures, scientific, political, miscellaneous, and even some purely literary, which were well attended. some lectures on shakespeare were crowded; and even i found much indulgence in reading, last winter, some biographical lectures, which were meant for theories or portraits of luther, michelangelo, milton, george fox, burke. these courses are really given under the auspices of societies, as "natural history society," "mechanics' institutes," "diffusion of useful knowledge," &c., &c., and the fee to the lecturer is inconsiderable, usually $ for each lecture. but in a few instances individuals have undertaken courses of lectures, and have been well paid. dr. spurzheim* received probably $ , in the few months that he lived here. mr. silliman, a professor of yale college, has lately received something more than that for a course of fifteen or sixteen lectures on geology. private projects of this sort are, however, always attended with a degree of uncertainty. the favor of my townsmen is often sudden and spasmodic, and mr. silliman, who has had more success than ever any before him, might not find a handful of hearers another winter. but it is the opinion of many friends whose judgment i value, that a person of so many claims upon the ear and imagination of our fashionable populace as the "author of the _life of schiller,_" "the reviewer of _burns's life,_" the live "contributor to the _edinburgh_ and _foreign_ reviews," nay, the "worshipful teufelsdrockh," the "personal friend of goethe," would, for at least one season, batter down opposition, and command all ears on whatever topic pleased him, and that, quite independently of the merit of his lectures, merely for so many names' sake. ----------- * the memory of dr. spurzheim has faded, but his name is still known to men of science on both sides of the atlantic as that of the most ardent and accomplished advocate of the doctrine of phrenology. he came to the united states in to advance the cause he had at heart, but he had been only a short time in the country when he died at boston of a fever. ------------- but the subject, you say, does not yet define itself. whilst it is "gathering to a god," we who wait will only say, that we know enough here of goethe and schiller to have some interest in german literature. a respectable german here, dr. follen, has given lectures to a good class upon schiller. i am quite sure that goethe's name would now stimulate the curiosity of scores of persons. on english literature, a much larger class would have some preparedness. but whatever topics you might choose, i need not say you must leave under them scope for your narrative and pictorial powers; yes, and space to let out all the length of all the reins of your eloquence of moral sentiment. what "lay sermons" might you not preach! or methinks "lectures on europe" were a sea big enough for you to swim in. the only condition our adolescent ear insists upon is, that the english as it is spoken by the unlearned shall be the bridge between our teacher and our tympanum. _income and expenses._--all our lectures are usually delivered in the same hall, built for the purpose. it will hold , persons; are thought a large assembly. the expenses of rent, lights, doorkeeper, &c. for this hall, would be $ each lecture. the price of $ is the least that might be demanded for a single ticket of admission to the course,--perhaps $ ; $ for a ticket admitting a gentleman and lady. so let us suppose we have persons paying $ each, or $ , . if it should happen, as did in prof. silliman's case, that many more than tickets were sold, it would be easy to give the course in the day and in the evening, an expedient sometimes practised to divide an audience, and because it is a great convenience to many to choose their time. if the lectures succeed in boston, their success is insured at salem, a town thirteen miles off, with a population of , . they might, perhaps, be repeated at cambridge, three miles from boston, and probably at philadelphia, thirty-six hours distant. at new york anything literary has hitherto had no favor. the lectures might be fifteen or sixteen in number, of about an hour each. they might be delivered, one or two in each week. and if they met with sudden success, it would be easy to carry on the course simultaneously at salem, and cambridge, and in the city. they must be delivered in the winter. another plan suggested in addition to this. a gentleman here is giving a course of lectures on english literature to a private class of ladies, at $ to each subscriber. there is no doubt, were you so disposed, you might turn to account any writings in the bottom of your portfolio, by reading lectures to such a class, or, still better, by speaking. _expense of living._--you may travel in this country for $ to $ . a day. you may board in boston in a "gigmanic" style for $ per week, including all domestic expenses. eight dollars per week is the board paid by the permanent residents at the tremont house,--probably the best hotel in north america. there, and at the best hotels in new york, the lodger for a few days pays at the rate of $ . per day. twice eight dollars would provide a gentleman and lady with board, chamber, and private parlor, at a fashionable boardinghouse. in the country, of course, the expenses are two thirds less. these are rates of expense where economy is not studied. i think the liverpool and new york packets demand $ of the passenger, and their accommodations are perfect. (n.b.--i set down all sums in dollars. you may commonly reckon a pound sterling worth $ . .) "the man is certain of success," say those i talk with, "for one winter, but not afterwards." that supposes no extraordinary merit in the lectures, and only regards you in your leonine aspect. however, it was suggested that, if mr. c. would undertake a journal of which we have talked much, but which we have never yet produced, he would do us great service, and we feel some confidence that it could be made to secure him a support. it is that project which i mentioned to you in a letter by mr. barnard,--a book to be called _the transcendentalist,_ or _the spiritual inquirer,_ or the like, and of which f.h. hedge* was to be editor. those who are most interested in it designed to make gratuitous contributions to its pages, until its success could be assured. hedge is just leaving our neighborhood to be settled as a minister two hundred and fifty miles off, in maine, and entreats that you will edit the journal. he will write, and i please myself with thinking i shall be able to write under such auspices. then you might (though i know not the laws respecting literary property) collect some of your own writings and reprint them here. i think the _sartor_ would now be sure of a sale. your _life of schiller,_ and _wilhelm meister,_ have been long reprinted here. at worst, if you wholly disliked us, and preferred old england to new, you can judge of the suggestion of a knowing man, that you might see niagara, get a new stock of health, and pay all your expenses by printing in england a book of travels in america. ---------- *now the rev. dr. hedge, late professor of german and of ecclesiastical history in harvard college. ------------ i wish you to know that we do not depend for your _eclat_ on your being already known to rich men here. you are not. nothing has ever been published here designating you by name. but dr. channing reads and respects you. that is a fact of importance to our project. several clergymen, messrs. frothingham, ripley, francis, all of them scholars and spiritualists, (some of them, unluckily, called unitarian,) love you dearly, and will work heartily in your behalf. mr. frothing ham, a worthy and accomplished man, more like erasmus than luther, said to me on parting, the other day, "you cannot express in terms too extravagant my desire that he should come." george ripley, having heard, through your letter to me, that nobody in england had responded to the _sartor,_ had secretly written you a most reverential letter, which, by dint of coaxing, be read to me, though he said there was but one step from the sublime to the ridiculous. i prayed him, though i thought the letter did him no justice, save to his heart, to send you it or another; and he says he will. he is a very able young man, even if his letter should not show it.* he said he could, and would, bring many persons to hear you, and you should be sure of his utmost aid. dr. bradford, a medical man, is of good courage. mr. loring,** a lawyer, said,"--invite mr. and mrs. carlyle to spend a couple of months at my house," (i assured him i was too selfish for that,) "and if our people," he said, "cannot find out his worth, i will subscribe, with, others, to make him whole of any expense he shall incur in coming." hedge promised more than he ought. there are several persons beside, known to me, who feel a warm interest in this thing. mr. furness, a popular and excellent minister in philadelphia, at whose house harriet martineau was spending a few days, i learned the other day "was feeding miss martineau with the _sartor._" and here some of the best women i know are warm friends of yours, and are much of mrs. carlyle's opinion when she says, your books shall prosper. ----------- * emerson's estimate of mr. ripley was justified as the years went on. his _life,_ by mr. octavius frothingham,--like his father, "a worthy and accomplished, man," but more like luther than erasmus,--forms one of the most attractive volumes of the series of _lives of american men of letters._ ** the late ellis gray loring, a man of high character, well esteemed in his profession, and widely respected. ---------- on the other hand, i make no doubt you shall be sure of some opposition. andrews norton, one of our best heads, once a theological professor, and a destroying critic, lives upon a rich estate at cambridge, and frigidly excludes the diderot paper from a _select journal_ edited by him, with the remark, "another paper of the teufelsdrockh school." the university perhaps, and much that is conservative in literature and religion, i apprehend, will give you its cordial opposition, and what eccentricity can be collected from the obituary notice on goethe, or from the _sartor,_ shall be mustered to demolish you. nor yet do i feel quite certain of this. if we get a good tide with us, we shall sweep away the whole inertia, which is the whole force of these gentlemen, except norton. that you do not like the unitarians will never hurt you at all, if possibly you do like the calvinists. if you have any friendly relations to your native church, fail not to bring a letter from a scottish calvinist to a calvinist here, and your fortune is made. but that were too good to happen. since things are so, can you not, my dear sir, finish your new work and cross the great water in september or october, and try the experiment of a winter in america? i cannot but think that if we do not make out a case strong enough to make you build your house, at least you should pitch your tent among us. the country is, as you say, worth visiting, and to give much pleasure to a few persons will be some inducement to you. i am afraid to press this matter. to me, as you can divine, it would be an unspeakable comfort; and the more, that i hope before that time so far to settle my own affairs as to have a wife and a house to receive you. tell mrs. carlyle, with my affectionate regards, that some friends whom she does not yet know do hope with me to have her company for the next winter at our house, and shall not cease to hope it until you come. i have many things to say upon the topics of your letter, but my letter is already so immeasurably long, it must stop. long as it is, i regret i have not more facts. dr. channing is in new york, or i think, despite your negligence of him, i should have visited him on account of his interest in you. could you see him you would like him. i shall write you immediately on learning anything new bearing on this business. i intended to have despatched this letter a day or two sooner, that it might go by the packet of the st of may from new york. now it will go by that of the th, and ought to reach you in thirty days. send me your thoughts upon it as soon as you can. i _jalouse_ of that new book. i fear its success may mar my project. yours affectionately, r. waldo emerson vii. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, london may, thanks, my kind friend, for the news you again send me. good news, good new friends; nothing that is not good comes to me across these waters. as if the "golden west" seen by poets were no longer a mere optical phenomenon, but growing a reality, and coining itself into solid blessings! to me it seems very strange; as indeed generally this whole existence here below more and more does. we have seen your barnard: a most modest, intelligent, compact, hopeful-looking man, who will not revisit you without conquests from his expedition hither. we expect to see much more of him; to instruct him, to learn of him: especially about that real-imaginary locality of "concord," where a kindly-speaking voice lives incarnated, there is much to learn. that you will take to yourself a wife is the cheerfulest tidings you could send us. it is in no wise meet for man to be alone; and indeed the beneficent heavens, in creating eve, did mercifully guard against that. may it prove blessed, this new arrangement! i delight to prophesy for you peaceful days in it; peaceful, not idle; filled rather with that best activity which is the stillest. to the future, or perhaps at this hour actual mrs. emerson, will you offer true wishes from two british friends; who have not seen her with their eyes, but whose thoughts need not be strangers to the home she will make for you. nay, you add the most chivalrous summons: which who knows but one day we may actually stir ourselves to obey! it may hover for the present among the gentlest of our day-dreams; mild-lustrous; an impossible possibility. may all go well with you, my worthy countryman, kinsman, and brother man! this so astonishing reception of teufelsdrockh in your new england circle seems to me not only astonishing, but questionable; not, however, to be quarreled with. i may say: if the new. england cup is dangerously sweet, there are here in old england whole antiseptic floods of good _hop_-decoction; therein let it mingle; work wholesomely towards what clear benefit it can. your young ones too, as all exaggeration is transient, and exaggerated love almost itself a blessing, will get through it without damage. as for fraser, however, the idea of a new edition is frightful to him; or rather ludicrous, unimaginable. of him no man has inquired for a _sartor:_ in his whole wonderful world of tory pamphleteers, conservative younger-brothers, regent-street loungers, crockford gamblers, irish jesuits, drunken reporters, and miscellaneous unclean persons (whom nitre and much soap will not wash clean), not a soul has expressed the smallest wish that way. he shrieks at the idea. accordingly i realized these four copies from [him,] all he will surrender; and can do no more. take them with my blessing. i beg you will present one to the honorablest of those "honorable women"; say to her that her (unknown) image as she reads shall be to me a bright faultless vision, textured out of mere sunbeams; to be loved and worshiped; the best of all transatlantic women! do at any rate, in a more business like style, offer my respectful regards to dr. channing, whom certainly i could not count on for a reader, or other than a grieved condemnatory one; for i reckoned tolerance had its limits. his own faithful, long-continued striving towards what is best, i knew and honored; that he will let me go my own way thitherward, with a god-speed from him, is surely a new honor to us both. finally, on behalf of the british world (which is not all contained in fraser's shop) i should tell you that various persons, some of them in a dialect not to be doubted of, have privately expressed their recognition of this poor rhapsody, the best the poor clothes-professor could produce in the circumstances; nay, i have scottish presbyterian elders who read, and thank. so true is what you say about the aptitude of all natural hearts for receiving what is from the heart spoken to them. as face answereth to face! brother, if thou wish me to believe, do thou thyself believe first: this is as true as that of the _flere_ and _dolendum;_ perhaps truer. wherefore, putting all things together, cannot i feel that i have washed my hands of this business in a quite tolerable manner? let a man be thankful; and on the whole go along, while he has strength left to go. this boston _transcendentalist,_ whatever the fate or merit of it prove to be, is surely an interesting symptom. there must be things not dreamt of, over in that transoceanic parish! i shall cordially wish well to this thing; and hail it as the sure forerunner of things better. the visible becomes the bestial when it rests not on the invisible. innumerable tumults of metaphysic must be struggled through (whole generations perishing by the way), and at last transcendentalism evolve itself (if i construe aright), as the _euthanasia_ of metaphysic altogether. may it be sure, may it be speedy! thou shalt open thy _eyes,_ o son of adam; thou shalt _look,_ and not forever jargon about _laws_ of optics and the making of spectacles! for myself, i rejoice very much that i seem to be flinging aside innumerable sets of spectacles (could i but _lay_ them aside,--with gentleness!) and hope one day actually to see a thing or two. man _lives_ by belief (as it was well written of old); by logic he can only at best long to live. oh, i am dreadfully, afflicted with logic here, and wish often (in my haste) that i had the besom of destruction to lay to it for a little! "why? and wherefore? god wot, simply therefore! ask not why; 't is sith thou hast to care for." since i wrote last to you, (which seems some three months ago,) there has a great mischance befallen me: the saddest, i think, of the kind called accidents i ever had to front. by dint of continual endeavor for many weary weeks, i had got the first volume of that miserable _french revolution_ rather handsomely finished: from amid infinite contradictions i felt as if my head were fairly above water, and i could go on writing my poor book, defying the devil and the world, with a certain degree of assurance, and even of joy. a friend borrowed this volume of manuscript,--a kind friend but a careless one,--to write notes on it, which he was well qualified to do. one evening about two months ago he came in on us, "distraction (literally) in his aspect"; the manuscript, left carelessly out, had been torn up as waste paper, and all but three or four tatters was clean gone! i could not complain, or the poor man seemed as if he would have shot himself: we had to gather ourselves together, and show a smooth front to it; which happily, though difficult, was not impossible to do. i began again at the beginning; to such a wretched paralyzing torpedo of a task as my hand never found to do: at which i have worn myself these two months to the hue of saffron, to the humor of incipient desperation; and now, four days ago, perceiving well that i was like a man swimming in an element that grew ever rarer, till at last it became vacuum (think of that!) i with a new effort of self-denial sealed up all the paper fragments, and said to myself: in this mood thou makest no way, writest _nothing_ that requires not to be erased again; lay it by for one complete week! and so it lies, under lock and key. i have digested the whole misery; i say, if thou canst _never_ write this thing, why then never do write it: god's universe will go along _better_--without it. my belief in a special providence grows yearly stronger, unsubduable, impregnable: however, you see all the mad increase of entanglement i have got to strive with, and will pity me in it. bodily exhaustion (and "diana in the shape of bile")* i will at least try to exclude from the controversy. by god's blessing, perhaps the book shall yet be written; but i find it will not do, by sheer direct force; only by gentler side-methods. i have much else to write too: i feel often as if with one year of health and peace i could write something considerable;--the image of which sails dim and great through my head. which year of health and peace, god, if he see meet, will give me yet; or withhold from me, as shall be for the best. --------- * this allusion to diana as an obstruction was a favorite one with carlyle. "sir hudibras, according to butler, was about to do a dreadful homicide,--an all-important catastrophe,--and had drawn his pistol with that full intent, and would decidedly have done it, had not, says butler, 'diana in the shape of rust' imperatively intervened. a miracle she has occasionally wrought upon me in other shapes." so wrote carlyle in a letter in . --------- i have dwelt and swum now for about a year in this world-maelstrom of london; with much pain, which however has given me many thoughts, more than a counterbalance for that. hitherto there is no outlook, but confusion, darkness, innumerable things against which a man must "set his face like a flint." madness rules the world, as it has generally done: one cannot, unhappily, without loss, say to it, rule then; and yet must say it.--however, in two months more i expect my good brother from italy (a brave fellow, who is a great comfort to me); we are then for scotland to gather a little health, to consider ourselves a little. i must have this book done before anything else will prosper with me. your american pamphlets got to hand only a few days ago; worthy old rich had them not originally; seemed since to have been oblivious, out of town, perhaps unwell. i called one day, and unearthed them. those papers you marked i have read. genuine endeavor; which may the heavens forward!--in this poor country all is swallowed up in the barren chaos of politics: ministries tumbled out, ministries tumbled in; all things (a fearful substratum of "ignorance and hunger" weltering and heaving under them) apparently in rapid progress towards--the melting-pot. there will be news from england by and by: many things have reached their term; destiny "with lame foot" has overtaken them, and there will be a reckoning. o blessed are you where, what jargoning soever there be at washington, the poor man (_un_governed can govern himself) shoulders his age, and walks into the western woods, sure of a nourishing earth and an overarching sky! it is verily the door of hope to distracted europe; which otherwise i should see crumbling down into blackness of darkness.--that too shall be for good. i wish i had anything to send you besides these four poor pamphlets; but i fear there is nothing going. our ex-chancellor has been promulgating triticalities (significant as novelties, when _he_ with his wig and lordhood utters them) against the aristocracy; whereat the upper circles are terribly scandalized. in literature, except a promised or obtained (but to me still unknown) volume of wordsworth, nothing nameworthy doing.--did i tell you that i _saw_ wordsworth this winter? twice, at considerable length; with almost no disappointment. he is a _natural_ man (which means whole immensities here and now); flows like a natural well yielding mere wholesomeness,--though, as it would not but seem to me, in _small_ quantity, and astonishingly _diluted._ franker utterance of mere garrulities and even platitudes i never heard from any man; at least never, whom i could _honor_ for uttering them. i am thankful for wordsworth; as in great darkness and perpetual _sky-rockets_ and _coruscations,_ one were for the smallest clear-burning farthing candle. southey also i saw; a far _cleverer_ man in speech, yet a considerably smaller man. shovel-hatted; the shovel-hat is _grown_ to him: one must take him as he is. the second leaf is done; i must not venture on another. god bless you, my worthy friend; you and her who is to be yours! my wife bids me send heartiest wishes and regards from her too across the sea. perhaps we shall all meet one another some day, --if not here, then yonder! faithfully always, t. carlyle viii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, june, my dear friend,--your very kind letter has been in my hand these four weeks,--the subject of much meditation, which has not yet cleared itself into anything like a definite practical issue. indeed, the conditions of the case are still not wholly before me: for if the american side of it, thanks to your perspicuous minuteness, is now tolerably plain, the european side continues dubious, too dim for a decision. so much in my own position here is vague, not to be measured; then there is a brother, coming home to me from italy, almost daily expected now; whose ulterior resolutions cannot but be influential on mine; for we are brothers in the old good sense, and have one heart and one interest and object, and even one purse; and jack is a _good man,_ for whom i daily thank heaven, as for one of its principal mercies. he is traveling physician to the countess of clare, well entreated by her and hers; but, i think, weary of that inane element of "the english abroad," and as good as determined to have done with it; to seek _work_ (he sees not well how), if possible, with wages; but even almost _without,_ or with the lowest endurable, if need be. work and wages: the two prime necessities of man! it is pity they should ever be disjoined; yet of the two, if one _must,_ in this mad earth, be dispensed with, it is really wise to say at all hazards, be it the wages then. this brother (if the heavens have been kind to me) must be in paris one of these days; then here speedily; and "the house must resolve itself into a committee"--of ways and means. add to all this, that i myself have been and am one of the stupidest of living men; in one of my vacant, interlunar conditions, unfit for deciding on anything: were i to give you my actual _view_ of this case, it were a view such as satan had from the pavilion of the anarch old. alas! it is all too like chaos: confusion of dense and rare: i also know what it is to drop _plumb,_ fluttering my pennons vain,--for a series of weeks. one point only is clear: that you, my friend, are very friendly to me; that new england is as much my country and home as old england. very singular and very pleasant it is to me to feel as if i had a _house of my own_ in that far country: so many leagues and geographical degrees of wild-weltering "unfruitful brine"; and then the hospitable hearth and the smiles of brethren awaiting one there! what with railways, steamships, printing presses, it has surely become a most _monstrous_ "tissue," this life of ours; if evil and confusion in the one hemisphere, then good and order in the other, a man knows not how: and so it rustles forth, immeasurable, from "that roaring loom of time,"--miraculous ever as of old! to ralph waldo emerson, however, and those that love me as he, be thanks always, and a sure place in the sanctuary of the mind. long shall we remember that autumn sunday that landed him (out of infinite space) on the craigenputtock wilderness, not to leave us as he found us. my wife says, whatever i decide on, i cannot thank you too heartily;--which really is very sound doctrine. i write to tell you so much; and that you shall hear from me again when there is more to tell. it does seem next to certain to me that i could preach a very considerable quantity of things from that boston pulpit, such as it is,--were i once fairly started. if so, what an unspeakable relief were it too! of the whole mountain of miseries one grumbles at in this life, the central and parent one, as i often say, is that you cannot utter yourself. the poor soul sits struggling, impatient, longing vehemently out towards all corners of the universe, and cannot get its hest delivered, not even so far as the voice might do it. imprisoned, enchanted, like the arabian prince with half his body marble: it is really bad work. then comes bodily sickness; to act and react, and double the imbroglio. till at last, i suppose, one does rise, like eliphaz the temanite; states that his inner man is bursting (as if filled with carbonic acid and new wine), that by the favor of heaven he will speak a word or two. would it were come so far,-- if it be ever to come! on the whole i think the odds are that i shall some time or other get over to you; but that for this winter i ought not to go. my london expedition is not decided hitherto; i have begun various relations and arrangements, which it were questionable to cut short so soon. that beggarly book, were there nothing else, hampers me every way. to fling it once for all into the fire were perhaps the best; yet i grudge to do that. to finish it, on the other hand, is denied me for the present, or even so much as to work at it. what am i to do? when my brother arrives, we go all back to scotland for some weeks: there, in seclusion, with such calmness as i can find or create, the plan for the winter must be settled. you shall hear from me then; let us hope something more reasonable than i can write at present. for about a month i have gone to and fro utterly _idle:_ understand that, and i need explain no more. the wearied machine refused to be urged any farther; after long spasmodic struggling comes collapse. the burning of that wretched manuscript has really been a sore business for me. nevertheless that too shall clear itself, and prove a _favor_ of the upper powers: _tomorrow_ to fresh fields and pastures new! this monstrous london has taught me several things during the past year; for if its wisdom be of the most uninstructive ever heard of by that name of wisdom, its folly abounds with lessons,--which one ought to learn. i feel (with my burnt manuscript) as if defeated in this campaign; defeated, yet not altogether disgraced. as the great fritz said, when the battle had gone against him, "another time we will do better." as to literature, politics, and the whole multiplex aspect of existence here, expect me not to say one word. we are a singular people, in a singular condition. not many nights ago, in one of those phenomenal assemblages named routs, whither we had gone to see the countenance of o'connell and company (the tail was a peacock's tail, with blonde muslin women and heroic parliamentary men), one of the company, a "distinguished female" (as we call them), informed my wife "o'connell was the master-spirit of this age." if so, then for what we have received let us be thankful, --and enjoy it _without_ criticism.--it often painfully seems to me as if much were coming fast to a crisis here; as if the crown-wheel had given way, and the whole horologe were rushing rapidly down, down, to its end! wreckage is swift; rebuilding is slow and distant. happily another than we has charge of it. my new american friends have come and gone. barnard went off northward some fortnight ago, furnished with such guidance and furtherance as i could give him. professor longfellow went about the same time; to sweden, then to berlin and germany: we saw him twice or thrice, and his ladies, with great pleasure; as one sees worthy souls from a far country, who cannot abide with you, who throw you a kind greeting as they pass. i inquired considerably about concord, and a certain man there; one of the fair pilgrims told me several comfortable things. by the bye, how very good you are, in regard to this of unitarianism! i declare, i am ashamed of my intolerance:--and yet you have ceased to be a teacher of theirs, have you not? i mean to address you this time by the secular title of esquire; as if i liked you better so. but truly, in black clothes or in white, by this style or by that, the man himself can never be other than welcome to me. you will further allow me to fancy that you are now wedded; and offer our united congratulations and kindest good wishes to that new fair friend of ours, whom one day we shall surely know more of,--if the fates smile. my sheet is ending, and i must not burden you with double postage for such stuff as this. by dint of some inquiry i have learnt the law of the american letter-carrying; and i now mention it for our mutual benefit. there are from new york to london three packets monthly (on the st, on the th, on the th); the masters of these carry letters gratis for all men; and put the same into the post-office; there are some pence charged on the score of "ship-letter" there, and after that, the regular postage of the country, if the letter has to go farther. i put this, for example, into a place called north and south american coffee-house in the city here, and pay twopence for it, and it flies. doubtless there is some similar receiving-house with its "leather bag" somewhere in new york, and fixed days (probably the same as our days) for emptying, or rather for tying and despatching, said leather bag: if you deal with the london packets (so long as i am here) in preference to the liverpool ones, it will all be well. as for the next letter, (if you write as i hope you may before hearing from me again,) pray direct it, "care of john mill, esq., india house, london"; and he will forward it directly, should i even be still absent in the north.--now will you write? and pray write something about yourself. we both love you here, and send you all good prayers. _vale faveque!_ yours ever, t. carlyle ix. emerson to carlyle* concord, october, my dear friend,--please god i will never again sit six weeks of this short human life over a letter of yours without answering it. ----------- * the original of this letter is missing; what is printed here is from the rough draft. ----------- i received in august your letter of june, and just then hearing that a lady, a little lady with a mighty heart, mrs. child,* whom i scarcely know but do much respect, was about to visit england (invited thither for work's sake by the african or abolition society) and that she begged an introduction to you, i used the occasion to say the godsend was come, and that i would acknowledge it as soon as three then impending tasks were ended. i have now learned that mrs. child was detained for weeks in new york and did not sail. only last night i received your letter written in may, with the four copies of the _sartor,_ which by a strange oversight have been lying weeks, probably months, in the custom-house. on such provocation i can sit still no longer. ------------ * the excellent mrs. lydia maria child, whose romance of _philothea_ was published in this year, . "if her heart at high floods swamps her brain now and then, 't is but richer for that when the tide ebbs agen." says lowell, in his _fable for critics._ ----------- the three tasks were, a literary address; a historical discourse on the two-hundredth anniversary of our little town of concord* (my first adventure in print, which i shall send you); the third, my marriage, now happily consummated. all three, from the least to the greatest, trod so fast upon each other's heel as to leave me, who am a slow and awkward workman, no interstice big enough for a letter that should hope to convey any information. again i waited that the discourse might go in his new jacket to show how busy i had been, but the creeping country press has not dressed it yet. now congratulate me, my friend, as indeed you have already done, that i live with my wife in my own house, waiting on the good future. the house is not large, but convenient and very elastic. the more hearts (specially great hearts) it holds, the better it looks and feels. i have not had so much leisure yet but that the fact of having ample space to spread my books and blotted paper is still gratifying. so know now that your rooms in america wait for you, and that my wife is making ready a closet for mrs. carlyle. ---------- * "a historical discourse, delivered before the citizens of concord, th september, , on the second centennial anniversary of the incorporation of the town. by ralph waldo emerson. published by request. concord: g.f. bemis, printer. ." vo, pp. .--a discourse worthy of the author and of the town. it is reprinted in the eleventh volume of emerson's works, boston, . ----------- i could cry at the disaster that has befallen you in the loss of the book. my brother charles says the only thing the friend could do on such an occasion was to shoot himself, and wishes to know if he have done so. such mischance might well quicken one's curiosity to know what oversight there is of us, and i greet you well upon your faith and the resolution issuing out of it. you have certainly found a right manly consolation, and can afford to faint and rest a month or two on the laurels of such endeavor. i trust ere this you have re-collected the entire creation out of the secret cells where, under the smiles of every muse, it first took life. believe, when you are weary, that you who stimulate and rejoice virtuous young men do not write a line in vain. and whatever betide us in the inexorable future, what is better than to have awaked in many men the sweet sense of beauty, and to double the courage of virtue. so do not, as you will not, let the imps from all the fens of weariness and apathy have a minute too much. to die of feeding the fires of others were sweet, since it were not death but multiplication. and yet i hold to a more orthodox immortality too. this morning in happiest time i have a letter from george ripley, who tells me you have written him, and that you say pretty confidently you will come next summer. _io paean!_ he tells me also that alexander everett (brother of edward) has sent you the friendly notice that has just appeared in the _north american review,_ with a letter.* all which i hope you have received. i am delighted, for this man represents a clique to which i am a stranger, and which i supposed might not love you. it must be you shall succeed when saul prophesies. indeed, i have heard that you may hear the _sartor_ preached from some of our best pulpits and lecture-rooms. don't think i speak of myself, for i cherish carefully a salutary horror at the german style, and hold off my admiration as long as ever i can. but all my importance is quite at an end. for now that doctors of divinity and the solemn review itself have broke silence to praise you, i have quite lost my plume as your harbinger. ----------- * mr. a.h. everett's paper on _sartor resartus_ was published in the _north american review_ for october, . ----------- i read with interest what you say of the political omens in england. i could wish our country a better comprehension of its felicity. but government has come to be a trade, and is managed solely on commercial principles. a man plunges into politics to make his fortune, and only cares that the world should last his day. we have had in different parts of the country mobs and moblike legislation, and even moblike judicature, which have betrayed an almost godless state of society; so that i begin to think even here it behoves every man to quit his dependency on society as much as he can, as he would learn to go without crutches that will be soon plucked away from him, and settle with himself the principles he can stand upon, happen what may. there is reading, and public lecturing too, in this country, that i could recommend as medicine to any gentleman who finds the love of life too strong in him. if virtue and friendship have not yet become fables, do believe we keep your face for the living type. i was very glad to hear of the brother you describe, for i have one too, and know what it is to have presence in two places. charles chauncy emerson is a lawyer now settled in this town, and, as i believe, no better lord hamlet was ever. he is our doctor on all questions of taste, manners, or action. and one of the pure pleasures i promise myself in the months to come is to make you two gentlemen know each other. x. emerson to carlyle concord, mass., april, my dear friend,--i am concerned at not hearing from you. i have written you two letters, one in october, one in november, i believe, since i had any tidings of you.* your last letter is dated june, . i have counted all the chances of delay and miscarriage, and still am anxious lest you are ill, or have forgotten us. i have looked at the advertising sheet of the booksellers, but it promised nothing of the _history._ i thought i had made the happiest truce with sorrow in having the promise of your coming,--i was to take possession of a new kingdom of virtue and friendship. let not the new wine mourn. speak to me out of the wide silence. many friends inquire of me concerning you, and you must write some word immediately on receipt of this sheet. ------------ * one in august by mrs. child, apparently not delivered, and one, the preceding, in october. ----------- with it goes an american reprint of the _sartor._ five hundred copies only make the edition, at one dollar a copy. about one hundred and fifty copies are subscribed for. how it will be received i know not. i am not very sanguine, for i often hear and read somewhat concerning its repulsive style. certainly, i tell them, it is very odd. yet i read a chapter lately with great pleasure. i send you also, with dr. channing's regards and good wishes, a copy of his little work, lately published, on our great local question of slavery. you must have written me since july. i have reckoned upon your projected visit the ensuing summer or autumn, and have conjectured the starlike influences of a new spiritual element. especially lectures. my own experiments for one or two winters, and the readiness with which you embrace the work, have led me to think much and to expect much from this mode of addressing men. in new england the lyceum, as we call it, is already a great institution. beside the more elaborate courses of lectures in the cities, every country town has its weekly evening meeting, called a lyceum, and every professional man in the place is called upon, in the course of the winter, to entertain his fellow-citizens with a discourse on whatever topic. the topics are miscellaneous as heart can wish. but in boston, lowell, salem, courses are given by individuals. i see not why this is not the most flexible of all organs of opinion, from its popularity and from its newness permitting you to say what you think, without any shackles of prescription. the pulpit in our age certainly gives forth an obstructed and uncertain sound, and the faith of those in it, if men of genius, may differ so much from that of those under it, as to embarrass the conscience of the speaker, because so much is attributed to him from the fact of standing there. in the lyceum nothing is presupposed. the orator is only responsible for what his lips articulate. then what scope it allows! you may handle every member and relation of humanity. what could homer, socrates, or st. paul say that cannot be said here? the audience is of all classes, and its character will be determined always by the name of the lecturer. why may you not give the reins to your wit, your pathos, your philosophy, and become that good despot which the virtuous orator is? another thing. i am persuaded that, if a man speak well, he shall find this a well-rewarded work in new england. i have written this year ten lectures; i had written as many last year. and for reading both these and those at places whither i was invited, i have received this last winter about three hundred and fifty dollars. had i, in lieu of receiving a lecturer's fee, myself advertised that i would deliver these in certain places, these receipts would have been greatly increased. i insert all this because my prayers for you in this country are quite of a commercial spirit. if you lose no dollar by us, i shall joyfully trust your genius and virtue for your satisfaction on all other points. i cannot remember that there are any other mouthpieces that are specially vital at this time except criticism and parliamentary debate. i think this of ours would possess in the hands of a great genius great advantages over both. but what avail any commendations of the form, until i know that the man is alive and well? if you love them that love you, write me straightway of your welfare. my wife desires to add to mine her friendliest greetings to mrs. carlyle and to yourself. yours affectionately, r. waldo emerson i ought to say that le-baron russell, a worthy young man who studies engineering, did cause the republication of teufelsdrockh.* i trust you shall yet see a better american review of it than the _north american._ ------------ * this first edition of _sartor_ as an independent volume was published by james munroe and company, boston. emerson, at mr. (now dr.) russell's request, wrote a preface for the book. he told dr. russell that his brother charles was not pleased with the preface, thinking it "too commonplace, too much like all prefaces." ----------- xi. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, london april, my dear emerson,--barnard is returning across the water, and must not go back without a flying salutation for you. these many weeks i have had your letter by me; these many weeks i have felt always that it deserved and demanded a grateful answer; and, alas! also that i could give it none. it is impossible for you to figure what mood i am in. one sole thought, that book! that weary book! occupies me continually: wreck and confusion of all kinds go tumbling and falling around me, within me; but to wreck and growth, to confusion and order, to the world at large, i turn a deaf ear; and have life only for this one thing,--which also in general i feel to be one of the pitifulest that ever man went about possessed with. have compassion for me! it is really very miserable: but it will end. some months more, and it is _ended;_ and i am done with _french revolution,_ and with revolution and revolt in general; and look once more with free eyes over this earth, where are other things than mean internecine work of that kind: things fitter for me, under the bright sun, on this green mother's-bosom (though the devil does dwell in it)! for the present, really, it is like a nessus' shirt, burning you into madness, this wretched enterprise; nay, it is also like a kind of panoply, rendering you invulnerable, insensible, to all _other_ mischiefs. i got the fatal first volume finished (in the miserablest way, after great efforts) in october last; my head was all in a whirl; i fled to scotland and my mother for a month of rest. rest is nowhere for the son of adam: all looked so "spectral" to me in my old-familiar birthland; hades itself could not have seemed stranger; annandale also was part of the kingdom of time. since november i have worked again as i could; a second volume got wrapped up and sealed out of my sight within the last three days. there is but a third now: one pull more, and then! it seems to me, i will fly into some obscurest cranny of the world, and lie silent there for a twelvemonth. the mind is weary, the body is very sick; a little black speck dances to and fro in the left eye (part of the retina protesting against the liver, and striking work): i cannot help it; it must flutter and dance there, like a signal of distress, unanswered till i be done. my familiar friends tell me farther that the book is all wrong, style cramp, &c., &c.: my friends, i answer, you are very right; but this also, heaven be my witness, i cannot help.--in such sort do i live here; all this i had to write you, if i wrote at all. for the rest i cannot say that this huge blind monster of a city is without some sort of charm for me. it leaves one alone, to go his own road unmolested. deep in your soul you take up your protest against it, defy it, and even despise it; but need not divide yourself from it for that. worthy individuals are glad to hear your thought, if it have any sincerity; they do not exasperate themselves or you about it; they have not even time for such a thing. nay, in stupidity itself on a scale of this magnitude, there is an impressiveness, almost a sublimity; one thinks how, in the words of schiller, "the very gods fight against it in vain"; how it lies on its unfathomable foundations there, inert yet peptic; nay, eupeptic; and is a _fact_ in the world, let theory object as it will. brown-stout, in quantities that would float a seventy-four, goes down the throats of men; and the roaring flood of life pours on;--over which philosophy and theory are but a poor shriek of remonstrance, which oftenest were wiser, perhaps, to hold its peace. i grow daily to honor facts more and more, and theory less and less. a fact, it seems to me, is a great thing: a sentence printed if not by god, then at least by the devil;--neither jeremy bentham nor lytton bulwer had a hand in _that._ there are two or three of the best souls here i have known for long: i feel less alone with them; and yet one is alone,--a stranger and a pilgrim. these friends expect mainly that the church of england is not dead but asleep; that the leather coaches, with their gilt panels, can be peopled again with a living aristocracy, instead of the simulacra of such. i must altogether hold my peace to this, as i do to much. coleridge is the father of all these. _ay de mi!_ but to look across the "divine salt-sea." a letter reached me, some two months ago, from mobile, alabama; the writer, a kind friend of mine, signs himself james freeman clarke.* i have mislaid, not lost his letter; and do not at present know his permanent address (for he seemed to be only on a visit at mobile); but you, doubtless, do know it. will you therefore take or even find an opportunity to tell this good friend that it is not the wreckage of the liverpool ship he wrote by, nor insensibility on my part, that prevents his hearing direct from me; that i see him, and love him in this letter; and hope we shall meet one day under the sun, shall live under it, at any rate, with many a kind thought towards one another. ---------- * now the rev. dr. clarke, of boston. ---------- the _north american review_ you spoke of never came (i mean that copy of it with the note in it); but another copy became rather public here, to the amusement of some. i read the article myself: surely this reviewer, who does not want in [sense]* otherwise, is an original: either a _thrice_-plied quiz (_sartor's_ "editor" a twice-plied one); or else opening on you a grandeur of still dulness, rarely to be met with on earth. ------------- * the words supplied here were lost under the seal of the letter. ------------- my friend! i must end here. forgive me till i get done with this book. can you have the generosity to write, _without_ an answer? well, if you can_not,_ i will answer. do not forget me. my love and my wife's to your good lady, to your brother, and all friends. tell me what you do; what your world does. as for my world, take this (which i rendered from the german voss, a tough old-teutonic fellow) for the best i can say of it:-- "as journeys this earth, her eye on a sun, through the heavenly spaces, and, radiant in azure, or sunless, swallowed in tempests, falters not, alters not; journeying equal, sunlit or stormgirt so thou, son of earth, who hast force, goal, and time, go still onwards." adieu, my dear friend! believe me ever yours, thomas carlyle xii. emerson to carlyle concord, massachusetts, september, my dear friend,--i hope you do not measure my love by the tardiness of my messages. i have few pleasures like that of receiving your kind and eloquent letters. i should be most impatient of the long interval between one and another, but that they savor always of eternity, and promise me a friendship and friendly inspiration not reckoned or ended by days or years. your last letter, dated in april, found me a mourner, as did your first. i have lost out of this world my brother charles,* of whom i have spoken to you,--the friend and companion of many years, the inmate of my house, a man of a beautiful genius, born to speak well, and whose conversation for these last years has treated every grave question of humanity, and has been my daily bread. i have put so much dependence on his gifts that we made but one man together; for i needed never to do what he could do by noble nature much better than i. he was to have been married in this month, and at the time of his sickness and sudden death i was adding apartments to my house for his permanent accommodation. i wish that you could have known him. at twenty-seven years the best life is only preparation. he built his foundation so large that it needed the full age of man to make evident the plan and proportions of his character. he postponed always a particular to a final and absolute success, so that his life was a silent appeal to the great and generous. but some time i shall see you and speak of him. --------- * charles chauncy emerson,--died may , ,--whose memory still survives fresh and beautiful in the hearts of the few who remain who knew him in life. a few papers of his published in the _dial_ show to others what he was and what he might have become. ----------- we want but two or three friends, but these we cannot do without, and they serve us in every thought we think. i find now i must hold faster the remaining jewels of my social belt. and of you i think much and anxiously since mrs. channing, amidst her delight at what she calls the happiest hour of her absence, in her acquaintance with you and your family, expresses much uneasiness respecting your untempered devotion to study. i am the more disturbed by her fears, because your letters avow a self-devotion to your work, and i know there is no gentle dulness in your temperament to counteract the mischief. i fear nature has not inlaid fat earth enough into your texture to keep the ethereal blade from whetting it through. i write to implore you to be careful of your health. you are the property of all whom you rejoice in art and soul, and you must not deal with your body as your own. o my friend, if you would come here and let me nurse you and pasture you in my nook of this long continent, i will thank god and you therefor morning and evening, and doubt not to give you, in a quarter of a year, sound eyes, round cheeks, and joyful spirits. my wife has been lately an invalid, but she loves you thoroughly, and hardly stores a barrel of flour or lays her new carpet without some hopeful reference to mrs. carlyle. and in good earnest, why cannot you come here forthwith, and deliver in lectures to the solid men of boston the _history of the french revolution_ before it is published,--or at least whilst it is publishing in england, and before it is published here. there is no doubt of the perfect success of such a course now that the _five hundred copies of the sartor are all sold,_ and read with great delight by many persons. this i suggest if you too must feel the vulgar necessity of _doing;_ but if you will be governed by your friend, you shall come into the meadows, and rest and talk with your friend in my country pasture. if you will come here like a noble brother, you shall have your solid day undisturbed, except at the hours of eating and walking; and as i will abstain from you myself, so i will defend you from others. i entreat mrs. carlyle, with my affectionate remembrances, to second me in this proposition, and not suffer the wayward man to think that in these space-destroying days a prayer from boston, massachusetts, is any less worthy of serious and prompt granting than one from edinburgh or oxford. i send you a little book i have just now published, as an entering wedge, i hope, for something more worthy and significant.* this is only a naming of topics on which i would gladly speak and gladlier hear. i am mortified to learn the ill fate of my former packet containing the _sartor_ and dr. channing's work. my mercantile friend is vexed, for he says accurate orders were given to send it as a packet, not as a letter. i shall endeavor before despatching this sheet to obtain another copy of our american edition. ----------- * this was _nature,_ the first clear manifesto of emerson's genius. ----------- i wish i could come to you instead of sending this sheet of paper. i think i should persuade you to get into a ship this autumn, quit all study for a time, and follow the setting sun. i have many, many things to learn of you. how melancholy to think how much we need confession!...* yet the great truths are always at hand, and all the tragedy of individual life is separated how thinly from that universal nature which obliterates all ranks, all evils, all individualities. how little of you is in your _will!_ above your will how intimately are you related to all of us! in god we meet. therein we _are,_ thence we descend upon time and these infinitesimal facts of christendom, and trade, and england old and new. wake the soul now drunk with a sleep, and we overleap at a bound the obstructions, the griefs, the mistakes, of years, and the air we breathe is so vital that the past serves to contribute nothing to the result. ----------- ** some words appear to be lost here. ----------- i read goethe, and now lately the posthumous volumes, with a great interest. a friend of mine who studies his life with care would gladly know what records there are of his first ten years after his settlement at weimar, and what books there are in germany about him beside what mrs. austin has collected and heine. can you tell me? write me of your health, or else come. yours ever, r.w. emerson. p.s.--i learn that an acquaintance is going to england, so send the packet by him. xiii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, november, my dear friend,--you are very good to write to me in my silence, in the mood you must be in. my silence you may well judge is not forgetfulness; it is a forced silence; which this kind letter enforces into words. i write the day after your letter comes, lest the morrow bring forth something new to hinder me. what a bereavement, my friend, is this that has overtaken you! such a brother, with such a life opening around him, like a blooming garden where he was to labor and gather, all vanished suddenly like frostwork, and hidden from your eye! it is a loss, a sore loss; which god had appointed you. i do not tell you not to mourn: i mourn with you, and could wish all mourners the spirit you have in this sorrow. oh, i know it well! often enough in this noisy inanity of a vision where _we_ still linger, i say to myself, perhaps thy buried ones are not far from thee, are with thee; they are in eternity, which is a now and here! and yet nature will have her right; memory would feel desecrated if she could forget. many times in the crowded din of the living, some sight, some feature of a face, will recall to you the loved face; and in these turmoiling streets you see the little silent churchyard, the green grave that lies there so silent, inexpressibly _wae._ o, perhaps we _shall_ all meet yonder, and the tears be wiped from all eyes! one thing is no perhaps: surely we _shall_ all meet, if it be the will of the maker of us. if it be not his will,--then is it not better so? silence,--since in these days we have no speech! eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, in any day. you inquire so earnestly about my welfare; hold open still the hospitable door for me. truly concord, which i have sought out on the map, seems worthy of its name: no dissonance comes to me from that side; but grief itself has acquired a harmony: in joy or grief a voice says to me, behold there is one that loves thee; in thy loneliness, in thy darkness, see how a hospitable candle shines from far over seas, how a friendly heart watches! it is very good, and precious for me. as for my health, be under no apprehension. i am always sick; i am sicker and worse in body and mind, a little, for the present; but it has no deep significance: it is _weariness_ merely; and now, by the bounty of heaven, i am as it were within sight of land. in two months more, this unblessed book will be _finished;_ at newyearday we begin printing: before the end of march, the thing is out; and i am a free man! few happinesses i have ever known will equal that, as it seems to me. and yet i ought not to call the poor book unblessed: no, it has girdled me round like a panoply these two years; kept me invulnerable, indifferent, to innumerable things. the poorest man in london has perhaps been one of the freest: the roaring press of gigs and gigmen, with their gold blazonry and fierce gig-wheels, have little incommoded him; they going their way, he going his.--as for the results of the book, i can rationally promise myself, on the economical, pecuniary, or otherwise worldly side, simply _zero._ it is a book contradicting all rules of formalism, that have not a reality within them, which so few have;--testifying, the more quietly the worse, internecine war with quacks high and low. my good brother, who was with me out of italy in summer, declared himself shocked, and almost terror-struck: "jack," i answered, "innumerable men give their lives cheerfully to defend falsehoods and half-falsehoods; why should not one writer give his life cheerfully to say, in plain scotch-english, in the hearing of god and man, to me they seem false and half-false? at all events, thou seest, i cannot help it. it is the nature of the beast." so that, on the whole, i suppose there is no more unpromotable, unappointable man now living in england than i. literature also, the miscellaneous place of refuge, seems done here, unless you will take the devil's wages for it; which one does not incline to do. a _disjectum membrum;_ cut off from relations with men? verily so; and now forty years of age; and extremely dyspeptical: a hopeless-looking man. yet full of what i call desperate-hope! one does verily stand on the earth, a star-dome encompassing one; seemingly accoutred and enlisted and sent to battle, with rations good, indifferent, or bad,--what can one do but in the name of odin, tuisco, hertha, horsa, and all saxon and hebrew gods, fight it out?--this surely is very idle talk. as to the book, i do say seriously that it is a wild, savage, ruleless, very bad book; which even you will not be able to like; much less any other man. yet it contains strange things; sincerities drawn out of the heart of a man very strangely situated; reverent of nothing but what is reverable in all ages and places: so we will print it, and be done with it;--and try a new turn next time. what i am to do, were the thing done, you see therefore, is most uncertain. how gladly would i run to concord! and if i were there, be sure the do-nothing arrangement is the only conceivable one for me. that my sick existence subside again, this is the first condition; that quiet vision be restored me. it is frightful what an impatience i have got for many kinds of fellow-creatures. their jargon really hurts me like the shrieking of inarticulate creatures that ought to articulate. there is no resource but to say: brother, thou surely art not hateful; thou art lovable, at lowest pitiable;-- alas! in my case, thou art dreadfully wearisome, unedifying: go thy ways, with my blessing. there are hardly three people among these two millions, whom i care much to exchange words with, in the humor i have. nevertheless, at bottom, it is not my purpose to quit london finally till i have as it were _seen it out._ in the very hugeness of the monstrous city, contradiction cancelling contradiction, one finds a sort of composure for one's self that is not to be met with elsewhere perhaps in the world: people tolerate you, were it only that they have not time to trouble themselves with you. some individuals even love me here; there are one or two whom i have even learned to love,--though, for the present, cross circumstances have snatched them out of my orbit again mostly. wherefore, if you ask me, what i am to do?--the answer is clear so far, "rest myself awhile"; and all farther is as dark as chaos. now for resting, taking that by itself, my brother, who has gone back to rome with some thoughts of settling as a physician there, presses me to come thither, and rest in rome. on the other hand, a certain john sterling (the best man i have found in these regions) has been driven to bordeaux lately for his health; he will have it that i must come to him, and walk through the south of france to dauphine, avignon, and over the alps next spring!* thirdly, my mother will have me return to annandale, and lie quiet in her little habitation;--which i incline to think were the wisest course of all. and lastly from over the atlantic comes my good emerson's voice. we will settle nothing, except that all shall remain unsettled. _die zukunft decket schmerzen and glucke._ ------------ * in his _life of sterling,_ carlyle prints a letter from sterling to himself, dated bordeaux, october , , in which sterling urges him to come "in the first fine days of spring." it must have reached him a few days before he wrote this letter to emerson. --------- i ought to say, however, that about new-year's-day i will send you an article on _mirabeau,_ which they have printed here (for a thing called the _london review_), and some kind of note to escort it. i think pamphlets travel as letters in new england, provided you leave the ends of them open: if i be mistaken, pray instruct messrs. barnard to _refuse_ the thing, for it has small value. _the diamond necklace_ is to be printed also, in _fraser;_ inconceivable hawking that poor paper has had; till now fraser takes it--for l : not being able to get it for nothing. the _mirabeau_ was written at the passionate request of john mill; and likewise for needful lucre. i think it is the first shilling of money i have earned by my craft these four years: where the money i have lived on has come from while i sat here scribbling gratis, amazes me to think; yet surely it has come (for i am still here), and heaven only to thank for it, which is a great fact. as for mill's _london review_ (for he is quasi-editor), i do not recommend it to you. hide-bound radicalism; a to me well-nigh insupportable thing! open it not: a breath as of sahara and the infinite sterile comes from every page of it. a young radical baronet* has laid out l , on getting the world instructed in that manner: it is very curious to see.--alas! the bottom of the sheet! take my hurried but kindest thanks for the prospect of your second teufelsdrockh: the _first_ too is now in my possession; brother john went to the post-office, and worked it out for a ten shillings. it is a beautiful little book; and a preface to it such as no kindest friend could have improved. thank my kind editor** very heartily from me. --------- * sir william molesworth. in his _autobiography_ mill gives an interesting account of the founding of this _review,_ and his quasi-editorial relations to it. "in the beginning," he says, "it did not, as a whole, by any means represent my opinion." ** dr. le-baron russell --------- my wife was in scotland in summer, driven thither by ill health; she is stronger since her return, though not yet strong; she sends over to concord her kindest wishes. if i fly to the alps or the ocean, her mother and she must keep one another company, we think, till there be better news of me. you are to thank dr. channing also for his valued gift. i read the discourse, and other friends of his read it, with great estimation; but the _end_ of that black question lies beyond my ken. i suppose, as usual, might and right will have to make themselves synonymous in some way. canst and shalt, if they are _very_ well understood, mean the same thing under this sun of ours. adieu, my dear emerson. _gehab' dich wohl!_ many affectionate regards to the lady wife: it is far within the verge of probabilities that i shall see her face, and eat of her bread, one day. but she must not get sick! it is a dreadful thing, sickness; really a thing which i begin frequently to think _criminal_--at least in myself. nay, in myself it really is criminal; wherefore i determine to be well one day. good be with you and yours. t. carlyle as to goethe and your friend: i know not anything out of goethe's own works (which have many notices in them) that treats specially of those ten years. doubtless your friend knows jordens's _lexicon_ (which dates all the writings, for one thing), the _conversations-lexicon supplement,_ and such like. there is an essay by one schubarth which has reputation; but it is critical and ethical mainly. the letters to zelter, and the letters to schiller, will do nothing for those years, but are essential to see. perhaps in some late number of the _zeitgenossen_ there may be something? blackguard heine is worth very little; mentzel is duller, decenter, not much wiser. a very curious book is eckermann's _conversations with goethe,_ just published. no room more!* ----------- * concerning this letter emerson wrote in his diary: "january , . received day before yesterday a letter from thomas carlyle, dated november;--as ever, a cordial influence. strong he is, upright, noble, and sweet, and makes good how much of our human nature. quite in consonance with my delight in his eloquent letters i read in bacon this afternoon this sentence (of letters): 'and such as are written from wise men are of all the words of men, in my judgment, the best; for they are more natural than orations, public speeches, and more advised than conferences or present speeches.'" ------------- xiv. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, london, february, my dear emerson,--you had promise of a letter to be despatched you about new-year's-day; which promise i was myself in a condition to fulfil at the time set, but delayed it, owing to delays of printers and certain "articles" that were to go with it. six weeks have not yet entirely brought up these laggard animals: however, i will delay no longer for them. nay, it seems the articles, were they never so ready, cannot go with the letter; but must fare round by liverpool or portsmouth, in a separate conveyance. we will leave them to the bounty of time. your little book and the copy of _teufelsdrockh_ came safely; soon after i had written. the _teufelsdrockh_ i instantaneously despatched to hamburg, to a scottish merchant there, to whom there is an allusion in the book; who used to be my _speditor_ (one of the politest extant though totally a stranger) in my missions and packages to and from weimar.* the other, former copy, more specially yours, had already been, as i think i told you, delivered out of durance; and got itself placed in the bookshelf, as _the_ teufelsdrockh. george ripley tells me you are printing another edition; much good may it do you! there is now also a kind of whisper and whimper rising _here_ about printing one. i said to myself once, when bookseller fraser shrieked so loud at a certain message you sent him: "perhaps after all they will print this poor rag of a thing into a book, after i am dead it may be,--if so seem good to them. _either_ way!" as it is, we leave the poor orphan to its destiny, all the more cheerfully. ripley says farther he has sent me a critique of it by a better hand than the _north american:_ i expect it, but have not got it yet.** the _north american_ seems to say that he too sent me one. it never came to hand, nor any hint of it,--except i think once before through you. it was not at all an unfriendly review; but had an opacity, of matter-of-fact in it that filled one with amazement. since the irish bishop who said there were some things in _gulliver_ on which he for one would keep his belief _suspended,_ nothing equal to it, on that side, has come athwart me. however, he _has_ made out that teufelsdrockh is, in all human probability, a fictitious character; which is always something, for an inquirer into truth.--will you, finally, thank friend ripley in my name, till i have time to write to him and thank him. ----------- * the allusion referred to is the following: "by the kindness of a scottish hamburg merchant, whose name, known to the whole mercantile world, he must not mention; but whose honorable courtesy, now and before spontaneously manifested to him, a mere literary stranger, he cannot soon forget,--the bulky weissnichtwo packet, with all its custom-house seals, foreign hieroglyphs, and miscellaneous tokens of travel, arrived here in perfect safety, and free of cost."--_sartor resartus,_ book i. ch. xi. ** an article by the rev. n.l. frothingham in the _christian examiner._ ---------- your little azure-colored nature gave me true satisfaction. i read it, and then lent it about to all my acquaintance that had a sense for such things; from whom a similar verdict always came back. you say it is the first chapter of something greater. i call it rather the foundation and ground-plan on which you may build whatsoever of great and true has been given you to build. it is the true apocalypse, this when the "open secret" becomes revealed to a man. i rejoice much in the glad serenity of soul with which you look out on this wondrous dwelling-place of yours and mine--with an ear for the _ewigen melodien,_ which pipe in the winds round us, and utter themselves forth in all sounds and sights and things: not to be written down by gamut-machinery; but which all right writing is a kind of attempt to write down. you will see what the years will bring you. it is not one of your smallest qualities in my mind, that you can wait so quietly and let the years do their best. he that cannot keep himself quiet is of a morbid nature; and the thing he yields us will be like him in that, whatever else it be. miss martineau (for i have seen her since i wrote) tells me you "are the only man in america" who has quietly set himself down on a competency to follow his own path, and do the work his own will prescribes for him. pity that you were the only one! but be one, nevertheless; be the first, and there will come a second and a third. it is a poor country where all men are _sold_ to mammon, and can make nothing but railways and bursts of parliamentary eloquence! and yet your new england here too has the upper hand of our old england, of our old europe: we too are sold to mammon, soul, body, and spirit; but (mark that, i pray you, with double pity) mammon will not _pay_ us,--we, are "two million three hundred thousand in ireland that have not potatoes enough"! i declare, in history i find nothing more tragical. i find also that it will alter; that for me as one it has altered. me mammon will _pay_ or not as he finds convenient; buy me he will not.--in fine, i say, sit still at concord, with such spirit as you are of; under the blessed skyey influences, with an open sense, with the great book of existence open round you: we shall see whether you too get not something blessed to read us from it. the paper is declining fast, and all is yet speculation. along with these two "articles" (to be sent by liverpool; there are two of them, _diamond necklace_ and _mirabeau_), you will very probably get some stray proofsheet--of the unutterable _french revolution!_ it is actually at press; two printers working at separate volumes of it,--though still too slow. in not many weeks, my hands will be washed of it! you, i hope, can have little conception of the feeling with which i wrote the last word of it, one night in early january, when the clock was striking ten, and our frugal scotch supper coming in! i did not cry; nor i did not pray but could have done both. no such _spell_ shall get itself fixed on me for some while to come! a beggarly distortion; that will please no mortal, not even myself; of which i know not whether the fire were not after all the due place! and yet i ought not to say so: there is a great blessing in a man's doing what he utterly can, in the case he is in. perhaps great quantities of dross are burnt out of me by this calcination i have had; perhaps i shall be far quieter and healthier of mind and body than i have ever been since boyhood. the world, though no man had ever less empire in it, seems to me a thing lying _under_ my feet; a mean imbroglio, which i never more shall fear, or court, or disturb myself with: welcome and welcome to go wholly _its own way;_ i wholly clear for going mine. through the summer months i am, somewhere or other, to rest myself, in the deepest possible sleep. the residue is vague as the wind,--unheeded as the wind. some way it will turn out that a poor, well-meaning son of adam has bread growing for him too, better or worse: _any_ way,--or even _no_ way, if that be it,--i shall be content. there is a scheme here among friends for my lecturing in a thing they call royal institution; but it will not do there, i think. the instant two or three are gathered together under any terms, who want to learn something i can teach them,--then we will, most readily, as burns says, "loose our tinkler jaw"; but not i think till then; were the institution even imperial. america has faded considerably into the background of late: indeed, to say truth, whenever i think of myself in america, it is as in the backwoods, with a rifle in my hand, god's sky over my head, and this accursed lazar-house of quacks and blockheads, 'and sin and misery (now near a head) lying all behind me forevermore. a thing, you see, which is and can be at bottom but a daydream! to rest through the summer: that is my only fixed wisdom; a resolution taken; only the place where uncertain.-- what a pity this poor sheet is done! i had innumerable things to tell you about people whom i have seen, about books,--miss harriet martineau, mrs. butler, southey, influenza, parliament, literature and the life of man,--the whole of which must lie over till next time. write to me; do not forget me. my wife, who is sitting by me, in very poor health (this long while), sends "kindest remembrances," "compliments" she expressly does not send. good be with you always, my dear friend! --t. carlyle we send our felicitation to the mother and little boy; which latter you had better tell us the name of. xv. emerson to carlyle concord, mass., march, my dear friend,--last night, i said i would write to you forthwith. this morning i received your letter of february th, and _with it_ the _diamond necklace,_ the _mirabeau,_ and the olive leaf of a proof-sheet. i write out the sum of my debt as the best acknowledgment i can make. i had already received, about new-year's-day, the preceding letter. it came in the midst of my washbowl-storm of a course of lectures on the philosophy of history. for all these gifts and pledges,--thanks. over the finished _history,_ joy and evergreen laurels. i embrace you with all my heart. i solace myself with the noble nature god has given you, and in you to me, and to all. i had read the _diamond necklace_ three weeks ago at the boston athenaeum, and the _mirabeau_ i had just read when my copy came. but the proof-sheet was virgin gold. the _mirabeau_ i forebode is to establish your kingdom in england. that is genuine thunder, which nobody that wears ears can affect to mistake for the rumbling of cart-wheels. i please myself with thinking that my angelo has blocked a colossus which may stand in the public square to defy all competitors. to be sure, that is its least merit,--that nobody can do the like,--yet is it a gag to cerberus. its better merit is that it inspires self-trust, by teaching the immense resources that are in human nature; so i sent it to be read by a brave man who is poor and decried. the doctrine is indeed true and grand which you preach as by cannonade, that god made a man, and it were as well to stand by and see what is in him, and, if he act ever from his impulses, believe that he has his own checks, and, however extravagant, will keep his orbit, and return from far; a faith that draws confirmation from the sempiternal ignorance and stationariness of society, and the sempiternal growth of all the individuals. the _diamond necklace_ i read with joy, whilst i read with my own eyes. when i read with english or new-english eyes, my joy is marred by the roaring of the opposition. i doubt not the exact story is there told as it fell out, and told for the first time; but the eye of your readers, as you will easily guess, will be bewildered by the multitude of brilliant-colored hieroglyphics whereby the meaning is conveyed. and for the gig,--the gig,--it is fairly worn out, and such a cloud-compeller must mock that particular symbol no more. i thought as i read this piece that your strange genius was the instant fruit of your london. it is the aroma of babylon. such as the great metropolis, such is this style: so vast, enormous, related to all the world, and so endless in details. i think you see as pictures every street, church, parliament-house, barrack, baker's shop, mutton-stall, forge, wharf, and ship, and whatever stands, creeps, rolls, or swims thereabouts, and make all your own. hence your encyclopediacal allusion to all knowables, and the virtues and vices of your panoramic pages. well, it is your own; and it is english; and every word stands for somewhat; and it cheers and fortifies me. and what more can a man ask of his writing fellow-man? why, all things; inasmuch as a good mind creates wants at every stroke. the proof-sheet rhymes well with _mirabeau,_ and has abated my fears from your own and your brother's account of the new book. i greet it well. auspicious babe, be born! the first good of the book is that it makes you free, and as i anxiously hope makes your body sound. a possible good is that it will cause me to see your face. but i seemed to read in _mirabeau_ what you intimate in your letter, that you will not come westward. old england is to find you out, and then the new will have no charm. for me it will be the worst; for you, not. a man, a few men, cannot be to you (with your ministering eyes) that which you should travel far to find. moreover, i observe that america looks, to those who come hither, as unromantic and unexciting as the dutch canals. i see plainly that our society, for the most part, is as bigoted to the _respectabilities_ of religion and education as yours; that there is no more appetite for a revelation here than elsewhere; and the educated class are, of course, less fair-minded than others. yet, in the moments when my eyes are open, i see that here are rich materials for the philosopher and poet, and, what is more to your purpose as an artist, that we have had in these parts no one philosopher or poet to put a sickle to the prairie wheat. i have really never believed that you would do us that crowning grace of coming hither, yet if god should be kinder to us than our belief, i meant and mean to hold you fast in my little meadows on the musketaquid (now concord) river, and show you (as in this country we can anywhere) an america in miniature in the april or november town meeting. therein should you conveniently study and master the whole of our hemispherical politics reduced to a nutshell, and have a new version of oxenstiern's little wit; and yet be consoled by seeing that here the farmers patient as their bulls of head-boards--provided for them in relation to distant national objects, by kind editors of newspapers--do yet their will, and a good will, in their own parish. if a wise man would pass by new york, and be content to sit still in this village a few months, he should get a thorough native knowledge which no foreigner has yet acquired. so i leave you with god, and if any oracle in the great delphos should say "go," why fly to us instantly. come and spend a year with me, and see if i cannot respect your retirements. i must love you for your interest in me and my way of life, and the more that we only look for good-nature in the creative class. they pay the tag of grandeur, and, attracted irresistibly to make, their living is usually weak and hapless. but you are so companionable--god has made you man as well as poet--that i lament the three thousand miles of mountainous water. burns might have added a better verse to his poem, importing that one might write iliads or hamlets, and yet come short of truth by infinity, as every written word must; but "the man's the gowd for a' that." and i heartily thank the lady for her good-will. please god she may be already well. we all grieve to know of her ill health. people who have seen her never stop with _mr._ carlyle, but count him thrice blest in her. my wife believes in nothing for her but the american voyage. i shall never cease to expect you both until you come. my boy is five months old, he is called waldo,--a lovely wonder that made the universe look friendlier to me. my wife, one of your best lovers, sends her affectionate regards to mrs. carlyle, and says that she takes exception in your letters only to that sentence that she would go to scotland if you came here. my wife beseeches her to come and possess her new-dressed chamber. do not cease to write whenever you can spare me an hour. a man named bronson alcott is great, and one of the jewels we have to show you. good bye. --r.w. emerson the second edition of _sartor_ is out and sells well. i learned the other day that twenty-five copies of it were ordered for england. it was very amiable of you, that word about it in _mirabeau._* ---------- * this refers to carlyle's introducing, in his paper on _mirabeau,_ a citation from _sartor,_ with the words, "we quote from a new england book." ---------- xvi. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, london, june, my dear friend,--a word must go to concord in answer to your last kind word. it reached me, that word of yours, on the morning of a most unspeakable day; the day when i, half dead with fret, agitation, and exasperation, was to address extempore an audience of london quality people on the subject of german literature! the heart's wish of me was that i might be left in deepest oblivion, wrapped in blankets and silence, not speaking, not spoken to, for a twelvemonth to come. my printers had only let me go, out of their treadmill, the day before. however, all that is over now; and i am still here alive to write to you, and hope for better days. almost a month ago there went a copy of a book called _french revolution,_ with your address on it, over to red-lion square, and thence, as old rich declared, himself now _emeritus,_ back to one kennet (i think) near covent garden; who professes to correspond with hilliard and company, boston, and undertook the service. the book is not gone yet, i understand; but kennet engages that it shall leave liverpool infallibly on the th of june. i wish you a happy reading of it, therefore: it is the only copy of my sending that has crossed the water. ill printed (there are many errors, one or two gross ones), ill written, ill thought! but in fine it _is_ off my hands: that is a fact worth all others. as to its reception here or elsewhere, i anticipate nothing or little. gabble, gabble, the astonishment of the dull public brain is likely to be considerable, and its ejaculations unedifying. we will let it go its way. beat this thing, i say always, under thy dull hoofs, o dull public! trample it and tumble it into all sinks and kennels; if thou canst kill it, kill it in god's name: if thou canst not kill it, why then thou wilt not. by the by, speaking of dull publics, i ought to say that i have seen a review of myself in the _christian examiner_ (i think that is it) of boston; the author of which, if you know him, i desire you to thank on my part. for if a dull million is good, then withal a seeing unit or two is also good. this man images back a beautiful idealized clothes-philosopher, very satisfactory to look upon; in whose beatified features i did verily detect more similitude to what i myself meant to be, than in any or all the other criticisms i have yet seen written of me. that a man see himself reflected from the soul of his brother-man in this brotherly improved way: there surely is one of the most legitimate joys of existence. friend ripley took the trouble to send me this review, in which i detected an article of his own; there came also some discourses of his much to be approved of; a newspaper passage-of-fence with a philistine of yours; and a set of essays on progress-of-the-species and such like by a man whom i grieved to see confusing himself with that. progress of the species is a thing i can get no good of at all. these books, which miss martineau has borrowed from me, did not arrive till three weeks ago or less. i pray you to thank ripley for them very kindly; which at present i still have not time to do. he seems to me a good man, with good aims; with considerable natural health of mind, wherein all goodness is likely to grow better, all clearness to grow clearer. miss martineau laments that he does not fling himself, or not with the due impetuosity, into the black controversy; a thing lamentable in the extreme, when one considers what a world this is, and how perfect it would be could mungo once get his stupid case rectified, and eat his squash as a stupid _apprentice_ instead of stupid _slave!_ miss martineau's book on america is out, here and with you. i have read it for the good authoress's sake, whom i love much. she is one of the strangest phenomena to me. a genuine little poetess, buckramed, swathed like a mummy into socinian and political-economy formulas; and yet verily alive in the inside of that! "god has given a prophet to every people in its own speech," say the arabs. even the english unitarians were one day to have their poet, and the best that could be said for them too was to be said. i admire this good lady's integrity, sincerity; her quick, sharp discernment to the depth it goes: her love also is great; nay, in fact it is too great: the host of illustrious obscure mortals whom she produces on you, of preachers, pamphleteers, antislavers, able editors, and other atlases bearing (unknown to us) the world on their shoulder, is absolutely more than enough. what they say to her book here i do not well know. i fancy the general reception will be good, and even brilliant. i saw mrs. butler* last night, "in an ocean of blonde and broadcloth," one of those oceans common at present. ach gott! they are not of persons, these soirdes, but of cloth figures. ---------- * mrs fanny kemble butler. ---------- i mean to retreat into scotland very soon, to repose myself as i intended. my wife continues here with her mother; here at least till the weather grow too hot, or a journey to join me seem otherwise advisable for her. she is gathering strength, but continues still weak enough. i rest myself "on the sunny side of hedges" in native annandale, one of the obscurest regions; no man shall speak to me, i will speak to no man; but have dialogues yonder with the old dumb crags, of the most unfathomable sort. once rested, i think of returning to london for another season. several things are beginning which i ought to see end before taking up my staff again. in this enormous chaos the very multitude of conflicting perversions produces something more like a _calm_ than you can elsewhere meet with. men let you alone, which is an immense thing: they do it even because they have no time to meddle with you. london, or else the backwoods of america, or craigenputtock! we shall see. i still beg the comfort of hearing from you. i am sick of soul and body, but not incurable; the loving word of a waldo emerson is as balm to me, medicinal now more than ever. my wife earnestly joins me in love to the concord household. may a blessing be in it, on one and all! i do nowise give up the idea of sojourning there one time yet. on the contrary, it seems almost certain that i shall. good be with you. yours always, t. carlyle* ----------- * emerson wrote in his diary, july , : "a letter today from carlyle rejoiced me. pleasant would life be with such companions. but if you cannot have them on good mutual terms you cannot have them. if not the deity but our wilfulness hews and shapes the new relations, their sweetness escapes, as strawberries lose their flavor by cultivation." ---------- xvii. emerson to carlyle concord, september, my dear friend,--such a gift as the _french revolution_ demanded a speedier acknowledgment. but you mountaineers that can scale andes before breakfast for an airing have no measures for the performance of lowlanders and valetudinarians. i am ashamed to think, and will not tell, what little things have kept me silent. the _french revolution_ did not reach me until three weeks ago, having had at least two long pauses by the way, as i find, since landing. between many visits received, and some literary haranguing done, i have read two volumes and half the third and i think you a very good giant; disporting yourself with an original and vast ambition of fun: pleasure and peace not being strong enough for you, you choose to suck pain also, and teach fever and famine to dance and sing. i think you have written a wonderful book, which will last a very long time. i see that you have created a history, which the world will own to be such. you have recognized the existence of other persons than officers, and of other relations than civism. you have broken away from all books, and written a mind. it is a brave experiment, and the success is great. we have men in your story and not names merely; always men, though i may doubt sometimes whether i have the historic men. we have great facts--and selected facts--truly set down. we have always the co-presence of humanity along with the imperfect damaged individuals. the soul's right of wonder is still left to us; and we have righteous praise and doom awarded, assuredly without cant. yes, comfort yourself on that particular, o ungodliest divine man! thou cantest never. finally we have not--a dull word. never was there a style so rapid as yours,--which no reader can outrun; and so it is for the most intelligent. i suppose nothing will astonish more than the audacious wit and cheerfulness which no tragedy and no magnitude of events can overpower or daunt. henry viii loved a man, and i see with joy my bard always equal to the crisis he represents. and so i thank you for your labor, and feel that your contemporaries ought to say, all hail, brother! live forever: not only in the great soul which thou largely inhalest, but also as a named, person in this thy definite deed. i will tell you more of the book when i have once got it at focal distance,--if that can ever be, and muster my objections when i am sure of their ground. i insist, of course, that it might be more simple, less gothically efflorescent. you will say no rules for the illumination of windows can apply to the aurora borealis. however, i find refreshment when every now and then a special fact slips into the narrative couched in sharp and businesslike terms. this character-drawing in the book is certainly admirable; the lines are ploughed furrows; but there was cake and ale before, though thou be virtuous. clarendon surely drew sharp outlines for me in falkland, hampden, and the rest, without defiance or sky-vaulting. i wish i could talk with you face to face for one day, and know what your uttermost frankness would say concerning the book. i feel assured of its good reception in this country. i learned last saturday that in all eleven hundred and sixty-six copies of _sartor_ have been sold. i have told the publisher of that book that he must not print the _history_ until some space has been given to people to import british copies. i have ordered hilliard, gray, & co. to import twenty copies as an experiment. at the present very high rate of exchange, which makes a shilling worth thirty cents, they think, with freight and duties, the book would be too costly here for sale, but we confide in a speedy fall of exchange; then my books shall come. i am ashamed that you should educate our young men, and that we should pirate your books. one day we will have a better law, or perhaps you will make our law yours. i had your letter long before your book. very good work you have done in your lifetime, and very generously you adorn and cheer this pilgrimage of mine by your love. i find my highest prayer granted in calling a just and wise man my friend. your profuse benefaction of genius in so few years makes me feel very poor and useless. i see that i must go on trust to you and to all the brave for some longer time, hoping yet to prove one day my truth and love. there are in this country so few scholars, that the services of each studious person are needed to do what he can for the circulation of thoughts, to the end of making some counterweight to the money force, and to give such food as he may to the nigh starving youth. so i religiously read lectures every winter, and at other times whenever summoned. last year, "the philosophy of history," twelve lectures; and now i meditate a course on what i call "ethics." i peddle out all the wit i can gather from time or from nature, and am pained at heart to see how thankfully that little is received. write to me, good friend, tell me if you went to scotland,--what you do, and will do,--tell me that your wife is strong and well again as when i saw her at craigenputtock. i desire to be affectionately remembered to her. tell me when you will come hither. i called together a little club a week ago, who spent a day with me,--counting fifteen souls,--each one of whom warmly loves you. so if the _french revolution_ does not convert the "dull public" of your native nineveh, i see not but you must shake their dust from your shoes and cross the atlantic to a new england. yours in love and honor. --r. waldo emerson may i trouble you with a commission when you are in the city? you mention being at the shop of rich in red-lion square. will you say to him that he sent me some books two or three years ago without any account of prices annexed? i wrote him once myself, once through s. burdett, bookseller, and since through c.p. curtis, esq., who professes to be his attorney in boston,--three times,--to ask for this account. no answer has ever come. i wish he would send me the account, that i may settle it. if he persist in his self-denying contumacy, i think you may immortalize him as a bookseller of the gods. i shall send you an oration presently, delivered before a literary society here, which is now being printed.* gladly i hear of the carlylet--so they say--in the new westminster. --------- * this was emerson's famous oration before the phi beta kappa society, at cambridge, august , , on "the american scholar." in his admirable essay on thoreau,--an essay which might serve as introduction and comment to the letters of carlyle and emerson during these years,--lowell speaks of the impression made by this remarkable discourse. it "was an event without any former parallel in our literary annals, a scene to be always treasured in the memory for its picturesqueness and its inspiration. what crowded and breathless aisles, what windows clustering with eager heads, what enthusiasm of approval, what grim silence of foregone dissent! it was our yankee version of a lecture by abelard, our harvard parallel to the last public appearances of schelling."--_my study windows,_ p. --------- xviii. emerson to carlyle concord, november, my dear friend,--mr. charles sumner, a lawyer of high standing for his age, and editor or one editor of a journal called _the jurist,_ and withal a lover of your writings, tells me he is going to paris and thence to london, and sets out in a few days. i cannot, of course, resist his request for a letter to you, nor let pass the occasion of a greeting. health, joy, and peace be with you! i hope you sit still yet, and do not hastily meditate new labors. phidias need not be always tinkering. sit still like an egyptian. somebody told me the other day that your friends here might have made a sum for the author by publishing _sartor_ themselves, instead of leaving it with a bookseller. instantly i wondered why i had never such a thought before, and went straight to boston, and have made a bargain with a bookseller to print the _french revolution._ it is to be printed in two volumes of the size of our american _sartor,_ one thousand copies, the estimate making the cost of the book say (in dollars and cents) $ . a copy, and the price $ . . the bookseller contracts with me to sell the book at a commission of twenty percent on that selling price, allowing me however to take at cost as many copies as i can find subscribers for. there is yet, i believe, no other copy in the country than mine: so i gave him the first volume, and the printing is begun. i shall take care that your friends here shall know my contract with the bookseller, and so shall give me their names. then, if so good a book can have a tolerable sale, (almost contrary to the nature of a good book, i know,) i shall sustain with great glee the new relation of being your banker and attorney. they have had the wit in the london _examiner,_ i find, to praise at last; and i mean that our public shall have the entire benefit of that page. the _westminster_ they can read themselves. the printers think they can get the book out by christmas. so it must be long before i can tell you what cheer. meantime do you tell me, i entreat you, what speed it has had at home. the best, i hope, with the wise and good withal. i have nothing to tell you and no thoughts. i have promised a course of lectures for december, and am far from knowing what i am to say; but the way to make sure of fighting into the new continent is to burn your ships. the "tender ears," as george fox said, of young men are always an effectual call to me ignorant to speak. i find myself so much more and freer on the platform of the lecture-room than in the pulpit, that i shall not much more use the last; and do now only in a little country chapel at the request of simple men to whom i sustain no other relation than that of preacher. but i preach in the lecture-room and then it tells, for there is no prescription. you may laugh, weep, reason, sing, sneer, or pray, according to your genius. it is the new pulpit, and very much in vogue with my northern countrymen. this winter, in boston, we shall have more than ever: two or three every night of the week. when will you come and redeem your pledge? the day before yesterday my little boy was a year old,--no, the day before that,--and i cannot tell you what delight and what study i find in this little bud of god, which i heartily desire you also should see. good, wise, kind friend, i shall see you one day. let me hear, when you can write, that mrs. carlyle is well again. --r. waldo emerson xix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, december, my dear emerson,--how long it is since you last heard of me i do not very accurately know; but it is too long. a very long, ugly, inert, and unproductive chapter of my own history seems to have passed since then. whenever i delay writing, be sure matters go not well with me; and do you in that case write to me, were it again and over again,--unweariable in pity. i did go to scotland, for almost three months; leaving my wife here with her mother. the poor wife had fallen so weak that she gave me real terror in the spring-time, and made the doctor look very grave indeed: she continued too weak for traveling: i was worn out as i had never in my life been. so, on the longest day of june, i got back to my mother's cottage; threw myself down, i may say, into what we may call the "frightfulest _magnetic sleep,_" and lay there avoiding the intercourse of men. most wearisome had their gabble become; almost unearthly. but indeed all was unearthly in that humor. the gushing of my native brooks, the _sough_ of the old solitary woods, the great roar of old native solway (billowing fresh out of your atlantic, drawn by the moon): all this was a kind of unearthly music to me; i cannot tell you how unearthly. it did not bring me to rest; yet _towards_ rest i do think at all events, the time had come when i behoved to quit it again. i have been here since september evidently another little "chapter" or paragraph, _not_ altogether inert, is getting forward. but i must not speak of these things. how can i speak of them on a miserable scrap of blue paper? looking into your kind-eyes with my eyes, i could speak: not here. pity me, my friend, my brother; yet hope well of me: if i can (in all senses) _rightly hold my peace,_ i think much will yet be well with me. silence is the great thing i worship at present; almost the sole tenant of my pantheon. let a man know rightly how to hold his peace. i love to repeat to myself, "silence is of eternity." ah me, i think how i could rejoice to quit these jarring discords and jargonings of babel, and go far, far away! i do believe, if i had the smallest competence of money to get "food and warmth" with, i would shake the mud of london from my feet, and go and bury myself in some green place, and never print any syllable more. perhaps it is better as it is. but quitting this, we will actually speak (under favor of "silence") one very small thing; a pleasant piece of news. there is a man here called john sterling (_reverend_ john of the church of england too), whom i love better than anybody i have met with, since a certain sky-messenger alighted to me at craigenputtock, and vanished in the blue again. this sterling has written; but what is far better, he has lived, he is alive. across several unsuitable wrappages, of church-of-englandism and others, my heart loves the man. he is one, and the best, of a small class extant here, who, nigh drowning in a black wreck of infidelity (lighted up by some glare of radicalism only, now growing _dim_ too) and about to perish, saved themselves into a coleridgian shovel-hattedness, or determination to _preach,_ to preach peace, were it only the spent _echo_ of a peace once preached. he is still only about thirty; young; and i think will shed the shovel-hat yet perhaps. do you ever read _blackwood?_ this john sterling is the "new contributor" whom wilson makes such a rout about, in the november and prior month "crystals from a cavern," &c., which it is well worth your while to see. well, and what then, cry you?--why then, this john sterling has fallen overhead in love with a certain waldo emerson; that is all. he saw the little book _nature_ lying here; and, across a whole _silva silvarum_ of prejudices, discerned what was in it; took it to his heart,--and indeed into his pocket; and has carried it off to madeira with him; whither unhappily (though now with good hope and expectation) the doctors have ordered him. this is the small piece of pleasant news, that two sky-messengers (such they were both of them to me) have met and recognized each other; and by god's blessing there shall one day be a trio of us: call you that nothing? and so now by a direct transition i am got to the _oration._ my friend! you know not what you have done for me there. it was long decades of years that i had heard nothing but the infinite jangling and jabbering, and inarticulate twittering and screeching, and my soul had sunk down sorrowful, and said there is no articulate speaking then any more, and thou art solitary among stranger-creatures? and lo, out of the west comes a clear utterance, clearly recognizable as a _man's_ voice, and i _have_ a kinsman and brother: god be thanked for it! i could have _wept_ to read that speech; the clear high melody of it went tingling through my heart;--i said to my wife, "there, woman!" she read; and returned, and charges me to return for answer, "that there had been nothing met with like it since schiller went silent." my brave emerson! and all this has been lying silent, quite tranquil in him, these seven years, and the "vociferous platitude" dinning his ears on all sides, and he quietly answering no word; and a whole world of thought has silently built itself in these calm depths, and, the day being come, says quite softly, as if it were a common thing, "yes, i _am_ here too." miss martineau tells me, "some say it is inspired, some say it is mad." exactly so; no say could be suitabler. but for you, my dear friend, i say and pray heartily: may god grant you strength; for you have a _fearful_ work to do! fearful i call it; and yet it is great, and the greatest. o for god's sake _keep yourself still quiet!_ do not hasten to write; you cannot be too slow about it. give no ear to any man's praise or censure; know that that is _not_ it: on the one side is as heaven if you have strength to keep silent, and climb unseen; yet on the other side, yawning always at one's right-hand and one's left, is the frightfulest abyss and pandemonium! see fenimore cooper;--poor cooper, he is _down in it;_ and had a climbing faculty too. be steady, be quiet, be in no haste; and god speed you well! my space is done. and so adieu, for this time. you must write soon again. my copy of the _oration_ has never come: how is this? i could dispose of a dozen well.--they say i am to lecture again in spring, _ay de mi!_ the "book" is babbled about sufficiently in several dialects: fraser wants to print my scattered reviews and articles; a pregnant sign. teufelsdrockh to precede. the man "screamed" once at the name of it in a very musical manner. he shall not print a line; unless he give me money for it, more or less. i have had enough of printing for one while,--thrown into "magnetic sleep" by it! farewell my brother. --t. carlyle o. rich, it seems, is in spain. his representative assured me, some weeks since, that the account was now sent. there is an article on sir w. scott: shocking; invitissima minerva!* ---------- *carlyle's article on scott published in the _london and westminster review,_ no. . reprinted in his _critical and miscellaneous essays._ ---------- miss martineau charges me to send kind remembrances to you and your lady: her words were kinder than i have room for here.--can you not, in defect or delay of letter, send me a massachusetts newspaper? i think it costs little or almost nothing now; and i shall know your hand. xx. emerson to carlyle concord, february, my dear friend,--it is ten days now--ten cold days--that your last letter has kept my heart warm, and i have not been able to write before. i have just finished--wednesday evening--a course of lectures which i ambitiously baptized "human culture," and read once a week to the curious in boston. i could write nothing else the while, for weariness of the week's stated scribbling. now i am free as a wood-bird, and can take up the pen without fretting or fear. your letter should, and nearly did, make me jump for joy,--fine things about our poor speech at cambridge,-- fine things from carlyle. scarcely could we maintain a decorous gravity on the occasion. and then news of a friend, who is also carlyle's friend. what has life better to offer than such tidings? you may suppose i went directly and got me _blackwood,_ and read the prose and the verse of john sterling, and saw that my man had a head and a heart, and spent an hour or two very happily in spelling his biography out of his own hand;--a species of palmistry in which i have a perfect reliance. i found many incidents grave and gay and beautiful, and have determined to love him very much. in this romancing of the gentle affections we are children evermore. we forget the age of life, the barriers so thin yet so adamantean of space and circumstance; and i have had the rarest poems self-singing in my head of brave men that work and conspire in a perfect intelligence across seas and conditions--and meet at last. i heartily pray that the sea and its vineyards may cheer with warm medicinal breath a voyager so kind and noble. for the _oration,_ i am so elated with your goodwill that i begin to fear your heart has betrayed your head this time, and so the praise is not good on parnassus but only in friendship. i sent it diffidently (i did send it through bookselling munroe) to you, and was not a little surprised by your generous commendations. yet here it interested young men a good deal for an academical performance, and an edition of five hundred was disposed of in a month. a new edition is now printing, and i will send you some copies presently to give to anybody who you think will read. i have a little budget of news myself. i hope you had my letter --sent by young sumner--saying that we meant to print the _french revolution_ here for the author's benefit. it was published on the th of december. it is published at my risk, the booksellers agreeing to let me have at cost all the copies i can get subscriptions for. all the rest they are to sell and to have twenty percent on the retail price for their commission. the selling price of the book is $ . ; the cost of a copy, $ . ; the bookseller's commission, cts.; so that t.c. only gains cts. on each copy they sell. but we have two hundred subscribers, and on each copy they buy you have $ . , except in cases where the distant residence of subscribers makes a cost of freight. you ought to have three or four quarters of a dollar more on each copy, but we put the lowest price on the book in terror of the philistines, and to secure its accessibleness to the economical public. we printed one thousand copies: of these, five hundred are already sold, in six weeks; and brown the bookseller talks, as i think, much too modestly, of getting rid of the whole edition in one year. i say six months. the printing, &c. is to be paid and a settlement made in six months from the day of publication; and i hope the settlement will be the final one. and i confide in sending you seven hundred dollars at least, as a certificate that you have so many readers in the west. yet, i own, i shake a little at the thought of the bookseller's account. whenever i have seen that species of document, it was strange how the hopefulest ideal dwindled away to a dwarfish actual. but you may be assured i shall on this occasion summon to the bargain all the yankee in my constitution, and multiply and divide like a lion. the book has the best success with the best. young men say it is the only history they have ever read. the middle-aged and the old shake their heads, and cannot make anything of it. in short, it has the success of a book which, as people have not fashioned, has to fashion the people. it will take some time to win all, but it wins and will win. i sent a notice of it to the _christian examiner,_ but the editor sent it all back to me except the first and last paragraphs; those he printed. and the editor of the _north american_ declined giving a place to a paper from another friend of yours. but we shall see. i am glad you are to print your _miscellanies;_ but--forgive our transatlantic effrontery--we are beforehand of you, and we are already selecting a couple of volumes from the same, and shall print them on the same plan as the _history,_ and hope so to turn a penny for our friend again. i surely should not do this thing without consulting you as to the selection but that i had no choice. if i waited, the bookseller would have done it himself, and carried off the profit. i sent you (to kennet) a copy of the _french revolution._ i regret exceedingly the printer's blunder about the numbering the books in the volumes, but he had warranted me in a literal, punctual reprint of the copy without its leaving his office, and i trusted him. i am told there are many errors. i am going to see for myself. i have filled my paper, and not yet said a word of how many things. you tell me how ill was mrs. c., and you do not tell me that she is well again. but i see plainly that i must take speedily another sheet. i love you always. --r.w. emerson xxi. emerson to carlyle boston, march, my dear friend,--here in a bookseller's shop i have secured a stool and corner to say a swift benison. mr. bancroft told me that the presence of english lord gosford in town would give me a safe conveyance of pamphlets to you, so i send some _orations_ of which you said so kind and cheering words. give them to any one who will read them. i have written names in three. you have, i hope, got the letter sent nearly a month ago, giving account of our reprint of the _french revolution,_ and have received a copy of the same. i learn from the bookseller today that six hundred and fifty copies are sold, and the book continues to sell. so i hope that our settlement at the end of six months will be final, or nearly so. i had nearly closed my agreement the other day with a publisher for the emission of _carlyle's miscellanies,_ when just in the last hour comes word from e.g. loring that he has an authentic catalogue from the bard himself. now i have that, and could wish loring had communicated his plan to me at first, or that i had bad wit enough to have undertaken this matter long ago and conferred with you. i designed nothing for you or your friends; but merely a lucrative book for our daily market that would have yielded a pecuniary compensation to you, such as we are all bound to make, and have bought our socrates a cloak. loring contemplated something quite different,--a "complete works," etc.,--and now clamors for the same thing, and i do not know but i shall have to gratify him and others at the risk of injury to this my vulgar hope of dollars,--that innate idea of the american mind. this i shall settle in a few days. no copyright can be secured here for an english book unless it contain original matter: but my moments are going, and i can only promise to write you quickly, at home and at leisure, for i have just been reading the _history_ again with many, many thoughts, and i revere, wonder at, and love you. --r. waldo emerson xxii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, march, my dear emerson,--your letter through sumner was sent by him from paris about a month ago; the man himself has not yet made his appearance, or been heard of in these parts: he shall be very welcome to me, arrive when he will. the february letter came yesterday, by direct conveyance from dartmouth. i answer it today rather than tomorrow; i may not for long have a day freer than this. _fronte capillata, post est occasio calva:_ true either in latin or english! you send me good news, as usual. you have been very brisk and helpful in this business of the _revolution_ book, and i give you many thanks and commendations. it will be a very brave day when cash actually reaches me, no matter what the _number_ of the coins, whether seven or seven hundred, out of yankee-land; and strange enough, what is not unlikely, if it be the _first_ cash i realize for that piece of work,--angle-land continuing still _in_solvent to me! well, it is a wide motherland we have here, or are getting to have, from bass's straits all round to columbia river, already almost circling the globe: it must be hard with a man if somewhere or other he find not some one or other to take his part, and stand by him a little! blessings on you, my brother: nay, your work is already twice blessed.--i believe after all, with the aid of my scotch thrift, i shall not be absolutely thrown into the streets here, or reduced to borrow, and become the slave of somebody, for a morsel of bread. thank god, no! nay, of late i begin entirely to despise that whole matter, so as i never hitherto despised it: "thou beggarliest spectre of beggary that hast chased me ever since i was man, come on then, in the devil's name, let us see what is in thee! will the soul of a man, with eternity within a few years of it, quail before _thee?_" better, however, is my good pious mother's version of it: "they cannot take god's providence from thee; thou hast never wanted yet."* ---------- * in his diary, may , , emerson wrote: "a letter this morning from t. carlyle. how should he be so poor? it is the most creditable poverty i know of." ---------- but to go on with business; and the republication of books in that transoceanic england, new and improved edition of england. in january last, if i recollect right, miss martineau, in the name of a certain mr. loring, applied to me for a correct list of all my fugitive papers; the said mr. loring meaning to publish them for my behoof. this list she, though not without solicitation, for i had small hope in it, did at last obtain, and send, coupled with a request from me that you should be consulted in the matter. now it appears you had of yourself previously determined on something of the same sort, and probably are far on with the printing of your two select volumes. i confess myself greatly better pleased with it on that footing than on another. who mr. loring may be i know not, with any certainty, at first hand; but who waldo emerson is i do know; and more than one god from the machine is not necessary. i pray you, thank mr. loring for his goodness towards me (his intents are evidently charitable and not wicked); but consider yourself as in nowise bound at all by that blotted paper he has, but do the best you can for me, consulting with him or not taking any counsel just as you see to be fittest on the spot. and so heaven prosper you, both in your "aroused yankee" state, and in all others;--and let us for the present consider that we have enough about books and guineas. i must add, however, that fraser and i have yet made no bargain. we found, on computing, that there would be five good volumes, including _teufelsdrockh._ for an edition of seven hundred and fifty i demanded l a volume, and fraser refused: the poor man then fell dangerously ill, and there could not be a word farther said on the subject; till very lately, when it again became possible, but has not yet been put in practice. all the world cries out, why _do you_ publish with fraser? "because my soul is sick of booksellers, and of trade, and deception, and 'need and greed' altogether; and this poor fraser, not worse than the rest of them, has in some sort grown less hideous to me by custom." i fancy, however, either fraser will publish these things before long; or some samaritan here will take me to some bolder brother of the trade that will. great samuel johnson assisted at the beginning of bibliopoly; small thomas carlyle assists at the ending of it: both are sorrowful seasons for a man. for the rest, people here continue to receive that _revolution_ very much as you say they do _there:_ i am right well quit of it; and the elderly gentlemen on both sides of the water may take comfort, they will not soon have to suffer the like again. but really england is wonderfully changed within these ten years; the old gentlemen all shrunk into nooks, some of them even voting with the young.--the american ill-printed two and-a-half-dollars copy shall, for emerson's sake, be welcomest to me of all. kennet will send it when it comes. the _oration_ did arrive, with my name on it, one snowy night in january. it is off to madeira; probably there now. i can dispose of a score of copies to good advantage. friend sterling has done the best of all his things in the current _blackwood,_-- "crystals from a cavern,"--which see. he writes kind things of you from madeira, in expectation of the speech. i will gratify him with your message; he is to be here in may; better, we hope, and in the way towards safety. miss martineau has given you a luminous section in her new book about america; you are one of the american "originals,"--the good harriet! and now i have but one thing to add and to repeat: be quiet, be quiet! the fire that is in one's own stomach is enough, without foreign bellows to blow it ever and anon. my whole heart shudders at the thrice-wretched self-combustion into which i see all manner of poor paper-lanterns go up, the wind of "popularity" puffing at them, and nothing left erelong but ashes and sooty wreck. it is sad, most sad. i shun all such persons and circles, as much as possible; and pray the gods to make me a brick layer's hodbearer rather. o the "cabriolets, neatflies," and blue twaddlers of both sexes therein, that drive many a poor mrs. rigmarole to the devil!*--as for me, i continue doing as nearly nothing as i can manage. i decline all invitations of society that are declinable: a london rout is one of the maddest things under the moon; a london dinner makes me sicker for a week, and i say often, it is better to be even dull than to be witty, better to be silent than to speak. -------- * this sentence is a variation on one at the beginning of the article on scott. -------- curious: your course of lectures "on human culture" seems to be on the very subject i am to discourse upon here in may coming; but i am to call it "on the history of literature," and _speak_ it, not write it. while you read this, i shall be in the agonies! ah me! often when i think of the matter, how my one sole wish is to be left to hold my tongue, and by what bayonets of necessity clapt to my back i am driven into that lecture-room, and in what mood, and ordered to speak or die, i feel as if my only utterance should be a flood of tears and blubbering! but that, clearly, will not do. then again i think it is perhaps better so; who knows? at all events, we will try what is in this lecturing in london. if something, well; if nothing, why also well. but i do want to get out of these coils for a tune. my brother is to be home again in may; if he go back to italy, if our lecturing proved productive, why might we not all set off thitherward for the winter coming? there is a dream to that effect. it would suit my wife, too: she was alarmingly weak this time twelvemonth; and i can only yet tell you that she is stronger, not strong: she has not ventured out except at midday, and rarely then, since autumn last; she sits here patiently waiting summer, and charges me to send you her love.--america also always lies in the background: i do believe, if i live long, i shall get to concord one day. your wife must love me. if the little boy be a well-behaved fellow, he shall ride on my back yet: if not, tell him i will have nothing to do with him, the riotous little imp that he is. and so god bless you always, my dear friend! your affectionate, --t. carlyle xxiii. emerson to carlyle* concord, may, my dear friend,--yesterday i had your letter of march. it quickens my purpose (always all but ripe) to write to you. if it had come earlier i should have been confirmed in my original purpose of publishing _select miscellanies of t.c._ as it is, we are far on in the printing of the first two volumes (to make pages) of the papers as they stand in your list. and now i find we shall only get as far as the seventeenth or eighteenth article. i regret it, because this book will not embrace those papers i chiefly desire to provide people with, and it may be some time, in these years of bankruptcy and famine, before we shall think it prudent to publish two volumes more. but loring is a good man, and thinks that many desire to see the sources of nile. i, for my part, fancy that to meet the taste of the readers we should publish _from the last_ backwards, beginning with the paper on scott, which has had the best reception ever known. carlyleism is becoming so fashionable that the most austere seniors are glad to qualify their reprobation by applauding this review. i have agreed with the bookseller publishing the _miscellanies_ that he is to guarantee to you one dollar on every copy he sells; and you are to have the total profit on every copy subscribed for. the retail price [is] to be $ . . the cost of the work is not yet precisely ascertained. the work will probably appear in six or seven weeks. we print one thousand copies. so whenever it is sold you shall have one thousand dollars. ---------- * printed in the _athenaeum,_ july , . ---------- the _french revolution_ continues to find friends and purchasers. it has gone to new orleans, to nashville, to vicksburg. i have not been in boston lately, but have determined that nearly or quite eight hundred copies should be gone. on the st of july i shall make up accounts with the booksellers, and i hope to make you the most favorable returns. i shall use the advice of barnard, adams, & co. in regard to remittances. when you publish your next book i think you must send it out to me in sheets, and let us print it here contemporaneously with the english edition. the _eclat_ of so new a book would help the sale very much. but a better device would be, that you should embark in the "victoria" steamer, and come in a fortnight to new york, and in twenty-four hours more to concord. your study arm-chair, fireplace, and bed, long vacant, auguring expect you. then you shall revise your proofs and dictate wit and learning to the new world. think of it in good earnest. in aid of your friendliest purpose, i will set down some of the facts. i occupy, or _improve,_ as we yankees say, two acres only of god's earth; on which is my house, my kitchen-garden, my orchard of thirty young trees, my empty barn. my house is now a very good one for comfort, and abounding in room. besides my house, i have, i believe, $ , , whose income in ordinary years is six percent. i have no other tithe or glebe except the income of my winter lectures, which was last winter $ . well, with this income, here at home, i am a rich man. i stay at home and go abroad at my own instance. i have food, warmth, leisure, books, friends. go away from home, i am rich no longer. i never have a dollar to spend on a fancy. as no wise man, i suppose, ever was rich in the sense of _freedom to spend,_ because of the inundation of claims, so neither am i, who am not wise. but at home, i am rich,--rich enough for ten brothers. my wife lidian is an incarnation of christianity,--i call her asia,--and keeps my philosophy from antinomianism; my mother, whitest, mildest, most conservative of ladies, whose only exception to her universal preference for old things is her son; my boy, a piece of love and sunshine, well worth my watching from morning to night;--these, and three domestic women, who cook and sew and run for us, make all my household. here i sit and read and write, with very little system, and, as far as regards composition, with the most fragmentary result: paragraphs incompressible, each sentence an infinitely repellent particle. in summer, with the aid of a neighbor, i manage my garden; and a week ago i set out on the west side of my house forty young pine trees to protect me or my son from the wind of january. the ornament of the place is the occasional presence of some ten or twelve persons, good and wise, who visit us in the course of the year.--but my story is too long already. god grant that you will come and bring that blessed wife, whose protracted illness we heartily grieve to learn, and whom a voyage and my wife's and my mother's nursing would in less than a twelvemonth restore to blooming health. my wife sends to her this message: "come, and i will be to you a sister." what have you to do with italy? your genius tendeth to the new, to the west. come and live with me a year, and if you do not like new england well enough to stay, one of these years (when the _history_ has passed its ten editions, and been translated into as many languages) i will come and dwell with you. i gladly hear what you say of sterling. i am foolish enough to be delighted with being an object of kindness to a man i have never seen, and who has not seen me. i have not yet got the _blackwood_ for march, which i long to see, but the other three papers i have read with great satisfaction. they lie here on my table. but he must get well. as to miss martineau, i know not well what to say. meaning to do me a signal kindness (and a kindness quite out of all measure of justice) she does me a great annoyance,--to take away from me my privacy and thrust me before my time (if ever there be a time) into the arena of the gladiators to be stared at. i was ashamed to read, and am ashamed to remember. yet, as you see her, i would not be wanting in gratitude to a gifted and generous lady who so liberally transfigures our demerits. so you shall tell her, if you please, that i read all her book with pleasure but that part, and if ever i shall travel west or south, i think she has furnished me with the eyes. farewell, dear wise man. i think your poverty honorable above the common brightness of that thorn-crown of the great. it earns you the love of men and the praise of a thousand years. yet i hope the angelical beldame, all-helping, all-hated, has given you her last lessons, and, finding you so striding a proficient, will dismiss you to a hundred editions and the adoration of the booksellers. --r.w. emerson i have never heard from rich, who, you wrote, had sent his account to me. let him direct to me at concord. a young engineer in cambridge, by name mckean,* volunteers his services in correcting the proofs of the _miscellanies,_--and he has your errata,--for the love of the reading. shall we have anthracite coal or wood in your chamber? my old mother is glad you are coming. ----------- * the late mr. henry s. mckean, a son of professor mckean, and a graduate of harvard college in . ----------- xxiv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, june, my dear emerson,--our correspondence has fallen into a raveled state; which would doubtless clear itself could i afford to wait for your next letter, probably tumbling over the atlantic brine about this very moment: but i cannot afford to wait; i must write straightway. your answer to this will bring matters round again. i have had two irregular notes of your writing, or perhaps three; two dated march, one by mr. bancroft's parcel,-- bringing twelve _orations_ withal; then some ten days later, just in this very time, another note by mr. sumner, whom i have not yet succeeded in seeing, though i have attempted it, and hope soon to do it. the letter he forwarded me from paris was acknowledged already, i think. and now if the atlantic will but float me in safe that other promised letter! i got your american _french revolution_ a good while ago. it seems to me a very pretty book indeed, wonderfully so for the money; neither does it seem what we can call _incorrectly_ printed so far as i have seen; compared with the last _sartor_ it is correctness itself. many thanks to you, my friend, and much good may it do us all! should there be any more reprinting, i will request you to rectify at least the three following errors, copied out of the english text indeed; nay, mark them in your own new-english copy, whether there be reprinting or not: vol. i. p. , last paragraph, _for_ september _read_ august; vol. ii. p. , first line, _for_ book of prayer _read_ look of prayer; p. , _for_ blank _read_ black ( d paragraph, "all black "). and so _basta._ and let us be well content about this f.r. on both sides of the water, yours as well as mine. "too many cooks"! the proverb says: it is pity if this new apparition of a mr. loring should spoil the broth. but i calculate you will adjust it well and smoothly between you, some way or other. how you shall adjust it, or have adjusted it, is what i am practically anxious now to learn. for you are to understand that our english edition has come to depend partly on yours. after long higgling with the foolish fraser, i have quitted him, quite quietly, and given "saunders and ottley, conduit street," the privilege of printing a small edition of _teufelsdrockh_ (five hundred copies), with a prospect of the "miscellaneous writings" soon following. saunders and ottley are at least more reputable persons, they are useful to me also in the business of lecturing. _teufelsdrockh_ is at press, to be out very soon; i will send you a correct copy, the only one in america i fancy. the enterprise here too is on the "half-profits" plan, which i compute generally to mean equal partition of the oyster-shells and a net result of zero. but the thing will be economically useful to me otherwise; as a publication of the "miscellaneous" also would be; which latter, however, i confess myself extremely unwilling to undertake the trouble of for _nothing._ to me they are grown or fast growing _obsolete,_ these miscellanies, for most part; if money lie not in them, what does lie for me? now it strikes me you will infallibly edit these things, at least as well as i, and are doing it at any rate; your printing too would seem to be cheaper than ours: i said to saunders and ottley, why not have two hundred or three hundred of this american edition struck off with "london: saunders and ottley, conduit street," on the title-page, and sent over hither in sheets at what price they have cost my friends yonder? saunders of course threw cold water on this project, but was obliged to admit that there would be some profit in it, and that for me it would be far easier. the grand profit for me is that people would understand better what i mean, and come better about me if i lectured again, which seems the only way of getting any wages at all for me here at present. pray meditate my project, if it be not already too late, hear what your booksellers say about it, and understand that i will not in any case set to printing till i hear from you in answer to this. how my sheet is filling with dull talk about mere economics! i must still add that the _lecturing_ i talked of, last time, is verily over now; and well over. the superfine people listened to the rough utterance with patience, with favor, increasing to the last. i sent you a newspaper once, to indicate that it was in progress. i know not yet what the money result is; but i suppose it will enable us to exist here thriftily another year; not without hope of at worst doing the like again when the time comes. it is a great novelty in my lot; felt as a very considerable blessing; and really it has arrived, if it have arrived, in _due_ time, for i had begun to get quite impatient of the other method. poverty and youth may do; poverty and age go badly together.--for the rest, i feel fretted to fiddle-strings; my head and heart all heated, sick,--ah me! the question as ever is: rest. but then where? my brother invites us to come to rome for the winter; my poor sick wife might perhaps profit by it; as for me, natty leatherstocking's lodge in the western wood, i think, were welcomer still. i have a great mind, too, to run off and see my mother, by the new railways. what we shall do, whether not stay quietly here, must remain uncertain for a week or two. write you always hither, till you hear otherwise. the _orations_ were right welcome; my _madeira_ one, returned thence with sterling, was circulating over the west of england. sterling and harriet stretched out the right hand with wreathed smiles. i have read, a second or third time. robert southey has got a copy, for his own behoof and that of _lake_land: if he keep his word as to _me,_ he may do as much for you, or more. copies are at cambridge; among the oxonians too; i have with stingy discretion distributed all my copies but two. old rogers, a grim old dilettante, full of sardonic sense, was heard saying, "it is german poetry given out in american prose." friend emerson ought to be content;--and has now above all things, as i said, to _be in no haste._ slow fire does make sweet malt: how true, how true! also his next work ought to be a _concrete_ thing; not _theory_ any longer, but _deed._ let him "live it," as he says; that is the way to come to "painting of it." geometry and the art of design being once well over, take the brush, and _andar con dios!_ mrs. child has sent me a book, _philothea,_ and a most magnanimous epistle. i have answered as i could. the book is beautiful, but of a _hectic_ beauty; to me not pleasant, even fatal looking. such things grow not in the ground, on mother earth's honest bosom, but in hothouses,--sentimental-calvinist fire traceable underneath! bancroft also is of the hothouse partly: i have a note to send him by sumner; do you thank him meanwhile, and say nothing about _hothouses!_ but, on the whole, men ought in new england, too to "swallow their formulas";* there is no freedom till then: yet hitherto i find only one man there who seems fairly on the way towards that, or arrived at that. good speed to _him._ i had to send my wife's love: she is not dangerously ill; but always feeble, and has to _struggle_ to keep erect; the summer always improves her, and this summer too. adieu, dear friend; may good always be with you and yours. --t. carlyle ----------- * this was the saying of the old marquis de mirabeau concerning his son, _il a hume toutes les formules,_ and is used as a text by carlyle in his article on mirabeau. "of inexpressible advantage is it that a man have 'an eye instead of a pair of spectacles merely'; that, seeing through the formulas of things and even 'making away' with many a formula, he see into the thing itself, and so know it and be master of it!" ---------- xxv. emerson to carlyle boston, july, my dear sir,--i am in town today to get what money the booksellers will relinquish from their faithful gripe, and have succeeded now in obtaining a first instalment, however small. i enclose to you a bill of exchange for fifty pounds sterling, which costs here exactly $ . , the rate of exchange being nine percent. i shall not today trouble you with any account, for my letter must be quickly ready to go by the steam-packet. an exact account has been rendered to me, which, though its present balance in our favor is less than i expected, yet, as far as i understand it, agrees well with all that has been promised: at least the balance in our favor when the edition is sold, which the booksellers assure me will assuredly be done within a year from the publication, must be seven hundred and sixty dollars, and what more heaven and the subscribers may grant. i shall follow this letter and bill by a duplicate of the bill in the next packet. the _miscellanies_ is published in two volumes, a copy of which goes to you immediately. munroe tells me that two hundred and fifty copies of it are already sold. writing in a bookshop, my dear friend, i have no power to say aught than that i am heartily and always, yours, r. waldo emerson xxvi. emerson to carlyle concord, august, my dear friend,--the swift ships are slow when they carry our letters. your letter dated the th of june arrived here last friday, the d of august. that day i was in boston, and i have only now got the information necessary to answer it. you have probably already learned from my letter sent by the "royal william" (enclosing a bill of exchange for l ), that our first two volumes of the _miscellanies_ are published. i have sent you a copy. the edition consists of one thousand copies. of these five hundred are bound, five hundred remain in sheets. the title-pages, of course, are all printed alike; but the publishers assure me that new title-pages can be struck off at a trifling expense, with the imprint of saunders and ottley. the cost of a copy in sheets or "folded" (if that means somewhat more?) is eighty-nine cents; and bound is $ . . the retail price is $ . a copy; and the author's profit, $ ; and the bookseller's, cents per copy; according to my understanding of the written contract. here i believe you have all the material facts. i think there is no doubt that the book will sell very well here. but if, for the reasons you suggest, you wish any part of it, you can have it as soon as ships can bring your will. when you see your copy, you will perceive that we have printed half the matter. i should presently begin to print the remainder, inclusive of the article on lockhart's scott, in two more volumes; but now i think i shall wait until i hear from you. of those books we will print a larger edition, say twelve hundred and fifty or fifteen hundred, if you want a part of it in london. for i feel confident now that our public here is one thousand strong. write me therefore _by the steam packet_ your wishes. i am sure you will like our edition. it has been most carefully corrected by two young gentlemen who successively volunteered their services, (the second when the first was called away,) and who, residing in cambridge, where the book was printed, could easilier oversee it. they are henry s. mcbean, an engineer, and charles stearns wheeler, a divinity student,--working both for love of you. to one other gentleman i have brought you in debt, --rev. convers francis* (brother of mrs. child), who supplied from his library all the numbers of the _foreign review_ from which we printed the work. we could not have done without his books, and he is a noble-hearted man, who rejoices in you. i have sent to all three copies of the work as from you, and i shall be glad if you will remember to sanction this expressly in your next letter. ---------- * this worthy man and lover of good books was, from till his death in , professor in the divinity school of harvard university. ---------- thanks for the letter: thanks for your friendliest seeking of friends for the poor _oration._ poor little pamphlet, to have gone so far and so high! i am ashamed. i shall however send you a couple more of the thin gentry presently, maugre all your hopes and cautions. i have written and read a kind of sermon to the senior class of our cambridge theological school a fortnight ago; and an address to the literary societies of dartmouth college;* for though i hate american pleniloquence, i cannot easily say no to young men who bid me speak also. and both these are now in press. the first i hear is very offensive. i will now try to hold my tongue until next winter. but i am asked continually when you will come to boston. your lectures are boldly and joyfully expected by brave young men. so do not forget us: and if ever the scale-beam trembles, i beseech you, let the love of me decide for america. i will not dare to tease you on a matter of so many relations, and so important, and especially as i have written out, i believe, my requests in a letter sent two or three months ago,--but i must see you somewhere, somehow, may it please god! i grieve to hear no better news of your wife. i hoped she was sound and strong ere this, and can only hope still. my wife and i send her our hearty love. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson ----------- * the address at the cambridge divinity school was delivered on the th of july, and that at dartmouth college on the th of the same month. the title of the latter was "literary ethics." both are reprinted in emerson's _miscellanies._ these remarkable discourses excited deep interest and wide attention. they established emerson's position as the leader of what was known as the transcendental movement. they were the expressions of his inmost convictions and his matured thought. the address at the divinity school gave rise to a storm of controversy which did not disturb the serenity of its author. "it was," said theodore parker, "the noblest, the most inspiring strain i ever listened to." to others it seemed "neither good divinity nor good sense." the address at dartmouth college set forth the high ideals of intellectual life with an eloquence made irresistible by the character of the speaker. from this time emerson's influence upon thought in america was acknowledged. ---------- xxvii. carlyle to emerson scotsbrig, ecclefechan, (annandale, scotland) september, my dear emerson,--there cannot any right answer be written you here and now; yet i must write such answer as i can. you said, "by steamship"; and it strikes me with a kind of remorse, on this my first day of leisure and composure, that i have delayed so long. for you must know, this is my mother's house,--a place to me unutterable as hades and the land of spectres were; likewise that my brother is just home from italy, and on the wing thitherward or somewhither swiftly again; in a word, that all is confusion and flutter with me here,--fit only for _silence!_ my wife sent me off hitherward, very sickly and unhappy, out of the london dust, several weeks ago; i lingered in fifeshire, i was in edinburgh, in roxburghshire; have some calls to cumberland, which i believe i must refuse; and prepare to creep homeward again, refreshed in health, but with a head and heart all seething and tumbling (as the wont is, in such cases), and averse to pens beyond all earthly implements. but my brother is off for dumfries this morning; you before all others deserve an hour of my solitude. i will abide by business; one must write about that. your bill and duplicate of a bill for l , with the two letters that accompanied them, you are to know then, did duly arrive at chelsea; and the larger letter (of the th of august) was forwarded to me hither some two weeks ago. i had also, long before that, one of the friendliest of letters from you, with a clear and most inviting description of the concord household, its inmates and appurtenances; and the announcement, evidently authentic, that an apartment and heart's welcome was ready there for my wife and me; that we were to come quickly, and stay for a twelvemonth. surely no man has such friends as i. we ought to say, may the heavens give us thankful hearts! for, in truth, there are blessings which do, like sun-gleams in wild weather, make this rough life beautiful with rainbows here and there. indicating, i suppose, that there is a sun, and general heart of goodness, behind all that;--for which, as i say again, let us be thankful evermore. my wife says she received your american bill of so many pounds sterling for the revolution book, with a "pathetic feeling" which brought "tears" to her eyes. from beyond the waters there is a hand held out; beyond the waters too live brothers. i would only the book were an epic, a _dante,_ or undying thing, that new england might boast in after times of this feat of hers; and put stupid, poundless, and penniless old england to the blush about it! but after all, that is no matter; the feebler the well- meant book is, the more "pathetic" is the whole transaction: and so we will go on, fuller than ever of "desperate hope" (if you know what that is), with a feeling one would not give and could not get for several money-bags; and say or think, long live true friends and emersons, and (in scotch phrase) "may ne'er waur be amang us!"--i will buy something permanent, i think, out of this l , and call it either _ebenezer_ or _yankee-doodle-doo._ may good be repaid you manifold, my kind brother! may good be ever with you, my kind friends all! but now as to this edition of the _miscellanies_ (poor things), i really think my wife is wisest, who says i ought to leave you altogether to your own resources with it, america having an art of making money out of my books which england is unfortunately altogether without. besides, till i once see the two volumes now under way, and can let a bookseller see them, there could no bargain be made on the subject. we will let it rest there, therefore. go on with your second two volumes, as if there were no england extant, according to your own good judgment. when i get to london, i will consult some of the blockheads with the book in my hand: if we do want two hundred copies, you can give us them with a trifling loss. it is possible they may make some better proposal about an edition here: that depends on the fate of _sartor_ here, at present trying itself; which i have not in the least ascertained. for the present, thank as is meet all friends in your world that have interested themselves for me. alas! i have nothing to give them but thanks. henry mckean, charles wheeler, convers francis; these names shall, if it please heaven, become persons for me, one day. well!--but i will say nothing more. that too is of the things on which all words are poor to silence. good to the good and kind! a letter from me must have crossed that _descriptive_ concord one, on the ocean, i think. our correspondence is now standing on its feet. i will write to you again, whether i hear from you or not, so soon as my hand finds its cunning again in london,--so soon as i can see there what is to be done or said. all goes decidedly better, i think. my wife was and is much healthier than last year, than in any late year. i myself get visibly quieter my preternatural _meditations in hades,_ apropos of this annandale of mine, are calm compared with those of last year. by another course of lectures i have a fair prospect of living for another season; nay, people call it a "new profession" i have devised for myself, and say i may live by it as many years as i like. this too is partly the fruit of my poor book; one should not say that it was worth nothing to me even in money. last year i fancied my audience mainly the readers of it; drawn round me, in spite of many things, by force of it. let us be content. i have jesuits, swedenborgians, old quakeresses, _omne cum proteus,_ --god help me, no man ever had so confused a public!--i salute you, my dear friend, and your hospitable circle. may blessings be on your kind household, on your kind hearts! --t. carlyle a copy of the english _teufelsdrockh_ has lain with your name on it these two months in chelsea; waiting an opportunity. it is worth nothing to you: a dingy, ill-managed edition; but correct or nearly correct as to printing; it is right that such should be in your hands in case of need. the new england pamphlets will be greedily expected. more than one inquires of me, has that emerson of yours written nothing else? and i have lent them the little book _nature,_ till it is nearly thumbed to pieces. sterling is gone to italy for the winter since i left town; swift as a flash! i cannot teach him the great art of _sitting still;_ his fine qualities are really like to waste for want of that. i read your paragraph to miss martineau; she received it, as she was bound, with a good grace. but i doubt, i doubt, o ralph waldo emerson, thou hast not been sufficiently ecstatic about her,--thou graceless exception, confirmatory of a rule! in truth there _are_ bores, of the first and of all lower magnitudes. patience and shuffle the cards. xxviii. emerson to carlyle concord, october, my dear friend,--i am quite uneasy that i do not hear from you. on the st of july i wrote to you and enclosed a remittance of l by a bill of exchange on baring brothers, drawn by chandler, howard, & co., which was sent in the steamer "royal william." on the d of august i received your letter of inquiry respecting our edition of the _miscellanies,_ and wrote a few days later in reply, that we could send you out two or three hundred copies of our first two volumes, in sheets, at eighty-nine cents per copy of two volumes, and the small additional price of the new title- page. i said also that i would wait until i heard from you before commencing the printing of the last two volumes of the _miscellanies,_ and, if you desired it, would print any number of copies with a title-page for london. this letter went in a steamer--he "great western" probably--about the th or th of august. (perhaps i misremember the names [of the steamers], and the first should be last.) i have heard nothing from you since. i trust my letters have not miscarried. (a third was sent also by another channel inclosing a duplicate of the bill of exchange.) with more fervency, i trust that all goes well in the house of my friend,--and i suppose that you are absent on some salutary errand of repairs and recreation. _use, i pray you, your earliest_ hour in certifying me of the facts. one word more in regard to business. i believe i expressed some surprise, in the july letter, that the booksellers should have no greater balance for us at this settlement. i have since studied the account better, and see that we shall not be disappointed in the year of obtaining at least the sum first promised,--seven hundred and sixty dollars; but the whole expense of the edition is paid out of the copies first sold, and our profits depend on the last sales. the edition is almost gone, and you shall have an account at the end of the year. in a letter within a twelvemonth i have urged you to pay us a visit in america, and in concord. i have believed that you would come one day, and do believe it. but if, on your part, you have been generous and affectionate enough to your friends here--or curious enough concerning our society--to wish to come, i think you must postpone, for the present, the satisfaction of your friendship and your curiosity. at this moment i would not have you here, on any account. the publication of my _address to the divinity college_ (copies of which i sent you) has been the occasion of an outcry in all our leading local newspapers against my "infidelity," "pantheism," and "atheism." the writers warn all and sundry against me, and against whatever is supposed to be related to my connection of opinion, &c.; against transcendentalism, goethe, and _carlyle._ i am heartily sorry to see this last aspect of the storm in our washbowl. for, as carlyle is nowise guilty, and has unpopularities of his own, i do not wish to embroil him in my parish differences. you were getting to be a great favorite with us all here, and are daily a greater with the american public, but just now, _in boston,_ where i am known as your editor, i fear you lose by the association. now it is indispensable to your right influence here, that you should never come before our people as one of a clique, but as a detached, that is, universally associated man; so i am happy, as i could not have thought, that you have not yielded yourself to my entreaties. let us wait a little until this foolish clamor be overblown. my position is fortunately such as to put me quite out of the reach of any real inconvenience from the panic-strikers or the panic-struck; and, indeed, so far as this uneasiness is a necessary result of mere inaction of mind, it seems very clear to me that, if i live, my neighbors must look for a great many more shocks, and perhaps harder to bear. the article on german religious writers in the last _foreign quarterly review_ suits our meridian as well as yours; as is plainly signified by the circumstance that our newspapers copy into their columns the opening tirade and _no more._ who wrote that paper? and who wrote the paper on montaigne in the _westminster?_ i read with great satisfaction the poems and thoughts of archaeus in _blackwood._ "the sexton's daughter" is a beautiful poem: and i recognize in them all _the_ soul, with joy and love. tell me of the author's health and welfare; or, will not he love me so much as to write me a letter with his own hand? and tell me of yourself, what task of love and wisdom the muses impose; and what happiness the good god sends to you and yours. i hope your wife has not forgotten me. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson the _miscellanies,_ vols. i. and ii., are a popular book. about five hundred copies have been sold. the second article on jean paul works with might on the inner man of young men. i hate to write you letters on business and facts like this. there are so few friends that i think some time i shall meet you nearer, for i love you more than is fit to say. w.h. channing has written a critique on you, which i suppose he has sent you, in the _boston review._ xxix. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, london november, my dear friend,--it is all right; all your letters with their inclosures have arrived in due succession: the last, inquiring after the fate of the others, came this morning. i was in scotland, as you partly conjecture; i wrote to you already (though not without blamable delay), from my mother's house in annandale, a confused scrawl, which i hope has already got to hand, and quieted your kind anxieties. i am as well as usual in health, my wife better than usual; nothing is amiss, except my negligence and indolence, which has put you to this superfluous solicitude on my account. however, i have an additional letter by it; you must pardon me, you must not grudge me that undeserved pleasure, the reward of evil-doing. i may well say, you are a blessing to me on this earth; no letter comes from you with other than good tidings,--or can come while you live there to love me. the bill was thrust duly into baring's brass slit "for acceptance," on my return hither some three weeks ago; and will, no doubt, were the days of grace run, come out in the shape of fifty pounds sterling; a very curious product indeed. do you know what i think of doing with it? _dyspepsia,_ my constant attendant in london, is incapable of help in my case by any medicine or appliance except one only, riding on horseback. with a good horse to whirl me over the world for two hours daily, i used to keep myself supportably well. here, the maintenance of a horse far transcends my means; yet it seems hard i should not for a little while be in a kind of approximate health in this babylon where i have my bread to seek it is like swimming with a millstone round your neck,--ah me! in brief, i am about half resolved to buy myself a sharp little nag with twenty of these transatlantic pounds, and ride him till the other thirty be eaten: i will call the creature "yankee," and kind thoughts of those far away shall be with me every time i mount him. will not that do? my wife says it is the best plan i have had for years, and strongly urges it on. my kind friends! as to those copies of the carlyle miscellanies, i unfortunately still can say nothing, except what was said in the former (scotch) letter, that you must proceed in the business with an eye to america and not to us. my booksellers, saunders and ottley, have no money for me, no definite offer in money to make for those two hundred copies, of which you seem likely to make money if we simply leave them alone. i have asked these booksellers, i have asked fraser too: what will you _give me in ready money_ for two hundred and fifty copies of that work, sell it afterwards as you can? they answer always, we must see it first. now the copy long ago sent me has never come to hand; i have asked for it of kennet, but without success; i have nothing for it but to wait the winds and chances. meanwhile saunders and ottley want forsooth a _sketches of german literature_ in three volumes: then a _miscellanies_ in three volumes: that is their plan of publishing an english edition; and the outlook they hold out for me is certain trouble in this matter, and recompense entirely uncertain. i think on the whole it is extremely likely i shall apply to you for two hundred and fifty copies (that is their favorite number) of these four volumes, (nay, if it be of any moment, you can bind me down to it _now,_ and take it for sure,) but i cannot yet send you the title-page; no bookseller purchasing till "we see it first." but after all, will it suit america to print an _unequal_ number of your two pairs of volumes? do not the two together make one work? on the whole, consider that i shall in all likelihood want two hundred and fifty copies, and consider it certain if that will serve the enterprise: we must leave it here today. i will stir in it now, however, and take no rest till in one way or other you do get a title-page from me, or some definite deliverance on the matter. o athenians, what a trouble i _give,_ having _got_ your applauses! kennet the bookseller gave me yesterday (on my way to "the city" with that brother of mine, the italian doctor who is here at present and a great lover of yours) ten copies of your dartmouth oration: we read it over dinner in a chop-house in bucklersbury, amid the clatter of some fifty stand of knives and forks; and a second time more leisurely at chelsea here. a right brave speech; announcing, in its own way, with emphasis of full conviction, to all whom it may concern, that great forgotten truth, _man is still man._ may it awaken a pulsation under the ribs of death! i believe the time is come for such a gospel. they must speak it out who have it,--with what audience there may be. i have given away two copies this morning; i will take care of the rest. go on, and speed.--and now where is the heterodox divinity one, which awakens such "tempest in a washbowl," brings goethe, transcendentalism, and carlyle into question, and on the whole evinces "what [difference] new england also makes between _pan_-theism and _pot_-theism"? i long to see that; i expect to congratulate you on that too. meanwhile we will let the washbowl storm itself out; and emerson at concord shall recognize it for a washbowl storming, and hold on his way. as to my share in it, grieve not for half an instant. pantheism, pottheism, mydoxy, thydoxy, are nothing at all to me; a weariness the whole jargon, which i avoid speaking of, decline listening to: _live,_ for god's sake, with what faith thou couldst get; leave off _speaking_ about faith! thou knowest it not. be _silent,_ do not speak.--as to you, my friend, you are even to go on, giving still harder shocks if need be; and should i come into censure by means of you, there or here, think that i am proud of my company; that, as the boy hazlitt said after hearing coleridge, "i will go with that man"; or, as our wild burns has it, "wi' sic as he, where'er he be, may i be saved or damned!" oime! what a foolish goose of a world this is! if it were not [for] here and there an articulate-speaking man, one would be all-too lonely. this is nothing at all like the letter i meant to write you; but i will write again, i trust, in few days, and the first paragraph shall, if possible, hold all the business. i have much to tell you, which perhaps is as well not written. o that i did see you face to face! but the time shall come, if heaven will. why not you come over, since i cannot? there is a room here, there is welcome here, and two friends always. it must be done one way or the other. i will take, care of your messages to sterling. he is in florence; he was the author of _montaigne._* the _foreign quarterly_ reviewer of _strauss_ i take to be one blackie, an advocate in edinburgh, a frothy, semi-confused disciple of mine and other men's; i guess this, but i have not read the article: the man blackie is from aberdeen, has been roaming over europe, and carries more sail than ballast. brother john, spoken of above, is knocking at the door even now; he is for italy again, we expect, in few days, on a better appointment: know that you have a third friend in him under this roof,--a man who quarrels with me all day in a small way, and loves me with the whole soul of him. my wife demanded to have "room for one line." what she is to write i know not, except it be what she has said, holding up the pamphlet, "is it not a noble thing? none of them all but he," &c., &c. i will write again without delay when the stray volumes arrive; before that if they linger. commend me to all the kind household of concord: wife, mother, and son. ever yours, t. carlyle --------- * see _ante,_ p. . sterling's essay on montaigne was his first contribution, in , to the _london and westminster review._ it is reprinted in "essays and tales, by john sterling, collected and edited, with a memoir of his life, by julius charles hare," london, , vol. i. p. . ---------- _"forgotten you?"_ o, no indeed! if there were nothing else to remember you by, i should never forget the visitor, who years ago in the desert descended on us, out of the clouds as it were, and made one day there look like enchantment for us, and left me weeping that it was only _one_ day. when i think of america, it is of you,--neither harriet martineau nor any one else succeeds in giving me a more extended idea of it. when i wish to see america it is still you, and those that are yours. i read all that you write with an interest which i feel in no other writing but my husband's,--or it were nearer the truth to say there is no other writing of living men but yours and his that i _can_ read. god bless you and weib and kind. surely i shall some day see you all. your affectionate jane carlyle xxx. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, november, dear emerson,--hardly above a week ago, i wrote you in immediate answer to some friendly inquiries produced by negligence of mine: the letter is probably tumbling on the salt waves at this hour, in the belly of the "great western"; or perhaps it may be still on firm land waiting, in which case this will go along with it. i had written before out of scotland a letter of mere acknowledgment and postponement; you must have received that before now, i imagine. our small piece of business is now become articulate, and i will despatch it in a paragraph. pity my stupidity that i did not put the thing on this footing long ago! it never struck me till the other day that though no copy of our _miscellanies_ would turn up for inspection here, and no bookseller would bargain for a thing unseen, i myself might bargain, and leave their hesitations resting on their own basis. in fine, i have rejected all their schemes of printing _miscellaneous works_ here, printing _sketches of german literature,_ or printing anything whatever on the "half-profits system," which is like toilsomely scattering seed into the sea: and i settled yesterday with fraser to give him the american sheets, and let them sell _themselves,_ on clear principles, or remain unsold if they like. i find it infinitely the best plan, and to all appearance the profitablest as to money that could have been devised for me. what you have to do therefore is to get two hundred and fifty copies (_in sheets_) of the whole four volumes, so soon as the second two are printed, and have them, with the proper title- page, sent off hither to fraser's address; the sooner the better. the american title-page, instead of "boston," &c. at the bottom, will require to bear, in three lines "london: / james fraser, regent street, / ." fraser is anxious that you should not spell him with a z; your man can look on the magazine and beware. i suppose also you should print _labels_ for the backs of the four volumes, to be used by the _half_-binder; they do the books in that way here now: but if it occasion any difficulty, never mind this; it was not spoken of to fraser, and is my own conjecture merely; the thing can be managed in various other ways. two hundred and fifty copies, then, of the entire book: there is nothing else to be attended to that you do not understand as well as i. fraser will announce it in his magazine: the eager, select public will wait. probably, there is no chance before the middle of march or so? do not hurry yourselves, or at all change your rate for _us:_ but so soon as the work is ready in the course of nature, the earliest conveyance to the port of london will bring a little cargo which one will welcome with a strange feeling! i declare myself delighted with the plan; an altogether romantic kind of plan, of romance and reality: fancy me riding on _yankee_ withal, at the time, and considering what a curious world this is, that bakes bread for one beyond the great ocean-stream, and how a poor man is not left after all to be trodden into the gutters, though the fight went sore against him, and he saw no backing anywhere. _allah akbar!_ god is great; no saying truer than that.--and so now, by the blessing of heaven, we will talk no more of business this day. my employments, my outlooks, condition, and history here, were a long chapter; on which i could like so well to talk with you face to face; but as for writing of them, it is a mere mockery. in these four years, so full of pain and toil, i seem to have lived four decades. by degrees, the creature gets accustomed to its element; the salamander learns to live in fire, and be of the same temperature with it. ah me! i feel as if grown old innumerable things are become weary, flat, stale, and unprofitable. and yet perhaps i am not old, only wearied, and there is a stroke or two of work in me yet. for the rest, the fret and agitation of this babylon wears me down: it is the most unspeakable life; of sunbeams and miry clay; a contradiction which no head can reconcile. pain and poverty are not wholesome; but praise and flattery along with them are poison: god deliver us from that; it carries madness in the very breath of it! on the whole, i say to myself, what thing is there so good as _rest?_ a sad case it is and a frequent one in my circle, to be entirely cherubic, _all_ face and wings. "mes enfans," said a french gentleman to the cherubs in the picture, "mes enfans, asseyez-vous?"--"monseigneur," answer they, "il n'y a pas de quoi!" i rejoice rather in my laziness; proving that i _can_ sit.--but, after all, ought i not to be thankful? i positively can, in some sort, exist here for the while; a thing i had been for many years ambitious of to no purpose. i shall have to lecture again in spring, heaven knows on what; it will be a wretched fever for me; but once through it there will be board wages for another year. the wild ishmael can hunt in _this_ desert too, it would seem. i say, i will be thankful; and wait quietly what farther is to come, or whether anything farther. but indeed, to speak candidly, i do feel sometimes as if another book were growing in me,--though i almost tremble to think of it. not for this winter, o no! i will write an article merely, or some such thing, and read trash if better be not. this, i do believe, is my horoscope for the next season: an article on something about new-year's-day (the westminster editor, a good- natured, admiring swan-goose from the north country, will not let me rest); then lectures; then--what? i am for some practical subject too; none of your pictures in the air, or _aesthetisches zeug_ (as mullner's wife called it, mullner of the _midnight blade_): nay, i cannot get up the steam on any such best; it is extremely irksome as well as fruitless at present. in the next _westminster review,_ therefore, if you see a small scrub of a paper signed "s.p." on one varnhagen a german, say that it is by "simon pure," or by "scissars and paste," or even by "soaped pig"--whom no man shall _catch!_ truly it is a secret which you must not mention: i was driven to it by the swan-goose above mentioned, not mill but another. let this suffice for my winter's history: may the summer be more productive. as for concord and new england, alas! my friend, i should but deface your idyllion with an ugly contradiction, did i come in such mood as mine is. i am older in years than you; but in humor i am older by centuries. what a hope is in that ever young heart, cheerful, healthful as the morning! and as for me, you have no conception what a crabbed, sulky piece of sorrow and dyspepsia i am grown; and growing, if i do not draw bridle. let me gather heart a little! i have not forgotten concord or the west; no, it lies always beautiful in the blue of the horizon, afar off and yet attainable; it is a great possession to me; should it even never be attained. but i have got to consider lately that it is you who are coming hither first. that is the right way, is it not? new england is becoming more than ever part of old england; why, you are nearer to us now than yorkshire was a hundred years ago; this is literally a fact: you can come _without_ making your will. it is one of my calculations that all englishmen from all zones and hemispheres will, for a good while yet, resort occasionally to the mother- babel, and see a thing or two there. come if you dare; i said there was a room, house-room and heart-room, constantly waiting you here, and you shall see blockheads by the million. _pickwick_ himself shall be visible; innocent young dickens reserved for a questionable fate. the great wordsworth shall talk till you yourself pronounce him to be a bore. southey's complexion is still healthy mahogany-brown, with a fleece of white hair, and eyes that seem running at full gallop. leigh hunt, "man of genius in the shape of a cockney," is my near neighbor, full of quips and cranks, with good humor and no common sense. old rogers with his pale head, white, bare, and cold as snow, will work on you with those large blue eyes, cruel, sorrowful, and that sardonic shelf-chin:--this is the man, o rogers, that wrote the german poetry in american prose; consider him well!--but whither am i running? my sheet is done! my brother john returns again almost immediately to italy. he has got appointed traveling doctor to a certain duke of buccleuch, the chief of our scotch dukes: an excellent position for him as far as externals go. his departure will leave me lonelier; but i must reckon it for the best: especially i must begin working. harriet martineau is coming hither this evening; with beautiful enthusiasm for the blacks and others. she is writing a novel. the first american book proved generally rather wearisome, the second not so; we have since been taught (not i) "how to observe." suppose you and i promulgate a treatise next, "how to see"? the old plan was, to have a pair of _eyes _first of all, and then to open them: and endeavor with your whole strength to _look._ the good harriet! but "god," as the arabs say, "has given to every people a prophet (or poet) in its own speech": and behold now unitarian mechanical formalism was to have its poetess too; and stragglings of genius were to spring up even through that like grass through a macadam highway!--adieu, my friend, i wait still for your heterodox speech; and love you always. --t. carlyle an english _sartor_ goes off to you this day; through kennet, to c.c. little and j. brown of boston; the likeliest conveyance. it is correctly printed, and that is all. its fate here (the fate of the publication, i mean) remains unknown; "unknown and unimportant." xxxi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, december, my dear emerson,--almost the very day after my last letter went off, the long-expected two volumes of _miscellanies_ arrived. the heterodox pamphlet has never yet come to hand. i am now to write you again about that _miscellany_ concern the fourth letter, i do believe; but it is confirmatory of the foregoing three, and will be the last, we may hope. fraser is charmed with the look of your two volumes; declares them unsurpassable by art of his; and wishes (what is the main part of this message) that you would send his cargo in the _bound_ state, bound and lettered as these are, with the sole difference that the leaves be _not_ cut, or shaved on the sides, our english fashion being to have them _rough._ he is impatient that the book were here; desires further that it be sent to the port of london rather than another port, and that it be packed in _boxes_ "to keep the covers of the volumes safe,"--all which i doubt not the packers and the shippers of new england have dexterity enough to manage for the best, without desire of his. if you have printed off nothing yet, i will desire for my own behoof that two hundred and _sixty_ be the number sent; i find i shall need some ten to give away: if your first sheet is printed off, let the number stand as it was. it would be an improvement if you could print our title-pages on paper a little stronger; that would stand ink, i mean: the fly leaves in the same, if you have such paper convenient; if not, not. farther as to the matter of the title-page, it seems to me your printer might give a bolder and a broader type to the words "critical and miscellaneous," and add after "essays" with a colon (:), the line "collected and republished," with a colon also; then the "by," &c. "in four volumes, vol. i.," &c. i mean that we want, in general, a little more ink and decisiveness: show your man the title-page of the english _french revolution,_ or look at it your self, and you will know. r.w.e.'s "advertisement," friendly and good, as all his dealings are to me ward, will of course be suppressed in the english copies. i see not that with propriety i can say anything by way of substitute: silence and the new england _imprint_ will tell the story as eloquently as there is need. for the rest you must tell mr. loring, and all men who had a hand in it along with you, that i am altogether right well pleased with this edition, and find it far beyond my expectation. to my two young friends, henry s. mckean (be so good as write these names more indisputably for me) and charles stearns wheeler, in particular, i will beg you to express emphatically my gratitude; they have stood by me with right faithfulness, and made the correctest printing; a _great_ service had i known that there were such eyes and heads acting in behalf of me there, i would have scraped out the editorial blotches too (notes of admiration, dashes, "we think"s, &c., &c., common in jeffrey's time in the _edinburgh review_) and london misprints; which are almost the only deformities that remain now. it is _extremely_ correct printing wherever i have looked, and many things are silently amended; it is the most fundamental service of all. i have not the other _articles_ by me at present; i think they are of themselves a little more correct; at all events there are nothing but _misprints_ to deal with;--the editors, by this time, had got bound up to let me alone. in the _life of scott,_ fourth page of it (p. of our edition), there is a sentence to be deleted. "it will tell us, say they, little new and nothing pleasing to know": out with this, for it is nonsense, and was marked for erasure in the manuscript, i dare say. i know with certainty no more at present. fraser is to sell the four volumes at two guineas here. on studying accurately your program of the american mercantile method, i stood amazed to contrast it with our english one. the bookseller here admits that he could, by diligent bargaining, get up such a book for something like the same cost or a _little_ more; but the "laws of the trade" deduct from the very front of the selling price--how much think you--_forty percent_ and odd, when your man has only _fifteen;_ for the mere act of vending! to cover all, they charge that enormous price. (a man, while i stood consulting with fraser, came in and asked for carlyle's _revolution;_ they showed it him, he asked the price; and exclaimed, "guinea and a half! i can get it from america for nine shillings!" and indignantly went his way; not without reason.) there are "laws of the trade" which ought to be _repealed;_ which i will take the liberty of contravening to all lengths by all opportunities--if i had but the power! but if this joint-stock american plan prosper, it will answer rarely. fraser's first _french revolution,_ for instance, will be done, he calculates, about new-year's-day; and a second edition wanted; mine to do with what i like. if you in america wanted more also--? i leave you to think of this.--and now enough, enough! my brother went from us last tuesday; ought to be in paris yesterday. i am yet writing nothing; feel forsaken, sad, sick, --not unhappy. in general death seems beautiful to me; sweet and great. but life also is beautiful, is great and divine, were it never to be joyful any more. i read books, my wife sewing by me, with the light of a sinumbra, in a little apartment made snug against the winter; and am happiest when all men leave me alone, or nearly all,--though many men love me rather, ungrateful that i am. my present book is _horace walpole;_ i get endless stuff out of it; epic, tragic, lyrical, didactic: all inarticulate indeed. an old blind schoolmaster in annan used to ask with endless anxiety when a new scholar was offered him, "but are ye sure _he's not a dunce?_" it is really the one thing needful in a man; for indeed (if we will candidly understand it) all else is presupposed in that. horace walpole is no dunce, not a fibre of him is duncish. your friend sumner was here yesterday, a good while, for the first time: an ingenious, cultivated, courteous man; a little sensitive or so, and with no other fault that i discerned. he borrowed my copy of your dartmouth business, and bound himself over to return with it soon. some approve of that here, some condemn: my wife and another lady call it better even than the former, i not so good. and now the heterodox, the heterodox, where is that? adieu, my dear friend. commend me to the concord household; to the little boy, to his grandmother, and mother, and father; we must all meet some day,--or _some no-day_ then (as it shall please god)! my wife heartily greets you all. ever yours, t. carlyle i sent your book, message, and address to sterling; he is in florence or rome. read the article _simonides_ by him in the _london and westminster_--brilliant prose, translations--wooden? his signature is l (pounds sterling!).--_now_ you are to write _soon?_ i always forgot to tell you, there came long since two packages evidently in your hand, marked "one printed sheet," and "one newspaper," for which the postman demanded about fifteen shillings: _rejected._ after considerable correspondence the newspaper was again offered me at _ten pence;_ the _sheet_ unattainable altogether: "no," even at tenpence. the fact is, it was wrong wrapped, that newspaper. leave it open at the ends, and try me again, once; i think it will come almost gratis. steam and iron are making all the planet into one village.--a mr. dwight wrote to me about the dedicating of some german translations: _yes._ what are they or he?*--your _sartor_ is off through kennet. could you send me two copies of the american _life of schiller,_ if the thing is fit for making a present of, and easy to be got? if not, do not mind it at all.--addio! ------------- * mr. john s. dwight, whose volume of _select minor poems from the german of goethe and schiller,_ published in , was dedicated to carlyle. it was the third volume of _specimens of foreign standard literature, edited by george ripley. beside mr. dwight's own excellent versions, it contained translations by mr. bancroft, dr. hedge, dr. frothingham, and others. for many years mr. dwight rendered a notable public service as the editor of _dwight's journal of music,_--a publication which did more than any other to raise and to maintain high the standard of musical taste and culture in america. --------- xxxii. emerson to carlyle concord, january, my dear friend,--i am not now in any condition to write a letter, having neither the facts from the booksellers which you would know touching our future plans, nor yet a satisfactory account balanced and settled of our past dealings; and lastly, no time to write what i would say,--as my poor lectures are in full course, and absorb all my wits; but as the "royal william" will not wait, and as i have a hundred pounds to send on account of the sales of the _french revolution,_ i must steal a few minutes to send my salutation. i have received all your four good letters: and you are a good and generous man to write so many. two came on the d and d of january, and the last on the th. if the bookselling munroe had answered me yesterday, as he ought, i should be able to satisfy you as to the time when to expect our cargo of _miscellanies._ the third and fourth volumes are now printing: 't is a fortnight since we began. you shall have two hundred and fifty copies,--i am not quite sure you can have more,--bound, and _entitled,_ and directed as you desire, at least according to the best ability of our printer as far as the typography is concerned, and we will speed the work as fast as we can; but as we have but a single copy of _fraser's magazine_--we do not get on rapidly. the _french revolution_ was all sold more than a month since. we should be glad of more copies, but the bookseller thinks not of enough copies to justify a new edition yet. i should not be surprised, however, to see that some bold brother of the trade had undertaken it. now, what does your question point at in reference to your new edition, asking "if we want more"? could you send us out a part of your edition at american prices, and at the same time to your advantage? i wish i knew the precise answer to this question, then perhaps i could keep all pirates out of our bay. i shall convey in two days your message to stearns wheeler, who is now busy in correcting the new volumes. he is now greek tutor in harvard college.*--kindest thanks to jane carlyle for her generous remembrances, which i will study to deserve. has the heterodoxy arrived in chelsea, and quite destroyed us even in the charity of our friend? i am sorry to have worried you so often about the summer letter. now am i your debtor four times. the parish commotion, too, has long ago subsided here, and my course of lectures on "human life" finds a full attendance. i wait for the coming of the _westminster,_ which has not quite yet arrived here, though i have seen the london advertisement. it sounds prosperously in my ear what you say of dr. carlyle's appointments. i was once very near the man in rome, but did not see him. i will atone as soon as i can for this truncated epistle. you must answer it immediately, so far as to acknowledge the receipt of the enclosed bill of exchange, and soon i will send you the long promised _account_ of the _french revolution,_ and also such moral account of the same as is over due. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson --------- * this promising young scholar edited with english notes the first american edition of herodotus. he went to europe to pursue his studies, and died, greatly regretted, at rome, of a fever, in . --------- xxxiii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, february, my dear friend,--your welcome little letter, with the astonishing inclosure, arrived safe four days ago; right welcome, as all your letters are, and bringing as these usually do the best news i get here. the miraculous draught of paper i have just sent to a sure hand in liverpool, there to lie till in due time it have ripened into a crop of a hundred gold sovereigns! on this subject, which gives room for so many thoughts, there is little that can be said, that were not an impertinence more or less. the matter grows serious to me, enjoins me to be silent and reflect. i will say, at any rate, there never came money into my hands i was so proud of; the promise of a blessing looks from the face of it; nay, it _will_ be _twice_ blessed. so i will ejaculate, with the arabs, _allah akbar!_ and walk silent by the shore of the many-sounding babel-tumult, meditating on much. thanks to the mysterious all-bounteous guide of men, and to you my true brother, far over the sea!--for the rest, i showed fraser this nehemiah document, and said i hoped he would blush very deep;--which indeed the poor creature did, till i was absolutely sorry for him. but now first as to this question, what i mean? you must know poor fraser, a punctual but most pusillanimous mortal, has been talking louder and louder lately of a "second edition" here; whereupon, as labor-wages are not higher here than with you, and printing-work, if well bargained for, ought to be about the same price, it struck me that, as in the case of the _miscellanies,_ so here inversely the supply of both the new and the old england might be profitably combined. whether aught can come of this, now that it is got close upon us, i yet know not. fraser has only seventy-five copies left; but when these will be done his prophecy comprehends not,--"surely within the year"! for the present i have set him to ascertain, and will otherwise ascertain for myself, what the exact cost of _stereotyping_ the book were, in the same letter and style as yours; it is not so much more than printing, they tell me: i should then have done with it forever and a day. you on your side, and we on ours, might have as many copies as were wanted for all time coming. this is, in these very days, under inquisition; but there are many points to be settled before the issue. i have not yet succeeded in finding a bookseller of any fitness, but am waiting for one always. and even had i found such a one, i mean an energetic seller that would sell on other terms than forty percent for his trouble, it were still a question whether one ought to venture on such a speculation: "quitting the old highways," as i say, "in indignation at the excessive tolls, with hope that you will arrive cheaper in the steeple-chase way!" it is clear, however, that said highways are of the corduroy sort, said tolls an anomaly that must be remedied soon; and also that in all england there is no book in a likelier case to adventure it with than this same,--which did not sell at all for two months, as i hear, which all booksellers got terrified for, and which has crept along mainly by its own gravitation ever since. we will consider well, we shall see. you can understand that such a thing, for your market too, is in agitation; if any pirate step in before us in the meanwhile, we cannot help it. thanks again for your swift attention to the _miscellanies;_ poor fraser is in great haste to see them; hoping for his forty- per-cent division of the spoil. if you have not yet got to the very end with your printing, i will add a few errata; if they come too late, never mind; they are of small moment.... this foggy babylon tumbles along as it was wont; and, as for my particular case, uses me not worse, but better, than of old. nay, there are many in it that have a real friendliness for me. for example, the other night, a massive portmanteau of books, sent according to my written list, from the cambridge university library, from certain friends there whom i have never seen; a gratifying arrival. for we have no library here, from which we can borrow books home; and are only in these weeks striving to get one:* think of that! the worst is the sore tear and wear of this huge roaring niagara of things on such a poor excitable set of nerves as mine. the velocity of all things, of the very word you hear on the streets, is at railway rate: joy itself is unenjoyable, to be avoided like pain; there is no wish one has so pressing as for quiet. ah me! i often swear i will be buried at least in free breezy scotland, out of this insane hubbub, where fate tethers me in life! if fate always tether me;--but if ever the smallest competence of worldly means be mine, i will fly this whirlpool as i would the lake of _malebolge,_ and only visit it now and then! yet perhaps it is the proper place after all, seeing all places are improper: who knows? meanwhile i lead a most dyspeptic, solitary, self-shrouded life: consuming, if possible in silence, my considerable daily allotment of pain; glad when any strength is left in me for working, which is the only use i can see in myself,--too rare a case of late. the ground of my existence is black as death; too black, when all void too but at times there paint themselves on it pictures of gold and rainbow and lightning; all the brighter for the black ground, i suppose. withal i am very much of a fool.--some people will have me write on _cromwell,_ which i have been talking about. i do read on that and english subjects, finding that i know nothing and that nobody knows anything of that: but whether anything will come of it remains to be seen. mill, the _westminster_ friend, is gone in bad health to the continent, and has left a rude aberdeen longear, a great admirer of mine too, with whom i conjecture i cannot act at all: so good-bye to that. the wisest of all, i do believe, were that i bought my nag _yankee_ and set to galloping about the elevated places here! a certain mr. coolidge,** a boston man of clear iron visage and character, came down to me the other day with sumner; he left a newspaper fragment, containing "the socinian pope's denunciation of emerson." --------- * the beginning of the london library, a most useful institution, from which books may be borrowed. it served carlyle well in later years, and for a long time he was president of it. ** the late mr. joseph coolidge. --------- the thing denounced had not then arrived, though often asked for at kennet's; it did not arrive till yesterday, but had lain buried in bales of i know not what. we have read it only once, and are not yet at the bottom of it. meanwhile, as i judge, the socinian "tempest in a washbowl" is all according to nature, and will be profitable to you, not hurtful. a man is called to let his light shine before men; but he ought to understand better and better what medium it is through, what retinas it falls on: wherefore look _there._ i find in this, as in the two other speeches, that noblest self-assertion, and believing originality, which is like sacred fire, the _beginning_ of whatsoever is to flame and work; and for young men especially one sees not what could be more vivifying. speak, therefore, while you feel called to do it; and when you feel called. but for yourself, my friend, i prophesy it will not do always: a faculty is in you for a _sort_ of speech which is itself _action,_ an artistic sort. you _tell_ us with piercing emphasis that man's soul is great; _show_ us a great soul of a man, in some work symbolic of such: this is the seal of such a message, and you will feel by and by that you are called to this. i long to see some concrete thing, some event, man's life, american forest, or piece of creation, which this emerson loves and wonders at, well _emersonized,_ depictured by emerson, filled with the life of emerson, and cast forth from him then to live by itself. if these orations balk me of this, how profitable soever they be for others. i will not love them.--and yet, what am i saying? how do i know what is good for _you,_ what authentically makes your own heart glad to work in it? i speak from _without,_ the friendliest voice must speak from without; and a man's ultimate monition comes only from _within._ forgive me, and love me, and write soon. _a dieu!_ --t. carlyle my wife, very proud of your salutation, sends a sick return of greeting. after a winter of unusual strength, she took cold the other day, and coughs again; though she will not call it serious yet. one likes none of these things. she has a brisk heart and a stout, but too weak a frame for this rough life of mine. i will not get sad about it. one of the strangest things about these new england orations is a fact i have heard, but not yet seen, that a certain w. gladstone, an oxford crack scholar, tory m.p., and devout churchman of great talent and hope, has contrived to insert a piece of you (_first_ oration it must be) in a work of his on _church and state,_ which makes some figure at present! i know him for a solid, serious, silent-minded man; but how with his coleridge shovel-hattism he has contrived to relate himself to _you,_ there is the mystery. true men of all creeds, it _would_ seem, are brothers. to write soon! xxxiv. emerson to carlyle* concord, march, my dear friend,--i will spare you my apologies for not writing, they are so many. you have been very generous, i very promising and dilatory. i desired to send you an account of the sales of the _history,_ thinking that the details might be more intelligible to you than to me, and might give you some insight into literary and social, as well as bibliopolical relations. but many details of this account will not yet settle themselves into sure facts, but do dance and mystify me as one green in ledgers. bookseller says nine hundred and ninety-one copies came from binder, nine remaining imperfect, and so not bound. but in all my reckonings of the particulars of distribution i make either more or less than nine hundred and ninety-one copies. and some of my accounts are with private individuals at a distance, and they have their uncertainties and misrememberings also. but the facts will soon show themselves, and i count confidently on a small balance against the world to your credit. ---------- * this letter appeared in the _athenaeum,_ july , . ---------- the _miscellanies_ go forward too slowly, at about the rate of seventy-two pages a week, as i understand. of the _fraser_ articles and of some others we have but a single copy, (such are the tough limits of some english immortalities and editorial renowns,) but we expect the end of the printing in six weeks. the first two volumes, with title-pages, are gone to the binder-- two hundred and sixty copies--with strait directions; and i presume will go to sea very soon. we shall send the last two volumes by a later ship. you will pay nothing for the books we send except freight. we shall deduct the cost of the books from the credit side of your account here. we print of the second series twelve hundred and fifty copies, with the intention of printing a second edition of the first series of five hundred, if we see fit hereafter to supply the place of the emigrating portion of the first. you express some surprise at the cheapness of our work. the publishers, i believe, generally get more profits. they grumbled a little at the face of the account on the st of january; so in the new contract for the new volumes i have allowed them nine cents more on each copy sold by them. so that you should receive ninety-one cents on a copy instead of one dollar. when the two hundred and fifty copies of our first two volumes are gone to you, i think they will have but about one hundred copies more to sell. your books are read. i hear, i think, more gratitude expressed for the _miscellanies_ than for the _history._ young men at all our colleges study them in closets, and the copernican is eradicating the ptolemaic lore. i have frequent and cordial testimonies to the good working of the leaven, and continual inquiry whether the man will come hither. _speriamo._ i was a fool to tell you once you must not come if i did tell you so. i knew better at the time, and did steadily believe, as far as i was concerned, that no polemical mud, however much was thrown, could by any possibility stick to me; for i was purely an observer; had not the smallest personal or _partial_ interest; and merely spoke to the question as a historian; and i knew whoever could see me must see that. but, at the moment, the little pamphlet made much stir and excitement in the newspapers; and the whole thousand copies were bought up. the ill wind has blown over. i advertised, as usual, my winter course of lectures, and it prospered very well. ten lectures: i. doctrine of the soul; ii. home; iii. the school; iv. love; v. genius; vi. the protest; vii. tragedy; viii. comedy; ix. duty; x. demonology. i designed to add two more, but my lungs played me false with unseasonable inflammation, so i discoursed no more on "human life." now i am well again.--but, as i said, as i could not hurt myself, it was foolish to flatter myself that i could mix your cause with mine and hurt you. nothing is more certain than that you shall have all our ears, whenever you wish for them, and free from that partial position which i deprecated. yet i cannot regret my letter, which procured me so affectionate and magnanimous a reply. thanks, too, for your friendliest invitation. but i have a new reason why i should not come to england,--a blessed babe, named ellen, almost three weeks old,--a little, fair, soft lump of contented humanity, incessantly sleeping, and with an air of incurious security that says she has come to stay, has come to be loved, which has nothing mean, and quite piques me. yet how gladly should i be near you for a time. the months and years make me more desirous of an unlimited conversation with you; and one day, i think, the god will grant it, after whatever way is best. i am lately taken with _the onyx ring,_ which seemed to me full of knowledge, and good, bold, true drawing. very saucy, was it not? in john sterling to paint collins; and what intrepid iconoclasm in this new alcibiades to break in among your lares and disfigure your sacred hermes himself in walsingham.* to me, a profane man, it was good sport to see the olympic lover of frederica, lili, and so forth, lampooned. and by alcibiades too, over whom the wrath of pericles must pause and brood ere it falls. i delight in this sterling, but now that i know him better i shall no longer expect him to write to me. i wish i could talk to you on the grave questions, graver than all literature, which the trifles of each day open. our doing seems to be a gaudy screen or popinjay to divert the eye from our nondoing. i wish, too, you could know my friends here. a man named bronson alcott is a majestic soul, with whom conversation is possible. he is capable of truth, and gives me the same glad astonishment that he should exist which the world does. -------- * collins and walsingham, two characters in _the onyx ring,_ are partly drawn, not very felicitously, from carlyle and goethe. in his _life of sterling,_ carlyle says of the story: "a tale still worth reading, in which, among the imaginary characters, various friends of sterling's are shadowed forth not always in the truest manner." it is reprinted in the second volume of sterling's essays and tales, edited by julius hare. --------- as i hear not yet of your reception of the bill of exchange, which went by the "royal william" in january, i enclose the duplicate. and now all success to the lectures of april or may! a new kingdom with new extravagances of power and splendor i know. unless you can keep your own secret better in _rahel,_ &c., you must not give it me to keep. the london _sartor_ arrived in my hands march th, dated the th of november, so long is the way from kennet to little & co. the book is welcome, and awakens a sort of nepotism in me,--my brother's child. --r.w. emerson i rejoice in the good accounts you give me of your household; in your wife's health; in your brother's position. my wife wishes to be affectionately remembered to you and yours. and the lady must continue to love her _old_ transatlantic friend. xxxv. emerson to carlyle concord, march, my dear friend,--only last saturday i despatched a letter to you containing a duplicate of the bill of exchange sent in january, and all the facts i knew of our books; and now comes to me a note from wheeler, at cambridge, saying that the printers, on reckoning up their amount of copy, find that nowise can they make pages per volume, as they have promised, for these two last of the _miscellanies._ they end the third volume with page , and they have not but or less pages for the fourth. they ask, what shall be done? nothing is known to me but to give them _rahel,_ though i grudge it, for i vastly prefer to end with _scott._ _rahel,_ i fancy, cost you no night and no morning, but was writ in that gentle after-dinner hour so friendly to good digestion. stearns wheeler dreams that it is possible to draw at this eleventh hour some possible manuscript out of the unedited treasures of teufelsdrockh's cabinets. if the manuscripts were ready, all fairly copied out by foreseeing scribes in your sanctuary at chelsea, the good goblin of steam would--with the least waiting, perhaps a few days--bring the packet to our types in time. i have little hope, almost none, from a sally so desperate on possible portfolios; but neither will i be wanting to my sanguine co-editor, your good friend. so i told him i would give you as instant notice as mr. rogers at the merchants' exchange bar can contrive, and tell you plainly that we shall proceed to print _rahel_ when we come so far on; and with that paper end; unless we shall receive some contrary word from you. and if we can obtain any manuscript from you before we have actually bound our book, we will cancel our last sheets and insert it. and so may the friendly heaven grant a speedy passage to my letter and to yours! i fear the possibility of our success is still further reduced by the season of the year, as the lectures must shortly be on foot. well, the best speed to them also. when i think of you as speaking and not writing them, i remember luther's words, "he that can speak well, the same is a man." i hope you liked john dwight's translations of goethe, and his notes. he is a good, susceptible, yearning soul, not so apt to create as to receive with the freest allowance, but i like his books very much. do think to say in a letter whether you received _from me_ a copy of our edition of your _french revolution._ i ordered a copy sent to you,--probably wrote your name in it,--but it does not appear in the bookseller's account. farewell. --r.w. emerson xxxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, april, my dear emerson,--has anything gone wrong with you? how is it that you do not write to me? these three or four weeks, i know not whether _duly_ or not so long, i have been in daily hope of some sign from you; but none comes; not even a newspaper,--open at the ends. the german translator, mr. dwight, mentioned, at the end of a letter i had not long ago, that you had given a brilliant course of lectures at boston, but had been obliged to _intermit it on account of illness._ bad news indeed, that latter clause; at the same time, it was thrown in so cursorily i would not let myself be much alarmed; and since that, various new england friends have assured me here that there was nothing of great moment in it, that the business was all well over now, and you safe at concord again. yet how is it that i do not hear? i will tell you my guess is that those boston carlylean _miscellanies_ are to blame. the printer is slack and lazy as printers are; and you do not wish to write till you can send some news of him? i will hope and believe that only this is it, till i hear worse. i sent you a dumfries newspaper the other week, for a sign of my existence and anxiety. a certain mr. ellis of boston is this day packing up a very small memorial of me to your wife; a poor print rolled about a bit of wood: let her receive it graciously in defect of better. it comes under your address. nay, properly it is my wife's memorial to your wife. it is to be hung up in the concord drawing-room. the two households, divided by wide seas, are to understand always that they are united nevertheless. my special cause for writing this day rather than another is the old story, book business. you have brought that upon yourself, my friend; and must do the best you can with it. after all, why should not letters be on business too? many a kind thought, uniting man with man, in gratitude and helpfulness, is founded on business. the speaker at dartmouth college seems to think it ought to be so. nor do i dissent.--but the case is this, fraser and i are just about bargaining for a second edition of the _revolution._ he will print fifteen hundred for the english market, in a somewhat closer style, and sell them here at twenty- four shillings a copy. his first edition is all gone but some handful; and the man is in haste, and has taken into a mood of hope,--for he is weak and aguish, alternating from hot to cold; otherwise, i find, a very accurate creature, and deals in his unjust trade as justly as any other will. he has settled with me; his half-profits amount to some l , which by charging me for every presentation copy he cuts down to somewhere about l ; _not_ the lion's share in the gross produce, yet a great share compared with an expectancy no higher than _zero!_ we continue on the same system for this second adventure; i cannot go hawking about in search of new terms; i might go farther and fare worse. and now comes your part of the affair; in which i would fain have had your counsel; but must ask your help, proceeding with my own light alone. after fraser's fifteen hundred are printed off, the types remain standing, and i for my own behoof throw off five hundred more, designed for your market. whether five hundred are too many or too few, i can only guess; if too many, we can retain them here and turn them to account; if too few, there is no remedy. at all events, costing me only the paper and press-work, there is surely no pirate in the union that can _undersell_ us! nay, it seems they have a drawback on our taxed paper, sufficient or nearly so to land the cargo at boston without more charge. you see, therefore, how it is. can you find me a bookseller, as for yourself; he and you can fix what price the ware will carry when you see it. meanwhile i must have his title-page; i must have his directions (if any be needed); nay, for that matter, you might write a preface if you liked,--though i see not what you have to say, and recommend silence rather! the book is to be in three volumes duodecimo, and we will take care it be fit to show its face in your market. a few errors of the press; and one correction (about the sinking of the _vengeur,_ which i find lately to be an indisputable falsehood); these are all the changes. we are to have done printing, fraser predicts, "in two months";--say two and a half! i suppose you decipher the matter out of this plastering and smearing; and will do what is needful in it. "great inquiry" is made for the _miscellanies,_ fraser says; though he suspects it may perhaps be but one or two men inquiring _often,_--the dog! i am again upon the threshold of extempore lecturing: on "the revolutions of modern europe"; protestantism, lectures; puritanism, ; french revolution, . i almost regret that i had undertaken the thing this year at all, for i am no longer driven by poverty as heretofore. nay, i am richer than i have been for ten years; and have a kind of prospect, for the first time this great while, of being allowed to subsist in this world for the future: a great blessing, perhaps the greatest, when it comes as a novelty! however, i thought it right to keep this lecture business open, come what might. i care less about it than i did; it is not agony and wretched trembling to the marrow of the bone, as it was the last two times. i believe, in spite of all my perpetual indigestions and nervous woes, i am actually getting into better health; the weary heart of me is quieter; i wait in silence for the new chapter,--feeling truly that we are at the end of one period here. i count it _two_ in my autobiography: we shall see what the _third_ is; [if] third there be. but i am in small haste for a third. how true is that of the old prophets, "the _word of the lord_ came unto" such and such a one! when it does not come, both prophet and prosaist ought to be thankful (after a sort), and rigorously hold their tongue.--lord durham's people have come over with golden reports of the americans, and their brotherly feelings. one arthur buller preaches to me, with emphasis, on a quite personal topic till one explodes in laughter to hear him, the good soul: that i, namely, am the most esteemed, &c., and ought to go over and lecture in all great towns of the union, and make, &c., &c.! i really do begin to think of it in this interregnum that i am in. but then my lectures must be written; but then i must become a _hawker, --ach gott!_ the people are beginning to quote you here: _tant pis pour eux!_ i have found you in two cambridge books. a certain mr. richard m. milnes, m.p., a beautiful little tory dilettante poet and politician whom i love much, applied to me for _nature_ (the others he has) that he might write upon it. somebody has stolen _nature_ from me, or many have thumbed it to pieces; i could not find a copy. send me one, the first chance you have. and see miss martineau in the last _westminster review:_--these things you are old enough to stand? they are even of benefit? emerson is not without a select public, the root of a select public on this side of the water too.--popular sumner is off to italy, the most popular of men,--inoffensive, like a worn sixpence that has no physiognomy left. we preferred coolidge to him in this circle; a square-cut iron man, yet with clear symptoms of a heart in him. your people will come more and more to their maternal babylon, will they not, by the steamers?-- adieu, my dear friend. my wife joins me in all good prayers for you and yours. --thomas carlyle xxxvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, april, dear friend,--some four days ago i wrote you a long letter, rather expressive of anxiety about you; it will probably come to hand along with this. i had heard vaguely that you were unwell, and wondered why you did not write. happily, that point is as good as settled now, even by your silence about it. i have, half an hour ago, received your concord letter of the th of march. the letter you speak of there as "written last saturday" has not yet made its appearance, but may be looked for now shortly: as there is no mention here of any mischance, except the shortcoming of printers' copy, i infer that all else is in a tolerably correct state; i wait patiently for the "last saturday" tidings, and will answer as to the matters of copy, in good heart, without loss of a moment. there is nothing of the manuscript sort in teufelsdrockh's repositories that would suit you well; nothing at all in a completed state, except a long rigmarole dissertation (in a crabbed sardonic vein) about the early history of the teutonic kindred, wriggling itself along not in the best style through proverb lore, and i know not what, till it end (if my memory serve) in a kind of essay on the _minnesingers._ it was written almost ten years ago, and never contented me well. it formed part of a lucklessly projected _history of german literature,_ subsequent portions of which, the _nibelungen_ and _reinecke fox,_ you have already printed. the unfortunate "_cabinet library_ editor," or whatever his title was, broke down; and i let him off,--without paying me; and this alone remains of the misventure; a thing not fit for you, nor indeed at bottom for anybody, though i have never burnt it yet. my other manuscripts are scratchings and scrawlings;--children's _infant_ souls weeping because they never could be born, but were left there whimpering _in limine primo!_ on this side, therefore, is no help. nevertheless, it seems to me, otherwise there is. _varnhagen_ may be printed i think without offence, since there is need of it: if that will make up your fourth volume to a due size, why not? it is the last faint murmur one gives in periodical literature, and may indicate the approach of silence and slumber. i know no errors of the press in _varnhagen:_ there is one thing about jean paul f. richter's _want_ of humor in his _speech,_ which somehow i could like to have the opportunity of uttering a word on, though _what_ word i see not very well. my notion is partly that v. overstates the thing, taking a berlin _propos de salon_ for a scientifically accurate record; and partly farther that the defect (if any) was _creditable_ to jean paul, indicating that he talked from the abundance of the heart, not burning himself off in miserable perpetual sputter like a town-wit, but speaking what he had to say, were it dull, were it not dull,--for his own satisfaction first of all! if you in a line or two could express at the right point something of that sort, it were well; yet on the whole, if not, then is almost no matter. let the whole stand then as the commencement of slumber and stertorous breathing! varnhagen himself will not bring up your fourth volume to the right size; hardly beyond pages, i should think; yet what more can be done? do you remember fraser's magazine for october, , and a translation there, with notes, of a thing called goethe's mahrchen? it is by me; i regard it as a most remarkable piece, well worthy of perusal, especially by all readers of mine. the printing of your third volume will of course be finished before this letter arrive; nevertheless i have a plan: that you (as might be done, i suppose, by cancelling and reprinting the concluding leaf or leaves) append the said translated tale, in a smaller type, to that volume. it is or pages of _fraser,_ and will perhaps bring yours up to the mark. nay, indeed there are two other little translations from goethe which i reckon good, though of far less interest than the _mahrchen;_ i think they are in the frasers almost immediately preceding; one of them is called _fragment from goethe_ (if i remember); in his _works,_ it is _novelle;_ it treats of a visit by some princely household to a strange mountain ruin or castle, and the catastrophe is the escape of a show-lion from its booth in the neighboring market-town. i have not the thing here,--alas, sinner that i am, it now strikes me that the "two other things" are this one thing, which my treacherous memory is making into two! this however you will find in the number immediately, or not far from immediately, preceding that of the _mahrchen;_ along with which, in the same type with which, it would give us letter-press enough. it ought to stand _before_ the _mahrchen:_ read it, and say whether it is worthy or not worthy. will this _appendix_ do, then? i should really rather like the _mahrchen_ to be printed, and had thoughts of putting [it] at the end of the english _sartor._ the other i care not for, intrinsically, but think it very beautiful in its kind.--some rubbish of my own, in small quantity, exists here and there in _fraser;_ one story, entitled _cruthers and jonson,_* was written sixteen years ago, and printed somewhere early (probably the second year) in that rubbish heap, with several gross errors of the press (mares for maces was one!): it is the first thing i wrote, or among the very first;--otherwise a thing to be kept rather secret, except from the like of you! this or any other of the "original" immaturities i will _not_ recommend as an appendix; i hope the _mahrchen,_ or the _novelle_ and _mahrchen,_ will suffice. but on the whole, to thee, o friend, and thy judgment and decision, without appeal, i leave it altogether. say yes, say no; do what seemeth good to thee.--nay now, writing with the speed of light, another consideration strikes me: why should volume third be interfered with if it is finished? why will not this _appendix_ do, these _appendixes,_ to hang to the skirts of volume four as well? perhaps better! the _mahrchen_ in any case closing the rear. i leave it all to emerson and stearns wheeler, my more than kind editors: e. knows it better than i; be his decision irrevocable. ----------- * "cruthers and jonson; or, the outskirts of life. a true story." _fraser's magazine,_ january, . ------------ this letter is far too long, but i had not time to make it shorter.--i got your _french revolution,_ and have seen no other: my name is on it in your hand. i received dwight's book, liked it, and have answered him: a good youth, of the kind you describe; no englishman, to my knowledge, has yet uttered as much sense about goethe and german things. i go this day to settle with fraser about printers and a second edition of the _revolution_ book,--as specified in the other letter: five hundred copies for america, which are to cost he computes about / , and _your_ bookseller will bind them, and defy piracy. my lectures come on, this day two weeks: o heaven! i cannot "speak"; i can only gasp and writhe and stutter, a spectacle to gods and fashionables,--being forced to it by want of money. in five weeks i shall be free, and then--! shall it be switzerland, shall it be scotland, nay, shall it be america and concord? ever your affectionate t. carlyle all love from both of us to the mother and boy. my wife is better than usual; rejoices in the promise of summer now at last visible after a spring like greenland. scarcity, discontent, fast ripening towards desperation, extends far and wide among our working people. god help them! in man as yet is small help. there will be work yet, before that account is liquidated; a generation or two of work! miss martineau is gone to switzerland, after emitting _deerwood_ [sic], a novel.* how do you like it? people ask. to which there are serious answers returnable, but few so good as none. ah me! lady bulwer too has written a novel, in satire of her husband. i saw the husband not long since; one of the wretchedest phantasms, it seemed to me, i had yet fallen in with,--many, many, as they are here. the l sterling bill came, in due time, in perfect order; and will be payable one of these days. i forget dates; but had well calculated that before the th of march this piece of news and my gratitude for it had reached you. -------- * _deerbrook_ -------- xxxviii. emerson to carlyle boston, april, my dear friend,--learning here in town that letters may go today to the "great western," i seize the hour to communicate a bookseller's message. i told brown, of c.c. little & co., that you think of stereotyping the _history._ he says that he can make it profitable to himself and to you to use your plates here in this manner (which he desires may be kept secret here, and i suppose with you also). you are to get your plates made and proved, then you are to send them out here to him, having first insured them in london, and he is to pay you a price for every copy he prints from them. as soon as he has printed a supply for our market,--and we want, he says, five hundred copies now,--he will send them back to you. i told him i thought he had better fix the price per copy to be paid by him, and i would send it to you as his offer. he is willing to do so, but not today. it was only this morning i informed him of your plan. i think in a fortnight i shall need to write again,--probably to introduce to you my countrywoman, miss sedgwick, the writer of affectionate new england tales and the like, who is about to go to europe for a year or more. i will then get somewhat definite from brown as to rates and prices. brown thought you might better send the plates here first, as we are in immediate want of copies; and afterwards print with them in london. he is quite sure that it would be more profitable to print them in this manner than to try to import and sell here the books after being manufactured in london. on the th of april we shall ship at new york the first two volumes of the _miscellanies,_ two hundred and sixty copies. in four weeks, the second two volumes will be finished, unless we wait for something to be added by yourself, agreeably to a suggestion of wheeler's and mine. two copies of _schiller's life_ will go in the same box. we send them to the port of london. when these are gone, only one hundred copies remain unsold of the first two volumes (_miscellanies_). brown said it was important that the plates should be proved correct at london by striking off impressions before they were sent hither. this is the whole of my present message. i shall have somewhat presently to reply to your last letter, received three weeks since. and may health and peace dwell with you and yours! --r.w. emerson xxxix. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear friend,--behold my account! a very simple thing, is it not! a very mouse, after such months, almost years, of promise! despise it not, however; for such is my extreme dulness at figures and statements that this nothing has been a fear to me, a long time, how to extract it from the bookseller's promiscuous account with me, and from obscure records of my own. you see that it promises yet to pay you between $ and $ more, if mr. fuller (a gentleman of providence, who procured many _subscribers_ for us there) and mr. owen (who owes us also for copies subscribed for) will pay us our demand. they have both been lately reminded of their delinquency. herrick and noyes, you will see credited for eight copies, $ . they are booksellers who supplied eight subscribers, and charged us $ for their trouble and some alleged damage to a copy. one copy you will see is sold to ann pomeroy for $ . this lady bought the copy of me, and preferred sending me $ to sending $ . for so good a book. you will notice one or two other variations in the prices, in each of which i aimed to use a friend's discretion. add lastly, that you must revise all my figures, as i am a hopeless blunderer, and quite lately made a brilliant mistake in regard to the amount of multiplied by . have i asked you whether you received from me a copy of the _history?_ i designated a copy to go, and the bookseller's boy thinks he sent one, but there is none charged in their account. the account of the _miscellanies_ does not prosper quite so well.... thanks for your too friendly and generous expectations from my wit. alas! my friend, i can do no such gay thing as you say. i do not belong to the poets, but only to a low department of literature, the reporters; suburban men. but in god we are all great, all rich, each entitled to say, all is mine. i hope the advancing season has restored health to your wife, and, if benedictions will help her, tell her we send them on every west wind. my wife and babes are well. --r.w.e. xl. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear friend,--i received last night c.c. little & co.'s proposition in reference to the stereotyping the _history._ their offer is based on my statement that you proposed to print the book in two volumes similar to ours. they say, "we should be willing to pay three hundred dollars for the use of plates for striking off five hundred copies of the two volumes, with the farther agreement that, if we wished to strike off another five hundred in nine months after the publication of the first five hundred, we should have the liberty to do so, paying the same again; that is, another three hundred dollars for the privilege of printing another five hundred copies;--the plates to be furnished us ready for use and free of expense." they add, "should mr. carlyle send the plates to this country, he should be particular to ship them to _this port direct._" i am no judge of the liberality of this offer, as i know nothing of the expense of the plates. the men, little and brown, are fair in their dealings, and the most respectable book-selling firm in boston. when you have considered the matter, i hope you will send me as early an answer as you can. for as we have no protection from pirates we must use speed. i ought to have added to my account and statement sent by miss sedgwick one explanation. you will find in the account a credit of $ . , agreed on with little & co., as compensation for lost subscribers. we had a little book, kept in the bookshop, into which were transferred the names of subscribers from all lists which were returned from various places. these names amounted to two hundred, more or less. when we came to settle the account, this book could not be found. they expressed much regret, and made much vain searching. their account with me recorded only one hundred and thirty-four copies delivered to subscribers. thus, a large number, say sixty-six, had been sold by them to our subscribers, and our half-dollar on each copy put in their pocket as commission, expressly contrary to treaty! with some ado, i mustered fifty-five names of subscribers known to me as such, not recorded on their books as having received copies, and demanded $ . . they replied that they also had claims; that they had sent the books to distant subscribers in various states, and had charged no freight (with one or two exceptions, when the books went alone); that other booksellers had, no doubt, in many cases, sold the copies to subscribers for which i claimed the half-dollar; and lastly, which is indeed the moving reason, that they had sent twenty copies up the mississippi to a bookseller (in vicksburg, i think), who had made them no return. on these grounds they proposed that they should pay half my demand, and so compromise. they said, however, that, if i insisted, they would pay the whole. i was so glad to close the affair with mutual goodwill that i said with the unjust steward, write $ . . so are we all pleased at your expense. [greek] i think i will not give you any more historiettes,--they take too much room; but as i write this time only on business, you are welcome to this from your friend, --r.w. emerson xli. emerson to carlyle* concord, may, . my dear friend,--last saturday, th instant, i had your two letters of th and th april. before now, you must have one or two notes of mine touching the stereotype plates: a proposition superseded by your new plan. i have also despatched one or two sheets lately containing accounts. now for the new matter. i was in boston yesterday, and saw brown, the bookseller. he accedes gladly, to the project of five hundred american copies of the _history._ he says, that the duty is the same on books in sheets and books in boards; and desires, therefore, that the books may come out _bound._ you bind yours in cloth? put up his in the same style as those for your market, only a little more strongly than is the custom with london books, as it will only cost a little more. he would be glad also to have his name added in the titlepage (london: published by j. fraser; and boston: by c.c. little and james brown, washington st.), or is not this the right way? he only said he should like to have his name added. he threatens to charge me percent commission. if, as he computes from your hint of / , the work costs you, say, cents per copy, unbound; he reckons it at a dollar, when bound; then cents duty in boston, $ . . he thinks we cannot set a higher price on it than $ . , _because_ we sold our former edition for $ . . on that price, his commissions would be cents; and $ . per copy will to you. if when we see the book, we venture to put a higher price on it, your remainder shall be more. i confess, when i set this forth on paper, it looks as bad as your english trade,--this barefaced percent; but their plea is, we guarantee the sales; we advertise; we pay you when it is sold, though we give our customers six months' credit. i have made no final bargain with the man, and perhaps before the books arrive i shall be better advised, and may get better terms from him. meantime, give me the best advice you can; and despatch the books with all speed, and if you send six hundred, i think, we will sell them. ------------ * in the first edition of this correspondence a portion of this letter was printed from a rough draft, such as emerson was accustomed to make of his letters to carlyle. i owe the original to the kindness of the editor of the _athenaeum,_ in the pages of which it was printed. ----------- i went to the _athenaeum,_ and procured the _frasers'_ and will print the _novelle_ and the _mahrchen_ at the end of the fourth volume, which has been loitering under one workman for a week or two past, awaiting this arrival. now we will finish at once. _cruthers and jonson_ i read gladly. it is indispensable to such as would see the fountains of nile: but i incline to what seems your opinion, that it will be better in the final edition of your works than in this present first collection of them. i believe i could find more matter now of yours if we should be pinched again. the cat-raphael? and _mirabeau_ and _macaulay?_ stearns wheeler is very faithful in his loving labor,--has taken a world of pains with the sweetest smile. we are very fortunate in having him to friend.--for the _miscellanies_ once more, the two boxes containing two hundred and sixty copies of the first series went to sea in the "st. james," captain sebor, addressed to mr. fraser. (i hope rightly addressed; yet i saw a memorandum at munroe's in which he was named _john_ fraser.) arthur buller has my hearty thanks for his good and true witnessing. and now that our old advice is indorsed by john bull himself, you will believe and come. nothing can be better. as soon as the lectures are over, let the trunks be packed. only my wife and my blessed sister dear--elizabeth hoar, betrothed in better times to my brother charles,--my wife and this lovely nun do say that mrs. carlyle must come hither also; that it will make her strong, and lengthen her days on the earth, and cheer theirs also. come, and make a home with me; and let us make a truth that is better than dreams. from this farm-house of mine you shall sally forth as god shall invite you, and "lecture in the great cities." you shall do it by proclamation of your own, or by the mediation of a committee, which will readily be found. wife, mother, and sister shall nurse thy wife meantime, and you shall bring your republican laurels home so fast that she shall not sigh for the old england. eyes here do sparkle at the very thought. and my little placid musketaquid river looked gayer today in the sun. in very sooth and love, my friend, i shall look for you in august. if aught that we know not must forbid your wife at present, you will still come. in october, you shall lecture in boston; in november, in new york; in december, in philadelphia; in january, in washington. i can show you three or four great natures, as yet unsung by harriet martineau or anna jameson, that content the heart and provoke the mind. and for yourself, you shall be as cynical and headstrong and fantastical as you can be. i rejoice in what you say of better health and better prospects. i was glad to hear of milnes, whose _poems_ already lay on my table when your letter came. since the little _nature_ book is not quite dead, i have sent you a few copies, and wish you would offer one to mr. milnes with my respects. i hope before a great while i may have somewhat better to send him. i am ashamed that my little books should be "quoted" as you say. my affectionate salutations to mrs. carlyle, who is to sanction and enforce all i have written on the migration. in the prospect of your coming i feel it to be foolish to write. i have very much to say to you. but now only good bye. --r.w. emerson xlii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, may, my dear emerson,--your letter, dated boston, th april, has been here for some two weeks. miss sedgwick, whom it taught us to expect in "about a fortnight," has yet given no note of herself, but shall be right welcome whenever she appears. miss martineau's absence (she is in switzerland this summer) will probably be a loss to the fair pilgrim;--which of course the rest of us ought to exert ourselves to make good.... my lectures are happily over ten days ago; with "success" enough, as it is called; the only _valuable_ part of which is some l , gained with great pain, but also with great brevity:--economical respite for another solar year! the people were boundlessly tolerant; my agitation beforehand was less this year, my remorse afterwards proportionally greater. there was but one moderately good lecture, the last,--on sausculottism, to an audience mostly tory, and rustling with the beautifulest quality silks! two things i find: first that _i ought to have had a horse;_ i had only three incidental rides or gallops, hired rides; my horse _yankee_ is never yet purchased, but it shall be, for i cannot live, except in great pain, without a horse. it was sweet beyond measure to escape out of the dustwhirlpool here, and _fly,_ in solitude, through the ocean of verdure and splendor, as far as harrow and back again; and one's nerves were _clear_ next day, and words lying in one like water in a well. but the _second_ thing i found was, that extempore speaking, especially in the way of lecture, is an _art_ or craft, and requires an apprenticeship, which i have never served. repeatedly it has come into my head that i should go to america, this very fall, and belecture you from north to south till i learn it! such a thing does lie in the bottom-scenes, should hard come to hard; and looks pleasant enough.--on the whole, i say sometimes, i must either begin a book, or do it. books are the lasting thing; lectures are like corn ground into flour; there are loaves for today, but no wheat harvests for next year. rudiments of a new book (thank heaven!) do sometimes disclose themselves in me. _festina lente._ it ought to be better than the _french revolution;_ i mean better written. the greater part of that book, as i read proof-sheets of it in these weeks, does nothing but _disgust_ me. and yet it was, as nearly as was good, the utmost that lay in me. i should not like to be nearer killed with any other book!--books too are a triviality. life alone is great; with its infinite spaces, its everlasting times, with its death, with its heaven and its hell. ah me! wordsworth is here at present; a garrulous, rather watery, not wearisome old man. there is a freshness as of brooks and mountain breezes in him; one says of him: thou art not great, but thou art genuine; well speed _thou._ sterling is home from italy, recovered in health, indeed very well could he but _sit still._ he is for clifton, near bristol, for the next three months. i hear him speak of some sonnet or other he means to address to you: as for me he knows well that i call his verses timber toned, without true melody either in thought, phrase or sound. the good john! did you ever see such a vacant turnip-lantern as that walsingham goethe? iconoclast collins strikes his wooden shoe through him, and passes on, saying almost nothing.--my space is done! i greet the little _maidkin,_ and bid her welcome to this unutterable world. commend her, poor little thing, to her little brother, to her mother and father;-- nature, i suppose, has sent her strong letters of recommendation, without our help, to them all. where i shall be in six weeks is not very certain; likeliest in scotland, whither our whole household, servant and all, is pressingly invited, where they have provided horses and gigs. letters sent hither will still find me, or lie waiting for me, safe: but perhaps the _speediest_ address will be "care of fraser, regent street." my brother wants me to the tyrol and vienna; but i think i shall not go. adieu, dear friend. it is a great treasure to me that i have you in this world. my wife salutes you all.-- yours ever and ever, t. carlyle xliii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, june, dear friend,--two letters from you were brought hither by miss sedgwick last week. the series of post letters is a little embroiled in my head; but i have a conviction that all hitherto due have arrived; that up to the date of my last despatch (a _proof-sheet_ and a letter), which ought to be getting into your hands in these very days, our correspondence is clear. that letter and proof-sheet, two separate pieces, were sent to liverpool some three weeks ago, to be despatched by the first conveyance thence; as i say, they are probably in boston about this time. the proof-sheet was one of the forty-seven such which the new _french revolution_ is to consist of: with this, as with a correct sample, you were to act upon some boston bookseller, and make a bargain for me,--or at least report that none was to be made. a bad bargain will content me now, my hopes are not at all high. for the present, i am to announce on the part of bookseller fraser that the first portion of our celebrated _miscellanies_ have been hovering about on these coasts for several weeks, have lain safe "in the river" for some two weeks, and ought at last to be safe in fraser's shop today or else to morrow. i will ask there, and verify, before this letter go. the reason of these "two weeks in the river" is that the packages were addressed "_john_ fraser, london," and the people had tried all the frasers in london before they attempted the right individual, james, of regent street. of course, the like mistake in the second case will be avoided. a letter, put ashore at falmouth, and properly addressed, but without any _signature,_ had first of all announced that the thing was at the door, and so with this "john fraser," it has been knocking ever since, finding difficult admission. in the present instance, such delay has done no ill, for fraser will not sell till the second portion come; and with this the mistake will be avoided. what has shocked poor james much more is a circumstance which your boston booksellers have no power to avoid: the "enormousness" of the charges in our port here! he sends me the account of them last saturday, with eyes-- such as drew priam's curtains: l and odd silver, whereof l as duty on books at l per cwt. is charged by the rapacious custom-house alone! what help, o james? i answer: we cannot bombard the british custom-house, and sack it, and explode it; we must yield, and pay it the money; thankful for what is still left.--on the whole, one has to learn by trying. this notable finance-expedient, of printing in the one country what is to be sold in the other, did not take vandalic custom-houses into view, which nevertheless do seem to exist. we must persist in it for the present reciprocal pair of times, having started in it for these: but on future occasions always, we can ask the past; and _see_ whether it be not better to let each side of the water stand on its own basis. as for your "accounts," my friend, i find them clear as day, verifiable to the uttermost farthing. you are a good man to conquer your horror of arithmetic; and, like hydrophobic peter of russia making himself a sailor, become an accountant for my sake. but now will you forgive me if i never do verify this same account, or look at it more in this world except as a memento of affection, its arithmetical ciphers so many hierograms, really _sacred_ to me! a reflection i cannot but make is that at bottom this money was all yours; not a penny of it belonged to me by any law except that of helpful friendship. i feel as if i could not examine it without a kind of crime. for the rest, you may rejoice to think that, thanks to you and the books, and to heaven over all, i am for the present no longer poor; but have a reasonable prospect of existing, which, as i calculate, is literally the most that money can do for a man. not for these twelve years, never since i had a house to maintain with money, have i had as much money in my possession as even now. _allah kerim!_ we will hope all that is good on that side. and herewith enough of _it._ you tell me you are but "a reporter": i like you for thinking so. and you will never know that it is _not true,_ till you have tried. meanwhile, far be it from me to urge you to a trial before your time come. ah, it will come, and soon enough; much better, perhaps, if it never came!--a man has "_such_ a baptism to be baptized withal," no easy baptism; and is "straitened till it be accomplished." as for me i honor peace before all things; the silence of a great soul is to me greater than anything it will ever say, it ever can say. be tranquil, my friend; utter no word till you cannot help it;--and think yourself a "reporter," till you find (not with any great joy) that you are not altogether that! we have not yet seen miss sedgwick: your letters with her card were sent hither by post we went up next day, but she was out; no meeting could be arranged earlier than tomorrow evening, when we look for her here. her reception, i have no doubt, will be abundantly flattering in this england. american notabilities are daily becoming notabler among us; the ties of the two parishes, mother and daughter, getting closer and closer knit. indissoluble ties:--i reckon that this huge smoky wen may, for some centuries yet, be the best mycale for our saxon _panionium,_ a yearly meeting-place of "all the saxons," from beyond the atlantic, from the antipodes, or wherever the restless wanderers dwell and toil. after centuries, if boston, if new york, have become the most convenient _"all-saxondom,"_ we will right cheerfully go thither to hold such festival, and leave the wen.-- not many days ago i saw at breakfast the notabest of all your notabilities, daniel webster. he is a magnificent specimen; you might say to all the world, this is your yankee englishman, such limbs _we_ make in yankeeland! as a logic-fencer, advocate, or parliamentary hercules, one would incline to back him at first sight against all the extant world. the tanned complexion, that amorphous crag-like face; the dull black eyes under their precipice of brows, like dull anthracite furnaces, needing only to be _blown;_ the mastiff-mouth, accurately closed:--i have not traced as much of _silent berserkir-rage,_ that i remember of, in any other man. "i guess i should not like to be your nigger!"-- webster is not loquacious, but he is pertinent, conclusive; a dignified, perfectly bred man, though not english in breeding: a man worthy of the best reception from us; and meeting such, i understand. he did not speak much with me that morning, but seemed not at all to dislike me: i meditate whether it is fit or not fit that i should seek out his residence, and leave _my_ card too, before i go? probably not; for the man is political, seemingly altogether; has been at the queen's levee, &c., &c.: it is simply as a mastiff-mouthed _man_ that he is interesting to me, and not otherwise at all. in about seven days hence we go to scotland till the july heats be over. that is our resolution after all. our address there, probably till the end of august, is "templand, thornhill, dumfries, n. b.,"--the residence of my mother-in-law, within a day's drive of my mother's. any letter of yours sent by the old constant address (cheyne row, chelsea) will still find me there; but the other, for that time, will be a day or two shorter. we all go, servant and all. i am bent on writing _something;_ but have no faith that i shall be able. i _must_ try. there is a thing of mine in _fraser_ for july, of no account, about the "sinking of the _vengeur_" as you will see. the _french revolution_ printing is not to stop; two thirds of it are done; at this present rate, it ought to finish, and the whole be ready, within three weeks hence. a letter will be here from you about that time, i think: i will print no title-page for the five hundred till it do come. "published by _fraser and_ little" would, i suppose, be unobjectionable, though fraser is the most nervous of creatures: but why put _him_ in at all, since these five hundred copies are wholly little's and yours? adieu, my friend. our blessings are with you and your house. my wife grows better with the hot weather; i, always worse. yours ever, t. carlyle i say not a word about america or lecturing at present; because i mean to consider it intently in scotland, and there to decide. my brother is to be at ischl (not far from salzburg) during summer: he was anxious to have me there, and i to have gone; but--but--adieu. _fraser's shop._ books not yet come, but known to be safe, and expected soon. nay, the dexterous fraser has argued away l of the duty, he says! all is right therefore. n.b. he says you are to send the second portion _in sheets,_ the weight will be less. this if it be still time.--_basta._ --t.c. xliv. emerson to carlyle concord, july, i hear tonight, o excellent man! that, unless i send a letter to boston tomorrow with the peep of day, it will miss the liverpool steamer, which sails earlier than i dreamed of. o foolish steamer! i am not ready to write. the facts are not yet ripe, though on the turn of the blush. couldst not wait a little? hurry is for slaves;--and aristotle, if i rightly remember only that little from my college lesson, affirmed that the high-minded man never walked fast. o foolish steamer! wait but a week, and we will style thee megalopsyche, and hang thee by the argo in the stars. meantime i will not deny the dear and admirable man the fragments of intelligence i have. be it known unto you then, thomas carlyle, that i received yesterday morning your letter by the "liverpool" with great contentment of heart and mind, in all respects, saving that the american hegira, so often predicted on your side and prayed on ours, is treated with a most unbecoming levity and oblivion; and, moreover, that you do not seem to have received all the letters i seem to have sent. with the letter came the proof-sheet safe, and shall be presently exhibited to little and brown. you must have already the result of our first colloquy on that matter. i can now bring the thing nearer to certainty. but you must print their names as before advised on the title-page. nearly four weeks ago ellis sent me the noble italian print for my wife.* she is in boston at this time, and i believe will be glad that i have written without her aid or word this time, for she was so deeply pleased with the gift that she said she never could write to you. it came timely to me at least. it is a right morning thought, full of health and flowing genius, and i rejoice in it. it is fitly framed and tomorrow is to be hung in the parlor. -------- * morghen's engraving of guido's aurora. -------- our munroe's press, you must believe, was of aristotle's category of the high-minded and slow. chiding would do no good. they still said, "we have but one copy, and so but one hand at work"! at last, on the st of july, the book appeared in the market, but does not come from the binder fast enough to supply the instant demand; and therefore your two hundred and sixty copies cannot part from new york until the th of july. they will be on board the london packet which sails on that day. the publisher has his instructions to bind the volumes to match the old ones. our year since the publication of the vols. i. and ii. is just complete, and i have set the man on the account, but doubt if i get it before twelve or fourteen days. all the edition is gone except forty copies, he told me; and asked me if i would not begin to print a small edition of this first series, five hundred, as we have five hundred of the new series too many, with that view. but i am now so old a fox that i suspend majestically my answer until i have his account. for on the st of july i am to pay $ for the paper of this new book: and by and by the printer's bill,--whose amount i do not yet know; and it is better to be "slow and high-minded" a little more, since we have been so much, and not go deeper into these men's debt until we have tasted somewhat of their credit. we are to get, as you know, by contract, near a thousand dollars from these first two volumes; yet a month ago i was forced to borrow two hundred dollars for you on interest, such advances had the account required. but the coming account will enlighten us all. i am very happy in the "success" of the london lectures. i have no word to add tonight, only that sterling is not timber-toned, that i love his poetry, that i admire his prose with reservations here and there. what he knows he writes manly and well. now and then he puts in a pasteboard man; but all our readers here take _blackwood_ for his sake, and lately seek him in vain. i am getting on with some studies of mine prosperously for me, have got three essays nearly done, and who knows but in the autumn i shall have a book? meantime my little boy and maid, my mother and wife, are well, and the two ladies send to you and yours affectionate regards,--they would fain say urgent invitations. my mother sends tonight, my wife always. i shall send you presently a copy of a translation published here of eckermann, by margaret fuller, a friend of mine and of yours, for the sake of its preface mainly. she is a most accomplished lady, and her culture belongs rather to europe than to america. good bye. --r.w. emerson xlv. emerson to carlyle concord, august, dear friend,--this day came the letter dated june, with "steam packet" written by you on the outside, but no paddles wheeled it through the sea. it is forty-five days old, and too old to do its errand even had it come twenty days sooner--so far as printer and bookbinder are concerned. i am truly grieved for the mischance of the _john_ fraser, and will duly lecture the sinning bookseller. i noticed the misnomer in a letter of his new york correspondent, and, i believe, mentioned to you in a letter my fear of such a mischance. i am more sorry for the costliness of this adventure to you, though in a gracious note to me you cut down the fine one half. the new books, tardily printed, were tardily bound and tardily put to sea on the packet ship "ontario," which left new york for london on the st of august. at least this was the promise of munroe & co. i stood over the boxes in which they were packing them in the latter days of july. i hope they have not gone to john again, but you must keep an eye to both names.... i cannot tell you how glad i am that you have seen my brave senator, and seen him as i see him. all my days i have wished that he should go to england, and never more than when i listened two or three times to debates in the house of commons. we send out usually mean persons as public agents, mere partisans, for whom i can only hope that no man with eyes will meet them; and now those thirsty eyes, those portrait-eating, portrait-painting eyes of thine, those fatal perceptions, have fallen full on the great forehead which i followed about all my young days, from court-house to senate-chamber, from caucus to street. he has his own sins no doubt, is no saint, is a prodigal. he has drunk this rum of party too so long, that his strong head is soaked, sometimes even like the soft sponges, but the "man's a man for a' that." better, he is a great boy,--as wilful, as nonchalant and good-humored. but you must hear him speak, not a show speech which he never does well, but _with cause_ he can strike a stroke like a smith. i owe to him a hundred fine hours and two or three moments of eloquence. his voice in a great house is admirable. i am sorry if you decided not to visit him. he loves a _man,_ too. i do not know him, but my brother edward read law with him, and loved him, and afterwards in sick and unfortunate days received the steadiest kindness from him. well, i am glad you are to think in earnest in scotland of our cisatlantic claims. we shall have more rights over the wise and brave, i believe before many years or months. we shall have more men and a better cause than has yet moved on our stagnant waters. i think our church, so called, must presently vanish. there is a universal timidity, conformity, and rage; and on the other hand the most resolute realism in the young. the man alcott bides his time. i have a young poet in this village named thoreau, who writes the truest verses. i pine to show you my treasures; and tell your wife, we have women who deserve to know her. --r.w. emerson the yankees read and study the new volumes of _miscellanies_ even more than the old. the "sam johnson" and "scott" are great favorites. stearns wheeler corrected proofs affectionately to the last. truth and health be with you alway! xlvi. carlyle to emerson scotsbrig, ecclefechan, september, dear emerson,--a cheerful and right welcome letter of yours, dated th july, reached me here, duly forwarded, some three weeks ago; i delayed answering till there could some definite statement, as to bales of literature shipped or landed, or other matter of business forwarded a stage, be made. i am here, with my wife, rusticating again, these two months; amid diluvian rains, chartism, teetotalism, deficient harvest, and general complaint and confusion; which not being able to mend, all that i can do is to heed them as little as possible. "what care i for the house? i am only a lodger." on the whole, i have sat under the wing of saint swithin; uncheery, sluggish, murky, as the wettest of his days;--hoping always, nevertheless, that blue sky, figurative and real, does exist, and will demonstrate itself by and by. i have been the stupidest and laziest of men. i could not write even to you, till some palpable call told me i must. yesternight, however, there arrives a despatch from fraser, apprising me that the american _miscellanies,_ second cargo, are announced from portsmouth, and "will probably be in the river tomorrow"; where accordingly they in all likelihood now are, a fair landing and good welcome to them! fraser "knows not whether they are bound or not"; but will soon know. the first cargo, of which i have a specimen here, contented him extremely; only there was one fatality, the cloth of the binding was multiplex, party-colored, some sets done in green, others in red, blue, perhaps skyblue! now if the second cargo were not multiplex, party-colored, nay multiplex, _in exact concordance with the first,_ as seemed almost impossible--?--alas, in that case, one could not well predict the issue!--seriously, it is a most handsome book you have made; and i have nothing to return but thanks and again thanks. by the bye, if you do print a small second edition of the first portion, i might have had a small set of errata ready: but _where are they?_ the book only came into my hand here a few days ago; and i have been whipt from post to pillar without will of my own, without energy to form a will! the only glaring error i recollect at this moment is one somewhere in the second article on _jean paul:_ "osion" (i think, or some such thing) instead of "orson": it is not an original american error, but copied from the english; if the printer get his eye upon it, let him rectify; if not, not, i _deserve_ to have it stand against me there. fraser's joy, should the books prove either unbound or multiplex in the right way, will be great and unalloyed; he calculates on selling all the copies very soon. he has begun reprinting goethe's _wilhelm meister_ too, the _apprenticeship_ and _travels_ under one; and hopes to remunerate himself for that by and by: whether there will then remain any small peculium for me is but uncertain; meanwhile i correct the press, nothing doubting. one of these i call my best translation, the other my worst; i have read that latter, the _apprenticeship,_ again in these weeks; not without surprise, disappointment, nay, aversion here and there, yet on the whole with ever new esteem. i find i can pardon _all_ things in a man except purblindness, falseness of vision,--for, indeed, does not that presuppose every other kind of falseness? but let me hasten to say that the _french revolution,_ five hundred strong for the new england market, is also, as fraser advises, "to go to sea in three days." it is bound in red cloth, gilt; a pretty book, james says; which he will sell for twenty-five shillings here;--nay, the london brotherhood have "subscribed" for one hundred and eighty at once, which he considers great work. i directed him to consign to little and brown in boston, the _property_ of the thing _yours,_ with such phraseology and formalities as they use in those cases. i paid him for it yesterday (to save discount) l ; that is the whole cost to me, twenty or thirty pounds more than was once calculated on. do the best with it you can, my friend; and never mind the result. if the thing fail, as is likely enough, we will simply quit that transport trade, and my experience must be _paid for._ the title-page was "boston: charles c. little and james brown," then in a second line and smaller type, "london james fraser"; to which arrangement james made not the slightest objection, or indeed rather seemed to like it.--so much for trade matters: is it not _enough?_ i declare i blush sometimes, and wonder where the good emerson gets all his patience. we shall be through the affair one day, and find something better to speak about than dollars and pounds. and yet, as you will say, why not even of dollars? ah, there are leaden-worded [bills] of exchange i have seen which have had an almost sacred character to me! _pauca verba._ doubt not your new utterances are eagerly waited for here; above all things the "book" is what i want to see. you might have told me what it was about. we shall see by and by. a man that has discerned somewhat, and knows it for himself, let him speak it out, and thank heaven. i pray that they do not confuse you by praises; their blame will do no harm at all. praise is sweet to all men; and yet alas, alas, if the light of one's own heart go out, bedimmed with poor vapors and sickly false glitterings and flashings, what profit is it! happier in darkness, in all manner of mere outward darkness, misfortune and neglect, "so that _thou canst endure,_"--which however one cannot to all lengths. god speed you, my brother! i hope all good things of you; and wonder whether like phoebus apollo you are destined to be a youth forever.--sterling will be right glad to hear your praises; not unmerited, for he is a man among millions that john of mine, though his perpetual mobility wears me out at times. did he ever write to you? his latest speculation was that he should and would; but i fancy it is among the clouds again. i hear from him the other day, out of welsh villages where he passed his boyhood, &c., all in a flow of "lyrical recognition," hope, faith, and sanguine unrest; i have even some thoughts of returning by bristol (in a week or so, that must be), and seeing him. the dog has been reviewing me, he says, and it is coming out in the next _westminster!_ he hates terribly my doctrine of _"silence."_ as to america and lecturing, i cannot in this torpid condition venture to say one word. really it is not impossible; and yet lecturing is a thing i shall never grow to like; still less lionizing, martineau-ing: _ach gott!_ my wife sends a thousand regards; _she_ will never get across the ocean, you must come to her; she was almost _dead_ crossing from liverpool hither, and declares she will never go to sea for any purpose whatsoever again. never till next time! my good old mother is here, my brother john (home with his duke from italy); all send blessings and affection to you and yours. adieu till i get to london. yours ever, t. carlyle xlvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, december, my dear emerson,--what a time since we have written to one another! was it you that defalcated? alas, i fear it was myself; i have had a feeling these nine or ten weeks that you were expecting to hear from me; that i absolutely could not write. your kind gift of fuller's _eckermann_* was handed in to our hackney coach, in regent street, as we wended homewards from the railway and scotland, on perhaps the th of september last; a welcome memorial of distant friends and doings: nay, perhaps there was a letter two weeks prior to that:--i am a great sinner! but the truth is, i could not write; and now i can and do it! ---------- * "conversations with goethe. translated from the german of eckermann. by s.m. fuller." boston, . this was the fourth volume in the series of "specimens of foreign standard literature," edited by george ripley. the book has a characteristic preface by miss fuller, in which she speaks of carlyle as "the only competent english critic" of goethe. ---------- our sojourn in scotland was stagnant, sad; but tranquil, _well let alone,_--an indispensable blessing to a poor creature fretted to fiddle-strings, as i grow to be in this babylon, take it as i will. we had eight weeks of desolate rain; with about eight days bright as diamonds intercalated in that black monotony of bad weather. the old hills are the same; the old streams go gushing along as in past years, in past ages; but he that looks on them is no longer the same: and the old friends, where are they? i walk silent through my old haunts in that country; sunk usually in inexpressible reflections, in an immeasurable chaos of musings and mopings that cannot be reflected or articulated. the only work i had on hand was one that would not prosper with me: an article for the _quarterly review_ on the state of the working classes here. the thoughts were familiar to me, old, many years old; but the utterance of them, in what spoken dialect to utter them! the _quarterly review_ was not an eligible vehicle, and yet the eligiblest; of whigs, abandoned to dilettantism and withered sceptical conventionality, there was no hope at all; the _london-and-westminster_ radicals, wedded to their benthamee formulas, and tremulous at their own shadows, expressly rejected my proposal many months ago: tories alone remained; tories i often think have more stuff in them, in spite of their blindness, than any other class we have;--walter scott's _sympathy_ with his fellow creatures, what is it compared with sydney smith's, with a poor law commissioner's! well: this thing would not prosper with me in scotland at all; nor here at all, where nevertheless i had to persist writing; writing and burning, and cursing my destiny, and then again writing. finally the thing came out, as an essay on _chartism;_ was shown to lockhart, according to agreement; was praised by him, but was also found unsuitable by him; suitable to _explode_ a whole fleet of quarterlies into sky-rockets in these times! and now fraser publishes it himself, with some additions, as a little volume; and it will go forth in a week or two on its own footing; and england will see what she has to say to it, whether something or nothing; and one man, as usual, is right glad that he has nothing more to do with it. this is the reason why i could not write. i mean to send you the proof-sheets of this thing, to do with as you see cause; there will be but some five or six, i think. it is probable my new england brothers may approve some portions of it; may be curious to see it reprinted; you ought to say yes or no in regard to that. i think i will send all the sheets together; or at farthest, at two times. fraser, when we returned hither, had already received his _miscellanies;_ had about despatched his five hundred _french revolutions,_ insured and so, forth, consigned, i suppose, to your protection and the proper booksellers; probably they have got over from new york into your neighborhood before now. much good may they do you! the _miscellanies,_ with their variegated binding, proved to be in perfect order; and are now all sold; with much regret from poor james that we had not a thousand more of them! this thousand he now sets about providing by his own industry, poor man; i am revising the american copy in these days; the printer is to proceed forthwith. i admire the good stearns wheeler as i proceed; i write to him my thanks by this post, and send him by kennet a copy of goethe's _meister,_ for symbol of acknowledgment. another copy goes off for you, to the care of little and company. fraser has got it out two weeks ago; a respectable enough book, now that the version is corrected somewhat. tell me whether you dislike it less; what you do think of it? by the by, have you not learned to read german now? i rather think you have. it is three months spent well, if ever months were, for a thinking englishman of this age.--i hope kennet will use more despatch than he sometimes does. thank heaven for these boston steamers they project! may the nereids and poseidon favor them! they will bring us a thousand miles nearer, at one step; by and by we shall be of one parish after all. during autumn i speculated often about a hegira into new england this very year: but alas! my horror of _lecturing_ continues great; and what else is there for me to do there? these several years i have had no wish so pressing as to hold my peace. i begin again to feel some use in articulate speech; perhaps i shall one day have something that i want to utter even in your side of the water. we shall see. patience, and shuffle the cards.--i saw no more of webster; did not even learn well where he was, till lately i noticed in the newspapers that he had gone home again. a certain mr. brown (i think) brought me a letter from you, not long since; i forwarded him to cambridge and scotland: a modest inoffensive man. he said he had never personally met with emerson. my wife recalled to him the story of the scotch traveler on the top of vesuvius: "never saw so beautiful a scene in the world!"--"nor i," replied a stranger standing there, "except once; on the top of dunmiot, in the ochil hills in scotland."--"good heavens! that is a part of my estate, and i was never there! i will go thither." yes, do!--we have seen no other transoceanic that i remember. we expect your _book_ soon! we know the subject of your winter lectures too; at least miss martineau thinks she does, and makes us think so. heaven speed the work! heaven send my good emerson a clear utterance, in all right ways, of the nobleness that dwells in him! he knows what silence means; let him know speech also, in its season the two are like canvas and pigment, like darkness and light-image painted thereon; the one is essential to the other, not possible without the other. poor miss martineau is in newcastle-on-tyne this winter; sick, painfully not dangerously; with a surgical brother-in-law. her meagre didacticalities afflict me no more; but also her blithe friendly presence cheers me no more. we wish she were back. this silence, i calculate, forced silence, will do her much good. if i were a legislator, i would order every man, once a week or so, to lock his lips together, and utter no vocable at all for four-and-twenty hours: it would do him an immense benefit, poor fellow. such racket, and cackle of mere hearsay and sincere-cant, grows at last entirely deafening, enough to drive one mad, --like the voice of mere infinite rookeries answering your voice! silence, silence! sterling sent you a letter from clifton, which i set under way here, having added the address. he is not well again, the good sterling; talks of madeira this season again: but i hope otherwise. you of course read his sublime "article"? i tell him it was--a thing untellable! mr. southey has fallen, it seems, into a mournful condition: oblivion, mute hebetation, loss of all faculty. he suffered greatly, nursing his former wife in her insanity, for years till her relief by death; suffered, worked, and made no moan; the brunt of the task over, he sank into collapse in the hands of a new wife he had just wedded. what a lot for him; for her especially! the most excitable but most methodic man i have ever seen. [greek] that is a word that awaits us all.--i have my brother here at present; though talking of lisbon with his buccleuchs. my wife seems better than of late winters. i actually had a horse, nay actually have it, though it has gone to the country till the mud abate again! it did me perceptible good; i mean to try it farther. i am no longer so desperately poor as i have been for twelve years back; sentence of starvation or beggary seems revoked at last, a blessedness really very considerable. thanks, thanks! we send a thousand regards to the two little ones, to the two mothers. _valete nostrum memores._ --t. carlyle xlviii. emerson to carlyle concord, december, my dear friend,--not until the th of november did the five hundred copies of the _french revolution_ arrive in boston. fraser unhappily sent them to new york, whence they came not without long delays. they came in perfectly good order, not in the pretty red you told us of, but in a sober green;--not so handsome and salable a back, our booksellers said, as their own; but in every other respect a good book. the duties at the new york custom house on these and a quantity of other books sent by fraser amounted to $ . , whereof, i understand, the _french revolution_ pays for its share $ . no bill has been brought us for freight, so we conclude that you have paid it. i confided the book very much to the conscience and discretion of little and brown, and after some ciphering they settle to sell it at $ . per copy, wherefrom you are to get the cost of the book, and (say) $ . per copy profit, and no more. the booksellers eat the rest. the book is rather too dear for our market of cheap manufactures, and therefore we are obliged to give the booksellers a good percentage to get it off at all: for we stand in daily danger of a cheap edition from some rival neighbor. i hope to give you good news of its sale soon, although i have been assured today that no book sells, the times are so bad. brown had disposed of fifty or sixty copies to the trade, and twelve at retail. he doubted not to sell them all in six months.... several persons have asked me to get some copies of the _german romance_ sent over here for sale. last week a gentleman desired me to say he wanted four copies, and today i have been charged to procure another. i think, if you will send me by little and brown, through longman, six copies, we can find an immediate market. it gives me great joy to write to my friend once more, slow as you may think me to use the privilege. for a good while i dared believe you were coming hither, and why should i write?--and now for weeks i have been absorbed in my foolish lectures, of which only two are yet delivered and ended. there should be eight more; subject, "the present age." out of these follies i remember you with glad heart. lately i had sterling's letter, which, since i have read his article on you, i am determined to answer speedily. i delighted in the spirit of that paper, loving you so well and accusing you so conscientiously. what does he at clifton? if you communicate with him, tell him i thank him for his letter, and hold him dear. i am very happy lately in adding one or two new friends to my little circle, and you may be sure every friend of mine is a friend of yours. so when you come here you shall not be lonely. a new person is always to me a great event, and will not let me sleep.--i believe i was not wise to volunteer myself to this fever fit of lecturing again. i ought to have written instead in silence and serenity. yet i work better under this base necessity, and then i have a certain delight (base also?) in speaking to a multitude. but my joy in friends, those sacred people, is my consolation for the mishaps of the adventure, and they for the most part come to me from this _publication_ of myself.--after ten or twelve weeks i think i shall address myself earnestly to writing, and give some form to my formless scripture. i beg you will write to me and tell me what you do, and give me good news of your wife and your brother. can they not see the necessity of your coming to look after your american interests? my wife and mother love both you and them. a young man of new york told me the other day he was about getting you an invitation from an association in that city to give them a course of lectures on such terms as would at least make you whole in the expenses of coming thither. we could easily do that in boston. --r.w. emerson what manner of person is heraud? do you read landor, or know him, o seeing man? farewell! xlix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, january, my dear emerson,--it is you, i surely think, that are in my debt now;* nevertheless i must fling you another word: may it cross one from you coming hither--as near the _lizard point_ as it likes! --------- * the preceding letter had not yet arrived. --------- some four sheets making a pamphlet called _chartism_ addressed to you at concord are, i suppose, snorting along through the waters this morning, part of the cargo of the "british queen." at least i gave them to mr. brown (your unseen friend) about ten days ago, who promised to dispose of them; the "british queen," he said, was the earliest chance. the pamphlet itself (or rather booklet, for fraser has gilt it, &c., and asks five shillings for it as a book) is out since then; radicals and others yelping considerably in a discordant manner about it; i have nothing other to say to _you_ about it than what i said last time, that the sheets were _yours_ to do with as you saw good,--to burn if you reckoned that fittest. it is not entirely a political pamphlet; nay, there are one or two things in it which my american friends specially may like: but the interests discussed are altogether english, and cannot be considered as likely to concern new-englishmen very much. however, it will probably be itself in your hand before this sheet, and you will have determined what is fit. a copy of _wilhelm meister,_ two copies, one for stearns wheeler, are probably in some of the "line ships" at this time too: good voyage to them! the _french revolutions_ were all shipped, invoiced, &c.; they have, i will suppose, arrived safe, as we shall hear by and by. what freightages, landings, and embarkments! for only two days ago i sent you off, through kennet, another book: john sterling's _poems,_ which he has collected into a volume. poor john has overworked himself again, or the climate without fault on his side has proved too hard for him: he sails for madeira again next week! his doctors tell me there is no intrinsic danger; but they judge the measure safe as one of precaution. it is very mortifying he had nestled himself down at clifton, thinking he might now hope to continue there; and lo! he has to fly again.--did you get his letter? the address to him now will be, for three months to come, "_edward_ sterling, esq., south place, knightsbridge, london," his father's designation. farther i must not omit to say that richard monckton milnes purposes, through the strength of heaven, to _review_ you! in the next number of the _london and westminster,_ the courageous youth will do this feat, if they let him. nay, he has already done it, the paper being actually written he employed me last week in negotiating with the editors about it; and their answer was, "send us the paper, it promises very well." we shall see whether it comes out or not; keeping silence till then. milnes is a _tory_ member of parliament; think of that! for the rest, he describes his religion in these terms: "i profess to be a crypto-catholic." conceive the man! a most bland-smiling, semi- quizzical, affectionate, high-bred, italianized little man, who has long olive-blond hair, a dimple, next to no chin, and flings his arm round your neck when he addresses you in public society! let us hear now what he will say, of the american _vates._* --------- * the end of this letter has been cut off. --------- l. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, january, dear emerson,--your letter of the th of december, greatly, to my satisfaction, has arrived; the struggling steamship, in spite of all hurricanes, has brought it safe across the waters to me. i find it good to write you a word in return straightway; though i think there are already two, or perhaps even three, messages of mine to you flying about unacknowledged somewhere under the moon; nay, the last of them perhaps may go by the same packet as this, --having been forwarded, as this will be, to _liverpool,_ after the "british queen" sailed from london. your account of the _french revolution_ packages, and prognosis of what little and brown will do with them, is altogether as it should be. i apprised fraser instantly of his invoiceless books, &c.; he answers, that order has been taken in that long since, "instructions" sent, and, i conclude, arrangements for _bills_ least of all forgotten. i mentioned what share of the duty was his; and that your men meant to draw on him for it. that is all right. as to the _french revolution,_ i agree with your booksellers altogether about it; the american edition actually pleases myself better for looking at; nor do i know that this new english one has much superiority for use: it is despicably printed, i fear, so far as false spellings and other slovenlinesses can go. fraser "finds the people like it"; _credat judaeus;_--as for me, i have told him i will _not print any more_ with that man, but with some other man. curious enough, the price little and brown have fixed upon was the price i remember guessing at beforehand, and the result they propose to realize for me corresponds closely with my prophecy too. thanks, a thousand thanks, for all the trouble you never grudge to take. we shall get ourselves handsomely out of this export and import speculation; and know, taught at a rather _cheap_ rate, not to embark in the like again. there went off a _wilhelm meister_ for you, and a letter to announce it, several weeks ago; that was message first. your traveling neighbor, brown, took charge of a pamphlet named _chartism,_ to be put into the "british queen's" letter-bag (where i hope, and doubt not, he did put it, though i have seen nothing of him since); that and a letter in reference to it was message second. thirdly, i sent off a volume of _poems_ by sterling, likewise announced in that letter. and now this that i actually write is the fourth (it turns out to be) and last of all the messages. let us take arithmetic along with us in all things.--of _chartism_ i have nothing farther to say, except that fraser is striking off another one thousand copies to be called second edition; and that the people accuse me, not of being an incendiary and speculative sansculotte threatening to become practical, but of being a tory,--thank heaven. the _miscellanies_ are at press; at _two_ presses; to be out, as hope asseverates, in march: five volumes, without _chartism;_ with hoffmann and tieck from german romance, stuck in somewhere as appendix; with some other trifles stuck in elsewhere, chiefly as appendix; and no essential change from the boston edition. fraser, "overwhelmed with business," does not yet send me his net result of those two hundred and fifty copies sold off some time ago; so soon as he does, you shall hear of it for your satisfaction.--as to _german romance,_ tell my friends that it has been out of print these ten years; procurable, of late not without difficulty, only in the old-bookshops. the comfort is that the best part of it stands in the new _wilhelm meister:_ fraser and i had some thought of adding tieck's and richter's parts, had they suited for a volume; the rest may without detriment to anybody perish. such press-correctings and arrangings waste my time here, not in the agreeablest way. i begin, though in as sulky a state of health as ever, to look again towards some new kind of work. i have often thought of cromwell and puritans; but do not see how the subject can be presented still alive. a subject dead is not worth presenting. meanwhile i read rubbish of books; eichhorn, grimm, &c.; very considerable rubbish; one grain in the cart load worth pocketing. it is pity i have no appetite for lecturing! many applications have been made to me here;--none more touching to me than one, the day before yesterday, by a fine, innocent-looking scotch lad, in the name of himself and certain other booksellers' shopmen eastward in the city! i cannot get them out of my head. poor fellows! they have nobody to say an honest word to them, in this articulate-speaking world, and they apply to _me._--for you, good friend, i account you luckier; i do verily: lecture there what innumerable things you have got to say on "the present age";--yet withal do not forget to _write_ either, for that is the lasting plan after all. i have a curious note, sent me for inspection the other day; it is addressed to a scotch mr. erskine (famed among the saints here) by a madame necker, madame de stael's kinswoman, to whom he, the said mr. erskine, had lent your first pamphlet at geneva. she regards you with a certain love, yet a _shuddering_ love. she says, "cela sent l'americain qui apres avoir abattu les forets a coup de hache, croit qu'on doit de meme conquerir le monde intellectuel"! what r.m. milnes will say of you we hope also to see.--i know both heraud and landor; but alas, what room is here! another sheet with less of "arithmetic" in it will soon be allowed me. adieu, dear friend. yours, ever and ever, t. carlyle li. emerson to carlyle* new york, march, my dear friend,--i have just seen the steamer "british queen" enter the harbor from sea, and here lies the "great western," to sail tomorrow. i will not resist hints so broad upon my long procrastinations. you shall have at least a tardy acknowledgment that i received in january your letter of december, which i should have answered at once had it not found me absorbed in writing foolish lectures which were then in high tide. i had written you, a little earlier, tidings of the receipt of your _french revolution._ your letter was very welcome, as all your letters are. i have since seen tidings of the _essay on chartism_ in an english periodical, but have not yet got my proof-sheets. they are probably still rolling somewhere outside of this port, for all our packetships have had the longest passages: only one has come in for many a week. we will be as patient as we can. -------- * this letter appeared in the _athenaeum,_ for july , -------- i am here on a visit to my brother, who is a lawyer in this city, and lives at staten island, at a distance of half an hour's sail. the city has such immense natural advantages and such capabilities of boundless growth, and such varied and ever increasing accommodations and appliances for eye and ear, for memory and wit, for locomotion and lavation, and all manner of delectation, that i see that the poor fellows that live here do get some compensation for the sale of their souls. and how they multiply! they estimate the population today at , , and forty years ago, it is said, there were but , . but i always seem to suffer some loss of faith on entering cities. they are great conspiracies; the parties are all maskers, who have taken mutual oaths of silence not to betray each other's secret and each to keep the other's madness in countenance. you can scarce drive any craft here that does not seem a subornation of the treason. i believe in the spade and an acre of good ground. whoso cuts a straight path to his own bread, by the help of god in the sun and rain and sprouting of the grain, seems to me an _universal_ workman. he solves the problem of life, not for one, but for all men of sound body. i wish i may one day send you word, or, better, show you the fact, that i live by my hands without loss of memory or of hope. and yet i am of such a puny constitution, as far as concerns bodily labor, that perhaps i never shall. we will see. did i tell you that we hope shortly to send you some american verses and prose of good intent? my vivacious friend margaret fuller is to edit a journal whose first number she promises for the st of july next, which i think will be written with a good will if written at all. i saw some poetical fragments which charmed me,--if only the writer consents to give them to the public. i believe i have yet little to tell you of myself. i ended in the middle of february my ten lectures on the present age. they are attended by four hundred and fifty to five hundred people, and the young people are so attentive; and out of the hall ask me so many questions, that i assume all the airs of age and sapience. i am very happy in the sympathy and society of from six to a dozen persons, who teach me to hope and expect everything from my countrymen. we shall have many richmonds in the field presently. i turn my face homeward to-morrow, and this summer i mean to resume my endeavor to make some presentable book of essays out of my mountain of manuscript, were it only for the sake of clearance. i left my wife, and boy, and girl,--the softest, gracefulest little maiden alive, creeping like a turtle with head erect all about the house,--well at home a week ago. the boy has two deep blue wells for eyes, into which i gladly peer when i am tired. ellen, they say, has no such depth of orb, but i believe i love her better than ever i did the boy. i brought my mother with me here to spend the summer with william emerson and his wife and ruddy boy of four years. all these persons love and honour you in proportion to their knowledge and years. my letter will find you, i suppose, meditating new lectures for your london disciples. may love and truth inspire them! i can see easily that my predictions are coming to pass, and that. having waited until your fame wag in the floodtide, we shall not now see you at all on western shores. our saintly dr. t---, i am told, had a letter within a year from lord byron's daughter, _informing_ the good man of the appearance of a certain wonderful genius in london named thomas carlyle, and all his astonishing workings on her own and her friends' brains, and him the very monster whom the doctor had been honoring with his best dread and consternation these five years. but do come in one of mr. cunard's ships as soon as the booksellers have made you rich. if they fail to do so, come and read lectures which the yankees will pay for. give my love and hope and perpetual remembrance to your wife, and my wife's also, who bears her in her kindest heart, and who resolves every now and then to write to her, that she may thank her for the beautiful guido. you told me to send you no more accounts. but i certainly shall, as our financial relations are grown more complex, and i wish at least to relieve myself of this unwonted burden of booksellers' accounts and long delays, by sharing them. i have had one of their estimates by me a year, waiting to send. farewell. --r.w.e. lii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, april, my dear emerson,--a letter has been due to you from me, if not by palpable law of reciprocity, yet by other law and right, for some week or two. i meant to write, so soon as fraser and i had got a settlement effected. the traveling sumner being about to return into your neighborhood, i gladly accept his offer to take a message to you. i wish i had anything beyond a dull letter to send! but unless, as my wife suggests, i go and get you a d'orsay _portrait_ of myself, i see not what there is! do you read german or not? i now and then fall in with a curious german volume, not perhaps so easily accessible in the western world. tell me. or do you ever mean to learn it? i decidedly wish you would.--as to the d'orsay portrait, it is a real curiosity: count d'orsay the emperor of european dandies portraying the prophet of spiritual sansculottism! he came rolling down hither one day, many months ago, in his sun-chariot, to the bedazzlement of all bystanders; found me in dusty gray-plaid dressing-gown, grim as the spirit of presbyterianism (my wife said), and contrived to get along well enough with me. i found him a man worth talking to, once and away; a man of decided natural gifts; every utterance of his containing in it a wild caricature _likeness_ of some object or other; a dashing man, who might, some twenty years sooner born, have become one of bonaparte's marshals, and _is,_ alas,--count d'orsay! the portrait he dashed off in some twenty minutes (i was dining there, to meet landor); we have not chanced to meet together since, and i refuse to undergo any more eight-o'clock dinners for such an object.--now if i do not send you the portrait, after all? fraser's account of the _miscellanies_ stood legibly extended over large spaces of paper, and was in several senses amazing to look upon. i trouble _you_ only with the result. two hundred and forty-eight copies (for there were some one or two "imperfect"): all these he had sold, at two guineas each; and sold swiftly, for i recollect in december, or perhaps november, he told me he was "holding back," not to run entirely out. well, of the l and odd so realized for these books, the portion that belonged to me was l ,--the l had been the expense of handing the ware to emerson over the counter, and drawing in the coin for it! "rules of the trade";--it is a trade, one would surmise, in which the devil has a large interest. however,--not to spend an instant polluting one's eyesight with that side of it,--let me feel joyfully, with thanks to heaven and america, that i do receive such a sum in the shape of wages, by decidedly the noblest method in which wages could come to a man. without friendship, without ralph waldo emerson, there had been no sixpence of that money here. thanks, and again thanks. this earth is not an unmingled ball of mud, after all. sunbeams visit it;--mud _and_ sunbeams are the stuff it has from of old consisted of.--i hasten away from the ledger, with the mere good- news that james is altogether content with the "progress" of all these books, including even the well-abused _chartism_ book. we are just on the point of finishing our english reprint of the _miscellanies;_ of which i hope to send you a copy before long. and now why do not _you_ write to me? your lectures must be done long ago. or are you perhaps writing a book? i shall be right glad to hear of that; and withal to hear that you do not hurry yourself, but strive with deliberate energy to produce what in you is best. certainly, i think, a right book does lie in the man! it is to be remembered also always that the true value is determined by what we _do not_ write! there is nothing truer than that now all but forgotten truth; it is eternally true. he whom it concerns can consider it.--you have doubtless seen milnes's review of you. i know not that you will find it to strike direct upon the secret of _emerson,_ to hit the nail on the head, anywhere at all; i rather think not. but it is gently, not unlovingly done;--and lays the first plank of a kind of pulpit for you here and throughout all saxondom: a thing rather to be thankful for. it on the whole surpassed my expectations. milnes tells me he is sending you a copy and a note, by sumner. he is really a pretty little robin-redbreast of a man. you asked me about landor and heraud. before my paper entirely vanish, let me put down a word about them. heraud is a loquacious scribacious little man, of middle age, of parboiled greasy aspect, whom leigh hunt describes as "wavering in the most astonishing manner between being something and nothing." to me he is chiefly remarkable as being still--with his entirely enormous vanity and very small stock of faculty--out of bedlam. he picked up a notion or two from coleridge many years ago; and has ever since been rattling them in his head, like peas in an empty bladder, and calling on the world to "list the music of the spheres." he escapes _assassination,_ as i calculate, chiefly by being the cheerfulest best-natured little creature extant.--you cannot kill him he laughs so softly, even when he is like killing you. john mill said, "i forgive him freely for interpreting the universe, now when i find he cannot pronounce the _h's!_" really this is no caricature; you have not seen the match of heraud in your days. i mentioned to him once that novalis had said, "the highest problem of authorship is the writing of a bible."-- "that is precisely what i am doing!" answered the aspiring, unaspirating.*--of landor i have not got much benefit either. we met first, some four years ago, on cheyne walk here: a tall, broad, burly man, with gray hair, and large, fierce-rolling eyes; of the most restless, impetuous vivacity, not to be held in by the most perfect breeding,--expressing itself in high-colored superlatives, indeed in reckless exaggeration, now and then in a dry sharp laugh not of sport but of mockery; a wild man, whom no extent of culture had been able to tame! his intellectual faculty seemed to me to be weak in proportion to his violence of temper: the judgment he gives about anything is more apt to be wrong than right,--as the inward whirlwind shows him this side or the other of the object; and _sides_ of an object are all that he sees. he is not an original man; in most cases one but sighs over the spectacle of common place torn to rags. i find him painful as a writer; like a soul ever promising to take wing into the aether, yet never doing it, ever splashing webfooted in the terrene mud, and only splashing the worse the more he strives! two new tragedies of his that i read lately are the fatalest stuff i have seen for long: not an ingot; ah no, a distracted coil of wire-drawings salable in no market. poor landor has left his wife (who is said to be a fool) in italy, with his children, who would not quit her; but it seems he has honestly surrendered all his money to her, except a bare annuity for furnished lodgings; and now lives at bath, a solitary sexagenarian, in that manner. he visits london in may; but says always it would kill him soon: alas, i can well believe that! they say he has a kind heart; nor does it seem unlikely: a perfectly honest heart, free and fearless, dwelling amid such hallucinations, excitations, tempestuous confusions, i can see he has. enough of him! me he likes well enough, more thanks to him; but two hours of such speech as his leave me giddy and undone. i have seen some other lions, and lion's-_providers;_ but consider them a worthless species.--when will you write, then? consider my frightful outlook with a course of lectures to give "on heroes and hero-worship,"--from odin to robert burns! my wife salutes you all. good be in the concord household! yours ever, t. carlyle -------- * there is an account of heraud by an admirer in the _dial_ for october, , p. . it contrasts curiously and instructively with carlyle's sketch. -------- liii. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear friend,--three weeks ago i received a letter from you following another in the week before, which i should have immediately acknowledged but that i was promised a private opportunity for the th of april, by which time i promised myself to send you sheets of accounts. i had also written you from new york about the middle of march. but now i suppose mr. grinnell--a hospitable, humane, modest gentleman in providence, r.i., a merchant, much beloved by all his townspeople, and, though no scholar, yet very fond of silently listening to such-- is packing his trunk to go to england. he offered to carry any letters for me, and as at his house during my visit to providence i was eagerly catechised by all comers concerning thomas carlyle, i thought it behoved me to offer him for his brethren, sisters, and companions' sake, the joy of seeing the living face of that wonderful man. let him see thy face and pass on his way. i who cannot see it, nor hear the voice that comes forth of it, must even betake me to this paper to repay the best i can the love of the scottish man, and in the hope to deserve more. your letter announces _wilhelm meister,_ sterling's _poems,_ and _chartism._ i am very rich, or am to be. but kennet is no mercury. _wilhelm_ and _sterling_ have not yet made their appearance, though diligently inquired after by stearns wheeler and me. little and brown now correspond with longman, not with kennet. but they will come soon, perhaps are already arrived. _chartism_ arrived at concord by mail not until one of the last days of march, though dated by you, i think, the st of december. i returned home on the d of april, and found it waiting. all that is therein said is well and strongly said, and as the words are barbed and feathered the memory of men cannot choose but carry them whithersoever men go. and yet i thought the book itself instructed me to look for more. we seemed to have a right to an answer less concise to a question so grave and humane, and put with energy and eloquence. i mean that whatever probabilities or possibilities of solution occurred should have been opened to us in some detail. but now it stands as a preliminary word, and you will one day, when the fact itself is riper; write the second lesson; or those whom you have influenced will. i read the book twice hastily through, and sent it directly to press, fearing to be forestalled, for the london book was in boston already. little and brown are to print it. their estimate is:-- printing page for page with copy ....... $ . paper ..................................... . binding .................................. . total .................................... $ . costing say twenty cents per copy for one thousand copies bound. the book to sell for fifty cents: the bookseller's commission twenty percent on the retail price. the author's profit fifteen cents per copy. they intend, if a cheap edition is published,-- no unlikely event,--to stitch the book as pamphlet, and sell it at thirty-eight cents. i expect it from the press in a few days. i shall not on this sheet break into the other accounts, as i am expecting hourly from munroe's clerk an entire account of r.w.e. with t.c., of which i have furnished him with all the facts i had, and he is to write it out in the manner of his craft. i did not give it to him until i had made some unsuccessful experiments myself. i am here at work now for a fortnight to spin some single cord out of my thousand and one strands of every color and texture that lie raveled around me in old snarls. we need to be possessed with a mountainous conviction of the value of our advice to our contemporaries, if we will take such pains to find what that is. but no, it is the pleasure of the spinning that betrays poor spinners into the loss of so much good time. i shall work with the more diligence on this book to-be of mine, that you inform me again and again that my penny tracts are still extant; nay, that, beside friendly men, learned and poetic men read and even review them. i am like scholasticus of the greek primer, who was ashamed to bring out so small a dead child before such grand people. pygmalion shall try if he cannot fashion a better, certainly a bigger.--i am sad to hear that sterling sails again for his health. i am ungrateful not to have written to him, as his letter was very welcome to me. i will not promise again until i do it. i received a note last week forwarded by mr. hume from new york, and instantly replied to greet the good messenger to our babylonian city, and sent him letters to a few friends of mine there. but my brother writes me that he had left new york for washington when he went to seek him at his lodgings. i hope he will come northward presently, and let us see his face. _ april._--last evening came true the promised account drawn up by munroe's clerk, chapman. i have studied it with more zeal than success. an account seems an ingenious way of burying facts: it asks wit equal to his who hid them to find them. i am far as yet from being master of this statement, yet, as i have promised it so long, i will send it now, and study a copy of it at my leisure. it is intended to begin where the last account i sent you, viz. of _french revolution,_ ended, with a balance of $ . in your favor.... i send you also a paper which munroe drew up a long time ago by way of satisfying me that, so far as the first and second volumes [of the _miscellanies_] were concerned, the result had accorded with the promise that you should have $ , profit from the edition. we prosper marvelously on paper, but the realized benefit loiters. will you now set some friend of yours in fraser's shop at work on this paper, and see if this statement is true and transparent. i trust the munroe firm,-- chiefly nichols, the clerical partner,--and yet it is a duty to understand one's own affair. when i ask, at each six months' reckoning, why we should always be in debt to them, they still remind me of new and newer printing, and promise correspondent profits at last. by sending you this account i make it entirely an affair between you and them. you will have all the facts which any of us know. i am only concerned as having advanced the sums which are charged in the account for the payment of paper and printing, and which promise to liquidate themselves soon, for munroe declares he shall have $ to pay me in a few days. for the benefit of all parties bid your clerk sift them. one word more and i have done with this matter, which shall not be weary if it comes to good,--the account of the london five hundred _french revolution_ is not yet six months old, and so does not come in. neither does that of the second edition of the first and second volumes of the _miscellanies,_ for the same reason. they will come in due time. i have very good hope that my friend margaret fuller's journal--after many false baptisms now saying it will be called _the dial,_ and which is to appear in july-- will give you a better knowledge of our young people than any you have had. i will see that it goes to you when the sun first shines on its face. you asked me if i read german, and i forget if i have answered. i have contrived to read almost every volume of goethe, and i have fifty-five, but i have read nothing else: but i have not now looked even into goethe for a long time. there is no great need that i should discourse to you on books, least of all on _his_ books; but in a lecture on literature, in my course last winter, i blurted all my nonsense on that subject, and who knows but margaret fuller may be glad to print it and send it to you? i know not. a bronson alcott, who is a great man if he cannot write well, has come to concord with his wife and three children and taken a cottage and an acre of ground to get his living by the help of god and his own spade. i see that some of the education people in england have a school called "alcott house" after my friend. at home here he is despised and rejected of men as much as was ever pestalozzi. but the creature thinks and talks, and i am glad and proud of my neighbor. he is interested more than need is in the editor heraud. so do not fail to tell me of him. of landor i would gladly know your knowledge. and now i think i will release your eyes. yours always, r.w. emerson liv. emerson to carlyle concord, june, my dear carlyle,--since i wrote a couple of letters to you,--i know not exactly when, but in near succession many weeks ago,-- there has come to me _wilhelm meister_ in three volumes, goodly to see, good to read,--indeed quite irresistible;--for though i thought i knew it all, i began at the beginning and read to the end of the _apprenticeship,_ and no doubt shall despatch the _travels,_ on the earliest holiday. my conclusions and inferences therefrom i will spare you now, since i appended them to a piece i had been copying fairly for margaret fuller's _dial,_--"thoughts on modern literature," and which is the substance of a lecture in my last winter's course. but i learn that my paper is crowded out of the first number, and is not to appear until october. i will not reckon the accidents that threaten the ghost of an article through three months of pre- existence! meantime, i rest your glad debtor for the good book. with it came sterling's _poems,_ which, in the interim, i have acknowledged in a letter to him. sumner has since brought me a gay letter from yourself, concerning, in part, landor and heraud; in which as i know justice is not done to the one i suppose it is not done to the other. but heraud i give up freely to your tender mercies: i have no wish to save him. landor can be shorn of all that is false and foolish, and yet leave a great deal for me to admire. many years ago i have read a hundred fine memorable things in the _imaginary conversations,_ though i know well the faults of that book, and the _pericles_ and _aspasia_ within two years has given me delight. i was introduced to the man landor when i was in florence, and he was very kind to me in answering a multitude of questions. his speech, i remember, was below his writing. i love the rich variety of his mind, his proud taste, his penetrating glances, and the poetic loftiness of his sentiment, which rises now and then to the meridian, though with the flight, i own, rather of a rocket than an orb, and terminated sometimes by a sudden tumble. i suspect you of very short and dashing reading in his books; and yet i should think you would like him,--both of you such glorious haters of cant. forgive me, i have put you two together twenty times in my thought as the only writers who have the old briskness and vivacity. but you must leave me to my bad taste and my perverse and whimsical combinations. i have written to mr. milnes who sent me by sumner a copy of his article with a note. i addressed my letter to him at "london,"-- no more. will it ever reach him? i told him that if i should print more he would find me worse than ever with my rash, unwhipped generalization. for my journals, which i dot here at home day by day, are full of disjointed dreams, audacities, unsystematic irresponsible lampoons of systems, and all manner of rambling reveries, the poor drupes and berries i find in my basket after endless and aimless rambles in woods and pastures. i ask constantly of all men whether life may not be poetic as well as stupid? i shall try and persuade mr. calvert, who has sent to me for a letter to you, to find room in his trunk for a poor lithograph portrait of our concord "battle-field," so called, and village, that you may see the faint effigy of the fields and houses in which we walk and love you. the view includes my grandfather's house (under the trees near the monument), in which i lived for a time until i married and bought my present house, which is not in the scope of this drawing. i will roll up two of them, and, as sterling seems to be more nomadic than you, i beg you will send him also this particle of foreign parts. with this, or presently after it, i shall send a copy of the _dial._ it is not yet much; indeed, though no copy has come to me, i know it is far short of what it should be, for they have suffered puffs and dulness to creep in for the sake of the complement of pages; but it is better than anything we had; and i have some poetry communicated to me for the next number which i wish sterling and milnes to see. in this number what say you to the _elegy_ written by a youth who grew up in this town and lives near me,--henry thoreau? a criticism on persius is his also. from the papers of my brother charles, i gave them the fragments on homer, shakespeare, burke: and my brother edward wrote the little _farewell,_ when last he left his home. the address of the editors to the readers is all the prose that is mine, and whether they have printed a few verses for me i do not know. i am daily expecting an account for you from little and brown. they promised it at this time. it will speedily follow this sheet, if it do not accompany it. but i am determined, if i can, to send one letter which is not on business. send me some word of the lectures. i have yet seen only the initial notices. surely you will send me some time the d'orsay portrait. sumner thinks mrs. carlyle was very well when he saw her last, which makes me glad.--i wish you both to love me, as i am affectionately yours, --r.w. emerson lv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, july, my dear emerson,--surely i am a sinful man to neglect so long making any acknowledgment of the benevolent and beneficent arithmetic you sent me! it is many weeks, perhaps it is months, since the worthy citizen--your host as i understood you in some of your northern states--stept in here, one mild evening, with his mild honest face and manners; presented me your bookseller accounts; talked for half an hour, and then went his way into france. much has come and gone since then; letters of yours, beautiful disciples of yours:--i pray you forgive me! i have been lecturing; i have been sick; i have been beaten about in all ways. nay, at bottom, it was only three days ago that i got the _bibliopoliana_ back from fraser; to whom, as you recommended, i, totally inadequate like yourself to understand such things, had straightway handed them for examination. i always put off writing till fraser should have spoken. i did not urge him, or he would have spoken any day: there is my sin. fraser declares the accounts to be made out in the most beautiful manner; intelligible to any human capacity; correct so far as he sees, and promising to yield by and by a beautiful return of money. a precious crop, which we must not cut in the blade; mere time will ripen it into yellow nutritive ears yet. so he thinks. the only point on which i heard him make any criticism was on what he called, if i remember, "the number of copies _delivered,_"--that is to say, delivered by the printer and binder as actually available for sale. the edition being of a thousand, there have only come bodily forth; are "waste." our printers, it appears, are in the habit of _adding_ one for every fifty beforehand, whereby the _waste_ is usually made good, and more; so that in one thousand there will usually be some dozen called "author's copies" over and above. fraser supposes your printers have a different custom. that is all. the rest is apparently every-way _right;_ is to be received with faith; with faith, charity, and even hope,--and packed into the bottom of one's drawer, never to be looked at more except on the outside, as a memorial of one of the best and helpfulest of men! in that capacity it shall lie there. my lectures were in may, about _great men._ the misery of it was hardly equal to that of former years, yet still was very hateful. i had got to a certain feeling of superiority over my audience; as if i had something to tell them, and would tell it them. at times i felt as if i could, in the end, learn to speak. the beautiful people listened with boundless tolerance, eager attention. i meant to tell them, among other things, that man was still alive, nature not dead or like to die; that all true men continued true to this hour,--odin himself true, and the grand lama of thibet himself not wholly a lie. the lecture on mahomet ("the hero as prophet") astonished my worthy friends beyond measure. it seems then this mahomet was not a quack? not a bit of him! that he is a better christian, with his "bastard christianity," than the most of us shovel-hatted? i guess than almost any of you!--not so much as oliver cromwell ("the hero as king") would i allow to have been a quack. all quacks i asserted to be and to have been nothing, _chaff_ that would not grow: my poor mahomet "was _wheat_ with barn sweepings"; nature had tolerantly hidden the barn sweepings; and as to the _wheat,_ behold she had said yes to it, and it was growing!--on the whole, i fear i did little but confuse my esteemed audience: i was amazed, after all their reading of me, to be understood so ill;-- gratified nevertheless to see how the rudest _speech_ of a man's heart goes into men's hearts, and is the welcomest thing there. withal i regretted that i had not six months of preaching, whereby to learn to preach, and explain things fully! in the fire of the moment i had all but decided on setting out for america this autumn, and preaching far and wide like a very lion there. quit your paper formulas, my brethren,--equivalent to old wooden idols, _un_divine as they: in the name of god, understand that you are alive, and that god is alive! did the upholsterer make this universe? were you created by the tailor? i tell you, and conjure you to believe me literally, no, a thousand times no! thus did i mean to preach, on "heroes, hero-worship, and the heroic"; in america too. alas! the fire of determination died away again: all that i did resolve upon was to write these lectures down, and in some way promulgate them farther. two of them accordingly are actually written; the third to be begun on monday: it is my chief work here, ever since the end of may. whether i go to preach them a second time extempore in america rests once more with the destinies. it is a shame to talk so much about a thing, and have it still hang _in nubibus:_ but i was, and perhaps am, really nearer doing it than i had ever before been. a month or two now, i suppose, will bring us back to the old nonentity again. is there, at bottom, in the world or out of it, anything one would like so well, with one's whole heart _well,_ as peace? is lecturing and noise the way to get at that? popular lecturer! popular writer! if they would undertake in chancery, or heaven's chancery, to make a wise man mahomet second and greater, "mahomet of saxondom," not reviewed only, but worshiped for twelve centuries by all bulldom, yankee- doodle-doodom, felondom new zealand, under the tropics and in part of flanders,--would he not rather answer: thank you; but in a few years i shall be dead, twelve centuries will have become eternity; part of flanders immensity: we will sit still here if you please, and consider what quieter thing we can do! enough of this. richard milnes had a letter from you, one morning lately, when i met him at old rogers's. he is brisk as ever; his kindly _dilettantism_ looking sometimes as if it would grow a sort of earnest by and by. he has a new volume of poems out: i advised him to try prose; he admitted that poetry would not be generally read again in these ages,--but pleaded, "it was so convenient for veiling commonplace!" the honest little heart!--we did not know what to make of the bright miss --- here; she fell in love with my wife;--the _contrary,_ i doubt, with me: my hard realism jarred upon her beautiful rose-pink dreams. is not all that very morbid,--unworthy the children of odin, not to speak of luther, knox, and the other brave? i can do nothing with vapors, but wish them _condensed._ kennet had a copy of the english _miscellanies_ for you a good many weeks ago: indeed, it was just a day or two _before_ your advice to try green henceforth. has the _meister_ ever arrived? i received a controversial volume from mr. ripley: pray thank him very kindly. somebody borrowed the book from me; i have not yet read it. i did read a pamphlet which seems now to have been made part of it. norton* surely is a chimera; but what has the whole business they are jarring about become? as healthy _worshiping_ paganism is to seneca and company, so is healthy worshiping christianity to--i had rather not work the sum!--send me some swift news of yourself, dear emerson. we salute you and yours, in all heartiness of brotherhood. yours ever and always-- t. carlyle --------- * professor andrews norton. the controversy was that occasioned by professor norton's discourse on "the latest form of infidelity." --------- lvi. emerson to carlyle concord, august, my dear carlyle,--i fear, nay i know, that when i wrote last to you, about the st of july, i promised to follow my sheet immediately with a bookseller's account. the bookseller did presently after render his account, but on its face appeared the fact--which with many and by me unanswerable reasons they supported--that the balance thereon credited to you was not payable until the st of october. the account is footed "net sales of _french revolution_ to july, , due october , $ . ." let us hope then that we shall get, not only a new page of statement, but also some small payment in money a month hence. having no better story to tell, i told nothing. but i will not let the second of the cunard boats leave boston without a word to you. since i wrote by calvert came your letter describing your lectures and their success: very welcome news, for a good london newspaper, which i consulted, promised reports, but gave none. i have heard so oft of your projected trip to america, that my ear would now be dull, and my faith cold, but that i wish it so much. my friend, your audience still waits for you here willing and eager, and greatly larger no doubt than it would have been when the matter was first debated. our community begin to stand in some terror of transcendentalism, and the _dial,_ poor little thing, whose first number contains scarce anything considerable or even visible, is just now honored by attacks from almost every newspaper and magazine; which at least betrays the irritability and the instincts of the good public. but they would hardly be able to fasten on so huge a man as you are any party badge. we must all hear you for ourselves. but beside my own hunger to see and know you, and to hear you speak at ease and at large under my own roof, i have a growing desire to present you to three or four friends, and them to you. almost all my life has been passed alone. within three or four years i have been drawing nearer to a few men and women whose love gives me in these days more happiness than i can write of. how gladly i would bring your jovial light upon this friendly constellation, and make you too know my distant riches! we have our own problems to solve also, and a good deal of movement and tendency emerging into sight every day in church and state, in social modes and in letters. i sometimes fancy our cipher is larger and easier to read than that of your english society. you will naturally ask me if i try my hand at the history of all this,--i who have leisure, and write. no, not in the near and practical way in which they seem to invite. i incline to write philosophy, poetry, possibility,--anything but history. and yet this phantom of the next age limns himself sometimes so large and plain that every feature is apprehensible, and challenges a painter. i can brag little of my diligence or achievement this summer. i dot evermore in my endless journal, a line on every knowable in nature; but the arrangement loiters long, and i get a brick kiln instead of a house.--consider, however, that all summer i see a good deal of company,--so near as my fields are to the city. but next winter i think to omit lectures, and write more faithfully. hope for me that i shall get a book ready to send you by new-year's-day. sumner came to see me the other day. i was glad to learn all the little that he knew of you and yours. i do not wonder you set so lightly by my talkative countryman. he has brought nothing home but names, dates, and prefaces. at cambridge last week i saw brown for the first time. i had little opportunity to learn what he knew. mr. hume has never yet shown his face here. he sent me his poems from new york, and then went south, and i know no more of him. my mother and wife send you kind regards and best wishes,--to you and all your house. tell your wife that i hate to hear that she cannot sail the seas. perhaps now she is stronger she will be a better sailor. for the sake of america will she not try the trip to leith again? it is only twelve days from liverpool to boston. love, truth, and power abide with you always! --r.w.e. lvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, september, my dear emerson,--two letters of yours are here, the latest of them for above a week: i am a great sinner not to have answered sooner. my way of life has been a thing of petty confusions, uncertainties; i did not till a short while ago see any definite highway, through the multitude of byelanes that opened out on me, even for the next few months. partly i was busy; partly too, as my wont is, i was half asleep:--perhaps you do not know the _combination_ of these two predicables in one and the same unfortunate human subject! seeing my course now for a little, i must speak. according to your prognosis, it becomes at length manifest that i do _not_ go to america for the present. alas, no! it was but a dream of the fancy; projected, like the french shoemaker's fairy shoes, "in a moment of enthusiasm." the nervous flutter of may lecturing has subsided into stagnancy; into the feeling that, of all things in the world, public speaking is the hatefulest for me; that i ought devoutly to thank heaven there is no absolute compulsion laid on me at present to speak! my notion in general was but an absurd one: i fancied i might go across the sea, open my lips wide; go raging and lecturing over the union like a very lion (too like a frothy mountebank) for several months;--till i had gained, say a thousand pounds; therewith to retire to some small, quiet cottage by the shore of the sea, at least three hundred miles from this, and sit silent there for ten years to come, or forever and a day perhaps! that was my poor little day dream;--incapable of being realized. it appears, i have to stay here, in this brick babylon; tugging at my chains, which will not break for me: the less i tug, the better. ah me! on the whole, i have written down my last course of lectures, and shall probably print them; and you, with the aid of proof-sheets, may again print them; that will be the easiest way of lecturing to america! it is truly very weak to speak about that matter so often and long, that matter of coming to you; and never to come. _frey ist das herz,_ as goethe says, _doch ist der fuss gebunden._ after innumerable projects, and invitations towards all the four winds, for this summer, i have ended about a week ago by--simply going nowhither, not even to see my dear aged mother, but sitting still here under the autumn sky such as i have it; in these vacant streets i am lonelier than elsewhere, have more chance for composure than elsewhere! with sterne's starling i repeat to myself, "i can't get out."--well, hang it, stay in then; and let people alone of it! i have parted with my horse; after an experiment of seven or eight months, most assiduously prosecuted, i came to the conclusion that, though it did me some good, there was not _enough_ of good to warrant such equestrianism: so i plunged out, into green england, in the end of july, for a whole week of riding, an _explosion_ of riding, therewith to end the business, and send off my poor quadruped for sale. i rode over surrey,-- with a leather valise behind me and a mackintosh before; very singular to see: over sussex, down to pevensey where the norman bastard landed; i saw julius hare (whose _guesses at truth_ you perhaps know), saw saint dunstan's stithy and hammer, at mayfield, and the very tongs with which he took the devil by the nose;--finally i got home again, a right wearied man; sent my horse off to be sold, as i say; and finished the writing of my lectures on heroes. this is all the rustication i have had, or am like to have. i am now over head and ears in _cromwellian_ books; studying, for perhaps the fourth time in my life, to see if it be possible to get any credible face-to-face acquaintance with our english puritan period; or whether it must be left forever a mere hearsay and echo to one. books equal in dulness were at no epoch of the world penned by unassisted man. nevertheless, courage! i have got, within the last twelve months, actually, as it were, to _see_ that this cromwell was one of the greatest souls ever born of the english kin; a great amorphous semi-articulate _baresark;_ very interesting to me. i grope in the dark vacuity of baxters, neales; thankful for here a glimpse and there a glimpse. this is to be my reading for some time. the _dial_ no. came duly: of course i read it with interest; it is an utterance of what is purest, youngest in your land; pure, ethereal, as the voices of the morning! and yet--you know me--for me it is _too_ ethereal, speculative, theoretic: all theory becomes more and more confessedly inadequate, untrue, unsatisfactory, almost a kind of mockery to me! i will have all things condense themselves, take shape and body, if they are to have my sympathy. i have a _body_ myself; in the brown leaf, sport of the autumn winds, i find what mocks all prophesyings, even hebrew ones,--royal societies, and scientific associations eating venison at glasgow, not once reckoned in! nevertheless go on with this, my brothers. the world has many most strange utterances of a prophetic nature in it at the present time; and this surely is worth listening to among the rest. do you know english puseyism? good heavens! in the whole circle of history is there the parallel of that,--a true worship rising at this hour of the day for bands and the shovel-hat? distraction surely, incipience of the "final deliration" enters upon the poor old english formulism that has called itself for some two centuries a church. no likelier symptom of its being soon about to leave the world has come to light in my time. as if king macready should quit covent-garden, go down to st. stephen's, and insist on saying, _le roi le veut!_--i read last night the wonderfulest article to that effect, in the shape of a criticism on myself, in the _quarterly review._ it seems to be by one sewell, an oxford doctor of note, one of the chief men among the pusey-and-newman corporation. a good man, and with good notions, whom i have noted for some years back. he finds me a very worthy fellow; "true, most true,"--except where i part from puseyism, and reckon the shovel-hat to be an old bit of felt; then i am false, most false. as the turks say, _allah akbar!_ i forget altogether what i said of landor; but i hope i did not put him in the heraud category: a cockney windbag is one thing; a scholar and bred man, though incontinent, explosive, half-true, is another. he has not been in town, this year; milnes describes him as _eating_ greatly at bath, and perhaps even cooking! milnes did get your letter: i told you? sterling has the concord landscape; mine is to go upon the wall here, and remind me of many things. sterling is busy writing; he is to make falmouth do, this winter, and try to dispense with italy. he cannot away with my doctrine of _silence;_ the good john. my wife has been better than usual all summer; she begins to shiver again as winter draws nigh. adieu, dear emerson. good be with you and yours. i must be far gone when i cease to love you. "the stars are above us, the graves are under us." adieu. --t. carlyle lviii. emerson to carlyle concord, october, my dear friend,--my hope is that you may live until this creeping bookseller's balance shall incline at last to your side. my rude ciphering, based on the last account of this kind which i sent you in april from j. munroe & co., had convinced me that i was to be in debt to you at this time l or more; so that i actually bought l the day before the "caledonia" sailed to send you; but on giving my new accounts to j.m. & co., to bring the statement up to this time, they astonished me with the above written result. i professed absolute incredulity, but nichols* labored to show me the rise and progress of all my blunders. please to send the account with the last to your fraser, and have it sifted. that i paid, a few weeks since, $ . , and again, $ . , for printing and paper respectively, is true.--c.c. little & co. acknowledge the sale of more copies of the london edition _french revolution_ since the copies of july ; but these they do not get paid for until january , and we it seems must wait as long. we will see if the new-year's-day will bring us more pence. --------- * partner in the firm of j. munroe & co. --------- i received by the "acadia" a letter from you, which i acknowledge now, lest i should not answer it more at large on another sheet, which i think to do. if you do not despair of american booksellers send the new proofs of the lectures when they are in type to me by john green, newgate street (i believe), to the care of j. munroe & co. he sends a box to munroe by every steamer. i sent a _dial,_ no. , for you, to green. kennet, i hear, has failed. i hope he did not give his creditors my _miscellanies,_ which you told me were there. i shall be glad if you will draw cromwell, though if i should choose it would be carlyle. you will not feel that you have done your work until those devouring eyes and that portraying hand have achieved england in the nineteenth century. perhaps you cannot do it until you have made your american visit. i assure you the view of britain is excellent from new england. we are all a little wild here with numberless projects of social reform. not a reading man but has a draft of a new community in his waistcoat pocket. i am gently mad myself, and am resolved to live cleanly. george ripley is talking up a colony of agriculturists and scholars, with whom he threatens to take the field and the book.* one man renounces the use of animal food; and another of coin; and another of domestic hired service; and another of the state; and on the whole we have a commendable share of reason and hope. ----------- * preliminary to the experiment of brook farm, in . ----------- i am ashamed to tell you, though it seems most due, anything of my own studies, they seem so desultory, idle, and unproductive. i still hope to print a book of essays this winter, but it cannot be very large. i write myself into letters, the last few months, to three or four dear and beautiful persons, my country-men and women here. i lit my candle at both ends, but will now be colder and scholastic. i mean to write no lectures this winter. i hear gladly of your wife's better health; and a letter of jane tuckerman's, which i saw, gave the happiest tidings of her. we do not despair of seeing her yet in concord, since it is now but twelve and a half days to you. i had a letter from sterling, which i will answer. in all love and good hope for you and yours, your affectionate --r.w. emerson lix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, december, dear emerson,--my answer on this occasion has been delayed above two weeks by a rigorous, searching investigation into the procedure of the hapless book-conveyer, kennet, in reference to that copy of the _miscellanies._ i was deceived by hopes of a conclusive response from day to day; not till yesterday did any come. my first step, taken long ago, was to address a new copy of the book, not to you, luckless man, but to _lydia_ emerson, the fortunate wife; this copy green now has lying by him, waiting for the january steamer (we sail only once a month in this season); before the new year has got out of infancy the lady will be graciously pleased to make a few inches of room on her bookshelves for this celebrated performance. and now as to kennet, take the brief outcome of some dozen visitations, judicial interrogatories, searches of documents, and other piercing work on the part of methodic fraser, attended with demurrers, pleadings, false denials, false affirmings, on the part of innocent chaotic kennet: namely, that the said kennet, so urged, did in the end of the last week, fish up from his repositories your very identical book directed to munroe's care, duly booked and engaged for, in may last, but left to repose itself in the covent-garden crypts ever since without disturbance from gods or men! fraser has brought back the book, and you have lost it;--and the library of my native village in scotland is to get it; and not kennet any more in this world, but green ever henceforth is to be our book carrier. there is a history. green, it seems, addresses also to munroe; but the thing, i suppose, will now shift for itself without watching. as to the bibliopolic accounts, my friend! we will trust them, with a faith known only in the purer ages of roman catholicism,-- when papacy had indeed become a dubiety, but was not yet a quackery and falsehood, was a thing _as_ true as it could manage to be! that really may be the fact of this too. in any case what signifies it much? money were still useful; but it is not now so indispensable. booksellers by their knavery or their fidelity cannot kill us or cure us. of the truth of waldo emerson's heart to me, there is, god be thanked for it, no doubt at all. my hero-lectures lie still in manuscript. fraser offers no amount of cash adequate to be an outward motive; and inwardly there is as yet none altogether clear, though i rather feel of late as if it were clearing. to fly in the teeth of english puseyism, and risk such shrill welcome as i am pretty sure of, is questionable: yet at bottom why not? dost thou not as entirely reject this new distraction of a puseyism as man can reject a thing,--and couldst utterly abjure it, and even abhor it,--were the shadow of a cobweb ever likely to become momentous, the cobweb itself being _beheaded,_ with axe and block on tower hill, two centuries ago? i think it were as well to _tell_ puseyism that it has something of good, but also much of bad and even worst. we shall see. if i print the thing, we shall surely take in america again; either by stereotype or in some other way. fear not that!--do you attend at all to this new _laudism_ of ours? it spreads far and wide among our clergy in these days; a most notable symptom, very cheering to me many ways; whether or not one of the fatalest our poor church of england has ever exhibited, and betokening swifter ruin to it than any other, i do not inquire. thank god, men do discover at last that there is still a god present in their affairs, and must be, or their affairs are of the devil, naught, and worthy of being sent to the devil! this once given, i find that all is given; daily history, in kingdom and in parish, is an _experimentum crucis_ to show what is the devil's and what not. but on the whole are we not the _formalest_ people ever created under this sun? cased and overgrown with formulas, like very lobsters with their shells, from birth upwards; so that in the man we see only his breeches, and believe and swear that wherever a pair of old breeches are there is a man! i declare i could both laugh and cry. these poor good men, merciful, zealous, with many sympathies and thoughts, there do they vehemently appeal to me, _et tu, brute?_ brother, wilt thou too insist on the breeches being old,--not ply a needle among us here?--to the naked caliban, gigantic, for whom such breeches would not be a glove, who is stalking and groping there in search of new breeches and accoutrements, sure to get them, and to tread into nonentity whoever hinders him in the search,--they are blind as if they had no eyes. sartorial men; ninth-parts of a man:--enough of them. the second number of the _dial_ has also arrived some days ago. i like it decidedly better than the first; in fact, it is right well worth being put on paper, and sent circulating;--i find only, as before that it is still too much of a soul for circulating as it should. i wish you could in future contrive to mark at the end of each article who writes it, or give me some general key for knowing. i recognize emerson readily; the rest are of [greek] for most part. but it is all good and very good as a _soul;_ wants only a body, which want means a great deal! your paper on literature is incomparably the worthiest thing hitherto; a thing i read with delight. speak out, my brave emerson; there are many good men that listen! even what you say of goethe gratifies me; it is one of the few things yet spoken of him from personal insight, the sole kind of things that should be spoken! you call him _actual,_ not _ideal;_ there is truth in that too; and yet at bottom is not the whole truth rather this: the actual well-seen _is_ the ideal? the _actual,_ what really is and exists: the past, the present, the future no less, do all lie there! ah yes! one day you will find that this sunny-looking, courtly goethe held veiled in him a prophetic sorrow deep as dante's,--all the nobler to me and to you, that he _could_ so hold it. i believe this; no man can _see_ as he sees, that has not suffered and striven as man seldom did.-- apropos of _this,_ have you got miss martineau's _hour and man?_ how curious it were to have the real history of the negro toussaint, and his _black_ sansculottism in saint domingo,--the most atrocious form sansculottism could or can assume! this of a "black wilberforce-washington," as sterling calls it, is decidedly something. adieu, dear emerson: time presses, paper is done. commend me to your good wife, your good mother, and love me as well as you can. peace and health under clear winter skies be with you all. --t. carlyle my wife rebukes me sharply that i have "forgot her love." she is much better this winter than of old. having mentioned sterling i should say that he is at torquay (devonshire) for the winter, meditating new publication of poems. i work still in cromwellism; all but desperate of any feasible issue worth naming. i "enjoy bad health" too, considerably! lx. carlyle to mrs. emerson chelsea, london, february, dear mrs. emerson,--your husband's letter shall have answer when some moment of leisure is granted me; he will wait till then, and must. but the beautiful utterance which you send over to me; melodious as the voice of flutes, of aeolian harps borne on the rude winds so _far,_--this must have answer, some word or growl of answer, be there leisure or none! the "acadia," it seems, is to return from liverpool the day after tomorrow. i shove my paper-whirlpools aside for a little, and grumble in pleased response. you are an enthusiast; make arabian nights out of dull foggy london days; with your beautiful female imagination, shape burnished copper castles out of london fog! it is very beautiful of you;--nay, it is not foolish either, it is wise. i have a guess what of truth there may be in that; and you the fair alchemist, are you not all the richer and better that you know the _essential_ gold, and will not have it called pewter or spelter, though in the shops it is only such? i honor such alchemy, and love it; and have myself done something in that kind. long may the talent abide with you; long may i abide to have it exercised on me! except the annandale farm where my good mother still lives, there is no house in all this world which i should be gladder to see than the one at concord. it seems to stand as only over the hill, in the next parish to me, familiar from boyhood. alas! and wide-waste atlantics roll between; and i cannot walk over of an evening!--i never give up the hope of getting thither some time. were i a little richer, were i a little healthier; were i this and that--!--one has no fortunatus' "time-annihilating" or even "space-annihilating hat": it were a thing worth having in this world. my wife unites with me in all kindest acknowledgments: she is getting stronger these last two years; but is still such a _sailor_ as the island hardly parallels: had she the _space- annihilating hat,_ she too were soon with you. your message shall reach miss martineau; my dame will send it in her first letter. the good harriet is not well; but keeps a very courageous heart. she lives by the shore of the beautiful blue northumbrian sea; a "many-sounding" solitude which i often envy her. she writes unweariedly, has many friends visiting her. you saw her _toussaint l'ouverture:_ how she has made such a beautiful "black washington," or "washington-christ-macready," as i have heard some call it, of a rough-handed, hard-headed, semi- articulate gabbling negro; and of the horriblest phasis that "sansculottism" _can_ exhibit, of a black sansculottism, a musical opera or oratorio in pink stockings! it is very beautiful. beautiful as a child's heart,--and in so shrewd a head as that. she is now writing express children's-tales, which i calculate i shall find more perfect. some ten days ago there went from me to liverpool, perhaps there will arrive at concord by this very "acadia," a bundle of printed sheets directed to your husband: pray apprise the man of that. they are sheets of a volume called _lectures on heroes;_ the concord hero gets them without direction or advice of any kind. i have got some four sheets more ready for him here; shall perhaps send them too, along with this. some four again more will complete the thing. i know not what he will make of it;-- perhaps wry faces at it? adieu, dear mrs. emerson. we salute you from this house. may all good which the heavens grant to a kind heart, and the good which they never _refuse_ to one such, abide with you always. i commend myself to your and emerson's good mother, to the mischievous boys and--all the household. peace and fair spring- weather be there! yours with great regard, t. carlyle lxi. emerson to carlyle concord, february, my dear carlyle,--behold mr. george nichols's new digest and exegesis of his october accounts. the letter seems to me the most intelligible of the two papers, but i have long been that man's victim, semi-annually, and never dare to make head against his figures. you are a brave man, and out of the ring of his enchantments, and withal have magicians of your own who can give spell for spell, and read his incantations backward. i entreat you to set them on the work, and convict his figures if you can. he has really taken pains, and is quite proud of his establishment of his accounts. in a month it will be april, and be will have a new one to fender. little and brown also in april promise a payment on _french revolution,_--and i suppose something is due from _chartism._ we will hope that a bill of exchange will yet cross from us to you, before our booksellers fail. i hoped before this to have reached my last proofsheet, but shall have two or three more yet. in a fortnight or three weeks my little raft will be afloat.* expect nothing more of my powers of construction,--no shipbuilding, no clipper, smack, nor skiff even, only boards and logs tied together. i read to some mechanics' apprentices a long lecture on reform, one evening, a little while ago. they asked me to print it, but margaret fuller asked it also, and i preferred the _dial,_ which shall have the dubious sermon, and i will send it to you in that.--you see the bookseller reverendizes me notwithstanding your laudable perseverance to adorn me with profane titles, on the one hand, and the growing habit of the majority of my correspondents to clip my name of all titles on the other. i desire that you and your wife will keep your kindness for --r. w. emerson ---------- * the first series of _essays._ ---------- lxii. emerson to carlyle boston, april, my dear carlyle,--above you have a bill of exchange for one hundred pounds sterling drawn by t.w. ward & co. on the messrs. barings, payable at sight. let us hope it is but the first of a long series. i have vainly endeavored to get your account to be rendered by munroe & co. to the date of the st of april. it was conditionally promised for the day of the last steamer ( april). it is not ready for that which sails tomorrow and carries this. little & co. acknowledge a debt of $ . due to you st of april, and just now paid me; and regret that their sales have been so slow, which they attribute to the dulness of all trade among us for the last two years. you shall have the particulars of their account from munroe's statement of the account between you and me. munroe & co. have a long apology for not rendering their own account; their book keeper left them at a critical moment, they were without one six weeks, &c.;--but they add, if we could give you it, to what use, since we should be utterly unable to make you any payment at this time? to what use, surely? i am too much used to similar statements from our booksellers and others in the last few years to be much surprised; nor do i doubt their readiness or their power to pay all their debts at last; but a great deal of mutual concession and accommodation has been the familiar resort of our tradesmen now for a good while, a vice which they are all fain to lay at the doors of the government, whilst it belongs in the first instance, no doubt, to the rashness of the individual traders. these men i believe to be prudent, honest, and solvent, and that we shall get all our debt from them at last. they are not reckoned as rich as little and brown. by the next steamer they think they can promise to have their account ready. i am sorry to find that we have been driven from the market by the new york pirates in the affair of the six lectures.* the book was received from london and for sale in new york and boston before my last sheets arrived by the "columbia." appleton in new york braved us and printed it, and furthermore told us that he intends to print in future everything of yours that shall be printed in london,--complaining in rude terms of the monopoly your publishers here exercise, and the small commissions they allow to the trade, &c., &c. munroe showed me the letter, which certainly was not an amiable one. in this distress, then, i beg you, when you have more histories and lectures to print, to have the manuscript copied by a scrivener before you print at home, and send it out to me, and i will keep all appletons and corsairs whatsoever out of the lists. not only these men made a book (of which, by the by, munroe sends you by this steamer a copy, which you will find at john green's, newgate street), but the new york newspapers print the book in chapters, and you circulate for six cents per newspaper at the corners of all streets in new york and boston; gaining in fame what you lose in coin.--the book is a good book, and goes to make men brave and happy. i bear glad witness to its cheering and arming quality. --------- * "heroes and hero-worship." --------- i have put into munroe's box which goes to green a _dial_ no. also, which i could heartily wish were a better book. but margaret fuller, who is a noble woman, is not in sufficiently vigorous health to do this editing work as she would and should, and there is no other who can and will. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson lxiii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, may, my dear emerson,--your last letter found me on the southern border of yorkshire, whither richard milnes had persuaded me with him, for the time they call "easter holidays" here. i was to shake off the remnants of an ugly _influenza_ which still hung about me; my little portmanteau, unexpectedly driven in again by perverse accidents, had stood packed, its cowardly owner, the worst of all travelers, standing dubious the while, for two weeks or more; milnes offering to take me as under his cloak, i went with milnes. the mild, cordial, though something dilettante nature of the man distinguishes him for me among men, as men go. for ten days i rode or sauntered among yorkshire fields and knolls; the sight of the young spring, new to me these seven years, was beautiful, or better than beauty. solitude itself, the great silence of the earth, was as balm to this weary, sick heart of mine; not dragons of wantley (so they call lord wharncliffe, the wooden tory man), not babbling itinerant barrister people, fox-hunting aristocracy, nor yeomanry captains cultivating milk-white mustachios, nor the perpetual racket, and "dinner at eight o'clock," could altogether countervail the fact that green earth was around one and unadulterated sky overhead, and the voice of waters and birds,--not the foolish speech of cockneys at _all_ times!--on the last morning, as richard and i drove off towards the railway, your letter came in, just in time; and richard, who loves you well, hearing from whom it was, asked with such an air to see it that i could not refuse him. we parted at the "station," flying each his several way on the wings of steam; and have not yet met again. i went over to leeds, staid two days with its steeple-chimneys and smoke-volcano still in view; then hurried over to native annandale, to see my aged excellent mother yet again in this world while she is spared to me. my birth-land is always as the cave of trophonius to me; i return from it with a haste to which the speed of steam is slow, --with no smile on my face; avoiding all speech with men! it is not yet eight-and-forty hours since i got back; your letter is among the first i answer, even with a line; your new book--but we will not yet speak of that.... my friend, i _thank_ you for this volume of yours; not for the copy alone which you send to me, but for writing and printing such a book. _euge!_ say i, from afar. the voice of one crying in the desert;--it is once more the voice of a _man._ ah me! i feel as if in the wide world there were still but this one voice that responded intelligently to my own; as if the rest were all hearsays, melodious or unmelodious echoes; as if this alone were true and alive. my blessing on you, good ralph waldo! i read the book all yesterday; my wife scarcely yet done with telling me her news. it has rebuked me, it has aroused and comforted me. objections of all kinds i might make, how many objections to superficies and detail, to a dialect of thought and speech as yet imperfect enough, a hundred-fold too narrow for the infinitude it strives to speak: but what were all that? it is an infinitude, the real vision and belief of one, seen face to face: a "voice of the heart of nature" is here once more. this is the one fact for me, which absorbs all others whatsoever. persist, persist; you have much to say and to do. these voices of yours which i likened to unembodied souls, and censure sometimes for having no body,--how can they have a body? they are light-rays darting upwards in the east; they will yet make much and much to have a body! you are a new era, my man, in your new huge country: god give you strength, and speaking and silent faculty, to do such a work as seems possible now for you! and if the devil will be pleased to set all the popularities _against_ you and evermore against you,--perhaps that is of all things the very kindest any _angel_ could do. of myself i have nothing good to report. years of sick idleness and barrenness have grown wearisome to me. i do nothing. i waver and hover, and painfully speculate even now as to health, and where i shall spend the summer out of london! i am a very poor fellow;--but hope to grow better by and by. then this _alluvies_ of foul lazy stuff that has long swum over me may perhaps yield the better harvest. _esperons!_--hail to all of you from both of us. yours ever, t. carlyle lxiv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, may, my dear emerson,--about a week ago i wrote to you, after too long a silence. since that there has another letter come, with a draft of l in it, and other comfortable items not pecuniary; a line in acknowledgment of the money is again very clearly among my duties. yesterday, on my first expedition up to town, i gave the paper to fraser; who is to present the result to me in the shape of cash tomorrow. thanks, and again thanks. this l , i think, nearly clears off for me the outlay of the second _french revolution;_ an ill-printed, ill-conditioned publication, the prime cost of which, once all lying saved from the atlantic whirlpools and hard and fast in my own hand, it was not perhaps well done to venture thitherward again. to the new trouble of my friends withal! we will now let the rest of the game play itself out as it can; and my friends, and my one friend, must not take more trouble than their own kind feelings towards me will reward. the books, the _dial_ no. , and appleton's pirated _lectures,_ are still expected from green. in a day or two he will send them: if not, we will jog him into wakefulness, and remind him of the _parcels delivery company,_ which carries luggage of all kinds, like mere letters, many times a day, over all corners of our babylon. in this, in the universal british _penny post,_ and a thing or two of that sort, men begin to take advantage of their crowded ever-whirling condition in these days, which brings such enormous disadvantages along with it _un_sought for.-- bibliopolist appleton does not seem to be a "hero,"--except after his own fashion. he is one of those of whom the scotch say, "thou wouldst do little for god if the devil were dead!" the devil is unhappily dead, in that international bibliopolic province, and little hope of his reviving for some time; whereupon this is what squire appleton does. my respects to him even in the bedouin department, i like to see a complete man, a clear decisive bedouin. for the rest, there is one man who ought to be apprised that i can now stand robbery a little better; that i am no longer so very poor as i once was. in fraser himself there do now lie vestiges of money! i feel it a great relief to see, for a year or two at least, the despicable bugbear of beggary driven out of my sight; for _which_ small mercy, at any rate, be the heavens thanked. fraser himself, for these two editions, one thousand copies each, of the lectures and _sartor,_ pays me down on the nail l ; consider that miracle! of the other books which he is selling on a joint-stock basis, the poor man likewise promises something, though as yet, ever since new-year's-day, i cannot learn what, owing to a grievous sickness of his,--for which otherwise i cannot but be sorry, poor fraser within the cockney limits being really a worthy, accurate, and rather friendly creature. so you see me here provided with bread and water for a season,--it is but for a season one needs either water or bread, --and rejoice with me accordingly. it is the one useful, nay, i will say the one _innoxious,_ result of all this trumpeting, reviewing, and dinner-invitationing; from which i feel it indispensable to withdraw myself more and more resolutely, and altogether count it as a thing not there. solitude is what i long and pray for. in the babble of men my own soul goes all to babble: like soil you were forever _screening,_ tumbling over with shovels and riddles; in _which_ soil no fruit can grow! my trust in heaven is, i shall yet get away "to some cottage by the sea-shore"; far enough from all the mad and mad making things that dance round me here, which i shall then look on only as a theatrical phantasmagory, with an eye only to the _meaning_ that lies hidden in it. you, friend emerson, are to be a farmer, you say, and dig earth for your living? well; i envy you that as much as any other of your blessednesses. meanwhile, i sit shrunk together here in a small _dressing-closet,_ aloft in the back part of the house, excluding all cackle and cockneys; and, looking out over the similitude of a may grove (with little brick in it, and only the minarets of westminster and gilt cross of st. paul's visible in the distance, and the enormous roar of london softened into an enormous hum), endeavor to await what will betide. i am busy with luther in one marheinecke's very long- winded book. i think of innumerable things; steal out westward at sunset among the kensington lanes; would this _may_ weather last, i might be as well here as in any attainable place. but june comes; the rabid dogs get muzzles; all is brown-parched, dusty, suffocating, desperate, and i shall have to run! enough of all that. on my paper there comes, or promises to come, as yet simply nothing at all. patience;--and yet who can be patient? had you the happiness to see yourself not long ago, in _fraser's magazine,_ classed _nominatim_ by an emphatic earnest man, not without a kind of splay-footed strength and sincerity,--among the chief heresiarchs of the--world? perfectly right. fraser was very anxious to know what i thought of the paper,--"by an entirely unknown man in the country." i counseled "that there was something in him, which he ought to improve by holding his peace for the next five years." adieu, dear emerson; there is not a scrap more of paper. all copies of your _essays_ are out at use; with what result we shall perhaps see. as for me i love the book and man, and their noble rustic herohood and manhood:--one voice as of a living man amid such jabberings of galvanized corpses: _ach gott!_ yours evermore, t. carlyle lxv. emerson to carlyle concord, may, my dear friend,--in my letter written to you on the st of may (enclosing a bill of exchange of l sterling, which, i hope, arrived safely) i believe i promised to send you by the next steamer an account for april. but the false tardy munroe & co. did not send it to me until one day too late. here it is, as they render it, compiled from little and brown's statement and their own. i have never yet heard whether you have received their _analysis_ or explanation of the last abstract they drew up of the mutual claims between the great houses of t.c. and r.w.e., and i am impatient to know whether you have caused it to be examined, and whether it was satisfactory. this new one is based on that, and if that was incorrect, this must be also. i am daily looking for some letter from you, which is perhaps near at hand. if you have not written, write me exactly and immediately on this subject, i entreat you. you will see that in this sheet i am charged with a debt to you of $ . . i shall tomorrow morning pay to mr. james brown (of little and brown), who should be the bearer of this letter, $ . , which sum he will pay you in its equivalent of english coin. i give mr. brown an introductory letter to you, and you must not let slip the opportunity to make the man explain his own accounts, if any darkness hang on them. in due time, perhaps, we can send you munroe, and nichols also, and so all your factors shall render direct account of themselves to you. i believe i shall also make brown the bearer of a little book written some time since by a young friend of mine in a very peculiar frame of mind,--thought by most persons to be mad,--and of the publication of which i took the charge.* mr. very requested me to send you a copy.--i had a letter from sterling, lately, which rejoiced me in all but the dark picture it gave of his health. i earnestly wish good news of him. when you see him, show him these poems, and ask him if they have not a grandeur. --------- * _essays and poems,_ by jones very,--a little volume, the work of an exquisite spirit. some of the poems it contains are as if written by a george herbert who had studied shakespeare, read wordsworth, and lived in america. --------- when i wrote last, i believe all the sheets of the six lectures had not come to me. they all arrived safely, although the last package not until our american pirated copy was just out of press in new york. my private reading was not less happy for this robbery whereby the eager public were supplied. odin was all new to me; and mahomet, for the most part; and it was all good to read, abounding in truth and nobleness. yet, as i read these pages, i dream that your audience in london are less prepared to hear, than is our new england one. i judge only from the tone. i think i know many persons here who accept thoughts of this vein so readily now, that, if you were speaking on this shore, you would not feel that emphasis you use to be necessary. i have been feeble and almost sick during all the spring, and have been in boston but once or twice, and know nothing of the reception the book meets from the catholic carlylian church. one reader and friend of yours dwells now in my house, and, as i hope, for a twelvemonth to come,--henry thoreau,--a poet whom you may one day be proud of;--a noble, manly youth, full of melodies and inventions. we work together day by day in my garden, and i grow well and strong. my mother, my wife, my boy and girl, are all in usual health, and according to their several ability salute you and yours. do not cease to tell me of the health of your wife and of the learned and friendly physician. yours, r.w. emerson lxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, june, dear emerson,--now that there begins again to be some program possible of my future motions for some time, i hastily despatch you some needful outline of the same. after infinite confused uncertainty, i learn yesternight that there has been a kind of country-house got for us, at a place called annan, on the north shore of the solway frith, in my native county of dumfries. you passed through the little burgh, i suppose, in your way homeward from craigenputtock: it stands about midway, on the great road, between dumfries and carlisle. it is the place where i got my schooling;--consider what a _preter_natural significance such a scene has now got for me! it is within eight miles of my aged mother's dwelling-place; within riding distance, in fact, of almost all the kindred i have in the world.--the house, which is built since my time, and was never yet seen by me, is said to be a reasonable kind of house. we get it for a small sum in proportion to its value (thanks to kind accident); the three hundred miles of travel, very hateful to me, will at least entirely obliterate all traces of _this_ dust- babel; the place too being naturally almost ugly, as far as a green leafy place in sight of sea and mountains can be so nicknamed, the whole gang of picturesque tourists, cockney friends of nature, &c., &c., who penetrate now by steam, in shoals every autumn, into the very centre of the scotch highlands, will be safe over the horizon! in short, we are all bound thitherward in few days; must cobble up some kind of gypsy establishment; and bless heaven for solitude, for the sight of green fields, heathy moors; for a silent sky over one's head, and air to breathe which does not consist of coal-smoke, finely powdered flint, and other beautiful _etceteras_ of that kind among others! god knows i have need enough to be left altogether alone for some considerable while (_forever,_ as it at present seems to me), to get my inner world, and my poor bodily nerves, both all torn to pieces, set in order a little again! after much vain reluctance therefore; disregarding many considerations,-- disregarding _finance_ in the front of these,--i am off; and calculate on staying till i am heartily _sated_ with country, till at least the last gleam of summer weather has departed. my way of life has all along hitherto been a resolute _staying at home:_ i find now, however, that i must alter my habits, cost what it may; that i cannot live all the year round in london, under pain of dying or going rabid;--that i must, in fact, learn to travel, as others do, and be hanged to me! wherefore, in brief, my friend, our address for the next two or three months is "newington lodge, annan, scotland,"--where a letter from emerson will be a right pleasant visitor! _faustum sit._ my second piece of news, not less interesting i hope, is that _emerson's essays,_ the book so called, is to be reprinted here; nay, i think, is even now at press,--in the hands of that invaluable printer, robson, who did the _miscellanies._ fraser undertakes it, "on _half-profits_";--t. carlyle writing a preface,*--which accordingly he did (in rather sullen humor,--not with you!) last night and the foregoing days. robson will stand by the text to the very utmost; and i also am to read the proof sheets. the edition is of seven hundred and fifty; which fraser thinks he will sell. with what joy shall i then sack up the small ten pounds sterling perhaps of "half-profits," and remit them to the man emerson; saying: there, man! tit for tat, the reciprocity _not_ all on one side!--i ought to say, moreover, that this was a volunteer scheme of fraser's; the risk is all his, the origin of it was with him: i advised him to have it reviewed, as being a really noteworthy book; "write you a preface," said he, "and i will reprint it";--to which, after due delay and meditation; i consented. let me add only, on this subject, the story of a certain rio,** a french breton, with long, distracted, black hair. he found your book at richard milnes's, a borrowed copy, and could not borrow it; whereupon he appeals passionately to me; carries off my wife's copy, this distracted rio; and is to "read it _four_ times" during this current autumn, at quimperle, in his native celtdom! the man withal is a _catholic,_ eats fish on friday;--a great lion here when he visits us; one of the _naivest_ men in the world: concerning whom nevertheless, among fashionables, there is a controversy, "whether he is an angel, or partially a windbag and _humbug?_" such is the lot of loveliness in the world! a truer man i never saw; how _wind_less, how windy, i will not compute at present. me he likes greatly (in spite of my unspeakable contempt for his fish on friday); likes,--but withal is apt to bore. ---------- * the greater part of this interesting preface is reprinted in mr. george willis cooke's excellent book on the _life, writings, and philosophy of emerson,_ boston, , p. . ** the author of a book once much admired, _de 'l'art chretien._ in a later work entitled _epilogue a l'art chretien,_ but actually a sort of autobiography, written in the naivest spirit of personal conceit and pious sentimentalism, m. rio gives an exceedingly entertaining account of his intercourse with carlyle. ---------- enough, dear emerson; and more than enough for a day so hurried. our island is all in a ferment electioneering: tories to come in;--perhaps not to come in; at all events not to stay long, without altering their figure much! i sometimes ask myself rather earnestly, what is the duty of a citizen? to be as i have been hitherto, a pacific _alien?_ that is the _easiest,_ with my humor!--our brave dame here, just rallying for the _remove,_ sends loving salutations. good be with you all always. adieu, dear emerson. --t. carlyle appleton's book of _hero-worship_ has come; for which pray thank mr. munroe for me: it is smart on the surface; but printed altogether scandalously! lxvii. emerson to carlyle concord, july, my dear carlyle,--eight days ago--when i had gone to nantasket beach, to sit by the sea and inhale its air and refresh this puny body of mine--came to me your letter, all bounteous as all your letters are, generous to a fault, generous to the shaming of me, cold, fastidious, ebbing person that i am. already in a former letter you had said too much good of my poor little arid book,-- which is as sand to my eyes,--and now in this you tell me it shall be printed in london, and graced with a preface from the man of men. i can only say that i heartily wish the book were better, and i must try and deserve so much favor from the kind gods by a bolder and truer living in the months to come; such as may perchance one day relax and invigorate this cramp hand of mine, and teach it to draw some grand and adequate strokes, which other men may find their own account and not their good-nature in repeating. yet i think i shall never be killed by my ambition. i behold my failures and shortcomings there in writing, wherein it would give me much joy to thrive, with an equanimity which my worst enemy might be glad to see. and yet it is not that i am occupied with better things. one could well leave to others the record, who was absorbed in the life. but i have done nothing. i think the branch of the "tree of life" which headed to a bud in me, curtailed me somehow of a drop or two of sap, and so dwarfed all my florets and drupes. yet as i tell you i am very easy in my mind, and never dream of suicide. my whole philosophy--which is very real--teaches acquiescence and optimism. only when i see how much work is to be done, what room for a poet--for any spiritualist--in this great, intelligent, sensual, and avaricious america, i lament my fumbling fingers and stammering tongue. i have sometimes fancied i was to catch sympathetic activity from contact with noble persons; that you would come and see me; that i should form stricter habits of love and conversation with some men and women here who are already dear to me,--and at some rate get off the numb palsy, and feel the new blood sting and tingle in my fingers' ends. well, sure i am that the right word will be spoken though i cut out my tongue. thanks, too, to your munificent fraser for his liberal intention to divide the profits of the _essays._ i wish, for the encouragement of such a bookseller, there were to be profits to divide. but i have no faith in your public for their heed to a mere book like mine. there are things i should like to say to them, in a lecture-room or in a "steeple house," if i were there. seven hundred and fifty copies! ah no! and so my dear brother has quitted the roaring city, and gone back in peace to his own land,--not the man he left it, but richer every way, chiefly in the sense of having done something valiantly and well, which the land, and the lands, and all that wide elastic english race in all their dispersion, will know and thank him for. the holy gifts of nature and solitude be showered upon you! do you not believe that the fields and woods have their proper virtue, and that there are good and great things which will not be spoken in the city? i give you joy in your new and rightful home, and the same greetings to jane carlyle! with thanks and hopes and loves to you both. --r.w. emerson as usual at this season of the year, i, incorrigible spouting yankee, am writing an oration to deliver to the boys in one of our little country colleges, nine days hence.* you will say i do not deserve the aid of any muse. o but if you knew how natural it is to me to run to these places! besides, i always am lured on by the hope of saying something which shall stick by the good boys. i hope brown did not fail to find you, with thirty-eight sovereigns (i believe) which he should carry you. ---------- * "the method of nature. an address to the society of the adelphi, in waterville college, maine, august , ." ---------- lxviii. carlyle to emerson newby, annan, scotland, august, my dear emerson,--two days ago your letter, direct from liverpool, reached me here; only fifteen days after date on the other side of the ocean: one of the swiftest messengers that have yet come from you. steamers have been known to come, they say, in nine days. by and by we shall visibly be, what i always say we virtually are, members of neighboring parishes; paying continual visits to one another. what is to hinder huge london from being to universal saxondom what small mycale was to the tribes of greece,--a place to hold your [greek] in? a meeting of _all the english_ ought to be as good as one of all the ionians; --and as homeric "equal ships" are to bristol steamers, so, or somewhat so, may new york and new holland be to ephesus and crete, with their distances, relations, and etceteras!--few things on this earth look to me greater than the future of that family of men. it is some two months since i got into this region; my wife followed me with her maid and equipments some five weeks ago. newington lodge, when i came to inspect it with eyes, proved to be too rough an undertaking: upholsterers, expense and confusion,--the cynic snarled, "give me a whole tub rather! i want nothing but shelter from the elements, and to be let alone of all men." after a little groping, this little furnished cottage, close by the beach of the solway frith, was got hold of: here we have been, in absolute seclusion, for a month,--no company but the corn-fields and the everlasting sands and brine; mountains, and thousand-voiced memories on all hands, sending their regards to one, from the distance. daily (sometimes even nightly!) i have swashed about in the sea; i have been perfectly idle, at least inarticulate; i fancy i feel myself considerably sounder of body and of mind. deeply do i agree with you in the great unfathomable meaning of a colloquy with the dumb ocean, with the dumb earth, and their eloquence! a legislator would prescribe some weeks of that annually as a religious duty for all mortals, if he could. a legislator will prescribe it for himself, since he can! you too have been at nantasket; my friend, this great rough purple sea-flood that roars under my little garret-window here, this too comes from nantasket and farther,--swung hitherward by the moon and the sun. it cannot be said that i feel "happy" here, which means joyful;-- as far as possible from that. the cave of trophonius could not be grimmer for one than this old land of graves. but it is a sadness worth any hundred "happinesses." _n'en parlons plus._ by the way, have you ever clearly remarked withal what a despicable function "view-hunting" is. analogous to "philanthropy," "pleasures of virtue," &c., &c. i for my part, in these singular circumstances, often find an honestly ugly country the preferable one. black eternal peat-bog, or these waste-howling sands with mews and seagulls: you meet at least no cockney to exclaim, "how charming it is!" one of the last things i did in london was to pocket bookseller brown's l : a very honest-looking man, that brown; whom i was sorry i could not manage to welcome better. you asked in that letter about some other item of business,--munroe's or brown's account to acknowledge?--something or other that i was to _do:_ i only remember vaguely that it seemed to me i had as good as done it. your letter is not here now, but at chelsea. three sheets of the _essays_ lay waiting me at my mother's, for correction; needing as good as none. the type and shape is the same as that of late _lectures on heroes._ robson the printer, who is a very punctual intelligent man, a scholar withal, undertook to be himself the corrector of the other sheets. i hope you will find them "exactly conformable to the text, _minus_ mere typographical blunders and the more salient american spellings (labor for labour, &c.)." the book is perhaps just getting itself subscribed in these very days. it should have been out before now: but poor fraser is in the country, dangerously ill, which perhaps retards it a little; and the season, at any rate, is at the very dullest. by the first conveyance i will send a certain lady two copies of it. little danger but the edition will sell; fraser knows his own trade well enough, and is as much a "desperado" as poor attila schmelzle was! poor james, i wish he were well again; but really at times i am very anxious about him.--the book will sell; will be liked and disliked. harriet martineau, whom i saw in passing hitherward, writes with her accustomed enthusiasm about it. richard milnes too is very warm. john sterling scolds and kisses it (as the manner of the man is), and concludes by inquiring, whether there is any procurable likeness of emerson? emerson himself can answer. there ought to be. --good heavens! here came my wife, all in tears, pointing out to me a poor ship, just tumbled over on a sand-bank on the cumberland coast; men still said to be alive on it,--a belfast steamer doing all it can to get in contact with it! moments are precious (say the people on the beach), the flood runs ten miles an hour. thank god, the steamer's boat is out: "eleven men," says a person with a glass, "are saved: it is an american timber-ship, coming up without a pilot." and now--in ten minutes more--there lies the melancholy mass alone among the waters, wreck-boats all hastening towards it, like birds of prey; the poor canadians all up and away towards annan. what an end for my letter, which nevertheless must end! adieu, dear emerson. address to chelsea next time. i can say no more. yours ever, t.c. lxix. emerson to carlyle concord, october, my dear carlyle,--i was in boston yesterday, and found at munroe's your promised packet of the two london books. they are very handsome,--that for my wife is beautiful,--and i am not so old or so cold but that i can feel the hope and the pleasure that lie in this gift. it seems i am to speak in england--great england--fortified by the good word of one whose word is fame. well, it is a lasting joy to be indebted to the wise and generous; and i am well contented that my little boat should swim, whilst it can, beside your great galleys, nor will i allow my discontent with the great faults of the book, which the rich english dress cannot hide, to spoil my joy in this fine little romance of friendship and hope. i am determined--so help me all muses--to send you something better another day. but no more printing for me at present. i have just decided to go to boston once more, with a course of lectures, which i will perhaps baptize "on the times," by way of making once again the experiment whether i cannot, not only speak the truth, but speak it truly, or in proportion. i fancy i need more than another to speak, with such a formidable tendency to the lapidary style. i build my house of boulders; somebody asked me "if i built of medals." besides, i am always haunted with brave dreams of what might be accomplished in the lecture-room,--so free and so unpretending a platform,--a delos not yet made fast. i imagine an eloquence of infinite variety,--rich as conversation can be, with anecdote, joke, tragedy, epics and pindarics, argument and confession. i should love myself wonderfully better if i could arm myself to go, as you go, with the word in the heart and not in a paper. when i was in boston i saw the booksellers, the children of tantalus,--no, but they who trust in them are. this time, little and brown render us their credit account to t.c. $ (i think it was), payable in three months from october. they had sold all the london _french revolutions_ but fifteen copies. may we all live until january. j. munroe & co. acknowledge about $ due and now rightfully payable to t.c., but, unhappily, not yet paid. by the help of brokers, i will send that sum more or less in some english currency, by the next steamship, which sails in about a fortnight, and will address it, as you last bade me, to chelsea. what news, my dear friend, from your study? what designs ripened or executed? what thoughts? what hopes? you can say nothing of yourself that will not greatly interest us all. harriet martineau, whose sicknesses may it please god to heal! wrote me a kind, cheerful letter, and the most agreeable notice of your health and spirit on a visit at her house. my little boy is five years old today, and almost old enough to send you his love. with kindest greetings to jane carlyle, i am her and your friend, --r.w.e. lxx. emerson to carlyle concord, november, my dear carlyle,--above, you have a bill of exchange for forty pounds sterling, with which sum you must credit the munroe account. the bill, i must not fail to notice, is drawn by a lover of yours who expresses great satisfaction in doing us this courtesy; and courtesy i must think it when he gives me a bill at sight, whilst of all other merchants i have got only one payable at some remote day. ---- is a beautiful and noble youth, of a most subtle and magnetic nature, made for an artist, a painter, and in his art has made admirable sketches, but his criticism, i fancy, was too keen for his poetry (shall i say?); he sacrificed to despair, and threw away his pencil. for the present, he buys and sells. i wrote you some sort of letter a fortnight ago, promising to send a paper like this. the hour when this should be despatched finds me by chance very busy with little affairs. i sent you by an italian, signor gambardella,*-- who took a letter to you with good intent to persuade you to sit to him for your portrait,--a _dial,_ and some copies of an oration i printed lately. if you should have any opportunity to send one of them to harriet martineau, my debts to her are great, and i wish to acknowledge her abounding kindness by a letter, as i must. i am now in the rage of preparation for my lectures "on the times;" which begin in a fortnight. there shall be eight, but i cannot yet accurately divide the topics. if it were eighty, i could better. in fear lest this sheet should not safely and timely reach its man, i must now write some duplicate. farewell, dear friend. r.w. emerson -------- * spiridione gambardella was born at naples. he was a refugee from italy, having escaped, the story was, on board an american man-of-war. he had been educated as a public singer, but he had a facile genius, and turned readily to painting as a means of livelihood. he painted some excellent portraits in boston, between and , among them one of dr. channing, and one of dr. follen; both of these were engraved. he had some success for a time as a portrait-painter in london. ---------- lxxi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, november, dear emerson,--since that going down of the american timber-ship on one of the banks of the solway under my window, i do not remember that you have heard a word of me. i only added that the men were all saved, and the beach all in agitation, certain women not far from hysterics;--and there ended. i did design to send you some announcement of our return hither; but fear there is no chance that i did it! about ten days ago the signor gambardella arrived, with a note and books from you: and here now is your letter of october th; which, arriving at a moment when i have a little leisure, draws forth an answer almost instantly. the signor gambardella, whom we are to see a second time tonight or tomorrow, amuses and interests us not a little. his face is the very image of the classic god pan's; with horns, and cloven feet, we feel that he would make a perfect wood-god;--really, some of poussin's satyrs are almost portraits of this brave gambardella. i will warrant him a right glowing mass of southern-italian vitality,--full of laughter, wild insight, caricature, and every sort of energy and joyous savagery: a most profitable element to get introduced (in moderate quantity), i should say, into the general current of your puritan blood over in new england there! gambardella has behaved with magnanimity in that matter of the portrait: i have already sat, to men in the like case, some four times, and gambardella knows it is a dreadful weariness; i directed him, accordingly, to my last painter, one laurence, a man of real parts, whom i wished gambardella to know,--and whom i wished to know gambardella withal, that he might tell me whether there was any probability of a _good_ picture by him in case one did decide on encountering the weariness. well: gambardella returns with a magnanimous report that laurence's picture far transcends any capability of his; that whoever in america or elsewhere will have a likeness of the said individual must apply to laurence, not to gambardella,--which latter artist heroically throws down his brush, and says, be it far from me! the brave gambardella! if i can get him this night to dilate a little farther on his visit to the _community of shakers,_ and the things he saw and felt there, it will be a most true benefit to me. inextinguishable laughter seemed to me to lie in gambardella's vision of that phenomenon,-- the sight and the seer, but we broke out too loud all at once, and he was afraid to continue.--alas! there is almost no laughter going in the world at present. true laughter is as rare as any other truth,--the sham of it frequent and detestable, like all other shams. i know nothing wholesomer; but it is rarer even than christmas, which comes but once a year, and does always come once. your satisfactions and reflections at sight of your english book are such as i too am very thankful for. i understand them well. may worse guest never visit the drawing-room at concord than that bound book. tell the good wife to rejoice in it: she has all the pleasure;--to her poor husband it will be increase of pain withal: nay, let us call it increase of valiant labor and endeavor; no evil for a man, if he be fit for it! a man must learn to digest praise too, and not be poisoned with it: some of it _is_ wholesome to the system under certain circumstances; the most of it a healthy system will learn by and by to throw into the slop-basin, harmlessly, without any _trial_ to digest it. a thinker, i take it, in the long run finds that essentially he must ever be and continue _alone;--alone:_ "silent, rest over him the stars, and under him the graves"! the clatter of the world, be it a friendly, be it a hostile world, shall not intermeddle with him much. the book of _essays,_ however, does decidedly "speak to england," in its way, in these months; and even makes what one may call a kind of appropriate "sensation" here. reviews of it are many, in all notes of the gamut;--of small value mostly; as you might see by the two newspaper specimens i sent you. (did you get those two newspapers?) the worst enemy admits that there are piercing radiances of perverse insight in it; the highest friends, some few, go to a very high point indeed. newspapers are busy with extracts;--much complaining that it is "abstruse," neological, hard to get the meaning of. all which is very proper. still better,--though poor fraser, alas, is dead, (poor fraser!), and no help could come from industries of the bookshop, and books indeed it seems were never selling worse than of late months,--i learn that the "sale of the essays goes very steadily forward," and will wind itself handsomely up in due time, we may believe! so emerson henceforth has a real public in old england as well as new. and finally, my friend, do _not_ disturb yourself about turning better, &c., &c.; write as it is given you, and not till it be given you, and never mind it a whit. the new _adelphi_ piece seems to me, as a piece of composition, the best _written_ of them all. people cry over it: "whitherward? what, what?" in fact, i do again desiderate some _concretion_ of these beautiful _abstracta._ it seems to me they will never be _right_ otherwise; that otherwise they are but as prophecies yet, not fulfilments. the dial too, it is all spirit-like, aeriform, aurora-borealis like. will no _angel_ body himself out of that; no stalwart yankee _man,_ with color in the cheeks of him, and a coat on his back! these things i _say:_ and yet, very true, you alone can decide what practical meaning is in them. write you always _as_ it is given you,_ be it in the solid, in the aeriform, or whatsoever way. there is no other rule given among men.--i have sent the criticism on landor* to an editorial friend of l.'s, by whom i expect it will be put into the newspapers here, for the benefit of walter savage; he is not often so well praised among us, and deserves a little good praise. -------- * from the dial for october, . -------- you propose again to send me moneys,--surprising man! i am glad also to hear that that beggarly misprinted _french revolution_ is nearly out among you. i only hope farther your booksellers will have an eye on that rascal appleton, and not let _him_ reprint and deface, if more copies of the book turn out to be wanted. adieu, dear emerson! good speed to you at boston, and in all true things. i hope to write soon again. yours ever, t. carlyle lxxii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, december, dear emerson,--though i wrote to you very lately, and am in great haste today, i must lose no time in announcing that the letter with the l draught came to hand some mornings ago; and now, this same morning, a second letter round by dumfriesshire, which had been sent as a duplicate, or substitute in case of accident, for the former. it is all right, my friend ----'s paper has got itself changed into forty gold sovereigns, and lies here waiting use; thanks, many thanks! sums of that kind come always upon me like manna out of the sky; surely they, more emphatically than any others, are the gift of heaven. let us receive, use, and be thankful. i am not so poor now at all; heaven be praised: indeed, i do not know, now and then when i reflect on it, whether being rich were not a considerably harder problem. with the wealth of rothschild what farther good thing could one get,--if not perhaps some but to live in, under free skies, in the country, with a horse to ride and have a little less pain on? _angulus ille ridet!_--i will add, for practical purposes in the future, that it is in general of little or no moment whether an american bill be at sight or after a great many days; that the paper can wait as conveniently here as the cash can,--if your new england house and baring of old england will forbear bankruptcy in the mean while. by the bye, will you tell me some time or other in _what_ american funds it is that your funded money, you once gave me note of, now lies? i too am creditor to america,-- state of illinois or some such state: one thousand dollars of mine, which some years ago i had no use for, now lies there, paying i suppose for canals, in a very obstructed condition! my brother here is continually telling me that i shall lose it all, --which is not so bad; but lose it all by my own unreason,--which is very bad. it struck me i would ask where emerson's money lies, and lay mine there too, let it live or perish as it likes! your _adelphi_ went straightway off to miss martineau with a message. richard milnes has another; john sterling is to have a third,--had certain other parties seen it first. for the man emerson is become a person to be _seen_ in these times. i also gave a _morning-chronicle_ editor your brave eulogy on landor, with instructions that it were well worth publishing there, for landor's and others' sake. landor deserves more praise than he gets at present; the world too, what is far more, should hear of him oftener than it does. a brave man after his kind,--though considerably "flamed on from the hell beneath." he speaks notable things; and at lowest and worst has the faculty too of holding his peace. the "lectures on the times" are even now in progress? good speed to the speaker, to the speech. your country is luckier than most at this time; it has still real preaching; the tongue of man is not, whensoever it begins wagging, entirely sure to emit babblement, twaddlement, sincere--cant, and other noises which awaken the passionate wish for silence! that must alter everywhere the human tongue is no wooden watchman's-rattle or other _obsolete_ implement; it continues forever new and useful, nay indispensable. as for me and my doings--_ay de mi!_* ------- * the signature has been cut off. ------- lxxiii. emerson to carlyle new york, february, my dear friend,--i enclose a bill of exchange for forty-eight pounds sterling, payable by baring brothers & co. after sixty days from the th of february. this sum is part of a payment from little and brown on account of sales of your london _french revolution and of chartism._ as another part of their payment they asked me if they might not draw on the estate of james fraser for a balance due from his house to them, and pay you so. i, perhaps unwisely, consented to make the proffer to you, with the distinct stipulation, however, that if it should not prove perfectly agreeable to you, and exactly as available as another form of money, you should instantly return it to me, and they shall pay me the amount, $ . , or l s. d. in cash. my mercantile friend, abel adams, did not admire my wisdom in accepting this bill of little and brown; so i told them i should probably bring it back to them, and if there is a shadow of inconvenience in it you will send it back to me by the next steamer. for they have no claims on us. i decide not to enclose the little and brown bill in this sheet,--but to let it accompany this letter in the same packet. i grieve to hear that you have bought any of our wretched southern stocks. in new england all southern and southwestern debt is usually regarded as hopeless, unless the debtor is personally known. massachusetts stock is in the best credit of any public stock. ward told me that it would be safest for you to keep your illinois stock, although he could say nothing very good of it. our city banks in boston are in better credit than the banks in any other city here, yet one in which a large part of my own property is invested has failed, for the two last half-years, to pay any dividend, and i am a poor man until next april, when, i hope, it will not fail me again. if you wish to invest money here, my friend abel adams, who is the principal partner in one of our best houses, barnard, adams, & co., will know how to give you the best assistance and action the case admits. my dear friend, you should have had this letter and these messages by the last steamer; but when it sailed, my son, a perfect little boy of five years and three months, had ended his earthly life.* you can never sympathize with me; you can never know how much of me such a young child can take away. a few weeks ago i accounted myself a very rich man, and now the poorest of all. what would it avail to tell you anecdotes of a sweet and wonderful boy, such as we solace and sadden ourselves with at home every morning and evening? from a perfect health and as happy a life and as happy influences as ever child enjoyed, he was hurried out of my arms in three short days by scarlatina.--we have two babes yet,--one girl of three years, and one girl of three months and a week, but a promise like that boy's i shall never see. how often i have pleased myself that one day i should send to you this morning star of mine, and stay at home so gladly behind such a representative. i dare not fathom the invisible and untold to inquire what relations to my departed ones i yet sustain. lidian, the poor lidian, moans at home by day and by night. you too will grieve for us, afar. i believe i have two letters from you since i wrote last. i shall write again soon, for bronson alcott will probably go to london in about a month, and him i shall surely send to you, hoping to atone by his great nature for many smaller one, that have craved to see you. give me early advice of receiving these bills of exchange. --------- * the memory of this boy, "born for the future, to the future lost;" is enshrined in the heart of every lover of childhood and of poetry by his father's impassioned _threnody._ ----------- tell jane carlyle our sorrowing story with much love, and with all good hope for her health and happiness. tell us when you write, with as much particularity as you can, how it stands with you, and all your household; with the doctor, and the friends; what you do, and propose to do, and whether you will yet come to america, one good day? yours with love, r. waldo emerson lxxiv. carlyle to emerson templand, thornhill, dumfries, scotland march, my dear friend,--this is heavy news that you send me; the heaviest outward bereavement that can befall a man has overtaken you. your calm tone of deep, quiet sorrow, coming in on the rear of poor trivial worldly businesses, all punctually despatched and recorded too, as if the higher and highest had not been busy with you, tells me a sad tale. what can we say in these cases? there is nothing to be said,--nothing but what the wild son of ishmael, and every thinking heart, from of old have learned to say: god is great! he is terrible and stern; but we know also he is good. "though he slay me, yet will i trust in him." your bright little boy, chief of your possessions here below, is rapt away from you; but of very truth he is with god, even as we that yet live are,--and surely in the way that was best for him, and for you, and for all of us.--poor lidian emerson, poor mother! to her i have no word. such poignant unspeakable grief, i believe, visits no creature as that of a mother bereft of her child. the poor sparrow in the bush affects one with pity, mourning for its young; how much more the human soul of one's friend! i cannot bid her be of comfort; for there is as yet no comfort. may good influences watch over her, bring her some assuagement. as the hebrew david said, "we shall go to him, he will not return to us." i also am here in a house rendered vacant and sacred by death. a sore calamity has fallen on us, or rather has fallen on my poor wife (for what am i but like a spectator in comparison?): she has lost unexpectedly her good mother, her sole surviving parent, and almost only relative of much value that was left to her. the manner too was almost tragic. we had heard of illness here, but only of commonplace illness, and had no alarm. the doctor himself, specially applied to, made answer as if there was no danger: his poor patient, in whose character the like of that intimately lay, had rigorously charged him to do so: her poor daughter was far off, confined to her room by illness of her own; why alarm her, make her wretched? the danger itself did seem over; the doctor accordingly obeyed. our first intimation of alarm was despatched on the very day which proved the final one. my poor wife, casting sickness behind her, got instantly ready, set off by the first railway train: traveling all night, on the morrow morning at her uncle's door in liverpool she is met by tidings that all is already ended. she broke down there; she is now home again at chelsea, a cheery, amiable younger jane welsh to nurse her: the tone of her letters is still full of disconsolateness. i had to proceed hither, and have to stay here till this establishment can be abolished, and all the sad wrecks of it in some seemly manner swept away. it is above three weeks that i have been here; not till eight days ago could i so much as manage to command solitude, to be left altogether alone. i lead a strange life; full of sadness, of solemnity, not without a kind of blessedness. i say it is right and fitting that one be left entirely alone now and then, alone with one's own griefs and sins, with the mysterious ancient earth round one, the everlasting heaven over one, and what one can make of these. poor rustic businesses, subletting of farms, disposal of houses, household goods: these strangely intervene, like matter upon spirit, every day;--wholesome this too perhaps. it is many years since i have stood so in close contact face to face with the reality of earth, with its haggard ugliness, its divine beauty, its depths of death and of life. yesterday, one of, the stillest sundays, i sat long by the side of the swift river nith; sauntered among woods all vocal only with rooks and pairing birds.* the hills are often white with snow-powder, black brief spring-tempests rush fiercely down from them, and then again the sky looks forth with a pale pure brightness,--like eternity from behind time. the _sky,_ when one thinks of it, is _always_ blue, pure changeless azure; rains and tempests are only for the little dwellings where men abide. let us think of this too. think of this, thou sorrowing mother! thy boy has escaped many showers. --------- * "templand has a very fine situation; old walter's walk, at the south end of the house, was one of the most picturesque and pretty to be found in the world. nith valley (river half a mile off, winding through green holms, now in its border of clean shingle, now lost in pleasant woods and rushes) lay patent to the south. "carlyle's reminiscences," vol. ii. p. . --------- in some three weeks i shall probably be back at chelsea. write thitherward so soon as you have opportunity; i will write again before long, even if i do not hear from you. the moneys, &c. are all safe here as you describe: if fraser's' executors make any demur, your bookseller shall soon hear of it. i had begun to write some book on cromwell: i have often begun, but know not how to set about it; the most unutterable of all subjects i ever felt much meaning to lie in. there is risk yet that, with the loss of still farther labor, i may have to abandon it;--and then the great dumb oliver may lie unspoken forever; gathered to the mighty _silent_ of the earth; for, i think, there will hardly ever live another man that will believe in him and his puritanism as i do. to _him_ small matter. adieu, my good kind friend, ever dear to me, dearer now in sorrow. my wife when she hears of your affliction will send a true thought over to you also. the poor lidian!--john sterling is driven off again, setting out i think this very day for gibraltar, malta, and naples. farewell, and better days to us. your affectionate t. carlyle lxxv. emerson to carlyle concord, march, my dear carlyle,--i wrote you a letter from my brother's office in new york nearly a month ago to tell you how hardly it had fared with me here at home, that the eye of my home was plucked out when that little innocent boy departed in his beauty and perfection from my sight. well, i have come back hither to my work and my play, but he comes not back, and i must simply suffer it. doubtless the day will come which will resolve this, as everything gets resolved, into light, but not yet. i write now to tell you of a piece of life. i wish you to know that there is shortly coming to you a man by the name of bronson alcott. if you have heard his name before, forget what you have heard. especially if you have ever read anything to which this name was attached, be sure to forget that; and, inasmuch as in you lies, permit this stranger when he arrives at your gate to make a new and primary impression. i do not wish to bespeak any courtesies or good or bad opinion concerning him. you may love him, or hate him, or apathetically pass by him, as your genius shall dictate; only i entreat this, that you do not let him go quite out of your reach until you are sure you have seen him and know for certain the nature of the man. and so i leave contentedly my pilgrim to his fate. i should tell you that my friend margaret fuller, who has edited our little _dial_ with such dubious approbation on the part of you and other men, has suddenly decided a few days ago that she will edit it no more. the second volume was just closing; shall it live for a third year? you should know that, if its interior and spiritual life has been ill fed, its outward and bibliopolic existence has been worse managed. its publishers failed, its short list of subscribers became shorter, and it has never paid its laborious editor, who has been very generous of her time and labor, the smallest remuneration. unhappily, to me alone could the question be put whether the little aspiring starveling should be reprieved for another year. i had not the cruelty to kill it, and so must answer with my own proper care and nursing for its new life. perhaps it is a great folly in me who have little adroitness in turning off work to assume this sure vexation, but the _dial_ has certain charms to me as an opportunity, which i grudge to destroy. lately at new york i found it to be to a certain class of men and women, though few, an object of tenderness and religion. you cannot believe it? mr. lee,* who brings you this letter, is the son of one of the best men in massachusetts, a man whose name is a proverb among merchants for his probity, for his sense and his information. the son, who bears his father's name, is a favorite among all the young people for his sense and spirit, and has lived always with good people. --------- * mr. henry lee. -------- i have read at new york six out of eight lectures on the times which i read this winter in boston. i found a very intelligent and friendly audience. the penny papers reported my lectures, somewhat to my chagrin when i tried to read them; many persons came and talked with me, and i felt when i came away that new york is open to me henceforward whenever my boston parish is not large enough. this summer, i must try to set in order a few more chapters from these rambling lectures, one on "the poet" and one on "character" at least. and now will you not tell me what you read and write? is it cromwell still? for i supposed from the _westminster_ piece that the laborer must be in that quarter. i send herewith a new _dial,_ no. , and the last of this dispensation. i hope you have received every number. they have been sent in order. i have written no line in this number. i send a letter for sterling, as i do not know whether his address is still at falmouth. is he now a preacher? by the "acadia" you should have received a letter of exchange on the barings, and another on james fraser's estate. with constant good hope for yourself and for your wife, i am your friend, --r.w. emerson end of vol. i. the education of henry adams by henry adams the education of henry adams contents editor's preface preface i. quincy ( - ) ii. boston ( - ) iii. washington ( - ) iv. harvard college ( - ) v. berlin ( - ) vi. rome ( - ) vii. treason ( - ) viii. diplomacy ( ) ix. foes or friends ( ) x. political morality ( ) xi. the battle of the rams ( ) xii. eccentricity ( ) xiii. the perfection of human society ( ) xiv. dilettantism ( - ) xv. darwinism ( - ) xvi. the press ( ) xvii. president grant ( ) xviii. free fight ( - ) xix. chaos ( ) xx. failure ( ) xxi. twenty years after ( ) xxii. chicago ( ) xxiii. silence ( - ) xxiv. indian summer ( - ) xxv. the dynamo and the virgin ( ) xxvi. twilight ( ) xxvii. teufelsdrockh ( ) xxviii. the height of knowledge ( ) xxix. the abyss of ignorance ( ) xxx. vis inertiae ( ) xxxi. the grammar of science ( ) xxxii. vis nova ( - ) xxxiii. a dynamic theory of history ( ) xxxiv. a law of acceleration ( ) xxxv. nunc age ( ) editor's preface this volume, written in as a sequel to the same author's "mont saint michel and chartres," was privately printed, to the number of one hundred copies, in , and sent to the persons interested, for their assent, correction, or suggestion. the idea of the two books was thus explained at the end of chapter xxix: -- "any schoolboy could see that man as a force must be measured by motion from a fixed point. psychology helped here by suggesting a unit--the point of history when man held the highest idea of himself as a unit in a unified universe. eight or ten years of study had led adams to think he might use the century - , expressed in amiens cathedral and the works of thomas aquinas, as the unit from which he might measure motion down to his own time, without assuming anything as true or untrue, except relation. the movement might be studied at once in philosophy and mechanics. setting himself to the task, he began a volume which he mentally knew as 'mont-saint-michel and chartres: a study of thirteenth-century unity.' from that point he proposed to fix a position for himself, which he could label: 'the education of henry adams: a study of twentieth-century multiplicity.' with the help of these two points of relation, he hoped to project his lines forward and backward indefinitely, subject to correction from any one who should know better." the "chartres" was finished and privately printed in . the "education" proved to be more difficult. the point on which the author failed to please himself, and could get no light from readers or friends, was the usual one of literary form. probably he saw it in advance, for he used to say, half in jest, that his great ambition was to complete st. augustine's "confessions," but that st. augustine, like a great artist, had worked from multiplicity to unity, while he, like a small one, had to reverse the method and work back from unity to multiplicity. the scheme became unmanageable as he approached his end. probably he was, in fact, trying only to work into it his favorite theory of history, which now fills the last three or four chapters of the "education," and he could not satisfy himself with his workmanship. at all events, he was still pondering over the problem in , when he tried to deal with it in another way which might be more intelligible to students. he printed a small volume called "a letter to american teachers," which he sent to his associates in the american historical association, hoping to provoke some response. before he could satisfy himself even on this minor point, a severe illness in the spring of put an end to his literary activity forever. the matter soon passed beyond his control. in the institute of architects published the "mont-saint-michel and chartres." already the "education" had become almost as well known as the "chartres," and was freely quoted by every book whose author requested it. the author could no longer withdraw either volume; he could no longer rewrite either, and he could not publish that which he thought unprepared and unfinished, although in his opinion the other was historically purposeless without its sequel. in the end, he preferred to leave the "education" unpublished, avowedly incomplete, trusting that it might quietly fade from memory. according to his theory of history as explained in chapters xxxiii and xxxiv, the teacher was at best helpless, and, in the immediate future, silence next to good-temper was the mark of sense. after midsummer, , the rule was made absolute. the massachusetts historical society now publishes the "education" as it was printed in , with only such marginal corrections as the author made, and it does this, not in opposition to the author's judgment, but only to put both volumes equally within reach of students who have occasion to consult them. henry cabot lodge september, preface jean jacques rousseau began his famous confessions by a vehement appeal to the deity: "i have shown myself as i was; contemptible and vile when i was so; good, generous, sublime when i was so; i have unveiled my interior such as thou thyself hast seen it, eternal father! collect about me the innumerable swarm of my fellows; let them hear my confessions; let them groan at my unworthiness; let them blush at my meannesses! let each of them discover his heart in his turn at the foot of thy throne with the same sincerity; and then let any one of them tell thee if he dares: 'i was a better man!'" jean jacques was a very great educator in the manner of the eighteenth century, and has been commonly thought to have had more influence than any other teacher of his time; but his peculiar method of improving human nature has not been universally admired. most educators of the nineteenth century have declined to show themselves before their scholars as objects more vile or contemptible than necessary, and even the humblest teacher hides, if possible, the faults with which nature has generously embellished us all, as it did jean jacques, thinking, as most religious minds are apt to do, that the eternal father himself may not feel unmixed pleasure at our thrusting under his eyes chiefly the least agreeable details of his creation. as an unfortunate result the twentieth century finds few recent guides to avoid, or to follow. american literature offers scarcely one working model for high education. the student must go back, beyond jean jacques, to benjamin franklin, to find a model even of self-teaching. except in the abandoned sphere of the dead languages, no one has discussed what part of education has, in his personal experience, turned out to be useful, and what not. this volume attempts to discuss it. as educator, jean jacques was, in one respect, easily first; he erected a monument of warning against the ego. since his time, and largely thanks to him, the ego has steadily tended to efface itself, and, for purposes of model, to become a manikin on which the toilet of education is to be draped in order to show the fit or misfit of the clothes. the object of study is the garment, not the figure. the tailor adapts the manikin as well as the clothes to his patron's wants. the tailor's object, in this volume, is to fit young men, in universities or elsewhere, to be men of the world, equipped for any emergency; and the garment offered to them is meant to show the faults of the patchwork fitted on their fathers. at the utmost, the active-minded young man should ask of his teacher only mastery of his tools. the young man himself, the subject of education, is a certain form of energy; the object to be gained is economy of his force; the training is partly the clearing away of obstacles, partly the direct application of effort. once acquired, the tools and models may be thrown away. the manikin, therefore, has the same value as any other geometrical figure of three or more dimensions, which is used for the study of relation. for that purpose it cannot be spared; it is the only measure of motion, of proportion, of human condition; it must have the air of reality; must be taken for real; must be treated as though it had life. who knows? possibly it had! february , the education of henry adams chapter i quincy ( - ) under the shadow of boston state house, turning its back on the house of john hancock, the little passage called hancock avenue runs, or ran, from beacon street, skirting the state house grounds, to mount vernon street, on the summit of beacon hill; and there, in the third house below mount vernon place, february , , a child was born, and christened later by his uncle, the minister of the first church after the tenets of boston unitarianism, as henry brooks adams. had he been born in jerusalem under the shadow of the temple and circumcised in the synagogue by his uncle the high priest, under the name of israel cohen, he would scarcely have been more distinctly branded, and not much more heavily handicapped in the races of the coming century, in running for such stakes as the century was to offer; but, on the other hand, the ordinary traveller, who does not enter the field of racing, finds advantage in being, so to speak, ticketed through life, with the safeguards of an old, established traffic. safeguards are often irksome, but sometimes convenient, and if one needs them at all, one is apt to need them badly. a hundred years earlier, such safeguards as his would have secured any young man's success; and although in their value was not very great compared with what they would have had in , yet the mere accident of starting a twentieth-century career from a nest of associations so colonial,--so troglodytic--as the first church, the boston state house, beacon hill, john hancock and john adams, mount vernon street and quincy, all crowding on ten pounds of unconscious babyhood, was so queer as to offer a subject of curious speculation to the baby long after he had witnessed the solution. what could become of such a child of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when he should wake up to find himself required to play the game of the twentieth? had he been consulted, would he have cared to play the game at all, holding such cards as he held, and suspecting that the game was to be one of which neither he nor any one else back to the beginning of time knew the rules or the risks or the stakes? he was not consulted and was not responsible, but had he been taken into the confidence of his parents, he would certainly have told them to change nothing as far as concerned him. he would have been astounded by his own luck. probably no child, born in the year, held better cards than he. whether life was an honest game of chance, or whether the cards were marked and forced, he could not refuse to play his excellent hand. he could never make the usual plea of irresponsibility. he accepted the situation as though he had been a party to it, and under the same circumstances would do it again, the more readily for knowing the exact values. to his life as a whole he was a consenting, contracting party and partner from the moment he was born to the moment he died. only with that understanding--as a consciously assenting member in full partnership with the society of his age--had his education an interest to himself or to others. as it happened, he never got to the point of playing the game at all; he lost himself in the study of it, watching the errors of the players; but this is the only interest in the story, which otherwise has no moral and little incident. a story of education--seventy years of it--the practical value remains to the end in doubt, like other values about which men have disputed since the birth of cain and abel; but the practical value of the universe has never been stated in dollars. although every one cannot be a gargantua-napoleon-bismarck and walk off with the great bells of notre dame, every one must bear his own universe, and most persons are moderately interested in learning how their neighbors have managed to carry theirs. this problem of education, started in , went on for three years, while the baby grew, like other babies, unconsciously, as a vegetable, the outside world working as it never had worked before, to get his new universe ready for him. often in old age he puzzled over the question whether, on the doctrine of chances, he was at liberty to accept himself or his world as an accident. no such accident had ever happened before in human experience. for him, alone, the old universe was thrown into the ash-heap and a new one created. he and his eighteenth-century, troglodytic boston were suddenly cut apart--separated forever--in act if not in sentiment, by the opening of the boston and albany railroad; the appearance of the first cunard steamers in the bay; and the telegraphic messages which carried from baltimore to washington the news that henry clay and james k. polk were nominated for the presidency. this was in may, ; he was six years old; his new world was ready for use, and only fragments of the old met his eyes. of all this that was being done to complicate his education, he knew only the color of yellow. he first found himself sitting on a yellow kitchen floor in strong sunlight. he was three years old when he took this earliest step in education; a lesson of color. the second followed soon; a lesson of taste. on december , , he developed scarlet fever. for several days he was as good as dead, reviving only under the careful nursing of his family. when he began to recover strength, about january , , his hunger must have been stronger than any other pleasure or pain, for while in after life he retained not the faintest recollection of his illness, he remembered quite clearly his aunt entering the sickroom bearing in her hand a saucer with a baked apple. the order of impressions retained by memory might naturally be that of color and taste, although one would rather suppose that the sense of pain would be first to educate. in fact, the third recollection of the child was that of discomfort. the moment he could be removed, he was bundled up in blankets and carried from the little house in hancock avenue to a larger one which his parents were to occupy for the rest of their lives in the neighboring mount vernon street. the season was midwinter, january , , and he never forgot his acute distress for want of air under his blankets, or the noises of moving furniture. as a means of variation from a normal type, sickness in childhood ought to have a certain value not to be classed under any fitness or unfitness of natural selection; and especially scarlet fever affected boys seriously, both physically and in character, though they might through life puzzle themselves to decide whether it had fitted or unfitted them for success; but this fever of henry adams took greater and greater importance in his eyes, from the point of view of education, the longer he lived. at first, the effect was physical. he fell behind his brothers two or three inches in height, and proportionally in bone and weight. his character and processes of mind seemed to share in this fining-down process of scale. he was not good in a fight, and his nerves were more delicate than boys' nerves ought to be. he exaggerated these weaknesses as he grew older. the habit of doubt; of distrusting his own judgment and of totally rejecting the judgment of the world; the tendency to regard every question as open; the hesitation to act except as a choice of evils; the shirking of responsibility; the love of line, form, quality; the horror of ennui; the passion for companionship and the antipathy to society--all these are well-known qualities of new england character in no way peculiar to individuals but in this instance they seemed to be stimulated by the fever, and henry adams could never make up his mind whether, on the whole, the change of character was morbid or healthy, good or bad for his purpose. his brothers were the type; he was the variation. as far as the boy knew, the sickness did not affect him at all, and he grew up in excellent health, bodily and mental, taking life as it was given; accepting its local standards without a difficulty, and enjoying much of it as keenly as any other boy of his age. he seemed to himself quite normal, and his companions seemed always to think him so. whatever was peculiar about him was education, not character, and came to him, directly and indirectly, as the result of that eighteenth-century inheritance which he took with his name. the atmosphere of education in which he lived was colonial, revolutionary, almost cromwellian, as though he were steeped, from his greatest grandmother's birth, in the odor of political crime. resistance to something was the law of new england nature; the boy looked out on the world with the instinct of resistance; for numberless generations his predecessors had viewed the world chiefly as a thing to be reformed, filled with evil forces to be abolished, and they saw no reason to suppose that they had wholly succeeded in the abolition; the duty was unchanged. that duty implied not only resistance to evil, but hatred of it. boys naturally look on all force as an enemy, and generally find it so, but the new englander, whether boy or man, in his long struggle with a stingy or hostile universe, had learned also to love the pleasure of hating; his joys were few. politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, had always been the systematic organization of hatreds, and massachusetts politics had been as harsh as the climate. the chief charm of new england was harshness of contrasts and extremes of sensibility--a cold that froze the blood, and a heat that boiled it--so that the pleasure of hating--one's self if no better victim offered--was not its rarest amusement; but the charm was a true and natural child of the soil, not a cultivated weed of the ancients. the violence of the contrast was real and made the strongest motive of education. the double exterior nature gave life its relative values. winter and summer, cold and heat, town and country, force and freedom, marked two modes of life and thought, balanced like lobes of the brain. town was winter confinement, school, rule, discipline; straight, gloomy streets, piled with six feet of snow in the middle; frosts that made the snow sing under wheels or runners; thaws when the streets became dangerous to cross; society of uncles, aunts, and cousins who expected children to behave themselves, and who were not always gratified; above all else, winter represented the desire to escape and go free. town was restraint, law, unity. country, only seven miles away, was liberty, diversity, outlawry, the endless delight of mere sense impressions given by nature for nothing, and breathed by boys without knowing it. boys are wild animals, rich in the treasures of sense, but the new england boy had a wider range of emotions than boys of more equable climates. he felt his nature crudely, as it was meant. to the boy henry adams, summer was drunken. among senses, smell was the strongest--smell of hot pine-woods and sweet-fern in the scorching summer noon; of new-mown hay; of ploughed earth; of box hedges; of peaches, lilacs, syringas; of stables, barns, cow-yards; of salt water and low tide on the marshes; nothing came amiss. next to smell came taste, and the children knew the taste of everything they saw or touched, from pennyroyal and flagroot to the shell of a pignut and the letters of a spelling-book--the taste of a-b, ab, suddenly revived on the boy's tongue sixty years afterwards. light, line, and color as sensual pleasures, came later and were as crude as the rest. the new england light is glare, and the atmosphere harshens color. the boy was a full man before he ever knew what was meant by atmosphere; his idea of pleasure in light was the blaze of a new england sun. his idea of color was a peony, with the dew of early morning on its petals. the intense blue of the sea, as he saw it a mile or two away, from the quincy hills; the cumuli in a june afternoon sky; the strong reds and greens and purples of colored prints and children's picture-books, as the american colors then ran; these were ideals. the opposites or antipathies, were the cold grays of november evenings, and the thick, muddy thaws of boston winter. with such standards, the bostonian could not but develop a double nature. life was a double thing. after a january blizzard, the boy who could look with pleasure into the violent snow-glare of the cold white sunshine, with its intense light and shade, scarcely knew what was meant by tone. he could reach it only by education. winter and summer, then, were two hostile lives, and bred two separate natures. winter was always the effort to live; summer was tropical license. whether the children rolled in the grass, or waded in the brook, or swam in the salt ocean, or sailed in the bay, or fished for smelts in the creeks, or netted minnows in the salt-marshes, or took to the pine-woods and the granite quarries, or chased muskrats and hunted snapping-turtles in the swamps, or mushrooms or nuts on the autumn hills, summer and country were always sensual living, while winter was always compulsory learning. summer was the multiplicity of nature; winter was school. the bearing of the two seasons on the education of henry adams was no fancy; it was the most decisive force he ever knew; it ran though life, and made the division between its perplexing, warring, irreconcilable problems, irreducible opposites, with growing emphasis to the last year of study. from earliest childhood the boy was accustomed to feel that, for him, life was double. winter and summer, town and country, law and liberty, were hostile, and the man who pretended they were not, was in his eyes a schoolmaster--that is, a man employed to tell lies to little boys. though quincy was but two hours' walk from beacon hill, it belonged in a different world. for two hundred years, every adams, from father to son, had lived within sight of state street, and sometimes had lived in it, yet none had ever taken kindly to the town, or been taken kindly by it. the boy inherited his double nature. he knew as yet nothing about his great-grandfather, who had died a dozen years before his own birth: he took for granted that any great-grandfather of his must have always been good, and his enemies wicked; but he divined his great-grandfather's character from his own. never for a moment did he connect the two ideas of boston and john adams; they were separate and antagonistic; the idea of john adams went with quincy. he knew his grandfather john quincy adams only as an old man of seventy-five or eighty who was friendly and gentle with him, but except that he heard his grandfather always called "the president," and his grandmother "the madam," he had no reason to suppose that his adams grandfather differed in character from his brooks grandfather who was equally kind and benevolent. he liked the adams side best, but for no other reason than that it reminded him of the country, the summer, and the absence of restraint. yet he felt also that quincy was in a way inferior to boston, and that socially boston looked down on quincy. the reason was clear enough even to a five-year old child. quincy had no boston style. little enough style had either; a simpler manner of life and thought could hardly exist, short of cave-dwelling. the flint-and-steel with which his grandfather adams used to light his own fires in the early morning was still on the mantelpiece of his study. the idea of a livery or even a dress for servants, or of an evening toilette, was next to blasphemy. bathrooms, water-supplies, lighting, heating, and the whole array of domestic comforts, were unknown at quincy. boston had already a bathroom, a water-supply, a furnace, and gas. the superiority of boston was evident, but a child liked it no better for that. the magnificence of his grandfather brooks's house in pearl street or south street has long ago disappeared, but perhaps his country house at medford may still remain to show what impressed the mind of a boy in with the idea of city splendor. the president's place at quincy was the larger and older and far the more interesting of the two; but a boy felt at once its inferiority in fashion. it showed plainly enough its want of wealth. it smacked of colonial age, but not of boston style or plush curtains. to the end of his life he never quite overcame the prejudice thus drawn in with his childish breath. he never could compel himself to care for nineteenth-century style. he was never able to adopt it, any more than his father or grandfather or great-grandfather had done. not that he felt it as particularly hostile, for he reconciled himself to much that was worse; but because, for some remote reason, he was born an eighteenth-century child. the old house at quincy was eighteenth century. what style it had was in its queen anne mahogany panels and its louis seize chairs and sofas. the panels belonged to an old colonial vassall who built the house; the furniture had been brought back from paris in or or , along with porcelain and books and much else of old diplomatic remnants; and neither of the two eighteenth-century styles--neither english queen anne nor french louis seize--was comfortable for a boy, or for any one else. the dark mahogany had been painted white to suit daily life in winter gloom. nothing seemed to favor, for a child's objects, the older forms. on the contrary, most boys, as well as grown-up people, preferred the new, with good reason, and the child felt himself distinctly at a disadvantage for the taste. nor had personal preference any share in his bias. the brooks grandfather was as amiable and as sympathetic as the adams grandfather. both were born in , and both died in . both were kind to children, and both belonged rather to the eighteenth than to the nineteenth centuries. the child knew no difference between them except that one was associated with winter and the other with summer; one with boston, the other with quincy. even with medford, the association was hardly easier. once as a very young boy he was taken to pass a few days with his grandfather brooks under charge of his aunt, but became so violently homesick that within twenty-four hours he was brought back in disgrace. yet he could not remember ever being seriously homesick again. the attachment to quincy was not altogether sentimental or wholly sympathetic. quincy was not a bed of thornless roses. even there the curse of cain set its mark. there as elsewhere a cruel universe combined to crush a child. as though three or four vigorous brothers and sisters, with the best will, were not enough to crush any child, every one else conspired towards an education which he hated. from cradle to grave this problem of running order through chaos, direction through space, discipline through freedom, unity through multiplicity, has always been, and must always be, the task of education, as it is the moral of religion, philosophy, science, art, politics, and economy; but a boy's will is his life, and he dies when it is broken, as the colt dies in harness, taking a new nature in becoming tame. rarely has the boy felt kindly towards his tamers. between him and his master has always been war. henry adams never knew a boy of his generation to like a master, and the task of remaining on friendly terms with one's own family, in such a relation, was never easy. all the more singular it seemed afterwards to him that his first serious contact with the president should have been a struggle of will, in which the old man almost necessarily defeated the boy, but instead of leaving, as usual in such defeats, a lifelong sting, left rather an impression of as fair treatment as could be expected from a natural enemy. the boy met seldom with such restraint. he could not have been much more than six years old at the time--seven at the utmost--and his mother had taken him to quincy for a long stay with the president during the summer. what became of the rest of the family he quite forgot; but he distinctly remembered standing at the house door one summer morning in a passionate outburst of rebellion against going to school. naturally his mother was the immediate victim of his rage; that is what mothers are for, and boys also; but in this case the boy had his mother at unfair disadvantage, for she was a guest, and had no means of enforcing obedience. henry showed a certain tactical ability by refusing to start, and he met all efforts at compulsion by successful, though too vehement protest. he was in fair way to win, and was holding his own, with sufficient energy, at the bottom of the long staircase which led up to the door of the president's library, when the door opened, and the old man slowly came down. putting on his hat, he took the boy's hand without a word, and walked with him, paralyzed by awe, up the road to the town. after the first moments of consternation at this interference in a domestic dispute, the boy reflected that an old gentleman close on eighty would never trouble himself to walk near a mile on a hot summer morning over a shadeless road to take a boy to school, and that it would be strange if a lad imbued with the passion of freedom could not find a corner to dodge around, somewhere before reaching the school door. then and always, the boy insisted that this reasoning justified his apparent submission; but the old man did not stop, and the boy saw all his strategical points turned, one after another, until he found himself seated inside the school, and obviously the centre of curious if not malevolent criticism. not till then did the president release his hand and depart. the point was that this act, contrary to the inalienable rights of boys, and nullifying the social compact, ought to have made him dislike his grandfather for life. he could not recall that it had this effect even for a moment. with a certain maturity of mind, the child must have recognized that the president, though a tool of tyranny, had done his disreputable work with a certain intelligence. he had shown no temper, no irritation, no personal feeling, and had made no display of force. above all, he had held his tongue. during their long walk he had said nothing; he had uttered no syllable of revolting cant about the duty of obedience and the wickedness of resistance to law; he had shown no concern in the matter; hardly even a consciousness of the boy's existence. probably his mind at that moment was actually troubling itself little about his grandson's iniquities, and much about the iniquities of president polk, but the boy could scarcely at that age feel the whole satisfaction of thinking that president polk was to be the vicarious victim of his own sins, and he gave his grandfather credit for intelligent silence. for this forbearance he felt instinctive respect. he admitted force as a form of right; he admitted even temper, under protest; but the seeds of a moral education would at that moment have fallen on the stoniest soil in quincy, which is, as every one knows, the stoniest glacial and tidal drift known in any puritan land. neither party to this momentary disagreement can have felt rancor, for during these three or four summers the old president's relations with the boy were friendly and almost intimate. whether his older brothers and sisters were still more favored he failed to remember, but he was himself admitted to a sort of familiarity which, when in his turn he had reached old age, rather shocked him, for it must have sometimes tried the president's patience. he hung about the library; handled the books; deranged the papers; ransacked the drawers; searched the old purses and pocket-books for foreign coins; drew the sword-cane; snapped the travelling-pistols; upset everything in the corners, and penetrated the president's dressing-closet where a row of tumblers, inverted on the shelf, covered caterpillars which were supposed to become moths or butterflies, but never did. the madam bore with fortitude the loss of the tumblers which her husband purloined for these hatcheries; but she made protest when he carried off her best cut-glass bowls to plant with acorns or peachstones that he might see the roots grow, but which, she said, he commonly forgot like the caterpillars. at that time the president rode the hobby of tree-culture, and some fine old trees should still remain to witness it, unless they have been improved off the ground; but his was a restless mind, and although he took his hobbies seriously and would have been annoyed had his grandchild asked whether he was bored like an english duke, he probably cared more for the processes than for the results, so that his grandson was saddened by the sight and smell of peaches and pears, the best of their kind, which he brought up from the garden to rot on his shelves for seed. with the inherited virtues of his puritan ancestors, the little boy henry conscientiously brought up to him in his study the finest peaches he found in the garden, and ate only the less perfect. naturally he ate more by way of compensation, but the act showed that he bore no grudge. as for his grandfather, it is even possible that he may have felt a certain self-reproach for his temporary role of schoolmaster--seeing that his own career did not offer proof of the worldly advantages of docile obedience--for there still exists somewhere a little volume of critically edited nursery rhymes with the boy's name in full written in the president's trembling hand on the fly-leaf. of course there was also the bible, given to each child at birth, with the proper inscription in the president's hand on the fly-leaf; while their grandfather brooks supplied the silver mugs. so many bibles and silver mugs had to be supplied, that a new house, or cottage, was built to hold them. it was "on the hill," five minutes' walk above "the old house," with a far view eastward over quincy bay, and northward over boston. till his twelfth year, the child passed his summers there, and his pleasures of childhood mostly centred in it. of education he had as yet little to complain. country schools were not very serious. nothing stuck to the mind except home impressions, and the sharpest were those of kindred children; but as influences that warped a mind, none compared with the mere effect of the back of the president's bald head, as he sat in his pew on sundays, in line with that of president quincy, who, though some ten years younger, seemed to children about the same age. before railways entered the new england town, every parish church showed half-a-dozen of these leading citizens, with gray hair, who sat on the main aisle in the best pews, and had sat there, or in some equivalent dignity, since the time of st. augustine, if not since the glacial epoch. it was unusual for boys to sit behind a president grandfather, and to read over his head the tablet in memory of a president great-grandfather, who had "pledged his life, his fortune, and his sacred honor" to secure the independence of his country and so forth; but boys naturally supposed, without much reasoning, that other boys had the equivalent of president grandfathers, and that churches would always go on, with the bald-headed leading citizens on the main aisle, and presidents or their equivalents on the walls. the irish gardener once said to the child: "you'll be thinkin' you'll be president too!" the casuality of the remark made so strong an impression on his mind that he never forgot it. he could not remember ever to have thought on the subject; to him, that there should be a doubt of his being president was a new idea. what had been would continue to be. he doubted neither about presidents nor about churches, and no one suggested at that time a doubt whether a system of society which had lasted since adam would outlast one adams more. the madam was a little more remote than the president, but more decorative. she stayed much in her own room with the dutch tiles, looking out on her garden with the box walks, and seemed a fragile creature to a boy who sometimes brought her a note or a message, and took distinct pleasure in looking at her delicate face under what seemed to him very becoming caps. he liked her refined figure; her gentle voice and manner; her vague effect of not belonging there, but to washington or to europe, like her furniture, and writing-desk with little glass doors above and little eighteenth-century volumes in old binding, labelled "peregrine pickle" or "tom jones" or "hannah more." try as she might, the madam could never be bostonian, and it was her cross in life, but to the boy it was her charm. even at that age, he felt drawn to it. the madam's life had been in truth far from boston. she was born in london in , daughter of joshua johnson, an american merchant, brother of governor thomas johnson of maryland; and catherine nuth, of an english family in london. driven from england by the revolutionary war, joshua johnson took his family to nantes, where they remained till the peace. the girl louisa catherine was nearly ten years old when brought back to london, and her sense of nationality must have been confused; but the influence of the johnsons and the services of joshua obtained for him from president washington the appointment of consul in london on the organization of the government in . in president washington appointed john quincy adams minister to the hague. he was twenty-seven years old when he returned to london, and found the consul's house a very agreeable haunt. louisa was then twenty. at that time, and long afterwards, the consul's house, far more than the minister's, was the centre of contact for travelling americans, either official or other. the legation was a shifting point, between and ; but the consulate, far down in the city, near the tower, was convenient and inviting; so inviting that it proved fatal to young adams. louisa was charming, like a romney portrait, but among her many charms that of being a new england woman was not one. the defect was serious. her future mother-in-law, abigail, a famous new england woman whose authority over her turbulent husband, the second president, was hardly so great as that which she exercised over her son, the sixth to be, was troubled by the fear that louisa might not be made of stuff stern enough, or brought up in conditions severe enough, to suit a new england climate, or to make an efficient wife for her paragon son, and abigail was right on that point, as on most others where sound judgment was involved; but sound judgment is sometimes a source of weakness rather than of force, and john quincy already had reason to think that his mother held sound judgments on the subject of daughters-in-law which human nature, since the fall of eve, made adams helpless to realize. being three thousand miles away from his mother, and equally far in love, he married louisa in london, july , , and took her to berlin to be the head of the united states legation. during three or four exciting years, the young bride lived in berlin; whether she was happy or not, whether she was content or not, whether she was socially successful or not, her descendants did not surely know; but in any case she could by no chance have become educated there for a life in quincy or boston. in the overthrow of the federalist party drove her and her husband to america, and she became at last a member of the quincy household, but by that time her children needed all her attention, and she remained there with occasional winters in boston and washington, till . her husband was made senator in , and in was appointed minister to russia. she went with him to st. petersburg, taking her baby, charles francis, born in ; but broken-hearted at having to leave her two older boys behind. the life at st. petersburg was hardly gay for her; they were far too poor to shine in that extravagant society; but she survived it, though her little girl baby did not, and in the winter of - , alone with the boy of seven years old, crossed europe from st. petersburg to paris, in her travelling-carriage, passing through the armies, and reaching paris in the cent jours after napoleon's return from elba. her husband next went to england as minister, and she was for two years at the court of the regent. in her husband came home to be secretary of state, and she lived for eight years in f street, doing her work of entertainer for president monroe's administration. next she lived four miserable years in the white house. when that chapter was closed in , she had earned the right to be tired and delicate, but she still had fifteen years to serve as wife of a member of the house, after her husband went back to congress in . then it was that the little henry, her grandson, first remembered her, from to , sitting in her panelled room, at breakfast, with her heavy silver teapot and sugar-bowl and cream-jug, which still exist somewhere as an heirloom of the modern safety-vault. by that time she was seventy years old or more, and thoroughly weary of being beaten about a stormy world. to the boy she seemed singularly peaceful, a vision of silver gray, presiding over her old president and her queen anne mahogany; an exotic, like her sevres china; an object of deference to every one, and of great affection to her son charles; but hardly more bostonian than she had been fifty years before, on her wedding-day, in the shadow of the tower of london. such a figure was even less fitted than that of her old husband, the president, to impress on a boy's mind, the standards of the coming century. she was louis seize, like the furniture. the boy knew nothing of her interior life, which had been, as the venerable abigail, long since at peace, foresaw, one of severe stress and little pure satisfaction. he never dreamed that from her might come some of those doubts and self-questionings, those hesitations, those rebellions against law and discipline, which marked more than one of her descendants; but he might even then have felt some vague instinctive suspicion that he was to inherit from her the seeds of the primal sin, the fall from grace, the curse of abel, that he was not of pure new england stock, but half exotic. as a child of quincy he was not a true bostonian, but even as a child of quincy he inherited a quarter taint of maryland blood. charles francis, half marylander by birth, had hardly seen boston till he was ten years old, when his parents left him there at school in , and he never forgot the experience. he was to be nearly as old as his mother had been in , before he quite accepted boston, or boston quite accepted him. a boy who began his education in these surroundings, with physical strength inferior to that of his brothers, and with a certain delicacy of mind and bone, ought rightly to have felt at home in the eighteenth century and should, in proper self-respect, have rebelled against the standards of the nineteenth. the atmosphere of his first ten years must have been very like that of his grandfather at the same age, from till , barring the battle of bunker hill, and even as late as , the battle of bunker hill remained actual. the tone of boston society was colonial. the true bostonian always knelt in self-abasement before the majesty of english standards; far from concealing it as a weakness, he was proud of it as his strength. the eighteenth century ruled society long after . perhaps the boy began to shake it off rather earlier than most of his mates. indeed this prehistoric stage of education ended rather abruptly with his tenth year. one winter morning he was conscious of a certain confusion in the house in mount vernon street, and gathered, from such words as he could catch, that the president, who happened to be then staying there, on his way to washington, had fallen and hurt himself. then he heard the word paralysis. after that day he came to associate the word with the figure of his grandfather, in a tall-backed, invalid armchair, on one side of the spare bedroom fireplace, and one of his old friends, dr. parkman or p. p. f. degrand, on the other side, both dozing. the end of this first, or ancestral and revolutionary, chapter came on february , --and the month of february brought life and death as a family habit--when the eighteenth century, as an actual and living companion, vanished. if the scene on the floor of the house, when the old president fell, struck the still simple-minded american public with a sensation unusually dramatic, its effect on a ten-year-old boy, whose boy-life was fading away with the life of his grandfather, could not be slight. one had to pay for revolutionary patriots; grandfathers and grandmothers; presidents; diplomats; queen anne mahogany and louis seize chairs, as well as for stuart portraits. such things warp young life. americans commonly believed that they ruined it, and perhaps the practical common-sense of the american mind judged right. many a boy might be ruined by much less than the emotions of the funeral service in the quincy church, with its surroundings of national respect and family pride. by another dramatic chance it happened that the clergyman of the parish, dr. lunt, was an unusual pulpit orator, the ideal of a somewhat austere intellectual type, such as the school of buckminster and channing inherited from the old congregational clergy. his extraordinarily refined appearance, his dignity of manner, his deeply cadenced voice, his remarkable english and his fine appreciation, gave to the funeral service a character that left an overwhelming impression on the boy's mind. he was to see many great functions--funerals and festival--in after-life, till his only thought was to see no more, but he never again witnessed anything nearly so impressive to him as the last services at quincy over the body of one president and the ashes of another. the effect of the quincy service was deepened by the official ceremony which afterwards took place in faneuil hall, when the boy was taken to hear his uncle, edward everett, deliver a eulogy. like all mr. everett's orations, it was an admirable piece of oratory, such as only an admirable orator and scholar could create; too good for a ten-year-old boy to appreciate at its value; but already the boy knew that the dead president could not be in it, and had even learned why he would have been out of place there; for knowledge was beginning to come fast. the shadow of the war of still hung over state street; the shadow of the civil war to come had already begun to darken faneuil hall. no rhetoric could have reconciled mr. everett's audience to his subject. how could he say there, to an assemblage of bostonians in the heart of mercantile boston, that the only distinctive mark of all the adamses, since old sam adams's father a hundred and fifty years before, had been their inherited quarrel with state street, which had again and again broken out into riot, bloodshed, personal feuds, foreign and civil war, wholesale banishments and confiscations, until the history of florence was hardly more turbulent than that of boston? how could he whisper the word hartford convention before the men who had made it? what would have been said had he suggested the chance of secession and civil war? thus already, at ten years old, the boy found himself standing face to face with a dilemma that might have puzzled an early christian. what was he?--where was he going? even then he felt that something was wrong, but he concluded that it must be boston. quincy had always been right, for quincy represented a moral principle--the principle of resistance to boston. his adams ancestors must have been right, since they were always hostile to state street. if state street was wrong, quincy must be right! turn the dilemma as he pleased, he still came back on the eighteenth century and the law of resistance; of truth; of duty, and of freedom. he was a ten-year-old priest and politician. he could under no circumstances have guessed what the next fifty years had in store, and no one could teach him; but sometimes, in his old age, he wondered--and could never decide--whether the most clear and certain knowledge would have helped him. supposing he had seen a new york stock-list of , and had studied the statistics of railways, telegraphs, coal, and steel--would he have quitted his eighteenth-century, his ancestral prejudices, his abstract ideals, his semi-clerical training, and the rest, in order to perform an expiatory pilgrimage to state street, and ask for the fatted calf of his grandfather brooks and a clerkship in the suffolk bank? sixty years afterwards he was still unable to make up his mind. each course had its advantages, but the material advantages, looking back, seemed to lie wholly in state street. chapter ii boston ( - ) peter chardon brooks, the other grandfather, died january , , bequeathing what was supposed to be the largest estate in boston, about two million dollars, to his seven surviving children: four sons--edward, peter chardon, gorham, and sydney; three daughters--charlotte, married to edward everett; ann, married to nathaniel frothingham, minister of the first church; and abigail brown, born april , , married september , , to charles francis adams, hardly a year older than herself. their first child, born in , was a daughter, named louisa catherine, after her johnson grandmother; the second was a son, named john quincy, after his president grandfather; the third took his father's name, charles francis; while the fourth, being of less account, was in a way given to his mother, who named him henry brooks, after a favorite brother just lost. more followed, but these, being younger, had nothing to do with the arduous process of educating. the adams connection was singularly small in boston, but the family of brooks was singularly large and even brilliant, and almost wholly of clerical new england stock. one might have sought long in much larger and older societies for three brothers-in-law more distinguished or more scholarly than edward everett, dr. frothingham, and mr. adams. one might have sought equally long for seven brothers-in-law more unlike. no doubt they all bore more or less the stamp of boston, or at least of massachusetts bay, but the shades of difference amounted to contrasts. mr. everett belonged to boston hardly more than mr. adams. one of the most ambitious of bostonians, he had broken bounds early in life by leaving the unitarian pulpit to take a seat in congress where he had given valuable support to j. q. adams's administration; support which, as a social consequence, led to the marriage of the president's son, charles francis, with mr. everett's youngest sister-in-law, abigail brooks. the wreck of parties which marked the reign of andrew jackson had interfered with many promising careers, that of edward everett among the rest, but he had risen with the whig party to power, had gone as minister to england, and had returned to america with the halo of a european reputation, and undisputed rank second only to daniel webster as the orator and representative figure of boston. the other brother-in-law, dr. frothingham, belonged to the same clerical school, though in manner rather the less clerical of the two. neither of them had much in common with mr. adams, who was a younger man, greatly biassed by his father, and by the inherited feud between quincy and state street; but personal relations were friendly as far as a boy could see, and the innumerable cousins went regularly to the first church every sunday in winter, and slept through their uncle's sermons, without once thinking to ask what the sermons were supposed to mean for them. for two hundred years the first church had seen the same little boys, sleeping more or less soundly under the same or similar conditions, and dimly conscious of the same feuds; but the feuds had never ceased, and the boys had always grown up to inherit them. those of the generation of had mostly disappeared in ; death had cleared that score; the quarrels of john adams, and those of john quincy adams were no longer acutely personal; the game was considered as drawn; and charles francis adams might then have taken his inherited rights of political leadership in succession to mr. webster and mr. everett, his seniors. between him and state street the relation was more natural than between edward everett and state street; but instead of doing so, charles francis adams drew himself aloof and renewed the old war which had already lasted since . he could not help it. with the record of j. q. adams fresh in the popular memory, his son and his only representative could not make terms with the slave-power, and the slave-power overshadowed all the great boston interests. no doubt mr. adams had principles of his own, as well as inherited, but even his children, who as yet had no principles, could equally little follow the lead of mr. webster or even of mr. seward. they would have lost in consideration more than they would have gained in patronage. they were anti-slavery by birth, as their name was adams and their home was quincy. no matter how much they had wished to enter state street, they felt that state street never would trust them, or they it. had state street been paradise, they must hunger for it in vain, and it hardly needed daniel webster to act as archangel with the flaming sword, to order them away from the door. time and experience, which alter all perspectives, altered this among the rest, and taught the boy gentler judgment, but even when only ten years old, his face was already fixed, and his heart was stone, against state street; his education was warped beyond recovery in the direction of puritan politics. between him and his patriot grandfather at the same age, the conditions had changed little. the year was like enough to the year to make a fair parallel. the parallel, as concerned bias of education, was complete when, a few months after the death of john quincy adams, a convention of anti-slavery delegates met at buffalo to organize a new party and named candidates for the general election in november: for president, martin van buren; for vice-president, charles francis adams. for any american boy the fact that his father was running for office would have dwarfed for the time every other excitement, but even apart from personal bias, the year , for a boy's road through life, was decisive for twenty years to come. there was never a side-path of escape. the stamp of was almost as indelible as the stamp of , but in the eighteenth or any earlier century, the stamp mattered less because it was standard, and every one bore it; while men whose lives were to fall in the generation between and had, first of all, to get rid of it, and take the stamp that belonged to their time. this was their education. to outsiders, immigrants, adventurers, it was easy, but the old puritan nature rebelled against change. the reason it gave was forcible. the puritan thought his thought higher and his moral standards better than those of his successors. so they were. he could not be convinced that moral standards had nothing to do with it, and that utilitarian morality was good enough for him, as it was for the graceless. nature had given to the boy henry a character that, in any previous century, would have led him into the church; he inherited dogma and a priori thought from the beginning of time; and he scarcely needed a violent reaction like anti-slavery politics to sweep him back into puritanism with a violence as great as that of a religious war. thus far he had nothing to do with it; his education was chiefly inheritance, and during the next five or six years, his father alone counted for much. if he were to worry successfully through life's quicksands, he must depend chiefly on his father's pilotage; but, for his father, the channel lay clear, while for himself an unknown ocean lay beyond. his father's business in life was to get past the dangers of the slave-power, or to fix its bounds at least. the task done, he might be content to let his sons pay for the pilotage; and it mattered little to his success whether they paid it with their lives wasted on battle-fields or in misdirected energies and lost opportunity. the generation that lived from to could do very well with the old forms of education; that which had its work to do between and needed something quite new. his father's character was therefore the larger part of his education, as far as any single person affected it, and for that reason, if for no other, the son was always a much interested critic of his father's mind and temper. long after his death as an old man of eighty, his sons continued to discuss this subject with a good deal of difference in their points of view. to his son henry, the quality that distinguished his father from all the other figures in the family group, was that, in his opinion, charles francis adams possessed the only perfectly balanced mind that ever existed in the name. for a hundred years, every newspaper scribbler had, with more or less obvious excuse, derided or abused the older adamses for want of judgment. they abused charles francis for his judgment. naturally they never attempted to assign values to either; that was the children's affair; but the traits were real. charles francis adams was singular for mental poise--absence of self-assertion or self-consciousness--the faculty of standing apart without seeming aware that he was alone--a balance of mind and temper that neither challenged nor avoided notice, nor admitted question of superiority or inferiority, of jealousy, of personal motives, from any source, even under great pressure. this unusual poise of judgment and temper, ripened by age, became the more striking to his son henry as he learned to measure the mental faculties themselves, which were in no way exceptional either for depth or range. charles francis adams's memory was hardly above the average; his mind was not bold like his grandfather's or restless like his father's, or imaginative or oratorical--still less mathematical; but it worked with singular perfection, admirable self-restraint, and instinctive mastery of form. within its range it was a model. the standards of boston were high, much affected by the old clerical self-respect which gave the unitarian clergy unusual social charm. dr. channing, mr. everett, dr. frothingham. dr. palfrey, president walker, r. w. emerson, and other boston ministers of the same school, would have commanded distinction in any society; but the adamses had little or no affinity with the pulpit, and still less with its eccentric offshoots, like theodore parker, or brook farm, or the philosophy of concord. besides its clergy, boston showed a literary group, led by ticknor, prescott, longfellow, motley, o. w. holmes; but mr. adams was not one of them; as a rule they were much too websterian. even in science boston could claim a certain eminence, especially in medicine, but mr. adams cared very little for science. he stood alone. he had no master--hardly even his father. he had no scholars--hardly even his sons. almost alone among his boston contemporaries, he was not english in feeling or in sympathies. perhaps a hundred years of acute hostility to england had something to do with this family trait; but in his case it went further and became indifference to social distinction. never once in forty years of intimacy did his son notice in him a trace of snobbishness. he was one of the exceedingly small number of americans to whom an english duke or duchess seemed to be indifferent, and royalty itself nothing more than a slightly inconvenient presence. this was, it is true, rather the tone of english society in his time, but americans were largely responsible for changing it, and mr. adams had every possible reason for affecting the manner of a courtier even if he did not feel the sentiment. never did his son see him flatter or vilify, or show a sign of envy or jealousy; never a shade of vanity or self-conceit. never a tone of arrogance! never a gesture of pride! the same thing might perhaps have been said of john quincy adams, but in him his associates averred that it was accompanied by mental restlessness and often by lamentable want of judgment. no one ever charged charles francis adams with this fault. the critics charged him with just the opposite defect. they called him cold. no doubt, such perfect poise--such intuitive self-adjustment--was not maintained by nature without a sacrifice of the qualities which would have upset it. no doubt, too, that even his restless-minded, introspective, self-conscious children who knew him best were much too ignorant of the world and of human nature to suspect how rare and complete was the model before their eyes. a coarser instrument would have impressed them more. average human nature is very coarse, and its ideals must necessarily be average. the world never loved perfect poise. what the world does love is commonly absence of poise, for it has to be amused. napoleons and andrew jacksons amuse it, but it is not amused by perfect balance. had mr. adams's nature been cold, he would have followed mr. webster, mr. everett, mr. seward, and mr. winthrop in the lines of party discipline and self-interest. had it been less balanced than it was, he would have gone with mr. garrison, mr. wendell phillips, mr. edmund quincy, and theodore parker, into secession. between the two paths he found an intermediate one, distinctive and characteristic--he set up a party of his own. this political party became a chief influence in the education of the boy henry in the six years to , and violently affected his character at the moment when character is plastic. the group of men with whom mr. adams associated himself, and whose social centre was the house in mount vernon street, numbered only three: dr. john g. palfrey, richard h. dana, and charles sumner. dr. palfrey was the oldest, and in spite of his clerical education, was to a boy often the most agreeable, for his talk was lighter and his range wider than that of the others; he had wit, or humor, and the give-and-take of dinner-table exchange. born to be a man of the world, he forced himself to be clergyman, professor, or statesman, while, like every other true bostonian, he yearned for the ease of the athenaeum club in pall mall or the combination room at trinity. dana at first suggested the opposite; he affected to be still before the mast, a direct, rather bluff, vigorous seaman, and only as one got to know him better one found the man of rather excessive refinement trying with success to work like a day-laborer, deliberately hardening his skin to the burden, as though he were still carrying hides at monterey. undoubtedly he succeeded, for his mind and will were robust, but he might have said what his lifelong friend william m. evarts used to say: "i pride myself on my success in doing not the things i like to do, but the things i don't like to do." dana's ideal of life was to be a great englishman, with a seat on the front benches of the house of commons until he should be promoted to the woolsack; beyond all, with a social status that should place him above the scuffle of provincial and unprofessional annoyances; but he forced himself to take life as it came, and he suffocated his longings with grim self-discipline, by mere force of will. of the four men, dana was the most marked. without dogmatism or self-assertion, he seemed always to be fully in sight, a figure that completely filled a well-defined space. he, too, talked well, and his mind worked close to its subject, as a lawyer's should; but disguise and silence it as he liked, it was aristocratic to the tenth generation. in that respect, and in that only, charles sumner was like him, but sumner, in almost every other quality, was quite different from his three associates--altogether out of line. he, too, adored english standards, but his ambition led him to rival the career of edmund burke. no young bostonian of his time had made so brilliant a start, but rather in the steps of edward everett than of daniel webster. as an orator he had achieved a triumph by his oration against war; but boston admired him chiefly for his social success in england and on the continent; success that gave to every bostonian who enjoyed it a halo never acquired by domestic sanctity. mr. sumner, both by interest and instinct, felt the value of his english connection, and cultivated it the more as he became socially an outcast from boston society by the passions of politics. he was rarely without a pocket-full of letters from duchesses or noblemen in england. having sacrificed to principle his social position in america, he clung the more closely to his foreign attachments. the free soil party fared ill in beacon street. the social arbiters of boston--george ticknor and the rest--had to admit, however unwillingly, that the free soil leaders could not mingle with the friends and followers of mr. webster. sumner was socially ostracized, and so, for that matter, were palfrey, dana, russell, adams, and all the other avowed anti-slavery leaders, but for them it mattered less, because they had houses and families of their own; while sumner had neither wife nor household, and, though the most socially ambitious of all, and the most hungry for what used to be called polite society, he could enter hardly half-a-dozen houses in boston. longfellow stood by him in cambridge, and even in beacon street he could always take refuge in the house of mr. lodge, but few days passed when he did not pass some time in mount vernon street. even with that, his solitude was glacial, and reacted on his character. he had nothing but himself to think about. his superiority was, indeed, real and incontestable; he was the classical ornament of the anti-slavery party; their pride in him was unbounded, and their admiration outspoken. the boy henry worshipped him, and if he ever regarded any older man as a personal friend, it was mr. sumner. the relation of mr. sumner in the household was far closer than any relation of blood. none of the uncles approached such intimacy. sumner was the boy's ideal of greatness; the highest product of nature and art. the only fault of such a model was its superiority which defied imitation. to the twelve-year-old boy, his father, dr. palfrey, mr. dana, were men, more or less like what he himself might become; but mr. sumner was a different order--heroic. as the boy grew up to be ten or twelve years old, his father gave him a writing-table in one of the alcoves of his boston library, and there, winter after winter, henry worked over his latin grammar and listened to these four gentlemen discussing the course of anti-slavery politics. the discussions were always serious; the free soil party took itself quite seriously; and they were habitual because mr. adams had undertaken to edit a newspaper as the organ of these gentlemen, who came to discuss its policy and expression. at the same time mr. adams was editing the "works" of his grandfather john adams, and made the boy read texts for proof-correction. in after years his father sometimes complained that, as a reader of novanglus and massachusettensis, henry had shown very little consciousness of punctuation; but the boy regarded this part of school life only as a warning, if he ever grew up to write dull discussions in the newspapers, to try to be dull in some different way from that of his great-grandfather. yet the discussions in the boston whig were carried on in much the same style as those of john adams and his opponent, and appealed to much the same society and the same habit of mind. the boy got as little education, fitting him for his own time, from the one as from the other, and he got no more from his contact with the gentlemen themselves who were all types of the past. down to , and even later, new england society was still directed by the professions. lawyers, physicians, professors, merchants were classes, and acted not as individuals, but as though they were clergymen and each profession were a church. in politics the system required competent expression; it was the old ciceronian idea of government by the best that produced the long line of new england statesmen. they chose men to represent them because they wanted to be well represented, and they chose the best they had. thus boston chose daniel webster, and webster took, not as pay, but as honorarium, the cheques raised for him by peter harvey from the appletons, perkinses, amorys, searses, brookses, lawrences, and so on, who begged him to represent them. edward everett held the rank in regular succession to webster. robert c. winthrop claimed succession to everett. charles sumner aspired to break the succession, but not the system. the adamses had never been, for any length of time, a part of this state succession; they had preferred the national service, and had won all their distinction outside the state, but they too had required state support and had commonly received it. the little group of men in mount vernon street were an offshoot of this system; they were statesmen, not politicians; they guided public opinion, but were little guided by it. the boy naturally learned only one lesson from his saturation in such air. he took for granted that this sort of world, more or less the same that had always existed in boston and massachusetts bay, was the world which he was to fit. had he known europe he would have learned no better. the paris of louis philippe, guizot, and de tocqueville, as well as the london of robert peel, macaulay, and john stuart mill, were but varieties of the same upper-class bourgeoisie that felt instinctive cousinship with the boston of ticknor, prescott, and motley. even the typical grumbler carlyle, who cast doubts on the real capacity of the middle class, and who at times thought himself eccentric, found friendship and alliances in boston--still more in concord. the system had proved so successful that even germany wanted to try it, and italy yearned for it. england's middle-class government was the ideal of human progress. even the violent reaction after , and the return of all europe to military practices, never for a moment shook the true faith. no one, except karl marx, foresaw radical change. what announced it? the world was producing sixty or seventy million tons of coal, and might be using nearly a million steam-horsepower, just beginning to make itself felt. all experience since the creation of man, all divine revelation or human science, conspired to deceive and betray a twelve-year-old boy who took for granted that his ideas, which were alone respectable, would be alone respected. viewed from mount vernon street, the problem of life was as simple as it was classic. politics offered no difficulties, for there the moral law was a sure guide. social perfection was also sure, because human nature worked for good, and three instruments were all she asked--suffrage, common schools, and press. on these points doubt was forbidden. education was divine, and man needed only a correct knowledge of facts to reach perfection: "were half the power that fills the world with terror, were half the wealth bestowed on camps and courts, given to redeem the human mind from error, there were no need of arsenals nor forts." nothing quieted doubt so completely as the mental calm of the unitarian clergy. in uniform excellence of life and character, moral and intellectual, the score of unitarian clergymen about boston, who controlled society and harvard college, were never excelled. they proclaimed as their merit that they insisted on no doctrine, but taught, or tried to teach, the means of leading a virtuous, useful, unselfish life, which they held to be sufficient for salvation. for them, difficulties might be ignored; doubts were waste of thought; nothing exacted solution. boston had solved the universe; or had offered and realized the best solution yet tried. the problem was worked out. of all the conditions of his youth which afterwards puzzled the grown-up man, this disappearance of religion puzzled him most. the boy went to church twice every sunday; he was taught to read his bible, and he learned religious poetry by heart; he believed in a mild deism; he prayed; he went through all the forms; but neither to him nor to his brothers or sisters was religion real. even the mild discipline of the unitarian church was so irksome that they all threw it off at the first possible moment, and never afterwards entered a church. the religious instinct had vanished, and could not be revived, although one made in later life many efforts to recover it. that the most powerful emotion of man, next to the sexual, should disappear, might be a personal defect of his own; but that the most intelligent society, led by the most intelligent clergy, in the most moral conditions he ever knew, should have solved all the problems of the universe so thoroughly as to have quite ceased making itself anxious about past or future, and should have persuaded itself that all the problems which had convulsed human thought from earliest recorded time, were not worth discussing, seemed to him the most curious social phenomenon he had to account for in a long life. the faculty of turning away one's eyes as one approaches a chasm is not unusual, and boston showed, under the lead of mr. webster, how successfully it could be done in politics; but in politics a certain number of men did at least protest. in religion and philosophy no one protested. such protest as was made took forms more simple than the silence, like the deism of theodore parker, and of the boy's own cousin octavius frothingham, who distressed his father and scandalized beacon street by avowing scepticism that seemed to solve no old problems, and to raise many new ones. the less aggressive protest of ralph waldo emerson, was, from an old-world point of view, less serious. it was naif. the children reached manhood without knowing religion, and with the certainty that dogma, metaphysics, and abstract philosophy were not worth knowing. so one-sided an education could have been possible in no other country or time, but it became, almost of necessity, the more literary and political. as the children grew up, they exaggerated the literary and the political interests. they joined in the dinner-table discussions and from childhood the boys were accustomed to hear, almost every day, table-talk as good as they were ever likely to hear again. the eldest child, louisa, was one of the most sparkling creatures her brother met in a long and varied experience of bright women. the oldest son, john, was afterwards regarded as one of the best talkers in boston society, and perhaps the most popular man in the state, though apt to be on the unpopular side. palfrey and dana could be entertaining when they pleased, and though charles sumner could hardly be called light in hand, he was willing to be amused, and smiled grandly from time to time; while mr. adams, who talked relatively little, was always a good listener, and laughed over a witticism till he choked. by way of educating and amusing the children, mr. adams read much aloud, and was sure to read political literature, especially when it was satirical, like the speeches of horace mann and the "epistles" of "hosea biglow," with great delight to the youth. so he read longfellow and tennyson as their poems appeared, but the children took possession of dickens and thackeray for themselves. both were too modern for tastes founded on pope and dr. johnson. the boy henry soon became a desultory reader of every book he found readable, but these were commonly eighteenth-century historians because his father's library was full of them. in the want of positive instincts, he drifted into the mental indolence of history. so too, he read shelves of eighteenth-century poetry, but when his father offered his own set of wordsworth as a gift on condition of reading it through, he declined. pope and gray called for no mental effort; they were easy reading; but the boy was thirty years old before his education reached wordsworth. this is the story of an education, and the person or persons who figure in it are supposed to have values only as educators or educated. the surroundings concern it only so far as they affect education. sumner, dana, palfrey, had values of their own, like hume, pope, and wordsworth, which any one may study in their works; here all appear only as influences on the mind of a boy very nearly the average of most boys in physical and mental stature. the influence was wholly political and literary. his father made no effort to force his mind, but left him free play, and this was perhaps best. only in one way his father rendered him a great service by trying to teach him french and giving him some idea of a french accent. otherwise the family was rather an atmosphere than an influence. the boy had a large and overpowering set of brothers and sisters, who were modes or replicas of the same type, getting the same education, struggling with the same problems, and solving the question, or leaving it unsolved much in the same way. they knew no more than he what they wanted or what to do for it, but all were conscious that they would like to control power in some form; and the same thing could be said of an ant or an elephant. their form was tied to politics or literature. they amounted to one individual with half-a-dozen sides or facets; their temperaments reacted on each other and made each child more like the other. this was also education, but in the type, and the boston or new england type was well enough known. what no one knew was whether the individual who thought himself a representative of this type, was fit to deal with life. as far as outward bearing went, such a family of turbulent children, given free rein by their parents, or indifferent to check, should have come to more or less grief. certainly no one was strong enough to control them, least of all their mother, the queen-bee of the hive, on whom nine-tenths of the burden fell, on whose strength they all depended, but whose children were much too self-willed and self-confident to take guidance from her, or from any one else, unless in the direction they fancied. father and mother were about equally helpless. almost every large family in those days produced at least one black sheep, and if this generation of adamses escaped, it was as much a matter of surprise to them as to their neighbors. by some happy chance they grew up to be decent citizens, but henry adams, as a brand escaped from the burning, always looked back with astonishment at their luck. the fact seemed to prove that they were born, like birds, with a certain innate balance. home influences alone never saved the new england boy from ruin, though sometimes they may have helped to ruin him; and the influences outside of home were negative. if school helped, it was only by reaction. the dislike of school was so strong as to be a positive gain. the passionate hatred of school methods was almost a method in itself. yet the day-school of that time was respectable, and the boy had nothing to complain of. in fact, he never complained. he hated it because he was here with a crowd of other boys and compelled to learn by memory a quantity of things that did not amuse him. his memory was slow, and the effort painful. for him to conceive that his memory could compete for school prizes with machines of two or three times its power, was to prove himself wanting not only in memory, but flagrantly in mind. he thought his mind a good enough machine, if it were given time to act, but it acted wrong if hurried. schoolmasters never gave time. in any and all its forms, the boy detested school, and the prejudice became deeper with years. he always reckoned his school-days, from ten to sixteen years old, as time thrown away. perhaps his needs turned out to be exceptional, but his existence was exceptional. between and nearly every one's existence was exceptional. for success in the life imposed on him he needed, as afterwards appeared, the facile use of only four tools: mathematics, french, german, and spanish. with these, he could master in very short time any special branch of inquiry, and feel at home in any society. latin and greek, he could, with the help of the modern languages, learn more completely by the intelligent work of six weeks than in the six years he spent on them at school. these four tools were necessary to his success in life, but he never controlled any one of them. thus, at the outset, he was condemned to failure more or less complete in the life awaiting him, but not more so than his companions. indeed, had his father kept the boy at home, and given him half an hour's direction every day, he would have done more for him than school ever could do for them. of course, school-taught men and boys looked down on home-bred boys, and rather prided themselves on their own ignorance, but the man of sixty can generally see what he needed in life, and in henry adams's opinion it was not school. most school experience was bad. boy associations at fifteen were worse than none. boston at that time offered few healthy resources for boys or men. the bar-room and billiard-room were more familiar than parents knew. as a rule boys could skate and swim and were sent to dancing-school; they played a rudimentary game of baseball, football, and hockey; a few could sail a boat; still fewer had been out with a gun to shoot yellow-legs or a stray wild duck; one or two may have learned something of natural history if they came from the neighborhood of concord; none could ride across country, or knew what shooting with dogs meant. sport as a pursuit was unknown. boat-racing came after . for horse-racing, only the trotting-course existed. of all pleasures, winter sleighing was still the gayest and most popular. from none of these amusements could the boy learn anything likely to be of use to him in the world. books remained as in the eighteenth century, the source of life, and as they came out--thackeray, dickens, bulwer, tennyson, macaulay, carlyle, and the rest--they were devoured; but as far as happiness went, the happiest hours of the boy's education were passed in summer lying on a musty heap of congressional documents in the old farmhouse at quincy, reading "quentin durward," "ivanhoe," and "the talisman," and raiding the garden at intervals for peaches and pears. on the whole he learned most then. chapter iii washington ( - ) except for politics, mount vernon street had the merit of leaving the boy-mind supple, free to turn with the world, and if one learned next to nothing, the little one did learn needed not to be unlearned. the surface was ready to take any form that education should cut into it, though boston, with singular foresight, rejected the old designs. what sort of education was stamped elsewhere, a bostonian had no idea, but he escaped the evils of other standards by having no standard at all; and what was true of school was true of society. boston offered none that could help outside. every one now smiles at the bad taste of queen victoria and louis philippe--the society of the forties--but the taste was only a reflection of the social slack-water between a tide passed, and a tide to come. boston belonged to neither, and hardly even to america. neither aristocratic nor industrial nor social, boston girls and boys were not nearly as unformed as english boys and girls, but had less means of acquiring form as they grew older. women counted for little as models. every boy, from the age of seven, fell in love at frequent intervals with some girl--always more or less the same little girl--who had nothing to teach him, or he to teach her, except rather familiar and provincial manners, until they married and bore children to repeat the habit. the idea of attaching one's self to a married woman, or of polishing one's manners to suit the standards of women of thirty, could hardly have entered the mind of a young bostonian, and would have scandalized his parents. from women the boy got the domestic virtues and nothing else. he might not even catch the idea that women had more to give. the garden of eden was hardly more primitive. to balance this virtue, the puritan city had always hidden a darker side. blackguard boston was only too educational, and to most boys much the more interesting. a successful blackguard must enjoy great physical advantages besides a true vocation, and henry adams had neither; but no boy escaped some contact with vice of a very low form. blackguardism came constantly under boys' eyes, and had the charm of force and freedom and superiority to culture or decency. one might fear it, but no one honestly despised it. now and then it asserted itself as education more roughly than school ever did. one of the commonest boy-games of winter, inherited directly from the eighteenth-century, was a game of war on boston common. in old days the two hostile forces were called north-enders and south-enders. in the north-enders still survived as a legend, but in practice it was a battle of the latin school against all comers, and the latin school, for snowball, included all the boys of the west end. whenever, on a half-holiday, the weather was soft enough to soften the snow, the common was apt to be the scene of a fight, which began in daylight with the latin school in force, rushing their opponents down to tremont street, and which generally ended at dark by the latin school dwindling in numbers and disappearing. as the latin school grew weak, the roughs and young blackguards grew strong. as long as snowballs were the only weapon, no one was much hurt, but a stone may be put in a snowball, and in the dark a stick or a slungshot in the hands of a boy is as effective as a knife. one afternoon the fight had been long and exhausting. the boy henry, following, as his habit was, his bigger brother charles, had taken part in the battle, and had felt his courage much depressed by seeing one of his trustiest leaders, henry higginson--"bully hig," his school name--struck by a stone over the eye, and led off the field bleeding in rather a ghastly manner. as night came on, the latin school was steadily forced back to the beacon street mall where they could retreat no further without disbanding, and by that time only a small band was left, headed by two heroes, savage and marvin. a dark mass of figures could be seen below, making ready for the last rush, and rumor said that a swarm of blackguards from the slums, led by a grisly terror called conky daniels, with a club and a hideous reputation, was going to put an end to the beacon street cowards forever. henry wanted to run away with the others, but his brother was too big to run away, so they stood still and waited immolation. the dark mass set up a shout, and rushed forward. the beacon street boys turned and fled up the steps, except savage and marvin and the few champions who would not run. the terrible conky daniels swaggered up, stopped a moment with his body-guard to swear a few oaths at marvin, and then swept on and chased the flyers, leaving the few boys untouched who stood their ground. the obvious moral taught that blackguards were not so black as they were painted; but the boy henry had passed through as much terror as though he were turenne or henri iv, and ten or twelve years afterwards when these same boys were fighting and falling on all the battle-fields of virginia and maryland, he wondered whether their education on boston common had taught savage and marvin how to die. if violence were a part of complete education, boston was not incomplete. the idea of violence was familiar to the anti-slavery leaders as well as to their followers. most of them suffered from it. mobs were always possible. henry never happened to be actually concerned in a mob, but he, like every other boy, was sure to be on hand wherever a mob was expected, and whenever he heard garrison or wendell phillips speak, he looked for trouble. wendell phillips on a platform was a model dangerous for youth. theodore parker in his pulpit was not much safer. worst of all, the execution of the fugitive slave law in boston--the sight of court square packed with bayonets, and his own friends obliged to line the streets under arms as state militia, in order to return a negro to slavery--wrought frenzy in the brain of a fifteen-year-old, eighteenth-century boy from quincy, who wanted to miss no reasonable chance of mischief. one lived in the atmosphere of the stamp act, the tea tax, and the boston massacre. within boston, a boy was first an eighteenth-century politician, and afterwards only a possibility; beyond boston the first step led only further into politics. after february, , but one slight tie remained of all those that, since , had connected quincy with the outer world. the madam stayed in washington, after her husband's death, and in her turn was struck by paralysis and bedridden. from time to time her son charles, whose affection and sympathy for his mother in her many tribulations were always pronounced, went on to see her, and in may, , he took with him his twelve-year-old son. the journey was meant as education, and as education it served the purpose of fixing in memory the stage of a boy's thought in . he could not remember taking special interest in the railroad journey or in new york; with railways and cities he was familiar enough. his first impression was the novelty of crossing new york bay and finding an english railway carriage on the camden and amboy railroad. this was a new world; a suggestion of corruption in the simple habits of american life; a step to exclusiveness never approached in boston; but it was amusing. the boy rather liked it. at trenton the train set him on board a steamer which took him to philadelphia where he smelt other varieties of town life; then again by boat to chester, and by train to havre de grace; by boat to baltimore and thence by rail to washington. this was the journey he remembered. the actual journey may have been quite different, but the actual journey has no interest for education. the memory was all that mattered; and what struck him most, to remain fresh in his mind all his lifetime, was the sudden change that came over the world on entering a slave state. he took education politically. the mere raggedness of outline could not have seemed wholly new, for even boston had its ragged edges, and the town of quincy was far from being a vision of neatness or good-repair; in truth, he had never seen a finished landscape; but maryland was raggedness of a new kind. the railway, about the size and character of a modern tram, rambled through unfenced fields and woods, or through village streets, among a haphazard variety of pigs, cows, and negro babies, who might all have used the cabins for pens and styes, had the southern pig required styes, but who never showed a sign of care. this was the boy's impression of what slavery caused, and, for him, was all it taught. coming down in the early morning from his bedroom in his grandmother's house--still called the adams building in--f street and venturing outside into the air reeking with the thick odor of the catalpa trees, he found himself on an earth-road, or village street, with wheel-tracks meandering from the colonnade of the treasury hard by, to the white marble columns and fronts of the post office and patent office which faced each other in the distance, like white greek temples in the abandoned gravel-pits of a deserted syrian city. here and there low wooden houses were scattered along the streets, as in other southern villages, but he was chiefly attracted by an unfinished square marble shaft, half-a-mile below, and he walked down to inspect it before breakfast. his aunt drily remarked that, at this rate, he would soon get through all the sights; but she could not guess--having lived always in washington--how little the sights of washington had to do with its interest. the boy could not have told her; he was nowhere near an understanding of himself. the more he was educated, the less he understood. slavery struck him in the face; it was a nightmare; a horror; a crime; the sum of all wickedness! contact made it only more repulsive. he wanted to escape, like the negroes, to free soil. slave states were dirty, unkempt, poverty-stricken, ignorant, vicious! he had not a thought but repulsion for it; and yet the picture had another side. the may sunshine and shadow had something to do with it; the thickness of foliage and the heavy smells had more; the sense of atmosphere, almost new, had perhaps as much again; and the brooding indolence of a warm climate and a negro population hung in the atmosphere heavier than the catalpas. the impression was not simple, but the boy liked it: distinctly it remained on his mind as an attraction, almost obscuring quincy itself. the want of barriers, of pavements, of forms; the looseness, the laziness; the indolent southern drawl; the pigs in the streets; the negro babies and their mothers with bandanas; the freedom, openness, swagger, of nature and man, soothed his johnson blood. most boys would have felt it in the same way, but with him the feeling caught on to an inheritance. the softness of his gentle old grandmother as she lay in bed and chatted with him, did not come from boston. his aunt was anything rather than bostonian. he did not wholly come from boston himself. though washington belonged to a different world, and the two worlds could not live together, he was not sure that he enjoyed the boston world most. even at twelve years old he could see his own nature no more clearly than he would at twelve hundred, if by accident he should happen to live so long. his father took him to the capitol and on the floor of the senate, which then, and long afterwards, until the era of tourists, was freely open to visitors. the old senate chamber resembled a pleasant political club. standing behind the vice-president's chair, which is now the chief justice's, the boy was presented to some of the men whose names were great in their day, and as familiar to him as his own. clay and webster and calhoun were there still, but with them a free soil candidate for the vice-presidency had little to do; what struck boys most was their type. senators were a species; they all wore an air, as they wore a blue dress coat or brass buttons; they were roman. the type of senator in was rather charming at its best, and the senate, when in good temper, was an agreeable body, numbering only some sixty members, and affecting the airs of courtesy. its vice was not so much a vice of manners or temper as of attitude. the statesman of all periods was apt to be pompous, but even pomposity was less offensive than familiarity--on the platform as in the pulpit--and southern pomposity, when not arrogant, was genial and sympathetic, almost quaint and childlike in its simple-mindedness; quite a different thing from the websterian or conklinian pomposity of the north. the boy felt at ease there, more at home than he had ever felt in boston state house, though his acquaintance with the codfish in the house of representatives went back beyond distinct recollection. senators spoke kindly to him, and seemed to feel so, for they had known his family socially; and, in spite of slavery, even j. q. adams in his later years, after he ceased to stand in the way of rivals, had few personal enemies. decidedly the senate, pro-slavery though it were, seemed a friendly world. this first step in national politics was a little like the walk before breakfast; an easy, careless, genial, enlarging stride into a fresh and amusing world, where nothing was finished, but where even the weeds grew rank. the second step was like the first, except that it led to the white house. he was taken to see president taylor. outside, in a paddock in front, "old whitey," the president's charger, was grazing, as they entered; and inside, the president was receiving callers as simply as if he were in the paddock too. the president was friendly, and the boy felt no sense of strangeness that he could ever recall. in fact, what strangeness should he feel? the families were intimate; so intimate that their friendliness outlived generations, civil war, and all sorts of rupture. president taylor owed his election to martin van buren and the free soil party. to him, the adamses might still be of use. as for the white house, all the boy's family had lived there, and, barring the eight years of andrew jackson's reign, had been more or less at home there ever since it was built. the boy half thought he owned it, and took for granted that he should some day live in it. he felt no sensation whatever before presidents. a president was a matter of course in every respectable family; he had two in his own; three, if he counted old nathaniel gorham, who, was the oldest and first in distinction. revolutionary patriots, or perhaps a colonial governor, might be worth talking about, but any one could be president, and some very shady characters were likely to be. presidents, senators, congressmen, and such things were swarming in every street. every one thought alike whether they had ancestors or not. no sort of glory hedged presidents as such, and, in the whole country, one could hardly have met with an admission of respect for any office or name, unless it were george washington. that was--to all appearance sincerely--respected. people made pilgrimages to mount vernon and made even an effort to build washington a monument. the effort had failed, but one still went to mount vernon, although it was no easy trip. mr. adams took the boy there in a carriage and pair, over a road that gave him a complete virginia education for use ten years afterwards. to the new england mind, roads, schools, clothes, and a clean face were connected as part of the law of order or divine system. bad roads meant bad morals. the moral of this virginia road was clear, and the boy fully learned it. slavery was wicked, and slavery was the cause of this road's badness which amounted to social crime--and yet, at the end of the road and product of the crime stood mount vernon and george washington. luckily boys accept contradictions as readily as their elders do, or this boy might have become prematurely wise. he had only to repeat what he was told--that george washington stood alone. otherwise this third step in his washington education would have been his last. on that line, the problem of progress was not soluble, whatever the optimists and orators might say--or, for that matter, whatever they might think. george washington could not be reached on boston lines. george washington was a primary, or, if virginians liked it better, an ultimate relation, like the pole star, and amid the endless restless motion of every other visible point in space, he alone remained steady, in the mind of henry adams, to the end. all the other points shifted their bearings; john adams, jefferson, madison, franklin, even john marshall, took varied lights, and assumed new relations, but mount vernon always remained where it was, with no practicable road to reach it; and yet, when he got there, mount vernon was only quincy in a southern setting. no doubt it was much more charming, but it was the same eighteenth-century, the same old furniture, the same old patriot, and the same old president. the boy took to it instinctively. the broad potomac and the coons in the trees, the bandanas and the box-hedges, the bedrooms upstairs and the porch outside, even martha washington herself in memory, were as natural as the tides and the may sunshine; he had only enlarged his horizon a little; but he never thought to ask himself or his father how to deal with the moral problem that deduced george washington from the sum of all wickedness. in practice, such trifles as contradictions in principle are easily set aside; the faculty of ignoring them makes the practical man; but any attempt to deal with them seriously as education is fatal. luckily charles francis adams never preached and was singularly free from cant. he may have had views of his own, but he let his son henry satisfy himself with the simple elementary fact that george washington stood alone. life was not yet complicated. every problem had a solution, even the negro. the boy went back to boston more political than ever, and his politics were no longer so modern as the eighteenth century, but took a strong tone of the seventeenth. slavery drove the whole puritan community back on its puritanism. the boy thought as dogmatically as though he were one of his own ancestors. the slave power took the place of stuart kings and roman popes. education could go no further in that course, and ran off into emotion; but, as the boy gradually found his surroundings change, and felt himself no longer an isolated atom in a hostile universe, but a sort of herring-fry in a shoal of moving fish, he began to learn the first and easier lessons of practical politics. thus far he had seen nothing but eighteenth-century statesmanship. america and he began, at the same time, to become aware of a new force under the innocent surface of party machinery. even at that early moment, a rather slow boy felt dimly conscious that he might meet some personal difficulties in trying to reconcile sixteenth-century principles and eighteenth-century statesmanship with late nineteenth-century party organization. the first vague sense of feeling an unknown living obstacle in the dark came in l. the free soil conclave in mount vernon street belonged, as already said, to the statesman class, and, like daniel webster, had nothing to do with machinery. websters or sewards depended on others for machine work and money--on peter harveys and thurlow weeds, who spent their lives in it, took most of the abuse, and asked no reward. almost without knowing it, the subordinates ousted their employers and created a machine which no one but themselves could run. in things had not quite reached that point. the men who ran the small free soil machine were still modest, though they became famous enough in their own right. henry wilson, john b. alley, anson burlingame, and the other managers, negotiated a bargain with the massachusetts democrats giving the state to the democrats and a seat in the senate to the free soilers. with this bargain mr. adams and his statesman friends would have nothing to do, for such a coalition was in their eyes much like jockeys selling a race. they did not care to take office as pay for votes sold to pro-slavery democrats. theirs was a correct, not to say noble, position; but, as a matter of fact, they took the benefit of the sale, for the coalition chose charles sumner as its candidate for the senate, while george s. boutwell was made governor for the democrats. this was the boy's first lesson in practical politics, and a sharp one; not that he troubled himself with moral doubts, but that he learned the nature of a flagrantly corrupt political bargain in which he was too good to take part, but not too good to take profit. charles sumner happened to be the partner to receive these stolen goods, but between his friend and his father the boy felt no distinction, and, for him, there was none. he entered into no casuistry on the matter. his friend was right because his friend, and the boy shared the glory. the question of education did not rise while the conflict lasted. yet every one saw as clearly then as afterwards that a lesson of some sort must be learned and understood, once for all. the boy might ignore, as a mere historical puzzle, the question how to deduce george washington from the sum of all wickedness, but he had himself helped to deduce charles sumner from the sum of political corruption. on that line, too, education could go no further. tammany hall stood at the end of the vista. mr. alley, one of the strictest of moralists, held that his object in making the bargain was to convert the democratic party to anti-slavery principles, and that he did it. henry adams could rise to no such moral elevation. he was only a boy, and his object in supporting the coalition was that of making his friend a senator. it was as personal as though he had helped to make his friend a millionaire. he could never find a way of escaping immoral conclusions, except by admitting that he and his father and sumner were wrong, and this he was never willing to do, for the consequences of this admission were worse than those of the other. thus, before he was fifteen years old, he had managed to get himself into a state of moral confusion from which he never escaped. as a politician, he was already corrupt, and he never could see how any practical politician could be less corrupt than himself. apology, as he understood himself, was cant or cowardice. at the time he never even dreamed that he needed to apologize, though the press shouted it at him from every corner, and though the mount vernon street conclave agreed with the press; yet he could not plead ignorance, and even in the heat of the conflict, he never cared to defend the coalition. boy as he was, he knew enough to know that something was wrong, but his only interest was the election. day after day, the general court balloted; and the boy haunted the gallery, following the roll-call, and wondered what caleb cushing meant by calling mr. sumner a "one-eyed abolitionist." truly the difference in meaning with the phrase "one-ideaed abolitionist," which was mr. cushing's actual expression, is not very great, but neither the one nor the other seemed to describe mr. sumner to the boy, who never could have made the error of classing garrison and sumner together, or mistaking caleb cushing's relation to either. temper ran high at that moment, while sumner every day missed his election by only one or two votes. at last, april , , standing among the silent crowd in the gallery, henry heard the vote announced which gave sumner the needed number. slipping under the arms of the bystanders, he ran home as hard as he could, and burst into the dining-room where mr. sumner was seated at table with the family. he enjoyed the glory of telling sumner that he was elected; it was probably the proudest moment in the life of either. the next day, when the boy went to school, he noticed numbers of boys and men in the streets wearing black crepe on their arm. he knew few free soil boys in boston; his acquaintances were what he called pro-slavery; so he thought proper to tie a bit of white silk ribbon round his own arm by way of showing that his friend mr. sumner was not wholly alone. this little piece of bravado passed unnoticed; no one even cuffed his ears; but in later life he was a little puzzled to decide which symbol was the more correct. no one then dreamed of four years' war, but every one dreamed of secession. the symbol for either might well be matter of doubt. this triumph of the mount vernon street conclave capped the political climax. the boy, like a million other american boys, was a politician, and what was worse, fit as yet to be nothing else. he should have been, like his grandfather, a protege of george washington, a statesman designated by destiny, with nothing to do but look directly ahead, follow orders, and march. on the contrary, he was not even a bostonian; he felt himself shut out of boston as though he were an exile; he never thought of himself as a bostonian; he never looked about him in boston, as boys commonly do wherever they are, to select the street they like best, the house they want to live in, the profession they mean to practise. always he felt himself somewhere else; perhaps in washington with its social ease; perhaps in europe; and he watched with vague unrest from the quincy hills the smoke of the cunard steamers stretching in a long line to the horizon, and disappearing every other saturday or whatever the day might be, as though the steamers were offering to take him away, which was precisely what they were doing. had these ideas been unreasonable, influences enough were at hand to correct them; but the point of the whole story, when henry adams came to look back on it, seemed to be that the ideas were more than reasonable; they were the logical, necessary, mathematical result of conditions old as history and fixed as fate--invariable sequence in man's experience. the only idea which would have been quite unreasonable scarcely entered his mind. this was the thought of going westward and growing up with the country. that he was not in the least fitted for going west made no objection whatever, since he was much better fitted than most of the persons that went. the convincing reason for staying in the east was that he had there every advantage over the west. he could not go wrong. the west must inevitably pay an enormous tribute to boston and new york. one's position in the east was the best in the world for every purpose that could offer an object for going westward. if ever in history men had been able to calculate on a certainty for a lifetime in advance, the citizens of the great eastern seaports could do it in when their railway systems were already laid out. neither to a politician nor to a business-man nor to any of the learned professions did the west promise any certain advantage, while it offered uncertainties in plenty. at any other moment in human history, this education, including its political and literary bias, would have been not only good, but quite the best. society had always welcomed and flattered men so endowed. henry adams had every reason to be well pleased with it, and not ill-pleased with himself. he had all he wanted. he saw no reason for thinking that any one else had more. he finished with school, not very brilliantly, but without finding fault with the sum of his knowledge. probably he knew more than his father, or his grandfather, or his great-grandfather had known at sixteen years old. only on looking back, fifty years later, at his own figure in , and pondering on the needs of the twentieth century, he wondered whether, on the whole the boy of stood nearer to the thought of , or to that of the year . he found himself unable to give a sure answer. the calculation was clouded by the undetermined values of twentieth-century thought, but the story will show his reasons for thinking that, in essentials like religion, ethics, philosophy; in history, literature, art; in the concepts of all science, except perhaps mathematics, the american boy of stood nearer the year than to the year . the education he had received bore little relation to the education he needed. speaking as an american of , he had as yet no education at all. he knew not even where or how to begin. chapter iv harvard college ( - ) one day in june, , young adams walked for the last time down the steps of mr. dixwell's school in boylston place, and felt no sensation but one of unqualified joy that this experience was ended. never before or afterwards in his life did he close a period so long as four years without some sensation of loss--some sentiment of habit--but school was what in after life he commonly heard his friends denounce as an intolerable bore. he was born too old for it. the same thing could be said of most new england boys. mentally they never were boys. their education as men should have begun at ten years old. they were fully five years more mature than the english or european boy for whom schools were made. for the purposes of future advancement, as afterwards appeared, these first six years of a possible education were wasted in doing imperfectly what might have been done perfectly in one, and in any case would have had small value. the next regular step was harvard college. he was more than glad to go. for generation after generation, adamses and brookses and boylstons and gorhams had gone to harvard college, and although none of them, as far as known, had ever done any good there, or thought himself the better for it, custom, social ties, convenience, and, above all, economy, kept each generation in the track. any other education would have required a serious effort, but no one took harvard college seriously. all went there because their friends went there, and the college was their ideal of social self-respect. harvard college, as far as it educated at all, was a mild and liberal school, which sent young men into the world with all they needed to make respectable citizens, and something of what they wanted to make useful ones. leaders of men it never tried to make. its ideals were altogether different. the unitarian clergy had given to the college a character of moderation, balance, judgment, restraint, what the french called mesure; excellent traits, which the college attained with singular success, so that its graduates could commonly be recognized by the stamp, but such a type of character rarely lent itself to autobiography. in effect, the school created a type but not a will. four years of harvard college, if successful, resulted in an autobiographical blank, a mind on which only a water-mark had been stamped. the stamp, as such things went, was a good one. the chief wonder of education is that it does not ruin everybody concerned in it, teachers and taught. sometimes in after life, adams debated whether in fact it had not ruined him and most of his companions, but, disappointment apart, harvard college was probably less hurtful than any other university then in existence. it taught little, and that little ill, but it left the mind open, free from bias, ignorant of facts, but docile. the graduate had few strong prejudices. he knew little, but his mind remained supple, ready to receive knowledge. what caused the boy most disappointment was the little he got from his mates. speaking exactly, he got less than nothing, a result common enough in education. yet the college catalogue for the years to shows a list of names rather distinguished in their time. alexander agassiz and phillips brooks led it; h. h. richardson and o. w. holmes helped to close it. as a rule the most promising of all die early, and never get their names into a dictionary of contemporaries, which seems to be the only popular standard of success. many died in the war. adams knew them all, more or less; he felt as much regard, and quite as much respect for them then, as he did after they won great names and were objects of a vastly wider respect; but, as help towards education, he got nothing whatever from them or they from him until long after they had left college. possibly the fault was his, but one would like to know how many others shared it. accident counts for much in companionship as in marriage. life offers perhaps only a score of possible companions, and it is mere chance whether they meet as early as school or college, but it is more than a chance that boys brought up together under like conditions have nothing to give each other. the class of , to which henry adams belonged, was a typical collection of young new englanders, quietly penetrating and aggressively commonplace; free from meannesses, jealousies, intrigues, enthusiasms, and passions; not exceptionally quick; not consciously skeptical; singularly indifferent to display, artifice, florid expression, but not hostile to it when it amused them; distrustful of themselves, but little disposed to trust any one else; with not much humor of their own, but full of readiness to enjoy the humor of others; negative to a degree that in the long run became positive and triumphant. not harsh in manners or judgment, rather liberal and open-minded, they were still as a body the most formidable critics one would care to meet, in a long life exposed to criticism. they never flattered, seldom praised; free from vanity, they were not intolerant of it; but they were objectiveness itself; their attitude was a law of nature; their judgment beyond appeal, not an act either of intellect or emotion or of will, but a sort of gravitation. this was harvard college incarnate, but even for harvard college, the class of was somewhat extreme. of unity this band of nearly one hundred young men had no keen sense, but they had equally little energy of repulsion. they were pleasant to live with, and above the average of students--german, french, english, or what not--but chiefly because each individual appeared satisfied to stand alone. it seemed a sign of force; yet to stand alone is quite natural when one has no passions; still easier when one has no pains. into this unusually dissolvent medium, chance insisted on enlarging henry adams's education by tossing a trio of virginians as little fitted for it as sioux indians to a treadmill. by some further affinity, these three outsiders fell into relation with the bostonians among whom adams as a schoolboy belonged, and in the end with adams himself, although they and he knew well how thin an edge of friendship separated them in from mortal enmity. one of the virginians was the son of colonel robert e. lee, of the second united states cavalry; the two others who seemed instinctively to form a staff for lee, were town-virginians from petersburg. a fourth outsider came from cincinnati and was half kentuckian, n. l. anderson, longworth on the mother's side. for the first time adams's education brought him in contact with new types and taught him their values. he saw the new england type measure itself with another, and he was part of the process. lee, known through life as "roony," was a virginian of the eighteenth century, much as henry adams was a bostonian of the same age. roony lee had changed little from the type of his grandfather, light horse harry. tall, largely built, handsome, genial, with liberal virginian openness towards all he liked, he had also the virginian habit of command and took leadership as his natural habit. no one cared to contest it. none of the new englanders wanted command. for a year, at least, lee was the most popular and prominent young man in his class, but then seemed slowly to drop into the background. the habit of command was not enough, and the virginian had little else. he was simple beyond analysis; so simple that even the simple new england student could not realize him. no one knew enough to know how ignorant he was; how childlike; how helpless before the relative complexity of a school. as an animal, the southerner seemed to have every advantage, but even as an animal he steadily lost ground. the lesson in education was vital to these young men, who, within ten years, killed each other by scores in the act of testing their college conclusions. strictly, the southerner had no mind; he had temperament. he was not a scholar; he had no intellectual training; he could not analyze an idea, and he could not even conceive of admitting two; but in life one could get along very well without ideas, if one had only the social instinct. dozens of eminent statesmen were men of lee's type, and maintained themselves well enough in the legislature, but college was a sharper test. the virginian was weak in vice itself, though the bostonian was hardly a master of crime. the habits of neither were good; both were apt to drink hard and to live low lives; but the bostonian suffered less than the virginian. commonly the bostonian could take some care of himself even in his worst stages, while the virginian became quarrelsome and dangerous. when a virginian had brooded a few days over an imaginary grief and substantial whiskey, none of his northern friends could be sure that he might not be waiting, round the corner, with a knife or pistol, to revenge insult by the dry light of delirium tremens; and when things reached this condition, lee had to exhaust his authority over his own staff. lee was a gentleman of the old school, and, as every one knows, gentlemen of the old school drank almost as much as gentlemen of the new school; but this was not his trouble. he was sober even in the excessive violence of political feeling in those years; he kept his temper and his friends under control. adams liked the virginians. no one was more obnoxious to them, by name and prejudice; yet their friendship was unbroken and even warm. at a moment when the immediate future posed no problem in education so vital as the relative energy and endurance of north and south, this momentary contact with southern character was a sort of education for its own sake; but this was not all. no doubt the self-esteem of the yankee, which tended naturally to self-distrust, was flattered by gaining the slow conviction that the southerner, with his slave-owning limitations, was as little fit to succeed in the struggle of modern life as though he were still a maker of stone axes, living in caves, and hunting the bos primigenius, and that every quality in which he was strong, made him weaker; but adams had begun to fear that even in this respect one eighteenth-century type might not differ deeply from another. roony lee had changed little from the virginian of a century before; but adams was himself a good deal nearer the type of his great-grandfather than to that of a railway superintendent. he was little more fit than the virginians to deal with a future america which showed no fancy for the past. already northern society betrayed a preference for economists over diplomats or soldiers--one might even call it a jealousy--against which two eighteenth-century types had little chance to live, and which they had in common to fear. nothing short of this curious sympathy could have brought into close relations two young men so hostile as roony lee and henry adams, but the chief difference between them as collegians consisted only in their difference of scholarship: lee was a total failure; adams a partial one. both failed, but lee felt his failure more sensibly, so that he gladly seized the chance of escape by accepting a commission offered him by general winfield scott in the force then being organized against the mormons. he asked adams to write his letter of acceptance, which flattered adams's vanity more than any northern compliment could do, because, in days of violent political bitterness, it showed a certain amount of good temper. the diplomat felt his profession. if the student got little from his mates, he got little more from his masters. the four years passed at college were, for his purposes, wasted. harvard college was a good school, but at bottom what the boy disliked most was any school at all. he did not want to be one in a hundred--one per cent of an education. he regarded himself as the only person for whom his education had value, and he wanted the whole of it. he got barely half of an average. long afterwards, when the devious path of life led him back to teach in his turn what no student naturally cared or needed to know, he diverted some dreary hours of faculty-meetings by looking up his record in the class-lists, and found himself graded precisely in the middle. in the one branch he most needed--mathematics--barring the few first scholars, failure was so nearly universal that no attempt at grading could have had value, and whether he stood fortieth or ninetieth must have been an accident or the personal favor of the professor. here his education failed lamentably. at best he could never have been a mathematician; at worst he would never have cared to be one; but he needed to read mathematics, like any other universal language, and he never reached the alphabet. beyond two or three greek plays, the student got nothing from the ancient languages. beyond some incoherent theories of free-trade and protection, he got little from political economy. he could not afterwards remember to have heard the name of karl marx mentioned, or the title of "capital." he was equally ignorant of auguste comte. these were the two writers of his time who most influenced its thought. the bit of practical teaching he afterwards reviewed with most curiosity was the course in chemistry, which taught him a number of theories that befogged his mind for a lifetime. the only teaching that appealed to his imagination was a course of lectures by louis agassiz on the glacial period and paleontology, which had more influence on his curiosity than the rest of the college instruction altogether. the entire work of the four years could have been easily put into the work of any four months in after life. harvard college was a negative force, and negative forces have value. slowly it weakened the violent political bias of childhood, not by putting interests in its place, but by mental habits which had no bias at all. it would also have weakened the literary bias, if adams had been capable of finding other amusement, but the climate kept him steady to desultory and useless reading, till he had run through libraries of volumes which he forgot even to their title-pages. rather by instinct than by guidance, he turned to writing, and his professors or tutors occasionally gave his english composition a hesitating approval; but in that branch, as in all the rest, even when he made a long struggle for recognition, he never convinced his teachers that his abilities, at their best, warranted placing him on the rank-list, among the first third of his class. instructors generally reach a fairly accurate gauge of their scholars' powers. henry adams himself held the opinion that his instructors were very nearly right, and when he became a professor in his turn, and made mortifying mistakes in ranking his scholars, he still obstinately insisted that on the whole, he was not far wrong. student or professor, he accepted the negative standard because it was the standard of the school. he never knew what other students thought of it, or what they thought they gained from it; nor would their opinion have much affected his. from the first, he wanted to be done with it, and stood watching vaguely for a path and a direction. the world outside seemed large, but the paths that led into it were not many and lay mostly through boston, where he did not want to go. as it happened, by pure chance, the first door of escape that seemed to offer a hope led into germany, and james russell lowell opened it. lowell, on succeeding longfellow as professor of belles-lettres, had duly gone to germany, and had brought back whatever he found to bring. the literary world then agreed that truth survived in germany alone, and carlyle, matthew arnold, renan, emerson, with scores of popular followers, taught the german faith. the literary world had revolted against the yoke of coming capitalism--its money-lenders, its bank directors, and its railway magnates. thackeray and dickens followed balzac in scratching and biting the unfortunate middle class with savage ill-temper, much as the middle class had scratched and bitten the church and court for a hundred years before. the middle class had the power, and held its coal and iron well in hand, but the satirists and idealists seized the press, and as they were agreed that the second empire was a disgrace to france and a danger to england, they turned to germany because at that moment germany was neither economical nor military, and a hundred years behind western europe in the simplicity of its standard. german thought, method, honesty, and even taste, became the standards of scholarship. goethe was raised to the rank of shakespeare--kant ranked as a law-giver above plato. all serious scholars were obliged to become german, for german thought was revolutionizing criticism. lowell had followed the rest, not very enthusiastically, but with sufficient conviction, and invited his scholars to join him. adams was glad to accept the invitation, rather for the sake of cultivating lowell than germany, but still in perfect good faith. it was the first serious attempt he had made to direct his own education, and he was sure of getting some education out of it; not perhaps anything that he expected, but at least a path. singularly circuitous and excessively wasteful of energy the path proved to be, but the student could never see what other was open to him. he could have done no better had he foreseen every stage of his coming life, and he would probably have done worse. the preliminary step was pure gain. james russell lowell had brought back from germany the only new and valuable part of its universities, the habit of allowing students to read with him privately in his study. adams asked the privilege, and used it to read a little, and to talk a great deal, for the personal contact pleased and flattered him, as that of older men ought to flatter and please the young even when they altogether exaggerate its value. lowell was a new element in the boy's life. as practical a new englander as any, he leaned towards the concord faith rather than towards boston where he properly belonged; for concord, in the dark days of , glowed with pure light. adams approached it in much the same spirit as he would have entered a gothic cathedral, for he well knew that the priests regarded him as only a worm. to the concord church all adamses were minds of dust and emptiness, devoid of feeling, poetry or imagination; little higher than the common scourings of state street; politicians of doubtful honesty; natures of narrow scope; and already, at eighteen years old, henry had begun to feel uncertainty about so many matters more important than adamses that his mind rebelled against no discipline merely personal, and he was ready to admit his unworthiness if only he might penetrate the shrine. the influence of harvard college was beginning to have its effect. he was slipping away from fixed principles; from mount vernon street; from quincy; from the eighteenth century; and his first steps led toward concord. he never reached concord, and to concord church he, like the rest of mankind who accepted a material universe, remained always an insect, or something much lower--a man. it was surely no fault of his that the universe seemed to him real; perhaps--as mr. emerson justly said--it was so; in spite of the long-continued effort of a lifetime, he perpetually fell back into the heresy that if anything universal was unreal, it was himself and not the appearances; it was the poet and not the banker; it was his own thought, not the thing that moved it. he did not lack the wish to be transcendental. concord seemed to him, at one time, more real than quincy; yet in truth russell lowell was as little transcendental as beacon street. from him the boy got no revolutionary thought whatever--objective or subjective as they used to call it--but he got good-humored encouragement to do what amused him, which consisted in passing two years in europe after finishing the four years of cambridge. the result seemed small in proportion to the effort, but it was the only positive result he could ever trace to the influence of harvard college, and he had grave doubts whether harvard college influenced even that. negative results in plenty he could trace, but he tended towards negation on his own account, as one side of the new england mind had always done, and even there he could never feel sure that harvard college had more than reflected a weakness. in his opinion the education was not serious, but in truth hardly any boston student took it seriously, and none of them seemed sure that president walker himself, or president felton after him, took it more seriously than the students. for them all, the college offered chiefly advantages vulgarly called social, rather than mental. unluckily for this particular boy, social advantages were his only capital in life. of money he had not much, of mind not more, but he could be quite certain that, barring his own faults, his social position would never be questioned. what he needed was a career in which social position had value. never in his life would he have to explain who he was; never would he have need of acquaintance to strengthen his social standing; but he needed greatly some one to show him how to use the acquaintance he cared to make. he made no acquaintance in college which proved to have the smallest use in after life. all his boston friends he knew before, or would have known in any case, and contact of bostonian with bostonian was the last education these young men needed. cordial and intimate as their college relations were, they all flew off in different directions the moment they took their degrees. harvard college remained a tie, indeed, but a tie little stronger than beacon street and not so strong as state street. strangers might perhaps gain something from the college if they were hard pressed for social connections. a student like h. h. richardson, who came from far away new orleans, and had his career before him to chase rather than to guide, might make valuable friendships at college. certainly adams made no acquaintance there that he valued in after life so much as richardson, but still more certainly the college relation had little to do with the later friendship. life is a narrow valley, and the roads run close together. adams would have attached himself to richardson in any case, as he attached himself to john lafarge or augustus st. gaudens or clarence king or john hay, none of whom were at harvard college. the valley of life grew more and more narrow with years, and certain men with common tastes were bound to come together. adams knew only that he would have felt himself on a more equal footing with them had he been less ignorant, and had he not thrown away ten years of early life in acquiring what he might have acquired in one. socially or intellectually, the college was for him negative and in some ways mischievous. the most tolerant man of the world could not see good in the lower habits of the students, but the vices were less harmful than the virtues. the habit of drinking--though the mere recollection of it made him doubt his own veracity, so fantastic it seemed in later life--may have done no great or permanent harm; but the habit of looking at life as a social relation--an affair of society--did no good. it cultivated a weakness which needed no cultivation. if it had helped to make men of the world, or give the manners and instincts of any profession--such as temper, patience, courtesy, or a faculty of profiting by the social defects of opponents--it would have been education better worth having than mathematics or languages; but so far as it helped to make anything, it helped only to make the college standard permanent through life. the bostonian educated at harvard college remained a collegian, if he stuck only to what the college gave him. if parents went on generation after generation, sending their children to harvard college for the sake of its social advantages, they perpetuated an inferior social type, quite as ill-fitted as the oxford type for success in the next generation. luckily the old social standard of the college, as president walker or james russell lowell still showed it, was admirable, and if it had little practical value or personal influence on the mass of students, at least it preserved the tradition for those who liked it. the harvard graduate was neither american nor european, nor even wholly yankee; his admirers were few, and critics his many; perhaps his worst weakness was his self-criticism and self-consciousness; but his ambitions, social or intellectual, were necessarily cheap even though they might be negative. afraid of such serious risks, and still more afraid of personal ridicule, he seldom made a great failure of life, and nearly always led a life more or less worth living. so henry adams, well aware that he could not succeed as a scholar, and finding his social position beyond improvement or need of effort, betook himself to the single ambition which otherwise would scarcely have seemed a true outcome of the college, though it was the last remnant of the old unitarian supremacy. he took to the pen. he wrote. the college magazine printed his work, and the college societies listened to his addresses. lavish of praise the readers were not; the audiences, too, listened in silence; but this was all the encouragement any harvard collegian had a reasonable hope to receive; grave silence was a form of patience that meant possible future acceptance; and henry adams went on writing. no one cared enough to criticise, except himself who soon began to suffer from reaching his own limits. he found that he could not be this--or that--or the other; always precisely the things he wanted to be. he had not wit or scope or force. judges always ranked him beneath a rival, if he had any; and he believed the judges were right. his work seemed to him thin, commonplace, feeble. at times he felt his own weakness so fatally that he could not go on; when he had nothing to say, he could not say it, and he found that he had very little to say at best. much that he then wrote must be still in existence in print or manuscript, though he never cared to see it again, for he felt no doubt that it was in reality just what he thought it. at best it showed only a feeling for form; an instinct of exclusion. nothing shocked--not even its weakness. inevitably an effort leads to an ambition--creates it--and at that time the ambition of the literary student, which almost took place of the regular prizes of scholarship, was that of being chosen as the representative of his class--class orator--at the close of their course. this was political as well as literary success, and precisely the sort of eighteenth-century combination that fascinated an eighteenth century boy. the idea lurked in his mind, at first as a dream, in no way serious or even possible, for he stood outside the number of what were known as popular men. year by year, his position seemed to improve, or perhaps his rivals disappeared, until at last, to his own great astonishment, he found himself a candidate. the habits of the college permitted no active candidacy; he and his rivals had not a word to say for or against themselves, and he was never even consulted on the subject; he was not present at any of the proceedings, and how it happened he never could quite divine, but it did happen, that one evening on returning from boston he received notice of his election, after a very close contest, as class orator over the head of the first scholar, who was undoubtedly a better orator and a more popular man. in politics the success of the poorer candidate is common enough, and henry adams was a fairly trained politician, but he never understood how he managed to defeat not only a more capable but a more popular rival. to him the election seemed a miracle. this was no mock-modesty; his head was as clear as ever it was in an indifferent canvass, and he knew his rivals and their following as well as he knew himself. what he did not know, even after four years of education, was harvard college. what he could never measure was the bewildering impersonality of the men, who, at twenty years old, seemed to set no value either on official or personal standards. here were nearly a hundred young men who had lived together intimately during four of the most impressionable years of life, and who, not only once but again and again, in different ways, deliberately, seriously, dispassionately, chose as their representatives precisely those of their companions who seemed least to represent them. as far as these orators and marshals had any position at all in a collegiate sense, it was that of indifference to the college. henry adams never professed the smallest faith in universities of any kind, either as boy or man, nor had he the faintest admiration for the university graduate, either in europe or in america; as a collegian he was only known apart from his fellows by his habit of standing outside the college; and yet the singular fact remained that this commonplace body of young men chose him repeatedly to express his and their commonplaces. secretly, of course, the successful candidate flattered himself--and them--with the hope that they might perhaps not be so commonplace as they thought themselves; but this was only another proof that all were identical. they saw in him a representative--the kind of representative they wanted--and he saw in them the most formidable array of judges he could ever meet, like so many mirrors of himself, an infinite reflection of his own shortcomings. all the same, the choice was flattering; so flattering that it actually shocked his vanity; and would have shocked it more, if possible, had he known that it was to be the only flattery of the sort he was ever to receive. the function of class day was, in the eyes of nine-tenths of the students, altogether the most important of the college, and the figure of the orator was the most conspicuous in the function. unlike the orators at regular commencements, the class day orator stood alone, or had only the poet for rival. crowded into the large church, the students, their families, friends, aunts, uncles and chaperones, attended all the girls of sixteen or twenty who wanted to show their summer dresses or fresh complexions, and there, for an hour or two, in a heat that might have melted bronze, they listened to an orator and a poet in clergyman's gowns, reciting such platitudes as their own experience and their mild censors permitted them to utter. what henry adams said in his class oration of he soon forgot to the last word, nor had it the least value for education; but he naturally remembered what was said of it. he remembered especially one of his eminent uncles or relations remarking that, as the work of so young a man, the oration was singularly wanting in enthusiasm. the young man--always in search of education--asked himself whether, setting rhetoric aside, this absence of enthusiasm was a defect or a merit, since, in either case, it was all that harvard college taught, and all that the hundred young men, whom he was trying to represent, expressed. another comment threw more light on the effect of the college education. one of the elderly gentlemen noticed the orator's "perfect self-possession." self-possession indeed! if harvard college gave nothing else, it gave calm. for four years each student had been obliged to figure daily before dozens of young men who knew each other to the last fibre. one had done little but read papers to societies, or act comedy in the hasty pudding, not to speak of regular exercises, and no audience in future life would ever be so intimately and terribly intelligent as these. three-fourths of the graduates would rather have addressed the council of trent or the british parliament than have acted sir anthony absolute or dr. ollapod before a gala audience of the hasty pudding. self-possession was the strongest part of harvard college, which certainly taught men to stand alone, so that nothing seemed stranger to its graduates than the paroxysms of terror before the public which often overcame the graduates of european universities. whether this was, or was not, education, henry adams never knew. he was ready to stand up before any audience in america or europe, with nerves rather steadier for the excitement, but whether he should ever have anything to say, remained to be proved. as yet he knew nothing. education had not begun. chapter v berlin ( - ) a fourth child has the strength of his weakness. being of no great value, he may throw himself away if he likes, and never be missed. charles francis adams, the father, felt no love for europe, which, as he and all the world agreed, unfitted americans for america. a captious critic might have replied that all the success he or his father or his grandfather achieved was chiefly due to the field that europe gave them, and it was more than likely that without the help of europe they would have all remained local politicians or lawyers, like their neighbors, to the end. strictly followed, the rule would have obliged them never to quit quincy; and, in fact, so much more timid are parents for their children than for themselves, that mr. and mrs. adams would have been content to see their children remain forever in mount vernon street, unexposed to the temptations of europe, could they have relied on the moral influences of boston itself. although the parents little knew what took place under their eyes, even the mothers saw enough to make them uneasy. perhaps their dread of vice, haunting past and present, worried them less than their dread of daughters-in-law or sons-in-law who might not fit into the somewhat narrow quarters of home. on all sides were risks. every year some young person alarmed the parental heart even in boston, and although the temptations of europe were irresistible, removal from the temptations of boston might be imperative. the boy henry wanted to go to europe; he seemed well behaved, when any one was looking at him; he observed conventions, when he could not escape them; he was never quarrelsome, towards a superior; his morals were apparently good, and his moral principles, if he had any, were not known to be bad. above all, he was timid and showed a certain sense of self-respect, when in public view. what he was at heart, no one could say; least of all himself; but he was probably human, and no worse than some others. therefore, when he presented to an exceedingly indulgent father and mother his request to begin at a german university the study of the civil law--although neither he nor they knew what the civil law was, or any reason for his studying it--the parents dutifully consented, and walked with him down to the railway-station at quincy to bid him good-bye, with a smile which he almost thought a tear. whether the boy deserved such indulgence, or was worth it, he knew no more than they, or than a professor at harvard college; but whether worthy or not, he began his third or fourth attempt at education in november, , by sailing on the steamer persia, the pride of captain judkins and the cunard line; the newest, largest and fastest steamship afloat. he was not alone. several of his college companions sailed with him, and the world looked cheerful enough until, on the third day, the world--as far as concerned the young man--ran into a heavy storm. he learned then a lesson that stood by him better than any university teaching ever did--the meaning of a november gale on the mid-atlantic--which, for mere physical misery, passed endurance. the subject offered him material for none but serious treatment; he could never see the humor of sea-sickness; but it united itself with a great variety of other impressions which made the first month of travel altogether the rapidest school of education he had yet found. the stride in knowledge seemed gigantic. one began at last to see that a great many impressions were needed to make very little education, but how many could be crowded into one day without making any education at all, became the pons asinorum of tourist mathematics. how many would turn out to be wrong whether any could turn out right, was ultimate wisdom. the ocean, the persia, captain judkins, and mr. g. p. r. james, the most distinguished passenger, vanished one sunday morning in a furious gale in the mersey, to make place for the drearier picture of a liverpool street as seen from the adelphi coffee-room in november murk, followed instantly by the passionate delights of chester and the romance of red-sandstone architecture. millions of americans have felt this succession of emotions. possibly very young and ingenuous tourists feel them still, but in days before tourists, when the romance was a reality, not a picture, they were overwhelming. when the boys went out to eaton hall, they were awed, as thackeray or dickens would have felt in the presence of a duke. the very name of grosvenor struck a note of grandeur. the long suite of lofty, gilded rooms with their gilded furniture; the portraits; the terraces; the gardens, the landscape; the sense of superiority in the england of the fifties, actually set the rich nobleman apart, above americans and shopkeepers. aristocracy was real. so was the england of dickens. oliver twist and little nell lurked in every churchyard shadow, not as shadow but alive. even charles the first was not very shadowy, standing on the tower to see his army defeated. nothing thereabouts had very much changed since he lost his battle and his head. an eighteenth-century american boy fresh from boston naturally took it all for education, and was amused at this sort of lesson. at least he thought he felt it. then came the journey up to london through birmingham and the black district, another lesson, which needed much more to be rightly felt. the plunge into darkness lurid with flames; the sense of unknown horror in this weird gloom which then existed nowhere else, and never had existed before, except in volcanic craters; the violent contrast between this dense, smoky, impenetrable darkness, and the soft green charm that one glided into, as one emerged--the revelation of an unknown society of the pit--made a boy uncomfortable, though he had no idea that karl marx was standing there waiting for him, and that sooner or later the process of education would have to deal with karl marx much more than with professor bowen of harvard college or his satanic free-trade majesty john stuart mill. the black district was a practical education, but it was infinitely far in the distance. the boy ran away from it, as he ran away from everything he disliked. had he known enough to know where to begin he would have seen something to study, more vital than the civil law, in the long, muddy, dirty, sordid, gas-lit dreariness of oxford street as his dingy four-wheeler dragged its weary way to charing cross. he did notice one peculiarity about it worth remembering. london was still london. a certain style dignified its grime; heavy, clumsy, arrogant, purse-proud, but not cheap; insular but large; barely tolerant of an outside world, and absolutely self-confident. the boys in the streets made such free comments on the american clothes and figures, that the travellers hurried to put on tall hats and long overcoats to escape criticism. no stranger had rights even in the strand. the eighteenth century held its own. history muttered down fleet street, like dr. johnson, in adams's ear; vanity fair was alive on piccadilly in yellow chariots with coachmen in wigs, on hammer-cloths; footmen with canes, on the footboard, and a shrivelled old woman inside; half the great houses, black with london smoke, bore large funereal hatchments; every one seemed insolent, and the most insolent structures in the world were the royal exchange and the bank of england. in november, , london was still vast, but it was the london of the eighteenth century that an american felt and hated. education went backward. adams, still a boy, could not guess how intensely intimate this london grime was to become to him as a man, but he could still less conceive himself returning to it fifty years afterwards, noting at each turn how the great city grew smaller as it doubled in size; cheaper as it quadrupled its wealth; less imperial as its empire widened; less dignified as it tried to be civil. he liked it best when he hated it. education began at the end, or perhaps would end at the beginning. thus far it had remained in the eighteenth century, and the next step took it back to the sixteenth. he crossed to antwerp. as the baron osy steamed up the scheldt in the morning mists, a travelling band on deck began to play, and groups of peasants, working along the fields, dropped their tools to join in dancing. ostade and teniers were as much alive as they ever were, and even the duke of alva was still at home. the thirteenth-century cathedral towered above a sixteenth-century mass of tiled roofs, ending abruptly in walls and a landscape that had not changed. the taste of the town was thick, rich, ripe, like a sweet wine; it was mediaeval, so that rubens seemed modern; it was one of the strongest and fullest flavors that ever touched the young man's palate; but he might as well have drunk out his excitement in old malmsey, for all the education he got from it. even in art, one can hardly begin with antwerp cathedral and the descent from the cross. he merely got drunk on his emotions, and had then to get sober as he best could. he was terribly sober when he saw antwerp half a century afterwards. one lesson he did learn without suspecting that he must immediately lose it. he felt his middle ages and the sixteenth century alive. he was young enough, and the towns were dirty enough--unimproved, unrestored, untouristed--to retain the sense of reality. as a taste or a smell, it was education, especially because it lasted barely ten years longer; but it was education only sensual. he never dreamed of trying to educate himself to the descent from the cross. he was only too happy to feel himself kneeling at the foot of the cross; he learned only to loathe the sordid necessity of getting up again, and going about his stupid business. this was one of the foreseen dangers of europe, but it vanished rapidly enough to reassure the most anxious of parents. dropped into berlin one morning without guide or direction, the young man in search of education floundered in a mere mess of misunderstandings. he could never recall what he expected to find, but whatever he expected, it had no relation with what it turned out to be. a student at twenty takes easily to anything, even to berlin, and he would have accepted the thirteenth century pure and simple since his guides assured him that this was his right path; but a week's experience left him dazed and dull. faith held out, but the paths grew dim. berlin astonished him, but he had no lack of friends to show him all the amusement it had to offer. within a day or two he was running about with the rest to beer-cellars and music-halls and dance-rooms, smoking bad tobacco, drinking poor beer, and eating sauerkraut and sausages as though he knew no better. this was easy. one can always descend the social ladder. the trouble came when he asked for the education he was promised. his friends took him to be registered as a student of the university; they selected his professors and courses; they showed him where to buy the institutes of gaius and several german works on the civil law in numerous volumes; and they led him to his first lecture. his first lecture was his last. the young man was not very quick, and he had almost religious respect for his guides and advisers; but he needed no more than one hour to satisfy him that he had made another failure in education, and this time a fatal one. that the language would require at least three months' hard work before he could touch the law was an annoying discovery; but the shock that upset him was the discovery of the university itself. he had thought harvard college a torpid school, but it was instinct with life compared with all that he could see of the university of berlin. the german students were strange animals, but their professors were beyond pay. the mental attitude of the university was not of an american world. what sort of instruction prevailed in other branches, or in science, adams had no occasion to ask, but in the civil law he found only the lecture system in its deadliest form as it flourished in the thirteenth century. the professor mumbled his comments; the students made, or seemed to make, notes; they could have learned from books or discussion in a day more than they could learn from him in a month, but they must pay his fees, follow his course, and be his scholars, if they wanted a degree. to an american the result was worthless. he could make no use of the civil law without some previous notion of the common law; but the student who knew enough of the common law to understand what he wanted, had only to read the pandects or the commentators at his ease in america, and be his own professor. neither the method nor the matter nor the manner could profit an american education. this discovery seemed to shock none of the students. they went to the lectures, made notes, and read textbooks, but never pretended to take their professor seriously. they were much more serious in reading heine. they knew no more than heine what good they were getting, beyond the berlin accent--which was bad; and the beer--which was not to compare with munich; and the dancing--which was better at vienna. they enjoyed the beer and music, but they refused to be responsible for the education. anyway, as they defended themselves, they were learning the language. so the young man fell back on the language, and being slow at languages, he found himself falling behind all his friends, which depressed his spirits, the more because the gloom of a berlin winter and of berlin architecture seemed to him a particular sort of gloom never attained elsewhere. one day on the linden he caught sight of charles sumner in a cab, and ran after him. sumner was then recovering from the blows of the south carolinian cane or club, and he was pleased to find a young worshipper in the remote prussian wilderness. they dined together and went to hear "william tell" at the opera. sumner tried to encourage his friend about his difficulties of language: "i came to berlin," or rome, or whatever place it was, as he said with his grand air of mastery, "i came to berlin, unable to say a word in the language; and three months later when i went away, i talked it to my cabman." adams felt himself quite unable to attain in so short a time such social advantages, and one day complained of his trials to mr. robert apthorp, of boston, who was passing the winter in berlin for the sake of its music. mr. apthorp told of his own similar struggle, and how he had entered a public school and sat for months with ten-year-old-boys, reciting their lessons and catching their phrases. the idea suited adams's desperate frame of mind. at least it ridded him of the university and the civil law and american associations in beer-cellars. mr. apthorp took the trouble to negotiate with the head-master of the friedrichs-wilhelm-werdersches gymnasium for permission to henry adams to attend the school as a member of the ober-tertia, a class of boys twelve or thirteen years old, and there adams went for three months as though he had not always avoided high schools with singular antipathy. he never did anything else so foolish but he was given a bit of education which served him some purpose in life. it was not merely the language, though three months passed in such fashion would teach a poodle enough to talk with a cabman, and this was all that foreign students could expect to do, for they never by any chance would come in contact with german society, if german society existed, about which they knew nothing. adams never learned to talk german well, but the same might be said of his english, if he could believe englishmen. he learned not to annoy himself on this account. his difficulties with the language gradually ceased. he thought himself quite germanized in . he even deluded himself with the idea that he read it as though it were english, which proved that he knew little about it; but whatever success he had in his own experiment interested him less than his contact with german education. he had revolted at the american school and university; he had instantly rejected the german university; and as his last experience of education he tried the german high school. the experiment was hazardous. in berlin was a poor, keen-witted, provincial town, simple, dirty, uncivilized, and in most respects disgusting. life was primitive beyond what an american boy could have imagined. overridden by military methods and bureaucratic pettiness, prussia was only beginning to free her hands from internal bonds. apart from discipline, activity scarcely existed. the future kaiser wilhelm i, regent for his insane brother king friedrich wilhelm iv, seemed to pass his time looking at the passers-by from the window of his modest palace on the linden. german manners, even at court, were sometimes brutal, and german thoroughness at school was apt to be routine. bismarck himself was then struggling to begin a career against the inertia of the german system. the condition of germany was a scandal and nuisance to every earnest german, all whose energies were turned to reforming it from top to bottom; and adams walked into a great public school to get educated, at precisely the time when the germans wanted most to get rid of the education they were forced to follow. as an episode in the search for education, this adventure smacked of heine. the school system has doubtless changed, and at all events the schoolmasters are probably long ago dead; the story has no longer a practical value, and had very little even at the time; one could at least say in defence of the german school that it was neither very brutal nor very immoral. the head-master was excellent in his prussian way, and the other instructors were not worse than in other schools; it was their system that struck the systemless american with horror. the arbitrary training given to the memory was stupefying; the strain that the memory endured was a form of torture; and the feats that the boys performed, without complaint, were pitiable. no other faculty than the memory seemed to be recognized. least of all was any use made of reason, either analytic, synthetic, or dogmatic. the german government did not encourage reasoning. all state education is a sort of dynamo machine for polarizing the popular mind; for turning and holding its lines of force in the direction supposed to be most effective for state purposes. the german machine was terribly efficient. its effect on the children was pathetic. the friedrichs-wilhelm-werdersches gymnasium was an old building in the heart of berlin which served the educational needs of the small tradesmen or bourgeoisie of the neighborhood; the children were berliner-kinder if ever there were such, and of a class suspected of sympathy and concern in the troubles of . none was noble or connected with good society. personally they were rather sympathetic than not, but as the objects of education they were proofs of nearly all the evils that a bad system could give. apparently adams, in his rigidly illogical pursuit, had at last reached his ideal of a viciously logical education. the boys' physique showed it first, but their physique could not be wholly charged to the school. german food was bad at best, and a diet of sauerkraut, sausage, and beer could never be good; but it was not the food alone that made their faces white and their flesh flabby. they never breathed fresh air; they had never heard of a playground; in all berlin not a cubic inch of oxygen was admitted in winter into an inhabited building; in the school every room was tightly closed and had no ventilation; the air was foul beyond all decency; but when the american opened a window in the five minutes between hours, he violated the rules and was invariably rebuked. as long as cold weather lasted, the windows were shut. if the boys had a holiday, they were apt to be taken on long tramps in the thiergarten or elsewhere, always ending in over-fatigue, tobacco-smoke, sausages, and beer. with this, they were required to prepare daily lessons that would have quickly broken down strong men of a healthy habit, and which they could learn only because their minds were morbid. the german university had seemed a failure, but the german high school was something very near an indictable nuisance. before the month of april arrived, the experiment of german education had reached this point. nothing was left of it except the ghost of the civil law shut up in the darkest of closets, never to gibber again before any one who could repeat the story. the derisive jew laughter of heine ran through the university and everything else in berlin. of course, when one is twenty years old, life is bound to be full, if only of berlin beer, although german student life was on the whole the thinnest of beer, as an american looked on it, but though nothing except small fragments remained of the education that had been so promising--or promised--this is only what most often happens in life, when by-products turn out to be more valuable than staples. the german university and german law were failures; german society, in an american sense, did not exist, or if it existed, never showed itself to an american; the german theatre, on the other hand, was excellent, and german opera, with the ballet, was almost worth a journey to berlin; but the curious and perplexing result of the total failure of german education was that the student's only clear gain--his single step to a higher life--came from time wasted; studies neglected; vices indulged; education reversed;--it came from the despised beer-garden and music-hall; and it was accidental, unintended, unforeseen. when his companions insisted on passing two or three afternoons in the week at music-halls, drinking beer, smoking german tobacco, and looking at fat german women knitting, while an orchestra played dull music, adams went with them for the sake of the company, but with no pretence of enjoyment; and when mr. apthorp gently protested that he exaggerated his indifference, for of course he enjoyed beethoven, adams replied simply that he loathed beethoven; and felt a slight surprise when mr. apthorp and the others laughed as though they thought it humor. he saw no humor in it. he supposed that, except musicians, every one thought beethoven a bore, as every one except mathematicians thought mathematics a bore. sitting thus at his beer-table, mentally impassive, he was one day surprised to notice that his mind followed the movement of a sinfonie. he could not have been more astonished had he suddenly read a new language. among the marvels of education, this was the most marvellous. a prison-wall that barred his senses on one great side of life, suddenly fell, of its own accord, without so much as his knowing when it happened. amid the fumes of coarse tobacco and poor beer, surrounded by the commonest of german haus-frauen, a new sense burst out like a flower in his life, so superior to the old senses, so bewildering, so astonished at its own existence, that he could not credit it, and watched it as something apart, accidental, and not to be trusted. he slowly came to admit that beethoven had partly become intelligible to him, but he was the more inclined to think that beethoven must be much overrated as a musician, to be so easily followed. this could not be called education, for he had never so much as listened to the music. he had been thinking of other things. mere mechanical repetition of certain sounds had stuck to his unconscious mind. beethoven might have this power, but not wagner, or at all events not the wagner later than "tannhauser." near forty years passed before he reached the "gotterdammerung." one might talk of the revival of an atrophied sense--the mechanical reaction of a sleeping consciousness--but no other sense awoke. his sense of line and color remained as dull as ever, and as far as ever below the level of an artist. his metaphysical sense did not spring into life, so that his mind could leap the bars of german expression into sympathy with the idealities of kant and hegel. although he insisted that his faith in german thought and literature was exalted, he failed to approach german thought, and he shed never a tear of emotion over the pages of goethe and schiller. when his father rashly ventured from time to time to write him a word of common sense, the young man would listen to no sense at all, but insisted that berlin was the best of educations in the best of germanies; yet, when, at last, april came, and some genius suggested a tramp in thuringen, his heart sang like a bird; he realized what a nightmare he had suffered, and he made up his mind that, wherever else he might, in the infinities of space and time, seek for education, it should not be again in berlin. chapter vi rome ( - ) the tramp in thuringen lasted four-and-twenty hours. by the end of the first walk, his three companions--john bancroft, james j. higginson, and b. w. crowninshield, all boston and harvard college like himself--were satisfied with what they had seen, and when they sat down to rest on the spot where goethe had written-- "warte nur! balde rubest du auch!"-- the profoundness of the thought and the wisdom of the advice affected them so strongly that they hired a wagon and drove to weimar the same night. they were all quite happy and lighthearted in the first fresh breath of leafless spring, and the beer was better than at berlin, but they were all equally in doubt why they had come to germany, and not one of them could say why they stayed. adams stayed because he did not want to go home, and he had fears that his father's patience might be exhausted if he asked to waste time elsewhere. they could not think that their education required a return to berlin. a few days at dresden in the spring weather satisfied them that dresden was a better spot for general education than berlin, and equally good for reading civil law. they were possibly right. there was nothing to study in dresden, and no education to be gained, but the sistine madonna and the correggios were famous; the theatre and opera were sometimes excellent, and the elbe was prettier than the spree. they could always fall back on the language. so he took a room in the household of the usual small government clerk with the usual plain daughters, and continued the study of the language. possibly one might learn something more by accident, as one had learned something of beethoven. for the next eighteen months the young man pursued accidental education, since he could pursue no other; and by great good fortune, europe and america were too busy with their own affairs to give much attention to his. accidental education had every chance in its favor, especially because nothing came amiss. perhaps the chief obstacle to the youth's education, now that he had come of age, was his honesty; his simple-minded faith in his intentions. even after berlin had become a nightmare, he still persuaded himself that his german education was a success. he loved, or thought he loved the people, but the germany he loved was the eighteenth-century which the germans were ashamed of, and were destroying as fast as they could. of the germany to come, he knew nothing. military germany was his abhorrence. what he liked was the simple character; the good-natured sentiment; the musical and metaphysical abstraction; the blundering incapacity of the german for practical affairs. at that time everyone looked on germany as incapable of competing with france, england or america in any sort of organized energy. germany had no confidence in herself, and no reason to feel it. she had no unity, and no reason to want it. she never had unity. her religious and social history, her economical interests, her military geography, her political convenience, had always tended to eccentric rather than concentric motion. until coal-power and railways were created, she was mediaeval by nature and geography, and this was what adams, under the teachings of carlyle and lowell, liked. he was in a fair way to do himself lasting harm, floundering between worlds passed and worlds coming, which had a habit of crushing men who stayed too long at the points of contact. suddenly the emperor napoleon declared war on austria and raised a confused point of morals in the mind of europe. france was the nightmare of germany, and even at dresden one looked on the return of napoleon to leipsic as the most likely thing in the world. one morning the government clerk, in whose family adams was staying, rushed into his room to consult a map in order that he might measure the distance from milan to dresden. the third napoleon had reached lombardy, and only fifty or sixty years had passed since the first napoleon had begun his military successes from an italian base. an enlightened young american, with eighteenth-century tastes capped by fragments of a german education and the most excellent intentions, had to make up his mind about the moral value of these conflicting forces. france was the wicked spirit of moral politics, and whatever helped france must be so far evil. at that time austria was another evil spirit. italy was the prize they disputed, and for at least fifteen hundred years had been the chief object of their greed. the question of sympathy had disturbed a number of persons during that period. the question of morals had been put in a number of cross-lights. should one be guelph or ghibelline? no doubt, one was wiser than one's neighbors who had found no way of settling this question since the days of the cave-dwellers, but ignorance did better to discard the attempt to be wise, for wisdom had been singularly baffled by the problem. better take sides first, and reason about it for the rest of life. not that adams felt any real doubt about his sympathies or wishes. he had not been german long enough for befogging his mind to that point, but the moment was decisive for much to come, especially for political morals. his morals were the highest, and he clung to them to preserve his self-respect; but steam and electricity had brought about new political and social concentrations, or were making them necessary in the line of his moral principles--freedom, education, economic development and so forth--which required association with allies as doubtful as napoleon iii, and robberies with violence on a very extensive scale. as long as he could argue that his opponents were wicked, he could join in robbing and killing them without a qualm; but it might happen that the good were robbed. education insisted on finding a moral foundation for robbery. he could hope to begin life in the character of no animal more moral than a monkey unless he could satisfy himself when and why robbery and murder were a virtue and duty. education founded on mere self-interest was merely guelph and ghibelline over again--machiavelli translated into american. luckily for him he had a sister much brighter than he ever was--though he thought himself a rather superior person--who after marrying charles kuhn, of philadelphia, had come to italy, and, like all good americans and english, was hotly italian. in july, , she was at thun in switzerland, and there henry adams joined them. women have, commonly, a very positive moral sense; that which they will, is right; that which they reject, is wrong; and their will, in most cases, ends by settling the moral. mrs. kuhn had a double superiority. she not only adored italy, but she cordially disliked germany in all its varieties. she saw no gain in helping her brother to be germanized, and she wanted him much to be civilized. she was the first young woman he was ever intimate with--quick, sensitive, wilful, or full of will, energetic, sympathetic and intelligent enough to supply a score of men with ideas--and he was delighted to give her the reins--to let her drive him where she would. it was his first experiment in giving the reins to a woman, and he was so much pleased with the results that he never wanted to take them back. in after life he made a general law of experience--no woman had ever driven him wrong; no man had ever driven him right. nothing would satisfy mrs. kuhn but to go to the seat of war as soon as the armistice was declared. wild as the idea seemed, nothing was easier. the party crossed the st. gothard and reached milan, picturesque with every sort of uniform and every sign of war. to young adams this first plunge into italy passed beethoven as a piece of accidental education. like music, it differed from other education in being, not a means of pursuing life, but one of the ends attained. further, on these lines, one could not go. it had but one defect--that of attainment. life had no richer impression to give; it offers barely half-a-dozen such, and the intervals seem long. exactly what they teach would puzzle a berlin jurist; yet they seem to have an economic value, since most people would decline to part with even their faded memories except at a valuation ridiculously extravagant. they were also what men pay most for; but one's ideas become hopelessly mixed in trying to reduce such forms of education to a standard of exchangeable value, and, as in political economy, one had best disregard altogether what cannot be stated in equivalents. the proper equivalent of pleasure is pain, which is also a form of education. not satisfied with milan, mrs. kuhn insisted on invading the enemy's country, and the carriage was chartered for innsbruck by way of the stelvio pass. the valtellina, as the carriage drove up it, showed war. garibaldi's cacciatori were the only visible inhabitants. no one could say whether the pass was open, but in any case no carriage had yet crossed. at the inns the handsome young officers in command of the detachments were delighted to accept invitations to dinner and to talk all the evening of their battles to the charming patriot who sparkled with interest and flattery, but not one of them knew whether their enemies, the abhorred austrian jagers, would let the travellers through their lines. as a rule, gaiety was not the character failing in any party that mrs. kuhn belonged to, but when at last, after climbing what was said to be the finest carriage-pass in europe, the carriage turned the last shoulder, where the glacier of the ortler spitze tumbled its huge mass down upon the road, even mrs. kuhn gasped when she was driven directly up to the barricade and stopped by the double line of sentries stretching on either side up the mountains, till the flash of the gun barrels was lost in the flash of the snow. for accidental education the picture had its value. the earliest of these pictures count for most, as first impressions must, and adams never afterwards cared much for landscape education, except perhaps in the tropics for the sake of the contrast. as education, that chapter, too, was read, and set aside. the handsome blond officers of the jagers were not to be beaten in courtesy by the handsome young olive-toned officers of the cacciatori. the eternal woman as usual, when she is young, pretty, and engaging, had her way, and the barricade offered no resistance. in fifteen minutes the carriage was rolling down to mals, swarming with german soldiers and german fleas, worse than the italian; and german language, thought, and atmosphere, of which young adams, thanks to his glimpse of italy, never again felt quite the old confident charm. yet he could talk to his cabman and conscientiously did his cathedrals, his rhine, and whatever his companions suggested. faithful to his self-contracted scheme of passing two winters in study of the civil law, he went back to dresden with a letter to the frau hofrathin von reichenbach, in whose house lowell and other americans had pursued studies more or less serious. in those days, "the initials" was a new book. the charm which its clever author had laboriously woven over munich gave also a certain reflected light to dresden. young adams had nothing to do but take fencing-lessons, visit the galleries and go to the theatre; but his social failure in the line of "the initials," was humiliating and he succumbed to it. the frau hofrathin herself was sometimes roused to huge laughter at the total discomfiture and helplessness of the young american in the face of her society. possibly an education may be the wider and the richer for a large experience of the world; raphael pumpelly and clarence king, at about the same time, were enriching their education by a picturesque intimacy with the manners of the apaches and digger indians. all experience is an arch, to build upon. yet adams admitted himself unable to guess what use his second winter in germany was to him, or what he expected it to be. even the doctrine of accidental education broke down. there were no accidents in dresden. as soon as the winter was over, he closed and locked the german door with a long breath of relief, and took the road to italy. he had then pursued his education, as it pleased him, for eighteen months, and in spite of the infinite variety of new impressions which had packed themselves into his mind, he knew no more, for his practical purposes, than the day he graduated. he had made no step towards a profession. he was as ignorant as a schoolboy of society. he was unfit for any career in europe, and unfitted for any career in america, and he had not natural intelligence enough to see what a mess he had thus far made of his education. by twisting life to follow accidental and devious paths, one might perhaps find some use for accidental and devious knowledge, but this had been no part of henry adams's plan when he chose the path most admired by the best judges, and followed it till he found it led nowhere. nothing had been further from his mind when he started in november, , than to become a tourist, but a mere tourist, and nothing else, he had become in april, , when he joined his sister in florence. his father had been in the right. the young man felt a little sore about it. supposing his father asked him, on his return, what equivalent he had brought back for the time and money put into his experiment! the only possible answer would be: "sir, i am a tourist!" the answer was not what he had meant it to be, and he was not likely to better it by asking his father, in turn, what equivalent his brothers or cousins or friends at home had got out of the same time and money spent in boston. all they had put into the law was certainly thrown away, but were they happier in science? in theory one might say, with some show of proof, that a pure, scientific education was alone correct; yet many of his friends who took it, found reason to complain that it was anything but a pure, scientific world in which they lived. meanwhile his father had quite enough perplexities of his own, without seeking more in his son's errors. his quincy district had sent him to congress, and in the spring of he was in the full confusion of nominating candidates for the presidential election in november. he supported mr. seward. the republican party was an unknown force, and the democratic party was torn to pieces. no one could see far into the future. fathers could blunder as well as sons, and, in , every one was conscious of being dragged along paths much less secure than those of the european tourist. for the time, the young man was safe from interference, and went on his way with a light heart to take whatever chance fragments of education god or the devil was pleased to give him, for he knew no longer the good from the bad. he had of both sorts more than he knew how to use. perhaps the most useful purpose he set himself to serve was that of his pen, for he wrote long letters, during the next three months, to his brother charles, which his brother caused to be printed in the boston courier; and the exercise was good for him. he had little to say, and said it not very well, but that mattered less. the habit of expression leads to the search for something to express. something remains as a residuum of the commonplace itself, if one strikes out every commonplace in the expression. young men as a rule saw little in italy, or anywhere else, and in after life when adams began to learn what some men could see, he shrank into corners of shame at the thought that he should have betrayed his own inferiority as though it were his pride, while he invited his neighbors to measure and admire; but it was still the nearest approach he had yet made to an intelligent act. for the rest, italy was mostly an emotion and the emotion naturally centred in rome. the american parent, curiously enough, while bitterly hostile to paris, seemed rather disposed to accept rome as legitimate education, though abused; but to young men seeking education in a serious spirit, taking for granted that everything had a cause, and that nature tended to an end, rome was altogether the most violent vice in the world, and rome before was seductive beyond resistance. the month of may, , was divine. no doubt other young men, and occasionally young women, have passed the month of may in rome since then, and conceive that the charm continues to exist. possibly it does--in them--but in the lights and shadows were still mediaeval, and mediaeval rome was alive; the shadows breathed and glowed, full of soft forms felt by lost senses. no sand-blast of science had yet skinned off the epidermis of history, thought, and feeling. the pictures were uncleaned, the churches unrestored, the ruins unexcavated. mediaeval rome was sorcery. rome was the worst spot on earth to teach nineteenth-century youth what to do with a twentieth-century world. one's emotions in rome were one's private affair, like one's glass of absinthe before dinner in the palais royal; they must be hurtful, else they could not have been so intense; and they were surely immoral, for no one, priest or politician, could honestly read in the ruins of rome any other certain lesson than that they were evidence of the just judgments of an outraged god against all the doings of man. this moral unfitted young men for every sort of useful activity; it made rome a gospel of anarchy and vice; the last place under the sun for educating the young; yet it was, by common consent, the only spot that the young--of either sex and every race--passionately, perversely, wickedly loved. boys never see a conclusion; only on the edge of the grave can man conclude anything; but the first impulse given to the boy is apt to lead or drive him for the rest of his life into conclusion after conclusion that he never dreamed of reaching. one looked idly enough at the forum or at st. peter's, but one never forgot the look, and it never ceased reacting. to a young bostonian, fresh from germany, rome seemed a pure emotion, quite free from economic or actual values, and he could not in reason or common sense foresee that it was mechanically piling up conundrum after conundrum in his educational path, which seemed unconnected but that he had got to connect; that seemed insoluble but had got to be somehow solved. rome was not a beetle to be dissected and dropped; not a bad french novel to be read in a railway train and thrown out of the window after other bad french novels, the morals of which could never approach the immorality of roman history. rome was actual; it was england; it was going to be america. rome could not be fitted into an orderly, middle-class, bostonian, systematic scheme of evolution. no law of progress applied to it. not even time-sequences--the last refuge of helpless historians--had value for it. the forum no more led to the vatican than the vatican to the forum. rienzi, garibaldi, tiberius gracchus, aurelian might be mixed up in any relation of time, along with a thousand more, and never lead to a sequence. the great word evolution had not yet, in , made a new religion of history, but the old religion had preached the same doctrine for a thousand years without finding in the entire history of rome anything but flat contradiction. of course both priests and evolutionists bitterly denied this heresy, but what they affirmed or denied in had very little importance indeed for . anarchy lost no ground meanwhile. the problem became only the more fascinating. probably it was more vital in may, , than it had been in october, , when the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to the mind of gibbon, "in the close of the evening, as i sat musing in the church of the zoccolanti or franciscan friars, while they were singing vespers in the temple of jupiter, on the ruins of the capitol." murray's handbook had the grace to quote this passage from gibbon's "autobiography," which led adams more than once to sit at sunset on the steps of the church of santa maria di ara coeli, curiously wondering that not an inch had been gained by gibbon--or all the historians since--towards explaining the fall. the mystery remained unsolved; the charm remained intact. two great experiments of western civilization had left there the chief monuments of their failure, and nothing proved that the city might not still survive to express the failure of a third. the young man had no idea what he was doing. the thought of posing for a gibbon never entered his mind. he was a tourist, even to the depths of his sub-consciousness, and it was well for him that he should be nothing else, for even the greatest of men cannot sit with dignity, "in the close of evening, among the ruins of the capitol," unless they have something quite original to say about it. tacitus could do it; so could michael angelo; and so, at a pinch, could gibbon, though in figure hardly heroic; but, in sum, none of them could say very much more than the tourist, who went on repeating to himself the eternal question:--why! why!! why!!!--as his neighbor, the blind beggar, might do, sitting next him, on the church steps. no one ever had answered the question to the satisfaction of any one else; yet every one who had either head or heart, felt that sooner or later he must make up his mind what answer to accept. substitute the word america for the word rome, and the question became personal. perhaps henry learned something in rome, though he never knew it, and never sought it. rome dwarfs teachers. the greatest men of the age scarcely bore the test of posing with rome for a background. perhaps garibaldi--possibly even cavour--could have sat "in the close of the evening, among the ruins of the capitol," but one hardly saw napoleon iii there, or palmerston or tennyson or longfellow. one morning, adams happened to be chatting in the studio of hamilton wilde, when a middle-aged englishman came in, evidently excited, and told of the shock he had just received, when riding near the circus maximus, at coming unexpectedly on the guillotine, where some criminal had been put to death an hour or two before. the sudden surprise had quite overcome him; and adams, who seldom saw the point of a story till time had blunted it, listened sympathetically to learn what new form of grim horror had for the moment wiped out the memory of two thousand years of roman bloodshed, or the consolation, derived from history and statistics, that most citizens of rome seemed to be the better for guillotining. only by slow degrees, he grappled the conviction that the victim of the shock was robert browning; and, on the background of the circus maximus, the christian martyrs flaming as torches, and the morning's murderer on the block, browning seemed rather in place, as a middle-aged gentlemanly english pippa passes; while afterwards, in the light of belgravia dinner-tables, he never made part of his background except by effacement. browning might have sat with gibbon, among the ruins, and few romans would have smiled. yet browning never revealed the poetic depths of saint francis; william story could not touch the secret of michael angelo, and mommsen hardly said all that one felt by instinct in the lives of cicero and caesar. they taught what, as a rule, needed no teaching, the lessons of a rather cheap imagination and cheaper politics. rome was a bewildering complex of ideas, experiments, ambitions, energies; without her, the western world was pointless and fragmentary; she gave heart and unity to it all; yet gibbon might have gone on for the whole century, sitting among the ruins of the capitol, and no one would have passed, capable of telling him what it meant. perhaps it meant nothing. so it ended; the happiest month of may that life had yet offered, fading behind the present, and probably beyond the past, somewhere into abstract time, grotesquely out of place with the berlin scheme or a boston future. adams explained to himself that he was absorbing knowledge. he would have put it better had he said that knowledge was absorbing him. he was passive. in spite of swarming impressions he knew no more when he left rome than he did when he entered it. as a marketable object, his value was less. his next step went far to convince him that accidental education, whatever its economical return might be, was prodigiously successful as an object in itself. everything conspired to ruin his sound scheme of life, and to make him a vagrant as well as pauper. he went on to naples, and there, in the hot june, heard rumors that garibaldi and his thousand were about to attack palermo. calling on the american minister, chandler of pennsylvania, he was kindly treated, not for his merit, but for his name, and mr. chandler amiably consented to send him to the seat of war as bearer of despatches to captain palmer of the american sloop of war iroquois. young adams seized the chance, and went to palermo in a government transport filled with fleas, commanded by a charming prince caracciolo. he told all about it to the boston courier; where the narrative probably exists to this day, unless the files of the courier have wholly perished; but of its bearing on education the courier did not speak. he himself would have much liked to know whether it had any bearing whatever, and what was its value as a post-graduate course. quite apart from its value as life attained, realized, capitalized, it had also a certain value as a lesson in something, though adams could never classify the branch of study. loosely, the tourist called it knowledge of men, but it was just the reverse; it was knowledge of one's ignorance of men. captain palmer of the iroquois, who was a friend of the young man's uncle, sydney brooks, took him with the officers of the ship to make an evening call on garibaldi, whom they found in the senate house towards sunset, at supper with his picturesque and piratic staff, in the full noise and color of the palermo revolution. as a spectacle, it belonged to rossini and the italian opera, or to alexandre dumas at the least, but the spectacle was not its educational side. garibaldi left the table, and, sitting down at the window, had a few words of talk with captain palmer and young adams. at that moment, in the summer of , garibaldi was certainly the most serious of the doubtful energies in the world; the most essential to gauge rightly. even then society was dividing between banker and anarchist. one or the other, garibaldi must serve. himself a typical anarchist, sure to overshadow europe and alarm empires bigger than naples, his success depended on his mind; his energy was beyond doubt. adams had the chance to look this sphinx in the eyes, and, for five minutes, to watch him like a wild animal, at the moment of his greatest achievement and most splendid action. one saw a quiet-featured, quiet-voiced man in a red flannel shirt; absolutely impervious; a type of which adams knew nothing. sympathetic it was, and one felt that it was simple; one suspected even that it might be childlike, but could form no guess of its intelligence. in his own eyes garibaldi might be a napoleon or a spartacus; in the hands of cavour he might become a condottiere; in the eyes of history he might, like the rest of the world, be only the vigorous player in the game he did not understand. the student was none the wiser. this compound nature of patriot and pirate had illumined italian history from the beginning, and was no more intelligible to itself than to a young american who had no experience in double natures. in the end, if the "autobiography" tells truth, garibaldi saw and said that he had not understood his own acts; that he had been an instrument; that he had served the purposes of the class he least wanted to help; yet in he thought himself the revolution anarchic, napoleonic, and his ambition was unbounded. what should a young bostonian have made of a character like this, internally alive with childlike fancies, and externally quiet, simple, almost innocent; uttering with apparent conviction the usual commonplaces of popular politics that all politicians use as the small change of their intercourse with the public; but never betraying a thought? precisely this class of mind was to be the toughest problem of adams's practical life, but he could never make anything of it. the lesson of garibaldi, as education, seemed to teach the extreme complexity of extreme simplicity; but one could have learned this from a glow-worm. one did not need the vivid recollection of the low-voiced, simple-mannered, seafaring captain of genoese adventurers and sicilian brigands, supping in the july heat and sicilian dirt and revolutionary clamor, among the barricaded streets of insurgent palermo, merely in order to remember that simplicity is complex. adams left the problem as he found it, and came north to stumble over others, less picturesque but nearer. he squandered two or three months on paris. from the first he had avoided paris, and had wanted no french influence in his education. he disapproved of france in the lump. a certain knowledge of the language one must have; enough to order dinner and buy a theatre ticket; but more he did not seek. he disliked the empire and the emperor particularly, but this was a trifle; he disliked most the french mind. to save himself the trouble of drawing up a long list of all that he disliked, he disapproved of the whole, once for all, and shut them figuratively out of his life. france was not serious, and he was not serious in going there. he did this in good faith, obeying the lessons his teachers had taught him; but the curious result followed that, being in no way responsible for the french and sincerely disapproving them, he felt quite at liberty to enjoy to the full everything he disapproved. stated thus crudely, the idea sounds derisive; but, as a matter of fact, several thousand americans passed much of their time there on this understanding. they sought to take share in every function that was open to approach, as they sought tickets to the opera, because they were not a part of it. adams did like the rest. all thought of serious education had long vanished. he tried to acquire a few french idioms, without even aspiring to master a subjunctive, but he succeeded better in acquiring a modest taste for bordeaux and burgundy and one or two sauces; for the trois freres provencaux and voisin's and philippe's and the cafe anglais; for the palais royal theatre, and the varietes and the gymnase; for the brohans and bressant, rose cheri and gil perez, and other lights of the stage. his friends were good to him. life was amusing. paris rapidly became familiar. in a month or six weeks he forgot even to disapprove of it; but he studied nothing, entered no society, and made no acquaintance. accidental education went far in paris, and one picked up a deal of knowledge that might become useful; perhaps, after all, the three months passed there might serve better purpose than the twenty-one months passed elsewhere; but he did not intend it--did not think it--and looked at it as a momentary and frivolous vacation before going home to fit himself for life. therewith, after staying as long as he could and spending all the money he dared, he started with mixed emotions but no education, for home. chapter vii treason ( - ) when, forty years afterwards, henry adams looked back over his adventures in search of knowledge, he asked himself whether fortune or fate had ever dealt its cards quite so wildly to any of his known antecessors as when it led him to begin the study of law and to vote for abraham lincoln on the same day. he dropped back on quincy like a lump of lead; he rebounded like a football, tossed into space by an unknown energy which played with all his generation as a cat plays with mice. the simile is none too strong. not one man in america wanted the civil war, or expected or intended it. a small minority wanted secession. the vast majority wanted to go on with their occupations in peace. not one, however clever or learned, guessed what happened. possibly a few southern loyalists in despair might dream it as an impossible chance; but none planned it. as for henry adams, fresh from europe and chaos of another sort, he plunged at once into a lurid atmosphere of politics, quite heedless of any education or forethought. his past melted away. the prodigal was welcomed home, but not even his father asked a malicious question about the pandects. at the utmost, he hinted at some shade of prodigality by quietly inviting his son to act as private secretary during the winter in washington, as though any young man who could afford to throw away two winters on the civil law could afford to read blackstone for another winter without a master. the young man was beyond satire, and asked only a pretext for throwing all education to the east wind. november at best is sad, and november at quincy had been from earliest childhood the least gay of seasons. nowhere else does the uncharitable autumn wreak its spite so harshly on the frail wreck of the grasshopper summer; yet even a quincy november seemed temperate before the chill of a boston january. this was saying much, for the november of at quincy stood apart from other memories as lurid beyond description. although no one believed in civil war, the air reeked of it, and the republicans organized their clubs and parades as wide-awakes in a form military in all things except weapons. henry reached home in time to see the last of these processions, stretching in ranks of torches along the hillside, file down through the november night; to the old house, where mr. adams, their member of congress, received them, and, let them pretend what they liked, their air was not that of innocence. profoundly ignorant, anxious, and curious, the young man packed his modest trunk again, which had not yet time to be unpacked, and started for washington with his family. ten years had passed since his last visit, but very little had changed. as in and , so in , the same rude colony was camped in the same forest, with the same unfinished greek temples for work rooms, and sloughs for roads. the government had an air of social instability and incompleteness that went far to support the right of secession in theory as in fact; but right or wrong, secession was likely to be easy where there was so little to secede from. the union was a sentiment, but not much more, and in december, , the sentiment about the capitol was chiefly hostile, so far as it made itself felt. john adams was better off in philadelphia in than his great-grandson henry in in washington. patriotism ended by throwing a halo over the continental congress, but over the close of the thirty-sixth congress in - , no halo could be thrown by any one who saw it. of all the crowd swarming in washington that winter, young adams was surely among the most ignorant and helpless, but he saw plainly that the knowledge possessed by everybody about him was hardly greater than his own. never in a long life did he seek to master a lesson so obscure. mr. sumner was given to saying after oxenstiern: "quantula sapientia mundus regitur!" oxenstiern talked of a world that wanted wisdom; but adams found himself seeking education in a world that seemed to him both unwise and ignorant. the southern secessionists were certainly unbalanced in mind--fit for medical treatment, like other victims of hallucination--haunted by suspicion, by idees fixes, by violent morbid excitement; but this was not all. they were stupendously ignorant of the world. as a class, the cotton-planters were mentally one-sided, ill-balanced, and provincial to a degree rarely known. they were a close society on whom the new fountains of power had poured a stream of wealth and slaves that acted like oil on flame. they showed a young student his first object-lesson of the way in which excess of power worked when held by inadequate hands. this might be a commonplace of , but in it was paradox. the southern statesmen were regarded as standards of statesmanship, and such standards barred education. charles sumner's chief offence was his insistence on southern ignorance, and he stood a living proof of it. to this school, henry adams had come for a new education, and the school was seriously, honestly, taken by most of the world, including europe, as proper for the purpose, although the sioux indians would have taught less mischief. from such contradictions among intelligent people, what was a young man to learn? he could learn nothing but cross-purpose. the old and typical southern gentleman developed as cotton-planter had nothing to teach or to give, except warning. even as example to be avoided, he was too glaring in his defiance of reason, to help the education of a reasonable being. no one learned a useful lesson from the confederate school except to keep away from it. thus, at one sweep, the whole field of instruction south of the potomac was shut off; it was overshadowed by the cotton planters, from whom one could learn nothing but bad temper, bad manners, poker, and treason. perforce, the student was thrown back on northern precept and example; first of all, on his new england surroundings. republican houses were few in washington, and mr. and mrs. adams aimed to create a social centre for new englanders. they took a house on i street, looking over pennsylvania avenue, well out towards georgetown--the markoe house--and there the private secretary began to learn his social duties, for the political were confined to committee-rooms and lobbies of the capitol. he had little to do, and knew not how to do it rightly, but he knew of no one who knew more. the southern type was one to be avoided; the new england type was one's self. it had nothing to show except one's own features. setting aside charles sumner, who stood quite alone and was the boy's oldest friend, all the new englanders were sane and steady men, well-balanced, educated, and free from meanness or intrigue--men whom one liked to act with, and who, whether graduates or not, bore the stamp of harvard college. anson burlingame was one exception, and perhaps israel washburn another; but as a rule the new englander's strength was his poise which almost amounted to a defect. he offered no more target for love than for hate; he attracted as little as he repelled; even as a machine, his motion seemed never accelerated. the character, with its force or feebleness, was familiar; one knew it to the core; one was it--had been run in the same mould. there remained the central and western states, but there the choice of teachers was not large and in the end narrowed itself to preston king, henry winter davis, owen lovejoy, and a few other men born with social faculty. adams took most kindly to henry j. raymond, who came to view the field for the new york times, and who was a man of the world. the average congressman was civil enough, but had nothing to ask except offices, and nothing to offer but the views of his district. the average senator was more reserved, but had not much more to say, being always excepting one or two genial natures, handicapped by his own importance. study it as one might, the hope of education, till the arrival of the president-elect, narrowed itself to the possible influence of only two men--sumner and seward. sumner was then fifty years old. since his election as senator in he had passed beyond the reach of his boy friend, and, after his brooks injuries, his nervous system never quite recovered its tone; but perhaps eight or ten years of solitary existence as senator had most to do with his development. no man, however strong, can serve ten years as schoolmaster, priest, or senator, and remain fit for anything else. all the dogmatic stations in life have the effect of fixing a certain stiffness of attitude forever, as though they mesmerized the subject. yet even among senators there were degrees in dogmatism, from the frank south carolinian brutality, to that of webster, benton, clay, or sumner himself, until in extreme cases, like conkling, it became shakespearian and bouffe--as godkin used to call it--like malvolio. sumner had become dogmatic like the rest, but he had at least the merit of qualities that warranted dogmatism. he justly thought, as webster had thought before him, that his great services and sacrifices, his superiority in education, his oratorical power, his political experience, his representative character at the head of the whole new england contingent, and, above all, his knowledge of the world, made him the most important member of the senate; and no senator had ever saturated himself more thoroughly with the spirit and temper of the body. although the senate is much given to admiring in its members a superiority less obvious or quite invisible to outsiders, one senator seldom proclaims his own inferiority to another, and still more seldom likes to be told of it. even the greatest senators seemed to inspire little personal affection in each other, and betrayed none at all. sumner had a number of rivals who held his judgment in no high esteem, and one of these was senator seward. the two men would have disliked each other by instinct had they lived in different planets. each was created only for exasperating the other; the virtues of one were the faults of his rival, until no good quality seemed to remain of either. that the public service must suffer was certain, but what were the sufferings of the public service compared with the risks run by a young mosquito--a private secretary--trying to buzz admiration in the ears of each, and unaware that each would impatiently slap at him for belonging to the other? innocent and unsuspicious beyond what was permitted even in a nursery, the private secretary courted both. private secretaries are servants of a rather low order, whose business is to serve sources of power. the first news of a professional kind, imparted to private secretary adams on reaching washington, was that the president-elect, abraham lincoln, had selected mr. seward for his secretary of state, and that seward was to be the medium for communicating his wishes to his followers. every young man naturally accepted the wishes of mr. lincoln as orders, the more because he could see that the new president was likely to need all the help that several million young men would be able to give, if they counted on having any president at all to serve. naturally one waited impatiently for the first meeting with the new secretary of state. governor seward was an old friend of the family. he professed to be a disciple and follower of john quincy adams. he had been senator since , when his responsibilities as leader had separated him from the free soil contingent, for, in the dry light of the first free soil faith, the ways of new york politics thurlow weed had not won favor; but the fierce heat which welded the republican party in melted many such barriers, and when mr. adams came to congress in december, , governor seward instantly renewed his attitude of family friend, became a daily intimate in the household, and lost no chance of forcing his fresh ally to the front. a few days after their arrival in december, , the governor, as he was always called, came to dinner, alone, as one of the family, and the private secretary had the chance he wanted to watch him as carefully as one generally watches men who dispose of one's future. a slouching, slender figure; a head like a wise macaw; a beaked nose; shaggy eyebrows; unorderly hair and clothes; hoarse voice; offhand manner; free talk, and perpetual cigar, offered a new type--of western new york--to fathom; a type in one way simple because it was only double--political and personal; but complex because the political had become nature, and no one could tell which was the mask and which the features. at table, among friends, mr. seward threw off restraint, or seemed to throw it off, in reality, while in the world he threw it off, like a politician, for effect. in both cases he chose to appear as a free talker, who loathed pomposity and enjoyed a joke; but how much was nature and how much was mask, he was himself too simple a nature to know. underneath the surface he was conventional after the conventions of western new york and albany. politicians thought it unconventionality. bostonians thought it provincial. henry adams thought it charming. from the first sight, he loved the governor, who, though sixty years old, had the youth of his sympathies. he noticed that mr. seward was never petty or personal; his talk was large; he generalized; he never seemed to pose for statesmanship; he did not require an attitude of prayer. what was more unusual--almost singular and quite eccentric--he had some means, unknown to other senators, of producing the effect of unselfishness. superficially mr. seward and mr. adams were contrasts; essentially they were much alike. mr. adams was taken to be rigid, but the puritan character in all its forms could be supple enough when it chose; and in massachusetts all the adamses had been attacked in succession as no better than political mercenaries. mr. hildreth, in his standard history, went so far as to echo with approval the charge that treachery was hereditary in the family. any adams had at least to be thick-skinned, hardened to every contradictory epithet that virtue could supply, and, on the whole, armed to return such attentions; but all must have admitted that they had invariably subordinated local to national interests, and would continue to do so, whenever forced to choose. c. f. adams was sure to do what his father had done, as his father had followed the steps of john adams, and no doubt thereby earned his epithets. the inevitable followed, as a child fresh from the nursery should have had the instinct to foresee, but the young man on the edge of life never dreamed. what motives or emotions drove his masters on their various paths he made no pretence of guessing; even at that age he preferred to admit his dislike for guessing motives; he knew only his own infantile ignorance, before which he stood amazed, and his innocent good-faith, always matter of simple-minded surprise. critics who know ultimate truth will pronounce judgment on history; all that henry adams ever saw in man was a reflection of his own ignorance, and he never saw quite so much of it as in the winter of - . every one knows the story; every one draws what conclusion suits his temper, and the conclusion matters now less than though it concerned the merits of adam and eve in the garden of eden; but in the conclusion made the sharpest lesson of life; it was condensed and concentrated education. rightly or wrongly the new president and his chief advisers in washington decided that, before they could administer the government, they must make sure of a government to administer, and that this chance depended on the action of virginia. the whole ascendancy of the winter wavered between the effort of the cotton states to drag virginia out, and the effort of the new president to keep virginia in. governor seward representing the administration in the senate took the lead; mr. adams took the lead in the house; and as far as a private secretary knew, the party united on its tactics. in offering concessions to the border states, they had to run the risk, or incur the certainty, of dividing their own party, and they took this risk with open eyes. as seward himself, in his gruff way, said at dinner, after mr. adams and he had made their speeches: "if there's no secession now, you and i are ruined." they won their game; this was their affair and the affair of the historians who tell their story; their private secretaries had nothing to do with it except to follow their orders. on that side a secretary learned nothing and had nothing to learn. the sudden arrival of mr. lincoln in washington on february , and the language of his inaugural address, were the final term of the winter's tactics, and closed the private secretary's interest in the matter forever. perhaps he felt, even then, a good deal more interest in the appearance of another private secretary, of his own age, a young man named john hay, who lighted on lafayette square at the same moment. friends are born, not made, and henry never mistook a friend except when in power. from the first slight meeting in february and march, , he recognized hay as a friend, and never lost sight of him at the future crossing of their paths; but, for the moment, his own task ended on march when hay's began. the winter's anxieties were shifted upon new shoulders, and henry gladly turned back to blackstone. he had tried to make himself useful, and had exerted energy that seemed to him portentous, acting in secret as newspaper correspondent, cultivating a large acquaintance and even haunting ballrooms where the simple, old-fashioned, southern tone was pleasant even in the atmosphere of conspiracy and treason. the sum was next to nothing for education, because no one could teach; all were as ignorant as himself; none knew what should be done, or how to do it; all were trying to learn and were more bent on asking than on answering questions. the mass of ignorance in washington was lighted up by no ray of knowledge. society, from top to bottom, broke down. from this law there was no exception, unless, perhaps, that of old general winfield scott, who happened to be the only military figure that looked equal to the crisis. no one else either looked it, or was it, or could be it, by nature or training. had young adams been told that his life was to hang on the correctness of his estimate of the new president, he would have lost. he saw mr. lincoln but once; at the melancholy function called an inaugural ball. of course he looked anxiously for a sign of character. he saw a long, awkward figure; a plain, ploughed face; a mind, absent in part, and in part evidently worried by white kid gloves; features that expressed neither self-satisfaction nor any other familiar americanism, but rather the same painful sense of becoming educated and of needing education that tormented a private secretary; above all a lack of apparent force. any private secretary in the least fit for his business would have thought, as adams did, that no man living needed so much education as the new president but that all the education he could get would not be enough. as far as a young man of anxious temperament could see, no one in washington was fitted for his duties; or rather, no duties in march were fitted for the duties in april. the few people who thought they knew something were more in error than those who knew nothing. education was matter of life and death, but all the education in the world would have helped nothing. only one man in adams's reach seemed to him supremely fitted by knowledge and experience to be an adviser and friend. this was senator sumner; and there, in fact, the young man's education began; there it ended. going over the experience again, long after all the great actors were dead, he struggled to see where he had blundered. in the effort to make acquaintances, he lost friends, but he would have liked much to know whether he could have helped it. he had necessarily followed seward and his father; he took for granted that his business was obedience, discipline, and silence; he supposed the party to require it, and that the crisis overruled all personal doubts. he was thunderstruck to learn that senator sumner privately denounced the course, regarded mr. adams as betraying the principles of his life, and broke off relations with his family. many a shock was henry adams to meet in the course of a long life passed chiefly near politics and politicians, but the profoundest lessons are not the lessons of reason; they are sudden strains that permanently warp the mind. he cared little or nothing about the point in discussion; he was even willing to admit that sumner might be right, though in all great emergencies he commonly found that every one was more or less wrong; he liked lofty moral principle and cared little for political tactics; he felt a profound respect for sumner himself; but the shock opened a chasm in life that never closed, and as long as life lasted, he found himself invariably taking for granted, as a political instinct, with out waiting further experiment--as he took for granted that arsenic poisoned--the rule that a friend in power is a friend lost. on his own score, he never admitted the rupture, and never exchanged a word with mr. sumner on the subject, then or afterwards, but his education--for good or bad--made an enormous stride. one has to deal with all sorts of unexpected morals in life, and, at this moment, he was looking at hundreds of southern gentlemen who believed themselves singularly honest, but who seemed to him engaged in the plainest breach of faith and the blackest secret conspiracy, yet they did not disturb his education. history told of little else; and not one rebel defection--not even robert e. lee's--cost young adams a personal pang; but sumner's struck home. this, then, was the result of the new attempt at education, down to march , ; this was all; and frankly, it seemed to him hardly what he wanted. the picture of washington in march, , offered education, but not the kind of education that led to good. the process that matthew arnold described as wandering between two worlds, one dead, the other powerless to be born, helps nothing. washington was a dismal school. even before the traitors had flown, the vultures descended on it in swarms that darkened the ground, and tore the carrion of political patronage into fragments and gobbets of fat and lean, on the very steps of the white house. not a man there knew what his task was to be, or was fitted for it; every one without exception, northern or southern, was to learn his business at the cost of the public. lincoln, seward, sumner, and the rest, could give no help to the young man seeking education; they knew less than he; within six weeks they were all to be taught their duties by the uprising of such as he, and their education was to cost a million lives and ten thousand million dollars, more or less, north and south, before the country could recover its balance and movement. henry was a helpless victim, and, like all the rest, he could only wait for he knew not what, to send him he knew not where. with the close of the session, his own functions ended. ceasing to be private secretary he knew not what else to do but return with his father and mother to boston in the middle of march, and, with childlike docility, sit down at a desk in the law-office of horace gray in court street, to begin again: "my lords and gentlemen"; dozing after a two o'clock dinner, or waking to discuss politics with the future justice. there, in ordinary times, he would have remained for life, his attempt at education in treason having, like all the rest, disastrously failed. chapter viii diplomacy ( ) hardly a week passed when the newspapers announced that president lincoln had selected charles francis adams as his minister to england. once more, silently, henry put blackstone back on its shelf. as friar bacon's head sententiously announced many centuries before: time had passed! the civil law lasted a brief day; the common law prolonged its shadowy existence for a week. the law, altogether, as path of education, vanished in april, , leaving a million young men planted in the mud of a lawless world, to begin a new life without education at all. they asked few questions, but if they had asked millions they would have got no answers. no one could help. looking back on this moment of crisis, nearly fifty years afterwards, one could only shake one's white beard in silent horror. mr. adams once more intimated that he thought himself entitled to the services of one of his sons, and he indicated henry as the only one who could be spared from more serious duties. henry packed his trunk again without a word. he could offer no protest. ridiculous as he knew himself about to be in his new role, he was less ridiculous than his betters. he was at least no public official, like the thousands of improvised secretaries and generals who crowded their jealousies and intrigues on the president. he was not a vulture of carrion--patronage. he knew that his father's appointment was the result of governor seward's personal friendship; he did not then know that senator sumner had opposed it, or the reasons which sumner alleged for thinking it unfit; but he could have supplied proofs enough had sumner asked for them, the strongest and most decisive being that, in his opinion, mr. adams had chosen a private secretary far more unfit than his chief. that mr. adams was unfit might well be, since it was hard to find a fit appointment in the list of possible candidates, except mr. sumner himself; and no one knew so well as this experienced senator that the weakest of all mr. adams's proofs of fitness was his consent to quit a safe seat in congress for an exceedingly unsafe seat in london with no better support than senator sumner, at the head of the foreign relations committee, was likely to give him. in the family history, its members had taken many a dangerous risk, but never before had they taken one so desperate. the private secretary troubled himself not at all about the unfitness of any one; he knew too little; and, in fact, no one, except perhaps mr. sumner, knew more. the president and secretary of state knew least of all. as secretary of legation the executive appointed the editor of a chicago newspaper who had applied for the chicago post-office; a good fellow, universally known as charley wilson, who had not a thought of staying in the post, or of helping the minister. the assistant secretary was inherited from buchanan's time, a hard worker, but socially useless. mr. adams made no effort to find efficient help; perhaps he knew no name to suggest; perhaps he knew too much of washington, but he could hardly have hoped to find a staff of strength in his son. the private secretary was more passive than his father, for he knew not where to turn. sumner alone could have smoothed his path by giving him letters of introduction, but if sumner wrote letters, it was not with the effect of smoothing paths. no one, at that moment, was engaged in smoothing either paths or people. the private secretary was no worse off than his neighbors except in being called earlier into service. on april the storm burst and rolled several hundred thousand young men like henry adams into the surf of a wild ocean, all helpless like himself, to be beaten about for four years by the waves of war. adams still had time to watch the regiments form ranks before boston state house in the april evenings and march southward, quietly enough, with the air of business they wore from their cradles, but with few signs or sounds of excitement. he had time also to go down the harbor to see his brother charles quartered in fort independence before being thrown, with a hundred thousand more, into the furnace of the army of the potomac to get educated in a fury of fire. few things were for the moment so trivial in importance as the solitary private secretary crawling down to the wretched old cunard steamer niagara at east boston to start again for liverpool. this time the pitcher of education had gone to the fountain once too often; it was fairly broken; and the young man had got to meet a hostile world without defence--or arms. the situation did not seem even comic, so ignorant was the world of its humors; yet minister adams sailed for england, may , , with much the same outfit as admiral dupont would have enjoyed if the government had sent him to attack port royal with one cabin-boy in a rowboat. luckily for the cabin-boy, he was alone. had secretary seward and senator sumner given to mr. adams the rank of ambassador and four times his salary, a palace in london, a staff of trained secretaries, and personal letters of introduction to the royal family and the whole peerage, the private secretary would have been cabin-boy still, with the extra burden of many masters; he was the most fortunate person in the party, having for master only his father who never fretted, never dictated, never disciplined, and whose idea of american diplomacy was that of the eighteenth century. minister adams remembered how his grandfather had sailed from mount wollaston in midwinter, , on the little frigate boston, taking his eleven-year-old son john quincy with him, for secretary, on a diplomacy of adventure that had hardly a parallel for success. he remembered how john quincy, in , had sailed for russia, with himself, a baby of two years old, to cope with napoleon and the czar alexander single-handed, almost as much of an adventurer as john adams before him, and almost as successful. he thought it natural that the government should send him out as an adventurer also, with a twenty-three-year-old son, and he did not even notice that he left not a friend behind him. no doubt he could depend on seward, but on whom could seward depend? certainly not on the chairman of the committee of foreign relations. minister adams had no friend in the senate; he could hope for no favors, and he asked none. he thought it right to play the adventurer as his father and grandfather had done before him, without a murmur. this was a lofty view, and for him answered his objects, but it bore hard on cabin-boys, and when, in time, the young man realized what had happened, he felt it as a betrayal. he modestly thought himself unfit for the career of adventurer, and judged his father to be less fit than himself. for the first time america was posing as the champion of legitimacy and order. her representatives should know how to play their role; they should wear the costume; but, in the mission attached to mr. adams in , the only rag of legitimacy or order was the private secretary, whose stature was not sufficient to impose awe on the court and parliament of great britain. one inevitable effect of this lesson was to make a victim of the scholar and to turn him into a harsh judge of his masters. if they overlooked him, he could hardly overlook them, since they stood with their whole weight on his body. by way of teaching him quickly, they sent out their new minister to russia in the same ship. secretary seward had occasion to learn the merits of cassius m. clay in the diplomatic service, but mr. seward's education profited less than the private secretary's, cassius clay as a teacher having no equal though possibly some rivals. no young man, not in government pay, could be asked to draw, from such lessons, any confidence in himself, and it was notorious that, for the next two years, the persons were few indeed who felt, or had reason to feel, any sort of confidence in the government; fewest of all among those who were in it. at home, for the most part, young men went to the war, grumbled and died; in england they might grumble or not; no one listened. above all, the private secretary could not grumble to his chief. he knew surprisingly little, but that much he did know. he never labored so hard to learn a language as he did to hold his tongue, and it affected him for life. the habit of reticence--of talking without meaning--is never effaced. he had to begin it at once. he was already an adept when the party landed at liverpool, may , , and went instantly up to london: a family of early christian martyrs about to be flung into an arena of lions, under the glad eyes of tiberius palmerston. though lord palmerston would have laughed his peculiar palmerston laugh at figuring as tiberius, he would have seen only evident resemblance in the christian martyrs, for he had already arranged the ceremony. of what they had to expect, the minister knew no more than his son. what he or mr. seward or mr. sumner may have thought is the affair of history and their errors concern historians. the errors of a private secretary concerned no one but himself, and were a large part of his education. he thought on may that he was going to a friendly government and people, true to the anti-slavery principles which had been their steadiest profession. for a hundred years the chief effort of his family had aimed at bringing the government of england into intelligent cooperation with the objects and interests of america. his father was about to make a new effort, and this time the chance of success was promising. the slave states had been the chief apparent obstacle to good understanding. as for the private secretary himself, he was, like all bostonians, instinctively english. he could not conceive the idea of a hostile england. he supposed himself, as one of the members of a famous anti-slavery family, to be welcome everywhere in the british islands. on may , he met the official announcement that england recognized the belligerency of the confederacy. this beginning of a new education tore up by the roots nearly all that was left of harvard college and germany. he had to learn--the sooner the better--that his ideas were the reverse of truth; that in may, , no one in england--literally no one--doubted that jefferson davis had made or would make a nation, and nearly all were glad of it, though not often saying so. they mostly imitated palmerston who, according to mr. gladstone, "desired the severance as a diminution of a dangerous power, but prudently held his tongue." the sentiment of anti-slavery had disappeared. lord john russell, as foreign secretary, had received the rebel emissaries, and had decided to recognize their belligerency before the arrival of mr. adams in order to fix the position of the british government in advance. the recognition of independence would then become an understood policy; a matter of time and occasion. whatever minister adams may have felt, the first effect of this shock upon his son produced only a dullness of comprehension--a sort of hazy inability to grasp the missile or realize the blow. yet he realized that to his father it was likely to be fatal. the chances were great that the whole family would turn round and go home within a few weeks. the horizon widened out in endless waves of confusion. when he thought over the subject in the long leisure of later life, he grew cold at the idea of his situation had his father then shown himself what sumner thought him to be--unfit for his post. that the private secretary was unfit for his--trifling though it were--was proved by his unreflecting confidence in his father. it never entered his mind that his father might lose his nerve or his temper, and yet in a subsequent knowledge of statesmen and diplomats extending over several generations, he could not certainly point out another who could have stood such a shock without showing it. he passed this long day, and tedious journey to london, without once thinking of the possibility that his father might make a mistake. whatever the minister thought, and certainly his thought was not less active than his son's, he showed no trace of excitement. his manner was the same as ever; his mind and temper were as perfectly balanced; not a word escaped; not a nerve twitched. the test was final, for no other shock so violent and sudden could possibly recur. the worst was in full sight. for once the private secretary knew his own business, which was to imitate his father as closely as possible and hold his tongue. dumped thus into maurigy's hotel at the foot of regent street, in the midst of a london season, without a friend or even an acquaintance, he preferred to laugh at his father's bewilderment before the waiter's "'amhandheggsir" for breakfast, rather than ask a question or express a doubt. his situation, if taken seriously, was too appalling to face. had he known it better, he would only have thought it worse. politically or socially, the outlook was desperate, beyond retrieving or contesting. socially, under the best of circumstances, a newcomer in london society needs years to establish a position, and minister adams had not a week or an hour to spare, while his son had not even a remote chance of beginning. politically the prospect looked even worse, and for secretary seward and senator sumner it was so; but for the minister, on the spot, as he came to realize exactly where he stood, the danger was not so imminent. mr. adams was always one of the luckiest of men, both in what he achieved and in what he escaped. the blow, which prostrated seward and sumner, passed over him. lord john russell had acted--had probably intended to act--kindly by him in forestalling his arrival. the blow must have fallen within three months, and would then have broken him down. the british ministers were a little in doubt still--a little ashamed of themselves--and certain to wait the longer for their next step in proportion to the haste of their first. this is not a story of the diplomatic adventures of charles francis adams, but of his son henry's adventures in search of an education, which, if not taken too seriously, tended to humor. the father's position in london was not altogether bad; the son's was absurd. thanks to certain family associations, charles francis adams naturally looked on all british ministers as enemies; the only public occupation of all adamses for a hundred and fifty years at least, in their brief intervals of quarrelling with state street, had been to quarrel with downing street; and the british government, well used to a liberal unpopularity abroad, even when officially rude liked to be personally civil. all diplomatic agents are liable to be put, so to speak, in a corner, and are none the worse for it. minister adams had nothing in especial to complain of; his position was good while it lasted, and he had only the chances of war to fear. the son had no such compensations. brought over in order to help his father, he could conceive no way of rendering his father help, but he was clear that his father had got to help him. to him, the legation was social ostracism, terrible beyond anything he had known. entire solitude in the great society of london was doubly desperate because his duties as private secretary required him to know everybody and go with his father and mother everywhere they needed escort. he had no friend, or even enemy, to tell him to be patient. had any one done it, he would surely have broken out with the reply that patience was the last resource of fools as well as of sages; if he was to help his father at all, he must do it at once, for his father would never so much need help again. in fact he never gave his father the smallest help, unless it were as a footman, clerk, or a companion for the younger children. he found himself in a singular situation for one who was to be useful. as he came to see the situation closer, he began to doubt whether secretaries were meant to be useful. wars were too common in diplomacy to disturb the habits of the diplomat. most secretaries detested their chiefs, and wished to be anything but useful. at the st. james's club, to which the minister's son could go only as an invited guest, the most instructive conversation he ever heard among the young men of his own age who hung about the tables, more helpless than himself, was: "quel chien de pays!" or, "que tu es beau aujourd'hui, mon cher!" no one wanted to discuss affairs; still less to give or get information. that was the affair of their chiefs, who were also slow to assume work not specially ordered from their courts. if the american minister was in trouble to-day, the russian ambassador was in trouble yesterday, and the frenchman would be in trouble to-morrow. it would all come in the day's work. there was nothing professional in worry. empires were always tumbling to pieces and diplomats were always picking them up. this was his whole diplomatic education, except that he found rich veins of jealousy running between every chief and his staff. his social education was more barren still, and more trying to his vanity. his little mistakes in etiquette or address made him writhe with torture. he never forgot the first two or three social functions he attended: one an afternoon at miss burdett coutts's in stratton place, where he hid himself in the embrasure of a window and hoped that no one noticed him; another was a garden-party given by the old anti-slavery duchess dowager of sutherland at chiswick, where the american minister and mrs. adams were kept in conversation by the old duchess till every one else went away except the young duke and his cousins, who set to playing leap-frog on the lawn. at intervals during the next thirty years henry adams continued to happen upon the duke, who, singularly enough, was always playing leap-frog. still another nightmare he suffered at a dance given by the old duchess dowager of somerset, a terrible vision in castanets, who seized him and forced him to perform a highland fling before the assembled nobility and gentry, with the daughter of the turkish ambassador for partner. this might seem humorous to some, but to him the world turned to ashes. when the end of the season came, the private secretary had not yet won a private acquaintance, and he hugged himself in his solitude when the story of the battle of bull run appeared in the times. he felt only the wish to be more private than ever, for bull run was a worse diplomatic than military disaster. all this is history and can be read by public schools if they choose; but the curious and unexpected happened to the legation, for the effect of bull run on them was almost strengthening. they no longer felt doubt. for the next year they went on only from week to week, ready to leave england at once, and never assuming more than three months for their limit. europe was waiting to see them go. so certain was the end that no one cared to hurry it. so far as a private secretary could see, this was all that saved his father. for many months he looked on himself as lost or finished in the character of private secretary; and as about to begin, without further experiment, a final education in the ranks of the army of the potomac where he would find most of his friends enjoying a much pleasanter life than his own. with this idea uppermost in his mind, he passed the summer and the autumn, and began the winter. any winter in london is a severe trial; one's first winter is the most trying; but the month of december, , in mansfield street, portland place, would have gorged a glutton of gloom. one afternoon when he was struggling to resist complete nervous depression in the solitude of mansfield street, during the absence of the minister and mrs. adams on a country visit, reuter's telegram announcing the seizure of mason and slidell from a british mail-steamer was brought to the office. all three secretaries, public and private were there--nervous as wild beasts under the long strain on their endurance--and all three, though they knew it to be not merely their order of departure--not merely diplomatic rupture--but a declaration of war--broke into shouts of delight. they were glad to face the end. they saw it and cheered it! since england was waiting only for its own moment to strike, they were eager to strike first. they telegraphed the news to the minister, who was staying with monckton milnes at fryston in yorkshire. how mr. adams took it, is told in the "lives" of lord houghton and william e. forster who was one of the fryston party. the moment was for him the crisis of his diplomatic career; for the secretaries it was merely the beginning of another intolerable delay, as though they were a military outpost waiting orders to quit an abandoned position. at the moment of sharpest suspense, the prince consort sickened and died. portland place at christmas in a black fog was never a rosy landscape, but in the most hardened londoner lost his ruddiness. the private secretary had one source of comfort denied to them--he should not be private secretary long. he was mistaken--of course! he had been mistaken at every point of his education, and, on this point, he kept up the same mistake for nearly seven years longer, always deluded by the notion that the end was near. to him the trent affair was nothing but one of many affairs which he had to copy in a delicate round hand into his books, yet it had one or two results personal to him which left no trace on the legation records. one of these, and to him the most important, was to put an end forever to the idea of being "useful." hitherto, as an independent and free citizen, not in the employ of the government, he had kept up his relations with the american press. he had written pretty frequently to henry j. raymond, and raymond had used his letters in the new york times. he had also become fairly intimate with the two or three friendly newspapers in london, the daily news, the star, the weekly spectator; and he had tried to give them news and views that should have a certain common character, and prevent clash. he had even gone down to manchester to study the cotton famine, and wrote a long account of his visit which his brother charles had published in the boston courier. unfortunately it was printed with his name, and instantly came back upon him in the most crushing shape possible--that of a long, satirical leader in the london times. luckily the times did not know its victim to be a part, though not an official, of the legation, and lost the chance to make its satire fatal; but he instantly learned the narrowness of his escape from old joe parkes, one of the traditional busy-bodies of politics, who had haunted london since , and who, after rushing to the times office, to tell them all they did not know about henry adams, rushed to the legation to tell adams all he did not want to know about the times. for a moment adams thought his "usefulness" at an end in other respects than in the press, but a day or two more taught him the value of obscurity. he was totally unknown; he had not even a club; london was empty; no one thought twice about the times article; no one except joe parkes ever spoke of it; and the world had other persons--such as president lincoln, secretary seward, and commodore wilkes--for constant and favorite objects of ridicule. henry adams escaped, but he never tried to be useful again. the trent affair dwarfed individual effort. his education at least had reached the point of seeing its own proportions. "surtout point de zele!" zeal was too hazardous a profession for a minister's son to pursue, as a volunteer manipulator, among trent affairs and rebel cruisers. he wrote no more letters and meddled with no more newspapers, but he was still young, and felt unkindly towards the editor of the london times. mr. delane lost few opportunities of embittering him, and he felt little or no hope of repaying these attentions; but the trent affair passed like a snowstorm, leaving the legation, to its surprise, still in place. although the private secretary saw in this delay--which he attributed to mr. seward's good sense--no reason for changing his opinion about the views of the british government, he had no choice but to sit down again at his table, and go on copying papers, filing letters, and reading newspaper accounts of the incapacity of mr. lincoln and the brutality of mr. seward--or vice versa. the heavy months dragged on and winter slowly turned to spring without improving his position or spirits. socially he had but one relief; and, to the end of life, he never forgot the keen gratitude he owed for it. during this tedious winter and for many months afterwards, the only gleams of sunshine were on the days he passed at walton-on-thames as the guest of mr. and mrs. russell sturgis at mount felix. his education had unfortunately little to do with bankers, although old george peabody and his partner, junius morgan, were strong allies. joshua bates was devoted, and no one could be kinder than thomas baring, whose little dinners in upper grosvenor street were certainly the best in london; but none offered a refuge to compare with mount felix, and, for the first time, the refuge was a liberal education. mrs. russell sturgis was one of the women to whom an intelligent boy attaches himself as closely as he can. henry adams was not a very intelligent boy, and he had no knowledge of the world, but he knew enough to understand that a cub needed shape. the kind of education he most required was that of a charming woman, and mrs. russell sturgis, a dozen years older than himself, could have good-naturedly trained a school of such, without an effort, and with infinite advantage to them. near her he half forgot the anxieties of portland place. during two years of miserable solitude, she was in this social polar winter, the single source of warmth and light. of course the legation itself was home, and, under such pressure, life in it could be nothing but united. all the inmates made common cause, but this was no education. one lived, but was merely flayed alive. yet, while this might be exactly true of the younger members of the household, it was not quite so with the minister and mrs. adams. very slowly, but quite steadily, they gained foothold. for some reason partly connected with american sources, british society had begun with violent social prejudice against lincoln, seward, and all the republican leaders except sumner. familiar as the whole tribe of adamses had been for three generations with the impenetrable stupidity of the british mind, and weary of the long struggle to teach it its own interests, the fourth generation could still not quite persuade itself that this new british prejudice was natural. the private secretary suspected that americans in new york and boston had something to do with it. the copperhead was at home in pall mall. naturally the englishman was a coarse animal and liked coarseness. had lincoln and seward been the ruffians supposed, the average englishman would have liked them the better. the exceedingly quiet manner and the unassailable social position of minister adams in no way conciliated them. they chose to ignore him, since they could not ridicule him. lord john russell set the example. personally the minister was to be kindly treated; politically he was negligible; he was there to be put aside. london and paris imitated lord john. every one waited to see lincoln and his hirelings disappear in one vast debacle. all conceived that the washington government would soon crumble, and that minister adams would vanish with the rest. this situation made minister adams an exception among diplomats. european rulers for the most part fought and treated as members of one family, and rarely had in view the possibility of total extinction; but the governments and society of europe, for a year at least, regarded the washington government as dead, and its ministers as nullities. minister adams was better received than most nullities because he made no noise. little by little, in private, society took the habit of accepting him, not so much as a diplomat, but rather as a member of opposition, or an eminent counsel retained for a foreign government. he was to be received and considered; to be cordially treated as, by birth and manners, one of themselves. this curiously english way of getting behind a stupidity gave the minister every possible advantage over a european diplomat. barriers of race, language, birth, habit, ceased to exist. diplomacy held diplomats apart in order to save governments, but earl russell could not hold mr. adams apart. he was undistinguishable from a londoner. in society few londoners were so widely at home. none had such double personality and corresponding double weight. the singular luck that took him to fryston to meet the shock of the trent affair under the sympathetic eyes of monckton milnes and william e. forster never afterwards deserted him. both milnes and forster needed support and were greatly relieved to be supported. they saw what the private secretary in may had overlooked, the hopeless position they were in if the american minister made a mistake, and, since his strength was theirs, they lost no time in expressing to all the world their estimate of the minister's character. between them the minister was almost safe. one might discuss long whether, at that moment, milnes or forster were the more valuable ally, since they were influences of different kinds. monckton milnes was a social power in london, possibly greater than londoners themselves quite understood, for in london society as elsewhere, the dull and the ignorant made a large majority, and dull men always laughed at monckton milnes. every bore was used to talk familiarly about "dicky milnes," the "cool of the evening"; and of course he himself affected social eccentricity, challenging ridicule with the indifference of one who knew himself to be the first wit in london, and a maker of men--of a great many men. a word from him went far. an invitation to his breakfast-table went farther. behind his almost falstaffian mask and laugh of silenus, he carried a fine, broad, and high intelligence which no one questioned. as a young man he had written verses, which some readers thought poetry, and which were certainly not altogether prose. later, in parliament he made speeches, chiefly criticised as too good for the place and too high for the audience. socially, he was one of two or three men who went everywhere, knew everybody, talked of everything, and had the ear of ministers; but unlike most wits, he held a social position of his own that ended in a peerage, and he had a house in upper brook street to which most clever people were exceedingly glad of admission. his breakfasts were famous, and no one liked to decline his invitations, for it was more dangerous to show timidity than to risk a fray. he was a voracious reader, a strong critic, an art connoisseur in certain directions, a collector of books, but above all he was a man of the world by profession, and loved the contacts--perhaps the collisions--of society. not even henry brougham dared do the things he did, yet brougham defied rebuff. milnes was the good-nature of london; the gargantuan type of its refinement and coarseness; the most universal figure of may fair. compared with him, figures like hayward, or delane, or venables, or henry reeve were quite secondary, but william e. forster stood in a different class. forster had nothing whatever to do with may fair. except in being a yorkshireman he was quite the opposite of milnes. he had at that time no social or political position; he never had a vestige of milnes's wit or variety; he was a tall, rough, ungainly figure, affecting the singular form of self-defense which the yorkshiremen and lancashiremen seem to hold dear--the exterior roughness assumed to cover an internal, emotional, almost sentimental nature. kindly he had to be, if only by his inheritance from a quaker ancestry, but he was a friend one degree removed. sentimental and emotional he must have been, or he could never have persuaded a daughter of dr. arnold to marry him. pure gold, without a trace of base metal; honest, unselfish, practical; he took up the union cause and made himself its champion, as a true yorkshireman was sure to do, partly because of his quaker anti-slavery convictions, and partly because it gave him a practical opening in the house. as a new member, he needed a field. diffidence was not one of forster's weaknesses. his practical sense and his personal energy soon established him in leadership, and made him a powerful champion, not so much for ornament as for work. with such a manager, the friends of the union in england began to take heart. minister adams had only to look on as his true champions, the heavy-weights, came into action, and even the private secretary caught now and then a stray gleam of encouragement as he saw the ring begin to clear for these burly yorkshiremen to stand up in a prize-fight likely to be as brutal as ever england had known. milnes and forster were not exactly light-weights, but bright and cobden were the hardest hitters in england, and with them for champions the minister could tackle even lord palmerston without much fear of foul play. in society john bright and richard cobden were never seen, and even in parliament they had no large following. they were classed as enemies of order,--anarchists,--and anarchists they were if hatred of the so-called established orders made them so. about them was no sort of political timidity. they took bluntly the side of the union against palmerston whom they hated. strangers to london society, they were at home in the american legation, delightful dinner-company, talking always with reckless freedom. cobden was the milder and more persuasive; bright was the more dangerous to approach; but the private secretary delighted in both, and nourished an ardent wish to see them talk the same language to lord john russell from the gangway of the house. with four such allies as these, minister adams stood no longer quite helpless. for the second time the british ministry felt a little ashamed of itself after the trent affair, as well it might, and disposed to wait before moving again. little by little, friends gathered about the legation who were no fair-weather companions. the old anti-slavery, exeter hall, shaftesbury clique turned out to be an annoying and troublesome enemy, but the duke of argyll was one of the most valuable friends the minister found, both politically and socially, and the duchess was as true as her mother. even the private secretary shared faintly in the social profit of this relation, and never forgot dining one night at the lodge, and finding himself after dinner engaged in instructing john stuart mill about the peculiar merits of an american protective system. in spite of all the probabilities, he convinced himself that it was not the duke's claret which led him to this singular form of loquacity; he insisted that it was the fault of mr. mill himself who led him on by assenting to his point of view. mr. mill took no apparent pleasure in dispute, and in that respect the duke would perhaps have done better; but the secretary had to admit that though at other periods of life he was sufficiently and even amply snubbed by englishmen, he could never recall a single occasion during this trying year, when he had to complain of rudeness. friendliness he found here and there, but chiefly among his elders; not among fashionable or socially powerful people, either men or women; although not even this rule was quite exact, for frederick cavendish's kindness and intimate relations made devonshire house almost familiar, and lyulph stanley's ardent americanism created a certain cordiality with the stanleys of alderley whose house was one of the most frequented in london. lorne, too, the future argyll, was always a friend. yet the regular course of society led to more literary intimacies. sir charles trevelyan's house was one of the first to which young adams was asked, and with which his friendly relations never ceased for near half a century, and then only when death stopped them. sir charles and lady lyell were intimates. tom hughes came into close alliance. by the time society began to reopen its doors after the death of the prince consort, even the private secretary occasionally saw a face he knew, although he made no more effort of any kind, but silently waited the end. whatever might be the advantages of social relations to his father and mother, to him the whole business of diplomacy and society was futile. he meant to go home. chapter ix foes or friends ( ) of the year henry adams could never think without a shudder. the war alone did not greatly distress him; already in his short life he was used to seeing people wade in blood, and he could plainly discern in history, that man from the beginning had found his chief amusement in bloodshed; but the ferocious joy of destruction at its best requires that one should kill what one hates, and young adams neither hated nor wanted to kill his friends the rebels, while he wanted nothing so much as to wipe england off the earth. never could any good come from that besotted race! he was feebly trying to save his own life. every day the british government deliberately crowded him one step further into the grave. he could see it; the legation knew it; no one doubted it; no one thought of questioning it. the trent affair showed where palmerston and russell stood. the escape of the rebel cruisers from liverpool was not, in a young man's eyes, the sign of hesitation, but the proof of their fixed intention to intervene. lord russell's replies to mr. adams's notes were discourteous in their indifference, and, to an irritable young private secretary of twenty-four, were insolent in their disregard of truth. whatever forms of phrase were usual in public to modify the harshness of invective, in private no political opponent in england, and few political friends, hesitated to say brutally of lord john russell that he lied. this was no great reproach, for, more or less, every statesman lied, but the intensity of the private secretary's rage sprang from his belief that russell's form of defence covered intent to kill. not for an instant did the legation draw a free breath. the suspense was hideous and unendurable. the minister, no doubt, endured it, but he had support and consideration, while his son had nothing to think about but his friends who were mostly dying under mcclellan in the swamps about richmond, or his enemies who were exulting in pall mall. he bore it as well as he could till midsummer, but, when the story of the second bull run appeared, he could bear it no longer, and after a sleepless night, walking up and down his room without reflecting that his father was beneath him, he announced at breakfast his intention to go home into the army. his mother seemed to be less impressed by the announcement than by the walking over her head, which was so unlike her as to surprise her son. his father, too, received the announcement quietly. no doubt they expected it, and had taken their measures in advance. in those days, parents got used to all sorts of announcements from their children. mr. adams took his son's defection as quietly as he took bull run; but his son never got the chance to go. he found obstacles constantly rising in his path. the remonstrances of his brother charles, who was himself in the army of the potomac, and whose opinion had always the greatest weight with henry, had much to do with delaying action; but he felt, of his own accord, that if he deserted his post in london, and found the capuan comforts he expected in virginia where he would have only bullets to wound him, he would never forgive himself for leaving his father and mother alone to be devoured by the wild beasts of the british amphitheatre. this reflection might not have stopped him, but his father's suggestion was decisive. the minister pointed out that it was too late for him to take part in the actual campaign, and that long before next spring they would all go home together. the young man had copied too many affidavits about rebel cruisers to miss the point of this argument, so he sat down again to copy some more. consul dudley at liverpool provided a continuous supply. properly, the affidavits were no business of the private secretary, but practically the private secretary did a second secretary's work, and was glad to do it, if it would save mr. seward the trouble of sending more secretaries of his own selection to help the minister. the work was nothing, and no one ever complained of it; not even moran, the secretary of legation after the departure of charley wilson, though he might sit up all night to copy. not the work, but the play exhausted. the effort of facing a hostile society was bad enough, but that of facing friends was worse. after terrific disasters like the seven days before richmond and the second bull run, friends needed support; a tone of bluff would have been fatal, for the average mind sees quickest through a bluff; nothing answers but candor; yet private secretaries never feel candid, however much they feel the reverse, and therefore they must affect candor; not always a simple act when one is exasperated, furious, bitter, and choking with tears over the blunders and incapacity of one's government. if one shed tears, they must be shed on one's pillow. least of all, must one throw extra strain on the minister, who had all he could carry without being fretted in his family. one must read one's times every morning over one's muffin without reading aloud--"another disastrous federal defeat"; and one might not even indulge in harmless profanity. self-restraint among friends required much more effort than keeping a quiet face before enemies. great men were the worst blunderers. one day the private secretary smiled, when standing with the crowd in the throne-room while the endless procession made bows to the royal family, at hearing, behind his shoulder, one cabinet minister remark gaily to another: "so the federals have got another licking!" the point of the remark was its truth. even a private secretary had learned to control his tones and guard his features and betray no joy over the "lickings" of an enemy--in the enemy's presence. london was altogether beside itself on one point, in especial; it created a nightmare of its own, and gave it the shape of abraham lincoln. behind this it placed another demon, if possible more devilish, and called it mr. seward. in regard to these two men, english society seemed demented. defence was useless; explanation was vain; one could only let the passion exhaust itself. one's best friends were as unreasonable as enemies, for the belief in poor mr. lincoln's brutality and seward's ferocity became a dogma of popular faith. the last time henry adams saw thackeray, before his sudden death at christmas in , was in entering the house of sir henry holland for an evening reception. thackeray was pulling on his coat downstairs, laughing because, in his usual blind way, he had stumbled into the wrong house and not found it out till he shook hands with old sir henry, whom he knew very well, but who was not the host he expected. then his tone changed as he spoke of his--and adams's--friend, mrs. frank hampton, of south carolina, whom he had loved as sally baxter and painted as ethel newcome. though he had never quite forgiven her marriage, his warmth of feeling revived when he heard that she had died of consumption at columbia while her parents and sister were refused permission to pass through the lines to see her. in speaking of it, thackeray's voice trembled and his eyes filled with tears. the coarse cruelty of lincoln and his hirelings was notorious. he never doubted that the federals made a business of harrowing the tenderest feelings of women--particularly of women--in order to punish their opponents. on quite insufficient evidence he burst into violent reproach. had adams carried in his pocket the proofs that the reproach was unjust, he would have gained nothing by showing them. at that moment thackeray, and all london society with him, needed the nervous relief of expressing emotion; for if mr. lincoln was not what they said he--was what were they? for like reason, the members of the legation kept silence, even in private, under the boorish scotch jibes of carlyle. if carlyle was wrong, his diatribes would give his true measure, and this measure would be a low one, for carlyle was not likely to be more sincere or more sound in one thought than in another. the proof that a philosopher does not know what he is talking about is apt to sadden his followers before it reacts on himself. demolition of one's idols is painful, and carlyle had been an idol. doubts cast on his stature spread far into general darkness like shadows of a setting sun. not merely the idols fell, but also the habit of faith. if carlyle, too, was a fraud, what were his scholars and school? society as a rule was civil, and one had no more reason to complain than every other diplomatist has had, in like conditions, but one's few friends in society were mere ornament. the legation could not dream of contesting social control. the best they could do was to escape mortification, and by this time their relations were good enough to save the minister's family from that annoyance. now and then, the fact could not be wholly disguised that some one had refused to meet--or to receive--the minister; but never an open insult, or any expression of which the minister had to take notice. diplomacy served as a buffer in times of irritation, and no diplomat who knew his business fretted at what every diplomat--and none more commonly than the english--had to expect; therefore henry adams, though not a diplomat and wholly unprotected, went his way peacefully enough, seeing clearly that society cared little to make his acquaintance, but seeing also no reason why society should discover charms in him of which he was himself unconscious. he went where he was asked; he was always courteously received; he was, on the whole, better treated than at washington; and he held his tongue. for a thousand reasons, the best diplomatic house in london was lord palmerston's, while lord john russell's was one of the worst. of neither host could a private secretary expect to know anything. he might as well have expected to know the grand lama. personally lord palmerston was the last man in london that a cautious private secretary wanted to know. other prime ministers may perhaps have lived who inspired among diplomatists as much distrust as palmerston, and yet between palmerston's word and russell's word, one hesitated to decide, and gave years of education to deciding, whether either could be trusted, or how far. the queen herself in her famous memorandum of august , , gave her opinion of palmerston in words that differed little from words used by lord john russell, and both the queen and russell said in substance only what cobden and bright said in private. every diplomatist agreed with them, yet the diplomatic standard of trust seemed to be other than the parliamentarian. no professional diplomatists worried about falsehoods. words were with them forms of expression which varied with individuals, but falsehood was more or less necessary to all. the worst liars were the candid. what diplomatists wanted to know was the motive that lay beyond the expression. in the case of palmerston they were unanimous in warning new colleagues that they might expect to be sacrificed by him to any momentary personal object. every new minister or ambassador at the court of st. james received this preliminary lesson that he must, if possible, keep out of palmerston's reach. the rule was not secret or merely diplomatic. the queen herself had emphatically expressed the same opinion officially. if palmerston had an object to gain, he would go down to the house of commons and betray or misrepresent a foreign minister, without concern for his victim. no one got back on him with a blow equally mischievous--not even the queen--for, as old baron brunnow described him: "c'est une peau de rhinocere!" having gained his point, he laughed, and his public laughed with him, for the usual british--or american--public likes to be amused, and thought it very amusing to see these beribboned and bestarred foreigners caught and tossed and gored on the horns of this jovial, slashing, devil-may-care british bull. diplomatists have no right to complain of mere lies; it is their own fault, if, educated as they are, the lies deceive them; but they complain bitterly of traps. palmerston was believed to lay traps. he was the enfant terrible of the british government. on the other hand, lady palmerston was believed to be good and loyal. all the diplomats and their wives seemed to think so, and took their troubles to her, believing that she would try to help them. for this reason among others, her evenings at home--saturday reviews, they were called--had great vogue. an ignorant young american could not be expected to explain it. cambridge house was no better for entertaining than a score of others. lady palmerston was no longer young or handsome, and could hardly at any age have been vivacious. the people one met there were never smart and seldom young; they were largely diplomatic, and diplomats are commonly dull; they were largely political, and politicians rarely decorate or beautify an evening party; they were sprinkled with literary people, who are notoriously unfashionable; the women were of course ill-dressed and middle-aged; the men looked mostly bored or out of place; yet, beyond a doubt, cambridge house was the best, and perhaps the only political house in london, and its success was due to lady palmerston, who never seemed to make an effort beyond a friendly recognition. as a lesson in social education, cambridge house gave much subject for thought. first or last, one was to know dozens of statesmen more powerful and more agreeable than lord palmerston; dozens of ladies more beautiful and more painstaking than lady palmerston; but no political house so successful as cambridge house. the world never explains such riddles. the foreigners said only that lady palmerston was "sympathique." the small fry of the legations were admitted there, or tolerated, without a further effort to recognize their existence, but they were pleased because rarely tolerated anywhere else, and there they could at least stand in a corner and look at a bishop or even a duke. this was the social diversion of young adams. no one knew him--not even the lackeys. the last saturday evening he ever attended, he gave his name as usual at the foot of the staircase, and was rather disturbed to hear it shouted up as "mr. handrew hadams!" he tried to correct it, and the footman shouted more loudly: "mr. hanthony hadams!" with some temper he repeated the correction, and was finally announced as "mr. halexander hadams," and under this name made his bow for the last time to lord palmerston who certainly knew no better. far down the staircase one heard lord palmerston's laugh as he stood at the door receiving his guests, talking probably to one of his henchmen, delane, borthwick, or hayward, who were sure to be near. the laugh was singular, mechanical, wooden, and did not seem to disturb his features. "ha! ... ha! ... ha!" each was a slow, deliberate ejaculation, and all were in the same tone, as though he meant to say: "yes! ... yes! ... yes!" by way of assurance. it was a laugh of and the congress of vienna. adams would have much liked to stop a moment and ask whether william pitt and the duke of wellington had laughed so; but young men attached to foreign ministers asked no questions at all of palmerston and their chiefs asked as few as possible. one made the usual bow and received the usual glance of civility; then passed on to lady palmerston, who was always kind in manner, but who wasted no remarks; and so to lady jocelyn with her daughter, who commonly had something friendly to say; then went through the diplomatic corps, brunnow, musurus, azeglio, apponyi, van de weyer, bille, tricoupi, and the rest, finally dropping into the hands of some literary accident as strange there as one's self. the routine varied little. there was no attempt at entertainment. except for the desperate isolation of these two first seasons, even secretaries would have found the effort almost as mechanical as a levee at st. james's palace. lord palmerston was not foreign secretary; he was prime minister, but he loved foreign affairs and could no more resist scoring a point in diplomacy than in whist. ministers of foreign powers, knowing his habits, tried to hold him at arms'-length, and, to do this, were obliged to court the actual foreign secretary, lord john russell, who, on july , , was called up to the house of lords as an earl. by some process of personal affiliation, minister adams succeeded in persuading himself that he could trust lord russell more safely than lord palmerston. his son, being young and ill-balanced in temper, thought there was nothing to choose. englishmen saw little difference between them, and americans were bound to follow english experience in english character. minister adams had much to learn, although with him as well as with his son, the months of education began to count as aeons. just as brunnow predicted, lord palmerston made his rush at last, as unexpected as always, and more furiously than though still a private secretary of twenty-four. only a man who had been young with the battle of trafalgar could be fresh and jaunty to that point, but minister adams was not in a position to sympathize with octogenarian youth and found himself in a danger as critical as that of his numerous predecessors. it was late one after noon in june, , as the private secretary returned, with the minister, from some social function, that he saw his father pick up a note from his desk and read it in silence. then he said curtly: "palmerston wants a quarrel!" this was the point of the incident as he felt it. palmerston wanted a quarrel; he must not be gratified; he must be stopped. the matter of quarrel was general butler's famous woman-order at new orleans, but the motive was the belief in president lincoln's brutality that had taken such deep root in the british mind. knowing palmerston's habits, the minister took for granted that he meant to score a diplomatic point by producing this note in the house of commons. if he did this at once, the minister was lost; the quarrel was made; and one new victim to palmerston's passion for popularity was sacrificed. the moment was nervous--as far as the private secretary knew, quite the most critical moment in the records of american diplomacy--but the story belongs to history, not to education, and can be read there by any one who cares to read it. as a part of henry adams's education it had a value distinct from history. that his father succeeded in muzzling palmerston without a public scandal, was well enough for the minister, but was not enough for a private secretary who liked going to cambridge house, and was puzzled to reconcile contradictions. that palmerston had wanted a quarrel was obvious; why, then, did he submit so tamely to being made the victim of the quarrel? the correspondence that followed his note was conducted feebly on his side, and he allowed the united states minister to close it by a refusal to receive further communications from him except through lord russell. the step was excessively strong, for it broke off private relations as well as public, and cost even the private secretary his invitations to cambridge house. lady palmerston tried her best, but the two ladies found no resource except tears. they had to do with american minister perplexed in the extreme. not that mr. adams lost his temper, for he never felt such a weight of responsibility, and was never more cool; but he could conceive no other way of protecting his government, not to speak of himself, than to force lord russell to interpose. he believed that palmerston's submission and silence were due to russell. perhaps he was right; at the time, his son had no doubt of it, though afterwards he felt less sure. palmerston wanted a quarrel; the motive seemed evident; yet when the quarrel was made, he backed out of it; for some reason it seemed that he did not want it--at least, not then. he never showed resentment against mr. adams at the time or afterwards. he never began another quarrel. incredible as it seemed, he behaved like a well-bred gentleman who felt himself in the wrong. possibly this change may have been due to lord russell's remonstrances, but the private secretary would have felt his education in politics more complete had he ever finally made up his mind whether palmerston was more angry with general butler, or more annoyed at himself, for committing what was in both cases an unpardonable betise. at the time, the question was hardly raised, for no one doubted palmerston's attitude or his plans. the season was near its end, and cambridge house was soon closed. the legation had troubles enough without caring to publish more. the tide of english feeling ran so violently against it that one could only wait to see whether general mcclellan would bring it relief. the year was a dark spot in henry adams's life, and the education it gave was mostly one that he gladly forgot. as far as he was aware, he made no friends; he could hardly make enemies; yet towards the close of the year he was flattered by an invitation from monckton milnes to fryston, and it was one of many acts of charity towards the young that gave milnes immortality. milnes made it his business to be kind. other people criticised him for his manner of doing it, but never imitated him. naturally, a dispirited, disheartened private secretary was exceedingly grateful, and never forgot the kindness, but it was chiefly as education that this first country visit had value. commonly, country visits are much alike, but monckton milnes was never like anybody, and his country parties served his purpose of mixing strange elements. fryston was one of a class of houses that no one sought for its natural beauties, and the winter mists of yorkshire were rather more evident for the absence of the hostess on account of them, so that the singular guests whom milnes collected to enliven his december had nothing to do but astonish each other, if anything could astonish such men. of the five, adams alone was tame; he alone added nothing to the wit or humor, except as a listener; but they needed a listener and he was useful. of the remaining four, milnes was the oldest, and perhaps the sanest in spite of his superficial eccentricities, for yorkshire sanity was true to a standard of its own, if not to other conventions; yet even milnes startled a young american whose boston and washington mind was still fresh. he would not have been startled by the hard-drinking, horse-racing yorkshireman of whom he had read in books; but milnes required a knowledge of society and literature that only himself possessed, if one were to try to keep pace with him. he had sought contact with everybody and everything that europe could offer. he knew it all from several points of view, and chiefly as humorous. the second of the party was also of a certain age; a quiet, well-mannered, singularly agreeable gentleman of the literary class. when milnes showed adams to his room to dress for dinner, he stayed a moment to say a word about this guest, whom he called stirling of keir. his sketch closed with the hint that stirling was violent only on one point--hatred of napoleon iii. on that point, adams was himself sensitive, which led him to wonder how bad the scotch gentleman might be. the third was a man of thirty or thereabouts, whom adams had already met at lady palmerston's carrying his arm in a sling. his figure and bearing were sympathetic--almost pathetic--with a certain grave and gentle charm, a pleasant smile, and an interesting story. he was lawrence oliphant, just from japan, where he had been wounded in the fanatics' attack on the british legation. he seemed exceptionally sane and peculiarly suited for country houses, where every man would enjoy his company, and every woman would adore him. he had not then published "piccadilly"; perhaps he was writing it; while, like all the young men about the foreign office, he contributed to the owl. the fourth was a boy, or had the look of one, though in fact a year older than adams himself. he resembled in action--and in this trait, was remotely followed, a generation later, by another famous young man, robert louis stevenson--a tropical bird, high-crested, long-beaked, quick-moving, with rapid utterance and screams of humor, quite unlike any english lark or nightingale. one could hardly call him a crimson macaw among owls, and yet no ordinary contrast availed. milnes introduced him as mr. algernon swinburne. the name suggested nothing. milnes was always unearthing new coins and trying to give them currency. he had unearthed henry adams who knew himself to be worthless and not current. when milnes lingered a moment in adams's room to add that swinburne had written some poetry, not yet published, of really extraordinary merit, adams only wondered what more milnes would discover, and whether by chance he could discover merit in a private secretary. he was capable of it. in due course this party of five men sat down to dinner with the usual club manners of ladyless dinner-tables, easy and formal at the same time. conversation ran first to oliphant who told his dramatic story simply, and from him the talk drifted off into other channels, until milnes thought it time to bring swinburne out. then, at last, if never before, adams acquired education. what he had sought so long, he found; but he was none the wiser; only the more astonished. for once, too, he felt at ease, for the others were no less astonished than himself, and their astonishment grew apace. for the rest of the evening swinburne figured alone; the end of dinner made the monologue only freer, for in , even when ladies were not in the house, smoking was forbidden, and guests usually smoked in the stables or the kitchen; but monckton milnes was a licensed libertine who let his guests smoke in adams's bedroom, since adams was an american-german barbarian ignorant of manners; and there after dinner all sat--or lay--till far into the night, listening to the rush of swinburne's talk. in a long experience, before or after, no one ever approached it; yet one had heard accounts of the best talking of the time, and read accounts of talkers in all time, among the rest, of voltaire, who seemed to approach nearest the pattern. that swinburne was altogether new to the three types of men-of-the-world before him; that he seemed to them quite original, wildly eccentric, astonishingly gifted, and convulsingly droll, adams could see; but what more he was, even milnes hardly dared say. they could not believe his incredible memory and knowledge of literature, classic, mediaeval, and modern; his faculty of reciting a play of sophocles or a play of shakespeare, forward or backward, from end to beginning; or dante, or villon, or victor hugo. they knew not what to make of his rhetorical recitation of his own unpublished ballads--"faustine"; the "four boards of the coffin lid"; the "ballad of burdens"--which he declaimed as though they were books of the iliad. it was singular that his most appreciative listener should have been the author only of pretty verses like "we wandered by the brook-side," and "she seemed to those that saw them meet"; and who never cared to write in any other tone; but milnes took everything into his sympathies, including americans like young adams whose standards were stiffest of all, while swinburne, though millions of ages far from them, united them by his humor even more than by his poetry. the story of his first day as a member of professor stubbs's household was professionally clever farce, if not high comedy, in a young man who could write a greek ode or a provençal chanson as easily as an english quatrain. late at night when the symposium broke up, stirling of keir wanted to take with him to his chamber a copy of "queen rosamund," the only volume swinburne had then published, which was on the library table, and adams offered to light him down with his solitary bedroom candle. all the way, stirling was ejaculating explosions of wonder, until at length, at the foot of the stairs and at the climax of his imagination, he paused, and burst out: "he's a cross between the devil and the duke of argyll!" to appreciate the full merit of this description, a judicious critic should have known both, and henry adams knew only one--at least in person--but he understood that to a scotchman the likeness meant something quite portentous, beyond english experience, supernatural, and what the french call moyenageux, or mediaeval with a grotesque turn. that stirling as well as milnes should regard swinburne as a prodigy greatly comforted adams, who lost his balance of mind at first in trying to imagine that swinburne was a natural product of oxford, as muffins and pork-pies of london, at once the cause and effect of dyspepsia. the idea that one has actually met a real genius dawns slowly on a boston mind, but it made entry at last. then came the sad reaction, not from swinburne whose genius never was in doubt, but from the boston mind which, in its uttermost flights, was never moyenageux. one felt the horror of longfellow and emerson, the doubts of lowell and the humor of holmes, at the wild walpurgis-night of swinburne's talk. what could a shy young private secretary do about it? perhaps, in his good nature, milnes thought that swinburne might find a friend in stirling or oliphant, but he could hardly have fancied henry adams rousing in him even an interest. adams could no more interest algernon swinburne than he could interest encke's comet. to swinburne he could be no more than a worm. the quality of genius was an education almost ultimate, for one touched there the limits of the human mind on that side; but one could only receive; one had nothing to give--nothing even to offer. swinburne tested him then and there by one of his favorite tests--victor hugo for to him the test of victor hugo was the surest and quickest of standards. french poetry is at best a severe exercise for foreigners; it requires extraordinary knowledge of the language and rare refinement of ear to appreciate even the recitation of french verse; but unless a poet has both, he lacks something of poetry. adams had neither. to the end of his life he never listened to a french recitation with pleasure, or felt a sense of majesty in french verse; but he did not care to proclaim his weakness, and he tried to evade swinburne's vehement insistence by parading an affection for alfred de musset. swinburne would have none of it; de musset was unequal; he did not sustain himself on the wing. adams would have given a world or two, if he owned one, to sustain himself on the wing like de musset, or even like hugo; but his education as well as his ear was at fault, and he succumbed. swinburne tried him again on walter savage landor. in truth the test was the same, for swinburne admired in landor's english the qualities that he felt in hugo's french; and adams's failure was equally gross, for, when forced to despair, he had to admit that both hugo and landor bored him. nothing more was needed. one who could feel neither hugo nor landor was lost. the sentence was just and adams never appealed from it. he knew his inferiority in taste as he might know it in smell. keenly mortified by the dullness of his senses and instincts, he knew he was no companion for swinburne; probably he could be only an annoyance; no number of centuries could ever educate him to swinburne's level, even in technical appreciation; yet he often wondered whether there was nothing he had to offer that was worth the poet's acceptance. certainly such mild homage as the american insect would have been only too happy to bring, had he known how, was hardly worth the acceptance of any one. only in france is the attitude of prayer possible; in england it became absurd. even monckton milnes, who felt the splendors of hugo and landor, was almost as helpless as an american private secretary in personal contact with them. ten years afterwards adams met him at the geneva conference, fresh from paris, bubbling with delight at a call he had made on hugo: "i was shown into a large room," he said, "with women and men seated in chairs against the walls, and hugo at one end throned. no one spoke. at last hugo raised his voice solemnly, and uttered the words: 'quant a moi, je crois en dieu!' silence followed. then a woman responded as if in deep meditation: 'chose sublime! un dieu qui croit en dieu!"' with the best of will, one could not do this in london; the actors had not the instinct of the drama; and yet even a private secretary was not wholly wanting in instinct. as soon as he reached town he hurried to pickering's for a copy of "queen rosamund," and at that time, if swinburne was not joking, pickering had sold seven copies. when the "poems and ballads" came out, and met their great success and scandal, he sought one of the first copies from moxon. if he had sinned and doubted at all, he wholly repented and did penance before "atalanta in calydon," and would have offered swinburne a solemn worship as milnes's female offered hugo, if it would have pleased the poet. unfortunately it was worthless. the three young men returned to london, and each went his own way. adams's interest in making friends was something desperate, but "the london season," milnes used to say, "is a season for making acquaintances and losing friends"; there was no intimate life. of swinburne he saw no more till monckton milnes summoned his whole array of frystonians to support him in presiding at the dinner of the authors' fund, when adams found himself seated next to swinburne, famous then, but no nearer. they never met again. oliphant he met oftener; all the world knew and loved him; but he too disappeared in the way that all the world knows. stirling of keir, after one or two efforts, passed also from adams's vision into sir william stirling-maxwell. the only record of his wonderful visit to fryston may perhaps exist still in the registers of the st. james's club, for immediately afterwards milnes proposed henry adams for membership, and unless his memory erred, the nomination was seconded by tricoupi and endorsed by laurence oliphant and evelyn ashley. the list was a little singular for variety, but on the whole it suggested that the private secretary was getting on. chapter x political morality ( ) on moran's promotion to be secretary, mr. seward inquired whether minister adams would like the place of assistant secretary for his son. it was the first--and last--office ever offered him, if indeed he could claim what was offered in fact to his father. to them both, the change seemed useless. any young man could make some sort of assistant secretary; only one, just at that moment, could make an assistant son. more than half his duties were domestic; they sometimes required long absences; they always required independence of the government service. his position was abnormal. the british government by courtesy allowed the son to go to court as attache, though he was never attached, and after five or six years' toleration, the decision was declared irregular. in the legation, as private secretary, he was liable to do secretary's work. in society, when official, he was attached to the minister; when unofficial, he was a young man without any position at all. as the years went on, he began to find advantages in having no position at all except that of young man. gradually he aspired to become a gentleman; just a member of society like the rest. the position was irregular; at that time many positions were irregular; yet it lent itself to a sort of irregular education that seemed to be the only sort of education the young man was ever to get. such as it was, few young men had more. the spring and summer of saw a great change in secretary seward's management of foreign affairs. under the stimulus of danger, he too got education. he felt, at last, that his official representatives abroad needed support. officially he could give them nothing but despatches, which were of no great value to any one; and at best the mere weight of an office had little to do with the public. governments were made to deal with governments, not with private individuals or with the opinions of foreign society. in order to affect european opinion, the weight of american opinion had to be brought to bear personally, and had to be backed by the weight of american interests. mr. seward set vigorously to work and sent over every important american on whom he could lay his hands. all came to the legation more or less intimately, and henry adams had a chance to see them all, bankers or bishops, who did their work quietly and well, though, to the outsider, the work seemed wasted and the "influential classes" more indurated with prejudice than ever. the waste was only apparent; the work all told in the end, and meanwhile it helped education. two or three of these gentlemen were sent over to aid the minister and to cooperate with him. the most interesting of these was thurlow weed, who came to do what the private secretary himself had attempted two years before, with boyish ignorance of his own powers. mr. weed took charge of the press, and began, to the amused astonishment of the secretaries, by making what the legation had learned to accept as the invariable mistake of every amateur diplomat; he wrote letters to the london times. mistake or not, mr. weed soon got into his hands the threads of management, and did quietly and smoothly all that was to be done. with his work the private secretary had no connection; it was he that interested. thurlow weed was a complete american education in himself. his mind was naturally strong and beautifully balanced; his temper never seemed ruffled; his manners were carefully perfect in the style of benevolent simplicity, the tradition of benjamin franklin. he was the model of political management and patient address; but the trait that excited enthusiasm in a private secretary was his faculty of irresistibly conquering confidence. of all flowers in the garden of education, confidence was becoming the rarest; but before mr. weed went away, young adams followed him about not only obediently--for obedience had long since become a blind instinct--but rather with sympathy and affection, much like a little dog. the sympathy was not due only to mr. weed's skill of management, although adams never met another such master, or any one who approached him; nor was the confidence due to any display of professions, either moral or social, by mr. weed. the trait that astounded and confounded cynicism was his apparent unselfishness. never, in any man who wielded such power, did adams meet anything like it. the effect of power and publicity on all men is the aggravation of self, a sort of tumor that ends by killing the victim's sympathies; a diseased appetite, like a passion for drink or perverted tastes; one can scarcely use expressions too strong to describe the violence of egotism it stimulates; and thurlow weed was one of the exceptions; a rare immune. he thought apparently not of himself, but of the person he was talking with. he held himself naturally in the background. he was not jealous. he grasped power, but not office. he distributed offices by handfuls without caring to take them. he had the instinct of empire: he gave, but he did not receive. this rare superiority to the politicians he controlled, a trait that private secretaries never met in the politicians themselves, excited adams's wonder and curiosity, but when he tried to get behind it, and to educate himself from the stores of mr. weed's experience, he found the study still more fascinating. management was an instinct with mr. weed; an object to be pursued for its own sake, as one plays cards; but he appeared to play with men as though they were only cards; he seemed incapable of feeling himself one of them. he took them and played them for their face-value; but once, when he had told, with his usual humor, some stories of his political experience which were strong even for the albany lobby, the private secretary made bold to ask him outright: "then, mr. weed, do you think that no politician can be trusted?" mr. weed hesitated for a moment; then said in his mild manner: "i never advise a young man to begin by thinking so." this lesson, at the time, translated itself to adams in a moral sense, as though mr. weed had said: "youth needs illusions!" as he grew older he rather thought that mr. weed looked on it as a question of how the game should be played. young men most needed experience. they could not play well if they trusted to a general rule. every card had a relative value. principles had better be left aside; values were enough. adams knew that he could never learn to play politics in so masterly a fashion as this: his education and his nervous system equally forbade it, although he admired all the more the impersonal faculty of the political master who could thus efface himself and his temper in the game. he noticed that most of the greatest politicians in history had seemed to regard men as counters. the lesson was the more interesting because another famous new yorker came over at the same time who liked to discuss the same problem. secretary seward sent william m. evarts to london as law counsel, and henry began an acquaintance with mr. evarts that soon became intimate. evarts was as individual as weed was impersonal; like most men, he cared little for the game, or how it was played, and much for the stakes, but he played it in a large and liberal way, like daniel webster, "a great advocate employed in politics." evarts was also an economist of morals, but with him the question was rather how much morality one could afford. "the world can absorb only doses of truth," he said; "too much would kill it." one sought education in order to adjust the dose. the teachings of weed and evarts were practical, and the private secretary's life turned on their value. england's power of absorbing truth was small. englishmen, such as palmerston, russell, bethell, and the society represented by the times and morning post, as well as the tories represented by disraeli, lord robert cecil, and the standard, offered a study in education that sickened a young student with anxiety. he had begun--contrary to mr. weed's advice--by taking their bad faith for granted. was he wrong? to settle this point became the main object of the diplomatic education so laboriously pursued, at a cost already stupendous, and promising to become ruinous. life changed front, according as one thought one's self dealing with honest men or with rogues. thus far, the private secretary felt officially sure of dishonesty. the reasons that satisfied him had not altogether satisfied his father, and of course his father's doubts gravely shook his own convictions, but, in practice, if only for safety, the legation put little or no confidence in ministers, and there the private secretary's diplomatic education began. the recognition of belligerency, the management of the declaration of paris, the trent affair, all strengthened the belief that lord russell had started in may, , with the assumption that the confederacy was established; every step he had taken proved his persistence in the same idea; he never would consent to put obstacles in the way of recognition; and he was waiting only for the proper moment to interpose. all these points seemed so fixed--so self-evident--that no one in the legation would have doubted or even discussed them except that lord russell obstinately denied the whole charge, and persisted in assuring minister adams of his honest and impartial neutrality. with the insolence of youth and zeal, henry adams jumped at once to the conclusion that earl russell--like other statesmen--lied; and, although the minister thought differently, he had to act as though russell were false. month by month the demonstration followed its mathematical stages; one of the most perfect educational courses in politics and diplomacy that a young man ever had a chance to pursue. the most costly tutors in the world were provided for him at public expense--lord palmerston, lord russell, lord westbury, lord selborne, mr. gladstone, lord granville, and their associates, paid by the british government; william h. seward, charles francis adams, william maxwell evarts, thurlow weed, and other considerable professors employed by the american government; but there was only one student to profit by this immense staff of teachers. the private secretary alone sought education. to the end of his life he labored over the lessons then taught. never was demonstration more tangled. hegel's metaphysical doctrine of the identity of opposites was simpler and easier to understand. yet the stages of demonstration were clear. they began in june, , after the escape of one rebel cruiser, by the remonstrances of the minister against the escape of "no. ," which was imminent. lord russell declined to act on the evidence. new evidence was sent in every few days, and with it, on july , was included collier's legal opinion: "it appears difficult to make out a stronger case of infringement of the foreign enlistment act, which, if not enforced on this occasion, is little better than a dead letter." such language implied almost a charge of collusion with the rebel agents--an intent to aid the confederacy. in spite of the warning, earl russell let the ship, four days afterwards, escape. young adams had nothing to do with law; that was business of his betters. his opinion of law hung on his opinion of lawyers. in spite of thurlow weed's advice, could one afford to trust human nature in politics? history said not. sir robert collier seemed to hold that law agreed with history. for education the point was vital. if one could not trust a dozen of the most respected private characters in the world, composing the queen's ministry, one could trust no mortal man. lord russell felt the force of this inference, and undertook to disprove it. his effort lasted till his death. at first he excused himself by throwing the blame on the law officers. this was a politician's practice, and the lawyers overruled it. then he pleaded guilty to criminal negligence, and said in his "recollections":--"i assent entirely to the opinion of the lord chief justice of england that the alabama ought to have been detained during the four days i was waiting for the opinion of the law officers. but i think that the fault was not that of the commissioners of customs, it was my fault as secretary of state for foreign affairs." this concession brought all parties on common ground. of course it was his fault! the true issue lay not in the question of his fault, but of his intent. to a young man, getting an education in politics, there could be no sense in history unless a constant course of faults implied a constant motive. for his father the question was not so abstruse; it was a practical matter of business to be handled as weed or evarts handled their bargains and jobs. minister adams held the convenient belief that, in the main, russell was true, and the theory answered his purposes so well that he died still holding it. his son was seeking education, and wanted to know whether he could, in politics, risk trusting any one. unfortunately no one could then decide; no one knew the facts. minister adams died without knowing them. henry adams was an older man than his father in , before he learned a part of them. the most curious fact, even then, was that russell believed in his own good faith and that argyll believed in it also. argyll betrayed a taste for throwing the blame on bethell, lord westbury, then lord chancellor, but this escape helped adams not at all. on the contrary, it complicated the case of russell. in england, one half of society enjoyed throwing stones at lord palmerston, while the other half delighted in flinging mud at earl russell, but every one of every party united in pelting westbury with every missile at hand. the private secretary had no doubts about him, for he never professed to be moral. he was the head and heart of the whole rebel contention, and his opinions on neutrality were as clear as they were on morality. the private secretary had nothing to do with him, and regretted it, for lord westbury's wit and wisdom were great; but as far as his authority went he affirmed the law that in politics no man should be trusted. russell alone insisted on his honesty of intention and persuaded both the duke and the minister to believe him. every one in the legation accepted his assurances as the only assertions they could venture to trust. they knew he expected the rebels to win in the end, but they believed he would not actively interpose to decide it. on that--on nothing else--they rested their frail hopes of remaining a day longer in england. minister adams remained six years longer in england; then returned to america to lead a busy life till he died in still holding the same faith in earl russell, who had died in . in , spencer walpole published the official life of earl russell, and told a part of the story which had never been known to the minister and which astounded his son, who burned with curiosity to know what his father would have said of it. the story was this: the alabama escaped, by russell's confessed negligence, on july , . in america the union armies had suffered great disasters before richmond and at the second bull run, august - , followed by lee's invasion of maryland, september , the news of which, arriving in england on september , roused the natural idea that the crisis was at hand. the next news was expected by the confederates to announce the fall of washington or baltimore. palmerston instantly, september , wrote to russell: "if this should happen, would it not be time for us to consider whether in such a state of things england and france might not address the contending parties and recommend an arrangement on the basis of separation?" this letter, quite in the line of palmerston's supposed opinions, would have surprised no one, if it had been communicated to the legation; and indeed, if lee had captured washington, no one could have blamed palmerston for offering intervention. not palmerston's letter but russell's reply, merited the painful attention of a young man seeking a moral standard for judging politicians:-- gotha, september, , my dear palmerston:-- whether the federal army is destroyed or not, it is clear that it is driven back to washington and has made no progress in subduing the insurgent states. such being the case, i agree with you that the time is come for offering mediation to the united states government with a view to the recognition of the independence of the confederates. i agree further that in case of failure, we ought ourselves to recognize the southern states as an independent state. for the purpose of taking so important a step, i think we must have a meeting of the cabinet. the d or th would suit me for the meeting. we ought then, if we agree on such a step, to propose it first to france, and then on the part of england and france, to russia and other powers, as a measure decided upon by us. we ought to make ourselves safe in canada, not by sending more troops there, but by concentrating those we have in a few defensible posts before the winter sets in.... here, then, appeared in its fullest force, the practical difficulty in education which a mere student could never overcome; a difficulty not in theory, or knowledge, or even want of experience, but in the sheer chaos of human nature. lord russell's course had been consistent from the first, and had all the look of rigid determination to recognize the southern confederacy "with a view" to breaking up the union. his letter of september hung directly on his encouragement of the alabama and his protection of the rebel navy; while the whole of his plan had its root in the proclamation of belligerency, may , . the policy had every look of persistent forethought, but it took for granted the deliberate dishonesty of three famous men: palmerston, russell, and gladstone. this dishonesty, as concerned russell, was denied by russell himself, and disbelieved by argyll, forster, and most of america's friends in england, as well as by minister adams. what the minister would have thought had he seen this letter of september , his son would have greatly liked to know, but he would have liked still more to know what the minister would have thought of palmerston's answer, dated september :-- ... it is evident that a great conflict is taking place to the northwest of washington, and its issue must have a great effect on the state of affairs. if the federals sustain a great defeat, they may be at once ready for mediation, and the iron should be struck while it is hot. if, on the other hand, they should have the best of it, we may wait a while and see what may follow... the roles were reversed. russell wrote what was expected from palmerston, or even more violently; while palmerston wrote what was expected from russell, or even more temperately. the private secretary's view had been altogether wrong, which would not have much surprised even him, but he would have been greatly astonished to learn that the most confidential associates of these men knew little more about their intentions than was known in the legation. the most trusted member of the cabinet was lord granville, and to him russell next wrote. granville replied at once decidedly opposing recognition of the confederacy, and russell sent the reply to palmerston, who returned it october , with the mere suggestion of waiting for further news from america. at the same time granville wrote to another member of the cabinet, lord stanley of alderley, a letter published forty years afterwards in granville's "life" (i, ) to the private secretary altogether the most curious and instructive relic of the whole lesson in politics: ... i have written to johnny my reasons for thinking it decidedly premature. i, however, suspect you will settle to do so. pam., johnny, and gladstone would be in favor of it, and probably newcastle. i do not know about the others. it appears to me a great mistake.... out of a cabinet of a dozen members, granville, the best informed of them all, could pick only three who would favor recognition. even a private secretary thought he knew as much as this, or more. ignorance was not confined to the young and insignificant, nor were they the only victims of blindness. granville's letter made only one point clear. he knew of no fixed policy or conspiracy. if any existed, it was confined to palmerston, russell, gladstone, and perhaps newcastle. in truth, the legation knew, then, all that was to be known, and the true fault of education was to suspect too much. by that time, october , news of antietam and of lee's retreat into virginia had reached london. the emancipation proclamation arrived. had the private secretary known all that granville or palmerston knew, he would surely have thought the danger past, at least for a time, and any man of common sense would have told him to stop worrying over phantoms. this healthy lesson would have been worth much for practical education, but it was quite upset by the sudden rush of a new actor upon the stage with a rhapsody that made russell seem sane, and all education superfluous. this new actor, as every one knows, was william ewart gladstone, then chancellor of the exchequer. if, in the domain of the world's politics, one point was fixed, one value ascertained, one element serious, it was the british exchequer; and if one man lived who could be certainly counted as sane by overwhelming interest, it was the man who had in charge the finances of england. if education had the smallest value, it should have shown its force in gladstone, who was educated beyond all record of english training. from him, if from no one else, the poor student could safely learn. here is what he learned! palmerston notified gladstone, september , of the proposed intervention: "if i am not mistaken, you would be inclined to approve such a course." gladstone replied the next day: "he was glad to learn what the prime minister had told him; and for two reasons especially he desired that the proceedings should be prompt: the first was the rapid progress of the southern arms and the extension of the area of southern feeling; the second was the risk of violent impatience in the cotton-towns of lancashire such as would prejudice the dignity and disinterestedness of the proffered mediation." had the puzzled student seen this letter, he must have concluded from it that the best educated statesman england ever produced did not know what he was talking about, an assumption which all the world would think quite inadmissible from a private secretary--but this was a trifle. gladstone having thus arranged, with palmerston and russell, for intervention in the american war, reflected on the subject for a fortnight from september to october , when he was to speak on the occasion of a great dinner at newcastle. he decided to announce the government's policy with all the force his personal and official authority could give it. this decision was no sudden impulse; it was the result of deep reflection pursued to the last moment. on the morning of october , he entered in his diary: "reflected further on what i should say about lancashire and america, for both these subjects are critical." that evening at dinner, as the mature fruit of his long study, he deliberately pronounced the famous phrase:-- ... we know quite well that the people of the northern states have not yet drunk of the cup--they are still trying to hold it far from their lips--which all the rest of the world see they nevertheless must drink of. we may have our own opinions about slavery; we may be for or against the south; but there is no doubt that jefferson davis and other leaders of the south have made an army; they are making, it appears, a navy; and they have made, what is more than either, they have made a nation.... looking back, forty years afterwards, on this episode, one asked one's self painfully what sort of a lesson a young man should have drawn, for the purposes of his education, from this world-famous teaching of a very great master. in the heat of passion at the moment, one drew some harsh moral conclusions: were they incorrect? posed bluntly as rules of conduct, they led to the worst possible practices. as morals, one could detect no shade of difference between gladstone and napoleon except to the advantage of napoleon. the private secretary saw none; he accepted the teacher in that sense; he took his lesson of political morality as learned, his notice to quit as duly served, and supposed his education to be finished. every one thought so, and the whole city was in a turmoil. any intelligent education ought to end when it is complete. one would then feel fewer hesitations and would handle a surer world. the old-fashioned logical drama required unity and sense; the actual drama is a pointless puzzle, without even an intrigue. when the curtain fell on gladstone's speech, any student had the right to suppose the drama ended; none could have affirmed that it was about to begin; that one's painful lesson was thrown away. even after forty years, most people would refuse to believe it; they would still insist that gladstone, russell, and palmerston were true villains of melodrama. the evidence against gladstone in special seemed overwhelming. the word "must" can never be used by a responsible minister of one government towards another, as gladstone used it. no one knew so well as he that he and his own officials and friends at liverpool were alone "making" a rebel navy, and that jefferson davis had next to nothing to do with it. as chancellor of the exchequer he was the minister most interested in knowing that palmerston, russell, and himself were banded together by mutual pledge to make the confederacy a nation the next week, and that the southern leaders had as yet no hope of "making a nation" but in them. such thoughts occurred to every one at the moment and time only added to their force. never in the history of political turpitude had any brigand of modern civilization offered a worse example. the proof of it was that it outraged even palmerston, who immediately put up sir george cornewall lewis to repudiate the chancellor of the exchequer, against whom he turned his press at the same time. palmerston had no notion of letting his hand be forced by gladstone. russell did nothing of the kind; if he agreed with palmerston, he followed gladstone. although he had just created a new evangel of non-intervention for italy, and preached it like an apostle, he preached the gospel of intervention in america as though he were a mouthpiece of the congress of vienna. on october , he issued his call for the cabinet to meet, on october , for discussion of the "duty of europe to ask both parties, in the most friendly and conciliatory terms, to agree to a suspension of arms." meanwhile minister adams, deeply perturbed and profoundly anxious, would betray no sign of alarm, and purposely delayed to ask explanation. the howl of anger against gladstone became louder every day, for every one knew that the cabinet was called for october , and then could not fail to decide its policy about the united states. lord lyons put off his departure for america till october expressly to share in the conclusions to be discussed on october . when minister adams at last requested an interview, russell named october as the day. to the last moment every act of russell showed that, in his mind, the intervention was still in doubt. when minister adams, at the interview, suggested that an explanation was due him, he watched russell with natural interest, and reported thus: ... his lordship took my allusion at once, though not without a slight indication of embarrassment. he said that mr. gladstone had been evidently much misunderstood. i must have seen in the newspapers the letters which contained his later explanations. that he had certain opinions in regard to the nature of the struggle in america, as on all public questions, just as other englishmen had, was natural enough. and it was the fashion here for public men to express such as they held in their public addresses. of course it was not for him to disavow anything on the part of mr. gladstone; but he had no idea that in saying what he had, there was a serious intention to justify any of the inferences that had been drawn from it of a disposition in the government now to adopt a new policy.... a student trying to learn the processes of politics in a free government could not but ponder long on the moral to be drawn from this "explanation" of mr. gladstone by earl russell. the point set for study as the first condition of political life, was whether any politician could be believed or trusted. the question which a private secretary asked himself, in copying this despatch of october , , was whether his father believed, or should believe, one word of lord russell's "embarrassment." the "truth" was not known for thirty years, but when published, seemed to be the reverse of earl russell's statement. mr. gladstone's speech had been drawn out by russell's own policy of intervention and had no sense except to declare the "disposition in the government now to adopt" that new policy. earl russell never disavowed gladstone, although lord palmerston and sir george cornewall lewis instantly did so. as far as the curious student could penetrate the mystery, gladstone exactly expressed earl russell's intent. as political education, this lesson was to be crucial; it would decide the law of life. all these gentlemen were superlatively honorable; if one could not believe them, truth in politics might be ignored as a delusion. therefore the student felt compelled to reach some sort of idea that should serve to bring the case within a general law. minister adams felt the same compulsion. he bluntly told russell that while he was "willing to acquit" gladstone of "any deliberate intention to bring on the worst effects," he was bound to say that gladstone was doing it quite as certainly as if he had one; and to this charge, which struck more sharply at russell's secret policy than at gladstone's public defence of it, russell replied as well as he could:-- ... his lordship intimated as guardedly as possible that lord palmerston and other members of the government regretted the speech, and mr. gladstone himself was not disinclined to correct, as far as he could, the misinterpretation which had been made of it. it was still their intention to adhere to the rule of perfect neutrality in the struggle, and to let it come to its natural end without the smallest interference, direct or otherwise. but he could not say what circumstances might happen from month to month in the future. i observed that the policy he mentioned was satisfactory to us, and asked if i was to understand him as saying that no change of it was now proposed. to which he gave his assent.... minister adams never knew more. he retained his belief that russell could be trusted, but that palmerston could not. this was the diplomatic tradition, especially held by the russian diplomats. possibly it was sound, but it helped in no way the education of a private secretary. the cat's-paw theory offered no safer clue, than the frank, old-fashioned, honest theory of villainy. neither the one nor the other was reasonable. no one ever told the minister that earl russell, only a few hours before, had asked the cabinet to intervene, and that the cabinet had refused. the minister was led to believe that the cabinet meeting was not held, and that its decision was informal. russell's biographer said that, "with this memorandum [of russell's, dated october ] the cabinet assembled from all parts of the country on october ; but ... members of the cabinet doubted the policy of moving, or moving at that time." the duke of newcastle and sir george grey joined granville in opposition. as far as known, russell and gladstone stood alone. "considerations such as these prevented the matter being pursued any further." still no one has distinctly said that this decision was formal; perhaps the unanimity of opposition made the formal cabinet unnecessary; but it is certain that, within an hour or two before or after this decision, "his lordship said [to the united states minister] that the policy of the government was to adhere to a strict neutrality and to leave this struggle to settle itself." when mr. adams, not satisfied even with this positive assurance, pressed for a categorical answer: "i asked him if i was to understand that policy as not now to be changed; he said: yes!" john morley's comment on this matter, in the "life of gladstone," forty years afterwards, would have interested the minister, as well as his private secretary: "if this relation be accurate," said morley of a relation officially published at the time, and never questioned, "then the foreign secretary did not construe strict neutrality as excluding what diplomatists call good offices." for a vital lesson in politics, earl russell's construction of neutrality mattered little to the student, who asked only russell's intent, and cared only to know whether his construction had any other object than to deceive the minister. in the grave one can afford to be lavish of charity, and possibly earl russell may have been honestly glad to reassure his personal friend mr. adams; but to one who is still in the world even if not of it, doubts are as plenty as days. earl russell totally deceived the private secretary, whatever he may have done to the minister. the policy of abstention was not settled on october . only the next day, october , gladstone circulated a rejoinder to g. c. lewis, insisting on the duty of england, france, and russia to intervene by representing, "with moral authority and force, the opinion of the civilized world upon the conditions of the case." nothing had been decided. by some means, scarcely accidental, the french emperor was led to think that his influence might turn the scale, and only ten days after russell's categorical "yes!" napoleon officially invited him to say "no!" he was more than ready to do so. another cabinet meeting was called for november , and this time gladstone himself reports the debate: nov. . we have had our cabinet to-day and meet again tomorrow. i am afraid we shall do little or nothing in the business of america. but i will send you definite intelligence. both lords palmerston and russell are right. nov. . the united states affair has ended and not well. lord russell rather turned tail. he gave way without resolutely fighting out his battle. however, though we decline for the moment, the answer is put upon grounds and in terms which leave the matter very open for the future. nov. . i think the french will make our answer about america public; at least it is very possible. but i hope they may not take it as a positive refusal, or at any rate that they may themselves act in the matter. it will be clear that we concur with them, that the war should cease. palmerston gave to russell's proposal a feeble and half-hearted support. forty years afterwards, when every one except himself, who looked on at this scene, was dead, the private secretary of read these lines with stupor, and hurried to discuss them with john hay, who was more astounded than himself. all the world had been at cross-purposes, had misunderstood themselves and the situation, had followed wrong paths, drawn wrong conclusions, had known none of the facts. one would have done better to draw no conclusions at all. one's diplomatic education was a long mistake. these were the terms of this singular problem as they presented themselves to the student of diplomacy in : palmerston, on september , under the impression that the president was about to be driven from washington and the army of the potomac dispersed, suggested to russell that in such a case, intervention might be feasible. russell instantly answered that, in any case, he wanted to intervene and should call a cabinet for the purpose. palmerston hesitated; russell insisted; granville protested. meanwhile the rebel army was defeated at antietam, september , and driven out of maryland. then gladstone, october , tried to force palmerston's hand by treating the intervention as a fait accompli. russell assented, but palmerston put up sir george cornewall lewis to contradict gladstone and treated him sharply in the press, at the very moment when russell was calling a cabinet to make gladstone's words good. on october , russell assured adams that no change in policy was now proposed. on the same day he had proposed it, and was voted down. instantly napoleon iii appeared as the ally of russell and gladstone with a proposition which had no sense except as a bribe to palmerston to replace america, from pole to pole, in her old dependence on europe, and to replace england in her old sovereignty of the seas, if palmerston would support france in mexico. the young student of diplomacy, knowing palmerston, must have taken for granted that palmerston inspired this motion and would support it; knowing russell and his whig antecedents, he would conceive that russell must oppose it; knowing gladstone and his lofty principles, he would not doubt that gladstone violently denounced the scheme. if education was worth a straw, this was the only arrangement of persons that a trained student would imagine possible, and it was the arrangement actually assumed by nine men out of ten, as history. in truth, each valuation was false. palmerston never showed favor to the scheme and gave it only "a feeble and half-hearted support." russell gave way without resolutely fighting out "his battle." the only resolute, vehement, conscientious champion of russell, napoleon, and jefferson davis was gladstone. other people could afford to laugh at a young man's blunders, but to him the best part of life was thrown away if he learned such a lesson wrong. henry james had not yet taught the world to read a volume for the pleasure of seeing the lights of his burning-glass turned on alternate sides of the same figure. psychological study was still simple, and at worst--or at best--english character was never subtile. surely no one would believe that complexity was the trait that confused the student of palmerston, russell, and gladstone. under a very strong light human nature will always appear complex and full of contradictions, but the british statesman would appear, on the whole, among the least complex of men. complex these gentlemen were not. disraeli alone might, by contrast, be called complex, but palmerston, russell, and gladstone deceived only by their simplicity. russell was the most interesting to a young man because his conduct seemed most statesmanlike. every act of russell, from april, , to november, , showed the clearest determination to break up the union. the only point in russell's character about which the student thought no doubt to be possible was its want of good faith. it was thoroughly dishonest, but strong. habitually russell said one thing and did another. he seemed unconscious of his own contradictions even when his opponents pointed them out, as they were much in the habit of doing, in the strongest language. as the student watched him deal with the civil war in america, russell alone showed persistence, even obstinacy, in a definite determination, which he supported, as was necessary, by the usual definite falsehoods. the young man did not complain of the falsehoods; on the contrary, he was vain of his own insight in detecting them; but he was wholly upset by the idea that russell should think himself true. young adams thought earl russell a statesman of the old school, clear about his objects and unscrupulous in his methods--dishonest but strong. russell ardently asserted that he had no objects, and that though he might be weak he was above all else honest. minister adams leaned to russell personally and thought him true, but officially, in practice, treated him as false. punch, before , commonly drew russell as a schoolboy telling lies, and afterwards as prematurely senile, at seventy. education stopped there. no one, either in or out of england, ever offered a rational explanation of earl russell. palmerston was simple--so simple as to mislead the student altogether--but scarcely more consistent. the world thought him positive, decided, reckless; the record proved him to be cautious, careful, vacillating. minister adams took him for pugnacious and quarrelsome; the "lives" of russell, gladstone, and granville show him to have been good-tempered, conciliatory, avoiding quarrels. he surprised the minister by refusing to pursue his attack on general butler. he tried to check russell. he scolded gladstone. he discouraged napoleon. except disraeli none of the english statesmen were so cautious as he in talking of america. palmerston told no falsehoods; made no professions; concealed no opinions; was detected in no double-dealing. the most mortifying failure in henry adams's long education was that, after forty years of confirmed dislike, distrust, and detraction of lord palmerston, he was obliged at last to admit himself in error, and to consent in spirit--for by that time he was nearly as dead as any of them--to beg his pardon. gladstone was quite another story, but with him a student's difficulties were less because they were shared by all the world including gladstone himself. he was the sum of contradictions. the highest education could reach, in this analysis, only a reduction to the absurd, but no absurdity that a young man could reach in would have approached the level that mr. gladstone admitted, avowed, proclaimed, in his confessions of , which brought all reason and all hope of education to a still-stand:-- i have yet to record an undoubted error, the most singular and palpable, i may add the least excusable of them all, especially since it was committed so late as in the year when i had outlived half a century ... i declared in the heat of the american struggle that jefferson davis had made a nation.... strange to say, this declaration, most unwarrantable to be made by a minister of the crown with no authority other than his own, was not due to any feeling of partisanship for the south or hostility to the north.... i really, though most strangely, believed that it was an act of friendliness to all america to recognize that the struggle was virtually at an end. ... that my opinion was founded upon a false estimate of the facts was the very least part of my fault. i did not perceive the gross impropriety of such an utterance from a cabinet minister of a power allied in blood and language, and bound to loyal neutrality; the case being further exaggerated by the fact that we were already, so to speak, under indictment before the world for not (as was alleged) having strictly enforced the laws of neutrality in the matter of the cruisers. my offence was indeed only a mistake, but one of incredible grossness, and with such consequences of offence and alarm attached to it, that my failing to perceive them justly exposed me to very severe blame. it illustrates vividly that incapacity which my mind so long retained, and perhaps still exhibits, an incapacity of viewing subjects all round.... long and patiently--more than patiently--sympathetically, did the private secretary, forty years afterwards in the twilight of a life of study, read and re-read and reflect upon this confession. then, it seemed, he had seen nothing correctly at the time. his whole theory of conspiracy--of policy--of logic and connection in the affairs of man, resolved itself into "incredible grossness." he felt no rancor, for he had won the game; he forgave, since he must admit, the "incapacity of viewing subjects all round" which had so nearly cost him life and fortune; he was willing even to believe. he noted, without irritation, that mr. gladstone, in his confession, had not alluded to the understanding between russell, palmerston, and himself; had even wholly left out his most "incredible" act, his ardent support of napoleon's policy, a policy which even palmerston and russell had supported feebly, with only half a heart. all this was indifferent. granting, in spite of evidence, that gladstone had no set plan of breaking up the union; that he was party to no conspiracy; that he saw none of the results of his acts which were clear to every one else; granting in short what the english themselves seemed at last to conclude--that gladstone was not quite sane; that russell was verging on senility; and that palmerston had lost his nerve--what sort of education should have been the result of it? how should it have affected one's future opinions and acts? politics cannot stop to study psychology. its methods are rough; its judgments rougher still. all this knowledge would not have affected either the minister or his son in . the sum of the individuals would still have seemed, to the young man, one individual--a single will or intention--bent on breaking up the union "as a diminution of a dangerous power." the minister would still have found his interest in thinking russell friendly and palmerston hostile. the individual would still have been identical with the mass. the problem would have been the same; the answer equally obscure. every student would, like the private secretary, answer for himself alone. chapter xi the battle of the rams ( ) minister adams troubled himself little about what he did not see of an enemy. his son, a nervous animal, made life a terror by seeing too much. minister adams played his hand as it came, and seldom credited his opponents with greater intelligence than his own. earl russell suited him; perhaps a certain personal sympathy united them; and indeed henry adams never saw russell without being amused by his droll likeness to john quincy adams. apart from this shadowy personal relation, no doubt the minister was diplomatically right; he had nothing to lose and everything to gain by making a friend of the foreign secretary, and whether russell were true or false mattered less, because, in either case, the american legation could act only as though he were false. had the minister known russell's determined effort to betray and ruin him in october, , he could have scarcely used stronger expressions than he did in . russell must have been greatly annoyed by sir robert collier's hint of collusion with the rebel agents in the alabama case, but he hardened himself to hear the same innuendo repeated in nearly every note from the legation. as time went on, russell was compelled, though slowly, to treat the american minister as serious. he admitted nothing so unwillingly, for the nullity or fatuity of the washington government was his idee fixe; but after the failure of his last effort for joint intervention on november , , only one week elapsed before he received a note from minister adams repeating his charges about the alabama, and asking in very plain language for redress. perhaps russell's mind was naturally slow to understand the force of sudden attack, or perhaps age had affected it; this was one of the points that greatly interested a student, but young men have a passion for regarding their elders as senile, which was only in part warranted in this instance by observing that russell's generation were mostly senile from youth. they had never got beyond . both palmerston and russell were in this case. their senility was congenital, like gladstone's oxford training and high church illusions, which caused wild eccentricities in his judgment. russell could not conceive that he had misunderstood and mismanaged minister adams from the start, and when after november he found himself on the defensive, with mr adams taking daily a stronger tone, he showed mere confusion and helplessness. thus, whatever the theory, the action of diplomacy had to be the same. minister adams was obliged to imply collusion between russell and the rebels. he could not even stop at criminal negligence. if, by an access of courtesy, the minister were civil enough to admit that the escape of the alabama had been due to criminal negligence, he could make no such concession in regard to the ironclad rams which the lairds were building; for no one could be so simple as to believe that two armored ships-of-war could be built publicly, under the eyes of the government, and go to sea like the alabama, without active and incessant collusion. the longer earl russell kept on his mask of assumed ignorance, the more violently in the end, the minister would have to tear it off. whatever mr. adams might personally think of earl russell, he must take the greatest possible diplomatic liberties with him if this crisis were allowed to arrive. as the spring of drew on, the vast field cleared itself for action. a campaign more beautiful--better suited for training the mind of a youth eager for training--has not often unrolled itself for study, from the beginning, before a young man perched in so commanding a position. very slowly, indeed, after two years of solitude, one began to feel the first faint flush of new and imperial life. one was twenty-five years old, and quite ready to assert it; some of one's friends were wearing stars on their collars; some had won stars of a more enduring kind. at moments one's breath came quick. one began to dream the sensation of wielding unmeasured power. the sense came, like vertigo, for an instant, and passed, leaving the brain a little dazed, doubtful, shy. with an intensity more painful than that of any shakespearean drama, men's eyes were fastened on the armies in the field. little by little, at first only as a shadowy chance of what might be, if things could be rightly done, one began to feel that, somewhere behind the chaos in washington power was taking shape; that it was massed and guided as it had not been before. men seemed to have learned their business--at a cost that ruined--and perhaps too late. a private secretary knew better than most people how much of the new power was to be swung in london, and almost exactly when; but the diplomatic campaign had to wait for the military campaign to lead. the student could only study. life never could know more than a single such climax. in that form, education reached its limits. as the first great blows began to fall, one curled up in bed in the silence of night, to listen with incredulous hope. as the huge masses struck, one after another, with the precision of machinery, the opposing mass, the world shivered. such development of power was unknown. the magnificent resistance and the return shocks heightened the suspense. during the july days londoners were stupid with unbelief. they were learning from the yankees how to fight. an american saw in a flash what all this meant to england, for one's mind was working with the acceleration of the machine at home; but englishmen were not quick to see their blunders. one had ample time to watch the process, and had even a little time to gloat over the repayment of old scores. news of vicksburg and gettysburg reached london one sunday afternoon, and it happened that henry adams was asked for that evening to some small reception at the house of monckton milnes. he went early in order to exchange a word or two of congratulation before the rooms should fill, and on arriving he found only the ladies in the drawing-room; the gentlemen were still sitting over their wine. presently they came in, and, as luck would have it, delane of the times came first. when milnes caught sight of his young american friend, with a whoop of triumph he rushed to throw both arms about his neck and kiss him on both cheeks. men of later birth who knew too little to realize the passions of --backed by those of --and reenforced by those of --might conceive that such publicity embarrassed a private secretary who came from boston and called himself shy; but that evening, for the first time in his life, he happened not to be thinking of himself. he was thinking of delane, whose eye caught his, at the moment of milnes's embrace. delane probably regarded it as a piece of milnes's foolery; he had never heard of young adams, and never dreamed of his resentment at being ridiculed in the times; he had no suspicion of the thought floating in the mind of the american minister's son, for the british mind is the slowest of all minds, as the files of the times proved, and the capture of vicksburg had not yet penetrated delane's thick cortex of fixed ideas. even if he had read adams's thought, he would have felt for it only the usual amused british contempt for all that he had not been taught at school. it needed a whole generation for the times to reach milnes's standpoint. had the minister's son carried out the thought, he would surely have sought an introduction to delane on the spot, and assured him that he regarded his own personal score as cleared off--sufficiently settled, then and there--because his father had assumed the debt, and was going to deal with mr. delane himself. "you come next!" would have been the friendly warning. for nearly a year the private secretary had watched the board arranging itself for the collision between the legation and delane who stood behind the palmerston ministry. mr. adams had been steadily strengthened and reenforced from washington in view of the final struggle. the situation had changed since the trent affair. the work was efficiently done; the organization was fairly complete. no doubt, the legation itself was still as weakly manned and had as poor an outfit as the legations of guatemala or portugal. congress was always jealous of its diplomatic service, and the chairman of the committee of foreign relations was not likely to press assistance on the minister to england. for the legation not an additional clerk was offered or asked. the secretary, the assistant secretary, and the private secretary did all the work that the minister did not do. a clerk at five dollars a week would have done the work as well or better, but the minister could trust no clerk; without express authority he could admit no one into the legation; he strained a point already by admitting his son. congress and its committees were the proper judges of what was best for the public service, and if the arrangement seemed good to them, it was satisfactory to a private secretary who profited by it more than they did. a great staff would have suppressed him. the whole legation was a sort of improvised, volunteer service, and he was a volunteer with the rest. he was rather better off than the rest, because he was invisible and unknown. better or worse, he did his work with the others, and if the secretaries made any remarks about congress, they made no complaints, and knew that none would have received a moment's attention. if they were not satisfied with congress, they were satisfied with secretary seward. without appropriations for the regular service, he had done great things for its support. if the minister had no secretaries, he had a staff of active consuls; he had a well-organized press; efficient legal support; and a swarm of social allies permeating all classes. all he needed was a victory in the field, and secretary stanton undertook that part of diplomacy. vicksburg and gettysburg cleared the board, and, at the end of july, , minister adams was ready to deal with earl russell or lord palmerston or mr. gladstone or mr. delane, or any one else who stood in his way; and by the necessity of the case, was obliged to deal with all of them shortly. even before the military climax at vicksburg and gettysburg, the minister had been compelled to begin his attack; but this was history, and had nothing to do with education. the private secretary copied the notes into his private books, and that was all the share he had in the matter, except to talk in private. no more volunteer services were needed; the volunteers were in a manner sent to the rear; the movement was too serious for skirmishing. all that a secretary could hope to gain from the affair was experience and knowledge of politics. he had a chance to measure the motive forces of men; their qualities of character; their foresight; their tenacity of purpose. in the legation no great confidence was felt in stopping the rams. whatever the reason, russell seemed immovable. had his efforts for intervention in september, , been known to the legation in september, the minister must surely have admitted that russell had, from the first, meant to force his plan of intervention on his colleagues. every separate step since april, , led to this final coercion. although russell's hostile activity of was still secret--and remained secret for some five-and-twenty years--his animus seemed to be made clear by his steady refusal to stop the rebel armaments. little by little, minister adams lost hope. with loss of hope came the raising of tone, until at last, after stripping russell of every rag of defence and excuse, he closed by leaving him loaded with connivance in the rebel armaments, and ended by the famous sentence: "it would be superfluous in me to point out to your lordship that this is war!" what the minister meant by this remark was his own affair; what the private secretary understood by it, was a part of his education. had his father ordered him to draft an explanatory paragraph to expand the idea as he grasped it, he would have continued thus:-- "it would be superfluous: st. because earl russell not only knows it already, but has meant it from the start. nd because it is the only logical and necessary consequence of his unvarying action. d. because mr. adams is not pointing out to him that 'this is war,' but is pointing it out to the world, to complete the record." this would have been the matter-of-fact sense in which the private secretary copied into his books the matter-of-fact statement with which, without passion or excitement, the minister announced that a state of war existed. to his copying eye, as clerk, the words, though on the extreme verge of diplomatic propriety, merely stated a fact, without novelty, fancy, or rhetoric. the fact had to be stated in order to make clear the issue. the war was russell's war--adams only accepted it. russell's reply to this note of september reached the legation on september , announcing at last to the anxious secretaries that "instructions have been issued which will prevent the departure of the two ironclad vessels from liverpool." the members of the modest legation in portland place accepted it as grant had accepted the capitulation of vicksburg. the private secretary conceived that, as secretary stanton had struck and crushed by superior weight the rebel left on the mississippi, so secretary seward had struck and crushed the rebel right in england, and he never felt a doubt as to the nature of the battle. though minister adams should stay in office till he were ninety, he would never fight another campaign of life and death like this; and though the private secretary should covet and attain every office in the gift of president or people, he would never again find education to compare with the life-and-death alternative of this two-year-and-a-half struggle in london, as it had racked and thumb-screwed him in its shifting phases; but its practical value as education turned on his correctness of judgment in measuring the men and their forces. he felt respect for russell as for palmerston because they represented traditional england and an english policy, respectable enough in itself, but which, for four generations, every adams had fought and exploited as the chief source of his political fortunes. as he understood it, russell had followed this policy steadily, ably, even vigorously, and had brought it to the moment of execution. then he had met wills stronger than his own, and, after persevering to the last possible instant, had been beaten. lord north and george canning had a like experience. this was only the idea of a boy, but, as far as he ever knew, it was also the idea of his government. for once, the volunteer secretary was satisfied with his government. commonly the self-respect of a secretary, private or public, depends on, and is proportional to, the severity of his criticism, but in this case the english campaign seemed to him as creditable to the state department as the vicksburg campaign to the war department, and more decisive. it was well planned, well prepared, and well executed. he could never discover a mistake in it. possibly he was biassed by personal interest, but his chief reason for trusting his own judgment was that he thought himself to be one of only half a dozen persons who knew something about it. when others criticised mr. seward, he was rather indifferent to their opinions because he thought they hardly knew what they were talking about, and could not be taught without living over again the london life of . to him secretary seward seemed immensely strong and steady in leadership; but this was no discredit to russell or palmerston or gladstone. they, too, had shown power, patience and steadiness of purpose. they had persisted for two years and a half in their plan for breaking up the union, and had yielded at last only in the jaws of war. after a long and desperate struggle, the american minister had trumped their best card and won the game. again and again, in after life, he went back over the ground to see whether he could detect error on either side. he found none. at every stage the steps were both probable and proved. all the more he was disconcerted that russell should indignantly and with growing energy, to his dying day, deny and resent the axiom of adams's whole contention, that from the first he meant to break up the union. russell affirmed that he meant nothing of the sort; that he had meant nothing at all; that he meant to do right; that he did not know what he meant. driven from one defence after another, he pleaded at last, like gladstone, that he had no defence. concealing all he could conceal--burying in profound secrecy his attempt to break up the union in the autumn of --he affirmed the louder his scrupulous good faith. what was worse for the private secretary, to the total derision and despair of the lifelong effort for education, as the final result of combined practice, experience, and theory--he proved it. henry adams had, as he thought, suffered too much from russell to admit any plea in his favor; but he came to doubt whether this admission really favored him. not until long after earl russell's death was the question reopened. russell had quitted office in ; he died in ; the biography was published in . during the alabama controversy and the geneva conference in , his course as foreign secretary had been sharply criticised, and he had been compelled to see england pay more than l , , penalty for his errors. on the other hand, he brought forward--or his biographer for him--evidence tending to prove that he was not consciously dishonest, and that he had, in spite of appearances, acted without collusion, agreement, plan, or policy, as far as concerned the rebels. he had stood alone, as was his nature. like gladstone, he had thought himself right. in the end, russell entangled himself in a hopeless ball of admissions, denials, contradictions, and resentments which led even his old colleagues to drop his defence, as they dropped gladstone's; but this was not enough for the student of diplomacy who had made a certain theory his law of life, and wanted to hold russell up against himself; to show that he had foresight and persistence of which he was unaware. the effort became hopeless when the biography in published papers which upset all that henry adams had taken for diplomatic education; yet he sat down once more, when past sixty years old, to see whether he could unravel the skein. of the obstinate effort to bring about an armed intervention, on the lines marked out by russell's letter to palmerston from gotha, september, , nothing could be said beyond gladstone's plea in excuse for his speech in pursuance of the same effort, that it was "the most singular and palpable error," "the least excusable," "a mistake of incredible grossness," which passed defence; but while gladstone threw himself on the mercy of the public for his speech, he attempted no excuse for lord russell who led him into the "incredible grossness" of announcing the foreign secretary's intent. gladstone's offence, "singular and palpable," was not the speech alone, but its cause--the policy that inspired the speech. "i weakly supposed ... i really, though most strangely, believed that it was an act of friendliness." whatever absurdity gladstone supposed, russell supposed nothing of the sort. neither he nor palmerston "most strangely believed" in any proposition so obviously and palpably absurd, nor did napoleon delude himself with philanthropy. gladstone, even in his confession, mixed up policy, speech, motives, and persons, as though he were trying to confuse chiefly himself. there gladstone's activity seems to have stopped. he did not reappear in the matter of the rams. the rebel influence shrank in , as far as is known, to lord russell alone, who wrote on september that he could not interfere in any way with those vessels, and thereby brought on himself mr. adams's declaration of war on september . a student held that, in this refusal, he was merely following his policy of september, , and of every step he had taken since . the student was wrong. russell proved that he had been feeble, timid, mistaken, senile, but not dishonest. the evidence is convincing. the lairds had built these ships in reliance on the known opinion of the law-officers that the statute did not apply, and a jury would not convict. minister adams replied that, in this case, the statute should be amended, or the ships stopped by exercise of the political power. bethell rejoined that this would be a violation of neutrality; one must preserve the status quo. tacitly russell connived with laird, and, had he meant to interfere, he was bound to warn laird that the defect of the statute would no longer protect him, but he allowed the builders to go on till the ships were ready for sea. then, on september , two days before mr. adams's "superfluous" letter, he wrote to lord palmerston begging for help; "the conduct of the gentlemen who have contracted for the two ironclads at birkenhead is so very suspicious,"--he began, and this he actually wrote in good faith and deep confidence to lord palmerston, his chief, calling "the conduct" of the rebel agents "suspicious" when no one else in europe or america felt any suspicion about it, because the whole question turned not on the rams, but on the technical scope of the foreign enlistment act,--"that i have thought it necessary to direct that they should be detained," not, of course, under the statute, but on the ground urged by the american minister, of international obligation above the statute. "the solicitor general has been consulted and concurs in the measure as one of policy though not of strict law. we shall thus test the law, and, if we have to pay damages, we have satisfied the opinion which prevails here as well as in america that that kind of neutral hostility should not be allowed to go on without some attempt to stop it." for naivete that would be unusual in an unpaid attache of legation, this sudden leap from his own to his opponent's ground, after two years and a half of dogged resistance, might have roused palmerston to inhuman scorn, but instead of derision, well earned by russell's old attacks on himself, palmerston met the appeal with wonderful loyalty. "on consulting the law officers he found that there was no lawful ground for meddling with the ironclads," or, in unprofessional language, that he could trust neither his law officers nor a liverpool jury; and therefore he suggested buying the ships for the british navy. as proof of "criminal negligence" in the past, this suggestion seemed decisive, but russell, by this time, was floundering in other troubles of negligence, for he had neglected to notify the american minister. he should have done so at once, on september . instead he waited till september , and then merely said that the matter was under "serious and anxious consideration." this note did not reach the legation till three o'clock on the afternoon of september --after the "superfluous" declaration of war had been sent. thus, lord russell had sacrificed the lairds: had cost his ministry the price of two ironclads, besides the alabama claims--say, in round numbers, twenty million dollars--and had put himself in the position of appearing to yield only to a threat of war. finally he wrote to the admiralty a letter which, from the american point of view, would have sounded youthful from an eton schoolboy:-- september , . my dear duke:-- it is of the utmost importance and urgency that the ironclads building at birkenhead should not go to america to break the blockade. they belong to monsieur bravay of paris. if you will offer to buy them on the part of the admiralty you will get money's worth if he accepts your offer; and if he does not, it will be presumptive proof that they are already bought by the confederates. i should state that we have suggested to the turkish government to buy them; but you can easily settle that matter with the turks.... the hilarity of the secretaries in portland place would have been loud had they seen this letter and realized the muddle of difficulties into which earl russell had at last thrown himself under the impulse of the american minister; but, nevertheless, these letters upset from top to bottom the results of the private secretary's diplomatic education forty years after he had supposed it complete. they made a picture different from anything he had conceived and rendered worthless his whole painful diplomatic experience. to reconstruct, when past sixty, an education useful for any practical purpose, is no practical problem, and adams saw no use in attacking it as only theoretical. he no longer cared whether he understood human nature or not; he understood quite as much of it as he wanted; but he found in the "life of gladstone" (ii, ) a remark several times repeated that gave him matter for curious thought. "i always hold," said mr. gladstone, "that politicians are the men whom, as a rule, it is most difficult to comprehend"; and he added, by way of strengthening it: "for my own part, i never have thus understood, or thought i understood, above one or two." earl russell was certainly not one of the two. henry adams thought he also had understood one or two; but the american type was more familiar. perhaps this was the sufficient result of his diplomatic education; it seemed to be the whole. chapter xii eccentricity ( ) knowledge of human nature is the beginning and end of political education, but several years of arduous study in the neighborhood of westminster led henry adams to think that knowledge of english human nature had little or no value outside of england. in paris, such a habit stood in one's way; in america, it roused all the instincts of native jealousy. the english mind was one-sided, eccentric, systematically unsystematic, and logically illogical. the less one knew of it, the better. this heresy, which scarcely would have been allowed to penetrate a boston mind--it would, indeed, have been shut out by instinct as a rather foolish exaggeration--rested on an experience which henry adams gravely thought he had a right to think conclusive--for him. that it should be conclusive for any one else never occurred to him, since he had no thought of educating anybody else. for him--alone--the less english education he got, the better! for several years, under the keenest incitement to watchfulness, he observed the english mind in contact with itself and other minds. especially with the american the contact was interesting because the limits and defects of the american mind were one of the favorite topics of the european. from the old-world point of view, the american had no mind; he had an economic thinking-machine which could work only on a fixed line. the american mind exasperated the european as a buzz-saw might exasperate a pine forest. the english mind disliked the french mind because it was antagonistic, unreasonable, perhaps hostile, but recognized it as at least a thought. the american mind was not a thought at all; it was a convention, superficial, narrow, and ignorant; a mere cutting instrument, practical, economical, sharp, and direct. the english themselves hardly conceived that their mind was either economical, sharp, or direct; but the defect that most struck an american was its enormous waste in eccentricity. americans needed and used their whole energy, and applied it with close economy; but english society was eccentric by law and for sake of the eccentricity itself. the commonest phrase overheard at an english club or dinner-table was that so-and-so "is quite mad." it was no offence to so-and-so; it hardly distinguished him from his fellows; and when applied to a public man, like gladstone, it was qualified by epithets much more forcible. eccentricity was so general as to become hereditary distinction. it made the chief charm of english society as well as its chief terror. the american delighted in thackeray as a satirist, but thackeray quite justly maintained that he was not a satirist at all, and that his pictures of english society were exact and good-natured. the american, who could not believe it, fell back on dickens, who, at all events, had the vice of exaggeration to extravagance, but dickens's english audience thought the exaggeration rather in manner or style, than in types. mr. gladstone himself went to see sothern act dundreary, and laughed till his face was distorted--not because dundreary was exaggerated, but because he was ridiculously like the types that gladstone had seen--or might have seen--in any club in pall mall. society swarmed with exaggerated characters; it contained little else. often this eccentricity bore all the marks of strength; perhaps it was actual exuberance of force, a birthmark of genius. boston thought so. the bostonian called it national character--native vigor--robustness--honesty--courage. he respected and feared it. british self-assertion, bluff, brutal, blunt as it was, seemed to him a better and nobler thing than the acuteness of the yankee or the polish of the parisian. perhaps he was right. these questions of taste, of feeling, of inheritance, need no settlement. every one carries his own inch-rule of taste, and amuses himself by applying it, triumphantly, wherever he travels. whatever others thought, the cleverest englishmen held that the national eccentricity needed correction, and were beginning to correct it. the savage satires of dickens and the gentler ridicule of matthew arnold against the british middle class were but a part of the rebellion, for the middle class were no worse than their neighbors in the eyes of an american in ; they were even a very little better in the sense that one could appeal to their interests, while a university man, like gladstone, stood outside of argument. from none of them could a young american afford to borrow ideas. the private secretary, like every other bostonian, began by regarding british eccentricity as a force. contact with it, in the shape of palmerston, russell, and gladstone, made him hesitate; he saw his own national type--his father, weed, evarts, for instance--deal with the british, and show itself certainly not the weaker; certainly sometimes the stronger. biassed though he were, he could hardly be biassed to such a degree as to mistake the effects of force on others, and while--labor as he might--earl russell and his state papers seemed weak to a secretary, he could not see that they seemed strong to russell's own followers. russell might be dishonest or he might be merely obtuse--the english type might be brutal or might be only stupid--but strong, in either case, it was not, nor did it seem strong to englishmen. eccentricity was not always a force; americans were deeply interested in deciding whether it was always a weakness. evidently, on the hustings or in parliament, among eccentricities, eccentricity was at home; but in private society the question was not easy to answer. that english society was infinitely more amusing because of its eccentricities, no one denied. barring the atrocious insolence and brutality which englishmen and especially englishwomen showed to each other--very rarely, indeed, to foreigners--english society was much more easy and tolerant than american. one must expect to be treated with exquisite courtesy this week and be totally forgotten the next, but this was the way of the world, and education consisted in learning to turn one's back on others with the same unconscious indifference that others showed among themselves. the smart of wounded vanity lasted no long time with a young man about town who had little vanity to smart, and who, in his own country, would have found himself in no better position. he had nothing to complain of. no one was ever brutal to him. on the contrary, he was much better treated than ever he was likely to be in boston--let alone new york or washington--and if his reception varied inconceivably between extreme courtesy and extreme neglect, it merely proved that he had become, or was becoming, at home. not from a sense of personal griefs or disappointments did he labor over this part of the social problem, but only because his education was becoming english, and the further it went, the less it promised. by natural affinity the social eccentrics commonly sympathized with political eccentricity. the english mind took naturally to rebellion--when foreign--and it felt particular confidence in the southern confederacy because of its combined attributes--foreign rebellion of english blood--which came nearer ideal eccentricity than could be reached by poles, hungarians, italians or frenchmen. all the english eccentrics rushed into the ranks of rebel sympathizers, leaving few but well-balanced minds to attach themselves to the cause of the union. none of the english leaders on the northern side were marked eccentrics. william e. forster was a practical, hard-headed yorkshireman, whose chief ideals in politics took shape as working arrangements on an economical base. cobden, considering the one-sided conditions of his life, was remarkably well balanced. john bright was stronger in his expressions than either of them, but with all his self-assertion he stuck to his point, and his point was practical. he did not, like gladstone, box the compass of thought; "furiously earnest," as monckton milnes said, "on both sides of every question"; he was rather, on the whole, a consistent conservative of the old commonwealth type, and seldom had to defend inconsistencies. monckton milnes himself was regarded as an eccentric, chiefly by those who did not know him, but his fancies and hobbies were only ideas a little in advance of the time; his manner was eccentric, but not his mind, as any one could see who read a page of his poetry. none of them, except milnes, was a university man. as a rule, the legation was troubled very little, if at all, by indiscretions, extravagances, or contradictions among its english friends. their work was largely judicious, practical, well considered, and almost too cautious. the "cranks" were all rebels, and the list was portentous. perhaps it might be headed by old lord brougham, who had the audacity to appear at a july th reception at the legation, led by joe parkes, and claim his old credit as "attorney general to mr. madison." the church was rebel, but the dissenters were mostly with the union. the universities were rebel, but the university men who enjoyed most public confidence--like lord granville, sir george cornewall lewis, lord stanley, sir george grey--took infinite pains to be neutral for fear of being thought eccentric. to most observers, as well as to the times, the morning post, and the standard, a vast majority of the english people seemed to follow the professional eccentrics; even the emotional philanthropists took that direction; lord shaftesbury and carlyle, fowell buxton, and gladstone, threw their sympathies on the side which they should naturally have opposed, and did so for no reason except their eccentricity; but the "canny" scots and yorkshiremen were cautious. this eccentricity did not mean strength. the proof of it was the mismanagement of the rebel interests. no doubt the first cause of this trouble lay in the richmond government itself. no one understood why jefferson davis chose mr. mason as his agent for london at the same time that he made so good a choice as mr. slidell for paris. the confederacy had plenty of excellent men to send to london, but few who were less fitted than mason. possibly mason had a certain amount of common sense, but he seemed to have nothing else, and in london society he counted merely as one eccentric more. he enjoyed a great opportunity; he might even have figured as a new benjamin franklin with all society at his feet; he might have roared as lion of the season and made the social path of the american minister almost impassable; but mr. adams had his usual luck in enemies, who were always his most valuable allies if his friends only let them alone. mason was his greatest diplomatic triumph. he had his collision with palmerston; he drove russell off the field; he swept the board before cockburn; he overbore slidell; but he never lifted a finger against mason, who became his bulwark of defence. possibly jefferson davis and mr. mason shared two defects in common which might have led them into this serious mistake. neither could have had much knowledge of the world, and both must have been unconscious of humor. yet at the same time with mason, president davis sent out slidell to france and mr. lamar to russia. some twenty years later, in the shifting search for the education he never found, adams became closely intimate at washington with lamar, then senator from mississippi, who had grown to be one of the calmest, most reasonable and most amiable union men in the united states, and quite unusual in social charm. in he passed for the worst of southern fire-eaters, but he was an eccentric by environment, not by nature; above all his southern eccentricities, he had tact and humor; and perhaps this was a reason why mr. davis sent him abroad with the others, on a futile mission to st. petersburg. he would have done better in london, in place of mason. london society would have delighted in him; his stories would have won success; his manners would have made him loved; his oratory would have swept every audience; even monckton milnes could never have resisted the temptation of having him to breakfast between lord shaftesbury and the bishop of oxford. lamar liked to talk of his brief career in diplomacy, but he never spoke of mason. he never alluded to confederate management or criticised jefferson davis's administration. the subject that amused him was his english allies. at that moment--the early summer of --the rebel party in england were full of confidence, and felt strong enough to challenge the american legation to a show of power. they knew better than the legation what they could depend upon: that the law officers and commissioners of customs at liverpool dared not prosecute the ironclad ships; that palmerston, russell, and gladstone were ready to recognize the confederacy; that the emperor napoleon would offer them every inducement to do it. in a manner they owned liverpool and especially the firm of laird who were building their ships. the political member of the laird firm was lindsay, about whom the whole web of rebel interests clung--rams, cruisers, munitions, and confederate loan; social introductions and parliamentary tactics. the firm of laird, with a certain dignity, claimed to be champion of england's navy; and public opinion, in the summer of , still inclined towards them. never was there a moment when eccentricity, if it were a force, should have had more value to the rebel interest; and the managers must have thought so, for they adopted or accepted as their champion an eccentric of eccentrics; a type of ; a sort of brougham of sheffield, notorious for poor judgment and worse temper. mr. roebuck had been a tribune of the people, and, like tribunes of most other peoples, in growing old, had grown fatuous. he was regarded by the friends of the union as rather a comical personage--a favorite subject for punch to laugh at--with a bitter tongue and a mind enfeebled even more than common by the political epidemic of egotism. in all england they could have found no opponent better fitted to give away his own case. no american man of business would have paid him attention; yet. the lairds, who certainly knew their own affairs best, let roebuck represent them and take charge of their interests. with roebuck's doings, the private secretary had no concern except that the minister sent him down to the house of commons on june , , to report the result of roebuck's motion to recognize the southern confederacy. the legation felt no anxiety, having vicksburg already in its pocket, and bright and forster to say so; but the private secretary went down and was admitted under the gallery on the left, to listen, with great content, while john bright, with astonishing force, caught and shook and tossed roebuck, as a big mastiff shakes a wiry, ill-conditioned, toothless, bad-tempered yorkshire terrier. the private secretary felt an artistic sympathy with roebuck, for, from time to time, by way of practice, bright in a friendly way was apt to shake him too, and he knew how it was done. the manner counted for more than the words. the scene was interesting, but the result was not in doubt. all the more sharply he was excited, near the year , in washington, by hearing lamar begin a story after dinner, which, little by little, became dramatic, recalling the scene in the house of commons. the story, as well as one remembered, began with lamar's failure to reach st. petersburg at all, and his consequent detention in paris waiting instructions. the motion to recognize the confederacy was about to be made, and, in prospect of the debate, mr. lindsay collected a party at his villa on the thames to bring the rebel agents into relations with roebuck. lamar was sent for, and came. after much conversation of a general sort, such as is the usual object or resource of the english sunday, finding himself alone with roebuck, lamar, by way of showing interest, bethought himself of john bright and asked roebuck whether he expected bright to take part in the debate: "no, sir!" said roebuck sententiously; "bright and i have met before. it was the old story--the story of the sword-fish and the whale! no, sir! mr. bright will not cross swords with me again!" thus assured, lamar went with the more confidence to the house on the appointed evening, and was placed under the gallery, on the right, where he listened to roebuck and followed the debate with such enjoyment as an experienced debater feels in these contests, until, as he said, he became aware that a man, with a singularly rich voice and imposing manner, had taken the floor, and was giving roebuck the most deliberate and tremendous pounding he ever witnessed, "until at last," concluded lamar, "it dawned on my mind that the sword-fish was getting the worst of it." lamar told the story in the spirit of a joke against himself rather than against roebuck; but such jokes must have been unpleasantly common in the experience of the rebel agents. they were surrounded by cranks of the worst english species, who distorted their natural eccentricities and perverted their judgment. roebuck may have been an extreme case, since he was actually in his dotage, yet this did not prevent the lairds from accepting his lead, or the house from taking him seriously. extreme eccentricity was no bar, in england, to extreme confidence; sometimes it seemed a recommendation; and unless it caused financial loss, it rather helped popularity. the question whether british eccentricity was ever strength weighed heavily in the balance of education. that roebuck should mislead the rebel agents on so strange a point as that of bright's courage was doubly characteristic because the southern people themselves had this same barbaric weakness of attributing want of courage to opponents, and owed their ruin chiefly to such ignorance of the world. bright's courage was almost as irrational as that of the rebels themselves. every one knew that he had the courage of a prize-fighter. he struck, in succession, pretty nearly every man in england that could be reached by a blow, and when he could not reach the individual he struck the class, or when the class was too small for him, the whole people of england. at times he had the whole country on his back. he could not act on the defensive; his mind required attack. even among friends at the dinner-table he talked as though he were denouncing them, or someone else, on a platform; he measured his phrases, built his sentences, cumulated his effects, and pounded his opponents, real or imagined. his humor was glow, like iron at dull heat; his blow was elementary, like the thrash of a whale. one day in early spring, march , , the minister requested his private secretary to attend a trades-union meeting at st. james's hall, which was the result of professor beesly's patient efforts to unite bright and the trades-unions on an american platform. the secretary went to the meeting and made a report which reposes somewhere on file in the state department to this day, as harmless as such reports should be; but it contained no mention of what interested young adams most--bright's psychology. with singular skill and oratorical power, bright managed at the outset, in his opening paragraph, to insult or outrage every class of englishman commonly considered respectable, and, for fear of any escaping, he insulted them repeatedly under consecutive heads. the rhetorical effect was tremendous:-- "privilege thinks it has a great interest in the american contest," he began in his massive, deliberate tones; "and every morning with blatant voice, it comes into our streets and curses the american republic. privilege has beheld an afflicting spectacle for many years past. it has beheld thirty million of men happy and prosperous, without emperors--without king (cheers)--without the surroundings of a court (renewed cheers)--without nobles, except such as are made by eminence in intellect and virtue--without state bishops and state priests, those vendors of the love that works salvation (cheers)--without great armies and great navies--without a great debt and great taxes--and privilege has shuddered at what might happen to old europe if this great experiment should succeed." an ingenious man, with an inventive mind, might have managed, in the same number of lines, to offend more englishmen than bright struck in this sentence; but he must have betrayed artifice and hurt his oratory. the audience cheered furiously, and the private secretary felt peace in his much troubled mind, for he knew how careful the ministry would be, once they saw bright talk republican principles before trades-unions; but, while he did not, like roebuck, see reason to doubt the courage of a man who, after quarrelling with the trades-unions, quarreled with all the world outside the trades-unions, he did feel a doubt whether to class bright as eccentric or conventional. every one called bright "un-english," from lord palmerston to william e. forster; but to an american he seemed more english than any of his critics. he was a liberal hater, and what he hated he reviled after the manner of milton, but he was afraid of no one. he was almost the only man in england, or, for that matter, in europe, who hated palmerston and was not afraid of him, or of the press or the pulpit, the clubs or the bench, that stood behind him. he loathed the whole fabric of sham religion, sham loyalty, sham aristocracy, and sham socialism. he had the british weakness of believing only in himself and his own conventions. in all this, an american saw, if one may make the distinction, much racial eccentricity, but little that was personal. bright was singularly well poised; but he used singularly strong language. long afterwards, in , adams happened to be living again in london for a season, when james russell lowell was transferred there as minister; and as adams's relations with lowell had become closer and more intimate with years, he wanted the new minister to know some of his old friends. bright was then in the cabinet, and no longer the most radical member even there, but he was still a rare figure in society. he came to dinner, along with sir francis doyle and sir robert cunliffe, and as usual did most of the talking. as usual also, he talked of the things most on his mind. apparently it must have been some reform of the criminal law which the judges opposed, that excited him, for at the end of dinner, over the wine, he took possession of the table in his old way, and ended with a superb denunciation of the bench, spoken in his massive manner, as though every word were a hammer, smashing what it struck:-- "for two hundred years, the judges of england sat on the bench, condemning to the penalty of death every man, woman, and child who stole property to the value of five shillings; and, during all that time, not one judge ever remonstrated against the law. we english are a nation of brutes, and ought to be exterminated to the last man." as the party rose from table and passed into the drawing-room, adams said to lowell that bright was very fine. "yes!" replied lowell, "but too violent!" precisely this was the point that adams doubted. bright knew his englishmen better than lowell did--better than england did. he knew what amount of violence in language was necessary to drive an idea into a lancashire or yorkshire head. he knew that no violence was enough to affect a somersetshire or wiltshire peasant. bright kept his own head cool and clear. he was not excited; he never betrayed excitement. as for his denunciation of the english bench, it was a very old story, not original with him. that the english were a nation of brutes was a commonplace generally admitted by englishmen and universally accepted by foreigners; while the matter of their extermination could be treated only as unpractical, on their deserts, because they were probably not very much worse than their neighbors. had bright said that the french, spaniards, germans, or russians were a nation of brutes and ought to be exterminated, no one would have found fault; the whole human race, according to the highest authority, has been exterminated once already for the same reason, and only the rainbow protects them from a repetition of it. what shocked lowell was that he denounced his own people. adams felt no moral obligation to defend judges, who, as far as he knew, were the only class of society specially adapted to defend themselves; but he was curious--even anxious--as a point of education, to decide for himself whether bright's language was violent for its purpose. he thought not. perhaps cobden did better by persuasion, but that was another matter. of course, even englishmen sometimes complained of being so constantly told that they were brutes and hypocrites, although they were told little else by their censors, and bore it, on the whole, meekly; but the fact that it was true in the main troubled the ten-pound voter much less than it troubled newman, gladstone, ruskin, carlyle, and matthew arnold. bright was personally disliked by his victims, but not distrusted. they never doubted what he would do next, as they did with john russell, gladstone, and disraeli. he betrayed no one, and he never advanced an opinion in practical matters which did not prove to be practical. the class of englishmen who set out to be the intellectual opposites of bright, seemed to an american bystander the weakest and most eccentric of all. these were the trimmers, the political economists, the anti-slavery and doctrinaire class, the followers of de tocqueville, and of john stuart mill. as a class, they were timid--with good reason--and timidity, which is high wisdom in philosophy, sicklies the whole cast of thought in action. numbers of these men haunted london society, all tending to free-thinking, but never venturing much freedom of thought. like the anti-slavery doctrinaires of the forties and fifties, they became mute and useless when slavery struck them in the face. for type of these eccentrics, literature seems to have chosen henry reeve, at least to the extent of biography. he was a bulky figure in society, always friendly, good-natured, obliging, and useful; almost as universal as milnes and more busy. as editor of the edinburgh review he had authority and even power, although the review and the whole whig doctrinaire school had begun--as the french say--to date; and of course the literary and artistic sharpshooters of --like frank palgrave--frothed and foamed at the mere mention of reeve's name. three-fourths of their fury was due only to his ponderous manner. london society abused its rights of personal criticism by fixing on every too conspicuous figure some word or phrase that stuck to it. every one had heard of mrs. grote as "the origin of the word grotesque." every one had laughed at the story of reeve approaching mrs. grote, with his usual somewhat florid manner, asking in his literary dialect how her husband the historian was: "and how is the learned grotius?" "pretty well, thank you, puffendorf!" one winced at the word, as though it were a drawing of forain. no one would have been more shocked than reeve had he been charged with want of moral courage. he proved his courage afterwards by publishing the "greville memoirs," braving the displeasure of the queen. yet the edinburgh review and its editor avoided taking sides except where sides were already fixed. americanism would have been bad form in the liberal edinburgh review; it would have seemed eccentric even for a scotchman, and reeve was a saxon of saxons. to an american this attitude of oscillating reserve seemed more eccentric than the reckless hostility of brougham or carlyle, and more mischievous, for he never could be sure what preposterous commonplace it might encourage. the sum of these experiences in left the conviction that eccentricity was weakness. the young american who should adopt english thought was lost. from the facts, the conclusion was correct, yet, as usual, the conclusion was wrong. the years of palmerston's last cabinet, to , were avowedly years of truce--of arrested development. the british system like the french, was in its last stage of decomposition. never had the british mind shown itself so decousu--so unravelled, at sea, floundering in every sort of historical shipwreck. eccentricities had a free field. contradictions swarmed in state and church. england devoted thirty years of arduous labor to clearing away only a part of the debris. a young american in could see little or nothing of the future. he might dream, but he could not foretell, the suddenness with which the old europe, with england in its wake, was to vanish in . he was in dead-water, and the parti-colored, fantastic cranks swam about his boat, as though he were the ancient mariner, and they saurians of the prime. chapter xiii the perfection of human society ( ) minister adams's success in stopping the rebel rams fixed his position once for all in english society. from that moment he could afford to drop the character of diplomatist, and assume what, for an american minister in london, was an exclusive diplomatic advantage, the character of a kind of american peer of the realm. the british never did things by halves. once they recognized a man's right to social privileges, they accepted him as one of themselves. much as lord derby and mr. disraeli were accepted as leaders of her majesty's domestic opposition, minister adams had a rank of his own as a kind of leader of her majesty's american opposition. even the times conceded it. the years of struggle were over, and minister adams rapidly gained a position which would have caused his father or grandfather to stare with incredulous envy. this anglo-american form of diplomacy was chiefly undiplomatic, and had the peculiar effect of teaching a habit of diplomacy useless or mischievous everywhere but in london. nowhere else in the world could one expect to figure in a role so unprofessional. the young man knew no longer what character he bore. private secretary in the morning, son in the afternoon, young man about town in the evening, the only character he never bore was that of diplomatist, except when he wanted a card to some great function. his diplomatic education was at an end; he seldom met a diplomat, and never had business with one; he could be of no use to them, or they to him; but he drifted inevitably into society, and, do what he might, his next education must be one of english social life. tossed between the horns of successive dilemmas, he reached his twenty-sixth birthday without the power of earning five dollars in any occupation. his friends in the army were almost as badly off, but even army life ruined a young man less fatally than london society. had he been rich, this form of ruin would have mattered nothing; but the young men of were none of them rich; all had to earn a living; yet they had reached high positions of responsibility and power in camps and courts, without a dollar of their own and with no tenure of office. henry adams had failed to acquire any useful education; he should at least have acquired social experience. curiously enough, he failed here also. from the european or english point of view, he had no social experience, and never got it. minister adams happened on a political interregnum owing to lord palmerston's personal influence from to ; but this political interregnum was less marked than the social still-stand during the same years. the prince consort was dead; the queen had retired; the prince of wales was still a boy. in its best days, victorian society had never been "smart." during the forties, under the influence of louis philippe, courts affected to be simple, serious and middle class; and they succeeded. the taste of louis philippe was bourgeois beyond any taste except that of queen victoria. style lingered in the background with the powdered footman behind the yellow chariot, but speaking socially the queen had no style save what she inherited. balmoral was a startling revelation of royal taste. nothing could be worse than the toilettes at court unless it were the way they were worn. one's eyes might be dazzled by jewels, but they were heirlooms, and if any lady appeared well dressed, she was either a foreigner or "fast." fashion was not fashionable in london until the americans and the jews were let loose. the style of london toilette universal in was grotesque, like monckton milnes on horseback in rotten row. society of this sort might fit a young man in some degree for editing shakespeare or swift, but had little relation with the society of , and none with that of . owing to other causes, young adams never got the full training of such style as still existed. the embarrassments of his first few seasons socially ruined him. his own want of experience prevented his asking introductions to the ladies who ruled society; his want of friends prevented his knowing who these ladies were; and he had every reason to expect snubbing if he put himself in evidence. this sensitiveness was thrown away on english society, where men and women treated each others' advances much more brutally than those of strangers, but young adams was son and private secretary too; he could not be as thick-skinned as an englishman. he was not alone. every young diplomat, and most of the old ones, felt awkward in an english house from a certainty that they were not precisely wanted there, and a possibility that they might be told so. if there was in those days a country house in england which had a right to call itself broad in views and large in tastes, it was bretton in yorkshire; and if there was a hostess who had a right to consider herself fashionable as well as charming, it was lady margaret beaumont; yet one morning at breakfast there, sitting by her side--not for his own merits--henry adams heard her say to herself in her languid and liberal way, with her rich voice and musing manner, looking into her tea-cup: "i don't think i care for foreigners!" horror-stricken, not so much on his own account as on hers, the young man could only execute himself as gaily as he might: "but lady margaret, please make one small exception for me!" of course she replied what was evident, that she did not call him a foreigner, and her genial irish charm made the slip of tongue a happy courtesy; but none the less she knew that, except for his momentary personal introduction, he was in fact a foreigner, and there was no imaginable reason why she should like him, or any other foreigner, unless it were because she was bored by natives. she seemed to feel that her indifference needed a reason to excuse itself in her own eyes, and she showed the subconscious sympathy of the irish nature which never feels itself perfectly at home even in england. she, too, was some shadowy shade un-english. always conscious of this barrier, while the war lasted the private secretary hid himself among the herd of foreigners till he found his relations fixed and unchangeable. he never felt himself in society, and he never knew definitely what was meant as society by those who were in it. he saw far enough to note a score of societies which seemed quite independent of each other. the smartest was the smallest, and to him almost wholly strange. the largest was the sporting world, also unknown to him except through the talk of his acquaintances. between or beyond these lay groups of nebulous societies. his lawyer friends, like evarts, frequented legal circles where one still sat over the wine and told anecdotes of the bench and bar; but he himself never set eyes on a judge except when his father took him to call on old lord lyndhurst, where they found old lord campbell, both abusing old lord brougham. the church and the bishops formed several societies which no secretary ever saw except as an interloper. the army; the navy; the indian service; the medical and surgical professions; city people; artists; county families; the scotch, and indefinite other subdivisions of society existed, which were as strange to each other as they were to adams. at the end of eight or ten seasons in london society he professed to know less about it, or how to enter it, than he did when he made his first appearance at miss burdett coutts's in may, . sooner or later every young man dropped into a set or circle, and frequented the few houses that were willing to harbor him. an american who neither hunted nor raced, neither shot nor fished nor gambled, and was not marriageable, had no need to think of society at large. ninety-nine houses in every hundred were useless to him, a greater bore to him than he to them. thus the question of getting into--or getting out of--society which troubled young foreigners greatly, settled itself after three or four years of painful speculation. society had no unity; one wandered about in it like a maggot in cheese; it was not a hansom cab, to be got into, or out of, at dinner-time. therefore he always professed himself ignorant of society; he never knew whether he had been in it or not, but from the accounts of his future friends, like general dick taylor or george smalley, and of various ladies who reigned in the seventies, he inclined to think that he knew very little about it. certain great houses and certain great functions of course he attended, like every one else who could get cards, but even of these the number was small that kept an interest or helped education. in seven years he could remember only two that seemed to have any meaning for him, and he never knew what that meaning was. neither of the two was official; neither was english in interest; and both were scandals to the philosopher while they scarcely enlightened men of the world. one was at devonshire house, an ordinary, unpremeditated evening reception. naturally every one went to devonshire house if asked, and the rooms that night were fairly full of the usual people. the private secretary was standing among the rest, when mme. de castiglione entered, the famous beauty of the second empire. how beautiful she may have been, or indeed what sort of beauty she was, adams never knew, because the company, consisting of the most refined and aristocratic society in the world, instantly formed a lane, and stood in ranks to stare at her, while those behind mounted on chairs to look over their neighbors' heads; so that the lady walked through this polite mob, stared completely out of countenance, and fled the house at once. this was all! the other strange spectacle was at stafford house, april , , when, in a palace gallery that recalled paolo veronese's pictures of christ in his scenes of miracle, garibaldi, in his gray capote over his red shirt, received all london, and three duchesses literally worshipped at his feet. here, at all events, a private secretary had surely caught the last and highest touch of social experience; but what it meant--what social, moral, or mental development it pointed out to the searcher of truth--was not a matter to be treated fully by a leader in the morning post or even by a sermon in westminster abbey. mme. de castiglione and garibaldi covered, between them, too much space for simple measurement; their curves were too complex for mere arithmetic. the task of bringing the two into any common relation with an ordered social system tending to orderly development--in london or elsewhere--was well fitted for algernon swinburne or victor hugo, but was beyond any process yet reached by the education of henry adams, who would probably, even then, have rejected, as superficial or supernatural, all the views taken by any of the company who looked on with him at these two interesting and perplexing sights. from the court, or court society, a mere private secretary got nothing at all, or next to nothing, that could help him on his road through life. royalty was in abeyance. one was tempted to think in these years, - , that the nicest distinction between the very best society and the second-best, was their attitude towards royalty. the one regarded royalty as a bore, and avoided it, or quietly said that the queen had never been in society. the same thing might have been said of fully half the peerage. adams never knew even the names of half the rest; he never exchanged ten words with any member of the royal family; he never knew any one in those years who showed interest in any member of the royal family, or who would have given five shillings for the opinion of any royal person on any subject; or cared to enter any royal or noble presence, unless the house was made attractive by as much social effort as would have been necessary in other countries where no rank existed. no doubt, as one of a swarm, young adams slightly knew various gilded youth who frequented balls and led such dancing as was most in vogue, but they seemed to set no value on rank; their anxiety was only to know where to find the best partners before midnight, and the best supper after midnight. to the american, as to arthur pendennis or barnes newcome, the value of social position and knowledge was evident enough; he valued it at rather more than it was worth to him; but it was a shadowy thing which seemed to vary with every street corner; a thing which had shifting standards, and which no one could catch outright. the half-dozen leaders and beauties of his time, with great names and of the utmost fashion, made some of the poorest marriages, and the least showy careers. tired of looking on at society from the outside, adams grew to loathe the sight of his court dress; to groan at every announcement of a court ball; and to dread every invitation to a formal dinner. the greatest social event gave not half the pleasure that one could buy for ten shillings at the opera when patti sang cherubino or gretchen, and not a fourth of the education. yet this was not the opinion of the best judges. lothrop motley, who stood among the very best, said to him early in his apprenticeship that the london dinner and the english country house were the perfection of human society. the young man meditated over it, uncertain of its meaning. motley could not have thought the dinner itself perfect, since there was not then--outside of a few bankers or foreigners--a good cook or a good table in london, and nine out of ten of the dinners that motley ate came from gunter's, and all were alike. every one, especially in young society, complained bitterly that englishmen did not know a good dinner when they ate it, and could not order one if they were given carte blanche. henry adams was not a judge, and knew no more than they, but he heard the complaints, and he could not think that motley meant to praise the english cuisine. equally little could motley have meant that dinners were good to look at. nothing could be worse than the toilettes; nothing less artistic than the appearance of the company. one's eyes might be dazzled by family diamonds, but, if an american woman were present, she was sure to make comments about the way the jewels were worn. if there was a well-dressed lady at table, she was either an american or "fast." she attracted as much notice as though she were on the stage. no one could possibly admire an english dinner-table. least of all did motley mean that the taste or the manners were perfect. the manners of english society were notorious, and the taste was worse. without exception every american woman rose in rebellion against english manners. in fact, the charm of london which made most impression on americans was the violence of its contrasts; the extreme badness of the worst, making background for the distinction, refinement, or wit of a few, just as the extreme beauty of a few superb women was more effective against the plainness of the crowd. the result was mediaeval, and amusing; sometimes coarse to a degree that might have startled a roustabout, and sometimes courteous and considerate to a degree that suggested king arthur's round table; but this artistic contrast was surely not the perfection that motley had in his mind. he meant something scholarly, worldly, and modern; he was thinking of his own tastes. probably he meant that, in his favorite houses, the tone was easy, the talk was good, and the standard of scholarship was high. even there he would have been forced to qualify his adjectives. no german would have admitted that english scholarship was high, or that it was scholarship at all, or that any wish for scholarship existed in england. nothing that seemed to smell of the shop or of the lecture-room was wanted. one might as well have talked of renan's christ at the table of the bishop of london, as talk of german philology at the table of an oxford don. society, if a small literary class could be called society, wanted to be amused in its old way. sydney smith, who had amused, was dead; so was macaulay, who instructed if he did not amuse; thackeray died at christmas, ; dickens never felt at home, and seldom appeared, in society; bulwer lytton was not sprightly; tennyson detested strangers; carlyle was mostly detested by them; darwin never came to town; the men of whom motley must have been thinking were such as he might meet at lord houghton's breakfasts: grote, jowett, milman, or froude; browning, matthew arnold, or swinburne; bishop wilberforce, venables, or hayward; or perhaps gladstone, robert lowe, or lord granville. a relatively small class, commonly isolated, suppressed, and lost at the usual london dinner, such society as this was fairly familiar even to a private secretary, but to the literary american it might well seem perfection since he could find nothing of the sort in america. within the narrow limits of this class, the american legation was fairly at home; possibly a score of houses, all liberal, and all literary, but perfect only in the eyes of a harvard college historian. they could teach little worth learning, for their tastes were antiquated and their knowledge was ignorance to the next generation. what was altogether fatal for future purposes, they were only english. a social education in such a medium was bound to be useless in any other, yet adams had to learn it to the bottom. the one thing needful for a private secretary, was that he should not only seem, but should actually be, at home. he studied carefully, and practised painfully, what seemed to be the favorite accomplishments of society. perhaps his nervousness deceived him; perhaps he took for an ideal of others what was only his reflected image; but he conceived that the perfection of human society required that a man should enter a drawing-room where he was a total stranger, and place himself on the hearth-rug, his back to the fire, with an air of expectant benevolence, without curiosity, much as though he had dropped in at a charity concert, kindly disposed to applaud the performers and to overlook mistakes. this ideal rarely succeeded in youth, and towards thirty it took a form of modified insolence and offensive patronage; but about sixty it mellowed into courtesy, kindliness, and even deference to the young which had extraordinary charm both in women and in men. unfortunately adams could not wait till sixty for education; he had his living to earn; and the english air of patronage would earn no income for him anywhere else. after five or six years of constant practice, any one can acquire the habit of going from one strange company to another without thinking much of one's self or of them, as though silently reflecting that "in a world where we are all insects, no insect is alien; perhaps they are human in parts"; but the dreamy habit of mind which comes from solitude in crowds is not fitness for social success except in london. everywhere else it is injury. england was a social kingdom whose social coinage had no currency elsewhere. englishwomen, from the educational point of view, could give nothing until they approached forty years old. then they become very interesting--very charming--to the man of fifty. the young american was not worth the young englishwoman's notice, and never received it. neither understood the other. only in the domestic relation, in the country--never in society at large--a young american might accidentally make friends with an englishwoman of his own age, but it never happened to henry adams. his susceptible nature was left to the mercy of american girls, which was professional duty rather than education as long as diplomacy held its own. thus he found himself launched on waters where he had never meant to sail, and floating along a stream which carried him far from his port. his third season in london society saw the end of his diplomatic education, and began for him the social life of a young man who felt at home in england--more at home there than anywhere else. with this feeling, the mere habit of going to garden-parties, dinners, receptions, and balls had nothing to do. one might go to scores without a sensation of home. one might stay in no end of country houses without forgetting that one was a total stranger and could never be anything else. one might bow to half the dukes and duchesses in england, and feel only the more strange. hundreds of persons might pass with a nod and never come nearer. close relation in a place like london is a personal mystery as profound as chemical affinity. thousands pass, and one separates himself from the mass to attach himself to another, and so make, little by little, a group. one morning, april , , he was asked to breakfast with sir henry holland, the old court physician who had been acquainted with every american minister since edward everett, and was a valuable social ally, who had the courage to try to be of use to everybody, and who, while asking the private secretary to breakfast one day, was too discreet to betray what he might have learned about rebel doings at his breakfast-table the day before. he had been friendly with the legation, in the teeth of society, and was still bearing up against the weight of opinion, so that young adams could not decline his invitations, although they obliged him to breakfast in brook street at nine o'clock in the morning, alternately with mr. james m. mason. old dr. holland was himself as hale as a hawk, driving all day bare-headed about london, and eating welsh rarebit every night before bed; he thought that any young man should be pleased to take his early muffin in brook street, and supply a few crumbs of war news for the daily peckings of eminent patients. meekly, when summoned, the private secretary went, and on reaching the front door, this particular morning, he found there another young man in the act of rapping the knocker. they entered the breakfastroom together, where they were introduced to each other, and adams learned that the other guest was a cambridge undergraduate, charles milnes gaskell, son of james milnes gaskell, the member for wenlock; another of the yorkshire milneses, from thornes near wakefield. fate had fixed adams to yorkshire. by another chance it happened that young milnes gaskell was intimate at cambridge with william everett who was also about to take his degree. a third chance inspired mr. evarts with a fancy for visiting cambridge, and led william everett to offer his services as host. adams acted as courier to mr. evarts, and at the end of may they went down for a few days, when william everett did the honors as host with a kindness and attention that made his cousin sorely conscious of his own social shortcomings. cambridge was pretty, and the dons were kind. mr. evarts enjoyed his visit but this was merely a part of the private secretary's day's work. what affected his whole life was the intimacy then begun with milnes gaskell and his circle of undergraduate friends, just about to enter the world. intimates are predestined. adams met in england a thousand people, great and small; jostled against every one, from royal princes to gin-shop loafers; attended endless official functions and private parties; visited every part of the united kingdom and was not quite a stranger at the legations in paris and rome; he knew the societies of certain country houses, and acquired habits of sunday-afternoon calls; but all this gave him nothing to do, and was life wasted. for him nothing whatever could be gained by escorting american ladies to drawing-rooms or american gentlemen to levees at st. james's palace, or bowing solemnly to people with great titles, at court balls, or even by awkwardly jostling royalty at garden-parties; all this was done for the government, and neither president lincoln nor secretary seward would ever know enough of their business to thank him for doing what they did not know how to get properly done by their own servants; but for henry adams--not private secretary--all the time taken up by such duties was wasted. on the other hand, his few personal intimacies concerned him alone, and the chance that made him almost a yorkshireman was one that must have started under the heptarchy. more than any other county in england, yorkshire retained a sort of social independence of london. scotland itself was hardly more distinct. the yorkshire type had always been the strongest of the british strains; the norwegian and the dane were a different race from the saxon. even lancashire had not the mass and the cultivation of the west riding. london could never quite absorb yorkshire, which, in its turn had no great love for london and freely showed it. to a certain degree, evident enough to yorkshiremen, yorkshire was not english--or was all england, as they might choose to express it. this must have been the reason why young adams was drawn there rather than elsewhere. monckton milnes alone took the trouble to draw him, and possibly milnes was the only man in england with whom henry adams, at that moment, had a chance of calling out such an un-english effort. neither oxford nor cambridge nor any region south of the humber contained a considerable house where a young american would have been sought as a friend. eccentricity alone did not account for it. monckton milnes was a singular type, but his distant cousin, james milnes gaskell, was another, quite as marked, in an opposite sense. milnes never seemed willing to rest; milnes gaskell never seemed willing to move. in his youth one of a very famous group--arthur hallam, tennyson, manning, gladstone, francis doyle--and regarded as one of the most promising; an adorer of george canning; in parliament since coming of age; married into the powerful connection of the wynns of wynstay; rich according to yorkshire standards; intimate with his political leaders; he was one of the numerous englishmen who refuse office rather than make the effort of carrying it, and want power only to make it a source of indolence. he was a voracious reader and an admirable critic; he had forty years of parliamentary tradition on his memory; he liked to talk and to listen; he liked his dinner and, in spite of george canning, his dry champagne; he liked wit and anecdote; but he belonged to the generation of , a generation which could not survive the telegraph and railway, and which even yorkshire could hardly produce again. to an american he was a character even more unusual and more fascinating than his distant cousin lord houghton. mr. milnes gaskell was kind to the young american whom his son brought to the house, and mrs. milnes gaskell was kinder, for she thought the american perhaps a less dangerous friend than some englishman might be, for her son, and she was probably right. the american had the sense to see that she was herself one of the most intelligent and sympathetic women in england; her sister, miss charlotte wynn, was another; and both were of an age and a position in society that made their friendship a compliment as well as a pleasure. their consent and approval settled the matter. in england, the family is a serious fact; once admitted to it, one is there for life. london might utterly vanish from one's horizon, but as long as life lasted, yorkshire lived for its friends. in the year , mr. james milnes gaskell, who had sat for thirty years in parliament as one of the members for the borough of wenlock in shropshire, bought wenlock abbey and the estate that included the old monastic buildings. this new, or old, plaything amused mrs. milnes gaskell. the prior's house, a charming specimen of fifteenth-century architecture, had been long left to decay as a farmhouse. she put it in order, and went there to spend a part of the autumn of . young adams was one of her first guests, and drove about wenlock edge and the wrekin with her, learning the loveliness of this exquisite country, and its stores of curious antiquity. it was a new and charming existence; an experience greatly to be envied--ideal repose and rural shakespearian peace--but a few years of it were likely to complete his education, and fit him to act a fairly useful part in life as an englishman, an ecclesiastic, and a contemporary of chaucer. chapter xiv dilettantism ( - ) the campaign of and the reelection of mr. lincoln in november set the american minister on so firm a footing that he could safely regard his own anxieties as over, and the anxieties of earl russell and the emperor napoleon as begun. with a few months more his own term of four years would come to an end, and even though the questions still under discussion with england should somewhat prolong his stay, he might look forward with some confidence to his return home in . his son no longer fretted. the time for going into the army had passed. if he were to be useful at all, it must be as a son, and as a son he was treated with the widest indulgence and trust. he knew that he was doing himself no good by staying in london, but thus far in life he had done himself no good anywhere, and reached his twenty-seventh birthday without having advanced a step, that he could see, beyond his twenty-first. for the most part, his friends were worse off than he. the war was about to end and they were to be set adrift in a world they would find altogether strange. at this point, as though to cut the last thread of relation, six months were suddenly dropped out of his life in england. the london climate had told on some of the family; the physicians prescribed a winter in italy. of course the private secretary was detached as their escort, since this was one of his professional functions; and he passed six months, gaining an education as italian courier, while the civil war came to its end. as far as other education went, he got none, but he was amused. travelling in all possible luxury, at some one else's expense, with diplomatic privileges and position, was a form of travel hitherto untried. the cornice in vettura was delightful; sorrento in winter offered hills to climb and grottoes to explore, and naples near by to visit; rome at easter was an experience necessary for the education of every properly trained private secretary; the journey north by vettura through perugia and sienna was a dream; the splugen pass, if not equal to the stelvio, was worth seeing; paris had always something to show. the chances of accidental education were not so great as they had been, since one's field of experience had grown large; but perhaps a season at baden baden in these later days of its brilliancy offered some chances of instruction, if it were only the sight of fashionable europe and america on the race-course watching the duke of hamilton, in the middle, improving his social advantages by the conversation of cora pearl. the assassination of president lincoln fell on the party while they were at rome, where it seemed singularly fitting to that nursery of murderers and murdered, as though america were also getting educated. again one went to meditate on the steps of the santa maria in ara coeli, but the lesson seemed as shallow as before. nothing happened. the travellers changed no plan or movement. the minister did not recall them to london. the season was over before they returned; and when the private secretary sat down again at his desk in portland place before a mass of copy in arrears, he saw before him a world so changed as to be beyond connection with the past. his identity, if one could call a bundle of disconnected memories an identity, seemed to remain; but his life was once more broken into separate pieces; he was a spider and had to spin a new web in some new place with a new attachment. all his american friends and contemporaries who were still alive looked singularly commonplace without uniforms, and hastened to get married and retire into back streets and suburbs until they could find employment. minister adams, too, was going home "next fall," and when the fall came, he was going home "next spring," and when the spring came, president andrew johnson was at loggerheads with the senate, and found it best to keep things unchanged. after the usual manner of public servants who had acquired the habit of office and lost the faculty of will, the members of the legation in london continued the daily routine of english society, which, after becoming a habit, threatened to become a vice. had henry adams shared a single taste with the young englishmen of his time, he would have been lost; but the custom of pounding up and down rotten row every day, on a hack, was not a taste, and yet was all the sport he shared. evidently he must set to work; he must get a new education; he must begin a career of his own. nothing was easier to say, but even his father admitted two careers to be closed. for the law, diplomacy had unfitted him; for diplomacy he already knew too much. any one who had held, during the four most difficult years of american diplomacy, a position at the centre of action, with his hands actually touching the lever of power, could not beg a post of secretary at vienna or madrid in order to bore himself doing nothing until the next president should do him the honor to turn him out. for once all his advisers agreed that diplomacy was not possible. in any ordinary system he would have been called back to serve in the state department, but, between the president and the senate, service of any sort became a delusion. the choice of career was more difficult than the education which had proved impracticable. adams saw no road; in fact there was none. all his friends were trying one path or another, but none went a way that he could have taken. john hay passed through london in order to bury himself in second-rate legations for years, before he drifted home again to join whitelaw reid and george smalley on the tribune. frank barlow and frank bartlett carried major-generals' commissions into small law business. miles stayed in the army. henry higginson, after a desperate struggle, was forced into state street; charles adams wandered about, with brevet-brigadier rank, trying to find employment. scores of others tried experiments more or less unsuccessful. henry adams could see easy ways of making a hundred blunders; he could see no likely way of making a legitimate success. such as it was, his so-called education was wanted nowhere. one profession alone seemed possible--the press. in he would have said that he was born to be an editor, like at least a thousand other young graduates from american colleges who entered the world every year enjoying the same conviction; but in the situation was altered; the possession of money had become doubly needful for success, and double energy was essential to get money. america had more than doubled her scale. yet the press was still the last resource of the educated poor who could not be artists and would not be tutors. any man who was fit for nothing else could write an editorial or a criticism. the enormous mass of misinformation accumulated in ten years of nomad life could always be worked off on a helpless public, in diluted doses, if one could but secure a table in the corner of a newspaper office. the press was an inferior pulpit; an anonymous schoolmaster; a cheap boarding-school but it was still the nearest approach to a career for the literary survivor of a wrecked education. for the press, then, henry adams decided to fit himself, and since he could not go home to get practical training, he set to work to do what he could in london. he knew, as well as any reporter on the new york herald, that this was not an american way of beginning, and he knew a certain number of other drawbacks which the reporter could not see so clearly. do what he might, he drew breath only in the atmosphere of english methods and thoughts; he could breathe none other. his mother--who should have been a competent judge, since her success and popularity in england exceeded that of her husband--averred that every woman who lived a certain time in england came to look and dress like an englishwoman, no matter how she struggled. henry adams felt himself catching an english tone of mind and processes of thought, though at heart more hostile to them than ever. as though to make him more helpless and wholly distort his life, england grew more and more agreeable and amusing. minister adams became, in , almost a historical monument in london; he held a position altogether his own. his old opponents disappeared. lord palmerston died in october, ; lord russell tottered on six months longer, but then vanished from power; and in july, , the conservatives came into office. traditionally the tories were easier to deal with than the whigs, and minister adams had no reason to regret the change. his personal relations were excellent and his personal weight increased year by year. on that score the private secretary had no cares, and not much copy. his own position was modest, but it was enough; the life he led was agreeable; his friends were all he wanted, and, except that he was at the mercy of politics, he felt much at ease. of his daily life he had only to reckon so many breakfasts; so many dinners; so many receptions, balls, theatres, and country-parties; so many cards to be left; so many americans to be escorted--the usual routine of every young american in a legation; all counting for nothing in sum, because, even if it had been his official duty--which it was not--it was mere routine, a single, continuous, unbroken act, which led to nothing and nowhere except portland place and the grave. the path that led somewhere was the english habit of mind which deepened its ruts every day. the english mind was like the london drawing-room, a comfortable and easy spot, filled with bits and fragments of incoherent furnitures, which were never meant to go together, and could be arranged in any relation without making a whole, except by the square room. philosophy might dispute about innate ideas till the stars died out in the sky, but about innate tastes no one, except perhaps a collie dog, has the right to doubt; least of all, the englishman, for his tastes are his being; he drifts after them as unconsciously as a honey-bee drifts after his flowers, and, in england, every one must drift with him. most young englishmen drifted to the race-course or the moors or the hunting-field; a few towards books; one or two followed some form of science; and a number took to what, for want of a better name, they called art. young adams inherited a certain taste for the same pursuit from his father who insisted that he had it not, because he could not see what his son thought he saw in turner. the minister, on the other hand, carried a sort of aesthetic rag-bag of his own, which he regarded as amusement, and never called art. so he would wander off on a sunday to attend service successively in all the city churches built by sir christopher wren; or he would disappear from the legation day after day to attend coin sales at sotheby's, where his son attended alternate sales of drawings, engravings, or water-colors. neither knew enough to talk much about the other's tastes, but the only difference between them was a slight difference of direction. the minister's mind like his writings showed a correctness of form and line that his son would have been well pleased had he inherited. of all supposed english tastes, that of art was the most alluring and treacherous. once drawn into it, one had small chance of escape, for it had no centre or circumference, no beginning, middle, or end, no origin, no object, and no conceivable result as education. in london one met no corrective. the only american who came by, capable of teaching, was william hunt, who stopped to paint the portrait of the minister which now completes the family series at harvard college. hunt talked constantly, and was, or afterwards became, a famous teacher, but henry adams did not know enough to learn. perhaps, too, he had inherited or acquired a stock of tastes, as young men must, which he was slow to outgrow. hunt had no time to sweep out the rubbish of adams's mind. the portrait finished, he went. as often as he could, adams ran over to paris, for sunshine, and there always sought out richardson in his attic in the rue du bac, or wherever he lived, and they went off to dine at the palais royal, and talk of whatever interested the students of the beaux arts. richardson, too, had much to say, but had not yet seized his style. adams caught very little of what lay in his mind, and the less, because, to adams, everything french was bad except the restaurants, while the continuous life in england made french art seem worst of all. this did not prove that english art, in , was good; far from it; but it helped to make bric-a-brac of all art, after the manner of england. not in the legation, or in london, but in yorkshire at thornes, adams met the man that pushed him furthest in this english garden of innate disorder called taste. the older daughter of the milnes gaskells had married francis turner palgrave. few americans will ever ask whether any one has described the palgraves, but the family was one of the most describable in all england at that day. old sir francis, the father, had been much the greatest of all the historians of early england, the only one who was un-english; and the reason of his superiority lay in his name, which was cohen, and his mind which was cohen also, or at least not english. he changed his name to palgrave in order to please his wife. they had a band of remarkable sons: francis turner, gifford, reginald, inglis; all of whom made their mark. gifford was perhaps the most eccentric, but his "travels" in arabia were famous, even among the famous travels of that generation. francis turner--or, as he was commonly called, frank palgrave--unable to work off his restlessness in travel like gifford, and stifled in the atmosphere of the board of education, became a critic. his art criticisms helped to make the saturday review a terror to the british artist. his literary taste, condensed into the "golden treasury," helped adams to more literary education than he ever got from any taste of his own. palgrave himself held rank as one of the minor poets; his hymns had vogue. as an art-critic he was too ferocious to be liked; even holman hunt found his temper humorous; among many rivals, he may perhaps have had a right to claim the much-disputed rank of being the most unpopular man in london; but he liked to teach, and asked only for a docile pupil. adams was docile enough, for he knew nothing and liked to listen. indeed, he had to listen, whether he liked or not, for palgrave's voice was strident, and nothing could stop him. literature, painting, sculpture, architecture were open fields for his attacks, which were always intelligent if not always kind, and when these failed, he readily descended to meaner levels. john richard green, who was palgrave's precise opposite, and whose irish charm of touch and humor defended him from most assaults, used to tell with delight of palgrave's call on him just after he had moved into his new queen anne house in kensington square: "palgrave called yesterday, and the first thing he said was, 'i've counted three anachronisms on your front doorstep.'" another savage critic, also a poet, was thomas woolner, a type almost more emphatic than palgrave in a society which resounded with emphasis. woolner's sculpture showed none of the rough assertion that woolner himself showed, when he was not making supernatural effort to be courteous, but his busts were remarkable, and his work altogether was, in palgrave's clamorous opinion, the best of his day. he took the matter of british art--or want of art--seriously, almost ferociously, as a personal grievance and torture; at times he was rather terrifying in the anarchistic wrath of his denunciation. as henry adams felt no responsibility for english art, and had no american art to offer for sacrifice, he listened with enjoyment to language much like carlyle's, and accepted it without a qualm. on the other hand, as a third member of this critical group, he fell in with stopford brooke whose tastes lay in the same direction, and whose expression was modified by clerical propriety. among these men, one wandered off into paths of education much too devious and slippery for an american foot to follow. he would have done better to go on the race-track, as far as concerned a career. fortunately for him he knew too little ever to be an art-critic, still less an artist. for some things ignorance is good, and art is one of them. he knew he knew nothing, and had not the trained eye or the keen instinct that trusted itself; but he was curious, as he went on, to find out how much others knew. he took palgrave's word as final about a drawing of rembrandt or michael angelo, and he trusted woolner implicitly about a turner; but when he quoted their authority to any dealer, the dealer pooh-poohed it, and declared that it had no weight in the trade. if he went to a sale of drawings or paintings, at sotheby's or christie's, an hour afterwards, he saw these same dealers watching palgrave or woolner for a point, and bidding over them. he rarely found two dealers agree in judgment. he once bought a water-color from the artist himself out of his studio, and had it doubted an hour afterwards by the dealer to whose place he took it for framing. he was reduced to admit that he could not prove its authenticity; internal evidence was against it. one morning in early july, , palgrave stopped at the legation in portland place on his way downtown, and offered to take adams to sotheby's, where a small collection of old drawings was on show. the collection was rather a curious one, said to be that of sir anthony westcomb, from liverpool, with an undisturbed record of a century, but with nothing to attract notice. probably none but collectors or experts examined the portfolios. some dozens of these were always on hand, following every sale, and especially on the lookout for old drawings, which became rarer every year. turning rapidly over the numbers, palgrave stopped at one containing several small drawings, one marked as rembrandt, one as rafael; and putting his finger on the rafael, after careful examination; "i should buy this," he said; "it looks to me like one of those things that sell for five shillings one day, and fifty pounds the next." adams marked it for a bid, and the next morning came down to the auction. the numbers sold slowly, and at noon he thought he might safely go to lunch. when he came back, half an hour afterwards, the drawing was gone. much annoyed at his own stupidity, since palgrave had expressly said he wanted the drawing for himself if he had not in a manner given it to adams, the culprit waited for the sale to close, and then asked the clerk for the name of the buyer. it was holloway, the art-dealer, near covent garden, whom he slightly knew. going at once to the shop he waited till young holloway came in, with his purchases under his arm, and without attempt at preface, he said: "you bought to-day, mr. holloway, a number that i wanted. do you mind letting me have it?" holloway took out the parcel, looked over the drawings, and said that he had bought the number for the sake of the rembrandt, which he thought possibly genuine; taking that out, adams might have the rest for the price he paid for the lot--twelve shillings. thus, down to that moment, every expert in london had probably seen these drawings. two of them--only two--had thought them worth buying at any price, and of these two, palgrave chose the rafael, holloway the one marked as rembrandt. adams, the purchaser of the rafael, knew nothing whatever on the subject, but thought he might credit himself with education to the value of twelve shillings, and call the drawing nothing. such items of education commonly came higher. he took the drawing to palgrave. it was closely pasted to an old, rather thin, cardboard mount, and, on holding it up to the window, one could see lines on the reverse. "take it down to reed at the british museum," said palgrave; "he is curator of the drawings, and, if you ask him, he will have it taken off the mount." adams amused himself for a day or two by searching rafael's works for the figure, which he found at last in the parnasso, the figure of horace, of which, as it happened--though adams did not know it--the british museum owned a much finer drawing. at last he took the dirty, little, unfinished red-chalk sketch to reed whom he found in the curator's room, with some of the finest rafael drawings in existence, hanging on the walls. "yes!" said mr reed; "i noticed this at the sale; but it's not rafael!" adams, feeling himself incompetent to discuss this subject, reported the result to palgrave, who said that reed knew nothing about it. also this point lay beyond adams's competence; but he noted that reed was in the employ of the british museum as curator of the best--or nearly the best--collection in the world, especially of rafaels, and that he bought for the museum. as expert he had rejected both the rafael and the rembrandt at first-sight, and after his attention was recalled to the rafael for a further opinion he rejected it again. a week later, adams returned for the drawing, which mr. reed took out of his drawer and gave him, saying with what seemed a little doubt or hesitation: "i should tell you that the paper shows a water-mark, which i find the same as that of paper used by marc antonio." a little taken back by this method of studying art, a method which even a poor and ignorant american might use as well as rafael himself, adams asked stupidly: "then you think it genuine?" "possibly!" replied reed; "but much overdrawn." here was expert opinion after a second revise, with help of water-marks! in adams's opinion it was alone worth another twelve shillings as education; but this was not all. reed continued: "the lines on the back seem to be writing, which i cannot read, but if you will take it down to the manuscript-room, they will read it for you." adams took the sheet down to the keeper of the manuscripts and begged him to read the lines. the keeper, after a few minutes' study, very obligingly said he could not: "it is scratched with an artist's crayon, very rapidly, with many unusual abbreviations and old forms. if any one in europe can read it, it is the old man at the table yonder, libri! take it to him!" this expert broke down on the alphabet! he could not even judge a manuscript; but adams had no right to complain, for he had nothing to pay, not even twelve shillings, though he thought these experts worth more, at least for his education. accordingly he carried his paper to libri, a total stranger to him, and asked the old man, as deferentially as possible, to tell him whether the lines had any meaning. had adams not been an ignorant person he would have known all about libri, but his ignorance was vast, and perhaps was for the best. libri looked at the paper, and then looked again, and at last bade him sit down and wait. half an hour passed before he called adams back and showed him these lines:-- "or questo credo ben che una elleria te offende tanto che te offese il core. perche sei grande nol sei in tua volia; tu vedi e gia non credi il tuo valore; passate gia son tutte gelosie; tu sei di sasso; non hai piu dolore." as far as adams could afterwards recall it, this was libri's reading, but he added that the abbreviations were many and unusual; that the writing was very ancient; and that the word he read as "elleria" in the first line was not italian at all. by this time, one had got too far beyond one's depth to ask questions. if libri could not read italian, very clearly adams had better not offer to help him. he took the drawing, thanked everybody, and having exhausted the experts of the british museum, took a cab to woolner's studio, where he showed the figure and repeated reed's opinion. woolner snorted: "reed's a fool!" he said; "he knows nothing about it; there may be a rotten line or two, but the drawing's all right." for forty years adams kept this drawing on his mantelpiece, partly for its own interest, but largely for curiosity to see whether any critic or artist would ever stop to look at it. none ever did, unless he knew the story. adams himself never wanted to know more about it. he refused to seek further light. he never cared to learn whether the drawing was rafael's, or whether the verse was rafael's, or whether even the water-mark was rafael's. the experts--some scores of them including the british museum,--had affirmed that the drawing was worth a certain moiety of twelve shillings. on that point, also, adams could offer no opinion, but he was clear that his education had profited by it to that extent--his amusement even more. art was a superb field for education, but at every turn he met the same old figure, like a battered and illegible signpost that ought to direct him to the next station but never did. there was no next station. all the art of a thousand--or ten thousand--years had brought england to stuff which palgrave and woolner brayed in their mortars; derided, tore in tatters, growled at, and howled at, and treated in terms beyond literary usage. whistler had not yet made his appearance in london, but the others did quite as well. what result could a student reach from it? once, on returning to london, dining with stopford brooke, some one asked adams what impression the royal academy exhibition made on him. with a little hesitation, he suggested that it was rather a chaos, which he meant for civility; but stopford brooke abruptly met it by asking whether chaos were not better than death. truly the question was worth discussion. for his own part, adams inclined to think that neither chaos nor death was an object to him as a searcher of knowledge--neither would have vogue in america--neither would help him to a career. both of them led him away from his objects, into an english dilettante museum of scraps, with nothing but a wall-paper to unite them in any relation of sequence. possibly english taste was one degree more fatal than english scholarship, but even this question was open to argument. adams went to the sales and bought what he was told to buy; now a classical drawing by rafael or rubens; now a water-color by girtin or cotman, if possible unfinished because it was more likely to be a sketch from nature; and he bought them not because they went together--on the contrary, they made rather awkward spots on the wall as they did on the mind--but because he could afford to buy those, and not others. ten pounds did not go far to buy a michael angelo, but was a great deal of money to a private secretary. the effect was spotty, fragmentary, feeble; and the more so because the british mind was constructed in that way--boasted of it, and held it to be true philosophy as well as sound method. what was worse, no one had a right to denounce the english as wrong. artistically their mind was scrappy, and every one knew it, but perhaps thought itself, history, and nature, were scrappy, and ought to be studied so. turning from british art to british literature, one met the same dangers. the historical school was a playground of traps and pitfalls. fatally one fell into the sink of history--antiquarianism. for one who nourished a natural weakness for what was called history, the whole of british literature in the nineteenth century was antiquarianism or anecdotage, for no one except buckle had tried to link it with ideas, and commonly buckle was regarded as having failed. macaulay was the english historian. adams had the greatest admiration for macaulay, but he felt that any one who should even distantly imitate macaulay would perish in self-contempt. one might as well imitate shakespeare. yet evidently something was wrong here, for the poet and the historian ought to have different methods, and macaulay's method ought to be imitable if it were sound; yet the method was more doubtful than the style. he was a dramatist; a painter; a poet, like carlyle. this was the english mind, method, genius, or whatever one might call it; but one never could quite admit that the method which ended in froude and kinglake could be sound for america where passion and poetry were eccentricities. both froude and kinglake, when one met them at dinner, were very agreeable, very intelligent; and perhaps the english method was right, and art fragmentary by essence. history, like everything else, might be a field of scraps, like the refuse about a staffordshire iron-furnace. one felt a little natural reluctance to decline and fall like silas wegg on the golden dust-heap of british refuse; but if one must, one could at least expect a degree from oxford and the respect of the athenaeum club. while drifting, after the war ended, many old american friends came abroad for a holiday, and among the rest, dr. palfrey, busy with his "history of new england." of all the relics of childhood, dr. palfrey was the most sympathetic, and perhaps the more so because he, too, had wandered into the pleasant meadows of antiquarianism, and had forgotten the world in his pursuit of the new england puritan. although america seemed becoming more and more indifferent to the puritan except as a slightly rococo ornament, he was only the more amusing as a study for the monkbarns of boston bay, and dr. palfrey took him seriously, as his clerical education required. his work was rather an apologia in the greek sense; a justification of the ways of god to man, or, what was much the same thing, of puritans to other men; and the task of justification was onerous enough to require the occasional relief of a contrast or scapegoat. when dr. palfrey happened on the picturesque but unpuritanic figure of captain john smith, he felt no call to beautify smith's picture or to defend his moral character; he became impartial and penetrating. the famous story of pocahontas roused his latent new england scepticism. he suggested to adams, who wanted to make a position for himself, that an article in the north american review on captain john smith's relations with pocahontas would attract as much attention, and probably break as much glass, as any other stone that could be thrown by a beginner. adams could suggest nothing better. the task seemed likely to be amusing. so he planted himself in the british museum and patiently worked over all the material he could find, until, at last, after three or four months of labor, he got it in shape and sent it to charles norton, who was then editing the north american. mr. norton very civilly and even kindly accepted it. the article appeared in january, . surely, here was something to ponder over, as a step in education; something that tended to stagger a sceptic! in spite of personal wishes, intentions, and prejudices; in spite of civil wars and diplomatic education; in spite of determination to be actual, daily, and practical, henry adams found himself, at twenty-eight, still in english society, dragged on one side into english dilettantism, which of all dilettantism he held the most futile; and, on the other, into american antiquarianism, which of all antiquarianism he held the most foolish. this was the result of five years in london. even then he knew it to be a false start. he had wholly lost his way. if he were ever to amount to anything, he must begin a new education, in a new place, with a new purpose. chapter xv darwinism ( - ) politics, diplomacy, law, art, and history had opened no outlet for future energy or effort, but a man must do something, even in portland place, when winter is dark and winter evenings are exceedingly long. at that moment darwin was convulsing society. the geological champion of darwin was sir charles lyell, and the lyells were intimate at the legation. sir charles constantly said of darwin, what palgrave said of tennyson, that the first time he came to town, adams should be asked to meet him, but neither of them ever came to town, or ever cared to meet a young american, and one could not go to them because they were known to dislike intrusion. the only americans who were not allowed to intrude were the half-dozen in the legation. adams was content to read darwin, especially his "origin of species" and his "voyage of the beagle." he was a darwinist before the letter; a predestined follower of the tide; but he was hardly trained to follow darwin's evidences. fragmentary the british mind might be, but in those days it was doing a great deal of work in a very un-english way, building up so many and such vast theories on such narrow foundations as to shock the conservative, and delight the frivolous. the atomic theory; the correlation and conservation of energy; the mechanical theory of the universe; the kinetic theory of gases, and darwin's law of natural selection, were examples of what a young man had to take on trust. neither he nor any one else knew enough to verify them; in his ignorance of mathematics, he was particularly helpless; but this never stood in his way. the ideas were new and seemed to lead somewhere--to some great generalization which would finish one's clamor to be educated. that a beginner should understand them all, or believe them all, no one could expect, still less exact. henry adams was darwinist because it was easier than not, for his ignorance exceeded belief, and one must know something in order to contradict even such triflers as tyndall and huxley. by rights, he should have been also a marxist but some narrow trait of the new england nature seemed to blight socialism, and he tried in vain to make himself a convert. he did the next best thing; he became a comteist, within the limits of evolution. he was ready to become anything but quiet. as though the world had not been enough upset in his time, he was eager to see it upset more. he had his wish, but he lost his hold on the results by trying to understand them. he never tried to understand darwin; but he still fancied he might get the best part of darwinism from the easier study of geology; a science which suited idle minds as well as though it were history. every curate in england dabbled in geology and hunted for vestiges of creation. darwin hunted only for vestiges of natural selection, and adams followed him, although he cared nothing about selection, unless perhaps for the indirect amusement of upsetting curates. he felt, like nine men in ten, an instinctive belief in evolution, but he felt no more concern in natural than in unnatural selection, though he seized with greediness the new volume on the "antiquity of man" which sir charles lyell published in in order to support darwin by wrecking the garden of eden. sir charles next brought out, in , a new edition of his "principles," then the highest text-book of geology; but here the darwinian doctrine grew in stature. natural selection led back to natural evolution, and at last to natural uniformity. this was a vast stride. unbroken evolution under uniform conditions pleased every one--except curates and bishops; it was the very best substitute for religion; a safe, conservative, practical, thoroughly common-law deity. such a working system for the universe suited a young man who had just helped to waste five or ten thousand million dollars and a million lives, more or less, to enforce unity and uniformity on people who objected to it; the idea was only too seductive in its perfection; it had the charm of art. unity and uniformity were the whole motive of philosophy, and if darwin, like a true englishman, preferred to back into it--to reach god a posteriori--rather than start from it, like spinoza, the difference of method taught only the moral that the best way of reaching unity was to unite. any road was good that arrived. life depended on it. one had been, from the first, dragged hither and thither like a french poodle on a string, following always the strongest pull, between one form of unity or centralization and another. the proof that one had acted wisely because of obeying the primordial habit of nature flattered one's self-esteem. steady, uniform, unbroken evolution from lower to higher seemed easy. so, one day when sir charles came to the legation to inquire about getting his "principles" properly noticed in america, young adams found nothing simpler than to suggest that he could do it himself if sir charles would tell him what to say. youth risks such encounters with the universe before one succumbs to it, yet even he was surprised at sir charles's ready assent, and still more so at finding himself, after half an hour's conversation, sitting down to clear the minds of american geologists about the principles of their profession. this was getting on fast; arthur pendennis had never gone so far. the geologists were a hardy class, not likely to be much hurt by adams's learning, nor did he throw away much concern on their account. he undertook the task chiefly to educate, not them, but himself, and if sir isaac newton had, like sir charles lyell, asked him to explain for americans his last edition of the "principia," adams would have jumped at the chance. unfortunately the mere reading such works for amusement is quite a different matter from studying them for criticism. ignorance must always begin at the beginning. adams must inevitably have begun by asking sir isaac for an intelligible reason why the apple fell to the ground. he did not know enough to be satisfied with the fact. the law of gravitation was so-and-so, but what was gravitation? and he would have been thrown quite off his base if sir isaac had answered that he did not know. at the very outset adams struck on sir charles's glacial theory or theories. he was ignorant enough to think that the glacial epoch looked like a chasm between him and a uniformitarian world. if the glacial period were uniformity, what was catastrophe? to him the two or three labored guesses that sir charles suggested or borrowed to explain glaciation were proof of nothing, and were quite unsolid as support for so immense a superstructure as geological uniformity. if one were at liberty to be as lax in science as in theology, and to assume unity from the start, one might better say so, as the church did, and not invite attack by appearing weak in evidence. naturally a young man, altogether ignorant, could not say this to sir charles lyell or sir isaac newton; but he was forced to state sir charles's views, which he thought weak as hypotheses and worthless as proofs. sir charles himself seemed shy of them. adams hinted his heresies in vain. at last he resorted to what he thought the bold experiment of inserting a sentence in the text, intended to provoke correction. "the introduction [by louis agassiz] of this new geological agent seemed at first sight inconsistent with sir charles's argument, obliging him to allow that causes had in fact existed on the earth capable of producing more violent geological changes than would be possible in our own day." the hint produced no effect. sir charles said not a word; he let the paragraph stand; and adams never knew whether the great uniformitarian was strict or lax in his uniformitarian creed; but he doubted. objections fatal to one mind are futile to another, and as far as concerned the article, the matter ended there, although the glacial epoch remained a misty region in the young man's darwinism. had it been the only one, he would not have fretted about it; but uniformity often worked queerly and sometimes did not work as natural selection at all. finding himself at a loss for some single figure to illustrate the law of natural selection, adams asked sir charles for the simplest case of uniformity on record. much to his surprise sir charles told him that certain forms, like terebratula, appeared to be identical from the beginning to the end of geological time. since this was altogether too much uniformity and much too little selection, adams gave up the attempt to begin at the beginning, and tried starting at the end--himself. taking for granted that the vertebrates would serve his purpose, he asked sir charles to introduce him to the first vertebrate. infinitely to his bewilderment, sir charles informed him that the first vertebrate was a very respectable fish, among the earliest of all fossils, which had lived, and whose bones were still reposing, under adams's own favorite abbey on wenlock edge. by this time, in adams had learned to know shropshire familiarly, and it was the part of his diplomatic education which he loved best. like catherine olney in "northanger abbey," he yearned for nothing so keenly as to feel at home in a thirteenth-century abbey, unless it were to haunt a fifteenth-century prior's house, and both these joys were his at wenlock. with companions or without, he never tired of it. whether he rode about the wrekin, or visited all the historical haunts from ludlow castle and stokesay to boscobel and uriconium; or followed the roman road or scratched in the abbey ruins, all was amusing and carried a flavor of its own like that of the roman campagna; but perhaps he liked best to ramble over the edge on a summer afternoon and look across the marches to the mountains of wales. the peculiar flavor of the scenery has something to do with absence of evolution; it was better marked in egypt: it was felt wherever time-sequences became interchangeable. one's instinct abhors time. as one lay on the slope of the edge, looking sleepily through the summer haze towards shrewsbury or cader idris or caer caradoc or uriconium, nothing suggested sequence. the roman road was twin to the railroad; uriconium was well worth shrewsbury; wenlock and buildwas were far superior to bridgnorth. the shepherds of caractacus or offa, or the monks of buildwas, had they approached where he lay in the grass, would have taken him only for another and tamer variety of welsh thief. they would have seen little to surprise them in the modern landscape unless it were the steam of a distant railway. one might mix up the terms of time as one liked, or stuff the present anywhere into the past, measuring time by falstaff's shrewsbury clock, without violent sense of wrong, as one could do it on the pacific ocean; but the triumph of all was to look south along the edge to the abode of one's earliest ancestor and nearest relative, the ganoid fish, whose name, according to professor huxley, was pteraspis, a cousin of the sturgeon, and whose kingdom, according to sir roderick murchison, was called siluria. life began and ended there. behind that horizon lay only the cambrian, without vertebrates or any other organism except a few shell-fish. on the further verge of the cambrian rose the crystalline rocks from which every trace of organic existence had been erased. that here, on the wenlock edge of time, a young american, seeking only frivolous amusement, should find a legitimate parentage as modern as though just caught in the severn below, astonished him as much as though he had found darwin himself. in the scale of evolution, one vertebrate was as good as another. for anything he, or any one else, knew, nine hundred and ninety nine parts of evolution out of a thousand lay behind or below the pteraspis. to an american in search of a father, it mattered nothing whether the father breathed through lungs, or walked on fins, or on feet. evolution of mind was altogether another matter and belonged to another science, but whether one traced descent from the shark or the wolf was immaterial even in morals. this matter had been discussed for ages without scientific result. la fontaine and other fabulists maintained that the wolf, even in morals, stood higher than man; and in view of the late civil war, adams had doubts of his own on the facts of moral evolution:-- "tout bien considere, je te soutiens en somme, que scelerat pour scelerat, il vaut mieux etre un loup qu'un homme." it might well be! at all events, it did not enter into the problem of pteraspis, for it was quite certain that no complete proof of natural selection had occurred back to the time of pteraspis, and that before pteraspis was eternal void. no trace of any vertebrate had been found there; only starfish, shell-fish, polyps, or trilobites whose kindly descendants he had often bathed with, as a child on the shores of quincy bay. that pteraspis and shark were his cousins, great-uncles, or grandfathers, in no way troubled him, but that either or both of them should be older than evolution itself seemed to him perplexing; nor could he at all simplify the problem by taking the sudden back-somersault into quincy bay in search of the fascinating creature he had called a horseshoe, whose huge dome of shell and sharp spur of tail had so alarmed him as a child. in siluria, he understood, sir roderick murchison called the horseshoe a limulus, which helped nothing. neither in the limulus nor in the terebratula, nor in the cestracion philippi, any more than in the pteraspis, could one conceive an ancestor, but, if one must, the choice mattered little. cousinship had limits but no one knew enough to fix them. when the vertebrate vanished in siluria, it disappeared instantly and forever. neither vertebra nor scale nor print reappeared, nor any trace of ascent or descent to a lower type. the vertebrate began in the ludlow shale, as complete as adams himself--in some respects more so--at the top of the column of organic evolution: and geology offered no sort of proof that he had ever been anything else. ponder over it as he might, adams could see nothing in the theory of sir charles but pure inference, precisely like the inference of paley, that, if one found a watch, one inferred a maker. he could detect no more evolution in life since the pteraspis than he could detect it in architecture since the abbey. all he could prove was change. coal-power alone asserted evolution--of power--and only by violence could be forced to assert selection of type. all this seemed trivial to the true darwinian, and to sir charles it was mere defect in the geological record. sir charles labored only to heap up the evidences of evolution; to cumulate them till the mass became irresistible. with that purpose, adams gladly studied and tried to help sir charles, but, behind the lesson of the day, he was conscious that, in geology as in theology, he could prove only evolution that did not evolve; uniformity that was not uniform; and selection that did not select. to other darwinians--except darwin--natural selection seemed a dogma to be put in the place of the athanasian creed; it was a form of religious hope; a promise of ultimate perfection. adams wished no better; he warmly sympathized in the object; but when he came to ask himself what he truly thought, he felt that he had no faith; that whenever the next new hobby should be brought out, he should surely drop off from darwinism like a monkey from a perch; that the idea of one form, law, order, or sequence had no more value for him than the idea of none; that what he valued most was motion, and that what attracted his mind was change. psychology was to him a new study, and a dark corner of education. as he lay on wenlock edge, with the sheep nibbling the grass close about him as they or their betters had nibbled the grass--or whatever there was to nibble--in the silurian kingdom of pteraspis, he seemed to have fallen on an evolution far more wonderful than that of fishes. he did not like it; he could not account for it; and he determined to stop it. never since the days of his limulus ancestry had any of his ascendants thought thus. their modes of thought might be many, but their thought was one. out of his millions of millions of ancestors, back to the cambrian mollusks, every one had probably lived and died in the illusion of truths which did not amuse him, and which had never changed. henry adams was the first in an infinite series to discover and admit to himself that he really did not care whether truth was, or was not, true. he did not even care that it should be proved true, unless the process were new and amusing. he was a darwinian for fun. from the beginning of history, this attitude had been branded as criminal--worse than crime--sacrilege! society punished it ferociously and justly, in self-defence. mr. adams, the father, looked on it as moral weakness; it annoyed him; but it did not annoy him nearly so much as it annoyed his son, who had no need to learn from hamlet the fatal effect of the pale cast of thought on enterprises great or small. he had no notion of letting the currents of his action be turned awry by this form of conscience. to him, the current of his time was to be his current, lead where it might. he put psychology under lock and key; he insisted on maintaining his absolute standards; on aiming at ultimate unity. the mania for handling all the sides of every question, looking into every window, and opening every door, was, as bluebeard judiciously pointed out to his wives, fatal to their practical usefulness in society. one could not stop to chase doubts as though they were rabbits. one had no time to paint and putty the surface of law, even though it were cracked and rotten. for the young men whose lives were cast in the generation between and , law should be evolution from lower to higher, aggregation of the atom in the mass, concentration of multiplicity in unity, compulsion of anarchy in order; and he would force himself to follow wherever it led, though he should sacrifice five thousand millions more in money, and a million more lives. as the path ultimately led, it sacrificed much more than this; but at the time, he thought the price he named a high one, and he could not foresee that science and society would desert him in paying it. he, at least, took his education as a darwinian in good faith. the church was gone, and duty was dim, but will should take its place, founded deeply in interest and law. this was the result of five or six years in england; a result so british as to be almost the equivalent of an oxford degree. quite serious about it, he set to work at once. while confusing his ideas about geology to the apparent satisfaction of sir charles who left him his field-compass in token of it, adams turned resolutely to business, and attacked the burning question of specie payments. his principles assured him that the honest way to resume payments was to restrict currency. he thought he might win a name among financiers and statesmen at home by showing how this task had been done by england, after the classical suspension of - . setting himself to the study of this perplexed period, he waded as well as he could through a morass of volumes, pamphlets, and debates, until he learned to his confusion that the bank of england itself and all the best british financial writers held that restriction was a fatal mistake, and that the best treatment of a debased currency was to let it alone, as the bank had in fact done. time and patience were the remedies. the shock of this discovery to his financial principles was serious; much more serious than the shock of the terebratula and pteraspis to his principles of geology. a mistake about evolution was not fatal; a mistake about specie payments would destroy forever the last hope of employment in state street. six months of patient labor would be thrown away if he did not publish, and with it his whole scheme of making himself a position as a practical man-of-business. if he did publish, how could he tell virtuous bankers in state street that moral and absolute principles of abstract truth, such as theirs, had nothing to do with the matter, and that they had better let it alone? geologists, naturally a humble and helpless class, might not revenge impertinences offered to their science; but capitalists never forgot or forgave. with labor and caution he made one long article on british finance in , and another on the bank restriction of - , and, doing both up in one package, he sent it to the north american for choice. he knew that two heavy, technical, financial studies thus thrown at an editor's head, would probably return to crush the author; but the audacity of youth is more sympathetic--when successful--than his ignorance. the editor accepted both. when the post brought his letter, adams looked at it as though he were a debtor who had begged for an extension. he read it with as much relief as the debtor, if it had brought him the loan. the letter gave the new writer literary rank. henceforward he had the freedom of the press. these articles, following those on pocahontas and lyell, enrolled him on the permanent staff of the north american review. precisely what this rank was worth, no one could say; but, for fifty years the north american review had been the stage coach which carried literary bostonians to such distinction as they had achieved. few writers had ideas which warranted thirty pages of development, but for such as thought they had, the review alone offered space. an article was a small volume which required at least three months' work, and was paid, at best, five dollars a page. not many men even in england or france could write a good thirty-page article, and practically no one in america read them; but a few score of people, mostly in search of items to steal, ran over the pages to extract an idea or a fact, which was a sort of wild game--a bluefish or a teal--worth anywhere from fifty cents to five dollars. newspaper writers had their eye on quarterly pickings. the circulation of the review had never exceeded three or four hundred copies, and the review had never paid its reasonable expenses. yet it stood at the head of american literary periodicals; it was a source of suggestion to cheaper workers; it reached far into societies that never knew its existence; it was an organ worth playing on; and, in the fancy of henry adams, it led, in some indistinct future, to playing on a new york daily newspaper. with the editor's letter under his eyes, adams asked himself what better he could have done. on the whole, considering his helplessness, he thought he had done as well as his neighbors. no one could yet guess which of his contemporaries was most likely to play a part in the great world. a shrewd prophet in wall street might perhaps have set a mark on pierpont morgan, but hardly on the rockefellers or william c. whitney or whitelaw reid. no one would have picked out william mckinley or john hay or mark hanna for great statesmen. boston was ignorant of the careers in store for alexander agassiz and henry higginson. phillips brooks was unknown; henry james was unheard; howells was new; richardson and lafarge were struggling for a start. out of any score of names and reputations that should reach beyond the century, the thirty-years-old who were starting in the year could show none that was so far in advance as to warrant odds in its favor. the army men had for the most part fallen to the ranks. had adams foreseen the future exactly as it came, he would have been no wiser, and could have chosen no better path. thus it turned out that the last year in england was the pleasantest. he was already old in society, and belonged to the silurian horizon. the prince of wales had come. mr. disraeli, lord stanley, and the future lord salisbury had thrown into the background the memories of palmerston and russell. europe was moving rapidly, and the conduct of england during the american civil war was the last thing that london liked to recall. the revolution since was nearly complete, and, for the first time in history, the american felt himself almost as strong as an englishman. he had thirty years to wait before he should feel himself stronger. meanwhile even a private secretary could afford to be happy. his old education was finished; his new one was not begun; he still loitered a year, feeling himself near the end of a very long, anxious, tempestuous, successful voyage, with another to follow, and a summer sea between. he made what use he could of it. in february, , he was back in rome with his friend milnes gaskell. for another season he wandered on horseback over the campagna or on foot through the rome of the middle ages, and sat once more on the steps of ara coeli, as had become with him almost a superstition, like the waters of the fountain of trevi. rome was still tragic and solemn as ever, with its mediaeval society, artistic, literary, and clerical, taking itself as seriously as in the days of byron and shelley. the long ten years of accidental education had changed nothing for him there. he knew no more in than in . he had learned nothing whatever that made rome more intelligible to him, or made life easier to handle. the case was no better when he got back to london and went through his last season. london had become his vice. he loved his haunts, his houses, his habits, and even his hansom cabs. he loved growling like an englishman, and going into society where he knew not a face, and cared not a straw. he lived deep into the lives and loves and disappointments of his friends. when at last he found himself back again at liverpool, his heart wrenched by the act of parting, he moved mechanically, unstrung, but he had no more acquired education than when he first trod the steps of the adelphi hotel in november, . he could see only one great change, and this was wholly in years. eaton hall no longer impressed his imagination; even the architecture of chester roused but a sleepy interest; he felt no sensation whatever in the atmosphere of the british peerage, but mainly an habitual dislike to most of the people who frequented their country houses; he had become english to the point of sharing their petty social divisions, their dislikes and prejudices against each other; he took england no longer with the awe of american youth, but with the habit of an old and rather worn suit of clothes. as far as he knew, this was all that englishmen meant by social education, but in any case it was all the education he had gained from seven years in london. chapter xvi the press ( ) at ten o'clock of a july night, in heat that made the tropical rain-shower simmer, the adams family and the motley family clambered down the side of their cunard steamer into the government tugboat, which set them ashore in black darkness at the end of some north river pier. had they been tyrian traders of the year b.c. landing from a galley fresh from gibraltar, they could hardly have been stranger on the shore of a world, so changed from what it had been ten years before. the historian of the dutch, no longer historian but diplomatist, started up an unknown street, in company with the private secretary who had become private citizen, in search of carriages to convey the two parties to the brevoort house. the pursuit was arduous but successful. towards midnight they found shelter once more in their native land. how much its character had changed or was changing, they could not wholly know, and they could but partly feel. for that matter, the land itself knew no more than they. society in america was always trying, almost as blindly as an earthworm, to realize and understand itself; to catch up with its own head, and to twist about in search of its tail. society offered the profile of a long, straggling caravan, stretching loosely towards the prairies, its few score of leaders far in advance and its millions of immigrants, negroes, and indians far in the rear, somewhere in archaic time. it enjoyed the vast advantage over europe that all seemed, for the moment, to move in one direction, while europe wasted most of its energy in trying several contradictory movements at once; but whenever europe or asia should be polarized or oriented towards the same point, america might easily lose her lead. meanwhile each newcomer needed to slip into a place as near the head of the caravan as possible, and needed most to know where the leaders could be found. one could divine pretty nearly where the force lay, since the last ten years had given to the great mechanical energies--coal, iron, steam--a distinct superiority in power over the old industrial elements--agriculture, handwork, and learning; but the result of this revolution on a survivor from the fifties resembled the action of the earthworm; he twisted about, in vain, to recover his starting-point; he could no longer see his own trail; he had become an estray; a flotsam or jetsam of wreckage; a belated reveller, or a scholar-gipsy like matthew arnold's. his world was dead. not a polish jew fresh from warsaw or cracow--not a furtive yacoob or ysaac still reeking of the ghetto, snarling a weird yiddish to the officers of the customs--but had a keener instinct, an intenser energy, and a freer hand than he--american of americans, with heaven knew how many puritans and patriots behind him, and an education that had cost a civil war. he made no complaint and found no fault with his time; he was no worse off than the indians or the buffalo who had been ejected from their heritage by his own people; but he vehemently insisted that he was not himself at fault. the defeat was not due to him, nor yet to any superiority of his rivals. he had been unfairly forced out of the track, and must get back into it as best he could. one comfort he could enjoy to the full. little as he might be fitted for the work that was before him, he had only to look at his father and motley to see figures less fitted for it than he. all were equally survivals from the forties--bric-a-brac from the time of louis philippe; stylists; doctrinaires; ornaments that had been more or less suited to the colonial architecture, but which never had much value in desbrosses street or fifth avenue. they could scarcely have earned five dollars a day in any modern industry. the men who commanded high pay were as a rule not ornamental. even commodore vanderbilt and jay gould lacked social charm. doubtless the country needed ornament--needed it very badly indeed--but it needed energy still more, and capital most of all, for its supply was ridiculously out of proportion to its wants. on the new scale of power, merely to make the continent habitable for civilized people would require an immediate outlay that would have bankrupted the world. as yet, no portion of the world except a few narrow stretches of western europe had ever been tolerably provided with the essentials of comfort and convenience; to fit out an entire continent with roads and the decencies of life would exhaust the credit of the entire planet. such an estimate seemed outrageous to a texan member of congress who loved the simplicity of nature's noblemen; but the mere suggestion that a sun existed above him would outrage the self-respect of a deep-sea fish that carried a lantern on the end of its nose. from the moment that railways were introduced, life took on extravagance. thus the belated reveller who landed in the dark at the desbrosses street ferry, found his energies exhausted in the effort to see his own length. the new americans, of whom he was to be one, must, whether they were fit or unfit, create a world of their own, a science, a society, a philosophy, a universe, where they had not yet created a road or even learned to dig their own iron. they had no time for thought; they saw, and could see, nothing beyond their day's work; their attitude to the universe outside them was that of the deep-sea fish. above all, they naturally and intensely disliked to be told what to do, and how to do it, by men who took their ideas and their methods from the abstract theories of history, philosophy, or theology. they knew enough to know that their world was one of energies quite new. all this, the newcomer understood and accepted, since he could not help himself and saw that the american could help himself as little as the newcomer; but the fact remained that the more he knew, the less he was educated. society knew as much as this, and seemed rather inclined to boast of it, at least on the stump; but the leaders of industry betrayed no sentiment, popular or other. they used, without qualm, whatever instruments they found at hand. they had been obliged, in , to turn aside and waste immense energy in settling what had been settled a thousand years before, and should never have been revived. at prodigious expense, by sheer force, they broke resistance down, leaving everything but the mere fact of power untouched, since nothing else had a solution. race and thought were beyond reach. having cleared its path so far, society went back to its work, and threw itself on that which stood first--its roads. the field was vast; altogether beyond its power to control offhand; and society dropped every thought of dealing with anything more than the single fraction called a railway system. this relatively small part of its task was still so big as to need the energies of a generation, for it required all the new machinery to be created--capital, banks, mines, furnaces, shops, power-houses, technical knowledge, mechanical population, together with a steady remodelling of social and political habits, ideas, and institutions to fit the new scale and suit the new conditions. the generation between and was already mortgaged to the railways, and no one knew it better than the generation itself. whether henry adams knew it or not, he knew enough to act as though he did. he reached quincy once more, ready for the new start. his brother charles had determined to strike for the railroads; henry was to strike for the press; and they hoped to play into each other's hands. they had great need, for they found no one else to play with. after discovering the worthlessness of a so-called education, they had still to discover the worthlessness of so-called social connection. no young man had a larger acquaintance and relationship than henry adams, yet he knew no one who could help him. he was for sale, in the open market. so were many of his friends. all the world knew it, and knew too that they were cheap; to be bought at the price of a mechanic. there was no concealment, no delicacy, and no illusion about it. neither he nor his friends complained; but he felt sometimes a little surprised that, as far as he knew, no one, seeking in the labor market, ever so much as inquired about their fitness. the want of solidarity between old and young seemed american. the young man was required to impose himself, by the usual business methods, as a necessity on his elders, in order to compel them to buy him as an investment. as adams felt it, he was in a manner expected to blackmail. many a young man complained to him in after life of the same experience, which became a matter of curious reflection as he grew old. the labor market of good society was ill-organized. boston seemed to offer no market for educated labor. a peculiar and perplexing amalgam boston always was, and although it had changed much in ten years, it was not less perplexing. one no longer dined at two o'clock; one could no longer skate on back bay; one heard talk of bostonians worth five millions or more as something not incredible. yet the place seemed still simple, and less restless-minded than ever before. in the line that adams had chosen to follow, he needed more than all else the help of the press, but any shadow of hope on that side vanished instantly. the less one meddled with the boston press, the better. all the newspapermen were clear on that point. the same was true of politics. boston meant business. the bostonians were building railways. adams would have liked to help in building railways, but had no education. he was not fit. he passed three or four months thus, visiting relations, renewing friendships, and studying the situation. at thirty years old, the man who has not yet got further than to study the situation, is lost, or near it. he could see nothing in the situation that could be of use to him. his friends had won no more from it than he. his brother charles, after three years of civil life, was no better off than himself, except for being married and in greater need of income. his brother john had become a brilliant political leader on the wrong side. no one had yet regained the lost ground of the war. he went to newport and tried to be fashionable, but even in the simple life of , he failed as fashion. all the style he had learned so painfully in london was worse than useless in america where every standard was different. newport was charming, but it asked for no education and gave none. what it gave was much gayer and pleasanter, and one enjoyed it amazingly; but friendships in that society were a kind of social partnership, like the classes at college; not education but the subjects of education. all were doing the same thing, and asking the same question of the future. none could help. society seemed founded on the law that all was for the best new yorkers in the best of newports, and that all young people were rich if they could waltz. it was a new version of the ant and grasshopper. at the end of three months, the only person, among the hundreds he had met, who had offered him a word of encouragement or had shown a sign of acquaintance with his doings, was edward atkinson. boston was cool towards sons, whether prodigals or other, and needed much time to make up its mind what to do for them--time which adams, at thirty years old, could hardly spare. he had not the courage or self-confidence to hire an office in state street, as so many of his friends did, and doze there alone, vacuity within and a snowstorm outside, waiting for fortune to knock at the door, or hoping to find her asleep in the elevator; or on the staircase, since elevators were not yet in use. whether this course would have offered his best chance he never knew; it was one of the points in practical education which most needed a clear understanding, and he could never reach it. his father and mother would have been glad to see him stay with them and begin reading blackstone again, and he showed no very filial tenderness by abruptly breaking the tie that had lasted so long. after all, perhaps beacon street was as good as any other street for his objects in life; possibly his easiest and surest path was from beacon street to state street and back again, all the days of his years. who could tell? even after life was over, the doubt could not be determined. in thus sacrificing his heritage, he only followed the path that had led him from the beginning. boston was full of his brothers. he had reckoned from childhood on outlawry as his peculiar birthright. the mere thought of beginning life again in mount vernon street lowered the pulsations of his heart. this is a story of education--not a mere lesson of life--and, with education, temperament has in strictness nothing to do, although in practice they run close together. neither by temperament nor by education was he fitted for boston. he had drifted far away and behind his companions there; no one trusted his temperament or education; he had to go. since no other path seemed to offer itself, he stuck to his plan of joining the press, and selected washington as the shortest road to new york, but, in , washington stood outside the social pale. no bostonian had ever gone there. one announced one's self as an adventurer and an office-seeker, a person of deplorably bad judgment, and the charges were true. the chances of ending in the gutter were, at best, even. the risk was the greater in adams's case, because he had no very clear idea what to do when he got there. that he must educate himself over again, for objects quite new, in an air altogether hostile to his old educations, was the only certainty; but how he was to do it--how he was to convert the idler in rotten row into the lobbyist of the capital--he had not an idea, and no one to teach him. the question of money is rarely serious for a young american unless he is married, and money never troubled adams more than others; not because he had it, but because he could do without it, like most people in washington who all lived on the income of bricklayers; but with or without money he met the difficulty that, after getting to washington in order to go on the press, it was necessary to seek a press to go on. for large work he could count on the north american review, but this was scarcely a press. for current discussion and correspondence, he could depend on the new york nation; but what he needed was a new york daily, and no new york daily needed him. he lost his one chance by the death of henry j. raymond. the tribune under horace greeley was out of the question both for political and personal reasons, and because whitelaw reid had already undertaken that singularly venturesome position, amid difficulties that would have swamped adams in four-and-twenty hours. charles a. dana had made the sun a very successful as well as a very amusing paper, but had hurt his own social position in doing it; and adams knew himself well enough to know that he could never please himself and dana too; with the best intentions, he must always fail as a blackguard, and at that time a strong dash of blackguardism was life to the sun. as for the new york herald, it was a despotic empire admitting no personality but that of bennett. thus, for the moment, the new york daily press offered no field except the free-trade holy land of the evening post under william cullen bryant, while beside it lay only the elevated plateau of the new jerusalem occupied by godkin and the nation. much as adams liked godkin, and glad as he was to creep under the shelter of the evening post and the nation, he was well aware that he should find there only the same circle of readers that he reached in the north american review. the outlook was dim, but it was all he had, and at washington, except for the personal friendship of mr. evarts who was then attorney general and living there, he would stand in solitude much like that of london in . evarts did what no one in boston seemed to care for doing; he held out a hand to the young man. whether boston, like salem, really shunned strangers, or whether evarts was an exception even in new york, he had the social instinct which boston had not. generous by nature, prodigal in hospitality, fond of young people, and a born man-of-the-world, evarts gave and took liberally, without scruple, and accepted the world without fearing or abusing it. his wit was the least part of his social attraction. his talk was broad and free. he laughed where he could; he joked if a joke was possible; he was true to his friends, and never lost his temper or became ill-natured. like all new yorkers he was decidedly not a bostonian; but he was what one might call a transplanted new englander, like general sherman; a variety, grown in ranker soil. in the course of life, and in widely different countries, adams incurred heavy debts of gratitude to persons on whom he had no claim and to whom he could seldom make return; perhaps half-a-dozen such debts remained unpaid at last, although six is a large number as lives go; but kindness seldom came more happily than when mr. evarts took him to washington in october, . adams accepted the hospitality of the sleeper, with deep gratitude, the more because his first struggle with a sleeping-car made him doubt the value--to him--of a pullman civilization; but he was even more grateful for the shelter of mr. evarts's house in h street at the corner of fourteenth, where he abode in safety and content till he found rooms in the roomless village. to him the village seemed unchanged. had he not known that a great war and eight years of astonishing movement had passed over it, he would have noticed nothing that betrayed growth. as of old, houses were few; rooms fewer; even the men were the same. no one seemed to miss the usual comforts of civilization, and adams was glad to get rid of them, for his best chance lay in the eighteenth century. the first step, of course, was the making of acquaintance, and the first acquaintance was naturally the president, to whom an aspirant to the press officially paid respect. evarts immediately took him to the white house and presented him to president andrew johnson. the interview was brief and consisted in the stock remark common to monarchs and valets, that the young man looked even younger than he was. the younger man felt even younger than he looked. he never saw the president again, and never felt a wish to see him, for andrew johnson was not the sort of man whom a young reformer of thirty, with two or three foreign educations, was likely to see with enthusiasm; yet, musing over the interview as a matter of education, long years afterwards, he could not help recalling the president's figure with a distinctness that surprised him. the old-fashioned southern senator and statesman sat in his chair at his desk with a look of self-esteem that had its value. none doubted. all were great men; some, no doubt, were greater than others; but all were statesmen and all were supported, lifted, inspired by the moral certainty of rightness. to them the universe was serious, even solemn, but it was their universe, a southern conception of right. lamar used to say that he never entertained a doubt of the soundness of the southern system until he found that slavery could not stand a war. slavery was only a part of the southern system, and the life of it all--the vigor--the poetry--was its moral certainty of self. the southerner could not doubt; and this self-assurance not only gave andrew johnson the look of a true president, but actually made him one. when adams came to look back on it afterwards, he was surprised to realize how strong the executive was in --perhaps the strongest he was ever to see. certainly he never again found himself so well satisfied, or so much at home. seward was still secretary of state. hardly yet an old man, though showing marks of time and violence, mr. seward seemed little changed in these eight years. he was the same--with a difference. perhaps he--unlike henry adams--had at last got an education, and all he wanted. perhaps he had resigned himself to doing without it. whatever the reason, although his manner was as roughly kind as ever, and his talk as free, he appeared to have closed his account with the public; he no longer seemed to care; he asked nothing, gave nothing, and invited no support; he talked little of himself or of others, and waited only for his discharge. adams was well pleased to be near him in these last days of his power and fame, and went much to his house in the evenings when he was sure to be at his whist. at last, as the end drew near, wanting to feel that the great man--the only chief he ever served even as a volunteer--recognized some personal relation, he asked mr. seward to dine with him one evening in his rooms, and play his game of whist there, as he did every night in his own house. mr. seward came and had his whist, and adams remembered his rough parting speech: "a very sensible entertainment!" it was the only favor he ever asked of mr. seward, and the only one he ever accepted. thus, as a teacher of wisdom, after twenty years of example, governor seward passed out of one's life, and adams lost what should have been his firmest ally; but in truth the state department had ceased to be the centre of his interest, and the treasury had taken its place. the secretary of the treasury was a man new to politics--hugh mcculloch--not a person of much importance in the eyes of practical politicians such as young members of the press meant themselves to become, but they all liked mr. mcculloch, though they thought him a stop-gap rather than a force. had they known what sort of forces the treasury was to offer them for support in the generation to come, they might have reflected a long while on their estimate of mcculloch. adams was fated to watch the flittings of many more secretaries than he ever cared to know, and he rather came back in the end to the idea that mcculloch was the best of them, although he seemed to represent everything that one liked least. he was no politician, he had no party, and no power. he was not fashionable or decorative. he was a banker, and towards bankers adams felt the narrow prejudice which the serf feels to his overseer; for he knew he must obey, and he knew that the helpless showed only their helplessness when they tempered obedience by mockery. the world, after , became a bankers' world, and no banker would ever trust one who had deserted state street, and had gone to washington with purposes of doubtful credit, or of no credit at all, for he could not have put up enough collateral to borrow five thousand dollars of any bank in america. the banker never would trust him, and he would never trust the banker. to him, the banking mind was obnoxious; and this antipathy caused him the more surprise at finding mcculloch the broadest, most liberal, most genial, and most practical public man in washington. there could be no doubt of it. the burden of the treasury at that time was very great. the whole financial system was in chaos; every part of it required reform; the utmost experience, tact, and skill could not make the machine work smoothly. no one knew how well mcculloch did it until his successor took it in charge, and tried to correct his methods. adams did not know enough to appreciate mcculloch's technical skill, but he was struck at his open and generous treatment of young men. of all rare qualities, this was, in adams's experience, the rarest. as a rule, officials dread interference. the strongest often resent it most. any official who admits equality in discussion of his official course, feels it to be an act of virtue; after a few months or years he tires of the effort. every friend in power is a friend lost. this rule is so nearly absolute that it may be taken in practice as admitting no exception. apparent exceptions exist, and mcculloch was one of them. mcculloch had been spared the gluttonous selfishness and infantile jealousy which are the commoner results of early political education. he had neither past nor future, and could afford to be careless of his company. adams found him surrounded by all the active and intelligent young men in the country. full of faith, greedy for work, eager for reform, energetic, confident, capable, quick of study, charmed with a fight, equally ready to defend or attack, they were unselfish, and even--as young men went--honest. they came mostly from the army, with the spirit of the volunteers. frank walker, frank barlow, frank bartlett were types of the generation. most of the press, and much of the public, especially in the west, shared their ideas. no one denied the need for reform. the whole government, from top to bottom, was rotten with the senility of what was antiquated and the instability of what was improvised. the currency was only one example; the tariff was another; but the whole fabric required reconstruction as much as in , for the constitution had become as antiquated as the confederation. sooner or later a shock must come, the more dangerous the longer postponed. the civil war had made a new system in fact; the country would have to reorganize the machinery in practice and theory. one might discuss indefinitely the question which branch of government needed reform most urgently; all needed it enough, but no one denied that the finances were a scandal, and a constant, universal nuisance. the tariff was worse, though more interests upheld it. mcculloch had the singular merit of facing reform with large good-nature and willing sympathy--outside of parties, jobs, bargains, corporations or intrigues--which adams never was to meet again. chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit. the civil war had bred life. the army bred courage. young men of the volunteer type were not always docile under control, but they were handy in a fight. adams was greatly pleased to be admitted as one of them. he found himself much at home with them--more at home than he ever had been before, or was ever to be again--in the atmosphere of the treasury. he had no strong party passion, and he felt as though he and his friends owned this administration, which, in its dying days, had neither friends nor future except in them. these were not the only allies; the whole government in all its branches was alive with them. just at that moment the supreme court was about to take up the legal tender cases where judge curtis had been employed to argue against the constitutional power of the government to make an artificial standard of value in time of peace. evarts was anxious to fix on a line of argument that should have a chance of standing up against that of judge curtis, and was puzzled to do it. he did not know which foot to put forward. about to deal with judge curtis, the last of the strong jurists of marshall's school, he could risk no chances. in doubt, the quickest way to clear one's mind is to discuss, and evarts deliberately forced discussion. day after day, driving, dining, walking he provoked adams to dispute his positions. he needed an anvil, he said, to hammer his ideas on. adams was flattered at being an anvil, which is, after all, more solid than the hammer; and he did not feel called on to treat mr. evarts's arguments with more respect than mr. evarts himself expressed for them; so he contradicted with freedom. like most young men, he was much of a doctrinaire, and the question was, in any event, rather historical or political than legal. he could easily maintain, by way of argument, that the required power had never been given, and that no sound constitutional reason could possibly exist for authorizing the government to overthrow the standard of value without necessity, in time of peace. the dispute itself had not much value for him, even as education, but it led to his seeking light from the chief justice himself. following up the subject for his letters to the nation and his articles in the north american review, adams grew to be intimate with the chief justice, who, as one of the oldest and strongest leaders of the free soil party, had claims to his personal regard; for the old free soilers were becoming few. like all strong-willed and self-asserting men, mr. chase had the faults of his qualities. he was never easy to drive in harness, or light in hand. he saw vividly what was wrong, and did not always allow for what was relatively right. he loved power as though he were still a senator. his position towards legal tender was awkward. as secretary of the treasury he had been its author; as chief justice he became its enemy. legal tender caused no great pleasure or pain in the sum of life to a newspaper correspondent, but it served as a subject for letters, and the chief justice was very willing to win an ally in the press who would tell his story as he wished it to be read. the intimacy in mr. chase's house grew rapidly, and the alliance was no small help to the comforts of a struggling newspaper adventurer in washington. no matter what one might think of his politics or temper, mr. chase was a dramatic figure, of high senatorial rank, if also of certain senatorial faults; a valuable ally. as was sure, sooner or later, to happen, adams one day met charles sumner on the street, and instantly stopped to greet him. as though eight years of broken ties were the natural course of friendship, sumner at once, after an exclamation of surprise, dropped back into the relation of hero to the school boy. adams enjoyed accepting it. he was then thirty years old and sumner was fifty-seven; he had seen more of the world than sumner ever dreamed of, and he felt a sort of amused curiosity to be treated once more as a child. at best, the renewal of broken relations is a nervous matter, and in this case it bristled with thorns, for sumner's quarrel with mr. adams had not been the most delicate of his ruptured relations, and he was liable to be sensitive in many ways that even bostonians could hardly keep in constant mind; yet it interested and fascinated henry adams as a new study of political humanity. the younger man knew that the meeting would have to come, and was ready for it, if only as a newspaper need; but to sumner it came as a surprise and a disagreeable one, as adams conceived. he learned something--a piece of practical education worth the effort--by watching sumner's behavior. he could see that many thoughts--mostly unpleasant--were passing through his mind, since he made no inquiry about any of adams's family, or allusion to any of his friends or his residence abroad. he talked only of the present. to him, adams in washington should have seemed more or less of a critic, perhaps a spy, certainly an intriguer or adventurer, like scores of others; a politician without party; a writer without principles; an office-seeker certain to beg for support. all this was, for his purposes, true. adams could do him no good, and would be likely to do him all the harm in his power. adams accepted it all; expected to be kept at arm's length; admitted that the reasons were just. he was the more surprised to see that sumner invited a renewal of old relations. he found himself treated almost confidentially. not only was he asked to make a fourth at sumner's pleasant little dinners in the house on la fayette square, but he found himself admitted to the senator's study and informed of his views, policy and purposes, which were sometimes even more astounding than his curious gaps or lapses of omniscience. on the whole, the relation was the queerest that henry adams ever kept up. he liked and admired sumner, but thought his mind a pathological study. at times he inclined to think that sumner felt his solitude, and, in the political wilderness, craved educated society; but this hardly told the whole story. sumner's mind had reached the calm of water which receives and reflects images without absorbing them; it contained nothing but itself. the images from without, the objects mechanically perceived by the senses, existed by courtesy until the mental surface was ruffled, but never became part of the thought. henry adams roused no emotion; if he had roused a disagreeable one, he would have ceased to exist. the mind would have mechanically rejected, as it had mechanically admitted him. not that sumner was more aggressively egoistic than other senators--conkling, for instance--but that with him the disease had affected the whole mind; it was chronic and absolute; while, with other senators for the most part, it was still acute. perhaps for this very reason, sumner was the more valuable acquaintance for a newspaper-man. adams found him most useful; perhaps quite the most useful of all these great authorities who were the stock-in-trade of the newspaper business; the accumulated capital of a silurian age. a few months or years more, and they were gone. in , they were like the town itself, changing but not changed. la fayette square was society. within a few hundred yards of mr. clark mills's nursery monument to the equestrian seat of andrew jackson, one found all one's acquaintance as well as hotels, banks, markets and national government. beyond the square the country began. no rich or fashionable stranger had yet discovered the town. no literary or scientific man, no artist, no gentleman without office or employment, had ever lived there. it was rural, and its society was primitive. scarcely a person in it had ever known life in a great city. mr. evarts, mr. sam hooper, of boston, and perhaps one or two of the diplomatists had alone mixed in that sort of world. the happy village was innocent of a club. the one-horse tram on f street to the capitol was ample for traffic. every pleasant spring morning at the pennsylvania station, society met to bid good-bye to its friends going off on the single express. the state department was lodged in an infant asylum far out on fourteenth street while mr. mullett was constructing his architectural infant asylum next the white house. the value of real estate had not increased since , and the pavements were more impassable than the mud. all this favored a young man who had come to make a name. in four-and-twenty hours he could know everybody; in two days everybody knew him. after seven years' arduous and unsuccessful effort to explore the outskirts of london society, the washington world offered an easy and delightful repose. when he looked round him, from the safe shelter of mr. evarts's roof, on the men he was to work with--or against--he had to admit that nine-tenths of his acquired education was useless, and the other tenth harmful. he would have to begin again from the beginning. he must learn to talk to the western congressman, and to hide his own antecedents. the task was amusing. he could see nothing to prevent him from enjoying it, with immoral unconcern for all that had gone before and for anything that might follow. the lobby offered a spectacle almost picturesque. few figures on the paris stage were more entertaining and dramatic than old sam ward, who knew more of life than all the departments of the government together, including the senate and the smithsonian. society had not much to give, but what it had, it gave with an open hand. for the moment, politics had ceased to disturb social relations. all parties were mixed up and jumbled together in a sort of tidal slack-water. the government resembled adams himself in the matter of education. all that had gone before was useless, and some of it was worse. chapter xvii president grant ( ) the first effect of this leap into the unknown was a fit of low spirits new to the young man's education; due in part to the overpowering beauty and sweetness of the maryland autumn, almost unendurable for its strain on one who had toned his life down to the november grays and browns of northern europe. life could not go on so beautiful and so sad. luckily, no one else felt it or knew it. he bore it as well as he could, and when he picked himself up, winter had come, and he was settled in bachelor's quarters, as modest as those of a clerk in the departments, far out on g street, towards georgetown, where an old finn named dohna, who had come out with the russian minister stoeckel long before, had bought or built a new house. congress had met. two or three months remained to the old administration, but all interest centred in the new one. the town began to swarm with office-seekers, among whom a young writer was lost. he drifted among them, unnoticed, glad to learn his work under cover of the confusion. he never aspired to become a regular reporter; he knew he should fail in trying a career so ambitious and energetic; but he picked up friends on the press--nordhoff, murat halstead, henry watterson, sam bowles--all reformers, and all mixed and jumbled together in a tidal wave of expectation, waiting for general grant to give orders. no one seemed to know much about it. even senators had nothing to say. one could only make notes and study finance. in waiting, he amused himself as he could. in the amusements of washington, education had no part, but the simplicity of the amusements proved the simplicity of everything else, ambitions, interests, thoughts, and knowledge. proverbially washington was a poor place for education, and of course young diplomats avoided or disliked it, but, as a rule, diplomats disliked every place except paris, and the world contained only one paris. they abused london more violently than washington; they praised no post under the sun; and they were merely describing three-fourths of their stations when they complained that there were no theatres, no restaurants, no monde, no demi-monde, no drives, no splendor, and, as mme. de struve used to say, no grandezza. this was all true; washington was a mere political camp, as transient and temporary as a camp-meeting for religious revival, but the diplomats had least reason to complain, since they were more sought for there than they would ever be elsewhere. for young men washington was in one way paradise, since they were few, and greatly in demand. after watching the abject unimportance of the young diplomat in london society, adams found himself a young duke in washington. he had ten years of youth to make up, and a ravenous appetite. washington was the easiest society he had ever seen, and even the bostonian became simple, good-natured, almost genial, in the softness of a washington spring. society went on excellently well without houses, or carriages, or jewels, or toilettes, or pavements, or shops, or grandezza of any sort; and the market was excellent as well as cheap. one could not stay there a month without loving the shabby town. even the washington girl, who was neither rich nor well-dressed nor well-educated nor clever, had singular charm, and used it. according to mr. adams the father, this charm dated back as far as monroe's administration, to his personal knowledge. therefore, behind all the processes of political or financial or newspaper training, the social side of washington was to be taken for granted as three-fourths of existence. its details matter nothing. life ceased to be strenuous, and the victim thanked god for it. politics and reform became the detail, and waltzing the profession. adams was not alone. senator sumner had as private secretary a young man named moorfield storey, who became a dangerous example of frivolity. the new attorney-general, e. r. hoar, brought with him from concord a son, sam hoar, whose example rivalled that of storey. another impenitent was named dewey, a young naval officer. adams came far down in the list. he wished he had been higher. he could have spared a world of superannuated history, science, or politics, to have reversed better in waltzing. he had no adequate notion how little he knew, especially of women, and washington offered no standard of comparison. all were profoundly ignorant together, and as indifferent as children to education. no one needed knowledge. washington was happier without style. certainly adams was happier without it; happier than he had ever been before; happier than any one in the harsh world of strenuousness could dream of. this must be taken as background for such little education as he gained; but the life belonged to the eighteenth century, and in no way concerned education for the twentieth. in such an atmosphere, one made no great pretence of hard work. if the world wants hard work, the world must pay for it; and, if it will not pay, it has no fault to find with the worker. thus far, no one had made a suggestion of pay for any work that adams had done or could do; if he worked at all, it was for social consideration, and social pleasure was his pay. for this he was willing to go on working, as an artist goes on painting when no one buys his pictures. artists have done it from the beginning of time, and will do it after time has expired, since they cannot help themselves, and they find their return in the pride of their social superiority as they feel it. society commonly abets them and encourages their attitude of contempt. the society of washington was too simple and southern as yet, to feel anarchistic longings, and it never read or saw what artists produced elsewhere, but it good-naturedly abetted them when it had the chance, and respected itself the more for the frailty. adams found even the government at his service, and every one willing to answer his questions. he worked, after a fashion; not very hard, but as much as the government would have required of him for nine hundred dollars a year; and his work defied frivolity. he got more pleasure from writing than the world ever got from reading him, for his work was not amusing, nor was he. one must not try to amuse moneylenders or investors, and this was the class to which he began by appealing. he gave three months to an article on the finances of the united states, just then a subject greatly needing treatment; and when he had finished it, he sent it to london to his friend henry reeve, the ponderous editor of the edinburgh review. reeve probably thought it good; at all events, he said so; and he printed it in april. of course it was reprinted in america, but in england such articles were still anonymous, and the author remained unknown. the author was not then asking for advertisement, and made no claim for credit. his object was literary. he wanted to win a place on the staff of the edinburgh review, under the vast shadow of lord macaulay; and, to a young american in , such rank seemed colossal--the highest in the literary world--as it had been only five-and-twenty years before. time and tide had flowed since then, but the position still flattered vanity, though it brought no other flattery or reward except the regular thirty pounds of pay--fifty dollars a month, measured in time and labor. the edinburgh article finished, he set himself to work on a scheme for the north american review. in england, lord robert cecil had invented for the london quarterly an annual review of politics which he called the "session." adams stole the idea and the name--he thought he had been enough in lord robert's house, in days of his struggle with adversity, to excuse the theft--and began what he meant for a permanent series of annual political reviews which he hoped to make, in time, a political authority. with his sources of information, and his social intimacies at washington, he could not help saying something that would command attention. he had the field to himself, and he meant to give himself a free hand, as he went on. whether the newspapers liked it or not, they would have to reckon with him; for such a power, once established, was more effective than all the speeches in congress or reports to the president that could be crammed into the government presses. the first of these "sessions" appeared in april, but it could not be condensed into a single article, and had to be supplemented in october by another which bore the title of "civil service reform," and was really a part of the same review. a good deal of authentic history slipped into these papers. whether any one except his press associates ever read them, he never knew and never greatly cared. the difference is slight, to the influence of an author, whether he is read by five hundred readers, or by five hundred thousand; if he can select the five hundred, he reaches the five hundred thousand. the fateful year was near at hand, which was to mark the close of the literary epoch, when quarterlies gave way to monthlies; letter-press to illustration; volumes to pages. the outburst was brilliant. bret harte led, and robert louis stevenson followed. guy de maupassant and rudyard kipling brought up the rear, and dazzled the world. as usual, adams found himself fifty years behind his time, but a number of belated wanderers kept him company, and they produced on each other the effect or illusion of a public opinion. they straggled apart, at longer and longer intervals, through the procession, but they were still within hearing distance of each other. the drift was still superficially conservative. just as the church spoke with apparent authority, or the quarterlies laid down an apparent law, and no one could surely say where the real authority, or the real law, lay. science did not know. truths a priori held their own against truths surely relative. according to lowell, right was forever on the scaffold, wrong was forever on the throne; and most people still thought they believed it. adams was not the only relic of the eighteenth century, and he could still depend on a certain number of listeners--mostly respectable, and some rich. want of audience did not trouble him; he was well enough off in that respect, and would have succeeded in all his calculations if this had been his only hazard. where he broke down was at a point where he always suffered wreck and where nine adventurers out of ten make their errors. one may be more or less certain of organized forces; one can never be certain of men. he belonged to the eighteenth century, and the eighteenth century upset all his plans. for the moment, america was more eighteenth century than himself; it reverted to the stone age. as education--of a certain sort--the story had probably a certain value, though he could never see it. one seldom can see much education in the buck of a broncho; even less in the kick of a mule. the lesson it teaches is only that of getting out of the animal's way. this was the lesson that henry adams had learned over and over again in politics since . at least four-fifths of the american people--adams among the rest--had united in the election of general grant to the presidency, and probably had been more or less affected in their choice by the parallel they felt between grant and washington. nothing could be more obvious. grant represented order. he was a great soldier, and the soldier always represented order. he might be as partisan as he pleased, but a general who had organized and commanded half a million or a million men in the field, must know how to administer. even washington, who was, in education and experience, a mere cave-dweller, had known how to organize a government, and had found jeffersons and hamiltons to organize his departments. the task of bringing the government back to regular practices, and of restoring moral and mechanical order to administration, was not very difficult; it was ready to do it itself, with a little encouragement. no doubt the confusion, especially in the old slave states and in the currency, was considerable, but, the general disposition was good, and every one had echoed that famous phrase: "let us have peace." adams was young and easily deceived, in spite of his diplomatic adventures, but even at twice his age he could not see that this reliance on grant was unreasonable. had grant been a congressman one would have been on one's guard, for one knew the type. one never expected from a congressman more than good intentions and public spirit. newspaper-men as a rule had no great respect for the lower house; senators had less; and cabinet officers had none at all. indeed, one day when adams was pleading with a cabinet officer for patience and tact in dealing with representatives, the secretary impatiently broke out: "you can't use tact with a congressman! a congressman is a hog! you must take a stick and hit him on the snout!" adams knew far too little, compared with the secretary, to contradict him, though he thought the phrase somewhat harsh even as applied to the average congressman of --he saw little or nothing of later ones--but he knew a shorter way of silencing criticism. he had but to ask: "if a congressman is a hog, what is a senator?" this innocent question, put in a candid spirit, petrified any executive officer that ever sat a week in his office. even adams admitted that senators passed belief. the comic side of their egotism partly disguised its extravagance, but faction had gone so far under andrew johnson that at times the whole senate seemed to catch hysterics of nervous bucking without apparent reason. great leaders, like sumner and conkling, could not be burlesqued; they were more grotesque than ridicule could make them; even grant, who rarely sparkled in epigram, became witty on their account; but their egotism and factiousness were no laughing matter. they did permanent and terrible mischief, as garfield and blaine, and even mckinley and john hay, were to feel. the most troublesome task of a reform president was that of bringing the senate back to decency. therefore no one, and henry adams less than most, felt hope that any president chosen from the ranks of politics or politicians would raise the character of government; and by instinct if not by reason, all the world united on grant. the senate understood what the world expected, and waited in silence for a struggle with grant more serious than that with andrew johnson. newspaper-men were alive with eagerness to support the president against the senate. the newspaper-man is, more than most men, a double personality; and his person feels best satisfied in its double instincts when writing in one sense and thinking in another. all newspaper-men, whatever they wrote, felt alike about the senate. adams floated with the stream. he was eager to join in the fight which he foresaw as sooner or later inevitable. he meant to support the executive in attacking the senate and taking away its two-thirds vote and power of confirmation, nor did he much care how it should be done, for he thought it safer to effect the revolution in than to wait till . with this thought in his mind, he went to the capitol to hear the names announced which should reveal the carefully guarded secret of grant's cabinet. to the end of his life, he wondered at the suddenness of the revolution which actually, within five minutes, changed his intended future into an absurdity so laughable as to make him ashamed of it. he was to hear a long list of cabinet announcements not much weaker or more futile than that of grant, and none of them made him blush, while grant's nominations had the singular effect of making the hearer ashamed, not so much of grant, as of himself. he had made another total misconception of life--another inconceivable false start. yet, unlikely as it seemed, he had missed his motive narrowly, and his intention had been more than sound, for the senators made no secret of saying with senatorial frankness that grant's nominations betrayed his intent as plainly as they betrayed his incompetence. a great soldier might be a baby politician. adams left the capitol, much in the same misty mental condition that he recalled as marking his railway journey to london on may , ; he felt in himself what gladstone bewailed so sadly, "the incapacity of viewing things all round." he knew, without absolutely saying it, that grant had cut short the life which adams had laid out for himself in the future. after such a miscarriage, no thought of effectual reform could revive for at least one generation, and he had no fancy for ineffectual politics. what course could he sail next? he had tried so many, and society had barred them all! for the moment, he saw no hope but in following the stream on which he had launched himself. the new cabinet, as individuals, were not hostile. subsequently grant made changes in the list which were mostly welcome to a bostonian--or should have been--although fatal to adams. the name of hamilton fish, as secretary of state, suggested extreme conservatism and probable deference to sumner. the name of george s. boutwell, as secretary of the treasury, suggested only a somewhat lugubrious joke; mr. boutwell could be described only as the opposite of mr. mcculloch, and meant inertia; or, in plain words, total extinction for any one resembling henry adams. on the other hand, the name of jacob d. cox, as secretary of the interior, suggested help and comfort; while that of judge hoar, as attorney-general, promised friendship. on the whole, the personal outlook, merely for literary purposes, seemed fairly cheerful, and the political outlook, though hazy, still depended on grant himself. no one doubted that grant's intention had been one of reform; that his aim had been to place his administration above politics; and until he should actually drive his supporters away, one might hope to support him. one's little lantern must therefore be turned on grant. one seemed to know him so well, and really knew so little. by chance it happened that adam badeau took the lower suite of rooms at dohna's, and, as it was convenient to have one table, the two men dined together and became intimate. badeau was exceedingly social, though not in appearance imposing. he was stout; his face was red, and his habits were regularly irregular; but he was very intelligent, a good newspaper-man, and an excellent military historian. his life of grant was no ordinary book. unlike most newspaper-men, he was a friendly critic of grant, as suited an officer who had been on the general's staff. as a rule, the newspaper correspondents in washington were unfriendly, and the lobby sceptical. from that side one heard tales that made one's hair stand on end, and the old west point army officers were no more flattering. all described him as vicious, narrow, dull, and vindictive. badeau, who had come to washington for a consulate which was slow to reach him, resorted more or less to whiskey for encouragement, and became irritable, besides being loquacious. he talked much about grant, and showed a certain artistic feeling for analysis of character, as a true literary critic would naturally do. loyal to grant, and still more so to mrs. grant, who acted as his patroness, he said nothing, even when far gone, that was offensive about either, but he held that no one except himself and rawlins understood the general. to him, grant appeared as an intermittent energy, immensely powerful when awake, but passive and plastic in repose. he said that neither he nor the rest of the staff knew why grant succeeded; they believed in him because of his success. for stretches of time, his mind seemed torpid. rawlins and the others would systematically talk their ideas into it, for weeks, not directly, but by discussion among themselves, in his presence. in the end, he would announce the idea as his own, without seeming conscious of the discussion; and would give the orders to carry it out with all the energy that belonged to his nature. they could never measure his character or be sure when he would act. they could never follow a mental process in his thought. they were not sure that he did think. in all this, adams took deep interest, for although he was not, like badeau, waiting for mrs. grant's power of suggestion to act on the general's mind in order to germinate in a consulate or a legation, his portrait gallery of great men was becoming large, and it amused him to add an authentic likeness of the greatest general the world had seen since napoleon. badeau's analysis was rather delicate; infinitely superior to that of sam ward or charles nordhoff. badeau took adams to the white house one evening and introduced him to the president and mrs. grant. first and last, he saw a dozen presidents at the white house, and the most famous were by no means the most agreeable, but he found grant the most curious object of study among them all. about no one did opinions differ so widely. adams had no opinion, or occasion to make one. a single word with grant satisfied him that, for his own good, the fewer words he risked, the better. thus far in life he had met with but one man of the same intellectual or unintellectual type--garibaldi. of the two, garibaldi seemed to him a trifle the more intellectual, but, in both, the intellect counted for nothing; only the energy counted. the type was pre-intellectual, archaic, and would have seemed so even to the cave-dwellers. adam, according to legend, was such a man. in time one came to recognize the type in other men, with differences and variations, as normal; men whose energies were the greater, the less they wasted on thought; men who sprang from the soil to power; apt to be distrustful of themselves and of others; shy; jealous; sometimes vindictive; more or less dull in outward appearance; always needing stimulants, but for whom action was the highest stimulant--the instinct of fight. such men were forces of nature, energies of the prime, like the pteraspis, but they made short work of scholars. they had commanded thousands of such and saw no more in them than in others. the fact was certain; it crushed argument and intellect at once. adams did not feel grant as a hostile force; like badeau he saw only an uncertain one. when in action he was superb and safe to follow; only when torpid he was dangerous. to deal with him one must stand near, like rawlins, and practice more or less sympathetic habits. simple-minded beyond the experience of wall street or state street, he resorted, like most men of the same intellectual calibre, to commonplaces when at a loss for expression: "let us have peace!" or, "the best way to treat a bad law is to execute it"; or a score of such reversible sentences generally to be gauged by their sententiousness; but sometimes he made one doubt his good faith; as when he seriously remarked to a particularly bright young woman that venice would be a fine city if it were drained. in mark twain, this suggestion would have taken rank among his best witticisms; in grant it was a measure of simplicity not singular. robert e. lee betrayed the same intellectual commonplace, in a virginian form, not to the same degree, but quite distinctly enough for one who knew the american. what worried adams was not the commonplace; it was, as usual, his own education. grant fretted and irritated him, like the terebratula, as a defiance of first principles. he had no right to exist. he should have been extinct for ages. the idea that, as society grew older, it grew one-sided, upset evolution, and made of education a fraud. that, two thousand years after alexander the great and julius caesar, a man like grant should be called--and should actually and truly be--the highest product of the most advanced evolution, made evolution ludicrous. one must be as commonplace as grant's own commonplaces to maintain such an absurdity. the progress of evolution from president washington to president grant, was alone evidence enough to upset darwin. education became more perplexing at every phase. no theory was worth the pen that wrote it. america had no use for adams because he was eighteenth-century, and yet it worshipped grant because he was archaic and should have lived in a cave and worn skins. darwinists ought to conclude that america was reverting to the stone age, but the theory of reversion was more absurd than that of evolution. grant's administration reverted to nothing. one could not catch a trait of the past, still less of the future. it was not even sensibly american. not an official in it, except perhaps rawlins whom adams never met, and who died in september, suggested an american idea. yet this administration, which upset adams's whole life, was not unfriendly; it was made up largely of friends. secretary fish was almost kind; he kept the tradition of new york social values; he was human and took no pleasure in giving pain. adams felt no prejudice whatever in his favor, and he had nothing in mind or person to attract regard; his social gifts were not remarkable; he was not in the least magnetic; he was far from young; but he won confidence from the start and remained a friend to the finish. as far as concerned mr. fish, one felt rather happily suited, and one was still better off in the interior department with j. d. cox. indeed, if cox had been in the treasury and boutwell in the interior, one would have been quite satisfied as far as personal relations went, while, in the attorney-general's office, judge hoar seemed to fill every possible ideal, both personal and political. the difficulty was not the want of friends, and had the whole government been filled with them, it would have helped little without the president and the treasury. grant avowed from the start a policy of drift; and a policy of drift attaches only barnacles. at thirty, one has no interest in becoming a barnacle, but even in that character henry adams would have been ill-seen. his friends were reformers, critics, doubtful in party allegiance, and he was himself an object of suspicion. grant had no objects, wanted no help, wished for no champions. the executive asked only to be let alone. this was his meaning when he said: "let us have peace!" no one wanted to go into opposition. as for adams, all his hopes of success in life turned on his finding an administration to support. he knew well enough the rules of self-interest. he was for sale. he wanted to be bought. his price was excessively cheap, for he did not even ask an office, and had his eye, not on the government, but on new york. all he wanted was something to support; something that would let itself be supported. luck went dead against him. for once, he was fifty years in advance of his time. chapter xviii free fight ( - ) the old new englander was apt to be a solitary animal, but the young new englander was sometimes human. judge hoar brought his son sam to washington, and sam hoar loved largely and well. he taught adams the charm of washington spring. education for education, none ever compared with the delight of this. the potomac and its tributaries squandered beauty. rock creek was as wild as the rocky mountains. here and there a negro log cabin alone disturbed the dogwood and the judas-tree, the azalea and the laurel. the tulip and the chestnut gave no sense of struggle against a stingy nature. the soft, full outlines of the landscape carried no hidden horror of glaciers in its bosom. the brooding heat of the profligate vegetation; the cool charm of the running water; the terrific splendor of the june thunder-gust in the deep and solitary woods, were all sensual, animal, elemental. no european spring had shown him the same intermixture of delicate grace and passionate depravity that marked the maryland may. he loved it too much, as though it were greek and half human. he could not leave it, but loitered on into july, falling into the southern ways of the summer village about la fayette square, as one whose rights of inheritance could not be questioned. few americans were so poor as to question them. in spite of the fatal deception--or undeception--about grant's political character, adams's first winter in washington had so much amused him that he had not a thought of change. he loved it too much to question its value. what did he know about its value, or what did any one know? his father knew more about it than any one else in boston, and he was amused to find that his father, whose recollections went back to , betrayed for washington much the same sentimental weakness, and described the society about president monroe much as his son felt the society about president johnson. he feared its effect on young men, with some justice, since it had been fatal to two of his brothers; but he understood the charm, and he knew that a life in quincy or boston was not likely to deaden it. henry was in a savage humor on the subject of boston. he saw boutwells at every counter. he found a personal grief in every tree. fifteen or twenty years afterwards, clarence king used to amuse him by mourning over the narrow escape that nature had made in attaining perfection. except for two mistakes, the earth would have been a success. one of these errors was the inclination of the ecliptic; the other was the differentiation of the sexes, and the saddest thought about the last was that it should have been so modern. adams, in his splenetic temper, held that both these unnecessary evils had wreaked their worst on boston. the climate made eternal war on society, and sex was a species of crime. the ecliptic had inclined itself beyond recovery till life was as thin as the elm trees. of course he was in the wrong. the thinness was in himself, not in boston; but this is a story of education, and adams was struggling to shape himself to his time. boston was trying to do the same thing. everywhere, except in washington, americans were toiling for the same object. every one complained of surroundings, except where, as at washington, there were no surroundings to complain of. boston kept its head better than its neighbors did, and very little time was needed to prove it, even to adams's confusion. before he got back to quincy, the summer was already half over, and in another six weeks the effects of president grant's character showed themselves. they were startling--astounding--terrifying. the mystery that shrouded the famous, classical attempt of jay gould to corner gold in september, , has never been cleared up--at least so far as to make it intelligible to adams. gould was led, by the change at washington, into the belief that he could safely corner gold without interference from the government. he took a number of precautions, which he admitted; and he spent a large sum of money, as he also testified, to obtain assurances which were not sufficient to have satisfied so astute a gambler; yet he made the venture. any criminal lawyer must have begun investigation by insisting, rigorously, that no such man, in such a position, could be permitted to plead that he had taken, and pursued, such a course, without assurances which did satisfy him. the plea was professionally inadmissible. this meant that any criminal lawyer would have been bound to start an investigation by insisting that gould had assurances from the white house or the treasury, since none other could have satisfied him. to young men wasting their summer at quincy for want of some one to hire their services at three dollars a day, such a dramatic scandal was heaven-sent. charles and henry adams jumped at it like salmon at a fly, with as much voracity as jay gould, or his ame damnee jim fisk, had ever shown for erie; and with as little fear of consequences. they risked something; no one could say what; but the people about the erie office were not regarded as lambs. the unravelling a skein so tangled as that of the erie railway was a task that might have given months of labor to the most efficient district attorney, with all his official tools to work with. charles took the railway history; henry took the so-called gold conspiracy; and they went to new york to work it up. the surface was in full view. they had no trouble in wall street, and they paid their respects in person to the famous jim fisk in his opera-house palace; but the new york side of the story helped henry little. he needed to penetrate the political mystery, and for this purpose he had to wait for congress to meet. at first he feared that congress would suppress the scandal, but the congressional investigation was ordered and took place. he soon knew all that was to be known; the material for his essay was furnished by the government. material furnished by a government seldom satisfies critics or historians, for it lies always under suspicion. here was a mystery, and as usual, the chief mystery was the means of making sure that any mystery existed. all adams's great friends--fish, cox, hoar, evarts, sumner, and their surroundings--were precisely the persons most mystified. they knew less than adams did; they sought information, and frankly admitted that their relations with the white house and the treasury were not confidential. no one volunteered advice. no one offered suggestion. one got no light, even from the press, although press agents expressed in private the most damning convictions with their usual cynical frankness. the congressional committee took a quantity of evidence which it dared not probe, and refused to analyze. although the fault lay somewhere on the administration, and could lie nowhere else, the trail always faded and died out at the point where any member of the administration became visible. every one dreaded to press inquiry. adams himself feared finding out too much. he found out too much already, when he saw in evidence that jay gould had actually succeeded in stretching his net over grant's closest surroundings, and that boutwell's incompetence was the bottom of gould's calculation. with the conventional air of assumed confidence, every one in public assured every one else that the president himself was the savior of the situation, and in private assured each other that if the president had not been caught this time, he was sure to be trapped the next, for the ways of wall street were dark and double. all this was wildly exciting to adams. that grant should have fallen, within six months, into such a morass--or should have let boutwell drop him into it--rendered the outlook for the next four years--probably eight--possibly twelve--mysterious, or frankly opaque, to a young man who had hitched his wagon, as emerson told him, to the star of reform. the country might outlive it, but not he. the worst scandals of the eighteenth century were relatively harmless by the side of this, which smirched executive, judiciary, banks, corporate systems, professions, and people, all the great active forces of society, in one dirty cesspool of vulgar corruption. only six months before, this innocent young man, fresh from the cynicism of european diplomacy, had expected to enter an honorable career in the press as the champion and confidant of a new washington, and already he foresaw a life of wasted energy, sweeping the stables of american society clear of the endless corruption which his second washington was quite certain to breed. by vigorously shutting one's eyes, as though one were an assistant secretary, a writer for the press might ignore the erie scandal, and still help his friends or allies in the government who were doing their best to give it an air of decency; but a few weeks showed that the erie scandal was a mere incident, a rather vulgar wall street trap, into which, according to one's point of view grant had been drawn by jay gould, or jay gould had been misled by grant. one could hardly doubt that both of them were astonished and disgusted by the result; but neither jay gould nor any other astute american mind--still less the complex jew--could ever have accustomed itself to the incredible and inexplicable lapses of grant's intelligence; and perhaps, on the whole, gould was the less mischievous victim, if victims they both were. the same laxity that led gould into a trap which might easily have become the penitentiary, led the united states senate, the executive departments and the judiciary into confusion, cross-purposes, and ill-temper that would have been scandalous in a boarding-school of girls. for satirists or comedians, the study was rich and endless, and they exploited its corners with happy results, but a young man fresh from the rustic simplicity of london noticed with horror that the grossest satires on the american senator and politician never failed to excite the laughter and applause of every audience. rich and poor joined in throwing contempt on their own representatives. society laughed a vacant and meaningless derision over its own failure. nothing remained for a young man without position or power except to laugh too. yet the spectacle was no laughing matter to him, whatever it might be to the public. society is immoral and immortal; it can afford to commit any kind of folly, and indulge in any sort of vice; it cannot be killed, and the fragments that survive can always laugh at the dead; but a young man has only one chance, and brief time to seize it. any one in power above him can extinguish the chance. he is horribly at the mercy of fools and cowards. one dull administration can rapidly drive out every active subordinate. at washington, in - , every intelligent man about the government prepared to go. the people would have liked to go too, for they stood helpless before the chaos; some laughed and some raved; all were disgusted; but they had to content themselves by turning their backs and going to work harder than ever on their railroads and foundries. they were strong enough to carry even their politics. only the helpless remained stranded in washington. the shrewdest statesman of all was mr. boutwell, who showed how he understood the situation by turning out of the treasury every one who could interfere with his repose, and then locking himself up in it, alone. what he did there, no one knew. his colleagues asked him in vain. not a word could they get from him, either in the cabinet or out of it, of suggestion or information on matters even of vital interest. the treasury as an active influence ceased to exist. mr. boutwell waited with confidence for society to drag his department out of the mire, as it was sure to do if he waited long enough. warned by his friends in the cabinet as well as in the treasury that mr. boutwell meant to invite no support, and cared to receive none, adams had only the state and interior departments left to serve. he wanted no better than to serve them. opposition was his horror; pure waste of energy; a union with northern democrats and southern rebels who never had much in common with any adams, and had never shown any warm interest about them except to drive them from public life. if mr. boutwell turned him out of the treasury with the indifference or contempt that made even a beetle helpless, mr. fish opened the state department freely, and seemed to talk with as much openness as any newspaper-man could ask. at all events, adams could cling to this last plank of salvation, and make himself perhaps the recognized champion of mr. fish in the new york press. he never once thought of his disaster between seward and sumner in . such an accident could not occur again. fish and sumner were inseparable, and their policy was sure to be safe enough for support. no mosquito could be so unlucky as to be caught a second time between a secretary and a senator who were both his friends. this dream of security lasted hardly longer than that of . adams saw sumner take possession of the department, and he approved; he saw sumner seize the british mission for motley, and he was delighted; but when he renewed his relations with sumner in the winter of - , he began slowly to grasp the idea that sumner had a foreign policy of his own which he proposed also to force on the department. this was not all. secretary fish seemed to have vanished. besides the department of state over which he nominally presided in the infant asylum on fourteenth street, there had risen a department of foreign relations over which senator sumner ruled with a high hand at the capitol; and, finally, one clearly made out a third foreign office in the war department, with president grant himself for chief, pressing a policy of extension in the west indies which no northeastern man ever approved. for his life, adams could not learn where to place himself among all these forces. officially he would have followed the responsible secretary of state, but he could not find the secretary. fish seemed to be friendly towards sumner, and docile towards grant, but he asserted as yet no policy of his own. as for grant's policy, adams never had a chance to know fully what it was, but, as far as he did know, he was ready to give it ardent support. the difficulty came only when he heard sumner's views, which, as he had reason to know, were always commands, to be disregarded only by traitors. little by little, sumner unfolded his foreign policy, and adams gasped with fresh astonishment at every new article of the creed. to his profound regret he heard sumner begin by imposing his veto on all extension within the tropics; which cost the island of st. thomas to the united states, besides the bay of samana as an alternative, and ruined grant's policy. then he listened with incredulous stupor while sumner unfolded his plan for concentrating and pressing every possible american claim against england, with a view of compelling the cession of canada to the united states. adams did not then know--in fact, he never knew, or could find any one to tell him--what was going on behind the doors of the white house. he doubted whether mr. fish or bancroft davis knew much more than he. the game of cross-purposes was as impenetrable in foreign affairs as in the gold conspiracy. president grant let every one go on, but whom he supported, adams could not be expected to divine. one point alone seemed clear to a man--no longer so very young--who had lately come from a seven years' residence in london. he thought he knew as much as any one in washington about england, and he listened with the more perplexity to mr. sumner's talk, because it opened the gravest doubts of sumner's sanity. if war was his object, and canada were worth it, sumner's scheme showed genius, and adams was ready to treat it seriously; but if he thought he could obtain canada from england as a voluntary set-off to the alabama claims, he drivelled. on the point of fact, adams was as peremptory as sumner on the point of policy, but he could only wonder whether mr. fish would dare say it. when at last mr. fish did say it, a year later, sumner publicly cut his acquaintance. adams was the more puzzled because he could not believe sumner so mad as to quarrel both with fish and with grant. a quarrel with seward and andrew johnson was bad enough, and had profited no one; but a quarrel with general grant was lunacy. grant might be whatever one liked, as far as morals or temper or intellect were concerned, but he was not a man whom a light-weight cared to challenge for a fight; and sumner, whether he knew it or not, was a very light weight in the republican party, if separated from his committee of foreign relations. as a party manager he had not the weight of half-a-dozen men whose very names were unknown to him. between these great forces, where was the administration and how was one to support it? one must first find it, and even then it was not easily caught. grant's simplicity was more disconcerting than the complexity of a talleyrand. mr. fish afterwards told adams, with the rather grim humor he sometimes indulged in, that grant took a dislike to motley because he parted his hair in the middle. adams repeated the story to godkin, who made much play with it in the nation, till it was denied. adams saw no reason why it should be denied. grant had as good a right to dislike the hair as the head, if the hair seemed to him a part of it. very shrewd men have formed very sound judgments on less material than hair--on clothes, for example, according to mr. carlyle, or on a pen, according to cardinal de retz--and nine men in ten could hardly give as good a reason as hair for their likes or dislikes. in truth, grant disliked motley at sight, because they had nothing in common; and for the same reason he disliked sumner. for the same reason he would be sure to dislike adams if adams gave him a chance. even fish could not be quite sure of grant, except for the powerful effect which wealth had, or appeared to have, on grant's imagination. the quarrel that lowered over the state department did not break in storm till july, , after adams had vanished, but another quarrel, almost as fatal to adams as that between fish and sumner, worried him even more. of all members of the cabinet, the one whom he had most personal interest in cultivating was attorney general hoar. the legal tender decision, which had been the first stumbling-block to adams at washington, grew in interest till it threatened to become something more serious than a block; it fell on one's head like a plaster ceiling, and could not be escaped. the impending battle between fish and sumner was nothing like so serious as the outbreak between hoar and chief justice chase. adams had come to washington hoping to support the executive in a policy of breaking down the senate, but he never dreamed that he would be required to help in breaking down the supreme court. although, step by step, he had been driven, like the rest of the world, to admit that american society had outgrown most of its institutions, he still clung to the supreme court, much as a churchman clings to his bishops, because they are his only symbol of unity; his last rag of right. between the executive and the legislature, citizens could have no rights; they were at the mercy of power. they had created the court to protect them from unlimited power, and it was little enough protection at best. adams wanted to save the independence of the court at least for his lifetime, and could not conceive that the executive should wish to overthrow it. frank walker shared this feeling, and, by way of helping the court, he had promised adams for the north american review an article on the history of the legal tender act, founded on a volume just then published by spaulding, the putative father of the legal-tender clause in . secretary jacob d. cox, who alone sympathized with reform, saved from boutwell's decree of banishment such reformers as he could find place for, and he saved walker for a time by giving him the census of . walker was obliged to abandon his article for the north american in order to devote himself to the census. he gave adams his notes, and adams completed the article. he had not toiled in vain over the bank of england restriction. he knew enough about legal tender to leave it alone. if the banks and bankers wanted fiat money, fiat money was good enough for a newspaper-man; and if they changed about and wanted "intrinsic" value, gold and silver came equally welcome to a writer who was paid half the wages of an ordinary mechanic. he had no notion of attacking or defending legal tender; his object was to defend the chief justice and the court. walker argued that, whatever might afterwards have been the necessity for legal tender, there was no necessity for it at the time the act was passed. with the help of the chief justice's recollections, adams completed the article, which appeared in the april number of the north american. its ferocity was walker's, for adams never cared to abandon the knife for the hatchet, but walker reeked of the army and the springfield republican, and his energy ran away with adams's restraint. the unfortunate spaulding complained loudly of this treatment, not without justice, but the article itself had serious historical value, for walker demolished every shred of spaulding's contention that legal tender was necessary at the time; and the chief justice told his part of the story with conviction. the chief justice seemed to be pleased. the attorney general, pleased or not, made no sign. the article had enough historical interest to induce adams to reprint it in a volume of essays twenty years afterwards; but its historical value was not its point in education. the point was that, in spite of the best intentions, the plainest self-interest, and the strongest wish to escape further trouble, the article threw adams into opposition. judge hoar, like boutwell, was implacable. hoar went on to demolish the chief justice; while henry adams went on, drifting further and further from the administration. he did this in common with all the world, including hoar himself. scarcely a newspaper in the country kept discipline. the new york tribune was one of the most criminal. dissolution of ties in every direction marked the dissolution of temper, and the senate chamber became again a scene of irritated egotism that passed ridicule. senators quarrelled with each other, and no one objected, but they picked quarrels also with the executive and threw every department into confusion. among others they quarrelled with hoar, and drove him from office. that sumner and hoar, the two new englanders in great position who happened to be the two persons most necessary for his success at washington, should be the first victims of grant's lax rule, must have had some meaning for adams's education, if adams could only have understood what it was. he studied, but failed. sympathy with him was not their weakness. directly, in the form of help, he knew he could hope as little from them as from boutwell. so far from inviting attachment they, like other new englanders, blushed to own a friend. not one of the whole delegation would ever, of his own accord, try to help adams or any other young man who did not beg for it, although they would always accept whatever services they had not to pay for. the lesson of education was not there. the selfishness of politics was the earliest of all political education, and adams had nothing to learn from its study; but the situation struck him as curious--so curious that he devoted years to reflecting upon it. his four most powerful friends had matched themselves, two and two, and were fighting in pairs to a finish; sumner-fish; chase-hoar; with foreign affairs and the judiciary as prizes! what value had the fight in education? adams was puzzled, and was not the only puzzled bystander. the stage-type of statesman was amusing, whether as roscoe conkling or colonel mulberry sellers, but what was his value? the statesmen of the old type, whether sumners or conklings or hoars or lamars, were personally as honest as human nature could produce. they trod with lofty contempt on other people's jobs, especially when there was good in them. yet the public thought that sumner and conkling cost the country a hundred times more than all the jobs they ever trod on; just as lamar and the old southern statesmen, who were also honest in money-matters, cost the country a civil war. this painful moral doubt worried adams less than it worried his friends and the public, but it affected the whole field of politics for twenty years. the newspapers discussed little else than the alleged moral laxity of grant, garfield, and blaine. if the press were taken seriously, politics turned on jobs, and some of adams's best friends, like godkin, ruined their influence by their insistence on points of morals. society hesitated, wavered, oscillated between harshness and laxity, pitilessly sacrificing the weak, and deferentially following the strong. in spite of all such criticism, the public nominated grant, garfield, and blaine for the presidency, and voted for them afterwards, not seeming to care for the question; until young men were forced to see that either some new standard must be created, or none could be upheld. the moral law had expired--like the constitution. grant's administration outraged every rule of ordinary decency, but scores of promising men, whom the country could not well spare, were ruined in saying so. the world cared little for decency. what it wanted, it did not know; probably a system that would work, and men who could work it; but it found neither. adams had tried his own little hands on it, and had failed. his friends had been driven out of washington or had taken to fisticuffs. he himself sat down and stared helplessly into the future. the result was a review of the session for the july north american into which he crammed and condensed everything he thought he had observed and all he had been told. he thought it good history then, and he thought it better twenty years afterwards; he thought it even good enough to reprint. as it happened, in the process of his devious education, this "session" of - proved to be his last study in current politics, and his last dying testament as a humble member of the press. as such, he stood by it. he could have said no more, had he gone on reviewing every session in the rest of the century. the political dilemma was as clear in as it was likely to be in . the system of had broken down, and with it the eighteenth-century fabric of a priori, or moral, principles. politicians had tacitly given it up. grant's administration marked the avowal. nine-tenths of men's political energies must henceforth be wasted on expedients to piece out--to patch--or, in vulgar language, to tinker--the political machine as often as it broke down. such a system, or want of system, might last centuries, if tempered by an occasional revolution or civil war; but as a machine, it was, or soon would be, the poorest in the world--the clumsiest--the most inefficient. here again was an education, but what it was worth he could not guess. indeed, when he raised his eyes to the loftiest and most triumphant results of politics--to mr. boutwell, mr. conkling or even mr. sumner--he could not honestly say that such an education, even when it carried one up to these unattainable heights, was worth anything. there were men, as yet standing on lower levels--clever and amusing men like garfield and blaine--who took no little pleasure in making fun of the senatorial demi-gods, and who used language about grant himself which the north american review would not have admitted. one asked doubtfully what was likely to become of these men in their turn. what kind of political ambition was to result from this destructive political education? yet the sum of political life was, or should have been, the attainment of a working political system. society needed to reach it. if moral standards broke down, and machinery stopped working, new morals and machinery of some sort had to be invented. an eternity of grants, or even of garfields or of conklings or of jay goulds, refused to be conceived as possible. practical americans laughed, and went their way. society paid them to be practical. whenever society cared to pay adams, he too would be practical, take his pay, and hold his tongue; but meanwhile he was driven to associate with democratic congressmen and educate them. he served david wells as an active assistant professor of revenue reform, and turned his rooms into a college. the administration drove him, and thousands of other young men, into active enmity, not only to grant, but to the system or want of system, which took possession of the president. every hope or thought which had brought adams to washington proved to be absurd. no one wanted him; no one wanted any of his friends in reform; the blackmailer alone was the normal product of politics as of business. all this was excessively amusing. adams never had been so busy, so interested, so much in the thick of the crowd. he knew congressmen by scores and newspaper-men by the dozen. he wrote for his various organs all sorts of attacks and defences. he enjoyed the life enormously, and found himself as happy as sam ward or sunset cox; much happier than his friends fish or j. d. cox, or chief justice chase or attorney general hoar or charles sumner. when spring came, he took to the woods, which were best of all, for after the first of april, what maurice de guerin called "the vast maternity" of nature showed charms more voluptuous than the vast paternity of the united states senate. senators were less ornamental than the dogwood or even the judas-tree. they were, as a rule, less good company. adams astonished himself by remarking what a purified charm was lent to the capitol by the greatest possible distance, as one caught glimpses of the dome over miles of forest foliage. at such moments he pondered on the distant beauty of st. peter's and the steps of ara coeli. yet he shortened his spring, for he needed to get back to london for the season. he had finished his new york "gold conspiracy," which he meant for his friend henry reeve and the edinburgh review. it was the best piece of work he had done, but this was not his reason for publishing it in england. the erie scandal had provoked a sort of revolt among respectable new yorkers, as well as among some who were not so respectable; and the attack on erie was beginning to promise success. london was a sensitive spot for the erie management, and it was thought well to strike them there, where they were socially and financially exposed. the tactics suited him in another way, for any expression about america in an english review attracted ten times the attention in america that the same article would attract in the north american. habitually the american dailies reprinted such articles in full. adams wanted to escape the terrors of copyright, his highest ambition was to be pirated and advertised free of charge, since in any case, his pay was nothing. under the excitement of chase he was becoming a pirate himself, and liked it. chapter xix chaos ( ) one fine may afternoon in adams drove again up st. james's street wondering more than ever at the marvels of life. nine years had passed since the historic entrance of may, . outwardly london was the same. outwardly europe showed no great change. palmerston and russell were forgotten; but disraeli and gladstone were still much alive. one's friends were more than ever prominent. john bright was in the cabinet; w. e. forster was about to enter it; reform ran riot. never had the sun of progress shone so fair. evolution from lower to higher raged like an epidemic. darwin was the greatest of prophets in the most evolutionary of worlds. gladstone had overthrown the irish church; was overthrowing the irish landlords; was trying to pass an education act. improvement, prosperity, power, were leaping and bounding over every country road. even america, with her erie scandals and alabama claims, hardly made a discordant note. at the legation, motley ruled; the long adams reign was forgotten; the rebellion had passed into history. in society no one cared to recall the years before the prince of wales. the smart set had come to their own. half the houses that adams had frequented, from to , were closed or closing in . death had ravaged one's circle of friends. mrs. milnes gaskell and her sister miss charlotte wynn were both dead, and mr. james milnes gaskell was no longer in parliament. that field of education seemed closed too. one found one's self in a singular frame of mind--more eighteenth-century than ever--almost rococo--and unable to catch anywhere the cog-wheels of evolution. experience ceased to educate. london taught less freely than of old. that one bad style was leading to another--that the older men were more amusing than the younger--that lord houghton's breakfast-table showed gaps hard to fill--that there were fewer men one wanted to meet--these, and a hundred more such remarks, helped little towards a quicker and more intelligent activity. for english reforms adams cared nothing. the reforms were themselves mediaeval. the education bill of his friend w. e. forster seemed to him a guaranty against all education he had use for. he resented change. he would have kept the pope in the vatican and the queen at windsor castle as historical monuments. he did not care to americanize europe. the bastille or the ghetto was a curiosity worth a great deal of money, if preserved; and so was a bishop; so was napoleon iii. the tourist was the great conservative who hated novelty and adored dirt. adams came back to london without a thought of revolution or restlessness or reform. he wanted amusement, quiet, and gaiety. had he not been born in under the shadow of boston state house, and been brought up in the early victorian epoch, he would have cast off his old skin, and made his court to marlborough house, in partnership with the american woman and the jew banker. common-sense dictated it; but adams and his friends were unfashionable by some law of anglo-saxon custom--some innate atrophy of mind. figuring himself as already a man of action, and rather far up towards the front, he had no idea of making a new effort or catching up with a new world. he saw nothing ahead of him. the world was never more calm. he wanted to talk with ministers about the alabama claims, because he looked on the claims as his own special creation, discussed between him and his father long before they had been discussed by government; he wanted to make notes for his next year's articles; but he had not a thought that, within three months, his world was to be upset, and he under it. frank palgrave came one day, more contentious, contemptuous, and paradoxical than ever, because napoleon iii seemed to be threatening war with germany. palgrave said that "germany would beat france into scraps" if there was war. adams thought not. the chances were always against catastrophes. no one else expected great changes in europe. palgrave was always extreme; his language was incautious--violent! in this year of all years, adams lost sight of education. things began smoothly, and london glowed with the pleasant sense of familiarity and dinners. he sniffed with voluptuous delight the coal-smoke of cheapside and revelled in the architecture of oxford street. may fair never shone so fair to arthur pendennis as it did to the returned american. the country never smiled its velvet smile of trained and easy hostess as it did when he was so lucky as to be asked on a country visit. he loved it all--everything--had always loved it! he felt almost attached to the royal exchange. he thought he owned the st. james's club. he patronized the legation. the first shock came lightly, as though nature were playing tricks on her spoiled child, though she had thus far not exerted herself to spoil him. reeve refused the gold conspiracy. adams had become used to the idea that he was free of the quarterlies, and that his writing would be printed of course; but he was stunned by the reason of refusal. reeve said it would bring half-a-dozen libel suits on him. one knew that the power of erie was almost as great in england as in america, but one was hardly prepared to find it controlling the quarterlies. the english press professed to be shocked in by the erie scandal, as it had professed in to be shocked by the scandal of slavery, but when invited to support those who were trying to abate these scandals, the english press said it was afraid. to adams, reeve's refusal seemed portentous. he and his brother and the north american review were running greater risks every day, and no one thought of fear. that a notorious story, taken bodily from an official document, should scare the edinburgh review into silence for fear of jay gould and jim fisk, passed even adams's experience of english eccentricity, though it was large. he gladly set down reeve's refusal of the gold conspiracy to respectability and editorial law, but when he sent the manuscript on to the quarterly, the editor of the quarterly also refused it. the literary standard of the two quarterlies was not so high as to suggest that the article was illiterate beyond the power of an active and willing editor to redeem it. adams had no choice but to realize that he had to deal in with the same old english character of , and the same inability in himself to understand it. as usual, when an ally was needed, the american was driven into the arms of the radicals. respectability, everywhere and always, turned its back the moment one asked to do it a favor. called suddenly away from england, he despatched the article, at the last moment, to the westminster review and heard no more about it for nearly six months. he had been some weeks in london when he received a telegram from his brother-in-law at the bagni di lucca telling him that his sister had been thrown from a cab and injured, and that he had better come on. he started that night, and reached the bagni di lucca on the second day. tetanus had already set in. the last lesson--the sum and term of education--began then. he had passed through thirty years of rather varied experience without having once felt the shell of custom broken. he had never seen nature--only her surface--the sugar-coating that she shows to youth. flung suddenly in his face, with the harsh brutality of chance, the terror of the blow stayed by him thenceforth for life, until repetition made it more than the will could struggle with; more than he could call on himself to bear. he found his sister, a woman of forty, as gay and brilliant in the terrors of lockjaw as she had been in the careless fun of , lying in bed in consequence of a miserable cab-accident that had bruised her foot. hour by hour the muscles grew rigid, while the mind remained bright, until after ten days of fiendish torture she died in convulsion. one had heard and read a great deal about death, and even seen a little of it, and knew by heart the thousand commonplaces of religion and poetry which seemed to deaden one's senses and veil the horror. society being immortal, could put on immortality at will. adams being mortal, felt only the mortality. death took features altogether new to him, in these rich and sensuous surroundings. nature enjoyed it, played with it, the horror added to her charm, she liked the torture, and smothered her victim with caresses. never had one seen her so winning. the hot italian summer brooded outside, over the market-place and the picturesque peasants, and, in the singular color of the tuscan atmosphere, the hills and vineyards of the apennines seemed bursting with mid-summer blood. the sick-room itself glowed with the italian joy of life; friends filled it; no harsh northern lights pierced the soft shadows; even the dying women shared the sense of the italian summer, the soft, velvet air, the humor, the courage, the sensual fulness of nature and man. she faced death, as women mostly do, bravely and even gaily, racked slowly to unconsciousness, but yielding only to violence, as a soldier sabred in battle. for many thousands of years, on these hills and plains, nature had gone on sabring men and women with the same air of sensual pleasure. impressions like these are not reasoned or catalogued in the mind; they are felt as part of violent emotion; and the mind that feels them is a different one from that which reasons; it is thought of a different power and a different person. the first serious consciousness of nature's gesture--her attitude towards life--took form then as a phantasm, a nightmare, an insanity of force. for the first time, the stage-scenery of the senses collapsed; the human mind felt itself stripped naked, vibrating in a void of shapeless energies, with resistless mass, colliding, crushing, wasting, and destroying what these same energies had created and labored from eternity to perfect. society became fantastic, a vision of pantomime with a mechanical motion; and its so-called thought merged in the mere sense of life, and pleasure in the sense. the usual anodynes of social medicine became evident artifice. stoicism was perhaps the best; religion was the most human; but the idea that any personal deity could find pleasure or profit in torturing a poor woman, by accident, with a fiendish cruelty known to man only in perverted and insane temperaments, could not be held for a moment. for pure blasphemy, it made pure atheism a comfort. god might be, as the church said, a substance, but he could not be a person. with nerves strained for the first time beyond their power of tension, he slowly travelled northwards with his friends, and stopped for a few days at ouchy to recover his balance in a new world; for the fantastic mystery of coincidences had made the world, which he thought real, mimic and reproduce the distorted nightmare of his personal horror. he did not yet know it, and he was twenty years in finding it out; but he had need of all the beauty of the lake below and of the alps above, to restore the finite to its place. for the first time in his life, mont blanc for a moment looked to him what it was--a chaos of anarchic and purposeless forces--and he needed days of repose to see it clothe itself again with the illusions of his senses, the white purity of its snows, the splendor of its light, and the infinity of its heavenly peace. nature was kind; lake geneva was beautiful beyond itself, and the alps put on charms real as terrors; but man became chaotic, and before the illusions of nature were wholly restored, the illusions of europe suddenly vanished, leaving a new world to learn. on july , all europe had been in peace; on july , europe was in full chaos of war. one felt helpless and ignorant, but one might have been king or kaiser without feeling stronger to deal with the chaos. mr. gladstone was as much astounded as adams; the emperor napoleon was nearly as stupefied as either, and bismarck: himself hardly knew how he did it. as education, the out-break of the war was wholly lost on a man dealing with death hand-to-hand, who could not throw it aside to look at it across the rhine. only when he got up to paris, he began to feel the approach of catastrophe. providence set up no affiches to announce the tragedy. under one's eyes france cut herself adrift, and floated off, on an unknown stream, towards a less known ocean. standing on the curb of the boulevard, one could see as much as though one stood by the side of the emperor or in command of an army corps. the effect was lurid. the public seemed to look on the war, as it had looked on the wars of louis xiv and francis i, as a branch of decorative art. the french, like true artists, always regarded war as one of the fine arts. louis xiv practiced it; napoleon i perfected it; and napoleon iii had till then pursued it in the same spirit with singular success. in paris, in july, , the war was brought out like an opera of meyerbeer. one felt one's self a supernumerary hired to fill the scene. every evening at the theatre the comedy was interrupted by order, and one stood up by order, to join in singing the marseillaise to order. for nearly twenty years one had been forbidden to sing the marseillaise under any circumstances, but at last regiment after regiment marched through the streets shouting "marchons!" while the bystanders cared not enough to join. patriotism seemed to have been brought out of the government stores, and distributed by grammes per capita. one had seen one's own people dragged unwillingly into a war, and had watched one's own regiments march to the front without sign of enthusiasm; on the contrary, most serious, anxious, and conscious of the whole weight of the crisis; but in paris every one conspired to ignore the crisis, which every one felt at hand. here was education for the million, but the lesson was intricate. superficially napoleon and his ministers and marshals were playing a game against thiers and gambetta. a bystander knew almost as little as they did about the result. how could adams prophesy that in another year or two, when he spoke of his paris and its tastes, people would smile at his dotage? as soon as he could, he fled to england and once more took refuge in the profound peace of wenlock abbey. only the few remaining monks, undisturbed by the brutalities of henry viii--three or four young englishmen--survived there, with milnes gaskell acting as prior. the august sun was warm; the calm of the abbey was ten times secular; not a discordant sound--hardly a sound of any sort except the cawing of the ancient rookery at sunset--broke the stillness; and, after the excitement of the last month, one felt a palpable haze of peace brooding over the edge and the welsh marches. since the reign of pteraspis, nothing had greatly changed; nothing except the monks. lying on the turf the ground littered with newspapers, the monks studied the war correspondence. in one respect adams had succeeded in educating himself; he had learned to follow a campaign. while at wenlock, he received a letter from president eliot inviting him to take an assistant professorship of history, to be created shortly at harvard college. after waiting ten or a dozen years for some one to show consciousness of his existence, even a terebratula would be pleased and grateful for a compliment which implied that the new president of harvard college wanted his help; but adams knew nothing about history, and much less about teaching, while he knew more than enough about harvard college; and wrote at once to thank president eliot, with much regret that the honor should be above his powers. his mind was full of other matters. the summer, from which he had expected only amusement and social relations with new people, had ended in the most intimate personal tragedy, and the most terrific political convulsion he had ever known or was likely to know. he had failed in every object of his trip. the quarterlies had refused his best essay. he had made no acquaintances and hardly picked up the old ones. he sailed from liverpool, on september , to begin again where he had started two years before, but with no longer a hope of attaching himself to a president or a party or a press. he was a free lance and no other career stood in sight or mind. to that point education had brought him. yet he found, on reaching home, that he had not done quite so badly as he feared. his article on the session in the july north american had made a success. though he could not quite see what partisan object it served, he heard with flattered astonishment that it had been reprinted by the democratic national committee and circulated as a campaign document by the hundred thousand copies. he was henceforth in opposition, do what he might; and a massachusetts democrat, say what he pleased; while his only reward or return for this partisan service consisted in being formally answered by senator timothy howe, of wisconsin, in a republican campaign document, presumed to be also freely circulated, in which the senator, besides refuting his opinions, did him the honor--most unusual and picturesque in a senator's rhetoric--of likening him to a begonia. the begonia is, or then was, a plant of such senatorial qualities as to make the simile, in intention, most flattering. far from charming in its refinement, the begonia was remarkable for curious and showy foliage; it was conspicuous; it seemed to have no useful purpose; and it insisted on standing always in the most prominent positions. adams would have greatly liked to be a begonia in washington, for this was rather his ideal of the successful statesman, and he thought about it still more when the westminster review for october brought him his article on the gold conspiracy, which was also instantly pirated on a great scale. piratical he was himself henceforth driven to be, and he asked only to be pirated, for he was sure not to be paid; but the honors of piracy resemble the colors of the begonia; they are showy but not useful. here was a tour de force he had never dreamed himself equal to performing: two long, dry, quarterly, thirty or forty page articles, appearing in quick succession, and pirated for audiences running well into the hundred thousands; and not one person, man or woman, offering him so much as a congratulation, except to call him a begonia. had this been all, life might have gone on very happily as before, but the ways of america to a young person of literary and political tastes were such as the so-called evolution of civilized man had not before evolved. no sooner had adams made at washington what he modestly hoped was a sufficient success, than his whole family set on him to drag him away. for the first time since his father interposed; his mother entreated; and his brother charles argued and urged that he should come to harvard college. charles had views of further joint operations in a new field. he said that henry had done at washington all he could possibly do; that his position there wanted solidity; that he was, after all, an adventurer; that a few years in cambridge would give him personal weight; that his chief function was not to be that of teacher, but that of editing the north american review which was to be coupled with the professorship, and would lead to the daily press. in short, that he needed the university more than the university needed him. henry knew the university well enough to know that the department of history was controlled by one of the most astute and ideal administrators in the world--professor gurney--and that it was gurney who had established the new professorship, and had cast his net over adams to carry the double load of mediaeval history and the review. he could see no relation whatever between himself and a professorship. he sought education; he did not sell it. he knew no history; he knew only a few historians; his ignorance was mischievous because it was literary, accidental, indifferent. on the other hand he knew gurney, and felt much influenced by his advice. one cannot take one's self quite seriously in such matters; it could not much affect the sum of solar energies whether one went on dancing with girls in washington, or began talking to boys at cambridge. the good people who thought it did matter had a sort of right to guide. one could not reject their advice; still less disregard their wishes. the sum of the matter was that henry went out to cambridge and had a few words with president eliot which seemed to him almost as american as the talk about diplomacy with his father ten years before. "but, mr. president," urged adams, "i know nothing about mediaeval history." with the courteous manner and bland smile so familiar for the next generation of americans mr. eliot mildly but firmly replied, "if you will point out to me any one who knows more, mr. adams, i will appoint him." the answer was neither logical nor convincing, but adams could not meet it without overstepping his privileges. he could not say that, under the circumstances, the appointment of any professor at all seemed to him unnecessary. so, at twenty-four hours' notice, he broke his life in halves again in order to begin a new education, on lines he had not chosen, in subjects for which he cared less than nothing; in a place he did not love, and before a future which repelled. thousands of men have to do the same thing, but his case was peculiar because he had no need to do it. he did it because his best and wisest friends urged it, and he never could make up his mind whether they were right or not. to him this kind of education was always false. for himself he had no doubts. he thought it a mistake; but his opinion did not prove that it was one, since, in all probability, whatever he did would be more or less a mistake. he had reached cross-roads of education which all led astray. what he could gain at harvard college he did not know, but in any case it was nothing he wanted. what he lost at washington he could partly see, but in any case it was not fortune. grant's administration wrecked men by thousands, but profited few. perhaps mr. fish was the solitary exception. one might search the whole list of congress, judiciary, and executive during the twenty-five years to , and find little but damaged reputation. the period was poor in purpose and barren in results. henry adams, if not the rose, lived as near it as any politician, and knew, more or less, all the men in any way prominent at washington, or knew all about them. among them, in his opinion, the best equipped, the most active-minded, and most industrious was abram hewitt, who sat in congress for a dozen years, between and , sometimes leading the house and always wielding influence second to none. with nobody did adams form closer or longer relations than with mr. hewitt, whom he regarded as the most useful public man in washington; and he was the more struck by hewitt's saying, at the end of his laborious career as legislator, that he left behind him no permanent result except the act consolidating the surveys. adams knew no other man who had done so much, unless mr. sherman's legislation is accepted as an instance of success. hewitt's nearest rival would probably have been senator pendleton who stood father to civil service reform in , an attempt to correct a vice that should never have been allowed to be born. these were the men who succeeded. the press stood in much the same light. no editor, no political writer, and no public administrator achieved enough good reputation to preserve his memory for twenty years. a number of them achieved bad reputations, or damaged good ones that had been gained in the civil war. on the whole, even for senators, diplomats, and cabinet officers, the period was wearisome and stale. none of adams's generation profited by public activity unless it were william c. whitney, and even he could not be induced to return to it. such ambitions as these were out of one's reach, but supposing one tried for what was feasible, attached one's self closely to the garfields, arthurs, frelinghuysens, blaines, bayards, or whitneys, who happened to hold office; and supposing one asked for the mission to belgium or portugal, and obtained it; supposing one served a term as assistant secretary or chief of bureau; or, finally, supposing one had gone as sub-editor on the new york tribune or times--how much more education would one have gained than by going to harvard college? these questions seemed better worth an answer than most of the questions on examination papers at college or in the civil service; all the more because one never found an answer to them, then or afterwards, and because, to his mind, the value of american society altogether was mixed up with the value of washington. at first, the simple beginner, struggling with principles, wanted to throw off responsibility on the american people, whose bare and toiling shoulders had to carry the load of every social or political stupidity; but the american people had no more to do with it than with the customs of peking. american character might perhaps account for it, but what accounted for american character? all boston, all new england, and all respectable new york, including charles francis adams the father and charles francis adams the son, agreed that washington was no place for a respectable young man. all washington, including presidents, cabinet officers, judiciary, senators, congressmen, and clerks, expressed the same opinion, and conspired to drive away every young man who happened to be there or tried to approach. not one young man of promise remained in the government service. all drifted into opposition. the government did not want them in washington. adams's case was perhaps the strongest because he thought he had done well. he was forced to guess it, since he knew no one who would have risked so extravagant a step as that of encouraging a young man in a literary career, or even in a political one; society forbade it, as well as residence in a political capital; but harvard college must have seen some hope for him, since it made him professor against his will; even the publishers and editors of the north american review must have felt a certain amount of confidence in him, since they put the review in his hands. after all, the review was the first literary power in america, even though it paid almost as little in gold as the united states treasury. the degree of harvard college might bear a value as ephemeral as the commission of a president of the united states; but the government of the college, measured by money alone, and patronage, was a matter of more importance than that of some branches of the national service. in social position, the college was the superior of them all put together. in knowledge, she could assert no superiority, since the government made no claims, and prided itself on ignorance. the service of harvard college was distinctly honorable; perhaps the most honorable in america; and if harvard college thought henry adams worth employing at four dollars a day, why should washington decline his services when he asked nothing? why should he be dragged from a career he liked in a place he loved, into a career he detested, in a place and climate he shunned? was it enough to satisfy him, that all america should call washington barren and dangerous? what made washington more dangerous than new york? the american character showed singular limitations which sometimes drove the student of civilized man to despair. crushed by his own ignorance--lost in the darkness of his own gropings--the scholar finds himself jostled of a sudden by a crowd of men who seem to him ignorant that there is a thing called ignorance; who have forgotten how to amuse themselves; who cannot even understand that they are bored. the american thought of himself as a restless, pushing, energetic, ingenious person, always awake and trying to get ahead of his neighbors. perhaps this idea of the national character might be correct for new york or chicago; it was not correct for washington. there the american showed himself, four times in five, as a quiet, peaceful, shy figure, rather in the mould of abraham lincoln, somewhat sad, sometimes pathetic, once tragic; or like grant, inarticulate, uncertain, distrustful of himself, still more distrustful of others, and awed by money. that the american, by temperament, worked to excess, was true; work and whiskey were his stimulants; work was a form of vice; but he never cared much for money or power after he earned them. the amusement of the pursuit was all the amusement he got from it; he had no use for wealth. jim fisk alone seemed to know what he wanted; jay gould never did. at washington one met mostly such true americans, but if one wanted to know them better, one went to study them in europe. bored, patient, helpless; pathetically dependent on his wife and daughters; indulgent to excess; mostly a modest, decent, excellent, valuable citizen; the american was to be met at every railway station in europe, carefully explaining to every listener that the happiest day of his life would be the day he should land on the pier at new york. he was ashamed to be amused; his mind no longer answered to the stimulus of variety; he could not face a new thought. all his immense strength, his intense nervous energy, his keen analytic perceptions, were oriented in one direction, and he could not change it. congress was full of such men; in the senate, sumner was almost the only exception; in the executive, grant and boutwell were varieties of the type--political specimens--pathetic in their helplessness to do anything with power when it came to them. they knew not how to amuse themselves; they could not conceive how other people were amused. work, whiskey, and cards were life. the atmosphere of political washington was theirs--or was supposed by the outside world to be in their control--and this was the reason why the outside world judged that washington was fatal even for a young man of thirty-two, who had passed through the whole variety of temptations, in every capital of europe, for a dozen years; who never played cards, and who loathed whiskey. chapter xx failure ( ) far back in childhood, among its earliest memories, henry adams could recall his first visit to harvard college. he must have been nine years old when on one of the singularly gloomy winter afternoons which beguiled cambridgeport, his mother drove him out to visit his aunt, mrs. everett. edward everett was then president of the college and lived in the old president's house on harvard square. the boy remembered the drawing-room, on the left of the hall door, in which mrs. everett received them. he remembered a marble greyhound in the corner. the house had an air of colonial self-respect that impressed even a nine-year-old child. when adams closed his interview with president eliot, he asked the bursar about his aunt's old drawing-room, for the house had been turned to base uses. the room and the deserted kitchen adjacent to it were to let. he took them. above him, his brother brooks, then a law student, had rooms, with a private staircase. opposite was j. r. dennett, a young instructor almost as literary as adams himself, and more rebellious to conventions. inquiry revealed a boarding-table, somewhere in the neighborhood, also supposed to be superior in its class. chauncey wright, francis wharton, dennett, john fiske, or their equivalents in learning and lecture, were seen there, among three or four law students like brooks adams. with these primitive arrangements, all of them had to be satisfied. the standard was below that of washington, but it was, for the moment, the best. for the next nine months the assistant professor had no time to waste on comforts or amusements. he exhausted all his strength in trying to keep one day ahead of his duties. often the stint ran on, till night and sleep ran short. he could not stop to think whether he were doing the work rightly. he could not get it done to please him, rightly or wrongly, for he never could satisfy himself what to do. the fault he had found with harvard college as an undergraduate must have been more or less just, for the college was making a great effort to meet these self-criticisms, and had elected president eliot in to carry out its reforms. professor gurney was one of the leading reformers, and had tried his hand on his own department of history. the two full professors of history--torrey and gurney, charming men both--could not cover the ground. between gurney's classical courses and torrey's modern ones, lay a gap of a thousand years, which adams was expected to fill. the students had already elected courses numbered , , and , without knowing what was to be taught or who was to teach. if their new professor had asked what idea was in their minds, they must have replied that nothing at all was in their minds, since their professor had nothing in his, and down to the moment he took his chair and looked his scholars in the face, he had given, as far as he could remember, an hour, more or less, to the middle ages. not that his ignorance troubled him! he knew enough to be ignorant. his course had led him through oceans of ignorance; he had tumbled from one ocean into another till he had learned to swim; but even to him education was a serious thing. a parent gives life, but as parent, gives no more. a murderer takes life, but his deed stops there. a teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops. a teacher is expected to teach truth, and may perhaps flatter himself that he does so, if he stops with the alphabet or the multiplication table, as a mother teaches truth by making her child eat with a spoon; but morals are quite another truth and philosophy is more complex still. a teacher must either treat history as a catalogue, a record, a romance, or as an evolution; and whether he affirms or denies evolution, he falls into all the burning faggots of the pit. he makes of his scholars either priests or atheists, plutocrats or socialists, judges or anarchists, almost in spite of himself. in essence incoherent and immoral, history had either to be taught as such--or falsified. adams wanted to do neither. he had no theory of evolution to teach, and could not make the facts fit one. he had no fancy for telling agreeable tales to amuse sluggish-minded boys, in order to publish them afterwards as lectures. he could still less compel his students to learn the anglo-saxon chronicle and the venerable bede by heart. he saw no relation whatever between his students and the middle ages unless it were the church, and there the ground was particularly dangerous. he knew better than though he were a professional historian that the man who should solve the riddle of the middle ages and bring them into the line of evolution from past to present, would be a greater man than lamarck or linnaeus; but history had nowhere broken down so pitiably, or avowed itself so hopelessly bankrupt, as there. since gibbon, the spectacle was almost a scandal. history had lost even the sense of shame. it was a hundred years behind the experimental sciences. for all serious purpose, it was less instructive than walter scott and alexandre dumas. all this was without offence to sir henry maine, tyler, mclennan, buckle, auguste comte, and the various philosophers who, from time to time, stirred the scandal, and made it more scandalous. no doubt, a teacher might make some use of these writers or their theories; but adams could fit them into no theory of his own. the college expected him to pass at least half his time teaching the boys a few elementary dates and relations, that they might not be a disgrace to the university. this was formal; and he could frankly tell the boys that, provided they passed their examinations, they might get their facts where they liked, and use the teacher only for questions. the only privilege a student had that was worth his claiming, was that of talking to the professor, and the professor was bound to encourage it. his only difficulty on that side was to get them to talk at all. he had to devise schemes to find what they were thinking about, and induce them to risk criticism from their fellows. any large body of students stifles the student. no man can instruct more than half-a-dozen students at once. the whole problem of education is one of its cost in money. the lecture system to classes of hundreds, which was very much that of the twelfth century, suited adams not at all. barred from philosophy and bored by facts, he wanted to teach his students something not wholly useless. the number of students whose minds were of an order above the average was, in his experience, barely one in ten; the rest could not be much stimulated by any inducements a teacher could suggest. all were respectable, and in seven years of contact, adams never had cause to complain of one; but nine minds in ten take polish passively, like a hard surface; only the tenth sensibly reacts. adams thought that, as no one seemed to care what he did, he would try to cultivate this tenth mind, though necessarily at the expense of the other nine. he frankly acted on the rule that a teacher, who knew nothing of his subject, should not pretend to teach his scholars what he did not know, but should join them in trying to find the best way of learning it. the rather pretentious name of historical method was sometimes given to this process of instruction, but the name smacked of german pedagogy, and a young professor who respected neither history nor method, and whose sole object of interest was his students' minds, fell into trouble enough without adding to it a german parentage. the task was doomed to failure for a reason which he could not control. nothing is easier than to teach historical method, but, when learned, it has little use. history is a tangled skein that one may take up at any point, and break when one has unravelled enough; but complexity precedes evolution. the pteraspis grins horribly from the closed entrance. one may not begin at the beginning, and one has but the loosest relative truths to follow up. adams found himself obliged to force his material into some shape to which a method could be applied. he could think only of law as subject; the law school as end; and he took, as victims of his experiment, half-a-dozen highly intelligent young men who seemed willing to work. the course began with the beginning, as far as the books showed a beginning in primitive man, and came down through the salic franks to the norman english. since no textbooks existed, the professor refused to profess, knowing no more than his students, and the students read what they pleased and compared their results. as pedagogy, nothing could be more triumphant. the boys worked like rabbits, and dug holes all over the field of archaic society; no difficulty stopped them; unknown languages yielded before their attack, and customary law became familiar as the police court; undoubtedly they learned, after a fashion, to chase an idea, like a hare, through as dense a thicket of obscure facts as they were likely to meet at the bar; but their teacher knew from his own experience that his wonderful method led nowhere, and they would have to exert themselves to get rid of it in the law school even more than they exerted themselves to acquire it in the college. their science had no system, and could have none, since its subject was merely antiquarian. try as hard as he might, the professor could not make it actual. what was the use of training an active mind to waste its energy? the experiments might in time train adams as a professor, but this result was still less to his taste. he wanted to help the boys to a career, but not one of his many devices to stimulate the intellectual reaction of the student's mind satisfied either him or the students. for himself he was clear that the fault lay in the system, which could lead only to inertia. such little knowledge of himself as he possessed warranted him in affirming that his mind required conflict, competition, contradiction even more than that of the student. he too wanted a rank-list to set his name upon. his reform of the system would have begun in the lecture-room at his own desk. he would have seated a rival assistant professor opposite him, whose business should be strictly limited to expressing opposite views. nothing short of this would ever interest either the professor or the student; but of all university freaks, no irregularity shocked the intellectual atmosphere so much as contradiction or competition between teachers. in that respect the thirteenth-century university system was worth the whole teaching of the modern school. all his pretty efforts to create conflicts of thought among his students failed for want of system. none met the needs of instruction. in spite of president eliot's reforms and his steady, generous, liberal support, the system remained costly, clumsy and futile. the university--as far as it was represented by henry adams--produced at great waste of time and money results not worth reaching. he made use of his lost two years of german schooling to inflict their results on his students, and by a happy chance he was in the full tide of fashion. the germans were crowning their new emperor at versailles, and surrounding his head with a halo of pepins and merwigs, othos and barbarossas. james bryce had even discovered the holy roman empire. germany was never so powerful, and the assistant professor of history had nothing else as his stock in trade. he imposed germany on his scholars with a heavy hand. he was rejoiced; but he sometimes doubted whether they should be grateful. on the whole, he was content neither with what he had taught nor with the way he had taught it. the seven years he passed in teaching seemed to him lost. the uses of adversity are beyond measure strange. as a professor, he regarded himself as a failure. without false modesty he thought he knew what he meant. he had tried a great many experiments, and wholly succeeded in none. he had succumbed to the weight of the system. he had accomplished nothing that he tried to do. he regarded the system as wrong; more mischievous to the teachers than to the students; fallacious from the beginning to end. he quitted the university at last, in , with a feeling, that, if it had not been for the invariable courtesy and kindness shown by every one in it, from the president to the injured students, he should be sore at his failure. these were his own feelings, but they seemed not to be felt in the college. with the same perplexing impartiality that had so much disconcerted him in his undergraduate days, the college insisted on expressing an opposite view. john fiske went so far in his notice of the family in "appleton's cyclopedia," as to say that henry had left a great reputation at harvard college; which was a proof of john fiske's personal regard that adams heartily returned; and set the kind expression down to camaraderie. the case was different when president eliot himself hinted that adams's services merited recognition. adams could have wept on his shoulder in hysterics, so grateful was he for the rare good-will that inspired the compliment; but he could not allow the college to think that he esteemed himself entitled to distinction. he knew better, and his was among the failures which were respectable enough to deserve self-respect. yet nothing in the vanity of life struck him as more humiliating than that harvard college, which he had persistently criticised, abused, abandoned, and neglected, should alone have offered him a dollar, an office, an encouragement, or a kindness. harvard college might have its faults, but at least it redeemed america, since it was true to its own. the only part of education that the professor thought a success was the students. he found them excellent company. cast more or less in the same mould, without violent emotions or sentiment, and, except for the veneer of american habits, ignorant of all that man had ever thought or hoped, their minds burst open like flowers at the sunlight of a suggestion. they were quick to respond; plastic to a mould; and incapable of fatigue. their faith in education was so full of pathos that one dared not ask them what they thought they could do with education when they got it. adams did put the question to one of them, and was surprised at the answer: "the degree of harvard college is worth money to me in chicago." this reply upset his experience; for the degree of harvard college had been rather a drawback to a young man in boston and washington. so far as it went, the answer was good, and settled one's doubts. adams knew no better, although he had given twenty years to pursuing the same education, and was no nearer a result than they. he still had to take for granted many things that they need not--among the rest, that his teaching did them more good than harm. in his own opinion the greatest good he could do them was to hold his tongue. they needed much faith then; they were likely to need more if they lived long. he never knew whether his colleagues shared his doubts about their own utility. unlike himself, they knew more or less their business. he could not tell his scholars that history glowed with social virtue; the professor of chemistry cared not a chemical atom whether society was virtuous or not. adams could not pretend that mediaeval society proved evolution; the professor of physics smiled at evolution. adams was glad to dwell on the virtues of the church and the triumphs of its art: the professor of political economy had to treat them as waste of force. they knew what they had to teach; he did not. they might perhaps be frauds without knowing it; but he knew certainly nothing else of himself. he could teach his students nothing; he was only educating himself at their cost. education, like politics, is a rough affair, and every instructor has to shut his eyes and hold his tongue as though he were a priest. the students alone satisfied. they thought they gained something. perhaps they did, for even in america and in the twentieth century, life could not be wholly industrial. adams fervently hoped that they might remain content; but supposing twenty years more to pass, and they should turn on him as fiercely as he had turned on his old instructors--what answer could he make? the college had pleaded guilty, and tried to reform. he had pleaded guilty from the start, and his reforms had failed before those of the college. the lecture-room was futile enough, but the faculty-room was worse. american society feared total wreck in the maelstrom of political and corporate administration, but it could not look for help to college dons. adams knew, in that capacity, both congressmen and professors, and he preferred congressmen. the same failure marked the society of a college. several score of the best-educated, most agreeable, and personally the most sociable people in america united in cambridge to make a social desert that would have starved a polar bear. the liveliest and most agreeable of men--james russell lowell, francis j. child, louis agassiz, his son alexander, gurney, john fiske, william james and a dozen others, who would have made the joy of london or paris--tried their best to break out and be like other men in cambridge and boston, but society called them professors, and professors they had to be. while all these brilliant men were greedy for companionship, all were famished for want of it. society was a faculty-meeting without business. the elements were there; but society cannot be made up of elements--people who are expected to be silent unless they have observations to make--and all the elements are bound to remain apart if required to make observations. thus it turned out that of all his many educations, adams thought that of school-teacher the thinnest. yet he was forced to admit that the education of an editor, in some ways, was thinner still. the editor had barely time to edit; he had none to write. if copy fell short, he was obliged to scribble a book-review on the virtues of the anglo-saxons or the vices of the popes; for he knew more about edward the confessor or boniface viii than he did about president grant. for seven years he wrote nothing; the review lived on his brother charles's railway articles. the editor could help others, but could do nothing for himself. as a writer, he was totally forgotten by the time he had been an editor for twelve months. as editor he could find no writer to take his place for politics and affairs of current concern. the review became chiefly historical. russell lowell and frank palgrave helped him to keep it literary. the editor was a helpless drudge whose successes, if he made any, belonged to his writers; but whose failures might easily bankrupt himself. such a review may be made a sink of money with captivating ease. the secrets of success as an editor were easily learned; the highest was that of getting advertisements. ten pages of advertising made an editor a success; five marked him as a failure. the merits or demerits of his literature had little to do with his results except when they led to adversity. a year or two of education as editor satiated most of his appetite for that career as a profession. after a very slight experience, he said no more on the subject. he felt willing to let any one edit, if he himself might write. vulgarly speaking, it was a dog's life when it did not succeed, and little better when it did. a professor had at least the pleasure of associating with his students; an editor lived the life of an owl. a professor commonly became a pedagogue or a pedant; an editor became an authority on advertising. on the whole, adams preferred his attic in washington. he was educated enough. ignorance paid better, for at least it earned fifty dollars a month. with this result henry adams's education, at his entry into life, stopped, and his life began. he had to take that life as he best could, with such accidental education as luck had given him; but he held that it was wrong, and that, if he were to begin again, he would do it on a better system. he thought he knew nearly what system to pursue. at that time alexander agassiz had not yet got his head above water so far as to serve for a model, as he did twenty or thirty years afterwards; but the editorship of the north american review had one solitary merit; it made the editor acquainted at a distance with almost every one in the country who could write or who could be the cause of writing. adams was vastly pleased to be received among these clever people as one of themselves, and felt always a little surprised at their treating him as an equal, for they all had education; but among them, only one stood out in extraordinary prominence as the type and model of what adams would have liked to be, and of what the american, as he conceived, should have been and was not. thanks to the article on sir charles lyell, adams passed for a friend of geologists, and the extent of his knowledge mattered much less to them than the extent of his friendship, for geologists were as a class not much better off than himself, and friends were sorely few. one of his friends from earliest childhood, and nearest neighbor in quincy, frank emmons, had become a geologist and joined the fortieth parallel survey under government. at washington in the winter of - , emmons had invited adams to go out with him on one of the field-parties in summer. of course when adams took the review he put it at the service of the survey, and regretted only that he could not do more. when the first year of professing and editing was at last over, and his july north american appeared, he drew a long breath of relief, and took the next train for the west. of his year's work he was no judge. he had become a small spring in a large mechanism, and his work counted only in the sum; but he had been treated civilly by everybody, and he felt at home even in boston. putting in his pocket the july number of the north american, with a notice of the fortieth parallel survey by professor j. d. whitney, he started for the plains and the rocky mountains. in the year , the west was still fresh, and the union pacific was young. beyond the missouri river, one felt the atmosphere of indians and buffaloes. one saw the last vestiges of an old education, worth studying if one would; but it was not that which adams sought; rather, he came out to spy upon the land of the future. the survey occasionally borrowed troopers from the nearest station in case of happening on hostile indians, but otherwise the topographers and geologists thought more about minerals than about sioux. they held under their hammers a thousand miles of mineral country with all its riddles to solve, and its stores of possible wealth to mark. they felt the future in their hands. emmons's party was out of reach in the uintahs, but arnold hague's had come in to laramie for supplies, and they took charge of adams for a time. their wanderings or adventures matter nothing to the story of education. they were all hardened mountaineers and surveyors who took everything for granted, and spared each other the most wearisome bore of english and scotch life, the stories of the big game they killed. a bear was an occasional amusement; a wapiti was a constant necessity; but the only wild animal dangerous to man was a rattlesnake or a skunk. one shot for amusement, but one had other matters to talk about. adams enjoyed killing big game, but loathed the labor of cutting it up; so that he rarely unslung the little carbine he was in a manner required to carry. on the other hand, he liked to wander off alone on his mule, and pass the day fishing a mountain stream or exploring a valley. one morning when the party was camped high above estes park, on the flank of long's peak, he borrowed a rod, and rode down over a rough trail into estes park, for some trout. the day was fine, and hazy with the smoke of forest fires a thousand miles away; the park stretched its english beauties off to the base of its bordering mountains in natural landscape and archaic peace; the stream was just fishy enough to tempt lingering along its banks. hour after hour the sun moved westward and the fish moved eastward, or disappeared altogether, until at last when the fisherman cinched his mule, sunset was nearer than he thought. darkness caught him before he could catch his trail. not caring to tumble into some fifty-foot hole, he "allowed" he was lost, and turned back. in half-an-hour he was out of the hills, and under the stars of estes park, but he saw no prospect of supper or of bed. estes park was large enough to serve for a bed on a summer night for an army of professors, but the supper question offered difficulties. there was but one cabin in the park, near its entrance, and he felt no great confidence in finding it, but he thought his mule cleverer than himself, and the dim lines of mountain crest against the stars fenced his range of error. the patient mule plodded on without other road than the gentle slope of the ground, and some two hours must have passed before a light showed in the distance. as the mule came up to the cabin door, two or three men came out to see the stranger. one of these men was clarence king on his way up to the camp. adams fell into his arms. as with most friendships, it was never a matter of growth or doubt. friends are born in archaic horizons; they were shaped with the pteraspis in siluria; they have nothing to do with the accident of space. king had come up that day from greeley in a light four-wheeled buggy, over a trail hardly fit for a commissariat mule, as adams had reason to know since he went back in the buggy. in the cabin, luxury provided a room and one bed for guests. they shared the room and the bed, and talked till far towards dawn. king had everything to interest and delight adams. he knew more than adams did of art and poetry; he knew america, especially west of the hundredth meridian, better than any one; he knew the professor by heart, and he knew the congressman better than he did the professor. he knew even women; even the american woman; even the new york woman, which is saying much. incidentally he knew more practical geology than was good for him, and saw ahead at least one generation further than the text-books. that he saw right was a different matter. since the beginning of time no man has lived who is known to have seen right; the charm of king was that he saw what others did and a great deal more. his wit and humor; his bubbling energy which swept every one into the current of his interest; his personal charm of youth and manners; his faculty of giving and taking, profusely, lavishly, whether in thought or in money as though he were nature herself, marked him almost alone among americans. he had in him something of the greek--a touch of alcibiades or alexander. one clarence king only existed in the world. a new friend is always a miracle, but at thirty-three years old, such a bird of paradise rising in the sage-brush was an avatar. one friend in a lifetime is much; two are many; three are hardly possible. friendship needs a certain parallelism of life, a community of thought, a rivalry of aim. king, like adams, and all their generation, was at that moment passing the critical point of his career. the one, coming from the west, saturated with the sunshine of the sierras, met the other, drifting from the east, drenched in the fogs of london, and both had the same problems to handle--the same stock of implements--the same field to work in; above all, the same obstacles to overcome. as a companion, king's charm was great, but this was not the quality that so much attracted adams, nor could he affect even distant rivalry on this ground. adams could never tell a story, chiefly because he always forgot it; and he was never guilty of a witticism, unless by accident. king and the fortieth parallel influenced him in a way far more vital. the lines of their lives converged, but king had moulded and directed his life logically, scientifically, as adams thought american life should be directed. he had given himself education all of a piece, yet broad. standing in the middle of his career, where their paths at last came together, he could look back and look forward on a straight line, with scientific knowledge for its base. adams's life, past or future, was a succession of violent breaks or waves, with no base at all. king's abnormal energy had already won him great success. none of his contemporaries had done so much, single-handed, or were likely to leave so deep a trail. he had managed to induce congress to adopt almost its first modern act of legislation. he had organized, as a civil--not military--measure, a government survey. he had paralleled the continental railway in geology; a feat as yet unequalled by other governments which had as a rule no continents to survey. he was creating one of the classic scientific works of the century. the chances were great that he could, whenever he chose to quit the government service, take the pick of the gold and silver, copper or coal, and build up his fortune as he pleased. whatever prize he wanted lay ready for him--scientific social, literary, political--and he knew how to take them in turn. with ordinary luck he would die at eighty the richest and most many-sided genius of his day. so little egoistic he was that none of his friends felt envy of his extraordinary superiority, but rather grovelled before it, so that women were jealous of the power he had over men; but women were many and kings were one. the men worshipped not so much their friend, as the ideal american they all wanted to be. the women were jealous because, at heart, king had no faith in the american woman; he loved types more robust. the young men of the fortieth parallel had californian instincts; they were brothers of bret harte. they felt no leanings towards the simple uniformities of lyell and darwin; they saw little proof of slight and imperceptible changes; to them, catastrophe was the law of change; they cared little for simplicity and much for complexity; but it was the complexity of nature, not of new york or even of the mississippi valley. king loved paradox; he started them like rabbits, and cared for them no longer, when caught or lost; but they delighted adams, for they helped, among other things, to persuade him that history was more amusing than science. the only question left open to doubt was their relative money value. in emmons's camp, far up in the uintahs, these talks were continued till the frosts became sharp in the mountains. history and science spread out in personal horizons towards goals no longer far away. no more education was possible for either man. such as they were, they had got to stand the chances of the world they lived in; and when adams started back to cambridge, to take up again the humble tasks of schoolmaster and editor he was harnessed to his cart. education, systematic or accidental, had done its worst. henceforth, he went on, submissive. chapter xxi twenty years after ( ) once more! this is a story of education, not of adventure! it is meant to help young men--or such as have intelligence enough to seek help--but it is not meant to amuse them. what one did--or did not do--with one's education, after getting it, need trouble the inquirer in no way; it is a personal matter only which would confuse him. perhaps henry adams was not worth educating; most keen judges incline to think that barely one man in a hundred owns a mind capable of reacting to any purpose on the forces that surround him, and fully half of these react wrongly. the object of education for that mind should be the teaching itself how to react with vigor and economy. no doubt the world at large will always lag so far behind the active mind as to make a soft cushion of inertia to drop upon, as it did for henry adams; but education should try to lessen the obstacles, diminish the friction, invigorate the energy, and should train minds to react, not at haphazard, but by choice, on the lines of force that attract their world. what one knows is, in youth, of little moment; they know enough who know how to learn. throughout human history the waste of mind has been appalling, and, as this story is meant to show, society has conspired to promote it. no doubt the teacher is the worst criminal, but the world stands behind him and drags the student from his course. the moral is stentorian. only the most energetic, the most highly fitted, and the most favored have overcome the friction or the viscosity of inertia, and these were compelled to waste three-fourths of their energy in doing it. fit or unfit, henry adams stopped his own education in , and began to apply it for practical uses, like his neighbors. at the end of twenty years, he found that he had finished, and could sum up the result. he had no complaint to make against man or woman. they had all treated him kindly; he had never met with ill-will, ill-temper, or even ill-manners, or known a quarrel. he had never seen serious dishonesty or ingratitude. he had found a readiness in the young to respond to suggestion that seemed to him far beyond all he had reason to expect. considering the stock complaints against the world, he could not understand why he had nothing to complain of. during these twenty years he had done as much work, in quantity, as his neighbors wanted; more than they would ever stop to look at, and more than his share. merely in print, he thought altogether ridiculous the number of volumes he counted on the shelves of public libraries. he had no notion whether they served a useful purpose; he had worked in the dark; but so had most of his friends, even the artists, none of whom held any lofty opinion of their success in raising the standards of society, or felt profound respect for the methods or manners of their time, at home or abroad, but all of whom had tried, in a way, to hold the standard up. the effort had been, for the older generation, exhausting, as one could see in the hunts; but the generation after made more figure, not in proportion to public wealth or in the census, but in their own self-assertion. a fair number of the men who were born in the thirties had won names--phillips brooks; bret harte; henry james; h. h. richardson; john la farge; and the list might be made fairly long if it were worth while; but from their school had sprung others, like augustus st. gaudens, mckim, stanford white, and scores born in the forties, who counted as force even in the mental inertia of sixty or eighty million people. among all these clarence king, john hay, and henry adams had led modest existences, trying to fill in the social gaps of a class which, as yet, showed but thin ranks and little cohesion. the combination offered no very glittering prizes, but they pursued it for twenty years with as much patience and effort as though it led to fame or power, until, at last, henry adams thought his own duties sufficiently performed and his account with society settled. he had enjoyed his life amazingly, and would not have exchanged it for any other that came in his way; he was, or thought he was, perfectly satisfied with it; but for reasons that had nothing to do with education, he was tired; his nervous energy ran low; and, like a horse that wears out, he quitted the race-course, left the stable, and sought pastures as far as possible from the old. education had ended in ; life was complete in ; the rest mattered so little! as had happened so often, he found himself in london when the question of return imposed its verdict on him after much fruitless effort to rest elsewhere. the time was the month of january, ; he was alone, in hospital, in the gloom of midwinter. he was close on his fifty-fourth birthday, and pall mall had forgotten him as completely as it had forgotten his elders. he had not seen london for a dozen years, and was rather amused to have only a bed for a world and a familiar black fog for horizon. the coal-fire smelt homelike; the fog had a fruity taste of youth; anything was better than being turned out into the wastes of wigmore street. he could always amuse himself by living over his youth, and driving once more down oxford street in , with life before him to imagine far less amusing than it had turned out to be. the future attracted him less. lying there for a week he reflected on what he could do next. he had just come up from the south seas with john la farge, who had reluctantly crawled away towards new york to resume the grinding routine of studio-work at an age when life runs low. adams would rather, as choice, have gone back to the east, if it were only to sleep forever in the trade-winds under the southern stars, wandering over the dark purple ocean, with its purple sense of solitude and void. not that he liked the sensation, but that it was the most unearthly he had felt. he had not yet happened on rudyard kipling's "mandalay," but he knew the poetry before he knew the poem, like millions of wanderers, who have perhaps alone felt the world exactly as it is. nothing attracted him less than the idea of beginning a new education. the old one had been poor enough; any new one could only add to its faults. life had been cut in halves, and the old half had passed away, education and all, leaving no stock to graft on. the new world he faced in paris and london seemed to him fantastic. willing to admit it real in the sense of having some kind of existence outside his own mind, he could not admit it reasonable. in paris, his heart sank to mere pulp before the dismal ballets at the grand opera and the eternal vaudeville at the old palais royal; but, except for them, his own paris of the second empire was as extinct as that of the first napoleon. at the galleries and exhibitions, he was racked by the effort of art to be original, and when one day, after much reflection, john la farge asked whether there might not still be room for something simple in art, adams shook his head. as he saw the world, it was no longer simple and could not express itself simply. it should express what it was; and this was something that neither adams nor la farge understood. under the first blast of this furnace-heat, the lights seemed fairly to go out. he felt nothing in common with the world as it promised to be. he was ready to quit it, and the easiest path led back to the east; but he could not venture alone, and the rarest of animals is a companion. he must return to america to get one. perhaps, while waiting, he might write more history, and on the chance as a last resource, he gave orders for copying everything he could reach in archives, but this was mere habit. he went home as a horse goes back to his stable, because he knew nowhere else to go. home was washington. as soon as grant's administration ended, in , and evarts became secretary of state, adams went back there, partly to write history, but chiefly because his seven years of laborious banishment, in boston, convinced him that, as far as he had a function in life, it was as stable-companion to statesmen, whether they liked it or not. at about the same time, old george bancroft did the same thing, and presently john hay came on to be assistant secretary of state for mr. evarts, and stayed there to write the "life" of lincoln. in adams joined him in employing richardson to build them adjoining houses on la fayette square. as far as adams had a home this was it. to the house on la fayette square he must turn, for he had no other status--no position in the world. never did he make a decision more reluctantly than this of going back to his manger. his father and mother were dead. all his family led settled lives of their own. except for two or three friends in washington, who were themselves uncertain of stay, no one cared whether he came or went, and he cared least. there was nothing to care about. every one was busy; nearly every one seemed contented. since nothing had ruffled the surface of the american world, and even the progress of europe in her side-way track to dis-europeaning herself had ceased to be violent. after a dreary january in paris, at last when no excuse could be persuaded to offer itself for further delay, he crossed the channel and passed a week with his old friend, milnes gaskell, at thornes, in yorkshire, while the westerly gales raved a warning against going home. yorkshire in january is not an island in the south seas. it has few points of resemblance to tahiti; not many to fiji or samoa; but, as so often before, it was a rest between past and future, and adams was grateful for it. at last, on february , he drove, after a fashion, down the irish channel, on board the teutonic. he had not crossed the atlantic for a dozen years, and had never seen an ocean steamer of the new type. he had seen nothing new of any sort, or much changed in france or england. the railways made quicker time, but were no more comfortable. the scale was the same. the channel service was hardly improved since , or so little as to make no impression. europe seemed to have been stationary for twenty years. to a man who had been stationary like europe, the teutonic was a marvel. that he should be able to eat his dinner through a week of howling winter gales was a miracle. that he should have a deck stateroom, with fresh air, and read all night, if he chose, by electric light, was matter for more wonder than life had yet supplied, in its old forms. wonder may be double--even treble. adams's wonder ran off into figures. as the niagara was to the teutonic--as was to --so the teutonic and must be to the next term--and then? apparently the question concerned only america. western europe offered no such conundrum. there one might double scale and speed indefinitely without passing bounds. fate was kind on that voyage. rudyard kipling, on his wedding trip to america, thanks to the mediation of henry james, dashed over the passenger his exuberant fountain of gaiety and wit--as though playing a garden hose on a thirsty and faded begonia. kipling could never know what peace of mind he gave, for he could hardly ever need it himself so much; and yet, in the full delight of his endless fun and variety, one felt the old conundrum repeat itself. somehow, somewhere, kipling and the american were not one, but two, and could not be glued together. the american felt that the defect, if defect it were, was in himself; he had felt it when he was with swinburne, and, again, with robert louis stevenson, even under the palms of vailima; but he did not carry self-abasement to the point of thinking himself singular. whatever the defect might be, it was american; it belonged to the type; it lived in the blood. whatever the quality might be that held him apart, it was english; it lived also in the blood; one felt it little if at all, with celts, and one yearned reciprocally among fiji cannibals. clarence king used to say that it was due to discord between the wave-lengths of the man-atoms; but the theory offered difficulties in measurement. perhaps, after all, it was only that genius soars; but this theory, too, had its dark corners. all through life, one had seen the american on his literary knees to the european; and all through many lives back for some two centuries, one had seen the european snub or patronize the american; not always intentionally, but effectually. it was in the nature of things. kipling neither snubbed nor patronized; he was all gaiety and good-nature; but he would have been first to feel what one meant. genius has to pay itself that unwilling self-respect. towards the middle of february, , adams found himself again in washington. in paris and london he had seen nothing to make a return to life worth while; in washington he saw plenty of reasons for staying dead. changes had taken place there; improvements had been made; with time--much time--the city might become habitable according to some fashionable standard; but all one's friends had died or disappeared several times over, leaving one almost as strange as in boston or london. slowly, a certain society had built itself up about the government; houses had been opened and there was much dining; much calling; much leaving of cards; but a solitary man counted for less than in . society seemed hardly more at home than he. both executive and congress held it aloof. no one in society seemed to have the ear of anybody in government. no one in government knew any reason for consulting any one in society. the world had ceased to be wholly political, but politics had become less social. a survivor of the civil war--like george bancroft, or john hay--tried to keep footing, but without brilliant success. they were free to say or do what they liked; but no one took much notice of anything said or done. a presidential election was to take place in november, and no one showed much interest in the result. the two candidates were singular persons, of whom it was the common saying that one of them had no friends; the other, only enemies. calvin brice, who was at that time altogether the wittiest and cleverest member of the senate, was in the habit of describing mr. cleveland in glowing terms and at great length, as one of the loftiest natures and noblest characters of ancient or modern time; "but," he concluded, "in future i prefer to look on at his proceedings from the safe summit of some neighboring hill." the same remark applied to mr. harrison. in this respect, they were the greatest of presidents, for, whatever harm they might do their enemies, was as nothing when compared to the mortality they inflicted on their friends. men fled them as though they had the evil eye. to the american people, the two candidates and the two parties were so evenly balanced that the scales showed hardly a perceptible difference. mr. harrison was an excellent president, a man of ability and force; perhaps the best president the republican party had put forward since lincoln's death; yet, on the whole, adams felt a shade of preference for president cleveland, not so much personally as because the democrats represented to him the last remnants of the eighteenth century; the survivors of hosea biglow's cornwallis; the sole remaining protestants against a banker's olympus which had become, for five-and-twenty years, more and more despotic over esop's frog-empire. one might no longer croak except to vote for king log, or--failing storks--for grover cleveland; and even then could not be sure where king banker lurked behind. the costly education in politics had led to political torpor. every one did not share it. clarence king and john hay were loyal republicans who never for a moment conceived that there could be merit in other ideals. with king, the feeling was chiefly love of archaic races; sympathy with the negro and indian and corresponding dislike of their enemies; but with hay, party loyalty became a phase of being, a little like the loyalty of a highly cultivated churchman to his church. he saw all the failings of the party, and still more keenly those of the partisans; but he could not live outside. to adams a western democrat or a western republican, a city democrat or a city republican, a w. c. whitney or a j. g. blaine, were actually the same man, as far as their usefulness to the objects of king, hay, or adams was concerned. they graded themselves as friends or enemies not as republicans or democrats. to hay, the difference was that of being respectable or not. since , king, hay, and adams had been inseparable. step by step, they had gone on in the closest sympathy, rather shunning than inviting public position, until, in , none of them held any post at all. with great effort, in hayes's administration, all king's friends, including abram hewitt and carl schurz, had carried the bill for uniting the surveys and had placed king at the head of the bureau; but king waited only to organize the service, and then resigned, in order to seek his private fortune in the west. hay, after serving as assistant secretary of state under secretary evarts during a part of hayes's administration, then also insisted on going out, in order to write with nicolay the "life" of lincoln. adams had held no office, and when his friends asked the reason, he could not go into long explanations, but preferred to answer simply that no president had ever invited him to fill one. the reason was good, and was also conveniently true, but left open an awkward doubt of his morals or capacity. why had no president ever cared to employ him? the question needed a volume of intricate explanation. there never was a day when he would have refused to perform any duty that the government imposed on him, but the american government never to his knowledge imposed duties. the point was never raised with regard to him, or to any one else. the government required candidates to offer; the business of the executive began and ended with the consent or refusal to confer. the social formula carried this passive attitude a shade further. any public man who may for years have used some other man's house as his own, when promoted to a position of patronage commonly feels himself obliged to inquire, directly or indirectly, whether his friend wants anything; which is equivalent to a civil act of divorce, since he feels awkward in the old relation. the handsomest formula, in an impartial choice, was the grandly courteous southern phrase of lamar: "of course mr. adams knows that anything in my power is at his service." a la disposicion de usted! the form must have been correct since it released both parties. he was right; mr. adams did know all about it; a bow and a conventional smile closed the subject forever, and every one felt flattered. such an intimate, promoted to power, was always lost. his duties and cares absorbed him and affected his balance of mind. unless his friend served some political purpose, friendship was an effort. men who neither wrote for newspapers nor made campaign speeches, who rarely subscribed to the campaign fund, and who entered the white house as seldom as possible, placed themselves outside the sphere of usefulness, and did so with entirely adequate knowledge of what they were doing. they never expected the president to ask for their services, and saw no reason why he should do so. as for henry adams, in fifty years that he knew washington, no one would have been more surprised than himself had any president ever asked him to perform so much of a service as to cross the square. only texan congressmen imagined that the president needed their services in some remote consulate after worrying him for months to find one. in washington this law or custom is universally understood, and no one's character necessarily suffered because he held no office. no one took office unless he wanted it; and in turn the outsider was never asked to do work or subscribe money. adams saw no office that he wanted, and he gravely thought that, from his point of view, in the long run, he was likely to be a more useful citizen without office. he could at least act as audience, and, in those days, a washington audience seldom filled even a small theatre. he felt quite well satisfied to look on, and from time to time he thought he might risk a criticism of the players; but though he found his own position regular, he never quite understood that of john hay. the republican leaders treated hay as one of themselves; they asked his services and took his money with a freedom that staggered even a hardened observer; but they never needed him in equivalent office. in washington hay was the only competent man in the party for diplomatic work. he corresponded in his powers of usefulness exactly with lord granville in london, who had been for forty years the saving grace of every liberal administration in turn. had usefulness to the public service been ever a question, hay should have had a first-class mission under hayes; should have been placed in the cabinet by garfield, and should have been restored to it by harrison. these gentlemen were always using him; always invited his services, and always took his money. adams's opinion of politics and politicians, as he frankly admitted, lacked enthusiasm, although never, in his severest temper, did he apply to them the terms they freely applied to each other; and he explained everything by his old explanation of grant's character as more or less a general type; but what roused in his mind more rebellion was the patience and good-nature with which hay allowed himself to be used. the trait was not confined to politics. hay seemed to like to be used, and this was one of his many charms; but in politics this sort of good-nature demands supernatural patience. whatever astonishing lapses of social convention the politicians betrayed, hay laughed equally heartily, and told the stories with constant amusement, at his own expense. like most americans, he liked to play at making presidents, but, unlike most, he laughed not only at the presidents he helped to make, but also at himself for laughing. one must be rich, and come from ohio or new york, to gratify an expensive taste like this. other men, on both political flanks, did the same thing, and did it well, less for selfish objects than for the amusement of the game; but hay alone lived in washington and in the centre of the ohio influences that ruled the republican party during thirty years. on the whole, these influences were respectable, and although adams could not, under any circumstances, have had any value, even financially, for ohio politicians, hay might have much, as he showed, if they only knew enough to appreciate him. the american politician was occasionally an amusing object; hay laughed, and, for want of other resource, adams laughed too; but perhaps it was partly irritation at seeing how president harrison dealt his cards that made adams welcome president cleveland back to the white house. at all events, neither hay nor king nor adams had much to gain by reelecting mr. harrison in , or by defeating him, as far as he was concerned; and as far as concerned mr. cleveland, they seemed to have even less personal concern. the whole country, to outward appearance, stood in much the same frame of mind. everywhere was slack-water. hay himself was almost as languid and indifferent as adams. neither had occupation. both had finished their literary work. the "life" of lincoln had been begun, completed, and published hand in hand with the "history" of jefferson and madison, so that between them they had written nearly all the american history there was to write. the intermediate period needed intermediate treatment; the gap between james madison and abraham lincoln could not be judicially filled by either of them. both were heartily tired of the subject, and america seemed as tired as they. what was worse, the redeeming energy of americans which had generally served as the resource of minds otherwise vacant, the creation of new force, the application of expanding power, showed signs of check. even the year before, in , far off in the pacific, one had met everywhere in the east a sort of stagnation--a creeping paralysis--complaints of shipping and producers--that spread throughout the whole southern hemisphere. questions of exchange and silver-production loomed large. credit was shaken, and a change of party government might shake it even in washington. the matter did not concern adams, who had no credit, and was always richest when the rich were poor; but it helped to dull the vibration of society. however they studied it, the balance of profit and loss, on the last twenty years, for the three friends, king, hay, and adams, was exceedingly obscure in . they had lost twenty years, but what had they gained? they often discussed the question. hay had a singular faculty for remembering faces, and would break off suddenly the thread of his talk, as he looked out of the window on la fayette square, to notice an old corps commander or admiral of the civil war, tottering along to the club for his cards or his cocktail: "there is old dash who broke the rebel lines at blankburg! think of his having been a thunderbolt of war!" or what drew adams's closer attention: "there goes old boutwell gambolling like the gambolling kid!" there they went! men who had swayed the course of empire as well as the course of hay, king, and adams, less valued than the ephemeral congressman behind them, who could not have told whether the general was a boutwell or boutwell a general. theirs was the highest known success, and one asked what it was worth to them. apart from personal vanity, what would they sell it for? would any one of them, from president downwards, refuse ten thousand a year in place of all the consideration he received from the world on account of his success? yet consideration had value, and at that time adams enjoyed lecturing augustus st. gaudens, in hours of depression, on its economics: "honestly you must admit that even if you don't pay your expenses you get a certain amount of advantage from doing the best work. very likely some of the really successful americans would be willing you should come to dinner sometimes, if you did not come too often, while they would think twice about hay, and would never stand me." the forgotten statesman had no value at all; the general and admiral not much; the historian but little; on the whole, the artist stood best, and of course, wealth rested outside the question, since it was acting as judge; but, in the last resort, the judge certainly admitted that consideration had some value as an asset, though hardly as much as ten--or five--thousand a year. hay and adams had the advantage of looking out of their windows on the antiquities of la fayette square, with the sense of having all that any one had; all that the world had to offer; all that they wanted in life, including their names on scores of title-pages and in one or two biographical dictionaries; but this had nothing to do with consideration, and they knew no more than boutwell or st. gaudens whether to call it success. hay had passed ten years in writing the "life" of lincoln, and perhaps president lincoln was the better for it, but what hay got from it was not so easy to see, except the privilege of seeing popular book-makers steal from his book and cover the theft by abusing the author. adams had given ten or a dozen years to jefferson and madison, with expenses which, in any mercantile business, could hardly have been reckoned at less than a hundred thousand dollars, on a salary of five thousand a year; and when he asked what return he got from this expenditure, rather more extravagant in proportion to his means than a racing-stable, he could see none whatever. such works never return money. even frank parkman never printed a first edition of his relatively cheap and popular volumes, numbering more than seven hundred copies, until quite at the end of his life. a thousand copies of a book that cost twenty dollars or more was as much as any author could expect; two thousand copies was a visionary estimate unless it were canvassed for subscription. as far as adams knew, he had but three serious readers--abram hewitt, wayne mcveagh, and hay himself. he was amply satisfied with their consideration, and could dispense with that of the other fifty-nine million, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-seven; but neither he nor hay was better off in any other respect, and their chief title to consideration was their right to look out of their windows on great men, alive or dead, in la fayette square, a privilege which had nothing to do with their writings. the world was always good-natured; civil; glad to be amused; open-armed to any one who amused it; patient with every one who did not insist on putting himself in its way, or costing it money; but this was not consideration, still less power in any of its concrete forms, and applied as well or better to a comic actor. certainly a rare soprano or tenor voice earned infinitely more applause as it gave infinitely more pleasure, even in america; but one does what one can with one's means, and casting up one's balance sheet, one expects only a reasonable return on one's capital. hay and adams had risked nothing and never played for high stakes. king had followed the ambitious course. he had played for many millions. he had more than once come close to a great success, but the result was still in doubt, and meanwhile he was passing the best years of his life underground. for companionship he was mostly lost. thus, in , neither hay, king, nor adams knew whether they had attained success, or how to estimate it, or what to call it; and the american people seemed to have no clearer idea than they. indeed, the american people had no idea at all; they were wandering in a wilderness much more sandy than the hebrews had ever trodden about sinai; they had neither serpents nor golden calves to worship. they had lost the sense of worship; for the idea that they worshipped money seemed a delusion. worship of money was an old-world trait; a healthy appetite akin to worship of the gods, or to worship of power in any concrete shape; but the american wasted money more recklessly than any one ever did before; he spent more to less purpose than any extravagant court aristocracy; he had no sense of relative values, and knew not what to do with his money when he got it, except use it to make more, or throw it away. probably, since human society began, it had seen no such curious spectacle as the houses of the san francisco millionaires on nob hill. except for the railway system, the enormous wealth taken out of the ground since , had disappeared. west of the alleghenies, the whole country might have been swept clean, and could have been replaced in better form within one or two years. the american mind had less respect for money than the european or asiatic mind, and bore its loss more easily; but it had been deflected by its pursuit till it could turn in no other direction. it shunned, distrusted, disliked, the dangerous attraction of ideals, and stood alone in history for its ignorance of the past. personal contact brought this american trait close to adams's notice. his first step, on returning to washington, took him out to the cemetery known as rock creek, to see the bronze figure which st. gaudens had made for him in his absence. naturally every detail interested him; every line; every touch of the artist; every change of light and shade; every point of relation; every possible doubt of st. gaudens's correctness of taste or feeling; so that, as the spring approached, he was apt to stop there often to see what the figure had to tell him that was new; but, in all that it had to say, he never once thought of questioning what it meant. he supposed its meaning to be the one commonplace about it--the oldest idea known to human thought. he knew that if he asked an asiatic its meaning, not a man, woman, or child from cairo to kamtchatka would have needed more than a glance to reply. from the egyptian sphinx to the kamakura daibuts; from prometheus to christ; from michael angelo to shelley, art had wrought on this eternal figure almost as though it had nothing else to say. the interest of the figure was not in its meaning, but in the response of the observer. as adams sat there, numbers of people came, for the figure seemed to have become a tourist fashion, and all wanted to know its meaning. most took it for a portrait-statue, and the remnant were vacant-minded in the absence of a personal guide. none felt what would have been a nursery-instinct to a hindu baby or a japanese jinricksha-runner. the only exceptions were the clergy, who taught a lesson even deeper. one after another brought companions there, and, apparently fascinated by their own reflection, broke out passionately against the expression they felt in the figure of despair, of atheism, of denial. like the others, the priest saw only what he brought. like all great artists, st. gaudens held up the mirror and no more. the american layman had lost sight of ideals; the american priest had lost sight of faith. both were more american than the old, half-witted soldiers who denounced the wasting, on a mere grave, of money which should have been given for drink. landed, lost, and forgotten, in the centre of this vast plain of self-content, adams could see but one active interest, to which all others were subservient, and which absorbed the energies of some sixty million people to the exclusion of every other force, real or imaginary. the power of the railway system had enormously increased since . already the coal output of , , tons closely approached the , , of the british empire, and one held one's breath at the nearness of what one had never expected to see, the crossing of courses, and the lead of american energies. the moment was deeply exciting to a historian, but the railway system itself interested one less than in , since it offered less chance for future profit. adams had been born with the railway system; had grown up with it; had been over pretty nearly every mile of it with curious eyes, and knew as much about it as his neighbors; but not there could he look for a new education. incomplete though it was, the system seemed on the whole to satisfy the wants of society better than any other part of the social machine, and society was content with its creation, for the time, and with itself for creating it. nothing new was to be done or learned there, and the world hurried on to its telephones, bicycles, and electric trams. at past fifty, adams solemnly and painfully learned to ride the bicycle. nothing else occurred to him as a means of new life. nothing else offered itself, however carefully he sought. he looked for no change. he lingered in washington till near july without noticing a new idea. then he went back to england to pass his summer on the deeside. in october he returned to washington and there awaited the reelection of mr. cleveland, which led to no deeper thought than that of taking up some small notes that happened to be outstanding. he had seen enough of the world to be a coward, and above all he had an uneasy distrust of bankers. even dead men allow themselves a few narrow prejudices. chapter xxii chicago ( ) drifting in the dead-water of the fin-de-siecle--and during this last decade every one talked, and seemed to feel fin-de-siecle--where not a breath stirred the idle air of education or fretted the mental torpor of self-content, one lived alone. adams had long ceased going into society. for years he had not dined out of his own house, and in public his face was as unknown as that of an extinct statesman. he had often noticed that six months' oblivion amounts to newspaper-death, and that resurrection is rare. nothing is easier, if a man wants it, than rest, profound as the grave. his friends sometimes took pity on him, and came to share a meal or pass a night on their passage south or northwards, but existence was, on the whole, exceedingly solitary, or seemed so to him. of the society favorites who made the life of every dinner-table and of the halls of congress--tom reed, bourke cockran, edward wolcott--he knew not one. although calvin brice was his next neighbor for six years, entertaining lavishly as no one had ever entertained before in washington, adams never entered his house. w. c. whitney rivalled senator brice in hospitality, and was besides an old acquaintance of the reforming era, but adams saw him as little as he saw his chief, president cleveland, or president harrison or secretary bayard or blaine or olney. one has no choice but to go everywhere or nowhere. no one may pick and choose between houses, or accept hospitality without returning it. he loved solitude as little as others did; but he was unfit for social work, and he sank under the surface. luckily for such helpless animals as solitary men, the world is not only good-natured but even friendly and generous; it loves to pardon if pardon is not demanded as a right. adams's social offences were many, and no one was more sensitive to it than himself; but a few houses always remained which he could enter without being asked, and quit without being noticed. one was john hay's; another was cabot lodge's; a third led to an intimacy which had the singular effect of educating him in knowledge of the very class of american politician who had done most to block his intended path in life. senator cameron of pennsylvania had married in a young niece of senator john sherman of ohio, thus making an alliance of dynastic importance in politics, and in society a reign of sixteen years, during which mrs. cameron and mrs. lodge led a career, without precedent and without succession, as the dispensers of sunshine over washington. both of them had been kind to adams, and a dozen years of this intimacy had made him one of their habitual household, as he was of hay's. in a small society, such ties between houses become political and social force. without intention or consciousness, they fix one's status in the world. whatever one's preferences in politics might be, one's house was bound to the republican interest when sandwiched between senator cameron, john hay, and cabot lodge, with theodore roosevelt equally at home in them all, and cecil spring-rice to unite them by impartial variety. the relation was daily, and the alliance undisturbed by power or patronage, since mr. harrison, in those respects, showed little more taste than mr. cleveland for the society and interests of this particular band of followers, whose relations with the white house were sometimes comic, but never intimate. in february, , senator cameron took his family to south carolina, where he had bought an old plantation at coffin's point on st. helena island, and adams, as one of the family, was taken, with the rest, to open the new experience. from there he went on to havana, and came back to coffin's point to linger till near april. in may the senator took his family to chicago to see the exposition, and adams went with them. early in june, all sailed for england together, and at last, in the middle of july, all found themselves in switzerland, at prangins, chamounix, and zermatt. on july they drove across the furka pass and went down by rail to lucerne. months of close contact teach character, if character has interest; and to adams the cameron type had keen interest, ever since it had shipwrecked his career in the person of president grant. perhaps it owed life to scotch blood; perhaps to the blood of adam and eve, the primitive strain of man; perhaps only to the blood of the cottager working against the blood of the townsman; but whatever it was, one liked it for its simplicity. the pennsylvania mind, as minds go, was not complex; it reasoned little and never talked; but in practical matters it was the steadiest of all american types; perhaps the most efficient; certainly the safest. adams had printed as much as this in his books, but had never been able to find a type to describe, the two great historical pennsylvanians having been, as every one had so often heard, benjamin franklin of boston and albert gallatin of geneva. of albert gallatin, indeed, he had made a voluminous study and an elaborate picture, only to show that he was, if american at all, a new yorker, with a calvinistic strain--rather connecticut than pennsylvanian. the true pennsylvanian was a narrower type; as narrow as the kirk; as shy of other people's narrowness as a yankee; as self-limited as a puritan farmer. to him, none but pennsylvanians were white. chinaman, negro, dago, italian, englishman, yankee--all was one in the depths of pennsylvanian consciousness. the mental machine could run only on what it took for american lines. this was familiar, ever since one's study of president grant in ; but in , as then, the type was admirably strong and useful if one wanted only to run on the same lines. practically the pennsylvanian forgot his prejudices when he allied his interests. he then became supple in action and large in motive, whatever he thought of his colleagues. when he happened to be right--which was, of course, whenever one agreed with him--he was the strongest american in america. as an ally he was worth all the rest, because he understood his own class, who were always a majority; and knew how to deal with them as no new englander could. if one wanted work done in congress, one did wisely to avoid asking a new englander to do it. a pennsylvanian not only could do it, but did it willingly, practically, and intelligently. never in the range of human possibilities had a cameron believed in an adams--or an adams in a cameron--but they had curiously enough, almost always worked together. the camerons had what the adamses thought the political vice of reaching their objects without much regard to their methods. the loftiest virtue of the pennsylvania machine had never been its scrupulous purity or sparkling professions. the machine worked by coarse means on coarse interests, but its practical success had been the most curious subject of study in american history. when one summed up the results of pennsylvanian influence, one inclined to think that pennsylvania set up the government in ; saved it in ; created the american system; developed its iron and coal power; and invented its great railways. following up the same line, in his studies of american character, adams reached the result--to him altogether paradoxical--that cameron's qualities and defects united in equal share to make him the most useful member of the senate. in the interest of studying, at last, a perfect and favorable specimen of this american type which had so persistently suppressed his own, adams was slow to notice that cameron strongly influenced him, but he could not see a trace of any influence which he exercised on cameron. not an opinion or a view of his on any subject was ever reflected back on him from cameron's mind; not even an expression or a fact. yet the difference in age was trifling, and in education slight. on the other hand, cameron made deep impression on adams, and in nothing so much as on the great subject of discussion that year--the question of silver. adams had taken no interest in the matter, and knew nothing about it, except as a very tedious hobby of his friend dana horton; but inevitably, from the moment he was forced to choose sides, he was sure to choose silver. every political idea and personal prejudice he ever dallied with held him to the silver standard, and made a barrier between him and gold. he knew well enough all that was to be said for the gold standard as economy, but he had never in his life taken politics for a pursuit of economy. one might have a political or an economical policy; one could not have both at the same time. this was heresy in the english school, but it had always been law in the american. equally he knew all that was to be said on the moral side of the question, and he admitted that his interests were, as boston maintained, wholly on the side of gold; but, had they been ten times as great as they were, he could not have helped his bankers or croupiers to load the dice and pack the cards to make sure his winning the stakes. at least he was bound to profess disapproval--or thought he was. from early childhood his moral principles had struggled blindly with his interests, but he was certain of one law that ruled all others--masses of men invariably follow interests in deciding morals. morality is a private and costly luxury. the morality of the silver or gold standards was to be decided by popular vote, and the popular vote would be decided by interests; but on which side lay the larger interest? to him the interest was political; he thought it probably his last chance of standing up for his eighteenth-century principles, strict construction, limited powers, george washington, john adams, and the rest. he had, in a half-hearted way, struggled all his life against state street, banks, capitalism altogether, as he knew it in old england or new england, and he was fated to make his last resistance behind the silver standard. for him this result was clear, and if he erred, he erred in company with nine men out of ten in washington, for there was little difference on the merits. adams was sure to learn backwards, but the case seemed entirely different with cameron, a typical pennsylvanian, a practical politician, whom all the reformers, including all the adamses, had abused for a lifetime for subservience to moneyed interests and political jobbery. he was sure to go with the banks and corporations which had made and sustained him. on the contrary, he stood out obstinately as the leading champion of silver in the east. the reformers, represented by the evening post and godkin, whose personal interests lay with the gold standard, at once assumed that senator cameron had a personal interest in silver, and denounced his corruption as hotly as though he had been convicted of taking a bribe. more than silver and gold, the moral standard interested adams. his own interests were with gold, but he supported silver; the evening post's and godkin's interests were with gold, and they frankly said so, yet they avowedly pursued their interests even into politics; cameron's interests had always been with the corporations, yet he supported silver. thus morality required that adams should be condemned for going against his interests; that godkin was virtuous in following his interests; and that cameron was a scoundrel whatever he did. granting that one of the three was a moral idiot, which was it:--adams or godkin or cameron? until a council or a pope or a congress or the newspapers or a popular election has decided a question of doubtful morality, individuals are apt to err, especially when putting money into their own pockets; but in democracies, the majority alone gives law. to any one who knew the relative popularity of cameron and godkin, the idea of a popular vote between them seemed excessively humorous; yet the popular vote in the end did decide against cameron, for godkin. the boston moralist and reformer went on, as always, like dr. johnson, impatiently stamping his foot and following his interests, or his antipathies; but the true american, slow to grasp new and complicated ideas, groped in the dark to discover where his greater interest lay. as usual, the banks taught him. in the course of fifty years the banks taught one many wise lessons for which an insect had to be grateful whether it liked them or not; but of all the lessons adams learned from them, none compared in dramatic effect with that of july , , when, after talking silver all the morning with senator cameron on the top of their travelling-carriage crossing the furka pass, they reached lucerne in the afternoon, where adams found letters from his brothers requesting his immediate return to boston because the community was bankrupt and he was probably a beggar. if he wanted education, he knew no quicker mode of learning a lesson than that of being struck on the head by it; and yet he was himself surprised at his own slowness to understand what had struck him. for several years a sufferer from insomnia, his first thought was of beggary of nerves, and he made ready to face a sleepless night, but although his mind tried to wrestle with the problem how any man could be ruined who had, months before, paid off every dollar of debt he knew himself to owe, he gave up that insoluble riddle in order to fall back on the larger principle that beggary could be no more for him than it was for others who were more valuable members of society, and, with that, he went to sleep like a good citizen, and the next day started for quincy where he arrived august . as a starting-point for a new education at fifty-five years old, the shock of finding one's self suspended, for several months, over the edge of bankruptcy, without knowing how one got there, or how to get away, is to be strongly recommended. by slow degrees the situation dawned on him that the banks had lent him, among others, some money--thousands of millions were--as bankruptcy--the same--for which he, among others, was responsible and of which he knew no more than they. the humor of this situation seemed to him so much more pointed than the terror, as to make him laugh at himself with a sincerity he had been long strange to. as far as he could comprehend, he had nothing to lose that he cared about, but the banks stood to lose their existence. money mattered as little to him as to anybody, but money was their life. for the first time he had the banks in his power; he could afford to laugh; and the whole community was in the same position, though few laughed. all sat down on the banks and asked what the banks were going to do about it. to adams the situation seemed farcical, but the more he saw of it, the less he understood it. he was quite sure that nobody understood it much better. blindly some very powerful energy was at work, doing something that nobody wanted done. when adams went to his bank to draw a hundred dollars of his own money on deposit, the cashier refused to let him have more than fifty, and adams accepted the fifty without complaint because he was himself refusing to let the banks have some hundreds or thousands that belonged to them. each wanted to help the other, yet both refused to pay their debts, and he could find no answer to the question which was responsible for getting the other into the situation, since lenders and borrowers were the same interest and socially the same person. evidently the force was one; its operation was mechanical; its effect must be proportional to its power; but no one knew what it meant, and most people dismissed it as an emotion--a panic--that meant nothing. men died like flies under the strain, and boston grew suddenly old, haggard, and thin. adams alone waxed fat and was happy, for at last he had got hold of his world and could finish his education, interrupted for twenty years. he cared not whether it were worth finishing, if only it amused; but he seemed, for the first time since , to feel that something new and curious was about to happen to the world. great changes had taken place since in the forces at work; the old machine ran far behind its duty; somewhere--somehow--it was bound to break down, and if it happened to break precisely over one's head, it gave the better chance for study. for the first time in several years he saw much of his brother brooks in quincy, and was surprised to find him absorbed in the same perplexities. brooks was then a man of forty-five years old; a strong writer and a vigorous thinker who irritated too many boston conventions ever to suit the atmosphere; but the two brothers could talk to each other without atmosphere and were used to audiences of one. brooks had discovered or developed a law of history that civilization followed the exchanges, and having worked it out for the mediterranean was working it out for the atlantic. everything american, as well as most things european and asiatic, became unstable by this law, seeking new equilibrium and compelled to find it. loving paradox, brooks, with the advantages of ten years' study, had swept away much rubbish in the effort to build up a new line of thought for himself, but he found that no paradox compared with that of daily events. the facts were constantly outrunning his thoughts. the instability was greater than he calculated; the speed of acceleration passed bounds. among other general rules he laid down the paradox that, in the social disequilibrium between capital and labor, the logical outcome was not collectivism, but anarchism; and henry made note of it for study. by the time he got back to washington on september , the storm having partly blown over, life had taken on a new face, and one so interesting that he set off to chicago to study the exposition again, and stayed there a fortnight absorbed in it. he found matter of study to fill a hundred years, and his education spread over chaos. indeed, it seemed to him as though, this year, education went mad. the silver question, thorny as it was, fell into relations as simple as words of one syllable, compared with the problems of credit and exchange that came to complicate it; and when one sought rest at chicago, educational game started like rabbits from every building, and ran out of sight among thousands of its kind before one could mark its burrow. the exposition itself defied philosophy. one might find fault till the last gate closed, one could still explain nothing that needed explanation. as a scenic display, paris had never approached it, but the inconceivable scenic display consisted in its being there at all--more surprising, as it was, than anything else on the continent, niagara falls, the yellowstone geysers, and the whole railway system thrown in, since these were all natural products in their place; while, since noah's ark, no such babel of loose and ill joined, such vague and ill-defined and unrelated thoughts and half-thoughts and experimental outcries as the exposition, had ever ruffled the surface of the lakes. the first astonishment became greater every day. that the exposition should be a natural growth and product of the northwest offered a step in evolution to startle darwin; but that it should be anything else seemed an idea more startling still; and even granting it were not--admitting it to be a sort of industrial, speculative growth and product of the beaux arts artistically induced to pass the summer on the shore of lake michigan--could it be made to seem at home there? was the american made to seem at home in it? honestly, he had the air of enjoying it as though it were all his own; he felt it was good; he was proud of it; for the most part, he acted as though he had passed his life in landscape gardening and architectural decoration. if he had not done it himself, he had known how to get it done to suit him, as he knew how to get his wives and daughters dressed at worth's or paquin's. perhaps he could not do it again; the next time he would want to do it himself and would show his own faults; but for the moment he seemed to have leaped directly from corinth and syracuse and venice, over the heads of london and new york, to impose classical standards on plastic chicago. critics had no trouble in criticising the classicism, but all trading cities had always shown traders' taste, and, to the stern purist of religious faith, no art was thinner than venetian gothic. all trader's taste smelt of bric-a-brac; chicago tried at least to give her taste a look of unity. one sat down to ponder on the steps beneath richard hunt's dome almost as deeply as on the steps of ara coeli, and much to the same purpose. here was a breach of continuity--a rupture in historical sequence! was it real, or only apparent? one's personal universe hung on the answer, for, if the rupture was real and the new american world could take this sharp and conscious twist towards ideals, one's personal friends would come in, at last, as winners in the great american chariot-race for fame. if the people of the northwest actually knew what was good when they saw it, they would some day talk about hunt and richardson, la farge and st. gaudens, burnham and mckim, and stanford white when their politicians and millionaires were otherwise forgotten. the artists and architects who had done the work offered little encouragement to hope it; they talked freely enough, but not in terms that one cared to quote; and to them the northwest refused to look artistic. they talked as though they worked only for themselves; as though art, to the western people, was a stage decoration; a diamond shirt-stud; a paper collar; but possibly the architects of paestum and girgenti had talked in the same way, and the greek had said the same thing of semitic carthage two thousand years ago. jostled by these hopes and doubts, one turned to the exhibits for help, and found it. the industrial schools tried to teach so much and so quickly that the instruction ran to waste. some millions of other people felt the same helplessness, but few of them were seeking education, and to them helplessness seemed natural and normal, for they had grown up in the habit of thinking a steam-engine or a dynamo as natural as the sun, and expected to understand one as little as the other. for the historian alone the exposition made a serious effort. historical exhibits were common, but they never went far enough; none were thoroughly worked out. one of the best was that of the cunard steamers, but still a student hungry for results found himself obliged to waste a pencil and several sheets of paper trying to calculate exactly when, according to the given increase of power, tonnage, and speed, the growth of the ocean steamer would reach its limits. his figures brought him, he thought, to the year ; another generation to spare before force, space, and time should meet. the ocean steamer ran the surest line of triangulation into the future, because it was the nearest of man's products to a unity; railroads taught less because they seemed already finished except for mere increase in number; explosives taught most, but needed a tribe of chemists, physicists, and mathematicians to explain; the dynamo taught least because it had barely reached infancy, and, if its progress was to be constant at the rate of the last ten years, it would result in infinite costless energy within a generation. one lingered long among the dynamos, for they were new, and they gave to history a new phase. men of science could never understand the ignorance and naivete; of the historian, who, when he came suddenly on a new power, asked naturally what it was; did it pull or did it push? was it a screw or thrust? did it flow or vibrate? was it a wire or a mathematical line? and a score of such questions to which he expected answers and was astonished to get none. education ran riot at chicago, at least for retarded minds which had never faced in concrete form so many matters of which they were ignorant. men who knew nothing whatever--who had never run a steam-engine, the simplest of forces--who had never put their hands on a lever--had never touched an electric battery--never talked through a telephone, and had not the shadow of a notion what amount of force was meant by a watt or an ampere or an erg, or any other term of measurement introduced within a hundred years--had no choice but to sit down on the steps and brood as they had never brooded on the benches of harvard college, either as student or professor, aghast at what they had said and done in all these years, and still more ashamed of the childlike ignorance and babbling futility of the society that let them say and do it. the historical mind can think only in historical processes, and probably this was the first time since historians existed, that any of them had sat down helpless before a mechanical sequence. before a metaphysical or a theological or a political sequence, most historians had felt helpless, but the single clue to which they had hitherto trusted was the unity of natural force. did he himself quite know what he meant? certainly not! if he had known enough to state his problem, his education would have been complete at once. chicago asked in for the first time the question whether the american people knew where they were driving. adams answered, for one, that he did not know, but would try to find out. on reflecting sufficiently deeply, under the shadow of richard hunt's architecture, he decided that the american people probably knew no more than he did; but that they might still be driving or drifting unconsciously to some point in thought, as their solar system was said to be drifting towards some point in space; and that, possibly, if relations enough could be observed, this point might be fixed. chicago was the first expression of american thought as a unity; one must start there. washington was the second. when he got back there, he fell headlong into the extra session of congress called to repeal the silver act. the silver minority made an obstinate attempt to prevent it, and most of the majority had little heart in the creation of a single gold standard. the banks alone, and the dealers in exchange, insisted upon it; the political parties divided according to capitalistic geographical lines, senator cameron offering almost the only exception; but they mixed with unusual good-temper, and made liberal allowance for each others' actions and motives. the struggle was rather less irritable than such struggles generally were, and it ended like a comedy. on the evening of the final vote, senator cameron came back from the capitol with senator brice, senator jones, senator lodge, and moreton frewen, all in the gayest of humors as though they were rid of a heavy responsibility. adams, too, in a bystander's spirit, felt light in mind. he had stood up for his eighteenth century, his constitution of , his george washington, his harvard college, his quincy, and his plymouth pilgrims, as long as any one would stand up with him. he had said it was hopeless twenty years before, but he had kept on, in the same old attitude, by habit and taste, until he found himself altogether alone. he had hugged his antiquated dislike of bankers and capitalistic society until he had become little better than a crank. he had known for years that he must accept the regime, but he had known a great many other disagreeable certainties--like age, senility, and death--against which one made what little resistance one could. the matter was settled at last by the people. for a hundred years, between and , the american people had hesitated, vacillated, swayed forward and back, between two forces, one simply industrial, the other capitalistic, centralizing, and mechanical. in , the issue came on the single gold standard, and the majority at last declared itself, once for all, in favor of the capitalistic system with all its necessary machinery. all one's friends, all one's best citizens, reformers, churches, colleges, educated classes, had joined the banks to force submission to capitalism; a submission long foreseen by the mere law of mass. of all forms of society or government, this was the one he liked least, but his likes or dislikes were as antiquated as the rebel doctrine of state rights. a capitalistic system had been adopted, and if it were to be run at all, it must be run by capital and by capitalistic methods; for nothing could surpass the nonsensity of trying to run so complex and so concentrated a machine by southern and western farmers in grotesque alliance with city day-laborers, as had been tried in and , and had failed even under simple conditions. there, education in domestic politics stopped. the rest was question of gear; of running machinery; of economy; and involved no disputed principle. once admitted that the machine must be efficient, society might dispute in what social interest it should be run, but in any case it must work concentration. such great revolutions commonly leave some bitterness behind, but nothing in politics ever surprised henry adams more than the ease with which he and his silver friends slipped across the chasm, and alighted on the single gold standard and the capitalistic system with its methods; the protective tariff; the corporations and trusts; the trades-unions and socialistic paternalism which necessarily made their complement; the whole mechanical consolidation of force, which ruthlessly stamped out the life of the class into which adams was born, but created monopolies capable of controlling the new energies that america adored. society rested, after sweeping into the ash-heap these cinders of a misdirected education. after this vigorous impulse, nothing remained for a historian but to ask--how long and how far! chapter xxiii silence ( - ) the convulsion of left its victims in dead-water, and closed much education. while the country braced itself up to an effort such as no one had thought within its powers, the individual crawled as he best could, through the wreck, and found many values of life upset. but for connecting the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the four years, to , had no value in the drama of education, and might be left out. much that had made life pleasant between and perished in the ruin, and among the earliest wreckage had been the fortunes of clarence king. the lesson taught whatever the bystander chose to read in it; but to adams it seemed singularly full of moral, if he could but understand it. in he had thought king's education ideal, and his personal fitness unrivalled. no other young american approached him for the combination of chances--physical energy, social standing, mental scope and training, wit, geniality, and science, that seemed superlatively american and irresistibly strong. his nearest rival was alexander agassiz, and, as far as their friends knew, no one else could be classed with them in the running. the result of twenty years' effort proved that the theory of scientific education failed where most theory fails--for want of money. even henry adams, who kept himself, as he thought, quite outside of every possible financial risk, had been caught in the cogs, and held for months over the gulf of bankruptcy, saved only by the chance that the whole class of millionaires were more or less bankrupt too, and the banks were forced to let the mice escape with the rats; but, in sum, education without capital could always be taken by the throat and forced to disgorge its gains, nor was it helped by the knowledge that no one intended it, but that all alike suffered. whether voluntary or mechanical the result for education was the same. the failure of the scientific scheme, without money to back it, was flagrant. the scientific scheme in theory was alone sound, for science should be equivalent to money; in practice science was helpless without money. the weak holder was, in his own language, sure to be frozen out. education must fit the complex conditions of a new society, always accelerating its movement, and its fitness could be known only from success. one looked about for examples of success among the educated of one's time--the men born in the thirties, and trained to professions. within one's immediate acquaintance, three were typical: john hay, whitelaw reid, and william c. whitney; all of whom owed their free hand to marriage, education serving only for ornament, but among whom, in , william c. whitney was far and away the most popular type. newspapers might prate about wealth till commonplace print was exhausted, but as matter of habit, few americans envied the very rich for anything the most of them got out of money. new york might occasionally fear them, but more often laughed or sneered at them, and never showed them respect. scarcely one of the very rich men held any position in society by virtue of his wealth, or could have been elected to an office, or even into a good club. setting aside the few, like pierpont morgan, whose social position had little to do with greater or less wealth, riches were in new york no object of envy on account of the joys they brought in their train, and whitney was not even one of the very rich; yet in his case the envy was palpable. there was reason for it. already in whitney had finished with politics after having gratified every ambition, and swung the country almost at his will; he had thrown away the usual objects of political ambition like the ashes of smoked cigarettes; had turned to other amusements, satiated every taste, gorged every appetite, won every object that new york afforded, and, not yet satisfied, had carried his field of activity abroad, until new york no longer knew what most to envy, his horses or his houses. he had succeeded precisely where clarence king had failed. barely forty years had passed since all these men started in a bunch to race for power, and the results were fixed beyond reversal; but one knew no better in than in what an american education ought to be in order to count as success. even granting that it counted as money, its value could not be called general. america contained scores of men worth five millions or upwards, whose lives were no more worth living than those of their cooks, and to whom the task of making money equivalent to education offered more difficulties than to adams the task of making education equivalent to money. social position seemed to have value still, while education counted for nothing. a mathematician, linguist, chemist, electrician, engineer, if fortunate might average a value of ten dollars a day in the open market. an administrator, organizer, manager, with mediaeval qualities of energy and will, but no education beyond his special branch, would probably be worth at least ten times as much. society had failed to discover what sort of education suited it best. wealth valued social position and classical education as highly as either of these valued wealth, and the women still tended to keep the scales even. for anything adams could see he was himself as contented as though he had been educated; while clarence king, whose education was exactly suited to theory, had failed; and whitney, who was no better educated than adams, had achieved phenomenal success. had adams in been starting in life as he did in , he must have repeated that all he asked of education was the facile use of the four old tools: mathematics, french, german, and spanish. with these he could still make his way to any object within his vision, and would have a decisive advantage over nine rivals in ten. statesman or lawyer, chemist or electrician, priest or professor, native or foreign, he would fear none. king's breakdown, physical as well as financial, brought the indirect gain to adams that, on recovering strength, king induced him to go to cuba, where, in january, , they drifted into the little town of santiago. the picturesque cuban society, which king knew well, was more amusing than any other that one had yet discovered in the whole broad world, but made no profession of teaching anything unless it were cuban spanish or the danza; and neither on his own nor on king's account did the visitor ask any loftier study than that of the buzzards floating on the trade-wind down the valley to dos bocas, or the colors of sea and shore at sunrise from the height of the gran piedra; but, as though they were still twenty years old and revolution were as young as they, the decaying fabric, which had never been solid, fell on their heads and drew them with it into an ocean of mischief. in the half-century between and , empires were always falling on one's head, and, of all lessons, these constant political convulsions taught least. since the time of rameses, revolutions have raised more doubts than they solved, but they have sometimes the merit of changing one's point of view, and the cuban rebellion served to sever the last tie that attached adams to a democratic administration. he thought that president cleveland could have settled the cuban question, without war, had he chosen to do his duty, and this feeling, generally held by the democratic party, joined with the stress of economical needs and the gold standard to break into bits the old organization and to leave no choice between parties. the new american, whether consciously or not, had turned his back on the nineteenth century before he was done with it; the gold standard, the protective system, and the laws of mass could have no other outcome, and, as so often before, the movement, once accelerated by attempting to impede it, had the additional, brutal consequence of crushing equally the good and the bad that stood in its way. the lesson was old--so old that it became tedious. one had studied nothing else since childhood, and wearied of it. for yet another year adams lingered on these outskirts of the vortex, among the picturesque, primitive types of a world which had never been fairly involved in the general motion, and were the more amusing for their torpor. after passing the winter with king in the west indies, he passed the summer with hay in the yellowstone, and found there little to study. the geysers were an old story; the snake river posed no vital statistics except in its fordings; even the tetons were as calm as they were lovely; while the wapiti and bear, innocent of strikes and corners, laid no traps. in return the party treated them with affection. never did a band less bloody or bloodthirsty wander over the roof of the continent. hay loved as little as adams did, the labor of skinning and butchering big game; he had even outgrown the sedate, middle-aged, meditative joy of duck-shooting, and found the trout of the yellowstone too easy a prey. hallett phillips himself, who managed the party loved to play indian hunter without hunting so much as a fieldmouse; iddings the geologist was reduced to shooting only for the table, and the guileless prattle of billy hofer alone taught the simple life. compared with the rockies of , the sense of wildness had vanished; one saw no possible adventures except to break one's neck as in chasing an aniseed fox. only the more intelligent ponies scented an occasional friendly and sociable bear. when the party came out of the yellowstone, adams went on alone to seattle and vancouver to inspect the last american railway systems yet untried. they, too, offered little new learning, and no sooner had he finished this debauch of northwestern geography than with desperate thirst for exhausting the american field, he set out for mexico and the gulf, making a sweep of the caribbean and clearing up, in these six or eight months, at least twenty thousand miles of american land and water. he was beginning to think, when he got back to washington in april, , that he knew enough about the edges of life--tropical islands, mountain solitudes, archaic law, and retrograde types. infinitely more amusing and incomparably more picturesque than civilization, they educated only artists, and, as one's sixtieth year approached, the artist began to die; only a certain intense cerebral restlessness survived which no longer responded to sensual stimulants; one was driven from beauty to beauty as though art were a trotting-match. for this, one was in some degree prepared, for the old man had been a stage-type since drama began; but one felt some perplexity to account for failure on the opposite or mechanical side, where nothing but cerebral action was needed. taking for granted that the alternative to art was arithmetic, he plunged deep into statistics, fancying that education would find the surest bottom there; and the study proved the easiest he had ever approached. even the government volunteered unlimited statistics, endless columns of figures, bottomless averages merely for the asking. at the statistical bureau, worthington ford supplied any material that curiosity could imagine for filling the vast gaps of ignorance, and methods for applying the plasters of fact. one seemed for a while to be winning ground, and one's averages projected themselves as laws into the future. perhaps the most perplexing part of the study lay in the attitude of the statisticians, who showed no enthusiastic confidence in their own figures. they should have reached certainty, but they talked like other men who knew less. the method did not result in faith. indeed, every increase of mass--of volume and velocity--seemed to bring in new elements, and, at last, a scholar, fresh in arithmetic and ignorant of algebra, fell into a superstitious terror of complexity as the sink of facts. nothing came out as it should. in principle, according to figures, any one could set up or pull down a society. one could frame no sort of satisfactory answer to the constructive doctrines of adam smith, or to the destructive criticisms of karl marx or to the anarchistic imprecations of elisee reclus. one revelled at will in the ruin of every society in the past, and rejoiced in proving the prospective overthrow of every society that seemed possible in the future; but meanwhile these societies which violated every law, moral, arithmetical, and economical, not only propagated each other, but produced also fresh complexities with every propagation and developed mass with every complexity. the human factor was worse still. since the stupefying discovery of pteraspis in , nothing had so confused the student as the conduct of mankind in the fin-de-siecle. no one seemed very much concerned about this world or the future, unless it might be the anarchists, and they only because they disliked the present. adams disliked the present as much as they did, and his interest in future society was becoming slight, yet he was kept alive by irritation at finding his life so thin and fruitless. meanwhile he watched mankind march on, like a train of pack-horses on the snake river, tumbling from one morass into another, and at short intervals, for no reason but temper, falling to butchery, like cain. since , massacres had become so common that society scarcely noticed them unless they summed up hundreds of thousands, as in armenia; wars had been almost continuous, and were beginning again in cuba, threatening in south africa, and possible in manchuria; yet impartial judges thought them all not merely unnecessary, but foolish--induced by greed of the coarsest class, as though the pharaohs or the romans were still robbing their neighbors. the robbery might be natural and inevitable, but the murder seemed altogether archaic. at one moment of perplexity to account for this trait of pteraspis, or shark, which seemed to have survived every moral improvement of society, he took to study of the religious press. possibly growth in human nature might show itself there. he found no need to speak unkindly of it; but, as an agent of motion, he preferred on the whole the vigor of the shark, with its chances of betterment; and he very gravely doubted, from his aching consciousness of religious void, whether any large fraction of society cared for a future life, or even for the present one, thirty years hence. not an act, or an expression, or an image, showed depth of faith or hope. the object of education, therefore, was changed. for many years it had lost itself in studying what the world had ceased to care for; if it were to begin again, it must try to find out what the mass of mankind did care for, and why. religion, politics, statistics, travel had thus far led to nothing. even the chicago fair had only confused the roads. accidental education could go no further, for one's mind was already littered and stuffed beyond hope with the millions of chance images stored away without order in the memory. one might as well try to educate a gravel-pit. the task was futile, which disturbed a student less than the discovery that, in pursuing it, he was becoming himself ridiculous. nothing is more tiresome than a superannuated pedagogue. for the moment he was rescued, as often before, by a woman. towards midsummer, , mrs. cabot lodge bade him follow her to europe with the senator and her two sons. the study of history is useful to the historian by teaching him his ignorance of women; and the mass of this ignorance crushes one who is familiar enough with what are called historical sources to realize how few women have ever been known. the woman who is known only through a man is known wrong, and excepting one or two like mme. de sevigne, no woman has pictured herself. the american woman of the nineteenth century will live only as the man saw her; probably she will be less known than the woman of the eighteenth; none of the female descendants of abigail adams can ever be nearly so familiar as her letters have made her; and all this is pure loss to history, for the american woman of the nineteenth century was much better company than the american man; she was probably much better company than her grandmothers. with mrs. lodge and her husband, senator since , adams's relations had been those of elder brother or uncle since when cabot lodge had left his examination-papers on assistant professor adams's desk, and crossed the street to christ church in cambridge to get married. with lodge himself, as scholar, fellow instructor, co-editor of the north american review, and political reformer from to , he had worked intimately, but with him afterwards as politician he had not much relation; and since lodge had suffered what adams thought the misfortune of becoming not only a senator but a senator from massachusetts--a singular social relation which adams had known only as fatal to friends--a superstitious student, intimate with the laws of historical fatality, would rather have recognized him only as an enemy; but apart from this accident he valued lodge highly, and in the waste places of average humanity had been greatly dependent on his house. senators can never be approached with safety, but a senator who has a very superior wife and several superior children who feel no deference for senators as such, may be approached at times with relative impunity while they keep him under restraint. where mrs. lodge summoned, one followed with gratitude, and so it chanced that in august one found one's self for the first time at caen, coutances, and mont-saint-michel in normandy. if history had a chapter with which he thought himself familiar, it was the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; yet so little has labor to do with knowledge that these bare playgrounds of the lecture system turned into green and verdurous virgin forests merely through the medium of younger eyes and fresher minds. his german bias must have given his youth a terrible twist, for the lodges saw at a glance what he had thought unessential because un-german. they breathed native air in the normandy of , a compliment which would have seemed to the senator lacking in taste or even in sense when addressed to one of a class of men who passed life in trying to persuade themselves and the public that they breathed nothing less american than a blizzard; but this atmosphere, in the touch of a real emotion, betrayed the unconscious humor of the senatorial mind. in the thirteenth century, by an unusual chance, even a senator became natural, simple, interested, cultivated, artistic, liberal--genial. through the lodge eyes the old problem became new and personal; it threw off all association with the german lecture-room. one could not at first see what this novelty meant; it had the air of mere antiquarian emotion like wenlock abbey and pteraspis; but it expelled archaic law and antiquarianism once for all, without seeming conscious of it; and adams drifted back to washington with a new sense of history. again he wandered south, and in april returned to mexico with the camerons to study the charms of pulque and churriguerresque architecture. in may he ran through europe again with hay, as far south as ravenna. there came the end of the passage. after thus covering once more, in , many thousand miles of the old trails, adams went home in october, with every one else, to elect mckinley president and start the world anew. for the old world of public men and measures since , adams wept no tears. within or without, during or after it, as partisan or historian, he never saw anything to admire in it, or anything he wanted to save; and in this respect he reflected only the public mind which balanced itself so exactly between the unpopularity of both parties as to express no sympathy with either. even among the most powerful men of that generation he knew none who had a good word to say for it. no period so thoroughly ordinary had been known in american politics since christopher columbus first disturbed the balance of american society; but the natural result of such lack of interest in public affairs, in a small society like that of washington, led an idle bystander to depend abjectly on intimacy of private relation. one dragged one's self down the long vista of pennsylvania avenue, by leaning heavily on one's friends, and avoiding to look at anything else. thus life had grown narrow with years, more and more concentrated on the circle of houses round la fayette square, which had no direct or personal share in power except in the case of mr. blaine whose tumultuous struggle for existence held him apart. suddenly mr. mckinley entered the white house and laid his hand heavily on this special group. in a moment the whole nest so slowly constructed, was torn to pieces and scattered over the world. adams found himself alone. john hay took his orders for london. rockhill departed to athens. cecil spring-rice had been buried in persia. cameron refused to remain in public life either at home or abroad, and broke up his house on the square. only the lodges and roosevelts remained, but even they were at once absorbed in the interests of power. since , no such social convulsion had occurred. even this was not quite the worst. to one whose interests lay chiefly in foreign affairs, and who, at this moment, felt most strongly the nightmare of cuban, hawaiian, and nicaraguan chaos, the man in the state department seemed more important than the man in the white house. adams knew no one in the united states fit to manage these matters in the face of a hostile europe, and had no candidate to propose; but he was shocked beyond all restraints of expression to learn that the president meant to put senator john sherman in the state department in order to make a place for mr. hanna in the senate. grant himself had done nothing that seemed so bad as this to one who had lived long enough to distinguish between the ways of presidential jobbery, if not between the jobs. john sherman, otherwise admirably fitted for the place, a friendly influence for nearly forty years, was notoriously feeble and quite senile, so that the intrigue seemed to adams the betrayal of an old friend as well as of the state department. one might have shrugged one's shoulders had the president named mr. hanna his secretary of state, for mr. hanna was a man of force if not of experience, and selections much worse than this had often turned out well enough; but john sherman must inevitably and tragically break down. the prospect for once was not less vile than the men. one can bear coldly the jobbery of enemies, but not that of friends, and to adams this kind of jobbery seemed always infinitely worse than all the petty money bribes ever exploited by the newspapers. nor was the matter improved by hints that the president might call john hay to the department whenever john sherman should retire. indeed, had hay been even unconsciously party to such an intrigue, he would have put an end, once for all, to further concern in public affairs on his friend's part; but even without this last disaster, one felt that washington had become no longer habitable. nothing was left there but solitary contemplation of mr. mckinley's ways which were not likely to be more amusing than the ways of his predecessors; or of senatorial ways, which offered no novelty of what the french language expressively calls embetement; or of poor mr. sherman's ways which would surely cause anguish to his friends. once more, one must go! nothing was easier! on and off, one had done the same thing since the year , at frequent intervals, and had now reached the month of march, ; yet, as the whole result of six years' dogged effort to begin a new education, one could not recommend it to the young. the outlook lacked hope. the object of travel had become more and more dim, ever since the gibbering ghost of the civil law had been locked in its dark closet, as far back as . noah's dove had not searched the earth for resting-places so carefully, or with so little success. any spot on land or water satisfies a dove who wants and finds rest; but no perch suits a dove of sixty years old, alone and uneducated, who has lost his taste even for olives. to this, also, the young may be driven, as education, and the lesson fails in humor; but it may be worth knowing to some of them that the planet offers hardly a dozen places where an elderly man can pass a week alone without ennui, and none at all where he can pass a year. irritated by such complaints, the world naturally answers that no man of sixty should live, which is doubtless true, though not original. the man of sixty, with a certain irritability proper to his years, retorts that the world has no business to throw on him the task of removing its carrion, and that while he remains he has a right to require amusement--or at least education, since this costs nothing to any one--and that a world which cannot educate, will not amuse, and is ugly besides, has even less right to exist than he. both views seem sound; but the world wearily objects to be called by epithets what society always admits in practice; for no one likes to be told that he is a bore, or ignorant, or even ugly; and having nothing to say in its defence, it rejoins that, whatever license is pardonable in youth, the man of sixty who wishes consideration had better hold his tongue. this truth also has the defect of being too true. the rule holds equally for men of half that age only the very young have the right to betray their ignorance or ill-breeding. elderly people commonly know enough not to betray themselves. exceptions are plenty on both sides, as the senate knew to its acute suffering; but young or old, women or men, seemed agreed on one point with singular unanimity; each praised silence in others. of all characteristics in human nature, this has been one of the most abiding. mere superficial gleaning of what, in the long history of human expression, has been said by the fool or unsaid by the wise, shows that, for once, no difference of opinion has ever existed on this. "even a fool," said the wisest of men, "when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise," and still more often, the wisest of men, when he spoke the highest wisdom, has been counted a fool. they agreed only on the merits of silence in others. socrates made remarks in its favor, which should have struck the athenians as new to them; but of late the repetition had grown tiresome. thomas carlyle vociferated his admiration of it. matthew arnold thought it the best form of expression; and adams thought matthew arnold the best form of expression in his time. algernon swinburne called it the most noble to the end. alfred de vigny's dying wolf remarked:-- "a voir ce que l'on fut sur terre et ce qu'on laisse, seul le silence est grand; tout le reste est faiblesse." "when one thinks what one leaves in the world when one dies, only silence is strong,--all the rest is but lies." even byron, whom a more brilliant era of genius seemed to have decided to be but an indifferent poet, had ventured to affirm that-- "the alp's snow summit nearer heaven is seen than the volcano's fierce eruptive crest;" with other verses, to the effect that words are but a "temporary torturing flame"; of which no one knew more than himself. the evidence of the poets could not be more emphatic:-- "silent, while years engrave the brow! silent,--the best are silent now!" although none of these great geniuses had shown faith in silence as a cure for their own ills or ignorance, all of them, and all philosophy after them, affirmed that no man, even at sixty, had ever been known to attain knowledge; but that a very few were believed to have attained ignorance, which was in result the same. more than this, in every society worth the name, the man of sixty had been encouraged to ride this hobby--the pursuit of ignorance in silence--as though it were the easiest way to get rid of him. in america the silence was more oppressive than the ignorance; but perhaps elsewhere the world might still hide some haunt of futilitarian silence where content reigned--although long search had not revealed it--and so the pilgrimage began anew! the first step led to london where john hay was to be established. one had seen so many american ministers received in london that the lord chamberlain himself scarcely knew more about it; education could not be expected there; but there adams arrived, april , , as though thirty-six years were so many days, for queen victoria still reigned and one saw little change in st. james's street. true, carlton house terrace, like the streets of rome, actually squeaked and gibbered with ghosts, till one felt like odysseus before the press of shadows, daunted by a "bloodless fear"; but in spring london is pleasant, and it was more cheery than ever in may, , when every one was welcoming the return of life after the long winter since . one's fortunes, or one's friends' fortunes, were again in flood. this amusement could not be prolonged, for one found one's self the oldest englishman in england, much too familiar with family jars better forgotten, and old traditions better unknown. no wrinkled tannhauser, returning to the wartburg, needed a wrinkled venus to show him that he was no longer at home, and that even penitence was a sort of impertinence. he slipped away to paris, and set up a household at st. germain where he taught and learned french history for nieces who swarmed under the venerable cedars of the pavillon d'angouleme, and rode about the green forest-alleys of st. germain and marly. from time to time hay wrote humorous laments, but nothing occurred to break the summer-peace of the stranded tannhauser, who slowly began to feel at home in france as in other countries he had thought more homelike. at length, like other dead americans, he went to paris because he could go nowhere else, and lingered there till the hays came by, in january, ; and mrs. hay, who had been a stanch and strong ally for twenty years, bade him go with them to egypt. adams cared little to see egypt again, but he was glad to see hay, and readily drifted after him to the nile. what they saw and what they said had as little to do with education as possible, until one evening, as they were looking at the sun set across the nile from assouan, spencer eddy brought them a telegram to announce the sinking of the maine in havana harbor. this was the greatest stride in education since , but what did it teach? one leant on a fragment of column in the great hall at karnak and watched a jackal creep down the debris of ruin. the jackal's ancestors had surely crept up the same wall when it was building. what was his view about the value of silence? one lay in the sands and watched the expression of the sphinx. brooks adams had taught him that the relation between civilizations was that of trade. henry wandered, or was storm-driven, down the coast. he tried to trace out the ancient harbor of ephesus. he went over to athens, picked up rockhill, and searched for the harbor of tiryns; together they went on to constantinople and studied the great walls of constantine and the greater domes of justinian. his hobby had turned into a camel, and he hoped, if he rode long enough in silence, that at last he might come on a city of thought along the great highways of exchange. chapter xxiv indian summer ( - ) the summer of the spanish war began the indian summer of life to one who had reached sixty years of age, and cared only to reap in peace such harvest as these sixty years had yielded. he had reason to be more than content with it. since he had felt no such sense of power and momentum, and had seen no such number of personal friends wielding it. the sense of solidarity counts for much in one's contentment, but the sense of winning one's game counts for more; and in london, in , the scene was singularly interesting to the last survivor of the legation of . he thought himself perhaps the only person living who could get full enjoyment of the drama. he carried every scene of it, in a century and a half since the stamp act, quite alive in his mind--all the interminable disputes of his disputatious ancestors as far back as the year --as well as his own insignificance in the civil war, every step in which had the object of bringing england into an american system. for this they had written libraries of argument and remonstrance, and had piled war on war, losing their tempers for life, and souring the gentle and patient puritan nature of their descendants, until even their private secretaries at times used language almost intemperate; and suddenly, by pure chance, the blessing fell on hay. after two hundred years of stupid and greedy blundering, which no argument and no violence affected, the people of england learned their lesson just at the moment when hay would otherwise have faced a flood of the old anxieties. hay himself scarcely knew how grateful he should be, for to him the change came almost of course. he saw only the necessary stages that had led to it, and to him they seemed natural; but to adams, still living in the atmosphere of palmerston and john russell, the sudden appearance of germany as the grizzly terror which, in twenty years effected what adamses had tried for two hundred in vain--frightened england into america's arms--seemed as melodramatic as any plot of napoleon the great. he could feel only the sense of satisfaction at seeing the diplomatic triumph of all his family, since the breed existed, at last realized under his own eyes for the advantage of his oldest and closest ally. this was history, not education, yet it taught something exceedingly serious, if not ultimate, could one trust the lesson. for the first time in his life, he felt a sense of possible purpose working itself out in history. probably no one else on this earthly planet--not even hay--could have come out on precisely such extreme personal satisfaction, but as he sat at hay's table, listening to any member of the british cabinet, for all were alike now, discuss the philippines as a question of balance of power in the east, he could see that the family work of a hundred and fifty years fell at once into the grand perspective of true empire-building, which hay's work set off with artistic skill. the roughness of the archaic foundations looked stronger and larger in scale for the refinement and certainty of the arcade. in the long list of famous american ministers in london, none could have given the work quite the completeness, the harmony, the perfect ease of hay. never before had adams been able to discern the working of law in history, which was the reason of his failure in teaching it, for chaos cannot be taught; but he thought he had a personal property by inheritance in this proof of sequence and intelligence in the affairs of man--a property which no one else had right to dispute; and this personal triumph left him a little cold towards the other diplomatic results of the war. he knew that porto rico must be taken, but he would have been glad to escape the philippines. apart from too intimate an acquaintance with the value of islands in the south seas, he knew the west indies well enough to be assured that, whatever the american people might think or say about it, they would sooner or later have to police those islands, not against europe, but for europe, and america too. education on the outskirts of civilized life teaches not very much, but it taught this; and one felt no call to shoulder the load of archipelagoes in the antipodes when one was trying painfully to pluck up courage to face the labor of shouldering archipelagoes at home. the country decided otherwise, and one acquiesced readily enough since the matter concerned only the public willingness to carry loads; in london, the balance of power in the east came alone into discussion; and in every point of view one had as much reason to be gratified with the result as though one had shared in the danger, instead of being vigorously employed in looking on from a great distance. after all, friends had done the work, if not one's self, and he too serves a certain purpose who only stands and cheers. in june, at the crisis of interest, the camerons came over, and took the fine old house of surrenden dering in kent which they made a sort of country house to the embassy. kent has charms rivalling those of shropshire, and, even compared with the many beautiful places scattered along the welsh border, few are nobler or more genial than surrenden with its unbroken descent from the saxons, its avenues, its terraces, its deer-park, its large repose on the kentish hillside, and its broad outlook over what was once the forest of anderida. filled with a constant stream of guests, the house seemed to wait for the chance to show its charms to the american, with whose activity the whole world was resounding; and never since the battle of hastings could the little telegraph office of the kentish village have done such work. there, on a hot july , , to an expectant group under the shady trees, came the telegram announcing the destruction of the spanish armada, as it might have come to queen elizabeth in ; and there, later in the season, came the order summoning hay to the state department. hay had no wish to be secretary of state. he much preferred to remain ambassador, and his friends were quite as cold about it as he. no one knew so well what sort of strain falls on secretaries of state, or how little strength he had in reserve against it. even at surrenden he showed none too much endurance, and he would gladly have found a valid excuse for refusing. the discussion on both sides was earnest, but the decided voice of the conclave was that, though if he were a mere office-seeker he might certainly decline promotion, if he were a member of the government he could not. no serious statesman could accept a favor and refuse a service. doubtless he might refuse, but in that case he must resign. the amusement of making presidents has keen fascination for idle american hands, but these black arts have the old drawback of all deviltry; one must serve the spirit one evokes, even though the service were perdition to body and soul. for him, no doubt, the service, though hard, might bring some share of profit, but for the friends who gave this unselfish decision, all would prove loss. for one, adams on that subject had become a little daft. no one in his experience had ever passed unscathed through that malarious marsh. in his fancy, office was poison; it killed--body and soul--physically and socially. office was more poisonous than priestcraft or pedagogy in proportion as it held more power; but the poison he complained of was not ambition; he shared none of cardinal wolsey's belated penitence for that healthy stimulant, as he had shared none of the fruits; his poison was that of the will--the distortion of sight--the warping of mind--the degradation of tissue--the coarsening of taste--the narrowing of sympathy to the emotions of a caged rat. hay needed no office in order to wield influence. for him, influence lay about the streets, waiting for him to stoop to it; he enjoyed more than enough power without office; no one of his position, wealth, and political experience, living at the centre of politics in contact with the active party managers, could escape influence. his only ambition was to escape annoyance, and no one knew better than he that, at sixty years of age, sensitive to physical strain, still more sensitive to brutality, vindictiveness, or betrayal, he took office at cost of life. neither he nor any of the surrenden circle made pretence of gladness at the new dignity for, with all his gaiety of manner and lightness of wit, he took dark views of himself, none the lighter for their humor, and his obedience to the president's order was the gloomiest acquiescence he had ever smiled. adams took dark views, too, not so much on hay's account as on his own, for, while hay had at least the honors of office, his friends would share only the ennuis of it; but, as usual with hay, nothing was gained by taking such matters solemnly, and old habits of the civil war left their mark of military drill on every one who lived through it. he shouldered his pack and started for home. adams had no mind to lose his friend without a struggle, though he had never known such sort of struggle to avail. the chance was desperate, but he could not afford to throw it away; so, as soon as the surrenden establishment broke up, on october , he prepared for return home, and on november , none too gladly, found himself again gazing into la fayette square. he had made another false start and lost two years more of education; nor had he excuse; for, this time, neither politics nor society drew him away from his trail. he had nothing to do with hay's politics at home or abroad, and never affected agreement with his views or his methods, nor did hay care whether his friends agreed or disagreed. they all united in trying to help each other to get along the best way they could, and all they tried to save was the personal relation. even there, adams would have been beaten had he not been helped by mrs. hay, who saw the necessity of distraction, and led her husband into the habit of stopping every afternoon to take his friend off for an hour's walk, followed by a cup of tea with mrs. hay afterwards, and a chat with any one who called. for the moment, therefore, the situation was saved, at least in outward appearance, and adams could go back to his own pursuits which were slowly taking a direction. perhaps they had no right to be called pursuits, for in truth one consciously pursued nothing, but drifted as attraction offered itself. the short session broke up the washington circle, so that, on march , adams was able to sail with the lodges for europe and to pass april in sicily and rome. with the lodges, education always began afresh. forty years had left little of the palermo that garibaldi had shown to the boy of , but sicily in all ages seems to have taught only catastrophe and violence, running riot on that theme ever since ulysses began its study on the eye of cyclops. for a lesson in anarchy, without a shade of sequence, sicily stands alone and defies evolution. syracuse teaches more than rome. yet even rome was not mute, and the church of ara coeli seemed more and more to draw all the threads of thought to a centre, for every new journey led back to its steps--karnak, ephesus, delphi, mycenæ, constantinople, syracuse--all lying on the road to the capitol. what they had to bring by way of intellectual riches could not yet be discerned, but they carried camel-loads of moral; and new york sent most of all, for, in forty years, america had made so vast a stride to empire that the world of stood already on a distant horizon somewhere on the same plane with the republic of brutus and cato, while schoolboys read of abraham lincoln as they did of julius caesar. vast swarms of americans knew the civil war only by school history, as they knew the story of cromwell or cicero, and were as familiar with political assassination as though they had lived under nero. the climax of empire could be seen approaching, year after year, as though sulla were a president or mckinley a consul. nothing annoyed americans more than to be told this simple and obvious--in no way unpleasant--truth; therefore one sat silent as ever on the capitol; but, by way of completing the lesson, the lodges added a pilgrimage to assisi and an interview with st. francis, whose solution of historical riddles seemed the most satisfactory--or sufficient--ever offered; worth fully forty years' more study, and better worth it than gibbon himself, or even st. augustine, st. ambrose, or st. jerome. the most bewildering effect of all these fresh cross-lights on the old assistant professor of was due to the astonishing contrast between what he had taught then and what he found himself confusedly trying to learn five-and-twenty years afterwards--between the twelfth century of his thirtieth and that of his sixtieth years. at harvard college, weary of spirit in the wastes of anglo-saxon law, he had occasionally given way to outbursts of derision at shedding his life-blood for the sublime truths of sac and soc:-- hic jacet homunculus scriptor doctor barbaricus henricus adams adae filius et evae primo explicuit socnam the latin was as twelfth-century as the law, and he meant as satire the claim that he had been first to explain the legal meaning of sac and soc, although any german professor would have scorned it as a shameless and presumptuous bid for immortality; but the whole point of view had vanished in . not he, but sir henry maine and rudolph sohm, were the parents or creators of sac and soc. convinced that the clue of religion led to nothing, and that politics led to chaos, one had turned to the law, as one's scholars turned to the law school, because one could see no other path to a profession. the law had proved as futile as politics or religion, or any other single thread spun by the human spider; it offered no more continuity than architecture or coinage, and no more force of its own. st. francis expressed supreme contempt for them all, and solved the whole problem by rejecting it altogether. adams returned to paris with a broken and contrite spirit, prepared to admit that his life had no meaning, and conscious that in any case it no longer mattered. he passed a summer of solitude contrasting sadly with the last at surrenden; but the solitude did what the society did not--it forced and drove him into the study of his ignorance in silence. here at last he entered the practice of his final profession. hunted by ennui, he could no longer escape, and, by way of a summer school, he began a methodical survey--a triangulation--of the twelfth century. the pursuit had a singular french charm which france had long lost--a calmness, lucidity, simplicity of expression, vigor of action, complexity of local color, that made paris flat. in the long summer days one found a sort of saturated green pleasure in the forests, and gray infinity of rest in the little twelfth-century churches that lined them, as unassuming as their own mosses, and as sure of their purpose as their round arches; but churches were many and summer was short, so that he was at last driven back to the quays and photographs. for weeks he lived in silence. his solitude was broken in november by the chance arrival of john la farge. at that moment, contact with la farge had a new value. of all the men who had deeply affected their friends since john la farge was certainly the foremost, and for henry adams, who had sat at his feet since , the question how much he owed to la farge could be answered only by admitting that he had no standard to measure it by. of all his friends la farge alone owned a mind complex enough to contrast against the commonplaces of american uniformity, and in the process had vastly perplexed most americans who came in contact with it. the american mind--the bostonian as well as the southern or western--likes to walk straight up to its object, and assert or deny something that it takes for a fact; it has a conventional approach, a conventional analysis, and a conventional conclusion, as well as a conventional expression, all the time loudly asserting its unconventionality. the most disconcerting trait of john la farge was his reversal of the process. his approach was quiet and indirect; he moved round an object, and never separated it from its surroundings; he prided himself on faithfulness to tradition and convention; he was never abrupt and abhorred dispute. his manners and attitude towards the universe were the same, whether tossing in the middle of the pacific ocean sketching the trade-wind from a whale-boat in the blast of sea-sickness, or drinking the cha-no-yu in the formal rites of japan, or sipping his cocoanut cup of kava in the ceremonial of samoan chiefs, or reflecting under the sacred bo-tree at anaradjpura. one was never quite sure of his whole meaning until too late to respond, for he had no difficulty in carrying different shades of contradiction in his mind. as he said of his friend okakura, his thought ran as a stream runs through grass, hidden perhaps but always there; and one felt often uncertain in what direction it flowed, for even a contradiction was to him only a shade of difference, a complementary color, about which no intelligent artist would dispute. constantly he repulsed argument: "adams, you reason too much!" was one of his standing reproaches even in the mild discussion of rice and mangoes in the warm night of tahiti dinners. he should have blamed adams for being born in boston. the mind resorts to reason for want of training, and adams had never met a perfectly trained mind. to la farge, eccentricity meant convention; a mind really eccentric never betrayed it. true eccentricity was a tone--a shade--a nuance--and the finer the tone, the truer the eccentricity. of course all artists hold more or less the same point of view in their art, but few carry it into daily life, and often the contrast is excessive between their art and their talk. one evening humphreys johnston, who was devoted to la farge, asked him to meet whistler at dinner. la farge was ill--more ill than usual even for him--but he admired and liked whistler, and insisted on going. by chance, adams was so placed as to overhear the conversation of both, and had no choice but to hear that of whistler, which engrossed the table. at that moment the boer war was raging, and, as every one knows, on that subject whistler raged worse than the boers. for two hours he declaimed against england--witty, declamatory, extravagant, bitter, amusing, and noisy; but in substance what he said was not merely commonplace--it was true! that is to say, his hearers, including adams and, as far as he knew, la farge, agreed with it all, and mostly as a matter of course; yet la farge was silent, and this difference of expression was a difference of art. whistler in his art carried the sense of nuance and tone far beyond any point reached by la farge, or even attempted; but in talk he showed, above or below his color-instinct, a willingness to seem eccentric where no real eccentricity, unless perhaps of temper, existed. this vehemence, which whistler never betrayed in his painting, la farge seemed to lavish on his glass. with the relative value of la farge's glass in the history of glass-decoration, adams was too ignorant to meddle, and as a rule artists were if possible more ignorant than he; but whatever it was, it led him back to the twelfth century and to chartres where la farge not only felt at home, but felt a sort of ownership. no other american had a right there, unless he too were a member of the church and worked in glass. adams himself was an interloper, but long habit led la farge to resign himself to adams as one who meant well, though deplorably bostonian; while adams, though near sixty years old before he knew anything either of glass or of chartres, asked no better than to learn, and only la farge could help him, for he knew enough at least to see that la farge alone could use glass like a thirteenth-century artist. in europe the art had been dead for centuries, and modern glass was pitiable. even la farge felt the early glass rather as a document than as a historical emotion, and in hundreds of windows at chartres and bourges and paris, adams knew barely one or two that were meant to hold their own against a color-scheme so strong as his. in conversation la farge's mind was opaline with infinite shades and refractions of light, and with color toned down to the finest gradations. in glass it was insubordinate; it was renaissance; it asserted his personal force with depth and vehemence of tone never before seen. he seemed bent on crushing rivalry. even the gloom of a paris december at the elysee palace hotel was somewhat relieved by this companionship, and education made a step backwards towards chartres, but la farge's health became more and more alarming, and adams was glad to get him safely back to new york, january , , while he himself went at once to washington to find out what had become of hay. nothing good could be hoped, for hay's troubles had begun, and were quite as great as he had foreseen. adams saw as little encouragement as hay himself did, though he dared not say so. he doubted hay's endurance, the president's firmness in supporting him, and the loyalty of his party friends; but all this worry on hay's account fretted him not nearly so much as the boer war did on his own. here was a problem in his political education that passed all experience since the treason winter of - ! much to his astonishment, very few americans seemed to share his point of view; their hostility to england seemed mere temper; but to adams the war became almost a personal outrage. he had been taught from childhood, even in england, that his forbears and their associates in had settled, once for all, the liberties of the british free colonies, and he very strongly objected to being thrown on the defensive again, and forced to sit down, a hundred and fifty years after john adams had begun the task, to prove, by appeal to law and fact, that george washington was not a felon, whatever might be the case with george iii. for reasons still more personal, he declined peremptorily to entertain question of the felony of john adams. he felt obliged to go even further, and avow the opinion that if at any time england should take towards canada the position she took towards her boer colonies, the united states would be bound, by their record, to interpose, and to insist on the application of the principles of . to him the attitude of mr. chamberlain and his colleagues seemed exceedingly un-american, and terribly embarrassing to hay. trained early, in the stress of civil war, to hold his tongue, and to help make the political machine run somehow, since it could never be made to run well, he would not bother hay with theoretical objections which were every day fretting him in practical forms. hay's chance lay in patience and good-temper till the luck should turn, and to him the only object was time; but as political education the point seemed vital to adams, who never liked shutting his eyes or denying an evident fact. practical politics consists in ignoring facts, but education and politics are two different and often contradictory things. in this case, the contradiction seemed crude. with hay's politics, at home or abroad, adams had nothing whatever to do. hay belonged to the new york school, like abram hewitt, evarts, w. c. whitney, samuel j. tilden--men who played the game for ambition or amusement, and played it, as a rule, much better than the professionals, but whose aims were considerably larger than those of the usual player, and who felt no great love for the cheap drudgery of the work. in return, the professionals felt no great love for them, and set them aside when they could. only their control of money made them inevitable, and even this did not always carry their points. the story of abram hewitt would offer one type of this statesman series, and that of hay another. president cleveland set aside the one; president harrison set aside the other. "there is no politics in it," was his comment on hay's appointment to office. hay held a different opinion and turned to mckinley whose judgment of men was finer than common in presidents. mr. mckinley brought to the problem of american government a solution which lay very far outside of henry adams's education, but which seemed to be at least practical and american. he undertook to pool interests in a general trust into which every interest should be taken, more or less at its own valuation, and whose mass should, under his management, create efficiency. he achieved very remarkable results. how much they cost was another matter; if the public is ever driven to its last resources and the usual remedies of chaos, the result will probably cost more. himself a marvellous manager of men, mckinley found several manipulators to help him, almost as remarkable as himself, one of whom was hay; but unfortunately hay's strength was weakest and his task hardest. at home, interests could be easily combined by simply paying their price; but abroad whatever helped on one side, hurt him on another. hay thought england must be brought first into the combine; but at that time germany, russia, and france were all combining against england, and the boer war helped them. for the moment hay had no ally, abroad or at home, except pauncefote, and adams always maintained that pauncefote alone pulled him through. yet the difficulty abroad was far less troublesome than the obstacles at home. the senate had grown more and more unmanageable, even since the time of andrew johnson, and this was less the fault of the senate than of the system. "a treaty of peace, in any normal state of things," said hay, "ought to be ratified with unanimity in twenty-four hours. they wasted six weeks in wrangling over this one, and ratified it with one vote to spare. we have five or six matters now demanding settlement. i can settle them all, honorably and advantageously to our own side; and i am assured by leading men in the senate that not one of these treaties, if negotiated, will pass the senate. i should have a majority in every case, but a malcontent third would certainly dish every one of them. to such monstrous shape has the original mistake of the constitution grown in the evolution of our politics. you must understand, it is not merely my solution the senate will reject. they will reject, for instance, any treaty, whatever, on any subject, with england. i doubt if they would accept any treaty of consequence with russia or germany. the recalcitrant third would be differently composed, but it would be on hand. so that the real duties of a secretary of state seem to be three: to fight claims upon us by other states; to press more or less fraudulent claims of our own citizens upon other countries; to find offices for the friends of senators when there are none. is it worth while--for me--to keep up this useless labor?" to adams, who, like hay, had seen a dozen acquaintances struggling with the same enemies, the question had scarcely the interest of a new study. he had said all he had to say about it in a dozen or more volumes relating to the politics of a hundred years before. to him, the spectacle was so familiar as to be humorous. the intrigue was too open to be interesting. the interference of the german and russian legations, and of the clan-na-gael, with the press and the senate was innocently undisguised. the charming russian minister, count cassini, the ideal of diplomatic manners and training, let few days pass without appealing through the press to the public against the government. the german minister, von holleben, more cautiously did the same thing, and of course every whisper of theirs was brought instantly to the department. these three forces, acting with the regular opposition and the natural obstructionists, could always stop action in the senate. the fathers had intended to neutralize the energy of government and had succeeded, but their machine was never meant to do the work of a twenty-million horse-power society in the twentieth century, where much work needed to be quickly and efficiently done. the only defence of the system was that, as government did nothing well, it had best do nothing; but the government, in truth, did perfectly well all it was given to do; and even if the charge were true, it applied equally to human society altogether, if one chose to treat mankind from that point of view. as a matter of mechanics, so much work must be done; bad machinery merely added to friction. always unselfish, generous, easy, patient, and loyal, hay had treated the world as something to be taken in block without pulling it to pieces to get rid of its defects; he liked it all: he laughed and accepted; he had never known unhappiness and would have gladly lived his entire life over again exactly as it happened. in the whole new york school, one met a similar dash of humor and cynicism more or less pronounced but seldom bitter. yet even the gayest of tempers succumbs at last to constant friction. the old friend was rapidly fading. the habit remained, but the easy intimacy, the careless gaiety, the casual humor, the equality of indifference, were sinking into the routine of office; the mind lingered in the department; the thought failed to react; the wit and humor shrank within the blank walls of politics, and the irritations multiplied. to a head of bureau, the result seemed ennobling. although, as education, this branch of study was more familiar and older than the twelfth century, the task of bringing the two periods into a common relation was new. ignorance required that these political and social and scientific values of the twelfth and twentieth centuries should be correlated in some relation of movement that could be expressed in mathematics, nor did one care in the least that all the world said it could not be done, or that one knew not enough mathematics even to figure a formula beyond the schoolboy s = gt^ / . if kepler and newton could take liberties with the sun and moon, an obscure person in a remote wilderness like la fayette square could take liberties with congress, and venture to multiply half its attraction into the square of its time. he had only to find a value, even infinitesimal, for its attraction at any given time. a historical formula that should satisfy the conditions of the stellar universe weighed heavily on his mind; but a trifling matter like this was one in which he could look for no help from anybody--he could look only for derision at best. all his associates in history condemned such an attempt as futile and almost immoral--certainly hostile to sound historical system. adams tried it only because of its hostility to all that he had taught for history, since he started afresh from the new point that, whatever was right, all he had ever taught was wrong. he had pursued ignorance thus far with success, and had swept his mind clear of knowledge. in beginning again, from the starting-point of sir isaac newton, he looked about him in vain for a teacher. few men in washington cared to overstep the school conventions, and the most distinguished of them, simon newcomb, was too sound a mathematician to treat such a scheme seriously. the greatest of americans, judged by his rank in science, willard gibbs, never came to washington, and adams never enjoyed a chance to meet him. after gibbs, one of the most distinguished was langley, of the smithsonian, who was more accessible, to whom adams had been much in the habit of turning whenever he wanted an outlet for his vast reservoirs of ignorance. langley listened with outward patience to his disputatious questionings; but he too nourished a scientific passion for doubt, and sentimental attachment for its avowal. he had the physicist's heinous fault of professing to know nothing between flashes of intense perception. like so many other great observers, langley was not a mathematician, and like most physicists, he believed in physics. rigidly denying himself the amusement of philosophy, which consists chiefly in suggesting unintelligible answers to insoluble problems, he still knew the problems, and liked to wander past them in a courteous temper, even bowing to them distantly as though recognizing their existence, while doubting their respectability. he generously let others doubt what he felt obliged to affirm; and early put into adams's hands the "concepts of modern science," a volume by judge stallo, which had been treated for a dozen years by the schools with a conspiracy of silence such as inevitably meets every revolutionary work that upsets the stock and machinery of instruction. adams read and failed to understand; then he asked questions and failed to get answers. probably this was education. perhaps it was the only scientific education open to a student sixty-odd years old, who asked to be as ignorant as an astronomer. for him the details of science meant nothing: he wanted to know its mass. solar heat was not enough, or was too much. kinetic atoms led only to motion; never to direction or progress. history had no use for multiplicity; it needed unity; it could study only motion, direction, attraction, relation. everything must be made to move together; one must seek new worlds to measure; and so, like rasselas, adams set out once more, and found himself on may settled in rooms at the very door of the trocadero. chapter xxv the dynamo and the virgin ( ) until the great exposition of closed its doors in november, adams haunted it, aching to absorb knowledge, and helpless to find it. he would have liked to know how much of it could have been grasped by the best-informed man in the world. while he was thus meditating chaos, langley came by, and showed it to him. at langley's behest, the exhibition dropped its superfluous rags and stripped itself to the skin, for langley knew what to study, and why, and how; while adams might as well have stood outside in the night, staring at the milky way. yet langley said nothing new, and taught nothing that one might not have learned from lord bacon, three hundred years before; but though one should have known the "advancement of science" as well as one knew the "comedy of errors," the literary knowledge counted for nothing until some teacher should show how to apply it. bacon took a vast deal of trouble in teaching king james i and his subjects, american or other, towards the year , that true science was the development or economy of forces; yet an elderly american in knew neither the formula nor the forces; or even so much as to say to himself that his historical business in the exposition concerned only the economies or developments of force since , when he began the study at chicago. nothing in education is so astonishing as the amount of ignorance it accumulates in the form of inert facts. adams had looked at most of the accumulations of art in the storehouses called art museums; yet he did not know how to look at the art exhibits of . he had studied karl marx and his doctrines of history with profound attention, yet he could not apply them at paris. langley, with the ease of a great master of experiment, threw out of the field every exhibit that did not reveal a new application of force, and naturally threw out, to begin with, almost the whole art exhibit. equally, he ignored almost the whole industrial exhibit. he led his pupil directly to the forces. his chief interest was in new motors to make his airship feasible, and he taught adams the astonishing complexities of the new daimler motor, and of the automobile, which, since , had become a nightmare at a hundred kilometres an hour, almost as destructive as the electric tram which was only ten years older; and threatening to become as terrible as the locomotive steam-engine itself, which was almost exactly adams's own age. then he showed his scholar the great hall of dynamos, and explained how little he knew about electricity or force of any kind, even of his own special sun, which spouted heat in inconceivable volume, but which, as far as he knew, might spout less or more, at any time, for all the certainty he felt in it. to him, the dynamo itself was but an ingenious channel for conveying somewhere the heat latent in a few tons of poor coal hidden in a dirty engine-house carefully kept out of sight; but to adams the dynamo became a symbol of infinity. as he grew accustomed to the great gallery of machines, he began to feel the forty-foot dynamos as a moral force, much as the early christians felt the cross. the planet itself seemed less impressive, in its old-fashioned, deliberate, annual or daily revolution, than this huge wheel, revolving within arm's length at some vertiginous speed, and barely murmuring--scarcely humming an audible warning to stand a hair's-breadth further for respect of power--while it would not wake the baby lying close against its frame. before the end, one began to pray to it; inherited instinct taught the natural expression of man before silent and infinite force. among the thousand symbols of ultimate energy the dynamo was not so human as some, but it was the most expressive. yet the dynamo, next to the steam-engine, was the most familiar of exhibits. for adams's objects its value lay chiefly in its occult mechanism. between the dynamo in the gallery of machines and the engine-house outside, the break of continuity amounted to abysmal fracture for a historian's objects. no more relation could he discover between the steam and the electric current than between the cross and the cathedral. the forces were interchangeable if not reversible, but he could see only an absolute fiat in electricity as in faith. langley could not help him. indeed, langley seemed to be worried by the same trouble, for he constantly repeated that the new forces were anarchical, and especially that he was not responsible for the new rays, that were little short of parricidal in their wicked spirit towards science. his own rays, with which he had doubled the solar spectrum, were altogether harmless and beneficent; but radium denied its god--or, what was to langley the same thing, denied the truths of his science. the force was wholly new. a historian who asked only to learn enough to be as futile as langley or kelvin, made rapid progress under this teaching, and mixed himself up in the tangle of ideas until he achieved a sort of paradise of ignorance vastly consoling to his fatigued senses. he wrapped himself in vibrations and rays which were new, and he would have hugged marconi and branly had he met them, as he hugged the dynamo; while he lost his arithmetic in trying to figure out the equation between the discoveries and the economies of force. the economies, like the discoveries, were absolute, supersensual, occult; incapable of expression in horse-power. what mathematical equivalent could he suggest as the value of a branly coherer? frozen air, or the electric furnace, had some scale of measurement, no doubt, if somebody could invent a thermometer adequate to the purpose; but x-rays had played no part whatever in man's consciousness, and the atom itself had figured only as a fiction of thought. in these seven years man had translated himself into a new universe which had no common scale of measurement with the old. he had entered a supersensual world, in which he could measure nothing except by chance collisions of movements imperceptible to his senses, perhaps even imperceptible to his instruments, but perceptible to each other, and so to some known ray at the end of the scale. langley seemed prepared for anything, even for an indeterminable number of universes interfused--physics stark mad in metaphysics. historians undertake to arrange sequences,--called stories, or histories--assuming in silence a relation of cause and effect. these assumptions, hidden in the depths of dusty libraries, have been astounding, but commonly unconscious and childlike; so much so, that if any captious critic were to drag them to light, historians would probably reply, with one voice, that they had never supposed themselves required to know what they were talking about. adams, for one, had toiled in vain to find out what he meant. he had even published a dozen volumes of american history for no other purpose than to satisfy himself whether, by severest process of stating, with the least possible comment, such facts as seemed sure, in such order as seemed rigorously consequent, he could fix for a familiar moment a necessary sequence of human movement. the result had satisfied him as little as at harvard college. where he saw sequence, other men saw something quite different, and no one saw the same unit of measure. he cared little about his experiments and less about his statesmen, who seemed to him quite as ignorant as himself and, as a rule, no more honest; but he insisted on a relation of sequence, and if he could not reach it by one method, he would try as many methods as science knew. satisfied that the sequence of men led to nothing and that the sequence of their society could lead no further, while the mere sequence of time was artificial, and the sequence of thought was chaos, he turned at last to the sequence of force; and thus it happened that, after ten years' pursuit, he found himself lying in the gallery of machines at the great exposition of , his historical neck broken by the sudden irruption of forces totally new. since no one else showed much concern, an elderly person without other cares had no need to betray alarm. the year was not the first to upset schoolmasters. copernicus and galileo had broken many professorial necks about ; columbus had stood the world on its head towards ; but the nearest approach to the revolution of was that of , when constantine set up the cross. the rays that langley disowned, as well as those which he fathered, were occult, supersensual, irrational; they were a revelation of mysterious energy like that of the cross; they were what, in terms of mediaeval science, were called immediate modes of the divine substance. the historian was thus reduced to his last resources. clearly if he was bound to reduce all these forces to a common value, this common value could have no measure but that of their attraction on his own mind. he must treat them as they had been felt; as convertible, reversible, interchangeable attractions on thought. he made up his mind to venture it; he would risk translating rays into faith. such a reversible process would vastly amuse a chemist, but the chemist could not deny that he, or some of his fellow physicists, could feel the force of both. when adams was a boy in boston, the best chemist in the place had probably never heard of venus except by way of scandal, or of the virgin except as idolatry; neither had he heard of dynamos or automobiles or radium; yet his mind was ready to feel the force of all, though the rays were unborn and the women were dead. here opened another totally new education, which promised to be by far the most hazardous of all. the knife-edge along which he must crawl, like sir lancelot in the twelfth century, divided two kingdoms of force which had nothing in common but attraction. they were as different as a magnet is from gravitation, supposing one knew what a magnet was, or gravitation, or love. the force of the virgin was still felt at lourdes, and seemed to be as potent as x-rays; but in america neither venus nor virgin ever had value as force--at most as sentiment. no american had ever been truly afraid of either. this problem in dynamics gravely perplexed an american historian. the woman had once been supreme; in france she still seemed potent, not merely as a sentiment, but as a force. why was she unknown in america? for evidently america was ashamed of her, and she was ashamed of herself, otherwise they would not have strewn fig-leaves so profusely all over her. when she was a true force, she was ignorant of fig-leaves, but the monthly-magazine-made american female had not a feature that would have been recognized by adam. the trait was notorious, and often humorous, but any one brought up among puritans knew that sex was sin. in any previous age, sex was strength. neither art nor beauty was needed. every one, even among puritans, knew that neither diana of the ephesians nor any of the oriental goddesses was worshipped for her beauty. she was goddess because of her force; she was the animated dynamo; she was reproduction--the greatest and most mysterious of all energies; all she needed was to be fecund. singularly enough, not one of adams's many schools of education had ever drawn his attention to the opening lines of lucretius, though they were perhaps the finest in all latin literature, where the poet invoked venus exactly as dante invoked the virgin:-- "quae quondam rerum naturam sola gubernas." the venus of epicurean philosophy survived in the virgin of the schools:-- "donna, sei tanto grande, e tanto vali, che qual vuol grazia, e a te non ricorre, sua disianza vuol volar senz' ali." all this was to american thought as though it had never existed. the true american knew something of the facts, but nothing of the feelings; he read the letter, but he never felt the law. before this historical chasm, a mind like that of adams felt itself helpless; he turned from the virgin to the dynamo as though he were a branly coherer. on one side, at the louvre and at chartres, as he knew by the record of work actually done and still before his eyes, was the highest energy ever known to man, the creator of four-fifths of his noblest art, exercising vastly more attraction over the human mind than all the steam-engines and dynamos ever dreamed of; and yet this energy was unknown to the american mind. an american virgin would never dare command; an american venus would never dare exist. the question, which to any plain american of the nineteenth century seemed as remote as it did to adams, drew him almost violently to study, once it was posed; and on this point langleys were as useless as though they were herbert spencers or dynamos. the idea survived only as art. there one turned as naturally as though the artist were himself a woman. adams began to ponder, asking himself whether he knew of any american artist who had ever insisted on the power of sex, as every classic had always done; but he could think only of walt whitman; bret harte, as far as the magazines would let him venture; and one or two painters, for the flesh-tones. all the rest had used sex for sentiment, never for force; to them, eve was a tender flower, and herodias an unfeminine horror. american art, like the american language and american education, was as far as possible sexless. society regarded this victory over sex as its greatest triumph, and the historian readily admitted it, since the moral issue, for the moment, did not concern one who was studying the relations of unmoral force. he cared nothing for the sex of the dynamo until he could measure its energy. vaguely seeking a clue, he wandered through the art exhibit, and, in his stroll, stopped almost every day before st. gaudens's general sherman, which had been given the central post of honor. st. gaudens himself was in paris, putting on the work his usual interminable last touches, and listening to the usual contradictory suggestions of brother sculptors. of all the american artists who gave to american art whatever life it breathed in the seventies, st. gaudens was perhaps the most sympathetic, but certainly the most inarticulate. general grant or don cameron had scarcely less instinct of rhetoric than he. all the others--the hunts, richardson, john la farge, stanford white--were exuberant; only st. gaudens could never discuss or dilate on an emotion, or suggest artistic arguments for giving to his work the forms that he felt. he never laid down the law, or affected the despot, or became brutalized like whistler by the brutalities of his world. he required no incense; he was no egoist; his simplicity of thought was excessive; he could not imitate, or give any form but his own to the creations of his hand. no one felt more strongly than he the strength of other men, but the idea that they could affect him never stirred an image in his mind. this summer his health was poor and his spirits were low. for such a temper, adams was not the best companion, since his own gaiety was not folle; but he risked going now and then to the studio on mont parnasse to draw him out for a stroll in the bois de boulogne, or dinner as pleased his moods, and in return st. gaudens sometimes let adams go about in his company. once st. gaudens took him down to amiens, with a party of frenchmen, to see the cathedral. not until they found themselves actually studying the sculpture of the western portal, did it dawn on adams's mind that, for his purposes, st. gaudens on that spot had more interest to him than the cathedral itself. great men before great monuments express great truths, provided they are not taken too solemnly. adams never tired of quoting the supreme phrase of his idol gibbon, before the gothic cathedrals: "i darted a contemptuous look on the stately monuments of superstition." even in the footnotes of his history, gibbon had never inserted a bit of humor more human than this, and one would have paid largely for a photograph of the fat little historian, on the background of notre dame of amiens, trying to persuade his readers--perhaps himself--that he was darting a contemptuous look on the stately monument, for which he felt in fact the respect which every man of his vast study and active mind always feels before objects worthy of it; but besides the humor, one felt also the relation. gibbon ignored the virgin, because in religious monuments were out of fashion. in his remark sounded fresh and simple as the green fields to ears that had heard a hundred years of other remarks, mostly no more fresh and certainly less simple. without malice, one might find it more instructive than a whole lecture of ruskin. one sees what one brings, and at that moment gibbon brought the french revolution. ruskin brought reaction against the revolution. st. gaudens had passed beyond all. he liked the stately monuments much more than he liked gibbon or ruskin; he loved their dignity; their unity; their scale; their lines; their lights and shadows; their decorative sculpture; but he was even less conscious than they of the force that created it all--the virgin, the woman--by whose genius "the stately monuments of superstition" were built, through which she was expressed. he would have seen more meaning in isis with the cow's horns, at edfoo, who expressed the same thought. the art remained, but the energy was lost even upon the artist. yet in mind and person st. gaudens was a survival of the s he bore the stamp of the renaissance, and should have carried an image of the virgin round his neck, or stuck in his hat, like louis xi. in mere time he was a lost soul that had strayed by chance to the twentieth century, and forgotten where it came from. he writhed and cursed at his ignorance, much as adams did at his own, but in the opposite sense. st. gaudens was a child of benvenuto cellini, smothered in an american cradle. adams was a quintessence of boston, devoured by curiosity to think like benvenuto. st. gaudens's art was starved from birth, and adams's instinct was blighted from babyhood. each had but half of a nature, and when they came together before the virgin of amiens they ought both to have felt in her the force that made them one; but it was not so. to adams she became more than ever a channel of force; to st. gaudens she remained as before a channel of taste. for a symbol of power, st. gaudens instinctively preferred the horse, as was plain in his horse and victory of the sherman monument. doubtless sherman also felt it so. the attitude was so american that, for at least forty years, adams had never realized that any other could be in sound taste. how many years had he taken to admit a notion of what michael angelo and rubens were driving at? he could not say; but he knew that only since had he begun to feel the virgin or venus as force, and not everywhere even so. at chartres--perhaps at lourdes--possibly at cnidos if one could still find there the divinely naked aphrodite of praxiteles--but otherwise one must look for force to the goddesses of indian mythology. the idea died out long ago in the german and english stock. st. gaudens at amiens was hardly less sensitive to the force of the female energy than matthew arnold at the grande chartreuse. neither of them felt goddesses as power--only as reflected emotion, human expression, beauty, purity, taste, scarcely even as sympathy. they felt a railway train as power, yet they, and all other artists, constantly complained that the power embodied in a railway train could never be embodied in art. all the steam in the world could not, like the virgin, build chartres. yet in mechanics, whatever the mechanicians might think, both energies acted as interchangeable force on man, and by action on man all known force may be measured. indeed, few men of science measured force in any other way. after once admitting that a straight line was the shortest distance between two points, no serious mathematician cared to deny anything that suited his convenience, and rejected no symbol, unproved or unproveable, that helped him to accomplish work. the symbol was force, as a compass-needle or a triangle was force, as the mechanist might prove by losing it, and nothing could be gained by ignoring their value. symbol or energy, the virgin had acted as the greatest force the western world ever felt, and had drawn man's activities to herself more strongly than any other power, natural or supernatural, had ever done; the historian's business was to follow the track of the energy; to find where it came from and where it went to; its complex source and shifting channels; its values, equivalents, conversions. it could scarcely be more complex than radium; it could hardly be deflected, diverted, polarized, absorbed more perplexingly than other radiant matter. adams knew nothing about any of them, but as a mathematical problem of influence on human progress, though all were occult, all reacted on his mind, and he rather inclined to think the virgin easiest to handle. the pursuit turned out to be long and tortuous, leading at last to the vast forests of scholastic science. from zeno to descartes, hand in hand with thomas aquinas, montaigne, and pascal, one stumbled as stupidly as though one were still a german student of . only with the instinct of despair could one force one's self into this old thicket of ignorance after having been repulsed a score of entrances more promising and more popular. thus far, no path had led anywhere, unless perhaps to an exceedingly modest living. forty-five years of study had proved to be quite futile for the pursuit of power; one controlled no more force in than in , although the amount of force controlled by society had enormously increased. the secret of education still hid itself somewhere behind ignorance, and one fumbled over it as feebly as ever. in such labyrinths, the staff is a force almost more necessary than the legs; the pen becomes a sort of blind-man's dog, to keep him from falling into the gutters. the pen works for itself, and acts like a hand, modelling the plastic material over and over again to the form that suits it best. the form is never arbitrary, but is a sort of growth like crystallization, as any artist knows too well; for often the pencil or pen runs into side-paths and shapelessness, loses its relations, stops or is bogged. then it has to return on its trail, and recover, if it can, its line of force. the result of a year's work depends more on what is struck out than on what is left in; on the sequence of the main lines of thought, than on their play or variety. compelled once more to lean heavily on this support, adams covered more thousands of pages with figures as formal as though they were algebra, laboriously striking out, altering, burning, experimenting, until the year had expired, the exposition had long been closed, and winter drawing to its end, before he sailed from cherbourg, on january , , for home. chapter xxvi twilight ( ) while the world that thought itself frivolous, and submitted meekly to hearing itself decried as vain, fluttered through the paris exposition, jogging the futilities of st. gaudens, rodin, and besnard, the world that thought itself serious, and showed other infallible marks of coming mental paroxysm, was engaged in weird doings at peking and elsewhere such as startled even itself. of all branches of education, the science of gauging people and events by their relative importance defies study most insolently. for three or four generations, society has united in withering with contempt and opprobrium the shameless futility of mme. de pompadour and mme. du barry; yet, if one bid at an auction for some object that had been approved by the taste of either lady, one quickly found that it were better to buy half-a-dozen napoleons or frederics, or maria theresas, or all the philosophy and science of their time, than to bid for a cane-bottomed chair that either of these two ladies had adorned. the same thing might be said, in a different sense, of voltaire; while, as every one knows, the money-value of any hand-stroke of watteau or hogarth, nattier or sir joshua, is out of all proportion to the importance of the men. society seemed to delight in talking with solemn conviction about serious values, and in paying fantastic prices for nothing but the most futile. the drama acted at peking, in the summer of , was, in the eyes of a student, the most serious that could be offered for his study, since it brought him suddenly to the inevitable struggle for the control of china, which, in his view, must decide the control of the world; yet, as a money-value, the fall of china was chiefly studied in paris and london as a calamity to chinese porcelain. the value of a ming vase was more serious than universal war. the drama of the legations interested the public much as though it were a novel of alexandre dumas, but the bearing of the drama on future history offered an interest vastly greater. adams knew no more about it than though he were the best-informed statesman in europe. like them all, he took for granted that the legations were massacred, and that john hay, who alone championed china's "administrative entity," would be massacred too, since he must henceforth look on, in impotence, while russia and germany dismembered china, and shut up america at home. nine statesmen out of ten, in europe, accepted this result in advance, seeing no way to prevent it. adams saw none, and laughed at hay for his helplessness. when hay suddenly ignored european leadership, took the lead himself, rescued the legations and saved china, adams looked on, as incredulous as europe, though not quite so stupid, since, on that branch of education, he knew enough for his purpose. nothing so meteoric had ever been done in american diplomacy. on returning to washington, january , , he found most of the world as astonished as himself, but less stupid than usual. for a moment, indeed, the world had been struck dumb at seeing hay put europe aside and set the washington government at the head of civilization so quietly that civilization submitted, by mere instinct of docility, to receive and obey his orders; but, after the first shock of silence, society felt the force of the stroke through its fineness, and burst into almost tumultuous applause. instantly the diplomacy of the nineteenth century, with all its painful scuffles and struggles, was forgotten, and the american blushed to be told of his submissions in the past. history broke in halves. hay was too good an artist not to feel the artistic skill of his own work, and the success reacted on his health, giving him fresh life, for with him as with most men, success was a tonic, and depression a specific poison; but as usual, his troubles nested at home. success doubles strain. president mckinley's diplomatic court had become the largest in the world, and the diplomatic relations required far more work than ever before, while the staff of the department was little more efficient, and the friction in the senate had become coagulated. hay took to studying the "diary" of john quincy adams eighty years before, and calculated that the resistance had increased about ten times, as measured by waste of days and increase of effort, although secretary of state j. q. adams thought himself very hardly treated. hay cheerfully noted that it was killing him, and proved it, for the effort of the afternoon walk became sometimes painful. for the moment, things were going fairly well, and hay's unruly team were less fidgety, but pauncefote still pulled the whole load and turned the dangerous corners safely, while cassini and holleben helped the senate to make what trouble they could, without serious offence, and the irish, after the genial celtic nature, obstructed even themselves. the fortunate irish, thanks to their sympathetic qualities, never made lasting enmities; but the germans seemed in a fair way to rouse ill-will and even ugly temper in the spirit of politics, which was by no means a part of hay's plans. he had as much as he could do to overcome domestic friction, and felt no wish to alienate foreign powers. yet so much could be said in favor of the foreigners that they commonly knew why they made trouble, and were steady to a motive. cassini had for years pursued, in peking as in washington, a policy of his own, never disguised, and as little in harmony with his chief as with hay; he made his opposition on fixed lines for notorious objects; but senators could seldom give a reason for obstruction. in every hundred men, a certain number obstruct by instinct, and try to invent reasons to explain it afterwards. the senate was no worse than the board of a university; but incorporators as a rule have not made this class of men dictators on purpose to prevent action. in the senate, a single vote commonly stopped legislation, or, in committee, stifled discussion. hay's policy of removing, one after another, all irritations, and closing all discussions with foreign countries, roused incessant obstruction, which could be overcome only by patience and bargaining in executive patronage, if indeed it could be overcome at all. the price actually paid was not very great except in the physical exhaustion of hay and pauncefote, root and mckinley. no serious bargaining of equivalents could be attempted; senators would not sacrifice five dollars in their own states to gain five hundred thousand in another; but whenever a foreign country was willing to surrender an advantage without an equivalent, hay had a chance to offer the senate a treaty. in all such cases the price paid for the treaty was paid wholly to the senate, and amounted to nothing very serious except in waste of time and wear of strength. "life is so gay and horrid!" laughed hay; "the major will have promised all the consulates in the service; the senators will all come to me and refuse to believe me dis-consulate; i shall see all my treaties slaughtered, one by one, by the thirty-four per cent of kickers and strikers; the only mitigation i can foresee is being sick a good part of the time; i am nearing my grand climacteric, and the great culbute is approaching." he was thinking of his friend blaine, and might have thought of all his predecessors, for all had suffered alike, and to adams as historian their sufferings had been a long delight--the solitary picturesque and tragic element in politics--incidentally requiring character-studies like aaron burr and william b. giles, calhoun and webster and sumner, with sir forcible feebles like james m. mason and stage exaggerations like roscoe conkling. the senate took the place of shakespeare, and offered real brutuses and bolingbrokes, jack cades, falstaffs, and malvolios--endless varieties of human nature nowhere else to be studied, and none the less amusing because they killed, or because they were like schoolboys in their simplicity. "life is so gay and horrid!" hay still felt the humor, though more and more rarely, but what he felt most was the enormous complexity and friction of the vast mass he was trying to guide. he bitterly complained that it had made him a bore--of all things the most senatorial, and to him the most obnoxious. the old friend was lost, and only the teacher remained, driven to madness by the complexities and multiplicities of his new world. to one who, at past sixty years old, is still passionately seeking education, these small, or large, annoyances had no great value except as measures of mass and motion. for him the practical interest and the practical man were such as looked forward to the next election, or perhaps, in corporations, five or ten years. scarcely half-a-dozen men in america could be named who were known to have looked a dozen years ahead; while any historian who means to keep his alignment with past and future must cover a horizon of two generations at least. if he seeks to align himself with the future, he must assume a condition of some sort for a world fifty years beyond his own. every historian--sometimes unconsciously, but always inevitably--must have put to himself the question: how long could such-or-such an outworn system last? he can never give himself less than one generation to show the full effects of a changed condition. his object is to triangulate from the widest possible base to the furthest point he thinks he can see, which is always far beyond the curvature of the horizon. to the practical man, such an attempt is idiotic, and probably the practical man is in the right to-day; but, whichever is right--if the question of right or wrong enters at all into the matter--the historian has no choice but to go on alone. even in his own profession few companions offer help, and his walk soon becomes solitary, leading further and further into a wilderness where twilight is short and the shadows are dense. already hay literally staggered in his tracks for weariness. more worn than he, clarence king dropped. one day in the spring he stopped an hour in washington to bid good-bye, cheerily and simply telling how his doctors had condemned him to arizona for his lungs. all three friends knew that they were nearing the end, and that if it were not the one it would be the other; but the affectation of readiness for death is a stage role, and stoicism is a stupid resource, though the only one. non doles, paete! one is ashamed of it even in the acting. the sunshine of life had not been so dazzling of late but that a share of it flickered out for adams and hay when king disappeared from their lives; but hay had still his family and ambition, while adams could only blunder back alone, helplessly, wearily, his eyes rather dim with tears, to his vague trail across the darkening prairie of education, without a motive, big or small, except curiosity to reach, before he too should drop, some point that would give him a far look ahead. he was morbidly curious to see some light at the end of the passage, as though thirty years were a shadow, and he were again to fall into king's arms at the door of the last and only log cabin left in life. time had become terribly short, and the sense of knowing so little when others knew so much, crushed out hope. he knew not in what new direction to turn, and sat at his desk, idly pulling threads out of the tangled skein of science, to see whether or why they aligned themselves. the commonest and oldest toy he knew was the child's magnet, with which he had played since babyhood, the most familiar of puzzles. he covered his desk with magnets, and mapped out their lines of force by compass. then he read all the books he could find, and tried in vain to makes his lines of force agree with theirs. the books confounded him. he could not credit his own understanding. here was literally the most concrete fact in nature, next to gravitation which it defied; a force which must have radiated lines of energy without stop, since time began, if not longer, and which might probably go on radiating after the sun should fall into the earth, since no one knew why--or how--or what it radiated--or even whether it radiated at all. perhaps the earliest known of all natural forces after the solar energies, it seemed to have suggested no idea to any one until some mariner bethought himself that it might serve for a pointer. another thousand years passed when it taught some other intelligent man to use it as a pump, supply-pipe, sieve, or reservoir for collecting electricity, still without knowing how it worked or what it was. for a historian, the story of faraday's experiments and the invention of the dynamo passed belief; it revealed a condition of human ignorance and helplessness before the commonest forces, such as his mind refused to credit. he could not conceive but that some one, somewhere, could tell him all about the magnet, if one could but find the book--although he had been forced to admit the same helplessness in the face of gravitation, phosphorescence, and odors; and he could imagine no reason why society should treat radium as revolutionary in science when every infant, for ages past, had seen the magnet doing what radium did; for surely the kind of radiation mattered nothing compared with the energy that radiated and the matter supplied for radiation. he dared not venture into the complexities of chemistry, or microbes, so long as this child's toy offered complexities that befogged his mind beyond x-rays, and turned the atom into an endless variety of pumps endlessly pumping an endless variety of ethers. he wanted to ask mme. curie to invent a motor attachable to her salt of radium, and pump its forces through it, as faraday did with a magnet. he figured the human mind itself as another radiating matter through which man had always pumped a subtler fluid. in all this futility, it was not the magnet or the rays or the microbes that troubled him, or even his helplessness before the forces. to that he was used from childhood. the magnet in its new relation staggered his new education by its evidence of growing complexity, and multiplicity, and even contradiction, in life. he could not escape it; politics or science, the lesson was the same, and at every step it blocked his path whichever way he turned. he found it in politics; he ran against it in science; he struck it in everyday life, as though he were still adam in the garden of eden between god who was unity, and satan who was complexity, with no means of deciding which was truth. the problem was the same for mckinley as for adam, and for the senate as for satan. hay was going to wreck on it, like king and adams. all one's life, one had struggled for unity, and unity had always won. the national government and the national unity had overcome every resistance, and the darwinian evolutionists were triumphant over all the curates; yet the greater the unity and the momentum, the worse became the complexity and the friction. one had in vain bowed one's neck to railways, banks, corporations, trusts, and even to the popular will as far as one could understand it--or even further; the multiplicity of unity had steadily increased, was increasing, and threatened to increase beyond reason. he had surrendered all his favorite prejudices, and foresworn even the forms of criticism--except for his pet amusement, the senate, which was a tonic or stimulant necessary to healthy life; he had accepted uniformity and pteraspis and ice age and tramways and telephones; and now--just when he was ready to hang the crowning garland on the brow of a completed education--science itself warned him to begin it again from the beginning. maundering among the magnets he bethought himself that once, a full generation earlier, he had begun active life by writing a confession of geological faith at the bidding of sir charles lyell, and that it might be worth looking at if only to steady his vision. he read it again, and thought it better than he could do at sixty-three; but elderly minds always work loose. he saw his doubts grown larger, and became curious to know what had been said about them since . the geological survey supplied stacks of volumes, and reading for steady months; while, the longer he read, the more he wondered, pondered, doubted what his delightful old friend sir charles lyell would have said about it. truly the animal that is to be trained to unity must be caught young. unity is vision; it must have been part of the process of learning to see. the older the mind, the older its complexities, and the further it looks, the more it sees, until even the stars resolve themselves into multiples; yet the child will always see but one. adams asked whether geology since had drifted towards unity or multiplicity, and he felt that the drift would depend on the age of the man who drifted. seeking some impersonal point for measure, he turned to see what had happened to his oldest friend and cousin the ganoid fish, the pteraspis of ludlow and wenlock, with whom he had sported when geological life was young; as though they had all remained together in time to act the mask of comus at ludlow castle, and repeat "how charming is divine philosophy!" he felt almost aggrieved to find walcott so vigorously acting the part of comus as to have flung the ganoid all the way off to colorado and far back into the lower trenton limestone, making the pteraspis as modern as a mississippi gar-pike by spawning an ancestry for him, indefinitely more remote, in the dawn of known organic life. a few thousand feet, more or less, of limestone were the liveliest amusement to the ganoid, but they buried the uniformitarian alive, under the weight of his own uniformity. not for all the ganoid fish that ever swam, would a discreet historian dare to hazard even in secret an opinion about the value of natural selection by minute changes under uniform conditions, for he could know no more about it than most of his neighbors who knew nothing; but natural selection that did not select--evolution finished before it began--minute changes that refused to change anything during the whole geological record--survival of the highest order in a fauna which had no origin--uniformity under conditions which had disturbed everything else in creation--to an honest-meaning though ignorant student who needed to prove natural selection and not assume it, such sequence brought no peace. he wished to be shown that changes in form caused evolution in force; that chemical or mechanical energy had by natural selection and minute changes, under uniform conditions, converted itself into thought. the ganoid fish seemed to prove--to him--that it had selected neither new form nor new force, but that the curates were right in thinking that force could be increased in volume or raised in intensity only by help of outside force. to him, the ganoid was a huge perplexity, none the less because neither he nor the ganoid troubled darwinians, but the more because it helped to reveal that darwinism seemed to survive only in england. in vain he asked what sort of evolution had taken its place. almost any doctrine seemed orthodox. even sudden conversions due to mere vital force acting on its own lines quite beyond mechanical explanation, had cropped up again. a little more, and he would be driven back on the old independence of species. what the ontologist thought about it was his own affair, like the theologist's views on theology, for complexity was nothing to them; but to the historian who sought only the direction of thought and had begun as the confident child of darwin and lyell in , the matter of direction seemed vital. then he had entered gaily the door of the glacial epoch, and had surveyed a universe of unities and uniformities. in he entered a far vaster universe, where all the old roads ran about in every direction, overrunning, dividing, subdividing, stopping abruptly, vanishing slowly, with side-paths that led nowhere, and sequences that could not be proved. the active geologists had mostly become specialists dealing with complexities far too technical for an amateur, but the old formulas still seemed to serve for beginners, as they had served when new. so the cause of the glacial epoch remained at the mercy of lyell and croll, although geikie had split up the period into half-a-dozen intermittent chills in recent geology and in the northern hemisphere alone, while no geologist had ventured to assert that the glaciation of the southern hemisphere could possibly be referred to a horizon more remote. continents still rose wildly and wildly sank, though professor suess of vienna had written an epoch-making work, showing that continents were anchored like crystals, and only oceans rose and sank. lyell's genial uniformity seemed genial still, for nothing had taken its place, though, in the interval, granite had grown young, nothing had been explained, and a bewildering system of huge overthrusts had upset geological mechanics. the textbooks refused even to discuss theories, frankly throwing up their hands and avowing that progress depended on studying each rock as a law to itself. adams had no more to do with the correctness of the science than the gar-pike or the port jackson shark, for its correctness in no way concerned him, and only impertinence could lead him to dispute or discuss the principles of any science; but the history of the mind concerned the historian alone, and the historian had no vital concern in anything else, for he found no change to record in the body. in thought the schools, like the church, raised ignorance to a faith and degraded dogma to heresy. evolution survived like the trilobites without evolving, and yet the evolutionists held the whole field, and had even plucked up courage to rebel against the cossack ukase of lord kelvin forbidding them to ask more than twenty million years for their experiments. no doubt the geologists had always submitted sadly to this last and utmost violence inflicted on them by the pontiff of physical religion in the effort to force unification of the universe; they had protested with mild conviction that they could not state the geological record in terms of time; they had murmured ignoramus under their breath; but they had never dared to assert the ignorabimus that lay on the tips of their tongues. yet the admission seemed close at hand. evolution was becoming change of form broken by freaks of force, and warped at times by attractions affecting intelligence, twisted and tortured at other times by sheer violence, cosmic, chemical, solar, supersensual, electrolytic--who knew what?--defying science, if not denying known law; and the wisest of men could but imitate the church, and invoke a "larger synthesis" to unify the anarchy again. historians have got into far too much trouble by following schools of theology in their efforts to enlarge their synthesis, that they should willingly repeat the process in science. for human purposes a point must always be soon reached where larger synthesis is suicide. politics and geology pointed alike to the larger synthesis of rapidly increasing complexity; but still an elderly man knew that the change might be only in himself. the admission cost nothing. any student, of any age, thinking only of a thought and not of his thought, should delight in turning about and trying the opposite motion, as he delights in the spring which brings even to a tired and irritated statesman the larger synthesis of peach-blooms, cherry-blossoms, and dogwood, to prove the folly of fret. every schoolboy knows that this sum of all knowledge never saved him from whipping; mere years help nothing; king and hay and adams could neither of them escape floundering through the corridors of chaos that opened as they passed to the end; but they could at least float with the stream if they only knew which way the current ran. adams would have liked to begin afresh with the limulus and lepidosteus in the waters of braintree, side by side with adamses and quincys and harvard college, all unchanged and unchangeable since archaic time; but what purpose would it serve? a seeker of truth--or illusion--would be none the less restless, though a shark! chapter xxvii teufelsdrockh ( ) inevitable paris beckoned, and resistance became more and more futile as the store of years grew less; for the world contains no other spot than paris where education can be pursued from every side. even more vigorously than in the twelfth century, paris taught in the twentieth, with no other school approaching it for variety of direction and energy of mind. of the teaching in detail, a man who knew only what accident had taught him in the nineteenth century, could know next to nothing, since science had got quite beyond his horizon, and mathematics had become the only necessary language of thought; but one could play with the toys of childhood, including ming porcelain, salons of painting, operas and theatres, beaux-arts and gothic architecture, theology and anarchy, in any jumble of time; or totter about with joe stickney, talking greek philosophy or recent poetry, or studying "louise" at the opera comique, or discussing the charm of youth and the seine with bay lodge and his exquisite young wife. paris remained parisian in spite of change, mistress of herself though china fell. scores of artists--sculptors and painters, poets and dramatists, workers in gems and metals, designers in stuffs and furniture--hundreds of chemists, physicists, even philosophers, philologists, physicians, and historians--were at work, a thousand times as actively as ever before, and the mass and originality of their product would have swamped any previous age, as it very nearly swamped its own; but the effect was one of chaos, and adams stood as helpless before it as before the chaos of new york. his single thought was to keep in front of the movement, and, if necessary, lead it to chaos, but never fall behind. only the young have time to linger in the rear. the amusements of youth had to be abandoned, for not even pugilism needs more staying-power than the labors of the pale-faced student of the latin quarter in the haunts of montparnasse or montmartre, where one must feel no fatigue at two o'clock in the morning in a beer-garden even after four hours of mounet sully at the theatre francais. in those branches, education might be called closed. fashion, too, could no longer teach anything worth knowing to a man who, holding open the door into the next world, regarded himself as merely looking round to take a last glance of this. the glance was more amusing than any he had known in his active life, but it was more--infinitely more--chaotic and complex. still something remained to be done for education beyond the chaos, and as usual the woman helped. for thirty years or there-abouts, he had been repeating that he really must go to baireuth. suddenly mrs. lodge appeared on the horizon and bade him come. he joined them, parents and children, alert and eager and appreciative as ever, at the little old town of rothenburg-on-the taube, and they went on to the baireuth festival together. thirty years earlier, a baireuth festival would have made an immense stride in education, and the spirit of the master would have opened a vast new world. in the effect was altogether different from the spirit of the master. in the rococo setting of baireuth seemed the correct atmosphere for siegfried and brunhilde, perhaps even for parsifal. baireuth was out of the world, calm, contemplative, and remote. in the world had altogether changed, and wagner had become a part of it, as familiar as shakespeare or bret harte. the rococo element jarred. even the hudson and the susquehanna--perhaps the potomac itself--had often risen to drown out the gods of walhalla, and one could hardly listen to the "gotterdammerung" in new york, among throngs of intense young enthusiasts, without paroxysms of nervous excitement that toned down to musical philistinism at baireuth, as though the gods were bavarian composers. new york or paris might be whatever one pleased--venal, sordid, vulgar--but society nursed there, in the rottenness of its decay, certain anarchistic ferments, and thought them proof of art. perhaps they were; and at all events, wagner was chiefly responsible for them as artistic emotion. new york knew better than baireuth what wagner meant, and the frivolities of paris had more than once included the rising of the seine to drown out the etoile or montmartre, as well as the sorcery of ambition that casts spells of enchantment on the hero. paris still felt a subtile flattery in the thought that the last great tragedy of gods and men would surely happen there, while no one could conceive of its happening at baireuth, or would care if it did. paris coquetted with catastrophe as though it were an old mistress--faced it almost gaily as she had done so often, for they were acquainted since rome began to ravage europe; while new york met it with a glow of fascinated horror, like an inevitable earthquake, and heard ternina announce it with conviction that made nerves quiver and thrill as they had long ceased to do under the accents of popular oratory proclaiming popular virtue. flattery had lost its charm, but the fluch-motif went home. adams had been carried with the tide till brunhilde had become a habit and ternina an ally. he too had played with anarchy; though not with socialism, which, to young men who nourished artistic emotions under the dome of the pantheon, seemed hopelessly bourgeois, and lowest middle-class. bay lodge and joe stickney had given birth to the wholly new and original party of conservative christian anarchists, to restore true poetry under the inspiration of the "gotterdammerung." such a party saw no inspiration in baireuth, where landscape, history, and audience were--relatively--stodgy, and where the only emotion was a musical dilettantism that the master had abhorred. yet baireuth still amused even a conservative christian anarchist who cared as little as "grane, mein ross," whether the singers sang false, and who came only to learn what wagner had supposed himself to mean. this end attained as pleased frau wagner and the heiliger geist, he was ready to go on; and the senator, yearning for sterner study, pointed to a haven at moscow. for years adams had taught american youth never to travel without a senator who was useful even in america at times, but indispensable in russia where, in , anarchists, even though conservative and christian, were ill-seen. this wing of the anarchistic party consisted rigorously of but two members, adams and bay lodge. the conservative christian anarchist, as a party, drew life from hegel and schopenhauer rightly understood. by the necessity of their philosophical descent, each member of the fraternity denounced the other as unequal to his lofty task and inadequate to grasp it. of course, no third member could be so much as considered, since the great principle of contradiction could be expressed only by opposites; and no agreement could be conceived, because anarchy, by definition, must be chaos and collision, as in the kinetic theory of a perfect gas. doubtless this law of contradiction was itself agreement, a restriction of personal liberty inconsistent with freedom; but the "larger synthesis" admitted a limited agreement provided it were strictly confined to the end of larger contradiction. thus the great end of all philosophy--the "larger synthesis"--was attained, but the process was arduous, and while adams, as the older member, assumed to declare the principle, bay lodge necessarily denied both the assumption and the principle in order to assure its truth. adams proclaimed that in the last synthesis, order and anarchy were one, but that the unity was chaos. as anarchist, conservative and christian, he had no motive or duty but to attain the end; and, to hasten it, he was bound to accelerate progress; to concentrate energy; to accumulate power; to multiply and intensify forces; to reduce friction, increase velocity and magnify momentum, partly because this was the mechanical law of the universe as science explained it; but partly also in order to get done with the present which artists and some others complained of; and finally--and chiefly--because a rigorous philosophy required it, in order to penetrate the beyond, and satisfy man's destiny by reaching the largest synthesis in its ultimate contradiction. of course the untaught critic instantly objected that this scheme was neither conservative, christian, nor anarchic, but such objection meant only that the critic should begin his education in any infant school in order to learn that anarchy which should be logical would cease to be anarchic. to the conservative christian anarchist, the amiable doctrines of kropotkin were sentimental ideas of russian mental inertia covered with the name of anarchy merely to disguise their innocence; and the outpourings of elisee reclus were ideals of the french ouvrier, diluted with absinthe, resulting in a bourgeois dream of order and inertia. neither made a pretence of anarchy except as a momentary stage towards order and unity. neither of them had formed any other conception of the universe than what they had inherited from the priestly class to which their minds obviously belonged. with them, as with the socialist, communist, or collectivist, the mind that followed nature had no relation; if anarchists needed order, they must go back to the twelfth century where their thought had enjoyed its thousand years of reign. the conservative christian anarchist could have no associate, no object, no faith except the nature of nature itself; and his "larger synthesis" had only the fault of being so supremely true that even the highest obligation of duty could scarcely oblige bay lodge to deny it in order to prove it. only the self-evident truth that no philosophy of order--except the church--had ever satisfied the philosopher reconciled the conservative christian anarchist to prove his own. naturally these ideas were so far in advance of the age that hardly more people could understand them than understood wagner or hegel; for that matter, since the time of socrates, wise men have been mostly shy of claiming to understand anything; but such refinements were greek or german, and affected the practical american but little. he admitted that, for the moment, the darkness was dense. he could not affirm with confidence, even to himself, that his "largest synthesis" would certainly turn out to be chaos, since he would be equally obliged to deny the chaos. the poet groped blindly for an emotion. the play of thought for thought's sake had mostly ceased. the throb of fifty or a hundred million steam horse-power, doubling every ten years, and already more despotic than all the horses that ever lived, and all the riders they ever carried, drowned rhyme and reason. no one was to blame, for all were equally servants of the power, and worked merely to increase it; but the conservative christian anarchist saw light. thus the student of hegel prepared himself for a visit to russia in order to enlarge his "synthesis"--and much he needed it! in america all were conservative christian anarchists; the faith was national, racial, geographic. the true american had never seen such supreme virtue in any of the innumerable shades between social anarchy and social order as to mark it for exclusively human and his own. he never had known a complete union either in church or state or thought, and had never seen any need for it. the freedom gave him courage to meet any contradiction, and intelligence enough to ignore it. exactly the opposite condition had marked russian growth. the czar's empire was a phase of conservative christian anarchy more interesting to history than all the complex variety of american newspapers, schools, trusts, sects, frauds, and congressmen. these were nature--pure and anarchic as the conservative christian anarchist saw nature--active, vibrating, mostly unconscious, and quickly reacting on force; but, from the first glimpse one caught from the sleeping-car window, in the early morning, of the polish jew at the accidental railway station, in all his weird horror, to the last vision of the russian peasant, lighting his candle and kissing his ikon before the railway virgin in the station at st. petersburg, all was logical, conservative, christian and anarchic. russia had nothing in common with any ancient or modern world that history knew; she had been the oldest source of all civilization in europe, and had kept none for herself; neither europe nor asia had ever known such a phase, which seemed to fall into no line of evolution whatever, and was as wonderful to the student of gothic architecture in the twelfth century, as to the student of the dynamo in the twentieth. studied in the dry light of conservative christian anarchy, russia became luminous like the salt of radium; but with a negative luminosity as though she were a substance whose energies had been sucked out--an inert residuum--with movement of pure inertia. from the car window one seemed to float past undulations of nomad life--herders deserted by their leaders and herds--wandering waves stopped in their wanderings--waiting for their winds or warriors to return and lead them westward; tribes that had camped, like khirgis, for the season, and had lost the means of motion without acquiring the habit of permanence. they waited and suffered. as they stood they were out of place, and could never have been normal. their country acted as a sink of energy like the caspian sea, and its surface kept the uniformity of ice and snow. one russian peasant kissing an ikon on a saint's day, in the kremlin, served for a hundred million. the student had no need to study wallace, or re-read tolstoy or tourguenieff or dostoiewski to refresh his memory of the most poignant analysis of human inertia ever put in words; gorky was more than enough: kropotkin answered every purpose. the russian people could never have changed--could they ever be changed? could inertia of race, on such a scale, be broken up, or take new form? even in america, on an infinitely smaller scale, the question was old and unanswered. all the so-called primitive races, and some nearer survivals, had raised doubts which persisted against the most obstinate convictions of evolution. the senator himself shook his head, and after surveying warsaw and moscow to his content, went on to st. petersburg to ask questions of mr. de witte and prince khilkoff. their conversation added new doubts; for their efforts had been immense, their expenditure enormous, and their results on the people seemed to be uncertain as yet, even to themselves. ten or fifteen years of violent stimulus seemed resulting in nothing, for, since , russia lagged. the tourist-student, having duly reflected, asked the senator whether he should allow three generations, or more, to swing the russian people into the western movement. the senator seemed disposed to ask for more. the student had nothing to say. for him, all opinion founded on fact must be error, because the facts can never be complete, and their relations must be always infinite. very likely, russia would instantly become the most brilliant constellation of human progress through all the ordered stages of good; but meanwhile one might give a value as movement of inertia to the mass, and assume a slow acceleration that would, at the end of a generation, leave the gap between east and west relatively the same. this result reached, the lodges thought their moral improvement required a visit to berlin; but forty years of varied emotions had not deadened adams's memories of berlin, and he preferred, at any cost, to escape new ones. when the lodges started for germany, adams took steamer for sweden and landed happily, in a day or two, at stockholm. until the student is fairly sure that his problem is soluble, he gains little by obstinately insisting on solving it. one might doubt whether mr. de witte himself, or prince khilkoff, or any grand duke, or the emperor, knew much more about it than their neighbors; and adams was quite sure that, even in america, he should listen with uncertain confidence to the views of any secretary of the treasury, or railway president, or president of the united states whom he had ever known, that should concern the america of the next generation. the mere fact that any man should dare to offer them would prove his incompetence to judge. yet russia was too vast a force to be treated as an object of unconcern. as inertia, if in no other way, she represented three-fourths of the human race, and her movement might be the true movement of the future, against the hasty and unsure acceleration of america. no one could yet know what would best suit humanity, and the tourist who carried his la fontaine in mind, caught himself talking as bear or as monkey according to the mirror he held before him. "am i satisfied?" he asked:-- "moi? pourquoi non? n'ai-je pas quatre pieds aussi bien que les autres? mon portrait jusqu'ici ne m'a rien reproche; mais pour mon frere l'ours, on ne l'a qu'ebauche; jamais, s'il me veut croire, il ne se fera peindre." granting that his brother the bear lacked perfection in details, his own figure as monkey was not necessarily ideal or decorative, nor was he in the least sure what form it might take even in one generation. he had himself never ventured to dream of three. no man could guess what the daimler motor and x-rays would do to him; but so much was sure; the monkey and motor were terribly afraid of the bear; how much,--only a man close to their foreign departments knew. as the monkey looked back across the baltic from the safe battlements of stockholm, russia looked more portentous than from the kremlin. the image was that of the retreating ice-cap--a wall of archaic glacier, as fixed, as ancient, as eternal, as the wall of archaic ice that blocked the ocean a few hundred miles to the northward, and more likely to advance. scandinavia had been ever at its mercy. europe had never changed. the imaginary line that crossed the level continent from the baltic to the black sea, merely extended the northern barrier-line. the hungarians and poles on one side still struggled against the russian inertia of race, and retained their own energies under the same conditions that caused inertia across the frontier. race ruled the conditions; conditions hardly affected race; and yet no one could tell the patient tourist what race was, or how it should be known. history offered a feeble and delusive smile at the sound of the word; evolutionists and ethnologists disputed its very existence; no one knew what to make of it; yet, without the clue, history was a nursery tale. the germans, scandinavians, poles and hungarians, energetic as they were, had never held their own against the heterogeneous mass of inertia called russia, and trembled with terror whenever russia moved. from stockholm one looked back on it as though it were an ice-sheet, and so had stockholm watched it for centuries. in contrast with the dreary forests of russia and the stern streets of st. petersburg, stockholm seemed a southern vision, and sweden lured the tourist on. through a cheerful new england landscape and bright autumn, he rambled northwards till he found himself at trondhjem and discovered norway. education crowded upon him in immense masses as he triangulated these vast surfaces of history about which he had lectured and read for a life-time. when the historian fully realizes his ignorance--which sometimes happens to americans--he becomes even more tiresome to himself than to others, because his naivete is irrepressible. adams could not get over his astonishment, though he had preached the norse doctrine all his life against the stupid and beer-swilling saxon boors whom freeman loved, and who, to the despair of science, produced shakespeare. mere contact with norway started voyages of thought, and, under their illusions, he took the mail steamer to the north, and on september , reached hammerfest. frivolous amusement was hardly what one saw, through the equinoctial twilight, peering at the flying tourist, down the deep fiords, from dim patches of snow, where the last laps and reindeer were watching the mail-steamer thread the intricate channels outside, as their ancestors had watched the first norse fishermen learn them in the succession of time; but it was not the laps, or the snow, or the arctic gloom, that impressed the tourist, so much as the lights of an electro-magnetic civilization and the stupefying contrast with russia, which more and more insisted on taking the first place in historical interest. nowhere had the new forces so vigorously corrected the errors of the old, or so effectively redressed the balance of the ecliptic. as one approached the end--the spot where, seventy years before, a futile carlylean teufelsdrockh had stopped to ask futile questions of the silent infinite--the infinite seemed to have become loquacious, not to say familiar, chattering gossip in one's ear. an installation of electric lighting and telephones led tourists close up to the polar ice-cap, beyond the level of the magnetic pole; and there the newer teufelsdrockh sat dumb with surprise, and glared at the permanent electric lights of hammerfest. he had good reason--better than the teufelsdrockh of , in his liveliest scotch imagination, ever dreamed, or mortal man had ever told. at best, a week in these dim northern seas, without means of speech, within the arctic circle, at the equinox, lent itself to gravity if not to gloom; but only a week before, breakfasting in the restaurant at stockholm, his eye had caught, across, the neighboring table, a headline in a swedish newspaper, announcing an attempt on the life of president mckinley, and from stockholm to trondhjem, and so up the coast to hammerfest, day after day the news came, telling of the president's condition, and the doings and sayings of hay and roosevelt, until at last a little journal was cried on reaching some dim haven, announcing the president's death a few hours before. to adams the death of mckinley and the advent of roosevelt were not wholly void of personal emotion, but this was little in comparison with his depth of wonder at hearing hourly reports from his most intimate friends, sent to him far within the realm of night, not to please him, but to correct the faults of the solar system. the electro-dynamo-social universe worked better than the sun. no such strange chance had ever happened to a historian before, and it upset for the moment his whole philosophy of conservative anarchy. the acceleration was marvellous, and wholly in the lines of unity. to recover his grasp of chaos, he must look back across the gulf to russia, and the gap seemed to have suddenly become an abyss. russia was infinitely distant. yet the nightmare of the glacial ice-cap still pressed down on him from the hills, in full vision, and no one could look out on the dusky and oily sea that lapped these spectral islands without consciousness that only a day's steaming to the northward would bring him to the ice-barrier, ready at any moment to advance, which obliged tourists to stop where laps and reindeer and norse fishermen had stopped so long ago that memory of their very origin was lost. adams had never before met a ne plus ultra, and knew not what to make of it; but he felt at least the emotion of his norwegian fishermen ancestors, doubtless numbering hundreds of thousands, jammed with their faces to the sea, the ice on the north, the ice-cap of russian inertia pressing from behind, and the ice a trifling danger compared with the inertia. from the day they first followed the retreating ice-cap round the north cape, down to the present moment, their problem was the same. the new teufelsdrockh, though considerably older than the old one, saw no clearer into past or future, but he was fully as much perplexed. from the archaic ice-barrier to the caspian sea, a long line of division, permanent since ice and inertia first took possession, divided his lines of force, with no relation to climate or geography or soil. the less a tourist knows, the fewer mistakes he need make, for he will not expect himself to explain ignorance. a century ago he carried letters and sought knowledge; to-day he knows that no one knows; he needs too much and ignorance is learning. he wandered south again, and came out at kiel, hamburg, bremen, and cologne. a mere glance showed him that here was a germany new to mankind. hamburg was almost as american as st. louis. in forty years, the green rusticity of dusseldorf had taken on the sooty grime of birmingham. the rhine in resembled the rhine of much as it resembled the rhine of the salic franks. cologne was a railway centre that had completed its cathedral which bore an absent-minded air of a cathedral of chicago. the thirteenth century, carefully strained-off, catalogued, and locked up, was visible to tourists as a kind of neanderthal, cave-dwelling, curiosity. the rhine was more modern than the hudson, as might well be, since it produced far more coal; but all this counted for little beside the radical change in the lines of force. in the whole plain of northern europe, as well as the danube in the south, bore evident marks of being still the prehistoric highway between asia and the ocean. the trade-route followed the old routes of invasion, and cologne was a resting-place between warsaw and flanders. throughout northern germany, russia was felt even more powerfully than france. in russia had vanished, and not even france was felt; hardly england or america. coal alone was felt--its stamp alone pervaded the rhine district and persisted to picardy--and the stamp was the same as that of birmingham and pittsburgh. the rhine produced the same power, and the power produced the same people--the same mind--the same impulse. for a man sixty-three years old who had no hope of earning a living, these three months of education were the most arduous he ever attempted, and russia was the most indigestible morsel he ever met; but the sum of it, viewed from cologne, seemed reasonable. from hammerfest to cherbourg on one shore of the ocean--from halifax to norfolk on the other--one great empire was ruled by one great emperor--coal. political and human jealousies might tear it apart or divide it, but the power and the empire were one. unity had gained that ground. beyond lay russia, and there an older, perhaps a surer, power, resting on the eternal law of inertia, held its own. as a personal matter, the relative value of the two powers became more interesting every year; for the mass of russian inertia was moving irresistibly over china, and john hay stood in its path. as long as de witte ruled, hay was safe. should de witte fall, hay would totter. one could only sit down and watch the doings of mr. de witte and mr. de plehve. chapter xxviii the height of knowledge ( ) america has always taken tragedy lightly. too busy to stop the activity of their twenty-million-horse-power society, americans ignore tragic motives that would have overshadowed the middle ages; and the world learns to regard assassination as a form of hysteria, and death as neurosis, to be treated by a rest-cure. three hideous political murders, that would have fattened the eumenides with horror, have thrown scarcely a shadow on the white house. the year was a year of tragedy that seemed to hay to centre on himself. first came, in summer, the accidental death of his son, del hay. close on the tragedy of his son, followed that of his chief, "all the more hideous that we were so sure of his recovery." the world turned suddenly into a graveyard. "i have acquired the funeral habit." "nicolay is dying. i went to see him yesterday, and he did not know me." among the letters of condolence showered upon him was one from clarence king at pasadena, "heart-breaking in grace and tenderness--the old king manner"; and king himself "simply waiting till nature and the foe have done their struggle." the tragedy of king impressed him intensely: "there you have it in the face!" he said--"the best and brightest man of his generation, with talents immeasurably beyond any of his contemporaries; with industry that has often sickened me to witness it; with everything in his favor but blind luck; hounded by disaster from his cradle, with none of the joy of life to which he was entitled, dying at last, with nameless suffering alone and uncared-for, in a california tavern. ca vous amuse, la vie?" the first summons that met adams, before he had even landed on the pier at new york, december , was to clarence king's funeral, and from the funeral service he had no gayer road to travel than that which led to washington, where a revolution had occurred that must in any case have made the men of his age instantly old, but which, besides hurrying to the front the generation that till then he had regarded as boys, could not fail to break the social ties that had till then held them all together. ca vous amuse, la vie? honestly, the lessons of education were becoming too trite. hay himself, probably for the first time, felt half glad that roosevelt should want him to stay in office, if only to save himself the trouble of quitting; but to adams all was pure loss. on that side, his education had been finished at school. his friends in power were lost, and he knew life too well to risk total wreck by trying to save them. as far as concerned roosevelt, the chance was hopeless. to them at sixty-three, roosevelt at forty-three could not be taken seriously in his old character, and could not be recovered in his new one. power when wielded by abnormal energy is the most serious of facts, and all roosevelt's friends know that his restless and combative energy was more than abnormal. roosevelt, more than any other man living within the range of notoriety, showed the singular primitive quality that belongs to ultimate matter--the quality that mediaeval theology assigned to god--he was pure act. with him wielding unmeasured power with immeasurable energy, in the white house, the relation of age to youth--of teacher to pupil--was altogether out of place; and no other was possible. even hay's relation was a false one, while adams's ceased of itself. history's truths are little valuable now; but human nature retains a few of its archaic, proverbial laws, and the wisest courtier that ever lived--lucius seneca himself--must have remained in some shade of doubt what advantage he should get from the power of his friend and pupil nero claudius, until, as a gentleman past sixty, he received nero's filial invitation to kill himself. seneca closed the vast circle of his knowledge by learning that a friend in power was a friend lost--a fact very much worth insisting upon--while the gray-headed moth that had fluttered through many moth-administrations and had singed his wings more or less in them all, though he now slept nine months out of the twelve, acquired an instinct of self-preservation that kept him to the north side of la fayette square, and, after a sufficient habitude of presidents and senators, deterred him from hovering between them. those who seek education in the paths of duty are always deceived by the illusion that power in the hands of friends is an advantage to them. as far as adams could teach experience, he was bound to warn them that he had found it an invariable disaster. power is poison. its effect on presidents had been always tragic, chiefly as an almost insane excitement at first, and a worse reaction afterwards; but also because no mind is so well balanced as to bear the strain of seizing unlimited force without habit or knowledge of it; and finding it disputed with him by hungry packs of wolves and hounds whose lives depend on snatching the carrion. roosevelt enjoyed a singularly direct nature and honest intent, but he lived naturally in restless agitation that would have worn out most tempers in a month, and his first year of presidency showed chronic excitement that made a friend tremble. the effect of unlimited power on limited mind is worth noting in presidents because it must represent the same process in society, and the power of self-control must have limit somewhere in face of the control of the infinite. here, education seemed to see its first and last lesson, but this is a matter of psychology which lies far down in the depths of history and of science; it will recur in other forms. the personal lesson is different. roosevelt was lost, but this seemed no reason why hay and lodge should also be lost, yet the result was mathematically certain. with hay, it was only the steady decline of strength, and the necessary economy of force; but with lodge it was law of politics. he could not help himself, for his position as the president's friend and independent statesman at once was false, and he must be unsure in both relations. to a student, the importance of cabot lodge was great--much greater than that of the usual senator--but it hung on his position in massachusetts rather than on his control of executive patronage; and his standing in massachusetts was highly insecure. nowhere in america was society so complex or change so rapid. no doubt the bostonian had always been noted for a certain chronic irritability--a sort of bostonitis--which, in its primitive puritan forms, seemed due to knowing too much of his neighbors, and thinking too much of himself. many years earlier william m. evarts had pointed out to adams the impossibility of uniting new england behind a new england leader. the trait led to good ends--such as admiration of abraham lincoln and george washington--but the virtue was exacting; for new england standards were various, scarcely reconcilable with each other, and constantly multiplying in number, until balance between them threatened to become impossible. the old ones were quite difficult enough--state street and the banks exacted one stamp; the old congregational clergy another; harvard college, poor in votes, but rich in social influence, a third; the foreign element, especially the irish, held aloof, and seldom consented to approve any one; the new socialist class, rapidly growing, promised to become more exclusive than the irish. new power was disintegrating society, and setting independent centres of force to work, until money had all it could do to hold the machine together. no one could represent it faithfully as a whole. naturally, adams's sympathies lay strongly with lodge, but the task of appreciation was much more difficult in his case than in that of his chief friend and scholar, the president. as a type for study, or a standard for education, lodge was the more interesting of the two. roosevelts are born and never can be taught; but lodge was a creature of teaching--boston incarnate--the child of his local parentage; and while his ambition led him to be more, the intent, though virtuous, was--as adams admitted in his own case--restless. an excellent talker, a voracious reader, a ready wit, an accomplished orator, with a clear mind and a powerful memory, he could never feel perfectly at ease whatever leg he stood on, but shifted, sometimes with painful strain of temper, from one sensitive muscle to another, uncertain whether to pose as an uncompromising yankee; or a pure american; or a patriot in the still purer atmosphere of irish, germans, or jews; or a scholar and historian of harvard college. english to the last fibre of his thought--saturated with english literature, english tradition, english taste--revolted by every vice and by most virtues of frenchmen and germans, or any other continental standards, but at home and happy among the vices and extravagances of shakespeare--standing first on the social, then on the political foot; now worshipping, now banning; shocked by the wanton display of immorality, but practicing the license of political usage; sometimes bitter, often genial, always intelligent--lodge had the singular merit of interesting. the usual statesmen flocked in swarms like crows, black and monotonous. lodge's plumage was varied, and, like his flight, harked back to race. he betrayed the consciousness that he and his people had a past, if they dared but avow it, and might have a future, if they could but divine it. adams, too, was bostonian, and the bostonian's uncertainty of attitude was as natural to him as to lodge. only bostonians can understand bostonians and thoroughly sympathize with the inconsequences of the boston mind. his theory and practice were also at variance. he professed in theory equal distrust of english thought, and called it a huge rag-bag of bric-a-brac, sometimes precious but never sure. for him, only the greek, the italian or the french standards had claims to respect, and the barbarism of shakespeare was as flagrant as to voltaire; but his theory never affected his practice. he knew that his artistic standard was the illusion of his own mind; that english disorder approached nearer to truth, if truth existed, than french measure or italian line, or german logic; he read his shakespeare as the evangel of conservative christian anarchy, neither very conservative nor very christian, but stupendously anarchistic. he loved the atrocities of english art and society, as he loved charles dickens and miss austen, not because of their example, but because of their humor. he made no scruple of defying sequence and denying consistency--but he was not a senator. double standards are inspiration to men of letters, but they are apt to be fatal to politicians. adams had no reason to care whether his standards were popular or not, and no one else cared more than he; but roosevelt and lodge were playing a game in which they were always liable to find the shifty sands of american opinion yield suddenly under their feet. with this game an elderly friend had long before carried acquaintance as far as he wished. there was nothing in it for him but the amusement of the pugilist or acrobat. the larger study was lost in the division of interests and the ambitions of fifth-rate men; but foreign affairs dealt only with large units, and made personal relation possible with hay which could not be maintained with roosevelt or lodge. as an affair of pure education the point is worth notice from young men who are drawn into politics. the work of domestic progress is done by masses of mechanical power--steam, electric, furnace, or other--which have to be controlled by a score or two of individuals who have shown capacity to manage it. the work of internal government has become the task of controlling these men, who are socially as remote as heathen gods, alone worth knowing, but never known, and who could tell nothing of political value if one skinned them alive. most of them have nothing to tell, but are forces as dumb as their dynamos, absorbed in the development or economy of power. they are trustees for the public, and whenever society assumes the property, it must confer on them that title; but the power will remain as before, whoever manages it, and will then control society without appeal, as it controls its stokers and pit-men. modern politics is, at bottom, a struggle not of men but of forces. the men become every year more and more creatures of force, massed about central power-houses. the conflict is no longer between the men, but between the motors that drive the men, and the men tend to succumb to their own motive forces. this is a moral that man strongly objects to admit, especially in mediaeval pursuits like politics and poetry, nor is it worth while for a teacher to insist upon it. what he insists upon is only that in domestic politics, every one works for an immediate object, commonly for some private job, and invariably in a near horizon, while in foreign affairs the outlook is far ahead, over a field as wide as the world. there the merest scholar could see what he was doing. for history, international relations are the only sure standards of movement; the only foundation for a map. for this reason, adams had always insisted that international relation was the only sure base for a chart of history. he cared little to convince any one of the correctness of his view, but as teacher he was bound to explain it, and as friend he found it convenient. the secretary of state has always stood as much alone as the historian. required to look far ahead and round him, he measures forces unknown to party managers, and has found congress more or less hostile ever since congress first sat. the secretary of state exists only to recognize the existence of a world which congress would rather ignore; of obligations which congress repudiates whenever it can; of bargains which congress distrusts and tries to turn to its advantage or to reject. since the first day the senate existed, it has always intrigued against the secretary of state whenever the secretary has been obliged to extend his functions beyond the appointment of consuls in senators' service. this is a matter of history which any one may approve or dispute as he will; but as education it gave new resources to an old scholar, for it made of hay the best schoolmaster since . hay had become the most imposing figure ever known in the office. he had an influence that no other secretary of state ever possessed, as he had a nation behind him such as history had never imagined. he needed to write no state papers; he wanted no help, and he stood far above counsel or advice; but he could instruct an attentive scholar as no other teacher in the world could do; and adams sought only instruction--wanted only to chart the international channel for fifty years to come; to triangulate the future; to obtain his dimension, and fix the acceleration of movement in politics since the year , as he was trying to fix it in philosophy and physics; in finance and force. hay had been so long at the head of foreign affairs that at last the stream of events favored him. with infinite effort he had achieved the astonishing diplomatic feat of inducing the senate, with only six negative votes, to permit great britain to renounce, without equivalent, treaty rights which she had for fifty years defended tooth and nail. this unprecedented triumph in his negotiations with the senate enabled him to carry one step further his measures for general peace. about england the senate could make no further effective opposition, for england was won, and canada alone could give trouble. the next difficulty was with france, and there the senate blocked advance, but england assumed the task, and, owing to political changes in france, effected the object--a combination which, as late as , had been visionary. the next, and far more difficult step, was to bring germany into the combine; while, at the end of the vista, most unmanageable of all, russia remained to be satisfied and disarmed. this was the instinct of what might be named mckinleyism; the system of combinations, consolidations, trusts, realized at home, and realizable abroad. with the system, a student nurtured in ideas of the eighteenth century, had nothing to do, and made not the least presence of meddling; but nothing forbade him to study, and he noticed to his astonishment that this capitalistic scheme of combining governments, like railways or furnaces, was in effect precisely the socialist scheme of jaures and bebel. that john hay, of all men, should adopt a socialist policy seemed an idea more absurd than conservative christian anarchy, but paradox had become the only orthodoxy in politics as in science. when one saw the field, one realized that hay could not help himself, nor could bebel. either germany must destroy england and france to create the next inevitable unification as a system of continent against continent--or she must pool interests. both schemes in turn were attributed to the kaiser; one or the other he would have to choose; opinion was balanced doubtfully on their merits; but, granting both to be feasible, hay's and mckinley's statesmanship turned on the point of persuading the kaiser to join what might be called the coal-power combination, rather than build up the only possible alternative, a gun-power combination by merging germany in russia. thus bebel and jaures, mckinley and hay, were partners. the problem was pretty--even fascinating--and, to an old civil-war private soldier in diplomacy, as rigorous as a geometrical demonstration. as the last possible lesson in life, it had all sorts of ultimate values. unless education marches on both feet--theory and practice--it risks going astray; and hay was probably the most accomplished master of both then living. he knew not only the forces but also the men, and he had no other thought than his policy. probably this was the moment of highest knowledge that a scholar could ever reach. he had under his eyes the whole educational staff of the government at a time when the government had just reached the heights of highest activity and influence. since , education had done its worst, under the greatest masters and at enormous expense to the world, to train these two minds to catch and comprehend every spring of international action, not to speak of personal influence; and the entire machinery of politics in several great countries had little to do but supply the last and best information. education could be carried no further. with its effects on hay, adams had nothing to do; but its effects on himself were grotesque. never had the proportions of his ignorance looked so appalling. he seemed to know nothing--to be groping in darkness--to be falling forever in space; and the worst depth consisted in the assurance, incredible as it seemed, that no one knew more. he had, at least, the mechanical assurance of certain values to guide him--like the relative intensities of his coal-powers, and relative inertia of his gun-powers--but he conceived that had he known, besides the mechanics, every relative value of persons, as well as he knew the inmost thoughts of his own government--had the czar and the kaiser and the mikado turned schoolmasters, like hay, and taught him all they knew, he would still have known nothing. they knew nothing themselves. only by comparison of their ignorance could the student measure his own. chapter xxix the abyss of ignorance ( ) the years hurried past, and gave hardly time to note their work. three or four months, though big with change, come to an end before the mind can catch up with it. winter vanished; spring burst into flower; and again paris opened its arms, though not for long. mr. cameron came over, and took the castle of inverlochy for three months, which he summoned his friends to garrison. lochaber seldom laughs, except for its children, such as camerons, mcdonalds, campbells and other products of the mist; but in the summer of scotland put on fewer airs of coquetry than usual. since the terrible harvest of which one had watched sprouting on its stalks on the shropshire hillsides, nothing had equalled the gloom. even when the victims fled to switzerland, they found the lake of geneva and the rhine not much gayer, and carlsruhe no more restful than paris; until at last, in desperation, one drifted back to the avenue of the bois de boulogne, and, like the cuckoo, dropped into the nest of a better citizen. diplomacy has its uses. reynolds hitt, transferred to berlin, abandoned his attic to adams, and there, for long summers to come, he hid in ignorance and silence. life at last managed of its own accord to settle itself into a working arrangement. after so many years of effort to find one's drift, the drift found the seeker, and slowly swept him forward and back, with a steady progress oceanwards. such lessons as summer taught, winter tested, and one had only to watch the apparent movement of the stars in order to guess one's declination. the process is possible only for men who have exhausted auto-motion. adams never knew why, knowing nothing of faraday, he began to mimic faraday's trick of seeing lines of force all about him, where he had always seen lines of will. perhaps the effect of knowing no mathematics is to leave the mind to imagine figures--images--phantoms; one's mind is a watery mirror at best; but, once conceived, the image became rapidly simple, and the lines of force presented themselves as lines of attraction. repulsions counted only as battle of attractions. by this path, the mind stepped into the mechanical theory of the universe before knowing it, and entered a distinct new phase of education. this was the work of the dynamo and the virgin of chartres. like his masters, since thought began, he was handicapped by the eternal mystery of force--the sink of all science. for thousands of years in history, he found that force had been felt as occult attraction--love of god and lust for power in a future life. after , when this attraction began to decline, philosophers fell back on some vis a tergo--instinct of danger from behind, like darwin's survival of the fittest; and one of the greatest minds, between descartes and newton--pascal--saw the master-motor of man in ennui, which was also scientific: "i have often said that all the troubles of man come from his not knowing how to sit still." mere restlessness forces action. "so passes the whole of life. we combat obstacles in order to get repose, and, when got, the repose is insupportable; for we think either of the troubles we have, or of those that threaten us; and even if we felt safe on every side, ennui would of its own accord spring up from the depths of the heart where it is rooted by nature, and would fill the mind with its venom." "if goodness lead him not, yet weariness may toss him to my breast." ennui, like natural selection, accounted for change, but failed to account for direction of change. for that, an attractive force was essential; a force from outside; a shaping influence. pascal and all the old philosophies called this outside force god or gods. caring but little for the name, and fixed only on tracing the force, adams had gone straight to the virgin at chartres, and asked her to show him god, face to face, as she did for st. bernard. she replied, kindly as ever, as though she were still the young mother of to-day, with a sort of patient pity for masculine dulness: "my dear outcast, what is it you seek? this is the church of christ! if you seek him through me, you are welcome, sinner or saint; but he and i are one. we are love! we have little or nothing to do with god's other energies which are infinite, and concern us the less because our interest is only in man, and the infinite is not knowable to man. yet if you are troubled by your ignorance, you see how i am surrounded by the masters of the schools! ask them!" the answer sounded singularly like the usual answer of british science which had repeated since bacon that one must not try to know the unknowable, though one was quite powerless to ignore it; but the virgin carried more conviction, for her feminine lack of interest in all perfections except her own was honester than the formal phrase of science; since nothing was easier than to follow her advice, and turn to thomas aquinas, who, unlike modern physicists, answered at once and plainly: "to me," said st. thomas, "christ and the mother are one force--love--simple, single, and sufficient for all human wants; but love is a human interest which acts even on man so partially that you and i, as philosophers, need expect no share in it. therefore we turn to christ and the schools who represent all other force. we deal with multiplicity and call it god. after the virgin has redeemed by her personal force as love all that is redeemable in man, the schools embrace the rest, and give it form, unity, and motive." this chart of force was more easily studied than any other possible scheme, for one had but to do what the church was always promising to do--abolish in one flash of lightning not only man, but also the church itself, the earth, the other planets, and the sun, in order to clear the air; without affecting mediaeval science. the student felt warranted in doing what the church threatened--abolishing his solar system altogether--in order to look at god as actual; continuous movement, universal cause, and interchangeable force. this was pantheism, but the schools were pantheist; at least as pantheistic as the energetik of the germans; and their deity was the ultimate energy, whose thought and act were one. rid of man and his mind, the universe of thomas aquinas seemed rather more scientific than that of haeckel or ernst mach. contradiction for contradiction, attraction for attraction, energy for energy, st. thomas's idea of god had merits. modern science offered not a vestige of proof, or a theory of connection between its forces, or any scheme of reconciliation between thought and mechanics; while st. thomas at least linked together the joints of his machine. as far as a superficial student could follow, the thirteenth century supposed mind to be a mode of force directly derived from the intelligent prime motor, and the cause of all form and sequence in the universe--therefore the only proof of unity. without thought in the unit, there could be no unity; without unity no orderly sequence or ordered society. thought alone was form. mind and unity flourished or perished together. this education startled even a man who had dabbled in fifty educations all over the world; for, if he were obliged to insist on a universe, he seemed driven to the church. modern science guaranteed no unity. the student seemed to feel himself, like all his predecessors, caught, trapped, meshed in this eternal drag-net of religion. in practice the student escapes this dilemma in two ways: the first is that of ignoring it, as one escapes most dilemmas; the second is that the church rejects pantheism as worse than atheism, and will have nothing to do with the pantheist at any price. in wandering through the forests of ignorance, one necessarily fell upon the famous old bear that scared children at play; but, even had the animal shown more logic than its victim, one had learned from socrates to distrust, above all other traps, the trap of logic--the mirror of the mind. yet the search for a unit of force led into catacombs of thought where hundreds of thousands of educations had found their end. generation after generation of painful and honest-minded scholars had been content to stay in these labyrinths forever, pursuing ignorance in silence, in company with the most famous teachers of all time. not one of them had ever found a logical highroad of escape. adams cared little whether he escaped or not, but he felt clear that he could not stop there, even to enjoy the society of spinoza and thomas aquinas. true, the church alone had asserted unity with any conviction, and the historian alone knew what oceans of blood and treasure the assertion had cost; but the only honest alternative to affirming unity was to deny it; and the denial would require a new education. at sixty-five years old a new education promised hardly more than the old. possibly the modern legislator or magistrate might no longer know enough to treat as the church did the man who denied unity, unless the denial took the form of a bomb; but no teacher would know how to explain what he thought he meant by denying unity. society would certainly punish the denial if ever any one learned enough to understand it. philosophers, as a rule, cared little what principles society affirmed or denied, since the philosopher commonly held that though he might sometimes be right by good luck on some one point, no complex of individual opinions could possibly be anything but wrong; yet, supposing society to be ignored, the philosopher was no further forward. nihilism had no bottom. for thousands of years every philosopher had stood on the shore of this sunless sea, diving for pearls and never finding them. all had seen that, since they could not find bottom, they must assume it. the church claimed to have found it, but, since , motives for agreeing on some new assumption of unity, broader and deeper than that of the church, had doubled in force until even the universities and schools, like the church and state, seemed about to be driven into an attempt to educate, though specially forbidden to do it. like most of his generation, adams had taken the word of science that the new unit was as good as found. it would not be an intelligence--probably not even a consciousness--but it would serve. he passed sixty years waiting for it, and at the end of that time, on reviewing the ground, he was led to think that the final synthesis of science and its ultimate triumph was the kinetic theory of gases; which seemed to cover all motion in space, and to furnish the measure of time. so far as he understood it, the theory asserted that any portion of space is occupied by molecules of gas, flying in right lines at velocities varying up to a mile in a second, and colliding with each other at intervals varying up to , , times in a second. to this analysis--if one understood it right--all matter whatever was reducible, and the only difference of opinion in science regarded the doubt whether a still deeper analysis would reduce the atom of gas to pure motion. thus, unless one mistook the meaning of motion, which might well be, the scientific synthesis commonly called unity was the scientific analysis commonly called multiplicity. the two things were the same, all forms being shifting phases of motion. granting this ocean of colliding atoms, the last hope of humanity, what happened if one dropped the sounder into the abyss--let it go--frankly gave up unity altogether? what was unity? why was one to be forced to affirm it? here everybody flatly refused help. science seemed content with its old phrase of "larger synthesis," which was well enough for science, but meant chaos for man. one would have been glad to stop and ask no more, but the anarchist bomb bade one go on, and the bomb is a powerful persuader. one could not stop, even to enjoy the charms of a perfect gas colliding seventeen million times in a second, much like an automobile in paris. science itself had been crowded so close to the edge of the abyss that its attempts to escape were as metaphysical as the leap, while an ignorant old man felt no motive for trying to escape, seeing that the only escape possible lay in the form of vis a tergo commonly called death. he got out his descartes again; dipped into his hume and berkeley; wrestled anew with his kant; pondered solemnly over his hegel and schopenhauer and hartmann; strayed gaily away with his greeks--all merely to ask what unity meant, and what happened when one denied it. apparently one never denied it. every philosopher, whether sane or insane, naturally affirmed it. the utmost flight of anarchy seemed to have stopped with the assertion of two principles, and even these fitted into each other, like good and evil, light and darkness. pessimism itself, black as it might be painted, had been content to turn the universe of contradictions into the human thought as one will, and treat it as representation. metaphysics insisted on treating the universe as one thought or treating thought as one universe; and philosophers agreed, like a kinetic gas, that the universe could be known only as motion of mind, and therefore as unity. one could know it only as one's self; it was psychology. of all forms of pessimism, the metaphysical form was, for a historian, the least enticing. of all studies, the one he would rather have avoided was that of his own mind. he knew no tragedy so heartrending as introspection, and the more, because--as mephistopheles said of marguerite--he was not the first. nearly all the highest intelligence known to history had drowned itself in the reflection of its own thought, and the bovine survivors had rudely told the truth about it, without affecting the intelligent. one's own time had not been exempt. even since friends by scores had fallen victims to it. within five-and-twenty years, a new library had grown out of it. harvard college was a focus of the study; france supported hospitals for it; england published magazines of it. nothing was easier than to take one's mind in one's hand, and ask one's psychological friends what they made of it, and the more because it mattered so little to either party, since their minds, whatever they were, had pretty nearly ceased to reflect, and let them do what they liked with the small remnant, they could scarcely do anything very new with it. all one asked was to learn what they hoped to do. unfortunately the pursuit of ignorance in silence had, by this time, led the weary pilgrim into such mountains of ignorance that he could no longer see any path whatever, and could not even understand a signpost. he failed to fathom the depths of the new psychology, which proved to him that, on that side as on the mathematical side, his power of thought was atrophied, if, indeed, it ever existed. since he could not fathom the science, he could only ask the simplest of questions: did the new psychology hold that the ivxn--soul or mind--was or was not a unit? he gathered from the books that the psychologists had, in a few cases, distinguished several personalities in the same mind, each conscious and constant, individual and exclusive. the fact seemed scarcely surprising, since it had been a habit of mind from earliest recorded time, and equally familiar to the last acquaintance who had taken a drug or caught a fever, or eaten a welsh rarebit before bed; for surely no one could follow the action of a vivid dream, and still need to be told that the actors evoked by his mind were not himself, but quite unknown to all he had ever recognized as self. the new psychology went further, and seemed convinced that it had actually split personality not only into dualism, but also into complex groups, like telephonic centres and systems, that might be isolated and called up at will, and whose physical action might be occult in the sense of strangeness to any known form of force. dualism seemed to have become as common as binary stars. alternating personalities turned up constantly, even among one's friends. the facts seemed certain, or at least as certain as other facts; all they needed was explanation. this was not the business of the searcher of ignorance, who felt himself in no way responsible for causes. to his mind, the compound ivxn took at once the form of a bicycle-rider, mechanically balancing himself by inhibiting all his inferior personalities, and sure to fall into the sub-conscious chaos below, if one of his inferior personalities got on top. the only absolute truth was the sub-conscious chaos below, which every one could feel when he sought it. whether the psychologists admitted it or not, mattered little to the student who, by the law of his profession, was engaged in studying his own mind. on him, the effect was surprising. he woke up with a shudder as though he had himself fallen off his bicycle. if his mind were really this sort of magnet, mechanically dispersing its lines of force when it went to sleep, and mechanically orienting them when it woke up--which was normal, the dispersion or orientation? the mind, like the body, kept its unity unless it happened to lose balance, but the professor of physics, who slipped on a pavement and hurt himself, knew no more than an idiot what knocked him down, though he did know--what the idiot could hardly do--that his normal condition was idiocy, or want of balance, and that his sanity was unstable artifice. his normal thought was dispersion, sleep, dream, inconsequence; the simultaneous action of different thought-centres without central control. his artificial balance was acquired habit. he was an acrobat, with a dwarf on his back, crossing a chasm on a slack-rope, and commonly breaking his neck. by that path of newest science, one saw no unity ahead--nothing but a dissolving mind--and the historian felt himself driven back on thought as one continuous force, without race, sex, school, country, or church. this has been always the fate of rigorous thinkers, and has always succeeded in making them famous, as it did gibbon, buckle, and auguste comte. their method made what progress the science of history knew, which was little enough, but they did at last fix the law that, if history ever meant to correct the errors she made in detail, she must agree on a scale for the whole. every local historian might defy this law till history ended, but its necessity would be the same for man as for space or time or force, and without it the historian would always remain a child in science. any schoolboy could see that man as a force must be measured by motion, from a fixed point. psychology helped here by suggesting a unit--the point of history when man held the highest idea of himself as a unit in a unified universe. eight or ten years of study had led adams to think he might use the century - , expressed in amiens cathedral and the works of thomas aquinas, as the unit from which he might measure motion down to his own time, without assuming anything as true or untrue, except relation. the movement might be studied at once in philosophy and mechanics. setting himself to the task, he began a volume which he mentally knew as "mont-saint-michel and chartres: a study of thirteenth-century unity." from that point he proposed to fix a position for himself, which he could label: "the education of henry adams: a study of twentieth-century multiplicity." with the help of these two points of relation, he hoped to project his lines forward and backward indefinitely, subject to correction from any one who should know better. thereupon, he sailed for home. chapter xxx vis inertiae ( ) washington was always amusing, but in , as in , its chief interest lay in its distance from new york. the movement of new york had become planetary--beyond control--while the task of washington, in as in , was to control it. the success of washington in the past century promised ill for its success in the next. to a student who had passed the best years of his life in pondering over the political philosophy of jefferson, gallatin, and madison, the problem that roosevelt took in hand seemed alive with historical interest, but it would need at least another half-century to show its results. as yet, one could not measure the forces or their arrangement; the forces had not even aligned themselves except in foreign affairs; and there one turned to seek the channel of wisdom as naturally as though washington did not exist. the president could do nothing effectual in foreign affairs, but at least he could see something of the field. hay had reached the summit of his career, and saw himself on the edge of wreck. committed to the task of keeping china "open," he saw china about to be shut. almost alone in the world, he represented the "open door," and could not escape being crushed by it. yet luck had been with him in full tide. though sir julian pauncefote had died in may, , after carrying out tasks that filled an ex-private secretary of with open-mouthed astonishment, hay had been helped by the appointment of michael herbert as his successor, who counted for double the value of an ordinary diplomat. to reduce friction is the chief use of friendship, and in politics the loss by friction is outrageous. to herbert and his wife, the small knot of houses that seemed to give a vague unity to foreign affairs opened their doors and their hearts, for the herberts were already at home there; and this personal sympathy prolonged hay's life, for it not only eased the effort of endurance, but it also led directly to a revolution in germany. down to that moment, the kaiser, rightly or wrongly, had counted as the ally of the czar in all matters relating to the east. holleben and cassini were taken to be a single force in eastern affairs, and this supposed alliance gave hay no little anxiety and some trouble. suddenly holleben, who seemed to have had no thought but to obey with almost agonized anxiety the least hint of the kaiser's will, received a telegram ordering him to pretext illness and come home, which he obeyed within four-and-twenty hours. the ways of the german foreign office had been always abrupt, not to say ruthless, towards its agents, and yet commonly some discontent had been shown as excuse; but, in this case, no cause was guessed for holleben's disgrace except the kaiser's wish to have a personal representative at washington. breaking down all precedent, he sent speck von sternburg to counterbalance herbert. welcome as speck was in the same social intimacy, and valuable as his presence was to hay, the personal gain was trifling compared with the political. of hay's official tasks, one knew no more than any newspaper reporter did, but of one's own diplomatic education the successive steps had become strides. the scholar was studying, not on hay's account, but on his own. he had seen hay, in , bring england into his combine; he had seen the steady movement which was to bring france back into an atlantic system; and now he saw suddenly the dramatic swing of germany towards the west--the movement of all others nearest mathematical certainty. whether the kaiser meant it or not, he gave the effect of meaning to assert his independence of russia, and to hay this change of front had enormous value. the least was that it seemed to isolate cassini, and unmask the russian movement which became more threatening every month as the manchurian scheme had to be revealed. of course the student saw whole continents of study opened to him by the kaiser's coup d'etat. carefully as he had tried to follow the kaiser's career, he had never suspected such refinement of policy, which raised his opinion of the kaiser's ability to the highest point, and altogether upset the centre of statesmanship. that germany could be so quickly detached from separate objects and brought into an atlantic system seemed a paradox more paradoxical than any that one's education had yet offered, though it had offered little but paradox. if germany could be held there, a century of friction would be saved. no price would be too great for such an object; although no price could probably be wrung out of congress as equivalent for it. the kaiser, by one personal act of energy, freed hay's hands so completely that he saw his problems simplified to russia alone. naturally russia was a problem ten times as difficult. the history of europe for two hundred years had accomplished little but to state one or two sides of the russian problem. one's year of berlin in youth, though it taught no civil law, had opened one's eyes to the russian enigma, and both german and french historians had labored over its proportions with a sort of fascinated horror. germany, of all countries, was most vitally concerned in it; but even a cave-dweller in la fayette square, seeking only a measure of motion since the crusades, saw before his eyes, in the spring of , a survey of future order or anarchy that would exhaust the power of his telescopes and defy the accuracy of his theodolites. the drama had become passionately interesting and grew every day more byzantine; for the russian government itself showed clear signs of dislocation, and the orders of lamsdorf and de witte were reversed when applied in manchuria. historians and students should have no sympathies or antipathies, but adams had private reasons for wishing well to the czar and his people. at much length, in several labored chapters of history, he had told how the personal friendliness of the czar alexander i, in , saved the fortunes of j. q. adams, and opened to him the brilliant diplomatic career that ended in the white house. even in his own effaced existence he had reasons, not altogether trivial, for gratitude to the czar alexander ii, whose firm neutrality had saved him some terribly anxious days and nights in ; while he had seen enough of russia to sympathize warmly with prince khilkoff's railways and de witte's industries. the last and highest triumph of history would, to his mind, be the bringing of russia into the atlantic combine, and the just and fair allotment of the whole world among the regulated activities of the universe. at the rate of unification since , this end should be possible within another sixty years; and, in foresight of that point, adams could already finish--provisionally--his chart of international unity; but, for the moment, the gravest doubts and ignorance covered the whole field. no one--czar or diplomat, kaiser or mikado--seemed to know anything. through individual russians one could always see with ease, for their diplomacy never suggested depth; and perhaps hay protected cassini for the very reason that cassini could not disguise an emotion, and never failed to betray that, in setting the enormous bulk of russian inertia to roll over china, he regretted infinitely that he should have to roll it over hay too. he would almost rather have rolled it over de witte and lamsdorf. his political philosophy, like that of all russians, seemed fixed in the single idea that russia must fatally roll--must, by her irresistible inertia, crush whatever stood in her way. for hay and his pooling policy, inherited from mckinley, the fatalism of russian inertia meant the failure of american intensity. when russia rolled over a neighboring people, she absorbed their energies in her own movement of custom and race which neither czar nor peasant could convert, or wished to convert, into any western equivalent. in hay saw russia knocking away the last blocks that held back the launch of this huge mass into the china sea. the vast force of inertia known as china was to be united with the huge bulk of russia in a single mass which no amount of new force could henceforward deflect. had the russian government, with the sharpest sense of enlightenment, employed scores of de wittes and khilkoffs, and borrowed all the resources of europe, it could not have lifted such a weight; and had no idea of trying. these were the positions charted on the map of political unity by an insect in washington in the spring of ; and they seemed to him fixed. russia held europe and america in her grasp, and cassini held hay in his. the siberian railway offered checkmate to all possible opposition. japan must make the best terms she could; england must go on receding; america and germany would look on at the avalanche. the wall of russian inertia that barred europe across the baltic, would bar america across the pacific; and hay's policy of the open door would infallibly fail. thus the game seemed lost, in spite of the kaiser's brilliant stroke, and the movement of russia eastward must drag germany after it by its mere mass. to the humble student, the loss of hay's game affected only hay; for himself, the game--not the stakes--was the chief interest; and though want of habit made him object to read his newspapers blackened--since he liked to blacken them himself--he was in any case condemned to pass but a short space of time either in siberia or in paris, and could balance his endless columns of calculation equally in either place. the figures, not the facts, concerned his chart, and he mused deeply over his next equation. the atlantic would have to deal with a vast continental mass of inert motion, like a glacier, which moved, and consciously moved, by mechanical gravitation alone. russia saw herself so, and so must an american see her; he had no more to do than measure, if he could, the mass. was volume or intensity the stronger? what and where was the vis nova that could hold its own before this prodigious ice-cap of vis inertiae? what was movement of inertia, and what its laws? naturally a student knew nothing about mechanical laws, but he took for granted that he could learn, and went to his books to ask. he found that the force of inertia had troubled wiser men than he. the dictionary said that inertia was a property of matter, by which matter tends, when at rest, to remain so, and, when in motion, to move on in a straight line. finding that his mind refused to imagine itself at rest or in a straight line, he was forced, as usual, to let it imagine something else; and since the question concerned the mind, and not matter, he decided from personal experience that his mind was never at rest, but moved--when normal--about something it called a motive, and never moved without motives to move it. so long as these motives were habitual, and their attraction regular, the consequent result might, for convenience, be called movement of inertia, to distinguish it from movement caused by newer or higher attraction; but the greater the bulk to move, the greater must be the force to accelerate or deflect it. this seemed simple as running water; but simplicity is the most deceitful mistress that ever betrayed man. for years the student and the professor had gone on complaining that minds were unequally inert. the inequalities amounted to contrasts. one class of minds responded only to habit; another only to novelty. race classified thought. class-lists classified mind. no two men thought alike, and no woman thought like a man. race-inertia seemed to be fairly constant, and made the chief trouble in the russian future. history looked doubtful when asked whether race-inertia had ever been overcome without destroying the race in order to reconstruct it; but surely sex-inertia had never been overcome at all. of all movements of inertia, maternity and reproduction are the most typical, and women's property of moving in a constant line forever is ultimate, uniting history in its only unbroken and unbreakable sequence. whatever else stops, the woman must go on reproducing, as she did in the siluria of pteraspis; sex is a vital condition, and race only a local one. if the laws of inertia are to be sought anywhere with certainty, it is in the feminine mind. the american always ostentatiously ignored sex, and american history mentioned hardly the name of a woman, while english history handled them as timidly as though they were a new and undescribed species; but if the problem of inertia summed up the difficulties of the race question, it involved that of sex far more deeply, and to americans vitally. the task of accelerating or deflecting the movement of the american woman had interest infinitely greater than that of any race whatever, russian or chinese, asiatic or african. on this subject, as on the senate and the banks, adams was conscious of having been born an eighteenth-century remainder. as he grew older, he found that early institutions lost their interest, but that early women became a passion. without understanding movement of sex, history seemed to him mere pedantry. so insistent had he become on this side of his subject that with women he talked of little else, and--because women's thought is mostly subconscious and particularly sensitive to suggestion--he tried tricks and devices to disclose it. the woman seldom knows her own thought; she is as curious to understand herself as the man to understand her, and responds far more quickly than the man to a sudden idea. sometimes, at dinner, one might wait till talk flagged, and then, as mildly as possible, ask one's liveliest neighbor whether she could explain why the american woman was a failure. without an instant's hesitation, she was sure to answer: "because the american man is a failure!" she meant it. adams owed more to the american woman than to all the american men he ever heard of, and felt not the smallest call to defend his sex who seemed able to take care of themselves; but from the point of view of sex he felt much curiosity to know how far the woman was right, and, in pursuing this inquiry, he caught the trick of affirming that the woman was the superior. apart from truth, he owed her at least that compliment. the habit led sometimes to perilous personalities in the sudden give-and-take of table-talk. this spring, just before sailing for europe in may, , he had a message from his sister-in-law, mrs. brooks adams, to say that she and her sister, mrs. lodge, and the senator were coming to dinner by way of farewell; bay lodge and his lovely young wife sent word to the same effect; mrs. roosevelt joined the party; and michael herbert shyly slipped down to escape the solitude of his wife's absence. the party were too intimate for reserve, and they soon fell on adams's hobby with derision which stung him to pungent rejoinder: "the american man is a failure! you are all failures!" he said. "has not my sister here more sense than my brother brooks? is not bessie worth two of bay? wouldn't we all elect mrs. lodge senator against cabot? would the president have a ghost of a chance if mrs. roosevelt ran against him? do you want to stop at the embassy, on your way home, and ask which would run it best--herbert or his wife?" the men laughed a little--not much! each probably made allowance for his own wife as an unusually superior woman. some one afterwards remarked that these half-dozen women were not a fair average. adams replied that the half-dozen men were above all possible average; he could not lay his hands on another half-dozen their equals. gay or serious, the question never failed to stir feeling. the cleverer the woman, the less she denied the failure. she was bitter at heart about it. she had failed even to hold the family together, and her children ran away like chickens with their first feathers; the family was extinct like chivalry. she had failed not only to create a new society that satisfied her, but even to hold her own in the old society of church or state; and was left, for the most part, with no place but the theatre or streets to decorate. she might glitter with historical diamonds and sparkle with wit as brilliant as the gems, in rooms as splendid as any in rome at its best; but she saw no one except her own sex who knew enough to be worth dazzling, or was competent to pay her intelligent homage. she might have her own way, without restraint or limit, but she knew not what to do with herself when free. never had the world known a more capable or devoted mother, but at forty her task was over, and she was left with no stage except that of her old duties, or of washington society where she had enjoyed for a hundred years every advantage, but had created only a medley where nine men out of ten refused her request to be civilized, and the tenth bored her. on most subjects, one's opinions must defer to science, but on this, the opinion of a senator or a professor, a chairman of a state central committee or a railway president, is worth less than that of any woman on fifth avenue. the inferiority of man on this, the most important of all social subjects, is manifest. adams had here no occasion to deprecate scientific opinion, since no woman in the world would have paid the smallest respect to the opinions of all professors since the serpent. his own object had little to do with theirs. he was studying the laws of motion, and had struck two large questions of vital importance to america--inertia of race and inertia of sex. he had seen mr. de witte and prince khilkoff turn artificial energy to the value of three thousand million dollars, more or less, upon russian inertia, in the last twenty years, and he needed to get some idea of the effects. he had seen artificial energy to the amount of twenty or five-and-twenty million steam horse-power created in america since , and as much more economized, which had been socially turned over to the american woman, she being the chief object of social expenditure, and the household the only considerable object of american extravagance. according to scientific notions of inertia and force, what ought to be the result? in russia, because of race and bulk, no result had yet shown itself, but in america the results were evident and undisputed. the woman had been set free--volatilized like clerk maxwell's perfect gas; almost brought to the point of explosion, like steam. one had but to pass a week in florida, or on any of a hundred huge ocean steamers, or walk through the place vendome, or join a party of cook's tourists to jerusalem, to see that the woman had been set free; but these swarms were ephemeral like clouds of butterflies in season, blown away and lost, while the reproductive sources lay hidden. at washington, one saw other swarms as grave gatherings of dames or daughters, taking themselves seriously, or brides fluttering fresh pinions; but all these shifting visions, unknown before , touched the true problem slightly and superficially. behind them, in every city, town, and farmhouse, were myriads of new types--or type-writers--telephone and telegraph-girls, shop-clerks, factory-hands, running into millions of millions, and, as classes, unknown to themselves as to historians. even the schoolmistresses were inarticulate. all these new women had been created since ; all were to show their meaning before . whatever they were, they were not content, as the ephemera proved; and they were hungry for illusions as ever in the fourth century of the church; but this was probably survival, and gave no hint of the future. the problem remained--to find out whether movement of inertia, inherent in function, could take direction except in lines of inertia. this problem needed to be solved in one generation of american women, and was the most vital of all problems of force. the american woman at her best--like most other women--exerted great charm on the man, but not the charm of a primitive type. she appeared as the result of a long series of discards, and her chief interest lay in what she had discarded. when closely watched, she seemed making a violent effort to follow the man, who had turned his mind and hand to mechanics. the typical american man had his hand on a lever and his eye on a curve in his road; his living depended on keeping up an average speed of forty miles an hour, tending always to become sixty, eighty, or a hundred, and he could not admit emotions or anxieties or subconscious distractions, more than he could admit whiskey or drugs, without breaking his neck. he could not run his machine and a woman too; he must leave her; even though his wife, to find her own way, and all the world saw her trying to find her way by imitating him. the result was often tragic, but that was no new thing in feminine history. tragedy had been woman's lot since eve. her problem had been always one of physical strength and it was as physical perfection of force that her venus had governed nature. the woman's force had counted as inertia of rotation, and her axis of rotation had been the cradle and the family. the idea that she was weak revolted all history; it was a palaeontological falsehood that even an eocene female monkey would have laughed at; but it was surely true that, if her force were to be diverted from its axis, it must find a new field, and the family must pay for it. so far as she succeeded, she must become sexless like the bees, and must leave the old energy of inertia to carry on the race. the story was not new. for thousands of years women had rebelled. they had made a fortress of religion--had buried themselves in the cloister, in self-sacrifice, in good works--or even in bad. one's studies in the twelfth century, like one's studies in the fourth, as in homeric and archaic time, showed her always busy in the illusions of heaven or of hell--ambition, intrigue, jealousy, magic--but the american woman had no illusions or ambitions or new resources, and nothing to rebel against, except her own maternity; yet the rebels increased by millions from year to year till they blocked the path of rebellion. even her field of good works was narrower than in the twelfth century. socialism, communism, collectivism, philosophical anarchism, which promised paradise on earth for every male, cut off the few avenues of escape which capitalism had opened to the woman, and she saw before her only the future reserved for machine-made, collectivist females. from the male, she could look for no help; his instinct of power was blind. the church had known more about women than science will ever know, and the historian who studied the sources of christianity felt sometimes convinced that the church had been made by the woman chiefly as her protest against man. at times, the historian would have been almost willing to maintain that the man had overthrown the church chiefly because it was feminine. after the overthrow of the church, the woman had no refuge except such as the man created for himself. she was free; she had no illusions; she was sexless; she had discarded all that the male disliked; and although she secretly regretted the discard, she knew that she could not go backward. she must, like the man, marry machinery. already the american man sometimes felt surprise at finding himself regarded as sexless; the american woman was oftener surprised at finding herself regarded as sexual. no honest historian can take part with--or against--the forces he has to study. to him even the extinction of the human race should be merely a fact to be grouped with other vital statistics. no doubt every one in society discussed the subject, impelled by president roosevelt if by nothing else, and the surface current of social opinion seemed set as strongly in one direction as the silent undercurrent of social action ran in the other; but the truth lay somewhere unconscious in the woman's breast. an elderly man, trying only to learn the law of social inertia and the limits of social divergence could not compel the superintendent of the census to ask every young woman whether she wanted children, and how many; he could not even require of an octogenarian senate the passage of a law obliging every woman, married or not, to bear one baby--at the expense of the treasury--before she was thirty years old, under penalty of solitary confinement for life; yet these were vital statistics in more senses than all that bore the name, and tended more directly to the foundation of a serious society in the future. he could draw no conclusions whatever except from the birth-rate. he could not frankly discuss the matter with the young women themselves, although they would have gladly discussed it, because faust was helpless in the tragedy of woman. he could suggest nothing. the marguerite of the future could alone decide whether she were better off than the marguerite of the past; whether she would rather be victim to a man, a church, or a machine. between these various forms of inevitable inertia--sex and race--the student of multiplicity felt inclined to admit that--ignorance against ignorance--the russian problem seemed to him somewhat easier of treatment than the american. inertia of race and bulk would require an immense force to overcome it, but in time it might perhaps be partially overcome. inertia of sex could not be overcome without extinguishing the race, yet an immense force, doubling every few years, was working irresistibly to overcome it. one gazed mute before this ocean of darkest ignorance that had already engulfed society. few centres of great energy lived in illusion more complete or archaic than washington with its simple-minded standards of the field and farm, its southern and western habits of life and manners, its assumptions of ethics and history; but even in washington, society was uneasy enough to need no further fretting. one was almost glad to act the part of horseshoe crab in quincy bay, and admit that all was uniform--that nothing ever changed--and that the woman would swim about the ocean of future time, as she had swum in the past, with the gar-fish and the shark, unable to change. chapter xxxi the grammar of science ( ) of all the travels made by man since the voyages of dante, this new exploration along the shores of multiplicity and complexity promised to be the longest, though as yet it had barely touched two familiar regions--race and sex. even within these narrow seas the navigator lost his bearings and followed the winds as they blew. by chance it happened that raphael pumpelly helped the winds; for, being in washington on his way to central asia he fell to talking with adams about these matters, and said that willard gibbs thought he got most help from a book called the "grammar of science," by karl pearson. to adams's vision, willard gibbs stood on the same plane with the three or four greatest minds of his century, and the idea that a man so incomparably superior should find help anywhere filled him with wonder. he sent for the volume and read it. from the time he sailed for europe and reached his den on the avenue du bois until he took his return steamer at cherbourg on december , he did little but try to find out what karl pearson could have taught willard gibbs. here came in, more than ever, the fatal handicap of ignorance in mathematics. not so much the actual tool was needed, as the right to judge the product of the tool. ignorant as one was of the finer values of french or german, and often deceived by the intricacies of thought hidden in the muddiness of the medium, one could sometimes catch a tendency to intelligible meaning even in kant or hegel; but one had not the right to a suspicion of error where the tool of thought was algebra. adams could see in such parts of the "grammar" as he could understand, little more than an enlargement of stallo's book already twenty years old. he never found out what it could have taught a master like willard gibbs. yet the book had a historical value out of all proportion to its science. no such stride had any englishman before taken in the lines of english thought. the progress of science was measured by the success of the "grammar," when, for twenty years past, stallo had been deliberately ignored under the usual conspiracy of silence inevitable to all thought which demands new thought-machinery. science needs time to reconstruct its instruments, to follow a revolution in space; a certain lag is inevitable; the most active mind cannot instantly swerve from its path; but such revolutions are portentous, and the fall or rise of half-a-dozen empires interested a student of history less than the rise of the "grammar of science," the more pressingly because, under the silent influence of langley, he was prepared to expect it. for a number of years langley had published in his smithsonian reports the revolutionary papers that foretold the overthrow of nineteenth-century dogma, and among the first was the famous address of sir william crookes on psychical research, followed by a series of papers on roentgen and curie, which had steadily driven the scientific lawgivers of unity into the open; but karl pearson was the first to pen them up for slaughter in the schools. the phrase is not stronger than that with which the "grammar of science" challenged the fight: "anything more hopelessly illogical than the statements with regard to force and matter current in elementary textbooks of science, it is difficult to imagine," opened mr. pearson, and the responsible author of the "elementary textbook," as he went on to explain, was lord kelvin himself. pearson shut out of science everything which the nineteenth century had brought into it. he told his scholars that they must put up with a fraction of the universe, and a very small fraction at that--the circle reached by the senses, where sequence could be taken for granted--much as the deep-sea fish takes for granted the circle of light which he generates. "order and reason, beauty and benevolence, are characteristics and conceptions which we find solely associated with the mind of man." the assertion, as a broad truth, left one's mind in some doubt of its bearing, for order and beauty seemed to be associated also in the mind of a crystal, if one's senses were to be admitted as judge; but the historian had no interest in the universal truth of pearson's or kelvin's or newton's laws; he sought only their relative drift or direction, and pearson went on to say that these conceptions must stop: "into the chaos beyond sense-impressions we cannot scientifically project them." we cannot even infer them: "in the chaos behind sensations, in the 'beyond' of sense-impressions, we cannot infer necessity, order or routine, for these are concepts formed by the mind of man on this side of sense-impressions"; but we must infer chaos: "briefly chaos is all that science can logically assert of the supersensuous." the kinetic theory of gas is an assertion of ultimate chaos. in plain words, chaos was the law of nature; order was the dream of man. no one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous; but since bacon and newton, english thought had gone on impatiently protesting that no one must try to know the unknowable at the same time that every one went on thinking about it. the result was as chaotic as kinetic gas; but with the thought a historian had nothing to do. he sought only its direction. for himself he knew, that, in spite of all the englishmen that ever lived, he would be forced to enter supersensual chaos if he meant to find out what became of british science--or indeed of any other science. from pythagoras to herbert spencer, every one had done it, although commonly science had explored an ocean which it preferred to regard as unity or a universe, and called order. even hegel, who taught that every notion included its own negation, used the negation only to reach a "larger synthesis," till he reached the universal which thinks itself, contradiction and all. the church alone had constantly protested that anarchy was not order, that satan was not god, that pantheism was worse than atheism, and that unity could not be proved as a contradiction. karl pearson seemed to agree with the church, but every one else, including newton, darwin and clerk maxwell, had sailed gaily into the supersensual, calling it:-- "one god, one law, one element, and one far-off, divine event, to which the whole creation moves." suddenly, in , science raised its head and denied. yet, perhaps, after all, the change had not been so sudden as it seemed. real and actual, it certainly was, and every newspaper betrayed it, but sequence could scarcely be denied by one who had watched its steady approach, thinking the change far more interesting to history than the thought. when he reflected about it, he recalled that the flow of tide had shown itself at least twenty years before; that it had become marked as early as ; and that the man of science must have been sleepy indeed who did not jump from his chair like a scared dog when, in , mme. curie threw on his desk the metaphysical bomb she called radium. there remained no hole to hide in. even metaphysics swept back over science with the green water of the deep-sea ocean and no one could longer hope to bar out the unknowable, for the unknowable was known. the fact was admitted that the uniformitarians of one's youth had wound about their universe a tangle of contradictions meant only for temporary support to be merged in "larger synthesis," and had waited for the larger synthesis in silence and in vain. they had refused to hear stallo. they had betrayed little interest in crookes. at last their universe had been wrecked by rays, and karl pearson undertook to cut the wreck loose with an axe, leaving science adrift on a sensual raft in the midst of a supersensual chaos. the confusion seemed, to a mere passenger, worse than that of when the astronomers upset the world; it resembled rather the convulsion of when the civitas dei cut itself loose from the civitas romae, and the cross took the place of the legions; but the historian accepted it all alike; he knew that his opinion was worthless; only, in this case, he found himself on the raft, personally and economically concerned in its drift. english thought had always been chaos and multiplicity itself, in which the new step of karl pearson marked only a consistent progress; but german thought had affected system, unity, and abstract truth, to a point that fretted the most patient foreigner, and to germany the voyager in strange seas of thought alone might resort with confident hope of renewing his youth. turning his back on karl pearson and england, he plunged into germany, and had scarcely crossed the rhine when he fell into libraries of new works bearing the names of ostwald, ernst mach, ernst haeckel, and others less familiar, among whom haeckel was easiest to approach, not only because of being the oldest and clearest and steadiest spokesman of nineteenth-century mechanical convictions, but also because in he had published a vehement renewal of his faith. the volume contained only one paragraph that concerned a historian; it was that in which haeckel sank his voice almost to a religious whisper in avowing with evident effort, that the "proper essence of substance appeared to him more and more marvellous and enigmatic as he penetrated further into the knowledge of its attributes--matter and energy--and as he learned to know their innumerable phenomena and their evolution." since haeckel seemed to have begun the voyage into multiplicity that pearson had forbidden to englishmen, he should have been a safe pilot to the point, at least, of a "proper essence of substance" in its attributes of matter and energy: but ernst mach seemed to go yet one step further, for he rejected matter altogether, and admitted but two processes in nature--change of place and interconversion of forms. matter was motion--motion was matter--the thing moved. a student of history had no need to understand these scientific ideas of very great men; he sought only the relation with the ideas of their grandfathers, and their common direction towards the ideas of their grandsons. he had long ago reached, with hegel, the limits of contradiction; and ernst mach scarcely added a shade of variety to the identity of opposites; but both of them seemed to be in agreement with karl pearson on the facts of the supersensual universe which could be known only as unknowable. with a deep sigh of relief, the traveller turned back to france. there he felt safe. no frenchman except rabelais and montaigne had ever taught anarchy other than as path to order. chaos would be unity in paris even if child of the guillotine. to make this assurance mathematically sure, the highest scientific authority in france was a great mathematician, m. poincare of the institut, who published in a small volume called "la science et l'hypothese," which purported to be relatively readable. trusting to its external appearance, the traveller timidly bought it, and greedily devoured it, without understanding a single consecutive page, but catching here and there a period that startled him to the depths of his ignorance, for they seemed to show that m. poincare was troubled by the same historical landmarks which guided or deluded adams himself: "[in science] we are led," said m. poincare, "to act as though a simple law, when other things were equal, must be more probable than a complicated law. half a century ago one frankly confessed it, and proclaimed that nature loves simplicity. she has since given us too often the lie. to-day this tendency is no longer avowed, and only as much of it is preserved as is indispensable so that science shall not become impossible." here at last was a fixed point beyond the chance of confusion with self-suggestion. history and mathematics agreed. had m. poincare shown anarchistic tastes, his evidence would have weighed less heavily; but he seemed to be the only authority in science who felt what a historian felt so strongly--the need of unity in a universe. "considering everything we have made some approach towards unity. we have not gone as fast as we hoped fifty years ago; we have not always taken the intended road; but definitely we have gained much ground." this was the most clear and convincing evidence of progress yet offered to the navigator of ignorance; but suddenly he fell on another view which seemed to him quite irreconcilable with the first: "doubtless if our means of investigation should become more and more penetrating, we should discover the simple under the complex; then the complex under the simple; then anew the simple under the complex; and so on without ever being able to foresee the last term." a mathematical paradise of endless displacement promised eternal bliss to the mathematician, but turned the historian green with horror. made miserable by the thought that he knew no mathematics, he burned to ask whether m. poincare knew any history, since he began by begging the historical question altogether, and assuming that the past showed alternating phases of simple and complex--the precise point that adams, after fifty years of effort, found himself forced to surrender; and then going on to assume alternating phases for the future which, for the weary titan of unity, differed in nothing essential from the kinetic theory of a perfect gas. since monkeys first began to chatter in trees, neither man nor beast had ever denied or doubted multiplicity, diversity, complexity, anarchy, chaos. always and everywhere the complex had been true and the contradiction had been certain. thought started by it. mathematics itself began by counting one--two--three; then imagining their continuity, which m. poincare was still exhausting his wits to explain or defend; and this was his explanation: "in short, the mind has the faculty of creating symbols, and it is thus that it has constructed mathematical continuity which is only a particular system of symbols." with the same light touch, more destructive in its artistic measure than the heaviest-handed brutality of englishmen or germans, he went on to upset relative truth itself: "how should i answer the question whether euclidian geometry is true? it has no sense!... euclidian geometry is, and will remain, the most convenient." chaos was a primary fact even in paris--especially in paris--as it was in the book of genesis; but every thinking being in paris or out of it had exhausted thought in the effort to prove unity, continuity, purpose, order, law, truth, the universe, god, after having begun by taking it for granted, and discovering, to their profound dismay, that some minds denied it. the direction of mind, as a single force of nature, had been constant since history began. its own unity had created a universe the essence of which was abstract truth; the absolute; god! to thomas aquinas, the universe was still a person; to spinoza, a substance; to kant, truth was the essence of the "i"; an innate conviction; a categorical imperative; to poincare, it was a convenience; and to karl pearson, a medium of exchange. the historian never stopped repeating to himself that he knew nothing about it; that he was a mere instrument of measure, a barometer, pedometer, radiometer; and that his whole share in the matter was restricted to the measurement of thought-motion as marked by the accepted thinkers. he took their facts for granted. he knew no more than a firefly about rays--or about race--or sex--or ennui--or a bar of music--or a pang of love--or a grain of musk--or of phosphorus--or conscience--or duty--or the force of euclidian geometry--or non-euclidian--or heat--or light--or osmosis--or electrolysis--or the magnet--or ether--or vis inertiae--or gravitation--or cohesion--or elasticity--or surface tension--or capillary attraction--or brownian motion--or of some scores, or thousands, or millions of chemical attractions, repulsions or indifferences which were busy within and without him; or, in brief, of force itself, which, he was credibly informed, bore some dozen definitions in the textbooks, mostly contradictory, and all, as he was assured, beyond his intelligence; but summed up in the dictum of the last and highest science, that motion seems to be matter and matter seems to be motion, yet "we are probably incapable of discovering" what either is. history had no need to ask what either might be; all it needed to know was the admission of ignorance; the mere fact of multiplicity baffling science. even as to the fact, science disputed, but radium happened to radiate something that seemed to explode the scientific magazine, bringing thought, for the time, to a standstill; though, in the line of thought-movement in history, radium was merely the next position, familiar and inexplicable since zeno and his arrow: continuous from the beginning of time, and discontinuous at each successive point. history set it down on the record--pricked its position on the chart--and waited to be led, or misled, once more. the historian must not try to know what is truth, if he values his honesty; for, if he cares for his truths, he is certain to falsify his facts. the laws of history only repeat the lines of force or thought. yet though his will be iron, he cannot help now and then resuming his humanity or simianity in face of a fear. the motion of thought had the same value as the motion of a cannon-ball seen approaching the observer on a direct line through the air. one could watch its curve for five thousand years. its first violent acceleration in historical times had ended in the catastrophe of . the next swerve of direction occurred towards . galileo and bacon gave a still newer curve to it, which altered its values; but all these changes had never altered the continuity. only in , the continuity snapped. vaguely conscious of the cataclysm, the world sometimes dated it from , by the roentgen rays, or from , by the curie's radium; but in , arthur balfour announced on the part of british science that the human race without exception had lived and died in a world of illusion until the last year of the century. the date was convenient, and convenience was truth. the child born in would, then, be born into a new world which would not be a unity but a multiple. adams tried to imagine it, and an education that would fit it. he found himself in a land where no one had ever penetrated before; where order was an accidental relation obnoxious to nature; artificial compulsion imposed on motion; against which every free energy of the universe revolted; and which, being merely occasional, resolved itself back into anarchy at last. he could not deny that the law of the new multiverse explained much that had been most obscure, especially the persistently fiendish treatment of man by man; the perpetual effort of society to establish law, and the perpetual revolt of society against the law it had established; the perpetual building up of authority by force, and the perpetual appeal to force to overthrow it; the perpetual symbolism of a higher law, and the perpetual relapse to a lower one; the perpetual victory of the principles of freedom, and their perpetual conversion into principles of power; but the staggering problem was the outlook ahead into the despotism of artificial order which nature abhorred. the physicists had a phrase for it, unintelligible to the vulgar: "all that we win is a battle--lost in advance--with the irreversible phenomena in the background of nature." all that a historian won was a vehement wish to escape. he saw his education complete; and was sorry he ever began it. as a matter of taste, he greatly preferred his eighteenth-century education when god was a father and nature a mother, and all was for the best in a scientific universe. he repudiated all share in the world as it was to be, and yet he could not detect the point where his responsibility began or ended. as history unveiled itself in the new order, man's mind had behaved like a young pearl oyster, secreting its universe to suit its conditions until it had built up a shell of nacre that embodied all its notions of the perfect. man knew it was true because he made it, and he loved it for the same reason. he sacrificed millions of lives to acquire his unity, but he achieved it, and justly thought it a work of art. the woman especially did great things, creating her deities on a higher level than the male, and, in the end, compelling the man to accept the virgin as guardian of the man's god. the man's part in his universe was secondary, but the woman was at home there, and sacrificed herself without limit to make it habitable, when man permitted it, as sometimes happened for brief intervals of war and famine; but she could not provide protection against forces of nature. she did not think of her universe as a raft to which the limpets stuck for life in the surge of a supersensual chaos; she conceived herself and her family as the centre and flower of an ordered universe which she knew to be unity because she had made it after the image of her own fecundity; and this creation of hers was surrounded by beauties and perfections which she knew to be real because she herself had imagined them. even the masculine philosopher admired and loved and celebrated her triumph, and the greatest of them sang it in the noblest of his verses:-- "alma venus, coeli subter labentia signa quae mare navigerum, quae terras frugiferenteis concelebras ...... . quae quondam rerum naturam sola gubernas, nec sine te quidquam dias in luminis oras exoritur, neque fit laetum neque amabile quidquam; te sociam studeo!" neither man nor woman ever wanted to quit this eden of their own invention, and could no more have done it of their own accord than the pearl oyster could quit its shell; but although the oyster might perhaps assimilate or embalm a grain of sand forced into its aperture, it could only perish in face of the cyclonic hurricane or the volcanic upheaval of its bed. her supersensual chaos killed her. such seemed the theory of history to be imposed by science on the generation born after . for this theory, adams felt himself in no way responsible. even as historian he had made it his duty always to speak with respect of everything that had ever been thought respectable--except an occasional statesman; but he had submitted to force all his life, and he meant to accept it for the future as for the past. all his efforts had been turned only to the search for its channel. he never invented his facts; they were furnished him by the only authorities he could find. as for himself, according to helmholz, ernst mach, and arthur balfour, he was henceforth to be a conscious ball of vibrating motions, traversed in every direction by infinite lines of rotation or vibration, rolling at the feet of the virgin at chartres or of m. poincare in an attic at paris, a centre of supersensual chaos. the discovery did not distress him. a solitary man of sixty-five years or more, alone in a gothic cathedral or a paris apartment, need fret himself little about a few illusions more or less. he should have learned his lesson fifty years earlier; the times had long passed when a student could stop before chaos or order; he had no choice but to march with his world. nevertheless, he could not pretend that his mind felt flattered by this scientific outlook. every fabulist has told how the human mind has always struggled like a frightened bird to escape the chaos which caged it; how--appearing suddenly and inexplicably out of some unknown and unimaginable void; passing half its known life in the mental chaos of sleep; victim even when awake, to its own ill-adjustment, to disease, to age, to external suggestion, to nature's compulsion; doubting its sensations, and, in the last resort, trusting only to instruments and averages--after sixty or seventy years of growing astonishment, the mind wakes to find itself looking blankly into the void of death. that it should profess itself pleased by this performance was all that the highest rules of good breeding could ask; but that it should actually be satisfied would prove that it existed only as idiocy. satisfied, the future generation could scarcely think itself, for even when the mind existed in a universe of its own creation, it had never been quite at ease. as far as one ventured to interpret actual science, the mind had thus far adjusted itself by an infinite series of infinitely delicate adjustments forced on it by the infinite motion of an infinite chaos of motion; dragged at one moment into the unknowable and unthinkable, then trying to scramble back within its senses and to bar the chaos out, but always assimilating bits of it, until at last, in , a new avalanche of unknown forces had fallen on it, which required new mental powers to control. if this view was correct, the mind could gain nothing by flight or by fight; it must merge in its supersensual multiverse, or succumb to it. chapter xxxii vis nova ( - ) paris after midsummer is a place where only the industrious poor remain, unless they can get away; but adams knew no spot where history would be better off, and the calm of the champs elysees was so deep that when mr. de witte was promoted to a powerless dignity, no one whispered that the promotion was disgrace, while one might have supposed, from the silence, that the viceroy alexeieff had reoccupied manchuria as a fulfilment of treaty-obligation. for once, the conspiracy of silence became crime. never had so modern and so vital a riddle been put before western society, but society shut its eyes. manchuria knew every step into war; japan had completed every preparation; alexeieff had collected his army and fleet at port arthur, mounting his siege guns and laying in enormous stores, ready for the expected attack; from yokohama to irkutsk, the whole east was under war conditions; but europe knew nothing. the banks would allow no disturbance; the press said not a word, and even the embassies were silent. every anarchist in europe buzzed excitement and began to collect in groups, but the hotel ritz was calm, and the grand dukes who swarmed there professed to know directly from the winter palace that there would be no war. as usual, adams felt as ignorant as the best-informed statesman, and though the sense was familiar, for once he could see that the ignorance was assumed. after nearly fifty years of experience, he could not understand how the comedy could be so well acted. even as late as november, diplomats were gravely asking every passer-by for his opinion, and avowed none of their own except what was directly authorized at st. petersburg. he could make nothing of it. he found himself in face of his new problem--the workings of russian inertia--and he could conceive no way of forming an opinion how much was real and how much was comedy had he been in the winter palace himself. at times he doubted whether the grand dukes or the czar knew, but old diplomatic training forbade him to admit such innocence. this was the situation at christmas when he left paris. on january , , he reached washington, where the contrast of atmosphere astonished him, for he had never before seen his country think as a world-power. no doubt, japanese diplomacy had much to do with this alertness, but the immense superiority of japanese diplomacy should have been more evident in europe than in america, and in any case, could not account for the total disappearance of russian diplomacy. a government by inertia greatly disconcerted study. one was led to suspect that cassini never heard from his government, and that lamsdorf knew nothing of his own department; yet no such suspicion could be admitted. cassini resorted to transparent blague: "japan seemed infatuated even to the point of war! but what can the japanese do? as usual, sit on their heels and pray to buddha!" one of the oldest and most accomplished diplomatists in the service could never show his hand so empty as this if he held a card to play; but he never betrayed stronger resource behind. "if any japanese succeed in entering manchuria, they will never get out of it alive." the inertia of cassini, who was naturally the most energetic of diplomatists, deeply interested a student of race-inertia, whose mind had lost itself in the attempt to invent scales of force. the air of official russia seemed most dramatic in the air of the white house, by contrast with the outspoken candor of the president. reticence had no place there. every one in america saw that, whether russia or japan were victim, one of the decisive struggles in american history was pending, and any pretence of secrecy or indifference was absurd. interest was acute, and curiosity intense, for no one knew what the russian government meant or wanted, while war had become a question of days. to an impartial student who gravely doubted whether the czar himself acted as a conscious force or an inert weight, the straight-forward avowals of roosevelt had singular value as a standard of measure. by chance it happened that adams was obliged to take the place of his brother brooks at the diplomatic reception immediately after his return home, and the part of proxy included his supping at the president's table, with secretary root on one side, the president opposite, and miss chamberlain between them. naturally the president talked and the guests listened; which seemed, to one who had just escaped from the european conspiracy of silence, like drawing a free breath after stifling. roosevelt, as every one knew, was always an amusing talker, and had the reputation of being indiscreet beyond any other man of great importance in the world, except the kaiser wilhelm and mr. joseph chamberlain, the father of his guest at table; and this evening he spared none. with the usual abuse of the quos ego, common to vigorous statesmen, he said all that he thought about russians and japanese, as well as about boers and british, without restraint, in full hearing of twenty people, to the entire satisfaction of his listener; and concluded by declaring that war was imminent; that it ought to be stopped; that it could be stopped: "i could do it myself; i could stop it to-morrow!" and he went on to explain his reasons for restraint. that he was right, and that, within another generation, his successor would do what he would have liked to do, made no shadow of doubt in the mind of his hearer, though it would have been folly when he last supped at the white house in the dynasty of president hayes; but the listener cared less for the assertion of power, than for the vigor of view. the truth was evident enough, ordinary, even commonplace if one liked, but it was not a truth of inertia, nor was the method to be mistaken for inert. nor could the force of japan be mistaken for a moment as a force of inertia, although its aggressive was taken as methodically--as mathematically--as a demonstration of euclid, and adams thought that as against any but russians it would have lost its opening. each day counted as a measure of relative energy on the historical scale, and the whole story made a grammar of new science quite as instructive as that of pearson. the forces thus launched were bound to reach some new equilibrium which would prove the problem in one sense or another, and the war had no personal value for adams except that it gave hay his last great triumph. he had carried on his long contest with cassini so skillfully that no one knew enough to understand the diplomatic perfection of his work, which contained no error; but such success is complete only when it is invisible, and his victory at last was victory of judgment, not of act. he could do nothing, and the whole country would have sprung on him had he tried. japan and england saved his "open door" and fought his battle. all that remained for him was to make the peace, and adams set his heart on getting the peace quickly in hand, for hay's sake as well as for that of russia. he thought then that it could be done in one campaign, for he knew that, in a military sense, the fall of port arthur must lead to negotiation, and every one felt that hay would inevitably direct it; but the race was close, and while the war grew every day in proportions, hay's strength every day declined. st. gaudens came on to model his head, and sargent painted his portrait, two steps essential to immortality which he bore with a certain degree of resignation, but he grumbled when the president made him go to st. louis to address some gathering at the exposition; and mrs. hay bade adams go with them, for whatever use he could suppose himself to serve. he professed the religion of world's fairs, without which he held education to be a blind impossibility; and obeyed mrs. hay's bidding the more readily because it united his two educations in one; but theory and practice were put to equally severe test at st. louis. ten years had passed since he last crossed the mississippi, and he found everything new. in this great region from pittsburgh through ohio and indiana, agriculture had made way for steam; tall chimneys reeked smoke on every horizon, and dirty suburbs filled with scrap-iron, scrap-paper and cinders, formed the setting of every town. evidently, cleanliness was not to be the birthmark of the new american, but this matter of discards concerned the measure of force little, while the chimneys and cinders concerned it so much that adams thought the secretary of state should have rushed to the platform at every station to ask who were the people; for the american of the prime seemed to be extinct with the shawnee and the buffalo. the subject grew quickly delicate. history told little about these millions of germans and slavs, or whatever their race-names, who had overflowed these regions as though the rhine and the danube had turned their floods into the ohio. john hay was as strange to the mississippi river as though he had not been bred on its shores, and the city of st. louis had turned its back on the noblest work of nature, leaving it bankrupt between its own banks. the new american showed his parentage proudly; he was the child of steam and the brother of the dynamo, and already, within less than thirty years, this mass of mixed humanities, brought together by steam, was squeezed and welded into approach to shape; a product of so much mechanical power, and bearing no distinctive marks but that of its pressure. the new american, like the new european, was the servant of the powerhouse, as the european of the twelfth century was the servant of the church, and the features would follow the parentage. the st. louis exposition was its first creation in the twentieth century, and, for that reason, acutely interesting. one saw here a third-rate town of half-a-million people without history, education, unity, or art, and with little capital--without even an element of natural interest except the river which it studiously ignored--but doing what london, paris, or new york would have shrunk from attempting. this new social conglomerate, with no tie but its steam-power and not much of that, threw away thirty or forty million dollars on a pageant as ephemeral as a stage flat. the world had never witnessed so marvellous a phantasm by night arabia's crimson sands had never returned a glow half so astonishing, as one wandered among long lines of white palaces, exquisitely lighted by thousands on thousands of electric candles, soft, rich, shadowy, palpable in their sensuous depths; all in deep silence, profound solitude, listening for a voice or a foot-fall or the plash of an oar, as though the emir mirza were displaying the beauties of this city of brass, which could show nothing half so beautiful as this illumination, with its vast, white, monumental solitude, bathed in the pure light of setting suns. one enjoyed it with iniquitous rapture, not because of exhibits but rather because of their want. here was a paradox like the stellar universe that fitted one's mental faults. had there been no exhibits at all, and no visitors, one would have enjoyed it only the more. here education found new forage. that the power was wasted, the art indifferent, the economic failure complete, added just so much to the interest. the chaos of education approached a dream. one asked one's self whether this extravagance reflected the past or imaged the future; whether it was a creation of the old american or a promise of the new one. no prophet could be believed, but a pilgrim of power, without constituency to flatter, might allow himself to hope. the prospect from the exposition was pleasant; one seemed to see almost an adequate motive for power; almost a scheme for progress. in another half-century, the people of the central valleys should have hundreds of millions to throw away more easily than in they could throw away tens; and by that time they might know what they wanted. possibly they might even have learned how to reach it. this was an optimist's hope, shared by few except pilgrims of world's fairs, and frankly dropped by the multitude, for, east of the mississippi, the st. louis exposition met a deliberate conspiracy of silence, discouraging, beyond measure, to an optimistic dream of future strength in american expression. the party got back to washington on may , and before sailing for europe, adams went over, one warm evening, to bid good-bye on the garden-porch of the white house. he found himself the first person who urged mrs. roosevelt to visit the exposition for its beauty, and, as far as he ever knew, the last. he left st. louis may , , and on sunday, june , found himself again in the town of coutances, where the people of normandy had built, towards the year , an exposition which architects still admired and tourists visited, for it was thought singularly expressive of force as well as of grace in the virgin. on this sunday, the norman world was celebrating a pretty church-feast--the fete dieu--and the streets were filled with altars to the virgin, covered with flowers and foliage; the pavements strewn with paths of leaves and the spring handiwork of nature; the cathedral densely thronged at mass. the scene was graceful. the virgin did not shut her costly exposition on sunday, or any other day, even to american senators who had shut the st. louis exposition to her--or for her; and a historical tramp would gladly have offered a candle, or even a candle-stick in her honor, if she would have taught him her relation with the deity of the senators. the power of the virgin had been plainly one, embracing all human activity; while the power of the senate, or its deity, seemed--might one say--to be more or less ashamed of man and his work. the matter had no great interest as far as it concerned the somewhat obscure mental processes of senators who could probably have given no clearer idea than priests of the deity they supposed themselves to honor--if that was indeed their purpose; but it interested a student of force, curious to measure its manifestations. apparently the virgin--or her son--had no longer the force to build expositions that one cared to visit, but had the force to close them. the force was still real, serious, and, at st. louis, had been anxiously measured in actual money-value. that it was actual and serious in france as in the senate chamber at washington, proved itself at once by forcing adams to buy an automobile, which was a supreme demonstration because this was the form of force which adams most abominated. he had set aside the summer for study of the virgin, not as a sentiment but as a motive power, which had left monuments widely scattered and not easily reached. the automobile alone could unite them in any reasonable sequence, and although the force of the automobile, for the purposes of a commercial traveller, seemed to have no relation whatever to the force that inspired a gothic cathedral, the virgin in the twelfth century would have guided and controlled both bag-man and architect, as she controlled the seeker of history. in his mind the problem offered itself as to newton; it was a matter of mutual attraction, and he knew it, in his own case, to be a formula as precise as s = gt^ / , if he could but experimentally prove it. of the attraction he needed no proof on his own account; the costs of his automobile were more than sufficient: but as teacher he needed to speak for others than himself. for him, the virgin was an adorable mistress, who led the automobile and its owner where she would, to her wonderful palaces and chateaux, from chartres to rouen, and thence to amiens and laon, and a score of others, kindly receiving, amusing, charming and dazzling her lover, as though she were aphrodite herself, worth all else that man ever dreamed. he never doubted her force, since he felt it to the last fibre of his being, and could not more dispute its mastery than he could dispute the force of gravitation of which he knew nothing but the formula. he was only too glad to yield himself entirely, not to her charm or to any sentimentality of religion, but to her mental and physical energy of creation which had built up these world's fairs of thirteenth-century force that turned chicago and st. louis pale. "both were faiths and both are gone," said matthew arnold of the greek and norse divinities; but the business of a student was to ask where they had gone. the virgin had not even altogether gone; her fading away had been excessively slow. her adorer had pursued her too long, too far, and into too many manifestations of her power, to admit that she had any equivalent either of quantity or kind, in the actual world, but he could still less admit her annihilation as energy. so he went on wooing, happy in the thought that at last he had found a mistress who could see no difference in the age of her lovers. her own age had no time-measure. for years past, incited by john la farge, adams had devoted his summer schooling to the study of her glass at chartres and elsewhere, and if the automobile had one vitesse more useful than another, it was that of a century a minute; that of passing from one century to another without break. the centuries dropped like autumn leaves in one's road, and one was not fined for running over them too fast. when the thirteenth lost breath, the fourteenth caught on, and the sixteenth ran close ahead. the hunt for the virgin's glass opened rich preserves. especially the sixteenth century ran riot in sensuous worship. then the ocean of religion, which had flooded france, broke into shelley's light dissolved in star-showers thrown, which had left every remote village strewn with fragments that flashed like jewels, and were tossed into hidden clefts of peace and forgetfulness. one dared not pass a parish church in champagne or touraine without stopping to look for its window of fragments, where one's glass discovered the christ-child in his manger, nursed by the head of a fragmentary donkey, with a cupid playing into its long ears from the balustrade of a venetian palace, guarded by a legless flemish leibwache, standing on his head with a broken halbert; all invoked in prayer by remnants of the donors and their children that might have been drawn by fouquet or pinturicchio, in colors as fresh and living as the day they were burned in, and with feeling that still consoled the faithful for the paradise they had paid for and lost. france abounds in sixteenth-century glass. paris alone contains acres of it, and the neighborhood within fifty miles contains scores of churches where the student may still imagine himself three hundred years old, kneeling before the virgin's window in the silent solitude of an empty faith, crying his culp, beating his breast, confessing his historical sins, weighed down by the rubbish of sixty-six years' education, and still desperately hoping to understand. he understood a little, though not much. the sixteenth century had a value of its own, as though the one had become several, and unity had counted more than three, though the multiple still showed modest numbers. the glass had gone back to the roman empire and forward to the american continent; it betrayed sympathy with montaigne and shakespeare; but the virgin was still supreme. at beauvais in the church of st. stephen was a superb tree of jesse, famous as the work of engrand le prince, about or , in whose branches, among the fourteen ancestors of the virgin, three-fourths bore features of the kings of france, among them francis i and henry ii, who were hardly more edifying than kings of israel, and at least unusual as sources of divine purity. compared with the still more famous tree of jesse at chartres, dating from or thereabouts, must one declare that engrand le prince proved progress? and in what direction? complexity, multiplicity, even a step towards anarchy, it might suggest, but what step towards perfection? one late afternoon, at midsummer, the virgin's pilgrim was wandering through the streets of troyes in close and intimate conversation with thibaut of champagne and his highly intelligent seneschal, the sieur de joinville, when he noticed one or two men looking at a bit of paper stuck in a window. approaching, he read that m. de plehve had been assassinated at st. petersburg. the mad mixture of russia and the crusades, of the hippodrome and the renaissance, drove him for refuge into the fascinating church of st. pantaleon near by. martyrs, murderers, caesars, saints and assassins--half in glass and half in telegram; chaos of time, place, morals, forces and motive--gave him vertigo. had one sat all one's life on the steps of ara coeli for this? was assassination forever to be the last word of progress? no one in the street had shown a sign of protest; he himself felt none; the charming church with its delightful windows, in its exquisite absence of other tourists, took a keener expression of celestial peace than could have been given it by any contrast short of explosive murder; the conservative christian anarchist had come to his own, but which was he--the murderer or the murdered? the virgin herself never looked so winning--so one--as in this scandalous failure of her grace. to what purpose had she existed, if, after nineteen hundred years, the world was bloodier than when she was born? the stupendous failure of christianity tortured history. the effort for unity could not be a partial success; even alternating unity resolved itself into meaningless motion at last. to the tired student, the idea that he must give it up seemed sheer senility. as long as he could whisper, he would go on as he had begun, bluntly refusing to meet his creator with the admission that the creation had taught him nothing except that the square of the hypothenuse of a right-angled triangle might for convenience be taken as equal to something else. every man with self-respect enough to become effective, if only as a machine, has had to account to himself for himself somehow, and to invent a formula of his own for his universe, if the standard formulas failed. there, whether finished or not, education stopped. the formula, once made, could be but verified. the effort must begin at once, for time pressed. the old formulas had failed, and a new one had to be made, but, after all, the object was not extravagant or eccentric. one sought no absolute truth. one sought only a spool on which to wind the thread of history without breaking it. among indefinite possible orbits, one sought the orbit which would best satisfy the observed movement of the runaway star groombridge, , commonly called henry adams. as term of a nineteenth-century education, one sought a common factor for certain definite historical fractions. any schoolboy could work out the problem if he were given the right to state it in his own terms. therefore, when the fogs and frosts stopped his slaughter of the centuries, and shut him up again in his garret, he sat down as though he were again a boy at school to shape after his own needs the values of a dynamic theory of history. chapter xxxiii a dynamic theory of history ( ) a dynamic theory, like most theories, begins by begging the question: it defines progress as the development and economy of forces. further, it defines force as anything that does, or helps to do work. man is a force; so is the sun; so is a mathematical point, though without dimensions or known existence. man commonly begs the question again taking for granted that he captures the forces. a dynamic theory, assigning attractive force to opposing bodies in proportion to the law of mass, takes for granted that the forces of nature capture man. the sum of force attracts; the feeble atom or molecule called man is attracted; he suffers education or growth; he is the sum of the forces that attract him; his body and his thought are alike their product; the movement of the forces controls the progress of his mind, since he can know nothing but the motions which impinge on his senses, whose sum makes education. for convenience as an image, the theory may liken man to a spider in its web, watching for chance prey. forces of nature dance like flies before the net, and the spider pounces on them when it can; but it makes many fatal mistakes, though its theory of force is sound. the spider-mind acquires a faculty of memory, and, with it, a singular skill of analysis and synthesis, taking apart and putting together in different relations the meshes of its trap. man had in the beginning no power of analysis or synthesis approaching that of the spider, or even of the honey-bee; he had acute sensibility to the higher forces. fire taught him secrets that no other animal could learn; running water probably taught him even more, especially in his first lessons of mechanics; the animals helped to educate him, trusting themselves into his hands merely for the sake of their food, and carrying his burdens or supplying his clothing; the grasses and grains were academies of study. with little or no effort on his part, all these forces formed his thought, induced his action, and even shaped his figure. long before history began, his education was complete, for the record could not have been started until he had been taught to record. the universe that had formed him took shape in his mind as a reflection of his own unity, containing all forces except himself. either separately, or in groups, or as a whole, these forces never ceased to act on him, enlarging his mind as they enlarged the surface foliage of a vegetable, and the mind needed only to respond, as the forests did, to these attractions. susceptibility to the highest forces is the highest genius; selection between them is the highest science; their mass is the highest educator. man always made, and still makes, grotesque blunders in selecting and measuring forces, taken at random from the heap, but he never made a mistake in the value he set on the whole, which he symbolized as unity and worshipped as god. to this day, his attitude towards it has never changed, though science can no longer give to force a name. man's function as a force of nature was to assimilate other forces as he assimilated food. he called it the love of power. he felt his own feebleness, and he sought for an ass or a camel, a bow or a sling, to widen his range of power, as he sought fetish or a planet in the world beyond. he cared little to know its immediate use, but he could afford to throw nothing away which he could conceive to have possible value in this or any other existence. he waited for the object to teach him its use, or want of use, and the process was slow. he may have gone on for hundreds of thousands of years, waiting for nature to tell him her secrets; and, to his rivals among the monkeys, nature has taught no more than at their start; but certain lines of force were capable of acting on individual apes, and mechanically selecting types of race or sources of variation. the individual that responded or reacted to lines of new force then was possibly the same individual that reacts on it now, and his conception of the unity seems never to have changed in spite of the increasing diversity of forces; but the theory of variation is an affair of other science than history, and matters nothing to dynamics. the individual or the race would be educated on the same lines of illusion, which, according to arthur balfour, had not essentially varied down to the year . to the highest attractive energy, man gave the name of divine, and for its control he invented the science called religion, a word which meant, and still means, cultivation of occult force whether in detail or mass. unable to define force as a unity, man symbolized it and pursued it, both in himself, and in the infinite, as philosophy and theology; the mind is itself the subtlest of all known forces, and its self-introspection necessarily created a science which had the singular value of lifting his education, at the start, to the finest, subtlest, and broadest training both in analysis and synthesis, so that, if language is a test, he must have reached his highest powers early in his history; while the mere motive remained as simple an appetite for power as the tribal greed which led him to trap an elephant. hunger, whether for food or for the infinite, sets in motion multiplicity and infinity of thought, and the sure hope of gaining a share of infinite power in eternal life would lift most minds to effort. he had reached this completeness five thousand years ago, and added nothing to his stock of known forces for a very long time. the mass of nature exercised on him so feeble an attraction that one can scarcely account for his apparent motion. only a historian of very exceptional knowledge would venture to say at what date between b.c. and a.d., the momentum of europe was greatest; but such progress as the world made consisted in economies of energy rather than in its development; it was proved in mathematics, measured by names like archimedes, aristarchus, ptolemy, and euclid; or in civil law, measured by a number of names which adams had begun life by failing to learn; or in coinage, which was most beautiful near its beginning, and most barbarous at its close; or it was shown in roads, or the size of ships, or harbors; or by the use of metals, instruments, and writing; all of them economies of force, sometimes more forceful than the forces they helped; but the roads were still travelled by the horse, the ass, the camel, or the slave; the ships were still propelled by sails or oars; the lever, the spring, and the screw bounded the region of applied mechanics. even the metals were old. much the same thing could be said of religious or supernatural forces. down to the year of the christian era they were little changed, and in spite of plato and the sceptics were more apparently chaotic than ever. the experience of three thousand years had educated society to feel the vastness of nature, and the infinity of her resources of power, but even this increase of attraction had not yet caused economies in its methods of pursuit. there the western world stood till the year a.d. , when the emperor diocletian abdicated; and there it was that adams broke down on the steps of ara coeli, his path blocked by the scandalous failure of civilization at the moment it had achieved complete success. in the year the empire had solved the problems of europe more completely than they have ever been solved since. the pax romana, the civil law, and free trade should, in four hundred years, have put europe far in advance of the point reached by modern society in the four hundred years since , when conditions were less simple. the efforts to explain, or explain away, this scandal had been incessant, but none suited adams unless it were the economic theory of adverse exchanges and exhaustion of minerals; but nations are not ruined beyond a certain point by adverse exchanges, and rome had by no means exhausted her resources. on the contrary, the empire developed resources and energies quite astounding. no other four hundred years of history before a.d. knew anything like it; and although some of these developments, like the civil law, the roads, aqueducts, and harbors, were rather economies than force, yet in northwestern europe alone the empire had developed three energies--france, england, and germany--competent to master the world. the trouble seemed rather to be that the empire developed too much energy, and too fast. a dynamic law requires that two masses--nature and man--must go on, reacting upon each other, without stop, as the sun and a comet react on each other, and that any appearance of stoppage is illusive. the theory seems to exact excess, rather than deficiency, of action and reaction to account for the dissolution of the roman empire, which should, as a problem of mechanics, have been torn to pieces by acceleration. if the student means to try the experiment of framing a dynamic law, he must assign values to the forces of attraction that caused the trouble; and in this case he has them in plain evidence. with the relentless logic that stamped roman thought, the empire, which had established unity on earth, could not help establishing unity in heaven. it was induced by its dynamic necessities to economize the gods. the church has never ceased to protest against the charge that christianity ruined the empire, and, with its usual force, has pointed out that its reforms alone saved the state. any dynamic theory gladly admits it. all it asks is to find and follow the force that attracts. the church points out this force in the cross, and history needs only to follow it. the empire loudly asserted its motive. good taste forbids saying that constantine the great speculated as audaciously as a modern stock-broker on values of which he knew at the utmost only the volume; or that he merged all uncertain forces into a single trust, which he enormously overcapitalized, and forced on the market; but this is the substance of what constantine himself said in his edict of milan in the year , which admitted christianity into the trust of state religions. regarded as an act of congress, it runs: "we have resolved to grant to christians as well as all others the liberty to practice the religion they prefer, in order that whatever exists of divinity or celestial power may help and favor us and all who are under our government." the empire pursued power--not merely spiritual but physical--in the sense in which constantine issued his army order the year before, at the battle of the milvian bridge: in hoc signo vinces! using the cross as a train of artillery, which, to his mind, it was. society accepted it in the same character. eighty years afterwards, theodosius marched against his rival eugene with the cross for physical champion; and eugene raised the image of hercules to fight for the pagans; while society on both sides looked on, as though it were a boxing-match, to decide a final test of force between the divine powers. the church was powerless to raise the ideal. what is now known as religion affected the mind of old society but little. the laity, the people, the million, almost to a man, bet on the gods as they bet on a horse. no doubt the church did all it could to purify the process, but society was almost wholly pagan in its point of view, and was drawn to the cross because, in its system of physics, the cross had absorbed all the old occult or fetish-power. the symbol represented the sum of nature--the energy of modern science--and society believed it to be as real as x-rays; perhaps it was! the emperors used it like gunpowder in politics; the physicians used it like rays in medicine; the dying clung to it as the quintessence of force, to protect them from the forces of evil on their road to the next life. throughout these four centuries the empire knew that religion disturbed economy, for even the cost of heathen incense affected the exchanges; but no one could afford to buy or construct a costly and complicated machine when he could hire an occult force at trifling expense. fetish-power was cheap and satisfactory, down to a certain point. turgot and auguste comte long ago fixed this stage of economy as a necessary phase of social education, and historians seem now to accept it as the only gain yet made towards scientific history. great numbers of educated people--perhaps a majority--cling to the method still, and practice it more or less strictly; but, until quite recently, no other was known. the only occult power at man's disposal was fetish. against it, no mechanical force could compete except within narrow limits. outside of occult or fetish-power, the roman world was incredibly poor. it knew but one productive energy resembling a modern machine--the slave. no artificial force of serious value was applied to production or transportation, and when society developed itself so rapidly in political and social lines, it had no other means of keeping its economy on the same level than to extend its slave-system and its fetish-system to the utmost. the result might have been stated in a mathematical formula as early as the time of archimedes, six hundred years before rome fell. the economic needs of a violently centralizing society forced the empire to enlarge its slave-system until the slave-system consumed itself and the empire too, leaving society no resource but further enlargement of its religious system in order to compensate for the losses and horrors of the failure. for a vicious circle, its mathematical completeness approached perfection. the dynamic law of attraction and reaction needed only a newton to fix it in algebraic form. at last, in , alaric sacked rome, and the slave-ridden, agricultural, uncommercial western empire--the poorer and less christianized half--went to pieces. society, though terribly shocked by the horrors of alaric's storm, felt still more deeply the disappointment in its new power, the cross, which had failed to protect its church. the outcry against the cross became so loud among christians that its literary champion, bishop augustine of hippo--a town between algiers and tunis--was led to write a famous treatise in defence of the cross, familiar still to every scholar, in which he defended feebly the mechanical value of the symbol--arguing only that pagan symbols equally failed--but insisted on its spiritual value in the civitas dei which had taken the place of the civitas romae in human interest. "granted that we have lost all we had! have we lost faith? have we lost piety? have we lost the wealth of the inner man who is rich before god? these are the wealth of christians!" the civitas dei, in its turn, became the sum of attraction for the western world, though it also showed the same weakness in mechanics that had wrecked the civitas romae. st. augustine and his people perished at hippo towards , leaving society in appearance dull to new attraction. yet the attraction remained constant. the delight of experimenting on occult force of every kind is such as to absorb all the free thought of the human race. the gods did their work; history has no quarrel with them; they led, educated, enlarged the mind; taught knowledge; betrayed ignorance; stimulated effort. so little is known about the mind--whether social, racial, sexual or heritable; whether material or spiritual; whether animal, vegetable or mineral--that history is inclined to avoid it altogether; but nothing forbids one to admit, for convenience, that it may assimilate food like the body, storing new force and growing, like a forest, with the storage. the brain has not yet revealed its mysterious mechanism of gray matter. never has nature offered it so violent a stimulant as when she opened to it the possibility of sharing infinite power in eternal life, and it might well need a thousand years of prolonged and intense experiment to prove the value of the motive. during these so-called middle ages, the western mind reacted in many forms, on many sides, expressing its motives in modes, such as romanesque and gothic architecture, glass windows and mosaic walls, sculpture and poetry, war and love, which still affect some people as the noblest work of man, so that, even to-day, great masses of idle and ignorant tourists travel from far countries to look at ravenna and san marco, palermo and pisa, assisi, cordova, chartres, with vague notions about the force that created them, but with a certain surprise that a social mind of such singular energy and unity should still lurk in their shadows. the tourist more rarely visits constantinople or studies the architecture of sancta sofia, but when he does, he is distinctly conscious of forces not quite the same. justinian has not the simplicity of charlemagne. the eastern empire showed an activity and variety of forces that classical europe had never possessed. the navy of nicephoras phocas in the tenth century would have annihilated in half an hour any navy that carthage or athens or rome ever set afloat. the dynamic scheme began by asserting rather recklessly that between the pyramids (b.c. ), and the cross (a.d. ), no new force affected western progress, and antiquarians may easily dispute the fact; but in any case the motive influence, old or new, which raised both pyramids and cross was the same attraction of power in a future life that raised the dome of sancta sofia and the cathedral at amiens, however much it was altered, enlarged, or removed to distance in space. therefore, no single event has more puzzled historians than the sudden, unexplained appearance of at least two new natural forces of the highest educational value in mechanics, for the first time within record of history. literally, these two forces seemed to drop from the sky at the precise moment when the cross on one side and the crescent on the other, proclaimed the complete triumph of the civitas dei. had the manichean doctrine of good and evil as rival deities been orthodox, it would alone have accounted for this simultaneous victory of hostile powers. of the compass, as a step towards demonstration of the dynamic law, one may confidently say that it proved, better than any other force, the widening scope of the mind, since it widened immensely the range of contact between nature and thought. the compass educated. this must prove itself as needing no proof. of greek fire and gunpowder, the same thing cannot certainly be said, for they have the air of accidents due to the attraction of religious motives. they belong to the spiritual world; or to the doubtful ground of magic which lay between good and evil. they were chemical forces, mostly explosives, which acted and still act as the most violent educators ever known to man, but they were justly feared as diabolic, and whatever insolence man may have risked towards the milder teachers of his infancy, he was an abject pupil towards explosives. the sieur de joinville left a record of the energy with which the relatively harmless greek fire educated and enlarged the french mind in a single night in the year , when the crusaders were trying to advance on cairo. the good king st. louis and all his staff dropped on their knees at every fiery flame that flew by, praying--"god have pity on us!" and never had man more reason to call on his gods than they, for the battle of religion between christian and saracen was trifling compared with that of education between gunpowder and the cross. the fiction that society educated itself, or aimed at a conscious purpose, was upset by the compass and gunpowder which dragged and drove europe at will through frightful bogs of learning. at first, the apparent lag for want of volume in the new energies lasted one or two centuries, which closed the great epochs of emotion by the gothic cathedrals and scholastic theology. the moment had greek beauty and more than greek unity, but it was brief; and for another century or two, western society seemed to float in space without apparent motion. yet the attractive mass of nature's energy continued to attract, and education became more rapid than ever before. society began to resist, but the individual showed greater and greater insistence, without realizing what he was doing. when the crescent drove the cross in ignominy from constantinople in , gutenberg and fust were printing their first bible at mainz under the impression that they were helping the cross. when columbus discovered the west indies in , the church looked on it as a victory of the cross. when luther and calvin upset europe half a century later, they were trying, like st. augustine, to substitute the civitas dei for the civitas romae. when the puritans set out for new england in , they too were looking to found a civitas dei in state street; and when bunyan made his pilgrimage in , he repeated st. jerome. even when, after centuries of license, the church reformed its discipline, and, to prove it, burned giordano bruno in , besides condemning galileo in --as science goes on repeating to us every day--it condemned anarchists, not atheists. none of the astronomers were irreligious men; all of them made a point of magnifying god through his works; a form of science which did their religion no credit. neither galileo nor kepler, neither spinoza nor descartes, neither leibnitz nor newton, any more than constantine the great--if so much--doubted unity. the utmost range of their heresies reached only its personality. this persistence of thought-inertia is the leading idea of modern history. except as reflected in himself, man has no reason for assuming unity in the universe, or an ultimate substance, or a prime-motor. the a priori insistence on this unity ended by fatiguing the more active--or reactive--minds; and lord bacon tried to stop it. he urged society to lay aside the idea of evolving the universe from a thought, and to try evolving thought from the universe. the mind should observe and register forces--take them apart and put them together--without assuming unity at all. "nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed." "the imagination must be given not wings but weights." as galileo reversed the action of earth and sun, bacon reversed the relation of thought to force. the mind was thenceforth to follow the movement of matter, and unity must be left to shift for itself. the revolution in attitude seemed voluntary, but in fact was as mechanical as the fall of a feather. man created nothing. after , the speed of progress so rapidly surpassed man's gait as to alarm every one, as though it were the acceleration of a falling body which the dynamic theory takes it to be. lord bacon was as much astonished by it as the church was, and with reason. suddenly society felt itself dragged into situations altogether new and anarchic--situations which it could not affect, but which painfully affected it. instinct taught it that the universe in its thought must be in danger when its reflection lost itself in space. the danger was all the greater because men of science covered it with "larger synthesis," and poets called the undevout astronomer mad. society knew better. yet the telescope held it rigidly standing on its head; the microscope revealed a universe that defied the senses; gunpowder killed whole races that lagged behind; the compass coerced the most imbruted mariner to act on the impossible idea that the earth was round; the press drenched europe with anarchism. europe saw itself, violently resisting, wrenched into false positions, drawn along new lines as a fish that is caught on a hook; but unable to understand by what force it was controlled. the resistance was often bloody, sometimes humorous, always constant. its contortions in the eighteenth century are best studied in the wit of voltaire, but all history and all philosophy from montaigne and pascal to schopenhauer and nietzsche deal with nothing else; and still, throughout it all, the baconian law held good; thought did not evolve nature, but nature evolved thought. not one considerable man of science dared face the stream of thought; and the whole number of those who acted, like franklin, as electric conductors of the new forces from nature to man, down to the year , did not exceed a few score, confined to a few towns in western europe. asia refused to be touched by the stream, and america, except for franklin, stood outside. very slowly the accretion of these new forces, chemical and mechanical, grew in volume until they acquired sufficient mass to take the place of the old religious science, substituting their attraction for the attractions of the civitas dei, but the process remained the same. nature, not mind, did the work that the sun does on the planets. man depended more and more absolutely on forces other than his own, and on instruments which superseded his senses. bacon foretold it: "neither the naked hand nor the understanding, left to itself, can effect much. it is by instruments and helps that the work is done." once done, the mind resumed its illusion, and society forgot its impotence; but no one better than bacon knew its tricks, and for his true followers science always meant self-restraint, obedience, sensitiveness to impulse from without. "non fingendum aut excogitandum sed inveniendum quid natura faciat aut ferat." the success of this method staggers belief, and even to-day can be treated by history only as a miracle of growth, like the sports of nature. evidently a new variety of mind had appeared. certain men merely held out their hands--like newton, watched an apple; like franklin, flew a kite; like watt, played with a tea-kettle--and great forces of nature stuck to them as though she were playing ball. governments did almost nothing but resist. even gunpowder and ordnance, the great weapon of government, showed little development between and . society was hostile or indifferent, as priestley and jenner, and even fulton, with reason complained in the most advanced societies in the world, while its resistance became acute wherever the church held control; until all mankind seemed to draw itself out in a long series of groups, dragged on by an attractive power in advance, which even the leaders obeyed without understanding, as the planets obeyed gravity, or the trees obeyed heat and light. the influx of new force was nearly spontaneous. the reaction of mind on the mass of nature seemed not greater than that of a comet on the sun; and had the spontaneous influx of force stopped in europe, society must have stood still, or gone backward, as in asia or africa. then only economies of process would have counted as new force, and society would have been better pleased; for the idea that new force must be in itself a good is only an animal or vegetable instinct. as nature developed her hidden energies, they tended to become destructive. thought itself became tortured, suffering reluctantly, impatiently, painfully, the coercion of new method. easy thought had always been movement of inertia, and mostly mere sentiment; but even the processes of mathematics measured feebly the needs of force. the stupendous acceleration after ended in with the appearance of the new class of supersensual forces, before which the man of science stood at first as bewildered and helpless as, in the fourth century, a priest of isis before the cross of christ. this, then, or something like this, would be a dynamic formula of history. any schoolboy knows enough to object at once that it is the oldest and most universal of all theories. church and state, theology and philosophy, have always preached it, differing only in the allotment of energy between nature and man. whether the attractive energy has been called god or nature, the mechanism has been always the same, and history is not obliged to decide whether the ultimate tends to a purpose or not, or whether ultimate energy is one or many. every one admits that the will is a free force, habitually decided by motives. no one denies that motives exist adequate to decide the will; even though it may not always be conscious of them. science has proved that forces, sensible and occult, physical and metaphysical, simple and complex, surround, traverse, vibrate, rotate, repel, attract, without stop; that man's senses are conscious of few, and only in a partial degree; but that, from the beginning of organic existence, his consciousness has been induced, expanded, trained in the lines of his sensitiveness; and that the rise of his faculties from a lower power to a higher, or from a narrower to a wider field, may be due to the function of assimilating and storing outside force or forces. there is nothing unscientific in the idea that, beyond the lines of force felt by the senses, the universe may be--as it has always been--either a supersensuous chaos or a divine unity, which irresistibly attracts, and is either life or death to penetrate. thus far, religion, philosophy, and science seem to go hand in hand. the schools begin their vital battle only there. in the earlier stages of progress, the forces to be assimilated were simple and easy to absorb, but, as the mind of man enlarged its range, it enlarged the field of complexity, and must continue to do so, even into chaos, until the reservoirs of sensuous or supersensuous energies are exhausted, or cease to affect him, or until he succumbs to their excess. for past history, this way of grouping its sequences may answer for a chart of relations, although any serious student would need to invent another, to compare or correct its errors; but past history is only a value of relation to the future, and this value is wholly one of convenience, which can be tested only by experiment. any law of movement must include, to make it a convenience, some mechanical formula of acceleration. chapter xxxiv a law of acceleration ( ) images are not arguments, rarely even lead to proof, but the mind craves them, and, of late more than ever, the keenest experimenters find twenty images better than one, especially if contradictory; since the human mind has already learned to deal in contradictions. the image needed here is that of a new centre, or preponderating mass, artificially introduced on earth in the midst of a system of attractive forces that previously made their own equilibrium, and constantly induced to accelerate its motion till it shall establish a new equilibrium. a dynamic theory would begin by assuming that all history, terrestrial or cosmic, mechanical or intellectual, would be reducible to this formula if we knew the facts. for convenience, the most familiar image should come first; and this is probably that of the comet, or meteoric streams, like the leonids and perseids; a complex of minute mechanical agencies, reacting within and without, and guided by the sum of forces attracting or deflecting it. nothing forbids one to assume that the man-meteorite might grow, as an acorn does, absorbing light, heat, electricity--or thought; for, in recent times, such transference of energy has become a familiar idea; but the simplest figure, at first, is that of a perfect comet--say that of --which drops from space, in a straight line, at the regular acceleration of speed, directly into the sun, and after wheeling sharply about it, in heat that ought to dissipate any known substance, turns back unharmed, in defiance of law, by the path on which it came. the mind, by analogy, may figure as such a comet, the better because it also defies law. motion is the ultimate object of science, and measures of motion are many; but with thought as with matter, the true measure is mass in its astronomic sense--the sum or difference of attractive forces. science has quite enough trouble in measuring its material motions without volunteering help to the historian, but the historian needs not much help to measure some kinds of social movement; and especially in the nineteenth century, society by common accord agreed in measuring its progress by the coal-output. the ratio of increase in the volume of coal-power may serve as dynamometer. the coal-output of the world, speaking roughly, doubled every ten years between and , in the form of utilized power, for the ton of coal yielded three or four times as much power in as in . rapid as this rate of acceleration in volume seems, it may be tested in a thousand ways without greatly reducing it. perhaps the ocean steamer is nearest unity and easiest to measure, for any one might hire, in , for a small sum of money, the use of , steam-horse-power to cross the ocean, and by halving this figure every ten years, he got back to horse-power for , which was accuracy enough for his purposes. in truth, his chief trouble came not from the ratio in volume of heat, but from the intensity, since he could get no basis for a ratio there. all ages of history have known high intensities, like the iron-furnace, the burning-glass, the blow-pipe; but no society has ever used high intensities on any large scale till now, nor can a mere bystander decide what range of temperature is now in common use. loosely guessing that science controls habitually the whole range from absolute zero to degrees centigrade, one might assume, for convenience, that the ten-year ratio for volume could be used temporarily for intensity; and still there remained a ratio to be guessed for other forces than heat. since scores of new forces had been discovered; old forces had been raised to higher powers, as could be measured in the navy-gun; great regions of chemistry had been opened up, and connected with other regions of physics. within ten years a new universe of force had been revealed in radiation. complexity had extended itself on immense horizons, and arithmetical ratios were useless for any attempt at accuracy. the force evolved seemed more like explosion than gravitation, and followed closely the curve of steam; but, at all events, the ten-year ratio seemed carefully conservative. unless the calculator was prepared to be instantly overwhelmed by physical force and mental complexity, he must stop there. thus, taking the year as the starting point for carrying back the series, nothing was easier than to assume a ten-year period of retardation as far back as , but beyond that point the statistician failed, and only the mathematician could help. laplace would have found it child's-play to fix a ratio of progression in mathematical science between descartes, leibnitz, newton, and himself. watt could have given in pounds the increase of power between newcomen's engines and his own. volta and benjamin franklin would have stated their progress as absolute creation of power. dalton could have measured minutely his advance on boerhaave. napoleon i must have had a distinct notion of his own numerical relation to louis xiv. no one in doubted the progress of force, least of all those who were to lose their heads by it. pending agreement between these authorities, theory may assume what it likes--say a fifty, or even a five-and-twenty-year period of reduplication for the eighteenth century, for the period matters little until the acceleration itself is admitted. the subject is even more amusing in the seventeenth than in the eighteenth century, because galileo and kepler, descartes, huygens, and isaac newton took vast pains to fix the laws of acceleration for moving bodies, while lord bacon and william harvey were content with showing experimentally the fact of acceleration in knowledge; but from their combined results a historian might be tempted to maintain a similar rate of movement back to , subject to correction from the historians of mathematics. the mathematicians might carry their calculations back as far as the fourteenth century when algebra seems to have become for the first time the standard measure of mechanical progress in western europe; for not only copernicus and tycho brahe, but even artists like leonardo, michael angelo, and albert durer worked by mathematical processes, and their testimony would probably give results more exact than that of montaigne or shakespeare; but, to save trouble, one might tentatively carry back the same ratio of acceleration, or retardation, to the year , with the help of columbus and gutenberg, so taking a uniform rate during the whole four centuries ( - ), and leaving to statisticians the task of correcting it. or better, one might, for convenience, use the formula of squares to serve for a law of mind. any other formula would do as well, either of chemical explosion, or electrolysis, or vegetable growth, or of expansion or contraction in innumerable forms; but this happens to be simple and convenient. its force increases in the direct ratio of its squares. as the human meteoroid approached the sun or centre of attractive force, the attraction of one century squared itself to give the measure of attraction in the next. behind the year , the process certainly went on, but the progress became so slight as to be hardly measurable. what was gained in the east or elsewhere, cannot be known; but forces, called loosely greek fire and gunpowder, came into use in the west in the thirteenth century, as well as instruments like the compass, the blow-pipe, clocks and spectacles, and materials like paper; arabic notation and algebra were introduced, while metaphysics and theology acted as violent stimulants to mind. an architect might detect a sequence between the church of st. peter's at rome, the amiens cathedral, the duomo at pisa, san marco at venice, sancta sofia at constantinople and the churches at ravenna. all the historian dares affirm is that a sequence is manifestly there, and he has a right to carry back his ratio, to represent the fact, without assuming its numerical correctness. on the human mind as a moving body, the break in acceleration in the middle ages is only apparent; the attraction worked through shifting forms of force, as the sun works by light or heat, electricity, gravitation, or what not, on different organs with different sensibilities, but with invariable law. the science of prehistoric man has no value except to prove that the law went back into indefinite antiquity. a stone arrowhead is as convincing as a steam-engine. the values were as clear a hundred thousand years ago as now, and extended equally over the whole world. the motion at last became infinitely slight, but cannot be proved to have stopped. the motion of newton's comet at aphelion may be equally slight. to evolutionists may be left the processes of evolution; to historians the single interest is the law of reaction between force and force--between mind and nature--the law of progress. the great division of history into phases by turgot and comte first affirmed this law in its outlines by asserting the unity of progress, for a mere phase interrupts no growth, and nature shows innumerable such phases. the development of coal-power in the nineteenth century furnished the first means of assigning closer values to the elements; and the appearance of supersensual forces towards made this calculation a pressing necessity; since the next step became infinitely serious. a law of acceleration, definite and constant as any law of mechanics, cannot be supposed to relax its energy to suit the convenience of man. no one is likely to suggest a theory that man's convenience had been consulted by nature at any time, or that nature has consulted the convenience of any of her creations, except perhaps the terebratula. in every age man has bitterly and justly complained that nature hurried and hustled him, for inertia almost invariably has ended in tragedy. resistance is its law, and resistance to superior mass is futile and fatal. fifty years ago, science took for granted that the rate of acceleration could not last. the world forgets quickly, but even today the habit remains of founding statistics on the faith that consumption will continue nearly stationary. two generations, with john stuart mill, talked of this stationary period, which was to follow the explosion of new power. all the men who were elderly in the forties died in this faith, and other men grew old nursing the same conviction, and happy in it; while science, for fifty years, permitted, or encouraged, society to think that force would prove to be limited in supply. this mental inertia of science lasted through the eighties before showing signs of breaking up; and nothing short of radium fairly wakened men to the fact, long since evident, that force was inexhaustible. even then the scientific authorities vehemently resisted. nothing so revolutionary had happened since the year . thought had more than once been upset, but never caught and whirled about in the vortex of infinite forces. power leaped from every atom, and enough of it to supply the stellar universe showed itself running to waste at every pore of matter. man could no longer hold it off. forces grasped his wrists and flung him about as though he had hold of a live wire or a runaway automobile; which was very nearly the exact truth for the purposes of an elderly and timid single gentleman in paris, who never drove down the champs elysees without expecting an accident, and commonly witnessing one; or found himself in the neighborhood of an official without calculating the chances of a bomb. so long as the rates of progress held good, these bombs would double in force and number every ten years. impossibilities no longer stood in the way. one's life had fattened on impossibilities. before the boy was six years old, he had seen four impossibilities made actual--the ocean-steamer, the railway, the electric telegraph, and the daguerreotype; nor could he ever learn which of the four had most hurried others to come. he had seen the coal-output of the united states grow from nothing to three hundred million tons or more. what was far more serious, he had seen the number of minds, engaged in pursuing force--the truest measure of its attraction--increase from a few scores or hundreds, in , to many thousands in , trained to sharpness never before reached, and armed with instruments amounting to new senses of indefinite power and accuracy, while they chased force into hiding-places where nature herself had never known it to be, making analyses that contradicted being, and syntheses that endangered the elements. no one could say that the social mind now failed to respond to new force, even when the new force annoyed it horribly. every day nature violently revolted, causing so-called accidents with enormous destruction of property and life, while plainly laughing at man, who helplessly groaned and shrieked and shuddered, but never for a single instant could stop. the railways alone approached the carnage of war; automobiles and fire-arms ravaged society, until an earthquake became almost a nervous relaxation. an immense volume of force had detached itself from the unknown universe of energy, while still vaster reservoirs, supposed to be infinite, steadily revealed themselves, attracting mankind with more compulsive course than all the pontic seas or gods or gold that ever existed, and feeling still less of retiring ebb. in , science would have smiled at such a romance as this, but, in , as far as history could learn, few men of science thought it a laughing matter. if a perplexed but laborious follower could venture to guess their drift, it seemed in their minds a toss-up between anarchy and order. unless they should be more honest with themselves in the future than ever they were in the past, they would be more astonished than their followers when they reached the end. if karl pearson's notions of the universe were sound, men like galileo, descartes, leibnitz, and newton should have stopped the progress of science before , supposing them to have been honest in the religious convictions they expressed. in they were plainly forced back; on faith in a unity unproved and an order they had themselves disproved. they had reduced their universe to a series of relations to themselves. they had reduced themselves to motion in a universe of motions, with an acceleration, in their own case of vertiginous violence. with the correctness of their science, history had no right to meddle, since their science now lay in a plane where scarcely one or two hundred minds in the world could follow its mathematical processes; but bombs educate vigorously, and even wireless telegraphy or airships might require the reconstruction of society. if any analogy whatever existed between the human mind, on one side, and the laws of motion, on the other, the mind had already entered a field of attraction so violent that it must immediately pass beyond, into new equilibrium, like the comet of newton, to suffer dissipation altogether, like meteoroids in the earth's atmosphere. if it behaved like an explosive, it must rapidly recover equilibrium; if it behaved like a vegetable, it must reach its limits of growth; and even if it acted like the earlier creations of energy--the saurians and sharks--it must have nearly reached the limits of its expansion. if science were to go on doubling or quadrupling its complexities every ten years, even mathematics would soon succumb. an average mind had succumbed already in ; it could no longer understand the problem in . fortunately, a student of history had no responsibility for the problem; he took it as science gave it, and waited only to be taught. with science or with society, he had no quarrel and claimed no share of authority. he had never been able to acquire knowledge, still less to impart it; and if he had, at times, felt serious differences with the american of the nineteenth century, he felt none with the american of the twentieth. for this new creation, born since , a historian asked no longer to be teacher or even friend; he asked only to be a pupil, and promised to be docile, for once, even though trodden under foot; for he could see that the new american--the child of incalculable coal-power, chemical power, electric power, and radiating energy, as well as of new forces yet undetermined--must be a sort of god compared with any former creation of nature. at the rate of progress since , every american who lived into the year would know how to control unlimited power. he would think in complexities unimaginable to an earlier mind. he would deal with problems altogether beyond the range of earlier society. to him the nineteenth century would stand on the same plane with the fourth--equally childlike--and he would only wonder how both of them, knowing so little, and so weak in force, should have done so much. perhaps even he might go back, in , to sit with gibbon on the steps of ara coeli. meanwhile he was getting education. with that, a teacher who had failed to educate even the generation of , dared not interfere. the new forces would educate. history saw few lessons in the past that would be useful in the future; but one, at least, it did see. the attempt of the american of to educate the american of had not often been surpassed for folly; and since the forces and their complications had increased a thousand times or more. the attempt of the american of to educate the american of , must be even blinder than that of the congressman of , except so far as he had learned his ignorance. during a million or two of years, every generation in turn had toiled with endless agony to attain and apply power, all the while betraying the deepest alarm and horror at the power they created. the teacher of , if foolhardy, might stimulate; if foolish, might resist; if intelligent, might balance, as wise and foolish have often tried to do from the beginning; but the forces would continue to educate, and the mind would continue to react. all the teacher could hope was to teach it reaction. even there his difficulty was extreme. the most elementary books of science betrayed the inadequacy of old implements of thought. chapter after chapter closed with phrases such as one never met in older literature: "the cause of this phenomenon is not understood"; "science no longer ventures to explain causes"; "the first step towards a causal explanation still remains to be taken"; "opinions are very much divided"; "in spite of the contradictions involved"; "science gets on only by adopting different theories, sometimes contradictory." evidently the new american would need to think in contradictions, and instead of kant's famous four antinomies, the new universe would know no law that could not be proved by its anti-law. to educate--one's self to begin with--had been the effort of one's life for sixty years; and the difficulties of education had gone on doubling with the coal-output, until the prospect of waiting another ten years, in order to face a seventh doubling of complexities, allured one's imagination but slightly. the law of acceleration was definite, and did not require ten years more study except to show whether it held good. no scheme could be suggested to the new american, and no fault needed to be found, or complaint made; but the next great influx of new forces seemed near at hand, and its style of education promised to be violently coercive. the movement from unity into multiplicity, between and , was unbroken in sequence, and rapid in acceleration. prolonged one generation longer, it would require a new social mind. as though thought were common salt in indefinite solution it must enter a new phase subject to new laws. thus far, since five or ten thousand years, the mind had successfully reacted, and nothing yet proved that it would fail to react--but it would need to jump. chapter xxxv nunc age ( ) nearly forty years had passed since the ex-private secretary landed at new york with the ex-ministers adams and motley, when they saw american society as a long caravan stretching out towards the plains. as he came up the bay again, november , , an older man than either his father or motley in , he found the approach more striking than ever--wonderful--unlike anything man had ever seen--and like nothing he had ever much cared to see. the outline of the city became frantic in its effort to explain something that defied meaning. power seemed to have outgrown its servitude and to have asserted its freedom. the cylinder had exploded, and thrown great masses of stone and steam against the sky. the city had the air and movement of hysteria, and the citizens were crying, in every accent of anger and alarm, that the new forces must at any cost be brought under control. prosperity never before imagined, power never yet wielded by man, speed never reached by anything but a meteor, had made the world irritable, nervous, querulous, unreasonable and afraid. all new york was demanding new men, and all the new forces, condensed into corporations, were demanding a new type of man--a man with ten times the endurance, energy, will and mind of the old type--for whom they were ready to pay millions at sight. as one jolted over the pavements or read the last week's newspapers, the new man seemed close at hand, for the old one had plainly reached the end of his strength, and his failure had become catastrophic. every one saw it, and every municipal election shrieked chaos. a traveller in the highways of history looked out of the club window on the turmoil of fifth avenue, and felt himself in rome, under diocletian, witnessing the anarchy, conscious of the compulsion, eager for the solution, but unable to conceive whence the next impulse was to come or how it was to act. the two-thousand-years failure of christianity roared upward from broadway, and no constantine the great was in sight. having nothing else to do, the traveller went on to washington to wait the end. there roosevelt was training constantines and battling trusts. with the battle of trusts, a student of mechanics felt entire sympathy, not merely as a matter of politics or society, but also as a measure of motion. the trusts and corporations stood for the larger part of the new power that had been created since , and were obnoxious because of their vigorous and unscrupulous energy. they were revolutionary, troubling all the old conventions and values, as the screws of ocean steamers must trouble a school of herring. they tore society to pieces and trampled it under foot. as one of their earliest victims, a citizen of quincy, born in , had learned submission and silence, for he knew that, under the laws of mechanics, any change, within the range of the forces, must make his situation only worse; but he was beyond measure curious to see whether the conflict of forces would produce the new man, since no other energies seemed left on earth to breed. the new man could be only a child born of contact between the new and the old energies. both had been familiar since childhood, as the story has shown, and neither had warped the umpire's judgment by its favors. if ever judge had reason to be impartial, it was he. the sole object of his interest and sympathy was the new man, and the longer one watched, the less could be seen of him. of the forces behind the trusts, one could see something; they owned a complete organization, with schools, training, wealth and purpose; but of the forces behind roosevelt one knew little; their cohesion was slight; their training irregular; their objects vague. the public had no idea what practical system it could aim at, or what sort of men could manage it. the single problem before it was not so much to control the trusts as to create the society that could manage the trusts. the new american must be either the child of the new forces or a chance sport of nature. the attraction of mechanical power had already wrenched the american mind into a crab-like process which roosevelt was making heroic efforts to restore to even action, and he had every right to active support and sympathy from all the world, especially from the trusts themselves so far as they were human; but the doubt persisted whether the force that educated was really man or nature--mind or motion. the mechanical theory, mostly accepted by science, seemed to require that the law of mass should rule. in that case, progress would continue as before. in that, or any other case, a nineteenth-century education was as useless or misleading as an eighteenth-century education had been to the child of ; but adams had a better reason for holding his tongue. for his dynamic theory of history he cared no more than for the kinetic theory of gas; but, if it were an approach to measurement of motion, it would verify or disprove itself within thirty years. at the calculated acceleration, the head of the meteor-stream must very soon pass perihelion. therefore, dispute was idle, discussion was futile, and silence, next to good-temper, was the mark of sense. if the acceleration, measured by the development and economy of forces, were to continue at its rate since , the mathematician of should be able to plot the past and future orbit of the human race as accurately as that of the november meteoroids. naturally such an attitude annoyed the players in the game, as the attitude of the umpire is apt to infuriate the spectators. above all, it was profoundly unmoral, and tended to discourage effort. on the other hand, it tended to encourage foresight and to economize waste of mind. if it was not itself education, it pointed out the economies necessary for the education of the new american. there, the duty stopped. there, too, life stopped. nature has educated herself to a singular sympathy for death. on the antarctic glacier, nearly five thousand feet above sea-level, captain scott found carcasses of seals, where the animals had laboriously flopped up, to die in peace. "unless we had actually found these remains, it would have been past believing that a dying seal could have transported itself over fifty miles of rough, steep, glacier-surface," but "the seal seems often to crawl to the shore or the ice to die, probably from its instinctive dread of its marine enemies." in india, purun dass, at the end of statesmanship, sought solitude, and died in sanctity among the deer and monkeys, rather than remain with man. even in america, the indian summer of life should be a little sunny and a little sad, like the season, and infinite in wealth and depth of tone--but never hustled. for that reason, one's own passive obscurity seemed sometimes nearer nature than john hay's exposure. to the normal animal the instinct of sport is innate, and historians themselves were not exempt from the passion of baiting their bears; but in its turn even the seal dislikes to be worried to death in age by creatures that have not the strength or the teeth to kill him outright. on reaching washington, november , , adams saw at a glance that hay must have rest. already mrs. hay had bade him prepare to help in taking her husband to europe as soon as the session should be over, and although hay protested that the idea could not even be discussed, his strength failed so rapidly that he could not effectually discuss it, and ended by yielding without struggle. he would equally have resigned office and retired, like purun dass, had not the president and the press protested; but he often debated the subject, and his friends could throw no light on it. adams himself, who had set his heart on seeing hay close his career by making peace in the east, could only urge that vanity for vanity, the crown of peacemaker was worth the cross of martyrdom; but the cross was full in sight, while the crown was still uncertain. adams found his formula for russian inertia exasperatingly correct. he thought that russia should have negotiated instantly on the fall of port arthur, january , ; he found that she had not the energy, but meant to wait till her navy should be destroyed. the delay measured precisely the time that hay had to spare. the close of the session on march left him barely the strength to crawl on board ship, march , and before his steamer had reached half her course, he had revived, almost as gay as when he first lighted on the markoe house in i street forty-four years earlier. the clouds that gather round the setting sun do not always take a sober coloring from eyes that have kept watch on mortality; or, at least, the sobriety is sometimes scarcely sad. one walks with one's friends squarely up to the portal of life, and bids good-bye with a smile. one has done it so often! hay could scarcely pace the deck; he nourished no illusions; he was convinced that he should never return to his work, and he talked lightly of the death sentence that he might any day expect, but he threw off the coloring of office and mortality together, and the malaria of power left its only trace in the sense of tasks incomplete. one could honestly help him there. laughing frankly at his dozen treaties hung up in the senate committee-room like lambs in a butcher's shop, one could still remind him of what was solidly completed. in his eight years of office he had solved nearly every old problem of american statesmanship, and had left little or nothing to annoy his successor. he had brought the great atlantic powers into a working system, and even russia seemed about to be dragged into a combine of intelligent equilibrium based on an intelligent allotment of activities. for the first time in fifteen hundred years a true roman pax was in sight, and would, if it succeeded, owe its virtues to him. except for making peace in manchuria, he could do no more; and if the worst should happen, setting continent against continent in arms--the only apparent alternative to his scheme--he need not repine at missing the catastrophe. this rosy view served to soothe disgusts which every parting statesman feels, and commonly with reason. one had no need to get out one's notebook in order to jot down the exact figures on either side. why add up the elements of resistance and anarchy? the kaiser supplied him with these figures, just as the cretic approached morocco. every one was doing it, and seemed in a panic about it. the chaos waited only for his landing. arrived at genoa, the party hid itself for a fortnight at nervi, and he gained strength rapidly as long as he made no effort and heard no call for action. then they all went on to nanheim without relapse. there, after a few days, adams left him for the regular treatment, and came up to paris. the medical reports promised well, and hay's letters were as humorous and light-handed as ever. to the last he wrote cheerfully of his progress, and amusingly with his usual light scepticism, of his various doctors; but when the treatment ended, three weeks later, and he came on to paris, he showed, at the first glance, that he had lost strength, and the return to affairs and interviews wore him rapidly out. he was conscious of it, and in his last talk before starting for london and liverpool he took the end of his activity for granted. "you must hold out for the peace negotiations," was the remonstrance. "i've not time!" he replied. "you'll need little time!" was the rejoinder. each was correct. there it ended! shakespeare himself could use no more than the commonplace to express what is incapable of expression. "the rest is silence!" the few familiar words, among the simplest in the language, conveying an idea trite beyond rivalry, served shakespeare, and, as yet, no one has said more. a few weeks afterwards, one warm evening in early july, as adams was strolling down to dine under the trees at armenonville, he learned that hay was dead. he expected it; on hay's account, he was even satisfied to have his friend die, as we would all die if we could, in full fame, at home and abroad, universally regretted, and wielding his power to the last. one had seen scores of emperors and heroes fade into cheap obscurity even when alive; and now, at least, one had not that to fear for one's friend. it was not even the suddenness of the shock, or the sense of void, that threw adams into the depths of hamlet's shakespearean silence in the full flare of paris frivolity in its favorite haunt where worldly vanity reached its most futile climax in human history; it was only the quiet summons to follow--the assent to dismissal. it was time to go. the three friends had begun life together; and the last of the three had no motive--no attraction--to carry it on after the others had gone. education had ended for all three, and only beyond some remoter horizon could its values be fixed or renewed. perhaps some day--say , their centenary--they might be allowed to return together for a holiday, to see the mistakes of their own lives made clear in the light of the mistakes of their successors; and perhaps then, for the first time since man began his education among the carnivores, they would find a world that sensitive and timid natures could regard without a shudder. the end life and letters of lord macaulay volume i by sir george otto trevelyan preface to the second edition. when publishing the second edition of lord macaulay's life and letters, i may be permitted to say that no pains were spared in order that the first edition should be as complete as possible. but, in the course of the last nine months, i have come into possession of a certain quantity of supplementary matter, which the appearance of the book has elicited from various quarters. stray letters have been hunted up. half-forgotten anecdotes have been recalled. floating reminiscences have been reduced to shape;--in one case, as will be seen from the extracts from sir william stirling maxwell's letter, by no unskilful hand. i should have been tempted to draw more largely upon these new resources, if it had not been for the examples, which literary history only too copiously affords, of the risk that attends any attempt to alter the form, or considerably increase the bulk, of a work which, in its original shape, has had the good fortune not to displease the public. i have, however, ventured, by a very sparing selection from sufficiently abundant material, slightly to enlarge, and, i trust, somewhat to enrich the book. if this second edition is not rigidly correct in word and substance, i have no valid excuse to offer. nothing more pleasantly indicates the wide-spread interest with which lord macaulay has inspired his readers, both at home and in foreign countries, than the almost microscopic care with which these volumes have been studied. it is not too much to say that, in several instances, a misprint, or a verbal error, has been brought to my notice by at least five-and-twenty different persons; and there is hardly a page in the book which has not afforded occasion for comment or suggestion from some friendly correspondent. there is no statement of any importance throughout the two volumes the accuracy of which has been circumstantially impugned; but some expressions, which have given personal pain or annoyance, have been softened or removed. there is another class of criticism to which i have found myself altogether unable to defer. i have frequently been told by reviewers that i should "have better consulted macaulay's reputation," or "done more honour to macaulay's memory," if i had omitted passages in the letters or diaries which may be said to bear the trace of intellectual narrowness, or political and religious intolerance. i cannot but think that strictures, of this nature imply a serious misconception of the biographer's duty. it was my business to show my uncle as he was, and not as i, or any one else, would have had him. if a faithful picture of macaulay could not have been produced without injury to his memory, i should have left the task of drawing that picture to others; but, having once undertaken the work, i had no choice but to ask myself, with regard to each feature of the portrait, not whether it was attractive, but whether it was characteristic. we who had the best opportunity of knowing him have always been convinced that his character would stand the test of an exact, and even a minute, delineation; and we humbly believe that our confidence was not misplaced, and that the reading world has now extended to the man the approbation which it has long conceded to his hooks. g. o. t. december . preface to the first edition this work has been undertaken principally from a conviction that it is the performance of a duty which, to the best of my ability, it is incumbent on me to fulfil. though even on this ground i cannot appeal to the forbearance of my readers, i may venture to refer to a peculiar difficulty which i have experienced in dealing with lord macaulay's private papers. to give to the world compositions not intended for publication may be no injury to the fame of writers who, by habit, were careless and hasty workmen; but it is far otherwise in the case of one who made it a rule for himself to publish nothing which was not carefully planned, strenuously laboured, and minutely finished. now, it is impossible to examine lord macaulay's journals and correspondence without being persuaded that the idea of their being printed, even in part, never was present to his mind; and i should not feel myself justified in laying them before the public if it were not that their unlaboured and spontaneous character adds to their biographical value all, and perhaps more than all, that it detracts from their literary merit. to the heirs and relations of mr. thomas flower ellis and mr. adam black, to the marquis of lansdowne, to mr. macvey napier, and to the executors of dr. whewell, my thanks are due for the courtesy with which they have placed the different portions of my uncle's correspondence at my disposal. lady caroline lascelles has most kindly permitted me to use as much of lord carlisle's journal as relates to the subject of this work; and mr. charles cowan, my uncle's old opponent at edinburgh, has sent me a considerable mass of printed matter bearing upon the elections of and . the late sir edward ryan, and mr. fitzjames stephen, spared no pains to inform me with regard to lord macaulay's work at calcutta. his early letters, with much that relates to the whole course of his life, have been preserved, studied, and arranged, by the affectionate industry of his sister, miss macaulay; and material of high interest has been entrusted to my hands by mr. and the hon. mrs. edward cropper. i have been assisted throughout the book by the sympathy, and the recollections, of my sister lady holland, the niece to whose custody lord macaulay's papers by inheritance descend. g.o.t. march . life and letters of lord macaulay by sir george otto trevelyan chapter i. - . plan and scope of the work--history of the macaulay family-- aulay--kenneth--johnson and boswell--john macaulay and his children--zachary macaulay--his career in the west indies and in africa--his character--visit of the french squadron to sierra leone--zachary macaulay's marriage--birth of his eldest son--lord macaulay's early years--his childish productions--mrs. hannah more--general macaulay--choice of a school--shelford--dean milner--macaulay's early letters-- aspenden hall--the boy's habits and mental endowments--his home--the clapham set--the boy's relations with his father-- the political ideas amongst which he was brought up, and their influence on the work of his life. he who undertakes to publish the memoirs of a distinguished man may find a ready apology in the custom of the age. if we measure the effective demand for biography by the supply, the person commemorated need possess but a very moderate reputation, and have played no exceptional part, in order to carry the reader through many hundred pages of anecdote, dissertation, and correspondence. to judge from the advertisements of our circulating libraries, the public curiosity is keen with regard to some who did nothing worthy of special note, and others who acted so continuously in the face of the world that, when their course was run, there was little left for the world to learn about them. it may, therefore, be taken for granted that a desire exists to hear something authentic about the life of a man who has produced works which are universally known, but which bear little or no indication of the private history and the personal qualities of the author. this was in a marked degree the case with lord macaulay. his two famous contemporaries in english literature have, consciously or unconsciously, told their own story in their books. those who could see between the lines in "david copperfield" were aware that they had before them a delightful autobiography; and all who knew how to read thackeray could trace him in his novels through every stage in his course, on from the day when as a little boy, consigned to the care of english relatives and schoolmasters, he left his mother on the steps of the landing-place at calcutta. the dates and names were wanting, but the man was there; while the most ardent admirers of macaulay will admit that a minute study of his literary productions left them, as far as any but an intellectual knowledge of the writer himself was concerned, very much as it found them. a consummate master of his craft, he turned out works which bore the unmistakable marks of the artificer's hand, but which did not reflect his features. it would be almost as hard to compose a picture of the author from the history, the essays, and the lays, as to evolve an idea of shakespeare from henry the fifth and measure for measure. but, besides being a man of letters, lord macaulay was a statesman, a jurist, and a brilliant ornament of society, at a time when to shine in society was a distinction which a man of eminence and ability might justly value. in these several capacities, it will be said, he was known well, and known widely. but in the first place, as these pages will show, there was one side of his life (to him, at any rate, the most important,) of which even the persons with whom he mixed most freely and confidentially in london drawing-rooms, in the indian council chamber, and in the lobbies and on the benches of the house of commons, were only in part aware. and in the next place, those who have seen his features and heard his voice are few already and become yearly fewer; while, by a rare fate in literary annals, the number of those who read his books is still rapidly increasing. for everyone who sat with him in private company or at the transaction of public business,--for every ten who have listened to his oratory in parliament or from the hustings,--there must be tens of thousands whose interest in history and literature he has awakened and informed by his pen, and who would gladly know what manner of man it was that has done them so great a service. to gratify that most legitimate wish is the duty of those who have the means at their command. his lifelike image is indelibly impressed upon their minds, (for how could it be otherwise with any who had enjoyed so close relations with such a man?) although the skill which can reproduce that image before the general eye may well be wanting. but his own letters will supply the deficiencies of the biographer. never did any one leave behind him more copious materials for enabling others to put together a narrative which might be the history, not indeed of his times, but of the man himself. for in the first place he so soon showed promise of being one who would give those among whom his early years were passed reason to be proud, and still more certain assurance that he would never afford them cause for shame, that what he wrote was preserved with a care very seldom bestowed on childish compositions; and the value set upon his letters by those with whom he corresponded naturally enough increased as years went on. and in the next place he was by nature so incapable of affectation or concealment that he could not write otherwise than as he felt, and, to one person at least, could never refrain from writing all that he felt; so that we may read in his letters, as in a clear mirror, his opinions and inclinations, his hopes and affections, at every succeeding period of his existence. such letters could never have been submitted to an editor not connected with both correspondents by the strongest ties; and even one who stands in that position must often be sorely puzzled as to what he has the heart to publish and the right to withhold. i am conscious that a near relative has peculiar temptations towards that partiality of the biographer which lord macaulay himself so often and so cordially denounced; and the danger is greater in the case of one whose knowledge of him coincided with his later years; for it would not be easy to find a nature which gained more by time than his, and lost less. but believing, as i do, (to use his own words,) that "if he were now living he would have sufficient judgment and sufficient greatness of mind" to wish to be shown as himself, i will suppress no trait in his disposition, or incident in his career, which might provoke blame or question. such in all points as he was, the world, which has been so indulgent to him, has a right to know him; and those who best love him do not fear the consequences of freely submitting his character and his actions to the public verdict. the most devout believers in the doctrine of the transmission of family qualities will be content with tracing back descent through four generations; and all favourable hereditary influences, both intellectual and moral, are assured by a genealogy which derives from a scotch manse. in the first decade of the eighteenth century aulay macaulay, the great-grandfather of the historian, was minister of tiree and coll; where he was "grievously annoyed by a decreet obtained after instance of the laird of ardchattan, taking away his stipend." the duchess of argyll of the day appears to have done her best to see him righted; "but his health being much impaired, and there being no church or meeting-house, he was exposed to the violence of the weather at all seasons; and having no manse or plebe, and no fund for communion elements, and no mortification for schools or any pious purpose in either of the islands, and the air being unwholesome, he was dissatisfied;" and so, to the great regret of the parishioners whom he was leaving behind, he migrated to harris, where he discharged the clerical duties for nearly half a century. aulay was the father of fourteen children, of whom one, kenneth, the minister of ardnamurchan, still occupies a very humble niche in the temple of literature. he wrote a history of st. kilda which happened to fall into the hands of dr. johnson, who spoke of it more than once with favour. his reason for liking the book is characteristic enough. mr. macaulay had recorded the belief prevalent in st. kilda that, as soon as the factor landed on the island, all the inhabitants had an attack which from the account appears to have partaken of the nature both of influenza and bronchitis. this touched the superstitious vein in johnson, who praised him for his "magnanimity" in venturing to chronicle so questionable a phenomenon; the more so because,--said the doctor,--"macaulay set out with a prejudice against prejudice, and wanted to be a smart modern thinker." to a reader of our day the history of st. kilda appears to be innocent of any trace of such pretension; unless it be that the author speaks slightingly of second-sight, a subject for which johnson always had a strong hankering. in johnson paid a visit to mr. macaulay, who by that time had removed to calder, and began the interview by congratulating him on having produced "a very pretty piece of topography,"--a compliment which did not seem to the taste of the author. the conversation turned upon rather delicate subjects, and, before many hours had passed, the guest had said to the host one of the very rudest things recorded by boswell! later on in the same evening he atoned for his incivility by giving one of the boys of the house a pocket sallust, and promising to procure him a servitorship at oxford. subsequently johnson pronounced that mr. macaulay was not competent to have written the book that went by his name; a decision which, to those who happen to have read the work, will give a very poor notion of my ancestor's abilities. the eldest son of old aulay, and the grandfather of lord macaulay, was john, born in the year . he was minister successively of barra, south uist, lismore, and inverary; the last appointment being a proof of the interest which the family of argyll continued to take in the fortunes of the macaulays. he, likewise, during the famous tour in the hebrides, came across the path of boswell, who mentions him in an exquisitely absurd paragraph, the first of those in which is described the visit to inverary castle. ["monday, oct. .--my acquaintance, the rev. mr. john m'aulay, one of the ministers of inverary, and brother to our good friend at calder, came to us this morning, and accompanied us to the castle, where i presented dr. johnson to the duke of argyll. we were shown through the house; and i never shall forget the impression made upon my fancy by some of the ladies' maids tripping about in neat morning dresses. after seeing for a long time little but rusticity, their lively manner, and gay inciting appearance, pleased me so much, that i thought for a moment i could have been a knight-errant for them."] mr. macaulay afterwards passed the evening with the travellers at their inn, and provoked johnson into what boswell calls warmth, and anyone else would call brutality, by the very proper remark that he had no notion of people being in earnest in good professions if their practice belied them. when we think what well-known ground this was to lord macaulay, it is impossible to suppress a wish that the great talker had been at hand to avenge his grandfather and grand-uncle. next morning "mr. macaulay breakfasted with us, nothing hurt or dismayed by his last night's correction. being a man of good sense he had a just admiration of dr. johnson." he was rewarded by seeing johnson at his very best, and hearing him declaim some of the finest lines that ever were written in a manner worthy of his subject. there is a tradition that, in his younger days, the minister of inverary proved his whiggism by giving information to the authorities which almost led to the capture of the young pretender. it is perhaps a matter of congratulation that this item was not added to the heavy account that the stuarts have against the macaulay family. john macaulay enjoyed a high reputation as a preacher, and was especially renowned for his fluency. in he removed to cardross in dumbartonshire, where, on the bank of the noble estuary of the clyde, he spent the last fifteen years of a useful and honoured life. he was twice married. his first wife died at the birth of his first child. eight years afterwards, in , he espoused margaret, daughter of colin campbell of inveresragan, who survived him by a single year. by her he had the patriarchal number of twelve children, whom he brought up on the old scotch system,--common to the households of minister, man of business, farmer, and peasant alike,--on fine air, simple diet, and a solid training in knowledge human and divine. two generations after, mr. carlyle, during a visit to the late lord ashburton at the grange, caught sight of macaulay's face in unwonted repose, as he was turning over the pages of a book. "i noticed," said he, "the homely norse features that you find everywhere in the western isles, and i thought to myself 'well! anyone can see that you are an honest good sort of fellow, made out of oatmeal.'" several of john macaulay's children obtained position in the world. aulay, the eldest by his second wife, became a clergyman of the church of england. his reputation as a scholar and antiquary stood high, and in the capacity of a private tutor he became known even in royal circles. he published pamphlets and treatises, the list of which it is not worth while to record, and meditated several large works that perhaps never got much beyond a title. of all his undertakings the one best deserving commemoration in these pages was a tour that he made into scotland in company with mr. thomas babington, the owner of rothley temple in leicestershire, in the course of which the travellers paid a visit to the manse at cardross. mr. babington fell in love with one of the daughters of the house, miss jean macaulay, and married her in . nine years afterwards he had an opportunity of presenting his brother-in-law aulay macaulay with the very pleasant living of rothley. alexander, another son of john macaulay, succeeded his father as minister of cardross. colin went into the indian army, and died a general. he followed the example of the more ambitious among his brother officers, and exchanged military for civil duties. in he acted as secretary to a political and diplomatic commission which accompanied the force that marched under general harris against seringapatam. the leading commissioner was colonel wellesley, and to the end of general macaulay's life the great duke corresponded with him on terms of intimacy, and (so the family flattered themselves) even of friendship. soon after the commencement of the century colin macaulay was appointed resident at the important native state of travancore. while on this employment he happened to light upon a valuable collection of books, and rapidly made himself master of the principal european languages, which he spoke and wrote with a facility surprising in one who had acquired them within a few leagues of cape comorin. there was another son of john macaulay, who in force and elevation of character stood out among his brothers, and who was destined to make for himself no ordinary career. the path which zachary macaulay chose to tread did not lead to wealth, or worldly success, or indeed to much worldly happiness. born in , he was sent out at the age of sixteen by a scotch house of business as bookkeeper to an estate in jamaica, of which he soon rose to be sole manager. his position brought him into the closest possible contact with negro slavery. his mind was not prepossessed against the system of society which he found in the west indies. his personal interests spoke strongly in its favour, while his father, whom he justly respected, could see nothing to condemn in an institution recognised by scripture. indeed, the religious world still allowed the maintenance of slavery to continue an open question. john newton, the real founder of that school in the church of england of which in after years zachary macaulay was a devoted member, contrived to reconcile the business of a slave trader with the duties of a christian, and to the end of his days gave scandal to some of his disciples, (who by that time were one and all sworn abolitionists,) by his supposed reluctance to see that there could be no fellowship between light and such darkness. but zachary macaulay had eyes of his own to look about him, a clear head for forming a judgment on what he saw, and a conscience which would not permit him to live otherwise than in obedience to its mandates. the young scotchman's innate respect for his fellows, and his appreciation of all that instruction and religion can do for men, was shocked at the sight of a population deliberately kept ignorant and heathen. his kind heart was wounded by cruelties practised at the will and pleasure of a thousand petty despots. he had read his bible too literally to acquiesce easily in a state of matters under which human beings were bred and raised like a stock of cattle, while outraged morality was revenged on the governing race by the shameless licentiousness which is the inevitable accompaniment of slavery. he was well aware that these evils, so far from being superficial or remediable, were essential to the very existence of a social fabric constituted like that within which he lived. it was not for nothing that he had been behind the scenes in that tragedy of crime and misery. his philanthropy was not learned by the royal road of tracts, and platform speeches, and monthly magazines. what he knew he had spelt out for himself with no teacher except the aspect of human suffering, and degradation, and sin. he was not one of those to whom conviction comes in a day; and, when convinced, he did nothing sudden. little more than a boy in age, singularly modest, and constitutionally averse to any course that appeared pretentious or theatrical, he began by a sincere attempt to make the best of his calling. for some years he contented himself with doing what he could, (so he writes to a friend,) "to alleviate the hardships of a considerable number of my fellow-creatures, and to render the bitter cup of servitude as palatable as possible." but by the time he was four-and-twenty he became tired of trying to find a compromise between right and wrong, and, refusing really great offers from the people with whom he was connected, he threw up his position, and returned to his native country. this step was taken against the wishes of his father, who was not prepared for the construction which his son put upon the paternal precept that a man should make his practice square with his professions. but zachary macaulay soon had more congenial work to do. the young west indian overseer was not alone in his scruples. already for some time past a conviction had been abroad that individual citizens could not divest themselves of their share in the responsibility in which the nation was involved by the existence of slavery in our colonies. already there had been formed the nucleus of the most disinterested, and perhaps the most successful, popular movement which history records. the question of the slave trade was well before parliament and the country. ten years had passed since the freedom of all whose feet touched the soil of our island had been vindicated before the courts at westminster, and not a few negroes had become their own masters as a consequence of that memorable decision. the patrons of the race were somewhat embarrassed by having these expatriated freedmen on their hands; an opinion prevailed that the traffic in human lives could never be efficiently checked until africa had obtained the rudiments of civilisation; and, after long discussion, a scheme was matured for the colonisation of sierra leone by liberated slaves. a company was organised, with a charter from the crown, and a board which included the names of granville sharpe and wilberforce. a large capital was speedily subscribed, and the chair was accepted by mr. henry thornton, a leading city banker and a member of parliament, whose determined opposition to cruelty and oppression in every form was such as might be expected in one who had inherited from his father the friendship of the poet cowper. mr. thornton heard macaulay's story from thomas babington, with whom he lived on terms of close intimacy and political alliance. the board, by the advice of its chairman, passed a resolution appointing the young man second member in the sierra leone council, and early in the year he sailed for africa, where soon after his arrival he succeeded to the position and duties of governor. the directors had done well to secure a tried man. the colony was at once exposed to the implacable enmity of merchants whose market the agents of the new company spoiled in their capacity of traders, and slave-dealers with whom they interfered in their character of philanthropists. the native tribes in the vicinity, instigated by european hatred and jealousy, began to inflict upon the defenceless authorities of the settlement a series of those monkey-like impertinences which, absurdly as they may read in a narrative, are formidable and ominous when they indicate that savages feel their power. these barbarians, who had hitherto commanded as much rum and gunpowder as they cared to have by selling their neighbours at the nearest barracoon, showed no appreciation for the comforts and advantages of civilisation. indeed, those advantages were displayed in anything but an attractive shape even within the pale of the company's territory. an aggregation of negroes from jamaica, london, and nova scotia, who possessed no language except an acquired jargon, and shared no associations beyond the recollections of a common servitude, were not very promising apostles for the spread of western culture and the christian faith. things went smoothly enough as long as the business of the colony was mainly confined to eating the provisions that had been brought in the ships; but as soon as the work became real, and the commons short, the whole community smouldered down into chronic mutiny. zachary macaulay was the very man for such a crisis. to a rare fund of patience, and self-command, and perseverance, he united a calm courage that was equal to any trial. these qualities were, no doubt, inherent in his disposition; but no one except those who have turned over his voluminous private journals can understand what constant effort, and what incessant watchfulness, went to maintain throughout a long life a course of conduct, and a temper of mind, which gave every appearance of being the spontaneous fruit of nature. he was not one who dealt in personal experiences; and few among even the friends who loved him like father or brother, and who would have trusted him with all their fortune on his bare word, knew how entirely his outward behaviour was the express image of his religious belief. the secret of his character and of his actions lay in perfect humility and an absolute faith. events did not discompose him, because they were sent by one who best knew his own purposes. he was not fretted by the folly of others, or irritated by their hostility, because he regarded the humblest or the worst of mankind as objects, equally with himself, of the divine love and care. on all other points he examined himself so closely that the meditations of a single evening would fill many pages of diary; but so completely in his case had the fear of god cast out all other fear that amidst the gravest perils, and the most bewildering responsibilities, it never occurred to him to question whether he was brave or not. he worked strenuously and unceasingly, never amusing himself from year's end to year's end, and shrinking from any public praise or recognition as from an unlawful gratification, because he was firmly persuaded that, when all had been accomplished and endured, he was yet but an unprofitable servant, who had done that which was his duty to do. some, perhaps, will consider such motives as oldfashioned, and such convictions as out of date; but self-abnegation, self-control, and self-knowledge that does not give to self the benefit of any doubt, are virtues which are not oldfashioned, and for which, as time goes on, the world is likely to have as much need as ever. [sir james stephen writes thus of his friend macaulay: "that his understanding was proof against sophistry, and his nerves against fear, were, indeed, conclusions to which a stranger arrived at the first interview with him. but what might be suggesting that expression of countenance, at once so earnest and so monotonous--by what manner of feeling those gestures, so uniformly firm and deliberate were prompted--whence the constant traces of fatigue on those overhanging brows and on that athletic though ungraceful figure--what might be the charm which excited amongst his chosen circle a faith approaching to superstition, and a love rising to enthusiasm, towards a man whose demeanour was so inanimate, if not austere:--it was a riddle of which neither gall nor lavater could have found the key." that sir james himself could read the riddle is proved by the concluding words of a passage marked by a force and tenderness of feeling unusual even in him: "his earthward affections,--active and all--enduring as they were, could yet thrive without the support of human sympathy, because they were sustained by so abiding a sense of the divine presence, and so absolute a submission to the divine will, as raised him habitually to that higher region where the reproach of man could not reach, and the praise of man might not presume to follow him."] mr. macaulay was admirably adapted for the arduous and uninviting task of planting a negro colony. his very deficiencies stood him in good stead; for, in presence of the elements with which he had to deal, it was well for him that nature had denied him any sense of the ridiculous. unconscious of what was absurd around him, and incapable of being flurried, frightened, or fatigued, he stood as a centre of order and authority amidst the seething chaos of inexperience and insubordination. the staff was miserably insufficient, and every officer of the company had to do duty for three in a climate such that a man is fortunate if he can find health for the work of one during a continuous twelvemonth. the governor had to be in the counting-house, the law-court, the school, and even the chapel. he was his own secretary, his own paymaster, his own envoy. he posted ledgers, he decided causes, he conducted correspondence with the directors at home, and visited neighbouring potentates on diplomatic missions which made up in danger what they lacked in dignity. in the absence of properly qualified clergymen, with whom he would have been the last to put himself in competition, he preached sermons and performed marriages;--a function which must have given honest satisfaction to one who had been so close a witness of the enforced and systematised immorality of a slave-nursery. before long, something fairly resembling order was established, and the settlement began to enjoy a reasonable measure of prosperity. the town was built, the fields were planted, and the schools filled. the governor made a point of allotting the lightest work to the negroes who could read and write; and such was the stimulating effect of this system upon education that he confidently looked forward "to the time when there would be few in the colony unable to read the bible." a printing-press was in constant operation, and in the use of a copying-machine the little community was three-quarters of a century ahead of the london public offices. but a severe ordeal was in store for the nascent civilisation of sierra leone. on a sunday morning in september , eight french sail appeared off the coast. the town was about as defensible as brighton; and it is not difficult to imagine the feelings which the sansculottes inspired among evangelical colonists whose last advices from europe dated from the very height of the reign of terror. there was a party in favour of escaping into the forest with as much property as could be removed at so short a notice; but the governor insisted that there would be no chance of saving the company's buildings unless the company's servants could make up their minds to remain at their posts, and face it out. the squadron moored within musket-shot of the quay, and swept the streets for two hours with grape and bullets; a most gratuitous piece of cruelty that killed a negress and a child, and gave one unlucky english gentleman a fright which ultimately brought him to his grave. the invaders then proceeded to land, and mr. macaulay had an opportunity of learning something about the condition of the french marine during the heroic period of the republic. a personal enemy of his own, the captain of a yankee slaver, brought a party of sailors straight to the governor's house. what followed had best be told in mr. macaulay's own words. "newell, who was attended by half-a-dozen sans-culottes, almost foaming with rage, presented a pistol to me, and with many oaths demanded instant satisfaction for the slaves who had run away from him to my protection. i made very little reply, but told him he must now _take_ such satisfaction as he judged equivalent to his claims, as i was no longer master of my actions. he became so very outrageous that, after bearing with him a little while, i thought it most prudent to repair myself to the french officer, and request his safe-conduct on board the commodore's ship. as i passed along the wharf the scene was curious enough. the frenchmen, who had come ashore in filth and rags, were now many of them dressed out with women's shifts, gowns, and petticoats. others had quantities of cloth wrapped about their bodies, or perhaps six or seven suits of clothes upon them at a time. the scene which presented itself on my getting on board the flag-ship was still more singular. the quarter-deck was crowded by a set of ragamuffins whose appearance beggared every previous description, and among whom i sought in vain for some one who looked like a gentleman. the stench and filth exceeded anything i had ever witnessed in any ship, and the noise and confusion gave me some idea of their famous mountain. i was ushered into the commodore's cabin, who at least received me civilly. his name was citizen allemand. he did not appear to have the right of excluding any of his fellow-citizens even from this place. whatever might be their rank, they crowded into it, and conversed familiarly with him." such was the discipline of the fleet that had been beaten by lord hove on the first of june; and such the raw material of the armies which, under firm hands, and on an element more suited to the military genius of their nation, were destined to triumph at rivoli and hohenlinden. mr. macaulay, who spoke french with ease and precision, in his anxiety to save the town used every argument which might prevail on the commodore, whose christian name, (if one may use such a phrase with reference to a patriot of the year two of the republic,) happened oddly enough to be the same as his own. he appealed first to the traditional generosity of frenchmen towards a fallen enemy, but soon discerned that the quality in question had gone out with the old order of things, if indeed it ever existed. he then represented that a people, who professed to be waging war with the express object of striking off the fetters of mankind, would be guilty of flagrant inconsistency if they destroyed an asylum for liberated slaves; but the commodore gave him to understand that sentiments, which sounded very well in the hall of the jacobins, were out of place on the west coast of africa. the governor returned on shore to find the town already completely gutted. it was evident at every turn that, although the republican battalions might carry liberty and fraternity through europe on the points of their bayonets, the republican sailors had found a very different use for the edge of their cutlasses. "the sight of my own and of the accountant's offices almost sickened me. every desk, and every drawer, and every shelf, together with the printing and copying presses, had been completely demolished in the search for money. the floors were strewed with types, and papers, and leaves of books; and i had the mortification to see a great part of my own labour, and of the labour of others, for several years totally destroyed. at the other end of the house i found telescopes, hygrometers, barometers, thermometers, and electrical machines, lying about in fragments. the view of the town library filled me with lively concern. the volumes were tossed about and defaced with the utmost wantonness; and, if they happened to bear any resemblance to bibles, they were torn in pieces and trampled on. the collection of natural curiosities next caught my eye. plants, seeds, dried birds, insects, and drawings were scattered about in great confusion, and some of the sailors were in the act of killing a beautiful musk-cat, which they afterwards ate. every house was full of frenchmen, who were hacking, and destroying, and tearing up everything which they could not convert to their own use. the destruction of live stock on this and the following day was immense. in my yard alone they killed fourteen dozen of fowls, and there were not less than twelve hundred hogs shot in the town." it was unsafe to walk in the streets of freetown during the forty-eight hours that followed its capture, because the french crews, with too much of the company's port wine in their heads to aim straight, were firing at the pigs of the poor freedmen over whom they had achieved such a questionable victory. to readers of erckmann-chatrian it is unpleasant to be taken thus behind the curtain on which those skilful artists have painted the wars of the early revolution. it is one thing to be told how the crusaders of ' and ' were received with blessings and banquets by the populations to whom they brought freedom and enlightenment, and quite another to read the journal in which a quiet accurate-minded scotchman tells us how a pack of tipsy ruffians sat abusing pitt and george to him, over a fricassee of his own fowls, and among the wreck of his lamps and mirrors which they had smashed as a protest against aristocratic luxury. "there is not a boy among them who has not learnt to accompany the name of pitt with an execration. when i went to bed, there was no sleep to be had on account of the sentinels thinking fit to amuse me the whole night through with the revenge they meant to take on him when they got him to paris. next morning i went on board the 'experiment.' the commodore and all his officers messed together, and i was admitted among them. they are truly the poorest-looking people i ever saw. even the commodore has only one suit which can at all distinguish him, not to say from the officers, but from the men. the filth and confusion of their meals was terrible. a chorus of boys usher in the dinner with the marseilles hymn, and it finishes in the same way. the enthusiasm of all ranks among them is astonishing, but not more so than their blindness. they talk with ecstasy of their revolutionary government, of their bloody executions, of their revolutionary tribunal, of the rapid movement of their revolutionary army with the corps of justice and the flying guillotine before it; forgetting that not one of them is not liable to its stroke on the accusation of the greatest vagabond on board. they asked me with triumph if yesterday had not been sunday. 'oh,' said they, 'the national convention have decreed that there is no sunday, and that the bible is all a lie.'" after such an experience it is not difficult to account for the keen and almost personal interest with which, to the very day of waterloo, mr. macaulay watched through its varying phases the rise and the downfall of the french power. he followed the progress of the british arms with a minute and intelligent attention which from a very early date communicated itself to his son; and the hearty patriotism of lord macaulay is perhaps in no small degree the consequence of what his father suffered from the profane and rapacious sansculottes of the revolutionary squadron. towards the middle of october the republicans took their departure. even at this distance of time it is provoking to learn that they got back to brest without meeting an enemy that had teeth to bite. the african climate, however, reduced the squadron to such a plight, that it was well for our frigates that they had not the chance of getting its fever-stricken crews under their hatches. the french never revisited freetown. indeed, they had left the place in such a condition that it was not worth their while to return. the houses had been carefully burned to the ground, and the live stock killed. except the clothes on their backs, and a little brandy and flour, the europeans had lost everything they had in the world. till assistance came from the mother country they lived upon such provisions as could be recovered from the reluctant hands of the negro settlers, who providentially had not been able to resist the temptation of helping the republicans to plunder the company's stores. judicious liberality at home, and a year's hard work on the spot, did much to repair the damage; and, when his colony was again upon its feet, mr. macaulay sailed to england with the object of recruiting his health, which had broken down under an attack of low fever. on his arrival he was admitted at once and for ever within the innermost circle of friends and fellow-labourers who were united round wilberforce and henry thornton by indissoluble bonds of mutual personal regard and common public ends. as an indispensable part of his initiation into that very pleasant confederacy, he was sent down to be introduced to hannah more, who was living at cowslip green, near bristol, in the enjoyment of general respect, mixed with a good deal of what even those who admire her as she deserved must in conscience call flattery. he there met selina mills, a former pupil of the school which the miss mores kept in the neighbouring city, and a lifelong friend of all the sisters. the young lady is said to have been extremely pretty and attractive, as may well be believed by those who saw her in later years. she was the daughter of a member of the society of friends, who at one time was a bookseller in bristol, and who built there a small street called "mills place," in which he himself resided. his grandchildren remembered him as an old man of imposing appearance, with long white hair, talking incessantly of jacob boehmen. mr. mills had sons, one of whom edited a bristol journal exceedingly well, and is said to have made some figure in light literature. this uncle of lord macaulay was a very lively, clever man, full of good stories, of which only one has survived. young mills, while resident in london, had looked in at rowland hill's chapel, and had there lost a new hat. when he reported the misfortune to his father, the old quaker replied: "john, if thee'd gone to the right place of worship, thee'd have kept thy hat upon thy head." lord macaulay was accustomed to say that he got his "joviality" from his mother's family. if his power of humour was indeed of quaker origin, he was rather ungrateful in the use to which he sometimes put it. mr. macaulay fell in love with miss mills, and obtained her affection in return. he had to encounter the opposition of her relations, who were set upon her making another and a better match, and of mrs. patty more, (so well known to all who have studied the somewhat diffuse annals of the more family,) who, in the true spirit of romantic friendship, wished her to promise never to marry at all, but to domesticate herself as a youngest sister in the household at cowslip green. miss hannah, however, took a more unselfish view of the situation, and advocated mr. macaulay's cause with firmness and good feeling. indeed, he must have been, according to her particular notions, the most irreproachable of lovers, until her own coelebs was given to the world. by her help he carried his point in so far that the engagement was made and recognised; but the friends of the young lady would not allow her to accompany him to africa; and, during his absence from england, which began in the early months of , by an arrangement that under the circumstances was very judicious, she spent much of her time in leicestershire with his sister mrs. babington. his first business after arriving at sierra leone was to sit in judgment on the ringleaders of a formidable outbreak which had taken place in the colony; and he had an opportunity of proving by example that negro disaffection, from the nature of the race, is peculiarly susceptible to treatment by mild remedies, if only the man in the post of responsibility has got a heart and can contrive to keep his head. he had much more trouble with a batch of missionaries, whom he took with him in the ship, and who were no sooner on board than they began to fall out, ostensibly on controversial topics, but more probably from the same motives that so often set the laity quarrelling during the incessant and involuntary companionship of a sea-voyage. mr. macaulay, finding that the warmth of these debates furnished sport to the captain and other irreligious characters, was forced seriously to exert his authority in order to separate and silence the disputants. his report of these occurrences went in due time to the chairman of the company, who excused himself for an arrangement which had turned out so ill by telling a story of a servant who, having to carry a number of gamecocks from one place to another, tied them up in the same bag, and found on arriving at his journey's end that they had spent their time in tearing each other to pieces. when his master called him to account for his stupidity he replied: "sir, as they were all your cocks, i thought they would be all on one side." things did not go much more smoothly on shore. mr. macaulay's official correspondence gives a curious picture of his difficulties in the character of minister of public worship in a black community. "the baptists under david george are decent and orderly, but there is observable in them a great neglect of family worship, and sometimes an unfairness in their dealings. to lady huntingdon's methodists, as a body, may with great justice be addressed the first verse of the third chapter of the revelation. the lives of many of them are very disorderly, and rank antinomianism prevails among them." but his sense of religion and decency was most sorely tried by moses wilkinson, a so-called wesleyan methodist, whose congregation, not a very respectable one to begin with, had recently been swollen by a revival which had been accompanied by circumstances the reverse of edifying. [lord macaulay had in his youth heard too much about negro preachers, and negro administrators, to permit him to entertain any very enthusiastic anticipations with regard to the future of the african race. he writes in his journal for july : "motley called. i like him much. we agree wonderfully well about slavery, and it is not often that i meet any person with whom i agree on that subject. for i hate slavery from the bottom of my soul; and yet i am made sick by the cant and the silly mock reasons of the abolitionists. the nigger driver and the negrophile are two odious things to me. i must make lady macbeth's reservation: 'had he not resembled--,'"] the governor must have looked back with regret to that period in the history of the colony when he was underhanded in the clerical department. but his interest in the negro could bear ruder shocks than an occasional outburst of eccentric fanaticism. he liked his work, because he liked those for whom he was working. "poor people," he writes, "one cannot help loving them. with all their trying humours, they have a warmth of affection which is really irresistible." for their sake he endured all the risk and worry inseparable from a long engagement kept by the lady among disapproving friends, and by the gentleman at sierra leone. he stayed till the settlement had begun to thrive, and the company had almost begun to pay; and until the home government had given marked tokens of favour and protection, which some years later developed into a negotiation under which the colony was transferred to the crown. it was not till that he finally gave up his appointment, and left a region which, alone among men, he quitted with unfeigned, and, except in one particular, with unmixed regret. but for the absence of an eve, he regarded the west coast of africa as a veritable paradise, or, to use his own expression, as a more agreeable montpelier. with a temper which in the intercourse of society was proof against being ruffled by any possible treatment of any conceivable subject, to the end of his life he showed faint signs of irritation if anyone ventured in his presence to hint that sierra leone was unhealthy. on his return to england he was appointed secretary to the company, and was married at bristol on the th of august, . a most close union it was, and, (though in latter years he became fearfully absorbed in the leading object of his existence, and ceased in a measure to be the companion that he had been,) his love for his wife, and deep trust and confidence in her, never failed. they took a small house in lambeth for the first twelve months. when mrs. macaulay was near her confinement, mrs. babington, who belonged to the school of matrons who hold that the advantage of country air outweighs that of london doctors, invited her sister-in-law to rothley temple; and there, in a room panelled from ceiling to floor, like every corner of the ancient mansion, with oak almost black from age,--looking eastward across the park and southward through an ivy-shaded window into a little garden,--lord macaulay was born. it was on the th of october , the day of st. crispin, the anniversary of agincourt, (as he liked to say,) that he opened his eyes on a world which he was destined so thoroughly to learn and so intensely to enjoy. his father was as pleased as a father could be; but fate seemed determined that zachary macaulay should not be indulged in any great share of personal happiness. the next morning the noise of a spinning-jenny, at work in a cottage, startled his horse as he was riding past. he was thrown, and both arms were broken; and he spent in a sick-room the remainder of the only holiday worth the name which, (as far as can be traced in the family records,) he ever took during his married life. owing to this accident the young couple were detained at rothley into the winter; and the child was baptised in the private chapel which formed part of the house, on the th november , by the names of thomas babington;--the rev. aulay macaulay, and mr. and mrs. babington, acting as sponsors. the two years which followed were passed in a house in birchin lane, where the sierra leone company had its office. the only place where the child could be taken for exercise, and what might be called air, was drapers' gardens, which (already under sentence to be covered with bricks and mortar at an early date) lies behind throgmorton street, and within a hundred yards of the stock exchange. to this dismal yard, containing as much gravel as grass, and frowned upon by a board of rules and regulations almost as large as itself, his mother used to convoy the nurse and the little boy through the crowds that towards noon swarmed along cornhill and threadneedle street; and thither she would return, after a due interval, to escort them back to birchin lane. so strong was the power of association upon macaulay's mind that in after years drapers' garden was among his favourite haunts. indeed, his habit of roaming for hours through and through the heart of the city, (a habit that never left him as long as he could roam at all,) was due in part to the recollection which caused him to regard that region as native ground. baby as he was when he quitted it, he retained some impression of his earliest home. he remembered standing up at the nursery window by his father's side, looking at a cloud of black smoke pouring out of a tall chimney. he asked if that was hell; an inquiry that was received with a grave displeasure which at the time he could not understand. the kindly father must have been pained, almost against his own will, at finding what feature of his creed it was that had embodied itself in so very material a shape before his little son's imagination. when in after days mrs. macaulay was questioned as to how soon she began to detect in the child a promise of the future, she used to say that his sensibilities and affections were remarkably developed at an age which to her hearers appeared next to incredible. he would cry for joy on seeing her after a few hours' absence, and, (till her husband put a stop to it,) her power of exciting his feelings was often made an exhibition to her friends. she did not regard this precocity as a proof of cleverness; but, like a foolish young mother, only thought that so tender a nature was marked for early death. the next move which the family made was into as healthy an atmosphere, in every sense, as the most careful parent could wish to select. mr. macaulay took a house in the high street of clapham, in the part now called the pavement, on the same side as the plough inn, but some doors nearer to the common. it was a roomy comfortable dwelling, with a very small garden behind, and in front a very small one indeed, which has entirely disappeared beneath a large shop thrown out towards the road-way by the present occupier, who bears the name of heywood. here the boy passed a quiet and most happy childhood. from the time that he was three years old he read incessantly, for the most part lying on the rug before the fire, with his book on the ground, and a piece of bread and batter in his hand. a very clever woman, who then lived in the house as parlour-maid, told how he used to sit in his nankeen frock, perched on the table by her as she was cleaning the plate, and expounding to her out of a volume as big as himself. he did not care for toys, but was very fond of taking his walk, when he would hold forth to his companion, whether nurse or mother, telling interminable stories out of his own head, or repeating what he had been reading in language far above his years. his memory retained without shout effort the phraseology of the book which he had been last engaged on, and he talked, as the maid said, "quite printed words," which produced an effect that appeared formal, and often, no doubt, exceedingly droll. mrs. hannah more was fond of relating how she called at mr. macaulay's, and was met by a fair, pretty, slight child, with abundance of light hair, about four years of age, who came to the front door to receive her, and tell her that his parents were out, but that if she would be good enough to come in he would bring her a glass of old spirits; a proposition which greatly startled the good lady, who had never aspired beyond cowslip wine. when questioned as to what he knew about old spirits, he could only say that robinson crusoe often had some. about this period his father took him on a visit to lady waldegrave at strawberry hill, and was much pleased, to exhibit to his old friend the fair bright boy, dressed in a green coat with red cellar and cuffs, a frill at the throat, and white trousers. after some time had been spent among the wonders of the orford collection, of which he ever after carried a catalogue in his head, a servant who was waiting upon the company in the great gallery spilt some hot coffee over his legs. the hostess was all kindness and compassion, and when, after a while, she asked how he was feeling, the little fellow looked up in her face and replied: "thank you, madam, the agony is abated." but it must not be supposed that his quaint manners proceeded from affectation or conceit; for all testimony declares that a more simple and natural child never lived, or a more lively and merry one. he had at his command the resources of the common; to this day the most unchanged spot within ten miles of st. paul's, and which to all appearance will ere long hold that pleasant preeminence within ten leagues. that delightful wilderness of gorse bushes, and poplar groves, and gravel-pits, and ponds great and small, was to little tom macaulay a region of inexhaustible romance and mystery. he explored its recesses; he composed, and almost believed, its legends; he invented for its different features a nomenclature which has been faithfully preserved by two generations of children. a slight ridge, intersected by deep ditches, towards the west of the common, the very existence of which no one above eight years old would notice, was dignified with the title of the alps; while the elevated island, covered with shrubs, that gives a name to the mount pond, was regarded with infinite awe as being the nearest approach within the circuit of his observation to a conception of the majesty of sinai. indeed, at this period his infant fancy was much exercised with the threats and terrors of the law. he had a little plot of ground at the back of the house, marked out as his own by a tory of oyster-shells, which a maid one day threw away as rubbish. he went straight to the drawing-room, where his mother was entertaining some visitors, walked into the circle, and said very solemnly: "cursed be sally; for it is written, cursed is he that removeth his neighbour's land-mark." while still the merest child he was sent as a day-scholar to mr. greaves, a shrewd yorkshireman with a turn for science, who had been originally brought to the neighbourhood in order to educate a number of african youths sent over to imbibe western civilisation at the fountain-head. the poor fellows had found as much difficulty in keeping alive at clapham as englishmen experience at sierra leone; and, in the end, their tutor set up a school for boys of his own colour, and at one time had charge of almost the entire rising generation of the common. mrs. macaulay explained to tom that he must learn to study without the solace of bread and butter, to which he replied: "yes, mama, industry shall be my bread and attention my butter." but, as a matter of fact, no one ever crept more unwillingly to school. each several afternoon he made piteous entreaties to be excused returning after dinner, and was met by the unvarying formula: "no, tom, if it rains cats and dogs, you shall go." his reluctance to leave home had more than one side to it. not only did his heart stay behind, but the regular lessons of the class took him away from occupations which in his eyes were infinitely more delightful and important; for these were probably the years of his greatest literary activity. as an author he never again had mere facility, or anything like so wide a range. in september , his mother writes: "my dear tom continues to show marks of uncommon genius. he gets on wonderfully in all branches of his education, and the extent of his reading, and of the knowledge he has derived from it, are truly astonishing in a boy not yet eight years old. he is at the same time as playful as a kitten. to give you some idea of the activity of his mind i will mention a few circumstances that may interest you and colin. you will believe that to him we never appear to regard anything he does as anything more than a schoolboy's amusement. he took it into his head to write a compendium of universal history about a year ago, and he really contrived to give a tolerably connected view of the leading events from the creation to the present time, filling about a quire of paper. he told me one day that he had been writing a paper, which henry daly was to translate into malabar, to persuade the people of travancore to embrace the christian religion. on reading it i found it to contain a very clear idea of the leading facts and doctrines of that religion, with some strong arguments for its adoption. he was so fired with reading scott's lay and marmion, the former of which he got entirely, and the latter almost entirely, by heart, merely from his delight in reading them, that he determined on writing himself a poem in six cantos which he called the 'battle of cheviot.' after he had finished about three of the cantos of about lines each, which he did in a couple of days, he became tired of it. i make no doubt he would have finished his design, but, as he was proceeding with it, the thought struck him of writing an heroic poem to be called 'olaus the great, or the conquest of mona,' in which, after the manner of virgil, he might introduce in prophetic song the future fortunes of the family;--among others, those of the hero who aided in the fall of the tyrant of mysore, after having long suffered from his tyranny; [general macaulay had been one of tippoo sahib's prisoners] and of another of his race who had exerted himself for the deliverance of the wretched africans. he has just begun it. he has composed i know not how many hymns. i send you one, as a specimen, in his own handwriting, which he wrote about six months ago on one monday morning while we were at breakfast." the affection of the last generation of his relatives has preserved all these pieces, but the piety of this generation will refrain from submitting them to public criticism. a marginal note, in which macaulay has expressed his cordial approval of uncle toby's [tristram shandy, chapter clxiii.] remark about the great lipsius, indicates his own wishes in the matter too clearly to leave any choice for those who come after him. but there still may be read in a boyish scrawl the epitome of universal history, from "a new king who knew not joseph,"--down through rameses, and dido, and tydeus, and tarquin, and crassus, and gallienus, and edward the martyr,--to louis, who "set off on a crusade against the albigenses," and oliver cromwell, who "was an unjust and wicked man." the hymns remain, which mrs. hannah more, surely a consummate judge of the article, pronounced to be "quite extraordinary for such a baby." to a somewhat later period probably belongs a vast pile of blank verse, entitled "fingal, a poem in xii books;" two of which are in a complete and connected shape, while the rest of the story is lost amidst a labyrinth of many hundred scattered lines, so transcribed as to suggest a conjecture that the boy's demand for foolscap had outrun the paternal generosity. of all his performances, that which attracted most attention at the time was undertaken for the purpose of immortalising olaus magnus, king of norway, from whom the clan to which the bard belonged was supposed to derive its name. two cantos are extant, of which there are several exemplars, in every stage of calligraphy from the largest round hand downwards, a circumstance which is apparently due to the desire on the part of each of the little macaulays to possess a copy of the great family epic. the opening stanzas, each of which contains more lines than their author counted years, go swinging along with plenty of animation and no dearth of historical and geographical allusion. day set on cumbria's hills supreme, and, menai, on thy silver stream. the star of day had reached the west. now in the main it sank to rest. shone great eleindyn's castle tall: shone every battery, every hall: shone all fair mona's verdant plain; but chiefly shone the foaming main. and again "long," said the prince, "shall olave's name live in the high records of fame. fair mona now shall trembling stand that ne'er before feared mortal hand. mona, that isle where ceres' flower in plenteous autumn's golden hour hides all the fields from man's survey as locusts hid old egypt's day." the passage containing a prophetic mention of his father and uncle after the manner of the sixth book of the aeneid, for the sake of which, according to mrs. macaulay, the poem was originally designed, can nowhere be discovered. it is possible that in the interval between the conception and the execution the boy happened to light upon a copy of the rolliad. if such was the case, he already had too fine a sense of humour to have persevered in his original plan after reading that masterpiece of drollery. it is worthy of note that the voluminous writings of his childhood, dashed off at headlong speed in the odds and ends of leisure from school-study and nursery routine, are not only perfectly correct in spelling and grammar, but display the same lucidity of meaning, and scrupulous accuracy in punctuation and the other minor details of the literary art, which characterise his mature works. nothing could be more judicious than the treatment that mr. and mrs. macaulay adopted towards their boy. they never handed his productions about, or encouraged him to parade his powers of conversation or memory. they abstained from any word or act which might foster in him a perception of his own genius with as much care as a wise millionaire expends on keeping his son ignorant of the fact that he is destined to be richer than his comrades. "it was scarcely ever," writes one who knew him well from the very first, "that the consciousness was expressed by either of his parents of the superiority of their son over other children. indeed, with his father i never remember any such expression. what i most observed myself was his extraordinary command of language. when he came to describe to his mother any childish play, i took care to be present, when i could, that i might listen to the way in which he expressed himself, often scarcely exceeded in his later years. except this trifle, i remember him only as a good-tempered boy, always occupied, playing with his sisters without assumption of any kind." one effect of this early discipline showed itself in his freedom from vanity and susceptibility,--those qualities which, coupled together in our modern psychological dialect under the head of "self-consciousness," are supposed to be the besetting defects of the literary character. another result was his habitual over-estimate of the average knowledge possessed by mankind. judging others by himself, he credited the world at large with an amount of information which certainly few have the ability to acquire, or the capacity to retain. if his parents had not been so diligent in concealing from him the difference between his own intellectual stores and those of his neighbours, it is probable that less would have been heard of lord macaulay's schoolboy. the system pursued at home was continued at barley wood, the place where the misses more resided from onwards. mrs. macaulay gladly sent her boy to a house where he was encouraged without being spoiled, and where he never failed to be a welcome guest. the kind old ladies made a real companion of him, and greatly relished his conversation; while at the same time, with their ideas on education, they would never have allowed him, even if he had been so inclined, to forget that he was a child. mrs. hannah more, who had the rare gift of knowing how to live with both young and old, was the most affectionate and the wisest of friends, and readily undertook the superintendence of his studies, his pleasures, and his health. she would keep him with her for weeks, listening to him as he read prose by the ell, declaimed poetry by the hour, and discussed and compared his favourite heroes, ancient, modern, and fictitious, under all points of view and in every possible combination; coaxing him into the garden under pretence of a lecture on botany; sending him from his books to run round the grounds, or play at cooking in the kitchen; giving him bible lessons which invariably ended in a theological argument, and following him with her advice and sympathy through his multifarious literary enterprises. ["the next time," (my uncle once said to us,) "that i saw hannah more was in . the old ladies begged my parents to leave me with them for a week, and this visit was a great event in my life. in parlour and kitchen they could not make enough of me. they taught me to cook; and i was to preach, and they got in people from the fields and i stood on a chair, and preached sermons. i might have been indicted for holding a conventicle."] she writes to his father in : "i heartily hope that the sea air has been the means of setting you up, and mrs. macaulay also, and that the dear little poet has caught his share of bracing.... tell tom i desire to know how 'olaus' goes on. the sea, i suppose, furnished him with some new images." the broader and more genial aspect under which life showed itself to the boy at barley wood has left its trace in a series of childish squibs and parodies, which may still be read with an interest that his cambrian and scandinavian rhapsodies fail to inspire. the most ambitious of these lighter efforts is a pasquinade occasioned by some local scandal, entitled "childe hugh and the labourer, a pathetic ballad." the "childe" of the story was a neighbouring baronet, and the "abbot" a neighbouring rector, and the whole performance, intended, as it was, to mimic the spirit of percy's reliques, irresistibly suggests a reminiscence of john gilpin. it is pleasant to know that to mrs. hannah more was due the commencement of what eventually became the most readable of libraries, as is shown in a series of letters extending over the entire period of macaulay's education. when he was six years old she writes; "though you are a little boy now, you will one day, if it please god, be a man; but long before you are a man i hope you will be a scholar. i therefore wish you to purchase such books as will be useful and agreeable to you _then_, and that you employ this very small sum in laying a little tiny corner-stone for your future library." a year or two afterwards she thanks him for his "two letters, so neat and free from blots. by this obvious improvement you have entitled yourself to another book. you must go to hatchard's and choose. i think we have nearly exhausted the epics. what say you to a little good prose? johnson's hebrides, or walton's lives, unless you would like a neat edition of cowper's poems or paradise lost for your own eating? in any case choose something which you do not possess. i want you to become a complete frenchman, that i may give you racine, the only dramatic poet i know in any modern language that is perfectly pure and good. i think you have hit off the ode very well, and i am much obliged to you for the dedication." the poor little author was already an adept in the traditional modes of requiting a patron. he had another maecenas in the person of general macaulay, who came back from india in . the boy greeted him with a copy of verses, beginning "now safe returned from asia's parching strand, welcome, thrice welcome to thy native land." to tell the unvarnished truth, the general's return was not altogether of a triumphant character. after very narrowly escaping with his life from an outbreak at travancore, incited by a native minister who owed him a grudge, he had given proof of courage and spirit during some military operations which ended in his being brought back to the residency with flying colours. but, when the fighting was over, he countenanced, and perhaps prompted, measures of retaliation which were ill taken by his superiors at calcutta. in his congratulatory effusion the nephew presumes to remind the uncle that on european soil there still might be found employment for so redoubtable a sword. "for many a battle shall be lost and won ere yet thy glorious labours shall be done." the general did not take the hint, and spent the remainder of his life peacefully enough between london, bath, and the continental capitals. he was accustomed to say that his travelling carriage was his only freehold; and, wherever he fixed his temporary residence, he had the talent of making himself popular. at geneva he was a universal favourite; he always was welcome at coppet; and he gave the strongest conceivable proof of a cosmopolitan disposition by finding himself equally at home at rome and at clapham. when in england he lived much with his relations, to whom he was sincerely attached. he was generous in a high degree, and the young people owed to him books which they otherwise could never have obtained, and treats and excursions which formed the only recreations that broke the uniform current of their lives. they regarded their uncle colin as the man of the world of the macaulay family. zachary macaulay's circumstances during these years were good, and constantly improving. for some time he held the post of secretary to the sierra leone company, with a salary of l per annum. he subsequently entered into partnership with a nephew, and the firm did a large business as african merchants under the names of macaulay and babington. the position of the father was favourable to the highest interests of his children. a boy has the best chance of being well brought up in a household where there is solid comfort, combined with thrift and simplicity; and the family was increasing too fast to leave any margin for luxurious expenditure. before the eldest son had completed his thirteenth year he had three brothers and five sisters. [it was in the course of his thirteenth year that the boy wrote his "epitaph on henry martyn." here martyn lies. in manhood's early bloom the christian hero finds a pagan tomb. religion, sorrowing o'er her favourite son, points to the glorious trophies that he won. eternal trophies! not with carnage red, not stained with tears by hapless captives shed, but trophies of the cross. for that dear name, through every form of danger, death, and shame, onward he journeyed to a happier shore, where danger, death and shame assault no more."] in the course of it began to be evident that tom had got beyond the educational capabilities of clapham; and his father seriously contemplated the notion of removing to london in order to place him as a day-scholar at westminster. thorough as was the consideration which the parents gave to the matter, their decision was of more importance than they could at the time foresee. if their son had gone to a public school, it is more than probable that he would have turned out a different man, and have done different work. so sensitive and homeloving a boy might for a while have been too depressed to enter fully unto the ways of the place; but, as he gained confidence, he could not have withstood the irresistible attractions which the life of a great school exercises over a vivid eager nature, and he would have sacrificed to passing pleasures and emulations a part, at any rate, of those years which, in order to be what he was, it was necessary that he should spend wholly among his books. westminster or harrow might have sharpened his faculties for dealing with affairs and with men; but the world at large would have lost more than he could by any possibility have gained. if macaulay had received the usual education of a young englishman, he might in all probability have kept his seat for edinburgh; but he could hardly have written the essay on von ranke, or the description of england in the third chapter of the history. mr. macaulay ultimately fixed upon a private school, kept by the rev. mr. preston, at little shelford, a village in the immediate vicinity of cambridge. the motives which guided this selection were mainly of a religious nature. mr. preston held extreme low church opinions, and stood in the good books of mr. simeon, whose word had long been law in the cambridge section of the evangelical circle. but whatever had been the inducement to make it, the choice proved singularly fortunate. the tutor, it is true, was narrow in his views, and lacked the taste and judgment to set those views before his pupils in an attractive form. theological topics dragged into the conversation at unexpected moments, inquiries about their spiritual state, and long sermons which had to be listened to under the dire obligation of reproducing them in an epitome, fostered in the minds of some of the boys a reaction against the outward manifestations of religion;--a reaction which had already begun under the strict system pursued in their respective homes. but, on the other hand, mr. preston knew both how to teach his scholars, and when to leave them to teach themselves. the eminent judge, who divided grown men into two sharply defined and most uncomplimentary categories, was accustomed to say that private schools made poor creatures, and public schools sad dogs; but mr. preston succeeded in giving a practical contradiction to sir william maine's proposition. his pupils, who were limited to an average of a dozen at a time, got far beyond their share of honours at the university and of distinction in after life. george stainforth, a grandson of sir francis baring, by his success at cambridge was the first to win the school an honourable name, which was more than sustained by henry malden, now greek professor at university college, london, and by macaulay himself. shelford was strongly under the influence of the neighbouring university; an influence which mr. preston, himself a fellow of trinity, wisely encouraged. the boys were penetrated with cambridge ambitions and ways of thought; and frequent visitors brought to the table, where master and pupils dined in common, the freshest cambridge gossip of the graver sort. little macaulay received much kindness from dean milner, the president of queen's college, then at the very summit of a celebrity which is already of the past. those who care to search among the embers of that once brilliant reputation can form a fair notion of what samuel johnson would have been if he had lived a generation later, and had been absolved from the necessity of earning his bread by the enjoyment of ecclesiastical sinecures, and from any uneasiness as to his worldly standing by the possession of academical dignities and functions. the dean who had boundless goodwill for all his fellow-creatures at every period of life, provided that they were not jacobins or sceptics, recognised the promise of the boy, and entertained him at his college residence on terms of friendliness, and almost of equality. after one of these visits he writes to mr. macaulay; "your lad is a fine fellow. he shall stand before kings, he shall not stand before mean men." shelford: february , . my dear papa,--as this is a whole holiday, i cannot find a better time for answering your letter. with respect to my health, i am very well, and tolerably cheerful, as blundell, the best and most clever of all the scholars, is very kind, and talks to me, and takes my part. he is quite a friend of mr. preston's. the other boys, especially lyon, a scotch boy, and wilberforce, are very good-natured, and we might have gone on very well had not one, a bristol fellow, come here. he is unanimously alloyed to be a queer fellow, and is generally characterised as a foolish boy, and by most of us as an ill-natured one. in my learning i do xenophon every day, and twice a week the odyssey, in which i am classed with wilberforce, whom all the boys allow to be very clever, very droll, and very impudent. we do latin verses trice a week, and i have not yet been laughed at, as wilberforce is the only one who hears them, being in my class. we are exercised also once a week in english composition, and once in latin composition, and letters of persons renowned in history to each other. we get by heart greek grammar or virgil every evening. as for sermon-writing, i have hitherto got off with credit, and i hope i shall keep up my reputation. we have had the first meeting of our debating society the other day, when a vote of censure was moved for upon wilberforce, but he getting up said, "mr. president, i beg to second the motion." by this means he escaped. the kindness which mr. preston shows me is very great. he always assists me in what i cannot do, and takes me to walk out with him every now and then. my room is a delightful snug little chamber, which nobody can enter, as there is a trick about opening the door. i sit like a king, with my writing-desk before me; for, (would you believe it?) there is a writing-desk in my chest of drawers; my books on one side, my box of papers on the other, with my arm-chair and my candle; for every boy has a candlestick, snuffers, and extinguisher of his own. being pressed for room, i will conclude what i have to say to-morrow, and ever remain, your affectionate son, thomas b. macaulay. the youth who on this occasion gave proof of his parentage by his readiness and humour was wilberforce's eldest son. a fortnight later on, the subject chosen for discussion was "whether lord wellington or marlborough was the greatest general. a very warm debate is expected." shelford: april , . my dear mama,--pursuant to my promise i resume my pen to write to you with the greatest pleasure. since i wrote to you yesterday, i have enjoyed myself more than i have ever done since i came to shelford. mr. hodson called about twelve o'clock yesterday morning with a pony for me, and took me with him to cambridge. how surprised and delighted was i to learn that i was to take a bed at queen's college in dean milner's apartments! wilberforce arrived soon after, and i spent the day very agreeably, the dean amusing me with the greatest kindness. i slept there, and came home on horseback to-day just in time for dinner. the dean has invited me to come again, and mr. preston has given his consent. the books which i am at present employed in reading to myself are, in english, plutarch's lives, and milner's ecclesiastical history; in french, fenelon's dialogues of the dead. i shall send you back the volumes of madame de genlis's petits romans as soon as possible, and i should be very much obliged for one or two more of them. everything now seems to feel the influence of spring. the trees are all out. the lilacs are in bloom. the days are long, and i feel that i should be happy were it not that i want home. even yesterday, when i felt more real satisfaction than i have done for almost three months, i could not help feeling a sort of uneasiness, which indeed i have always felt more or less since i have been here, and which is the only thing that hinders me from being perfectly happy. this day two months will put a period to my uneasiness. "fly fast the hours, and dawn th' expected morn." every night when i lie down i reflect that another day is cut off from the tiresome time of absence. your affectionate son, thomas b. macaulay. shelford: april . my dear papa,--since i have given you a detail of weekly duties, i hope you will be pleased to be informed of my sunday's occupations. it is quite a day of rest here, and i really look to it with pleasure through the whole of the week. after breakfast we learn a chapter in the greek testament that is with the aid of our bibles, and without doing it with a dictionary like other lessons. we then go to church. we dine almost as soon as we come back, and we are left to ourselves till afternoon church. during this time i employ myself in reading, and mr. preston lends me any books for which i ask him, so that i am nearly as well off in this respect as at home, except for one thing, which, though i believe it is useful, is not very pleasant. i can only ask for one book at a time, and cannot touch another till i have read it through. we then go to church, and after we come hack i read as before till tea-time. after tea we write out the sermon. i cannot help thinking that mr. preston uses all imaginable means to make us forget it, for he gives us a glass of wine each on sunday, and on sunday only, the very day when we want to have all our faculties awake; and some do literally go to sleep during the sermon, and look rather silly when they wake. i, however, have not fallen into this disaster. your affectionate son, thomas b. macaulay. the constant allusions to home politics and to the progress of the continental struggle, which occur throughout zachary macaulay's correspondence with his son, prove how freely, and on what an equal footing, the parent and child already conversed on questions of public interest. the following letter is curious as a specimen of the eagerness with which the boy habitually flung himself into the subjects which occupied his father's thoughts. the renewal of the east india company's charter was just then under the consideration of parliament, and the whole energies of the evangelical party were exerted in order to signalise the occasion by securing our eastern dominions as a field for the spread of christianity. petitions against the continued exclusion of missionaries were in course of circulation throughout the island, the drafts of which had been prepared by mr. macaulay. shelford: may , . my dear papa,--as on monday it will be out of my power to write, since the examination subjects are to be given out i write to-day instead to answer your kind and long letter. i am very much pleased that the nation seems to take such interest in the introduction of christianity into india. my scotch blood begins to boil at the mention of the , names that went up from a single country parish. ask mama and selina if they do not now admit my argument with regard to the superior advantages of the scotch over the english peasantry. as to my examination preparations, i will if you please give you a sketch of my plan. on monday, the day on which the examination subjects are given out, i shall begin. my first performance will be my verses and my declamation. i shall then translate the greek and latin. the first time of going over i shall mark the passages which puzzle me, and then return to them again. but i shall have also to rub up my mathematics, (by the bye, i begin the second book of euclid to-day,) and to study whatever history may be appointed for the examination. i shall not be able to avoid trembling, whether i know my subjects or not. i am however intimidated at nothing but greek. mathematics suit my taste, although, before i came, i declaimed against them, and asserted that, when i went to college, it should not be to cambridge. i am occupied with the hope of lecturing mama and selina upon mathematics, as i used to do upon heraldry, and to change or, and argent, and azure, and gules, for squares, and points, and circles, and angles, and triangles, and rectangles, and rhomboids, and in a word "all the pomp and circumstance" of euclid. when i come home i shall, if my purse is sufficient, bring a couple of rabbits for selina and jane. your affectionate son, thomas b. macaulay. it will be seen that this passing fondness for mathematics soon changed into bitter disgust. clapham may , . my dear tom,--i am very happy to hear that you have so far advanced in your different prize exercises, and with such little fatigue. i know you write with great ease to yourself, and would rather write ten poems than prune one; but remember that excellence is not attained at first. all your pieces are much mended after a little reflection, and therefore take some solitary walks, and think over each separate thing. spare no time or trouble to render each piece as perfect as you can, and then leave the event without one anxious thought. i have always admired a saying of one of the old heathen philosophers. when a friend was condoling with him that he so well deserved of the gods, and yet that they did not shower their favours on him, as on some others less worthy, he answered, "i will, however, continue to deserve well of them." so do you, my dearest. do your best because it is the will of god you should improve every faculty to the utmost now, and strengthen the powers of your mind by exercise, and then in future you will be better enabled to glorify god with all your powers and talents, be they of a more humble, or higher order, and you shall not fail to be received into everlasting habitations, with the applauding voice of your saviour, "well done, good and faithful servant." you see how ambitious your mother is. she must have the wisdom of her son acknowledged before angels, and an assembled world. my wishes can soar no higher, and they can be content with nothing less for any of my children. the first time i saw your face, i repeated those beautiful lines of watts' cradle hymn, mayst thou live to know and fear him, trust and love him all thy days then go dwell for ever near him, see his face, and sing his praise. and this is the substance of all my prayers for you. in less than a month you and i shall, i trust, be rambling over the common, which now looks quite beautiful. i am ever, my dear tom, your affectionate mother, selina macaulay. the commencement of the second half-year at school, perhaps the darkest season of a boy's existence, was marked by an unusually severe and prolonged attack of home-sickness. it would be cruel to insert the first letter written after the return to shelford from the summer holidays. that which follows it is melancholy enough. shelford: august . . my dear mama,--i must confess that i have been a little disappointed at not receiving a letter from home to-day. i hope, however, for one to-morrow. my spirits are far more depressed by leaving home than they were last half-year. everything brings home to my recollection. everything i read, or see, or hear, brings it to my mind. you told me i should be happy when i once came here, but not an hour passes in which i do not shed tears at thinking of home. every hope, however unlikely to be realised, affords me some small consolation. the morning on which i went, you told me that possibly i might come home before the holidays. if you can confirm this hope, believe me when i assure you that there is nothing which i would not give for one instant's sight of home. tell me in your next, expressly, if you can, whether or no there is any likelihood of my coming home before the holidays. if i could gain papa's leave, i should select my birthday on october as the time which i should wish to spend at that home which absence renders still dearer to me. i think i see you sitting by papa just after his dinner, reading my letter, and turning to him, with an inquisitive glance, at the end of the paragraph. i think too that i see his expressive shake of the head at it. o, may i be mistaken! you cannot conceive what an alteration a favourable answer would produce in me. if your approbation of my request depends upon my advancing in study, i will work like a cart-horse. if you should refuse it, you will deprive me of the most pleasing illusion which i ever experienced in my life. pray do not fail to write speedily. your dutiful and affectionate son, t. b. macaulay. his father answered him in a letter of strong religious complexion, full of feeling, and even of beauty, but too long for reproduction in a biography that is not his own. mr. macaulay's deep anxiety for his son's welfare sometimes induced him to lend too ready an ear to busybodies, who informed him of failings in the boy which would have been treated more lightly, and perhaps more wisely, by a less devoted father. in the early months of he writes as follows, after hearing the tale of some guest of mr. preston whom tom had no doubt contradicted at table in presence of the assembled household. london: march , . my dear tom,--in taking up my pen this morning a passage in cowper almost involuntarily occurred to me. you will find it at length in his "conversation." "ye powers who rule the tongue, if such there are, and make colloquial happiness your care, preserve me from the thing i dread and hate, a duel in the form of a debate. vociferated logic kills me quite. a noisy man is always in the right." you know how much such a quotation as this would fall in with my notions, averse as i am to loud and noisy tones, and self-confident, overwhelming, and yet perhaps very unsound arguments. and you will remember how anxiously i dwelt upon this point while you were at home. i have been in hopes that this half-year would witness a great change in you in this respect. my hopes, however, have been a little damped by something which i heard last week through a friend, who seemed to have received an impression that you had gained a high distinction among the young gentlemen at shelford by the loudness and vehemence of your tones. now, my dear tom, you cannot doubt that this gives me pain; and it does so not so much on account of the thing itself, as because i consider it a pretty infallible test of the mind within. i do long and pray most earnestly that the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit may be substituted for vehemence and self-confidence, and that you may be as much distinguished for the former as ever you have been for the latter. it is a school in which i am not ambitious that any child of mine should take a high degree. if the people of shelford be as bad as you represent them in your letters, what are they but an epitome of the world at large? are they ungrateful to you for your kindnesses? are they foolish, and wicked, and wayward in the use of their faculties? what is all this but what we ourselves are guilty of every day? consider how much in our case the guilt of such conduct is aggravated by our superior knowledge. we shall not have ignorance to plead in its extenuation, as many of the people of shelford may have. now, instead of railing at the people of shelford, i think the best thing which you and your schoolfellows could do would be to try to reform them. you can buy and distribute useful and striking tracts, as well as testaments, among such as can read. the cheap repository and religious tract society will furnish tracts suited to all descriptions of persons; and for those who cannot read--why should you not institute a sunday school to be taught by yourselves, and in which appropriate rewards being given for good behaviour, not only at school but through the week, great effects of a moral kind might soon be produced? i have exhausted my paper, and must answer the rest of your letter in a few days. in the meantime, i am ever your most affectionate father, zachary macaulay. a father's prayers are seldom fulfilled to the letter. many years were to elapse before the son ceased to talk loudly and with confidence; and the literature that he was destined to distribute through the world was of another order from that which mr. macaulay here suggests. the answer, which is addressed to the mother, affords a proof that the boy could already hold his own. the allusions to the christian observer, of which his father was editor, and to dr. herbert marsh, with whom the ablest pens of clapham were at that moment engaged in hot and embittered controversy, are thrown in with an artist's hand. shelford: april . . my dear mama,--the news is glorious indeed. peace! peace with a bourbon, with a descendant of henri quatre, with a prince who is bound to us by all the ties of gratitude. i have some hopes that it will be a lasting peace; that the troubles of the last twenty years may make kings and nations wiser. i cannot conceive a greater punishment to buonaparte than that which the allies have inflicted on him. how can his ambitious mind support it? all his great projects and schemes, which once made every throne in europe tremble, are buried in the solitude of an italian isle. how miraculously everything has been conducted! we almost seem to hear the almighty saying to the fallen tyrant, "for this cause have i raised thee up, that i might show in thee my power." as i am in very great haste with this letter, i shall have but little time to write. i am sorry to hear that some nameless friend of papa's denounced my voice as remarkably loud. i have accordingly resolved to speak in a moderate key except on the undermentioned special occasions. imprimis, when i am speaking at the same time with three others. secondly, when i am praising the christian observer. thirdly, when i am praising mr. preston or his sisters i may be allowed to speak in my loudest voice, that they may hear me. i saw to-day that greatest of churchmen, that pillar of orthodoxy, that true friend to the liturgy, that mortal enemy to the bible society,--herbert marsh, d.d., professor of divinity on lady margaret's foundation. i stood looking at him for about ten minutes, and shall always continue to maintain that he is a very ill-favoured gentleman as far as outward appearance is concerned. i am going this week to spend a day or two at dean milner's, where i hope, nothing unforeseen preventing, to see you in about two months' time. ever your affectionate son, t.b. macaulay. in the course of the year mr. preston removed his establishment to aspenden hall near buntingford, in hertfordshire; a large old-fashioned mansion, standing amidst extensive shrubberies, and a pleasant undulating domain sprinkled with fine timber. the house has been rebuilt within the last twenty years, and nothing remains of it except the dark oak panelling of the hall in which the scholars made their recitations on the annual speech day. the very pretty church, which stands hard by within the grounds, was undergoing restoration in and by this time the only existing portion of the former internal fittings is the family pew, in which the boys sat on drowsy summer afternoons, doing what they could to keep their impressions of the second sermon distinct from their reminiscences of the morning. here macaulay spent four most industrious years, doing less and less in the class-room as time went on, but enjoying the rare advantage of studying greek and latin by the side of such a scholar as malden. the two companions were equally matched in age and classical attainments, and at the university maintained a rivalry so generous as hardly to deserve the name. each of the pupils had his own chamber, which the others were forbidden to enter under the penalty of a shilling fine. this prohibition was in general not very strictly observed; but the tutor had taken the precaution of placing macaulay in a room next his own;--a proximity which rendered the position of an intruder so exceptionally dangerous that even malden could not remember having once passed his friend's threshold during the whole of their stay at aspenden. in this seclusion, removed from the delight of family intercourse, (the only attraction strong enough to draw him from his books,) the boy read widely, unceasingly, more than rapidly. the secret of his immense acquirements lay in two invaluable gifts of nature,--an unerring memory, and the capacity for taking in at a glance the contents of a printed page. during the first part of his life he remembered whatever caught his fancy without going through the process of consciously getting it by heart. as a child, during one of the numerous seasons when the social duties devolved upon mr. macaulay, he accompanied his father on an afternoon call, and found on a table the lay of the last minstrel, which he had never before met with. he kept himself quiet with his prize while the elders were talking, and, on his return home, sat down upon his mother's bed, and repeated to her as many cantos as she had the patience or the strength to listen to. at one period of his life he was known to say that, if by some miracle of vandalism all copies of paradise lost and the pilgrim's progress were destroyed off the face of the earth, he would undertake to reproduce them both from recollection whenever a revival of learning came. in , while waiting in a cambridge coffee-room for a postchaise which was to take him to his school, he picked up a county newspaper containing two such specimens of provincial poetical talent as in those days might be read in the corner of any weekly journal. one piece was headed "reflections of an exile;" while the other was a trumpery parody on the welsh ballad "ar hyd y nos," referring to some local anecdote of an ostler whose nose had been bitten off by a filly. he looked them once through, and never gave them a thought for forty years, at the end of which time he repeated them both without missing,--or, as far as he knew, changing,--a single word. [sir william stirling maxwell says, in a letter with which he has honoured me: "of his extraordinary memory i remember lord jeffrey telling me an instance. they had had a difference about a quotation from paradise lost, and made a wager about it; the wager being a copy of the hook, which, on reference to the passage, it was found jeffrey had won. the bet was made just before, and paid immediately after, the easter vacation. on putting the volume into jeffrey's hand, your uncle said, 'i don't think you will find me tripping again. i knew it, i thought, pretty well before; but i am sure i know it now.' jeffrey proceeded to examine him, putting him on at a variety of the heaviest passages--the battle of the angels--the dialogues of adam and the archangels,--and found him ready to declaim them all, till he begged him to stop. he asked him how he had acquired such a command of the poem, and had for answer: 'i had him in the country, and i read it twice over, and i don't think that i shall ever forget it again.' at the same time he told jeffrey that he believed he could repeat everything of his own he had ever printed, and nearly all he had ever written, 'except, perhaps, some of my college exercises.' "i myself had an opportunity of seeing and hearing a remarkable proof of your uncle's hold upon the most insignificant verbiage that chance had poured into his ear. i was staying with him at bowood, in the winter of . lord elphinstone--who had been many years before governor of madras,--was telling one morning at breakfast of a certain native barber there, who was famous, in his time, for english doggrel of his own making, with which he was wont to regale his customers. 'of course,' said lord elphinstone, 'i don't remember any of it; but was very funny, and used to be repeated in society.' macaulay, who was sitting a good way off, immediately said: 'i remember being shaved by the fellow, and he recited a quantity of verse to me during the operation, and here is some of it;' and then he went off in a very queer doggrel about the exploits of bonaparte, of which i recollect the recurring refrain-- but when he saw the british boys, he up and ran away. it is hardly conceivable that he had ever had occasion to recall that poem since the day when he escaped from under the poet's razor.] as he grew older, this wonderful power became impaired so far that getting by rote the compositions of others was no longer an involuntary process. he has noted in his lucan the several occasions on which he committed to memory his favourite passages of an author whom he regarded as unrivalled among rhetoricians; and the dates refer to , when he had just turned the middle point of life. during his last years, at his dressing-table in the morning, he would learn by heart one or another of the little idylls in which martial expatiates on the enjoyments of a spanish country-house, or a villa-farm in the environs of rome;--those delicious morsels of verse which, (considering the sense that modern ideas attach to the name,) it is an injustice to class under the head of epigrams. macaulay's extraordinary faculty of assimilating printed matter at first sight remained the same through life. to the end he read books more quickly than other people skimmed them, and skimmed them as fast as anyone else could turn the leaves. "he seemed to read through the skin," said one who had often watched the operation. and this speed was not in his case obtained at the expense of accuracy. anything which had once appeared in type, from the highest effort of genius down to the most detestable trash that ever consumed ink and paper manufactured for better things, had in his eyes an authority which led him to look upon misquotation as a species of minor sacrilege. with these endowments, sharpened by an insatiable curiosity, from his fourteenth year onward he was permitted to roam almost at will over the whole expanse of literature. he composed little beyond his school exercises, which themselves bear signs of having been written in a perfunctory manner. at this period he had evidently no heart in anything but his reading. before leaving shelford for aspenden he had already invoked the epic muse for the last time. "arms and the man i sing, who strove in vain to save green erin from a foreign reign." the man was roderic, king of connaught, whom he got tired of singing before he had well completed two books of the poem. thenceforward he appears never to have struck his lyre, except in the first enthusiasm aroused by the intelligence of some favourable turn of fortune on the continent. the flight of napoleon from russia was celebrated in a "pindaric ode" duly distributed into strophes and antistrophes; and, when the allies entered paris, the school put his services into requisition to petition for a holiday in honour of the event. he addressed his tutor in a short poem, which begins with a few sonorous and effective couplets, grows more and more like the parody on fitzgerald in "rejected addresses," and ends in a peroration of which the intention is unquestionably mock-heroic: "oh, by the glorious posture of affairs, by the enormous price that omnium hears, by princely bourbon's late recovered crown, and by miss fanny's safe return from town, oh, do not thou, and thou alone, refuse to show thy pleasure at this glorious news!" touched by the mention of his sister, mr. preston yielded and young macaulay never turned another verse except at the bidding of his schoolmaster, until, on the eve of his departure for cambridge, he wrote between three and four hundred lines of a drama, entitled "don fernando," marked by force and fertility of diction, but somewhat too artificial to be worthy of publication under a name such as his. much about the same time he communicated to malden the commencement of a burlesque poem on the story of anthony babington; who, by the part that he took in the plots against the life of queen elizabeth, had given the family a connection with english history which, however questionable, was in macaulay's view better than none. "each, says the proverb, has his taste. 'tis true. marsh loves a controversy; coates a play; bennet a felon; lewis way a jew; the jew the silver spoons of lewis way. the gipsy poetry, to own the truth, has been my love through childhood and in youth." it is perhaps as well that the project to all appearance stopped with the first stanza, which in its turn was probably written for the sake of a single line. the young man had a better use for his time than to spend it in producing frigid imitations of beppo. he was not unpopular among his fellow-pupils, who regarded him with pride and admiration, tempered by the compassion which his utter inability to play at any sort of game would have excited in every school, private or public alike. he troubled himself very little about the opinion of those by whom he was surrounded at aspenden. it required the crowd and the stir of a university to call forth the social qualities which he possessed in so large a measure. the tone of his correspondence during these years sufficiently indicates that he lived almost exclusively among books. his letters, which had hitherto been very natural and pretty, began to smack of the library, and please less than those written in early boyhood. his pen was overcharged with the metaphors and phrases of other men; and it was not till maturing powers had enabled him to master and arrange the vast masses of literature which filled his memory that his native force could display itself freely through the medium of a style which was all his own. in he began a formal literary correspondence, after the taste of the previous century, with mr. hudson, a gentleman in the examiner's office of the east india house. aspenden hall: august , . dear sir,--the spectator observes, i believe in his first paper, that we can never read an author with much zest unless we are acquainted with his situation. i feel the same in my epistolary correspondence; and, supposing that in this respect we may be alike, i will just tell you my condition. imagine a house in the middle of pretty large grounds, surrounded by palings. these i never pass. you may therefore suppose that i resemble the hermit of parnell. "as yet by books and swains the world he knew, nor knew if books and swains report it true." if you substitute newspapers and visitors for books and swains, you may form an idea of what i know of the present state of things. write to me as one who is ignorant of every event except political occurrences. these i learn regularly; but if lord byron were to publish melodies or romances, or scott metrical tales without number, i should never see them, or perhaps hear of them, till christmas. retirement of this kind, though it precludes me from studying the works of the hour, is very favourable for the employment of "holding high converse with the mighty dead." i know not whether "peeping at the world through the loopholes of retreat" be the best way of forming us for engaging in its busy and active scenes. i am sure it is not a way to my taste. poets may talk of the beauties of nature, the enjoyments of a country life, and rural innocence; but there is another kind of life which, though unsung by bards, is yet to me infinitely superior to the dull uniformity of country life. london is the place for me. its smoky atmosphere, and its muddy river, charm me more than the pure air of hertfordshire, and the crystal currents of the river rib. nothing is equal to the splendid varieties of london life, "the fine flow of london talk," and the dazzling brilliancy of london spectacles. such are my sentiments, and, if ever i publish poetry, it shall not be pastoral. nature is the last goddess to whom my devoirs shall be paid. yours most faithfully, thomas b. macaulay. this votary of city life was still two months short of completing his fifteenth year! aspenden hall: august , . my dear mama,--you perceive already in so large a sheet, and so small a hand, the promise of a long, a very long letter, longer, as i intend it, than all the letters which you send in a half-year together. i have again begun my life of sterile monotony, unvarying labour, the dull return of dull exercises in dull uniformity of tediousness. but do not think that i complain. my mind to me a kingdom is, such perfect joy therein i find as doth exceed all other bliss that god or nature hath assigned. assure yourself that i am philosopher enough to be happy,--i meant to say not particularly unhappy,--in solitude; but man is an animal made for society. i was gifted with reason, not to speculate in aspenden park, but to interchange ideas with some person who can understand me. this is what i miss at aspenden. there are several here who possess both taste and reading; who can criticise lord byron and southey with much tact and "savoir du metier." but here it is not the fashion to think. hear what i have read since i came here. hear and wonder! i have in the first place read boccacio's decameron, a tale of a hundred cantos. he is a wonderful writer. whether he tells in humorous or familiar strains the follies of the silly calandrino, or the witty pranks of buffalmacco and bruno, or sings in loftier numbers dames, knights, and arms, and love, the feats that spring from courteous minds and generous faith, or lashes with a noble severity and fearless independence the vices of the monks and the priestcraft of the established religion, he is always elegant, amusing, and, what pleases and surprises most in a writer of so unpolished an age, strikingly delicate and chastised. i prefer him infinitely to chaucer. if you wish for a good specimen of boccacio, as soon as you have finished my letter, (which will come, i suppose, by dinner-time,) send jane up to the library for dryden's poems, and you will find among them several translations from boccacio, particularly one entitled "theodore and honoria." but, truly admirable as the bard of florence is, i must not permit myself to give him more than his due share of my letter. i have likewise read gil blas, with unbounded admiration of the abilities of le sage. malden and i have read thalaba together, and are proceeding to the curse of kehama. do not think, however, that i am neglecting more important studies than either southey or boccacio. i have read the greater part of the history of james i. and mrs. montague's essay on shakspeare, and a great deal of gibbon. i never devoured so many books in a fortnight. john smith, bob hankinson, and i, went over the hebrew melodies together. i certainly think far better of them than we used to do at clapham. papa may laugh, and indeed he did laugh me out of my taste at clapham; but i think that there is a great deal of beauty in the first melody, "she walks in beauty," though indeed who it is that walks in beauty is not very exactly defined. my next letter shall contain a production of my muse, entitled "an inscription for the column of waterloo," which is to be shown to mr. preston to-morrow. what he may think of it i do not know. but i am like my favourite cicero about my own productions. it is all one to me what others think of them. i never like them a bit less for being disliked by the rest of mankind. mr. preston has desired me to bring him up this evening two or three subjects for a declamation. those which i have selected are as follows: st, a speech in the character of lord coningsby, impeaching the earl of oxford; nd, an essay on the utility of standing armies; rd, an essay on the policy of great britain with regard to continental possessions. i conclude with sending my love to papa, selina, jane, john, ("but he is not there," as fingal pathetically says, when in enumerating his sons who should accompany him to the chase he inadvertently mentions the dead ryno,) henry, fanny, hannah, margaret, and charles. valete. t.b. macaulay. this exhaustive enumeration of his brothers and sisters invites attention to that home where he reigned supreme. lady trevelyan thus describes their life at clapham: "i think that my father's strictness was a good counterpoise to the perfect worship of your uncle by the rest of the family. to us he was an object of passionate love and devotion. to us he could do no wrong. his unruffled sweetness of temper, his unfailing flow of spirits, his amusing talk, all made his presence so delightful that his wishes and his tastes were our law. he hated strangers; and his notion of perfect happiness was to see us all working round him while he read aloud a novel, and then to walk all together on the common, or, if it rained, to have a frightfully noisy game of hide-and-seek. i have often wondered how our mother could ever have endured our noise in her little house. my earliest recollections speak of the intense happiness of the holidays, beginning with finding him in papa's room in the morning; the awe at the idea of his having reached home in the dark after we were in bed, and the saturnalia which at once set in;--no lessons; nothing but fun and merriment for the whole six weeks. in the year we were at brighton for the summer holidays, and he read to us sir charles grandison. it was always a habit in our family to read aloud every evening. among the books selected i can recall clarendon, burnet, shakspeare, (a great treat when my mother took the volume,) miss edgeworth, mackenzie's lounger and mirror, and, as a standing dish, the quarterly and the edinburgh reviews. poets too, especially scott and crabbe, were constantly chosen. poetry and novels, except during tom's holidays, were forbidden in the daytime, and stigmatised as 'drinking drams in the morning.'" morning or evening, mr. macaulay disapproved of novel-reading; but, too indulgent to insist on having his own way in any but essential matters, he lived to see himself the head of a family in which novels were more read, and better remembered, than in any household of the united kingdom. the first warning of the troubles that were in store for him was an anonymous letter addressed to him as editor of the christian observer, defending works of fiction, and eulogising fielding and smollett. this he incautiously inserted in his periodical, and brought down upon himself the most violent objurgations from scandalised contributors, one of whom informed the public that he had committed the obnoxious number to the flames, and should thenceforward cease to take in the magazine. the editor replied with becoming spirit; although by that time he was aware that the communication, the insertion of which in an unguarded moment had betrayed him into a controversy for which he had so little heart, had proceeded from the pen of his son. such was young macaulay's first appearance in print, if we except the index to the thirteenth volume of the christian observer, which he drew up during his christmas holidays of . the place where he performed his earliest literary work can be identified with tolerable certainty. he enjoyed the eldest son's privilege of a separate bedchamber; and there, at the front window on the top story, furthest from the common and nearest to london, we can fancy him sitting, apart from the crowded play-room, keeping himself warm as best he might, and travelling steadily through the blameless pages the contents of which it was his task to classify for the convenience of posterity. lord macaulay used to remark that thackeray introduced too much of the dissenting element into his picture of clapham in the opening chapters of "the newcomes." the leading people of the place,--with the exception of mr. william smith, the unitarian member of parliament,--were one and all staunch churchmen; though they readily worked in concert with those religious communities which held in the main the same views, and pursued the same objects, as themselves. old john thornton, the earliest of the evangelical magnates, when he went on his annual tour to the south coast or the scotch mountains, would take with him some independent or wesleyan minister who was in need of a holiday; and his followers in the next generation had the most powerful motives for maintaining the alliance which he had inaugurated. they could not neglect such doughty auxiliaries in the memorable war which they waged against cruelty, ignorance, and irreligion, and in their less momentous skirmishes with the votaries of the stage, the racecourse, and the card-table. without the aid of nonconformist sympathy, and money, and oratory, and organisation, their operations would have been doomed to certain failure. the cordial relations entertained with the members of other denominations by those among whom his youth was passed did much to indoctrinate macaulay with a lively and genuine interest in sectarian theology. he possessed a minute acquaintance, very rare among men of letters, with the origin and growth of the various forms of faith and practice which have divided the allegiance of his countrymen; not the least important of his qualifications for writing the history of an epoch when the national mind gave itself to religious controversy even more largely than has been its wont. the method of education in vogue among the clapham families was simple, without being severe. in the spacious gardens, and the commodious houses of an architecture already dating a century back, which surrounded the common, there was plenty of freedom, and good fellowship, and reasonable enjoyment for young and old alike. here again thackeray has not done justice to a society that united the mental culture, and the intellectual activity, which are developed by the neighbourhood of a great capital, with the wholesome quiet and the homely ways of country life. hobson and brian newcome are not fair specimens of the effect of clapham influences upon the second generation. there can have been nothing vulgar, and little that was narrow, in a training which produced samuel wilberforce, and sir james stephen, and charles and robert grant, and lord macaulay. the plan on which children were brought up in the chosen home of the low church party, during its golden age, will bear comparison with systems about which, in their day, the world was supposed never to tire of hearing, although their ultimate results have been small indeed. it is easy to trace whence the great bishop and the great writer derived their immense industry. working came as naturally as walking to sons who could not remember a time when their fathers idled. "mr. wilberforce and mr. babington have never appeared downstairs lately, except to take a hasty dinner, and for half an hour after we have supped. the slave-trade now occupies them nine hours daily. mr. babington told me last night that he had fourteen hundred folio pages to read, to detect the contradictions, and to collect the answers which corroborate mr. wilberforce's assertions in his speeches. these, with more than two thousand pages to be abridged, must be done within a fortnight, and they talk of sitting up one night in every week to accomplish it. the two friends begin to look very ill, but they are in excellent spirits, and at this moment i hear them laughing at some absurd questions in the examination." passages such as this are scattered broadcast through the correspondence of wilberforce and his friends. fortitude, and diligence, and self-control, and all that makes men good and great, cannot be purchased from professional educators. charity is not the only quality which begins at home. it is throwing away money to spend a thousand a year on the teaching of three boys, if they are to return from school only to find the older members of their family intent on amusing themselves at any cost of time and trouble, or sacrificing self-respect in ignoble efforts to struggle into a social grade above their own. the child will never place his aims high, and pursue them steadily, unless the parent has taught him what energy, and elevation of purpose, mean not less by example than by precept. in that company of indefatigable workers none equalled the labours of zachary macaulay. even now, when he has been in his grave for more than the third of a century, it seems almost an act of disloyalty to record the public services of a man who thought that he had done less than nothing if his exertions met with praise, or even with recognition. the nature and value of those services may be estimated from the terms in which a very competent judge, who knew how to weigh his words, spoke of the part which mr. macaulay played in one only of his numerous enterprises,--the suppression of slavery and the slave-trade. "that god had called him into being to wage war with this gigantic evil became his immutable conviction. during forty successive years he was ever burdened with this thought. it was the subject of his visions by day and of his dreams by night. to give them reality he laboured as men labour for the honours of a profession or for the subsistence of their children. in that service he sacrificed all that a man may lawfully sacrifice--health, fortune, repose, favour, and celebrity. he died a poor man, though wealth was within his reach. he devoted himself to the severest toil, amidst allurements to luxuriate in the delights of domestic and social intercourse, such as few indeed have encountered. he silently permitted some to usurp his hardly-earned honours, that no selfish controversy might desecrate their common cause. he made no effort to obtain the praises of the world, though he had talents to command, and a temper peculiarly disposed to enjoy them. he drew upon himself the poisoned shafts of calumny, and, while feeling their sting as generous spirits only can feel it, never turned a single step aside from his path to propitiate or to crush the slanderers." zachary macaulay was no mere man of action. it is difficult to understand when it was that he had time to pick up his knowledge of general literature; or how he made room for it in a mind so crammed with facts and statistics relating to questions of the day that when wilberforce was at a loss for a piece of information he used to say, "let us look it out in macaulay." his private papers, which are one long register of unbroken toil, do nothing to clear up the problem. highly cultivated, however, he certainly was, and his society was in request with many who cared little for the objects which to him were everything. that he should have been esteemed and regarded by lord brougham, francis homer, and sir james mackintosh, seems natural enough, but there is something surprising in finding him in friendly and frequent intercourse with some of his most distinguished french contemporaries. chateaubriand, sismondi, the duc de broglie, madame de stael, and dumont, the interpreter of bentham, corresponded with him freely in their own language, which he wrote to admiration. the gratification that his foreign acquaintance felt at the sight of his letters would have been unalloyed but for the pamphlets and blue-books by which they were too often accompanied. it is not difficult to imagine the feelings of a parisian on receiving two quarto volumes, with the postage only in part pre-paid, containing the proceedings of a committee on apprenticeship in the west indies, and including the twelve or fifteen thousand questions and answers on which the report was founded. it would be hard to meet with a more perfect sample of the national politeness than the passage in which m. dumont acknowledges one of the less formidable of these unwelcome gifts. "mon cher ami,--je ne laisserai pas partir mr. inglis sans le charger de quelques lignes pour vous, afin de vous remercier du christian observer que vous avez eu la bonte de m'envoyer. vous savez que j'ai a great taste for it; mais il faut vous avouer une triste verite, c'est que je manque absolument de loisir pour le lire. ne m'en envoyez plus; car je me sens peine d'avoir sous les yeux de si bonnes choses, dont je n'ai pas le temps de tue nourrir." "in the year ," lady trevelyan writes, "my parents made a tour in scotland with your uncle. brougham gave them a letter to jeffrey, who hospitably entertained them; but your uncle said that jeffrey was not at all at his ease, and was apparently so terrified at my father's religious reputation that he seemed afraid to utter a joke. your uncle complained grievously that they travelled from manse to manse, and always came in for very long prayers and expositions. [macaulay writes in his journal of august , : "we passed my old acquaintance, dumbarton castle, i remembered my first visit to dumbarton, and the old minister, who insisted on our eating a bit of cake with him, and said a grace over it which might have been prologue to a dinner of the fishmongers' company, or the grocers' company."] i think, with all the love and reverence with which your uncle regarded his father's memory, there mingled a shade of bitterness that he had not met quite the encouragement and appreciation from him which he received from others. but such a son as he was! never a disrespectful word or look; always anxious to please and amuse; and at last he was the entire stay and support of his father's declining years. "your uncle was of opinion that the course pursued by his father towards him during his youth was not judicious. but here i am inclined to disagree with him. there was no want of proof of the estimation in which his father held him, corresponding with him from a very early age as with a man, conversing with him freely, and writing of him most fondly. but, in the desire to keep down any conceit, there was certainly in my father a great outward show of repression and depreciation. then the faults of your uncle were peculiarly those that my father had no patience with. himself precise in his arrangements, writing a beautiful hand, particular about neatness, very accurate and calm, detesting strong expressions, and remarkably self-controlled; while his eager impetuous boy, careless of his dress, always forgetting to wash his hands and brush his hair, writing an execrable hand, and folding his letters with a great blotch for a seal, was a constant care and irritation. many letters to your uncle have i read on these subjects. sometimes a specimen of the proper way of folding a letter is sent him, (those were the sad days before envelopes were known,) and he is desired to repeat the experiment till he succeeds. general macaulay's fastidious nature led him to take my father's line regarding your uncle, and my youthful soul was often vexed by the constant reprimands for venial transgressions. but the great sin was the idle reading, which was a thorn in my father's side that never was extracted. in truth, he really acknowledged to the full your uncle's abilities, and felt that if he could only add his own morale, his unwearied industry, his power of concentrating his energies on the work in hand, his patient painstaking calmness, to the genius and fervour which his son possessed, then a being might be formed who could regenerate the world. often in later years i have heard my father, after expressing an earnest desire for some object, exclaim, 'if i had only tom's power of speech!' but he should have remembered that all gifts are not given to one, and that perhaps such a union as he coveted is even impossible. parents must be content to see their children walk in their own path, too happy if through any road they attain the same end, the living for the glory of god and the good of man." from a marvellously early date in macaulay's life public affairs divided his thoughts with literature, and, as he grew to manhood, began more and more to divide his aspirations. his father's house was much used as a centre of consultation by members of parliament who lived in the suburbs on the surrey side of london; and the boy could hardly have heard more incessant, and assuredly not more edifying, political talk if he had been brought up in downing street. the future advocate and interpreter of whig principles was not reared in the whig faith. attached friends of pitt, who in personal conduct, and habits of life, certainly came nearer to their standard than his great rival,--and warmly in favour of a war which, to their imagination, never entirely lost its early character of an internecine contest with atheism.--the evangelicals in the house of commons for the most part acted with the tories. but it may be doubted whether, in the long run, their party would not have been better without them. by the zeal, the munificence, the laborious activity, with which they pursued their religious and semi-religious enterprises, they did more to teach the world how to get rid of existing institutions than by their votes and speeches at westminster they contributed to preserve them. [macaulay, writing to one of his sisters in , says: "i think stephen's article on the clapham sect the best thing he ever did, i do not think with you that the claphamites were men too obscure for such delineation. the truth is that from that little knot of men emanated all the bible societies, and almost all the missionary societies, in the world. the whole organisation of the evangelical party was their work. the share which they had in providing means for the education of the people was great. they were really the destroyers of the slave-trade, and of slavery. many of those whom stephen describes were public men of the greatest weight, lord teignmouth governed india in calcutta, grant governed india in leadenhall street, stephen's father was perceval's right-hand man in the house of commons. it is needless to speak of wilberforce. as to simeon, if you knew what his authority and influence were, and how they extended from cambridge to the most remote corners of england, you would allow that his real sway in the church was far greater than that of any primate. thornton, to my surprise, thinks the passage about my father unfriendly. i defended stephen. the truth is that he asked my permission to draw a portrait of my father for the edinburgh review. i told him that i had only to beg that he would not give it the air of a puff; a thing which, for myself and for my friends, i dread far more than any attack. my influence over the review is so well known that a mere eulogy of my father appearing in that work would only call forth derision. i therefore am really glad that stephen has introduced into his sketch some little characteristic traits which, in themselves, were not beauties."] with their may meetings, and african institutions, and anti-slavery reporters, and their subscriptions of tens of thousands of pounds, and their petitions bristling with hundreds of thousands of signatures, and all the machinery for informing opinion and bringing it to bear on ministers and legislators which they did so much to perfect and even to invent, they can be regarded as nothing short of the pioneers and fuglemen of that system of popular agitation which forms a leading feature in our internal history during the past half-century. at an epoch when the cabinet which they supported was so averse to manifestations of political sentiment that a reformer who spoke his mind in england was seldom long out of prison, and in scotland ran a very serious risk of transportation, toryism sat oddly enough on men who spent their days in the committee-room and their evenings on the platform, and each of whom belonged to more associations combined for the purpose of influencing parliament than he could count on the fingers of both his hands. there was something incongruous in their position; and as time went on they began to perceive the incongruity. they gradually learned that measures dear to philanthropy might be expected to result from the advent to power of their opponents; while their own chief too often failed them at a pinch out of what appeared to them an excessive, and humiliating, deference to interests powerfully represented on the benches behind him. their eyes were first opened by pitt's change of attitude with regard to the object that was next all their hearts. there is something almost pathetic in the contrast between two entries in wilberforce's diary, of which the first has become classical, but the second is not so generally known. in , referring to the movement against the slave-trade, he says: "pitt recommended me to undertake its conduct, as a subject suited to my character and talents. at length, i well remember, after a conversation in the open air at the root of an old tree at holwood, just above the vale of keston, i resolved to give notice on a fit occasion in the house of commons of my intention to bring the subject forward." twelve years later mr. henry thornton had brought in a bill for confining the trade within certain limits upon the coast of africa. "upon the second reading of this bill," writes wilberforce, "pitt coolly put off the debate when i had manifested a design of answering p.'s speech, and so left misrepresentations without a word. william smith's anger;--henry thornton's coolness;--deep impression on me, but conquered, i hope, in a christian way." besides instructing their successors in the art of carrying on a popular movement, wilberforce and his followers had a lesson to teach, the value of which not so many perhaps will be disposed to question. in public life, as in private, they habitually had the fear of god before their eyes. a mere handful as to number, and in average talent very much on a level with the mass of their colleagues;--counting in their ranks no orator, or minister, or boroughmonger;--they commanded the ear of the house, and exerted on its proceedings an influence, the secret of which those who have studied the parliamentary history of the period find it only too easy to understand. to refrain from gambling and ball-giving, to go much to church and never to the theatre, was not more at variance with the social customs of the day than it was the exception in the political world to meet with men who looked to the facts of the case and not to the wishes of the minister, and who before going into the lobby required to be obliged with a reason instead of with a job. confidence and respect, and (what in the house of commons is their unvarying accompaniment) power, were gradually, and to a great extent involuntarily, accorded to this group of members. they were not addicted to crotchets, nor to the obtrusive and unseasonable assertion of conscientious scruples. the occasions on which they made proof of independence and impartiality were such as justified, and dignified, their temporary renunciation of party ties. they interfered with decisive effect in the debates on the great scandals of lord melville and the duke of york, and in more than one financial or commercial controversy that deeply concerned the national interests, of which the question of the retaining the orders in council was a conspicuous instance. a boy who, like young macaulay, was admitted to the intimacy of politicians such as these, and was accustomed to hear matters of state discussed exclusively from a public point of view without any afterthought of ambition, or jealousy, or self-seeking, could hardly fail to grow up a patriotic and disinterested man. "what is far better and more important than all is this, that i believe macaulay to be incorruptible. you might lay ribbons, stars, garters, wealth, titles before him in vain. he has an honest genuine love of his country, and the world would not bribe him to neglect her interests." thus said sydney smith, who of all his real friends was the least inclined to over-praise him. the memory of thornton and babington, and the other worthies of their day and set, is growing dim, and their names already mean little in our ears. part of their work was so thoroughly done that the world, as its wont is, has long ago taken the credit of that work to itself. others of their undertakings, in weaker hands than theirs, seem out of date among the ideas and beliefs which now are prevalent. at clapham, as elsewhere, the old order is changing, and not always in a direction which to them would be acceptable or even tolerable. what was once the home of zachary macaulay stands almost within the swing of the bell of a stately and elegant roman catholic chapel; and the pleasant mansion of lord teignmouth, the cradle of the bible society, is now a religious house of the redemptorist order. but in one shape or another honest performance always lives, and the gains that accrued from the labours of these men are still on the right side of the national ledger. among the most permanent of those gains is their undoubted share in the improvement of our political integrity by direct, and still more by indirect, example. it would be ungrateful to forget in how large a measure it is due to them that one, whose judgments upon the statesmen of many ages and countries have been delivered to an audience vast beyond all precedent, should have framed his decisions in accordance with the dictates of honour and humanity, of ardent public spirit and lofty public virtue. chapter ii. - . macaulay goes to the university--his love for trinity college--his contemporaries at cambridge--charles austin-- the union debating society--university studies, successes, and failures--the mathematical tripos--the trinity fellowship--william the third--letters--prize poems-- peterloo--novel-reading--the queen's trial--macaulay's feeling towards his mother--a reading-party--hoaxing an editor--macaulay takes pupils. in october macaulay went into residence at trinity college, cambridge. mr. henry sykes thornton, the eldest son of the member for southwark, was his companion throughout his university career. the young men lived in the same lodgings, and began by reading with the same tutor; a plan which promised well, because, in addition to what was his own by right, each had the benefit of the period of instruction paid for by the other. but two hours were much the same as one to macaulay, in whose eyes algebra and geometry were so much additional material for lively and interminable argument. thornton reluctantly broke through the arrangement, and eventually stood highest among the trinity wranglers of his year; an elevation which he could hardly have attained if he had pursued his studies in company with one who regarded every successive mathematical proposition as an open question. a parliamentary election took place while the two friends were still quartered together in jesus lane. a tumult in the neighbouring street announced that the citizens were expressing their sentiments by the only channel which was open to them before the days of reform; and macaulay, to whom any excitement of a political nature was absolutely irresistible, dragged thornton to the scene of action, and found the mob breaking the windows of the hoop hotel, the head-quarters of the successful candidates. his ardour was cooled by receiving a dead cat full in the face. the man who was responsible for the animal came up and apologised very civilly, assuring him that there was no town and gown feeling in the matter, and that the cat had been meant for mr. adeane. "i wish," replied macaulay, "that you had meant it for me, and hit mr. adeane." after no long while he removed within the walls of trinity, and resided first in the centre rooms of bishop's hostel, and subsequently in the old court, between the gate and the chapel. the door, which once bore his name, is on the ground floor, to the left hand as you face the staircase. in more recent years, undergraduates who are accustomed to be out after lawful hours have claimed a right of way through the window which looks towards the town;--to the great annoyance of any occupant who is too good-natured to refuse the accommodation to others, and too steady to need it himself. this power of surreptitious entry had not been discovered in macaulay's days; and, indeed, he would have cared very little for the privilege of spending his time outside walls which contained within them as many books as even he could read, and more friends than even he could talk to. wanting nothing beyond what his college had to give, he revelled in the possession of leisure and liberty, in the almost complete command of his own time, in the power of passing at choice from the most perfect solitude to the most agreeable company. he keenly appreciated a society which cherishes all that is genuine, and is only too out-spoken in its abhorrence of pretension and display:--a society in which a man lives with those whom he likes, and with those only; choosing his comrades for their own sake, and so indifferent to the external distinctions of wealth and position that no one who has entered fully into the spirit of college life can ever unlearn its priceless lesson of manliness and simplicity. of all his places of sojourn during his joyous and shining pilgrimage through the world, trinity, and trinity alone, had any share with his home in macaulay's affection and loyalty. to the last he regarded it as an ancient greek, or a mediaeval italian, felt towards his native city. as long as he had place and standing there, he never left it willingly or returned to it without delight. the only step in his course about the wisdom of which he sometimes expressed misgiving was his preference of a london to a cambridge life. the only dignity that in his later days he was known to covet was an honorary fellowship, which would have allowed him again to look through his window upon the college grass-plots, and to sleep within sound of the splashing of the fountain; again to breakfast on commons, and dine beneath the portraits of newton and bacon on the dais of the hall; again to ramble by moonlight round neville's cloister, discoursing the picturesque but somewhat exoteric philosophy which it pleased him to call by the name of metaphysics. from the door of his rooms, along the wall of the chapel, there runs a flagged pathway which affords an acceptable relief from the rugged pebbles that surround it. here as a bachelor of arts he would walk, book in hand, morning after morning throughout the long vacation, reading with the same eagerness and the same rapidity whether the volume was the most abstruse of treatises, the loftiest of poems, or the flimsiest of novels. that was the spot where in his failing years he specially loved to renew the feelings of the past; and some there are who can never revisit it without the fancy that there, if anywhere, his dear shade must linger. he was fortunate in his contemporaries. among his intimate friends were the two coleridges--derwent, the son, and henry nelson, who was destined to be the son-in-law of the poet; and how exceptional that destiny was the readers of sara coleridge's letters are now aware. hyde villiers, whom an untimely death alone prevented from taking an equal place in a trio of distinguished brothers, was of his year, though not of his college. [lord clarendon, and his brothers, were all johnians.] in the year below were the young men who now bear the titles of lord grey, lord belper, and lord romilly; [this paragraph was written in the summer of . three of macaulay's old college friends, lord romilly, moultrie, and charles austin, died, in the hard winter that followed, within a few days of each other.] and after the same interval came moultrie, who in his "dream of life," with a fidelity which he himself pronounced to have been obtained at some sacrifice of grace, has told us how the heroes of his time looked and lived, and charles villiers, who still delights our generation by showing us how they talked. then there was praed, fresh from editing the etonian, as a product of collective boyish effort unique in its literary excellence and variety; and sidney walker, praed's gifted school fellow, whose promise was blighted by premature decay of powers; and charles austin, whose fame would now be more in proportion to his extraordinary abilities, had not his unparalleled success as an advocate tempted him before his day to retire from the toils of a career of whose rewards he already had enough. with his vigour and fervour, his depth of knowledge and breadth of humour, his close reasoning illustrated by an expansive imagination,--set off, as these gifts were, by the advantage, at that period of life so irresistible, of some experience of the world at home and abroad,--austin was indeed a king among his fellows. "grave, sedate, and (if the looks may indicate the age,) our senior some few years; no keener wit, no intellect more subtle, none more bold, was found in all our host." so writes moultrie, and the testimony of his verse is borne out by john stuart mill's prose. "the impression he gave was that of boundless strength, together with talents which, combined with such apparent force of will and character, seemed capable of dominating the world." he certainly was the only man who ever succeeded in dominating macaulay. brimming over with ideas that were soon to be known by the name of utilitarian, a panegyrist of american institutions, and an unsparing assailant of ecclesiastical endowments and hereditary privileges, he effectually cured the young undergraduate of his tory opinions, which were never more than skin deep, and brought him nearer to radicalism than he ever was before or since. the report of this conversion, of which the most was made by ill-natured tale-bearers who met with more encouragement than they deserved, created some consternation in the family circle; while the reading set at cambridge was duly scandalised at the influence which one, whose classical attainments were rather discursive than exact, had gained over a craven scholar. to this hour men may be found in remote parsonages who mildly resent the fascination which austin of jesus exercised over macaulay of trinity. [it was at this period of his career that macaulay said to the late mr. hampden gurney: "gurney, i have been a tory, i am a radical; _but i never will be a whig_."] the day and the night together were too short for one who was entering on the journey of life amidst such a band of travellers. so long as a door was open, or a light burning, in any of the courts, macaulay was always in the mood for conversation and companionship. unfailing in his attendance at lecture and chapel, blameless with regard to college laws and college discipline, it was well for his virtue that no curfew was in force within the precincts of trinity. he never tired of recalling the days when he supped at midnight on milk-punch and roast turkey, drank tea in floods at an hour when older men are intent upon anything rather than on the means of keeping themselves awake, and made little of sitting over the fire till the bell rang for morning chapel in order to see a friend off by the early coach. in the license of the summer vacation, after some prolonged and festive gathering, the whole party would pour out into the moonlight, and ramble for mile after mile through the country, till the noise of their wide-flowing talk mingled with the twittering of the birds in the hedges which bordered the coton pathway or the madingley road. on such occasions it must have been well worth the loss of sleep to hear macaulay plying austin with sarcasms upon the doctrine of the greatest happiness, which then had still some gloss of novelty; putting into an ever-fresh shape the time-honoured jokes against the johnians for the benefit of the villierses; and urging an interminable debate on wordsworth's merits as a poet, in which the coleridges, as in duty bound, were ever ready to engage. in this particular field he acquired a skill of fence which rendered him the most redoubtable of antagonists. many years afterwards, at the time when the prelude was fresh from the press, he was maintaining against the opinion of a large and mixed society that the poem was unreadable. at last, overborne by the united indignation of so many of wordsworth's admirers, he agreed that the question should be referred to the test of personal experience; and on inquiry it was discovered that the only individual present who had got through the prelude was macaulay himself. it is not only that the witnesses of these scenes unanimously declare that they have never since heard such conversation in the most renowned of social circles. the partiality of a generous young man for trusted and admired companions may well colour his judgment over the space of even half a century. but the estimate of university contemporaries was abundantly confirmed by the outer world. while on a visit to lord lansdowne at bowood, years after they had left cambridge, austin and macaulay happened to get upon college topics one morning at breakfast. when the meal was finished they drew their chairs to either end of the chimney-piece, and talked at each other across the hearth-rug as if they were in a first-floor room in the old court of trinity. the whole company, ladies, artists, politicians, and diners-out, formed a silent circle round the two cantabs, and, with a short break for lunch, never stirred till the bell warned them that it was time to dress for dinner. it has all irrevocably perished. with life before them, and each intent on his own future, none among that troop of friends had the mind to play boswell to the others. one repartee survives, thrown off in the heat of discussion, but exquisitely perfect in all its parts. acknowledged without dissent to be the best applied quotation that ever was made within five miles of the fitzwilliam museum, it is unfortunately too strictly classical for reproduction in these pages. we are more easily consoled for the loss of the eloquence which then flowed so full and free in the debates of the cambridge union. in that society was emerging from a period of tribulation and repression. the authorities of the university, who, as old constituents of mr. pitt and warm supporters of lord liverpool, had never been very much inclined to countenance the practice of political discussion among the undergraduates, set their faces against it more than ever at an epoch when the temper of the time increased the tendency of young men to run into extremes of partisanship. at length a compromise was extorted from the reluctant hands of the vice-chancellor, and the club was allowed to take into consideration public affairs of a date anterior to the century. it required less ingenuity than the leaders of the union had at their command to hit upon a method of dealing with the present under the guise of the past. motions were framed that reflected upon the existing government under cover of a censure on the cabinets of the previous generation. resolutions which called upon the meeting to declare that the boon of catholic emancipation should have been granted in the year , or that our commercial policy previous to should have been founded on the basis of free trade, were clearly susceptible of great latitude of treatment. and, again, in its character of a reading club, the society, when assembled for the conduct of private business, was at liberty to review the political creed of the journals of the day in order to decide which of them it should take in, and which it should discontinue. the examiner newspaper was the flag of many a hard-fought battle; the morning chronicle was voted in and out of the rooms half-a-dozen times within a single twelvemonth; while a series of impassioned speeches on the burning question of interference in behalf of greek independence were occasioned by a proposition of malden's "that 'e ellenike salpigks' do lie upon the table." at the close of the debates, which were held in a large room at the back of the red lion in petty cury, the most prominent members met for supper in the hotel, or at moultrie's lodgings, which were situated close at hand. they acted as a self-appointed standing committee, which watched over the general interests of the union, and selected candidates whom they put in nomination for its offices. the society did not boast a hansard;--an omission which, as time went on, some among its orators had no reason to regret. faint recollections still survive of a discussion upon the august topic of the character of george the third. "to whom do we owe it," asked macaulay, "that while europe was convulsed with anarchy and desolated with war, england alone remained tranquil, prosperous, and secure? to whom but the good old king? why was it that, when neighbouring capitals were perishing in the flames, our own was illuminated only for triumphs? [this debate evidently made some noise in the university world. there is an allusion to it in a squib of praed's, very finished and elegant, and beyond all doubt contemporary. the passage relating to macaulay begins with the lines--"then the favourite comes with his trumpets and drums, and his arms and his metaphors crossed."] you may find the cause in the same three words: the good old king." praed, on the other hand, would allow his late monarch neither public merits nor private virtues. "a good man! if he had been a plain country gentleman with no wider opportunities for mischief, he would at least have bullied his footmen and cheated his steward." macaulay's intense enjoyment of all that was stirring and vivid around him undoubtedly hindered him in the race for university honours; though his success was sufficient to inspirit him at the time, and to give him abiding pleasure in the retrospect. he twice gained the chancellor's medal for english verse, with poems admirably planned, and containing passages of real beauty, but which may not be republished in the teeth of the panegyric which, within ten years after they were written, he pronounced upon sir roger newdigate. sir roger had laid down the rule that no exercise sent in for the prize which he established at oxford was to exceed fifty lines. this law, says macaulay, seems to have more foundation in reason than is generally the case with a literary canon, "for the world, we believe, is pretty well agreed in thinking that the shorter a prize poem is, the better." trinity men find it difficult to understand how it was that he missed getting one of the three silver goblets given for the best english declamations of the year. if there is one thing which all macaulay's friends, and all his enemies, admit, it is that he could declaim english. his own version of the affair was that the senior dean, a relative of the victorious candidate, sent for him and said: "mr. macaulay, as you have not got the first cup, i do not suppose that you will care for either of the others." he was consoled, however, by the prize for latin declamation; and in he established his classical repute by winning a craven university scholarship in company with his friend malden, and mr. george long, who preceded malden as professor of greek at university college, london. macaulay detested the labour of manufacturing greek and latin verse in cold blood as an exercise; and his hexameters were never up to the best etonian mark, nor his iambics to the highest standard of shrewsbury. he defined a scholar as one who reads plato with his feet on the fender. when already well on in his third year he writes: "i never practised composition a single hour since i have been at cambridge." "soak your mind with cicero," was his constant advice to students at that time of life when writing latin prose is the most lucrative of accomplishments. the advantage of this precept was proved in the fellowship examination of the year , when he obtained the honour which in his eyes was the most desirable that cambridge had to give. the delight of the young man at finding himself one of the sixty masters of an ancient and splendid establishment; the pride with which he signed his first order for the college plate, and dined for the first time at the high table in his own right; the reflection that these privileges were the fruit, not of favour or inheritance, but of personal industry and ability,--were matters on which he loved to dwell long after the world had loaded him with its most envied prizes. macaulay's feeling on this point is illustrated by the curious reverence which he cherished for those junior members of the college who, some ninety years ago, by a spirited remonstrance addressed to the governing body, brought about a reform in the trinity fellowship examination that secured to it the character for fair play, and efficiency, which it has ever since enjoyed. in his copy of the cambridge calendar for the year , (the last of his life,) throughout the list of the old mathematical triposes the words "one of the eight" appear in his hand-writing opposite the name of each of these gentlemen. and i can never remember the time when it was not diligently impressed upon me that, if i minded my syntax, i might eventually hope to reach a position which would give me three hundred pounds a year, a stable for my horse, six dozen of audit ale every christmas, a loaf and two pats of butter every morning, and a good dinner for nothing, with as many almonds and raisins as i could eat at dessert. macaulay was not chosen a fellow until his last trial, nominally for the amazing reason that his translations from greek and latin, while faithfully representing the originals, were rendered into english that was ungracefully bald and inornate. the real cause was, beyond all doubt, his utter neglect of the special study of the place; a liberty which cambridge seldom allows to be taken with impunity even by her most favoured sons. he used to profess deep and lasting regret for his early repugnance to scientific subjects; but the fervour of his penitence in after years was far surpassed by the heartiness with which he inveighed against mathematics as long as it was his business to learn them. everyone who knows the senate house may anticipate the result. when the tripos of made its appearance, his name did not grace the list. in short, to use the expressive vocabulary of the university, macaulay was gulfed--a mishap which disabled him from contending for the chancellor's medals, then the crowning trophies of a classical career. "i well remember," says lady trevelyan, "that first trial of my life. we were spending the winter at brighton when a letter came giving an account of the event. i recollect my mother taking me into her room to tell me, for even then it was known how my whole heart was wrapped up in him, and it was thought necessary to break the news. when your uncle arrived at brighton, i can recall my mother telling him that he had better go at once to his father, and get it over, and i can see him as he left the room on that errand." during the same year he engaged in a less arduous competition. a certain mr. greaves of fulbourn had long since provided a reward of ten pounds for "the junior bachelor of trinity college who wrote the best essay on the conduct and character of william the third." as the prize is annual, it is appalling to reflect upon the searching analysis to which the motives of that monarch must by this time have been subjected. the event, however, may be counted as an encouragement to the founders of endowments; for, amidst the succession of juvenile critics whose attention was by his munificence turned in the direction of his favourite hero, mr. greaves had at last fallen in with the right man. it is more than probable that to this old cambridgeshire whig was due the first idea of that history in whose pages william of orange stands as the central figure. the essay is still in existence, in a close neat hand, which twenty years of reviewing never rendered illegible. originally written as a fair copy, but so disfigured by repeated corrections and additions as to be unfit for the eyes of the college authorities, it bears evident marks of having been held to the flames, and rescued on second, and in this case it will be allowed, on better thoughts. the exercise, (which is headed by the very appropriate motto, "primus qui legibus urbem fundabit, curibus parvis et paupere terra missus in imperium magnum,") is just such as will very likely be produced in the course of next easter term by some young man of judgment and spirit, who knows his macaulay by heart, and will paraphrase him without scruple. the characters of james, of shaftesbury, of william himself; the popish plot; the struggle over the exclusion bill; the reaction from puritanic rigour into the license of the restoration, are drawn on the same lines and painted in the same colours as those with which the world is now familiar. the style only wants condensation, and a little of the humour which he had not yet learned to transfer from his conversation to his writings, in order to be worthy of his mature powers. he thus describes william's lifelong enemy and rival, whose name he already spells after his own fashion. "lewis was not a great general. he was not a great legislator. but he was, in one sense of the words, a great king. he was a perfect master of all the mysteries of the science of royalty,--of all the arts which at once extend power and conciliate popularity,--which most advantageously display the merits, or most dexterously conceal the deficiencies, of a sovereign. he was surrounded by great men, by victorious commanders, by sagacious statesmen. yet, while he availed himself to the utmost of their services, he never incurred any danger from their rivalry. his was a talisman which extorted the obedience of the proudest and mightiest spirits. the haughty and turbulent warriors whose contests had agitated france during his minority yielded to the irresistible spell, and, like the gigantic slaves of the ring and lamp of aladdin, laboured to decorate and aggrandise a master whom they could have crushed. with incomparable address he appropriated to himself the glory of campaigns which had been planned, and counsels which had been suggested, by others. the arms of turenne were the terror of europe. the policy of colbert was the strength of france. but in their foreign successes, and their internal prosperity, the people saw only the greatness and wisdom of lewis." in the second chapter of the history much of this is compressed into the sentence: "he had shown, in an eminent degree, two talents invaluable to a prince,--the talent of choosing his servants well, and the talent of appropriating to himself the chief part of the credit of their acts." in a passage that occurs towards the close of the essay may be traced something more than an outline of the peroration in which, a quarter of a century later on, he summed up the character and results of the revolution of . "to have been a sovereign, yet the champion of liberty; a revolutionary leader, yet the supporter of social order, is the peculiar glory of william. he knew where to pause. he outraged no national prejudice. he abolished no ancient form. he altered no venerable name. he saw that the existing institutions possessed the greatest capabilities of excellence, and that stronger sanctions, and clearer definitions, were alone required to make the practice of the british constitution as admirable as the theory. thus he imparted to innovation the dignity and stability of antiquity. he transferred to a happier order of things the associations which had attached the people to their former government. as the roman warrior, before he assaulted veii, invoked its guardian gods to leave its walls, and to accept the worship and patronise the cause of the besiegers, this great prince, in attacking a system of oppression, summoned to his aid the venerable principles and deeply seated feelings to which that system was indebted for protection." a letter, written during the latter years of his life, expresses macaulay's general views on the subject of university honours. "if a man brings away from cambridge self-knowledge, accuracy of mind, and habits of strong intellectual exertion, he has gained more than if he had made a display of showy superficial etonian scholarship, got three or four browne's medals, and gone forth into the world a schoolboy and doomed to be a schoolboy to the last. after all, what a man does at cambridge is, in itself, nothing. if he makes a poor figure in life, his having been senior wrangler or university scholar is never mentioned but with derision. if he makes a distinguished figure, his early honours merge in those of a later date. i hope that i do not overrate my own place in the estimation of society. such as it is, i would not give a halfpenny to add to the consideration which i enjoy, all the consideration that i should derive from having been senior wrangler. but i often regret, and even acutely, my want of a senior wrangler's knowledge of physics and mathematics; and i regret still more some habits of mind which a senior wrangler is pretty certain to possess." like all men who know what the world is, he regarded the triumph of a college career as of less value than its disappointments. those are most to be envied who soonest learn to expect nothing for which they have not worked hard, and who never acquire the habit, (a habit which an unbroken course of university successes too surely breeds,) of pitying themselves overmuch if ever in after life they happen to work in vain. cambridge: wednesday. (post-mark, ) my dear mother,--king, i am absolutely certain, would take no more pupils on any account. and, even if he would, he has numerous applicants with prior claims. he has already six, who occupy him six hours in the day, and is likewise lecturer to the college. it would, however, be very easy to obtain an excellent tutor. lefevre and malkin are men of first-rate mathematical abilities, and both of our college. i can scarcely bear to write on mathematics or mathematicians. oh for words to express my abomination of that science, if a name sacred to the useful and embellishing arts may be applied to the perception and recollection of certain properties in numbers and figures! oh that i had to learn astrology, or demonology, or school divinity! oh that i were to pore over thomas aquinas, and to adjust the relation of entity with the two predicaments, so that i were exempted from this miserable study! "discipline" of the mind! say rather starvation, confinement, torture, annihilation! but it must be. i feel myself becoming a personification of algebra, a living trigonometrical canon, a walking table of logarithms. all my perceptions of elegance and beauty gone, or at least going. by the end of the term my brain will be "as dry as the remainder biscuit after a voyage." oh to change cam for isis! but such is my destiny; and, since it is so, be the pursuit contemptible, below contempt, or disgusting beyond abhorrence, i shall aim at no second place. but three years! i cannot endure the thought. i cannot bear to contemplate what i must have to undergo. farewell then homer and sophocles and cicero. farewell happy fields where joy for ever reigns hail, horrors, hail, infernal world! how does it proceed? milton's descriptions have been driven out of my head by such elegant expressions as the following [long mathematical formula] my classics must be woodhouse, and my amusements summing an infinite series. farewell, and tell selina and jane to be thankful that it is not a necessary part of female education to get a headache daily without acquiring one practical truth or beautiful image in return. again, and with affectionate love to my father, farewell wishes your most miserable and mathematical son t.b. macaulay. cambridge: november , . my dear father,--your letter, which i read with the greatest pleasure, is perfectly safe from all persons who could make a bad use of it. the emperor alexander's plans as detailed in the conversation between him and clarkson [thomas clarkson, the famous assailant of slavery.] are almost superhuman; and tower as much above the common hopes and aspirations of philanthropists as the statue which his macedonian namesake proposed to hew out of mount athos excelled the most colossal works of meaner projectors. as burke said of henry the fourth's wish that every peasant in france might have the chicken in his pot comfortably on a sunday, we may say of these mighty plans, "the mere wish, the unfulfilled desire, exceeded all that we hear of the splendid professions and exploits of princes." yet my satisfaction in the success of that noble cause in which the emperor seems to be exerting himself with so much zeal is scarcely so great as my regret for the man who would have traced every step of its progress with anxiety, and hailed its success with the most ardent delight. poor sir samuel romilly! quando ullum invenient parem? how long may a penal code at once too sanguinary and too lenient, half written in blood like draco's, and half undefined and loose as the common law of a tribe of savages, be the curse and disgrace of the country? how many years may elapse before a man who knows like him all that law can teach, and possesses at the same time like him a liberality and a discernment of general rights which the technicalities of professional learning rather tend to blunt, shall again rise to ornament and reform our jurisprudence? for such a man, if he had fallen in the maturity of years and honours, and been borne from the bed of sickness to a grave by the side of his prototype hale amidst the tears of nobles and senators, even then, i think, the public sorrow would have been extreme. but that the last moments of an existence of high thoughts and great virtues should have been passed as his were passed! in my feelings the scene at claremont [the death of princess charlotte.] this time last year was mere dust in the balance in comparison. ever your affectionate son, t. b. m. cambridge: friday, february , . my dear father,--i have not of course had time to examine with attention all your criticisms on pompeii. [the subject of the english poem for the chancellor's prize of was the destruction of pompeii.] i certainly am much obliged to you for withdrawing so much time from more important business to correct my effusions. most of the remarks which i have examined are perfectly just; but as to the more momentous charge, the want of a moral, i think it might be a sufficient defence that, if a subject is given which admits of none, the man who writes without a moral is scarcely censurable. but is it the real fact that no literary employment is estimable or laudable which does not lead to the spread of moral truth or the excitement of virtuous feeling? books of amusement tend to polish the mind, to improve the style, to give variety to conversation, and to lend a grace to more important accomplishments. he who can effect this has surely done something. is no useful end served by that writer whose works have soothed weeks of languor and sickness, have relieved the mind exhausted from the pressure of employment by an amusement which delights without enervating, which relaxes the tension of the powers without rendering them unfit for future exercise? i should not be surprised to see these observations refuted; and i shall not be sorry if they are so. i feel personally little interest in the question. if my life be a life of literature, it shall certainly be one of literature directed to moral ends. at all events let us be consistent. i was amused in turning over an old volume of the christian observer to find a gentleman signing himself excubitor, (one of our antagonists in the question of novel-reading,) after a very pious argument on the hostility of novels to a religious frame of mind, proceeding to observe that he was shocked to hear a young lady who had displayed extraordinary knowledge of modern ephemeral literature own herself ignorant of dryden's fables! consistency with a vengeance! the reading of modern poetry and novels excites a worldly disposition and prevents ladies from reading dryden's fables! there is a general disposition among the more literary part of the religious world to cry down the elegant literature of our own times, while they are not in the slightest degree shocked at atrocious profaneness or gross indelicacy when a hundred years have stamped them with the title of classical. i say: "if you read dryden you can have no reasonable objection to reading scott." the strict antagonist of ephemeral reading exclaims, "not so. scott's poems are very pernicious. they call away the mind from spiritual religion, and from tancred and sigismunda." but i am exceeding all ordinary limits. if these hasty remarks fatigue you, impute it to my desire of justifying myself from a charge which i should be sorry to incur with justice. love to all at home. affectionately yours, t. b. m. with or without a moral, the poem carried the day. the subject for the next year was waterloo. the opening lines of macaulay's exercise were pretty and simple enough to ruin his chance in an academical competition. it was the sabbath morn. how calm and fair is the blest dawning of the day of prayer! who hath not felt how fancy's mystic power with holier beauty decks that solemn hour; a softer lustre in its sunshine sees; and hears a softer music in its breeze? who hath not dreamed that even the skylark's throat hails that sweet morning with a gentler note? fair morn, how gaily shone thy dawning smile on the green valleys of my native isle! how gladly many a spire's resounding height with peals of transport hailed thy newborn light! ah! little thought the peasant then, who blest the peaceful hour of consecrated rest, and heard the rustic temple's arch prolong the simple cadence of the hallowed song, that the same sun illumed a gory field, where wilder song and sterner music pealed; where many a yell unholy rent the air, and many a hand was raised,--but not in prayer. the prize fell to a man of another college, and trinity comforted itself by inventing a story to the effect that the successful candidate had run away from the battle. in the summer of there took place a military affair, less attractive than waterloo as a theme for poets, but which, as far as this country is concerned, has proved even more momentous in its ultimate consequences. on the th of august a reform demonstration was arranged at manchester resembling those which were common in the northern districts during the year , except that in women formed an important element in the procession. a troop of yeomanry, and afterwards two squadrons of hussars, were sent in among the crowd, which was assembled in st. peter's fields, the site on which the free trade hall now stands. the men used their swords freely, and the horses their hoofs. the people, who meant anything but fighting, trampled each other down in the attempt to escape. five or six lives were lost, and fifty or sixty persons were badly hurt; but the painful impression wrought upon the national conscience was well worth the price. british blood has never since been shed by british hands in any civic contest that rose above the level of a lawless riot. the immediate result, however, was to concentrate and embitter party feeling. the grand jury threw out the bills against the yeomen, and found true bills against the popular orators who had called the meeting together. the common councilmen of the city of london, who had presented an address to the prince regent reflecting upon the conduct of the government, were roundly rebuked for their pains. earl fitzwilliam was dismissed from the office of lord lieutenant, for taking part in a yorkshire county gathering which had passed resolutions in the same sense as the address from the city. on the other hand, a peterloo medal was struck, which is still treasured in such manchester families as have not learned to be ashamed of the old manchester politics. in this heated state of the political atmosphere the expiring toryism of the anti-slavery leaders flamed up once again. "i declare," said wilberforce, "my greatest cause of difference with the democrats is their laying, and causing people to lay, so great a stress on the concerns of this world as to occupy their whole minds and hearts, and to leave a few scanty and lukewarm thoughts for the heavenly treasure." zachary macaulay, who never canted, and who knew that on the th of august the manchester magistrates were thinking just as much or as little about religion as the manchester populace, none the less took the same side as wilberforce. having formed for himself, by observations made on the spot, a decided opinion that the authorities ought to be supported, he was much disturbed by reports which came to him from cambridge. september, . my dear father,--my mother's letter, which has just arrived, has given me much concern. the letter which has, i am sorry to learn, given you and her uneasiness was written rapidly and thoughtlessly enough, but can scarcely, i think, as far as i remember its tenour, justify some of the extraordinary inferences which it has occasioned. i can only assure you most solemnly that i am not initiated into any democratical societies here, and that i know no people who make politics a common or frequent topic of conversation, except one man who is a determined tory. it is true that this manchester business has roused some indignation here, as at other places, and drawn philippics against the powers that be from lips which i never heard opened before but to speak on university contests or university scandal. for myself i have long made it a rule never to talk on politics except in the most general manner; and i believe that my most intimate associates have no idea of my opinions on the questions of party. i can scarcely be censured, i think, for imparting them to you;--which, however, i should scarcely have thought of doing, (so much is my mind occupied with other concerns,) had not your letter invited me to state my sentiments on the manchester business. i hope that this explanation will remove some of your uneasiness. as to my opinions, i have no particular desire to vindicate them. they are merely speculative, and therefore cannot partake of the nature of moral culpability. they are early formed, and i am not solicitous that you should think them superior to those of most people at eighteen. i will, however, say this in their defence. whatever the affectionate alarm of my dear mother may lead her to apprehend, i am not one of the "sons of anarchy and confusion" with whom she classes me. my opinions, good or bad, were learnt, not from hunt and waithman, but from cicero, from tacitus, and from milton. they are the opinions which have produced men who have ornamented the world, and redeemed human nature from the degradation of ages of superstition and slavery. i may be wrong as to the facts of what occurred at manchester; but, if they be what i have seen them stated, i can never repent speaking of them with indignation. when i cease to feel the injuries of others warmly, to detest wanton cruelty, and to feel my soul rise against oppression, i shall think myself unworthy to be your son. i could say a great deal more. above all i might, i think, ask, with some reason, why a few democratical sentences in a letter, a private letter, of a collegian of eighteen, should be thought so alarming an indication of character, when brougham and other people, who at an age which ought to have sobered them talk with much more violence, are not thought particularly ill of? but i have so little room left that i abstain, and will only add thus much. were my opinions as decisive as they are fluctuating, and were the elevation of a cromwell or the renown of a hampden the certain reward of my standing forth in the democratic cause, i would rather have my lips sealed on the subject than give my mother or you one hour of uneasiness. there are not so many people in the world who love me that i can afford to pain them for any object of ambition which it contains. if this assurance be not sufficient, clothe it in what language you please, and believe me to express myself in those words which you think the strongest and most solemn. affectionate love to my mother and sisters. farewell. t. b. m. cambridge: january , . my dear father,--nothing that gives you disquietude can give me amusement. otherwise i should have been excessively diverted by the dialogue which you have reported with so much vivacity; the accusation; the predictions; and the elegant agnomen of "the novel-reader" for which i am indebted to this incognito. i went in some amazement to malden, romilly, and barlow. their acquaintance comprehends, i will venture to say, almost every man worth knowing in the university in every field of study. they had never heard the appellation applied to me by any man. their intimacy with me would of course prevent any person from speaking to them on the subject in an insulting manner; for it is not usual here, whatever your unknown informant may do, for a gentleman who does not wish to be kicked downstairs to reply to a man who mentions another as his particular friend, "do you mean the blackguard or the novel-reader?" but i am fully convinced that had the charge prevailed to any extent it must have reached the ears of one of those whom i interrogated. at all events i have the consolation of not being thought a novel-reader by three or four who are entitled to judge upon the subject, and whether their opinion be of equal value with that of this john-a-nokes against whom i have to plead i leave you to decide. but stronger evidence, it seems, is behind. this gentleman was in company with me. alas that i should never have found out how accurate an observer was measuring my sentiments, numbering the novels which i criticised, and speculating on the probability of my being plucked. "i was familiar with all the novels whose names he had ever heard." if so frightful an accusation did not stun me at once, i might perhaps hint at the possibility that this was to be attributed almost as much to the narrowness of his reading on this subject as to the extent of mine. there are men here who are mere mathematical blocks; who plod on their eight hours a day to the honours of the senate house; who leave the groves which witnessed the musings of milton, of bacon, and of gray, without one liberal idea or elegant image, and carry with them into the world minds contracted by unmingled attention to one part of science, and memories stored only with technicalities. how often have i seen such men go forth into society for people to stare at them, and ask each other how it comes that beings so stupid in conversation, so uninformed on every subject of history, of letters, and of taste, could gain such distinction at cambridge! it is in such circles, which, i am happy to say, i hardly know but by report, that knowledge of modern literature is called novel-reading; a commodious name, invented by ignorance and applied by envy, in the same manner as men without learning call a scholar a pedant, and men without principle call a christian a methodist. to me the attacks of such men are valuable as compliments. the man whose friend tells him that he is known to be extensively acquainted with elegant literature may suspect that he is flattering him; but he may feel real and secure satisfaction when some johnian sneers at him for a novel-reader. [my uncle was fond of telling us how he would walk miles out of cambridge in order to meet the coach which brought the last new waverley novel.] as to the question whether or not i am wasting time, i shall leave that for time to answer. i cannot afford to sacrifice a day every week in defence and explanation as to my habits of reading. i value, most deeply value, that solicitude which arises from your affection for me; but let it not debar me from justice and candour. believe me ever, my dear father, your most affectionate son, t. b. m. the father and son were in sympathy upon what, at this distance of time, appears as the least inviting article of the whig creed. they were both partisans of the queen. zachary macaulay was inclined in her favour by sentiments alike of friendship, and of the most pardonable resentment. brougham, her illustrious advocate, had for ten years been the main hope and stay of the movement against slavery and the slave trade; while the john bull, whose special mission it was to write her down, honoured the abolitionist party with its declared animosity. however full its columns might be of libels upon the honour of the wives and daughters of whig statesmen, it could always find room for calumnies against mr. macaulay which in ingenuity of fabrication, and in cruelty of intention, were conspicuous even among the contents of the most discreditable publication that ever issued from the london press. when queen caroline landed from the continent in june the young trinity undergraduate greeted her majesty with a complimentary ode, which certainly little resembled those effusions that, in the old courtly days, an university was accustomed to lay at the feet of its sovereign. the piece has no literary value, and is curious only as reflecting the passion of the hour. the first and last stanzas run as follows:-- let mirth on every visage shine and glow in every soul. bring forth, bring forth, the oldest wine, and crown the largest bowl. bear to her home, while banners fly from each resounding steeple, and rockets sparkle in the sky, the daughter of the people. e'en here, for one triumphant day, let want and woe be dumb, and bonfires blaze, and schoolboys play. thank heaven, our queen is come. * * * * though tyrant hatred still denies each right that fits thy station, to thee a people's love supplies a nobler coronation; a coronation all unknown to europe's royal vermin; for england's heart shall be thy throne, and purity thine ermine; thy proclamation our applause, applause denied to some; thy crown our love; thy shield our laws. thank heaven, our queen is come! early in november, warned by growing excitement outside the house of lords, and by dwindling majorities within, lord liverpool announced that the king's ministers had come to the determination not to proceed further with the bill of pains and penalties. the joy which this declaration spread through the country has been described as "beyond the scope of record." cambridge: november , . my dear father,--all here is ecstasy. "thank god, the country is saved," were my first words when i caught a glimpse of the papers of friday night. "thank god, the country is saved," is written on every face and echoed by every voice. even the symptoms of popular violence, three days ago so terrific, are now displayed with good humour and received with cheerfulness. instead of curses on the lords, on every post and every wall is written, "all is as it should be;" "justice done at last;" and similar mottoes expressive of the sudden turn of public feeling. how the case may stand in london i do not know; but here the public danger, like all dangers which depend merely on human opinions and feelings, has disappeared from our sight almost in the twinkling of an eye. i hope that the result of these changes may be the secure reestablishment of our commerce, which i suppose political apprehension must have contributed to depress. i hope, at least, that there is no danger to our own fortunes of the kind at which you seem to hint. be assured however, my dear father, that, be our circumstances what they may, i feel firmly prepared to encounter the worst with fortitude, and to do my utmost to retrieve it by exertion. the best inheritance you have already secured to me,--an unblemished name and a good education. and for the rest, whatever calamities befall us, i would not, to speak without affectation, exchange adversity consoled, as with us it must ever be, by mutual affection and domestic happiness, for anything which can be possessed by those who are destitute of the kindness of parents and sisters like mine. but i think, on referring to your letter, that i insist too much upon the signification of a few words. i hope so, and trust that everything will go well. but it is chapel time, and i must conclude. ever most affectionately yours, t.b. macaulay. trin. coll.: march , . my dear mother,--i entreat you to entertain no apprehensions about my health. my fever, cough, and sore-throat have all disappeared for the last four days. many thanks for your intelligence about poor dear john's recovery, which has much exhilarated me. yet i do not know whether illness to him is not rather a prerogative than an evil. i am sure that it is well worth while being sick to be nursed by a mother. there is nothing which i remember with such pleasure as the time when you nursed me at aspenden. the other night, when i lay on my sofa very ill and hypochondriac, i was thinking over that time. how sick, and sleepless, and weak i was, lying in bed, when i was told that you were come! how well i remember with what an ecstasy of joy i saw that face approaching me, in the middle of people that did not care if i died that night except for the trouble of burying me! the sound of your voice, the touch of your hand, are present to me now, and will be, i trust in god, to my last hour. the very thought of these things invigorated me the other day; and i almost blessed the sickness and low spirits which brought before me associated images of a tenderness and an affection, which, however imperfectly repaid, are deeply remembered. such scenes and such recollections are the bright half of human nature and human destiny. all objects of ambition, all rewards of talent, sink into nothing compared with that affection which is independent of good or adverse circumstances, excepting that it is never so ardent, so delicate, or so tender as in the hour of languor or distress. but i must stop. i had no intention of pouring out on paper what i am much more used to think than to express. farewell, my dear mother. ever yours affectionately, t.b. macaulay. macaulay liked cambridge too well to spend the long vacation elsewhere except under strong compulsion; but in , with the terrors of the mathematical tripos already close at hand, he was persuaded into joining a reading party in wales with a mr. bird as tutor. eardley childers, the father of the statesman of that name, has preserved a pleasant little memorial of the expedition. to charles smith bird, eardley childers, thos. b. macaulay, william clayton walters, geo. b. paley, robert jarratt, thos. jarratt, edwin kempson, ebenezer ware, wm. cornwall, john greenwood, j. lloyd, and jno. wm. gleadall, esquires. gentlemen,--we the undersigned, for ourselves and the inhabitants in general of the town of llanrwst in the county of denbigh, consider it our duty to express to you the high sense we entertain of your general good conduct and demeanour during your residence here, and we assure you that we view with much regret the period of your separation and departure from amongst us. we are very sensible of the obligation we are under for your uniformly benevolent and charitable exertions upon several public occasions, and we feel peculiar pleasure in thus tendering to you individually our gratitude and thanks. wishing you all possible prosperity and happiness in your future avocations, we subscribe ourselves with unfeigned respect, gentlemen, your most obedient servants, rev. john tiltey, &c., &c. ( signatures.) in one respect macaulay hardly deserved his share of this eulogium. a scheme was on foot in the town to found an auxiliary branch of the bible society. a public meeting was called, and mr. bird urged his eloquent pupil to aid the project with a specimen of union rhetoric. macaulay, however, had had enough of the bible society at clapham, and sturdily refused to come forward as its champion at llanrwst. llanrwst: july--, . my dear mother,--you see i know not how to date my letter. my calendar in this sequestered spot is as irregular as robinson crusoe's after he had missed one day in his calculation. i have no intelligence to send you, unless a battle between a drunken attorney and an impudent publican which took place here yesterday may deserve the appellation. you may perhaps be more interested to hear that i sprained my foot, and am just recovering from the effects of the accident by means of opodeldoc which i bought at the tinker's. for all trades and professions here lie in a most delightful confusion. the druggist sells hats; the shoemaker is the sole bookseller, if that dignity may be allowed him on the strength of the three welsh bibles, and the guide to caernarvon, which adorn his window; ink is sold by the apothecary; the grocer sells ropes, (a commodity which, i fear, i shall require before my residence here is over,) and tooth-brushes. a clothes-brush is a luxury yet unknown to llanrwst. as to books, for want of any other english literature, i intend to learn paradise lost by heart at odd moments. but i must conclude. write to me often, my dear mother, and all of you at home, or you may have to answer for my drowning myself, like gray's bard, in "old conway's foaming flood," which is most conveniently near for so poetical an exit. ever most affectionately yours, t. b. m. llanrwst: august , . my dear father,--i have just received your letter, and cannot but feel concerned at the tone of it. i do not think it quite fair to attack me for filling my letters with remarks on the king's irish expedition. it has been the great event of this part of the world. i was at bangor when he sailed. his bows, and the marquis of anglesea's fete, were the universal subjects of conversation; and some remarks on the business were as natural from me as accounts of the coronation from you in london. in truth i have little else to say. i see nothing that connects me with the world except the newspapers. i get up, breakfast, read, play at quoits, and go to bed. this is the history of my life. it will do for every day of the last fortnight. as to the king, i spoke of the business, not at all as a political, but as a moral question,--as a point of correct feeling and of private decency. if lord were to issue tickets for a gala ball immediately after receiving intelligence of the sudden death of his divorced wife, i should say the same. i pretend to no great insight into party politics; but the question whether it is proper for any man to mingle in festivities while his wife's body lies unburied is one, i confess, which i thought myself competent to decide. but i am not anxious about the fate of my remarks, which i have quite forgot, and which, i dare say, were very foolish. to me it is of little importance whether the king's conduct were right or wrong; but it is of great importance that those whom i love should not think me a precipitate, silly, shallow sciolist in politics, and suppose that every frivolous word that falls from my pen is a dogma which i mean to advance as indisputable; and all this only because i write to them without reserve; only because i love them well enough to trust them with every idea which suggests itself to me. in fact, i believe that i am not more precipitate or presumptuous than other people, but only more open. you cannot be more fully convinced than i am how contracted my means are of forming a judgment. if i chose to weigh every word that i uttered or wrote to you, and, whenever i alluded to politics, were to labour and qualify my expressions as if i were drawing up a state paper, my letters might be a great deal wiser, but would not be such letters as i should wish to receive from those whom i loved. perfect love, we are told, casteth out fear. if i say, as i know i do, a thousand wild and inaccurate things, and employ exaggerated expressions about persons or events in writing to you or to my mother, it is not, i believe, that i want power to systematise my ideas or to measure my expressions, but because i have no objection to letting you see my mind in dishabille. i have a court dress for days of ceremony and people of ceremony, nevertheless. but i would not willingly be frightened into wearing it with you; and i hope you do not wish me to do so. ever yours, t. b. m. to hoax a newspaper has, time out of mind, been the special ambition of undergraduate wit. in the course of macaulay sent to the morning post a burlesque copy of verses, entitled "tears of sensibility." the editor fell an easy victim, but unfortunately did not fall alone. no pearl of ocean is so sweet as that in my zuleika's eye. no earthly jewel can compete with tears of sensibility. like light phosphoric on the billow, or hermit ray of evening sky, like ripplings round a weeping willow are tears of sensibility. like drops of iris-coloured fountains by which endymion loved to lie, like dew-gems on untrodden mountains are tears of sensibility. while zephyr broods o'er moonlight rill the flowerets droop as if to die, and from their chaliced cup distil the tears of sensibility. the heart obdurate never felt one link of nature's magic tie if ne'er it knew the bliss to melt in tears of sensibility. the generous and the gentle heart is like that balmy indian tree which scatters from the wounded part the tears of sensibility. then oh! ye fair, if pity's ray e'er taught your snowy breasts to sigh, shed o'er my contemplative lay the tears of sensibility. november , . my dear mother,--i possess some of the irritability of a poet, and it has been a good deal awakened by your criticisms. i could not have imagined that it would have been necessary for me to have said that the execrable trash entitled "tears of sensibility" was merely a burlesque on the style of the magazine verses of the day. i could not suppose that you could have suspected me of _seriously_ composing such a farrago of false metaphor and unmeaning epithet. it was meant solely for a caricature on the style of the poetasters of newspapers and journals; and, (though i say it who should not say it,) has excited more attention and received more praise at cambridge than it deserved. if you have it, read it over again, and do me the justice to believe that such a compound of jargon, nonsense, false images, and exaggerated sentiment, is not the product of my serious labours. i sent it to the morning post, because that paper is the ordinary receptacle of trash of the description which i intended to ridicule, and its admission therefore pointed the jest. i see, however, that for the future i must mark more distinctly when i intend to be ironical. your affectionate son t. b. m. cambridge: july , . my dear father,--i have been engaged to take two pupils for nine months of the next year. they are brothers, whose father, a mr. stoddart, resides at cambridge. i am to give them an hour a day, each; and am to receive a hundred guineas. it gives me great pleasure to be able even in this degree to relieve you from the burden of my expenses here. i begin my tutorial labours to-morrow. my pupils are young, one being fifteen and the other thirteen years old, but i hear excellent accounts of their proficiency, and i intend to do my utmost for them. farewell. t. b. m. a few days later on he writes "i do not dislike teaching whether it is that i am more patient than i had imagined, or that i have not yet had time to grow tired of my new vocation. i find, also, what at first sight may appear paradoxical, that i read much more in consequence, and that the regularity of habits necessarily produced by a periodical employment which cannot be procrastinated fully compensates for the loss of the time which is consumed in tuition." trinity college, cambridge: october , . my dear father,--i was elected fellow this morning, shall be sworn in to-morrow, and hope to leave cambridge on tuesday for rothley temple. the examiners speak highly of the manner in which i acquitted myself, and i have reason to believe that i stood first of the candidates. i need not say how much i am delighted by my success, and how much i enjoy the thought of the pleasure which it will afford to you, my mother, and our other friends. till i become a master of arts next july the pecuniary emolument which i shall derive will not be great. for seven years from that time it will make me almost an independent man. malden is elected. you will take little interest in the rest of our cambridge successes and disappointments. yours most affectionately, t. b. m. chapter iii. - . macaulay is called to the bar--does not make it a serious profession--speech before the anti-slavery society--knight's quarterly magazine--the edinburgh review and the essay on milton--macaulay's personal appearance and mode of existence--his defects and virtues, likings and antipathies-- croker sadler--zachary macaulay's circumstances-- description of the family habits of life in great ormond street--macaulay's sisters--hannah macaulay--the judicious poet--macaulay's humour in conversation--his articles in the review--his attacks on the utilitarians and on southey-- blackwood's magazine--macaulay is made commissioner of bankruptcy--enters parliament--letters from circuit and edinburgh. macaulay was called to the bar in , and joined the northern circuit. on the evening that he first appeared at mess, when the company were retiring for the night, he was observed to be carefully picking out the longest candle. an old king's counsel, who noticed that he had a volume under his arm, remonstrated with him on the danger of reading in bed, upon which he rejoined with immense rapidity of utterance "i always read in bed at home; and, if i am not afraid of committing parricide, and matricide, and fratricide, i can hardly be expected to pay any special regard to the lives of the bagmen of leeds." and, so saying, he left his hearers staring at one another, and marched off to his room, little knowing that, before many years were out, he would have occasion to speak much more respectfully of the leeds bagmen. under its social aspect macaulay heartily enjoyed his legal career. he made an admirable literary use of the saturnalia which the northern circuit calls by the name of "grand night," when personalities of the most pronounced description are welcomed by all except the object of them, and forgiven even by him. his hand may be recognised in a macaronic poem, written in greek and english, describing the feast at which alexander murdered clitus. the death of the victim is treated with an exuberance of fantastic drollery, and a song, put into the mouth of nearchus, the admiral of the macedonian fleet, and beginning with the lines "when as first i did come back from ploughing the salt water they paid me off at salamis, three minae and a quarter,--" is highly aristophanic in every sense of the word. he did not seriously look to the bar as a profession. no persuasion would induce him to return to his chambers in the evening, according to the practice then in vogue. after the first year or two of the period during which he called himself a barrister he gave up even the pretence of reading law, and spent many more hours under the gallery of the house of commons, than in all the courts together. the person who knew him best said of him: "throughout life he never really applied himself to any pursuit that was against the grain." nothing is more characteristic of the man than the contrast between his unconquerable aversion to the science of jurisprudence at the time when he was ostensibly preparing himself to be an advocate, and the zest with which, on his voyage to india, he mastered that science in principle and detail as soon as his imagination was fired by the prospect of the responsibilities of a law-giver. he got no business worth mention, either in london or on circuit. zachary macaulay, who was not a man of the world, did what he could to make interest with the attorneys, and, as a last resource, proposed to his son to take a brief in a suit which he himself had instituted against the journal that had so grossly libelled him. "i am rather glad," writes macaulay from york in march , "that i was not in london, if your advisers thought it right that i should have appeared as your counsel. whether it be contrary to professional etiquette i do not know; but i am sure that it would be shocking to public feeling, and particularly imprudent against adversaries whose main strength lies in detecting and exposing indecorum or eccentricity. it would have been difficult to avoid a quarrel with sugden, with wetherell, and with old lord eldon himself. then the john bull would have been upon us with every advantage. the personal part of the consideration it would have been my duty, and my pleasure and pride also, to overlook; but your interests must have suffered." meanwhile he was busy enough in fields better adapted than the law to his talents and his temperament. he took a part in a meeting of the anti-slavery society held at freemasons' tavern, on the th of june , with the duke of gloucester in the chair. the edinburgh review described his speech as "a display of eloquence so signal for rare and matured excellence that the most practised orator may well admire how it should have come from one who then for the first time addressed a public assembly." those who know what the annual meeting of a well-organised and disciplined association is, may imagine the whirlwind of cheers which greeted the declaration that the hour was at hand when "the peasant of the antilles will no longer crawl in listless and trembling dejection round a plantation from whose fruits he must derive no advantage, and a hut whose door yields him no protection; but, when his cheerful and voluntary labour is performed, he will return with the firm step and erect brow of a british citizen from the field which is his freehold to the cottage which is his castle." surer promise of aptitude for political debate was afforded by the skill with which the young speaker turned to account the recent trial for sedition, and death in prison, of smith, the demerara missionary; an event which was fatal to slavery in the west indies in the same degree as the execution of john brown was its deathblow in the united states. "when this country has been endangered either by arbitrary power or popular delusion, truth has still possessed one irresistible organ, and justice one inviolable tribunal. that organ has been an english press, and that tribunal an english jury. but in those wretched islands we see a press more hostile to truth than any censor, and juries more insensible to justice than any star chamber. in those islands alone is exemplified the full meaning of the most tremendous of the curses denounced against the apostate hebrews, 'i will curse your blessings.' we can prove this assertion out of the mouth of our adversaries. we remember, and god almighty forbid that we ever should forget, how, at the trial of mr. smith, hatred regulated every proceeding, was substituted for every law, and allowed its victim no sanctuary in the house of mourning, no refuge in the very grave. against the members of that court-martial the country has pronounced its verdict. but what is the line of defence taken by its advocates? it has been solemnly and repeatedly declared in the house of commons that a jury composed of planters would have acted with far more injustice than did this court;--this court which has never found a single lawyer to stake his professional character on the legality of its proceedings. the argument is this. things have doubtless been done which should not have been done. the court-martial sat without a jurisdiction; it convicted without evidence; it condemned to a punishment not warranted by law. but we must make allowances. we must judge by comparison. 'mr smith ought to have been very thankful that it was no worse. only think what would have been his fate if he had been tried by a jury of planters!' sir, i have always lived under the protection of the british laws, and therefore i am unable to imagine what could be worse; but, though i have small knowledge, i have a large faith; i by no means presume to set any limits to the possible injustice of a west indian judicature. and since the colonists maintain that a jury composed of their own body not only possibly might, but necessarily must, have acted with more iniquity than this court-martial, i certainly shall not dispute the assertion, though i am utterly unable to conceive the mode." that was probably the happiest half-hour of zachary macaulay's life. "my friend," said wilberforce, when his turn came to speak, "would doubtless willingly bear with all the base falsehoods, all the vile calumnies, all the detestable artifices which have been aimed against him, to render him the martyr and victim of our cause, for the gratification he has this day enjoyed in hearing one so dear to him plead such a cause in such a manner." keen as his pleasure was, he took it in his own sad way. from the first moment to the last, he never moved a muscle of his countenance, but sat with his eyes fixed on a piece of paper, on which he seemed to be writing with a pencil. while talking with his son that evening, he referred to what had passed only to remark that it was ungraceful in so young a man to speak with folded arms in the presence of royalty. in the leading members of the cleverest set of boys who ever were together at a public school found themselves collected once more at cambridge. of the former staff of the etonian, praed, moultrie, nelson coleridge, and, among others, mr. edmond beales, so well known to our generation as an ardent politician, were now in residence at king's or trinity. mr. charles knight, too enterprising a publisher to let such a quantity of youthful talent run to waste, started a periodical, which was largely supported by undergraduates and bachelors of arts, among whom the veterans of the eton press formed a brilliant, and, as he vainly hoped, a reliable nucleus of contributors. knight's quarterly magazine is full of macaulay, and of macaulay in the attractive shape which a great author wears while he is still writing to please no one but himself. he unfortunately did not at all please his father. in the first number, besides a great deal of his that is still worth reading, there were printed under his adopted signature of tristram merton two little poems, the nature of which may be guessed from praed's editorial comments. "tristram merton, i have a strong curiosity to know who rosamond is. but you will not tell me; and, after all, as far as your verses are concerned, the surname is nowise germane to the matter. as poor sheridan said, it is too formal to be registered in love's calendar." and again: "tristram, i hope rosamond and your fair girl of france will not pull caps; but i cannot forbear the temptation of introducing your roxana and statira to an admiring public." the verses were such as any man would willingly look back to having written at two and twenty; but their appearance occasioned real misery to zachary macaulay, who indeed disapproved of the whole publication from beginning to end, with the exception of an article on west indian slavery which his son had inserted with the most filial intention, but which, it must be allowed, was not quite in keeping with the general character of the magazine. july , . my dear father,--i have seen the two last letters which you have sent to my mother. they have given me deep pain; but pain without remorse. i am conscious of no misconduct, and whatever uneasiness i may feel arises solely from sympathy for your distress. you seem to imagine that the book is edited, or principally written, by friends of mine. i thought that you had been aware that the work is conducted in london, and that my friends and myself are merely contributors, and form a very small proportion of the contributors. the manners of almost all of my acquaintances are so utterly alien from coarseness, and their morals from libertinism, that i feel assured that no objection of that nature can exist to their writings. as to my own contributions i can only say that the roman story was read to my mother before it was published, and would have been read to you if you had happened to be at home. not one syllable of censure was uttered. the essay on the royal society of literature was read to you. i made the alterations which i conceived that you desired, and submitted them afterwards to my mother. as to the poetry which you parallel with little's, if anything vulgar or licentious has been written by myself, i am willing to bear the consequences. if anything of that cast has been written by my friends, i allow that a certain degree of blame attaches to me for having chosen them at least indiscreetly. if, however, a bookseller of whom we knew nothing has coupled improper productions with ours in a work over which we had no control, i cannot plead guilty to anything more than misfortune; a misfortune in which some of the most rigidly moral and religious men of my acquaintance have participated in the present instance. i am pleading at random for a book which i never saw. i am defending the works of people most of whose names i never heard. i am therefore writing under great disadvantages. i write also in great haste. i am unable even to read over what i have written. affectionately yours t. b. m. moved by the father's evident unhappiness, the son promised never to write again for the obnoxious periodical. the second number was so dull and decorous that zachary macaulay, who felt that, if the magazine went on through successive quarters reforming its tone in the same proportion, it would soon be on a level of virtue with the christian observer, withdrew his objection; and the young man wrote regularly till the short life of the undertaking ended in something very like a quarrel between the publisher and his contributors. it is not the province of biography to dilate upon works which are already before the world; and the results of macaulay's literary labour during the years and have been, perhaps, only too freely reproduced in the volumes which contain his miscellaneous writings. it is, however, worthy of notice that among his earlier efforts in literature his own decided favourite was "the conversation between mr. abraham cowley and mr. john milton touching the great civil war." but an author, who is exempt from vanity, is inclined to rate his own works rather according as they are free from faults than as they abound in beauties; and macaulay's readers will very generally give the preference to two fragmentary sketches of roman and athenian society which sparkle with life, and humour, and a masculine vigorous fancy that had not yet learned to obey the rein. their crude but genuine merit suggests a regret that he did not in after days enrich the edinburgh review with a couple of articles on classical subjects, as a sample of that ripened scholarship which produced the prophecy of capys, and the episode relating to the phalaris controversy in the essay on sir william temple. rothley temple: october , . my dear father,--as to knight's magazine, i really do not think that, considering the circumstances under which it is conducted, it can be much censured. every magazine must contain a certain quantity of mere ballast, of no value but as it occupies space. the general tone and spirit of the work will stand a comparison, in a moral point of view, with any periodical publication not professedly religious. i will venture to say that nothing has appeared in it, at least since the first number, from the pen of any of my friends, which can offend the most fastidious. knight is absolutely in our hands, and most desirous to gratify us all, and me in particular. when i see you in london i will mention to you a piece of secret history which will show you how important our connection with this work may possibly become. yours affectionately t. b. m. the "piece of secret history" above referred to was beyond a doubt the commencement of macaulay's connection with the edinburgh review. that famous periodical, which for three and twenty years had shared in and promoted the rising fortunes of the liberal cause, had now attained its height--a height unequalled before or since--of political, social, and literary power. to have the entry of its columns was to command the most direct channel for the spread of opinions, and the shortest road to influence and celebrity. but already the anxious eye of the master seemed to discern symptoms of decline. jeffrey, in lord cockburn's phrase, was "growing feverish about new writers." in january he says in a letter to a friend in london: "can you not lay your hands on some clever young man who would write for us? the original supporters of the work are getting old, and either too busy or too stupid, and here the young men are mostly tories." overtures had already been made to macaulay, and that same year his article on milton appeared in the august number. the effect on the author's reputation was instantaneous. like lord byron, he awoke one morning and found himself famous. the beauties of the work were such as all men could recognise, and its very faults pleased. the redundance of youthful enthusiasm, which he himself unsparingly condemns in the preface to his collected essays, seemed graceful enough in the eyes of others, if it were only as a relief from the perverted ability of that elaborate libel on our great epic poet which goes by the name of dr. johnson's life of milton. murray declared that it would be worth the copyright of childe harold to have macaulay on the staff of the quarterly. the family breakfast table in bloomsbury was covered with cards of invitation to dinner from every quarter of london, and his father groaned in spirit over the conviction that thenceforward the law would be less to him than ever. a warm admirer of robert hall, macaulay heard with pride how the great preacher, then wellnigh worn out with that long disease, his life, was discovered lying on the floor, employed in learning by aid of grammar and dictionary enough italian to enable him to verify the parallel between milton and dante. but the compliment that of all others came most nearly home,--the only commendation of his literary talent which even in the innermost domestic circle he was ever known to repeat,--was the sentence with which jeffrey acknowledged the receipt of his manuscript: "the more i think, the less i can conceive where you picked up that style." macaulay's outward man was never better described than in two sentences of praed's introduction to knight's quarterly magazine. "there came up a short manly figure, marvellously upright, with a bad neckcloth, and one hand in his waistcoat pocket. ["i well remember," writes sir william stirling maxwell, "the first time i met him,--in or ' , i think,--at dinner at the house of his old friend, sir john macleod. i did not know him by sight, and, when he came into the room with two or three other guests, i supposed that he was announced as general--i forget what. the party was large, and i was on the other side of the table, and a good way off, and i was very soon struck by the amazing number of subjects on which he seemed at home;--politics, home and foreign,--french literature, and hebrew poetry;--and i remember thinking, 'this is a general with a singularly well-stored mind and badly tied neckcloth.' till, at last, a remark on the prose of dryden led me to conclude that it could be no one but the great essayist."] of regular beauty he had little to boast; but in faces where there is an expression of great power, or of great good humour, or both, you do not regret its absence." this picture, in which every touch is correct, tells all that there is to be told. he had a massive head, and features of a powerful and rugged cast, but so constantly lit up by every joyful and ennobling emotion that it mattered little if, when absolutely quiescent, his face was rather homely than handsome. while conversing at table no one thought him otherwise than good-looking; but, when he rose, he was seen to be short and stout in figure. "at holland house, the other day," writes his sister margaret in september , "tom met lady lyndhurst for the first time. she said to him: 'mr. macaulay, you are so different to what i expected. i thought you were dark and thin, but you are fair, and really, mr. macaulay, you are fat."' he at all times sat and stood straight, full, and square; and in this respect woolner, in the fine statue at cambridge, has missed what was undoubtedly the most marked fact in his personal appearance. he dressed badly, but not cheaply. his clothes, though ill put on, were good, and his wardrobe was always enormously overstocked. later in life he indulged himself in an apparently inexhaustible succession of handsome embroidered waistcoats, which he used to regard with much complacency. he was unhandy to a degree quite unexampled in the experience of all who knew him. when in the open air he wore perfectly new dark kid gloves, into the fingers of which he never succeeded in inserting his own more than half way. after he had sailed for india there were found in his chambers between fifty and sixty strops, hacked into strips and splinters, and razors without beginning or end. about the same period he hurt his hand, and was reduced to send for a barber. after the operation, he asked what was to pay. "oh, sir," said the man, "whatever you usually give the person who shaves you." "in that case," said macaulay, "i should give you a great gash on each cheek." during an epoch when, at our principal seats of education, athletic pursuits are regarded as a leading object of existence rather than as a means of health and recreation, it requires some boldness to confess that macaulay was utterly destitute of bodily accomplishments, and that he viewed his deficiencies with supreme indifference. he could neither swim, nor row, nor drive, nor skate, nor shoot. he seldom crossed a saddle, and never willingly. when in attendance at windsor as a cabinet minister he was informed that a horse was at his disposal. "if her majesty wishes to see me ride," he said, "she must order out an elephant." the only exercise in which he can be said to have excelled was that of threading crowded streets with his eyes fixed upon a book. he might be seen in such thoroughfares as oxford street, and cheapside, walking as fast as other people walked, and reading a great deal faster than anybody else could read. as a pedestrian he was, indeed, above the average. till he had passed fifty he thought nothing of going on foot from the albany to clapham, and from clapham on to greenwich; and, while still in the prime of life, he was for ever on his feet indoors as well as out. "in those days," says his cousin mrs. conybeare, "he walked rapidly up and down a room as he talked. i remember on one occasion, when he was making a call, he stopped short in his walk in the midst of a declamation on some subject, and said, 'you have a brick floor here.' the hostess confessed that it was true, though she hoped that it had been disguised by double matting and a thick carpet. he said that his habit of always walking enabled him to tell accurately the material he was treading on." his faults were such as give annoyance to those who dislike a man rather than anxiety to those who love him. vehemence, over-confidence, the inability to recognise that there are two sides to a question or two people in a dialogue, are defects which during youth are perhaps inseparable from gifts like those with which he was endowed. moultrie, speaking of his undergraduate days, tells us that "to him there was no pain like silence--no constraint so dull as unanimity. he breathed an atmosphere of argument, nor shrank from making, where he could not find, excuse for controversial fight." at cambridge he would say of himself that, whenever anybody enunciated a proposition, all possible answers to it rushed into his mind at once; and it was said of him by others that he had no politics except the opposite of those held by the person with whom he was talking. to that charge, at any rate, he did not long continue liable. he left college a staunch and vehement whig, eager to maintain against all comers, and at any moment, that none but whig opinions had a leg to stand upon. his cousin george babington, a rising surgeon, with whom at one time he lived in the closest intimacy, was always ready to take up the tory cudgels. the two friends "would walk up and down the room, crossing each other for hours, shouting one another down with a continuous simultaneous storm of words, until george at length yielded to arguments and lungs combined. never, so far as i remember, was there any loss of temper. it was a fair, good-humoured battle in not very mannerly lists." even as a very young man nine people out of ten liked nothing better than to listen to him, which was fortunate; because in his early days he had scanty respect of persons, either as regarded the choice of his topics, or the quantity of his words. but with his excellent temper, and entire absence of conceit, he soon began to learn consideration for others in small things as well as in great. by the time he was fairly launched in london he was agreeable in company, as well as forcible and amusing. wilberforce speaks of his "unruffled good-humour." sir robert inglis, a good observer with ample opportunity of forming a judgment, pronounced that he conversed and did not dictate, and that he was loud but never overbearing. as far back as the year crabb robinson gave a very favourable account of his demeanour in society, which deserves credence as the testimony of one who liked his share of talk, and was not willing to be put in the background for anybody. "i went to james stephen, and drove with him to his house at hendon. a dinner party. i had a most interesting companion in young macaulay, one of the most promising of the rising generation i have seen for a long time. he has a good face,--not the delicate features of a man of genius and sensibility, but the strong lines and well-knit limbs of a man sturdy in body and mind. very eloquent and cheerful. overflowing with words, and not poor in thought. liberal in opinion, but no radical. he seems a correct as well as a full man. he showed a minute knowledge of subjects not introduced by himself." so loyal and sincere was macaulay's nature that he was unwilling to live upon terms of even apparent intimacy with people whom he did not like, or could not esteem; and, as far as civility allowed, he avoided their advances, and especially their hospitality. he did not choose, he said, to eat salt with a man for whom he could not say a good word in all companies. he was true throughout life to those who had once acquired his regard and respect. moultrie says of him "his heart was pure and simple as a child's unbreathed on by the world: in friendship warm, confiding, generous, constant; and, though now he ranks among the great ones of the earth and hath achieved such glory as will last to future generations, he, i think, would sup on oysters with as right good will in this poor home of mine as e'er he did on petty cury's classical first floor some twenty years ago." he loved to place his purse, his influence, and his talents at the disposal of a friend; and anyone whom he called by that name he judged with indulgence, and trusted with a faith that would endure almost any strain. if his confidence proved to have been egregiously misplaced, which he was always the last to see, he did not resort to remonstrance or recrimination. his course under such circumstances he described in a couplet from an old french comedy: "le bruit est pour le fat, la plainte pour le sot; l'honnete homme trompe s'eloigne et ne dit mot. ["la coquette corrigee. comedie par mr. delanoue, ." in his journal of february , , after quoting the couplet, macaulay adds: "odd that two lines of a damned play, and, it should seem, a justly damned play, should have lived near a century and have become proverbial."] he was never known to take part in any family quarrel, or personal broil, of any description whatsoever. his conduct in this respect was the result of self-discipline, and did not proceed from any want of sensibility. "he is very sensitive," said his sister margaret, "and remembers long, as well as feels deeply, anything in the form of slight." indeed, at college his friends used to tell him that his leading qualities were "generosity and vindictiveness." courage he certainly did not lack. during the years when his spirit was high, and his pen cut deep, and when the habits of society were different from what they are at present, more than one adversary displayed symptoms of a desire to meet him elsewhere than on paper. on these occasions, while showing consideration for his opponent, he evinced a quiet but very decided sense of what was due to himself, which commanded the respect of all who were implicated, and brought difficulties that might have been grave to an honourable and satisfactory issue. he reserved his pugnacity for quarrels undertaken on public grounds, and fought out with the world looking on as umpire. in the lists of criticism and of debate it cannot be denied that, as a young man, he sometimes deserved the praise which dr. johnson pronounced upon a good hater. he had no mercy for bad writers, and notably for bad poets, unless they were in want of money; in which case he became within his means, the most open-handed of patrons. he was too apt to undervalue both the heart and the head of those who desired to maintain the old system of civil and religious exclusion, and who grudged political power to their fellow-countrymen, or at any rate to those of their fellow-countrymen whom he was himself prepared to enfranchise. independent, frank, and proud almost to a fault, he detested the whole race of jobbers and time-servers, parasites and scandal-mongers, led-captains, led-authors, and led-orators. some of his antipathies have stamped themselves indelibly upon literary history. he attributed to the right honourable john wilson croker, secretary to the admiralty during the twenty years preceding , qualities which excited his disapprobation beyond control, and possibly beyond measure. his judgment has been confirmed by the public voice, which identifies croker with the character of rigby in mr. disraeli's coningsby. macaulay was the more formidable as an opponent because he could be angry without losing his command of the situation. his first onset was terrific; but in the fiercest excitement of the melee he knew when to call a halt. a certain member of parliament named michael thomas sadler had fallen foul of malthus, and very foul indeed of macaulay, who in two short and telling articles took revenge enough for both. [macaulay writes to mr. napier in february : "people here think that i have answered sadler completely. empson tells me that malthus is well pleased, which is a good sign. as to blackwood's trash i could not get through it. it bore the same relation to sadler's pamphlet that a bad hash bears to a bad joint."] he writes on this subject to mr. macvey napier, who towards the close of had succeeded jeffrey in the editorship of the edinburgh review: "the position which we have now taken up is absolutely impregnable, and, if we were to quit it, though we might win a more splendid victory, we should expose ourselves to some risk. my rule in controversy has always been that to which the lacedaemonians adhered in war: never to break the ranks for the purpose of pursuing a beaten enemy." he had, indeed, seldom occasion to strike twice. where he set his mark, there was no need of a second impression. the unduly severe fate of those who crossed his path during the years when his blood was hot teaches a serious lesson on the responsibilities of genius. croker, and sadler, and poor robert montgomery, and the other less eminent objects of his wrath, appear likely to enjoy just so much notoriety, and of such a nature, as he has thought fit to deal out to them in his pages; and it is possible that even lord ellenborough may be better known to our grand-children by macaulay's oration on the gates of somnauth than by the noise of his own deeds, or the echo of his own eloquence. when macaulay went to college he was justified in regarding himself as one who would not have to work for his bread. his father, who believed himself to be already worth a hundred thousand pounds, had statedly declared to the young man his intention of making him, in a modest way, an eldest son; and had informed him that, by doing his duty at the university, he would earn the privilege of shaping his career at choice. in the family removed to london, and set up an establishment on a scale suited to their improved circumstances in cadogan place, which, in everything except proximity to bond street, was then hardly less rural than clapham. but the prosperity of the house of macaulay and babington was short-lived. the senior member of the firm gave his whole heart, and five-sixths of his time, to objects unconnected with his business; and he had selected a partner who did not possess the qualities necessary to compensate for his own deficiencies. in the first indications of possible disaster begin to show themselves in the letters to and from cambridge; while waiting for a fellowship macaulay was glad to make a hundred guineas by taking pupils; and, as time went on, it became evident that he was to be an eldest son only in the sense that, throughout the coming years of difficulty and distress, his brothers and sisters would depend mainly upon him for comfort, guidance, and support. he acknowledged the claim cheerfully, lovingly, and, indeed, almost unconsciously. it was not in his disposition to murmur over what was inevitable, or to plume himself upon doing what was right. he quietly took up the burden which his father was unable to bear; and, before many years had elapsed, the fortunes of all for whose welfare he considered himself responsible were abundantly assured. in the course of the efforts which he expended on the accomplishment of this result he unlearned the very notion of framing his method of life with a view to his own pleasure; and such was his high and simple nature, that it may well be doubted whether it ever crossed his mind that to live wholly for others was a sacrifice at all. he resided with his father in cadogan place, and accompanied him when, under the pressure of pecuniary circumstances, he removed to a less fashionable quarter of the town. in the family settled in great ormond street, which runs east and west for some three hundred yards through the region bounded by the british museum, the foundling hospital, and gray's inn road. it was a large rambling house, at the corner of powis place, and was said to have been the residence of lord chancellor thurlow at the time when the great seal was stolen from his custody. it now forms the east wing of an homoeopathic hospital. here the macaulays remained till . "those were to me," says lady trevelyan, "years of intense happiness. there might be money troubles, but they did not touch us. our lives were passed after a fashion which would seem indeed strange to the present generation. my father, ever more and more engrossed in one object, gradually gave up all society; and my mother never could endure it. we had friends, of course, with whom we stayed out for months together; and we dined with the wilberforces, the buxtons, sir robert inglis, and others; but what is now meant by 'society' was utterly unknown to us. "in the morning there was some pretence of work and study. in the afternoon your uncle always took my sister margaret and myself a long walk. we traversed every part of the city, islington, clerkenwell, and the parks, returning just in time for a six o'clock dinner. what anecdotes he used to pour out about every street, and square, and court, and alley! there are many places i never pass without 'the tender grace of a day that is dead' coming back to me. then, after dinner, he always walked up and down the drawing-room between us chatting till tea-time. our noisy mirth, his wretched puns, so many a minute, so many an hour! then we sang, none of us having any voices, and he, if possible, least of all; but still the old nursery songs were set to music, and chanted. my father, sitting at his own table, used to look up occasionally, and push back his spectacles, and, i dare say, wonder in his heart how we could so waste our time. after tea the book then in reading was produced. your uncle very seldom read aloud himself of an evening, but walked about listening, and commenting, and drinking water. "the sundays were in some respects trying days to him. my father's habit was to read a long sermon to us all in the afternoon, and again after evening service another long sermon was read at prayer-time to the servants. our doors were open to sons of relations or friends; and cousins who were medical students, or clerks in merchants' houses, came in regularly to partake of our sunday dinner and sermons. sunday walking, for walking's sake, was never allowed; and even going to a distant church was discouraged. when in cadogan place, we always crossed the five fields, where belgrave square now stands, to hear dr. thorpe at the lock chapel, and bring him home to dine with us. from great ormond street, we attended st. john's chapel in bedford row, then served by daniel wilson, afterwards bishop of calcutta. he was succeeded in by the rev. baptist noel. your uncle generally went to church with us in the morning, and latterly formed the habit of walking out of town, alone or with a friend, in the after part of the day. i never heard that my father took any notice of this; and, indeed, in the interior of his own family, he never attempted in the smallest degree to check his son in his mode of life, or in the expression of his opinions. "i believe that breakfast was the pleasantest part of the day to my father. his spirits were then at their best, and he was most disposed to general conversation. he delighted in discussing the newspaper with his son, and lingered over the table long after the meal was finished. on this account he felt it extremely when, in the year , your uncle went to live in chambers, and often said to my mother that the change had taken the brightness out of his day. though your uncle generally dined with us, yet my father was tired by the evening, so that the breakfast hour was a grievous loss to him, as indeed it was to us all. truly he was to old and young alike the sunshine of our home; and i believe that no one, who did not know him there, ever knew him in his most brilliant, witty, and fertile vein." that home was never more cheerful than during the eight years which followed the close of macaulay's college life. there had been much quiet happiness at clapham, and much in cadogan place; but it was round the house in great ormond street that the dearest associations gathered. more than forty years afterwards, when lady trevelyan was dying, she had herself driven to the spot, as the last drive she ever took, and sat silent in her carriage for many minutes with her eyes fixed upon those well-known walls. [in august , macaulay notes in his diary: "i sent the carriage home, and walked to the museum. passing through great ormond street i saw a bill upon no. . i knocked, was let in, and went over the house with a strange mixture of feelings. it is more than twenty-six years since i was in it. the dining-room, and the adjoining room, in which i once slept, are scarcely changed--the same colouring on the wall, but more dingy. my father's study much the same;--the drawing-rooms too, except the papering. my bedroom just what it was. my mother's bedroom. i had never been in it since her death. i went away sad."] while warmly attached to all his nearest relations, macaulay lived in the closest and most frequent companionship with his sisters hannah and margaret, younger than himself by ten and twelve years respectively. his affection for these two, deep and enduring as it was, had in it no element of blindness or infatuation. even in the privacy of a diary, or the confidence of the most familiar correspondence, macaulay, when writing about those whom he loved, was never tempted to indulge in fond exaggeration of their merits. margaret, as will be seen in the course of this narrative, died young, leaving a memory of outward graces, and sweet and noble mental qualities, which is treasured by all among whom her short existence was passed. as regards the other sister, there are many alive who knew her for what she was; and, for those who did not know her, if this book proves how much of her brother's heart she had, and how well it was worth having, her children will feel that they have repaid their debt even to her. education in the macaulay family was not on system. of what are ordinarily called accomplishments the daughters had but few, and hannah fewest of any; but, ever since she could remember anything, she had enjoyed the run of a good standard library, and had been allowed to read at her own time, and according to her own fancy. there were two traits in her nature which are seldom united in the same person: a vivid practical interest in the realities which surrounded her, joined with the power of passing at will into a world of literature and romance in which she found herself entirely at home. the feeling with which macaulay and his sister regarded books differed from that of other people in kind rather than in degree. when they were discoursing together about a work of history or biography, a bystander would have supposed that they had lived in the times of which the author treated, and had a personal acquaintance with every human being who was mentioned in his pages. pepys, addison, horace walpole, dr. johnson, madame de genlis, the duc de st. simon, and the several societies in which those worthies moved, excited in their minds precisely the same sort of concern, and gave matter for discussions of exactly the same type, as most people bestow upon the proceedings of their own contemporaries. the past was to them as the present, and the fictitious as the actual. the older novels, which had been the food of their early years, had become part of themselves to such an extent that, in speaking to each other, they frequently employed sentences from dialogues in those novels to express the idea, or even the business, of the moment. on matters of the street or of the household they would use the very language of mrs. elton and mrs. bennet, mr. woodhouse, mr. collins, and john thorpe, and the other inimitable actors on jane austen's unpretending stage: while they would debate the love affairs and the social relations of their own circle in a series of quotations from sir charles grandison or evelina. the effect was at times nothing less than bewildering. when lady trevelyan married, her husband, whose reading had lain anywhere rather than among the circulating libraries, used at first to wonder who the extraordinary people could be with whom his wife and his brother-in-law appeared to have lived. this style of thought and conversation had for young minds a singular and a not unhealthy fascination. lady trevelyan's children were brought up among books, (to use the homely simile of an american author), as a stable-boy among horses. the shelves of the library, instead of frowning on us as we played and talked, seemed alive with kindly and familiar faces. but death came, and came again, and then all was changed, and changed as in an instant. there were many favourite volumes out of which the spirit seemed to vanish at once and for ever. we endeavoured unsuccessfully to revive by our own efforts the amusement which we had been taught to find in the faded flatteries and absurdities that passed between miss seward and her admirers, or to retrace for ourselves the complications of female jealousy which played round cowper's tea-table at olney. we awoke to the discovery that the charm was not in us, nor altogether in the books themselves. the talisman, which endowed with life and meaning all that it touched, had passed away from among us, leaving recollections which are our most cherished, as they must ever be our proudest, possession. macaulay thought it probable that he could re-write sir charles grandison from memory, and certainly he might have done so with his sister's help. but his intimate acquaintance with a work was no proof of its merit. "there was a certain prolific author," says lady trevelyan, "named mrs. meeke, whose romances he all but knew by heart; though he quite agreed in my criticism that they were one just like another, turning on the fortunes of some young man in a very low rank of life who eventually proves to be the son of a duke. then there was a set of books by a mrs. kitty cuthbertson, most silly though readable productions, the nature of which may be guessed from their titles:--'santo sebastiano, or the young protector,' 'the forest of montalbano,' 'the romance of the pyrenees,' and 'adelaide, or the countercharm.' i remember how, when 'santo sebastiano' was sold by auction in india, he and miss eden bid against each other till he secured it at a fabulous price; and i possess it still." as an indication of the thoroughness with which this literary treasure has been studied, there appears on the last page an elaborate computation of the number of fainting-fits that occur in the course of the five volumes. julia de clifford..... lady delamore....... lady theodosia....... lord glenbrook...... lord delamore...... lady enderfield...... lord ashgrove....... lord st. orville..... henry mildmay....... a single passage, selected for no other reason than because it is the shortest, will serve as a specimen of these catastrophes "one of the sweetest smiles that ever animated the face of mortal now diffused itself over the countenance of lord st. orville, as he fell at the feet of julia in a death-like swoon." the fun that went on in great ormond street was of a jovial, and sometimes uproarious, description. even when the family was by itself, the school-room and the drawing-room were full of young people; and friends and cousins flocked in numbers to a resort where so much merriment was perpetually on foot. there were seasons during the school holidays when the house overflowed with noise and frolic from morning to night; and macaulay, who at any period of his life could literally spend whole days in playing with children, was master of the innocent revels. games of hide-and-seek, that lasted for hours, with shouting and the blowing of horns up and down the stairs and through every room, were varied by ballads, which, like the scalds of old, he composed during the act of recitation, while the others struck in with the chorus. he had no notion whatever of music, but an infallible ear for rhythm. his knack of improvisation he at all times exercised freely. the verses which he thus produced, and which he invariably attributed to an anonymous author whom he styled "the judicious poet," were exclusively for home consumption. some of these effusions illustrate a sentiment in his disposition which was among the most decided, and the most frequently and loudly expressed. macaulay was only too easily bored, and those whom he considered fools he by no means suffered gladly. he once amused his sisters by pouring out whole iliads of extempore doggrel upon the head of an unfortunate country squire of their acquaintance, who had a habit of detaining people by the button, and who was especially addicted to the society of the higher order of clergy "his grace archbishop manners sutton could not keep on a single button. as for right reverend john of chester, his waistcoats open at the breast are. our friend* has filled a mighty trunk with trophies torn from doctor monk and he has really tattered foully the vestments of archbishop howley no button could i late discern on the garments of archbishop vernon, and never had his fingers mercy upon the garb of bishop percy. the buttons fly from bishop ryder like corks that spring from bottled cyder,--" [*the name of this gentleman has been concealed, as not being sufficiently known by all to give point, but well enough remembered by some to give pain.] and so on, throughout the entire bench, until, after a good half-hour of hearty and spontaneous nonsense, the girls would go laughing back to their italian and their drawing-boards. he did not play upon words as a habit, nor did he interlard his talk with far-fetched or overstrained witticisms. his humour, like his rhetoric, was full of force and substance, and arose naturally from the complexion of the conversation or the circumstance of the moment. but when alone with his sisters, and, in after years, with his nieces, he was fond of setting himself deliberately to manufacture conceits resembling those on the heroes of the trojan war which have been thought worthy of publication in the collected works of swift. when walking in london he would undertake to give some droll turn to the name of every shopkeeper in the street, and, when travelling, to the name of every station along the line. at home he would run through the countries of europe, the states of the union, the chief cities of our indian empire, the provinces of france, the prime ministers of england, or the chief writers and artists of any given century; striking off puns, admirable, endurable, and execrable, but all irresistibly laughable, which followed each other in showers like sparks from flint. capping verses was a game of which he never tired. "in the spring of ," says his cousin mrs. conybeare, "we were staying in ormond street. my chief recollection of your uncle during that visit is on the evenings when we capped verses. all the family were quick at it, but his astounding memory made him supereminent. when the time came for him to be off to bed at his chambers, he would rush out of the room after uttering some long-sought line, and would be pursued to the top of the stairs by one of the others who had contrived to recall a verse which served the purpose, in order that he might not leave the house victorious; but he, with the hall-door open in his hand, would shriek back a crowning effort, and go off triumphant." nothing of all this can be traced in his letters before the year . up to that period he corresponded regularly with no one but his father, between whom and himself there existed a strong regard, but scanty sympathy or similarity of pursuits. it was not until he poured out his mind almost daily to those who approached him more nearly in age, and in tastes, that the lighter side of his nature began to display itself on paper. most of what he addressed to his parents between the time when he left cambridge, and the time when he entered the house of commons, may be characterised as belonging to the type of duty-letters, treating of politics, legal gossip, personal adventures, and domestic incidents, with some reticence and little warmth or ease of expression, the periodical insertion on the son's part of anecdotes and observations bearing upon the question of slavery reminds the reader of those presents of tall recruits with which, at judiciously chosen intervals, frederic the great used to conciliate his terrible father. as between the macaulays, these little filial attentions acquire a certain gracefulness from the fact that, in the circumstances of the family, they could be prompted by no other motive than a dutiful and disinterested affection. it must not be supposed,--no one who examines the dates of his successive essays will for a moment suppose,--that his attention was distracted, or his energy dissipated, by trifles. besides the finished study of machiavelli, and the masterly sketch of our great civil troubles known as the article on hallam's constitutional history, he produced much which his mature judgment would willingly have allowed to die, but which had plenty of life in it when it first appeared between the blue and yellow covers. his most formidable enterprise, during the five earliest years of his connection with the great review, was that passage of arms against the champions of the utilitarian philosophy in which he touched the mighty shields of james mill and jeremy bentham, and rode slashing to right and left through the ranks of their less distinguished followers. indeed, while he sincerely admired the chiefs of the school, he had a young man's prejudice against their disciples, many of whom he regarded as "persons who, having read little or nothing, are delighted to be rescued from the sense of their own inferiority by some teacher who assures them that the studies which they have neglected are of no value, puts five or six phrases into their mouths, lends them an odd number of the westminster review, and in a month transforms them into philosophers." it must be allowed that there was some colour for his opinion. the benthamite training may have stimulated the finer intellects, (and they were not few,) which came within its influence; but it is impossible to conceive anything more dreary than must have been the condition of a shallow mind, with a native predisposition to sciolism, after its owner had joined a society "composed of young men agreeing in fundamental principles, acknowledging utility as their standard in ethics and politics," "meeting once a fortnight to read essays and discuss questions conformably to the premises thus agreed on," and "expecting the regeneration of mankind, not from any direct action on the sentiments of unselfish benevolence and love of justice, but from the effect of educated intellect enlightening the selfish feelings." john stuart mill, with that candour which is the rarest of his great qualities, gave a generous and authoritative testimony to the merit of these attacks upon his father, and his father's creed, which macaulay himself lived to wish that he had left unwritten. ["the author has been strongly urged to insert three papers on the utilitarian philosophy, which, when they first appeared, attracted some notice. * * * he has, however, determined to omit these papers, not because he is disposed to retract a single doctrine which they contain, but because he is unwilling to offer what might be regarded as an affront to the memory of one from whose opinions he still widely dissents, but to whose talents and virtues he admits that he formerly did not do justice. * * it ought to be known that mr. mill had the generosity, not only to forgive, but to forget the unbecoming acrimony with which he had been assailed, and was, when his valuable life closed, on terms of cordial friendship with his assailant."--preface to macaulay's collected essays.] he was already famous enough to have incurred the inevitable penalty of success in the shape of the pronounced hostility of blackwood's magazine. the feelings which the leading contributors to that periodical habitually entertained towards a young and promising writer were in his case sharpened by political partisanship; and the just and measured severity which he infused into his criticism on southey's "colloquies of society" brought down upon him the bludgeon to whose strokes poetic tradition has attributed the death of keats. macaulay was made of harder stuff, and gave little heed to a string of unsavoury invectives compounded out of such epithets as "ugly," "splay-footed," and "shapeless;" such phrases as "stuff and nonsense," "malignant trash," "impertinent puppy," and "audacity of impudence;" and other samples from the polemical vocabulary of the personage who, by the irony of fate, filled the chair of moral philosophy at edinburgh. the substance of professor wilson's attacks consisted in little more than the reiteration of that charge of intellectual juvenility, which never fails to be employed as the last resource against a man whose abilities are undoubted, and whose character is above detraction. "north. he's a clever lad, james. "shepherd. evidently; and a clever lad he'll remain, depend ye upon that, a' the days of his life. a clever lad thirty years auld and some odds is to ma mind the maist melancholy sight in nature. only think of a clever lad o' three-score-and-ten, on his deathbed, wha can look back on nae greater achievement than having aince, or aiblins ten times, abused mr. southey in the embro' review." the prophecies of jealousy seldom come true. southey's book died before its author, with the exception of the passages extracted by macaulay, which have been reproduced in his essay a hundred times, and more, for once that they were printed in the volumes from which he selected them for his animadversion. the chambers in which he ought to have been spending his days, and did actually spend his nights between the years and , were within five minutes' walk of the house in great ormond street. the building of which those chambers formed a part,-- south square, gray's inn,--has since been pulled down to make room for an extension of the library; a purpose which, in macaulay's eyes, would amply compensate for the loss of such associations as might otherwise have attached themselves to the locality. his trinity fellowship brought him in nearly three hundred pounds annually, and the edinburgh review nearly two hundred. in january , during the interregnum that separated the resignation of lord goderich and the acceptance of the premiership by the duke of wellington, lord lyndhurst made him a commissioner of bankruptcy; a rare piece of luck at a time when, as lord cockburn tells us, "a youth of a tory family, who was discovered to have a leaning towards the doctrines of the opposition, was considered as a lost son." "the commission is welcome," macaulay writes to his father, "and i am particularly glad that it has been given at a time when there is no ministry, and when the acceptance of it implies no political obligation. to lord lyndhurst i of course feel personal gratitude, and i shall always take care how i speak of him." the emoluments of the office made up his income, for the three or four years during which he held it, to about nine hundred pounds per annum. his means were more than sufficient for his wants, but too small, and far too precarious, for the furtherance of the political aspirations which now were uppermost in his mind. "public affairs," writes lady trevelyan, "were become intensely interesting to him. canning's accession to power, then his death, the repeal of the test act, the emancipation of the catholics, all in their turn filled his heart and soul. he himself longed to be taking his part in parliament, but with a very hopeless longing. "in february i was staying at mr. wilberforce's at highwood hill when i got a letter from your uncle, enclosing one from lord lansdowne, who told him that he had been much struck by the articles on mill, and that he wished to be the means of first introducing their author to public life by proposing to him to stand for the vacant seat at calne. lord lansdowne expressly added that it was your uncle's high moral and private character which had determined him to make the offer, and that he wished in no respect to influence his votes, but to leave him quite at liberty to act according to his conscience. i remember flying into mr. wilberforce's study, and, absolutely speechless, putting the letter into his hands. he read it with much emotion, and returned it to me, saying 'your father has had great trials, obloquy, bad health, many anxieties. one must feel as if tom were given him for a recompense.' he was silent for a moment, and then his mobile face lighted up, and he clapped his hand to his ear, and cried: 'ah! i hear that shout again. hear! hear! what a life it was!'" and so, on the eve of the most momentous conflict that ever was fought out by speech and vote within the walls of a senate-house, the young recruit went gaily to his post in the ranks of that party whose coming fortunes he was prepared loyally to follow, and the history of whose past he was destined eloquently, and perhaps imperishably, to record. york: april , . my dear father,--i am sorry that i have been unable to avail myself of the letters of introduction which you forwarded to me. since i received them i have been confined to the house with a cold; and, now that i am pretty well recovered, i must take my departure for pontefract. but, if it had been otherwise, i could not have presented these recommendations. letters of this sort may be of great service to a barrister; but the barrister himself must not be the bearer of them. on this subject the rule is most strict, at least on our circuit. the hugging of the bar, like the simony of the church, must be altogether carried on by the intervention of third persons. we are sensible of our dependence on the attorneys, and proportioned to that sense of dependence is our affectation of superiority. even to take a meal with an attorney is a high misdemeanour. one of the most eminent men among us brought himself into a serious scrape by doing so. but to carry a letter of introduction, to wait in the outer room while it is being read, to be then ushered into the presence, to receive courtesies which can only be considered as the condescensions of a patron, to return courtesies which are little else than the blessings of a beggar, would be an infinitely more terrible violation of our professional code. every barrister to whom i have applied for advice has most earnestly exhorted me on no account whatever to present the letters myself. i should perhaps add that my advisers have been persons who cannot by any possibility feel jealous of me. in default of anything better i will eke out my paper with some lines which i made in bed last night,--an inscription for a picture of voltaire. if thou would'st view one more than man and less, made up of mean and great, of foul and fair, stop here; and weep and laugh, and curse and bless, and spurn and worship; for thou seest voltaire. that flashing eye blasted the conqueror's spear, the monarch's sceptre, and the jesuit's beads and every wrinkle in that haggard sneer hath been the grave of dynasties and creeds. in very wantonness of childish mirth he puffed bastilles, and thrones, and shrines away, insulted heaven, and liberated earth. was it for good or evil? who shall say? ever affectionately yours t. b. m. york: july , . my dear father,--the other day, as i was changing my neck-cloth which my wig had disfigured, my good landlady knocked at the door of my bedroom, and told me that mr. smith wished to see me, and was in my room below. of all names by which men are called there is none which conveys a less determinate idea to the mind than that of smith. was he on the circuit? for i do not know half the names of my companions. was he a special messenger from london? was he a york attorney coming to be preyed upon, or a beggar coming to prey upon me, a barber to solicit the dressing of my wig, or a collector for the jews' society? down i went, and to my utter amazement beheld the smith of smiths, sydney smith, alias peter plymley. i had forgotten his very existence till i discerned the queer contrast between his black coat and his snow-white head, and the equally curious contrast between the clerical amplitude of his person, and the most unclerical wit, whim, and petulance of his eye. i shook hands with him very heartily; and on the catholic question we immediately fell, regretted evans, triumphed over lord george beresford, and abused the bishops. [these allusions refer to the general election which had recently taken place.] he then very kindly urged me to spend the time between the close of the assizes and the commencement of the sessions at his house; and was so hospitably pressing that i at last agreed to go thither on saturday afternoon. he is to drive me over again into york on monday morning. i am very well pleased at having this opportunity of becoming better acquainted with a man who, in spite of innumerable affectations and oddities, is certainly one of the wittiest and most original writers of our times. ever yours affectionately t. b. m. bradford: july , . my dear father,--on saturday i went to sydney smith's. his parish lies three or four miles out of any frequented road. he is, however, most pleasantly situated. "fifteen years ago," said he to me as i alighted at the gate of his shrubbery, "i was taken up in piccadilly and set down here. there was no house, and no garden; nothing but a bare field." one service this eccentric divine has certainly rendered to the church. he has built the very neatest, most commodious, and most appropriate rectory that i ever saw. all its decorations are in a peculiarly clerical style; grave, simple, and gothic. the bed-chambers are excellent, and excellently fitted up; the sitting-rooms handsome; and the grounds sufficiently pretty. tindal and parke, (not the judge of course,) two of the best lawyers, best scholars, and best men in england, were there. we passed an extremely pleasant evening, had a very good dinner, and many amusing anecdotes. after breakfast the next morning i walked to church with sydney smith. the edifice is not at all in keeping with the rectory. it is a miserable little hovel with a wooden belfry. it was, however, well filled, and with decent people, who seemed to take very much to their pastor. i understand that he is a very respectable apothecary; and most liberal of his skill, his medicine, his soul, and his wine, among the sick. he preached a very queer sermon--the former half too familiar and the latter half too florid, but not without some ingenuity of thought and expression. sydney smith brought me to york on monday morning, in time for the stage-coach which runs to skipton. we parted with many assurances of goodwill. i have really taken a great liking to him. he is full of wit, humour, and shrewdness. he is not one of those show-talkers who reserve all their good things for special occasions. it seems to be his greatest luxury to keep his wife and daughters laughing for two or three hours every day. his notions of law, government, and trade are surprisingly clear and just. his misfortune is to have chosen a profession at once above him and below him. zeal would have made him a prodigy; formality and bigotry would have made him a bishop; but he could neither rise to the duties of his order, nor stoop to its degradations. he praised my articles in the edinburgh review with a warmth which i am willing to believe sincere, because he qualified his compliments with several very sensible cautions. my great danger, he said, was that of taking a tone of too much asperity and contempt in controversy. i believe that he is right, and i shall try to mend. ever affectionately yours t. b. m. lancaster: september , . my dear father,--thank hannah from me for her pleasant letter. i would answer it if i had anything equally amusing to say in return; but here we have no news, except what comes from london, and is as stale as inland fish before it reaches us. we have circuit anecdotes to be sure; and perhaps you will be pleased to hear that brougham has been rising through the whole of this struggle. at york pollock decidedly took the lead. at durham brougham overtook him, passed him at newcastle, and got immensely ahead of him at carlisle and appleby, which, to be sure, are the places where his own connections lie. we have not been here quite long enough to determine how he will succeed with the lancastrians. this has always hitherto been his least favourable place. he appears to improve in industry and prudence. he learns his story more thoroughly, and tells it more clearly, than formerly. if he continues to manage causes as well as he has done of late he must rise to the summit of the profession. i cannot say quite so much for his temper, which this close and constant rivalry does not improve. he squabbles with pollock more than, in generosity or policy, he ought to do. i have heard several of our younger men wondering that he does not show more magnanimity. he yawns while pollock is speaking; a sign of weariness which, in their present relation to each other, he would do well to suppress. he has said some very good, but very bitter, things. there was a case of a lead-mine. pollock was for the proprietors, and complained bitterly of the encroachments which brougham's clients had made upon this property, which he represented as of immense value. brougham said that the estimate which his learned friend formed of the property was vastly exaggerated, but that it was no wonder that a person who found it so easy to get gold for his lead should appreciate that heavy metal so highly. the other day pollock laid down a point of law rather dogmatically. "mr. pollock," said brougham, "perhaps, before you rule the point, you will suffer his lordship to submit a few observations on it to your consideration." i received the edinburgh paper which you sent me. silly and spiteful as it is, there is a little truth in it. in such cases i always remember those excellent lines of boileau "moi, qu'une humeur trop libre, un esprit peu soumis, de bonne heure a pourvo d'utiles ennemis, je dois plus a leur haine (il faut que je l'avoue) qu'au faible et vain talent dont la france me loue. sitot que sur un vice un pensent me confondre, c'est en me guerissant que je sais leur repondre." this place disagrees so much with me that i shall leave it as soon as the dispersion of the circuit commences,--that is, after the delivery of the last batch of briefs; always supposing, which may be supposed without much risk of mistake, that there are none for me. ever yours affectionately t. b. m. it was about this period that the cambridge senate came to a resolution to petition against the catholic claims. the minority demanded a poll, and conveyed a hint to their friends in london. macaulay, with one or two more to help him, beat up the inns of court for recruits, chartered a stage-coach, packed it inside and out with young whig masters of arts, and drove up king's parade just in time to turn the scale in favour of emancipation. the whole party dined in triumph at trinity, and got back to town the same evening; and the tory journalists were emphatic in their indignation at the deliberate opinion of the university having been overridden by a coachful of "godless and briefless barristers." court house, pomfret: april , . my dear mother,--i address this epistle to you as the least undeserving of a very undeserving family. you, i think, have sent me one letter since i left london. i have nothing here to do but to write letters; and, what is not very often the case, i have members of parliament in abundance to frank them, and abundance of matter to fill them with. my edinburgh expedition has given me so much to say that, unless i write off some of it before i come home, i shall talk you all to death, and be voted a bore in every house which i visit. i will commence with jeffrey himself. i had almost forgotten his person; and, indeed, i should not wonder if even now i were to forget it again. he has twenty faces almost as unlike each other as my father's to mr. wilberforce's, and infinitely more unlike to each other than those of near relatives often are; infinitely more unlike, for example, than those of the two grants. when absolutely quiescent, reading a paper, or hearing a conversation in which he takes no interest, his countenance shows no indication whatever of intellectual superiority of any kind. but as soon as he is interested, and opens his eyes upon you, the change is like magic. there is a flash in his glance, a violent contortion in his frown, an exquisite humour in his sneer, and a sweetness and brilliancy in his smile, beyond anything that ever i witnessed. a person who had seen him in only one state would not know him if he saw him in another. for he has not, like brougham, marked features which in all moods of mind remain unaltered. the mere outline of his face is insignificant. the expression is everything; and such power and variety of expression i never saw in any human countenance, not even in that of the most celebrated actors. i can conceive that garrick may have been like him. i have seen several pictures of garrick, none resembling another, and i have heard hannah more speak of the extraordinary variety of countenance by which he was distinguished, and of the unequalled radiance and penetration of his eye. the voice and delivery of jeffrey resemble his face. he possesses considerable power of mimicry, and rarely tells a story without imitating several different accents. his familiar tone, his declamatory tone, and his pathetic tone are quite different things. sometimes scotch predominates in his pronunciation; sometimes it is imperceptible. sometimes his utterance is snappish and quick to the last degree; sometimes it is remarkable for rotundity and mellowness. i can easily conceive that two people who had seen him on different days might dispute about him as the travellers in the fable disputed about the chameleon. in one thing, as far as i observed, he is always the same and that is the warmth of his domestic affections. neither mr. wilberforce, nor my uncle babington, come up to him in this respect. the flow of his kindness is quite inexhaustible. not five minutes pass without some fond expression, or caressing gesture, to his wife or his daughter. he has fitted up a study for himself; but he never goes into it. law papers, reviews, whatever he has to write, he writes in the drawing-room, or in his wife's boudoir. when he goes to other parts of the country on a retainer he takes them in the carriage with him. i do not wonder that he should be a good husband, for his wife is a very amiable woman. but i was surprised to see a man so keen and sarcastic, so much of a scoffer, pouring himself out with such simplicity and tenderness in all sorts of affectionate nonsense. through our whole journey to perth he kept up a sort of mock quarrel with his daughter; attacked her about novel-reading, laughed her into a pet, kissed her out of it, and laughed her into it again. she and her mother absolutely idolise him, and i do not wonder at it. his conversation is very much like his countenance and his voice, of immense variety; sometimes plain and unpretending even to flatness; sometimes whimsically brilliant and rhetorical almost beyond the license of private discourse. he has many interesting anecdotes, and tells them very well. he is a shrewd observer; and so fastidious that i am not surprised at the awe in which many people seem to stand when in his company. though not altogether free from affectation himself, he has a peculiar loathing for it in other people, and a great talent for discovering and exposing it. he has a particular contempt, in which i most heartily concur with him, for the fadaises of bluestocking literature, for the mutual flatteries of coteries, the handing about of vers de societe, the albums, the conversaziones, and all the other nauseous trickeries of the sewards, hayleys, and sothebys. i am not quite sure that he has escaped the opposite extreme, and that he is not a little too desirous to appear rather a man of the world, an active lawyer, or an easy careless gentleman, than a distinguished writer. i must own that, when jeffrey and i were by ourselves, he talked much and very well on literary topics. his kindness and hospitality to me were, indeed, beyond description, and his wife was as pleasant and friendly as possible. i liked everything but the hours. we were never up till ten, and never retired till two hours at least after midnight. jeffrey, indeed, never goes to bed till sleep comes on him overpoweringly, and never rises till forced up by business or hunger. he is extremely well in health; so that i could not help suspecting him of being very hypochondriac; for all his late letters to me have been filled with lamentations about his various maladies. his wife told me, when i congratulated her on his recovery, that i must not absolutely rely on all his accounts of his own diseases. i really think that he is, on the whole, the youngest-looking man of fifty that i know, at least when he is animated. his house is magnificent. it is in moray place, the newest pile of buildings in the town, looking out to the forth on one side, and to a green garden on the other. it is really equal to the houses in grosvenor square. fine, however, as is the new quarter of edinburgh, i decidedly prefer the old town. there is nothing like it in the island. you have been there, but you have not seen the town, and no lady ever sees a town. it is only by walking on foot through all corners at all hours that cities can be really studied to good purpose. there is a new pillar to the memory of lord melville; very elegant, and very much better than the man deserved. his statue is at the top, with a wreath on the head very like a nightcap drawn over the eyes. it is impossible to look at it without being reminded of the fate which the original most richly merited. but my letter will overflow even the ample limits of a frank, if i do not conclude. i hope that you will be properly penitent for neglecting such a correspondent when you receive so long a dispatch, written amidst the bellowing of justices, lawyers, criers, witnesses, prisoners, and prisoners' wives and mothers. ever yours affectionately t. b. m. lancaster: march , . my dear father,--a single line to say that i am at lancaster. where you all are i have not the very slightest notion. pray let me hear. that dispersion of the gentiles which our friends the prophets foretell seems to have commenced with our family. everything here is going on in the common routine. the only things of peculiar interest are those which we get from the london papers. all minds seem to be perfectly made up as to the certainty of catholic emancipation having come at last. the feeling of approbation among the barristers is all but unanimous. the quiet townspeople here, as far as i can see, are very well contented. as soon as i arrived i was asked by my landlady how things had gone. i told her the division, which i had learned from brougham at garstang. she seemed surprised at the majority. i asked her if she was against the measure. "no; she only wished that all christians would live in peace and charity together." a very sensible speech, and better than one at least of the members for the county ever made in his life. i implore you above everything, my dear father, to keep up your health and spirits. come what may, the conveniences of life, independence, our personal respectability, and the exercise of the intellect and the affections, we are almost certain of retaining; and everything else is a mere superfluity, to be enjoyed, but not to be missed. but i ought to be ashamed of reading you a lecture on qualities which you are so much more competent to teach than myself. ever yours very affectionately t. b. m. to macvey napier, esq. great ormond street, london: january , . my dear sir,--i send off by the mail of to-day an article on southey,--too long, i fear, to meet your wishes, but as short as i could make it. there were, by the bye, in my last article a few omissions made, of no great consequence in themselves; the longest, i think, a paragraph of twelve or fourteen lines. i should scarcely have thought this worth mentioning, as it certainly by no means exceeds the limits of that editorial prerogative which i most willingly recognise, but that the omissions seemed to me, and to one or two persons who had seen the article in its original state, to be made on a principle which, however sound in itself, does not i think apply to compositions of this description. the passages omitted were the most pointed and ornamented sentences in the review. now, for high and grave works, a history for example, or a system of political or moral philosophy, doctor johnson's rule,--that every sentence which the writer thinks fine ought to be cut out,--is excellent. but periodical works like ours, which unless they strike at the first reading are not likely to strike at all, whose whole life is a month or two, may, i think, be allowed to be sometimes even viciously florid. probably, in estimating the real value of any tinsel which i may put upon my articles, you and i should not materially differ. but it is not by his own taste, but by the taste of the fish, that the angler is determined in his choice of bait. perhaps after all i am ascribing to system what is mere accident. be assured, at all events, that what i have said is said in perfect good humour, and indicates no mutinous disposition. the jews are about to petition parliament for relief from the absurd restrictions which lie on them,--the last relique of the old system of intolerance. i have been applied to by some of them in the name of the managers of the scheme to write for them in the edinburgh review. i would gladly further a cause so good, and you, i think, could have no objection. ever yours truly t. b. macaulay. bowood: february , . my dear father,--i am here in a very nice room, with perfect liberty, and a splendid library at my command. it seems to be thought desirable that i should stay in the neighbourhood, and pay my compliments to my future constituents every other day. the house is splendid and elegant, yet more remarkable for comfort than for either elegance or splendour. i never saw any great place so thoroughly desirable for a residence. lord kerry tells me that his uncle left everything in ruin,--trees cut down, and rooms unfurnished,--and sold the library, which was extremely fine. every book and picture in bowood has been bought by the present lord, and certainly the collection does him great honour. i am glad that i stayed here. a burgess of some influence, who, at the last election, attempted to get up an opposition to the lansdowne interest, has just arrived. i called on him this morning, and, though he was a little ungracious at first, succeeded in obtaining his promise. without him, indeed, my return would have been secure; but both from motives of interest and from a sense of gratitude i think it best to leave nothing undone which may tend to keep lord lansdowne's influence here unimpaired against future elections. lord kerry seems to me to be going on well. he has been in very good condition, he says, this week; and hopes to be at the election, and at the subsequent dinner. i do not know when i have taken so much to so young a man. in general my intimacies have been with my seniors; but lord kerry is really quite a favourite of mine,--kind, lively, intelligent, modest, with the gentle manners which indicate a long intimacy with the best society, and yet without the least affectation. we have oceans of beer, and mountains of potatoes, for dinner. indeed, lady lansdowne drank beer most heartily on the only day which she passed with us, and, when i told her laughing that she set me at ease on a point which had given me much trouble, she said that she would never suffer any dandy novelist to rob her of her beer or her cheese. the question between law and politics is a momentous one. as far as i am myself concerned, i should not hesitate; but the interest of my family is also to be considered. we shall see, however, before long what my chance of success as a public man may prove to be. at present it would clearly be wrong in me to show any disposition to quit my profession. i hope that you will be on your guard as to what you may say to brougham about this business. he is so angry at it that he cannot keep his anger to himself. i know that he has blamed lord lansdowne in the robing-room of the court of king's bench. the seat ought, he says, to have been given to another man. if he means denman, i can forgive, and even respect him, for the feeling which he entertains. believe me ever yours most affectionately t. b. m. chapter iv. - . state of public affairs when macaulay entered parliament-- his maiden speech--the french revolution of july -- macaulay's letters from paris--the palais royal--lafayette-- lardner's cabinet cyclopaedia--the new parliament meets-- fall of the duke of wellington--scene with croker--the reform bill--political success--house of commons life-- macaulay's party spirit--loudon society--mr. thomas flower ellis--visit to cambridge--rothley temple--margaret macaulay's journal--lord brougham--hopes of office--macaulay as a politician--letters to hannah macaulay, mr. napier, and mr. ellis. throughout the last two centuries of our history there never was a period when a man conscious of power, impatient of public wrongs, and still young enough to love a fight for its own sake, could have entered parliament with a fairer prospect of leading a life worth living, and doing work that would requite the pains, than at the commencement of the year . in this volume, which only touches politics in order to show to what extent macaulay was a politician, and for how long, controversies cannot appropriately be started or revived. this is not the place to enter into a discussion on the vexed question as to whether mr. pitt and his successors, in pursuing their system of repression, were justified by the necessities of the long french war. it is enough to assert, what few or none will deny, that, for the space of more than a generation from onwards, our country had, with a short interval, been governed on declared reactionary principles. we, in whose days whigs and tories have often exchanged office, and still more often interchanged policies, find it difficult to imagine what must have been the condition of the kingdom, when one and the same party almost continuously held not only place, but power, throughout a period when, to an unexampled degree, "public life was exasperated by hatred, and the charities of private life soured by political aversion." [these expressions occur in lord cockburn's memorials of his time.] fear, religion, ambition, and self-interest,--everything that could tempt and everything that could deter,--were enlisted on the side of the dominant opinions. to profess liberal views was to be excluded from all posts of emolument, from all functions of dignity, and from all opportunities of public usefulness. the whig leaders, while enjoying that security for life and liberty which even in the worst days of our recent history has been the reward of eminence, were powerless in the commons and isolated in the lords. no motive but disinterested conviction kept a handful of veterans steadfast round a banner which was never raised except to be swept contemptuously down by the disciplined and overwhelming strength of the ministerial phalanx. argument and oratory were alike unavailing under a constitution which was indeed a despotism of privilege. the county representation of england was an anomaly, and the borough representation little better than a scandal. the constituencies of scotland, with so much else that of right belonged to the public, had got into dundas's pocket. in the year all the towns north of tweed together contained fewer voters than are now on the rolls of the single burgh of hawick, and all the counties together contained fewer voters than are now on the register of roxburghshire. so small a band of electors was easily manipulated by a party leader who had the patronage of india at his command. the three presidencies were flooded with the sons and nephews of men who were lucky enough to have a seat in a town council, or a superiority in a rural district; and fortunate it was for our empire that the responsibilities of that noblest of all careers soon educated young indian civil servants into something higher than mere adherents of a political party. while the will of the nation was paralysed within the senate, effectual care was taken that its voice should not be heard without. the press was gagged in england, and throttled in scotland. every speech, or sermon, or pamphlet, the substance of which a crown lawyer could torture into a semblance of sedition, sent its author to the jail, the hulks, or the pillory. in any place of resort where an informer could penetrate, men spoke their minds at imminent hazard of ruinous fines, and protracted imprisonment. it was vain to appeal to parliament for redress against the tyranny of packed juries, and panic-driven magistrates. sheridan endeavoured to retain for his countrymen the protection of habeas corpus; but he could only muster forty-one supporters. exactly as many members followed fox into the lobby when he opposed a bill, which, interpreted in the spirit that then actuated our tribunals, made attendance at an open meeting summoned for the consideration of parliamentary reform a service as dangerous as night-poaching, and far more dangerous than smuggling. only ten more than that number ventured to protest against the introduction of a measure, still more inquisitorial in its provisions and ruthless in its penalties, which rendered every citizen who gave his attention to the removal of public grievances liable at any moment to find himself in the position of a criminal;--that very measure in behalf of which bishop horsley had stated in the house of peers that he did not know what the mass of the people of any country had to do with the laws, except to obey them. amidst a population which had once known freedom, and was still fit to be entrusted with it, such a state of matters could not last for ever. justly proud of the immense success that they had bought by their resolution, their energy, and their perseverance, the ministers regarded the fall of napoleon as a party triumph which could only serve to confirm their power. but the last cannon-shot that was fired on the th of june, was in truth the death-knell of the golden age of toryism. when the passion and ardour of the war gave place to the discontent engendered by a protracted period of commercial distress, the opponents of progress began to perceive that they had to reckon, not with a small and disheartened faction, but with a clear majority of the nation led by the most enlightened, and the most eminent, of its sons. agitators and incendiaries retired into the background, as will always be the case when the country is in earnest; and statesmen who had much to lose, but were not afraid to risk it, stepped quietly and firmly to the front. the men, and the sons of the men, who had so long endured exclusion from office, embittered by unpopularity, at length reaped their reward. earl grey, who forty years before had been hooted through the streets of north shields with cries of "no popery," lived to bear the most respected name in england; and brougham, whose opinions differed little from those for expressing which dr. priestley in had his house burned about his ears by the birmingham mob, was now the popular idol beyond all comparison or competition. in the face of such unanimity of purpose, guided by so much worth and talent, the ministers lost their nerve, and, like all rulers who do not possess the confidence of the governed, began first to make mistakes, and then to quarrel among themselves. throughout the years of macaulay's early manhood the ice was breaking fast. he was still quite young when the concession of catholic emancipation gave a moral shock to the tory party from which it never recovered until the old order of things had finally passed away. [macaulay was fond of repeating an answer made to him by lord clarendon in the year . the young men were talking over the situation, and macaulay expressed curiosity as to the terms in which the duke of wellington would recommend the catholic relief bill to the peers. "oh," said the other, "it will be easy enough. he'll say 'my lords! attention! right about face! march!'"] it was his fortune to enter into other men's labours after the burden and heat of the day had already been borne, and to be summoned into the field just as the season was at hand for gathering in a ripe and long-expected harvest of beneficent legislation. on the th of april, , he addressed the house of commons on the second reading of mr. robert grant's bill for the removal of jewish disabilities. sir james mackintosh rose with him, but macaulay got the advantage of the preference that has always been conceded to one who speaks for the first time after gaining his seat during the continuance of a parliament;--a privilege which, by a stretch of generosity, is now extended to new members who have been returned at a general election. sir james subsequently took part in the debate; not, as he carefully assured his audience, "to supply any defects in the speech of his honourable friend, for there were none that he could find, but principally to absolve his own conscience." indeed, macaulay, addressing himself to his task with an absence of pretension such as never fails to conciliate the goodwill of the house towards a maiden speech, put clearly and concisely enough the arguments in favour of the bill;--arguments which, obvious, and almost common-place, as they appear under his straightforward treatment, had yet to be repeated during a space of six and thirty years before they commended themselves to the judgment of our upper chamber. "the power of which you deprive the jew consists in maces, and gold chains, and skins of parchment with pieces of wax dangling from their edges. the power which you leave the jew is the power of principal over clerk, of master over servant, of landlord over tenant. as things now stand, a jew may be the richest man in england. he may possess the means of raising this party and depressing that; of making east indian directors; of making members of parliament. the influence of a jew may be of the first consequence in a war which shakes europe to the centre. his power may come into play in assisting or thwarting the greatest plans of the greatest princes; and yet, with all this confessed, acknowledged, undenied, you would have him deprived of power! does not wealth confer power? how are we to permit all the consequences of that wealth but one? i cannot conceive the nature of an argument that is to bear out such a position. if we were to be called on to revert to the day when the warehouses of jews were torn down and pillaged, the theory would be comprehensible. but we have to do with a persecution so delicate that there is no abstract rule for its guidance. you tell us that the jews have no legal right to power, and i am bound to admit it; but in the same way, three hundred years ago they had no legal right to be in england, and six hundred years ago they had no legal right to the teeth in their heads. but, if it is the moral right we are to look at, i hold that on every principle of moral obligation the jew has a right to political power." he was on his legs once again, and once only, during his first session; doing more for future success in parliament by his silence than he could have effected by half a dozen brilliant perorations. a crisis was rapidly approaching when a man gifted with eloquence, who by previous self-restraint had convinced the house that he did not speak for speaking's sake, might rise almost in a day to the very summit of influence and reputation. the country was under the personal rule of the duke of wellington, who had gradually squeezed out of his cabinet every vestige of liberalism, and even of independence, and who at last stood so completely alone that he was generally supposed to be in more intimate communication with prince polignac than with any of his own colleagues. the duke had his own way in the lords; and on the benches of the commons the opposition members were unable to carry, or even visibly to improve their prospect of carrying, the measures on which their hearts were set. the reformers were not doing better in the division lobby than in ; and their question showed no signs of having advanced since the day when it had been thrown over by pitt on the eve of the french revolution. but the outward aspect of the situation was very far from answering to the reality. while the leaders of the popular party had been spending themselves in efforts that seemed each more abortive than the last,--dividing only to be enormously outvoted, and vindicating with calmness and moderation the first principles of constitutional government only to be stigmatised as the apostles of anarchy,--a mighty change was surely but imperceptibly effecting itself in the collective mind of their fellow-countrymen. "for, while the tired waves, vainly breaking, seem here no painful inch to gain, far back, through creeks and inlets making, comes silent, flooding in, the main." events were at hand, which unmistakably showed how different was the england of from the england of . the king died; parliament was dissolved on the th of july; and in the first excitement and bustle of the elections, while the candidates were still on the roads and the writs in the mailbags, came the news that paris was in arms. the troops fought as well as frenchmen ever can be got to fight against the tricolour; but by the evening of the th it was all over with the bourbons. the minister, whose friendship had reflected such unpopularity on our own premier, succumbed to the detestation of the victorious people, and his sacrifice did not save the dynasty. what was passing among our neighbours for once created sympathy, and not repulsion, on this side the channel. one french revolution had condemned english liberalism to forty years of subjection, and another was to be the signal which launched it on as long a career of supremacy. most men said, and all felt, that wellington must follow polignac; and the public temper was such as made it well for the stability of our throne that it was filled by a monarch who had attracted to himself the hopes and affection of the nation, and who shared its preferences and antipathies with regard to the leading statesmen of the day. one result of political disturbance in any quarter of the globe is to fill the scene of action with young members of parliament, who follow revolutions about europe as assiduously as jew brokers attend upon the movements of an invading army. macaulay, whose re-election for calne had been a thing of course, posted off to paris at the end of august, journeying by dieppe and rouen, and eagerly enjoying a first taste of continental travel. his letters during the tour were such as, previously to the age of railroads, brothers who had not been abroad before used to write for the edification of sisters who expected never to go abroad at all. he describes in minute detail manners and institutions that to us are no longer novelties, and monuments which an educated englishman of our time knows as well as westminster abbey, and a great deal better than the tower. everything that he saw, heard, ate, drank, paid, and suffered, was noted down in his exuberant diction to be read aloud and commented on over the breakfast table in great ormond street. "at rouen," he says, "i was struck by the union of venerable antiquity with extreme liveliness and gaiety. we have nothing of the sort in england. till the time of james the first, i imagine, our houses were almost all of wood, and have in consequence disappeared. in york there are some very old streets; but they are abandoned to the lowest people, and the gay shops are in the newly-built quarter of the town. in london, what with the fire of , and what with the natural progress of demolition and rebuilding, i doubt whether there are fifty houses that date from the reformation. but in rouen you have street after street of lofty stern-looking masses of stone, with gothic carvings. the buildings are so high, and the ways so narrow, that the sun can scarcely reach the pavements. yet in these streets, monastic in their aspect, you have all the glitter of regent street or the burlington arcade. rugged and dark, above, below they are a blaze of ribands, gowns, watches, trinkets, artificial flowers; grapes, melons, and peaches such as covent garden does not furnish, filling the windows of the fruiterers; showy women swimming smoothly over the uneasy stones, and stared at by national guards swaggering by in full uniform. it is the soho bazaar transplanted into the gloomy cloisters of oxford." he writes to a friend just before he started on his tour: "there is much that i am impatient to see, but two things specially,--the palais royal, and the man who called me the aristarchus of edinburgh." who this person might be, and whether macaulay succeeded in meeting him, are questions which his letters leave unsolved; but he must have been a constant visitor at the palais royal if the hours that he spent in it bore any relation to the number of pages which it occupies in his correspondence. the place was indeed well worth a careful study; for in it was not the orderly and decent bazaar of the second empire, but was still that compound of parnassus and bohemia which is painted in vivid colours in the "grand homme de province" of balzac,--still the paradise of such ineffable rascals as diderot has drawn with terrible fidelity in his "neveu de rameau." "if i were to select the spot in all the earth in which the good and evil of civilisation are most strikingly exhibited, in which the arts of life are carried to the highest perfection, and in which all pleasures, high and low, intellectual and sensual, are collected in the smallest space, i should certainly choose the palais royal. it is the covent garden piazza, the paternoster row, the vauxhall, the albion tavern, the burlington arcade, the crockford's the finish, the athenaeum of paris all in one. even now, when the first dazzling effect has passed off, i never traverse it without feeling bewildered by its magnificent variety. as a great capital is a country in miniature, so the palais royal is a capital in miniature,--an abstract and epitome of a vast community, exhibiting at a glance the politeness which adorns its higher ranks, the coarseness of its populace, and the vices and the misery which lie underneath its brilliant exterior. everything is there, and everybody. statesmen, wits, philosophers, beauties, dandies, blacklegs, adventurers, artists, idlers, the king and his court, beggars with matches crying for charity, wretched creatures dying of disease and want in garrets. there is no condition of life which is not to be found in this gorgeous and fantastic fairyland." macaulay had excellent opportunities for seeing behind the scenes during the closing acts of the great drama that was being played out through those summer months. the duc de broglie, then prime minister, treated him with marked attention, both as an englishman of distinction, and as his father's son. he was much in the chamber of deputies, and witnessed that strange and pathetic historical revival when, after an interval of forty such years as mankind had never known before, the aged la fayette again stood forth, in the character of a disinterested dictator, between the hostile classes of his fellow-countrymen. "de la fayette is so overwhelmed with work that i scarcely knew how to deliver even brougham's letter, which was a letter of business, and should have thought it absurd to send him mackintosh's, which was a mere letter of introduction, i fell in with an english acquaintance who told me that he had an appointment with la fayette, and who undertook to deliver them both. i accepted his offer, for, if i had left them with the porter, ten to one they would never have been opened. i hear that hundreds of letters are lying in the lodge of the hotel. every wednesday morning, from nine to eleven, la fayette gives audience to anybody who wishes to speak with him; but about ten thousand people attend on these occasions, and fill, not only the house, but all the courtyard and half the street. la fayette is commander in chief of the national guard of france. the number of these troops in paris alone is upwards of forty thousand. the government find a musket and bayonet; but the uniform, which costs about ten napoleons, the soldiers provide themselves. all the shopkeepers are enrolled, and i cannot sufficiently admire their patriotism. my landlord, meurice, a man who, i suppose, has realised a million francs or more, is up one night in four with his firelock doing the duty of a common watchman. "there is, however, something to be said as an explanation of the zeal with which the bourgeoisie give their time and money to the public. the army received so painful a humiliation in the battles of july that it is by no means inclined to serve the new system faithfully. the rabble behaved nobly during the conflict, and have since shown rare humanity and moderation. yet those who remember the former revolution feel an extreme dread of the ascendency of mere multitude and there have been signs, trifling in themselves, but such as may naturally alarm people of property. workmen have struck. machinery has been attacked. inflammatory handbills have appeared upon the walls. at present all is quiet; but the thing may happen, particularly if polignac and peyronnet should not be put to death. the peers wish to save them. the lower orders, who have had five or six thousand of their friends and kinsmen butchered by the frantic wickedness of these men, will hardly submit. 'eh! eh!' said a fierce old soldier of napoleon to me the other day. 'l'on dit qu'ils seront deportes: mais ne m'en parle pas. non! non! coupez-leur le cou. sacre! ca ne passera pas comme ca.'" "this long political digression will explain to you why monsieur de la fayette is so busy. he has more to do than all the ministers together. however, my letters were presented, and he said to my friend that he had a soiree every tuesday, and should be most happy to see me there. i drove to his house yesterday night. of the interest which the common parisians take in politics you may judge by this. i told my driver to wait for me, and asked his number. 'ah! monsieur, c'est un beau numero. c'est un brave numero. c'est .' you may remember that the number of deputies who voted the intrepid address to charles the tenth, which irritated him into his absurd coup d'etat, was . i walked into the hotel through a crowd of uniforms, and found the reception-rooms as full as they could hold. i was not able to make my way to la fayette; but i was glad to see him. he looks like the brave, honest, simple, good-natured man that he is." besides what is quoted above, there is very little of general interest in these journal letters; and their publication would serve no purpose except that of informing the present leader of the monarchists what his father had for breakfast and dinner during a week of , and of enabling him to trace changes in the disposition of the furniture of the de broglie hotel. "i believe," writes macaulay, "that i have given the inventory of every article in the duke's salon. you will think that i have some intention of turning upholsterer." his thoughts and observations on weightier matters he kept for an article on the state of parties in france which he intended to provide for the october number of the edinburgh review. while he was still at paris, this arrangement was rescinded by mr. napier in compliance with the wish, or the whim, of brougham; and macaulay's surprise and annoyance vented itself in a burst of indignant rhetoric strong enough to have upset a government. [see on page the letter to mr. napier of september , .] his wrath,--or that part of it, at least, which was directed against the editor,--did not survive an interchange of letters; and he at once set to work upon turning his material into the shape of a volume for the series of lardner's cabinet cyclopaedia, under the title of "the history of france, from the restoration of the bourbons to the accession of louis philippe." ten years ago proofs of the first eighty-eight pages were found in messrs. spottiswoode's printing office, with a note on the margin to the effect that most of the type was broken up before the sheets had been pulled. the task, as far as it went, was faithfully performed; but the author soon arrived at the conclusion that he might find a more profitable investment for his labour. with his head full of reform, macaulay was loth to spend in epitomising history the time and energy that would be better employed in helping to make it. when the new parliament met on the th of october it was already evident that the government was doomed. where the elections were open, reform had carried the day. brougham was returned for yorkshire, a constituency of tried independence, which before seldom failed to secure the triumph of a cause into whose scale it had thrown its enormous weight. the counties had declared for the whigs by a majority of eight to five, and the great cities by a majority of eight to one. of the close boroughs in tory hands many were held by men who had not forgotten catholic emancipation, and who did not mean to pardon their leaders until they had ceased to be ministers. in the debate on the address the duke of wellington uttered his famous declaration that the legislature possessed, and deserved to possess, the full and entire confidence of the country; that its existing constitution was not only practically efficient but theoretically admirable; and that, if he himself had to frame a system of representation, he should do his best to imitate so excellent a model, though he admitted that the nature of man was incapable at a single effort of attaining to such mature perfection. his bewildered colleagues could only assert in excuse that their chief was deaf, and wish that everybody else had been deaf too. the second ministerial feat was of a piece with the first. their majesties had accepted an invitation to dine at guildhall on the th of november. the lord mayor elect informed the home office that there was danger of riot, and the premier, (who could not be got to see that london was not paris because his own political creed happened to be much the same as prince polignac's,) advised the king to postpone his visit to the city, and actually talked of putting lombard street and cheapside in military occupation. such a step taken at such a time by such a man had its inevitable result. consols, which the duke's speech on the address had brought from to , fell to in an hour and a half; jewellers and silversmiths sent their goods to the banks; merchants armed their clerks and barricaded their warehouses; and, when the panic subsided, fear only gave place to the shame and annoyance which a loyal people, whose loyalty was at that moment more active than ever, experienced from the reflection that all europe was discussing the reasons why our king could not venture to dine in public with the chief magistrate of his own capital. a strong minister, who sends the funds down seven per cent. in as many days, is an anomaly that no nation will consent to tolerate; the members of the cabinet looked forward with consternation to a scheme of reform which, with the approbation of his party, brougham had undertaken to introduce on the th of november; and when, within twenty-four hours of the dreaded debate, they were defeated on a motion for a committee on the civil list, their relief at having obtained an excuse for retiring at least equalled that which the country felt at getting rid of them. earl grey came in, saying, (and meaning what he said,) that the principles on which he stood were "amelioration of abuses, promotion of economy, and the endeavour to preserve peace consistently with the honour of the country." brougham, who was very sore at having been forced to postpone his notice on reform on account of the ministerial crisis, had gratuitously informed the house of commons on two successive days that he had no intention of taking office. a week later on he accepted the chancellorship with an inconsistency which his friends readily forgave, for they knew that, when he resolved to join the cabinet, he was thinking more of his party than of himself; a consideration that naturally enough only sharpened the relish with which his adversaries pounced upon this first of his innumerable scrapes. when the new writ for yorkshire was moved, croker commented sharply on the position in which the chancellor was placed, and remarked that he had often heard brougham declare that "the characters of public men formed part of the wealth of england;"--a reminiscence which was delivered with as much gravity and unction as if it had been mackintosh discoursing on romilly. unfortunately for himself, croker ruined his case by referring to a private conversation, an error which the house of commons always takes at least an evening to forgive; and macaulay had his audience with him as he vindicated the absent orator with a generous warmth, which at length carried him so far that he was interrupted by a call to order from the chair. "the noble lord had but a few days for deliberation, and that at a time when great agitation prevailed, and when the country required a strong and efficient ministry to conduct the government of the state. at such a period a few days are as momentous as months would be at another period. it is not by the clock that we should measure the importance of the changes that might take place during such an interval. i owe no allegiance to the noble lord who has been transferred to another place; but as a member of this house i cannot banish from my memory the extraordinary eloquence of that noble person within these walls,--an eloquence which has left nothing equal to it behind; and when i behold the departure of the great man from amongst us, and when i see the place in which he sat, and from which he has so often astonished us by the mighty powers of his mind, occupied this evening by the honourable member who has commenced this debate, i cannot express the feelings and emotions to which such circumstances give rise." parliament adjourned over christmas; and on the st of march lord john russell introduced the reform bill amidst breathless silence, which was at length broken by peals of contemptuous laughter from the opposition benches, as he read the list of the hundred and ten boroughs which were condemned to partial or entire disfranchisement. sir robert inglis led the attack upon a measure that he characterised as revolution in the guise of a statute. next morning as sir robert was walking into town over westminster bridge, he told his companion that up to the previous night he had been very anxious, but that his fears were now at an end, inasmuch as the shock caused by the extravagance of the ministerial proposals would infallibly bring the country to its senses. on the evening of that day macaulay made the first of his reform speeches. when he sat down the speaker sent for him, and told him that in all his prolonged experience he had never seen the house in such a state of excitement. even at this distance of time it is impossible to read aloud the last thirty sentences without an emotion which suggests to the mind what must have been their effect when declaimed by one who felt every word that he spoke, in the midst of an assembly agitated by hopes and apprehensions such as living men have never known, or have long forgotten. ["the question of parliamentary reform is still behind. but signs, of which it is impossible to misconceive the import, do most clearly indicate that, unless that question also be speedily settled, property, and order, and all the institutions of this great monarchy, will be exposed to fearful peril. is it possible that gentlemen long versed in high political affairs cannot read these signs? is it possible that they can really believe that the representative system of england, such as it now is, will last to the year ? if not, for what would they have us wait? would they have us wait, merely that we may show to all the world how little we have profited by our own recent experience? would they have us wait, that we may once again hit the exact point where we can neither refuse with authority, nor concede with grace? would they have us wait, that the numbers of the discontented party may become larger, its demands higher, its feelings more acrimonious, its organisation more complete? would they have us wait till the whole tragicomedy of has been acted over again? till they have been brought into office by a cry of 'no reform,' to be reformers, as they were once before brought into office by a cry of 'no popery', to be emancipators? have they obliterated from their minds--gladly, perhaps, would some among them obliterate from their minds--the transactions of that year? and have they forgotten all the transactions of the succeeding year? have they forgotten how the spirit of liberty in ireland, debarred from its natural outlet, found a vent by forbidden passages? have they forgotten how we were forced to indulge the catholics in all the license of rebels, merely because we chose to withhold from them the liberties of subjects? do they wait for associations more formidable than that of the corn exchange, for contributions larger than the rent, for agitators more violent than those who, three years ago, divided with the king and the parliament the sovereignty of ireland? do they wait for that last and most dreadful paroxysm of popular rage, for that last and most cruel test of military fidelity? let them wait, if their past experience shall induce them to think that any high honour or any exquisite pleasure is to be obtained by a policy like this. let them wait, if this strange and fearful infatuation be indeed upon them, that they should not see with their eyes, or hear with their ears, or understand with their heart. but let us know our interest and our duty better. turn where we may, within, around, the voice of great events is proclaiming to us, reform, that you may preserve. now, therefore, while everything at home and abroad forebodes ruin to those who persist in a hopeless struggle against the spirit of the age, now, while the crash of the proudest throne of the continent is still resounding in our ears, now, while the roof of a british palace affords an ignominious shelter to the exiled heir of forty kings, now, while we see on every side ancient institutions subverted, and great societies dissolved, now, while the heart of england is still sound, now, while old feelings and old associations retain a power and a charm which may too soon pass away, now, in this your accepted time, now, in this your day of salvation, take counsel, not of prejudice, not of party spirit, not of the ignominious pride of a fatal consistency, but of history, of reason, of the ages which are past, of the signs of this most portentous time. pronounce in a manner worthy of the expectation with which this great debate has been anticipated, and of the long remembrance which it will leave behind. renew the youth of the state. save property, divided against itself. save the multitude, endangered by its own ungovernable passions. save the aristocracy, endangered by its own unpopular power. save the greatest, the fairest, and most highly civilised community that ever existed, from calamities which may in a few days sweep away all the rich heritage of so many ages of wisdom and glory. the danger is terrible. the time is short. if this bill should be rejected, i pray to god that none of those who concur in rejecting it may ever remember their votes with unavailing remorse, amidst the wreck of laws, the confusion of ranks, the spoliation of property, and the dissolution of social order."] sir thomas denman, who rose later on in the discussion, said, with universal acceptance, that the orator's words remained tingling in the ears of all who heard them, and would last in their memories as long as they had memories to employ. that sense of proprietorship in an effort of genius, which the house of commons is ever ready to entertain, effaced for a while all distinctions of party. "portions of the speech," said sir robert peel, "were as beautiful as anything i have ever heard or read. it reminded one of the old times." the names of fox, burke, and canning were during that evening in everybody's mouth; and macaulay overheard with delight a knot of old members illustrating their criticisms by recollections of lord plunket. he had reason to be pleased; for he had been thought worthy of the compliment which the judgment of parliament reserves for a supreme occasion. in , on the second reading of the franchise bill, when the crowning oration of that memorable debate had come to its close amidst a tempest of applause, one or two veterans of the lobby, forgetting macaulay on reform,--forgetting, it may be, mr. gladstone himself on the conservative budget of ,--pronounced, amidst the willing assent of a younger generation, that there had been nothing like it since plunket. the unequivocal success of the first speech into which he had thrown his full power decided for some time to come the tenor of macaulay's career. during the next three years he devoted himself to parliament, rivalling stanley in debate, and hume in the regularity of his attendance. he entered with zest into the animated and manysided life of the house of commons, of which so few traces can ordinarily be detected in what goes by the name of political literature. the biographers of a distinguished statesman too often seem to have forgotten that the subject of their labours passed the best part of his waking hours, during the half of every year, in a society of a special and deeply marked character, the leading traits of which are at least as well worth recording as the fashionable or diplomatic gossip that fills so many volumes of memoirs and correspondence. macaulay's letters sufficiently indicate how thoroughly he enjoyed the ease, the freedom, the hearty good-fellowship, that reign within the precincts of our national senate; and how entirely he recognised that spirit of noble equality, so prevalent among its members, which takes little or no account of wealth, or title, or indeed of reputation won in other fields, but which ranks a man according as the value of his words, and the weight of his influence, bear the test of a standard which is essentially its own. in february he writes to whewell: "i am impatient for praed's debut. the house of commons is a place in which i would not promise success to any man. i have great doubts even about jeffrey. it is the most peculiar audience in the world. i should say that a man's being a good writer, a good orator at the bar, a good mob-orator, or a good orator in debating clubs, was rather a reason for expecting him to fail than for expecting him to succeed in the house of commons. a place where walpole succeeded and addison failed; where dundas succeeded and burke failed; where peel now succeeds and where mackintosh fails; where erskine and scarlett were dinner-bells; where lawrence and jekyll, the two wittiest men, or nearly so, of their time, were thought bores, is surely a very strange place. and yet i feel the whole character of the place growing upon me. i begin to like what others about me like, and to disapprove what they disapprove. canning used to say that the house, as a body, had better taste than the man of best taste in it, and i am very much inclined to think that canning was right." the readers of macaulay's letters will, from time to time, find reason to wish that the young whig of had more frequently practised that studied respect for political opponents, which now does so much to correct the intolerance of party among men who can be adversaries without ceasing to regard each other as colleagues. but this honourable sentiment was the growth of later days; and, at an epoch when the system of the past and the system of the future were night after night in deadly wrestle on the floor of st. stephen's, the combatants were apt to keep their kindliness, and even their courtesies, for those with whom they stood shoulder to shoulder in the fray. politicians, conservative and liberal alike, who were themselves young during the sessions of and , and who can recall the sensations evoked by a contest of which the issues were far less grave and the passions less strong than of yore, will make allowances for one who, with the imagination of a poet and the temperament of an orator, at thirty years old was sent straight into the thickest of the tumult which then raged round the standard of reform, and will excuse him for having borne himself in that battle of giants as a determined and a fiery partisan. if to live intensely be to live happily, macaulay had an enviable lot during those stirring years; and, if the old songwriters had reason on their side when they celebrated the charms of a light purse, he certainly possessed that element of felicity. among the earliest economical reforms undertaken by the new government was a searching revision of our bankruptcy jurisdiction, in the course of which his commissionership was swept away, without leaving him a penny of compensation. "i voted for the bankruptcy court bill," he said in answer to an inquisitive constituent. "there were points in that bill of which i did not approve, and i only refrained from stating those points because an office of my own was at stake." when this source fell dry he was for a while a poor man; for a member of parliament, who has others to think of besides himself, is anything but rich on sixty or seventy pounds a quarter as the produce of his pen, and a college income which has only a few more months to run. at a time when his parliamentary fame stood at its highest he was reduced to sell the gold medals which he had gained at cambridge; but he was never for a moment in debt; nor did he publish a line prompted by any lower motive than the inspiration of his political faith, or the instinct of his literary genius. he had none but pleasant recollections connected with the period when his fortunes were at their lowest. from the secure prosperity of after life he delighted in recalling the time when, after cheering on the fierce debate for twelve or fifteen hours together, he would walk home by daylight to his chambers, and make his supper on a cheese which was a present from one of his wiltshire constituents, and a glass of the audit ale which reminded him that he was still a fellow of trinity. with political distinction came social success, more rapid and more substantial, perhaps, than has ever been achieved by one who took so little trouble to win or to retain it. the circumstances of the time were all in his favour. never did our higher circles present so much that would attract a new-comer, and never was there more readiness to admit within them all who brought the honourable credentials of talent and celebrity. in the exclusiveness of birth was passing away, and the exclusiveness of fashion had not set in. the whig party, during its long period of depression, had been drawn together by the bonds of common hopes, and endeavours, and disappointments; and personal reputation, whether literary, political, or forensic, held its own as against the advantages of rank and money to an extent that was never known before, and never since. macaulay had been well received in the character of an edinburgh reviewer, and his first great speech in the house of commons at once opened to him all the doors in london that were best worth entering. brought up, as he had been, in a household which was perhaps the strictest and the homeliest among a set of families whose creed it was to live outside the world, it put his strength of mind to the test when he found himself courted and observed by the most distinguished and the most formidable personages of the day. lady holland listened to him with unwonted deference, and scolded him with a circumspection that was in itself a compliment. rogers spoke of him with friendliness, and to him with positive affection, and gave him the last proof of his esteem and admiration by asking him to name the morning for a breakfast-party. he was treated with almost fatherly kindness by the able and worthy man who is still remembered by the name of conversation sharp. indeed, his deference for the feelings of all whom he liked and respected, which an experienced observer could detect beneath the eagerness of his manner and the volubility of his talk, made him a favourite among those of a generation above his own. he bore his honours quietly, and enjoyed them with the natural and hearty pleasure of a man who has a taste for society, but whose ambitions lie elsewhere. for the space of three seasons he dined out almost nightly, and spent many of his sundays in those suburban residences which, as regards the company and the way of living, are little else than sections of london removed into a purer air. before very long his habits and tastes began to incline in the direction of domesticity, and even of seclusion; and, indeed, at every period of his life he would gladly desert the haunts of those whom pope and his contemporaries used to term "the great," to seek the cheerful and cultured simplicity of his home, or the conversation of that one friend who had a share in the familiar confidence which macaulay otherwise reserved for his nearest relatives. this was mr. thomas flower ellis, whose reports of the proceedings in king's bench, extending over a whole generation, have established and perpetuated his name as that of an acute and industrious lawyer. he was older than macaulay by four years. though both fellows of the same college, they missed each other at the university, and it was not until , on the northern circuit, that their acquaintance began. "macaulay has joined," writes mr. ellis; "an amusing person; somewhat boyish in his manner, but very original." the young barristers had in common an insatiable love of the classics; and similarity of character, not very perceptible on the surface, soon brought about an intimacy which ripened into an attachment as important to the happiness of both concerned as ever united two men through every stage of life and vicissitude of fortune. mr. ellis had married early; but in he lost his wife, and macaulay's helpful and heartfelt participation in his great sorrow riveted the links of a chain that was already indissoluble. the letters contained in this volume will tell, better than the words of any third person, what were the points of sympathy between the two companions, and in what manner they lived together till the end came. mr. ellis survived his friend little more than a year; not complaining or lamenting but going about his work like a man from whose day the light has departed. brief and rare were the vacations of the most hard-worked parliament that had sat since the times of pym and hampden. in the late autumn of , the defeat of the reform bill in the house of lords delivered over the country to agitation, resentment, and alarm; and gave a short holiday to public men who were not ministers, magistrates, or officers in the yeomanry. hannah and margaret macaulay accompanied their brother on a visit to cambridge, where they met with the welcome which young masters of arts delight in providing for the sisters of a comrade of whom they are fond and proud. "on the evening that we arrived," says lady trevelyan, "we met at dinner whewell, sedgwick, airy, and thirlwail and how pleasant they were, and how much they made of us two happy girls, who were never tired of seeing, and hearing and admiring! we breakfasted, lunched, and dined with one or the other of the set during our stay, and walked about the colleges all day with the whole train. [a reminiscence from that week of refined and genial hospitality survives in the essay on madame d'arblay. the reception which miss burney would have enjoyed at oxford, if she had visited it otherwise than as an attendant on royalty, is sketched off with all the writer's wonted spirit, and more than his wonted grace.] whewell was then tutor; rougher, but less pompous, and much more agreeable, than in after years; though i do not think that he ever cordially liked your uncle. we then went on to oxford, which from knowing no one there seemed terribly dull to us by comparison with cambridge, and we rejoiced our brother's heart by sighing after trinity." during the first half of his life macaulay spent some months of every year at the seat of his uncle, mr. babington, who kept open house for his nephews and nieces throughout the summer and autumn. rothley temple, which lies in a valley beyond the first ridge that separates the flat unattractive country immediately round leicester from the wild and beautiful scenery of charnwood forest, is well worth visiting as a singularly unaltered specimen of an old english home. the stately trees; the grounds, half park and half meadow; the cattle grazing up to the very windows; the hall, with its stone pavement rather below than above the level of the soil, hung with armour rude and rusty enough to dispel the suspicion of its having passed through a collector's hands; the low ceilings; the dark oak wainscot, carved after primitive designs, that covered every inch of wall in bedroom and corridor; the general air which the whole interior presented of having been put to rights at the date of the armada and left alone ever since;--all this antiquity contrasted quaintly, but prettily enough, with the youth and gaiety that lit up every corner of the ever-crowded though comfortable mansion. in wet weather there was always a merry group sitting on the staircase, or marching up and down the gallery; and, wherever the noise and fun were most abundant, wherever there was to be heard the loudest laughter and the most vehement expostulation, macaulay was the centre of a circle which was exclaiming at the levity of his remarks about the blessed martyr; disputing with him on the comparative merits of pascal, racine, corneille, moliere, and boileau or checking him as he attempted to justify his godparents by running off a list of all the famous thomases in history. the place is full of his memories. his favourite walk was a mile of field-road and lane which leads from the house to a lodge on the highway; and his favourite point of view in that walk was a slight acclivity, whence the traveller from leicester catches his first sight of rothley temple, with its background of hill and greenwood. he is remembered as sitting at the window in the hall, reading dante to himself, or translating it aloud as long as any listener cared to remain within ear-shot. he occupied, by choice, a very small chamber on the ground floor, through the window of which he could escape unobserved while afternoon callers were on their way between the front door and the drawing-room. on such occasions he would take refuge in a boat moored under the shade of some fine oaks which still exist, though the ornamental water on whose bank they stood has since been converted into dry land. a journal kept at intervals by margaret macaulay, some extracts from which have here been arranged in the form of a continuous narrative, affords a pleasant and faithful picture of her brother's home-life during the years and . with an artless candour, from which his reputation will not suffer, she relates the alternations of hope and disappointment through which the young people passed when it began to be a question whether or not he would be asked to join the administration. "i think i was about twelve when i first became very fond of my brother, and from that time my affection for him has gone on increasing during a period of seven years. i shall never forget my delight and enchantment when i first found that he seemed to like talking to me. his manner was very flattering to such a child, for he always took as much pains to amuse me, and to inform me on anything i wished to know, as ho could have done to the greatest person in the land. i have heard him express great disgust towards those people who, lively and agreeable abroad, are a dead weight in the family circle. i think the remarkable clearness of his style proceeds in some measure from the habit of conversing with very young people, to whom he has a great deal to explain and impart. "he reads his works to us in the manuscript, and, when we find fault, as i very often do with his being too severe upon people, he takes it with the greatest kindness, and often alters what we do not like. i hardly ever, indeed, met with a sweeter temper than his. he is rather hasty, and when he has not time for an instant's thought, he will sometimes return a quick answer, for which he will be sorry the moment he has said it. but in a conversation of any length, though it may be on subjects that touch him very nearly, and though the person with whom he converses may be very provoking and extremely out of temper, i never saw him lose his. he never uses this superiority, as some do, for the purpose of irritating another still more by coolness; but speaks in a kind, good-natured manner, as if he wished to bring the other back to temper without appearing to notice that he had lost it. "he at one time took a very punning turn, and we laid a wager in books, my mysteries of udolpho against his german theatre, that he could not make two hundred puns in one evening. he did it, however, in two hours, and, although they were of course most of them miserably bad, yet it was a proof of great quickness. "saturday, february , --at dinner we talked of the grants. tom said he had found mr. robert grant walking about in the lobbies of the house of commons, and saying that he wanted somebody to defend his place in the government, which he heard was going to be attacked. 'what did you say to him?' we asked. 'oh, i said nothing; but, if they'll give me the place, i'll defend it. when i am judge advocate, i promise you that i will not go about asking anyone to defend me.' "after dinner we played at capping verses, and after that at a game in which one of the party thinks of something for the others to guess at. tom gave the slug that killed perceval, the lemon that wilkes squeezed for doctor johnson, the pork-chop which thurtell ate after he had murdered weare, and sir charles macarthy's jaw which was sent by the ashantees as a present to george the fourth. "some one mentioned an acquaintance who had gone to the west indies, hoping to make money, but had only ruined the complexions of his daughters. tom said: mr. walker was sent to berbice by the greatest of statesmen and earls. he went to bring back yellow boys, but he only brought back yellow girls. "i never saw anything like the fun and humour that kindles in his eye when a repartee or verse is working in his brain. "march , .--yesterday morning hannah and i walked part of the way to his chambers with tom, and, as we separated, i remember wishing him good luck and success that night. he went through it most triumphantly, and called down upon himself admiration enough to satisfy even his sister. i like so much the manner in which he receives compliments. he does not pretend to be indifferent, but smiles in his kind and animated way, with 'i am sure it is very kind of you to say so,' or something of that nature. his voice from cold and over-excitement got quite into a scream towards the last part. a person told him that he had not heard such speaking since fox. 'you have not heard such screaming since fox,' he said. "march , .--by tom's account, there never was such a scene of agitation as the house of commons presented at the passing of the second reading of the reform bill the day before yesterday, or rather yesterday, for they did not divide till three or four in the morning. when dear tom came the next day he was still very much excited, which i found to my cost, for when i went out to walk with him he walked so very fast that i could scarcely keep up with him at all. with sparkling eyes he described the whole scene of the preceding evening in the most graphic manner. "'i suppose the ministers are all in high spirits,' said mamma. 'in spirits, ma'am? i'm sure i don't know. in bed, i'll answer for it.' mamma asked him for franks, that she might send his speech to a lady [this lady was mrs. hannah more.] who, though of high tory principles, is very fond of tom, and has left him in her will her valuable library. 'oh, no,' he said, 'don't send it. if you do, she'll cut me off with a prayer-book.' "tom is very much improved in his appearance during the last two or three years. his figure is not so bad for a man of thirty as for a man of twenty-two. he dresses better, and his manners, from seeing a great deal of society, are very much improved. when silent and occupied in thought, walking up and down the room as he always does, his hands clenched and muscles working with the intense exertion of his mind, strangers would think his countenance stern; but i remember a writing-master of ours, when tom had come into the room and left it again, saying, 'ladies, your brother looks like a lump of good-humour!' "march , --tom has just left me, after a very interesting conversation. he spoke of his extreme idleness. he said: 'i never knew such an idle man as i am. when i go in to empson or ellis their tables are always covered with books and papers. i cannot stick at anything for above a day or two. i mustered industry enough to teach myself italian. i wish to speak spanish. i know i could master the difficulties in a week, and read any book in the language at the end of a month, but i have not the courage to attempt it. if there had not been really something in me, idleness would have ruined me.' "i said that i was surprised at the great accuracy of his information, considering how desultory his reading had been. 'my accuracy as to facts,' he said, 'i owe to a cause which many men would not confess. it is due to my love of castle-building. the past is in my mind soon constructed into a romance.' he then went on to describe the way in which from his childhood his imagination had been filled by the study of history. 'with a person of my turn,' he said, 'the minute touches are of as great interest, and perhaps greater, than the most important events. spending so much time as i do in solitude, my mind would have rusted by gazing vacantly at the shop windows. as it is, i am no sooner in the streets than i am in greece, in rome, in the midst of the french revolution. precision in dates, the day or hour in which a man was born or died, becomes absolutely necessary. a slight fact, a sentence, a word, are of importance in my romance. pepys's diary formed almost inexhaustible food for my fancy. i seem to know every inch of whitehall. i go in at hans holbein's gate, and come out through the matted gallery. the conversations which i compose between great people of the time are long, and sufficiently animated; in the style, if not with the merits, of sir walter scott's. the old parts of london, which you are sometimes surprised at my knowing so well, those old gates and houses down by the river, have all played their part in my stories.' he spoke, too, of the manner in which he used to wander about paris, weaving tales of the revolution, and he thought that he owed his command of language greatly to this habit. "i am very sorry that the want both of ability and memory should prevent my preserving with greater truth a conversation which interested me very much. "may , .--tom was from london at the time my mother's death occurred, and things fell out in such a manner that the first information he received of it was from the newspapers. he came home directly. he was in an agony of distress, and gave way at first to violent bursts of feeling. during the whole of the week he was with us all day, and was the greatest comfort to us imaginable. he talked a great deal of our sorrow, and led the conversation by degrees to other subjects, bearing the whole burden of it himself and interesting us without jarring with the predominant feeling of the time. i never saw him appear to greater advantage--never loved him more dearly. "september .--of late we have walked a good deal. i remember pacing up and down brunswick square and lansdowne place for two hours one day, deep in the mazes of the most subtle metaphysics;--up and down cork street, engaged over dryden's poetry and the great men of that time;--making jokes all the way along bond street, and talking politics everywhere. "walking in the streets with tom and hannah, and talking about the hard work the heads of his party had got now, i said: "'how idle they must think you, when they meet you here in the busy part of the day!' 'yes, here i am,' said he, 'walking with two unidea'd girls. [boswell relates in his tenth chapter how johnson scolded langton for leaving "his social friends, to go and sit with a set of wretched unidea'd girls."] however, if one of the ministry says to me, "why walk you here all the day idle?" i shall say, "because no man has hired me."' "we talked of eloquence, which he has often compared to fresco-painting: the result of long study and meditation, but at the moment of execution thrown off with the greatest rapidity; what has apparently been the work of a few hours being destined to last for ages. "mr. tierney said he was sure sir philip francis had written junius, for he was the proudest man he ever knew, and no one ever heard of anything he had done to be proud of. "november , , half-past-ten.--on friday last lord grey sent for tom. his note was received too late to be acted on that day. on saturday came another, asking him to east sheen on that day, or sunday. yesterday, accordingly, he went, and stayed the night, promising to be here as early as possible to-day. so much depends upon the result of this visit! that he will be offered a place i have not the least doubt. he will refuse a lordship of the treasury, a lordship of the admiralty, or the mastership of the ordnance. he will accept the secretaryship of the board of control, but will not thank them for it; and would not accept that, but that he thinks it will be a place of importance during the approaching discussions on the east indian monopoly. "if he gets a sufficient salary, hannah and i shall most likely live with him. can i possibly look forward to anything happier? i cannot imagine a course of life that would suit him better than thus to enjoy the pleasures of domestic life without its restraints; with sufficient business, but not, i hope, too much. "at one o'clock he came. i went out to meet him. 'i have nothing to tell you. nothing. lord grey sent for me to speak about a matter of importance, which must be strictly private.' "november .--i am just returned from a long walk, during which the conversation turned entirely on one subject. after a little previous talk about a certain great personage, [the personage was lord brougham, who at this time was too formidable for the poor girl to venture to write his name at length even in a private journal.] i asked tom when the present coolness between them began. he said: 'nothing could exceed my respect and admiration for him in early days. i saw at that time private letters in which he spoke highly of my articles, and of me as the most rising man of the time. after a while, however, i began to remark that he became extremely cold to me, hardly ever spoke to me on circuit, and treated me with marked slight. if i were talking to a man, if he wished to speak to him on politics or anything else that was not in any sense a private matter, he always drew him away from me instead of addressing us both. when my article on hallam came out, he complained to jeffrey that i took up too much of the review; and, when my first article on mill appeared, he foamed with rage, and was very angry with jeffrey for having printed it.' "'but,' said i,' the mills are friends of his, and he naturally did not like them to be attacked.' "'on the contrary,' said tom, 'he had attacked them fiercely himself; but he thought i had made a hit, and was angry accordingly. when a friend of mine defended my articles to him, he said: "i know nothing of the articles. i have not read macaulay's articles." what can be imagined more absurd than his keeping up an angry correspondence with jeffrey about articles he has never read? well, the next thing was that jeffrey, who was about to give up the editorship, asked me if i would take it. i said that i would gladly do so, if they would remove the headquarters of the review to london. jeffrey wrote to him about it. he disapproved of it so strongly that the plan was given up. the truth was that he felt that his power over the review diminished as mine increased, and he saw that he would have little indeed if i were editor. "'i then came into parliament. i do not complain that he should have preferred denman's claims to mine, and that he should have blamed lord lansdowne for not considering him. i went to take my seat. as i turned from the table at which i had been taking the oaths, he stood as near to me as you do now, and he cut me dead. we never spoke in the house, excepting once, that i can remember, when a few words passed between us in the lobby. i have sat close to him when many men of whom i knew nothing have introduced themselves to me to shake hands, and congratulate me after making a speech, and he has never said a single word. i know that it is jealousy, because i am not the first man whom he has used in this way. during the debate on the catholic claims he was so enraged because lord plunket had made a very splendid display, and because the catholics had chosen sir francis burdett instead of him to bring the bill forward, that he threw every difficulty in its way. sir francis once said to him: "really, mr.-- you are so jealous that it is impossible to act with you." i never will serve in an administration of which he is the head. on that i have most firmly made up my mind. i do not believe that it is in his nature to be a month in office without caballing against his colleagues. ["there never was a direct personal rival, or one who was in a position which, however reluctantly, implied rivalry, to whom he has been just; and on the fact of this ungenerous jealousy i do not understand that there is any difference of opinion."--lord cockburn's journal.] "'he is, next to the king, the most popular man in england. there is no other man whose entrance into any town in the kingdom would be so certain to be with huzzaing and taking off of horses. at the same time he is in a very ticklish situation, for he has no real friends. jeffrey, sydney smith, mackintosh, all speak of him as i now speak to you. i was talking to sydney smith of him the other day, and said that, great as i felt his faults to be, i must allow him a real desire to raise the lower orders, and do good by education, and those methods upon which his heart has been always set. sydney would not allow this, or any other, merit. now, if those who are called his friends feel towards him, as they all do, angry and sore at his overbearing, arrogant, and neglectful conduct, when those reactions in public feeling, which must come, arrive, he will have nothing to return upon, no place of refuge, no hand of such tried friends as fox and canning had to support him. you will see that he will soon place himself in a false position before the public. his popularity will go down, and he will find himself alone. mr. pitt, it is true, did not study to strengthen himself by friendships but this was not from jealousy. i do not love the man, but i believe he was quite superior to that. it was from a solitary pride he had. i heard at holland house the other day that sir philip francis said that, though he hated pitt, he must confess there was something fine in seeing how he maintained his post by himself. "the lion walks alone," he said. "the jackals herd together."'" this conversation, to those who have heard macaulay talk, bears unmistakable signs of having been committed to paper while the words,--or, at any rate, the outlines,--of some of the most important sentences were fresh in his sister's mind. nature had predestined the two men to mutual antipathy. macaulay, who knew his own range and kept within it, and who gave the world nothing except his best and most finished work, was fretted by the slovenly omniscience of brougham, who affected to be a walking encyclopaedia, "a kind of semi-solomon, half knowing everything from the cedar to the hyssop." [these words are extracted from a letter written by macaulay.] the student, who, in his later years, never left his library for the house of commons without regret, had little in common with one who, like napoleon, held that a great reputation was a great noise; who could not change horses without making a speech, see the tories come in without offering to take a judgeship, or allow the french to make a revolution without proposing to naturalise himself as a citizen of the new republic. the statesman who never deserted an ally, or distrusted a friend, could have no fellowship with a free-lance, ignorant of the very meaning of loyalty; who, if the surfeited pen of the reporter had not declined its task, would have enriched our collections of british oratory by at least one philippic against every colleague with whom he had ever acted. the many who read this conversation by the light of the public history of lord melbourne's administration, and still more the few who have access to the secret history of lord grey's cabinet, will acknowledge that seldom was a prediction so entirely fulfilled, or a character so accurately read. and that it was not a prophecy composed after the event is proved by the circumstance that it stands recorded in the handwriting of one who died before it was accomplished. "january , .--yesterday tom dined at holland house, and heard lord holland tell this story. some paper was to be published by mr. fox, in which mention was made of mr. pitt having been employed at a club in a manner that would have created scandal. mr. wilberforce went to mr. fox, and asked him to omit the passage. 'oh, to be sure,' said mr. fox; 'if there are any good people who would be scandalised, i will certainly put it out!' mr. wilberforce then preparing to take his leave, he said: 'now, mr. wilberforce, if, instead of being about mr. pitt, this had been an account of my being seen gaming at white's on a sunday, would you have taken so much pains to prevent it being known?' 'i asked this,' said mr. fox, 'because i wanted to see what he would say, for i knew he would not tell a lie about it. he threw himself back, as his way was, and only answered: "oh, mr. fox, you are always so pleasant!"' "january , .--yesterday tom dined with us, and stayed late. he talked almost uninterruptedly for six hours. in the evening he made a great many impromptu charades in verse. i remember he mentioned a piece of impertinence of sir philip francis. sir philip was writing a history of his own time, with characters of its eminent men, and one day asked mr. tierney if he should like to hear his own character. of course he said 'yes,' and it was read to him. it was very flattering, and he expressed his gratification for so favourable a description of himself. 'subject to revision, you must remember, mr. tierney,' said sir philip, as he laid the manuscript by; 'subject to revision according to what may happen in the future.' "i am glad tom has reviewed old john bunyan. many are reading it who never read it before. yesterday, as he was sitting in the athenaeum, a gentleman called out: 'waiter, is there a copy of the pilgrim's progress in the library?' as might be expected, there was not. "february , .--this evening tom came in, hannah and i being alone. he was in high boyish spirits. he had seen lord lansdowne in the morning, who had requested to speak with him. his lordship said that he wished to have a talk about his taking office, not with any particular thing in view, as there was no vacancy at present, and none expected, but that he should be glad to know his wishes in order that he might be more able to serve him in them. "tom, in answer, took rather a high tone. he said he was a poor man, but that he had as much as he wanted, and, as far as he was personally concerned, had no desire for office. at the same time he thought that, after the reform bill had passed, it would be absolutely necessary that the government should be strengthened; that he was of opinion that he could do it good service; that he approved of its general principles, and should not be unwilling to join it. lord lansdowne said that they all,--and he particularly mentioned lord grey,--felt of what importance to them his help was, and that he now perfectly understood his views. "february , .--it has been much reported, and has even appeared in the newspapers, that the ministers were doing what they could to get mr. robert grant out of the way to make room for tom. last sunday week it was stated in the john bull that madras had been offered to the judge advocate for this purpose, but that he had refused it. two or three nights since, tom, in endeavouring to get to a high bench in the house, stumbled over mr. robert grant's legs, as he was stretched out half asleep. being roused he apologised in the usual manner, and then added, oddly enough: 'i am very sorry, indeed, to stand in the way of your mounting.' "march , .--yesterday hannah and i spent a very agreeable afternoon with tom. "he began to talk of his idleness. he really came and dawdled with us all day long; he had not written a line of his review of burleigh's life, and he shrank from beginning on such a great work. i asked him to put it by for the present, and write a light article on novels. this he seemed to think he should like, and said he could get up an article on richardson in a very short time, but he knew of no book that he could hang it on. hannah advised that he should place at the head of this article a fictitious title in italian of a critique on clarissa harlowe, published at venice. he seemed taken with this idea, but said that, if he did such a thing, he must never let his dearest friend know. "i was amused with a parody of tom's on the nursery song 'twenty pounds shall marry me,' as applied to the creation of peers. what though now opposed i be? twenty peers shall carry me. if twenty won't, thirty will, for i'm his majesty's bouncing bill. sir robert peel has been extremely complimentary to him. one sentence he repeated to us: 'my only feeling towards that gentleman is a not ungenerous envy, as i listened to that wonderful flow of natural and beautiful language, and to that utterance which, rapid as it is, seems scarcely able to convey its rich freight of thought and fancy!' people say that these words were evidently carefully prepared. "i have just been looking round our little drawing-room, as if trying to impress every inch of it on my memory, and thinking how in future years it will rise before my mind as the scene of many hours of light-hearted mirth; how i shall again see him, lolling indolently on the old blue sofa, or strolling round the narrow confines of our room. with such a scene will come the remembrance of his beaming countenance, happy affectionate smile, and joyous laugh; while, with everyone at ease around him, he poured out the stores of his full mind in his own peculiarly beautiful and expressive language, more delightful here than anywhere else, because more perfectly unconstrained. the name which passes through this little room in the quiet, gentle tones of sisterly affection is a name which will be repeated through distant generations, and go down to posterity linked with eventful times and great deeds." the last words here quoted will be very generally regarded as the tribute of a sister's fondness. many, who readily admit that macaulay's name will go down to posterity linked with eventful times and great deeds, make that admission with reference to times not his own, and deeds in which he had no part except to commemorate them with his pen. to him, as to others, a great reputation of a special order brought with it the consequence that the credit, which he deserved for what he had done well, was overshadowed by the renown of what he did best. the world, which has forgotten that newton excelled as an administrator, and voltaire as a man of business, remembers somewhat faintly that macaulay was an eminent orator and, for a time at least, a strenuous politician. the universal voice of his contemporaries, during the first three years of his parliamentary career, testifies to the leading part which he played in the house of commons, so long as with all his heart he cared, and with all his might he tried, to play it. jeffrey, (for it is well to adduce none but first-rate evidence,) says in his account of an evening's discussion on the second reading of the reform bill: "not a very striking debate. there was but one exception, and it was a brilliant one. i mean macaulay, who surpassed his former appearance in closeness, fire, and vigour, and very much improved the effect of it by a more steady and graceful delivery. it was prodigiously cheered, as it deserved, and i think puts him clearly at the head of the great speakers, if not the debaters, of the house." and again, on the th of december: "macaulay made, i think, the best speech he has yet delivered; the most condensed, at least, and with the greatest weight of matter. it contained, indeed, the only argument to which any of the speakers who followed him applied themselves." lord cockburn, who sat under the gallery for twenty-seven hours during the last three nights of the bill, pronounced macaulay's speech to have been "by far the best;" though, like a good scotchman, he asserts that he heard nothing at westminster which could compare with dr. chalmers in the general assembly. sir james mackintosh writes from the library of the house of commons: "macaulay and stanley have made two of the finest speeches ever spoken in parliament;" and a little further on he classes together the two young orators as "the chiefs of the next, or rather of this, generation." to gain and keep the position that mackintosh assigned him macaulay possessed the power, and in early days did not lack the will. he was prominent on the parliamentary stage, and active behind the scenes;--the soul of every honourable project which might promote the triumph of his principles, and the ascendency of his party. one among many passages in his correspondence may be quoted without a very serious breach of ancient and time-worn confidences. on the th of september, , he writes to his sister hannah: "i have been very busy since i wrote last, moving heaven and earth to render it certain that, if our ministers are so foolish as to resign in the event of a defeat in the lords, the commons may be firm and united; and i think that i have arranged a plan which will secure a bold and instant declaration on our part, if necessary. lord ebrington is the man whom i have in my eye as our leader. i have had much conversation with him, and with several of our leading county members. they are all staunch; and i will answer for this,--that, if the ministers should throw us over, we will be ready to defend ourselves." the combination of public spirit, political instinct, and legitimate self-assertion, which was conspicuous in macaulay's character, pointed him out to some whose judgment had been trained by long experience of affairs as a more than possible leader in no remote future; and it is not for his biographer to deny that they had grounds for their conclusion. the prudence, the energy, the self-reliance, which he displayed in another field, might have been successfully directed to the conduct of an executive policy, and the management of a popular assembly. macaulay never showed himself deficient in the qualities which enable a man to trust his own sense; to feel responsibility, but not to fear it; to venture where others shrink; to decide while others waver; with all else that belongs to the vocation of a ruler in a free country. but it was not his fate; it was not his work; and the rank which he might have claimed among the statesmen of britain was not ill exchanged for the place which he occupies in the literature of the world. to macvey napier, esq. york: march , . my dear sir,--i was in some doubt as to what i should be able to do for number , and i deferred writing till i could make up my mind. if my friend ellis's article on greek history, of which i have formed high expectations, could have been ready, i should have taken a holiday. but, as there is no chance of that for the next number, i ought, i think, to consider myself as his bail, and to surrender myself to your disposal in his stead. i have been thinking of a subject, light and trifling enough, but perhaps not the worse for our purpose on that account. we seldom want a sufficient quantity of heavy matter. there is a wretched poetaster of the name of robert montgomery who has written some volumes of detestable verses on religious subjects, which by mere puffing in magazines and newspapers have had an immense sale, and some of which are now in their tenth or twelfth editions. i have for some time past thought that the trick of puffing, as it is now practised both by authors and publishers, is likely to degrade the literary character, and to deprave the public taste, in a frightful degree. i really think that we ought to try what effect satire will have upon this nuisance, and i doubt whether we can ever find a better opportunity. yours very faithfully t. b. macaulay. to macvey napier, esq. london: august , . my dear sir,--the new number appeared this morning in the shop windows. the article on niebuhr contains much that is very sensible; but it is not such an article as so noble a subject required. i am not like ellis, niebuhr-mad; and i agree with many of the remarks which the reviewer has made both on this work, and on the school of german critics and historians. but surely the reviewer ought to have given an account of the system of exposition which niebuhr has adopted, and of the theory which he advances respecting the institutions of rome. the appearance of the book is really an era in the intellectual history of europe, and i think that the edinburgh review ought at least to have given a luminous abstract of it. the very circumstance that niebuhr's own arrangement and style are obscure, and that his translators have need of translators to make them intelligible to the multitude, rendered it more desirable that a clear and neat statement of the points in controversy should be laid before the public. but it is useless to talk of what cannot be mended. the best editors cannot always have good writers, and the best writers cannot always write their best. i have no notion on what ground brougham imagines that i am going to review his speech. he never said a word to me on the subject. nor did i ever say either to him, or to anyone else, a single syllable to that effect. at all events i shall not make brougham's speech my text. we have had quite enough of puffing and flattering each other in the review. it is a vile taste for men united in one literary undertaking to exchange their favours. i have a plan of which i wish to know your opinion. in ten days, or thereabouts, i set off for france, where i hope to pass six weeks. i shall be in the best society, that of the duc de broglie, guizot, and so on. i think of writing an article on the politics of france since the restoration, with characters of the principal public men, and a parallel between the present state of france and that of england. i think that this might be made an article of extraordinary interest. i do not say that i could make it so. it must, you will perceive, be a long paper, however concise i may try to be; but as the subject is important, and i am not generally diffuse, you must not stint me. if you like this scheme, let me know as soon as possible. ever yours truly t. b. macaulay. it cannot be denied that there was some ground for the imputation of systematic puffing which macaulay urges with a freedom that a modern editor would hardly permit to the most valued contributor. brougham had made a speech on slavery in the house of commons; but time was wanting to get the corrected report published soon enough for him to obtain his tribute of praise in the body of the review. the unhappy mr. napier was actually reduced to append a notice to the july number regretting that "this powerful speech, which, as we are well informed, produced an impression on those who heard it not likely to be forgotten, or to remain barren of effects, should have reached us at a moment when it was no longer possible for us to notice its contents at any length.... on the eve of a general election to the first parliament of a new reign, we could have wished to be able to contribute our aid towards the diffusion of the facts and arguments here so strikingly and commandingly stated and enforced, among those who are about to exercise the elective franchise.... we trust that means will be taken to give the widest possible circulation to the corrected report. unfortunately, we can, at present, do nothing more than lay before our readers its glowing peroration--so worthy of this great orator, this unwearied friend of liberty and humanity." to macvey napier, esq. paris: september , . my dear sir,--i have just received your letter, and i cannot deny that i am much vexed at what has happened. it is not very agreeable to find that i have thrown away the labour, the not unsuccessful labour as i thought, of a month; particularly as i have not many months of perfect leisure. this would not have happened if brougham had notified his intentions to you earlier, as he ought in courtesy to you, and to everybody connected with the review, to have done. he must have known that this french question was one on which many people would be desirous to write. i ought to tell you that i had scarcely reached paris when i received a letter containing a very urgent application from a very respectable quarter. i was desired to write a sketch, in one volume, of the late revolution here. now, i really hesitated whether i should not make my excuses to you, and accept this proposal,--not on account of the pecuniary terms, for about these i have never much troubled myself--but because i should have had ampler space for this noble subject than the review would have afforded. i thought, however, that this would not be a fair or friendly course towards you. i accordingly told the applicants that i had promised you an article, and that i could not well write twice in one month on the same subject without repeating myself. i therefore declined; and recommended a person whom i thought quite capable of producing an attractive book on these events. to that person my correspondent has probably applied. at all events i cannot revive the negotiation. i cannot hawk my rejected articles up and down paternoster row. i am, therefore, a good deal vexed at this affair; but i am not at all surprised at it. i see all the difficulties of your situation. indeed, i have long foreseen them. i always knew that in every association, literary or political, brougham would wish to domineer. i knew also that no editor of the edinburgh review could, without risking the ruin of the publication, resolutely oppose the demands of a man so able and powerful. it was because i was certain that he would exact submissions which i am not disposed to make that i wished last year to give up writing for the review. i had long been meditating a retreat. i thought jeffrey's abdication a favourable time for effecting it; not, as i hope you are well assured, from any unkind feeling towards you; but because i knew that, under any editor, mishaps such as that which has now occurred would be constantly taking place. i remember that i predicted to jeffrey what has now come to pass almost to the letter. my expectations have been exactly realised. the present constitution of the edinburgh review is this, that, at whatever time brougham may be pleased to notify his intention of writing on any subject, all previous engagements are to be considered as annulled by that notification. his language translated into plain english is this: "i must write about this french revolution, and i will write about it. if you have told macaulay to do it, you may tell him to let it alone. if he has written an article, he may throw it behind the grate. he would not himself have the assurance to compare his own claims with mine. i am a man who act a prominent part in the world; he is nobody. if he must be reviewing, there is my speech about the west indies. set him to write a puff on that. what have people like him to do, except to eulogise people like me?" no man likes to be reminded of his inferiority in such a way, and there are some particular circumstances in this case which render the admonition more unpleasant than it would otherwise be. i know that brougham dislikes me; and i have not the slightest doubt that he feels great pleasure in taking this subject out of my hands, and at having made me understand, as i do most clearly understand, how far my services are rated below his. i do not blame you in the least. i do not see how you could have acted otherwise. but, on the other hand, i do not see why i should make any efforts or sacrifices for a review which lies under an intolerable dictation. whatever my writings may be worth, it is not for want of strong solicitations, and tempting offers, from other quarters that i have continued to send them to the edinburgh review. i adhered to the connection solely because i took pride and pleasure in it. it has now become a source of humiliation and mortification. i again repeat, my dear sir, that i do not blame you in the least. this, however, only makes matters worse. if you had used me ill, i might complain, and might hope to be better treated another time. unhappily you are in a situation in which it is proper for you to do what it would be improper in me to endure. what has happened now may happen next quarter, and must happen before long, unless i altogether refrain from writing for the review. i hope you will forgive me if i say that i feel what has passed too strongly to be inclined to expose myself to a recurrence of the same vexations. yours most truly t. b. macaulay. a few soft words induced macaulay to reconsider his threat of withdrawing from the review; but, even before mr. napier's answer reached him, the feeling of personal annoyance had already been effaced by a greater sorrow. a letter arrived, announcing that his sister jane had died suddenly and most unexpectedly. she was found in the morning lying as though still asleep, having passed away so peacefully as not to disturb a sister who had spent the night in the next room, with a door open between them. mrs. macaulay never recovered from this shock. her health gave way, and she lived into the coming year only so long as to enable her to rejoice in the first of her son's parliamentary successes. paris: september . my dear father,--this news has broken my heart. i am fit neither to go nor to stay. i can do nothing but sit down in my room, and think of poor dear jane's kindness and affection. when i am calmer, i will let you know my intentions. there will be neither use nor pleasure in remaining here. my present purpose, as far as i can form one, is to set off in two or three days for england; and in the meantime to see nobody, if i can help it, but dumont, who has been very kind to me. love to all,--to all who are left me to love. we must love each other better. t. b. m. london: march , dear ellis,--i have little news for you, except what you will learn from the papers as well as from me. it is clear that the reform bill must pass, either in this or in another parliament. the majority of one does not appear to me, as it does to you, by any means inauspicious. we should perhaps have had a better plea for a dissolution if the majority had been the other way. but surely a dissolution under such circumstances would have been a most alarming thing. if there should be a dissolution now, there will not be that ferocity in the public mind which there would have been if the house of commons had refused to entertain the bill at all. i confess that, till we had a majority, i was half inclined to tremble at the storm which we had raised. at present i think that we are absolutely certain of victory, and of victory without commotion. such a scene as the division of last tuesday i never saw, and never expect to see again. if i should live fifty years, the impression of it will be as fresh and sharp in my mind as if it had just taken place. it was like seeing caesar stabbed in the senate house, or seeing oliver taking the mace from the table; a sight to be seen only once, and never to be forgotten. the crowd overflowed the house in every part. when the strangers were cleared out, and the doors locked, we had six hundred and eight members present,--more by fifty-five than ever were in a division before. the ayes and noes were like two volleys of cannon from opposite sides of a field of battle. when the opposition went out into the lobby, an operation which took up twenty minutes or more, we spread ourselves over the benches on both sides of the house; for there were many of us who had not been able to find a seat during the evening. ["the practice in the commons, until , was to send one party forth into the lobby, the other remaining in the house."--sir t. erskine may's "parliamentary practice."] when the doors were shut we began to speculate on our numbers. everybody was desponding. "we have lost it. we are only two hundred and eighty at most. i do not think we are two hundred and fifty. they are three hundred. alderman thompson has counted them. he says they are two hundred and ninety-nine." this was the talk on our benches. i wonder that men who have been long in parliament do not acquire a better coup d'oeil for numbers. the house, when only the ayes were in it, looked to me a very fair house,--much fuller than it generally is even on debates of considerable interest. i had no hope, however, of three hundred. as the tellers passed along our lowest row on the left hand side the interest was insupportable,--two hundred and ninety-one,--two hundred and ninety-two,--we were all standing up and stretching forward, telling with the tellers. at three hundred there was a short cry of joy,--at three hundred and two another,--suppressed however in a moment; for we did not yet know what the hostile force might be. we knew, however, that we could not be severely beaten. the doors were thrown open, and in they came. each of them, as he entered, brought some different report of their numbers. it must have been impossible, as you may conceive, in the lobby, crowded as they were, to form any exact estimate. first we heard that they were three hundred and three; then that number rose to three hundred and ten; then went down to three hundred and seven. alexander barry told me that he had counted, and that they were three hundred and four. we were all breathless with anxiety, when charles wood, who stood near the door, jumped up on a bench and cried out, "they are only three hundred and one." we set up a shout that you might have heard to charing cross, waving our hats, stamping against the floor, and clapping our hands. the tellers scarcely got through the crowd; for the house was thronged up to the table, and all the floor was fluctuating with heads like the pit of a theatre. but you might have heard a pin drop as duncannon read the numbers. then again the shouts broke out, and many of us shed tears. i could scarcely refrain. and the jaw of peel fell; and the face of twiss was as the face of a damned soul; and herries looked like judas taking his necktie off for the last operation. we shook hands, and clapped each other on the back, and went out laughing, crying, and huzzaing into the lobby. and no sooner were the outer doors opened than another shout answered that within the house. all the passages, and the stairs into the waiting-rooms, were thronged by people who had waited till four in the morning to know the issue. we passed through a narrow lane between two thick masses of them; and all the way down they were shouting and waving their hats, till we got into the open air. i called a cabriolet, and the first thing the driver asked was, "is the bill carried?" "yes, by one." "thank god for it, sir." and away i rode to gray's inn,--and so ended a scene which will probably never be equalled till the reformed parliament wants reforming; and that i hope will not be till the days of our grandchildren, till that truly orthodox and apostolical person dr. francis ellis is an archbishop of eighty. as for me, i am for the present a sort of lion. my speech has set me in the front rank, if i can keep there; and it has not been my luck hitherto to lose ground when i have once got it. sheil and i are on very civil terms. he talks largely concerning demosthenes and burke. he made, i must say, an excellent speech; too florid and queer, but decidedly successful. why did not price speak? if he was afraid, it was not without reason; for a more terrible audience there is not in the world. i wish that praed had known to whom he was speaking. but, with all his talent, he has no tact, and he has fared accordingly. tierney used to say that he never rose in the house without feeling his knees tremble under him; and i am sure that no man who has not some of that feeling will ever succeed there. ever yours t. b. macaulay. london: may , . my dear hannah,--let me see if i can write a letter a la richardson:--a little less prolix it must be, or it will exceed my ounce. by the bye, i wonder that uncle selby never grudged the postage of miss byron's letters. according to the nearest calculation that i can make, her correspondence must have enriched the post office of ashby canons by something more than the whole annual interest of her fifteen thousand pounds. i reached lansdowne house by a quarter to eleven, and passed through the large suite of rooms to the great sculpture gallery. there were seated and standing perhaps three hundred people, listening to the performers, or talking to each other. the room is the handsomest and largest, i am told, in any private house in london. i enclose our musical bill of fare. fanny, i suppose, will be able to expound it better than i. the singers were more showily dressed than the auditors, and seemed quite at home. as to the company, there was just everybody in london (except that little million and a half that you wot of,)--the chancellor, and the first lord of the admiralty, and sydney smith, and lord mansfield, and all the barings and the fitzclarences, and a hideous russian spy, whose face i see everywhere, with a star on his coat. during the interval between the delights of "i tuoi frequenti," and the ecstasies of "se tu m'ami," i contrived to squeeze up to lord lansdowne. i was shaking hands with sir james macdonald, when i heard a command behind us: "sir james, introduce me to mr. macaulay;" and we turned, and there sate a large bold-looking woman, with the remains of a fine person, and the air of queen elizabeth. "macaulay," said sir james, "let me present you to lady holland." then was her ladyship gracious beyond description, and asked me to dine and take a bed at holland house next tuesday. i accepted the dinner, but declined the bed, and i have since repented that i so declined it. but i probably shall have an opportunity of retracting on tuesday. to-night i go to another musical party at marshall's, the late m.p. for yorkshire. everybody is talking of paganini and his violin. the man seems to be a miracle. the newspapers say that long streamy flakes of music fall from his string, interspersed with luminous points of sound which ascend the air and appear like stars. this eloquence is quite beyond me. ever yours t. b. m. london: may , . my dear hannah,--more gaieties and music-parties; not so fertile of adventures as that memorable masquerade whence harriet byron was carried away; but still i hope that the narrative of what passed there will gratify "the venerable circle." yesterday i dressed, called a cab, and was whisked away to hill street. i found old marshall's house a very fine one. he ought indeed to have a fine one; for he has, i believe, at least thirty thousand a year. the carpet was taken up, and chairs were set out in rows, as if we had been at a religious meeting. then we had flute-playing by the first flute-player in england, and pianoforte-strumming by the first pianoforte-strummer in england, and singing by all the first singers in england, and signor rubini's incomparable tenor, and signor curioni's incomparable counter-tenor, and pasta's incomparable expression. you who know how airs much inferior to these take my soul, and lap it in elysium, will form some faint conception of my transport. sharp beckoned me to sit by him in the back row. these old fellows are so selfish. "always," said he, "establish yourself in the middle of the row against the wall; for, if you sit in the front or next the edges, you will be forced to give up your seat to the ladies who are standing." i had the gallantry to surrender mine to a damsel who had stood for a quarter of an hour; and i lounged into the ante-rooms, where i found samuel rogers. rogers and i sate together on a bench in one of the passages, and had a good deal of very pleasant conversation. he was,--as indeed he has always been to me,--extremely kind, and told me that, if it were in his power, he would contrive to be at holland house with me, to give me an insight into its ways. he is the great oracle of that circle. he has seen the king's letter to lord grey, respecting the garter; or at least has authentic information about it. it is a happy stroke of policy, and will, they say, decide many wavering votes in the house of lords. the king, it seems, requests lord grey to take the order, as a mark of royal confidence in him "at so critical a time;"--significant words, i think. ever yours t. b. macaulay. to hannah more macaulay. london: may , . well, my dear, i have been to holland house. i took a glass coach, and arrived, through a fine avenue of elms, at the great entrance towards seven o'clock. the house is delightful;--the very perfection of the old elizabethan style;--a considerable number of very large and very comfortable rooms, rich with antique carving and gilding, but carpeted and furnished with all the skill of the best modern upholsterers. the library is a very long room,--as long, i should think, as the gallery at rothley temple,--with little cabinets for study branching out of it. warmly and snugly fitted up, and looking out on very beautiful grounds. the collection of books is not, like lord spencer's, curious; but it contains almost everything that one ever wished to read. i found nobody there when i arrived but lord russell, the son of the marquess of tavistock. we are old house of commons friends; so we had some very pleasant talk, and in a little while in came allen, who is warden of dulwich college, and who lives almost entirely at holland house. he is certainly a man of vast information and great conversational powers. some other gentlemen dropped in, and we chatted till lady holland made her appearance. lord holland dined by himself on account of his gout. we sat down to dinner in a fine long room, the wainscot of which is rich with gilded coronets, roses, and portcullises. there were lord albemarle, lord alvanley, lord russell, lord mahon,--a violent tory, but a very agreeable companion, and a very good scholar. there was cradock, a fine fellow who was the duke of wellington's aide-de-camp in , and some other people whose names i did not catch. what however is more to the purpose, there was a most excellent dinner. i have always heard that holland house is famous for its good cheer, and certainly the reputation is not unmerited. after dinner lord holland was wheeled in, and placed very near me. he was extremely amusing and good-natured. in the drawing-room i had a long talk with lady holland about the antiquities of the house, and about the purity of the english language, wherein she thinks herself a critic. i happened, in speaking about the reform bill, to say that i wished that it had been possible to form a few commercial constituencies, if the word constituency were admissible. "i am glad you put that in," said her ladyship. "i was just going to give it you. it is an odious word. then there is _talented_ and _influential_, and _gentlemanly_. i never could break sheridan of _gentlemanly_, though he allowed it to be wrong." we talked about the word _talents_ and its history. i said that it had first appeared in theological writing, that it was a metaphor taken from the parable in the new testament, and that it had gradually passed from the vocabulary of divinity into common use. i challenged her to find it in any classical writer on general subjects before the restoration, or even before the year . i believe that i might safely have gone down later. she seemed surprised by this theory, never having, so far as i could judge, heard of the parable of the talents. i did not tell her, though i might have done so, that a person who professes to be a critic in the delicacies of the english language ought to have the bible at his fingers' ends. she is certainly a woman of considerable talents and great literary acquirements. to me she was excessively gracious; yet there is a haughtiness in her courtesy which, even after all that i had heard of her, surprised me. the centurion did not keep his soldiers in better order than she keeps her guests. it is to one "go," and he goeth; and to another "do this," and it is done. "ring the bell, mr. macaulay." "lay down that screen, lord russell; you will spoil it." "mr. allen, take a candle and show mr. cradock the picture of buonaparte." lord holland is, on the other hand, all kindness, simplicity, and vivacity. he talked very well both on politics and on literature. he asked me in a very friendly manner about my father's health, and begged to be remembered to him. when my coach came, lady holland made me promise that i would on the first fine morning walk out to breakfast with them, and see the grounds;--and, after drinking a glass of very good iced lemonade, i took my leave, much amused and pleased. the house certainly deserves its reputation for pleasantness, and her ladyship used me, i believe, as well as it is her way to use anybody. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. court of commissioners, basinghall street: may , . my dear sister,--how delighted i am that you like my letters, and how obliged by yours! but i have little more than my thanks to give for your last. i have nothing to tell about great people to-day. i heard no fine music yesterday, saw nobody above the rank of a baronet, and was shut up in my own room reading and writing all the morning. this day seems likely to pass in much the same way, except that i have some bankruptcy business to do, and a couple of sovereigns to receive. so here i am, with three of the ugliest attorneys that ever deserved to be transported sitting opposite to me; a disconsolate-looking bankrupt, his hands in his empty pockets, standing behind; a lady scolding for her money, and refusing to be comforted because it is not; and a surly butcher-like looking creditor, growling like a house-dog, and saying, as plain as looks can say "if i sign your certificate, blow me, that's all." among these fair and interesting forms, on a piece of official paper, with a pen and with ink found at the expense of the public, am i writing to nancy. these dirty courts, filled with jew money-lenders, sheriffs' officers, attorneys' runners, and a crowd of people who live by giving sham bail and taking false oaths, are not by any means such good subjects for a lady's correspondent as the sculpture gallery at lansdowne house, or the conservatory at holland house, or the notes of pasta, or the talk of rogers. but we cannot be always fine. when my richardsonian epistles are published, there must be dull as well as amusing letters among them; and this letter is, i think, as good as those sermons of sir charles to geronymo which miss byron hypocritically asked for, or as the greater part of that stupid last volume. we shall soon have more attractive matter. i shall walk out to breakfast at holland house; and i am to dine with sir george philips, and with his son the member for steyning, who have the best of company; and i am going to the fancy ball of the jew. he met me in the street, and implored me to come. "you need not dress more than for an evening party. you had better come. you will be delighted. it will be so very pretty." i thought of dr. johnson and the herdsman with his "see, such pretty goats." [see boswell's tour to the hebrides, sept. . "the doctor was prevailed with to mount one of vass's grays. as he rode upon it downhill, it did not go well, and he grumbled. i walked on a little before, but was excessively entertained with the method taken to keep him in good humour. hay led the horse's head, talking to dr. johnson as much as he could and, (having heard him, in the forenoon, express a pastoral pleasure on seeing the goats browsing,) just when the doctor was uttering his displeasure, the fellow cried, with a very highland accent, 'see, such pretty goats!' then he whistled whu! and made them jump."] however, i told my honest hebrew that i would come. i may perhaps, like the benjamites, steal away some israelite damsel in the middle of her dancing. but the noise all round me is becoming louder, and a baker in a white coat is bellowing for the book to prove a debt of nine pounds fourteen shillings and fourpence. so i must finish my letter and fall to business. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london june , . my dear sister,--my last letter was a dull one. i mean this to be very amusing. my last was about basinghall street, attorneys, and bankrupts. but for this,--take it dramatically in the german style. fine morning. scene, the great entrance of holland house. enter macaulay and two footmen in livery. first footman.--sir, may i venture to demand your name? macaulay.--macaulay, and thereto i add m.p. and that addition, even in these proud halls, may well ensure the bearer some respect. second footman.--and art thou come to breakfast with our lord? macaulay.--i am for so his hospitable will, and hers--the peerless dame ye serve--hath bade. first footman.--ascend the stair, and thou above shalt find, on snow-white linen spread, the luscious meal. (exit macaulay up stairs.) in plain english prose, i went this morning to breakfast at holland house. the day was fine, and i arrived at twenty minutes after ten. after i had lounged a short time in the dining-room, i heard a gruff good-natured voice asking, "where is mr. macaulay? where have you put him?" and in his arm-chair lord holland was wheeled in. he took me round the apartments, he riding and i walking. he gave me the history of the most remarkable portraits in the library, where there is, by the bye, one of the few bad pieces of lawrence that i have seen--a head of charles james fox, an ignominious failure. lord holland said that it was the worst ever painted of so eminent a man by so eminent an artist. there is a very fine head of machiavelli, and another of earl grey, a very different sort of man. i observed a portrait of lady holland painted some thirty years ago. i could have cried to see the change. she must have been a most beautiful woman. she still looks, however, as if she had been handsome, and shows in one respect great taste and sense. she does not rouge at all; and her costume is not youthful, so that she looks as well in the morning as in the evening. we came back to the dining-room. our breakfast party consisted of my lord and lady, myself, lord russell, and luttrell. you must have heard of luttrell. i met him once at rogers's; and i have seen him, i think, in other places. he is a famous wit,--the most popular, i think, of all the professed wits,--a man who has lived in the highest circles, a scholar, and no contemptible poet. he wrote a little volume of verse entitled "advice to julia,"--not first rate, but neat, lively, piquant, and showing the most consummate knowledge of fashionable life. we breakfasted on very good coffee, and very good tea, and very good eggs, butter kept in the midst of ice, and hot rolls. lady holland told us her dreams; how she had dreamed that a mad dog bit her foot, and how she set off to brodie, and lost her way in st. martin's lane, and could not find him. she hoped, she said, the dream would not come true. i said that i had had a dream which admitted of no such hope; for i had dreamed that i heard pollock speak in the house of commons, that the speech was very long, and that he was coughed down. this dream of mine diverted them much. after breakfast lady holland offered to conduct me to her own drawing-room, or, rather, commanded my attendance. a very beautiful room it is, opening on a terrace, and wainscoted with miniature paintings interesting from their merit, and interesting from their history. among them i remarked a great many,--thirty, i should think,--which even i, who am no great connoisseur, saw at once could come from no hand but stothard's. they were all on subjects from lord byron's poems. "yes," said she; "poor lord byron sent them to me a short time before the separation. i sent them back, and told him that, if he gave them away, he ought to give them to lady byron. but he said that he would not, and that if i did not take them, the bailiffs would, and that they would be lost in the wreck." her ladyship then honoured me so far as to conduct me through her dressing-room into the great family bedchamber to show me a very fine picture by reynolds of fox, when a boy, birds-nesting. she then consigned me to luttrell, asking him to show me the grounds. through the grounds we went, and very pretty i thought them. in the dutch garden is a fine bronze bust of napoleon, which lord holland put up in , while napoleon was a prisoner at st. helena. the inscription was selected by his lordship, and is remarkably happy. it is from homer's odyssey. i will translate it, as well as i can extempore, into a measure which gives a better idea of homer's manner than pope's singsong couplet. for not, be sure, within the grave is hid that prince, the wise, the brave; but in an islet's narrow bound, with the great ocean roaring round, the captive of a foeman base he pines to view his native place. there is a seat near the spot which is called rogers's seat. the poet loves, it seems, to sit there. a very elegant inscription by lord holland is placed over it. "here rogers sate; and here for ever dwell with me those pleasures which he sang so well." very neat and condensed, i think. another inscription by luttrell hangs there. luttrell adjured me with mock pathos to spare his blushes; but i am author enough to know what the blushes of authors mean. so i read the lines, and very pretty and polished they were, but too many to be remembered from one reading. having gone round the grounds i took my leave, very much pleased with the place. lord holland is extremely kind. but that is of course; for he is kindness itself. her ladyship too, which is by no means of course, is all graciousness and civility. but, for all this, i would much rather be quietly walking with you; and the great use of going to these fine places is to learn how happy it is possible to be without them. indeed, i care so little for them that i certainly should not have gone to-day, but that i thought that i should be able to find materials for a letter which you might like. farewell. t. b. macaulay. to hannah m. macaulay. london: june , . my dear sister,--i cannot tell you how delighted i am to find that my letters amuse you. but sometimes i must be dull like my neighbours. i paid no visits yesterday, and have no news to relate to-day. i am sitting again in basinghall street and basil montagu is haranguing about lord verulam, and the way of inoculating one's mind with truth; and all this a propos of a lying bankrupt's balance-sheet. ["those who are acquainted with the courts in which mr. montagu practises with so much ability and success, will know how often he enlivens the discussion of a point of law by citing some weighty aphorism, or some brilliant illustration, from the de augmentis or the novum organum."--macaulay's review of basil montagu's edition of bacon.] send me some gossip, my love. tell me how you go on with german. what novel have you commenced? or, rather, how many dozen have you finished? recommend me one. what say you to "destiny"? is the "young duke" worth reading? and what do you think of "laurie todd"? i am writing about lord byron so pathetically that i make margaret cry, but so slowly that i am afraid i shall make napier wait. rogers, like a civil gentleman, told me last week to write no more reviews, and to publish separate works; adding, what for him is a very rare thing, a compliment: "you may do anything, mr. macaulay." see how vain and insincere human nature is! i have been put into so good a temper with rogers that i have paid him, what is as rare with me as with him, a very handsome compliment in my review. ["well do we remember to have heard a most correct judge of poetry revile mr. rogers for the incorrectness of that most sweet and graceful passage:-- 'such grief was ours,--it seems but yesterday,-- when in thy prime, wishing so much to stay, twas thine, maria, thine without a sigh at midnight in a sister's arms to die, oh! thou wast lovely; lovely was thy frame, and pure thy spirit as from heaven it came; and, when recalled to join the blest above, thou diedst a victim to exceeding love nursing the young to health. in happier hours, when idle fancy wove luxuriant flowers, once in thy mirth thou badst me write on thee; and now i write what thou shalt never see.' macaulay's essay on byron.] it is not undeserved; but i confess that i cannot understand the popularity of his poetry. it is pleasant and flowing enough; less monotonous than most of the imitations of pope and goldsmith; and calls up many agreeable images and recollections. but that such men as lord granville, lord holland, hobhouse, lord byron, and others of high rank in intellect, should place rogers, as they do, above southey, moore, and even scott himself, is what i cannot conceive. but this comes of being in the highest society of london. what lady jane granville called the patronage of fashion can do as much for a middling poet as for a plain girl like miss arabella falconer. [lady jane, and miss arabella, appear in miss edgeworth's "patronage."] but i must stop. this rambling talk has been scrawled in the middle of haranguing, squabbling, swearing, and crying. since i began it i have taxed four bills, taken forty depositions, and rated several perjured witnesses. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: june , . yesterday i dined at marshall's, and was almost consoled for not meeting ramohun roy by a very pleasant party. the great sight was the two wits, rogers and sydney smith. singly i have often seen them; but to see them both together was a novelty, and a novelty not the less curious because their mutual hostility is well known, and the hard hits which they have given to each other are in everybody's mouth. they were very civil, however. but i was struck by the truth of what matthew bramble, a person of whom you probably never heard, says in smollett's humphrey clinker: that one wit in a company, like a knuckle of ham in soup, gives a flavour; but two are too many. rogers and sydney smith would not come into conflict. if one had possession of the company, the other was silent; and, as you may conceive, the one who had possession of the company was always sydney smith, and the one who was silent was always rogers. sometimes, however, the company divided, and each of them had a small congregation. i had a good deal of talk with both of them; for, in whatever they may disagree, they agree in always treating me with very marked kindness. i had a good deal of pleasant conversation with rogers. he was telling me of the curiosity and interest which attached to the persons of sir walter scott and lord byron. when sir walter scott dined at a gentleman's in london some time ago, all the servant-maids in the house asked leave to stand in the passage and see him pass. he was, as you may conceive, greatly flattered. about lord byron, whom he knew well, he told me some curious anecdotes. when lord byron passed through florence, rogers was there. they had a good deal of conversation, and rogers accompanied him to his carriage. the inn had fifty windows in front. all the windows were crowded with women, mostly english women, to catch a glance at their favourite poet. among them were some at whose houses he had often been in england, and with whom he had lived on friendly terms. he would not notice them, or return their salutations. rogers was the only person that he spoke to. the worst thing that i know about lord byron is the very unfavourable impression which he made on men, who certainly were not inclined to judge him harshly, and who, as far as i know, were never personally ill-used by him. sharp and rogers both speak of him as an unpleasant, affected, splenetic person. i have heard hundreds and thousands of people who never saw him rant about him; but i never heard a single expression of fondness for him fall from the lips of any of those who knew him well. yet, even now, after the lapse of five-and-twenty years, there are those who cannot talk for a quarter of an hour about charles fox without tears. sydney smith leaves london on the th, the day before parliament meets for business. i advised him to stay, and see something of his friends who would be crowding to london. "my flock!" said this good shepherd. "my dear sir, remember my flock! the hungry sheep look up and are not fed." i could say nothing to such an argument; but i could not help thinking that, if mr. daniel wilson had said such a thing, it would infallibly have appeared in his funeral sermon, and in his life by baptist noel. but in poor sydney's mouth it sounded like a joke. he begged me to come and see him at combe florey. "there i am, sir, the priest of the flowery valley, in a delightful parsonage, about which i care a good deal, and a delightful country, about which i do not care a straw." i told him that my meeting him was some compensation for missing ramohun roy. sydney broke forth: "compensation! do you mean to insult me? a beneficed clergyman, an orthodox clergyman, a nobleman's chaplain, to be no more than compensation for a brahmin; and a heretic brahmin too, a fellow who has lost his own religion and can't find another; a vile heterodox dog, who, as i am credibly informed eats beef-steaks in private! a man who has lost his caste! who ought to have melted lead poured down his nostrils, if the good old vedas were in force as they ought to be." these are some boswelliana of sydney; not very clerical, you will say, but indescribably amusing to the hearers, whatever the readers may think of them. nothing can present a more striking contrast to his rapid, loud, laughing utterance, and his rector-like amplitude and rubicundity, than the low, slow, emphatic tone, and the corpse-like face of rogers. there is as great a difference in what they say as in the voice and look with which they say it. the conversation of rogers is remarkably polished and artificial. what he says seems to have been long meditated, and might be published with little correction. sydney talks from the impulse of the moment, and his fun is quite inexhaustible. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m macaulay. london: june , . my dear sister,--yesterday night i went to the jew's. i had indeed no excuse for forgetting the invitation; for, about a week after i had received the green varnished billet, and answered it, came another in the self-same words, and addressed to mr. macaulay, junior. i thought that my answer had miscarried; so down i sate, and composed a second epistle to the hebrews. i afterwards found that the second invitation was meant for charles. i set off a little after ten, having attired myself simply as for a dinner-party. the house is a very fine one. the door was guarded by peace-officers, and besieged by starers. my host met me in a superb court-dress, with his sword at his side. there was a most sumptuous-looking persian, covered with gold lace. then there was an italian bravo with a long beard. two old gentlemen, who ought to have been wiser, were fools enough to come in splendid turkish costumes at which everybody laughed. the fancy-dresses were worn almost exclusively by the young people. the ladies for the most part contented themselves with a few flowers and ribands oddly disposed. there was, however, a beautiful mary queen of scots, who looked as well as dressed the character perfectly; an angel of a jewess in a highland plaid; and an old woman, or rather a woman,--for through her disguise it was impossible to ascertain her age,--in the absurdest costume of the last century. these good people soon began their quadrilles and galopades, and were enlivened by all the noise that twelve fiddlers could make for their lives. you must not suppose the company was made up of these mummers. there was dr. lardner, and long, the greek professor in the london university, and sheil, and strutt, and romilly, and owen the philanthropist. owen laid bold on sheil, and gave him a lecture on co-operation which lasted for half an hour. at last sheil made his escape. then owen seized mrs. sheil,--a good catholic, and a very agreeable woman,--and began to prove to her that there could be no such thing as moral responsibility. i had fled at the first sound of his discourse, and was talking with strutt and romilly, when behold! i saw owen leave mrs. sheil and come towards us. so i cried out "sauve qui peut!" and we ran off. but before we had got five feet from where we were standing, who should meet us face to face but old basil montagu? "nay, then," said i, "the game is up. the prussians are on our rear. if we are to be bored to death there is no help for it." basil seized romilly; owen took possession of strutt; and i was blessing myself on my escape, when the only human being worthy to make a third with such a pair, j--, caught me by the arm, and begged to have a quarter of an hour's conversation with me. while i was suffering under j--, a smart impudent-looking young dog, dressed like a sailor in a blue jacket and check shirt, marched up, and asked a jewish-looking damsel near me to dance with him. i thought that i had seen the fellow before; and, after a little looking, i perceived that it was charles; and most knowingly, i assure you, did he perform a quadrille with miss hilpah manasses. if i were to tell you all that i saw i should exceed my ounce. there was martin the painter, and proctor, alias barry cornwall, the poet or poetaster. i did not see one peer, or one star, except a foreign order or two, which i generally consider as an intimation to look to my pockets. a german knight is a dangerous neighbour in a crowd. [macaulay ended by being a german knight himself.] after seeing a galopade very prettily danced by the israelitish women, i went downstairs, reclaimed my hat, and walked into the dining-room. there, with some difficulty, i squeezed myself between a turk and a bernese peasant, and obtained an ice, a macaroon, and a glass of wine. charles was there, very active in his attendance on his fair hilpah. i bade him good night. "what!" said young hopeful, "are you going yet?" it was near one o'clock; but this joyous tar seemed to think it impossible that anybody could dream of leaving such delightful enjoyments till daybreak. i left him staying hilpah with flagons, and walked quietly home. but it was some time before i could get to sleep. the sound of fiddles was in mine ears; and gaudy dresses, and black hair, and jewish noses, were fluctuating up and down before mine eyes. there is a fancy ball for you. if charles writes a history of it, tell me which of us does it best. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m macaulay. london: june . . my dear sister,--i am at basinghall street, and i snatch this quarter of an hour, the only quarter of an hour which i am likely to secure during the day, to write to you. i will not omit writing two days running, because, if my letters give you half the pleasure which your letters give me, you will, i am sure, miss them. i have not, however, much to tell. i have been very busy with my article on moore's life of byron. i never wrote anything with less heart. i do not like the book; i do not like the hero; i have said the most i could for him, and yet i shall be abused for speaking as coldly of him as i have done. i dined the day before yesterday at sir george philips's with sotheby, morier the author of "hadji baba," and sir james mackintosh. morier began to quote latin before the ladies had left the room, and quoted it by no means to the purpose. after their departure he fell to repeating virgil, choosing passages which everybody else knows and does not repeat. he, though he tried to repeat them, did not know them, and could not get on without my prompting. sotheby was full of his translation of homer's iliad, some specimens of which he has already published. it is a complete failure; more literal than that of pope, but still tainted with the deep radical vice of pope's version, a thoroughly modern and artificial manner. it bears the same kind of relation to the iliad that robertson's narrative bears to the story of joseph in the book of genesis. there is a pretty allegory in homer--i think in the last book, but i forget precisely where--about two vessels, the one filled with blessings and the other with sorrow, which stand, says the poet, on the right and left hand of jupiter's throne, and from which he dispenses good and evil at his pleasure among men. what word to use for these vessels has long posed the translators of homer. pope, who loves to be fine, calls them _urns_. cowper, who loves to be coarse, calls them _casks_;--a translation more improper than pope's; for a cask is, in our general understanding, a wooden vessel; and the greek word means an earthen vessel. there is a curious letter of cowper's to one of his female correspondents about this unfortunate word. she begged that jupiter might be allowed a more elegant piece of furniture for his throne than a cask. but cowper was peremptory. i mentioned this incidentally when we were talking about translations. this set sotheby off. "i," said he, "have translated it _vase_. i hope that meets your ideas. don't you think vase will do? does it satisfy you?" i told him, sincerely enough, that it satisfied me; for i must be most unreasonable to be dissatisfied at anything that he chooses to put in a book which i never shall read. mackintosh was very agreeable; and, as usually happens when i meet him, i learned something from him. [macaulay wrote to one of his nieces in september : "i am glad that mackintosh's life interests you. i knew him well; and a kind friend he was to me when i was a young fellow, fighting my way uphill."] the great topic now in london is not, as you perhaps fancy, reform, but cholera. there is a great panic; as great a panic as i remember, particularly in the city. rice shakes his head, and says that this is the most serious thing that has happened in his time; and assuredly, if the disease were to rage in london as it has lately raged in riga, it would be difficult to imagine anything more horrible. i, however, feel no uneasiness. in the first place i have a strong leaning towards the doctrines of the anti-contagionists. in the next place i repose a great confidence in the excellent food and the cleanliness of the english. i have this instant received your letter of yesterday with the enclosed proof-sheets. your criticism is to a certain extent just; but you have not considered the whole sentence together. depressed is in itself better than weighed down; but "the oppressive privileges which had depressed industry" would be a horrible cacophony. i hope that word convinces you. i have often observed that a fine greek compound is an excellent substitute for a reason. i met rogers at the athenaeum. he begged me to breakfast with him, and name my day, and promised that he would procure me as agreeable a party as he could find in london. very kind of the old man, is it not? and, if you knew how rogers is thought of, you would think it as great a compliment as could be paid to a duke. have you seen what the author of the "young duke" says about me: how rabid i am, and how certain i am to rat? ever yours t. b. m. macaulay's account of the allusion to himself in the "young duke" is perfectly accurate; and yet, when read as a whole, the passage in question does not appear to have been ill-naturedly meant. ["i hear that mr. babington macaulay is to be returned. if he speaks half as well as he writes, the house will be in fashion again. i fear that he is one of those who, like the individual whom he has most studied, will give up to a party what was meant for mankind. at any rate, he must get rid of his rabidity. he writes now on all subjects as if he certainly intended to be a renegade, and was determined to make the contrast complete."--the young duke, book v chap. vi.] it is much what any young literary man outside the house of commons might write of another who had only been inside that house for a few weeks; and it was probably forgotten by the author within twenty-four hours after the ink was dry. it is to be hoped that the commentators of the future will not treat it as an authoritative record of mr. disraeli's estimate of lord macaulay's political character. to hannah m. macaulay. london: june , . my dear sister,--there was, as you will see, no debate on lord john russell's motion. the reform bill is to be brought in, read once, and printed, without discussion. the contest will be on the second reading, and will be protracted, i should think, through the whole of the week after next;--next week it will be, when you read this letter. i breakfasted with rogers yesterday. there was nobody there but moore. we were all on the most friendly and familiar terms possible; and moore, who is, rogers tells me, excessively pleased with my review of his book, showed me very marked attention. i was forced to go away early on account of bankrupt business; but rogers said that we must have the talk out so we are to meet at his house again to breakfast. what a delightful house it is! it looks out on the green park just at the most pleasant point. the furniture has been selected with a delicacy of taste quite unique. its value does not depend on fashion, but must be the same while the fine arts are held in any esteem. in the drawing-room, for example, the chimney-pieces are carved by flaxman into the most beautiful grecian forms. the book-case is painted by stothard, in his very best manner, with groups from chaucer, shakespeare, and boccacio. the pictures are not numerous; but every one is excellent. in the dining-room there are also some beautiful paintings. but the three most remarkable objects in that room are, i think, a cast of pope taken after death by roubiliac; a noble model in terra-cotta by michael angelo, from which he afterwards made one of his finest statues, that of lorenzo de medici; and, lastly, a mahogany table on which stands an antique vase. when chantrey dined with rogers some time ago he took particular notice of the vase, and the table on which it stands, and asked rogers who made the table. "a common carpenter," said rogers. "do you remember the making of it?" said chantrey. "certainly," said rogers, in some surprise. "i was in the room while it was finished with the chisel, and gave the workman directions about placing it." "yes," said chantrey, "i was the carpenter. i remember the room well, and all the circumstances." a curious story, i think, and honourable both to the talent which raised chantrey, and to the magnanimity which kept him from being ashamed of what he had been. ever yours affectionately t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: june , . my dear sister,--we are not yet in the full tide of parliamentary business. next week the debates will be warm and long. i should not wonder if we had a discussion of five nights. i shall probably take a part in it. i have breakfasted again with rogers. the party was a remarkable one,--lord john russell, tom moore, tom campbell, and luttrell. we were all very lively. an odd incident took place after breakfast, while we were standing at the window and looking into the green park. somebody was talking about diners-out. "ay," said campbell-- "ye diners-out from whom we guard our spoons." tom moore asked where the line was. "don't you know?" said campbell. "not i," said moore. "surely," said campbell, "it is your own." "i never saw it in my life," said moore. "it is in one of your best things in the times," said campbell. moore denied it. hereupon i put in my claim, and told them that it was mine. do you remember it? it is in some lines called the political georgics, which i sent to the times about three years ago. they made me repeat the lines, and were vociferous in praise of them. tom moore then said, oddly enough: "there is another poem in the times that i should like to know the author of;--a parson's account of his journey to the cambridge election." i laid claim to that also. "that is curious," said moore. "i begged barnes to tell me who wrote it. he said that he had received it from cambridge, and touched it up himself, and pretended that all the best strokes were his. i believed that he was lying, because i never knew him to make a good joke in his life. and now the murder is out." they asked me whether i had put anything else in the times. nothing, i said, except the sortes virgilianae, which lord john remembered well. i never mentioned the cambridge journey, or the georgics, to any but my own family; and i was therefore, as you may conceive, not a little flattered to hear in one day moore praising one of them, and campbell praising the other. i find that my article on byron is very popular; one among a thousand proofs of the bad taste of the public. i am to review croker's edition of bozzy. it is wretchedly ill done. the notes are poorly written, and shamefully inaccurate. there is, however, much curious information in it. the whole of the tour to the hebrides is incorporated with the life. so are most of mrs. thrale's anecdotes, and much of sir john hawkins's lumbering book. the whole makes five large volumes. there is a most laughable sketch of bozzy, taken by sir t. lawrence when young. i never saw a character so thoroughly hit off. i intend the book for you, when i have finished my criticism on it. you are, next to myself, the best read boswellite that i know. the lady whom johnson abused for flattering him [see boswell's life of johnson, april , .] was certainly, according to croker, hannah more. another ill-natured sentence about a bath lady ["he would not allow me to praise a lady then at bath; observing, 'she does not gain upon me, sir; i think her empty-headed.'"] whom johnson called "empty-headed" is also applied to your godmother. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , . my dear sister,--i have been so busy during the last two or three days that i have found no time to write to you. i have now good news for you. i spoke yesterday night with a success beyond my utmost expectations. i am half ashamed to tell you the compliments which i have received; but you well know that it is not from vanity, but to give you pleasure, that i tell you what is said about me. lord althorp told me twice that it was the best speech he had ever heard; graham, and stanley, and lord john russell spoke of it in the same way; and o'connell followed me out of the house to pay me the most enthusiastic compliments. i delivered my speech much more slowly than any that i have before made, and it is in consequence better reported than its predecessors, though not well. i send you several papers. you will see some civil things in the leading articles of some of them. my greatest pleasure, in the midst of all this praise, is to think of the pleasure which my success will give to my father and my sisters. it is happy for me that ambition has in my mind been softened into a kind of domestic feeling, and that affection has at least as much to do as vanity with my wish to distinguish myself. this i owe to my dear mother, and to the interest which she always took in my childish successes. from my earliest years, the gratification of those whom i love has been associated with the gratification of my own thirst for fame, until the two have become inseparably joined in my mind. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m macaulay london: july , . my dear sister,--do you want to hear all the compliments that are paid to me? i shall never end, if i stuff my letters with them; for i meet nobody who does not give me joy. baring tells me that i ought never to speak again. howick sent a note to me yesterday to say that his father wished very much to be introduced to me, and asked me to dine with them yesterday, as, by great good luck, there was nothing to do in the house of commons. at seven i went to downing street, where earl grey's official residence stands. it is a noble house. there are two splendid drawing-rooms, which overlook st. james's park. into these i was shown. the servant told me that lord grey was still at the house of lords, and that her ladyship had just gone to dress. howick had not mentioned the hour in his note. i sate down, and turned over two large portfolios of political caricatures. earl grey's own face was in every print. i was very much diverted. i had seen some of them before; but many were new to me, and their merit is extraordinary. they were the caricatures of that remarkably able artist who calls himself h. b. in about half an hour lady georgiana grey, and the countess, made their appearance. we had some pleasant talk, and they made many apologies. the earl, they said, was unexpectedly delayed by a question which had arisen in the lords. lady holland arrived soon after, and gave me a most gracious reception; shook my hand very warmly, and told me, in her imperial decisive manner, that she had talked with all the principal men on our side about my speech, that they all agreed that it was the best that had been made since the death of fox, and that it was more like fox's speaking than anybody's else. then she told me that i was too much worked, that i must go out of town, and absolutely insisted on my going to holland house to dine, and take a bed, on the next day on which there is no parliamentary business. at eight we went to dinner. lord howick took his father's place, and we feasted very luxuriously. at nine lord grey came from the house with lord durham, lord holland, and the duke of richmond. they dined on the remains of our dinner with great expedition, as they had to go to a cabinet council at ten. of course i had scarcely any talk with lord grey. he was, however, extremely polite to me, and so were his colleagues. i liked the ways of the family. i picked up some news from these cabinet ministers. there is to be a coronation on quite a new plan; no banquet in westminster hall, no feudal services, no champion, no procession from the abbey to the hall, and back again. but there is to be a service in the abbey. all the peers are to come in state and in their robes, and the king is to take the oaths, and be crowned and anointed in their presence. the spectacle will be finer than usual to the multitude out of doors. the few hundreds who could obtain admittance to the hall will be the only losers. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , . my dear sister,--since i wrote to you i have been out to dine and sleep at holland house. we had a very agreeable and splendid party; among others the duke and duchess of richmond, and the marchioness of clanricarde, who, you know, is the daughter of canning. she is very beautiful, and very like her father, with eyes full of fire, and great expression in all her features. she and i had a great deal of talk. she showed much cleverness and information, but, i thought, a little more of political animosity than is quite becoming in a pretty woman. however, she has been placed in peculiar circumstances. the daughter of a statesman who was a martyr to the rage of faction may be pardoned for speaking sharply of the enemies of her parent; and she did speak sharply. with knitted brows, and flashing eyes, and a look of feminine vengeance about her beautiful mouth, she gave me such a character of peel as he would certainly have had no pleasure in hearing. in the evening lord john russell came; and, soon after, old talleyrand. i had seen talleyrand in very large parties, but had never been near enough to hear a word that he said. i now had the pleasure of listening for an hour and a half to his conversation. he is certainly the greatest curiosity that i ever fell in with. his head is sunk down between two high shoulders. one of his feet is hideously distorted. his face is as pale as that of a corpse, and wrinkled to a frightful degree. his eyes have an odd glassy stare quite peculiar to them. his hair, thickly powdered and pomatumed, hangs down his shoulders on each side as straight as a pound of tallow candles. his conversation, however, soon makes you forget his ugliness and infirmities. there is a poignancy without effort in all that he says, which reminded me a little of the character which the wits of johnson's circle give of beauclerk. for example, we talked about metternich and cardinal mazarin. "j'y trouve beaucoup a redire. le cardinal trompait; mais il ne mentait pas. or, m. de metternich ment toujours, et ne trompe jamais." he mentioned m. de st. aulaire,--now one of the most distinguished public men of france. i said: "m. de saint-aulaire est beau-pere de m. le duc de cazes, n'est-ce pas?" "non, monsieur," said talleyrand; "l'on disait, il y a douze ans, que m. de saint-aulaire etoit beau-pere de m. de cazes; l'on dit maintenant que m. de cazes est gendre de m. de saint-aulaire." [this saying remained in macaulay's mind. he quoted it on the margin of his aulus gellius, as an illustration of the passage in the nineteenth book in which julius caesar is described, absurdly enough as "perpetuus ille dictator, cneii pompeii socer".] it was not easy to describe the change in the relative positions of two men more tersely and more sharply; and these remarks were made in the lowest tone, and without the slightest change of muscle, just as if he had been remarking that the day was fine. he added: "m. de saint-aulaire a beaucoup d'esprit. mais il est devot, et, ce qui pis est, devot honteux. il va se cacher dans quelque hameau pour faire ses paques." this was a curious remark from a bishop. he told several stories about the political men of france; not of any great value in themselves; but his way of telling them was beyond all praise,--concise, pointed, and delicately satirical. when he had departed, i could not help breaking out into admiration of his talent for relating anecdotes. lady holland said that he had been considered for nearly forty years as the best teller of a story in europe, and that there was certainly nobody like him in that respect. when the prince was gone, we went to bed. in the morning lord john russell drove me back to london in his cabriolet, much amused with what i had seen and heard. but i must stop. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. basinghall street: july . my dear sister,--the rage of faction at the present moment exceeds anything that has been known in our day. indeed i doubt whether, at the time of mr. pitt's first becoming premier, at the time of sir robert walpole's fall, or even during the desperate struggles between the whigs and tories at the close of anne's reign, the fury of party was so fearfully violent. lord mahon said to me yesterday that friendships of long standing were everywhere giving way, and that the schism between the reformers and the anti-reformers was spreading from the house of commons into every private circle. lord mahon himself is an exception. he and i are on excellent terms. but praed and i become colder every day. the scene of tuesday night beggars description. i left the house at about three, in consequence of some expressions of lord althorp's which indicated that the ministry was inclined to yield on the question of going into committee on the bill. i afterwards much regretted that i had gone away; not that my presence was necessary; but because i should have liked to have sate through so tremendous a storm. towards eight in the morning the speaker was almost fainting. the ministerial members, however, were as true as steel. they furnished the ministry with the resolution which it wanted. "if the noble lord yields," said one of our men, "all is lost." old sir thomas baring sent for his razor, and benett, the member for wiltshire, for his night-cap; and they were both resolved to spend the whole day in the house rather than give way. if the opposition had not yielded, in two hours half london would have been in old palace yard. since tuesday the tories have been rather cowed. but their demeanour, though less outrageous than at the beginning of the week, indicates what would in any other time be called extreme violence. i have not been once in bed till three in the morning since last sunday. to-morrow we have a holiday. i dine at lansdowne house. next week i dine with littleton, the member for staffordshire, and his handsome wife. he told me that i should meet two men whom i am curious to see, lord plunket and the marquess wellesley; let alone the chancellor, who is not a novelty to me. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , . my dear sister,--on saturday evening i went to holland house. there i found the dutch ambassador, m. de weissembourg, mr. and mrs. vernon smith, and admiral adam, a son of old adam, who fought the duel with fox. we dined like emperors, and jabbered in several languages. her ladyship, for an esprit fort, is the greatest coward that i ever saw. the last time that i was there she was frightened out of her wits by the thunder. she closed all the shutters, drew all the curtains, and ordered candles in broad day to keep out the lightning, or rather the appearance of the lightning. on saturday she was in a terrible taking about the cholera; talked of nothing else; refused to eat any ice because somebody said that ice was bad for the cholera; was sure that the cholera was at glasgow; and asked me why a cordon of troops was not instantly placed around that town to prevent all intercourse between the infected and the healthy spots. lord holland made light of her fears. he is a thoroughly good-natured, open, sensible man; very lively; very intellectual; well read in politics, and in the lighter literature both of ancient and modern times. he sets me more at ease than almost any person that i know, by a certain good-humoured way of contradicting that he has. he always begins by drawing down his shaggy eyebrows, making a face extremely like his uncle, wagging his head and saying: "now do you know, mr. macaulay, i do not quite see that. how do you make it out?" he tells a story delightfully; and bears the pain of his gout, and the confinement and privations to which it subjects him, with admirable fortitude and cheerfulness. her ladyship is all courtesy and kindness to me; but her demeanour to some others, particularly to poor allen, is such as it quite pains me to witness. he really is treated like a negro slave. "mr. allen, go into my drawing-room and bring my reticule." "mr. allen, go and see what can be the matter that they do not bring up dinner." "mr. allen, there is not enough turtle-soup for you. you must take gravy-soup or none." yet i can scarcely pity the man. he has an independent income; and, if he can stoop to be ordered about like a footman, i cannot so much blame her for the contempt with which she treats him. perhaps i may write again to-morrow. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. library of the house of commons july , . my dear sister,--here i am seated, waiting for the debate on the borough of st. germains with a very quiet party,--lord milton, lord tavistock, and george lamb. but, instead of telling you in dramatic form my conversations with cabinet ministers, i shall, i think, go back two or three days, and complete the narrative which i left imperfect in my epistle of yesterday. [this refers to a passage in a former letter, likewise written from the library of the house. "'macaulay!' who calls macaulay? sir james graham. what can he have to say to me? take it dramatically: sir j. g. macaulay! macaulay. what? sir j. g. whom are you writing to, that you laugh so much over your letter? macaulay. to my constituents at caine, to be sure. they expect news of the reform bill every day. sir j. g. well, writing to constituents is less of a plague to you than to most people, to judge by your face. macaulay. how do you know that i am not writing a billet doux to a lady? sir j. g. you look more like it, by jove! cutlar ferguson, m.p. for kirkcudbright. let ladies and constituents alone, and come into the house. we are going on to the case of the borough of great bedwin immediately."] at half after seven on sunday i was set down at littleton's palace, for such it is, in grosvenor place. it really is a noble house; four superb drawing-rooms on the first floor, hung round with some excellent pictures--a hobbema, (the finest by that artist in the world, it is said,) and lawrence's charming portrait of mrs. littleton. the beautiful original, by the bye, did not make her appearance. we were a party of gentlemen. but such gentlemen! listen, and be proud of your connection with one who is admitted to eat and drink in the same room with beings so exalted. there were two chancellors, lord brougham and lord plunket. there was earl gower; lord st. vincent; lord seaford; lord duncannon; lord ebrington; sir james graham; sir john newport; the two secretaries of the treasury, rice and ellice; george lamb; denison; and half a dozen more lords and distinguished commoners, not to mention littleton himself. till last year he lived in portman square. when he changed his residence his servants gave him warning. they could not, they said, consent to go into such an unheard-of part of the world as grosvenor place. i can only say that i have never been in a finer house than littleton's, lansdowne house excepted,--and perhaps lord milton's, which is also in grosvenor place. he gave me a dinner of dinners. i talked with denison, and with nobody else. i have found out that the real use of conversational powers is to put them forth in tete-a-tete. a man is flattered by your talking your best to him alone. ten to one he is piqued by your overpowering him before a company. denison was agreeable enough. i heard only one word from lord plunket, who was remarkably silent. he spoke of doctor thorpe, and said that, having heard the doctor in dublin, he should like to hear him again in london. "nothing easier," quoth littleton; "his chapel is only two doors off; and he will be just mounting the pulpit." "no," said lord plunket; "i can't lose my dinner." an excellent saying, though one which a less able man than lord plunket might have uttered. at midnight i walked away with george lamb, and went--where for a ducat? "to bed," says miss hannah. nay, my sister, not so; but to brooks's. there i found sir james macdonald; lord duncannon, who had left littleton's just before us; and many other whigs and ornaments of human nature. as macdonald and i were rising to depart we saw rogers, and i went to shake hands with him. you cannot think how kind the old man was to me. he shook my hand over and over, and told me that lord plunket longed to see me in a quiet way, and that he would arrange a breakfast party in a day or two for that purpose. away i went from brooks's--but whither? "to bed now, i am sure," says little anne. no, but on a walk with sir james macdonald to the end of sloane street, talking about the ministry, the reform bill, and the east india question. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. house of commons smoking room: saturday. my dear sister,--the newspapers will have, explained the reason of our sitting to-day. at three this morning i left the house. at two this afternoon i have returned to it, with the thermometer at boiling heat, and four hundred and fifty people stowed together like negroes in the john newton's slaveship. i have accordingly left sir francis burdett on his legs, and repaired to the smoking-room; a large, wainscoted, uncarpeted place, with tables covered with green baize and writing materials. on a full night it is generally thronged towards twelve o'clock with smokers. it is then a perfect cloud of fume. there have i seen, (tell it not to the west indians,) buxton blowing fire out of his mouth. my father will not believe it. at present, however, all the doors and windows are open, and the room is pure enough from tobacco to suit my father himself. get blackwood's new number. there is a description of me in it. what do you think he says that i am? "a little, splay-footed, ugly, dumpling of a fellow, with a mouth from ear to ear." conceive how such a charge must affect a man so enamoured of his own beauty as i am. i said a few words the other night. they were merely in reply, and quite unpremeditated, and were not ill received. i feel that much practice will be necessary to make me a good debater on points of detail; but my friends tell me that i have raised my reputation by showing that i was quite equal to the work of extemporaneous reply. my manner, they say, is cold and wants care. i feel this myself. nothing but strong excitement, and a great occasion, overcomes a certain reserve and mauvaise honte which i have in public speaking; not a mauvaise honte which in the least confuses me, or makes me hesitate for a word, but which keeps me from putting any fervour into my tone or my action. this is perhaps in some respects an advantage; for, when i do warm, i am the most vehement speaker in the house, and nothing strikes an audience so much as the animation of an orator who is generally cold. i ought to tell you that peel was very civil, and cheered me loudly; and that impudent leering croker congratulated the house on the proof which i had given of my readiness. he was afraid, he said, that i had been silent so long on account of the many allusions which had been made to calne. now that i had risen again he hoped that they should hear me often. see whether i do not dust that varlet's jacket for him in the next number of the blue and yellow. i detest him more than cold boiled veal. ["by the bye," macaulay writes elsewhere, "you never saw such a scene as croker's oration on friday night. he abused lord john russell; he abused lord althorp; he abused the lord advocate, and we took no notice;--never once groaned or cried 'no!' but he began to praise lord fitzwilliam;--'a venerable nobleman, an excellent and amiable nobleman' and so forth; and we all broke out together with 'question!' 'no, no!' 'this is too bad!' 'don't, don't!' he then called canning his right honourable friend. 'your friend! damn your impudent face!' said the member who sate next me."] after the debate i walked about the streets with bulwer till near three o'clock. i spoke to him about his novels with perfect sincerity, praising warmly, and criticising freely. he took the praise as a greedy boy takes apple-pie, and the criticism as a good dutiful boy takes senna-tea. he has one eminent merit, that of being a most enthusiastic admirer of mine; so that i may be the hero of a novel yet, under the name of delamere or mortimer. only think what an honour! bulwer is to be editor of the new monthly magazine. he begged me very earnestly to give him something for it. i would make no promises; for i am already over head and ears in literary engagements. but i may possibly now and then send him some trifle or other. at all events i shall expect him to puff me well. i do not see why i should not have my puffers as well as my neighbours. i am glad that you have read madame de stael's allemagne. the book is a foolish one in some respects; but it abounds with information, and shows great mental power. she was certainly the first woman of her age; miss edgeworth, i think, the second; and miss austen the third. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: august , . my dear sister,--here i am again settled, sitting up in the house of commons till three o'clock five days in the week, and getting an indigestion at great dinners the remaining two. i dined on saturday with lord althorp, and yesterday with sir james graham. both of them gave me exactly the same dinner; and, though i am not generally copious on the repasts which my hosts provide for me, i must tell you, for the honour of official hospitality, how our ministers regale their supporters. turtle, turbot, venison, and grouse, formed part of both entertainments. lord althorp was extremely pleasant at the head of his own table. we were a small party; lord ebrington, hawkins, captain spencer, stanley, and two or three more. we all of us congratulated lord althorp on his good health and spirits. he told us that he never took exercise now; that from his getting up, till four o'clock, he was engaged in the business of his office; that at four he dined, went down to the house at five, and never stirred till the house rose, which is always after midnight; that he then went home, took a basin of arrow-root with a glass of sherry in it, and went to bed, where he always dropped asleep in three minutes. "during the week," said he, "which followed my taking office, i did not close my eyes for anxiety. since that time i have never been awake a quarter of an hour after taking off my clothes." stanley laughed at lord althorp's arrow-root, and recommended his own supper, cold meat and warm negus; a supper which i will certainly begin to take when i feel a desire to pass the night with a sensation as if i was swallowing a nutmeg-grater every third minute. we talked about timidity in speaking. lord althorp said that he had only just got over his apprehensions. "i was as much afraid," he said, "last year as when first i came into parliament. but now i am forced to speak so often that i am quite hardened. last thursday i was up forty times." i was not much surprised at this in lord althorp, as he is certainly one of the most modest men in existence. but i was surprised to hear stanley say that he never rose without great uneasiness. "my throat and lips," he said, "when i am going to speak, are as dry as those of a man who is going to be hanged." nothing can be more composed and cool than stanley's manner. his fault is on that side. a little hesitation at the beginning of a speech is graceful; and many eminent speakers have practised it, merely in order to give the appearance of unpremeditated reply to prepared speeches; but stanley speaks like a man who never knew what fear, or even modesty, was. tierney, it is remarkable, who was the most ready and fluent debater almost ever known, made a confession similar to stanley's. he never spoke, he said, without feeling his knees knock together when he rose. my opinion of lord althorp is extremely high. in fact, his character is the only stay of the ministry. i doubt whether any person has ever lived in england who, with no eloquence, no brilliant talents, no profound information, with nothing in short but plain good sense and an excellent heart, possessed so much influence both in and out of parliament. his temper is an absolute miracle. he has been worse used than any minister ever was in debate; and he has never said one thing inconsistent, i do not say with gentlemanlike courtesy, but with real benevolence. lord north, perhaps, was his equal in suavity and good-nature; but lord north was not a man of strict principles. his administration was not only an administration hostile to liberty, but it was supported by vile and corrupt means,--by direct bribery, i fear, in many cases. lord althorp has the temper of lord north with the principles of romilly. if he had the oratorical powers of either of those men, he might do anything. but his understanding, though just, is slow, and his elocution painfully defective. it is, however, only justice to him to say that he has done more service to the reform bill even as a debater than all the other ministers together, stanley excepted. we are going,--by we i mean the members of parliament who are for reform,--as soon as the bill is through the commons, to give a grand dinner to lord althorp and lord john russell, as a mark of our respect. some people wished to have the other cabinet ministers included; but grant and palmerston are not in sufficiently high esteem among the whigs to be honoured with such a compliment. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: september , . my dear sister,--i scarcely know where to begin, or where to end, my story of the magnificence of yesterday. no pageant can be conceived more splendid. the newspapers will happily save me the trouble of relating minute particulars. i will therefore give you an account of my own proceedings, and mention what struck me most. i rose at six. the cannon awaked me; and, as soon as i got up, i heard the bells pealing on every side from all the steeples in london. i put on my court-dress, and looked a perfect lovelace in it. at seven the glass coach, which i had ordered for myself and some of my friends, came to the door. i called in hill street for william marshall, m.p. for beverley, and in cork street for strutt the member for derby, and hawkins the member for tavistock. our party being complete, we drove through crowds of people, and ranks of horseguards in cuirasses and helmets, to westminster hall, which we reached as the clock struck eight. the house of commons was crowded, and the whole assembly was in uniform. after prayers we went out in order by lot, the speaker going last. my county, wiltshire, was among the first drawn; so i got an excellent place in the abbey, next to lord mahon, who is a very great favourite of mine, and a very amusing companion, though a bitter tory. our gallery was immediately over the great altar. the whole vast avenue of lofty pillars was directly in front of us. at eleven the guns fired, the organ struck up, and the procession entered. i never saw so magnificent a scene. all down that immense vista of gloomy arches there was one blaze of scarlet and gold. first came heralds in coats stiff with embroidered lions, unicorns, and harps; then nobles bearing the regalia, with pages in rich dresses carrying their coronets on cushions; then the dean and prebendaries of westminster in copes of cloth of gold; then a crowd of beautiful girls and women, or at least of girls and women who at a distance looked altogether beautiful, attending on the queen. her train of purple velvet and ermine was borne by six of these fair creatures. all the great officers of state in full robes, the duke of wellington with his marshal's staff, the duke of devonshire with his white rod, lord grey with the sword of state, and the chancellor with his seals, came in procession. then all the royal dukes with their trains borne behind them, and last the king leaning on two bishops. i do not, i dare say, give you the precise order. in fact, it was impossible to discern any order. the whole abbey was one blaze of gorgeous dresses, mingled with lovely faces. the queen behaved admirably, with wonderful grace and dignity. the king very awkwardly. the duke of devonshire looked as if he came to be crowned instead of his master. i never saw so princely a manner and air. the chancellor looked like mephistopheles behind margaret in the church. the ceremony was much too long, and some parts of it were carelessly performed. the archbishop mumbled. the bishop of london preached, well enough indeed, but not so effectively as the occasion required; and, above all, the bearing of the king made the foolish parts of the ritual appear monstrously ridiculous, and deprived many of the better parts of their proper effect. persons who were at a distance perhaps did not feel this; but i was near enough to see every turn of his finger, and every glance of his eye. the moment of the crowning was extremely fine. when the archbishop placed the crown on the head of the king, the trumpets sounded, and the whole audience cried out "god save the king." all the peers and peeresses put on their coronets, and the blaze of splendour through the abbey seemed to be doubled. the king was then conducted to the raised throne, where the peers successively did him homage, each of them kissing his cheek, and touching the crown. some of them were cheered, which i thought indecorous in such a place, and on such an occasion. the tories cheered the duke of wellington; and our people, in revenge, cheered lord grey and brougham. you will think this a very dull letter for so great a subject; but i have only had time to scrawl these lines in order to catch the post. i have not a minute to read them over. i lost yesterday, and have been forced to work to-day. half my article on boswell went to edinburgh the day before yesterday. i have, though i say it who should not say it, beaten croker black and blue. impudent as he is, i think he must be ashamed of the pickle in which i leave him. [mr. carlyle reviewed croker's book in "fraser's magazine" a few months after the appearance of macaulay's article in the "edinburgh." the two critics seem to have arrived at much the same conclusion as to the merits of the work. "in fine," writes mr. carlyle, "what ideas mr. croker entertains of a literary _whole_, and the thing called _book_, and how the very printer's devils did not rise in mutiny against such a conglomeration as this, and refuse to print it, may remain a problem.... it is our painful duty to declare, aloud, if that be necessary, that his gift, as weighed against the hard money which the booksellers demand for giving it you, is (in our judgment) very much the lighter. no portion, accordingly, of our small floating capital has been embarked in the business, or ever shall be. indeed, were we in the market for such a thing, there is simply no edition of boswell to which this last would seem preferable,"] ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: september , . my dear sister,--i am in high spirits at the thought of soon seeing you all in london, and being again one of a family, and of a family which i love so much. it is well that one has something to love in private life; for the aspect of public affairs is very menacing;--fearful, i think, beyond what people in general imagine. three weeks, however, will probably settle the whole, and bring to an issue the question, reform or revolution. one or the other i am certain that we must and shall have. i assure you that the violence of the people, the bigotry of the lords, and the stupidity and weakness of the ministers, alarm me so much that even my rest is disturbed by vexation and uneasy forebodings; not for myself; for i may gain, and cannot lose; but for this noble country, which seems likely to be ruined without the miserable consolation of being ruined by great men. all seems fair as yet, and will seem fair for a fortnight longer. but i know the danger from information more accurate and certain than, i believe, anybody not in power possesses; and i perceive, what our men in power do not perceive, how terrible the danger is. i called on lord lansdowne on sunday. he told me distinctly that he expected the bill to be lost in the lords, and that, if it were lost, the ministers must go out. i told him, with as much strength of expression as was suited to the nature of our connection, and to his age and rank, that, if the ministers receded before the lords, and hesitated to make peers, they and the whig party were lost; that nothing remained but an insolent oligarchy on the one side, and an infuriated people on the other; and that lord grey and his colleagues would become as odious and more contemptible than peel and the duke of wellington. why did they not think of all this earlier? why put their hand to the plough, and look back? why begin to build without counting the cost of finishing? why raise the public appetite, and then baulk it? i told him that the house of commons would address the king against a tory ministry. i feel assured that it would do so. i feel assured that, if those who are bidden will not come, the highways and hedges will be ransacked to get together a reforming cabinet. to one thing my mind is made up. if nobody else will move an address to the crown against a tory ministry, i will. ever yours t. b. m. london: october , . my dear ellis,--i should have written to you before, but that i mislaid your letter and forgot your direction. when shall you be in london? of course you do not mean to sacrifice your professional business to the work of numbering the gates, and telling the towers, of boroughs in wales. [mr. ellis was one of the commissioners appointed to arrange the boundaries of parliamentary boroughs in connection with the reform bill.] you will come back, i suppose, with your head full of ten pound householders instead of eroes and of caermarthen and denbigh instead of carians and pelasgians. is it true, by the bye, that the commissioners are whipped on the boundaries of the boroughs by the beadles, in order that they may not forget the precise line which they have drawn? i deny it wherever i go, and assure people that some of my friends who are in the commission would not submit to such degradation. you must have been hard-worked indeed, and soundly whipped too, if you have suffered as much for the reform bill as we who debated it. i believe that there are fifty members of the house of commons who have done irreparable injury to their health by attendance on the discussions of this session. i have got through pretty well, but i look forward, i confess, with great dismay to the thought of recommencing; particularly as wetherell's cursed lungs seem to be in as good condition as ever. i have every reason to be gratified by the manner in which my speeches have been received. to say the truth, the station which i now hold in the house is such that i should not be inclined to quit it for any place which was not of considerable importance. what you saw about my having a place was a blunder of a stupid reporter's. croker was taunting the government with leaving me to fight their battle, and to rally their followers; and said that the honourable and learned member for calne, though only a practising barrister in title, seemed to be in reality the most efficient member of the government. by the bye, my article on croker has not only smashed his book, but has hit the westminster review incidentally. the utilitarians took on themselves to praise the accuracy of the most inaccurate writer that ever lived, and gave as an instance of it a note in which, as i have shown, he makes a mistake of twenty years and more. john mill is in a rage, and says that they are in a worse scrape than croker; john murray says that it is a damned nuisance; and croker looks across the house of commons at me with a leer of hatred, which i repay with a gracious smile of pity. i am ashamed to have said so much about myself. but you asked for news about me. no request is so certain to be granted, or so certain to be a curse to him who makes it as that which you have made to me. ever yours t. b. macaulay. london: january , . dear napier,--i have been so much engaged by bankrupt business, as we are winding up the affairs of many estates, that i shall not be able to send off my article about hampden till thursday the th. it will be, i fear, more than forty pages long. as pascal said of his eighteenth letter, i would have made it shorter if i could have kept it longer. you must indulge me, however; for i seldom offend in that way. it is in part a narrative. this is a sort of composition which i have never yet attempted. you will tell me, i am sure with sincerity, how you think that i succeed in it. i have said as little about lord nugent's book as i decently could. ever yours t. b. m. london: january , . dear napier,--i will try the life of lord burleigh, if you will tell longman to send me the book. however bad the work may be, it will serve as a heading for an article on the times of elizabeth. on the whole, i thought it best not to answer croker. almost all the little pamphlet which he published, (or rather printed, for i believe it is not for sale,) is made up of extracts from blackwood; and i thought that a contest with your grog-drinking, cock-fighting, cudgel-playing professor of moral philosophy would be too degrading. i could have demolished every paragraph of the defence. croker defended his thuetoi philoi by quoting a passage of euripides which, as every scholar knows, is corrupt; which is nonsense and false metre if read as he reads it; and which markland and matthiae have set right by a most obvious correction. but, as nobody seems to have read his vindication, we can gain nothing by refuting it. ["mr. croker has favoured us with some greek of his own. 'at the altar,' say dr. johnson. 'i recommended my th ph.' 'these letters,' says the editor, (which dr. strahan seems not to have understood,) probably mean _departed friends._' johnson was not a first-rate greek scholar; but he knew more greek than most boys when they leave school; and no schoolboy could venture to use the word thuetoi in the sense which mr. croker ascribes to it without imminent danger of a flogging."--macaulay's review of croker's boswell.] ever yours t. b. macaulay. chapter v. - . macaulay is invited to stand for leeds--the reform bill passes--macaulay appointed commissioner of the board of control--his life in office--letters to his sisters-- contested election at leeds--macaulay's bearing as a candidate--canvassing--pledges--intrusion of religion into politics--placemen in parliament--liverpool--margaret macaulay's marriage--how it affected her brother--he is returned for leeds--becomes secretary of the board of control--letters to hannah macaulay--session of -- macaulay's speech on the india bill--his regard for lord glenelg--letters to hannah macaulay--the west indian question--macaulay resigns office--he gains his point, and resumes his place--emancipation of the slaves--death of wilberforce--macaulay is appointed member of the supreme council of india--letters to hannah macaulay, lord lansdowne, and mr. napier--altercation between lord althorp and mr. shiel--macaulay's appearance before the committee of investigation--he sails for india. during the earlier half of the year the vessel of reform was still labouring heavily; but, long before she was through the breakers, men had begun to discount the treasures which she was bringing into port. the time was fast approaching when the country would be called upon to choose its first reformed parliament. as if the spectacle of what was doing at westminster did not satisfy their appetite for political excitement, the constituencies of the future could not refrain from anticipating the fancied pleasures of an electoral struggle. impatient to exercise their privileges, and to show that they had as good an eye for a man as those patrons of nomination seats whose discernment was being vaunted nightly in a dozen speeches from the opposition benches of the house of commons, the great cities were vying with each other to seek representatives worthy of the occasion and of themselves. the whigs of leeds, already provided with one candidate in a member of the great local firm of the marshalls, resolved to seek for another among the distinguished politicians of their party. as early as october macaulay had received a requisition from that town, and had pledged himself to stand as soon as it had been elevated into a parliamentary borough. the tories, on their side, brought forward mr. michael sadler, the very man on whose behalf the duke of newcastle had done "what he liked with his own" in newark,--and, at the last general election, had done it in vain. sadler, smarting from the lash of the edinburgh review, infused into the contest an amount of personal bitterness that for his own sake might better have been spared; and, during more than a twelvemonth to come, macaulay lived the life of a candidate whose own hands are full of public work at a time when his opponent has nothing to do except to make himself disagreeable. but, having once undertaken to fight the battle of the leeds liberals, he fought it stoutly and cheerily; and he would have been the last to claim it as a merit, that, with numerous opportunities of a safe and easy election at his disposal, he remained faithful to the supporters who had been so forward to honour him with their choice. the old system died hard; but in may came its final agony. the reform bill had passed the commons, and had been read a second time in the upper house; but the facilities which committee affords for maiming and delaying a measure of great magnitude and intricacy proved too much for the self-control of the lords. the king could not bring himself to adopt that wonderful expedient by which the unanimity of the three branches of our legislature may, in the last resort, be secured. deceived by an utterly fallacious analogy, his majesty began to be persuaded that the path of concession would lead him whither it had led louis the sixteenth; and he resolved to halt on that path at the point where his ministers advised him to force the hands of their lordships by creating peers. the supposed warnings of the french revolution, which had been dinned into the ears of the country by every tory orator from peel to sibthorpe, at last had produced their effect on the royal imagination. earl grey resigned, and the duke of wellington, with a loyalty which certainly did not stand in need of such an unlucky proof, came forward to meet the storm. but its violence was too much even for his courage and constancy. he could not get colleagues to assist him in the cabinet, or supporters to vote with him in parliament, or soldiers to fight for him in the streets; and it was evident that in a few days his position would be such as could only be kept by fighting. the revolution had in truth commenced. at a meeting of the political unions on the slope of newhall hill at birmingham a hundred thousand voices had sung the words: god is our guide. no swords we draw. we kindle not war's battle fires. by union, justice, reason, law, we claim the birthright of our sires. but those very men were now binding themselves by a declaration that, unless the bill passed, they would pay no taxes, nor purchase property distrained by the tax-gatherer. in thus renouncing the first obligation of a citizen they did in effect draw the sword, and they would have been cravens if they had left it in the scabbard. lord milton did something to enhance the claim of his historic house upon the national gratitude by giving practical effect to this audacious resolve; and, after the lapse of two centuries, another great rebellion, more effectual than its predecessor, but so brief and bloodless that history does not recognise it as a rebellion at all, was inaugurated by the essentially english proceeding of a quiet country gentleman telling the collector to call again. the crisis lasted just a week. the duke had no mind for a succession of peterloos, on a vaster scale, and with a different issue. he advised the king to recall his ministers; and his majesty, in his turn, honoured the refractory lords with a most significant circular letter, respectful in form, but unmistakable in tenor. a hundred peers of the opposition took the hint, and contrived to be absent whenever reform was before the house. the bill was read for a third time by a majority of five to one on the th of june; a strange, and not very complimentary, method of celebrating old george the third's birthday. on the th it received the last touches in the commons; and on the th it became an act, in very much the same shape, after such and so many vicissitudes, as it wore when lord john russell first presented it to parliament. macaulay, whose eloquence had signalised every stage of the conflict, and whose printed speeches are, of all its authentic records, the most familiar to readers of our own day, was not left without his reward. he was appointed one of the commissioners of the board of control, which, for three quarters of a century from onwards, represented the crown in its relations to the east indian directors. his duties, like those of every individual member of a commission, were light or heavy as he chose to make them; but his own feeling with regard to those duties must not be deduced from the playful allusions contained in letters dashed off, during the momentary leisure of an over-busy day, for the amusement of two girls who barely numbered forty years between them. his speeches and essays teem with expressions of a far deeper than official interest in india and her people; and his minutes remain on record, to prove that he did not affect the sentiment for a literary or oratorical purpose. the attitude of his own mind with regard to our eastern empire is depicted in the passage on burke, in the essay on warren hastings, which commences with the words, "his knowledge of india--," and concludes with the sentence, "oppression in bengal was to him the same thing as oppression in the streets of london." that passage, unsurpassed as it is in force of language, and splendid fidelity of detail, by anything that macaulay ever wrote or uttered, was inspired, as all who knew him could testify, by sincere and entire sympathy with that great statesman of whose humanity and breadth of view it is the merited, and not inadequate, panegyric. in margaret macaulay's journal there occurs more than one mention of her brother's occasional fits of contrition on the subject of his own idleness; but these regrets and confessions must be taken for what they are worth, and for no more. he worked much harder than he gave himself credit for. his nature was such that whatever he did was done with all his heart, and all his power; and he was constitutionally incapable of doing it otherwise. he always under-estimated the tension and concentration of mind which he brought to bear upon his labours, as compared with that which men in general bestow on whatever business they may have in hand; and, to-wards the close of life, this honourable self-deception no doubt led him to draw far too largely upon his failing strength, under the impression that there was nothing unduly severe in the efforts to which he continued to brace himself with ever increasing difficulty. during the eighteen months that he passed at the board of control he had no time for relaxation, and very little for the industry which he loved the best. giving his days to india, and his nights to the inexorable demands of the treasury whip, he could devote a few hours to the edinburgh review only by rising at five when the rules of the house of commons had allowed him to get to bed betimes on the previous evening. yet, under these conditions, he contrived to provide mr. napier with the highly finished articles on horace walpole and lord chatham, and to gratify a political opponent, who was destined to be a life-long friend, by his kindly criticism and spirited summary of lord mahon's "history of the war of the succession in spain." and, in the "friendship's offering" of , one of those mawkish annual publications of the album species which were then in fashion, appeared his poem of the armada; whose swinging couplets read as if somewhat out of place in the company of such productions as "the mysterious stranger, or the bravo of banff;" "away to the greenwood, a song;" and "lines on a window that had been frozen," beginning with, "pellucid pane, this morn on thee my fancy shaped both tower and tree." to hannah and margaret macaulay bath: june , . my dear sisters,--everything has gone wrong with me. the people at calne fixed wednesday for my re-election on taking office; the very day on which i was to have been at a public dinner at leeds. i shall therefore remain here till wednesday morning, and read indian politics in quiet. i am already deep in zemindars, ryots, polygars, courts of phoujdary, and courts of nizamut adawlut. i can tell you which of the native powers are subsidiary, and which independent, and read you lectures of an hour on our diplomatic transactions at the courts of lucknow, nagpore, hydrabad, and poonah. at poonah, indeed, i need not tell you that there is no court; for the paishwa, as you are doubtless aware, was deposed by lord hastings in the pindarree war. am i not in fair training to be as great a bore as if i had myself been in india?--that is to say, as great a bore as the greatest. i am leading my watering-place life here; reading, writing, and walking all day; speaking to nobody but the waiter and the chambermaid; solitary in a great crowd, and content with solitude. i shall be in london again on thursday, and shall also be an m. p. from that day you may send your letters as freely as ever; and pray do not be sparing of them. do you read any novels at liverpool? i should fear that the good quakers would twitch them out of your hands, and appoint their portion in the fire. yet probably you have some safe place, some box, some drawer with a key, wherein a marble-covered book may lie for nancy's sunday reading. and, if you do not read novels, what do you read? how does schiller go on? i have sadly neglected calderon; but, whenever i have a month to spare, i shall carry my conquests far and deep into spanish literature. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: july , . my dear sisters,--i am, i think, a better correspondent than you two put together. i will venture to say that i have written more letters, by a good many, than i have received, and this with india and the edinburgh review on my hands; the life of mirabeau to be criticised; the rajah of travancore to be kept in order; and the bad money, which the emperor of the burmese has had the impudence to send us byway of tribute, to be exchanged for better. you have nothing to do but to be good, and write. make no excuses, for your excuses are contradictory. if you see sights, describe them; for then you have subjects. if you stay at home, write; for then you have time. remember that i never saw the cemetery or the railroad. be particular, above all, in your accounts of the quakers. i enjoin this especially on nancy; for from meg i have no hope of extracting a word of truth. i dined yesterday at holland house; all lords except myself. lord radnor, lord poltimore, lord king, lord russell, and his uncle lord john. lady holland was very gracious, praised my article on burleigh to the skies, and told me, among other things, that she had talked on the preceding day for two hours with charles grant upon religion, and had found him very liberal and tolerant. it was, i suppose, the cholera which sent her ladyship to the only saint in the ministry for ghostly counsel. poor macdonald's case was most undoubtedly cholera. it is said that lord amesbury also died of cholera, though no very strange explanation seems necessary to account for the death of a man of eighty-four. yesterday it was rumoured that the three miss molyneuxes, of whom by the way there are only two, were all dead in the same way; that the bishop of worcester and lord barham were no more; and many other foolish stories. i do not believe there is the slightest ground for uneasiness; though lady holland apparently considers the case so serious that she has taken her conscience out of allen's keeping, and put it into the hands of charles grant. here i end my letter; a great deal too long already for so busy a man to write, and for such careless correspondents to receive. t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: july , . be you foxes, be you pitts, you must write to silly chits. be you tories, be you whigs, you must write to sad young gigs. on whatever board you are-- treasury, admiralty, war, customs, stamps, excise, control;-- write you must, upon my soul. so sings the judicious poet; and here i sit in my parlour, looking out on the thames, and divided, like garrick in sir joshua's picture, between tragedy and comedy; a letter to you, and a bundle of papers about hydrabad, and the firm of palmer and co., late bankers to the nizam. poor sir walter scott is going back to scotland by sea tomorrow. all hope is over; and he has a restless wish to die at home. he is many thousand pounds worse than nothing. last week he was thought to be so near his end that some people went, i understand, to sound lord althorp about a public funeral. lord althorp said, very like himself, that if public money was to be laid out, it would be better to give it to the family than to spend it in one day's show. the family, however, are said to be not ill off. i am delighted to hear of your proposed tour, but not so well pleased to be told that you expect to be bad correspondents during your stay at welsh inns. take pens and ink with you, if you think that you shall find none at the bard's head, or the glendower arms. but it will be too bad if you send me no letters during a tour which will furnish so many subjects. why not keep a journal, and minute down in it all that you see and hear? and remember that i charge you, as the venerable circle charged miss byron, to tell me of every person who "regards you with an eye of partiality." what can i say more? as the indians end their letters. did not lady holland tell me of some good novels? i remember:--henry masterton, three volumes, an amusing story and a happy termination. smuggle it in, next time that you go to liverpool, from some circulating library; and deposit it in a lock-up place out of the reach of them that are clothed in drab; and read it together at the curling hour. my article on mirabeau will be out in the forthcoming number. i am not a good judge of my own compositions, i fear; but i think that it will be popular. a yankee has written to me to say that an edition of my works is about to be published in america with my life prefixed, and that he shall be obliged to me to tell him when i was born, whom i married, and so forth. i guess i must answer him slick right away. for, as the judicious poet observes, though a new england man lolls back in his chair, with a pipe in his mouth, and his legs in the air, yet surely an old england man such as i to a kinsman by blood should be civil and spry. how i run on in quotation! but, when i begin to cite the verses of our great writers, i never can stop. stop i must, however. yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: july , . my dear sisters,--i have heard from napier. he speaks rapturously of my article on dumont, [dumont's "life of mirabeau." see the miscellaneous writings of lord macaulay.] but sends me no money. allah blacken his face! as the persians say. he has not yet paid me for burleigh. we are worked to death in the house of commons, and we are henceforth to sit on saturdays. this, indeed, is the only way to get through our business. on saturday next we shall, i hope, rise before seven, as i am engaged to dine on that day with pretty, witty mrs.--. i fell in with her at lady grey's great crush, and found her very agreeable. her husband is nothing in society. ropers has some very good stories about their domestic happiness,--stories confirming a theory of mine which, as i remember, made you very angry. when they first married, mrs.--treated her husband with great respect. but, when his novel came out and failed completely, she changed her conduct, and has, ever since that unfortunate publication, henpecked the poor author unmercifully. and the case, says ropers, is the harder, because it is suspected that she wrote part of the book herself. it is like the scene in milton where eve, after tempting adam, abuses him for yielding to temptation. but do you not remember how i told you that much of the love of women depended on the eminence of men? and do you not remember how, on behalf of your sex, you resented the imputation? as to the present state of affairs, abroad and at home, i cannot sum it up better than in these beautiful lines of the poet: peel is preaching, and croker is lying. the cholera's raging, the people are dying. when the house is the coolest, as i am alive, the thermometer stands at a hundred and five. we debate in a heat that seems likely to burn us, much like the three children who sang in the furnace. the disorders at paris have not ceased to plague us; don pedro, i hope, is ere this on the tagus; in ireland no tithe can be raised by a parson; mr. smithers is just hanged for murder and arson; dr. thorpe has retired from the lock, and 'tis said that poor little wilks will succeed in his stead. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: july . my dear sisters,--i am glad to find that there is no chance of nancy's turning quaker. she would, indeed, make a queer kind of female friend. what the yankees will say about me i neither know nor care. i told them the dates of my birth, and of my coming into parliament. i told them also that i was educated at cambridge. as to my early bon-mots, my crying for holidays, my walks to school through showers of cats and dogs, i have left all those for the "life of the late right honourable thomas babington macaulay, with large extracts from his correspondence, in two volumes, by the very rev. j. macaulay, dean of durham, and rector of bishopsgate, with a superb portrait from the picture by pickersgill in the possession of the marquis of lansdowne." as you like my verses, i will some day or other write you a whole rhyming letter. i wonder whether any man ever wrote doggrel so easily. i run it off just as fast as my pen can move, and that is faster by about three words in a minute than any other pen that i know. this comes of a schoolboy habit of writing verses all day long. shall i tell you the news in rhyme? i think i will send you a regular sing-song gazette. we gained a victory last night as great as e'er was known. we beat the opposition upon the russian loan. they hoped for a majority, and also for our places. we won the day by seventy-nine. you should have seen their faces. old croker, when the shout went down our rank, looked blue with rage. you'd have said he had the cholera in the spasmodic stage. dawson was red with ire as if his face was smeared with berries; but of all human visages the worst was that of herries. though not his friend, my tender heart i own could not but feel a little for the misery of poor sir robert peel. but hang the dirty tories! and let them starve and pine! huzza for the majority of glorious seventy-nine! ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. house of commons smoking-room july , . my dear sisters,--i am writing here, at eleven at night, in this filthiest of all filthy atmospheres, and in the vilest of all vile company; with the smell of tobacco in my nostrils, and the ugly, hypocritical face of lieutenant ---- before my eyes. there he sits writing opposite to me. to whom, for a ducat? to some secretary of an hibernian bible society; or to some old woman who gives cheap tracts, instead of blankets, to the starving peasantry of connemara; or to some good protestant lord who bullies his popish tenants. reject not my letter, though it is redolent of cigars and genuine pigtail; for this is the room-- the room,--but i think i'll describe it in rhyme, that smells of tobacco and chloride of lime. the smell of tobacco was always the same; but the chloride was brought since the cholera came. but i must return to prose, and tell you all that has fallen out since i wrote last. i have been dining with the listers at knightsbridge. they are in a very nice house, next, or almost next, to that which the wilberforces had. we had quite a family party. there were george villiers, and hyde villiers, and edward villiers. charles was not there. george and hyde rank very high in my opinion. i liked their behaviour to their sister much. she seems to be the pet of the whole family; and it is natural that she should be so. their manners are softened by her presence; and any roughness and sharpness which they have in intercourse with men vanishes at once. they seem to love the very ground that she treads on; and she is undoubtedly a charming woman, pretty, clever, lively, and polite. i was asked yesterday evening to go to sir john burke's, to meet another heroine who was very curious to see me. whom do you think? lady morgan. i thought, however, that, if i went, i might not improbably figure in her next novel; and, as i am not ambitious of such an honour, i kept away. if i could fall in with her at a great party, where i could see unseen and hear unheard, i should very much like to make observations on her; but i certainly will not, if i can help it, meet her face to face, lion to lioness. that confounded chattering--, has just got into an argument about the church with an irish papist who has seated himself at my elbow; and they keep such a din that i cannot tell what i am writing. there they go. the lord lieutenant--the bishop of derry-magee--o'connell--your bible meetings--your agitation meetings--the propagation of the gospel--maynooth college--the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head. my dear lieutenant, you will not only bruise, but break, my head with your clatter. mercy! mercy! however, here i am at the end of my letter, and i shall leave the two demoniacs to tear each other to pieces. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. library of the h. of c. july , , o'clock at night. my dear sisters,--here i am. daniel whittle harvey is speaking; the house is thin; the subject is dull; and i have stolen away to write to you. lushington is scribbling at my side. no sound is heard but the scratching of our pens, and the ticking of the clock. we are in a far better atmosphere than in the smoking-room, whence i wrote to you last week; and the company is more decent, inasmuch as that naval officer, whom nancy blames me for describing in just terms, is not present. by the bye, you know doubtless the lines which are in the mouth of every member of parliament, depicting the comparative merits of the two rooms. they are, i think, very happy. if thou goest into the smoking-room three plagues will thee befall,-- the chloride of lime, the tobacco smoke, and the captain who's worst of all, the canting sea-captain, the prating sea-captain, the captain who's worst of all. if thou goest into the library three good things will thee befall,-- very good books, and very good air, and m*c**l*y, who's best of all, the virtuous m*c**l*y, the prudent m*c**l*y, m*c**l*y who's best of all. oh, how i am worked! i never see fanny from sunday to sunday. all my civilities wait for that blessed day; and i have so many scores of visits to pay that i can scarcely find time for any of that sunday reading in which, like nancy, i am in the habit of indulging. yesterday, as soon as i was fixed in my best and had breakfasted, i paid a round of calls to all my friends who had the cholera. then i walked to all the clubs of which i am a member, to see the newspapers. the first of these two works you will admit to be a work of mercy; the second, in a political man, one of necessity. then, like a good brother, i walked under a burning sun to kensington to ask fanny how she did, and stayed there two hours. then i went to knightsbridge to call on mrs. listen and chatted with her till it was time to go and dine at the athenaeum. then i dined, and after dinner, like a good young man, i sate and read bishop heber's journal till bedtime. there is a sunday for you! i think that i excel in the diary lire. i will keep a journal like the bishop, that my memory may "smell sweet, and blossom in the dust." next sunday i am to go to lord lansdowne's at richmond, so that i hope to have something to tell you. but on second thoughts i will tell you nothing, nor ever will write to you again, nor ever speak to you again. i have no pleasure in writing to undutiful sisters. why do you not send me longer letters? but i am at the end of my paper, so that i have no more room to scold. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: august , . my dear sisters,--our work is over at last; not, however, till it has half killed us all.[on the th august, , macaulay writes to lord mahon: "we are now strictly on duty. no furloughs even for a dinner engagement, or a sight of taglioni's legs, can be obtained. it is very hard to keep forty members in the house. sibthorpe and leader are on the watch to count us out; and from six till two we never venture further than the smoking-room without apprehension. in spite of all our exertions the end of the session seems further and further off every day. if you would do me the favour of inviting sibthorpe to chevening park you might be the means of saving my life, and that of thirty or forty more of us who are forced to swallow the last dregs of the oratory of this parliament; and nauseous dregs they are."] on saturday we met,--for the last time, i hope, on business. when the house rose, i set off for holland house. we had a small party, but a very distinguished one. lord grey, the chancellor, lord palmerston, luttrell, and myself were the only guests. allen was of course at the end of the table, carving the dinner and sparring with my lady. the dinner was not so good as usual; for the french cook was ill; and her ladyship kept up a continued lamentation during the whole repast. i should never have found out that everything was not as it should be but for her criticisms. the soup was too salt; the cutlets were not exactly comme il faut; and the pudding was hardly enough boiled. i was amused to hear from the splendid mistress of such a house the same sort of apologies which--made when her cook forgot the joint, and sent up too small a dinner to table. i told luttrell that it was a comfort to me to find that no rank was exempted from these afflictions. they talked about --'s marriage. lady holland vehemently defended the match; and, when allen said that--had caught a tartar, she quite went off into one of her tantrums: "she a tartar! such a charming girl a tartar! he is a very happy man, and your language is insufferable: insufferable, mr. allen." lord grey had all the trouble in the world to appease her. his influence, however, is very great. he prevailed on her to receive allen again into favour, and to let lord holland have a slice of melon, for which he had been petitioning most piteously, but which she had steadily refused on account of his gout. lord holland thanked lord grey for his intercession.. "ah, lord grey, i wish you were always here. it is a fine thing to be prime minister." this tattle is worth nothing, except to show how much the people whose names will fill the history of our times resemble, in all essential matters, the quiet folks who live in mecklenburg square and brunswick square. i slept in the room which was poor mackintosh's. the next day, sunday, ---- came to dinner. he scarcely ever speaks in the society of holland house. rogers, who is the bitterest and most cynical observer of little traits of character that ever i knew-, once said to me of him: "observe that man. he never talks to men; he never talks to girls; but, when he can get into a circle of old tabbies, he is just in his element. he will sit clacking with an old woman for hours together. that always settles my opinion of a young fellow." i am delighted to find that you like my review on mirabeau, though i am angry with margaret for grumbling at my scriptural allusions, and still more angry with nancy for denying my insight into character. it is one of my strong points. if she knew how far i see into hers, she would he ready to hang herself. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay. london: august , , my dear sisters,--we begin to see a hope of liberation. to-morrow, or on saturday at furthest, the hope to finish our business. i did not reach home till four this morning, after a most fatiguing and yet rather amusing night. what passed will not find its way into the papers, as the gallery was locked during most of the time. so i will tell you the story. there is a bill before the house prohibiting those processions of orangemen which have excited a good deal of irritation in ireland. this bill was committed yesterday night. shaw, the recorder of dublin, an honest man enough, but a bitter protestant fanatic, complained that it should be brought forward so late in the session. several of his friends, he said, had left london believing that the measure had been abandoned. it appeared, however, that stanley and lord althorp had given fair notice of their intention; so that, if the absent members had been mistaken, the fault was their own; and the house was for going on. shaw said warmly that he would resort to all the means of delay in his power, and moved that the chairman should leave the chair. the motion was negatived by forty votes to two. then the first clause was read. shaw divided the house again on that clause. he was beaten by the same majority. he moved again that the chairman should leave the chair. he was beaten again. he divided on the second clause. he was beaten again. he then said that he was sensible that he was doing very wrong; that his conduct was unhandsome and vexatious; that he heartily begged our pardons; but that he had said that he would delay the bill as far as the forms of the house would permit; and that he must keep his word. now came a discussion by which nancy, if she had been in the ventilator, [a circular ventilator, in the roof of the house of commons, was the only ladies' gallery that existed in the year .] might have been greatly edified, touching the nature of vows; whether a man's promise given to himself,--a promise from which nobody could reap any advantage, and which everybody wished him to violate,--constituted an obligation. jephtha's daughter was a case in point, and was cited by somebody sitting near me. peregrine courtenay on one side of the house, and lord palmerston on the other, attempted to enlighten the poor orangeman on the question of casuistry. they might as well have preached to any madman out of st. luke's. "i feel," said the silly creature, "that i am doing wrong, and acting very unjustifiably. if gentlemen will forgive me, i will never do so again. but i must keep my word." we roared with laughter every time he repeated his apologies. the orders of the house do not enable any person absolutely to stop the progress of a bill in committee, but they enable him to delay it grievously. we divided seventeen times, and between every division this vexatious irishman made us a speech of apologies and self-condemnation. of the two who had supported him at the beginning of his freak one soon sneaked away. the other, sibthorpe, stayed to the last, not expressing remorse like shaw, but glorying in the unaccommodating temper he showed and in the delay which he produced. at last the bill went through. then shaw rose; congratulated himself that his vow was accomplished; said that the only atonement he could make for conduct so unjustifiable was to vow that he would never make such a vow again; promised to let the bill go through its future stages without any more divisions; and contented himself with suggesting one or two alterations in the details. "i hint at these amendments," he said. "if the secretary for ireland approves of them, i hope he will not refrain from introducing them because they are brought forward by me. i am sensible that i have forfeited all claim to the favour of the house. i will not divide on any future stage of the bill." we were all heartily pleased with these events; for the truth was that the seventeen divisions occupied less time than a real hard debate would have done, and were infinitely more amusing. the oddest part of the business is that shaw's frank good-natured way of proceeding, absurd as it was, has made him popular. he was never so great a favourite with the house as after harassing it for two or three hours with the most frivolous opposition. this is a curious trait of the house of commons. perhaps you will find this long story, which i have not time to read over again, very stupid and unintelligible. but i have thought it my duty to set before you the evil consequences of making vows rashly, and adhering to them superstitiously; for in truth, my christian brethren, or rather my christian sisters, let us consider &c. &c. &c. but i reserve the sermon on promises, which i had to preach, for another occasion. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah and margaret macaulay london: august , . my dear sisters,--i brought down my story of holland house to dinnertime on saturday evening. to resume my narrative, i slept there on sunday night. on monday morning, after breakfast, i walked to town with luttrell, whom i found a delightful companion. before we went, we sate and chatted with lord holland in the library for a quarter of an hour. he was very entertaining. he gave us an account of a visit which he paid long ago to the court of denmark; and of king christian, the madman, who was at last deprived of all real share in the government on account of his infirmity. "such a tom of bedlam i never saw," said lord holland. "one day the neapolitan ambassador came to the levee, and made a profound bow to his majesty. his majesty bowed still lower. the neapolitan bowed down his head almost to the ground; when, behold! the king clapped his hands on his excellency's shoulders, and jumped over him like a boy playing at leap-frog. another day the english ambassador was sitting opposite the king at dinner. his majesty asked him to take wine. the glasses were filled. the ambassador bowed, and put the wine to his lips. the king grinned hideously and threw his wine into the face of one of the footmen. the other guests kept the most profound gravity; but the englishman, who had but lately come to copenhagen, though a practised diplomatist, could not help giving some signs of astonishment. the king immediately addressed him in french: 'eh, mais, monsieur l'envoye d'angleterre, qu'avez-vous done? pourquoi riez-vous? est-ce qu'il y'ait quelque chose qui vous ait diverti? faites-moi le plaisir de me l'indiquer. j'aime beaucoup les ridicules.'" parliament is up at last. we official men are now left alone at the west end of london, and are making up for our long confinement in the mornings by feasting together at night. on wednesday i dined with labouchere at his official residence in somerset house. it is well that he is a bachelor; for he tells me that the ladies his neighbours make bitter complaints of the unfashionable situation in which they are cruelly obliged to reside gratis. yesterday i dined with will brougham, and an official party, in mount street. we are going to establish a club, to be confined to members of the house of commons in place under the present government, who are to dine together weekly at grillon's hotel, and to settle the affairs of the state better, i hope, than our masters at their cabinet dinners. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: september , my dear sister,--i am at home again from leeds, where everything is going on as well as possible. i, and most of my friends, feel sanguine as to the result. about half my day was spent in speaking, and hearing other people speak; in squeezing and being squeezed; in shaking hands with people whom i never saw before, and whose faces and names i forget within a minute after being introduced to them. the rest was passed in conversation with my leading friends, who are very honest substantial manufacturers. they feed me on roast beef and yorkshire pudding; at night they put me into capital bedrooms; and the only plague which they give me is that they are always begging me to mention some food or wine for which i have a fancy, or some article of comfort and convenience which i may wish them to procure. i travelled to town with a family of children who ate without intermission from market harborough, where they got into the coach, to the peacock at islington, where they got out of it. they breakfasted as if they had fasted all the preceding day. they dined as if they had never breakfasted. they ate on the road one large basket of sandwiches, another of fruit, and a boiled fowl; besides which there was not an orange-girl, an old man with cakes, or a boy with filberts, who came to the coach-side when we stopped to change horses, of whom they did not buy something. i am living here by myself with no society, or scarcely any, except my books. i read a play of calderon before i breakfast; then look over the newspaper; frank letters; scrawl a line or two to a foolish girl in leicestershire; and walk to my office. there i stay till near five, examining claims of money-lenders on the native sovereigns of india, and reading parliamentary papers. i am beginning to understand something about the bank, and hope, when next i go to rothley temple, to be a match for the whole firm of mansfield and babington on questions relating to their own business. when i leave the board, i walk for two hours; then i dine; and i end the day quietly over a basin of tea and a novel. on saturday i go to holland house, and stay there till monday. her ladyship wants me to take up my quarters almost entirely there; but i love my own chambers and independence, and am neither qualified nor inclined to succeed allen in his post. on friday week, that is to-morrow week, i shall go for three days to sir george philips's, at weston, in warwickshire. he has written again in terms half complaining; and, though i can ill spare time for the visit, yet, as he was very kind to me when his kindness was of some consequence to me, i cannot, and will not, refuse. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay london: september , . my dear sister,--i went on saturday to holland house, and stayed there sunday. it was legitimate sabbath employment,--visiting the sick,--which, as you well know, always stands first among the works of mercy enumerated in good books. my lord was ill, and my lady thought herself so. he was, during the greater part of the day, in bed. for a few hours he lay on his sofa, wrapped in flannels. i sate by him about twenty minutes, and was then ordered away. he was very weak and languid; and, though the torture of the gout was over, was still in pain; but he retained all his courage, and all his sweetness of temper. i told his sister that i did not think that he was suffering much. "i hope not," said she; "but it is impossible to judge by what he says; for through the sharpest pain of the attack he never complained." i admire him more, i think, than any man whom i know. he is only fifty-seven, or fifty-eight. he is precisely the man to whom health would be particularly valuable; for he has the keenest zest for those pleasures which health would enable him to enjoy. he is, however, an invalid, and a cripple. he passes some weeks of every year in extreme torment. when he is in his best health he can only limp a hundred yards in a day. yet he never says a cross word. the sight of him spreads good humour over the face of every one who comes near him. his sister, an excellent old maid as ever lived, and the favourite of all the young people of her acquaintance, says that it is quite a pleasure to nurse him. she was reading the "inheritance" to him as he lay in bed, and he enjoyed it amazingly. she is a famous reader; more quiet and less theatrical than most famous readers, and therefore the fitter for the bed-side of a sick man. her ladyship had fretted herself into being ill, could eat nothing but the breast of a partridge, and was frightened out of her wits by hearing a dog howl. she was sure that this noise portended her death, or my lord's. towards the evening, however, she brightened up, and was in very good spirits. my visit was not very lively. they dined at four, and the company was, as you may suppose at this season, but scanty. charles greville, commonly called, heaven knows why, punch greville, came on the saturday. byng, named from his hair poodle byng, came on the sunday. allen, like the poor, we had with us always. i was grateful, however, for many pleasant evenings passed there when london was full, and lord holland out of bed. i therefore did my best to keep the house alive. i had the library and the delightful gardens to myself during most of the day, and i got through my visit very well. news you have in the papers. poor scott is gone, and i cannot be sorry for it. a powerful mind in ruins is the most heart-breaking thing which it is possible to conceive. ferdinand of spain is gone too; and, i fear, old mr. stephen is going fast. i am safe at leeds. poor hyde villiers is very ill. i am seriously alarmed about him. kindest love to all. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. weston house: september , . my dear sister,--i came hither yesterday, and found a handsome house, pretty grounds, and a very kind host and hostess. the house is really very well planned. i do not know that i have ever seen so happy an imitation of the domestic architecture of elizabeth's reign. the oriels, towers, terraces, and battlements are in the most perfect keeping; and the building is as convenient within as it is picturesque without. a few weather-stains, or a few american creepers, and a little ivy, would make it perfect; and all that will come, i suppose, with time. the terrace is my favourite spot. i always liked "the trim gardens" of which milton speaks, and thought that brown and his imitators went too far in bringing forests and sheep-walks up to the very windows of drawing-rooms. i came through oxford. it was as beautiful a day as the second day of our visit, and the high street was in all its glory. but it made me quite sad to find myself there without you and margaret. all my old oxford associations are gone. oxford, instead of being, as it used to be, the magnificent old city of the seventeenth century,--still preserving its antique character among the improvements of modern times, and exhibiting in the midst of upstart birminghams and manchesters the same aspect which it wore when charles held his court at christchurch, and rupert led his cavalry over magdalene bridge, is now to me only the place where i was so happy with my little sisters. but i was restored to mirth, and even to indecorous mirth, by what happened after we had left the fine old place behind us. there was a young fellow of about five-and-twenty, mustachioed and smartly dressed, in the coach with me. he was not absolutely uneducated; for he was reading a novel, the hungarian brothers, the whole way. we rode, as i told you, through the high street. the coach stopped to dine; and this youth passed half an hour in the midst of that city of palaces. he looked about him with his mouth open, as he re-entered the coach, and all the while that we were driving away past the ratcliffe library, the great court of all souls, exeter, lincoln, trinity, balliol, and st. john's. when we were about a mile on the road he spoke the first words that i had heard him utter. "that was a pretty town enough. pray, sir, what is it called?" i could not answer him for laughing; but he seemed quite unconscious of his own absurdity. ever yours t. b. m. during all the period covered by this correspondence the town of leeds was alive with the agitation of a turbulent, but not very dubious, contest. macaulay's relations with the electors whose votes he was courting are too characteristic to be omitted altogether from the story of his life; though the style of his speeches and manifestoes is more likely to excite the admiring envy of modern members of parliament, than to be taken as a model for their communications to their own constituents. this young politician, who depended on office for his bread, and on a seat in the house of commons for office, adopted from the first an attitude of high and almost peremptory independence which would have sat well on a prime minister in his grand climacteric. the following letter, (some passages of which have been here omitted, and others slightly condensed,) is strongly marked in every line with the personal qualities of the writer. london: august , . "my dear sir,--i am truly happy to find that the opinion of my friends at leeds on the subject of canvassing agrees with that which i have long entertained. the practice of begging for votes is, as it seems to me, absurd, pernicious, and altogether at variance with the true principles of representative government. the suffrage of an elector ought not to be asked, or to be given as a personal favour. it is as much for the interest of constituents to choose well, as it can be for the interest of a candidate to be chosen. to request an honest man to vote according to his conscience is superfluous. to request him to vote against his conscience is an insult. the practice of canvassing is quite reasonable under a system in which men are sent to parliament to serve themselves. it is the height of absurdity under a system under which men are sent to parliament to serve the public. while we had only a mock representation, it was natural enough that this practice should be carried to a great extent. i trust it will soon perish with the abuses from which it sprung. i trust that the great and intelligent body of people who have obtained the elective franchise will see that seats in the house of commons ought not to be given, like rooms in an almshouse, to urgency of solicitation; and that a man who surrenders his vote to caresses and supplications forgets his duty as much as if he sold it for a bank-note. i hope to see the day when an englishman will think it as great an affront to be courted and fawned upon in his capacity of elector as in his capacity of juryman. he would be shocked at the thought of finding an unjust verdict because the plaintiff or the defendant had been very civil and pressing; and, if he would reflect, he would, i think, be equally shocked at the thought of voting for a candidate for whose public character he felt no esteem, merely because that candidate had called upon him, and begged very hard, and had shaken his hand very warmly. my conduct is before the electors of leeds. my opinions shall on all occasions be stated to them with perfect frankness. if they approve that conduct, if they concur in those opinions, they ought, not for my sake, but for their own, to choose me as their member. to be so chosen, i should indeed consider as a high and enviable honour; but i should think it no honour to be returned to parliament by persons who, thinking me destitute of the requisite qualifications, had yet been wrought upon by cajolery and importunity to poll for me in despite of their better judgment. "i wish to add a few words touching a question which has lately been much canvassed; i mean the question of pledges. in this letter, and in every letter which i have written to my friends at leeds, i have plainly declared my opinions. but i think it, at this conjuncture, my duty to declare that i will give no pledges. i will not bind myself to make or to support any particular motion. i will state as shortly as i can some of the reasons which have induced me to form this determination. the great beauty of the representative system is, that it unites the advantages of popular control with the advantages arising from a division of labour. just as a physician understands medicine better than an ordinary man, just as a shoemaker makes shoes better than an ordinary man, so a person whose life is passed in transacting affairs of state becomes a better statesman than an ordinary man. in politics, as well as every other department of life, the public ought to have the means of checking those who serve it. if a man finds that he derives no benefit from the prescription of his physician, he calls in another. if his shoes do not fit him, he changes his shoemaker. but when he has called in a physician of whom he hears a good report, and whose general practice he believes to be judicious, it would be absurd in him to tie down that physician to order particular pills and particular draughts. while he continues to be the customer of a shoemaker, it would be absurd in him to sit by and mete every motion of that shoemaker's hand. and in the same manner, it would, i think, be absurd in him to require positive pledges, and to exact daily and hourly obedience, from his representative. my opinion is, that electors ought at first to choose cautiously; then to confide liberally; and, when the term for which they have selected their member has expired, to review his conduct equitably, and to pronounce on the whole taken together. "if the people of leeds think proper to repose in me that confidence which is necessary to the proper discharge of the duties of a representative, i hope that i shall not abuse it. if it be their pleasure to fetter their members by positive promises, it is in their power to do so. i can only say that on such terms i cannot conscientiously serve them. "i hope, and feel assured, that the sincerity with which i make this explicit declaration, will, if it deprive me of the votes of my friends at leeds, secure to me what i value far more highly, their esteem. "believe me ever, my dear sir, "your most faithful servant, "t. b. macaulay." this frank announcement, taken by many as a slight, and by some as a downright challenge, produced remonstrances which, after the interval of a week, were answered by macaulay in a second letter; worth reprinting if it were only for the sake of his fine parody upon the popular cry which for two years past had been the watchword of reformers. "i was perfectly aware that the avowal of my feelings on the subject of pledges was not likely to advance my interest at leeds. i was perfectly aware that many of my most respectable friends were likely to differ from me; and therefore i thought it the more necessary to make, uninvited, an explicit declaration of my feelings. if ever there was a time when public men were in an especial measure _bound to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth_, to the people, this is that time. nothing is easier than for a candidate to avoid unpopular topics as long as possible, and, when they are forced on him, to take refuge in evasive and unmeaning phrases. nothing is easier than for him to give extravagant promises while an election is depending, and to forget them as soon as the return is made. i will take no such course. i do not wish to obtain a single vote on false pretences. under the old system i have never been the flatterer of the great. under the new system i will not be the flatterer of the people. the truth, or what appears to me to be such, may sometimes be distasteful to those whose good opinion i most value. i shall nevertheless always abide by it, and trust to their good sense, to their second thoughts, to the force of reason, and the progress of time. if, after all, their decision should be unfavourable to me, i shall submit to that decision with fortitude and good humour. it is not necessary to my happiness that i should sit in parliament; but it is necessary to my happiness that i should possess, in parliament or out of parliament, the consciousness of having done what is right." macaulay had his own ideas as to the limits within which constituents are justified in exerting their privilege of questioning a candidate; and, on the first occasion when those limits were exceeded, he made a notable example of the transgressor. during one of his public meetings, a voice was heard to exclaim from the crowd in the body of the hall: "an elector wishes to know the religious creed of mr. marshall and mr. macaulay." the last-named gentleman was on his legs in a moment. "let that man stand up!" he cried. "let him stand on a form, where i can see him!" the offender, who proved to be a methodist preacher, was heisted on to a bench by his indignant neighbours; nerving himself even in that terrible moment by a lingering hope that he might yet be able to hold his own. but the unhappy man had not a chance against macaulay, who harangued him as if he were the living embodiment of religious intolerance and illegitimate curiosity. "i have heard with the greatest shame and sorrow the question which has been proposed to me; and with peculiar pain do i learn that this question was proposed by a minister of religion. i do most deeply regret that any person should think it necessary to make a meeting like this an arena for theological discussion. i will not be a party to turning this assembly to such a purpose. my answer is short, and in one word. gentlemen, i am a christian." at this declaration the delighted audience began to cheer; but macaulay would have none of their applause. "this is no subject," he said, "for acclamation. i will say no more. no man shall speak of me as the person who, when this disgraceful inquisition was entered upon in an assembly of englishmen, brought forward the most sacred subjects to be canvassed here, and be turned into a matter for hissing or for cheering. if on any future occasion it should happen that mr. carlile should favour any large meeting with his infidel attacks upon the gospel, he shall not have it to say that i set the example. gentlemen, i have done; i tell you, i will say no more; and if the person who has thought fit to ask this question has the feelings worthy of a teacher of religion, he will not, i think, rejoice that he has called me forth." this ill-fated question had been prompted by a report, diligently spread through the town, that the whig candidates were unitarians; a report which, even if correct, would probably have done little to damage their electioneering prospects. there are few general remarks which so uniformly hold good as the observation that men are not willing to attend the religious worship of people who believe less than themselves, or to vote at elections for people who believe more than themselves. while the congregations at a high anglican service are in part composed of low churchmen and broad churchmen; while presbyterians and wesleyans have no objection to a sound discourse from a divine of the establishment; it is seldom the case that any but unitarians are seen inside a unitarian chapel. on the other hand, at the general election of , when not a solitary roman catholic was returned throughout the length and breadth of the island of great britain, the unitarians retained their long acknowledged pre-eminence as the most over-represented sect in the kingdom. while macaulay was stern in his refusal to gratify his electors with the customary blandishments, he gave them plenty of excellent political instruction; which he conveyed to them in rhetoric, not premeditated with the care that alone makes speeches readable after a lapse of years, but for this very reason all the more effective when the passion of the moment was pouring itself from his lips in a stream of faultless, but unstudied, sentences. a course of mobs, which turned cobden into an orator, made of macaulay a parliamentary debater; and the ear and eye of the house of commons soon detected, in his replies from the treasury bench, welcome signs of the invaluable training that can be got nowhere except on the hustings and the platform. there is no better sample of macaulay's extempore speaking than the first words which he addressed to his committee at leeds after the reform bill had received the royal assent. "i find it difficult to express my gratification at seeing such an assembly convened at such a time. all the history of our own country, all the history of other countries, furnishes nothing parallel to it. look at the great events in our own former history, and in every one of them, which, for importance, we can venture to compare with the reform bill, we shall find something to disgrace and tarnish the achievement. it was by the assistance of french arms and of roman bulls that king john was harassed into giving the great charter. in the times of charles i., how much injustice, how much crime, how much bloodshed and misery, did it cost to assert the liberties of england! but in this event, great and important as it is in substance, i confess i think it still more important from the manner in which it has been achieved. other countries have obtained deliverances equally signal and complete, but in no country has that deliverance been obtained with such perfect peace; so entirely within the bounds of the constitution; with all the forms of law observed; the government of the country proceeding in its regular course; every man going forth unto his labour until the evening. france boasts of her three days of july, when her people rose, when barricades fenced the streets, and the entire population of the capital in grins successfully vindicated their liberties. they boast, and justly, of those three days of july; but i will boast of our ten days of may. we, too, fought a battle, but it was with moral arms. we, too, placed an impassable barrier between ourselves and military tyranny; but we fenced ourselves only with moral barricades. not one crime committed, not one acre confiscated, not one life lost, not one instance of outrage or attack on the authorities or the laws. our victory has not left a single family in mourning. not a tear, not a drop of blood, has sullied the pacific and blameless triumph of a great people." the tories of leeds, as a last resource, fell to denouncing macaulay as a placeman; a stroke of superlative audacity in a party which, during eight-and-forty years, had been out of office for only fourteen months. it may well be imagined that he found plenty to say in his own defence. "the only charge which malice can prefer against me is that i am a placeman. gentlemen, is it your wish that those persons who are thought worthy of the public confidence should never possess the confidence of the king? is it your wish that no men should be ministers but those whom no populous places will take as their representatives? by whom, i ask, has the reform bill been carried? by ministers. who have raised leeds into the situation to return members to parliament? it is by the strenuous efforts of a patriotic ministry that that great result has been produced. i should think that the reform bill had done little for the people, if under it the service of the people was not consistent with the service of the crown." just before the general election hyde villiers died, and the secretaryship to the board of control became vacant. macaulay succeeded his old college friend in an office that gave him weighty responsibility, defined duties, and, as it chanced, exceptional opportunities for distinction. about the same time, an event occurred which touched him more nearly than could any possible turn of fortune in the world of politics. his sisters hannah and margaret had for some months been almost domesticated among a pleasant nest of villas which lie in the southern suburb of liverpool, on dingle bank; a spot whose natural beauty nothing can spoil, until in the fulness of time its inevitable destiny shall convert it into docks. the young ladies were the guests of mr. john cropper, who belonged to the society of friends, a circumstance which readers who have got thus far into the macaulay correspondence will doubtless have discovered for themselves. before the visit was over, margaret became engaged to the brother of her host, mr. edward cropper, a man in every respect worthy of the personal esteem and the commercial prosperity which have fallen to his lot. there are many who will be surprised at finding in macaulay's letters, both now and hereafter, indications of certain traits in his disposition with which the world, knowing him only through his political actions and his published works, may perhaps be slow to credit him; but which, taking his life as a whole, were predominant in their power to affect his happiness and give matter for his thoughts. those who are least partial to him will allow that his was essentially a virile intellect. he wrote, he thought, he spoke, he acted, like a man. the public regarded him as an impersonation of vigour, vivacity, and self-reliance; but his own family, together with one, and probably only one, of his friends, knew that his affections were only too tender, and his sensibilities only too acute. others may well be loth to parade what he concealed; but a portrait of macaulay, from which these features were omitted, would be imperfect to the extent of misrepresentation; and it must be acknowledged that, where he loved, he loved more entirely, and more exclusively, than was well for himself. it was improvident in him to concentrate such intensity of feeling upon relations who, however deeply they were attached to him, could not always be in a position to requite him with the whole of their time, and the whole of their heart. he suffered much for that improvidence; but he was too just and too kind to permit that others should suffer with him; and it is not for one who obtained by inheritance a share of his inestimable affection to regret a weakness to which he considers himself by duty bound to refer. how keenly macaulay felt the separation from his sister it is impossible to do more than indicate. he never again recovered that tone of thorough boyishness, which had been produced by a long unbroken habit of gay and affectionate intimacy with those younger than himself; indulged in without a suspicion on the part of any concerned that it was in its very nature transitory and precarious. for the first time he was led to doubt whether his scheme of life was indeed a wise one; or, rather, he began to be aware that he had never laid out any scheme of life at all. but with that unselfishness which was the key to his character and to much of his career, (resembling in its quality what we sometimes admire in a woman, rather than what we ever detect in a man,) he took successful pains to conceal his distress from those over whose happiness it otherwise could not have failed to cast a shadow. "the attachment between brothers and sisters," he writes in november , "blameless, amiable, and delightful as it is, is so liable to be superseded by other attachments that no wise man ought to suffer it to become indispensable to him. that women shall leave the home of their birth, and contract ties dearer than those of consanguinity, is a law as ancient as the first records of the history of our race, and as unchangeable as the constitution of the human body and mind. to repine against the nature of things, and against the great fundamental law of all society, because, in consequence of my own want of foresight, it happens to bear heavily on me, would be the basest and most absurd selfishness. "i have still one more stake to lose. there remains one event for which, when it arrives, i shall, i hope, be prepared. from that moment, with a heart formed, if ever any man's heart was formed, for domestic happiness, i shall have nothing left in this world but ambition. there is no wound, however, which time and necessity will not render endurable; and, after all, what am i more than my fathers,--than the millions and tens of millions who have been weak enough to pay double price for some favourite number in the lottery of life, and who have suffered double disappointment when their ticket came up a blank?" to hannah m. macaulay. leeds: december , my dear sister,--the election here is going on as well as possible. today the poll stands thus: marshall macaulay sadler , , , the probability is that sadler will give up the contest. if he persists, he will be completely beaten. the voters are under , in number; those who have already polled are , ; and about five hundred will not poll at all. even if we were not to bring up another man, the probability is that we should win. on sunday morning early i hope to be in london; and i shall see you in the course of the day. i had written thus far when your letter was delivered to me. i am sitting in the midst of two hundred friends, all mad with exultation and party spirit, all glorying over the tories, and thinking me the happiest man in the world. and it is all that i can do to hide my tears, and to command my voice, when it is necessary for me to reply to their congratulations. dearest, dearest sister, you alone are now left to me. whom have i on earth but thee? but for you, in the midst of all these successes, i should wish that i were lying by poor hyde villiers. but i cannot go on. i am wanted to waste an address to the electors; and i shall lay it on sadler pretty heavily. by what strange fascination is it that ambition and resentment exercise such power over minds which ought to be superior to them? i despise myself for feeling so bitterly towards this fellow as i do. but the separation from dear margaret has jarred my whole temper. i am cried up here to the skies as the most affable and kind-hearted of then, while i feel a fierceness and restlessness within me, quite new, and almost inexplicable. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: december , . my dear sister,--i am much obliged to you for your letter, and am gratified by all its contents, except what you say about your own cough. as soon as you come back, you shall see dr. chambers, if you are not quite well. do not oppose me in this; for i have set my heart on it. i dined on saturday at lord essex's in belgrave square. but never was there such a take-in. i had been given to understand that his lordship's cuisine was superintended by the first french artists, and that i should find there all the luxuries of the almanach des gourmands. what a mistake! his lordship is luxurious, indeed, but in quite a different way. he is a true englishman. not a dish on his table but what sir roger de coverley, or sir hugh tyrold, [the uncle of miss burney's camilla.] might have set before his guests. a huge haunch of venison on the sideboard; a magnificent piece of beef at the bottom of the table; and before my lord himself smoked, not a dindon aux truffes, but a fat roasted goose stuffed with sage and onions. i was disappointed, but very agreeably; for my tastes are, i fear, incurably vulgar, as you may perceive by my fondness for mrs. meeke's novels. our party consisted of sharp; lubbock; watson, m.p. for canterbury; and rich, the author of "what will the lords do?" who wishes to be m. p. for knaresborough. rogers was to have been of the party; but his brother chose that very day to die upon, so that poor sam had to absent himself. the chancellor was also invited, but he had scampered off to pass his christmas with his old mother in westmoreland. we had some good talk, particularly about junius's letters. i learned some new facts which i will tell you when we meet. i am more and more inclined to believe that francis was one of the people principally concerned. ever yours t.b. m. on the th of january, , commenced the first session of the reformed parliament. the main incidents of that session, so fruitful in great measures of public utility, belong to general history; if indeed clio herself is not fated to succumb beneath the stupendous undertaking of turning hansard into a narrative imbued with human interest. o'connell,--criticising the king's speech at vast length, and passing in turns through every mood from the most exquisite pathos to downright and undisguised ferocity,--at once plunged the house into a discussion on ireland, which alternately blazed and smouldered through four livelong nights. shed and grattan spoke finely; peel and stanley admirably; bulwer made the first of his successes, and cobbett the second of his failures; but the longest and the loudest cheers were those which greeted each of the glowing periods in which macaulay, as the champion of the whig party, met the great agitator face to face with high, but not intemperate, defiance.["we are called base, and brutal, and bloody. such are the epithets which the honourable and learned member for dublin thinks it becoming to pour forth against the party to which he owes every political privilege that he enjoys. the time will come when history will do justice to the whigs of england, and will faithfully relate how much they did and suffered for ireland. i see on the benches near me men who might, by uttering one word against catholic emancipation.--nay, by merely abstaining from uttering a word in favour of catholic emancipation,--have been returned to this house without difficulty or expense, and who, rather than wrong their irish fellow-subjects, were content to relinquish all the objects of their honourable ambition, and to retire into private life with conscience and fame untarnished. as to one eminent person, who seems to be regarded with especial malevolence by those who ought never to mention his name without respect and gratitude, i will only say this, that the loudest clamour which the honourable and learned gentleman can excite against lord grey will be trifling when compared with the clamour which lord grey withstood in order to place the honourable and learned gentleman where he now sits. though a young member of the whig party i will venture to speak in the name of the whole body. i tell the honourable and learned gentleman, that the same spirit which sustained us in a just contest for him will sustain us in an equally just contest against him. calumny, abuse, royal displeasure, popular fury, exclusion from office, exclusion from parliament, we were ready to endure them all, rather than that he should be less than a british subject. we never will suffer him to be more."] in spite of this flattering reception, he seldom addressed the house. a subordinate member of a government, with plenty to do in his own department, finds little temptation, and less encouragement, to play the debater. the difference of opinion between the two houses concerning the irish church temporalities bill, which constituted the crisis of the year, was the one circumstance that excited in macaulay's mind any very lively emotions; but those emotions, being denied their full and free expression in the oratory of a partisan, found vent in the doleful prognostications of a despairing patriot which fill his letters throughout the months of june and july. his abstinence from the passing topics of parliamentary controversy obtained for him a friendly, as well as an attentive, hearing from both sides of the house whenever he spoke on his own subjects; and did much to smooth the progress of those immense and salutary reforms with which the cabinet had resolved to accompany the renewal of the india company's charter. so rapid had been the march of events under that strange imperial system established in the east by the enterprise and valour of three generations of our countrymen, that each of the periodical revisions of that system was, in effect, a revolution. the legislation of destroyed the monopoly of the indian trade. in the time had arrived when it was impossible any longer to maintain the monopoly of the china trade; and the extinction of this remaining commercial privilege could not fail to bring upon the company commercial ruin. skill, and energy, and caution, however happily combined, would not enable rulers who were governing a population larger than that governed by augustus, and making every decade conquests more extensive than the conquests of trajan, to compete with private merchants in an open market. england, mindful of the inestimable debt which she owed to the great company, did not intend to requite her benefactors by imposing on them a hopeless task. justice and expediency could be reconciled by one course, and one only;--that of buying up the assets and liabilities of the company on terms the favourable character of which should represent the sincerity of the national gratitude. interest was to be paid from the indian exchequer at the rate of ten guineas a year on every hundred pounds of stock; the company was relieved of its commercial attributes, and became a corporation charged with the function of ruling hindoostan; and its directors, as has been well observed, remained princes, but merchant princes no longer. the machinery required for carrying into effect this gigantic metamorphosis was embodied in a bill every one of whose provisions breathed the broad, the fearless, and the tolerant spirit with which reform had inspired our counsels. the earlier sections placed the whole property of the company in trust for the crown, and enacted that "from and after the nd day of april the exclusive right of trading with the dominions of the emperor of china, and of trading in tea, shall cease." then came clauses which threw open the whole continent of india as a place of residence for all subjects of his majesty; which pronounced the doom of slavery; and which ordained that no native of the british territories in the east should "by reason only of his religion, place of birth, descent, or colour, be disabled from holding any place, office, or employment." the measure was introduced by mr. charles grant, the president of the board of control, and was read a second time on wednesday the th july. on that occasion macaulay defended the bill in a thin house; a circumstance which may surprise those who are not aware that on a wednesday, and with an indian question on the paper, cicero replying to hortensius would hardly draw a quorum. small as it was, the audience contained lord john russell, peel, o'connell, and other masters in the parliamentary craft. their unanimous judgment was summed up by charles grant, in words which every one who knows the house of commons will recognise as being very different from the conventional verbiage of mutual senatorial flattery. "i must embrace the opportunity of expressing, not what i felt, (for language could not express it,) but of making an attempt to convey to the house my sympathy with it in its admiration of the speech of my honourable and learned friend; a speech which, i will venture to assert, has never been exceeded within these walls for the development of statesmanlike policy and practical good sense. it exhibited all that is noble in oratory; all that is sublime, i had almost said, in poetry; all that is truly great, exalted, and virtuous in human nature. if the house at large felt a deep interest in this magnificent display, it may judge of what were my emotions when i perceived in the hands of my honourable friend the great principles which he expounded glowing with fresh colours, and arrayed in all the beauty of truth." there is no praise more gratefully treasured than that which is bestowed by a generous chief upon a subordinate with whom he is on the best of terms. macaulay to the end entertained for lord glenelg that sentiment of loyalty which a man of honour and feeling will always cherish with regard to the statesman under whom he began his career as a servant of the crown. [the affinity between this sentiment and that of the quaestor towards his first proconsul, so well described in the orations against verres, is one among the innumerable points of resemblance between the public life of ancient rome and modern england.] the secretary repaid the president for his unvarying kindness and confidence by helping him to get the bill through committee with that absence of friction which is the pride and delight of official men. the vexed questions of establishment and endowment, (raised by the clauses appointing bishops to madras and bombay, and balancing them with as many salaried presbyterian chaplains,) increased the length of the debates and the number of the divisions; but the government carried every point by large majorities, and, with slight modifications in detail, and none in principle, the measure became law with the almost universal approbation both of parliament and the country. to hannah m. macaulay. house of commons. monday night, half-past . my dear sister,--the papers will scarcely contain any account of what passed yesterday in the house of commons in the middle of the day. grant and i fought a battle with briscoe and o'connell in defence of the indian people, and won it by to . it was a rascally claim of a dishonest agent of the company against the employers whom he had cheated, and sold to their own tributaries. [in his great indian speech macaulay referred to this affair, in a passage, the first sentence of which has, by frequent quotation, been elevated into an apophthegm: "a broken head in cold bath fields produces a greater sensation than three pitched battles in india. a few weeks ago we had to decide on a claim brought by an individual against the revenues of india. if it had been an english question the walls would scarcely have held the members who would have flocked to the division. it was an indian question; and we could scarcely, by dint of supplication, make a house."] the nephew of the original claimant has been pressing his case on the board most vehemently. he is an attorney living in russell square, and very likely hears the word at st. john's chapel. he hears it however to very little purpose; for he lies as much as if he went to hear a "cauld clatter of morality" at the parish church. i remember that, when you were at leamington two years ago, i used to fill my letters with accounts of the people with whom i dined. high life was new to me then; and now it has grown so familiar that i should not, i fear, be able, as i formerly was, to select the striking circumstances. i have dined with sundry great folks since you left london, and i have attended a very splendid rout at lord grey's. i stole thither, at about eleven, from the house of commons with stewart mackenzie. i do not mean to describe the beauty of the ladies, nor the brilliancy of stars and uniforms. i mean only to tell you one circumstance which struck, and even affected me. i was talking to lady charlotte lindsay, the daughter of lord north, a great favourite of mine, about the apartments and the furniture, when she said with a good deal of emotion: "this is an interesting visit to me. i have never been in this house for fifty years. it was here that i was born; i left it a child when my father fell from power in , and i have never crossed the threshold since." then she told me how the rooms seemed dwindled to her; how the staircase, which appeared to her in recollection to be the most spacious and magnificent that she had ever seen, had disappointed her. she longed, she said, to go over the garrets and rummage her old nursery. she told me how, in the no-popery riots of , she was taken out of bed at two o'clock in the morning. the mob threatened lord north's house. there were soldiers at the windows, and an immense and furious crowd in downing street. she saw, she said, from her nursery the fires in different parts of london; but she did not understand the danger; and only exulted in being up at midnight. then she was conveyed through the park to the horse guards as the safest place; and was laid, wrapped up in blankets, on the table in the guardroom in the midst of the officers. "and it was such fun," she said, "that i have ever after had rather a liking for insurrections." i write in the midst of a crowd. a debate on slavery is going on in the commons; a debate on portugal in the lords. the door is slamming behind me every moment, and people are constantly going out and in. here comes vernon smith. "well, vernon, what are they doing?" "gladstone has just made a very good speech, and howick is answering him." "aye, but in the house of lords?" "they will beat us by twenty, they say." "well, i do not think it matters much." "no; nobody out of the house of lords cares either for don pedro, or for don miguel." there is a conversation between two official men in the library of the house of commons on the night of the rd june , reported word for word. to the historian three centuries hence this letter will be invaluable. to you, ungrateful as you are, it will seem worthless. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. smoking-room of the house of commons june , . my darling,--why am i such a fool as to write to a gypsey at liverpool, who fancies that none is so good as she if she sends one letter for my three? a lazy chit whose fingers tire with penning a page in reply to a quire! there, miss, you read all the first sentence of my epistle, and never knew that you were reading verse. i have some gossip for you about the edinburgh review. napier is in london, and has called on me several times. he has been with the publishers, who tell him that the sale is falling off; and in many private parties, where he hears sad complaints. the universal cry is that the long dull articles are the ruin of the review. as to myself, he assures me that my articles are the only things which keep the work up at all. longman and his partners correspond with about five hundred booksellers in different parts of the kingdom. all these booksellers, i find, tell them that the review sells, or does not sell, according as there are, or are not, articles by mr. macaulay. so, you see, i, like mr. darcy,[the central male figure in "pride and prejudice."] shall not care how proud i am. at all events, i cannot but be pleased to learn that, if i should be forced to depend on my pen for subsistence, i can command what price i choose. the house is sitting; peel is just down; lord palmerston is speaking; the heat is tremendous; the crowd stifling; and so here i am in the smoking-room, with three repealers making chimneys of their mouths under my very nose. to think that this letter will bear to my anna the exquisite scent of o'connor's havannah! you know that the lords have been foolish enough to pass a vote implying censure on the ministers.[on june rd, , a vote of censure on the portuguese policy of the ministry was moved by the duke of wellington, and carried in the lords by votes to . on june th a counter-resolution was carried in the commons by votes to .] the ministers do not seem inclined to take it of them. the king has snubbed their lordships properly; and in about an hour, as i guess, (for it is near eleven), we shall have come to a resolution in direct opposition to that agreed to by the upper house. nobody seems to care one straw for what the peers say about any public matter. a resolution of the court of common council, or of a meeting at freemasons' hall, has often made a greater sensation than this declaration of a branch of the legislature against the executive government. the institution of the peerage is evidently dying a natural death. i dined yesterday--where, and on what, and at what price, i am ashamed to tell you. such scandalous extravagance and gluttony i will not commit to writing. i blush when i think of it. you, however, are not wholly guiltless in this matter. my nameless offence was partly occasioned by napier; and i have a very strong reason for wishing to keep napier in good humour. he has promised to be at edinburgh when i take a certain damsel thither; to loop out for very nice lodgings for us in queen street; to show us everything and everybody; and to see us as far as dunkeld on our way northward, if we do go northward. in general i abhor visiting; but at edinburgh we must see the people as well as the walls and windows; and napier will be a capital guide. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: june , . my dear sister,--i do not know what you may have been told. i may have grumbled, for ought i know, at not having more letters from you; but, as to being angry, you ought to know by this time what sort of anger mine is when you are its object. you have seen the papers, i dare say, and you will perceive that i did not speak yesterday night.[the night of the first reading of the india bill.] the house was thin. the debate was languid. grant's speech had done our work sufficiently for one night; and both he and lord althorp advised me to reserve myself for the second reading. what have i to tell you? i will look at my engagement book, to see where i am to dine. friday june . lord grey. saturday june . mr. boddington. sunday june . mr. s. rice. saturday june . sir r. inglis. thursday june . the earl of ripon. saturday june . lord morpeth. read, and envy, and pine, and die. and yet i would give a large slice of my quarter's salary, which is now nearly due, to be at the dingle. i am sick of lords with no brains in their heads, and ladies with paint on their cheeks, and politics, and politicians, and that reeking furnace of a house. as the poet says, oh! rather would i see this day my little nancy well and merry than the blue riband of earl grey, or the blue stockings of miss berry. margaret tells us that you are better, and better, and better. i want to hear that you are well. at all events our scotch tour will set you up. i hope, for the sake of the tour, that we shall keep our places; but i firmly believe that, before many days have passed, a desperate attempt will be made in the house of lords to turn us out. if we stand the shock, we shall be firmer than ever. i am not without anxiety as to the result; yet i believe that lord grey understands the position in which he is placed, and, as for the king, he will not forget his last blunder, i will answer for it, even if he should live to the age of his father. [this "last blunder" was the refusal of the king to stand by his ministers in may . macaulay proved a bad prophet; for, after an interval of only three years, william the fourth repeated his blunder in an aggravated form.] but why plague ourselves about politics when we have so much pleasanter things to talk of? the parson's daughter; don't you like the parson's daughter? what a wretch harbottle was! and lady frances, what a sad worldly woman! but mrs. harbottle, dear suffering angel! and emma level, all excellence! dr. mac gopus you doubtless like; but you probably do not admire the duchess and lady catherine. there is a regular cone over a novel for you! but, if you will have my opinion, i think it theodore book's worst performance; far inferior to the surgeon's daughter; a set of fools making themselves miserable by their own nonsensical fancies and suspicions. let me hear your opinion, for i will be sworn that, in spite of all the serious world, of all the thumbs that ever twirled, of every broadbrim-shaded brow, of every tongue that e'er said "thou," you still read books in marble covers about smart girls and dapper lovers. but what folly i have been scrawling! i must go to work. i cannot all day be neglecting madras and slighting bombay for the sake of a lass. kindest love to edward, and to the woman who owns him. ever yours t. b. m. london: june , . dear hannah,--all is still anxiety here. whether the house of lords will throw out the irish church bill, whether the king will consent to create new peers, whether the tories will venture to form a ministry, are matters about which we are all in complete doubt. if the ministry should really be changed, parliament will, i feel quite sure, be dissolved. whether i shall have a seat in the next parliament i neither know nor care. i shall regret nothing for myself but our scotch tour. for the public i shall, if this parliament is dissolved, entertain scarcely any hopes. i see nothing before us but a frantic conflict between extreme opinions; a short period of oppression; then a convulsive reaction; and then a tremendous crash of the funds, the church, the peerage, and the throne. it is enough to make the most strenuous royalist lean a little to republicanism to think that the whole question between safety and general destruction may probably, at this most fearful conjuncture, depend on a single man whom the accident of his birth has placed in a situation to which certainly his own virtues or abilities would never have raised him. the question must come to a decision, i think, within the fortnight. in the meantime the funds are going down, the newspapers are storming, and the faces of men on both sides are growing day by day more gloomy and anxious. even during the most violent part of the contest for the reform bill i do not remember to have seen so much agitation in the political circles. i have some odd anecdotes for you, which i will tell you when we meet. if the parliament should be dissolved, the west indian and east indian bills are of course dropped. what is to become of the slaves? what is to become of the tea-trade? will the negroes, after receiving the resolutions of the house of commons promising them liberty, submit to the cart-whip? will our merchants consent to have the trade with china, which has just been offered to them, snatched away? the bank charter, too, is suspended. but that is comparatively a trifle. after all, what is it to me who is in or out, or whether those fools of lords are resolved to perish, and drag the king to perish with them in the ruin which they have themselves made? i begin to wonder what the fascination is which attracts men, who could sit over their tea and their books in their own cool quiet room, to breathe bad air, hear bad speeches, lounge up and down the long gallery, and doze uneasily on the green benches till three in the morning. thank god, these luxuries are not necessary to me. my pen is sufficient for my support, and my sister's company is sufficient for my happiness. only let me see her well and cheerful, and let offices in government, and seats in parliament, go to those who care for them. if i were to leave public life to-morrow, i declare that, except for the vexation which it might give you and one or two others, the event would not be in the slightest degree painful to me. as you boast of having a greater insight into character than i allow to you, let me know how you explain this philosophical disposition of mine, and how you reconcile it with my ambitious inclinations. that is a problem for a young lady who professes knowledge of human nature. did i tell you that i dined at the duchess of kent's, and sate next that loveliest of women, mrs. littleton? her husband, our new secretary for ireland, told me this evening that lord wellesley, who sate near us at the duchess's, asked mrs. littleton afterwards who it was that was talking to her. "mr. macaulay." "oh! "said the marquess," i am very sorry i did not know it. i have a most particular desire to be acquainted with that man." accordingly littleton has engaged me to dine with him, in order to introduce me to the marquess. i am particularly curious, and always was, to know him. he has made a great and splendid figure in history, and his weaknesses, though they make his character less worthy of respect, make it more interesting as a study. such a blooming old swain i never saw; hair combed with exquisite nicety, a waistcoat of driven snow, and a star and garter put on with rare skill. to-day we took up our resolutions about india to the house of lords. the two houses had a conference on the subject in an old gothic room called the painted chamber. the painting consists in a mildewed daub of a woman in the niche of one of the windows. the lords sate in little cocked hats along a table; and we stood uncovered on the other side, and delivered in our resolutions. i thought that before long it may be our turn to sit, and theirs to stand. ever yours t. b. m. london: june , . dear hannah,--i cannot tell you how delighted i was to learn from fanny this morning that margaret pronounces you to be as well as she could wish you to be. only continue so, and all the changes of public life will be as indifferent to me as to horatio. if i am only spared the misery of seeing you suffer, i shall be found a man that fortune's buffets and rewards has ta'en with equal thanks. whether we are to have buffets or rewards is known only to heaven and to the peers. i think that their lordships are rather cowed. indeed, if they venture on the course on which they lately seemed bent, i would not give sixpence for a coronet or a penny for a mitre. i shall not read the repealers; and i think it very impudent in you to make such a request. have i nothing to do but to be your novel-taster? it is rather your duty to be mine. what else have you to do? i have read only one novel within the last week, and a most precious one it was: the invisible gentleman. have you ever read it? but i need not ask. no doubt it has formed part of your sunday studies. a wretched, trumpery, imitation of godwin's worst manner. what a number of stories i shall have to tell you when we meet!--which will be, as nearly as i can guess, about the th or th of august. i shall be as rich as a jew by that time. next wednesday will be quarter-day; and then, if i'm alive, of sterling pounds i shall receive three hundred seventy-five. already i possess in cash two hundred twenty-four, besides what i have lent to john which makes up twenty more. also the man who editeth the yellow and the blue doth owe me ninety pounds at least, all for my last review. so, if my debtors pay their debts, you'll find, dear sister mine, that all my wealth together makes seven hundred pounds and nine. ever yours t. b. m. the rhymes in which macaulay unfolds his little budget derive a certain dignity and meaning from the events of the ensuing weeks. the unparalleled labours of the anti-slavery leaders were at length approaching a successful issue, and lord grey's cabinet had declared itself responsible for the emancipation of the west indian negroes. but it was already beginning to be known that the ministerial scheme, in its original shape, was not such as would satisfy even the more moderate abolitionists. its most objectionable feature was shadowed forth in the third of the resolutions with which mr. stanley, who had the question in charge, prefaced the introduction of his bill: "that all persons, now slaves, be entitled to be registered as apprenticed labourers, and to acquire thereby all the rights and privileges of freemen, subject to the restriction of labouring, for a time to be fixed by parliament, for their present owners." it was understood that twelve years would be proposed as the period of apprenticeship; although no trace of this intention could be detected in the wording of the resolution. macaulay, who thought twelve years far too long, felt himself justified in supporting the government during the preliminary stages; but he took occasion to make some remarks indicating that circumstances might occur which would oblige him to resign office, and adopt a line of his own. as time went on it became evident that his firmness would be put to the test; and a severe test it was. a rising statesman, whose prospects would be irremediably injured by abruptly quitting a government that seemed likely to be in power for the next quarter of a century; a zealous whig, who shrank from the very appearance of disaffection to his party; a man of sense, with no ambition to be called quixotic; a member for a large constituency, possessed of only seven hundred pounds in the world when his purse was at its fullest; above all, an affectionate son and brother, now, more than ever, the main hope and reliance of those whom he held most dear;--it may well be believed that he was not in a hurry to act the martyr. his father's affairs were worse than bad. the african firm, without having been reduced to declare itself bankrupt, had ceased to exist as a house of business; or existed only so far that for some years to come every penny that macaulay earned, beyond what the necessities of life demanded, was scrupulously devoted to paying, and at length to paying off, his father's creditors; a dutiful enterprise in which he was assisted by his brother henry, [henry married in a daughter of his brother's old political ally, lord denman. he died at boa vista, in , leaving two sons, henry, and joseph, macaulay.] a young man of high spirit and excellent abilities, who had recently been appointed one of the commissioners of arbitration in the prize courts at sierra leone. the pressure of pecuniary trouble was now beginning to make itself felt even by the younger members of the family. about this time, or perhaps a little earlier, hannah macaulay writes thus to one of her cousins: "you say nothing about coming to us. you must come in good health and spirits. our trials ought not greatly to depress us; for, after all, all we want is money, the easiest want to bear; and, when we have so many mercies--friends who love us and whom we love; no bereavements; and, above all, (if it be not our own fault,) a hope full of immortality--let us not be so ungrateful as to repine because we are without what in itself cannot make our happiness." macaulay's colleagues, who, without knowing his whole story, knew enough to be aware that he could ill afford to give up office, were earnest in their remonstrances; but he answered shortly, and almost roughly: "i cannot go counter to my father. he has devoted his whole life to the question, and i cannot grieve him by giving way when he wishes me to stand firm." during the crisis of the west india bill, zachary macaulay and his son were in constant correspondence. there is something touching in the picture which these letters present of the older man, (whose years were coming to a close in poverty which was the consequence of his having always lived too much for others,) discussing quietly and gravely how, and when, the younger was to take a step that in the opinion of them both would be fatal to his career; and this with so little consciousness that there was anything heroic in the course which they were pursuing, that it appears never to have occurred to either of their that any other line of conduct could possibly be adopted. having made up his mind as to what he should do, macaulay set about it with as good a grace as is compatible with the most trying position in which a man, and especially a young man, can find himself. carefully avoiding the attitude of one who bargains or threatens, he had given timely notice in the proper quarter of his intentions and his views. at length the conjuncture arrived when decisive action could no longer be postponed. on the th of july mr. thomas fowell buxton moved an amendment in committee, limiting the apprenticeship to the shortest period necessary for establishing the system of free labour. macaulay, whose resignation was already in lord althorp's hands, made a speech which produced all the more effect as being inornate, and, at times, almost awkward. even if deeper feelings had not restrained the range of his fancy and the flow of his rhetoric, his judgment would have told him that it was not the moment for an oratorical display. he began by entreating the house to extend to him that indulgence which it had accorded on occasions when he had addressed it "with more confidence and with less harassed feelings." he then, at some length, exposed the effects of the government proposal. "in free countries the master has a choice of labourers, and the labourer has a choice of masters; but in slavery it is always necessary to give despotic power to the master. this bill leaves it to the magistrate to keep peace between master and slave. every time that the slave takes twenty minutes to do that which the master thinks he should do in fifteen, recourse must be had to the magistrate. society would day and night be in a constant state of litigation, and all differences and difficulties must be solved by judicial interference." he did not share in mr. buxton's apprehension of gross cruelty as a result of the apprenticeship. "the magistrate would be accountable to the colonial office, and the colonial office to the house of commons, in which every lash which was inflicted under magisterial authority would be told and counted. my apprehension is that the result of continuing for twelve years this dead slavery,--this state of society destitute of any vital principle,--will be that the whole negro population will sink into weak and drawling inefficacy, and will be much less fit for liberty at the end of the period than at the commencement. my hope is that the system will die a natural death; that the experience of a few months will so establish its utter inefficiency as to induce the planters to abandon it, and to substitute for it a state of freedom. i have voted," he said, "for the second reading, and i shall vote for the third reading; but, while the bill is in committee, i shall join with other honourable gentlemen in doing all that is possible to amend it." such a declaration, coming from the mouth of a member of the government, gave life to the debate, and secured to mr. buxton an excellent division, which under the circumstances was equivalent to a victory. the next day mr. stanley rose; adverted shortly to the position in which the ministers stood; and announced that the term of apprenticeship would be reduced from twelve years to seven. mr. buxton, who, with equal energy and wisdom, had throughout the proceedings acted as leader of the anti-slavery party in the house of commons, advised his friends to make the best of the concession; and his counsel was followed by all those abolitionists who were thinking more of their cause than of themselves. it is worthy of remark that macaulay's prophecy came true, though not at so early a date as he ventured to anticipate. four years of the provisional system brought all parties to acquiesce in the premature termination of a state of things which denied to the negro the blessings of freedom, and to the planter the profits of slavery. "the papers," macaulay writes to his father, "will have told you all that has happened, as far as it is known to the public. the secret history you will have heard from buxton. as to myself, lord althorp told me yesterday night that the cabinet had determined not to accept my resignation. i have therefore the singular good luck of having saved both my honour and my place, and of having given no just ground of offence either to the abolitionists or to my party-friends. i have more reason than ever to say that honesty is the best policy." this letter is dated the th of july. on that day week, wilberforce was carried to his grave in westminster abbey. "we laid him," writes macaulay, "side by side with canning, at the feet of pitt, and within two steps of fox and grattan." he died with the promised land full in view. before the end of august parliament abolished slavery, and the last touch was put to the work that had consumed so many pure and noble lives. in a letter of congratulation to zachary macaulay, mr. buxton says: "surely you have reason to rejoice. my sober and deliberate opinion is that you have done more towards this consummation than any other man. for myself, i take pleasure in acknowledging that you have been my tutor all the way through, and that i could have done nothing without you." such was the spirit of these men, who, while the struggle lasted, were prodigal of health and ease; but who, in the day of triumph, disclaimed, each for himself, even that part of the merit which their religion allowed them to ascribe to human effort and self-sacrifice. london: july , . dear hannah,--i have been so completely overwhelmed with business for some days that i have not been able to find time for writing a line. yesterday night we read the india bill a second time. it was a wednesday, and the reporters gave hardly any account of what passed. they always resent being forced to attend on that day, which is their holiday. i made the best speech, by general agreement, and in my own opinion, that i ever made in my life. i was an hour and three-quarters up; and such compliments as i had from lord althorp, lord palmerston, lord john russell, wynne, o'connell, grant, the speaker, and twenty other people, you never heard. as there is no report of the speech, i have been persuaded, rather against my will, to correct it for publication. i will tell you one compliment that was paid me, and which delighted me more than any other. an old member said to me: "sir, having heard that speech may console the young people for never having heard mr. burke." [a tory member said that macaulay resembled both the burkes: that he was like the first from his eloquence, and like the second from his stopping other people's mouths.] the slavery bill is miserably bad. i am fully resolved not to be dragged through the mire, but to oppose, by speaking and voting, the clauses which i think objectionable. i have told lord althorp this, and have again tendered my resignation. he hinted that he thought that the government would leave me at liberty to take my own line, but that he must consult his colleagues. i told him that i asked for no favour; that i knew what inconvenience would result if official men were allowed to dissent from ministerial measures, and yet to keep their places; and that i should not think myself in the smallest degree ill-used if the cabinet accepted my resignation. this is the present posture of affairs. in the meantime the two houses are at daggers drawn. whether the government will last to the end of the session i neither know nor care. i am sick of boards, and of the house of commons; and pine for a few quiet days, a cool country breeze, and a little chatting with my dear sister. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay london: july , . my dear sister,--i snatch a few minutes to write a single line to you. we went into committee on the india bill at twelve this morning, sate till three, and are just set at liberty for two hours. at five we recommence, and shall be at work till midnight. in the interval between three and five i have to despatch the current business of the office, which, at present, is fortunately not heavy; to eat my dinner, which i shall do at grant's; and to write a short scrawl to my little sister. my work, though laborious, has been highly satisfactory. no bill, i believe, of such importance,--certainly no important bill in my time, has been received with such general approbation. the very cause of the negligence of the reporters, and of the thinness of the house, is that we have framed our measure so carefully as to give little occasion for debate. littleton, denison, and many other members, assure me that they never remember to have seen a bill better drawn or better conducted. on monday night, i hope, my work will be over. our bill will have been discussed, i trust, for the last time in the house of commons; and, in all probability, i shall within forty-eight hours after that time be out of office. i am fully determined not to give way about the west india bill; and i can hardly expect,--i am sure i do not wish,--that the ministers should suffer me to keep my place and oppose their measure. whatever may befall me or my party, i am much more desirous to come to an end of this interminable session than to stay either in office or in parliament. the tories are quite welcome to take everything, if they will only leave me my pen and my books, a warm fireside, and you chattering beside it. this sort of philosophy, an odd kind of cross between stoicism and epicureanism, i have learned, where most people unlearn all their philosophy, in crowded senates and fine drawing-rooms. but time flies, and grant's dinner will be waiting. he keeps open house for us during this fight. ever yours t. b. m. london: july , . my dear father,--we are still very anxious here. the lords, though they have passed the irish church bill through its first stage, will very probably mutilate it in committee. it will then be for the ministers to decide whether they can with honour keep their places. i believe that they will resign if any material alteration should be made; and then everything is confusion. these circumstances render it very difficult for me to shape my course right with respect to the west india bill, the second reading of which stands for this evening. i am fully resolved to oppose several of the clauses. but to declare my intention publicly, at a moment when the government is in danger, would have the appearance of ratting. i must be guided by circumstances; but my present intention is to say nothing on the second reading. by the time that we get into committee the political crisis, will, i hope, be over; the fate of the church bill will be decided one way or the other; and i shall be able to take my own course on the slavery question without exposing myself to the charge of deserting my friends in a moment of peril. ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , , my dear sister,--you will have seen by the papers that the west india debate on monday night went off very quietly in little more than an hour. to-night we expect the great struggle, and i fear that, much against my inclination, i must bear a part in it. my resignation is in lord althorp's hands. he assures me that he will do his utmost to obtain for me liberty to act as i like on this question; but lord grey and stanley are to be consulted, and i think it very improbable that they will consent to allow me so extraordinary a privilege. i know that, if i were minister, i would not allow such latitude to any man in office; and so i told lord althorp. he answered in the kindest and most flattering manner; told me that in office i had surpassed their expectations, and that, much as they wished to bring me in last year, they wished much more to keep me in now. i told him in reply that the matter was one for the ministers to settle, purely with a view to their own interest; that i asked for no indulgence; that i could make no terms; and that, what i would not do to serve them, i certainly would not do to keep my place. thus the matter stands. it will probably be finally settled within a few hours. this detestable session goes on lengthening, and lengthening, like a human hair in one's mouth. (do you know that delicious sensation?) last month we expected to have been up before the middle of august. now we should be glad to be quite certain of being in the country by the first of september. one comfort i shall have in being turned out: i will not stay a day in london after the west india bill is through committee; which i hope it will be before the end of next week. the new edinburgh review is not much amiss; but i quite agree with the publishers, the editor, and the reading public generally, that the number would have been much the better for an article of thirty or forty pages from the pen of a gentleman who shall be nameless. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , . my dear sister,--the plot is thickening. yesterday buxton moved an instruction to the committee on the slavery bill, which the government opposed, and which i supported. it was extremely painful to me to speak against all my political friends; so painful that at times i could hardly go on. i treated them as mildly as i could; and they all tell me that i performed my difficult task not ungracefully. we divided at two this morning, and were to . the ministers found that, if they persisted, they would infallibly be beaten. accordingly they came down to the house at twelve this day, and agreed to reduce the apprenticeship to seven years for the agricultural labourers, and to five years for the skilled labourers. what other people may do i cannot tell; but i am inclined to be satisfied with this concession; particularly as i believe that, if we press the thing further, they will resign, and we shall have no bill at all, but instead of it a tory ministry and a dissolution. some people flatter me with the assurance that our large minority, and the consequent change in the bill, have been owing to me. if this be so, i have done one useful act at least in my life. i shall now certainly remain in office; and if, as i expect, the irish church bill passes the lords, i may consider myself as safe till the next session; when heaven knows what may happen. it is still quite uncertain when we may rise. i pine for rest, air, and a taste of family life, more than i can express. i see nothing but politicians, and talk about nothing but politics. i have not read village belles. tell me, as soon as you can get it, whether it is worth reading. as john thorpe [the young oxford man in "northanger abbey."] says "novels! oh lord! i never read novels. i have something else to do." farewell. t. b. m, to hannah m. macaulay, london: july , . my dear sister,--here i am, safe and well, at the end of one of the most stormy weeks that the oldest man remembers in parliamentary affairs. i have resigned my office, and my resignation has been refused. i have spoken and voted against the ministry under which i hold my place. the ministry has been so hard run in the commons as to be forced to modify its plan; and has received a defeat in the lords, [on the th of july the archbishop of canterbury carried an amendment on the irish church bill, against the government, by votes to .]--a slight one to be sure, and on a slight matter,--yet such that i, and many others, fully believed twenty-four hours ago that they would have resigned. in fact, some of the cabinet,--grant among the rest, to my certain knowledge, were for resigning. at last saturday has arrived. the ministry is as strong as ever. i am as good friends with the ministers as ever. the east india bill is carried through our house. the west india bill is so far modified that, i believe, it will be carried. the irish church bill has got through the committee in the lords; and we are all beginning to look forward to a prorogation in about three weeks. to-day i went to hayden's to be painted into his great picture of the reform banquet. ellis was with me, and declares that hayden has touched me off to a nicety. i am sick of pictures of my own face. i have seen within the last few days one drawing of it, one engraving, and three paintings. they all make me a very handsome fellow. hayden pronounces my profile a gem of art, perfectly antique; and, what is worth the praise of ten haydens, i was told yesterday that mrs. littleton, the handsomest woman in london, had paid me exactly the same compliment. she pronounced mr. macaulay's profile to be a study for an artist. i have bought a new looking-glass and razor-case on the strength of these compliments, and am meditating on the expediency of having my hair cut in the burlington arcade, rather than in lamb's conduit street. as richard says, "since i am crept in favour with myself, i will maintain it with some little cost." i begin, like sir walter elliot, [the baronet in "persuasion."] to rate all my acquaintance according to their beauty. but what nonsense i write, and in times that make many merry men look grave! ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , . my dear sister,--i dined last night at holland house. there was a very pleasant party. my lady was courteous, and my lord extravagantly entertaining, telling some capital stories about old bishop horsley, which were set off with some of the drollest mimicry that i ever saw. among many others there were sir james graham; and dr. holland, who is a good scholar as well as a good physician; and wilkie, who is a modest, pleasing companion as well as an excellent artist. for ladies, we had her grace of--; and her daughter lady--, a fine, buxom, sonsy lass, with more colour than, i am sorry to say, is often seen among fine ladies. so our dinner and our soiree were very agreeable. we narrowly escaped a scene at one time. lord is in the navy, and is now on duty in the fleet at the tagus. we got into a conversation about portuguese politics. his name was mentioned, and graham, who is first lord of the admiralty, complimented the duchess on her son's merit, to which, he said, every despatch bore witness. the duchess forthwith began to entreat that he might be recalled. he was very ill, she said. if he stayed longer on that station she was sure that he would die; and then she began to cry. i cannot bear to see women cry, and the matter became serious, for her pretty daughter began to bear her company. that hardhearted lord ---- seemed to be diverted by the scene. he, by all accounts, has been doing little else than making women cry during the last five-and-twenty years. however, we all were as still as death while the wiping of eyes and the blowing of noses proceeded. at last lord holland contrived to restore our spirits; but, before the duchess went away, she managed to have a tete-a-tete with graham, and, i have no doubt, begged and blubbered to some purpose. i could not help thinking how many honest stout-hearted fellows are left to die on the most unhealthy stations for want of being related to some duchess who has been handsome, or to some duchess's daughter who still is so. the duchess said one thing that amused us. we were talking about lady morgan. "when she first came to london," said lord holland, "i remember that she carried a little irish harp about with her wherever she went." others denied this. i mentioned what she says in her book of the boudoir. there she relates how she went one evening to lady--'s with her little irish harp, and how strange everybody thought it. "i see nothing very strange," said her grace, "in her taking her harp to lady--'s. if she brought it safe away with her, that would have been strange indeed." on this, as a friend of yours says, we la-a-a-a-a-a-a-ft. i am glad to find that you approve of my conduct about the niggers. i expect, and indeed wish, to be abused by the agency society. my father is quite satisfied, and so are the best part of my leeds friends. i amuse myself, as i walk back from the house at two in the morning, with translating virgil. i am at work on one of the most beautiful episodes, and am succeeding pretty well. you shall have what i have done when i come to liverpool, which will be, i hope, in three weeks or thereanent. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: july , . my dear sister,--political affairs look cheeringly. the lords passed the irish church bill yesterday, and mean, we understand, to give us little or no trouble about the india bill. there is still a hitch in the commons about the west india bill, particularly about the twenty millions for compensation to the planters; but we expect to carry our point by a great majority. by the end of next week we shall be very near the termination of our labours. heavy labours they have been. so wilberforce is gone! we talk of burying him in westminster abbey; and many eminent men, both whigs and tories, are desirous to join in paying him this honour. there is, however, a story about a promise given to old stephen that they should both lie in the same grave. wilberforce kept his faculties, and, except when he was actually in fits, his spirits, to the very last. he was cheerful and full of anecdote only last saturday. he owned that he enjoyed life much, and that he had a great desire to live longer. strange in a man who had, i should have said, so little to attach him to this world, and so firm a belief in another; in a man with an impaired fortune, a weak spine, and a worn-out stomach! what is this fascination which makes us cling to existence in spite of present sufferings and of religious hopes? yesterday evening i called at the house in cadogan place, where the body is lying. i was truly fond of him; that is, "je l'aimais comme l'on aime." and how is that? how very little one human being generally cares for another! how very little the world misses anybody! how soon the chasm left by the best and wisest men closes! i thought, as i walked back from cadogan place, that our own selfishness when others are taken away ought to teach us how little others will suffer at losing us. i thought that, if i were to die to-morrow, not one of the fine people, whom i dine with every week, will take a cotelette aux petits pois the less on saturday at the table to which i was invited to meet them, or will smile less gaily at the ladies over the champagne. and i am quite even with them. what are those pretty lines of shelley? oh, world, farewell! listen to the passing bell. it tells that thou and i must part with a light and heavy heart. there are not ten people in the world whose deaths would spoil my dinner; but there are one or two whose deaths would break my heart. the more i see of the world, and the more numerous my acquaintance becomes, the narrower and more exclusive my affection grows, and the more i cling to my sisters, and to one or two old tried friends of my quiet days. but why should i go on preaching to you out of ecclesiastes? and here comes, fortunately, to break the train of my melancholy reflections, the proof of my east india speech from hansard; so i must put my letter aside, and correct the press. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: august , . my dear sister,--i agree with your judgment on chesterfield's letters. they are for the most part trash; though they contain some clever passages, and the style is not bad. their celebrity must be attributed to causes quite distinct from their literary merit, and particularly to the position which the author held in society. we see in our own time that the books written by public men of note are generally rated at more than their real value: lord granville's little compositions, for example; canning's verses; fox's history; brougham's treatises. the writings of people of high fashion, also, have a value set on them far higher than that which intrinsically belongs to them. the verses of the late duchess of devonshire, or an occasional prologue by lord alvanley, attract a most undue share of attention. if the present duke of devonshire, who is the very "glass of fashion and mould of form," were to publish a book with two good pages, it would be extolled as a masterpiece in half the drawing-rooms of london. now chesterfield was, what no person in our time has been or can be, a great political leader, and at the same time the acknowledged chief of the fashionable world; at the head of the house of lords, and at the head of laze; mr. canning and the duke of devonshire in one. in our time the division of labour is carried so far that such a man could not exist. politics require the whole of energy, bodily and mental, during half the year; and leave very little time for the bow window at white's in the day, or for the crush-room of the opera at night. a century ago the case was different. chesterfield was at once the most distinguished orator in the upper house, and the undisputed sovereign of wit and fashion. he held this eminence for about forty years. at last it became the regular custom of the higher circles to laugh whenever he opened his mouth, without waiting for his bon mot. he used to sit at white's with a circle of young men of rank round him, applauding every syllable that he uttered. if you wish for a proof of the kind of position which chesterfield held among his contemporaries, look at the prospectus of johnson's dictionary. look even at johnson's angry letter. it contains the strongest admission of the boundless influence which chesterfield exercised over society. when the letters of such a man were published, of course they were received more favourably by far than they deserved. so much for criticism. as to politics, everything seems tending to repose; and i should think that by this day fortnight we shall probably be prorogued. the jew bill was thrown out yesterday night by the lords. no matter. our turn will come one of these days. if you want to see me puffed and abused by somebody who evidently knows nothing about me, look at the new monthly for this month. bulwer, i see, has given up editing it. i suppose he is making money in some other way; for his dress must cost as much as that of any five other members of parliament. to-morrow wilberforce is to be buried. his sons acceded, with great eagerness, to the application made to them by a considerable number of the members of both houses that the funeral should be public. we meet to-morrow at twelve at the house of commons, and we shall attend the coffin into the abbey. the duke of wellington, lord eldon, and sir r. peel have put down their names, as well as the ministers and the abolitionists. my father urges me to pay some tribute to wilberforce in the house of commons. if any debate should take place on the third reading of the west india bill in which i might take part, i should certainly embrace the opportunity of doing honour to his memory. but i do not expect that such an occasion will arise. the house seems inclined to pass the bill without more contest; and my father must be aware that anything like theatrical display,--anything like a set funeral oration not springing naturally out of the discussion of a question,--is extremely distasteful to the house of commons. i have been clearing off a great mass of business, which had accumulated at our office while we were conducting our bill through parliament. today i had the satisfaction of seeing the green boxes, which a week ago were piled up with papers three or four feet high, perfectly empty. admire my superhuman industry. this i will say for myself, that, when i do sit down to work, i work harder and faster than any person that i ever knew. ever yours t. b. m. the next letter, in terms too clear to require comment, introduces the mention of what proved to be the most important circumstance in macaulay's life. to hannah m. macaulay. london: august , . my dear sister,--i am about to write to you on a subject which to you and margaret will be one of the most agitating interest; and which, on that account chiefly, is so to me. by the new india bill it is provided that one of the members of the supreme council, which is to govern our eastern empire, is to be chosen from among persons who are not servants of the company. it is probable, indeed nearly certain, that the situation will be offered to me. the advantages are very great. it is a post of the highest dignity and consideration. the salary is ten thousand pounds a year. i am assured by persons who know calcutta intimately, and who have themselves mixed in the highest circles and held the highest offices at that presidency, that i may live in splendour there for five thousand a year, and may save the rest of the salary with the accruing interest. i may therefore hope to return to england at only thirty-nine, in the full vigour of life, with a fortune of thirty thousand pounds. a larger fortune i never desired. i am not fond of money, or anxious about it. but, though every day makes me less and less eager for wealth, every day shows me more and more strongly how necessary a competence is to a man who desires to be either great or useful. at present the plain fact is that i can continue to be a public man only while i can continue in office. if i left my place in the government, i must leave my seat in parliament too. for i must live; i can live only by my pen; and it is absolutely impossible for any man to write enough to procure him a decent subsistence, and at the same time to take an active part in politics. i have not during this session been able to send a single line to the edinburgh review; and, if i had been out of office, i should have been able to do very little. edward bulwer has just given up the new monthly magazine on the ground that he cannot conduct it, and attend to his parliamentary duties. cobbett has been compelled to neglect his register so much that its sale has fallen almost to nothing. now, in order to live like a gentleman, it would be necessary for me to write, not as i have done hitherto, but regularly, and even daily. i have never made more than two hundred a year by my pen. i could not support myself in comfort on less than five hundred; and i shall in all probability have many others to support. the prospects of our family are, if possible, darker than ever. in the meantime my political outlook is very gloomy. a schism in the ministry is approaching. it requires only that common knowledge of public affairs, which any reader of the newspapers may possess, to see this; and i have more, much more, than common knowledge on the subject. they cannot hold together. i tell you in perfect seriousness that my chance of keeping my present situation for six months is so small, that i would willingly sell it for fifty pounds down. if i remain in office, i shall, i fear, lose my political character. if i go out, and engage in opposition, i shall break most of the private ties which i have formed during the last three years. in england i see nothing before me, for some time to come, but poverty, unpopularity, and the breaking up of old connections. if there were no way out of these difficulties, i would encounter them with courage. a man can always act honourably and uprightly; and, if i were in the fleet prison or the rules of the king's bench, i believe that i could find in my own mind resources which would preserve me from being positively unhappy. but, if i could escape from these impending disasters, i should wish to do so. by accepting the post which is likely to be offered to me, i withdraw myself for a short time from the contests of faction here. when i return, i shall find things settled, parties formed into new combinations, and new questions under discussion. i shall then be able, without the scandal of a violent separation, and without exposing myself to the charge of inconsistency, to take my own line. in the meantime i shall save my family from distress; and shall return with a competence honestly earned, as rich as if i were duke of northumberland or marquess of westminster, and able to act on all public questions without even a temptation to deviate from the strict line of duty. while in india, i shall have to discharge duties not painfully laborious, and of the highest and most honourable kind. i shall have whatever that country affords of comfort or splendour; nor will my absence be so long that my friends, or the public here, will be likely to lose sight of me. the only persons who know what i have written to you are lord grey, the grants, stewart mackenzie, and george babington. charles grant and stewart mackenzie, who know better than most men the state of the political world, think that i should act unwisely in refusing this post; and this though they assure me,--and, i really believe, sincerely,--that they shall feel the loss of my society very acutely. but what shall i feel? and with what emotions, loving as i do my country and my family, can i look forward to such a separation, enjoined, as i think it is, by prudence and by duty? whether the period of my exile shall be one of comfort,--and, after the first shock, even of happiness,--depends on you. if, as i expect, this offer shall be made to me, will you go with me? i know what a sacrifice i ask of you. i know how many dear and precious ties you must, for a time, sunder. i know that the splendour of the indian court, and the gaieties of that brilliant society of which you would be one of the leading personages, have no temptation for you. i can bribe you only by telling you that, if you will go with me, i will love you better than i love you now, if i can. i have asked george babington about your health and mine. he says that he has very little apprehension for me, and none at all for you. indeed, he seemed to think that the climate would be quite as likely to do you good as harm. all this is most strictly secret. you may, of course, show the letter to margaret; and margaret may tell edward; for i never cabal against the lawful authority of husbands. but further the thing must not go. it would hurt my father, and very justly, to hear of it from anybody before he hears of it from myself; and, if the least hint of it were to get abroad, i should be placed in a very awkward position with regard to the people at leeds. it is possible, though not probable, that difficulties may arise at the india house; and i do not mean to say anything to any person, who is not already in the secret, till the directors have made their choice, and till the king's pleasure has been taken. and now think calmly over what i have written. i would not have written on the subject even to you, till the matter was quite settled, if i had not thought that you ought to have full time to make up your mind. if you feel an insurmountable aversion to india, i will do all in my power to make your residence in england comfortable during my absence, and to enable you to confer instead of receiving benefits. but if my dear sister would consent to give me, at this great crisis of my life, that proof, that painful and arduous proof, of her affection, which i beg of her, i think that she will not repent of it. she shall not, if the unbounded confidence and attachment of one to whom she is dearer than life can compensate her for a few years' absence from much that she loves. dear margaret! she will feel this. consult her, my love, and let us both have the advantage of such advice as her excellent understanding, and her warm affection for us, may furnish. on monday next, at the latest, i expect to be with you. our scotch tour, under these circumstances, must be short. by christmas it will be fit that the new councillor should leave england. his functions in india commence next april. we shall leave our dear margaret, i hope, a happy mother. farewell, my dear sister. you cannot tell how impatiently i shall wait for your answer. t. b. m. this letter, written under the influence of deep and varied emotions, was read with feelings of painful agitation and surprise. india was not then the familiar name that it has become to a generation which regards a visit to cashmere as a trip to be undertaken between two london seasons, and which discusses over its breakfast table at home the decisions arrived at on the previous afternoon in the council-room of simla or calcutta. in those rural parsonages and middle-class households where service in our eastern territories now presents itself in the light of a probable and desirable destiny for a promising son, those same territories were forty years ago regarded as an obscure and distant region of disease and death. a girl who had seen no country more foreign than wales, and crossed no water broader and more tempestuous than the mersey, looked forward to a voyage which (as she subsequently learned by melancholy experience), might extend over six weary months, with an anxiety that can hardly be imagined by us who spend only half as many weeks on the journey between dover and bombay. a separation from beloved relations under such conditions was a separation indeed; and, if macaulay and his sister could have foreseen how much of what they left at their departure they would fail to find on their return, it is a question whether any earthly consideration could have induced them to quit their native shore. but hannah's sense of duty was too strong for these doubts and tremors; and, happily, (for on the whole her resolution was a fortunate one,) she resolved to accompany her brother in an expatriation which he never would have faced without her. with a mind set at ease by a knowledge of her intention, he came down to liverpool as soon as the session was at an end; and carried her off on a jaunt to edinburgh, in a post-chaise furnished with horace walpole's letters for their common reading, and smollett's collected works for his own. before october he was back at the board of control; and his letters recommenced, as frequent and rather more serious and business-like than of old. london: october , dear hannah,--life goes on so quietly here, or rather stands so still, that i have nothing, or next to nothing, to say. at the athenaeum i now and then fall in with some person passing through town on his way to the continent or to brighton. the other day i met sharp, and had a long talk with him about everything and everybody,--metaphysics, poetry, politics, scenery, and painting. one thing i have observed in sharp, which is quite peculiar to him among town-wits and diners-out. he never talks scandal. if he can say nothing good of a man, he holds his tongue. i do not, of course, mean that in confidential communication about politics he does not speak freely of public men; but about the foibles of private individuals i do not believe that, much as i have talked with him, i ever heard him utter one word. i passed three or four hours very agreeably in his company at the club. i have also seen kenny for an hour or two. i do not know that i ever mentioned kenny to you. when london is overflowing, i meet such numbers of people that i cannot remember half their names. this is the time at which every acquaintance, however slight, attracts some degree of attention. in the desert island, even poor poll was something of a companion to robinson crusoe. kenny is a writer of a class which, in our time, is at the very bottom of the literary scale. he is a dramatist. most of the farces, and three-act plays, which have succeeded during the last eight or ten years, are, i am told, from his pen. heaven knows that, if they are the farces and plays which i have seen, they do him but little honour. however, this man is one of our great comic writers. he has the merit, such as it is, of hitting the very bad taste of our modern audiences better than any other person who has stooped to that degrading work. we had a good deal of literary chat; and i thought him a clever shrewd fellow. my father is poorly; not that anything very serious is the matter with him; but he has a cold, and is in low spirits. ever yours t. b. m. london: october , dear hannah,--i have just finished my article on horace walpole. this is one of the happy moments of my life; a stupid task performed; a weight taken off my mind. i should be quite joyous if i had only you to read it to. but to napier it must go forthwith; and, as soon as i have finished this letter, i shall put it into the general post with my own fair hands. i was up at four this morning to put the last touch to it. i often differ with the majority about other people's writings, and still oftener about my own; and therefore i may very likely be mistaken; but i think that this article will be a hit. we shall see. nothing ever cost me more pains than the first half; i never wrote anything so flowingly as the latter half; and i like the latter half the best. i have laid it on walpole so unsparingly that i shall not be surprised if miss berry should cut me. you know she was walpole's favourite in her youth. neither am i sure that lord and lady holland will be well pleased. but they ought to be obliged to me; for i refrained for their sake from laying a hand, which has been thought to be not a light one, on that old rogue the first lord holland. [lord holland, once upon a time, speaking to macaulay of his grandfather, said: "he had that temper which kind folks have been pleased to say belongs to my family; but he shared the fault that belonged to that school of statesmen, an utter disbelief in public virtue."] charles grant is still at paris; ill, he says. i never knew a man who wanted setting to rights so often. he goes as badly as your watch. my father is at me again to provide for p--. what on earth have i to do with p--? the relationship is one which none but scotchmen would recognise. the lad is such a fool that he would utterly disgrace my recommendation. and, as if to make the thing more provoking, his sisters say that he must be provided for in england, for that they cannot think of parting with him. this, to be sure, matters little; for there is at present just as little chance of getting anything in india as in england. but what strange folly this is which meets me in every quarter; people wanting posts in the army, the navy, the public offices, and saying that, if they cannot find such posts, they must starve! how do all the rest of mankind live? if i had not happened to be engaged in politics, and if my father had not been connected, by very extraordinary circumstances, with public men, i should never have dreamed of having places. why cannot p-- be apprenticed to some hatter or tailor? he may do well in such a business; he will do detestably ill as a clerk in my office. he may come to make good coats; he will never, i am sure, write good despatches. there is nothing truer than poor richard's say: "we are taxed twice as heavily by our pride as by the state." the curse of england is the obstinate determination of the middle classes to make their sons what they call gentlemen. so we are overrun by clergymen without livings; lawyers without briefs; physicians without patients; authors without readers; clerks soliciting employment, who might have thriven, and been above the world, as bakers, watchmakers, or innkeepers. the next time my father speaks to me about p--, i will offer to subscribe twenty guineas towards making a pastry-cook of him. he had a sweet tooth when he was a child. so you are reading burnet! did you begin from the beginning? what do you think of the old fellow? he was always a great favourite of mine; honest, though careless; a strong party man on the right side, yet with much kind feeling towards his opponents, and even towards his personal enemies. he is to me a most entertaining writer; far superior to clarendon in the art of amusing, though of course far clarendon's inferior in discernment, and in dignity and correctness of style. do you know, by the bye, clarendon's life of himself? i like it, the part after the restoration at least, better than his great history. i am very quiet; rise at seven or half-past; read spanish till ten; breakfast; walk to my office; stay there till four; take a long walk, dine towards seven; and am in bed before eleven. i am going through don quixote again, and admire it more than ever. it is certainly the best novel in the world, beyond all comparison. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: october , . my dear sister,--grant is here at last, and we have had a very long talk about matters both public and private. the government would support my appointment; but he expects violent opposition from the company. he mentioned my name to the chairs, and they were furious. they know that i have been against them through the whole course of the negotiations which resulted in the india bill. they put their opposition on the ground of my youth,--a very flattering objection to a man who this week completes his thirty-third year. they spoke very highly of me in other respects; but they seemed quite obstinate. the question now is whether their opposition will be supported by the other directors. if it should be so, i have advised grant most strongly to withdraw my name, to put up some other man, and then to fight the battle to the utmost. we shall be suspected of jobbing if we proceed to extremities on behalf of one of ourselves; but we can do what we like, if it is in favour of some person whom we cannot be suspected of supporting from interested motives. from the extreme unreasonableness and pertinacity which are discernible in every communication that we receive from the india house at present, i am inclined to think that i have no chance of being chosen by them, without a dispute in which i should not wish the government to engage for such a purpose. lord grey says that i have a right to their support if i ask for it; but that, for the sake of his administration generally, he is very adverse to my going. i do not think that i shall go. however, a few days will decide the matter. i have heard from napier. he praises my article on walpole in terms absolutely extravagant. he says that it is the best that i ever wrote; and, entre nous, i am not very far from agreeing with him. i am impatient to have your opinion. no flattery pleases me so much as domestic flattery. you will have the number within the week. ever yours t. b. m to macvey napier, esq. london: october , . dear napier,--i am glad to learn that you like my article. i like it myself; which is not much my habit. very likely the public, which has often been kinder to my performances than i was, may on this, as on other occasions, differ from me in opinion. if the paper has any merit, it owes it to the delay of which you must, i am sure, have complained very bitterly in your heart. i was so thoroughly dissatisfied with the article, as it stood at first, that i completely re-wrote it; altered the whole arrangement; left out ten or twelve pages in one part; and added twice as many in another. i never wrote anything so slowly as the first half, or so rapidly as the last half. you are in an error about akenside, which i must clear up for his credit, and for mine. you are confounding the ode to curio and the epistle to curio. the latter is generally printed at the end of akenside's works, and is, i think, the best thing that he ever wrote. the ode is worthless. it is merely an abridgment of the epistle executed in the most unskilful way. johnson says, in his life of akenside, that no poet ever so much mistook his powers as akenside when he took to lyric composition. "having," i think the words are, "written with great force and poignancy his epistle to curio, he afterwards transformed it into an ode only disgraceful to its author." ["akenside was one of the fiercest and the most uncompromising of the young patriots out of parliament. when he found that the change of administration had produced no change of system, he gave vent to his indignation in the 'epistle to curio,' the best poem that he ever wrote; a poem, indeed, which seems to indicate that, if he had left lyrical composition to cray and collins, and had employed his powers in grave and elevated satire, he might have disputed the pre-eminence of dryden." this passage occurs in macaulay's essay on horace walpole. in the course of the same essay, macaulay remarks that "lord chesterfield stands much lower in the estimation of posterity than he would have done if his letters had never been published."] when i said that chesterfield had lost by the publication of his letters, i of course considered that he had much to lose; that he has left an immense reputation, founded on the testimony of all his contemporaries of all parties, for wit, taste, and eloquence; that what remains of his parliamentary oratory is superior to anything of that time that has come down to us, except a little of pitt's. the utmost that can be said of the letters is that they are the letters of a cleverish man; and there are not many which are entitled even to that praise. i think he would have stood higher if we had been left to judge of his powers,--as we judge of those of chatham, mansfield, charles townshend, and many others,--only by tradition, and by fragments of speeches preserved in parliamentary reports. i said nothing about lord byron's criticism on walpole, because i thought it, like most of his lordship's criticism, below refutation. on the drama lord byron wrote more nonsense than on any subject. he wanted to have restored the unities. his practice proved as unsuccessful as his theory was absurd. his admiration of the "mysterious mother" was of a piece with his thinking gifford, and rogers, greater poets than wordsworth, and coleridge. ever yours truly t. b. macaulay. london: october , . dear hannah,--i wish to have malkin as head of the commission at canton, and grant seems now to be strongly bent on the same plan. [sir benjamin malkin, a college friend of macaulay, was afterwards a judge in the supreme court at calcutta.] malkin is a man of singular temper, judgment, and firmness of nerve. danger and responsibility, instead of agitating and confusing him, always bring out whatever there is in him. this was the reason of his great success at cambridge. he made a figure there far beyond his learning or his talents, though both his learning and his talents are highly respectable. but the moment that he sate down to be examined, which is just the situation in which all other people, from natural flurry, do worse than at other times, he began to do his very best. his intellect became clearer, and his manner more quiet, than usual. he is the very man to make up his mind in three minutes if the viceroy of canton were in a rage, the mob bellowing round the doors of the factory, and an english ship of war making preparations to bombard the town. a propos of places, my father has been at me again about p--. would you think it? this lad has a hundred and twenty pounds a year for life! i could not believe my ears; but so it is; and i, who have not a penny, with half a dozen brothers and sisters as poor as myself, am to move heaven and earth to push this boy who, as he is the silliest, is also, i think, the richest relation that i have in the world. i am to dine on thursday with the fishmongers' company, the first company for gourmandise in the world. their magnificent hall near london bridge is not yet built, but, as respects eating and drinking, i shall be no loser; for we are to be entertained at the albion tavern. this is the first dinner-party that i shall have been to for a long time. there is nobody in town that i know except official men, and they have left their wives and households in the country. i met poodle byng, it is true, the day before yesterday in the street; and he begged me to make haste to brooks's; for lord essex was there, he said, whipping up for a dinner-party; cursing and swearing at all his friends for being out of town; and wishing--what an honour!--that macaulay was in london. i preserved all the dignity of a young lady in an affaire du coeur. "i shall not run after my lord, i assure you. if he wants me, he knows where he may hear of me." this nibble is the nearest approach to a dinner-party that i have had. ever yours t. b. m. london: november , . dear hannah,--i have not much to add to what i told you yesterday; but everything that i have to add looks one way. we have a new chairman and deputy chairman, both very strongly in my favour. sharp, by whom i sate yesterday at the fishmongers' dinner, told me that my old enemy james mill had spoken to him on the subject. mill is, as you have heard, at the head of one of the principal departments of the india house. the late chairman consulted him about me; hoping, i suppose, to have his support against me. mill said, very handsomely, that he would advise the company to take me; for, as public men went, i was much above the average, and, if they rejected me, he thought it very unlikely that they would get anybody so fit. this is all the news that i have to give you. it is not much. but i wish to keep you as fully informed of what is going on as i am myself. old sharp told me that i was acting quite wisely, but that he should never see me again; and he cried as he said it. [mr. sharp died in , before macaulay's return from india.] i encouraged him; and told him that i hoped to be in england again before the end of , and that there was nothing impossible in our meeting again. he cheered up after a time; told me that he should correspond with me, and give me all the secret history both of politics and of society; and promised to select the best books, and send them regularly to me. the fishmongers' dinner was very good, but not so profusely splendid as i had expected. there has been a change, i find, and not before it was wanted. they had got at one time to dining at ten guineas a head. they drank my health, and i harangued them with immense applause. i talked all the evening to sharp. i told him what a dear sister i had, and how readily she had agreed to go with me. i had told grant the same in the morning. both of them extolled my good fortune in having such a companion. ever yours t. b. m. london: november--, . dear hannah,--things stand as they stood; except that the report of my appointment is every day spreading more widely; and that i am beset by advertising dealers begging leave to make up a hundred cotton shirts for me, and fifty muslin gowns for you, and by clerks out of place begging to be my secretaries. i am not in very high spirits to-day, as i have just received a letter from poor ellis, to whom i had not communicated my intentions till yesterday. he writes so affectionately and so plaintively that he quite cuts me to the heart. there are few indeed from whom i shall part with so much pain; and he, poor fellow, says that, next to his wife, i am the person for whom he feels the most thorough attachment, and in whom he places the most unlimited confidence. on the th of this month there is to be a dinner given to lushington by the electors of the tower hamlets. he has persecuted me with importunities to attend, and make a speech for him; and my father has joined in the request. it is enough, in these times, heaven knows, for a man who represents, as i do, a town of a hundred and twenty thousand people to keep his own constituents in good humour; and the spitalfields weavers, and whitechapel butchers, are nothing to me. but, ever since i succeeded in what everybody allows to have been the most hazardous attempt of the kind ever made,--i mean in persuading an audience of manufacturers, all whigs or radicals, that the immediate alteration of the corn-laws was impossible,--i have been considered as a capital physician for desperate cases in politics. however,--to return from that delightful theme, my own praises,--lushington, who is not very popular with the rabble of the tower hamlets, thinks that an oration from me would give him a lift. i could not refuse him directly, backed as he was by my father. i only said that i would attend if i were in london on the th; but i added that, situated as i was, i thought it very probable that i should be out of town. i shall go to-night to miss berry's soiree. i do not know whether i told you that she resented my article on horace walpole so much that sir stratford canning advised me not to go near her. she was walpole's greatest favourite. his reminiscences are addressed to her in terms of the most gallant eulogy. when he was dying at past eighty, he asked her to marry him, merely that he might make her a countess and leave her his fortune. you know that in vivian grey she is called miss otranto. i always expected that my article would put her into a passion, and i was not mistaken; but she has come round again, and sent me a most pressing and kind invitation the other day. i have been racketing lately, having dined twice with rogers, and once with grant. lady holland is in a most extraordinary state. she came to rogers's, with allen, in so bad a humour that we were all forced to rally, and make common cause against her. there was not a person at table to whom she was not rude; and none of us were inclined to submit. rogers sneered; sydney made merciless sport of her. tom moore looked excessively impertinent; bobus put her down with simple straightforward rudeness; and i treated her with what i meant to be the coldest civility. allen flew into a rage with us all, and especially with sydney, whose guffaws, as the scotch say, were indeed tremendous. when she and all the rest were gone, rogers made tom moore and me sit down with him for half an hour, and we coshered over the events of the evening. rogers said that he thought allen's firing up in defence of his patroness the best thing that he had seen in him. no sooner had tom and i got into the street than he broke forth: "that such an old stager as rogers should talk such nonsense, and give allen credit for attachment to anything but his dinner! allen was bursting with envy to see us so free, while he was conscious of his own slavery." her ladyship has been the better for this discipline. she has overwhelmed me ever since with attentions and invitations. i have at last found out the cause of her ill-humour, or at least of that portion of it of which i was the object. she is in a rage at my article on walpole, but at what part of it i cannot tell. i know that she is very intimate with the waldegraves, to whom the manuscripts belong, and for whose benefit the letters were published. but my review was surely not calculated to injure the sale of the book. lord holland told me, in an aside, that he quite agreed with me, but that we had better not discuss the subject. a note; and, by my life, from my lady holland: "dear mr. macaulay, pray wrap yourself very warm, and come to us on wednesday." no, my good lady. i am engaged on wednesday to dine at the albion tavern with the directors of the east india company; now my servants; next week, i hope, to be my masters. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: november , . my dear sister,--the decision is postponed for a week; but there is no chance of an unfavourable result. the chairs have collected the opinions of their brethren; and the result is, that, of the twenty-four directors, only six or seven at the most will vote against me. i dined with the directors on wednesday at the albion tavern. we had a company of about sixty persons, and many eminent military men amongst them. the very courteous manner in which several of the directors begged to be introduced to me, and drank my health at dinner, led me to think that the chairs have not overstated the feeling of the court. one of them, an old indian and a great friend of our uncle the general, told me in plain words that he was glad to hear that i was to be in their service. another, whom i do not even know by sight, pressed the chairman to propose my health. the chairman with great judgment refused. it would have been very awkward to have had to make a speech to them in the present circumstances. of course, my love, all your expenses, from the day of my appointment, are my affair. my present plan, formed after conversation with experienced east indians, is not to burden myself with an extravagant outfit. i shall take only what will be necessary for the voyage. plate, wine, coaches, furniture, glass, china, can be bought in calcutta as well as in london. i shall not have money enough to fit myself out handsomely with such things here; and to fit myself out shabbily would be folly. i reckon that we can bring our whole expense for the passage within the twelve hundred pounds allowed by the company. my calculation is that our cabins and board will cost l apiece. the passage of our servants l apiece. that makes up l . my clothes and etceteras, as mrs. meeke observes, i will, i am quite sure, come within l . [mrs. meeke was his favourite among bad novel-writers, see page .] yours will, of course, be more. i will send you l to lay out as you like; not meaning to confine you to it, by any means; but you would probably prefer having a sum down to sending in your milliner's bills to me. i reckon my servant's outfit at l ; your maid's at as much more. the whole will be l . one word about your maid. you really must choose with great caution. hitherto the company has required that all ladies, who take maidservants with them from this country to india, should give security to send them back within two years. the reason was, that no class of people misconducted themselves so much in the east as female servants from this country. they generally treat the natives with gross insolence; an insolence natural enough to people accustomed to stand in a subordinate relation to others when, for the first time, they find a great population placed in a servile relation towards them. then, too, the state of society is such that they are very likely to become mistresses of the wealthy europeans, and to flaunt about in magnificent palanquins, bringing discredit on their country by the immorality of their lives and the vulgarity of their manners. on these grounds the company has hitherto insisted upon their being sent back at the expense of those who take them out. the late act will enable your servant to stay in india, if she chooses to stay. i hope, therefore, that you will be careful in your selection. you see how much depends upon it. the happiness and concord of our native household, which will probably consist of sixty or seventy people, may be destroyed by her, if she should be ill-tempered and arrogant. if she should be weak and vain, she will probably form connections that will ruin her morals and her reputation. i am no preacher, as you very well know; but i have a strong sense of the responsibility under which we shall both lie with respect to a poor girl, brought by us into the midst of temptations of which she cannot be aware, and which have turned many heads that might have been steady enough in a quiet nursery or kitchen in england. to find a man and wife, both of whom would suit us, would be very difficult; and i think it right, also, to offer to my clerk to keep him in my service. he is honest, intelligent, and respectful; and, as he is rather inclined to consumption, the change of climate would probably be useful to him. i cannot bear the thought of throwing any person who has been about me for five years, and with whom i have no fault to find, out of bread, while it is in my power to retain his services. ever yours t. b. m. london: december , dear lord lansdowne,--i delayed returning an answer to your kind letter till this day, in order that i might be able to send you definite intelligence. yesterday evening the directors appointed me to a seat in the council of india. the votes were nineteen for me, and three against me. i feel that the sacrifice which i am about to make is great. but the motives which urge me to make it are quite irresistible. every day that i live i become less and less desirous of great wealth. but every day makes me more sensible of the importance of a competence. without a competence it is not very easy for a public man to be honest; it is almost impossible for him to be thought so. i am so situated that i can subsist only in two ways: by being in office, and by my pen. hitherto, literature has been merely my relaxation,--the amusement of perhaps a month in the year. i have never considered it as the means of support. i have chosen my own topics, taken my own time, and dictated my own terms. the thought of becoming a bookseller's hack; of writing to relieve, not the fulness of the mind, but the emptiness of the pocket; of spurring a jaded fancy to reluctant exertion; of filling sheets with trash merely that the sheets may be filled; of bearing from publishers and editors what dryden bore from tonson, and what, to my own knowledge, mackintosh bore from lardner, is horrible to me. yet thus it must be, if i should quit office. yet to hold office merely for the sake of emolument would be more horrible still. the situation, in which i have been placed for some time back, would have broken the spirit of many men. it has rather tended to make me the most mutinous and unmanageable of the followers of the government. i tendered my resignation twice during the course of the last session. i certainly should not have done so if i had been a man of fortune. you, whom malevolence itself could never accuse of coveting office for the sake of pecuniary gain, and whom your salary very poorly compensates for the sacrifice of ease, and of your tastes, to the public service, cannot estimate rightly the feelings of a man who knows that his circumstances lay him open to the suspicion of being actuated in his public conduct by the lowest motives. once or twice, when i have been defending unpopular measures in the house of commons, that thought has disordered my ideas, and deprived me of my presence of mind. if this were all, i should feel that, for the sake of my own happiness and of my public utility, a few years would be well spent in obtaining an independence. but this is not all. i am not alone in the world. a family which i love most fondly is dependent on me. unless i would see my father left in his old age to the charity of less near relations; my youngest brother unable to obtain a good professional education; my sisters, who are more to me than any sisters ever were to a brother, forced to turn governesses or humble companions,--i must do something, i must make some effort. an opportunity has offered itself. it is in my power to make the last days of my father comfortable, to educate my brother, to provide for my sisters, to procure a competence for myself. i may hope, by the time i am thirty-nine or forty, to return to england with a fortune of thirty thousand pounds. to me that would be affluence. i never wished for more. as far as english politics are concerned, i lose, it is true, a few years. but, if your kindness had not introduced me very early to parliament,--if i had been left to climb up the regular path of my profession, and to rise by my own efforts,--i should have had very little chance of being in the house of commons at forty. if i have gained any distinction in the eyes of my countrymen,--if i have acquired any knowledge of parliamentary and official business, and any habitude for the management of great affairs,--i ought to consider these things as clear gain. then, too, the years of my absence, though lost, as far as english politics are concerned, will not, i hope, be wholly lost, as respects either my own mind or the happiness of my fellow-creatures. i can scarcely conceive a nobler field than that which our indian empire now presents to a statesman. while some of my partial friends are blaming me for stooping to accept a share in the government of that empire, i am afraid that i am aspiring too high for my qualifications. i sometimes feel, i most unaffectedly declare, depressed and appalled by the immense responsibility which i have undertaken. you are one of the very few public men of our time who have bestowed on indian affairs the attention which they deserve; and you will therefore, i am sure, fully enter into my feelings. and now, dear lord lansdowne, let me thank you most warmly for the kind feeling which has dictated your letter. that letter is, indeed, but a very small part of what i ought to thank you for. that at an early age i have gained some credit in public life; that i have done some little service to more than one good cause; that i now have it in my power to repair the ruined fortunes of my family, and to save those who are dearest to me from the misery and humiliation of dependence; that i am almost certain, if i live, of obtaining a competence by honourable means before i am past the full vigour of manhood,--this i owe to your kindness. i will say no more. i will only entreat you to believe that neither now, nor on any former occasion, have i ever said one thousandth part of what i feel. if it will not be inconvenient to you, i propose to go to bowood on wednesday next. labouchere will be my fellow-traveller. on saturday we must both return to town. short as my visit must be, i look forward to it with great pleasure. believe me, ever, yours most faithfully and affectionately t. b. macaulay. to hannah m. macaulay. london: december , my dear sister,--i am overwhelmed with business, clearing off my work here, and preparing for my new functions. plans of ships, and letters from captains, pour in without intermission. i really am mobbed with gentlemen begging to have the honour of taking me to india at my own time. the fact is that a member of council is a great catch, not merely on account of the high price which he directly pays for accommodation, but because other people are attracted by him. every father of a young writer, or a young cadet, likes to have his son on board the same vessel with the great man, to dine at the same table, and to have a chance of attracting his notice. everything in india is given by the governor in council; and, though i have no direct voice in the disposal of patronage, my indirect influence may be great. grant's kindness through all these negotiations has been such as i really cannot describe. he told me yesterday, with tears in his eyes, that he did not know what the board would do without me. i attribute his feeling partly to robert grant's absence; not that robert ever did me ill offices with him far from it; but grant's is a mind that cannot stand alone. it is begging your pardon for my want of gallantry, a feminine mind. it turns, like ivy, to some support. when robert is near him, he clings to robert. robert being away, he clings to me. this may be a weakness in a public man; but i love him the better for it. i have lately met sir james graham at dinner. he took me aside, and talked to me on my appointment with a warmth of kindness which, though we have been always on good terms, surprised me. but the approach of a long separation, like the approach of death, brings out all friendly feelings with unusual strength. the cabinet, he said, felt the loss strongly. it was great at the india board, but in the house of commons, (he used the word over and over,) "irreparable." they all, however, he said, agreed that a man of honour could not make politics a profession unless he had a competence of his own, without exposing himself to privation of the severest kind. they felt that they had never had it in their power to do all they wished to do for me. they had no means of giving me a provision in england; and they could not refuse me what i asked in india. he said very strongly that they all thought that i judged quite wisely; and added that, if god heard his prayers, and spared my health, i should make a far greater figure in public life than if i had remained during the next five or six years in england. i picked up in a print-shop the other day some superb views of the suburbs of chowringhee, and the villas of the garden reach. selina professes that she is ready to die with envy of the fine houses and verandahs. i heartily wish we were back again in a nice plain brick house, three windows in front, in cadogan place or russell square, with twelve or fifteen hundred a year, and a spare bedroom,--(we, like mrs. norris, [a leading personage in miss austen's "mansfield park."] must always have a spare bedroom,)--for edward and margaret, love to them both. ever yours t. b. m. to macvey napier, esq. london: december , dear napier,--you are probably not unprepared for what i am about to tell you. yesterday evening the directors of the east india company elected me one of the members of the supreme council. it will, therefore, be necessary that in a few weeks,--ten weeks, at furthest,--i should leave this country for a few years. it would be mere affectation in me to pretend not to know that my support is of some importance to the edinburgh review. in the situation in which i shall now be placed, a connection with the review will be of some importance to me. i know well how dangerous it is for a public man wholly to withdraw himself from the public eye. during an absence of six years, i run some risk of losing most of the distinction, literary and political, which i have acquired. as a means of keeping myself in the recollection of my countrymen during my sojourn abroad the review will be invaluable to me; nor do i foresee that there will be the slightest difficulty in my continuing to write for you at least as much as ever. i have thought over my late articles, and i really can scarcely call to mind a single sentence in any one of them which might not have been written at calcutta as easily as in london. perhaps in india i might not have the means of detecting two or three of the false dates in croker's boswell. but that would have been all. very little, if any, of the effect of my most popular articles is produced either by minute research into rare books, or by allusions to mere topics of the day. i think therefore that we might easily establish a commerce mutually beneficial. i shall wish to be supplied with all the good books which come out in this part of the world. indeed, many books which in themselves are of little value, and which, if i were in england, i should not think it worth while to read, will be interesting to me in india; just as the commonest daubs, and the rudest vessels, at pompeii attract the minute attention of people who would not move their eyes to see a modern signpost, or a modern kettle. distance of place, like distance of time, makes trifles valuable. what i propose, then, is that you should pay me for the articles which i may send you from india, not in money, but in books. as to the amount i make no stipulations. you know that i have never haggled about such matters. as to the choice of books, the mode of transmission, and other matters, we shall have ample time to discuss them before my departure. let me know whether you are willing to make an arrangement on this basis. i have not forgotten chatham in the midst of my avocations. i hope to send you an article on him early next week. ever yours sincerely t. b. macaulay. from the right hon. francis jeffrey to macvey napier, esq. , moray place saturday evening, december my dear napier,--i am very much obliged to you for the permission to read this. it is to me, i will confess, a solemn and melancholy announcement. i ought not, perhaps, so to consider it. but i cannot help it. i was not prepared for six years, and i must still hope that it will not be so much. at my age, and with that climate for him, the chances of our ever meeting again are terribly endangered by such a term. he does not know the extent of the damage which his secession may be to the great cause of liberal government. his anticipations and offers about the review are generous and pleasing, and must be peculiarly gratifying to you. i think, if you can, you should try to see him before he goes, and i envy you the meeting. ever very faithfully yours f. jeffrey. to hannah m. macaulay. london: december , . my dear sister,--yesterday i dined at boddington's. we had a very agreeable party: duncannon, charles grant, sharp, chantrey the sculptor, bobus smith, and james mill. mill and i were extremely friendly, and i found him a very pleasant companion, and a man of more general information than i had imagined. bobus was very amusing. he is a great authority on indian matters. he was during several years advocate-general in bengal, and made all his large fortune there. i asked him about the climate. nothing, he said, could be pleasanter, except in august and september. he never ate or drank so much in his life. indeed, his looks do credit to bengal; for a healthier man of his age i never saw. we talked about expenses. "i cannot conceive," he said, "how anybody at calcutta can live on less than l , a year, or can contrive to spend more than l , ." we talked of the insects and snakes, and he said a thing which reminded me of his brother sydney: "always, sir, manage to have at your table some fleshy, blooming, young writer or cadet, just come out; that the musquitoes may stick to him, and leave the rest of the company alone." i have been with george babington to the asia. we saw her to every disadvantage, all litter and confusion; but she is a fine ship, and our cabins will be very good. the captain i like much. he is an agreeable, intelligent, polished man of forty; and very good-looking, considering what storms and changes of climate he has gone through. he advised me strongly to put little furniture into our cabins. i told him to have yours made as neat as possible, without regard to expense. he has promised to have it furnished simply, but prettily; and when you see it, if any addition occurs to you, it shall be made. i shall spare nothing to make a pretty little boudoir for you. you cannot think how my friends here praise you. you are quite sir james graham's heroine. to-day i breakfasted with sharp, whose kindness is as warm as possible. indeed, all my friends seen to be in the most amiable mood. i have twice as many invitations as i can accept; and i have been frequently begged to name my own party. empty as london is, i never was so much beset with invitations. sharp asked me about you. i told him how much i regretted my never having had any opportunity of showing you the best part of london society. he said that he would take care that you should see what was best worth seeing before your departure. he promises to give us a few breakfast-parties and dinner-parties, where you will meet as many as he can muster of the best set in town,--rogers, luttrell, rice, tom moore, sydney smith, grant, and other great wits and politicians. i am quite delighted at this; both because you will, i am sure, be amused, and pleased, at a time when you ought to have your mind occupied, and because even to have mixed a little in a circle so brilliant will be of advantage to you in india. you have neglected, and very rightly and sensibly, frivolous accomplishments; you have not been at places of fashionable diversion; and it is, therefore, the more desirable that you should appear among the dancing, pianoforte-playing, opera-going, damsels at calcutta as one who has seen society better than any that they ever approached. i hope that you will not disapprove of what i have done. i accepted sharp's offer for you eagerly. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: january , . my dear sister,--i am busy with an article for napier. [the first article on lord chatham.] i cannot in the least tell at present whether i shall like it or not. i proceed with great ease; and in general i have found that the success of my writings has been in proportion to the ease with which they have been written. i had a most extraordinary scene with lady holland. if she had been as young and handsome as she was thirty years ago, she would have turned my head. she was quite hysterical about my going; paid me such compliments as i cannot repeat; cried; raved; called me dear, dear macaulay. "you are sacrificed to your family. i see it all. you are too good to them. they are always making a tool of you; last session about the slaves; and now sending you to india!" i always do my best to keep my temper with lady holland for three reasons; because she is a woman; because she is very unhappy in her health, and in the circumstances of her position; and because she has a real kindness for me. but at last she said something about you. this was too much, and i was beginning to answer her in a voice trembling with anger, when she broke out again: "i beg your pardon. pray forgive me, dear macaulay. i was very impertinent. i know you will forgive me. nobody has such a temper as you. i have said so a hundred times. i said so to allen only this morning. i am sure you will bear with my weakness. i shall never see you again;" and she cried, and i cooled; for it would have been to very little purpose to be angry with her. i hear that it is not to me alone that she runs on in this way. she storms at the ministers for letting me go. i was told that at one dinner she became so violent that even lord holland, whose temper, whatever his wife may say, is much cooler than mine, could not command himself, and broke out: "don't talk such nonsense, my lady. what, the devil! can we tell a gentleman who has a claim upon us that he must lose his only chance of getting an independence in order that he may come and talk to you in an evening?" good-bye, and take care not to become so fond of your own will as my lady. it is now my duty to omit no opportunity of giving you wholesome advice. i am henceforward your sole guardian. i have bought gisborne's duties of women, moore's fables for the female sex, mrs. king's female scripture characters, and fordyce's sermons. with the help of these books i hope to keep my responsibility in order on our voyage, and in india. ever yours t. b. m. to hannah m. macaulay. london: january , . my dear sister,--i am now buying books; not trashy books which will only bear one reading; but good books for a library. i have my eye on all the bookstalls; and i shall no longer suffer you, when we walk together in london, to drag me past them as you used to do. pray make out a list of any which you would like to have. the provision which i design for the voyage is richardson, voltaire's works, gibbon, sismondi's history of the french, davila, the orlando in italian, don quixote in spanish, homer in greek, horace in latin. i must also have some books of jurisprudence, and some to initiate me in persian and hindostanee. shall i buy "dunallan" for you? i believe that in your eyes it would stand in the place of all the rest together. but, seriously, let me know what you would like me to procure. ellis is making a little collection of greek classics for me. sharp has given me one or two very rare and pretty books, which i much wanted. all the edinburgh reviews are being bound, so that we shall have a complete set, up to the forth coming number, which will contain an article of mine on chatham. and this reminds me that i must give over writing to you, and fall to my article. i rather think that it will be a good one. ever yours t. b. m. london: february , . dear napier,--it is true that i have been severely tried by ill-health during the last few weeks; but i am now rapidly recovering, and am assured by all my medical advisers that a week of the sea will make me better than ever i was in my life. i have several subjects in my head. one is mackintosh's history; i mean the fragment of the large work. another plan which i have is a very fine one, if it could be well executed. i think that the time is come when a fair estimate may be formed of the intellectual and moral character of voltaire. the extreme veneration, with which he was regarded during his lifetime, has passed away; the violent reaction, which followed, has spent itself; and the world can now, i think, bear to hear the truth, and to see the man exhibited as he was,--a strange mixture of greatness and littleness, virtues and vices. i have all his works, and shall take them in my cabin on the voyage. but my library is not particularly rich in those books which illustrate the literary history of his times. i have rousseau, and marmontel's memoirs, and madame du deffand's letters, and perhaps a few other works which would be of use. but grimm's correspondence, and several other volumes of memoirs and letters, would be necessary. if you would make a small collection of the works which would be most useful in this point of view, and send it after me as soon as possible, i will do my best to draw a good voltaire. i fear that the article must be enormously long,--seventy pages perhaps;--but you know that i do not run into unnecessary lengths. i may perhaps try my hand on miss austen's novels. that is a subject on which i shall require no assistance from books. whatever volumes you may send me ought to be half bound; or the white ants will devour them before they have been three days on shore. besides the books which may be necessary for the review, i should like to have any work of very striking merit which may appear during my absence. the particular department of literature which interests me most is history; above all, english history. any valuable book on that subject i should wish to possess. sharp, miss berry, and some of my other friends, will perhaps, now and then, suggest a book to you. but it is principally on your own judgment that i must rely to keep me well supplied. yours most truly t. b. macaulay. on the th of february macaulay bade farewell to his electors, in an address which the leeds tories probably thought too high-flown for the occasion. ["if, now that i have ceased to be your servant, and am only your sincere and grateful friend, i may presume to offer you advice which must, at least, be allowed to be disinterested, i would say to you: act towards your future representatives as you have acted towards me. choose them, as you chose me, without canvassing and without expense. encourage them, as you encouraged me, always to speak to you fearlessly and plainly. reject, as you have hitherto rejected, the wages of dishonour. defy, as you have hitherto defied, the threats of petty tyrants. never forget that the worst and most degrading species of corruption is the corruption which operates, not by hopes, but by fears. cherish those noble and virtuous principles for which we have struggled and triumphed together--the principles of liberty and toleration, of justice and order. support, as you have steadily supported, the cause of good government; and may all the blessings which are the natural fruits of good government descend upon you and be multiplied to you an hundredfold! may your manufactures flourish; may your trade be extended; may your riches increase! may the works of your skill, and the signs of your prosperity, meet me in the furthest regions of the east, and give me fresh cause to be proud of the intelligence, the industry, and the spirit of my constituents!"] but he had not yet done with the house of commons. parliament met on the first tuesday in the month; and, on the wednesday, o'connell, who had already contrived to make two speeches since the session began, rose for a third time to call attention to words uttered during the recess by mr. hill, the member for hull. that gentleman, for want of something better to say to his constituents, had told them that he happened to know "that an irish member, who spoke with great violence against every part of the coercion bill, and voted against every clause of it, went to ministers and said: 'don't bate a single atom of that bill, or it will be impossible for any man to live in ireland."' o'connell called upon lord althorp, as the representative of the government, to say what truth there was in this statement. lord althorp, taken by surprise, acted upon the impulse of the moment, which in his case was a feeling of reluctance to throw over poor mr. hill to be bullied by o'connell and his redoubtable tail. after explaining that no set and deliberate communication of the nature mentioned had been made to the ministers, his lordship went on to say that he "should not act properly if he did not declare that he had good reason to believe that some irish members did, in private conversation, use very different language" from what they had employed in public. it was chivalrously, but most unwisely, spoken. o'connell at once gave the cue by inquiring whether he himself was among the members referred to, and lord althorp assured him that such was not the case. the speaker tried to interfere; but the matter had gone too far. one irish representative after another jumped up to repeat the same question with regard to his own case, and received the same answer. at length sheil rose, and asked whether he was one of the members to whole the noble lord had alluded. lord althorp replied: "yes. the honourable and learned gentleman is one." sheil, "in the face of his country, and the presence of his god," asserted that the individual who had given any such information to the noble lord was guilty of a "gross and scandalous calumny," and added that he understood the noble lord to have made himself responsible for the imputation. then ensued one of those scenes in which the house of commons appears at its very worst. all the busybodies, as their manner is, rushed to the front; and hour after hour slipped away in an unseemly, intricate, and apparently interminable wrangle. sheil was duly called upon to give an assurance that the affair should not be carried beyond the walls of the house. he refused to comply, and was committed to the charge of the sergeant at arms. the speaker then turned to lord althorp, who promised in parliamentary language not to send a challenge. upon this, as is graphically enough described in the conventional terms of hansard, "mr o'connell made some observation to the honourable member sitting next him which was not heard in the body of the house. lord althorp immediately rose, and amid loud cheers, and with considerable warmth, demanded to know what the honourable and learned gentleman meant by his gesticulation;" and then, after an explanation from o'connell, his lordship went on to use phrases which very clearly signified that, though he had no cause for sending a challenge, he had just as little intention of declining one; upon which he likewise was made over to the sergeant. before, however, honourable members went to their dinners, they had the relief of learning that their refractory colleagues had submitted to the speaker's authority, and had been discharged from custody. there was only one way out of the difficulty. on the th of february a committee of investigation was appointed, composed of members who enjoyed a special reputation for discretion. mr. hill called his witnesses. the first had nothing relevant to tell. macaulay was the second; and he forthwith cut the matter short by declaring that, on principle, he refused to disclose what had passed in private conversation; a sentiment which was actually cheered by the committee. one sentence of common sense brought the absurd embroilment to a rational conclusion. mr. hill saw his mistake; begged that no further evidence might be taken; and, at the next sitting of the house, withdrew his charge in unqualified terms of self-abasement and remorse. lord althorp readily admitted that he had acted "imprudently as a man, and still more imprudently as a minister," and stated that he considered himself bound to accept sheil's denial; but he could not manage so to frame his remarks as to convey to his hearers the idea that his opinion of that honourable gentleman had been raised by the transaction. sheil acknowledged the two apologies with effusion proportioned to their respective value; and so ended an affair which, at the worst, had evoked a fresh proof of that ingrained sincerity of character for the sake of which his party would have followed lord althorp to the death. [in macaulay's journal for june , , we read: "i went to breakfast with the bishop of oxford, and there learned that sheil was dead. poor fellow! we talked about sheil, and i related my adventure of february . odd that it should have been so little known or so completely forgotten!"] gravesend: february , . dear lord lansdowne,--i had hoped that it would have been in my power to shake hands with you once more before my departure; but this deplorably absurd affair in the house of commons has prevented me from calling on you. i lost a whole day while the committee were deciding whether i should, or should not, be forced to repeat all the foolish, shabby, things that i had heard sheil say at brooks's. everybody thought me right, as i certainly was. i cannot leave england without sending a few lines to you,--and yet they are needless. it is unnecessary for me to say with what feelings i shall always remember our connection, and with what interest i shall always learn tidings of you and of your family. yours most sincerely t. b. macaulay. chapter vi. - . the outward voyage--arrival at madras--macaulay is summoned to join lord william bentinck in the neilgherries--his journey up-country--his native servant--arcot--bangalore-- seringapatam--ascent of the neilgherries--first sight of the governor-general--letters to mr. ellis, and the miss macaulays--a summer on the neilgherries--native christians-- clarissa--a tragi-comedy--macaulay leaves the neilgherries, travels to calcutta, and there sets up house--letters to mr. napier, and mrs. cropper--mr. trevelyan--marriage of hannah macaulay--death of mrs. cropper--macaulay's work in india-- his minutes for council--freedom of the press--literary gratitude--second minute on the freedom of the press--the black act--a calcutta public meeting--macaulay's defence of the policy of the indian government--his minute on education--he becomes president of the committee of public instruction--his industry in discharging the functions of that post--specimens of his official writing--results of his labours--he is appointed president of the law commission, and recommends the framing of a criminal code--appearance of the code--comments of mr. fitzjames stephen--macaulay's private life in india--oriental delicacies--breakfast- parties--macaulay's longing for england--calcutta and dublin--departure from india--letters to mr. ellis, mr. sharp, mr. napier, and mr. z. macaulay. from the moment that a deputation of falmouth whigs, headed by their mayor, came on board to wish macaulay his health in india and a happy return to england, nothing occurred that broke the monotony of an easy and rapid voyage. "the catching of a shark; the shooting of an albatross; a sailor tumbling down the hatchway and breaking his head; a cadet getting drunk and swearing at the captain," are incidents to which not even the highest literary power can impart the charm of novelty in the eyes of the readers of a seafaring nation. the company on the quarterdeck was much on a level with the average society of an east indiaman. "hannah will give you the histories of all these good people at length, i dare say, for she was extremely social; danced with the gentlemen in the evenings, and read novels and sermons with the ladies in the mornings. i contented myself with being very civil whenever i was with the other passengers, and took care to be with them as little as i could. except at meals, i hardly exchanged a word with any human being. i never was left for so long a time so completely to my own resources; and i am glad to say that i found them quite sufficient to keep me cheerful and employed. during the whole voyage i read with keen and increasing enjoyment. i devoured greek, latin, spanish, italian, french, and english; folios, quartos, octavos, and duodecimos." on the th of june the vessel lay to off madras; and macaulay had his first introduction to the people for whom he was appointed to legislate in the person of a boatman who pulled through the surf on his raft. "he came on board with nothing on him but a pointed yellow cap, and walked among us with a self-possession and civility which, coupled with his colour and his nakedness, nearly made me die of laughing." this gentleman was soon followed by more responsible messengers, who brought tidings the reverse of welcome. lord william bentinck, who was then governor-general, was detained by ill-health at ootacamund in the neilgherry hills; a place which, by name at least, is now as familiar to englishmen as malvern; but which in was known to macaulay, by vague report, as situated somewhere "in the mountains of malabar, beyond mysore." the state of public business rendered it necessary that the council should meet; and, as the governor-general had left one member of that body in bengal as his deputy, he was not able to make a quorum until his new colleague arrived from england. a pressing summons to attend his lordship in the hills placed macaulay in some embarrassment on account of his sister, who could not with safety commence her eastern experiences by a journey of four hundred miles up the country in the middle of june. happily the second letter which he opened proved to be from bishop wilson, who insisted that the son and daughter of so eminent an evangelical as the editor of the christian observer, themselves part of his old congregation in bedford row, should begin their indian life nowhere except under his roof. hannah, accordingly, continued her voyage, and made her appearance in calcutta circles with the bishop's palace as a home, and lady william bentinck as a kind, and soon an affectionate, chaperon; while her brother remained on shore at madras, somewhat consoled for the separation by finding himself in a country where so much was to be seen, and where, as far as the english residents were concerned, he was regarded with a curiosity at least equal to his own. during the first few weeks nothing came amiss to him. "to be on land after three months at sea is of itself a great change. but to be in such a land! the dark faces, with white turbans, and flowing robes; the trees not our trees; the very smell of the atmosphere that of a hothouse, and the architecture as strange as the vegetation." every feature in that marvellous scene delighted him both in itself, and for the sake of the innumerable associations and images which it conjured up in his active and well-stored mind. the salute of fifteen guns that greeted him, as he set his foot on the beach, reminded him that he was in a region where his countrymen could exist only on the condition of their being warriors and rulers. when on a visit of ceremony to a dispossessed rajah or nabob, he pleased himself with the reflection that he was face to face with a prince who in old days governed a province as large as a first-class european kingdom, conceding to his suzerain, the mogul, no tribute beyond "a little outward respect such as the great dukes of burgundy used to pay to the kings of france; and who now enjoyed the splendid and luxurious insignificance of an abdicated prince which fell to the lot of charles the fifth or queen christina of sweden," with a court that preserved the forms of royalty, the right of keeping as many badly armed and worse paid ragamuffins as he could retain under his tawdry standard, and the privilege of "occasionally sending letters of condolence and congratulation to the king of england, in which he calls himself his majesty's good brother and ally." macaulay set forth on his journey within a week from his landing, travelling by night, and resting while the sun was at its hottest. he has recorded his first impressions of hindostan in a series of journal letters addressed to his sister margaret. the fresh and vivid character of those impressions--the genuine and multiform interest excited in him by all that met his ear or eye--explain the secret of the charm which enabled him in after days to overcome the distaste for indian literature entertained by that personage who, for want of a better, goes by the name of the general reader. macaulay reversed in his own case, the experience of those countless writers on indian themes who have successively blunted their pens against the passive indifference of the british public; for his faithful but brilliant studies of the history of our eastern empire are to this day incomparably the most popular of his works. [when published in a separate form the articles on lord clive and warren hastings have sold nearly twice as well as the articles on lord chatham, nearly thrice as well as the article on addison, and nearly five times as well as the article on byron. the great sepoy mutiny, while it something more than doubled the sale of the essay on warren hastings, all but trebled the sale of the essay on lord clive; but, taking the last twenty years together, there has been little to choose between the pair. the steadiness and permanence of the favour with which they are regarded may be estimated by the fact that, during the five years between and , as compared with the five years between and , the demand for them has been in the proportion of seven to three; and, as compared with the five years between and , in the proportion of three to one.] it may be possible, without injury to the fame of the author, to present a few extracts from a correspondence, which is in some sort the raw material of productions that have already secured their place among our national classics: "in the afternoon of the th june i left madras. my train consisted of thirty-eight persons. i was in one palanquin, and my servant followed in another. he is a half-caste. on the day on which we set out he told me he was a catholic; and added, crossing himself and turning up the whites of his eyes, that he had recommended himself to the protection of his patron saint, and that he was quite confident that we should perform our journey in safety. i thought of ambrose llamela, gil blas's devout valet, who arranges a scheme for robbing his master of his portmanteau, and, when he comes back from meeting his accomplices, pretends that he has been to the cathedral to implore a blessing on their voyage. i did him, however, a great injustice; for i have found him a very honest man, who knows the native languages, and who can dispute a charge, bully a negligent bearer, arrange a bed, and make a curry. but he is so fond of giving advice that i fear he will some day or other, as the scotch say, raise my corruption, and provoke me to send him about his business. his name, which i never hear without laughing, is peter prim. "half my journey was by daylight, and all that i saw during that time disappointed me grievously. it is amazing how small a part of the country is under cultivation. two-thirds at least, as it seemed to me, was in the state of wandsworth common, or, to use an illustration which you will understand better, of chatmoss. the people whom we met were as few as in the highlands of scotland. but i have been told that in india the villages generally lie at a distance from the roads, and that much of the land, which when i passed through it looked like parched moor that had never been cultivated, would after the rains be covered with rice." after traversing this landscape for fifteen hours he reached the town of arcot, which, under his handling, was to be celebrated far and wide as the cradle of our greatness in the east. "i was most hospitably received by captain smith, who commanded the garrison. after dinner the palanquins went forward with my servant, and the captain and i took a ride to see the lions of the neighbourhood. he mounted me on a very quiet arab, and i had a pleasant excursion. we passed through a garden which was attached to the residence of the nabob of the carnatic, who anciently held his court at arcot. the garden has been suffered to run to waste, and is only the more beautiful for having been neglected. garden, indeed, is hardly a proper word. in england it would rank as one of our noblest parks, from which it differs principally in this, that most of the fine trees are fruit trees. from this we came to a mountain pass which reminded me strongly of borradaile, near derwentwater, and through this defile we struck into the road, and rejoined the bearers." and so he went forward on his way, recalling at every step the reminiscence of some place, or event, or person; and, thereby, doubling for himself, and perhaps for his correspondent, the pleasure which the reality was capable of affording. if he put up at a collector's bungalow, he liked to think that his host ruled more absolutely and over a larger population than "a duke of saxe-weimar or a duke of lucca;" and, when he came across a military man with a turn for reading, he pronounced him "as dominic sampson said of another indian colonel, 'a man of great erudition, considering his imperfect opportunities.'" on the th of june he crossed the frontier of mysore; reached bangalore on the morning of the th and rested there for three days in the house of the commandant. "on monday, the rd, i took leave of colonel cubbon, who told me, with a warmth which i was vain enough to think sincere, that he had not passed three such pleasant days for thirty years. i went on all night, sleeping soundly in my palanquin. at five i was waked, and found that a carriage was waiting for me. i had told colonel cubbon that i very much wished to see seringapatam. he had written to the british authorities at the town of mysore, and an officer had come from the residency to show me all that was to be seen. i must now digress into indian politics; and let me tell you that, if you read the little that i shall say about them, you will know more on the subject than half the members of the cabinet." after a few pages occupied by a sketch of the history of mysore during the preceding century, macaulay proceeds "seringapatam has always been a place of peculiar interest to me. it was the scene of the greatest events of indian history. it was the residence of the greatest of indian princes. from a child, i used to hear it talked of every day. our uncle colin was imprisoned there for four years, and he was afterwards distinguished at the siege. i remember that there was, in a shop-window at clapham, a daub of the taking of seringapatam, which, as a boy, i often used to stare at with the greatest interest. i was delighted to have an opportunity of seeing the place; and, though my expectations were high, they were not disappointed. "the town is depopulated; but the fortress, which was one of the strongest in india, remains entire. a river almost as broad as the thames at chelsea breaks into two branches, and surrounds the walls, above which are seen the white minarets of a mosque. we entered, and found everything silent and desolate. the mosque, indeed, is still kept up, and deserves to be so; but the palace of tippoo has fallen into utter ruin. i saw, however, with no small interest, the airholes of the dungeon in which the english prisoners were confined, and the water-gate leading down to the river where the body of tippoo was found still warm by the duke of wellington, then colonel wellesley. the exact spot through which the english soldiers fought their way against desperate disadvantages into the fort is still perfectly discernible. but, though only thirty-five years have elapsed since the fall of the city, the palace is in the condition of tintern abbey and melrose abbey. the courts, which bear a great resemblance to those of the oxford colleges, are completely overrun with weeds and flowers. the hall of audience, once considered the finest in india, still retains some very faint traces of its old magnificence. it is supported on a great number of light and lofty wooden pillars, resting on pedestals of black granite. these pillars were formerly covered with gilding, and here and there the glitter may still be perceived. in a few more years not the smallest trace of this superb chamber will remain. i am surprised that more care was not taken by the english to preserve so splendid a memorial of the greatness of him whom they had conquered. it was not like lord wellesley's general mode of proceeding; and i soon saw a proof of his taste and liberality. tippoo raised a most sumptuous mausoleum to his father, and attached to it a mosque which he endowed. the buildings are carefully maintained at the expense of our government. you walk up from the fort through a narrow path, bordered by flower beds and cypresses, to the front of the mausoleum, which is very beautiful, and in general character closely resembles the most richly carved of our small gothic chapels. within are three tombs, all covered with magnificent palls embroidered in gold with verses from the koran. in the centre lies hyder; on his right the mother of tippoo; and tippoo himself on the left." during his stay at mysore, macaulay had an interview with the deposed rajah; whose appearance, conversation, palace, furniture, jewels, soldiers, elephants, courtiers, and idols, he depicts in a letter, intended for family perusal, with a minuteness that would qualify him for an anglo-indian richardson. by the evening of the th june he was once more on the road; and, about noon on the following day, he began to ascend the neilgherries, through scenery which, for the benefit of readers who had never seen the pyrenees or the italian slopes of an alpine pass, he likened to "the vegetation of windsor forest, or blenheim, spread over the mountains of cumberland." after reaching the summit of the table-land, he passed through a wilderness where for eighteen miles together he met nothing more human than a monkey, until a turn of the road disclosed the pleasant surprise of an amphitheatre of green hills encircling a small lake, whose banks were dotted with red-tiled cottages surrounding a pretty gothic church. the whole station presented "very much the look of a rising english watering-place. the largest house is occupied by the governor-general. it is a spacious and handsome building of stone. to this i was carried, and immediately ushered into his lordship's presence. i found him sitting by a fire in a carpeted library. he received me with the greatest kindness, frankness, and hospitality. he is, as far as i can yet judge, all that i have heard; that is to say, rectitude, openness, and good-nature, personified." many months of close friendship and common labours did but confirm macaulay in this first view of lord william bentinck. his estimate of that singularly noble character survives in the closing sentence of the essay on lord clive; and is inscribed on the base of the statue which, standing in front of the town hall may be seen far and wide over the great expanse of grass that serves as the park, the parade-ground, and the race-course of calcutta. to thomas flower ellis. ootacamund: july , . dear ellis,--you need not get your map to see where ootacamund is; for it has not found its way into the maps. it is a new discovery; a place to which europeans resort for their health, or, as it is called by the company's servants--blessings on their learning,--a _sanaterion_. it lies at the height of , feet above the sea. while london is a perfect gridiron, here am i, at degrees north from the equator, by a blazing wood fire, with my windows closed. my bed is heaped with blankets, and my black servants are coughing round me in all directions. one poor fellow in particular looks so miserably cold that, unless the sun comes out, i am likely soon to see under my own roof the spectacle which, according to shakespeare, is so interesting to the english,--a dead indian. [the tempest, act ii. scene .] i travelled the whole four hundred miles between this and madras on men's shoulders. i had an agreeable journey on the whole. i was honoured by an interview with the rajah of mysore, who insisted on showing me all his wardrobe, and his picture gallery. he has six or seven coloured english prints, not much inferior to those which i have seen in the sanded parlour of a country inn; "going to cover," "the death of the fox," and so forth. but the bijou of his gallery, of which he is as vain as the grand duke can be of the venus, or lord carlisle of the three maries, is a head of the duke of wellington, which has, most certainly, been on a sign-post in england. yet, after all, the rajah was by no means the greatest fool whom i found at mysore. i alighted at a bungalow appertaining to the british residency. there i found an englishman who, without any preface, accosted me thus: "pray, mr. macaulay, do not you think that buonaparte was the beast?" "no, sir, i cannot say that i do." "sir, he was the beast. i can prove it. i have found the number in his name. why, sir, if he was not the beast, who was?" this was a puzzling question, and i am not a little vain of my answer. "sir," said i, "the house of commons is the beast. there are members of the house; and these, with their chief officers,--the three clerks, the sergeant and his deputy, the chaplain, the doorkeeper, and the librarian,--make ." "well, sir, that is strange. but i can assure you that, if you write napoleon buonaparte in arabic, leaving out only two letters, it will give ." "and pray, sir, what right have you to leave out two letters? and, as st. john was writing greek, and to greeks, is it not likely that he would use the greek rather than the arabic notation?" "but, sir," said this learned divine, "everybody knows that the greek letters were never used to mark numbers." i answered with the meekest look and voice possible: "i do not think that everybody knows that. indeed i have reason to believe that a different opinion,--erroneous no doubt,--is universally embraced by all the small minority who happen to know any greek." so ended the controversy. the man looked at me as if he thought me a very wicked fellow; and, i dare say, has by this time discovered that, if you write my name in tamul, leaving out t in thomas, b in babington, and m in macaulay, it will give the number of this unfortunate beast. i am very comfortable here. the governor-general is the frankest and best-natured of men. the chief functionaries, who have attended him hither, are clever people, but not exactly on a par as to general attainments with the society to which i belonged in london. i thought, however, even at madras, that i could have formed a very agreeable circle of acquaintance; and i am assured that at calcutta i shall find things far better. after all, the best rule in all parts of the world, as in london itself, is to be independent of other men's minds. my power of finding amusement without companions was pretty well tried on my voyage. i read insatiably; the iliad and odyssey, virgil, horace, caesar's commentaries, bacon de augmentis, dante, petrarch, ariosto, tasso, don quixote, gibbon's rome, mill's india, all the seventy volumes of voltaire, sismondi's history of france, and the seven thick folios of the biographia britannica. i found my greek and latin in good condition enough. i liked the iliad a little less, and the odyssey a great deal more than formerly. horace charmed me more than ever; virgil not quite so much as he used to do. the want of human character, the poverty of his supernatural machinery, struck me very strongly. can anything be so bad as the living bush which bleeds and talks, or the harpies who befoul aeneas's dinner? it is as extravagant as ariosto, and as dull as wilkie's epigoniad. the last six books, which virgil had not fully corrected, pleased me better than the first six. i like him best on italian ground. i like his localities; his national enthusiasm; his frequent allusions to his country, its history, its antiquities, and its greatness. in this respect he often reminded me of sir walter scott, with whom, in the general character of his mind, he had very little affinity. the georgics pleased me better; the eclogues best,--the second and tenth above all. but i think the finest lines in the latin language are those five which begin, "sepibus in nostris parvam te roscida mala--" [eclogue viii. .] i cannot tell you how they struck me. i was amused to find that voltaire pronounces that passage to be the finest in virgil. i liked the jerusalem better than i used to do. i was enraptured with ariosto; and i still think of dante, as i thought when i first read him, that he is a superior poet to milton, that he runs neck and neck with homer, and that none but shakespeare has gone decidedly beyond him. as soon as i reach calcutta i intend to read herodotus again. by the bye, why do not you translate him? you would do it excellently; and a translation of herodotus, well executed, would rank with original compositions. a quarter of an hour a day would finish the work in five years. the notes might be made the most amusing in the world. i wish you would think of it. at all events, i hope you will do something which may interest more than seven or eight people. your talents are too great, and your leisure time too small, to be wasted in inquiries so frivolous, (i must call them,) as those in which you have of late been too much engaged; whether the cherokees are of the same race with the chickasaws; whether van diemen's land was peopled from new holland, or new holland from van diemen's land; what is the precise anode of appointing a headman in a village in timbuctoo. i would not give the worst page in clarendon or fra paolo for all that ever was, or ever will be, written about the migrations of the leleges and the laws of the oscans. i have already entered on my public functions, and i hope to do some good. the very wigs of the judges in the court of king's bench would stand on end if they knew how short a chapter my law of evidence will form. i am not without many advisers. a native of some fortune in madras has sent me a paper on legislation. "your honour must know," says this judicious person, "that the great evil is that men swear falsely in this country. no judge knows what to believe. surely if your honour can make men to swear truly, your honour's fame will be great, and the company will flourish. now, i know how men may be made to swear truly; and i will tell your honour for your fame, and for the profit of the company. let your honour cut off the great toe of the right foot of every man who swears falsely, whereby your honour's fame will be extended." is not this an exquisite specimen of legislative wisdom? i must stop. when i begin to write to england, my pen runs as if it would run on for ever. ever yours affectionately t. b. m. to miss fanny and miss selina macaulay. ootacamund: august , . my dear sisters,--i sent last month a full account of my journey hither, and of the place, to margaret, as the most stationary of our family; desiring her to let you all see what i had written to her. i think that i shall continue to take the same course. it is better to write one full and connected narrative than a good many imperfect fragments. money matters seem likely to go on capitally. my expenses, i find, will be smaller than i anticipated. the rate of exchange, if you know what that means, is very favourable indeed; and, if i live, i shall get rich fast. i quite enjoy the thought of appearing in the light of an old hunks who knows on which side his bread is buttered; a warm man; a fellow who will cut up well. this is not a character which the macaulays have been much in the habit of sustaining; but i can assure you that, after next christmas, i expect to lay up, on an average, about seven thousand pounds a year, while i remain in india. at christmas i shall send home a thousand, or twelve hundred, pounds for my father, and you all. i cannot tell you what a comfort it is to me to find that i shall be able to do this. it reconciles me to all the pains--acute enough, sometimes, god knows,--of banishment. in a few years, if i live--probably in less than five years from the time at which you will be reading this letter--we shall be again together in a comfortable, though a modest, home; certain of a good fire, a good joint of meat, and a good glass of wine; without owing obligations to anybody; and perfectly indifferent, at least as far as our pecuniary interest is concerned, to the changes of the political world. rely on it, my dear girls, that there is no chance of my going back with my heart cooled towards you. i came hither principally to save my family, and i am not likely while here to forget them. ever yours t. b. m. the months of july and august macaulay spent on the neilgherries, in a climate equable as madeira and invigorating as braemar; where thickets of rhododendron fill the glades and clothe the ridges; and where the air is heavy with the scent of rose-trees of a size more fitted for an orchard than a flower-bed, and bushes of heliotrope thirty paces round. the glories of the forests and of the gardens touched him in spite of his profound botanical ignorance, and he dilates more than once upon his "cottage buried in laburnums, or something very like them, and geraniums which grow in the open air." he had the more leisure for the natural beauties of the place, as there was not much else to interest even a traveller fresh from england. "i have as yet seen little of the idolatry of india; and that little, though excessively absurd, is not characterised by atrocity or indecency. there is nothing of the sort at ootacamund. i have not, during the last six weeks, witnessed a single circumstance from which you would have inferred that this was a heathen country. the bulk of the natives here are a colony from the plains below, who have come up hither to wait on the european visitors, and who seem to trouble themselves very little about caste or religion. the todas, the aboriginal population of these hills, are a very curious race. they had a grand funeral a little while ago. i should have gone if it had not been a council day; but i found afterwards that i had lost nothing. the whole ceremony consisted in sacrificing bullocks to the manes of the defunct. the roaring of the poor victims was horrible. the people stood talking and laughing till a particular signal was made, and immediately all the ladies lifted up their voices and wept. i have not lived three and thirty years in this world without learning that a bullock roars when he is knocked down, and that a woman can cry whenever she chooses. "by all that i can learn, the catholics are the most respectable portion of the native christians. as to swartz's people in the tanjore, they are a perfect scandal to the religion which they profess. it would have been thought something little short of blasphemy to say this a year ago; but now it is considered impious to say otherwise, for they have got into a violent quarrel with the missionaries and the bishop. the missionaries refused to recognise the distinctions of caste in the administration of the sacrament of the lord's supper, and the bishop supported them in the refusal. i do not pretend to judge whether this was right or wrong. swartz and bishop heber conceived that the distinction of caste, however objectionable politically, was still only a distinction of rank; and that, as in english churches the gentlefolks generally take the sacrament apart from the poor of the parish, so the high-caste natives might be allowed to communicate apart from the pariahs. "but, whoever was first in the wrong, the christians of tanjore took care to be most so. they called in the interposition of government, and sent up such petitions and memorials as i never saw before or since; made up of lies, invectives, bragging, cant, bad grammar of the most ludicrous kind, and texts of scripture quoted without the smallest application. i remember one passage by heart, which is really only a fair specimen of the whole: 'these missionaries, my lord, loving only filthy lucre, bid us to eat lord-supper with pariahs as lives ugly, handling dead men, drinking rack and toddy, sweeping the streets, mean fellows altogether, base persons, contrary to that which saint paul saith: i determined to know nothing among you save jesus christ and him crucified.' "was there ever a more appropriate quotation? i believe that nobody on either side of the controversy found out a text so much to the purpose as one which i cited to the council of india, when we were discussing this business: 'if this be a question of words, and names, and of your law, look ye to it; for i will be no judge of such matters.' but though, like gallio, i drove them and their petitions from my judgment seat, i could not help saying to one of the missionaries, who is here on the hills, that i thought it a pity to break up the church of tanjore on account of a matter which such men as swartz and heber had not been inclined to regard as essential. 'sir,' said the reverend gentleman, 'the sooner the church of tanjore is broken up the better. you can form no notion of the worthlessness of the native christians there.' i could not dispute this point with him; but neither could i help thinking, though i was too polite to say so, that it was hardly worth the while of so many good men to come fifteen thousand miles over sea and land in order to make proselytes, who, their very instructors being judges, were more children of hell than before." unfortunately macaulay's stay on the neilgherries coincided with the monsoon. "the rain streamed down in floods. it was very seldom that i could see a hundred yards in front of me. during a month together i did not get two hours' walking." he began to be bored, for the first and last time in his life; while his companions, who had not his resources, were ready to hang themselves for very dulness. the ordinary amusements with which, in the more settled parts of india, our countrymen beguile the rainy season, were wanting in a settlement that had only lately been reclaimed from the desert; in the immediate vicinity of which you still ran the chance of being "trod into the shape of half a crown by a wild elephant, or eaten by the tigers, which prefer this situation to the plains below for the same reason that takes so many europeans to india; they encounter an uncongenial climate for the sake of what they can get." there were no books in the place except those that macaulay had brought with him, among which, most luckily, was clarissa harlowe. aided by the rain outside, he soon talked his favourite romance into general favour. the reader will consent to put up with one or two slight inaccuracies in order to have the story told by thackeray. "i spoke to him once about clarissa. 'not read clarissa!' he cried out. 'if you have once read clarissa, and are infected by it, you can't leave it. when i was in india i passed one hot season in the hills; and there were the governor-general, and the secretary of government, and the commander-in-chief, and their wives. i had clarissa with me; and, as soon as they began to read, the whole station was in a passion of excitement about miss harlowe, and her misfortunes, and her scoundrelly lovelace. the governor's wife seized the book; the secretary waited for it; the chief justice could not read it for tears.' he acted the whole scene; he paced up and down the athenaeum library. i dare say he could have spoken pages of the book; of that book, and of what countless piles of others!" an old scotch doctor, a jacobin and a free-thinker, who could only be got to attend church by the positive orders of the governor-general, cried over the last volume until he was too ill to appear at dinner. [degenerate readers of our own day have actually been provided with an abridgment of clarissa, itself as long as an ordinary novel. a wiser course than buying the abridgment would be to commence the original at the third volume. in the same way, if anyone, after obtaining the outline of lady clementina's story from a more adventurous friend, will read sir charles grandison, skipping all letters from italians, to italians, and about italians, he will find that he has got hold of a delightful, and not unmanageable, book.] the chief secretary,--afterwards, as sir william macnaghten, the hero and the victim of the darkest episode in our indian history,--declared that reading this copy of clarissa, under the inspiration of its owner's enthusiasm, was nothing less than an epoch in his life. after the lapse of thirty years, when ootacamund had long enjoyed the advantage of a book-club and a circulating library, the tradition of macaulay and his novel still lingered on with a tenacity most unusual in the ever-shifting society of an indian station. "at length lord william gave me leave of absence. my bearers were posted along the road; my palanquins were packed; and i was to start next day; when an event took place which may give you some insight into the state of the laws, morals, and manners among the natives. "my new servant, a christian, but such a christian as the missionaries make in this part of the world, had been persecuted most unmercifully for his religion by the servants of some other gentlemen on the hills. at last they contrived to excite against him (whether justly or unjustly i am quite unable to say) the jealousy of one of lord william's under-cooks. we had accordingly a most glorious tragi-comedy; the part of othello by the cook aforesaid; desdemona by an ugly, impudent pariah girl, his wife; iago by colonel casement's servant; and michael cassio by my rascal. the place of the handkerchief was supplied by a small piece of sugar-candy which desdemona was detected in the act of sucking, and which had found its way from my canisters to her fingers. if i had any part in the piece, it was, i am afraid, that of roderigo, whom shakespeare describes as a 'foolish gentleman,' and who also appears to have had 'money in his purse.' "on the evening before my departure my bungalow was besieged by a mob of blackguards. the native judge came with them. after a most prodigious quantity of jabbering, of which i could not understand one word, i called the judge, who spoke tolerable english, into my room, and learned from him the nature of the case. i was, and still am, in doubt as to the truth of the charge. i have a very poor opinion of my man's morals, and a very poor opinion also of the veracity of his accusers. it was, however, so very inconvenient for me to be just then deprived of my servant that i offered to settle the business at my own expense. under ordinary circumstances this would have been easy enough, for the hindoos of the lower castes have no delicacy on these subjects. the husband would gladly have taken a few rupees, and walked away; but the persecutors of my servant interfered, and insisted that he should be brought to trial in order that they might have the pleasure of smearing him with filth, giving him a flogging, beating kettles before him, and carrying him round on an ass with his face to the tail. "as the matter could not be accommodated, i begged the judge to try the case instantly; but the rabble insisted that the trial should not take place for some days. i argued the matter with them very mildly, and told them that i must go next day, and that, if my servant were detained, guilty or innocent, he must lose his situation. the gentle and reasoning tone of my expostulations only made them impudent. they are, in truth, a race so accustomed to be trampled on by the strong that they always consider humanity as a sign of weakness. the judge told me that he never heard a gentleman speak such sweet words to the people. but i was now at an end of my sweet words. my blood was beginning to boil at the undisguised display of rancorous hatred and shameless injustice. i sate down, and wrote a line to the commandant of the station, begging him to give orders that the case might be tried that very evening. the court assembled, and continued all night in violent contention. at last the judge pronounced my servant not guilty. i did not then know, what i learned some days after, that this respectable magistrate had received twenty rupees on the occasion. "the husband would now gladly have taken the money which he refused the day before; but i would not give him a farthing. the rascals who had raised the disturbance were furious. my servant was to set out at eleven in the morning, and i was to follow at two. he had scarcely left the door when i heard a noise. i looked forth, and saw that the gang had pulled him out of his palanquin, torn off his turban, stripped him almost naked, and were, as it seemed, about to pull him to pieces. i snatched up a sword-stick, and ran into the middle of them. it was all i could do to force my way to him, and, for a moment, i thought my own person was in danger as well as his. i supported the poor wretch in my arms; for, like most of his countrymen, he is a chickenhearted fellow, and was almost fainting away. my honest barber, a fine old soldier in the company's service, ran off for assistance, and soon returned with some police officers. i ordered the bearers to turn round, and proceeded instantly to the house of the commandant. i was not long detained here. nothing can be well imagined more expeditious than the administration of justice in this country, when the judge is a colonel, and the plaintiff a councillor. i told my story in three words. in three minutes the rioters were marched off to prison, and my servant, with a sepoy to guard him, was fairly on his road and out of danger." early next morning macaulay began to descend the pass. "after going down for about an hour we emerged from the clouds and moisture, and the plain of mysore lay before us--a vast ocean of foliage on which the sun was shining gloriously. i am very little given to cant about the beauties of nature, but i was moved almost to tears. i jumped off the palanquin, and walked in front of it down the immense declivity. in two hours we descended about three thousand feet. every turning in the road showed the boundless forest below in some new point of view. i was greatly struck with the resemblance which this prodigious jungle, as old as the world and planted by nature, bears to the fine works of the great english landscape gardeners. it was exactly a wentworth park, as large as devonshire. after reaching the foot of the hills, we travelled through a succession of scenes which might have been part of the garden of eden. such gigantic trees i never saw. in a quarter of an hour i passed hundreds the smallest of which would bear a comparison with any of those oaks which are shown as prodigious in england. the grass, the weeds, and the wild flowers grew as high as my head. the sun, almost a stranger to me, was now shining brightly; and, when late in the afternoon i again got out of my palanquin and looked back, i saw the large mountain ridge from which i had descended twenty miles behind me, still buried in the same mass of fog and rain in which i had been living for weeks. "on tuesday, the th" (of september), "i went on board at madras. i amused myself on the voyage to calcutta with learning portuguese, and made myself almost as well acquainted with it as i care to be. i read the lusiad, and am now reading it a second time. i own that i am disappointed in camoens; but i have so often found my first impressions wrong on such subjects that i still hope to be able to join my voice to that of the great body of critics. i never read any famous foreign book, which did not, in the first perusal, fall short of my expectations; except dante's poem, and don quixote, which were prodigiously superior to what i had imagined. yet in these cases i had not pitched my expectations low." he had not much time for his portuguese studies. the run was unusually fast, and the ship only spent a week in the bay of bengal, and forty-eight hours in the hooghly. he found his sister comfortably installed in government house, where he himself took up his quarters during the next six weeks; lady william bentinck having been prepared to welcome him as her guest by her husband's letters, more than one of which ended with the words "e un miracolo." towards the middle of november, macaulay began housekeeping for himself; living, as he always loved to live, rather more generously than the strict necessities of his position demanded. his residence, then the best in calcutta, has long since been converted into the bengal club. to macvey napier, esq. calcutta: december , . dear napier,--first to business. at length i send you the article on mackintosh; an article which has the merit of length, whatever it may be deficient in. as i wished to transmit it to england in duplicate, if not in triplicate, i thought it best to have two or three copies coarsely printed here under the seal of strict secresy. the printers at edinburgh will, therefore, have no trouble in deciphering my manuscript, and the corrector of the press will find his work done to his hands. the disgraceful imbecility, and the still more disgraceful malevolence, of the editor have, as you will see, moved my indignation not a little. i hope that longman's connection with the review will not prevent you from inserting what i have said on this subject. murray's copy writers are unsparingly abused by southey and lockhart in the quarterly; and it would be hard indeed if we might not in the edinburgh strike hard at an assailant of mackintosh. i shall now begin another article. the subject i have not yet fixed upon; perhaps the romantic poetry of italy, for which there is an excellent opportunity; panizzi's reprint of boiardo; perhaps the little volume of burnet's characters edited by bishop jebb. this reminds me that i have to acknowledge the receipt of a box from longman, containing this little book; and other books of much greater value, grimm's correspondence, jacquemont's letters, and several foreign works on jurisprudence. all that you have yet sent have been excellently chosen. i will mention, while i am on this subject, a few books which i want, and which i am not likely to pick up here--daru's histoire de venise; st. real's conjuration de venise; fra paolo's works; monstrelet's chronicle; and coxe's book on the pelhams. i should also like to have a really good edition of lucian. my sister desires me to send you her kind regards. she remembers her visit to edinburgh, and your hospitality, with the greatest pleasure. calcutta is called, and not without some reason, the city of palaces; but i have seen nothing in the east like the view from the castle rock, nor expect to see anything like it till we stand there together again. kindest regards to lord jeffrey. yours most truly t. b. macaulay. to mrs. cropper. calcutta: december , . dearest margaret,--i rather suppose that some late letters from nancy may have prepared you to learn what i am now about to communicate. she is going to be married, and with my fullest and warmest approbation. i can truly say that, if i had to search india for a husband for her, i could have found no man to whom i could with equal confidence have entrusted her happiness. trevelyan is about eight and twenty. he was educated at the charter-house, and then went to haileybury, and came out hither. in this country he has distinguished himself beyond any man of his standing by his great talent for business; by his liberal and enlarged views of policy; and by literary merit, which, for his opportunities, is considerable. he was at first placed at delhi under ----, a very powerful and a very popular man, but extremely corrupt. this man tried to initiate trevelyan in his own infamous practices. but the young fellow's spirit was too noble for such things. when only twenty-one years of age he publicly accused ----, then almost at the head of the service, of receiving bribes from the natives. a perfect storm was raised against the accuser. he was almost everywhere abused, and very generally cut. but with a firmness and ability scarcely ever seen in any man so young, he brought his proofs forward, and, after an inquiry of some weeks, fully made out his case. ---- was dismissed in disgrace, and is now living obscurely in england. the government here and the directors at home applauded trevelyan in the highest terms; and from that tithe he has been considered as a man likely to rise to the very top of the service. lord william told him to ask for anything that he wished for. trevelyan begged that something might be done for his elder brother, who is in the company's army. lord william told him that he had richly earned that or anything else, and gave lieutenant trevelyan a very good diplomatic employment. indeed lord william, a man who makes no favourites, has always given to trevelyan the strongest marks, not of a blind partiality, but of a thoroughly well-grounded and discriminating esteem. not long ago trevelyan was appointed by him to the under secretaryship for foreign affairs, an office of a very important and confidential nature. while holding the place he was commissioned to report to government on the operation of the internal transit duties of india. about a year ago his report was completed. i shall send to england a copy or two of it by the first safe conveyance; for nothing that i can say of his abilities, or of his public spirit, will be half so satisfactory. i have no hesitation in affirming that it is a perfect masterpiece in its kind. accustomed as i have been to public affairs, i never read an abler state paper; and i do not believe that there is, i will not say in india, but in england, another man of twenty-seven who could have written it. trevelyan is a most stormy reformer. lord william said to me, before anyone had observed trevelyan's attentions to nancy: "that man is almost always on the right side in every question; and it is well that he is so, for he gives a most confounded deal of trouble when he happens to take the wrong one." [macaulay used to apply to his future brother-in-law the remark which julius caesar made with regard to his young friend brutus: "magni refert hic quid velit; sed quidquid volet, valde volet."] he is quite at the head of that active party among the younger servants of the company who take the side of improvement. in particular, he is the soul of every scheme for diffusing education among the natives of this country. his reading has been very confined; but to the little that he has read he has brought a mind as active and restless as lord brougham's, and much more judicious and honest. as to his person, he always looks like a gentleman, particularly on horseback. he is very active and athletic, and is renowned as a great master in the most exciting and perilous of field sports, the spearing of wild boars. his face has a most characteristic expression of ardour and impetuosity, which makes his countenance very interesting to me. birth is a thing that i care nothing about; but his family is one of the oldest and best in england. during the important years of his life, from twenty to twenty-five, or thereabouts, trevelyan was in a remote province of india, where his whole time was divided between public business and field sports, and where he seldom saw a european gentleman and never a european lady. he has no small talk. his mind is full of schemes of moral and political improvement, and his zeal boils over in his talk. his topics, even in courtship, are steam navigation, the education of the natives, the equalisation of the sugar duties, the substitution of the roman for the arabic alphabet in the oriental languages. i saw the feeling growing from the first; for, though i generally pay not the smallest attention to those matters, i had far too deep an interest in nancy's happiness not to watch her behaviour to everybody who saw much of her. i knew it, i believe, before she knew it herself; and i could most easily have prevented it by merely treating trevelyan with a little coldness, for he is a man whom the smallest rebuff would completely discourage. but you will believe, my dearest margaret, that no thought of such base selfishness ever passed through my mind. i would as soon have locked my dear nancy up in a nunnery as have put the smallest obstacle in the way of her having a good husband. i therefore gave every facility and encouragement to both of them. what i have myself felt it is unnecessary to say. my parting from you almost broke my heart. but when i parted from you i had nancy; i had all my other relations; i had my friends; i had my country. now i have nothing except the resources of my own mind, and the consciousness of having acted not ungenerously. but i do not repine. whatever i suffer i have brought on myself. i have neglected the plainest lessons of reason and experience. i have staked my happiness without calculating the chances of the dice. i have hewn out broken cisterns; i have leant on a reed; i have built on the sand; and i have fared accordingly. i must bear my punishment as i can; and, above all, i must take care that the punishment does not extend beyond myself. nothing can be kinder than nancy's conduct has been. she proposes that we should form one family; and trevelyan, (though, like most lovers, he would, i imagine, prefer having his goddess to himself,) consented with strong expressions of pleasure. the arrangement is not so strange as it might seem at home. the thing is often done here; and those quarrels between servants, which would inevitably mar any such plan in england, are not to be apprehended in an indian establishment. one advantage there will be in our living together of a most incontestable sort; we shall both be able to save more money. trevelyan will soon be entitled to his furlough; but he proposes not to take it till i go home. i shall write in a very different style from this to my father. to him i shall represent the marriage as what it is, in every respect except its effect on my own dreams of happiness--a most honourable and happy event; prudent in a worldly point of view; and promising all the felicity which strong mutual affection, excellent principles on both sides, good temper, youth, health, and the general approbation of friends can afford. as for myself, it is a tragical denouement of an absurd plot. i remember quoting some nursery rhymes, years ago, when you left me in london to join nancy at rothley temple or leamington, i forget which. those foolish lines contain the history of my life. "there were two birds that sat on a stone; one flew away, and there was but one. the other flew away, and then there was none; and the poor stone was left all alone." ever, my dearest margaret, yours t. b. macaulay. a passage from a second letter to the same person deserves to be quoted, as an instance of how a good man may be unable to read aright his own nature, and a wise man to forecast his own future. "i feel a growing tendency to cynicism and suspicion. my intellect remains; and is likely, i sometimes think, to absorb the whole man. i still retain, (not only undiminished, but strengthened by the very events which have deprived me of everything else,) my thirst for knowledge; my passion for holding converse with the greatest minds of all ages and nations; any power of forgetting what surrounds me, and of living with the past, the future, the distant, and the unreal. books are becoming everything to me. if i had at this moment my choice of life, i would bury myself in one of those immense libraries that we saw together at the universities, and never pass a waking hour without a book before me." so little was macaulay aware that, during the years which were to come, his thoughts and cares would be less than ever for himself, and more for others, and that his existence would be passed amidst a bright atmosphere of affectionate domestic happiness, which, until his own death came, no accident was thenceforward destined to overcloud. but, before his life assumed the equable and prosperous tenor in which it continued to the end, one more trouble was in store for him. long before the last letters to his sister margaret had been written, the eyes which were to have read them had been closed for ever. the fate of so young a wife and mother touched deeply all who had known her, and some who knew her only by name. [moultrie made mrs. cropper's death the subject of some verses on which her relatives set a high value. he acknowledges his little poem to be the tribute of one who had been a stranger to her whom it was written to commemorate: "and yet methinks we are not strange: so many claims there be which seem to weave a viewless band between my soul and thee. sweet sister of my early friend, the kind, the singlehearted, than whose remembrance none more bright still gilds the days departed! beloved, with more than sister's love, by some whose love to me is now almost my brightest gem in this world's treasury."] when the melancholy news arrived in india, the young couple were spending their honeymoon in a lodge in the governor-general's park at barrackpore. they immediately returned to calcutta, and, under the shadow of a great sorrow, began their sojourn in their brother's house, who, for his part, did what he might to drown his grief in floods of official work. ["april . lichfield. easter sunday. after the service was ended we went over the cathedral. when i stood before the famous children by chantrey, i could think only of one thing; that, when last i was there, in , my dear sister margaret was with me and that she was greatly affected. i could not command my tears and was forced to leave our party, and walk about by myself."--macaulay's journal for the year .] the narrative of that work may well be the despair of macaulay's biographer. it would be inexcusable to slur over what in many important respects was the most honourable chapter of his life; while, on the other hand, the task of interesting englishmen in the details of indian administration is an undertaking which has baffled every pen except his own. in such a dilemma the safest course is to allow that pen to tell the story for itself; or rather so much of the story as, by concentrating the attention of the reader upon matters akin to those which are in frequent debate at home, may enable him to judge whether macaulay, at the council-board and the bureau, was the equal of macaulay in the senate and the library. examples of his minute-writing may with some confidence be submitted to the criticism of those whose experience of public business has taught them in what a minute should differ from a despatch, a memorial, a report, and a decision. his method of applying general principles to the circumstances of a special case, and of illustrating those principles with just as much literary ornament as would place his views in a pictorial form before the minds of those whom it was his business to convince, is strikingly exhibited in the series of papers by means of which he reconciled his colleagues in the council, and his masters in leadenhall street, to the removal of the modified censorship which existed in india previously to the year . "it is difficult," he writes, "to conceive that any measures can be more indefensible than those which i propose to repeal. it has always been the practice of politic rulers to disguise their arbitrary measures under popular forms and names. the conduct of the indian government with respect to the press has been altogether at variance with this trite and obvious maxim. the newspapers have for years been allowed as ample a measure of practical liberty as that which they enjoy in england. if any inconveniences arise from the liberty of political discussion, to those inconveniences we are already subject. yet while our policy is thus liberal and indulgent, we are daily reproached and taunted with the bondage in which we keep the press. a strong feeling on this subject appears to exist throughout the european community here; and the loud complaints which have lately been uttered are likely to produce a considerable effect on the english people, who will see at a glance that the law is oppressive, and who will not know how completely it is inoperative. "to impose strong restraints on political discussion is an intelligible policy, and may possibly--though i greatly doubt it--be in some countries a wise policy. but this is not the point at issue. the question before us is not whether the press shall be free, but whether, being free, it shall be called free. it is surely mere madness in a government to make itself unpopular for nothing; to be indulgent, and yet to disguise its indulgence under such outward forms as bring on it the reproach of tyranny. yet this is now our policy. we are exposed to all the dangers--dangers, i conceive, greatly over-rated--of a free press; and at the same time we contrive to incur all the opprobrium of a censorship. it is universally allowed that the licensing system, as at present administered, does not keep any man who can buy a press from publishing the bitterest and most sarcastic reflections on any public measure, or any public functionary. yet the very words 'license to print' have a sound hateful to the ears of englishmen in every part of the globe. it is unnecessary to inquire whether this feeling be reasonable; whether the petitioners who have so strongly pressed this matter on our consideration would not have shown a better judgment if they had been content with their practical liberty, and had reserved their murmurs for practical grievances. the question for us is not what they ought to do, but what we ought to do; not whether it be wise in them to complain when they suffer no injury, but whether it be wise in us to incur odium unaccompanied by the smallest accession of security or of power. "one argument only has been urged in defence of the present system. it is admitted that the press of bengal has long been suffered to enjoy practical liberty, and that nothing but an extreme emergency could justify the government in curtailing that liberty. but, it is said, such an emergency may arise, and the government ought to retain in its hands the power of adopting, in that event, the sharp, prompt, and decisive measures which may be necessary for the preservation of the empire. but when we consider with what vast powers, extending over all classes of people, parliament has armed the governor-general in council, and, in extreme cases, the governor-general alone, we shall probably be inclined to allow little weight to this argument. no government in the world is better provided with the means of meeting extraordinary dangers by extraordinary precautions. five persons, who may be brought together in half an hour, whose deliberations are secret, who are not shackled by any of those forms which elsewhere delay legislative measures, can, in a single sitting, make a law for stopping every press in india. possessing as we do the unquestionable power to interfere, whenever the safety of the state array require it, with overwhelming rapidity and energy, we surely ought not, in quiet times, to be constantly keeping the offensive form and ceremonial of despotism before the eyes of those whom, nevertheless, we permit to enjoy the substance of freedom." eighteen months elapsed; during which the calcutta press found occasion to attack macaulay with a breadth and ferocity of calumny such as few public men, in any age or country, have ever endured, and none, perhaps, have ever forgiven. there were many mornings when it was impossible for him to allow the newspapers to lie about his sister's drawing-room. the editor of the periodical which called itself, and had a right to call itself, the "friend of india," undertook to shame his brethren by publishing a collection of their invectives; but it was very soon evident that no decent journal could venture to foul its pages by reprinting the epithets, and the anecdotes, which constituted the daily greeting of the literary men of calcutta to their fellow-craftsman of the edinburgh review. but macaulay's cheery and robust common sense carried him safe and sound through an ordeal which has broken down sterner natures than his, and embittered as stainless lives. the allusions in his correspondence, all the more surely because they are brief and rare, indicate that the torrent of obloquy to which he was exposed interfered neither with his temper nor with his happiness; and how little he allowed it to disturb his judgment or distort his public spirit is proved by the tone of a state paper, addressed to the court of directors in september , in which he eagerly vindicates the freedom of the calcutta press, at a time when the writers of that press, on the days when they were pleased to be decent, could find for him no milder appellations than those of cheat, swindler, and charlatan. "i regret that on this, or on any subject, my opinion should differ from that of the honourable court. but i still conscientiously think that we acted wisely when we passed the law on the subject of the press; and i am quite certain that we should act most unwisely if we were now to repeal that law. "i must, in the first place, venture to express an opinion that the importance of that question is greatly over-rated by persons, even the best informed and the most discerning, who are not actually on the spot. it is most justly observed by the honourable court that many of the arguments which may be urged in favour of a free press at home do not apply to this country. but it is, i conceive, no less true that scarcely any of those arguments which have been employed in europe to defend restrictions on the press apply to a press such as that of india. "in europe, and especially in england, the press is an engine of tremendous power, both for good and for evil. the most enlightened men, after long experience both of its salutary and of its pernicious operation, have come to the conclusion that the good on the whole preponderates. but that there is no inconsiderable amount of evil to be set off against the good has never been disputed by the warmest friend to freedom of discussion. "in india the press is comparatively a very feeble engine. it does far less good and far less harm than in europe. it sometimes renders useful services to the public. it sometimes brings to the notice of the government evils the existence of which would otherwise have been unknown. it operates, to some extent, as a salutary check on public functionaries. it does something towards keeping the administration pure. on the other hand, by misrepresenting public measures, and by flattering the prejudices of those who support it, it sometimes produces a slight degree of excitement in a very small portion of the community. "how slight that excitement is, even when it reaches its greatest height, and how little the government has to fear from it, no person whose observation has been confined to european societies will readily believe. in this country the number of english residents is very small, and, of that small number, a great proportion are engaged in the service of the state, and are most deeply interested in the maintenance of existing institutions. even those english settlers who are not in the service of the government have a strong interest in its stability. they are few; they are thinly scattered among a vast population, with whom they have neither language, nor religion, nor morals, nor manners, nor colour in common; they feel that any convulsion which should overthrow the existing order of things would be ruinous to themselves. particular acts of the government--especially acts which are mortifying to the pride of caste naturally felt by an englishman in india--are often angrily condemned by these persons. but every indigo-planter in tirhoot, and every shopkeeper in calcutta, is perfectly aware that the downfall of the government would be attended with the destruction of his fortune, and with imminent hazard to his life. "thus, among the english inhabitants of india, there are no fit subjects for that species of excitement which the press sometimes produces at home. there is no class among them analogous to that vast body of english labourers and artisans whose minds are rendered irritable by frequent distress and privation, and on whom, therefore, the sophistry and rhetoric of bad men often produce a tremendous effect. the english papers here might be infinitely more seditious than the most seditious that were ever printed in london without doing harm to anything but their own circulation. the fire goes out for want of some combustible material on which to seize. how little reason would there be to apprehend danger to order and property in england from the most inflammatory writings, if those writings were read only by ministers of state, commissioners of the customs and excise, judges and masters in chancery, upper clerks in government offices, officers in the army, bankers, landed proprietors, barristers, and master manufacturers! the most timid politician would not anticipate the smallest evil from the most seditious libels, if the circulation of those libels were confined to such a class of readers; and it is to such a class of readers that the circulation of the english newspapers in india is almost entirely confined." the motive for the scurrility with which macaulay was assailed by a handful of sorry scribblers was his advocacy of the act familiarly known as the black act, which withdrew from british subjects resident in the provinces their so-called privilege of bringing civil appeals before the supreme court at calcutta. such appeals were thenceforward to be tried by the sudder court, which was manned by the company's judges, "all of them english gentlemen of liberal education; as free as even the judges of the supreme court from any imputation of personal corruption, and selected by the government from a body which abounds in men as honourable and as intelligent as ever were employed in the service of any state." the change embodied in the act was one of little practical moment; but it excited an opposition based upon arguments and assertions of such a nature that the success or failure of the proposed measure became a question of high and undeniable importance. "in my opinion," writes macaulay, "the chief reason for preferring the sudder court is this--that it is the court which we have provided to administer justice, in the last resort, to the great body of the people. if it is not fit for that purpose, it ought to be made so. if it is fit to administer justice to the great body of the people, why should we exempt a mere handful of settlers from its jurisdiction? there certainly is, i will not say the reality, but the semblance of partiality and tyranny in the distinction made by the charter act of . that distinction seems to indicate a notion that the natives of india may well put up with something less than justice, or that englishmen in india have a title to something more than justice. if we give our own countrymen an appeal to the king's courts, in cases in which all others are forced to be contented with the company's courts, we do in fact cry down the company's courts. we proclaim to the indian people that there are two sorts of justice--a coarse one, which we think good enough for then, and another of superior quality, which we keep for ourselves. if we take pains to show that we distrust our highest courts, how can we expect that the natives of the country will place confidence in them? "the draft of the act was published, and was, as i fully expected, not unfavourably received by the british in the mofussil. [the term "mofussil" is used to denote the provinces of the bengal presidency, as opposed to the capital.] seven weeks have elapsed since the notification took place. time has been allowed for petitions from the furthest corners of the territories subject to this presidency. but i have heard of only one attempt in the mofussil to get up a remonstrance; and the mofussil newspapers which i have seen, though generally disposed to cavil at all the acts of the government, have spoken favourably of this measure. "in calcutta the case has been somewhat different; and this is a remarkable fact. the british inhabitants of calcutta are the only british-born subjects in bengal who will not be affected by the proposed act; and they are the only british subjects in bengal who have expressed the smallest objection to it. the clamour, indeed, has proceeded from a very small portion of the society of calcutta. the objectors have not ventured to call a public meeting, and their memorial has obtained very few signatures. but they have attempted to make up by noise and virulence for what has been wanting in strength. it may at first sight appear strange that a law, which is not unwelcome to those who are to live under it, should excite such acrimonious feelings among people who are wholly exempted from its operation. but the explanation is simple. though nobody who resides at calcutta will be sued in the mofussil courts, many people who reside at calcutta have, or wish to have, practice in the supreme court. great exertions have accordingly been made, though with little success, to excite a feeling against this measure among the english inhabitants of calcutta. "the political phraseology of the english in india is the same with the political phraseology of our countrymen at home; but it is never to be forgotten that the same words stand for very different things at london and at calcutta. we hear much about public opinion, the love of liberty, the influence of the press. but we must remember that public opinion means the opinion of five hundred persons who have no interest, feeling, or taste in common with the fifty millions among whom they live; that the love of liberty means the strong objection which the five hundred feel to every measure which can prevent them from acting as they choose towards the fifty millions, that the press is altogether supported by the five hundred, and has no motive to plead the cause of the fifty millions. "we know that india cannot have a free government. but she may have the next best thing--a firm and impartial despotism. the worst state in which she can possibly be placed is that in which the memorialists would place her. they call on us to recognise them as a privileged order of freemen in the midst of slaves. it was for the purpose of averting this great evil that parliament, at the same time at which it suffered englishmen to settle in india, armed us with those large powers which, in my opinion, we ill deserve to possess, if we have, not the spirit to use them now." macaulay had made two mistakes. he had yielded to the temptation of imputing motives, a habit which the spectator newspaper has pronounced to be his one intellectual vice, finely adding that it is "the vice of rectitude;" and he had done worse still, for he had challenged his opponents to a course of agitation. they responded to the call. after preparing the way by a string of communications to the public journals, in to which their objections to the act were set forth at enormous length, and with as much point and dignity as can be obtained by a copious use of italics and capital letters, they called a public meeting, the proceedings at which were almost too ludicrous for description. "i have seen," said one of the speakers, "at a hindoo festival, a naked dishevelled figure, his face painted with grotesque colours, and his long hair besmeared with dirt and ashes. his tongue was pierced with an iron bar, and his breast was scorched by the fire from the burning altar which rested on his stomach. this revolting figure, covered with ashes, dirt, and bleeding voluntary wounds, may the next moment ascend the sudder bench, and in a suit between a hindoo and an englishman think it an act of sanctity to decide against law in favour of the professor of the true faith." another gentleman, mr. longueville clarke, reminded "the tyrant" that there yawns the sack, and yonder rolls the sea. "mr. macaulay may treat this as an idle threat; but his knowledge of history will supply him with many examples of what has occurred when resistance has been provoked by milder instances of despotism than the decimation of a people." this pretty explicit recommendation to lynch a member of council was received with rapturous applause. at length arose a captain biden, who spoke as follows: "gentlemen, i come before you in the character of a british seaman, and on that ground claim your attention for a few moments. gentlemen, there has been much talk during the evening of laws, and regulations, and rights, and liberties; but you all seem to have forgotten that this is the anniversary of the glorious battle of waterloo. i beg to propose, and i call on the statue of lord cornwallis and yourselves to join me in three cheers for the duke of wellington and the battle of waterloo." the audience, who by this time were pretty well convinced that no grievance which could possibly result under the black act could equal the horrors of a crowd in the town hall of calcutta during the latter half of june, gladly caught at the diversion, and made noise enough to satisfy even the gallant orator. the business was brought to a hurried close, and the meeting was adjourned till the following week. but the luck of macaulay's adversaries pursued them still. one of the leading speakers at the adjourned meeting, himself a barrister, gave another barrister the lie, and a tumult ensued which captain biden in vain endeavoured to calm by his favourite remedy. "the opinion at madras, bombay, and canton," said he,--and in so saying he uttered the only sentence of wisdom which either evening had produced,--"is that there is no public opinion at calcutta but the lawyers. and now,--who has the presumption to call it a burlesque?--let's give three cheers for the battle of waterloo, and then i'll propose an amendment which shall go into the whole question." the chairman, who certainly had earned the vote of thanks for "his very extraordinary patience," which captain biden was appropriately selected to move, contrived to get resolutions passed in favour of petitioning parliament and the home government against the obnoxious act. the next few weeks were spent by the leaders of the movement in squabbling over the preliminaries of duels that never came off, and applying for criminal informations for libel against each other, which their beloved supreme court very judiciously refused to grant; but in the course of time the petitions were signed, and an agent was selected, who undertook to convey them to england. on the nd of march, , a committee of inquiry into the operation of the act was moved for in the house of commons; but there was nothing in the question which tempted honourable members to lay aside their customary indifference with regard to indian controversies, and the motion fell through without a division. the house allowed the government to have its own way in the matter; and any possible hesitation on the part of the ministers was borne down by the emphasis with which macaulay claimed their support. "i conceive," he wrote, "that the act is good in itself, and that the time for passing it has been well chosen. the strongest reason, however, for passing it is the nature of the opposition which it has experienced. the organs of that opposition repeated every day that the english were the conquerors, and the lords of the country, the dominant race; the electors of the house of commons, whose power extends both over the company at home, and over the governor-general in council here. the constituents of the british legislature, they told us, were not to be bound by laws made by any inferior authority. the firmness with which the government withstood the idle outcry of two or three hundred people, about a matter with which they had nothing to do, was designated as insolent defiance of public opinion. we were enemies of freedom, because we would not suffer a small white aristocracy to domineer over millions. how utterly at variance these principles are with reason, with justice, with the honour of the british government, and with the dearest interests of the indian people, it is unnecessary for me to point out. for myself, i can only say that, if the government is to be conducted on such principles, i am utterly disqualified, by all my feelings and opinions, from bearing any part in it, and cannot too soon resign my place to some person better fitted to hold it." it is fortunate for india that a man with the tastes, and the training, of macaulay came to her shores as one vested with authority, and that he came at the moment when he did; for that moment was the very turning-point of her intellectual progress. all educational action had been at a stand for some time back, on account of an irreconcilable difference of opinion in the committee of public instruction; which was divided, five against five, on either side of a controversy,--vital, inevitable, admitting of neither postponement nor compromise, and conducted by both parties with a pertinacity and a warmth that was nothing but honourable to those concerned. half of the members were for maintaining and extending the old scheme of encouraging oriental learning by stipends paid to students in sanscrit, persian, and arabic; and by liberal grants for the publication of works in those languages. the other half were in favour of teaching the elements of knowledge in the vernacular tongues, and the higher branches in english. on his arrival, macaulay was appointed president of the committee; but he declined to take any active part in its proceedings until the government had finally pronounced on the question at issue. later in january the advocates of the two systems, than whom ten abler men could not be found in the service, laid their opinions before the supreme council; and, on the and of february, macaulay, as a member of that council, produced a minute in which he adopted and defended the views of the english section in the committee. "how stands the case? we have to educate a people who cannot at present be educated by means of their mother-tongue. we must teach them some foreign language. the claims of our own language it is hardly necessary to recapitulate. it stands preeminent even among the languages of the west. it abounds with works of imagination not inferior to the noblest which greece has bequeathed to us; with models of every species of eloquence; with historical compositions, which, considered merely as narratives, have seldom been surpassed, and which, considered as vehicles of ethical and political instruction, have never been equalled; with just and lively representations of human life and human nature; with the most profound speculations on metaphysics, morals, government, jurisprudence, and trade; with full and correct information respecting every experimental science which tends to preserve the health, to increase the comfort, or to expand the intellect of man. whoever knows that language has ready access to all the vast intellectual wealth which the the wisest nations of the earth have created and hoarded in the course of ninety generations. it may safely be said that the literature now extant in that language is of far greater value than all the literature which three hundred years ago was extant in all the languages of the world together. nor is this all. in india, english is the language spoken by the ruling class. it is spoken by the higher class of natives at the seats of government. it is likely to become the language of commerce throughout the seas of the east. it is the language of two great european communities which are rising, the one in the south of africa, the other in australasia; communities which are every year becoming more important, and more closely connected with our indian empire. whether we look at the intrinsic value of our literature or at the particular situation of this country, we shall see the strongest reason to think that, of all foreign tongues, the english tongue is that which would be the most useful to our native subjects. "the question now before us is simply whether, when it is in our power to teach this language, we shall teach languages in which, by universal confession, there are no books on any subject which deserve to be compared to our own; whether, when we can teach european science, we shall teach systems which, by universal confession, whenever they differ from those of europe, differ for the worse; and whether, when we can patronise sound philosophy and true history, we shall countenance, at the public expense, medical doctrines, which would disgrace an english furrier--astronomy, which would move laughter in the girls at an english boarding-school--history, abounding with kings thirty feet high, and reigns thirty thousand years long--and geography made up of seas of treacle and seas of butter. "we are not without experience to guide us. history furnishes several analogous cases, and they all teach the same lesson. there are in modern times, to go no further, two memorable instances of a great impulse given to the mind of a whole society--of prejudice overthrown--of knowledge diffused--of taste purified--of arts and sciences planted in countries which had recently been ignorant and barbarous. "the first instance to which i refer is the great revival of letters among the western nations at the close of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth century. at that time almost everything that was worth reading was contained in the writings of the ancient greeks and romans. had our ancestors acted as the committee of public instruction has hitherto acted; had they neglected the language of cicero and tacitus; had they confined their attention to the old dialects of our own island; had they printed nothing, and taught nothing at the universities, but chronicles in anglo-saxon, and romances in norman french, would england have been what she now is? what the greek and latin were to the contemporaries of more and ascham, our tongue is to the people of india. the literature of england is now more valuable than that of classical antiquity. i doubt whether the sanscrit literature be as valuable as that of our saxon and norman progenitors. in some departments--in history, for example--i am certain that it is much less so. "another instance may be said to be still before our eyes. within the last hundred and twenty years a nation which had previously been in a state as barbarous as that in which our ancestors were before the crusades has gradually emerged from the ignorance in which it was sunk, and has taken its place among civilised communities. i speak of russia. there is now in that country a large educated class, abounding with persons fit to serve the state in the highest functions, and in no way inferior to the most accomplished men who adorn the best circles of paris and london. there is reason to hope that this vast empire, which in the time of our grandfathers was probably behind the punjab, may, in the time of our grandchildren, be pressing close on france and britain in the career of improvement. and how was this change effected? not by flattering national prejudices; not by feeding the mind of the young muscovite with the old woman's stories which his rude fathers had believed; not by filling his head with lying legends about st. nicholas; not by encouraging him to study the great question, whether the world was or was not created on the th of september; not by calling him 'a learned native,' when he has mastered all these points of knowledge; but by teaching him those foreign languages in which the greatest mass of information had been laid up, and thus putting all that information within his reach. the languages of western europe civilised russia. i cannot doubt that they will do for the hindoo what they have done for the tartar." this minute, which in its original shape is long enough for an article in a quarterly review, and as businesslike as a report of a royal commission, set the question at rest at once and for ever. on the th of march, , lord william bentinck decided that "the great object of the british government ought to be the promotion of european literature and science among the natives of india;" two of the orientalists retired from the committee of public instruction; several new members, both english and native, were appointed; and macaulay entered upon the functions of president with an energy and assiduity which in his case was an infallible proof that his work was to his mind. the post was no sinecure. it was an arduous task to plan, found, and construct, in all its grades, the education of such a country as india. the means at macaulay's disposal were utterly inadequate for the undertaking on which he was engaged. nothing resembling an organised staff was as yet in existence. there were no inspectors of schools. there were no training colleges for masters. there were no boards of experienced managers. the machinery consisted of voluntary committees acting on the spot, and corresponding directly with the superintending body at calcutta. macaulay rose to the occasion, and threw himself into the routine of administration and control with zeal sustained by diligence and tempered by tact. "we were hardly prepared," said a competent critic, "for the amount of conciliation which he evinces in dealing with irritable colleagues and subordinates, and for the strong, sterling, practical common sense with which he sweeps away rubbish, or cuts the knots of local and departmental problems." the mastery which a man exercises over himself, and the patience and forbearance displayed in his dealings with others, are generally in proportion to the value which he sets upon the objects of his pursuit. if we judge macaulay by this standard, it is plain that he cared a great deal more for providing our eastern empire with an educational outfit that would work and wear than he ever cared for keeping his own seat in parliament or pushing his own fortunes in downing street. throughout his innumerable minutes, on all subjects from the broadest principle to the narrowest detail, he is everywhere free from crotchets and susceptibilities; and everywhere ready to humour any person who will make himself useful, and to adopt any appliance which can be turned to account. "i think it highly probable that mr. nicholls may be to blame, because i have seldom known a quarrel in which both parties were not to blame. but i see no evidence that he is so. nor do i see any evidence which tends to prove that mr. nicholls leads the local committee by the nose. the local committee appear to have acted with perfect propriety, and i cannot consent to treat them in the manner recommended by mr. sutherland. if we appoint the colonel to be a member of their body, we shall in effect pass a most severe censure on their proceedings. i dislike the suggestion of putting military men on the committee as a check on the civilians. hitherto we have never, to the best of my belief, been troubled by any such idle jealousies. i would appoint the fittest men without caring to what branch of the service they belonged, or whether they belonged to the service at all." [this, and the following extracts, are taken from a volume of macaulay's minutes, "now first collected from records in the department of public instruction, by h. woodrow, esq., m.a., inspector of schools at calcutta, and formerly fellow of caius college, cambridge." the collection was published in india.] exception had been taken to an applicant for a mastership, on the ground that he had been a preacher with a strong turn for proselytising. "mr. ---- seems to be so little concerned about proselytising, that he does not even know how to spell the word; a circumstance which, if i did not suppose it to be a slip of the pen, i should think a more serious objection than the 'reverend' which formerly stood before his name. i am quite content with his assurances." in default of better, macaulay was always for employing the tools which came to hand. a warm and consistent advocate of appointment by competitive examination, wherever a field for competition existed, he was no pedantic slave to a theory. in the dearth of schoolmasters, which is a feature in every infant educational system, he refused to reject a candidate who mistook "argos for corinth," and backed the claims of aspirants of respectable character who could "read, write, and work a sum." "by all means accept the king of oude's present; though, to be sure, more detestable maps were never seen. one would think that the revenues of oude, and the treasures of saadut ali, might have borne the expense of producing something better than a map in which sicily is joined on to the toe of italy, and in which so important an eastern island as java does not appear at all." "as to the corrupting influence of the zenana, of which mr. trevelyan speaks, i may regret it; but i own that i cannot help thinking that the dissolution of the tie between parent and child is as great a moral evil as can be found in any zenana. in whatever degree infant schools relax that tie they do mischief. for my own part, i would rather hear a boy of three years old lisp all the bad words in the language than that he should have no feelings of family affection--that his character should be that which must be expected in one who has had the misfortune of having a schoolmaster in place of a mother." "i do not see the reason for establishing any limit as to the age of scholars. the phenomena are exactly the same which have always been found to exist when a new mode of education has been rising into fashion. no man of fifty now learns greek with boys; but in the sixteenth century it was not at all unusual to see old doctors of divinity attending lectures side by side with young students." "with respect to making our college libraries circulating libraries, there is much to be said on both sides. if a proper subscription is demanded from those who have access to them, and if all that is raised by this subscription is laid out in adding to the libraries, the students will be no losers by the plan. our libraries, the best of them at least, would be better than any which would be readily accessible at an up-country station; and i do not know why we should grudge a young officer the pleasure of reading our copy of boswell's life of johnson or marmontel's memoirs, if he is willing to pay a few rupees for the privilege." these utterances of cultured wisdom or homely mother-wit are sometimes expressed in phrases almost as amusing, though not so characteristic, as those which frederic the great used to scrawl on the margin of reports and despatches for the information of his secretaries. "we are a little too indulgent to the whims of the people in our employ. we pay a large sum to send a master to a distant station. he dislikes the place. the collector is uncivil; the surgeon quarrels with him; and he must be moved. the expenses of the journey have to be defrayed. another man is to be transferred from a place where he is comfortable and useful. our masters run from station to station at our cost, as vapourised ladies at home run about from spa to spa. all situations have their discomforts; and there are times when we all wish that our lot had been cast in some other line of life, or in some other place." with regard to a proposed coat of arms for hooghly college, he says "i do not see why the mummeries of european heraldry should be introduced into any part of our indian system. heraldry is not a science which has any eternal rules. it is a system of arbitrary canons, originating in pure caprice. nothing can be more absurd and grotesque than armorial bearings, considered in themselves. certain recollections, certain associations, make them interesting in many cases to an englishman; but in those recollections and associations the natives of india do not participate. a lion, rampant, with a folio in his paw, with a man standing on each side of him, with a telescope over his head, and with a persian motto under his feet, must seem to them either very mysterious, or very absurd." in a discussion on the propriety of printing some books of oriental science, macaulay writes "i should be sorry to say anything disrespectful of that liberal and generous enthusiasm for oriental literature which appears in mr. sutherland's minute; but i own that i cannot think that we ought to be guided in the distribution of the small sum, which the government has allotted for the purpose of education, by considerations which seem a little romantic. that the saracens a thousand years ago cultivated mathematical science is hardly, i think, a reason for our spending any money in translating english treatises on mathematics into arabic. mr. sutherland would probably think it very strange if we were to urge the destruction of the alexandrian library as a reason against patronising arabic literature in the nineteenth century. the undertaking may be, as mr. sutherland conceives, a great national work. so is the breakwater at madras. but under the orders which we have received from the government, we have just as little to do with one as with the other." now and then a stroke, aimed at hooghly college, hits nearer home. that men of thirty should be bribed to continue their education into mature life "seems very absurd. moghal jan has been paid to learn something during twelve years. we are told that he is lazy and stupid; but there are hopes that in four years more he will have completed his course of study. we have had quite enough of these lazy, stupid schoolboys of thirty." "i must frankly own that i do not like the list of books. grammars of rhetoric and grammars of logic are among the most useless furniture of a shelf. give a boy robinson crusoe. that is worth all the grammars of rhetoric and logic in the world. we ought to procure such books as are likely to give the children a taste for the literature of the west; not books filled with idle distinctions and definitions, which every man who has learned them makes haste to forget. who ever reasoned better for having been taught the difference between a syllogism and an enthymeme? who ever composed with greater spirit and elegance because he could define an oxymoron or an aposiopesis? i am not joking, but writing quite seriously, when i say that i would much rather order a hundred copies of jack the giant-killer for our schools than a hundred copies of any grammar of rhetoric or logic that ever was written." "goldsmith's histories of greece and rome are miserable performances, and i do not at all like to lay out pounds on them, even after they have received all mr. pinnock's improvements. i must own too, that i think the order for globes and other instruments unnecessarily large. to lay out pounds at once on globes alone, useful as i acknowledge those articles to be, seems exceedingly profuse, when we have only about , pounds a year for all purposes of english education. one -inch or -inch globe for each school is quite enough; and we ought not, i think, to order sixteen such globes when we are about to establish only seven schools. useful as the telescopes, the theodolites, and the other scientific instruments mentioned in the indent undoubtedly are, we must consider that four or five such instruments run away with a year's salary of a schoolmaster, and that, if we purchase them, it will be necessary to defer the establishment of schools." at one of the colleges at calcutta the distribution of prizes was accompanied by some histrionic performances on the part of the pupils. "i have no partiality," writes macaulay, "for such ceremonies. i think it a very questionable thing whether, even at home, public spouting and acting ought to form part of the system of a place of education. but in this country such exhibitions are peculiarly out of place. i can conceive nothing more grotesque than the scene from the merchant of venice, with portia represented by a little black boy. then, too, the subjects of recitation were ill chosen. we are attempting to introduce a great nation to a knowledge of the richest and noblest literature in the world. the society of calcutta assemble to see what progress we are making; and we produce as a sample a boy who repeats some blackguard doggerel of george colman's, about a fat gentleman who was put to bed over an oven, and about a man-midwife who was called out of his bed by a drunken man at night. our disciple tries to hiccup, and tumbles and staggers about in imitation of the tipsy english sailors whom he has seen at the punch houses. really, if we can find nothing better worth reciting than this trash, we had better give up english instruction altogether." "as to the list of prize books, i am not much better satisfied. it is absolutely unintelligible to me why pope's works and my old friend moore's lalla rookh should be selected from the whole mass of english poetry to be prize books. i will engage to frame, currente calamo, a better list. bacon's essays, hume's england, gibbon's rome, robertson's charles v., robertson's scotland, robertson's america, swift's gulliver, robinson crusoe, shakespeare's works, paradise lost, milton's smaller poems, arabian nights, park's travels, anson's voyage, the vicar of wakefield, johnson's lives, gil blas, voltaire's charles xii., southey's nelson, middleton's life of cicero. "this may serve as a specimen. these are books which will amuse and interest those who obtain them. to give a boy abercrombie on the intellectual powers, dick's moral improvement, young's intellectual philosophy, chalmers's poetical economy!!! (in passing i may be allowed to ask what that means?) is quite absurd. i would not give orders at random for books about which we know nothing. we are under no necessity of ordering at haphazard. we know robinson crusoe, and gulliver, and the arabian nights, and anson's voyage, and many other delightful works which interest even the very young, and which do not lose their interest to the end of our lives. why should we order blindfold such books as markham's new children's friend, the juvenile scrap book, the child's own book, niggens's earth, mudie's sea, and somebody else's fire and air?--books which, i will be bound for it, none of us ever opened. "the list ought in all its parts to be thoroughly recast. if sir benjamin malkin will furnish the names of ten or twelve works of a scientific kind, which he thinks suited for prizes, the task will not be difficult; and, with his help, i will gladly undertake it. there is a marked distinction between a prize book and a school book. a prize book ought to be a book which a boy receives with pleasure, and turns over and over, not as a task, but spontaneously. i have not forgotten my own school-boy feelings on this subject. my pleasure at obtaining a prize was greatly enhanced by the knowledge that my little library would receive a very agreeable addition. i never was better pleased than when at fourteen i was master of boswell's life of johnson, which i had long been wishing to read. if my master had given me, instead of boswell, a critical pronouncing dictionary, or a geographical class book, i should have been much less gratified by my success." the idea had been started of paying authors to write books in the languages of the country. on this macaulay remarks "to hire four or five people to make a literature is a course which never answered and never will answer, in any part of the world. languages grow. they cannot be built. we are now following the slow but sure course on which alone we can depend for a supply of good books in the vernacular languages of india. we are attempting to raise up a large class of enlightened natives. i hope that, twenty years hence, there will be hundreds, nay thousands, of natives familiar with the best models of composition, and well acquainted with western science. among them some persons will be found who will have the inclination and the ability to exhibit european knowledge in the vernacular dialects. this i believe to be the only way in which we can raise up a good vernacular literature in this country." these hopeful anticipations have been more than fulfilled. twice twenty years have brought into existence, not hundreds or thousands, but hundreds of thousands, of natives who can appreciate european knowledge when laid before them in the english language, and can reproduce it in their own. taking one year with another, upwards of a thousand works of literature and science are published annually in bengal alone, and at least four times that number throughout the entire continent. our colleges have more than six thousand students on their books, and two hundred thousand boys are receiving a liberal education in schools of the higher order. for the improvement of the mass of the people, nearly seven thousand young men are in training as certificated masters. the amount allotted in the budget to the item of public instruction has increased more than seventy-fold since ; and is largely supplemented by the fees which parents of all classes willingly contribute when once they have been taught the value of a commodity the demand for which is created by the supply. during many years past the generosity of wealthy natives has to a great extent been diverted from the idle extravagance of pageants and festivals, to promote the intellectual advancement of their fellow-countrymen. on several different occasions, at a single stroke of the pen, our indian universities have been endowed with twice, three times, four times the amount of the slender sum which macaulay had at his command. but none the less was he the master-engineer, whose skill and foresight determined the direction of the channels, along which this stream of public and private munificence was to flow for the regeneration of our eastern empire. it may add something to the merit of macaulay's labours in the cause of education that those labours were voluntary and unpaid; and voluntary and unpaid likewise was another service which he rendered to india, not less durable than the first, and hardly less important. a clause in the act of gave rise to the appointment of a commission to inquire into the jurisprudence and jurisdiction of our eastern empire. macaulay, at his own instigation, was appointed president of that commission. he had not been many months engaged in his new duties before he submitted a proposal, by the adoption of which his own industry and the high talents of his colleagues, mr. cameron and sir john macleod, might be turned to the best account by being employed in framing a criminal code for the whole indian empire. "this code," writes macaulay, "should not be a mere digest of existing usages and regulations, but should comprise all the reforms which the commission may think desirable. it should be framed on two great principles, the principle of suppressing crime with the smallest possible amount of suffering, and the principle of ascertaining truth at the smallest possible cost of time and money. the commissioners should be particularly charged to study conciseness, as far as it is consistent with perspicuity. in general, i believe, it will be found that perspicuous and concise expressions are not only compatible, but identical." the offer was eagerly accepted, and the commission fell to work. the results of that work did not show themselves quickly enough to satisfy the most practical, and, (to its credit be it spoken,) the most exacting of governments; and macaulay was under the necessity of explaining and excusing a procrastination, which was celerity itself as compared with any codifying that had been done since the days of justinian. "during the last rainy season,--a season, i believe, peculiarly unhealthy,--every member of the commission, except myself, was wholly incapacitated for exertion. mr. anderson has been twice under the necessity of leaving calcutta, and has not, till very lately, been able to labour with his accustomed activity. mr. macleod has been, till within the last week or ten days, in so feeble a state that the smallest effort seriously disordered him; and his health is so delicate that, admirably qualified as he is, by very rare talents, for the discharge of his functions, it would be imprudent, in forming any prospective calculation, to reckon on much service from him. mr. cameron, of the importance of whose assistance i need not speak, has been, during more than four months, utterly unable to do any work, and has at length been compelled to ask leave of absence, in order to visit the cape for the recovery of his health. thus, as the governor-general has stated, mr. millett and myself have, during a considerable time, constituted the whole effective strength of the commission. nor has mr. millett been able to devote to the business of the commission his whole undivided attention. "i must say that, even if no allowance be made for the untoward occurrences which have retarded our progress, that progress cannot be called slow. people who have never considered the importance and difficulty of the task in which we are employed are surprised to find that a code cannot be spoken of extempore, or written like an article in a magazine. i am not ashamed to acknowledge that there are several chapters in the code on which i have been employed for months; of which i have changed the whole plan ten or twelve times; which contain not a single word as it originally stood; and with which i am still very far indeed from being satisfied. i certainly shall not hurry on my share of the work to gratify the childish impatience of the ignorant. their censure ought to be a matter of perfect indifference to men engaged in a task, on the right performance of which the welfare of millions may, during a long series of years, depend. the cost of the commission is as nothing when compared with the importance of such a work. the time during which the commission has sat is as nothing compared with the time during which that work will produce good, or evil, to india. "indeed, if we compare the progress of the indian code with the progress of codes under circumstances far more favourable, we shall find little reason to accuse the law commission of tardiness. buonaparte had at his command the services of experienced jurists to any extent to which he chose to call for them; yet his legislation proceeded at a far slower rate than ours. the french criminal code was begun, under the consulate, in march ; and yet the code of criminal procedure was not completed till , and the penal code not till . the criminal code of louisiana was commenced in february . after it had been in preparation during three years and a half, an accident happened to the papers which compelled mr. livingstone to request indulgence for another year. indeed, when i remember the slow progress of law reforms at home, and when i consider that our code decides hundreds of questions, every one of which, if stirred in england, would give occasion to voluminous controversy and to many animated debates, i must acknowledge that i am inclined to fear that we have been guilty rather of precipitation than of delay." this minute was dated the end of january, ; and in the course of the same year the code appeared, headed by an introductory report in the shape of a letter to the governor-general, and followed by an appendix containing eighteen notes, each in itself an essay. the most readable of all digests, its pages are alive with illustrations drawn from history, from literature, and from the habits and occurrences of everyday life. the offence of fabricating evidence is exemplified by a case which may easily be recognised as that of lady macbeth and the grooms; ["a, after wounding a person with a knife, goes into the room where z is sleeping, smears z's clothes with blood, and lays the knife under z's pillow; intending not only that suspicion may thereby be turned away front himself, but also that z may be convicted of voluntarily causing grievous hurt. a is liable to punishment as a fabricator of false evidence."] and the offence of voluntary culpable homicide by an imaginary incident of a pit covered with sticks and turf, which irresistibly recalls a reminiscence of jack the giant-killer. the chapters on theft and trespass establish the rights of book owners as against book stealers, book borrowers, and book defacers, with an affectionate precision which would have gladdened the heart of charles lamb or sir walter scott. ["a, being on friendly terms with z, goes into z's library, in z's absence, and takes a book without z's express consent. here, it is probable that a may have conceived that he had z's implied consent to use z's books. if this was a's impression, a has not committed theft." "a takes up a book belonging to z, and reads it, not having any right over the book, and not having the consent of any person entitled to authorise a so to do. a trespasses. "a, being exasperated at a passage in a book which is lying on the counter of z, snatches it up, and tears it to pieces. a has not committed theft, as he has not acted fraudulently, though he may have committed criminal trespass and mischief."] in the chapter on manslaughter, the judge is enjoined to treat with lenity an act done in the first anger of a husband or father, provoked by the intolerable outrage of a certain kind of criminal assault. "such an assault produced the sicilian vespers. such an assault called forth the memorable blow of wat tyler." and, on the question whether the severity of a hurt should be considered in apportioning the punishment, we are reminded of "examples which are universally known. harley was laid up more than twenty days by the wound which he received from guiscard;" while "the scratch which damien gave to louis the fifteenth was so slight that it was followed by no feverish symptoms." such a sanguine estimate of the diffusion of knowledge with regard to the details of ancient crimes could proceed from no pen but that of the writer who endowed schoolboys with the erudition of professors, and the talker who, when he poured forth the stores of his memory, began each of his disquisitions with the phrase, "don't you remember?" if it be asked whether or not the penal code fulfils the ends for which it was framed, the answer may safely be left to the gratitude of indian civilians, the younger of whom carry it about in their saddle-bags, and the older in their heads. the value which it possesses in the eyes of a trained english lawyer may be gathered from the testimony of macaulay's eminent successor, mr. fitzjames stephen, who writes of it thus: "in order to appreciate the importance of the penal code, it must be borne in mind what crime in india is. here, in england, order is so thoroughly well established that the crime of the country is hardly more than an annoyance. in india, if crime is allowed to let to a head, it is capable of destroying the peace and prosperity of whole tracts of country. the mass of the people in their common moods are gentle, submissive, and disposed to be innocent; but, for that very reason, bold and successful criminals are dangerous in the extreme. in old days, when they joined in gangs or organised bodies, they soon acquired political importance. now, in many parts of india, crime is quite as uncommon as in the least criminal parts of england; and the old high-handed systematised crime has almost entirely disappeared. this great revolution (for it is nothing less) in the state of society of a whole continent has been brought about by the regular administration of a rational body of criminal law. "the administration of criminal justice is entrusted to a very small number of english magistrates, organised according to a carefully-devised system of appeal and supervision which represents the experience of a century. this system is not unattended by evils; but it is absolutely necessary to enable a few hundred civilians to govern a continent. persons in such a position must be provided with the plainest instructions as to the nature of their duties. these instructions, in so far as the administration of criminal justice is concerned, are contained in the indian penal code and the code of criminal procedure. the code of criminal procedure contains sections, and forms a pamphlet of widely printed octavo pages. the penal code consists of sections. pocket editions of these codes are published, which may be carried about as easily as a pocket bible; and i doubt whether, even in scotland, you would find many people who know their bibles as indian civilians know their codes." after describing the confusion and complication of the criminal law of our indian empire before it was taken in hand by the commission of , mr. stephen proceeds to say: "lord macaulay's great work was far too daring and original to be accepted at once. it was a draft when he left india in . his successors made remarks on it for twenty-two years. those years were filled with wars and rumours of wars. the afghan disasters and triumphs, the war in central india, the wars with the sikhs, lord dalhousie's annexations, threw law reform into the background, and produced a state of mind not very favourable to it. then came the mutiny, which in its essence was the breakdown of an old system; the renunciation of an attempt to effect an impossible compromise between the asiatic and the european view of things, legal, military, and administrative. the effect of the mutiny on the statute-book was unmistakable. the code of civil procedure was enacted in . the penal code was enacted in , and came into operation on the st of january . the credit of passing the penal code into law, and of giving to every part of it the improvements which practical skill and technical knowledge could bestow, is due to sir barnes peacock, who held lord macaulay's place during the most anxious years through which the indian empire has passed. the draft and the revision are both eminently creditable to their authors; and the result of their successive efforts has been to reproduce in a concise, and even beautiful, form the spirit of the law of england; the most technical, the most clumsy, and the most bewildering of all systems of criminal law; though i think, if its principles are fully understood, it is the most rational. if anyone doubts this assertion, let him compare the indian penal code with such a book as mr. greaves's edition of russell on crimes. the one subject of homicide, as treated by mr. greaves and russell, is, i should think, twice as long as the whole penal code; and it does not contain a tenth part of the matter." "the point which always has surprised me most in connection with the penal code is, that it proves that lord macaulay must have had a knowledge of english criminal law which, considering how little he had practised it, may fairly be called extraordinary. [macaulay's practice at the bar had been less than little, according to an account which he gave of it at a public dinner: "my own forensic experience, gentlemen, has been extremely small; for my only recollection of an achievement that way is that at quarter sessions i once convicted a boy of stealing a parcel of cocks and hens."] he must have possessed the gift of going at once to the very root of the matter, and of sifting the corn from the chaff to a most unusual degree; for his draft gives the substance of the criminal law of england, down to its minute working details, in a compass which, by comparison with the original, may be regarded as almost absurdly small. the indian penal code is to the english criminal law what a manufactured article ready for use is to the materials out of which it is made. it is to the french 'code penal,' and, i may add, to the north german code of , what a finished picture is to a sketch. it is far simpler, and much better expressed, than livingstone's code for louisiana; and its practical success has been complete. the clearest proof of this is that hardly any questions have arisen upon it which have had to be determined by the courts; and that few and slight amendments have had to be made in it by the legislature." without troubling himself unduly about the matter, macaulay was conscious that the world's estimate of his public services would be injuriously affected by the popular notion, which he has described as "so flattering to mediocrity," that a great writer cannot be a great administrator; and it is possible that this consciousness had something to do with the heartiness and fervour which he threw into his defence of the author of "cato" against the charge of having been an inefficient secretary of state. there was much in common between his own lot and that of the other famous essayist who had been likewise a whig statesman; and this similarity in their fortunes may account in part for the indulgence, and almost tenderness, with which he reviewed the career and character of addison. addison himself, at his villa in chelsea, and still more amidst the gilded slavery of holland house, might have envied the literary seclusion, ample for so rapid a reader, which the usages of indian life permitted macaulay to enjoy. "i have a very pretty garden," he writes, "not unlike our little grass-plot at clapham, but larger. it consists of a fine sheet of turf, with a gravel walk round it, and flower-beds scattered over it. it looks beautiful just now after the rains, and i hear that it keeps its verdure during a great part of the year. a flight of steps leads down from my library into the garden, and it is so well shaded that you may walk there till ten o'clock in the morning." here, book in hand, and in dressing-gown and slippers, he would spend those two hours after sun-rise which anglo-indian gentlemen devote to riding, and anglo-indian ladies to sleeping off the arrears of the sultry night. regularly, every morning, his studies were broken in upon by the arrival of his baby niece, who came to feed the crows with the toast which accompanied his early cup of tea; a ceremony during which he had much ado to protect the child from the advances of a multitude of birds, each almost as big as herself, which hopped and fluttered round her as she stood on the steps of the verandah. when the sun drove him indoors, (which happened sooner than he had promised himself, before he had learned by experience what the hot season was,) he went to his bath and toilette, and then to breakfast; "at which we support nature under the exhausting effects of the climate by means of plenty of eggs, mango-fish, snipe-pies, and frequently a hot beefsteak. my cook is renowned through calcutta for his skill. he brought me attestations of a long succession of gourmands, and among them one from lord dalhousie, who pronounced him decidedly the first artist in bengal. [lord dalhousie, the father of the governor-general, was commander-in-chief in india during the years and .] this great man, and his two assistants, i am to have for thirty rupees a month. while i am on the subject of the cuisine, i may as well say all that i have to say about it at once. the tropical fruits are wretched. the best of them is inferior to our apricot or gooseberry. when i was a child, i had a notion of its being the most exquisite of treats to eat plantains and yams, and to drink palm-wine. how i envied my father for having enjoyed these luxuries! i have now enjoyed them all, and i have found like much greater men on much more important occasions, that all is vanity. a plantain is very like a rotten pear,--so like that i would lay twenty to one that a person blindfolded would not discover the difference. a yam is better. it is like an indifferent potato. i tried palm-wine at a pretty village near madras, where i slept one night. i told captain barron that i had been curious to taste that liquor ever since i first saw, eight or nine and twenty years ago, the picture of the negro climbing the tree in sierra leone. the next morning i was roused by a servant, with a large bowl of juice fresh from the tree. i drank it, and found it very like ginger-beer in which the ginger has been sparingly used." macaulay necessarily spent away from home the days on which the supreme council, or the law commission, held their meetings; but the rest of his work, legal, literary, and educational, he carried on in the quiet of his library. now and again, a morning was consumed in returning calls, an expenditure of time which it is needless to say that he sorely grudged. "happily, the good people here are too busy to be at home. except the parsons, they are all usefully occupied somewhere or other, so that i have only to leave cards; but the reverend gentlemen are always within doors in the heat of the day, lying on their backs, regretting breakfast, longing for tiffin, and crying out for lemonade." after lunch he sate with mrs. trevelyan, translating greek or reading french for her benefit; and scribe's comedies and saint simon's memoirs beguiled the long languid leisure of the calcutta afternoon, while the punkah swung overhead, and the air came heavy and scented through the moistened grass-matting which shrouded the windows. at the approach of sunset, with its attendant breeze, he joined his sister in her drive along the banks of the hooghly; and they returned by starlight,--too often to take part in a vast banquet of forty guests, dressed as fashionably as people can dress at ninety degrees east from paris; who, one and all, had far rather have been eating their curry, and drinking their bitter beer, at home, in all the comfort of muslin and nankeen. macaulay is vehement in his dislike of "those great formal dinners, which unite all the stiffness of a levee to all the disorder and discomfort of a two-shilling ordinary. nothing can be duller. nobody speaks except to the person next him. the conversation is the most deplorable twaddle, and, as i always sit next to the lady of the highest rank, or, in other words, to the oldest, ugliest, and proudest woman in the company, i am worse off than my neighbours." nevertheless he was far too acute a judge of men to undervalue the special type of mind which is produced and fostered by the influences of an indian career. he was always ready to admit that there is no better company in the world than a young and rising civilian; no one who has more to say that is worth hearing, and who can say it in a manner better adapted to interest those who know good talk from bad. he delighted in that freedom from pedantry, affectation, and pretension which is one of the most agreeable characteristics of a service, to belong to which is in itself so effectual an education, that a bore is a phenomenon notorious everywhere within a hundred miles of the station which has the honour to possess him, and a fool is quoted by name throughout all the three presidencies. macaulay writes to his sisters at home: "the best way of seeing society here is to have very small parties. there is a little circle of people whose friendship i value, and in whose conversation i take pleasure: the chief justice, sir edward ryan; my old friend, malkin; cameron and macleod, the law commissioners; macnaghten, among the older servants of the company, and mangles, colvin, and john peter grant among the younger. [it cannot be said that all the claims made upon macaulay's friendship were acknowledged as readily as those of sir benjamin malkin. "i am dunned unmercifully by place-hunters. the oddest application that i have received is from that rascal --, who is somewhere in the interior. he tells me he is sure that prosperity has not changed me; that i am still the same john macaulay who was his dearest friend, his more than brother; and that he means to come up, and live with me at calcutta. if he fulfils his intention, i will have him taken before the police-magistrates."] these, in my opinion, are the flower of calcutta society, and i often ask some of them to a quiet dinner." on the friday of every week, these chosen few met round macaulay's breakfast table to discuss the progress which the law commission had made in its labours; and each successive point which was started opened the way to such a flood of talk,--legal, historical, political, and personal,--that the company would sit far on towards noon over the empty teacups, until an uneasy sense of accumulating despatch-boxes drove them, one by one, to their respective offices. there are scattered passages in these letters which prove that macaulay's feelings, during his protracted absence from his native country, were at times almost as keen as those which racked the breast of cicero, when he was forced to exchange the triumphs of the forum, and the cozy suppers with his brother augurs, for his hateful place of banishment at thessalonica, or his hardly less hateful seat of government at tarsus. the complaints of the english statesman do not, however, amount in volume to a fiftieth part of those reiterated out pourings of lachrymose eloquence with which the roman philosopher bewailed an expatriation that was hardly one-third as long. "i have no words," writes macaulay, very much under-estimating the wealth of his own vocabulary, "to tell you how i pine for england, or how intensely bitter exile has been to me, though i hope that i have borne it well. i feel as if i had no other wish than to see my country again and die. let me assure you that banishment is no light matter. no person can judge of it who has not experienced it. a complete revolution in all the habits of life; an estrangement from almost every old friend and acquaintance; fifteen thousand miles of ocean between the exile and everything that he cares for; all this is, to me at least, very trying. there is no temptation of wealth, or power, which would induce me to go through it again. but many people do not feel as i do. indeed, the servants of the company rarely have such a feeling; and it is natural that they should not have it, for they are sent out while still schoolboys, and when they know little of the world. the moment of emigration is to them also the moment of emancipation; and the pleasures of liberty and affluence to a great degree compensate them for the loss of their home. in a few years they become orientalised, and, by the time that they are of my age, they would generally prefer india, as a residence, to england. but it is a very different matter when a man is transplanted at thirty-three." making, as always, the best of everything, he was quite ready to allow that he might have been placed in a still less agreeable situation. in the following extract from a letter to his friend, mrs. drummond, there is much which will come home to those who are old enough to remember how vastly the dublin of differed, for the worse, from the dublin of , "it now seems likely that you may remain in ireland for years. i cannot conceive what has induced you to submit to such an exile. i declare, for my own part, that, little as i love calcutta, i would rather stay here than be settled in the phoenix park. the last residence which i would choose would be a place with all the plagues, and none of the attractions, of a capital; a provincial city on fire with factions political and religious, peopled by raving orangemen and raving repealers, and distracted by a contest between protestantism as fanatical as that of knot and catholicism as fanatical as that of bonner. we have our share of the miseries of life in this country. we are annually baked four months, boiled four more, and allowed the remaining four to become cool if we can. at this moment, the sun is blazing like a furnace. the earth, soaked with oceans of rain, is steaming like a wet blanket. vegetation is rotting all round us. insects and undertakers are the only living creatures which seem to enjoy the climate. but, though our atmosphere is hot, our factions are lukewarm. a bad epigram in a newspaper, or a public meeting attended by a tailor, a pastry-cook, a reporter, two or three barristers, and eight or ten attorneys, are our most formidable annoyances. we have agitators in our own small way, tritons of the minnows, bearing the same sort of resemblance to o'connell that a lizard bears to an alligator. therefore calcutta for me, in preference to dublin." he had good reason for being grateful to calcutta, and still better for not showing his gratitude by prolonging his stay there over a fourth summer and autumn. "that tremendous crash of the great commercial houses which took place a few years ago has produced a revolution in fashions. it ruined one half of the english society in bengal, and seriously injured the other half. a large proportion of the most important functionaries here are deeply in debt, and accordingly, the mode of living is now exceedingly quiet and modest. those immense subscriptions, those public tables, those costly equipages and entertainments of which heber, and others who saw calcutta a few years back, say so much, are never heard of. speaking for myself, it was a great piece of good fortune that i came hither just at the time when the general distress had forced everybody to adopt a moderate way of living. owing very much to that circumstance, (while keeping house, i think, more handsomely than any other member of council,) i have saved what will enable me to do my part towards making my family comfortable; and i shall have a competency for myself, small indeed, but quite sufficient to render me as perfectly independent as if i were the possessor of burleigh or chatsworth." [macaulay writes to lord mahon on the last day of december : "in another year i hope to leave this country, with a fortune which you would think ridiculously small, but which will make me as independent as if i had all that lord westminster has above the ground, and lord durham below it. i have no intention of again taking part in politics; but i cannot tell what effect the sight of the old hall and abbey may produce on me."] "the rainy season of has been exceedingly unhealthy. our house has escaped as well as any; yet hannah is the only one of us who has come off untouched. the baby has been repeatedly unwell. trevelyan has suffered a good deal, and is kept right only by occasional trips in a steamer down to the mouth of the hooghly. i had a smart touch of fever, which happily stayed but an hour or two, and i took such vigorous measures that it never came again; but i remained unnerved and exhausted for nearly a fortnight. this was my first, and i hope my last, taste of indian maladies. it is a happy thing for us all that we are not to pass another year in the reek of this deadly marsh." macaulay wisely declined to set the hope of making another lac of rupees against the risk, to himself and others of such a fate as subsequently befell lord canning and mr. james wilson. he put the finishing stroke to his various labours; resigned his seat in the council, and his presidentships of the law commission and the committee of public instruction; and, in company with the trevelyans, sailed for england in the first fortnight of the year . to mr thomas flower ellis. calcutta: december , . dear ellis,--many thanks for your letter. it is delightful in this strange land to see the handwriting of such a friend. we must keep up our spirits. we shall meet, i trust, in little more than four years, with feelings of regard only strengthened by our separation. my spirits are not bad; and they ought not to be bad. i have health; affluence; consideration; great power to do good; functions which, while they are honourable and useful, are not painfully burdensome; leisure for study; good books; an unclouded and active mind; warm affections; and a very dear sister. there will soon be a change in my domestic arrangements. my sister is to be married next week. her lover, who is lover enough to be a knight of the round table, is one of the most distinguished of our young civilians. i have the very highest opinion of his talents both for action and for discussion. indeed, i should call him a man of real genius. he is also, what is even more important, a man of the utmost purity of honour, of a sweet temper, and of strong principle. his public virtue has gone through very severe trials, and has come out resplendent. lord william, in congratulating me the other day, said that he thought my destined brother-in-law the ablest young man in the service. his name is trevelyan. he is a nephew of sir john trevelyan, a baronet; in cornwall i suppose, by the name; for i never took the trouble to ask. he and my sister will live with me during my stay here. i have a house about as large as lord dudley's in park lane, or rather larger, so that i shall accommodate them without the smallest difficulty. this arrangement is acceptable to me, because it saves me from the misery of parting with my sister in this strange land; and is, i believe, equally gratifying to trevelyan, whose education, like that of other indian servants, was huddled up hastily at home; who has an insatiable thirst for knowledge of every sort; and who looks on me as little less than an oracle of wisdom. he came to me the other morning to know whether i would advise him to keep up his greek, which he feared he had nearly lost. i gave him homer, and asked him to read a page; and i found that, like most boys of any talent who had been at the charterhouse, he was very well grounded in that language. he read with perfect rapture, and has marched off with the book, declaring that he shall never be content till he has finished the whole. this, you will think, is not a bad brother-in-law for a man to pick up in degrees of north latitude, and degrees of east longitude. i read much, and particularly greek; and i find that i am, in all essentials, still not a bad scholar. i could, i think, with a year's hard study, qualify myself to fight a good battle for a craven's scholarship. i read, however, not as i read at college, but like a man of the world. if i do not know a word, i pass it by unless it is important to the sense. if i find, as i have of late often found, a passage which refuses to give up its meaning at the second reading, i let it alone. i have read during the last fortnight, before breakfast, three books of herodotus, and four plays of aeschylus. my admiration of aeschylus has been prodigiously increased by this reperusal. i cannot conceive how any person of the smallest pretension to taste should doubt about his immeasurable superiority to every poet of antiquity, homer only excepted. even milton, i think, must yield to him. it is quite unintelligible to me that the ancient critics should have placed him so low. horace's notice of him in the ars poetica is quite ridiculous. there is, to be sure, the "magnum loqui;" but the great topic insisted on is the skill of aeschylus as a manager, as a property-man; the judicious way in which he boarded the stage; the masks, the buskins, and the dresses. ["post hunc personae pallaeque repertor honestae aeschylus et modicis instravit pulpita tignis, et docuit magnumnque loqui, nitique cothuruo."] and, after all, the "magnum loqui," though the most obvious characteristic of aeschylus, is by no means his highest or his best. nor can i explain this by saying that horace had too tame and unimaginative a mind to appreciate aeschylus. horace knew what he could himself do, and, with admirable wisdom, he confined himself to that; but he seems to have had a perfectly clear comprehension of the merit of those great masters whom he never attempted to rival. he praised pindar most enthusiastically. it seems incomprehensible to me that a critic, who admired pindar, should not admire aeschylus far more. greek reminds me of cambridge and of thirlwall. when you see thirlwall, tell him that i congratulate him from the bottom of my soul on having suffered in so good a cause; and that i would rather have been treated as he has been treated, on such an account, than have the mastership of trinity. [the subjoined extract from the letter of a leading member of trinity college explains macaulay's indignation. "thirlwall published a pamphlet in , on the admission of dissenters to the university. the result was that he was either deprived of his assistant tutorship or had to give it up. thirlwall left cambridge soon afterwards. i suppose that, if he had remained, he would have been very possibly wordsworth's successor in the mastership."] there would be some chance for the church, if we had more churchmen of the same breed, worthy successors of leighton and tillotson. from one trinity fellow i pass to another. (this letter is quite a study to a metaphysician who wishes to illustrate the law of association.) we have no official tidings yet of malkin's appointment to the vacant seat on the bench at calcutta. i cannot tell you how delighted i am at the prospect of having him here. an honest enlightened judge, without professional narrowness, is the very man whom we want on public grounds. and, as to my private feelings, nothing could be more agreeable to me than to have an old friend, and so estimable a friend, brought so near to me in this distant country. ever, dear ellis, yours very affectionately t. b. macaulay. calcutta: february , . dear ellis,--the last month has been the most painful that i ever went through. indeed, i never knew before what it was to be miserable. early in january, letters from england brought me news of the death of my youngest sister. what she was to me no words can express. i will not say that she was dearer to me than anything in the world; for my sister who was with me was equally dear; but she was as dear to me as one human being can be to another. even now, when time has begun to do its healing office, i cannot write about her without being altogether unmanned. that i have not utterly sunk under this blow i owe chiefly to literature. what a blessing it is to love books as i love them;--to be able to converse with the dead, and to live amidst the unreal! many times during the last few weeks i have repeated to myself those fine lines of old hesiod: ei gar tis kai penthos egon neokedei thumo aksetai kradien akakhemenos, autar aoidos mousaon therapon kleia proteron anthropon umnese, makaras te theous oi olumpon ekhousi, aips oge dusphroneon epilethetai oude ti kedeon memnetai takheos de paretrape dora theaon. ["for if to one whose grief is fresh as he sits silent with sorrow-stricken heart, a minstrel, the henchman of the muses, celebrates the men of old and the gods who possess olympus; straightway he forgets his melancholy, and remembers not at all his grief, beguiled by the blessed gift of the goddesses of song." in macaulay's hesiod this passage is scored with three lines in pencil.] i have gone back to greek literature with a passion quite astonishing to myself. i have never felt anything like it. i was enraptured with italian during the six months which i gave up to it; and i was little less pleased with spanish. but, when i went back to the greek, i felt as if i had never known before what intellectual enjoyment was. oh that wonderful people! there is not one art, not one science, about which we may not use the same expression which lucretius has employed about the victory over superstition, "primum graius homo--." i think myself very fortunate in having been able to return to these great masters while still in the full vigour of life, and when my taste and judgment are mature. most people read all the greek that they ever read before they are five and twenty. they never find time for such studies afterwards till they are in the decline of life; and then their knowledge of the language is in a great measure lost, and cannot easily be recovered. accordingly, almost all the ideas that people have of greek literature, are ideas formed while they were still very young. a young man, whatever his genius may be, is no judge of such a writer as thucydides. i had no high opinion of him ten years ago. i have now been reading him with a mind accustomed to historical researches, and to political affairs; and i am astonished at my own former blindness, and at his greatness. i could not bear euripides at college. i now read my recantation. he has faults undoubtedly. but what a poet! the medea, the alcestis, the troades, the bacchae, are alone sufficient to place him in the very first rank. instead of depreciating him, as i have done, i may, for aught i know, end by editing him. i have read pindar,--with less pleasure than i feel in reading the great attic poets, but still with admiration. an idea occurred to me which may very likely have been noticed by a hundred people before. i was always puzzled to understand the reason for the extremely abrupt transitions in those odes of horace which are meant to be particularly fine. the "justum et tenacem" is an instance. all at once you find yourself in heaven, heaven knows how. what the firmness of just men in times of tyranny, or of tumult, has to do with juno's oration about troy it is hardly possible to conceive. then, again, how strangely the fight between the gods and the giants is tacked on to the fine hymn to the muses in that noble ode, "descende coelo et die age tibia"! this always struck me as a great fault, and an inexplicable one; for it is peculiarly alien from the calm good sense, and good taste, which distinguish horace. my explanation of it is this. the odes of pindar were the acknowledged models of lyric poetry. lyric poets imitated his manner as closely as they could; and nothing was more remarkable in his compositions than the extreme violence and abruptness of the transitions. this in pindar was quite natural and defensible. he had to write an immense number of poems on subjects extremely barren, and extremely monotonous. there could be little difference between one boxing-match and another. accordingly, he made all possible haste to escape from the immediate subject, and to bring in, by hook or by crook, some local description; some old legend; something or other, in short, which might be more susceptible of poetical embellishment, and less utterly threadbare, than the circumstances of a race or a wrestling-match. this was not the practice of pindar alone. there is an old story which proves that simonides did the same, and that sometimes the hero of the day was nettled at finding how little was said about him in the ode for which he was to pay. this abruptness of transition was, therefore, in the greek lyric poets, a fault rendered inevitable by the peculiarly barren and uniform nature of the subjects which they had to treat. but, like many other faults of great masters, it appeared to their imitators a beauty; and a beauty almost essential to the grander ode. horace was perfectly at liberty to choose his own subjects, and to treat them after his own fashion. but he confounded what was merely accidental in pindar's manner with what was essential; and because pindar, when he had to celebrate a foolish lad from aegina who had tripped up another's heels at the isthmus, made all possible haste to get away from so paltry a topic to the ancient heroes of the race of aeacus, horace took it into his head that he ought always to begin as far from the subject as possible, and then arrive at it by some strange and sudden bound. this is my solution. at least i can find no better. the most obscure passage,--at least the strangest passage,--in all horace may be explained by supposing that he was misled by pindar's example: i mean that odd parenthesis in the "qualem ministrum:" quibus mos unde deductus per omne--. this passage, taken by itself, always struck me as the harshest, queerest, and most preposterous digression in the world. but there are several things in pindar very like it. [orelli makes an observation, much to the same effect, in his note on this passage in his edition of .] you must excuse all this, for i labour at present under a suppression of greek, and am likely to do so for at least three years to come. malkin may be some relief; but i am quite unable to guess whether he means to come to calcutta. i am in excellent bodily health, and i am recovering my mental health; but i have been sorely tried. money matters look well. my new brother-in-law and i are brothers in more than law. i am more comfortable than i expected to be in this country; and, as to the climate, i think it, beyond all comparison, better than that of the house of commons. yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. writing three days after the date of the foregoing letter, macaulay says to his old friend mr. sharp: "you see that my mind is not in great danger of rusting. the danger is that i may become a mere pedant. i feel a habit of quotation growing on me; but i resist that devil, for such it is, and it flees from me. it is all that i can do to keep greek and latin out of all my letters. wise sayings of euripides are even now at my fingers' ends. if i did not maintain a constant struggle against this propensity, my correspondence would resemble the notes to the 'pursuits of literature.' it is a dangerous thing for a man with a very strong memory to read very much. i could give you three or four quotations this moment in support of that proposition; but i will bring the vicious propensity under subjection, if i can." [many years later macaulay wrote to my mother: "dr. -- came, and i found him a very clever man; a little of a coxcomb, but, i dare say, not the worse physician for that. he must have quoted horace and virgil six times at least a propos of his medical inquiries. horace says, in a poem in which he jeers the stoics, that even a wise man is out of sort when 'pituita molesta est;' which is, being interpreted, 'when, his phlegm is troublesome.' the doctor thought it necessary to quote this passage in order to prove that phlegm is troublesome;--a proposition, of the truth of which, i will venture to say, no man on earth is better convinced than myself."] calcutta, may , . dear ellis,--i am in great want of news. we know that the tories dissolved at the end of december, and we also know that they were beaten towards the end of february. [in november the king called sir robert peel to power; after having of his own accord dismissed the whig ministry. parliament was dissolved, but the tories did not succeed in obtaining a majority. after three months of constant and angry fighting, peel was driven from office in april .] as to what passed in the interval, we are quite in the dark. i will not plague you with comments on events which will have been driven out of your mind by other events before this reaches you, or with prophecies which may be falsified before you receive them. about the final issue i am certain. the language of the first great reformer is that which i should use in reply to the exultation of our tories here, if there were any of them who could understand it sebou, proseukhou thopte ton kratount aei emoi d'elasson zeuos e meden melei. drato krateito tonde ton brakhun khronon opes thelei daron gar ouk arksei theois ["worship thou, adore, and flatter the monarch of the hour. to me jove is of less account than nothing. let him have his will, and his sceptre, for this brief season; for he will not long be the ruler of the gods." it is needless to say that poor william the fourth was the jove of the whig prometheus.] as for myself, i rejoice that i am out of the present storm. "suave mari magno;" or, as your new premier, if he be still premier, construes. "it is a source of melancholy satisfaction." i may, indeed, feel the effects of the changes here, but more on public than private grounds. a tory governor-general is not very likely to agree with me about the very important law reforms which i am about to bring before the council. but he is not likely to treat me ill personally; or, if he does, all ou ti khairon, en tod orthothe belos, ["it shall be to his cost, so long as this bow carries true."] as philoctetes says. in a few months i shall have enough to enable me to live, after my very moderate fashion, in perfect independence at home; and whatever debts any governor-general may choose to lay on me at calcutta shall be paid off, he may rely on it, with compound interest, at westminster. my time is divided between public business and books. i mix with society as little as i can. my spirits have not yet recovered,--i sometimes think that they will never wholly recover,--the shock which they received five months ago. i find that nothing soothes them so much as the contemplation of those miracles of art which athens has bequeathed to us. i am really becoming, i hope not a pedant, but certainly an enthusiast about classical literature. i have just finished a second reading of sophocles. i am now deep in plato, and intend to go right through all his works. his genius is above praise. even where he is most absurd,--as, for example, in the cratylus,--he shows an acuteness, and an expanse of intellect, which is quite a phenomenon by itself. the character of socrates does not rise upon me. the more i read about him, the less i wonder that they poisoned him. if he had treated me as he is said to have treated protagoras, hippias, and gorgias, i could never have forgiven him. nothing has struck me so much in plato's dialogues as the raillery. at college, somehow or other, i did not understand or appreciate it. i cannot describe to you the way in which it now tickles me. i often sink forward on my huge old marsilius ficinus in a fit of laughter. i should say that there never was a vein of ridicule so rich, at the same time so delicate. it is superior to voltaire's; nay, to pascal's. perhaps there are one or two passages in cervantes, and one or two in fielding, that might give a modern reader a notion of it. i have very nearly finished livy. i never read him through before. i admire him greatly, and would give a quarter's salary to recover the lost decades. while i was reading the earlier books i went again through niebuhr. and i am sorry to say that, having always been a little sceptical about his merits, i am now a confirmed unbeliever. i do not of course mean that he has no merit. he was a man of immense learning, and of great ingenuity. but his mind was utterly wanting in the faculty by which a demonstrated truth is distinguished from a plausible supposition. he is not content with suggesting that an event may have happened. he is certain that it happened, and calls on the reader to be certain too, (though not a trace of it exists in any record whatever,) because it would solve the phenomena so neatly. just read over again, if you have forgotten it, the conjectural restoration of the inscription in page of the second volume; and then, on your honour as a scholar and a man of sense, tell me whether in bentley's edition of milton there is anything which approaches to the audacity of that emendation. niebuhr requires you to believe that some of the greatest men in rome were burned alive in the circus; that this event was commemorated by an inscription on a monument, one half of which is sill in existence; but that no roman historian knew anything about it; and that all tradition of the event was lost, though the memory of anterior events much less important has reached our time. when you ask for a reason, he tells you plainly that such a thing cannot be established by reason; that he is sure of it; and that you must take his word. this sort of intellectual despotism always moves me to mutiny, and generates a disposition to pull down the reputation of the dogmatist. niebuhr's learning was immeasurably superior to mine; but i think myself quite as good a judge of evidence as he was. i might easily believe him if he told me that there were proofs which i had never seen; but, when he produces all his proofs, i conceive that i am perfectly competent to pronounce on their value. as i turned over his leaves just now, i lighted on another instance of what i cannot but call ridiculous presumption. he says that martial committed a blunder in making the penultimate of porsena short. strange that so great a scholar should not know that horace had done so too! minacis aut etrusca porsenae manus. there is something extremely nauseous to me in a german professor telling the world, on his own authority, and without giving the smallest reason, that two of the best latin poets were ignorant of the quantity of a word which they must have used in their exercises at school a hundred times. as to the general capacity of niebuhr for political speculations, let him be judged by the preface to the second volume. he there says, referring to the french revolution of july , that "unless god send us some miraculous help, we have to look forward to a period of destruction similar to that which the roman world experienced about the middle of the third century." now, when i see a man scribble such abject nonsense about events which are passing under our eyes, what confidence can i put in his judgment as to the connection of causes and effects in times very imperfectly known to us. but i must bring my letter, or review, to a close. remember me most kindly to your wife. tell frank that i mean to be a better scholar than he when i come back, and that he must work hard if he means to overtake me. ever, dear ellis, your affectionate friend t. b. macaulay. calcutta: august , . dear ellis,--cameron arrived here about a fortnight ago, and we are most actively engaged in preparing a complete criminal code for india. he and i agree excellently. ryan, the most liberal of judges, lends us his best assistance. i heartily hope, and fully believe, that we shall put the whole penal law, and the whole law of criminal procedure, into a moderately sized volume. i begin to take a very warm interest in this work. it is, indeed, one of the finest employments of the intellect that it is easy to conceive. i ought, however, to tell you that, the more progress i make as a legislator, the more intense my contempt for the mere technical study of law becomes. i am deep in the examination of the political theories of the old philosophers. i have read plato's republic, and his laws; and i am now reading aristotle's politics; after which i shall go through plato's two treatises again. i every now and then read one of plutarch's lives on an idle afternoon; and in this way i have got through a dozen of them. i like him prodigiously. he is inaccurate, to be sure, and a romancer; but he tells a story delightfully, and his illustrations and sketches of character are as good as anything in ancient eloquence. i have never, till now, rated him fairly. as to latin, i am just finishing lucan, who remains pretty much where he was in my opinion; and i am busily engaged with cicero, whose character, moral and intellectual, interests me prodigiously. i think that i see the whole man through and through. but this is too vast a subject for a letter. i have gone through all ovid's poems. i admire him; but i was tired to death before i got to the end. i amused myself one evening with turning over the metamorphoses, to see if i could find any passage of ten lines which could, by possibility, have been written by virgil. whether i was in ill luck or no i cannot tell; but i hunted for half an hour without the smallest success. at last i chanced to light on a little passage more virgilian, to my thinking, than virgil himself. tell me what you say to my criticism. it is part of apollo's speech to the laurel semper habebunt te coma, te citharae, te nostrae, laure, pharetrae tu ducibus latiis aderis, cum laeta triumphum vox canet, et longas visent capitolia pompas. portibus augustis cadem fidissima custos ante fores stabis, mediamque tuebere quercum. as to other latin writers, sallust has gone sadly down in my opinion. caesar has risen wonderfully. i think him fully entitled to cicero's praise. [in the dialogue "de claris oratoribus" cicero makes atticus say that 'a consummate judge of style (who is evidently intended for cicero himself,) pronounces caesar's latin to be the most elegant, with one implied exception, that had ever been heard in the senate or the forum'. atticus then goes on to detail at full length a compliment which caesar had paid to cicero's powers of expression; and brutus declares with enthusiasm that such praise, coming from such a quarter, is worth more than a triumph, as triumphs were then given; and inferior in value only to the honours which were voted to the statesman who had baffled catiline. the whole passage is a model of self-glorification, exquisite in skill and finish.] he has won the honour of an excellent historian while attempting merely to give hints for history. but what are they all to the great athenian? i do assure you that there is no prose composition in the world, not even the de corona, which i place so high as the seventh book of thucydides. it is the ne plus ultra of human art. i was delighted to find in gray's letters the other day this query to wharton: "the retreat from syracuse--is it or is it not the finest thing you ever read in your life?" did you ever read athenaeus through? i never did; but i am meditating an attack on him. the multitude of quotations looks very tempting; and i never open him for a minute without being paid for my trouble. yours very affectionately t. b. macaulay. calcutta: december , , dear ellis,--what the end of the municipal reform bill is to be i cannot conjecture. our latest english intelligence is of the th of august. the lords were then busy in rendering the only great service that i expect them ever to render to the nation; that is to say, in hastening the day of reckoning. [in the middle of august the irish tithe bill went up to the house of lords, where it was destined to undergo a mutilation which was fatal to its existence.] but i will not fill my paper with english politics. i am in excellent health. so are my sister and brother-in-law, and their little girl, whom i am always nursing; and of whom i am becoming fonder than a wise man, with half my experience, would choose to be of anything except himself. i have but very lately begun to recover my spirits. the tremendous blow which fell on me at the beginning of this year has left marks behind it which i shall carry to my grave. literature has saved my life and my reason. even now, i dare not, in the intervals of business, remain alone for a minute without a book in my hand. what my course of life will be, when i return to england, is very doubtful. but i am more than half determined to abandon politics, and to give myself wholly to letters; to undertake some great historical work, which may be at once the business and the amusement of my life; and to leave the pleasures of pestiferous rooms, sleepless nights, aching heads, and diseased stomachs to roebuck and to praed. in england i might probably be of a very different opinion. but, in the quiet of my own little grass-plot,--when the moon, at its rising, finds me with the philoctetes or the de finibus in my hand,--i often wonder what strange infatuation leads men who can do something better to squander their intellect, their health, their energy, on such subjects as those which most statesmen are engaged in pursuing. i comprehend perfectly how a man who can debate, but who would make a very indifferent figure as a contributor to an annual or a magazine,--such a man as stanley, for example,--should take the only line by which he can attain distinction. but that a man before whom the two paths of literature and politics lie open, and who might hope for eminence in either, should choose politics, and quit literature, seems to me madness. on the one side is health, leisure, peace of mind, the search after truth, and all the enjoyments of friendship and conversation. on the other side is almost certain ruin to the constitution, constant labour, constant anxiety. every friendship which a man may have, becomes precarious as soon as he engages in politics. as to abuse, men soon become callous to it, but the discipline which makes them callous is very severe. and for what is it that a man who might, if he chose, rise and lie down at his own hour, engage in any study, enjoy any amusement, and visit any place, consents to make himself as much a prisoner as if he were within the rules of the fleet; to be tethered during eleven months of the year within the circle of half a mile round charing cross; to sit, or stand, night after night for ten or twelve hours, inhaling a noisome atmosphere, and listening to harangues of which nine-tenths are far below the level of a leading article in a newspaper? for what is it that he submits, day after day, to see the morning break over the thames, and then totters home, with bursting temples, to his bed? is it for fame? who would compare the fame of charles townshend to that of hume, that of lord north to that of gibbon, that of lord chatham to that of johnson? who can look back on the life of burke and not regret that the years which he passed in ruining his health and temper by political exertions were not passed in the composition of some great and durable work? who can read the letters to atticus, and not feel that cicero would have been an infinitely happier and better man, and a not less celebrated man, if he had left us fewer speeches, and more academic questions and tusculan disputations; if he had passed the time which he spent in brawling with vatinius and clodius in producing a history of rome superior even to that of livy? but these, as i said, are meditations in a quiet garden, situated far beyond the contagious influence of english action. what i might feel if i again saw downing street and palace yard is another question. i tell you sincerely my present feelings. i have cast up my reading account, and brought it to the end of the year . it includes december ; for i came into my house and unpacked my books at the end of november . during the last thirteen months i have read aeschylus twice; sophocles twice; euripides once; pindar twice; callimachus; apollonius rhodius; quintus calaber; theocritus twice; herodotus; thucydides; almost all xenophon's works; almost all plato; aristotle's politics, and a good deal of his organon, besides dipping elsewhere in him; the whole of plutarch's lives; about half of lucian; two or three books of athenaeus; plautus twice; terence twice; lucretius twice; catullus; tibullus; propertius; lucan; statius; silius italicus; livy; velleius paterculus; sallust; caesar; and, lastly, cicero. i have, indeed, still a little of cicero left; but i shall finish him in a few days. i am now deep in aristophanes and lucian. of aristophanes i think as i always thought; but lucian has agreeably surprised me. at school i read some of his dialogues of the dead when i was thirteen; and, to my shame, i never, to the best of my belief, read a line of him since. i am charmed with him. his style seems to me to be superior to that of any extant writer who lived later than the age of demosthenes and theophrastus. he has a most peculiar and delicious vein of humour. it is not the humour of aristophanes; it is not that of plato; and yet it is akin to both; not quite equal, i admit, to either, but still exceedingly charming. i hardly know where to find an instance of a writer, in the decline of a literature, who has shown an invention so rich, and a taste so pure. but, if i get on these matters, i shall fill sheet after sheet. they must wait till we take another long walk, or another tavern dinner, together; that is, till the summer of . i had a long story to tell you about a classical examination here; but i have not time. i can only say that some of the competitors tried to read the greek with the papers upside down; and that the great man of the examination, the thirlwall of calcutta, a graduate of trinity college, dublin, translated the words of theophrastus, osas leitourgias leleitroupgeke "how many times he has performed divine service." ["how many public services he had discharged at his own expense." macaulay used to say that a lady who dips into mr. grote's history, and learns that alcibiades won the heart of his fellow-citizens by the novelty of his theories and the splendour of his liturgies, may get a very false notion of that statesman's relations with the athenian public.] ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. that the enormous list of classical works recorded in the foregoing letter was not only read through, but read with care, is proved by the pencil marks, single, double, and treble, which meander down the margin of such passages as excited the admiration of the student; and by the remarks, literary, historical, and grammatical, with which the critic has interspersed every volume, and sometimes every page. in the case of a favourite writer, macaulay frequently corrects the errors of the press, and even the punctuation, as minutely as if he were preparing the book for another edition. he read plautus, terence, and aristophanes four times through at calcutta; and euripides thrice. [see the appendix at the end.] in his copy of quintus calaber, (a versifier who is less unknown by the title of quintus smyrnaeus,) appear the entries, "september , ." "turned over, july , ." it may be doubted whether the pandects would have attained the celebrity which they enjoy, if, in the course of the three years during which justinian's law commission was at work, the president tribonian had read quintus smyrnaeus twice. calcutta; may , . dear ellis,--i have just received your letter dated december, ; how time flies! another hot season has almost passed away, and we are daily expecting the beginning of the rains. cold season, hot season, and rainy season are all much the same to me. i shall have been two years on indian ground in less than a fortnight, and i have not taken ten grains of solid, or a pint of liquid, medicine during the whole of that time. if i judged only from my own sensations, i should say that this climate is absurdly maligned; but the yellow, spectral, figures which surround me serve to correct the conclusions which i should be inclined to draw from the state of my own health. one execrable effect the climate produces. it destroys all the works of man with scarcely one exception. steel rusts; razors lose their edge; thread decays; clothes fall to pieces; books moulder away, and drop out of their bindings; plaster cracks; timber rots; matting is in shreds. the sun, the steam of this vast alluvial tract, and the infinite armies of white ants, make such havoc with buildings that a house requires a complete repair every three years. ours was in this situation about three months ago; and, if we had determined to brave the rains without any precautions, we should, in all probability, have had the roof down on our heads. accordingly we were forced to migrate for six weeks from our stately apartments and our flower-beds, to a dungeon where we were stifled with the stench of native cookery, and deafened by the noise of native music. at last we have returned to our house. we found it all snow-white and pea-green; and we rejoice to think that we shall not again be under the necessity of quitting it, till we quit it for a ship bound on a voyage to london. we have been for some months in the middle of what the people here think a political storm. to a person accustomed to the hurricanes of english faction this sort of tempest in a horsepond is merely ridiculous. we have put the english settlers up the country under the exclusive jurisdiction of the company's courts in civil actions in which they are concerned with natives. the english settlers are perfectly contented; but the lawyers of the supreme court have set up a yelp which they think terrible, and which has infinitely diverted me. they have selected me as the object of their invectives, and i am generally the theme of five or six columns of prose and verse daily. i have not patience to read a tenth part of what they put forth. the last ode in my praise which i perused began, "soon we hope they will recall ye, tom macaulay, tom macaulay." the last prose which i read was a parallel between me and lord strafford. my mornings, from five to nine, are quite my own. i still give them to ancient literature. i have read aristophanes twice through since christmas; and have also read herodotus, and thucydides again. i got into a way last year of reading a greek play every sunday. i began on sunday the th of october with the prometheus, and next sunday i shall finish with the cyclops of euripides. euripides has made a complete conquest of me. it has been unfortunate for him that we have so many of his pieces. it has, on the other hand, i suspect, been fortunate for sophocles that so few of his have come down to us. almost every play of sophocles, which is now extant, was one of his masterpieces. there is hardly one of them which is not mentioned with high praise by some ancient writer. yet one of them, the trachiniae, is, to my thinking, very poor and insipid. now, if we had nineteen plays of sophocles, of which twelve or thirteen should be no better than the trachiniae,--and if, on the other hand, only seven pieces of euripides had come down to us, and if those seven had been the medea, the bacchae, the iphigenia in aulis, the orestes, the phoenissae, the hippolytus, and the alcestis, i am not sure that the relative position which the two poets now hold in our estimation would not be greatly altered. i have not done much in latin. i have been employed in turning over several third-rate and fourth-rate writers. after finishing cicero, i read through the works of both the senecas, father and son. there is a great deal in the controversiae both of curious information, and of judicious criticism. as to the son, i cannot bear him. his style affects me in something the same way with that of gibbon. but lucius seneca's affectation is even more rank than gibbon's. his works are made up of mottoes. there is hardly a sentence which might not be quoted; but to read him straightforward is like dining on nothing but anchovy sauce. i have read, as one does read such stuff, valerius maximus, annaeus florus, lucius ampelius, and aurelius victor. i have also gone through phaedrus. i am now better employed. i am deep in the annals of tacitus, and i am at the same time reading suetonius. you are so rich in domestic comforts that i am inclined to envy you. i am not, however, without my share. i am as fond of my little niece as her father. i pass an hour or more every day in nursing her, and teaching her to talk. she has got as far as ba, pa, and ma; which, as she is not eight months old, we consider as proofs of a genius little inferior to that of shakespeare or sir isaac newton. the municipal elections have put me in good spirits as to english politics. i was rather inclined to despondency. ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. calcutta: july , . my dear ellis,--i have heard from you again, and glad i always am to hear from you. there are few things to which i look forward with more pleasure than to our meeting. it is really worth while to go into banishment for a few years for the pleasure of going home again. yet that home will in some things be a different home--oh how different a home!--from that to which i expected to return. but i will not stir up the bitterness of sorrow which has at last subsided. you take interest, i see, in my greek and latin studies. i continue to pursue them steadily and actively. i am now reading demosthenes with interest and admiration indescribable. i am slowly, at odd minutes, getting through the stupid trash of diodorus. i have read through seneca, and an affected empty scribbler he is. i have read tacitus again, and, by the bye, i will tell you a curious circumstance relating to that matter. in my younger days i always thought the annals a prodigiously superior work to the history. i was surprised to find that the annals seemed cold and poor to me on the last reading. i began to think that i had overrated tacitus. but, when i began the history, i was enchanted, and thought more highly of him than ever. i went back to the annals, and liked them even better than the history. all at once the explanation of this occurred to me. while i was reading the annals i was reading thucydides. when i began the history, i began the hellenics. what made the annals appear cold and poor to me was the intense interest which thucydides inspired. indeed, what colouring is there which would not look tame when placed side by side with the magnificent light, and the terrible shade, of thucydides? tacitus was a great man, but he was not up to the sicilian expedition. when i finished thucydides, and took up xenophon, the case was reversed. tacitus had been a foil to thucydides. xenophon was a foil to tacitus. i have read pliny the younger. some of the epistles are interesting. nothing more stupid than the panegyric was ever preached in the university church. i am reading the augustan history, and aulus gellius. aulus is a favourite of mine. i think him one of the best writers of his class. i read in the evenings a great deal of english, french, and italian; and a little spanish. i have picked up portuguese enough to read camoens with care; and i want no more. i have adopted an opinion about the italian historians quite different from that which i formerly held, and which, i believe, is generally considered as orthodox. i place fra paolo decidedly at the head of them, and next to him davila, whom i take to be the best modern military historian except colonel napier. davila's battle of ivry is worthy of thucydides himself. next to davila i put guicciardini, and last of all machiavelli. but i do not think that you ever read much italian. the english poetry of the day has very few attractions for me. van artevelde is far the best specimen that i have lately seen. i do not much like talfourd's ion; but i mean to read it again. it contains pretty lines; but, to my thinking, it is neither fish nor flesh. there is too much, and too little, of the antique about it. nothing but the most strictly classical costume can reconcile me to a mythological plot; and ion is a modern philanthropist, whose politics and morals have been learned from the publications of the society for the diffusion of useful knowledge. i do not know whether the noise which the lawyers of the supreme court have been raising against our legislative authority has reached, or will reach, england. they held a public meeting, which ended,--or rather began, continued, and ended,--in a riot; and ever since then the leading agitators have been challenging each other, refusing each other's challenges, libelling each other, swearing the peace against each other, and blackballing each other. mr. longueville clarke, who aspires to be the o'connell of calcutta, called another lawyer a liar. the last-mentioned lawyer challenged mr. longueville clarke. mr. longueville clarke refused to fight, on the ground that his opponent had been guilty of hugging attorneys. the bengal club accordingly blackballed longueville. this, and some other similar occurrences, have made the opposition here thoroughly ridiculous and contemptible. they will probably send a petition home; but, unless the house of commons has undergone a great change since , they have no chance there. i have almost brought my letter to a close without mentioning the most important matter about which i had to write. i dare say you have heard that my uncle general macaulay, who died last february, has left me l , this legacy, together with what i shall have saved by the end of , will make me quite a rich man; richer than i even wish to be as a single man; and every day renders it more unlikely that i should marry. we have had a very unhealthy season; but sickness has not come near our house. my sister, my brother-in-law, and their little child, are as well as possible. as to me, i think that, as buonaparte said of himself after the russian campaign, j'ai le diable au corps. ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. to macvey napier, esq. calcutta: november , . dear napier,--at last i send you an article of interminable length about lord bacon. i hardly know whether it is not too long for an article in a review; but the subject is of such vast extent that i could easily have made the paper twice as long as it is. about the historical and political part there is no great probability that we shall differ in opinion; but what i have said about bacon's philosophy is widely at variance with what dugald stuart, and mackintosh, have said on the same subject. i have not your essay; nor have i read it since i read it at cambridge, with very great pleasure, but without any knowledge of the subject. i have at present only a very faint and general recollection of its contents, and have in vain tried to procure a copy of it here. i fear, however, that, differing widely as i do from stewart and mackintosh, i shall hardly agree with you. my opinion is formed, not at second hand, like those of nine-tenths of the people who talk about bacon; but after several very attentive perusals of his greatest works, and after a good deal of thought. if i am in the wrong, my errors may set the minds of others at work, and may be the means of bringing both them, and me, to a knowledge of the truth. i never bestowed so much care on anything that i have written. there is not a sentence in the latter half of the article which has not been repeatedly recast. i have no expectation that the popularity of the article will bear any proportion to the trouble which i have expended on it. but the trouble has been so great a pleasure to me that i have already been greatly overpaid. pray look carefully to the printing. in little more than a year i shall be embarking for england, and i have determined to employ the four months of my voyage in mastering the german language. i should be much obliged to you to send me out, as early as you can, so that they may be certain to arrive in time, the best grammar, and the best dictionary, that can be procured; a german bible; schiller's works; goethe's works; and niebuhr's history, both in the original, and in the translation. my way of learning a language is always to begin with the bible, which i can read without a dictionary. after a few days passed in this way, i am master of all the common particles, the common rules of syntax, and a pretty large vocabulary. then i fall on some good classical work. it was in this way that i learned both spanish and portuguese, and i shall try the same course with german. i have little or nothing to tell you about myself. my life has flowed away here with strange rapidity. it seems but yesterday that i left my country; and i am writing to beg you to hasten preparations for my return. i continue to enjoy perfect health, and the little political squalls which i have had to weather here are mere capfuls of wind to a man who has gone through the great hurricanes of english faction. i shall send another copy of the article on bacon by another ship. yours very truly t. b. macaulay. calcutta: november , . dear napier,--there is an oversight in the article on bacon which i shall be much obliged to you to correct. i have said that bacon did not deal at all in idle rants "like those in which cicero and mr. shandy sought consolation for the loss of tullia and of bobby." nothing can, as a general remark, be more true, but it escaped my recollection that two or three of mr. shandy's consolatory sentences are quoted from bacon's essays. the illustration, therefore, is singularly unfortunate. pray alter it thus; "in which cicero vainly sought consolation for the loss of tullia." to be sure, it is idle to correct such trifles at a distance of fifteen thousand miles. yours ever t. b. macaulay. from lord jeffrey to macvey napier, esq. may , . my dear n.,--what mortal could ever dream of cutting out the least particle of this precious work, to make it fit better into your review? it would be worse than paring down the pitt diamond to fit the old setting of a dowager's ring. since bacon himself, i do not know that there has been anything so fine. the first five or six pages are in a lower tone, but still magnificent, and not to be deprived of a word. still, i do not object to consider whether it might not be best to serve up the rich repast in two courses; and on the whole i incline to that partition. pages might cloy even epicures, and would be sure to surfeit the vulgar; and the biography and philosophy are so entirely distinct, and of not very unequal length, that the division would not look like a fracture. francis jeffrey. in the end, the article appeared entire; occupying pages of the review; and accompanied by an apology for its length in the shape of one of those editorial appeals to "the intelligent scholar," and "the best class of our readers," which never fail of success. the letters addressed to zachary macaulay are half filled with anecdotes of the nursery; pretty enough, but such as only a grandfather could be expected to read. in other respects, the correspondence is chiefly remarkable for the affectionate ingenuity with which the son selects such topics as would interest the father. calcutta: october . my dear father, we were extremely gratified by receiving, a few days ago, a letter from you which, on the whole, gave a good account of your health and spirits. the day after tomorrow is the first anniversary of your little grand-daughter's birthday. the occasion is to be celebrated with a sort of droll puppet-show, much in fashion among the natives; an exhibition much in the style of punch in england, but more dramatic and more showy. all the little boys and girls from the houses of our friends are invited, and the party will, i have no doubt, be a great deal more amusing than the stupid dinners and routs with which the grown-up people here kill the time. in a few months,--i hope, indeed, in a few weeks,--we shall send up the penal code to government. we have got rid of the punishment of death, except in the case of aggravated treason and wilful murder. we shall also get rid indirectly of everything that can properly be called slavery in india. there will remain civil claims on particular people for particular services, which claims may be enforced by civil action; but no person will be entitled, on the plea of being the master of another, to do anything to that other which it would be an offence to do to a free-man. our english schools are flourishing wonderfully. we find it difficult,--indeed, in some places impossible,--to provide instruction for all who want it. at the single town of hoogly fourteen hundred boys are learning english. the effect of this education on the hindoos is prodigious. no hindoo, who has received an english education, ever remains sincerely attached to his religion. some continue to profess it as matter of policy; but many profess themselves pure deists, and some embrace christianity. it is my firm belief that, if our plans of education are followed up, there will not be a single idolater among the respectable classes in bengal thirty years hence. and this will be effected without any efforts to proselytise; without the smallest interference with religious liberty; merely by the natural operation of knowledge and reflection. i heartily rejoice in the prospect. i have been a sincere mourner for mill. he and i were on the best terms, and his services at the india house were never so much needed as at this time. i had a most kind letter from him a few weeks before i heard of his death. he has a son just come out, to whom i have shown such little attentions as are in my power. within half a year after the time when you read this we shall be making arrangements for our return. the feelings with which i look forward to that return i cannot express. perhaps i should be wise to continue here longer, in order to enjoy during a greater number of months the delusion,--for i know that it will prove a delusion,--of this delightful hope. i feel as if i never could be unhappy in my own country; as if to exist on english ground and among english people, seeing the old familiar sights and hearing the sound of my mother tongue, would be enough for me. this cannot be; yet some days of intense happiness i shall surely have; and one of those will be the day when i again see my dear father and sisters. ever yours most affectionately t. b. macaulay. calcutta: november , . dear ellis,--how the months run away! here is another cold season; morning fogs, cloth coats, green peas, new potatoes, and all the accompaniments of a bengal winter. as to my private life, it has glided on, since i wrote to you last, in the most peaceful monotony. if it were not for the books which i read, and for the bodily and mental growth of my dear little niece, i should have no mark to distinguish one part of the year from another. greek and latin, breakfast; business, an evening walk with a book, a drive after sunset, dinner, coffee, my bed,--there you have the history of a day. my classical studies go on vigorously. i have read demosthenes twice,--i need not say with what delight and admiration. i am now deep in isocrates and from him i shall pass to lysias. i have finished diodorus siculus at last, after dawdling over him at odd times ever since last march. he is a stupid, credulous, prosing old ass; yet i heartily wish that we had a good deal more of him. i have read arrian's expedition of alexander, together with quintus curtius. i have at stray hours read longus's romance and xenophon's ephesiaca; and i mean to go through heliodorus, and achilles tatius, in the same way. longus is prodigiously absurd; but there is often an exquisite prettiness in the style. xenophon's novel is the basest thing to be found in greek. [xenophon the ephesian lived in the third or fourth century of the christian era. at the end of his work macaulay has written: "a most stupid worthless performance, below the lowest trash of an english circulating library." achilles tatius he disposes of with the words "detestable trash;" and the aethiopics of heliodorus, which he appears to have finished on easter-day, , he pronounces "the best of the greek romances, which is not saying much for it."] it was discovered at florence, little more than a hundred years ago, by an english envoy. nothing so detestable ever came from the minerva press. i have read theocritus again, and like him better than ever. as to latin, i made a heroic attempt on pliny's natural history; but i stuck after getting through about a quarter of it. i have read ammianus marcellinus, the worst written book in ancient latin. the style would disgrace a monk of the tenth century; but marcellinus has many of the substantial qualities of a good historian. i have gone through the augustan history, and much other trash relating to the lower empire; curious as illustrating the state of society, but utterly worthless as composition. i have read statius again and thought him as bad as ever. i really found only two lines worthy of a great poet in all the thebais. they are these. what do you think of my taste? "clamorem, bello qualis supremus apertis urbibus, aut pelago jam descendente carina." i am now busy with quintilian and lucan, both excellent writers. the dream of pompey in the seventh book of the pharsalia is a very noble piece of writing. i hardly know an instance in poetry of so great an effect produced by means so simple. there is something irresistibly pathetic in the lines "qualis erat populi facies, clamorque faventum olim cum juvenis--" and something unspeakably solemn in the sudden turn which follows "crastina dira quies--" there are two passages in lucan which surpass in eloquence anything that i know in the latin language. one is the enumeration of pompey's exploits "quod si tam sacro dignaris nomine saxum--" the other is the character which cato gives of pompey, "civis obit, inquit--" a pure gem of rhetoric, without one flaw, and, in my opinion, not very far from historical truth. when i consider that lucan died at twenty-six, i cannot help ranking him among the most extraordinary men that ever lived. [the following remarks occur at the end of macaulay's copy of the pharsalia august , . "when lucan's age is considered, it is impossible not to allow that the poem is a very extraordinary one; more extraordinary, perhaps, than if it had been of a higher kind; for it is more common for the imagination to be in full vigour at an early time of life than for a young man to obtain a complete mastery of political and philosophical rhetoric. i know no declamation in the world, not even cicero's best, which equals some passages in the pharsalia. as to what were meant for bold poetical flights,--the sea-fight at marseilles, the centurion who is covered with wounds, the snakes in the libyan desert, it is all as detestable as cibber's birthday odes. the furious partiality of lucan takes away much of the pleasure which his talents would otherwise afford. a poet who is, as has often been said, less a poet than a historian, should to a certain degree conform to the laws of history. the manner in which he represents the two parties is not to be reconciled with the laws even of fiction. the senators are demigods; pompey, a pure lover of his country; cato, the abstract idea of virtue; while caesar, the finest gentleman, the most humane conqueror, and the most popular politician that rome ever produced, is a bloodthirsty ogre. if lucan had lived, he would probably have improved greatly." "again, december , ,"] i am glad that you have so much business, and sorry that you have so little leisure. in a few years you will be a baron of the exchequer; and then we shall have ample time to talk over our favourite classics. then i will show you a most superb emendation of bentley's in ampelius, and i will give you unanswerable reasons for pronouncing that gibbon was mistaken in supposing that quintus curtius wrote under gordian. remember me most kindly to mrs. ellis. i hope that i shall find frank writing as good alcaics as his father. ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. calcutta: march , . dear ellis,--i am at present very much worked, and have been so for a long time past. cameron, after being laid up for some months, sailed at christmas for the cape, where i hope his health will be repaired; for this country can very ill spare him. however, we have almost brought our great work to a conclusion. in about a month we shall lay before the government a complete penal code for a hundred millions of people, with a commentary explaining and defending the provisions of the text. whether it is well, or ill, done heaven knows. i only know that it seems to me to be very ill done when i look at it by itself; and well done when i compare it with livingstone's code, with the french code, or with the english statutes which have been passed for the purpose of consolidating and amending the criminal law. in health i am as well as ever i was in my life. time glides fast. one day is so like another that, but for a habit which i acquired soon after i reached india of pencilling in my books the date of my reading them, i should have hardly any way of estimating the lapse of time. if i want to know when an event took place, i call to mind which of calderon's plays, or of plutarch's lives, i was reading on that day. i turn to the book; find the date; and am generally astonished to see that, what seems removed from me by only two or three months, really happened nearly a year ago. i intend to learn german on my voyage home, and i have indented largely, (to use our indian official term), for the requisite books. people tell me that it is a hard language; but i cannot easily believe that there is a language which i cannot master in four months, by working ten hours a day. i promise myself very great delight and information from german literature; and, over and above, i feel a soft of presentiment, a kind of admonition of the deity, which assures me that the final cause of my existence,--the end for which i was sent into this vale of tears,--was to make game of certain germans. the first thing to be done in obedience to this heavenly call is to learn german; and then i may perhaps try, as milton says, "frangere saxonicas britonum sub marte phalanges." ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. the years which macaulay spent in india formed a transition period between the time when he kept no journal at all, and the time when the daily portion of his journal was completed as regularly as the daily portion of his history. between and , he contented himself with jotting down any circumstance that struck his fancy in the book which he happened to have in hand. the records of his calcutta life, written in half a dozen different languages, are scattered throughout the whole range of classical literature from hesiod to macrobius. at the end of the eighty-ninth epistle of seneca we read: "april , . hodie praemia distribui tois en to mouseio sanskritiko neaniskois. [to-day i distributed the prizes to the students of the sanscrit college."] on the last page of the birds of aristophanes: "jan. , . oi presbeis of papa ton basileos ton nepauliton eisegonto khthes es kalkouttan." ["the ambassadors from the king of nepaul entered calcutta yesterday." it may be observed that macaulay wrote greek with or without accents, according to the humour, or hurry, of the moment.] on the first page of theocrats: "march , . lord w. bentinck sailed this morning." on the last page of the "de amicitia:" "march , . yesterday lord auckland arrived at government house, and was sworn in." beneath an idyl of moschus, of all places in the world, macaulay notes the fact of peel being first lord of the treasury; and he finds space, between two quotations in athenaeus, to commemorate a ministerial majority of on the second reading of the irish church bill. a somewhat nearer approach to a formal diary may be found in his catullus, which contains a catalogue of the english books that he read in the cold season of - ; as for instance gibbon's answer to davis. november and gibbon on virgil's vi aeneid november whately's logic november thirlwall's greece november edinburgh review november and all this was in addition to his greek and latin studies, to his official work, to the french that he read with his sister, and the unrecorded novels that he read to himself; which last would alone have afforded occupation for two ordinary men, unless this month of november was different from every other month of his existence since the day that he left mr. preston's schoolroom. there is something refreshing, amidst the long list of graver treatises, to light upon a periodical entry of "pikwikina"; the immortal work of a classic who has had more readers in a single year than statius and seneca in all their eighteen centuries together. macaulay turned over with indifference, and something of distaste, the earlier chapters of that modern odyssey. the first touch which came home to him was jingle's "handsome englishman?" in that phrase he recognised a master; and, by the time that he landed in england, he knew his pickwick almost as intimately as his grandison. calcutta: june , dear napier,--your letter about my review of mackintosh miscarried, vexatiously enough. i should have been glad to know what was thought of my performance among friends and foes; for here we have no information on such subjects. the literary correspondents of the calcutta newspapers seem to be penny-a-line risen, whose whole stock of literature comes from the conversations in the green room. my long article on bacon has, no doubt, been in your hands some time. i never, to the best of my recollection, proposed to review hannah more's life or works. if i did, it must have been in jest. she was exactly the very last person in the world about whom i should choose to write a critique. she was a very kind friend to me from childhood. her notice first called out my literary tastes. her presents laid the foundation of my library. she was to me what ninon was to voltaire,--begging her pardon for comparing her to a bad woman, and yours for comparing myself to a great man. she really was a second mother to me. i have a real affection for her memory. i therefore could not possibly write about her unless i wrote in her praise; and all the praise which i could give to her writings, even after straining my conscience in her favour, would be far indeed from satisfying any of her admirers. i will try my hand on temple, and on lord clive. shaftesbury i shall let alone. indeed, his political life is so much connected with temple's that, without endless repetition, it would be impossible for me to furnish a separate article on each. temple's life and works, the part which he took in the controversy about the ancients and moderns; the oxford confederacy against bentley; and the memorable victory which bentley obtained, will be good subjects. i am in training for this part of the subject, as i have twice read through the phalaris controversy since i arrived in india. i have been almost incessantly engaged in public business since i sent off the paper on bacon; but i expect to have comparative leisure during the short remainder of my stay here. the penal code of india is finished, and is in the press. the illness of two of my colleagues threw the work almost entirely on me. it is done, however; and i am not likely to be called upon for vigorous exertion during the rest of my indian career. yours ever t. b. macaulay. if you should have assigned temple, or clive, to anybody else, pray do not be uneasy on that account. the pleasure of writing pays itself. calcutta: december , . dear ellis,--my last letter was on a deeply melancholy subject, the death of our poor friend malkin. i have felt very much for his widow. the intensity of her affliction, and the fortitude and good feeling which she showed as soon as the first agony was over, have interested me greatly in her. six or seven of malkin's most intimate friends here have joined with ryan and me, in subscribing to put up a plain marble tablet in the cathedral, for which i have written an inscription. [this inscription appears in lord macaulay's miscellaneous works.] my departure is now near at hand. this is the last letter which i shall write to you from india. our passage is taken in the lord hungerford; the most celebrated of the huge floating hotels which run between london and calcutta. she is more renowned for the comfort and luxury of her internal arrangements than for her speed. as we are to stop at the cape for a short time, i hardly expect to be with you till the end of may, or the beginning of june. i intend to make myself a good german scholar by the time of my arrival in england. i have already, at leisure moments broken the ice. i have read about half of the new testament in luther's translation, and am now getting rapidly, for a beginner, through schiller's history of the thirty years' war. my german library consists of all goethe's works, all schiller's works, muller's history of switzerland, some of tieck, some of lessing, and other works of less fame. i hope to despatch them all on my way home. i like schiller's style exceedingly. his history contains a great deal of very just and deep thought, conveyed in language so popular and agreeable that dunces would think him superficial. i lately took it into my head to obtain some knowledge of the fathers, and i read therefore a good deal of athanasius, which by no means raised him in my opinion. i procured the magnificent edition of chrysostom, by montfaucon, from a public library here, and turned over the eleven huge folios, reading wherever the subject was of peculiar interest. as to reading him through, the thing is impossible. these volumes contain matter at least equal to the whole extant literature of the best times of greece, from homer to aristotle inclusive. there are certainly some very brilliant passages in his homilies. it seems curious that, though the greek literature began to flourish so much earlier than the latin, it continued to flourish so much later. indeed, if you except the century which elapsed between cicero's first public appearance and livy's death, i am not sure that there was any time at which greece had not writers equal or superior to their roman contemporaries. i am sure that no latin writer of the age of lucian is to be named with lucian; that no latin writer of the age of longinus is to be named with longinus; that no latin prose of the age of chrysostom can be named with chrysostom's compositions. i have read augustin's confessions. the book is not without interest; but he expresses himself in the style of a field-preacher. our penal code is to be published next week. it has cost me very intense labour; and, whatever its faults may be, it is certainly not a slovenly performance. whether the work proves useful to india or not, it has been of great use, i feel and know, to my own mind. [in october , macaulay writes to my mother: "i cannot but be pleased to find that, at last, the code on which i bestowed the labour of two of the best years of my life has had justice done to it. had this justice been done sixteen years ago, i should probably have given much more attention to legislation, and much less to literature than i have done. i do not know that i should have been either happier or more useful than i have been."] ever yours affectionately t. b. macaulay. the life of froude by herbert paul london: sir isaac pitman & sons, . preface although eleven years have elapsed since mr. froude's death, no biography of him has, so far as i know, appeared. this book is an attempt to tell the public something about a man whose writings have a permanent place in the literature of england. it is a pleasure to acknowledge my obligation to miss margaret froude for having allowed me the use of such written material as existed. a large number of mr. froude's letters were destroyed after his death, and it was not intended by the family that any biography of him should be written. finding that i was engaged upon the task, miss froude supplied those facts, dates, and papers which were essential to the accuracy of the narrative. mr. froude's niece, mrs. st. leger harrison, known to the world as lucas malet, has allowed me to use some of her uncle's letters to her mother. lady margaret cecil has, with great kindness, permitted me to make copious extracts from mr. froude's letters to her mother, the late countess of derby. i must also express my gratitude to sir thomas sanderson, lord derby's executor, to cardinal newman's literary representative mr. edward bellasis, and to mr. arthur clough, son of froude's early friend the poet. mr. james rye, of balliol college, oxford, placed at my disposal, with singular generosity, the results of his careful examination into the charges made against mr. froude by mr. freeman. the rector of exeter was good enough to show me the entries in the college books bearing upon mr. froude's resignation of his fellowship, and to tell me everything he knew on the subject. my indebtedness to the late sir john skelton's delightful book, the table talk of shirley, will be obvious to my readers. i have, in conclusion, to thank my old friend mr. birrell, for lending me his very rare copy of the funeral sermon preached by mr. froude at torquay. october , . chapter i childhood in reading biographies i always skip the genealogical details. to be born obscure and to die famous has been described as the acme of human felicity. however that may be, whether fame has anything to do with happiness or no, it is a man himself, and not his ancestors, whose life deserves, if it does deserve, to be written. such was froude's own opinion, and it is the opinion of most sensible people. few, indeed, are the families which contain more than one remarkable figure, and this is the rock upon which the hereditary principle always in practice breaks. for human lineage is not subject to the scientific tests which alone could give it solid value as positive or negative evidence. there is nothing to show from what source, other than the ultimate source of every good and perfect gift, froude derived his brilliant and splendid powers. he was a gentleman, and he did not care to find or make for himself a pedigree. he knew that the froudes had been settled in devonshire time out of mind as yeomen with small estates, and that one of them, to whom his own father always referred with contempt, had bought from the heralds' college what gibbon calls the most useless of all coats, a coat of arms. froude's grandfather did a more sensible thing by marrying an heiress, a devonshire heiress, miss hurrell, and thereby doubling his possessions. although he died before he was five-and-twenty, he left four children behind him, and his only son was the historian's father. james anthony froude, known as anthony to those who called him by his christian name, was born at dartington, two miles from totnes, on st. george's day, shakespeare's birthday, the rd of april, . his father, who had taken a pass degree at oxford, and had then taken orders, was by that time rector of dartington and archdeacon of totnes. archdeacon froude belonged to a type of clergyman now almost extinct in the church of england, though with strong idiosyncrasies of his own. orthodox without being spiritual, he was a landowner as well as a parson, a high and dry churchman, an active magistrate, a zealous tory, with a solid and unclerical income of two or three thousand a year. he was a personage in the county, as well as a dignitary of the church. every one in devonshire knew the name of froude, if only from "parson froude," no credit to his cloth, who appears as parson chowne in blackmore's once popular novel, the maid of sker. but the archdeacon was a man of blameless life, and not in the least like parson froude. a hard rider and passionately fond of hunting, he was a good judge of a horse and usually the best mounted man in the field. one of his exploits as an undergraduate was to jump the turnpike gate on the abingdon road with pennies under his seat, between his knees and the saddle, and between his feet and the stirrups, without dropping one. although he had been rather extravagant and something of a dandy, he was able to say that he could account for every sixpence he spent after the age of twenty-one. on leaving oxford he settled down to the life of a country parson with conscientious thoroughness, and was reputed the best magistrate in the south hams. farming his own glebe, as he did, with skill and knowledge, perpetually occupied, as he was, with clerical or secular business, he found the church of england, not then disturbed by any wave of enthusiasm, at once necessary and sufficient to his religious sense. his horror of nonconformists was such that he would not have a copy of the pilgrim's progress in his house. he upheld the bishop and all established institutions, believing that the way to heaven was to turn to the right and go straight on. there were many such clergymen in his day. in appearance he was a cold, hard, stern man, despising sentiment, reticent and self-restrained. but beneath the surface there lay deep emotions and an aesthetic sense, of which his drawings were the only outward sign. to these sketches he himself attached no value. "you can buy better at the nearest shop for sixpence," he would say, if he heard them praised. yet good judges of art compared them with the early sketches of turner, and ruskin afterwards gave them enthusiastic praise. mr. froude had married, when quite a young man, margaret spedding, the daughter of an old college friend, from armathwaite in cumberland. her nephew is known as the prince of baconian scholars and the j. s. of tennyson's poem. she was a woman of great beauty, deeply religious, belonging to a family more strongly given to letters and to science than the froudes, whose tastes were rather for the active life of sport and adventure. one can imagine the froudes of the sixteenth century manning the ships of queen bess and sailing with frobisher or drake. for many years mrs. froude was the mistress of a happy home, the mother of many handsome sons and fair daughters. the two eldest, hurrell and robert, were especially striking, brilliant lads, popular at eton, their father's companions in the hunting-field or on the moors. but in dartington rectory, with all its outward signs of prosperity and welfare, there were the seeds of death. before anthony froude, the youngest of eight, was three years old, his mother died of a decline, and within a few years the same illness proved fatal to five of her children. the whole aspect of life at dartington was changed. the archdeacon retired into himself and nursed his grief in silence, melancholy, isolated, austere. this irreparable calamity was made by circumstances doubly calamitous. though destined to survive all his brothers and sisters, anthony was a weak, sickly child, not considered never heard the mention of his mother's name, or was the archdeacon himself capable of showing any tenderness whatever. in place of a mother the little boy had an aunt, who applied to him principles of spartan severity. at the mature age of three he was ducked every morning at a trough, to harden him, in the ice-cold water from a spring, and whenever he was naughty he was whipped. it may have been from this unpleasant discipline that he derived the contempt for self-indulgence, and the indifference to pain, which distinguished him in after life. on the other hand, he was allowed to read what he liked, and devoured grimm's tales, the seven champions of christendom, and the arabian nights. he was an imaginative and reflective child, full of the wonder in which philosophy begins. the boy felt from the first the romantic beauty of his home. dartington rectory, some two miles from totnes, is surrounded by woods which overhang precipitously the clear waters of the river dart. dartington hall, which stood near the rectory, is one of the oldest houses in england, originally built before the conquest, and completed with great magnificence in the reign of richard ii. the vast banqueting-room was, in the nineteenth century, a ruin, and open to the sky. the remains of the old quadrangle were a treasure to local antiquaries, and the whole place was full of charm for an imaginative boy. mr. champernowne, the owner, was an intimate friend of the archdeacon, to whom he left the guardianship of his children, so that the froudes were as much at home in their squire's house as in the parsonage itself. although most of his brothers and sisters were too old to be his companions, the group in which his first years were passed was an unusually spirited and vivacious one. newman, who was one of hurrell's visitors from oxford, has described the young girls "blooming and in high spirits," full of gaiety and charm.* -- * newman's letters and correspondence, ii. . -- the froudes were a remarkable family. they had strong characters and decided tastes, but they had not their father's conventionality and preference for the high roads of life. they were devoted to sport, and at the same time abounded in mental vigour. all the brothers had the gift of drawing. john, though forced into a lawyer's office, would if left to himself have become an artist by profession. the nearest to anthony in age was william, afterwards widely celebrated as a naval engineer. then came robert, the most attractive of the boys. a splendid athlete, compared by anthony with a greek statue, he had sweetness as well as depth of nature. his drawings of horses were the delight of his family; and when his favourite hunter died he wrote a graceful elegy on the afflicting event. the influence of his genial kindness was never forgotten by his youngest brother; but there was a stronger and more dominating personality of which the effect was less beneficial to a sensitive and nervous child. richard hurrell froude is regarded by high churchmen as an originator of the oxford movement, and he impressed all his contemporaries by the brilliancy of his gifts. dean church went so far as to compare him with pascal. but his ideas of bringing up children were naturally crude, and his treatment of anthony was more harsh than wise. his early character as seen at home is described by his mother in a letter written a year before her death, when he was seventeen. fond as she was of him and proud of his brilliant promise, she did not know what to make of him, so wayward was he and inconsiderately selfish. "i am in a wretched state of health," the poor lady explained, "and quiet is important to my recovery and quite essential to my comfort, yet he disturbs it for what he calls 'funny tormenting,' without the slightest feeling, twenty times a day. at one time he kept one of his brothers screaming, from a sort of teasing play, for near an hour under my window. at another he acted a wolf to his baby brother, whom he had promised never to frighten again."* -- * guiney's hurrell froude, p. . -- anthony was the baby brother, and though this form of teasing was soon given up, the temper which dictated it remained. hurrell, it should be said, inflicted severe discipline upon himself to curb his own refractory nature. in applying the same to his little brother he showed that he did not understand the difference between anthony's character and his own. but lack of insight and want of sympathy were among hurrell's acknowledged defects. conceiving that the child wanted spirit, hurrell once took him up by the heels, and stirred with his head the mud at the bottom of a stream. another time he threw him into deep water out of a boat to make him manly. but he was not satisfied by inspiring physical terror. invoking the aid of the preternatural, he taught his brother that the hollow behind the house was haunted by a monstrous and malevolent phantom, to which, in the plenitude of his imagination, he gave the name of peningre. gradually the child discovered that peningre was an illusion, and began to suspect that other ideas of hurrell's might be illusions too. superstition is the parent of scepticism from the cradle to the gave. at the same time his own faculty of invention was rather stimulated than repressed. he was encouraged in telling, as children will, imaginative stories of things which never occurred. in spite of ghosts and muddy water anthony worshipped hurrell, a born leader of men, who had a fascination for his brothers and sisters, though not perhaps of the most wholesome kind. the archdeacon himself had no crotchets. he was a religious man, to whom religion meant duty rather than dogma, a light to the feet, and a lantern for the path. a tory and a churchman, he was yet a moderate tory and a moderate churchman; prudent, sensible, a man of the world. to hurrell dissenters were rogues and idiots, a liberal was half an infidel, a radical was, at least in intention, a thief. from the effect of this nonsense anthony was saved for a time by his first school. at the age of nine he was sent to buckfastleigh, five miles up the river dart, where mr. lowndes, the rector and patron of the living, took boarders and taught them, mostly devonshire boys. buckfastleigh was not a bad school for the period. there was plenty of caning, but no bullying, and latin was well taught. froude was a gentle, amiable child, "such a very good-tempered little fellow that, in spite of his sawneyness, he is sure to be liked," as his eldest brother wrote in . he suffered at this time from an internal weakness, which made games impossible. his passion, which he never lost, was for greek, and especially for homer. with a precocity which mill or macaulay might have envied, he had read both the iliad and the odyssey twice before he was eleven. the standard of accuracy at buckfastleigh was not high, and froude's scholarship was inexact. what he learnt there was to enjoy homer, to feel on friendly terms with the greeks and trojans, at ease with the everlasting wanderer in the best story-book composed by man. anthony's holidays were not altogether happy. he was made to work instead of amusing himself, and forced into an unwholesome precocity. then at eleven he was sent to westminster. in the reputation of westminster stood high. the boarding- houses were well managed, the lagging in them was light, and their tone was good. unhappily, in spite of the head master's remonstrances, froude's father, who had spent a great deal of money on his other sons' education, insisted on placing him in college, which was then far too rough for a boy of his age and strength. on account of what he had read, rather than what he had learnt, at buckfastleigh, he took a very high place, and was put with boys far older than himself. the lagging was excessively severe. the bullying was gross and unchecked. the sanitary accommodation was abominable. the language of the dormitory was indecent and profane. froude, whose health prevented him from the effective use of nature's weapons, was woke by the hot points of cigars burning holes in his face, made drunk by being forced to swallow brandy punch, and repeatedly thrashed. he was also more than half starved, because the big fellows had the pick of the joints at dinner, and left the small fellows little besides the bone. ox-tail soup at the pastrycook's took the place of a meal which the authorities were bound to provide. scandalous as all this may have been, it was not peculiar to westminster. the state of college at winchester, and at eton, was in many respects as bad. public schools had not yet felt the influence of arnold and of the reforming spirit. head masters considered domestic details beneath them, and parents, if they felt any responsibility at all, persuaded themselves that boys were all the better for roughing it as a preparation for the discipline of the world. the case of froude, however, was a peculiarly bad one. he was suffering from hernia, and the treatment might well have killed him. although his lagging only lasted for a year, he was persistently bullied and tormented, until he forgot what he had learned, instead of adding to it. when the body is starved and ill- treated, the mind will not work. the head master, dr. williamson, was disappointed in a boy of whom he had expected so much, and wrote unfavourable reports. after enduring undeserved and disabling hardships for three years and a half, froude was taken away from westminster at the age of fifteen. to escape from such a den of horrors was at first a relief. but he soon found that his miseries were not over. he came home in disgrace. his misfortunes were regarded as his faults, and the worst construction was put upon everything he said or did. his clothes and books had been freely stolen in the big, unregulated dormitory. he was accused of having pawned them, and his denials were not believed. if he had had a mother, all might have been well, for no woman with a heart would assume that her child was lying. the archdeacon, without a particle of evidence, assumed it at once, and beat the wretched boy severely in the presence of the approving hurrell. hurrell would have made an excellent inquisitor. his brother always spoke of him as peculiarly gifted in mind and in character; but he knew little of human nature, and he doubtless fancied that in torturing anthony's body he was helping anthony's soul. to alter two words in the fierce couplet of the satirist, he said his duty, both to man and god, required such conduct, which seemed very odd. anthony was threatened, in the true inquisitorial spirit, with a series of floggings, until he should confess what he had not done. at last, however, he was set down as incorrigibly stupid, and given up as a bad job. the archdeacon arrived at the conclusion that his youngest son was a fool, and might as well be apprenticed to a tanner. having hoped that he would be off his hands as a student of christ church at sixteen, he was bitterly disappointed, and took no pains to conceal his disappointment. to anthony himself it seemed a matter of indifference what became of him, and a hopeless mystery why he had been brought into the world. he had no friend. the consumption in the family was the boy's only hope. his mother had died of it, and his brother robert, who had been kind to him, and taught him to ride. it was already showing itself in hurrell. his own time could not, he thought, be long. meanwhile, he was subjected to petty humiliations, in which the inventive genius of hurrell may be traced. he was not, for instance, permitted to have clothes from a tailor. old garments were found in the house, and made up for him in uncouth shapes by a woman in the village. his father seldom spoke to him, and never said a kind word to him. by way of keeping him quiet, he was set to copy out barrow's sermons. it is difficult to understand how the sternest disciplinarian, being human, could have treated his own motherless boy with such severity. the archdeacon acted, no doubt, upon a theory, the theory that sternness to children is the truest kindness in the long run. well might macaulay say that he would rather a boy should learn to lisp all the bad words in the language than grow up without a mother. froude's interrupted studies were nothing compared to a childhood without love, and there was nobody to make him feel the meaning of the word. fortunately, though his father was always at home, his brother was much away, and he was a good deal left to himself after robert's death. hurrell did not disdain to employ him in translating john of salisbury's letters for his own life of becket. no more was heard of the tanner, who had perhaps been only a threat. while he wandered in solitude through the woods, or by the river, his health improved, he acquired a passion for nature, and in his father's library, which was excellent, he began eagerly to read. he devoured sharon turner's history of england, and the great work of gibbon. shakespeare and spenser introduced him to the region of the spirit in its highest and deepest, its purest and noblest forms. unhappily he also fell in with byron, the worst poet that can come into the hands of a boy, and always retained for him an admiration which would now be thought excessive. by these means he gained much. he discovered what poetry was, what history was, and he learned also the lesson that no one can teach, the hard lesson of self-reliance. this was the period, as everybody knows, of the oxford movement, in which hurrell froude acted as a pioneer. hurrell's ideal was the church of the middle ages represented by thomas becket. in the vacations he brought some of his tractarian friends home with him, and anthony listened to their talk. strange talk it seemed. they found out, these young men, that dr. arnold, one of the most devoutly religious men who ever lived, was not a christian. the reformation was an infamous rebellion against authority. liberalism, not the pope, was antichrist. the church was above the state, and the supreme ruler of the world. transubstantiation, which the archdeacon abhorred, was probably true. hurrell froude was a brilliant talker, a consummate dialectician, and an ardent proselytising controversialist. but his young listener knew a little history, and perceived that, to put it mildly, there were gaps in hurrell's knowledge. when he heard that the huguenots were despicable, that charles i. was a saint, that the old pretender was james iii., that the revolution of was a crime, and that the non-jurors were the true confessors of the english church, it did not seem to square with his reading, or his reflections. perhaps, after all, the infallible hurrell might be wrong. one fear he had never been able to instil into his brother, and that was the fear of death. when asked what would happen if he were suddenly called to appear in the presence of god, anthony replied that he was in the presence of god from morning to night and from night to morning. that abiding consciousness he never lost, and when his speculations went furthest they invariably stopped there. left with his father and one sister, the boy drank in the air of dartmoor, and grew to love devonshire with an unalterable affection. he also continued his reading, and invaded theology. newton on the prophecies remarked that "if the pope was not antichrist, he had bad luck to be so like him," and renan had not yet explained that antichrist was neither the pope nor the french revolution, but the emperor nero. from pearson on the creed he learned the distinction between "believing" and "believing in." when we believe in a person, we trust him. when we believe a thing, we are not sure of it. this is one of the few theological distinctions which are also differences. meanwhile, the archdeacon had been watching his youngest son, and had observed that he had at least a taste for books. perhaps he might not be the absolute dolt that hurrell pronounced him. he had lost five years, so far as classical training was concerned, by the mismanagement of the archdeacon himself. still, he was only seventeen, and there was time to repair the waste. he was sent to a private tutor's in preparation for oxford. his tutor, a dreamy, poetical high churchman, devoted to wordsworth and keble, failed to understand his character or to give him an interest in his work, and a sixth year was added to the lost five. during this year his brother hurrell died, and the tragic extinction of that commanding spirit seemed a presage of his own early doom. two of his sisters, both lately married, died within a few months of hurrell, and of each other. the archdeacon, incapable of expressing emotion, became more reserved than ever, and scarcely spoke at all. sadly was he disappointed in his children. most of them went out of the world long before him. not one of them distinguished himself in those regular professional courses which alone he understood as success. hurrell joined ardently, while his life was spared, in the effort to counteract the reformation and romanise the church of england. william, though he became a naval architect of the highest possible distinction, and performed invaluable services for his country, worked on his own account, and made his own experiments in his own fashion. anthony, too, took his line, and went his way, whither his genius led him, indifferent to the opinion of the world. his had been a strange childhood, not without its redeeming features. left to himself, seeing his brothers and sisters die around him, expecting soon to follow them, the boy grew up stern, hardy, and self-reliant. he was by no means a bookworm. he had learned to ride in the best mode, by falling off, and had acquired a passion for fishing which lasted as long as his life. there were few better yachtsmen in england than froude, and he could manage a boat as well as any sailor in his native county. his religious education, as he always said himself, was thoroughly wholesome and sound, consisting of morality and the bible. sympathy no doubt he missed, and he used to regard the early death of his brother robert as the loss of his best friend. for his father's character he had a profound admiration as an embodiment of all the manly virtues, stoical rather than christian, never mawkish nor effeminate. chapter ii oxford westminster, it will have been seen, did less than nothing for froude. his progress there was no progress at all, but a movement backwards, physical and mental deterioration. he recovered himself at home, his father's coldness and unkindness notwithstanding. but it was not until he went to oxford that his real intellectual life began, and that he realised his own powers. in october, , four months after hurrell's death, he came into residence at oriel. that distinguished society was then at the climax of its fame; dr. hawkins was beginning his long career as provost; newman and church were fellows; the oriel common room had a reputation unrivalled in oxford, and was famous far beyond the precincts of the university. but of these circumstances froude thought little, or nothing. he felt free. for the first time in his life the means of social intercourse and enjoyment were at his disposal. his internal weakness had been overcome, and his health, in spite of all he had gone through, was good. he had an ample allowance, and facilities for spending it among pleasant companions in agreeable ways. he had shot up to his full height, five feet eleven inches, and from his handsome features there shone those piercing dark eyes which riveted attention where-ever they were turned. his loveless, cheerless boyhood was over, and the liberty of oxford, which, even after the mild constraint of a public school, seems boundless, was to him the perfection of bliss. he began to develop those powers of conversation which in after years gave him an irresistible influence over men and women, young and old. convinced that, like his brothers and sisters, he had but a short time to live, and having certainly been full of misery, he resolved to make the best of his time, and enjoy himself while he could. he was under no obligation to any one, unless it were to the archdeacon for his pocket-money. his father and his brother, doubtless with the best intentions, had made life more painful for him after his mother's death than they could have made it if she had been alive. but hurrell was gone, his father was in devonshire, and he could do as he pleased. he lived with the idle set in college; riding, boating, and playing tennis, frequenting wines and suppers. from vicious excess his intellect and temperament preserved him. deep down in his nature there was a strong puritan element, to which his senses were subdued. nevertheless, for two years he lived at oxford in contented idleness, saying with isaiah, and more literally than the prophet, "let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we shall die." it was a wholly unreformed oxford to which froude came. if it "breathed the last enchantments of the middle age," it was mediaeval in its system too, and the most active spirits of the place, the leaders of the oxford movement, were frank reactionaries, who hated the very name of reform. even a reduction in the monstrous number of irish bishoprics pertaining to the establishment was indignantly denounced as sacrilege, and was the immediate cause of keble's sermon on national apostasy to which the famous "movement" has been traced. john henry newman was at that time residing in oriel, not as a tutor, but as vicar of st. mary's. he was kind to froude for hurrell's sake, and introduced him to the reading set. the fascination of his character acted at once as a spell. froude attended his sermons, and was fascinated still more. for a time, however, the effect was merely aesthetic. the young man enjoyed the voice, the eloquence, the thinking power of the preacher as he might have enjoyed a sonata of beethoven's. but his acquaintance with the reading men was not kept up, and he led an idle, luxurious life. nobody then dreamt of an oxford commission, and the colleges, like the university, were left to themselves. they were not economically managed, and the expenses of the undergraduates were heavy. their battels were high, and no check was put upon the bills which they chose to run up with tradesmen. froude spent his father's: money, and enjoyed himself. the dissipation was not flagrant. he was never a sensualist, nor a sybarite. even then he had a frugal mind, and knew well the value of money. "i remember," he says in the oxford counter reformation, an autobiographical essay--"i remember calculating that i could have lived at a boarding-house on contract, with every luxury which i had in college, at a reduction of fifty per cent."* he was not given to coarse indulgence, and idleness was probably his worst sin at oxford. but his innocence of evil was not ignorance; and though he never led a fast life himself, he knew perfectly well how those lived who did. -- * short studies on great subjects, th series, p. . -- an intellect like froude's seldom slumbers long. he had to attend lectures, and his old love of homer revived. plato opened a new world, a word which never grows old, and becomes fresher the more it is explored. herodotus proved more charming than the arabian nights. thucydides showed how much wisdom may be contained in the form of history. froude preferred greek to latin, and sat up at night to read the philoctetes, the only work of literature that ever moved him to tears. aeschylus divided his allegiance with sophocles. but the author who most completely mastered him, and whom he most completely mastered, was pindar. the olympian odes seemed to him like the elgin marbles in their serene and unapproachable splendour. all this classical reading, though it cannot have been fruitless, was not done systematically for the schools. froude had no ambition, believing that he should soon die. but a reading-party during the long vacation of resulted in an engagement, which changed the course of his life. hitherto he had been under the impression that nobody cared for him at all, and that it mattered not what became of him. the sense of being valued by another person made him value himself. he became ambitious, and worked hard for his degree. he remembered how the master of his first school had prophesied that he would be a bishop. he did not want to be a bishop, but he began to think that such grandeur would not have been predicted of a fool. abandoning his idle habits, he read night and day that he might distinguish himself in the young lady's eyes. after six months her father interfered. he had no confidence in the stability of this very young suitor's character, and he put an end to the engagement. froude was stunned by the blow, and gave up all hope of a first class. in any case there would have been difficulties. his early training in scholarship had not been accurate, and he suffered from the blunders of his education. but under the influence of excitement he had so far made up for lost time that he got, like hurrell, a second class in the final classical schools. his qualified success gave him, no satisfaction. he was suffering from a bitter sense of disappointment and wrong. it seemed to him that he was marked out for misfortune, and that there was no one to help him or to take any trouble about him. thrown back upon himself, however, he conquered his discouragement and resolved that he would be the master of his fate. it was in the year that froude took his degree. newman was then at the height of his power and influence. the tracts for the times, which mrs. browning in aurora leigh calls "tracts against the times," were popular with undergraduates, and high churchmen were making numerous recruits. newman's sermons are still read for their style. but we can hardly imagine the effect which they produced when they were delivered. the preacher's unrivalled command of english, his exquisitely musical voice, his utter unworldliness, the fervent evangelical piety which his high anglican doctrine did not disturb, were less moving than his singular power, which he seemed to have derived from christ himself, of reading the human heart. the young men who listened to him felt, each of them, as if he had confessed his inmost thoughts to newman, as if newman were speaking to him alone. and yet, from his own point of view, there was a danger in his arguments, a danger which he probably did not see himself, peculiarly insidious to an acute, subtle, speculative mind like froude's. newman's intellect, when left to itself, was so clear, so powerful, so intense, that it cut through sophistry like a knife, and went straight from premisses to conclusion. but it was only left to itself within narrow and definite limits. he never suffered from religious doubts. from evangelical protestantism to roman catholicism he passed by slow degrees without once entering the domain of scepticism. dissenting altogether from bishop butler's view that reason is the only faculty by which we can judge even of revelation, he set religion apart, outside reason altogether. from the pulpit of st. mary's he told his congregation that hume's argument against miracles was logically sound. it was really more probable that the witnesses should be mistaken than that lazarus should have been raised from the dead. but, all the same, lazarus was raised from the dead: we were required by faith to believe it, and logic had nothing to do with the matter. how butler would have answered hume, butler to whom probability was the guide of life, we cannot tell. newman's answer was not satisfactory to froude. if hume were right, how could he also be wrong? newman might say, with tertullian, credo quia impossibile. but mankind in general are not convinced by paradox, and "to be suddenly told that the famous argument against miracles was logically valid after all was at least startling."* -- * short studies on great subjects, th series, p. . -- perplexed by this dilemma, froude at oxford as a graduate, taking pupils in what was then called science, and would now be called philosophy, for the honour school of literae humaniores. he was soon offered, and accepted, a tutorship in ireland. his pupils father, mr. cleaver, was rector of delgany in the county of wicklow. mr. cleaver was a dignified, stately clergyman of the evangelical school. froude had been taught by his brother at home, and by his friends at oxford, to despise evangelicals as silly, ignorant, ridiculous persons. he saw in mr. cleaver the perfect type of a christian gentleman, cultivated, pious, and well bred. mrs. cleaver was worthy of her husband. they were both models of practical christianity. they and their circle held all the opinions about catholicism and the reformation which newman and the anglo-catholics denounced. the real thing was always among them, and they did not want any imitation. "a clergyman," says froude, "who was afterwards a bishop in the irish church, declared in my hearing that the theory of a christian priesthood was a fiction; that the notion of the sacraments as having a mechanical efficacy irrespective of their conscious effect upon the mind of the receiver was an idolatrous superstition; that the church was a human institution, which had varied in form in different ages, and might vary again; that it was always fallible; that it might have bishops in england, and dispense with bishops in scotland and germany; that a bishop was merely an officer; that the apostolical succession was probably false as a fact--and, if a fact, implied nothing but historical continuity. yet the man who said these things had devoted his whole life to his master's service--thought of nothing else, and cared for nothing else."* -- * short studies on great subjects, th series, p. . -- froude had been taught by his brother, and his brother's set, to believe that dissenters were, morally and intellectually, the scum of the earth. here were men who, though not dissenters themselves, held doctrines practically undistinguishable from theirs, and yet united the highest mental training with the service of god and the imitation of christ. there was in the cleaver household none of that reserve which the tractarians inculcated in matters of religion. the christian standard was habitually held up as the guide of life and conduct, an example to be always followed whatever the immediate consequences that might ensue. mr. cleaver was a man of moderate fortune, who could be hospitable without pinching, and he was acquainted with the best protestant society in ireland. public affairs were discussed in his house with full knowledge, and without the frivolity affected by public men. o'connell was at that time supreme in the government of ireland, though his reign was drawing to a close. the whigs held office by virtue of a compact with the irish leader, and their under-secretary at dublin castle, thomas drummond, had gained the affections of the people by his sympathetic statesmanship. an epigrammatic speaker said in the house of commons that peel governed england, o'connell governed ireland, and the whigs governed downing street. it was all coming to an end. drummond died, the whigs went out of office, peel governed ireland, and england too. froude just saw the last phase of o'connellism, and he did not like it. in politics he never looked very far below the surface of things, and the wrongs of ireland did not appeal to him. that protestantism was the religion of the english pale, and of the scottish presbyterians in ulster, not of the irish people, was a fact outside his thoughts. he saw two things clearly enough. one was the strength and beauty of the religious faith by which the cleavers and their friends lived. the other was the misery, squalor, and chronic discontent of the catholic population, then almost twice as large as after the famine it became. he did not pause to reflect upon what had been done by laws made in england, or upon the iniquity of taxing ireland in tithes for the church of a small minority. he concluded simply that protestantism meant progress, and catholicism involved stagnation. he heard dark stories of ribbonism, and was gravely assured that if mr. cleaver's catholic coachman, otherwise an excellent servant, were ordered to shoot his master, he would obey. very likely mr. cleaver was right, though the event did not occur. what was the true origin of ribbonism, what made it dangerous, why it had the sympathy of the people, were questions which froude could hardly be expected to answer, inasmuch as they were not answered by sir robert peel. while froude was at delgany there appeared the once famous tract ninety, last of the series, unless we are to reckon monckton milnes's one tract more. the author of tract ninety was newman, and the ferment it made was prodigious. it was a subtle, ingenious, and plausible attempt to prove that the articles and other formularies of the english church might be honestly interpreted in a catholic sense, as embodying principles which the whole catholic church held before the reformation, and held still. mr. cleaver and his circle were profoundly shocked. to them catholicism meant roman catholicism, or, as they called it, popery. if a man were not a protestant, he had no business to remain in the united church of england and ireland. if he did remain in it, he was not merely mistaken, but dishonest, and sophistry could not purge him from the moral stain of treachery to the institution of which he was an officer. froude's sense of chivalry was aroused, and he warmly defended newman, whom he knew to be as honest as himself, besides being saintly and pure. if he had stopped there, all might have been well. mr. cleaver was himself high-minded, and could appreciate the virtue of standing up for an absent friend. but froude went further. he believed newman to be legally and historically right. the church of england was designed to be comprehensive. chatham had spoken of it, not unfairly, as having an arminian liturgy and calvinist articles. when the book of common prayer assumed its present shape, every citizen had been required to conform, and the policy of elizabeth was to exclude no one. the result was a compromise, and mr. cleaver would have found it hard to reconcile his principles with the form of absolution in the visitation of the sick. this was, in mr. cleaver's opinion, sophistry almost as bad as newman's, and froude's tutorship came to an end. there was no quarrel, and, after a tour through the south of ireland, where he saw superstition and irreverence, solid churches, well-fed priests, and a starving peasantry in rags, froude returned for a farewell visit to delgany. on this occasion he met dr. pusey, who had been at christ church with mr. cleaver, and was then visiting bray. dr. pusey, however, was not at his ease he was told by a clerical guest, afterwards a bishop, with more freedom than courtesy, that they wanted no popery brought to ireland, they had enough of their own. the sequel is curious. for while newman justified mr. cleaver by going over to rome, his own sons, including froude's pupil, became puseyite clergymen of the highest possible type. froude returned to oxford at the beginning of , and won the chancellor's prize for an english essay on the influence of political economy in the development of nations. in the summer he was elected to a devonshire fellowship at exeter, and his future seemed secure. but his mind was not at rest. it was an age of ecclesiastical controversy, and oxford was the centre of what now seems a storm in a teacup. froude became mixed up in it. on the one hand was the personal influence of newman, who raised more doubts than he solved. on the other hand froude's experience of evangelical protestantism in ireland, where he read for the first time the pilgrim's progress, contradicted the assumption of the tractarians that high catholicity was an essential note of true religion. gradually the young fellow became aware that high church and low church did not exhaust the intellectual world. he read carlyle's french revolution, and hero worship, and past and present. he read emerson too. for emerson and carlyle the church of england did not exist. carlyle despised it. emerson had probably not so much as given it a thought in his life. but what struck froude most about them was that they dealt with actual phaenomena, with things and persons around them, with the world as it was. they did not appeal to tradition, or to antiquity, but to nature, and to the mind of man. the french revolution, then but half a century old, was interpreted by carlyle not as antichrist, but as god's judgment upon sin. perhaps one view was not more historical than the other. but the first was groundless, and second had at least some evidence in support of it. god may be, or rather must be, conceived to work through other instruments besides christianity. "neither in jerusalem, nor on this mountain, shall men worship the father." carlyle completed what newman had begun, and the dogmatic foundation of froude's belief gave way. the two greatest geniuses of the age, as he thought them, agreeing in little else, agreed that christianity did not rest upon reason. then upon what did it rest? reason appeals to one. faith is the appanage of a few. from carlyle froude went to goethe, then almost unknown at oxford, a true philosopher as well as a great poet, an example of dignity, a liberator of the human soul. the church as a profession is not suitable to a man in froude's state of mind. but in oxford at that time there flourished a lamentable system which would have been felt to be irreligious if the authorities of the place had known what religion really was. most fellows lost their fellowships in a very short time unless they took orders, and froude's fellowship was in that sense a clerical one. they were ordained as a matter of course, the bishop requiring no other title. they were not expected, unless they wished it, to take any parochial duty, and the notion that they had a "serious call" to keep their fellowships can only be described as absurd. froude had no other profession in view, and he persuaded himself that a church established by law must allow a wider range of opinion than a voluntary communion could afford to tolerate. as we have seen, he had defended tract ninety, and he claimed for himself the latitude which he conceded to newman. it was in his case a mistake, as he very soon discovered. but the system which encouraged it must bear a large part of the blame. meanwhile he had been employed by newman on an uncongenial task. after the discontinuance of tracts for the times, newman projected another series, called lives of the saints. the idea was of course taken from the bollandist acta sanctorum. but newman had a definite polemical purpose. just as he felt the force of hume's argument against the probability of miracles, so he realised the difficulty of answering gibbon's inquiry when miracles ceased. had they ever ceased at all? many roman catholics, if not the most enlightened and instructed, thought not. newman conceived that the lives of english and irish saints held much matter for edification, including marvels and portents of various kinds. he desired that these things should be believed, as he doubtless believed them. they proved, he thought, if they could be proved themselves, that supernatural power resided in the church, and when the church was concerned he laid his reason aside. he was extraordinarily sanguine. "rationalise," he said to froude, "when the evidence is weak, and this will give credibility for others, when you can show that the evidence is strong." froude chose st. neot, a contemporary of alfred, in whose life the supernatural played a comparatively small part. he told his story as legend, not quite as newman wanted it. "this is all," he said at the end, "and perhaps rather more than all, that is known of the life of the blessed st. neot." his connection with the series ceased. but his curiosity was excited. he read far and wide in the benedictine biographies. no trace of investigation into facts could he discover. if a tale was edifying, it was believed, and credibility had nothing to do with it. the saints were beatified conjurers, and any nonsense about them was swallowed, if it involved the miraculous element. the effect upon froude may be left to his own words. "st. patrick i found once lighted a fire with icicles, changed a french marauder into a wolf, and floated to ireland on an altar stone. i thought it nonsense. i found it eventually uncertain whether patricius was not a title, and whether any single apostle of that name had so much as existed." froude's scepticism was too indiscriminate when it assailed the existence of st. patrick, which is not now doubted by scholars, baseless as the patrician legends may be. colgan's lives of irish saints had taken him back to ireland, that he might examine the scenes described. he visited them under the best guidance; and petre, the learned historian of the round towers, showed him a host of curious antiquities, including a utensil which had come to be called the crown of brian boru. legendary history made no impression upon froude. the actual state of ireland affected him with the deepest interest. a population of eight millions, fed chiefly upon potatoes, and multiplying like rabbits, light-hearted, reckless, and generous, never grudged hospitality, nor troubled themselves about paying their debts. their kindness to strangers was unbounded. in the wilds of mayo froude caught the smallpox, and was nursed with a devotion which he always remembered, ungrateful as in some of his writings about ireland he may seem. after his recovery he wandered about the coast, saw the station of protestant missionaries at achill, and was rowed out to clare island, where a disabled galleon from the armada had been wrecked. his studies in hagiology led him to consider the whole question of the miraculous, and he found it impossible to work with newman any more. a religion which rested upon such stories as father colgan's was a religion nurtured in lies. all this, however, had nothing to do with the church of england by law established, and froude was ordained deacon in . the same year newman seceded, and was received into the church of rome. no similar event, before or since, has excited such consternation and alarm. so impartial an observer as mr. disraeli thought that the church of england did not in his time recover from the blow. we are only concerned with it here as it affected froude. it affected him in a way unknown outside the family. hurrell froude, who abhorred private judgment as a protestant error, had told his brothers that when they saw newman and keble disagree they might think for themselves. he felt sure that he was thereby guarding them against thinking for themselves at all. but now the event which he considered impossible had happened. newman had gone to rome. keble remained faithful to the church of his baptism. which side hurrell froude would have taken nobody could say. he had died a clergyman of the church of england at the age of thirty-three, nine years before. anthony froude had no inclination to follow newman. but neither did he agree with keble. he thought for himself. of his brief clerical career there exists a singular record in the shape of a funeral sermon preached at st. mary's church, torquay, on the second sunday after trinity, . the subject was george may coleridge, vicar of the parish, the poet's nephew, who had been cut off in the prime of life while froude acted as his curate. the sermon itself is not remarkable, except for being written in unusually good english. the doctrine is strictly orthodox, and the simple life of a good clergyman devoted to his people is described with much tenderness of feeling. this sermon, of which he gave a copy to john duke coleridge, the future lord chief justice of england, was froude's first experiment in authorship, and it was at least harmless. as much cannot be said for the second, two anonymous stories, called shadows of the clouds and the lieutenant's daughter. the lieutenant's daughter has been long and deservedly forgotten. shadows of the clouds is a valuable piece of autobiography. without literary merit, without any quality to attract the public, it gives a vivid and faithful account of the author's troubles at school and at home, together with a slight sketch of his unfortunate love-affair. froude was a born story-teller, with an irresistible propensity for making books. the fascination which, throughout his life, he had for women showed itself almost before he was out of his teens; and in this case the feeling was abundantly returned. nevertheless he could, within a few years, publish the whole narrative, changing only the names, and then feel genuine surprise that the other person concerned should be pained. he was not inconsiderate. those who lived with him never heard from him a rough or unkind word. but his dramatic instinct was uncontrollable and had to be expressed. the archdeacon read the book, and was naturally furious. if he could have been in any way convinced of his errors, which may be doubted, to publish an account of them was not the best way to begin. reconciliation had been made impossible, and anthony was left to his own devices. his miscellaneous reading was not checked by an ordination which imposed no duties. goethe sent him to spinoza, a "god-intoxicated man," and a philosophical genius, but not a pillar of ecclesiastical orthodoxy. vestiges of creation, which had appeared in , woke oxford to the discovery that physical science might have something to say about the origin, or at least the growth, of the universe. the writer, robert chambers, whose name was not then known, so far anticipated darwin that he dispensed with the necessity for a special creation of each plant and animal. he did not, any more than darwin, attack the christian religion, and he did not really go much farther than lucretius. but he had more modern lights, he understood science, and he wrote in a popular style. he made a lively impression upon froude, who learnt from him that natural phenomena were due to natural causes, at the same time that he acquired from spinoza a disbelief in the freedom of the will. when dr. johnson said, "sir, we know that the will is free, and there's an end on't," he did not understand the question. we all know that the will is free to act. but is man free to will? if everything about a man were within our cognisance, we could predict his conduct in given circumstances as certainly as a chemist can foretell the effect of mixing an acid with an alkali. i have no intention of expressing any opinion of my own upon this subject. the important thing is that froude became in the philosophic sense a determinist, and his conviction that calvin was in that respect the best philosopher among theologians strengthened his attachment to the protestant cause. protestantism apart, however, froude's position as a clergyman had become intolerable. he had been persuaded to accept ordination for the reason, among others, that the church could be reformed better from within than from without. but there were few doctrines of the church that he could honestly teach, and the straightforward course was to abandon the clerical profession. nowadays a man in froude's plight would only have to sign a paper, and he would be free. but before orders, even deacon's orders, were indelible. neither a priest nor a deacon could sit in parliament, or enter any other learned profession. froude was in great difficulty and distress. he consulted his friends arthur stanley, matthew arnold, and arthur clough. clough, though a layman, felt the same perplexity as himself. as a fellow and tutor of oriel he had signed the articles. now that he no longer believed in them, ought he not to live up his appointments? the provost, dr. hawkins, induced him to pause and reflect. meanwhile he published a volume of poetry, including the celebrated bothie, about which froude wrote to him: "i was for ever falling upon lines which gave me uneasy twitchings; e.g. the end of the love scene: "and he fell at her feet, and buried his face in her apron. "i daresay the head would fall there, but what an image! it chimes in with your notion of the attractiveness of the working business. but our undisciplined ears have divided the ideas too long to bear to have them so abruptly shaken together. love is an idle sort of a god, and comes in other hours than the working ones; at least i have always found it so. i don't think of it in my working time, and when i see a person i do love working (at whatever it may be), i have quite another set of thoughts about her. . . it would do excellently well for married affection, for it is the element in which it lives. but i don't think young love gets born then. i only speak for myself, and from a very limited experience. as to the story, i don't the least object to it on the spectator's ground. i think it could not have been done in prose. verse was wanted to give it dignity. but if we find it trivial, the fault is in our own varnished selves. we have been polished up so bright that we forget the stuff we are made of." clough was in politics a republican, and sympathised ardently with the french revolution of . so did charles kingsley, a cambridge man, who was at that time on a visit to exeter. but kingsley, though a disciple of carlyle, was also a hard-working clergyman, who held that the masses could be regenerated by christian socialism. froude had no faith in socialism, nor in christianity as the church understood it. in this year, , emerson also came to oxford, and dined with clough at oriel, where they thought him like newman. froude was already an admirer of emerson's essays, and laid his case before the american moralist. emerson gave him, as might have been expected, no practical advice, but recommended him to read the vedas. nothing mattered much to emerson, who took the opportunity to give a lecture in london on the spiritual unity of all animated beings. froude attended it, and there first saw carlyle, who burst, characteristically enough, into a shout of laughter at the close. carlyle loved emerson; but the emersonian philosophy was to him like any other form of old clothes, only rather more grotesque than most. in the long vacation of froude went alone to ireland for the third time, and shut himself up at killarney. from killarney he wrote a long account of himself to clough: "killarney, july , . "i came over here where for the present i am all day in the woods and on the lake and retire at night into an unpleasant hotel, where i am sitting up writing this and waiting with the rest of the household rather anxiously for the arrival of a fresh wedded pair. next week i move off across the lake to a sort of lodge of lord kenmare, where i have persuaded an old lady to take me into the family. i am going to live with them, and i am going to have her ladyship's own boudoir to scribble in. it is a wild place enough with porridge and potatoes to eat, varied with what fish i may provide for myself and arbutus berries if it comes to starving. the noble lord has been away for some years. they will put a deal table into the said boudoir for me, and if living under a noble roof has charms for me i have that at least to console myself with. i can't tell about your coming. there may be a rising in september, and you may be tempted to turn rebel, you know; and i don't know whether you like porridge, or whether a straw bed is to your--not 'taste,' touch is better, i suppose. it is perfectly beautiful here, or it would be if it wasn't for the swarm of people about one that are for ever insisting on one's saying so. between hotel-keeper and carmen and boatmen and guides that describe to my honour the scenery, and young girls that insist on my honour taking a taste of the goats' milk, and a thousand other creatures that insist on boring me and being paid for it, i am really thankful every night when i get to my room and find all the pieces of me safe in their places. however, i shall do very well when i get to my lodge, and in the meantime i am contented to do ill. i have hopes of these young paddies after all. i think they will have a fight for it, or else their landlords will bully the government into strong measures as they call them--and then will finally disgust whatever there is left of doubtful loyalty in the country into open unloyalty, and they will win without fighting. there is the most genuine hatred of the irish landlords everywhere that i can remember to have heard expressed of persons or things. my landlady that is to be next week told me she believed it was god's doing. if god wished the people should be stirred up to fight, then it was all right they should do it; and if he didn't will, why surely then there would be no fighting at all. i am not sure it could have been expressed better. i have heard horrid stories in detail of the famine. they are getting historical now, and the people can look back at them and tell them quietly. it is very lucky for us that we are let to get off for the most part with generalities, and the knowledge of details is left to those who suffer them. i think if it was not so we should all go mad or shoot ourselves. "the echoes of english politics which come over here are very sickening: even the spectator exasperates me with its d--d cold- water cure for all enthusiasm. when i see these beautiful mountain glens, i quite long to build myself a little den in the middle of them, and say good-bye to the world, with all its lies and its selfishness, till other times. i have still one great consolation here, and that is the rage and fury of the sqireens at the poor rates; six and sixpence in the pound with an estate mortgaged right up to high-water mark and the year's income anticipated is not the very most delightful prospect possible. "the crows are very fat and very plenty. they sit on the roadside and look at you with a kind of right of property. there are no beggars--at least, professional ones. they were all starved-dead, gone where at least i suppose the means of subsistence will be found for them. there is no begging or starving, i believe, in the two divisions of kingdom come. i see in the spectator the undergraduates were energetically loyal at commemoration--nice boys--and the dons have been snubbed about guizot. is there a chance for m---? poor fellow, he is craving to be married, and ceteris paribus i suppose humanity allows it to be a claim, though john mill doesn't. my wedding party have not arrived. it is impossible not to feel a kindly interest in them. at the bottom of all the agitation a wedding sets going in us all there is lying, i think a kind of misgiving, a secret pity for the fate of the poor rose which is picked now and must forthwith wither; and our boisterous jollification is but an awkward barely successful effort at concealing it. well, good-bye. i hardly know when i look over these pages whether to wish you to get them or not. "yours notwithstanding, "j.a.f." ireland had been devastated, far more than decimated, by the famine, and was simmering with insurrection, like the continent of europe. the corn laws had gone, and the whigs were back in office, but they could do nothing with ireland. to froude it appeared as if the disturbed state of the country were an emblem of distracted churches and outworn creeds. religion seemed to him hopelessly damaged, and he asked himself whether morality would not follow religion. if the christian sanction were lost, would the difference between right and wrong survive? his own state of mind was thoroughly wretched. the creed in which he had been brought up was giving way under him, and he could find no principle of action at all. brooding ceaselessly over these problems, he at the same time lowered his physical strength by abstinence, living upon bread, milk, and vegetables, giving up meat and wine. in this unpromising frame of mind, and in the course of solitary rambles, he composed the nemesis of faith.* the book is, both in substance and in style, quite unworthy of froude. but in the life of a man who afterwards wrote what the world would not willingly let die it is an epoch of critical importance. to describe it in a word is impossible. to describe it in a few words is not easy. froude himself called it in after life a "cry of pain," meaning that it was intended to relieve the intolerable pressure of his thoughts. it is not a novel, it is not a treatise, it is not poetry, it is not romance. it is the delineation of a mood; and though it was called, with some reason, sceptical, its moral, if it has a moral, is that scepticism leads to misconduct. that unpleasant and unverified hypothesis, soon rejected by froude himself, has been revived by m. bourget in le disciple, and l'etape. the nemesis of faith is as unwholesome as either of these books, and has not their literary charm. it had few friends, because it disgusted free-thinking liberals as much as it scandalised orthodox conservatives. if it were read at all nowadays, as it is not, it would be read for the early sketches of newman and carlyle, afterwards amplified in memorable pages which are not likely to perish. -- * chapman, . -- in a letter to charles kingsley, written from dartington on new year's day, , froude speaks with transparent candour of his book, and of his own mind: "i wish to give up my fellowship. i hate the articles. i have said i hate chapel to the rector himself; and then i must live somehow, and england is not hospitable, and the parties here to whom i am in submission believe too devoutly in the god of this world to forgive an absolute apostasy. under pain of lost favour for ever if i leave my provision at oxford, i must find another, and immediately. there are many matters i wish to talk over with you. i have a book advertised. you may have seen it. it is too utterly subjective to please you. i can't help it. if the creatures breed, they must come to the birth. there is something in the thing, i know; for i cut a hole in my heart, and wrote with the blood. i wouldn't write such another at the cost of the same pain for anything short of direct promotion into heaven." of kingsley himself froude wrote* to another clerical friend, friend of a lifetime, cowley powles: "kingsley is such a fine fellow--i almost wish, though, he wouldn't write and talk chartism, and be always in such a stringent excitement about it all. he dreams of nothing but barricades and provisional governments and grand smithfield bonfires, where the landlords are all roasting in the fat of their own prize oxen. he is so musical and beautiful in poetry, and so rough and harsh in prose, and he doesn't know the least that it is because in the first the art is carrying him out of himself, and making him forget just for a little that the age is so entirely out of joint." a very fine and discriminating piece of criticism. -- * april th, . -- the immediate effect of the nemesis, the only effect it ever had, was disastrous. whatever else it might be, it was undoubtedly heretical, and in the oxford of heresy was the unpardonable sin. the senior tutor of exeter, the reverend william sewell, burnt the book during a lecture in the college hall. sewell, afterwards founder and first warden of radley, was a didactic churchman, always talking or writing, seldom thinking, who contributed popular articles to the quarterly review. the editor, lockhart, knew their value well enough. they tell one nothing, he said, they mean nothing, they are nothing, but they go down like bottled velvet. sewell's eccentricities could not hurt froude. but more serious consequences followed. the governing body of exeter, the rector* and fellows, called upon him to resign his fellowship. this they had no moral right to do, and froude should have rejected the demand. for though his name and college were on the title-page of the book, the book itself was a work of fiction, and he could not justly be held responsible for the opinions of the characters. expulsion was, however, held out to him as the alternative of resignation. -- * dr. richards. -- "if the rector will permit me," he wrote from oxford to clough, "tomorrow i cease to be a fellow of the college. but there is a doubt if he will permit it, and will not rather try to send me out in true heretic style. my book is therefore, as you may suppose, out. i know little of what is said, but it sells fast, and is being read, and is producing sorrow this time, i understand, as much as anger, but the two feelings will speedily unite." if he could have appealed to a court of law, the authorities would probably have failed for want of evidence, and froude would have retained his fellowship. but he was sensitive, and yielded to pressure. he signed the paper presented to him as if he had been a criminal, and shook the dust of the university from his feet. within ten years a new rector, quite as orthodox as the old, had invited him to replace his name on the books of the college. it was long, however, before he returned to an oxford where only the buildings were the same. twenty years from this date an atheistic treatise might have been written with perfect impunity by any fellow of any college. nobody would even have read it if atheism had been its only recommendation. the wise indifference of the wise had relieved true religion from the paralysis of official patronage. but in the action of the rector and fellows was heartily applauded by the visitor, bishop phillpotts, the famous henry of exeter. their behaviour was conscientious, and dr. richards, the rector, was a model of dignified urbanity. it is unreasonable to blame men for not being in advance of their age. chapter iii liberty froude's position was now, from a worldly point of view, deplorable. for the antagonism of high churchmen he was of course prepared. "never mind," he wrote to clough of the nemesis, "if the puseyites hate it; they must fear it, and it will work in the mind they have made sick." but he was also assailed in the protestant press as an awful example of what the oxford movement might engender. his book was denounced on all sides, even by freethinkers, who regarded it as a reproach to their cause. the professors of university college, london, had appointed him to a mastership at hobart town in australia, for which he applied the year before in the hope that change of scene might help to re-settle his mind. on reading the attacks in the newspapers they pusillanimously asked him to withdraw, and he withdrew. a letter to clough, dated the th of march, , explains his intellectual and material position at this time in a vivid and striking manner. "i admire matt. to a very great extent, only i don't see what business he has to parade his calmness, and lecture us on resignation, when he has never known what a storm is, and doesn't know what to resign himself to. i think he only knows the shady side of nature out of books. still i think his versifying, and generally his aesthetic power is quite wonderful .... on the whole he shapes better than you, i think, but you have marble to cut out, and he has only clay .... do you think that if the council do ask me to give up i might fairly ask lord brougham as their president to get me helped instead to ever so poor an honest living in the colonies? i can't turn hack writer, and i must have something fixed to do. congreve is down-hearted about oxford: not so i. i quite look to coming back in a very few years." the archdeacon, conceiving that the best remedy for free thought was short commons, stopped his son's allowance. froude would have been alone in the world, if the brave and generous kingsley had not come to his assistance. like a true christian, he invited froude to his house, and made him at home there. to appreciate the magnanimity of this offer we must consider that kinglsey was himself suspected of being a heretic, and that his prominent association with froude brought him letters of remonstrance by every post. he said nothing about them, and froude, in perfect ignorance of what he was inflicting upon his host, stayed two months with him at ilfracombe and lynmouth. yet kingsley did not, and could not, agree with froude. he was a resolved, serious christian, and never dreamt of giving up his ministry. he did not in the least agree with froude, who made no impression upon him in argument. he acted from kindness, and respect for integrity. froude, however, could not stay permanently with the kingsleys. his father would have nothing to do with him, and in his son's opinion was right to leave him with the consequences of his own errors. but the outcry against him had been so violent and excessive as to provoke a reaction. froude might be an "infidel," he was not a criminal, and in resigning his fellowship he had shown more honesty than prudence. his position excited the sympathy of influential persons. crabb robinson, though an entire stranger to him, wrote a public protest against froude's treatment. other men, not less distinguished, went farther. chevalier bunsen, the prussian minister, monckton milnes, afterwards lord houghton, and others whose names he never knew, subscribed a considerable sum of money for maintaining the unpopular writer at a german university while he made a serious study of theological science. but he had had enough of theology, and the munificent offer was declined, though bunsen harangued him enthusiastically for five hours in carlton gardens on the exquisite adaptation of evangelical doctrines to the human soul, until froude began to suspect that they must have originated in the soul itself. at this time a greater change than the loss of his fellowship came upon froude. while staying with the kingsleys at ilfracombe, he met mrs. kingsley's sister, charlotte grenfell, the argemone of yeast, a lady of somewhat wilful, yet most brilliant spirit, with a small fortune of her own. miss grenfell had joined the church of rome two years before, and at that time thought of entering a convent. this idea was extremely distasteful to her sister and her sister's husband. their favourite remedy for feminine caprice was marriage, and they soon had the satisfaction of seeing miss grenfell become mrs. froude. there were some difficulties in the way, for froude's prospects were by no means assured, and mrs. kingsley felt occasional scruples. but froude had confidence in himself, and when his mind was made up he would not look back. "you remember," he wrote to mrs. kingsley, in , "i warned you that i intended to take my own way in life, doing (as i always have done) in all important matters just what i should think good, at whatever risk of consequences, and taking no other person's opinion when it crossed with my own. now in this matter i feel certain that the way to save charlotte most pain is to shorten the struggle, and that will be best done by being short, peremptory, and decided in allowing no dictation and no interference .... charlotte herself is really magnificent. every letter shows me larger nobleness of heart. you cannot go back now, mrs. kingsley." mrs. kingsley did not go back, and froude had his way. before the wedding, however, another and a novel experience awaited him. his misfortunes aroused the interest of a rich manufacturer at manchester, mr. darbishire, who offered him a resident tutorship, and would have taken him into his own firm, even, as it would seem, into his own family, if he had desired to become a man of business, and to live in a smoky town. but froude was engaged to be married, and had a passionate love of the country. his keen, clear, rapid intelligence would probably have served him well in commercial affairs when once he had learnt to understand them. he was reserved for a very different destiny, and he gratefully declined mr. darbishire's offer. nevertheless, his stay at manchester as private tutor had some share in his mental development. he made acquaintance with interesting persons, such as harriet martineau, geraldine jewsbury, mrs. gaskell, and william edward forster, then known as a young quaker who had devoted himself, in the true quaker spirit of self-sacrifice, to relieving the sufferers from the irish famine. besides manchester friends, froude imbibed manchester principles. he had been half inclined to sympathise with the socialism of louis blanc and other french revolutionists. manchester cured him. he adopted the creed of individualism, private enterprise, no interference by government, and free trade. in these matters he did not, at that time, go with carlyle, as in ecclesiastical matters he had not gone with newman. his mind was intensely practical, though in personal questions of self-interest he was careless, and even indifferent. henceforth he abandoned speculation, as well philosophical as theological, and reverted to the historical studies of his youth. philosophy at oxford in those days meant plato, aristotle, and bishop butler. froude was a good greek scholar, and he had the true oxford reverence for butler. but he had not gone deeper into philosophy than his examinations and his pupils required. he liked positive results, and metaphysicians always suggested to him the movements of a squirrel in a cage. the alternative to business was literature. biographies of literary men, said carlyle, are the most wretched documents in human history, except the newgate calendar. but carlyle said many things he did not believe, and this was probably one of them. the truth is, that the literary profession, like the commercial, requires some little capital with which to set out, and froude received this with his wife. besides it he had brilliant talents, unflagging industry, and powers of writing such as have seldom been given to any of the sons of men. while at manchester he composed the cat's pilgrimage, the earliest of his short studies in date. the moral of this fanciful fable is very like the moral of candide. the discontented cat, tired of her monotonously comfortable place on the hearthrug, goes out into the world, and gets nothing more than experience for her pains. she finds the other animals occupied with their own concerns, and enjoying life because they do not go beyond them. not a very elevating paper, perhaps, but better than the nemesis of faith, and froude's last word on the subjects that had tormented his youth. he recoiled from materialism, finding that it offered no explanation of the universe. faith in god he had never entirely lost, and on that he founded his henceforth unshaken belief in the providential government of the world. whatever might be the origin of the christian religion, it furnished the best guide of life; and spiritual truth, as bunsen said, was independent of history. he had no sort of sympathy with those who rejected belief in christianity altogether, still less with those who abandoned theism. although he could not be a minister of the church, he was content to be a member, understanding the church to be what he was brought up to think it, the national organ of religion, a protestant, evangelical establishment under the authority of the law and the supremacy of the crown. froude returned to manchester immediately after his marriage, but his wife did not like the place nor the people. they looked about for a country home, and were fortunate enough to find the most enchanting spot in north wales. plas gwynant, the shining place, stands on a rising ground surrounded by woods, at the foot of snowdon, between capel curig and beddgelert. beyond the lawn and meadow is dinas lake. a cherry orchard stood close to the house door, and a torrent poured through a rocky ravine in the grounds, falling into a pool below. a mile up the valley was the glittering lake, lyn gwynant, with a boat and plenty of fishing. good shooting was also within reach. to this ideal home froude came with his wife in the summer of . here began a new life of cloudless happiness and perfect peace. his spiritual difficulties fell away from him, and he found that the church in which he had been born was comprehensive enough for him, as for others. he was not called upon to solve problems which had baffled the subtlest intellects, and would baffle them till the end of time. religion could be made practical, and not until its practical lessons had been exhausted was it necessary to go farther afield. "do the duty that lies nearest you," said goethe, who knew art and science, literature and life, as few men have known them. froude was never idle, and never at a loss for amusement. although he wrote regularly, and his love of reading was a passion, he had the keenest enjoyment of sport and expeditions, of country air and sights and sounds, of natural beauty and physical exercise. it was impossible to be dull in his company, for he was the prince of conversers, drawing out as much as he gave. no wonder that there were numerous visitors at plas gwynant. he was the best and warmest of friends. in london he would always lay aside his work for the day to entertain one of his contemporaries at oxford, and at plas gwynant they found a hospitable welcome. he would fish with them, or shoot with them, or boat with them, or walk with them, discussing every subject under heaven. perhaps the most valued of his guests was clough, who had then written most of his poetry, and projected new enterprises, not knowing how short his life would be. besides clough, matthew arnold came to plas gwynant, and charles kingsley, and john conington, the oxford professor of latin, and max muller, the great philologist. a letter to max muller, dated the th of june, , gives a pleasant picture of existence there. "i shall be so glad to see you in july. come and stay as long as work will let you, and you can endure our hospitality. we are poor, and so are not living at a high rate. i can't give you any wine, because i haven't a drop in the house, and you must bring your own cigars, as i am come down to pipes. but to set against that, you shall have the best dinner in wales every day--fresh trout, welsh mutton, as much bitter ale as you can drink; a bedroom and a little sitting-room joining it all for your own self, and the most beautiful look-out from the window that i have ever seen. you may vary your retirement. you may change your rooms for the flower- garden, which is an island in the river, or for the edge of the waterfall, the music of which will every night lull you to sleep. last of all, you will have the society of myself, and of my wife, and, what ought to weigh with you too, you will give us the great pleasure of yours." clough neither fished, nor shot, nor boated, but as a walking companion there was no one, in froude's opinion, to be put above him. for fishing he gave pre-eminence to kingsley, and together they carried up their coracles to waters higher than ordinary boats could reach. kingsley was ardent in all forms of sport, and an enthusiast for maurician theology, holding, as he said, that it had pleased god to show him and maurice things which he had concealed from carlyle. he had concealed them also from froude, who regarded carlyle as his teacher, feeling that he owed him his emancipation from clerical bonds. froude and kingsley did not agree either in theology or in politics. "i meant to say," froude wrote to his wife's brother-in-law in , "that the philosophical necessity of the incarnation as a fact must have been as cogent to the earliest thinkers as to ourselves. if we may say it must have been, they might say so. and they might, and indeed must, have concluded, each at their several date, that the highest historical person known to them must have been the incarnate god; so that unless the incarnation was the first fact in human history, there must have been a time when they would have used the argument and it would have led them wrong." concerning kingsley's socialism, especially as shown in hypatia, froude was cold and critical. "it is by no means as yet clear to me," he wrote about this time, "that all good people are socialists, and that therefore whoever sticks to the old thing is a bad fellow. whatever is has no end of claims on us. i have no doubt that we could not get on without the devil. if it had not been so, he would not have been. the ideas must be content to fight a long time before they assimilate all the wholesome flesh in the universe, and we cannot leave what works somehow for what only promises to work, and has yet by no means largely realised that promise. i consider it a bad sign in the thinkers among the christian socialists if they set to cursing those who don't agree with them. the multitudes must, but the thinkers should not. i cannot believe that if clement of alexandria had been asked whether he candidly believed tacitus was damned because he was a heathen he would have said 'yes.' indeed, on indifferent matters (supposing he had been alive in tacitus's time), i don't think he would have minded writing a leader in the acta diurna, even though tacitus followed on the other side!" oxford, and its old clothes, froude had cast behind him. he had never taken priest's orders, and the clerical disabilities imposed upon him were not only cruel, but ridiculous. shut out from the law, he turned to literature, and became a regular reviewer. there was not so much reviewing then as there is now, but it was better paid. his services were soon in great request, for he wrote an incomparable style. the origin of froude's style is not obscure. too original to be an imitator, he was in his handling of english an apt pupil of newman. there is the same ease, the same grace, the same lightness of elastic strength. froude, like newman, can pass from racy, colloquial vernacular, the talk of educated men who understand each other, to heights of genuine eloquence, where the resources of our grand old english tongue are drawn out to the full. his vocabulary was large and various. he was familiar with every device of rhetoric. he could play with every pipe in the language, and sound what stop he pleased. oxford men used to talk very much in those days, and have talked more or less ever since, about the oriel style. perhaps the best example of it is church, the accomplished dean of st. paul's. church does not rival newman and froude at their best. but he never, as they sometimes do, falls into loose and slipshod writing. he was the fine flower of the old oxford education, growing in hedged gardens, sheltered from the winds of heaven, such as catullus painted in everlasting colours long centuries ago. froude was a man of the world, who knew the classics, and the minds of men, and cities, and governments, and the various races which make up the medley of the universe. he wrote for the multitude who read books for relaxation, who want to have their facts clearly stated, and their thinking done for them. he satisfied all their requirements, and yet he expressed himself with the natural eloquence of a fastidious scholar. lucky indeed were the editors who could obtain the services of such a reviewer, and he was fortunate in being able to recommend with power the poetry of his friend, matthew arnold.* -- * his recommendation was entirely sincere. "matt. a.'s sohrab and rustum," he wrote to clough, "is to my taste all but perfect." -- although froude enjoyed with avidity the conversation of his chosen friends, he was not satisfied with intellectual epicureanism. he was resolved to make for himself a name, to leave behind him some not unworthy memorial. the history of the reformation attracted him strongly. if an historian is a man of science, or a mere chronicler, then certainly froude was not an historian. he made no claim to be impartial. he held that the oxford movement was not only endangering the national church, but injuring the national character and corrupting men's knowledge of the past. he believed in the reformation first as an historic fact, and secondly as a beneficent revolt of the laity against clerical dominion. he denied that since the reformation there had been one catholic church, and as an englishman he asserted in the language of the articles that the bishop of rome had no jurisdiction within this realm of england. he wanted to vindicate the reformers, and to prove that in the struggle against papal supremacy english patriots took the side of the king. he was roused to indignation by slanders against the character of elizabeth; and he held, as almost every one now holds, that the attempt to make an innocent saint of mary stuart was futile. even more and fisher he refused to accept as candidates for the crown of martyrdom. they were both excellent men. more was, in some respects, a great man. they were certainly far more virtuous than the king who put them to death. but they were executed for treason, not for heresy, and to clear their memory it is necessary to show that they had no part in conspiring with a foreign power against their lawful sovereign. that power, the church of rome, a power till , froude cordially hated. he regarded it as an obstacle to progress, an enemy of freedom, an enslaver of the intellect and the soul. the english catholics of his own time were mild, honourable, and loyal. although they had been relieved of their disabilities, they had no power. froude's reading and reflection led him to infer that when the church was powerful it aimed a deadly blow at english independence, and that henry viii., with all his moral failings, was entitled to the credit of averting it. these opinions were not new. they were held by most people when froude was a boy. it was from oxford that an attack upon them came, and from oxford came also, in the person of froude, their champion. froude's historical work took at first the form of essays, chiefly in the westminster review and fraser's magazine. the rolls series of state papers had not then begun, and the reign of henry was imperfectly understood. froude was especially attracted by the age of elizabeth, who admired her father as a monarch, whatever she may have thought of him as a man. it was an age of mighty dramatists, of divine poets, of statesmen wise and magnanimous, if not great, of seamen who made england, not spain, the ruler of the seas. it was with the seamen that froude began. his essay on england's forgotten worthies, which appeared in the westminster review for , was suggested by a new, and very bad, edition of hakluyt. it inspired kingsley with the idea of his historical novel, westward ho! and tennyson drew from it, many years later, the story of his noble poem, the revenge. the eloquence is splendid, and the patriotic fervour stirs the blood like the sound of a trumpet. the cruelties of the spaniards in south america, perpetrated in the name of holy church, are described with unflinching fidelity and unsparing truth. for instance, four hundred french huguenots were massacred in cold blood by spaniards, who invaded their settlement in florida at a time when france was at peace with spain. these protestants were flayed alive, and, to show that it was done in the cause of religion, an inscription was suspended over their bodies, "not as frenchmen, but as heretics." even at this distance of time it is satisfactory to reflect that these defenders of the faith were not left to the slow judgment of god. a french privateer, dominique de gourges, whose name deserves to be held in honour and remembrance, sailed from rochelle, collected a body of american indians, swooped down upon the spanish forts, and hanged their pious inmates, wretches not less guilty than the authors of st. bartholomew, with the appropriate legend, "not as spaniards, but as murderers." "it was at such a time," says froude, "and to take their part amidst such scenes as these, that the english navigators appeared along the shores of south america as the armed soldiers of the reformation, and as the avengers of humanity." hawkins, drake, raleigh, davis, grenville, are bright names in the annals of british seamanship. but they were not merely staunch patriots, and loyal subjects of the great queen; they were pioneers of civil and religious freedom from the most grievous yoke and most intolerable bondage that had ever oppressed mankind. in the westminster for appeared froude's essay on the book of job, which may be taken as his final expression of theological belief. henceforward he turned from theology to history, from speculation to fact. even his friendship for frederic maurice could not rouse him to any great interest in the latter's expulsion from king's college. "as thinkers," he wrote to clough on the nd of november, , "maurice, and still more the mauricians, appear to me the most hopelessly imbecile that any section of the world have been driven to believe in. i am glad you liked job, though my writing it was a mere accident, and i am not likely to do more of the kind. i am going to stick to the history in spite of your discouragement, and i believe i shall make something of it. at any rate one has substantial stuff between one's fingers to be moulding at, and not those slime and sea sand ladders to the moon 'opinion.'" froude pursued his studies, reading all the collections of original documents in strype and other chroniclers. why, he asked himself should henry, this bloody and ferocious tyrant, have been so popular in his own lifetime? parliament, judges, juries, all the articulate classes of the community, why had they stood by him? no doubt he could dissolve parliament, and dismiss the judges. but to submit without a struggle, without even protest or remonstrance, was not like englishmen, before or since. when erasmus visited england he found that the laity were the best read and the best behaved in europe, while the clergy were gluttonous, profligate, and avaricious. no historian ever prepared himself more thoroughly for his task than froude. sir francis palgrave, the deputy keeper of the records under sir john romilly, offered to let him see the unpublished documents in the chapter house at westminster which dealt with the later years of wolsey's government, and to the action of parliament after the cardinal' s fall. he examined them thoroughly, and accepted parker's proposal that he should write the history of the period. but he had to leave plas gwynant. the london library, which carlyle had founded, sufficed for contributions to magazines. history was a more serious affair, and it was necessary for him to be, if not in london, at least near a railway. he returned to his native county, and took a house at babbicombe, from which, after three years, he moved to bideford. he made frequent visits to london, where he was the guest of his publisher, john parker, at whose table he met arthur helps, john and richard doyle, cornewall lewis, richard trench, then dean of westminster, and henry thomas buckle, once famous as a scientific historian. he called on the carlyles at their house in chelsea, and began an intimacy only broken by death. carlyle himself was an excellent adviser in froude's peculiar field. he had the same puritan leanings, the same sympathy with the reformation, the same hostility to ecclesiastical interference with secular affairs, unless, as in the case of john knox, the interference was directed against rome. froude considered him not unlike knox in humour, keenness of intellect, integrity, and daring. history was the one form of literature outside goethe and burns for which he really cared. he had translated wilhelm meister in , and it was probably at his suggestion that froude translated elective affinities for bohn's library in . scottish history and scottish character carlyle knew as he knew his bible. his assistance and encouragement, which were freely given, proved invaluable to froude. froude settled steadily down to work, dividing his time between london and devonshire. shooting and fishing had for the time to be dropped. for recreation he joined an archery club, where, as james spedding told him, you were always sure of your game. in after life froude, who never bore malice, used to say that his father had been right in leaving him to his own resources, and that the necessity of providing for himself was, in his instance, as in so many others, the foundation of his career. he owed much to his publisher, john parker, who was liberal, generous, and confiding. publishers, like mothers-in-law, have got a bad name from bad jokes. parker, by trusting froude, and relieving him from anxiety while he wrote, smoothed the way for a memorable contribution to english history which after many vicissitudes has now an established place as a work of genius and research. the principles on which he worked are explained in a contribution to the volume of oxford essays for the year . the subject of this brilliant though forgotten paper is the best means of teaching english history, and the author's judgments upon modern historians are peculiar. hume and hallam, the latter of whom was still living, are indiscriminately condemned. macaulay, whose first two volumes were already famous, is ignored. the oxford examiners are severely censured for prescribing campbell's lives of the chancellors as authoritative, and carlyle's cromwell, a collection of materials rather than a book, is pronounced to be the one good modern history, though froude denounces, with friendly candour, carlyle's "distempered antagonism to the prevailing fashions of the age." the most characteristic part of this essay, however, is that which recommends the statutes, with their preambles, as the best text- book, and the following passage would be confidently assigned by most critics to the history itself: "who now questions, to mention an extreme instance, that anne boleyn's death was the result of the licentious caprice of henry? and yet her own father, the earl of wiltshire, her uncle, the duke of norfolk, the hero of flodden field, the privy council, the house of lords, the archbishop and bishopsm, the house of commons, the grand jury of middlesex, and three other juries, assented without, as far as we know, an opposing voice, to the proofs of her guilt, and approved of the execution of the sentence against her." froude was not, however, so much absorbed in the work of his life that he could not form and express strong opinions upon the great events passing around him. his view of the russian war and of the french alliance was set forth with much plainness of speech in a letter to max muller:* "i felt in the autumn (and you were angry at me for saying so) that the very worst thing which could happen for europe would be the success of the policy with which france and england were managing things. happily the gods were against it too, as now, after having between us wasted sixty millions of money and fifty thousand human lives, we are beginning to discover. but i have no hope that things will go right, or that men will think reasonably, until they have first exhausted every mode of human folly. i still think louis napoleon the d--d'est rascal in europe (for which again you will be angry with me), and that his reception the other day in london will hereafter appear in history as simply the most shameful episode in the english annals. thinking this, you will not consider my opinion good for anything, and therefore i need not inflict it upon you. humbugs, however, will explode in the present state of the atmosphere, and the austrian humbug, for instance, is at last, god be praised for it, exploding. john bull, i suppose, will work himself into a fine fever about that; but he will think none the worse of the old ladies in downing street who are made fools of: and will be none the better disposed to listen to people who told him all along how it would be. however, in the penal fatuity which has taken possession of our big bow-wow people, and in even the general folly, i see great ground for comfort to quiet people like myself; and if i live fifteen years, i still hope i shall see a republic among us." -- * april th, . -- froude's republicanism did not last. his opinion of louis napoleon never altered. chapter iv the history "it has not yet become superfluous to insist," said the regius professor of modern history in the university of cambridge on the th of january, , "that history is a science, no less and no more." if this view is correct and exhaustive, froude was no historian. he must remain outside the pale in the company of thucydides, tacitus, gibbon, macaulay, and mommsen. among literary historians, the special detestation of the pseudo-scientific school, froude was pre-eminent. few things excite more suspicion than a good style, and no theory is more plausible than that which associates clearness of expression with shallowness of thought. froude, however, was no fine writer, no coiner of phrases for phrases' sake. a mere chronicler of events he would hardly have cared to be. he had a doctrine to propound, a gospel to preach. "the reformation," he said, "was the hinge on which all modern history turned,"* and he regarded the reformation as a revolt of the laity against the clergy, rather than a contest between two sets of rival dogmas for supremacy over the human mind. that is the key of the historical position which he took up from the first, and always defended. he held the church of rome to have been the enemy of human freedom, and of british independence. he was devoid of theological prejudice, and never reviled catholicism as newman reviled it before his conversion. but he held that the reformers, alike in england, in france, and in germany, were fighting for truth, honesty, and private judgment against priestcraft and ecclesiastical tyranny. the scepticism and cynicism of which he was often accused were on the surface. they were provoked by what he felt to be hypocrisy and sham. they were not his true self. he believed firmly unflinchingly, and always in "the grand, simple landmarks of morality," which existed before all churches, and would exist if all churches disappeared. ou gar tanun ge kachthes, all' aei pote ze tauta, koudeis oiden ex hotou phane ["for they are not of today or yesterday, but these things live for ever, but no one knows from whence they appear." sophocles, antigone, .] before abraham was they were, and it is impossible to imagine a time when they will have ceased to be. -- * lectures on the council of trent, p. . -- froude was an erastian, holding that the church should be subordinate to the state. true religion is incompatible with persecution. but true religion is rare, and the best modern security against the persecutor is the secular power. mr. spurgeon once excited great applause from members of his church by declaring that the baptists had never persecuted. when the cheers had subsided he explained that it was because they had never had a chance. froude was convinced that ecclesiastics could not be trusted, and that they would oppress the laity unless the laity muzzled them. he held that the reformers had been calumniated, that their services were in danger of being forgotten, and that the modern attempt to ignore the reformation was not only unhistorical, but disingenuous. he wrote partly to rehabilitate them, and partly to prove that henry viii. had conferred great benefits upon england by his repudiation of papal authority. he took, as he considered it his duty to take, the side of individual liberty against ecclesiastical authority, and of england against rome. the idea that an historian was to have no opinions of his own, or that, having them, he was to conceal them, never entered his mind. that froude had any prejudice against the church of england as such is a baseless fancy. he believed in the church of his childhood, and, unless the word be used in the narrow sense of the clerical profession, he never left it to the end of his days. it was to him, as it was to his father, a protestant church, out of communion with rome, cut off from the pope and his court by the great upheaval of the sixteenth century. it is unreasonable, and indeed foolish, to say that that opinion disqualified him to be the historian of henry viii., and mary tudor, and elizabeth. the catholicism of lingard is not considered to be a disqualification by sensible protestants. froude's faults as an historian were of a different kind, and had nothing to do with his ecclesiastical views. he was not the only erastian, nor was he an erastian pure and simple. he has left it on record that macaulay's unfairness to cranmer in the celebrated review of hallam's constitutional history first suggested to him the project of his own book. his besetting sin was not so much erastianism, or secularism, as a love of paradox. henry viii seemed to him not merely a great statesman and a true patriot, but a victim of persistent misrepresentation, whose lofty motives had been concealed, and displaced by vile, baseless calumnies. more and fisher, honoured for three centuries as saints, he suspected, and, as he thought, discovered to have been traitors who justly expiated their offences on the block. he was not satisfied with proving that there was a case for henry, and that the triumph of rome would have been the end of civil as well as spiritual freedom: he must go on to whitewash the tyrant himself, and to prove that his marriage with anne boleyn, like his separation from katharine of aragon, was simply the result of an unselfish desire to provide the country with a male heir. the refusal of more and fisher to acknowledge the royal supremacy may show that they were catholics first and englishmen afterwards, without impugning their personal integrity, or justifying the malice of thomas cromwell. to judge henry as if he were a constitutional king with a secure title, in no more danger from catholics than louis xiv was from huguenots, is doubtless preposterous. if the catholics had got the upper hand, they would have deposed him, and put him to death. in that fell strife of mighty opposites the voice of toleration was not raised, and would not have been heard. tyrant as he was himself, henry in his battle against rome did represent the english people, and his cause was theirs. froude brought out this great truth, and to bring it out was a great service. unfortunately he went too far the other way, and impartial readers who had no sympathy with cardinal campeggio were revolted by what looked like a defence of cruel persecution. the welfare of a nation is more important in history than the observance of any marriage; and if henry had been guided by mere desire, there was no reason why he should marry anne boleyn at all. froude's achievement, which, despite all criticism, remains, was marred or modified by his too obvious zeal for upsetting established conclusions and reversing settled beliefs. the moment that froude had made up his mind, which was not till after long and careful research, he began to paint a picture. the lights were delicately and adroitly arranged. the artist's eye set all accessories in the most telling positions. he was an advocate, an incomparably brilliant advocate, in his mode of presenting a case. but it was his own case, the case in which he believed, not a case he had been retained to defend. when he came to deal with elizabeth he was on firmer ground. by that time the reformation was an accomplished fact, and the fiercest controversies lay behind him. disgusted as he was with the scandals invented against the virgin queen, he did not shrink from exposing the duplicity and meanness which tarnish the lustre of her imperishable renown. like knox, he was insensible to the charms of mary stuart, and that is a deficiency hard to forgive in a man. yet who can deny that elizabeth only did to mary as mary would have done to her? the morality of the guises was as much a part of mary as her scholarship, her grace, her profound statecraft, the courage which a voluptuous life never imparted. froude was not thinking of her, or of any woman. he was thinking of england. between the fall of wolsey and the defeat of the armada was decided the great question whether england should be catholic or protestant, bond or free. the dazzling queen of scots, like the virtuous chancellor and the holy bishop, were on the wrong side. henry and elizabeth, with all their faults, were on the right one. that is the pith and marrow of froude's book. those who think that in history there is no side may blame him. he followed carlyle. "froude is a man of genius," said jowett: "he has been abominably treated." "il a vu iuste," said a young critic of our own day* in reply to the usual charges of inaccuracy. the real object of his attack was that ecclesiastical corruption which belongs to no church exclusively, and is older than christianity itself. -- * arthur strong. -- the main portion of froude's life for nearly twenty years was occupied with his history of england from the fall of wolsey to the defeat of the spanish armada. it is on a large scale, in twelve volumes. every chapter bears ample proof of laborious study. froude neglected no source of information, and spared himself no pains in pursuit of it. at the record office, in the british museum, at hatfield, among the priceless archives preserved in the spanish village of simancas, he toiled with unquenchable ardour and unrelenting assiduity. nine-tenths of his authorities were in manuscript. they were in five languages. they filled nine hundred volumes. excellent linguist as he was, froude could hardly avoid falling into some errors. with his general accuracy as an historian i shall have to deal in a later part of this book. here i am only concerned to prove that he took unlimited pains. he kept no secretary, he was his own copyist, and he was not a good proof- reader. those natural blots, quas aut incuria fudit, aut humaria parum cavit natura, are to be found, no doubt, in his pages. from a conscientious obedience to truth as he understood it, and a resolute determination to present it as he saw it, he never swerved. he was not a chronicler, but an artist, a moralist, and a man of genius. unless an historian can put himself into the place of the men about whom he is writing, think their thoughts, share their hopes, their aspirations, and their fears, he had better be taking a healthy walk than poring over dusty documents. a paste-pot, a pair of scissors, the mechanical precision of a copying clerk, are all useful in their way; but they no more make an historian than a cowl makes a monk. polloi men narthekophoroi bakchoi de te pauroi ["there are many officials, but few inspired." zenobius, . ] there are many writers of history, but very few historians. froude wrote with a definite purpose, which he never concealed from himself, or from others. he believed, and he thought he could prove, that the reformation freed england from a cruel and degrading yoke, that the things which were caesar's should be rendered to caesar, and that the church should be restricted within its own proper sphere. those, if such there be, who think that an historian should have no opinions are entitled to condemn him. those who simply disagree with him are not. no man is hindered by any other cause than laziness, incompetence, or more immediately profitable occupations, from writing a history of the same period in exactly the opposite sense. froude's earliest chapters were set in type, and distributed among a few friends whose judgment he trusted. the most sympathetic was carlyle, who pronounced the introductory survey of england's social condition at the opening of the sixteenth century to be just what it ought to have been. carlyle's marginal notes upon the first two chapters are extremely interesting, and doubly characteristic, because they illustrate at the same time his practical shrewdness and his intense prejudice. for these reasons, and also because in many instances his advice was followed, it may be worth while to give some account of his pencil jottings, written when carlyle's hand was still firm, and as legible as they were fifty years ago. upon the first chapter as a whole, carlyle's judgment, though critical, was highly favourable. "this," he wrote, "is a vigorous, sunny, calm, and wonderfully effective delineation; pleasant to read; and bids fair to give much elucidation to what is coming. curious too as got mainly from good reading of the statutes at large! might there be with advantage (or not) some subdivision into sections, with headings, etc? also, here and there, some condensation of the excerpts given--condensation into narrative where too longwinded? item, for symmetry's sake (were there nothing else) is not some outline of spiritual england a little to be expected? or will that come piece-meal as we proceed? hint, then, somewhere to that effect? also remember a little that there was an europe as well as an england? in sum, euge." such praise from such a man was balm to froude's wounds and tonic to his nerves. practically expelled from his college, regarded by his own family as almost a black sheep, he found himself taken up, and treated as an equal, by a writer of european fame, whom of all his contemporaries he most admired. in deference to carlyle he rewrote his opening paragraphs, and added useful dates. european history and spiritual england do come into far greater prominence "as we proceed." the abbreviation and summary of extracts might, i think, have been carried farther with advantage. but it is curious that froude was attacked for the precisely opposite fault of treating his authorities with too much freedom. carlyle, who knew what historical labour was, saw at once that froude dealt with his material as a born student and an ardent lover of truth. his suggestions were always excellent, as sound and just as they were careful and kind. one criticism, which froude disregarded, shows not only carlyle's wide knowledge (that appears throughout), but also that his long residence south of the tweed never made him really english. it refers to froude's description of the english volunteers at calais who "were for years the terror of normandy," and of englishmen generally as "the finest people in all europe," nurtured in profuse abundance on "great shins of beef." "this," says carlyle, "seems to me exaggerated; what we call john- bullish. the english are not, in fact, stronger, braver, truer, or better than the other teutonic races: they never fought better than the dutch, prussians, swedes, etc., have done. for the rest, modify a little: frederick the great was brought up on beer-sops (bread boiled in beer), robert burns on oatmeal porridge; and mahomet and the caliphs conquered the world on barley meal." david hume would have thoroughly approved of this note. froude's patriotism was incorrigible, and he left the passage as it stood. a little farther on carlyle's hatred of political economy, in which froude fully shared, breaks out with amusing vigour. "if," wrote the younger historian, "the tendency of trade to assume a form of mere self-interest be irresistible," etc. "and is it?" comments the elder. "let us all get prussic acid, then." a recent speculator preferred cyanide of potassium. but if "mere self-interest" comprises fraudulent balance-sheets, it cannot claim any support from political economy. when carlyle drew up a petition to the house of commons for amending the law of copyright, he was guided by self- interest, but it was not a counsel of despair. the city companies, says froude, "are all which now remain of a vast organisation which once penetrated the entire trading life of england--an organisation set on foot to realise that impossible condition of commercial excellence under which man should deal faithfully with his brother, and all wares offered for sale, of whatever kind, should honestly be what they pretend to be." for "impossible" carlyle proposed "highly necessary, if highly difficult," and a similar change was made. but why people who do not understand political economy should be more honest than those who do neither master nor disciple condescended to explain. it is much easier to preach than to argue. more valuable than these gibes is carlyle's reminder that guilds were not peculiar to england. "in lubeck, augsburg, nurnberg, dantzig, not to speak of venice, genoa, pisa,--george hudson and the gospel of cheap and nasty were totally unknown entities. the german gilds even made poetry together; herr sachs of nurnberg was one of the finest pious genial master shoemakers that ever lived anywhere--his shoes and rhymes alike genuine (i can speak for the rhymes) and worthy." it is strange that carlyle should have taken the trouble to correct a misquotation from juvenal, and still stranger that froude should have left the words uncorrected. misquotation was a too frequent habit with him. in his second chapter he applies to henry the famous passage in tacitus's character of galba, and changes capax imperii to dignus imperil, though dignus would have required imperio, and would then have made inferior sense. some of carlyle's queries were productive of really substantial results; for instance, the simple words "such as" brought out the fact that the spoils of the monasteries were in part devoted to national defence. "inveterate frenzy" is froude's description of the years covered by the reign of edward iv. "fine healthy years in the main, for all their fighting," notes carlyle. "see the paston letters, for one proof." some of his recommendations are racily colloquial. "give us time of day" is his mode of asking for more dates. henry's instructions to his secretary or ambassador at rome he pronounces "very rough matter to set upon the table uncooked," and recommends an appendix, unluckily without avail. "abridge, redact," he exclaims towards the end, but there was no abridgment and no redaction. on the other hand, "prestige," stigmatised by carlyle as "a bad newspaper word," was rejected for "influence," and his insistence that english only should be used in the text, foreign languages being confined to notes, was accepted by froude. that "new doctrines ever gain readiest hearing among the common people" he left to stand as a general proposition, although, as carlyle reminded him, "in germany it was by no means the common people who believed luther first, but the elector of saxony, philip of hesse, etc., etc.--scotland too." the conclusion at which carlyle arrived after reading the second chapter is less favourable than his verdict upon the first. inasmuch, however, as some of the modifications suggested were made, though by no means all of them, and as carlyle's notions of history are worth knowing on their own account, i will transcribe his words, which are dated the th of september, : "this chapter contains a great deal of well meditated knowledge, just insight, and sound thinking; seems calculated to explain the phaenomenon of the reformation to an unusual degree, in fact has great merit of many kinds, historical among the rest. but it seems to me ( ) to be more of a dissertation than a narrative; to want dates, specific details, outline of every kind. ( ) the management might surely be mended? it does not "begin at the beginning" (which indeed is the most difficult of all things, but also the most indispensable); the story is not clear; or rather, as hinted above, there is no story, but an explanation of some story supposed to be already known, which is contrary to rule in writing 'history.' on the whole, the author seems to have such a conception of the subject as were well worth a better setting forth; and if this is all he has yet written of his book, i could almost advise him to start afresh, and remodel all this second chapter. this is a high demand; but the excellence attainable by him seems also high. the rule throughout is, that events should speak. commentary ought to be sparing; clear insight, definite conviction, brought about with a minimum of commentary; that is always the art of history. alter or not, however, there is such a generous breadth of intelligence, of manly sympathy, sound judgment, and in general of luminous solidity, promised in this book, that i will gladly read it, however it be put together. would it not be better to specify a little what martin luther is about, and keep up a chronological intercourse, more or less strict, with the great continental ocean of reform, the better to understand the tides from it that ebb and flow in these narrow seas? some notice of wiclif too i expected in some form or other. once more, go on and prosper!" the notice of wycliffe does seem a rather unreasonable expectation, and a history of england loses identity if it becomes a history of europe. but carlyle's principles, whether he always acted upon them himself or no, are excellent, and, though froude's second chapter was not quite rewritten, the effect of them may be seen in the rest of the book. carlyle's influence upon froude, which happily never extended to his style, confirmed him in his attachment to protestantism and his hatred of rome. it also accounted for much of froude's belief in despots. in democracy he had no faith. manhood suffrage in england, would, he thought, even in the wonderful year , the last of his history, have restored the pope. this was perhaps a little inconsistent with his theory that henry viii. had been popular with all classes. yet at least froude could distinguish one despot from another. he was entirely opposed, as we have seen, to the alliance with louis napoleon against russia, which culminated in the crimean war. otherwise his sympathy with liberalism was chiefly academic. he rejoiced in the university commission, and in the consequent removal of religious tests for undergraduates. but he took carlyle's latter- day pamphlets for gospel, and had no faith in peace by great exhibitions, or progress by political reform. the war with russia justified the first part of his creed, and even liberals in the house of commons seemed tacitly to agree with the second. to the glorification of mere money-making, the worship of the golden calf, the sincerest and the most fashionable of all worships, both he and carlyle were equally opposed. they were agreed with the socialists and with ruskin in their dislike of seeing bricks and mortar substituted for green fields, smoky chimneys for church towers, myriads of factory hands for the rural population of england. carlyle still called himself a radical, a believer in root and branch change, but moral rather than political. his faith in representative institutions had been shaken by reflecting that the long parliament, the best ever assembled in england, would have given up the cause of the civil war if it had not been for cromwell and the army. although he had been one of peel's warmest supporters in , he had come to dread liberalism as tending towards anarchy, and he adopted the singular verbal fallacy that a low franchise would mean a low standard of politics. froude, though he still called himself a liberal, and in some respects always was so, swore by carlyle, acknowledged him as his master, and repeated his creed. carlyle had many admirers, but few disciples, and he naturally set great value on froude's adhesion. he had always a great contempt for universal suffrage. it would have given, he said grimly, the same voice in the government of palestine to jesus christ and to judas iscariot. but whatever might have happened to judas, the son of man had not where to lay his head, and would certainly have been excluded under any system which met the approval of carlyle. in latter-day pamphlets carlyle had made a tremendous attack upon downing street, and the administrative deficiencies which the crimean campaign disclosed could be treated as confirmatory evidence in his favour. as a matter of fact, lord aberdeen and lord palmerston were all the same to him. he was denouncing the parliamentary system, which has borne up against worse ministers than the duke of newcastle. if sebastopol had been taken after the alma, as it well might have been, carlyle would not have altered his tone. nothing would have prevented him from delivering his message, or froude from accepting it. the first two volumes of the history appeared in . they dealt with the latter part of henry's reign, when he had rid himself of wolsey, and was personally ruling england with the aid of thomas cromwell. froude had to describe the dissolution of the monasteries, and besides describing he justified it. he had to depict the absolute government of henry; and he argued that it was a necessity of the times. we must not transfer the passions of one age to the controversies of another. in the seventeenth century the issue was between the stuart kings and their parliaments, or, in other words, between the crown and the people. in the sixteenth century king and parliament were united against an alien power, the catholic church, and a foreign prince, the pope. before england was free she had to become protestant, and henry, whatever his motives, was on the protestant side. that he was himself an unscrupulous tyrant is beside the point. he was an ephemeral phaemomenon, and, as a matter of fact, his tyranny, which the people never felt, died with him. the church of rome was a permanent fact, immortal, if not unchangeable, which would have reduced england, if it had prevailed, to the condition of france, italy, and spain. whether henry viii. was a good man, or a bad one, is not the question. bishop stubbs, who cannot be accused of anti-ecclesiastical, or anti-theological prejudice, calls him a "grand, gross figure," not to be tried and condemned by ordinary standards of private morals. the only interest of his character now is its bearing upon the fate of england. if the pope, and not the king, had become head of the english church, would it have been for the advantage of the english people? by frankly taking the king's side froude made two different and influential sets of enemies, especially at oxford. high churchmen, then and for the rest of his life, assailed him for hostility to "the church," forgetting or ignoring the fact that the church of england is not the church of rome. liberals, on the other hand, mistook him for a friend of lawless despotism, as if henry's opponents had been constitutional statesmen, and not arrogant churchmen, hating liberty even more than he did. that froude had no faith in modern liberalism is true enough. his political leader in was neither palmerston nor cobden, but carlyle. in he would have been a king's man and not a pope's man, an englishman first and a churchman afterwards. lord melbourne used to declare, in his paradoxical manner, that henry viii. was the greatest man who ever lived, because he always had his own way. strength is not greatness, and melbourne must not be taken literally. what can be pleaded for henry, without paradox and with truth, is that he imposed upon catholic and protestant alike the supremacy of the law. froude preached the subordination of the church to the state; and while supporters of the voluntary principle regarded him with suspicion, adherents to the sacerdotal principle shrank from him with horror. the reviews of froude's earliest volumes were mostly unfavourable. the times indeed was appreciative and sympathetic. but the christian remembrancer was emphatic in its censure, and the edinburgh review, of which henry reeve had just become editor, was vehemently hostile. after all, however, an author depends, not upon this party, nor upon that party, but upon the general public. the public took to froude's history from the first. they took to it because it interested them, and carried them on. paradoxical it might be. partial it might be. readable it undoubtedly was. parker's confidence was more than justified. the book sold as no history had sold except gibbon's and macaulay's. there were no obscure, no ugly sentences. the reader was carried down the stream with a motion all the pleasanter because it was barely perceptible. the name of the author was in all mouths. his old college perceived that he was a credit, not a disgrace to it, and the rector of exeter* courteously invited him to replace his name on the books. the committee of the athenaeum elected him an honorary member of the club. even the archdeacon, now a very old man, discovered at last that his youngest son was an honour to the name of froude. he knew something of ecclesiastical history, and he understood that the character of henry, which certainly left much to be desired, might have been blackened of set purpose by ecclesiastical historians. froude's reputation was made. the reviewers, most of whom knew nothing about the subject, could not hurt him. he had followed his bent, and chosen his vocation well. the gift of narrative was his, and he had had thoughts of turning novelist. but to write a novel, or at least a successful novel, was a thing he could never do. he had not the spirit of romance. if there was anything romantic in him, it was love of england, and of the sea. from the ocean rovers of elizabeth to the colonial path-finders of his own day, he delighted in men who carried the name and fame of england to distant places of the earth. he was an advocate rather than a judge. he held so strongly the correctness of his own views, and the importance of having a right judgment in all things, that he sometimes gave undue prominence to the facts which supported his theory. it was only fair and reasonable that critics should draw attention to this characteristic of froude as an historian. that he deliberately falsified history is a baseless delusion. a sterner moralist, a more strenuous worker, it would have been difficult to find. an artist he could not help being, for it was in the blood. once his fingers grasped the pen, they began instinctively to draw a picture. he was not, like macaulay, a rhetorician. he had inherited from his father a contempt for oratory, and he did not speak well in public. but when he had studied a period he saw it in a series of moving scenes as the figures passed along the stage. that he was not always accurate in detail is notorious. accuracy is a question of degree. there are mistakes in macaulay. there are mistakes in gibbon. humanum est effete. an historian must be judged not by the number of slips he has made in names or dates, but by the general conformity of his representation with the object. canaletto painted pictures of venice in which there was not a palace out of drawing, nor a brick out of place. yet not all canaletto's venetian pictures would give a stranger much idea of the atmosphere of venice. glance at one turner, in which a venetian could hardly identify a building or a canal, and there lies before you the queen of the sea. serious blunders have been discovered by microscopic criticism in carlyle's french revolution; it remains the most vivid and impressive version of a tremendous drama that has ever been given to the world. froude and carlyle had the same scorn of the multitude, the same belief in destiny, the same love of truth. froude was more sceptical, less inclined to hero-worship, far more academic in thought and style. they agreed in setting the moral lessons of history above any theory of scientific development, and in cultivating the human interest of the narrative as that which alone abides. -- * dr. lightfoot. -- that froude set out with a polemical purpose is not to be denied. he had seen enough of the romanist or anglican revival to dislike it heartily, and he held that protestant countries were the most prosperous because they were morally the best. although he did not accept the evangelical theology, he thought calvinism the most philosophic form of religious belief, and puritanism the soundest sort of ethical creed. the church of england as understood by his father was to him the healthiest of ecclesiastical institutions, teaching godliness, inculcating duty, saying as little as possible about dogma. religion, he said, was meant to be obeyed, not to be examined. the sun was invaluable, unless you looked at it if you looked at it, you saw neither it nor anything else. but for the reformation, england, like france, might be under a worthless despot sanctified by the church, or, like spain, be trampled under the feet of priests. the statutes of henry viii. were the title- deeds of the english church. henry established the supremacy of the state by letters patent, praemunire, and conge d'elire. the old bluebeard henry, who spent his whole time in murdering his wives, was a nursery toy. the real henry put two wives to death by lawful means on definite and substantial charges of which death was the penalty. his subjects were quite as anxious as he could be that he should have a male heir, and few now suppose that anne boleyn, or katharine howard, was faithful to her husband. the church of rome would have dethroned henry and incited his subjects to rebellion. it was war to the knife, and the king won. froude regarded henry's victory as the salvation of england. the dissolution of the monasteries was an incident in the struggle, necessary for the public interest, and justified by the evidence. although part of their confiscated property was bestowed upon statesmen and courtiers, part went to found new cathedral colleges, or grammar schools, and part to strengthen the national defences. henry was a strange mixture, quite as much patriot as tyrant, and not safe enough on his throne to tolerate popery. in froude's view he stood for the nation. more and fisher were for a foreign power. the time with which froude chose to deal was full of blazing fire, which the ashes of three hundred years imperfectly covered. he did not realise the ordeal to which he was exposing himself, the malice he was stirring up. his whole life had been a preparation for the task. when he had the free run of his father's library after leaving westminster, it was to the historical shelves that he went first; and while his brother talked eloquently about the evils of the reformation, he himself was studying its causes. his own entanglement in the anglican revival was personal, accidental, and brief. it was due entirely to his affectionate admiration for newman, aided perhaps, if by anything, by curiosity to know something about the lives of the saints. for a real saint, such as hugh of lincoln, he had a sincere reverence, and loved to show it. the miraculous element disgusted him, and the more he read of ecclesiastical performances the more anti-ecclesiastical he became. the article in the edinburgh review for july, , upon froude's first four volumes is an elaborate, an able, and a bitter attack. henry reeve, the editor of the edinburgh at that time, and for many years afterwards, was not himself a scholar, like his illustrious predecessor, cornewall lewis. he was a whig of the most conventional type, regarding macaulay and hallam as the ideal historians, suspicious of novelty, and dismayed by paradox. froude's critic belonged to a more advanced school of liberalism, and shuddered at the glorification of a "tyrant" like henry viii. that he had also some reason for personally detesting froude is plain from his malicious references to the lives of the saints, and to the nemesis of faith, which froude himself had, so far as he could, suppressed. when froude's name was restored to the books of exeter college in , he wrote to dr. lightfoot, the rector, that he regretted the publication both of the nemesis and of shadows of the clouds. his object in future, he added, would be to defend the church of england. that his idea of the church was the same as lightfoot's is improbable. froude meant the church of the reformation, of private judgment, of an open bible, of lay independence of bishop or priest. to that church he was faithful, and he sympathised in sentiment, if he did not agree in dogma, with evangelical christians. with catholics, roman or anglican, he neither had nor pretended to have any sympathy at all. the reformation is a convenient name for a complex european movement, difficult to describe, and almost impossible to define; but so far as it was english and constitutional, it is embodied in the legislation of henry viii., which substituted the supremacy of the crown for the supremacy of the pope. it was because froude wrote avowedly in defence of that change that he incurred the bitter hostility of a powerful section in the english church. he also irritated, partly perhaps because his tone betrayed the influence of carlyle, a large body of liberal opinion to which all despotism and persecution were obnoxious. the compliments, the reluctant compliments, of the edinburgh reviewer must be taken as the admissions of an enemy. he acknowledges fully and frankly the thoroughness of froude's research among the state papers of the reign, not merely those printed and published by robert lemon, but "a large manuscript collection of copies of letters, minutes of council, theological tracts, parliamentary petitions, depositions upon trials, and miscellaneous communications upon the state of the country furnished by agents of the government, all relating to the early years of the english reformation." no historian has ever been more diligent than froude was in reading and collating manuscripts. for henry's reign alone he read and transcribed six hundred and eighty-seven pages in his small, close handwriting. that in so doing, and in working without assistance, he should sometimes fall into error was unavoidable. but he never spared himself. he was the most laborious of students, and his history was as difficult to write as it is easy to read. he had, as this hostile reviewer says, a "genuine love of historical research," and there is point in the same critic's complaint that his pages are "over-loaded with long quotations from state papers." what, then, it will be asked, was the real gist of the charges made against froude by the edinburgh review? the question at issue was nothing less than the whole policy of henry's reign, and the motives of the king. the character of henry is one of the most puzzling in historical literature, and froude had to deal with the most difficult part of it. to the virtues of his earlier days erasmus is an unimpeachable witness. the power of his mind and the excellence of his education are beyond dispute. he held the catholic faith, he was not naturally cruel, and, compared with francis i., or with henry of navarre, he was not licentious. but he was brought up to believe that the ordinary rules of morality do not govern kings. that the king can do no wrong is now a maxim of the constitution, and merely means that ministers are responsible for the acts of the crown. henry could scarcely have been made to understand, even if there had been any one to tell him, what a constitutional monarch was. though forced to admit, and taught by experience, that he could not safely tax his subjects without the formal sanction of parliament, he was in theory absolute, and he held it his duty to rule as well as to reign. when charles i. argued, a century later, that a king was not bound to keep faith with his subjects, it may be doubted whether he deceived himself. the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns. his duty to god henry would always have acknowledged. a historian so widely different from froude as bishop stubbs has pointed out that, if mere self-indulgence had been the king's object, the infinite pains he took to obtain a papal divorce from katharine of aragon would have been thrown away. that he had a duty to his neighbour, male or female, never entered his head. his subjects were his own, to deal with as he pleased. revolting as this theory may seem now, it was held by most people then, and there was not a man in england, not sir thomas more himself, who would have told the king that it was untrue. it is with the divorce of katharine that the difficulty of estimating henry begins. froude's narrative sets out with the marriage of anne boleyn. here the reviewer plants his first arrow. the divorce was a nullity, having no authority higher than cranmer's. anne boleyn, as is likely enough from other causes, was never the king's wife, and elizabeth was illegitimate, though she had of course a parliamentary title to the throne. it seems clear, however, that inasmuch as katharine had been his brother prince arthur's wife, the king could not lawfully marry her, according to the canons of the catholic church. why did he marry anne boleyn? the reviewer says because he was in love with her, and triumphantly refers to the king's letters, printed in the appendix of hearne's ayesbury.* they are undoubtedly love-letters, and they contain one indelicate expression. compared with mirabeau's letters to sophie de monnier, they are cold and chaste. froude says that the king wanted a male heir, and he gives the same reason for the scandalously indecent haste with which jane seymour was married the day after anne's execution. the character of henry viii. is only important now as it bears upon the policy of his reign. that froude washed him too white is almost as certain as that lingard painted him too black. the notion that lust supplies the key to his marriages and their consequences is utterly ridiculous. the most dissolute of english kings was content, and more than content, with one wife. on the other hand, froude does at least give a clue when he suggests that these frequent marriages were political moves. a female sovereign reigning in her own right had never been known in england, and up to the birth of jane seymour's son edward the whole kingdom passionately desired that there should be a prince of wales. edward himself was but a sickly child, and was not expected to live even for the short span of his actual career. credulous indeed must they be who maintain the innocence either of anne boleyn or of katharine howard, and there seems small use in holding with the learned father gasquet that anne was not guilty of the offences imputed to her, but had done something too bad to be mentioned on a trial for incest. it is a question of evidence, and the evidence is lost. but the grand jury which presented anne was respectable, the court which convicted her was distinguished, and neither she nor any of her paramours denied their guilt on the scaffold. simple adultery in a queen was capital then, if indeed it be not capital now. in an ordinary husband henry's conduct would have been revolting. it is not attractive in him. stubbs pleads that we cannot judge him, and abandons the attempt in despair. -- * oxford, . -- as he rejects with equal decision both the roman catholic picture and froude's, he only puts us all to ignorance again. froude is at least intelligible. it is a fact, and not a fancy, that henry provided from the spoils of the monasteries for the defence of the realm, that he founded new bishoprics from the same source, that he disarmed the ecclesiastical tribunals, and broke the bonds of rome. the corruption of at least the smaller monasteries, some of which were suppressed by wolsey before the rise of cromwell, is established by the balance of evidence, and the disappearance of the black book which set forth their condition was only to be expected in the reign of mary. the crime which weighs most upon the memory of the king is the execution of fisher and more. more, though he persecuted heretics, is the saint and philosopher of the age. of fisher macaulay says that he was worthy to have lived in a better age, and died in a better cause. but what if these good men, from purely conscientious motives, would have brought over a spanish army to coerce their protestant fellow-subjects and their lawful sovereign? that, and not speculative error, is the real charge against them. henry did all he could to put himself in the wrong. his atrocious request that more "would not use many words on the scaffold" makes one hate him after the lapse of well-nigh four hundred years. the question, however, is not one of personal feeling. good men go wrong. bad men are made by providence to be instruments for good. it is not more, nor fisher, it is the bluebeard of the children's history-books who gave england miles coverdale's bible, who freed her from the yoke that oppressed france till the revolution, and oppresses spain to-day. froude's first four volumes are an eloquent indictment of ultramontanism, a plea for the reformation, a sustained argument for english liberties and freedom of thought. no such book can be impartial in the sense of admitting that there is as much to be said on one side as on the other. froude replied to the edinburgh review in fraser's magazine for september, , and in the following month the reviewer retorted. he did not really shake the foundation of froude's case, which was the same as luther's. luther, like froude, was no democrat. to both of them the reformation was a protest against ecclesiastical tyranny, or for spiritual freedom. "the comedy has ended in a marriage," said erasmus of luther and luther's wife. it was not a comedy, and it had not ended. froude sometimes goes too far. when he defends the boiling act, under which human beings were actually boiled alive in smithfield, he shakes confidence in his judgment. he sets too much value upon the verdicts of henry's tribunals, forgetting macaulay's emphatic declaration that state trials before were murder under the forms of law. although the subject of his prize essay at oxford was "the influence of the science of political economy upon the moral and social welfare of a nation," he never to the end of his life understood what political economy was. misled by carlyle, he conceived it to be a sort of "gospel," a rival system to the christian religion, instead of useful generalisations from the observed course of trade. he never got rid of the idea that governments could fix the rate of wages and the price of goods. a more serious fault found by the edinburgh reviewer, the ablest of all froude's critics, was the implication rather than the assertion that henry viii.'s parliaments represented the people. the house of commons in the sixteenth century was really chosen through the sheriffs by the crown, and the preambles of the statutes, upon which froude relied as evidence of contemporary opinion, showed the opinion of the government rather than the opinion of the people. they are not of course on that account to be neglected. although the house of commons was no result of popular election, it consisted of representative englishmen, who would hardly have acquiesced in statements notoriously untrue. henry neither obtained nor asked the opinion of the people, as we understand the phrase. the "dim common populations" had no more to do with the government of england then than they have to do with the government of india now. at the same time it must be remembered that the king could not rely upon mere force. he had no standing army, and a popular rising would have swept him almost without resistance from his throne. it is almost as hard for us to imagine his position as to understand his character. parliament, judges, magistrates, were subordinate to his sovereign will and pleasure. from the authority of the pope he cut himself free, and neither clement vii. nor paul iii. was strong enough to stand up against him. he could hold his own with france, with the empire, with spain. the one power he never ventured to defy was the english people. it was the essence of the tudor monarchy to rely upon the masses rather than the classes, to keep the aristocracy down by expressing the popular will. so far as henry took part in it, the reformation was not religious at all. as macaulay drily remarks, he was a good catholic who preferred to be his own pope. he knew very well that englishmen would like him none the worse for resisting the pretensions of rome, for insisting on the royal supremacy, for taking every possible step to secure the succession in the male tudor line. if in his callous indifference to the fate of the men or women who stood in his way he appears scarcely human, we must consider, with bishop stubbs, his awful isolation. the whole burden of the state was upon him, and he could not share it. not till the reign of his elder daughter did his subjects realise the horrors from which he had delivered them. hostile criticism, though it affected the opinion of scholars, did froude no harm with the public. macaulay's popularity was at its height in . but macaulay passes lightly in his introduction over the sixteenth century, and the reign of henry viii., or at least the latter part of it, had never been so copiously illustrated before. the oxford movement, which treated the reformation as a discreditable incident worthy of oblivion, had not much influence with the laity. nine englishmen in ten were quite prepared to glorify the reformers, and were by no means sorry to find how much evidence there was for the good old english view of a parliamentary church. the statutes of supremacy and of praemunire, even the execution of more and fisher, reminded them that the bishop of rome neither had nor ought to have any jurisdiction within this realm of england. that "gospel light first dawned from boleyn's eyes" might be a paradox. it was, however, a paradox which contained a truth, and it was by no means disagreeable to find that a popular king was not a mere monster of iniquity. if henry had been what catholic historians represented him, the mob would have pulled his palace about his ears. the public bought the book, and read it; for the style, though very unlike macaulay's, was quite as easy to read. in appeared the two volumes dealing with edward vi. and mary, which complete the former half of this great book. after the brief and disturbed period of edward's minority and somerset's protectorate, the country enjoyed a true catholic reign. whatever may have been the religion of henry, there could be no doubt about mary's. mary had only one use for protestants, and that was to burn them. among her first victims were latimer and ridley, two bright ornaments of christian faith and practice, who committed the deadly sin of believing that it was against the truth of christ's natural body to be in heaven and earth at the same time. to them soon succeeded cranmer, the father of the english liturgy, not a man of unblemished character, but incomparably superior to gardiner, to bonner, or to pole. for cranmer froude had a peculiar affection, and his account of the archbishop's martyrdom is unsurpassed by any other passage in the history. i need make no apology for quoting the end of it; "so perished cranmer. he was brought out with the eyes of his soul blinded to make sport for his enemies, and in his death he brought upon them a wider destruction than he had effected by his teaching while alive. pole was appointed next day to the see of canterbury; but in other respects the court had overreached themselves by their cruelty. had they been contented to accept the recantation, they would have left the archbishop to die broken- hearted, pointed at by the finger of pitying scorn, and the reformation would have been disgraced in its champion. they were tempted, by an evil spirit of revenge, into an act unsanctioned even by their own bloody laws; and they gave him an opportunity of redeeming his fame, and of writing his name in the roll of martyrs. the worth of a man must be measured by his life, not by his failure under a single and peculiar trial. the apostle, though forewarned, denied his master on the first alarm of danger; yet that master, who knew his nature in its strength and its infirmity, chose him for the rock on which he would build his church." it used to be said of ernest renan that he was toniours seminariste, and there is a flavour of the pulpit in these beautiful sentences. beautiful indeed they are, and not more beautiful than true. the implacable mary, whose ghastly epithet clings to her for all time, like the shirt of nessus, found in pole an apt and zealous pupil in persecution. both are excellent specimens of their church, because according to that church they are absolutely blameless. punctilious in the discharge of all religious duties, they were chaste, sober, frugal, and honest. they made long prayers. they tithed mint, and anise, and cummin. they made clean the outside of the cup and platter. they firmly believed that they were pleasing the deity they worshipped when they deluged england with blood. the spirit of the marian martyrs is one of the noblest tributes to the power of true religion that the annals of christendom contain. henry' s victims were few and conspicuous. their crime, or alleged crime, was treason. mary's were obscure, and numbered by the hundred. many of them were artisans and mechanics, who, as burghley afterwards said, knew no faith except that they were called upon to abjure. they went to the stake without a murmur, sustained against the terrors of demonology by their own english hearts, by the love of their friends, and by the grace of god. tennyson, in his play of queen mary, has put into the mouth of pole some highly edifying sentiments on the want of true faith which prompts persecution. pole's example was very different from these precepts. for the wretched mary there may be some excuse; she was perhaps not wholly sane. her fixed idea, that if she killed protestants enough heaven would give her a son, was the conviction of a lunatic. her own husband fled from her, and left her with no earthly consolation save the stake. but pole was sane enough when he burnt better christians than himself. the true story of mary's reign deserved to be told as froude could tell it. the tale has two sides, and is a warning which has been taken to heart. mary's subjects could not rebel. her spanish husband had behind him the military strength of a great power. but never again, except during the brief and disastrous period which led to the expulsion of the second james, has england endured a catholic sovereign. neither her rulers nor her laws have always been just to catholics. to tolerate intolerance, though a truly christian lesson, is hard to learn. mary tudor and reginald pole taught the english people once for all what the triumph of catholicism meant. so long as they are not supreme, catholics are the best of subjects, of citizens, of neighbours, of friends. there is only one country in europe where they are supreme now, and that country is spain. they might have been supreme in england for at least a century if it had not been for the daughter of katharine of aragon and the legate of julius iii. froude had now completed the first part of his great history. the second part, the reign of elizabeth, was reserved for future issue in separately numbered volumes. the death of macaulay in december, , left froude the most famous of living english historians, and the ugly duckling of the brood had become the glory of the family. the reception of his first six volumes was a curious one. the general public read, and admired. the few critics who were competent to form an instructed and impartial opinion perceived that, while there were errors in detail, the story of the english reformation, and of the catholic reaction which followed it, had been for the first time thoroughly told. many years afterwards froude said to tennyson that the most essential quality in an historian was imagination. this true and profound remark is peculiarly liable to be misunderstood. people who do not know what imagination means are apt to confound it with invention, although the latter quality is really the last resort of those who are destitute of the former. froude was an ardent lover of the truth, and desired nothing so much as to tell it. but it must be the truth as perceived by him, not as it might appear to others.* his readers are expected, if not to see with his eyes, at least to look from his point of view. honestly believing that the reformation was a great and beneficent fact in the progress of mankind, he was incapable of treating it as a sinful rebellion against the authority of the church. holding henry viii., with all his faults, to have been the champion of the laity against the clergy, of spiritual and intellectual freedom against the roman yoke, he could not represent him as a monster of wickedness, trampling on morality for his own selfish ends. doing full justice to the conscientiousness of mary tudor, excusing her more than some think she ought to be excused, he depicted the heroes of her bloody reign not only in latimer and ridley, but in the scores and hundreds of lowlier persons who died for the faith of christ. -- * "shall we say that there is no such thing as truth or error, but that anything is true to a man which he troweth? and not rather, as the solution of a great mystery, that truth there is, and attainable it is, but that its rays stream in upon us through the medium of our moral as well as our intellectual being?"--newman's grammar of assent, p. . -- protestant as he was, however, froude was an englishman first and a protestant afterwards. one might say of his history, as was said of the drama which tennyson founded upon the fifth and sixth volumes, that the true heroine is the english people. much of his popularity was due to his patriotism and his protestantism. on the other hand he gave deep and lasting offence to high churchmen, which they neither forgot nor forgave. they could not bear the spectacle of a church established by statute, of the king in place of the pope, of cromwell and cranmer justified, of more and fisher condemned. while not unwilling to profit by erastianism, they liked its origin kept out of sight. bishops appointed by the crown and sitting in the house of lords, though awkward facts, were too familiar to be upsetting. the secular and parliamentary origin of praemunire and conge d' elire were less notorious and more disagreeable subjects. they were indeed to be found in hallam. but hallam had not the popularity or the influence of froude. constitutional histories are for the learned classes. froude wrote for men of the world. the consummate dexterity of his style was only observed by trained critics; its ease and grace were the unconscious delight of the humblest reader. froude gave to the protestant cause the same sort of distinction which newman had given to the oxford movement. newman's university sermons are neither learned nor profound. yet the preacher's mastery of the english language in all its rich and manifold resources has, and must always have, an irresistible charm. the mantle of newman had fallen on froude, and froude had also the indefatigable diligence of the born historian. none of his mistakes were due to carelessness. they proceeded rather from the multitude of the documents he studied and the self-reliance which led him to dispense with all external aid. he had of course friendly reviewers, such as william bodham donne; afterwards examiner of plays, in fraser, and charles kingsley in macmillan. kingsley, however, though lord palmerston made him professor of modern history at cambridge, was not altogether the best ally for an historian. it was in defending froude that kingsley made his unfortunate attack upon newman, which led to his own discomfiture in the first preface to the apologia. froude was unable to support his champion's irrelevant and unlucky onslaught. newman's casuistry was a fair subject for criticism; his personal integrity should have been above suspicion, and kingsley's insinuations against it only recoiled upon himself. no one, as his history shows, could do ampler justice to individual catholics than froude, and his feelings for newman were never altered, either by disagreement or by time. the first part of the history had just been finished when a sudden bereavement altered the whole course of froude's life. on the st of april, , mrs. froude died. her religious opinions had been very different from her husband's. she had always leant towards the church of rome, though after her marriage she did not conform to it. he was probably under mrs. froude's influence when he wrote his essay on the philosophy of catholicism in , reprinted in the first series of short studies, which does not strike one as at all characteristic of him, and is certainly quite different from his noble discourse on the book of job, published two years later. mrs. froude never cared for london, and had always lived in the country. after her death froude took for the first time a london house, and settled himself with his children in the neighbourhood of hyde park. later in the same year died his publisher, john parker the younger, of a painful and distressing illness, through which froude nursed him with tender affection. the elder parker kept on the business, and brought out the remaining volumes of froude's history. his son had been editor of fraser's magazine, and in that position froude succeeded him at the beginning of . he thus found a regular occupation besides his history. fraser had a high literary reputation, and among its regular contributors was john skelton, writing under the name of "shirley," who became one of froude's most intimate friends. in the table talk of shirley* are some interesting extracts from froude's letters, as well as a very vivid description of froude himself. on the th of january, when he was only just installed, froude began a correspondence kept up for thirty years by a brief note about thelatta, a political romance by skelton, with an odd, mixed portrait of canning and disraeli, very pleasant to read, but now almost, i do not know why, neglected. -- * blackwood, . -- froude is hardly just to it. "i have read thalatta," he writes, "and now what shall i say? for it is so charming, and it might be so much more charming. there is no mistake about its value. the yacht scene made me groan over the recollections of days and occupations exactly the same. to wander round the world in a hundred tons schooner would be my highest realisation of human felicity." even the name of the book must have appealed to froude. for more than almost any other man of letters he loved the sea. yachting was his passion. he pursued it in youth despite of qualms, and in later life they disappeared. constitutionally fearless, and an excellent sailor, a voyage was to him the best of holidays, invigorating the body and refreshing the brain. froude was already at work on the reign of elizabeth, and in march, , he went to spain for two months. this was the occasion of his earliest visit to simancas, where he was allowed free access to the diplomatic correspondence and other records there collected and kept. the advantage to froude of these documents, especially the despatches from the spanish ambassadors in london to the government at madrid, was enormous, and it is from them that the last volumes of the history derive their peculiar value. he used his opportunities to the utmost, and his bulky, voluminous transcripts may be seen at the british museum. his plan was to take rooms at valladolid, from which he drove to simancas, a wretched little village, and worked for the day. the unpublished materials which he found at his disposal were such as scarcely any historian had ever enjoyed before. a few months after his return to england, on the th of september, , he married his second wife, henrietta warre. miss warre, who had been his first wife's intimate friend, was exactly suited to him, and their union was one of perfect happiness. so long as he was editor of fraser, froude felt it his duty to write pretty regularly for it, so that his hands were constantly full. but of course his main business for the next ten years was the continuation of his history, which involved frequent visits to simancas, as well as many to the british museum, the record office, and hatfield house. from the marquess of salisbury, father of the late prime minister, froude received permission to search the cecil papers at hatfield, which, though less numerous than those in the record office, are invaluable to students of elizabeth's reign. his investigations at hatfield were begun in april, , and led, among other consequences, to one of his most valued friendships. with lady salisbury, afterwards lady derby, he kept up for more than thirty years a correspondence which only ended with his death. it was froude who introduced lady salisbury to carlyle, and she thoroughly appreciated the genius of both. her intimate knowledge of politics was completed when lord derby sat in disraeli's cabinet. but she was always behind the scenes, and it was from her that froude obtained most of his political information. their earliest communications, however, referred to the elizabethan part of the history, especially to the career and influence of william cecil, lord burghley. a preliminary letter shows the thoroughness of froude's methods. the date is the th of march, . "dear lady salisbury,--if lord salisbury has not repented of his kind promise to me, i shall in a few weeks be in a condition to avail myself of it, and i write to ask you whether about the beginning of next month i may be permitted to examine the papers at hatfield. i am unwilling to trouble lord salisbury more than necessary. i have therefore examined every other collection within my reach first, that i might know clearly what i wanted. obliged as i am to confine myself for the present to the first ten years of elizabeth's reign, there will not be much which i shall have to examine there, the great bulk of lord burleigh's papers for that time being in the record office--but if i can be allowed a few days' work, i believe i can turn them to good account. with my very best thanks for your own and salisbury's goodness in this matter, i remain, faithfully yours, "j. a. froude." a few days later he writes: "i have seen stewart and looked through the catalogue. there appear to be about eight volumes which i wish to examine. the volumes which i marked as containing matter at present important to me are vols. and on the war with france and scotland from to , vols. , , , , on the disputes relating to the succession to the english crown, and the respective claims of the queen of scots, lady catherine grey, lord darnley, and laqy margaret lennox. i noted the volumes only. i did not take notice of the pages because as far as i could see the volumes appeared to be given up to special subjects, and i should wish therefore to read them through." his growing admiration for cecil appears in the following extracts: "i could only do real justice to such a collection by being allowed to read through the whole of it volume by volume--and for such a large permission as that i fear it may be dangerous to ask. lord salisbury, however, whatever my faults may be, could find no one who has a more genuine admiration for his ancestor." october th, .--"i cannot say beforehand the papers which i wish to examine, as i cannot tell what the collection may contain. my object is to have everything which admits of being learnt about the period--especially what may throw light on lord burleigh's character. he, it is more and more clear to me, was the solitary author of elizabeth's and england's greatness." "i shall return from simancas," he writes from valladolid, "more a cecil maniac than ever. in the duke of norfolk's conspiracy, the queen seems to have fairly given up the reins to him. it is impossible to read the correspondence between philip, alva, the pope, the duke of norfolk, and the queen of scots, the deliberate arrangements for elizabeth's murder, without shivering to think how near a chance it was. cecil was the one only man they feared, and the skill with which he dug mines below theirs, and pulled the strings of the whole of europe against them, was truly splendid. elizabeth had lost her head with it all, but she knew it and did not interfere. there are a great many letters of the queen of scots at simancas, some of them of the deepest interest. she remains the same as i have always thought her--brilliant, cruel, ruthless, and perfectly unfeeling." although froude's admiration for elizabeth steadily diminished with the progress of his researches, even students of his history will be surprised by such a verdict as this: "i am slowly drawing to the end of my long journey through the records. by far the largest part of burghley's papers is here [in the record office], and not at hatfield. the private letters which passed between him and walsingham about elizabeth have destroyed finally the prejudice that still clung to me that, notwithstanding her many faults, she was a woman of ability. evidently in their opinion she had no ability at all worth calling by the name." two or three extracts will complete the part of this correspondence which deals with the composition of the history. "i have been incessantly busy in the record office since my return to london. the more completely i examine the mss. elsewhere the better use i shall be able to make of yours. i have still two months of this kind before me, and my intention, if you did not yourself write to me first, was to ask you to let me go to hatfield for a week or two about easter." "i am now sufficiently master of the story to be able to make very good (i daresay complete) use of the hatfield papers in my present condition. i feel as if there were very few dark places left in queen elizabeth's proceedings anywhere. i substantially end, in a blaze of fireworks, with the armada. the concentrated interest of the reign lies in the period now under my hands. it is all action, and i shall use my materials badly if i cannot make it as interesting as a novel." nothing was neglected by froude which could throw light upon the splendid and illustrious queen who raised england from the depths of degradation to the height of renown. it was at the zenith of elizabeth's career that froude stopped. his original intention had been to continue till her death. but the ample scale on which he had planned his book was so much enlarged by his copious quotations from the manuscripts at simancas that by the time he reached his eleventh volume he substituted for the death of elizabeth on his title-page the defeat of the armada. with the year , then, he closed his labours. even the perverse critics who had assumed to treat the history of henry viii. as an anti-ecclesiastical pamphlet were compelled to show more respect for volumes which gave so much novel information to the world. moreover henry's daughter was a very different person from her father. scandal about queen elizabeth had been chiefly confined to roman catholics, and few englishmen had forgotten who made england the mistress of the seas. the old religion had a strong fascination for her, and every one knows how she interrupted dean nowell when he preached against images. she declined to be the head of the church in the sense arrogated by henry, and yet she would by no means admit the supremacy of the pope. if she ever felt any inclination towards rome, the massacre of st. bartholomew checked it for ever. gregory xiii. and catherine de medici were rulers to her taste. on the other hand she resisted the persecuting tendencies of her bishops, and spared the life even of such a wretch as bonner. it is possible that she believed in transubstantiation. it is certain that she objected to the marriage of the clergy, and showed scant courtesy to the wife of her own favourite archbishop parker. nor would she suffer the bishops, except as peers, to meddle in affairs of state. a magnificent princess, every inch a queen, she could not forget that the english people had saved her life from the clutches of her sister, and it was for them, not for any minister, courtier, or lover, that she really cared. froude was no idolater of elizabeth, and he became more unfavourable to her as he proceeded. he dwells minutely upon all her intrigues, in which she was as petty as in great matters she was grand. for her rival, mary stuart, he had neither respect nor mercy. to her intellect indeed, which was quite on a par with elizabeth's, he does full justice. but neither her beauty nor her wit, neither her scholarship nor her statesmanship, neither her passion nor her courage, could blind him to her selfishness, her immorality, and the fact that she represented the catholic cause. his account of her execution certainly lacks sentiment, and mrs. norton accused him of writing like a disappointed lover. his sympathies are with john knox, and the regent murray, and maitland of lethington. but the man who believes that mary was not concerned in the murder of her husband will believe anything, even that she did not reward the murderer of her brother, or that she would have spared elizabeth if elizabeth had been in her power. and at least froude does not, like some more modern writers, degrade her to the level of a kitchen wench. froude's elizabeth was the subject of bitter, hostile, sometimes violent, criticism in the saturday review, the property of an ardent high churchman, beresford hope. in the next chapter i shall deal with these articles at more length. it is enough to say here that they were directed not merely at froude's accuracy as an historian, but at his truthfulness as a man, suggesting that the mode in which he had manipulated authorities accessible to every one threw grave doubts upon his version of what he read at simancas. froude knew very well that he should make enemies. his belief that history had been cericalised, and required to be laicised, was regarded as peculiarly offensive in one who had been himself ordained. mary stuart, moreover, had stalwart champions beyond the border who were neither clerical nor ecclesiastical. "i fear," froude wrote on the nd of may, , to his scottish friend skelton, who was himself much interested in the subject--"i fear my book will bring all your people about my ears. mary stuart, from my point of view, was something between rachel and a pantheress." the success of the history had been long since assured, and each successive pair of volumes met with a cordial welcome. many people disagreed with froude on many points. he expected disagreement, and did not mind it. but no one could fail to see the evidence of patient, thorough research which every chapter, almost every page, contains. indeed, it might be said with justice, or at least with some plausibility, that the long and frequent extracts from the despatches of de feria, de quadra, de silva, and don guereau, successively ambassadors from philip to elizabeth, water-log the book, and make it too like a series of extracts with explanatory comments. of froude's own style there could not be two opinions. his bitterest antagonists were forced to admit that it was the perfection of easy, graceful narrative, without the majestic splendour of gibbon, but also without the mechanical hardness of macaulay. froude did not stop deliberately, as other historians have stopped, to paint pictures or draw portraits, and there are few writers from whom it is more difficult to make typical or characteristic extracts. yet, as i have already quoted from his account of cranmer's execution, it may not be inappropriate that i should cite some of the thoughts suggested to him by the death of knox. morton's epitaph is well known. "there lies one," said the earl over the coffin, "who never feared the face of mortal man." "morton," says froude, "spoke only of what he knew; the full measure of knox's greatness neither he nor any man could then estimate. it is as we look back over that stormy time, and weigh the actors in it one against the other, that he stands out in his full proportions. no grander figure can be found, in the entire history of the reformation in this island, than that of knox. cromwell and burghley rank beside him for the work which they effected, but, as politicians and statesmen, they had to labour with instruments which soiled their hands in touching them. in purity, in uprightness, in courage, truth and stainless honour, the regent and latimer were perhaps his equals; but murray was intellectually far below him and the sphere of latimer's influence was on a smaller scale. the time has come when english history may do justice to one but for whom the reformation would have been overthrown among ourselves; for the spirit which knox created saved scotland; and if scotland had been catholic again, neither the wisdom of elizabeth's ministers, nor the teaching of her bishops, nor her own chicaneries, would have preserved england from revolution. his was the voice that taught the peasant of the lothians that he was a free man, the equal in the sight of god with the proudest peer or prelate that had trampled on his forefathers. he was the one antagonist whom mary stuart could not soften nor maitland deceive. he it was who had raised the poor commons of his country into a stern and rugged people, who might be hard, narrow, superstitious and fanatical, but who nevertheless were men whom neither king, noble, nor priest could force again to submit to tyranny. and his reward has been the ingratitude of those who should have done most honour to his memory." the spirit of this fine passage may be due to the great scotsman with whom froude's name will always be inseparably associated. but froude knew the subject as carlyle did not pretend to know it, and his verdict is as authoritative as it is just. it is knowledge, even more than brilliancy, that these twelve volumes evince. froude had mastered the sixteenth century as macaulay mastered the seventeenth, with the same minute, patient industry. when he came to write he wrote with such apparent facility that those who did not know the meaning of historical research thought him shallow and superficial. the period during which froude was studying the reign of elizabeth must be pronounced the happiest of his life. he was a born historian, and loved research. he had opportunities of acquiring knowledge opened to no one before, and it concerned those events which above all others attracted him. his second wife was the most sympathetic of companions, thoroughly understanding all his moods. she was fond of society, and induced him to frequent it. froude was disinclined to go out in the evening, and would, if he had been left to himself, have stayed at home. he wrote to lady salisbury: "i must trust to your kindness to make allowance for my old-fashioned ways. i am so much engaged in the week that i give my sunday evenings to my children, and never go out." but when he was in company he talked better than almost any one else, and he had a magnetic power of fascination which men as well as women often found quite irresistible. living in london, he saw people of all sorts, and the puritan sternness which lay at the root of his character was concealed by the cynical humour which gave zest to his conversation. he had not forgotten his native county, and in he took a house at salcombe on the southern coast of devonshire. ringrone, which he rented from lord kingsale, is a beautiful spot, now a hotel, then remote from railways, and an ideal refuge for a student. "we have a sea like the mediterranean," he tells skelton, "and estuaries beautiful as loch fyne, the green water washing our garden wall, and boats and mackerel." froude worked there, however, besides yachting, fishing, and shooting. in , for instance, he "floundered all the summer among the extinct mine-shafts of scotch politics--the most damnable set of pitfalls mortal man was ever set to blunder through in the dark." his study opened on the garden, from which the sea-view is one of the finest in england. froude loved devonshire folk, and enjoyed talking to them in their own dialect, or smoking with them on the shore. he was particularly fond of the indignant expostulation of a poor woman whose husband had been injured by his own chopper, and obliged in consequence to keep his bed. if, she said, it had been "a visitation of providence, or the like of that there," he would have borne it patiently. "but to come upon a man in the wood-house" was not in the fitness of things. froude's favourite places of worship in london were westminster abbey during dean stanley's time, and afterwards the temple church, as may be gathered from his short study on the templars. in devonshire he frequented an old-fashioned church where stringed instruments were still played, and was much delighted with the remark of a fiddler which he overheard. "who is the king of glory?" had been given out as the anthem. while the fiddles were tuning up a voice was heard to say: "hand us up the rosin, tom; us'it soon tell them who's the king of glory." as an editor froude was tolerant and catholic. "on controverted points," he said, "i approve myself of the practice of the reformation. when st. paul's cross pulpit was occupied one sunday by a lutheran, the next by a catholic, the next by a calvinist, all sides had a hearing, and the preachers knew that they would be pulled up before the same audience for what they might say." his own literary judgments were rather conventional. the mixture of classes in clough's bothie disturbed him. the genius of matthew arnold he had recognised at once, but then arnold was a classical, academic poet. about tennyson he agreed with the rest of the world, while tennyson, who was a personal friend, paid him the great compliment of taking from him the subject of a poem and the material of a play. his prejudice against browning's style, much as he liked browning himself, was hard to overcome, and on this point he had a serious difference with his friend skelton. "browning's verse!" he exclaims. "with intellect, thought, power, grace, all the charms in detail which poetry should have, it rings after all like a bell of lead." this was in , when browning had published men and women, and dramatic lyrics. however, he admitted skelton's article on the other side, and added, with magnificent candour, that "to this generation browning's poetry is as uninteresting as shakespeare's sonnets were to the last century." the most fervent browningite could have said no more than that. to mr. swinburne's poems and ballads froude was conspicuously fair. there was much in them which offended his puritanism, but he was disgusted with the virulence of the critics, and he allowed skelton to write in fraser a qualified apology. "the saturday review temperament," he wrote, "is ten thousand thousand times more damnable than the worst of swinburne's skits. modern respectability is so utterly without god, faith, heart; it shows so singular an ingenuity in and injuring everything that is noble and good, and so systematic a preference for what is mean and paltry, that i am not surprised at a young fellow dashing his heels into the face of it .... when there is any kind of true genius, we have no right to drive it mad. we must deal with it wisely, justly, fairly."* -- * table talk of shirley, p. . -- froude was an excellent editor; appreciative, discriminating, and alert. he prided himself on carlyle's approval, though perhaps carlyle was not the best judge of such things. his energy was multifarious. besides his history and his magazine, he found time for a stray lecture at odd times, and he could always reckon upon a good audience. his discourse at the royal institution in february, , on "the science of history," for which he was "called an atheist," is in the main a criticism of buckle, the one really scientific historian. according to buckle, the history of mankind was a natural growth, and it was only inadequate knowledge of the past that made the impossibility of predicting the future. great men were like small men, obeying the same natural laws, though a trifle more erratic in their behaviour. political economy was history in little, illustrating the regularity of human, like all other natural, forces. but can we predict historical events, as we can predict an eclipse? that is froude's answer to buckle, in the form of a question. "gibbon believed that the era of conquerors was at an end. had he lived out the full life of man, he would have seen europe at the feet of napoleon. but a few years ago we believed the world had grown too civilised for war, and the crystal palace in hyde park was to be the inauguration of a new era. battles, bloody as napoleon's, are now the familiar tale of every day; and the arts which have made the greatest progress are the arts of destruction." it is difficult to see the atheism in all this, but the common sense is plain enough. froude belonged to the school of literary historians, such as were thucydides and tacitus, gibbon and finlay, not to the school of buckle, or, as we should now say, of professor bury. in froude removed from clifton place, hyde park, to onslow gardens in south kensington, where he lived for the next quarter of a century. in the students of st. andrews chose him to be lord rector of the university, and on the rd of march, , he delivered his inaugural address on education, which compared the plain living and high thinking of the scottish universities with the expensive and luxurious idleness that he remembered at oxford. froude was delighted with the compliment the students had paid him, and they were equally charmed with their rector. in fact, his visit to st. andrews produced in a suggestion that he should become the parliamentary representative of that university and of edinburgh. but the injustice of the law as it then stood disqualified him as a candidate. his deacon's orders, the shadowy remnant of a mistaken choice, stood in his way. next year, in , bouverie's act passed, and froude was one of the first to take advantage of it by becoming again, what he had really never ceased to be, a layman. as he did not enter the house of commons, it is idle to speculate on what might have been his political career. probably it would have been undistinguished. he was not a good speaker, and he was a bad party man. his butler, who had been long with him, and knew him well, was once asked by a canvassing agent what his master's politics were. "well," he said reflectively, "when the liberals are in, mr. froude is sometimes a conservative. when the conservatives are in, mr. froude is always a liberal." his own master, carlyle, had been in early life an ardent reformer, and had hoped great things from the act of . perhaps he did not know very clearly what he expected. at any rate he was disappointed, and, though he wrote an enthusiastic letter to peel alter the abolition of the corn laws, he regarded the reform act of with indignant disgust. froude had a fitful and uncertain admiration for disraeli. gladstone he never liked or trusted, and did not take the trouble to understand. he had been brought up to despise oratory, he had caught from carlyle a horror of democracy, he disliked the anglo-catholic party in the church of england, and gladstone's financial genius was out of his line. the liberal government of was in his opinion criminally indifferent to the colonies. an earnest advocate of federation, he did not see that the best way of retaining colonial loyalty was to preserve colonial independence intact. nevertheless froude was a pioneer of the modern movement, still in progress, for a closer union with the scattered parts of the british empire. he feared that the colonies would go if some effort were not made to retain them, and he turned over in his mind the various means of building up a federal system. although canadian federation was emphatically canadian in its origin, and had been adopted in principle by cardwell during the government of lord russell, it was lord carnarvon who carried it out, and he had no warmer supporter than froude. of froude's favourite recreations at this time the best account is to be found in his two short studies on a fortnight in kerry. from to he rented from lord lansdowne a place called derreen, thirty-six miles from killarney, and seventeen from kenmare, where he spent the best part of the summer and autumn. if froude did not altogether understand the irish people, at least the irish catholics, and had no sympathy with their political aspirations, he loved their humour, and the scenery of "the most beautiful island in the world" had been familiar to him from his early manhood. in one of his youthful rambles he had been struck down by small-pox, and nursed with a devotion which he never forgot. yet between him and the celt, as between him and the catholic, there was a mysterious, impassable barrier. they had not the same fundamental ideas of right and wrong. they did not in very truth worship the same god. but of froude and the irish i shall have to speak more at length hereafter. in kerry he enjoyed himself, while at the same time he finished his history of england, and his description of the country is enchanting. "a glance out of the window in the morning showed that i had not overrated the general charm of the situation. the colours were unlike those of any mountain scenery to which i was accustomed elsewhere. the temperature is many degrees higher than that of the scotch highlands. the gulf stream impinges full upon the mouths of its long bays. every tide carries the flood of warm water forty miles inland, and the vegetation consequently is rarely or never checked by frost even two thousand feet above the sea-level. thus the mountains have a greenness altogether peculiar, stretches of grass as rich as water-meadows reaching between the crags and precipices to the very summits. the rock, chiefly old red sandstone, is purple. the heather, of which there are enormous masses, is in many places waist deep." yachting and fishing, fishing and yachting, were the staple amusements at derreen. nothing was more characteristic of froude than his love of the sea and the open air. sport, in the proper sense of the term, he also loved. "i always consider," he said, "that the proudest moment of my life was, when sliding down a shale heap, i got a right and left at woodcocks." for luxurious modes of making big bags with little trouble he never cared at all. but let him once more explain himself in his own words. "i delight in a mountain walk when i must work hard for my five brace of grouse. i see no amusement in dawdling over a lowland moor where the packs are as thick as chickens in a poultry-yard. i like better than most things a day with my own dogs in scattered covers, when i know not what may rise--a woodcock, an odd pheasant, a snipe in the out-lying willow-bed, and perhaps a mallard or a teal. a hare or two falls in agreeably when the mistress of the house takes an interest in the bag. i detest battues and hot corners, and slaughter for slaughter's sake. i wish every tenant in england had his share in amusements which in moderation are good for us all, and was allowed to shoot such birds or beasts as were bred on his own farm, any clause in his lease to the contrary notwithstanding." considering that this passage was written ten years before the ground game act, it must be admitted that the sentiment is remarkably liberal. the chief interest of these papers,* however, is not political, but personal. they show what froude's natural tastes were, the tastes of a sportsman and a country gentleman. he had long outgrown the weakness of his boyhood, and his physical health was robust. with a firm foot and a strong head he walked freely over cliffs where a false step would have meant a fall of a thousand feet. no man of letters was ever more devoted to exercise and sport. though subject, like most men, and all editors, to fits of despondency, he had a sound mind in a healthy frame, and his pessimism was purely theoretical. -- * short studies, vol. ii. pp. - . -- froude's history, the great work of his life, was completed in . he deliberately chose, after the twelve volumes, to leave elizabeth at the height of her power, mistress of the seas, with spain crushed at her feet. as he says himself, in the opening paragraph of his own conclusion, "chess-players, when they have brought their game to a point at which the result can be foreseen with certainty, regard their contest as ended, and sweep the pieces from the board." froude had accomplished his purpose. he had rewritten the story of the reformation. he had proved that the church of england, though in a sense it dated from st. austin of canterbury, became under henry viii. a self-contained institution, independent of rome and subject to the supremacy of the crown. elizabeth altered the form of words in which her father had expressed his ecclesiastical authority; but the substance was in both cases the same. the sovereign was everything. the bishop of rome was nothing. there has never been in the church of england since the divorce of katharine any power to make a bishop without the authority of the crown, or to change a doctrine without the authority of parliament, nor has any layman been legally subject to temporal punishment by the ecclesiastical courts. convocation cannot touch an article or a formulary. king, lords, and commons can make new formularies or abolish the old. the laity owe no allegiance to the canons, and in every theological suit the final appeal is to the king in council, now the judicial committee. since the accession of elizabeth divine service has been performed in english, and the english bible has been open to every one who can read. yet there are people who talk as if the reformation meant nothing, was nothing, never occurred at all. this theory, like the shallow sentimentalism which made an innocent saint and martyr of mary stuart, has never recovered from the crushing onslaught of froude. mr. swinburne in the encyclopaedia britannica reduces the latter theory to an absurdity, by demonstrating that if mary was innocent she was a fool. in his defence of elizabeth froude stops short of many admirers. he was disgusted by her feminine weakness for masculine flattery; he dwells with almost tedious minuteness upon her smallest intrigues; he exposes her parsimonious ingratitude to her dauntless and unrivalled seamen. yet for all that he brings out the vital difference between her and mary tudor, between the protestant and catholic systems of government. elizabeth boasted, and boasted truly, that she did not persecute opinion. if people were good citizens and loyal subjects, it was all the same to her whether they went to church or to mass. had it been possible to adopt and apply in the sixteenth century the modern doctrine of contemptuous indifference to sectarian quarrels, there was not one of her subjects more capable of appreciating and acting upon it than the great queen herself. but in that case she would have estranged her friends without conciliating her opponents. she would have forfeited her throne and her life. pius v. had not merely excommunicated her, which was a barren and ineffective threat, a telum imbelle sine ictu; he had also purported to depose her as a heretic, and to release her subjects from the duty of allegiance. another vicar of christ, gregory xiii., went farther. he intimated, not obscurely, that whosoever removed such a monster from the world would be doing god's service. this at least was no idle menace. those great leaders of protestantism in europe, coligny, murray, william the silent, were successively murdered within a few years. that was, as fra paolo said when he saw the dagger (stilus) which had wounded him, the style (stylus) of the roman court. it is all very well to say that gregory was a blasphemous, murderous old bigot, and might have been left to the god of justice and mercy, who would deal with him in his own good time. before that time came, elizabeth might have been in her grave, mary stuart might have been on the english throne, and the liberties of england might have been as the liberties of spain. elizabeth never felt personal fear. but she was not a private individual. she was an english sovereign, and the keynote of all her subtle, intricate, tortuous policy was the resolute determination, from which she never flinched, that england should be independent, spiritually as well as politically independent, of a foreign yoke. her connection with the protestants was political, not theological, for doctrinally she was farther from geneva than from rome. her own bishops she despised, not unjustly, as time-servers, calling them "doctors," not prelates. although she did not really believe that any human person, or any human formula, was required between the almighty and his creatures, she preferred the mass and the breviary to the book of common prayer. the inquisition was the one part of the catholic system which she really abhorred. for the first twenty years of her reign mass was celebrated in private houses with impunity, though to celebrate it was against the law. no part of her policy is more odious to modern notions of tolerance and enlightenment than prohibition of the mass. nothing shows more clearly the importance of understanding the mental atmosphere of a past age before we attempt to judge those who lived in it. even oliver cromwell, fifty years after elizabeth's death, declared that he would not tolerate the mass, and in general principles of religious freedom he was far ahead of his age. cromwell no doubt, unlike elizabeth, was a protestant in the religious sense. but that was not his reason. the mass to him, and still more to elizabeth, was a definite symbol of political disaffection. it was a rallying point for those who held that a heretical sovereign had no right to reign, and might lawfully be deposed, if not worse. between the catholics of our day and the catholics of elizabeth's time there is a great gulf fixed. what has fixed it is a question too complex to be discussed in this place. catholics still revere the memory of carlo borromeo, cardinal archbishop of milan, who gave his blessing to campian and parsons on their way to stir up rebellion in england, as well as in ireland, and to assassinate elizabeth if opportunity should serve. god said, "thou shall do no murder." the pope, however, thought that god had spoken too broadly, and that some qualification was required. the sixth commandment could not have been intended for the protection of heretics; and the jesuits, if they did not inspire, at least believed him. campian is regarded by thousands of good men and women, who would not hurt a fly, as a martyr to the faith, and to the faith as he conceived it he was a martyr. he endured torture and death without flinching rather than acknowledge that elizabeth was lawful sovereign over the whole english realm. his courage was splendid. there never, for the matter of that, was a braver man than guy fawkes. but when campian pretended that his mission to england was purely religious he was tampering with words in order to deceive. to him the removal of elizabeth would have been a religious act. the queen did all she could to make him save his life by recantation, even applying the cruel and lawless machinery of the rack. if his errand had been merely to preach what he regarded as catholic truth, she would have let him go, as she checked the persecuting tendencies of her bishops over and over again. but it was as much her duty to defend england from the invasion of the jesuits as to defend her from the invasion of the spanish armada. both indeed were parts of one and the same enterprise, the forcible reduction of england to dependence upon the catholic powers. although in god's good providence it was foiled, it very nearly succeeded; and if elizabeth had not removed campian, campian might, as babington certainly would, have remove her. the pope had been directly concerned in the massacre of st. bartholomew, and his great ally, philip ii., is said to have laughed for the first time when he heard of it. more than a hundred years afterwards the pious bossuet thanked god for the frightful slaughter of the huguenots which followed the revocation of the edict of nantes. while mary tudor burnt poor and humble persons who could be no possible danger to the state because they would not renounce the only form of christian faith they had ever known, elizabeth executed for treason powerful and influential men sent by the pope to kill her. when, after many long years, she reluctantly consented to mary stuart's death on the scaffold, mary had been implicated in a plot to take her life and succeed her as queen. mary would have made much shorter work of her. if that is called persecution, the word ceases to have any meaning. froude quotes with approval, as well he might, the words of campian's admiring biographer richard simpson, himself a catholic, a most learned and accomplished man. "the eternal truths of catholicism were made the vehicle for opinions about the authority of the holy see which could not be held by englishmen loyal to the government; and true patriotism united to a false religion overcame the true religion wedded to opinions that were unpatriotic in regard to the liberties of englishmen, and treasonable to the english government." in those days there was only one kind of english government possible; the government of elizabeth, burghley, and walsingham. parliamentary government did not exist. even the right of free speech in the house of commons was never recognised by the queen. if the english government had fallen, england would have been at the mercy of a papal legate. protestantism was synonymous with patriotism, and good catholics could not be good englishmen while there was a heretical sovereign on the throne. after the armada things were different. spain was crushed. sixtus v. was not a man to waste money, which he loved, in support of a losing cause. what froude wrote to establish, and succeeded in establishing, was that between and the reformation saved england from the tyranny of rome and the proud foot of a spanish conqueror. the true hero of froude's history is not henry viii., but cecil, the firm, incorruptible, sagacious minister who saved elizabeth's throne, and made england the leading anti-catholic country. of a greater man than cecil, john knox, he was however almost an idolater. he considered that knox surpassed in worldly wisdom even maitland of lethington, who was certainly not hampered by theological prejudice. with puritanism itself he had much natural affinity, and as a determinist the philosophical side of calvinism attracted him as strongly as it attracted jonathan edwards. froude combined, perhaps illogically, a belief in predestination with a deep sense of moral duty and the responsibility of man. every reader of his history must have been struck by his respect for all the manly virtues, even in those with whom he has otherwise no sympathy, and his corresponding contempt for weakness and self-indulgence. in his second and final address to the students of st. andrews he took calvinism as his theme.* by this time froude had acquired a great name, and was known all over the world as the most brilliant of living english historians. although his uncompromising treatment of mary stuart had provoked remonstrance, his eulogy of knox and murray was congenial to the scottish temperament, with which he had much in common. it was indeed from st. andrews alone that he had hitherto received any public recognition. he was grateful to the students, and gave them of his best, so that this lecture may be taken as an epitome of his moral and religious belief. -- * short studies, vol. ii. pp. - . -- "calvinism," he told these lads, "was the spirit which rises in revolt against untruth; the spirit which, as i have shown you, has appeared and reappeared, and in due time will appear again, unless god be a delusion and man be as the beasts that perish. for it is but the inflashing upon the conscience with overwhelming force of the nature and origin of the laws by which mankind are governed--laws which exist, whether we acknowledge them or whether we deny them, and will have their way, to our weal or woe, according to the attitude in which we please to place ourselves towards them--inherent, like electricity, in the nature of things, not made by us, not to be altered by us, but to be discerned and obeyed by us at our everlasting peril." the essence of froude's belief, not otherwise dogmatic, was a constant sense of god's presence and overruling power. sceptical his mind in many ways was. the two things he never doubted, and would not doubt, were theism and the moral law. without god there would be no religion. without morality there would be no difference between right and wrong. this simple creed was sufficient for him, as it has been sufficient for some of the greatest men who ever lived. epicureanism in all its forms was alien to his nature. "it is not true," he said at st. andrews, "that goodness is synonymous with happiness. the most perfect being who ever trod the soil of this planet was called the man of sorrows. if happiness means absence of care and inexperience of painful emotion, the best securities for it are a hard heart and a good digestion. if morality has no better foundation than a tendency to promote happiness, its sanction is but a feeble uncertainty." remembering where he stood, and speaking from the fulness of his mind, froude exclaimed: "norman leslie did not kill cardinal beaton down in the castle yonder because he was a catholic, but because he was a murderer. the catholics chose to add to their already incredible creed a fresh article, that they were entitled to hang and burn those who differed from them; and in this quarrel the calvinists, bible in hand, appealed to the god of battles." the importance of this striking address is largely due to the fact that it was composed immediately after the history had been finished, and may be regarded as an epilogue. it breathes the spirit, though it discards the trappings, of puritanism and the reformation. luther "was one of the grandest men that ever lived on earth. never was any one more loyal to the light that was in him, braver, truer, or wider- minded in the noblest sense of the word." about calvinism froude disagreed with carlyle, who loved to use the old formulas, though he certainly did not use them in the old sense. "it is astonishing to find," froude wrote to skelton, "how little in ordinary life the calvinists talked or wrote about doctrine. the doctrine was never more than the dress. the living creature was wholly moral and political--so at least i think myself." such language was almost enough to bring john knox out of his grave. could he have heard it, he would have felt that he was being confounded with maitland, who thought god "ane nursery bogill." but though the attempt to represent knox or calvin as undogmatic may be fanciful, it is the purest, noblest, and most permanent part of calvinism that froude invited the students of st. andrews to cherish and preserve. chapter v froude and freeman froude's reputation as an historian was seriously damaged for a time by the persistent attacks of the saturday review. it is difficult for the present generation to understand the influence which that celebrated periodical exercised, or the terror which it inspired, forty years ago. the first editor, douglas cook, was a master of his craft, and his colleagues included the most brilliant writers of the day. matthew arnold, who was not one of them, paid them the compliment of treating them as the special champions of philistia, the chosen garrison of gath. on most subjects they were fairly impartial, holding that there was nothing new and nothing true, and that if there were it wouldn't matter. but the proprietor* of the paper at that time was a high churchman, and on ecclesiastical questions he put forward his authority. within that sphere he would not tolerate either neutrality or difference of opinion. to him, and to those who thought like him, froude's history was anathema. their detested reformation was set upon its legs again; bishop fisher was removed from his pedestal; the church of england, which since keble's assize sermon had been the church of the fathers, was shown to be protestant in its character and parliamentary in its constitution. the oxford movement seemed to be discredited, and that by a man who had once been enlisted in its service. it was necessary that the presumptuous iconoclast should be put down, and taught not to meddle with things which were sacred. -- * alexander james beresford hope, some time member for the university of cambridge. -- from the first the saturday review was hostile, but it was not till that the campaign became systematic. at that time the editor secured the services of edward augustus freeman, who had been for several years a contributor on miscellaneous topics. freeman is well known as the historian of the norman conquest, as an active politician, controversialist, and pamphleteer. froude toiled for months and years over parchments and manuscripts often almost illegible, carefully noting the caligraphy, and among the authors of a joint composition assigning his proper share to each. freeman wrote his history of the norman conquest, upon which he was at this time engaged, entirely from books, without consulting a manuscript or an original document of any kind. every historian must take his own line, and the public are concerned not with processes, but with results. i wish merely to point out the fact that, as between froude and freeman, the assailed and the assailant, froude was incomparably the more laborious student of the two. it would be hard to say that one historian should not review the work of another; but we may at least expect that he should do so with sympathetic consideration for the difficulties which all historians encounter, and should not pass sentence until he has all the evidence before him. what were freeman's qualifications for delivering an authoritative judgment on the work of froude? though not by any means so learned a man as his tone of conscious superiority induced people to suppose, he knew his own period very well indeed, and his acquaintance with that period, perhaps also his veneration for stubbs, had given him a natural prejudice in favour of the church. for the church of the middle ages, the undivided church of christ, was even in its purely mundane aspect the salvation of society, the safeguard of law and order, the last restraint of the powerful, and the last hope of the wretched. historically, if not doctrinally, freeman was a high churchman, and his ecclesiastical leanings were a great advantage to him in dealing with the eleventh century. it was far otherwise when he came to write of the sixteenth. if the church of the sixteenth century had been like the church of the eleventh century, or the twelfth, or the thirteenth, there would have been no reformation, and no froude. freeman lived, and loved, the controversial life. sharing gladstone's politics both in church and state, he was in all secular matters a strong liberal, and his hatred of disraeli struck even liberals as bordering on fanaticism. yet his hatred of disraeli was as nothing to his hatred of froude. by nature "so over-violent or over-civil that every man with him was god or devil," he had erected froude into his demon incarnate. other men might be, froude must be, wrong. he detested froude's opinions. he could not away with his style. freeman's own style was forcible, vigorous, rhetorical, hard; the sort of style which macaulay might have written if he had been a pedant and a professor instead of a politician and a man of the world. it was not ill suited for the blood-and-thunder sort of reviewing to which his nature disposed him, and for the vengeance of the high churchmen he seemed an excellent tool. freeman's biographer, dean stephens, preserves absolute and unbroken silence on the duel between freeman and froude. i think the dean's conduct was judicious. but there is no reason why a biographer of froude should follow his example. on the contrary, it is absolutely essential that he should not; for freeman's assiduous efforts, first in the saturday, and afterwards in the contemporary, review, did ultimately produce an impression, never yet fully dispelled, that froude was an habitual garbler of facts and constitutionally reckless of the truth. but, before i come to details, let me say one word more about freeman's qualifications for the task which he so lightly and eagerly undertook. freeman, with all his self-assertion, was not incapable of candour. he was staunch in friendship, and spoke openly to his friends. to one of them, the excellent dean hook, famous for his lives of the archbishops of canterbury, he wrote, on the th of april, [ ?], "you have found me out about the sixteenth century. i fancy that, from endlessly belabouring froude, i get credit for knowing more of those times than i do. but one can belabour froude on a very small amount of knowledge, and you are quite right when you say that i have 'never thrown the whole force of my mind on that portion of history.'"* these words pour a flood of light on the temper and knowledge with which freeman must have entered on what he really seemed to consider a crusade. his object was to belabour froude. his own acquaintance with the subject was, as he says, "very small," but sufficient for enabling him to dispose satisfactorily of an historian who had spent years of patient toil in thorough and exhaustive research. on another occasion, also writing to hook, whom he could not deceive, he said, "i find i have a reputation with some people for knowing the sixteenth century, of which i am profoundly ignorant."+ -- * life and letters of e. a. freeman, vol. i. p. . + ibid. p. . -- it does not appear to have struck him that he had done his best in the saturday review to make people think that, as froude's critic, he deserved the reputation which he thus frankly and in private disclaims. another curious piece of evidence has come to light. after freeman's death his library was transferred to owens college, manchester, and there, among his other books, is his copy of froude's history. he once said himself, in reference to his criticism of froude, "in truth there is no kind of temper in the case, but a strong sense of amusement in bowling down one thing after another." let us see. here are some extracts from his marginal notes. "a lie, teste stubbs," as if stubbs were an authority, in the proper sense of the term, any more than froude. authorities are contemporary witnesses, or original documents. another entry is "beast," and yet another is "bah!" "may i live to embowel james anthony froude" is the pious aspiration with which he has adorned another page. "can froude understand honesty?" asks this anxious inquirer; and again, "supposing master froude were set to break stones, feed pigs, or do anything else but write paradoxes, would he not curse his day?" along with such graceful compliments as "you've found that out since you wrote a book against your own father," "give him as slave to thirlwall," there may be seen the culminating assertion, "froude is certainly the vilest brute that ever wrote a book." yet there was "no kind of temper in the case," and "only a strong sense of amusement." i suppose it must have amused freeman to call another historian a vile brute. but it is fortunate that there was no temper in the case. for if there had, it would have been a very bad temper indeed. in this judicial frame of mind did freeman set himself to review successive volumes of froude's elizabeth. froude did not always correct his proofs with mechanical accuracy, and this gave freeman an advantage of which he was not slow to avail himself. "mr. froude," he says in the saturday review for the th of january, , "talks of a french attack on guienne, evidently meaning guisnes. it is hardly possible that this can be a misprint." it was of course a misprint, and could hardly have been anything else. guisnes was a town, and could be attacked. guienne was a province, and would have been invaded. guienne had been a french province since the hundred years' war, and therefore the french would neither have attacked nor invaded it. as if all this were not enough to show the nature and source of the error, the word was correctly printed in the marginal heading. in the same article, after quoting froude's denial that a sentence described by the spanish ambassador de silva as having been passed upon a pirate could have been pronounced in an english court of justice, freeman asked, "is it possible that mr. froude has never heard of the peine forte et dure?" freeman of course knew it to be impossible. he knew also that the peine forte et dure was inflicted for refusing to plead, and that this pirate, by de silva's own account, had been found guilty. but he wanted to suggest that froude was an ignoramus, and for the purpose of beating a dog one stick is as good as another. freeman's trump card, however, was the bishop of lexovia, and that brilliant victory he never forgot. froude examined the strange and startling allegation, cited by macaulay in his introductory chapter, that during the reign of henry viii. seventy-two thousand persons perished by the hand of the public executioner. he traced it to the commentaries of cardan, an astrologer, not a very trustworthy authority, who had himself heard it, he said, from "an unknown bishop of lexovia." "unknown," observed freeman, with biting sarcasm, "to no one who has studied the history of julius caesar or of henry ii." froude had not been aware that lexovia was the ancient name for the modern lisieux, and for twenty years he was periodically reminded of the fact. had he followed freeman's methods, he might have asked whether his critic really supposed that there were bishops in the time of julius caesar. freeman failed to see that the point was not the modern name of lexovia, but the number of persons put to death by henry, on which froude had shown the worthlessness of popular tradition. bishop hooper was burnt at gloucester in the cathedral close. froude describes the scene of the execution as "an open space opposite the college." that shows, says freeman, that froude did not, like macaulay, visit the scenes of the events he described. perhaps he did not visit gloucester, or even guisnes. that freeman's general conclusion was entirely wide of the mark a single letter from froude to skelton is enough to show. "i want you some day," he wrote on the th of december, , "to go with me to loch leven, and then to stirling, perth, and glasgow. before i go farther i must have a personal knowledge of loch leven castle and the grounds at langside. also i must look at the street at linlithgow where murray was shot."* thus freeman's amiable inference was the exact reverse of the truth. -- * table talk of shirley, p. . -- some of freeman's methods, however, were a good deal less scrupulous than this. by way of bringing home to froude "ecclesiastical malignity of the most frantic kind," he cited the case of bishop coxe. "to hatton," froude wrote in his text,+ "was given also the naboth's vineyard of his neighbour the bishop of ely." in a long note he commented upon the bishop's inclination to resist, and showed how the "proud prelate" was "brought to reason by means so instructive on elizabeth's mode of conducting business when she had not burghley or walsingham to keep her in order that" the whole account is given at length in the words of lord north, whom she employed for the purpose. this letter from lord north is extremely valuable evidence. froude read it and transcribed it from the collection of manuscripts at hatfield. as an idle rumour that froude spent only one day at hatfield obtained currency after his death, it may be convenient to mention here that the work which he did there in copying manuscripts alone must have occupied him at least a month. now let us see what use freeman made of the information thus given him by froude. "meanwhile," he says in the saturday review for the nd of january, , "mr. froude is conveniently silent as to the infamous tricks played by elizabeth and her courtiers in order to make estates for court favourites out of episcopal lands. a line or two of text is indeed given to the swindling transaction by which bishop coxe of ely was driven to surrender his london house to sir christopher hatton. but why? because the story gives mr. froude an opportunity of quoting at full length a letter from lord north to the bishop in which all the bishop's real or pretended enormities are strongly set forth." here follows a short extract from the letter, in which north accused coxe of grasping covetousness. now it is perfectly obvious to any one having the whole letter before him, as freeman had, that froude quoted it with the precisely opposite aim of denouncing the conduct of elizabeth to the bishop, whom he compares with naboth. freeman must have heard of naboth. he must have known what froude meant. yet the whole effect of his comments must have been to make the readers of the saturday review think that froude was attacking the church, when he was attacking the crown for its conduct to the church. -- + history of england, vol. xi. p. . -- freeman seemed to glory in his own deficiencies, and was almost as proud of what he did not know as of what he did. thus, for instance, froude, a born man of letters, was skilful and accomplished in the employment of metaphors. freeman could no more handle a metaphor than he could fish with a dry fly. he therefore, without the smallest consciousness of being absurd, condemned froude for doing what he was unable to do himself, and even wrote, in the name of the saturday review, "we are no judges of metaphors," though there must surely have been some one on the staff who knew something about them. froude had a mode of treating documents which is open to animadversion. he did not, as mr. pollard happily puts it in the dictionary of national biography, "respect the sanctity of inverted commas." they ought to imply textual quotation, froude used them for his abridgments, openly proclaiming the fact that he had abridged, and therefore deceiving no one. freeman's comment upon this irregularity is extremely characteristic. "now we will not call this dishonest; we do not believe that mr. froude is intentionally dishonest in this or any other matter; but then it is because he does not know what literary honesty and dishonesty are." there is no such thing as literary honesty, or scientific honesty, or political honesty. there is only one kind of honesty, and an honest man does not misrepresent an opponent, as freeman misrepresented froude. to call a man a liar is an insult. to say that is not a liar because he does not know the difference between truth and falsehood is a cowardly insult. but froude was soon avenged. freeman gave himself into his adversary's hands. "sometimes," he wrote,* "mr. froude gives us the means of testing him. let us try a somewhat remarkable passage. he tells us "it had been argued in the admiralty courts that the prince of orange, 'having his principality of his title in france, might make lawful war against the duke of alva,* and that the queen would violate the rules of neutrality if she closed her ports against his cruisers." then follows a latin passage from which the english is paraphrased. "we presume," continues freeman in fancied triumph, "that the words put by mr. froude in inverted commas are not lord burghiey's summary of the latin extract in the note, but mr. froude's own, for it is utterly impossible that burghley could have so misconceived a piece of plain latin, or have so utterly misunderstood the position of any contemporary prince." presumption indeed. i have before me a photograph of burghley's own words in his own writing examined by froude at the rolls house. they are "question whether the prince of orange, being a free prince of the empire, and also having his principality of his title in france, might not make a just war against the duke of alva." froude abridged, and wrote "lawful" for "just." but the words which freeman says that burghley could not have used are the words which he did use, and the explanation is simple enough. freeman was freeman. burghley was a statesman. burghley of course knew perfectly well that orange was not subject to the king of france, not part of his dominions, which is freeman's objection. he called it in france because it, and the papal possessions of venaissin adjoining it, were surrounded by french territory. he called it "in france," as we should call the republic of san marino "in italy" now. freeman might have ascertained what burghley did write if he had cared to know. he did not care to know. he was "belabouring froude." -- * saturday review, nov. th, . -- once froude was weak enough to accept freeman's correction on a small point, only to find that freeman was entirely in error, and that he himself had been right all along. after much vituperative language not worth repeating, freeman wrote in the saturday review for the th of february, , these genial words, "as it is, there is nothing to be done but to catch mr. froude whenever he comes from his hiding- place at simancas into places in which we can lie in wait for him." the sneer at original research is characteristic of freeman. one can almost hear his self-satisfied laugh as he wrote this unlucky sentence, "the thing is too grotesque to talk about seriously; but can we trust a single uncertified detail from the hands of a man who throughout his story of the armada always calls the ark royal the ark raleigh? ... it is the sort of blunder which so takes away one's breath that one thinks for the time that it must be right. we do not feel satisfied till we have turned to our camden and seen 'ark regis' staring us full in the face." freeman did not know the meaning of historical research as conducted by a real scholar like froude. froude had not gone to camden, who in freeman's eyes represented the utmost stretch of elizabethan learning. if freeman had had more natural shrewdness, it might have occurred to him that the name of a great seaman was not an unlikely name for a ship. but he could never fall lightly, and heavily indeed did he fall on this occasion. with almost incredible fatuity, he wrote, "the puzzle of guessing how mr. froude got at so grotesque a union of words as 'ark raleigh' fades before the greater puzzle of guessing what idea he attached to the words 'ark raleigh' when he had got them together." when freeman was most hopelessly wrong he always began to parody macaulay. corruptio optimi pessima. "ark raleigh" means raleigh's ship, and froude took the name, "ark rawlie" as it was then spelt, from the manuscripts at the rolls house. he was of course right, and freeman was wrong. but that is not all. freeman could easily have put himself right if he had chosen to take the trouble. edwards's life of raleigh appeared in , and a copy of it is in freeman's library at owens college. edwards gives an account of the ark raleigh, which was built for sir humphrey gilbert, raleigh advancing two hundred pounds. freeman, however, need not have read this book to find out the truth. for "the ark raleigh" occurs fourteen times in a calendar of manuscripts from to , published by robert lemon in . when freeman was brought to book, and taxed with this gross blunder, he pleaded that he "did a true verdict give according to such evidence as came before him." the implied analogy is misleading. jurymen are bound by their oaths, and by their duty, to find a verdict one way or the other. freeman was under no obligation to say anything about the ark raleigh. prudence and ignorance might well have restrained his pen. two blots in froude's history freeman may, i think, be acknowledged to have hit. one was intellectual; the other was moral. it was pure childishness to suggest that froude had never heard of the peine forte et dure, and only invincible prejudice could have dictated such a sentence as "that mr. froude's law would be queer might be taken as a matter of course."* still, it is true, and a serious misfortune, that froude took very little interest in legal and constitutional questions. for, while they had not the same importance in the sixteenth century as they had in the seventeenth, they cannot be disregarded to the extent in which froude disregarded them without detracting from the value of his book as a whole. he did not sit down, like hallam, to write a constitutional history, and he could not be expected to deal with his subject from that special point of view. freeman's complaint, which is quite just, was that he neglected almost entirely the relations of the crown with the houses of parliament and with the courts of law. the moral blot accounts for a good deal of the indignation which froude excited in minds far less jaundiced than freeman's. no one hated injustice more than froude. but cruelty as such did not inspire him with any horror. no punishment, however atrocious, seemed to him too great for persons clearly guilty of enormous crimes. i have already referred to his defence of the horrible boiling act which disgraced the reign and the parliament of henry viii. the account of mary stuart's old and wizened face as it appeared when her false hair and front had been removed after her execution may be set down as an error of taste. but what is to be said, on the score of humanity, for an historian who in the nineteenth century calmly and in cold blood defended the use of the rack? even here freeman's ingenuity of suggestion did not desert him. after quoting part, and part only, of froude's sinister apology, he writes, "to all this the answer is very simple. every time that elizabeth and her counsellors sent a prisoner to the rack they committed a breach of the law of england."+ any one who read this article without reading the history would infer that froude had maintained the legality, as well as the expediency, of torture. that is not true. what froude says is, "a practice which by the law was always forbidden could be palliated only by a danger so great that the nation had become like an army in the field. it was repudiated on the return of calmer times, and the employment of it rests a stain on the memory of those by whom it was used. it is none the less certain, however, that the danger was real and terrible, and the same causes which relieve a commander in active service from the restraints of the common law apply to the conduct of statesmen who are dealing with organised treason. the law is made for the nation, not the nation for the law. those who transgress it do it at their own risk, but they may plead circumstances at the bar of history, and have a right to be heard." thus froude asserts as strongly and clearly as freeman himself that torture was in , and always had been, contrary to the law of england. on the purely legal and technical aspect of the question a point might be raised which neither froude nor freeman has attempted to solve. would any court in the reign of elizabeth have convicted a man of a criminal offence for carrying out the express commands of the sovereign? if not, in what sense was the racking of the jesuits illegal? but there is a law of god, as well as a law of man, and surely elizabeth broke it. froude's argument seems to prove too much, if it proves anything, for it would justify all the worst cruelties ever inflicted by tyrants for political objects, from the burning of christians who refused incense for the roman emperor to luke's iron crown, and damien's bed of steel. -- * saturday review, jan. th, . + saturday review, dec. st, . -- the analogy of a commander in active service is inadequate. elizabeth, burghley, walsingham, were not commanders on active service; and if they had been, they would have had no right, on any christian or civilised principle, to torture prisoners. unless the end justifies the means, in which case there is no morality, the rack was an abomination, and those who applied it to extort either confession or evidence debased themselves to the level of the holy inquisitors. froude did not, i grieve to say, stop at an apology for the rack. in a passage which must always disfigure his book he thus describes the fate of antony babington and those who suffered with him in . "they were all hanged but for a moment, according to the letter of the sentence, taken down while the susceptibility of agony was still unimpaired, and cut in pieces afterwards with due precautions for the protraction of the pain. if it was to be taken as part of the catholic creed that to kill a prince in the interests of holy church was an act of piety and merit, stern english common sense caught the readiest means of expressing its opinion on the character both of the creed and its professors." stern english common sense! to suggest that the english people had anything to do with it is a libel on the english nation. elizabeth had the decency to forbid the repetition of such atrocities. that she should have tolerated them at all is a stain upon her character, as his sophistical plea for them is a stain upon froude's. on the th of january, , freeman delivered in the saturday review his final verdict on froude's history of england from the fall of wolsey to the defeat of the spanish armada. it is one of the most preposterous judgments that ever found their way into print. in knowledge of the subject, and in patient assiduity of research, froude was immeasurably freeman's superior, and his life had been devoted to historic studies. yet this was the language in which the editor of the first literary journal in england permitted freeman to write of the greatest historical work completed since macaulay died: "he has won his place among the popular writers of the day; his name has come to be used as a figure of speech, sometimes in strange company with his betters .... but an historian he is not; four volumes of ingenious paradox, eight volumes of ecclesiastical pamphlet, do not become a history, either because of the mere number of volumes, or because they contain a narrative which gradually shrinks into little more than a narrative of diplomatic intrigues. the main objections to mr. froude's book, the blemishes which cut it off from any title to the name of history, are utter carelessness as to facts and utter incapacity to distinguish right from wrong .... that burning zeal for truth, for truth in all matters great and small, that zeal which shrinks from no expenditure of time and toil in the pursuit of truth--the spirit without which history, to be worthy of the name, cannot be written--is not in mr. froude's nature, and it would probably be impossible to make him understand what it is .... how far the success of the book is due to its inherent vices, how far to its occasional virtues, is a point too knotty for us to solve. the general reader and his tastes--why this thing pleases him and the other thing displeases him--have ever been to us the proroundest of mysteries. it is enough that on mr. froude's book, as a whole, the verdict of all competent historical scholars has long ago been given. occasional beauties of style and narrative cannot be allowed to redeem carelessness of truth, ignorance of law, contempt for the first principles of morals, ecclesiastical malignity of the most frantic kind. there are parts of mr. froude's volumes which we have read with real pleasure, with real admiration. but the book, as a whole, is vicious in its conception, vicious in its execution. no merit of detail can atone for the hollowness that runs through the whole. mr. froude has written twelve volumes, and he has made himself a name in writing them, but he has not written, in the pregnant phrase so aptly quoted by the duke of aumale, 'un livre de bonne foy.'"* -- * the duke was not, as freeman implies that he was, referring to froude. -- by a curious irony of fate or circumstance freeman has unconsciously depicted the frame of mind in which froude approached historic problems. "that burning zeal for truth, for truth in all matters great and small, that zeal which shrinks from no expenditure of time and toil in the pursuit of truth--the spirit without which history, to be worthy of the name, cannot be written," was the dominant principle of froude's life and work. he had hitherto taken no notice of the attacks in the saturday review. the errors pointed out in them were of the most trivial kind, and mere abuse is not worth a reply. but even gibbon was moved from his philosophic calm when mr. somebody of something "presumed to attack not the faith but the fidelity of the historian." froude passed over in contemptuous silence impertinent reflections upon his religious belief. his honesty was now in set terms impugned, and on the th of february, , he addressed, through the editor of the pall mall gazette, mr. frederick greenwood, a direct challenge to mr. philip harwood, who had become editor of the saturday review. after a few caustic remarks upon the absurdity of the defects imputed to him, such as ignorance that parliament could pass bills of attainder, because he had said that the house of lords would not pass one in a particular case, he came to close quarters with the imputation of bad faith. "i am," he said, "peculiarly situated"--as freeman of course knew--"towards a charge of this kind, for nine-tenths of my documents are in manuscript, and a large proportion of those manuscripts are in spain. to deal as fairly as i can with the public, i have all along deposited my spanish transcripts, as soon as i have done with them, in the british museum. the reading of manuscripts, however, is at best laborious. the public may be inclined to accept as proved an uncontradicted charge, the value of which they cannot readily test. i venture therefore to make the following proposal. i do not make it to my reviewer. he will be reluctant to exchange communications with me, and the disinclination will not be on his side only. i address myself to his editor. if the editor will select any part of my volumes, one hundred, two hundred, three hundred pages, wherever he pleases, i am willing to subject them to a formal examination by two experts, to be chosen--if sir thomas hardy will kindly undertake it--by the deputy keeper of the public records. they shall go through my references, line for line. they shall examine every document to which i have alluded, and shall judge whether i have dealt with it fairly. i lay no claim to be free from mistakes. i have worked in all through nine hundred volumes of letters, notes, and other papers, private and official, in five languages and in difficult handwritings. i am not rash enough to say that i have never misread a word, or overlooked a passage of importance. i profess only to have dealt with my materials honestly to the best of my ability. i submit myself to a formal trial, of which i am willing to bear the entire expense, on one condition-that the report, whatever it be, shall be published word for word in the saturday review." the proposal was certainly a novel one, and could not in ordinary circumstances have been accepted. but it is also novel to charge an historian of the highest character and repute with inability to speak the truth, or to distinguish between truth and falsehood. freeman, signing himself "mr. froude's saturday reviewer," replied in the pall mall gazette. the challenge he left to the editor of the saturday, who contemptuously refused it, and he admitted that after all froude probably did know what a bill of attainder was. the rest of his letter is a shuffle. "i have made no charge of bad faith against mr. froude"--whom he had accused of not knowing what truth meant--"with regard to any spanish manuscripts, or any other manuscripts. all that i say is, that as i find gross inaccuracies in mr. froude's book, which he does not whenever i have the means of testing him which was certainly not often--"i think there is a presumption against his accuracy in those parts where i have not the means of testing him. but this is only a presumption, and not proof. mr. froude may have been more careful, or more lucky"--meaning less fraudulent, or more skilful--"with the hidden wealth of simancas than he has been with regard to materials which are more generally accessible. i trust it may prove so." if freeman thought that he meant that, he must have had singular powers of self-deception. "i have been twitted by men of thought and learning"--whom he does not name--"for letting mr. froude off too easily, and i am inclined to plead guilty to the charge. i do not suppose that mr. froude wilfully misrepresents anything; the fault seems to be inherent and incurable; he does not know what historical truth is, or how a man should set about looking for it. as therefore his book is not written with that regard for truth with which a book ought to be written, i hold that i am justified in saying that it is not 'un livre de bonne roy.'" it is difficult to read this disingenuous farrago of insinuation even now without a strong sense of moral contempt. but vengeance was coming, and before many years were over his head freeman had occasion to remember the hornfinn tag: raro antecedentem scelestum deseruit pede poena claudo. froude himself took the matter very lightly. he had boldly offered the fullest inquiry, and freeman had not been clever enough to shelter himself behind the plea that copies were not originals; he did not know enough about manuscripts to think of it. the blunders he had detected were trifling, and froude summed up the labours of his antagonists fairly enough in a letter to skelton from his beloved derreen.* "i acknowledge to five real mistakes in the whole book- twelve volumes--about twenty trifling slips, equivalent to i's not dotted and t's not crossed; and that is all that the utmost malignity has discovered. every one of the rascals has made a dozen blunders of his own, too, while detecting one of mine." skelton's own testimony is worth citing, for, though a personal friend, he was a true scholar. "we must remember that he was to some extent a pioneer, and that he was the first (for instance) to utilise the treasures of simancas. he transcribed, from the spanish, masses of papers which even a spaniard could have read with difficulty, and i am assured that his translations (with rare exceptions) render the original with singular exactness."+ and in the preface to his maitland of lethington the same distinguished author says, "only the man or woman who has had to work upon the mass of scottish material in the record office can properly appreciate mr. froude's inexhaustible industry and substantial accuracy. his point of view is very different from mine; but i am bound to say that his acquaintance with the intricacies of scottish politics during the reign of mary appears to me to be almost, if not quite, unrivalled." john hill burton, to whose learning and judgment freeman's were as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine, concurred in skelton's view, and no one has ever known scottish history better than burton. -- * june st, . + table talk of shirley, p. . -- freeman's reckless and unscholarly attacks upon froude produced no effect upon his own master stubbs, whom he was always covering with adulation. from the chair of modern history at oxford in stubbs pronounced froude's "great book," as he called it, to be "a work of great industry, power, and importance." stubbs was as far as possible from agreeing with froude in opinion. an orthodox churchman and a staunch tory, he never varied in his opposition to liberalism, as well ecclesiastical as political, and he had no sympathy with the reformers. but his simple, manly, pious character was incapable of supporting his cause by personal slander. unlike freeman, he had a rich vein of racy humour, which he indulged in a famous epigram on froude and kingsley, too familiar for quotation. but he could appreciate froude's learning and industry, for he was a real student himself. the controversy between froude and freeman, however, was by no means at an end, and i may as well proceed at once to the conclusion of it, chronology notwithstanding. in the year , froude contributed to the nineteenth century a series of papers on the life and times of thomas becket, since republished in the fourth volume of his short studies. full of interesting information, the result of minute pains, and excellent in style, they make no pretence to be, as the history was, a work of original research. they are indeed founded upon the materials for the history of thomas becket, which canon robertson had edited for the master of the rolls in the previous year. they were of course read by every one, because they were written by froude, whereas robertson's learned introduction would only have been read by scholars. froude's conclusions were much the same as the erudite canon's. he did not pretend to know the twelfth century as he knew the sixteenth, and he avowedly made use of another man's knowledge to point his favourite moral that emancipation from ecclesiastical control was a necessary stage in the development of english freedom. he may have been unconsciously affected by his familiarity with the quarrel between wolsey and henry viii. in describing the quarrel between becket and henry ii. the church of the middle ages discharged invaluable functions which in later times were more properly undertaken by the state. froude sided with henry, and showed, as he had not much difficulty in showing, that there were a good many spots on the robe of becket's saintliness. the immunity of churchmen, that is, of clergymen, from the jurisdiction of secular tribunals was not conducive either to morality or to order. froude's essays might have been forgotten, like other brilliant articles in other magazines, if freeman had let them alone. but the spectacle of froude presuming to write upon those earlier periods of which the saturday review had so often and so dogmatically pronounced him to be ignorant, drove freeman into print. if he had disagreed with froude on the main question, the only question which matters now, he would have been justified, and more than justified, in setting out the opposite view. a defence of becket against henry, of the church against the state, from the pen of a competent writer, would have been as interesting and as important a contribution as froude's own papers to the great issue between sacerdotalism and erastianism. there is a great deal more to be said for becket than for wolsey; and though freeman found it difficult to state any case with temperance, he could have stated this case with power. but, much as he disliked froude, he agreed with him. "looking," he wrote, "at the dispute between henry and thomas by the light of earlier and of later ages, we see that the cause of henry was the right one; that is, we see that it was well that the cause of henry triumphed in the long run." nevertheless he rushed headlong upon his victim, and "belaboured" froude, with all the violence of which he was capable, in the contemporary review. hitherto his attacks had been anonymous. now for the first time he came into the open, and delivered his assault in his own name. froude's forbearance, as well as his own vanity, had blinded him to the danger he was incurring. the first sentence of his first article explains the fury of an invective for which few parallels could be found since the days of the renaissance. "mr. froude's appearance on the field of mediaeval history will hardly be matter of rejoicing to those who have made mediaeval history one of the chief studies of their lives." freeman's pedantry was, as matthew arnold said, ferocious, and he seems to have cherished the fantastic delusion that particular periods of history belonged to particular historians. before writing about becket froude should, according to this primitive doctrine, have asked leave of freeman, or of stubbs, or of an industrious clergyman, professor brewer, who edited with ability and learning several volumes of the rolls series. that to warn off froude would be to warn off the public was so much the better for the purposes of an exclusive clique. for froude's style, that accursed style which was gall and wormwood to freeman, "had," as he kindly admitted, "its merits." page after page teems with mere abuse, a sort of pale reflection, or, to vary the metaphor, a faint echo from cicero on catiline, or burke on hastings. "on purely moral points there is no need now for me to enlarge; every man who knows right from wrong ought to be able to see through the web of ingenious sophistry which tries to justify the slaughter of more and fisher"; although the guilt of more and fisher is a question not of morality, but of evidence. "mr. froude by his own statement has not made history the study of his life," which was exactly what he had done, and stated that he had done. "the man who insisted on the statute-book being the text of english history showed that he had never heard of peine forte et dure, and had no clear notion of a bill of attainder." freeman could not even be consistent in abuse for half a page. immediately after charging froude with "fanatical hatred towards the english church, reformed or unreformed"--though he was the great champion of the reformation--"a degree of hatred which must be peculiar to those who have entered her ministry and forsaken it"- like freeman's bosom friend green--he says that froude "never reaches so high a point as in several passages where he describes various scenes and features of monastic life." but this could not absolve him from having made a "raid" upon another man's period, from being a "marauder," from writing about a personage whom stubbs might have written about, though he had not. froude had "an inborn and incurable twist, which made it impossible for him to make an accurate statement about any matter." "by some destiny which it would seem that he cannot escape, instead of the narrative which he finds--at least which all other readers find--in his book he invariably substitutes another narrative out of his own head." "very few of us can test manuscripts at simancas; it is not every one who can at a moment's notice test references to manuscripts much nearer home." this is a strange insinuation from a man who never tested a manuscript, seldom, if ever, consulted a manuscript, and had declined froude's challenge to let his copies be compared with his abridgment. one grows tired of transcribing a mere succession of innuendoes. yet it is essential to clear this matter up once and for all, that the public may judge between froude and his life-long enemy. the standard by which freeman affected to judge froude's articles in the nineteenth century was fantastic. "emperors and popes, sicilian kings and lombard commonwealths, should be as familiar to him who would write the life and times of thomas becket as the text of the constitutions of clarendon or the relations between the sees of canterbury and york." if froude had written an elaborate history of henry ii., as he wrote a history of henry viii., he would have qualified himself in the manner somewhat bombastically described. but even lord acton, who seemed to think that he could not write about anything until he knew everything, would scarcely have prepared himself for an article in the nineteenth century by mastering the history of the world. and if froude had done so, it would have profited him little. he would have forgotten it, "with that calm oblivion of facts which distinguishes him from all other men who have taken on themselves to read past events." he would still have written "whatever first came into his head, without stopping to see whether a single fact bore his statements out or not." "accurate statement of what really happened, even though such accurate statement might serve mr. froude's purpose, is clearly forbidden by the destiny which guides mr. froude's literary career." these extracts from the contemporary review are samples, and only samples, from a mass of rhetoric not unworthy of the grammarian who prayed for the damnation of an opponent because he did not agree with him in his theory of irregular verbs. freeman, whose self-assertion was perpetual, represented himself throughout his libel as fighting for the cause of truth. his own reverence for truth he illustrated quaintly enough at the close of his last article. "i leave others to protest," said this veracious critic, "against mr. froude's treatment of the sixteenth century. i do not profess to have mastered those times in detail from original sources." i leave others to protest! from to freeman had continuously attacked successive volumes of froude's history in the saturday review. yet he here makes in his own name a statement quite irreconcilable with his ever having done anything of the kind, and accompanies it with an admission which, if it had been made in the saturday review, would have robbed his invective of more than half its sting. and now let us see what was the real foundation for this imposing fabric. freeman's boisterous truculence made such a deafening noise, and raised such a blinding dust, that it takes some little time and trouble to discover the hollowness of the charges. with four-fifths of froude's narrative he does not deal at all, except to borrow from it for his own purposes, as he used to borrow from the history in the saturday review. in the other fifth, the preliminary pages, he discovered two misprints of names, one mistake of fact, and three or four exaggerations. not one of these errors is so grave as his own statement, picked up from some bad lawyer, that "the preamble of an act of parliament need not be received as of any binding effect." the preamble is part of the act, and gives the reasons why the act was passed. of course the rules of grammar show that being explanatory it is not an operative part; but it can be quoted in any court of justice to explain the meaning of the clauses. in his annals of an english abbey froude allowed "robert fitzwilliam" to pass for robert fitzwalter in his proofs, and upon this conclusive evidence that froude was unfit to write history freeman pounced with triumphant exultation. he had some skill in the correction of misprints, and would have been better employed in revising proof- sheets for froude than in "belabouring" him. froude said that becket's name "denoted saxon extraction." an anonymous biographer, not always accurate, says that both his parents came from normandy. it is probable, though by no means certain, that in this case the biographer was right, and froude corrected the mistake when, in consequence of freeman's criticisms, he republished the articles. froude, on the authority of edward grim, who knew becket, and wrote his life, referred to the cruelty and ferocity of becket's administration as chancellor. freeman declared that "anything more monstrous never appeared from the pen of one who professed to be narrating facts." froude not only "professed" to be narrating facts: he was narrating them. the only question is whether they happened in england, in toulouse, or in aquitaine. freeman exposed his own ignorance by alleging that grim meant the suppression of the free lances, which happened before becket became chancellor. he did not in fact know the subject half so well as froude, though froude might have more carefully qualified his general words. froude's account of becket's appointment to the archbishopric of canterbury, his scruples, and how he overcame them, is described by freeman as "pure fiction." it was taken from william of canterbury, and, though open to doubt upon some points, is quite as likely to be true as the narrative preferred by freeman. the most serious error, indeed the only serious error, attributed by freeman to froude is the statement that becket's murderers were shielded from punishment by the king. freeman alleges with his usual confidence that they could not be tried in a secular court because their victim was a bishop. it is doubtful whether a lay tribunal ever admitted such a plea, and the constitutions of clarendon, which were in force at the time of becket's assassination, abolished clerical privileges altogether. here froude was almost certainly right, and freeman almost certainly wrong. but freeman was not content with making mountains of mole-hills, with speaking of a great historian as if he were a pretentious dunce. he stooped to write the words, "natural kindliness, if no other feeling, might have kept back the fiercest of partisans from ignoring the work of a long-forgotten brother, and from dealing stabs in the dark at a brother's almost forgotten fame." the meaning of this sentence, so far as it has a meaning, was that hurrell froude composed a fragment on the life of becket which the mistaken kindness of friends published after his own premature death. if froude had written anonymously against this work, the phrase "stabs in the dark" would have been intelligible. as he had written in his own name, and had not mentioned his brother's work at all, part at least of the accusation was transparently and obviously false. at last, however, freeman had gone too far. froude had borne a great deal, he could bear no more; and he took up a weapon which freeman never forgot. i can well recall, as can hundreds of others, the appearance in the nineteenth century for april, , of "a few words on mr. freeman." they were read with a sense of general pleasure and satisfaction, a boyish delight in seeing a big bully well thrashed before the whole school. froude was so calm, so dignified, so self- restrained, so consciously superior to his rough antagonist in temper and behaviour. only once did he show any emotion. it was when he spoke of the dastardly attempt to strike him through the memory of his brother. "i look back upon my brother," he said, "as on the whole the most remarkable man i have ever met in my life. i have never seen any person--not one--in whom, as i now think of him, the excellences of intellect and character were combined in fuller measure. of my personal feeling towards him i cannot speak. i am ashamed to have been compelled, by what i can only describe as an inexcusable insult, to say what i have said." it was not difficult to show that freeman's four articles in the contemporary review contained worse blunders than any he had attributed to froude, as, for instance, the allegation that henry viii., who founded bishoprics and organised the defence of the country, squandered away all that men before his time had agreed to respect. easy also was it to disprove the charge of "hatred towards the english church at all times and under all characters" by the mere mention of cranmer, latimer, ridley, and hooper. the statement that froude had been a "fanatical votary" of the mediaeval church was almost delicious in the extravagance of its absurdity; and it would have been impossible better to retort the wild charges of misrepresentation, in which it is hard to suppose that even freeman himself believed, than by the simple words, "it is true that i substitute a story in english for a story in latin, a short story for a long one, and a story in a popular form for a story in a scholastic one." in short, froude wrote a style which every scholar loves, and every pedant hates. with a light touch, but a touch which had a sting, froude disposed of the nonsense which made him translate praedictae rationes "shortened rations" instead of "the foregoing accounts," and in a graver tone he reminded the public that his offer to test the accuracy of his extracts from unprinted authorities had been refused. graver still, and not without indignation, is his reference to freeman's suggestion that he thought the cathedral church of st. albans had been destroyed. most people, when they finished froude's temperate but crushing refutation, must have felt the opportunity for it should ever surprised that have arisen. froude had done his work at last, and done it thoroughly. freeman's plight was not to be envied. if his offence had been rank, his punishment had been tremendous. even the spectator, which had hitherto upheld him through thick and thin, admonished him that he had passed the bounds of decency and infringed the rules of behaviour. dreading a repetition of the penalty if he repeated the offence, fearing that silence would imply acquiescence in charges of persistent calumny, he blurted out a kind of awkward half-apology. he confessed, in the contemporary review for may, , that he had criticised in the saturday all the volumes of froude's elizabeth. this self-constituted champion proceeded to say that he knew nothing about froude's personal character, and that when he accused froude of stabbing his dead brother "in the dark" he only meant that the brother was dead. when he says that froude's article was "plausible, and more than plausible," he is quite right. it is more than plausible, because it is true. after vainly trying to explain away some of the errors brought home to him by froude, and leaving others unnoticed, he complains, with deep and obvious sincerity, that froude had not read his books, nor even his articles in encyclopaedias. he exhibits a striking instance of his own accuracy. in his defence against the rather absurd charge of not going, as macaulay had gone, to see the places about which he wrote, froude pleaded want of means. freeman rejoined that macaulay was at one time of his life "positively poor." he was so for a very short time when his fellowship at trinity came to an end. unluckily for freeman's statement the period was before his appointment to be legal member of council in india, and long before he had begun to write his history of england. the most charitable explanation of an erroneous statement is usually the correct one, and it was probably forgetfulness which made freeman say that he did not hear of froude's having placed copies of the simancas manuscripts in the british museum till , whereas he had himself discussed it in the pall mall gazette eight years before. if froude had made such an astonishing slip, there would have been more ground for imputing to him an incapacity to distinguish between truth and falsehood. freeman's "last words on mr. froude" show no sign of penitence or good feeling, and they end with characteristic bluster about the truth, from which he had so grievously departed. but froude was never troubled with him again. although a refuted detractor is not formidable in the flesh, the evil that he does lives after him. freeman's view of froude is not now held by any one whose opinion counts; yet still there seems to rise, as from a brazen head of ananias, dismal and monotonous chaunt, "he was careless of the truth, he did not make history the business of his life." he did make history the business of his life, and he cared more for truth than for anything else in the world. freeman's biographer has given no clue to his imperfect sympathy with froude. green, true historian as he was, made more mistakes than froude, and the mistakes he did make were more serious. he trespassed on the preserves of brewer, who criticised him severely without deviating from the standard of a christian and a gentleman. even over the domain of stubbs, and the consecrated ground of the norman conquest itself, green ranged without being freemanised as a poacher. but then green was freeman's personal friend, and in friendship freeman was staunch. they belonged to the same set, and no one was more cliquish than freeman. liberal as he was in politics, he always professed the utmost contempt for the general public, and wondered what guided their strange tastes in literature. dean stephens has apparently suppressed most of the references to froude in freeman's private letters, and certainly he drops no hint of the controversy about becket. but the following passage from his "concluding survey" is apparently aimed at froude. freeman, we are told, "was unable to write or speak politely"--and if the dean had stopped there i should have had nothing to say; but he goes on--"of any one who pretended to more knowledge than he really had, or who enjoyed a reputation for learning which was undeserved; nay, more, he considered it to be a positive duty to expose such persons. in doing this he was often no doubt too indifferent to their feelings, and employed language of unwarranted severity which provoked angry retaliation, and really weakened the effect of his criticism, by diverting public sympathy from himself to the object of his attack. but it was quite a mistake to suppose, as many did, that his fierce utterances were the outcome of ill-temper or of personal animosity. he entertained no ill-will whatever towards literary or political opponents." there is more to the same effect, and of course froude must have been in stephens's mind. but the reputation of a great historian is not to be taken away by hints. it may suit freeman's admirers to seek refuge in meaningless generalities. those who are grateful for froude's services to england, and to literature, have no interest in concealment. froude never "pretended to more knowledge than he really had." so far from "enjoying a reputation for learning which was undeserved," he disguised his learning rather than displayed it, and wore it lightly, a flower. that freeman should have "considered it to be a positive duty to expose" a man whose knowledge was so much wider and whose industry was so much greater than his own is strange. that he did his best for years, no doubt from the highest motives, to damage froude's reputation, and to injure his good name, is certain. with the general reader he failed. the public had too much sense to believe froude was merely, or chiefly, or at all, an ecclesiastical pamphleteer. but by dint of noisy assertion, and perpetual repetition, freeman did at last infect academic coteries with the idea that froude was a superficial sciolist. the same thing had been said of macaulay, and believed by the same sort of people. froude's books were certainly much easier to read than freeman's. must they therefore have been much easier to write? two-thirds of froude's mistakes would have been avoided, and freeman would never have had his chance, if the former had had a keener eye for slips in his proof-sheets, or had engaged competent assistance. when he allowed wilhelmus to be printed instead of willelmus, freeman shouted with exultant glee that a man so hopelessly ignorant of mediaeval nomenclature had no right to express an opinion upon the dispute between becket and the king. nothing could exceed his transports of joy when he found out that froude did not know the ancient name of lisieux. freeman thought, like the older pharisees, that he should be heard for his much speaking, and for a time he was. people did not realise that so many confident allegations could be made in which there was no substance at all. they thought themselves safe in making allowance for freeman's exaggeration, and freeman simply bored many persons into accepting his estimate of froude. perhaps he went a little too far when he claimed to have found inaccuracies in froude's transcripts from the simancas manuscripts without knowing a word of spanish. but he was seldom so frank as that. it was not often that he forgot his two objects of holding up froude as the fluent, facile ignoramus, and himself as the profound, erudite student. just after reading freeman's furious articles on becket, i turned to froude's "index of papers collected by me october, november, and december, ." it covers twenty-one pages, very closely written, and i will give a few extracts to show what sort of preparation this sciolist thought necessary for his ecclesiastical pamphlet. the first entry, representing four pages of text, is "hanson's description of england. diet, habits, prices of provisions from parliamentary history." another is "dress and loose habits of the london clergy in . from morton's injunctions." "state of the abbey of st. albans in shows that froude was well acquainted with that subject many years before he wrote his short study on it. "the bishops of all the sees in england under henry, date of appointment, etc.," is another of these items, which also comprise "extracts from the so-called privy purse expenses of henry viii." "bulla clementis papae vii. concessa regi henrico de secundis nuptiis. this contains the passage quocunque licito vel illicito coitu." "petition of the upper house of convocation for the suppression of heretical books." "royal letter on the articles of which were written, henry says, by himself." "elaborate and extremely valuable state papers on the duchy of milan, and the dispute between the emperor and francis i." "pole to james, the fifth letter of warning." "pole to the pope, may th, . n.b.--very remarkable." "remarkable state paper drawn by pole and addressed to the pope at the time of the interview at paris between francis and the emperor." "privy council to the duke of norfolk. marquis of exeter to sir a. brown. promise of money. directions to send relief to the duke of suffolk in lincolnshire, etc." "henry viii. to the duke of norfolk about november th, . part of it in his own hand. high and chivalrous." "curious account of the ferocity of the clergy in lincolnshire." "curious questions addressed to fisher bishop of rochester on some treasonable foreign correspondence." "learned men to be sent to preach to the disaffected counties. henry's version of the causes of the insurrection---n.b., and the cure." "instructions to the earl of sussex for tranquillising the north after the insurrection. long and curious--noticeable list of accusations against the monastic bodies. in wriothesley's hand." "sir francis bigod to sir robert constable. very remarkable account of his unpopularity in the first rebellion from suspicion of heresy, january th, ." "emperor at paris, . war between france and england. secret causes why the emperor made a secret peace with france." "lord lisle to henry viii. on his chance of running down the french fleet as they lay at anchor, july st, ." "losses of the old families by the suppression--new foundation by henry viii. bishoprics, hospitals, colleges, etc." "the abbot of coggeshall hides jewels, makes away goods, maintains rome and consults the devil." "henry viii. to justices of the peace, admonition for neglect of duty. highly in character." "king's highness having discovered all the enormities of the clergy, pardons all that is past, and exhorts them to a christian life in all time to come." during the three months to which alone this list refers froude must have read and studied more than four hundred pages of important documents. if any one wishes to form a correct judgment of froude as an historian, he can scarcely begin better than by reversing every statement that freeman felt it his duty to make. froude came to write about the sixteenth century after careful study of previous times. he prepared himself for his task by patient research among letters and manuscripts such as freeman never thought of attempting. he neglected no source of information open to him, and he obtained special privileges for searching spanish archives which entailed upon him the severest labour. he studied not only at simancas, where none had been before him, but also in paris, in brussels, in vienna. the documents he read were in half a dozen languages, sometimes in the vilest scrawls. long afterwards he described his own experience in his own graphic way. "often at the end of a page," he said, "i have felt as after descending a precipice, and have wondered how i got down. i had to cut my way through a jungle, for no one had opened the road for me. i have been turned into rooms piled to the window-sill with bundles of dust-covered despatches, and told to make the best of it. often i have found the sand glistening on the ink where it had been sprinkled when a page was turned. there the letter had lain, never looked at again since it was read and put away." out of such materials froude wrote a history which any educated person can read with undisturbed enjoyment. he was too good an artist to let his own difficulties be seen, and they were assumed not to exist. froude did not write, like stubbs, for professional students alone; he wrote for the general public, for those whom freeman affected to despise. so did macaulay, whom freeman idolised. so did gibbon, the greatest historian of all time. froude's history covered the most controversial period in the growth of the english church. lynx-eyed critics, with their powers sharpened by partisanship, searched it through and through for errors the most minute. some of course they found. but they did not find one which interfered with the main argument, and such evidence as has since been discovered confirms froude's proposition that the cause of henry was the cause of england. freeman's norman conquest has secured for him an honourable fame; his attacks upon froude, until they have been forgotten, will always be a reproach to his memory. it was with just pride, and natural satisfaction, that froude wrote to lady derby in may, : "i am revising my english history for a final edition. since i wrote it the libraries and archives of all europe have been searched and sifted. i am fairly astonished to find how little i shall have to alter. the book is of course young, but i do not know that it is the worse on that account. that fault at any rate i shall not try to cure." the divorce of katharine of aragon, though not published till , is a sequel to the history. the twenty years which had intervened did not lead froude to modify any of his main conclusions, and he was able to furnish new evidence in support of them. the correspondence of chapuys, imperial ambassador at the court of henry viii., puts fisher's treason beyond doubt, and proves that the bishop was endeavouring to procure an invasion by spanish troops when the king, in freeman's language, "slaughtered" him. the next year froude brought out, in a volume with other essays, his spanish story of the armada, written in his raciest manner, and proving from spanish sources the grotesque incompetence of medina sidonia. there are few better narratives in the language, and the enthusiastic admiration of a great american humourist was as well deserved as it is charmingly expressed. "the other night," wrote bret harte, "i took up longman's magazine* and began to lazily read something about the spanish armada. my knowledge of that historic event, i ought to say, is rather hazy; i remember a vague something about drake playing bowls while the spanish fleet was off the coast, and of elizabeth going to tilbury en grande tenue, but there was always a good deal of 'jingo' shouting and crystal palace fireworks about it, and it never seemed real. in the article i was reading the style caught me first; i became tremendously interested; it was a new phase of the old story, and yet there was something pleasantly familiar. i turned to the last page quickly, and saw your blessed name. i had heard nothing about it before. then i went through it breathlessly to the last word, which came all too soon. and now i am as eager for the next instalment as i was when a boy for the next chapter of my dickens or thackeray. don't laugh, dear old fellow, over my enthusiasm or my illustration, but remember that i represent a considerable amount of average human nature, and that's what we all write for, and ought to write for, and be dashed to the critics who say to the contrary! i thought your parallel of philip and don quixote delightful, but the similitude of medina sidonia and sancho panza is irresistible. that letter to philip is sancho's own hand! where did you get it? how long have you had it up your sleeve? have you got any more such cards to play? can you not give us a picture of those gentlemen adventurers with their exalted beliefs, their actual experiences, their little jealousies, and the love-lorn lope de vega in their midst? what mankind you have come upon, dear froude! how i envy you! have you nothing to spare for a poor literary man like myself, who has made all he could out of the hulk of a poor old philippine galleon on pacific seas? couldn't you lend me a don or a galley-slave out of that delightful crew of solemn lunatics? and yet how splendid are those last orders of the duke! with what a swan-like song they sailed away!" -- * the successor to fraser. -- the letter from medina sidonia to philip, which reminded both froude and bret harte of sancho panza, is too delicious not to be given in full. "my health is bad, and from my small experience of the water i know that i am always sea-sick. i have no money which i can spare, i owe a million ducats, and i have not a real to spend on my outfit. the expedition is on such a scale, and the object is of such high importance, that the person at the head of it ought to understand navigation and sea-fighting, and i know nothing of either. i have not one of those essential qualifications. i have no acquaintance among the officers who are to serve under me. santa cruz had information about the state of things in england; i have none. were i competent otherwise, i should have to act in the dark by the opinion of others, and i cannot tell to whom i may trust. the adelantado of castile would do better than i. our lord would help him, for he is a good christian, and has fought in several battles. if you send me, depend upon it, i shall have a bad account to render of my trust."* -- * spanish story of the armada, pp. , . -- "those last orders of the duke"--the same duke, by the way--are "splendid" enough of their kind. "from highest to lowest you are to understand the object of our expedition, which is to recover countries to the church now oppressed by the enemies of the true faith. i therefore beseech you to remember your calling, so that god may be with us in what we do. i charge you, one and all, to abstain from profane oaths, dishonouring to the names of our lord, our lady, and the saints. all personal quarrels are to be suspended while the expedition lasts, and for a month after it is completed. neglect of this will be held as treason. each morning at sunrise the ship-boys, according to custom, will sing 'good morrow' at the foot of the mainmast, and at sunset the 'ave maria.' since bad weather may interrupt the communications the watchword is laid down for each day in the week: sunday, jesus; the days succeeding, the holy ghost, the holy trinity, santiago, the angels, all saints, and our lady."* -- * spanish story of the armada, pp. , . -- "god and one," it has been said, "make a majority." but in this case god was not on the side of the pious and incompetent medina sidonia. it was not till this same year , after freeman's death, that the "calendar of letters and state papers relative to english affairs preserved principally in the archives of simancas" began to be published in england by the master of the rolls. translated by an eminent scholar, mr. martin hume, and printed in a book, they could have been read by freeman himself, and can be read by any one who cares to undertake the task. they will at least give some idea of the enormous labour undergone by froude in his several sojourns at simancas. i cannot profess to have instituted a systematic comparison, but a few specimens selected at random show that froude summarised fairly the documents with which he dealt. that there should be some discrepancies was inevitable. philip ii. wrote a remarkably bad hand, and his ambassadors were not chosen for their penmanship. the most striking fact in the case is that mr. hume has derived assistance from froude in the performance of his own duties. "i have," he writes in his introduction, "very carefully compared the spanish text when doubtful with mr. froude's extracts and copies and with transcripts of many of the letters in the british museum." nothing could give a better idea than this sentence of the difficulties which froude had to surmount, or of the fidelity with which he surmounted them. he had not only achieved his own object: he also smoothed the path of future labourers in the same field. it was the inaccessibility of the records at simancas that enabled freeman to accuse froude of not correctly transcribing or abstracting manuscripts. like other people, he made mistakes; but mistakes have to be weighed as well as counted, and even in enumerating froude's we must always remember that he used more original matter than any other modern historian. chapter vi ireland and america froude had made history the business of his life, and he had no sooner completed his history of england than he turned his attention to the sister people. the irish chapters in his great book had been picked out by hostile critics as especially good, and in them he had strongly condemned the cruel misgovernment of an englishman otherwise so humane as essex. while he was in ireland he had examined large stores of material in dublin, which he compared with documents at the record office in london, and he contemplated early in , if not before, a book on irish history. for this task he was not altogether well qualified. the religion of celtic ireland was repugnant to him, and he never thoroughly understood it. in religious matters froude could not be neutral. where catholic and protestant came into conflict, he took instinctively, almost involuntarily, the protestant side. in the england of the sixteenth century the protestant side was the side of england. in ireland the case was reversed, and the spirit of catholicism was identical with the spirit of nationality. irish catholics to this day associate protestantism with the sack of drogheda and wexford, with the detested memory of oliver cromwell. to froude, as to carlyle, cromwell was the minister of divine vengeance upon murderous and idolatrous papists. his liking for the irish, though perfectly genuine, was accompanied with an underlying contempt which is more offensive to the objects of it than the hatred of an open foe. he regarded them as a race unfit for self-government, who had proved their unworthiness of freedom by not winning it with the sword. if they had not quarrelled among themselves, and betrayed one another, they would have established their right to independence; or, if there had been still an act of union, they could have come in, as the scots came, on their own terms. for an englishman to write the history of ireland without prejudice he must be either a cosmopolitan philosopher, or a passionless recluse. froude was an ardent patriot, and his early studies in hagiology had led him to the conclusion, not now accepted, that st. patrick never existed at all. his scepticism about st. patrick might have been forgiven to a man who had probably not much belief in st. george. but froude could not help running amok at all the popular heroes of ireland. in the first of his two papers describing a fortnight in kerry he went out of his way to depreciate the fame of daniel o'connell. "ireland," he wrote, "has ceased to care for him. his fame blazed like a straw bonfire, and has left behind it scarce a shovelful of ashes. never any public man had it in his power to do so much good for his country, nor was there ever one who accomplished so little."* -- * short studies, vol. ii. p. . -- that o'connell wasted much time in clamouring for repeal is perfectly true. but he was as much the author of catholic emancipation as cobden was the author of free trade, and that fact alone should have debarred froude from the use of this extravagant language. for though an article in fraser's magazine is a very different thing from a serious history, print imposes some obligations, and even two or three casual sentences may show the bent of a man's mind. whatever froude wrote on ireland, or on anything else, was sure to be widely read, and to affect, for good or for evil, the opinion of the british public. it was therefore peculiarly incumbent on him not to flatter english pride by wounding irish self-respect. while froude was writing his english in ireland he received an invitation to give a series of lectures in the united states. "the yankees," he says to skelton,+ "have written to me about going over to lecture to them. i am strongly tempted; but i could not tell the truth about ireland without reflecting in a good many ways on my own country. i don't fancy doing that, however justly, to amuse jonathan." these words certainly do not show implacable bitterness against ireland. brought face to face with responsibility, froude always felt the weight of it, and he was never consciously unfair. he was under a strong sense of obligation, which he felt bound to fulfil. it is impossible not to admire the chivalrous and intrepid spirit with which he undertook singlehanded to justify the conduct of his countrymen before the american people, and to persuade them that england had provocation for her treatment of ireland. once convinced that his cause was righteous, he never flinched. he believed that false views of the irish question prevailed in america, and that he could set them right. he did not altogether underrate the magnitude of the enterprise. "i go like an arab of the desert," he wrote to skelton a little later: "my hand will be against every man, and therefore every man's hand will be against me."* a belief in ireland's wrongs was part of the american creed, like the faithlessness of charles ii. and the tyranny of george iii. irish americans had enormous influence at elections, in congress, and in the newspapers. released fenians, o'donovan rossa among them, had been spreading what they called the light, and their own countrymen at all events believed what they said. the american people as a whole were not unfriendly to england. the alabama arbitration and the geneva award had destroyed the ill feeling that remained after the fall of richmond. but it was not worth the while of any american politician to alienate the irish vote, and most americans honestly thought, not without reason, that the policy of england in ireland had been abominable. to let sleeping dogs lie might be wise. once they were unchained, no american hand would help to chain them up again. froude, however, conceived that circumstances were unusually favourable. the irish church had been disestablished, and the fenian prisoners had been set free. the irish land act of had recognised the irish tenant's right to a partnership in the soil. although froude had no sympathy, ecclesiastical or political, with gladstone, he did think that the land act was a just and beneficent measure from which good would come. in the firm belief that he could vindicate the statesmanship of his own country before american audiences without sacrificing the paramount claims of truth and justice, he accepted the invitation. -- + table talk of shirley, p. . * table talk of shirley, p. . -- after a summer cruise in a big schooner with his friend lord ducie, whose hospitality at sea he often in coming years enjoyed, froude sailed from liverpool in the russia at the end of september, , with the distinguished physicist john tyndall. he was a good sailor, and loved a voyage. in his first letter to his wife from american soil he describes a storm with the delight of a schoolboy. "on saturday morning it blew so hard that it was scarcely possible to stand on deck. the wind and waves dead ahead, and the whole power of the engines only just able to move the ship against it. it was the grandest sight i ever witnessed--the splendid russia, steady as if she were on a railway, holding her straight course without yielding one point to the sea--up the long hill-sides of the waves and down into the troughs--the crests of the sea all round as far as the eye could reach in one wild whirl of foam and spray. it was worth coming into the atlantic to see--with the sense all the time of perfect security." froude's visit was in one respect well timed. president grant had just been assured of his second term, and even politicians had leisure to think of their famous guest. he was at once invited to a great banquet in new york, and found himself lodged with sumptuous hospitality in a luxurious hotel at the expense of the bureau which had organised the lectures. one newspaper quaintly described him as "looking like a scotch farmer, with an open frank face and calm mild eyes." his history was well known, for the scribners had sold a hundred and fifty thousand copies. his opinions were of course freely invited, and he did not hesitate to give them. "i talk much toryism to them all, and ridicule the idea of england's decay, or of our being in any danger of revolution; and with colonies and india and commerce, etc., i insist that we are just as big as they are, and have just as large a future before us." both froude and his hosts might have remembered with advantage disraeli's fine saying that great nations are those which produce great men. but the sensual idolatry of mere size is almost equally common on both sides of the atlantic. the banquet was given by froude's american publishers, the scribners, and his old acquaintance emerson was one of the company. another was a popular clergyman, henry ward beecher, and a third was the present ambassador of the united states in london, mr. whitelaw reid. in his speech froude referred to the object of his visit. he had heard at home that "one of the most prominent fenian leaders," o'donovan rossa, "was making a tour in the united states, dilating upon english tyranny and the wrongs of ireland." that froude should cross the seas to confute o'donovan rossa must have struck the audience as scarcely credible, until he explained his mission, for as such he regarded it, by asserting that "the judgment of america has more weight in ireland than twenty batteries of english cannon." when the irish had the management of their own affairs, he continued, the result was universal misery. they could not govern themselves in the sixteenth century; therefore they could not govern themselves in the nineteenth. if american opinion would only tell the irish that they had no longer any grievances which legislation could redress, the irish would believe it, and all would be well. though courteously treated as a representative englishman, froude had of course no official position, and he hoped that as a private individual his voice might be heard. but, while there were thousands of native americans who had no love for their irish fellow-citizens, there were very few indeed who cared to take up england's case against ireland. the democratic party were inclined to sympathise with home rule as being a mild form of secession, and the republican party did not see why ireland should be refused the qualified independence enjoyed by every state of the union. in these unfavourable circumstances froude delivered his first lecture. he made a good point when he described the irish peasant in munster or connaught looking to america as his natural protector. "there is not a lad," he exclaimed, "in an irish national school who does not pore over the maps of the states which hang on the walls, gaze on them with admiration and hope, and count the years till he too shall set his foot in those famous cities which float before his imagination like the gardens of aladdin." nevertheless he asked his hearers and readers to take it from him that ireland had no longer any good ground of complaint against the parliament of the united kingdom. independence she could not have, and that not because the interests of great britain forbade it, which would have been an intelligible argument, but because she was unfit for it herself. "if i were to sum up in one sentence the secret of ireland's misfortunes, i should say it lay in this: that while from the first she has resisted england, complained of england, appealed to heaven and earth against the wrongs which england has inflicted on her, she has ever invited others to help her, and has never herself made an effective fight for her own rights .... a majority of hustings votes might be found for a separation. the majority would be less considerable if instead of a voting-paper they were called to handle a rifle." to tell irishmen that they could obtain liberty by fighting for it, and would never get it in any other way, was not likely to conciliate them, or to promote the cause of peace. froude's appeal to american opinion, however, was more practical. "the irishman requires to be ruled, but ruled as all men ought to be, by the laws of right and wrong, laws which shall defend the weak from the strong and the poor from the rich. when the poor peasant is secured the reward of his own labour, and is no longer driven to the blunderbuss to save himself and his family from legalised robbery, if he prove incorrigible then, i will give him up. but the experiment remains to be made." an example had been set by gladstone in the land act, and that was the path which further legislation ought to follow. so far there would not be much disagreement between froude and most irish americans. rack-renting upon the tenants' improvements was the bane of irish agriculture, and the act of was precisely what froude described it, a partial antidote. then the lecturer reverted to ancient history, to the annals of the four masters, and the danish invasion. the audience found it rather long, and rather dull, even though dublin, wexford, waterford, cork, and limerick were all built by the danes. but a foundation had to be laid, and froude felt bound also to make it clear that he did not take the old whig view of government as a necessary evil, or swear by the "dismal science" of adam smith. he concluded his first lecture in words which at once defined his position and challenged the whole irish race. "it was not tyranny," he cried, "but negligence; it was not the intrusion of english authority, but the absence of all authority; it was that very leaving ireland to herself which she demands so passionately that was the cause of her wretchedness." after that it was hopeless to expect that he would have an impartial hearing. every irishman understood that the lecturer was an enemy, and was prepared not to read for instruction, but to look out for mistakes. an article in the new york tribune, which spoke of froude with admiration and esteem, told him plainly enough how it would be. "we have had historical lecturers before, but never any who essayed with such industry, learning, and eloquence to convince a nation that its sympathies for half a century at least have have been misplaced .... the thesis which he only partly set out for the night--that the misfortunes of ireland are rather due to the congenital qualities of the race than to wrongs inflicted by their conquerors--will excite earnest and perhaps bitter controversy." this prediction was abundantly fulfilled, and the controversy spoiled the tour. a friendly and sympathetic journalist questioned froude's "wisdom in coming before our people with this course of lectures on irish history ... we do not care for the domestic troubles of other nations, and it is a piece of impertinence to thrust them upon our attention. mr. froude knows perfectly well that england would resent, and rightfully, the least interference on our part with her irish policy or her irish subjects." in this criticism there is a large amount of common sense, and froude would have done well to think of it before. he was not, however, a man to be put down by clamour; he was sustained by the fervour of his convictions, and it was too late for remonstrance. his lectures had all been carefully prepared, and he went steadily on with them. the unusual charge of dullness, which had been made against some passages in his opening discourse, was never made again. the lectures became a leading topic of conversation, and a subject of fierce attack. without fear, and in defiance of his critics, he dashed into the reign of henry viii., "the english blue beard, whom i have been accused of attempting to whitewash." "i have no particular veneration for kings," he said. "the english liturgy speaks of them officially as most religious and gracious. they have been, i suppose, as religious and gracious as other men, neither more nor less. the chief difference is that we know more of kings than we know of other men." henry had a short way with absentees. he took away their irish estates, "and gave them to others who would reside and attend to their work. it would have been confiscation doubtless," beyond the power of american congress, though not of a british parliament. "if in later times there had been more such confiscations, ireland would not have been the worse for it." here, then, froude was on the side of the irish. here, as always, he was under the influence of carlyle. his ideal form of government was an enlightened despotism, with a ruler drawn after the pattern of children's story-books, who would punish the wicked and reward the good. froude never consciously defended injustice, or tampered with the truth. his faults were of the opposite kind. he could not help speaking out the whole truth as it appeared to him, without regard for time, place, or expediency. if he could have defended england without attacking ireland, all would have been well, but he could not do it. for his defence of england, stated simply, was that ireland had always been, and still remained, incapable of managing her own affairs. "free nations, gentlemen, are not made by playing at insurrection. if ireland desires to be a nation, she must learn not merely to shout for liberty, but to fight for it" against a bigger nation with a standing army in which many irishmen were enlisted. the irish are a sensitive as well as a generous race; and they feel taunts as much as more substantial wrongs. when the first british statesman of his time, not a roman catholic, nor, as the irish would have said, a catholic at all, had denounced the upas, or poison, tree of protestant ascendency, and had cut off its two principal branches, froude wasted his breath in telling the american irish, or the american people, that gladstone did not know what he was talking about. the irish church act, the irish land act, the release of the fenians, appealed to them as honest measures of justice and conciliation. there was nothing conciliatory in froude's language, and they did not think it just. from the purely historical point of view he had much to say for himself, as, for instance: "the papal cause in europe in the sixteenth century, take it for all in all, was the cause of stake and gibbet, inquisition, dungeons, and political tyranny. it did not lose its character because in ireland it assumed the accidental form of the defence of the freedom of opinion." perhaps not. ireland, for good or for evil, was connected with england, and when england was at war with the pope she was at war with him in ireland as elsewhere. the argument, however, is double- edged. the papal cause being no longer, for various reasons, the cause of stake and gibbet, how could there be the same ground for restricting freedom of opinion in ireland, for passing coercion acts, for refusing home rule? as froude himself said, "popery now has its teeth drawn. it can bark, but it can no longer bite." "the irish generally," he went on, "were rather superstitious than religious." these. are delicate distinctions. "the bishop of peterborough must understand," said john bright on a famous occasion, "that i believe in holy earth as little as he believes in holy water." elizabeth's irish policy was to take advantage of local factions, and to maintain english supremacy by setting them against each other. "the result was hideous. the forty-five glorious years of elizabeth were to ireland years of unremitting wretchedness." nobody could complain that froude spared the english government. if he had been writing history, or rather when he was writing it, the mutual treachery of the irish could not be passed over. "alas and shame for ireland," said froude in new york. "not then only, but many times before and after, the same plan [offer of pardon to murderous traitors] was tried, and was never known to fail. brother brought in the dripping head of brother, son of father, comrade of comrade. i pardon none, said an english commander, until they have imbued their hands in blood." the revival of such horrors on a public platform could serve no useful purpose. they could not be pleaded as an apology for england, and they inflamed, instead of soothing, the animosities which froude professed himself anxious to allay. yet he never lost sight of justice. on elizabeth he had no mercy. he made her responsible for the slaughter of men, women, and children by her officers, for first neglecting her duties as ruler, and then putting down rebellion by assassination. the plantation of ulster by 'james i., and the accompanying forfeiture of catholic estates, he defended on the ground that only the idle rich were dispossessed. this is of course socialism pure and simple. james i.'s own excuse was that tyrone and tyrconnell, who owned the greater part of ulster between them, had been implicated in the gunpowder plot. if they were, the loss of their lands was a very mild penalty indeed. on the rebellion of , which led to cromwell's terrible retribution, froude touched lightly. although the number of protestants who perished in the massacre has been exaggerated, the attempts of catholic historians to deny it, or explain it away, are futile. sir william petty's figure of , is as well authenticated as any. froude of course justifies cromwell for putting, eight years afterwards, the garrisons of drogheda and wexford to the sword. his characteristic intrepidity was never more fully shown than in these appeals to american opinion against the irish race and creed. unfortunately the practical result of them was the reverse of what he intended. he preached the gospel of force. thus he expressed it in reply to cromwell's critics: "i say frankly, that i believe the control of human things in this world is given to the strong, and those who cannot hold their own ground with all advantage on their side must bear the consequences of their weakness." the holy inquisition, might have used this language in italy or in spain. any tyrant might use it at any time. it was denied in anticipation by an older and higher authority than carlyle in the words "the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong." there is a better morality, if indeed there be a worse, than reverence for big battalions. sceptre and crown must topple down, and in the earth be equal made with the poor crooked scythe and spade; only the actions of the just smell sweet and blossom in their dust. froude seldom did things by halves, and his apology for cromwell is not half-hearted. he applauds the celebrated pronouncement, "i meddle with no man's conscience; but if you mean by liberty of conscience, liberty to have the mass, that will not be suffered where the parliament of england has power." a great deal has happened since cromwell's time, and the mass is no longer the symbol of intolerance, if only because the church of rome has no power to persecute. cromwell would have had a short shrift if he had fallen into the hands of mass-goers. to tolerate intolerance is a christian duty, and therefore possible for an individual. whether it was possible for the lord general in is a question hardly suited for popular treatment on a public platform. all that he did was right in froude's eyes, including the prescription of "hell or connaught" for "the men whose trade was fighting, who had called themselves lords of the soil," and the abolition of the irish parliament. "i as an englishman," said froude, "honour cromwell and glory in him as the greatest statesman and soldier our race has produced. in the matter we have now in hand i consider him to have been the best friend, in the best sense, to all that was good in ireland." this is of course an opinion which can honestly be held. but to the irish race all over the world such language is an irritating defiance, and they simply would not listen to any man who used it. the expulsion of presbyterians under charles ii. was foolish as well as cruel, for it deprived the english government in ireland of their best friends, and supplied the american colonies with some of their staunchest soldiers in the war of independence. enough were left, however, to immortalise the siege of derry, while the native irish failed to distinguish themselves, or, in plain english, ran away, at the battle of the boyne, and the defeat of james ii. was recognised by the treaty of limerick. an exclusively protestant, parliament was accompanied by such toleration as the catholics had enjoyed under charles ii. the infamous law against the irish trade in wool and the episcopal persecution of nonconformists, were condemned in just and forcible terms by froude. episcopal shortcomings seldom escaped his vigilant eye. "i believe," he said, "bishops have produced more mischief in this world than any class of officials that have ever been invented." the petition of the irish parliament for union with england in was refused, madly refused, froude thought; protestant dissenters were treated as harshly as catholics, and the commercial regulations of the eighteenth century were such that smuggling thrived better than any other trade. the country was pillaged by absent landlords, and "the mere hint of an absentee tax was sufficient to throw the younger pitt into convulsions." the irish protestant bishops provoked the savage satire of swift, who doubted not that excellent men had been appointed, and only deplored that they should be personated by scoundrels who had murdered them on hounslow heath. these lectures stung the irish to the quick, and gave much embarrassment to froude's american friends. the irish found a powerful champion in father burke, the dominican friar, who had been a popular preacher at rome, and with an audience of his own catholic countrymen was irresistible. burke was not a well informed man, and his knowledge of history was derived from catholic handbooks. but the occasion did not call for dry facts. froude had not been passionless, and what the irish wanted in reply was the rhetorical eloquence which to the father was second nature. burke, however, had the good taste and good sense to acknowledge that froude suffered from nothing worse than the invincible prejudice which all catholics attribute to all protestants. as a protestant and an englishman, froude could not be expected to give such a history of ireland as would be agreeable to irishmen. "yet to the honour of this learned gentleman be it said that he frankly avows the injuries which have been done, and that he comes nearer than any man whom i have ever heard to the real root of the remedy to be applied to these evils." when his handling of documentary evidence was criticised, froude repeated his challenge to the editor of the saturday review, which had never been taken up, and on that point the american sense of fair play gave judgment in his favour. but how was public opinion to pronounce upon such a subject as the alleged bull of adrian ii., granting ireland to henry ii of england? the bull was not in existence, and burke boldly denied that it had ever existed at all. froude maintained that its existence and its nature were proved by later bulls of succeeding popes. the matter had no interest for protestants, and the american press regarded it as a bore. burke had more success with the rebellion of , and the cromwellian massacres of such . such topics cannot be exhaustively treated in part of a single lecture, and burke could not be expected to put the slaughter of true believers on a level with irregular justice roughly wreaked upon heretics. the combat was not so much unequal as impossible. there was no common groud. froude could be fair to an eminent especially if he were a protestant. his panegyric on grattan deserves to be quoted alike for its eloquence and its justice. "in those singular labyrinths of intrigue and treachery," meaning the secret correspondence at the castle, "i have found irishmen whose names stand fair enough in patriotic history concerned in transactions that show them knaves and scoundrels; but i never found stain nor shadow of stain on the reputation of henry grattan. i say nothing of the temptations to which he was exposed. there were no honours with which england would not have decorated him; there was no price so high that england would not have paid to have silenced or subsidised him. he was one of those perfectly disinterested men who do not feel temptations of this kind. they passed by him and over him without giving him even the pains to turn his back on them. in every step of his life he was governed simply and fairly by what he conceived to be the interest of his country." grattan's parliament, as we all know, nearly perished in a dispute about the regency, and finally disappeared after the rebellion of . it gave the catholics votes in , though no catholic ever sat within its walls. grattan, according to froude, was led astray by the "delirium of nationality," and the true irish statesman of his time was chancellor fitzgibbon, lord clare, whose name is only less abhorred by irish nationalists than cromwell's own. americans did not think nationality a delirium, and their ideal of statesmanship was not represented by lord clare. the fifth and last of froude's american lectures was reprinted in short studies with the title of "ireland since the union."* it has a closer bearing upon current politics than the others, and it runs counter to american as well as to irish sentiment. "suppose in any community two-thirds who are cowards vote one way, and the remaining third will not only vote, but fight the other way." the argument has often been used against woman's suffrage. one obvious answer is that women, like men, would vote on different sides. in a community where two-thirds of the adult male population were cowards problems of government would doubtless assume a secondary importance, and that there are limits to the power of majorities no sane constitutionalist denies. -- * vol. ii. pp, - . -- short of making carlyle dictator of the universe, froude suggested no alternative to the ballot-box of civilised life. this last lecture, however, is chiefly remarkable for the rare tribute which it pays to the services of the catholic priesthood. father burke himself must have been melted when he read, "ireland is one of the poorest countries in europe. there is less theft, less cheating, less house-breaking, less robbery of all sorts, than in any country of the same size in the world. in the wild district where i lived we slept with unlocked door and open windows, with as much security as if we had been--i will not say in london or new york, i should be sorry to try the experiment in either place: i will say as if we had been among the saints in paradise. in the sixteenth century the irish were notoriously regardless of what is technically morality. for the last hundred years at least impurity has been almost unknown in ireland. and this absence of vulgar crime, and this exceptional delicacy and modesty of character, are due alike, to their ever- lasting honour, to the influence of the catholic clergy." that is the testimony of an opponent, and it is emphatic testimony indeed. to o'connell froude is again conspicuously unjust, and his remark that "a few attacks on handfuls of the police, or the blowing in of the walls of an english prison . . . will not overturn an empire" is open to the observation that they disestablished a church. when froude came to practical politics, he always seemed to be "moving about in worlds not realised." his statement that national education in ireland was the best that existed in any part of the empire almost takes one's breath away, and the idea that no irish legislature would have passed the land act is a strange fantasy indeed. whether an irish parliament could be trusted to deal fairly by the landlords is an open question. that it would fail to consider the interests of the tenants is unthinkable. froude was on much firmer ground when he employed the case of protestant ulster, the ulster of the plantation, as an argument against home rule. those protestants would, he said, fight rather than submit to a catholic majority, and england could not assent to shooting them down. there is only one real answer to this objection, and that is that protestant ulster would do nothing of the kind. a logical method of reconciling contradictory prophecies has never been found. in home rule had no support in england, and even in ireland the electors were pretty equally divided. froude did not lay hold of the american mind, as he might have done, by showing the inapplicability of the federal system which suits the united states to the circumstances of the united kingdom. the impression made by froude upon his audiences in new york is graphically described by an american reporter. "mr. froude improved very much in delivery and manner during this course of lectures .... in his earlier lectures his ways were awkward, his speech was too rapid, and he did not know what in world to do with his hands. it was quite to see him run them under his coat tails, spread them across his shirt front, stick them in his breeches pockets, twirl them in the arm-holes his vest, or hold them behind his back. he has now found out how to dispose of them in a more or less natural way. his delivery is less rapid, his voice better modulated, and his enunciation more distinct .... one of his most effective peculiarities, in inviting the attention of his hearers, is the exceeding earnestness of the manner of his address. this earnestness is not like that of rant. it is the result of his own strong conviction and his desire to impress others." that is a fair and unprejudiced estimate of froude as he appeared to a trained observer who took neither side in the dispute. many irishmen shook hands with him, and thanked him for his plain speaking. bret harte told him that even those who dissented most widely from his opinions admired his "grit." but politicians had to think of the irish vote, and the proprietors of newspapers could not ignore their catholic subscribers. the priests worked against him with such effect that mr. peabody's servants in boston, who were irish catholics, threatened to leave their places if froude remained as a guest in their master's house. father burke, who had begun politely enough, became obstreperous and abusive. froude's life was in danger, and he was put under the special protection of the police. the english newspapers, except the pall mall gazette, gave him no support, and the times treated his enterprise as quixotic. a preposterous rumour that he received payment from the british ministry obtained circulation among respectable persons in new york. he had intended to visit the western states, but the project was abandoned in consequence of growing irish hostility which made him feel that further effort would be useless. it was not that he thought his arguments refuted, or capable of refutation. he had considered them too long, and too carefully, for that. but the well had been poisoned. the malicious imputation of bribery was caught up by the more credulous irish, and their priests warned them that they would do wrong in listening to a heretic. as for the american people, they had no mind to take up the quarrel. it was no business of theirs. some extracts from froude's letters to his wife will show how much he enjoyed american hospitality, and how far he appreciated american character. "i was received on saturday," he wrote from new york on the th of october, , "as a member of the lotus club--the wits and journalists of new york. it was the strangest scene i ever was present at. they were very clever--very witty at each other's expense, very complimentary to me; and, believe me, they worked the publishers who were present for the profit they were making out of me." he was agreeably surprised by the merchant princes of new york. "there is absolutely no vulgarity about them. they are immensely rich, but simple, and rather elaborately 'religious' in the forms of their lives. a very long grace is always said before dinner. in this and many ways they are totally unlike what i expected." again, after a description of cornell's university, he says, "there is mr. cornell, who has made all this, living in a little poky house in a street with a couple of maids, his wife and daughters dressed in the homeliest manner. his name will be remembered for centuries as having spent his wealth in the very best institutions on which a country's prosperity depends. our people spend their fortunes in buying great landed estates to found and perpetuate their own family. i wonder which name will last the longest, mr. cornell's or lord overstone's." "there is no such thing," he says elsewhere, "as founding a family, and those who save good fortunes have to give them to the public when they die for want of a better use to put them to." with sincerely religious people, especially if they were evangelicals, froude felt deep sympathy. patronage of religion he detested, most of all the form of it which prescribes religion for other people. an american philosopher called, and told him that, having failed to find a new creed, he thought the old superstitions had better be kept up, popery for choice. "this," remarks froude, "is what i call want of faith. if you can believe that what you are convinced is a lie may nevertheless exert a wholesome moral influence on people, and that, whether true or not, or rather though certainly not true, it is good to be preserved and taken up with, you are to all practical purposes an atheist." while he was at boston froude saw a great fire, and his description of it is hardly inferior to the best things in his best books. he was staying with george peabody, equally well known in england and the united states as a philanthropist, "one of the sweetest and gentlest of beings." "as we were sitting after dinner, the children said there was a fire somewhere. they heard the alarm bell, and saw a red light in the sky. presently we saw flames. mr. peabody was uneasy, and i walked out with him to see. between the house here and the town lies the common or city park. as we crossed this, the signs became more ominous. we made our way into the principal street through the crowd, and then, looking down a cross street full of enormous warehouses, saw both sides of it in flames. the streets were full of steam fire-engines, all roaring and playing, but the houses were so high and large, and the volumes of fire so prodigious, that their water-jets looked like so many squirts. as we stood, we saw the fire grow. block caught after block. i myself saw one magnificent store catch at the lower windows. in a few seconds the flame ran up storey after storey, spouting out at the different landings as it rose. it reached the roof with a spring, and the place was gone. there was nothing to stop it. our people were sure that it would be another chicago. the night was fine and frosty, with a light north-easterly breeze against which the fire was advancing. we stayed an hour or two. there seemed no danger for mr. peabody's bank. he was evidently, however, extremely harassed and anxious, as he held the bonds of innumerable merchants whose property was being destroyed. i thought i was in his way, and left him, and came home to tell the family what was going on. after i left the fire travelled faster than ever. huge rolls of smoke swelled up fold after fold. the under folds crimson and glowing yellow from the flames below, sparks flying up like rocket stars. a petroleum store caught, and the flames ran about in rivers, and above all the steel blue moon shone through the rents of the rolling vapour, and the stars with an intensity of brilliant calm such as we never see in england. it was a night to be eternally remembered." a great many irish families were made homeless by this fire, and froude subscribed seven hundred dollars for their relief, thereby encouraging the rumour that he was in the pay of the british minister whom he disliked and distrusted most. froude's final view of america and americans was in some respects less favourable than his first impressions. he was struck by the difference between their public and private treatment of himself, between their conversation and the articles in their press. "from what i see of the eastern states i do not anticipate any very great things as likely to come out of the americans. their physical frames seem hung together rather than organically grown .... they are generous with their money, have much tenderness and quiet good feeling; but the anglo- saxon power is running to seed, and i don't think will revive. puritanism is dead, and the collected sternness of temperament which belonged to it is dead also." this language seems strange, written as it was only seven years after the great war. froude, however, considered that there was much hysterical passion in the policy of the north, and he shared carlyle's dislike of democratic institutions. moreover, he was disappointed with the result of his mission. the case seemed so clear to him that he could not understand why it should seem less clear to others. he believed that if the priests could have been driven out of ireland by william of orange, the more fanatical catholics would have followed them, and ireland would have become prosperous, contented, and loyal. to an american republican such ideas were as repugnant as they were to an irish catholic. an american could understand the argument that home rule was impracticable, because a federal constitution did not apply to the circumstances of the united kingdom. he would not readily believe that the irish were by nature incapable of self-government, or that englishmen must know better what was good for them than they knew themselves. for cromwell he could make allowance. the protector had to deal with a catholicism which would have made an end of him and restored charles ii. but times had changed. catholics had abandoned persecution, and ought not to be punished the sins of their fathers. the irish did not claim, as the southern states had claimed, the right to secede, but to exercise the powers inherent in every state of the american union. carlyle warmly approved of froude's undertaking, and persisted in believing that it had done good by forcing the american public to see that there were two sides to the historic question, an english side as well as an irish one. he was so far right, and with that qualified success froude had to be content. his champion, whose opinion was more to him than any other, than any number of others, wrote to mrs. froude on the th of december, : "the rest of the affair, all that loud whirlwind of bully burke, saturday review and co., both at home and abroad, i take to be, in essence, absolutely nothing; and to deserve from him no more regard than the barking of dogs, or the braying of asses. he may depend on it, what he is saying about ireland is the genuine truth, or the nearest to it that has ever been said by any person whatever; and i hope he knows long ere this (if he likes to consider it) that the truth alone is anything, and all the circumambient balderdash and whirlwinds of nonsense tumbling round it are, and eternally remain, nothing. tell him i have read his book, and know others that have read it with attention; and that their and my clear opinion is as above. to myself there is a ring in it as of clear steel; and my prophecy is that all the roaring blockheads of the world cannot prevent its natural effect on human souls. sooner or later all persons will have to believe it." carlyle seldom qualified his approval, and his earnest advocacy was to froude a recompense beyond all price. the first volume of froude's english in ireland in the eighteenth century, to which carlyle refers, had been published at home while the author was lecturing on the irish question to the people of the united states. like the lectures, on a more thorough and comprehensive scale, it is a bold indictment of the irish nation. froude could not write without a purpose, nor forget that he was an englishman and a protestant. before he had finished a single chapter of his new book he had stated in uncompromising language his opinion of the irish race. "passionate in everything--passionate in their patriotism, passionate in their religion, passionately courageous, passionately loyal and affectionate--they are without the manliness which would give strength and solidity to the sentimental part of their dispositions; while the surface and show is so seductive and winning that only experience of its instability can resist its charm."* such summary judgments are seldom accurate. every one must be acquainted with individual irishmen who do not correspond with froude's general description. nor does froude always take into account the shrewdness, the humour, the genius for politics, which have distinguished irishmen throughout the world. impressed with this view of the irish character, he held that forbearance in dealing with irish rebellions was misplaced, that irishmen respected only an authority with which they durst not trifle, and that universal confiscation should have followed the defeat of shan o'neill. -- * vol. i, pp. , , -- these, however, were preliminary matters. when he came to the eighteenth century froude had to consider details, and here his prejudice against catholicism led him astray. in the reign of george ii. acts of lawless violence were not uncommon on this side of the channel, and richardson's clarissa was read with a credulity which showed that abduction could be committed without being followed by punishment. in parts of ireland it was not an infrequent offence, and froude collected some abominable cases, which he described in his picturesque way.* as examples of disregard for humanity, and contempt for law, he was fully justified in citing them. but he endeavoured to throw responsibility for these outrages on the roman catholic church. "young gentlemen," he says, "of the catholic persuasion were in the habit of recovering equivalents for the lands of which they considered themselves to have been robbed, and of recovering souls at the same time by carrying off young protestant girls of fortune to the mountains, ravishing them with the most exquisite brutality, and then compelling them to go through a form of marriage, which a priest was always in attendance ready to celebrate."+ this is a very serious charge, perhaps as serious a charge as could well be made against a religious communion. it was an accusation improbable on the face of it; for while the church of rome in the course of her strange, eventful history has tampered with the sixth commandment, as protestants call it, she has never underrated the virtue of chastity, and has always proclaimed a high standard of sexual morals. in his zeal to justify the penal laws against catholics froude accepted without sufficient inquiry evidence which could only have satisfied one willing to believe the worst. -- * english in ireland, vol. i. pp. - . + ibid., p. . -- several years afterwards, in , the subject was fully discussed, and froude's conclusions were shown to be unsound, by another historian, william edward hartpole lecky. lecky was a much more formidable critic than freeman. calm in temperament and moderate in language, he could take part in an historical controversy without getting into a rage. freeman, after pages of mere abuse, would pounce with triumphant ejaculations upon a misprint. lecky did not waste his time either on scolding or on trifles. the faults he found were grave, and his censure was not the less severe for being decorous. an anglicised irishman, living in england, though a graduate of dublin university, lecky became known when he was a very young man for a brilliant little book on leaders of irish opinion. he had since published mature and valuable histories of rationalism, and of morals. his history of england in the eighteenth century is likely to remain a standard book, being written with fairness, lucidity, and candour. it is true that in his irish chapters, with which alone i am concerned, lecky, like froude, wrote with a purpose. he was an irish patriot, and bent on making out the best possible case for his own country. at the same time he was, for an irishman, singularly impartial between catholic and protestant, leaning, if at all, to the protestant side. yet he repudiated with indignant vehemence froude's attempt to connect the catholic church with these atrocious crimes. i am bound to say that i think he disproves the charge of ecclesiastical complicity. the evidence upon which froude relied, the only evidence accessible, is the collection of presentments by grand juries, with the accompanying depositions, in dublin castle. in the first sixty years of the eighteenth century there were twenty-eight cases of abduction thus recorded. in only four of them can it be shown that the perpetrator was a catholic and the victim a protestant. in only one, which froude has described at much length, did the criminal try to make a protestant girl attend mass. for one of the cases, which according to froude went unpunished, two men were hanged. "the truth is," says lecky, "that the crime was merely the natural product of a state of great lawlessness and barbarism."* these offences have so completely disappeared from ireland that even the memory of them has perished, and yet ireland remains as catholic as ever. arthur young, who denounces them as scandalous to a civilised community, does not hint that they had anything to do with religion, nor were they ever cited in defence of the penal code. froude was led astray by religious prejudice, and forgot for once the historian in the advocate. the penal codes were rather the cause than the effect of crime and outrage in ireland. by setting authority on one side, and popular religion on the other, they made a breach of the law a pious and meritorious act. the bane of english rule in ireland at that time was the treatment of catholics as enemies, and the, charter schools which froude praises were employed for the purpose of alienating children from the faith of their parents. this mean and paltry persecution strengthened instead of weakening the roman catholic church. -- * england in the eighteenth century, ii. . -- meanwhile froude continued his history, and by the beginning of the year had brought it down to the union, with which it concludes. no more unsparing indictment of a nation has ever been drawn. except lord clare, and the orange lodges, formed after the battle of the diamond, scarcely an irishman or an irish institution spared. grattan's parliament, though it did contain a single catholic, is condemned because it gave the catholics votes in . the recall of lord fitzwilliam, an englishman and a protestant, in , is justified because he was in favour of emancipation. flood and curran are treated with disdain. burke, though he was no more a catholic than froude himself, is told that he was not a true protestant, and did not understand his own countrymen. sir ralph abercrombie was possessed with an "evil spirit," because he urged that rebels should not be punished by soldiers without the sanction of the civil magistrate. his successor, general lake, who was responsible for pitch-caps, receives a gentle, a very gentle, reprimand. "the united irishmen had affected the fashion of short hair. the loyalists called them croppies, and if a croppy prisoner stood silent when it was certain [without a trial] that he could confess with effect, paper or linen caps smeared with pitch were forced upon his head to bring him to his senses. such things ought not to have been, and such things would not have been had general lake been supplied with english troops, but assassins and their accomplices will not always be delicately handled by those whose lives they have threatened occasionally. not a few men suffered who were innocent, so far as no definite guilt could be proved against them. at such times, however, those who are not actively loyal lie in the borderland of just suspicion."* that all irish catholics were guilty unless they could prove themselves to be innocent is a proposition which cannot be openly maintained, and vitiates history if it be tacitly assumed. froude honestly and sincerely believed that the irish people were unfit for representative government. he compares the irish rebellion of with the indian mutiny of , and suggests that ireland should have been treated like oude. lord moira, known afterwards as lord hastings, and governor-general of india, is called a traitor because he sympathised with the aspirations of his countrymen. lord cornwallis is severely censured for endeavouring to infuse a spirit of moderation into the executive after the rebellion had been put down. what cornwallis thought of the means by which the union was carried is well known. "i long," he said in "to kick those whom my public duty obliges me to court. my occupation is to negociate and job with the most corrupt people under heaven. i despise and hate myself every hour for engaging in such dirty work, and am supported only by the reflection that without a union the british empire must be dissolved." that is the real case for the union, which could not be better stated than cornwallis has stated it. carried by corrupt means as it was, it might have met with gradual acquiescence if only it had been accompanied, as pitt meant to accompany it, by catholic emancipation. on this point froude goes all lengths with george iii., whose hatred of catholicism was not greater than his own. in the development of his theory, he was courageous and consistent. he struck at great names, denouncing "the persevering disloyalty of the liberal party, in both houses of the english legislature," including fox, sheridan, tierney, holland, the dukes of bedford and norfolk, who dared to propose a policy of conciliation with ireland, as burke had proposed it with the american colonies. even pitt does not come up to froude's standard, for pitt removed lord camden, and sent out lord cornwallis. -- * english in ireland, iii. . -- it is no disqualification for an historian to hold definite views, which, if he holds them, it must surely be his duty to express. the fault of the english in ireland is to overstate the case, to make it appear that there was no ground for rebellion in , and no objection to union in . the whole book is written on the supposition that the irish are an inferior race and catholicism an inferior religion. so far as religion was concerned, lecky did not disagree with froude. but either because he was an irishman, or because he had a judicial mind, he could see the necessity of understanding what irish catholics aimed at before passing judgment upon them. froude could never get out of his mind the approval of treason and assassination to which in the sixteenth century the vatican was committed. it may be fascinating polemics to taunt the church of rome with being "always the same." but as a matter of fact the church is not the same. it improves with the general march of the progress that it condemns. froude fairly and honourably quotes a crucial instance. pitt "sought the opinion of the universities of france and spain on the charge generally alleged against catholics that their allegiance to their sovereign was subordinate to their allegiance to the pope; that they held that heretics might lawfully be put to death, and that no faith was to be kept with them. the universities had unanimously disavowed doctrines which they declared at once inhuman and unchristian, and on the strength of the disavowal the british parliament repealed the penal acts of william for england and scotland, restored to the catholics the free use of their chapels, and readmitted them to the magistracy." toleration was extended to ireland by giving the franchise to catholics, and complete emancipation might have followed but for the interference of the king, which involved the recall of lord fitzwilliam. to prevent that calamitous measure no one worked harder than edmund burke, whose religion was as rational as his patriotism was sincere. in the last of his published letters, written to sir hercules langrishe, in the year before the rebellion, the year of his own death, he said that "ireland, locally, civilly, and commercially independent, ought politically to look up to great britain in all matters of peace or war; in all those points to be guided by her: and in a word, with her to live and to die." "at bottom," he added, "ireland has no other choice; i mean no other rational choice." to a parliamentary union accompanied by emancipation burke might have been brought by the rebellion. protestant ascendency as understood in his time he would always have repudiated, if only because it furnished recruits to the jacobinism which he loathed more than anything else in the world. he even denied that there was such a thing as the protestant religion. the difference between protestantism and catholicism was, he said, a negative, and out of a negative no religion could be made. to persecute people for believing too much was even more preposterous than to persecute them for believing too little. protestant ascendency was social ascendency, and had no motive so respectable as bigotry behind it. burke never conceived the possibility of disestablishing the irish church, or even of curtailing its emoluments. he would have been satisfied with a parliament from which catholics were not excluded. froude brushed almost contemptuously aside the theories of an illustrious irishman, the first political writer of his age, and an almost fanatical enemy of revolution. genius apart, burke was peculiarly well qualified to form an opinion. he knew england as well as ireland; and imperial as his conceptions were, they never extinguished his love for the land of his birth. he was himself a member of the established church, and a firm supporter of her connection with the state. but his wife was a roman catholic, and for the old faith he had a sympathetic respect. for the french directory, with which wolfe tone was associated, he felt a passionate hatred of which he has left a monument more durable than brass in the reflections on the french revolution, and the letters on a regicide peace. he worshipped the british constitution with the unquestioning fervour of a devotee, and he had been attacked by the new whigs in parliament as the recipient of a pension from the king. the old whigs, his whigs, had coalesced with pitt, and the chief fault he found with the government was that it did not carry on the french war with sufficient vigour. that burke should have retained his calmness of mind in writing of ireland when he lost it in writing of all other subjects is a curious circumstance, but it is a circumstance which entitles him to peculiar attention from the irish historian. burke was no oracle of irish revolutionists. their hero was his critic, tom paine. yet froude says that when burke "took up the irish cause at last in earnest, it was with a brain which the french revolution had deranged, and his interference became infinitely mischievous."* as a matter of fact, his interference after had no result at all. so far as the french revolution modified his ideas, it made them more conservative than ever, and his object in preaching the conciliation of catholics was to deter them from revolutionary methods. -- * english in ireland, ii. , . -- but burke, like grattan, was an irishman, and therefore not to be trusted. if he had been an englishman, or if he had gloried in the name of protestant, froude's eyes would have been opened, and he would have seen burke's incomparable superiority to lord clare as a just interpreter of events. froude looked at the rebellion and the union from an orange lodge, and his book is really an orange manifesto. such works have their purpose, and froude's is an unusually eloquent specimen of its class; but they are not history, any more than the speech of lord clare on the union, or the diary of wolfe tone. froude does not explain, nor seem to understand, what the supporters of the irish legislature meant. speaker foster said that the whole unbribed intellect of ireland was against the union. foster was the last speaker in the irish house of commons. he had been elected in against the "patriot" ponsonby, and was opposed to the catholic franchise in . he was a man of unblemished character, and in a position where he could not afford to talk nonsense. yet, if froude were right, nonsense he must have talked. cornwallis, an englishman, corroborates foster; cornwallis is disregarded. "all that was best and noblest in ireland" was gathered into the orange association, which has been the plague of every irish government since the union. froude's model sovereign of ireland, as of england, was george iii., who ordered that in a catholic country "a sharp eye should be kept on papists," and would doubtless have joined an orange lodge himself if he had been an irishman and a subject. the english in ireland is reported to have been parnell's favourite book. it made him, he said, a home ruler because it exposed the iniquities of the english government. this was not froude's principal object, but the testimony to his truthfulness is all the more striking on that account. gladstone, who quoted from the english in ireland when he introduced his land purchase bill in , paid a just tribute to the "truth and honour" of the writer. if it be once granted that the irish are a subject race, that the catholic faith is a degrading superstition, and that ireland is only saved from ruin by her english or scottish settlers, froude's book deserves little but praise. although he did not study for it as he studied for his history of england he read and copied a large number of state papers, with a great mass of official correspondence. freeman would have been appalled at the idea of such research as froude made in dublin, and at the record office in london. but the scope of his book, and the thesis he was to develop, had formed themselves in his mind before he began. he was to vindicate the protestant cause in ireland, and to his own satisfaction he vindicated it. if i may apply a phrase coined many years afterwards, froude assumed that irish catholics had taken a double dose of original sin. he always found in them enough vice to account for any persecution of which they might be the victims. just as he could not write of kerry without imputing failure and instability to o'connell, so he could not write about ireland without traducing the leaders of irish opinion. they might be protestants themselves; but they had catholics for their followers, and that was enough. it was enough for carlyle also, and to attack froude's historical reputation is to attack carlyle's. "i have read," carlyle wrote on the th of june, , "all your book carefully over again, and continue to think of it not less but rather more favourably than ever: a few little phrases and touches you might perhaps alter with advantage; and the want of a copious, carefully weighed concluding chapter is more sensible to me than ever; but the substance of the book is genuine truth, and the utterance of it is clear, sharp, smiting, and decisive, like a shining damascus sabre; i never doubted or doubt but its effect will be great and lasting. no criticism have i seen since you went away that was worth notice. poor lecky is weak as water--bilge-water with a drop of formic acid in it: unfortunate lecky, he is wedded to his irish idols; let him alone." the reference to lecky, as unfair as it is amusing, was provoked by a review of froude in macmillan's magazine. there are worse idols than burke, or even grattan, and lecky was an irishman after all. a very different critic from carlyle expressed an equally favourable opinion. "i have an interesting letter," froude wrote to his friend lady derby, formerly lady salisbury, "from bancroft the historian (american minister at berlin) on the irish book. he, i am happy to say, accepts the view which i wished to impress on the americans, and he has sent me some curious correspondence from the french foreign office illustrating and confirming one of my points. one evening last summer i met lady salisbury,* and told her my opinion of lord clare. she dissented with characteristic emphasis--and she is not a lady who can easily be moved from her judgments. still, if she finds time to read the book i should like to hear that she can recognise the merits as well as the demerits of a statesman who, in the former at least, so nearly resembled her husband." -- * the wife of the late prime minister. -- in another letter he says: "the meaning of the book as a whole is to show to what comes of forcing uncongenial institutions on a country to which they are unsuited. if we had governed ireland as we govern india, there would have been no confiscation, no persecution of religion, and consequently none of the reasons for disloyalty. having chosen to set parliament and an established church, and to the lands of the old owners, we left nothing undone to spoil the chances of success with the experiment." froude went to the united states with no very exalted opinion of the irish; he returned with the lowest possible. "like all irish patriots," including grattan, wolfe tone "would have accepted greedily any tolerable appointment from the government which he had been execrating." the subsequent history of ireland has scarcely justified this sweeping invective. "there are persons who believe that if the king had not interfered with lord fitzwilliam, the irish catholics would have accepted gratefully the religious equality which he was prepared to offer them, and would have remained thenceforward for all time contented citizens of the british empire." so reasonable a theory requires more convincing refutation than a simple statement that it is "incredible." incredible, no doubt, if the catholics of ireland were wild beasts, cringing under the whip, ferocious when released from restraint. very credible indeed if irish catholics in were like other people, asking for justice, and not expecting an impossible ascendency. interesting as froude's narrative is, it becomes, when read together with lecky's, more interesting still. though indignant with froude's aspersions upon the irish race, lecky did not allow himself to be hurried. he was writing a history of england as well as of ireland, and the irish chapters had to wait their turn. in froude's book there are signs of haste; in lecky's there are none. without the brilliancy and the eloquence which distinguished froude, lecky had a power of marshalling facts that gave to each of them its proper value. no human being is without prejudice. but lecky was curiously unlike the typical irishman of froude's imagination. he has written what is by general acknowledgment the fairest account of the irish rebellion, and of the union to which it led. of the eight volumes which compose his history of england in the eighteenth century, two, the seventh and eighth, are devoted exclusively to ireland. after the publication of his first two volumes he made no direct reference to froude, and contented himself with his own independent narrative. he vindicated the conduct of lord fitzwilliam, and traced to his recall in the desperate courses adopted by irish catholics. he showed that froude had been unjust to the whigs who gave evidence for arthur o'connor at maidstone in , and especially to grattan. that o'connor was engaged in treasonable correspondence with france there can be no doubt now. but he did not tell his secrets to his whig friends, and what grattan said of his never having heard o'connor talk about a french invasion was undoubtedly true.* froude's hatred of the english whigs almost equalled his contempt for the irish catholics, and the two feelings prevented him from writing anything like an narrative either of the rebellion or of the union. no other book of his shows such evident traces of having been written under the influence of carlyle. carlyle's horror of democracy, worship of force, his belief that martial law was the law of almighty god, and that cruelty might always be perpetrated on the right side, are conspicuously displayed. if froude spoke of the roman catholic church, he always seemed to fancy himself back in the sixteenth century, when the murder of protestants was regarded at the vatican as justifiable. the irish rebellion of was led by protestants, like lord edward fitzgerald, and free thinkers, like wolfe tone. but for the recall of lord fitzwilliam, the catholics would have taken no part in it, and it would not have been more dangerous than the rebellion of . such at least was lecky's opinion, supported by weighty arguments, and by facts which cannot be denied. if froude's reputation as an historian depended upon his english in ireland, it certainly would not stand high. of course he had as much right to put the english case as father burke had to put the irish one. but his responsibility was far greater, and his splendid talents might have been better employed than in reviving the mutual animosities of religion or of race. -- * see froude's english in ireland, vol. iii. pp. , ; lecky's history of england, vol. viii. p. . -- when lecky reviewed, with much critical asperity, the last two volumes of froude's english in ireland for macmillan's magazine* he referred to home rule as a moderate and constitutional movement. his own history was not completed till . but when gladstone introduced his first home rule bill, in , lecky opposed it as strongly as froude himself. lecky was quite logical, for the question whether the union had been wisely or legitimately carried had very little to do with the expedience of repealing it. fieri non debuit, factum valet, may be common sense as well as good law. but froude was not unnaturally triumphant to find his old antagonist in irish matters on his side, especially as freeman was a home ruler. froude's attitude was never for a moment doubtful. he had always held that the irish people were quite unfitted for self-government, and of all english statesmen gladstone was the one he trusted least. he had a theory that great orators were always wrong, even when, like pitt and fox, they were on opposite sides. gladstone he doubly repudiated as a high churchman and a democrat. yet, with more candour than consistency, he always declared that gladstone was the english statesman who best understood the irish land question, and so he plainly told the liberal unionists, speaking as one of themselves. he had praised henry viii for confiscating the irish estates of absentees, and taunted pitt with his unreasoning horror of an absentee tax. he would have given the irish people almost everything rather than allow them to do anything for themselves. in he brought out another edition of his irish book, with a new chapter on the crisis. the intervening years had made no difference in his estimate of ireland, or of irishmen. o'connell, who had nothing to do with the politics of the eighteenth century, was "not sincere about repeal," although he "forced the whigs to give him whatever he might please to ask for,"+ and he certainly asked for that. -- * june, . + english in ireland, , vol. iii. p. . -- that catholic emancipation was useless and mischievous, froude never ceased to declare. he would have dragooned the irish into protestantism and made the three catholic provinces into a crown colony. the irish establishment he regretted as a badge of protestant ascendency. but he was a dangerous ally for unionists. that the government of ireland by what he called a protestant parliament sitting at westminister, meaning the parliament of the united kingdom, had failed, he not merely admitted, but loudly proclaimed. it had failed "more signally, and more disgracefully," than any other system, because gladstone admitted that fenian outrages precipitated legislative reforms. the alternative was to rule ireland, or let her be free, and altogether separate from great britain. neither branch of the supposed alternative was within the range of practical politics. but on one point froude unconsciously anticipated the immediate future. "the remedy" for the agrarian troubles of ireland was, he said, "the establishment of courts to which the tenant might appeal." the ink of this sentence was scarcely dry when the irish land bill of appeared with that very provision. froude was always ready and willing to promote the material benefit of ireland. irishmen, except the protestant population of ulster, were children to be treated with firmness and kindness, the truest kindness being never to let them have their own way. chapter vii south africa before froude had written the last chapter of the english in ireland he was visited by the greatest sorrow of his life. mrs. froude died suddenly in february, . it had been a perfect marriage, and he never enjoyed the same happiness afterwards. carlyle and his faithful friend fitzjames stephen were the only persons he could see at first, though he manfully completed the book on which he was engaged. it was long before he rallied from the shock, and he felt as if he could never write again. he dreaded "the length of years which might yet lie ahead of him before he could have his discharge from service." he took a melancholy pride in noting that none of the reviewers discovered any special defects in those final pages of his book which had been written under such terrible conditions. mrs. froude had thoroughly understood all her husband's moods, and her quiet humour always cheered him in those hours of gloom from which a man of his sensitive nature could not escape. she could use a gentle mockery which was always effective, along with her common sense, in bringing out the true proportions of things. conscious as she was of his social brilliancy and success, she would often tell the children that they lost nothing by not going out with him, because their father talked better at home than he talked anywhere else. her deep personal religion was the form of belief with which he had most sympathy, and which he best understood, regarding it as the foundation of virtue and conduct and honour and truth. he attended with her the services of the church, which satisfied him whenever they were performed with the reverent simplicity familiar to his boyhood. happily he was not left alone. he had two young children to love, and his eldest daughter was able to take her stepmother's place as mistress of his house. with the children he left london as soon as he could, and tried to occupy his mind by reading to them from don quixote, or, on a sunday, from the pilgrim's progress. to the end of his life he felt his loss; and when he was offered, fifteen years later, the chance of going back to his beloved derreen, he shrank from the associations it would have recalled. he took a house for his family in wales, which he described in the following letter to lady derby: "crogan house, corwen, june rd, . "i do not know if i told you upon what a curious and interesting old place we have fallen for our retirement. the walls of the room in which i am writing are five feet thick. the old part of the house must have been an abbey grange; the cellars run into a british tumulus, the oaks in the grounds must many of them be as old as the conquest, and the site of the parish church was a place of pilgrimage probably before christianity. stone coffins are turned over on the hillsides in making modern improvements. denfil gadenis' (the mediaeval welsh saint's) wooden horn still stands in the church porch, and the sense of strangeness and antiquity is the more palpable because hardly a creature in the valley, except the cows and the birds, speak in a language familiar to me. it was owen glendower's country. owen himself doubtless has many times ridden down the avenue. we are in the very heart of welsh nationality, which was always a respectable thing--far more so than the celticism of the gaels and irish. we are apt to forget that the tudors were welsh." fortunately a plan suggested itself which gave him variety of occupation and change of scene. disraeli's government had just come into office, and with the colonial secretary, lord carnarvon, froude was on intimate terms. froude had always been interested in the colonies, and was an advocate of federation long before it had become a popular scheme. as early as he wrote to skelton: "gladstone and co. deliberately intend to shake off the colonies. they are privately using their command of the situation to make the separation inevitable."* i do not know what this means. lord dufferin has left it on record that after his appointment to canada in lowe came up to him at the club, and said, "now, you ought to make it your business to get rid of the dominion." but lowe was in the habit of saying paradoxical things, and it was disraeli, not gladstone, who spoke of the colonies as millstones round our necks. cardwell, the secretary for war, withdrew british troops from canada and new zealand, holding that the self-governing colonies should be responsible for their own defence. that wise policy fostered union rather than separation, by providing that the working classes at home should not be taxed for the benefit of their colonial fellow- subjects. lord carnarvon himself had passed in the bill which federated canada and which his liberal predecessor had drawn. he was now anxious to carry out a similar scheme in south africa, and froude offered to find out for him how the land lay. his visit was not to be in any sense official. he would be ostensibly travelling for his health, which was always set up by a voyage. he was interested in extending to south africa miss rye's benevolent plans of emigration to canada; in the treatment of a kaffir chief called langalibalele; and in the disputes which had arisen from the annexation of the diamond fields. thus there were reasons for his trip enough and to spare. he would, it was thought, be more likely to obtain accurate information if the principal purpose of his visit were kept in the background. -- *table talk of shirley, p. . -- there was one great and fundamental difference between the case of canada and the case of south africa. canada had itself asked for federation, and parliament simply gave effect to the wish of the canadians. opinion in south africa was notoriously divided, and the centre of opposition was at cape town. natal had not yet obtained a full measure of self-government, and the lieutenant-governor, sir benjamin pine, had excited indignation among all friends of the natives by arbitrary imprisonment, after a mock trial, of a kaffir chief. lord carnarvon had carefully to consider this case, and also to decide whether the mixed constitution of natal, which would not work, should be reformed or annulled. a still more serious difficulty was connected with the diamond fields, officially known as griqualand west. the ownership of this district had been disputed between the orange free state and a native chief called nicholas waterboer. in lord kimberley, as secretary of state for the colonies, had purchased it from waterboer at a price ludicrously small in proportion to its value, and it had since been annexed to the british dominions by the governor, sir henry barkly. waterboer, who knew nothing about the value of money, was satisfied. the orange state vehemently protested, and president brand denounced the annexation as a breach of faith. not only, he said, were the diamond fields within the limits of his republic; the agreement between waterboer and the secretary of state was itself a breach of the orange river convention, by which great britain undertook not to negotiate with any native chief north of the river vaal. lord kimberley paid no heed to brand's remonstrances. he denied altogether the validity of the dutch claim, and he would not hear of arbitration. by the time that lord carnarvon came into office thousands of british settlers were digging for diamonds in griqualand west, and its abandonment was impossible. brand himself did not wish to take the responsibility of governing it. but he continued to press the case for compensation, and the british government, which had forced independence upon the boers, appeared in the invidious light of shirking responsibility while grasping at mineral wealth. if it had not been for this untoward incident, the dutch republics would have been more favourable to lord carnarvon's policy than cape colony was. the transvaal was imperfectly protected against the formidable power of the zulus, and a general rising of blacks against whites was the real danger which threatened south africa. that peril, however, was felt more acutely in natal than in cape colony. the cape had for two years enjoyed responsible government, and its first prime minister was john charles molteno. molteno was not in any other respect a remarkable man. he had come to the post by adroit management of a miscellaneous community, comprising british, dutch, and kaffirs. he was personally incorruptible, and he played the game according to the rules. he would have called himself, and so far as his opportunities admitted, he was, a constitutional statesman, justly proud of the position to which his own qualities had raised him, and extremely jealous of interference downing street. he had no responsibility, he was never tired of explaining, for the acquisition of the diamond fields, and he left the colonial office to settle that matter with president brand. local politics were his business. he did not look beyond the house of assembly at cape town, which it was his duty to lead, and the governor, sir henry barkly, with whom he was on excellent terms. his own origin, which was partly english and partly italian, made it easy for him to be impartial between the two white races in south africa. for the kaffirs he had no great tenderness. they had votes, and if they chose to sell them for brandy that was their own affair. of what would now be called imperialism molteno had no trace. he would support federation when in his opinion it suited the interests of cape colony, and not an hour before. froude left dartmouth in the walmer castle on the rd of august, . he occupied himself during the voyage partly in discussing the affairs of the cape with his fellow-passengers, and partly in reading greek. the "leaves from a south african journal," which close the third volume of short studies, describe his journey in his most agreeably colloquial style. a piece of literary criticism adorns the entry for september th. "i have been feeding hitherto on greek plays: this morning i took homer instead, and the change is from a hot-house to the open air. the greek dramatists, even aeschylus himself, are burdened with a painful consciousness of the problems of human life, with perplexed theories of fate and providence. homer is fresh, free, and salt as the ocean." no sooner had froude landed at cape town than he began tracing all its evils to responsible government. the solidity of the houses reminded him that they were built under an absolute system. "what is it which has sent our colonies into so sudden a frenzy for what they call political liberty?" a movement which has been in steady progress for thirty years can scarcely be called sudden, even though it be regarded as a frenzy, and so far back as there were british colonists beyond the seas who attached some practical value to freedom. a drive across the peninsula of table mountain suggested equally positive reflections of another kind. "were england wise in her generation, a line of forts from table bay to false bay would be the northern limit of her imperial responsibilities." this had been the cherished policy of lord grey at the colonial office, and the whigs generally inclined to the same view. but it was already obsolete. lord kimberley had proceeded on exactly the opposite principle, and lord carnarvon's object in federation was certainly not to diminish the area of the british empire. if froude talked in south africa as he wrote in his journal, his conversation must have been more interesting than discreet. "every one," he wrote from port elizabeth, on the th of september, , "approves of the action of the natal government in the langalibalele affair. i am told that if natal is irritated it may petition to relinquish the british connection, and to be allowed to join the free states. i cannot but think that it would have been a wise policy, when the free states were thrown off, to have attached natal to them." lord carnarvon disapproved of the natal government's action, released langalibalele, and recalled the lieutenant- governor. his policy was as wise as it was courageous, and no proposal to relinquish the british connection followed. froude was a firm believer in the dutch method of dealing with kaffirs, and he had no more prejudice against slavery than carlyle himself. but his sense of justice was offended by the treatment of langalibalele, and if he had been secretary of state he would have done as lord carnarvon did. with the boers froude had a good deal of sympathy. their religion, a purer calvinism than existed even in scotland, appealed to his deepest sentiments, and he admired the austere simplicity of their lives. no one could accuse a cape dutchman of complicity in such horrors as progress and the march of intellect. on his way from cape town to durban froude was told a characteristic story of a dutch farmer. "his estate adjoined the diamond fields. had he remained where he was, he could have made a large fortune. milk, butter, poultry, eggs, vegetables, fruit, went up to fabulous prices. the market was his own to demand what he pleased. but he was disgusted at the intrusion upon his solitude. the diggers worried him from morning to night, demanding to buy, while he required his farm produce for his own family. he sold his land, in his impatience, for a tenth of what he might have got had he cared to wait and bargain, mounted his wife and children into his waggon, and moved off into the wilderness." froude's sarcastic comment is not less characteristic than the story. "which was the wisest man, the dutch farmer or the yankee who was laughing at him? the only book that the dutchman had ever read was the bible, and he knew no better."* -- * short studies, iii. . -- the state of natal, which was then perplexing the colonial office, puzzled froude still more. four courses seemed to him possible. natal might be annexed to cape colony, made a province of a south african federation, governed despotically by a soldier, or left to join the dutch republics. the fifth course, which was actually taken, of giving it responsible government by stages, did not come within the scope of his ideas. the difficulty of federation lay, as it seemed to him, in the native problem. "if we can make up our minds to allow the colonists to manage the natives their own way, we may safely confederate the whole country. the dutch will be in the majority, and the dutch method of management will more or less prevail. they will be left wholly to themselves for self-defence, and prudence will prevent them from trying really harsh or aggressive measures. in other respects the dutch are politically conservative, and will give us little trouble." if, on the other hand, native policy was to be directed from home, or, in other words, if adequate precautions were to be taken against slavery, a federal system would be useless, and south africa must be governed like an indian province. pretoria froude found full of english, loudly demanding annexation. he told them, speaking of course only for himself, that it was impossible, because the cape was a self-governing colony, and the dutch majority "would take any violence offered to their kinsmen in the republics as an injury to themselves." to annexation without violence, by consent of the boers, the great obstacle, so froude found, was the seizure, the fraudulent seizure, as they thought it, of the diamond fields. he visited kimberley, called after the colonial secretary who acquired it, "like a squalid wimbledon camp set down in an arid desert." the method of digging for diamonds was then primitive. "each owner works by himself or with his own servants. he has his own wire rope, and his own basket, by which he sends his stuff to the surface to be washed. the rim of the pit is fringed with windlasses. the descending wire ropes stretch from them thick as gossamers on an autumn meadow. the system is as demoralising as it is ruinous. the owner cannot be ubiquitous: if he is with his working cradle, his servants in the pit steal his most valuable stones and secrete them. forty per cent of the diamonds discovered are supposed to be lost in this way."* the proportion of profit between employer and employed seems to have been fairer than usual, though it might, no doubt, have been more regularly arranged. at bloemfontein froude called on president brand, "a resolute, stubborn-looking man, with a frank, but not over-conciliatory, expression of face." brand was in no conciliatory mood. he held that his country had been robbed of land which the british government renounced in , and only resumed now because diamonds had been discovered on it. the interview, however, was neither unimportant nor unsatisfactory. it was followed by an invitation to dinner, and frank discussion of the whole subject. so firmly convinced was froude of the president's good faith and of the injustice done him that he pleaded the cause of the free state with the colonial office, and lord carnarvon settled the dispute in a friendly manner by the payment of a reasonable sum.+ but that was not till , after brand had visited london, and seen lord carnarvon himself. -- * short studies, vol. iii. p. . + , lbs. -- at the end of froude returned to england, and reported to lord carnarvon what he had observed. the colonial secretary, just, but punctilious, was unwilling to reverse lord kimberley's policy, and froude discovered that party politics, to which he traced all our woes, had much less to do with administration than he imagined. under the influence of bishop colenso, an intrepid friend of the natives, lord carnarvon had already interfered on behalf of langalibalele, but that only involved overruling the government of natal. after mature consideration he wrote a despatch to sir henry barkly in which stress was laid upon the importance of arranging all differences with the orange state. then he proceeded to the subject of federation, which was always in his mind and at his heart. here he unfortunately failed to make allowance for the sensitive pride of colonial statesmen. he proposed the assemblage of a federal conference at cape town, at which froude would represent the colonial office. for cape colony he suggested the names of the prime minister, molteno, and of paterson, who led the opposition. in june, , froude went back to south africa, this time as an acknowledged emissary of the government, but by ill luck his arrival coincided with the receipt of the despatch. the effect of this document was prodigious. molteno considered that he had been personally insulted. the legislative assembly was defiant, and greeted the recital of carnarvon's words with ironical laughter. a ministerial minute, signed by molteno and his colleagues, protested against the colonial secretary's intrusion, and especially against his rather ill advised reference to a proposed separation of the eastern from the western provinces of the cape. it was a fact that port elizabeth and grahamstown, where there were very few dutch, considered that they paid proportionately too much towards the colonial revenues, and desired separate treatment. but the people of cape town strongly objected, and it was unwise for the secretary of state to take a side in local politics. froude found his position by no means agreeable. molteno, though never discourteous, received him coldly, and objected to his making speeches. the governor, who liked to be good friends with his ministers, gave him no encouragement. the house of assembly, after proposing to censure carnarvon in their haste, censured froude at their leisure. that did him no harm. but he disliked the new position in which he found himself, and in his private journal he expressed his sentiments freely. he had not been long in cape town when he wrote, on the th of july, , to his eldest daughter a full and vivid account of the political situation. "i am glad," he said, "that no one is with me who cares for me. no really good thing can be carried out without disturbing various interests. the governor and parliament have set themselves against lord carnarvon. the whole country has declared itself enthusiastically for him. the consequence is that the opposition, who are mortified and enraged, now daily pour every sort of calumny on my unfortunate head. i don't read more of it than i can help, but some things i am forced to look at in order to answer; and the more successful my mission promises to be, the more violent and unscrupulous become those whose pockets are threatened by it. i wait in cape town till the next english steamer arrives, and then i mean to start for a short tour in the neighbourhood. i shall make my way by land to mossel bay, and then go on by sea to port elizabeth and natal, where i shall wait for orders from home. sir garnet* has written me a very affectionate letter, inviting me to stay with him. here the authorities begin to be more respectful than they were. last night there was a state dinner at government house, when i took in lady barkly. miss barkly would hardly speak to me. i don't wonder. she is devoted to her father; i would do exactly the same in her place. i sent you a paper with an account of the dinner, and my speech, but you must not think that the dinner represented cape town society generally. cape town society, up to the reception at government house, has regarded me as some portentous object come here to set the country on fire, and to be regarded with tremors by all respectable people. outside cape town, on the contrary, in every town in the country, dutch or english, i should be carried through the streets on the people's shoulders if i would only allow it, so you see i am in an 'unexampled situation.'+ the governor's dinner cards had on them 'to meet mr. froude.' i am told that no less than eight people who were invited refused in mere terror of me .... things are in a wild state here, and grow daily wilder. i am responsible for having lighted the straw; and if lord carnarvon has been frightened at the first bad news, there will be danger of real disturbance. the despatch has created a real enthusiasm, and excited hopes which must not now be disappointed." "never," he wrote a few weeks afterwards, "never did a man of letters volunteer into a more extraordinary position than that in which i find myself." sir garnet wolseley stood by him through thick and thin. after sir garnet's departure he had no english friend. his local supporters were "all looking out for themselves," and there was not one among them in whom he could feel any real confidence." -- * the present lord wolseley. + a favourite expression with mrs. carlyle. -- of molteno he made no personal complaint, and he always considered him the fittest man for his post in south africa. but colonial politicians as a whole were "not gentlemen with whom it was agreeable to be forced into contact." to give the colony responsible government has been "an act of deliberate insanity" on the part of lord kimberley and the liberal cabinet. froude endeavoured loyally and faithfully to carry out the policy of the colonial office, and his relations with lord carnarvon were relations of unbroken confidence. his objects were purely unselfish and patriotic. it was his misfortune rather than his fault to become involved in local politics, from which it was essential for the success of his mission that he should keep entirely aloof. circumstances brought him into much greater favour with the dutch than with his own countrymen, for it was thought, not without reason, that he had brought carnarvon round to see the truth about the diamond fields and the free state. he made them speeches, and they received him with enthusiasm. with molteno, on the other hand, he found it impossible to act, and the governor supported molteno. barkly was not unfavourable to federation. but he perceived that it could not be forced upon a self-governing colony, and that he himself would be powerless unless he acted in harmony with his constitutional advisers. he, as well as molteno, refused to attend the dinner at which froude on his arrival was entertained in cape town. molteno advised froude not to go, or if he went, not to speak. froude, however, both went and spoke, claiming as an englishman the right of free speech in a british colony. the right was of course incontestable. the expediency was a very different matter. froude was not accustomed to public speaking, and only long experience can teach that most difficult part of the process, the instinctive avoidance of what should not be said. his brilliant lectures were all read from manuscript, and he had never been in the habit of thinking on his legs. in he could at least say that he spoke only for himself. in he committed the colonial office, and even the cabinet, to his own personal opinions, which were not in favour of parliamentary government as understood either by englishmen or by africanders. he was accused of getting up a popular agitation on behalf of the imperial authorities against the governor of the colony, his ministers, and the legislative assembly of the cape. he did in fact, under a strong sense of duty, urge carnarvon to recall barkly, and to substitute for him sir garnet wolseley, who had temporarily taken over the administration of natal. sir garnet, however, had no such ambition. soldiering was the business of his life, and he had had quite enough of constitutionalism in natal. barkly was for the present maintained, and froude regarded his maintenance as fatal to federation. but sir bartle frere, who succeeded him, was not more fortunate, and the real mistake was interference from home. to froude his experience of south africa came as a disagreeable shock. a passionate believer in greater britain, in the expansion of england, in the energy, resources, and prospects of the queen's dominions beyond the seas, the parochialism of cape colony astonished and perplexed him. while he was dreaming of a federated empire, and paterson were counting heads in the cape assembly, and considering what would be the political result if the eastern provinces set up for themselves. if south africa were federated, would cape town remain the seat of government? to froude such a question was paltry and trivial. to a cape town shopkeeper it loomed as large as table mountain. the attitude of molteno's ministry, on the other hand, seemed as ominous to him as it seemed obvious to the colonists. he thought it fatal to the unity of the empire, and amounting to absolute independence. he did not understand the people with whom he had to deal. most of them were as loyal subjects as himself, and never contemplated for a moment secession from the empire. all they claimed was complete freedom to manage their own affairs, to federate or not to federate, as they pleased and when they pleased. they had only just acquired full constitutional rights; and if they sometimes exaggerated the effect of them, the error was venial. if carnarvon, instead of writing for publication an elaborate and official despatch, had explained his policy to the governor in private letters, and directed him to sound molteno in confidence, the cape ministers might themselves have proposed a scheme; and if they had proposed it, it would have been carried. had froude said nothing at dinners, or on platforms, he might have exercised far more influence behind the scenes. but he was an enthusiast for federation by means of a south african conference, and he made a proselytising tour through the colony. the dutch welcomed him because he acknowledged their rights. at grahamstown too, and at port elizabeth, he was hailed as the champion of separation for the eastern provinces. the legislative assembly at cape town, however, was hostile, and the proposed conference fell through. lord carnarvon did not see the full significance of the fact that the confederation of canada had been first mooted within the dominion itself. an interesting account of froude at this time has been given by sir george colley, the brilliant and accomplished soldier whose career was cut short six years afterwards at majuba: "i came home from the cape, and almost lived on the way with mr. froude .... it was rather a sad mind, sometimes grand, sometimes pathetic and tender, usually cynical, but often relating with the highest appreciation, and with wonderful beauty of language, some gallant deed of some of his heroes of the fifteenth or sixteenth centuries. he seemed to have gone through every phase of thought, and come to the end 'all is vanity.' he himself used to say the interest of life to a thinking man was exhausted at thirty, or thirty-five. after that there remained nothing but disappointment of earlier visions and hopes. sometimes there was something almost fearful in the gloom, and utter disbelief, and defiance of his mind."* -- * butler's life of colley, p. . -- the picture is a sombre one. but it must be remembered that the death of his wife was still weighing heavily upon froude. a few days after his return to london froude wrote a long and interesting report to the secretary of state, which was laid before parliament in due course. few documents more thoroughly unofficial have ever appeared in a blue book. the excellence of the paper as a literary essay is conspicuous. but its chief value lies in the impression produced by south african politics upon a penetrating and observant mind trained under wholly different conditions. froude would not have been a true disciple of carlyle if he had felt or expressed much sympathy with the native race. he wanted them to be comfortable. for freedom he did not consider them fit. it was the boers who really attracted him, and the man he admired the most in south africa was president brand. the sketch of the two dutch republics in his report is drawn with a very friendly hand. he thought, not without reason, that they had been badly treated. their independence, which they did not then desire, had been forced upon them by lord grey and the duke of newcastle. the sand river convention of , and the orange river convention of , resulted from british desire to avoid future responsibility outside cape colony and natal. as for the dutch treatment of the kaffirs, it had never in froude's opinion been half so bad as pine's treatment of langalibalele. by the second article of the orange river convention, renewed and ratified at aliwal after the basuto war in , her majesty's government promised not to make any agreement with native chiefs north of the vaal river. yet, when diamonds were discovered north of the vaal in griqualand west, the territory was purchased by lord kimberley from nicholas waterboer, without the consent, and notwithstanding the protests, of the orange free state. but although lord kimberley assented to the annexation of griqualand west in , he only did so on the distinct understanding that cape colony would undertake to administer the diamond fields, and this the cape ministers refused to do, lest they should offend their dutch constituents. it was not till , when all differences with the free state had been settled, and the transvaal was a british possession, that griqualand west became an integral part of cape colony. in january, , brand was still asking for arbitration, and carnarvon was still refusing it. when he explained the colonial secretary's policy to the colonial secretary himself froude came very near explaining it away. the conference, he said, was only intended to deal with the native question and the question of griqualand. was confederation then a dream? froude himself, in a private letter to molteno, dated april th, , wrote, "lord carnarvon's earnest desire since he came into office has been if possible to form south africa into a confederate dominion, with complete internal self-government."* that was the whole object of the conference, which but for that would never have been proposed. that, as froude truly says in his report, was one of molteno's reasons for resisting it. the cape premier thought that south africa was not ripe for confederation. if froude had had more practice in drawing up official documents, he would probably have left out this deprecatory argument, which does not agree with the rest of his case. he attributes, for instance, to local politicians a dread that the supremacy of cape town would be endangered. but no possible treatment of the natives, or of griqualand west, would have endangered the supremacy of cape town. the confederation of which froude and carnarvon were champions would have avoided tremendous calamities if it could have been carried out. the chief difficulties in its way were colonial jealousy of interference from downing street and dutch exasperation at the seizure of the diamond fields. "you have trampled on those poor states, sir," said a member of the cape legislature to froude, "till the country cries shame upon you, and you come now to us to assist you in your tyranny; we will not do it, sir. we are astonished that you should dare to ask us." such language was singularly inappropriate to froude himself, for the boers never had a warmer advocate than they had in him. but the circumstances in which griqualand west were annexed will excuse a good deal of strong language. at port elizabeth and grahamstown froude was welcomed as an advocate of their local independence, which was what they most desired. when, with unusual prudence, he declined to take part in a separatist campaign, their zeal for confederation soon cooled. on the other hand, the dutch papers all supported the conference, although brand refused to lay his case before it, or to treat with any authority except the british government at home. -- * life of molteno, vol. i. p. . -- neither froude nor carnarvon made sufficient allowance for colonial independence and the susceptibilities of colonial ministers. many of froude's expressions in public were imprudent, and he himself in his report apologised for his unguarded language at grahamstown, where he said that molteno's reply to carnarvon's despatch would have meant war if it had come from a foreign state. yet in the main their policy was a wise one, and they saw farther ahead than the men who worked the political machine at cape town. froude was too sanguine when he wrote, "a confederate south african dominion, embracing all the states, both english and dutch, under a common flag, may be expected as likely to follow, and perhaps at no very distant period." but he added that it would have to come by the deliberate action of the south african communities themselves. that was not the only discovery he had made in south africa. he had found that the transavll, reputed then and long afterwards in england to be worthless, was rich in minerals, including gold. he warned the colonial office that cetewayo, with forty thousand armed men, was a serious danger to natal. he saw clearly, and said plainly that unless south africa was to be despotically governed, it must be administered with the consent and approval of the dutch. he dwelt strongly upon the danger of allowing and encouraging natives to procure arms in griqualand west as an enticement to work for the diamond owners. the secret designs of sir theophilus shepstone he did not penetrate, and therefore he was unprepared for the next development in the south african drama. the south african conference in london, which he attended during august, , led to no useful result because molteno, though he had come to london, and was discussing the affairs of griqualand with lord carnarvon, refused to attend it. this was the end of south african confederation, and the permissive act of , passed after the transvaal had been annexed, remained a dead letter on the statute book. although the immediate purpose of froude's visits to south africa was not attained, it would be a mistake to infer that they had no results at all. early in the annexation of the transvaal, to which froude was strongly opposed, changed the whole aspect of affairs, and from that time the strongest opponents of federalism were the dutch. but the credit of settling with the orange free state a dispute which might have led to infinite mischief is as much froude's as carnarvon's, and as a consequence of their wise conduct president brand became for the rest of his life a steady friend to the british power in south africa. ninety thousand pounds was a small price to pay for the double achievement of reconciling a model state and wiping out a stain upon england's honour. more than four years after his second return from south africa, in january, , froude delivered two lectures to the philosophical society of edinburgh, in which his view of south african policy is with perfect clearness set forth. he condemns the annexation of the transvaal, and the zulu war. he expresses a wish that lord carnarvon, who had resigned two years before, could be permanent secretary for the colonies. "i would give back the transvaal to the dutch," he said. again, in even more emphatic language, "the transvaal, in spite of prejudices about the british flag, i still hope that we shall return to its lawful owners."* what is more surprising, he recommended that zululand should be restored to cetewayo, or cetewayo to zululand. he had predicted in that cetewayo would prove a troublesome person, and few men had less of the sentiment which used to be associated with exeter hall. the restoration of cetewayo, when it came was disastrous both to himself and to others. frere understood the zulus better than froude or colenso. the surrender of the transvaal, which was a good deal nearer than froude thought, was at least successful for a time, a longer time than froude's own life. he did not share gladstone's ignorance of its value; he knew it to be rich in minerals, especially in gold. but he knew also that carnarvon had been deceived about the willingness of the inhabitants to become british subjects, and he sympathised with their independence. it illustrates his own fairness and detachment of mind that he should have taken so strong and so unpopular a line when the boers were generally supposed in england to have acquiesced in the loss of their liberties, and when his hero sir garnet wolseley, to whom he dedicated his english in ireland, had declared that the vaal would run back to the drakensberg before the british flag ceased to wave over pretoria. -- * two lectures on south africa, pp. , , . -- froude's south african policy was to work with the dutch, and keep the natives in their places. he had no personal interest in the question. it was through lord carnarvon that he came in contact with south africa at all, and there were few statesmen with whom he more thoroughly agreed. when disraeli came for the second time into office, and for the first time into power, froude was well pleased. in , after his legal disqualification had been removed, he was again invited to become a candidate for parliament. but he did not really know to which party he belonged. "four weeks ago," he wrote to lady derby on the rd of april, "the liberal whip (mr. adam) asked me to stand for the glasgow and aberdeen universities on very easy terms to myself. i declined, because i should have had to commit myself to the liberal party, which i did not choose to do. lord carnarvon afterwards spoke to me with regret at my resolution. he had a conversation with mr. d'israeli, and it was agreed that if possible i should be brought in by a compromise without a contest. but it appeared doubtful afterwards whether the liberals would consent to this without fuller pledges than i could consent to give. i was asked if i would stand anyhow (contest or not), or whether i would allow myself to be nominated in their interest for any other place when a vacancy should occur. i said, no. (i would stand a contest on the conservative side, if on any.) i was neither conservative nor liberal per se, but would not oppose mr. d'israeli. so there this matter lies, unless your people have as good an opinion of me as the others, and want a candidate of my lax description. but indeed i have no wish to go into parliament. i am too old to begin a parliamentary life, and infinitely prefer making myself of use to the conservative side in some other way .... i am at lord carnarvon's service if he wishes me to go on with his colonial affairs. i came home from the cape to be of use to him." the colonial policy of the liberals froude had always regarded with suspicion. even lord kimberley's grant of a constitution to the cape he interpreted as showing a centrifugal tendency, and cardwell's withdrawal of troops from canada was all of a piece. disraeli, on the other hand, who never did anything for the colonies, had been making a speech about them at manchester, wherein all manner of colonial possibilities were suggested. they did not go, if they were ever intended to go, beyond suggestion, and in the sudden crisis in eastern affairs superseded all other topics of political interest. when the eastern question was first raised, froude had taken the side of the government. "i like lord derby's speech," he wrote to lady derby on the th of september, , "to the working men's association. so i think the country will when it recovers from its present intoxication. violent passions which rise suddenly generally sink as fast if there is no real reason for them. it is impossible that the people can fail to recollect in a little while that the reticence of which they complain is under the circumstances inevitable. "gladstone and his satellites are using their opportunities, however, with thorough unscrupulousness. it is possible that they may force an autumn session, and even force the ministry to resign- but woe to themselves if they do. they will promise what cannot be carried out, and will perhaps, in fine retribution for the crimean war, bring the russians to constantinople. it will not be a bad thing in itself, but there will be an end of the english minister who brings it about." again, three days later, to the same correspondent: "i admire the premier's speech. it is what i expected of him. the liberal leaders are behaving scandalously, with the exception perhaps of lord hartington. the cabinet i trust will now decide on an autumn session to remove so critical a matter out of the hands of irresponsible mobs. i was surprised to hear the war in servia attributed to the secret societies. cluseret i know has intended to ask for service with turkey, with a view to a war, against russia, and has been withheld only by some differences with general klapha, the turco-hungarian, from doing so. i had a long letter from him to- day, in which he expresses his restlessness characteristically, j'ai la nostalgic de la poudre." afterwards froude followed carlyle, and went with russia against turkey. the "unspeakable turk" was to be "struck out of the question and bismarck invited to arbitrate. such was the oracular deliverance from cheyne row, and froude obeyed the oracle. he attended the conference at st. james's hall in december at which gladstone spoke, and carlyle's letter was read, sitting for the only time in his life on the same platform with freeman. next may, when war between russia and turkey had actually begun, when gladstone was about to move his famous resolutions in the house of commons, there appeared in the times* another remarkable letter from the same hand. this time, however, it was no mere question of style, though "our miraculous premier" was a phrase which stuck. carlyle evidently had information of some design for giving turkey the support of the british fleet in the neighbourhood of constantinople, and was not very discreet in the use he made of it. the cabinet were supposed to be divided on the question of helping turkey by material means, which of course meant war with russia, and the foreign secretary, lord derby, was known to be in favour of peace. a year later lord carnarvon and lord derby had both left the cabinet rather than be responsible for a vote of credit which meant preparation for war, and for calling out the reserves. -- * may , . -- froude was in complete sympathy with the retiring ministers, and he regarded it as a profound mistake for england to quarrel with russia on behalf of a power which had no business in europe at all. from his point of view the presence at the colonial office of so sympathetic a minister as carnarvon was far more important than the difference between the treaty of san stefano and the treaty of berlin. of the afghan war in he strongly disapproved. the following extracts from letters to lady derby show the phases of thought on the eastern question through which froude passed, and are interesting also because they represent him in an unfamiliar light as the champion of parliamentary government against the secret diplomacy of lord beaconsfield. arbitrary rule might be very good for irishmen. as applied to englishmen froude disliked it no less than gladstone or bright. "february th, .--the opposition have no hope of making a successful attack on the present parliament--but they are resolute. they know their own minds, and gladstone (i know) has said that he has but to hold up his finger to force a dissolution and return as prime minister. i too think you are deceived by the london press. another massacre and all would be over. the golden bridge you speak of i conclude is for russia; but if it was possible for the cabinet, without changing its attitude, to make such a bridge, there would be no need of one. england has been, and i fear still is, the one obstacle to measures which would have long ago brought the turk to his senses. i cannot but feel assured that you have thrown away an opportunity for securing to the conservative party the gratitude of europe and the possession of office for a generation. if more mischief happens in turkey it will be on you that public displeasure will fall, and you may need a bridge for yourselves and not find one. i croak like a raven. perhaps you may set it down to an almost totally sleepless night." "april th, .--you destroy the last hope to which i had clung, that lord derby, though opposed to russian policy, would not consent to go to war with her. i remain of my old opinion that england (foolishly excited as it always when fighting is going on) will in the long run resent the absurdity and punish the criminality of taking arms in a worthless cause. i am sick of heart at the thought of what is coming, here as well as on the continent. i have begged carlyle to write a last appeal to the times. we must agitate in the great towns, we must protest against what we may be unable to prevent. the crimean war was innocent compared to what is now threatened, yet three years ago there was scarcely a person in england who did not admit that it was a mistake. i do not know what may be the verdict of the public about a repetition of it at the present moment. i know but too well what will be the verdict five years hence, and the fate which will overtake those who, with however good a motive, are courting the ruin of their party." "december nd, .---the passion for interference in defence of the turks seems limited (as i was always convinced that it was) to the idle educated classes. the public meetings which have been, or are to be, go the other way, or at least are against our taking a part on the turkish side. the demonstrations which lord b. expected to follow on the first russian success have not followed. the telegraph and morning post have used their whips on the dead crimean horse, but it will not stir for them. it will not stir even for the third volume of the prince consort's life. but i am very sorry about it all, for the damage to the conservative party from the lost opportunity of playing a great and honourable part is, i fear, irretrievable." "december th, .--the accounts from bulgaria and armenia turn me sick. these sheep, what have they done? diplomalists quarrel, and the people suffer. the management of human affairs will be much improved when the people tell their respective cabinets that if there is fighting to be done the cabinets must fight themselves, and that the result shall be accepted as final. nine out of ten great wars might have been settled that way with equal advantage so far as the consequences were concerned, and to the infinite relief of poor humanity." "march th, .--i met lord d. at the club the other night. he looked as prometheus might have looked when he was 'unbound.' he was in excellent spirits and talked brilliantly. not one allusion to the east, but i guessed that he had a mind at ease." "april th, .--i wish i knew whether the cabinet has determined on forcing war upon russia at all events, or if russia consents to go into the conference on the english terms; the cabinet will then bona fide endeavour after an equitable and honourable settlement. lord b.'s antecedents all point to a determination to make any settlement impossible. he has succeeded so far without provoking the other powers, but such a game is surely dangerous, backed though he by every fool and knave in england." "july th, .--i gather that the opposition is too disorganised to resist; and if parliament endure to be set aside, and allow the destinies of their country to be affected so enormously by the sole action of the crown and the cabinet, a change is passing over us the results of which it is impossible to estimate. we do, in fact, take charge of the turkish empire as completely as we took the empire of the moguls. in a little while we shall have to administer on the continent as well as in cyprus, and then will arise a new asiatic army. this will bring wars with it before long, and a proportionate increase of the power of the executive government. if parliament abdicates its authority now, what may we not anticipate? i have long felt that the house of commons could not long continue to govern the great concerns of the british empire as it has done. i certainly did not expect that it would yield without a struggle--nor will it. sooner or later we shall see a fight against the tendency which is giving so startling an evidence of its existence--and what is to happen then?" "july st, .--lord derby's speech was as good as it could possibly be. what he says now all the world will say two years hence. how deeply it cut appeared plainly enough in the scenes which followed. it must be peculiarly distressing to you--distressing in many ways, for i feel as certain as ever that the end of it all will be irreparable damage to the conservative party. one would like to know prince bismarck's private opinion of the premier and private opinion also of the nation which has taken him for their chosen leader. of course he will dissolve while the glamour is fresh; and before the effects of the bad champagne with which he has dosed the country begin to appear--first headache and penitence, and then exasperation at the provider of the entertainment." "november th, .--the evil shadow of the premier extends over the most innocent of our pleasures. i had been looking forward to a few days at knowsley as the most enjoyable which i should have had during the whole year. yet i knew how it would be. daring as he is, he could not venture on an entire defiance of public opinion. parliament of course would have to meet, and equally of course you and lord d. would have to come up. i conclude the object to be to get up a russian war after all. the stress laid by lord cranbrook on the reception of the russian embassy as the point of the injury will make it very difficult for the russians to be neutral. if this is what the ministry really intend, they may have their majority in parliament docile, but i doubt whether they will have the country with them. i am sure they will not if hartington and granville support lord lawrence. "i interpret it all as meaning that the premier knows that his policy has thoroughly broken down in europe, and at all risks he means to have another try in the east." it was froude's opinion, right or wrong, that lord beaconsfield might have settled the irish question if he had left the eastern question alone. he understood it, as some of his early speeches show, and he might have "established a just land court with the support of all the best land-owners in ireland."* why the land court established by gladstone in was unjust froude did not explain. some of the best landlords, if not all, supported it, and it relieved an intolerable situation. -- * table talk of shirley, p. . -- chapter viii froude and carlyle when james spedding introduced froude to carlyle he made unconsciously an epoch in english literature. for though froude was incapable of merging himself in another man, as spedding merged himself in bacon, he did more for the author of sartor resartus than spedding did for the author of the novum organum. spedding's bacon is an impossible hero of unhistorical perfection. froude's carlyle, like boswell's johnson, is a great man painted as he was. when the original head master of uppingham described his school as eton without its faults, there were those who felt for the first time that there was something to be said for the faults of eton. carlyle without his paradoxes and prejudices, his impetuous temper and his unbridled tongue would be only half himself. if he were known only through his books, the world would have missed acquaintance with letters of singular beauty, and with the most humourous talker of his age. he was one of two men, newman being the other, whose influence froude felt through life, and the influence of newman was chiefly upon his style. of newman indeed he saw very little after he left oxford, though his admiration and reverence for him never abated. it was not until he came to live in london after the death of his first wife that he grew really intimate with carlyle. up to that time he was no more than an occasional visitor in cheyne row with a profound belief in the philosophy of that incomparable poem in prose, the french revolution. carlyle helped him with his own history, the earlier volumes of which show clear traces of the master, and encouraged him in his literary work. mrs. carlyle was scarcely less remarkable than her husband. although she never wrote a line for publication, her private letters are among the best in the language, and all who knew her agree that she talked as well as she wrote. froude thought her the most brilliant and interesting woman he had ever met. the attraction was purely intellectual. mrs. carlyle was no longer young, and froude's temperament was not inflammable. but she liked clever men, and clever men liked her. she was an unhappy woman, without children, without religion, without any regular occupation except keeping house. her husband she regarded as the greatest genius of his time, and his affection for her was the deepest feeling of his heart. he was at bottom a sincerely kind man, and his servants were devoted to him. but he was troublesome in small matters; irritable, nervous, and dyspeptic. his books harassed him like illnesses, and he groaned under the infliction. if he were disturbed when he was working, he lost all self-control, and his wife felt, she said, as if she were keeping a private mad-house. it was not quite so private as it might have been, for mrs. carlyle found in her grievances abundant food for her sarcastic tongue. whatever she talked about she made interesting, and her relations with her husband became a common subject of gossip. it was said that the marriage had never been a real one, that they were only companions, and so forth. froude was content to enjoy the society of the most gifted couple in london without troubling himself to solve mysteries which did not concern him. thrifty as she was, mrs. carlyle was not fitted by physical strength and early training to be the wife of a poor man. she was too anxious a housekeeper, and worried herself nervously about trifles. her father had been a country doctor, not rich, but able to keep the necessary servants. in carlyle's home there were no servants at all. his father was a mason, and the work of the house was done by the family. why should his wife be in a different position from his mother's? there was no reason, in the nature of things. but custom is very strong, and the early years of mrs. carlyle's married life were a hard struggle against grinding poverty. carlyle was grandly indifferent to material things. he wanted no luxuries, except tobacco and a horse. he would not have altered his message to mankind, or his mode of delivering it, for the wealth of the indies. what he had to say he said, and men might take it or leave it as they thought proper. he never swerved from the path of integrity. he did not know his way to the house of rimmon. the mere practical ability required to produce such a book as frederick the great might have realised a fortune in business. carlyle just made enough money to live in decent and wholesome comfort. from the first carlyle's conversation attracted froude, and dazzled him. but he felt, as others felt, that submission rather than intimacy was the attitude which it suggested or compelled. there was no republic of letters in carlyle's house. it was a dictatorship, pure and simple. what the dictator condemned was heresy. what he did not know was not knowledge. mill was a poor feckless driveller. darwin was a pretentious sciolist. newman had the intellect of a rabbit. herbert spencer was "the most unending ass in christendom." "scribbling sands and eliots" were unfit to tie mrs. carlyle's shoe-strings. editing keats was "currying dead dog." ruskin could only point out the correggiosity of correggio. political economy was the dismal science, or the gospel according to mccrowdie.* carlyle's eloquent and humourous diatribes were wonderful, laughter-moving, awe-compelling. they did not put his hearers at their ease, and froude felt more admiration than sympathy. -- * mcculloch, the editor of adam smith, was meant -- in , when froude had been settled in london about a year, he received a visit from the great author himself. carlyle did not take to many people, but he took to froude. perhaps he was touched by the younger man's devotion. perhaps he saw that froude was no ordinary disciple, and would be able to carry on the torch when he relinquished it himself. at all events he expressed a wish to see him oftener in his walks, in his rides, in his home. nothing could be more flattering than such an invitation from such a man. froude responded cordially, and became an habitual visitor. like all really good talkers, carlyle was at his best with a single companion, and there could be no more sympathetic companion than froude. but there was another object of interest at cheyne row, and froude felt for mrs. carlyle sincere compassion. she was often left to herself while her husband wrote upstairs, and she suffered tortures from neuralgia. it seemed to froude that carlyle, who never had a day's serious illness, felt more for his own dyspepsia and hypochondria than for his wife's far graver ailments. in this he was very likely unjust, for carlyle was tenderly attached to his "jeanie," and would have done anything for her if he had thought of it. but he was absorbed in friederich, whose battles he would fight over again with the tired invalid on sofa. if woman be the name of frailty, the name of vanity is man. carlyle was fond of his wife, but he was thinking of himself. his "niagaras of scorn and vituperation" were a vent for his own feelings, a sort of moral gout. the apostle of silence recked not his own rede, nor did he think of the impression which his purely destructive preaching might make upon other people. he himself found in the eternities and immensities some kind of substitute for the calvinistic presbyterianism of his childhood. to her it was idle rhetoric and verbiage. he had taken away her dogmatic beliefs, and had nothing to put in their place. her "pale, drawn, suffering face" haunted froude in his dreams. in mrs. carlyle's health broke down, and for a year her case seemed desperate. her doctor sent her away to st. leonard's, and in no long time she apparently recovered. after that her husband took more care of her, and provided her with a carriage. but her constitution had been shattered, and she died suddenly as she drove through hyde park on the st of april, , while carlyle was at dumfries, resting after the delivery of his rectorial address to the university of edinburgh. carlyle's bereavement drove him into more complete dependence upon froude's sympathy and support. the lonely old man brooded over his loss, and over his own short-comings. he shut himself up in the house to read his wife's diaries and papers. he found that without meaning it he had often made her miserable. in her journal for the st of june, , he read, "the chief interest of to-day expressed in blue marks on my wrists!"* he realised that he had almost driven her to suicide, he the great preacher of duty and self-abnegation. "for the next few years," says froude, "i never walked with him without his recurring to a subject which was never absent from his mind." doubtless his remorse was exaggerated. his letters, and his wife's, show that he was a most affectionate husband when nothing had occurred to deprive him of his self-command. but he had at times been cruelly inconsiderate, and he wished to do penance for his misdeeds. a practical christian would have asked god to pardon him, and made amends by active kindness to his surviving fellow- creatures. carlyle took another course. in , five years after his wife's death, he suddenly brought froude a large bundle of papers, containing a memoir of mrs. carlyle by himself, a number of her letters, and some other biographical fragments. froude was to read them, to keep them, and to publish them or not, as he pleased, after carlyle was dead.+ -- * this passage was suppressed by froude when he published mrs. carlyle's diary and letters. but he kept the copy made by carlyle's niece under his superintendence, which still exists; and as an incorrect version has appeared since his death, i give the correct one now. + "i long much, with a tremulous, deep, and almost painful feeling, about that other manuscript which you were kind enough to read at the very first. be prepared to tell me, with all your candour, the pros and contras there."--carlyle to froude, th of september, . from the hill, dumfries. -- well would it have been for froude's peace of mind if he had handed the parcel back again, and refused to look at it. the tree of the knowledge of good and evil scarcely yielded more fatal fruit. he read the papers, however, and "for the first time realised what a tragedy the life in cheyne row had been." that he exaggerated the purport of what he read is likely enough. when there are quarrels between husband and wife, a man naturally inclines to take the woman's side. froude, as he says himself, was haunted by mrs. carlyle's look of suffering, physical rather than mental, and it would necessarily colour his judgment of the facts. at all events his conclusion was that carlyle had just ground for remorse, and that in collecting the letters he had partially expiated his offence. when mrs. carlyle's correspondence came to be published it was seen that there were two sides to the question, and that, if he had leisure to think of what he was doing, carlyle could be the most considerate of husbands. irritable and selfish he might be. deliberately cruel he never was. froude, with his accustomed frankness, told carlyle at once what he thought. mrs. carlyle's letters should be published, not alone, but with the memoir composed by himself. carlyle had originally intended that this memoir, or sketch, as it rather is, should be preserved, but not printed. afterwards, however, he gave it to froude, and added an express permission to do as he liked with it. froude was not content with his own opinion. he consulted john forster, the biographer of goldsmith and of dickens, a common friend of carlyle and himself. forster read the documents, and promised that he would speak to carlyle about them, giving no opinion to froude, but intimating that he should impress upon carlyle the need for making things clear in his will. this most sensible advice was duly taken, and carlyle's will, signed on the th of february, , which nominated forster and his own brother john as executors, contained the following passage: "my manuscript entitled 'letters and memorials of jane welsh carlyle' is to me in my now bereaved state, of endless value, though of what value to others i cannot in the least clearly judge; and indeed for the last four years am imperatively forbidden to write farther on it, or even to look farther into it. of that manuscript my kind, considerate, and ever faithful friend, james anthony froude (as he has lovingly promised me) takes precious charge in my stead. to him therefore i give it with whatever other fartherances and elucidations may be possible, and i solemnly request of him to do his best and wisest in the matter, as i feel assured he will. there is incidentally a quantity of autobiographic record in my notes to this manuscript; but except as subsidiary and elucidative of the text i put no value on such. express biography of me i had really rather that there should be none. james anthony froude, john forster, and my brother john, will make earnest survey of the manuscript and its subsidiaries there or elsewhere in respect to this as well as to its other bearings; their united utmost candour and impartiality, taking always james anthony froude's practicality along with it, will evidently furnish a better judgment than mine can be. the manuscript is by no means ready for publication; nay, the questions how, when (after what delay, seven, ten years) it, or any portion of it, should be published are still dark to me; but on all such points james anthony froude's practical summing up and decision is to be taken as mine." no expression of confidence could well be stronger, no discretion could well be more absolute. so far as one man can substitute another for himself, carlyle substituted froude. froude was under the impression that carlyle had given him the letters because he wanted them to be published, and did not want to publish them. embarrassing as the position was, he accepted it in tranquil ignorance of what was to come. two years after the receipt of the memoirs and letters there arrived at his house a box of more letters, more memoirs, dimes, odds and ends, put together without much arrangement in the course of a long life. he was told that they were the materials for carlyle's biography, and was begged to undertake it forthwith. so far as his own interests were concerned, he had much better have declined the task. his history of england had given him a name throughout europe, and whatever he wrote was sure to be well received. his english in ireland was approaching completion, and he had in his mind a scheme for throwing fresh light on the age of charles v. principal robertson's standard book was in many respects obsolete. the subject was singularly attractive, and would have furnished an excellent opportunity for bringing out the best side of the roman catholic church, which in charles's son, philip, so familiar in froude's history of england, was seen at its worst or weakest. charles was to him an embodiment of the conservative principle, which he regarded as the strongest part of catholicism, and as needed to counteract the social upheaval of the reformation. such a book he could write in his own way, independent of every one. the biographer of carlyle, on the other hand, would be involved in numerous difficulties, could hardly avoid giving offence, and must sacrifice years of his life to employment more onerous, as well as less lucrative, than writing a history of his own. carlyle, however, was persistent, and froude yielded. after mrs. carlyle's death they had met constantly, and the older man relied upon the younger as upon a son. froude sat down before the mass of documents in the spirit which had encountered the manuscripts of simancas. no help was accorded him. he had to spell out the narrative for himself. on one point he did venture to consult carlyle, but carlyle shrank from the topic with evident pain, and the conversation was not renewed. it appeared from mrs. carlyle's letters and journals that she had been jealous of lady ashburton, formerly lady harriet baring, and by birth a sandwich montagu. "lady ashburton," says charles greville, writing on the occasion of her death in , "was perhaps, on the whole, the most conspicuous woman in the society of the present day. she was undoubtedly very intelligent, with much quickness and vivacity in conversation, and by dint of a good deal of desultory reading and social intercourse with men more or less distinguished, she had improved her mind, and made herself a very agreeable woman, and had acquired no small reputation for ability and wit .... she was, or affected to be, extremely intimate with every man whose literary celebrity or talents constituted their only attraction, and, while they were gratified by the attentions of the great lady, her vanity was flattered by the homage of such men, of whom carlyle was the principal. it is only justice to her to say that she treated her literary friends with constant kindness and the most unselfish attentions. they and their wives and children (when they had any) were received at her house in the country, and entertained there for weeks without any airs of patronage, and with a spirit of genuine benevolence as well as hospitality."* -- * the greville memoirs, vol. iii. pp. , . -- but lady ashburton and mrs. carlyle did not get on. as carlyle's wife the latter would doubtless have been welcome enough at the grange. being much cleverer than lady ashburton, she seemed to dispute a supremacy which had not hitherto been challenged, and the relations of the two women were strained. carlyle, on the other hand, had become, so froude discovered from his wife's journal, romantically, though quite innocently, attached to lady ashburton, and this was one cause of dissension at cheyne row. there was nothing very dreadful in the disclosure. carlyle was a much safer acquaintance for the other sex than robert burns, whose conversation carried the duchess of gordon off her feet, and mrs. carlyle's jealousy was not of the ordinary kind. still, the incident was not one of those which lighten a biographer's responsibility. froude has himself explained, in a paper not intended for publication, the light in which it appeared to him. "intellectual and spiritual affection being all which he had to give, mrs. carlyle naturally looked on these at least as exclusively her own. she had once been his idol, she was now a household drudge, and the imaginative homage which had been once hers was given to another." froude's posthumous championship of mrs. carlyle may have led him to magnify unduly the importance of domestic disagreements. but however that may be, the opinions which he formed, and which carlyle gave him the means of forming, did not increase the attractions of the duty he had undertaken to discharge. froude's own admiration of carlyle was, it must always be remembered, not in the least diminished by what he read. he still thought him the greatest man of his age, and believed that his good influence would expand with time. that there should be spots on the sun did not disturb him, especially as moral perfection was the last thing he had ever attributed to carlyle. meanwhile his position was altered, and altered, as it seems, without his knowledge. carlyle's original executors were his brother, dr. carlyle, and john forster. forster died in , and by a codicil dated the th of november, , froude's name was put in the place of his, sir james stephen, the eminent jurist, afterwards a judge of the high court, being added as a third. at that time froude was engaged, to carlyle's knowledge, upon the first volume of the life. at carlyle's request he had given up the editorship of fraser's magazine, which brought him in a comfortable income of four hundred a year, and he had wholly devoted himself to the service of his master. carlyle expected that he would soon follow his wife. he survived her fifteen years, during which he wrote little, for his right hand was partly paralysed, and continually meditated upon the future destiny of the memorials entrusted to froude. in dr. carlyle died, leaving froude and stephen the sole executors under the will. late in the autumn of that year carlyle suddenly said to froude, "when you have done with those papers of mine, give them to mary." mary was his niece mary aitken, mrs. alexander carlyle, who had lived in cheyne row to take care of her uncle since her aunt's death, and was married to her cousin. carlyle speaks of her with great affection in his will, "for the loving care and unwearied patience and helpfulness she has shown to me in these my last solitary and infirm years." it was natural that he should think of her, and should contemplate leaving her more than the five hundred pounds specified in his original will. but this particular request was so startling that froude ought to have made further inquiries. the papers had been given to him, and he might have destroyed them. they had been, without his knowledge, left in the will to john carlyle, who was then dead. carlyle's mind was not clear about the fate of his manuscripts. froude, however, acquiesced, and did not even ask that carlyle should put his intentions on paper. at this time, while he was writing the first volume of the life, froude made up his mind to keep back mrs. carlyle's letters, with her husband's sketch of her, to suppress the fact that there had been any disagreement between them, but to publish in a single volume carlyle's reminiscences of his father, of edward irving, of francis jeffrey, and of robert southey. to this separate publication carlyle at once assented. but in november, , when he was eighty-five, and mrs. carlyle had been fourteen years in her grave, he asked what froude really meant to do with the letters and the memoir. forced to make up his mind at once, and believing that publication was carlyle's own wish, he replied that he meant to publish them. the old man seemed to be satisfied, and no more was said. froude drew the inference that most people would, in the circumstances, have drawn. he concluded that carlyle wished to relieve himself of responsibility, to get the matter off his mind, to have no disclosure in his lifetime, but to die with the assurance that after his death the whole story of his wife's heroism would be told. on the th of february, , carlyle died. froude, tyndall, and lecky attended his quiet funeral in the kirkyard of ecclefechan, where he lies with his father and mother. dean stanley had offered westminster abbey, but the family had refused. carlyle was buried among his own people, who best understood him, and whom he best understood. the two volumes of reminiscences at once appeared, including sketches of irving and jeffrey, with the memoir of mrs. carlyle. but even before the publication of these volumes, which came out early in march, a question, which was ominous of future trouble, arose out of copyright and title to profits. a fortnight after carlyle's death froude's co-executor, mr. justice stephen, had a personal interview with mrs. alexander carlyle, in the presence of her husband, and of mr. ouvry, who was acting as solicitor for all parties. on this occasion mrs. carlyle said that froude had promised her the whole profits of the reminiscences, that her uncle had approved of this arrangement, and that she would not take less. thus the first difference between froude and the carlyle family related to money. mrs. carlyle did not know that the memoirs of her aunt would be among the reminiscences, and the sum which had promised her was the speculative value of an american edition, which was never in fact realised. in lieu of this he offered half the english profits, and brought out the reminiscences, "jane welsh carlyle" being among them. they were eagerly read, not merely by all lovers of good literature, but by all lovers of gossip, good or bad. carlyle's pen, like dante's, "bit into the live man's flesh for parchment." he had a tacitean power of drawing a portrait with a phrase which haunted the memory. james carlyle, the annandale mason, was as vivid as jonathan oldbuck himself. but it was upon mrs. carlyle that public interest fastened. the delineation of her was most beautiful, and most pathetic. there were few expressions of actual remorse, and carlyle was not the first man to feel that the value of a blessing is enhanced by loss. but there was an undertone of something more than regret, a suspicion or suggestion of penitence, which set people talking. it is always pleasant to discover that a preacher of righteousness has not been a good example himself, and "poor mrs. carlyle" received much posthumous sympathy, as cheap as it was useless. whether froude should have published the memoir is a question which may be discussed till the end of time. he conceived himself to be under a pledge. he had given his word to a dead man, who could not release him. it seems, however, clear that he should have taken the course least injurious to carlyle's memory, and in such a very delicate matter he might well have asked advice. from the purely literary point of view there could be no doubt at all. not even frederick the great, that storehouse of "jewels five words long," contains more sparkling gems than these two precious little volumes. froude speaks in his preface of having made "requisite omissions." a few more omissions might have been made with advantage, especially a brutal passage about charles lamb and his sister, which elia's countless admirers find it hard to forgive. mrs. procter, widow of barry cornwall, the poet, and herself a most remarkable woman, was so much annoyed by the description of her mother, mrs. basil montagu, and her step-father, the editor of bacon,* that she published some early and rather obsequious letters written to them by carlyle himself. but the chief outcry was raised by the revelation of carlyle's most intimate feelings about his wife, and about his own behaviour to her. there was nothing very bad. he was driven to accuse himself of the crime that, when he was writing frederick and she lay ill on the sofa, he used to talk to her about the battle of mollwitz. froude was naturally astonished at the effect produced, but then froude knew carlyle, and the public did not. -- * carlyle's miscellanies, i. - . -- trouble, however, awaited him of a very different kind. after the publication of the reminiscences, on the rd of may, , he returned to mrs. alexander carlyle the manuscript note-book which contained the memoir of her aunt, as carlyle had requested him to do. at the end of it, on separate and wafered paper, following rather vague surmise that, though he meant to burn the book, it would probably survive him and be read by his friends, were these words: "in which event, i solemnly forbid them, each and all, to publish this bit of writing as it stands here; and warn them that without fit editing no part of it should be printed (nor so far as i can order, shall ever be); and that the 'fit editing' of perhaps nine- tenths of it will, after i am gone, have become impossible. "t. c. (saturday, july th, )." mary carlyle at once wrote to the times, and accused froude of having violated her uncle's express directions. it would have been better if froude had himself quoted this passage, and explained the subsequent events which made it obsolete. but he never suspected any one, and believed at the time of publication in the entire friendliness of the carlyle family. his answer to the charge of betraying a trust was simple and satisfactory. carlyle had changed his mind. this is clear from the fact that he gave froude the memoir in , five years after it was written, to do as he pleased with; and still clearer from the conversation in , when froude told him that he meant to publish, and carlyle said "very well." moreover, the will, a formal and legal document, expressly gave froude entire discretion in the matter. froude replied at first with temper and judgment. but when mrs. carlyle persisted in her insinuations, and implied a doubt of his veracity, he gave way to a very natural resentment, and made a rash offer. he had, he said, brought out the memoir by carlyle's own desire. he should do the same with mrs. carlyle's letters, for the same reason. "the remaining letters," he went on to say, "which i was directed to return to mrs. carlyle so soon as i had done with them, i will restore at once to any responsible person whom she will empower to receive them from me. i have reason to complain of the position in which i have been placed with respect to these mss. they were sent to me at intervals without inventory or even a memorial list. i was told that the more i burnt of them the better, and they were for several years in my possession before i was aware that they were not my own. happily i have destroyed none of them, and mrs. carlyle may have them all when she pleases." froude can hardly have reflected upon the full significance of what he was saying. he had at this time been long engaged upon the biography of carlyle, and a considerable part of it was finished. if he had then given back his materials, his labour would have been wasted, and carlyle's own personal injunction would have been disobeyed. carlyle's memory would also have suffered parable injury. it is said, and it squares with the facts, that mary carlyle and her friends, whose literary judgment was not quite equal to carlyle's own, desired to substitute as his biographer some learned professor in scotland.* if that were their object, they are to be congratulated upon their failure. for the offer was not carried out. as a bare promise without consideration it was not of course valid in law, and since no one had acted upon it, its withdrawal did no one any harm. there were also legal difficulties which made its fulfilment impossible. according to counsel's opinion, dated the th of may, , carlyle's request that the papers should be restored was "an attempted verbal testamentary disposition, which had no legal authority." the documents belonged not to froude personally, but to himself and fitz-james stephen, as joint executors, and stephen has left it on record that he would not have consented to their return until froude's task was accomplished. -- * david masson, the editor of milton, i have been told, but i do not know. -- mrs. alexander carlyle's view was not shared by other and older members of her uncle's family. during the summer of froude received from carlyle's surviving brother, james, and his surviving sister, mrs. austin, a letter dated the th of august, and written from ecclefechan, in which he was implored not to give up his task of writing the life, and assured of their perfect reliance upon him. this assurance is the more significant because it was given after the publication of the reminiscences. it was renewed on james carlyle' s part through his son after the appearance of mrs. carlyle's letters in , and by mrs. austin through her daughter upon receiving the final volumes of the biography in . miss austin wrote at her mother's request on the th of october, , "my uncle at all times placed implicit confidence in you, and that confidence has not, i am sure, in any way been abused. he always spoke of you as his best and truest friend." time has amply vindicated carlyle's opinion, and his discretion in the choice of a biographer. as mrs. alexander carlyle considered the publication of the memoir, which is by far the most interesting part of the reminiscences, to be an impropriety, and a breach of faith, it might have been supposed that she would repudiate the idea of deriving any profit from the book. on the contrary, she attempted to secure the whole, and refused to take a part, declaring that froude had promised to give her all. froude's recollection was that, thinking carlyle's provision for his niece insufficient,* he had promised her the american income, which he had been told would be large, though it turned out to be very small indeed, in acknowledgment of her services as a copyist. ultimately he made her the generous offer of fifteen hundred pounds, retaining only three for himself. she accepted the money, though she denied that it was a gift. in the opinion of mr. justice stephen, which is worth rather more than hers, it was legally a gift, though there may have been in the circumstances a moral obligation. but mary carlyle put forward another clam, of which the executors heard for the first time in june, . she then said that in , six years before his death, her uncle had orally given her all his papers, and handed her the keys of the receptacles which contained them. -- * the provision for mary carlyle in the will of was, however, materially increase by the codicil of , under which she received the house in cheyne row after the death of her uncle john, who died before her uncle thomas. -- her recollection, however, must have been erroneous. for the bulk of the papers had been in froude's possession since the end of , or at latest the beginning of , and were not in the drawers or boxes which the keys would have opened. on the strength of her own statement, which was never tested in a court of law and was inconsistent with the clause in carlyle's will leaving his manuscripts to his brother john, mrs. carlyle demanded that froude should surrender the materials for his biography, and not complete it. he put himself into the hands of his co-executor, who successfully resisted the demand, and froude, in accordance with carlyle's clearly expressed desire, kept the papers until he had done with them. in a long and able letter to froude himself, printed for private circulation in , mr. justice stephen says, with natural pride, "it was my whole object throughout to prevent a law- suit for the determination of what i felt was a merely speculative question, and to defeat the attempt made to prevent you from writing mr. carlyle's life, and i am happy to say i succeeded." the public will always be grateful to the judge, for there was no one living except froude who had both the knowledge and the eloquence that could have produced such a book as his. of the reminiscences froude wrote to skelton, "to me in no one of his writings does he appear in a more beautiful aspect; and so, i am still convinced, will all mankind eventually think." his own frame of mind at this period is vividly expressed in a letter to max muller, dated the th of december, . after some references to goethe's letters, and german copyright, he continues: "so much ill will has been shown me in the case of other letters that i walk as if on hot ashes, and often curse the day when i undertook the business. i had intended, when i finished my english history, to set myself quietly down to charles the fifth, and spend the rest of my life on him. i might have been half through by this time, and the world all in good humour with me. my ill star was uppermost when i laid this aside. there are objections to every course which i can follow. the arguments for and against were so many and so strong that carlyle himself could not decide what was to be done, and left it to me. he could see all sides of the question. other people will see one, or one more strongly than another, whatever it may be; and therefore, do what i will, a large body of people will blame me. nay, if i threw it up, a great many would blame me. what have i done that i should be in such a strait? but i am sixty-four years old, and i shall soon be beyond it all." the first two volumes of the biography, covering the earlier half of carlyle's life, when his home was in scotland, from to , appeared in and added to the hubbub. the public had got on a false scent, and gossip had found a congenial theme. carlyle was in truth one of the noblest men that ever lived. his faults were all on the surface. his virtues were those which lie at the foundation of our being. for the common objects of vulgar ambition he had a scorn too deep for words. he never sought, and he did not greatly value, the praise of men. he had a message to deliver, in which he profoundly believed, and he could no more go beyond it, or fall short of it, than balaam when he was tempted by balak. contemporaries without a hundredth part of his talent, even for practical business, attained high positions, or positions which the world thought high. carlyle did not envy them, was not dazzled by them, but held to his own steadfast purpose of preaching truth and denouncing shams. his generosity to his own family was boundless, and he never expected thanks. he was tender-hearted, forgiving, kind, in all great matters, whenever he had time to think. courage and truth made him indifferent to fashion and popularity. popularity was not his aim. his aim was to tell people what was for their good, whether they would hear or whether they would forbear. froude had so much confidence in the essential greatness of the man that he did not hesitate to show him as he was, not a prodigy of impossible perfection, but a sterling character and a lofty genius. therefore his portrait lives, and will live, when biographies written for flattery or for edification have been consigned to boxes or to lumber-rooms. froude was only following the principles laid down by carlyle himself. in reviewing lockhart's life of scott, carlyle emptied the vials of his scorn, which were ample and capacious, upon "english biography, bless its mealy mouth." the censure of lockhart for "personalities, indiscretion," violating the "sanctities of private life," was, he said, better than a good many praises. a biographer should speak the truth, having the fear of god before his eyes, and no other fear whatever. that lockhart had done, and in the eyes carlyle, who admired him as he admired few it was a supreme merit. for the hypothesis lockhart "at heart had a dislike to scott, had done his best in an underhand, treacherous manner to dis-hero him," he expressed, as he well might, unbounded contempt. it seems incredible now that such a theory should ever, in or out of bedlam, have been held. perhaps it will be equally incredible some day that a similar view should have been taken of the relations between froude and carlyle. it is no disparagement of lockhart's great book to say that in this respect of telling the truth he had an easy task. for scott was as faultless as a human creature can be. every one who knew him loved him, and he loved all men, even whigs. his early life, prosperous and successful, was as different as possible from carlyle's. it was not until the years were closing in upon him that misfortune came, and called out that serene, heroic fortitude which his diary has made an everlasting possession for mankind. carlyle once said in a splenetic mood that the lives of men of letters were the most miserable records in literature, except the newgate calendar. there could be no more striking examples to the contrary than scott's life and his own. perhaps froude went too far in the direction indicated by carlyle himself; abounded, as the french say, too much in carlyle's sense. in his zeal to paint his hero, as his hero's hero wished to be painted, with the warts, he may have made those disfiguring marks too prominent. that a great man often has many small faults is a truism which does not need perpetual insistence. froude is rather too fond, like carlyle himself, of taking up and repeating a single phrase. when, for example, carlyle's mother said, half in fun, that he was "gey ill to deal wi'," she was not stating a general proposition, but referring to a particular, and not very important, case of diet. when miss welsh, who was in love with edward irving, told carlyle in that she could only love him as a brother, and could not marry him, it is a too summary judgment, and not compatible with froude's own language elsewhere, to say that had they left matters thus it would have been better for both of them. if she said at the end of her life, "i married for ambition, carlyle has exceeded all that my wildest hopes ever imagined of him- and i am miserable,"* she said also, many times over, that he was the tenderest of husbands, and that no mother could have watched her health with more solicitude. he gave what he had to give. he could not give what he had not. "of all the men whom i have ever seen," said froude, "carlyle was the least patient of the common woes of humanity." the fact is that his natural eloquence was irrepressible. if miss edgeworth's king corny had the gout, nature said "howl," and he howled. if carlyle had indigestion, he broke into picturesque rhetoric about the hag which was riding him no-whither. a far characteristic passage than his mother's "gey to deal wi'" is his own simple confession to his father, "when i shout murder, i am not always being killed."+ -- * life, i. . + life, i. . -- that froude's ideas of a biographer's duty were the same as his own carlyle had good reason to know. froude had stated them plainly enough in fraser's magazine, which carlyle always saw, for june, . he prefaced an article on the present sir george trevelyan's life of macaulay, a daring attack upon that historian for the very faults that were attributed to himself, with the following sentences: "every man who has played a distinguished part in life, and has largely influenced either the fortunes or the opinions of his contemporaries, becomes the property of the public. we desire to know, and we have a right to know, the inner history of the person who has obtained our confidence." this doctrine would not have been universally accepted. tennyson, for instance, would have vehemently denied it. but it is at least frankly expressed, and carlyle must have known very well what sort of biography froude would write. if froude dwelt on carlyle's failings, it was because he knew that his reputation would bear the strain. he has been justified by the result, for carlyle's fame stands higher to-day than it ever stood before. that man, be he prince or peasant, is not to be envied who can read froude's account of carlyle's early life without feeling the better for it. it is by no means a cheerful story. the first forty years of carlyle's existence, when the french revolution had not been published, were an apparently hopeless struggle against poverty and obscurity. sartor resartus was scarcely understood by any one, and though his wife saw that it was a work of genius, it seemed to most people unintelligible mysticism. with the splendid exception of goethe, hardly any one saw at that time what carlyle was. he was too transcendental for the edinburgh review, to which he had occasionally contributed, and the payment for sartor in fraser's magazine was beggarly.* for some years after his marriage in carlyle was within measurable distance of starvation. jeffrey had to explain to him, or did explain to him, that he was unfit for any public employment. he could not dig. to beg he was ashamed. when his father died in he refused to touch a penny of what the old man left, lest there should not be enough for his brothers and sisters. his personal dignity made it impossible for any stranger to assist him, except by giving him work. he worked incessantly, devouring books of all sorts, especially french and german, translating wilhelm meister so superbly well as to make it almost an english book. there was no greater intellect then in the british islands than carlyle's and very few with which it could be compared. yet it was difficult for him to earn a bare subsistence for his wife and himself. froude has brought out with wonderful power and beauty the character which in carlyle was above and beyond all the gifts of his mind. if he was a severe critic of others, he was a still sterner judge of himself. it would have been easy for him to make money by writing what people wanted to read. he was determined that if they read anything of his, they should read what would do them good. his isolation was complete. his wife encouraged him and believed in him. nobody could help him. -- * i need hardly say that this was long before froude's connection with fraser. -- work without hope draws nectar in a sieve, and hope without an object cannot live. carlyle, unlike coleridge, was a real moralist, and it was duty, not hope, that guided his pen. health he had, though he never would admit it, and with excellent sense he invested his first savings in a horse. his frugal life was at least wholesome, and the one comfort with which he could not dispense was the cheap comfort of tobacco. idleness would have been impossible to him if he had been a millionaire, and labour was his refuge from despondency. like most humourists, he had low spirits, though his "genial sympathy with the under side of things," to quote his own definition of the undefinable, must have been some solace for his woes. he could read all day without wearying, so that he need never be alone. as a talker no one surpassed him, or perhaps equalled him at his best, in london or even in annandale. what ought to have struck all readers of these volumes was the courage, the patience, the dignity, the generosity, and the genius of this scottish peasant. what chiefly struck too many of them was that he did not get on with his wife. froude's defence is first carlyle's precept, and secondly his own conviction that the truth would be advantageous rather than injurious to carlyle. carlyle's way of writing about other people, for instance charles lamb, saint charles, as thackeray called him, is sometimes unpardonable; and if froude had suppressed those passages he would have done well. his own personal conduct is a lesson to us all, and that lesson is in froude's pages for every one to read. "what a noisy inanity is this world," wrote carlyle in his diary at the opening of the year . without the few great men who, like carlyle, can lift themselves and others above it, it would be still noisier, still more inane. next year the gossips had a still richer feast. in froude, faithful to his trust, brought out three volumes letters and memorials of jane welsh carlyle. the true and permanent interest of this book is that it introduced the british and american public to some of the most brilliantly witty and amusing epistles that the language contains. indeed, there are very few letter-writers in any language who can be compared with mrs. carlyle. inferior to her husband in humourous description, as in depth of thought, she surpassed him in liveliness of wit, in pungency of satire, and in terseness of expression. her narrative is inimitable, and sometimes, as in the account of her solitary visit to her old home at haddington twenty-three years after her marriage, her dramatic power is overwhelming. carlyle himself had been familiar to the public for half a century through his books. until mrs. carlyle's letters appeared the world knew nothing of her at all, except through her husband's sketch. considering that good letter-writers are almost as rare as good poets, and that jane carlyle is one of the very best, the general reader might have been simply grateful, as perhaps he was. but for purposes of scandal the value of the book was the light it threw upon the matrimonial squabbles, actual or imaginary, of two remarkable persons. mrs. carlyle had long been dead, and her relations with her husband were of no importance to any one. but the trivial mind grasps at trivialities, and will not be satisfied without them. thousands who were quite incapable of appreciating the letters as literature could read between the lines, and apply the immortal principle that a warming-pan is a cover for hidden fire. unfortunately, carlyle's heart-broken ejaculations over his dead wife's words leant themselves to theories and surmises. he thought that he had not made enough of her when she was alive, and apparently he wanted the world to know that he thought so. yet the bulk of the letters are not those of an unhappy, oppressed, down- trodden woman, nor of a woman unable to take care of herself. some few are intensely miserable, almost like the cries of a wounded animal, and these, even in extracts, might well have been omitted. mrs. carlyle would not have written them if she had been herself, and in a collection of more than three hundred they would not have been missed. some thought also that there were too many household details.* on the whole, however, these letters, with the others published in the life, are a rich store-house, and they retain their permanent value, untouched by ephemeral rumour. -- * "a good woman," i remember lord bowen saying of mrs. carlyle, "with perhaps an excessive passion for insecticide." -- i doubt if he bathed before he dressed. a brasier? the pagan, he burned perfumes! you see, it is proved, what the neighbours guessed: his wife and himself had separate rooms. carlyle had been dead more than twenty years before the controversies about all that was unimportant in him flickered out and died an unsavoury death. the vital fact about him and his wife is that they contributed, if not equally, at least in an unparalleled degree, to the common stock of genius. but for froude we might never have known that mrs. carlyle had genius at all. through him we have a series of letters not surpassed by lady mary wortley's, or by any woman's except madame de sevigne's. then in froude completed his task with carlyle' s life in london, a biographical masterpiece if ever there was one. it is written on the same principle of telling the truth, painting the warts. but it brings out even more clearely than its predecessor the essential qualities of carlyle. in one way this was easier. the period of fruitless struggle was almost over when carlyle left craigenputtock in . after the appearance of the french revolution in he was famous, and every one who read anything read that book. southey read it six times. dickens carried it about with him, and founded on it his tale of two cities. thackeray wrote an enthusiastic review of it. its wisdom and eloquence were a treasure to dr. arnold, who knew, if any man did, what history was. it was like no other book that had ever been written, and critics were driven to talk of aeschylus or isaiah. such comparisons profit little or nothing. the french revolution is an original book by a man who believed in god's judgment upon sin. the memoirs of madame dubarry might have suggested it; but it came from carlyle's own heart and soul. professors may prove to their own satisfaction that it is not history at all, and carlyle has been posthumously convicted of miscalculating the distance from paris to varennes. it remains one of the books that cannot be forgotten, that fascinate all readers, even the professors themselves. and yet, greater than the book itself is carlyle's behaviour when the first volume had been lost by mill. mill, himself in extreme misery, had to come and tell the author. he stayed a long time, and when he had gone carlyle said to his wife, "well, mill, poor fellow, is terribly cut up; we must endeavour to hide from him how very serious this business is to us." maximus in maximis; minimus in minimis; such was carlyle, and as such froude exhibits him, not concealing the fact that in small matters he could be very small. the two personalities of carlyle and his wife are so fascinating that there may be some excuse for regarding even their quarrels, which were chiefly on her side,* with interest. but frederick the great will survive these broils, and so long as carlyle's books are read his biography will be read too, as his best extraneous memorial, just, eloquent, appreciative, sincere. carlyle was no model of austere, colourless consistency. his reverent admiration of peel, whom he knew, is quite irreconcilable with his savage contempt of gladstone, whom he did not know. peel was a great parliamentary statesman, and gladstone was his disciple. both belonged equally to the class which carlyle denounced as the ruin of england, and rose to supreme power through the representative system that he especially abhorred. on no important point, while peel was alive, did they differ. "on the whole," said gladstone, "peel was the greatest man i ever knew," and in finance he was always a peelite. that a man who was four times prime minister of england could have been a canting hypocrite, deceiving himself and others, implies that the whole nation was fit for a lunatic asylum. carlyle seldom studied a political question thoroughly, and of public men with whom he was acquainted only through the newspapers he was no judge. personal contact produced estimates which, though they might be harsh, hasty, and unfair, were always interesting, and sometimes marvellously accurate. of peel, for instance, though he saw him very seldom, he has left a finished portrait, not omitting the great minister's humour, for any trace of which the peel papers may be searched in vain. -- * "both he and she were noble and generous, but his was the soft heart and hers the stern one."---carlyle's life in london, vol. ii. p. . -- the same can be said of thirlwall, barring the groundless insinuation that he was dishonest in accepting a bishopric. a very different sort of bishop, samuel wilberforce, carlyle liked for his cleverness, though here too he could not help suggesting that on the foundation, or rather baselessness, of the christian religion, "sam" agreed with him. the great historian of the age he did not appreciate at all. but, then, he never met macaulay. "some little ape called keble," is not a happy formula for the author of the christian year, and this is one of the phrases which i think froude might well have omitted, as meaning no more than a casual execration. yet how minute are these defects, when set beside the intrinsic grandeur of the central figure in the book. carlyle mixed with all sorts and conditions of men and women, from the peasants of annandale to the best intellectual society of london. he was always, or almost always, the first man in the company, not elated, nor over-awed," standing on the adamantine basis of his manhood, casting aside all props and shoars." from snobbishness, the corroding vice of english society, he was, though he once jocularly charged himself with it, entirely free. he judged individuals on their merits with an eye as piercing and as pitiless as saint simon's. on pretence and affectation he had no mercy. learning, intellect, character, humility, integrity, worth, he held always in true esteem. as froude says, and it is the final word, carlyle's "extraordinary talents were devoted, with an equally extraordinary purity of purpose, to his maker's service, so far as he could see and understand that maker's will." he led "a life of single-minded effort to do right and only that of constant truthfulness in word and deed." that the man who wrote these sentences at the close of a book with which they are quite in keeping should have been reviled as a traitor to carlyle's memory is strange indeed. to froude it was incredible. conscious of regarding carlyle as the greatest moral and intellectual force of his time, he could not have been more astonished if he had been charged with picking a pocket. for criticism of his own judgment he was prepared. he knew well that acute differences of opinion might arise. the dishonesty and malignity imputed to him were outside the habits of his life and the range of his ideas. he lived in a society where such things were not done, and where nobody was suspected of doing them. he had fulfilled, to the best of his ability, carlyle's own injunctions, and he had faithfully portrayed as he knew him the man whom of all others he most revered. he was bewildered, almost dazed, at what seemed to him the perverse and unscrupulous recklessness of his accusers. anonymous and abusive letters reached him daily; some even of his own friends looked coldly on him. he was a sensitive man, and he felt it deeply. he shrank from going out unless he knew exactly whom he was to meet. but his pride came to his rescue, and he preferred suffering injustice in silence to discussing in public, as though it admitted of doubt, the question whether he was an honest man. he did, however, invite the opinion of his co-executor, an english judge, a close friend of carlyle, and a man whose personal integrity was above all suspicion. although the calumnies which gave froude so much distress have long sunk into an oblivion of contempt, and require no formal refutation, the conclusive verdict of sir james fitzjames stephen may be fitly quoted here: "for about fifteen years i was the intimate friend and constant companion of both of you [carlyle and froude], and never in my life did i see any one man so much devoted to any other as you were to him during the whole of that period of time. the most affectionate son could not have acted better to the most venerated father. you cared for him, soothed him, protected him, as a guide might protect a weak old man down a steep and painful path. the admiration you have habitually expressed for him was unqualified. you never said to me one ill-natured word about him down to this day. it is to me wholly incredible that anything but a severe regard for truth, learnt to a great extent from his teaching, could ever have led you to embody in your portrait of him a delineation of the faults and weaknesses which mixed with his great qualities."* -- * my relations with carlyle, p. . -- calling witnesses to the character of such a man as froude is itself almost an insult. but there is one judgment so valuable and so emphatic that i cannot refrain from citing it. the fifteenth earl of derby held such a high position in the political world that his literary attainments have been comparatively neglected. he was in truth an omnivorous reader and a cool, sagacious critic, who was not led astray by enthusiasm, and never said more than he felt. writing to froude on the th of october, , lord derby described the life of carlyle as the most interesting biography in the english language, and added, "i think you have finally silenced the foolish talk about indiscretion, and treachery to a friend's memory. it is clear that you have done only, and exactly, what carlyle wished done: and to me it is also apparent that he and you were right: that his character could not have been understood without a full disclosure of what was least attractive in it: and that those defects--the product mainly of morbid physical conditions--do not really take away from his greatness, while they explain much that was dark, at least to me, in his writings." lord derby's opinions were not lightly formed, and he was as much guided by pure reason as mortal man can be. froude's own judgment is given in a letter to lady derby, which contains also much interesting speculation on south african politics. lord derby, it will be remembered, was at that time secretary of state for the colonies. "october th, .--carlyle in london comes out this week. i loved and honoured him above all living men, and with this feeling i have done my best to produce a faithful likeness of him. this is a consolation to me, if the only one i am likely to have. we shall see. i am very anxious about south africa. i have written twice at length to lord derby. unfortunately my view is the exact opposite to that which is generally taken. lord d. is evidently being driven into active measures against his will. my fear is that there will be some half-action insufficient to crush the dutch, and sufficient to exasperate them. he relies on the promised support of the colonial ministry. they may promise, but i will believe only when i see it that a cape ministry and legislature will oppose the boers in earnest. they will encourage us to entangle ourselves, as they did with the diamond fields, and then leave us to get out of the mess as we can. south africa cannot be self-governed in connection with this country, except with the good-will of the dutch population. enough may have been done, however, to quiet parliament (which knows nothing about the matter) in the approaching session--and that, i suppose, is the chief consideration. carnarvon writes to me preliminary, i suppose, to some attack when government meets. i have told him exactly what i have told lord d. i hope i may turn out mistaken, but the course of things so far has generally confirmed my opinion whenever i have seen my way to forming one. i shall be glad to hear what you think about the book. from you i shall get the friendliest judgment that the circumstances admit of, and if you are dissatisfied i shall know what to look for from others. the last two hundred pages are the most interesting. the drift of the whole is that carlyle was by far the most remarkable man of his time--that five hundred years hence he will be the only one of us all whose name will be so much as remembered, while perhaps he may be one who will have reshaped in a permanent form the religious belief of mankind. therefore he ought to be known exactly as he was. the argument will not be felt by those who disbelieve in his greatness, and the idolaters--those who pretend to worship without believing- will be savagest of all. idols must be draped in fine clothes, and are reduced to nothing by mere human garments." perhaps the fullest, and certainly the least reserved, account of froude's own feelings about the book is contained in a letter to mrs. charles kingsley: "i tell longmans to-day to send you the book. if you can find time, i shall like to hear the independent impression it makes upon you. only remember this: that it was carlyle's own determination (or at least desire) to do justice to his wife, and to do public penance himself--a desire which i think so noble as to obliterate in my own mind the occasion there was for it. i have long known the worst, and charles knew it generally. we all knew it, and yet the more intimately i knew carlyle, the more i loved and admired him; and some people, lord derby, for instance, after reading the life, can tell me that their opinion of him is rather raised than diminished. there is something demonic both in him and her which will never be adequately understood; but the hearts of both of them were sound and true to the last fibre. you may guess what difficulty mine has been, and how weary the responsibility. you may guess, too, how dreary it is to me to hear myself praised for frankness, when i find the world all fastening on c.'s faults, while the splendid qualities are ignored or forgotten. let them look into their own miserable souls, and ask themselves how they could bear to have their own private histories ransacked and laid bare. i deliberately say (and i have said it in the book), that c.'s was the finest nature i have ever known. it is a rembrandt picture, but what a picture! ruskin, too, understands him, and feels too, as he should, for me, if that mattered, which it doesn't in the least." a few years after publication the reminiscences ran out of print, and froude was anxious to bring out a corrected edition. mrs. alexander carlyle, however, wished for another editor. the copyright was froude's, and no one could reprint the book in great britain without his consent. at that time there was no international copyright between the united kingdom and the united states. a distinguished american professor, mr. eliot norton, was invited by mary carlyle to re-edit the book beyond the atlantic, and he undertook the task. froude always thought that professor norton should have communicated with him, and the public will probably be of the same opinion. in the end, however, froude voluntarily assigned the copyright to mrs. carlyle, who then had possession of the papers, and mr. norton's edition appeared in england, published by macmillan, six years after carlyle's death. it proved to be very like the first, though some errors of the press were corrected and also some slips of the pen. the disputed memoir was not omitted, nor was anything of the slightest interest added by mr. norton to the book. in his preface he attacked froude for fulfilling carlyle's own wishes, of which he seems to have known little or nothing, and, by way of further justification for his interference, he added the following paragraph: "the first edition of the reminiscences was so carelessly printed as to do grave wrong to the sense. the punctuation, the use of capitals and italics, in the manuscript, characteristic of carlyle's method of expression in print, were entirely disregarded. in the first five pages of the printed text there were more than a hundred and thirty corrections to be made of words, punctuation, capitals, quotation marks, and such like; and these pages are not exceptional." this looks like a formidable indictment, and in the literal sense of the words it may be true. i have compared the first five pages of the two editions, and there are a good many changes in the use of capitals and italics. but except one obvious misprint of a single letter, "even" for "ever," there is nothing which does "grave wrong" to the sense, or affects it in any way. "and these pages," as mr. norton says, with another meaning, "are not exceptional." the later reminiscences were not easy to decipher. carlyle's handwriting was seriously affected by age, he wrote upon both sides of very thin paper, and i have seen several letters of his which bear out froude's assertion that, after his hand began to shake, "it became harder to decipher than the worst manuscript which i have ever examined." in preparing the book froude had to use a magnifying glass, and in many cases the true reading was a matter of opinion. in one case, however, it was not. sir henry taylor, the most serene and dignified of men, found himself charged in carlyle's sketch of southey with the unpleasant attribute of "morbid vivacity," and not only with morbid vivacity simpliciter, or per se, but "in all senses of that deep-reaching word." mr. norton restored the true reading, which was "marked veracity," though, on the other hand, he replaced the statement, omitted by froude, that taylor, who had died between the two editions, was "not a well-read or wide-minded man." it must be admitted that in this instance froude allowed a proof which made nonsense to pass, and that mr. norton did a public service by correcting the phrase. froude's occasional carelessness in revision is a common failing enough. what made it remarkable in him was the combination of liability to these lapses with intensely laborious and methodical habits. although froude's legal connection with carlyle's family ceased with the assignment to carlyle's niece of the copyright in the reminiscences, the names of the two men are as inseparably associated as boswell's and johnson's, lockhart's and scott's, macaulay's and trevelyan's, morley's and gladstone's. some readers, such as tennyson and lecky, thought that froude had revealed too much. others, such as john skelton and edward fitzgerald, believed that he had raised carlyle to a higher eminence than he had occupied before. froude himself felt entire confidence both in the greatness of carlyle's qualities and in the permanence of his fame. that was why he thought that the revelation of small defects would do more good than harm. a faultless character, even if he himself could have reconciled it with his conscience to draw one, would not have been accepted as genuine, would not have been treated as credible. the true character, in its strength and its weakness, would command belief, and admiration too. if froude were alive, he would say that the time had not yet come for a final judgment, and might not come for a hundred years. still, i think it will be conceded that the twenty years which have elapsed since he accomplished his task are a period of growth rather than decadence in the number and zeal of carlyle's admirers. this is no doubt in large measure due to carlyle's own books. he has been called the father of modern socialism, and credited with the destruction of political economy. i am too much out of sympathy with these views to judge them fairly. but i suppose it cannot be denied that carlyle fascinates thousands who do not accept him as an infallible, or even as a fallible, guide, or that they, as well as his disciples, devour the pages of froude. nothing annoyed carlyle more than to be told that he confounded might with right. he declared that, on the contrary, he had never said, and would never say, a word for power which was not founded on justice. cromwell was as good as he was great, and he had never glorified frederick, unless to write a book about a man is necessarily to glorify him. this prevalent misconception of carlyle's gospel, so prevalent that it deceived no less keen a critic than lecky, was completely dissipated by froude. no one can read his life intelligently without perceiving that carlyle's real foe was materialism. the french revolution was to him the central fact of modern history, and at the same time a supreme judgment of heaven upon a society given up to unrestrained licentiousness. whether he was right or wrong is not the point. he was as far as possible from being, in the modern sense, a scientific historian. yet in some respects he was utilitarian enough. the condition of england was to him more important than any constitutional change, any triumph in diplomacy, or any victory in war, and this fact explains apparently inconsistent admiration of peel, who though a parliamentary statesman, had accomplished a solid achievement for the benefit of the people. carlyle in his own writings is an almost insoluble enigma. to have given the true solution is the supreme merit of froude.* -- * john nichol, a name still dear in scotland, formerly professor of literature at the university of glasgow, who wrote on carlyle for mr. morley's english men of letters in , says in his preface: "every critic of carlyle must admit as constant obligation to mr. froude as every critic of byron to moore, or of scott to lockhart .... i must here be allowed to express a feeling akin to indignation at the persistent, often virulent, attach directed against a loyal friend, betrayed, it may be, by excess of faith, and the defective reticence that often belongs to genius, to publish too much about his hero. but mr. froude's quotation, in defence, from the essay on sir walter scott, requires no supplement: it should be remembered that he acted with the most ample authority; that the restrictions under which he was first entrusted with the mss. of the reminiscences and the letters and memorials (annotated by carlyle himself as if for publication) were withdrawn; and that the initial permission to select finally approached a practical injunction to communicate the whole." -- chapter ix books and travel the two passions of froude's life were devonshire and the sea. "summer has come at last," he wrote to mrs. kingsley from salcombe in the middle of september, "after two months of rain and storm. the fields from which the wrecks of the harvest were scraped up mined and sprouting now lie basking in stillest sunshine, as if wind and rain had never been heard of. the coast is extremely beautiful, and i, in addition to the charms of the place, hear my native tongue spoken and sung in the churches in undiminished purity." carlyle often kept him in london when he would much rather have been elsewhere. but, wherever he was, he had a ready pen, and his thoughts naturally clothed themselves in a literary garb. his enjoyment of books, especially old books, was intense. reading, however, is idle work, and idleness was impossible to froude. on his return from south africa, where everything was being done which he thought least wise, he took up a classical subject, and began to write a book about caesar. he read cicero, plutarch, suetonius, caesar himself, and produced early in a volume which was always a particular favourite of his own. "i believe," he said to skelton, "it is the best book i have ever written." the public did not altogether agree with him, and it never became so popular as short studies. yet it is undoubtedly a brilliant performance, with just the qualities which might have been expected to make it popular, and a second edition was soon required. it is interesting from the first page to the last, and its whole object is to show that the roman world in the last days of the republic was very like the english world under queen victoria. in rome itself it has a steady sale. the general reader, however, was not wrong in thinking that these eloquent pages are below the level of froude at his best. there is a hard metallic glitter in the style, and a forced comparison of ancient with modern things not really parallel, which make the whole narrative artificial and unreal. lord dufferin said, with his natural acuteness, "it is interesting, and forcibly written, but one feels he is not a safe guide. as they say of the mansions of ireland, 'they are always within a hundred yards of the best situation,' so one feels that froude is never quite in the bull's- eye in the view he gives."* -- * lyall's life of dufferin, vol. ii. p. . -- those who criticised the book as if it were a formal and historical narrative showed a lack of humour, which is a sense of proportion. macaulay might almost as well be judged by his fragment of a roman tale. froude himself calls his caesar a sketch, and it is scarcely more authoritative than the pamphlet of louis napoleon on the same subject. on the other hand, it is quite untrue that froude had not read cicero's letters. he had read those which bore upon his subject, and he quotes them freely enough. the fault of his caesar is that he makes a wrong start. points of resemblance between the first century before the christian era and the nineteenth century after it may of course be found. but the differences are essential and fundamental. a society which rests upon servitude cannot be like a society which rests upon freedom. christianity has modified the whole lives of those who do not profess it, and has created a totally new atmosphere, even if it be not in all respects a better one. representative government, whether it be a good thing or a bad thing, is at least a thing which counts. caesar could hardly have understood the idea of an indissoluble marriage, of a limited monarchy, of equality before the law. one strange similitude froude did, in deference to outraged susceptibilities, omit, and only the first edition contains a formal comparison of julius caesar with jesus christ. no irreverence was intended. it was froude's enthusiasm for caesar that carried him away. still, the instance is only an extreme form of what comes from pushing parallels below the surface. it is only a shade less misleading, though many shades less startling, to represent caesar as a virtuous philanthropist abstemious habits who perished in a magnanimous effort to rescue the people from the tyranny of nobles. the people in the modern sense were slaves, and the republic at least ensured that there should be some protection against military despotism, to which in due course its abolition led. that caesar was intellectually among the greatest men of all time is beyond question. both strategist and as historian he is supreme. his "thrasonical boast" was sober truth, and he stands above military or literary criticism, a lesson and a model. but he was steeped in all the vices of his age, and his motive was personal ambition. the republic did not give him sufficient scope, and therefore he would have destroyed it, if he had not been himself destroyed. froude adopted the position of a great german professor and historian, theodor mommsen, whose prejudices were as strong as his learning was profound. he went with mommsen in adoration of caesar, and in depreciation of cicero. that cicero used one sort of language in public speeches, and another sort in private correspondence, is true, and is notorious because some of his most intimate letters have been preserved. but it is not peculiar to him. the man who talked in public as he talked in private would have small sense of fitness. the man who talked in private as he talked in public would have small sense of humour. although cicero's humour was not brilliant, he had sufficient taste to preserve him from pedantry and from solecisms. his devotion to the republic was perfectly sincere; and if he changed in his behaviour to caesar, it was because caesar changed in his behaviour to the republic. froude's specific charge of rapid tergiversation is disproved by dates. the speech for marcellus, with its over-strained flattery of the conqueror, was delivered, not "within a few weeks of his murder," but eighteen months before that event, at a time when cicero still hoped that caesar would be moderate. if cicero's republic was a narrow oligarchy, it was also the only form of constitutional and civilian government which he knew or could imagine. he failed to preserve it. he was murdered like caesar himself. neither of them believed that political assassination was a crime. cicero's only regret was that antony had not been killed with caesar. antony's chief desire, which he accomplished, was to kill cicero. the idea that cicero was a mere declaimer, who did not count, never occurred either to caesar or to antony. it was left for professor mommsen to discover. froude, always on the look-out for examples of his theory, or his father's theory, that orators must be useless and mistaken, seized it with an eager gasp. an agreeable looseness of treatment pervades the book, and "patricians" appear as wealthy leaders of fashionable society, being in fact a small number of old roman families, who might be poor, or in trade, and could not legally under the republic be increased in number, resembling rather a hindu caste than any institution of western christendom. in caesar's time they had almost died out, and the aristocracy of the day was an aristocracy of office. the book, however, though far from faultless, though in some respects misleading, has a singular fascination, the charm of a picture drawn by the hand of a master with consummate skill. as an historical study, what the french call une etude, it deserves a very high place, and it contains one sentence which all democrats would do well to learn: "popular forms are possible only when individual men can govern their own lives on moral principles, and when duty is of more importance than pleasure, and justice than material expediency." that represents the best side of carlyle's teaching; the subordination of material objects, the supremacy of the moral law. carlyle, however, did not care for the book, as appears in the following letter from froude to lady derby: "april th, .--you are a most kind critic. if i have succeeded in creating interest in so old a subject my utmost wishes are accomplished. i am very curious indeed to hear what lord d. says. i can guess that he thinks i ought to have said more in defence of the constitutionalists, and that i have hardly used cicero. carlyle reduced me to the condition of a 'drenched hen'--to use one of his own images. he told me that the book was not clear, that 'he got no good of it'--in fact, that it was 'a failure.' it may be a failure, but 'want of clearness' is certainly not the cause. i fancy he wanted something else which he did not find, and he would not give himself the trouble to examine what he did find." froude contributed in to mr. morley's english men of letters a critical and biographical sketch of bunyan. the pilgrim's progress, as the work of a dissenter, had been excluded from the rectory at dartington. but froude was not long in supplying the deficiency for himself, and his literary appreciation of bunyan's style was accompanied by a sincere sympathy with the puritan part of his faith. all religious people, he thought, might find common ground in bunyan, a man who lived for religion, and for nothing else. yet even here froude's erastianism, and respect for authority, come into play. he gravely defends bunyan's imprisonment in bedford gaol, which lasted, with some intermissions, from to , as necessary to enforce respect for the law. that such a man as charles stuart should have had power to punish such a man as john bunyan for preaching the word of god is a strange comment on the nature of a christian country. but it cannot be denied that charles and his judges, sir matthew hale among them, provided the leisure to which we owe the best religious allegories in the language. nor can it be said that froude's apology for the confinement bunyan is so repugnant to reason and justice as gibbon's apology for the martyrdom of cyprian. the general election of was regarded by froude with mixed feelings. "i am glad," he wrote to lady derby on the th of april, , "that there is to be an end of 'glory and gunpowder,' but my feelings about gladstone remain where they were. when you came into power in , i dreamed of a revival of real conservatism which under wiser guiding might and would have lasted to the end of the century. this is gone--gone for ever. the old england of order and rational government is past and will not return. now i should like to see a moderate triumvirate--lord hartington, lord granville, and your husband, with a cabinet which they could control. this too may easily be among the impossibilities, but i am sure that at the bottom of its heart the country wants quiet, and a liberal revolutionary sensationalism will be just as distasteful to reasonable people as 'asian mysteries,' tall talk, and ambitious buffooneries." lord derby became more and more liberal, until in december, , he joined mr. gladstone's cabinet. before that decisive step, however, it became evident in which direction he was tending, and froude wrote to lady derby on the th of march: "i will call on tuesday about . i have not been out of town, but my afternoons have been taken up with a multitude of small engagements, and indeed i have been sulky too, and imagined lord d. had delivered himself over to the enemy. but what right have i to say anything when i am going this evening to dine with chamberlain? i like chamberlain. he knows his mind. there is no dust in his eyes, and he throws no dust in the eyes of others." of the great struggle between lords and commons over the franchise in , froude wrote to the same correspondent on the st of july: "as to what has happened since i went away, i for my own humble part am heartily pleased, for it will clear the air. if we are to have democracy, as i suppose we are, let us go into it with our eyes open. i don't like drifting among cataracts, hiding the reality from ourselves by forms which are not allowed either sense or power. that i suppose to be lord salisbury's feeling. i greatly admired his speech in cannon street, which reminded me of a talk i had with him long ago at hatfield. if the result is a change in the constitution of the house of lords which will make it a real power, no one will be more sorry than chamberlain, whose own wish is to keep it in the condition of ornamental helplessness. lord derby himself can hardly wish to see the country entirely in the hands of a single irresponsible chamber elected by universal suffrage--and of such a chamber, which each extension of the suffrage brings to a lower intellectual level." the following letter was written from salcombe just after the general election of and the defeat of home rule: "a devonshire farmer fell ill of typhus fever once. he had quarrelled with a neighbour, and the clergyman told him that he must not die out of charity, and must see the man and shake hands with him. he agreed. the man came. they were reconciled, and he was going away again when the sick farmer called him back to the bed-side. 'mind you,' he said, 'if so be as i get over this here, 'tis to be as 'twas.' "i am sorry to see we are taking for granted that we have got over the scare, and that ''tis to be as 'twas' in parliament. if no way can be found of giving effect to the feeling of which has been just expressed, the old enemy will be back again stronger than ever. i, for my small part, shall finally despair of parliamentary government, and shall pray for a chamberlain dictatorship. i do not think politicians know how slight the respect which is now generally felt for parliament, or how weary sensible people have grown of it and its factions. "we are very happy down here. we have lost the molt, but have a very tolerable substitute for it. the halifaxes are at the molt themselves, and considering what i am, and that he is the president of the church union, i think he and i are both astonished to find how well we get on together. the colonists come next week to plymouth. i have promised to meet them. their dinner will be the exact anniversary of the arrival of the armada off the harbour. that was the beginning of the english naval greatness and of the english colonial empire. think of poor oceana-- , copies of it sold. it stands for something that the english nation is interested in.... but i must not try your eyes any further." it was in that froude, whose connection with fraser had ceased, wrote for good words the series of papers on the oxford counter- reformation which are the best record hitherto published of his college life.* i have already referred to the vivid picture of john henry newman contained in one of them. on the nd of march, , the aged cardinal, writing from the birmingham oratory, sent a gracious message of acknowledgment. "my dear anthony froude," he began, "i have seen some portions of what you have been writing about me, and i cannot help sending you a line to thank you... i thank you, not as being able to accept all you have said in praise of me. of course i can't. nor again as if there may not be other aspects of me which you cannot praise, and which you may in a coming chapter of your publication find it a duty, whether i allow them or not, to remark upon. but i write to thank you for such an evidence of your affectionate feelings towards me, for which i was not prepared, and which has touched me very much. may god's fullest blessings be upon you, and give you all good. yours affectionately, john h. cardinal newman." -- * short studies, fourth series, pp. - . -- froude carefully kept this letter, and, remote as their opinions were, he never varied in his loyal admiration of the illustrious oratorian. that admiration, however, was purely personal, and did not affect in any degree the staunchness of froude's principles. in protestant germany celebrated the four hundredth anniversary of luther's birth, and froude wrote for the occasion a short biography of the rebellious monk who changed the history of the world. he founded on the larger life by julius koestlin, which had then just appeared, this little book makes no pretence to original learning or research. it is a polemical pamphlet by a master of english, and a fervent admirer of the illustrious martin. "when the german states revolted against the roman hierarchy," says froude in his preface, "we in england revolted also," and luther's name was as familiar as bunyan's to the protestant churches of england. the catholic revival of which froude had seen so much at oxford was still in full swing. "nevertheless, we are still a protestant nation, and the majority of us intend to remain protestant. if we are indifferent to our smithfield and oxford martyrs, we are not indifferent to the reformation, and we can join with germany in paying respect to the memory of a man to whom we also, in part, owe our deliverance. without luther there would have been either no change in england in the sixteenth century, or a change purely political. luther's was one of those great individualities which have modelled the history of mankind, and modelled it entirely for good. he revived and maintained the spirit of piety and reverence in which, and by which alone, real progress is possible." such was the temper in which froude set about his task, and which made it a labour of love. besides the great public events in luther's career which are familiar to all, he gave a charming picture of the affectionate father, the genial host, the eloquent, humourous talker whose fragments of conversation, his tischreden, are in germany almost as popular as his hymns. luther's dominant quality was force, and that was a quality which froude, like carlyle, honoured above all others. luther was not in all respects like a modern protestant. he had a great respect for authority, when it was genuine, and he believed in transubstantiation, which leo x. regarded as a juggle to deceive the vulgar. if luther's appearance before the diet of worms was, as froude says, "the finest scene in human history," it is so because this solitary monk stood not for one form of religion against another, but for truth against falsehood, for earnest belief in divine things against a church governed by unbelievers. the renaissance in its most pagan form had invaded the vatican, and the vicar of christ appeared to luther as anti-christ himself. if charles v. had been pope, and leo x. had been emperor, we might never have heard of luther. froude sincerely respected charles v., and held that protestant historians had done him less than justice. although charles opposed the reformation, he opposed it honestly, and his faith in his own religion was absolute. he was a christian gentleman. as he entered wittenberg after the battle of mahlberg, some bishop asked him to dig up luther's body and burn it. "i war not with the dead," he perhaps remembering the grand old roman line: nullum cum victis certamen, et aethere cassis. one valuable truth froude had learned not from carlyle, but from study of the past, and from his own observation at the cape. "if," he wrote in caesar, "there be one lesson which history clearly teaches, it is this, that free nations" cannot govern subject provinces. if they are unable or unwilling to admit their dependencies to share their constitution, the constitution itself will fall in pieces from mere incompetence for its duties." a critic in the quarterly review expressed a hope that this would not prove to be true of india. but froude was not thinking of india. he had in his mind the self-governing colonies, whose fortunes and future were to him a source of perpetual interest. he loved travel, and as soon as he had shaken off the burden of carlyle he took a voyage round the world, described, not always with topical accuracy, in oceana. the name of this delightful volume is of course taken from harrington, more's successor in the days of the commonwealth. the contents were a characteristic mixture of history, speculation, and personal experience. froude had a fixed idea that english politicians, especially liberal politicians, wanted to get rid of the colonies. else why had they withdrawn british troops from canada and new zealand? he could not see, perhaps they did not all see themselves, that to give the colonies complete freedom, and to insist upon their providing, except so far as the navy was concerned, for their own defence, would strengthen, not weaken, the tie. in proof of his theory he produced some singular evidence, comprising one of the strangest stories that ever was told. he heard it, so he informs us, from sir arthur helps, and reproduces it in his own words. "a government had gone out; lord palmerston was forming a new ministry, and in a preliminary council was arranging the composition of it. he had filled up the other places. he was at a loss for a colonial secretary. this name and that was suggested, and thrown aside. at last he said, 'i suppose i must take the thing myself. come upstairs with me, helps, when the council is over. we will look at the maps, and you shall show me where these places are.'" if froude's memory of this anecdote be accurate, helps must, for once, have been drawing upon his imagination. as clerk of the council, he had no more to do with forming cabinets than with appointing bishops. palmerston was never colonial secretary in his life; and among his faults as a minister, which were positive rather than negative, ignorance of political geography was certainly not included. many people, however, especially the tariff reform league, will consider that the passage which immediately succeeds proves froude to have been in advance of his age. for he argues that trade follows the flag, because "our colonists take three times as much of our productions in proportion to their number as foreigners take." a tour through the colonies for the purpose of conversing with their most influential statesmen had long been one of his cherished plans. hitherto he had got no farther than the cape, where, as we have seen, he became entangled in south african politics, and had to repeat his visit. now he was bound for australasia, and on the th of december, , he left tilbury docks, with his son ashley, in an aberdeen packet of four thousand tons. his love of the sea, elizabethan in its intensity, was heightened by his enjoyment of greek literature, especially the odyssey, which he considered ideal reading for a ship, and, as it surely is, on ship or on shore, an incomparable tale of adventure. before the end of the year froude was at cape town, renewing his acquaintance with familiar scenes. many of his former friends were dead, and his courteous enemy, now sir john molteno, had left cape town as well as public life. the prime minister was mr. upington, a clever lawyer, afterwards sir thomas upington, and the chief topic was sir charles warren's expedition to bechuanaland, which happily did not end in war, as upington apprehended that it would. sir hercules robinson was governor and high commissioner, a man after froude's heart, "too upright to belong to any party," and thoroughly appreciative of all that was best in the boers. this time froude's stay was a short one, and early in he was at melbourne. here the burning question was the german occupation of new guinea, for which colonial opinion held gladstone's government, and lord derby in particular, responsible. on the other hand, lord derby had suggested australian federation, which received a good deal of support, though it led to nothing at the time. on one point froude seems always to have met with sympathy. abuse of gladstone never failed to elicit a favourable response, and the news of gordon's death was an opportunity not to be wasted. but when there came rumours of a possible war with russia over the afghan frontier, froude took the side of russia, or at all events of peace, and contended with his tory companion, lord elphinstone, who was for war. in new zealand he visited the venerable sir george grey, who had violated all precedent by entering local politics, and becoming prime minister, after the duke of buckingham had recalled him from the governorship of the colony. he was not equally successful in his second career, and froude's unqualified praise of him was resented by many new zealanders. that the colonies would be true to the mother country if the mother country were true to them was the safe if somewhat vague conclusion at which the returning traveller arrived. he came home by america, and met with a more formidable antagonist than his old assailant father burke, in the shape of a terrific blizzard. but hardships had no deterring effect upon froude, and his love of travel, like his love of the classics, suffered no diminution while strength remained. he returned from the antipodes early in . before was out he had started on a voyage to the west indies, so that his survey of our colonial possessions might be complete. ardent imperialist as he was, froude was not less fully alive than mr. goldwin smith to the difficulties inherent in a policy of imperial federation. "all of us are united at present," he had written in oceana,* "by the invisible bonds of relationship and of affection for our common country, for our common sovereign, and for our joint spiritual inheritance. these links are growing, and if let alone will continue to grow, and the free fibres will of themselves become a rope of steel. a federation contrived by politicians would snap at the first strain." australian federation, which froude did not live to see, was no contrivance of politicians, but the result of spontaneous opinion generated in australia, and ratified as a matter of course by parliament at home. -- * p. . -- the west indian islands had an especial fascination for froude on account of the great naval exploits of rodney, hood, and other british sailors. 'kingsley's at last had revived his interest in them; and though kingsley had long been dead, his memory was fresh among all who knew him. the diary which froude kept during this journey has been preserved, and i am enabled to make a few extracts from it. on the last day of , while he was crossing the bay of biscay, he meditated upon the subject which occupied cicero at an earlier period of his life. "last day of the year. one more gone of the few which can now remain to me. old age is not what i looked for. it is much pleasanter. physically, except that i cannot run, or jump, or dance, i do not feel much difference, and i don't want to do those things. spirits are better. life itself has less worries with it, and seems prettier and truer to me now that i can look at it objectively, without hopes and anxieties on my own account. i have nothing to expect in this world in the way of good. it has given me all that it will or can. i am less liable to illusions. one knows by experience that nothing is so good or so bad as one has fancied, and that what is to be will be mainly what has been. so many of one's friends are dead! yes, but one will soon die too. each friend gone is the cutting a link which would have made death painful. it loses its terror as it draws nearer, especially when one thinks what it would be if one were not allowed to die." tennyson has expressed in tithonus the idea at which froude glances, and from which he averts his gaze. carlyle's senility was not enviable, and even that sturdy veteran stratford canning* told gladstone that longevity was "not a blessing." like cephalus at the opening of plato's republic, froude found that he could see more clearly when the mists of sentiment were dispersed. while at sea froude pursued his favourite musings on the worthlessness of all orators, from demosthenes and cicero to burke and fox, from burke and fox to gladstone and bright. the world was conveniently divided into talking men and acting men. gladstone had never done anything. he had always talked. "i wonder whether people will ever open their eyes about all this. the orators go in for virtue, freedom, etc., the cheap cant which will charm the constituencies. they are generous with what costs them nothing--irish land, religious liberty, emancipation of niggers--sacrificing the dependencies to tickle the vanity of an english mob and catch the praises of the newspapers. if ever the tide turns, surely the first step will be to hang the great misleaders of the people--as the pirates used to be--along the house of commons terrace by the river as a sign to mankind, and send the rest for ever back into silence and impotence." -- * lord stratford de redcliffe. -- whether a man be a pirate is a matter of fact. whether he be a misleader of the people is a matter of opinion. "whom shall we hang?" would become a party question, and perhaps a general amnesty for mere debaters is the most practical solution of the problem. barbados, which has since suffered severely from the want of a market for its sugar, seemed to froude's eyes to present in a sort of comic picture the summit of human felicity. "swarms of niggers on board--delightful fat woman in blue calico with a sailor straw hat, and a pipe in her mouth. all of them perfectly happy, without a notion of morality--piously given too--psalm-singing, doing all they please without scruple, rarely married, for easiness of parting, looking as if they never knew a care .... niggerdom perfect happiness. schopenhauer should come here." schopenhauer would perhaps have said that "niggers" were happier than other men because they come nearer to the beasts. as froude has been accused of injustice to the church of rome, it may be as well to quote an entry from his journal at trinidad:* "went to roman catholic cathedral--saw a few men and women on their knees at solitary prayers--much better for them than methodist addresses on salvation." in another place he says:+ "religion as a motive alters the aspect of everything--so much of the world rescued from rome and the great enemy. yet the roman church after all is something. it is a cause and a home everywhere--something to care for outside oneself--an something which does not change." -- * january th, . + february st. -- again at barbados, on the th of february he writes: "by far the most prosperous of the upper classes that i have seen in the islands are the roman catholic priests and bishops. they stand, step, and speak out with as fine a consciousness of power as in ireland itself .... large, authoritative, dignified, with their long sweeping robes. the old thing is getting fast on its feet again. the philosophers and critics have done for protestantism as a positive, manly, and intellectually credible explanation of the world. the old organism and old superstition steps into its ancient dominion- finding it swept and garnished." in san domingo at sunrise froude's meditations were far from cheerful: "the sense of natural beauty is nothing where man is degraded." so far bishop heber in a well-known couplet. froude proceeds: "the perception of beauty is the perception of something which is acting upon and elevating the intellectual nature. . . it is connected with hope, connected with the consciousness of the noble element in the human soul; and where it is unperceived, or where there is none to perceive it, or where it falls dead, and fails in its effect, the solitary eye which gazes will find no pleasure, no joy--only distress--as for something calling to him out of a visionary world from which his own race is shut out. we cannot feel healthily alone. the sense of worship, the sense of beauty, the sense of sight, is only alive and keen when shared by others .... it is something not alone, but generated by the action of the object on the soul. thus in these islands there is only sadness. in new zealand there was hope and life." a passage from the diary concerning the appointment of colonial governors will be regarded by all official persons as obsolete. "the english nation, if they wish to keep the colonies, ought to insist on proper men being chosen as governors .... the colonial office is not to blame and will only be grateful for an expression of opinion which will enable them to answer pressure upon them with a peremptory 'impossible.' court influence, party influence, party convenience, all equally injurious. a noble lord is out at elbows; give him a governorship of a colony. a party politician must be disappointed in arrangements at home; console him with a colony. the colonists feel that no respect is felt for them; anybody will do for a colony; and whether it is a crown colony, or a with responsible government of its own, the effect is equally mischievous. in fact, while they continue liable, and occasionally subject, to treatment of this kind, the feelings insensibly generate which will lead in the end to separation." the immediate consequence of froude's west indian travels was his well-known book the english in the west indies, to which he gave a second title, one that he himself preferred, the bow of ulysses. it was illustrated from his own sketches, for he had inherited that gift from his father. being often controversial in tone, and not always accurate in description, it provoked numerous criticisms, though not of the sort which interfere with success. in everything froude wrote, though least of all in his history, allowance has to be made for the personal equation. he had not carlyle's memory, nor his unfailing accuracy of eye. where he wrote from mere recollection, deserting the safe ground of his diary, he was liable to error, and few men of letters have been less capable of producing a trustworthy guide book. the value of oceana and the bow of ulysses is altogether different. they are the characteristic reflections of an intensely vivid, highly cultivated mind, bringing out of its treasure-house things new and old. "the king knows your book," it was said to montaigne, "and would like to know you." "if the king knows my book," replied the philosopher, "he knows me." froude is in his books, especially in his books of travel, for in them, more than anywhere else, he thinks aloud. there are strange people in the world. one of them criticised froude in an obituary notice because, when he went to jamaica, he sat in the shade reading dante while he might have been studying the jamaican constitution. there may be those who would study the jamaican constitution, what there is of it, in the sun, while they might, if they could, read dante in the shade, and the necrologist in question may be one of them. froude did not go to study constitutions, which he could have studied at home. he went to see for himself what the west indian colonies were like, and his incorrigible habit of reading the best literature did not forsake him even in tropical climates. he cared only too little for constitutions even when they were his proper business, as they certainly were not in jamaica. the object of the english in the west indies is to make people at home feel an interest in their west indian fellow-subjects, and that it did by the mere fact of its circulation. his belief that the west indies should be governed, like the east indies, despotically, is a subsidiary matter, and the quaint parody of the athanasian creed in which he epitomised what he supposed to be the radical faith is merely an intellectual amusement. on the virtues of rodney, and the future of the colonies, he is serious, though scarcely practical. "imperial federation," he wrote in , "is far away, if ever it is to be realised at all. if it is to come it will come of itself, brought about by circumstances and silent impulses working continuously through many years unseen and unspoken of. it is conceivable that great britain and her scattered offspring, under the pressure of danger from without, or impelled by some purpose, might agree to place themselves under a single administrative head. it is conceivable that out of a combination so formed, if it led to a successful immediate result, some union of a closer kind might eventually emerge. it is not only conceivable, but it is entirely certain, that attempts made when no such occasion has arisen, by politicians ambitious of distinguishing themselves, will fail, and in failing will make the object that is aimed at more confessedly unattainable than it is now."* -- * english in the west indies, p. . -- so far froude's predictions have been realised. when he wrote, the imperial federation league had just been formed, and lord rosebery was arguing for irish home rule as part of a much wider scheme. except australia, which is homogeneous, like the dominion of canada, the british empire is no nearer federation, and ireland is no nearer home rule, than they were then. the depression of the sugar trade in the west indian islands has been met by a treaty which raises the price of sugar at home, and makes those colonies proportionately unpopular with the working classes. it has since been proposed to carry the principle farther, and tax the british workman for the benefit of colonial manufacturers. for these strange results of imperial thinking neither froude nor any of his contemporaries were prepared. but they correspond accurately, especially the second of them, with the "attempt made by politicians ambitious of distinguishing themselves," against which froude warned his countrymen. froude was no scientific economist. he believed in "free trade within the empire," which is not free trade. he was for an imperial tariff, a thing made in germany, and called a zollverein. but his practical experience and personal observation taught him that proposals for closer union with the colonies must come from the colonies themselves. the negroes were a difficulty. they were not really fit for self-government, as the statesmen of the american union had found. personal freedom, the inalienable right of all men and all women, is a very different thing from the possession of a vote. as for india, the idea of home rule there had receded a long way into the distance since the sanguine predictions of macaulay. perhaps froude never quite worked out his conceptions of the federal system which he would have liked to see. in australia it would have been plain sailing. in canada it was already established. in south africa it would have embodied the union of british with dutch, and prevented the disasters which have since occurred. in the west indies it would have raised problems of race and colour which are more prudently agitated at a greater distance from the black. republic of hayti. imperial federalists not yet explained what they would do with india. froude neither was nor aimed at being practical politican. his object, in which he succeeded, was to kindle in the public mind at home that imaginative enthusiasm for the colonial idea of which his own heart was full. although the measure of colonial loyalty was given afterwards in the south african war, the despatch of troops from sydney to the soudan in showed that ties of sentiment are the strongest of all. it was those ties, rather than any political or commercial bond, which froude desired to strengthen. no one would have liked less to live in a colony. colonial society did not suit him. colonial manners were not to his mind. but to meet governing men, like sir henry norman, a "warm gladstonian," by the way, was always a pleasure to him, and as a symbol of england's greatness he loved her territory beyond the seas. the two chiefs of dunboy, published in , was froude's one mature and serious attempt at a novel. for distinction of style and beauty of thought it may be compared with the greatest of historical romances. if it was the least successful of his books, the failure can be assigned to the absence of women, or at least of love, which ever since dr. johnson's definition, if not before, has been expected in a novel. the scene is laid in the neighbourhood of his favourite derreen, and the period is the middle of the eighteenth century. the real hero is an english protestant, colonel goring. goring "belonged to an order of men who, if they had been allowed fair play, would have made the sorrows of ireland the memory of an evil dream; but he had come too late, the spirit of the cromwellians had died out of the land, and was not to be revived by a single enthusiast." he was murdered, and froude could point his favourite moral that the woes of the sister country would be healed by the appearance of another cromwell, which he had to admit was improbable. the irish hero, morty sullivan, has been in france, and is ready to fight for the pretender. he did no good. few irishmen, in froude's opinion, ever did any good. but in the two chiefs of dunboy, if anywhere, froude shows his sympathy with the softness of the irish character, and morty's meditations on his return from france are expressed as only froude could express them. morty was walking with his sister by the estuary of the kenmare river opposite derrynane, afterwards famous as the residence of daniel o'connell, "for how many ages had the bay and the rocks and the mountains looked exactly the same as they were looking then? how many generations had played their part on the same stage, eager and impassioned as if it had been erected only for them! the half-naked fishermen of forgotten centuries who had earned a scanty living there; the monks from the skelligs who had come in on high days in their coracles to say mass for them, baptize the children, or bury the dead; the celtic chief, with saffron shirt and battle-axe, driven from his richer lands by norman or saxon invaders, and keeping hold in this remote spot on his ragged independence; the scandinavian pirates, the overflow of the northern fiords, looking for new soil where they could take root. these had all played their brief parts there and were gone, and as many more would follow in the cycles of the years that were to come, yet the scene itself was unchanged and would not change. the same soft had fed those that were departed, and would feed those that were to be. the same landscape had affected their imaginations with its beauty or awed them with its splendours; and each alike had yielded to the same delusion that the valley was theirs and was inseparably connected with themselves and their fortunes. morty's career had been a stormy one .... he had gone out into the world, and had battled and struggled in the holy cause, yet the cause was not advanced, and it was all nothing. he was about to leave the old place, probably for ever. yet there it was, tranquil, calm, indifferent whether he came or went. what was he? what was any one? to what purpose the ineffectual strivings of short-lived humanity? man's life was but the shadow of a dream, and his work was but the heaping of sand which the next tide would level flat again." wordsworth's "pathetic fallacy" that the moods of nature correspond with the moods of man has seldom found such eloquent illustration as in morty's vain imaginings. morty himself was shot dead by english soldiers in revenge for the murder of goring. the story is a dismal and tragic one. but the best qualities of the irish race are there, depicted with true sympathy, and perhaps this volume may be held to confirm carlyle's opinion, expressed in a letter to miss davenport bromley, that even the english in ireland was "more disgraceful to the english government by far than to the irish savageries." froude, indeed, never forgot the kindness of the kerry peasants who nursed him through the small-pox. he would have done anything for the irish, except allow them to govern themselves. in froude contributed to the series of the queen's prime ministers, edited by mr. stuart reid, a biographical study of lord beaconsfield. he wrote to mr. reid on the subject: ". . . lord beaconsfield wore a mask to the generality of mankind. it was only when i read lothair that i could form any notion to myself of the personality which was behind. i once alluded to that book in a speech at a royal academy banquet. lord beaconsfield was present, and was so far interested in what i said that he wished me to review endymion in the edinburgh, and sent me the proof-sheets of it before publication. edymion did not take hold of me as lothair did, and i declined, but i have never lost the impression which i gathered out of lothair. it is worse than useless to attempt the biography of a man unless you know, or think you know, what his inner nature was .... i am quite sure that lord beaconsfield had a clearer insight than most men into the contemporary constitution of europe--that he had a real interest in the welfare and prospects of mankind; and while perhaps he rather despised the great english aristocracy, he probably thought better of them than of any other class in england. i suppose that like cicero he wished to excel, or perhaps more like augustus to play his part well in the tragic comedy of life. i do not suppose that he had any vulgar ambition at all .... " the feelings with which he approached this not altogether congenial task are described in the following passages from letters to lady derby: .... "the molt, september th, . "if my wonderful adventure into the beaconsfield country comes off, i shall want all the help which lord d. offered to give me. i do not wonder that he and you were both startled at the proposition, and i am not at all sure that in a respectable series of victorian prime ministers i should be allowed to treat the subject in the way that i wish. the point is to make out what there was behind the mask. had it not been for lothair i should have said nothing but a charlatan. but that altered my opinion, and the more often i read it the more i want to know what his real nature was. the early life is a blank filled up by imaginative people out of vivian grey. i am feeling my way indirectly with his brother, ralph d'israeli, and whether i go on or not will depend on whether he will help me." "the molt, november th, , "the difficulty is to find out the real man that lay behind the sphynx-like affectations. i have come to think that these affectations (natural at first) came to be themselves affected as a useful defensive armour which covered the vital parts. anyway, the study of him is extremely amusing. i had nothing else to do, and i can easily throw what i write into the fire if it turns out unsatisfactory." although the book was necessarily a short one, it is too characteristic to be lightly dismissed. when froude gave mr. reid the manuscript, he said, "it will please neither disraeli's friends nor his foes. but it is at least an honest book." he heard, with more amusement than satisfaction, that it had pleased gladstone. for the political estimate of a modern and parliamentary statesman froude lacked some indispensable qualifications. he knew little, and cared less, about the house of commons, in which the best years of disraeli's life were passed. he despised the party system, of which disraeli was at once a product and a devotee. he had no sympathy with lord beaconsfield's foreign policy, and the colonial policy which he would have substituted for it was outside lord beaconsfield's scope. he had adopted from carlyle the theory that disraeli and gladstone were both adventurers, the difference between them being that disraeli only deceived others, whereas gladstone deceived also himself. but gladstone had ignored whereas disraeli, with singular magnanimity, had offered to the author of shooting niagara a pension and a grand cross of the bath. it was, however, as a man of letters rather than as a politician that disraeli fascinated froude, so much so that he is betrayed into the paradox of representing his hero as a lover of literature rather than politics. disraeli sometimes talked in that way himself, as when he was persuading lightfoot to accept the bishopric of durham, and remarked, "i, too, have sacrificed inclination to duty." but he was hardly serious, and even in his novels it is the political parts that survive. although froude had found it impossible to review endymion, the book is very like the author, and can only be appreciated by those who have been behind the scenes in politics. froude's idea of disraeli as a man with a great opportunity who threw it away, who might have pacified ireland and preferred to quarrel with russia, was naturally not agreeable to disraelites, and as a general rule it is desirable that a biographer should be able, to write from his victim's point of view. yet, all said and done, froude's beaconsfield is a work of genius, the gem of the series. professional politicians, with the curious exception of gladstone, thought very little of it. it was not written for them. disraeli was a many-sided man, so that there is room for various estimates of his character and career. of his early life froude had no special knowledge. he was not even aware that disraeli had applied for office to peel. he shows sometimes an indifference to dry details, as when he makes gladstone dissolve parliament in immediately after his defeat on the irish university bill, and represents russia as having by her own act repealed the black sea clauses in the treaty of paris. startling too is his assertion that the parliament of did nothing for england or scotland, on account of its absorption in irish affairs. but he was not writing a formal history, and these points did not appeal to him at all. he drew with inimitable skill a picture of the despised and fantastic jew, vain as a peacock and absurdly dressed, alien in race and in his real creed, smiling sardonically at english ways, enthusiasms, and institutions, until he became, after years of struggle and obloquy, the idol of what was then the proudest aristocracy in the world. disraeli's peculiar humour just suited froude's taste. disraeli never laughed. even his smile was half inward. the irony of life, and of his own position, was a subject of inexhaustible amusement to him. there was nothing in his nature low, sordid, or petty. it was not money, nor rank, but power which he coveted, and at which he aimed. irreproachable in domestic life, faithful in friendship, a placable enemy, undaunted by failure, accepting final defeat with philosophic calm, he played with political passions which he did not share, and made use of prejudices which he did not feel. froude loved him, as he loved reineke fuchs, for his weird incongruity with everything stuffy and commonplace. from a constitutional history of english politics disraeli might almost be omitted. his reform act was not his own, and his own ideas were seldom translated into practice. in any political romance of the victorian age he would be the principal figure. in the congress of berlin, where he did nothing, or next to nothing, he attracted the gaze of every one, not for anything he said there, but because he was there at all. if he had left an autobiography, it would be priceless, not for its facts, but for its opinions. that froude thoroughly understood him it would be rash to say. but he did perceive by sympathetic intuition a great deal that an ordinary writer would have missed altogether. for instance, the full humour of that singular occasion when benjamin disraeli appeared on the platform of a diocesan conference at oxford, with samuel wilberforce in the chair, could have been given by no one else exactly as froude gave it. nothing like it had ever happened before. it is scarcely possible that anything of the kind can ever happen again. froude found the origin of the established church in the statutes of henry viii. gladstone found it, or seemed to find it, in the poems of homer. in disraeli's eyes its pedigree was semitic, and it ministered to the "craving credulity" of a sceptical age, undisturbed by the provincial arrogance that flashed or flared in an essay or review. "in the year ," says froude, "disraeli happened to be on a visit at cuddesdon, and it happened equally that a diocesan conference was to be held at oxford at the time, with bishop wilberforce in the chair. the clerical mind had been doubly exercised, by the appearance of colenso on the 'pentateuch' and darwin on the 'origin of species.' disraeli, to the surprise of every one, presented himself in the theatre. he had long abandoned the satins and silks of his youth, but he was as careful of effect as he had ever been, and had prepared himself in a elaborately negligent. he lounged into the assembly in a black velvet shooting-coat and a wide-awake hat, as if he had been accidentally passing through the town. it was the fashion with university intellect to despise disraeli as a man with neither sweetness nor light; but he was famous, or at least notorious, and when he rose to speak there was a general curiosity. he began in his usual affected manner, slowly and rather pompously, as if he had nothing to say beyond perfunctory platitudes. the oxford wits began to compare themselves favourably the dullness of parliamentary orators; when first one sentence and then another startled them into attention. they were told that the church was not likely to be disestablished. it would remain, but would remain subject to a parliament which would not allow an imperium in imperio. it must exert itself and reassert its authority, but within the limits which the law laid down. the interest grew deeper when he came to touch on the parties to one or other of which all his listeners belonged. high church and low church were historical and intelligible, but there had arisen lately, the speaker said, a party called the broad, never before heard of. he went on to explain what broad churchmen were." disraeli's gibes at colenso and maurice are too well known to need repetition here. the equally famous reference to darwin will bear to be quoted once more, at least as an introduction for froude's incisive comment. "what is the question now placed before society with a glibness the most astounding? the question is this: is man an ape or an angel? i, my lord, am on the side of the angels." "mr. disraeli," so froude continues, "is on the side of the angels. pit and gallery echoed with laughter. fellows and tutors repeated the phrase over their port in the common room with shaking sides. the newspapers carried the announcement the next morning over the length and breadth of the island, and the leading article writers struggled in their comments to maintain a decent gravity. did disraeli mean it, or was it but an idle jest? and what must a man be who could exercise his wit on such a subject? disraeli was at least as much in earnest as his audience. the phrase answered its purpose. it has lived and become historical when the decorous protests of professional divines have been forgotten with the breath which uttered them. the note of scorn with which it rings has preserved it better than any affectation of pious horror, which indeed would have been out of place in the presence of such an assembly." i have taken the liberty of giving such emphasis as italics can confer to two brief passages in this brilliant description, because they express froude's real opinion of diocesan conferences and those who frequented them.* disraeli's audience applauded, partly in admiration of his wit, and partly because, they thought that he was amusing them at the expense of the latitudinarians they abhorred. froude's appreciation came from an opposite source. he regarded disraeli not as a flatterer, but as a busy mocker, laughing at the people thought he was laughing with them. he made no attempt at a really critical estimate of the most baffling figure in english politics. he fastened on the picturesque aspects of disraeli's career, and touched them with an artist's hand. as to what it all meant, or whether it meant anything, he left his readers as much, in the dark as they were before. my own theory, if one must have a theory, is that one word explains disraeli, and that that word is "ambition." if so, he was one of the most marvellously successful men that ever lived. if not, and if a different standard should be applied, other consequences would ensue. froude gives no help in the solution of the problem. what he does is to portray the original genius which no absurdities could cover, and no obstacles could restrain. disraeli the "imperialist" had no more to do with building empires than with building churches, but he was twice prime minister of england. -- * disraeli's contempt for italics is well known. he called them "the last resort of the forcible feebles." -- froude's sea studies in the third series of his collected essays are chiefly a series of thoughts on the plays of euripides. but, like so much of his writing, they are redolent of the ocean, on which and near which he always felt at home. the opening sentences of this fresh and wholesome paper are too characteristic not to be quoted. "to a man of middle age whose occupations have long confined him to the unexhilarating atmosphere of a library, there is something unspeakably delightful in a sea voyage. increasing years, if they bring little else that is agreeable with them, bring to some of us immunity from sea-sickness. the regularity of habit on board a ship, the absence of dinner parties, the exchange of the table in the close room for the open deck under an awning, and the ever-flowing breeze which the motion of the vessel forbids to sink into a calm, give vigour to the tired system, restore the conscious enjoyment of elastic health, and even mock us for the moment with the belief that age is an illusion, and that 'the wild freshness' of the morning of life has not yet passed away for ever. above our heads is the arch of the sky, around us the ocean, rolling free and fresh as it rolled a million years ago, and our spirits catch a contagion from the elements. our step on the boards recovers its buoyancy. we are rocked to rest at night by a gentle movement which soothes you into the dreamless sleep of childhood, and we wake with the certainty that we are beyond the reach of the postman. we are shut off, in a catholic retreat, from the worries and anxieties of the world." this is not the language of a man who ever suffered seriously from sea-sickness, and froude's face had an open-air look which never suggested "the unexhilarating atmosphere of a library." but he was of course a laborious student, and nothing refreshed him like a voyage. on the yacht of his old friend lord ducie, as enthusiastic a sailor and fisherman as himself, he made several journeys to norway, and caught plenty of big salmon. he has done ample justice to these expeditions in the last volume of his essays, which contains the spanish story of the armada. a country where the mountains are impassable, and the fiords the only roads, just suited his taste. it even inspired him with a poem, rornsdal fiord, which appeared in blackwood for april, , and it gave him health, which is not always, like poetry, a pure gift of nature. the life of society, and of towns, never satisfied froude. apart from his genius and his training, he was a country gentleman, and felt most at home when he was out of doors. from panshanger he wrote to lady derby: "how well i understand what you felt sitting on the top of the pyrenees. we men are but a sorry part of the creation. now and then there comes to us a breath out of another order of things; a sudden perception--coming we cannot tell how--of the artificial and contemptible existence we are all living; a longing to be out of it and have done with it--by a pistol-shot if nothing else will do. i continually wonder at myself for remaining in london when i can go where i please, and take with me all the occupations i am fit for. alas! it is oneself that one wants really to be rid of. if we did not ourselves share in the passions and follies that are working round us we should not be touched by them. i have made up my mind to leave it all, at all events, as soon as mr. carlyle is gone; but the enchantment which scenery, grand or beautiful, or which simple country life promises at a distance, will never abide--let us be where we will. it comes in moments like a revelation; like the faces of those whom we have loved and lost; which pass before us, and we stretch our hands to clasp them and they are gone. i came here yesterday for two or three days. the house is full of the young generation. they don't attract me .... whatever their faults, diffidence is not one of them. macaulay's doctrine of the natural superiority of each new generation to its predecessor seems most heartily accepted and believed. the superb pictures in the house are a silent protest against the cant of progress. you look into the faces of the men and the women on the walls and can scarcely believe they are the same race with us. i have sometimes thought 'the numbers' of the elect have been really fulfilled, and that the rest of us are left to gibber away an existence back into an apehood which we now recognise as our real primitive type." from the molt, on the other hand, he wrote: "it is near midnight. i have just come in from the terrace. the moon is full over the sea, which is glittering as if it was molten gold. the rocks and promontories stand out dear and ghost-like. there is not a breath to rustle the leaves or to stir the painted wash upon the shore. men and men's doings, and their speeches and idle excitement, seem all poor, transient, and contemptible. sea and rocks and moonlight looked just as they look to-night before adam sinned in paradise. they remain--we come and go, hardly more enduring than the moth that flutters in through the window, and we are hardly of more consequence." chapter x the oxford professorship on the th of march, , froude's old antagonist, freeman, who had been regius professor of modern history at oxford since stubbs's elevation to the episcopal bench in , died suddenly in spain. the prime minister, who was also chancellor of the university, offered the vacant chair to froude, and after some hesitation froude accepted it. the doubt was due to his age. "there are seventy-four reasons against it," he said. fortunately he yielded. "the temptation of going back to oxford in a respectable way," he wrote to skelton, "was too much for me. i must just do the best i can, and trust that i shall not be haunted by freeman's ghost." lord salisbury did a bold thing when he appointed froude successor to freeman. froude had indeed a more than european reputation as a man of letters, and was acknowledged to be a master of english prose. but he was seventy-four, five years older than freeman, and he had never taught in his life, except as tutor for a very brief time in two private families. the historical school at oxford had been trained to believe that stubbs was the great historian, that freeman was his prophet, and that froude was not an historian at all. lord salisbury of course knew better, for it was at hatfield that some of froude's most thorough historical work had been done. still, it required some courage to fly in the face of all that was pedantic in oxford, and to nominate in freeman's room the writer that freeman had spent the best years of his life in "belabouring." some critics attributed the selection to lord salisbury's sardonic humour, or pronounced that, as lamb said of coleridge's metaphysics, "it was only his fun." some stigmatised it as a party job. gladstone's nominee freeman, had been a home ruler, froude was a unionist; what could be clearer than the motive? but both nominations could be defended on their own merits, and a regius professorship should not be the monopoly of a clique. lord salisbury's choice of froude was indeed, like lord rosebery's subsequent choice of lord acton for cambridge, an example which justified the patronage of the crown. a prime minister has more courage than an academic board, and is guided by larger considerations. froude was one of the most distinguished living oxonians, and yet oxford had not even given him an honorary degree. membership the scottish universities commission in was the only official acknowledgment of his services to culture that he had ever received, and that was more of an obligation than a compliment. "froude," said jowett, "is a man of genius. he has been abominably treated." lord salisbury had made amends. himself a man of the highest intellectual distinction, apart from the offices he happened to hold, he had promoted froude to great honour in the place he loved best, and the most eminent of living english historians returned to oxford in the character which was his due. the new professor gave up his house in london, and settled at cherwell edge, near the famous bathing-place called parson' s pleasure.* he found the university a totally different place from what it was when he first knew it. dr. arnold, who died in , the year after his appointment, was the earliest professor whose lectures were famous, or were attended, and dr. arnold did exactly as he pleased. there was no board of studies to supervise him, and it was thought rather good of a professor to lecture at all. now the board of studies was omnipotent, and a professor's time was not his own. he was bound in fact to give forty-two lectures in a year, and to lecture twice a week for seven weeks in two terms out of the three. the prospect appalled him. "i never," he wrote to max muller,+ "i never gave a lecture on an historical subject without a fortnight or three weeks of preparation, and to undertake to deliver forty-two such lectures in six months would be to undertake an impossibility. if the university is to get any good out of me, i must work in my own way." he did not, however, work in his own way, and the university got a great deal of good out of him all the same. -- * the house is now, oddly enough, a catholic convent. + april th, . -- lord salisbury, in making froude the offer, spoke apologetically of the stipend as small, but added that the work would be light. the accomplished chancellor was imperfectly informed. the stipend was small enough: the work was extremely hard for a man of seventy-four. froude's conscientiousness in preparation was almost excessive. every lecture was written out twice from notes for improvement of style and matter. his audiences were naturally large, for not since the days mr. goldwin smith, who resigned in , had anything like froude's lectures been heard at oxford. when i was an undergraduate, in the seventies, we all of course knew that professor stubbs had a european reputation for learning. but, except to those reading for the history school, stubbs was a name, and nothing more. nobody ever dreamt of going to hear him. crowds flocked to hear froude, as in my time they flocked to hear ruskin. one sex was as well represented as the other. froude had left the dons celibate and clerical. he found them, for the most part, married and lay. there was every variety of opinion in the common rooms, and every variety of perambulators in the parks. london hours had been adopted, and the society, though by no means frivolous or ostentatious, was anything rather than monastic. at oxford, as in london, froude was almost always the best talker in the room. he had travelled, not so much in europe as in america and the more distant parts of the british empire. he had read almost everything, and known almost every one. his boyish enthusiasm for deeds of adventure was not abated. he believed in soldiers and sailors, especially sailors. creeds, parliaments, and constitutions did not greatly attract or keenly interest him. old as he was by the almanac, he retained the buoyant freshness of youth, and loved watching the eights on the river as much as any undergraduate. the chapel services, especially at magdalen, brought back old times and tastes. as professor of history he became a fellow of oriel, where he had been a commoner in the thick of the oxford movement. if the tractarian tutors could have heard the conversation of their successors, they would have been astonished and perplexed. even the essayists and reviewers would have been inclined to wish that some things could be taken for granted. modern oxford was not altogether congenial to froude. while he could not be called orthodox, he detested materialism, and felt sympathy, if not agreement, with evangelical protestants. like bacon, he would rather believe all the legends of the talmud than that this universal frame was without a mind. of the questions which absorbed high churchmen he said, "one might as well be interested in the amours of the heathen gods." on the other hand, he had no sympathy with the new school of specialists, the devotees of original research. he believed in education as a training of the mental faculties, and thought that undergraduates should learn to use their own minds. "i can see what books the boys have read," he observed, after examining for the arnold prize, "but i cannot see that they make any use of what they have read. they seem to have power of assimilation." the study of authorities at first hand, to which he had given so much of his own time, he regarded as the work of a few, and as occupation for later years. the faculty of thinking, and the art of writing, could not be learned too soon. few indeed were the old friends who remained at oxford to welcome him back. max muller was the most intimate of them, and among his few surviving contemporaries was bartholomew price, master of pembroke, a clergyman more distinguished in mathematics than in theology. the rector of exeter* gave a cordial welcome to the most illustrious of its former fellows. the provost of oriel+ was equally gracious. in the younger generation of heads his chief friends were the dean of christ church,^ now bishop of oxford, and the president of magdalen.# but the oxford of was so unlike the oxford of that froude might well feel like one of the seven sleepers of ephesus. and if there had been many changes in oxford, there had been some also in himself. he had long ceased to be, so far as he ever was, a clergyman. he had been twice married, and twice left a widower. his children had grown up. his fame as an author extended far beyond the limits of his own country, and of europe. he had made carlyle's acquaintance, become his intimate friend, and written a biography of him which numbered as many readers as the french revolution itself. he had lectured in the united states, and challenged the representatives of irish nationalism on the history of their own land. he had visited most of the british colonies, and promoted to the best of his ability the federation of south africa. few men had seen more, or read more, or enjoyed a wider experience of the world. what were the lessons which after such a life he chiefly desired to teach young englishmen who were studying the past? the value of their religious reformation, and the achievements of their naval heroes. the authorised version and the navy were in his mind the symbols of england's greatness. greater britain, including britain beyond the seas, was the goal of his hopes for the future progress of the race. there were in oxford more learned men than froude, max muller for one. there was not a single professor, or tutor, who could compare with him for the multitude and variety of his experience. undergraduates were fascinated by him, as everybody else was. the dignitaries of the place, except a stray freemanite here and there, recognised the advantage of having so distinguished a personage in so conspicuous a chair. even in a professor other qualities are required besides erudition. stubbs's constitutional history of england may be a useful book for students. unless or until it is rewritten, it can have no existence for the general reader; and if the test of impartiality be applied, stubbs is as much for the church against the state as froude is for the state against the church. when mr. goldwin smith resigned the professorship of modern history, or contemplated resigning it stubbs wrote to freeman, "it would be painful to have froude, and worse still to have anybody else." he received the appointment himself, and held it for eighteen years, when he gave way to freeman, and more than a quarter of century elapsed before the painful event occurred. by that time stubbs was bishop of oxford, translated from chester, and had shown what a fatal combination for a modern prelate is learning with humour. if froude had been appointed twenty years earlier, on the completion of his twelve volumes, he might have made oxford the great historical school of england. but it was too late. the aftermath was wonderful, and the lectures he delivered at oxford show him at his best. but the effort was too much tor him, and hastened his end. -- * dr. jackson. + mr. monro. ^ dr. paget. # mr. warren. -- it must not be supposed that froude felt only the burden. his powers of enjoyment were great, and he thoroughly enjoyed oxford. he had left it forty years ago under a cloud. he came back in a dignified character with an assured position. he liked the familiar buildings and the society of scholars. the young men interested and amused him. ironical as he might be at times, and pessimistic, his talk was intellectually stimulating. his strong convictions, even his inveterate prejudices, prevented his irony from degenerating into cynicism. history, said carlyle, is the quintessence of innumerable biographies, and it was always the human side of history that appealed to froude. he once playfully compared himself with the mephistopheles of faust, sitting in the professor's chair. but in truth he saw always behind historical events the directing providence of god. newman held that no belief could stand against the destructive force of the human reason, the intellectus sibi permissus. froude felt that there were things which reason could not explain, and that no revelation was needed to trace the limits of knowledge. sceptical as he was in many ways, he had the belief which is fundamental, which no scientific discovery or philosophic speculation can shake or move. creeds and churches might come or go. the moral law remained where it was. his own creed is expressed in that which he attributes to luther. "the faith which luther himself would have described as the faith that saved is the faith that beyond all things and always truth is the most precious of possessions, and truthfulness the most precious of qualities; that when truth calls, whatever the consequence, a brave man is bound to follow."* -- * short studies, iii. . -- although froude was probably happier at oxford than he had been at any time since , the regulations of his professorship worried him, as they had worried stubbs and freeman. they seemed to have been drawn on the assumption that a professor would evade his duties, and behave like an idle undergraduate. froude, on the contrary, interpreted them in the sense most adverse to himself. the authorities of the place, or some of them, would have had him spare his pains, and colourably evade the statute by talking instead of lecturing. but froude was too conscientious to seek relief in this way. whatever he had to do he did thoroughly, conscientiously, and as well as he could. there is no trace of senility in his professorial utterances. on the contrary, they are full of life and fire. yet froude was by no means entirely engrossed in his work. he had time for hospitality, and for making friends with young men. he loved his familiar surroundings, for nothing can vulgarise oxford. he found men who still read the classics as literature, not to convict aeschylus of violating dawes's canon, or to get loafers through the schools. he was not in all respects, it must be admitted, abreast of modern thought. his education had been unscientific, and he cared no more for darwin than carlyle did. he had learnt from his brother william, who died in ,* the scope and tendency of modern experiments, and astronomical illustrations are not uncommon in his writings. but the bent of his mind was in other directions, and he had never been under the influence of spencer or of mill. the oxford which he left in was dominated by aristotle and bishop butler. he came back to find butler dethroned, and more modern philosophers established in his place. aristotle remained where he was, not the type and symbol of universal knowledge, as dante conceived him, but the groundwork upon which all later systems had been built. plato, without whom there would have been no aristotle, was more closely and reverently studied than ever, partly no doubt through jowett, and yet mainly because no philosopher can ever get far away from him. jowett himself, the ideal "head of a house," who had been at balliol when froude was at oriel, died in the second year of froude's professorship, after seeing many of his pupils famous in the world. he had lived through the great period of transition in which oxford passed from a monastery to a microcosm. the act of had opened the university to dissenters, reserving fellowships and scholarships, all places of honour and emolument, for members of the established church. the act of removed the test of churchmanship for all such places, and for the higher degrees, except theological professorships and degrees in divinity. the act of opened the headships of the colleges, and put an end to prize fellowships for life. the provost of oriel, then vice- chancellor, was a layman. marriage did not terminate a fellowship, which, unless it were connected with academic work, lasted for seven years, and no longer. the old collegiate existence was at an end. many of the tutors were married, and lived in their own houses. when gladstone revisited oxford in , and occupied rooms in college as an honorary fellow of all souls, nothing pleased him less than the number of women he encountered at every turn. they were not all the wives and daughters of the dons, who in gladstone's view had no more right to such appendages than priests of the roman church; there were also the students at the ladies' colleges, who were allowed to compete for honours, though not to receive degrees. -- * "my brother," froude wrote to lady derby, "though his name was little before the public, was well known to the admiralty and indeed in every dock-yard in europe. he has contributed more than any man of his time to the scientific understanding of ships and shipbuilding. his inner life was still more remarkable. he resisted the influence of newman when all the rest of his family gave way, refusing to become a catholic when they went over, and keeping steadily to his own honest convictions. to me he was ever the most affectionate of friends. the earliest recollections of my life are bound up with him, and his death takes away a large past of the little interest which remained to me in this most uninteresting world. the loss to the admiralty for the special work in which he was engaged will be almost irreparable." -- froude, who brought his own daughters with him, entered easily into the changed conditions. he was not given to lamentation over the past, and if he regretted anything it was the want of puritan earnestness, of serious purpose in life. he had an instinctive sympathy with men of action, whether they were soldiers, sailors, or statesmen. for mere talkers he had no respect at all, and he was under the mistaken impression that they governed the country through the house of commons. he never realised, any more than carlyle, the vast amount of practical administrative work which such a man as gladstone achieved, or on the other hand the immense weight carried in parliament by practical ability and experience, as distinguished from brilliancy and rhetoric. the history which he liked, and to which he confined himself, was antecedent to the triumph of parliament over the crown. warren hastings, he used to say, conquered india; burke would have hanged him for doing it. the house of lords acquitted hastings; and so far from criticising the doubtful policy of the war with france in , burke's only complaint of pitt was that he did not carry it on with sufficient vigour. the distinction between talkers and doers is really fallacious. some speeches are actions. some actions are too trivial to deserve the name. but if froude was incapable of understanding parliamentary government, he very seldom attempted to deal with it. the english in ireland is a rare and not a fortunate, exception. the house of tudor was far more congenial to him than either the house of stuart or the house of brunswick. froude delivered his inaugural lecture on the th of october, . the place was the museum, which stands in the parks opposite keble, and the attendance was very large. in the history of oxford there have been few more remarkable occasions. although the new professor had made his name and writings familiar to the whole of the educated world, his immediate predecessor had vehemently denied his right to the name of historian, and had assured the public with all the emphasis which reiteration can give that froude could not distinguish falsehood from truth. if anything could have brought freeman out of his grave, it would have been froude's appointment to succeed him. it is the custom in an inaugural lecture to mention in eulogistic language the late occupant of the chair. no man was less inclined to bear malice than froude. his disposition was placable, and his temperament calm. freeman had grossly and frequently insulted him without the faintest provocation. but he had long since taken his revenge, such as it was, and he could afford to be generous now. he discovered, with some ingenuity, a point of agreement in that freeman, like himself, was a champion of classical education. therefore, "along with his asperities," he had "strong masculine sense," and had voted for compulsory greek. if the right of suffrage were restricted to men who knew greek as well as froude or freeman, the decisions of congregation at oxford, and of the senate at cambridge, would command more respect. froude must have been reminded by the obligatory reference to freeman that a man of seventy-four was succeeding a man of sixty- nine. the roman cardinals were, he said, in the habit of electing an aged pontiff with the hope, not always fulfilled, that he would die soon. he had no belief that such an expectation would be falsified in his own case, and he undertook, with obvious sincerity, not to hold the post for a single day after he had ceased to be capable of efficiently discharging his functions. to history his own life had been devoted, and it would indeed have been strange if he could not give young men some help in reading it. his own great book might not be officially recommended for the schools. it was unofficially recommended by all lovers of good literature and sound learning. like most people who know the meaning of science and of history, he denied that history was a science. there were no fixed and ascertained principles by which the actions of men were determined. there was no possibility of trying experiments. the late mr. buckle had not displaced the methods of the older historians, nor founded a system of his own. "i have no philosophy of history," added froude, who disbelieved in the universal applicability of general truths. here, perhaps, he is hardly just to himself. the introductory chapter to his history of the reformation, especially the impressive contrast between modern and mediaeval england, is essentially philosophical, so much so that one sees in it the student of thucydides, tacitus, and gibbon. history to froude, like the world to jaques, was a stage, and all the men and women merely players. but a lover of goethe knows well enough that the drama can be philosophical, and shakespeare, the master of human nature, has drawn nothing more impressive than the close of wolsey's career. "the history of mankind is the history of great men," was carlyle's motto, and froude's. it is a noble one, and to discredit great men with low motives is the vice of ignoble minds. the reign of henry viii., after wolsey's fall, was rich in horrors and in tragical catastrophes. but it was not a mere carnival of lust and blood. high principles were at stake, and profound issues divided parties, beside which the levity of anne boleyn and the eyes of jane seymour were not worth a moment's thought. hobbes wondered that a parliament man worth thousands of pounds, like hampden, to pay twenty shillings for ship-money, as if the amount had anything to do with the principle that taxes could only be levied by the house of commons. henry's vices are dust in the balance against the fact that he stood for england against rome. it is one of froude's chief merits that he never fails to see the wood for the trees, never forgets general propositions to lose himself in details. a novice whose own mind is a blank may read whole chapters of gardiner without discovering that any events of much significance happened in the seventeenth century. he will not read many pages of froude before he perceives that the sixteenth century established our national independence. two of froude's pet hobbies may be found in his inaugural lecture. there is the theory that judgment falls upon idleness and vice, which he adopted from carlyle. there is his own doctrine that the statute book furnishes the most authentic material of history. it is no answer to say that preambles are inserted by ministers, who put their own case and not the case of the nation. in the use or reception of all evidence allowance must be made for the source from which it comes. but even governments do not invent out of their own heads, or put into statutes what is foreign to the public mind. they employ the arguments most likely to prevail, and these must be closely connected with the circumstances of the day. no recital in an act of parliament can prove incontestably that the monasteries were stews, or worse. that such a thing could be plausibly alleged, and generally believed, is itself important, and history must take account of popular views. debates were not reported in the sixteenth century, nor was freedom of speech in parliament recognised by the crown. there was nothing to ensure a fair trial for the victims of a royal prosecution, and testimony obtained by torture was accepted as authentic. all these are facts, and to neglect them is to go astray. but they do not prove that every public document is untrustworthy; or that the words of a statute have no more to do with reality than the words of a romance. it is a question of degree. historical narrative could not be written under the conditions most properly imposed upon criminal proceedings in a court of law. if nothing which cannot be proved beyond the possibility of reasonable doubt is admitted into the pages of history, they will be bare indeed. it is significant that froude laid down in the same propositions for which he had contended in the oxford essays of . he had suffered many things in the meantime of the saturday review, but he held to his old opinions with unshaken tenacity. all froude's changes were made early in life. when once he had shaken himself free of tractarianism, the nemesis of faith, and elective affinities, he remained a protestant, puritan, sea-loving, priest-hating englishman. the subject with which froude began his brief career as professor was the council of trent. the council of trent has been described by one of the great historians of the world, fra paolo sarpi, whom macaulay considered second only to thucydides. entirely ineffective for the purpose of securing universal concord, it did in reality separate protestant from catholic europe, and establish papal authority over the church of rome. when the council met, the papacy was no part of orthodox catholicism, and henry viii. never dreamt that in repudiating the jurisdiction of the pope he severed himself from the catholic church. if luther had been only a heretic, the council might have put him down. but he had behind him the bulk of the laity, and cardinal contarini told paul iii. that the revolt against ecclesiastical power would continue if every priest submitted. "the reformation," said froude at the beginning of his first course, in november, , "is the hinge on which all modern history turns." he traced in it the rise of england's greatness. when he came back in his old age to oxford, it was to sound the trumpet-note of private judgment and religious liberty, as if the oxford movement and the anglo-catholic revival had never been. froude could not be indifferent to the moral side of historical questions, or accept the doctrine that every one is right from his own point of view. the reformation did in his eyes determine that men were responsible to god alone, and not to priests or churches, for their opinions and their deeds. it also decided that the church must be subordinate to the state, not the state to the church. this is called erastianism, and is the bugbear of high churchmen. but there is no escape from the alternative, and the church of rome has never abandoned her claim to universal authority. against it henry viii. and cromwell, elizabeth and cecil, set up the supremacy of the law, made and administered by laymen. as froude said at the close of his first course, in the hilary term of , "the principles on which the laity insisted have become the rule of the modern popes no longer depose princes, dispense with oaths, or absolve subjects from their allegiance. appeals are not any more carried to rome from the national tribunals, nor justice sold there to the highest bidder." justice was sold at rome before the existence of the catholic church, or even the christian religion. it has been sold, as hugh latimer testified, in england herself. but with the english court's independence of the holy see came the principles of civil and religious freedom. few things annoyed froude more than the attacks of macaulay and other liberals on cranmer. this was not merely sentimental attachment on froude's part to the compiler of the prayer book. he looked on the marian martyrs as the precursors of the long parliament and of the revolution, the champions of liberty in church and state. he would have felt that he was doing less than his duty if he had taught his pupils mere facts. those facts had a lesson, for them as well as for him, and his sense of what the lesson was had deepened with years. he had observed in his own day an event which made much the same impression upon him as study of the french revolution had made upon carlyle. when the second empire perished at sedan, froude saw in the catastrophe the judgment of providence upon a sinister and tortuous career. if the duty of an historian be to exclude moral considerations, froude did not fulfil it. that there were good men on the wrong side he perceived plainly enough. but that did not make it the right side, nor confuse the difference between the two. froude's second set of oxford lectures, begun in the easter term of , was entitled english seamen of the sixteenth century, and the name of the first lecture in it, a thoroughly characteristic name, was the sea cradle of the reformation. he was in his element, and his success was complete. how protestant england ousted catholic spain from the command of the ocean, and made it britannia's realm, was a story which he loved to tell. "the young king," henry viii., "like a wise man, turned his first attention to the broad ditch, as he called the british channel, which formed the natural defence of the kingdom." it was "the secret determined policy of spain to destroy the english fleet, pilots, masters, and sailors, by means of the inquisition." in , according to cecil, more than twenty british subjects had been burnt at the stake in spain for heresy, and more than two hundred were starving in spanish prisons. there was work for hawkins and drake. they were both devonshire men, like raleigh. 'twas ever the way with good queen bess, who ruled as well as a mortal can, when she was stogged, and the country in a mess, to send for a devonshire man. spain paid heavily for the persecution of british sailors. in his fifth lecture, parties in the state, froude read with dramatic emphasis, and in a singularly impressive manner, the application of a seaman to elizabeth for leave to attack philip's men-of-war off the banks of newfoundland. "give me five vessels, and i will go out and sink them all, and the galleons shall rot in cadiz harbour for want of hands to sail them. but decide, madam, and decide quickly. time flies, and will not return. the wings of man's life are plumed with the feathers of death." when he uttered these tragic words, froude paused, and looked up, and it seemed to those who heard him as if he felt that the time of his own departure was at hand. elizabeth herself was never moved by sentiment, and final vengeance on spain had to wait for the armada, with which these lectures, like the history, conclude. the consequences he left to others who had more years before them than he himself. he loved to dwell on the glories of seamen, especially devonshire seamen, whose descendants he had known from his boyhood. the open sea and the open air, the stars and the waves, were akin to him. his companions sometimes thought that he cared too little for the perils of the deep. a lady who went boating with him, and hazarded the opinion that they would be drowned, got no warmer comfort than "very likely," which struck her as grim. probably he knew that there was no danger. he was accustomed to storms, and rather enjoyed them than otherwise. his lectures on the elizabethan heroes of the sea had a fascination for young englishmen which no historical discourses ever surpassed. these sea-tales were spread over a year, being delivered in the easter terms of and . before they were finished froude had begun another course on the life and correspondence of erasmus. erasmus is one of the choicest names in the history of letters, the flower of the religious renaissance. simply and sincerely pious, he enjoyed without abusing all the pleasures of life, wrote such latin prose as had not been known since pliny, and learnt greek that he might understand the true meaning of the new testament. hating the monks of his own time for their ignorance and coarseness, he was as learned as any benedictine of old, and as a master of irony he is like a gentler pascal, a more reverent voltaire. he loved england, the england of archbishop warham, dean colet, and sir thomas more. english ladies too were much to his taste, and in his familiar letters he has described their charms with frank appreciation. priest as he was, and strictly moral, he cultivated an innocent epicureanism, including the collection of manuscripts and the exposure of pretentious ignorance in high places. he felt imperfect sympathy with luther, and his literary criticism would have made no reformation. he was indeed precisely what we now call a broad churchman, accepting forms as convenient, though not essential, to faith. no one was better qualified to interpret him than froude, whose translations of his letters, though free and sometimes loose, are vivid, racy, and idiomatic. froude was by no means a blind admirer of erasmus. his favourite heroes were men of action, and he regarded luther as the real champion of spiritual freedom. intellect, he used to say, fought no battles, and was no match for superstition. without luther there would have been no reformation. there might well have been a reformation without erasmus. neither of them was necessary according to contarini, and in truth the reformation had many sides. when selden attended the westminster assembly of divines, he took occasion to remind his colleagues that the scriptures were not written in english. "perhaps in your little pocket bibles with gilt leaves" (which they would often pull out and read) "the translation may be thus, but the greek or the hebrew signifies thus and thus." so he would speak, says whitelock, and totally silence them. but neither were the scriptures written in latin. it was erasmus who revived the study of the greek testament, the charter of the scholar's reformation. he gave the renaissance, in its origin purely pagan, a christian direction, and prevented the divorce of learning from religion. he also protested against the confusion of christianity with asceticism, and against belief in the superior sanctity of monks. he turned his satire upon corruption in high places, and did not spare the holy see. his residence in england, his friendship with more, his admiration for the earlier and better part of henry viii.'s career, connected him with events of which froude had himself traced the development. luther moved him sometimes to sarcasm. toleration and comprehension were the watchwords of erasmus. "reduce the dogmas necessary to be believed," he said, "to the smallest possible number; you can do it without danger to the realities of christianity. on other points, either discourage inquiry, or leave every one to believe what he pleases- then we shall have no more quarrels, and religion will again take hold of life." the subject was not a new one to froude. he had lectured on erasmus and luther at newcastle five-and-twenty years before. the contrast between the two reformers is perennially interesting. goethe, a supreme critic, thought that reform of the church should have been left to erasmus, and that luther was a misfortune. but then goethe, though he understood religious enthusiasm, did not see the need for it, and would have tolerated such a pope as leo x., who had excellent taste in literature, rather than see issues submitted to the people which should be left for the learned to decide. the weak point of froude's erasmus is the inaccuracy of its verbal scholarship. "sir," said dr. johnson of a loose scholar, "he makes out the latin from the meaning, not the meaning from the latin." this biting sarcasm would be inapplicable to froude, who knew the dead languages, as they are called, well enough to read them with ease and enjoyment. but he took in the general sense of a passage so quickly that he did not always, even in translating, stop to consider the precise significance of every word. literal conformity with the original text is of course not possible or desirable in a paraphrase. what froude did not sufficiently consider was the difference between the translation and the translator himself, who cannot paraphrase properly unless he renders literally in his own mind. froude gave abundant proof of his good faith by quoting in notes some of the very passages which are incorrectly rendered above. a great deal has been made by a catholic critic of the fact that the book which checked ignatius loyola's "devotional emotions" was not erasmus's greek testament, but his enchiridion militis christiani, christian soldier's manual. this mistake was unduly favourable to the saint. froude did not mean to imply that it was the actual words of scripture which had this effect upon ignatius. he was referring to the great scholar's own notes, which are polemical, and not intended to please monks. the founder of the jesuits would have doubtless regarded them as most detestable blasphemy. the enchiridion, on the other hand, is a purely devotional book, though written for a man of the world. "my object," says froude in his preface, "has been rather to lead historical students to a study of erasmus's own writings than to provide an abbreviated substitute for them." the students who took the advice will have found that froude was guilty of some strange inadvertences, such as mistaking through a misprint a foster brother for a collection of the classics, but they will not have discovered anything which substantially impairs the value of his work. his paraphrases were submitted to two competent scholars, who drew up a long and rather formidable list of apparently inaccurate renderings. these were in turn submitted to the accomplished latinist, mr. allen of corpus, who is editing the letters of erasmus for the clarendon press. mr. allen thought that in several cases froude had given the true meaning better than a more literal translation would give it. there remain a number of rather trivial slips, which do not appreciably diminish the merit of the best attempt ever made to set erasmus before english readers in his habit as he was. the latin of erasmus is not always easy. he wrote it beautifully, but not naturally, as an exercise in imitation of cicero. without a thorough knowledge of cicero and of terence he is sometimes unintelligible, in a few cases the text of his letters is corrupt, and in others his real meaning is doubtful. one of the most glaring blunders, "idol" for "old," is obviously due to the printer, and a more careful comparison with the latin would have easily removed them all. but at seventy-six a little laxity may be pardoned, and these were the only oxford lectures which froude himself prepared for the press. the publication of english seamen and the council of trent was posthumous. between and froude had become more favourable to erasmus, or more sympathetic with his point of view. it was not that he admired luther less. on the contrary, his protestant convictions grew stronger with years, and to the last he raised his voice against the anglo-catholic revival. but he seemed to feel with more force the saying of erasmus that "the sum of religion is peace." he translated and read out to his class the whole of the satiric dialogue held at the gate of paradise between st. peter and julius ii., in which the wars of that pontiff are ruthlessly flagellated, and the wicked old man threatens to take the celestial city by storm. erasmus, averse as he was from violent measures, had no lack of courage, and in his own name he told the truth about the most dignified ecclesiastics. no artifices imposed upon him, and he acknowledged no master but christ. he translated the arch-sceptic lucian, about whom froude has himself written a delightful essay. "i wish," said froude, "i wish more of us read lucian now. he was the greatest man by far outside the christian church in the second century." lucian lived in an age when miracles the most grotesque were supported by witnesses the most serious, and when, as he said, the one safeguard was an obstinate incredulity, the ineradicable certainty that miracles did not happen. erasmus enjoyed lucian as a corrective of monkish superstition, though he himself was essentially christian. a protestant he never became. he lived and died in communion with rome, denounced by monks as a heretic, and by lutherans as a time-server. paul iii. would have made him a cardinal if his means had sufficed for a prince of the church. standing between the two extremes, he saw better than any of his contemporaries the real proportions of things, and froude's last words on the subject were that students would be most likely to understand the reformation if they looked at it with the eyes of erasmus. small faults notwithstanding, there is no one who has drawn a more vivid, or a more faithful, portrait of erasmus than anthony froude. of froude in his oxford chair it may fairly be said that in a short time he fulfilled a long time, and made more impression upon the under-graduates in a few months than stubbs had made in as many years. it was not so much the love of learning that he inspired, though the range of his studies was wide, as enthusiasm for history because it was the history of england. his subjects were really english. erasmus knew england thoroughly, and would have been an englishman if he could. the council of trent failed to check the reformation, and england without the reformation would have been a different country, if not a province of spain. froude's lectures were events, landmarks in the intellectual life of oxford, and the young men who came to him for advice went away not merely with dry facts, but with fructifying ideas. distasteful as modern parliamentary politics were to him, the position of the british empire in the world was the dominant fact in his mind, and he regarded oxford as a training-ground of imperial statesmanship. he was not made to run in harness, or to act as a coach for the schools. "the teaching business at oxford," he wrote to skelton, after his last term, "goes at high pressure--in itself utterly absurd, and unsuited altogether to an old stager like myself. the undergraduates come about me in large numbers, and i have asserted in some sense my own freedom; but one cannot escape the tyranny of the system."* this is severe, though not perhaps severer than the inaugural lecture of professor firth. to a critic from the outside it seems that boards of studies should have power to relax their own rules, and that the utmost possible relaxation should have been granted in the case of froude. a famous historian of seventy-four, if qualified to be a professor at all, must be capable of managing his own work so that it may be most useful and efficient. the restrictions of which froude, not alone, complained are really incompatible with regius professorships, or at least with the patronage of the crown. they imply that the teaching branch of the university is to be entirely controlled by expert specialists on the spot. a regius professor is a national institution, a public man, not like a college tutor, who has purely local functions to discharge. that is a point on which freeman would have agreed with froude, and stubbs would have agreed with both of them. froude's success in spite of limitations does not show that they were wise, but that genius surmounts obstacles and breaks the barriers which seek to impede it. "to my sorrow i am popular," he said, "and my room is crowded. i know not who they are, and have no means of knowing. so it is not satisfactory. i must alter things somehow. -- * table talk of shirley, p. . -- i can't yet tell how." the opportunity never came. but he was too old and too wise a man to let such things affect his happiness, and he was happier in oxford than in london. "some of the old dons," he wrote, "have been rather touchingly kind." there was indeed only one chance of escaping froude's magnetism, and that was to keep out of his way. the charm of his company was always irresistible. different as the oxford of was from the oxford of , young men are always the same, and froude thoroughly understood them. he had enjoyed himself at oriel not as a reading recluse, but as a boy out of school, and he was as young in heart as ever. strange is the hold that oxford lays upon men, and not less strong than strange. nothing weakens it; neither time, nor distance, nor success, nor failure, nor the revolution of opinion, nor the deaths of friends. oxford had been unjust to froude, and had driven out one of her most illustrious sons in something like disgrace. yet he never wavered in his affection for her, and the many vicissitudes of his life he came back to oriel with the spirits of a boy. the spells of oxford, like the spells of medea, disperse the weight of years. chapter xi the end he lectures on erasmus were not public; they were delivered in froude's private house at cherwell edge, and attended only by members of the university reading for the modern history school. his public lectures on the council of trent and on english seamen had been so much crowded by men and women, young and old, that candidates for honours in history were scarcely able to find room. nothing could be more honourable to froude, or to oxford, than his enthusiastic reception by his old university at the close of his brilliant and laborious career. but it was too much for him. like voltaire in paris, he was stifled with flowers. his twentieth discourse on erasmus begins with the pathetic sentence, "this will be my last lecture, for the life of erasmus was drawing to an end." so was his own. his final task in this world was the preparation of erasmus for the press. he had been all his life accustomed to work at his own time, and the strain of living by rule at oxford had told upon him more than he knew. before the end of the summer term in he left oxford for devonshire, worn out and broken down. "education," he wrote in his last letter to skelton, "like so much else in these days, has gone mad, and has turned into a large examination mill." he was so much exhausted that he could not go again to norway with lord ducie,* though with characteristic pluck he half thought of paying another visit to sir george grey in new zealand. but it was not to be. during the summer his strength failed, and it became known that the disorder was incurable. with philosophic calmness he awaited the inevitable close, feeling, as he had always felt, that he was in the hands of god. his religion, very deep, constant, and genuine, was not a spiritual emotion, nor a dogmatic creed, but a calm and steady confidence that, whatever weak mortals might do, the judge of all the earth would do right. "it is impossible," said emerson, whom he loved and admired, "for a man not to be always praying." the relations of such men with the unseen are an inseparable part of their daily lives. froude had no more sympathy with the self-complacent "agnosticism" of modern thought than he had with catholic authority or ecstatic revivalism. to fear god and to keep his commandments was with him the whole duty of man. the materialistic hypothesis he rejected as incredible, explaining nothing, meaning nothing, a presumptuous attempt to put ignorance in the place of knowledge. -- * "ducie wanted me to go to norway with him, salmon-fishing; but i didn't feel that i could do justice to the opportunity. in the debased state to which i am reduced, if i hooked a thirty-pound salmon, i should only pray him to get off."--table talk of shirley, pp. , . -- his soul had always dwelt apart. his early training did not encourage spiritual sympathy, and, except in his books, he habitually kept silence on ultimate things. but he had always thought of them; and as he lay dying, in almost the last moments of consciousness, he repeated dearly to himself those great, those superhuman lines which shakespeare puts into the mouth of macbeth between his wife's death and his own. to-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time, and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. out, out, brief candle; life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more. still later he murmured, "shall not the judge of all the earth do right?" he died on the th of october, , and was buried at salcombe in his beloved devonshire not far from his beloved sea. he "made his everlasting mansion upon the beached verge of the salt flood." by his own particular desire he was described on his tombstone as regius professor of modern history at oxford, so deeply did he feel the complete though tardy recognition of the place he had made for himself among english historians. otherwise he was the most unassuming of men, simple and natural in manner, never putting himself forward, patient under the most hostile criticism which did not impugn his personal veracity. although the malice of freeman did once provoke him to a retort the more deadly because it was restrained, he suffered in silence all the detraction which followed the reminiscences and the biography of carlyle. his temper was singularly placable, and he bore no malice. his father and his eldest brother had not treated him wisely or kindly. but neither of hurrell froude nor of the archdeacon did he ever speak except with admiration and respect. his early training hardened him, and perhaps accounts for the indifference to cruelty which sometimes disfigures his pages. he did not know what a mother's affection was before he had a wife and children of his own. before he became an honour to his family he was regarded as a disgrace to it, and not until the first two volumes of the history appeared did his father believe that there was any good in him. yet the archdeacon was always his ideal clergyman, and the church of england as it stood before the oxford movement was his model communion. with the evangelical party, represented to him by his irish friend, mr. cleaver, he had sympathetic relations, and practical, though not doctrinal, agreement. his temporary leaning towards tractarianism was no more than personal admiration for newman, and he took orders not because he was a high churchman, but because he was a fellow. yet it was in some respects a fortunate accident, which, by shutting him out from other professions, drove him into literature. fiction he soon learned to avoid, for his early experiments in it were failures, and in later years his least successful book, with all its eloquence, was the two chiefs of dunboy. as an historical writer he has few superiors, and his essays are among the most delightful in our tongue. to analyse his style is as difficult as not to feel the charm of it. it is as smooth as the motion of a ship sailing on a calm sea, and yet it is never fiat nor tame. although froude, like newman, belonged to the oriel school, he has a spirit which is not of any school, which breathes from the wide ocean and the liquid air. he wrote, for all his scholarly grace, like a man of flesh and blood, not a pedant nor a doctrinaire. impartial he never was, nor pretended to be. dramatic he could not help being, and yet his own opinions were seldom concealed. three or four main propositions were at the root of his mind. he held the reformation to be the greatest and most beneficent change in modern history. he believed the english race to be the finest in the world. he disbelieved in equality, and in parliamentary government. essentially an aristocrat in the proper sense of the term, he cherished the doctrine of submission to a few fit persons, qualified for authority by training and experience. these ideas run through all froude's historical writing, which takes from them its trend and colour. whatever else the male tudors may have been, they were emphatically men; and even elizabeth, whom froude did not love, had a commanding spirit. except poor priest-ridden mary, who had a spanish mother and a spanish husband, they did not brook control, and no one was ever more conscious of being a king than henry viii. to him, as to elizabeth, the reformation was not dogmatic but practical, the subjection of the church to the state. the struggle between pope and sovereign had to be fought out before the struggle between sovereign and parliament could begin. liberals thought that froude would not have been on the side of the parliament, and they joined high churchmen in attacking him. spiritual and democratic power were to him equally obnoxious. he delighted in plato's simile of the ship, where the majority are nothing, and the captain rules. his opinions were not popular, except his dislike for the church of rome. he is read partly for his exquisite diction, and partly for the patriotic fervour with which he rejoices in the achievements of england, especially on sea. rossetti's fine burden: lands are swayed by a king on a throne, the sea hath no king but god alone: might be a motto for the title-page of froude. the fallacy that brilliant writers are superficial accounts for much of the prejudice in academic circles against which froude had to contend. to him of all men it was inapplicable, for no historian studied original documents with greater zest. that he did not know his period nobody could pretend. he knew it so much better than his critics that few of them could even criticise him intelligently. that he was not thoroughly acquainted with the periods preceding his own may be more plausibly argued. there must of course be some limit. the siege of troy can be told without mention of leda's egg. but if froude had given a little more time to henry vii., and all that followed the battle of bosworth, he would have approached the fall of wolsey and the rise of cromwell with a more thorough understanding of cause and effect. his mind moved with great rapidity, and went so directly to the point that the circumstances were not always fully weighed. it is possible to see the truth too clearly, without allowance for drawbacks and qualifications. the important fact about henry, for instance, is that he was a statesman who had to provide for a peaceful succession. but he was also a wilful, headstrong, arbitrary man, spoiled from his cradle by flatterers, and determined to have his own way. froude saw the absurdity of the blue-beard delusion, and did immense service in exposing it. he would have given no handle to his roman catholic and anglo-catholic enemies if he had acknowledged that there was an explanation of the error. he was sometimes carried away by his own eloquence, and his convictions grew stronger as he expressed them, until the facts on the other side looked so small that they were ignored. history deals, and can only deal, with consequences and results. motives and intentions, however interesting, belong to another sphere. henry and cromwell, mary and pole, elizabeth and cecil, are tried in froude's pages by the simple test of what they did, or failed to do, for england. froude detested and despised the cosmopolitan philosophy which regards patriotic sentiment as a relic of barbarism. he was not merely an historian of england, but also an english historian; and holding fisher to be a traitor, he did not hesitate to justify the execution of a pious, even saintly man. fisher would no doubt have said that it was far more important to preserve the catholic faith in england than to keep england independent of spain. froude would have replied that unless the nation punished those who sought for the aid of spanish troops against their own countrymen, she would soon cease to be a nation at all. his critics evaded the point, and took refuge in talk about bloody tyrants wreaking vengeance upon harmless old men. if patriotism be not a disqualification for an historian, froude had none. like every other writer, he made mistakes. but he was laborious in research, a master of narrative, with a genius for seizing dramatic points. above all, he had imagination, without which the vastest knowledge is as a ship without sails, or a bird without wings. his objects, even his prejudices, were frankly avowed, and his prejudices gave way to fresh facts or reasons. the records at simancas, for instance, completely changed, and changed for the worse, his estimate of queen elizabeth's character, and he admitted it at once with his transparent candour. to defend froude against mendacity seems like an insult to his memory, for if he loved anything it was truth, though he sometimes spoke in a cynical way about the difficulty of attaining it. but such monstrous charges were made against him when he could no longer reply for himself that i may be forgiven for quoting an authority which will command general respect. mr. andrew lang is as scrupulously accurate in statement as he is brilliantly felicitous in style. he has studied the history of the sixteenth century, especially in scotland, and he disagrees with froude on many, if not on most, of the points in dispute. yet this is mr. lang's deliberate judgment: "i have found mr. froude often in error; often, as i think, misunderstanding, misquoting, omitting and even adding, but i have never once seen reason to suspect him of conscious misrepresentation, of knowingly giving a false impression. ... it is easy to show that mr. froude erred contrary to his bias on occasion, and it must never be forgotten that he did what no consciously dishonest historian could possibly do. he deposited at the british museum copies, in the original spanish, of the documents, very difficult of access, which he used in his history. by aid of these transcripts, we can find him slipping into errors, and his action in presenting the country with the means of correcting his mistakes proves beyond doubt that he did not consciously make mistakes. there is no way in which this conclusion can be evaded. no historian was more honest than mr. froude, though few or none of his merit have been so fallible." how many historians of his merit have there been? he had no contemporary rival in england, for carlyle and macaulay belonged to a previous generation. there was certainly no one living when froude died who could have written the famous passage in the first chapter of his history about the decay of mediaevalism: "for, indeed, a change was coming upon the world, the meaning and direction of which even still are hidden from us, a change from era to era. the paths trodden by the footsteps of ages were broken up; old things were passing away, and the faith and the life of ten centuries were dissolving like a dream. chivalry was dying; the abbey and the castle were soon together to crumble into ruins; and all the forms, desires, beliefs, convictions of the old world were passing away, never to return. a new continent had risen up beyond the western sea. the floor of heaven, inlaid with stars, had sunk back into an infinite abyss of immeasurable space; and the fair earth itself, unfixed from its foundations, was seen to be but a small atom in the awful vastness of the universe. in the fabric of habit which they had so laboriously built for themselves, mankind were to remain no longer. and now it is all gone--like an unsubstantial pageant faded; and between us and the old english themselves a gulf of mystery which the prose of the historian will never adequately bridge. they cannot come to us, and our imagination can but feebly penetrate to them. only among the aisles of the cathedrals, only before the silent figures sleeping on the tombs, some faint conceptions float before us of what these men were when they were alive, and perhaps in the sound of church bells, that peculiar creation of the middle age, which falls upon the ear like the echo of a vanished world." although froude cared little for music, the rhythm of his sentences is musical, and the organ-note of the opening words in the quotation carries a reminiscence of tacitus which will not escape the classical reader. that is literary artifice, though a very high form of it. the real merit of the paragraph is not so much its eloquence as its insight into the depth of things. many respectable historians see only the outward lineaments. froude saw the nation's heart and soul. it was the same with the great man whose biographer froude became. carlyle's faults would have been impossible in a character mean or small. they were the defects of his qualities, those fears of the brave, and follies of the wise, which do not wait to appear till the last scene of life. now that more than twenty years have passed since the final volumes of the life were published, it may be said with confidence that carlyle owes almost as much to froude as to his own writings for his high and enduring fame. "though the lives of the carlyles were not happy," says froude, "yet, if we look at them from the beginning to the end, they were grandly beautiful. neither of them probably under other conditions would have risen to as high an excellence as in fact they each actually achieved; and the main question is not how happy men and women have been in this world, but what they have made of themselves."* the loftier a man's own view of mental conceptions and sublunary things, the more will he admire carlyle as described by froude. the same carlyle who made a ridiculous fuss about trifles confronted the real evils and trials of life with a dignity, courage, and composure which inspire humble reverence rather than vulgar admiration. froude rightly felt that carlyle's petty grumbles, often most amusing, throw into bright and strong relief his splendid generosity to his kinsfolk, his manly pride in writing what was good instead of what was lucrative, his anxiety that mill should not perceive what he lost in the first volume of the french revolution. whenever a crisis came, carlyle stood the test. the greater the occasion, the better he behaved. one thing froude did not give, and perhaps no biographer could. carlyle was essentially a humourist. he laughed heartily at other people, and not less heartily at himself. when he was letting himself go, and indulging freely in the most lurid denunciations of all and sundry, he would give a peculiar and most significant chuckle which cannot be put into print. it was a warning not to take him literally, which has too often passed unheeded. he has been compared with swift, but he was not really a misanthropist, and no man loved laughter more, or could excite more uproarious merriment in others. i remember a sober scotsman, by no means addicted to frivolous merriment, telling me that he had come out of carlyle's house in physical pain from continuous laughter at an imaginary dialogue between a missionary and a negro which carlyle had conducted entirely himself. -- * carlyle's early life, i. . -- carlyle, it must be remembered, knew froude's historical methods quite as well as he knew froude. it was because he knew them, and approved of them, that he asked froude to be the historian of cheyne row. froude's devotion to him had indeed been singular. during the last decade of his life carlyle was very feeble, and required constant care. he came to lean upon froude more and more, requiring his company in walks, and even in omnibuses, until froude almost ceased to be his own master. the lecturing tour in the united states and the political visits to south africa were permitted, because they were thought right. but fraser's magazine had to be given up, partly that employment might be found for a young man in whom carlyle was interested, and the project for a new history of charles v. was perforce abandoned. it has been said, though not by any one who knew the facts, that froude profited in a pecuniary sense by exchanging history for biography. the exact opposite is the truth. from to , the last years of his great book, froude received from messrs. longman about fourteen hundred pounds a year, including his salary as editor of fraser, which he relinquished at carlyle's bidding. from to he did not receive more than seven hundred. two volumes of history brought in about as much as three of biography, and there is no reason to suppose that charles v. would have proved less popular than henry viii. or elizabeth. froude was unusually prosperous and successful as a man of letters, though it is of course impossible for the highest literary work to be adequately paid. he had to deal with liberal publishers, and after his position as a writer was assured. the idea that necessity drove him to fill his pockets at the expense of a dead friend's reputation is as preposterous in his case as it would have been in lockhart's or stanley's. had froude been the cynic he is often called, he would have borne with callous indifference, as he did bear in dignified silence, the attacks made upon him for his revelations of carlyle. but froude was not what he seemed. behind his stately presence, and lofty manner, and calmly audacious speech, there was a singularly sensitive nature. he would do what he thought right with perfect fearlessness, and without a moment's hesitation. when the consequences followed he was not always prepared for them, and people who were not worth thinking about could give him pain. human beings are composite creatures, and the feminine element in man is more obvious than the masculine element in woman. froude had a feminine disposition to be guided by feeling, and to remember old grievances as vividly as if they had happened the day before. he was also a typical west countryman in habit of mind, as well as in face, figure, and speech. his beautiful voice, exquisitely modulated, never raised in talk, was thoroughly devonian. so too were his imperfect sense of the effect produced by what he said upon ordinary minds, and his love, which might almost be called mischievous, of giving small electric shocks. in the case of carlyle, however, the out-cry was wholly unexpected, and for a time he was distressed, though never mastered, by it. what he could not understand, what it took him a long time to live down, was that friends who really knew him should believe him capable of baseness and treachery. now that it is all over, that froude's biography has taken its place in classical literature, and that mrs. carlyle's letters are acknowledged to be among the best in the language, the whole story appears like a nightmare. but it was real enough twenty years ago, when people who never read books of any kind thought that froude was the name of the man that whitewashed henry viii. and blackened carlyle. froude would probably have been happier if he had turned upon his assailants once for all, as he once finally and decisively turned upon freeman. freeman, however, was an open enemy. a false friend is a more difficult person to dispose of, and even to deny the charge of deliberate treachery hardly consistent with self-respect. long before froude died the clamour against him had by all decent people been dropped. but he himself continued to feel the effect of it until he became professor of history at oxford. that rehabilitated him, where only he required it, in his own eyes. it was a public recognition by the country through the prime minister of the honour he had reflected upon oxford since his virtual expulsion in , and he felt himself again. from that time the whole incident was blotted from his mind, and he forgot that some of his friends had forgotten the meaning of friendship. the last two years of his life were indeed the fullest he had ever known. forty-two lectures in two terms at the age of seventy-four are a serious undertaking. happily he knew the sixteenth century so well that the process of refreshing his memory was rather a pleasure than a task, and he could have written good english in his sleep. yet few even of his warmest admirers expected that in a year and a half he would compose three volumes which both for style and for substance are on a level with the best work of his prime. it was less surprising, and intensely characteristic, that his subjects should be the reformation and the sea. froude's religious position is best stated in his own words, written when he was in south africa, to a member of his family: "i know by sad experience much of what is passing in your mind. although my young days were chequered with much which i look back on with regret and shame, still i believe i always tried to learn what was true, and when i had found it to stick to it. the high church theology was long attractive to me, but then i found, or thought i found, that it had no foundation, and indeed that very few of its professors in their heart of hearts believed what they were saying. apostolic succession, sacramental grace, and the rest of it, are very pretty, but are they facts? is it a fact that any special mysterious power is communicated by a bishop's hands? is it a fact that a child's nature is changed by water and words--or that the bread when it is broken ceases to be bread? we cannot tell that it is not so, you say. but can we tell that it is so? and we ought to be able to tell before we believe it. all that fell away from me when i came in contact with the cleavers and their friends. their views never commended themselves to me wholly; but at least they were spiritual and not material. and election is a fact, although they express it oddly--and so is reprobation--and so is what they say of free will, and so is conversion. it is true that we bring natures into the world which are moulded by circumstances and by their own tendencies, as clay in the hands of the potter. look round you and see that some are made for honour and some for dishonour. so far i agree with the evangelicals still, and i agree too with them that if what they call faith--that is, a distinct conviction of sin, a resolution to say to oneself "sammy, my boy, this won't do,"* a perception and love for what is right and good, and a loathing of the old self--can be put into one, and by the grace of god we see that it can be and is--the whole nature is changed, is what we call regenerated. this is certain--and it is to me certain also that the world and we who live in it, with all these mysterious conditions of our being, are no creation of accident or blind law. we were created for purposes unknown to us by almighty god, who is using us and training us for his own objects--objects wholly unconceivable by us, but nevertheless which we know to exist, for intelligence never works but for an end. -- * the reference is to thackeray's story of a hairdresser named samuel, who remarked, "mr. thackeray, there comes a time in the life of every man when he says to himself, 'sammy, my boy, this won't do.'" the story was an especial favourite of froude's. -- "of other things which are popularly called religion, i have my opinion positive and negative. but religion to me is not opinion it is certainty. i cannot govern my actions or guide my deepest convictions by probabilities. the laws which we are to obey and the obligations to obey them are part of my being of which i am as sure as that i am alive. the things to argue about are by their nature uncertain, and therefore it is to me inconceivable that in them can lie religion. i cannot tell whether these thoughts will be of any help to you. but it is better, in my judgment, to remain a proselyte of the gate--resolute to remain there till one receives a genuine conviction of some truths beyond--than for imagined relief from the pain of suspense to take up by an act of will a complete system of belief, catholic or calvinistic, and insist to one's own soul that it is, was, and shall be the whole and complete truth. some people do this--deliberately blind their eyes, and because they never see again declare loudly that no one else can see. other people, less happy, find by experience that they cannot believe what they have taken to in this way, and fly for a change to the next theory and then to the next. i remain for myself unconvinced of much which is generally called the essential part of things; but convinced with all my heart of what i regard as essential." froude made no secret of his religious opinions and they may be collected from his numerous books, especially perhaps from the oxford counter-reformation. a curious paper, first published in , called "a siding at a railway station," is one of his most direct utterances on the subject. it will be found in the fourth series of short studies, and is in many respects the most remarkable of them all. "some years' ago," it begins, "i was travelling by railway, no matter whence or whither." the railway is life, and the siding at which the train was suddenly stopped is the end that awaits all travellers through this world. the examination of the luggage is the judgment which will be passed upon all human actions hereafter. wages received are placed on one side, and value to mankind of service rendered on the other. naturally working men come out best. the worst show is made by idle and luxurious grandees. authors occupy a middle position, and in froude's own books "chapter after chapter vanished away, leaving the paper clean as if no compositor had ever laboured in setting type for it. pale and illegible became the fine-sounding paragraphs on which i had secretly prided myself. a few passages, however, survived here and there at long intervals. they were those on which i had laboured least and had almost forgotten, or those, as i observed in one or two instances, which had been selected for special reprobation in the weekly journals." the hit at the saturday review is amusing enough, and froude goes on to plead successfully that though he may have been ignorant, prejudiced, or careless, no charge of dishonesty could be established against him. apart from his own personal case, the allegory means little more than the gospel of work which is the noblest part in the teaching of carlyle. titled personages come off badly, and the most ridiculous figure in the motley throng is an archbishop. not much sympathy is shown with any one, except with a widow who hopes to rejoin her husband, and sympathy is all that froude can give her. of froude's friendships much has been said. they were numerous, and drawn from very different classes. beginning at oxford, they increased rather than diminished throughout his life, notwithstanding the gaps which death inevitably and inexorably made. to one fellow of exeter who stood by him in his troubles, george butler, afterwards canon of winchester, he remained always attached. dean stanley throughout life he loved, and another clerical friend, cowley powles. of the many persons who felt clough's early death as an irreparable calamity there was hardly one who felt it more than froude. his affectionate reverence for newman was proof against a mental and moral antagonism which could not be bridged. after kingsley's death he wrote, from the molt, to mrs. kingsley: "dearest fanny,--you tell me not to write, so i will say nothing beyond telling you how deeply i am affected by your thought of me. the old times are as fresh in my mind as in yours. you and charles were the best and truest friends i ever had. we shall soon be all together again. god bless you now and in eternity. "your affectionate. j. a. froude." "cowley powles is here. it was he who first took me to eversley." it was when he came to london that froude enlarged the circle of his friends, carlyle being the greatest and the chief. among the contributors to fraser's magazine those whom he knew best were the late sir john skelton, "shirley," and the present sir theodore martin, the biographer of the prince consort, whom some still prefer to associate with those delightful parodies, the bon gaultier ballads. the enumeration of froude's london acquaintances would be merely a social chronicle, with the supplement of some names, such as general cluseret's, quite outside the ordinary groove. he could get on with any one, and he was interested in every one who had interesting qualities. after his second marriage his dinner-parties in onslow gardens were famous for their brilliancy and charm. his magnetic personality drew from people whatever they had, while his ease of manner made them feel at home. it was perhaps because he never pretended to know anything that only scholars realised how much he knew, and that he seemed to be not so much a man of letters as a man of the world. of all the friends he made in later life there was not one that he valued more highly than lord wolseley. "i have been staying," he wrote to his daughter, from south africa, "with sir garnet wolseley and his brilliant staff. it was worth a voyage to south africa to make so intimate an acquaintance with him." after his second return from the cape, when his social life in london was taken up again, with his eldest daughter in her step- mother's place, there were added to the military and naval officers he had met, the irish protestants, who regarded him as their champion, and the wide circle of his ordinary associates, an africander contingent, made up of all parties in that troubled area. there were, in fact, few phases of human life with which froude was not familiar, from devonshire fishermen to cabinet ministers. although he knew and admired mr. chamberlain, his greatest political friends were lord carnarvon and lord derby, with whom he almost invariably agreed. the man of science whom, after his own brother, he knew best, was tyndall. men of letters were familiar to him in every degree. among the houses where he was a frequent and welcome guest were knowsley, highclere, tortworth, and castle howard. in his own family there were troubles and bereavements. his eldest son, who died before him, gave him much trouble and anxiety. his second daughter died of consumption a few months after her stepmother, while he was in south africa alone. otherwise, his relations with his children were perfect and unbroken, for no father was more beloved and adored. indeed, all intelligent children delighted in his company, because they could not help understanding him, and yet he paid them the acceptable compliment of talking to them as if they were grown up. there is nothing in the world more evanescent than good conversation. froude was one of the best and most agreeable talkers of his day. he could talk to old and young, to men, women, and children, to devonshire seamen or labourers, to the most highly cultivated society of oxford or london, with equal ease and equal enjoyment. he never tried to monopolise the conversation, and yet somehow the chief share fell naturally to him. if he were bored, he could be as silent as the grave. but when his interest was roused, and most things roused it, he always had something pointed and forcible to say. he was not always a sympathetic hearer. once he sat between two extremely intellectual women who considered themselves leaders of advanced thought. when they left the room after dinner he turned to a friend of mine, and said simply, "i think all these bigots ought to be burnt." such deplorable intolerance was happily rare. less rare, perhaps, were his irresistible sense of the ludicrous and irrepressible tendency to sarcasm. of a famous clergyman he said, "at least they have not put him into a bishop's apron, the emblem of our first parents' shame." "what can education do for a man," he once asked, "except enable him to tell a lie in five ways instead of one?" as a rule, froude, like most good talkers, listened well, and responded readily. if he had not carlyle's rich, exuberant humour, he was also without the prophet's leaning to dogmatism and anathema. sardonic irony was his nearest approach to an offensive weapon, and even in that he was sparing. but he had a look which seemed to say, "don't offer me any theories, or creeds, or speculations, for i have tried them all." perhaps i may be permitted in this connection to describe my one and only experience of froude and his ways. it was after dinner, and the talk had fallen into the hands, or the mouth, of an eminent administrator, who seemed to be a pillar, a model of talent and virtue. his language was copious, his subject "schoolmaster bishops," and the services they had rendered to the church of england. bishop blomfield, for example, had procured the appointment of the ecclesiastical commission. there might, for aught we knew, be endless examples, and the prospect was appalling. the host was a roman catholic, and the guests were not ecclesiastical. froude came to the rescue. in a gentle voice, and with the air of an anxious inquirer, he asked whether dr. blomfield had happened to acquaint the commissioners with the nature and extent of his own emoluments. then, without pausing for a reply, he added, still gently, "because it always used to be said that there were only two persons who knew what the bishop of london's income was; himself and the devil." the remark may not have been a new one. it was not offered as such, but it served its purpose, for the interrupted lecture was never resumed. froude's vast reading and his wide human experience enabled him to hold his own in any company, but he never paraded his knowledge, or lay in wait to trip people up. although the prospect of going out worried him, and his first impulse was to refuse an invitation, he enjoyed society when he was in it, being neither vain nor shy. at oxford he could not dine out. late hours interfered with his work. but he was hospitable both to tutors and to undergraduates, liking to show himself at home in the old place. except for the failure of his health, perhaps in spite of it, his enjoyment of his oxford professorship was unmixed. he did not hold it long enough to feel the brevity of the generations which makes the real sadness of the place. many ghosts he must have seen, but he had reached an age when men are prepared for them, and his academic career in the forties had come to such an unfortunate end that comparison of the past with the present can only have been cheerful and honourable. he found a provost of oriel and a rector of exeter who could read his books, and appreciate them, without prejudice against the author. but indeed, though he was capable of being profoundly bored, he was at his ease in the most diverse societies, and no form of conversation not absolutely foolish came amiss to him. he had read so many books, and seen so much of the world, he held such strong opinions, and expressed them with such placid freedom, that he never failed to command attention, or to deserve it. contemptuous enough, perhaps too contemptuous, of human frailties, he at least knew how to make them entertaining, and his urbane irony dissolved pretentious egoism. it is a familiar saying that men's characters and habits are formed in the earliest years of their lives. froude was by profession and by choice a man of letters. he loved writing, and whatever he read, or heard, or saw, turned itself without effort into literary shape. the occupations and amusements of his life can be traced in his short studies. but he had not been reared in a literary atmosphere. he had been brought up among horses and dogs, with grooms and keepers, on the moors and the sea. he describes it himself as "the old wild scratch way, when the keeper was the rabbit-catcher, and sporting was enjoyed more for the adventure than for the bag." he never lost his love of sport, and he gave his own son the same training he had himself. even in his last illness he liked the young man to go out shooting, and always asked what sport he had had. his own father had been a country gentleman, as well as a clergyman, and his brothers, while their health lasted, all rode to hounds. he himself never forgot how he had been put by robert on a horse without a saddle, and thrown seventeen times in one afternoon without hurting himself on the soft devonshire grass. he went out shooting with his brothers long before he could himself shoot. for his first two years at oxford he had done little except ride, and boat, and play tennis. at plas gwynant he was as much out of doors as in, and even to the last his physical enjoyment of an expedition in the open air was intense. yet this was the same man who could sit patiently down at simancas in a room full of dusty, disorderly documents, ill written in a foreign tongue, and patiently decipher them all. if a healthy mind in a healthy body be, as the roman satirist says, the greatest of blessings, froude was certainly blessed. the hardness of his frame, and the soundness of his nerves, gave him the imperturbable temper which marlborough is said to have valued more than money itself. of money froude was always careful, and he was most judicious in his investments. he held the puritan view of luxury as a thing bad in itself, and the parent of evil, relaxing the moral fibre. the sternness of temperament he had inherited from his father was concealed by an easy, sociable disposition, inclined to make the best of the present, but it was always there. in the struggle between knox and mary stuart all his sympathies are with knox, who had the root of the matter in him, calvinism and the moral law. few imaginative artists could have resisted as he did the temptation to draw a dazzling picture of mary's charms and accomplishments, scholarship and statesmanship, beauty and wit. froude felt of her as jehu felt of jezebel, that she was the enemy of the people of god. so with his own contemporaries, such as carlyle's "copper captain," louis napoleon. he was never dazzled by the blaze of the tuileries and the glare of temporary success. he might have said after boileau, j' appelle un chat un chat, et louis un fripon. the peculiarity of froude's nature was to combine this firm foundation with superficial layers of cynicism, paradox, and irony, as in his apology for the rack, his character of henry viii., his defence of cranmer's churchmanship, and parker's. he shared with carlyle the belief that conventional views were sham views, and ought to be exposed. ridicule, if not a test of truth, is at all events a weapon against falsehood, and has done much to clear the air of history. froude's sense of humour was rather receptive than expansive, and he did not often display it in his writings. tristram shandy he knew almost by heart, and he never tired of candide, or zadig. voltaire's wit and sterne's humour have not in their own lines been surpassed. but sure as froude's taste was in such matters, he did not himself enter the lists as a competitor. he was too much occupied with his narrative, or his theory, as the case might be, to spare time for such diversion by the way. he was too earnest to be impartial. where is the impartial historian to be found? macaulay said in hallam. the clerical editor of bishop stubbs's letters thinks that hallam, who was an erastian, had a violent prejudice against the church. his impartial historian is stubbs, for the simple reason that he agrees with him. froude was for england against rome and spain. he could oppose the foreign policy of an english government when he thought it wrong, as in the case of the crimean war, and of disraeli's aggressive imperialism in . but the english cause in the sixteenth century he regarded as national and religious, making for freedom and independence of policy and thought. to be free, to understand, to enjoy, said thomas hill green, is the claim of the modern spirit. froude would not have admitted that man in the philosophic sense was free, or that he could ever hope to understand the ultimate causes of things. and, though no man was more capable of enjoying the present moment, he would have sternly denied that pleasure, however refined, could be a legitimate aim in life. he was a disciple of the porch, and not of the garden. it was deeds of chivalry and endurance that he held up to the admiration of mankind. the hero of his history, william cecil, lord burghley, was not a man of brilliant gifts or dazzling attainments, but a sober, solid, servant of duty and of the state. to most people burghley is a far less interesting figure than his haughty and splendid sovereign, or the beautiful and seductive queen against whom he protected her. froude judged burghley, as he judged elizabeth tudor and mary stuart, by the standards of political integrity and personal honour. the secret of froude's influence and the source of his power is that beneath the attraction of his personality and the seductiveness of his writing there lay a bedrock of principle which could never be moved. professor sanday, who preached the first university sermon at oxford after froude's death, referred to his "fifty years of unwearied literary activity." the period of course included, and was meant to include, the nemesis of faith. "we all know," continued dr. sanday, "how the young and ardent churchman followed his reason where it seemed to lead, and sacrificed a fellowship, and, as it seemed, a career, to scruples of conscience .... now we can see that the difficulties which led to it were real difficulties. it was right and not wrong that they should be raised and faced." it is the fashion to regard scruples of conscience as morbid, and the last man who troubled himself about a test was not a young and ardent churchman, but charles bradlaugh. froude was "ever a fighter," who wished always to fight fair. he preferred resigning his fellowship to fighting for it on purely legal grounds, and holding it, if he could have held it, in the teeth of the college statutes. more than twenty years elapsed before the tests which condemned him were abolished, and in that time there must have been many less orthodox fellows than he. it was more than twenty years before he could lay aside the orders which in a rash moment under an evil system he had assumed. but he was a preacher, though a lay one, and his life was a struggle for the causes in which he believed. ecclesiastical controversies never really interested him, except so far as they touched upon national life and character. he wished to see the work, of the sixteenth century continued in the nineteenth by the naval power and the colonial possessions of england. "england" with him meant not merely that part of great britain which lies south of the tweed, but all the dominions of the sovereign, the british empire as a whole. what seeley called the expansion of england was to him the chief fact of the present, and the chief problem of the future. events since his death have vindicated his foresight. he urged and predicted the australian federation, which he did not live to see. to the policy which impeded the federation of south africa he was steadily opposed. the moral which he drew from his travels in australasia, and in the west indies, was the need for strengthening imperial ties. lord beaconsfield's imperialism was not to his taste, and he disliked every form of aggression or pretence. while he dreaded the intervention of party leaders, and desired the colonies to take the initiative themselves, he thought that a common tariff was the direction in which true imperialism should move. whether he was right or wrong is too large a question to be discussed here. that matter must make its own proof. but in raising it froude was a pioneer, and, though a man of letters, saw more plainly than practical politicians what were the questions they would have to solve. he despised local jealousies, and took large views. many men, perhaps most men, contract their horizon with advancing years. froude's vision seemed to widen. through the storms and mists of passion and prejudice which blinded the eyes of liberals and conservatives fighting each other at westminster, he looked to the ultimate union of all british subjects in an england conterminous with the sovereignty of the crown. it was that england of which he wrote the history. it was knowledge of her past, and belief in her future, that inspired the work of his life. the end english men of letters edited by john morley gibbon by james cotter morison, m.a. lincoln college, oxford london: macmillan and co. . contents chapter i. gibbon's early life up to the time of his leaving oxford chapter ii. at lausanne chapter iii. in the militia chapter iv. the italian journey chapter v. literary schemes.--the history of switzerland.--dissertation on the sixth Æneid.--father's death.--settlement in london chapter vi. life in london.--parliament.--the board of trade.--the decline and fall.--migration to lausanne chapter vii. the first three volumes of the decline and fall chapter viii. the last ten tears of his life at lausanne chapter ix. the last three volumes of the decline and fall chapter x. last illness.--death.--conclusion gibbon chapter i. gibbon's early life up to the time of his leaving oxford. edward gibbon[ ] was born at putney, near london, on th april in the year . after the reformation of the calendar his birthday became the th of may. he was the eldest of a family of seven children; but his five brothers and only sister all died in early infancy, and he could remember in after life his sister alone, whom he also regretted. footnotes: [footnote : gibbon's memoirs and letters are of such easy access that i have not deemed it necessary to encumber these pages with references to them. any one who wishes to control my statements will have no difficulty in doing so with the miscellaneous works, edited by lord sheffield, in his hand. whenever i advance anything that seems to require corroboration, i have been careful to give my authority.] he is at some pains in his memoirs to show the length and quality of his pedigree, which he traces back to the times of the second and third edwards. noting the fact, we pass on to a nearer ancestor, his grandfather, who seems to have been a person of considerable energy of character and business talent. he made a large fortune, which he lost in the south-sea scheme, and then made another before his death. he was one of the commissioners of customs, and sat at the board with the poet prior; bolingbroke was heard to declare that no man knew better than mr. edward gibbon the commerce and finances of england. his son, the historian's father, was a person of very inferior stamp. he was educated at westminster and cambridge, travelled on the continent, sat in parliament, lived beyond his means as a country gentleman, and here his achievements came to an end. he seems to have been a kindly but a weak and impulsive man, who however had the merit of obtaining and deserving his son's affection by genial sympathy and kindly treatment. gibbon's childhood was passed in chronic illness, debility, and disease. all attempts to give him a regular education were frustrated by his precarious health. the longest period he ever passed at school were two years at westminster, but he was constantly moved from one school to another. this even his delicacy can hardly explain, and it must have been fatal to all sustained study. two facts he mentions of his school life, which paint the manners of the age. in the year such was the strength of party spirit that he, a child of nine years of age, "was reviled and buffeted for the sins of his tory ancestors." secondly, the worthy pedagogues of that day found no readier way of leading the most studious of boys to a love of science than corporal punishment. "at the expense of many tears and some blood i purchased the knowledge of the latin syntax." whether all love of study would have been flogged out of him if he had remained at school, it is difficult to say, but it is not an improbable supposition that this would have happened. the risk was removed by his complete failure of health. "a strange nervous affection, which alternately contracted his legs and produced, without any visible symptom, the most excruciating pain," was his chief affliction, followed by intervals of languor and debility. the saving of his life during these dangerous years gibbon unhesitatingly ascribes to the more than maternal care of his aunt, catherine porten, on writing whose name for the first time in his memoirs, "he felt a tear of gratitude trickling down his cheek." "if there be any," he continues, "as i trust there are some, who rejoice that i live, to that dear and excellent woman they must hold themselves indebted. many anxious and solitary hours and days did she consume in the patient trial of relief and amusement; many wakeful nights did she sit by my bedside in trembling expectation that every hour would be my last." gibbon is rather anxious to get over these details, and declares he has no wish to expatiate on a "disgusting topic." this is quite in the style of the _ancien régime_. there was no blame attached to any one for being ill in those days, but people were expected to keep their infirmities to themselves. "people knew how to live and die in those days, and kept their infirmities out of sight. you might have the gout, but you must walk about all the same without making grimaces. it was a point of good breeding to hide one's sufferings."[ ] similarly walpole was much offended by a too faithful publication of madame de sévigné's _letters_. "heaven forbid," he says, "that i should say that the letters of madame de sévigné were bad. i only meant that they were full of family details and mortal distempers, to which the most immortal of us are subject." but gibbon was above all things a veracious historian, and fortunately has not refrained from giving us a truthful picture of his childhood. footnotes: [footnote : george sand, quoted in taine's _ancien régime_, p. .] of his studies, or rather his reading--his early and invincible love of reading, which he would not exchange for the treasures of india--he gives us a full account, and we notice at once the interesting fact that a considerable portion of the historical field afterwards occupied by his great work had been already gone over by gibbon before he was well in his teens. "my indiscriminate appetite subsided by degrees into the historic line, and since philosophy has exploded all innate ideas and natural propensities, i must ascribe the choice to the assiduous perusal of the _universal history_ as the octavo volumes successively appeared. this unequal work referred and introduced me to the greek and roman historians, to as many at least as were accessible to an english reader. all that i could find were greedily devoured, from littlebury's lame _herodotus_ to spelman's valuable _xenophon_, to the pompous folios of gordon's _tacitus_, and a ragged _procopius_ of the beginning of the last century." referring to an accident which threw the continuation of echard's _roman history_ in his way, he says, "to me the reigns of the successors of constantine were absolutely new, and i was immersed in the passage of the goths over the danube, when the summons of the dinner-bell reluctantly dragged me from my intellectual feast.... i procured the second and third volumes of howell's _history of the world_, which exhibit the byzantine period on a larger scale. mahomet and his saracens soon fixed my attention, and some instinct of criticism directed me to the genuine sources. simon ockley first opened my eyes, and i was led from one book to another till i had ranged round the circle of oriental history. before i was sixteen i had exhausted all that could be learned in english of the arabs and persians, the tartars and turks, and the same ardour urged me to guess at the french of d'herbelot and to construe the barbarous latin of pocock's _abulfaragius_." here is in rough outline a large portion at least of the _decline and fall_ already surveyed. the fact shows how deep was the sympathy that gibbon had for his subject, and that there was a sort of pre-established harmony between his mind and the historical period he afterwards illustrated. up to the age of fourteen it seemed that gibbon, as he says, was destined to remain through life an illiterate cripple. but as he approached his sixteenth year, a great change took place in his constitution, and his diseases, instead of growing with his growth and strengthening with his strength, wonderfully vanished. this unexpected recovery was not seized by his father in a rational spirit, as affording a welcome opportunity of repairing the defects of a hitherto imperfect education. instead of using the occasion thus presented of recovering some of the precious time lost, of laying a sound foundation of scholarship and learning on which a superstructure at the university or elsewhere could be ultimately built, he carried the lad off in an impulse of perplexity and impatience, and entered him as a gentleman commoner at magdalen college just before he had completed his fifteenth year ( , april ). this was perhaps the most unwise step he could have taken under the circumstances. gibbon was too young and too ignorant to profit by the advantages offered by oxford to a more mature student, and his status as a gentleman commoner seemed intended to class him among the idle and dissipated who are only expected to waste their money and their time. a good education is generally considered as reflecting no small credit on its possessor; but in the majority of cases it reflects credit on the wise solicitude of his parents or guardians rather than on himself. if gibbon escaped the peril of being an ignorant and frivolous lounger, the merit was his own. at no period in their history had the english universities sunk to a lower condition as places of education than at the time when gibbon went up to oxford. to speak of them as seats of learning seems like irony; they were seats of nothing but coarse living and clownish manners, the centres where all the faction, party spirit, and bigotry of the country were gathered to a head. in this evil pre-eminence both of the universities and all the colleges appear to have been upon a level, though lincoln college, oxford, is mentioned as a bright exception in john wesley's day to the prevalent degeneracy. the strange thing is that, with all their neglect of learning and morality, the colleges were not the resorts of jovial if unseemly boon companionship; they were collections of quarrelsome and spiteful litigants, who spent their time in angry lawsuits. the indecent contentions between bentley and the fellows of trinity were no isolated scandal. they are best known and remembered on account of the eminence of the chief disputants, and of the melancholy waste of bentley's genius which they occasioned. hearne writes of oxford in , "there are such differences now in the university of oxford (hardly one college but where all the members are busied in law business and quarrels not at all relating to the promotion of learning), that good letters decay every day, insomuch that this ordination on trinity sunday at oxford there were no fewer (as i am informed) than fifteen denied orders for insufficiency, which is the more to be noted because our bishops, and those employed by them, are themselves illiterate men."[ ] the state of things had not much improved twenty or thirty years later when gibbon went up, but perhaps it had improved a little. he does not mention lawsuits as a favourite pastime of the fellows. "the fellows or monks of my time," he says, "were decent, easy men, who supinely enjoyed the gifts of the founder: their days were filled by a series of uniform employments--the chapel, the hall, the coffee-house, and the common room--till they retired weary and well satisfied to a long slumber. from the toil of reading, writing, or thinking they had absolved their consciences. their conversation stagnated in a round of college business, tory politics, personal anecdotes, and private scandal. their dull and deep potations excused the brisk intemperance of youth, and their constitutional toasts were not expressive of the most lively loyalty to the house of hanover." some oxonians perhaps could still partly realise the truth of this original picture by their recollections of faint and feeble copies of it drawn from their experience in youthful days. it seems to be certain that the universities, far from setting a model of good living, were really below the average standard of the morals and manners of the age, and the standard was not high. such a satire as the _terræ filius_ of amhurst cannot be accepted without large deductions; but the caricaturist is compelled by the conditions of his craft to aim at the _true seeming_, if he neglects the true, and with the benefit of this limitation the _terræ filius_ reveals a deplorable and revolting picture of vulgarity, insolence, and licence. the universities are spoken of in terms of disparagement by men of all classes. lord chesterfield speaks of the "rust" of cambridge as something of which a polished man should promptly rid himself. adam smith showed his sense of the defects of oxford in a stern section of the _wealth of nations_, written twenty years after he had left the place. even youths like gray and west, fresh from eton, express themselves with contempt for their respective universities. "consider me," says the latter, writing from christ church, "very seriously, here is a strange country, inhabited by things that call themselves doctors and masters of arts, a country flowing with syllogisms and ale; where horace and virgil are equally unknown." gray, answering from peterhouse, can only do justice to his feelings by quoting the words of the hebrew prophet, and insists that isaiah had cambridge equally with babylon in view when he spoke of the wild beasts and wild asses, of the satyrs that dance, of an inhabitation of dragons and a court for owls. footnotes: [footnote : _social life at the english universities_. by christopher wordsworth. page .] into such untoward company was gibbon thrust by his careless father at the age of fifteen. that he succumbed to the unwholesome atmosphere cannot surprise us. he does not conceal, perhaps he rather exaggerates, in his memoirs, the depth of his fall. as bunyan in a state of grace accused himself of dreadful sins which in all likelihood he never committed, so it is probable that gibbon, in his old age, when study and learning were the only passions he knew, reflected with too much severity on the boyish freaks of his university life. moreover there appears to have been nothing coarse or unworthy in his dissipation; he was simply idle. he justly lays much of the blame on the authorities. to say that the discipline was lax would be to pay it an unmerited compliment. there was no discipline at all. he lived in magdalen as he might have lived at the angel or the mitre tavern. he not only left his college, but he left the university, whenever he liked. in one winter he made a tour to bath, another to buckinghamshire, and he made four excursions to london, "without once hearing the voice of admonition, without once feeling the hand of control." of study he had just as much and as little as he pleased. "as soon as my tutor had sounded the insufficiency of his disciple in school learning, he proposed that we should read every morning from ten to eleven the comedies of terence. during the first weeks i constantly attended these lessons in my tutor's room; but as they appeared equally devoid of profit and pleasure, i was once tempted to try the experiment of a formal apology. the apology was accepted with a smile. i repeated the offence with less ceremony: the excuse was admitted with the same indulgence; the slightest motive of laziness or indisposition, the most trifling avocation at home or abroad was allowed as a worthy impediment, nor did my tutor appear conscious of my absence or neglect." no wonder he spoke with indignation of such scandalous neglect. "to the university of oxford," he says, "i acknowledge no obligation, and she will as readily renounce me for a son, as i am willing to disclaim her for a mother. i spent fourteen months at magdalen college; they proved the most idle and unprofitable of my whole life. the reader will pronounce between the school and the scholar." this is only just and fully merited by the abuses denounced. one appreciates the anguish of the true scholar mourning over lost time as a miser over lost gold. there was another side of the question which naturally did not occur to gibbon, but which may properly occur to us. did gibbon lose as much as he thought in missing the scholastic drill of the regular public school and university man? something he undoubtedly lost: he was never a finished scholar, up to the standard even of his own day. if he had been, is it certain that the accomplishment would have been all gain? it may be doubted. at a later period gibbon read the classics with the free and eager curiosity of a thoughtful mind. it was a labour of love, of passionate ardour, similar to the manly zeal of the great scholars of the renaissance. this appetite had not been blunted by enforced toil in a prescribed groove. how much of that zest for antiquity, of that keen relish for the classic writers which he afterwards acquired and retained through life, might have been quenched if he had first made their acquaintance as school-books? above all, would he have looked on the ancient world with such freedom and originality as he afterwards gained, if he had worn through youth the harness of academical study? these questions do not suggest an answer, but they may furnish a doubt. oxford and cambridge for nearly a century have been turning out crowds of thorough-paced scholars of the orthodox pattern. it is odd that the two greatest historians who have been scholars as well--gibbon and grote--were not university-bred men. as if to prove by experiment where the fault lay, in "the school or the scholar," gibbon had no sooner left oxford for the long vacation, than his taste for study returned, and, not content with reading, he attempted original composition. the subject he selected was a curious one for a youth in his sixteenth year. it was an attempt to settle the chronology of the age of sesostris, and shows how soon the austere side of history had attracted his attention. "in my childish balance," he says, "i presumed to weigh the systems of scaliger and petavius, of marsham and of newton; and my sleep has been disturbed by the difficulty of reconciling the septuagint with the hebrew computation." of course his essay had the usual value of such juvenile productions; that is, none at all, except as an indication of early bias to serious study of history. on his return to oxford, the age of sesostris was wisely relinquished. he indeed soon commenced a line of study which was destined to have a lasting influence on the remainder of his course through life. he had an inborn taste for theology and the controversies which have arisen concerning religious dogma. "from my childhood," he says, "i had been fond of religious disputation: my poor aunt has often been puzzled by the mysteries which she strove to believe." how he carried the taste into mature life, his great chapters on the heresies and controversies of the early church are there to show. this inclination for theology, co-existing with a very different temper towards religious sentiment, recalls the similar case of the author of the _historical and critical dictionary_, the illustrious pierre bayle, whom gibbon resembled in more ways than one. at oxford his religious education, like everything else connected with culture, had been entirely neglected. it seems hardly credible, yet we have his word for it, that he never subscribed or studied the articles of the church of england, and was never confirmed. when he first went up, he was judged to be too young, but the vice-chancellor directed him to return as soon as he had completed his fifteenth year, recommending him in the meantime to the instruction of his college. "my college forgot to instruct; i forgot to return, and was myself forgotten by the first magistrate of the university. without a single lecture, either public or private, either christian or protestant, without any academical subscription, without any episcopal ordination, i was left by light of my catechism to grope my way to the chapel and communion table, where i was admitted without question how far or by what means i might be qualified to receive the sacrament. such almost incredible neglect was productive of the worst mischiefs." what did gibbon mean by this last sentence? did he, when he wrote it, towards the end of his life, regret the want of early religious instruction? nothing leads us to think so, or to suppose that his subsequent loss of faith was a heavy grief, supported, but painful to bear. his mind was by nature positive, or even pagan, and he had nothing of what the germans call _religiosität_ in him. still there is a passage in his memoirs where he oddly enough laments not having selected the _fat slumbers of the church_ as an eligible profession. did he reflect that perhaps the neglect of his religious education at oxford had deprived him of a bishopric or a good deanery, and the learned leisure which such positions at that time conferred on those who cared for it? he could not feel that he was morally, or even spiritually, unfit for an office filled in his own time by such men as warburton and hurd. he would not have disgraced the episcopal bench; he would have been dignified, courteous, and hospitable; a patron and promoter of learning, we may be sure. his literary labours would probably have consisted of an edition of a greek play or two, and certainly some treatise on the evidences of christianity. but in that case we should not have had the _decline and fall_. the "blind activity of idleness" to which he was exposed at oxford, prevented any result of this kind. for want of anything better to do, he was led to read middleton's _free enquiry into the miraculous powers which are supposed to have subsisted in the christian church_. gibbon says that the effect of middleton's "bold criticism" upon him was singular, and that instead of making him a sceptic, it made him more of a believer. he might have reflected that it is the commonest of occurrences for controversialists to produce exactly the opposite result to that which they intend, and that as many an apology for christianity has sown the first seeds of infidelity, so an attack upon it might well intensify faith. what follows is very curious. "the elegance of style and freedom of argument were repelled by a shield of prejudice. i still revered the character, or rather the names of the saints and fathers whom dr. middleton exposes; nor could he destroy my implicit belief that the gift of miraculous powers was continued in the church during the first four or five centuries of christianity. but i was unable to resist the weight of historical evidence, that within the same period most of the leading doctrines of popery were already introduced in theory and practice. nor was my conclusion absurd that miracles are the test of truth, and that the church must be orthodox and pure which was so often approved by the visible interposition of the deity. the marvellous tales which are boldly attested by the basils and chrysostoms, the austins and jeromes, compelled me to embrace the superior merits of celibacy, the institution of the monastic life, the use of the sign of the cross, of holy oil, and even of images, the invocation of saints, the worship of relics, the rudiments of purgatory in prayers for the dead, and the tremendous mystery of the sacrifice of the body and the blood of christ, which insensibly swelled into the prodigy of transubstantiation." in this remarkable passage we have a distinct foreshadow of the tractarian movement, which came seventy or eighty years afterwards. gibbon in , at the age of fifteen, took up a position practically the same as froude and newman took up about the year . in other words, he reached the famous _via media_ at a bound. but a second spring soon carried him clear of it, into the bosom of the church of rome. he had come to what are now called church principles, by the energy of his own mind working on the scanty data furnished him by middleton. by one of those accidents which usually happen in such cases, he made the acquaintance of a young gentleman who had already embraced catholicism, and who was well provided with controversial tracts in favour of romanism. among these were the two works of bossuet, the _exposition of catholic doctrine_ and the _history of the protestant variations_. gibbon says: "i read, i applauded, i believed, and surely i fell by a noble hand. i have since examined the originals with a more discerning eye, and shall not hesitate to pronounce that bossuet is indeed a master of all the weapons of controversy. in the _exposition_, a specious apology, the orator assumes with consummate art the tone of candour and simplicity, and the ten horned monster is transformed at his magic touch into the milk-white hind, who must be loved as soon as she is seen. in the _history_, a bold and well-aimed attack, he displays, with a happy mixture of narrative and argument, the faults and follies, the changes and contradictions of our first reformers, whose variations, as he dexterously contends, are the mark of historical error, while the perpetual unity of the catholic church is the sign and test of infallible truth. to my present feelings it seems incredible that i should ever believe that i believed in transubstantiation. but my conqueror oppressed me with the sacramental words, '_hoc est corpus meum_,' and dashed against each other the figurative half meanings of the protestant sects; every objection was resolved into omnipotence, and, after repeating at st. mary's the athanasian creed, i humbly acquiesced in the mystery of the real presence." many reflections are suggested on the respective domains of reason and faith by these words, but they cannot be enlarged on here. no one, nowadays, one may hope, would think of making gibbon's conversion a subject of reproach to him. the danger is rather that it should be regarded with too much honour. it unquestionably shows the early and trenchant force of his intellect: he mastered the logical position in a moment; saw the necessity of a criterion of faith; and being told that it was to be found in the practice of antiquity, boldly went there, and abided by the result. but this praise to his head does not extend to his heart. a more tender and deep moral nature would not have moved so rapidly. we must in fairness remember that it was not his fault that his religious education had been neglected at home, at school, and at college. but we have no reason to think that had it been attended to, the result would have been much otherwise. the root of spiritual life did not exist in him. it never withered, because it never shot up. thus when he applied his acute mind to a religious problem, he contemplated it with the coolness and impartiality of a geometer or chess player, his intellect operated _in vacuo_ so to speak, untrammelled by any bias of sentiment or early training. he had no profound associations to tear out of his heart. he merely altered the premisses of a syllogism. when catholicism was presented to him in a logical form, it met with no inward bar and repugnance. the house was empty and ready for a new guest, or rather the first guest. if gibbon anticipated the tractarian movement intellectually, he was farther removed than the poles are asunder from the mystic reverent spirit which inspired that movement. if we read the _apologia_ of dr. newman, we perceive the likeness and unlikeness of the two cases. "as a matter of simple conscience," says the latter, "i felt it to be a duty to protest against the church of rome." at the time he refers to dr. newman was a catholic to a degree gibbon never dreamed of. but in the one case conscience and heart-ties "strong as life, stronger almost than death," arrested the conclusions of the intellect. ground which gibbon dashed over in a few months or weeks, the great tractarian took ten years to traverse. so different is the mystic from the positive mind. gibbon had no sooner settled his new religion than he resolved with a frankness which did him all honour to profess it publicly. he wrote to his father, announcing his conversion, a letter which he afterwards described, when his sentiments had undergone a complete change, as written with all the pomp, dignity, and self-satisfaction of a martyr. a momentary glow of enthusiasm had raised him, as he said, above all worldly considerations. he had no difficulty, in an excursion to london, in finding a priest, who perceived in the first interview that persuasion was needless. "after sounding the motives and merits of my conversion, he consented to admit me into the pale of the church, and at his feet on the th of june , i solemnly, though privately, abjured the errors of heresy." he was exactly fifteen years and one month old. further details, which one would like to have, he does not give. the scene even of the solemn act is not mentioned, nor whether he was baptized again; but this may be taken for granted. the fact of any one "going over to rome" is too common an occurrence nowadays to attract notice. but in the eighteenth century it was a rare and startling phenomenon. gibbon's father, who was "neither a bigot nor a philosopher," was shocked and astonished by his "son's strange departure from the religion of his country." he divulged the secret of young gibbon's conversion, and "the gates of magdalen college were for ever shut" against the latter's return. they really needed no shutting at all. by the fact of his conversion to romanism he had ceased to be a member of the university. chapter ii. at lausanne. the elder gibbon showed a decision of character and prompt energy in dealing with his son's conversion to romanism, which were by no means habitual with him. he swiftly determined to send him out of the country, far away from the influences and connections which had done such harm. lausanne in switzerland was the place selected for his exile, in which it was resolved he should spend some years in wholesome reflections on the error he had committed in yielding to the fascinations of roman catholic polemics. no time was lost: gibbon had been received into the church on the th of june, , and on the th of the same month he had reached his destination. he was placed under the care of a m. pavillard, a calvinist minister, who had two duties laid upon him, a general one, to superintend the young man's studies, a particular and more urgent one, to bring him back to the protestant faith. it was a severe trial which gibbon had now to undergo. he was by nature shy and retiring; he was ignorant of french; he was very young; and with these disadvantages he was thrown among entire strangers alone. after the excitement and novelty of foreign travel were over, and he could realise his position, he felt his heart sink within him. from the luxury and freedom of oxford he was degraded to the dependence of a schoolboy. pavillard managed his expenses, and his supply of pocket-money was reduced to a small monthly allowance. "i had exchanged," he says, "my elegant apartment in magdalen college for a narrow gloomy street, the most unfrequented in an unhandsome town, for an old inconvenient house, and for a small chamber ill-contrived and ill-furnished, which on the approach of winter, instead of a companionable fire, must be warmed by the dull and invisible heat of a stove." under these gloomy auspices he began the most profitable, and after a time the most pleasant, period of his whole life, one on which he never ceased to look back with unmingled satisfaction as the starting-point of his studies and intellectual progress. the first care of his preceptor was to bring about his religious conversion. gibbon showed an honourable tenacity to his new faith, and a whole year after he had been exposed to the protestant dialectics of pavillard he still, as the latter observed with much regret, continued to abstain from meat on fridays. there is something slightly incongruous in the idea of gibbon _fasting_ out of religious scruples, but the fact shows that his religion had obtained no slight hold of him, and that although he had embraced it quickly, he also accepted with intrepid frankness all its consequences. his was not an intellect that could endure half measures and half lights; he did not belong to that class of persons who do not know their own minds. however it is not surprising that his religion, placed where he was, was slowly but steadily undermined. the swiss clergy, he says, were acute and learned on the topics of controversy, and pavillard seems to have been a good specimen of his class. an adult and able man, in daily contact with a youth in his own house, urging persistently but with tact one side of a thesis, could hardly fail in the course of time to carry his point. but though gibbon is willing to allow his tutor a handsome share in the work of his conversion, he maintains that it was chiefly effected by his own private reflections. and this is eminently probable. what logic had set up, logic could throw down. he gives us a highly characteristic example of the reflections in question. "i still remember my solitary transport at the discovery of a philosophical argument against the doctrine of transubstantiation: that the text of scripture which seems to inculcate the real presence is attested only by a single sense--our sight; while the real presence itself is disproved by three of our senses--the sight, the touch, and the taste." he was unaware of the distinction between the logical understanding and the higher reason, which has been made since his time to the great comfort of thinkers of a certain stamp. having reached so far, his progress was easy and rapid. "the various articles of the romish creed disappeared like a dream, and after a full conviction, on christmas-day, , i received the sacrament in the church of lausanne. it was here that i suspended my religious inquiries, acquiescing with implicit belief in the tenets and mysteries which are adopted by the general consent of catholics and protestants." he thus had been a catholic for about eighteen months. gibbon's residence at lausanne was a memorable epoch in his life on two grounds. firstly, it was during the five years he spent there that he laid the foundations of that deep and extensive learning by which he was afterwards distinguished. secondly, the foreign education he there received, at the critical period when the youth passes into the man, gave a permanent bent to his mind, and made him a continental european rather than an insular englishman--two highly important factors in his intellectual growth. he says that he went up to oxford with a "stock of erudition which might have puzzled a doctor, and a degree of ignorance of which a schoolboy might have been ashamed." both erudition and ignorance were left pretty well undisturbed during his short and ill-starred university career. at lausanne he found himself, for the first time, in possession of the means of successful study, good health, calm, books, and tuition, up to a certain point: that point did not reach very far. the good pavillard, an excellent man, for whom gibbon ever entertained a sincere regard, was quite unequal to the task of forming such a mind. there is no evidence that he was a ripe or even a fair scholar, and the plain fact is that gibbon belongs to the honourable band of self-taught men. "my tutor," says gibbon, "had the good sense to discern how far he could be useful, and when he felt that i advanced beyond his speed and measure, he wisely left me to my genius." under that good guidance he formed an extensive plan of reviewing the latin classics, in the four divisions of ( ) historians, ( ) poets, ( ) orators, and ( ) philosophers, in "chronological series from the days of plautus and sallust to the decline of the language and empire of rome." in one year he read over the following authors: virgil, sallust, livy, velleius paterculus, valerius maximus, tacitus, suetonius, quintus curtius, justin, florus, plautus, terence, and lucretius. we may take his word when he says that this review, however rapid, was neither hasty nor superficial. gibbon had the root of all scholarship in him, the most diligent accuracy and an unlimited faculty of taking pains. but he was a great scholar, not a minute one, and belonged to the robust race of the scaligers and the bentleys, rather than to the smaller breed of the elmsleys and monks, and of course he was at no time a professed philologer, occupied chiefly with the niceties of language. the point which deserves notice in this account of his studies is their wide sweep, so superior and bracing, as compared with that narrow restriction to the "authors of the best period," patronised by teachers who imperfectly comprehend their own business. gibbon proceeded on the common-sense principle, that if you want to obtain a real grasp of the literature, history, and genius of a people, you must master that literature with more or less completeness from end to end, and that to select arbitrarily the authors of a short period on the grounds that they are models of style, is nothing short of foolish. it was the principle on which joseph scaliger studied greek, and indeed occurs spontaneously to a vigorous mind eager for real knowledge.[ ] footnotes: [footnote : vix delibatis conjugationibus græcis, homerum cum interpretatione arreptum uno et viginti diebus totum didici. reliquos vero poetas græcos omnes intra quatuor menses devoravi. neque ullum oratorem aut historicum prius attigi quam poetas omnes tenerem.--_scaligeri epistolæ, lib. . epis. ._] nor did he confine himself to reading: he felt that no one is sure of knowing a language who limits his study of it to the perusal of authors. he practised diligently latin prose composition, and this in the simplest and most effectual way. "i translated an epistle of cicero into french, and after throwing it aside till the words and phrases were obliterated from my memory, i retranslated my french into such latin as i could find, and then compared each sentence of my imperfect version with the ease, the grace, the propriety of the roman orator." the only odd thing in connection with this excellent method is that gibbon in his memoirs seems to think it was a novel discovery of his own, and would recommend it to the imitation of students, whereas it is as old as the days of ascham at least. there is no indication that he ever in the least degree attempted latin verse, and it is improbable that he should have done so, reading alone in lausanne, under the slight supervision of such a teacher as pavillard. the lack of this elegant frivolity will be less thought of now than it would some years ago. but we may admit that it would have been interesting to have a copy of hexameters or elegiacs by the historian of rome. so much for latin. in greek he made far less progress. he had attained his nineteenth year before he learned the alphabet, and even after so late a beginning he did not prosecute the study with much energy. m. pavillard seems to have taught him little more than the rudiments. "after my tutor had left me to myself i worked my way through about half the _iliad_, and afterwards interpreted alone a large portion of xenophon and herodotus. but my ardour, destitute of aid and emulation, gradually cooled, and from the barren task of searching words in a lexicon i withdrew to the free and familiar conversation of virgil and tacitus." this statement of the memoirs is more than confirmed by the journal of his studies, where we find him, as late as the year , when he was twenty-five years of age, painfully reading homer, it would appear, for the first time. he read on an average about a book a week, and when he had finished the _iliad_ this is what he says: "i have so far met with the success i hoped for, that i have acquired a great facility in reading the language, and treasured up a very great stock of words. what i have rather neglected is the grammatical construction of them, and especially the many various inflections of the verbs." to repair this defect he wisely resolved to bestow some time every morning on the perusal of the greek grammar of port royal. thus we see that at an age when many men are beginning to forget their greek, gibbon was beginning to learn it. was this early deficiency ever repaired in greek as it was in latin? i think not. he never was at home in old hellas as he was in old rome. this may be inferred from the discursive notes of his great work, in which he has with admirable skill incorporated so much of his vast and miscellaneous reading. but his references to classic greek authors are relatively few and timid compared with his grasp and mastery of the latin. his judgments on greek authors are also, to say the least, singular. when he had achieved the _decline and fall_, and was writing his memoirs in the last years of his life, the greek writer whom he selects for especial commendation is xenophon. "cicero in latin and xenophon in greek are indeed the two ancients whom i would first propose to a liberal scholar, not only for the merit of their style and sentiments, but for the admirable lessons which may be applied almost to every situation of public and private life." of the merit of xenophon's sentiments, most people would now admit that the less said the better. the warmth of gibbon's language with regard to xenophon contrasts with the coldness he shows with regard to plato. "i involved myself," he says, "in the philosophic maze of the writings of plato, of which perhaps the dramatic is more interesting than the argumentative part." that gibbon knew amply sufficient greek for his purposes as an historian no one doubts, but his honourable candour enables us to see that he was never a greek scholar in the proper sense of the word. it would be greatly to misknow gibbon to suppose that his studies at lausanne were restricted to the learned languages. he obtained something more than an elementary knowledge of mathematics, mastered de crousaz' _logic_ and locke's _essay_, and filled up his spare time with that wide and discursive reading to which his boundless curiosity was always pushing him. he was thoroughly happy and contented, and never ceased throughout his life to congratulate himself on the fortunate exile which had placed him at lausanne. in one respect he did not use his opportunities while in switzerland. he never climbed a mountain all the time he was there, though he lived to see in his later life the first commencement of the alpine fever. on the other hand, as became a historian and man of sense, the social and political aspects of the country engaged his attention, as well they might. he enjoyed access to the best society of the place, and the impression he made seems to have been as favourable as the one he received. the influence of a foreign training is very marked in gibbon, affecting as it does his general cast of thought, and even his style. it would be difficult to name any writer in our language, especially among the few who deserve to be compared with him, who is so un-english, not in a bad sense of the word, as implying objectionable qualities, but as wanting the clear insular stamp and native flavour. if an intelligent chinese or persian were to read his book in a french translation, he would not readily guess that it was written by an englishman. it really bears the imprint of no nationality, and is emphatically european. we may postpone the question whether this is a merit or a defect, but it is a characteristic. the result has certainly been that he is one of the best-known of english prose writers on the continent, and one whom foreigners most readily comprehend. this peculiarity, of which he himself was fully aware, we may agree with him in ascribing to his residence at lausanne. at the "flexible age of sixteen he soon learned to endure, and gradually to adopt," foreign manners. french became the language in which he spontaneously thought; "his views were enlarged, and his prejudices were corrected." in one particular he cannot be complimented on the effect of his continental education, when he congratulates himself "that his taste for the french theatre had abated his idolatry for the gigantic genius of shakespeare, which is inculcated from our infancy as the first duty of englishmen." still it is well to be rid of idolatry and bigotry even with regard to shakespeare. we must remember that the insular prejudices from which gibbon rejoiced to be free were very different in their intensity and narrowness from anything of the kind which exists now. the mixed hatred and contempt for foreigners which prevailed in his day, were enough to excite disgust in any liberal mind. the lucid order and admirable literary form of gibbon's great work are qualities which can escape no observant reader. but they are qualities which are not common in english books. the french have a saying, "les anglais ne savent pas faire un livre." this is unjust, taken absolutely, but as a general rule it is not without foundation. it is not a question of depth or originality of thought, nor of the various merits belonging to style properly so-called. in these respects english authors need not fear competition. but in the art of clear and logical arrangement, of building up a book in such order and method that each part contributes to the general effect of the whole, we must own that we have many lessons to learn of our neighbours. now in this quality gibbon is a frenchman. not voltaire himself is more perspicuous than gibbon. everything is in its place, and disposed in such apparently natural sequence that the uninitiated are apt to think the matter could not have been managed otherwise. it is a case, if there ever was one, of consummate art concealing every trace, not only of art, but even of effort. of course the grasp and penetrating insight which are implied here, were part of gibbon's great endowment, which only nature could give. but it was fortunate that his genius was educated in the best school for bringing out its innate quality. it would be difficult to explain why, except on that principle of decimation by which macaulay accounted for the outcry against lord byron, gibbon's solitary and innocent love passage has been made the theme of a good deal of malicious comment. the parties most interested, and who, we may presume, knew the circumstances better than any one else, seem to have been quite satisfied with each other's conduct. gibbon and mdlle. curchod, afterwards madame necker, remained on terms of the _most_ intimate friendship till the end of the former's life. this might be supposed sufficient. but it has not been so considered by evil tongues. the merits of the case, however, may be more conveniently discussed in a later chapter. at this point it will be enough to give the facts. mdlle. susanne curchod was born about the year ; her father was the calvinist minister of crassier, her mother a french huguenot who had preferred her religion to her country. she had received a liberal and even learned education from her father, and was as attractive in person as she was accomplished in mind. "she was beautiful with that pure virginal beauty which depends on early youth" (sainte-beuve). in she was the talk of lausanne, and could not appear in an assembly or at the play without being surrounded by admirers; she was called la belle curchod. gibbon's curiosity was piqued to see such a prodigy, and he was smitten with love at first sight. "i found her" he says "learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners." he was twenty and she seventeen years of age; no impediment was placed in the way of their meeting; and he was a frequent guest in her father's house. in fact gibbon paid his court with an assiduity which makes an exception in his usually unromantic nature. "she listened," he says, "to the voice of truth and passion, and i might presume to hope that i had made some impression on a virtuous heart." we must remember that this and other rather glowing passages in his memoirs were written in his old age, when he had returned to lausanne, and when, after a long separation and many vicissitudes, he and madame necker were again thrown together in an intimacy of friendship which revived old memories. letters of hers to him which will be quoted in a later chapter show this in a striking light. he indulged, he says, his dream of felicity, but on his return to england he soon discovered that his father would not hear of this "strange alliance," and then follows the sentence which has lost him in the eyes of some persons. "after a painful struggle i yielded to my fate: i sighed as a lover, i obeyed as a son." what else he was to do under the circumstances does not appear. he was wholly dependent on his father, and on the continent at least parental authority is not regarded as a trifling impediment in such cases. gibbon could only have married mdlle. curchod as an exile and a pauper, if he had openly withstood his father's wishes. "all for love" is a very pretty maxim, but it is apt to entail trouble when practically applied. jean-jacques rousseau, who had the most beautiful sentiments on paper, but who in real life was not always a model of self-denial, found, as we shall see, grave fault with gibbon's conduct. gibbon, as a plain man of rather prosaic good sense, behaved neither heroically nor meanly. time, absence, and the scenes of a new life, which he found in england, had their usual effect; his passion vanished. "my cure," he says, "was accelerated by a faithful report of the tranquillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself, and my love subsided in friendship and esteem." the probability, indeed, that he and mdlle. curchod would ever see each other again, must have seemed remote in the extreme. europe and england were involved in the seven years war; he was fixed at home, and an officer in the militia; switzerland was far off: when and where were they likely to meet? they did, contrary to all expectation, meet again, and renewed terms not so much of friendship as of affection. mdlle. curchod, as the wife of necker, became somewhat of a celebrity, and it is chiefly owing to these last-named circumstances that the world has ever heard of gibbon's early love. while he was at lausanne gibbon made the acquaintance of voltaire, but it led to no intimacy or fruitful reminiscence. "he received me with civility as an english youth, but i cannot boast of any peculiar notice or distinction." still he had "the satisfaction of hearing--an uncommon circumstance--a great poet declaim his own productions on the stage." one is often tempted, in reading gibbon's memoirs, to regret that he adopted the austere plan which led him "to condemn the practice of transforming a private memorial into a vehicle of satire or praise." as he truly says, "it was assuredly in his power to amuse the reader with a gallery of portraits and a collection of anecdotes." this reserve is particularly disappointing when a striking and original figure like voltaire passes across the field, without an attempt to add one stroke to the portraiture of such a physiognomy. gibbon had now ( ) been nearly five years at lausanne, when his father suddenly intimated that he was to return home immediately. the seven years war was at its height, and the french had denied a passage through france to english travellers. gibbon, or more properly his swiss friends, thought that the alternative road through germany might be dangerous, though it might have been assumed that the great frederick, so far as he was concerned, would make things as pleasant as possible to british subjects, whose country had just consented to supply him with a much-needed subsidy. the french route was preferred, perhaps as much from a motive of frolic as anything else. two swiss officers of his acquaintance undertook to convey gibbon from france as one of their companions, under an assumed name, and in borrowed regimentals. his complete mastery of french removed any chance of detection on the score of language, and with a "mixture of joy and regret" on the th april, , gibbon left lausanne. he had a pleasant journey, but no adventures, and returned to his native land after an absence of four years, ten months, and fifteen days. chapter iii. in the militia. the only person whom, on his return, gibbon had the least wish to see was his aunt, catherine porten. to her house he at once hastened, and "the evening was spent in the effusions of joy and tenderness." he looked forward to his first meeting with his father with no slight anxiety, and that for two reasons. first, his father had parted from him with anger and menace, and he had no idea how he would be received now. secondly, his mother's place was occupied by a second wife, and an involuntary but strong prejudice possessed him against his step-mother. he was most agreeably disappointed in both respects. his father "received him as a man, as a friend, all constraint was banished at our first interview, and we ever after continued on the same terms of easy and equal politeness." so far the prospect was pleasant. but the step-mother remained a possible obstacle to all comfort at home. he seems to have regarded his father's second marriage as an act of displeasure with himself, and he was disposed to hate the rival of his mother. gibbon soon found that the injustice was in his own fancy, and the imaginary monster was an amiable and deserving woman. "i could not be mistaken in the first view of her understanding; her knowledge and the elegant spirit of her conversation, her polite welcome, and her assiduous care to study and gratify my wishes announced at least that the surface would be smooth; and my suspicions of art and falsehood were gradually dispelled by the full discovery of her warm and exquisite sensibility." he became indeed deeply attached to his step-mother. "after some reserve on my side, our minds associated in confidence and friendship, and as mrs. gibbon had neither children nor the hopes of children, we more easily adopted the tender names and genuine characters of mother and son." a most creditable testimony surely to the worth and amiability of both of them. the friendship thus begun continued without break or coolness to the end of gibbon's life. thirty-five years after his first interview with his step-mother, and only a few months before his own death, when he was old and ailing, and the least exertion, by reason of his excessive corpulence, involved pain and trouble, he made a long journey to bath for the sole purpose of paying mrs. gibbon a visit. he was very far from being the selfish epicurean that has been sometimes represented. he had brought with him from lausanne the first pages of a work which, after much bashfulness and delay, he at length published in the french language, under the title of _essai sur l'Étude de la littérature_, in the year , that is two years after its completion. in one respect this juvenile work of gibbon has little merit. the style is at once poor and stilted, and the general quality of remark eminently commonplace, where it does not fall into paradox. on the other hand, it has an interesting and even original side. the main idea of the little book, so far as it has one, was excellent, and really above the general thought of the age, namely, the vindication of classical literature and history generally from the narrow and singular prejudice which prevailed against them, especially in france. when gibbon ascribes the design of his first work to a "refinement of vanity, the desire of justifying and praising the object of a favourite pursuit," he does himself less than justice. this first utterance of his historic genius was prompted by an unconscious but deep reaction against that contempt for the past, which was the greatest blot in the speculative movement of the eighteenth century. he resists the temper of his time rather from instinct than reason, and pleads the cause of learning with the hesitation of a man who has not fully seen round his subject, or even mastered his own thoughts upon it. still there is his protest against the proposal of d'alembert, who recommended that after a selection of facts had been made at the end of every century the remainder should be delivered to the flames. "let us preserve them all," he says, "most carefully. a montesquieu will detect in the most insignificant, relations which the vulgar overlook." he resented the haughty pretensions of the mathematical sciences to universal dominion, with sufficient vigour to have satisfied auguste comte. "physics and mathematics are at present on the throne. they see their sister sciences prostrate before them, chained to their chariot, or at most occupied in adorning their triumph. perhaps their downfall is not far off." to speak of a positive downfall of exact sciences was a mistake. but we may fairly suppose that gibbon did not contemplate anything beyond a relative change of position in the hierarchy of the sciences, by which history and politics would recover or attain to a dignity which was denied them in his day. in one passage gibbon shows that he had dimly foreseen the possibility of the modern inquiries into the conditions of savage life and prehistoric man. "an iroquois book, even were it full of absurdities, would be an invaluable treasure. it would offer a unique example of the nature of the human mind placed in circumstances which we have never known, and influenced by manners and religious opinions, the complete opposite of ours." in this sentence gibbon seems to call in anticipation for the researches which have since been prosecuted with so much success by eminent writers among ourselves, not to mention similar inquirers on the continent. but in the meantime gibbon had entered on a career which removed him for long months from books and study. without sufficiently reflecting on what such a step involved, he had joined the militia, which was embodied in the year ; and for the next two and a half years led, as he says, a wandering life of military servitude. at first, indeed, he was so pleased with his new mode of life that he had serious thoughts of becoming a professional soldier. but this enthusiasm speedily wore off, and our "mimic bellona soon revealed to his eyes her naked deformity." it was indeed no mere playing at soldiering that he had undertaken. he was the practical working commander of "an independent corps of officers and men." "in the absence, or even in the presence of the two field officers" (one of whom was his father, the major) "i was intrusted with the effective labour of dictating the orders and exercising the battalion." and his duty did not consist in occasional drilling and reviews, but in serious marches, sometimes of thirty miles in a day, and camping under canvas. one encampment, on winchester downs, lasted four months. gibbon does not hesitate to say that the superiority of his grenadiers to the detachments of the regular army, with which they were often mingled, was so striking that the most prejudiced regular could not have hesitated a moment to admit it. but the drilling, and manoeuvring, and all that pertained to the serious side of militia business interested gibbon, and though it took up time it gave him knowledge of a special kind, of which he quite appreciated the value. he was much struck, for instance, by the difference between the nominal and effective force of every regiment he had seen, even when supposed to be complete, and gravely doubts whether a nominal army of , men often brings _fifty_ thousand into the field. what he found unendurable was the constant shifting of quarters, the utter want of privacy and leisure it often entailed, and the distasteful society in which he was forced to live. for eight months at a stretch he never took a book in his hand. "from the day we marched from blandford, i had hardly a moment i could call my own, being almost continually in motion, or if i was fixed for a day, it was in the guardroom, a barrack, or an inn." even worse were the drinking and late hours; sometimes in "rustic" company, sometimes in company in which joviality and wit were more abundant than decorum and common sense, which will surprise no one who hears that the famous john wilkes, who was colonel of the buckingham militia, was not unfrequently one of his boon companions. a few extracts from his journal will be enough. "to-day (august , ), sir thomas worsley," the colonel of the battalion, "came to us to dinner. pleased to see him, we kept bumperising till after roll-calling, sir thomas assuring us every fresh bottle how infinitely sober he was growing." september rd. "colonel wilkes, of the buckingham militia, dined with us, and renewed the acquaintance sir thomas and myself had begun with him at reading. i scarcely ever met with a better companion; he has inexhaustible spirits, infinite wit and humour, and a great deal of knowledge.... this proved a very debauched day; we drank a great deal both after dinner and supper; and when at last wilkes had retired, sir thomas and some others (of whom i was not one) broke into his room and made him drink a bottle of claret in bed." december . "we found old captain meard at arlesford with the second division of the fourteenth. he and all his officers supped with us, which made the evening rather a drunken one." gibbon might well say that the militia was unfit for and unworthy of him. yet it is quite astonishing to see, as recorded in his journal, how keen an interest he still managed to retain in literature in the midst of all this dissipation, and how fertile he was of schemes and projects of future historical works to be prosecuted under more favourable auspices. subject after subject occurred to him as eligible and attractive; he caresses the idea for a time, then lays it aside for good reasons. first, he pitched upon the expedition of charles viii. of france into italy. he read and meditated upon it, and wrote a dissertation of ten folio pages, besides large notes, in which he examined the right of charles viii. to the crown of naples, and the rival claims of the houses of anjou and aragon. in a few weeks he gives up this idea, firstly, for the rather odd reason that the subject was too remote from us; and, secondly, for the very good reason that the expedition was rather the introduction to great events than great and important in itself. he then successively chose and rejected the crusade of richard the first; the barons' war against john and henry iii.; the history of edward the black prince; the lives and comparisons of henry v. and the emperor titus; the life of sir philip sidney, and that of the marquis of montrose. at length he fixed on sir walter raleigh as his hero. on this he worked with all the assiduity that his militia life allowed, read a great quantity of original documents relating to it, and, after some months of labour, declared that "his subject opened upon him, and in general improved upon a nearer prospect." but half a year later he "is afraid he will have to drop his hero." and he covers half a page with reasons to persuade himself that he was right in doing so. besides the obvious one that he would be able to add little that was not already accessible in oldys' _life of raleigh_, that the topic was exhausted, and so forth, he goes on to make these remarks, which have more signification to us now than perhaps they had to him when he wrote them. "could i even surmount these obstacles, i should shrink with terror from the modern history of england, where every character is a problem and every reader a friend or an enemy: when a writer is supposed to hoist a flag of party, and is devoted to damnation by the adverse faction. such would be _my_ reception at home; and abroad the historian of raleigh must encounter an indifference far more bitter than censure or reproach. the events of his life are interesting; but his character is ambiguous; his actions are obscure; his writings are english, and his fame is confined to the narrow limits of our language and our island. _i must embrace a safer and more extensive theme._" here we see the first gropings after a theme of cosmopolitan interest. he has arrived at two negative conclusions: that it must not be english, and must not be narrow. what it is to be, does not yet appear, for he has still a series of subjects to go through, to be taken up and discarded. the history of the liberty of the swiss, which at a later period he partially achieved, was one scheme; the history of florence under the medici was another. he speaks with enthusiasm of both projects, adding that he will most probably fix upon the latter; but he never did anything of the kind. these were the topics which occupied gibbon's mind during his service in the militia, escaping when he could from the uproar and vulgarity of the camp and the guardroom to the sanctuary of the historic muse, to worship in secret. but these private devotions could not remove his disgust at "the inn, the wine, and the company" he was forced to endure, and latterly the militia became downright insupportable to him. but honourable motives kept him to his post. "from a service without danger i might have retired without disgrace; but as often as i hinted a wish of resigning, my fetters were riveted by the friendly intreaties of the colonel, the parental authority of the major, and my own regard for the welfare of the battalion." at last the long-wished-for day arrived, when the militia was disbanded. "our two companies," he writes in his journal, "were disembodied (december rd, ), mine at alton, my father's at buriton. they fired three volleys, lodged the major's colours, delivered up their arms, received their money, partook of a dinner at the major's expense, and then separated, with great cheerfulness and regularity. thus ended the militia." the compression that his spirit had endured was shown by the rapid energy with which he sought a change of scene and oblivion of his woes. within little more than a month after the scene just described, gibbon was in paris beginning the grand tour. with that keen sense of the value of time which marked him, gibbon with great impartiality cast up and estimated the profit and loss of his "bloodless campaigns." both have been alluded to already. he summed up with great fairness in the entry that he made in his journal on the evening of the day on which he recovered his liberty. "i am glad that the militia has been, and glad that it is no more." this judgment he confirmed thirty years afterwards, when he composed his memoirs. "my principal obligation to the militia was the making me an englishman and a soldier. after my foreign education, with my reserved temper, i should long have continued a stranger in my native country, had i not been shaken in this various scene of new faces and new friends; had not experience forced me to feel the characters of our leading men, the state of parties, the forms of office, the operations of our civil and military system. in this peaceful service i imbibed the rudiments of the language and science of tactics, which opened a new field of study and observation. i diligently read and meditated the _mémoires militaires_ of quintus icilius, the only writer who has united the merits of a professor and a veteran. the discipline and evolution of a modern battalion gave me a clearer notion of the phalanx and the legion, and the captain of the hampshire grenadiers (the reader may smile) has not been useless to the historian of the roman empire." no one can doubt it who compares gibbon's numerous narratives of military operations with the ordinary performances of civil historians in those matters. the campaigns of julian, belisarius, and heraclius, not to mention many others, have not only an uncommon lucidity, but also exhibit a clear appreciation of the obstacles and arduousness of warlike operations, which is rare or unknown to non-military writers. macaulay has pointed out that swift's party pamphlets are superior in an especial way to the ordinary productions of that class, in consequence of swift's unavowed but very serious participation in the cabinet councils of oxford and bolingbroke. in the same manner gibbon had an advantage through his military training, which gives him no small superiority to even the best historical writers who have been without it. the course of foreign travel which gibbon was now about to commence had been contemplated before, but the war and the militia had postponed it for nearly three years. it appears that as early as the year the elder gibbon had conceived the project of procuring a seat in parliament for his son, and was willing to incur the anticipated expense of £ for that object. young gibbon, who seems to have very accurately gauged his own abilities at that early age, was convinced that the money could be much better employed in another way. he wrote in consequence, under his father's roof, a letter to the latter which does such credit to his head and to his heart, that, although it is somewhat long, it cannot with propriety be omitted here. edward gibbon to his father. "dear sir, "an address in writing from a person who has the pleasure of being with you every day may appear singular. however i have preferred this method, as upon paper i can speak without a blush and be heard without interruption. if my letter displeases you, impute it, dear sir, to yourself. you have treated me, not like a son, but like a friend. can you be surprised that i should communicate to a friend all my thoughts and all my desires? unless the friend approve them, let the father never know them; or at least let him know at the same time that however reasonable, however eligible, my scheme may appear to me, i would rather forget it for ever than cause him the slightest uneasiness. "when i first returned to england, attentive to my future interests, you were so good as to give me hopes of a seat in parliament. this seat, it was supposed, would be an expense of fifteen hundred pounds. this design flattered my vanity, as it might enable me to shine in so august an assembly. it flattered a nobler passion: i promised myself that, by the means of this seat, i might one day be the instrument of some good to my country. but i soon perceived how little mere virtuous inclination, unassisted by talents, could contribute towards that great end, and a very short examination discovered to me that those talents had not fallen to my lot. do not, dear sir, impute this declaration to a false modesty--the meanest species of pride. whatever else i may be ignorant of, i think i know myself, and shall always endeavour to mention my good qualities without vanity and my defects without repugnance. i shall say nothing of the most intimate acquaintance with his country and language, so absolutely necessary to every senator; since they may be acquired, to allege my deficiency in them would seem only the plea of laziness. but i shall say with great truth that i never possessed that gift of speech, the first requisite of an orator, which use and labour may improve, but which nature can alone bestow; that my temper, quiet, retired, somewhat reserved, could neither acquire popularity, bear up against opposition, nor mix with ease in the crowds of public life; that even my genius (if you allow me any) is better qualified for the deliberate compositions of the closet than for the extempore discourses of parliament. an unexpected objection would disconcert me, and as i am incapable of explaining to others what i do not understand myself, i should be meditating when i ought to be answering. i even want necessary prejudices of party and of nation. in popular assemblies it is often necessary to inspire them, and never orator inspired well a passion which he did not feel himself. suppose me even mistaken in my own character, to set out with the repugnance such an opinion must produce offers but an indifferent prospect. but i hear you say it is not necessary that every man should enter into parliament with such exalted hopes. it is to acquire a title the most glorious of any in a free country, and to employ the weight and consideration it gives in the service of one's friends. such motives, though not glorious, yet are not dishonourable, and if we had a borough in our command, if you could bring me in without any great expense, or if our fortune enabled us to despise that expense, then indeed i should think them of the greatest strength. but with our private fortune, is it worthwhile to purchase at so high a rate a title honourable in itself, but which i must share with every fellow that can lay out pounds? besides, dear sir, a merchandise is of little value to the owner when he is resolved not to sell it. "i should affront your penetration did i not suppose you now see the drift of this letter. it is to appropriate to another use the sum with which you destined to bring me into parliament; to employ it, not in making me great, but in rendering me happy. i have often heard you say yourself that the allowance you had been so indulgent as to grant me, though very liberal in regard to your estate, was yet but small when compared with the almost necessary extravagances of the age. i have indeed found it so, notwithstanding a good deal of economy, and an exemption from many of the common expenses of youth. this, dear sir, would be a way of supplying these deficiencies without any additional expense to you. but i forbear--if you think my proposals reasonable, you want no intreaties to engage you to comply with them, if otherwise all will be without effect. "all that i am afraid of, dear sir, is that i should seem not so much asking a favour, as this really is, as exacting a debt. after all i can say, you will remain the best judge of my good and your own circumstances. perhaps, like most landed gentlemen, an addition to my annuity would suit you better than a sum of money given at once; perhaps the sum itself may be too considerable. whatever you may think proper to bestow on me, or in whatever manner, will be received with equal gratitude. "i intended to stop here, but as i abhor the least appearance of art, i think it better to lay open my whole scheme at once. the unhappy war which now desolates europe will oblige me to defer seeing france till a peace. but that reason can have no influence on italy, a country which every scholar must long to see. should you grant my request, and not disapprove of my manner of employing your bounty, i would leave england this autumn and pass the winter at lausanne with m. de voltaire and my old friends. in the spring i would cross the alps, and after some stay in italy, as the war must then be terminated, return home through france, to live happily with you and my dear mother. i am now two-and-twenty; a tour must take up a considerable time; and although i believe you have no thoughts of settling me soon (and i am sure i have not), yet so many things may intervene that the man who does not travel early runs a great risk of not travelling at all. but this part of my scheme, as well as the whole of it, i submit entirely to you. "permit me, dear sir, to add that i do not know whether the complete compliance with my wishes could increase my love and gratitude, but that i am very sure no refusal could diminish those sentiments with which i shall always remain, dear sir, your most dutiful and obedient son and servant. "e. gibbon, jun." instead of going to italy in the autumn of , as he fondly hoped when he wrote this letter, gibbon was marching about the south of england at the head of his grenadiers. but the scheme sketched in the above letter was only postponed, and ultimately realised in every particular. the question of a seat in parliament never came up again during his father's life, and no doubt the money it would have cost was, according to his wise suggestion, devoted to defray the expenses of his foreign tour, which he is now about to begin. chapter iv. the italian journey. gibbon reached paris on the th january, ; thirty-six days, as he tells us, after the disbanding of the militia. he remained a little over three months in the french capital, which on the whole pleased him so well that he thinks that if he had been independent and rich, he might have been tempted to make it his permanent residence. on the other hand he seems to have been little if at all aware of the extraordinary character of the society of which he became a spectator and for a time a member. he does not seem to have been conscious that he was witnessing one of the most singular social phases which have yet been presented in the history of man. and no blame attaches to him for this. no one of his contemporaries saw deeper in this direction than he did. it is a remarkable instance of the way in which the widest and deepest social movements are veiled to the eyes of those who see them, precisely because of their width and depth. foreigners, especially englishmen, visited paris in the latter half of the eighteenth century and reported variously of their experience and impressions. some, like hume and sterne, are delighted; some, like gibbon, are quietly, but thoroughly pleased; some, like walpole--though he perhaps is a class by himself--are half pleased and half disgusted. they all feel that there is something peculiar in what they witness, but never seem to suspect that nothing like it was ever seen before in the world. one is tempted to wish that they could have seen with our eyes, or, much more, that we could have had the privilege of enjoying their experience, of spending a few months in that singular epoch when "society," properly so called, the assembling of men and women in drawing-rooms for the purpose of conversation, was the most serious as well as the most delightful business of life. talk and discussion in the senate, the market-place, and the schools are cheap; even barbarians are not wholly without them. but their refinement and concentration in the _salon_--of which the president is a woman of tact and culture--this is a phenomenon which never appeared but in paris in the eighteenth century. and yet scholars, men of the world, men of business passed through this wonderland with eyes blindfolded. they are free to enter, they go, they come, without a sign that they have realised the marvellous scene that they were permitted to traverse. one does not wonder that they did not perceive that in those graceful drawing-rooms, filled with stately company of elaborate manners, ideas and sentiments were discussed and evolved which would soon be more explosive than gunpowder. one does not wonder that they did not see ahead of them--men never do. one does rather wonder that they did not see what was before their eyes. but wonder is useless and a mistake. people who have never seen a volcano cannot be expected to fear the burning lava, or even to see that a volcano differs from any other mountain. gibbon had brought good introductions from london, but he admits that they were useless, or rather superfluous. his nationality and his _essai_ were his best recommendations. it was the day of anglomania, and, as he says, "every englishman was supposed to be a patriot and a philosopher." "i had rather be," said mdlle. de lespinasse to lord shelburne, "the least member of the house of commons than even the king of prussia." similar things must have been said to gibbon, but he has not recorded them; and generally it may be said that he is disappointingly dull and indifferent to paris, though he liked it well enough when there. he never caught the paris fever as hume did, and sterne, or even as walpole did, for all the hard things he says of the underbred and overbearing manners of the philosophers. gibbon had ready access to the well-known houses of madame geoffrin, madame helvétius and the baron d'holbach; and his perfect mastery of the language must have removed every obstacle in the way of complete social intercourse. but no word in his memoirs or letters shows that he really saw with the eyes of the mind the singularities of that strange epoch. and yet he was there at an exciting and important moment. the order of the jesuits was tottering to its fall; the latter volumes of the _encyclopedia_ were being printed, and it was no secret; the coruscating wit and audacity of the _salons_ were at their height. he is not unjust or prejudiced, but somewhat cold. he dines with baron d'holbach, and says his dinners were excellent, but nothing of the guests. he goes to madame geoffrin, and pronounces her house an excellent one. such faint and commonplace praise reflects on the eulogist. the only man of letters of whom he speaks with warmth is helvétius. he does not appear in this first visit to have known madame du deffand, who was still keeping her _salon_ with the help of the pale deep-eyed l'espinasse, though the final rupture was imminent. louis racine died, and so did marivaux, while he was in paris. the old opera-house in the palais royal was burnt down when he had been there a little over a month, and the representations were transferred to the salle des machines, in the tuileries. the equestrian statue of louis xv. was set up in the place to which it gave its name (where the luxor column now stands, in the place de la concorde) amidst the jeers and insults of the mob, who declared it would never be got to pass the hotel of madame de pompadour. how much or how little of all this touched gibbon, we do not know. we do know one thing, that his english clothes were unfashionable and looked very foreign, the french being "excessively long-waisted." doubtless his scanty purse could not afford a new outfit, such as walpole two years afterwards, under the direction of lady hertford, promptly procured. on the th of may he hurried off to lausanne.[ ] footnotes: [footnote : the chronicle of events which occurred during gibbon's sojourn in paris will be found in the interesting _mémoires de bachaumont._] his ultimate object was italy. but he wisely resolved to place a period of solid study between the lively dissipation of paris and his classic pilgrimage. he knew the difference between seeing things he had read about and reading about things after he had seen them; how the mind, charged with associations of famous scenes, is delicately susceptible of impressions, and how rapidly old musings take form and colour, when, stirred by outward realities; and contrariwise, how slow and inadequate is the effort to reverse this process, and to clothe with memories, monuments and sites over which the spirit has not sent a halo of previous meditation. so he settled down quietly at lausanne for the space of nearly a year, and commenced a most austere and systematic course of reading on the antiquities of italy. the list of learned works which he perused "with his pen in his hand" is formidable, and fills a quarto page. but he went further than this, and compiled an elaborate treatise on the nations, provinces, and towns of ancient italy (which we still have) digested in alphabetical order, in which every latin author, from plautus to rutilius, is laid under contribution for illustrative passages, which are all copied out in full. this laborious work was evidently gibbon's own guidebook in his italian travels, and one sees not only what an admirable preparation it was for the object in view, but what a promise it contained of that scrupulous thoroughness which was to be his mark as an historian. his mind was indeed rapidly maturing, and becoming conscious in what direction its strength lay. his account of his first impressions of rome has been often quoted, and deserves to be so again. "my temper is not very susceptible of enthusiasm, and the enthusiasm which i do not feel i have ever scorned to affect. but at the distance of twenty-five years i can neither forget nor express the strong emotions which agitated my mind as i first approached and entered the eternal city. after a sleepless night, i trod with a lofty step the ruins of the forum. each memorable spot where romulus stood, or tully spoke, or cæsar fell, was at once present to my eye, and several days of intoxication were lost and enjoyed before i could descend to a cool and minute examination." he gave eighteen weeks to the study of rome only, and six to naples, and we may rest assured that he made good use of his time. but what makes this visit to rome memorable in his life and in literary history is that it was the occasion and date of the first conception of his great work. "it was at rome, on the th october, , as i sat musing amid the ruins of the capitol, while the barefooted friars were singing vespers in the temple of jupiter, that the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind." the scene, the contrast of the old religion and the new, the priests of christ replacing the flamens of jupiter, the evensong of catholic rome swelling like a dirge over the prostrate pagan rome might well concentrate in one grand luminous idea the manifold but unconnected thoughts with which his mind had so long been teeming. gibbon had found his work, which was destined to fill the remainder of his life. henceforth there is a fixed centre around which his thoughts and musings cluster spontaneously. difficulties and interruptions are not wanting. the plan then formed is not taken in hand at once; on the contrary, it is contemplated at "an awful distance"; but it led him on like a star guiding his steps, till he reached his appointed goal. after crossing the alps on his homeward journey, gibbon had had some thoughts of visiting the southern provinces of france. but when he reached lyons he found letters "expressive of some impatience" for his return. though he does not exactly say as much, we may justly conclude that the elder gibbon's pecuniary difficulties were beginning to be oppressive. so the traveller, with the dutifulness that he ever showed to his father, at once bent his steps northward. again he passed through paris, and the place had a new attraction in his eyes in the person of mdlle. curchod, now become madame necker, and wife of the great financier. this perhaps will be the most convenient place to notice and estimate a certain amount of rather spiteful gossip, of which gibbon was the subject in switzerland about this time. rousseau and his friend moultou have preserved it for us, and it is probable that it has lost none of its pungency in passing through the hands of the latter. the substance of it is this:--that in the year , when gibbon revisited lausanne, as we have seen, susanne curchod was still in a pitiable state of melancholy and well nigh broken-hearted at gibbon's manifest coldness, which we know he considered to be "friendship and esteem." whether he even saw her on this visit cannot be considered certain, but it is at least highly probable. be that as it may: this is the picture of her condition as drawn by moultou in a letter to rousseau: "how sorry i am for our poor mdlle. curchod! gibbon, whom she loves, and to whom i know she has sacrificed some excellent matches, has come to lausanne, but cold, insensible, and as entirely cured of his old passion as she is far from cure. she has written me a letter that makes my heart ache." rousseau says in reply, "he who does not appreciate mdlle. curchod is not worthy of her; he who appreciates her and separates himself from her is a man to be despised. she does not know what she wants. gibbon serves her better than her own heart. i would rather a hundred times that he left her poor and free among you than that he should take her off to be rich and miserable in england." one does not quite see how gibbon could have acted to the contentment of jean-jacques. for not taking mdlle. curchod to england--as we may presume he would have done if he had married her--he is contemptible. yet if he does take her he will make her miserable, and rousseau would rather a hundred times he left her alone--precisely what he was doing; but then he was despicable for doing it. the question is whether there is not a good deal of exaggeration in all this. only a year after the tragic condition in which moultou describes mdlle. curchod she married m. necker, and became devoted to her husband. a few months after she married necker she cordially invited gibbon to her house every day of his sojourn in paris. if gibbon had behaved in the unworthy way asserted, if she had had her feelings so profoundly touched and lacerated as moultou declares, would she, or even could she, have acted thus? if she was conscious of being wronged, and he was conscious--as he must have been--of having acted basely, or at least unfeelingly, is it not as good as certain that both parties would have been careful to see as little of each other as possible? a broken-off love-match, even without complication of unworthy conduct on either side, is generally an effective bar to further intercourse. but in this case the intercourse is renewed on the very first opportunity, and never dropped till the death of one of the persons concerned. two letters have been preserved of gibbon and madame necker respectively, nearly of the same date, and both referring to this rather delicate topic of their first interviews after her marriage. gibbon writes to his friend holroyd, "the curchod (madame necker) i saw in paris. she was very fond of me, and the husband particularly civil. could they insult me more cruelly? ask me every evening to supper, go to bed and leave me alone with his wife--what impertinent security! it is making an old lover of mighty little consequence. she is as handsome as ever, and much genteeler; seems pleased with her wealth rather than proud of it. i was exalting nanette d'illens's good luck and the fortune" (this evidently refers to some common acquaintance, who had changed her name to advantage). "'what fortune,' she said with an air of contempt:--'not above twenty thousand livres a year.' i smiled, and she caught herself immediately, 'what airs i give myself in despising twenty thousand livres a year, who a year ago looked upon eight hundred as the summit of my wishes.'" let us turn to the lady's account of the same scenes. "i do not know if i told you," she writes to a friend at lausanne, "that i have seen gibbon, and it has given me more pleasure than i know how to express. not indeed that i retain any sentiment for a man who i think does not deserve much" (this little toss of pique or pride need not mislead us); "but my feminine vanity could not have had a more complete and honest triumph. he stayed two weeks in paris, and i had him every day at my house; he has become soft, yielding, humble, decorous to a fault. he was a constant witness of my husband's kindness, wit, and gaiety, and made me remark for the first time, by his admiration for wealth, the opulence with which i am surrounded, and which up to this moment had only produced a disagreeable impression upon me." considering the very different points of view of the writers, these letters are remarkably in unison. the solid fact of the daily visits is recorded in both. it is easy to gather from madame necker's letter that she was very glad to show mr. gibbon that for going farther and not marrying him she had not fared worse. the rather acid allusion to "opulence" is found in both letters; but much more pronounced in hers than in his. each hints that the other thought too much of wealth. but he does so with delicacy, and only by implication; she charges him coarsely with vulgar admiration for it. we may reasonably suspect that riches had been the subject of not altogether smooth conversation between them, in the later part of the evening, perhaps, after m. necker had retired in triumph to bed. one might even fancy that there was a tacit allusion by madame necker to the dialogue recorded by gibbon to holroyd, when his smile checked her indirect pride in her own wealth, and that she remembered that smile with just a touch of resentment. if so, nothing was more natural and comforting than to charge him with the failing that he had detected in her. but here are the facts. eight months after her marriage, madame necker admits that she had gibbon every day to her house. he says that she was very cordial. she would have it understood that she received him only for the sake of gratifying a feminine vanity. for her own sake one might prefer his interpretation to hers. it is difficult to believe that the essentially simple-minded madame necker would have asked a man every day to her house merely to triumph over him; and more difficult still to believe that the man would have gone if such had been the object. a little tartness in these first interviews, following on a relation of some ambiguity, cannot surprise one. but it was not the dominant ingredient, or the interviews must have ceased of their own accord. in any case few will admit that either of the persons concerned would have written as they did if moultou's statement were correct. in neither epistle is there any trace of a grand passion felt or slighted. we discover the much lower level of vanity and badinage. and the subsequent relations of gibbon and madame necker all tend to prove that this was the real one. chapter v. literary schemes.--the history of switzerland.--dissertation on the sixth Æneid.--father's death.--settlement in london. gibbon now (june, ) returned to his father's house, and remained there till the latter's death in . he describes these five years as having been the least pleasant and satisfactory of his whole life. the reasons were not far to seek. the unthrifty habits of the elder gibbon were now producing their natural result. he was saddled with debt, from which two mortgages, readily consented to by his son, and the sale of the house at putney, only partially relieved him. gibbon now began to fear that he had an old age of poverty before him. he had pursued knowledge with single-hearted loyalty and now became aware that from a worldly point of view knowledge is not often a profitable investment. a more dejecting discovery cannot be made by the sincere scholar. he is conscious of labour and protracted effort, which the prosperous professional man and tradesman who pass him on their road to wealth with a smile of scornful pity have never known. he has forsaken comparatively all for knowledge, and the busy world meets him with a blank stare, and surmises shrewdly that he is but an idler, with an odd taste for wasting his time over books. it says much for gibbon's robustness of spirit that he did not break down in these trying years, that he did not weakly take fright at his prospect, and make hasty and violent efforts to mend it. on the contrary, he remained steadfast and true to the things of the mind. with diminished cheerfulness perhaps, but with no abatement of zeal, he pursued his course and his studies, thereby proving that he belonged to the select class of the strong and worthy who, penetrated with the loveliness of science, will not be turned away from it. his first effort to redeem the time was a project of a history of switzerland. his choice was decided by two circumstances: ( ) his love for a country which he had made his own by adoption; ( ) by the fact that he had in his friend deyverdun, a fellow-worker who could render him most valuable assistance. gibbon never knew german, which is not surprising when we reflect what german literature amounted to, in those days; and he soon discovered that the most valuable authorities of his projected work were in the german language. but deyverdun was a perfect master of that tongue, and translated a mass of documents for the use of his friend. they laboured for two years in collecting materials, before gibbon felt himself justified in entering on the "more agreeable task of composition." and even then he considered the preparation insufficient, as no doubt it was. he felt he could not do justice to his subject; uninformed as he was "by the scholars and statesmen, and remote from the archives and libraries of the swiss republic." such a beginning was not of good augury for the success of the undertaking. he never wrote more than about sixty quarto pages of the projected work, and these, as they were in french, were submitted to the judgment of a literary society of foreigners in london, before whom the ms. was read. the author was unknown, and gibbon attended the meeting, and thus listened without being observed "to the free strictures and unfavourable sentence of his judges." he admits that the momentary sensation was painful; but the condemnation was ratified by his cooler thoughts: and he declares that he did not regret the loss of a slight and superficial essay, though it "had cost some expense, much labour, and more time." he says in his memoirs that he burnt the sheets. but this, strange to say, was a mistake on his part. they were found among his papers after his death, and though not published by lord sheffield in the first two volumes of his miscellaneous works, which the latter edited in , they appeared in the supplemental third volume which came out in . we thus can judge for ourselves of their value. one sees at once why and how they failed to satisfy their author's mature judgment. they belong to that style of historical writing which consists in the rhetorical transcription and adornment of the original authorities, but in which the writer never gets close enough to his subject to apply the touchstone of a clear and trenchant criticism. such criticism indeed was not common in switzerland in his day, and one cannot blame gibbon for not anticipating the researches of modern investigators. but his historical sense was aroused to suspicion by the story of william tell, which he boldly sets down as a fable. altogether, one may pronounce the sketch to be pleasantly written in a flowing, picturesque narrative, and showing immense advance in style beyond the essay on the study of literature. david hume, to whom he submitted it, urged him to persevere, and the advice was justified under the circumstances, although one cannot now regret that it was not followed. after the failure of this scheme gibbon, still in connection with deyverdun, planned a periodical work under the title of _mémoires littéraires de la grande bretagne_. only two volumes ever appeared, and the speculation does not seem to have met with much success. gibbon "presumes to say that their merit was superior to their reputation, though they produced more reputation than emolument." the first volume is executed with evident pains, and gives a fair picture of the literary and social condition of england at the time. the heavy review articles are interspersed with what is intended to be lighter matter on the fashions, foibles, and prominent characters of the day. gibbon owns the authorship of the first article on lord lyttelton's history of henry the second, and his hand is discernible in the account of the fourth volume of lardner's work _on the credibility of the gospel history_. the first has no merit beyond a faithful report. the latter is written with much more zest and vigour, and shows the interest that he already took in christian antiquities. other articles, evidently from the pen of deyverdun, on the english theatre and beau nash of bath, are the liveliest in the collection. the magazine was avowedly intended for continental readers, and might have obtained success if it had been continued long enough. but it died before it had time to make itself known.[ ] footnotes: [footnote : two volumes appeared of the _mémoires littéraires_. of these only the first is to be found in the british museum. it is a small mo, containing pages. here is the table des matières:--( ) histoire de henri ii., par milord lyttelton; ( ) le nouveau guide de bath; ( ) essai sur l'histoire de la société civile, par m. ferguson; ( ) conclusions des mémoires de miss sydney bidulph; théologie ( ) recueil des témoignages anciens, par lardner; ( ) le confessional; ( ) transactions philosophiques; ( ) le gouverneur, par d. l. f. spectacles, beaux arts, nouvelles littéraires.] when the _mémoires littéraires_ collapsed gibbon was again left without a definite object to concentrate his energy, and with his work still to seek. one might wonder why he did not seriously prepare for the _decline and fall_. it must have been chiefly at this time that it was "contemplated at an awful distance," perhaps even with numbing doubt whether the distance would ever be lessened and the work achieved, or even begun. the probability is he had too little peace of mind to undertake anything that required calm and protracted labour. "while so many of my acquaintance were married, or in parliament, or advancing with a rapid step in the various roads of honour or fortune i stood alone, immovable, and insignificant.... the progress and the knowledge of our domestic disorders aggravated my anxiety, and i began to apprehend that in my old age i might be left without the fruits of either industry or inheritance." perhaps a reasonable apprehension of poverty is more paralysing than the reality. in the latter case prompt action is so imperatively commanded that the mind has no leisure for the fatal indulgence of regrets; but when indigence seems only imminent, and has not yet arrived, a certain lethargy is apt to be produced out of which only the most practical characters can rouse themselves, and these are not, as a rule, scholars by nature. we need not be surprised that gibbon during these years did nothing serious, and postponed undertaking his great work. the inspiration needed to accomplish such a long and arduous course as it implied could not be kindled in a mind harassed by pecuniary cares. the fervent heat of a poet's imagination may glow as brightly in poverty as in opulence, but the gentle yet prolonged enthusiasm of the historian is likely to be quenched when the resources of life are too insecure.[ ] footnotes: [footnote : scholarship has been frequently cultivated amidst great poverty; but from the time of thucydides, the owner of mines, to grote, the banker, historians seem to have been in, at least, easy circumstances.] it is perhaps not wholly fanciful to suspect that gibbon's next literary effort was suggested and determined by the inward discomposure he felt at this time. by nature he was not a controversialist; not that he wanted the abilities to support that character, but his mind was too full, fertile, and fond of real knowledge to take much pleasure in the generally barren occupation of gainsaying other men. but at this point in his life he made an exception, and an unprovoked exception. when he wrote his famous vindication of the first volume of the _decline and fall_ he was acting in self-defence, and repelling savage attacks upon his historical veracity. but in his _critical observations on the sixth book of the Æneid_ he sought controversy for its own sake, and became a polemic--shall we say out of gaiety or bitterness of heart? that inward unrest easily produces an aggressive spirit is a matter of common observation, and it may well have been that in attacking warburton he sought a diversion from the worry of domestic cares. be that as it may, his _observations_ are the most pungent and dashing effusion he ever allowed himself. it was his first effort in english prose, and it is doubtful whether he ever managed his mother tongue better, if indeed he ever managed it so well. the little tract is written with singular spirit and rapidity of style. it is clear, trenchant, and direct to a fault. it is indeed far less critical than polemical, and shows no trace of lofty calm, either moral or intellectual. we are not repelled much by his eagerness to refute and maltreat his opponent. that was not alien from the usages of the time, and warburton at least had no right to complain of such a style of controversy. but there is no width and elevation of view. the writer does not carry the discussion up to a higher level, and dominate his adversary from a superior standpoint. controversy is always ephemeral and vulgar, unless it can rise to the discussion and establishment of facts and principles valuable for themselves, independently of the particular point at issue. it is this quality which has made the master-works of chillingworth and bentley supereminent. the particular point for which the writers contended is settled or forgotten. but in moving up to that point they touched--such was their large discourse of reason--on topics of perennial interest, did such justice, though only in passing, to certain other truths, that they are gratefully remembered ever after. thus bentley's dissertation on phalaris is read, not for the main thesis--proof of the spuriousness of the letters--but for the profound knowledge and admirable logic with which subsidiary positions are maintained on the way to it. tried by this standard, and he deserves to be tried by a high standard, gibbon fails not much, but entirely. the _observations_ are rarely, if ever, quoted as an authority of weight by any one engaged on classical or virgilian literature. this arises from the attitude of the writer, who is nearly solely occupied with establishing negative conclusions that Æneas was _not_ a lawgiver, that the sixth Æneid is _not_ an allegory, that virgil had _not_ been initiated in the eleusinian mysteries when he wrote it, and so forth. indeed the best judges now hold that he has not done full justice to the grain of truth that was to be found in warburton's clumsy and prolix hypothesis.[ ] it should be added that gibbon very candidly admits and regrets the acrimonious style of the pamphlet, and condemns still more "in a personal attack his cowardly concealment of his name and character." footnotes: [footnote : conington, _introduction to the sixth Æneid_. "a reader of the present day will, i think, be induced to award the palm of learning and ingenuity to warburton." "the language and imagery of the sixth book more than once suggest that virgil intended to embody in his picture the poetical view of that inner side of ancient religion which the mysteries may be supposed to have presented."--_suggestion on the study of the Æneid_, by h. nettleship, p. .] the _observations_ were the last work which gibbon published in his father's lifetime. his account of the latter's death (november , ) is feelingly written, and shows the affectionate side of his own nature to advantage. he acknowledges his father's failings, his weakness and inconstancy, but insists that they were compensated by the virtues of the head and heart, and the warmest sentiments of honour and humanity. "his graceful person, polite address, gentle manners, and unaffected cheerfulness recommended him to the favour of every company." and gibbon recalls with emotion "the pangs of shame, tenderness, and self-reproach" which preyed on his father's mind at the prospect, no doubt, of leaving an embarrassed estate and precarious fortune to his son and widow. he had no taste for study in the fatal summer of , and declares that he would have been ashamed if he had. "i submitted to the order of nature," he says, in words which recall his resignation on losing his mistress--"i submitted to the order of nature, and my grief was soothed by the conscious satisfaction that i had discharged all the duties of filial piety." we see gibbon very fairly in this remark. he had tenderness, steady and warm attachments, but no passion. nearly two years elapsed after his father's death, before he was able to secure from the wreck of his estate a sufficient competence to establish himself in london. his house was no. , bentinck street, near manchester square, then a remote suburb close to the country fields. his housekeeping was that of a solitary bachelor, who could afford an occasional dinner-party. though not absolutely straitened in means, we shall presently see that he was never quite at his ease in money matters while he remained in london. but he had now freedom and no great anxieties, and he began seriously to contemplate the execution of his great work. gibbon, as we have seen, looked back with little satisfaction on the five years between his return from his travels and his father's death. they are also the years during which his biographer is able to follow him with the least certainty. hardly any of his letters which refer to that period have been preserved, and he has glided rapidly over it in his memoirs. yet it was, in other respects besides the matter of pecuniary troubles, a momentous epoch in his life. the peculiar views which he adopted and partly professed on religion must have been formed then. but the date, the circumstance, and the occasion are left in darkness. up to december , , gibbon was evidently a believer. in an entry in his private journal under that date he speaks of a communion sunday at lausanne as affording an "edifying spectacle," on the ground that there is "neither business nor parties, and they interdict even whist" on that day. how soon after this his opinions began to change, it is impossible to say. but we are conscious of a markedly different tone in the _observations_, and a sneer at "the ancient alliance between the avarice of the priests and the credulity of the people" is in the familiar style of the deists from toland to chubb. there is no evidence of his familiarity with the widely diffused works of the freethinkers, and as far as i am aware he does not quote or refer to them even once. but they could hardly have escaped his notice. still his strong historic sense and solid erudition would be more likely to be repelled than attracted by their vague and inaccurate scholarship, and chimerical theories of the light of nature. still we know that he practically adopted, in the end, at least the negative portion of these views, and the question is, when did he do so? his visit to paris, and the company that he frequented there, might suggest that as a probable date of his change of opinions. but the entry just referred to was subsequent by several months to that visit, and we may with confidence assume that no freethinker of the eighteenth century would pronounce the austerities of a communion sunday in a calvinist town an edifying spectacle. it is probable that his relinquishing of dogmatic faith was gradual, and for a time unconscious. it was an age of tepid belief, except among the nonjurors and methodists; and with neither of these groups could he have had the least sympathy. his acquaintance with hume, and his partiality for the writings of bayle, are more probable sources of a change of sentiment which was in a way predestined by natural bias and cast of mind. any occasion would serve to precipitate the result. in any case, this result had been attained some years before the publication of the first volume of the _decline and fall_, in . referring to his preparatory studies for the execution of that work, he says, "as i believed, and as i still believe, that the propagation of the gospel and the triumph of the church are inseparably connected with the decline of the roman monarchy, i weighed the causes and effects of the revolution, and contrasted the narratives and apologies of the christians themselves with the glances of candour or enmity which the pagans have cast on the rising sects. the jewish and heathen testimonies, as they are collected and illustrated by dr. lardner, directed without superseding my search of the originals, and in an ample dissertation on the miraculous darkness of the passion i privately drew my conclusions from the silence of an unbelieving age." here we have the argument which concludes the sixteenth chapter distinctly announced. but the previous travail of spirit is not indicated. gibbon has marked with precision the stages of his conversion to romanism. but the following chapters of the history of his religious opinions he has not written, or he has suppressed them, and we can only vaguely guess their outline. chapter vi. life in london.--parliament.--the board of trade.--the decline and fall.--migration to lausanne. gibbon's settlement in london as master in his own house did not come too soon. a few more years of anxiety and dependence, such as he had passed of late with his father in the country, would probably have dried up the spring of literary ambition and made him miss his career. he had no tastes to fit him for a country life. the pursuit of farming only pleased him in virgil's _georgics_. he seems neither to have liked nor to have needed exercise, and english rural sports had no charms for him. "i never handled a gun, i seldom mounted a horse, and my philosophic walks were soon terminated by a shady bench, where i was long detained by the sedentary amusement of reading or meditation." he was a born _citadin_. "never," he writes to his friend holroyd, "never pretend to allure me by painting in odious colours the dust of london. i love the dust, and whenever i move into the weald it is to visit you, and not your trees." his ideal was to devote the morning, commencing early--at seven, say--to study, and the afternoon and evening to society and recreation, not "disdaining the innocent amusement of a game at cards." and this plan of a happy life he very fairly realised in his little house in bentinck street. the letters that we have of his relating to this period are buoyant with spirits and self-congratulation at his happy lot. he writes to his step-mother that he is every day more satisfied with his present mode of life, which he always believed was most calculated to make him happy. the stable and moderate stimulus of congenial society, alternating with study, was what he liked. the excitement and dissipation of a town life, which purchase pleasure to-day at the expense of fatigue and disgust to-morrow, were as little to his taste as the amusements of the country. in , when he settled in london, he was young in years, but he was old in tastes, and he enjoyed himself with the complacency often seen in healthy old men. "my library," he writes to holroyd in , "kensington gardens, and a few parties with new acquaintance, among whom i reckon goldsmith and sir joshua reynolds," (poor goldsmith was to die the year following), "fill up my time, and the monster _ennui_ preserves a very respectful distance. by the by, your friends batt, sir john russell, and lascelles dined with me one day before they set off: _for i sometimes give the prettiest little dinner in the world_." one can imagine gibbon, the picture of plumpness and content, doing the honours of his modest household. still he was never prominent in society, even after the publication of his great work had made him famous. lord sheffield says that his conversation was superior to his writings, and in a circle of intimate friends it is probable that this was true. but in the free encounter of wit and argument, the same want of readiness that made him silent in parliament would most likely restrict his conversational power. it may be doubted if there is a striking remark or saying of his on record. his name occurs in boswell, but nearly always as a _persona muta_. certainly the arena where johnson and burke encountered each other was not fitted to bring out a shy and not very quick man. against johnson he manifestly harboured a sort of grudge, and if he ever felt the weight of ursa major's paw it is not surprising. he rather oddly preserved an instance of his conversational skill, as if aware that he would not easily get credit for it. the scene was in paris. "at the table of my old friend m. de foncemagne, i was involved in a dispute with the abbé de mably.... as i might be partial in my own cause, i shall transcribe the words of an unknown critic. 'you were, my dear théodon, at m. de foncemagne's house, when the abbé de mably and mr. gibbon dined there along with a number of guests. the conversation ran almost entirely on history. the abbé, being a profound politician, turned it while at dessert on the administration of affairs, and as by genius and temper, and the habit of admiring livy, he values only the republican system, he began to boast of the excellence of republics, being well persuaded that the learned englishman would approve of all he said and admire the profoundity of genius that had enabled a frenchman to discover all these advantages. but mr. gibbon, knowing by experience the inconveniences of a popular government, was not at all of his opinion, and generously took up the defence of monarchy. the abbé wished to convince him out of livy, and by some arguments drawn from plutarch in favour of the spartans. mr. gibbon, being endowed with a most excellent memory, and having all events present to his mind, soon got the command of the conversation. the abbé grew angry, they lost possession of themselves, and said hard things of each other. the englishman retaining his native coolness, watched for his advantages, and pressed the abbé with increasing success in proportion as he was more disturbed by passion. the conversation grew warmer, and was broken off by m. de foncemagne's rising from table and passing into the parlour, where no one was tempted to renew it." but if not brilliant in society, he was very _répandu_, and was welcomed in the best circles. he was a member of boodle's, white's, brooks's, and almack's,[ ] and "there were few persons in the literary or political world to whom he was a stranger." it is to be regretted that the best sketch of him at this period borders on caricature. "the learned gibbon," says colman, "was a curious counterbalance to the learned (may i not say the less learned) johnson. their manners and tastes, both in writing and conversation, were as different as their habiliments. on the day i first sat down with johnson in his rusty-brown suit and his black worsted stockings, gibbon was placed opposite to me in a suit of flowered velvet, with a bag and sword. each had his measured phraseology, and johnson's famous parallel between dryden and pope might be loosely parodied in reference to himself and gibbon. johnson's style was grand, and gibbon's elegant: the stateliness of the former was sometimes pedantic, and the latter was occasionally finical. johnson marched to kettledrums and trumpets, gibbon moved to flutes and hautboys. johnson hewed passages through the alps, while gibbon levelled walks through parks and gardens. mauled as i had been by johnson, gibbon poured balm upon my bruises by condescending once or twice in the course of the evening to talk with me. the great historian was light and playful, suiting his matter to the capacity of the boy: but it was done _more suo_--still his mannerism prevailed, still he tapped his snuff-box, still he smirked and smiled, and rounded his periods with the same air of good-breeding, as if he were conversing with men. his mouth, mellifluous as plato's, was a round hole nearly in the centre of his visage." (quoted in croker's _boswell_.) footnotes: [footnote : not the assembly-room of that name, but a gaming-club where the play was high. i find no evidence that gibbon ever yielded to the prevalent passion for gambling.] now and then he even joins in a masquerade, "the finest thing ever seen," which costs two thousand guineas. but the chief charm of it to him seems to have been the pleasure that it gave to his aunt porten. these little vanities are however quite superficial, and are never allowed to interfere with work. now indeed he was no loiterer. in three years after his settlement in london he had produced the first volume of the _decline and fall_: an amount of diligence which will not be underrated by those who appreciate the vast difference between commencing and continuing an undertaking of that magnitude. "at the outset," he says, "all was dark and doubtful; even the title of the work, the true æra of the decline and fall of the empire, the limits of the introduction, the division of the chapters, and the order of the narrative,--and i was often tempted to cast away the labour of seven years;"--alternations no doubt of hope and despair familiar to every sincere and competent student. but he had taken the best and only reliable means of securing himself from the danger of these fluctuations of spirit. he finished his reading and preparation before he began to write, and when he at last put pen to paper his course lay open before him, with no fear of sudden and disquieting stoppages arising from imperfect knowledge and need of further inquiry. it is a pity that we cannot follow the elaboration of the work in detail. that portion of his memoirs in which he speaks of it is very short and fragmentary, and the defect is not supplied by his letters. he seems to have worked with singular ease and mastery of his subject, and never to have felt his task as a strain or a fatigue. even his intimate friends were not aware that he was engaged on a work of such magnitude, and it is amusing to see his friend holroyd warn him against a hasty and immature publication when he learned that the book was in the press. he had apparently heard little of it before. this alone would show with what ease and smoothness gibbon must have worked. he had excellent health--a strange fact after his sickly childhood; society unbent his mind instead of distracting it; his stomach was perfect--perhaps too good, as about this time he began to be admonished by the gout. he never seems to have needed change. "sufficient for the summer is the evil thereof, viz., one distant country excursion." there was an extraordinary difference in this respect between the present age and those which went before it; restlessness and change of scene have become almost a necessity of life with us, whereas our ancestors could continue healthy and happy for months and years without stirring from home. what is there to explain the change? we must not pretend that we work harder than they did.[ ] however, gibbon was able to keep himself in good condition with his long spell of work in the morning, and his dinner-parties at home or elsewhere in the afternoon, and to have kept at home as much as he could. whenever he went away to the country, it was on invitations which he could not well refuse. the result was a leisurely, unhasting fulness of achievement, calm stretches of thorough and contented work, which have left their marks on the _decline and fall_. one of its charms is a constant good humour and complacency; not a sign is visible that the writer is pressed for time, or wants to get his performance out of hand; but, on the contrary, a calm lingering over details, sprightly asides in the notes, which the least hurry would have suppressed or passed by, and a general impression conveyed of thorough enjoyment in the immensity of the labour. footnotes: [footnote : the most remarkable instance of all is the case of newton, who, according to dr. whewell, resided in trinity college "for thirty-five years without the interruption of a month."--_hist. of the inductive sciences_, vol. ii. book vii.] one would have liked to see this elaboration more clearly, to have been allowed a glimpse into his workshop while he was so engaged. unfortunately the editor of his journals has selected the relatively unimportant records of his earlier studies, and left us in the dark as regards this far more interesting period. he was such an indefatigable diarist that it is unlikely that he neglected to keep a journal in this crisis of his studies. but it has not been published, and it may have been destroyed. all that we have is this short paragraph in his memoirs:-- "the classics, as low as tacitus and the younger pliny and juvenal, were my old and familiar companions. i insensibly plunged into the ocean of the augustan history, and in the descending series i investigated, with my pen almost always in my hand, the original records, both greek and latin, from dion cassius to ammianus marcellinus, from the reign of trajan to the last age of the western cæsars. the subsidiary rays of medals and inscriptions of geography and chronology, were thrown on their proper objects, and i applied the collections of tillemont to fix and arrange within my reach the loose and scattered atoms of historical information. through the darkness of the middle ages i explored my way in the _annals and antiquities of italy_ of the learned muratori, and diligently compared them with the parallel or transverse lines of sigonius and maffei, baronius and pagi, till i almost grasped the ruins of rome in the fourteenth century, without suspecting that this final chapter must be attained by the labour of six quartos and twenty years." when the time for composition arrived, he showed a fastidiousness which was full of good augury. "three times did i compose the first chapter, and twice the second and third, before i was tolerably satisfied with their effect." his hand grew firmer as he advanced. but the two final chapters interposed a long delay, and needed "three successive revisals to reduce them from a volume to their present size." gibbon spent more time over his first volume than over any one of the five which followed it. to these he devoted almost regularly two years apiece, more or less, whereas the first cost him three years--so disproportionately difficult is the start in matters of this kind. while engaged in the composition of the first volume, he became a member of parliament. one morning at half past seven, "as he was destroying an army of barbarians," he heard a double rap at his door. it was a friend who came to inquire if he was desirous of entering the house of commons. the answer may be imagined, and he took his seat as member for the borough of liskeard after the general election in . gibbon's political career is the side of his history from which a friendly biographer would most readily turn away. not that it was exceptionally ignoble or self-seeking if tried by the standard of the time, but it was altogether commonplace and unworthy of him. the fact that he never even once opened his mouth in the house is not in itself blameworthy, though disappointing in a man of his power. it was indeed laudable enough if he had nothing to say. but why had he nothing to say? his excuse is timidity and want of readiness. we may reasonably assume that the cause lay deeper. with his mental vigour he would soon have overcome such obstacles if he had really wished and tried to overcome them. the fact is that he never tried because he never wished. it is a singular thing to say of such a man, but nevertheless true, that he had no taste or capacity whatever for politics. he lived at one of the most exciting periods of our history; he assisted at debates in which constitutional and imperial questions of the highest moment were discussed by masters of eloquence and state policy, and he hardly appears to have been aware of the fact. it was not that he despised politics as walpole affected to do, or that he regarded party struggles as "barbarous and absurd faction," as hume did; still less did he pass by them with the supercilious indifference of a mystic whose eyes are fixed on the individual spirit of man as the one spring of good and evil. he never rose to the level of the ordinary citizen or even partisan, who takes an exaggerated view perhaps of the importance of the politics of the day, but who at any rate thereby shows a sense of social solidarity and the claims of civic communion. he called himself a whig, but he had no zeal for whig principles. he voted steadily with lord north, and quite approved of taxing and coercing america into slavery; but he had no high notions of the royal prerogative, and was lukewarm in this as in everything. with such absence of passion one might have expected that he would be at least shrewd and sagacious in his judgments on politics. but he is nothing of the kind. in his familiar letters he reserves generally a few lines for parliamentary gossip, amid chat about the weather and family business. he never approaches to a broad survey of policy, or expresses serious and settled convictions on home or foreign affairs. throughout the american war he never seems to have really made up his mind on the nature of the struggle, and the momentous issues that it involved. favourable news puts him in high spirits, which are promptly cooled by the announcement of reverses; not that he ever shows any real anxiety or despondency about the commonwealth. his opinions on the subject are at the mercy of the last mail. it is disappointing to find an elegant trifler like horace walpole not only far more discerning in his appreciation of such a crisis, but also far more patriotically sensitive as to the wisdom of the means of meeting it, than the historian of rome. gibbon's tone often amounts to levity, and he chronicles the most serious measures with an unconcern really surprising. "in a few days we stop the ports of new england. i cannot write volumes: but i am more and more convinced that with firmness all may go well: yet i sometimes doubt." (february , .) "something will be done this year; but in the spring the force of the country will be exerted to the utmost: scotch highlanders, irish papists, hanoverians, canadians, indians, &c., will all in various shapes be employed." (august , .) "what think you of the season, of siberia is it not? a pleasant campaign in america." (january , .) at precisely the same time the sagacious coxcomb of strawberry hill was writing thus: "the times are indeed very serious. pacification with america is not the measure adopted. more regiments are ordered thither, and to-morrow a plan, i fear equivalent to a declaration of war, is to be laid before both houses. they are bold ministers methinks who do not hesitate on civil war, in which victory may bring ruin, and disappointment endanger their heads.... acquisition alone can make burdens palatable, and in a war with our own colonies we must inflict instead of acquiring them, and we cannot recover them without undoing them. i am still to learn wisdom and experience, if these things are not so." (letter to mann, january , .) "a war with our colonies, which is now declared, is a proof how much influence jargon has on human actions. a war on our own trade is popular." (february , .) "the war with america goes on briskly, that is as far as voting goes. a great majority in both houses is as brave as a mob ducking a pick-pocket. they flatter themselves they shall terrify the colonies into submission in three months, and are amazed to hear that there is no such probability. they might as well have excommunicated them, and left it to the devil to put the sentence into execution." (february , .) not only is walpole's judgment wiser, but the elements of a wise judgment were present to him in a way in which they were not so to gibbon. when the latter does attempt a forecast, he shows, as might be expected, as little penetration of the future as appreciation of the present. writing from paris on august , , when all french society was ablaze with enthusiasm for america, and the court just on the point of yielding to the current, he is under no immediate apprehensions of a war with france, and "would not be surprised if next summer the french were to lend their cordial assistance to england as the weaker party." the emptiness of his letters as regards home politics perhaps admits of a more favourable explanation, and may be owing to the careful suppression by their editor, lord sheffield, of everything of real interest. it is impossible to estimate the weight of this consideration, but it may be great. still we have a sufficient number of his letters to be able to say that on the whole they are neither thoughtful nor graphic: they give us neither pictures of events nor insight into the times. it must be, however, remembered that gibbon greatly disliked letter-writing, and never wrote unless he was obliged. it was no secret that gibbon wanted a place under government. moderate as his establishment seems to have been, it was more expensive than he could afford, and he looked, not without warrant, to a supplement of income from one of the rich windfalls which, in that time of sinecures were wont to refresh the spirits of sturdy supporters of administration. he had influential friends, and even relatives, in and near the government, and but for his parliamentary nullity he would probably have been provided with a comfortable berth at an early period. but his "sincere and silent vote" was not valuable enough to command a high price from his patrons. once only was he able to help them with his pen, when he drew up, at the request of lords thurlow and weymouth, his _mémoire justificatif_, in french, in which "he vindicated against the french manifesto the justice of the british arms." it was a service worthy of a small fee, which no doubt he received. he had to wait till , when he had been five years in parliament, before his cousin mr. eliot, and his friend wedderburne, the attorney-general, were able to find him a post as one of the lords commissioners of trade and plantations. the board of trade, of which he became one of the eight members, survives in mortal memory only from being embalmed in the bright amber of one of burke's great speeches. "this board, sir, has had both its original formation and its regeneration in a job. in a job it was conceived, and in a job its mother brought it forth.... this board is a sort of temperate bed of influence: a sort of gently ripening hothouse, where eight members of parliament receive salaries of a thousand a year for a certain given time, in order to mature at a proper season a claim to two thousand, granted for doing less" (_speech on economical reform_). gibbon, with entire good humour, acknowledges the justice of burke's indictment, and says he was "heard with delight, even by those whose existence he proscribed." after all, he only enjoyed the emolument of his office for three years, and he places that emolument at a lower figure than burke did. he could not have received more than between two and three thousand pounds of public money; and when we consider what manner of men have fattened on the national purse, it would be churlish to grudge that small sum to the historian of the _decline and fall_. the misfortune is that, reasonably or otherwise, doubts were raised as to gibbon's complete straightforwardness and honourable adhesion to party ties in accepting office. he says himself: "my acceptance of a place provoked some of the leaders of opposition with whom i had lived in habits of intimacy, and i was most unjustly accused of deserting a party in which i had never enlisted." there is certainly no evidence that those who were most qualified to speak, those who gave him the place and reckoned on his vote, ever complained of want of allegiance. on the other hand, gibbon's own letter to edward elliot, accepting the place, betrays a somewhat uneasy conscience. he owns that he was far from approving all the past measures of the administration, even some of those in which he himself had silently concurred; that he saw many capital defects in the characters of some of the present ministers, and was sorry that in so alarming a situation of public affairs the country had not the assistance of several able and honest men who were now in opposition. still, for various reasons, he did not consider himself in any way implicated, and rather suspiciously concludes with an allusion to his pecuniary difficulties and a flourish. "the addition of the salary which is now offered will make my situation perfectly easy, but i hope that you will do me the justice to believe that my mind could not be so unless i were conscious of the rectitude of my conduct." the strongest charge against gibbon in reference to this matter is asserted to come from his friend fox, in this odd form. "in june , mr. fox's library came to be sold. amongst his other books the first volume of mr. gibbon's history was brought to the hammer. in the blank leaf of this was a note in the handwriting of mr. fox, stating a remarkable declaration of our historian at a well-known tavern in pall mall, and contrasting it with mr. gibbon's political conduct afterwards. 'the author,' it observed, 'at brooks's said that there was no salvation for this country until six heads of the principal persons in administration' (lord north being then prime minister) 'were laid upon the table. yet,' as the observation added, 'eleven days afterwards this same gentleman accepted a place of a lord of trade under these very ministers, and has acted with them ever since.'" it is impossible to tell what amount of truth there is in this story, and not very important to inquire. it rests on the authority of a strong personal enemy, and the cordial intimacy which ever subsisted between gibbon and fox seems to show that it was mere calumny. perhaps the fact that gibbon had really no opinions in politics may have led persons of opposite parties to think that he agreed with them more than he did, and when he merely followed his own interest, they may have inferred that he was deserting their principles. after losing his post on the board of trade he still hoped for government employ, "either a secure seat at the board of customs or excise," or in a diplomatic capacity. he was disappointed. if lord sheffield is to be believed, it was his friend fox who frustrated his appointment as secretary of embassy at paris, when he had been already named to that office. the way in which gibbon acted and afterwards spoke in reference to the celebrated coalition gives perhaps the best measure of his political calibre. he voted among the rank and file of lord north's followers for the coalition with meek subserviency. he speaks of a "principle of gratitude" which actuated him on this occasion. lord north had given him his seat, and if a man's conscience allows him to think rather of his patron than of his country, there is nothing to be said, except that his code of political ethics is low. we may admit that his vote was pledged; but there is also no doubt that any gratitude that there was in the matter was stimulated by a lively sense of favours to come. the portland ministry had not been long in office when he wrote in the following terms to his friend deyverdun: "you have not forgotten that i went into parliament without patriotism and without ambition, and that all my views tended to the convenient and respectable place of a lord of trade. this situation i at length obtained. i possessed it for three years, from to , and the net produce, which amounted to _l._ sterling, augmented my income to my wants and desires. but in the spring of last year the storm burst over our heads. lord north was overthrown, your humble servant turned out, and even the board of trade, of which i was a member, abolished and broken up for ever by mr. burke's reform. to complete my misfortunes, i still remain a member of the lower house. at the end of the last parliament, mr. eliot withdrew his nomination. but the favour of lord north facilitated my re-election, and gratitude imposed on me the duty of making available for his service the rights which i held in part from him. that winter we fought under the allied standards of lord north and mr. fox: we triumphed over lord shelburne and the peace, and my friend (_i.e._ lord north) remounted his steed in the quality of a secretary of state. now he can easily say to me, 'it was a great deal for me, it was nothing for you;' and in spite of the strongest assurances, i have too much reason to allow me to have much faith. with great genius and very respectable talents, he has now neither the title nor the credit of prime minister; more active colleagues carry off the most savoury morsels which their voracious creatures immediately devour; our misfortunes and reforms have diminished the number of favours; either through pride or through indolence i am but a bad suitor, and if at last i obtain something, it may perhaps be on the eve of a fresh revolution, which will in an instant snatch from me that which has cost me so many cares and pains." such a letter speaks for itself. gibbon might well say that he entered parliament without patriotism and without ambition. the only redeeming feature is the almost cynical frankness with which he openly regards politics from a personal point of view. however, it may be pleaded that the letter was written to a bosom friend at a moment of great depression, and when gibbon's pecuniary difficulties were pressing him severely. the coalition promised him a place, and that was enough; the contempt for all principle which had brought it about was not thought of. but even this minute excuse does not apply to the way in which, years after, when he was in comfort at lausanne, he refers to the subject in his memoirs. the light in which the coalition deserved to be regarded was clear by that time. yet he speaks of it, not only without blame or regret, but contrives to cast suspicion on the motives of those who were disgusted by it, and bestowed their allegiance elsewhere. "it is not the purpose of this narrative to expatiate on the public or secret history of the times: the schism which followed the death of the marquis of rockingham, the appointment of the earl of shelbourne, the resignation of mr. fox and his famous coalition with lord north. but i may assert with some degree of assurance that in their political conflict those great antagonists had never felt any personal animosity to each other, that their reconciliation was easy and sincere, and that their friendship has never been clouded by the shadow of suspicion or jealousy. the _most violent_ or _venal_ of their respective followers embraced this fair occasion of revolt, but their alliance still commanded a majority of the house of commons, the peace was censured, lord shelbourne resigned, and the two friends knelt on the same cushion to take the oath of secretary of state. from a principle of gratitude i adhered to the coalition; my vote was counted in the day of battle, but i was overlooked in the division of the spoil." from this we learn that it was only the _violent_ and the _venal_ who disapproved of the coalition. one would like to know how gibbon explained the fact that at the general election of no less than one hundred and sixty of the supporters of the coalition lost their seats, and that fox's political reputation was all but irretrievably ruined from this time forward. meanwhile, he had not neglected, his own proper work. the first volume of his history was published in february, . it derived, he says, "more credit from the name of the shop than from that of the author." in the first instance he intended to print only five hundred copies, but the number was doubled by the "prophetic taste" of his printer, mr. strahan. the book was received with a burst of applause--it was a _succès fou_. the first impression was exhausted in a few days, and a second and third edition were scarcely adequate to the demand. the wiser few were as warm in their eulogies as the general public. hume declared that if he had not been personally acquainted with the author, he should have been surprised by such a performance coming from any englishman in that age. dr. robertson, adam ferguson, and horace walpole joined in the chorus. walpole betrays an amusing mixture of admiration and pique at not having found the author out before. "i know him a little, and never suspected the extent of his talents; for he is perfectly modest, or i want penetration, which i know too; but i intend to know him a great deal more." he oddly enough says that gibbon was the "son of a foolish alderman," which shows at least how little the author was known in the great world up to this time. now, however, society was determined to know more of him, the surest proof, not of merit, but of success. it must have been a rather intoxicating moment, but gibbon had a cool head not easily turned. it would be unfair not to add that he had something much better, a really warm and affectionate regard for old friends, the best preservative against the fumes of flattery and sudden fame. holroyd, deyverdun, madame necker were more to him than all the great people with whom he now became acquainted. necker and his wife came over from paris and paid him a long visit in bentinck street, when his laurels were just fresh. "i live with her" he writes, "just as i used to do twenty years ago, laugh at her paris varnish, and oblige her to become a simple reasonable suissesse. the man, who might read english husbands lessons of proper and dutiful behaviour, is a sensible, good-natured creature." the next year he returned the visit to paris. his fame had preceded him, and he received the cordial but discriminating welcome which _the ancien régime_ at that time specially reserved for _gens d'esprit_. madame du deffand writes to walpole, "mr. gibbon has the greatest success here; it is quite a struggle to get him." he did not deny himself a rather sumptuous style of living while in paris. perhaps the recollection of the unpleasant effect of his english clothes and the long waists of the french on his former visit dwelt in his mind, for now, like walpole, he procured a new outfit at once. "after decking myself out with silks and silver, the ordinary establishment of coach, lodgings, servants, eating, and pocket expenses, does not exceed _l._ per month. yet i have two footmen in handsome liveries behind my coach, and my apartment is hung with damask." the remainder of his life in london has nothing important. he persevered assiduously with his history, and had two more quartos ready in . they were received with less enthusiasm than the first, although they were really superior. gibbon was rather too modestly inclined to agree with the public and "to believe that, especially in the beginning, they were more prolix and less entertaining" than the previous volume. he also wasted some weeks on his vindication of the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters of that volume, which had excited a host of feeble and ill-mannered attacks. his defence was complete, and in excellent temper. but the piece has no permanent value. his assailants were so ignorant and silly that they gave no scope for a great controversial reply. neither perhaps did the subject admit of it. a literary war generally makes people think of bentley's incomparable _phalaris_. but that was almost a unique occasion and victory in the history of letters. bentley himself, the most pugnacious of men, never found such another. and so the time glided by, till we come to the year . lord north had resigned office, the board of trade was abolished, and gibbon had lost his convenient salary. the outlook was not pleasant. the seat on the board of customs or excise with which his hopes had been for a time kept up, receded into a remote distance, and he came to the conclusion "that the reign of pensions and sinecures was at an end." it was clearly necessary to take some important step in the way of retrenchment. after he had lost his official income, his expenses exceeded his revenue by something like four hundred pounds. a less expensive style of living in london never seems to have presented itself as an alternative. so, like many an englishman before and since, he resolved to go abroad to economise. his old friend deyverdun was now settled in a comfortable house at lausanne, overlooking the lake of geneva. they had not met for eight years. but the friendship had begun a quarter of a century before, in the old days when gibbon was a boarder in pavillard's house, and the embers of old associations only wanted stirring to make them shoot up into flame. in a moment of expansion gibbon wrote off a warm and eager letter to his friend, setting forth his unsatisfactory position, and his wish and even necessity to change it. he gradually and with much delicacy discloses his plan, that he and deyverdun, both now old bachelors, should combine their solitary lives in a common household and carry out an old project, often discussed in younger days, of living together. "you live in a charming house. i see from here my apartment, the rooms we shall share with one another, our table, our walks. but such a marriage is worthless unless it suits both parties, and i easily feel that circumstances, new tastes, and connections may frustrate a design which appeared charming in the distance. to settle my mind and to avoid regrets, you must be as frank as i have been, and give me a true picture, external and internal, of george deyverdun." this letter, written in fluent and perfect french, is one of the best that we have of gibbon. deyverdun answered promptly, and met his friend's advances with at least equal warmth. the few letters that have been preserved of his connected with this subject give a highly favourable idea of his mind and character, and show he was quite worthy of the long and constant attachment that gibbon felt for him. he cannot express the delight he has felt at his friend's proposal; by the rarest piece of good fortune, it so happens that he himself is in a somewhat similar position of uncertainty and difficulty; a year ago gibbon's letter would have given him pleasure, now it offers assistance and support. after a few details concerning the tenant who occupies a portion of his house, he proceeds to urge gibbon to carry out the project he had suggested, to break loose from parliament and politics, for which he was not fit, and to give himself up to the charms of study and friendship. "call to mind, my dear friend," he goes on, "that i saw you enter parliament with regret, and i think i was only too good a prophet. i am sure that career has caused you more privations than joys, more pains than pleasures. ever since i have known you i have been convinced that your happiness lay in your study and in society, and that any path which led you elsewhere was a departure from happiness." through nine pages of gentle and friendly eloquence deyverdun pursues his argument to induce his friend to clinch the bargain. "i advise you not only not to solicit a place, but to refuse one if it were offered to you. would a thousand a year make up to you for the loss of five days a week?... by making this retreat to switzerland, besides the beauty of the country and the pleasures of its society, you will acquire two blessings which you have lost, liberty and competence. you will also be useful, your works will continue to enlighten us, and, independently of your talents, the man of honour and refinement is never useless." he then skilfully exhibits the attractions he has to offer. "you used to like my house and garden; what would you do now? on the first floor, which looks on the declivity of ouchy, i have fitted up an apartment which is enough for me. i have a servant's room, two _salons_, two cabinets. on a level with the terrace two other _salons_, of which one serves as a dining-room in summer, and the other a drawing-room for company. i have arranged three more rooms between the house and the coachhouse, so that i can offer you all the large apartment, which consists actually of eleven rooms, great and small, looking east and south, not splendidly furnished, i allow, but with a certain elegance which i hope you will like. the terrace is but little altered ... it is lined from end to end with boxes of orange-trees. the vine-trellis has prospered, and extends nearly to the end. i have purchased the vineyard below the garden, and in front of the house made it into a lawn, which is watered by the water of the fountain.... in a word, strangers come to see the place, and in spite of my pompous description of it i think you will like it.... if you come, you will find a tranquillity which you cannot have in london, and a friend who has not passed a single day without thinking of you, and who, in spite of his defects, his foibles, and his inferiority, is still one of the companions who suits you best." more letters followed from both sides in a similar strain. yet gibbon quailed before a final resolution. his aunt, mrs. porten, his mother, mrs. gibbon, his friend, lord sheffield, all joined in deprecating his voluntary exile. "that is a nonsensical scheme," said the latter, "you have got into your head of returning to lausanne--a pretty fancy; you remember how much you liked it in your youth, but now you have seen more of the world, and if you were to try it again you would find yourself woefully disappointed." deyverdun, with complete sympathy, begged him not to be in too great a hurry to decide on a course which he himself desired so much. "i agree with you," he wrote to gibbon, "that this is a sort of marriage, but i could never forgive myself if i saw you dissatisfied in the sequel, and in a position to reproach me." gibbon felt it was a case demanding decision of character, and he came to a determination with a promptitude and energy not usual with him. he promised deyverdun in the next letter an ultimatum, stating whether he meant to _go_ or to _stay_, and a week after he wrote, "i go." he had prudently refrained from consulting lord sheffield during this critical period, knowing that his certain disapprobation of the scheme would only complicate matters and render decision more difficult. then he wrote, "i have given deyverdun my word of honour to be at lausanne at the beginning of october, and no power of persuasion can divert me from this _irrevocable_ resolution, which i am every day proceeding to execute." this was no exaggeration. he cancelled the lease of his house in bentinck street, packed the more necessary portion of his books and shipped them for rouen, and as his postchaise moved over westminster bridge, "bade a long farewell to the _fumum et opes strepitumque romæ_." the only real pang he felt in leaving arose from the "silent grief" of his aunt porten, whom he did not hope to see again. nor did he. he started on september , , slept at dover, was flattered with the hope of making calais harbour by the same tide in "three hours and a half, as the wind was brisk and fair," but was driven into boulogne. he had not a symptom of seasickness. then he went on by easy stages through aire, bethune, douay, cambray, st. quentin, la fère, laon, rheims, chalons, st. dizier, langres, besançon, and arrived at lausanne on the th. the inns he found more agreeable to the palate than to the sight or the smell. at langres he had an excellent bed about six feet high from the ground. he beguiled the time with homer and clarendon, talking with his servant, caplin, and his dog muff, and sometimes with the french postilions, and he found them the least rational of the animals mentioned. he reached his journey's end, to alight amid a number of minor troubles, which to a less easy tempered man would have been real annoyances. he found that deyverdun had reckoned without his host, or rather his tenant, and that they could not have possession of the house for several months, so he had to take lodgings. then he sprained his ankle, and this brought on a bad attack of the gout, which laid him up completely. however, his spirits never gave way. in time his books arrived, and the friends got installed in their own house. his satisfaction has then no bounds, with the people, the place, the way of living, and his daily companion. we must now leave him for a short space in the enjoyment of his happiness, while we briefly consider the labours of the previous ten years. chapter vii. the first three volumes of the decline and fall. the historian who is also an artist is exposed to a particular drawback from which his brethren in other fields are exempt. the mere lapse of time destroys the value and even the fidelity of his pictures. in other arts correct colouring and outline remain correct, and if they are combined with imaginative power, age rather enhances than diminishes their worth. but the historian lives under another law. his reproduction of a past age, however full and true it may appear to his contemporaries, appears less and less true to his successors. the way in which he saw things ceases to be satisfactory; we may admit his accuracy, but we add a qualification referring to the time when he wrote, the point of view that he occupied. and we feel that what was accurate for him is no longer accurate for us. this superannuation of historical work is not similar to the superseding of scientific work which is ever going on, and is the capital test of progress. scientific books become rapidly old-fashioned, because the science to which they refer is in constant growth, and a work on chemistry or biology is out of date by reason of incompleteness or the discovery of unsuspected errors. the scientific side of history, if we allow it to have a scientific side, conforms to this rule, and presents no singularity. closer inspection of our materials, the employment of the comparative method, occasionally the bringing to light of new authorities--all contribute to an increase of real knowledge, and historical studies in this respect do not differ from other branches of research. but this is not the sole or the chief cause of the renovation and transformation constantly needed in historic work. that depends on the ever-moving standpoint from which the past is regarded, so that society in looking back on its previous history never sees it for long together at quite the same angle, never sees, we may say, quite the same thing. the past changes to us as we move down the stream of time, as a distant mountain changes through the windings of the road on which we travel away from it. to drop figure and use language now becoming familiar, the social organism is in constant growth, and receiving new additions, and each new addition causes us to modify our view of the whole. the historian, in fact, is engaged in the study of an unfinished organism, whose development is constantly presenting him with surprises. it is as if the biologist were suddenly to come upon new and unheard-of species and families which would upset his old classification, or as if the chemist were to find his laws of combination replaced by others which were not only unknown to him, but which were really new and recent in the world. other inquirers have the whole of the phenomena with which their science is concerned before them, and they may explore them at their leisure. the sociologist has only an instalment, most likely a very small instalment, of the phenomena with which his science is concerned before him. they have not yet happened, are not yet phenomena, and as they do happen and admit of investigation they necessarily lead to constant modification of his views and deductions. not only does he acquire new knowledge like other inquirers, but he is constantly having the subject-matter from which he derives his knowledge augmented. even in modern times society has thrown out with much suddenness rapid and unexpected developments, of such scope and volume that contemporaries have often lost self-possession at the sight of them, and wondered if social order could survive. the reformation and the french revolution are cases in point. and what a principal part do these two great events always play in any speculations instituted subsequent to them! how easy it is to see whether a writer lived before the reign of terror, or after it, from his gait and manner of approaching social inquiries! is there any reason to suppose that such mutations are now at an end? none. the probability, well nigh a certainty, is that metamorphoses of the social organism are in store for us which will equal, if they do not vastly exceed, anything that the past has offered. considerations of this kind need to be kept in view if we would be just in our appreciation of historical writings which have already a certain age. it is impossible that a history composed a century ago should fully satisfy us now; but we must beware of blaming the writer for his supposed or real shortcomings, till we have ascertained how far they arose from his personal inadequacy to his task, and were not the result of his chronological position. it need not be said that this remark does not refer to many books which are called histories, but are really contemporary memoirs and original authorities subservient to history proper. the works of clarendon and burnet, for instance, can never lose a certain value on this account. the immortal book which all subsequent generations have agreed to call a possession for ever, is the unapproachable ideal of this class. but neither thucydides nor clarendon were historians in the sense in which gibbon was an historian, that is, engaged in the delineation of a remote epoch by the help of such materials as have escaped the ravages of time. it is historians like gibbon who are exposed to the particular unhappiness referred to a little way back--that of growing out of date through no fault of their own, but through the changed aspect presented by the past in consequence of the movement which has brought us to the present. but if this is the field of historical disaster, it is also the opportunity of historical genius. in proportion as a writer transcends the special limitations of his time, will "age fail to wither him." that he cannot entirely shake off the fetters which fasten him to his epoch is manifest. but in proportion as his vision is clear, in proportion as he has with singleness of eye striven to draw the past with reverent loyalty, will his bondage to his own time be loosened, and his work will remain faithful work for which due gratitude will not be withheld. the sudden and rapid expansion of historic studies in the middle of the eighteenth century constitutes one of the great epochs in literature. up to the year no great historical work had appeared in any modern language.[ ] the instances that seem to make against this remark will be found to confirm it. they consist of memoirs, contemporary documents, in short materials for history, but not history itself. from froissart and de comines, or even from the earlier monastic writers to st. simon (who was just finishing his incomparable memoirs), history with wide outlook and the conception of social progress and interconnection of events did not exist. yet history in its simple forms is one of the most spontaneous of human achievements. stories of mighty deeds, of the prowess and death of heroes, are among the earliest productions of even semi-civilised man--the earliest subjects of epic and lyric verse. but this rudimentary form is never more than biographical. with increasing complexity of social evolution it dies away, and history proper, as distinct from annals and chronicle, does not arise till circumstances allow of general and synthetic views, till societies can be surveyed from a sufficient distance and elevation for their movements to be discerned. thucydides, livy, and tacitus do not appear till greece and home have reached their highest point of homogeneous national life. the tardy dawn of history in the modern world was owing to its immense complexity. materials also were wanting. they gradually emerged out of manuscript all over europe, during what may be called the great pedant age ( - ), under the direction of meritorious antiquaries, camden, savile, duchesne, gale, and others. still official documents and state papers were wanting, and had they been at hand would hardly have been used with competence. the national and religious limitations were still too marked and hostile to permit a free survey over the historic field. the eighteenth century, though it opened with a bloody war, was essentially peaceful in spirit: governments made war, but men and nations longed for rest. the increased interest in the past was shown by the publication nearly contemporary of the great historic collections of rymer (a.d. ), leibnitz ( ), and muratori ( ). before the middle of the century the historic muse had abundant oil to feed her lamp. still the lamp would probably not have been lighted but for the singular pass to which french thought had come. footnotes: [footnote : mézeray's great history of france is next to valueless till he reaches the sixteenth century, that was a period bordering on his own. thuanus deals with contemporary events.] from the latter years of louis xiv. till the third quarter of the eighteenth century was all but closed, france had a government at once so weak and wicked, so much below the culture of the people it oppressed, that the better minds of the nation turned away in disgust from their domestic ignominy, and sought consolation in contemplating foreign virtue wherever they thought it was to be found; in short, they became cosmopolitan. the country which has since been the birthplace of chauvinism, put away national pride almost with passion. but this was not all. the country whose king was called the eldest son of the church, and with which untold pains had been taken to keep it orthodox, had lapsed into such an abhorrence of the church and of orthodoxy that anything seemed preferable to them in its eyes. thus, as if by enchantment, the old barriers disappeared, both national and religious. man and his fortunes, in all climes and all ages, became topics of intense interest, especially when they tended to degrade by contrast the detested condition of things at home. this was the weak side of historical speculation in france: it was essentially polemical; prompted less by genuine interest in the past than by strong hatred of the present. of this perturbation note must be taken. but it is none the less true that the disengagement of french thought from the narrow limits of nation and creed produced, as it were in a moment, a lofty conception of history such as subsequent ages may equal, but can hardly surpass. the influence of french thought was european, and nowhere more beneficial than in england. in other countries it was too despotic, and produced in germany, at least, lessing's memorable reaction. but the robust national and political life of england reduced it to a welcome flavouring of our insular temperament. the scotch, who had a traditional connection with france, were the first importers of the new views. hume, who had practically grown in the same soil as voltaire, was only three years behind him in the historic field. the _age of louis xiv._ was published in , and the first volume of the _history of england_ in . hume was no disciple of voltaire; he simply wrote under the stimulus of the same order of ideas. robertson, who shortly followed him, no doubt drew direct inspiration from voltaire, and his weightiest achievement, the view of the state of europe, prefixed to his _history of charles v._, was largely influenced, if it was not absolutely suggested, by the _essay on manners_. but both hume and robertson surpassed their masters, if we allow, as seems right, that the french were their masters. the scotch writers had no quarrel with their country or their age as the french had. one was a tory, the other a whig; and hume allowed himself to be unworthily affected by party bias in his historical judgment. but neither was tempted to turn history into a covert attack on the condition of things amid which they lived. hence a calmness and dignity of tone and language, very different from the petulant brilliancy of voltaire, who is never so happy as when he can make the past look mean and ridiculous, merely because it was the parent of the odious present. but, excellent as were the scotch historians--hume, in style nearly perfect; robertson, admirable for gravity and shrewd sense--they yet left much to be desired. hume had despatched his five quartos, containing the whole history of england from the roman period to the revolution, in nine years. considering that the subject was new to him when he began, such rapidity made genuine research out of the question. robertson had the oddest way of consulting his friends as to what subject it would be advisable for him to treat, and was open to proposals from any quarter with exemplary impartiality; this only showed how little the stern conditions of real historic inquiry were appreciated by him. in fact it is not doing them injustice to say that these eminent men were a sort of modern livies, chiefly occupied with the rhetorical part of their work, and not over inclined to waste their time in ungrateful digging in the deep mines of historic lore. obviously the place was open for a writer who should unite all the broad spirit of comprehensive survey, with the thorough and minute patience of a benedictine; whose subject, mellowed by long brooding, should have sought him rather than he it; whose whole previous course of study had been an unconscious preparation for one great effort which was to fill his life. when gibbon sat down to write his book, the man had been found who united these difficult conditions. the decline and fall of rome is the greatest event in history. it occupied a larger portion of the earth's surface, it affected the lives and fortunes of a larger number of human beings, than any other revolution on record. for it was essentially one, though it took centuries to consummate, and though it had for its theatre the civilised world. great evolutions and catastrophes happened before it, and have happened since, but nothing which can compare with it in volume and mere physical size. nor was it less morally. the destruction of rome was not only a destruction of an empire, it was the destruction of a phase of human thought, of a system of human beliefs, of morals, politics, civilisation, as all these had existed in the world for ages. the drama is so vast, the cataclysm so appalling, that even at this day we are hardly removed from it far enough to take it fully in. the mind is oppressed, the imagination flags under the load imposed upon it. the capture and sack of a town one can fairly conceive: the massacre, outrage, the flaming roofs, the desolation. even the devastation of a province can be approximately reproduced in thought. but what thought can embrace the devastation and destruction of all the civilised portions of europe, africa, and asia? who can realise a thirty years war lasting five hundred years? a devastation of the palatinate extending through fifteen generations? if we try to insert into the picture, as we undoubtedly should do, the founding of the new, which was going on beside this destruction of the old, the settling down of the barbarian hosts in the conquered provinces, the expansion of the victorious church, driving paganism from the towns to the country and at last extinguishing it entirely, the effort becomes more difficult than ever. the legend of the seven sleepers testifies to the need men felt, even before the tragedy had come to an end, to symbolize in a manageable form the tremendous changes they saw going on around them. but the legend only refers to the changes in religion. the fall of rome was much more than that. it was the death of the old pagan world and the birth of the new christian world--the greatest transition in history. this, and no less than this, is gibbon's subject. he has treated it in such a way as even now fills competent judges with something like astonishment. his accuracy, coupled with the extraordinary range of his matter, the variety of his topics, the complexity of his undertaking, the fulness and thoroughness of his knowledge, never failing at any point over the vast field, the ease and mastery with which he lifts the enormous load, are appreciated in proportion to the information and abilities of his critic. one testimonial will suffice. mr. freeman says: "that gibbon should ever be displaced seems impossible. that wonderful man monopolised, so to speak, the historical genius and the historical learning of a whole generation, and left little, indeed, of either for his contemporaries. he remains the one historian of the eighteenth century whom modern research has neither set aside nor threatened to set aside. we may correct and improve from the stores which have been opened since gibbon's time; we may write again large parts of his story from other and often truer and more wholesome points of view, but the work of gibbon as a whole, as the encyclopædic history of years, as the grandest of historical designs, carried out alike with wonderful power and with wonderful accuracy, must ever keep its place. whatever else is read, gibbon must be read too." gibbon's immense scheme did not unfold itself to him at once: he passed through at least two distinct stages in the conception of his work. the original idea had been confined to the decline and fall of the city of rome. before he began to write, this had been expanded to the fall of the empire of the west. the first volume, which we saw him publish in the last chapter, was only an instalment, limited to the accession of constantine, through a doubt as to how his labours would be received. the two following volumes, published in , completed his primitive plan. then he paused exactly a year before he resolved to carry on his work to its true end, the taking of constantinople by the turks in . the latter portion he achieved in three volumes more, which he gave to the world on his fifty-first birthday, in . thus the work naturally falls into two equal parts. it will be more convenient to disregard in our remarks the interval of five years which separated the publication of the first volume from its two immediate companions. the first three volumes constitute a whole in themselves, which we will now consider. from the accession of commodus, a.d. , to the last of the western cæsars, a.d. , three centuries elapsed. the first date is a real point of departure, the commencement of a new stage of decay in the empire. the second is a mere official record of the final disappearance of a series of phantom sovereigns, whose vanishing was hardly noticed. between these limits the empire passed from the autumnal calm of the antonine period, through the dreadful century of anarchy between pertinax and diocletian, through the relative peace brought about by diocletian's reforms, the civil wars of the sons of constantine, the disastrous defeat of julian, the calamities of the gothic war, the short respite under theodosius, the growing anarchy and misery under his incompetent sons, the three sieges of rome and its sack by the goths, the awful appearance of attila and his huns, the final submergence of the western empire under the barbarians, and the universal ruin which marked the close of the fifth century. this was the temporal side of affairs. on the spiritual, we have the silent occult growth of the early church, the conversion of constantine, the tremendous conflict of hostile sects, the heresy of arius, the final triumph of athanasius, the spread of monasticism, the extinction of paganism. antiquity has ended, the middle ages have begun. over all this immense field gibbon moves with a striking attitude of power, which arose from his consciousness of complete preparation. what there was to be known of his subject he felt sure that he knew. his method of treatment is very simple, one might say primitive, but it is very effective. he masters his materials, and then condenses and clarifies them into a broad, well-filled narrative, which is always or nearly always perfectly lucid through his skill in grouping events and characters, and his fine boldness in neglecting chronological sequence for the sake of clearness and unity of action. it is doing the book injustice to consult it only as a work of reference, or even to read it in detached portions. it should be read through, if we would appreciate the art with which the story is told. no part can be fairly judged without regard to the remainder. in fact, gibbon was much more an artist than perhaps be suspected, and less of a philosophic thinker on history than he would have been willing to allow. his shortcomings in this latter respect will be adverted to presently; we are now considering his merits. and among these the very high one of lofty and vigorous narrative stands pre-eminent. the campaigns of julian, belisarius, and heraclius are painted with a dash and clearness which few civil historians have equalled. his descriptive power is also very great. the picture of constantinople in the seventeenth chapter is, as the writer of these pages can testify, a wonderful achievement, both for fidelity and brilliancy, coming from a man who had never seen the place. "if we survey byzantium in the extent which it acquired with the august name of constantinople, the figure of the imperial city may be represented under that of an unequal triangle. the obtuse point, which advances towards the east and the shores of asia, meets and repels the waves of the thracian bosphorus. the northern side of the city is bounded by the harbour; and the southern is washed by the propontis, or sea of marmora. the basis of the triangle is opposed to the west, and terminates the continent of europe. but the admirable form and division of the circumjacent land and water cannot, without a more ample explanation, be clearly or sufficiently understood. "the winding channel through which the waters of the euxine flow with rapid and incessant course towards the mediterranean received the appellation of bosphorus, a name not less celebrated in the history than in the fables of antiquity. a crowd of temples and of votive altars, profusely scattered along its steep and woody banks, attested the unskilfulness, the terrors, and the devotion of the grecian navigators, who, after the example of the argonauts, explored the dangers of the inhospitable euxine. on these banks tradition long preserved the memory of the palace of phineus, infested by the obscene harpies, and of the sylvan reign of amycus, who defied the son of leda to the combat of the cestus. the straits of the bosphorus are terminated by the cyanean rocks, which, according to the description of the poets, had once floated on the surface of the waters, and were destined by the gods to protect the entrance of the euxine against the eye of profane curiosity. from the cyanean rocks to the point and harbour of byzantium the winding length of the bosphorus extends about sixteen miles, and its most ordinary breadth may be computed at about one mile and a half. the _new_ castles of europe and asia are constructed on either continent upon the foundations of two celebrated temples of serapis and jupiter urius. the _old_ castles, a work of the greek emperors, command the narrowest part of the channel, in a place where the opposite banks advance within five hundred yards of each other. these fortresses were destroyed and strengthened by mahomet the second when he meditated the siege of constantinople; but the turkish conqueror was most probably ignorant that near two thousand years before his reign darius had chosen the same situation to connect the two continents by a bridge of boats. at a small distance from the old castles we discover the little town of chrysopolis or scutari, which may almost be considered as the asiatic suburb of constantinople. the bosphorus, as it begins to open into the propontis, passes between byzantium and chalcedon. the latter of these two cities was built by the greeks a few years before the former, and the blindness of its founders, who overlooked the superior advantages of the opposite coast, has been stigmatised by a proverbial expression of contempt. "the harbour of constantinople, which may be considered as an arm of the bosphorus, obtained in a very remote period, the denomination of the _golden horn_. the curve which it describes might be compared to the horn of a stag, or as it should seem with more propriety, to that of an ox. the epithet of _golden_ was expressive of the riches which every wind wafted from the most distant countries into the secure and capacious port of constantinople. the river lycus, formed by the conflux of two little streams, pours into the harbour a perpetual supply of fresh water, which serves to cleanse the bottom and to invite the periodical shoals of fish to seek their retreat in that convenient recess. as the vicissitudes of the tides are scarcely felt in those seas, the constant depth of the harbour allows goods to be landed on the quays without the assistance of boats, and it has been observed that in many places the largest vessels may rest their prows against the houses while their sterns are floating in the water. from the mouth of the lycus to that of the harbour, this arm of the bosphorus is more than seven miles in length. the entrance is about five hundred yards broad, and a strong chain could be occasionally drawn across it, to guard the port and the city from the attack of an hostile navy. "between the bosphorus and the hellespont, the shores of europe and asia receding on either side include the sea of marmora, which was known to the ancients by the denomination of the propontis. the navigation from the issue of the bosphorus to the entrance of the hellespont is about one hundred and twenty miles. those who steer their westward course through the middle of the propontis may at once descry the highlands of thrace and bithynia and never lose sight of the lofty summit of mount olympus, covered with eternal snows. they leave on the left a deep gulf, at the bottom of which nicomedia was seated, the imperial residence of diocletian, and they pass the small islands of cyzicus and proconnesus before they cast anchor at gallipoli, where the sea which separates asia from europe is again contracted to a narrow channel. "the geographers, who with the most skilful accuracy have surveyed the form and extent of the hellespont, assign about sixty miles for the winding course and about three miles for the ordinary breadth of those celebrated straits. but the narrowest part of the channel is found to the northward of the old turkish castles between the cities of sestos and abydos. it was here that the adventurous leander braved the passage of the flood for the possession of his mistress. it was here, likewise, in a place where the distance between the opposite banks cannot exceed five hundred paces, that xerxes imposed a stupendous bridge of boats for the purpose of transporting into europe an hundred and seventy myriads of barbarians. a sea contracted within such narrow limits may seem but ill to deserve the singular epithet of _broad_, which homer, as well as orpheus, has frequently bestowed on the hellespont. but our ideas of greatness are of a relative nature; the traveller, and especially the poet, who sailed along the hellespont, who pursued the windings of the stream and contemplated the rural scenery which appeared on every side to terminate the prospect, insensibly lost the remembrance of the sea, and his fancy painted those celebrated straits with all the attributes of a mighty river flowing with a swift current in the midst of a woody and inland country, and at length through a wide mouth discharging itself into the Ægean or archipelago. ancient troy, seated on an eminence at the foot of mount ida, overlooked the mouth of the hellespont, which scarcely received an accession of waters from the tribute of those immortal rivulets the simois and scamander. the grecian camp had stretched twelve miles along the shore from the sigæan to the rhætian promontory, and the flanks of the army were guarded by the bravest chiefs who fought under the banners of agamemnon. the first of these promontories was occupied by achilles with his invincible myrmidons, and the dauntless ajax pitched his tents on the other. after ajax had fallen a sacrifice to his disappointed pride and to the ingratitude of the greeks, his sepulchre was erected on the ground where he had defended the navy against the rage of jove and hector, and the citizens of the rising town of rhætium celebrated his memory with divine honours. before constantine gave a just preference to the situation of byzantium he had conceived the design of erecting the seat of empire on this celebrated spot, from whence the romans derived their fabulous origin. the extensive plain which lies below ancient troy towards the rhætian promontory was first chosen for his new capital; and though the undertaking was soon relinquished, the stately remains of unfinished walls and towers attracted the notice of all who sailed through the straits of the hellespont. "we are at present qualified to view the advantageous position of constantinople; which appears to have been formed by nature for the centre and capital of a great monarchy. situated in the forty-first degree of latitude, the imperial city commanded from her seven hills the opposite shores of europe and asia; the climate was healthy and temperate; the soil fertile; the harbour secure and capacious; and the approach on the side of the continent was of small extent and easy defence. the bosphorus and the hellespont may be considered as the two gates of constantinople, and the prince who possesses those important passages could always shut them against a naval enemy and open them to the fleets of commerce. the preservation of the eastern provinces may in some degree be ascribed to the policy of constantine, as the barbarians of the euxine, who in the preceding age had poured their armaments into the heart of the mediterranean, soon desisted from the exercise of piracy, and despaired of forcing this insurmountable barrier. when the gates of the hellespont and bosphorus were shut, the capital still enjoyed within their spacious inclosure every production which could supply the wants or gratify the luxury of its numerous inhabitants. the sea-coasts of thrace and bithynia, which languish under the weight of turkish oppression, still exhibit a rich prospect of vineyards, of gardens, and of plentiful harvests; and the propontis has ever been renowned for an inexhaustible store of the most exquisite fish that are taken in their stated seasons without skill and almost without labour. but when the passages of the straits were thrown open for trade, they alternately admitted the natural and artificial riches of the north and south, of the euxine and the mediterranean. whatever rude commodities were collected in the forests of germany and scythia, and as far as the sources of the tanais and borysthenes; whatsoever was manufactured by the skill of europe or asia, the corn of egypt, the gems and spices of the furthest india, were brought by the varying winds into the port of constantinople, which for many ages attracted the commerce of the ancient world. "the prospect of beauty, of safety, and of wealth united in a single spot was sufficient to justify the choice of constantine. but as some mixture of prodigy and fable has in every age been supposed to reflect a becoming majesty on the origin of great cities, the emperor was desirous of ascribing his resolution not so much to the uncertain counsels of human policy as to the eternal and infallible decrees of divine wisdom. in one of his laws he has been careful to instruct posterity that in obedience to the commands of god he laid the everlasting foundations of constantinople, and though he has not condescended to relate in what manner the celestial inspiration was communicated to his mind, the defect of his modest silence has been liberally supplied by the ingenuity of succeeding writers, who describe the nocturnal vision which appeared to the fancy of constantine as he slept within the walls of byzantium. the tutelar genius of the city, a venerable matron sinking under the weight of years and infirmities, was suddenly transformed into a blooming maid, whom his own hands adorned with all the symbols of imperial greatness. the monarch awoke, interpreted the auspicious omen, and obeyed without hesitation the will of heaven. the day which gave birth to a city or a colony was celebrated by the romans with such ceremonies as had been ordained by a generous superstition: and though constantine might omit some rites which savoured too strongly of their pagan origin, yet he was anxious to leave a deep impression of hope and respect on the minds of the spectators. on foot, with a lance in his hand, the emperor himself led the solemn procession: and directed the line which was traced as the boundary of the destined capital: till the growing circumference was observed with astonishment by the assistants, who at length ventured to observe that he had already exceeded the most ample measure of a great city. 'i shall still advance,' replied constantine, 'till he, the invisible guide who marches before me, thinks proper to stop.'" gibbon proceeds to describe the extent, limits, and edifices of constantinople. unfortunately the limits of our space prevent us from giving more than a portion of his brilliant picture. "in the actual state of the city the palace and gardens of the seraglio occupy the eastern promontory, the first of the seven hills, and cover about one hundred and fifty acres of our own measure. the seat of turkish jealousy and despotism is erected on the foundations of a grecian republic: but it may be supposed that the byzantines were tempted by the conveniency of the harbour to extend their habitations on that side beyond the modern limits of the seraglio. the new walls of constantine stretched from the port to the propontis across the enlarged breadth of the triangle, at the distance of fifteen stadia from the ancient fortifications: and with the city of byzantium they inclosed five of the seven hills, which to the eyes of those who approach constantinople appear to rise above each other in beautiful order. about a century after the death of the founder the new buildings, extending on one side up the harbour, and on the other the propontis, already covered the narrow ridge of the sixth and the broad summit of the seventh hill. the necessity of protecting those suburbs from the incessant inroads of the barbarians engaged the younger theodosius to surround his capital with an adequate and permanent inclosure of walls. from the eastern promontory to the golden gate, the extreme length of constantinople was above three roman miles; the circumference measured between ten and eleven; and the surface might be computed as equal to about two thousand english acres. it is impossible to justify the vain and credulous exaggerations of modern travellers, who have sometimes stretched the limits of constantinople over the adjacent villages of the european and even asiatic coasts. but the suburbs of pera and galata, though situate beyond the harbour, may deserve to be considered as a part of the city, and this addition may perhaps authorise the measure of a byzantine historian, who assigns sixteen greek (about sixteen roman) miles for the circumference of his native city. such an extent may seem not unworthy of an imperial residence. yet constantinople must yield to babylon and thebes, to ancient rome, to london, and even to paris.... "some estimate may be formed of the expense bestowed with imperial liberality on constantinople, by the allowance of about two millions five hundred thousand pounds for the construction of the walls, the porticoes, and the aqueducts. the forests that overshadowed the shores of the euxine, and the celebrated quarries of white marble in the little island of proconnesus, supplied an inexhaustible stock of materials ready to be conveyed by the convenience of a short water carriage to the harbour of byzantium. a multitude of labourers and artificers urged the conclusion of the work with incessant toil, but the impatience of constantine soon discovered that in the decline of the arts the skill as well as the number of his architects bore a very unequal proportion to the greatness of his design.... the buildings of the new city were executed by such artificers as the age of constantine could afford, but they were decorated by the hands of the most celebrated masters of the age of pericles and alexander.... by constantine's command the cities of greece and asia were despoiled of their most valuable ornaments. the trophies of memorable wars, the objects of religious veneration, the most finished statues of the gods and heroes, of the sages and poets of ancient times, contributed to the splendid triumph of constantinople. "... the circus, or hippodrome, was a stately building of about four hundred paces in length and one hundred in breadth. the space between the two _metæ_, or goals, was filled with statues and obelisks, and we may still remark a very singular fragment of antiquity--the bodies of three serpents twisted into one pillar of brass. their triple heads had once supported the golden tripod which, after the defeat of xerxes, was consecrated in the temple of delphi by the victorious greeks. the beauty of the hippodrome has been long since defaced by the rude hands of the turkish conquerors; but, under the similar appellation of atmeidan, it still serves as a place of exercise for their horses. from the throne whence the emperor viewed the circensian games a winding staircase descended to the palace, a magnificent edifice, which scarcely yielded to the residence of rome itself, and which, together with the dependent courts, gardens, and porticoes, covered a considerable extent of ground upon the banks of the propontis between the hippodrome and the church of st. sophia. we might likewise celebrate the baths, which still retained the name of zeuxippus, after they had been enriched by the magnificence of constantine with lofty columns, various marbles, and above three score statues of bronze. but we should deviate from the design of this history if we attempted minutely to describe the different buildings or quarters of the city.... a particular description, composed about a century after its foundation, enumerates a capitol or school of learning, a circus, two theatres, eight public and one hundred and fifty-three private baths, fifty-two porticoes, five granaries, eight aqueducts or reservoirs of water, four spacious halls for the meeting of the senate or courts of justice, fourteen churches, fourteen palaces, and four thousand three hundred and eighty-eight houses, which for their size or beauty deserved to be distinguished from the multitude of plebeian habitations." gibbon's conception of history was that of a spacious panorama, in which a series of tableaux pass in succession before the reader's eye. he adverts but little, far too little, to that side of events which does not strike the visual sense. he rarely generalises or sums up a widely-scattered mass of facts into pregnant synthetic views. but possibly he owes some of the permanence of his fame to this very defect. as soon as ever a writer begins to support a thesis, to prove a point, he runs imminent danger of one-sidedness and partiality in his presentation of events. gibbon's faithful transcript of the past has neither the merit nor the drawback of generalisation, and he has come in consequence to be regarded as a common mine of authentic facts to which all speculators can resort. the first volume, which was received with such warm acclamation, is inferior to those that followed. he seems to have been partly aware of this himself, and speaks of the "concise and superficial narrative from commodus to alexander." but the whole volume lacks the grasp and easy mastery which distinguish its successors. no doubt the subject-matter was comparatively meagre and ungrateful. the century between commodus and diocletian was one long spasm of anarchy and violence, which was, as niebuhr said, incapable of historical treatment. the obscure confusion of the age is aggravated into almost complete darkness by the wretched materials which alone have survived, and the attempt to found a dignified narrative on such scanty and imperfect authorities was hardly wise. gibbon would have shown a greater sense of historic proportion if he had passed over this period with a few bold strokes, and summed up with brevity such general results as may be fairly deduced. we may say of the first volume that it was tentative in every way. in it the author not only sounded his public, but he was also trying his instrument, running over the keys in preparatory search for the right note. he strikes it full and clear in the two final chapters on the early church; these, whatever objections may be made against them on other grounds, are the real commencement of the decline and fall. from this point onwards he marches with the steady and measured tramp of a roman legion. his materials improve both in number and quality. the fourth century, though a period of frightful anarchy and disaster if compared to a settled epoch, is a period of relative peace and order when compared to the third century. the fifth was calamitous beyond example; but ecclesiastical history comes to the support of secular history in a way which might have excited more gratitude in gibbon than it did. from constantine to augustulus gibbon is able to put forth all his strength. his style is less superfine, as his matter becomes more copious; and the more definite cleavage of events brought about by the separation between the eastern and western empires, enables him to display the higher qualities which marked him as an historian. the merit of his work, it is again necessary to point out, will not be justly estimated unless the considerations suggested at the beginning of this chapter be kept in view. we have to remember that his culture was chiefly french, and that his opinions were those which prevailed in france in the latter half of the eighteenth century. he was the friend of voltaire, helvétius, and d'holbach; that is, of men who regarded the past as one long nightmare of crime, imposture, and folly, instigated by the selfish machinations of kings and priests. a strong infusion of the spirit which animated not only voltaire's _essay on manners_, but certain parts of hume's _history of england_ might have been expected as a matter of course. it is essentially absent. gibbon's private opinions may have been what they will, but he has approved his high title to the character of an historian by keeping them well in abeyance. when he turned his eyes to the past and viewed it with intense gaze, he was absorbed in the spectacle, his peculiar prejudices were hushed, he thought only of the object before him and of reproducing it as well as he could. this is not the common opinion, but, nevertheless, a great deal can be said to support it. it will be as well to take two concrete tests--his treatment of two topics which of all others were most likely to betray him into deviations from historic candour. if he stands these, he may be admitted to stand any less severe. let them be his account of julian, and his method of dealing with christianity. the snare that was spread by julian's apostasy for the philosophers of the last century, and their haste to fall into it, are well known. the spectacle of a philosopher on the throne who proclaimed toleration, and contempt for christianity, was too tempting and too useful controversially to allow of much circumspection in handling it. the odious comparisons it offered were so exactly what was wanted for depreciating the most christian king and his courtly church, that all further inquiry into the apostate's merits seemed useless. voltaire finds that julian had all the qualities of trajan without his defects; all the virtues of cato without his ill-humour; all that one admires in julius cæsar without his vices; he had the continency of scipio, and was in all ways equal to marcus aurelius, the first of men. nay, more. if he had only lived longer, he would have retarded the fall of the roman empire, if he could not arrest it entirely. we here see the length to which "polemical fury" could hurry a man of rare insight. julian had been a subject of contention for years between the hostile factions. while one party made it a point of honour to prove that he was a monster, warring consciously against the most high, the other was equally determined to prove that he was a paragon of all virtue, by reason of his enmity to the christian religion. the deep interest attaching to the pagan reaction in the fourth century, and the social and moral problems it suggests, were perceived by neither side, and it is not difficult to see why they were not. the very word reaction, in its modern sense, will hardly be found in the eighteenth century, and the thing that it expresses was very imperfectly conceived. we, who have been surrounded by reactions, real or supposed, in politics, in religion, in philosophy, recognise an old acquaintance in the efforts of the limited, intense julian to stem the tide of progress as represented in the christian church. it is a fine instance of the way in which the ever-unfolding present is constantly lighting up the past. julian and his party were the ultramontanes of their day in matters of religion, and the romantics in matters of literature. those radical innovators and reformers, the christians, were marching from conquest to conquest, over the old faith, making no concealment of their revolutionary aims and intentions to wipe out the past as speedily as possible. the conservatives of those times, after long despising the reformers, passed easily to fearing them and hating them as their success became threatening. "the attachment to paganism," says neander, "lingered especially in many of the ancient and noble families of greece and rome." old families, or new rich ones who wished to be thought old, would be sure to take up the cause of ancestral wisdom as against modern innovation. before julian came to the throne, a pagan reaction was imminent, as neander points out. julian himself was a remarkable man, as men of his class usually are. in the breaking up of old modes of belief, as mill has said, "the most strong-minded and discerning, next to those who head the movement, are generally those who bring up the rear." the energy of his mind and character was quite exceptional, and if we reflect that he only reigned sixteen months, and died in his thirty-second year, we must admit that the mark he has left in history is very surprising. he and his policy are now discussed with entire calm by inquirers of all schools, and sincere christians like neander and dean milman are as little disposed to attack him with acrimony, as those of a different way of thought are inclined to make him a subject of unlimited panegyric. through this difficult subject gibbon has found his way with a prudence and true insight which extorted admiration, even in his own day. his account of julian is essentially a modern account. the influence of his private opinions can hardly be traced in the brilliant chapters that he has devoted to the apostate. he sees through julian's weaknesses in a way in which voltaire never saw or cared to see. his pitiful superstition, his huge vanity, his weak affectation are brought out with an incisive clearness and subtle penetration into character which gibbon was not always so ready to display. at the same time he does full justice to julian's real merits. and this is perhaps the most striking evidence of his penetration. an error on the side of injustice to julian is very natural in a man who, having renounced allegiance to christianity, yet fully realises the futility of attempting to arrest it in the fourth century. a certain intellectual disdain for the reactionary emperor is difficult to avoid. gibbon surmounts it completely, and he does so, not in consequence of a general conception of the reactionary spirit, as a constantly emerging element in society, but by sheer historical insight, clear vision of the fact before him. it may be added that nowhere is gibbon's command of vivid narrative seen to greater advantage than in the chapters that he has devoted to julian. the daring march from gaul to illyricum is told with immense spirit; but the account of julian's final campaign and death in persia is still better, and can hardly be surpassed. it has every merit of clearness and rapidity, yet is full of dignity, which culminates in this fine passage referring to the night before the emperor received his mortal wound. "while julian struggled with the almost insuperable difficulties of his situation, the silent hours of the night were still devoted to study and contemplation. whenever he closed his eyes in short and interrupted slumbers, his mind was agitated by painful anxiety; nor can it be thought surprising that the genius of the empire should once more appear before him, covering with a funereal veil his head and his horn of abundance, and slowly retiring from the imperial tent. the monarch started from his couch, and, stepping forth to refresh his wearied spirits with the coolness of the midnight air, he beheld a fiery meteor, which shot athwart the sky and suddenly vanished. julian was convinced that he had seen the menacing countenance of the god of war: the council which he summoned, of tuscan haruspices, unanimously pronounced that he should abstain from action; but on this occasion necessity and reason were more prevalent than superstition, and the trumpets sounded at the break of day."[ ] footnotes: [footnote : it is interesting to compare gibbon's admirable picture with the harsh original latin of his authority, ammianus marcellinus. "ipse autem ad sollicitam suspensamque quietem paullisper protractus, cum somno (ut solebat) depulso, ad æmulationem cæsaris julii quædam sub pellibus scribens, obscuro noctis altitudine sensus cujusdam philosophi teneretur, vidit squalidius, ut confessus est proximis, speciem illam genii publici, quam quum ad augustum surgeret culmen, conspexit in galliis, velata cum capite cornucopia per aulæa tristius discedentem. et quamquam ad momentum hæsit, stupore defixus, omni tamen superior metu, ventura decretis cælestibus commendabat; relicto humi strato cubili, adulta jam excitus nocte, et numinibus per sacra depulsoria supplicans, flagrantissimam facem cadenti similem visam, aëris parte sulcata evanuisse existimavit: horroreque perfusus est, ne ita aperte minax martis adparuerit sidus."--_amm. marc._ lib. xxv. cap. .] it will not be so easy to absolve gibbon from the charge of prejudice in reference to his treatment of the early church. it cannot be denied that in the two famous chapters, at least, which concluded his first volume, he adopted a tone which must be pronounced offensive, not only from the christian point of view, but on the broad ground of historical equity. his preconceived opinions were too strong for him on this occasion, and obstructed his generally clear vision. yet a distinction must be made. the offensive tone in question is confined to these two chapters. we need not think that it was in consequence of the clamour they raised that he adopted a different style with reference to church matters in his subsequent volumes. a more creditable explanation of his different tone, which will be presently suggested, is at least as probable. in any case, these two chapters remain the chief slur on his historical impartiality, and it is worth while to examine what his offence amounts to. gibbon's account of the early christians is vitiated by his narrow and distorted conception of the emotional side of man's nature. having no spiritual aspirations himself, he could not appreciate or understand them in others. those emotions which have for their object the unseen world and its centre, god, had no meaning for him; and he was tempted to explain them away when he came across them, or to ascribe their origin and effects to other instincts which were more intelligible to him. the wonderland which the mystic inhabits was closed to him, he remained outside of it and reproduced in sarcastic travesty the reports he heard of its marvels. what he has called the secondary causes of the growth of christianity, were much rather its effects. the first is "the inflexible and intolerant zeal of the christians" and their abhorrence of idolatry. with great power of language, he paints the early christian "encompassed with infernal snares in every convivial entertainment, as often as his friends, invoking the hospitable deities, poured out libations to each other's happiness. when the bride, struggling with well-affected reluctance, was forced in hymenæal pomp over the threshold of her new habitation, or when the sad procession of the dead slowly moved towards the funeral pile, the christian on these interesting occasions was compelled to desert the persons who were dearest to him, rather than contract the guilt inherent in those impious ceremonies." it is strange that gibbon did not ask himself what was the cause of this inflexible zeal. the zeal produced the effects alleged, but what produced the zeal? he says that it was derived from the jewish religion, but neglects to point out what could have induced gentiles of every diversity of origin to derive from a despised race tenets and sentiments which would make their lives one long scene of self-denial and danger. the whole vein of remark is so completely out of date, that it is not worth dwelling on, except very summarily. the second cause is "the doctrine of a future life, improved by every additional circumstance which could give weight and efficacy to that important truth." again we have an effect treated as a cause. "the ancient christians were animated by a contempt for their present existence, and by a just confidence of immortality." very true; but the fact of their being so animated was what wanted explaining. gibbon says it "was no wonder that so advantageous an offer" as that of immortality was accepted. yet he had just before told us that the ablest orators at the bar and in the senate of rome, could expose this offer of immortality to ridicule without fear of giving offence. whence arose, then, the sudden blaze of conviction with which the christians embraced it? the third cause is the miraculous powers _ascribed_ to the primitive church. gibbon apparently had not the courage to admit that he agreed with his friend hume in rejecting miracles altogether. he conceals his drift in a cloud of words, suggesting indirectly with innuendo and sneer his real opinion. but this does not account for the stress he lays on the _ascription_ of miracles. he seems to think that the claim of supernatural gifts somehow had the same efficacy as the gifts themselves would have had, if they had existed. the fourth cause is the virtues of the primitive christians. the paragraphs upon it, dean milman considers the most uncandid in all the history, and they certainly do gibbon no credit. with a strange ignorance of the human heart, he attributes the austere morals of the early christians to their care for their reputation. the ascetic temper, one of the most widely manifested in history, was beyond his comprehension. the fifth cause was the union and discipline of the christian republic. for the last time the effect figures as the cause. union and discipline we know are powerful, but we know also that they are the result of deep antecedent forces, and that prudence and policy alone never produced them. it can surprise no one that gibbon has treated the early church in a way which is highly unsatisfactory if judged by a modern standard. not only is it a period which criticism has gone over again and again with a microscope, but the standpoint from which such periods are observed has materially changed since his day. that dim epoch of nascent faith, full of tender and subdued tints, with a high light on the brows of the crucified, was not one in which he could see clearly, or properly see at all. he has as little insight into the religious condition of the pagan world, as of the christian. it is singular how he passes over facts which were plain before him, which he knew quite well, as he knew nearly everything connected with his subject, but the real significance of which he missed. thus he attributes to the scepticism of the pagan world the easy introduction of christianity. misled by the "eloquence of cicero and the wit of lucian," he supposes the second century to have been vacant of beliefs, in which a "fashion of incredulity" was widely diffused, and "many were almost disengaged from artificial prejudices." he was evidently unaware of the striking religious revival which uplifted paganism in the age of hadrian, and grew with the sinking empire: the first stirrings of it may even be discerned in tacitus, and go on increasing till we reach the theurgy of the neoplatonists. a growing fear of the gods, a weariness of life and longing for death, a disposition to look for compensation for the miseries of this world to a brighter one beyond the grave--these traits are common in the literature of the second century, and show the change which had come over the minds of men. gibbon is colour-blind to these shades of the religious spirit: he can only see the banter of lucian.[ ] in reference to these matters he was a true son of his age, and could hardly be expected to transcend it. footnotes: [footnote : on the religious revival of the second century, see hausrath's _neutestamentliche zeitgeschichte_, vol. iii., especially the sections, "hadrian's mysticismus" and "religiöse tendenzen in kunst und literatur," where this interesting subject is handled with a freshness and insight quite remarkable.] he cannot be cleared of this reproach. on the other hand, we must remember that gibbon's hard and accurate criticism set a good example in one respect. the fertile fancy of the middle ages had run into wild exaggerations of the number of the primitive martyrs, and their legends had not always been submitted to impartial scrutiny even in the eighteenth century. we may admit that gibbon was not without bias of another kind, and that his tone is often very offensive when he seeks to depreciate the evidence of the sufferings of the early confessors. his computation, which will allow of "an annual consumption of a hundred and fifty martyrs," is nothing short of cynical. still he did good service in insisting on chapter and verse and fair historical proof of these frightful stories, before they were admitted. dean milman acknowledges so much, and defends him against the hot zeal of m. guizot, justly adding that "truth must not be sacrificed even to well-grounded moral indignation," in which sentiment all now will no doubt be willing to concur. the difference between the church in the catacombs, and the church in the palaces at constantinople or ravenna, measures the difference between gibbon's treatment of early christian history and his treatment of ecclesiastical history. just as the simple-hearted emotions of god-fearing men were a puzzle and an irritation to him, so he was completely at home in exposing the intrigues of courtly bishops and in the metaphysics of theological controversy. his mode of dealing with church matters from this point onward is hardly ever unfair, and has given rise to few protestations. he has not succeeded in pleasing everybody. what church historian ever does? but he is candid, impartial, and discerning. his account of the conversion of constantine is remarkably just, and he is more generous to the first christian emperor than niebuhr or neander. he plunges into the arian controversy with manifest delight, and has given in a few pages one of the clearest and most memorable _résumés_ of that great struggle. but it is when he comes to the hero of that struggle, to an historic character who can be seen with clearness, that he shows his wonted tact and insight. a great man hardly ever fails to awaken gibbon into admiration and sympathy. the "great athanasius," as he often calls him, caught his eye at once, and the impulse to draw a fine character, promptly silenced any prejudices which might interfere with faithful portraiture. "athanasius stands out more grandly in gibbon, than in the pages of the orthodox ecclesiastical historians"--dr. newman has said,--a judge whose competence will not be questioned. and as if to show how much insight depends on sympathy, gibbon is immediately more just and open to the merits of the christian community, than he had been hitherto. he now sees "that the privileges of the church had already revived a sense of order and freedom in the roman government." his chapter on the rise of monasticism is more fair and discriminating than the average protestant treatment of that subject. he distinctly acknowledges the debt we owe the monks for their attention to agriculture, the useful trades, and the preservation of ancient literature. the more disgusting forms of asceticism he touches with light irony, which is quite as effective as the vehement denunciations of non-catholic writers. it must not be forgotten that his ecclesiastical history derives a great superiority of clearness and proportion by its interweaving with the general history of the times, and this fact of itself suffices to give gibbon's picture a permanent value even beside the master works of german erudition which have been devoted exclusively to church matters. if we lay down gibbon and take up neander, for instance, we are conscious that with all the greater fulness of detail, engaging candour, and sympathetic insight of the great berlin professor, the general impression of the times is less distinct and lasting. there is no specialism in gibbon; his book is a broad sociological picture in which the whole age is portrayed. to sum up. in two memorable chapters gibbon has allowed his prejudices to mar his work as an historian. but two chapters out of seventy-one constitute a small proportion. in the remainder of his work he is as free from bias and unfairness as human frailty can well allow. the annotated editions of milman and guizot are guarantees of this. their critical animadversions become very few and far between after the first volume is passed. if he had been animated by a polemical object in writing; if he had used the past as an arsenal from which to draw weapons to attack the present, we may depend that a swift blight would have shrivelled his labours, as it did so many famous works of the eighteenth century, when the great day of reaction set in. his mild rebuke of the abbé raynal should not be forgotten. he admired the _history of the indies_. it is one of the few books that he has honoured with mention and praise in the text of his own work. but he points out that the "zeal of the philosophic historian for the rights of mankind" had led him into a blunder. it was not only gibbon's scholarly accuracy which saved him from such blunders. perhaps he had less zeal for the rights of mankind than men like raynal, whose general views he shared. but it is certain that he did not write with their settled _parti pris_ of making history a vehicle of controversy. his object was to be a faithful historian, and due regard being had to his limitations, he attained to it. if we now consider the defects of the _decline and fall_--which the progress of historic study, and still more the lapse of time, have gradually rendered visible, they will be found, as was to be expected, to consist in the author's limited conception of society, and of the multitudinous forces which mould and modify it. we are constantly reminded by the tone of remark that he sees chiefly the surface of events, and that the deeper causes which produce them have not been seen with the same clearness. in proportion as an age is remote, and therefore different from that in which a historian writes, does it behove him to remember that the social and general side of history is more important than the individual and particular. in reference to a period adjacent to our own the fortunes of individuals properly take a prominent place, the social conditions amid which they worked are familiar to us, and we understand them and their position without effort. but with regard to a remote age the case is different. here our difficulty is to understand the social conditions, so unlike those with which we are acquainted, and as society is greater than man, so we feel that society, and not individual men, should occupy the chief place in the picture. not that individuals are to be suppressed or neglected, but their subordination to the large historic background must be well maintained. the social, religious, and philosophic conditions amid which they played their parts should dominate the scene, and dwarf by their grandeur and importance the human actors who move across it. the higher historical style now demands what may be called compound narrative, that is narrative having reference to two sets of phenomena--one the obvious surface events, the other the larger and wider, but less obvious, sociological condition. a better example could hardly be given than grote's account of the mutilation of the hermæ. the fact of the mutilation is told in the briefest way in a few lines, but the social condition which overarched it, and made the disfiguring of a number of half-statues "one of the most extraordinary events in greek history," demands five pages of reflections and commentary to bring out its full significance. grote insists on the duty "to take reasonable pains to realise in our minds the religious and political associations of the athenians," and helps us to do it by a train of argument and illustration. the larger part of the strength of the modern historical school lies in this method, and in able hands it has produced great results. it would be unfair to compare gibbon to these writers. they had a training in social studies which he had not. but it is not certain that he has always acquitted himself well, even if compared to his contemporaries and predecessors, montesquieu, mably, and voltaire. in any case his narrative is generally wanting in historic perspective and suggestive background. it adheres closely to the obvious surface of events with little attempt to place behind them the deeper sky of social evolution. in many of his crowded chapters one cannot see the wood for the trees. the story is not lifted up and made lucid by general points of view, but drags or hurries along in the hollow of events, over which the author never seems to raise himself into a position of commanding survey. the thirty-sixth chapter is a marked instance of this defect. but the defect is general. the vigorous and skilful narrative, and a certain grandeur and weightiness of language, make us overlook it. it is only when we try to attain clear and succinct views, which condense into portable propositions the enormous mass of facts collected before us, that we feel that the writer has not often surveyed his subject from a height and distance sufficient to allow the great features of the epoch to be seen in bold outline. by the side of the history of concrete events, we miss the presentation of those others which are none the less events for being vague, irregular, and wide-reaching, and requiring centuries for their accomplishment. gibbon's manner of dealing with the first is always good, and sometimes consummate, and equal to anything in historical literature. the thirty-first chapter, with its description of rome, soon to fall a prey to the goths and alaric, is a masterpiece, artistic and spacious in the highest degree; though it is unnecessary to cite particular instances, as nearly every chapter contains passages of admirable historic power. but the noble flood of narrative never stops in meditative pause to review the situation, and point out with pregnant brevity what is happening in the sum total, abstraction made of all confusing details. besides the facts of the time, we seek to have the tendencies of the age brought before us in their flow and expansion, the filiation of events over long periods deduced in clear sequence, a synoptical view which is to the mind what a picture is to the eye. in this respect gibbon's method leaves not a little to be desired. take for instance two of the most important aspects of the subject that he treated: the barbarian invasions, and the causes of the decline and fall of the roman empire. to the concrete side of both he has done ample justice. the rational and abstract side of neither has received the attention from him which it deserved. on the interesting question of the introduction of the barbarians into the frontier provinces, and their incorporation into the legions, he never seems to have quite made up his mind. in the twelfth chapter he calls it a "great and beneficial plan." subsequently he calls it a disgraceful and fatal expedient. he recurs frequently to the subject in isolated passages, but never collects the facts, into a focus, with a view of deducing their real meaning. yet the point is second to none in importance. its elucidation throws more light on the fall of rome than any other considerations whatever. the question is, whether rome was conquered by the barbarians in the ordinary sense of the word, conquered. we know that it was not, and gibbon knew that it was not. yet perhaps most people rise from reading his book with an impression that the empire succumbed to the invasion of the barbarians, as carthage, gaul, and greece had succumbed to the invasion of the romans; that the struggle lay between classic rome and outside uncivilised foes; and that after two centuries of hard fighting the latter were victorious. the fact that the struggle lay between barbarians, who were within and friendly to the empire, and barbarians who were without it, and hostile rather to their more fortunate brethren, than to the empire which employed them, is implicitly involved in gibbon's narrative, but it is not explicitly brought out. romanised goths, vandals, and franks were the defenders, nearly the only defenders, of the empire against other tribes and nations who were not romanised, and nothing can be more plain than that gibbon saw this as well as any one since, but he has not set it forth with prominence and clearness. with his complete mastery of the subject he would have done it admirably, if he had assumed the necessary point of view. similarly, with regard to the causes of the fall of the empire. it is quite evident that he was not at all unconscious of the deep economic and social vices which undermined the great fabric. depopulation, decay of agriculture, fiscal oppression, the general prostration begotten of despotism--all these sources of the great collapse may be traced in his text, or his wonderful notes, hinted very often with a flashing insight which anticipates the most recent inquiries into the subject. but these considerations are not brought together to a luminous point, nor made to yield clear and tangible results. they lie scattered, isolated, and barren over three volumes, and are easily overlooked. one may say that generalised and synthetic views are conspicuous by their absence in gibbon. but what of that? these reflections, even if they be well founded, hardly dim the majesty of the _decline and fall_. the book is such a marvel of knowledge at once wide and minute, that even now, after numbers of labourers have gone over the same ground, with only special objects in view, small segments of the great circle which gibbon fills alone, his word is still one of the weightiest that can be quoted. modern research has unquestionably opened out points of view to which he did not attain. but when it comes to close investigation of any particular question, we rarely fail to find that he has seen it, dropped some pregnant hint about it, more valuable than the dissertations of other men. as mr. freeman says, "whatever else is read, gibbon must be read too." chapter viii. the last ten years of his life in lausanne. after the preliminary troubles which met him on his arrival at lausanne, gibbon had four years of unbroken calm and steady work, of which there is nothing to record beyond the fact that they were filled with peaceful industry. "one day," he wrote, "glides by another in tranquil uniformity." during the whole period he never stirred ten miles out of lausanne. he had nearly completed the fourth volume before he left england. then came an interruption of a year--consumed in the break-up of his london establishment, his journey, the transport of his library, the delay in getting settled at lausanne. then he sat down in grim earnest to finish his task, and certainly the speed he used, considering the quality of the work, left nothing to be desired. he achieved the fifth volume in twenty-one months, and the sixth in little more than a year. he had hoped to finish sooner, but it is no wonder that he found his work grow under his hands when he passed from design to execution. "a long while ago, when i contemplated the distant prospect of my work," he writes to lord sheffield, "i gave you and myself some hopes of landing in england last autumn; but alas! when autumn grew near, hills began to rise on hills, alps on alps, and i found my journey far more tedious and toilsome than i had imagined. when i look back on the length of the undertaking and the variety of materials, i cannot accuse or suffer myself to be accused of idleness; yet it appeared that unless i doubled my diligence, another year, and perhaps more, would elapse before i could embark with my complete manuscript. under these circumstances i took, and am still executing, a bold and meritorious resolution. the mornings in winter, and in a country of early dinners, are very concise. to them, my usual period of study, i now frequently add the evenings, renounce cards and society, refuse the most agreeable evenings, or perhaps make my appearance at a late supper. by this extraordinary industry, which i never practised before, and to which i hope never to be again reduced, i see the last part of my history growing apace under my hands." he was indeed, as he said, now straining for the goal which was at last reached "on the day, or rather the night, of the th of june, . between the hours of eleven and twelve i wrote the last lines of the last page in a summer-house in my garden. after laying down my pen, i took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountains. the air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. i will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and perhaps the establishment of my fame. but my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind by the idea that i had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that whatsoever might be the future fate of my history, the life of the historian must be short and precarious." a faint streak of poetry occasionally shoots across gibbon's prose. but both prose and poetry had now to yield to stern business. the printing of three quarto volumes in those days of handpresses was a formidable undertaking, and unless expedition were used the publishing season of the ensuing year would be lost. a month had barely elapsed before gibbon with his precious cargo started for england. he went straight to his printers. the printing of the fourth volume occupied three months, and both author and publisher were warned that their common interest required a quicker pace. then mr. strahan "fulfilled his engagement, which few printers could sustain, of delivering every week three thousand copies of nine sheets." on the th of may, , the three concluding volumes were published, and gibbon had discharged his debt for the entertainment that he had had in this world. he returned as speedily as he could to lausanne, to rest from his labours. but he had a painful greeting in the sadly altered look of his friend deyverdun. soon an apoplectic seizure confirmed his forebodings, and within a twelvemonth the friend of his youth, whom he had loved for thirty-three years, was taken away by death (july , ).[ ] footnotes: [footnote : the letter in which gibbon communicated the sad news to lord sheffield was written on the th july, , the day of the taking of the bastille. so "that evening sun of july" sent its beams on gibbon mourning the dead friend, as well as on "reapers amid peaceful woods and fields, on old women spinning in cottages, on ships far out on the silent main, on balls at the orangerie of versailles, where high-rouged dames of the palace are even now dancing with double-jacketed hussar officers."] gibbon never got over this loss. his staid and solid nature was not given to transports of joy or grief. but his constant references to "poor deyverdun," and the vacancy caused by his loss, show the depth of the wound. "i want to change the scene," he writes, "and, beautiful as the garden and prospect must appear to every eye, i feel that the state of my mind casts a gloom over them: every spot, every walk, every bench recalls the memory of those hours, those conversations, which will return no more.... i almost hesitate whether i shall run over to england to consult with you on the spot, and to fly from poor deyverdun's shade, which meets me at every turn." not that he lacked attached friends, and of mere society and acquaintance he had more than abundance. he occupied at lausanne a position of almost patriarchal dignity, "and may be said," writes lord sheffield, "to have almost given the law to a set of as willing subjects as any man ever presided over." soon the troubles in france sent wave after wave of emigrants over the frontiers, and lausanne had its full share of the exiles. after a brief approval of the reforms in france he passed rapidly to doubt, disgust, and horror at the "new birth of time" there. "you will allow me to be a tolerable historian," he wrote to his step-mother, "yet on a fair review of ancient and modern times i can find none that bear any affinity to the present." the last social evolution was beyond his power of classification. the mingled bewilderment and anger with which he looks out from lausanne on the revolutionary welter, form an almost amusing contrast to his usual apathy on political matters. he is full of alarm lest england should catch the revolutionary fever. he is delighted with burke's _reflections_. "i admire his eloquence, i approve his politics, i adore his chivalry, and i can forgive even his superstition." his wrath waxes hotter at every post. "poor france! the state is dissolved! the nation is mad." at last nothing but vituperation can express his feelings, and he roundly calls the members of the convention "devils," and discovers that "democratical principles lead by a path of flowers into the abyss of hell." in his friends the neckers had fled to switzerland, and on every ground of duty and inclination he was called upon to show them the warmest welcome, and he did so in a way that excited their liveliest gratitude. necker was cast down in utter despair, not only for the loss of place and power, but on account of the strong animosity which was shown to him by the exiled french, none of whom would set their foot in his house. the neckers were now gibbon's chief intimates till the end of his sojourn in switzerland. they lived at coppet, and constant visits were exchanged there and at lausanne. madame necker wrote to him frequent letters, which prove that if she had ever had any grievance to complain of in the past, it was not only forgiven, but entirely forgotten. the letters, indeed, testify a warmth of sentiment on her part which, coming from a lady of less spotless propriety, would almost imply a revival of youthful affection for her early lover. "you have always been dear to me," she writes, "but the friendship you have shown to m. necker adds to that which you inspire me with on so many grounds, and i love you at present with a double affection."--"come to us when you are restored to health and to yourself; that moment should always belong to your first and your last friend (_amie_), and i do not know which of those titles is the sweetest and dearest to my heart."--"near you, the recollections you recalled were pleasant to me, and you connected them easily with present impressions; the chain of years seemed to link all times together with electrical rapidity; you were at once twenty and fifty years old for me. away from you the different places, which i have inhabited are only the milestones of my life telling me of the distance i have come." with much more in the same strain. of madame de staël gibbon does not speak in very warm praise. her mother, who was far from being contented with her, may perhaps have prejudiced him against her. in one letter to him she complains of her daughter's conduct in no measured terms. yet gibbon owns that madame de staël was a "pleasant little woman;" and in another place says that she was "wild, vain, but good-natured, with a much larger provision of wit than of beauty." one wonders if he ever knew of her childish scheme of marrying him in order that her parents might always have the pleasure of his company and conversation. these closing years of gibbon's life were not happy, through no fault of his. no man was less inclined by disposition to look at the dark side of things. but heavy blows fell on him in quick succession. his health was seriously impaired, and he was often laid up for months with the gout. his neglect of exercise had produced its effect, and he had become a prodigy of unwieldy corpulency. unfortunately his digestion seems to have continued only too good, and neither his own observation nor the medical science of that day sufficed to warn him against certain errors of regimen which were really fatal. all this time, while the gout was constantly torturing him, he drank madeira freely. there is frequent question of a pipe of that sweet wine in his correspondence with lord sheffield. he cannot bear the thought of being without a sufficient supply, as "good madeira is now become essential to his health and reputation." the last three years of his residence at lausanne were agitated by perpetual anxiety and dread of an invasion of french democratic principles, or even of french troops. reluctance to quit "his paradise" keeps him still, but he is always wondering how soon he will have to fly, and often regrets that he has not done so already. "for my part," he writes, "till geneva falls, i do not think of a retreat; but at all events i am provided with two strong horses and a hundred louis in gold." fate was hard on the kindly epicurean, who after his long toil had made his bed in the sun, on which he was preparing to lie down in genial content till the end came. but he feels he must not think of rest; and that, heavy as he is, and irksome to him as it is to move, he must before long be a rover again. still he is never peevish upon his fortune; he puts the best face on things as long as they will bear it. he was not so philosophical under the bereavements that he now suffered. his aunt, mrs. porten, had died in . he deplored her as he was bound to do, and feelingly regrets and blames himself for not having written to her as often as he might have done since their last parting. then came the irreparable loss of deyverdun. shortly, an old lausanne friend, m. de severy, to whom he was much attached, died after a long illness. lastly and suddenly, came the death of lady sheffield, the wife of his friend holroyd, with whom he had long lived on such intimate terms that he was in the habit of calling her his sister. the sheffields, father and mother and two daughters, had spent the summer of with him at lausanne. the visit was evidently an occasion of real happiness and _épanchement de coeur_ to the two old friends, and supplied gibbon for nearly two years with tender regrets and recollections. then, without any warning, he heard of lady sheffield's death. in a moment his mind was made up: he would go at once to console his friend. all the fatigue and irksomeness of the journey to one so ailing and feeble, all the dangers of the road lined and perhaps barred by hostile armies, vanished on the spot. within twelve days he had made his preparations and started on his journey. he was forced to travel through germany, and in his ignorance of the language he required an interpreter; young de severy, the son of his deceased friend, joyfully, and out of mere affection for him, undertook the office of courier. "his attachment to me," wrote gibbon, "is the sole motive which prompts him to undertake this troublesome journey." it is clear that he had the art of making himself loved. he travelled through frankfort, cologne, brussels, ostend, and was by his friend's side in little more than a month after he had received the fatal tidings. well might lord sheffield say, "i must ever regard it as the most enduring proof of his sensibility, and of his possessing the true spirit of friendship, that, after having relinquished the thought of his intended visit, he hastened to england, in spite of increasing impediments, to soothe me by the most generous sympathy, and to alleviate my domestic affliction; neither his great corpulency nor his extraordinary bodily infirmities, nor any other consideration, could prevent him a moment from resolving on an undertaking that might have deterred the most active young man. he almost immediately, with an alertness by no means natural to him, undertook a great circuitous journey along the frontier of an enemy worse than savage, within the sound of their cannon, within the range of the light troops of the different armies, and through roads ruined by the enormous machinery of war." in this public and private gloom he bade for ever farewell to lausanne. he was himself rapidly approaching "the dark portal, goal of all mortal," but of this he knew not as yet. while he is in the house of mourning, beside his bereaved friend, we will return for a short space to consider the conclusion of his great work. chapter ix. the last three volumes of the decline and fall. the thousand years between the fifth and the fifteenth century comprise the middle age, a period which only recently, through utterly inadequate conceptions of social growth, was wont to be called the dark ages. that long epoch of travail and growth, during which the old field of civilisation was broken up and sown afresh with new and various seed unknown to antiquity, receives now on all hands due recognition, as being one of the most rich, fertile, and interesting in the history of man. the all-embracing despotism of rome was replaced by the endless local divisions and subdivisions of feudal tenure. the multiform rites and beliefs of polytheism were replaced by the single faith and paramount authority of the catholic church. the philosophies of greece were dethroned, and the scholastic theology reigned in their stead. the classic tongues crumbled away, and out of their _débris_ arose the modern idioms of france, italy, and spain, to which were added in northern europe the new forms of teutonic speech. the fine and useful arts took a new departure; slavery was mitigated into serfdom; industry and commerce became powers in the world as they had never been before; the narrow municipal polity of the old world was in time succeeded by the broader national institutions based on various forms of representation. gunpowder, america, and the art of printing were discovered, and the most civilised portion of mankind passed insensibly into the modern era. such was the wide expanse which spread out before gibbon when he resolved to continue his work from the fall of the western empire to the capture of constantinople. indeed his glance took in a still wider field, as he was concerned as much with the decay of eastern as of western rome, and the long-retarded fall of the former demanded large attention to the oriental populations who assaulted the city and remaining empire of constantine. so bold an historic enterprise was never conceived as when, standing on the limit of antiquity in the fifth century, he determined to pursue in rapid but not hasty survey the great lines of events for a thousand years, to follow in detail the really great transactions while discarding the less important, thereby giving prominence and clearness to what is memorable, and reproducing on a small scale the flow of time through the ages. it is to this portion of gibbon's work that the happy comparison has been made, that it resembles a magnificent roman aqueduct spanning over the chasm which separates the ancient from the modern world. in these latter volumes he frees himself from the trammels of regular annalistic narrative, deals with events in broad masses according to their importance, expanding or contracting his story as occasion requires; now painting in large panoramic view the events of a few years, now compressing centuries into brief outline. many of his massive chapters afford materials for volumes, and are well worthy of a fuller treatment than he could give without deranging his plan. but works of greater detail and narrower compass can never compete with gibbon's history, any more than a county map can compete with a map of england or of europe. the variety of the contents of these last three volumes is amazing, especially when the thoroughness and perfection of the workmanship are considered. prolix compilations or sketchy outlines of universal history have their use and place, but they are removed by many degrees from the _decline and fall_, or rather they belong to another species of authorship. it is not only that gibbon combines width and depth, that the extent of his learning is as wonderful as its accuracy, though in this respect he has hardly a full rival in literature. the quality which places him not only in the first rank of historians, but in a class by himself, and makes him greater than the greatest, lies in his supreme power of moulding into lucid and coherent unity, the manifold and rebellious mass of his multitudinous materials, of coercing his divergent topics into such order that they seem spontaneously to grow like branches out of one stem, clear and visible to the mind. there is something truly epic in these latter volumes. tribes, nations, and empires are the characters; one after another they come forth like homeric heroes, and do their mighty deeds before the assembled armies. the grand and lofty chapters on justinian; on the arabs; on the crusades, have a rounded completeness, coupled with such artistic subordination to the main action, that they read more like cantos of a great prose poem than the ordinary staple of historical composition. it may well be questioned whether there is another instance of such high literary form and finish, coupled with such vast erudition. and two considerations have to be borne in mind, which heighten gibbon's merit in this respect. ( .) almost the whole of his subject had been as yet untouched by any preceding writer of eminence, and he had no stimulus or example from his precursors. he united thus in himself the two characters of pioneer and artist. ( .) the barbarous and imperfect nature of the materials with which he chiefly had to work,--dull inferior writers, whose debased style was their least defect. a historian who has for his authorities masters of reason and language such as herodotus, thucydides, livy, and tacitus is borne up by their genius; apt quotation and translation alone suffice to produce considerable effects; or in the case of subjects taken from modern times, weighty state papers, eloquent debates, or finished memoirs supply ample materials for graphic narrative. but gibbon had little but dross to deal with. yet he has smelted and cast it into the grand shapes we see. the fourth volume is nearly confined to the reign, or rather epoch, of justinian,--a magnificent subject, which he has painted in his loftiest style of gorgeous narrative. the campaigns of belisarius and narses are related with a clearness and vigour that make us feel that gibbon's merits as a military historian have not been quite sufficiently recognised. he had from the time of his service in the militia taken continued interest in tactics and all that was connected with the military art. it was no idle boast when he said that the captain of the hampshire grenadiers had not been useless to the historian of the roman empire. military matters perhaps occupy a somewhat excessive space in his pages. still, if the operations of war are to be related, it is highly important that they should be treated with intelligence, and knowledge how masses of men are moved, and by a writer to whom the various incidents of the camp, the march, and the bivouac, are not matters of mere hearsay, but of personal experience. the campaign of belisarius in africa may be quoted as an example. "in the seventh year of the reign of justinian, and about the time of the summer solstice, the whole fleet of six hundred ships was ranged in martial pomp before the gardens of the palace. the patriarch pronounced his benediction, the emperor signified his last commands, the general's trumpet gave the signal of departure, and every heart, according to its fears or wishes, explored with anxious curiosity the omens of misfortune or success. the first halt was made at perintheus, or heraclea, where belisarius waited five days to receive some thracian horses, a military gift of his sovereign. from thence the fleet pursued their course through the midst of the propontis; but as they struggled to pass the straits of the hellespont, an unfavourable wind detained them four days at abydos, where the general exhibited a remarkable lesson of firmness and severity. two of the huns who, in a drunken quarrel, had slain one of their fellow-soldiers, were instantly shown to the army suspended on a lofty gibbet. the national dignity was resented by their countrymen, who disclaimed the servile laws of the empire and asserted the free privileges of scythia, where a small fine was allowed to expiate the sallies of intemperance and anger. their complaints were specious, their clamours were loud, and the romans were not averse to the example of disorder and impunity. but the rising sedition was appeased by the authority and eloquence of the general, and he represented to the assembled troops the obligation of justice, the importance of discipline, the rewards of piety and virtue, and the unpardonable guilt of murder, which, in his apprehension, was aggravated rather than excused by the vice of intoxication. in the navigation from the hellespont to the peloponnesus, which the greeks after the siege of troy had performed in four days, the fleet of belisarius was guided in their course by his master-galley, conspicuous in the day by the redness of the sails, and in the night by torches blazing from the masthead. it was the duty of the pilots as they steered between the islands and turned the capes of malea and tænarium to preserve the just order and regular intervals of such a multitude. as the wind was fair and moderate, their labours were not unsuccessful, and the troops were safely disembarked at methone, on the messenian coast, to repose themselves for a while after the fatigues of the sea.... from the port of methone the pilots steered along the western coast of peloponnesus, as far as the island of zacynthus, or zante, before they undertook the voyage (in their eyes a most arduous voyage) of one hundred leagues over the ionian sea. as the fleet was surprised by a calm, sixteen days were consumed in the slow navigation.... at length the harbour of caucana, on the southern side of sicily, afforded a secure and hospitable shelter.... belisarius determined to hasten his operations, and his wise impatience was seconded by the winds. the fleet lost sight of sicily, passed before the island of malta, discovered the capes of africa, ran along the coast with a strong gale from the north-east, and finally cast anchor at the promontory of caput vada, about five days journey to the south of carthage.... "three months after their departure from constantinople, the men and the horses, the arms and the military stores were safely disembarked, and five soldiers were left as a guard on each of the ships, which were disposed in the form of a semicircle. the remainder of the troops occupied a camp on the seashore, which they fortified, according to ancient discipline, with a ditch and rampart, and the discovery of a source of fresh water, while it allayed the thirst, excited the superstitious confidence of the romans.... the small town of sullecte, one day's journey from the camp, had the honour of being foremost to open her gates and resume her ancient allegiance; the larger cities of leptis and adrumetum imitated the example of loyalty as soon as belisarius appeared, and he advanced without opposition as far as grasse, a palace of the vandal kings, at the distance of fifty miles from carthage. the weary romans indulged themselves in the refreshment of shady groves, cool fountains, and delicious fruits.... in three generations prosperity and a warm climate had dissolved the hardy virtue of the vandals, who insensibly became the most luxurious of mankind. in their villas and gardens, which might deserve the persian name of paradise, they enjoyed a cool and elegant repose, and after the daily use of the bath, the barbarians were seated at a table profusely spread with the delicacies of the land and sea. their silken robes, loosely flowing after the fashion of the medes, were embroidered with gold, love and hunting were the labours of their life, and their vacant hours were amused by pantomimes, chariot-races, and the music and dances of the theatre. "in a march of twelve days the vigilance of belisarius was constantly awake and active against his unseen enemies, by whom in every place and at every hour he might be suddenly attacked. an officer of confidence and merit, john the armenian, led the vanguard of three hundred horse. six hundred massagetæ covered at a certain distance the left flank, and the whole fleet, steering along the coast, seldom lost sight of the army, which moved each day about twelve miles, and lodged in the evening in strong camps or in friendly towns. the near approach of the romans to carthage filled the mind of gelimer with anxiety and terror.... "yet the authority and promises of gelimer collected a formidable army, and his plans were concerted with some degree of military skill. an order was despatched to his brother ammatas to collect all the forces of carthage, and to encounter the van of the roman army at the distance of ten miles from the city: his nephew gibamund with two thousand horse was destined to attack their left, when the monarch himself, who silently followed, should charge their rear in a situation which excluded them from the aid and even the view of their fleet. but the rashness of ammatas was fatal to himself and his country. he anticipated the hour of attack, outstripped his tardy followers, and was pierced with a mortal wound, after he had slain with his own hand twelve of his boldest antagonists. his vandals fled to carthage: the highway, almost ten miles, was strewed with dead bodies, and it seemed incredible that such multitudes could be slaughtered by the swords of three hundred romans. the nephew of gelimer was defeated after a slight combat by the six hundred massagetæ; they did not equal the third part of his numbers, but each scythian was fired by the example of his chief, who gloriously exercised the privilege of his family by riding foremost and alone to shoot the first arrow against the enemy. in the meantime gelimer himself, ignorant of the event, and misguided by the windings of the hills, inadvertently passed the roman army and reached the scene of action where ammatas had fallen. he wept the fate of his brother and of carthage, charged with irresistible fury the advancing squadrons, and might have pursued and perhaps decided the victory, if he had not wasted those inestimable moments in the discharge of a vain though pious duty to the dead. while his spirit was broken by this mournful office, he heard the trumpet of belisarius, who, leaving antonina and his infantry in the camp, pressed forward with his guards and the remainder of the cavalry to rally his flying troops, and to restore the fortune of the day. much room could not be found in this disorderly battle for the talents of a general; but the king fled before the hero, and the vandals, accustomed only to a moorish enemy, were incapable of withstanding the arms and the discipline of the romans.... "as soon as the tumult had subsided, the several parts of the army informed each other of the accidents of the day, and belisarius pitched his camp on the field of victory, to which the tenth milestone from carthage had applied the latin appellation of _decimus_. from a wise suspicion of the stratagems and resources of the vandals, he marched the next day in the order of battle; halted in the evening before the gates of carthage, and allowed a night of repose, that he might not, in darkness and disorder, expose the city to the licence of the soldiers, or the soldiers themselves to the secret ambush of the city. but as the fears of belisarius were the result of calm and intrepid reason, he was soon satisfied that he might confide without danger in the peaceful and friendly aspect of the capital. carthage blazed with innumerable torches, the signal of the public joy; the chain was removed that guarded the entrance of the port, the gates were thrown open, and the people with acclamations of gratitude hailed and invited their roman deliverers. the defeat of the vandals and the freedom of africa were announced to the city on the eve of st. cyprian, when the churches were already adorned and illuminated for the festival of the martyr whom three centuries of superstition had almost raised to a local deity.... one awful hour reversed the fortunes of the contending parties. the suppliant vandals, who had so lately indulged the vices of conquerors, sought an humble refuge in the sanctuary of the church; while the merchants of the east were delivered from the deepest dungeon of the palace by their affrighted keeper, who implored the protection of his captives, and showed them through an aperture in the wall the sails of the roman fleet. after their separation from the army, the naval commanders had proceeded with slow caution along the coast, till they reached the hermæan promontory, and obtained the first intelligence of the victory of belisarius. faithful to his instructions, they would have cast anchor about twenty miles from carthage, if the more skilful had not represented the perils of the shore and the signs of an impending tempest. still ignorant of the revolution, they declined however the rash attempt of forcing the chain of the port, and the adjacent harbour and suburb of mandracium were insulted only by the rapine of a private officer, who disobeyed and deserted his leaders. but the imperial fleet, advancing with a fair wind, steered through the narrow entrance of the goletta and occupied the deep and capacious lake of tunis, a secure station about five miles from the capital. no sooner was belisarius informed of the arrival than he despatched orders that the greatest part of the mariners should be immediately landed to join the triumph and to swell the apparent numbers of the romans. before he allowed them to enter the gates of carthage he exhorted them, in a discourse worthy of himself and the occasion, not to disgrace the glory of their arms, and to remember that the vandals had been the tyrants, but that _they_ were the deliverers of the africans, who must now be respected as the voluntary and affectionate subjects of their common sovereign. the romans marched through the street in close ranks, prepared for battle if an enemy had appeared; the strict order maintained by their general imprinted on their minds the duty of obedience; and in an age in which custom and impunity almost sanctified the abuse of conquest, the genius of one man repressed the passions of a victorious army. the voice of menace and complaint was silent, the trade of carthage was not interrupted; while africa changed her master and her government, the shops continued open and busy; and the soldiers, after sufficient guards had been posted, modestly departed to the houses which had been allotted for their reception. belisarius fixed his residence in the palace, seated himself on the throne of genseric, accepted and distributed the barbaric spoil, granted their lives to the suppliant vandals, and laboured to restore the damage which the suburb of mandracium had sustained in the preceding night. at supper he entertained his principal officers with the form and magnificence of a royal banquet. the victor was respectfully served by the captive officers of the household, and in the moments of festivity, when the impartial spectators applauded the fortune and merit of belisarius, his envious flatterers secretly shed their venom on every word and gesture which might alarm the suspicions of a jealous monarch. one day was given to these pompous scenes, which may not be despised as useless if they attracted the popular veneration; but the active mind of belisarius, which in the pride of victory could suppose defeat, had already resolved that the roman empire in africa should not depend on the chance of arms or the favour of the people. the fortifications of carthage had alone been excepted from the general proscription; but in the reign of ninety-five years they were suffered to decay by the thoughtless and indolent vandals. a wiser conqueror restored with incredible despatch the walls and ditches of the city. his liberality encouraged the workmen; the soldiers, the mariners, and the citizens vied with each other in the salutary labour; and gelimer, who had feared to trust his person in an open town, beheld with astonishment and despair the rising strength of an impregnable fortress." but we have hardly finished admiring the brilliant picture of the conquest of africa and italy, before gibbon gives us further proofs of his many-sided culture and catholicity of mind. his famous chapter on the roman law has been accepted by the most fastidious experts of an esoteric science as a masterpiece of knowledge, condensation, and lucidity. it has actually been received as a textbook in some of the continental universities, published separately with notes and illustrations. when we consider the neglect of roman jurisprudence in england till quite recent times, and its severe study on the continent, we shall better appreciate the mental grasp and vigour which enabled an unprofessional englishman in the last century to produce such a dissertation. a little further on (chapter forty-seven) the history of the doctrine of the incarnation, and the controversies that sprang up around it, are discussed with a subtlety worthy of a scientific theologian. it is perhaps the first attempt towards a philosophical history of dogma, less patient and minute than the works of the specialists of modern germany on the same subject, but for spirit, clearness, and breadth it is superior to those profound but somewhat barbarous writers. the flexibility of intellect which can do justice in quick succession to such diverse subjects is very extraordinary, and assuredly implies great width of sympathy and large receptivity of nature. having terminated the period of justinian, gibbon makes a halt, and surveys the varied and immense scene through which he will presently pass in many directions. he rapidly discovers _ten_ main lines, along which he will advance in succession to his final goal, the conquest of constantinople. the two pages at the commencement of the forty-eighth chapter, in which he sketches out the remainder of his plan and indicates the topics which he means to treat, are admirable as a luminous _précis_, and for the powerful grasp which they show of his immense subject. it lay spread out all before him, visible in every part to his penetrating eye, and he seems to rejoice in his conscious strength and ability to undertake the historical conquest on which he is about to set out. "nor will this scope of narrative," he says, "the riches and variety of these materials, be incompatible with the unity of design and composition. as in his daily prayers the mussulman of fez or delhi still turns his face towards the temple of mecca, the historian's eye will always be fixed on the city of constantinople." then follows the catalogue of nations and empires whose fortunes he means to sing. a grander vision, a more majestic procession, never swept before the mind's eye of poet or historian. and the practical execution is worthy of the initial inspiration. after a rapid and condensed narrative of byzantine history till the end of the twelfth century, he takes up the brilliant theme of mahomet and his successors. a few pages on the climate and physical features of arabia fittingly introduce the subject. and it may be noted in passing that gibbon's attention to geography, and his skill and taste for geographical description, are remarkable among his many gifts. he was as diligent a student of maps and travels as of historical records, and seems to have had a rare faculty of realising in imagination scenes and countries of which he had only read. in three chapters, glowing with oriental colour and rapid as a charge of arab horse, he tells the story of the prophet and the saracen empire. then the bulgarians, hungarians, and russians appear on the scene, to be soon followed by the normans, and their short but brilliant dominion in southern italy. but now the seljukian turks are emerging from the depths of asia, taking the place of the degenerate saracens, invading the eastern empire and conquering jerusalem. the two waves of hostile fanaticism soon meet in the crusades. the piratical seizure of constantinople by the latins brings in view the french and venetians, the family of courtenay and its pleasant digression. then comes the slow agony of the restored greek empire. threatened by the moguls, it is invaded and dismembered by the ottoman turks. constantinople seems ready to fall into their hands. but the timely diversion of tamerlane produces a respite of half a century. nothing can be more artistic than gibbon's management of his subject as he approaches its termination. he, who is such a master of swift narrative, at this point introduces artful pauses, _suspensions_ of the final catastrophe, which heighten our interest in the fate which is hanging over the city of constantine. in the victorious turks have conquered all the greek empire save the capital. amurath ii. besieged it for two months, and was only prevented from taking it by a domestic revolt in asia minor. at the end of his sixty-fifth chapter gibbon leaves constantinople hanging on the brink of destruction, and paints in glowing colours the military virtues of its deadly enemies, the ottomans. then he interposes one of his most finished chapters, of miscellaneous contents, but terminating in the grand and impressive pages on the revival of learning in italy. there we read of the "curiosity and emulation of the latins," of the zeal of petrarch and the success of boccace in greek studies, of leontius, pilatus, bessarion, and lascaris. a glow of sober enthusiasm warms the great scholar as he paints the early light of that happy dawn. he admits that the "arms of the turks pressed the flight of the muses" from greece to italy. but he "trembles at the thought that greece might have been overwhelmed with her schools and libraries, before europe had emerged from the deluge of barbarism, and that the seeds of science might have been scattered on the winds, before the italian soil was prepared for their cultivation." in one of the most perfect sentences to be found in english prose he thus describes the greek tongue: "in their lowest depths of servitude and depression, the subjects of the byzantine throne were still possessed of a golden key that could unlock the treasures of antiquity, of a musical and prolific language that gives a soul to the objects of sense and a body to the abstractions of philosophy." meanwhile we are made to feel that the subjects of the byzantine throne, with their musical speech, that constantinople with her libraries and schools, will all soon fall a prey to the ravening and barbarous turk. this brightening light of the western sky contending with the baleful gloom which is settling down over the east, is one of the most happy contrasts in historical literature. then comes the end, the preparations and skill of the savage invader, the futile but heroic defence, the overwhelming ruin which struck down the cross and erected the crescent over the city of constantine the great. it is one of the many proofs of gibbon's artistic instinct that he did not end with this great catastrophe. on the contrary, he adds three more chapters. his fine tact warned him that the tumult and thunder of the final ruin must not be the last sounds to strike the ear. a resolution of the discord was needed; a soft chorale should follow the din and lead to a mellow _adagio_ close. and this he does with supreme skill. with ill-suppressed disgust, he turns from new to old home. "constantinople no longer appertains to the roman historian--nor shall i enumerate the civil and religious edifices that were profaned or erected by its turkish masters." amid the decayed temples and mutilated beauty of the eternal city, he moves down to a melodious and pathetic conclusion--piously visits the remaining fragments of ancient splendour and art, deplores and describes the ravages wrought by time, and still more by man, and recurring once again to the scene of his first inspiration, bids farewell to the roman empire among the ruins of the capitol. we have hitherto spoken in terms of warm, though perhaps not excessive eulogy of this great work. but praise would lack the force of moderation and equipoise, if allusion were not made to some of its defects. the pervading defect of it all has been already referred to in a preceding chapter--an inadequate conception of society as an organism, living and growing, like other organisms, according to special laws of its own. in these brilliant volumes on the middle ages, the special problems which that period suggests are not stated, far less solved; they are not even suspected. the feudal polity, the catholic church, the theocratic supremacy of the popes, considered as institutions which the historian is called upon to estimate and judge; the gradual dissolution of both feudalism and catholicism, brought about by the spread of industry in the temporal order and of science in the spiritual order, are not even referred to. many more topics might be added to this list of weighty omissions. it would be needless to say that no blame attaches to gibbon for neglecting views of history which had not emerged in his time, if there were not persons who, forgetting the slow progress of knowledge, are apt to ascribe the defects of a book to incompetence in its author. if gibbon's conception of the middle ages seems to us inadequate now, it is because since his time our conceptions of society in that and in all periods have been much enlarged. we may be quite certain that if gibbon had had our experience, no one would have seen the imperfections of particular sides of his work as we now have it more clearly than he. laying aside, therefore, reflexions of this kind as irrelevant and unjust, we may ask whether there are any other faults which may fairly be found with him. one must admit that there are. after all, they are not very important. ( .) striking as is his account of justinian's reign, it has two blemishes. first, the offensive details about the vices of theodora. granting them to be well authenticated, which they are not, it was quite unworthy of the author and his subject to soil his pages with such a _chronique scandaleuse_. the defence which he sets up in his memoirs, that he is "justified in painting the manners of the times, and that the vices of theodora form an essential feature in the reign and character of justinian," cannot be admitted. first, we are not sure that the vices existed, and were not the impure inventions of a malignant calumniator. secondly, gibbon is far from painting the manners of the time as a moralist or an historian; he paints them with a zest for pruriency worthy of bayle or brantome. it was an occasion for a wise scepticism to register grave doubts as to the infamous stories of procopius. a rehabilitation of theodora is not a theme calculated to provoke enthusiasm, and is impossible besides from the entire want of adequate evidence. but a thoughtful writer would not have lost his time, if he referred to the subject at all, in pointing out the moral improbability of the current accounts. he might have dwelt on the _unsupported_ testimony of the only witness, the unscrupulous procopius, whom gibbon himself convicts on another subject of flagrant mendacity. but he would have been especially slow to believe that a woman who had led the life of incredible profligacy he has described, would, in consequence of "some vision either of sleep or fancy," in which future exaltation was promised to her, assume "like a skilful actress, a more decent character, relieve her poverty by the laudable industry of spinning wool, and affect a life of chastity and solitude in a small house, which she afterwards changed into a magnificent temple." magdalens have been converted, no doubt, from immoral living, but not by considerations of astute prudence suggested by day-dreams of imperial greatness. gibbon might have thought of the case of madame de maintenon, and how her reputation fared in the hands of the vindictive courtiers of versailles; how a woman, cold as ice and pure as snow, was freely charged with the most abhorrent vices without an atom of foundation. but the truth probably is that he never thought of the subject seriously at all, and that, yielding to a regrettable inclination, he copied his licentious greek notes with little reluctance. ( .) the character of belisarius, enigmatical enough in itself, is made by him more enigmatical still. he concludes the forty-first chapter, in which the great deeds of the conqueror of italy and africa, and the ingratitude with which justinian rewarded his services, are set forth in strong contrast, with the inept remark that "belisarius appears to be either below or above the character of a man." the grounds of the apparent meekness with which belisarius supported his repeated disgraces cannot now be ascertained: but the motives of justinian's conduct are not so difficult to find. as finlay points out in his thoughtful history of greece, belisarius must have been a peculator on a large and dangerous scale. "though he refused the gothic throne and the empire of the west, he did not despise nor neglect wealth: he accumulated riches which could not have been acquired by any commander-in-chief amidst the wars and famines of the period, without rendering the military and civil administration subservient to his pecuniary profit. on his return from italy he lived at constantinople in almost regal splendour, and maintained a body of , cavalry attached to his household. in an empire where confiscation was an ordinary financial resource, and under a sovereign whose situation rendered jealousy only common prudence, it is not surprising that the wealth of belisarius excited the imperial cupidity, and induced justinian to seize great part of it" (_greece under the romans_, chap. ). there is shrewd insight in this, and though we may regret that we cannot attain to more, it is better than leaving the subject with an unmeaning paradox. it may be said generally that gibbon has not done justice to the services rendered to europe by the byzantine empire. in his crowded forty-eighth chapter, which is devoted to the subject, he passes over events and characters with such speed that his history in this part becomes little more than a chronicle, vivid indeed, but barren of thoughtful political views. his account of the isaurian period may be instanced among others as an example of defective treatment. if we turn to the judicious finlay, we see what an immense but generally unacknowledged debt europe owes to the greek empire. the saving of christendom from mohammedan conquest is too easily attributed to the genius of charles martel and his brave franks. the victory at tours was important no doubt, but almost a century previously the followers of the prophet had been checked by heraclius; and their memorable repulse before constantinople under the isaurian leo was the real barrier opposed to their conquest of the west. it requires but little reflection to see that without this brave resistance to the moslem invasion, the course of mediæval history would have been completely changed. next in time, but hardly second in value to the services of the greeks at marathon and salamis, must be reckoned the services of the byzantine emperors in repelling the barbarians. such an important consideration as this should hardly have escaped gibbon. gibbon's account of charlemagne is strangely inadequate. it is perhaps the only instance in his work where he has failed to appreciate a truly great man, and the failure is the more deplorable as it concerns one of the greatest men who have ever lived. he did not realise the greatness of the man, of his age, or of his work. properly considered, the eighth century is the most important and memorable which europe has ever seen. during its course the geographical limits, the ecclesiastical polity, and the feudal system within and under which our western group of nations was destined to live for five or six centuries, were provisionally settled and determined. the wonderful house of the carolings, which produced no less than five successive rulers of genius (of whom two had extraordinary genius, charles martel and charlemagne), were the human instruments of this great work. the frankish monarchy was hastening to ruin when they saved it. saxons in the east and saracens in the south were on the point of extinguishing the few surviving embers of civilisation which still existed. the bishop of rome was ready to fall a prey to the lombards, and the progressive papacy of hildebrand and innocent ran imminent risk of being extirpated at its root. charles and his ancestors prevented these evils. of course it is open to any one to say that there were no evils threatening, that mohammedanism is as good as christianity, that the papacy was a monstrous calamity, that to have allowed eastern germany to remain pagan and barbarous would have done no harm. the question cannot be discussed here. but every law of historic equity compels us to admit that whether the result was good or bad, the genius of men who could leave such lasting impressions on the world as the carolings did, must have been exceptionally great. and this is what gibbon has not seen; he has not seen that, whether their work was good or bad in the issue, it was colossal. his tone in reference to charlemagne is unworthy to a degree. "without injustice to his fame, i may discern some blemishes in the sanctity and greatness of the restorer of the western empire. of his moral virtues, chastity was not the most conspicuous." this from the pen of gibbon seems hardly serious. again: "i touch with reverence the laws of charlemagne, so highly applauded by a respectable judge. they compose not a system, but a series of occasional and minute edicts, for the correction of abuses, the reformation of manners, the economy of his farms, the care of his poultry, and even the sale of his eggs." and yet gibbon had read the capitularies. the struggle and care of the hero to master in some degree the wide welter of barbarism surging around him, he never recognised. it is a spot on gibbon's fame. dean milman considers that gibbon's account of the crusades is the least accurate and satisfactory chapter in his history, and "that he has here failed in that lucid arrangement which in general gives perspicuity to his most condensed and crowded narratives." this blame seems to be fully merited, if restricted to the second of the two chapters which gibbon has devoted to the crusades. the fifty-eighth chapter, in which he treats of the first crusade, leaves nothing to be desired. it is not one of his best chapters, though it is quite up to his usually high level. but the fifty-ninth chapter, it must be owned, is not only weak, but what is unexampled elsewhere in him, confused and badly written. it is not, as in the case of charlemagne, a question of imperfect appreciation of a great man or epoch; it is a matter of careless and slovenly presentation of a period which he had evidently mastered with his habitual thoroughness, but, owing to the rapidity with which he composed his last volume, he did not do full justice to it. he says significantly in his memoirs, that "he wished that a pause, an interval, had been allowed for a serious revisal" of the last three volumes, and there can be little doubt that this chapter was one of the sources of his regrets. it is in fact a mere tangle. the second and the third crusades are so jumbled together, that it is only a reader who knows the subject very well who can find his way through the labyrinth. gibbon seems at this point, a thing very unusual with him, to have become impatient with his subject, and to have wished to hurry over it. "a brief parallel," he says, "may save the repetition of a tedious narrative." the result of this expeditious method has been far from happy. it is the only occasion where gibbon has failed in his usual high finish and admirable literary form. gibbon's style was at one period somewhat of a party question. good christians felt a scruple in discerning any merits in the style of a writer who had treated the martyrs of the early church with so little ceremony and generosity. on the other hand, those whose opinions approached more or less to his, expatiated on the splendour and majesty of his diction. archbishop whately went out of his way in a note to his _logic_ to make a keen thrust at an author whom it was well to depreciate whenever occasion served. "his way of writing," he says, "reminds one of those persons who never dare look you full in the face." such criticisms are out of date now. the faults of gibbon's style are obvious enough, and its compensatory merits are not far to seek. no one can overlook its frequent tumidity and constant want of terseness. it lacks suppleness, ease, variety. it is not often distinguished by happy selection of epithet, and seems to ignore all delicacy of _nuance_. a prevailing grandiloquence, which easily slides into pomposity, is its greatest blemish. the acute porson saw this and expressed it admirably. in the preface to his letters to archdeacon travis, he says of gibbon, "though his style is in general correct and elegant, he sometimes 'draws out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument.' in endeavouring to avoid vulgar terms he too frequently dignifies trifles, and clothes common thoughts in a splendid dress that would be rich enough for the noblest ideas. in short we are too often reminded of that great man, mr. prig, the auctioneer, whose manner was so inimitably fine that he had as much to say on a ribbon as on a raphael." it seems as if gibbon had taken the stilted tone of the old french tragedy for his model, rather than the crisp and nervous prose of the best french writers. we are constantly offended by a superfine diction lavished on barbarous chiefs and rough soldiers of the lower empire, which almost reproduces the high-flown rhetoric in which corneille's and racine's characters address each other. such phrases as the "majesty of the throne," "the dignity of the purple," the "wisdom of the senate," recur with a rather jarring monotony, especially when the rest of the narrative is designed to show that there was no majesty nor dignity nor wisdom involved in the matter. we feel that the writer was thinking more of his sonorous sentence than of the real fact. on the other hand, nothing but a want of candour or taste can lead any one to overlook the rare and great excellences of gibbon's style. first of all, it is singularly correct: a rather common merit now, but not common in his day. but its sustained vigour and loftiness will always be uncommon; above all its rapidity and masculine length of stride are quite admirable. when he takes up his pen to describe a campaign, or any great historic scene, we feel that we shall have something worthy of the occasion, that we shall be carried swiftly and grandly through it all, without the suspicion of a breakdown of any kind being possible. an indefinable stamp of weightiness is impressed on gibbon's writing; he has a baritone manliness which banishes everything small, trivial, or weak. when he is eloquent (and it should be remembered to his credit that he never affects eloquence, though he occasionally affects dignity), he rises without effort into real grandeur. on the whole we may say that his manner, with certain manifest faults, is not unworthy of his matter, and the praise is great. it is not quite easy to give expression to another feeling which is often excited in reading gibbon. it is somewhat of this kind, that it is more fitted to inspire admiration than love or sympathy. its merits are so great, the mass of information it contains is so stupendous, that all competent judges of such work feel bound to praise it. whether they like it in the same degree, may be questioned. among reading men and educated persons it is not common--such is my experience--to meet with people who know their gibbon well. superior women do not seem to take to him kindly, even when there is no impediment on religious grounds. madame du deffand, writing to walpole, says, "i whisper it to you, but i am not pleased with mr. gibbon's work. it is declamatory, oratorical.... i lay it aside without regret, and it requires an effort to take it up again." another of walpole's correspondents, the countess of ossory, seems to have made similar strictures. if we admit that women are less capable than masculine scholars of doing justice to the strong side of gibbon, we may also acknowledge that they are better fitted than men to appreciate and to be shocked by his defective side, which is a prevailing want of moral elevation and nobility of sentiment. his cheek rarely flushes in enthusiasm for a good cause. the tragedy of human life never seems to touch him, no glimpse of the infinite ever calms and raises the reader of his pages. like nearly all the men of his day, he was of the earth earthy, and it is impossible to get over the fact. chapter x. last illness.--death.--conclusion. gibbon had now only about six months to live. he did not seem to have suffered by his rapid journey from lausanne to london. during the summer which he spent with his friend lord sheffield, he was much as usual; only his friend noticed that his habitual dislike to motion appeared to increase, and he was so incapable of exercise that he was confined to the library and dining-room. "then he joined mr. f. north in pleasant arguments against exercise in general. he ridiculed the unsettled and restless disposition that summer, the most uncomfortable of all seasons, as he said, generally gives to those who have the use of their limbs." the true disciples of epicurus are not always the least stout and stoical in the presence of irreparable evils. after spending three or four months at sheffield place, he went to bath to visit his step-mother, mrs. gibbon. his conduct to her through life was highly honourable to him. it should be remembered that her jointure, paid out of his father's decayed estate, was a great tax on his small income. in his efforts to improve his position by selling his landed property, mrs. gibbon seems to have been at times somewhat difficult to satisfy as regards the security of her interests. it was only prudent on her part. but it is easy to see what a source of alienation and quarrel was here ready prepared, if both parties had not risen superior to sordid motives. there never seems to have been the smallest cloud between them. when one of his properties was sold he writes: "mrs. gibbon's jointure is secured on the buriton estate, and her legal consent is requisite for the sale. again and again i must repeat my hope that she is perfectly satisfied, and that the close of her life may not be embittered by suspicion, fear, or discontent. what new security does she prefer--the funds, a mortgage, or your land? at all events, she must be made easy." so gibbon left town and lay at reading on his road to bath: here he passed about ten days with his step-mother, who was now nearly eighty years of age. "in mind and conversation she is just the same as twenty years ago," he writes to lord sheffield; "she has spirits, appetite, legs, and eyes, and talks of living till ninety. i can say from my heart, amen." and in another letter, a few days later, he says: "a _tête-à-tête_ of eight or nine hours every day is rather difficult to support; yet i do assure you that our conversation flows with more ease and spirit when we are alone, than when any auxiliaries are summoned to our aid. she is indeed a wonderful woman, and i think all her faculties of the mind stronger and more active than i have ever known them.... i shall therefore depart next friday, but i may possibly reckon without my host, as i have not yet apprised mrs. g. of the term of my visit, and will certainly not quarrel with her for a short delay." he then went to althorpe, and it is the last evidence of his touching a book--"exhausted the morning (of the th november) among the first editions of cicero." then he came to london, and in a few days was seized with the illness which in a little more than two months put an end to his life. his malady was dropsy, complicated with other disorders. he had most strangely neglected a very dangerous symptom for upwards of thirty years, not only having failed to take medical advice about it, but even avoiding all allusion to it to bosom friends like lord sheffield. but longer concealment was now impossible. he sent for the eminent surgeon farquhar (the same who afterwards attended william pitt), and he, together with cline, at once recognised the case as one of the utmost gravity, though they did not say as much to the patient. on thursday, the th of november, he was tapped and greatly relieved. he said he was not appalled by the operation, and during its progress he did not lay aside his usual good-humoured pleasantry. he was soon out again, but only for a few days, and a fortnight after another tapping was necessary. again he went out to dinners and parties, which must have been most imprudent at his age and in his state. but he does not seem to have acted contrary to medical advice. he was very anxious to meet the prime minister, william pitt, with whom he was not acquainted, though he must have seen him in old days in the house. he saw him twice; once at eden farm for a whole day, and was much gratified, we are told. at last he got to what he called his home--the house of his true and devoted friend, lord sheffield. "but," says the latter, whose narrative of his friend's last illness is marked by a deep and reserved tenderness that does him much honour, "this last visit to sheffield place became far different from any he had ever made before. that ready, cheerful, various and illuminating conversation which we had before admired in him, was not always to be found in the library or the drawing-room. he moved with difficulty, and retired from company sooner than he had been used to do. on the rd of december his appetite began to fail him. he observed to me that it was a very bad sign _with him_ when he could not eat his breakfast, which he had done at all times very heartily; and this seems to have been the strongest expression of apprehension that he was ever observed to utter." he soon became too ill to remain beyond the reach of the highest medical advice. on the th of january, , he left a houseful of company and friends for his lodgings in st. james's street. on arriving he sent the following note to lord sheffield, the last lines he ever wrote:-- "st. james's, four o'clock, tuesday. "this date says everything. i was almost killed between sheffield place and east grinstead by hard, frozen, long, and cross ruts, that would disgrace the approach of an indian wigwam. the rest was somewhat less painful, and i reached this place half dead, but not seriously feverish or ill. i found a dinner invitation from lord lucan; but what are dinners to me? i wish they did not know of my departure. i catch the flying post. what an effort! adieu till thursday or friday." the end was not far off. on the th of january he underwent another operation, and, as usual, experienced much relief. "his spirits continued good. he talked of passing his time at houses which he had often frequented with great pleasure--the duke of devonshire's, mr. craufurd's, lord spencer's, lord lucan's, sir ralph payne's, mr. batt's." on the th of january "he saw some company--lady lucan and lady spencer--and thought himself well enough to omit the opium draught which he had been used to take for some time. he slept very indifferently; before nine the next morning he rose, but could not eat his breakfast. however, he appeared tolerably well, yet complained at times of a pain in his stomach. at one o'clock he received a visit of an hour from madame de sylva; and at three, his friend, mr. craufurd, of auchinames (whom he always mentioned with particular regard), called, and stayed with him till past five o'clock. they talked, as usual, on various subjects; and twenty hours before his death mr. gibbon happened to fall into a conversation not uncommon with him, on the probable duration of his life. he said that he thought himself a good life for ten, twelve, or perhaps twenty years. about six he ate the wing of a chicken and drank three glasses of madeira. after dinner he became very uneasy and impatient, complained a good deal, and appeared so weak that his servant was alarmed. "during the evening he complained much of his stomach, and of a feeling of nausea. soon after nine, he took his opium draught and went to bed. about ten he complained of much pain, and desired that warm napkins might be applied to his stomach. he almost incessantly expressed a sense of pain till about four o'clock in the morning, when he said he found his stomach much easier. about seven the servant asked whether he should send for mr. farquhar. he answered, no; that he was as well as the day before. at about half-past eight he got out of bed, and said he was 'plus adroit' than he had been for three months past, and got into bed again without assistance, better than usual. about nine he said he would rise. the servant, however, persuaded him to remain in bed till mr. farquhar, who was expected at eleven, should come. till about that hour he spoke with great facility. mr. farquhar came at the time appointed, and he was then visibly dying. when the _valet-de-chambre_ returned, after attending mr. farquhar out of the room, mr. gibbon said, 'pourquoi est ce que vous me quittez?' this was about half-past eleven. at twelve he drank some brandy and water from a teapot, and desired his favourite servant to stay with him. these were the last words he pronounced articulately. to the last he preserved his senses; and when he could no longer speak, his servant having asked a question, he made a sign to show that he understood him. he was quite tranquil, and did not stir, his eyes half shut. about a quarter before one he ceased to breathe." he wanted just eighty-three days of fifty-seven years of age. thus, in consequence of his own strange self-neglect and imprudence, was extinguished one of the most richly-stored minds that ever lived. occurring when it did, so near the last summons, gibbon's prospective hope of continued life "for ten, twelve, or twenty years" is harshly pathetic, and full of that irony which mocks the vain cares of men. but, truly, his forecast was not irrational if he had not neglected ordinary precautions. in spite of his ailments he felt full, and was full, of life, when he was cut off. we cannot be sure if lengthened days would have added much to his work already achieved. there is hardly a parallel case in literature of the great powers of a whole life being so concentrated on one supreme and magnificent effort. yet, if he had lived to , or as an extreme limit, to , we should have been all gainers. in the first place, he certainly would have finished his admirable autobiography. we cannot imagine what he would have made of it, judging from the fragment which exists. and yet that fragment is almost a masterpiece. but his fertile mind had other schemes in prospect; and what such a diligent worker would have done with a decade or two more of years it is impossible to say, except that it is certain they would not have been wasted. the extinction of a real mind is ever an irreparable loss. as it was, he went to his rest after one of the greatest victories ever achieved in his own field of humane letters, and lived long enough to taste the fruits of his toil. he was never puffed up, but soberly and without arrogance received his laurels. his unselfish zeal and haste to console his bereaved friend showed him warm and loving to the last; and we may say that his last serious effort was consecrated to the genius of pious friendship. in , two years after gibbon's death, lord sheffield published two quarto volumes of the historian's miscellaneous works. they have been republished in one thick octavo, and many persons suppose that it contains the whole of the posthumous works; not unnaturally, as a fraudulent statement on the title-page, "complete in one volume," is well calculated to produce that impression. but in lord sheffield issued a second edition in five volumes octavo, containing much additional matter, which additional matter was again published in a quarto form, no doubt for the convenience of the purchasers of the original quarto edition. of the posthumous works, the memoirs are by far the most important portion. unfortunately, they were left in a most unfinished state, and what we now read is nothing else than a mosaic put together by lord sheffield from _six_ different sketches. next to the memoirs are the journals and diaries of his studies. as a picture of gibbon's method, zeal, and thoroughness in the pursuit of knowledge, they are of the highest interest. but they refer to an early period of his studies, long previous to the concentration of his mind on his great work, and one would like to know whether they present the best selection that might have been made from these records. it is interesting to follow gibbon in his perusal of homer and juvenal at five-and-twenty. but one would much like to be admitted to his study when he was a far riper scholar, and preparing for or writing the _decline and fall_. lord sheffield positively prohibited, by a clause in his will, any further publication of the gibbon papers, and although dean milman was permitted to see them, it was with the express understanding that none of their contents should be divulged. after the memoirs and the journals, the most interesting portion of the miscellaneous works are _the antiquities of the house of brunswick_, which in their present form are merely the preparatory sketch of a large work. it is too imperfect to allow us to judge of what gibbon even designed to make of it. but it contains some masterly pages, and the style in many places seems more nervous and supple than that of the _decline and fall._ for instance, this account of albert azo the second:-- "like one of his tuscan ancestors azo the second was distinguished among the princes of italy by the epithet of the _rich_. the particulars of his rentroll cannot now be ascertained. an occasional though authentic deed of investiture enumerates eighty-three fiefs or manors which he held of the empire in lombardy and tuscany, from the marquisate of este to the county of luni; but to these possessions must be added the lands which he enjoyed as the vassal of the church, the ancient patrimony of otbert (the terra obertenga) in the counties of arezzo, pisa, and lucca, and the marriage portion of his first wife, which, according to the various readings of the manuscripts, may be computed either at twenty or two hundred thousand english acres. if such a mass of landed property were now accumulated on the head of an italian nobleman, the annual revenue might satisfy the largest demands of private luxury or avarice, and the fortunate owner would be rich in the improvement of agriculture, the manufactures of industry, the refinement of taste, and the extent of commerce. but the barbarism of the eleventh century diminished the income and aggravated the expense of the marquis of este. in a long series of war and anarchy, man and the works of man had been swept away, and the introduction of each ferocious and idle stranger had been overbalanced by the loss of five or six perhaps of the peaceful industrious natives. the mischievous growth of vegetation, the frequent inundations of the rivers were no longer checked by the vigilance of labour; the face of the country was again covered with forests and morasses; of the vast domains which acknowledged azo for their lord, the far greater part was abandoned to the beasts of the field, and a much smaller portion was reduced to the state of constant and productive husbandry. an adequate rent may be obtained from the skill and substance of a free tenant who fertilizes a grateful soil, and enjoys the security and benefit of a long lease. but faint is the hope and scanty is the produce of those harvests which are raised by the reluctant toil of peasants and slaves condemned to a bare subsistance and careless of the interests of a rapacious master. if his granaries are full, his purse is empty, and the want of cities or commerce, the difficulty of finding or reaching a market, obliges him to consume on the spot a part of his useless stock, which cannot be exchanged for merchandise or money.... the entertainment of his vassals and soldiers, their pay and rewards, their arms and horses, surpassed the measure of the most oppressive tribute, and the destruction which he inflicted on his neighbours was often retaliated on his own lands. the costly elegance of palaces and gardens was superseded by the laborious and expensive construction of strong castles on the summits of the most inaccessible rocks, and some of these, like the fortress of canossa in the apennine, were built and provided to sustain a three years' siege against a royal army. but his defence in this world was less burdensome to a wealthy lord than his salvation in the next; the demands of his chapel, his priests, his alms, his offerings, his pilgrimages were incessantly renewed; the monastery chosen for his sepulchre was endowed with his fairest possessions, and the naked heir might often complain that his father's sins had been redeemed at too high a price. the marquis azo was not exempt from the contagion of the times; his devotion was animated and inflamed by the frequent miracles that were performed in his presence; and the monks of vangadizza, who yielded to his request the arm of a dead saint, were not ignorant of the value of that inestimable jewel. after satisfying the demands of war and superstition he might appropriate the rest of his revenue to use and pleasure. but the italians of the eleventh century were imperfectly skilled in the liberal and mechanical arts; the objects of foreign luxury were furnished at an exorbitant price by the merchants of pisa and venice; and the superfluous wealth which could not purchase the real comforts of life, were idly wasted on some rare occasions of vanity and pomp. such were the nuptials of boniface, duke or marquis of tuscany, whose family was long after united with that of azo by the marriage of their children. these nuptials were celebrated on the banks of the mincius, which the fancy of virgil has decorated with a more beautiful picture. the princes and people of italy were invited to the feasts, which continued three months; the fertile meadows, which are intersected by the slow and winding course of the river, were covered with innumerable tents, and the bridegroom displayed and diversified the scenes of his proud and tasteless magnificence. all the utensils of the service were of silver, and his horses were shod with plates of the same metal, loosely nailed and carelessly dropped, to indicate his contempt of riches. an image of plenty and profusion was expressed in the banquet; the most delicious wines were drawn in buckets from the well; and the spices of the east were ground in water-mills like common flour. the dramatic and musical arts were in the rudest state; but the marquis had summoned the most popular singers, harpers, and buffoons to exercise their talents in this splendid theatre. after this festival i might remark a singular gift of this same boniface to the emperor henry iii., a chariot and oxen of solid silver, which were designed only as a vehicle for a hogshead of vinegar. if such an example should seem above the imitation of azo himself, the marquis of este was at least superior in wealth and dignity to the vassals of his compeer. one of these vassals, the viscount of mantua, presented the german monarch with one hundred falcons and one hundred bay horses, a grateful contribution to the pleasures of a royal sportsman. in that age the proud distinction between the nobles and princes of italy was guarded with jealous ceremony. the viscount of mantua had never been seated at the table of his immediate lord; he yielded to the invitation of the emperor; and a stag's skin filled with pieces of gold was graciously accepted by the marquis of tuscany as the fine of his presumption. "the temporal felicity of azo was crowned by the long possession of honour and riches; he died in the year , aged upwards of an hundred years; and the term of his mortal existence was almost commensurate with the lapse of the eleventh century. the character as well as the situation of the marquis of este rendered him an actor in the revolutions of that memorable period; but time has cast a veil over the virtues and vices of the man, and i must be content to mark some of the eras, the milestones of his which measure the extent and intervals of the vacant way. albert azo the second was no more than seventeen when he first drew the sword of rebellion and patriotism, when he was involved with his grandfather, his father, and his three uncles in a common proscription. in the vigour of his manhood, about his fiftieth year, the ligurian marquis governed the cities of milan and genoa as the minister of imperial authority. he was upwards of seventy when he passed the alps to vindicate the inheritance of maine for the children of his second marriage. he became the friend and servant of gregory vii., and in one of his epistles that ambitious pontiff recommends the marquis azo, as the most faithful and best beloved of the italian princes, as the proper channel through which a king of hungary might convey his petitions to the apostolic throne. in the mighty contest between the crown and the mitre, the marquis azo and the countess matilda led the powers of italy. and when the standard of st. peter was displayed, neither the age of the one nor the sex of the other could detain them from the field. with these two affectionate clients the pope maintained his station in the fortress of canossa, while the emperor, barefoot on the frozen ground, fasted and prayed three days at the foot of the rock; they were witnesses to the abject ceremony of the penance and pardon of henry iv.; and in the triumph of the church a patriot might foresee the deliverance of italy from the german yoke. at the time of this event the marquis of este was above fourscore; but in the twenty following years he was still alive and active amidst the revolutions of peace and war. the last act which he subscribed is dated above a century after his birth; and in that the venerable chief possesses the command of his faculties, his family, and his fortune. in this rare prerogative the longevity of albert azo the second stands alone. nor can i remember in the _authentic_ annals of mortality a single example of a king or prince, of a statesman or general, of a philosopher or poet, whose life has been extended beyond the period of a hundred years.... three approximations which will not hastily be matched have distinguished the present century, aurungzebe, cardinal fleury, and fontenelle. had a fortnight more been given to the philosopher, he might have celebrated his secular festival; but the lives and labours of the mogul king and the french minister were terminated before they had accomplished their ninetieth year." then follow several striking and graceful pages on lucrezia borgia and renée of france, duchess of ferrara. the following description of the university of padua and the literary tastes of the house of este is all that we can give here:-- "an university had been founded at padua by the house of este, and the scholastic rust was polished away by the revival of the literature of greece and rome. the studies of ferrara were directed by skilful and eloquent professors, either natives or foreigners. the ducal library was filled with a valuable collection of manuscripts and printed books, and as soon as twelve new plays of plautus had been found in germany, the marquis lionel of este was impatient to obtain a fair and faithful copy of that ancient poet. nor were these elegant pleasures confined to the learned world. under the reign of hercules i. a wooden theatre at a moderate cost of a thousand crowns was constructed in the largest court of the palace, the scenery represented some houses, a seaport and a ship, and the _menechmi_ of plautus, which had been translated into italian by the duke himself, was acted before a numerous and polite audience. in the same language and with the same success the _amphytrion_ of plautus and the _eunuchus_ of terence were successively exhibited. and these classic models, which formed the taste of the spectators, excited the emulation of the poets of the age. for the use of the court and theatre of ferrara, ariosto composed his comedies, which were often played with applause, which are still read with pleasure. and such was the enthusiasm of the new arts that one of the sons of alphonso the first did not disdain to speak a prologue on the stage. in the legitimate forms of dramatic composition the italians have not excelled; but it was in the court of ferrara that they invented and refined the _pastoral comedy_, a romantic arcadia which violates the truth of manners and the simplicity of nature, but which commands our indulgence by the elaborate luxury of eloquence and wit. the _aminta_ of tasso was written for the amusement and acted in the presence of alphonso the second, and his sister leonora might apply to herself the language of a passion which disordered the reason without clouding the genius of her poetical lover. of the numerous imitations, the _pastor fido_ of guarini, which alone can vie with the fame and merit of the original, is the work of the duke's secretary of state. it was exhibited in a private house in ferrara.... the father of the tuscan muses, the sublime but unequal dante, had pronounced that ferrara was never honoured with the name of a poet; he would have been astonished to behold the chorus of bards, of melodious swans (their own allusion), which now peopled the banks of the po. in the court of duke borso and his successor, boyardo count scandiano, was respected as a noble, a soldier, and a scholar: his vigorous fancy first celebrated the loves and exploits of the paladin orlando; and his fame has been preserved and eclipsed by the brighter glories and continuation of his work. ferrara may boast that on classic ground ariosto and tasso lived and sung; that the lines of the _orlando furioso_, the _gierusalemme liberata_ were inscribed in everlasting characters under the eye of the first and second alphonso. in a period of near three thousand years, five great epic poets have arisen in the world, and it is a singular prerogative that two of the five should be claimed as their own by a short age and a petty state." it perhaps will be admitted that if the style of these passages is less elaborate than that of the _decline and fall_, the deficiency, if it is one, is compensated by greater ease and lightness of touch. it may be interesting to give a specimen of gibbon's french style. his command of that language was not inferior to his command of his native idiom. one might even be inclined to say that his french prose is controlled by a purer taste than his english prose. the following excerpt, describing the battle of morgarten, will enable the reader to judge. it is taken from his early unfinished work on the history of the swiss republic, to which reference has already been made (p. ):-- "léopold était parti de zug vers le milieu de la nuit. il se flattait d'occuper sans résistance le défilé de morgarten qui ne perçait qu'avec difficulté entre le lac aegré et le pied d'une montagne escarpée. il marchait à la tête de sa gendarmerie. une colonne profonde d'infanterie le suivait de près, et les uns et les autres se promettaient une victoire facile si les paysans osaient se présenter à leur rencontre. ils étaient à peine entrés dans un chemin rude et étroit, et qui ne permettait qu'à trois ou quatre de marcher de front, qu'ils se sentirent accablés d'une grêle de pierres et de traits. rodolphe de reding, landamman de schwitz et général des confédérés, n'avait oublié aucun des avantages que lui offrit la situation des lieux. il avait fait couper des rochers énormes, qui en s'ébranlant dès qu'on retirait les faibles appuis qui les retenaient encore, se détachaient du sommet de la montaigne et se précipitaient avec un bruit affreux sur les bataillons serrés des autrichiens. déjà les chevaux s'éffrayaient, les rangs se confondaient, et le désordre égarait le courage et le rendait inutile, lorsque les suisses descendirent de la montagne en poussant de grands cris. accoutumés à poursuivre le chamois sur les bords glissants des précipices, ils couraient d'un pas assuré au milieu des neiges. ils étaient armés de grosses et pesantes hallebardes, auxquelles le fer le mieux trempé ne résistait point. les soldats de léopold chancelants et découragés cédèrent bientôt aux efforts désespérés d'une troupe qui combattait pour tout ce qu'il y a de plus cher aux hommes. l'abbé d'einsidlen, premier auteur de cette guerre malheureuse, et le comte henri de montfort, donnèrent les premiers l'example de la fuite. le désordre devint général, le carnage fut affreux, et les suisses se livraient au plaisir de la vengeance. a neuf heures du matin la bataille était gagnée.... un grand nombre d'autrichiens se précipitant les uns sur les autres, cherchèrent vainement dans le lac un asyle contre la fureur de leurs ennemis. ils y périrent presque tous. quinze cents hommes restèrent sur le champ de bataille. ils étaient pour la plupart de la gendarmerie, qu'une valeur malheureuse et une armure pesante arrêtaient dans un lieu où l'un et l'autre leur étaient inutiles. longtemps après l'on s'apercevait dans toutes les provinces voisines que l'élite de la noblesse avait péri dans cette fatale journée. l'infanterie beaucoup moins engagée dans le défilé, vit en tremblant la défaite des chevaliers qui passaient pour invincibles, et dont les escadrons effrayés se renversaient sur elle. elle s'arrêta, voulut se retirer, et dans l'instant cette retraite devint une fuite honteuse. sa perte fut assez peu considérable, mais les historiens de la nation ont conservé la mémoire de cinquante braves zuriquois dont on trouva les rangs couchés morts sur la place. léopold lui-même fut entrainé par la foule qui le portait du côté de zug. on le vit entrer dans sa ville de winterthur. la frayeur, la honte et l'indignation étaient encore peintes sur son front. dès que la victoire se fut déclarée en faveur des suisses, ils s'assemblèrent sur le champ de bataille, s'embrassèrent e versant des larmes d'allégresse, et remercièrent dieu de la grace qu'il venait de leur faire, et qui ne leur avait coûté que quatorze de leurs compagnons." his familiar letters and a number of essays, chiefly written in youth, form the remainder of the miscellaneous works. of the letters, some have been quoted in this volume, and the reader can form his own judgment of them. of the small essays we may say that they augment, if it is possible, one's notion of gibbon's laborious diligence and thoroughness in the field of historic research, and confirm his title to the character of an intrepid student. the lives of scholars are proverbially dull, and that of gibbon is hardly an exception to the rule. in the case of historians, the protracted silent labour of preparation, followed by the conscientious exposition of knowledge acquired, into which the intrusion of the writer's personality rarely appears to advantage, combine to give prominence to the work achieved, and to throw into the background the author who achieves it. if indeed the historian, forsaking his high function and austere reserve, succumbs to the temptations that beset his path, and turns history into political pamphlet, poetic rhapsody, moral epigram, or garish melodrama, he may become conspicuous to a fault at the expense of his work. gibbon avoided these seductions. if the _decline and fall_ has no superior in historical literature, it is not solely in consequence of gibbon's profound learning, wide survey, and masterly grasp of his subject. with wise discretion, he subordinated himself to his task. the life of gibbon is the less interesting, but his work remains monumental and supreme. * * * * * english men of letters. edited by john morley. _these short books are addressed to the general public with a view both to stirring and satisfying an interest in literature and its great topics in the minds of those who have to run as they read. an immense class is growing up, and must every year increase, whose education will have made them alive to the importance of the masters of our literature, and capable of intelligent curiosity as to their performances. the series is intended to give the means of nourishing this curiosity, to an extent that shall be copious enough to be profitable for knowledge and life, and yet be brief enough to serve those whose leisure is scanty_. _the following are arranged for_:-- _spenser_ _the dean of st. paul's._ _hume_ _professor huxley._ _in the press._ _bunyan_ _james anthony froude._ _johnson_ _leslie stephen._ [_ready._ _goldsmith_ _william black._ [_in the press._ _milton_ _mark pattison._ _wordsworth_ _goldwin smith._ _swift_ _john morley._ _burns_ _principal shairp._ _scott_ _richard h. hutton._ [_ready._ _shelley_ _j. a. symonds._ [_ready._ _gibbon_ _j. c. morison._ [_ready._ _byron_ _professor nichol._ _defoe_ _w. minto._ _gray_ _john morley._ [_others will be announced_] * * * * * opinions of the press. "the new series opens well with mr. leslie stephen's sketch of dr. johnson. it could hardly have been done better; and it will convey to the readers for whom it is intended a juster estimate of johnson than either of the two essays of lord macaulay."--_pall mall gazette_. "we have come across few writers who have had a clearer insight into johnson's character, or who have brought to the study of it a better knowledge of the time in which johnson lived and the men whom he knew."--_saturday review_. "it must be admitted that mr. stephen has succeeded admirably in his task. no writer could be more competent to supply what is wanted in boswell, a comprehensive sketch of his hero's position in the literature of the eighteenth century, and he has also shown great judgment and dexterity in his illustration of johnson's personal oddities and his power as a talker.... all the traits of the personality which boswell has immortalized are to be found here, as well as luminous sketches of the literature of the period, and a solid judgment of the work that johnson did in the world."--_examiner_. "we could not wish for a more suggestive introduction to scott and his poems and novels."--_examiner_. "the tone of the volume is excellent throughout."--_athenæum_ review of "scott." "as a clear, thoughtful, and attractive record of the life and works of the greatest among the world's historians, it deserves the highest praise."--_examiner_ review of "gibbon." macmillan's globe library. _beautifully printed on toned paper and bound in cloth extra, gilt edges, price s. d. each; in cloth plain, s. d. also kept in a variety of calf and morocco bindings, at moderate prices_. _the_ saturday review _says: "the globe editions are admirable for their scholarly editing, their typographical excellence, their compendious form, and their cheapness." the_ british quarterly review _says: "in compendiousness, elegance, and scholarliness the globe editions of messrs. macmillan surpass any popular series of our classics hitherto given to the public. as near an approach to miniature perfection as has ever been made_." shakespeare's complete works. edited by w. g. clark, m.a., and w. aldis wright, m.a., editors of the "cambridge shakespeare." with glossary, pp. . _the_ athenÆum _says this edition is "a marvel of beauty, cheapness, and compactness.... for the busy man, above all for the working student, this is the best of all existing shakespeares._" spenser's complete works. edited from the original editions and manuscripts, by r. morris, with a memoir by j. w. hales, m.a. with glossary. pp. lv., . "_worthy--and higher praise it needs not--of the beautiful 'globe series_'"--daily news. sir walter scott's poetical works. edited, with a biographical and critical memoir, by francis turner palgrave, and copious notes. pp. xliii., . "_we can almost sympathise with a middle-aged grumbler, who, after reading mr. palgrave's memoir and introduction, should exclaim, 'why was there not such an edition of scott when i was a schoolboy_?'"--guardian. complete works of robert burns. edited from the best printed and manuscript authorities, with glossarial index, notes, and a biographical memoir by alexander smith, pp. lxii., . "_admirable in all respects_."--spectator. robinson crusoe. edited after the original editions, with a biographical introduction by henry kingsley. pp. xxxi., . "_a most excellent and in every way desirable edition_."--court circular. goldsmith's miscellaneous works. edited with biographical introduction, by professor masson. pp. lx., . "_such an admirable compendium of the facts of goldsmith's life, and so careful and minute a delineation of the mixed traits of his peculiar character as to be a very model of a literary biography in little_."--scotsman. pope's poetical works. edited, with notes, and introductory memoir by a. w. ward, m.a., professor of history in owens college manchester, pp. lii., . _the_ literary churchman _remarks: "the editor's own notes and introductory memoir are excellent, the memoir alone would be cheap and well worth buying at the price of the whole volume_." dryden's poetical works. edited, with a memoir, revised text, and notes, by w.d. christie, m.a., of trinity college, cambridge, pp. lxxxvii., . "_an admirable edition, the result of great research and of a careful revision of the text_."--pall mall gazette. cowper's poetical works. edited, with notes and biographical introduction, by william benham, vicar of margate, pp. lxxiii., . "_mr. benham's edition of cowper is one of permanent value_."--saturday review. morte d'arthur.--sir thomas malory's book of king arthur and of his noble knights of the round table. the original edition of caxton, revised for modern use. with an introduction by sir edward strachey, bart. pp. xxxvii., . "_it is with perfect confidence that we recommend this edition of the old romance to every class of readers_."--pall mall gazette. the works of virgil. rendered into english prose, with introductions, notes, running analysis, and an index. by james lonsdale, m.a., and samuel lee, m.a. pp. . "_a more complete edition of virgil in english it is scarcely possible to conceive than the scholarly work before us_."--globe. the works of horace. rendered into english prose, with introductions, running analysis, notes, and index. by john lonsdale, m.a., and samuel lee, m.a. _the_ standard _says, "to classical and non-classical readers it will be invaluable_." milton's poetical works.--edited, with introductions, by professor masson. "_in every way an admirable book_."--pall mall gazette. macmillan & co., london. memoirs of my life and writings by edward gibbon in the fifty-second year of my age, after the completion of an arduous and successful work, i now propose to employ some moments of my leisure in reviewing the simple transactions of a private and literary life. truth, naked unblushing truth, the first virtue of more serious history, must be the sole recommendation of this personal narrative. the style shall be simple and familiar; but style is the image of character; and the habits of correct writing may produce, without labour or design, the appearance of art and study. my own amusement is my motive, and will be my reward: and if these sheets are communicated to some discreet and indulgent friends, they will be secreted from the public eye till the author shall be removed beyond the reach of criticism or ridicule. a lively desire of knowing and of recording our ancestors so generally prevails, that it must depend on the influence of some common principle in the minds of men. we seem to have lived in the persons of our forefathers; it is the labour and reward of vanity to extend the term of this ideal longevity. our imagination is always active to enlarge the narrow circle in which nature has confined us. fifty or an hundred years may be allotted to an individual, but we step forward beyond death with such hopes as religion and philosophy will suggest; and we fill up the silent vacancy that precedes our birth, by associating ourselves to the authors of our existence. our calmer judgment will rather tend to moderate, than to suppress, the pride of an ancient and worthy race. the satirist may laugh, the philosopher may preach; but reason herself will respect the prejudices and habits, which have been consecrated by the experience of mankind. wherever the distinction of birth is allowed to form a superior order in the state, education and example should always, and will often, produce among them a dignity of sentiment and propriety of conduct, which is guarded from dishonour by their own and the public esteem. if we read of some illustrious line so ancient that it has no beginning, so worthy that it ought to have no end, we sympathize in its various fortunes; nor can we blame the generous enthusiasm, or even the harmless vanity, of those who are allied to the honours of its name. for my own part, could i draw my pedigree from a general, a statesman, or a celebrated author, i should study their lives with the diligence of filial love. in the investigation of past events, our curiosity is stimulated by the immediate or indirect reference to ourselves; but in the estimate of honour we should learn to value the gifts of nature above those of fortune; to esteem in our ancestors the qualities that best promote the interests of society; and to pronounce the descendant of a king less truly noble than the offspring of a man of genius, whose writings will instruct or delight the latest posterity. the family of confucius is, in my opinion, the most illustrious in the world. after a painful ascent of eight or ten centuries, our barons and princes of europe are lost in the darkness of the middle ages; but, in the vast equality of the empire of china, the posterity of confucius have maintained, above two thousand two hundred years, their peaceful honours and perpetual succession. the chief of the family is still revered, by the sovereign and the people, as the lively image of the wisest of mankind. the nobility of the spencers has been illustrated and enriched by the trophies of marlborough; but i exhort them to consider the "fairy queen" as the most precious jewel of their coronet. i have exposed my private feelings, as i shall always do, without scruple or reserve. that these sentiments are just, or at least natural, i am inclined to believe, since i do not feel myself interested in the cause; for i can derive from my ancestors neither glory nor shame. yet a sincere and simple narrative of my own life may amuse some of my leisure hours; but it will subject me, and perhaps with justice, to the imputation of vanity. i may judge, however, from the experience both of past and of the present times, that the public are always curious to know the men, who have left behind them any image of their minds: the most scanty accounts of such men are compiled with diligence, and perused with eagerness; and the student of every class may derive a lesson, or an example, from the lives most similar to his own. my name may hereafter be placed among the thousand articles of a biographic britannica; and i must be conscious, that no one is so well qualified, as myself, to describe the series of my thoughts and actions. the authority of my masters, of the grave thuanus, and the philosophic hume, might be sufficient to justify my design; but it would not be difficult to produce a long list of ancients and moderns, who, in various forms, have exhibited their own portraits. such portraits are often the most interesting, and sometimes the only interesting parts of their writings; and if they be sincere, we seldom complain of the minuteness or prolixity of these personal memorials. the lives of the younger pliny, of petrarch, and of erasmus, are expressed in the epistles, which they themselves have given to the world. the essays of montaigne and sir william temple bring us home to the houses and bosoms of the authors: we smile without contempt at the headstrong passions of benevenuto cellini, and the gay follies of colley cibber. the confessions of st. austin and rousseau disclose the secrets of the human heart; the commentaries of the learned huet have survived his evangelical demonstration; and the memoirs of goldoni are more truly dramatic than his italian comedies. the heretic and the churchman are strongly marked in the characters and fortunes of whiston and bishop newton; and even the dullness of michael de marolles and anthony wood acquires some value from the faithful representation of men and manners. that i am equal or superior to some of these, the effects of modesty or affectation cannot force me to dissemble. my family is originally derived from the county of kent. the southern district, which borders on sussex and the sea, was formerly overspread with the great forest anderida, and even now retains the denomination of the weald or woodland. in this district, and in the hundred and parish of rolvenden, the gibbons were possessed of lands in the year one thousand three hundred and twenty-six; and the elder branch of the family, without much increase or diminution of property, still adheres to its native soil. fourteen years after the first appearance of his name, john gibbon is recorded as the marmorarius or architect of king edward the third: the strong and stately castle of queensborough, which guarded the entrance of the medway, was a monument of his skill; and the grant of an hereditary toll on the passage from sandwich to stonar, in the isle of thanet, is the reward of no vulgar artist. in the visitations of the heralds, the gibbons are frequently mentioned; they held the rank of esquire in an age, when that title was less promiscuously assumed: one of them, under the reign of queen elizabeth, was captain of the militia of kent; and a free school, in the neighbouring town of benenden, proclaims the charity and opulence of its founder. but time, or their own obscurity, has cast a veil of oblivion over the virtues and vices of my kentish ancestors; their character or station confined them to the labours and pleasures of a rural life: nor is it in my power to follow the advice of the poet, in an inquiry after a name,-- "go! search it there, where to be born, and die, of rich and poor makes all the history." so recent is the institution of our parish registers. in the beginning of the seventeenth century, a younger branch of the gibbons of rolvenden migrated from the country to the city; and from this branch i do not blush to descend. the law requires some abilities; the church imposes some restraints; and before our army and navy, our civil establishments, and india empire, had opened so many paths of fortune, the mercantile profession was more frequently chosen by youths of a liberal race and education, who aspired to create their own independence. our most respectable families have not disdained the counting-house, or even the shop; their names are enrolled in the livery and companies of london; and in england, as well as in the italian commonwealths, heralds have been compelled to declare that gentility is not degraded by the exercise of trade. the armorial ensigns which, in the times of chivalry, adorned the crest and shield of the soldier, are now become an empty decoration, which every man, who has money to build a carriage, may paint according to his fancy on the panels. my family arms are the same, which were borne by the gibbons of kent in an age, when the college of heralds religiously guarded the distinctions of blood and name: a lion rampant gardant, between three schallop-shells argent, on a field azure. i should not however have been tempted to blazon my coat of arms, were it not connected with a whimsical anecdote. about the reign of james the first, the three harmless schallop-shells were changed by edmund gibbon esq. into three ogresses, or female cannibals, with a design of stigmatizing three ladies, his kinswomen, who had provoked him by an unjust law-suit. but this singular mode of revenge, for which he obtained the sanction of sir william seagar, king at arms, soon expired with its author; and, on his own monument in the temple church, the monsters vanish, and the three schallop-shells resume their proper and hereditary place. our alliances by marriage it is not disgraceful to mention. the chief honour of my ancestry is james fiens, baron say and scale, and lord high treasurer of england, in the reign of henry the sixth; from whom by the phelips, the whetnalls, and the cromers, i am lineally descended in the eleventh degree. his dismission and imprisonment in the tower were insufficient to appease the popular clamour; and the treasurer, with his son-in-law cromer, was beheaded( ), after a mock trial by the kentish insurgents. the black list of his offences, as it is exhibited in shakespeare, displays the ignorance and envy of a plebeian tyrant. besides the vague reproaches of selling maine and normandy to the dauphin, the treasurer is specially accused of luxury, for riding on a foot-cloth; and of treason, for speaking french, the language of our enemies: "thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm," says jack cade to the unfortunate lord, "in erecting a grammar-school; and whereas before our forefathers had no other books than the score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be used; and, contrary to the king, his crown, and dignity, thou hast built a paper-mill. it will be proved to thy face, that thou hast men about thee, who usually talk of a noun and a verb, and such abominable words, as no christian ear can endure to hear." our dramatic poet is generally more attentive to character than to history; and i much fear that the art of printing was not introduced into england, till several years after lord say's death; but of some of these meritorious crimes i should hope to find my ancestor guilty; and a man of letters may be proud of his descent from a patron and martyr of learning. in the beginning of the last century robert gibbon esq. of rolvenden in kent (who died in ), had a son of the same name of robert, who settled in london, and became a member of the cloth-workers' company. his wife was a daughter of the edgars, who flourished about four hundred years in the county of suffolk, and produced an eminent and wealthy serjeant-at-law, sir gregory edgar, in the reign of henry the seventh. of the sons of robert gibbon, (who died in ,) matthew did not aspire above the station of a linen-draper in leadenhall-street; but john has given to the public some curious memorials of his existence, his character, and his family. he was born on nov. d, ; his education was liberal, at a grammar-school, and afterwards in jesus college at cambridge; and he celebrates the retired content which he enjoyed at allesborough, in worcestershire, in the house of thomas lord coventry, where john gibbon was employed as a domestic tutor, the same office which mr. hobbes exercised in the devonshire family. but the spirit of my kinsman soon immerged into more active life: he visited foreign countries as a soldier and a traveller, acquired the knowledge of the french and spanish languages, passed some time in the isle of jersey, crossed the atlantic, and resided upwards of a twelvemonth ( ) in the rising colony of virginia. in this remote province his taste, or rather passion, for heraldry found a singular gratification at a war-dance of the native indians. as they moved in measured steps, brandishing their tomahawks, his curious eye contemplated their little shields of bark, and their naked bodies, which were painted with the colours and symbols of his favourite science. "at which i exceedingly wondered; and concluded that heraldry was ingrafted _naturally_ into the sense of human race. if so, it deserves a greater esteem than now-a-days is put upon it." his return to england after the restoration was soon followed by his marriage his settlement in a house in st. catherine's cloister, near the tower, which devolved to my grandfather and his introduction into the heralds' college (in ) by the style and title of blue-mantle pursuivant at arms. in this office he enjoyed near fifty years the rare felicity of uniting, in the same pursuit, his duty and inclination: his name is remembered in the college, and many of his letters are still preserved. several of the most respectable characters of the age, sir william dugdale, mr. ashmole, dr. john betts, and dr. nehemiah grew, were his friends; and in the society of such men, john gibbon may be recorded without disgrace as the member of an astrological club. the study of hereditary honours is favourable to the royal prerogative; and my kinsman, like most of his family, was a high tory both in church and state. in the latter end of the reign of charles the second, his pen was exercised in the cause of the duke of york: the republican faction he most cordially detested; and as each animal is conscious of its proper arms, the heralds' revenge was emblazoned on a most diabolical escutcheon. but the triumph of the whig government checked the preferment of blue-mantle; and he was even suspended from his office, till his tongue could learn to pronounce the oath of abjuration. his life was prolonged to the age of ninety: and, in the expectation of the inevitable though uncertain hour, he wishes to preserve the blessings of health, competence, and virtue. in the year he published in london his introductio ad latinam blasoniam, an original attempt, which camden had desiderated, to define, in a roman idiom, the terms and attributes of a gothic institution. it is not two years since i acquired, in a foreign land, some domestic intelligence of my own family; and this intelligence was conveyed to switzerland from the heart of germany. i had formed an acquaintance with mr. langer, a lively and ingenious scholar, while he resided at lausanne as preceptor to the hereditary prince of brunswick. on his return to his proper station of librarian to the ducal library of wolfenbuttel, he accidentally found among some literary rubbish a small old english volume of heraldry, inscribed with the name of john gibbon. from the title only mr. langer judged that it might be an acceptable present to his friend--and he judged rightly. his manner is quaint and affected; his order is confused: but he displays some wit, more reading, and still more enthusiasm: and if an enthusiast be often absurd, he is never languid. an english text is perpetually interspersed with latin sentences in prose and verse; but in his own poetry he claims an exemption from the laws of prosody. amidst a profusion of genealogical knowledge, my kinsman could not be forgetful of his own name; and to him i am indebted for almost the whole of my information concerning the gibbon family. from this small work the author expected immortal fame. such are the hopes of authors! in the failure of those hopes john gibbon has not been the first of his profession, and very possibly may not be the last of his name. his brother matthew gibbon, the draper, had one daughter and two sons--my grandfather edward, who was born in the year , and thomas, afterwards dean of carlisle. according to the mercantile creed, that the best book is a profitable ledger, the writings of john the herald would be much less precious than those of his nephew edward: but an author professes at least to write for the public benefit; and the slow balance of trade can be pleasing to those persons only, to whom it is advantageous. the successful industry of my grandfather raised him above the level of his immediate ancestors; he appears to have launched into various and extensive dealings: even his opinions were subordinate to his interest; and i find him in flanders clothing king william's troops, while he would have contracted with more pleasure, though not perhaps at a cheaper rate, for the service of king james. during his residence abroad, his concerns at home were managed by his mother hester, an active and notable woman. her second husband was a widower of the name of acton: they united the children of their first nuptials. after his marriage with the daughter of richard acton, goldsmith in leadenhall-street, he gave his own sister to sir whitmore acton, of aldenham; and i am thus connected, by a triple alliance, with that ancient and loyal family of shropshire baronets. it consisted about that time of seven brothers, all of gigantic stature; one of whom, a pigmy of six feet two inches, confessed himself the last and least of the seven; adding, in the true spirit of party, that such men were not born since the revolution. under the tory administration of the four last years of queen anne ( - ) mr. edward gibbon was appointed one of the commissioners of the customs; he sat at that board with prior; but the merchant was better qualified for his station than the poet; since lord bolingbroke has been heard to declare, that he had never conversed with a man, who more clearly understood the commerce and finances of england. in the year he was elected one of the directors of the south sea company; and his books exhibited the proof that, before his acceptance of this fatal office, he had acquired an independent fortune of sixty thousand pounds. but his fortune was overwhelmed in the shipwreck of the year twenty, and the labours of thirty years were blasted in a single day. of the use or abuse of the south sea scheme, of the guilt or innocence of my grandfather and his brother directors, i am neither a competent nor a disinterested judge. yet the equity of modern times must condemn the violent and arbitrary proceedings, which would have disgraced the cause of justice, and would render injustice still more odious. no sooner had the nation awakened from its golden dream, than a popular and even a parliamentary clamour demanded their victims: but it was acknowledged on all sides that the south sea directors, however guilty, could not be touched by any known laws of the land. the speech of lord molesworth, the author of the state of denmark, may shew the temper, or rather the intemperance, of the house of commons. "extraordinary crimes (exclaimed that ardent whig) call aloud for extraordinary remedies. the roman lawgivers had not foreseen the possible existence of a parricide; but as soon as the first monster appeared, he was sewn in a sack, and cast headlong into the river; and i shall be content to inflict the same treatment on the authors of our present ruin." his motion was not literally adopted; but a bill of pains and penalties was introduced, a retroactive statute, to punish the offences, which did not exist at the time they were committed. such a pernicious violation of liberty and law can be excused only by the most imperious necessity; nor could it be defended on this occasion by the plea of impending danger or useful example. the legislature restrained the persons of the directors, imposed an exorbitant security for their appearance, and marked their characters with a previous note of ignominy: they were compelled to deliver, upon oath, the strict value of their estates; and were disabled from making any transfer or alienation of any part of their property. against a bill of pains and penalties it is the common right of every subject to be heard by his counsel at the bar: they prayed to be heard; their prayer was refused; and their oppressors, who required no evidence, would listen to no defence. it had been at first proposed that one-eighth of their respective estates should be allowed for the future support of the directors; but it was speciously urged, that in the various shades of opulence and guilt such an unequal proportion would be too light for many, and for some might possibly be too heavy. the character and conduct of each man were separately weighed; but, instead of the calm solemnity of a judicial inquiry, the fortune and honour of three and thirty englishmen were made the topic of hasty conversation, the sport of a lawless majority; and the basest member of the committee, by a malicious word or, a silent vote, might indulge his general spleen or personal animosity. injury was aggravated by insult, and insult was embittered by pleasantry. allowances of twenty pounds, or one shilling, were facetiously moved. a vague report that a director had formerly been concerned in another project, by which some unknown persons had lost their money, was admitted as a proof of his actual guilt. one man was ruined because he had dropped a foolish speech, that his horses should feed upon gold; another because he was grown so proud, that, one day at the treasury, he had refused a civil answer to persons much above him. all were condemned, absent and unheard, in arbitrary fines and forfeitures, which swept away the greatest part of their substance. such bold oppression can scarcely be shielded by the omnipotence of parliament; and yet it maybe seriously questioned, whether the judges of the south sea directors were the true and legal representatives of their country. the first parliament of george the first had been chosen ( ) for three years: the term had elapsed, their trust was expired; and the four additional years ( - ), during which they continued to sit, were derived not from the people, but from themselves; from the strong measure of the septennial bill, which can only be paralleled by il serar di consiglio of the venetian history. yet candour will own that to the same parliament every englishman is deeply indebted: the septennial act, so vicious in its origin, has been sanctioned by time, experience, and the national consent. its first operation secured the house of hanover on the throne, and its permanent influence maintains the peace and stability of government. as often as a repeal has been moved in the house of commons, i have given in its defence a clear and conscientious vote. my grandfather could not expect to be treated with more lenity than his companions. his tory principles and connections rendered him obnoxious to the ruling powers: his name is reported in a suspicious secret; and his well-known abilities could not plead the excuse of ignorance or error. in the first proceedings against the south sea directors, mr. gibbon is one of the few who were taken into custody; and, in the final sentence, the measure of his fine proclaims him eminently guilty. the total estimate which he delivered on oath to the house of commons amounted to , pounds shillings and pence, exclusive of antecedent settlements. two different allowances of , pounds and of , pounds were moved for mr. gibbon; but, on the question being put, it was carried without a division for the smaller sum. on these ruins, with the skill and credit, of which parliament had not been able to despoil him, my grandfather at a mature age erected the edifice of a new fortune: the labours of sixteen years were amply rewarded; and i have reason to believe that the second structure was not much inferior to the first. he had realized a very considerable property in sussex, hampshire, buckinghamshire, and the new river company; and had acquired a spacious house, with gardens and lands, at putney, in surrey, where he resided in decent hospitality. he died in december , at the age of seventy; and by his last will, at the expense of edward, his only son, (with whose marriage he was not perfectly reconciled,) enriched his two daughters, catherine and hester. the former became the wife of mr. edward elliston, an east india captain: their daughter and heiress catherine was married in the year to edward eliot, esq. (now lord eliot), of port eliot, in the county of cornwall; and their three sons are my nearest male relations on the father's side. a life of devotion and celibacy was the choice of my aunt, mrs. hester gibbon, who, at the age of eighty-five, still resides in a hermitage at cliffe, in northamptonshire; having long survived her spiritual guide and faithful companion mr. william law, who, at an advanced age, about the year , died in her house. in our family he had left the reputation of a worthy and pious man, who believed all that he professed, and practised all that he enjoined. the character of a non-juror, which he maintained to the last, is a sufficient evidence of his principles in church and state; and the sacrifice of interest to conscience will be always respectable. his theological writings, which our domestic connection has tempted me to peruse, preserve an imperfect sort of life, and i can pronounce with more confidence and knowledge on the merits of the author. his last compositions are darkly tinctured by the incomprehensible visions of jacob behmen; and his discourse on the absolute unlawfulness of stage entertainments is sometimes quoted for a ridiculous intemperance of sentiment and language.--"the actors and spectators must all be damned: the playhouse is the porch of hell, the place of the devil's abode, where he holds his filthy court of evil spirits: a play is the devil's triumph, a sacrifice performed to his glory, as much as in the heathen temples of bacchus or venus, &c., &c." but these sallies of religious frenzy must not extinguish the praise, which is due to mr. william law as a wit and a scholar. his argument on topics of less absurdity is specious and acute, his manner is lively, his style forcible and clear; and, had not his vigorous mind been clouded by enthusiasm, he might be ranked with the most agreeable and ingenious writers of the times. while the bangorian controversy was a fashionable theme, he entered the lists on the subject of christ's kingdom, and the authority of the priesthood: against the plain account of the sacrament of the lord's supper he resumed the combat with bishop hoadley, the object of whig idolatry, and tory abhorrence; and at every weapon of attack and defence the non-juror, on the ground which is common to both, approves himself at least equal to the prelate. on the appearance of the fable of the bees, he drew his pen against the licentious doctrine that private vices are public benefits, and morality as well as religion must join in his applause. mr. law's master-work, the serious call, is still read as a popular and powerful book of devotion. his precepts are rigid, but they are founded on the gospel; his satire is sharp, but it is drawn from the knowledge of human life; and many of his portraits are not unworthy of the pen of la bruyere. if he finds a spark of piety in his reader's mind, he will soon kindle it to a flame; and a philosopher must allow that he exposes, with equal severity and truth, the strange contradiction between the faith and practice of the christian world. under the names of flavia and miranda he has admirably described my two aunts the heathen and the christian sister. my father, edward gibbon, was born in october, : at the age of thirteen he could scarcely feel that he was disinherited by act of parliament; and, as he advanced towards manhood, new prospects of fortune opened to his view. a parent is most attentive to supply in his children the deficiencies, of which he is conscious in himself: my grandfather's knowledge was derived from a strong understanding, and the experience of the ways of men; but my father enjoyed the benefits of a liberal education as a scholar and a gentleman. at westminster school, and afterwards at emanuel college in cambridge, he passed through a regular course of academical discipline; and the care of his learning and morals was intrusted to his private tutor, the same mr. william law. but the mind of a saint is above or below the present world; and while the pupil proceeded on his travels, the tutor remained at putney, the much-honoured friend and spiritual director of the whole family. my father resided sometime at paris to acquire the fashionable exercises; and as his temper was warm and social, he indulged in those pleasures, for which the strictness of his former education had given him a keener relish. he afterwards visited several provinces of france; but his excursions were neither long nor remote; and the slender knowledge, which he had gained of the french language, was gradually obliterated. his passage through besancon is marked by a singular consequence in the chain of human events. in a dangerous illness mr. gibbon was attended, at his own request, by one of his kinsmen of the name of acton, the younger brother of a younger brother, who had applied himself to the study of physic. during the slow recovery of his patient, the physician himself was attacked by the malady of love: he married his mistress, renounced his country and religion, settled at besancon, and became the father of three sons; the eldest of whom, general acton, is conspicuous in europe as the principal minister of the king of the two sicilies. by an uncle whom another stroke of fortune had transplanted to leghorn, he was educated in the naval service of the emperor; and his valour and conduct in the command of the tuscan frigates protected the retreat of the spaniards from algiers. on my father's return to england he was chosen, in the general election of , to serve in parliament for the borough of petersfield; a burgage tenure, of which my grandfather possessed a weighty share, till he alienated (i know not why) such important property. in the opposition to sir robert walpole and the pelhams, prejudice and society connected his son with the tories,--shall i say jacobites? or, as they were pleased to style themselves, the country gentlemen? with them he gave many a vote; with them he drank many a bottle. without acquiring the fame of an orator or a statesman, he eagerly joined in the great opposition, which, after a seven years' chase, hunted down sir robert walpole: and in the pursuit of an unpopular minister, he gratified a private revenge against the oppressor of his family in the south sea persecution. i was born at putney, in the county of surrey, april th, o. s., in the year one thousand seven hundred and thirty-seven; the first child of the marriage of edward gibbon, esq., and of judith porten. [note: the union to which i owe my birth was a marriage of inclination and esteem. mr. james porten, a merchant of london, resided with his family at putney, in a house adjoining to the bridge and churchyard, where i have passed many happy hours of my childhood. he left one son (the late sir stanier porten) and three daughters; catherine, who preserved her maiden name, and of whom i shall hereafter speak; another daughter married mr. darrel of richmond, and left two sons, edward and robert: the youngest of the three sisters was judith, my mother.] my lot might have been that of a slave, a savage, or a peasant; nor can i reflect without pleasure on the bounty of nature, which cast my birth in a free and civilized country, in an age of science and philosophy, in a family of honourable rank, and decently endowed with the gifts of fortune. from my birth i have enjoyed the right of primogeniture; but i was succeeded by five brothers and one sister, all of whom were snatched away in their infancy. my five brothers, whose names may be found in the parish register of putney, i shall not pretend to lament: but from my childhood to the present hour i have deeply and sincerely regretted my sister, whose life was somewhat prolonged, and whom i remember to have been an amiable infant. the relation of a brother and a sister, especially if they do not marry, appears to me of a very singular nature. it is a familiar and tender friendship with a female, much about our own age; an affection perhaps softened by the secret influence of sex, and the sole species of platonic love that can be indulged with truth, and without danger. at the general election of , mr. gibbon and mr. delme stood an expensive and successful contest at southampton, against mr. dummer and mr. henly, afterwards lord chancellor and earl of northington. the whig candidates had a majority of the resident voters; but the corporation was firm in the tory interest: a sudden creation of one hundred and seventy new freemen turned the scale; and a supply was readily obtained of respectable volunteers, who flocked from all parts of england to support the cause of their political friends. the new parliament opened with the victory of an opposition, which was fortified by strong clamour and strange coalitions. from the event of the first divisions, sir robert walpole perceived that he could no longer lead a majority in the house of commons, and prudently resigned (after a dominion of one-and-twenty years) the guidance of the state ( ). but the fall of an unpopular minister was not succeeded, according to general expectation, by a millennium of happiness and virtue: some courtiers lost their places, some patriots lost their characters, lord orford's offences vanished with his power; and after a short vibration, the pelham government was fixed on the old basis of the whig aristocracy. in the year , the throne and the constitution were attacked by a rebellion, which does not reflect much honour on the national spirit; since the english friends of the pretender wanted courage to join his standard, and his enemies (the bulk of the people) allowed him to advance into the heart of the kingdom. without daring, perhaps without desiring, to aid the rebels, my father invariably adhered to the tory opposition. in the most critical season he accepted, for the service of the party, the office of alderman in the city of london: but the duties were so repugnant to his inclination and habits, that he resigned his gown at the end of a few months. the second parliament in which he sat was prematurely dissolved ( ): and as he was unable or unwilling to maintain a second contest for southampton, the life of the senator expired in that dissolution. the death of a new-born child before that of its parents may seem an unnatural, but it is strictly a probable, event: since of any given number the greater part are extinguished before their ninth year, before they possess the faculties of the mind or body. without accusing the profuse waste or imperfect workmanship of nature, i shall only observe, that this unfavourable chance was multiplied against my infant existence. so feeble was my constitution, so precarious my life, that, in the baptism of each of my brothers, my father's prudence successively repeated my christian name of edward, that, in case of the departure of the eldest son, this patronymic appellation might be still perpetuated in the family. --uno avulso non deficit alter. to preserve and to rear so frail a being, the most tender assiduity was scarcely sufficient, and my mother's attention was somewhat diverted by an exclusive passion for her husband, and by the dissipation of the world, in which his taste and authority obliged her to mingle. but the maternal office was supplied by my aunt, mrs. catherine porten; at whose name i feel a tear of gratitude trickling down my cheek. a life of celibacy transferred her vacant affection to her sister's first child; my weakness excited her pity; her attachment was fortified by labour and success: and if there be any, as i trust there are some, who rejoice that i live, to that dear and excellent woman they must hold themselves indebted. many anxious and solitary days did she consume in the patient trial of every mode of relief and amusement. many wakeful nights did she sit by my bedside in trembling expectation that each hour would be my last. of the various and frequent disorders of my childhood my own recollection is dark. suffice it to say, that while every practitioner, from sloane and ward to the chevalier taylor, was successively summoned to torture or relieve me, the care of my mind was too frequently neglected for that of my health: compassion always suggested an excuse for the indulgence of the master, or the idleness of the pupil; and the chain of my education was broken, as often as i was recalled from the school of learning to the bed of sickness. as soon as the use of speech had prepared my infant reason for the admission of knowledge, i was taught the arts of reading, writing, and arithmetic. so remote is the date, so vague is the memory of their origin in myself, that, were not the error corrected by analogy, i should be tempted to conceive them as innate. in my childhood i was praised for the readiness with which i could multiply and divide, by memory alone, two sums of several figures; such praise encouraged my growing talent; and had i persevered in this line of application, i might have acquired some fame in mathematical studies. after this previous institution at home, or at a day school at putney, i was delivered at the age of seven into the hands of mr. john kirkby, who exercised about eighteen months the office of my domestic tutor. his learning and virtue introduced him to my father; and at putney he might have found at least a temporary shelter, had not an act of indiscretion driven him into the world. one day reading prayers in the parish church, he most unluckily forgot the name of king george: his patron, a loyal subject, dismissed him with some reluctance, and a decent reward; and how the poor man ended his days i have never been able to learn. mr. john kirkby is the author of two small volumes; the life of automathes (london, ), and an english and latin grammar (london, ); which, as a testimony of gratitude, he dedicated (nov. th, ) to my father. the books are before me: from them the pupil may judge the preceptor; and, upon the whole, his judgment will not be unfavourable. the grammar is executed with accuracy and skill, and i know not whether any better existed at the time in our language: but the life of automathes aspires to the honours of a philosophical fiction. it is the story of a youth, the son of a ship-wrecked exile, who lives alone on a desert island from infancy to the age of manhood. a hind is his nurse; he inherits a cottage, with many useful and curious instruments; some ideas remain of the education of his two first years; some arts are borrowed from the beavers of a neighbouring lake; some truths are revealed in supernatural visions. with these helps, and his own industry, automathes becomes a self-taught though speechless philosopher, who had investigated with success his own mind, the natural world, the abstract sciences, and the great principles of morality and religion. the author is not entitled to the merit of invention, since he has blended the english story of robinson crusoe with the arabian romance of hai ebn yokhdan, which he might have read in the latin version of pocock. in the automathes i cannot praise either the depth of thought or elegance of style; but the book is not devoid of entertainment or instruction; and among several interesting passages, i would select the discovery of fire, which produces by accidental mischief the discovery of conscience. a man who had thought so much on the subjects of language and education was surely no ordinary preceptor: my childish years, and his hasty departure, prevented me from enjoying the full benefit of his lessons; but they enlarged my knowledge of arithmetic, and left me a clear impression of the english and latin rudiments. in my ninth year (jan., ), in a lucid interval of comparative health, my father adopted the convenient and customary mode of english education; and i was sent to kingston-upon-thames, to a school of about seventy boys, which was kept by dr. wooddeson and his assistants. every time i have since passed over putney common, i have always noticed the spot where my mother, as we drove along in the coach, admonished me that i was now going into the world, and must learn to think and act for myself. the expression may appear ludicrous; yet there is not, in the course of life, a more remarkable change than the removal of a child from the luxury and freedom of a wealthy house, to the frugal diet and strict subordination of a school; from the tenderness of parents, and the obsequiousness of servants, to the rude familiarity of his equals, the insolent tyranny of his seniors, and the rod, perhaps, of a cruel and capricious pedagogue. such hardships may steel the mind and body against the injuries of fortune; but my timid reserve was astonished by the crowd and tumult of the school; the want of strength and activity disqualified me for the sports of the play-field; nor have i forgotten how often in the year forty-six i was reviled and buffeted for the sins of my tory ancestors. by the common methods of discipline, at the expence of many tears and some blood, i purchased the knowledge of the latin syntax: and not long since i was possessed of the dirty volumes of phaedrus and cornelius nepos, which i painfully construed and darkly understood. the choice of these authors is not injudicious. the lives of cornelius nepos, the friend of atticus and cicero, are composed in the style of the purest age: his simplicity is elegant, his brevity copious; he exhibits a series of men and manners; and with such illustrations, as every pedant is not indeed qualified to give, this classic biographer may initiate a young student in the history of greece and rome. the use of fables or apologues has been approved in every age from ancient india to modern europe. they convey in familiar images the truths of morality and prudence; and the most childish understanding (i advert to the scruples of rousseau) will not suppose either that beasts do speak, or that men may lie. a fable represents the genuine characters of animals; and a skilful master might extract from pliny and buffon some pleasing lessons of natural history, a science well adapted to the taste and capacity of children. the latinity of phaedrus is not exempt from an alloy of the silver age; but his manner is concise, terse, and sententious; the thracian slave discreetly breathes the spirit of a freeman; and when the text is found, the style is perspicuous. but his fables, after a long oblivion, were first published by peter pithou, from a corrupt manuscript. the labours of fifty editors confess the defects of the copy, as well as the value of the original; and the school-boy may have been whipped for misapprehending a passage, which bentley could not restore, and which burman could not explain. my studies were too frequently interrupted by sickness; and after a real or nominal residence at kingston school of near two years, i was finally recalled (dec., ) by my mother's death, in her thirty-eighth year. i was too young to feel the importance of my loss; and the image of her person and conversation is faintly imprinted in my memory. the affectionate heart of my aunt, catherine porten, bewailed a sister and a friend; but my poor father was inconsolable, and the transport of grief seemed to threaten his life or his reason. i can never forget the scene of our first interview, some weeks after the fatal event; the awful silence, the room hung with black, the mid-day tapers, his sighs and tears; his praises of my mother, a saint in heaven; his solemn adjuration that i would cherish her memory and imitate her virtues; and the fervor with which he kissed and blessed me as the sole surviving pledge of their loves. the storm of passion insensibly subsided into calmer melancholy. at a convivial meeting of his friends, mr. gibbon might affect or enjoy a gleam of cheerfulness; but his plan of happiness was for ever destroyed: and after the loss of his companion he was left alone in a world, of which the business and pleasures were to him irksome or insipid. after some unsuccessful trials he renounced the tumult of london and the hospitality of putney, and buried himself in the rural or rather rustic solitude of beriton; from which, during several years, he seldom emerged. as far back as i can remember, the house, near putney-bridge and churchyard, of my maternal grandfather appears in the light of my proper and native home. it was there that i was allowed to spend the greatest part of my time, in sickness or in health, during my school vacations and my parents' residence in london, and finally after my mother's death. three months after that event, in the spring of , the commercial ruin of her father, mr. james porten, was accomplished and declared. he suddenly absconded: but as his effects were not sold, nor the house evacuated, till the christmas following, i enjoyed during the whole year the society of my aunt, without much consciousness of her impending fate. i feel a melancholy pleasure in repeating my obligations to that excellent woman, mrs. catherine porten, the true mother of my mind as well as of my health. her natural good sense was improved by the perusal of the best books in the english language; and if her reason was sometimes clouded by prejudice, her sentiments were never disguised by hypocrisy or affectation. her indulgent tenderness, the frankness of her temper, and my innate rising curiosity, soon removed all distance between us: like friends of an equal age, we freely conversed on every topic, familiar or abstruse; and it was her delight and reward to observe the first shoots of my young ideas. pain and languor were often soothed by the voice of instruction and amusement; and to her kind lessons i ascribe my early and invincible love of reading, which i would not exchange for the treasures of india. i should perhaps be astonished, were it possible to ascertain the date, at which a favourite tale was engraved, by frequent repetition, in my memory: the cavern of the winds; the palace of felicity; and the fatal moment, at the end of three months or centuries, when prince adolphus is overtaken by time, who had worn out so many pair of wings in the pursuit. before i left kingston school i was well acquainted with pope's homer and the arabian nights entertainments, two books which will always please by the moving picture of human manners and specious miracles: nor was i then capable of discerning that pope's translation is a portrait endowed with every merit, excepting that of likeness to the original. the verses of pope accustomed my ear to the sound of poetic harmony: in the death of hector, and the shipwreck of ulysses, i tasted the new emotions of terror and pity; and seriously disputed with my aunt on the vices and virtues of the heroes of the trojan war. from pope's homer to dryden's virgil was an easy transition; but i know not how, from some fault in the author, the translator, or the reader, the pious aeneas did not so forcibly seize on my imagination; and i derived more pleasure from ovid's metamorphoses, especially in the fall of phaeton, and the speeches of ajax and ulysses. my grand-father's flight unlocked the door of a tolerable library; and i turned over many english pages of poetry and romance, of history and travels. where a title attracted my eye, without fear or awe i snatched the volume from the shelf; and mrs. porten, who indulged herself in moral and religious speculations, was more prone to encourage than to check a curiosity above the strength of a boy. this year ( ), the twelfth of my age, i shall note as the most propitious to the growth of my intellectual stature. the relics of my grandfather's fortune afforded a bare annuity for his own maintenance; and his daughter, my worthy aunt, who had already passed her fortieth year, was left destitute. her noble spirit scorned a life of obligation and dependence; and after revolving several schemes, she preferred the humble industry of keeping a boarding-house for westminster-school, where she laboriously earned a competence for her old age. this singular opportunity of blending the advantages of private and public education decided my father. after the christmas holidays in january, , i accompanied mrs. porten to her new house in college-street; and was immediately entered in the school of which dr. john nicoll was at that time head-master. at first i was alone: but my aunt's resolution was praised; her character was esteemed; her friends were numerous and active: in the course of some years she became the mother of forty or fifty boys, for the most part of family and fortune; and as her primitive habitation was too narrow, she built and occupied a spacious mansion in dean's yard. i shall always be ready to join in the common opinion that our public schools, which have produced so many eminent characters, are the best adapted to the genius and constitution of the english people. a boy of spirit may acquire a previous and practical experience of the world; and his playfellows may be the future friends of his heart or his interest. in a free intercourse with his equals, the habits of truth, fortitude, and prudence will insensibly be matured. birth and riches are measured by the standard of personal merit; and the mimic scene of a rebellion has displayed, in their true colours, the ministers and patriots of the rising generation. our seminaries of learning do not exactly correspond with the precept of a spartan king, "that the child should be instructed in the arts, which will be useful to the man;" since a finished scholar may emerge from the head of westminster or eton, in total ignorance of the business and conversation of english gentlemen in the latter end of the eighteenth century. but these schools may assume the merit of teaching all that they pretend to teach, the latin and greek languages: they deposit in the hands of a disciple the keys of two valuable chests; nor can he complain, if they are afterwards lost or neglected by his own fault. the necessity of leading in equal ranks so many unequal powers of capacity and application, will prolong to eight or ten years the juvenile studies, which might be despatched in half that time by the skilful master of a single pupil. yet even the repetition of exercise and discipline contributes to fix in a vacant mind the verbal science of grammar and prosody: and the private or voluntary student, who possesses the sense and spirit of the classics, may offend, by a false quantity, the scrupulous ear of a well-flogged critic. for myself, i must be content with a very small share of the civil and literary fruits of a public school. in the space of two years ( , ), interrupted by danger and debility, i painfully climbed into the third form; and my riper age was left to acquire the beauties of the latin, and the rudiments of the greek tongue. instead of audaciously mingling in the sports, the quarrels, and the connections of our little world, i was still cherished at home under the maternal wing of my aunt; and my removal from westminster long preceded the approach of manhood. the violence and variety of my complaint, which had excused my frequent absence from westminster school, at length engaged mrs. porten, with the advice of physicians, to conduct me to bath: at the end of the michaelmas vacation ( ) she quitted me with reluctance, and i remained several months under the care of a trusty maid-servant. a strange nervous affection, which alternately contracted my legs, and produced, without any visible symptoms, the most excruciating pain, was ineffectually opposed by the various methods of bathing and pumping. from bath i was transported to winchester, to the house of a physician; and after the failure of his medical skill, we had again recourse to the virtues of the bath waters. during the intervals of these fits, i moved with my father to beriton and putney; and a short unsuccessful trial was attempted to renew my attendance at westminster school. but my infirmities could not be reconciled with the hours and discipline of a public seminary; and instead of a domestic tutor, who might have watched the favourable moments, and gently advanced the progress of my learning, my father was too easily content with such occasional teachers as the different places of my residence could supply. i was never forced, and seldom was i persuaded, to admit these lessons: yet i read with a clergyman at bath some odes of horace, and several episodes of virgil, which gave me an imperfect and transient enjoyment of the latin poets. it might now be apprehended that i should continue for life an illiterate cripple; but, as i approached my sixteenth year, nature displayed in my favour her mysterious energies: my constitution was fortified and fixed; and my disorders, instead of growing with my growth and strengthening with my strength, most wonderfully vanished. i have never possessed or abused the insolence of health: but since that time few persons have been more exempt from real or imaginary ills; and, till i am admonished by the gout, the reader will no more be troubled with the history of my bodily complaints. my unexpected recovery again encouraged the hope of my education; and i was placed at esher, in surrey, in the house of the reverend mr. philip francis, in a pleasant spot, which promised to unite the various benefits of air, exercise, and study (jan., ). the translator of horace might have taught me to relish the latin poets, had not my friends discovered in a few weeks, that he preferred the pleasures of london, to the instruction of his pupils. my father's perplexity at this time, rather than his prudence, was urged to embrace a singular and desperate measure. without preparation or delay he carried me to oxford; and i was matriculated in the university as a gentleman commoner of magdalen college, before i had accomplished the fifteenth year of my age (april , ). the curiosity, which had been implanted in my infant mind, was still alive and active; but my reason was not sufficiently informed to understand the value, or to lament the loss, of three precious years from my entrance at westminster to my admission at oxford. instead of repining at my long and frequent confinement to the chamber or the couch, i secretly rejoiced in those infirmities, which delivered me from the exercises of the school, and the society of my equals. as often as i was tolerably exempt from danger and pain, reading, free desultory reading, was the employment and comfort of my solitary hours. at westminster, my aunt sought only to amuse and indulge me; in my stations at bath and winchester, at beriton and putney, a false compassion respected my sufferings; and i was allowed, without controul or advice, to gratify the wanderings of an unripe taste. my indiscriminate appetite subsided by degrees in the historic line: and since philosophy has exploded all innate ideas and natural propensities, i must ascribe this choice to the assiduous perusal of the universal history, as the octavo volumes successively appeared. this unequal work, and a treatise of hearne, the ductor historicus, referred and introduced me to the greek and roman historians, to as many at least as were accessible to an english reader. all that i could find were greedily devoured, from littlebury's lame herodotus, and spelman's valuable xenophon, to the pompous folios of gordon's tacitus, and a ragged procopius of the beginning of the last century. the cheap acquisition of so much knowledge confirmed my dislike to the study of languages; and i argued with mrs. porten, that, were i master of greek and latin, i must interpret to myself in english the thoughts of the original, and that such extemporary versions must be inferior to the elaborate translations of professed scholars; a silly sophism, which could not easily be confuted by a person ignorant of any other language than her own. from the ancient i leaped to the modern world: many crude lumps of speed, rapin, mezeray, davila, machiavel, father paul, bower, &c., i devoured like so many novels; and i swallowed with the same voracious appetite the descriptions of india and china, of mexico and peru. my first introduction to the historic scenes, which have since engaged so many years of my life, must be ascribed to an accident. in the summer of , i accompanied my father on a visit to mr. hoare's, in wiltshire; but i was less delighted with the beauties of stourhead, than with discovering in the library a common book, the continuation of echard's roman history, which is indeed executed with more skill and taste than the previous work. to me the reigns of the successors of constantine were absolutely new; and i was immersed in the passage of the goths over the danube, when the summons of the dinner-bell reluctantly dragged me from my intellectual feast. this transient glance served rather to irritate than to appease my curiosity; and as soon as i returned to bath i procured the second and third volumes of howel's history of the world, which exhibit the byzantine period on a larger scale. mahomet and his saracens soon fixed my attention; and some instinct of criticism directed me to the genuine sources. simon ockley, an original in every sense, first opened my eyes; and i was led from one book to another, till i had ranged round the circle of oriental history. before i was sixteen, i had exhausted all that could be learned in english of the arabs and persians, the tartars and turks; and the same ardour urged me to guess at the french of d'herbelot, and to construe the barbarous latin of pocock's abulfaragius. such vague and multifarious reading could not teach me to think, to write, or to act; and the only principle that darted a ray of light into the indigested chaos, was an early and rational application to the order of time and place. the maps of cellarius and wells imprinted in my mind the picture of ancient geography: from stranchius i imbibed the elements of chronology: the tables of helvicus and anderson, the annals of usher and prideaux, distinguished the connection of events, and engraved the multitude of names and dates in a clear and indelible series. but in the discussion of the first ages i overleaped the bounds of modesty and use. in my childish balance i presumed to weigh the systems of scaliger and petavius, of marsham and newton, which i could seldom study in the originals; and my sleep has been disturbed by the difficulty of reconciling the septuagint with the hebrew computation. i arrived at oxford with a stock of erudition, that might have puzzled a doctor, and a degree of ignorance, of which a school-boy would have been ashamed. at the conclusion of this first period of my life, i am tempted to enter a protest against the trite and lavish praise of the happiness of our boyish years, which is echoed with so much affectation in the world. that happiness i have never known, that time i have never regretted; and were my poor aunt still alive, she would bear testimony to the early and constant uniformity of my sentiments. it will indeed be replied, that i am not a competent judge; that pleasure is incompatible with pain; that joy is excluded from sickness; and that the felicity of a schoolboy consists in the perpetual motion of thoughtless and playful agility, in which i was never qualified to excel. my name, it is most true, could never be enrolled among the sprightly race, the idle progeny of eton or westminster, "who foremost may delight to cleave, with pliant arm, the glassy wave, or urge the flying ball." the poet may gaily describe the short hours of recreation; but he forgets the daily tedious labours of the school, which is approached each morning with anxious and reluctant steps. a traveller, who visits oxford or cambridge, is surprised and edified by the apparent order and tranquillity that prevail in the seats of the english muses. in the most celebrated universities of holland, germany, and italy, the students, who swarm from different countries, are loosely dispersed in private lodgings at the houses of the burghers: they dress according to their fancy and fortune; and in the intemperate quarrels of youth and wine, their swords, though less frequently than of old, are sometimes stained with each other's blood. the use of arms is banished from our english universities; the uniform habit of the academics, the square cap, and black gown, is adapted to the civil and even clerical profession; and from the doctor in divinity to the under-graduate, the degrees of learning and age are externally distinguished. instead of being scattered in a town, the students of oxford and cambridge are united in colleges; their maintenance is provided at their own expense, or that of the founders; and the stated hours of the hall and chapel represent the discipline of a regular, and, as it were, a religious community. the eyes of the traveller are attracted by the size or beauty of the public edifices; and the principal colleges appear to be so many palaces, which a liberal nation has erected and endowed for the habitation of science. my own introduction to the university of oxford forms a new aera in my life; and at the distance of forty years i still remember my first emotions of surprise and satisfaction. in my fifteenth year i felt myself suddenly raised from a boy to a man: the persons, whom i respected as my superiors in age and academical rank, entertained me with every mark of attention and civility; and my vanity was flattered by the velvet cap and silk gown, which distinguish a gentleman commoner from a plebeian student. a decent allowance, more money than a schoolboy had ever seen, was at my own disposal; and i might command, among the tradesmen of oxford, an indefinite and dangerous latitude of credit. a key was delivered into my hands, which gave me the free use of a numerous and learned library; my apartment consisted of three elegant and well-furnished rooms in the new building, a stately pile, of magdalen college; and the adjacent walks, had they been frequented by plato's disciples, might have been compared to the attic shade on the banks of the ilissus. such was the fair prospect of my entrance (april , ) into the university of oxford. a venerable prelate, whose taste and erudition must reflect honour on the society in which they were formed, has drawn a very interesting picture of his academical life.--"i was educated (says bishop lowth) in the university of oxford. i enjoyed all the advantages, both public and private, which that famous seat of learning so largely affords. i spent many years in that illustrious society, in a well-regulated course of useful discipline and studies, and in the agreeable and improving commerce of gentlemen and of scholars; in a society where emulation without envy, ambition without jealousy, contention without animosity, incited industry, and awakened genius; where a liberal pursuit of knowledge, and a genuine freedom of thought, were raised, encouraged, and pushed forward by example, by commendation, and by authority. i breathed the same atmosphere that the hookers, the chillingworths, and the lockes had breathed before; whose benevolence and humanity were as extensive as their vast genius and comprehensive knowledge; who always treated their adversaries with civility and respect; who made candour, moderation, and liberal judgment as much the rule and law as the subject of their discourse. and do you reproach me with my education in this place, and with my relation to this most respectable body, which i shall always esteem my greatest advantage and my highest honour?" i transcribe with pleasure this eloquent passage, without examining what benefits or what rewards were derived by hooker, or chillingworth, or locke, from their academical institution; without inquiring, whether in this angry controversy the spirit of lowth himself is purified from the intolerant zeal, which warburton had ascribed to the genius of the place. it may indeed be observed, that the atmosphere of oxford did not agree with mr. locke's constitution; and that the philosopher justly despised the academical bigots, who expelled his person and condemned his principles. the expression of gratitude is a virtue and a pleasure: a liberal mind will delight to cherish and celebrate the memory of its parents; and the teachers of science are the parents of the mind. i applaud the filial piety, which it is impossible for me to imitate; since i must not confess an imaginary debt, to assume the merit of a just or generous retribution. to the university of oxford i acknowledge no obligation; and she will as cheerfully renounce me for a son, as i am willing to disclaim her for a mother. i spent fourteen months at magdalen college; they proved the fourteen months the most idle and unprofitable of my whole life: the reader will pronounce between the school and the scholar; but i cannot affect to believe that nature had disqualified me for all literary pursuits. the specious and ready excuse of my tender age, imperfect preparation, and hasty departure, may doubtless be alleged; nor do i wish to defraud such excuses of their proper weight. yet in my sixteenth year i was not devoid of capacity or application; even my childish reading had displayed an early though blind propensity for books; and the shallow flood might have been taught to flow in a deep channel and a clear stream. in the discipline of a well-constituted academy, under the guidance of skilful and vigilant professors, i should gradually have risen from translations to originals, from the latin to the greek classics, from dead languages to living science: my hours would have been occupied by useful and agreeable studies, the wanderings of fancy would have been restrained, and i should have escaped the temptations of idleness, which finally precipitated my departure from oxford. perhaps in a separate annotation i may coolly examine the fabulous and real antiquities of our sister universities, a question which has kindled such fierce and foolish disputes among their fanatic sons. in the meanwhile it will be acknowledged that these venerable bodies are sufficiently old to partake of all the prejudices and infirmities of age. the schools of oxford and cambridge were founded in a dark age of false and barbarous science; and they are still tainted with the vices of their origin. their primitive discipline was adapted to the education of priests and monks; and the government still remains in the hands of the clergy, an order of men whose manners are remote from the present world, and whose eyes are dazzled by the light of philosophy. the legal incorporation of these societies by the charters of popes and kings had given them a monopoly of the public instruction; and the spirit of monopolists is narrow, lazy, and oppressive; their work is more costly and less productive than that of independent artists; and the new improvements so eagerly grasped by the competition of freedom, are admitted with slow and sullen reluctance in those proud corporations, above the fear of a rival, and below the confession of an error. we may scarcely hope that any reformation will be a voluntary act; and so deeply are they rooted in law and prejudice, that even the omnipotence of parliament would shrink from an inquiry into the state and abuses of the two universities. the use of academical degrees, as old as the thirteenth century, is visibly borrowed from the mechanic corporations; in which an apprentice, after serving his time, obtains a testimonial of his skill, and a licence to practise his trade and mystery. it is not my design to depreciate those honours, which could never gratify or disappoint my ambition; and i should applaud the institution, if the degrees of bachelor or licentiate were bestowed as the reward of manly and successful study: if the name and rank of doctor or master were strictly reserved for the professors of science, who have approved their title to the public esteem. in all the universities of europe, excepting our own, the languages and sciences are distributed among a numerous list of effective professors: the students, according to their taste, their calling, and their diligence, apply themselves to the proper masters; and in the annual repetition of public and private lectures, these masters are assiduously employed. our curiosity may inquire what number of professors has been instituted at oxford? (for i shall now confine myself to my own university;) by whom are they appointed, and what may be the probable chances of merit or incapacity; how many are stationed to the three faculties, and how many are left for the liberal arts? what is the form, and what the substance, of their lessons? but all these questions are silenced by one short and singular answer, "that in the university of oxford, the greater part of the public professors have for these many years given up altogether even the pretence of teaching." incredible as the fact may appear, i must rest my belief on the positive and impartial evidence of a master of moral and political wisdom, who had himself resided at oxford. dr. adam smith assigns as the cause of their indolence, that, instead of being paid by voluntary contributions, which would urge them to increase the number, and to deserve the gratitude of their pupils, the oxford professors are secure in the enjoyment of a fixed stipend, without the necessity of labour, or the apprehension of controul. it has indeed been observed, nor is the observation absurd, that excepting in experimental sciences, which demand a costly apparatus and a dexterous hand, the many valuable treatises, that have been published on every subject of learning, may now supersede the ancient mode of oral instruction. were this principle true in its utmost latitude, i should only infer that the offices and salaries, which are become useless, ought without delay to be abolished. but there still remains a material difference between a book and a professor; the hour of the lecture enforces attendance; attention is fixed by the presence, the voice, and the occasional questions of the teacher; the most idle will carry something away; and the more diligent will compare the instructions, which they have heard in the school, with the volumes, which they peruse in their chamber. the advice of a skilful professor will adapt a course of reading to every mind and every situation; his authority will discover, admonish, and at last chastise the negligence of his disciples; and his vigilant inquiries will ascertain the steps of their literary progress. whatever science he professes he may illustrate in a series of discourses, composed in the leisure of his closet, pronounced on public occasions, and finally delivered to the press. i observe with pleasure, that in the university of oxford dr. lowth, with equal eloquence and erudition, has executed this task in his incomparable praelections on the poetry of the hebrews. the college of st. mary magdalen was founded in the fifteenth century by wainfleet, bishop of winchester; and now consists of a president, forty fellows, and a number of inferior students. it is esteemed one of the largest and most wealthy of our academical corporations, which may be compared to the benedictine abbeys of catholic countries; and i have loosely heard that the estates belonging to magdalen college, which are leased by those indulgent landlords at small quit-rents and occasional fines, might be raised, in the hands of private avarice, to an annual revenue of nearly thirty thousand pounds. our colleges are supposed to be schools of science, as well as of education; nor is it unreasonable to expect that a body of literary men, devoted to a life of celibacy, exempt from the care of their own subsistence, and amply provided with books, should devote their leisure to the prosecution of study, and that some effects of their studies should be manifested to the world. the shelves of their library groan under the weight of the benedictine folios, of the editions of the fathers, and the collections of the middle ages, which have issued from the single abbey of st. germain de prez at paris. a composition of genius must be the offspring of one mind; but such works of industry, as may be divided among many hands, and must be continued during many years, are the peculiar province of a laborious community. if i inquire into the manufactures of the monks of magdalen, if i extend the inquiry to the other colleges of oxford and cambridge, a silent blush, or a scornful frown, will be the only reply. the fellows or monks of my time were decent easy men, who supinely enjoyed the gifts of the founder; their days were filled by a series of uniform employments; the chapel and the hall, the coffee-house and the common room, till they retired, weary and well satisfied, to a long slumber. from the toil of reading, or thinking, or writing, they had absolved their conscience; and the first shoots of learning and ingenuity withered on the ground, without yielding any fruits to the owners or the public. as a gentleman commoner, i was admitted to the society of the fellows, and fondly expected that some questions of literature would be the amusing and instructive topics of their discourse. their conversation stagnated in a round of college business, tory politics, personal anecdotes, and private scandal: their dull and deep potations excused the brisk intemperance of youth; and their constitutional toasts were not expressive of the most lively loyalty for the house of hanover. a general election was now approaching: the great oxfordshire contest already blazed with all the malevolence of party-zeal. magdalen college was devoutly attached to the old interest! and the names of wenman and dashwood were more frequently pronounced, than those of cicero and chrysostom. the example of the senior fellows could not inspire the under-graduates with a liberal spirit or studious emulation; and i cannot describe, as i never knew, the discipline of college. some duties may possibly have been imposed on the poor scholars, whose ambition aspired to the peaceful honours of a fellowship (ascribi quietis ordinibus-- --deorum); but no independent members were admitted below the rank of a gentleman commoner, and our velvet cap was the cap of liberty. a tradition prevailed that some of our predecessors had spoken latin declamations in the hall; but of this ancient custom no vestige remained: the obvious methods of public exercises and examinations were totally unknown; and i have never heard that either the president or the society interfered in the private economy of the tutors and their pupils. the silence of the oxford professors, which deprives the youth of public instruction, is imperfectly supplied by the tutors, as they are styled, of the several colleges. instead of confining themselves to a single science, which had satisfied the ambition of burman or bernoulli, they teach, or promise to teach, either history or mathematics, or ancient literature, or moral philosophy; and as it is possible that they may be defective in all, it is highly probable that of some they will be ignorant. they are paid, indeed, by voluntary contributions; but their appointment depends on the head of the house: their diligence is voluntary, and will consequently be languid, while the pupils themselves, or their parents, are not indulged in the liberty of choice or change. the first tutor into whose hands i was resigned appears to have been one of the best of the tribe: dr. waldegrave was a learned and pious man, of a mild disposition, strict morals, and abstemious life, who seldom mingled in the politics or the jollity of the college. but his knowledge of the world was confined to the university; his learning was of the last, rather than the present age; his temper was indolent; his faculties, which were not of the first rate, had been relaxed by the climate, and he was satisfied, like his fellows, with the slight and superficial discharge of an important trust. as soon as my tutor had sounded the insufficiency of his pupil in school-learning, he proposed that we should read every morning from ten to eleven the comedies of terence. the sum of my improvement in the university of oxford is confined to three or four latin plays; and even the study of an elegant classic, which might have been illustrated by a comparison of ancient and modern theatres, was reduced to a dry and literal interpretation of the author's text. during the first weeks i constantly attended these lessons in my tutor's room; but as they appeared equally devoid of profit and pleasure i was once tempted to try the experiment of a formal apology. the apology was accepted with a smile. i repeated the offence with less ceremony; the excuse was admitted with the same indulgence: the slightest motive of laziness or indisposition, the most trifling avocation at home or abroad, was allowed as a worthy impediment; nor did my tutor appear conscious of my absence or neglect. had the hour of lecture been constantly filled, a single hour was a small portion of my academic leisure. no plan of study was recommended for my use; no exercises were prescribed for his inspection; and, at the most precious season of youth, whole days and weeks were suffered to elapse without labour or amusement, without advice or account. i should have listened to the voice of reason and of my tutor; his mild behaviour had gained my confidence. i preferred his society to that of the younger students; and in our evening walks to the top of heddington-hill, we freely conversed on a variety of subjects. since the days of pocock and hyde, oriental learning has always been the pride of oxford, and i once expressed an inclination to study arabic. his prudence discouraged this childish fancy; but he neglected the fair occasion of directing the ardour of a curious mind. during my absence in the summer vacation, dr. waldegrave accepted a college living at washington in sussex, and on my return i no longer found him at oxford. from that time i have lost sight of my first tutor; but at the end of thirty years ( ) he was still alive; and the practice of exercise and temperance had entitled him to a healthy old age. the long recess between the trinity and michaelmas terms empties the colleges of oxford, as well as the courts of westminster. i spent, at my father's house at beriton in hampshire, the two months of august and september. it is whimsical enough, that as soon as i left magdalen college, my taste for books began to revive; but it was the same blind and boyish taste for the pursuit of exotic history. unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, i resolved to write a book. the title of this first essay, the age of sesostris, was perhaps suggested by voltaire's age of lewis xiv. which was new and popular; but my sole object was to investigate the probable date of the life and reign of the conqueror of asia. i was then enamoured of sir john marsham's canon chronicus; an elaborate work, of whose merits and defects i was not yet qualified to judge. according to his specious, though narrow plan, i settled my hero about the time of solomon, in the tenth century before the christian era. it was therefore incumbent on me, unless i would adopt sir isaac newton's shorter chronology, to remove a formidable objection; and my solution, for a youth of fifteen, is not devoid of ingenuity. in his version of the sacred books, manetho, high priest has identified sethosis, or sesostris, with the elder brother of danaus, who landed in greece, according to the parian marble, fifteen hundred and ten years before christ. but in my supposition the high priest is guilty of a voluntary error; flattery is the prolific parent of falsehood. manetho's history of egypt is dedicated to ptolemy philadelphus, who derived a fabulous or illegitimate pedigree from the macedonian kings of the race of hercules. danaus is the ancestor of hercules; and after the failure of the elder branch, his descendants, the ptolemies, are the sole representatives of the royal family, and may claim by inheritance the kingdom which they hold by conquest. such were my juvenile discoveries; at a riper age i no longer presume to connect the greek, the jewish, and the egyptian antiquities, which are lost in a distant cloud. nor is this the only instance, in which the belief and knowledge of the child are superseded by the more rational ignorance of the man. during my stay at beriton, my infant-labour was diligently prosecuted, without much interruption from company or country diversions; and i already heard the music of public applause. the discovery of my own weakness was the first symptom of taste. on my return to oxford, the age of sesostris was wisely relinquished; but the imperfect sheets remained twenty years at the bottom of a drawer, till, in a general clearance of papers (nov., ,) they were committed to the flames. after the departure of dr. waldegrave, i was transferred, with his other pupils, to his academical heir, whose literary character did not command the respect of the college. dr--- well remembered that he had a salary to receive, and only forgot that he had a duty to perform. instead of guiding the studies, and watching over the behaviour of his disciple, i was never summoned to attend even the ceremony of a lecture; and, excepting one voluntary visit to his rooms, during the eight months of his titular office, the tutor and pupil lived in the same college as strangers to each other. the want of experience, of advice, and of occupation, soon betrayed me into some improprieties of conduct, ill-chosen company, late hours, and inconsiderate expense. my growing debts might be secret; but my frequent absence was visible and scandalous: and a tour to bath, a visit into buckingham-shire, and four excursions to london in the same winter, were costly and dangerous frolics. they were, indeed, without a meaning, as without an excuse. the irksomeness of a cloistered life repeatedly tempted me to wander; but my chief pleasure was that of travelling; and i was too young and bashful to enjoy, like a manly oxonian in town, the pleasures of london. in all these excursions i eloped from oxford; i returned to college; in a few days i eloped again, as if i had been an independent stranger in a hired lodging, without once hearing the voice of admonition, without once feeling the hand of control. yet my time was lost, my expenses were multiplied, my behaviour abroad was unknown; folly as well as vice should have awakened the attention of my superiors, and my tender years would have justified a more than ordinary degree of restraint and discipline. it might at least be expected, that an ecclesiastical school should inculcate the orthodox principles of religion. but our venerable mother had contrived to unite the opposite extremes of bigotry and indifference: an heretic, or unbeliever, was a monster in her eyes; but she was always, or often, or sometimes, remiss in the spiritual education of her own children. according to the statutes of the university, every student, before he is matriculated, must subscribe his assent to the thirty-nine articles of the church of england, which are signed by more than read, and read by more than believe them. my insufficient age excused me, however, from the immediate performance of this legal ceremony; and the vice-chancellor directed me to return, as soon as i should have accomplished my fifteenth year; recommending me, in the mean while, to the instruction of my college. my college forgot to instruct: i forgot to return, and was myself forgotten by the first magistrate of the university. without a single lecture, either public or private, either christian or protestant, without any academical subscription, without any episcopal confirmation, i was left by the dim light of my catechism to grope my way to the chapel and communion-table, where i was admitted, without a question, how far, or by what means, i might be qualified to receive the sacrament. such almost incredible neglect was productive of the worst mischiefs. from my childhood i had been fond of religious disputation: my poor aunt has been often puzzled by the mysteries which she strove to believe; nor had the elastic spring been totally broken by the weight of the atmosphere of oxford. the blind activity of idleness urged me to advance without armour into the dangerous mazes of controversy; and at the age of sixteen, i bewildered myself in the errors of the church of rome. the progress of my conversion may tend to illustrate, at least, the history of my own mind. it was not long since dr. middleton's free inquiry had founded an alarm in the theological world: much ink and much gall had been spilt in the defence of the primitive miracles; and the two dullest of their champions were crowned with academic honours by the university of oxford. the name of middleton was unpopular; and his proscription very naturally led me to peruse his writings, and those of his antagonists. his bold criticism, which approaches the precipice of infidelity, produced on my mind a singular effect; and had i persevered in the communion of rome, i should now apply to my own fortune the prediction of the sibyl, --via prima salutis, quod minime reris, graia, pandetur ab urbe. the elegance of style and freedom of argument were repelled by a shield of prejudice. i still revered the character, or rather the names, of the saints and fathers whom dr. middleton exposes; nor could he destroy my implicit belief, that the gift of miraculous powers was continued in the church, during the first four or five centuries of christianity. but i was unable to resist the weight of historical evidence, that within the same period most of the leading doctrines of popery were already introduced in theory and practice: nor was my conclusion absurd, that miracles are the test of truth, and that the church must be orthodox and pure, which was so often approved by the visible interposition of the deity. the marvellous tales which are so boldly attested by the basils and chrysostoms, the austins and jeroms, compelled me to embrace the superior merits of celibacy, the institution of the monastic life, the use of the sign of the cross, of holy oil, and even of images, the invocation of saints, the worship of relics, the rudiments of purgatory in prayers for the dead, and the tremendous mystery of the sacrifice of the body and blood of christ, which insensibly swelled into the prodigy of transubstantiation. in these dispositions, and already more than half a convert, i formed an unlucky intimacy with a young gentleman of our college, whose name i shall spare. with a character less resolute, mr.--- had imbibed the same religious opinions; and some popish books, i know not through what channel, were conveyed into his possession. i read, i applauded, i believed the english translations of two famous works of bossuet, bishop of meaux, the exposition of the catholic doctrine, and the history of the protestant variations, achieved my conversion, and i surely fell by a noble hand. i have since examined the originals with a more discerning eye, and shall not hesitate to pronounce, that bossuet is indeed a master of all the weapons of controversy. in the exposition, a specious apology, the orator assumes, with consummate art, the tone of candour and simplicity; and the ten-horned monster is transformed, at his magic touch, into the milk-white hind, who must be loved as soon as she is seen. in the history, a bold and well-aimed attack, he displays, with a happy mixture of narrative and argument, the faults and follies, the changes and contradictions of our first reformers; whose variations (as he dexterously contends) are the mark of historical error, while the perpetual unity of the catholic church is the sign and test of infallible truth. to my present feelings it seems incredible that i should ever believe that i believed in transubstantiation. but my conqueror oppressed me with the sacramental words, "hoc est corpus meum," and dashed against each other the figurative half-meanings of the protestant sects: every objection was resolved into omnipotence; and after repeating at st. mary's the athanasian creed, i humbly acquiesced in the mystery of the real presence. "to take up half on trust, and half to try, name it not faith, but bungling bigotry, both knave and fool, the merchant we may call, to pay great sums, and to compound the small, for who would break with heaven, and would not break for all?" no sooner had i settled my new religion than i resolved to profess myself a catholic. youth is sincere and impetuous; and a momentary glow of enthusiasm had raised me above all temporal considerations. by the keen protestants, who would gladly retaliate the example of persecution, a clamour is raised of the increase of popery: and they are always loud to declaim against the toleration of priests and jesuits, who pervert so many of his majesty's subjects from their religion and allegiance. on the present occasion, the fall of one or more of her sons directed this clamour against the university: and it was confidently affirmed that popish missionaries were suffered, under various disguises, to introduce themselves into the colleges of oxford. but justice obliges me to declare, that, as far as relates to myself, this assertion is false; and that i never conversed with a priest, or even with a papist, till my resolution from books was absolutely fixed. in my last excursion to london, i addressed myself to mr. lewis, a roman catholic bookseller in russell-street, covent garden, who recommended me to a priest, of whose name and order i am at present ignorant. in our first interview he soon discovered that persuasion was needless. after sounding the motives and merits of my conversion he consented to admit me into the pale of the church; and at his feet on the eighth of june , i solemnly, though privately, abjured the errors of heresy. the seduction of an english youth of family and fortune was an act of as much danger as glory; but he bravely overlooked the danger, of which i was not then sufficiently informed. "where a person is reconciled to the see of rome, or procures others to be reconciled, the offence (says blackstone) amounts to high treason." and if the humanity of the age would prevent the execution of this sanguinary statute, there were other laws of a less odious cast, which condemned the priest to perpetual imprisonment, and transferred the proselyte's estate to his nearest relation. an elaborate controversial epistle, approved by my director, and addressed to my father, announced and justified the step which i had taken. my father was neither a bigot nor a philosopher; but his affection deplored the loss of an only son; and his good sense was astonished at my strange departure from the religion of my country. in the first sally of passion he divulged a secret which prudence might have suppressed, and the gates of magdalen college were for ever shut against my return. many years afterwards, when the name of gibbon was become as notorious as that of middleton, it was industriously whispered at oxford, that the historian had formerly "turned papist;" my character stood exposed to the reproach of inconstancy; and this invidious topic would have been handled without mercy by my opponents, could they have separated my cause from that of the university. for my own part, i am proud of an honest sacrifice of interest to conscience. i can never blush, if my tender mind was entangled in the sophistry that seduced the acute and manly understandings of chillingworth and bayle, who afterwards emerged from superstition to scepticism. while charles the first governed england, and was himself governed by a catholic queen, it cannot be denied that the missionaries of rome laboured with impunity and success in the court, the country, and even the universities. one of the sheep, --whom the grim wolf with privy paw daily devours apace, and nothing said, is mr. william chillingworth, master of arts, and fellow of trinity college, oxford; who, at the ripe age of twenty-eight years, was persuaded to elope from oxford, to the english seminary at douay in flanders. some disputes with fisher, a subtle jesuit, might first awaken him from the prejudices of education; but he yielded to his own victorious argument, "that there must be somewhere an infallible judge; and that the church of rome is the only christian society which either does or can pretend to that character." after a short trial of a few months, mr. chillingworth was again tormented by religious scruples: he returned home, resumed his studies, unravelled his mistakes, and delivered his mind from the yoke of authority and superstition. his new creed was built on the principle, that the bible is our sole judge, and private reason our sole interpreter: and he ably maintains this principle in the religion of a protestant, a book which, after startling the doctors of oxford, is still esteemed the most solid defence of the reformation. the learning, the virtue, the recent merits of the author, entitled him to fair preferment: but the slave had now broken his fetters; and the more he weighed, the less was he disposed to subscribe to the thirty-nine articles of the church of england. in a private letter he declares, with all the energy of language, that he could not subscribe to them without subscribing to his own damnation; and that if ever he should depart from this immoveable resolution, he would allow his friends to think him a madman, or an atheist. as the letter is without a date, we cannot ascertain the number of weeks or months that elapsed between this passionate abhorrence and the salisbury register, which is still extant. "ego gulielmus chillingworth,...... omnibus hisce articulis....... et singulis in iisdem contentis volens, et ex animo subscribo, et consensum meum iisdem praebeo. die julii ." but, alas! the chancellor and prebendary of sarum soon deviated from his own subscription: as he more deeply scrutinized the article of the trinity, neither scripture nor the primitive fathers could long uphold his orthodox belief; and he could not but confess, "that the doctrine of arius is either the truth, or at least no damnable heresy." from this middle region of the air, the descent of his reason would naturally rest on the firmer ground of the socinians: and if we may credit a doubtful story, and the popular opinion, his anxious inquiries at last subsided in philosophic indifference. so conspicuous, however, were the candour of his nature and the innocence of his heart, that this apparent levity did not affect the reputation of chillingworth. his frequent changes proceeded from too nice an inquisition into truth. his doubts grew out of himself; he assisted them with all the strength of his reason: he was then too hard for himself; but finding as little quiet and repose in those victories, he quickly recovered, by a new appeal to his own judgment: so that in all his sallies and retreats, he was in fact his own convert. bayle was the son of a calvinist minister in a remote province of france, at the foot of the pyrenees. for the benefit of education, the protestants were tempted to risk their children in the catholic universities; and in the twenty-second year of his age, young bayle was seduced by the arts and arguments of the jesuits of toulouse. he remained about seventeen months (mar. --aug. ) in their hands, a voluntary captive: and a letter to his parents, which the new convert composed or subscribed (april ), is darkly tinged with the spirit of popery. but nature had designed him to think as he pleased, and to speak as he thought: his piety was offended by the excessive worship of creatures; and the study of physics convinced him of the impossibility of transubstantiation, which is abundantly refuted by the testimony of our senses. his return to the communion of a falling sect was a bold and disinterested step, that exposed him to the rigour of the laws; and a speedy flight to geneva protected him from the resentment of his spiritual tyrants, unconscious as they were of the full value of the prize, which they had lost. had bayle adhered to the catholic church, had he embraced the ecclesiastical profession, the genius and favour of such a proselyte might have aspired to wealth and honours in his native country: but the hypocrite would have found less happiness in the comforts of a benefice, or the dignity of a mitre, than he enjoyed at rotterdam in a private state of exile, indigence, and freedom. without a country, or a patron, or a prejudice, he claimed the liberty and subsisted by the labours of his pen: the inequality of his voluminous works is explained and excused by his alternately writing for himself, for the booksellers, and for posterity; and if a severe critic would reduce him to a single folio, that relic, like the books of the sibyl, would become still more valuable. a calm and lofty spectator of the religious tempest, the philosopher of rotterdam condemned with equal firmness the persecution of lewis the fourteenth, and the republican maxims of the calvinists; their vain prophecies, and the intolerant bigotry which sometimes vexed his solitary retreat. in reviewing the controversies of the times, he turned against each other the arguments of the disputants; successively wielding the arms of the catholics and protestants, he proves that neither the way of authority, nor the way of examination can afford the multitude any test of religious truth; and dexterously concludes that custom and education must be the sole grounds of popular belief. the ancient paradox of plutarch, that atheism is less pernicious than superstition, acquires a tenfold vigor, when it is adorned with the colours of his wit, and pointed with the acuteness of his logic. his critical dictionary is a vast repository of facts and opinions; and he balances the false religions in his sceptical scales, till the opposite quantities (if i may use the language of algebra) annihilate each other. the wonderful power which he so boldly exercised, of assembling doubts and objections, had tempted him jocosely to assume the title of the {greek expression} zeus, the cloud-compelling jove; and in a conversation with the ingenious abbe (afterwards cardinal) de polignac, he freely disclosed his universal pyrrhonism. "i am most truly (said bayle) a protestant; for i protest indifferently against all systems and all sects." the academical resentment, which i may possibly have provoked, will prudently spare this plain narrative of my studies, or rather of my idleness; and of the unfortunate event which shortened the term of my residence at oxford. but it may be suggested, that my father was unlucky in the choice of a society, and the chance of a tutor. it will perhaps be asserted, that in the lapse of forty years many improvements have taken place in the college and in the university. i am not unwilling to believe, that some tutors might have been found more active than dr. waldgrave, and less contemptible than dr.****. about the same time, and in the same walk, a bentham was still treading in the footsteps of a burton, whose maxims he had adopted, and whose life he had published. the biographer indeed preferred the school-logic to the new philosophy, burgursdicius to locke; and the hero appears, in his own writings, a stiff and conceited pedant. yet even these men, according to the measure of their capacity, might be diligent and useful; and it is recorded of burton, that he taught his pupils what he knew; some latin, some greek, some ethics and metaphysics; referring them to proper masters for the languages and sciences of which he was ignorant. at a more recent period, many students have been attracted by the merit and reputation of sir william scott, then a tutor in university college, and now conspicuous in the profession of the civil law: my personal acquaintance with that gentleman has inspired me with a just esteem for his abilities and knowledge; and i am assured that his lectures on history would compose, were they given to the public, a most valuable treatise. under the auspices of the present archbishop of york, dr. markham, himself an eminent scholar, a more regular discipline has been introduced, as i am told, at christ church; a course of classical and philosophical studies is proposed, and even pursued, in that numerous seminary: learning has been made a duty, a pleasure, and even a fashion; and several young gentlemen do honour to the college in which they have been educated. according to the will of the donor, the profit of the second part of lord clarendon's history has been applied to the establishment of a riding-school, that the polite exercises might be taught, i know not with what success, in the university. the vinerian professorship is of far more serious importance; the laws of his country are the first science of an englishman of rank and fortune, who is called to be a magistrate, and may hope to be a legislator. this judicious institution was coldly entertained by the graver doctors, who complained (i have heard the complaint) that it would take the young people from their books: but mr. viner's benefaction is not unprofitable, since it has at least produced the excellent commentaries of sir william blackstone. after carrying me to putney, to the house of his friend mr. mallet, by whose philosophy i was rather scandalized than reclaimed, it was necessary for my father to form a new plan of education, and to devise some method which, if possible, might effect the cure of my spiritual malady. after much debate it was determined, from the advice and personal experience of mr. eliot (now lord eliot) to fix me, during some years, at lausanne in switzerland. mr. frey, a swiss gentleman of basil, undertook the conduct of the journey: we left london the th of june, crossed the sea from dover to calais, travelled post through several provinces of france, by the direct road of st. quentin, rheims, langres, and besancon, and arrived the th of june at lausanne, where i was immediately settled under the roof and tuition of mr. pavilliard, a calvinist minister. the first marks of my father's displeasure rather astonished than afflicted me: when he threatened to banish, and disown, and disinherit a rebellious son, i cherished a secret hope that he would not be able or willing to effect his menaces; and the pride of conscience encouraged me to sustain the honourable and important part which i was now acting. my spirits were raised and kept alive by the rapid motion of my journey, the new and various scenes of the continent, and the civility of mr. frey, a man of sense, who was not ignorant of books or the world. but after he had resigned me into pavilliard's hands, and i was fixed in my new habitation, i had leisure to contemplate the strange and melancholy prospect before me. my first complaint arose from my ignorance of the language. in my childhood i had once studied the french grammar, and i could imperfectly understand the easy prose of a familiar subject. but when i was thus suddenly cast on a foreign land, i found myself deprived of the use of speech and of hearing; and, during some weeks, incapable not only of enjoying the pleasures of conversation, but even of asking or answering a question in the common intercourse of life. to a home-bred englishman every object, every custom was offensive; but the native of any country might have been disgusted with the general aspect of his lodging and entertainment. i had now exchanged my elegant apartment in magdalen college, for a narrow, gloomy street, the most unfrequented of an unhandsome town, for an old inconvenient house, and for a small chamber ill-contrived and ill-furnished, which, on the approach of winter, instead of a companionable fire, must be warmed by the dull invisible heat of a stove. from a man i was again degraded to the dependence of a schoolboy. mr. pavilliard managed my expences, which had been reduced to a diminutive state: i received a small monthly allowance for my pocket-money; and helpless and awkward as i have ever been, i no longer enjoyed the indispensable comfort of a servant. my condition seemed as destitute of hope, as it was devoid of pleasure: i was separated for an indefinite, which appeared an infinite term from my native country; and i had lost all connexion with my catholic friends. i have since reflected with surprise, that as the romish clergy of every part of europe maintain a close correspondence with each other, they never attempted, by letters or messages, to rescue me from the hands of the heretics, or at least to confirm my zeal and constancy in the profession of the faith. such was my first introduction to lausanne; a place where i spent nearly five years with pleasure and profit, which i afterwards revisited without compulsion, and which i have finally selected as the most grateful retreat for the decline of my life. but it is the peculiar felicity of youth that the most unpleasing objects and events seldom make a deep or lasting impression; it forgets the past, enjoys the present, and anticipates the future. at the flexible age of sixteen i soon learned to endure, and gradually to adopt, the new forms of arbitrary manners: the real hardships of my situation were alienated by time. had i been sent abroad in a more splendid style, such as the fortune and bounty of my father might have supplied, i might have returned home with the same stock of language and science, which our countrymen usually import from the continent. an exile and a prisoner as i was, their example betrayed me into some irregularities of wine, of play, and of idle excursions: but i soon felt the impossibility of associating with them on equal terms; and after the departure of my first acquaintance, i held a cold and civil correspondence with their successors. this seclusion from english society was attended with the most solid benefits. in the pays de vaud, the french language is used with less imperfection than in most of the distant provinces of france: in pavilliard's family, necessity compelled me to listen and to speak; and if i was at first disheartened by the apparent slowness, in a few months i was astonished by the rapidity of my progress. my pronunciation was formed by the constant repetition of the same sounds; the variety of words and idioms, the rules of grammar, and distinctions of genders, were impressed in my memory ease and freedom were obtained by practice; correctness and elegance by labour; and before i was recalled home, french, in which i spontaneously thought, was more familiar than english to my ear, my tongue, and my pen. the first effect of this opening knowledge was the revival of my love of reading, which had been chilled at oxford; and i soon turned over, without much choice, almost all the french books in my tutor's library. even these amusements were productive of real advantage: my taste and judgment were now somewhat riper. i was introduced to a new mode of style and literature: by the comparison of manners and opinions, my views were enlarged, my prejudices were corrected, and a copious voluntary abstract of the histoire de l'eglise et de l'empire, by le sueur, may be placed in a middle line between my childish and my manly studies. as soon as i was able to converse with the natives, i began to feel some satisfaction in their company my awkward timidity was polished and emboldened; and i frequented, for the first time, assemblies of men and women. the acquaintance of the pavilliards prepared me by degrees for more elegant society. i was received with kindness and indulgence in the best families of lausanne; and it was in one of these that i formed an intimate and lasting connection with mr. deyverdun, a young man of an amiable temper and excellent understanding. in the arts of fencing and dancing, small indeed was my proficiency; and some months were idly wasted in the riding-school. my unfitness to bodily exercise reconciled me to a sedentary life, and the horse, the favourite of my countrymen, never contributed to the pleasures of my youth. my obligations to the lessons of mr. pavilliard, gratitude will not suffer me to forget: he was endowed with a clear head and a warm heart; his innate benevolence had assuaged the spirit of the church; he was rational, because he was moderate: in the course of his studies he had acquired a just though superficial knowledge of most branches of literature; by long practice, he was skilled in the arts of teaching; and he laboured with assiduous patience to know the character, gain the affection, and open the mind of his english pupil. as soon as we began to understand each other, he gently led me, from a blind and undistinguishing love of reading, into the path of instruction. i consented with pleasure that a portion of the morning hours should be consecrated to a plan of modern history and geography, and to the critical perusal of the french and latin classics; and at each step i felt myself invigorated by the habits of application and method. his prudence repressed and dissembled some youthful sallies; and as soon as i was confirmed in the habits of industry and temperance, he gave the reins into my own hands. his favourable report of my behaviour and progress gradually obtained some latitude of action and expence; and he wished to alleviate the hardships of my lodging and entertainment. the principles of philosophy were associated with the examples of taste; and by a singular chance, the book, as well as the man, which contributed the most effectually to my education, has a stronger claim on my gratitude than on my admiration. mr. de crousaz, the adversary of bayle and pope, is not distinguished by lively fancy or profound reflection; and even in his own country, at the end of a few years, his name and writings are almost obliterated. but his philosophy had been formed in the school of locke, his divinity in that of limborch and le clerc; in a long and laborious life, several generations of pupils were taught to think, and even to write; his lessons rescued the academy of lausanne from calvinistic prejudice; and he had the rare merit of diffusing a more liberal spirit among the clergy and people of the pays de vaud. his system of logic, which in the last editions has swelled to six tedious and prolix volumes, may be praised as a clear and methodical abridgment of the art of reasoning, from our simple ideas to the most complex operations of the human understanding. this system i studied, and meditated, and abstracted, till i have obtained the free command of an universal instrument, which i soon presumed to exercise on my catholic opinions. pavilliard was not unmindful that his first task, his most important duty, was to reclaim me from the errors of popery. the intermixture of sects has rendered the swiss clergy acute and learned on the topics of controversy; and i have some of his letters in which he celebrates the dexterity of his attack, and my gradual concessions after a firm and well-managed defence. i was willing, and i am now willing, to allow him a handsome share of the honour of my conversion: yet i must observe, that it was principally effected by my private reflections; and i still remember my solitary transport at the discovery of a philosophical argument against the doctrine of transubstantiation: that the text of scripture, which seems to inculcate the real presence, is attested only by a single sense--our sight; while the real presence itself is disproved by three of our senses--the sight, the touch, and the taste. the various articles of the romish creed disappeared like a dream; and after a full conviction, on christmas-day, , i received the sacrament in the church of lausanne. it was here that i suspended my religious inquiries, acquiescing with implicit belief in the tenets and mysteries, which are adopted by the general consent of catholics and protestants. such, from my arrival at lausanne, during the first eighteen or twenty months (july --march ), were my useful studies, the foundation of all my future improvements. but every man who rises above the common level has received two educations: the first from his teachers; the second, more personal and important, from himself. he will not, like the fanatics of the last age, define the moment of grace; but he cannot forget the aera of his life, in which his mind has expanded to its proper form and dimensions. my worthy tutor had the good sense and modesty to discern how far he could be useful: as soon as he felt that i advanced beyond his speed and measure, he wisely left me to my genius; and the hours of lesson were soon lost in the voluntary labour of the whole morning, and sometimes of the whole day. the desire of prolonging my time, gradually confirmed the salutary habit of early rising, to which i have always adhered, with some regard to seasons and situations; but it is happy for my eyes and my health, that my temperate ardour has never been seduced to trespass on the hours of the night. during the last three years of my residence at lausanne, i may assume the merit of serious and solid application; but i am tempted to distinguish the last eight months of the year , as the period of the most extraordinary diligence and rapid progress. in my french and latin translations i adopted an excellent method, which, from my own success, i would recommend to the imitation of students. i chose some classic writer, such as cicero and vertot, the most approved for purity and elegance of style. i translated, for instance, an epistle of cicero into french; and after throwing it aside, till the words and phrases were obliterated from my memory, i re-translated my french into such latin as i could find; and then compared each sentence of my imperfect version, with the ease, the grace, the propriety of the roman orator. a similar experiment was made on several pages of the revolutions of vertot; i turned them into latin, returned them after a sufficient interval into my own french, and again scrutinized the resemblance or dissimilitude of the copy and the original. by degrees i was less ashamed, by degrees i was more satisfied with myself; and i persevered in the practice of these double translations, which filled several books, till i had acquired the knowledge or both idioms, and the command at least of a correct style. this useful exercise of writing was accompanied and succeeded by the more pleasing occupation of reading the best authors. the perusal of the roman classics was at once my exercise and reward. dr. middleton's history, which i then appreciated above its true value, naturally directed the to the writings of cicero. the most perfect editions, that of olivet, which may adorn the shelves of the rich, that of ernesti, which should lie on the table of the learned, were not in my power. for the familiar epistles i used the text and english commentary of bishop ross: but my general edition was that of verburgius, published at amsterdam in two large volumes in folio, with an indifferent choice of various notes. i read, with application and pleasure, all the epistles, all the orations, and the most important treatises of rhetoric and philosophy; and as i read, i applauded the observation of quintilian, that every student may judge of his own proficiency, by the satisfaction which he receives from the roman orator. i tasted the beauties of language, i breathed the spirit of freedom, and i imbibed from his precepts and examples the public and private sense of a man. cicero in latin, and xenophon in greek, are indeed the two ancients whom i would first propose to a liberal scholar; not only for the merit of their style and sentiments, but for the admirable lessons, which may be applied almost to every situation of public and private life. cicero's epistles may in particular afford the models of every form of correspondence, from the careless effusions of tenderness and friendship, to the well guarded declaration of discreet and dignified resentment. after finishing this great author, a library of eloquence and reason, i formed a more extensive plan of reviewing the latin classics, under the four divisions of, . historians, . poets, . orators, and . philosophers, in a chronological series, from the days of plautus and sallust, to the decline of the language and empire of rome: and this plan, in the last twenty-seven months of my residence at lausanne (jan. --april ), i nearly accomplished. nor was this review, however rapid, either hasty or superficial. i indulged myself in a second and even a third perusal of terence, virgil, horace, tacitus, &c.; and studied to imbibe the sense and spirit most congenial to my own. i never suffered a difficult or corrupt passage to escape, till i had viewed it in every light of which it was susceptible: though often disappointed, i always consulted the most learned or ingenious commentators, torrentius and dacier on horace, catrou and servius on virgil, lipsius on tacitus, meziriac on ovid, &c.; and in the ardour of my inquiries, i embraced a large circle of historical and critical erudition. my abstracts of each book were made in the french language: my observations often branched into particular essays; and i can still read, without contempt, a dissertation of eight folio pages on eight lines ( - ) of the fourth georgic of virgil. mr. deyverdun, my friend, whose name will be frequently repeated, had joined with equal zeal, though not with equal perseverance, in the same undertaking. to him every thought, every composition, was instantly communicated; with him i enjoyed the benefits of a free conversation on the topics of our common studies. but it is scarcely possible for a mind endowed with any active curiosity to be long conversant with the latin classics, without aspiring to know the greek originals, whom they celebrate as their masters, and of whom they so warmly recommend the study and imitation; --vos exemplaria graeca nocturna versate manu, versate diurna. it was now that i regretted the early years which had been wasted in sickness or idleness, or mere idle reading; that i condemned the perverse method of our schoolmasters, who, by first teaching the mother-language, might descend with so much ease and perspicuity to the origin and etymology of a derivative idiom. in the nineteenth year of my age i determined to supply this defect; and the lessons of pavilliard again contributed to smooth the entrance of the way, the greek alphabet, the grammar, and the pronunciation according to the french accent. at my earnest request we presumed to open the iliad; and i had the pleasure of beholding, though darkly and through a glass, the true image of homer, whom i had long since admired in an english dress. after my tutor had left me to myself, i worked my way through about half the iliad, and afterwards interpreted alone a large portion of xenophon and herodotus. but my ardour, destitute of aid and emulation, was gradually cooled, and, from the barren task of searching words in a lexicon, i withdrew to the free and familiar conversation of virgil and tacitus. yet in my residence at lausanne i had laid a solid foundation, which enabled me, in a more propitious season, to prosecute the study of grecian literature. from a blind idea of the usefulness of such abstract science, my father had been desirous, and even pressing, that i should devote some time to the mathematics; nor could i refuse to comply with so reasonable a wish. during two winters i attended the private lectures of monsieur de traytorrens, who explained the elements of algebra and geometry, as far as the conic sections of the marquis de l'hopital, and appeared satisfied with my diligence and improvement. but as my childish propensity for numbers and calculations was totally extinct, i was content to receive the passive impression of my professor's lectures, without any active exercise of my own powers. as soon as i understood the principles, i relinquished for ever the pursuit of the mathematics; nor can i lament that i desisted, before my mind was hardened by the habit of rigid demonstration, so destructive of the finer feelings of moral evidence, which must, however, determine the actions and opinions of our lives. i listened with more pleasure to the proposal of studying the law of nature and nations, which was taught in the academy of lausanne by mr. vicat, a professor of some learning and reputation. but instead of attending his public or private course, i preferred in my closet the lessons of his masters, and my own reason. without being disgusted by grotius or puffendorf, i studied in their writings the duties of a man, the rights of a citizen, the theory of justice (it is, alas! a theory), and the laws of peace and war, which have had some influence on the practice of modern europe. my fatigues were alleviated by the good sense of their commentator barbeyrac. locke's treatise of government instructed me in the knowledge of whig principles, which are rather founded in reason than experience; but my delight was in the frequent perusal of montesquieu, whose energy of style, and boldness of hypothesis, were powerful to awaken and stimulate the genius of the age. the logic of de crousaz had prepared me to engage with his master locke and his antagonist bayle; of whom the former may be used as a bridle, and the latter applied as a spur, to the curiosity of a young philosopher. according to the nature of their respective works, the schools of argument and objection, i carefully went through the essay on human understanding, and occasionally consulted the most interesting articles of the philosophic dictionary. in the infancy of my reason i turned over, as an idle amusement, the most serious and important treatise: in its maturity, the most trifling performance could exercise my taste or judgment, and more than once i have been led by a novel into a deep and instructive train of thinking. but i cannot forbear to mention three particular books, since they may have remotely contributed to form the historian of the roman empire. . from the provincial letters of pascal, which almost every year i have perused with new pleasure, i learned to manage the weapon of grave and temperate irony, even on subjects of ecclesiastical solemnity. . the life of julian, by the abbe de la bleterie, first introduced me to the man and the times; and i should be glad to recover my first essay on the truth of the miracle which stopped the rebuilding of the temple of jerusalem. . in giannone's civil history of naples i observed with a critical eye the progress and abuse of sacerdotal power, and the revolutions of italy in the darker ages. this various reading, which i now conducted with discretion, was digested, according to the precept and model of mr. locke, into a large common-place book; a practice, however, which i do not strenuously recommend. the action of the pen will doubtless imprint an idea on the mind as well as on the paper: but i much question whether the benefits of this laborious method are adequate to the waste of time; and i must agree with dr. johnson, (idler, no. .) "that what is twice read, is commonly better remembered, than what is transcribed." during two years, if i forget some boyish excursions of a day or a week, i was fixed at lausanne; but at the end of the third summer, my father consented that i should make the tour of switzerland with pavilliard: and our short absence of one month (sept. st--oct. th, ) was a reward and relaxation of my assiduous studies. the fashion of climbing the mountains and reviewing the glaciers, had not yet been introduced by foreign travellers, who seek the sublime beauties of nature. but the political face of the country is not less diversified by the forms and spirit of so many various republics, from the jealous government of the few to the licentious freedom of the many. i contemplated with pleasure the new prospects of men and manners; though my conversation with the natives would have been more free and instructive, had i possessed the german, as well as the french language. we passed through most of the principal towns of switzerland; neufchatel, bienne, soleurre, arau, baden, zurich, basil, and berne. in every place we visited the churches, arsenals, libraries, and all the most eminent persons; and after my return, i digested my notes in fourteen or fifteen sheets of a french journal, which i dispatched to my father, as a proof that my time and his money had not been mis-spent. had i found this journal among his papers, i might be tempted to select some passages; but i will not transcribe the printed accounts, and it may be sufficient to notice a remarkable spot, which left a deep and lasting impression on my memory. from zurich we proceeded to the benedictine abbey of einfidlen, snore commonly styled our lady of the hermits. i was astonished by the profuse ostentation of riches in the poorest corner of europe; amidst a savage scene of woods and mountains, a palace appears to have been erected by magic; and it was erected by the potent magic of religion. a crowd of palmers and votaries was prostrate before the altar. the title and worship of the mother of god provoked my indignation; and the lively naked image of superstition suggested to me, as in the same place it had done to zuinglius, the most pressing argument for the reformation of the church. about two years after this tour, i passed at geneva a useful and agreeable month; but this excursion, and short visits in the pays de vaud, did not materially interrupt my studious and sedentary life at lausanne. my thirst of improvement, and the languid state of science at lausanne, soon prompted me to solicit a literary correspondence with several men of learning, whom i had not an opportunity of personally consulting. . in the perusal of livy, (xxx. ,) i had been stopped by a sentence in a speech of hannibal, which cannot be reconciled by any torture with his character or argument. the commentators dissemble, or confess their perplexity. it occurred to me, that the change of a single letter, by substituting otio instead of odio, might restore a clear and consistent sense; but i wished to weigh my emendation in scales less partial than my own. i addressed myself to m. crevier, the successor of rollin, and a professor in the university of paris, who had published a large and valuable edition of livy. his answer was speedy and polite; he praised my ingenuity, and adopted my conjecture. . i maintained a latin correspondence, at first anonymous, and afterwards in my own name, with professor breitinger of zurich, the learned editor of a septuagint bible. in our frequent letters we discussed many questions of antiquity, many passages of the latin classics. i proposed my interpretations and amendments. his censures, for he did not spare my boldness of conjecture, were sharp and strong; and i was encouraged by the consciousness of my strength, when i could stand in free debate against a critic of such eminence and erudition. . i corresponded on similar topics with the celebrated professor matthew gesner, of the university of gottingen; and he accepted, as courteously as the two former, the invitation of an unknown youth. but his abilities might possibly be decayed; his elaborate letters were feeble and prolix; and when i asked his proper direction, the vain old man covered half a sheet of paper with the foolish enumeration of his titles and offices. . these professors of paris, zurich, and gottingen, were strangers, whom i presumed to address on the credit of their name; but mr. allamand, minister at bex, was my personal friend, with whom i maintained a more free and interesting correspondence. he was a master of language, of science, and, above all, of dispute; and his acute and flexible logic could support, with equal address, and perhaps with equal indifference, the adverse sides of every possible question. his spirit was active, but his pen had been indolent. mr. allamand had exposed himself to much scandal and reproach, by an anonymous letter ( ) to the protestants of france; in which he labours to persuade them that public worship is the exclusive right and duty of the state, and that their numerous assemblies of dissenters and rebels were not authorized by the law or the gospel. his style is animated, his arguments specious; and if the papist may seem to lurk under the mask of a protestant, the philosopher is concealed under the disguise of a papist. after some trials in france and holland, which were defeated by his fortune or his character, a genius that might have enlightened or deluded the world, was buried in a country living, unknown to fame, and discontented with mankind. est sacrificulus in pago, et rusticos decipit. as often as private or ecclesiastical business called him to lausanne, i enjoyed the pleasure and benefit of his conversation, and we were mutually flattered by our attention to each other. our correspondence, in his absence, chiefly turned on locke's metaphysics, which he attacked, and i defended; the origin of ideas, the principles of evidence, and the doctrine of liberty; and found no end, in wandering mazes lost. by fencing with so skilful a master, i acquired some dexterity in the use of my philosophic weapons; but i was still the slave of education and prejudice. he had some measures to keep; and i much suspect that he never showed me the true colours of his secret scepticism. before i was recalled from switzerland, i had the satisfaction of seeing the most extraordinary man of the age; a poet, an historian, a philosopher, who has filled thirty quartos, of prose and verse, with his various productions, often excellent, and always entertaining. need i add the name of voltaire? after forfeiting, by his own misconduct, the friendship of the first of kings, he retired, at the age of sixty, with a plentiful fortune, to a free and beautiful country, and resided two winters ( and ) in the town or neighbourhood of lausanne. my desire of beholding voltaire, whom i then rated above his real magnitude, was easily gratified. he received me with civility as an english youth; but i cannot boast of any peculiar notice or distinction, virgilium vidi tantum. the ode which he composed on his first arrival on the banks of the leman lake, o maison d'aristippe! o jardin d'epicure, &c. had been imparted as a secret to the gentleman by whom i was introduced. he allowed me to read it twice; i knew it by heart; and as my discretion was not equal to my memory, the author was soon displeased by the circulation of a copy. in writing this trivial anecdote, i wished to observe whether my memory was impaired, and i have the comfort of finding that every line of the poem is still engraved in fresh and indelible characters. the highest gratification which i derived from voltaire's residence at lausanne, was the uncommon circumstance of hearing a great poet declaim his own productions on the stage. he had formed a company of gentlemen and ladies, some of whom were not destitute of talents. a decent theatre was framed at monrepos, a country-house at the end of a suburb; dresses and scenes were provided at the expense of the actors; and the author directed the rehearsals with the zeal and attention of paternal love. in two successive winters his tragedies of zayre, alzire, zulime, and his sentimental comedy of the enfant prodigue, were played at the theatre of monrepos. voltaire represented the characters best adapted to his years, lusignan, alvarez, benassar, euphemon. his declamation was fashioned to the pomp and cadence of the old stage; and he expressed the enthusiasm of poetry, rather than the feelings of nature. my ardour, which soon became conspicuous, seldom failed of procuring me a ticket. the habits of pleasure fortified my taste for the french theatre, and that taste has perhaps abated my idolatry for the gigantic genius of shakespeare, which is inculcated from our infancy as the first duty of an englishman. the wit and philosophy of voltaire, his table and theatre, refined, in a visible degree, the manners of lausanne; and, however addicted to study, i enjoyed my share of the amusements of society. after the representation of monrepos i sometimes supped with the actors. i was now familiar in some, and acquainted in many houses; and my evenings were generally devoted to cards and conversation, either in private parties or numerous assemblies. i hesitate, from the apprehension of ridicule, when i approach the delicate subject of my early love. by this word i do not mean the polite attention, the gallantry, without hope or design, which has originated in the spirit of chivalry, and is interwoven with the texture of french manners. i understand by this passion the union of desire, friendship, and tenderness, which is inflamed by a single female, which prefers her to the rest of her sex, and which seeks her possession as the supreme or the sole happiness of our being. i need not blush at recollecting the object of my choice; and though my love was disappointed of success, i am rather proud that i was once capable of feeling such a pure and exalted sentiment. the personal attractions of mademoiselle susan curchod were embellished by the virtues and talents of the mind. her fortune was humble, but her family was respectable. her mother, a native of france, had preferred her religion to her country. the profession of her father did not extinguish the moderation and philosophy of his temper, and he lived content with a small salary and laborious duty, in the obscure lot of minister of crassy, in the mountains that separate the pays de vaud from the county of burgundy. in the solitude of a sequestered village he bestowed a liberal, and even learned, education on his only daughter. she surpassed his hopes by her proficiency in the sciences and languages; and in her short visits to some relations at lausanne, the wit, the beauty, and erudition of mademoiselle curchod were the theme of universal applause. the report of such a prodigy awakened my curiosity; i saw and loved. i found her learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners; and the first sudden emotion was fortified by the habits and knowledge of a more familiar acquaintance. she permitted me to make her two or three visits at her father's house. i passed some happy days there, in the mountains of burgundy, and her parents honourably encouraged the connection. in a calm retirement the gay vanity of youth no longer fluttered in her bosom; she listened to the voice of truth and passion, and i might presume to hope that i had made some impression on a virtuous heart. at crassy and lausanne i indulged my dream of felicity: but on my return to england, i soon discovered that my father would not hear of this strange alliance, and that without his consent i was myself destitute and helpless. after a painful struggle i yielded to my fate: i sighed as a lover, i obeyed as a son; my wound was insensibly healed by time, absence, and the habits of a new life. my cure was accelerated by a faithful report of the tranquillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself, and my love subsided in friendship and esteem. the minister of crassy soon afterwards died; his stipend died with him: his daughter retired to geneva, where, by teaching young ladies, she earned a hard subsistence for herself and her mother; but in her lowest distress she maintained a spotless reputation, and a dignified behaviour. a rich banker of paris, a citizen of geneva, had the good fortune and good sense to discover and possess this inestimable treasure; and in the capital of taste and luxury she resisted the temptations of wealth, as she had sustained the hardships of indigence. the genius of her husband has exalted him to the most conspicuous station in europe. in every change of prosperity and disgrace he has reclined on the bosom of a faithful friend; and mademoiselle curchod is now the wife of m. necker, the minister, and perhaps the legislator, of the french monarchy. whatsoever have been the fruits of my education, they must be ascribed to the fortunate banishment which placed me at lausanne. i have sometimes applied to my own fate the verses of pindar, which remind an olympic champion that his victory was the consequence of his exile; and that at home, like a domestic fowl, his days might have rolled away inactive or inglorious. [greek omitted] thus, like the crested bird of mars, at home engag'd in foul domestic jars, and wasted with intestine wars, inglorious hadst thou spent thy vig'rous bloom; had not sedition's civil broils expell'd thee from thy native crete, and driv'n thee with more glorious toils th' olympic crown in pisa's plain to meet. west's pindar. if my childish revolt against the religion of my country had not stripped me in time of my academic gown, the five important years, so liberally improved in the studies and conversation of lausanne, would have been steeped in port and prejudice among the monks of oxford. had the fatigue of idleness compelled me to read, the path of learning would not have been enlightened by a ray of philosophic freedom. i should have grown to manhood ignorant of the life and language of europe, and my knowledge of the world would have been confined to an english cloister. but my religious error fixed me at lausanne, in a state of banishment and disgrace. the rigid course of discipline and abstinence, to which i was condemned, invigorated the constitution of my mind and body; poverty and pride estranged me from my countrymen. one mischief, however, and in their eyes a serious and irreparable mischief, was derived from the success of my swiss education; i had ceased to be an englishman. at the flexible period of youth, from the age of sixteen to twenty-one, my opinions, habits, and sentiments were cast in a foreign mould; the faint and distant remembrance of england was almost obliterated; my native language was grown less familiar; and i should have cheerfully accepted the offer of a moderate independence on the terms of perpetual exile. by the good sense and temper of pavilliard my yoke was insensibly lightened: he left me master of my time and actions; but he could neither change my situation, nor increase my allowance, and with the progress of my years and reason i impatiently sighed for the moment of my deliverance. at length, in the spring of the year , my father signified his permission and his pleasure that i should immediately return home. we were then in the midst of a war: the resentment of the french at our taking their ships without a declaration, had rendered that polite nation somewhat peevish and difficult. they denied a passage to english travellers, and the road through germany was circuitous, toilsome, and perhaps in the neighbourhood of the armies, exposed to some danger. in this perplexity, two swiss officers of my acquaintance in the dutch service, who were returning to their garrisons, offered to conduct me through france as one of their companions; nor did we sufficiently reflect that my borrowed name and regimentals might have been considered, in case of a discovery, in a very serious light. i took my leave of lausanne on april , with a mixture of joy and regret, in the firm resolution revisiting, as a man, the persons and places which had been so dear to my youth. we travelled slowly, but pleasantly, in a hired coach, over the hills of franche-compte and the fertile province of lorraine, and passed, without accident or inquiry, through several fortified towns of the french frontier: from thence we entered the wild ardennes of the austrian dutchy of luxemburg; and after crossing the meuse at liege, we traversed the heaths of brabant, and reached, on april , our dutch garrison of bois le duc. in our passage through nancy, my eye was gratified by the aspect of a regular and beautiful city, the work of stanislaus, who, after the storms of polish royalty, reposed in the love and gratitude of his new subjects of lorraine. in our halt at maestricht i visited mr. de beaufort, a learned critic, who was known to me by his specious arguments against the five first centuries of the roman history. after dropping my regimental companions, i stepped aside to visit rotterdam and the hague. i wished to have observed a country, the monument of freedom and industry; but my days were numbered, and a longer delay would have been ungraceful. i hastened to embark at the brill, landed the next day at harwich, and proceeded to london, where my father awaited my arrival. the whole term of my first absence from england was four years ten months and fifteen days. in the prayers of the church our personal concerns are judiciously reduced to the threefold distinction of mind, body, and estate. the sentiments of the mind excite and exercise our social sympathy. the review of my moral and literary character is the most interesting to myself and to the public; and i may expatiate, without reproach, on my private studies; since they have produced the public writings, which can alone entitle me to the esteem and friendship of my readers. the experience of the world inculcates a discreet reserve on the subject of our person and estate, and we soon learn that a free disclosure of our riches or poverty would provoke the malice of envy, or encourage the insolence of contempt. the only person in england whom i was impatient to see was my aunt porten, the affectionate guardian of my tender years. i hastened to her house in college-street, westminster; and the evening was spent in the effusions of joy and confidence. it was not without some awe and apprehension that i approached the presence of my father. my infancy, to speak the truth, had been neglected at home; the severity of his look and language at our last parting still dwelt on my memory; nor could i form any notion of his character, or my probable reception. they were both more agreeable than i could expect. the domestic discipline of our ancestors has been relaxed by the philosophy and softness of the age; and if my father remembered that he had trembled before a stern parent, it was only to adopt with his own son an opposite mode of behaviour. he received me as a man and a friend; all constraint was banished at our first interview, and we ever afterwards continued on the same terms of easy and equal politeness. he applauded the success of my education; every word and action was expressive of the most cordial affection; and our lives would have passed without a cloud, if his oeconomy had been equal to his fortune, or if his fortune had been equal to his desires. during my absence he had married his second wife, miss dorothea patton, who was introduced to me with the most unfavourable prejudice. i considered his second marriage as an act of displeasure, and i was disposed to hate the rival of my mother. but the injustice was in my own fancy, and the imaginary monster was an amiable and deserving woman. i could not be mistaken in the first view of her understanding, her knowledge, and the elegant spirit of her conversation: her polite welcome, and her assiduous care to study and gratify my wishes, announced at least that the surface would be smooth; and my suspicions of art and falsehood were gradually dispelled by the full discovery of her warm and exquisite sensibility. after some reserve on my side, our minds associated in confidence and friendship; and as mrs. gibbon had neither children nor the hopes of children, we more easily adopted the tender names and genuine characters of mother and of son. by the indulgence of these parents, i was left at liberty to consult my taste or reason in the choice of place, of company, and of amusements; and my excursions were bounded only by the limits of the island, and the measure of my income. some faint efforts were made to procure me the employment of secretary to a foreign embassy; and i listened to a scheme which would again have transported me to the continent. mrs. gibbon, with seeming wisdom, exhorted me to take chambers in the temple, and devote my leisure to the study of the law. i cannot repent of having neglected her advice. few men, without the spur of necessity, have resolution to force their way, through the thorns and thickets of that gloomy labyrinth. nature had not endowed me with the bold and ready eloquence which makes itself heard amidst the tumult of the bar; and i should probably have been diverted from the labours of literature, without acquiring the fame or fortune of a successful pleader. i had no need to call to my aid the regular duties of a profession; every day, every hour, was agreeably filled; nor have i known, like so many of my countrymen, the tediousness of an idle life. of the two years (may -may ,) between my return to england and the embodying of the hampshire militia, i passed about nine months in london, and the remainder in the country. the metropolis affords many amusements, which are open to all. it is itself an astonishing and perpetual spectacle to the curious eye; and each taste, each sense may be gratified by the variety of objects which will occur in the long circuit of a morning walk. i assiduously frequented the theatres at a very propitious aera of the stage, when a constellation of excellent actors, both in tragedy and comedy, was eclipsed by the meridian brightness of garrick in the maturity of his judgment, and vigour of his performance. the pleasures of a town-life are within the reach of every man who is regardless of his health, his money, and his company. by the contagion of example i was sometimes seduced; but the better habits, which i had formed at lausanne, induced me to seek a more elegant and rational society; and if my search was less easy and successful than i might have hoped, i shall at present impute the failure to the disadvantages of my situation and character. had the rank and fortune of my parents given them an annual establishment in london, their own house would have introduced me to a numerous and polite circle of acquaintance. but my father's taste had always preferred the highest and the lowest company, for which he was equally qualified; and after a twelve years' retirement, he was no longer in the memory of the great with whom he had associated. i found myself a stranger in the midst of a vast and unknown city; and at my entrance into life i was reduced to some dull family parties, and some scattered connections, which were not such as i should have chosen for myself. the most useful friends of my father were the mallets: they received me with civility and kindness at first on his account, and afterwards on my own; and (if i may use lord chesterfield's words) i was soon domesticated in their house. mr. mallet, a name among the english poets, is praised by an unforgiving enemy, for the ease and elegance of his conversation, and his wife was not destitute of wit or learning. by his assistance i was introduced to lady hervey, the mother of the present earl of bristol. her age and infirmities confined her at home; her dinners were select; in the evening her house was open to the best company of both sexes and all nations; nor was i displeased at her preference and affectation of the manners, the language, and the literature of france. but my progress in the english world was in general left to my own efforts, and those efforts were languid and slow. i had not been endowed by art or nature with those happy gifts of confidence and address, which unlock every door and every bosom; nor would it be reasonable to complain of the just consequences of my sickly childhood, foreign education, and reserved temper. while coaches were rattling through bond-street, i have passed many a solitary evening in my lodging with my books. my studies were sometimes interrupted by a sigh, which i breathed towards lausanne; and on the approach of spring, i withdrew without reluctance from the noisy and extensive scene of crowds without company, and dissipation without pleasure. in each of the twenty-five years of my acquaintance with london ( - ) the prospect gradually brightened; and this unfavourable picture most properly belongs to the first period after my return from switzerland. my father's residence in hampshire, where i have passed many light, and some heavy hours, was at beriton, near petersfield, one mile from the portsmouth road, and at the easy distance of fifty-eight miles from london. an old mansion, in a state of decay, had been converted into the fashion and convenience of a modern house: and if strangers had nothing to see, the inhabitants had little to desire. the spot was not happily chosen, at the end of the village and the bottom of the hill: but the aspect of the adjacent grounds was various and cheerful; the downs commanded a noble prospect, and the long hanging woods in sight of the house could not perhaps have been improved by art or expence. my father kept in his own hands the whole of the estate, and even rented some additional land; and whatsoever might be the balance of profit and loss, the farm supplied him with amusement and plenty. the produce maintained a number of men and horses, which were multiplied by the intermixture of domestic and rural servants; and in the intervals of labour the favourite team, a handsome set of bays or greys, was harnessed to the coach. the oeconomy of the house was regulated by the taste and prudence of mrs. gibbon. she prided herself in the elegance of her occasional dinners; and from the uncleanly avarice of madame pavilliard, i was suddenly transported to the daily neatness and luxury of an english table. our immediate neighbourhood was rare and rustic; but from the verge of our hills, as far as chichester and goodwood, the western district of sussex was interspersed with noble seats and hospitable families, with whom we cultivated a friendly, and might have enjoyed a very frequent, intercourse. as my stay at buriton was always voluntary, i was received and dismissed with smiles; but the comforts of my retirement did not depend on the ordinary pleasures of the country. my father could never inspire me with his love and knowledge of farming. i never handled a gun, i seldom mounted an horse; and my philosophic walks were soon terminated by a shady bench, where i was long detained by the sedentary amusement of reading or meditation. at home i occupied a pleasant and spacious apartment; the library on the same floor was soon considered as my peculiar domain; and i might say with truth, that i was never less alone than when by myself. my sole complaint, which i piously suppressed, arose from the kind restraint imposed on the freedom of my time. by the habit of early rising i always secured a sacred portion of the day, and many scattered moments were stolen and employed by my studious industry. but the family hours of breakfast, of dinner, of tea, and of supper, were regular and long: after breakfast mrs. gibbon expected my company in her dressing-room; after tea my father claimed my conversation and the perusal of the newspapers; and in the midst of an interesting work i was often called down to receive the visit of some idle neighbours. their dinners and visits required, in due season, a similar return; and i dreaded the period of the full moon, which was usually reserved for our more distant excursions. i could not refuse attending my father, in the summer of , to the races at stockbridge, reading, and odiam, where he had entered a horse for the hunter's plate; and i was not displeased with the sight of our olympic games, the beauty of the spot, the fleetness of the horses, and the gay tumult of the numerous spectators. as soon as the militia business was agitated, many days were tediously consumed in meetings of deputy-lieutenants at petersfield, alton, and winchester. in the close of the same year, , sir simeon (then mr.) stewart attempted an unsuccessful contest for the county of southampton, against mr. legge, chancellor of the exchequer: a well-known contest, in which lord bute's influence was first exerted and censured. our canvas at portsmouth and gosport lasted several days; but the interruption of my studies was compensated in some degree by the spectacle of english manners, and the acquisition of some practical knowledge. if in a more domestic or more dissipated scene my application was somewhat relaxed, the love of knowledge was inflamed and gratified by the command of books; and i compared the poverty of lausanne with the plenty of london. my father's study at buriton was stuffed with much trash of the last age, with much high church divinity and politics, which have long since gone to their proper place: yet it contained some valuable editions of the classics and the fathers, the choice, as it should seem, of mr. law; and many english publications of the times had been occasionally added. from this slender beginning i have gradually formed a numerous and select library, the foundation of my works, and the best comfort of my life, both at home and abroad. on the receipt of the first quarter, a large share of my allowance was appropriated to my literary wants. i cannot forget the joy with which i exchanged a bank-note of twenty pounds for the twenty volumes of the memoirs of the academy of inscriptions; nor would it have been easy, by any other expenditure of the same sum, to have procured so large and lasting a fund of rational amusement. at a time when i most assiduously frequented this school of ancient literature, i thus expressed my opinion of a learned and various collection, which since the year has been doubled in magnitude, though not in merit--"une de ces societes, qui ont mieux immortalise louis xiv. qu un ambition souvent pernicieuse aux hommes, commengoit deja ces recherches qui reunissent la justesse de l'esprit, l'amenete & l'eruditlon: ou l'on voit iant des decouvertes, et quelquefois, ce qui ne cede qu'a peine aux decouvertes, une ignorance modeste et savante." the review of my library must be reserved for the period of its maturity; but in this place i may allow myself to observe, that i am not conscious of having ever bought a book from a motive of ostentation, that every volume, before it was deposited on the shelf, was either read or sufficiently examined, and that i soon adopted the tolerating maxim of the elder pliny, "nullum esse librum tam malum ut non ex aliqua parte prodesset." i could not yet find leisure or courage to renew the pursuit of the greek language, excepting by reading the lessons of the old and new testament every sunday, when i attended the family to church. the series of my latin authors was less strenuously completed; but the acquisition, by inheritance or purchase, of the best editions of cicero, quintilian, livy, tacitus, ovid, &c. afforded a fair prospect, which i seldom neglected. i persevered in the useful method of abstracts and observations; and a single example may suffice, of a note which had almost swelled into a work. the solution of a passage of livy (xxxviii. ,) involved me in the dry and dark treatises of greaves, arbuthnot, hooper, bernard, eisenschmidt, gronovius, la barre, freret, &c.; and in my french essay (chap. ,) i ridiculously send the reader to my own manuscript remarks on the weights, coins, and measures of the ancients, which were abruptly terminated by the militia drum. as i am now entering on a more ample field of society and study, i can only hope to avoid a vain and prolix garrulity, by overlooking the vulgar crowd of my acquaintance, and confining myself to such intimate friends among books and men, as are best entitled to my notice by their own merit and reputation, or by the deep impression which they have left on my mind. yet i will embrace this occasion of recommending to the young student a practice, which about this time i myself adopted. after glancing my eye over the design and order of a new book, i suspended the perusal till i had finished the task of self examination, till i had revolved, in a solitary walk, all that i knew or believed, or had thought on the subject of the whole work, or of some particular chapter: i was then qualified to discern how much the author added to my original stock; and i was sometimes satisfied by the agreement, i was sometimes armed by the opposition of our ideas. the favourite companions of my leisure were our english writers since the revolution: they breathe the spirit of reason and liberty; and they most seasonably contributed to restore the purity of my own language, which had been corrupted by the long use of a foreign idiom. by the judicious advice of mr. mallet, i was directed to the writings of swift and addison; wit and simplicity are their common attributes: but the style of swift is supported by manly original vigour; that of addison is adorned by the female graces of elegance and mildness. the old reproach, that no british altars had been raised to the muse of history, was recently disproved by the first performances of robertson and hume, the histories of scotland and of the stuarts. i will assume the presumption of saying, that i was not unworthy to read them: nor will i disguise my different feelings in the repeated perusals. the perfect composition, the nervous language, the well-turned periods of dr. robertson, inflamed me to the ambitious hope that i might one day tread in his footsteps: the calm philosophy, the careless, inimitable beauties of his friend and rival, often forced me to close the volume with a mixed sensation of delight and despair. the design of my first work, the essay on the study of literature, was suggested by a refinement of vanity, the desire of justifying and praising the object of a favourite pursuit. in france, to which my ideas were confined, the learning and language of greece and rome were neglected by a philosophic age. the guardian of those studies, the academy of inscriptions, was degraded to the lowest rank among the three royal societies of paris: the new appellation of erudits was contemptuously applied to the successors of lipsius and casaubon; and i was provoked to hear (see m. d'alembert discours preliminaire a l'encyclopedie) that the exercise of the memory, their sole merit, had been superseded by the nobler faculties of the imagination and the judgment. i was ambitious of proving by my own example, as well as by my precepts, that all the faculties of the mind may be exercised and displayed by the study of ancient literature: i began to select and adorn the various proofs and illustrations which had offered themselves in reading the classics; and the first pages or chapters of my essay were composed before my departure from lausanne. the hurry of the journey, and of the first weeks of my english life, suspended all thoughts of serious application: but my object was ever before my eyes; and no more than ten days, from the first to the eleventh of july, were suffered to elapse after my summer establishment at buriton. my essay was finished in about six weeks; and as soon as a fair copy had been transcribed by one of the french prisoners at petersfield, i looked round for a critic and judge of my first performance. a writer can seldom be content with the doubtful recompense of solitary approbation; but a youth ignorant of the world, and of himself, must desire to weigh his talents in some scales less partial than his own: my conduct was natural, my motive laudable, my choice of dr. maty judicious and fortunate. by descent and education dr. maty, though born in holland, might be considered as a frenchman; but he was fixed in london by the practice of physic, and an office in the british museum. his reputation was justly founded on the eighteen volumes of the journal britannique, which he had supported, almost alone, with perseverance and success. this humble though useful labour, which had once been dignified by the genius of bayle and the learning of le clerc, was not disgraced by the taste, the knowledge, and the judgment of maty: he exhibits a candid and pleasing view of the state of literature in england during a period of six years (january --december ); and, far different from his angry son, he handles the rod of criticism with the tenderness and reluctance of a parent. the author of the journal britannique sometimes aspires to the character of a poet and philosopher: his style is pure and elegant; and in his virtues, or even in his defects, he may be ranked as one of the last disciples of the school of fontenelle. his answer to my first letter was prompt and polite: after a careful examination he returned my manuscript, with some animadversion and much applause; and when i visited london in the ensuing winter, we discussed the design and execution in several free and familiar conversations. in a short excursion to buriton i reviewed my essay, according to his friendly advice; and after suppressing a third, adding a third, and altering a third, i consummated my first labour by a short preface, which is dated feb. , . yet i still shrunk from the press with the terrors of virgin modesty: the manuscript was safely deposited in my desk; and as my attention was engaged by new objects, the delay might have been prolonged till i had fulfilled the precept of horace, "nonumque prematur in annum." father sirmond, a learned jesuit, was still more rigid, since he advised a young friend to expect the mature age of fifty, before he gave himself or his writings to the public (olivet hist. de l'acad. francoise, tom. ii. p. ). the counsel was singular; but it is still more singular that it should have been approved by the example of the author. sirmond was himself fifty-five years of age when he published (in ) his first work, an edition of sidonius apollinaris, with many valuable annotations: (see his life, before the great edition of his works in five volumes folio, paris, , e typographia regia). two years elapsed in silence: but in the spring of i yielded to the authority of a parent, and complied, like a pious son, with the wish of my own heart. my private resolves were influenced by the state of europe. about this time the belligerent powers had made and accepted overtures of peace; our english plenipotentiaries were named to assist at the congress of augsburg, which never met: i wished to attend them as a gentleman or a secretary; and my father fondly believed that the proof of some literary talents might introduce me to public notice, and second the recommendations of my friends. after a last revisal i consulted with mr. mallet and dr. maty, who approved the design and promoted the execution. mr. mallet, after hearing me read my manuscript, received it from my hands, and delivered it into those of becket, with whom he made an agreement in my name; an easy agreement: i required only a certain number of copies; and, without transferring my property, i devolved on the bookseller the charges and profits of the edition. dr. maty undertook, in my absence, to correct the sheets: he inserted, without my knowledge, an elegant and flattering epistle to the author; which is composed, however, with so much art, that, in case of a defeat, his favourable report might have been ascribed to the indulgence of a friend for the rash attempt of a young english gentleman. the work was printed and published, under the title of essai sur l'etude de la litterature, a londres, chez t. becket et p. a. de hondt, , in a small volume in duodecimo: my dedication to my father, a proper and pious address, was composed the twenty-eighth of may: dr. maty's letter is dated june ; and i received the first copy (june ) at alresford, two days before i marched with the hampshire militia. some weeks afterwards, on the same ground, i presented my book to the late duke of york, who breakfasted in colonel pitt's tent. by my father's direction, and mallet's advice, many literary gifts were distributed to several eminent characters in england and france; two books were sent to the count de caylus, and the duchesse d'aiguillon, at paris: i had reserved twenty copies for my friends at lausanne, as the first fruits of my education, and a grateful token of my remembrance: and on all these persons i levied an unavoidable tax of civility and compliment. it is not surprising that a work, of which the style and sentiments were so totally foreign, should have been more successful abroad than at home. i was delighted by the copious extracts, the warm commendations, and the flattering predictions of the journals of france and holland: and the next year ( ) a new edition (i believe at geneva) extended the fame, or at least the circulation, of the work. in england it was received with cold indifference, little read, and speedily forgotten: a small impression was slowly dispersed; the bookseller murmured, and the author (had his feelings been more exquisite) might have wept over the blunders and baldness of the english translation. the publication of my history fifteen years afterwards revived the memory of my first performance, and the essay was eagerly sought in the shops. but i refused the permission which becket solicited of reprinting it: the public curiosity was imperfectly satisfied by a pirated copy of the booksellers of dublin; and when a copy of the original edition has been discovered in a sale, the primitive value of half-a-crown has risen to the fanciful price of a guinea or thirty shillings. i have expatiated on the petty circumstances and period of my first publication, a memorable aera in the life of a student, when he ventures to reveal the measure of his mind: his hopes and fears are multiplied by the idea of self-importance, and he believes for a while that the eyes of mankind are fixed on his person and performance. whatever may be my present reputation, it no longer rests on the merit of this first essay; and at the end of twenty-eight years i may appreciate my juvenile work with the impartiality, and almost with the indifference, of a stranger. in his answer to lady hervey, the count de caylus admires, or affects to admire, "les livres sans nombre que mr. gibbon a lus et tres bien lus." but, alas! my stock of erudition at that time was scanty and superficial; and if i allow myself the liberty of naming the greek masters, my genuine and personal acquaintance was confined to the latin classics. the most serious defect of my essay is a kind of obscurity and abruptness which always fatigues, and may often elude, the attention of the reader. instead of a precise and proper definition of the title itself, the sense of the word litterature is loosely and variously applied: a number of remarks and examples, historical, critical, philosophical, are heaped on each other without method or connection; and if we except some introductory pages, all the remaining chapters might indifferently be reversed or transposed. the obscure passages is often affected, brevis esse laboro, obscurus fio; the desire of expressing perhaps a common idea with sententious and oracular brevity: alas! how fatal has been the imitation of montesquieu! but this obscurity sometimes proceeds from a mixture of light and darkness in the author's mind; from a partial ray which strikes upon an angle, instead of spreading itself over the surface of an object. after this fair confession i shall presume to say, that the essay does credit to a young writer of two and twenty years of age, who had read with taste, who thinks with freedom, and who writes in a foreign language with spirit and elegance. the defence of the early history of rome and the new chronology of sir isaac newton form a specious argument. the patriotic and political design of the georgics is happily conceived; and any probable conjecture, which tends to raise the dignity of the poet and the poem, deserves to be adopted, without a rigid scrutiny. some dawnings of a philosophic spirit enlighten the general remarks on the study of history and of man. i am not displeased with the inquiry into the origin and nature of the gods of polytheism, which might deserve the illustration of a riper judgment. upon the whole, i may apply to the first labour of my pen the speech of a far superior artist, when he surveyed the first productions of his pencil. after viewing some portraits which he had painted in his youth, my friend sir joshua reynolds acknowledged to me, that he was rather humbled than flattered by the comparison with his present works; and that after so much time and study, he had conceived his improvement to be much greater than he found it to have been. at lausanne i composed the first chapters of my essay in french, the familiar language of my conversation and studies, in which it was easier for me to write than in my mother tongue. after my return to england i continued the same practice, without any affectation, or design of repudiating (as dr. bentley would say) my vernacular idiom. but i should have escaped some anti-gallican clamour, had i been content with the more natural character of an english author. i should have been more consistent had i rejected mallet's advice, of prefixing an english dedication to a french book; a confusion of tongues that seemed to accuse the ignorance of my patron. the use of a foreign dialect might be excused by the hope of being employed as a negociator, by the desire of being generally understood on the continent; but my true motive was doubtless the ambition of new and singular fame, an englishman claiming a place among the writers of france. the latin tongue had been consecrated by the service of the church, it was refined by the imitation of the ancients; and in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the scholars of europe enjoyed the advantage, which they have gradually resigned, of conversing and writing in a common and learned idiom. as that idiom was no longer in any country the vulgar speech, they all stood on a level with each other; yet a citizen of old rome might have smiled at the best latinity of the germans and britons; and we may learn from the ciceronianus of erasmus, how difficult it was found to steer a middle course between pedantry and barbarism. the romans themselves had sometimes attempted a more perilous task, of writing in a living language, and appealing to the taste and judgment of the natives. the vanity of tully was doubly interested in the greek memoirs of his own consulship; and if he modestly supposes that some latinisms might be detected in his style, he is confident of his own skill in the art of isocrates and aristotle; and he requests his friend atticus to disperse the copies of his work at athens, and in the other cities of greece, (ad atticum, i. . ii. i.) but it must not be forgotten, that from infancy to manhood cicero and his contemporaries had read and declaimed, and composed with equal diligence in both languages; and that he was not allowed to frequent a latin school till he had imbibed the lessons of the greek grammarians and rhetoricians. in modern times, the language of france has been diffused by the merit of her writers, the social manners of the natives, the influence of the monarchy, and the exile of the protestants. several foreigners have seized the opportunity of speaking to europe in this common dialect, and germany may plead the authority of leibnitz and frederick, of the first of her philosophers, and the greatest of her kings. the just pride and laudable prejudice of england has restrained this communication of idioms; and of all the nations on this side of the alps, my countrymen are the least practised, and least perfect in the exercise of the french tongue. by sir william temple and lord chesterfield it was only used on occasions of civility and business, and their printed letters will not be quoted as models of composition. lord bolingbroke may have published in french a sketch of his reflections on exile: but his reputation now reposes on the address of voltaire, "docte sermones utriusque linguae;" and by his english dedication to queen caroline, and his essay on epic poetry, it should seem that voltaire himself wished to deserve a return of the same compliment. the exception of count hamilton cannot fairly be urged; though an irishman by birth, he was educated in france from his childhood. yet i am surprised that a long residence in england, and the habits of domestic conversation, did not affect the ease and purity of his inimitable style; and i regret the omission of his english verses, which might have afforded an amusing object of comparison. i might therefore assume the primus ego in patriam, &c.; but with what success i have explored this untrodden path must be left to the decision of my french readers. dr. maty, who might himself be questioned as a foreigner, has secured his retreat at my expense. "je ne crois pas que vous vous piquiez d'etre moins facile a reconnoitre pour un anglois que lucullus pour un romain." my friends at paris have been more indulgent, they received me as a countryman, or at least as a provincial; but they were friends and parisians. the defects which maty insinuates, "ces traits saillans, ces figures hardies, ce sacrifice de la regle au sentiment, et de la cadence a la force," are the faults of the youth, rather than of the stranger: and after the long and laborious exercise of my own language, i am conscious that my french style has been ripened and improved. i have already hinted, that the publication of my essay was delayed till i had embraced the military profession. i shall now amuse myself with the recollection of an active scene, which bears no affinity to any other period of my studious and social life. in the outset of a glorious war, the english people had been defended by the aid of german mercenaries. a national militia has been the cry of every patriot since the revolution; and this measure, both in parliament and in the field, was supported by the country gentlemen or tories, who insensibly transferred their loyalty to the house of hanover: in the language of mr. burke, they have changed the idol, but they have preserved the idolatry. in the act of offering our names and receiving our commissions, as major and captain in the hampshire regiment, (june , ,) we had not supposed that we should be dragged away, my father from his farm, myself from my books, and condemned, during two years and a half, (may , --december , ,) to a wandering life of military servitude. but a weekly or monthly exercise of thirty thousand provincials would have left them useless and ridiculous; and after the pretence of an invasion had vanished, the popularity of mr. pitt gave a sanction to the illegal step of keeping them till the end of the war under arms, in constant pay and duty, and at a distance from their respective homes. when the king's order for our embodying came down, it was too late to retreat, and too soon to repent. the south battalion of the hampshire militia was a small independent corps of four hundred and seventy-six, officers and men, commanded by lieutenant-colonel sir thomas worsley, who, after a prolix and passionate contest, delivered us from the tyranny of the lord lieutenant, the duke of bolton. my proper station, as first captain, was at the head of my own, and afterwards of the grenadier, company; but in the absence, or even in the presence, of the two field officers, i was entrusted by my friend and my father with the effective labour of dictating the orders, and exercising the battalion. with the help of an original journal, i could write the history of my bloodless and inglorious campaigns; but as these events have lost much of their importance in my own eyes, they shall be dispatched in a few words. from winchester, the first place of assembly, (june , ,) we were removed, at our own request, for the benefit of a foreign education. by the arbitrary, and often capricious, orders of the war-office, the battalion successively marched to the pleasant and hospitable blandford (june ); to hilsea barracks, a seat of disease and discord (sept. ); to cranbrook in the weald of kent (dec. ); to the sea-coast of dover (dec. ); to winchester camp (june , ); to the populous and disorderly town of devizes (oct. ); to salisbury (feb. , ); to our beloved blandford a second time (march ); and finally, to the fashionable resort of southampton (june ); where the colours were fixed till our final dissolution. (dec. ). on the beach at dover we had exercised in sight of the gallic shores. but the most splendid and useful scene of our life was a four months' encampment on winchester down, under the command of the earl of effingham. our army consisted of the thirty-fourth regiment of foot and six militia corps. the consciousness of our defects was stimulated by friendly emulation. we improved our time and opportunities in morning and evening field-days; and in the general reviews the south hampshire were rather a credit than a disgrace to the line. in our subsequent quarters of the devizes and blandford, we advanced with a quick step in our military studies; the ballot of the ensuing summer renewed our vigour and youth; and had the militia subsisted another year, we might have contested the prize with the most perfect of our brethren. the loss of so many busy and idle hours was not compensated by any elegant pleasure; and my temper was insensibly soured by the society of out rustic officers. in every state there exists, however, a balance of good and evil. the habits of a sedentary life were usefully broken by the duties of an active profession: in the healthful exercise of the field i hunted with a battalion, instead of a pack; and at that time i was ready, at any hour of the day or night, to fly from quarters to london, from london to quarters, on the slightest call of private or regimental business. but my principal obligation to the militia, was the making me an englishman, and a soldier. after my foreign education, with my reserved temper, i should long have continued a stranger in my native country, had i not been shaken in this various scene of new faces and new friends: had not experience forced me to feel the characters of our leading men, the state of parties, the forms of office, and the operation of our civil and military system. in this peaceful service i imbibed the rudiments of the language, and science of tactics, which opened a new field of study and observation. i diligently read, and meditated, the memoires militaires of quintus icilius, (mr. guichardt,) the only writer who has united the merits of a professor and a veteran. the discipline and evolutions of a modern battalion gave me a clearer notion of the phalanx and the legion; and the captain of the hampshire grenadiers (the reader may smile) has not been useless to the historian of the roman empire. a youth of any spirit is fired even by the play of arms, and in the first sallies of my enthusiasm i had seriously attempted to embrace the regular profession of a soldier. but this military fever was cooled by the enjoyment of our mimic bellona, who soon unveiled to my eyes her naked deformity. how often did i sigh for my proper station in society and letters. how often (a proud comparison) did i repeat the complaint of cicero in the command of a provincial army: "clitellae bovi sunt impositae. est incredibile quam me negotii taedeat. non habet satis magnum campum ille tibi non ignotus cursus animi; et industriae meae praeclara opera cessat. lucem, libros, urbem, domum, vos desidero. sed feram, ut potero; sit modo annuum. si prorogatur, actum est."--epist. ad atticum, lib. v. . from a service without danger i might indeed have retired without disgrace; but as often as i hinted a wish of resigning, my fetters were riveted by the friendly intreaties of the colonel, the parental authority of the major, and my own regard for the honour and welfare of the battalion. when i felt that my personal escape was impracticable, i bowed my neck to the yoke: my servitude was protracted far beyond the annual patience of cicero; and it was not till after the preliminaries of peace that i received my discharge, from the act of government which disembodied the militia. when i complain of the loss of time, justice to myself and to the militia must throw the greatest part of that reproach on the first seven or eight months, while i was obliged to learn as well as to teach. the dissipation of blandford, and the disputes of portsmouth, consumed the hours which were not employed in the field; and amid the perpetual hurry of an inn, a barrack, or a guard-room, all literary ideas were banished from my mind. after this long fast, the longest which i have ever known, i once more tasted at dover the pleasures of reading and thinking; and the hungry appetite with which i opened a volume of tully's philosophical works is still present to my memory. the last review of my essay before its publication, had prompted me to investigate the nature of the gods; my inquiries led me to the historie critique du manicheisme of beausobre, who discusses many deep questions of pagan and christian theology: and from this rich treasury of facts and opinions, i deduced my own consequences, beyond the holy circle of the author. after this recovery i never relapsed into indolence; and my example might prove, that in the life most averse to study, some hours may be stolen, some minutes may be snatched. amidst the tumult of winchester camp i sometimes thought and read in my tent; in the more settled quarters of the devizes, blandford, and southampton, i always secured a separate lodging, and the necessary books; and in the summer of , while the new militia was raising, i enjoyed at buriton two or three months of literary repose. in forming a new plan of study, i hesitated between the mathematics and the greek language; both of which i had neglected since my return from lausanne. i consulted a learned and friendly mathematician, mr. george scott, a pupil of de moivre; and his map of a country which i have never explored, may perhaps be more serviceable to others. as soon as i had given the preference to greek, the example of scaliger and my own reason determined me on the choice of homer, the father of poetry, and the bible of the ancients: but scaliger ran through the iliad in one and twenty days; and i was not dissatisfied with my own diligence for performing the same labour in an equal number of weeks. after the first difficulties were surmounted, the language of nature and harmony soon became easy and familiar, and each day i sailed upon the ocean with a brisker gale and a more steady course. {passage in greek} ilias, a . --fair wind, and blowing fresh, apollo sent them; quick they rear'd the mast, then spread th'unsullied canvas to the gale, and the wind fill'd it. roar'd the sable flood around the bark, that ever as she went dash'd wide the brine, and scudded swift away. cowper's homer. in the study of a poet who has since become the most intimate of my friends, i successively applied many passages and fragments of greek writers; and among these i shall notice a life of homer, in the oposcula mythologica of gale, several books of the geography of strabo, and the entire treatise of longinus, which, from the title and the style, is equally worthy of the epithet of sublime. my grammatical skill was improved, my vocabulary was enlarged; and in the militia i acquired a just and indelible knowledge of the first of languages. on every march, in every journey, horace was always in my pocket, and often in my hand: but i should not mention his two critical epistles, the amusement of a morning, had they not been accompanied by the elaborate commentary of dr. hurd, now bishop of worcester. on the interesting subjects of composition and imitation of epic and dramatic poetry, i presumed to think for myself; and thirty close-written pages in folio could scarcely comprise my full and free discussion of the sense of the master and the pedantry of the servant. after his oracle dr. johnson, my friend sir joshua reynolds denies all original genius, any natural propensity of the mind to one art or science rather than another. without engaging in a metaphysical or rather verbal dispute, i know, by experience, that from my early youth i aspired to the character of an historian. while i served in the militia, before and after the publication of my essay, this idea ripened in my mind; nor can i paint in more lively colours the feelings of the moment, than by transcribing some passages, under their respective dates, from a journal which i kept at that time. beriton, april , . (in a short excursion from dover.)-- "having thought of several subjects for an historical composition, i chose the expedition of charles viii. of france into italy. i read two memoirs of mr. de foncemagne in the academy of inscriptions (tom. xvii. p. - .), and abstracted them. i likewise finished this day a dissertation, in which i examine the right of charles viii. to the crown of naples, and the rival claims of the house of anjou and arragon: it consists of ten folio pages, besides large notes." beriton, august , . (in a week's excursion from winchester camp.)--"after having long revolved subjects for my intended historical essay, i renounced my first thought of the expedition of charles viii. as too remote from us, and rather an introduction to great events, than great and important in itself. i successively chose and rejected the crusade of richard the first, the barons' wars against john and henry the third, the history of edward the black prince, the lives and comparisons of henry v. and the emperor titus, the life of sir philip sidney, and that of the marquis of montrose. at length i have fixed on sir walter raleigh for my hero. his eventful story is varied by the characters of the soldier and sailor, the courtier and historian; and it may afford such a fund of materials as i desire, which have not yet been properly manufactured. at present i cannot attempt the execution of this work. free leisure, and the opportunity of consulting many books, both printed and manuscript, are as necessary as they are impossible to be attained in my present way of life. however, to acquire a general insight into my subject and resources, i read the life of sir walter raleigh by dr. birch, his copious article in the general dictionary by the same hand, and the reigns of queen elizabeth and james the first in hume's history of england." beriton, january . (in a month's absence from the devizes.)-- "during this interval of repose, i again turned my thoughts to sir walter raleigh, and looked more closely into my materials. i read the two volumes in quarto of the bacon papers, published by dr. birch; the fragmenta regalia of sir robert naunton, mallet's life of lord bacon, and the political treatises of that great man in the first volume of his works, with many of his letters in the second; sir william monson's naval tracts, and the elaborate life of sir walter raleigh, which mr. oldys has prefixed to the best edition of his history of the world. my subject opens upon me, and in general improves upon a nearer prospect." beriton, july , . (during my summer residence.)--"i am afraid of being reduced to drop my hero; but my time has not, however, been lost in the research of his story, and of a memorable aera of our english annals. the life of sir walter raleigh, by oldys, is a very poor performance; a servile panegyric, or flat apology, tediously minute, and composed in a dull and affected style. yet the author was a man of diligence and learning, who had read everything relative to his subject, and whose ample collections are arranged with perspicuity and method. excepting some anecdotes lately revealed in the sidney and bacon papers, i know not what i should be able to add. my ambition (exclusive of the uncertain merit of style and sentiment) must be confined to the hope of giving a good abridgment of oldys. i have even the disappointment of finding some parts of this copious work very dry and barren; and these parts are unluckily some of the most characteristic: raleigh's colony of virginia, his quarrels with essex, the true secret of his conspiracy, and, above all, the detail of his private life, the most essential and important to a biographer. my best resource would be in the circumjacent history of the times, and perhaps in some digressions artfully introduced, like the fortunes of the peripatetic philosophy in the portrait of lord bacon. but the reigns of elizabeth and james the first are the periods of english history, which have been the most variously illustrated: and what new lights could i reflect on a subject, which has exercised the accurate industry of birch, the lively and curious acuteness of walpole, the critical spirit of hurd, the vigorous sense of mallet and robertson, and the impartial philosophy of hume? could i even surmount these obstacles, i should shrink with terror from the modern history of england, where every character is a problem, and every reader a friend or an enemy; where a writer is supposed to hoist a flag of party, and is devoted to damnation by the adverse faction. such would be my reception at home: and abroad, the historian of raleigh must encounter an indifference far more bitter than censure or reproach. the events of his life are interesting: but his character is ambiguous, his actions are obscure, his writings are english, and his fame is confined to the narrow limits of our language and our island. i must embrace a safer and more extensive theme. "there is one which i should prefer to all others, the history of the liberty of the swiss, of that independence which a brave people rescued from the house of austria, defended against a dauphin of france, and finally sealed with the blood of charles of burgundy. from such a theme, so full of public spirit, of military glory, of examples of virtue, of lessons of government, the dullest stranger would catch fire; what might not i hope, whose talents, whatsoever they may be, would be inflamed with the zeal of patriotism. but the materials of this history are inaccessible to me, fast locked in the obscurity of an old barbarous german dialect, of which i am totally ignorant, and which i cannot resolve to learn for this sole and peculiar purpose. "i have another subject in view, which is the contrast of the former history: the one a poor, warlike, virtuous republic, which emerges into glory and freedom; the other a commonwealth, soft, opulent, and corrupt; which, by just degrees, is precipitated from the abuse to the loss of her liberty: both lessons are, perhaps, equally instructive. this second subject is, the history of the republic of florence under the house of medicis: a period of one hundred and fifty years, which rises or descends from the dregs of the florentine democracy, to the title and dominion of cosmo de medicis in the grand duchy of tuscany. i might deduce a chain of revolutions not unworthy of the pen of vertot; singular men, and singular events; the medicis four times expelled, and as often recalled; and the genius of freedom reluctantly yielding to the arms of charles v. and the policy of cosmo. the character and fate of savanerola, and the revival of arts and letters in italy, will be essentially connected with the elevation of the family and the fall of the republic. the medicis (stirps quasi fataliter nata ad instauranda vel fovenda studia (lipsius ad germanos et galles, epist. viii.)) were illustrated by the patronage of learning; and enthusiasm was the most formidable weapon of their adversaries. on this splendid subject i shall most probably fix; but when, or where, or how will it be executed? i behold in a dark and doubtful perspective." res alta terra, et caligine mersas. the youthful habits of the language and manners of france had left in my mind an ardent desire of revisiting the continent on a larger and more liberal plan. according to the law of custom, and perhaps of reason, foreign travel completes the education of an english gentleman: my father had consented to my wish, but i was detained above four years by my rash engagement in the militia. i eagerly grasped the first moments of freedom: three or four weeks in hampshire and london were employed in the preparations of my journey, and the farewell visits of friendship and civility: my last act in town was to applaud mallet's new tragedy of elvira; a post-chaise conveyed me to dover, the packet to boulogne, and such was my diligence, that i reached paris on jan. , , only thirty-six days after the disbanding of the militia. two or three years were loosely defined for the term of my absence; and i was left at liberty to spend that time in such places and in such a manner as was most agreeable to my taste and judgment. in this first visit i passed three months and a half, (jan. -may ,) and a much longer space might have been agreeably filled, without any intercourse with the natives. at home we are content to move in the daily round of pleasure and business; and a scene which is always present is supposed to be within our knowledge, or at least within our power. but in a foreign country, curiosity is our business and our pleasure; and the traveller, conscious of his ignorance, and covetous of his time, is diligent in the search and the view of every object that can deserve his attention. i devoted many hours of the morning to the circuit of paris and the neighbourhood, to the visit of churches and palaces conspicuous by their architecture, to the royal manufactures, collections of books and pictures, and all the various treasures of art, of learning, and of luxury. an englishman may hear without reluctance, that in these curious and costly articles paris is superior to london; since the opulence of the french capital arises from the defects of its government and religion. in the absence of louis xiv. and his successors, the louvre has been left unfinished: but the millions which have been lavished on the sands of versailles, and the morass of marli, could not be supplied by the legal allowance of a british king. the splendour of the french nobles is confined to their town residence; that of the english is more usefully distributed in their country seats; and we should be astonished at our own riches, if the labours of architecture, the spoils of italy and greece, which are now scattered from inverary to wilton, were accumulated in a few streets between marylebone and westminster. all superfluous ornament is rejected by the cold frugality of the protestants; but the catholic superstition, which is always the enemy of reason, is often the parent of the arts. the wealthy communities of priests and monks expend their revenues in stately edifices; and the parish church of st. sulpice, one of the noblest structures in paris, was built and adorned by the private industry of a late cure. in this outset, and still more in the sequel of my tour, my eye was amused; but the pleasing vision cannot be fixed by the pen; the particular images are darkly seen through the medium of five-and-twenty years, and the narrative of my life must not degenerate into a book of travels. but the principal end of my journey was to enjoy the society of a polished and amiable people, in whose favour i was strongly prejudiced, and to converse with some authors, whose conversation, as i fondly imagined, must be far more pleasing and instructive than their writings. the moment was happily chosen. at the close of a successful war the british name was respected on the continent. clarum et venerabile nomen gentibus. our opinions, our fashions, even our games, were adopted in france, a ray of national glory illuminated each individual, and every englishman was supposed to be born a patriot and a philosopher. for myself, i carried a personal recommendation; my name and my essay were already known; the compliment of having written in the french language entitled me to some returns of civility and gratitude. i was considered as a man of letters, who wrote for amusement. before my departure i had obtained from the duke de nivernois, lady hervey, the mallets, mr. walpole, &c. many letters of recommendation to their private or literary friends. of these epistles the reception and success were determined by the character and situation of the persons by whom and to whom they were addressed: the seed was sometimes cast on a barren rock, and it sometimes multiplied an hundred fold in the production of new shoots, spreading branches, and exquisite fruit. but upon the whole, i had reason to praise the national urbanity, which from the court has diffused its gentle influence to the shop, the cottage, and the schools. of the men of genius of the age, montesquieu and fontenelle were no more; voltaire resided on his own estate near geneva; rousseau in the preceding year had been driven from his hermitage of montmorency; and i blush at my having neglected to seek, in this journey, the acquaintance of buffon. among the men of letters whom i saw, d'alembert and diderot held the foremost rank in merit, or at least in fame. i shall content myself with enumerating the well-known names of the count de caylus, of the abbe de la bleterie, barthelemy, reynal, arnaud, of messieurs de la condamine, du clos, de ste palaye, de bougainville, caperonnier, de guignes, suard, &c. without attempting to discriminate the shades of their characters, or the degrees of our connection. alone, in a morning visit, i commonly found the artists and authors of paris less vain, and more reasonable, than in the circles of their equals, with whom they mingle in the houses of the rich. four days in a week, i had place, without invitation, at the hospitable tables of mesdames geoffrin and du bocage, of the celebrated helvetius, and of the baron d'olbach. in these symposia the pleasures of the table were improved by lively and liberal conversation; the company was select, though various and voluntary. the society of madame du bocage was more soft and moderate than that of her rivals, and the evening conversations of m. de foncemagne were supported by the good sense and learning of the principal members of the academy of inscriptions. the opera and the italians i occasionally visited; but the french theatre, both in tragedy and comedy, was my daily and favourite amusement. two famous actresses then divided the public applause. for my own part, i preferred the consummate art of the claron, to the intemperate sallies of the dumesnil, which were extolled by her admirers, as the genuine voice of nature and passion. fourteen weeks insensibly stole away; but had i been rich and independent, i should have prolonged, and perhaps have fixed, my residence at paris. between the expensive style of paris and of italy it was prudent to interpose some months of tranquil simplicity; and at the thoughts of lausanne i again lived in the pleasures and studies of my early youth. shaping my course through dijon and besancon, in the last of which places i was kindly entertained by my cousin acton, i arrived in the month of may on the banks of the leman lake. it had been my intention to pass the alps in the autumn, but such are the simple attractions of the place, that the year had almost expired before my departure from lausanne in the ensuing spring. an absence of five years had not made much alteration in manners, or even in persons. my old friends, of both sexes, hailed my voluntary return; the most genuine proof of my attachment. they had been flattered by the present of my book, the produce of their soil; and the good pavilliard shed tears of joy as he embraced a pupil, whose literary merit he might fairly impute to his own labours. to my old list i added some new acquaintance, and among the strangers i shall distinguish prince lewis of wirtemberg, the brother of the reigning duke, at whose country-house, near lausanne, i frequently dined: a wandering meteor, and at length a falling star, his light and ambitious spirit had successively dropped from the firmament of prussia, of france, and of austria; and his faults, which he styled his misfortunes, had driven him into philosophic exile in the pays de vaud. he could now moralize on the vanity of the world, the equality of mankind, and the happiness of a private station. his address was affable and polite, and as he had shone in courts and armies, his memory could supply, and his eloquence could adorn, a copious fund of interesting anecdotes. his first enthusiasm was that of charity and agriculture; but the sage gradually lapsed in the saint, and prince lewis of wirtemberg is now buried in a hermitage near mayence, in the last stage of mystic devotion. by some ecclesiastical quarrel, voltaire had been provoked to withdraw himself from lausanne, and retire to his castle at ferney, where i again visited the poet and the actor, without seeking his more intimate acquaintance, to which i might now have pleaded a better title. but the theatre which he had founded, the actors whom he had formed, survived the loss of their master; and, recent from paris, i attended with pleasure at the representation of several tragedies and comedies. i shall not descend to specify particular names and characters; but i cannot forget a private institution, which will display the innocent freedom of swiss manners. my favourite society had assumed, from the age of its members, the proud denomination of the spring (la society du printems). it consisted of fifteen or twenty young unmarried ladies, of genteel, though not of the very first families; the eldest perhaps about twenty, all agreeable, several handsome, and two or three of exquisite beauty. at each other's houses they assembled almost every day, without the controul, or even the presence, of a mother or an aunt; they were trusted to their own prudence, among a crowd of young men of every nation in europe. they laughed, they sung, they danced, they played at cards, they acted comedies; but in the midst of this careless gaiety, they respected themselves, and were respected by the men; the invisible line between liberty and licentiousness was never transgressed by a gesture, a word, or a look, and their virgin chastity was never sullied by the breath of scandal or suspicion. a singular institution, expressive of the innocent simplicity of swiss manners. after having tasted the luxury of england and paris, i could not have returned with satisfaction to the coarse and homely table of madame pavilliard; nor was her husband offended that i now entered myself as a pensionaire, or boarder, in the elegant house of mr. de mesery, which may be entitled to a short remembrance, as it has stood above twenty years, perhaps, without a parallel in europe. the house in which we lodged was spacious and convenient, in the best street, and commanding, from behind, a noble prospect over the country and the lake. our table was served with neatness and plenty; the boarders were select; we had the liberty of inviting any guests at a stated price; and in the summer the scene was occasionally transferred to a pleasant villa, about a league from lausanne. the characters of master and mistress were happily suited to each other, and to their situation. at the age of seventy-five, madame de mesery, who has survived her husband, is still a graceful, i had almost said, a handsome woman. she was alike qualified to preside in her kitchen and her drawing-room; and such was the equal propriety of her conduct, that of two or three hundred foreigners, none ever failed in respect, none could complain of her neglect, and none could ever boast of her favour. mesery himself, of the noble family of de crousaz, was a man of the world, a jovial companion, whose easy manners and natural sallies maintained the cheerfulness of his house. his wit could laugh at his own ignorance: he disguised, by an air of profusion, a strict attention to his interest; and in this situation he appeared like a nobleman who spent his fortune and entertained his friends. in this agreeable society i resided nearly eleven months (may --april ); and in this second visit to lausanne, among a crowd of my english companions, i knew and esteemed mr. holroyd (now lord sheffield); and our mutual attachment was renewed and fortified in the subsequent stages of our italian journey. our lives are in the power of chance, and a slight variation on either side, in time or place, might have deprived me of a friend, whose activity in the ardour of youth was always prompted by a benevolent heart, and directed by a strong understanding. if my studies at paris had been confined to the study of the world, three or four months would not have been unprofitably spent. my visits, however superficial, to the academy of medals and the public libraries, opened a new field of inquiry; and the view of so many manuscripts of different ages and characters induced me to consult the two great benedictine works, the diplomatica of mabillon, and the palaeographia of montfaucon. i studied the theory without attaining the practice of the art: nor should i complain of the intricacy of greek abbreviations and gothic alphabets, since every day, in a familiar language, i am at a loss to decipher the hieroglyphics of a female note. in a tranquil scene, which revived the memory of my first studies, idleness would have been less pardonable: the public libraries of lausanne and geneva liberally supplied me with books; and if many hours were lost in dissipation, many more were employed in literary labour. in the country, horace and virgil, juvenal and ovid, were my assiduous companions but, in town, i formed and executed a plan of study for the use of my transalpine expedition: the topography of old rome, the ancient geography of italy, and the science of medals. . i diligently read, almost always with my pen in my hand, the elaborate treatises of nardini, donatus, &c., which fill the fourth volume of the roman antiquities of graevius. . i next undertook and finished the italia antiqua of cluverius, a learned native of prussia, who had measured, on foot, every spot, and has compiled and digested every passage of the ancient writers. these passages in greek or latin authors i perused in the text of cluverius, in two folio volumes: but i separately read the descriptions of italy by strabo, pliny, and pomponius mela, the catalogues of the epic poets, the itineraries of wesseling's antoninus, and the coasting voyage of rutilius numatianus; and i studied two kindred subjects in the measures itineraires of d'anville, and the copious work of bergier, histoire des grands chemins de i'empire romain. from these materials i formed a table of roads and distances reduced to our english measure; filled a folio common-place book with my collections and remarks on the geography of italy; and inserted in my journal many long and learned notes on the insulae and populousness of rome, the social war, the passage of the alps by hannibal, &c. . after glancing my eye over addison's agreeable dialogues, i more seriously read the great work of ezechiel spanheim de praestantia et usu numismatum, and applied with him the medals of the kings and emperors, the families and colonies, to the illustration of ancient history. and thus was i armed for my italian journey. i shall advance with rapid brevity in the narrative of this tour, in which somewhat more than a year (april -may ) was agreeably employed. content with tracing my line of march, and slightly touching on my personal feelings, i shall waive the minute investigation of the scenes which have been viewed by thousands, and described by hundreds, of our modern travellers. rome is the great object of our pilgrimage: and st, the journey; d, the residence; and d, the return; will form the most proper and perspicuous division. . i climbed mount cenis, and descended into the plain of piedmont, not on the back of an elephant, but on a light osier seat, in the hands of the dextrous and intrepid chairmen of the alps. the architecture and government of turin presented the same aspect of tame and tiresome uniformity: but the court was regulated with decent and splendid oeconomy; and i was introduced to his sardinian majesty charles emanuel, who, after the incomparable frederic, held the second rank (proximus longo tamen intervallo) among the kings of europe. the size and populousness of milan could not surprise an inhabitant of london: but the fancy is amused by a visit to the boromean islands, an enchanted palace, a work of the fairies in the midst of a lake encompassed with mountains, and far removed from the haunts of men. i was less amused by the marble palaces of genoa, than by the recent memorials of her deliverance (in december ) from the austrian tyranny; and i took a military survey of every scene of action within the inclosure of her double walls. my steps were detained at parma and modena, by the precious relics of the farnese and este collections: but, alas! the far greater part had been already transported, by inheritance or purchase, to naples and dresden. by the road of bologna and the apennine i at last reached florence, where i reposed from june to september, during the heat of the summer months. in the gallery, and especially in the tribune, i first acknowledged, at the feet of the venus of medicis, that the chisel may dispute the pre-eminence with the pencil, a truth in the fine arts which cannot on this side of the alps be felt or understood. at home i had taken some lessons of italian on the spot i read, with a learned native, the classics of the tuscan idiom: but the shortness of my time, and the use of the french language, prevented my acquiring any facility of speaking; and i was a silent spectator in the conversations of our envoy, sir horace mann, whose most serious business was that of entertaining the english at his hospitable table. after leaving florence, i compared the solitude of pisa with the industry of lucca and leghorn, and continued my journey through sienna to rome, where i arrived in the beginning of october. . my temper is not very susceptible of enthusiasm; and the enthusiasm which i do not feel, i have ever scorned to affect. but, at the distance of twenty-five years, i can neither forget nor express the strong emotions which agitated my mind as i first approached and entered the eternal city. after a sleepless night, i trod, with a lofty step, the ruins of the forum; each memorable spot where romulus stood, or tully spoke, or caesar fell, was at once present to my eye; and several days of intoxication were lost or enjoyed before i could descend to a cool and minute investigation. my guide was mr. byers, a scotch antiquary of experience and taste; but, in the daily labour of eighteen weeks, the powers of attention were sometimes fatigued, till i was myself qualified, in a last review, to select and study the capital works of ancient and modern art. six weeks were borrowed for my tour of naples, the most populous of cities, relative to its size, whose luxurious inhabitants seem to dwell on the confines of paradise and hell-fire. i was presented to the boy-king by our new envoy, sir william hamilton; who, wisely diverting his correspondence from the secretary of state to the royal society and british museum, has elucidated a country of such inestimable value to the naturalist and antiquarian. on my return, i fondly embraced, for the last time, the miracles of rome; but i departed without kissing the feet of rezzonico (clement xiii.), who neither possessed the wit of his predecessor lambertini, nor the virtues of his successor ganganelli. . in my pilgrimage from rome to loretto i again crossed the apennine; from the coast of the adriatic i traversed a fruitful and populous country, which could alone disprove the paradox of montesquieu, that modern italy is a desert. without adopting the exclusive prejudice of the natives, i sincerely admire the paintings of the bologna school. i hastened to escape from the sad solitude of ferrara, which in the age of caesar was still more desolate. the spectacle of venice afforded some hours of astonishment; the university of padua is a dying taper: but verona still boasts her amphitheatre, and his native vicenza is adorned by the classic architecture of palladio: the road of lombardy and piedmont (did montesquieu find them without inhabitants?) led me back to milan, turin, and the passage of mount cenis, where i again crossed the alps in my way to lyons. the use of foreign travel has been often debated as a general question; but the conclusion must be finally applied to the character and circumstances of each individual. with the education of boys, where or how they may pass over some juvenile years with the least mischief to themselves or others, i have no concern. but after supposing the previous and indispensable requisites of age, judgment, a competent knowledge of men and books, and a freedom from domestic prejudices, i will briefly describe the qualifications which i deem most essential to a traveller. he should be endowed with an active, indefatigable vigour of mind and body, which can seize every mode of conveyance, and support, with a careless smile, every hardship of the road, the weather, or the inn. the benefits of foreign travel will correspond with the degrees of these qualifications; but, in this sketch, those to whom i am known will not accuse me of framing my own panegyric. it was at rome, on the th of october , as i sat musing amidst the ruins of the capitol, while the bare-footed fryars were singing vespers in the temple of jupiter, that the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind. but my original plan was circumscribed to the decay of the city rather than of the empire: and though my reading and reflections began to point towards that object, some years elapsed, and several avocations intervened, before i was seriously engaged in the execution of that laborious work. i had not totally renounced the southern provinces of france, but the letters which i found at lyons were expressive of some impatience. rome and italy had satiated my curious appetite, and i was now ready to return to the peaceful retreat of my family and books. after a happy fortnight i reluctantly left paris, embarked at calais, again landed at dover, after an interval of two years and five months, and hastily drove through the summer dust and solitude of london. on june i arrived at my father's house: and the five years and a half between my travels and my father's death ( ) are the portion of my life which i passed with the least enjoyment, and which i remember with the least satisfaction. every spring i attended the monthly meeting and exercise of the militia at southampton; and by the resignation of my father, and the death of sir thomas worsley, i was successively promoted to the rank of major and lieutenant-colonel commandant; but i was each year more disgusted with the inn, the wine, the company, and the tiresome repetition of annual attendance and daily exercise. at home, the oeconomy of the family and farm still maintained the same creditable appearance. my connection with mrs. gibbon was mellowed into a warm and solid attachment: my growing years abolished the distance that might yet remain between a parent and a son, and my behaviour satisfied my father, who was proud of the success, however imperfect in his own life-time, of my literary talents. our solitude was soon and often enlivened by the visit of the friend of my youth, mr. deyverdun, whose absence from lausanne i had sincerely lamented. about three years after my first departure, he had emigrated from his native lake to the banks of the oder in germany. the res augusta domi, the waste of a decent patrimony, by an improvident father, obliged him, like many of his countrymen, to confide in his own industry; and he was entrusted with the education of a young prince, the grandson of the margrave of schavedt, of the royal family of prussia. our friendship was never cooled, our correspondence was sometimes interrupted; but i rather wished than hoped to obtain mr. deyverdun for the companion of my italian tour. an unhappy, though honourable passion, drove him from his german court; and the attractions of hope and curiosity were fortified by the expectation of my speedy return to england. during four successive summers he passed several weeks or months at beriton, and our free conversations, on every topic that-could interest the heart or understanding, would have reconciled me to a desert or a prison. in the winter months of london my sphere of knowledge and action was somewhat enlarged, by the many new acquaintance which i had contracted in the militia and abroad; and i must regret, as more than an acquaintance, mr. godfrey clarke of derbyshire, an amiable and worthy young man, who was snatched away by an untimely death. a weekly convivial meeting was established by myself and travellers, under the name of the roman club. the renewal, or perhaps the improvement, of my english life was embittered by the alteration of my own feelings. at the age of twenty-one i was, in my proper station of a youth, delivered from the yoke of education, and delighted with the comparative state of liberty and affluence. my filial obedience was natural and easy; and in the gay prospect of futurity, my ambition did not extend beyond the enjoyment of my books, my leisure, and my patrimonial estate, undisturbed by the cares of a family and the duties of a profession. but in the militia i was armed with power; in my travels, i was exempt from controul; and as i approached, as i gradually passed my thirtieth year, i began to feel the desire of being master to my own house. the most gentle authority will sometimes frown without reason, the most cheerful submission will sometimes murmur without cause; and such is the law of our imperfect nature, that we must either command or obey; that our personal liberty is supported by the obsequiousness of our own dependants. while so many of my acquaintance were married or in parliament, or advancing with a rapid step in the various roads of honour and fortune, i stood alone, immoveable and insignificant; for after the monthly meeting of , i had even withdrawn myself from the militia, by the resignation of an empty and barren commission. my temper is not susceptible of envy, and the view of successful merit has always excited my warmest applause. the miseries of a vacant life were never known to a man whose hours were insufficient for the inexhaustible pleasures of study. but i lamented that at the proper age i had not embraced the lucrative pursuits of the law or of trade, the chances of civil office or india adventure, or even the fat slumbers of the church; and my repentance became more lively as the loss of time was more irretrievable. experience shewed me the use of grafting my private consequence on the importance of a great professional body; the benefits of those firm connections which are cemented by hope and interest, by gratitude and emulation, by the mutual exchange of services and favours. from the emoluments of a profession i might have derived an ample fortune, or a competent income, instead of being stinted to the same narrow allowance, to be increased only by an event which i sincerely deprecated. the progress and the knowledge of our domestic disorders aggravated my anxiety, and i began to apprehend that i might be left in my old age without the fruits either of industry or inheritance. in the first summer after my return, whilst i enjoyed at beriton the society of my friend deyverdun, our daily conversations expatiated over the field of ancient and modern literature; and we freely discussed my studies, my first essay, and my future projects. the decline and fall of rome i still contemplated at an awful distance: but the two historical designs which had balanced my choice were submitted to his taste: and in the parallel between the revolutions of florence and switzerland, our common partiality for a country which was his by birth, and mine by adoption, inclined the scale in favour of the latter. according to the plan, which was soon conceived and digested, i embraced a period of two hundred years, from the association of the three peasants of the alps to the plenitude and prosperity of the helvetic body in the sixteenth century. i should have described the deliverance and victory of the swiss, who have never shed the blood of their tyrants but in a field of battle; the laws and manners of the confederate states; the splendid trophies of the austrian, burgundian, and italian wars; and the wisdom of a nation, which, after some sallies of martial adventure, has been content to guard the blessings of peace with the sword of freedom. --manus haec inimica tyrannis ense petit placidam sub libertate quietem. my judgment, as well as my enthusiasm, was satisfied with the glorious theme; and the assistance of deyverdun seemed to remove an insuperable obstacle. the french or latin memorials, of which i was not ignorant, are inconsiderable in number and weight; but in the perfect acquaintance of my friend with the german language, i found the key of a more valuable collection. the most necessary books were procured; he translated, for my use, the folio volume of schilling, a copious and contemporary relation of the war of burgundy; we read and marked the most interesting parts of the great chronicle of tschudi; and by his labour, or that of an inferior assistant, large extracts were made from the history of lauffer and the dictionary of lew: yet such was the distance and delay, that two years elapsed in these preparatory steps; and it was late in the third summer ( ) before i entered, with these slender materials, on the more agreeable task of composition. a specimen of my history, the first book, was read the following winter in a literary society of foreigners in london; and as the author was unknown, i listened, without observation, to the free strictures, and unfavourable sentence, of my judges. the momentary sensation was painful; but their condemnation was ratified by my cooler thoughts. i delivered my imperfect sheets to the flames,--and for ever renounced a design in which some expence, much labour, and more time had been so vainly consumed. i cannot regret the loss of a slight and superficial essay, for such the work must have been in the hands of a stranger, uninformed by the scholars and statesmen, and remote from the libraries and archives of the swiss republics. my ancient habits, and the presence of deyverdun, encouraged me to write in french for the continent of europe; but i was conscious myself that my style, above prose and below poetry, degenerated into a verbose and turgid declamation. perhaps i may impute the failure to the injudicious choice of a foreign language. perhaps i may suspect that the language itself is ill adapted to sustain the vigour and dignity of an important narrative. but if france, so rich in literary merit, had produced a great original historian, his genius would have formed and fixed the idiom to the proper tone, the peculiar model of historical eloquence. it was in search of some liberal and lucrative employment that my friend deyverdun had visited england. his remittances from home were scanty and precarious. my purse was always open, but it was often empty; and i bitterly felt the want of riches and power, which might have enabled me to correct the errors of his fortune. his wishes and qualifications solicited the station of the travelling governor of some wealthy pupil; but every vacancy provoked so many eager candidates, that for a long time i struggled without success; nor was it till after much application that i could even place him as a clerk in the office of the secretary of state. in a residence of several years he never acquired the just pronunciation and familiar use of the english tongue, but he read our most difficult authors with ease and taste: his critical knowledge of our language and poetry was such as few foreigners have possessed; and few of our countrymen could enjoy the theatre of shakspeare and garrick with more exquisite feeling and discernment. the consciousness of his own strength, and the assurance of my aid, emboldened him to imitate the example of dr. maty, whose journal britannique was esteemed and regretted; and to improve his model, by uniting with the transactions of literature a philosophic view of the arts and manners of the british nation. our journal for the year , under the title of memoires literaires de la grand bretagne, was soon finished, and sent to the press. for the first article, lord lyttelton's history of henry ii., i must own myself responsible; but the public has ratified my judgment of that voluminous work, in which sense and learning are not illuminated by a ray of genius. the next specimen was the choice of my friend, the bath guide, a light and whimsical performance, of local, and even verbal, pleasantry. i started at the attempt: he smiled at my fears: his courage was justified by success; and a master of both languages will applaud the curious felicity with which he has transfused into french prose the spirit, and even the humour, of the english verse. it is not my wish to deny how deeply i was interested in these memoirs, of which i need not surely be ashamed; but at the distance of more than twenty years, it would be impossible for me to ascertain the respective shares of the two associates. a long and intimate communication of ideas had cast our sentiments and style in the same mould. in our social labours we composed and corrected by turns; and the praise which i might honestly bestow, would fall perhaps on some article or passage most properly my own. a second volume (for the year ) was published of these memoirs. i will presume to say, that their merit was superior to their reputation; but it is not less true, that they were productive of more reputation than emolument. they introduced my friend to the protection, and myself to the acquaintance, of the earl of chesterfield, whose age and infirmities secluded him from the world; and of mr. david hume, who was under-secretary to the office in which deyverdun was more humbly employed. the former accepted a dedication,(april , ,) and reserved the author for the future education of his successor: the latter enriched the journal with a reply to mr. walpole's historical doubts, which he afterwards shaped into the form of a note. the materials of the third volume were almost completed, when i recommended deyverdun as governor to sir richard worsley, a youth, the son of my old lieutenant-colonel, who was lately deceased. they set forwards on their travels; nor did they return to england till some time after my father's death. my next publication was an accidental sally of love and resentment; of my reverence for modest genius, and my aversion for insolent pedantry. the sixth book of the aeneid is the most pleasing and perfect composition of latin poetry. the descent of aeneas and the sibyl to the infernal regions, to the world of spirits, expands an awful and boundless prospect, from the nocturnal gloom of the cumaean grot, ibant obscuri sola sub nocte per umbram, to the meridian brightness of the elysian fields; largior hic campos aether et lumine vestit purpureo-- from the dreams of simple nature, to the dreams, alas! of egyptian theology, and the philosophy of the greeks. but the final dismission of the hero through the ivory gate, whence falsa ad coelum mittunt insomnia manes, seems to dissolve the whole enchantment, and leaves the reader in a state of cold and anxious scepticism. this most lame and impotent conclusion has been variously imputed to the taste or irreligion of virgil; but, according to the more elaborate interpretation of bishop warburton, the descent to hell is not a false, but a mimic scene; which represents the initiation of aeneas, in the character of a law-giver, to the eleusinian mysteries. this hypothesis, a singular chapter in the divine legation of moses, had been admitted by many as true; it was praised by all as ingenious; nor had it been exposed, in a space of thirty years, to a fair and critical discussion. the learning and the abilities of the author had raised him to a just eminence; but he reigned the dictator and tyrant of the world of literature. the real merit of warburton was degraded by the pride and presumption with which he pronounced his infallible decrees; in his polemic writings he lashed his antagonists without mercy or moderation; and his servile flatterers, (see the base and malignant essay on the delicacy of friendship,) exalting the master critic far above aristotle and longinus, assaulted every modest dissenter who refused to consult the oracle, and to adore the idol. in a land of liberty, such despotism must provoke a general opposition, and the zeal of opposition is seldom candid or impartial. a late professor of oxford, (dr. lowth,) in a pointed and polished epistle, (aug. , ,) defended himself, and attacked the bishop; and, whatsoever might be the merits of an insignificant controversy, his victory was clearly established by the silent confusion of warburton and his slaves. i too, without any private offence, was ambitious of breaking a lance against the giant's shield; and in the beginning of the year , my critical observations on the sixth book of the aeneid were sent, without my name, to the press. in this short essay, my first english publication, i aimed my strokes against the person and the hypothesis of bishop warburton. i proved, at least to my own satisfaction, that the ancient lawgivers did not invent the mysteries, and that aeneas was never invested with the office of lawgiver: that there is not any argument, any circumstance, which can melt a fable into allegory, or remove the scene from the lake avernus to the temple of ceres: that such a wild supposition is equally injurious to the poet and the man: that if virgil was not initiated he could not, if he were, he would not, reveal the secrets of the initiation: that the anathema of horace (vetabo qui cereris sacrum vulgarit, &c.) at once attests his own ignorance and the innocence of his friend. as the bishop of gloucester and his party maintained a discreet silence, my critical disquisition was soon lost among the pamphlets of the day; but the public coldness was overbalanced to my feelings by the weighty approbation of the last and best editor of virgil, professor heyne of gottingen, who acquiesces in my confutation, and styles the unknown author, doctus - - - et elegantissimus britannus. but i cannot resist the temptation of transcribing the favourable judgment of mr. hayley, himself a poet and a scholar "an intricate hypothesis, twisted into a long and laboured chain of quotation and argument, the dissertation on the sixth book of virgil, remained some time unrefuted. - - - at length, a superior, but anonymous, critic arose, who, in one of the most judicious and spirited essays that our nation has produced, on a point of classical literature, completely overturned this ill-founded edifice, and exposed the arrogance and futility of its assuming architect." he even condescends to justify an acrimony of style, which had been gently blamed by the more unbiassed german; "paullo acrius quam velis - - - perstrinxit." but i cannot forgive myself the contemptuous treatment of a span who, with all his faults, was entitled to my esteem; [note: the divine legation of moses is a monument, already crumbling in the dust, of the vigour and weakness of the human mind. if warburton's new argument proved anything, it would be a demonstration against the legislator, who left his people without the knowledge of a future state. but some episodes of the work, on the greek philosophy, the hieroglyphics of egypt, &c. are entitled to the praise of learning, imagination, and discernment.] and i can less forgive, in a personal attack, the cowardly concealment of my name and character. in the fifteen years between my essay on the study of literature and the first volume of the decline and fall, ( - ,) this criticism on warburton, and some articles in the journal, were my sole publications. it is more especially incumbent on me to mark the employment, or to confess the waste of time, from my travels to my father's death, an interval in which i was not diverted by any professional duties from the labours and pleasures of a studious life. . as soon as i was released from the fruitless task of the swiss revolutions, ( ,) i began gradually to advance from the wish to the hope, from the hope to the design, from the design to the execution, of my historical work, of whose limits and extent i had yet a very inadequate notion. the classics, as low as tacitus, the younger pliny, and juvenal, were my old and familiar companions. i insensibly plunged into the ocean of the augustan history; and in the descending series i investigated, with my pen almost always in my hand, the original records, both greek and latin, from dion cassius to ammianus marcellinus, from the reign of trajan to the last age of the western caesars. the subsidiary rays of medals, and inscriptions of geography and chronology, were thrown on their proper objects; and i applied the collections of tillemont, whose inimitable accuracy almost assumes the character of genius, to fix and arrange within my reach the loose and scattered atoms of historical information. through the darkness of the middle ages i explored my way in the annals and antiquities of italy of the learned muratori; and diligently compared them with the parallel or transverse lines of sigonius and maffei, baronius and pagi, till i almost grasped the ruins of rome in the fourteenth century, without suspecting that this final chapter must be attained by the labour of six quartos and twenty years. among the books which i purchased, the theodocian code, with the commentary of james godefroy, must be gratefully remembered. i used it (and much i used it) as a work of history, rather than of jurisprudence: but in every light it may be considered as a full and capacious repository of the political state of the empire in the fourth and fifth centuries. as i believed, and as i still believe, that the propagation of the gospel, and the triumph of the church, are inseparably connected with the decline of the roman monarchy, i weighed the causes and effects of the revolution, and contrasted the narratives and apologies of the christians themselves, with the glances of candour or enmity which the pagans have cast on the rising sects, the jewish and heathen testimonies, as they are collected and illustrated by dr. lardner, directed, without superseding, my search of the originals; and in an ample dissertation on the miraculous darkness of the passion, i privately withdrew my conclusions from the silence of an unbelieving age. i have assembled the preparatory studies, directly or indirectly relative to my history; but, in strict equity, they must be spread beyond this period of my life, over the two summers ( and ) that elapsed between my father's death and my settlement in london. . in a free conversation with books and men, it would be endless to enumerate the names and characters of all who are introduced to our acquaintance; but in this general acquaintance we may select the degrees of friendship and esteem, according to the wise maxim, multum legere potius quam multa. i reviewed, again and again, the immortal works of the french and english, the latin and italian classics. my greek studies (though less assiduous than i designed) maintained and extended my knowledge of that incomparable idiom. homer and xenophon were still my favourite authors; and i had almost prepared for the press an essay on the cyropoedia, which, in my own judgment, is not unhappily laboured. after a certain age, the new publications of merit are the sole food of the many; and the must austere student will be often tempted to break the line, for the sake of indulging his own curiosity, and of providing the topics of fashionable currency. a more respectable motive maybe assigned for the third perusal of blackstone's commentaries, and a copious and critical abstract of that english work was my first serious production in my native language. . my literary leisure was much less complete and independent than it might appear to the eye of a stranger. in the hurry of london i was destitute of books; in the solitude of hampshire i was not master of my time. my quiet was gradually disturbed by our domestic anxiety, and i should be ashamed of my unfeeling philosophy, had i found much time or taste for study in the last fatal summer ( ) of my father's decay and dissolution. the disembodying of the militia at the close of the war ( ) had restored the major (a new cincinnatus) to a life of agriculture. his labours were useful, his pleasures innocent, his wishes moderate; and my father seemed to enjoy the state of happiness which is celebrated by poets and philosophers, as the most agreeable to nature, and the least accessible to fortune. beatus ille, qui procul negotiis (ut prisca gens mortalium) paterna rura bubus exercet suis, solutus omni foenore. hor. epod. ii. like the first mortals, blest is he, from debts, and usury, and business free, with his own team who ploughs the soil, which grateful once confessed his father's toil. francis. but the last indispensable condition, the freedom from debt, was wanting to my father's felicity; and the vanities of his youth were severely punished by the solicitude and sorrow of his declining age. the first mortgage, on my return from lausanne, ( ,) had afforded him a partial and transient relief. the annual demand of interest and allowance was a heavy deduction from his income; the militia was a source of expence, the farm in his hands was not a profitable adventure, he was loaded with the costs and damages of an obsolete law-suit; and each year multiplied the number, and exhausted the patience, of his creditors. under these painful circumstances, i consented to an additional mortgage, to the sale of putney, and to every sacrifice that could alleviate his distress. but he was no longer capable of a rational effort, and his reluctant delays postponed not the evils themselves, but the remedies of those evils (remedia malorum potius quam mala differebat). the pangs of shame, tenderness, and self-reproach, incessantly preyed on his vitals; his constitution was broken; he lost his strength and his sight; the rapid progress of a dropsy admonished him of his end, and he sunk into the grave on nov. , , in the sixty-fourth year of his age. a family tradition insinuates that mr. william law had drawn his pupil in the light and inconstant character of flatus, who is ever confident, and ever disappointed in the chace of happiness. but these constitutional failing were happily compensated by the virtues of the head and heart, by the warmest sentiments of honour and humanity. his graceful person, polite address, gentle manners, and unaffected cheerfulness, recommended him to the favour of every company; and in the change of times and opinions, his liberal spirit had long since delivered him from the zeal and prejudice of a tory education. i submitted to the order of nature; and my grief was soothed by the conscious satisfaction that i had discharged all the duties of filial piety. as soon as i had paid the last solemn duties to my father, and obtained, from time and reason, a tolerable composure of mind, i began to form the plan of an independent life, most adapted to my circumstances and inclination. yet so intricate was the net, my efforts were so awkward and feeble, that nearly two years (nov. -oct. ) were suffered to elapse before i could disentangle myself from the management of the farm, and transfer my residence from beriton to a house in london. during this interval i continued to divide my year between town and the country; but my new situation was brightened by hope; my stay in london was prolonged into the summer; and the uniformity of the summer was occasionally broken by visits and excursions at a distance from home. the gratification of my desires (they were not immoderate) has been seldom disappointed by the want of money or credit; my pride was never insulted by the visit of an importunate tradesman; and my transient anxiety for the past or future has been dispelled by the studious or social occupation of the present hour. my conscience does not accuse me of any act of extravagance or injustice, and the remnant of my estate affords an ample and honourable provision for my declining age. i shall not expatiate on my oeconomical affairs, which cannot be instructive or amusing to the reader. it is a rule of prudence, as well as of politeness, to reserve such confidence for the ear of a private friend, without exposing our situation to the envy or pity of strangers; for envy is productive of hatred, and pity borders too nearly on contempt. yet i may believe, and even assert, that in circumstances more indigent or more wealthy, i should never have accomplished the task, or acquired the fame, of an historian; that my spirit would have been broken by poverty and contempt, and that my industry might have been relaxed in the labour and luxury of a superfluous fortune. i had now attained the first of earthly blessings, independence: i was the absolute master of my hours and actions: nor was i deceived in the hope that the establishment of my library in town would allow me to divide the day between study and society. each year the circle of my acquaintance, the number of my dead and living companions, was enlarged. to a lover of books, the shops and sales of london present irresistible temptations; and the manufacture of my history required a various and growing stock of materials. the militia, my travels, the house of commons, the fame of an author, contributed to multiply my connections: i was chosen a member of the fashionable clubs; and, before i left england in , there were few persons of any eminence in the literary or political world to whom i was a stranger. [note: from the mixed, though polite, company of boodle's, white's, and brooks's, i must honourably distinguish a weekly society, which was instituted in the year , and which still continues to flourish, under the title of the literary club. (hawkins's life of johnson, p. . boswell's tour to the hebrides, p .) the names of dr. johnson, mr. burke, mr. topham beauclerc, mr. garrick, dr. goldsmith, sir joshua reynolds, mr. colman, sir william jones, dr. percy, mr. fox, mr. sheridan, mr. adam smith, mr. steevens, mr. dunning, sir joseph banks, dr. warton, and his brother mr. thomas warton, dr. burney, &c., form a large and luminous constellation of british stars.] it would most assuredly be in my power to amuse the reader with a gallery of portraits and a collection of anecdotes. but i have always condemned the practice of transforming a private memorial into a vehicle of satire or praise. by my own choice i passed in town the greatest part of the year; but whenever i was desirous of breathing the air of the country, i possessed an hospitable retreat at sheffield-place in sussex, in the family of my valuable friend mr. holroyd, whose character, under the name of lord sheffield, has since been more conspicuous to the public. no sooner was i settled in my house and library, than i undertook the composition of the first volume of my history. at the outset all was dark and doubtful; even the title of the work, the true aera of the decline and fall of the empire, the limits of the introduction, the division of the chapters, and the order of the narrative; and i was often tempted to cast away the labour of seven years. the style of an author should be the image of his mind, but the choice and command of language is the fruit of exercise. many experiments were made before i could hit the middle tone between a dull chronicle and a rhetorical declamation: three times did i compose the first chapter, and twice the second and third, before i was tolerably satisfied with their effect. in the remainder of the way i advanced with a more equal and easy pace; but the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters have been reduced by three successive revisals, from a large volume to their present size; and they might still be compressed, without any loss of facts or sentiments. an opposite fault may be imputed to the concise and superficial narrative of the first reigns from commodus to alexander; a fault of which i have never heard, except from mr. hume in his last journey to london. such an oracle might have been consulted and obeyed with rational devotion; but i was soon disgusted with the modest practice of reading the manuscript to my friends. of such friends some will praise from politeness, and some will criticise from vanity. the author himself is the best judge of his own performance; no one has so deeply meditated on the subject; no one is so sincerely interested in the event. by the friendship of mr. (now lord) eliot, who had married my first cousin, i was returned at the general election for the borough of liskeard. i took my seat at the beginning of the memorable contest between great britain and america, and supported, with many a sincere and silent vote, the rights, though not, perhaps, the interest, of the mother country. after a fleeting illusive hope, prudence condemned me to acquiesce in the humble station of a mute. i was not armed by nature and education with the intrepid energy of mind and voice. vincentem strepitus, et natum rebus agendis. timidity was fortified by pride, and even the success of my pen discouraged the trial of my voice. but i assisted at the debates of a free assembly; i listened to the attack and defence of eloquence and reason; i had a near prospect of the characters, views, and passions of the first men of the age. the cause of government was ably vindicated by lord north, a statesman of spotless integrity, a consummate master of debate, who could wield, with equal dexterity, the arms of reason and of ridicule. he was seated on the treasury-bench between his attorney and solicitor general, the two pillars of the law and state, magis pares quam similes; and the minister might indulge in a short slumber, whilst he was upholden on either hand by the majestic sense of thurlow, and the skilful eloquence of wedderburne. from the adverse side of the house an ardent and powerful opposition was supported, by the lively declamation of barre, the legal acuteness of dunning, the profuse and philosophic fancy of burke, and the argumentative vehemence of fox, who in the conduct of a party approved himself equal to the conduct of an empire. by such men every operation of peace and war, every principle of justice or policy, every question of authority and freedom, was attacked and defended; and the subject of the momentous contest was the union or separation of great britain and america. the eight sessions that i sat in parliament were a school of civil prudence, the first and most essential virtue of an historian. the volume of my history, which had been somewhat delayed by the novelty and tumult of a first session, was now ready for the press. after the perilous adventure had been declined by my friend mr. elmsly, i agreed, upon easy terms, with mr. thomas cadell, a respectable bookseller, and mr. william strahan, an eminent printer; and they undertook the care and risk of the publication, which derived more credit from the name of the shop than from that of the author. the last revisal of the proofs was submitted to my vigilance; and many blemishes of style, which had been invisible in the manuscript, were discovered and corrected in the printed sheet. so moderate were our hopes, that the original impression had been stinted to five hundred, till the number was doubled by the prophetic taste of mr. strahan. during this awful interval i was neither elated by the ambition of fame, nor depressed by the apprehension of contempt. my diligence and accuracy were attested by my own conscience. history is the most popular species of writing, since it can adapt itself to the highest or the lowest capacity. i had chosen an illustrious subject. rome is familiar to the school-boy and the statesman; and my narrative was deduced from the last period of classical reading. i had likewise flattered myself, that an age of light and liberty would receive, without scandal, an inquiry into the human causes of the progress and establishment of christianity. i am at a loss how to describe the success of the work, without betraying the vanity of the writer. the first impression was exhausted in a few days; a second and third edition were scarcely adequate to the demand; and the bookseller's property was twice invaded by the pirates of dublin. my book was on every table, and almost on every toilette; the historian was crowned by the taste or fashion of the day; nor was the general voice disturbed by the barking of any profane critic. the favour of mankind is most freely bestowed on a new acquaintance of any original merit; and the mutual surprise of the public and their favourite is productive of those warm sensibilities, which at a second meeting can no longer be rekindled. if i listened to the music of praise, i was more seriously satisfied with the approbation of my judges. the candour of dr. robertson embraced his disciple. a letter from mr. hume overpaid the labour of ten years, but i have never presumed to accept a place in the triumvirate of british historians. that curious and original letter will amuse the reader, and his gratitude should shield my free communication from the reproach of vanity. "dear sir, edinburgh, th march . "as i ran through your volume of history with great avidity and impatience, i cannot forbear discovering somewhat of the same impatience in returning you thanks for your agreeable present, and expressing the satisfaction which the performance has given me. whether i consider the dignity of your style, the depth of your matter, or the extensiveness of your learning, i must regard the work as equally the object of esteem; and i own that if i had not previously had the happiness of your personal acquaintance, such a performance from an englishman in our age would have given me some surprise. you may smile at this sentiment; but as it seems to me that your countrymen, for almost a whole generation, have given themselves up to barbarous and absurd faction, and have totally neglected all polite letters, i no longer expected any valuable production ever to come from them. i know it will give you pleasure (as it did me) to find that all the men of letters in this place concur in the admiration of your work, and in their anxious desire of your continuing it. "when i heard of your undertaking, (which was some time ago,) i own i was a little curious to see how you would extricate yourself from the subject of your two last chapters. i think you have observed a very prudent temperament; but it was impossible to treat the subject so as not to give grounds of suspicion against you, and you may expect that a clamour will arise. this, if anything, will retard your success with the public; for in every other respect your work is calculated to be popular. but among many other marks of decline, the prevalence of superstition in england prognosticates the fall of philosophy and decay of taste; and though nobody be more capable than you to revive them, you will probably find a struggle in your first advances. "i see you entertain a great doubt with regard to the authenticity of the poems of ossian. you are certainly right in so doing. it is indeed strange that any men of sense could have imagined it possible, that above twenty thousand verses, along with numberless historical facts, could have been preserved by oral tradition during fifty generations, by the rudest, perhaps, of all the european nations, the most necessitous, the most turbulent, and the most unsettled. where a supposition is so contrary to common sense, any positive evidence of it ought never to be regarded. men run with great avidity to give their evidence in favour of what flatters their passions and their national prejudices. you are therefore over and above indulgent to us in speaking of the matter with hesitation. "i must inform you that we all are very anxious to hear that you have fully collected the materials for your second volume, and that you are even considerably advanced in the composition of it. i speak this more in the name of my friends than in my own; as i cannot expect to live so long as to see the publication of it. your ensuing volume will be more delicate than the preceding, but i trust in your prudence for extricating you from the difficulties; and, in all events, you have courage to despise the clamour of bigots. i am, with great regard, "dear sir, &c. "david hume." some weeks afterwards i had the melancholy pleasure of seeing mr. hume in his passage through london; his body feeble, his mind firm. on aug. of the same year ( ) he died, at edinburgh, the death of a philosopher. my second excursion to paris was determined by the pressing invitation of m. and madame necker, who had visited england in the preceding summer. on my arrival i found m. necker director-general of the finances, in the first bloom of power and popularity. his private fortune enabled him to support a liberal establishment, and his wife, whose talents and virtues i had long admired, was admirably qualified to preside in the conversation of her table and drawing-room. as their friend, i was introduced to the best company of both sexes; to the foreign ministers of all nations, and to the first names and characters of france; who distinguished me by such marks of civility and kindness, as gratitude will not suffer me to forget, and modesty will not allow me to enumerate. the fashionable suppers often broke into the morning hours; yet i occasionally consulted the royal library, and that of the abbey of st. germain, and in the free use of their books at home i had always reason to praise the liberality of those institutions. the society of men of letters i neither courted nor declined; but i was happy in the acquaintance of m. de buffon, who united with a sublime genius the most amiable simplicity of mind and manners. at the table of my old friend, m. de foncemagne, i was involved in a dispute with the abbe de mably; and his jealous irascible spirit revenged itself on a work which he was incapable of reading in the original. as i might be partial in my own cause, i shall transcribe the words of an unknown critic, observing only, that this dispute had been preceded by another on the english constitution, at the house of the countess de froulay, an old jansenist lady. "vous etiez chez m. de foncemagne, mon cher theodon, le jour que m. l'abbe de mably et m. gibbon y dinerent en grande compagnie. la conversation roula presque entierement sur l'histoire. l'abbe etant un profond politique, la tourna sur l'administration, quand on fut au desert: et comme par caractere, par humeur, par l'habitude d'admirer tite live, il ne prise que le systeme republicain, il se mit a vanter l'excellence des republiques; bien persuade que le savant anglois l'approuveroit en tout, et admireroit la profondeur de genie qui avoit fait deviner tous ces avantages a un francois. mais m. gibbon, instruit par l'experience des inconveniens d'un gouvernement populaire, ne fut point du tout de son avis, et il prit genereusement la defense du gouvernement monarchique. l'abbe voulut le convaincre par tite live, et par quelques argumens tires de plutarque en faveur des spartiates. m. gibbon, doue de la memoire la plus heureuse, et ayant tous les faits presens a la pensee, domina bien-tot la conversation; i'abbe se facha, il s'emporta, il dit des choses dures; l'anglois, conservant le phlegme de son pays, prenoit ses avantages, et pressoit l'abbe avec d'autant plus de succes que la colere le troubloit de plus en plus. la conversation s'echauffoit, et m. de foncemagne la rompit en se levant de table, et en passant dans le salon, ou personne ne fut tente de la renouer."--supplement de la maniere d'ecrire l'histoire, p. , &c. [note: of the voluminous writings of the abbe de mably, (see his eloge by the abbe brizard,) the principes du droit public de l'europe, and the first part of the observ. sur l'hist. de france, may be deservedly praised; and even the maniere d'ecrire l'hist. contains several useful precepts and judicious remarks. mably was a lover of virtue and freedom; but his virtue was austere, and his freedom was impatient of an equal. kings, magistrates, nobles, and successful writers were the objects of his contempt, or hatred, or envy; but his illiberal abuse of voltaire, hume, buffon, the abbe reynal, dr. robertson, and tutti quanti can be injurious only to himself.] nearly two years had elapsed between the publication of my first and the commencement of my second volume; and the causes must be assigned of this long delay. . after a short holiday, i indulged my curiosity in some studies of a very different nature, a course of anatomy, which was demonstrated by doctor hunter; and some lessons of chymistry, which were delivered by mr. higgins. the principles of these sciences, and a taste for books of natural history, contributed to multiply my ideas and images; and the anatomist and chymist may sometimes track me in their own snow. . i dived, perhaps too deeply, into the mud of the arian controversy; and many days of reading, thinking, and writing were consumed in the pursuit of a phantom. . it is difficult to arrange, with order and perspicuity, the various transactions of the age of constantine; and so much was i displeased with the first essay, that i committed to the flames above fifty sheets. . the six months of paris and pleasure must be deducted from the account. but when i resumed my task i felt my improvement; i was now master of my style and subject, and while the measure of my daily performance was enlarged, i discovered less reason to cancel or correct. it has always been my practice to cast a long paragraph in a single mould, to try it by my ear, to deposit it in my memory, but to suspend the action of the pen till i had given the last polish to my work. shall i add, that i never found my mind more vigorous, not my composition more happy, than in the winter hurry of society and parliament? had i believed that the majority of english readers were so fondly attached even to the name and shadow of christianity; had i foreseen that the pious, the timid, and the prudent, would feel, or affect to feel, with such exquisite sensibility; i might, perhaps, have softened the two invidious chapters, which would create many enemies, and conciliate few friends. but the shaft was shot, the alarm was sounded, and i could only rejoice, that if the voice of our priests was clamorous and bitter, their hands were disarmed from the powers of persecution. i adhered to the wise resolution of trusting myself and my writings to the candour of the public, till mr. davies of oxford presumed to attack, not the faith, but the fidelity, of the historian. my vindication, expressive of less anger than contempt, amused for a moment the busy and idle metropolis; and the most rational part of the laity, and even of the clergy, appear to have been satisfied of my innocence and accuracy. i would not print this vindication in quarto, lest it should be bound and preserved with the history itself. at the distance of twelve years, i calmly affirm my judgment of davies, chelsum, &c. a victory over such antagonists was a sufficient humiliation. they, however, were rewarded in this world. poor chelsum was indeed neglected; and i dare not boast the making dr. watson a bishop; he is a prelate of a large mind and liberal spirit: but i enjoyed the pleasure of giving a royal pension to mr. davies, and of collating dr. apthorpe to an archiepiscopal living. their success encouraged the zeal of taylor the arian, [note: the stupendous title, thoughts on the causes of the grand apostacy, at first agitated my nerves, till i discovered that it was the apostacy of the whole church, since the council of nice, from mr. taylor's private religion. his book is a thorough mixture of high enthusiasm and low buffoonery, and the millennium is a fundamental article of his creed.] and milner the methodist, [note: from his grammar-school at kingston upon hull, mr. joseph milner pronounces an anathema against all rational religion. his faith is a divine taste, a spiritual inspiration; his church is a mystic and invisible body: the natural christians, such as mr. locke, who believe and interpret the scriptures, are, in his judgment, no better than profane infidels.] with many others, whom it would be difficult to remember, and tedious to rehearse. the list of my adversaries, however, was graced with the more respectable names of dr. priestley, sir david dalrymple, and dr. white; and every polemic, of either university, discharged his sermon or pamphlet against the impenetrable silence of the roman historian. in his history of the corruptions of christianity, dr. priestley threw down his two gauntlets to bishop hurd and mr. gibbon. i declined the challenge in a letter, exhorting my opponent to enlighten the world by his philosophical discoveries, and to remember that the merit of his predecessor servetus is now reduced to a single passage, which indicates the smaller circulation of the blood through the lungs, from and to the heart. instead of listening to this friendly advice, the dauntless philosopher of birmingham continued to fire away his double battery against those who believed too little, and those who believed too much. from my replies he has nothing to hope or fear: but his socinian shield has repeatedly been pierced by the spear of horsley, and his trumpet of sedition may at length awaken the magistrates of a free country. the profession and rank of sir david dalrymple (now a lord of session) has given a more decent colour to his style. but he scrutinized each separate passage of the two chapters with the dry minuteness of a special pleader; and as he was always solicitous to make, he may have succeeded sometimes in finding, a flaw. in his annals of scotland, he has shewn himself a diligent collector and an accurate critic. i have praised, and i still praise, the eloquent sermons which were preached in st. mary's pulpit at oxford by dr. white. if he assaulted me with some degree of illiberal acrimony, in such a place, and before such an audience, he was obliged to speak the language of the country. i smiled at a passage in one of his private letters to mr. badcock; "the part where we encounter gibbon must be brilliant and striking." in a sermon preached before the university of cambridge, dr. edwards complimented a work, "which can only perish with the language itself;" and esteems the author a formidable enemy. he is, indeed, astonished that more learning and ingenuity has not been shewn in the defence of israel; that the prelates and dignitaries of the church (alas, good man!) did not vie with each other, whose stone should sink the deepest in the forehead of this goliath. "but the force of truth will oblige us to confess, that in the attacks which have been levelled against our sceptical historian, we can discover but slender traces of profound and exquisite erudition, of solid criticism and accurate investigation; but we are too frequently disgusted by vague and inconclusive reasoning; by unseasonable banter and senseless witticisms; by imbittered bigotry and enthusiastic jargon; by futile cavils and illiberal invectives. proud and elated by the weakness of his antagonists, he condescends not to handle the sword of controversy."--monthly review, oct. . let me frankly own that i was startled at the first discharge of ecclesiastical ordnance; but as soon as i found that this empty noise was mischievous only in the intention, my fear was converted into indignation; and every feeling of indignation or curiosity has long since subsided in pure and placid indifference. the prosecution of my history was soon afterwards checked by another controversy of a very different kind. at the request of the lord chancellor, and of lord weymouth, then secretary of state, i vindicated, against the french manifesto, the justice of the british arms. the whole correspondence of lord stormont, our late ambassador at paris, was submitted to my inspection, and the memoire justificatif, which i composed in french, was first approved by the cabinet ministers, and then delivered as a state paper to the courts of europe. the style and manner are praised by beaumarchais himself, who, in his private quarrel, attempted a reply; but he flatters me, by ascribing the memoir to lord stormont; and the grossness of his invective betrays the loss of temper and of wit; he acknowledged, oeuv. de beaumarchais, iii. , , that le style ne seroit pas sans grace, ni la logique sans justesse, &c. if the facts were true which he undertakes to disprove. for these facts my credit is not pledged; i spoke as a lawyer from my brief, but the veracity of beaumarchais may be estimated from the assertion that france, by the treaty of paris ( ) was limited to a certain number of ships of war. on the application of the duke of choiseul, he was obliged to retract this daring falsehood. among the honourable connections which i had formed, i may justly be proud of the friendship of mr. wedderburne, at that time attorney-general, who now illustrates the title of lord loughborough, and the office of chief justice of the common pleas. by his strong recommendation, and the favourable disposition of lord north, i was appointed one of the lords commissioners of trade and plantations; and my private income was enlarged by a clear addition of between seven and eight hundred pounds a-year. the fancy of an hostile orator may paint, in the strong colours of ridicule, "the perpetual virtual adjournment, and the unbroken sitting vacation of the board of trade." [note: i can never forget the delight with which that diffusive and ingenious orator, mr. burke, was heard by all sides of the house, and even by those whose existence he proscribed. (speech on the bill of reform, p. - .) the lords of trade blushed at their insignificancy, and mr. eden's appeal to the , volumes of our reports, served only to excite a general laugh. i take this opportunity of certifying the correctness of mr. burke's printed speeches, which i have heard and read.] but it must be allowed that our duty was not intolerably severe, and that i enjoyed many days and weeks of repose, without being called away from my library to the office. my acceptance of a place provoked some of the leaders of opposition, with whom i had lived in habits of intimacy; and i was most unjustly accused of deserting a party, in which i had never enlisted. the aspect of the next session of parliament was stormy and perilous; county meetings, petitions, and committees of correspondence, announced the public discontent; and instead of voting with a triumphant majority, the friends of government were often exposed to a struggle, and sometimes to a defeat. the house of commons adopted mr. dunning's motion, "that the influence of the crown had increased, was increasing, and ought to be diminished:" and mr. burke's bill of reform was framed with skill, introduced with eloquence, and supported by numbers. our late president, the american secretary of state, very narrowly escaped the sentence of proscription; but the unfortunate board of trade was abolished in the committee by a small majority ( to ) of eight votes. the storm, however, blew over for a time; a large defection of country gentlemen eluded the sanguine hopes of the patriots: the lords of trade were revived; administration recovered their strength and spirit; and the flames of london, which were kindled by a mischievous madman, admonished all thinking men of the danger of an appeal to the people. in the premature dissolution which followed this session of parliament i lost my seat. mr. elliot was now deeply engaged in the measures of opposition, and the electors of leskeard are commonly of the same opinion as mr. elliot. in this interval of my senatorial life, i published the second and third volumes of the decline and fall. my ecclesiastical history still breathed the same spirit of freedom; but protestant zeal is more indifferent to the characters and controversies of the fourth and fifth centuries. my obstinate silence had damped the ardour of the polemics. dr. watson, the most candid of my adversaries, assured me that he had no thoughts of renewing the attack, and my impartial balance of the virtues and vices of julian was generally praised. this truce was interrupted only by some animadversions of the catholics of italy, and by some angry letters from mr. travis, who made me personally responsible for condemning, with the best critics, the spurious text of the three heavenly witnesses. the piety or prudence of my italian translator has provided an antidote against the poison of his original. the th and th volumes are armed with five letters from an anonymous divine to his friends, foothead and kirk, two english students at rome: and this meritorious service is commended by monsignor stoner, a prelate of the same nation, who discovers much venom in the fluid and nervous style of gibbon. the critical essay at the end of the third volume was furnished by the abbate nicola spedalieri, whose zeal has gradually swelled to a more solid confutation in two quarto volumes.--shall i be excused for not having read them? the brutal insolence of mr. travis's challenge can only be excused by the absence of learning, judgment, and humanity; and to that excuse be has the fairest or foulest pretension. compared with archdeacon travis, chelsum and davies assume the title of respectable enemies. the bigoted advocate of popes and monks may be turned over even to the bigots of oxford; and the wretched travis still smarts under the lash of the merciless porson. i consider mr. porson's answer to archdeacon travis as the most acute and accurate piece of criticism which has appeared since the days of bentley. his strictures are founded in argument, enriched with learning, and enlivened with wit; and his adversary neither deserves nor finds any quarter at his hands. the evidence of the three heavenly witnesses would now be rejected in any court of justice: but prejudice is blind, authority is deaf, and our vulgar bibles will ever be polluted by this spurious text, "sedet aeternumqne sedebit." the more learned ecclesiastics will indeed have the secret satisfaction of reprobating in the closet what they read in the church. i perceived, and without surprise, the coldness and even prejudice of the town; nor could a whisper escape my ear, that, in the judgment of many readers, my continuation was much inferior to the original attempts. an author who cannot ascend will always appear to sink; envy was now prepared for my reception, and the zeal of my religious, was fortified by the motive of my political, enemies. bishop newton, in writing his own life, was at full liberty to declare how much he himself and two eminent brethren were disgusted by mr. g.'s prolixity, tediousness, and affectation. but the old man should not have indulged his zeal in a false and feeble charge against the historian, who had faithfully and even cautiously rendered dr. burnet's meaning by the alternative of sleep or repose. that philosophic divine supposes, that, in the period between death and the resurrection, human souls exist without a body, endowed with internal consciousness, but destitute of all active or passive connection with the external world. "secundum communem dictionem sacrae scripturae, mors dicitur somnus, et morientes dicuntur abdormire, quod innuere mihi videtur statum mortis esse statum quietis, silentii, et {greek expression}." (de statu mortuorum, ch. v. p. .) i was however encouraged by some domestic and foreign testimonies of applause; and the second and third volumes insensibly rose in sale and reputation to a level with the first. but the public is seldom wrong; and i am inclined to believe that, especially in the beginning, they are more prolix and less entertaining than the first: my efforts had not been relaxed by success, and i had rather deviated into the opposite fault of minute and superfluous diligence. on the continent, my name and writings were slowly diffused; a french translation of the first volume had disappointed the booksellers of paris; and a passage in the third was construed as a personal reflection on the reigning monarch. [note: it may not be generally known that louis xvi. is a great reader, and a reader of english books. on perusing a passage of my history which seems to compare him to arcadius or honorius, he expressed his resentment to the prince of b------, from whom the intelligence was conveyed to me. i shall neither disclaim the allusion, nor examine the likeness; but the situation of the late king of france excludes all suspicion of flattery; and i am ready to declare that the concluding observations of my third volume were written before his accession to the throne.] before i could apply for a seat at the general election the list was already full; but lord north's promise was sincere, his recommendation was effectual, and i was soon chosen on a vacancy for the borough of lymington, in hampshire. in the first session of the new parliament, administration stood their ground; their final overthrow was reserved for the second. the american war had once been the favourite of the country: the pride of england was irritated by the resistance of her colonies, and the executive power was driven by national clamour into the most vigorous and coercive measures. but the length of a fruitless contest, the loss of armies, the accumulation of debt and taxes, and the hostile confederacy of france, spain, and holland, indisposed the public to the american war, and the persons by whom it was conducted; the representatives of the people, followed, at a slow distance, the changes of their opinion; and the ministers who refused to bend, were broken by the tempest. as soon as lord north had lost, or was about to lose, a majority in the house of commons, he surrendered his office, and retired to a private station, with the tranquil assurance of a clear conscience and a cheerful temper: the old fabric was dissolved, and the posts of government were occupied by the victorious and veteran troops of opposition. the lords of trade were not immediately dismissed, but the board itself was abolished by mr. burke's bill, which decency had compelled the patriots to revive; and i was stripped of a convenient salary, after having enjoyed it about three years. so flexible is the title of my history, that the final aera might be fixed at my own choice; and i long hesitated whether i should be content with the three volumes, the fall of the western empire, which fulfilled my first engagement with the public. in this interval of suspense, nearly a twelvemonth, i returned by a natural impulse to the greek authors of antiquity; i read with new pleasure the iliad and the odyssey, the histories of herodotus, thucydides, and xenophon, a large portion of the tragic and comic theatre of athens, and many interesting dialogues of the socratic school. yet in the luxury of freedom i began to wish for the daily task, the active pursuit, which gave a value to every book, and an object to every inquiry; the preface of a new edition announced my design, and i dropped without reluctance from the age of plato to that of justinian. the original texts of procopius and agathias supplied the events and even the characters of his reign: but a laborious winter was devoted to the codes, the pandects, and the modern interpreters, before i presumed to form an abstract of the civil law. my skill was improved by practice, my diligence perhaps was quickened by the loss of office; and, excepting the last chapter, i had finished the fourth volume before i sought a retreat on the banks of the leman lake. it is not the purpose of this narrative to expatiate on the public or secret history of the times: the schism which followed the death of the marquis of rockingham, the appointment of the earl of shelburne, the resignation of mr. fox, and his famous coalition with lord north. but i may assert, with some degree of assurance, that in their political conflict those great antagonists had never felt any personal animosity to each other, that their reconciliation was easy and sincere, and that their friendship has never been clouded by the shadow of suspicion or jealousy. the most violent or venal of their respective followers embraced this fair occasion of revolt, but their alliance still commanded a majority in the house of commons; the peace was censured, lord shelburne resigned, and the two friends knelt on the same cushion to take the oath of secretary of state. from a principle of gratitude i adhered to the coalition: my vote was counted in the day of battle, but i was overlooked in the division of the spoil. there were many claimants more deserving and importunate than myself: the board of trade could not be restored; and, while the list of places was curtailed, the number of candidates was doubled. an easy dismission to a secure seat at the board of customs or excise was promised on the first vacancy: but the chance was distant and doubtful; nor could i solicit with much ardour an ignoble servitude, which would have robbed me of the most valuable of my studious hours: at the same time the tumult of london, and the attendance on parliament, were grown more irksome; and, without some additional income, i could not long or prudently maintain the style of expence to which i was accustomed. from my early acquaintance with lausanne i had always cherished a secret wish, that the school of my youth might become the retreat of my declining age. a moderate fortune would secure the blessings of ease, leisure, and independence: the country, the people, the manners, the language, were congenial to my taste; and i might indulge the hope of passing some years in the domestic society of a friend. after travelling with several english, mr. deyverdun was now settled at home, in a pleasant habitation, the gift of his deceased aunt: we had long been separated, we had long been silent; yet in my first letter i exposed, with the most perfect confidence, my situation, my sentiments, and my designs. his immediate answer was a warm and joyful acceptance: the picture of our future life provoked my impatience; and the terms of arrangement were short and simple, as he possessed the property, and i undertook the expence of our common house. before i could break my english chain, it was incumbent on me to struggle with the feelings of my heart, the indolence of my temper, and the opinion of the world, which unanimously condemned this voluntary banishment. in the disposal of my effects, the library, a sacred deposit, was alone excepted: as my post-chaise moved over westminster-bridge i bid a long farewell to the "fumum et opes strepitumque romae." my journey by the direct road through france was not attended with any accident, and i arrived at lausanne nearly twenty years after my second departure. within less than three months the coalition struck on some hidden rocks: had i remained on board, i should have perished in the general shipwreck. since my establishment at lausanne, more than seven years have elapsed; and if every day has not been equally soft and serene, not a day, not a moment, has occurred in which i have repented of my choice. during my absence, a long portion of human life, many changes had happened: my elder acquaintance had left the stage; virgins were ripened into matrons, and children were grown to the age of manhood. but the same manners were transmitted from one generation to another: my friend alone was an inestimable treasure; my name was not totally forgotten, and all were ambitious to welcome the arrival of a stranger and the return of a fellow-citizen. the first winter was given to a general embrace, without any nice discrimination of persons and characters. after a more regular settlement, a more accurate survey, i discovered three solid and permanent benefits of my new situation. . my personal freedom had been somewhat impaired by the house of commons and the board of trade; but i was now delivered from the chain of duty and dependence, from the hopes and fears of political adventure: my sober mind was no longer intoxicated by the fumes of party, and i rejoiced in my escape, as often as i read of the midnight debates which preceded the dissolution of parliament. . my english oeconomy had been that of a solitary bachelor, who might afford some occasional dinners. in switzerland i enjoyed at every meal, at every hour, the free and pleasant conversation of the friend of my youth; and my daily table was always provided for the reception of one or two extraordinary guests. our importance in society is less a positive than a relative weight: in london i was lost in the crowd; i ranked with the first families of lausanne, and my style of prudent expence enabled me to maintain a fair balance of reciprocal civilities. . instead of a small house between a street and a stable-yard, i began to occupy a spacious and convenient mansion, connected on the north side with the city, and open on the south to a beautiful and boundless horizon. a garden of four acres had been laid out by the taste of mr. deyverdun: from the garden a rich scenery of meadows and vineyards descends to the leman lake, and the prospect far beyond the lake is crowned by the stupendous mountains of savoy. my books and my acquaintance had been first united in london; but this happy position of my library in town and country was finally reserved for lausanne. possessed of every comfort in this triple alliance, i could not be tempted to change my habitation with the changes of the seasons. my friends had been kindly apprehensive that i should not be able to exist in a swiss town at the foot of the alps, after having so long conversed with the first men of the first cities of the world. such lofty connections may attract the curious, and gratify the vain; but i am too modest, or too proud, to rate my own value by that of my associates; and whatsoever may be the fame of learning or genius, experience has shown the that the cheaper qualifications of politeness and good sense are of more useful currency in the commerce of life. by many, conversation is esteemed as a theatre or a school: but, after the morning has been occupied by the labours of the library, i wish to unbend rather than to exercise my mind; and in the interval between tea and supper i am far from disdaining the innocent amusement of a game at cards. lausanne is peopled by a numerous gentry, whose companionable idleness is seldom disturbed by the pursuits of avarice or ambition: the women, though confined to a domestic education, are endowed for the most part with more taste and knowledge than their husbands and brothers: but the decent freedom of both sexes is equally remote from the extremes of simplicity and refinement. i shall add as a misfortune rather than a merit, that the situation and beauty of the pays de vaud, the long habits of the english, the medical reputation of dr. tissot, and the fashion of viewing the mountains and glaciers, have opened us on all sides to the incursions of foreigners. the visits of mr. and madame necker, of prince henry of prussia, and of mr. fox, may form some pleasing exceptions; but, in general, lausanne has appeared most agreeable in my eyes, when we have been abandoned to our own society. i had frequently seen mr. necker, in the summer of , at a country house near lausanne, where he composed his treatise on the administration of the finances. i have since, in october , visited him in his present residence, the castle and barony of copet, near geneva. of the merits and measures of that statesman various opinions may be entertained; but all impartial men must agree in their esteem of his integrity and patriotism. in august , prince henry of prussia, in his way to paris, passed three days at lausanne. his military conduct has been praised by professional men; his character has been vilified by the wit and malice of a daemon (mem. secret de la cour de berlin); but i was flattered by his affability, and entertained by his conversation. in his tour of switzerland (sept. ) mr. fox gave me two days of free and private society. he seemed to feel, and even to envy, the happiness of my situation; while i admired the powers of a superior man, as they are blended in his attractive character with the softness and simplicity of a child. perhaps no human being was ever more perfectly exempt from the taint of malevolence, vanity, or falsehood. my transmigration from london to lausanne could not be effected without interrupting the course of my historical labours. the hurry of my departure, the joy of my arrival, the delay of my tools, suspended their progress; and a full twelvemonth was lost before i could resume the thread of regular and daily industry. a number of books most requisite and least common had been previously selected; the academical library of lausanne, which i could use as my own, contained at least the fathers and councils; and i have derived some occasional succour from the public collections of berne and geneva. the fourth volume was soon terminated, by an abstract of the controversies of the incarnation, which the learned dr. prideaux was apprehensive of exposing to profane eyes. it had been the original design of the learned dean prideaux to write the history of the ruin of the eastern church. in this work it would have been necessary, not only to unravel all those controversies which the christians made about the hypostatical union, but also to unfold all the niceties and subtle notions which each sect entertained concerning it. the pious historian was apprehensive of exposing that incomprehensible mystery to the cavils and objections of unbelievers: and he durst not, "seeing the nature of this book, venture it abroad in so wanton and lewd an age" (preface to the life of mahomet, p. ). in the fifth and sixth volumes the revolutions of the empire and the world are most rapid, various, and instructive; and the greek or roman historians are checked by the hostile narratives of the barbarians of the east and the west. [note: i have followed the judicious precept of the abbe de mably, (maniere d'ecrire l'hist., p. ,) who advises the historian not to dwell too minutely on the decay of the eastern empire; but to consider the barbarian conquerors as a more worthy subject of his narrative. "fas est et ab hoste doceri."] it was not till after many designs, and many trials, that i preferred, as i still prefer, the method of grouping my picture by nations; and the seeming neglect of chronological order is surely compensated by the superior merits of interest and perspicuity. the style of the first volume is, in my opinion, somewhat crude and elaborate; in the second and third it is ripened into ease, correctness, and numbers; but in the three last i may have been seduced by the facility of my pen, and the constant habit of speaking one language and writing another may have infused some mixture of gallic idioms. happily for my eyes, i have always closed my studies with the day, and commonly with the morning; and a long, but temperate, labour has been accomplished, without fatiguing either the mind or body; but when i computed the remainder of my time and my task, it was apparent that, according to the season of publication, the delay of a month would be productive of that of a year. i was now straining for the goal, and in the last winter many evenings were borrowed from the social pleasures of lausanne. i could now wish that a pause, an interval, had been allowed for a serious revisal. i have presumed to mark the moment of conception: i shall now commemorate the hour of my final deliverance. it was on the day, or rather night, of the th of june, , between the hours of eleven and twelve, that i wrote the last lines of the last page, in a summer house in my garden. after laying down my pen, i took several turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountains. the air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. i will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and, perhaps, the establishment of my fame. but my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind, by the idea that i had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that whatsoever might be the future fate of my history, the life of the historian must be short and precarious. i will add two facts, which have seldom occurred in the composition of six, or at least of five quartos. . my first rough manuscript, without any intermediate copy, has been sent to the press. . not a sheet has been seen by any human eyes, excepting those of the author and the printer: the faults and the merits are exclusively my own. i cannot help recollecting a much more extraordinary fact, which is affirmed of himself by retif de la bretorme, a voluminous and original writer of french novels. he laboured, and may still labour, in the humble office of corrector to a printing-house; but this office enabled him to transport an entire volume from his mind to the press; and his work was given to the public without ever having been written with a pen. after a quiet residence of four years, during which i had never moved ten miles from lausanne, it was not without some reluctance and terror, that i undertook, in a journey of two hundred leagues, to cross the mountains and the sea. yet this formidable adventure was achieved without danger or fatigue; and at the end of a fortnight i found myself in lord sheffield's house and library, safe, happy, and at home. the character of my friend (mr. holroyd) had recommended him to a seat in parliament for coventry, the command of a regiment of light dragoons, and an irish peerage. the sense and spirit of his political writings have decided the public opinion on the great questions of our commercial interest with america and ireland. the sale of his observations on the american states was diffusive, their effect beneficial; the navigation act, the palladium of britain, was defended, and perhaps saved, by his pen; and he proves, by the weight of fact and argument, that the mother-country may survive and flourish after the loss of america. my friend has never cultivated the arts of composition; but his materials are copious and correct, and he leaves on his paper the clear impression of an active and vigorous mind. his "observations on the trade, manufactures, and present state of ireland," were intended to guide the industry, to correct the prejudices, and to assuage the passions of a country which seemed to forget that she could be free and prosperous only by a friendly connection with great britain. the concluding observations are written with so much ease and spirit, that they may be read by those who are the least interested in the subject. he fell (in ) with the unpopular coalition; but his merit has been acknowledged at the last general election, , by the honourable invitation and free choice of the city of bristol. during the whole time of my residence in england i was entertained at sheffield-place and in downing-street by his hospitable kindness; and the most pleasant period was that which i passed in the domestic society of the family. in the larger circle of the metropolis i observed the country and the inhabitants with the knowledge, and without the prejudices, of an englishman; but i rejoiced in the apparent increase of wealth and prosperity, which might be fairly divided between the spirit of the nation and the wisdom of the minister. all party-resentment was now lost in oblivion: since i was no man's rival, no man was my enemy. i felt the dignity of independence, and as i asked no more, i was satisfied with the general civilities of the world. the house in london which i frequented with most pleasure and assiduity was that of lord north. after the loss of power and of sight, he was still happy in himself and his friends; and my public tribute of gratitude and esteem could no longer be suspected of any interested motive. before my departure from england, i was present at the august spectacle of mr. hastings's trial in westminster hall. it is not my province to absolve or condemn the governor of india; but mr. sheridan's eloquence demanded my applause; nor could i hear without emotion the personal compliment which he paid me in the presence of the british nation. from this display of genius, which blazed four successive days, i shall stoop to a very mechanical circumstance. as i was waiting in the managers' box, i had the curiosity to inquire of the short-hand writer, how many words a ready and rapid orator might pronounce in an hour? from to was his answer. the medium of will afford words in a minute, and two words in each second. but this computation will only apply to the english language. as the publication of my three last volumes was the principal object, so it was the first care of my english journey. the previous arrangements with the bookseller and the printer were settled in my passage through london, and the proofs, which i returned more correct, were transmitted every post from the press to sheffield-place. the length of the operation, and the leisure of the country, allowed some time to review my manuscript. several rare and useful books, the assises de jerusalem, ramusius de bello constantinopolitano, the greek acts of the synod of florence, the statuta urbis romae, &c. were procured, and introduced in their proper places the supplements which they afforded. the impression of the fourth volume had consumed three months. our common interest required that we should move with a quicker pace; and mr. strahan fulfilled his engagement, which few printers could sustain, of delivering every week three thousand copies of nine sheets. the day of publication was, however, delayed, that it might coincide with the fifty-first anniversary of my own birthday; the double festival was celebrated by a cheerful literary dinner at mr. cadell's house; and i seemed to blush while they read an elegant compliment from mr. hayley, whose poetical talents had more than once been employed in the praise of his friend. before mr. hayley inscribed with my name his epistles on history, i was not acquainted with that amiable man and elegant poet. he afterwards thanked me in verse for my second and third volumes; and in the summer of , the roman eagle, (a proud title) accepted the invitation of the english sparrow, who chirped in the groves of eartham, near chichester. as most of the former purchasers were naturally desirous of completing their sets, the sale of the quarto edition was quick and easy; and an octavo size was printed, to satisfy at a cheaper rate the public demand. the conclusion of my work was generally read, and variously judged. the style has been exposed to much academical criticism; a religious clamour was revived, and the reproach of indecency has been loudly echoed by the rigid censors of morals. i never could understand the clamour that has been raised against the indecency of my three last volumes. . an equal degree of freedom in the former part, especially in the first volume, had passed without reproach. . i am justified in painting the manners of the times; the vices of theodora form an essential feature in the reign and character of justinian. . my english text is chaste, and all licentious passages are left in the obscurity of a learned language. le latin dans ses mots brave l'honnetete, says the correct boileau, in a country and idiom more scrupulous than our own. yet, upon the whole, the history of the decline and fall seems to have struck root, both at home and abroad, and may, perhaps, a hundred years hence still continue to be abused. i am less flattered by mr. porson's high encomium on the style and spirit of my history, than i am satisfied with his honourable testimony to my attention, diligence, and accuracy; those humble virtues, which religious zeal had most audaciously denied. the sweetness of his praise is tempered by a reasonable mixture of acid. as the book may not be common in england, i shall transcribe my own character from the bibliotheca historica of meuselius, a learned and laborious german. "summis aevi nostri historicis gibbonus sine dubio adnumerandus est. inter capitolii ruinas stans primum hujus operis scribendi concilium cepit. florentissimos vitae annos colligendo et laborando eidem impendit. enatum inde monumentum aere perennius, licet passim appareant sinistre dicta, minus perfecta, veritati non satis consentanea. videmus quidem ubique fere studium scrutandi veritatemque scribendi maximum: tamen sine tillemontio duce ubi scilicet hujus historia finitur saepius noster titubat atque hallucinatur. quod vel maxime fit ubi de rebus ecclesiasticis vel de juris prudentia romana (tom. iv.) tradit, et in aliis locis. attamen naevi hujus generis haud impediunt quo minus operis summam et {greek} praedare dispositam, delectum rerum sapientissimum, argutum quoque interdum, dictionemque seu stylum historico aeque ac philosopho dignissimum, et vix a quoque alio anglo, humio ac robertsono haud exceptis (praereptum?) vehementer laudemus, atque saeculo nostro de hujusmodi historia gratulemur..... gibbonus adversaries cum in tum extra patriam nactus est, quia propogationem religionis christianae, non, tit vulgo, fieri solet, cut more theologorum, sed ut historicum et philosophum decet, exposuerat." the french, italian, and german translations have been executed with various success; but, instead of patronizing, i should willingly suppress such imperfect copies, which injure the character, while they propagate the name of the author. the first volume had been feebly, though faithfully, translated into french by m. le clerc de septchenes, a young gentleman of a studious character and liberal fortune. after his decease the work was continued by two manufacturers of paris, m. m. desmuniers and cantwell: but the former is now an active member in the national assembly, and the undertaking languishes in the hands of his associate. the superior merit of the interpreter, or his language, inclines me to prefer the italian version: but i wish that it were in my power to read the german, which is praised by the best judges. the irish pirates are at once my friends and my enemies, but i cannot be displeased with the too numerous and correct impressions which have been published for the use of the continent at basil in switzerland. [note: of their vo. vols. the two last include the whole body of the notes. the public importunity had forced me to remove them from the end of the volume to the bottom of the page; but i have often repented of my compliance.] the conquests of our language and literature are not confined to europe alone, and a writer who succeeds in london, is speedily read on the banks of the delaware and the ganges. in the preface of the fourth volume, while i gloried in the name of an englishman, i announced my approaching return to the neighbourhood of the lake of lausanne. this last trial confirmed my assurance that i had wisely chosen for my own happiness; nor did i once, in a year's visit, entertain a wish of settling in my native country. britain is the free and fortunate island; but where is the spot in which i could unite the comforts and beauties of my establishment at lausanne? the tumult of london astonished my eyes and ears; the amusements of public places were no longer adequate to the trouble; the clubs and assemblies were filled with new faces and young men; and our best society, our long and late dinners, would soon have been prejudicial to my health. without any share in the political wheel, i must be idle and insignificant: yet the most splendid temptations would not have enticed me to engage a second time in the servitude of parliament or office. at tunbridge, some weeks after the publication of my history, i reluctantly quitted lord and lady sheffield, and, with a young swiss friend, m. wilhelm. de severy, whom i had introduced to the english world, i pursued the road of dover and lausanne. my habitation was embellished in my absence, and the last division of books, which followed my steps, increased my chosen library to the number of between six and seven thousand volumes. my seraglio was ample, my choice was free, my appetite was keen. after a full repast on homer and aristophanes, i involved myself in the philosophic maze of the writings of plato, of which the dramatic is, perhaps, more interesting than the argumentative part: but i stepped aside into every path of inquiry which reading or reflection accidentally opened. alas! the joy of my return, and my studious ardour, were soon damped by the melancholy state of my friend mr. deyverdun. his health and spirits had long suffered a gradual decline, a succession of apoplectic fits announced his dissolution; and before he expired, those who loved him could not wish for the continuance of his life. the voice of reason might congratulate his deliverance, but the feelings of nature and friendship could be subdued only by time: his amiable character was still alive in my remembrance; each room, each walk, was imprinted with our common footsteps; and i should blush at my own philosophy, if a long interval of study had not preceded and followed the death of my friend. by his last will he left to me the option of purchasing his house and garden, or of possessing them during my life, on the payment either of a stipulated price, or of an easy retribution to his kinsman and heir. i should probably have been tempted by the daemon of property, if some legal difficulties had not been started against my title; a contest would have been vexatious, doubtful, and invidious; and the heir most gratefully subscribed an agreement, which rendered my life-possession more perfect, and his future condition more advantageous. yet i had often revolved the judicious lines in which pope answers the objections of his longsighted friend: pity to build without or child or wife; why, you'll enjoy it only all your life well, if the use be mine, does it concern one, whether the name belong to pope or vernon? the certainty of my tenure has allowed me to lay out a considerable sum in improvements and alterations: they have been executed with skill and taste; and few men of letters, perhaps, in europe, are so desirably lodged as myself. but i feel, and with the decline of years i shall more painfully feel, that i am alone in paradise. among the circle of my acquaintance at lausanne, i have gradually acquired the solid and tender friendship of a respectable family, the family of de severy: the four persons of whom it is composed are all endowed with the virtues best adapted to their age and situation; and i am encouraged to love the parents as a brother, and the children as a father. every day we seek and find the opportunities of meeting: yet even this valuable connection cannot supply the loss of domestic society. within the last two or three years our tranquillity has been clouded by the disorders of france: many families at lausanne were alarmed and affected by the terrors of an impending bankruptcy; but the revolution, or rather the dissolution of the kingdom has been heard and felt in the adjacent lands. i beg leave to subscribe my assent to mr. burke's creed on the revolution of france. i admire his eloquence, i approve his politics, i adore his chivalry, and i can almost excuse his reverence for church establishments. i have sometimes thought of writing a dialogue of the dead, in which lucian, erasmus, and voltaire should mutually acknowledge the danger of exposing an old superstition to the contempt of the blind and fanatic multitude. a swarm of emigrants of both sexes, who escaped from the public ruin, has been attracted by the vicinity, the manners, and the language of lausanne; and our narrow habitations in town and country are now occupied by the first names and titles of the departed monarchy. these noble fugitives are entitled to our pity; they may claim our esteem, but they cannot, in their present state of mind and fortune, much contribute to our amusement. instead of looking down as calm and idle spectators on the theatre of europe, our domestic harmony is somewhat embittered by the infusion of party spirit: our ladies and gentlemen assume the character of self-taught politicians; and the sober dictates of wisdom and experience are silenced by the clamour of the triumphant democrates. the fanatic missionaries of sedition have scattered the seeds of discontent in our cities and villages, which had flourished above two hundred and fifty years without fearing the approach of war, or feeling the weight of government. many individuals, and some communities, appear to be infested with the gallic phrenzy, the wild theories of equal and boundless freedom; but i trust that the body of the people will be faithful to their sovereign and to themselves; and i am satisfied that the failure or success of a revolt would equally terminate in the ruin of the country. while the aristocracy of berne protects the happiness, it is superfluous to enquire whether it be founded in the rights of man: the oeconomy of the state is liberally supplied without the aid of taxes; and the magistrates must reign with prudence and equity, since they are unarmed in the midst of an armed nation. the revenue of berne, excepting some small duties, is derived from church lands, tithes, feudal rights, and interest of money. the republic has nearly , pounds sterling in the english funds, and the amount of their treasure is unknown to the citizens themselves. for myself (may the omen be averted) i can only declare, that the first stroke of a rebel drum would be the signal of my immediate departure. when i contemplate the common lot of mortality, i must acknowledge that i have drawn a high prize in the lottery of life. the far greater part of the globe is overspread with barbarism or slavery: in the civilized world, the most numerous class is condemned to ignorance and poverty; and the double fortune of my birth in a free and enlightened country, in an honourable and wealthy family, is the lucky chance of an unit against millions. the general probability is about three to one, that a new-born infant will not live to complete his fiftieth year. [note: buffon, supplement a l'hist. naturelle, vii. p, - , of a given number of new-born infants, one half, by the fault of nature or man, is extinguished before the age of puberty and reason,--a melancholy calculation!] i have now passed that age, and may fairly estimate the present value of my existence in the three-fold division of mind, body, and estate. . the first and indispensable requisite of happiness is a clear conscience, unsullied by the reproach or remembrance of an unworthy action. --hic murus aheneus esto, nil conscire sibi, nulla pallescere culpa. i am endowed with a cheerful temper, a moderate sensibility, and a natural disposition to repose rather than to activity: some mischievous appetites and habits have perhaps been corrected by philosophy or time. the love of study, a passion which derives fresh vigour from enjoyment, supplies each day, each hour, with a perpetual source of independent and rational pleasure; and i am not sensible of any decay of the mental faculties. the original soil has been highly improved by cultivation; but it may be questioned, whether some flowers of fancy, some grateful errors, have not been eradicated with the weeds of prejudice. . since i have escaped from the long perils of my childhood, the serious advice of a physician has seldom been requisite. "the madness of superfluous health" i have never known; but my tender constitution has been fortified by time, and the inestimable gift of the sound and peaceful slumbers of infancy may be imputed both to the mind and body. . i have already described the merits of my society and situation; but these enjoyments would be tasteless or bitter if their possession were not assured by an annual and adequate supply. according to the scale of switzerland, i am a rich man; and i am indeed rich, since my income is superior to my expence, and my expence is equal to my wishes. my friend lord sheffield has kindly relieved me from the cares to which my taste and temper are most adverse: shall i add, that since the failure of my first wishes, i have never entertained any serious thoughts of a matrimonial connection? i am disgusted with the affectation of men of letters, who complain that they have renounced a substance for a shadow; and that their fame (which sometimes is no insupportable weight) affords a poor compensation for envy, censure, and persecution. [note: m. d'alembert relates, that as he was walking in the gardens of sans souci with the king of prussia, frederic said to him, "do you see that old woman, a poor weeder, asleep on that sunny bank? she is probably a more happy being than either of us." the king and the philosopher may speak for themselves; for my part i do not envy the old woman.] my own experience, at least, has taught me a very different lesson: twenty happy years have been animated by the labour of my history; and its success has given me a name, a rank, a character, in the world, to which i should not otherwise have been entitled. the freedom of my writings has indeed provoked an implacable tribe; but, as i was safe from the stings, i was soon accustomed to the buzzing of the hornets: my nerves are not tremblingly alive, and my literary temper is so happily framed, that i am less sensible of pain than of pleasure. the rational pride of an author may be offended, rather than flattered, by vague indiscriminate praise; but he cannot, he should not, be indifferent to the fair testimonies of private and public esteem. even his moral sympathy may be gratified by the idea, that now, in the present hour, he is imparting some degree of amusement or knowledge to his friends in a distant land: that one day his mind will be familiar to the grand-children of those who are yet unborn. i cannot boast of the friendship or favour of princes; the patronage of english literature has long since been devolved on our booksellers, and the measure of their liberality is the least ambiguous test of our common success. perhaps the golden mediocrity of my fortune has contributed to fortify my application. the present is a fleeting moment, the past is no more; and our prospect of futurity is dark and doubtful. this day may possibly be my last: but the laws of probability, so true in general, so fallacious in particular, still allow about fifteen years. [mr. buffon, from our disregard of the possibility of death within the four and twenty hours, concludes that a chance, which falls below or rises above ten thousand to one, will never affect the hopes or fears of a reasonable man. the fact is true, but our courage is the effect of thoughtlessness, rather than of reflection. if a public lottery were drawn for, the choice of an immediate victim, and if our name were inscribed on ore of the ten thousand tickets, should we be perfectly easy?] i shall soon enter into the period which, as the most agreeable of my long life, was selected by the judgment and experience of the sage fontenelle. his choice is approved by the eloquent historian of nature, who fixes our moral happiness to the mature season in which our passions are supposed to be calmed, our duties fulfilled, our ambition satisfied, our fame and fortune established on a solid basis (see buffon). in private conversation, that great and amiable man added the weight of his own experience; and this autumnal felicity might be exemplified in the lives of voltaire, hume, and many other men of letters. i am far more inclined to embrace than to dispute this comfortable doctrine. i will not suppose any premature decay of the mind or body; but i must reluctantly observe that two causes, the abbreviation of time, and the failure of hope, will always tinge with a browner shade the evening of life. [postscript by lord sheffield] when i first undertook to prepare mr. gibbon's memoirs for the press, i supposed that it would be necessary to introduce some continuation of them, from the time when they cease, namely, soon after his return to switzerland in the year ; but the examination of his correspondence with me suggested, that the best continuation would be the publication of his letters from that time to his death. i shall thus give more satisfaction, by employing the language of mr. gibbon, instead of my own; and the public will see him in a new and (i think) an admirable light, as a writer of letters. by the insertion of a few occasional sentences, i shall obviate the disadvantages that are apt to arise from an interrupted narration. a prejudiced or a fastidious critic may condemn, perhaps, some parts of the letters as trivial; but many readers, i flatter myself, will be gratified by discovering even in these my friend's affectionate feelings, and his character in familiar life. his letters in general bear a strong resemblance to the style and turn of his conversation; the characteristics of which were vivacity, elegance, and precision, with knowledge astonishingly extensive and correct. he never ceased to be instructive and entertaining; and in general there was a vein of pleasantry in his conversation which prevented its becoming languid, even during a residence of many months with a family in the country. it has been supposed that he always arranged what he intended to say, before he spoke; his quickness in conversation contradicts this notion: but it is very true, that before he sat down to write a note or letter, he completely arranged in his mind what he meant to express. he pursued the same method in respect to other composition; and he occasionally would walk several times about his apartment before he had rounded a period to his taste. he has pleasantly remarked to me, that it sometimes cost him many a turn before he could throw a sentiment into a form that gratified his own criticism. his systematic habit of arrangement in point of style, assisted, in his instance, by an excellent memory and correct judgment, is much to be recommended to those who aspire to any perfection in writing. although the memoirs extend beyond the time of mr. gibbon's return to lausanne, i shall insert a few letters, written immediately after his arrival there, and combine them so far as to include even the last note which he wrote a few days previously to his death. some of them contain few incidents; but they connect and carry on the account either of his opinions or of his employment. copyright laws are changing all over the world. be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing this or any other project gutenberg ebook. this header should be the first thing seen when viewing this project gutenberg file. please do not remove it. do not change or edit the header without written permission. please read the "legal small print," and other information about the ebook and project gutenberg at the bottom of this file. included is important information about your specific rights and restrictions in how the file may be used. you can also find out about how to make a thomas carlyle by john nichol, ll. d, m.a., balliol, oxon prefatory note the following record of the leading events of carlyle's life and attempt to estimate his genius rely on frequently renewed study of his work, on slight personal impressions--"vidi tantum"--and on information supplied by previous narrators. of these the great author's chosen literary legatee is the most eminent and, in the main, the most reliable. every critic of carlyle must admit as constant obligations to mr. froude as every critic of byron to moore or of scott to lockhart. the works of these masters in biography remain the ample storehouses from which every student will continue to draw. each has, in a sense, made his subject his own, and each has been similarly arraigned. i must here be allowed to express a feeling akin to indignation at the persistent, often virulent, attacks directed against a loyal friend, betrayed, it may be, by excess of faith and the defective reticence that often belongs to genius, to publish too much about his hero. but mr. froude's quotation, in defence, from the essay on _sir walter scott_ requires no supplement: it should be remembered that he acted with explicit authority; that the restrictions under which he was at first entrusted with the mss. of the _reminiscences_ and the _letters and memorials_ (annotated by carlyle himself, as if for publication) were withdrawn; and that the initial permission to select finally approached a practical injunction to communicate the whole. the worst that can be said is that, in the last years of carlyle's career, his own judgment as to what should be made public of the details of his domestic life may have been somewhat obscured; but, if so, it was a weakness easily hidden from a devotee. my acknowledgments are due to several of the press comments which appeared shortly after carlyle's death, more especially that of the _st. james's gazette_, giving the most philosophical brief summary of his religious views which i have seen; and to the kindness of dr. eugene oswald, president of the carlyle society, in supplying me with valuable hints on matters relating to german history and literature. i have also to thank the editor of the _manchester guardian_ for permitting me to reproduce the substance of my article in its columns of february . that article was largely based on a contribution on the same subject, in , to mackenzie's _imperial dictionary of biography_. i may add that in the distribution of material over the comparatively short space at my command, i have endeavoured to give prominence to facts less generally known, and passed over slightly the details of events previously enlarged on, as the terrible accident to mrs. carlyle and the incidents of her death. to her inner history i have only referred in so far as it had a direct bearing on her husband's life. as regards the itinerary of carlyle's foreign journeys, it has seemed to me that it might be of interest to those travelling in germany to have a short record of the places where the author sought his "studies" for his greatest work. contents chapter i introductory summary chapter ii - ecclefechan and edinburgh chapter iii - craigenputtock (from marriage to london) chapter iv - cheyne row--(to death of mrs. welsh) chapter v - cheyne row--(to death of carlyle's mother) chapter vi - the minotaur--(to death of mrs. carlyle) chapter vii - decadence chapter viii carlyle as man of letters, critic, and historian chapter ix carlyle's political philosophy chapter x ethics--predecessors--influence appendix on carlyle's religion index thomas carlyle chapter i introductory summary four scotchmen, born within the limits of the same hundred years, all in the first rank of writers, if not of thinkers, represent much of the spirit of four successive generations. they are leading links in an intellectual chain. david hume ( - ) remains the most salient type in our island of the scepticism, half conservative, half destructive, but never revolutionary, which marked the third quarter of the eighteenth century. he had some points of intellectual contact with voltaire, though substituting a staid temper and passionless logic for the incisive brilliancy of a mocking mercury; he had no relation, save an unhappy personal one, to rousseau. robert burns ( - ), last of great lyrists inspired by a local genius, keenest of popular satirists, narrative poet of the people, spokesman of their higher as of their lower natures, stood on the verge between two eras. half jacobite, nursling of old minstrelsy, he was also half jacobin, an early-born child of the upheaval that closed the century; as essentially a foe of calvinism as hume himself. master musician of his race, he was, as thomas campbell notes, severed, for good and ill, from his fellow scots, by an utter want of their protecting or paralysing caution. walter scott ( - ), broadest and most generous, if not loftiest of the group--"no sounder piece of british manhood," says carlyle himself in his inadequate review, "was put together in that century"--the great revivalist of the mediaeval past, lighting up its scenes with a magic glamour, the wizard of northern tradition, was also, like burns, the humorist of contemporary life. dealing with feudal themes, but in the manner of the romantic school, he was the heir of the troubadours, the sympathetic peer of byron, and in his translation of goetz von berlichingen he laid the first rafters of our bridge to germany. thomas carlyle ( - ) is on the whole the strongest, though far from the finest spirit of the age succeeding--an age of criticism threatening to crowd creation out, of jostling interests and of surging streams, some of which he has striven to direct, more to stem. even now what mill twenty-five years ago wrote of coleridge is still true of carlyle: "the reading public is apt to be divided between those to whom his views are everything and those to whom they are nothing." but it is possible to extricate from a mass of often turbid eloquence the strands of his thought and to measure his influence by indicating its range. travellers in the hartz, ascending the brocken, are in certain atmospheres startled by the apparition of a shadowy figure,--a giant image of themselves, thrown on the horizon by the dawn. similar is the relation of carlyle to the common types of his countrymen. burns, despite his perfervid patriotism, was in many ways "a starry stranger." carlyle was scotch to the core and to the close, in every respect a macrocosm of the higher peasant class of the lowlanders. saturated to the last with the spirit of a dismissed creed, he fretted in bonds from which he could never get wholly free. intrepid, independent, steadfast, frugal, prudent, dauntless, he trampled on the pride of kings with the pride of lucifer. he was clannish to excess, painfully jealous of proximate rivals, self-centred if not self-seeking, fired by zeal and inflamed by almost mean emulations, resenting benefits as debts, ungenerous--with one exception, that of goethe,--to his intellectual creditors; and, with reference to men and manners around him at variance with himself, violently intolerant. he bore a strange relation to the great poet, in many ways his predecessor in influence, whom with persistent inconsistency he alternately eulogised and disparaged, the half scot lord byron. one had by nature many affinities to the latin races, the other was purely teutonic: but the power of both was titanic rather than olympian; both were forces of revolution; both protested, in widely different fashion, against the tendency of the age to submerge individualism; both were to a large extent egoists: the one whining, the other roaring, against the "philistine" restraints of ordinary society. both had hot hearts, big brains, and an exhaustless store of winged and fiery words; both were wrapt in a measureless discontent, and made constant appeal against what they deemed the shallows of optimism; carlylism is the prose rather than "the male of byronism." the contrasts are no less obvious: the author of _sartor resartus_, however vaguely, defended the system of the universe; the author of _cain_, with an audacity that in its essence went beyond that of shelley, arraigned it. in both we find vehemence and substantial honesty; but, in the one, there is a dominant faith, tempered by pride, in the "caste of vere de vere," in freedom for itself--a faith marred by shifting purposes, the garrulous incontinence of vanity, and a broken life; in the other unwavering belief in law. the record of their fame is diverse. byron leapt into the citadel, awoke and found himself the greatest inheritor of an ancient name. carlyle, a peasant's son, laid slow siege to his eminence, and, only after outliving twice the years of the other, attained it. his career was a struggle, sterner than that of either johnson or wordsworth, from obscurity, almost from contempt, to a rarely challenged renown. fifty years ago few "so poor to do him reverence": at his death, in a sunset storm of praise, the air was full of him, and deafening was the babel of the reviews; for the progress of every original thinker is accompanied by a stream of commentary that swells as it runs till it ends in a dismal swamp of platitude. carlyle's first recognition was from america, his last from his own countrymen. his teaching came home to their hearts "late in the gloamin'." in scotland, where, for good or ill, passions are in extremes, he was long howled down, lampooned, preached at, prayed for: till, after his edinburgh inaugural address, he of a sudden became the object of an equally blind devotion; and was, often by the very men who had tried and condemned him for blasphemy, as senselessly credited with essential orthodoxy. "the stone which the builders rejected became the headstone of the corner," the terror of the pulpit its text. carlyle's decease was marked by a dirge of rhapsodists whose measureless acclamations stifled the voice of sober criticism. in the realm of contemporary english prose he has left no adequate successor; [footnote: the nearest being the now foremost prose writers of our time, mr. ruskin and mr. froude.] the throne that does not pass by primogeniture is vacant, and the bleak northern skies seem colder and grayer since that venerable head was laid to rest by the village churchyard, far from the smoke and din of the great city on whose streets his figure was long familiar and his name was at last so honoured. carlyle first saw the world tempest-tossed by the events he celebrates in his earliest history. in its opening pages, we are made to listen to the feet and chariots of "dubarrydom" hurrying from the "armida palace," where louis xv. and the _ancien régime_ lay dying; later to the ticking of the clocks in launay's doomed bastile; again to the tocsin of the steeples that roused the singers of the _marseillaise_ to march from "their bright phocaean city" and grapple with the swiss guard, last bulwark of the bourbons. "the swiss would have won," the historian characteristically quotes from napoleon, "if they had had a commander." already, over little more than the space of the author's life--for he was a contemporary of keats, born seven months before the death of burns, shelley's junior by three, scott's by twenty-four, byron's by seven years--three years after goethe went to feel the pulse of the "cannon-fever" at argonne--already these sounds are across a sea. two whole generations have passed with the memory of half their storms. "another race hath been, and other palms are won." old policies, governments, councils, creeds, modes and hopes of life have been sifted in strange fires. assaye, trafalgar, austerlitz, jena, leipzig, inkermann, sadowa,--waterloo when he was twenty and sedan when he was seventy-five,--have been fought and won. born under the french directory and the presidency of washington, carlyle survived two french empires, two kingdoms, and two republics; elsewhere partitions, abolitions, revivals and deaths of states innumerable. during his life our sway in the east doubled its area, two peoples (the german with, the italian without, his sympathy) were consolidated on the continent, while another across the atlantic developed to a magnitude that amazes and sometimes alarms the rest. aggressions were made and repelled, patriots perorated and fought, diplomatists finessed with a zeal worthy of the world's most restless, if not its wisest, age. in the internal affairs of the leading nations the transformation scenes were often as rapid as those of a pantomime. the art and literature of those eighty-six years--stirred to new thought and form at their commencement by the so-called romantic movement, more recently influenced by the classic reaction, the pre-raphaelite protest, the aesthetic _mode,_--followed various, even contradictory, standards. but, in one line of progress, there was no shadow of turning. over the road which bacon laid roughly down and newton made safe for transit, physical science, during the whole period, advanced without let and beyond the cavil of ignorance. if the dreams of the _new atlantis_ have not even in our days been wholly realised, science has been brought from heaven to earth, and the elements made ministers of prospero's wand. this apparent, and partially real, conquest of matter has doubtless done much to "relieve our estate," to make life in some directions run more smoothly, and to multiply resources to meet the demands of rapidly-increasing multitudes: but it is in danger of becoming a conquest of matter over us; for the agencies we have called into almost fearful activity threaten, like frankenstein's miscreated goblin, to beat us down to the same level. sanguine spirits who throw out acclamations of self-thanking, self-admiring, with, at every mile run taster, o the wondrous, wondrous age, are apt to forget that the electric light can do nothing to dispel the darkness of the mind; that there are strict limits to the power of prosperity to supply man's wants or satisfy his aspirations. this is a great part of carlyle's teaching. it is impossible, were it desirable, accurately to define his religious, social, or political creed. he swallows formulae with the voracity of mirabeau, and like proteus escapes analysis. no printed labels will stick to him: when we seek to corner him by argument he thunders and lightens. emerson complains that he failed to extract from him a definite answer about immortality. neither by syllogism nor by crucible could bacon himself have made the "form" of carlyle to confess itself. but call him what we will--essential calvinist or recalcitrant neologist, mystic, idealist, deist or pantheist, practical absolutist, or "the strayed reveller" of radicalism--he is consistent in his even bigoted antagonism to all utilitarian solutions of the problems of the world. one of the foremost physicists of our time was among his truest and most loyal friends; they were bound together by the link of genius and kindred political views; and carlyle was himself an expert in mathematics, the mental science that most obviously subserves physical research: but of physics themselves (astronomy being scarcely a physical science) his ignorance was profound, and his abusive criticisms of such men as darwin are infantile. this intellectual defect, or rather vacuum, left him free to denounce material views of life with unconditioned vehemence. "will the whole upholsterers," he exclaims in his half comic, sometimes nonsensical, vein, "and confectioners of modern europe undertake to make one single shoeblack happy!" and more seriously of the railways, without whose noisy aid he had never been able to visit the battle-fields of friedrich ii.-- our stupendous railway miracles i have stopped short in admiring.... the distances of london to aberdeen, to ostend, to vienna, are still infinitely inadequate to me. will you teach me the winged flight through immensity, up to the throne dark with excess of bright? you unfortunate, you grin as an ape would at such a question: you do not know that unless you can reach thither in some effectual most veritable sense, you are lost, doomed to hela's death-realm and the abyss where mere brutes are buried. i do not want cheaper cotton, swifter railways; i want what novalis calls "god, freedom, and immortality." will swift railways and sacrifices to hudson help me towards that? the economic and mechanical spirit of the age, faith in mere steel or stone, was one of carlyle's red rags. the others were insincerity in politics and in life, democracy without reverence, and philanthropy without sense. in our time these two last powers have made such strides as to threaten the reign of law. the democrat without a ruler, who protests that one man is by nature as good as another, according to carlyle is "shooting niagara." in deference to the mandate of the philanthropist the last shred of brutality, with much of decision, has vanished from our code. sentiment is in office and mercy not only tempers, but threatens to gag justice. when sir samuel romilly began his beneficent agitation, and carlyle was at school, talkers of treason were liable to be disembowelled before execution; now the crime of treason is practically erased, and the free use of dynamite brings so-called reforms "within the range of practical politics." individualism was still a mark of the early years of the century. the spirit of "l'etat c'est moi" survived in mirabeau's "never name to me that _bête_ of a word 'impossible';" in the first napoleon's threat to the austrian ambassador, "i will break your empire like this vase"; in nelson turning his blind eye to the signal of retreat at copenhagen, and wellington fencing torres vedras against the world: it lingered in nicholas the czar, and has found perhaps its latest political representative in prince bismarck. this is the spirit to which carlyle has always given his undivided sympathy. he has held out hands to knox, francia, friedrich, to the men who have made manners, not to the manners which have made men, to the rulers of people, not to their representatives: and the not inconsiderable following he has obtained is the most conspicuous tribute to a power resolute to pull against the stream. how strong its currents may be illustrated by a few lines from our leading literary journal, the _athenaeum,_ of the saturday after his death :-- "the future historian of the century will have to record the marvellous fact that while in the reign of queen victoria there was initiated, formulated, and methodised an entirely new cosmogony, its most powerful and highly-gifted man of letters was preaching a polity and a philosophy of history that would have better harmonised with the time of queen semiramis. . . . long before he launched his sarcasms at human progress, there had been a conviction among thinkers that it was not the hero that developed the race, but a deep mysterious energy in the race that produced the hero; that the wave produced the bubble, and not the bubble the wave. but the moment a theory of evolution saw the light it was a fact. the old cosmogony, on which were built _sartor resartus_ and the calvinism of ecclefechan, were gone. ecclefechan had declared that the earth did not move; but it moved nevertheless. the great stream of modern thought has advanced; the theory of evolution has been universally accepted; nations, it is acknowledged, produce kings, and kings are denied the faculty of producing nations." _taliter, qualiter;_ but one or two remarks on the incisive summary of this adroit and able theorist are obvious. first, the implied assertion,--"ecclefechan had declared that the earth did not move,"--that carlyle was in essential sympathy with the inquisitors who confronted galileo with the rack, is perhaps the strangest piece of recent criticism extant: for what is his _french revolution_ but a cannonade in three volumes, reverberating, as no other book has done, a hurricane of revolutionary thought and deed, a final storming of old fortresses, an assertion of the necessity of movement, progress, and upheaval? secondly, every new discovery is apt to be discredited by new shibboleths, and one-sided exaggerations of its range. it were platitude to say that mr. darwin was not only an almost unrivalled student of nature, as careful and conscientious in his methods, as fearless in stating his results, but--pace mr. carlyle--a man of genius, who has thrown hoods of light on the inter-relations of the organic world. but there are whole troops of serfs, "addicti jururo in verba magistri," who, accepting, without attempt or capacity to verify the conclusions of the master mind, think to solve all the mysteries of the universe by ejaculating the word "evolution." if i ask what was the secret of dante's or of shakespeare's divining rod, and you answer "evolution," 'tis as if, when sick in heart and sick in head, i were referred, as medicine for "a mind diseased," to grimm's law or to the magnetic belt. let us grant that cæsar was evolved from the currents in the air about the roman capitol, that marcus aurelius was a blend of plato and cleanthes, charlemagne a graft of frankish blood on gallic soil, william i. a rill from rollo filtered in neustrian fields, hildebrand a flame from the altar of the mediæval church, barbarossa a plant grown to masterdom in german woods, or later--not to heap up figures whose memories still possess the world--that columbus was a genoan breeze, bacon a _réchauffé_ of elizabethan thought, orange the silent a dutch dyke, chatham the frontispiece of eighteenth-century england, or corsican buonaparte the "armed soldier of democracy." these men, at all events, were no bubbles on the froth of the waves which they defied and dominated. so much, and more, is to be said for carlyle's insistence that great men are creators as well as creatures of their age. doubtless, as we advance in history, direct personal influence, happily or unhappily, declines. in an era of overwrought activity, of superficial, however free, education, when we run the risk of being associated into nothingness and criticised to death, it remains a question whether, in the interests of the highest civilisation (which means opportunity for every capable citizen to lead the highest life), the subordination of the one to the many ought to be accelerated or retarded. it is said that the triumph of democracy is a mere "matter of time." but time is in this case of the essence of the matter, and the party of resistance will all the more earnestly maintain that the defenders should hold the forts till the invaders have become civilised. "the individual withers and the world is more and more," preludes, though over a long interval, the cynic comment of the second "locksley hall" on the "increasing purpose" of the age. at an earlier date "luria" had protested against the arrogance of mere majorities. a people is but the attempt of many to rise to the completer life of one; and those who live as models to the mass are singly of more value than they all. carlyle set these notes to tennyson and to browning in his _hero-worship_--a creed, though in thought, and more in action, older than buddha or than achilles, which he first launched as a dogma on our times, clenching it with the asseveration that on two men, mirabeau and napoleon, mainly hung the fates of the most nominally levelling of revolutions. the stamp his teaching made remains marked on the minds of the men of light who _lead_, and cannot be wholly effaced by the clamour of the men of words who _orate_. if he leans unduly to the exaltation of personal power, carlyle is on the side of those whose defeat can be beneficent only if it be slow. further to account for his attitude, we must refer to his life and to its surroundings, _i.e._ to the circumstances amid which he was "evolved." chapter ii ecclefechan and edinburgh [ - ] in the introduction to one of his essays, carlyle has warned us against giving too much weight to genealogy: but all his biographies, from the sketch of the riquetti kindred to his full-length _friedrich_, prefaced by two volumes of ancestry, recognise, if they do not overrate, inherited influences; and similarly his fragments of autobiography abound in suggestive reference. his family portraits are to be accepted with the deductions due to the family fever that was the earliest form of his hero-worship. carlyle, says the _athenaeum_ critic before quoted, divides contemporary mankind into the fools and the wise: the wise are the carlyles, the welshes, the aitkens, and edward irving; the fools all the rest of unfortunate mortals: a fuseli stroke of the critic rivalling any of the author criticised; yet the comment has a grain of truth. [footnote: even the most adverse critics of carlyle are often his imitators, their hands taking a dye from what they work in.] the carlyles are said to have come, from the english town somewhat differently spelt, to annandale, with david ii.; and, according to a legend which the great author did not disdain to accept, among them was a certain lord of torthorwald, so created for defences of the border. the churchyard of ecclefechan is profusely strewn with the graves of the family, all with coats of arms--two griffins with adders' stings. more definitely we find thomas, the author's grandfather, settled in that dullest of county villages as a carpenter. in he saw the rebel highlanders on their southward march: he was notable for his study of _anson's voyages_ and of the _arabian nights_: "a fiery man, his stroke as ready as his word; of the toughness and springiness of steel; an honest but not an industrious man;" subsequently tenant of a small farm, in which capacity he does not seem to have managed his affairs with much effect; the family were subjected to severe privations, the mother having, on occasion, to heat the meal into cakes by straw taken from the sacks on which the children slept. in such an atmosphere there grew and throve the five sons known as the five fighting masons--"a curious sample of folks," said an old apprentice of one of them, "pithy, bitter speaking bodies, and awfu' fighters." the second of the group, james, born , married--first, a full cousin, janet carlyle (the sole issue of which marriage was john, who lived at cockermouth); second, margaret aitken, by whom he had four sons--thomas, - ; alexander, - ; john (dr. carlyle, translator of dante), - ; and james, - ; also five daughters, one of whom, jane, became the wife of her cousin james aitken of dumfries, and the mother of mary, the niece who tended her famous uncle so faithfully during the last years of his life. nowhere is carlyle's loyalty to his race shown in a fairer light than in the first of the papers published under the name of _reminiscences_. it differs from the others in being of an early date and free from all offence. from this pathetic sketch, written when on a visit to london in he had sudden news of his father's death, we may, even in our brief space, extract a few passages which throw light on the characters, _i.e._ the points of contact and contrast of the writer and his theme:-- in several respects i consider my father as one of the most interesting men i have known, ... of perhaps the very largest natural endowment of any it has been my lot to converse with. none of you will ever forget that bold glowing style of his, flowing free from his untutored soul, full of metaphors (though he knew not what a metaphor was), with all manner of potent words.... nothing did i ever hear him undertake to render visible which did not become almost ocularly so. emphatic i have heard him beyond all men. in anger he had no need of oaths: his words were like sharp arrows that smote into the very heart. the fault was that he exaggerated (which tendency i also inherit), yet in description, and for the sake chiefly of humorous effect. he was a man of rigid, even scrupulous veracity.... he was never visited with doubt. the old theorem of the universe was sufficient for him ... he stood a true man, while his son stands here on the verge of the new.... a virtue he had which i should learn to imitate: he never spoke of what was disagreeable and past. his was a healthy mind. he had the most open contempt for all "clatter."... he was irascible, choleric, and we all dreaded his wrath, but passion never mastered him.... man's face he did not fear: god he always feared. his reverence was, i think, considerably mixed with fear--rather awe, as of unutterable depths of silence through which flickered a trembling hope.... let me learn of him. let me write my books as he built his houses, and walk as blamelessly through this shadow world.... though genuine and coherent, living and life-giving, he was nevertheless but half developed. we had all to complain that we durst not freely love him. his heart seemed as if walled in: he had not the free means to unbosom himself.... it seemed as if an atmosphere of fear repelled us from him. to me it was especially so. till late years i was ever more or less awed and chilled by him. james carlyle has been compared to the father of burns. the failings of both leant to virtue's side, in different ways. they were at one in their integrity, independence, fighting force at stress, and their command of winged words; but the elder had a softer heart, more love of letters, a broader spirit; the younger more power to stem adverse tides, he was a better man of business, made of tougher clay, and a grimmer calvinist. "mr. lawson," he writes in , "is doing very well, and has given us no more paraphrases." he seems to have grown more rigid as he aged, under the narrowing influences of the covenanting land; but he remained stable and compact as the auldgarth bridge, built with his own hands. james carlyle hammered on at ecclefechan, making in his best year £ , till, after the first decade of the century, the family migrated to mainhill, a bleak farm two miles from lockerbie, where he so throve by work and thrift that he left on his death in about £ . strong, rough, and eminently _straight,_ intolerant of contradiction and ready with words like blows, his unsympathetic side recalls rather the father of the brontës on the wild yorkshire moor than william burness by the ingle of mount oliphant. margaret carlyle was in theological theory as strict as her husband, and for a time made more moan over the aberrations of her favourite son. like most scotch mothers of her rank, she had set her heart on seeing him in a pulpit, from which any other eminence seemed a fall; but she became, though comparatively illiterate, having only late in life learnt to write a letter, a student of his books. over these they talked, smoking together in old country fashion by the hearth; and she was to the last proud of the genius which grew in large measure under the unfailing sunshine of her anxious love. book ii. of _sartor_ is an acknowledged fragment of autobiography, mainly a record of the author's inner life, but with numerous references to his environment. there is not much to identify the foster parents of teufelsdröckh, and the dramatic drollery of the child's advent takes the place of ancestry: entepfuhl is obviously ecclefechan, where the ducks are paddling in the ditch that has to pass muster for a stream, to-day as a century gone: the severe frugality which (as in the case of wordsworth and carlyle himself) survived the need for it, is clearly recalled; also the discipline of the roman-like domestic law, "in an orderly house, where the litter of children's sports is hateful, your training is rather to bear than to do. i was forbid much, wishes in any measure bold i had to renounce; everywhere a strait bond of obedience inflexibly held me down. it was not a joyful life, yet ... a wholesome one." the following oft-quoted passage is characteristic of his early love of nature and the humorous touches by which he was wont to relieve his fits of sentiment:-- on fine evenings i was wont to carry forth my supper (bread crumb boiled in milk) and eat it out of doors. on the coping of the wall, which i could reach by climbing, my porringer was placed: there many a sunset have i, looking at the distant mountains, consumed, not without relish, my evening meal. those hues of gold and azure, that hush of world's expectation as day died, were still a hebrew speech for me: nevertheless i was looking at the fair illumined letters, and had an eye for the gilding. in all that relates to the writer's own education, the dichtung of _sartor_ and the wahrheit of the _reminiscences_ are in accord. by carlyle's own account, an "insignificant portion" of it "depended on schools." like burns, he was for some years trained in his own parish, where home influences counted for more than the teaching of not very competent masters. he soon read eagerly and variously. at the age of seven he was, by an inspector of the old order, reported to be "complete in english." in his tenth year ( ) he was sent to the grammar school of annan, the "hinterschlag gymnasium," where his "evil days" began. every oversensitive child finds the life of a public school one long misery. ordinary boys--those of the scotch borderland being of the most savage type--are more brutal than ordinary men; they hate singularity as the world at first hates originality, and have none of the restraints which the later semi-civilisation of life imposes. "they obey the impulse of rude nature which bids the deer herd fall upon any stricken hart, the duck flock put to death any broken-winged brother or sister, and on all hands the strong tyrannise over the weak." young carlyle was mocked for his moody ways, laughed at for his love of solitude, and called "tom the tearful" because of his habit of crying. to add much to his discomfort, he had made a rash promise to his pious mother, who seems, in contrast to her husband's race, to have adopted non-resistance principles--a promise to abstain from fighting, provocative of many cuffs till it was well broken by a hinterschlag, applied to some blustering bully. nor had he refuge in the sympathy of his teachers, "hide-bound pedants, who knew syntax enough, and of the human soul thus much: that it had a faculty called memory, which could be acted on through the muscular integument by appliance of birch rods." at annan, however, he acquired a fair knowledge of latin and french, the rudiments of algebra, the greek alphabet, began to study history, and had his first glimpse of edward irving, the bright prize-taker from edinburgh, later his mentor and then life-long friend. on thomas's return home it was decided to send him to the university, despite the cynical warning of one of the village cronies, "educate a boy, and he grows up to despise his ignorant parents." "thou hast not done so," said old james in after years, "god be thanked for it;" and the son pays due tribute to the tolerant patience and substantial generosity of the father: "with a noble faith he launched me forth into a world which he himself had never been permitted to visit." carlyle walked through moffat all the way to edinburgh with a senior student, tom smail (who owes to this fact the preservation of his name), with eyes open to every shade on the moors, as is attested in two passages of the _reminiscences_. the boys, as is the fashion still, clubbed together in cheap lodgings, and carlyle attended the curriculum from to . comparatively little is known of his college life, which seems to have been for the majority of scotch students much as it is now, a compulsorily frugal life, with too little variety, relaxation, or society outside class rooms; and, within them, a constant tug at science, mental or physical, at the gateway to dissecting souls or bodies. we infer, from hints in later conversations and memorials, that carlyle lived much with his own fancies, and owed little to any system. he is clearly thinking of his own youth in his account of dr. francia: "josè must have been a loose-made tawny creature, much given to taciturn reflection, probably to crying humours, with fits of vehement ill nature--subject to the terriblest fits of hypochondria." his explosion in _sartor,_ "it is my painful duty to say that out of england and spain, ours was the worst of all hitherto discovered universities," is the first of a long series of libels on things and persons he did not like. the scotch capital was still a literary centre of some original brilliancy, in the light of the circle of scott, which followed that of burns, in the early fame of cockburn and of clerk (lord eldin), of the _quarterly_ and _edinburgh reviews,_ and of the elder alison. the chairs of the university were conspicuously well filled by men of the sedate sort of ability required from professors, some of them--conspicuously brown (the more original if less "sound" successor of dugald stewart), playfair, and leslie--rising to a higher rank. but great educational institutions must adapt themselves to the training of average minds by requirements and restrictions against which genius always rebels. biography more than history repeats itself, and the murmurs of carlyle are, like those of milton, gibbon, locke, and wordsworth, the protests or growls of irrepressible individuality kicking against the pricks. he was never in any sense a classic; read greek with difficulty--aeschylus and sophocles mainly in translations--and while appreciating tacitus disparaged horace. for scotch metaphysics, or any logical system, he never cared, and in his days there was written over the academic entrances "no mysticism." he distinguished himself in mathematics, and soon found, by his own vaunt, the _principia_ of newton prostrate at his feet: he was a favourite pupil of leslie, who escaped the frequent penalty of befriending him, but he took no prizes: the noise in the class room hindered his answers, and he said later to mr. froude that thoughts only came to him properly when alone. [footnote: he went so far as to say in that "the man who had mastered the first forty-seven propositions of euclid stood nearer to god than he had done before."] the social leader of a select set of young men in his own rank, by choice and necessity _integer vitae_, he divided his time between the seclusion of study and writing letters, in which kind of literature he was perhaps the most prolific writer of his time. in carlyle completed his course without taking a degree, did some tutorial work, and, in the same year, accepted the post of mathematical usher at annan as successor to irving, who had been translated to haddington. still in formal pursuit of the ministry, though beginning to fight shy of its fences, he went up twice a year to deliver addresses at the divinity hall, one of which, "on the uses of affliction," was afterwards by himself condemned as flowery; another was a latin thesis on the theme, "num detur religio naturalis." the posthumous publication of some of his writings, e.g. of the fragment of the novel _wotton reinfred_, reconciles us to the loss of those which have not been recovered. in the vacations, spent at mainhill, he began to study german, and corresponded with his college friends. many of carlyle's early letters, reproduced in the volumes edited by mr. charles e. norton, are written in that which, according to voltaire, is the only unpermissible style, "the tiresome"; and the thought, far from being precocious, is distinctly commonplace, e.g. the letter to robert mitchell on the fall of napoleon; or the following to his parents: "there are few things in this world more valuable than knowledge, and youth is the season for acquiring it"; or to james johnstone the trite quotation, "truly pale death overturns with impartial foot the hut of the poor man and the palace of the king." several are marred by the egotism which in most scotch peasants of aspiring talent takes the form of perpetual comparison of themselves with others; refrains of the ambition against which the writer elsewhere inveighs as the "kettle tied to the dog's tail." in a note to thomas murray he writes:-- ever since i have been able to form a wish, the wish of being known has been the foremost. oh, fortune! bestow coronets and crowns and principalities and purses, and pudding and power, upon the great and noble and fat ones of the earth. grant me that, with a heart unyielding to thy favours and unbending to thy frowns, i may attain to literary fame. that his critical and literary instincts were yet undeveloped there is ample proof. take his comment, at the age of nineteen, on the verses of leyden :-- shout, britons, for the battle of assaye, for that was a day when we stood in our array like the lion's might at bay. "can anything be grander?" to johnstone (who with mitchell consumes almost a volume) he writes: "read shakespeare. if you have not, then i desire you read it (_sic_) and tell me what you think of _him_," etc. elsewhere the dogmatic summary of hume's "essays" illustrates the lingering eighteenth-century latinism that had been previously travestied in the more stilted passages of the letters of burns. "many of his opinions are not to be adopted. how odd does it look to refer all the modifications of national character to the influence of moral causes. might it not be asserted with some plausibility that even those which he denominates moral causes originate from physical circumstances?" the whole first volume of this somewhat overexpanded collection overflows with ebullitions of bile, in comparison with which the misanthropy of byron's early romances seems philanthropy, e.g.-- how weary, flat, stale, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world. for what are its inhabitants? its great men and its little, its fat ones and its lean ... pitiful automatons, despicable yahoos, yea, they are altogether an insufferable thing. "o for a lodge in some vast wilderness, some boundless contiguity of shade, where the scowl of the purse-proud nabob, the sneer and strut of the coxcomb, the bray of the ninny and the clodpole might never reach me more!" on the other hand, there are frequent evidences of the imperial intrepidity, the matchless industry, and the splendid independence of the writer. in his twenty-first year carlyle again succeeded his annan predecessor (who seems to have given dissatisfaction by some vagaries of severity) as mathematical teacher in the main school of kirkcaldy. the _reminiscences_ of irving's generous reception of his protégé present one of the pleasantest pictures in the records of their friendship. the same chapter is illustrated by a series of sketches of the scenery of the east coast rarely rivalled in descriptive literature. it is elsewhere enlivened, if also defaced, by the earliest examples of the cynical criticisms of character that make most readers rejoice in having escaped the author's observation. during the two years of his residence in fifeshire, carlyle encountered his first romance, in making acquaintance with a well-born young lady, "by far the brightest and cleverest" of irving's pupils--margaret gordon--"an acquaintance which might easily have been more" had not relatives and circumstances intervened. doubtless mr. froude is right in asserting this lady to have been the original of _sartor's_ "blumine"; and in leaving him to marry "herr towgood," ultimately governor of nova scotia, she bequeathed, though in antithetical style, advice that attests her discrimination of character. "cultivate the milder dispositions of the heart, subdue the mere extravagant visions of the brain. genius will render you great. may virtue render you beloved. remove the awful distance between you and other men by kind and gentle manners. deal gently with their inferiority, and be convinced that they will respect you as much and like you more." to this advice, which he never even tried to take, she adds, happily perhaps for herself, "i give you not my address, because i dare not promise to see you." in carlyle, always intolerant of work imposed, came to the conclusion that "it were better to perish than to continue schoolmastering," and left kirkcaldy, with £ saved, for edinburgh, where he lived over three years, taking private pupils, and trying to enter on his real mission through the gates of literature--gates constantly barred; for, even in those older days of laxer competition, obstinate eccentricity unredeemed by any social advantages led to failure and rebuff. men with the literary form of genius highly developed have rarely much endurance of defeat. carlyle, even in his best moods, resented real or fancied injuries, and at this stage of his career complained that he got nothing but vinegar from his fellows, comparing himself to a worm that trodden on would "turn into a torpedo." he had begun to be tormented by the dyspepsia, which "gnawed like a rat" at its life-long tenement, his stomach, and by sleeplessness, due in part to internal causes, but also to the "bedlam" noises of men, machines, and animals, which pestered him in town and country from first to last. he kept hesitating about his career, tried law, mathematical teaching, contributions to magazines and dictionaries, everything but journalism, to which he had a rooted repugnance, and the church, which he had definitely abandoned. how far the change in his views may have been due to his reading of gibbon, rousseau, voltaire, etc., how far to self- reflection, is uncertain; but he already found himself unable, in any plain sense, to subscribe to the westminster confession or to any "orthodox" articles, and equally unable by any philosophical reconciliation of contraries to write black with white on a ground of neutral gray. [footnote: he refers to gibbon's _decline and fall_ as "of all books the most impressive on me in my then stage of investigation and state of mind. his winged sarcasms, so quiet and yet so conclusively transpiercing, were often admirably potent and illustrative to me."] mentally and physically adrift he was midway in the valley of the shadow, which he represents as "the everlasting no," and beset by "temptations in the wilderness." at this crisis he writes, "the biographies of men of letters are the wretchedest chapters in our history, except perhaps the newgate calendar," a remark that recalls the similar cry of burns, "there is not among the martyrologies so rueful a narrative as the lives of the poets." carlyle, reverting to this crisis, refers with constant bitterness to the absence of a popularity which he yet professes to scorn.--i was entirely unknown in edinburgh circles; solitary eating my own heart, misgivings as to whether there shall be presently anything else to eat, fast losing health, a prey to numerous struggles and miseries ... three weeks without any kind of sleep, from impossibility to be free of noise, ... wanderings through mazes of doubt, perpetual questions unanswered, etc. what is this but byron's cry, "i am not happy," which his afterwards stern critic compares to the screaming of a meat-jack? carlyle carried with him from town to country the same dismal mood. "mainhill," says his biographer, "was never a less happy home to him than it was this summer ( ). he could not conceal the condition of his mind; and to his family, to whom the truth of their creed was no more a matter of doubt than the presence of the sun in the sky, he must have seemed as if possessed." returning to edinburgh in the early winter, he for a time wrote hopefully about his studies. "the law i find to be a most complicated subject, yet i like it pretty well. its great charm in my eyes is that no mean compliances are requisite for prospering in it." but this strain soon gave way to a fresh fit of perversity, and we have a record of his throwing up the cards in one of his most ill-natured notes. i did read some law books, attend hume's lectures on scotch law, and converse with and question various dull people of the practical sort. but it and they and the admired lecturing hume himself appeared to me mere denizens of the kingdom of dulness, pointing towards nothing but money as wages for all that bogpool of disgust. the same year (that of peterloo) was that of the radical rising in glasgow against the poverty which was the natural aftermath of the great war, oppressions, half real, half imaginary, of the military force, and the yeomanry in particular. carlyle's contribution to the reminiscences of the time is doubly interesting because written (in the article on irving, ) from memory, when he had long ceased to be a radical. a few sentences suffice to illustrate this phase or stage of his political progress:-- a time of great rages and absurd terrors and expectations, a very fierce radical and anti-radical time. edinburgh, endlessly agitated by it all around me ... gentry people full of zeal and foolish terror and fury, and looking _disgustingly busy and important_.... one bleared sunday morning i had gone out for my walk. at the riding-house in nicolson street was a kind of straggly group, with red-coats interspersed. they took their way, not very dangerous-looking men of war; but there rose from the little crowd the strangest shout i have heard human throats utter, not very loud, but it said as plain as words, and with infinitely more emphasis of sincerity, "may the devil go with you, ye peculiarly contemptible, and dead to the distresses of your fellow-creatures!" another morning ... i met an advocate slightly of my acquaintance hurrying along, musket in hand, towards the links, there to be drilled as item of the "gentlemen" volunteers now afoot. "you should have the like of this," said he, cheerily patting his musket "hm, yes; but i haven't yet quite settled on which side"--which probably he hoped was quiz, though it really expressed my feeling ... mutiny and revolt being a light matter to the young. this period is illustrated by numerous letters from irving, who had migrated to glasgow as an assistant to dr. chalmers, abounding in sound counsels to persevere in some profession and make the best of practical opportunities. carlyle's answers have in no instance been preserved, but the sole trace of his having been influenced by his friend's advice is his contribution ( - ) of sixteen articles to the _edinburgh encyclopedia_ under the editorship of sir david brewster. the scant remuneration obtained from these was well timed, but they contain no original matter, and did nothing for his fame. meanwhile it appears from one of irving's letters that carlyle's thoughts had been, as later in his early london life, turning towards emigration. he says, writes his friend, "i have the ends of my thoughts to bring together ... my views of life to reform, my health to recover, and then once more i shall venture my bark on the waters of this wide realm, and if she cannot weather it i shall steer west and try the waters of another world." [footnote: the subjects of these were--lady mary wortley montagu, montaigne, montesquieu, montfaucon, dr. moore, sir john moore, necker, nelson, netherlands, newfoundland, norfolk, northamptonshire, northumberland, mungo park, lord chatham, william pitt. these articles, on the whole judiciously omitted from the author's collected works, are characterised by marks of great industry, commonplace, and general fairness, with a style singularly formal, like that of the less im pressive pages of johnson. the following, among numerous passages, are curious as illustrating the comparative orthodoxy of the writer's early judgments: "the brilliant hints which montesquieu scatters round him with a liberal hand have excited or assisted the speculations of others in almost every department of political economy, and he is deservedly mentioned as a principal founder of that important science." "mirabeau confronted him (necker) like his evil genius; and being totally without scruple in the employment of any expedient, was but too successful in overthrowing all reasonable proposals, and conducting the people to that state of anarchy out of which his own ambition was to be rewarded," etc. similarly the verdicts on pitt, chatham, nelson, park, lady montagu, etc., are those of an ordinary intelligent englishman of conscientious research, fed on the "lives of the poets" and trafalgar memories. the morality, as in the essay on montaigne, is unexceptionable; the following would commend itself to any boarding school: "melancholy experience has never ceased to show that great warlike talents, like great talents of any kind, may be united with a coarse and ignoble heart."] the resolves, sometimes the efforts, of celebrated englishmen,--"nos manet oceanus,"--as cromwell, burns, coleridge, and southey (allured, some critic suggests, by the poetical sound of susquehanna), arthur clough, richard hengist horne, and browning's "waring," to elude "the fever and the fret" of an old civilisation, and take refuge in the fancied freedom of wild lands--when more than dreams--have been failures. [footnote: cf. the american bryant himself, in his longing to leave his new york press and "plant him where the red deer feed, in the green forest," to lead the life of robin hood and shakespeare's banished duke.] puritan patriots, it is true, made new england, and the scions of the cavaliers virginia; but no poet or imaginative writer has ever been successfully transplanted, with the dubious exception of heinrich heine. it is certain that, despite his first warm recognition coming from across the atlantic, the author of the _latter-day pamphlets_ would have found the "states" more fruitful in food for cursing than either edinburgh or london. the spring of was marked by a memorable visit to irving, on carlyle's way to spend as was his wont the summer months at home. his few days in glasgow are recorded in a graphic sketch of the bald-headed merchants at the tontine, and an account of his introduction to dr. chalmers, to whom he refers always with admiration and a respect but slightly modified. the critic's praise of british contemporaries, other than relatives, is so rare that the following sentences are worth transcribing:-- he (chalmers) was a man of much natural dignity, ingenuity, honesty, and kind affection, as well as sound intellect and imagination.... he had a burst of genuine fun too.... his laugh was ever a hearty, low guffaw, and his tones in preaching would reach to the piercingly pathetic. no preacher ever went so into one's heart. he was a man essentially of little culture, of narrow sphere all his life. such an intellect, professing to be educated, and yet ... ignorant in all that lies beyond the horizon in place or time i have almost nowhere met with--a man capable of so much soaking indolence, lazy brooding ... as the first stage of his life well indicated, ... yet capable of impetuous activity and braying audacity, as his later years showed. i suppose there will never again be such a preacher in any christian church. "the truth of christianity," he said, "was all written in us already in sympathetic ink. bible awakens it, and you can read"--a sympathetic image but of no great weight as an argument addressed to doubting thomas. chalmers, whose originality lay rather in his quick insight and fire than in his mainly commonplace thought, had the credit of recognising the religious side of carlyle's genius, when to the mass of his countrymen he was a rock of offence. one of the great preacher's criticisms of the great writer is notably just: "he is a lover of earnestness more than a lover of truth." there follows in some of the early pages of the _reminiscences_ an account of a long walk with irving, who had arranged to accompany carlyle for the first stage, _i.e._ fifteen miles of the road, of his for the most part pedestrian march from glasgow to ecclefechan, a record among many of similar excursions over dales and hills, and "by the beached margent," revived for us in sun and shade by a pen almost as magical as turner's brush. we must refer to the pages of mr. froude for the picture of drumclog moss,--"a good place for cameronian preaching, and dangerously difficult for claverse _(sic)_ and horse soldiery if the suffering remnant had a few old muskets among them,"--for the graphic glimpse of ailsa craig, and the talk by the dry stone fence, in the twilight. "it was just here, as the sun was sinking, irving drew from me by degrees, in the softest manner, that i did not think as he of the christian religion, and that it was vain for me to expect i ever could or should. this, if this was so, he had pre-engaged to take well of me, like an elder brother, if i would be frank with him. and right loyally he did so." they parted here: carlyle trudged on to the then "utterly quiet little inn" at muirkirk, left next morning at a.m., and reached dumfries, a distance of fifty-four miles, at p.m., "the longest walk i ever made." he spent the summer at mainhill, studying modern languages, "living riotously with schiller and goethe." at work on the _encyclopedia_ articles, and visiting his friend at annan, when he was offered the post of tutor to the son of a yorkshire farmer, an offer which irving urged him to accept, saying, "you live too much in an ideal world," and wisely adding, "try your hand with the respectable illiterate men of middle life. you may be taught to forget ... the splendours and envies ... of men of literature." this exhortation led to a result recorded with much humour, egotism, and arrogance in a letter to his intimate friend dr. john fergusson, of kelso grammar school, which, despite the mark "private and confidential," was yet published, several years after the death of the recipient and shortly after that of the writer, in a gossiping memoir. we are therefore at liberty to select from the letter the following paragraphs:-- i delayed sending an answer till i might have it in my power to communicate what seemed then likely to produce a considerable change in my stile (_sic_) of life, a proposal to become a "travelling tutor," as they call it, to a young person in the north riding, for whom that exercise was recommended on account of bodily and mental weakness. they offered me £ per annum, and withal invited me to come and examine things on the spot before engaging. i went accordingly, and happy was it i went; from description i was ready to accept the place; from inspection all earndale would not have hired me to accept it. this boy was a dotard, a semi-vegetable, the elder brother, head of the family, a two-legged animal without feathers, intellect, or virtue, and all the connections seemed to have the power of eating pudding but no higher power. so i left the barbarous people....york is but a heap of bricks. jonathan dryasdust (see _ivanhoe_) is justly named. york is the boetia of britain.... upon the whole, however, i derived great amusement from my journey, ... i conversed with all kinds of men, from graziers up to knights of the shire, argued with them all, and broke specimens from their souls (if any), which i retain within the museum of my cranium. i have no prospects that are worth the name. i am like a being thrown from another planet on this dark terrestrial ball, an alien, a pilgrim ... and life is to me like a pathless, a waste, and a howling wilderness. do not leave your situation if you can possibly avoid it. experience shows it to be a fearful thing to be swept in by the roaring surge of life, and then to float alone undirected on its restless, monstrous bosom. keep ashore while yet you may, or if you must to sea, sail under convoy; trust not the waves without a guide. you and i are but pinnaces or cock-boats, yet hold fast by the manilla ship, _and do not let go the painter_. towards the close of this year irving, alarmed by his friend's despondency, sent him a most generous and delicately-worded invitation to spend some months under his roof; but carlyle declined, and in a letter of march he writes to his brother john: "edinburgh, with all its drawbacks, is the only scene for me," on which follows one of his finest descriptions, that of the view from arthur seat. according to the most probable chronology, for many of carlyle's dates are hard to fix, the next important event of his life, his being introduced, on occasion of a visit to haddington, to miss jane welsh by her old tutor, edward irving--an event which marks the beginning of a new era in his career--took place towards the close of may or in the first week of june. to june is assigned the incident, described in _sartor_ as the transition from the everlasting no to the everlasting yea, a sort of revelation that came upon him as he was in leith walk--rue st. thomas de l'enfer in the romance--on the way to cool his distempers by a plunge in the sea. the passage proclaiming this has been everywhere quoted; and it is only essential to note that it resembled the "illuminations" of st. paul and of constantine merely by its being a sudden spiritual impulse. it was in no sense a conversion to any belief in person or creed, it was but the assertion of a strong manhood against an almost suicidal mood of despair; a condition set forth with superabundant paraphernalia of eloquence easily condensed. doubt in the mind of teufelsdröckh had darkened into disbelief in divine or human justice, freedom, or himself. if there be a god, he sits on the hills "since the first sabbath," careless of mankind. duty seems to be but a "phantasm made up of desire and fear"; virtue "some bubble of the blood," absence of vitality perhaps. what in these days are terrors of conscience to diseases of the liver? not on morality but on cookery let us build our stronghold.... thus has the bewildered wanderer to stand, shouting question after question into the sibyl cave, and receiving for answer an echo. from this scepticism, deeper than that of _queen mab,_ fiercer than that of _candide,_ carlyle was dramatically rescued by the sense that he was a servant of god, even when doubting his existence. after all the nameless woe that inquiry had wrought me, i nevertheless still loved truth, and would hate no jot of my allegiance....truth i cried, though the heavens crush me for following her; no falsehood! though a whole celestial lubberland were the price of apostacy. with a grasp on this rock, carlyle springs from the slough of despond and asserts himself: denn ich bin ein mensch gewesen und das heisst ein kämpfer seyn. he finds in persistent action, energy, and courage a present strength, and a lamp of at least such partial victory as he lived to achieve. he would not make his judgment blind; he faced the spectres of the mind,-- but he never "laid them," or came near the serenity of his master, goethe; and his teaching, public and private, remained half a wail. he threw the gage rather in the attitude of a man turning at bay than that of one making a leap. death? well, death ... let it come then, and i will meet it and defy it. and as so i thought there rushed a stream of fire over my soul, and i shook base fear away. ever from that time the temper of my misery was changed; not ... whining sorrow ... but grim defiance. yet the misery remained, for two years later we find him writing:-- i could read the curse of ernulphus, or something twenty times as fierce, upon myself and all things earthly....the year is closing. this time eight and twenty years i was a child of three weeks ago.... oh! little did my mother think, that day she cradled me, the lands that i should travel in, the death i was to dee. my curse seems deeper and blacker than that of any man: to be immured in a rotten carcase, every avenue of which is changed into an inlet of pain. how have i deserved this? i know not. then why don't you kill yourself, sir? is there not arsenic? is there not ratsbane of various kinds? and hemp, and steel? most true, sathanas...but it will be time enough to use them when i have _lost_ the game i am but _losing_, ... and while my friends, my mother, father, brothers, sisters live, the duty of not breaking their hearts would still remain....i want health, health, health! on this subject i am becoming quite furious: my torments are greater than i am able to bear. nowhere in carlyle's writing, save on the surface, is there any excess of optimism; but after the leith walk inspiration he had resolved on "no surrender"; and that, henceforth, he had better heart in his work we have proof in its more regular, if not more rapid progress. his last hack service was the series of articles for brewster, unless we add a translation, under the same auspices, of legendre's geometry, begun, according to some reports, in the kirkcaldy period, finished in , and published in . for this task, prefixed by an original _essay on proportion_, much commended by de morgan, he obtained the respectable sum of £ . two subsequent candidatures for chairs of astronomy showed that carlyle had not lost his taste for mathematics; but this work was his practical farewell to that science. his first sustained efforts as an author were those of an interpreter. his complete mastery of german has been said to have endowed him with "his sword of sharpness and shoes of swiftness"; it may be added, in some instances also, with the "fog-cap." but in his earliest substantial volume, the _life of schiller_, there is nothing either obscure in style or mystic in thought. this work began to appear in the _london magazine_ in , was finished in , and in published in a separate form. approved during its progress by an encouraging article in the _times_, it was, in , translated into german on the instigation of goethe, who introduced the work by an important commendatory preface, and so first brought the author's name conspicuously before a continental public. carlyle himself, partly perhaps from the spirit of contradiction, was inclined to speak slightingly of this high-toned and sympathetic biography: "it is," said he, "in the wrong vein, laborious, partly affected, meagre, bombastic." but these are sentences of a morbid time, when, for want of other victims, he turned and rent himself. _pari passu_, he was toiling at his translation of _wilhelm meister's apprenticeship_. this was published in edinburgh in . heartily commended in _blackwood_, it was generally recognised as one of the best english renderings of any foreign author; and jeffrey, in his absurd review of goethe's great prose drama, speaks in high terms of the skill displayed by the translator. the virulent attack of de quincey--a writer as unreliable as brilliant--in the _london magazine_ does not seem to have carried much weight even then, and has none now. the _wanderjahre_, constituting the third volume of the english edition, first appeared as the last of four on german romance--a series of admirably selected and executed translations from musæus, fouqué, tieck, hoffmann, richter, and goethe, prefaced by short biographical and critical notices of each--published in edinburgh in . this date is also that of the first of the more elaborate and extensive criticisms which, appearing in the edinburgh and foreign reviews, established carlyle as the english pioneer of german literature. the result of these works would have been enough to drive the wolf from the door and to render their author independent of the oatmeal from home; while another source of revenue enabled him not only to keep himself, but to settle his brother alick in a farm, and to support john through his university course as a medical student. this and similar services to the family circle were rendered with gracious disclaimers of obligation. "what any brethren of our father's house possess, i look on as a common stock from which all are entitled to draw." for this good fortune he was again indebted to his friend of friends. irving had begun to feel his position at glasgow unsatisfactory, and at the close of he was induced to accept an appointment to the caledonian chapel at hatton garden. on migrating to london, to make a greater, if not a safer, name in the central city, and finally, be lost in its vortex, he had invited carlyle to follow him, saying, "scotland breeds men, but england rears them." shortly after, introduced by mrs. strachey, one of his worshipping audience, to her sister mrs. buller, he found the latter in trouble about the education of her sons. charles, the elder, was a youth of bright but restive intelligence, and it was desired to find some transitional training for him on his way from harrow to cambridge. irving urged his being placed, in the interim, under carlyle's charge. the proposal, with an offer of £ a year, was accepted, and the brothers were soon duly installed in george square, while their tutor remained in moray place, edinburgh. the early stages of this relationship were eminently satisfactory; carlyle wrote that the teaching of the bullers was a pleasure rather than a task; they seemed to him "quite another set of boys than i have been used to, and treat me in another sort of manner than tutors are used. the eldest is one of the cleverest boys i have ever seen." there was never any jar between the teacher and the taught. carlyle speaks with unfailing regard of the favourite pupil, whose brilliant university and parliamentary career bore testimony to the good practical guidance he had received. his premature death at the entrance on a sphere of wider influence made a serious blank in his old master's life. [footnote: charles buller became carlyle's pupil at the age of fifteen. he died as commissioner of the poor in (_aet_. forty-two).] but as regards the relation of the employer and employed, we are wearied by the constantly recurring record of kindness lavishly bestowed, ungraciously received, and soon ungratefully forgotten. the elder bullers--the mother a former beauty and woman of some brilliancy, the father a solid and courteous gentleman retired from the anglo-indian service--came to edinburgh in the spring of the tutorship, and recognising carlyle's abilities, welcomed him to the family circle, and treated him, by his own confession, with a "degree of respect" he "did not deserve"; adapting their arrangements, as far as possible, to his hours and habits; consulting his convenience and humouring his whims. early in they went to live together at kinnaird house, near dunkeld, when he continued to write letters to his kin still praising his patrons; but the first note of discord is soon struck in satirical references to their aristocratic friends and querulous complaints of the servants. during the winter, for greater quiet, a room was assigned to him in another house near kinnaird; a consideration which met with the award: "my bower is the most polite of bowers, refusing admittance to no wind that blows." and about this same time he wrote, growling at his fare: "it is clear to me that i shall never recover my health under the economy of mrs. buller." in the family returned to london, and carlyle followed in june by a sailing yacht from leith. on arrival he sent to miss welsh a letter, sneering at his fellow passengers, but ending with a striking picture of his first impressions of the capital:-- we were winding slowly through the forest of masts in the thames up to our station at tower wharf. the giant bustle, the coal heavers, the bargemen, the black buildings, the ten thousand times ten thousand sounds and movements of that monstrous harbour formed the grandest object i had ever witnessed. one man seems a drop in the ocean; you feel annihilated in the immensity of that heart of all the world. on reaching london he first stayed for two or three weeks under irving's roof and was introduced to his friends. of mrs. strachey and her young cousin kitty, who seems to have run the risk of admiring him to excess, he always spoke well: but the basil montagues, to whose hospitality and friendship he was made welcome, he has maligned in such a manner as to justify the retaliatory pamphlet of the sharp-tongued eldest daughter of the house, then about to become mrs. anne procter. by letter and "reminiscence" he is equally reckless in invective against almost all the eminent men of letters with whom he then came in contact, and also, in most cases, in ridicule of their wives. his accounts of hazlitt, campbell, and coleridge have just enough truth to give edge to libels, in some cases perhaps whetted by the consciousness of their being addressed to a sympathetic listener: but it is his frequent travesty of well-wishers and creditors for kindness that has left the deepest stain on his memory. settled with his pupil charles in kew green lodgings he writes: "the bullers are essentially a cold race of people. they live in the midst of fashion and external show. they love no living creature." and a fortnight later, from irving's house at pentonville, he sends to his mother an account of his self-dismissal. mrs. buller had offered him two alternatives--to go with the family to france or to remain in the country preparing the eldest boy for cambridge. he declined both, and they parted, shaking hands with dry eyes. "i feel glad," he adds in a sentence that recalls the worst egotism of coleridge, "that i have done with them ... i was selling the very quintessence of my spirit for £ a year." [footnote: _vide_ carlyle's _life of sterling_ ( st ed. ), chap. viii. p. .] there followed eight weeks of residence in or about birmingham, with a friend called 'badams, who undertook to cure dyspepsia by a new method and failed without being reviled. together, and in company with others, as the astronomer airy, they saw the black country and the toiling squads, in whom carlyle, through all his shifts from radical democracy to platonic autocracy, continued to take a deep interest; on other days they had pleasant excursions to the green fields and old towers of warwickshire. on occasion of this visit he came in contact with de quincey's review of _meister_, and in recounting the event credits himself with the philosophic thought, "this man is perhaps right on some points; if so let him be admonitory." but the description that follows of "the child that has been in hell," however just, is less magnanimous. then came a trip, in company with mr. strachey and kitty and maid, by dover and calais along sterne's route to paris, "the vanity fair of the universe," where louis xviii. was then lying dead in state. carlyle's comments are mainly acid remarks on the palais royal, with the refrain, "god bless the narrow seas." but he met legendre and laplace, heard cuvier lecture and saw talma act, and, what was of more moment, had his first glimpse of the continent and the city of one phase of whose history he was to be the most brilliant recorder. back in london for the winter, where his time was divided between irving's house and his own neighbouring room in southampton street, he was cheered by goethe's own acknowledgment of the translation of _meister_, characteristically and generously cordial. in march carlyle again set his face northward, and travelling by coach through birmingham, manchester, bolton, and carlisle, established himself, in may, at hoddam hill; a farm near the solway, three miles from mainhill, which his father had leased for him. his brother alexander farmed, while thomas toiled on at german translations and rode about on horseback. for a space, one of the few contented periods of his life, there is a truce to complaining. here free from the noises which are the pests of literary life, he was building up his character and forming the opinions which, with few material changes, he long continued to hold. thus he writes from over a distance of forty years :-- with all its manifold petty troubles, this year at hoddam hill has a rustic beauty and dignity to me, and lies now like a not ignoble russet-coated idyll in my memory; one of the quietest on the whole, and perhaps the most triumphantly important of my life.... i found that i had conquered all my scepticisms, agonising doubtings, fearful wrestlings with the foul and vile and soul-murdering mud-gods of my epoch, and was emerging free in spirit into the eternal blue of ether. i had in effect gained an immense victory.... once more, thank heaven for its highest gift, i then felt and still feel endlessly indebted to goethe in the business. he, in his fashion, i perceived, had travelled the steep road before me, the first of the moderns. bodily health itself seemed improving.... nowhere can i recollect of myself such pious musings, communings silent and spontaneous with fact and nature as in these poor annandale localities. the sound of the kirk bell once or twice on sunday mornings from hoddam kirk, about a mile off on the plain below me, was strangely touching, like the departing voice of eighteen hundred years. elsewhere, during one of the rare gleams of sunshine in a life of lurid storms, we have the expression of his passionate independence, his tyrannous love of liberty:-- it is inexpressible what an increase of happiness and of consciousness--of inward dignity--i have gained since i came within the walls of this poor cottage--my own four walls. they simply admit that i am _herr im hause_, and act on this conviction. there is no grumbling about my habitudes and whims. if i choose to dine on fire and brimstone, they will cook it for me to their best skill, thinking only that i am an unintelligible mortal, _fâcheux_ to deal with, but not to be dealt with in any other way. my own four walls. the last words form the refrain of a set of verses, the most characteristic, as mr. froude justly observes, of the writer, the actual composition of which seems, however, to belong to the next chapter of his career, beginning-- wild through the wind the huntsman calls, as fast on willing nag i haste home to my own four walls. the feeling that inspires them is clenched in the defiance-- king george has palaces of pride, and armed grooms must ward those halls; with one stout bolt i safe abide within my own four walls. not all his men may sever this; it yields to friends', not monarchs' calls; my whinstone house my castle is-- i have my own four walls. when fools or knaves do make a rout, with gigmen, dinners, balls, cabals, i turn my back and shut them out; these are my own four walls. chapter iii craigenputtock [ - ] "ah, when she was young, she was a fleein', dancin", light-heartit thing, jeannie welsh, that naething would hae dauntit. but she grew grave a' at ance. there was maister irving, ye ken, that had been her teacher; and he cam' aboot her. then there was maister ----. then there was maister carlyle himsel', and _he_ cam' to finish her off like."--haddington nurse. "my broom, as i sweep up the withered leaves, might be heard at a furlong's distance."--t. carlyle, from craigenputtock, oct. . during the last days at hoddam hill, carlyle was on the verge of a crisis of his career, _i.e._ his making a marriage, for the chequered fortune of which he was greatly himself to blame. no biography can ignore the strange conditions of a domestic life, already made familiar in so many records that they are past evasion. various opinions have been held regarding the lady whom he selected to share his lot. any adequate estimate of this remarkable woman belongs to an account of her own career, such as that given by mrs. ireland in her judicious and interesting abridgment of the material amply supplied. jane baillie welsh (_b. , d. _)--descended on the paternal side from elizabeth, the youngest daughter of john knox; on the maternal owning to an inheritance of gipsy blood--belonged to a family long esteemed in the borders. her father, a distinguished edinburgh student, and afterwards eminent surgeon at haddington, noted alike for his humanity and skill, made a small fortune, and purchased in advance from his father his inheritance of craigenputtock, a remnant of the once larger family estate. he died in , when his daughter was in her eighteenth year. to her he left the now world-famous farm and the bulk of his property. jane, of precocious talents, seems to have been, almost from infancy, the tyrant of the house at haddington, where her people took a place of precedence in the small county town. her grandfathers, john of penfillan and walter of templand, also a welsh, though of another--the gipsy--stock, vied for her baby favours, while her mother's quick and shifty tempers seem at that date to have combined in the process of "spoiling" her. the records of the schooldays of the juvenile jane all point to a somewhat masculine strength of character. through life, it must be acknowledged, this brilliant creature was essentially "a mockingbird," and made game of every one till she met her mate. the little lady was learned, reading virgil at nine, ambitious enough to venture a tragedy at fourteen, and cynical; writing to her life-long friend, miss eliza stodart, of haddington as a "bottomless pit of dulness," where "all my little world lay glittering in tinsel at my feet." she was ruthless to the suitors--as numerous, says mr. froude, "as those of penelope "--who flocked about the young beauty, wit, and heiress. of the discarded rivals there was only one of note--george rennie, long afterwards referred to by carlyle as a "clever, decisive, very ambitious, but quite unmelodious young fellow whom we knew here (in chelsea) as sculptor and m.p." she dismissed him in for some cause of displeasure, "due to pride, reserve, and his soured temper about the world"; but when he came to take leave, she confesses, "i scarcely heard a word he said, my own heart beat so loud." years after, in london, she went by request of his wife to rennie's death-bed. meanwhile she had fallen under the spell of her tutor, edward irving, and, as she, after much _finesse_ and evasion, admitted, came to love him in earnest. irving saw her weak points, saying she was apt to turn her powers to "arts of cruelty which satire and scorn are," and "to contemplate the inferiority of others rather from the point of view of ridicule and contempt than of commiseration and relief." later she retaliated, "there would have been no 'tongues' had irving married me." but he was fettered by a previous engagement, to which, after some struggle for release, he held, leaving in charge of his pupil, as guide, philosopher, and friend, his old ally and successor, thomas carlyle. between this exceptional pair there began in a relationship of constant growth in intimacy, marked by frequent visits, conversations, confidences, and a correspondence, long, full, and varied, starting with interchange of literary sympathies, and sliding by degrees into the dangerous friendship called platonic. at the outset it was plain that carlyle was not the st. preux or wolmar whose ideas of elegance jane welsh--a hasty student of rousseau--had set in unhappy contrast to the honest young swains of haddington. uncouth, ungainly in manner and attire, he first excited her ridicule even more than he attracted her esteem, and her written descriptions of him recall that of johnson by lord chesterfield. "he scrapes the fender, ... only his tongue should be left at liberty, his other members are most fantastically awkward"; but the poor mocking-bird had met her fate. the correspondence falls under two sections, the critical and the personal. the critical consists of remarks, good, bad, and indifferent, on books and their writers. carlyle began his siege by talking german to her, now extolling schiller and goethe to the skies, now, with a rare stretch of deference, half conniving at her sneers. much also passed between them about english authors, among them comments on byron, notably inconsistent. of him carlyle writes (april th ) as "a pampered lord," who would care nothing for the £ a year that would make an honest man happy; but later, on hearing of the death at mesolonghi, more in the vein of his master goethe, he exclaims:-- alas, poor byron! the news of his death came upon me like a mass of lead; and yet the thought of it sends a painful twinge through all my being, as if i had lost a brother. o god! that so many souls of mud and clay should fill up their base existence to the utmost bound; and this, the noblest spirit in europe, should sink before half his course was run.... late so full of fire and generous passion and proud purposes, and now for ever dumb and cold.... had he been spared to the age of threescore and ten what might he not have been! what might he not have been! ... i dreamed of seeing him and knowing him; but ... we shall go to him, he shall not return to us. this in answer to her account of the same intelligence: "i was told it all alone in a room full of people. if they had said the sun or the moon was gone out of the heavens, it could not have struck me with the idea of a more awful and dreary blank in the creation than the words 'byron is dead.'" other letters of the same period, from london, are studded or disfigured by the incisive ill-natured sarcasms above referred to, or they relate to the work and prospects of the writer. those that bear on the progress of his suit mark it as the strangest and, when we look before and after, one of the saddest courtships in literary history. as early as carlyle entertained the idea of making jane welsh his wife; she had begun to yield to the fascinations of his speech--a fascination akin to that of burns--when she wrote, "i will be happier contemplating my beau-ideal than a real, substantial, eating, drinking, sleeping, honest husband." in they were half-declared lovers, but there were recalcitrant fits on both sides. on occasion of a meeting at edinburgh there was a quarrel, followed by a note of repentance, in which she confessed, "nothing short of a devil could have tempted me to torment you and myself as i did on that unblessed day." somewhat earlier she had written in answer to his first distinct avowal, "my friend, i love you. but were you my brother i should love you the same. no. your friend i will be ... while i breathe the breath of life; but your wife never, though you were as rich as croesus, as honoured and renowned as you yet shall be." to which carlyle answered with characteristic pride, "i have no idea of dying in the arcadian shepherd's style for the disappointment of hopes which i never seriously entertained, and had no right to entertain seriously." there was indeed nothing of corydon and phyllis in this struggle of two strong wills, the weaker giving way to the stronger, the gradual but inexorable closing of an iron ring. backed by the natural repugnance of her mother to the match, miss welsh still rebelled, bracing herself with the reflection, "men and women may be very charming without having any genius;" and to his renewed appeal ( ), "it lies with you whether i shall be a right man or only a hard and bitter stoic," retorting, "i am not in love with you ... my affections are in a state of perfect tranquillity." but she admitted he was her "only fellowship and support," and confiding at length the truth about irving, surrendered in the words, "decide, and woe to me if your reason be your judge and not your love." in this duel of puck and theseus, the latter felt he had won and pressed his advantage, offering to let her free and adding warnings to the blind, "without great sacrifices on both sides, the possibility of our union is an empty dream." at the eleventh hour, when, in her own words, she was "married past redemption," he wrote, "if you judge fit, i will take you to my heart this very week. if you judge fit, i will this very week forswear you for ever;" and replied to her request that her widowed mother might live under their wedded roof in terms that might have become petruchio: "it may be stated in a word. the man should bear rule in the house, not the woman. this is an eternal axiom, the law of nature which no mortal departs from unpunished. . . . will your mother consent to make me her guardian and director, and be a second wife to her daughter's husband!" was ever woman in this humour woo'd, was ever woman in this humour won? miss welsh at length reluctantly agreed to come to start life at scotsbrig, where his family had migrated; but carlyle pushed another counter: "your mother must not visit mine: the mere idea of such a visit argued too plainly that you _knew nothing_ of the family circle in which for my sake you were willing to take a place." it being agreed that mrs. welsh was to leave haddington, where the alliance was palpably unpopular, carlyle proposed to begin married life in his mother-in-law's vacant house, saying in effect to his fiancée that as for intrusive visitors he had "nerve enough" to kick her old friends out of doors. at this point, however, her complaisance had reached its limit. the bridegroom-elect had to soothe his sense of partial retreat by a scolding letter. as regards difficulties of finance he pointed out that he had £ to start with, and that a labourer and his wife had been known to live on £ a year. on the edge of the great change in her life, jane welsh writes, "i am resolved in spirit, in the face of every horrible fate," and says she has decided to put off mourning for her father, having found a second father. carlyle proposed that after the "dreaded ceremony" he and his bride and his brother john should travel together by the stage-coach from dumfries to edinburgh. in "the last dying speech and marrying words" she objects to this arrangement, and after the event (october th ) they drove in a post-chaise to comely bank, where mrs. welsh, now herself settled at templand, had furnished a house for them. meanwhile the carlyle family migrated to scotsbrig. there followed eighteen comparatively tranquil months, an oasis in the wilderness, where the anomalous pair lived in some respects like other people. they had seats in church, and social gatherings--wednesday "at homes," to which the celebrity of their brilliant conversational powers attracted the brightest spirits of the northern capital, among them sir william hamilton, sir david browster, john wilson, de quincey, forgiven for his review, and above all jeffrey, a friend, though of opposite character, nearly as true as irving himself. procter had introduced carlyle to the famous editor, who, as a scotch cousin of the welshes, took from the first a keen interest in the still struggling author, and opened to him the door of the _edinburgh review_. the appearance, of the article on _richter_, , and that, in the course of the same year, on _the state of german literature,_ marks the beginning of a long series of splendid historical and critical essays--closing in with the _prinzenraub_--which set carlyle in the front of the reviewers of the century. the success in the _edinburgh_ was an "open sesame;" and the conductors of the _foreign_ and _foreign quarterly_ reviews, later, those of _fraser_ and the _westminster_, were ready to receive whatever the new writer might choose to send. to the _foreign review_ he contributed from comely bank the _life and writings of werner_, a paper on _helena_, the leading episode of the second part of "faust," and the first of the two great essays on _goethe_, which fixed his place as the interpreter of germany to england. in midsummer carlyle received a letter from goethe cordially acknowledging the _life of schiller_, and enclosing presents of books for himself and his wife. this, followed by a later inquiry as to the author of the article on _german literature_, was the opening of a correspondence of sage advice on the one side and of lively gratitude on the other, that lasted till the death of the veteran in . goethe assisted, or tried to assist, his admirer by giving him a testimonial in a candidature for the chair (vacant by the promotion of dr. chalmers) of moral philosophy at st. andrews. jeffrey, a frequent visitor and host of the carlyles, still regarded as "a jewel of advocates ... the most lovable of little men," urged and aided the canvass, but in vain. the testimonials were too strong to be judicious, and "it was enough that" the candidate "was described as a man of original and extraordinary gifts to make college patrons shrink from contact with him." another failure, about the same date and with the same backing, was an application for a professorship in london university, practically under the patronage of brougham; yet another, of a different kind, was carlyle's attempt to write a novel, which having been found--better before than after publication--to be a failure, was for the most part burnt. "he could not," says froude, "write a novel any more than he could write poetry. he had no _invention._" [footnote: carlyle's verses also demonstrate that he had no metrical ear. the only really good lines he ever wrote, save in translations where the rhythm was set to him, are those constantly quoted about the dawn of "another blue day." those sent to his mother on "proud hapsburg," and to jane welsh before marriage are unworthy of macaulay's school-boy, "non di non homines;" but it took much hammering to persuade carlyle of the fact, and when persuaded he concluded that verse-writing was a mere tinkling of cymbals!] "his genius was for fact; to lay hold on truth, with all his intellect and all his imagination. he could no more invent than he could lie." the remaining incidents of carlyle's edinburgh life are few: a visit from his mother; a message from goethe transmitting a medal for sir walter scott; sums generously sent for his brother john's medical education in germany; loans to alexander, and a frustrate scheme for starting a new annual register, designed to be a literary _résumé_ of the year, make up the record. the "rift in the lute," carlyle's incapacity for domestic life, was already showing itself. within the course of an orthodox honeymoon he had begun to shut himself up in interior solitude, seldom saw his wife from breakfast till p.m., when they dined together and read _don quixote_ in spanish. the husband was half forgotten in the author beginning to prophesy: he wrote alone, walked alone, thought alone, and for the most part talked alone, _i.e._ in monologue that did not wait or care for answer. there was respect, there was affection, but there was little companionship. meanwhile, despite the _review_ articles, carlyle's other works, especially the volumes on german romance, were not succeeding, and the mill had to grind without grist. it seemed doubtful whether he could afford to live in edinburgh; he craved after greater quiet, and when the farm, which was the main welsh inheritance, fell vacant, resolved on migrating thither. his wife yielding, though with a natural repugnance to the extreme seclusion in store for her, and the jeffreys kindly assisting, they went together in may to the hill of the hawks. craigenputtock is by no means "the dreariest spot in all the british dominions." on a sunny day it is an inland home, with wide billowy straths of grass around, inestimable silence broken only by the placid bleating of sheep, and the long rolling ridges of the solway hills in front. but in the "winter wind," girt by drifts of snow, no post or apothecary within fifteen miles, it may be dreary enough. here carlyle allowed his wife to serve him through six years of household drudgery; an offence for which he was never quite forgiven, and to estimate its magnitude here seems the proper place. he was a model son and brother, and his conjugal fidelity has been much appraised, but he was as unfit, and for some of the same reasons, to make "a happy fireside clime" as was jonathan swift; and less even than byron had he a share of the mutual forbearance which is essential to the closest of all relations. "napoleon," says emerson, "to achieve his ends risked everything and spared nothing, neither ammunition, nor money, nor troops, nor generals, nor himself." with a slight change of phrase the same may be said of carlyle's devotion to his work. there is no more prevailing refrain in his writing, public and private, than his denunciation of literature as a profession, nor are there wiser words than those in which the veteran warns the young men, whose questions he answers with touching solicitude, against its adoption. "it should be," he declares, "the wine not the food of life, the ardent spirits of thought and fancy without the bread of action parches up nature and makes strong souls like byron dangerous, the weak despicable." but it was nevertheless the profession of his deliberate choice, and he soon found himself bound to it as ixion to his wheel. the most thorough worker on record, he found nothing easy that was great, and he would do nothing little. in his determination to pluck out the heart of the mystery, be it of himself, as in _sartor_; of germany, as in his goethes and richters; the state of england, as in _chartism_ and _past and present;_ of _cromwell_ or of _friedrich,_ he faced all obstacles and overthrew them. dauntless and ruthless, he allowed nothing to divert or to mar his designs, least of all domestic cares or even duties. "selfish he was,"--i again quote from his biographer,--"if it be selfish to be ready to sacrifice every person dependent on him as completely as he sacrificed himself." what such a man wanted was a housekeeper and a nurse, not a wife, and when we consider that he had chosen for the latter companionship a woman almost as ambitious as himself, whose conversation was only less brilliant than his own, of delicate health and dainty ways, loyal to death, but, according to mr. froude, in some respects "as hard as flint," with "dangerous sparks of fire," whose quick temper found vent in sarcasms that blistered and words like swords, who could declare during the time of the engagement, to which in spite of warnings manifold she clung, "i will not marry to live on less than my natural and artificial wants"; who, ridiculing his accent to his face and before his friends, could write, "apply your talents to gild over the inequality of our births"; and who found herself obliged to live sixteen miles from the nearest neighbour, to milk a cow, scour floors and mend shoes--when we consider all this we are constrained to admit that the th october was a _dies nefastus,_ nor wonder that thirty years later mrs. carlyle wrote, "i married for ambition, carlyle has exceeded all that my wildest hopes ever imagined of him, and i am miserable,"--and to a young friend, "my dear, whatever you do, never marry a man of genius." carlyle's own references to the life at craigenputtock are marked by all his aggravating inconsistency. "how happy we shall be in this craig o' putta," he writes to his wife from scotsbrig, april th ; and later to goethe:-- here rousseau would have been as happy as on his island of saint pierre. my town friends indeed ascribe my sojourn here to a similar disposition, and forebode me no good results. but i came here solely with the design to simplify my way of life, and to secure the independence through which i could be enabled to be true to myself. this bit of earth is our own; here we can live, write, and think as best pleases ourselves, even though zoilus himself were to be crowned the monarch of literature. from some of our heights i can descry, about a day's journey to the west, the hill where agricola and the romans left a camp behind them. at the foot of it i was born, and there both father and mother still live to love me.... the only piece of any importance that i have written since i came here is an essay on burns. this essay,--modified at first, then let alone, by jeffrey,--appeared in the _edinburgh_ in the autumn of . we turn to carlyle's journal and find the entry, "finished a paper on burns at this devil's den," elsewhere referred to as a "gaunt and hungry siberia." later still he confesses, when preparing for his final move south, "of solitude i have really had enough." romae tibur amem ventosus, tibure romam. carlyle in the moor was always sighing for the town, and in the town for the moor. during the first twenty years of his london life, in what he called "the devil's oven," he is constantly clamouring to return to the den. his wife, more and more forlorn though ever loyal, consistently disliked it; little wonder, between sluttish maid-servants and owl-like solitude: and she expressed her dislike in the pathetic verses, "to a swallow building under our eaves," sent to jeffrey in , and ending-- god speed thee, pretty bird; may thy small nest with little ones all in good time be blest; i love thee much for well thou managest that life of thine, while i! oh, ask not what i do with mine, would i were such! _the desert._ the monotony of the moorland life was relieved by visits of relations and others made and repaid, an excursion to edinburgh, a residence in london, and the production of work, the best of which has a chance of living with the language. one of the most interesting of the correspondences of this period is a series of letters, addressed to an anonymous edinburgh friend who seems to have had some idea of abandoning his profession of the law for literature, a course against which carlyle strenuously protests. from these letters, which have only appeared in the columns of the _glasgow herald_, we may extract a few sentences:-- don't disparage the work that gains your bread. what is all work but a drudgery? no labour for the present joyous, but grievous. a man who has nothing to admire except himself is in the minimum state. the question is, does a man really love truth, or only the market price of it? even literary men should have something else to do. katnes was a lawyer, roscoe a merchant, hans sachs a cobbler, burns a gauger, etc. the following singular passage, the style of which suggests an imitation of sterne, is the acme of unconscious self-satire:-- you are infinitely unjust to blockheads, as they are called. ask yourself seriously within your own heart--what right have you to live wisely in god's world, and they not to live a little less wisely? is there a man more to be condoled with, nay, i will say to be cherished and tenderly treated, than a man that has no brain? my purse is empty, it can be filled again; the jew rothschild could fill it; or i can even live with it very far from full. but, gracious heavens! what is to be done with my _empty head_? three of the visits of this period are memorable. two from the jeffreys (in and ) leave us with the same uncomfortable impression of kindness ungrudgingly bestowed and grudgingly received. jeffrey had a double interest in the household at craigenputtock--an almost brotherly regard for the wife, and a belief, restrained by the range of a keen though limited appreciation, in the powers of the husband, to whom he wrote: "take care of the fair creature who has entrusted herself so entirely to you," and with a half truth, "you have no mission upon earth, whatever you may fancy, half so important as to be innocently happy." and again: "bring your blooming eve out of your blasted paradise, and seek shelter in the lower world." but carlyle held to the "banner with a strange device," and was either deaf or indignant. the visits passed, with satirical references from both host and hostess; for mrs. carlyle, who could herself abundantly scoff and scold, would allow the liberty to no one else. jeffrey meanwhile was never weary of well-doing. previous to his promotion as lord advocate and consequent transference to london, he tried to negotiate for carlyle's appointment as his successor in the editorship of the _review,_ but failed to make him accept the necessary conditions. the paper entitled _signs of the times_ was the last production that he had to revise for his eccentric friend. those following on taylor's _german literature_ and the _characteristics_ were brought out in under the auspices of macvey napier. the other visit was from the most illustrious of carlyle's english-speaking friends, in many respects a fellow-worker, yet "a spirit of another sort," and destined, though a transcendental mystic, to be the most practical of his benefactors. twenty-four hours of ralph waldo emerson (often referred to in the course of a long and intimate correspondence) are spoken of by mrs. carlyle as a visit from the clouds, brightening the prevailing gray. he came to the remote inland home with "the pure intellectual gleam" of which hawthorne speaks, and "the quiet night of clear fine talk" remained one of the memories which led carlyle afterwards to say, "perhaps our happiest days were spent at the craig." goethe's letters, especially that in which he acknowledges a lock of mrs. carlyle's hair, "eine unvergleichliche schwarze haar locke," were also among the gleams of . the great german died three years later, after receiving the birthday tribute, in his nd year, from english friends; and it is pleasant to remember that in this instance the disciple was to the end loyal to his master. to this period belong many other correspondences. "i am scribble scribbling," he says in a letter of , and mere scribbling may fill many pages with few headaches; but carlyle wrestled as he wrote, and not a page of those marvellous _miscellanies_ but is red with his life's blood. under all his reviewing, he was set on a work whose fortunes were to be the strangest, whose result was, in some respects, the widest of his efforts. the plan of _sartor resartus_ is far from original. swift's _tale of a tub_ distinctly anticipates the clothes philosophy; there are besides manifest obligations to reinecke fuchs, jean paul richter, and other german authors: but in our days originality is only possible in the handling; carlyle has made an imaginary german professor the mere mouthpiece of his own higher aspirations and those of the scotland of his day, and it remains the most popular as surely as his _friedrich_ is the greatest of his works. the author was abundantly conscious of the value of the book, and super-abundantly angry at the unconsciousness of the literary patrons of the time. in he resolved if possible to go up to london to push the prospects of this first-born male child. the _res angusta_ stood in the way. jeffrey, after asking his friend "what situation he could get him that he would detest the least," pressed on him "in the coolest, lightest manner the use of his purse." this carlyle, to the extent of £ as a loan (carefully returned), was induced ultimately to accept. it has been said that "proud men never wholly forgive those to whom they feel themselves obliged," but their resenting benefits is the worst feature of their pride. carlyle made his second visit to london to seek types for _sartor_, in vain. always preaching reticence with the sound of artillery, he vents in many pages the rage of his chagrin at the "arimaspian" publishers, who would not print his book, and the public which, "dosed with froth," would not buy it. the following is little softened by the chiaroscuro of five-and-thirty years:-- done, i think, at craigenputtock between january and august , _teufelsdröckh_ was ready, and i decided to make for london; night before going, how i remember it.... the beggarly history of poor _sartor_ among the blockheadisms is not worth recording or remembering, least of all here! in short, finding that i had got £ (if memory serve) for _schiller_ six or seven years before, and for _sartor_, at least twice as good, i could not only not get £ , but even get no murray or the like to publish it on half profits. murray, a most stupendous object to me, tumbling about eyeless, with the evidently strong wish to say "yes" and "no,"--my first signal experience of that sad human predicament. i said, we will make it "no," then; wrap up our ms., and carry it about for some two years from one terrified owl to another; published at last experimentally in _fraser_, and even then mostly laughed at, nothing coming of the volume except what was sent by emerson from america. this summary is unfair to murray, who was inclined, on jeffrey's recommendation, to accept the book; but on finding that carlyle had carried the ms. to longmans and another publisher, in hopes of a better bargain, and that it had been refused, naturally wished to refer the matter to his "reader," and the negotiation closed. _sartor_ struggled into half life in parts of the magazine to which the writer had already contributed several of his german essays, and it was even then published with reluctance, and on half pay. the reception of this work, a nondescript, yet among the finest prose poems in our language, seemed to justify bookseller, editor, and readers alike, for the british public in general were of their worst opinion. "it is a heap of clotted nonsense," pronounced the _sun_. "stop that stuff or stop my paper," wrote one of _fraser's_ constituents. "when is that stupid series of articles by the crazy tailor going to end?" cried another. at this time carlyle used to say there were only two people who found anything in his book worth reading--emerson and a priest in cork, who said to the editor that he would take the magazine when anything in it appeared by the author of _sartor_. the volume was only published in , by saunders and otley, after the _french revolution_ had further raised the writer's name, and then on a guarantee from friends willing to take the risk of loss. it does not appear whether carlyle refers to this edition or to some slighter reissue of the magazine articles when he writes in the _reminiscences: "i sent off six copies to six edinburgh literary friends, from not one of whom did i get the smallest whisper even of receipt--a thing disappointing more or loss to human nature, and which has silently and insensibly led me never since to send any copy of a book to edinburgh.... the plebs of literature might be divided in their verdicts about me; though by count of heads i always suspect the guilty clear had it; but the conscript fathers declined to vote at all." [footnote: _tempora mutantur_. a few months before carlyle's death a cheap edition of _sartor_ was issued, and , copies were sold within a few weeks.] in america _sartor_ was pieced together from _fraser_, published in a volume introduced by alexander everett, extolled by emerson as "a criticism of the spirit of the age in which we live; exhibiting in the most just and novel light the present aspect of religion, politics, literature, and social life." the editors add: "we believe no book has been published for many years ... which discovers an equal mastery over all the riches of the language. the author makes ample amends for the occasional eccentricity of his genius not only by frequent bursts of pure splendour, but by the wit and sense which never fail him." americans are intolerant of honest criticism on themselves; but they are, more than any other nation, open to appreciate vigorous expressions of original views of life and ethics--all that we understand by philosophy--and equally so to new forms of art. the leading critics of the new england have often been the first and best testers of the fresh products of the old. a land of experiment in all directions, ranging from mount lebanon to oneida creek, has been ready to welcome the suggestions, physical or metaphysical, of startling enterprise. ideas which filter slowly through english soil and abide for generations, flash over the electric atmosphere of the west. hence coleridge, carlyle and browning were already accepted as prophets in boston, while their own countrymen were still examining their credentials. to this readiness, as of a photographic plate, to receive, must be added the fact that the message of _sartor_ crossed the atlantic when the hour to receive it had struck. to its publication has been attributed the origin of a movement that was almost simultaneously inaugurated by emerson's _harvard discourse_. it was a revolt against the reign of commerce in practice, calvinism in theory, and precedent in art that gave birth to the transcendentalism of _the dial_--a pantheon in which carlyle had at once assigned to him a place. he meanwhile was busy in london making friends by his conspicuous, almost obtrusive, genius, and sowing the seeds of discord by his equally obtrusive spleen. to his visit of - belongs one of the worst of the elaborate invectives against lamb which have recoiled on the memory of his critic--to the credit of english sympathies with the most lovable of slightly erring men--with more than the force of a boomorang. a sheaf of sharp sayings of the same date owe their sting to their half truth, _e.g._ to a man who excused himself for profligate journalism on the old plea, "i must live, sir." "no, sir, you need not live, if your body cannot be kept together without selling your soul." similarly he was abusing the periodicals--"mud," "sand," and "dust magazines"--to which he had contributed, _inter alia_, the great essay on _voltaire_ and the consummate sketch of _novalis_; with the second paper on _richler_ to the _foreign review_, the reviews of _history_ and of _schiller_ to _fraser_, and that on _goethe's works_ to the _foreign quarterly_. during this period he was introduced to molesworth, austin, and j.s. mill. on his summons, october st , mrs. carlyle came up to ampton street, where he then resided, to see him safe through the rest of his london time. they lamented over the lapse of irving, now lost in the delirium of tongues, and made a league of friendship with mill, whom he describes as "a partial disciple of mine," a friendship that stood a hard test, but was broken when the author of _liberty_ naturally found it impossible to remain a disciple of the writer of _latter-day pamphlets_. mill, like napier, was at first staggered by the _characteristics_, though he afterwards said it was one of carlyle's greatest works, and was enthusiastic over the review of boswell's _johnson_, published in _fraser_ in the course of this year. meanwhile margaret, carlyle's favourite sister, had died, and his brightest, jean, "the craw," had married her cousin, james aitken. in memory of the former he wrote as a master of threnody: to the bridegroom of the latter he addressed a letter reminding him of the duties of a husband, "to do as he would be done by to his wife"! in john, again by jeffrey's aid, obtained a situation at £ a year as travelling physician to lady clare, and was enabled, as he promptly did, to pay back his debts. alexander seems to have been still struggling with an imperfectly successful farm. in the same year, when carlyle was in london, his father died at scotsbrig, after a residence there of six years. his son saw him last in august , when, referring to his craigenputtock solitude, he said: "man, it's surely a pity that thou shouldst sit yonder with nothing but the eye of omniscience to see thee, and thou with such a gift to speak." the carlyles returned in march, she to her domestic services, baking bread, preserving eggs, and brightening grates till her eyes grew dim; he to work at his _diderot_, doing justice to a character more alien to his own than even voltaire's, reading twenty-five volumes, one per day, to complete the essay; then at _count cagliostro_, also for _fraser_, a link between his last craigenputtock and his first london toils. the period is marked by shoals of letters, a last present from weimar, a visit to edinburgh, and a candidature for a university chair, which carlyle thought jeffrey could have got for him; but the advocate did not, probably could not, in this case satisfy his client. in excusing himself he ventured to lecture the applicant on what he imagined to be the impracticable temper and perverse eccentricity which had retarded and might continue to retard his advancement. [footnote: the last was in , for the chair of astronomy in glasgow.] carlyle, never tolerant of rebuke however just, was indignant, and though an open quarrel was avoided by letters, on both sides, of courteous compromise, the breach was in reality never healed, and jeffrey has a niche in the _reminiscences_ as a "little man who meant well but did not see far or know much." carlyle went on, however, like thor, at the _diamond necklace,_ which is a proem to the _french revolution,_ but inly growling, "my own private impression is that i shall never get any promotion in this world." "a prophet is not readily acknowledged in his own country"; "mein leben geht sehr übel: all dim, misty, squally, disheartening at times, almost heartbreaking." this is the prose rather than the male of byron. of all men carlyle could least reek his own rede. he never even tried to consume his own smoke. his _sartor_ is indeed more contained, and takes at its summit a higher flight than rousseau's _confessions,_ or the _sorrows of werther,_ or the first two cantos of _childe harold:_ but reading byron's letters is mingling with a world gay and grave; reading goethe's walking in the parthenon, though the graces in the niches are sometimes unclad; reading carlyle's is travelling through glimpses of sunny fields and then plunging into coal black tunnels. at last he decided, "puttock is no longer good for _me_," and his brave wife approving, and even inciting, he resolved to burn his ships and seek his fortune sink or swim--in the metropolis. carlyle, for once taking the initiative of practical trouble, went in advance on a house-hunt to london, and by advice of leigh hunt fixed on the now famous house in chelsea near the thames. chapter iv cheyne row [ - ] the curtain falls on craigenputtock, the bleak farm by the bleak hills, and rises on cheyne row, a side street off the river thames, that winds, as slowly as cowper's ouse, by the reaches of barnes and battersea, dotted with brown-sailed ships and holiday boats in place of the excursion steamers that now stop at carlyle pier; hard by the carlyle statue on the new ( ) embankment, in front the "carlyle mansions," a stone's-throw from "carlyle square." turning up the row, we find over no. , formerly no. , the carlyle medallion in marble, marking the house where the chelsea prophet, rejected, recognised, and adulated of men, lived over a stretch of forty-seven years. here were his headquarters, but he was a frequent wanderer. about half the time was occupied in trips almost yearly to scotland, one to ireland, one to belgium, one to france, and two to germany; besides, in the later days, constant visits to admiring friends, more and more drawn from the higher ranks in english society, the members of which learnt to appreciate his genius before he found a hearing among the mass of the people. the whole period falls readily under four sections, marking as many phases of the author's outer and inner life, while the same character is preserved throughout:-- i. - --when the death of mrs. welsh and the late success of carlyle's work relieved him from a long, sometimes severe, struggle with narrow means. it is the period of the _french revolution, the lectures_, and _hero-worship_, and of _chartism_, the last work with a vestige of adherence to the radical creed. ii. - --when the death of his mother loosened his ties to the north. this decade of his literary career is mainly signalised by the writing and publication of the _life and letters of cromwell_, of carlyle's political works, _past and present_ and the _latter-day pamphlets_, and of the _life of sterling_, works which mark his now consummated disbelief in democracy, and his distinct abjuration of adherence, in any ordinary sense, to the "creed of christendom." iii. - --when the laurels of his triumphant speech as lord rector at edinburgh were suddenly withered by the death of his wife. this period is filled with the _history of friedrick ii._, and marked by a yet more decidedly accentuated trust in autocracy. iv. - .--fifteen years of the setting of the sun. the carlyles, coming to the metropolis in a spirit of rarely realised audacity on a reserve fund of from £ to £ at most, could not propose to establish themselves in any centre of fashion. in their circumstances their choice of abode was on the whole a fortunate one. chelsea, not wholly in the busy world, nor quite beyond it, was, even in those days of less constant communication, within measurable distance of the centres of london life: it had then and still preserves a host of interesting historic and literary traditions. among the men who in old times lived or met together in that outlying region of london, we have memories of sir thomas more and of erasmus, of the essayists addison and steele, and of swift. hard by is the tomb of bolingbroke and the square of sir hans sloane; smollett lived for a time in laurence street; nearer our own day, turner resided in cheyne walk, later george eliot, w.b. scott, dante rossetti, swinburne for a season, and george meredith. when carlyle came to settle there, leigh huntin upper cheyne row, an almost next-door neighbour, was among the first of a series of visitors; always welcome, despite his "hugger-mugger" household and his borrowing tendencies, his "unpractical messages" and "rose-coloured reform processes," as a bright "singing bird, musical in flowing talk," abounding in often subtle criticisms and constant good humour. to the chelsea home, since the mecca of many pilgrims, there also flocked other old ampton street friends, drawn thither by genuine regard, mrs. carlyle, by the testimony of miss cushman and all competent judges, was a "_raconteur_ unparalleled." to quote the same authority, "that wonderful woman, able to live in the full light of carlyle's genius without being overwhelmed by it," had a peculiar skill in drawing out the most brilliant conversationalist of the age. burns and wilson were his scotch predecessors in an art of which the close of our century--when every fresh thought is treasured to be printed and paid for--knows little but the shadow. of carlyle, as of johnson, it might have been said, "there is no use arguing with him, for if his pistol misses fire he knocks you down with the butt": both men would have benefited by revolt from their dictation, but the power to contradict either was overborne by a superior power to assert. swift's occasional insolence, in like manner, prevailed by reason of the colossal strength that made him a gulliver in lilliput. carlyle in earlier, as in later times, would have been the better of meeting his mate, or of being overmatched; but there was no wellington found for this "grand napoleon of the realms" of prose. his reverence for men, if not for things, grew weaker with the strengthening of his sway, a sway due to the fact that men of extensive learning are rarely men of incisive force, and carlyle--in this respect more akin to johnson than to swift--had the acquired material to serve as fuel for the inborn fire. hence the least satisfactory of his criticisms are those passed on his peers. injustices of conversation should be pardoned to an impulsive nature, even those of correspondence in the case of a man who had a mania for pouring out his moods to all and sundry; but where carlyle has carefully recarved false estimates in cameo, his memory must abide the consequence. quite late in life, referring to the chelsea days, he says, "the best of those who then flocked about us was leigh hunt," who never seriously said him nay; "and the worst lamb," who was not among the worshippers. no one now doubts that carlyle's best adviser and most candid critic might have been john stuart mill, for whom he long felt as much regard as it was possible for him to entertain towards a proximate equal. the following is characteristic: "he had taken a great attachment to me (which lasted about ten years and then suddenly ended, i never knew how), an altogether clear, logical, honest, amicable, affectionate young man, and respected as such here, though sometimes felt to be rather colourless, even aqueous, no religion in any form traceable in him." and similarly of his friend, mrs. taylor, "she was a will-o'-the- wispish iridescence of a creature; meaning nothing bad either"; and again of mill himself, "his talk is sawdustish, like ale when there is no wine to be had." such criticisms, some ungrateful, others unjust, may be relieved by reference to the close of two friendships to which (though even these were clouded by a touch of personal jealousy) he was faithful in the main; for the references of both husband and wife to irving's "delirations" are the tears due to the sufferings of errant minds. their last glimpse of this best friend of earlier days was in october , when he came on horseback to the door of their new home, and left with the benediction to his lost jane, "you have made a little paradise around you." he died in glasgow in december of the same year, and his memory is pathetically embalmed in carlyle's threnody. the final phases of another old relationship were in some degree similar. during the first years of their settlement, lord jeffrey frequently called at cheyne row, and sent kind letters to his cousin, received by her husband with the growl, "i am at work stern and grim, not to be interrupted by jeffrey's theoretic flourish of epistolary trumpeting." carlyle, however, paid more than one visit to craigcrook, seeing his host for the last time in the autumn of , "worn in body and thin in mind," "grown lunar now and not solar any more." three months later he heard of the death of this benefactor of his youth, and wrote the memorial which finds its place in the second volume of the _reminiscences_. [footnote: cf. byron's account of the same household at pisa. carlyle deals very leniently with the malignant volume on byron which amply justified the epigram of moore. but he afterwards spoke more slightly of his little satellite, attributing the faint praise, in the _examiner_, of the second course of lectures to hunt's jealousy of a friend now "beginning to be somebody."] the work "stern and grim" was the _french revolution_, the production of which is the dominant theme of the first chapter of carlyle's london life. mr. froude, in the course of an estimate of this work which leaves little room for other criticism, dwells on the fact that it was written for a purpose, _i.e._ to show that rulers, like those of the french in the eighteenth century, who are solely bent on the pleasures and oblivious of the duties of life, must end by being "burnt up." this, doubtless, is one of the morals of the _french revolution_--the other being that anarchy ends in despotism--and unquestionably a writer who never ceased to be a preacher must have had it in his mind. but carlyle's peculiarity is that he combined the functions of a prophet and of an artist, and that while now the one, now the other, was foremost, he never wholly forgot the one in the other. in this instance he found a theme well fit for both, and threw his heart into it, though under much discouragement. despite the essays, into each of which he had put work enough for a volume, the reviews were shy of him; while his _sartor_ had, on this side of the atlantic, been received mainly with jeers. carlyle, never unconscious of his prerogative and apostolic primogeniture, felt like an aspirant who had performed his vigils, and finding himself still ignored, became a knight of the rueful countenance. thoroughly equipped, adept enough in ancient tongues to appreciate homer, a master of german and a fluent reader of french, a critic whose range stretched from diderot to john knox, he regarded his treatment as "tragically hard," exclaiming, "i could learn to do all things i have seen done, and am forbidden to try any of them." the efforts to keep the wolf from his own doors were harder than any but a few were till lately aware of. landed in london with his £ reserve, he could easily have made way in the usual ruts; but he would have none of them, and refused to accept the employment which is the most open, as it is the most lucrative, to literary aspirants. to nine out of ten the "profession of literature" means journalism; while journalism often means dishonesty, always conformity. carlyle was, in a sense deeper than that of the sects, essentially a nonconformist; he not only disdained to write a word he did not believe, he would not suppress a word he did believe--a rule of action fatal to swift success. during these years there began an acquaintance, soon ripening into intimacy, the memories of which are enshrined in one of the most beautiful of biographies. carlyle's relation to john sterling drew out the sort of affection which best suited him--the love of a master for a pupil, of superior for inferior, of the benefactor for the benefited; and consequently there is no line in the record of it that jars. sterling once tried to benefit his friend, and perhaps fortunately failed. he introduced carlyle to his father, then the chief writer in the _times_, and the editor invited the struggling author to contribute to its columns, but, according to mr. froude, "on the implied conditions ... when a man enlists in the army, his soul as well as his body belong to his commanding officer." carlyle talked, all his life, about what his greatest disciple calls "the lamp of obedience"; but he himself would obey no one, and found it hard to be civil to those who did not see with his eyes. ho rejected--we trust in polite terms--the offer of "the thunderer." "in other respects also," says our main authority, "he was impracticable, unmalleable, and as independent and wilful as if he were the heir to a peerage. he had created no 'public' of his own; the public which existed could not understand his writings and would not buy them; and thus it was that in cheyne row he was more neglected than he had been in scotland." welcome to a limited range of literary society, he astonished and amused by his vehement eloquence, but when crossed he was not only "sarcastic" but rude, and speaking of people, as he wrote of them, with various shades of contempt, naturally gave frequent offence. those whose toes are trodden on, not by accident, justifiably retaliate. "are you looking for your t-t-turban?" charles lamb is reported to have said in some entertainer's lobby after listening for an evening to carlyle's invectives, and the phrase may have rankled in his mind. living in a glass case, while throwing stones about, super-sensitive to criticism though professing to despise critics, he made at least as many enemies as friends, and by his own confession became an ishmaelite. in view of the reception of _sartor_, we do not wonder to find him writing in -- it is twenty-three months since i earned a penny by the craft of literature, and yet i know no fault i have committed.... i am tempted to go to america.... i shall quit literature, it does not invite me. providence warns me to have done with it. i have failed in the divine infernal universe; or meditating, when at the lowest ebb, to go wandering about the world like teufelsdröckh, looking for a rest for the sole of his foot. and yet all the time, with incomparable naiveté, he was asserting:-- the longer i live among this people the deeper grows my feeling of natural superiority to them.... the literary world here is a thing which i have no other course left me but to defy.... i can reverence no existing man. with health and peace for one year, i could write a better book than there has been in this country for generations. all through his journal and his correspondence there is a perpetual alternation of despair and confidence, always closing with the refrain, "working, trying is the only remover of doubt," and wise counsels often echoed from goethe, "accomplish as well as you can the task on hand, and the next step will become clear;" on the other hand--a man must not only be able to work but to give over working.... if a man wait till he has entirely brushed off his imperfections, he will spin for ever on his axis, advancing no whither.... the _french revolution_ stands pretty fair in my head, nor do i mean to investigate much more about it, but to splash down what i know in large masses of colours, that it may look like a smoke-and-flame conflagration in the distance. the progress of this work was retarded by the calamity familiar to every reader, but it must be referred to as throwing one of the finest lights on carlyle's character. his closest intellectual link with j.s. mill was their common interest in french politics and literature; the latter, himself meditating a history of the revolution, not only surrendered in favour of the man whose superior pictorial genius he recognised, but supplied him freely with the books he had accumulated for the enterprise. his interest in the work was unfortunately so great as to induce him to borrow the ms. of the first volume, completed in the early spring of , and his business habits so defective as to permit him to lend it without authority; so that, as appears, it was left lying about by mrs. taylor and mistaken by her servant for waste paper: certainly it was destroyed; and mill came to cheyne row to announce the fact in such a desperate state of mind that carlyle's first anxiety seems to have been to console his friend. according to mrs. carlyle, as reported by froude, "the first words her husband uttered as the door closed were, 'well, mill, poor fellow, is terribly cut up; we must endeavour to hide from him how very serious this business is to us.'" this trait of magnanimity under the first blow of a disaster which seemed to cancel the work of years should be set against his nearly contemporaneous criticisms of coleridge, lamb, wordsworth, sydney smith, macaulay, etc. [footnote: carlyle had only been writing the volume for five months; but he was preparing for it during much of his life at craigenputtock.] mill sent a cheque of £ as "the slightest external compensation" for the loss, and only, by urgent entreaty, procured the acceptance of half the sum. carlyle here, as in every real emergency, bracing his resolve by courageous words, as "never tine heart or get provoked heart," set himself to re-write the volume with an energy that recalls that of scott rebuilding his ruined estate; but the work was at first so "wretched" that it had to be laid aside for a season, during which the author wisely took a restorative bath of comparatively commonplace novels. the re-writing of the first volume was completed in september ; the whole book in january . the mood in which it was written throws a light on the excellences as on the defects of the history. the _reminiscences_ again record the gloom and defiance of "thomas the doubter" walking through the london streets "with a feeling similar to satan's stepping the burning marl," and scowling at the equipages about hyde park corner, sternly thinking, "yes, and perhaps none of you could do what i am at. i shall finish this book, throw it at your feet, buy a rifle and spade, and withdraw to the transatlantic wilderness." in an adjacent page he reports himself as having said to his wife-- what they will do with this book none knows, my lass; but they have not had for two hundred years any book that came more truly from a man's very heart, and so let them trample it under foot and hoof as they see best.... "they cannot trample that," she would cheerily answer. this passage points at once to the secret of the writer's spell and to the limits of his lasting power. his works were written seldom with perfect fairness, never with the dry light required for a clear presentation of the truth; they have all "an infusion from the will and the affections"; but they were all written with a whole sincerity and utter fervour; they rose from his hot heart, and rushed through the air "like rockets druv' by their own burnin'." consequently his readers confess that he has never forgot the horatian maxim-- si vis me flere, dolendum est primum ipsi tibi. about this time carlyle writes, "my friends think i have found the art of living upon nothing," and there must, despite mill's contribution, have been "bitter thrift" in cheyne reow during the years - . he struggled through the unremunerative interval of waiting for the sale of a great work by help of fees derived from his essay on the _diamond necklace_ (which, after being refused by the _foreign quarterly,_ appeared in _fraser,_ ), that on _mirabeau_ in the _westminster,_ and in the following year, for the same periodical, the article on _sir walter scott._ to the last work, undertaken against the grain, he refers in one of the renewed wails of the year: "o that literature had never been devised. i am scourged back to it by the whip of necessity." the circumstance may account for some of the manifest defects of one of the least satisfactory of carlyle's longer' reviews. frequent references in previous letters show that he never appreciated scott, to whom he refers as a mere restaurateur. meanwhile the appearance of the _french revolution_ had brought the name of its author, then in his forty-third year, for the first time prominently before the public. it attracted the attention of thackeray, who wrote a generous review in the _times,_ of southey, jeffrey, macaulay, hallam, and brougham, who recognised the advent of an equal, if sometimes an adverse power in the world of letters. but, though the book established his reputation, the sale was slow, and for some years the only substantial profits, amounting to about £ , came from america, through the indefatigable activity and good management of emerson. it is pleasant to note a passage in the interesting volumes of their _correspondence_ which shows that in this instance the benefited understood his financial relation to the benefactor: "a reflection i cannot but make is that, at bottom, this money was all yours; not a penny of it belonged to me by any law except that of helpful friend-ship.... i could not examine it (the account) without a kind of crime." others who, at this period, made efforts to assist "the polar bear" were less fortunate. in several instances good intentions paved the palace of momus, and in one led a well-meaning man into a notoriously false position. mr. basil montagu being in want of a private secretary offered the post to his former guest, as a temporary makeshift, at a salary of £ , and so brought upon his memory a torrent of contempt. undeterred by this and similar warnings, the indefatigable philanthropist, miss harriet martineau, who at first conciliated the carlyles by her affection for "this side of the street," and was afterwards an object of their joint ridicule, conceived the idea of organising a course of lectures to an audience collected by canvass to hoar the strange being from the moors talk for an hour on end about literature, morals, and history. he was then an object of curiosity to those who knew anything about him at all, and lecturing was at that time a lucrative and an honourable employment. the "good harriet," so called by cheyne row in its condescending mood, aided by other kind friends of the sterling and mill circles--the former including frederick denison maurice--made so great a success of the enterprise that it was thrice repeated. the _first_ course of six lectures on "german literature," may , delivered in willis's rooms, realised £ ; the _second_ of twelve, on the "history of european literature," at edward street, portman square, had a net result of £ ; the _third,_ in the same rooms, on "revolutions," brought £ ; the _fourth,_ on "heroes," the same. in closing this course carlyle appeared for the last time on a public platform until , when he delivered his inaugural address as lord rector to the students of edinburgh. the impression he produced on his unusually select audiences was that of a man of genius, but roughly clad. the more superficial auditors had a new sensation, those who came to stare remained to wonder; the more reflective felt that they had learnt something of value. carlyle had no inconsiderable share of the oratorical power which he latterly so derided; he was able to speak from a few notes; but there were comments more or less severe on his manner and style. j. grant, in his _portraits of public characters,_ says: "at times he distorts his features as if suddenly seized by some paroxysm of pain ... he makes mouths; he has a harsh accent and graceless gesticulation." leigh hunt, in the _examiner,_ remarks on the lecturer's power of extemporising; but adds that he often touches only the mountain-tops of the subject, and that the impression left was as if some puritan had come to life again, liberalised by german philosophy. bunsen, present at one of the lectures, speaks of the striking and rugged thoughts thrown at people's heads; and margaret fuller, afterwards countess ossoli, referred to his arrogance redeemed by "the grandeur of a siegfried melting down masses of iron into sunset red." carlyle's own comments are for the most part slighting. he refers to his lectures as a mixture of prophecy and play-acting, and says that when about to open his course on "heroes" he felt like a man going to be hanged. to emerson, april th , he writes :-- my lectures come on this day two weeks. o heaven! i cannot "speak"; i can only gasp and writhe and stutter, a spectacle to gods and fashionables,--being forced to it by want of money. in five weeks i shall be free, and then--! shall it be switzerland? shall it be scotland? nay, shall it be america and concord? emerson had written about a boston publication of the _miscellanies_ (first there collected), and was continually urging his friend to emigrate and speak to more appreciative audiences in the states; but the london lectures, which had, with the remittances from over sea, practically saved carlyle from ruin or from exile, had made him decide "to turn his back to the treacherous syren"--the temptation to sink into oratory. mr. froude's explanation and defence of this decision may be clenched by a reference to the warning his master had received. he had announced himself as a preacher and a prophet, and been taken at his word; but similarly had edward irving, who for a season of sun or glamour gathered around him the same crowd and glitter: the end came; twilight and clouds of night. fashion had flocked to the sermons of the elder annandale youth--as to the recitatives of the younger--to see a wild man of the woods and hear him sing; but the novelty gone, they passed on" to egyptian crocodiles, iroquois hunters," and left him stranded with "unquiet fire" and "flaccid face." "o foulest circaean draft," exclaimed his old admirer in his fine dirge, "thou poison of popular applause, madness is in thee and death, thy end is bedlam and the grave," and with the fixed resolve, "de me fabula non narrabitur," he shut the book on this phase of his life. the lectures on "hero-worship" (a phrase taken from hume) were published in , and met with considerable success, the name of the writer having then begun to run "like wildfire through london." at the close of the previous year he had published his long pamphlet on _chartism_, it having proved unsuitable for its original destination as an article in the _quarterly_. here first he clearly enunciates, "might is right"--one of the few strings on which, with all the variations of a political paganini, he played through life. this tract is on the border line between the old modified radicalism of _sartor_ and the less modified conservatism of his later years. in carlyle still speaks of himself as a man foiled; but at the close of that year all fear of penury was over, and in the following he was able to refuse a chair of history at edinburgh, as later another at st. andrews. meanwhile his practical power and genuine zeal for the diffusion of knowledge appeared in his foundation of the london library, which brought him into more or less close contact with tennyson, milman, forster, helps, spedding, gladstone, and other leaders of the thought and action of the time. there is little in carlyle's life at any time that can be called eventful. from first to last it was that of a retired scholar, a thinker demanding sympathy while craving after solitude, and the frequent inconsistency of the two requirements was the source of much of his unhappiness. our authorities for all that we do not see in his published works are found in his voluminous correspondence, copious autobiographical jottings, and the three volumes of his wife's letters and journal dating from the commencement of the struggle for recognition in london, and extending to the year of her death. criticism of these remarkable documents, the theme of so much controversy, belongs rather to a life of mrs. carlyle; but a few salient facts may here be noted. it appears on the surface that husband and wife had in common several marked peculiarities; on the intellectual side they had not only an extraordinary amount but the same kind of ability, superhumanly keen insight, and wonderful power of expression, both with tongue and pen; the same intensity of feeling, thoroughness, and courage to look the ugliest truths full in the face; in both, these high qualities were marred by a tendency to attribute the worst motives to almost every one. their joint contempt for all whom they called "fools," _i.e._ the immense majority of mankind, was a serious drawback to the pleasure of their company. it is indeed obvious that, whether or not it be correct to say that "his nature was the soft one, her's the hard," mrs. carlyle was the severer cynic of the two. much of her writing confirms the impression of those who have heard her talk that no one, not even her husband, was safe from the shafts of her ridicule. her pride in his genius knew no bounds, and it is improbable that she would have tolerated from any outsider a breath of adverse criticism; but she herself claimed many liberties she would not grant. she was clannish as carlyle himself, yet even her relations are occasionally made to appear ridiculous. there was nothing in her affections, save her memory of her own father, corresponding to his devotion to his whole family. with equal penetration and greater scorn, she had no share of his underlying reverence. such limited union as was granted to her married life had only soured the mocking-bird spirit of the child that derided her grandfather's accent on occasion of his bringing her back from a drive by another route to "varry the shane." carlyle's constant wailings take from him any claim to such powers of endurance as might justify his later attacks on byron. but neither had his wife any real reticence. whenever there were domestic troubles--flitting, repairing, building, etc., on every occasion of clamour or worry, he, with scarce pardonable oblivion of physical delicacy greater than his own, went off, generally to visit distinguished friends, and left behind him the burden and the heat of the day. she performed her unpleasant work and all associated duties with a practical genius that he complimented as "triumphant." she performed them, ungrudgingly perhaps, but never without complaint; her invariable practice was to endure and tell. "quelle vie," she writes in to john sterling, whom she seems to have really liked, "let no woman who values peace of soul ever marry an author"; and again to the same in , "carlyle had to sit on a jury two days, to the ruin of his whole being, physical, moral, and intellectual," but "one gets to feel a sort of indifference to his growling." conspicuous exceptions, as in the case of the shelleys, the dobells, and the brownings, have been seen, within or almost within our memories, but as a rule it is a risk for two supersensitive and nervous people to live together: when they are sensitive in opposite ways the alliance is fatal; fortunately the carlyles were, in this respect, in the main sympathetic. with most of the household troubles which occupy so exaggerated a space in the letters and journals of both--papering, plastering, painting, deceitful or disorderly domestics--general readers have so little concern that they have reason to resent the number of pages wasted in printing them; but there was one common grievance of wider and more urgent interest, to which we must here again finally refer, premising that it affected not one period but the whole of their lives, _i.e._ their constant, only half-effectual struggle with the modern hydra-headed monster, the reckless and needless noises produced or permitted, sometimes increased rather than suppressed, by modern civilisation. mrs. carlyle suffered almost as much as her husband from these murderers of sleep and assassins of repose; on her mainly fell the task of contending with the cochin-chinas, whose senseless shrieks went "through her like a sword," of abating a "der freischütz of cats," or a pandemonium of barrel organs, of suppressing macaws for which carryle "could neither think nor live"; now mitigating the scales on a piano, now conjuring away, by threat or bribe, from their neighbours a shoal of "demon fowls"; lastly of superintending the troops of bricklayers, joiners, iron-hammerers employed with partial success to convert the top story of cheyne row into a sound-proof room. her hard-won victories in this field must have agreeably added to the sense of personality to which she resolutely clung. her assertion, "instead of boiling up individuals into the species, i would draw a chalk circle round every individuality," is the essence of much of her mate's philosophy; but, in the following to sterling, she somewhat bitterly protests against her own absorption: "in spite of the honestest efforts to annihilate my i---ity or merge it in what the world doubtless considers my better half, i still find myself a self-subsisting, and, alas, self-seeking me." the ever-restive consciousness of being submerged is one of the dominant notes of her journal, the other is the sense of being even within the circle unrecognised. "c. is a domestic wandering jew.... when he is at work i hardly ever see his face from breakfast to dinner."... "poor little wretch that i am, ... i feel as if i were already half-buried ... in some intermediate state between the living and the dead.... oh, so lonely." these are among the _suspiria de profundis_ of a life which her husband compared to "a great joyless stoicism," writing to the brother, whom he had proposed as a third on their first home-coming:--"solitude, indeed, is sad as golgotha, but it is not mad like bedlam; absence of delirium is possible only for me in solitude"; a sentiment almost literally acted on. in his offering of penitential cypress, referring to his wife's delight in the ultimate success of his work, he says, "she flickered round me like a perpetual radiance." but during their joint lives their numerous visits and journeys were made at separate times or apart. they crossed continually on the roads up and down, but when absent wrote to one another often the most affectionate letters. their attraction increased, contrary to newton's law, in the _direct_ ratio of the square of the distance, and when it was stretched beyond the stars the long-latent love of the survivor became a worship. carlyle's devotion to his own kin, blood of his blood and bone of his bone, did not wait for any death to make itself declared. his veneration for his mother was reciprocated by a confidence and pride in him unruffled from cradle to grave, despite their widening theoretic differences; for with less distinct acknowledgment she seems to have practically shared his belief, "it matters little what a man holds in comparison with how he holds it." but on his wife's side the family bond was less absolute, and the fact adds a tragic interest to her first great bereavement after the settlement in london. there were many callers--increasing in number and eminence as time went on--at cheyne row; but naturally few guests. among these, mrs. carlyle's mother paid, in , her first and last visit, unhappily attended by some unpleasant friction. grace welsh (through whom her daughter derived the gipsy vein) had been in early years a beauty and a woman of fashion, endowed with so much natural ability that carlyle, not altogether predisposed in her favour, confessed she had just missed being a genius; but she was accustomed to have her way, and old walter of pefillan confessed to having seen her in fifteen different humours in one evening. welcomed on her arrival, misunderstandings soon arose. carlyle himself had to interpose with conciliatory advice to his wife to bear with her mother's humours. one household incident, though often quoted, is too characteristic to be omitted. on occasion of an evening party, mrs. welsh, whose ideas of hospitality, if not display, were perhaps larger than those suited for her still struggling hosts, had lighted a show of candles for the entertainment, whereupon the mistress of the house, with an air of authority, carried away two of them, an act which her mother resented with tears. the penitent daughter, in a mood like that which prompted johnson to stand in the uttoxeter market-place, left in her will that the candles were to be preserved and lit about her coffin, round which, nearly thirty years later, they were found burning. carlyle has recorded their last sight of his mother-in-law in a few of his many graphic touches. it was at dumfries in , where she had brought jane down from templand to meet and accompany him back to the south. they parted at the door of the little inn, with deep suppressed emotion, perhaps overcharged by some presentiment; mrs. welsh looking sad but bright, and their last glimpse of her was the feather in her bonnet waving down the way to lochmaben gate. towards the close of february news came that she had had an apoplectic stroke, and mrs. carlyle hurried north, stopping to break the journey at her uncle's house in liverpool; when there she was so prostrated by the sudden announcement of her mother's death that she was prohibited from going further, and carlyle came down from london in her stead. on reaching templand he found that the funeral had already taken place. he remained six weeks, acting as executor in winding up the estate, which now, by the previous will, devolved on his wife. to her during the interval he wrote a series of pathetic letters. reading these,--which, with others from haddington in the following years make an anthology of tenderness and ruth, reading them alongside of his angry invectives, with his wife's own accounts of the bilious earthquakes and peevish angers over petty cares; or worse, with ebullitions of jealousy assuming the mask of contempt, we again revert to the biographer who has said almost all that ought to be said of carlyle, and more: "it seemed as if his soul was divided, like the dioscuri, as if one part of it was in heaven, and the other in the place opposite heaven. but the misery had its origin in the same sensitiveness of nature which was so tremulously alive to soft and delicate emotion. men of genius ... are like the wind-harp which answers to the breath that touches it, now low and sweet, now rising into wild swell or angry scream, as the strings are swept by some passing gust." this applies completely to men like burns, byron, heine, and carlyle, less to the miltons, shakespeares, and goethes of the world. the crisis of bereavement, which promised to bind the husband and wife more closely together, brought to an end a dispute in which for once mrs. carlyle had her way. during the eight years over which we have been glancing, carlyle had been perpetually grumbling at his chelsea life: the restless spirit, which never found peace on this side of the grave, was constantly goading him with an impulse of flight and change, from land to sea, from shore to hills; anywhere or everywhere, at the time, seemed better than where he was. america and the teufelsdröckh wanderings abandoned, he reverted to the idea of returning to his own haunts. a letter to emerson in best expresses his prevalent feeling:-- carlyle's devotion to his own kin, blood of his blood and bone of his bone, did not wait for any death to make itself declared. his veneration for his mother was reciprocated by a confidence and pride in him unruffled from cradle to grave, despite their widening theoretic differences; for with less distinct acknowledgment she seems to have practically shared his belief, "it matters little what a man holds in comparison with how he holds it." but on his wife's side the family bond was less absolute, and the fact adds a tragic interest to her first great bereavement after the settlement in london. there were many callers--increasing in number and eminence as time went on--at cheyne row; but naturally few guests. among these, mrs. carlyle's mother paid, in , her first and last visit, unhappily attended by some unpleasant friction. grace welsh (through whom her daughter derived the gipsy vein) had been in early years a beauty and a woman of fashion, endowed with so much natural ability that carlyle, not altogether predisposed in her favour, confessed she had just missed being a genius; but she was accustomed to have her way, and old walter of pefillan confessed to having seen her in fifteen different humours in one evening. welcomed on her arrival, misunderstandings soon arose. carlyle himself had to interpose with conciliatory advice to his wife to bear with her mother's humours. one household incident, though often quoted, is too characteristic to be omitted. on occasion of an evening party, mrs. welsh, whose ideas of hospitality, if not display, were perhaps larger than those suited for her still struggling hosts, had lighted a show of candles for the entertainment, whereupon the mistress of the house, with an air of authority, carried away two of them, an act which her mother resented with tears. the penitent daughter, in a mood like that which prompted johnson to stand in the uttoxeter market-place, left in her will that the candles were to be preserved and lit about her coffin, round which, nearly thirty years later, they were found burning. carlyle has recorded their last sight of his mother-in-law in a few of his many graphic touches. it was at dumfries in , where she had brought jane down from templand to meet and accompany him back to the south. they parted at the door of the little inn, with deep suppressed emotion, perhaps overcharged by some presentiment; mrs. welsh looking sad but bright, and their last glimpse of her was the feather in her bonnet waving down the way to lochmaben gate. towards the close of february news came that she had had an apoplectic stroke, and mrs. carlyle hurried north, stopping to break the journey at her uncle's house in liverpool; when there she was so prostrated by the sudden announcement of her mother's death that she was prohibited from going further, and carlyle came down from london in her stead. on reaching templand he found that the funeral had already taken place. he remained six weeks, acting as executor in winding up the estate, which now, by the previous will, devolved on his wife. to her during the interval he wrote a series of pathetic letters. reading these,--which, with others from haddington in the following years make an anthology of tenderness and ruth, reading them alongside of his angry invectives, with his wife's own accounts of the bilious earthquakes and peevish angers over petty cares; or worse, with ebullitions of jealousy assuming the mask of contempt, we again revert to the biographer who has said almost all that ought to be said of carlyle, and more: "it seemed as if his soul was divided, like the dioscuri, as if one part of it was in heaven, and the other in the place opposite heaven. but the misery had its origin in the same sensitiveness of nature which was so tremulously alive to soft and delicate emotion. men of genius ... are like the wind-harp which answers to the breath that touches it, now low and sweet, now rising into wild swell or angry scream, as the strings are swept by some passing gust." this applies completely to men like burns, byron, heine, and carlyle, less to the miltons, shakespeares, and goethes of the world. the crisis of bereavement, which promised to bind the husband and wife more closely together, brought to an end a dispute in which for once mrs. carlyle had her way. during the eight years over which we have been glancing, carlyle had been perpetually grumbling at his chelsea life: the restless spirit, which never found peace on this side of the grave, was constantly goading him with an impulse of flight and change, from land to sea, from shore to hills; anywhere or everywhere, at the time, seemed better than where he was. america and the teufelsdröckh wanderings abandoned, he reverted to the idea of returning to his own haunts. a letter to emerson in best expresses his prevalent feeling:-- this foggy babylon tumbles along as it was wont: and as for my particular case uses me not worse but better than of old. nay, there are many in it that have a real friendliness for me.... the worst is the sore tear and wear of this huge roaring niagara of things on such a poor excitable set of nerves as mine. the velocity of all things, of the very word you hear on the streets, is at railway rate: joy itself is unenjoyable, to be avoided like pain; there is no wish one has so pressingly as for quiet. ah me! i often swear i will be _buried_ at least in free breezy scotland, out of this insane hubbub ... if ever the smallest competence of worldly means be mine, i will fly this whirlpool as i would the lake of malebolge. the competence had come, the death of mrs. welsh leaving to his wife and himself practically from £ to £ a year: why not finally return to the home of their early restful secluded life, "in reductâ, valle," with no noise around it but the trickle of rills and the nibbling of sheep? craigenputtock was now their own, and within its "four walls" they would begin a calmer life. fortunately mrs. carlyle, whose shrewd practical instinct was never at fault, saw through the fallacy, and set herself resolutely against the scheme. scotland had lost much of its charm for her--a year later she refused an invitation from mrs. aitken, saying, "i could do nothing at scotsbrig or dumfries but cry from morning to night." she herself had enough of the hill of the hawks, and she know that within a year carlyle would again be calling it the devil's den and lamenting cheyne row. he gave way with the protest, "i cannot deliberately mean anything that is harmful to you," and certainly it was well for him. there is no record of an original writer or artist coming from the north of our island to make his mark in the south, succeeding, and then retracing his steps. had carlyle done so, he would probably have passed from the growing recognition of a society he was beginning to find on the whole congenial, to the solitude of intellectual ostracism. scotland may be breezy, but it is not conspicuously free. erratic opinions when duly veiled are generally allowed; but this concession is of little worth. on the tolerance of those who have no strong belief in anything, carlyle, thinking possibly of rose-water hunt and the litterateurs of his tribe, expressed himself with incisive and memorable truth: "it is but doubt and indifference. _touch the thing they do believe and value, their own self-conceit: they are rattlesnakes then_." [footnote: the italics are mr. froude's.] tolerance for the frank expression of views which clash with the sincere or professed faith of the majority is rare everywhere; in scotland rarest. english churchmen, high and broad, were content to condone the grim calvinism still infiltrating carlyle's thoughts, and to smile, at worst, at his idolatry of the iconoclast who said, "the idolater shall die the death." but the reproach of "pantheism" was for long fatal to his reception across the tweed. towards the close of this period he acknowledged that london was "among improper places" the best for "writing books," after all the one use of living "for him;" its inhabitants "greatly the best" he "had ever walked with," and its aristocracy--the marshalls, stanleys, hollands, russells, ashburtons, lansdownes, who held by him through life--its "choicest specimens." other friendships equally valued he made among the leading authors of the age. tennyson sought his company, and connop thirlwall. arnold of rugby wrote in commendation of the _french revolution_ and hailed _chartism._ thackeray admired him and reviewed him well. in macaulay, condemned to limbo under the suspicion of having reviewed him ill, he found, when the suspicion was proved unjust, a promise of better things. as early as sterling had written an article in the _westminster,_ which gave him intense pleasure; for while contemning praise in almost the same words as byron did, he loved it equally well. in he had crossed the rubicon that lies between aspiration and attainment. the populace might be blind or dumb, the "rattlesnakes"--the "irresponsible indolent reviewers," who from behind a hedge pelt every wrestler till they found societies for the victor--might still obscurely hiss; but carlyle was at length safe by the verdict of the "conscript fathers." [footnote: the italics are mr. froude's.] chapter v cheyne row [ - ] the bold venture of coming to london with a lean purse, few friends, and little fame had succeeded: but it had been a terrible risk, and the struggle had left scars behind it. to this period of his life we may apply carlyle's words,--made use of by himself at a later date,--"the battle was over and we were sore wounded." it is as a maimed knight of modern chivalry, who sounded the _réveil_ for an onslaught on the citadels of sham, rather than as a prophet of the future that his name is likely to endure in the history of english thought. he has also a place with scott amongst the recreators of bygone ages, but he regarded their annals less as pictures than as lesson-books. his aim was that expressed by tennyson to "steal fire from fountains of the past," but his design was to admonish rather than "to glorify the present." this is the avowed object of the second of his distinctly political works, which following on the track of the first, _charlism_, and written in a similar spirit, takes higher artistic rank. _past and present_, suggested by a visit to the poorhouse of st. ives and by reading the chronicle of _jocelin de brakelond_, was undertaken as a duty, while he was mainly engaged on a greater work,--the duty he felt laid upon him to say some thing that should bear directly on the welfare of the people, especially of the poor around him. it was an impulse similar to that which inspired _oliver twist_, but carlyle's remedies were widely different from those of dickens. not merely more kindness and sympathy, but paternal government, supplying work to the idle inmates of the workhouse, and insisting, by force if need be, on it being done, was his panacea. it had been abbot samson's way in his strong government of the monastery of st. edmunds, and he resolved, half in parable, half in plain sermon, to recommend it to the ministers peel and russell. in this mood, the book was written off in the first seven weeks of , a _tour de force_ comparable to johnson's writing of _rasselas_. published in april, it at once made a mark by the opposition as well as by the approval it excited. criticism of the work--of its excellences, which are acknowledged, and its defects as manifold--belongs to a review of the author's political philosophy: it is enough here to note that it was remarkable in three ways. _first_, the object of its main attack, _laissez faire_, being a definite one, it was capable of having and had some practical effect. mr. froude exaggerates when he says that carlyle killed the pseudo-science of orthodox political economy; for the fundamental truths in the works of turgot, smith, ricardo, and mill cannot be killed: but he pointed out that, like aristotle's leaden rule, the laws of supply and demand must be made to bend; as mathematics made mechanical must allow for friction, so must economics leave us a little room for charity. there is ground to believe that the famous factory acts owed some of their suggestions to _past and present_. carlyle always speaks respectfully of the future lord shaftesbury. "i heard milnes saying," notes the lady sneerwell of real life, "at the shuttleworths that lord ashley was the greatest man alive: he was the only man that carlyle praised in his book. i daresay he knew i was overhearing him." but, while supplying arguments and a stimulus to philanthropists, his protests against philanthropy as an adequate solution of the problem of human misery became more pronounced. about the date of the conception of this book we find in the journal:-- again and again of late i ask myself in whispers, is it the duty of a citizen to paint mere heroisms? ... live to make others happy! yes, surely, at all times, so far as you can. but at bottom that is not the aim of my life ... it is mere hypocrisy to call it such, as is continually done nowadays.... avoid cant. do not think that your life means a mere searching in gutters for fallen figures to wipe and set up. _past and present_, in the _second_ place, is notable as the only considerable consecutive book--unless we also except the _life of sterling_,--which the author wrote without the accompaniment of wrestlings, agonies, and disgusts. _thirdly_, though marking a stage in his mental progress, the fusion of the refrains of _chartism_ and _hero-worship_, and his first clear breach with mazzini and with mill, the book was written as an interlude, when he was in severe travail with his greatest contribution to english history. the last rebuff which carlyle encountered came, by curious accident, from the _westminster_, to which mill had engaged him to contribute an article on "oliver cromwell." while this was in preparation, mill had to leave the country on account of his health, and gave the review in charge to an aberdonian called robertson, who wrote to stop the progress of the essay with the message that _he_ had decided to undertake the subject himself. carlyle was angry; but, instead of sullenly throwing the ms. aside, he set about constructing on its basis a history of the civil war. numerous visits and tours during the following three years, though bringing him into contact with new and interesting personalities, were mainly determined by the resolve to make himself acquainted with the localities of the war; and his knowledge of them has contributed to give colour and reality to the finest battle-pieces in modern english prose. in with dr. arnold he drove from rugby fifteen miles to naseby, and the same year, after a brief yachting trip to belgium--in the notes on which the old flemish towns stand out as clearly as in longfellow's verse--he made his pilgrimage to st. ives and ely cathedral, where oliver two centuries before had called out to the recalcitrant anglican in the pulpit, "cease your fooling and come down." in july carlyle made a trip to south wales; to visit first a worthy devotee called redwood, and then bishop thirlwall near carmarthen. "a right solid simple-hearted robust man, very strangely swathed," is the visitor's meagre estimate of one of our most classic historians. on his way back he carefully reconnoitred the field of worcester. passing his wife at liverpool, where she was a guest of her uncle, and leaving her to return to london and brush up cheyne row, he walked over snowdon from llanheris to beddgelert with his brother john. he next proceeded to scotsbrig, then north to edinburgh, and then to dunbar, which he contrived to visit on the rd of september, an anniversary revived in his pictured page with a glow and force to match which we have to revert to bacon's account of the sea-fight of the _revenge_. from dunbar he returned to edinburgh, spent some time with his always admired and admiring friend erskine of linlathen, a scotch broad churchman of the type of f.d. maurice and macleod campbell, and then went home to set in earnest to the actual writing of his work. he had decided to abandon the design of a history, and to make his book a biography of cromwell, interlacing with it the main features and events of the commonwealth. the difficulties even of this reduced plan were still immense, and his groans at every stage in its progress were "louder and more loud," _e.g._ "my progress in _cromwell_ is frightful." "a thousand times i regretted that this task was ever taken up." "the most impossible book of all i ever before tried," and at the close, "_cromwell_ i must have written in , but for four years previous it had been a continual toil and misery to me; four years of abstruse toil, obscure speculation, futile wrestling, and misery i used to count it had cost me." the book issued in soon went through three editions, and brought the author to the front as the most original historian of his time. macaulay was his rival, but in different paths of the same field. about this time mr. froude became his pupil, and has left an interesting account (iii. - ) of his master's influence over the oxford of those days, which would be only spoilt by selections. oxford, like athens, ever longing after something new, patronised the chelsea prophet, and then calmed down to her wonted cynicism. but froude and ruskin were, as far as compatible with the strong personality of each, always loyal; and the capacity inborn in both, the power to breathe life into dry records and dead stones, had at least an added impulse from their master. the year is marked by the publication in the _foreign quarterly_ of the essay on _dr. francia,_ and by the death of john sterling,--loved with the love of david for jonathan--outside his own family losses, the greatest wrench in carlyle's life. sterling's published writings are as inadequate to his reputation as the fragmentary remains of arthur hallam; but in friendships, especially unequal friendships, personal fascination counts for more than half, and all are agreed as to the charm in both instances of the inspiring companionships. archdeacon hare having given a somewhat coldly correct account of sterling as a clergyman, carlyle three years later, in , published his own impressions of his friend as a thinker, sane philanthropist, and devotee of truth, in a work that, written in a three months' fervour, has some claim to rank, though faltering, as prose after verse, with _adonais_, _in memoriam_, and matthew arnold's _thyrsis_. these years are marked by a series of acts of unobtrusive benevolence, the memory of which has been in some cases accidentally rescued from the oblivion to which the benefactor was willing to have them consigned. carlyle never boasted of doing a kindness. he was, like wordsworth, frugal at home beyond necessity, but often as generous in giving as he was ungenerous in judging. his assistance to thomas cooper, author of the _purgatory of suicides_, his time spent in answering letters of "anxious enquirers,"--letters that nine out of ten busy men would have flung into the waste-paper basket,--his interest in such works as samuel bamford's _life of a radical_, and admirable advice to the writer; his instructions to a young student on the choice of books, and well-timed warning to another against the profession of literature, are sun-rifts in the storm, that show "a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity." the same epoch, however,--that of the start of the great writer's almost uninterrupted triumph--brings us in face of an episode singularly delicate and difficult to deal with, but impossible to evade. [footnote: these letters to bamford, showing a keen interest in the working men of whom his correspondent had written, point to the ideal of a sort of tory democracy. carlyle writes: "we want more knowledge about the lancashire operatives; their miseries and gains, virtues and vices. winnow what you have to say, and give us wheat free from chaff. then the rich captains of workers will he willing to listen to you. brevity and sincerity will succeed. be brief and select, omit much, give each subject its proper proportionate space; and be exact without caring to round off the edges of what you have to say." later, he declines bamford's offer of verses, saying "verse is a bugbear to booksellers at present. these are prosaic, earnest, practical, not singing times."] carlyle, now generally recognised in london as having one of the most powerful intellects and by far the greatest command of language among his contemporaries, was beginning to suffer some of the penalties of renown in being beset by bores and travestied by imitators; but he was also enjoying its rewards. eminent men of all shades of opinion made his acquaintance; he was a frequent guest of the genial maecenas, an admirer of genius though no mere worshipper of success, r. monckton milnes; meeting hallam, bunsen, pusey, etc., at his house in london, and afterwards visiting him at fryston hall in yorkshire. the future lord houghton was, among distinguished men of letters and society, the one of whom he spoke with the most unvarying regard. carlyle corresponded with peel, whom he set almost on a par with wellington as worthy of perfect trust, and talked familiarly with bishop wilberforce, whom he miraculously credits with holding at heart views much like his own. at a somewhat later date, in the circle of his friends, bound to him by various degrees of intimacy, history was represented by thirlwall, grote, and froude; poetry by browning, henry taylor, tennyson, and clough; social romance by kingsley; biography by james spedding and john forster; and criticism by john ruskin. his link to the last named was, however, their common distrust of political economy, as shown in _unto this last_, rather than any deep artistic sympathy. in macaulay, a conversationalist more rapid than himself, carlyle found a rival rather than a companion; but his prejudiced view of physical science was forgotten in his personal affection for tyndall and in their congenial politics. his society was from the publication of _cromwell_ till near his death increasingly sought after by the aristocracy, several members of which invited him to their country seats, and bestowed on him all acceptable favours. in this class he came to find other qualities than those referred to in the _sartor_ inscription, and other aims than that of "preserving their game,"--the ambition to hold the helm of the state in stormy weather, and to play their part among the captains of industry. in the _reminiscences_ the aristocracy are deliberately voted to be "for continual grace of bearing and of acting, steadfast honour, light address, and cheery stoicism, actually yet the best of english classes." there can be no doubt that his intercourse with this class, as with men of affairs and letters, some of whom were his proximate equals, was a fortunate sequel to the duck-pond of ecclefechan and the lonely rambles on the border moors. es bildet ein talent sich in der stille, sich ein character in dem strom der welt. the life of a great capital may be the crown of education, but there is a danger in homage that comes late and then without reserve. give me neither poverty nor riches, applies to praise as well as to wealth; and the sudden transition from comparative neglect to honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, is a moral trial passing the strength of all but a few of the "irritable race" of writers. the deference paid to carlyle made him yet more intolerant of contradiction, and fostered his selfishness, in one instance with the disastrous result of clouding a whole decade of his domestic life. in february he speaks of dining--"an eight-o'clock dinner which ruined me for a week"--with "a certain baring," at whose table in bath house he again met bunsen, and was introduced to lord mahon. this was the beginning of what, after the death of sterling, grew into the most intimate friendship of his life. baring, son of lord ashburton of the american treaty so named, and successor to the title on his father's death in , was a man of sterling worth and sound sense, who entered into many of the views of his guest. his wife was by general consent the most brilliant woman of rank in london, whose grace, wit, refinement, and decision of character had made her the acknowledged leader of society. lady harriet, by the exercise of some overpowering though purely intellectual spell, made the proudest of men, the modern diogenes, our later swift, so much her slave that for twelve years, whenever he could steal a day from his work, he ran at her beck from town to country, from castle to cot; from addiscombe, her husband's villa in surrey, to the grange, her father-in-law's seat in hampshire; from loch luichart and glen finnan, where they had highland shootings, to the palais eoyal. mr. froude's comment in his introduction to the journal is substantially as follows: lady harriet baring or ashburton was the centre of a planetary system in which every distinguished public man of genuine worth then revolved. carlyle was naturally the chief among them, and he was perhaps at one time ambitious of himself taking some part in public affairs, and saw the advantage of this stepping-stone to enable him to do something more for the world, as byron said, than write books for it. but the idea of entering parliament, which seems to have once suggested itself to him in , was too vague and transient to have ever influenced his conduct. it is more correct to say that he was flattered by a sympathy not too thorough to be tame, pleased by adulation never gross, charmed by the same graces that charmed the rest, and finally fascinated by a sort of hypnotism. the irritation which this strange alliance produced in the mind of the mistress of cheyne row is no matter of surprise. pride and affection together had made her bear with all her husband's humours, and share with him all the toils of the struggle from obscurity. he had emerged, and she was still half content to be systematically set aside for his books, the inanimate rivals on which he was building a fame she had some claim to share. but her fiery spirit was not yet tamed into submitting to be sacrificed to an animate rival, or passively permitting the usurpation of companionship grudged to herself by another woman, whom she could not enjoy the luxury of despising. lady harriet's superiority in _finesse_ and geniality, as well as advantages of station, only aggravated the injury; and this with a singular want of tact carlyle further aggravated when he insisted on his wife accepting the invitations of his hostess. these visits, always against the grain, were rendered more irritating from a half-conscious antagonism between the chief female actors in the tragi-comedy; the one sometimes innocently unobservant of the wants of her guest, the other turning every accidental neglect into a slight, and receiving every jest as an affront. carlyle's "gloriana" was to the mind of his wife a "heathen goddess," while mrs. carlyle, with reference to her favourite dog "nero," was in her turn nicknamed "agrippina." in midsummer of , after an enforced sojourn at addiscombe in worse than her usual health, she returned to chelsea with "her mind all churned to froth," and opened it to her husband with such plainness that "there was a violent scene": she left the house in a mood like that of the first mrs. milton, and took refuge with her friends the paulets at seaforth near liverpool, uncertain whether or not she would return. there were only two persons from whom it seemed natural for her at such a crisis to ask advice; one was geraldine jewsbury, a young manchester lady, authoress of a well-known novel, _the half-sisters_, from the beginning of their acquaintance in till the close in her most intimate associate and chosen confidant, who, we are told, "knew all" her secrets. [footnote: carlyle often speaks, sometimes slightingly, of miss jewsbury, as a sensational novelist and admirer of george sand, but he appreciated her genuine worth.] the other was the inspired italian, pure patriot and stoic moralist joseph mazzini. to him she wrote twice--once apparently before leaving london, and again from seaforth. his letters in reply, tenderly sympathetic and yet rigidly insistent on the duty of forbearance and endurance, availed to avert the threatened catastrophe; but there are sentences which show how bitter the complaints must have been. it is only you who can teach yourself that, whatever the _present_ may be, you must front it with dignity.... i could only point out to you the fulfilment of duties which can make life--not happy--what can? but earnest, sacred, and resigned.... i am carrying a burden even heavier than you, and have undergone even bitterer deceptions. your life proves an empty thing, you say. empty! do not blaspheme. have you never done good? have you never loved? ... pain and joy, deception and fulfilled hopes are just the rain and the sunshine that must meet the traveller on his way. bless the almighty if he has thought proper to send the latter to you.... wrap your cloak round you against the first, but do not think a single moment that the one or the other have anything to do with the _end_ of the journey. carlyle's first letter after the rupture is a mixture of reproach and affection. "we never parted before in such a manner; and all for literally nothing.... adieu, dearest, for that is, and, if madness prevail not, may for ever be your authentic title." another, enclosing the birthday present which he had never omitted since her mother's death, softened his wife's resentment, and the storm blew over for a time. but while the cause remained there was in the house at best a surface tranquillity, at worst an under tone of misery which (october to may ) finds voice in the famous diary, not merely covered with "black spider webs," but steeped in gall, the publication of which has made so much debate. it is like a page from _othello_ reversed. a few sentences condense the refrain of the lament. "charles buller said of the duchess de praslin, 'what could a poor fellow do with a wife that kept a journal but murder her?'" "that eternal bath house. i wonder how many thousand miles mr. c. has walked between here and there?" "being an only child, i never wished to sew men's trousers--no, never!" i gin to think i've sold myself for very little cas." "to-day i called on my lady: she was perfectly civil, for a wonder." "edward irving! the past is past and gone is gone-- o waly, waly, love is bonnie, a little while when it is new;" quotations which, laid alongside the records of the writer's visit to the people at haddington, "who seem all to grow so good and kind as they grow old," and to the graves in the churchyard there, are infinitely pathetic. the letters that follow are in the same strain, _e.g._ to carlyle when visiting his sister at the gill, "i never forget kindness, nor, alas, unkindness either": to luichart, "i don't believe thee, wishing yourself at home.... you don't, as weakly amiable people do, sacrifice yourself for the pleasure of others"; to mrs. russell at thornhill, "my london doctor's prescription is that i should be kept always happy and tranquil(!!!)." in the summer of lady ashburton gave a real ground for offence in allowing both the carlyles, on their way north with her, to take a seat in an ordinary railway carriage, beside her maid, while she herself travelled in a special saloon. partly, perhaps in consequence, mrs. carlyle soon went to visit her cousins in fifeshire, and afterwards refused to accompany her ladyship on the way back. this resulted in another quarrel with her husband, who had issued the command from luichart--but it was their last on the subject, for gloriana died on the th of the following may, , at paris: "the most queen-like woman i had ever known or seen, by nature and by culture _facile princeps_ she, i think, of all great ladies i have ever seen." this brought to a close an episode in which there were faults on both sides, gravely punished: the incidents of its course and the manner in which they were received show, among other things, that railing at the name of "happiness" does little or nothing to reconcile people to the want of the reality. in lord ashburton married again--a miss stuart mackenzie, who became the attached friend of the carlyles, and remained on terms of unruffled intimacy with both till the end: she survived her husband, who died in , leaving a legacy of £ to the household at cheyne row. _sic transiit._ from this date we must turn back over nearly twenty years to retrace the main steps of the great author's career. much of the interval was devoted to innumerable visits, in acceptance of endless hospitalities, or in paying his annual devotions to annandale,--calls on his time which kept him rushing from place to place like a comet. two facts are notable about those expeditions: they rarely seemed to give him much pleasure, even at scotsbrig he complained of sleepless nights and farm noises; and he was hardly ever accompanied by his wife. she too was constantly running north to her own kindred in liverpool or scotland, but their paths did not run parallel, they almost always intersected, so that when the one was on the way north the other was homeward bound, to look out alone on "a horizon of zero." only a few of these visits are worth recording as of general interest. most of them were paid, a few received. in the autumn of , margaret fuller, sent from emerson, called at cheyne row, and recorded her impression of the master as "in a very sweet humour, full of wit and pathos, without being overbearing," adding that she was "carried away by the rich flow of his discourse"; and that "the hearty noble earnestness of his personal bearing brought back the charm of his writing before she wearied of it." a later visitor, miss martineau, his old helper in days of struggle, was now thus esteemed: "broken into utter wearisomeness, a mind reduced to these three elements--imbecility, dogmatism, and unlimited hope. i never in my life was more heartily bored with any creature!" in there followed the last english glimpse of jeffrey and the last of dr. chalmers, who was full of enthusiasm about _cromwell_; then a visit to the brights, john and jacob, at rochdale: with the former he had "a paltry speaking match" on topics described as "shallow, totally worthless to me," the latter he liked, recognising in him a culture and delicacy rare with so much strength of will and independence of thought. later came a second visit from emerson, then on a lecturing tour to england, gathering impressions revived in his _english traits_. "his doctrines are too airy and thin," wrote carlyle, "for the solid practical heads of the lancashire region. we had immense talkings with him here, but found that he did not give us much to chew the cud upon. he is a pure-minded man, but i think his talent is not quite so high as i had anticipated." they had an interesting walk to stonehenge together, and carlyle attended one of his friend's lectures, but with modified approval, finding this serene "spiritual son" of his own rather "gone into philanthropy and moonshine." emerson's notes of this date, on the other hand, mark his emancipation from mere discipleship. "carlyle had all the kleinstãdtlicher traits of an islander and a scotsman, and reprimanded with severity the rebellious instincts of the native of a vast continent.... in him, as in byron, one is more struck with the rhetoric than with the matter.... there is more character than intellect in every sentence, therein strangely resembling samuel johnson." the same year carlyle perpetrated one of his worst criticisms, that on keats:-- the kind of man he was gets ever more horrible to me. force of hunger for pleasure of every kind, and want of all other force.... such a structure of soul, it would once have been very evident, was a chosen "vessel of hell"; and in the next an ungenerously contemptuous reference to macaulay's _history_:-- the most popular ever written. fourth edition already, within perhaps four months. book to which four hundred editions could not add any value, there being no depth of sense in it at all, and a very great quantity of rhetorical wind. landor, on the other hand, whom he visited later at bath, he appreciated, being "much taken with the gigantesque, explosive but essentially chivalrous and almost heroic old man." he was now at ease about the sale of his books, having, _inter alia_, received £ for a new edition of the _french revolution_ and the _miscellanies_. his journal is full of plans for a new work on democracy, organisation of labour, and education, and his letters of the period to thomas erskine and others are largely devoted to politics. [footnote: this is one of the few instances in which further knowledge led to a change for the better in carlyle's judgment. in a letter to emerson, , he speaks disparagingly of landor as "a wild man, whom no extent of culture had been able to tame! his intellectual faculty seemed to me to be weak in proportion to his violence of temper: the judgment he gives about anything is more apt to be wrong than right,--as the inward whirlwind shows him this side or the other of the object: and _sides_ of an object are all that he sees." _de te faliula._ emerson answers defending landor, and indicating points of likeness between him and carlyle.] in he spent the first week of september in ireland, crossing from ardrossan to belfast, and then driving to drogheda, and by rail to dublin, where in conciliation hall he saw o'connell for the first time since a casual glimpse at a radical meeting arranged by charles buller--a meeting to which he had gone out of curiosity in . o'connell was always an object of carlyle's detestation, and on this occasion he does not mince his words. chief quack of the then world ... first time i had ever heard the lying scoundrel speak.... demosthenes of blarney ... the big beggar-man who had £ , a year, and, _proh pudor!_ the favour of english ministers instead of the pillory. at dundrum he met by invitation carleton the novelist, with mitchell and gavan duffy, the young ireland leaders whom he seems personally to have liked, but he told mitchell that he would probably be hanged, and said during a drive about some flourishing and fertile fields of the pale, "ah! duffy, there you see the hoof of the bloody saxon." [footnote: sir c. gavan duffy, in the "conversations and correspondence," now being published in the _contemporary review_, naturally emphasises carlyle's politer, more genial side, and prints several expressions of sympathy with the "tenant agitations"; but his demur to the _reminiscences of my irish journey_ being accepted as an accurate account of the writer's real sentiments is of little avail in face of the letters to emerson, more strongly accentuating the same views, _e.g._ "bothered almost to madness with irish balderdash.... '_blacklead_ these two million idle beggars,' i sometimes advised, 'and sell them in brazil as niggers!'--perhaps parliament on sweet constraint will allow you to advance them to be niggers!"] he returned from kingston to liverpool on the th, and so closed his short and unsatisfactory trip. three years later, july to august th, , he paid a longer and final visit to the "ragged commonweal" or "common woe," as raleigh called it, landing at dublin, and after some days there passing on to kildare, kilkenny, lismore, waterford, beautiful killarney and its beggar hordes, and then to limerick, clare, castlebar, where he met w.e. forster, whose acquaintance he had made two years earlier at matlock. at gweedore in donegal he stayed with lord george hill, whom he respected, though persuaded that he was on the wrong road to reform by philanthropy in a country where it had never worked; and then on to half scotch derry. there, august th, he made an emphatic after- breakfast speech to a half-sympathetic audience; the gist of it being that the remedy for ireland was not "emancipation" or "liberty," but to "cease following the devil, as it had been doing for two centuries." the same afternoon he escaped on board a glasgow steamer, and landed safe at a.m. on the morning of the th. the notes of the tour, set down on his return to chelsea and republished in , have only the literary merit of the vigorous descriptive touches inseparable from the author's lightest writing; otherwise they are mere rough-and-tumble jottings, with no consecutive meaning, of a rapid hawk's-eye view of the four provinces. but carlyle never ceased to maintain the thesis they set forth, that ireland is, for the most part, a country of semi-savages, whose staple trade is begging, whose practice is to lie, unfit not only for self-government but for what is commonly called constitutional government, whose ragged people must be coerced, by the methods of raleigh, of spenser, and of cromwell, into reasonable industry and respect for law. at westport, where "human swinery has reached its acme," he finds " , paupers in a population of , , and , kindred hulks on outdoor relief, lifting each an ounce of mould with a shovel, while lads are pretending to break stones," and exclaims, "can it be a charity to keep men alive on these terms? in face of all the twaddle of the earth, shoot a man rather than train him (with heavy expense to his neighbours) to be a deceptive human swine." superficial travellers generally praise the irish. carlyle had not been long in their country when he formulated his idea of the home rule that seemed to him most for their good. kildare railway: big blockhead sitting with his dirty feet on seat opposite, not stirring them for one who wanted to sit there. "one thing we're all agreed on," said he; "we're very ill governed: whig, tory, radical, repealer, all all admit we're very ill-governed!" i thought to myself, "yes, indeed; you govern yourself! he that would govern you well would probably surprise you much, my friend--laying a hearty horse-whip over that back of yours." and a little later at castlebar he declares, "society here would have to eat itself and end by cannibalism in a week, if it were not held up by the rest of our empire standing afoot." these passages are written in the spirit which inspired his paper on "the nigger question" and the aggressive series of assaults to which it belongs, on what he regarded as the most prominent quackeries, shams, and pretence philanthropies of the day. his own account of the reception of this work is characteristic:-- in , after an interval of deep gloom and bottomless dubitation, came _latter-day pamphlets_, which unpleasantly astonished everybody, set the world upon the strangest suppositions--"carlyle got deep into whisky," said some,--ruined my reputation according to the friendliest voices, and in effect divided me altogether from the mob of "progress-of-the-species" and other vulgar; but were a great relief to my own conscience as a faithful citizen, and have been ever since. these pamphlets alienated mazzini and mill, and provoked the assault of the newspapers; which, by the author's confession, did something to arrest and restrict the sale. nor was this indignation wholly unnatural. once in his life, on occasion of his being called to serve at a jury trial, carlyle, with remarkable adroitness, coaxed a recalcitrant juryman into acquiescence with the majority; but coaxing as a rule was not his way. when he found himself in front of what he deemed to be a falsehood his wont was to fly in its face and tear it to pieces. his satire was not like that of horace, who taught his readers _ridendo dicere verum_, it was rather that of the elder lucilius or the later juvenal; not that of chaucer, who wrote-- that patience is a virtue high is plain, because it conquers, as the clerks explain, things that rude valour never could attain, but that of _the lye_, attributed to raleigh, or swift's _gulliver_ or the letters of junius. the method of direct denunciation has advantages: it cannot be mistaken, nor, if strong enough, ignored; but it must lay its account with consequences, and carlyle in this instance found them so serious that he was threatened at the height of his fame with dethronement. men said he had lost his head, gone back to the everlasting "no," and mistaken swearing all round for political philosophy. the ultimate value attached to the _latter-day pamphlets_ must depend to a large extent on the view of the critic. it is now, however, generally admitted on the one hand that they served in some degree to counteract the rashness of philanthropy; on the other, that their effect was marred by more than the writer's usual faults of exaggeration. it is needless to refer the temper they display to the troubles then gathering about his domestic life. a better explanation is to be found in the public events of the time. the two years previous to their appearance were the revolution years, during which the european world seemed to be turned upside down. the french had thrown out their _bourgeois_ king, louis philippe--"the old scoundrel," as carlyle called him,--and established their second republic. italy, hungary, and half germany were in revolt against the old authorities; the irish joined in the chorus, and the chartist monster petition was being carted to parliament. upheaval was the order of the day, kings became exiles and exiles kings, dynasties and creeds were being subverted, and empires seemed rocking as on the surface of an earthquake. they were years of great aspirations, with beliefs in all manner of swift regeneration-- magnus ab integro saeclorum nascitur ordo, all varieties of doctrinaire idealisms. mazzini failed at rome, kossuth at pesth; the riots of berlin resulted in the restoration of the old dull bureaucratic regime; smith o'brien's bluster exploded in a cabbage garden; the railway bubble burst in the fall of the bloated king hudson, and the chartism of the time evaporated in smoke. the old sham gods, with buonaparte of the stuffed eagle in front, came back; because, concluded carlyle, there was no man in the front of the new movement strong enough to guide it; because its figure-heads were futile sentimentalists, insurgents who could not win. the reaction produced by their failure had somewhat the same effect on his mind that the older french revolution had on that of burke: he was driven back to a greater degree than mr. froude allows on practical conservatism and on the negations of which the _latter-day pamphlets_ are the expression. to this series of _pronunciamentos_ of political scepticism he meant to add another, of which he often talks under the name of "exodus from houndsditch," boldly stating and setting forth the grounds of his now complete divergence from all forms of what either in england or europe generally could be called the orthodox faith in religion. he was, we are told, withheld from this by the feeling that the teaching even of the priests he saw and derided in belgium or in galway was better than the atheistic materialism which he associated with the dominion of mere physical science. he may have felt he had nothing definite enough to be understood by the people to substitute for what he proposed to destroy; and he may have had a thought of the reception of such a work at scotsbrig. much of the _life of sterling_, however, is somewhat less directly occupied with the same question, and though gentler in tone it excited almost as much clamour as the _pamphlets_, especially in the north. the book, says carlyle himself, was "utterly revolting to the religious people in particular (to my surprise rather than otherwise). 'doesn't believe in us either!' not he for certain; can't, if you will know." during the same year his almost morbid dislike of materialism found vent in denunciations of the "crystal palace" exhibition of industry; though for its main promoter, prince albert, he subsequently entertained and expressed a sincere respect. in the summer of the carlyles went together to malvern, where they met tennyson (whose good nature had been proof against some slighting remarks on his verses), sydney dobell, then in the fame of his "roman," and other celebrities. they tried the "water cure," under the superintendence of dr. gully, who received and treated them as guests; but they derived little good from the process. "i found," says carlyle, "water taken as medicine to be the most destructive drug i had ever tried." proceeding northward, he spent three weeks with his mother, then in her eighty-fourth year and at last growing feeble; a quiet time only disturbed by indignation at "one ass whom i heard the bray of in some glasgow newspaper," comparing "our grand hater of shams" to father gavazzi. his stay was shortened by a summons to spend a few days with the ashburtons at paris on their return from switzerland. though bound by a promise to respond to the call, carlyle did not much relish it. travelling abroad was always a burden to him, and it was aggravated in this case by his very limited command of the language for conversational purposes. fortunately, on reaching london he found that the poet browning, whose acquaintance he had made ten years before, was, with his wife, about to start for the same destination, and he prevailed upon them, though somewhat reluctant, to take charge of him. [footnote: mrs. sutherland orr's _life of robert browning_.] the companionship was therefore not accidental, and it was of great service. "carlyle," according to mrs. browning's biographer, "would have been miserable without browning," who made all the arrangements for the party, passed luggage through the customs, saw to passports, fought the battles of all the stations, and afterwards acted as guide through the streets of the great city. by a curious irony, two verse-makers and admirers of george sand made it possible for the would-be man of action to find his way. the poetess, recalling the trip afterwards, wrote that she liked the prophet more than she expected, finding his "bitterness only melancholy, and his scorn sensibility." browning himself continued through life to regard carlyle with "affectionate reverence." "he never ceased," says mrs. orr, "to defend him against the charge of unkindness to his wife, or to believe that, in the matter of their domestic unhappiness, she was the more responsible of the two.... he always thought her a hard unlovable woman, and i believe little liking was lost between them ... yet carlyle never rendered him that service--easy as it appears--which one man of letters most justly values from another, that of proclaiming the admiration which he privately professed for his work." the party started, september th, and reached dieppe by newhaven, after a rough passage, the effects of which on some fellow-travellers more unfortunate than himself carlyle describes in a series of recently-discovered jottings [footnote: partially reproduced, _pall mall gazette,_ april th , with illustrative connecting comments.] made on his return, october nd, to chelsea. on september th they reached paris. carlyle joined the ashburtons at meurice's hotel; there dined, went in the evening to the théâtre français, cursed the play, and commented unpleasantly on general changarnier sitting in the stalls. during the next few days he met many of the celebrities of the time, and caricatured, after his fashion, their personal appearance, talk, and manner. these criticisms are for the most part of little value. the writer had in some of his essays shown almost as much capacity of understanding the great frenchmen of the last century as was compatible with his puritan vein; but as regards french literature since the revolution he was either ignorant or alien. what light could be thrown on that interesting era by a man who could only say of the authors of _la comédie humaine_ and _consuelo_ that they were ministers in a phallus worship? carlyle seems to have seen most of thiers, whom he treats with good-natured condescension, but little insight: "round fat body, tapering like a ninepin into small fat feet, placidly sharp fat face, puckered eyeward ... a frank, sociable kind of creature, who has absolutely no malignity towards any one, and is not the least troubled with self-seekings." thiers talked with contempt of michelet; and carlyle, unconscious of the numerous affinities between that historian of genius and himself, half assented. prosper mérimée, on the other hand, incensed him by some freaks of criticism, whether in badinage or in earnest--probably the former. "jean paul," he said, getting on the theme of german literature, "was a hollow fool of the first magnitude," and goethe was "insignificant, unintelligible, a paltry kind of scribe manqué." "i could stand no more of it, but lighted a cigar, and adjourned to the street. 'you impertinent blasphemous blockhead!' this was sticking in my throat: better to retire without bringing it out." [footnote: the two men were mutually antagonistic; mérimée tried to read the _french revolution_, but flung the book aside in weariness or in disdain.] of guizot he writes, "tartuffe, gaunt, hollow, resting on the everlasting 'no' with a haggard consciousness that it ought to be the everlasting 'yea.'" "to me an extremely detestable kind of man." carlyle missed general cavaignac, "of all frenchmen the one" he "cared to see." in the streets of paris he found no one who could properly be called a gentleman. "the truly ingenious and strong men of france are here (_i.e_. among the industrial classes) making money, while the politician, literary, etc. etc. class is mere play-actorism." his summary before leaving at the close of a week, rather misspent, is: "articulate-speaking france was altogether without beauty or meaning to me in my then diseased mood; but i saw traces of the inarticulate ... much worthier." back in london, he sent mrs. carlyle to the grange (distinguishing himself, in an interval of study at home, by washing the back area flags with his own hands), and there joined her till the close of the year. during the early part of the next he was absorbed in reading and planning work. then came an unusually tranquil visit to thomas erskine of linlathen, during which he had only to complain that the servants were often obliged to run out of the room to hide their laughter at his humorous bursts. at the close of august he embarked on board a leith steamer bound for rotterdam, on his first trip to germany. home once more, in october, he found chaos come, and seas of paint overwhelming everything; "went to the grange, and back in time to witness from bath house the funeral, november th, of the great duke," remarking, "the one true man of official men in england, or that i know of in europe, concludes his long course.... tennyson's verses are naught. silence alone is respectable on such an occasion." in march, again at the grange, he met the italian minister azeglio, and when this statesman disparaged mazzini--a thing only permitted by carlyle to himself--he retorted with the remark, "monsieur, vous ne le connaissez pas du tout, du tout." at chelsea, on his return, the fowl tragic-comedy reached a crisis, "the unprotected male" declaring that he would shoot them or poison them. "a man is not a chatham nor a wallenstein; but a man has work too, which the powers would not quite wish to have suppressed by two and sixpence worth of bantams.... they must either withdraw or die." ultimately his mother-wife came to the rescue of her "babe of genius"; the cocks were bought off, and in the long-talked-of sound-proof room the last considerable work of his life, though painfully, proceeded. meanwhile "brother john" had married, and mrs. carlyle went to visit the couple at moffat. while there bad tidings came from scotsbrig, and she dutifully hurried off to nurse her mother-in-law through an attack from which the strong old woman temporarily rallied. but the final stroke could not be long delayed. when carlyle was paying his winter visit to the grange in december news came that his mother was worse, and her recovery despaired of; and, by consent of his hostess, he hurried off to scotsbrig,--"mournful leave given me by the lady a., mournful encouragement to be speedy, not dilatory,"--and arrived in time to hear her last words. "here is tom come to bid you good-night, mother," said john. "as i turned to go, she said, 'i'm muckle obleeged to you.'" she spoke no more, but passed from sleep after sleep of coma to that of death, on sunday, christmas day, . "we can only have one mother," exclaimed byron on a like event--the solemn close of many storms. but between margaret carlyle and the son of whom she was so proud there had never been a shadow. "if," writes mr. froude, "she gloried in his fame and greatness, he gloried more in being her son, and while she lived she, and she only, stood between him and the loneliness of which he so often and so passionately complained." of all carlyle's letters none are more tenderly beautiful than those which he sent to scotsbrig. the last, written on his fifty-eighth birthday, december th, which she probably never read, is one of the finest. the close of their wayfaring together left him solitary; his "soul all hung with black," and, for months to come, everything around was overshadowed by the thought of his bereavement. in his journal of february th , he tells us that he had on the sunday before seen a vision of mainhill in old days, with mother, father, and the rest getting dressed for the meeting-house. "they are gone now, vanished all; their poor bits of thrifty clothes, ... their pious struggling efforts; their little life, it is all away. it has all melted into the still sea, it was rounded with a sloop." the entry ends, as fitting, with a prayer: "o pious mother! kind, good, brave, and truthful soul as i have ever found, and more than i have elsewhere found in this world. your poor tom, long out of his schooldays now, has fallen very lonely, very lame and broken in this pilgrimage of his; and you cannot help him or cheer him ... any more. from your grave in ecclefechan kirkyard yonder you bid him trust in god; and that also he will try if he can understand and do." chapter vi the minotaur [ - ] carlyle was now engaged on a work which required, received, and well nigh exhausted all his strength, resulting in the greatest though the least generally read of all his books. _cromwell_ achieved, he had thrown himself for a season into contemporary politics, condescending even, contrary to his rule, to make casual contributions to the press; but his temper was too hot for success in that arena, and his letters of the time are full of the feeling that the _latter-day pamphlets_ had set the world against him. among his generous replies to young men asking advice, none is more suggestive than that in which he writes from chelsea (march th ):-- if my books teach you anything, don't mind in the least whether other people believe it or not; but lay it to heart ... as a real message left with you, which you must set about fulfilling, whatever others do.... and be not surprised that "people have no sympathy with you." that is an accompaniment that will attend you all your days if you mean to live an earnest life. but he himself, though "ever a fighter," felt that, even for him, it was not good to be alone. he decided there "was no use railing in vain like timon"; he would go back again from the present to the past, from the latter days of discord to seek countenance in some great figure of history, under whose ægis he might shelter the advocacy of his views. looking about for a theme, several crossed his mind. he thought of ireland, but that was too burning a subject; of william the conqueror, of simon de montfort, the norsemen, the cid; but these may have seemed to him too remote. why, ask patriotic scotsmen, did he not take up his and their favourite knox? but knox's life had been fairly handled by m'crie, and carlyle would have found it hard to adjust his treatment of that essentially national "hero" to the "exodus from houndsditch." "luther" might have been an apter theme; but there too it would have been a strain to steer clear of theological controversy, of which he had had enough. napoleon was at heart too much of a gamin for his taste. looking over europe in more recent times, he concluded that the prussian monarchy had been the main centre of modern stability, and that it had been made so by its virtual creator, friedrich ii., called the great. once entertained, the subject seized him as with the eye of coleridge's mariner, and, in spite of manifold efforts to get free, compelled him, so that he could "not choose but" write on it. again and again, as the magnitude of the task became manifest, we find him doubting, hesitating, recalcitrating, and yet captive. he began reading jomini, preuss, the king's own memoirs and despatches, and groaned at the mountains through which he had to dig. "prussian friedrich and the pelion laid on ossa of prussian dry-as-dust lay crushing me with the continual question, dare i try it? dare i not?" at length, gathering himself together for the effort, he resolved, as before in the case of cromwell, to visit the scenes of which he was to write. hence the excursion to germany of , during which, with the kindly-offered guidance of mr. neuberg, an accomplished german admirer of some fortune resident in london, he made his first direct acquaintance with the country of whose literature he had long been himself the english interpreter. the outlines of the trip may be shortly condensed from the letters written during its progress to his wife and mother. he reached rotterdam on september st; then after a night made sleepless by "noisy nocturnal travellers and the most industrious cocks and clamorous bells" he had ever heard, he sailed up the river to bonn, where he consulted books, saw "father arndt," and encountered some types of the german professoriate, "miserable creatures lost in statistics." there he met neuberg, and they went together to rolandseck, to the village of hunef among the sieben-gebirge, and then on to coblenz. after a detour to ems, which carlyle, comminating the gaming-tables, compared to matlock, and making a pilgrimage to nassau as the birthplace of william the silent, they rejoined the rhine and sailed admiringly up the finest reach of the river. from mainz the philosopher and his guide went on to frankfort, paid their respects to goethe's statue and the garret where _werther_ was written, the judengasse, "grimmest section of the middle ages," and the römer--election hall of the old kaisers; then to homburg, where they saw an old russian countess playing "gowpanfuls of gold pieces every stake," and left after no long stay, carlyle, in a letter to scotsbrig, pronouncing the fashionable badeort to be the "rallying-place of such a set of empty blackguards as are not to be found elsewhere in the world." we find him next at marburg, where he visited the castle of philip of hesse. passing through cassel, he went to eisenach, and visited the neighbouring wartburg, where he kissed the old oaken table, on which the bible was made an open book for the german race, and noted the hole in the plaster where the inkstand had been thrown at the devil and his noises; an incident to which eloquent reference is made in the lectures on "heroes." hence they drove to gotha, and lodged in napoleon's room after leipzig. then by erfurt, with more luther memories, they took rail to weimar, explored the houses of goethe and of schiller, and dined by invitation with the augustenburgs; the grand duchess, with sons and daughters, conversing in a babylonish dialect, a melange of french, english, and german. the next stage seems to have been leipzig, then in a bustle with the fair. "however," says carlyle, "we got a book or two, drank a glass of wine in auerbach's keller, and at last got off safe to the comparative quiet of dresden." he ignores the picture galleries; and makes a bare reference to the palaces from which they steamed up the elbe to the heart of saxon switzerland. there he surveyed lobositz, first battle-field of the seven years' war, and rested at the romantic mountain watering-place of töplitz. "he seems," wrote mrs. carlyle, "to be getting very successfully through his travels, thanks to the patience and helpfulness of neuberg. he makes in every letter frightful _misereres_ over his sleeping accommodations; but he cannot conceal that he is really pretty well." the writer's own _misereres_ are as doleful and nearly as frequent; but she was really in much worse health. from töplitz the companions proceeded in weary stellwagens to zittau in lusatia, and so on to herrnhut, the primitive city of the moravian brethren: a place not bigger than annan, but beautiful, pure, and quiet beyond any town on the earth, i daresay; and, indeed, more like a saintly dream of ideal calvinism made real than a town of stone and lime. onward by "dreary moory frankfurt" on the oder, whence they reconnoitred "the field of kunersdorf, a scraggy village where fritz received his worst defeat," they reached the prussian capital on the last evening of the month. from the british hotel, unter den linden, we have, october st:-- i am dead stupid; my heart nearly choked out of me, and my head churned to pieces.... berlin is loud almost as london, but in no other way great ... about the size of liverpool, and more like glasgow. they spent a week there (sight-seeing being made easier by an introduction from lady ashburton to the ambassador), discovering at length an excellent portrait of fritz, meeting tieck, cornelius, rauch, preuss, etc., and then got quickly back to london by way of hanover, cologne, and ostend. carlyle's travels are always interesting, and would be more so without the tiresome, because ever the same, complaints. six years later ( ) he made his second expedition to germany, in the company of two friends, a mr. foxton--who is made a butt--and the faithful neuberg. of this journey, undertaken with a more exclusively business purpose, and accomplished with greater dispatch, there are fewer notes, the substance of which may be here anticipated. he sailed (august st) from leith to hamburg, admiring the lower elbe, and then went out of his way to accept a pressing invitation from the baron usedom and his wife to the isle of rügen, sometimes called the german isle of wight. he went there by stralsund, liked his hosts and their pleasant place, where for cocks crowing he had doves cooing; but in putbus, the richmond of the island, he had to encounter brood sows as well as cochin-chinas. from rügen he went quickly south by stettin to berlin, then to cüstrin to survey the field of zorndorf, with what memorable result readers of _friedrich_ know. his next halt was at liegnitz, headquarters for exploring the grounds of "leuthen, the grandest of all the battles," and molwitz--first of fritz's fights--of which we hear so much in the _reminiscences_. his course lay on to breslau, "a queer old city as ever you heard of, high as edinburgh or more so," and, by landshut, through the picturesque villages of the riesen-gebirge into bohemia. there he first put up at pardubitz in a vile, big inn, for bed a "trough eighteen inches too short, a mattress forced into it which cocked up at both ends"--such as most travellers in remoter germany at that period have experienced. carlyle was unfavourably impressed by the bohemians; and "not one in a hundred of them could understand a word of german. they are liars, thieves, slatterns, a kind of miserable, subter-irish people,--irish with the addition of ill-nature." he and his friends visited the fields of chotusitz and kolin, where they found the "golden sun," from which "the last of the kings" had surveyed the ground, "sunk to be the dirtiest house probably in europe." thence he made for prague, whose picturesque grandeur he could not help extolling. "here," he writes, enclosing the flower to his wife, "is an authentic wild pink plucked from the battle-field. give it to some young lady who practises 'the battle of prague' on her piano to your satisfaction." on september th he dates from dresden, whence he spent a laborious day over torgau. thereafter they sped on, with the usual tribulations, by hochkirk, leipzig, weissenfels, and rossbach. hurrying homeward, they were obliged to decline another invitation from the duchess at weimar; and, making for guntershausen, performed the fatiguing journey from there to aix-la-chapelle in one day, _i.e._ travelling often in slow trains from a.m. to p.m., a foolish feat even for the eupeptic. carlyle visited the cathedral, but has left a very poor account of the impression produced on him by the simple slab sufficiently inscribed, "carolo magno." "next morning stand upon the lid of charlemagne, abominable monks roaring out their idolatrous grand music within sight." by ostend and dover he reached home on the nd. a yankee scamper trip, one might say, but for the result testifying to the enormous energy of the traveller. "he speaks lightly," says mr. froude, "of having seen kolin, torgau, etc. etc. no one would guess from reading these short notices that he had mastered the details of every field he visited; not a turn of the ground, not a brook, not a wood ... had escaped him.... there are no mistakes. military students in germany are set to learn frederick's battles in carlyle's account of them." during the interval between those tours there are few events of interest in carlyle's outer, or phases of his inner life which have not been already noted. the year found the country ablaze with the excitement of the crimean war, with which he had as little sympathy as had cobden or bright or the members of sturge's deputation. he had no share in the popular enthusiasm for what he regarded as a mere newspaper folly. all his political leaning was on the side of russia, which, from a safe distance, having no direct acquaintance with the country, he always admired as a seat of strong government, the representative of wise control over barbarous races. among the worst of these he reckoned the turk, "a lazy, ugly, sensual, dark fanatic, whom we have now had for years. i would not buy the continuance of him in europe at the rate of sixpence a century." carlyle had no more faith in the "balance of power" than had byron, who scoffed at it from another, the republican, side as "balancing straws on kings' noses instead of wringing them off," _e.g._-- as to russian increase of strength, he writes, i would wait till russia meddled with me before i drew sword to stop his increase of strength. it is the idle population of editors, etc., that has done all this in england. one perceives clearly that ministers go forward in it against their will. even our heroisms at alma--"a terrible, almost horrible, operation"--balaclava, and inkermann, failed to raise a glow in his mind, though he admitted the force of tennyson's ringing lines. the alliance with the "scandalous copper captain," elected by the french, as the jews chose barabbas,--an alliance at which many patriots winced--was to him only an added disgrace. carlyle's comment on the subsequent visit to osborne of victor hugo's "brigand," and his reception within the pale of legitimate sovereignty was, "louis bonaparte has not been shot hitherto. that is the best that can be said." sedan brought most men round to his mind about napoleon iii.: but his approval of the policy of the czars remains open to the criticism of m. lanin. in reference to the next great struggle of the age, carlyle was in full sympathy with the mass of his countrymen. he was as much enraged by the sepoy rebellion as were those who blew the ringleaders from the muzzles of guns. "tongue cannot speak," he exclaims, in the spirit of noel paton's picture, before it was amended or spoilt, "the horrors that were done on the english by these mutinous hyaenas. allow hyaenas to mutiny and strange things will follow." he never seems to have revolved the question as to the share of his admired muscovy in instigating the revolt. for the barbarism of the north he had ready apologies, for the savagery of the south mere execration; and he writes of the hindoos as he did, both before and afterwards, of the negroes in jamaica. three sympathetic obituary notices of the period expressed his softer side. in april , john wilson and lord cockburn died at edinburgh. his estimate of the former is notable as that generally entertained, now that the race of those who came under the personal spell of christopher north has passed:-- we lived apart as in different centuries; though to say the truth i always loved wilson, he had much nobleness of heart, and many traits of noble genius, but the central tie-beam seemed always wanting; very long ago i perceived in him the most irreconcilable contradictions--toryism with sansculottism, methodism of a sort with total incredulity, etc.... wilson seemed to me always by far the most gifted of our literary men, either then or still: and yet intrinsically he has written nothing that can endure. cockburn is referred to in contrast as "perhaps the last genuinely national type of rustic scotch sense, sincerity, and humour--a wholesome product of scotch dialect, with plenty of good logic in it." later, douglas jerrold is described as "last of the london wits, i hope the last." carlyle's letters during this period are of minor interest: many refer to visits paid to distinguished friends and humble relatives, with the usual complaints about health, servants, and noises. at farlingay, where he spent some time with edward fitzgerald, translator of _omar khayyam_, the lowing of cows took the place of cocks crowing. here and there occurs a, criticism or a speculation. that on his dreams is, in the days of "insomnia," perhaps worth noting (f. iv. , ); _inter alia_ he says:--"i have an impression that one always dreams, but that only in cases where the nerves are disturbed by bad health, which produces light imperfect sleep, do they start into such relief as to force themselves on our waking consciousness." among posthumously printed documents of cheyne row, to this date belongs the humorous appeal of mrs. carlyle for a larger allowance of house money, entitled "budget of a femme incomprise." the arguments and statement of accounts, worthy of a bank auditor, were so irresistible that carlyle had no resource but to grant the request, _i.e._ practically to raise the amount to £ , instead of £ per annum. it has been calculated that his reliable income even at this time did not exceed £ , but the rent of the house was kept very low, £ : he and his wife lived frugally, so that despite the expenses of the noise-proof room and his german tour he could afford in to put a stop to her travelling in second-class railway carriages; in , when the success of the first instalment of his great work made an end of financial fears, to keep two servants; and in to give mrs. carlyle a brougham. few men have left on the whole so unimpeachable a record in money matters. in november there occurred an incident hitherto unrecorded in any biography. the lord rectorship of the university of glasgow having fallen vacant, the "conservative club" of the year had put forward mr. disraeli as successor to the honorary office. a small body of mr. carlyle's admirers among the senior students on the other side nominated him, partly as a tribute of respect and gratitude, partly in opposition to a statesman whom they then distrusted. the nomination was, after much debate, adopted by the so-called "liberal association" of that day; and, with a curious irony, the author of the _latter-day pamphlets_ and _friedrich ii._ was pitted, as a radical, against the future promoter of the franchise of as a tory. it soon appeared that his supporters had underestimated the extent to which mr. carlyle had offended scotch theological prejudice and outraged the current philanthropy. his name received some sixty adherents, and had ultimately to be withdrawn. the nomination was received by the press, and other exponents of popular opinion, with denunciations that came loudest and longest from the leaders of orthodox dissent, then arrogating to themselves the profession of liberalism and the initiation of reform. among the current expressions in reference to his social and religious creeds were the following:-- carlyle's philanthropy is not that of howard, his cure for national distress is to bury our paupers in peat bogs, driving wooden boards on the top of them. his entire works may be described as reiterating the doctrine that "whatever is is wrong." he has thrown off every form of religious belief and settled down into the conviction that the christian profession of englishmen is a sham.... elect him and you bid god-speed to pantheism and spiritualism. [footnote: mr. wylie states that "twice before his election by his own university he (carlyle) had been invited to allow himself to be nominated for the office of lord rector, once by students in the university of glasgow and once by those of aberdeen: but both of these invitations he had declined." this as regards glasgow is incorrect.] mr. carlyle neither possesses the talent nor the distinction, nor does he occupy the position which entitle a man to such an honour as the rectorial chair. the _scotch guardian_ writes: but for the folly exhibited in bringing forward mr. disraeli, scarcely any party within the college or out of it would have ventured to nominate a still more obnoxious personage. this is the first instance we have been able to discover in which the suffrages of the youth of the university have been sought for a candidate who denied in his writings that the revealed word of god is "the way, the truth, the life." it is impossible to separate mr. carlyle from that obtrusive feature of his works in which the solemn verities of our holy religion are sneered at as wornout "biblicalities," "unbelievabilities," and religious profession is denounced as "dead putrescent cant." the reader of the _life of sterling_ is not left to doubt for a moment the author's malignant hostility to the religion of the bible. in that work, saving faith is described as "stealing into heaven by the modern method of sticking ostrich-like your head into fallacies on earth," that is to say, by believing in the doctrines of the gospels. how, after this, could the principal and professors of the university, the guardians of the faiths and morals of its inexperienced youth, accompany to the common hall, and allow to address the students a man who has degraded his powers to the life-labour of sapping and mining the foundations of the truth, and opened the fire of his fiendish raillery against the citadel of our best aspirations and dearest hopes? in the result, two men of genius--however diverse--were discarded, and a scotch nobleman of conspicuous talent, always an active, if not intrusive, champion of orthodoxy, was returned by an "overwhelming majority." in answer to intelligence transmitted to mr. carlyle of these events, the president of the association of his supporters--who had nothing on which to congratulate themselves save that only the benches of the rooms in which they held their meetings had been riotously broken,--received the following previously unpublished letter:-- chelsea, _ th december_ . dear sir--i have received your pamphlet; and return many thanks for all your kindness to me. i am sorry to learn, as i do for the first time from this narrative, what angry nonsense some of my countrymen see good to write of me. not being much a reader of newspapers, i had hardly heard of the election till after it was finished; and i did not know that anything of this melancholy element of heterodoxy, "pantheism," etc. etc., had been introduced into the matter. it is an evil, after its sort, this of being hated and denounced by fools and ignorant persons; but it cannot be mended for the present, and so must be left standing there. that another wiser class think differently, nay, that they alone have any real knowledge of the question, or any real right to vote upon it, is surely an abundant compensation. if that be so, then all is still right; and probably there is no harm done at all!--to you, and the other young gentlemen who have gone with you on this occasion, i can only say that i feel you have loyally meant to do me a great honour and kindness; that i am deeply sensible of your genial recognition, of your noble enthusiasm (which reminds me of my own young years); and that in fine there is no loss or gain of an election which can in the least alter these valuable facts, or which is not wholly insignificant to me, in comparison with them. "elections" are not a thing transacted by the gods, in general; and i have known very unbeautiful creatures "elected" to be kings, chief-priests, railway kings, etc., by the "most sweet voices," and the spiritual virtue that inspires these, in our time! leaving all that, i will beg you all to retain your honourable good feelings towards me; and to think that if anything i have done or written can help any one of you in the noble problem of living like a wise man in these evil and foolish times, it will be more valuable to me than never so many elections or non-elections. with many good wishes and regards i heartily thank you all, and remain--yours very sincerely, t. carlyle. [footnote: for the elucidation of some points of contact between carlyle and lord beaconsfield, _vide_ mr. froude's _life_ of the latter.] carlyle's letters to strangers are always valuable, for they are terse and reticent. in writing to weavers, like bamford; to men in trouble, as cooper; to students, statesmen, or earnest inquirers of whatever degree, a genuine sympathy for them takes the place of the sympathy for himself, often too prominent in the copious effusions to his intimates. the letter above quoted is of special interest, as belonging to a time from which comparatively few survive; when he was fairly under weigh with a task which seemed to grow in magnitude under his gaze. the _life of friedrich_ could not be a succession of dramatic scenes, like the _french revolution_, nor a biography like _cromwell_, illustrated by the surrounding events of thirty years. carlyle found, to his dismay, that he had involved himself in writing the history of germany, and in a measure of europe, during the eighteenth century, a period perhaps the most tangled and difficult to deal with of any in the world's annals. he was like a man who, with intent to dig up a pine, found himself tugging at the roots of an igdrasil that twined themselves under a whole hercynian forest. his constant cries of positive pain in the progress of the work are distressing, as his indomitable determination to wrestle with and prevail over it is inspiring. there is no imaginable image that he does not press into his service in rattling the chains of his voluntary servitude. above all, he groans over the unwieldy mass of his authorities--"anti-solar systems of chaff." "i read old german books dull as stupidity itself--nay superannuated stupidity--gain with labour the dreariest glimpses of unimportant extinct human beings ... but when i begin operating: _how_ to reduce that widespread black desert of brandenburg sand to a small human garden! ... i have no capacity of grasping the big chaos that lies around me, and reducing it to order. order! reducing! it is like compelling the grave to give up its dead!" elsewhere he compares his travail with the monster of his own creation to "balder's ride to the death kingdoms, through frozen rain, sound of subterranean torrents, leaden-coloured air"; and in the retrospect of the _reminiscences_ touchingly refers to his thirteen years of rarely relieved isolation. "a desperate dead-lift pull all that time; my whole strength devoted to it ... withdrawn from all the world." he received few visitors and had few correspondents, but kept his life vigorous by riding on his horse fritz (the gift of the marshalls), "during that book, some , miles, much of it, all the winter part of it, under cloud of night, sun just setting when i mounted. all the rest of the day i sat, silent, aloft, insisting upon work, and such work, _invitissimâ minervâ_, for that matter." mrs. carlyle had her usual share of the sufferings involved in "the awful _friedrich_." "that tremendous book," she writes, "made prolonged and entire devastation of any satisfactory semblance of home life or home happiness." but when at last, by help of neuberg and of mr. larkin, who made the maps of the whole book, the first two volumes were in type (they appeared in autumn ), his wife hailed them in a letter sent from edinburgh to chelsea: "oh, my dear, what a magnificent book this is going to be, the best of all your books, forcible, clear, and sparkling as the _french revolution_; compact and finished as _cromwell_. yes, you shall see that it will be the best of all your books, and small thanks to it, it has taken a doing." on which the author naively purrs: "it would be worth while to write books, if mankind would read them as you." later he speaks of his wife's recognition and that of emerson--who wrote enthusiastically of the art of the work, though much of it was across his grain--as "the only bit of human criticism in which he could discern lineaments of the thing." but the book was a swift success, two editions of and another of copies being sold in a comparatively brief space. carlyle's references to this--after his return from another visit to the north and the second trip to germany--seen somewhat ungracious:-- book ... much babbled over in newspapers ... no better to me than the barking of dogs ... officious people put reviews into my hands, and in an idle hour i glanced partly into these; but it would have been better not, so sordidly ignorant and impertinent were they, though generally laudatory. [footnote: carlyle himself writes: "i felt well enough how it was crushing down her existence, as it was crushing down my own; and the thought that she had not been at the choosing of it, and yet must suffer so for it, was occasionally bitter to me. but the practical conclusion always was, get done with it, get done with it! for the saving of us both that is the one outlook. and sure enough, i did stand by that dismal task with all my time and all my means; day and night wrestling with it, as with the ugliest dragon, which blotted out the daylight and the rest of the world to me till i should get it slain."] but these notices recall the fact familiar to every writer, that while the assailants of a book sometimes read it, favourable reviewers hardly ever do; these latter save their time by payment of generally superficial praise, and a few random quotations. carlyle scarcely enjoyed his brief respite on being discharged of the first instalment of his book: the remainder lay upon him like a menacing nightmare; he never ceased to feel that the work must be completed ere he could be free, and that to accomplish this he must be alone. never absent from his wife without regrets, lamentations, contrite messages, and childlike entreaties for her to "come and protect him," when she came it was to find that they were better apart; for his temper was never softened by success. "living beside him," she writes in , is "the life of a weathercock in high wind." during a brief residence together in a hired house near aberdour in fifeshire, she compares herself to a keeper in a madhouse; and writes later from sunny bank to her husband, "if you could fancy me in some part of the house out of sight, my absence would make little difference to you, considering how little i do see of you, and how preoccupied you are when i do see you." carlyle answers in his touching strain, "we have had a sore life pilgrimage together, much bad road. oh, forgive me!" and sends her beautiful descriptions; but her disposition, not wholly forgiving, received them somewhat sceptically. "byron," said lady byron, "can write anything, but he does not feel it"; and mrs. carlyle on one occasion told her "harsh spouse" that his fine passages were very well written for the sake of future biographers: a charge he almost indignantly repudiates. he was then, august , staying at thurso castle, the guest of sir george sinclair; a visit that terminated in an unfortunate careless mistake about a sudden change of plans, resulting in his wife, then with the stanleys at alderley, being driven back to chelsea and deprived of her promised pleasure and requisite rest with her friends in the north. the frequency of such incidents,--each apart capable of being palliated by the same fallacy of division that has attempted in vain to justify the domestic career of henry viii.,--points to the conclusion of miss gully that carlyle, though often nervous on the subject, acted to his wife as if he were "totally inconsiderate of her health," so much so that she received medical advice not to be much at home when he was in the stress of writing. in january he writes to his brother john an anxious letter in reference to a pain about a hand-breadth below the heart, of which she had begun to complain, the premonitory symptom of the disease which ultimately proved fatal; but he was not sufficiently impressed to give due heed to the warning; nor was it possible, with his long-engrained habits, to remove the marah spring that lay under all the wearisome bickerings, repentances, and renewals of offence. the "very little herring" who declined to be made a part of lady ashburton's luggage now suffered more than ever from her inanimate rival. the highly-endowed wife of one of the most eminent philanthropists of america, whose life was devoted to the awakening of defective intellects, thirty-five years ago murmured, "if i were only an idiot!" similarly mrs. carlyle might have remonstrated, "why was i not born a book!" her letters and journal teem to tiresomeness with the refrain, "i feel myself extremely neglected for unborn generations." her once considerable ambitions had been submerged, and her own vivid personality overshadowed by a man she was afraid to meet at breakfast, and glad to avoid at dinner. a woman of immense talent and a spark of genius linked to a man of vast genius and imperious will, she had no choice but to adopt his judgments, intensify his dislikes, and give a sharper edge to his sneers. mr. froude, who for many years lived too near the sun to see the sun, and inconsistently defends many of the inconsistencies he has himself inherited from his master, yet admits that carlyle treated the broad church party in the english church with some injustice. his recorded estimates of the leading theologians of the age, and personal relation to them, are hopelessly bewildering. his lifelong friendship for erskine of linlathen is intelligible, though he did not extend the same charity to what he regarded as the muddle-headedness of maurice (erskine's spiritual son), and keenly ridiculed the reconciliation pamphlet entitled "subscription no bondage." the essayists and reviewers, "septem contra christum," "should," he said, "be shot for deserting their posts"; even dean stanley, their _amicus curioe,_ whom he liked, came in for a share of his sarcasm; "there he goes," he said to froude, "boring holes in the bottom of the church of england." of colenso, who was doing as much as any one for the "exodus from houndsditch," he spoke with open contempt, saying, "he mistakes for fame an extended pillory that he is standing on"; and was echoed by his wife, "colenso isn't worth talking about for five minutes, except for the absurdity of a man making arithmetical onslaughts on the pentateuch with a bishop's little black silk apron on." this is not the place to discuss the controversy involved; but we are bound to note the fact that carlyle was, by an inverted scotch intolerance, led to revile men rowing in the same boat as himself, but with a different stroke. to another broad churchman, charles kingsley, partly from sympathy with this writer's imaginative power, he was more considerate; and one of the still deeply religious freethinkers of the time was among his closest friends. the death of arthur clough in left another blank in carlyle's life: we have had in this century to lament the comparatively early loss of few men of finer genius. clough had not, perhaps, the practical force of sterling, but his work is of a higher order than any of the fragments of the earlier favourite. among high churchmen carlyle commended dr. pusey as "solid and judicious," and fraternised with the bishop of oxford; but he called keble "an ape," and said of cardinal newman that he had "no more brains than an ordinary-sized rabbit." these years are otherwise marked by his most glaring political blunder. the civil war, then raging in america, brought, with its close, the abolition of slavery throughout the states, a consummation for which he cared little, for he had never professed to regard the negroes as fit for freedom; but this result, though inevitable, was incidental. as is known to every one who has the remotest knowledge of transatlantic history, the war was in great measure a struggle for the preservation of national unity: but it was essentially more; it was the vindication of law and order against the lawless and disorderly violence of those who, when defeated at the polling-booth, flew to the bowie knife; an assertion of right as might for which carlyle cared everything: yet all he had to say of it was his "ilias americana in nuce," published in _macmillan's magazine_, august . _peter of the north_ (to paul of the south): "paul, you unaccountable scoundrel, i find you hire your servants for life, not by the month or year as i do. you are going straight to hell, you----" _paul_: "good words, peter. the risk is my own. i am willing to take the risk. hire you your servants by the month or the day, and get straight to heaven; leave me to my own method." _peter_: "no, i won't. i will beat your brains out first!" [and is trying dreadfully ever since, but cannot yet manage it.] this, except the _prinzenraub_, a dramatic presentation of a dramatic incident in old german history, was his only side publication during the writing of _friedrich_. after the war ended and emerson's letters of remonstrance had proved prophetic, carlyle is said to have confessed to mr. moncure conway as well as to mr. froude that he "had not seen to the bottom of the matter." but his republication of this nadir of his nonsense was an offence, emphasising the fact that, however inspiring, he is not always a safe guide, even to those content to abide by his own criterion of success. there remains of this period the record of a triumph and of a tragedy. after seven years more of rarely intermitted toil, broken only by a few visits, trips to the sea-shore, etc., and the distress of the terrible accident to his wife,--her fall on a curbstone and dislocation of a limb,--which has been often sufficiently detailed, he had finished his last great work. the third volume of _friedrich_ was published in may , the fourth appeared in february , the fifth and sixth in march . carlyle had at last slain his minotaur, and stood before the world as a victorious theseus, everywhere courted and acclaimed, his hard-earned rest only disturbed by a shower of honours. his position as the foremost prose writer of his day was as firmly established in germany, where his book was at once translated and read by all readers of history, as in england. scotland, now fully awake to her reflected fame, made haste to make amends. even the leaders of the sects, bond and "free," who had denounced him, were now eager to proclaim that he had been intrinsically all along, though sometimes in disguise, a champion of their faith. no men knew better how to patronise, or even seem to lead, what they had failed to quell. the universities made haste with their burnt-offerings. in a body of edinburgh students had prematurely repeated the attempt of their forerunners in glasgow to confer on him their lord rectorship, and failed. in he was elected, in opposition again to mr. disraeli, to succeed mr. gladstone, the genius of elections being in a jesting mood. he was prevailed on to accept the honour, and, later, consented to deliver in the spring of the customary inaugural address. mrs. carlyle's anxiety on this occasion as to his success and his health is a tribute to her constant and intense fidelity. he went north to his installation, under the kind care of encouraging friends, imprimis of professor tyndall, one of his truest; they stopped on the road at fryston, with lord houghton, and there met professor huxley, who accompanied them to edinburgh. carlyle, having resolved to speak and not merely to read what he had to say, was oppressed with nervousness; and of the event itself he writes: "my speech was delivered in a mood of defiant despair, and under the pressure of nightmare. some feeling that i was not speaking lies alone sustained me. the applause, etc., i took for empty noise, which it really was not altogether." the address, nominally on the "reading of books," really a rapid autobiography of his own intellectual career, with references to history, literature, religion, and the conduct of life, was, as tyndall telegraphed to mrs. carlyle,--save for some difficulty the speaker had in making himself audible--"a perfect triumph." his reception by one of the most enthusiastic audiences ever similarly assembled marked the climax of a steadily-increasing fame. it may be compared to the late welcome given to wordsworth in the oxford theatre. after four days spent with erskine and his own brother james in edinburgh, he went for a week's quiet to scotsbrig, and was kept there, lingering longer than he had intended, by a sprained ankle, "blessed in the country stillness, the purity of sky and earth, and the absence of all babble." on april th he wrote his last letter to his wife, a letter which she never read. on the evening of saturday the st, when staying on the way south at his sister's house at dumfries, he received a telegram informing him that the close companionship of forty years--companionship of struggle and victory, of sad and sweet so strangely blent--was for ever at an end. mrs. carlyle had been found dead in her carriage when driving round hyde park on the afternoon of that day, her death (from heart-disease) being accelerated by an accident to a favourite little dog. carlyle felt as "one who hath been stunned," hardly able to realise his loss. "they took me out next day ... to wander in the green sunny sabbath fields, and ever and anon there rose from my sick heart the ejaculation, 'my poor little woman,' but no full gust of tears came to my relief, nor has yet come." on the following monday he set off with his brother for london. "never for a thousand years shall i forget that arrival hero of ours, my first unwelcomed by her. she lay in her coffin, lovely in death. pale death hid things not mine or ours had possession of our poor darling." on wednesday they returned, and on thursday the th she was buried in the nave of the old abbey kirk at haddington, in the grave of her father the now desolate old man, who had walked with her over many a stony road, paid the first of his many regretful tributes in the epitaph inscribed over her tomb: in which follows, after the name and date of birth:-- in her bright existence she had more sorrows than are common, but also a soft invincibility, a capacity of discernment, and a noble loyalty of heart which are rare. for years she was the true and loving help-mate of her husband, and by act and word unweariedly forwarded him as none else could in all of worthy that he did or attempted. she died at london, st april , suddenly snatched from him, and the light of his life as if gone out. [footnote: for the most interesting, loyally sympathetic, and characteristic account of carlyle's journey north on this occasion, and of the incidents which followed, we may refer to _new fragments_, by john tyndall, just published.] chapter vii decadence [ - ] after this shock of bereavement carlyle's days went by "on broken wing," never brightening, slowly saddening to the close; but lit up at intervals by flashes of the indomitable energy that, starting from no vantage, had conquered a world of thought, and established in it, if not a new dynasty, at least an intellectual throne. expressions of sympathy came to him from all directions, from the queen herself downwards, and he received them with the grateful acknowledgment that he had, after all, been loved by his contemporaries. when the question arose as to his future life, it seemed a natural arrangement that he and his brother john, then a childless widower who had retired from his profession with a competence, should take up house together. the experiment was made, but, to the discredit of neither, it proved a failure. they were in some respects too much alike. john would not surrender himself wholly to the will or whims even of one whom he revered, and the attempt was by mutual consent abandoned; but their affectionate correspondence lasted through the period of their joint lives. carlyle, being left to himself in his "gaunt and lonesome home," after a short visit to miss bromley, an intimate friend of his wife, at her residence in kent, accepted the invitation of the second lady ashburton to spend the winter in her house at mentone. there he arrived on christmas eve , under the kind convoy of professor tyndall, and remained breathing the balmy air and gazing on the violet sea till march of the following year. during the interval he occupied himself in writing his _reminiscences,_ drawing pen-and-ink pictures of the country, steeped in beauty fit to soothe any sorrow save such as his, and taking notes of some of the passers-by. of the greatest celebrity then encountered, mr. gladstone, he writes in his journal, in a tone intensified as time went on: "talk copious, ingenious,... a man of ardent faculty, but all gone irrecoverably into house of commons shape.... man once of some wisdom or possibility of it, but now possessed by the prince, or many princes, of the air." back in chelsea, he was harassed by heaps of letters, most of which, we are told, he answered, and spent a large portion of his time and means in charities. amid carlyle's irreconcilable inconsistencies of theory, and sometimes of conduct, he was through life consistent in practical benevolence. the interest in the welfare of the working classes that in part inspired his _sartor, chartism,_ and _past and present_ never failed him. he was among the foremost in all national movements to relieve and solace their estate. he was, further, with an amiable disregard of his own maxims, over lenient towards the waifs and strays of humanity, in some instances careless to inquire too closely into the causes of their misfortune or the degree of their demerits. in his latter days this disposition grew upon him: the gray of his own evening skies made him fuller of compassion to all who lived in the shade. sad himself, he mourned with those who mourned; afflicted, he held out hands to all in affliction. consequently "the poor were always with him," writing, entreating, and personally soliciting all sorts of alms, from advice and help to ready money. his biographer informs us that he rarely gave an absolute refusal to any of these various classes of beggars. he answered a letter which is a manifest parody of his own surface misanthropy; he gave a guinea to a ticket-of-leave-convict, pretending to be a decayed tradesman; and a shilling to a blind man, whose dog took him over the crossing to a gin shop. froude remonstrated; "poor fellow," was the answer, "i daresay he is cold and thirsty." the memory of wordsworth is less warmly cherished among the dales of westmoreland than that of carlyle in the lanes of chelsea, where "his one expensive luxury was charity." his attitude on political questions, in which for ten years he still took a more or less prominent part, represents him on his sterner side. the first of these was the controversy about governor eyre, who, having suppressed the jamaica rebellion by the violent and, as alleged, cruel use of martial law, and hung a quadroon preacher called gordon--the man whether honest or not being an undoubted incendiary--without any law at all, was by the force of popular indignation dismissed in disgrace, and then arraigned for mis-government and illegality. in the movement, which resulted in the governor's recall and impeachment, there was doubtless the usual amount of exaggeration--represented by the violent language of one of carlyle's minor biographers: "there were more innocent people slain than at jeffreys' bloody assize"; "the massacre of glencoe was nothing to it"; "members of christian churches were flogged," etc. etc.--but among its leaders there were so many men of mark and celebrity, men like john s. mill, t. hughes, john bright, fawcett, cairnes, goldwin smith, herbert spencer, and frederick harrison, that it could not be set aside as a mere unreasoning clamour. it was a hard test of carlyle's theory of strong government; and he stood to his colours. years before, on john sterling suggesting that the negroes themselves should be consulted as to making a permanent engagement with their masters, he had said, "i never thought the rights of the negroes worth much discussing in any form. quashee will get himself made a slave again, and with beneficent whip will be compelled to work." on this occasion he regarded the black rebellion in the same light as the sepoy revolt. he organised and took the chair of a "defence committee," joined or backed by ruskin, henry kingsley, tyndall, sir r. murchison, sir t. gladstone, and others. "i never," says mr. froude, "knew carlyle more anxious about anything." he drew up a petition to government and exerted himself heart and soul for the "brave, gentle, chivalrous, and clear man," who when the ship was on fire "had been called to account for having flung a bucket or two of water into the hold beyond what was necessary." he had damaged some of the cargo perhaps, but he had saved the ship, and deserved to be made "dictator of jamaica for the next twenty-five years," to govern after the model of dr. francia in paraguay. the committee failed to get eyre reinstalled or his pension restored; but the impeachment was unsuccessful. the next great event was the passing of the reform bill of , by the tories, educated by mr. disraeli to this method of "dishing the whigs," by outbidding them in the scramble for votes. this instigated the famous tract called _shooting niagara_, written in the spirit of the _latter-day pamphlets_--carlyle's final and unqualified denunciation of this concession to democracy and all its works. but the upper classes in england seemed indifferent to the warning. "niagara, or what you like," the author quotes as the saying of a certain shining countess, "we will at least have a villa on the mediterranean when church and state have gone." a _mot_ emphatically of the decadence. later he fulminated against the clerkenwell explosions being a means of bringing the irish question within the range of practical politics. i sit in speechless admiration of our english treatment of those fenians first and last. it is as if the rats of a house had decided to expel and extirpate the human inhabitants, which latter seemed to have neither rat-catchers, traps, nor arsenic, and are trying to prevail by the method of love. governor eyre, with spenser's essay on ireland for text and cromwell's storm of drogheda for example, or otto von bismarck, would have been, in his view, in place at dublin castle. in the next great event of the century, the close of the greatest european struggle since waterloo, the cause which pleased cato pleased also the gods. carlyle, especially in his later days, had a deepening confidence in the teutonic, a growing distrust of the gallic race. he regarded the contest between them as one between ormuzd and ahriman, and wrote of sedan, as he had written of rossbach, with exultation. when a feeling spread in this country, naming itself sympathy for the fallen,--really half that, the other half, as in the american war, being jealousy of the victor,--and threatened to be dangerous, carlyle wrote a decisive letter to the _times_, november th , tracing the sources of the war back to the robberies of louis xiv., and ridiculing the prevailing sentiment about the recaptured provinces of lothringen and elsass. with a possible reference to victor hugo and his clients, he remarks-- they believe that they are the "christ of nations."... i wish they would inquire whether there might not be a cartouche of nations. cartouche had many gallant qualities--had many fine ladies begging locks of his hair while the indispensable gibbet was preparing. better he should obey the heavy-handed teutsch police officer, who has him by the windpipe in such frightful manner, give up part of his stolen goods, altogether cease to be a cartouche, and try to become again a chevalier bayard. all europe does _not_ come to the rescue in gratitude for the heavenly illumination it is getting from france: nor could all europe if it did prevent that awful chancellor from having his own way. metz and the boundary fence, i reckon, will be dreadfully hard to get out of that chancellor's hands again.... considerable misconception as to herr von bismarck is still prevalent in england. he, as i read him, is not a person of napoleonic ideas, but of ideas quite superior to napoleonic.... that noble, patient, deep, pious, and solid germany should be at length welded into a nation, and become queen of the continent, instead of vapouring, vainglorious, gesticulating, quarrelsome, restless, and over-sensitive france, seems to me the hopefulest fact that has occurred in my time. carlyle seldom wrote with more force, or with more justice. only, to be complete, his paper should have ended with a warning. he has done more than any other writer to perpetuate in england the memories of the great thinkers and actors--fichte, richter, arndt, körner, stein, goethe,--who taught their countrymen how to endure defeat and retrieve adversity. who will celebrate their yet undefined successors, who will train germany gracefully to bear the burden of prosperity? two years later carlyle wrote or rather dictated, for his hand was beginning to shake, his historical sketch of the _early kings of norway_, showing no diminution of power either of thought or expression, his estimates of the three hakons and of the three olafs being especially notable; and a paper on _the portraits of john knox_, the prevailing dull gray of which is relieved by a radiant vision of mary stuart. he was incited to another public protest, when, in may , towards the close of the russo-turkish war, he had got, or imagined himself to have got, reliable information that lord beaconsfield, then prime minister, having sent our fleet to the dardanelles, was planning to seize gallipoli and throw england into the struggle. carlyle never seems to have contemplated the possibility of a sclavo-gallic alliance against the forces of civilised order in europe, and he chose to think of the czars as the representatives of an enlightened autocracy. we are here mainly interested in the letter he wrote to the _times_, as "his last public act in this world,"--the phrase of mr. froude, who does not give the letter, and unaccountably says it "was brief, not more than three or four lines." it is as follows:-- sir--a rumour everywhere prevails that our miraculous premier, in spite of the queen's proclamation of neutrality, intends, under cover of care for "british interests," to send the english fleet to the baltic, or do some other feat which shall compel russia to declare war against england. latterly the rumour has shifted from the baltic and become still more sinister, on the eastern side of the scene, where a feat is contemplated that will force, not russia only, but all europe, to declare war against us. this latter i have come to know as an indisputable fact; in our present affairs and outlooks surely a grave one. as to "british interests" there is none visible or conceivable to me, except taking strict charge of our route to india by suez and egypt, and for the rest, resolutely steering altogether clear of any copartnery with the turk in regard to this or any other "british interest" whatever. it should be felt by england as a real ignominy to be connected with such a turk at all. nay, if we still had, as we ought to have, a wish to save him from perdition and annihilation in god's world, the one future for him that has any hope in it is even now that of being conquered by the russians, and gradually schooled and drilled into peaceable attempt at learning to be himself governed. the newspaper outcry against russia is no more respectable to me than the howling of bedlam, proceeding as it does from the deepest ignorance, egoism, and paltry national jealousy. these things i write, not on hearsay, but on accurate knowledge, and to all friends of their country will recommend immediate attention to them while there is yet time, lest in a few weeks the maddest and most criminal thing that a british government could do, should be done and all europe kindle into flames of war.--i am, etc. t. carlyle. cheyne row, chelsea, _may th._ meanwhile honours without stint were being rendered to the great author and venerable sage. in he had by request a personal interview with the queen, and has left, in a letter, a graphic account of the interview at the deanery of westminster. great artists as millais, watts, and boehm vied with one another, in painting or sculpture, to preserve his lineaments; prominent reviews to record their impression of his work, and disciples to show their gratitude. one of these, professor masson of edinburgh, in memory of carlyle's own tribute to goethe, started a subscription for a medal, presented on his eightieth birthday; but he valued more a communication of the same date from prince bismarck. count bernstoff from berlin wrote him ( ) a semi-official letter of thanks for the services he had conferred on germany, and in he was prevailed on to accept the prussian "ordre pour le mérite." in the same year mr. disraeli proposed, in courteous oblivion of bygone hostilities, to confer on him a pension and the "order of the grand cross of bath," an emolument and distinction which carlyle, with equal courtesy, declined. to the countess of derby, whom he believed to be the originator of the scheme, he (december th) expressed his sense of the generosity of the premier's letter: "it reveals to me, after all the hard things i have said of him, a now and unexpected stratum of genial dignity and manliness of character." to his brother john he wrote: "i do, however, truly admire the magnanimity of dizzy in regard to me. he is the only man i almost never spoke of without contempt ... and yet see here he comes with a pan of hot coals for my guilty head." that he was by no means gagged by personal feeling or seduced in matters of policy is evident from the above-quoted letter to the _times_; but he liked disraeli better than he did his great rival; the one may have bewildered his followers, the other, according to his critic's view, deceived himself--the lie, in platonic phrase, had got into the soul, till, to borrow an epigram, "he made his conscience not his guide but his accomplice." "carlyle," says mr. froude, "did not regard mr. gladstone merely as an orator who, knowing nothing as it ought to be known, had flung his force into specious sentiments, but as the representative of the numerous cants of the age ... differing from others in that the cant seemed true to him. he in fact believed him to be one of those fatal figures created by england's evil genius to work irreparable mischief." it must be admitted that carlyle's censures are so broadcast as to lose half their sting. in uncontroversial writing, it is enough to note that his methods of reforming the world and mr. gladstone's were as far as the poles asunder; and the admirers of the latter may console themselves with the reflection that the censor was, at the same time, talking with equal disdain of the scientific discoverers of the age--conspicuously of mr. darwin, whom he describes as "evolving man's soul from frog spawn," adding, "i have no patience with these gorilla damnifications of humanity." other criticisms, as those of george eliot, whose _adam bede_ he pronounced "simply dull," display a curious limitation or obtuseness of mind. one of the pleasantest features of his declining years is the ardour of his attachment to the few staunch friends who helped to cheer and console them. he had a sincere regard for fitzjames stephen, "an honest man with heavy strokes"; for sir garnet wolseley, to whom he said in effect, "your duty one day will be to take away that bauble and close the doors of the house of discord"; for tyndall always; for lecky, despite their differences; for moncure conway, athwart the question of "nigger" philanthropies; for kingsley and tennyson and browning, the last of whom was a frequent visitor till near the end. froude he had bound to his soul by hoops of steel; and a more faithful disciple and apostle, in intention always, in practice in the main (despite the most perplexing errors of judgment), no professed prophet ever had. but carlyle's highest praise is reserved for ruskin, whom he regarded as no mere art critic, but as a moral power worthy to receive and carry onward his own "cross of fire." the relationship between the two great writers is unchequered by any shade of patronage on the one hand, of jealousy or adulation on the other. the elder recognised in the younger an intellect as keen, a spirit as fearless as his own, who in the eyre controversy had "plunged his rapier to the hilt in the entrails of the blatant beast," _i.e._ popular opinion. he admired all ruskin's books; the _stones of venice,_ the most solid structure of the group, he named "sermons in stones"; he resented an attack on _sesame and lilies_ as if the book had been his own; and passages of the _queen of the air_ went into his heart "like arrows." the _order of the rose_ has attempted a practical embodiment of the review contemplated by carlyle, as a counteractive to the money making practice and expediency-worships of the day. meanwhile he had been putting his financial affairs in order. in , on return from mentone, he had recorded his bequest of the revenues of graigenputtock for the endowment of three john welsh bursaries in the university of edinburgh. in he made his will, leaving john forster and froude his literary executors: a legacy of trust which, on the death of the former, fell to the latter, to whose discretion, by various later bequests, less and less limited, there was confided the choice--at last almost made a duty--of editing and publishing the manuscripts and journals of himself and his wife. early in his seventy-third year (december ) carlyle quotes, "youth is a garland of roses," adding, "i did not find it such. 'age is a crown of thorns.' neither is this altogether true for me. if sadness and sorrow tend to loosen us from life, they make the place of rest more desirable." the talk of socrates in the _republic_, and the fine phrases in cicero's _de senectute_, hardly touch on the great grief, apart from physical infirmities, of old age--its increasing solitariness. after sixty, a man may make disciples and converts, but few new friends, while the old ones die daily; the "familiar faces" vanish in the night to which there is no morning, and leave nothing in their stead. during these years carlyle's former intimates were falling round him like the leaves from an autumn tree, and the kind care of the few survivors, the solicitous attention of his niece, nurse, and amanuensis, mary aitken, yet left him desolate. clough had died, and thomas erskine, and john forster, and wilberforce, with whom he thought he agreed, and mill, his old champion and ally, with whom he so disagreed that he almost maligned his memory--calling one of the most interesting of autobiographies "the life of a logic-chopping machine." in march he attended the funeral of lady augusta stanley; in the following month his brother aleck died in canada; and in his brother john at dumfries. he seemed destined to be left alone; his physical powers were waning. as early as he and his last horse had their last ride together; later, his right hand failed, and he had to write by dictation. in the gathering gloom he began to look on death as a release from the shreds of life, and to envy the old roman mode of shuffling off the coil. his thoughts turned more and more to hamlet's question of the possible dreams hereafter, and his longing for his lost jeannie made him beat at the iron gates of the "undiscovered country" with a yearning cry; but he could get no answer from reason, and would not seek it in any form of superstition, least of all the latest, that of stealing into heaven "by way of mesmeric and spiritualistic trances." his question and answer are always-- strength quite a stranger to me.... life is verily a weariness on those terms. oftenest i feel willing to go, were my time come. sweet to rejoin, were it only in eternal sleep, those that are away. that ... is now and then the whisper of my worn-out heart, and a kind of solace to me. "but why annihilation or eternal sleep?" i ask too. they and i are alike in the will of the highest. "when," says mr. froude, "he spoke of the future and its uncertainties, he fell back invariably on the last words of his favourite hymn-- wir heissen euch hoffen." his favourite quotations in those days were macbeth's "to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow"; burns's line, "had we never lo'ed sae kindly,"--thinking of the tomb which he was wont to kiss in the gloamin' in haddington church,--the lines from "the tempest" ending, "our little life is rounded with a sleep," and the dirge in "cymbeline." he lived on during the last years, save for his quiet walks with his biographer about the banks of the thames, like a ghost among ghosts, his physical life slowly ebbing till, on february th , it ebbed away. his remains were, by his own desire, conveyed to ecclefechan and laid under the snow-clad soil of the rural churchyard, beside the dust of his kin. he had objected to be buried, should the request be made (as it was by dean stanley), in westminster abbey:[greek: andron gar epiphanon pasa gae taphos.] of no man whose life has been so laid bare to us is it more difficult to estimate the character than that of thomas carlyle; regarding no one of equal eminence, with the possible exception of byron, has opinion been so divided. after his death there was a carnival of applause from his countrymen in all parts of the globe, from canton to san francisco. their hot zeal, only equalled by that of their revelries over the memory of burns, was unrestrained by limit, order, or degree. no nation is warmer than the scotch in worship of its heroes when dead and buried: one perfervid enthusiast says of the former "atheist, deist, and pantheist": "carlyle is gone; his voice, pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free, will be heard no more": the _scotsman_ newspaper writes of him as "probably the greatest of modern literary men;... before the volcanic glare of his _french revolution_ all epics, ancient and modern, grow pale and shadowy,... his like is not now left in the world." more recently a stalwart aberdonian, on helping to put a bust into a monument, exclaims in a strain of genuine ardour, "i knew carlyle, and i aver to you that his heart was as large and generous as his brain was powerful; that he was essentially a most lovable man, and that there were depths of tenderness, kindliness, benevolence, and most delicate courtesy in him, with all his seeming ruggedness and sternness, such as i have found throughout my life rarely in any human being." on the other side, a little later, after the publication of the _reminiscences_, _blackwood_ denounced the "old man eloquent" as "a blatant impostor, who speaks as if he were the only person who knew good from bad. ... every one and every thing dealt with in his _history_ is treated in the tone of a virtuous mephistopheles." the _world_ remarks that carlyle has been made to pay the penalty of a posthumous depreciation for a factitious fame; "but the game of venomous recrimination was begun by himself.... there is little that is extraordinary, still less that is heroic in his character. he had no magnanimity about him ... he was full of littleness and weakness, of shallow dogmatism and of blustering conceit." the _quarterly_, after alluding to carlyle's style "as the eccentric expression of eccentricity," denounces his choice of "heroes" as reckless of morality. according to the same authority, he "was not a deep thinker, but he was a great word-painter ... he has the inspiration as well as the contortions of the sibyl, the strength as well as the nodosities of the oak. ... in the _french revolution_ he rarely condescends to plain narrative ... it resembles a drama at the porte st. martin, in so many acts and tableaux. ... the raisers of busts and statues in his honour are winging and pointing new arrows aimed at the reputation of their most distinguished contemporaries, and doing their best to perpetuate a baneful influence." _fraser_, no longer edited by mr. froude, swells the chorus of dissent: "money, for which he cared little, only came in quantity after the death of his wife, when everything became indifferent to an old and life-weary man. who would be great at such a price? who would buy so much misery with so much labour? most men like their work. in his carlyle seems to have found the curse imposed upon adam.... he cultivated contempt of the kindly race of men." ample texts for these and similar censures are to be found in the pages of mr. froude, and he has been accused by carlyle's devotees of having supplied this material of malice prepense. no accusation was over more ridiculously unjust. to the mind of every impartial reader, froude appears as one of the loyallest if one of the most infatuated of friends. living towards the close in almost daily communion with his master, and in inevitable contact with his numerous frailties, he seems to have revered him with a love that passeth understanding, and attributed to him in good faith, as dryden did in jest to the objects of his mock heroics, every mental as well as every moral power, _e.g.,_ "had carlyle turned his mind to it he would have been a great philologer." "a great diplomatist was lost in carlyle." "he would have done better as a man of action than a man of words." by kicking the other diplomatists into the sea, as he threatened to do with the urchins of kirkcaldy! froude's panegyrics are in style and tone worthy of that put into the mouth of pericles by thucydides, with which the modern biographer closes his only too faithful record. but his claims for his hero--amounting to the assertions that he was never seriously wrong; that he was as good as he was great; that "in the weightier matters of the law his life had been without speck or flaw"; that "such faults as he had were but as the vapours which hang about a mountain, inseparable from the nature of the man"; that he never, in their intercourse, uttered a "trivial word, nor one which he had better have left unuttered"--these claims will never be honoured, for they are refuted in every third page after that on which they appear:--_e.g._ in the biography, vol. iv. p. , we are told that carlyle's "knowledge was not in points or lines but complete and solid": facing the remark we read, "he liked _ill_ men like humboldt, laplace, or the author of the _vestiges_. he refused darwin's transmutation of species as unproved: he fought against it, though i could see he dreaded that it might turn out true." the statement that "he always spoke respectfully of macaulay" is soon followed by criticisms that make us exclaim, "save us from such respect." the extraordinary assertion that carlyle was "always just in speaking of living men" is safeguarded by the quotation of large utterances of injustice and contempt for coleridge, byron, shelley, keats, comte, balzac, hugo, lamb, george eliot, and disparaging patronage of scott, of jeffrey, of mazzini, and of mill. the dog-like fidelity of boswell and eckermann was fitting to their attitude and capacity; but the spectacle of one great writer surrendering himself to another is a new testimony to the glamour of conversational genius. [footnote: this patronage of men, some quite, others nearly on his own level, whom he delights in calling "small," "thin," and "poor," as if he were the only big, fat, and rich, is more offensive than spurts of merely dyspeptic abuse. as regards the libels on lamb, dr. ireland has endeavoured to establish that they were written in ignorance of the noble tragedy of "elia's" life; but this contention cannot be made good as regards the later attacks.] carlyle was a great man, but a great man spoiled, that is, largely soured. he was never a timon; but, while at best a stoic, he was at worst a cynic, emulous though disdainful, trying all men by his own standard, and intolerant of a rival on the throne. to this result there contributed the bleak though bracing environment of his early years, amid kindred more noted for strength than for amenity, whom he loved, trusted, and revered, but from whose grim creed, formally at least, he had to tear himself with violent wrenches apart; his purgatory among the border-ruffians of annan school; his teaching drudgeries; his hermit college days; ten years' struggle for a meagre competence; a lifelong groaning under the nessus shirt of the irritable yet stubborn constitution to which genius is often heir; and above all his unusually late recognition. there is a good deal of natural bitterness in reference to the long refusal by the publishers of his first original work--an idyll like goldsmith's _vicar of wakefield_, and our finest prose poem in philosophy. "popularity," says emerson, "is for dolls"; but it remains to find the preacher, prophet, or poet wholly impervious to unjust criticism. neglect which crushes dwarfs only exasperates giants, but to the latter also there is great harm done. opposition affected carlyle as it affected milton, it made him defiant, at times even fierce, to those beyond his own inner circle. when he triumphed, he accepted his success without a boast, but not without reproaches for the past. he was crowned; but his coronation came too late, and the death of his wife paralysed his later years. let those who from the clyde to the isis, from the dee to the straits, make it their pastime to sneer at living worth, compare ben jonson's lines, your praise and dispraise are to me alike, one does not stroke me, nor the other strike, with samuel johnson's, "it has been delayed till most of those whom i wished to please are sunk into the grave, and success and failure are empty sounds," and then take to heart the following:-- the "recent return of popularity greater than ever," which i hear of, seems due alone to that late edinburgh affair; especially to the edinburgh "address," and affords new proof of the singularly dark and feeble condition of "public judgment" at this time. no idea, or shadow of an idea, is in that address but what had been set forth by me tens of times before, and the poor gaping sea of prurient blockheadism receives it as a kind of inspired revelation, and runs to buy my books (it is said), now when i have got quite done with their buying or refusing to buy. if they would give me £ , a year and bray unanimously their hosannahs heaven-high for the rest of my life, who now would there be to get the smallest joy or profit from it? to me i feel as if it would be a silent sorrow rather, and would bring me painful retrospections, nothing else. we require no open-sesame, no clumsy confidence from attaches flaunting their intimacy, to assure us that there were "depths of tenderness" in carlyle. his susceptibility to the softer influences of nature, of family life, of his few chosen friends, is apparent in almost every page of his biography, above all in the _reminiscences_, those supreme records of regret, remorse, and the inspiration of bereavement. there is no surge of sorrow in our literature like that which is perpetually tossed up in the second chapter of the second volume, with the never-to-be-forgotten refrain-- cherish what is dearest while you have it near you, and wait not till it is far away. blind and deaf that we are; oh, think, if thou yet love anybody living, wait not till death sweep down the paltry little dust clouds and dissonances of the moment, and all be at last so mournfully clear and beautiful, when it is too late! were we asked to bring together the three most pathetic sentences in our tongue since lear asked the question, "and have his daughters brought him to this pass?" we should select swift's comment on the lock of stella, "only a woman's hair"; the cry of tennyson's rizpah, "the bones had moved in my side"; and carlyle's wail, "oh that i had you yet but for five minutes beside me, to tell you all!" but in answer we hear only the flapping of the folds of isis, "strepitumque acherontis avari." all of sunshine that remained in my life went out in that sudden moment. all of strength too often seems to have gone.... were it permitted, i would pray, but to whom? i can well understand the invocation of saints. one's prayer now has to be voiceless, done with the heart still, but also with the hands still more.... her birthday. she not here--i cannot keep it for her now, and send a gift to poor old betty, who next to myself remembers her in life-long love and sacred sorrow. this is all i can do.... time was to bring relief, said everybody; but time has not to any extent, nor, in truth, did i much wish him eurydicen vox ipsa et frigida lingua, eurydicen toto referebant flumine ripae. carlyle's pathos, far from being confined to his own calamity, was ready to awake at every touch. "i was walking with him," writes froude, "one sunday afternoon in battersea park. in the open circle among the trees was a blind man and his daughter, she singing hymns, he accompanying her on some instrument. we stood listening. she sang faber's 'pilgrims of the night.' the words were trivial, but the air, though simple, had something weird and unearthly about it. 'take me away,' he said, after a few minutes, 'i shall cry if i stay longer.'" the melancholy, "often as of deep misery frozen torpid," that runs through his writing, that makes him forecast death in life and paint the springs of nature in winter hue, the "hoarse sea," the "bleared skies," the sunsets "beautiful and brief and wae," compels our compassion in a manner quite different from the pictures of sterne, and de quincey, and other colour dramatists, because we feel it is as genuine as the melancholy of burns. both had the relief of humour, but burns only of the two was capable of gaiety. "look up there," said leigh hunt, pointing to the starry skies, "look at that glorious harmony that sings with infinite voices an eternal song of hope in the soul of man." "eh, it's a sair sicht," was the reply. we have referred to a few out of a hundred instances of carlyle's practical benevolence. to all deserving persons in misfortune he was a good samaritan, and like all benefactors the dupe of some undeserving. charity may be, like maternal affection, a form of self-indulgence, but it is so only to kind-hearted men. in all that relates to money carlyle's career is exemplary. he had too much common sense to affect to despise it, and was restive when he was underpaid; he knew that the labourer was worthy of his hire. but, after hacking for brewster he cannot be said to have ever worked for wages, his concern was rather with the quality of his work, and, regardless of results, he always did his best. a more unworldly man never lived; from his first savings he paid ample tributes to filial piety and fraternal kindness, and to the end of his life retained the simple habits in which he had been trained. he hated waste of all kinds, save in words, and carried his home frugalities even to excess. in writing to james aitken, engaged to his sister, "the craw," he says, "remember in marriage you have undertaken to do to others as you would wish they should do to you." but this rede he did not reck. "carlyle," writes longfellow, "was one of those men who sacrificed their happiness to their work"; the misfortune is that the sacrifice did not stop with himself. he seemed made to live with no one but himself. alternately courteous and cross-grained, all his dramatic power went into his creations; he could not put himself into the place of those near him. essentially perhaps the bravest man of his age, he would not move an inch for threat or flattery; centered in rectitude, conscience never made him a coward. he bore great calamities with the serenity of a marcus aurelius: his reception of the loss of his first volume of the _french revolution_ was worthy of sidney or of newton: his letters, when the successive deaths of almost all that were dearest left him desolate, are among the noblest, the most resigned, the most pathetic in biography. yet, says mr. froude, in a judgment which every careful reader must endorse: "of all men i have ever seen carlyle was the least patient of the common woes of humanity." "a positive christian," says mrs. carlyle, "in bearing others' pain, he was a roaring thor when himself pricked by a pin," and his biographer corroborates this: "if matters went well with himself, it never occurred to him that they could be going ill with any one else; and, on the other hand, if he were uncomfortable he required all the world to be uncomfortable along with him." he did his work with more than the tenacity of a prescott or a fawcett, but no man ever made more noise over it than this apostle of silence. "sins of passion he could forgive, but those of insincerity never." carlyle has no tinge of insincerity; his writing, his conversation, his life, are absolutely, dangerously, transparent. his utter genuineness was in the long run one of the sources of his success. he always, if we allow for a habit of rhetorical exaggeration, felt what he made others feel. sullen moods, and "words at random sent," those judging him from a distance can easily condone; the errors of a hot head are pardonable to one who, in his calmer hours, was ready to confess them. "your temptation and mine," he writes to his brother alexander, "is a tendency to imperiousness and indignant self-help; and, if no wise theoretical, yet, practical forgetfulness and tyrannical contempt of other men." his nicknaming mania was the inheritance of a family failing, always fostered by the mocking-bird at his side. humour, doubtless, ought to discount many of his criticisms. dean stanley, in his funeral sermon, charitably says, that in pronouncing the population of england to be "thirty millions, mostly fools," carlyle merely meant that "few are chosen and strait is the gate," generously adding--"there was that in him, in spite of his contemptuous descriptions of the people, which endeared him to those who knew him best. the idols of their market-place he trampled under foot, but their joys and sorrows, their cares and hopes, were to him revered things." another critic pleads for his discontent that it had in it a noble side, like that of faust, and that his harsh judgments of eminent men were based on the belief that they had allowed meaner to triumph over higher impulses, or influences of society to injure their moral fibre. this plea, however, fails to cover the whole case. carlyle's ignorance in treating men who moved in spheres apart from his own, as the leaders of science, definite theological enlightenment, or even poetry and arts, was an intellectual rather than a moral flaw; but in the implied assertion, "what i can't do is not worth doing," we have to regret the influence of an enormous egotism stunting enormous powers, which, beginning with his student days, possessed him to the last. the fame of newton, leibnitz, gibbon, whose works he came to regard as the spoon-meat of his "rude untutored youth," is beyond the range of his or of any shafts. when he trod on mazzini's pure patriot career, as a "rose-water imbecility," or maligned mill's intrepid thought as that of a mere machine, he was astray on more delicate ground, and alienated some of his truest friends. among the many curses of our nineteenth-century literature denounced by its leading censor, the worst, the want of loyalty among literary men, he fails to denounce because he largely shares in it. "no sadder proof," he declares, "can be given by a man of his own littleness than disbelief in great men," and no one has done more to retrieve from misconception the memories of heroes of the past; but rarely does either he or mrs. carlyle say a good word for any considerable english writer then living. it is true that he criticises, more or less disparagingly, all his own works, from _sartor,_ of which he remarks that "only some ten pages are fused and harmonious," to his self-entitled "rigmarole on the norse kings": but he would not let his enemy say so; nor his friend. mill's just strictures on the "nigger pamphlet" he treats as the impertinence of a boy, and only to emerson would he grant the privilege to hold his own. _per contra,_ he overestimated those who were content to be his echoes. material help he refused with a red indian pride; intellectual he used and slighted. he renders scant justice to those who had preceded him in his lines of historical investigation, as if they had been poachers on his premises, _e.g._ heath, the royalist writer of the commonwealth time, is "carrion heath": noble, a former biographer of cromwell, is "my reverend imbecile friend": his predecessors in _friedrich,_ as schlosser, preuss, ranke, förster, vehse, are "dark chaotic dullards whose books are mere blotches of printed stupor, tumbled mountains of marine stores "--criticism valueless even when it raises the laughter due to a pantomime. carlyle assailed three sets of people:-- . real humbugs, or those who had behaved, or whom he believed to have behaved, badly to him. . persons from whom he differed, or whom he could not understand--as shelley, keats, lamb, coleridge, and the leaders of physics and metaphysics. . persons who had befriended, but would not give him an unrestricted homage or an implicit following, as mill, mazzini, miss martineau, etc. the last series of assaults are hard to pardon. had his strictures been always just,--so winged with humorous epigram,--they would have blasted a score of reputations: as it is they have only served to mar his own. he was a typical scotch student of the better class, stung by the *_oistros_ of their ambitious competition and restless push, wanting in repose, never like a gentleman at wise with moral breadth of tomperament, too apt to note his superiority with the sneer, "they call this man as good as me," bacon, in one of his finest antitheses, draws a contrast between the love of excellence and the love of excelling. carlyle is possessed by both; he had none of the exaggerated caution which in others of his race is apt to degenerate into moral cowardice: but when he thought himself trod on he became, to use his own figure, "a rattlesnake," and put out fangs like those of the griffins curiously, if not sardonically, carved on the tombs of his family in the churchyard at ecclefechan. truth, in the sense of saying what he thought, was one of his ruling passions. to one of his brothers on the birth of a daughter, he writes, "train her to this, as the cornerstone of all morality, to stand by the truth, to abhor a lie as she does hell-fire." the "gates of hell" is the phrase of achilles; but carlyle has no real point of contact with the greek love of abstract truth. he objects that "socrates is terribly at ease in zion": he liked no one to be at ease anywhere. he is angry with walter scott because he hunted with his friends over the breezy heath instead of mooning alone over twilight moors. read scott's _memoirs_ in the morning, the _reminiscences_ at night, and dispute if you like about the greater genius, but never about the healthier, better, and larger man. hebraism, says matthew arnold, is the spirit which obeys the mandate, "walk by your light"; hellenism the spirit which remembers the other, "have a care your light be not darkness." the former prefers doing to thinking, the latter is bent on finding the truth it loves. carlyle is a hebraist unrelieved and unretrieved by the hellene. a man of inconsistencies, egotisms, alpine grandeurs and crevasses, let us take from him what the gods or protoplasms have allowed. his way of life, duly admired for its stern temperance, its rigidity of noble aim--eighty years spent in contempt of favour, plaudit, or reward,--left him austere to frailty other than his own, and wrapt him in the repellent isolation which is the wrong side of uncompromising dignity. he was too great to be, in the common sense, conceited. all his consciousness of power left him with the feeling of newton, "i am a child gathering shells on the shore": but what sense he had of fallibility arose from his glimpse of the infinite sea, never from any suspicion that, in any circumstances, he might be wrong and another mortal right: shelley's lines on byron-- the sense that he was greater than his kind had struck, methinks, his eagle spirit blind by gazing on its own exceeding light. fit him, like ruskin's verdict, "what can you say of carlyle but that he was born in the clouds and struck by the lightning?" which withers while it immortalises. [footnote: in the _times_ of february th , there appeared an interesting account of carlyle's daily routine. "no book hack could have surpassed the regularity and industry with which he worked early and late in his small attic. a walk before breakfast was part of the day's duties. at ten o'clock in the morning, whether the spirit moved him or not, he took up his pen and laboured hard until three o'clock. nothing, not even the opening of the morning letters, was allowed to distract him. then came walking, answering letters, and seeing friends.... in the evening he read and prepared for the work of the morrow."] chapter viii carlyle as man of letters, critic, and historian carlyle was so essentially a preacher that the choice of a profession made for him by his parents was in some measure justified; but he was also a keen critic, unamenable to ecclesiastic or other rule, a leader of the revolutionary spirit of the age, even while protesting against its extremes: above all, he was a literary artist. various opinions will continue to be held as to the value of his sermons; the excellence of his best workmanship is universally acknowledged. he was endowed with few of the qualities which secure a quick success--fluency, finish of style, the art of giving graceful utterance to current thought; he had in full measure the stronger if slower powers--sound knowledge, infinite industry, and the sympathetic insight of penetrative imagination--that ultimately hold the fastnesses of fame. his habit of startling his hearers, which for a time restricted, at a later date widened their circle. there is much, sometimes even tiresome, repetition in carlyle's work; the range of his ideas is limited, he plays on a few strings, with wonderfully versatile variations; in reading his later we are continually confronted with the "old familiar faces" of his earlier essays. but, after the perfunctory work for brewster he wrote nothing wholly commonplace; occasionally paradoxical to the verge of absurdity, he is never dull. setting aside his translations, always in prose,--often in verse,--masterpieces of their kind, he made his first mark in criticism, which may be regarded as a higher kind of translation: the great value of his work in this direction is due to his so regarding it. most criticism has for its aim to show off the critic; good criticism interprets the author. fifty years ago, in allusion to methods of reviewing, not even now wholly obsolete, carlyle wrote:-- the first and most convenient is for the reviewer to perch himself resolutely, as it were, on the shoulder of his author, and therefrom to show as if he commanded him and looked down upon him by natural superiority of stature. whatsoever the great man says or does the little man shall treat with an air of knowingness and light condescending mockery, professing with much covert sarcasm that this or that is beyond _his_ comprehension, and cunningly asking his readers if _they_ comprehend it. there is here perhaps some "covert sarcasm" directed against contemporaries who forgot that their mission was to pronounce on the merits of the books reviewed, and not to patronise their authors; it may be set beside the objection to jeffrey's fashion of saying, "i like this; i do not like that," without giving the reason why. but in this instance the writer did reck his own rede. the temptation of a smart critic is to seek or select legitimate or illegitimate objects of attack; and that carlyle was well armed with the shafts of ridicule is apparent in his essays as in his histories; superabundantly so in his letters and conversation. his examination of the _german playwrights_, of _taylor's german literature_, and his inimitable sketch of herr döring, the hapless biographer of richter, are as amusing as is macaulay's _coup de grâce_ to robert montgomery. but the graver critic would have us take to heart these sentences of his essay on voltaire:-- far be it from us to say that solemnity is an essential of greatness; that no great man can have other than a rigid vinegar aspect of countenance, never to be thawed or warmed by billows of mirth. there are things in this world to be laughed at as well as things to be admired. nevertheless, contempt is a dangerous element to sport in; a deadly one if we habitually live in it. the faculty of love, of admiration, is to be regarded as a sign and the measure of high souls; unwisely directed, it leads to many evils; but without it, there cannot be any good. ridicule, on the other hand, is the smallest of all faculties that other men are at pains to repay with any esteem.... its nourishment and essence is denial, which hovers only on the surface, while knowledge dwells far below,... it cherishes nothing but our vanity, which may in general be left safely enough to shift for itself. [footnote: as an estimate of voltaire this brilliant essay is inadequate. carlyle's maxim, we want to be told "not what is _not_ true but what _is_ true," prevented him from appreciating the great work of encyclopaedists.] we may compare with this one of the writer's numerous warnings to young men taking to literature, as to drinking, in despair of anything better to do, ending with the exhortation, "witty above all things, oh, be not witty"; or turn to the passage in the review of sir walter scott:-- is it with ease or not with ease that a man shall do his best in any shape; above all, in this shape justly named of soul's travail, working in the deep places of thought?... not so, now nor at any time.... virgil and tacitus, were they ready writers? the whole _prophecies of isaiah_ are not equal in extent to this cobweb of a review article. shakespeare, we may fancy, wrote with rapidity; but not till he had thought with intensity,... no easy writer he. neither was milton one of the mob of gentlemen that write with case. goethe tells us he "had nothing sent to him in his sleep," no page of his but he knew well how it came there. schiller--"konnte nie fertig werden"--never could get done. dante sees himself "growing lean" over his _divine comedy_; in stern solitary death wrestle with it, to prevail over it and do it, if his uttermost faculty may; hence too it is done and prevailed over, and the fiery life of it endures for evermore among men. no; creation, one would think, cannot be easy; your jove has severe pains and fire flames in the head, out of which an armed pallas is struggling! as for manufacture, that is a different matter.... write by steam if thou canst contrive it and sell it, but hide it like virtue. in these and frequent similar passages lies the secret of carlyle's slow recognition, long struggle, and ultimate success; also of his occasional critical intolerance. commander-in-chief of the "red artillery," he sets too little store on the graceful yet sometimes decisive charges of the light brigades of literature. he feels nothing but contempt for the banter of men like jerrold; despises the genial pathos of lamb; and salutes the most brilliant wit and exquisite lyrist of our century with the puritanical comment, "blackguard heine." he deified work as he deified strength; and so often stimulated his imitators to attempt to leap beyond their shadows. hard work will not do everything: a man can only accomplish what he was born fit for. many, in the first flush of ambition doomed to wreck, are blind to the fact that it is not in every ploughman to be a poet, nor in every prize-student to be a philosopher. nature does half: after all perhaps the larger half. genius has been inadequately defined as "an infinite capacity for taking trouble"; no amount of pumping can draw more water than is in the well. himself in "the chamber of little ease," carlyle travestied goethe's "worship of sorrow" till it became a pride in pain. he forgot that rude energy requires restraint. hercules furens and orlando furioso did more than cut down trees; they tore them up; but to no useful end. his power is often almost miltonic; it is never shakespearian; and his insistent earnestness would run the risk of fatiguing us were it not redeemed by his humour. but he errs on the better side; and his example is a salutary counteractive in an age when the dust of so many skirmishers obscures the air, and laughter is too readily accepted as the test of truth, his stern conception of literature accounts for his exaltations of the ideal, and denunciations of the actual, profession of letters in passages which, from his habit of emphasising opposite sides of truth, instead of striking a balance, appear almost side by side in contradiction. the following condenses the ideal:-- if the poor and humble toil that we have food, must not the high and glorious toil for him in return, that he may have guidance, freedom, immortality? these two in all degrees i honour; all else is chaff and dust, which let the wind blow whither it listeth. doubt, desire, sorrow, remorse, indignation, despair itself--all these like hell-hounds lie beleaguering the souls of the poor day worker as of every man; but he bends himself with free valour against his task, and all these are stifled--all these shrink murmuring far off in their caves. against this we have to set innumerable tirades on the crime of worthless writing, _e.g._-- no mortal has a right to wag his tongue, much less to wag his pen, without saying something; he knows not what mischief he does, past computation, scattering words without meaning, to afflict the whole world yet before they cease. for thistle-down flies abroad on all winds and airs of wind.... ship-loads of fashionable novels, sentimental rhymes, tragedies, farces ... tales by flood and field are swallowed monthly into the bottomless pool; still does the press toil,... and still in torrents rushes on the great army of publications to their final home; and still oblivion, like the grave, cries give! give! how is it that of all these countless multitudes no one can ... produce ought that shall endure longer than "snowflake on the river? because they are foam, because there is no reality in them. . . ." not by printing ink alone does man live. literature, as followed at present, is but a species of brewing or cooking, where the cooks use poison and vend it by telling innumerable lies. these passages owe their interest to the attestation of their sincerity by the writer's own practice. "do not," he counsels one of his unknown correspondents, "take up a subject because it is singular and will get you credit, but because you _love_ it;" and he himself acted on the rule. nothing more impresses the student of carlyle's works than his _thoroughness._ he never took a task in hand without the determination to perform it to the utmost of his ability; consequently when he satisfied himself that he was master of his subject he satisfied his readers; but this mastery was only attained, as it is only attainable, by the most rigorous research. he seems to have written down his results with considerable fluency: the molten ore flowed freely forth, but the process of smelting was arduous. the most painful part of literary work is not the actual composition, but the accumulation of details, the wearisome compilation of facts, weighing of previous criticisms, the sifting of the grains of wheat from the bushels of chaff. this part of his task carlyle performed with an admirable conscientiousness. his numerous letters applying for out-of-the-way books to buy or borrow, for every pamphlet throwing light on his subject, bear testimony to the careful exactitude which rarely permitted him to leave any record unread or any worthy opinion untested about any event of which or any person of whom he undertook to write. from templand ( ) he applies for seven volumes of beaumarchais, three of bassompierre, the memoirs of abbé georgel, and every attainable account of cagliostro and the countess de la motte, to fuse into _the diamond necklace._ to write the essay on _werner_ and the _german playwrights_ he swam through seas of trash. he digested the whole of _diderot_ for one review article. he seems to have read through _jean paul richter,_ a feat to accomplish which germans require a special dictionary. when engaged on the civil war he routed up a whole shoal of obscure seventeenth-century papers from yarmouth, the remnant of a yet larger heap, "read hundredweights of dreary books," and endured "a hundred museum headaches." in grappling with _friedrich_ he waded through so many gray historians that we can forgive his sweeping condemnation of their dulness. he visited all the scenes and places of which he meant to speak, from st. ives to prague, and explored the battlefields. work done after this fashion seldom brings a swift return; but if it is utilised and made vivid by literary genius it has a claim to permanence. bating a few instances where his sense of proportion is defective, or his eccentricity is in excess, carlyle puts his ample material to artistic use; seldom making ostentation of detail, but skilfully concentrating, so that we read easily and readily recall what he has written. almost everything he has done has made a mark: his best work in criticism is final, it does not require to be done again. he interests us in the fortunes of his leading characters: _first_, because he feels with them; _secondly_, because he knows how to distinguish the essence from the accidents of their lives, what to forget and what to remember, where to begin and where to stop. hence, not only his set biographies, as of schiller and of sterling, but the shorter notices in his essays, are intrinsically more complete and throw more real light on character than whole volumes of ordinary memoirs. with the limitations above referred to, and in view of his antecedents, the range of carlyle's critical appreciation is wonderfully wide. often perversely unfair to the majority of his english contemporaries, the scales seem to fall from his eyes in dealing with the great figures of other nations. the charity expressed in the saying that we should judge men, not by the number of their faults, but by the amount of their deflection from the circle, great or small, that bounds their being, enables him often to do justice to those most widely differing in creed, sentiment, and lines of activity from one another and from himself. when treating congenial themes he errs by overestimate rather than by depreciation: among the qualities of his early work, which afterwards suffered some eclipse in the growth of other powers, is its flexibility. it was natural for carlyle, his successor in genius in the scotch lowlands, to give an account of robert burns which throws all previous criticism of the poet into the shade. similarly he has strong affinities to johnson, luther, knox, cromwell, to all his so-called heroes: but he is fair to the characters, if not always to the work, of voltaire and diderot, slurs over or makes humorous the escapades of mirabeau, is undeterred by the mysticism of novalis, and in the fervour of his worship fails to see the gulf between himself and goethe. carlyle's essays mark an epoch, _i.e._ the beginning of a new era, in the history of british criticism. the able and vigorous writers who contributed to the early numbers of the _edinburgh_ and _quarterly reviews_ successfully applied their taste and judgment to such works as fell within their sphere, and could be fairly tested by their canons; but they passed an alien act on everything that lay beyond the range of their insular view. in dealing with the efforts of a nation whose literature, the most recent in europe save that of russia, had only begun to command recognition, their rules were at fault and their failures ridiculous. if the old formulas have been theoretically dismissed, and a conscientious critic now endeavours to place himself in the position of his author, the change is largely due to the influence of carlyle's _miscellanies._ previous to their appearance, the literature of germany, to which half of these papers are devoted, had been (with the exception of sir walter scott's translation of _goetz von berlichingen,_ de quincey's travesties, and taylor's renderings from lessing) a sealed book to english readers, save those who were willing to breathe in an atmosphere of coleridgean mist. carlyle first made it generally known in england, because he was the first fully to apprehend its meaning. the _life of schiller,_ which the author himself depreciated, remains one of the best of comparatively short biographies, it abounds in admirable passages (conspicuously the contrast between the elder and the younger of the dioscuri at weimar) and has the advantage to some readers of being written in classical english prose. to the essays relating to germany, which we may accept as the _disjecta membra_ of the author's unpublished history, there is little to add. in these volumes we have the best english account of the nibelungen lied--the most graphic, and in the main most just analyses of the genius of heyne, rchter, novalis, schiller, and, above all, of goethe, who is recorded to have said, "carlyle is almost more at home in our literature than ourselves." with the germans he is on his chosen ground; but the range of his sympathies is most apparent in the portrait gallery of eighteenth-century frenchmen that forms, as it were, a proscenium to his first great history. among other papers in the same collection the most prominent are the _signs of the times_ and _characteristics,_ in which he first distinctly broaches some of his peculiar views on political philosophy and life. the scope and some of the limitations of carlyle's critical power are exhibited in his second series of lectures, delivered in , when (_æt_. ) he had reached the maturity of his powers. the first three of these lectures, treating of ancient history and literature, bring into strong relief the speaker's inadequate view of greek thought and civilisation:-- greek transactions had never anything alive, no result for us, they were dead entirely ... all left is a few ruined towers, masses of stone and broken statuary.... the writings of socrates are made up of a few wire-drawn notions about virtue; there is no conclusion, no word of life in him. [footnote: though a mere reproduction of the notes of mr. chisholm anstey, this posthumous publication is justified by its interest and obvious authenticity. the appearance in a prominent periodical (while these sheets are passing through the press) of _wotton reinfred_ is more open to question. this fragment of a romance, partly based on the plan of _wilhelm meister_, with shadowy love episodes recalling the manner of the "minerva press," can add nothing to carlyle's reputation.] these and similar dogmatic utterances are comments of the hebrew on the hellene. to the romans, "the men of antiquity," he is more just, dwelling on their agriculture and road-making as their "greatest work written on the planet;" but the only latin author he thoroughly appreciates is tacitus, "a colossus on edge of dark night." then follows an exaltation of the middle ages, in which "we see belief getting the victory over unbelief," in the strain of newman's _grammar of assent_. on the surrender of henry to hildebrand at canossa his approving comment is, "the clay that is about man is always sufficiently ready to assert its rights; the danger is always the other way, that the spiritual part of man will become overlaid with the bodily part." in the later struggle between the popes and the hohenstaufens his sympathy is with gregory and innocent. in the same vein is his praise of peter the hermit, whose motto was not the "action, action" of demosthenes, but, "belief, belief." in the brief space of those suggestive though unequal discourses the speaker allows awkward proximity to some of the self-contradictions which, even when scattered farther apart, perplex his readers and render it impossible to credit his philosophy with more than a few strains of consistent thought. in one page "the judgments of the heart are of more value than those of the head." in the next "morals in a man are the counterpart of the intellect that is in him." the middle ages were "a healthy age," and therefore there was next to no literature. "the strong warrior disdained to write." "actions will be preserved when all writers are forgotten." two days later, apropos of dante, he says, "the great thing which any nation can do is to produce great men.... when the vatican shall have crumbled to dust, and st. peter's and strassburg minster be no more; for thousands of years to come catholicism will survive in this sublime relic of antiquity--the _divina commedia."_ [footnote: it has been suggested that carlyle may have been in this instance a student of vauvenargues, who in the early years of the much- maligned eighteenth century wrote "les graudes pensées viennent du coeur."] passing to spain, carlyle salutes cervantes and the cid,--calling don quixote the "poetry of comedy," "the age of gold in self-mockery,"--pays a more reserved tribute to calderon, ventures on the assertion that cortes was "as great as alexander," and gives a sketch, so graphic that it might serve as a text for motley's great work, of the way in which the decayed iberian chivalry, rotten through with the inquisition, broke itself on the dutch dykes. after a brief outline of the rise of the german power, which had three avatars--the overwhelming of rome, the swiss resistance to austria, and the reformation--we have a rough estimate of some of the reformers. luther is exalted even over knox; erasmus is depreciated, while calvin and melanchthon are passed by. the chapter on the saxons, in which the writer's love of the sea appears in picturesque reference to the old rover kings, is followed by unusually commonplace remarks on earlier english literature, interspersed with some of carlyle's refrains. the mind is one, and consists not of bundles of faculties at all ... the same features appear in painting, singing, fighting ... when i hear of the distinction between the poet and the thinker, i really see no difference at all.... bacon sees, shakespeare sees through,... milton is altogether sectarian--a presbyterian one might say--he got his knowledge out of knox.... eve is a cold statue. coming to the well-belaboured eighteenth century--when much was done of which the nineteenth talks, and massive books were written that we are content to criticise--we have the inevitable denunciations of scepticism, materialism, argumentation, logic; the quotation, (referred to a motto "in the swiss gardens"), "speech is silvern, silence is golden," and a loud assertion that all great things are silent. the age is commended for watt's steam engine, arkwright's spinning jenny, and whitfield's preaching, but its policy and theories are alike belittled. the summaries of the leading writers are interesting, some curious, and a few absurd. on the threshold of the age dryden is noted "as a great poet born in the worst of times": addison as "an instance of one formal man doing great things": swift is pronounced "by far the greatest man of that time, not unfeeling," who "carried sarcasm to an epic pitch": pope, we are told, had "one of the finest heads ever known." sterne is handled with a tenderness that contrasts with the death sentence pronounced on him by thackeray, "much is forgiven him because he loved much,... a good simple being after all." johnson, the "much enduring," is treated as in the _heroes_ and the essay. hume, with "a far duller kind of sense," is commended for "noble perseverance and stoic endurance of failure; but his eye was not open to faith," etc. on which follows a stupendous criticism of gibbon, whom carlyle, returning to his earlier and juster view, ended by admiring. with all his swagger and bombast, no man ever gave a more futile account of human things than he has done of the _decline and fall of the roman empire_. the sketch of the pre-revolution period is slight, and marked by a somewhat shallow reference to rousseau. the last lecture on the recent german writers is a mere _réchauffé_ of the essays. carlyle closes with the famous passage from richter, one of those which indicate the influence in style as in thought of the german over the scotch humorist. "it is now the twelfth hour of the night, birds of darkness are on the wing, the spectres uprear, the dead walk, the living dream. thou, eternal providence, wilt cause the day to dawn." the whole volume is a testimony to the speaker's power of speech, to his often unsurpassed penetration, and to the hopeless variance of the often rapidly shifting streams of his thought. detailed criticism of carlyle's histories belongs to the sphere of separate disquisitions. here it is only possible to take note of their general characteristics. his conception of what history should be is shared with macaulay. both writers protest against its being made a mere record of "court and camp," of royal intrigue and state rivalry, of pageants of procession, or chivalric encounters. both find the sources of these outwardly obtrusive events in the underground current of national sentiment, the conditions of the civilisation from which they were evolved, the prosperity or misery of the masses of the people. the essence of history does not lie in laws, senate-houses, or battle-fields, but in the tide of thought and action--the world of existence that in gloom and brightness blossoms and fades apart from these. but carlyle differs from macaulay in his passion for the concrete. the latter presents us with pictures to illustrate his political theory; the former leaves his pictures to speak for themselves. "give him a fact," says emerson, "he loaded you with thanks; a theory, with ridicule or even abuse." it has been said that with carlyle history was philosophy teaching by examples. he himself defines it as "the essence of innumerable biographies." he individualises everything he meets; his dislike of abstractions is everywhere extreme. thus while other writers have expanded biography into history, carlyle condenses history into biography. even most biographies are too vague for him. he delights in boswell: he glides over their generalisations to pick out some previously obscure record from clarendon or hume. even in _the french revolution,_ where the author has mainly to deal with masses in tumult, he gives most prominence to their leaders. they march past us, labelled with strange names, in the foreground of the scene, on which is being enacted the death wrestle of old feudalism and young democracy. this book is unique among modern histories for a combination of force and insight only rivalled by the most incisive passages of the seventh book of thucydides, of tacitus, of gibbon, and of michelet. [footnote: _vide_ a comparison of carlyle and michelet in dr. oswald's interesting and suggestive little volume of criticism and selection, _thomas carlyle, ein lebensbild und goldkörner aus seinen werken._] _the french revolution_ is open to the charge of being a comment and a prophecy rather than a narrative: the reader's knowledge of the main events of the period is too much assumed for the purpose of a school book. even dryasdust will turn when trod on, and this book has been a happy hunting field to aggressive antiquarians, to whom the mistake of a day in date, the omission or insertion of a letter in a name, is of more moment than the difference between vitalising or petrifying an era. the lumber merchants of history are the born foes of historians who, like carlyle and mr. froude, have manifested their dramatic power of making the past present and the distant near. that the excess of this power is not always compatible with perfect impartiality may be admitted; for a poetic capacity is generally attended by heats of enthusiasm, and is liable to errors of detail; but without some share of it-- die zeiten der vergangenheit sind uns ein buch mit sieben siegeln. mere research, the unearthing and arrangement of what sir philip sidney calls "old moth-eaten records," supplies material for the work of the historian proper; and, occasionally to good purpose, corrects it, but, as a rule, with too much flourish. applying this minute criticism to _the french revolution,_ one reviewer has found that the author has given the wrong number to a regiment: another esteemed scholar has discovered that there are seven errors in the famous account of the flight to varennes, to wit:--the delay in the departure was due to bouille, not to the queen; she did not lose her way and so delay the start; ste. menehould is too big to be called a village; on the arrest, it was the queen who asked for hot water and eggs; the king only left the coach once; it went rather faster than is stated; and, above all, _infandum!_ it was not painted yellow, but green and black. this criticism does not in any degree detract from the value of one of the most vivid and substantially accurate narratives in the range of european literature. carlyle's object was to convey the soul of the revolution, not to register its upholstery. the annalist, be he dryasdust or gossip, is, in legal phrase, "the devil" of the prose artist, whose work makes almost as great a demand on the imaginative faculty as that of the poet. historiography is related to history as the chronicles of holinshed and the voyages of hakluyt to the plays of shakespeare, plays which marlborough confessed to have been the main source of his knowledge of english history. some men are born philologists or antiquarians; but, as the former often fail to see the books because of the words, so the latter cannot read the story for the dates. the mass of readers require precisely what has been contemptuously referred to as the "romance of history," provided it leaves with them an accurate impression, as well as an inspiring interest. save in his over-hasty acceptance of the french _blague_ version of "the sinking of the vengeur," carlyle has never laid himself open to the reproach of essential inaccuracy. as far as possible for a man of genius, he was a devotee of facts. he is never a careless, though occasionally an impetuous writer; his graver errors are those of emotional misinterpretation. it has been observed that, while contemning robespierre, he has extenuated the guilt of danton as one of the main authors of the september massacres, and, more generally, that "his quickness and brilliancy made him impatient of systematic thought." but his histories remain the best illuminations of fact in our language. _the french revolution_ is a series of flame-pictures; every page is on fire; we read the whole as if listening to successive volleys of artillery: nowhere has such a motley mass been endowed with equal life. this book alone vindicates lowell's panegyric: "the figures of most historians seem like dolls stuffed with bran, whose whole substance runs through any hole that criticism may tear in them; but carlyle's are so real that if you prick them they bleed." when carlyle generalises, as in the introductions to his essays, he is apt to thrust his own views on his subject and on his readers; but, unlike de quincey, who had a like love of excursus, he comes to the point before the close. the one claimed the privilege, assumed by coleridge, of starting from no premises and arriving at no conclusion; the other, in his capacity as a critic, arrives at a conclusion, though sometimes from questionable premises. it is characteristic of his habit of concentrating, rather than condensing, that carlyle abandoned his design of a history of the civil wars for _oliver cromwell's letters and speeches._ the events of the period, whose issues the writer has firmly grasped, are brought into prominence mainly as they elucidate the career of his hero; but the "elucidations" have been accepted, with a few reservations, as final. no other work has gone so far to reverse a traditional estimate. the old current conceptions of the protector are refuted out of his own mouth; but it was left for his editor to restore life to the half-forgotten records, and sweep away the clouds that obscured their revelations of a great though rugged character. _cromwell_ has been generally accepted in scotland as carlyle's masterpiece--a judgment due to the fact of its being, among the author's mature works, the least apparently opposed to the theological views prevalent in the north of our island. in reality--though containing some of his finest descriptions and battle-pieces, conspicuously that of "dunbar"--it is the least artistic of his achievements, being overladen with detail and superabounding in extract. a good critic has said that it was a labour of love, like spedding's _bacon;_ but that the correspondence, lavishly reproduced in both works, has "some of the defects of lovers' letters for those to whom they are not addressed." [footnote: in _st. james' gazette,_ february th, .] carlyle has established that oliver was not a hypocrite, "not a man of falsehood, but a man of truth": he has thrown doubts on his being a fanatic; but he has left it open to m. guizot to establish that his later rule was a practical despotism. in _friedrich ii._ he undertook a yet greater task; and his work stretching over a wider arena, is, of necessity, more of a history, less of a biography, than any of his others. in constructing and composing it he was oppressed not only by the magnitude and complexity of his theme, but, for the first time, by hesitancies as to his choice of a hero. he himself confessed, "i never was admitted much to _friedrich's_ confidence, and i never cared very much about him." yet he determined, almost of malice prepense, to exalt the narrow though vivid prussian as "the last of the kings, the one genuine figure in the eighteenth century," and though failing to prove his case, he has, like a loyal lawyer, made the best of his brief. the book embodies and conveys the most brilliant and the most readable account of a great part of the century, and nothing he has written bears more ample testimony to the writer's pictorial genius. it is sometimes garrulous with the fluency of an old man eloquent; parts of the third volume, with its diffuse extracts from the king's survey of his realm, are hard if not weary reading; but the rest is a masterpiece of historic restoration. the introductory portion, leading us through one of the most tangled woods of genealogy and political adjustment, is relieved from tedium by the procession of the half-forgotten host of german worthies,--st. adalbert and his mission; old barbarossa; leopold's mystery; conrad and st. elizabeth; ptolemy alphonso; otto with the arrow; margaret with the mouth; sigismund _supra grammaticam_; augustus the physically strong; albert achilles and albert alcibiades; anne of cleves; mr. john kepler,--who move on the pages, more brightly "pictured" than those of livy, like marionettes inspired with life. in the main body of the book the men and women of the prussian court are brought before us in fuller light and shade. friedrich himself, at sans souci, with his cocked-hat, walking-stick and wonderful gray eyes; sophia charlotte's grace, wit, and music; wilhelmina and her book; the old hyperborean; the black artists seckendorf and grumkow; george i. and his blue-beard chamber; the little drummer; the old dessaner; the cabinet venus; grävenitz hecate; algarotti; goetz in his tower; the tragedy of katte; the immeasurable comedy of maupertuis, the flattener of the earth, and voltaire; all these and a hundred more are summoned by a wizard's wand from the land of shadows, to march by the central figures of these volumes; to dance, flutter, love, hate, intrigue, and die before our eyes. it is the largest and most varied showbox in all history; a prelude to a series of battle-pieces--rossbach, leuthen, molwitz, zorndorf--nowhere else, save in the author's own pages, approached in prose, and rarely rivalled out of homer's verse. carlyle's style, in the chiar-oscuro of which his histories and three-fourths of his essays are set, has naturally provoked much criticism and some objurgation. m. taine says it is "exaggerated and demoniacal." hallam could not read _the french revolution_ because of its "abominable" style, and wordsworth, whose own prose was perfectly limpid, is reported to have said, "no scotchman can write english. c---- is a pest to the language." [footnote: carlyle with equal unfairness disparaged hallam's _middle ages:--"eh, the poor miserable skeleton of a book," and regarded the _literature of europe_ as a valley of dry bones.] carlyle's style is not that of addison, of berkeley, or of helps; its peculiarities are due to the eccentricity of an always eccentric being; but it is neither affected nor deliberately imitated. it has been plausibly asserted that his earlier manner of writing, as in _schiller,_ under the influence of jeffrey, was not in his natural voice. "they forget," he said, referring to his critics, "that the style is the skin of the writer, not a coat: and the public is an old woman." erratic, metaphorical, elliptical to excess, and therefore a dangerous model, "the mature oaken carlylese style," with its freaks, "nodosities and angularities," is as set and engrained in his nature as the _birthmark_ in hawthorne's romance. to recast a chapter of the _revolution_ in the form of a chapter of macaulay would be like rewriting tacitus in the form of cicero, or browning in the form of pope. carlyle is seldom obscure, the energy of his manner is part of his matter; its abruptness corresponds to the abruptness of his thought, which proceeds often as it were by a series of electric shocks, that threaten to break through the formal restraints of an ordinary sentence. he writes like one who must, under the spell of his own winged words; at all hazards, determined to convey his meaning; willing, like montaigne, to "despise no phrase of those that run in the streets," to speak in strange tongues, and even to coin new words for the expression of a new emotion. it is his fashion to care as little for rounded phrase as for logical argument: and he rather convinces and persuades by calling up a succession of feelings than by a train of reasoning. he repeats himself like a preacher, instead of condensing like an essayist. the american thoreau writes in the course of an incisive survey:-- carlyle's ... mastery over the language is unrivalled; it is with him a keen, resistless weapon; his power of words is endless. all nature, human and external, is ransacked to serve and run his errands. the bright cutlery, after all the dross of birmingham has been thrown aside, is his style.... he has "broken the ice, and the torrent streams forth." he drives six-in-hand over ruts and streams and never upsets.... with wonderful art he grinds into paint for his picture all his moods and experiences, and crashes his way through shoals of dilettante opinions. it is not in man to determine what his style shall be, if it is to be his own. but though a rugged, carlyle was the reverse of a careless or ready writer. he weighed every sentence: if in all his works, from _sartor_ to the _reminiscences_, you pencil-mark the most suggestive passages you disfigure the whole book. his opinions will continue to be tossed to and fro; but as an artist he continually grows. he was, let us grant, though a powerful, a one-sided historian, a twisted though in some aspects a great moralist; but he was, in every sense, a mighty painter, now dipping his pencil "in the gloom of earthquake and eclipse," now etching his scenes with the tender touch of a millet. emerson, in one of his early letters to carlyle, wrote, "nothing seems hid from those wonderful eyes of yours; those devouring eyes; those thirsty eyes; those portrait-eating, portrait-painting eyes of thine." men of genius, whether expressing themselves in prose or verse, on canvas or in harmony, are, save when smitten, like beethoven, by some malignity of nature, endowed with keener physical senses than other men. they actually, not metaphorically, see more and hear more than their fellows. carlyle's super-sensitive ear was to him, through life, mainly a torment; but the intensity of his vision was that of a born artist, and to' it we owe the finest descriptive passages, if we except those of mr. ruskin, in english prose. none of our poets, from chaucer and dunbar to burns and tennyson, has been more alive to the influences of external nature. his early letters abound in passages like the following, on the view from arthur's seat:-- the blue, majestic, everlasting ocean, with the fife hills swelling gradually into the grampians behind; rough crags and rude precipices at our feet (where not a hillock rears its head unsung) with edinburgh at their base clustering proudly over her rugged foundations and covering with a vapoury mantle the jagged black masses of stonework that stretch far and wide, and show like a city of faeryland.... i saw it all last evening when the sun was going down, and the moon's fine crescent, like a pretty silver creature as it is, was riding quietly above me. compare with this the picture, in a letter to sterling, of middlebie burn, "leaping into its cauldron, singing a song better than pasta's"; or that of the scaur water, that may be compared with tennyson's verses in the valley of cauteretz; or the sketches of the flemish cities in the tour of , with the photograph of the lace-girl, recalling sterne at his purest; or the account of the "atmosphere like silk" over the moor, with the phrase, "it was as if pan slept"; or the few lines written at thurso, where "the sea is always one's friend"; or the later memories of mentone, old and new, in the _reminiscences_ (vol. ii. pp. - ). the most striking of those descriptions are, however, those in which the interests of some thrilling event or crisis of human life or history steal upon the scene, and give it a further meaning, as in the dim streak of dawn rising over st. abb's head on the morning of dunbar, or in the following famous apostrophe:-- o evening sun of july, how at this hour thy beams fall slant on reapers amid peaceful, woody fields; on old women spinning in cottages; on ships far out in the silent main; on balls at the orangerie at versailles, where high-rouged dames of the palace are even now dancing with double-jacketed hussar officers;--and also on this roaring hell-porch of an hôtel-de-ville. carlyle is, here and there, led astray by the love of contrast; but not even heinrich heine has employed antithesis with more effect than in the familiar passage on the sleeping city in _sartor_, beginning, "ach mein lieber ... it is a true sublimity to dwell here," and ending, "but i, mein werther, sit above it all. i am alone with the stars." his thought, seldom quite original, is often a resuscitation or survival, and owes much of its celebrity to its splendid brocade. _sartor resartus_ itself escaped the failure that was at first threatened by its eccentricity partly from its noble passion, partly because of the truth of the "clothes philosophy," applied to literature as to life. his descriptions, too often caricatures, of men are equally vivid. they set the whole great mass of _friedrich_ in a glow; they lighten the tedium of _cromwell's_ lumbering despatches; they give a heart of fire to _the french revolution_. dickens's _tale of two cities_ attempts and fulfils on a smaller what carlyle achieved on a greater scale. the historian makes us sympathise with the real actors, even more than the novelist does with the imaginary characters on the same stage. from the account of the dying louis xv. to the "whiff of grapeshot" which closed the last scene of the great drama, there is not a dull page. théroigne de méricourt, marat, danton, camille desmoulins, mirabeau, robespierre, talleyrand, mdme. roland, above all marie antoinette--for whom carlyle has a strong affection--and buonaparte, so kindle and colour the scene that we cannot pause to feel weary of the phrases with which they are labelled. the author's letters show the same power of baptizing, which he used often to unfair excess. we can no more forget count d'orsay as the "phoebus apollo of dandyism," daniel webster's "brows like cliffs and huge black eyes," or wordsworth "munching raisins" and recognising no poet but himself, or maurice "attacked by a paroxysm of mental cramp," than we can dismiss from our memories "the glass coachman" or "the tobacco parliament." carlyle quotes a saying of richter, that luther's words were half battles; he himself compares those of burns to cannon-balls; much of his own writing is a fusilade. all three were vehement in abuse of things and persons they did not like; abuse that might seem reckless, if not sometimes coarse, were it not redeemed, as the rogueries of falstaff are, by strains of humour. the most protean quality of carlyle's genius is his humour: now lighting up the crevices of some quaint fancy, now shining over his serious thought like sunshine over the sea, it is at its best as finely quaint as that of cervantes, more humane than swift's. there is in it, as in all the highest humour, a sense of apparent contrast, even of contradiction, in life, of matter for laughter in sorrow and tears in joy. he seems to check himself, and as if afraid of wearing his heart in his sleeve, throws in absurd illustrations of serious propositions, partly to show their universal range, partly in obedience to an instinct of reserve, to escape the reproach of sermonising and to cut the story short. carlyle's grotesque is a mode of his golden silence, a sort of socratic irony, in the indulgence of which he laughs at his readers and at himself. it appears now in the form of transparent satire, ridicule of his own and other ages, now in droll reference or mock heroic detail, in an odd conception, a character sketch, an event in parody, in an antithesis or simile,--sometimes it lurks in a word, and again in a sentence. in direct pathos--the other side of humour--he is equally effective. his denunciations of sentiment remind us of plato attacking the poets, for he is at heart the most emotional of writers, the greatest of the prose poets of england; and his dramatic sympathy extends alike to the actors in real events and to his ideal creations. few more pathetic passages occur in literature than his "stories of the deaths of kings." the following among the less known of his eloquent passages is an apotheosis of their burials:-- in this manner did the men of the eastern counties take up the slain body of their edmund, where it lay cast forth in the village of hoxne; seek out the severed head and reverently reunite the same. they embalmed him with myrrh and sweet spices, with love, pity, and all high and awful thoughts; consecrating him with a very storm of melodious, adoring admiration, and sun-dried showers of tears; joyfully, yet with awe (as all deep joy has something of the awful in it), commemorating his noble deeds and godlike walk and conversation while on earth. till, at length, the very pope and cardinals at rome were forced to hear of it; and they, summing up as correctly as they well could, with _advocatus diaboli_ pleadings and other forms of process, the general verdict of mankind, declared that he had in very fact led a hero's life in this world: and, being now gone, was gone, as they conceived, to god above and reaping his reward there. such, they said, was the best judgment they could form of the case, and truly not a bad judgment. carlyle's reverence for the past makes him even more apt to be touched by its sorrows than amused by its follies. with a sense of brotherhood he holds out hands to all that were weary; he feels even for the pedlars climbing the hohenzollern valley, and pities the solitude of soul on the frozen schreckhorn of power, whether in a dictator of paraguay or in a prussian prince. he leads us to the death chamber of louis xv., of mirabeau, of cromwell, of sterling, his own lost friend; and we feel with him in the presence of a solemnising mystery. constantly, amid the din of arms or words, and the sarcasms by which he satirises and contemns old follies and idle strifes, a gentler feeling wells up in his pages like the sound of the angelus. such pauses of pathos are the records of real or fanciful situations, as of teufelsdröckh "left alone with the night" when blumine and herr towgood ride down the valley; of oliver recalling the old days at st. ives; of the electress louisa bidding adieu to her elector. at the moment of her death, it is said, when speech had fled, he felt from her hand, which lay in his, three slight slight pressures--farewell thrice mutely spoken in that manner, not easily to forget in this world. there is nothing more pathetic in the range of his works, if in that of our literature, than the account of the relations of father and son in the domestic history of the prussian court, from the first estrangement between them--the young friedrich in his prison at cüstrin, the old friedrich gliding about seeking shelter from ghosts, mourning for absalom--to the reconciliation, the end, and the afterthoughts:-- the last breath of friedrich wilhelm having fled, friedrich hurried to a private room; sat there all in tears; looking back through the gulfs of the past, upon such a father now rapt away for ever. sad all and soft in the moonlight of memory--the lost loved one all in the right as we now see, we all in the wrong!--this, it appears, was the son's fixed opinion. sever, years hence here is how friedrich concludes the _history_ of his father, written with a loyal admiration throughout: "we have left under silence the domestic chagrins of this great prince; readers must have some indulgence for the faults of the children, in consideration of the virtues of such a father." all in tears he sits at present, meditating these sad things. in a little while the old dessauer, about to leave for dessau, ventures in to the crown prince, crown prince no longer; "embraces his knees," offers weeping his condolence, his congratulation; hopes withal that his sons and he will be continued in their old posts, and that he the old dessauer "will have the same authority as in the late reign." friedrich's eyes, at this last clause, flash out tearless, strangely olympian. "in your posts i have no thought of making change; in your posts yes; and as to authority i know of none there can be but what resides in the king that is sovereign," which, as it were, struck the breath out of the old dessauer; and sent him home with a painful miscellany of feelings, astonishment not wanting among them. at an after hour the same night friedrich went to berlin, met by acclamation enough. he slept there not without tumult of dreams, one may fancy; and on awakening next morning the first sound he heard was that of the regiment glasenap under his windows, swearing fealty to the new king. he sprang out of bed in a tempest of emotion; bustled distractedly to and fro, wildly weeping. pöllnitz, who came into the anteroom, found him in this state, "half-dressed, with dishevelled hair, in tears, and as if beside himself." "these huzzahings only tell me what i have lost," said the new king. "he was in great suffering," suggested pöllnitz; "he is now at rest." true, he suffered; but he was here with us; and now----! carlyle has said of dante's _francesco_ "that it is a thing woven as of rainbows on a ground of eternal black." the phrase, well applied to the _inferno_, is a perhaps half-conscious verdict on his own tenderness as exhibited in his life and in his works. chapter ix carlyle's political philosophy one of the subtlest of robert browning's critics, in the opening sentence of his work, quotes a saying of hegel's, "a great man condemns the world to the task of explaining him"; adding, "the condemnation is a double one, and it generally falls heaviest on the great man himself who has to submit to explanation." cousin, the graceful eclectic, is reported to have said to the great philosopher, "will you oblige me by stating the results of your teaching in a few sentences?" and to have received the reply, "it is not easy, especially in french." [footnote: _browning as a philosophical and religious teacher,_ by professor henry jones, of st. andrews.] the retort applies, with severity, to those who attempt to systematise carlyle; for he himself was, as we have seen, intolerant of system. his mathematical attainment and his antipathy to logical methods beyond the lines of square and circle, his love of concise fact and his often sweeping assertions are characteristic of the same contradictions in his nature as his almost tyrannical premises and his practically tender-hearted conclusions. a hard thinker, he was never a close reasoner; in all that relates to human affairs he relies on nobility of feeling rather than on continuity of thought. claiming the full latitude of the prophet to warn, exhort, even to command, he declines either to preach or to accept the rubric of the partisan or of the priest. in praise of german literature, he remarks, "one of its chief qualities is that it has no particular theory at all on the front of it;" and of its leaders, "i can only speak of the revelations these men have made to me. as to their doctrines, there is nothing definite or precise to be said"; yet he asserts that goethe, richter, and the rest, took him "out of the blackness and darkness of death." this is nearly the feeling that his disciples of forty years ago entertained towards himself; but their discipleship has rarely lasted through life. they came to his writings, inspired by the youthful enthusiasm that carries with it a vein of credulity, intoxicated by their fervour as by new wine or mountain air, and found in them the key of the perennial riddle and the solution of the insoluble mystery. but in later years the curtain to many of them became the picture. when carlyle was first recognised in london as a rising author, curiosity was rife as to his "opinions"; was he a chartist at heart or an absolutist, a calvinist like knox, a deist like hume, a feudalist with scott, or a democrat with burns--inquisitions mostly vain. he had come from the scotch moors and his german studies, a strange element, into the midst of an almost foreign society, not so much to promulgate a new set of opinions as to infuse a new life into those already existing. he claimed to have a "mission," but it was less to controvert any form of creed than to denounce the insufficiency of shallow modes of belief. he raised the tone of literature by referring to higher standards than those currently accepted; he tried to elevate men's minds to the contemplation of something better than themselves, and impress upon them the vacuity of lip-services; he insisted that the matter of most consequence was the grip with which they held their convictions and their willingness to sacrifice the interests on which they could lay their hands, in loyalty to some nobler faith. he taught that beliefs by hearsay are not only barren but obstructive; that it is only when half-gods go, the gods arrive. but his manner of reading these important lessons admitted the retort that he himself was content rather to dwell on what is _not_ than to discover what _is_ true. belief, he reiterates, is the cure for all the worst of human ills; but belief in what or in whom? in "the eternities and immensities," as an answer, requires definition. it means that we are not entitled to regard ourselves as the centres of the universe; that we are but atoms of space and time, with relations infinite beyond our personalities; that the first step to a real recognition of our duties is the sense of our inferiority to those above us, our realisation of the continuity of history and life, our faith and acquiescence in some universal law. this truth, often set forth by saint, by sage, by preacher, and by poet, no one has enforced with more eloquence than carlyle; but though he founded a dynasty of ideas, they are comparatively few; like a group of strolling players, each with a well-filled wardrobe, and ready for many parts. the difficulty of defining carlyle results not merely from his frequent golden nebulosity, but from his love of contradicting even himself. dr. johnson confessed to boswell that when arguing in his dreams he was often worsted and took credit for the resignation with which he bore these defeats, forgetting that the victor and the vanquished were one and the same. similarly his successor took liberties with himself which he would allow to no one else, and in doing so he has taken liberties with his reader. his praise and blame of the profession of letters, as the highest priesthood and the meanest trade; his early exaltation of "the writers of newspapers, pamphlets, books," as "the real effective working church of a modern country"; and his later expressed contempt for journalism as "mean and demoralising"--"we must destroy the faith in newspapers"; his alternate faith and unfaith in individualism; the teaching of the _characteristics_ and the _signs of the times_ that all healthy genius is unconscious, and the censure of sir walter scott for troubling himself too little with mysteries; his commendation of "the strong warrior" for writing no books, and his taking sides with the mediæval monks against the kings--there is no reconciliation of such contradictories. they are the expression of diverse moods and emphatically of different stages of mental progress, the later, as a rule, more negative than the earlier. this change is most marked in the sphere of politics. at the close of his student days carlyle was to all intents a radical, and believed in democracy; he saw hungry masses around him, and, justly attributing some of their suffering to misgovernment, vented his sympathetic zeal for the oppressed in denunciation of the oppressors. [footnote: passage quoted (chap. ii.) about the glasgow radical rising in .] he began not only by sympathising with the people, but by believing in their capacity to manage best their own affairs: a belief that steadily waned as he grew older until he denied to them even the right to choose their rulers. as late, however, as , he argued against irving's conservatism in terms recalled in the _reminiscences_. "he objected clearly to my reform bill notions, found democracy a thing forbidden, leading even to outer darkness: i a thing inevitable and obliged to lead whithersoever it could." during the same period he clenched his theory by taking a definite side in the controversy of the age. "this," he writes to macvey napier, "this is the day when the lords are to reject the reform bill. the poor lords can only accelerate (by perhaps a century) their own otherwise inevitable enough abolition." the political part of _sartor resartus_, shadowing forth some scheme of well-organised socialism, yet anticipates, especially in the chapter on _organic filaments_, the writer's later strain of belief in dukes, earls, and marshals of men: but this work, religious, ethical, and idyllic, contains mere vague suggestions in the sphere of practical life. about this time carlyle writes of liberty: "what art thou to the valiant and the brave when thou art thus to the weak and timid, dearer than life, stronger than death, higher than purest love?" and agrees with the verdict, "the slow poison of despotism is worse than the convulsive struggles of anarchy." but he soon passed from the mood represented by emily brontë to that of the famous apostrophe of madame roland. he proclaimed that liberty to do as we like is a fatal license, that the only true liberty is that of doing what is right, which he interprets living under the laws enacted by the wise. mrs. austin in wrote to mrs. carlyle, "i am that monster made up of all the whigs hate--a radical and an absolutist." the expression, at the time, accurately defined carlyle's own political position: but he shifted from it, till the absolutist, in a spirit made of various elements, devoured the radical. the leading counsel against the aristocracy changed his brief and became chief advocate on their side, declaring "we must recognise the hereditary principle if there is to be any fixity in things." in , he says to emerson:-- i believe literature to be as good as dead ... and nothing but hungry revolt and radicalism appointed us for perhaps three generations.... i suffer also terribly from the solitary existence i have all along had; it is becoming a kind of passion with me to feel myself among my brothers. and then how? alas i care not a doit for radicalism, nay, i feel it to be a wretched necessity unfit for me; conservatism being not unfit only but false for me: yet these two are the grand categories under which all english spiritual activity, that so much as thinks remuneration possible, must range itself. and somewhat later-- people accuse me, not of being an incendiary sansculotte, but of being a tory, thank heaven! some one has written with a big brush, "he who is not a radical in his youth is a knave, he who is not a conservative in his age is a fool." the rough, if not rude, generalisation has been plausibly supported by the changes in the mental careers of burke, coleridge, southey, and wordsworth. but carlyle was "a spirit of another sort," of more mixed yarn; and, as there is a vein of conservatism in his early radicalism, so there is, as also in the cases of landor and even of goethe, still a revolutionary streak in his later conservatism. consequently, in his instance, there is a plea in favour of the prepossession (especially strong in scotland) which leads the political or religious party that a distinguished man has left still to persist in claiming him; while that which he has joined accepts him, if at all, with distrust. scotch liberals will not give up carlyle, one of his biographers keenly asseverating that he was to the last "a democrat at heart"; while the representative organ of northern conservatism on the same ground continues to assail him--"mit der dummheit kämpfen götter selbst vergebens." on all questions directly bearing on the physical welfare of the masses of the people, his speech and action remained consistent with his declaration that he had "never heard an argument for the corn laws which might not make angels weep." from first to last he was an advocate of free trade--though under the constant protest that the greatness of a nation depended in a very minor degree on the abundance of its possessions--and of free, unsectarian, and compulsory education. while, in theology, though remote from either, he was more tolerant of the dogmatic narrowness of the low church of the lower, than of the ritualism of the upper, classes. his unwavering interest in the poor and his belief that legislation should keep them in constant view, was in accord with the spirit of bentham's standard: but carlyle, rightly or wrongly, came to regard the bulk of men as children requiring not only help and guidance but control. on the question of "the suffrage" he completely revolved. it appears, from the testimony of mr. froude, that the result of the reform bill of disappointed him in merely shifting power from the owners of land to the owners of shops, and leaving the handicraftsmen and his own peasant class no better off. before a further extension became a point of practical politics he had arrived at the conviction that the ascertainment of truth and the election of the fittest did not lie with majorities. these sentences of represent a transition stage:-- conservatism i cannot attempt to conserve, believing it to be a portentous embodied sham.... whether the tories stay out or in, it will be all for the advance of radicalism, which means revolt, dissolution, and confusion and a darkness which no man can see through. no one had less faith in the paean chanted by macaulay and others on the progress of the nation or of the race, a progress which, without faith in great men, was to him inevitably downward; no one protested with more emphasis against the levelling doctrines of the french revolution. it has been observed that carlyle's _chartism_ was "his first practical step in politics"; it is more true to say that it first embodied, with more than his usual precision, the convictions he had for some time held of the dangers of our social system; with an indication of some of the means to ward them off, based on the realisation of the interdependence of all classes in the state. this book is remarkable as containing his last, very partial, concessions to the democratic creed, the last in which he is willing to regard a wide suffrage as a possible, though by no means the best, expedient. subsequently, in _past and present_ and the _latter-day pamphlets_, he came to hold "that with every extension of the franchise those whom the voters would elect would be steadily inferior and more unfit." every stage in his political progress is marked by a growing distrust in the judgment of the multitude, a distrust set forth, with every variety of metaphor, in such sentences as the following:-- there is a divine message or eternal regulation of the universe. how find it? all the world answers me, "count heads, ask universal suffrage by the ballot-box and that will tell!" from adam's time till now the universe was wont to be of a somewhat abstruse nature, partially disclosing itself to the wise and noble-minded alone, whose number was not the majority. of what use towards the general result of finding out what it is wise to do, can the fools be? ... if of ten men nine are recognisable as fools, which is a common calculation, how in the name of wonder will you ever get a ballot-box to grind you out a wisdom from the votes of these ten men? ... only by reducing to zero nine of these votes can wisdom ever issue from your ten. the mass of men consulted at the hustings upon any high matter whatsoever, is as ugly an exhibition of human stupidity as this world sees.... if the question be asked and the answer given, i will generally consider in any case of importance, that the said answer is likely to be wrong, and that i have to go and do the reverse of the same ... for how should i follow a multitude to do evil? cease to brag to me of america and its model institutions.... on this side of the atlantic or on that, democracy is for ever impossible! the universe is a monarchy and a hierarchy, the noble in the high places, the ignoble in the low; this is in all times and in all places the almighty maker's law. democracy, take it where you will, is found a regulated method of rebellion, it abrogates the old arrangement of things, and leaves zero and vacuity. it is the consummation of no-government and _laissez faire_. alongside of this train of thought there runs a constant protest against the spirit of revolt. in _sartor_ we find: "whoso cannot obey cannot be free, still less bear rule; he that is the inferior of nothing can be the superior of nothing"; and in _chartism_-- men who rebel and urge the lower classes to rebel ought to have other than formulas to go upon, ... those to whom millions of suffering fellow-creatures are "masses," mere explosive masses for blowing down bastiles with, for voting at hustings for us--such men are of the questionable species.... obedience ... is the primary duty of man.... of all "rights of men" this right of the ignorant to be guided by the wiser, gently or forcibly--is the indisputablest.... cannot one discern, across all democratic turbulence, clattering of ballot-boxes, and infinite sorrowful jangle, that this is at bottom the wish and prayer of all human hearts everywhere, "give me a leader"? the last sentence indicates the transition from the merely negative aspect of carlyle's political philosophy to the positive, which is his hero-worship, based on the excessive admiration for individual greatness,--an admiration common to almost all imaginative writers, whether in prose or verse; on his notions of order and fealty, and on a reverence for the past, which is also a common property of poets. the old and middle ages, according to his view, had their chiefs, captains, kings, and waxed or waned with the increase or decrease of their loyality. democracy, the new force of our times, must in its turn be dominated by leaders. raised to independence over the arbitrary will of a multitude, these are to be trusted and followed, if need be, to death. your noblest men at the summit of affairs is the ideal world of poets.... other aim in this earth we have none. that we all reverence "great men" is to me the living rock amid all rushings down whatsoever. all that democracy ever meant lies there, the attainment of a truer aristocracy or government of the best. make search for the able man. how to get him is the question of questions. it is precisely the question to which carlyle never gives, and hardly attempts, a reply; and his failure to answer it invalidates the larger half of his politics. plato has at least detailed a scheme for eliminating his philosopher guardians, though it somewhat pedantically suggests a series of chinese examinations: his political, though probably unconscious disciple has only a few negative tests. the warrior or sage who is to rule is _not_ to be chosen by the majority, especially in our era, when they would choose the orators who seduce and "traduce the state"; nor are we ever told that the election is to rest with either under or upper house: the practical conclusion is that when we find a man of great force of character, whether representing our own opinions or the reverse, we should take him on trust. this brings us to the central maxim of carlyle's political philosophy, to which we must, even in our space, give some consideration, as its true meaning has been the theme of so much dispute. it is a misfortune of original thought that it is hardly ever put in practice by the original thinker. when his rank as a teacher is recognised, his words have already lost half their value by repetition. his manner is aped by those who find an easy path to notoriety in imitation; the belief he held near his heart is worn as a creed like a badge; the truth he promulgated is distorted in a room of mirrors, half of it is a truism, the other half a falsism. that which began as a denunciation of tea-table morality, is itself the tea-table morality of the next generation: an outcry against cant may become the quintessence of cant; a revolt from tyranny the basis of a new tyranny; the condemnation of sects the foundation of a new sect; the proclamation of peace a bone of contention. there is an ambiguity in most general maxims, and a seed of error which assumes preponderance over the truth when the interpreters of the maxim are men easily led by formulæ. nowhere is this degeneracy more strikingly manifested than in the history of some of the maxims which carlyle either first promulgated or enforced by his adoption. when he said, or quoted, "silence is better than speech," he meant to inculcate patience and reserve. always think before you speak: rather lose fluency than waste words: never speak for the sake of speaking. it is the best advice, but they who need it most are the last to take it; those who speak and write not because they have something to say, but because they wish to say or must say something, will continue to write and speak as long as they can spell or articulate. thoughtful men are apt to misapply the advice, and betray their trust when they sit still and leave the "war of words to those who like it." when carlyle condemned self-consciousness, a constant introspection and comparison of self with others, he theoretically struck at the root of the morbid moods of himself and other mental analysts; he had no intention to over-exalt mere muscularity or to deify athletic sports. it were easy to multiply instances of truths clearly conceived at first and parodied in their promulgation; but when we have the distinct authority of the discoverer himself for their correct interpretation, we can at once appeal to it. a yet graver, not uncommon, source of error arises when a great writer misapplies the maxims of his own philosophy, or states them in such a manner that they are sure to be misapplied. carlyle has laid down the doctrine that might is right at various times and in such various forms, with and without modification or caveat, that the real meaning can only be ascertained from his own application of it. he has made clear, what goes without saying, that by "might" he does not intend mere physical strength. of conquest we may say that it never yet went by brute force; conquest of that kind does not endure. the strong man, what is he? the wise man. his muscles and bones are not stronger than ours; but his soul is stronger, clearer, nobler.... late in man's history, yet clearly at length, it becomes manifest to the dullest that mind is stronger than matter, that not brute force, but only persuasion and faith, is the king of this world.... intellect has to govern this world and will do it. there are sentences which indicate that he means something more than even mental force; as in his diary (froude, iv. ), "i shall have to tell lecky, right is the eternal symbol of might"; and again in _chartism_, "might and right do differ frightfully from hour to hour; but give them centuries to try it, and they are found to be identical. the strong thing is the just thing. in kings we have either a divine right or a diabolic wrong." on the other hand, we read in _past and present_:-- savage fighting heptarchies: their lighting is an ascertainment who has the right to rule over them. and again-- clear undeniable right, clear undeniable might: _either_ of these, once ascertained, puts an end to battle. and elsewhere-- rights men have none save to be governed justly.... rights i will permit thee to call everywhere correctly articulated mights.... all goes by wager of battle in this world, and it is, well understood, the measure of all worth.... by right divine the strong and capable govern the weak and foolish.... strength we may say is justice itself. it is not left for us to balance those somewhat indefinite definitions. carlyle has himself in his histories illustrated and enforced his own interpretations of the summary views of his political treatises. there he has demonstrated that his doctrine, "might is right," is no mere unguarded expression of the truism that moral might is right. in his hands it implies that virtue is in all cases a property of strength, that strength is everywhere a property of virtue; that power of whatever sort having any considerable endurance, carries with it the seal and signal of its claim to respect, that whatever has established itself has, in the very act, established its right to be established. he is never careful enough to keep before his readers what he must himself have dimly perceived, that victory _by right_ belongs not to the force of will alone, apart from clear and just conceptions of worthy ends. even in its crude form, the maxim errs not so much in what it openly asserts as in what it implicitly denies. aristotle (the first among ancients to _question_ the institution of slavery, as carlyle has been one of the last of moderns to defend it) more guardedly admits that strength is in itself _a_ good,--[greek: kai estin aei to kratoun en uperochae agathoutinos],--but leaves it to be maintained that there are forms of good which do not show themselves in excess of strength. several of carlyle's conclusions and verdicts seem to show that he only acknowledges those types of excellence that have already manifested themselves as powers; and this doctrine (which, if adopted in earlier ages, would practically have left possession with physical strength) colours all his history and much of his biography. energy of any sort compels his homage. himself a titan, he shakes hands with all titans, gothic gods, knox, columbus, the fuliginous mirabeau, burly danton dying with "no weakness" on his lips. the fulness of his charity is for the errors of mohammed, cromwell, burns, napoleon i.,--whose mere belief in his own star he calls sincerity,--the atrocious francia, the norman kings, the jacobins, brandenburg despots; the fulness of his contempt for the conscientious indecision of necker, the girondists, the moderates of our own commonwealth. he condones all that ordinary judgments regard as the tyranny of conquest, and has for the conquered only a _væ victis._ in this spirit, he writes :-- m. thierry celebrates with considerable pathos the fate of the saxons; the fate of the welsh, too, moves him; of the celts generally, whom a fiercer race swept before them into the mountains, whither they were not worth following. what can we say, but that the cause which pleased the gods had in the end to please cato also? when all is said, carlyle's inconsistent optimism throws no more light than others have done on the apparent relapses of history, as the overthrow of greek civilisation, the long night of the dark ages, the spread of the russian power during the last century, or of continental militarism in the present. in applying the tests of success or failure we must bear in mind that success is from its very nature conspicuous. we only know that brave men have failed when they have had a "sacred bard." the good that is lost is, _ipso facto_, forgotten. we can rarely tell of greatness unrecognised, for the very fact of our being able to tell of it would imply a former recognition. the might of evil walks in darkness: we remember the martyrs who, by their deaths, ultimately drove the inquisition from england; not those whose courage quailed. "it was their fate," as a recent writer remarks, "that was the tragedy." reading carlyle's maxim between the lines of his chapter on the reformation, and noting that the inquisition triumphed in spain, while in austria, bavaria, and bohemia protestantism was stifled by stratagem or by force; that the massacre of st. bartholomew was successful; and that the revocation of the edict of nantes killed the france of henry iv., we see its limitations even in the long perspective of the past. let us, however, grant that in the ultimate issue the platonic creed, "justice is stronger than injustice," holds good. [footnote: _vide_ mill's _liberty_, chap. ii. pp. - ] it is when carlyle turns to politics and regards them as history accomplished instead of history in progress that his principle leads to the most serious error. no one has a more withering contempt for evil as meanness and imbecility; but he cannot see it in the strong hand. of two views, equally correct, "evil is weakness," such evil as sloth, and "corruptio optimi pessima," such evil as tyranny--he only recognises the first. despising the palpable anarchies of passion, he has no word of censure for the more settled form of anarchy which announced, "order reigns at warsaw." he refuses his sympathy to all unsuccessful efforts, and holds that if races are trodden under foot, they are [greek: phusei doulo dunamenoi allou einai] they who have allowed themselves to be subjugated deserve their fate. the cry of "oppressed nationalities" was to him mere cant. his providence is on the side of the big battalions, and forgives very violent means to an orderly end. to his credit he declined to acknowledge the right of louis napoleon to rule france; but he accepted the czars, and ridiculed mazzini till forced to admit, almost with chagrin, that he had, "after all," substantially succeeded. treason never prospers, what's the reason? that when it prospers, none dare call it treason. apprehending, on the whole more keenly than any of his contemporaries, the foundations of past greatness, his invectives and teaching lay athwart much that is best as well as much that is most hazardous in the new ideas of the age. because mental strength, endurance, and industry do not appear prominently in the negro race, he looks forward with satisfaction to the day when a band of white buccaneers shall undo toussaint l'ouverture's work of liberation in hayti, advises the english to revoke the emancipation act in jamaica, and counsels the americans to lash their slaves--better, he admits, made serfs and not saleable by auction--not more than is necessary to get from them an amount of work satisfactory to the anglo-saxon mind. similarly he derides all movements based on a recognition of the claims of weakness to consideration and aid. fallen cherub, to be weak is miserable, doing or suffering. the application of the maxim, "might is right," to a theory of government is obvious; the strongest government must be the best, _i.e._ that in which power, in the last resort supreme, is concentrated in the hands of a single ruler; the weakest, that in which it is most widely diffused, is the worst. carlyle in his address to the edinburgh students commends machiavelli for insight in attributing the preservation of rome to the institution of the dictatorship. in his _friedrich_ this view is developed in the lessons he directs the reader to draw from prussian history. the following conveys his final comparative estimate of an absolute and a limited monarchy:-- this is the first triumph of the constitutional principle which has since gone to such sublime heights among us--heights which we begin at last to suspect may be depths leading down, all men now ask whitherwards. a much-admired invention in its time, that of letting go the rudder or setting a wooden figure expensively to take care of it, and discovering that the ship would sail of itself so much the more easily. of all things a nation needs first to be drilled, and a nation that has not been governed by so-called tyrants never came to much in the world. among the currents of thought contending in our age, two are conspicuously opposed. the one says: liberty is an end not a mere means in itself; apart from practical results the crown of life. freedom of thought and its expression, and freedom of action, bounded only by the equal claim of our fellows, are desirable for their own sakes as constituting national vitality: and even when, as is sometimes the case, liberty sets itself against improvements for a time, it ultimately accomplishes more than any reforms could accomplish without it. the fewer restraints that are imposed from without on human beings the better: the province of law is only to restrain men from violently or fraudulently invading the province of other men. this view is maintained and in great measure sustained by j.s. mill in his _liberty_, the _areopagitica_ of the nineteenth century, and more elaborately if not more philosophically set forth in the comprehensive treatise of wilhelm von humboldt on _the sphere and duties of government_. these writers are followed with various reserves by grote, buckle, mr. herbert spencer, and by mr. lecky. mill writes:-- the idea of rational democracy is not that the people themselves govern; but that they have security for good government. this security they can only have by retaining in their own hands the ultimate control. the people ought to be masters employing servants more skilful than themselves. [footnote: it should be noted that mill lays as great stress on individualism as carlyle does, and a more practical stress. he has the same belief in the essential mediocrity of the masses of men whose "think ing is done for them ... through the newspapers," and the same scorn for "the present low state of society." he writes, "the initiation of all wise and noble things comes and must come from individuals: generally at first from some one individual"; but adds, "i am not countenancing the sort of 'hero-worship' which applauds the strong man of genius for forcibly seizing on the government of the world.... all he can claim is freedom to point out the way."] to this carlyle, with at least the general assent of mr. froude, mr. ruskin, and sir james stephen, substantially replies:-- in freedom for itself there is nothing to raise a man above a fly; the value of a human life is that of its work done; the prime province of law is to get from its subjects the most of the best work. the first duty of a people is to find--which means to accept--their chief; their second and last to obey him. we see to what men have been brought by "liberty, equality, and fraternity," by the dreams of idealogues, and the purchase of votes. this, the main drift of carlyle's political teaching, rests on his absolute belief in strength (which always grows by concentration), on his unqualified admiration of order, and on his utter disbelief in what his adverse friend mazzini was wont, with over-confidence, to appeal to as "collective wisdom." theoretically there is much to be said for this view: but, in practice, it involves another idealism as aerial as that of any "idealogue" on the side of liberty. it points to the establishment of an absolutism which must continue to exist, whether wisdom survives in the absolute rulers or ceases to survive. [greek: kratein d' esti kai mae dikios.] the rule of caesars, napoleons, czars may have been beneficent in times of revolution; but their right to rule is apt to pass before their power, and when the latter descends by inheritance, as from m. aurelius to commodus, it commonly degenerates. it is well to learn, from a safe distance, the amount of good that may be associated with despotism: its worst evil is lawlessness, it not only suffocates freedom and induces inertia, but it renders wholly uncertain the life of those under its control. most men would rather endure the "slings and arrows" of an irresponsible press, the bustle and jargon of many elections, the delay of many reforms, the narrowness of many streets, than have lived from to , with the noose around all necks, in paraguay, or even precariously prospered under the paternal shield of the great fritz's extraordinary father, friedrich wilhelm of prussia. carlyle's doctrine of the ultimate identity of "might and right" never leads, with him, to its worst consequence, a fatalistic or indolent repose; the withdrawal from the world's affairs of the soul "holding no form of creed but contemplating all." that he was neither a consistent optimist nor a consistent pessimist is apparent from his faith in man's partial ability to mould his fate. not "belief, belief," but "action, action," is his working motto. on the title-page of the _latter-day pamphlets_ he quotes from rushworth on a colloquy of sir david ramsay and lord reay in : "then said his lordship, 'well, god mend all!'--'nay, by god, donald; we must help him to mend it,' said the other." "i am not a tory," he exclaimed, after the clamour on the publication of _chartism_, "no, but one of the deepest though perhaps the quietest of radicals." with the toryism which merely says "stand to your guns" and, for the rest, "let well alone," he had no sympathy. there was nothing selfish in his theories. he felt for and was willing to fight for mankind, though he could not trust them; even his "king" he defines to be a minister or servant of the state. "the love of power," he says, "if thou understand what to the manful heart power signifies, is a very noble and indispensable love"; that is, the power to raise men above the "pig philosophy," the worship of clothes, the acquiescence in wrong. "the world is not here for me, but i for it." "thou shalt is written upon life in characters as terrible as thou shalt not"; are protests against the mere negative virtues which religionists are wont unduly to exalt. carlyle's so-called mysticism is a part of his german poetry; in the sphere of common life and politics he made use of plain prose, and often proved himself as shrewd as any of his northern race. an excessively "good hater," his pet antipathies are generally bad things. in the abstract they are always so; but about the abstract there is no dispute. every one dislikes or professes to dislike shams, hypocrisies, phantoms,--by whatever tiresomely reiterated epithet he may be pleased to address things that are not what they pretend to be. diogenes's toil with the lantern alone distinguished the cynic greek, in admiration of an honest man. similarly the genuine zeal of his successor appears in painstaking search; his discrimination in the detection, his eloquence in his handling of humbugs. occasional blunders in the choice of objects of contempt and of worship--between which extremes he seldom halts,--demonstrate his fallibility, but outside the sphere of literary and purely personal criticism he seldom attacks any one, or anything, without a show of reason. to all gospels there are two sides; and a great teacher who, by reason of the very fire that makes him great, disdains to halt and hesitate and consider the _juste milieu,_ seldom guards himself against misinterpretation or excess. mazzini writes, "he weaves and unweaves his web like penelope, preaches by turns life and nothingness, and wearies out the patience of his readers by continually carrying them from heaven to hell." carlyle, like ruskin, keeps himself right not by caveats but by contradictions of himself, and sometimes in a way least to be expected. much of his writing is a blast of war, or a protest against the philanthropy that sets charity before justice. yet in a letter to the london peace congress of , dated th july, we find:-- i altogether approve of your object. clearly the less war and cutting of throats we have among us, it will be the better for us all. as men no longer wear swords in the streets, so neither by and by will nations.... how many meetings would one expedition to russia cover the cost of? he denounced the americans, in apparent ignorance of their "constitution," for having no government; and yet admitted that what he called their anarchy had done perhaps more than anything else could have done to subdue the wilderness. he spoke with scorn of the "rights of women," their demand for the suffrage, and the _cohue_ of female authors, expressing himself in terms of ridiculous disparagement of writers so eminent as george sand and george eliot; but he strenuously advocated the claim of women to a recognised medical education. he reviled "model prisons" as pampering institutes of "a universal sluggard and scoundrel amalgamation society," and yet seldom passed on the streets one of the "devil's elect" without giving him a penny. he set himself against every law or custom that tended to make harder the hard life of the poor: there was no more consistent advocate of the abolition of the "game laws." emerson says of the mediaeval architects, "they builded better than they knew." carlyle felt more softly than he said, and could not have been trusted to execute one of his own rhadamanthine decrees. [footnote: _vide_ a remarkable instance of this in the best short _life of carlyle_, that by dr. richard garnett, p. .] scratch the skin of the tartar and you find beneath the despised humanitarian. everything that he has written on "the condition of england question" has a practical bearing, and many of his suggestions have found a place on our code, vindicating the assertion of the _times_ of the day after his death, that "the novelties and paradoxes of are to a large extent nothing but the good sense of ." such are:--his insistence on affording every facility for merit to rise from the ranks, embodied in measures against promotion by purchase; his advocacy of state-aided emigration, of administrative and civil service reform,--the abolition of "the circumlocution office" in downing street,--of the institution of a minister of education; his dwelling on the duties as well as the rights of landowners,--the theme of so many land acts; his enlarging on the superintendence of labour,--made practical in factory and limited hours bills--on care of the really destitute, on the better housing of the poor, on the regulation of weights and measures; his general contention for fixing more exactly the province of the legislative and the executive bodies. carlyle's view that we should find a way to public life for men of eminence who will not cringe to mobs, has made a step towards realisation in further enfranchisement of universities. other of his proposals, as the employment of our army and navy in time of peace, and the forcing of able-bodied paupers into "industrial regiments," have become matter of debate which may pave the way to legislation. one of his desiderata, a practical veto on "puffing," it has not yet been found feasible, by the passing of an almost prohibitive duty on advertisements, to realise. besides these specific recommendations, three ideas are dominant in carlyle's political treatises. _first_--a vehement protest against the doctrine of _laissez faire_; which, he says, "on the part of the governing classes will, we repeat again and again, have to cease; pacific mutual divisions of the spoil and a would-let-well-alone will no longer suffice":--a doctrine to which he is disposed to trace the trades union wars, of which he failed to see the issue. he is so strongly in favour of _free-trade_ between nations that, by an amusing paradox, he is prepared to make it _compulsory_. "all men," he writes in _past and present_, "trade with all men when mutually convenient, and are even bound to do it. our friends of china, who refused to trade, had we not to argue with, them, in cannon-shot at last?" but in free-trade between class and class, man and man, within the bounds of the same kingdom, he has no trust: he will not leave "supply and demand" to adjust their relations. the result of doing so is, he holds, the scramble between capital for larger interest and labour for higher wage, in which the rich if unchecked will grind the poor to starvation, or drive them to revolt. _second_.--as a corollary to the abolition of _laissez faire_, he advocates the _organisation of labour_, "the problem of the whole future to all who will pretend to govern men." the phrase from its vagueness has naturally provoked much discussion. carlyle's bigoted dislike of political economists withheld him from studying their works; and he seems ignorant of the advances that have been made by the "dismal science," or of what it has proved and disproved. consequently, while brought in evidence by most of our modern social idealists, comtists and communists alike, all they can say is that he has given to their protest against the existing state of the commercial world a more eloquent expression than their own. he has no compact scheme,--as that of st. simon or fourier, or owen--few such definite proposals as those of karl marx, bellamy, hertzka or gronlund, or even william morris. he seems to share with mill the view that "the restraints of communism are weak in comparison with those of capitalists," and with morris to look far forward to some golden age; he has given emphatic support to a copartnership of employers and employed, in which the profits of labour shall be apportioned by some rule of equity, and insisted on the duty of the state to employ those who are out of work in public undertakings. enlist, stand drill, and become from banditti soldiers of industry. i will lead you to the irish bogs ... english foxcovers ... new forest, salisbury plains, and scotch hill-sides which as yet feed only sheep ... thousands of square miles ... destined yet to grow green crops and fresh butter and milk and beef without limit:-- an estimate with the usual exaggeration. but carlyle's later work generally advances on his earlier, in its higher appreciation of industrialism. he looks forward to the boon of "one big railway right across america," a prophecy since three times fulfilled; and admits that "the new omnipotence of the steam engine is hewing aside quite other mountains than the physical," _i.e._ bridging the gulf between races and binding men to men. he had found, since writing _sartor_, that dear cotton and slow trains do not help one nearer to god, freedom, and immortality. carlyle's _third_ practical point is his advocacy of _emigration,_ or rather his insistence on it as a sufficient remedy for over-population. he writes of "malthusianism" with his constant contempt of convictions other than his own:-- a full formed man is worth more than a horse.... one man in a year, as i have understood it, if you lend him earth will feed himself and nine others(?).... too crowded indeed!.... what portion of this globe have ye tilled and delved till it will grow no more? how thick stands your population in the pampas and savannahs--in the curragh of kildare? let there be an _emigration service,_ ... so that every honest willing workman who found england too strait, and the organisation of labour incomplete, might find a bridge to carry him to western lands.... our little isle has grown too narrow for us, but the world is wide enough yet for another six thousand years.... if this small western rim of europe is over-peopled, does not everywhere else a whole vacant earth, as it were, call to us "come and till me, come and reap me"? on this follows an eloquent passage about our friendly colonies, "overarched by zodiacs and stars, clasped by many-sounding seas." carlyle would apparently force emigration, and coerce the australians, americans, and chinese, to receive our ship-loads of living merchandise; but the problem of population exceeds his solution of it. he everywhere inclines to rely on coercion till it is over-mastered by resistance, and to overstretch jurisdiction till it snaps. in germany, where the latest representative of the hohenzollerns is ostentatiously laying claim to "right divine," carlyle's appraisal of autocracy may have given it countenance. in england, where the opposite tide runs full, it is harmless: but, by a curious irony, our author's leaning to an organised control over social and private as well as public life, his exaltation of duties above rights, may serve as an incentive to the very force he seemed most to dread. events are every day demonstrating the fallacy of his view of democracy as an embodiment of _laissez faire._ kant with deeper penetration indicated its tendency to become despotic. good government, according to aristotle, is that of one, of few, or of many, for the sake of all. a democracy where the poor rule for the poor alone, maybe a deadly engine of oppression; it may trample without appeal on the rights of minorities, and, in the name of the common good, establish and enforce an almost unconditioned tyranny. carlyle's blindness to this superlative danger--a danger to which mill, in many respects his unrecognised coadjutor, became alive--emphasises the limits of his political foresight. he has consecrated fraternity with an eloquence unapproached by his peers, and with equal force put to scorn the superstition of equality; but he has aimed at liberty destructive shafts, some of which may find a mark the archer little meant. [footnote: _vide passim_ the chapter in _liberty_ entitled "limits to the authority of society over the individual," where mill denounces the idea of "the majority of operatives in many branches of industry ... that bad workmen ought to receive the same wages as good."] chapter x carlyle's religion and ethics--relation to predecessors--influence the same advance or retrogression that appears in carlyle's politics is traceable in his religion; though it is impossible to record the stages of the change with even an equal approach to precision. religion, in the widest sense--faith in some supreme power above us yet acting for us--was the great factor of his inner life. but when we further question his creed, he is either bewilderingly inconsistent or designedly vague. the answer he gives is that of schiller: "welche der religionen? keine von allen. warum? aus religion." in he writes: "i begin to think religion again possible for whoever will piously struggle upwards and sacredly refuse to tell lies: which indeed will mostly mean refusal to speak at all on that topic." this and other implied protests against intrusive inquisition are valid in the case of those who keep their own secrets: it is impertinence to peer and "interview" among the sanctuaries of a poet or politician or historian who does not himself open their doors. but carlyle has done this in all his books. a reticent writer may veil his convictions on every subject save that on which he writes. an avowed preacher or prophet cannot escape interrogation as to his text. with all the evidence before us--his collected works, his friendly confidences, his journals, his fragmentary papers, as the interesting series of jottings entitled "spiritual optics," and the partial accounts to emerson and others of the design of the "exodus from hounds-ditch"--it remains impossible to formulate carlyle's theology. we know that he abandoned the ministry, for which he was destined, because, at an early date, he found himself at irreconcilable variance, not on matters of detail but on essentials, with the standards of scotch presbyterianism. we know that he never repented or regretted his resolve; that he went, as continuously as possible for a mind so liable to fits and starts, further and further from the faith of his fathers; but that he remained to the last so much affected by it, and by the ineffaceable impress of early associations, that he has been plausibly called "a calvinist without dogma," "a calvinist without christianity," "a puritan who had lost his creed." we know that he revered the character of christ, and theoretically accepted the ideal of self-sacrifice: the injunction to return good for evil he never professed to accept; and vicarious sacrifice was contrary to his whole philosophy, which taught that every man must "dree his weird." we know that he not only believed in god as revealed in the larger bible, the whole history of the human race, but that he threatened, almost with hell-fire, all who dared on this point to give refuge to a doubt. finally, he believed both in fate and in free-will, in good and evil as powers at internecine war, and in the greater strength and triumph of good at some very far distant date. if we desire to know more of carlyle's creed we must proceed by "the method of exclusions," and note, in the first place, what he did _not_ believe. this process is simplified by the fact that he assailed all convictions other than his own. half his teaching is a protest, in variously eloquent phrase, against all forms of _materialism_ and _hedonism,_ which he brands as "worships of moloch and astarte," forgetting that progress in physical welfare may lead not only to material, but to mental, if not spiritual, gain. similarly he denounces _atheism,_ never more vehemently than in his journals of - :-- had no god made this world it were an insupportable place. laws without a lawgiver, matter without spirit is a gospel of dirt. all that is good, generous, wise, right ... who or what could by any possibility have given it to me, but one who first had it to give! this is not logic, it is axiom.... poor "comtism, ghastliest of algebraic specialities."... canst _thou_ by searching find out god? i am not surprised thou canst not, vain fool. if they do abolish god from their poor bewildered hearts, there will be seen such a world as few are dreaming of. carlyle calls evidence from all quarters, appealing to napoleon's question, "who made all that?" and to friedrich's belief that intellect "could not have been put into him by an entity that had none of its own," in support of what he calls the eternal fact of facts, to which he clings as to the rock of ages, the sole foundation of hope and of morality to one having at root little confidence in his fellow-men. if people are only driven upon virtuous conduct ... by association of ideas, and there is no "infinite nature of duty," the world, i should say, had better count its spoons to begin with, and look out for hurricanes and earthquakes to end with. carlyle hazardously confessed that as regards the foundations of his faith and morals, with napoleon and friedrich ii. on his side, he had against him the advancing tide of modern _science._ he did not attempt to disprove its facts, or, as emerson, to sublimate them into a new idealism; he scoffed at and made light of them, _e.g._-- geology has got rid of moses, which surely was no very sublime achievement either. i often think ... it is pretty much all that science in this age has done. ... protoplasm (unpleasant doctrine that we are all, soul and body, made of a kind of blubber, found in nettles among other organisms) appears to be delightful to many.... yesterday there came a pamphlet published at lewes, a hallelujah on the advent of atheism.... the real joy of julian (the author) was what surprised me, like the shout of a hyaena on finding that the whole universe was actually carrion. in about seven minutes my great julian was torn in two and lying in the place fit for him.... descended from gorillas! then where is the place for a creator? man is only a little higher than the tadpoles, says our new evangelist.... nobody need argue with these people. logic never will decide the matter, or will seem to decide it their way. he who traces nothing of god in his own soul, will never find god in the world of matter--mere circlings of force there, of iron regulation, of universal death and merciless indifference.... matter itself is either nothing or else a product due to man's _mind_. ... the fast-increasing flood of atheism on me takes no hold--does not even wet the soles of my feet. [footnote: cf. othello, "not a jot, not a jot." carlyle writes on this question with the agitation of one himself not quite at ease, with none of the calmness of a faith perfectly secure.] "carlyle," says one of his intimates, "speaks as if darwin wished to rob or to insult him." _scepticism_ proper fares as hardly in his hands as definite denial. it is, he declares, "a fatal condition," and, almost in the spirit of the inquisitors, he attributes to it moral vice as well as intellectual weakness, calling it an "atrophy, a disease of the whole soul," "a state of mental paralysis," etc. his fallacious habit of appeal to consequences, which in others he would have scouted as a commonplace of the pulpit, is conspicuous in his remark on hume's view of life as "a most melancholy theory," according to which, in the words of jean paul, "heaven becomes a gas, god a force, and the second world a grave." he fails to see that all such appeals are beside the question; and deserts the ground of his answer to john sterling's expostulation, "that is downright pantheism": "what if it were pot-theism if it is _true_?" it is the same inconsistency which, in practice, led his sympathy for suffering to override his stoic theories; but it vitiated his reasoning, and made it impossible for him to appreciate the calm, yet legitimately emotional, religiosity of mill. carlyle has vetoed all forms of so-called _orthodoxy_--whether catholic or protestant, of churches high or low; he abhorred puseyism, jesuitry, spoke of the "free kirk and other rubbish," and recorded his definite disbelief, in any ordinary sense, in revelation and in miracles. "it is as certain as mathematics that no such thing has ever been on earth." history is a perpetual revelation of god's will and justice, and the stars in their courses are a perpetual miracle, is his refrain. _this is not what orthodoxy means_, and no one was more intolerant than carlyle of all shifts and devices to slur the difference between "yes" and "no." but having decided that his own "exodus from houndsditch" might only open the way to the wilderness, he would allow no one else to take in hand his uncompleted task; and disliked strauss and renan even more than he disliked colenso. "he spoke to me once," says mr. froude, "with loathing of the _vie de jésus_." i asked if a true life could be written. he said, "yes, certainly, if it were right to do so; but it is not." still more strangely he writes to emerson:-- you are the only man of the unitarian persuasion whom i could unobstructedly like. the others that i have seen were all a kind of half-way-house characters, who i thought should, if they had not wanted courage, have ended in unbelief, in faint possible _theism_; which i like considerably worse than atheism. such, i could not but feel, deserve the fate they find here; the bat fate; to be killed among the bats as a bird, among the birds as a bat. what then is left for carlyle's creed? logically little, emotionally much. if it must be defined, it was that of a theist with a difference. a spirit of flame from the empyrean, he found no food in the cold _deism_ of the eighteenth century, and brought down the marble image from its pedestal, as by the music of the "winter's tale," to live among men and inspire them. he inherited and _coûte que coûte_ determined to persist in the belief that there was a personal god--"a maker, voiceless, formless, within our own soul." to emerson he writes in , "my belief in a special providence grows yearly stronger, unsubduable, impregnable"; and later, "some strange belief in a special providence was always in me at intervals." thus, while asserting that "all manner of pulpits are as good as broken and abolished," he clings to the old ecclefechan days. "to the last," says mr. froude, "he believed as strongly as ever hebrew prophet did in spiritual religion;" but if we ask the nature of the god on whom all relies, he cannot answer even with the apostles' creed. is he one or three? "wer darf ihn nennen." carlyle's god is not a mere "tendency that makes for righteousness"; he is a guardian and a guide, to be addressed in the words of pope's _universal prayer_, which he adopted as his own. a personal god does not mean a great figure head of the universe,--heine's fancy of a venerable old man, before he became "a knight" of the holy ghost,--it means a supreme power, love, or justice having relations to the individual man: in this sense carlyle believed in him, though more as justice, exacting "the terriblest penalties," than as love, preaching from the mount of olives. he never entered into controversies about the efficacy of prayer; but, far from deriding, he recommended it as "a turning of one's soul to the highest." in he writes:-- i occasionally feel able to wish, with my whole softened heart--it is my only form of prayer--"great father, oh, if thou canst, have pity on her and on me and on all such!" in this at least there is no harm. and about the same date to erskine:-- "our father;" in my sleepless tossings, these words, that brief and grand prayer, came strangely into my mind with an altogether new emphasis; as if written and shining for me in mild pure splendour on the black bosom of the night there; when i as it were read them word by word, with a sudden check to my imperfect wanderings, with a sudden softness of composure which was much unexpected. not for perhaps thirty or forty years had i once formally repeated that prayer: nay, i never felt before how intensely the voice of man's soul it is, the inmost inspiration of all that is high and pious in poor human nature, right worthy to be recommended with an "after this manner pray ye." carlyle holds that if we do our duty--the best work we can--and faithfully obey his laws, living soberly and justly, god will do the best for us in this life. as regards the next we have seen that he ended with goethe's hope. at an earlier date he spoke more confidently. on his father's death (_reminiscences_, vol. i. p. ) he wrote:-- man follows man. his life is as a tale that has been told: yet under time does there not lie eternity? ... perhaps my father, all that essentially was my father, is even now near me, with me. both he and i are with god. perhaps, if it so please god, we shall in some higher state of being meet one another, recognise one another. ... the possibility, nay (in some way) the certainty, of perennial existence daily grows plainer to me. on the death of mrs. welsh he wrote to his wife: "we shall yet go to her. god is great. god is good": and earlier, in - , to emerson on the loss of his brother:-- "what a thin film it is that divides the living and the dead. your brother is in very deed and truth with god, where both you and i are.... perhaps we shall all meet yonder, and the tears be wiped from all eyes. one thing is no perhaps: surely we shall all meet, if it be the will of the maker of us. if it be not his will, then is it not better so?" after his wife's death, naturally, the question of immortality came uppermost in his mind; but his conclusions are, like those of burns, never dogmatic:-- the truth about the matter is absolutely hidden from us. "in my father's house are many mansions." yes, if you are god you may have a right to say so; if you are a man what do you know more than i, or any of us? and later-- what if omnipotence should actually have said, "yes, poor mortals, such of you as have gone so far shall be permitted to go farther"? to emerson in he writes:-- i am as good as without hope and without fear; a gloomily serious, silent, and sad old man, gazing into the final chasm of things in mute dialogue with "death, judgment, and eternity" (dialogue mute on both sides), not caring to discourse with poor articulate speaking mortals, on their sorts of topics--disgusted with the world and its roaring nonsense, which i have no further thought of lifting a finger to help, and only try to keep out of the way of, and shut my door against. there can be no question of the sincerity of carlyle's conviction that he had to make war on credulity and to assail the pretences of a _formal belief_ (which he regards as even worse than atheism) in order to grapple with real unbelief. after all explanations of newton or laplace, the universe is, to him, a mystery, and we ourselves the miracle of miracles; sight and knowledge leave us no "less forlorn," and beneath all the soundings of science there is a deeper deep. it is this frame of mind that qualified him to be the exponent of the religious epochs in history. "by this alone," wrote dr. chalmers, "he has done so much to vindicate and bring to light the augustan age of christianity in england," adding that it is the secret also of the great writer's appreciation of the higher teutonic literature. his sombre rather than consolatory sense of "god in history," his belief in the mission of righteousness to constrain unrighteousness, and his stoic view that good and evil are absolute opposites, are his links with the puritans, whom he habitually exalts in variations of the following strain:-- the age of the puritans has gone from us, its earnest purpose awakens now no reverence in our frivolous hearts. not the body of heroic puritanism alone which was bound to die, but the soul of it also, which was and should have been, and yet shall be immortal, has, for the present, passed away. yet goethe, the only man of recent times whom he regarded with a feeling akin to worship, was in all essentials the reverse of a puritan. to carlyle's, as to most substantially emotional works, may be applied the phrase made use of in reference to the greatest of all the series of ancient books-- hic liber est in quo quisquis sua dogmata quaerit, invenit et pariter dogmata quisque sua. from passages like those above quoted--his complaints of the falling off of old scotch faith; his references to the kingdom of a god who has written "in plain letters on the human conscience a law that all may read"; his insistence that the great soul of the world is just; his belief in religion as a rule of conduct, and his sympathy with the divine depths of sorrow--from all these many of his scotch disciples persist in maintaining that their master was to the end essentially a christian. the question between them and other critics who assert that "he had renounced christianity" is to some extent, not wholly, a matter of nomenclature; it is hard exactly to decide it in the case of a man who so constantly found again in feeling what he had abandoned in thought. carlyle's religion was to the last an inconsistent mixture, not an amalgam, of his mother's and of goethe's. the puritan in him never dies; he attempts in vain to tear off the husk that cannot be separated from its kernel. he believes in no historical resurrection, ascension, or atonement, yet hungers and thirsts for a supramundane source of law, and holds fast by a faith in the nemesis of greek, goth, and jew. he abjures half-way houses; but is withheld by pathetic memories of the church spires and village graveyards of his youth from following his doubts to their conclusion; yet he gives way to his negation in his reference to "old jew lights now burnt out," and in the half-despair of his expression to froude about the deity himself, "he does nothing." professor masson says that "carlyle had abandoned the metaphysic of christianity while retaining much of its ethic." to reverse this dictum would be an overstrain on the other side: but the _metaphysic_ of calvinism is precisely what he retained; the alleged _facts_ of revelation he discarded; of the _ethic_ of the gospels he accepted perhaps the lesser half, and he distinctly ceased to regard the teaching of christ as final. [footnote: a passage in mrs. sutherland orr's _life and letters of robert browning_, p. , is decisive on this point, and perhaps too emphatic for general quotation.] his doctrine of renunciation (suggested by the three reverences in _wilhelm meister's travels_) is carlyle's transmutation, if not transfiguration, of puritanism; but it took neither in him nor in goethe any very consistent form, save that it meant temperance, keeping the body well under the control of the head, the will strong, and striving, through all the lures of sense, to attain to some ideal life. both write of christianity as "a thing of beauty," a perennial power, a spreading tree, a fountain of youth; but goethe was too much of a greek--though, as has been said, "a very german greek"--to be, in any proper sense of the word, a christian; carlyle too much of a goth. his mythology is norse; his ethics, despite his prejudice against the race, are largely jewish. he proclaimed his code with the thunders of sinai, not in the reconciling voice of the beatitudes. he gives or forces on us world-old truths splendidly set, with a leaning to strength and endurance rather than to advancing thought. he did not, says a fine critic of morals, recognise that "morality also has passed through the straits." he did not really believe in content, which has been called the catholic, nor in progress, more questionably styled the protestant virtue. his often excellent practical rule to "do the duty nearest to hand" may be used to gag the intellect in its search after the goal; so that even his everlasting yea, as a predetermined affirmation, may ultimately result in a deeper negation. [footnote: _vide_ professor jones's _browning as a philosophical and religious, teacher_, pp. - .] "duty," to him as to wordsworth, "stern daughter of the voice of god," has two aspects, on each of which he dwells with a persistent iteration. the _first_ is _surrender_ to something higher and wider than ourselves. that he has nowhere laid the line between this abnegation and the self-assertion which in his heroes he commends, partly means that correct theories of our complex life are impossible; but matthew arnold's criticism, that his ethics "are made paradoxical by his attack on happiness, which he should rather have referred to as the result of labour and of truth," can only be rebutted by the assertion that the pursuit of pleasure as an end defeats itself. the _second_ aspect of his "duty" is _work_. his master goethe is to him as apollo to hercules, as shakespeare to luther; the one entire as the chrysolite, the other like the schreckhorn rent and riven; the words of the former are oracles, of the latter battles; the one contemplates and beautifies truth, the other wrestles and fights for it. carlyle has a limited love of abstract truth; of action his love is unlimited. his lyre is not that of orpheus, but that of amphion which built the walls of thebes. _laborare est orare._ he alone is honourable who does his day's work by sword or plough or pen. strength is the crown of toil. action converts the ring of necessity that girds us into a ring of duty, frees us from dreams, and makes us men. the midnight phantoms feel the spell, the shadows sweep away. there are few grander passages in literature than some of those litanies of labour. they have the roll of music that makes armies march, and if they have been made so familiar as to cease to seem new, it is largely owing to the power of the writer which has compelled them to become common property. carlyle's practical ethics, though too little indulgent to the light and play of life, in which he admitted no [greek: adiaphora] and only the relaxation of a rare genial laugh, are more satisfactory than his conception of their sanction, which is grim. his "duty" is a categorical imperative, imposed from without by a taskmaster who has "written in flame across the sky, 'obey, unprofitable servant.'" he saw the infinite above and around, but not _in_ the finite. he insisted on the community of the race, and struck with a bolt any one who said, "am i my brother's keeper?" all things, the minutest that man does, influence all men, the very look of his face blesses or curses.... it is a mathematical fact that the casting of this pebble from my hand alters the centre of gravity of the universe. but he left a great gulf fixed between man and god, and so failed to attain to the optimism after which he often strove. he held, with browning, that "god's in his heaven," but not that "all's right with the world." his view was the zoroastrian _*athanatos machae*_, "in god's world presided over by the prince of the powers of the air," a "divine infernal universe." the calvinism of his mother, who said "the world is a lie, but god is truth," landed him in an _impasse_; he could not answer the obvious retort,--did then god make and love a lie, or make it hating it? there must have been some other power _to eteron_, or, as mill in his apologia for _theism_ puts it, a limit to the assumed omnipotence. carlyle, accepting neither alternative, inconsequently halts between them; and his prevailing view of mankind adds to his dilemma. [footnote: some one remarked to friedrich ii. that the philanthropist sulzer said, "men are by nature good." "ach, mein lieber sulzer," ejaculated fritz, as quoted approvingly by carlyle, "er remit nicht diese verdarnmte basse."] he imposes an "infinite duty on a finite being," as calvin imposes an infinite punishment for a finite fault. he does not see that mankind sets its hardest tasks to itself; or that, as emerson declares, "the assertion of our weakness and deficiency is the fine innuendo by which the soul makes its enormous claim." hence, according to mazzini, "he stands between the individual and the infinite without hope or guide, and crushes the human being by comparing him with god. from, his lips, so daring, we seem to hear every instant the cry of the breton mariner, 'my god, protect me; my bark is so small and thy ocean so vast.'" similarly, the critic of browning above referred to concludes of the great prose writer, whom he has called the poet's twin: "he has let loose confusion upon us. he has brought us within sight of the future: he has been our guide in the wilderness; but he died there and was denied the view from pisgah." carlyle's theism is defective because it is not sufficiently pantheistic; but, in his view of the succession of events in the "roaring loom of time," of the diorama of majesty girt by mystery, he has found a cosmic pantheism and given expression to it in a passage which is the culmination of the english prose eloquence, as surely as wordsworth's great ode is the high-tide [a phrase applied by emerson to the ode.] mark of the english verse, of this century:-- are we not sprite shaped into a body, into an appearance; and that fade away again into air and invisibility? this is no metaphor, it is a simple scientific fact: we start out of nothingness, take figure, and are apparitions; round us as round the veriest spectre is eternity, and to eternity minutes are as years and aeons. come there not tones of love and faith as from celestial harp-strings, like the song of beatified souls? and again do we not squeak and gibber and glide, bodeful and feeble and fearful, and revel in our mad dance of the dead,--till the scent of the morning air summons us to our still home; and dreamy night becomes awake and day? where now is alexander of macedon; does the steel host that yelled in fierce battle shouts at issus and arbela remain behind him; or have they all vanished utterly, even as perturbed goblins must? napoleon, too, with his moscow retreats and austerlitz campaigns, was it all other than the veriest spectre hunt; which has now with its howling tumult that made night hideous flitted away? ghosts! there are nigh a thousand million walking the earth openly at noontide; some half hundred have vanished from it, some half hundred have arisen in it, ere thy watch ticks once. o heaven, it is mysterious, it is awful to consider that we not only carry each a future ghost within him, but are in very deed ghosts. [footnote: _cf._ "tempest," "we are such stuff as dreams are made of."] these limbs, whence had we them; this stormy force; this life- blood with its burning passion? they are dust and shadow; a shadow system gathered round our _me_, wherein through some moments or years the divine essence is to be revealed in the flesh. so has it been from the beginning, so will it be to the end. generation after generation takes to itself the form of a body; and forth issuing from cimmerian night on heaven's mission appears. what force and fire there is in each he expends, one grinding in the mill of industry; one hunter-like climbing the giddy alpine heights of science; one madly dashed in pieces on the rocks of strife in war with his fellow, and then the heaven- sent is recalled; his earthly vesture falls away, and soon even to sense becomes a vanished shadow. thus, like some wild naming, wild thundering train of heaven's artillery, does this mysterious mankind thunder and flame in long-drawn, quick- succeeding grandeur through the unknown deep. thus, like a god- created fire-breathing spirit host, we emerge from the inane, haste stormfully across the astonished earth, then plunge again into the inane. earth's mountains are levelled and her seas filled up. on the hardest adamant some footprint of us is stamped; the rear of the host read traces of the earliest van. but whence, o heaven, whither? sense knows not. faith knows not; only that it is through mystery to mystery, from god and to god. volumes might be written on carlyle's relations, of sentiment, belief, opinion, method of thought, and manner of expression, to other thinkers. his fierce independence, and sense of his own prophetic mission to the exclusion of that of his predecessors and compeers, made him often unconscious of his intellectual debts, and only to the germans, who impressed his comparatively plastic youth, is he disposed adequately to acknowledge them. outside the hebrew scriptures he seems to have been wholly unaffected by the writings and traditions of the east, which exercised so marked an influence on his new england disciples. he never realised the part played by the philosophers of greece in moulding the speculations of modern europe. he knew plato mainly through the socratic dialogues. there is, however, a passage in a letter to emerson (march th ) which indicates that he had read, comparatively late in life, some portions of _the republic_. "i was much struck with plato last year, and his notions about democracy--mere _latter-day pamphlets, saxa et faces_ ... refined into empyrean radiance and the lightning of the gods." the tribute conveyed in the comparison is just; for there is nothing but community of political view between the bitter acorns dropped from the gnarled border oak and the rich fruit of the finest olive in athene's garden. but the coincidences of opinion between the ancient and the modern writer are among the most remarkable in literary history. we can only refer, without comments, to a few of the points of contact in this strange conjunction of minds far as the poles asunder. plato and carlyle are both possessed with the idea that they are living in a degenerate age, and they attribute its degeneracy to the same causes:--_laissez faire_; the growth of luxury; the effeminate preference of lydian to dorian airs in music, education, and life; the decay of the spartan and growth of the corinthian spirit; the habit of lawlessness culminating in the excesses of democracy, which they describe in language as nearly identical as the difference of the ages and circumstances admit. they propose the same remedies:-- a return to simpler manners, and stricter laws, with the best men in the state to regulate and administer them. philosophers, says plato, are to be made guardians, and they are to govern, not for gain or glory, but for the common weal. they need not be happy in the ordinary sense, for there is a higher than selfish happiness, the love of the good. to this love they must be _systematically educated_ till they are fit to be kings and priests in the ideal state; if they refuse they _must_, when their turn comes, be _made to govern_. compare the following declarations of carlyle:-- aristocracy and priesthood, a governing class and a teaching class--these two sometimes combined in one, a pontiff king--there did not society exist without those two vital elements, there will none exist. whenever there are born kings of men you had better seek them out and _breed them to the work_.... the few wise will have to take command of the innumerable foolish, they _must be got to do it_. the ancient and the modern, the greek and the teuton, are further curiously at one:--in their dislike of physical or mental valetudinarianism (cf. _rep._ bs. ii. and iii. and _characteristics_); in their protests against the morality of consequences, of rewards and punishments as motives for the highest life (the just man, says plato, crucified is better than the unjust man crowned); in their contempt for the excesses of philanthropy and the pampering of criminals (cf. _rep._ b. viii.); in their strange conjunctions of free-thinking and intolerance. plato in the laws enacts that he who speaks against the gods shall be first fined, then imprisoned, and at last, if he persists in his impiety, put to death; yet he had as little belief in the national religion as carlyle. [footnote: rousseau, in the "contrat social," also assumes this position; allowing freedom of thought, but banishing the citizen who shows disrespect to the state religion.] they both accept destiny,--the parcae or the norns spin the threads of life,--and yet both admit a sphere of human choice. in the republic the souls select their lots: with carlyle man can modify his fate. the juxtaposition in each of humour and pathos (cf. plato's account of the dogs in a democracy, and carlyle's "nigger gone masterless among the pumpkins," and, for pathos, the image of the soul encrusted by the world as the marine glaucus, or the vision of er and natural supernaturalism) is another contact. both held that philosophers and heroes were few, and yet both leant to a sort of socialism, under state control; they both assail poetry and deride the stage (cf. _rep._ b. ii. and b. x. with carlyle on "the opera"), while each is the greatest prose poet of his race; they are united in hatred of orators, who "would circumvent the gods," and in exalting action and character over "the most sweet voices"--the one enforcing his thesis in the "language of the gods," the other preaching silence in forty volumes of eloquent english speech. carlyle seems to have known little of aristotle. his stoicism was indigenous; but he always alludes with deference to the teaching of the porch. marcus aurelius, the nearest type of the philosophic king, must have riveted his regard as an instance of the combination of thought and action; and some interesting parallels have been drawn between their views of life as an arena on which there is much to be done and little to be known, a passage from time to a vague eternity. they have the same mystical vein, alongside of similar precepts of self-forgetfulness, abnegation, and the waiving of desire, the same confidence in the power of the spirit to defy or disdain vicissitudes, ideas which brought both in touch with the ethical side of christianity; but their tempers and manner are as far as possible apart. carlyle speaks of no one with more admiration than of dante, recognising in the italian his own intensity of love and hate and his own tenacity; but beyond this there is little evidence of the "divina commedia" having seriously attuned his thought: nor does he seem to have been much affected by any of the elder english poets. he scarcely refers to chaucer; he alludes to spenser here and there with some homage, but hardly ever, excepting shakespeare, to the elizabethan dramatists. among writers of the seventeenth century, he may have found in hobbes some support of his advocacy of a strong government; but his views on this theme came rather from a study of the history of that age. milton he appreciates inadequately. to dryden and swift he is just; the latter, whether consciously to carlyle or not, was in some respects his english master, and the points of resemblance in their characters suggest detailed examination. their styles are utterly opposed, that of the one resting almost wholly on its saxon base, that of the other being a coat of many colours; but both are, in the front rank of masters of prose-satire, inspired by the same audacity of "noble rage." swift's humour has a subtler touch and yet more scathing scorn; his contempt of mankind was more real; his pathos equally genuine but more withdrawn; and if a worse foe he was a better friend. the comparisons already made between johnson and carlyle have exhausted the theme; they remain associated by their similar struggle and final victory, and sometimes by their tyrannous use of power; they are dissociated by the divergence of their intellectual and in some respects even their moral natures; both were forces of character rather than discoverers, both rulers of debate; but the one was of sense, the other of imagination, "all compact." the one blew "the blast of doom" of the old patronage; the other, against heavier odds, contended against the later tyranny of uninformed and insolent popular opinion. carlyle did not escape wholly from the influence of the most infectious, if the most morbid, of french writers, j.j. rousseau. they are alike in setting emotion over reason: in referring to the past as a model; in subordinating mere criticism to ethical, religious or irreligious purpose; in being avowed propagandists; in their "deep unrest"; and in the diverse conclusions that have been drawn from their teaching. carlyle's enthusiasm for the leaders of the new german literature was, in some measure, inspired by the pride in a treasure-trove, the regard of a foster-father or _chaperon_ who first substantially took it by the hand and introduced it to english society: but it was also due to the feeling that he had found in it the fullest expression of his own perplexities, and at least their partial solution. his choice of its representatives is easily explained. in schiller he found intellectually a younger brother, who had fought a part of his own fight and was animated by his own aspirations; in dealing with his career and works there is a shade of patronage. goethe, on the other hand, he recognised across many divergencies as his master. the attachment of the belated scotch puritan to the greater german has provoked endless comment; but the former has himself solved the riddle. the contrasts between the teacher and pupil remain, but they have been exaggerated by those who only knew goethe as one who had attained, and ignored the struggle of his hot youth on the way to attainment. carlyle justly commends him, not for his artistic mastery alone, but for his sense of the reality and earnestness of life, which lifts him to a higher grade among the rulers of human thought than such more perfect artists and more passionate lyrists as heine. he admires above all his conquest over the world, without concession to it, saying:-- with him anarchy has now become peace ... the once perturbed spirit is serene and rich in good fruits.... neither, which is most important of all, has this peace been attained by a surrender to necessity, or any compact with delusion--a seeming blessing, such as years and dispiritment will of themselves bring to most men, and which is indeed no blessing, since ever-continued battle is better than captivity. many gird on the harness, few bear it warrior-like, still fewer put it off with triumph. euphorion still asserts, "to die in strife is the end of life." goethe ceased to fight only when he had won; his want of sympathy with the so-called apostles of freedom, the stump orators of his day, was genuine and shared by carlyle. in the apologue of the _three reverences_ in _meister_ the master indulges in humanitarian rhapsody and, unlike his pupil, verges on sentimental paradox, declaring through the lips of the chief in that imaginary pedagogic province--which here and there closely recalls the _new atlantis_--that we must recognise "humility and poverty, mockery and despite, disgrace and suffering, as divine--nay, even on sin and crime to look not as hindrances, but to honour them, as furtherances of what is holy." in answer to emerson's puritanic criticisms carlyle replies:-- believe me, it is impossible you can be more a puritan than i; nay, i often feel as if i were far too much so, but john knox himself, could he have seen the peaceable impregnable _fidelity_ of that man's mind, and how to him also duty was infinite,--knox would have passed on wondering, not reproaching. but i will tell you in a word why i like goethe. his is the only _healthy_ mind, of any extent, that i have discovered in europe for long generations; it was he who first convincingly proclaimed to me ... "behold even in this scandalous sceptico-epicurean generation, when all is gone but hunger and cant, it is still possible that man be a man." and then as to that dark ground on which you love to see genius paint itself: consider whether misery is not ill health too, also whether good fortune is not worse to bear than bad, and on the whole whether the glorious serene summer is not greater than the wildest hurricane--as light, the naturalists say, is stronger than lightning. among german so-called mystics the one most nearly in accord with carlyle was novalis, who has left a sheaf of sayings--as "there is but one temple in the universe, and that is the body of man," "who touches a human hand touches god"--that especially commended themselves to his commentator. among philosophers proper, fichte, in his assertion of the will as a greater factor of human life and a nearer indication of personality than pure thought, was carlyle's nearest tutor. the _vocation of the scholar_ and _the way to a blessed life_ anticipated and probably suggested much of the more speculative part of _sartor_. but to show their relation would involve a course of metaphysics. we accept carlyle's statement that he learnt most of the secret of life and its aims from his master goethe: but the closest of his kin, the man with whom he shook hands more nearly as an equal, was richter--_jean paul der einzige_, lord of the empire of the air, yet with feet firmly planted on german earth, a colossus of reading and industry, the quaintest of humorists, not excepting either sir thomas browne or laurence sterne, a lover and painter of nature unsurpassed in prose. he first seems to have influenced his translator's style, and set to him the mode of queer titles and contortions, fantastic imaginary incidents, and endless digressions. his ezekiel visions as the dream in the first _flower piece_ from the life of siebenkäs, and that on _new year's eve_, are like pre-visions of _sartor_, and we find in the fantasies of both authors much of the same machinery. it has been asserted that whole pages of _schmelzle's journey to flätz_ might pass current for carlyle's own; and it is evident that the latter was saturated with _quintus fixlein_. the following can hardly be a mere coincidence. richter writes of a dead brother, "for he chanced to leap on an ice-board that had jammed itself among several others; but these recoiled, and his shot forth with him, melted away as it floated under his feet, and so sank his heart of fire amid the ice and waves"; while in _cui bono_ we have-- what is life? a thawing ice-board on a sea with sunny shore. similarly, the eloquently pathetic close of _fixlein_, especially the passage, "then begun the Æolian harp of creation," recalls the deepest pathos of _sartor_. the two writers, it has been observed, had in common "reverence, humour, vehemence, tenderness, gorgeousness, grotesqueness, and pure conduct of life." much of carlyle's article in the _foreign quarterly_ of might be taken for a criticism of himself. enough has been said of the limits of carlyle's magnanimity in estimating his english contemporaries; but the deliberate judgments of his essays were often more genial than those of his letters and conversation; and perhaps his overestimate of inferiors, whom in later days he drew round him as the sun draws the mist, was more hurtful than his severity; it is good for no man to live with satellites. his practical severance from mazzini was mainly a personal loss: the widening of the gulf between him and mill was a public calamity, for seldom have two men been better qualified the one to correct the excesses of the other. carlyle was the greater genius; but the question which was the greater mind must be decided by the conflict between logic and emotion. they were related proximately as plato to aristotle, the one saw what the other missed, and their hold on the future has been divided. mill had "the dry light," and his meaning is always clear; he is occasionally open to the charge of being a formalist, allowing too little for the "infusion of the affections," save when touched, as carlyle was, by a personal loss; yet the critical range indicated by his essay on "coleridge" on the one side, that on "bentham" on the other, is as wide as that of his friend; and while neither said anything base, mill alone is clear from the charge of having ever said anything absurd. his influence, though more indirect, may prove, save artistically, more lasting. the two teachers, in their assaults on _laissez faire,_ curiously combine in giving sometimes undesigned support to social movements with which the elder at least had no sympathy. carlyle's best, because his most independent, friend lived beyond the sea. he has been almost to weariness compared with emerson, initial pupil later ally, but their contrasts are more instructive than their resemblances. they have both at heart a revolutionary spirit, marked originality, uncompromising aversion to illusions, disdain of traditional methods of thought and stereotyped modes of expression; but in carlyle this is tempered by greater veneration for the past, in which he holds out models for our imitation; while emerson sees in it only fingerposts for the future, and exhorts his readers to stay at home lest they should wander from themselves. the one loves detail, hates abstraction, delights to dwell on the minutiæ of biography, and waxes eloquent even on dates. the other, a brilliant though not always a profound generaliser, tells us that we must "leave a too close and lingering adherence to facts, and study the sentiment as it appeared in hope not in history ... with the ideal is the rose of joy. but grief cleaves to names and persons, and the partial interests of to-day and yesterday." the one is bent under a burden, and pores over the riddle of the earth, till, when he looks up at the firmament of the unanswering stars, he can but exclaim, "it is a sad sight." the other is blown upon by the fresh breezes of the new world; his vision ranges over her clear horizons, and he leaps up elastic under her light atmosphere, exclaiming, "give me health and a day and i will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous." carlyle is a half-germanised scotchman, living near the roar of the metropolis, with thoughts of weimar and reminiscences of the covenanting hills. emerson studies swedenborg and reads the _phædo_ in his garden, far enough from the din of cities to enable him in calm weather to forget them. "boston, london, are as fugitive as any whiff of smoke; so is society, so is the world." the one is strong where the other is weak. carlyle keeps his abode in the murk of clouds illumined by bolts of fire; he has never seen the sun unveiled. emerson's "threnody" shows that he has known the shadow; but he has fought with no apollyons, reached the celestial city without crossing the dark river, and won the immortal garland "without the dust and heat." self-sacrifice, inconsistently maintained, is the watchword of the one: self-reliance, more consistently, of the other. the art of the two writers is in strong contrast. the charm of emerson's style is its precision; his sentences are like medals each hung on its own string; the fields of his thought are combed rather than ploughed: he draws outlines, as flaxman, clear and colourless. carlyle's paragraphs are like streams from pactolus, that roll nuggets from their source on their turbid way. his expressions are often grotesque, but rarely offensive. both writers are essentially ascetic,--though the one swallows mirabeau, and the other says that jane eyre should have accepted eochester and "left the world in a minority." but emerson is never coarse, which carlyle occasionally is; and carlyle is never flippant, as emerson often is. in condemning the hurry and noise of mobs the american keeps his temper, and insists on justice without vindictiveness: wars and revolutions take nothing from his tranquillity, and he sets hafiz and shakespeare against luther and knox. careless of formal consistency--"the hobgoblin of little minds"--he balances his aristocratic reserve with a belief in democracy, in progression by antagonism, and in collective wisdom as a limit to collective folly. leaving his intellectual throne as the spokesman of a practical liberty, emerson's wisdom was justified by the fact that he was always at first on the unpopular, and ultimately on the winning, side. casting his rote for the diffusion of popular literature, a wide suffrage, a mild penal code, he yet endorsed the saying of an old american author, "a monarchy is a merchantman which sails well but will sometimes strike on a rock and go to the bottom; whilst a republic is a raft that will never sink, but then your feet are always in water." [footnote: carlyle, on the other hand, holds "that," as has been said, "we are entitled to deal with criminals as relics of barbarism in the midst of civilisation." his protest, though exuberated, against leniency in dealing with atrocities, emphatically requisite in an age apt to ignore the rigour of justice, has been so far salutary, and may be more so.] maintaining that the state exists for its members, he holds that the enervating influences of authority are least powerful in popular governments, and that the tyranny of a public opinion not enforced by law need only be endured by voluntary slaves. emerson confides in great men, "to educate whom the state exists"; but he regards them as inspired mouthpieces rather than controlling forces: their prime mission is to "fortify our hopes," their indirect services are their best. the career of a great man should rouse us to a like assertion of ourselves. we ought not to obey, but to follow, sometimes by not obeying, him. "it is the imbecility not the wisdom of men that is always inviting the impudence of power." it is obvious that many of these views are in essential opposition to the teaching of carlyle; and it is remarkable that two conspicuous men so differing and expressing their differences with perfect candour should have lived so long on such good terms. their correspondence, ranging over thirty-eight years (begun in , after emerson's visit to craigenputtock, and ending in , before his final trip to england), is on the whole one of the most edifying in literary history. the fundamental accord, unshaken by the ruffle of the visit in , is a testimony to the fact that the common preservation of high sentiments amid the irksome discharge of ordinary duties may survive and override the most distinct antagonisms of opinion. matthew arnold has gone so far as to say that he "would not wonder if carlyle lived in the long run by such an invaluable record as that correspondence between him and emerson and not by his works." this is paradoxical; but the volumes containing it are in some respects more interesting than the letters of goethe and schiller, as being records of "two noble kinsmen" of nearer intellectual claims. the practical part of the relationship on the part of emerson is very beautiful; he is the more unselfish, and on the whole appears the better man, especially in the almost unlimited tolerance that passes with a smile even such violences as the "ilias in nuce"; but carlyle shows himself to be the stronger. their mutual criticisms were of real benefit. emerson succeeded in convincing his friend that so-called anarchy might be more effective in subduing the wilderness than any despotism; while the advice to descend from "himalaya peaks and indigo skies" to concrete life is accepted and adopted in the later works of the american, _society and solitude_ and the _conduct of life,_ which carlyle praises without stint. keeping their poles apart they often meet half-way; and in matters of style as well as judgment tinge and tend to be transfused into each other, so that in some pages we have to look to the signature to be sure of the writer. towards the close of the correspondence carlyle in this instance admits his debt. i do not know another man in all the world to whom i can speak with clear hope of getting adequate response from him. truly concord seems worthy of the name: no dissonance comes to me from that side. ah me! i feel as if in the wide world there were still but this one voice that responded intelligently to my own: as if the rest were all hearsays ... echoes: as if this alone were true and alive. my blessings on you, good ralph waldo. emerson answers in , on receipt of the completed edition of his friend's work: "you shall wear the crown at the pan-saxon games, with no competitor in sight ... well earned by genius and exhaustive labour, and with nations for your pupils and praisers." the general verdict on carlyle's literary career assigns to him the first place among the british authors of his time. no writer of our generation, in england, has combined such abundance with such power. regarding his rank as a writer there is little or no dispute: it is admitted that the irregularities and eccentricities of his style are bound up with its richness. in estimating the value of his thought we must discriminate between instruction and inspiration. if we ask what new truths he has taught, what problems he has definitely solved, our answer must be, "few." this is a perhaps inevitable result of the manner of his writing, or rather of the nature of his mind. aside from political parties, he helped to check their exaggerations by his own; seeing deeply into the under-current evils of the time, even when vague in his remedies he was of use in his protest against leaving these evils to adjust themselves--what has been called "the policy of drifting"--or of dealing with them only by catchwords. no one set a more incisive brand on the meanness that often marks the unrestrained competition of great cities; no one was more effective in his insistence that the mere accumulation of wealth may mean the ruin of true prosperity; no one has assailed with such force the mammon-worship and the frivolity of his age. everything he writes comes home to the individual conscience: his claim to be regarded as a moral exemplar has been diminished, his hold on us as an ethical teacher remains unrelaxed. it has been justly observed that he helped to modify "the thought rather than the opinion of two generations." his message, as that of emerson, was that "life must be pitched on a higher plane." goethe said to eckermann in that carlyle was a moral force so great that he could not tell what he might produce. his influence has been, though not continuously progressive, more marked than that of any of his compeers, among whom he was, if not the greatest, certainly the most imposing personality. it had two culminations; shortly after the appearance of _the french revolution,_ and again towards the close of the seventh decade of the author's life. to the enthusiastic reception of his works in the universities, mr. froude has borne eloquent testimony, and the more reserved matthew arnold admits that "the voice of carlyle, overstrained and misused since, sounded then in oxford fresh and comparatively sound," though, he adds, "the friends of one's youth cannot always support a return to them." in the striking article in the _st. james' gazette_ of the date of the great author's death we read: "one who had seen much of the world and knew a large proportion of the remarkable men of the last thirty years declared that mr. carlyle was by far the most impressive person he had ever known, the man who conveyed most forcibly to those who approached him [best on resistance principles] that general impression of genius and force of character which it is impossible either to mistake or to define." thackeray, as well as ruskin and froude, acknowledged him as, beyond the range of his own _métier_, his master, and the american lowell, penitent for past disparagement, confesses that "all modern literature has felt his influence in the right direction"; while the emersonian hermit thoreau, a man of more intense though more restricted genius than the poet politician, declares--"carlyle alone with his wide humanity has, since coleridge, kept to us the promise of england. his wisdom provokes rather than informs. he blows down narrow walls, and struggles, in a lurid light, like the jöthuns, to throw the old woman time; in his work there is too much of the anvil and the forge, not enough hay-making under the sun. he makes us act rather than think: he does not say, know thyself, which is impossible, but know thy work. he has no pillars of hercules, no clear goal, but an endless atlantic horizon. he exaggerates. yes; but he makes the hour great, the picture bright, the reverence and admiration strong; while mere precise fact is a coil of lead." our leading journal on the morning after carlyle's death wrote of him in a tone of well-tempered appreciation: "we have had no such individuality since johnson. whether men agreed or not, he was a touchstone to which truth and falsehood were brought to be tried. a preacher of doric thought, always in his pulpit and audible, he denounced wealth without sympathy, equality without respect, mobs without leaders, and life without aim." to this we may add the testimony of another high authority in english letters, politically at the opposite pole: "carlyle's influence in kindling enthusiasm for virtues worthy of it, and in stirring a sense of the reality on the one hand and the unreality on the other, of all that men can do and suffer, has not been surpassed by any teacher now living. whatever later teachers may have done in definitely shaping opinion ... here is the friendly fire-bearer who first conveyed the promethean spark; here the prophet who first smote the rock." carlyle, writes one of his oldest friends, "may be likened to a fugleman; he stood up in the front of life's battle and showed in word and action his notion of the proper attitude and action of men. he was, in truth, a prophet, and he has left his gospels." to those who contest that these gospels are for the most part negative, we may reply that to be taught what not to do is to be far advanced on the way to do. in nothing is the generation after him so prone to be unjust to a fresh thinker as with regard to his originality. a physical discovery, as newton's, remains to ninety-nine out of a hundred a mental miracle; but a great moral teacher "labours to make himself forgotten." when he begins to speak he is suspected of insanity; when he has won his way he receives a royal commission to appoint the judges; as a veteran he is shelved for platitude. so horace is regarded as a mere jewelry store of the latin, bacon in his _essays_, of the english, wisdom, which they each in fact helped to create. carlyle's paradoxes have been exaggerated, his partialities intensified, in his followers; his critical readers, not his disciples, have learnt most from him; he has helped across the slough of despond only those who have also helped themselves. when all is said of his dogmatism, his petulance, his "evil behaviour," he remains the master spirit of his time, its censor, as macaulay is its panegyrist, and tennyson its mirror. he has saturated his nation with a wholesome tonic, and the practice of any one of his precepts for the conduct of life is ennobling. more intense than wordsworth, more intelligible than browning, more fervid than mill, he has indicated the pitfalls in our civilisation. his works have done much to mould the best thinkers in two continents, in both of which he has been the greatheart to many pilgrims. not a few could speak in the words of the friend whose memory he has so affectionately preserved, "towards me it is still more true than towards england that no one has been and done like you." a champion of ancient virtue, he appeared in his own phrase applied to fichte, as "a cato major among degenerate men." carlyle had more than the shortcomings of a cato; he had all the inconsistent vehemence of an imperfectly balanced mind; but he had a far wider range and deeper sympathies. the message of the modern preacher transcended all mere applications of the text _delenda est._ he denounced, but at the same time nobly exhorted, his age. a storm-tossed spirit, "tempest-buffeted," he was "citadel-crowned" in his unflinching purpose and the might of an invincible will. appendix carlyle's religion the _st. james' gazette,_ february , , writes:-- "it is obvious that from an early age he entirely ceased to believe, in its only true sense, the creed he had been taught. he never affected to believe it in any other sense, for he was far too manly and simple-hearted to care to frame any of those semi-honest transmutations of the old doctrines into new-fangled mysticism which had so great a charm for many of his weaker contemporaries. on the other hand, it is equally true that he never plainly avowed his unbelief. the line he took up was that christianity, though not true in fact, had a right to be regarded as the noblest aspiration after a theory of the universe and of human life ever formed: and that the calvinistic version of christianity was on the whole the best it ever assumed; and the one which represented the largest proportion of truth and the least amount of error. he also thought that the truths which calvinism tried to express, and succeeded in expressing in an imperfect or partially mistaken manner, were the ultimate governing principles of morals and politics, of whose systematic neglect in this age nothing but evil could come. "unwilling to take up the position of a rebel or revolutionist by stating his views plainly--indeed if he had done so sixty years ago he might have starved--the only resource left to him was that of approaching all the great subjects of life from the point of view of grim humour, irony, and pathos. this was the real origin of his unique style; though no doubt its special peculiarities were due to the wonderful power of his imagination, and to some extent--to a less extent we think than has been usually supposed--to his familiarity with german. "what then was his creed? what were the doctrines which in his view calvinism shadowed forth and which were so infinitely true, so ennobling to human life? first, he believed in god; secondly, he believed in an absolute opposition between good and evil; thirdly, he believed that all men do, in fact, take sides more or less decisively in this great struggle, and ultimately turn out to be either good or bad; fourthly, he believed that good is stronger than evil, and by infinitely slow degrees gets the better of it, but that this process is so slow as to be continually obscured and thrown back by evil influences of various kinds--one of which he believed to be specially powerful in the present day. "god in his view was not indeed a personal being, like the christian god--still less was he in any sense identified with jesus christ; who, though always spoken of with rather conventional reverence in his writings, does not appear to have specially influenced him. the god in which mr. carlyle believed is, as far as can be ascertained, a being possessing in some sense or other will and consciousness, and personifying the elementary principles of morals--justice, benevolence (towards good people), fortitude, and temperance--to such a pitch that they may be regarded, so to speak, as forming collectively the will of god.... that there is some one who--whether by the earthquake, or the fire, or the still small voice--is continually saying to mankind--'_discite justitiam moniti'_; and that this being is the ultimate fact at which we can arrive ... is what mr. carlyle seems to have meant by believing in god. and if any one will take the trouble to refer to the first few sentences of the westminster confession, and to divest them of their references to christianity and to the bible, he will find that between the god of calvin and of carlyle there is the closest possible similarity.... the great fact about each particular man is the relation, whether of friendship or enmity, in which he stands to god. in the one case he is on the side which must ultimately prevail, ... in the other ... he will, in due time, be crushed and destroyed.... our relation to the universe can be ascertained only by experiment. we all have to live out our lives.... one man is a cromwell, another a frederick, a third a goethe, a fourth a louis xv. god hates louis xv. and loves cromwell. why, if so, he made louis xv., and indeed whether he made him or not, are idle questions which cannot be answered and should not be asked. there are good men and bad men, all pass alike through this mysterious hall of doom called life: most show themselves in their true colours under pressure. the good are blessed here and hereafter; the bad are accursed. let us bring out as far as may be possible such good as a man has had in him since his origin. let us strike down the bad to the hell that gapes for him. this, we think, or something like this, was mr. carlyle's translation of election and predestination into politics and morals.... there is not much pity and no salvation worth speaking of in either body of doctrine; but there is a strange, and what some might regard as a terrible parallelism between these doctrines and the inferences that may be drawn from physical science. the survival of the fittest has much in common with the doctrine of election, and philosophical necessity, as summed up in what we now call evolution, comes practically to much the same result as predestination." index aberdour addiscombe addison Æschylus ailsa craig airy (the astronomer) aitken, james aitken, mary aitken, mrs. aix-la-chapelle albert, prince alison alma america annan annandale annual register antoinette, marie aristotle arndt arnold, dr. arnold, matthew ashburton, lord and lady assaye atheism _athenæum_ augustenburg austerlitz austin austin, mrs. azeglio bacon badams badcort balaclava balzac bamford, samuel barbarossa baring, see ashburton bassompierre beaconsfield, lord beaumarchais beethoven belgium bellamy bentham berkeley berlin bernstoff, count biography (by froude) birmingham bismarck _blackwood,_ boehm bohemia bolingbroke bonn boston boswell breslau brewster, sir david bright brocken, spectre of the bromley, miss bronte, emily brougham brown, prof. browne, sir thomas browning bryant _note_ buckle buller, charles buller, mrs. bunsen burke burness, william burns byron caesar _cagliostro, count_ cairnes calderon calvin campbell, macleod campbell, thomas carleton carlyle (family) carlyle, alexander carlyle, james (brother) carlyle, james (father) carlyle, john, dr. carlyle, margaret (mother) carlyle, margaret (sister) carlyle, mrs. (jane welsh)(wife) carlyle, thomas (grandfather) carlyle, thomas, birth; education; studies german; lives in edinburgh and takes pupils; studies law; tutor to the bullers; goes to london; at hoddam hill; marriage; edinburgh life; married life; life at craigenputtock; second visit to london; publishes _sartor_; takes house in chelsea; life and work in london; loss of first volume of _french revolution_; rewrites first volume of _french revolution_; lectures; founds london library; publishes _chartism_; writes _past and present_; writes _life of cromwell_; visits ireland; visits paris; writes _history of friedrich ii._; excursions to germany; nominated lord rector of glasgow; success of _friedrich ii._; lord rector of edinburgh; death of his wife; writes his _reminiscences_; defends governor eyre; writes on franco-german war; writes on russo-turkish war; honours; declining years; death; appreciation of; authorities for his life; complaints; contemporary history; conversation; critic, as; descriptive passages; domestic troubles; dreams; dyspepsia; elements of his character; estimates (his) of contemporaries; ethics; financial affairs; friends; genius; historian, as; ignorance; influence; journal; jury, serves on a; letters; literary artist mission nicknaming mania noises opinions paradoxes polities popularity and praise preacher, as, rank as a writer relations to other thinkers religion routine scepticism sound-proof room, style teaching translations travels, and visits truth verses views, change of walks worker, as cassel castlebar cato cavaignac, general cervantes chalmers, dr. changarnier, general _characteristics,_ charlemagne _chartism,_ chatham chaucer chelsea cheyne row china chotusitz christianity church, english cicero cid, the civil war civil war (american) clare, lady clarendon clerkenwell explosions clough, arthur cobden coblenz cockburn colenso, bishop coleridge colonies columbus comte conservatism conway, moncure cooper, thomas cornelius _correspondence,_ cortes cousin craigcrook craigenputtock crimean war cromwell _cromwell, life and letters of,_ crystal palace exhibition cushman, miss cüstrin cuvier czars, the dante danton dardanelles darwin david ii. _deism,_ democracy, de morgan demosthenes de quincey derby, countess of desmoulins _dial, the,_ _diamond necklace,_ dickens diderot diogenes disraeli. _see_ beaconsfield dobell _don quixote,_ döring, herr dresden drogheda drumclog dryden duffy, sir c. gavan dumfries dunbar dunbar (poet) duty ecclefechan eckermann edinburgh _edinburgh encyclopaedia_ _edinburgh review_ education eisenach eldin, lord eliot, george emerson _emigration_ ems england _english traits_ (emerson's) erasmus erfurt erskine _essay on proportion_ _essays_ (carlyle's) everett, alexander _examiner,_ "exodus from houndsditch," eyre, governor eyre, jane faber factory acts faust fawcett fergusson, dr. john fichte fitzgerald, edward flaxman _foreign quarterly preview_ _foreign review_ förster forster, john forster, w.e. fouqué fourier foxton, mr. france franchise francia, dr. frankenstein frankfort _fraser_ free trade french directory french literature _french revolution_ friedrich ii. _friedrich ii., history of_ fritz. _see_ friedrich fritz (carlyle's horse) froude, mr. fryston fuchs, reinecke galileo gallipoli galway game laws gavazzi, father georgel, abbé german literature german worthies germany gibbon gladstone, sir t gladstone, w. e. glasgow _glasgow herald_ goethe goldsmith gordon, margaret gordon (quadroon preacher) gotha grant, j. greek thought grimm's law gronlund grote guizot gully, dr. gully, miss guntershausen haddington hafiz hakluyt hallam hallam, arthur hamburg hamilton, sir william hare, archdeacon harrison, frederick _harvard discourse_ (emerson's) hawthorne hayti heath (royalist writer) hedonism hegel heine, heinrich _helena_ helps henry viii. _hero-worship_ (and _on heroes_} herrnhut hertzka heyne hildebrand hill, lord george _histories_ (carlyle's) history, definition of _history_ review of hobbes hochkirk hoddam hill hoffmann holinshed homburg homer home rule horace home, e.h. houghton, lord hudson (railway king) hughes, t. hugo, victor humboldt hume hunef hunt, leigh huxley, professor "ilias americana in nuce" immortality inkermann _in memoriam_ (tennyson's) inquisition ireland ireland, mrs. irish question irving, edward jamaica jeffrey jena jerrold, douglas jewsbury, geraldine _jocelin de brakelond_ johnson _johnson_ review of boswell's johnston, james jomini jonson, ben journalism, definition of judengasse junius juvenal kant keats keble kingsley, charles kingsley, henry kinnaird kirkcakly knox kolin körner kossuth kunersdorf lamb landor landshut lanin, m. laplace larkin _latter-day pamphlets_ law, carlyle's study of lawson, mr., james carlyle's estimate of _lectures_ legendre leibnitz leipzig leith leslie, prof. leuthen leyden "liberal association" liberalism liegnitz literature as a profession liverpool livy lobositz locke "locksley hall" london london library _london magazine_ london peace congress longfellow longmans (the publisher) louis xiv. louis xv. louis xviii. louisa, electress lowell lucilius luichart, loch "luria" luther macaulay macbeth machiavelli mackenzie, miss stuart mahon, lord mainhill mainz malthusianism malvern marat marburg marcus aurelius marlborough _marseillaise_ marshall mavtineau, miss h. marx, carl massou, prof. _materialism_ mathematics maurice, f. d. mazzini m'crie _meister, wilhelm_ melanchthen mentone meredith, george mericourt merimée, prosper metaphysics, scotch michelet middle ages mill, j.s. millais milman milton mirabeau _miscellanies_ mitchell, robert mitchell (young ireland leader) model prisons mohammed molesworth molwitz montague, basil montaigne montgomery, robert more, sir thomas morris, william motley motte, countess de la muirkirk murchison, sir r. murray (the publisher) murray, thomas musæus napier, macvey napoleon i. napoleon iii. naseby nassau necker negroes nelson "nero" (mrs. carlyle's dog) neuberg new england newman, cardinal newspapers newton nibelungen lied nicholas the czar "nigger question" noble (biographer of cromwell) north, christopher norton, charles e. _norway, early kings of_ novalis o'brien, smith o'connell optimism orsay, count d' orthodoxy vetoed ossoli, countess (margaret fuller) owen oxford oxford, bishop of paraguay pardubitz paris _past and present_ paton, noel paulets, the peel pericles peter the hermit philanthropy philip of hesse plato playfair political economy political philosophy pope popes prague prayer prescott preuss _prinzenraub_ procter procter, mrs. anne puritanism pusey putbus _quarterly review_ queen victoria radicalism railways raleigh ranke ranch "reading of books" redwood reform bills _reminiscences_ renan rennie, george revolution years rhine ricardo richter riesen-gebirge riquetti ritualism robertson robespierre roland, madame rolandseck romans rome, cause of its preservation romilly, sir samuel rossbach rossetti, dante rotterdam rousseau rugby rügen rushworth ruskin russell, lord john russell, mrs., at thornhill russia russo-turkish war sadowa st. andrews st. ives _st. james's gazette_ st. simon samson, abbot sand, george _sartor resartus_ saunders and otley (publishers) saxons scepticism schiller schlosser science scotland scotsbrig _scotsman_ newspaper scott, w.b. scott, sir walter sedan sepoy rebellion seven years' war shaftesbury, lord shakespeare shelley _shooting niagara_ sidney, sir philip _signs of the times_ simon de montfort sinclair, sir george slavery sloane, sir hans smail, tom smith, adam smith, goldwin smith, sydney smollett snowdon socrates sophocles southey spain spedding spencer, herbert spenser stanley, dean stanley, lady augusta stanleys (of alderley) steele stein stephen, fitzjames stephen, sir james sterling _sterling, life of_ sterne stewart, dugald stodart, miss eliza stonehenge strachey, mr. strachey, mrs. stralsund strauss stuart, mary sturge _sun,_ newspaper swift swinburne switzerland tacitus taine, m. _tale of a tub_ (swift's) talleyrand talma taylor, henry taylor's _german literature_ taylor, mrs. tennyson teufelsdröckh thackeray theism thierry, m. thiers thirlwall, bishop thoreau thucydides tieck _times,_ the toplitz torgau trafalgar turgot turks turner tyndall _unto this last_ (ruskin's) usedom, baron varennes vauvenargues vehse verses (carlyle's) verses (mrs. carlyle's) virginia voltaire _wanderjahre_ wartburg washington waterloo watts, g. f. webster, daniel weimar weissenfels wellington (duke of) welsh, jane. _see_ mrs. carlyle welsh, mrs. _werner_ _werther_ (goethe's) westminster abbey westminster confession _westminster review_ westport wilberforce (bishop) william the conqueror william the silent willis's rooms wilson wolseley worcester wordsworth _work_ working classes _world_ (newspaper) _wotton reinfred_ yarmouth zittau zorndorf http://www.archive.org/details/memoirofjaredspa mayeiala memoir of jared sparks, ll.d. by brantz mayer. president of the maryland historical society: [illustration: jared sparks _anno Ætatis xl._] [illustration] prepared at the request of the society, and read before its annual meeting, on thursday evening, february , . printed for the maryland historical society, by john murphy. baltimore, . memoir. it has been a sad but not entirely unpleasant duty to prepare, at the request of the maryland historical society, a brief memoir of one of our earliest and most distinguished honorary members, the late jared sparks, ll.d. the duty, though sad, is not without a pleasant recompense, for the eulogium which a long-continued friendship and intercourse demand can be bestowed with cordial truth. mr. sparks was what we call, in america, a self-made man. although his life is a fair illustration of what an industrious person of talent and common sense may compass by decision of character and a high aim, my object in these observations is not to draw from his biography what has been aptly called "ostentatious precepts and impertinent lessons." by a self-made man i do not mean to class mr. sparks with that large and influential body of citizens whose portraits adorn the illustrated newspapers, and whose memoirs disclose the opinion that the making of a great deal of money is the making of a very exemplary man. when i speak of mr. sparks as a self-made man i use the phrase in a sense of intellectual progress and success, founded on self-relying discipline,--of mental culture and mental fruit, bringing him up to honorable fame from low obscurity,--making him a lasting power in our nation, nay, throughout the world, in our best society, in our literature, in our institutions of learning; and, finally, bestowing on him the just pecuniary rewards always due, yet seldom obtained in america, by intellectual pursuits alone. jared sparks, the son of joseph and eleanor orcutt sparks, was born in willington, connecticut, on the th of may, . the dawn of his life was overshadowed by poverty. i do not know the character or pursuits of his parents, but certainly they were very poor; nor have i found any record of their early care over the child, or, that his youth was comforted by the love and society of a brother or sister. the most reliable account i have received of his infancy shows that he went, with the childless sister of his mother, and her wayward husband, to washington county, new york, and that the eager boy obtained the scant elements of education at the public schools of those days; working, at the same time, on a farm for his livelihood, and sometimes serving a dilapidated saw-mill, (his uncle's last resource,) whose slow movements afforded him broken hours to pour over a copy of guthrie's geography, which he always spoke of as a "real treasure." thus, there were no external influences to bring forth whatever powers were inborn in his character. probably, it was in spite of those influences that he became a man of mark. his aunt, kind at all times, is chiefly remembered for her gentleness and beauty; his mother, for her devotion to reading, and mainly to the constant study of josephus; while the grandmother of these ladies, bethiah parker, is mentioned as a singular enthusiast, who left to her posterity a manuscript volume of poems and letters peculiar only from the fact that, while they are vehicles of religious fervor, they are also autobiographical sketches, in which she discloses (in ) her prophetic visions of the "terrible times that are to come among the nations." there may have been some inheritance by the youth from his mother of a fondness for books, for he always spoke of her with great respect as a superior woman; but the probability is that the intellectual turn of his mind originated within itself, and was cherished by the affection he felt, and everywhere inspired as a boy, and the personal interest with which such a disposition is always repaid. his impressible mind was, doubtless, affected by the grand or beautiful scenery amid which his early life was passed. he was a bright pupil of all his teachers. one of them he so soon excelled in acquirements that the honest pedagogue frankly advised him to seek an abler instructor. but that boon was not to be at once or easily obtained, for jared was too poor to follow the master's advice; and, becoming apprenticed to a carpenter, he wrought at his trade for two years, still employing his spare time in study. he borrowed and mastered a common sailor's book on navigation. he taught himself the names and positions of the stars, and how to calculate the simpler problems of astronomy, the higher mysteries of which he also strove to unravel. for this purpose, he bought a large wooden ball, on which he marked the stars and traced the course of a celebrated comet; and finally he succeeded in calculating an eclipse. at sixteen, he seems to have lost entirely the care of his aunt and uncle, so that he was adrift in the world from that early period. but, his gentle and intellectual character had made him friends. his conduct was observed in that new england neighborhood, where such indications of worth are not only praised but protected. his employer, seeing the tendency of his mind and appreciating his talent, voluntarily released him from indenture, and his first impulse upon emancipation was to become, himself, a schoolmaster. he applied, at once, to the local authorities. the school-committee examined and passed him; and being thus pronounced able to instruct, he taught in a small district on the outskirts of tolland, until the scholars ceased coming during the summer, when jared, for lack of means, was obliged to return for support to his saw and chisel. fortunately, however, he was not detained long at the work-bench. the story of a carpenter-boy studying euclid and solving algebraic problems, made a stir in the village of willington, where he then lived. nor could the eager youth any longer study alone. sparks became restless under the double goad of his ambition and his disadvantages, and plucking up courage, one day marched bravely into the presence of the rev. hubbell loomis, an intelligent and cultivated clergyman, requesting his counsel and instruction. mr. loomis examined him carefully, and, taking him as an inmate of his house, taught him mathematics gratuitously, and induced him to commence the study of greek and latin, encouraging the spirit of independence--which was very lively in sparks--by allowing him to shingle his barn as partial compensation for board and tuition. hitherto, the life of a schoolmaster had been his utmost ambition, and the trials he made satisfied him that, with his love of knowledge and desire to impart it, he would ultimately be able to succeed. the prospect of a college course had not yet dawned on him. but, from his patron loomis to others of greater influence the carpenter's merit spread wider and wider, until the rev. abiel abbott, then a clergyman at coventry, connecticut, procured for him a scholarship at phillips exeter academy, upon a benevolent foundation, to which meritorious pupils of limited means were admitted without charge for board and instruction. on the th of september, , he left tolland, connecticut, and _walked_ the one hundred and twenty miles to exeter, new hampshire, becoming a scholar of the academy for two years. here he first met, as fellow pupils, his life-long friends, palfrey and bancroft. he studied diligently, and made rapid progress; yet, anxious to preserve his independence, and to obtain what was necessary for his personal comfort without further tax on friends or obligation to strangers, he taught, during one winter of these two years, a school at rochester in new hampshire. in one of his memorandums he sums up his tuition thus: "the whole amount of my schooling was about forty months, which was the length of time i attended school before i was _twenty_ years old." but the great hope of his heart--a hope that had been gradually kindled--was at last to be realized, and, in , at the age of twenty-two, through the active interest of president kirkland, sparks entered harvard university, on a pennoyer scholarship. yet, the _res angusta domi_ pursued him still. it is said, that, "in consequence partly of ill health and partly of poverty," he was unable to pass more than two entire years, of his four, at cambridge. to eke out a slender but necessary income, he obtained leave of absence during parts of his freshman and sophomore years, and spent the time as a private teacher in the family of mr. mark pringle, at havre de grace, maryland. he was there when the british, under admiral cockburn, plundered and partly destroyed the village; and here, probably, he enjoyed the only military experience of his life, by serving, as a private, in the maryland militia, called out to guard the neighborhood. the inhabitants, it is related, generally fled to the woods, and but few, among whom was sparks, remained to witness the barbarous behaviour of the enemy. fifteen months of this leave of absence were, thus, spent in our state, in the bosom of an excellent and refined family, by whose members he was warmly esteemed; and, at length, he received his degree of bachelor of arts, at harvard, with the class of . his college course, notwithstanding its interruptions, was successful. president kirkland used to say, in his quaint way, "sparks is not only a man, but a man and a-half." he graduated with high honors. in his senior year he gained the bowdoin prize for an essay on the physical discoveries of sir isaac newton, an essay which is remembered in the traditions of the university as "a masterpiece of analytic exposition, philosophical method, lucid and exact statement." this successful essay was, perhaps, the key of his life and character, for his mind was emphatically clear, exact, analytic, mathematical; and throughout his career, the same qualities were distinct in whatever he investigated or wrote. it has, indeed, been said that his merits were already recognized by the rival university of yale, and that offers for his removal thither had been made during one of his years at harvard; but the friendly influence of dr. kirkland prevailed over those allurements, and he remained constant to his patron and college. the years and were passed by the graduate in teaching a private school at lancaster, massachusetts. he finished his college course at the advanced age of twenty-six, and had now added two years more to the score. at lancaster he cultivated those habits of methodical industry which always characterized him afterwards. soon after undertaking the school, he wrote: "i board at major carter's, a mile and a quarter from my school, to and from which i walk twice a day. i rose this morning an hour before sunrise, and rode five or six miles before breakfast, an exercise which i shall continue regularly. my school occupies six hours, and i have resolved to devote, and thus far, have devoted, six hours of the twenty-four to study." before this, he has a memorandum of walking from cambridge to bolton, twenty-six miles; setting out at half-past one, and arriving at bolton at eight in the evening. in , at the age of twenty-eight, and two years after graduation, his _alma mater_ recognizing the tendency of his mind towards the exact sciences, as well as the extent of his acquirements, chose him tutor in mathematics and natural philosophy at harvard. there also, very soon afterwards, chiefly under the instruction of the rev. dr. ware, who was then the hollis professor, he commenced the study of divinity, pursuing it zealously during two years, being, at the same time, the "working editor" of the north american review. its numbers from may, , to march, , inclusive, were edited by him. in may, of the latter year, at the age of thirty, he was called to baltimore and ordained in this city as the first pastor of the unitarian church which had just been erected. on this memorable occasion, the rev. dr. william ellery channing preached that discourse in exposition of the unitarian faith, which has been so widely celebrated, published, and read in america and europe: a discourse which is said to have "caused more remark on its theological views, while more controversy grew out of the statement of doctrines therein declared, than any single religious discourse in this country ever occasioned." as clergyman of this congregation, mr. sparks remained a resident of our city for four years. he is well remembered in the families of his own church and of other religious societies, among whose members his firm but genial manners always made the studious and estimable gentleman a welcome guest. he was a steadfast laborer among his congregation; but the ultimate literary drift of his life was already beginning to develop itself, having probably received an impetus from his editorial task on the north american review. in addition to his clerical duty in baltimore, he did a great deal of work in editing the unitarian miscellany, in publishing his well-known letters on the comparative moral tendency of the unitarian and trinitarian doctrines, which drew on him the controversial notice of that renowned champion, dr. miller, of princeton, and produced a discussion, which, instead of estranging the combatants, strengthened their personal relations, and increased their mutual confidence and respect. in after years, when mr. sparks required a life of jonathan edwards for his american biography, he selected dr. miller to write it, and, in the truly liberal spirit that always governed his editorial labors, and, indeed, his whole literary life, published the memoir of the great calvanist "without the alteration of a single word." it was here, too, in baltimore, in consequence of a sermon against unitarianism by the late rev. dr. wm. e. wyatt, of st. paul's, that mr. sparks published his volume of letters on the ministry, ritual, and doctrines of the protestant episcopal church. it was in baltimore, in , that he arranged and began the republication of essays and tracts in theology by wm. penn, bishop hoadley, newton, whitby, evelyn, locke, and others. it was in baltimore, also, during his religious ministry, that he received the flattering tribute from congress of being elected its chaplain. this was a great honor, won in ten years, by the harvard student of ; and although his election alarmed the clergy and laity of other christian denominations, and a member of congress declared they had "voted christ out of the house," still, in time, congress learned to know him better, to admit the tolerance of his catholic spirit, and to honor him with increased confidence. but, in , after four years of labor in our city, mr. sparks's health became so much impaired that he resolved to retire from the church entirely, and devote himself exclusively to literature. yet, he always loved baltimore; he always met the people with warmth, and recurred joyfully to the happy years he spent in maryland as teacher and minister. at the beginning of the late rebellion he wrote to me concerning an address published by one of our patriotic citizens: "i could not," said he, "but approve most highly its candor and independent tone, and the enlightened and just views it presented of our public affairs. it furnished a demonstration that there were brave spirits and true in your city, notwithstanding the misgivings which many, in this quarter, had, at that time, begun to indulge. most heartily do i wish prosperity, good fortune, and success to baltimore. with no place have i more deeply cherished associations. may peace, quiet, and brotherly sympathies prevail within her borders." and again, at a later day, he wrote in the same strain of affectionate memory of our city and its people: "i take a lively interest in all that concerns maryland both present and past. i have not forgotten that my home was once there. i have many and deeply cherished recollections of baltimore, which will remain in my heart and mind while the power of memory continues to act. the order of providence and strange events have produced changes, _but it is baltimore, still_." such were the sentiments of this excellent man towards our state, and city, and people. they continued to be cherished by him to the last hour of his life, and were warmly repeated to me in one of the last letters he ever wrote, received but a day or two before his death. he left baltimore reluctantly; his congregation parted with him painfully, and its farewell letter, written and signed by the late chancellor of our state, theodorick bland, bears the most honorable testimony to the success of his pastoral labors. yet, probably, it was not ill health alone that determined mr. sparks's removal to boston. i think he had already set his heart on the great themes of national history, and resolved, if possible, to pursue the work faithfully by the acquisition of the vast and scattered materials it needed. upon his arrival in massachusetts in , he purchased the north american review, and became its sole editor from january, , to april, . in these seven years his industrious pen contributed no less than fifty articles, many of profound study, and all adding to the solid critical literature of america. it was in that he made his first elaborate biographical essay in the attractive life of john ledyard, the american traveller. about this time, too, good fruits were borne to him by his previous residence in baltimore and the acquaintance he had made with the illustrious men who, in those days, were found every winter in washington. in that city his worth had been recognized by the descendants of prominent revolutionary personages, by leading legislators and public functionaries from the several states, and, particularly, by such persons as chief justice marshall, the biographer of washington, and his nephew bushrod washington and mr. justice story, both, at that time, associate judges of the supreme court. thenceforward, the idea that had taken possession of his mind on the temporary failure of his health at baltimore--"the city of noble souls, of large-hearted men," as he was wont to call it--became the ruling purpose of his life. he was to run the career of a man of letters, and in a country hardly ripe for literary production. american history was to be his occupation; all things else became subservient to this great purpose. he had conceived the project of collecting the correspondence of washington, and of gathering all the accessible documents in this country and europe necessary for an authentic life of the great chief. on his first application for the washington manuscripts, which mr. justice bushrod washington had intended to edit, mr. sparks was told, much as he was respected, he could by no means have them. yet, his journal of that date has no complaining, despondent mention of the rebuff, for, on that very day he set forth from the city of washington on his journey to the south, in quest of other materials; and, with a light, confident, indefatigable spirit, went on patiently collecting them from public and private sources, everywhere finding profitable work, and, with marvellous keenness and sagacity, choosing and appropriating whatever he should want for the great task which it was his destiny to accomplish. our archives at annapolis, scant and neglected as they unfortunately are, still bear marks of his diligence; and, years after his task was completed in our state house, i have found, among our documents, the frequent traces of his minute and accurate labors. this, i am told, was a life-long trait of his preparation, for he always provided himself with every species of preliminary information which could lead to what he did not possess, in case, at some future day, it might become useful or necessary. his memorandums, therefore, were copious and explicit. indeed, he became so familiar with the archives of the several states, that from his study in massachusetts, he could readily, without a fresh journey, command the desired documents, and always indicate the department, and, generally, the shelf, book, or bundle in which the coveted manuscript was to be found by his correspondents. and, so he went on cheerily from state to state and family to family, increasing his national treasures, until, at last, the richest of the american collections was yielded to him by the washington family and the government. the manuscripts at mount vernon--the entire correspondence of washington and his papers--arranged by him in more than two hundred folio volumes; the state papers of the "old thirteen," and the private papers of many of the civil and military leaders of the revolution, were opened to his inspection, and some of them actually placed in his possession for ten years, while engaged in the composition of his great work. this would have been anxious labor even for a man of leisure, robust health, and a fortune that secured him from all care for present support or comfort. but sparks was still poor, and, while engaged in this expensive preliminary task of mere accumulation--a task that might produce profitable results after many years--he was also obliged to provide for the needs of the passing day. his ready talent and economical habits enabled him to do it.[ ] nor did he rest satisfied with what he found in the united states or could gain by correspondence from abroad. he went to europe to complete his researches; and the national and private archives of france and england, which had hitherto been closed to american students, were soon unlocked for him through the personal solicitations in his favor of sir james mackintosh, mr. lockhart, mr. hamilton, lord landsdowne, and lord holland, in great britain, and of general lafayette, monsieur guizot, and monsieur de marbois in france;--another proud achievement by the charity student of . i may add here, at once, that mr. sparks paid a second visit to europe in , in order to examine its archives; on that occasion, discovering, in the french cabinet, the original letter of franklin and the famous map with our north-eastern boundary delineated by a "red line," which were so much discussed in the subsequent negotiations with great britain in regard to our limits in that quarter. the first fruits of these domestic and foreign studies was mr. sparks's valuable publication, in - , of the diplomatic correspondence of the revolution; followed, after two years, by the life of gouverneur morris, with selections from his correspondence and miscellaneous papers. in , he originated and edited that excellent annual, so long a favorite in our country, known as the american almanac; and, about the same time, he began his library of american biography, extending, in two series, to twenty-five volumes, for which he composed the charming biographies of la salle, ribault, pulaski, benedict arnold, father marquette, charles lee, and ethan allen. meanwhile, his attention to the great work--the life and writings of washington--never flagged. of course, the labor of careful selection, arrangement, and illustration was immense. his apartment in ashburton place, boston, was covered from floor to ceiling with volumes and packages; nor did he ever leave it until his completed task of ten or twelve hours' work, freed him, after night, for a healthful walk and a refreshing visit to friends. ten of these busy years were thus spent in the preparation, printing, and publication of the life and writings of washington, which was finally given to the world, volume by volume, between and , in twelve stout octavos, at a cost, i understand, of about one hundred thousand dollars. in , appeared his other great national book, the life and works of franklin, in ten massive octavos, comprizing, among other valuable papers discovered by him, no less than two hundred and fifty-three letters of the philosopher, never before printed, and one hundred and fifty-four not included in any previous edition. to this superb collection he added the "life" as far as it had been written by franklin himself, and continued it, from his own materials, to the patriot's death. in seventeen years, and at the age of fifty-one, he had won the highest honors of literature, and the right to have his name linked forever, throughout the world, with the names of franklin and washington. nor were these honors less dear to him when he reflected that he had reached the mature age of thirty-four before he had _a real purpose in life_, and that, in spite of adverse fortune, he had accomplished his designs by the force of character, by self-denial and indomitable industry. in - , occurred the singular controversy between lord mahon, mr. w. b. reed, and mr. sparks, in regard to the manner in which the latter had edited washington's writings. it was conducted by our late colleague with good temper and success. he vindicated his facts and plan from all assaults, foreign and domestic, and was, doubtless, vastly aided by the exact method with which his letters, documents, and references had been arranged for his great work. for, _preparation_ was, at once, his task and his strength. he always wrote rapidly and alone, without the aid of an amanuensis, as soon as he was prepared to compose. he then worked with great perfection and ease to himself, because the materials were not only at hand but thoroughly digested. when asked how long a time would be required by him to make an abridgement of his life of washington, while he was still busy with his franklin, his reply was, "no time!" and the printer never waited for him a moment, so keen and clear were his decision and sense of proportion. in , he published the correspondence of the american revolution, in letters from eminent men to general washington from the time of his taking command of the army to the end of his presidency. this valuable addition to his historical series was prepared from the original mss., and terminated mr. sparks's important contributions to our national stores. it has been said that he contemplated a history of the foreign diplomacy of the revolution, and it is quite certain that he intended to write a history of the revolution, itself, preceding it, probably, by several volumes on our colonial history. as i heard mr. irving once say that the biography of washington was not a task to his liking, for "he had no _private_ life" to give it the personal interest essential to secure the reader's sympathy; so it may truly be said, from the constant publicity of the chief's career, that his life, during most of it, was the life of his country. nevertheless, mr. sparks felt that it was, in truth, biography and not history, and he sought a more extended field, for which he considered his powers to be, as doubtless they were, entirely equal. his collection of materials for this purpose was rich, completed, and bound in volumes; but his noble intention was, unfortunately, frustrated, and with it perished his most cherished hope. he always regretted his inability to go on with this work. all his other publications, valuable as they were, in his estimation had been but preparatory. in he broke his right arm, which was already weakened by a neuralgic affection contracted by long years of labor at the desk. this, ever afterwards, made the use of a pen extremely irksome. under the weight of these mixed evils of nervous malady and fractured limb, his task was procrastinated; yet, his patient hope was profound. the conflict between the desire to achieve and the disability was so painful, that the subject of his projected history became a sacred one among all who were familiar with him, and, even in his family, it was passed over in silence. at times, he would look at these accumulations of years in his library, with the simple ejaculation, "sad, sad!" when others alluded to them, he had some light reply: "you are a younger man; do _you_ work?" it was his great grief that the mine of golden ore was at hand, but that _he_ could work no more. yet, he never ceased to be prepared, by adding constantly to his materials; and, even in the last year of his life, he exclaimed, at times, "_i think i may soon go on!_" he never ceased to look forward to the time when his infirmity would allow him to march once more in pursuit of what had become the "evangeline" of his life, the only work worthy of his mature powers: "something there was in his life incomplete, imperfect, unfinished, as if a morning in june, with all its music and sunshine, suddenly paused in the sky, and fading slowly, descended into the east again, from whence it late had arisen!" the rich collection he had amassed for this history of the american revolution, carefully arranged and bound in volumes, was bequeathed to his son, ultimately to pass to the library of harvard university. i understand his heir has already discharged the trust by depositing these treasures in the institution where their collector designed they should be permanently preserved. although the life of mr. sparks as an author may be said to have terminated with his last original publications, he, nevertheless, did not withhold himself from an active interest in the cause of letters. he had been appointed mclean professor of ancient and modern history at cambridge, in ; and for the ten following years, in the midst of other work, performed the duties of that chair, until, on the resignation of president edward everett, his _alma mater_ bestowed her highest honor by electing him president of harvard. this was the _finale_ of a career of successful labor extending through thirty-eight years. his presidency was acceptable as well as popular; especially commanding the confidence and affectionate respect of the pupils. he was no martinet, but fostered the manhood of the generation entrusted to his government. a friend who was present in cambridge, and well acquainted with mr. sparks's administration of the presidency, tells me that its peculiarity was the parental character of his intercourse with the under-graduates. after the stateliness of some of his predecessors, this bland demeanor of the new president alarmed by its supposed relaxation of a discipline which the over-nice are accustomed to enforce by a stern preservation of cold formality; yet, even the critics who considered him a little slack, did not fail to see that he won the love of all, while many a poor fellow in disgrace felt quite inclined to bless a rod which fell in such sweet mercy.[ ] for three years, the successor of kirkland, quincy, and everett held the responsible presidency; nor, in all that period of watchfulness, did he ever forget or neglect the striving, indigent students, who required a helping hand in the days of their adversity. his works had made him independent in fortune, so that, wherever assistance was needed, his was an open but judicious hand. "in the days of his prosperity," it is said by one who knew him well, "he returned to his original benefactors not only the money he had received from them, but more than the interest." on resigning the presidency of harvard he retired to the property he owned in cambridge, where, in the enjoyment of society, of favorite studies, and of a large correspondence and intercourse with friends and distinguished strangers, he passed the remaining years of a tranquil life, which ended, after a short and painless malady, on the th of march, , in the seventy-seventh year of his age. the summons to eternity was sudden; but the faith and the life of the veteran sustained him to the close. as he was consciously approaching it, "i think," said he, feebly, "i shall not recover, _but i am happy_." and when asked whether he was rightly understood as saying he was "_happy_," his answer was, "_certainly!_" mr. sparks was twice married; first, in , to frances anne allen, of hyde park, new york, who died in ; and again, in , to mary c. silsbee, daughter of nathaniel silsbee, a wealthy and honored merchant of salem, for many years a senator of the united states from massachusetts, as colleague of daniel webster. four children, a son and three daughters, all the offspring of the second marriage, survive, with their mother, to rejoice in the memory of their illustrious father. the amount of mr. sparks's literary labor and its popular estimation, maybe judged from the fact that more than six hundred thousand volumes of his various publications have been published and disposed of. in personal appearance mr. sparks had a noble presence, a firm, bold, massive head, which, as age crept on, sometimes seemed careworn and impassive; but never lost its intellectual power. his portraits show that in his prime his face was remarkable for dignified, manly beauty. his manners were winning; and, though undemonstrative and rather reticent among strangers, with friends, he was always cheerful and hearty. he was never dogmatic, patronizing or repulsive, by that self-assertion into which superior men are too often petted by the subservient deference of society. he had large social resources, but, withal, was modest without being shy. his character was, indeed, a perfect balance of charming qualities. though moderate in the announcement of opinions, and too patriotic to degenerate into a partizan, he gave no timid, lukewarm support to the nation in its hour of trial. his knowledge of the world was ample; but that excellent lore did not always save him from the overreaching, so that, at one time, he lost much of the hard-earned avails of his labors, and though not impoverished, was uncomfortably straitened. yet, he loved to be trustful and serviceable; and, what he knew, he gave cordially to friends, correspondents, and respectful strangers who approached him properly. he desired to stimulate the young by truthful approbation, and, from his recognized eminence, to bestow the "nutritious praise of veteran talent." he was never spoken of lightly. large and active as was his mind, "his heart," unlike fontenelle's, was not "made of his brains." he was as pure, affectionate, and charitable a man in all his relations, as he was eminent in the literature he created and consecrated to his country. an author's life is commonly a catalogue of his works. the career of a scholar is generally uneventful, seldom possessing those stirring traits which give dramatic interest to public characters of less quiet pursuits. mr. sparks was not an exception to this rule. his life is in his works; for, as long as he could work _well_ he was a worker for his country. the few and simple facts i have told of this gentle student's struggles and success, show that his labors were mostly in the field of history. but, the field of history is large and sub-divided. it comprehends annals, chronicles, memoirs, biography; and these--the essence of the past--become the elements from which an artist endowed with disciplined judgment and combining imagination, shapes the master-pieces which are properly called by the generic name, history. it has been usual to associate the name of mr. sparks with those of bancroft, prescott, motley, and irving; yet, the qualities of these writers, as well as the tasks they set themselves, seem to me quite different from those of our late associate. if history may be properly defined, as i think it should be--a narrative of national life, claiming the utmost comprehension of fact, date, description, biography, annals, and chronicle, woven together with brilliant analysis and wholesome philosophy,--i hope i may not be considered unjust in the opinion that, as yet, our country has but one writer who will be classed with hume and gibbon. this is certainly no disparagement of others, for it is, probably, the result of extent of aim rather than of quality or power. no american, of acknowledged superiority, has yet equalled george bancroft in the breadth of his theme, the extent of time and place covered, the variety of character, circumstance, and nationality concerned, the corresponding research, the sparkling story, and the philosophic analysis of his national history. prescott, the prince of scholars and gentlemen, matchless in the department he chose, was rather a biographer than a historian. he selected stirring epochs and their prominent men, the pivots of certain times, upon whom the affairs of two worlds turned at critical periods,--the great warders who stood at the portals of america and europe in the sixteenth century. thus, ferdinand and isabella, cortez, pizarro, charles v., and philip ii., wonderfully as they revive in the books of prescott, exquisite in accuracy, harmonious style, and enamelled finish, are but beautiful cabinet-pictures of the princes and heroes of the age. the life of a nation requires a taller and wider canvas, a bolder and broader brush. and, so it is with the historical labors of irving and motley, though the latter has closely approached the true grandeur of history in his narrative of the rise of the dutch republic. yet, it must ever remain as the highest praise of our late colleague, that, in the field of national _biographies_, national in all their elements, he stands beside the masters on the platform of acknowledged success. he was the real pioneer in the unexplored wilderness of our historical literature. "indeed," says one familiar with his works, "it requires considerable knowledge on the part of a reader, _a knowledge of the state of things, of the obstacles and perplexities, in the way of effort, and of the hard conditions of success, at the time when mr. sparks gave himself to his large and costly enterprise_, in order that his eminent devotion and success may be, even in degree, appreciated." but he brought together the dispersed fragments of colonial and revolutionary days, and made the writing of history untroublesome for authors who, in "slippered ease" and comfortable libraries, availed themselves of his labor, and patronizingly patted him on the head. these are the silk-worms of literature, whose glory is spun from the digested leaves of other men's culture. it was his habit, when allusions were made to such appropriations, to find sufficient reward in his own diligence, and to comfort himself for this "way of the world" by a patient shrug and a pinch of snuff.[ ] irving, in his advanced life, could never have written his washington, had not sparks organized his twelve volumes of materials, and analysed them in the biography. that work must be _studied_, in order to be appreciated in relation to mr. sparks's literary merit: it is a mine of editorial tact and industry, displaying the mathematical spirit of the author in its method and organization, in its lucid statements, and in his sagacious perception of the value of what was retained and the worthlessness of what was rejected, so that washington is self-shown to the hereafter by what he thought, and wrote, and did. the commendation bestowed on mr. sparks, in the masterly eulogium of mr. haven before the american antiquarian society, may be taken as a wise and exact definition of his labors in the field of history: "not that mr. sparks," said he, "limited himself to the preparation and preservation of history _in bulk_; for he was equally able in narrative, in criticism, and in controversy,--he was an essayist as well as a compiler; but the last was his _forte_, his peculiar field of usefulness and eminence, where, it may be said, he reigns supreme." this estimate of mr. sparks by his friend does not classify him with the annalist and chronicler who build up a fleshless skeleton of facts and dates. nothing could be less just to the subject or the commentator. imagination was not a predominant quality of mr. sparks's mind. its cool precision so curbed the exercise of the ideal faculty that it was unjustly subdued if not absolutely stifled; and thus we do not always discern in him that creative power, so rarely found combined with sagacity in gathering and marshalling details, which, while it apprehends the true relation of men and circumstances, masses the historic groups with picturesque effect, delineates character with intuitive insight, gives soul to the moving drama of national life, and vividly _realizes_ the scenes and personages of the past. but, if he was not so brilliant in description as others, or in the majestic and harmonious march of his story, or in keen scrutiny of character, he unquestionably excelled in ample, direct, and truthful statement, so that his narrative was not only transparent in the fulness of detail, but the detail itself disclosed its philosophic lesson. no man can charge him with hasty or capricious censure. he was always the careful protector of human reputation, dealing with the unresisting and undefending dead as their advocate as well as righteous judge; reluctant to condemn by argument or inference, and never unless the proved facts were irresistible. he studiously discarded all that might either attract or detract by fancy or elaborate discussion; in a word, he shunned ambitious rhetoric, so perilous to solid judgments, and so often giving false color to historical portraits, for he knew the risk of losing the reliable in the brilliant. in his style, he was an artless artist, if there is truth in thackeray's observation, that the "true artist makes you think of a great deal more than the objects before you." his extreme calmness may have, sometimes, made him cold; yet, by conforming himself to plain forms of language, he always aimed to convey the absolute truth, which he regarded as the coveted prize of history. for history, to his mind, was a serious thing, not a melodramatic tale, and he wrote it as he would have delivered testimony in the presence of god. his desire was that the fact and not the form should fascinate and teach; because the fact was permanent and independent, the form flexible and voluntary. no one knew better or more dreaded the risk of biasing opinion by over or under-statements concerning the conspicuous persons of whom he wrote. if his theme was not so large as mr. bancroft's, he still felt that both addressed the american nation in words that were to last, concerning the founders of our political system and the chief who presided at the foundation. what he recorded was to form the opinions of posterity, and thus, not merely to influence but virtually to become a principle of action for his countrymen in relation to the great things that concern patriots. enthusiastic, yet, never excited; patient, and devoid of partizanship; he had the rare faculty of writing so fairly of men of a near period that his books were satisfactory to every one, save lord mahon. he never wrote a sentence that was not in the interest of his whole country. he was so calmly judicial in temper, that he found it easy to convert himself into what madame de stael so happily called "contemporaneous posterity." his life demonstrates that cultivated talents, independent self-respect, and industry in intellectual pursuits, not only secure reputation but fortune. it is a plea for wholesome literature in our land. literature, though never a speculation in his hands, was, as he conducted it, a successful enterprise. his career was charmingly rounded by honor, prosperity, and the love of mankind. in all respects it was a requited life. be it said, with reverence, that, considering the difference of their fields, there is a singular concord between the virtues and common sense of washington and sparks, and hence the sympathetic veneration of the author for the hero. if i attempted to characterize him briefly, i might say that he attained all the ends of an ambitious life without being, at any time, ambitious. he was certainly not devoid of a love of approbation, but it was not the selfish end for which he wrought; for, with him, approbation bestowed was only a recognition of the fact that his endeavor to be a good and useful man had been successful. "dignum laude virum musa vetat mori." [illustration: the end] footnotes: [footnote : he good-humoredly described himself as "dependent on his wits and daily exertions for a living; and this, too, with small abilities for making, and still less for keeping, _money_."] [footnote : the rev. james freeman clark relates a characteristic anecdote of dr. sparks's demeanor to the harvard scholars, which is worthy of repetition: one of the pupils, as he left the recitation-room, made a noise derisive of a tutor. the tutor stated the fact to the faculty, with the names of several, who, if not guilty, might know the real offender. they were summoned before the faculty, and president sparks was desired to ask them, one by one, "if they made the noise, or, knew who made it?" dr. sparks had previously said to the faculty that they could not expect to get the information thus, or suppose the boys would inform on their fellows; the invitation to falsehood was too great. when they came before him, dr. s. addressed them to the following effect: "i have been requested by the faculty to ask you if you made, or, know who made, the disturbance at the close of your recitation. i state to you their request; but, if you know who made the noise, i do not intend to ask you to tell." the answers were various; till, at length, one said: "i did it. i know i ought not to have done it, and am sorry. i hardly know why i did it; yes, i should say it was because i did not like the tutor, who, i thought, had not used me fairly in some of my recitations." having told the truth, and acknowledged his fault, dr. sparks thought the youth should be commended instead of punished; but the tutors outvoted the others, and he was suspended. the president, however, wrote a note to his father, saying he considered it no dishonor, as young men did not often have such opportunities to show themselves frank and noble. (_memoir of sparks_, _hist. mag._, vol. x., p. .)] [footnote : no candid student in lauding mr. sparks, should fail to acknowledge our debt of gratitude to peter force, for his vast and successful labors in recovering and rendering accessible the large stores of materials for american history and biography contained in the "american archives."] the correspondence of thomas carlyle and ralph waldo emerson - volume ii "to my friend i write a letter, and from him i receive a letter. it is a spiritual gift, worthy of him to give, and of me to receive."--emerson "what the writer did actually mean, the thing he then thought of, the thing he then was."--carlyle contents of volume ii lxxvi. emerson. concord, july, . remittance of l .-- alcott.--editorship of the _dial._--projected essay on poetry.-- stearns wheeler. lxxvii. carlyle. chelsea, july, . acknowledgment of remittance.--change of publishers.--work on _cromwell._-- sterling.--alcott. lxxviii. carlyle. chelsea, august, . impotence of speech.--heart-sick for his own generation.--transcendentalism of the _dial._ lxxix. emerson. concord, october, . the coming book on cromwell.--alcott.--the _dial_ and its sins.--booksellers' accounts. lxxx. carlyle. chelsea, november, . accounts.--alcott.-- sect-founders.--man the reformer.--james stephen.--gambardella. lxxxi. carlyle. chelsea, march, . _past and present._-- how to prevent pirated republication.--the _dial._--alcott's english tail. lxxxii. carlyle. chelsea, april, . copy of _past and present_ forwarded.--prospect of pirated edition. lxxxiii. emerson. concord, april, . carlyle's star.-- lectures on "new england" at baltimore, philadelphia, and new york.--politics in washington.--_past and present._--effect of cheap press in america.--reprint of the book.--the _dial_ does not pay expenses. extract from emerson's diary concerning _past and present._ lxxxiv. carlyle. august, . introduction of mr. macready. lxxxv. emerson. concord, october, . remittance of l .-- piratical reprint of _past and present._--e.p. clark, a carlylese, to be asked to take charge of accounts.--henry james. --ellery channing's poems. lxxxvi. carlyle. chelsea, october, . summer wanderings. --the _dial_ at the london library.--growth of emerson's public in england.--piratical reprint of his essays in london.--of _past and present_ in america.--criticism of carlyle in the dial.--dr. russell.--theodore parker.--book about cromwell.-- _commons journals._ lxxxvii. carlyle. chelsea, november, . receipt of l .-- e.p. clark.--henry james.--channing's poems.--reverend w.h. channing.--"progress of the species."--emerson.--the cromwell business. lxxxviii. emerson. concord, december, . macready.-- railroad to concord.--margaret fuller's review of sterling's poems in the _dial._--remittance of l . lxxxix. carlyle. chelsea, january, . remittance received and made.--criticism of emerson by gilfillan.--john sterling.-- cromwell book.--hexameters from voss. xc. emerson. concord, february, . acknowledgment of remittance.--a new collection of essays.--faith in writers as a class.--remittance of l .--proposal concerning publication in america of _cromwell._ xci. carlyle. chelsea, april, . acknowledgment of remittance.--piratical reprints.--professor ferrier. xcii. carlyle. chelsea, august, . fear for sterling.-- tennyson.--work on _cromwell_ frightful. xciii. emerson. concord, september, . sends proof sheets of new book of essays.--sterling. xciv. carlyle. chelsea, september, . death of sterling. xcv. emerson. concord, september, . remittance of l -- sterling.--tennyson.--regrets having troubled carlyle about proof-sheets.--birth of edward emerson.--purchase of land on walden pond. xcvi. carlyle. chelsea, november, . thanks for remittance.--london edition of _essays,_ second series.-- criticism on them. xcvii. emerson. concord, december, . sterling's death.-- london edition of _essays._--carlyle's preface and strictures. xcviii. emerson. concord, january, . bargain about _miscellanies_ with carey and hart.--portrait of carlyle desired.--e.p. clark's "illustrations of carlyle". xcix. carlyle. chelsea, february, . bargain with carey & co.--portrait.--emerson's public in england.--work on cromwell. c. emerson. concord, june, . death of mr. carey.-- portrait.--his own occupations.--preparing to print _poems._-- lectures in prospect. ci. carlyle. chelsea, august, . _cromwell's letters and speeches_ finished.--nature of the book.--new book from emerson welcome.--imperfection of all modes of utterance.--forbids further plague with booksellers. cii. emerson. concord, september, . payment sure from carey and hart.--lectures on "representative men". ciii. emerson. concord, september, . congratulations on completion of _cromwell_ book.--clark. civ. carlyle. chelsea, november, . cromwell book sent.-- visit to scotland.--changes there.--his mother.--impatience with the times.--weariness with the cromwell book.--visit to the ashburtons. cv. carlyle. chelsea, january, . thanks to mr. hart, mr. furness, and others.--_cromwell proves popular.--new letters of cromwell. cvi. carlyle. chelsea, february, . second edition of cromwell.--emerson to do what he will concerning republication.-- anti-corn-law.--aristocracy and millocracy. cvii. carlyle. chelsea, march, . cromwell lumber.--sheets of new edition sent.-essay on emerson in an edinburgh magazine.-- mr. everett.--jargon in newspapers and parliament. cviii. carlyle. chelsea, april, . arrangements concerning reprint of _cromwell._--promise of daguerrotype likeness.--fifty years old.--rides.--emerson's voice wholly human.--blessedness in work. cix. carlyle. chelsea, april, . photograph sent.-- arrangements with wiley and putnam for republication of _cromwell_ and other books.--photographs of emerson and himself. --remembrance of craigenputtock. cx. emerson. concord, may, . daguerrotype likeness.-- wood-lot on walden pond. cxi. emerson. concord, may, . photograph of carlyle received.--one of himself sent in return.--bargain with wiley and putnam. cxii. carlyle. chelsea, june, . bargain with wiley and putnam.--emerson's photograph expected. cxiii. emerson. concord, july, . wiley and putnam.-- dealings with booksellers.--accounts.--e.p. clark and his illustrations of carlyle's writings.--margaret fuller going to europe. cxiv. carlyle. chelsea, july, . photograph of emerson unsatisfactory.--revision of his own books.--spleen against books.--going to scotland.--reading in american history.-- marshall and sparks.--michelet.--beriah green. cxv. emerson. concord, july, . thanks for copy of new edition of cromwell.--margaret fuller.--desires carlyle to see her. cxvi. carlyle. chelsea, december, . long silence.-- disconsolate two months in scotland.--visit to ireland.--a country cast into the melting-pot.--o'connell.--young ireland.-- returned home sad.--miss fuller; estimate of her.--what she thought of carlyle.--emerson's poems. cxvii. emerson. concord, january, . margaret fuller's visit to chelsea.--speculates on going to england to lecture.-- his _poems._ cxviii. carlyle. chelsea, march, . visit to hampshire.-- emerson's _poems._--prospect of emerson's lectures in england.-- miss fuller. cxix. carlyle. chelsea, march, . remittance received.-- alexander ireland.--advice concerning lectures. cxx. emerson. concord, april, . prospect of lecturing in england.--works in garden and orchard. cxxi. carlyle. chelsea, may, . thoreau's lecture on carlyle.--visit from e.r. hoar.--emerson's visit to england. cxxii. emerson. concord, june, . prospect of visit to england.--f.h. hedge. cxxiii. emerson. concord, july, . visit to england decided upon.--portrait of sterling. cxxiv. carlyle. rawdon, yorkshire, august, . journeyings.--emerson's expected visit.--hedge.--dr. jacobson.-- quaker hosts. cxxv. emerson. concord, september, . plans for england. cxxvi. carlyle. chelsea, october, . delay of emerson's letter announcing his coming.--welcome to chelsea. emerson--extracts from his diary concerning carlyle. cxxvil. emerson. manchester, november, . his reception and occupations. cxxviii. carlyle. chelsea, november, . messages.-- occupations.--bancroft. cxxix. carlyle. chelsea., november, . messages.--mr. forster, &c. cxxx. emerson. manchester, december, . message from miss fuller.--hospitality shown him.--the english. cxxxi. carlyle. chelsea, december, . the pepolis.-- milnes.--tennyson.--idleness.--visit to hampshire.--massachusetts review. cxxxii. emerson. ambleside, february, . at miss martineau's.--wordsworth.--proposed return to chelsea. cxxxiii. carlyle. chelsea, february, . welcome ready at chelsea.--his own conditions.--the new french republic. cxxxiv. emerson. manchester, march, . return to london. cxxxv. emerson. [london,] june, . proposed call with mrs. crowe. cxxxvi. carlyle. chelsea, june, . mrs. crowe.--luncheon with the duchess. cxxxvii. carlyle. chelsea, june, . invitation to dinner. cxxxviii. carlyle. chelsea, december, . long silence.-- questions concerning indian meal.--death of charles buller, and of lord ashburton's mother.--neuberg and others. cxxxix. emerson. boston, january, . john carlyle's translation of the inferno.--indian corn.--clough's bothie. cxl. carlyle. chelsea, april, . indian corn from concord; trial of it, reflections upon it.--no writing at present.--macaulay's _history._--political outlook.--clough.-- sterling club. cxli. carlyle. scotsbrig, august, . indian corn again.-- tour in ireland.--letter from miss fuller.--message to thoreau. cxlii. carlyle. chelsea, july, . a year's silence.-- latter day pamphlets.--divergence from emerson.--_representative men._--prescott lionized. cxliii. carlyle. chelsea, november, . "eighteen million bores."--emerson on latter day pamphlets.--autumn journey.-- disordered nerves. cxliv. carlyle. chelsea, july, . appeal for news.--_life of sterling._--crystal palace.--bossu's _journal,_ bartram's _travels._--margaret fuller.--mazzini.--dr. carlyle. cxlv. emerson. concord, july, . story of the year.-- journey in the west.--memoir of margaret fuller.--_life of sterling._--english friends. cxlvi. carlyle. great malvern, august, . _life of sterling._--bossu's _journal._--water-cure.--twisleton.--milnes married.--tennyson.--browning on miss fuller. cxlvii. emerson. concord, april, . browning's reminiscences of margaret fuller.--books on the indians.--_life of sterling._ cxlviii. carlyle. chelsea, may, . correspondence must be revived.--margaret fuller.--memoirs of her. cxlix. emerson. concord, may, . relations with carlyle.-- carlyle's genius and his own.--margaret fuller. cl. carlyle. chelsea, june, . emerson and himself.-- reading about frederick the great. cli. emerson. concord, april, . excuses for not writing.--chapter on fate.--visit to the west.--conditions of american life.--clough. clii. carlyle. chelsea, may, . blessing of letters from emerson.--coming on of old age.--modern democracy.--visit to germany.--still reading about fritz. cliia. emerson. concord, august, . slowness to write.-- regret at clough's return to england.--miss bacon.--carlyle's visit to germany.--thackeray in america.--new york and its society. cliii. carlyle. chelsea, september, . regrets for old days.--not left town.--a new top story.--miss bacon, her quixotic enterprise.--clough.--thackeray.--to concord? cliv. emerson. concord, march, . laurence, the artist.-- reading latter day pamphlets.--death of carlyle's, and of emerson's mother.--miss bacon.--his english notes.--lecturing tour in the west.--speed _frederick!_ clv. carlyle. chelsea, april, . thankful for emerson's letter.--death of his mother.--makes no way in prussian history. --the insuperable difficulty with _frederick._--literature in these days.--emerson's picture of america.--battle of freedom and slavery.--emerson's book on england desired.--miss bacon. clvi. emerson. concord, april, . excuses for not writing.--unchanged feeling for carlyle.--the american.--true measure of life.--musings of indolence. clvii. carlyle. chelsea, may, . emerson's letters indispensable; his complete understanding of carlyle.--a grim and lonely year.--never had such a business as _frederick._-- frederick himself.--"balaklava."--persistence of the english.-- urges emerson to print his book on england. clviii. emerson. concord, may, . letter-writing.--leaves of grass.--mrs. ---. clix. carlyle. chelsea, july, . emerson's letter welcome.--life a burden.--going to scotland.--_life of frederick_ to go to press.--mrs. ---.--miss bacon.--browning. clx. carlyle. the gill, cummertrees, annan, august, . the debt of america to emerson.--_english traits_ will be welcome.--grateful for whatever emerson may have said of himself.--in retreat in annan. clxi. carlyle. chelsea, december, . close of negotiations for printing a complete edition of his works in america.-- _english traits._--its excellence. clxii. emerson. concord, may, . mr. and mrs. joseph longworth.--inquires for the _frederick._--desires a _liber veritatis._--friendship of old gentlemen. clxiii. carlyle. chelsea, june, . emerson's letter and friends welcome.--first two volumes of frederick just ready.-- ugliness of the job.--occasional tone of emerson in the magazines.--health.--separation of dickens from his wife. clxiii.* carlyle. chelsea, april, . copy of _frederick_ sent to emerson.--nearly choked by the job.--self-pity.-- emerson's speech on burns. clxiv. emerson. concord, i may, . arrival of first volumes of _frederick._--illusion of children.--his own children.--a correspondent of twenty-five years not to be disused. extracts from emerson's diary respecting the _frederick._ clxv. emerson. concord, april, . mr. o.w. wight's new edition of the _miscellanies._--sight at toronto of two nephews of carlyle.--carlyle commended to the gods. clxvi. carlyle. chelsea, april, . encouragement from emerson's words about _frederick._--message to mr. wight. clxvii. carlyle. chelsea, january, . emerson's _conduct of life._--still twelve months from end of his task; nearly worn out. clxviii. emerson. concord, april, . thanks for last note.--_frederick._ clxix. emerson. concord, december, . the third volume of _frederick._--the manner of it.--the war in america--death of clough. clxx. carlyle. chelsea, march, . introduction of the hon. lyulph stanley.--mrs. carlyle's ill-health. clxxi. emerson. concord, september, . sympathy.--fourth volume of frederick.--nature of the war in america--mr. stanley. clxxii. carlyle. annandale, scotland, june, . completion of _frederick._--saunterings.--stay in annandale.--mrs. carlyle. --photographs.--mr. m.d. conway.--the american peacock. clxxiii. emerson. concord, january, . the last volumes of friedrich.--america.--conduct of americans in war and in peace.-- photographs.--little to tell of himself. clxxiv. emerson. concord, may, . mrs. carlyle's death. clxxv. carlyle. mentone, january, . sad interval since last writing.--his condition.--mrs. carlye's death.--solace in writing reminiscences.--visit in kent during summer.--tennyson's _idyls._--emerson's _english traits._--mentone. clxxvi. carlyle. chelsea, november, . long abeyance of correspondence.--plan of bequeathing books to new england.-- emerson's counsel desired.--his own condition. clxxvii. carlyle. chelsea, january, . arrangements respecting bequest of books to harvard college. clxxviii. emerson. concord, january, . apologies for delay.--writing new book.--delight in proposed bequest.--advice concerning. clxxix. carlyle. melchet court, romsey, february, . acknowledgment of letter. clxxx. carlyle. chelsea, february, . ending of the harvard business. clxxxi. emerson. concord, march, . visit to president eliot concerning the bequest to harvard.--reflections on the gift.--speech about it to others.--must renew correspondence.-- his own children. clxxxii. carlyle. chelsea, march, . possible delay of his last letter.--society and solitude not received. clxxxiii. carlyle. chelsea, april, . emerson's letter received.--thankful for the conclusion of the little transaction.--reflections on it.--regrets that it has been spoken of.--_society and solitude._--news from concord.--the night cometh. clxxxiv. emerson. concord, june, . excuses for delay in writing.--lectures on philosophy.--steps taken to secure privacy in regard to bequest.--chapman's homer.--error in address of books.--report of carlyle's coming to america. clxxxv. carlyle. chelsea, september, . delay in receiving emerson's last letter.--correction of error in address of books.--emerson's lectures.--philosophies.--too late for him to come to america. clxxxvi. emerson. concord, october, . the victim of miscellany.--library edition of carlyle's works received.-- invitation.--the privilege of genius.--e.r. hoar.--j.m. forbes.-- the growing youth.--the lowell race. clxxxvia. emerson. concord, april, . account of himself and his work.--introduction to plutarch's _morals._--oration before the new england society in new york.--lectures at cambridge.--reprint of early writings.--about to go to california. clxxxvii. carlyle. chelsea, june, . gap in correspondence.--unfriendly winter.--completion of library edition of his works.--significance of piracy of emerson.-- conditions in america.--anti-anarchy.--j. lee bliss.--finis of the copper captaincy. clxxxviii. emerson. concord, june, . return from california.--california.--the plains.--brigham young.--lucy garbett.--carlyle's ill-health. clxxxix. emerson. concord, september, . introduction of his son edward. cxc. emerson. baltimore, january, . last instalment of library edition of carlyle's works received.--felicitations on this completion.--happiness in having been carlyle's contemporary and friend.--carlyle's perversities.--proposes to "retire and read the authors."--carlyle's talk. cxci. carlyle. chelsea, april, . excuses for silence.-- ill-health.--emerson's letter about the west.--aspect and meaning of that western world.--ruskin.--froude.--write. ----------- correspondence of carlyle and emerson lxxvi. emerson to carlyle concord, july, my dear carlyle,--i have lately received from our slow friends, james munroe & co., $ on account of their sales of the _miscellanies,_--and i enclose a bill of exchange for l , which cost $ . . it is a long time since i sent you any sketch of the account itself, and indeed a long time since it was posted, as the booksellers say; but i will find a time and a clerk also for this. i have had no word from you for a long space. you wrote me a letter from scotland after the death of your wife's mother, and full of pity for me also; and since, i have heard nothing. i confide that all has gone well and prosperously with you; that the iron puritan is emerging from the past, in shape and stature as he lived; and you are recruited by sympathy and content with your picture; and that the sure repairs of time and love and active duty have brought peace to the orphan daughter's heart. my friend alcott must also have visited you before this, and you have seen whether any relation could subsist betwixt men so differently excellent. his wife here has heard of his arrival on your coast,--no more. i submitted to what seemed a necessity of petty literary patriotism,--i know not what else to call it,--and took charge of our thankless little _dial,_ here, without subscribers enough to pay even a publisher, much less any laborer; it has no penny for editor or contributor, nothing but abuse in the newspapers, or, at best, silence; but it serves as a sort of portfolio, to carry about a few poems or sentences which would otherwise be transcribed and circulated; and always we are waiting when somebody shall come and make it good. but i took it, as i said, and it took me, and a great deal of good time, to a small purpose. i am ashamed to compute how many hours and days these chores consume for me. i had it fully in my heart to write at large leisure in noble mornings opened by prayer or by readings of plato or whomsoever else is dearest to the morning muse, a chapter on poetry, for which all readings, all studies, are but preparation; but now it is july, and my chapter is rudest beginnings. yet when i go out of doors in the summer night, and see how high the stars are, i am persuaded that there is time enough, here or somewhere, for all that i must do; and the good world manifests very little impatience. stearns wheeler, the cambridge tutor, a good grecian, and the editor, you will remember, of your american editions, is going to london in august probably, and on to heidelberg, &c. he means, i believe, to spend two years in germany, and will come to see you on his way; a man whose too facile and good-natured manners do some injustice to his virtues, to his great industry and real knowledge. he has been corresponding with your tennyson, and editing his poems here. my mother, my wife, my two little girls, are well; the youngest, edith, is the comfort of my days. peace and love be with you, with you both, and all that is yours. --r. w. emerson in our present ignorance of mr. alcott's address i advised his wife to write to your care, as he was also charged to keep you informed of his place. you may therefore receive letters for him with this. lxxvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, july, my dear emerson,--lest opportunity again escape me, i will take her, this time, by the forelock, and write while the matter is still hot. you have been too long without hearing of me; far longer, at least, than i meant. here is a second letter from you, besides various intermediate notes by the hands of friends, since that templand letter of mine: the letter arrived yesterday; my answer shall get under way today. first under the head of business let it be authenticated that the letter enclosed a draft for l ; a new, unexpected munificence out of america; which is ever and anon dropping gifts upon me,-- to be received, as indeed they partly are, like manna dropped out of the sky; the gift of unseen divinities! the last money i got from you changed itself in the usual soft manner from dollars into sovereigns, and was what they call "all right,"--all except the little bill (of eight pounds and odds, i think) drawn on fraser's executors by brown (little and brown?); which bill the said executors having refused for i know not what reason, i returned it to brown with note of the dishonor done it, and so the sum still stands on his books in our favor. fraser's people are not now my booksellers, except in the matter of your _essays_ and a second edition of _sartor;_ the other books i got transferred to a certain pair of people named "chapman and hall, strand"; which operation, though (i understand) it was transacted with great and vehement reluctance on the part of the fraser people, yet produced no _quarrel_ between them and me, and they still forward parcels, &c., and are full of civility when i see them:--so that whether this had any effect or none in their treatment of brown and his bill i never knew; nor indeed, having as you explained it no concern with brown's and their affairs, did i ever happen to inquire. i avoid all booksellers; see them rarely, the blockheads; study never to think of them at all. book-sales, reputation, profit, &c., &c.; all this at present is really of the nature of an encumbrance to me; which i study, not without success, to sweep almost altogether out of my head. one good is still possible to me in life, one only: to screw a little more work out of myself, my miserable, despicable, yet living, acting, and so far imperial and celestial _self;_ and this, god knows, is difficulty enough without any foreign one! you ask after _cromwell:_ ask not of him; he is like to drive me mad. there he lies, shining clear enough to me, nay glowing, or painfully burning; but far down; sunk under two hundred years of cant, oblivion, unbelief, and triviality of every kind: through all which, and to the top of all which, what mortal industry or energy will avail to raise him! a thousand times i have rued that my poor activity ever took that direction. the likelihood still is that i may abandon the task undone. i have bored through the dreariest mountains of rubbish; i have visited naseby field, and how many other unintelligible fields and places; i have &c., &c.:--alas, what a talent have i for getting into the impossible! meanwhile my studies still proceed; i even take a ghoulish kind of pleasure in raking through these old bone-houses and burial-aisles now; i have the strangest fellowship with that huge genius of death (universal president there), and catch sometimes, through some chink or other, glimpses into blessed _ulterior_ regions,--blessed, but as yet altogether _silent._ there is no use of writing of things past, unless they can be made in fact things present: not yesterday at all, but simply today and what it holds of fulfilment and of promises is _ours:_ the dead ought to bury their dead, ought they not? in short, i am very unfortunate, and deserve your prayers,--in a quiet kind of way! if you lose tidings of me altogether, and never hear of me more,--consider simply that i have gone to my natal element, that the mud nymphs have sucked me in; as they have done several in their time! sterling was here about the time your letters to him came: your american reprint of his pieces was naturally gratifying him much.* he seems getting yearly more restless; necessitated to find an outlet for himself, unable as yet to do it well. i think he will now write review articles for a while; which craft is really, perhaps, the one he is fittest for hitherto. i love sterling: a radiant creature; but very restless;--incapable either of rest or of effectual motion: aurora borealis and sheet lightning; which if it could but _concentrate_ itself, as i [say] always--!--we had much talk; but, on the whole, even his talk is not much better for me than silence at present. _me miserum!_ -------- * "the poetical works of john sterling," philadelphia, . -------- directly about the time of sterling's departure came alcott, some two weeks after i had heard of his arrival on these shores. he has been twice here, at considerable length; the second time, all night. he is a genial, innocent, simple-hearted man, of much natural intelligence and goodness, with an air of rusticity, veracity, and dignity withal, which in many ways appeals to one. the good alcott: with his long, lean face and figure, with his gray worn temples and mild radiant eyes; all bent on saving the world by a return to acorns and the golden age; he comes before one like a kind of venerable don quixote, whom nobody can even laugh at without loving!.... my poor wife is still weak, overshadowed with sorrow: her loss is great, the loss almost as of the widow's mite; for except her good mother she had almost no kindred left; and as for friends-- they are not rife in this world.--god be thanked withal they are not entirely non-extant! have i not a friend, and friends, though they too are in sorrow? good be with you all. --t. carlyle. by far the valuablest thing that alcott brought me was the newspaper report of emerson's last lectures in new york. really a right wholesome thing; radiant, fresh as the _morning;_ a thing _worth_ reading; which accordingly i clipped from the newspaper, and have in a state of assiduous circulation to the comfort of many.--i cannot bid you quit the _dial,_ though it, too, alas, is antinomian somewhat! _perge, perge,_ nevertheless. --and so now an end. --t. c. lxxviii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, august, my dear. emerson,--this, morning your new letter, of the th august, has arrived;* exactly one fortnight old: thanks to the gods and steam-demons! i already, perhaps six weeks ago, answered your former letter,--acknowledging the manna-gift of the l , and other things; nor do i think the letter can have been lost, for i remember putting it into the post-office myself. today i am on the eve of an expedition into suffolk, and full of petty business: however, i will throw you one word, were it only to lighten my own heart a little. you are a kind friend to me, and a precious;--and when i mourn over the impotence of human speech, and how each of us, speak or write as he will, has to stand _dumb,_ cased up in his own unutterabilities, before his unutterable brother, i feel always as if emerson were the man i could soonest _try_ to speak with,--were i within reach of him! well; we must be content. a pen is a pen, and worth something; though it expresses about as much of a _man's_ meaning perhaps as the stamping of a hoof will express of a horse's meaning; a very poor expression indeed! --------- * this letter of th august is missing. --------- your bibliopolic advice about cromwell or my next book shall be carefully attended, if i live ever to write another book! but i have again got down into primeval night; and live alone and mute with the _manes,_ as you say; uncertain whether i shall ever more see day. i am partly ashamed of myself; but cannot help it. one of my grand difficulties i suspect to be that i cannot write _two books at once;_ cannot be in the seventeenth century and in the nineteenth at one and the same moment; a feat which excels even that of the irishman's bird: "nobody but a bird can be in two places at once!" for my heart is sick and sore in behalf of my own poor generation; nay, i feel withal as if the one hope of help for it consisted in the possibility of new cromwells and new puritans: thus do the two centuries stand related to me, the seventeenth _worthless_ except precisely in so far as it can be made the nineteenth; and yet let anybody try that enterprise! heaven help me.--i believe at least that i ought _to hold my tongue;_ more especially at present. thanks for asking me to write you a word in the _dial._ had such a purpose struck me long ago, there have been many things passing through my head,--march-marching as they ever do, in long drawn, scandalous falstaff-regiments (a man ashamed to be seen passing through coventry with such a set!)--some one of which, snatched out of the ragged rank, and dressed and drilled a little, might perhaps fitly have been saved from chaos, and sent to the _dial._ in future we shall be on the outlook. i love your _dial,_ and yet it is with a kind of shudder. you seem to me in danger of dividing yourselves from the fact of this present universe, in which alone, ugly as it is, can i find any anchorage, and soaring away after ideas, beliefs, revelations, and such like,--into perilous altitudes, as i think; beyond the curve of perpetual frost, for one thing! i know not how to utter what impression you give me; take the above as some stamping of the fore-hoof. surely i could wish you _returned_ into your own poor nineteenth century, its follies and maladies, its blind or half-blind, but gigantic toilings, its laughter and its tears, and trying to evolve in some measure the hidden godlike that lies in it;--that seems to me the kind of feat for literary men. alas, it is so easy to screw one's self up into high and ever higher altitudes of transcendentalism, and see nothing under one but the everlasting snows of himmalayah, the earth shrinking to a planet, and the indigo firmament sowing itself with daylight stars; easy for _you,_ for me: but whither does it lead? i dread always, to inanity and mere injuring of the lungs!--"stamp, stamp, stamp!"-- well, i do believe, for one thing, a man has no right to say to his own generation, turning quite away from it, "be damned!" it is the whole past and the whole future, this same cotton-spinning, dollar-hunting, canting and shrieking, very wretched generation of ours. come back into it, i tell you;--and so for the present will "stamp" no more.... adieu, my friend; i must not add a word more. my wife is out on a visit; it is to bring her back that i am now setting forth for suffolk. i hope to see ely too, and st. ives, and huntingdon, and various _cromwelliana._ my blessings on the concord household now and always. commend me expressly to your wife and your mother. farewell, dear friend. --t. carlyle lxxix. emerson to carlyle concord, october, my dear carlyle,--i am in your debt for at least two letters since i sent you any word. i should be well content to receive one of these stringent epistles of bark and steel and mellow wine with every day's post, but as there is no hope that more will be sent without my writing to signify that these have come, i hereby certify that i love you well and prize all your messages. i read with special interest what you say of these english studies, and i doubt not the book is in steady progress again. we shall see what change the changed position of the author will make in the book. the first _history_ expected its public; the second is written to an expecting people. the tone of the first was proud,--to defiance; we will see if applauses have mitigated the master's temper. this time he has a hero, and we shall have a sort of standard to try, by the hero who fights, the hero who writes. well; may grand and friendly spirits assist the work in all hours; may impulses and presences from that profound world which makes and embraces the whole of humanity, keep your feet on the mount of vision which commands the centuries, and the book shall be an indispensable benefit to men, which is the surest fame. let me know all that can be told of your progress in it. you shall see in the last _dial_ a certain shadow or mask of yours, "another richmond," who has read your lectures and profited thereby.* alcott sent me the paper from london, but i do not know the name of the writer. as for alcott, you have discharged your conscience of him manfully and knightly; i absolve you well... he is a great man and was made for what is greatest, but i now fear that he has already touched what best he can, and through his more than a prophet's egotism, and the absence of all useful reconciling talents, will bring nothing to pass, and be but a voice in the wilderness. as you do not seem to have seen in him his pure and noble intellect, i fear that it lies under some new and denser clouds. -------- * an article on cromwell, in the _dial_ for october, . -------- for the _dial_ and its sins, i have no defence to set up. we write as we can, and we know very little about it. if the direction of these speculations is to be deplored, it is yet a fact for literary history, that all the bright boys and girls in new england, quite ignorant of each other, take the world so, and come and make confession to fathers and mothers,--the boys that they do not wish to go into trade, the girls that they do not like morning calls and evening parties. they are all religious, but hate the churches; they reject all the ways of living of other men, but have none to offer in their stead. perhaps, one of these days, a great yankee shall come, who will easily do the unknown deed. the booksellers have sent me accounts lately, but--i know not why--no money. little and brown from january to july had sold very few books. i inquired of them concerning the bill of exchange on fraser's estate, which you mention, and they said it had not been returned to them, but only some information, as i think, demanded by fraser's administrator, which they had sent, and, as they heard nothing again, they suppose that it is allowed and paid to you. inform me on this matter. munroe & co. allow some credits, but charge more debits for binding, &c., and also allege few sales in the hard times. i have got a good friend of yours, a banking man, to promise that he will sift all the account and see if the booksellers have kept their promises. but i have never yet got all the papers in readiness for him. i am looking to see if i have matter for new lectures, having left behind me last spring some half-promises in new york. if you can remember it, tell me who writes about loyola and xavier in the _edinburgh._ sterling's papers--if he is near you--are all in mr. russell's hands.* i played my part of fadladeen with great rigor, and sent my results to russell, but have not now written to j. s. yours, r.w.e. ---------- * mr. a.l. russell, who had been instrumental in procuring the american edition of sterling's _poetical works._ --------- lxxx. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, november, my dear emerson,--your letter finds me here today; busied with many things, but not likely to be soon more at leisure; wherefore i may as well give myself the pleasure of answering it on the spot. the fraser bill by brown and little has come all right; the dumfries banker apprises me lately that he has got the cash into his hands. pray do not pester yourself with these bookseller unintelligibilities: i suppose their accounts are all reasonably correct, the cheating, such as it is, done according to rule: what signifies it at any rate? i am no longer in any vital want of money; alas, the want that presses far heavier on me is a want of faculty, a want of _sense;_ and the feeling of that renders one comparatively very indifferent to money! i reflect many times that the wealth of the indies, the fame of ten shakespeares or ten mahomets, would at bottom do me no good at all. let us leave these poor slaves of the ingot and slaves of the lamp to their own courses,--within a _certain_ extent of halter! what you say of alcott seems to me altogether just. he is a man who has got into the highest intellectual region,--if that be the highest (though in that too there are many stages) wherein a man can believe and discern for himself, without need of help from any other, and even in opposition to all others: but i consider him entirely unlikely to accomplish anything considerable, except some kind of crabbed, semi-perverse, though still manful existence of his own; which indeed is no despicable thing. his "more than prophetic egoism,"--alas, yes! it is of such material that thebaid eremites, sect-founders, and all manner of cross-grained fanatical monstrosities have fashioned themselves, --in very _high,_ and in the highest regions, for that matter. sect-founders withal are a class i do not like. no truly great man, from jesus christ downwards, as i often say, ever founded a sect,--i mean wilfully intended founding one. what a view must a man have of this universe, who thinks "_he_ can swallow it all," who is not doubly and trebly happy that he can keep it from swallowing him! on the whole, i sometimes hope we have now done with fanatics and agonistic posture-makers in this poor world: it will be an immense improvement on the past; and the "new ideas," as alcott calls them, will prosper greatly the better on that account! the old gloomy gothic cathedrals were good; but the great blue dome that hangs over all is better than any cologne one.--on the whole, do not tell the good alcott a word of all this; but let him love me as he can, and live on vegetables in peace; as i, living _partly_ on vegetables, will continue to love him! the best thing alcott did while he staid among us was to circulate some copies of your _man the reformer._* i did not get a copy; i applied for one, so soon as i knew the right fountain; but alcott, i think, was already gone. and now mark,--for this i think is a novelty, if you do not already know it: certain radicals have reprinted your essay in lancashire, and it is freely circulating there, and here, as a cheap pamphlet, with excellent acceptance so far as i discern. various newspaper reviews of it have come athwart me: all favorable, but all too shallow for sending to you. i myself consider it a _truly excellent_ utterance; one of the best words you have ever spoken. speak many more such. and whosoever will distort them into any "vegetable" or other crotchet,--let it be at his own peril; for the word itself is _true;_ and will have to make itself a _fact_ therefore; though not a distracted _abortive_ fact, i hope! _words_ of that kind are not born into facts in the _seventh month;_ well if they see the light full-grown (they and their adjuncts) in the _second century;_ for old time is a most deliberate breeder!--but to speak without figure, i have been very much delighted with the clearness, simplicity, quiet energy and veracity of this discourse; and also with the fact of its spontaneous appearance here among us. the prime mover of the printing, i find, is one thomas ballantyne, editor of a manchester newspaper, a very good, cheery little fellow, once a paisley weaver as he informs me,--a great admirer of all worthy things. ---------- * "a lecture read before the mechanics' apprentices' library association, boston, january , ." ---------- my paper is so fast failing, let me tell you of the writer on loyola. he is a james stephen, head under-secretary of the colonial office,--that is to say, i believe, real governor of the british colonies, so far as they have any governing. he is of wilberforce's creed, of wilberforce's kin; a man past middle age, yet still in full vigor; reckoned an enormous fellow for "despatch of business," &c., especially by taylor (_van artevelde_) and others who are with him or under him in downing street.... i regard the man as standing on the confines of genius and dilettantism,--a man of many really good qualities, and excellent at the despatch of business. there we will leave him. --a mrs. lee of brookline near you has made a pleasant book about jean paul, chiefly by excerpting.* i am sorry to find gunderode & co. a decided weariness!** cromwell--cromwell? do not mention such a word, if you love me! and yet--farewell, my friend, tonight! yours ever, t. carlyle i will apprise sterling before long: he is at falmouth, and well; urging me much to start a periodical here! gambardella promises to become a real painter; there is a glow of real fire in the wild southern man: next to no _articulate_ intellect or the like, but of inarticulate much, or i mistake. he has tried to paint _me_ for you; but cannot, he says! --------- * "life of jean paul frederic richter. compiled from various sources. together with his autobiography. translated from the german." in two volumes. boston, . this book, which is one of the best in english concerning jean paul, was the work of the late mrs. thomas (eliza buckminster) lee. ** in the _dial,_ for january, , is an article by miss fuller on "bettine brentano and gunderode,"--a decided weariness. the canoness gunderode was a friend of bettine's, older and not much wiser than herself. --------- lxxxi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, march, dear emerson,--i know not whose turn it is to write; though a suspicion has long attended me that it was yours, and above all an indisputable wish that you would do it: but this present is a cursory line, all on business,--and as usual all on business of my own. i have finished a book, and just set the printer to it; one solid volume (rather bigger than one of the _french revolution_ volumes, as i compute); it is a somewhat fiery and questionable "tract for the times," _not_ by a puseyite, which the terrible aspect of things here has forced from me,--i know not whether as preliminary to _oliver_ or not; but it had gradually grown to be the preliminary of anything possible for me: so there it is written; and i am a very sick, but withal a comparatively very free man. the title of the thing is to be _past and present:_ it is divided into four books, "book i. proem," "book ii. the ancient monk," "book iii. the modern worker," and "book iv. horoscope" (or some such thing):--the size of it i guessed at above. the practical business, accordingly, is: how to cut out that new york scoundrel, who fancies that because there is no gallows it is permitted to steal? i have a distinct desire to do that;-- altogether apart from the money to be gained thereby. a friend's goodness ought not to be frustrated by a scoundrel destitute of gallows.--you told me long since how to do the operation; and here, according to the best way i had of fitting your scheme into my materials, is my way of attempting it. the book will not be out here for six good weeks from this date; it could be kept back for a week or two longer, if that were indispensable: but i hope it may not. in three weeks, half of it will be printed; i, in the meanwhile, get a correct manuscript copy of the latter half made ready: joining the printed sheets and this manuscript, your bookseller will have a three weeks' start of any rival, if i instantly despatch the parcel to him. will this do? this with the announcement of the title as given above? pray write to me straightway, and say. your answer will be here before we can publish; and the packet of proof-sheets and manuscript may go off whether there be word from you or none.--and so enough of _past and present._ and indeed enough of all things, for my haste is excessive in these hours. the last _dial_ came to me about three weeks ago _as a post-letter,_ charged something like a guinea of postage, if i remember; so it had to be rejected, and i have not yet seen that number; but will when my leeway is once brought up a little again. the two preceding numbers were, to a marked extent, more like life than anything i had seen before of the _dial._ there was not indeed anything, except the emersonian papers alone, which i know by the first ring of them on the tympanum of the mind, that i properly speaking _liked;_ but there was much that i did not dislike, and did half like; and i say, "_i fausto pede;_ that will decidedly do better!" by the bye, it were as well if you kept rather a strict outlook on alcott and his english _tail,_--i mean so far as we here have any business with it. bottomless imbeciles ought not to be seen in company with ralph waldo emerson, who has already men listening to him on this side of the water. the "tail" has an individual or two of that genus,--and the rest is mainly yet undecided. for example, i knew old --- myself; and can testify, if you will believe me, that few greater blockheads (if "blockhead" may mean "exasperated imbecile" and the ninth part of a thinker) broke the world's bread in his day. have a care of such! i say always to myself, --and to you, which you forgive me. adieu, my dear emerson. may a good genius guide you; for you are _alone, alone;_ and have a steep pilgrimage to make,-- leading _high,_ if you do not slip or stumble! ever your affectionate, t. carlyle lxxxii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, my dear carlyle,--along with this letter there will go from liverpool, on the th instant, the promised parcel, complete copy of the book called _past and present,_ of which you already had two simultaneous announcements.* the name of the steam packet, i understand, is the "britannia." i have addressed the parcel to the care of "messrs. little and brown, booksellers, boston," with your name atop: i calculate it will arrive safe enough. --------- * the letter making the second announcement, being very similar to the preceding, is omitted. --------- about one hundred pages of the manuscript copy have proved superfluous, the text being there also in a printed shape; i had misestimated the printer's velocity; i was anxious too that there should be no failure as to time. the manuscript is very indifferent in that section of it; the damage therefore is smaller: your press-corrector can acquaint himself with the _hand,_ &c. by means of it. a poor young governess, confined to a horizontal posture, and many sad thoughts, by a disease of the spine, was our artist in that part of the business: her writing is none of the distinctest; but it was a work of charity to give it her. i hope the thing is all as correct as i could make it. i do not bethink me of anything farther i have to add in the way of explanation. in fact, my prophecy rather is at present that the gibbetless thief at new york, will beat us after all! never mind if be do. to say truth, i myself shall almost be glad: there has been a botheration in this anxious arrangement of parts correcting of scrawly manuscript copies of what you never wished to read more, and insane terror withal of having your own manuscript burnt or lost,--that has exceeded my computation. not to speak of this trouble in which i involve you, my friend; which, i truly declare, makes me ashamed! true one _is_ bound to resist the devil in all shapes; if a man come to steal from you, you will put on what locks and padlocks are at hand, and not on the whole say, "steal, then!" but if the locks prove insufficient, and the thief do break through,--that side of the alternative also will suit you very well; and, with perhaps a faint prayer for gibbets when they are necessary, you will say to him, next time, "_macte virtute,_ my man." all is in a whirl with me here today; no other topic but this very poor one can be entered upon. i hope for a letter from your own hand soon, and some news about still more interesting matters. adieu, my friend; i feel still as if, in several senses, you stood alone with me under the sky at present!* ----------- * the signature to this letter has been cut off. ----------- lxxxiii. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear carlyle,--it is a pleasure to set your name once more at the head of a sheet. it signifies how much gladness, how much wealth of being, that the good, wise, man-cheering, man-helping friend, though unseen, lives there yonder, just out of sight. your star burns there just below our eastern horizon, and fills the lower and upper air with splendid and splendescent auroras. by some refraction which new lenses or else steamships shall operate, shall i not yet one day see again the disk of benign phosphorus? it is a solid joy to me, that whilst you work for all, you work for me and with me, even if i have little to write, and seldom write your name. since i last wrote to you, i found it needful, if only for the household's sake, to set some new lectures in order, and go to new congregations of men. i live so much alone, shrinking almost cowardly from the contact of worldly and public men, that i need more than others to quit home sometimes, and roll with the river of travelers, and live in hotels. i went to baltimore, where i had an invitation, and read two lectures on new england. on my return, i stopped at philadelphia, and, my course being now grown to four lectures, read them there. at new york, my snowball was larger, and i read five lectures on new england. . religion; . trade; . genius, manners and customs; . recent literary and spiritual influences from abroad; . domestic spiritual history.--perhaps i have not quite done with them yet, but may make them the block of a new and somewhat larger structure for boston, next winter. the newspaper reports of them in new york were such offensive misstatements, that i could not send you, as i wished, a sketch. between my two speeches at baltimore, i went to washington, thirty-seven miles, and spent four days. the two poles of an enormous political battery, galvanic coil on coil, self-increased by series on series of plates from mexico to canada, and from the sea westward to the rocky mountains, here meet and play, and make the air electric and violent. yet one feels how little, more than how much, man is represented there. i think, in the higher societies of the universe, it will turn out that the angels are molecules, as the devils were always titans, since the dulness of the world needs such mountainous demonstration, and the virtue is so modest and concentrating. but i must not delay to acknowledge the arrival of your book. it came ten or eleven days ago, in the "britannia," with the three letters of different dates announcing it.--i have read the superfluous hundred pages of manuscript, and find it only too popular. beside its abundance of brilliant points and proverbs, there is a deep, steady tide taking in, either by hope or by fear, all the great classes of society,--and the philosophic minority also, by the powerful lights which are shed on the phenomenon. it is true contemporary history, which other books are not, and you have fairly set solid london city aloft, afloat in bright mirage in the air. i quarrel only with the popular assumption, which is perhaps a condition of the humor itself, that the state of society is a new state, and was not the same thing in the days of rabelais and of aristophanes, as of carlyle. orators always allow something to masses, out of love to their own art, whilst austere philosophy will only know the particles. this were of no importance, if the historian did not so come to mix himself in some manner with his erring and grieving nations, and so saddens the picture; for health is always private and original, and its essence is in its unmixableness.--but this book, with all its affluence of wit, of insight, and of daring hints, is born for a longevity which i will not now compute.--in one respect, as i hinted above, it is only too good, so sure of success, i mean, that you are no longer secure of any respect to your property in our freebooting america. you must know that the cheap press has, within a few months, made a total change in our book markets. every english book of any name or credit is instantly converted into a newspaper or coarse pamphlet, and hawked by a hundred boys in the streets of all of our cities for , , or cents; dickens's notes for cents, _blackwood's magazine_ for cents, and so on. three or four great new york and philadelphia printing-houses do this work, with hot competition. one prints bulwer's novel yesterday, for cents; and already, in twenty-four hours, another has a coarser edition of it for cents, in all thoroughfares.--what to do with my sealed parcel of manuscripts and proofs? no bookseller would in these perilous circumstances offer a dollar for my precious parcel. i inquired of the lawyers whether i could not by a copyright protect my edition from piracy until an english copy arrived, and so secure a sale of a few weeks. they said, no; yet advised the taking a certificate of copyright, that we might try the case if we wished. after much consulting and balancing for a few hours, i decided to print, as heretofore, on our own account, an edition, but cheap, to make the temptation less, to retail at seventy-five cents. i print fifteen hundred copies, and announce to the public that it is your edition, and all good men must buy this. i have written to the great reprinters, namely to park benjamin, and to the harpers, of new york, to request their forbearance; and have engaged little and brown to publish, because, i think, they have something more of weight with booksellers, and are a little less likely to be invaded than munroe. if we sell a thousand copies at seventy-five cents, it will only yield you about two hundred dollars; if we should be invaded, we can then afford to sell the other five hundred copies at twenty-five cents, without loss. in thus doing, i involve you in some risk; but it was the best course that occurred.--hitherto, the _miscellanies_ have not been reprinted in the cheap forms; and in the last year, james munroe & co. have sold few copies; all books but the cheapest being unsold in the hard times; something has however accrued to your credit there. j.m. & co. fear that, if the new book is pirated at new york and the pirate prospers, instantly the _miscellanies_ will be plundered. we will hope better, or at least exult in that which remains, to wit, a worth unplunderable, yet infinitely communicable. i have hardly space left to say what i would concerning the _dial._ i heartily hoped i had done with it, when lately our poor, good, publishing miss peabody,... wrote me that its subscription would not pay its expenses (we all writing for love). but certain friends are very unwilling it should die, and i a little unwilling, though very unwilling to be the life of it, as editor. and now that you are safely through your book, and before the greater sequel rushes to its conclusion, send me, i pray you, that short chapter which hovers yet in the limbo of contingency, in solid letters and points. let it be, if that is readiest, a criticism on the _dial,_ and this too elysian race, not blood, and yet not ichor.--let jane carlyle be on my part, and, watchful of his hours, urge the poet in the golden one. i think to send you a duplicate of the last number of the _dial_ by mr. mann,* who with his bride (sister of the above-mentioned miss peabody) is going to london and so to prussia. he is little known to me, but greatly valued as a philanthropist in this state. i must go to work a little more methodically this summer, and let something grow to a tree in my wide straggling shrubbery. with your letters came a letter from sterling, who was too noble to allude to his books and manuscript sent hither, and which russell all this time has delayed to print; i know not why, but discouraged, i suppose, in these times by booksellers. i must know precisely, and write presently to j.s. farewell. r.w. emerson** ----------- * the late horace mann. ** the following passages from emerson's diary relating to _past and present_ seem to have been written a few days after the preceding letter:--"how many things this book of carlyle gives us to think! it is a brave grappling with the problem of the times, no luxurious holding aloof, as is the custom of men of letters, who are usually bachelors and not husbands in the state, but literature here has thrown off his gown and descended into the open lists. the gods are come among us in the likeness of men. an honest iliad of english woes. who is he that can trust himself in the fray? only such as cannot be familiarized, but nearest seen and touched is not seen and touched, but remains inviolate, inaccessible, because a higher interest, the politics of a higher sphere, bring him here and environ him, as the ambassador carries his country with him. love protects him from profanation. what a book this in its relation to english privileged estates! how shall queen victoria read this? how the primate and bishops of england? how the lords? how the colleges? how the rich? and how the poor? here is a book as full of treason as an egg is full of meat, and every lord and lordship and high form and ceremony of english conservatism tossed like a football into the air, and kept in the air with merciless rebounds and kicks, and yet not a word in the book is punishable by statute. the wit has eluded all official zeal, and yet these dire jokes, these cunning thrusts,--this flaming sword of cherubim waved high in air illuminates the whole horizon and shows to the eyes of the universe every wound it inflicts. worst of all for the party attacked, it bereaves them beforehand of all sympathy by anticipating the plea of poetic and humane conservation and impressing the reader with the conviction that carlyle himself has the truest love for everything old and excellent, and a genuine respect for the basis of truth in those whom he exposes. gulliver among the lilliputians... "carlyle must write thus or nohow, like a drunken man who can run, but cannot walk. what a man's book is that! no prudences, no compromises, but a thorough independence. a masterly criticism on the times. fault perhaps the excess of importance given to the circumstance of today. the poet is here for this, to dwarf and destroy all merely temporary circumstance, and to glorify the perpetual circumstance of men, e.g. dwarf british debt and raise nature and social life. "but everything must be done well once; even bulletins and almanacs must have one excellent and immortal bulletin and almanac. so let carlyle's be the immortal newspaper." ---------- lxxxiv. carlyle to emerson august, dear emerson,--the bearer of this is mr. macready, our celebrated actor, now on a journey to america, who wishes to know you. in the pauses of a feverish occupation which he strives honestly to make a noble one, this artist, become once more a man, would like well to meet here and there a true american man. he loves heroes as few do; and can recognize them, you will find, whether they have on the _cothurnus_ or not. i recommend him to you; bid you forward him as you have opportunity, in this department of his pilgrimage. mr. macready's deserts to the english drama are notable here to all the world; but his dignified, generous, and every-way honorable deportment in private life is known fully, i believe, only to a few friends. i have often said, looking at him as a manager of great london theatres, "this man, presiding over the unstablest, most chaotic province of english things, is the one public man among us who has dared to take his stand on what he understood to be _the truth,_ and expect victory from that: he puts to shame our bishops and archbishops." it is literally so. with continued kind wishes, yours as of old. t. carlyle lxxxv. emerson to carlyle concord, october, my dear friend,--i seize the occasion of having this morsel of paper for twenty-five pounds sterling from the booksellers to send you, (and which fail not to find enclosed, as clerks say,) to inquire whether you still exist in chelsea, london, and what is the reason that my generous correspondent has become dumb for weary months. i must go far back to resume my thread. i think in april last i received your manuscript, &c. of the book, which i forthwith proceeded to print, after some perplexing debate with the booksellers, as i fully informed you in my letter of april or beginning of may. since that time i have had no line or word from you. i must think that my letter did not reach you, or that you have written what has never come to me. i assure myself that no harm has befallen you, not only because you do not live in a corner, and what chances in your dwelling will come at least to my ears, but because i have read with great pleasure the story of dr. francia,* which gave the best report of your health and vivacity. ---------- * carlyle's article on dr. francia in the _foreign quarterly review,_ no. . reprinted in his _miscellanies._ ---------- i wrote you in april or may an account of the new state of things which the cheap press has wrought in our book market, and specially what difficulties it put in the way of our edition of _past and present._ for a few weeks i believed that the letters i had written to the principal new york and philadelphia booksellers, and the preface, had succeeded in repelling the pirates. but in the fourth or fifth week appeared a mean edition in new york, published by one collyer (an unknown person and supposed to be a mask of some other bookseller), sold for twelve and one half cents, and of this wretched copy several thousands were sold, whilst our seventy-five cents edition went off slower. there was no remedy, and we must be content that there was no expense from our edition, which before september had paid all its cost, and since that time has been earning a little, i believe. i am not fairly entitled to an account of the book from the publishers until the st of january.... i have never yet done what i have thought this other last week seriously to do, namely, to charge the good and faithful e.p. clark, a man of accounts as he is a cashier in a bank, with the total auditing and analyzing of these accounts of yours. my hesitation has grown from the imperfect materials which i have to offer him to make up so long a story. but he is a good man, and, do you know it? a carlylese of that intensity that i have often heard he has collected a sort of album of several volumes, containing illustrations of every kind, historical, critical, &c., to the _sartor._ i must go to boston and challenge him. once when i asked him, he seemed willing to assume it. no more of accounts tonight. i send you by this ship a volume of translations from dante, by doctor parsons of boston, a practising dentist and the son of a dentist. it is his gift to you. lately went henry james to you with a letter from me. he is a fine companion from his intelligence, valor, and worth, and is and has been a very beneficent person as i learn. he carried a volume of poems from my friend and nearest neighbor, w. ellery channing, whereof give me, i pray you, the best opinion you can. i am determined he shall be a poet, and you must find him such.* i have too many things to tell you to begin at the end of this sheet, which after all this waiting i have been compelled to scribble in a corner, with company waiting for me. send me instant word of yourself if you love me, and of those whom you love, and so god keep you and yours. --r. waldo emerson ---------- * in the second number of the _dial,_ in october, , emerson had published, under the title of "new poetry," an article warmly commending mr. channing's then unpublished poems. ---------- lxxxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, october, my dear emerson,--it is a long weary time since i have had the satisfaction of the smallest dialogue with you. the blame is all my own; the reasons would be difficult to give,--alas, they are properly no-reasons, children not of _something,_ but of mere idleness, confusion, inaction, inarticulation, of _nothing_ in short! let us leave them there, and profit by the hour which yet is. i ran away from london into bristol and, south wales, when the heats grew violent, at the end of june. south wales, north wales, lancashire, scotland: i roved about everywhere seeking some jacob's-pillow on which to lay my head, and dream of things heavenly;--yes, that at bottom was my modest prayer, though i disguised it from myself and the result was, i could find no pillow at all; but sank into ever meaner restlessness, blacker and blacker biliary gloom, and returned in the beginning of september thoroughly eclipsed and worn out, probably the weariest of all men living under the sky. sure enough i have a fatal talent of converting all nature into preternaturalism for myself: a truly horrible phantasm-reality it is to me; what of heavenly radiances it has, blended in close neighborhood, in intimate union, with the hideousness of death and chaos;--a very ghastly business indeed! on the whole, it is better to hold one's peace about it. i flung myself down on sofas here,--for my little wife had trimmed up our little dwelling-place into quite glorious order in my absence, and i had only to lie down: there, in reading books, and other make-believe employments, i could at least keep silence, which was an infinite relief. nay, gradually, as indeed i anticipated, the black vortexes and deluges have subsided; and now that it is past, i begin to feel myself better for my travels after all. for one thing, articulate speech having returned to me,--you see what use i make of it. on the table of the london library, voted in by some unknown benefactor whom i found afterwards to be richard milnes, there lay one thing highly gratifying to me: the last two numbers of the _dial._ it is to be one of our periodicals henceforth; the current number lies on the table till the next arrive; then the former goes to the binder; we have already, in a bound volume, all of it that emerson has had the editing of. this is right. nay, in edinburgh, and indeed wherever ingenuous inquisitive minds were met with, i have to report that the said emerson could number a select and most loving public; select, and i should say fast growing: for good and indifferent reasons it may behove the man to assure himself of this. farther, to the horror of poor nickerson (bookseller fraser's successor), a certain scoundrel interloper here has reprinted _emerson's essays_ on grayish paper, to be sold at two shillings,--distracting nickerson with the fear of change! i was glad at this, if also angry: it indicates several things. nickerson has taken his measures, will reduce the price of his remaining copies; indeed, he informs me the best part of his edition was already sold, and he has even some color of money due from england to emerson through me! with pride enough will i transmit this mournful, noble peculium: and after that, as i perceive, such chivalrous international doings must cease between us. _past and present,_ some one told me, was, in spite of all your precautions, straightway sent forth in modest gray, and your benevolent speculation ruined. here too, you see, it is the same. such chivalries, therefore, are now impossible; for myself i say, "well, let them cease; thank god they once were, the memory of that can never cease with us!" in this last number of the _dial_ which by the bye your bookseller never forwarded to me, i found one little essay, a criticism on myself,* which, if it should do me mischief, may the gods forgive you for! it is considerably the most dangerous thing i have read for some years. a decided likeness of myself recognizable in it, as in the celestial mirror of a friend's heart; but so enlarged, exaggerated, all _transfigured,_--the most delicious, the most dangerous thing! well, i suppose i must try to assimilate it also, to turn it also to good, if i be able. eulogies, dyslogies, in which one finds no features of one's own natural face, are easily dealt with; easily left unread, as stuff for lighting fires, such is the insipidity, the wearisome _non_entity of pabulum like that: but here is another sort of matter! "the beautifulest piece of criticism i have read for many a day," says every one that speaks of it. may the gods forgive you!--i have purchased a copy for three shillings, and sent it to my mother: one of the _indubitablest_ benefits i could think of in regard to it. --------- * a criticism by emerson of _past and present,_ in the _dial_ for july, . it embodies a great part of the extract from emerson's diary given in a preceding note, and is well worth reading in full for its appreciation of carlyle's powers and defects. --------- there have been two friends of yours here in these very days: dr. russell, just returning from paris; mr. parker, just bound thither.* we have seen them rather oftener than common, sterling being in town withal. they are the best figures of strangers we have had for a long time; possessions, both of them, to fall in with in this pilgrimage of life. russell carries friendliness in his eyes, a most courteous, modest, intelligent man; an english intelligence too, as i read, the best of it lying unspoken, not as a logic but as an instinct. parker is a most hardy, compact, clever little fellow, full of decisive utterance, with humor and good humor; whom i like much. they shine like suns, these two, amid multitudes of watery comets and tenebrific constellations, too sorrowful without such admixture on occasion! ------------ * dr. le baron russell; theodore parker. ------------ as for myself, dear emerson, you must ask me no questions till-- alas, till i know not when! after four weary years of the most unreadable reading, the painfulest poking and delving, i have come at last to the conclusion--that i must write a book on cromwell; that there is no rest for me till i do it. this point fixed, another is not less fixed hitherto, that a book on cromwell is _impossible._ literally so: you would weep for me if you saw how, between these two adamantine certainties, i am whirled and tumbled. god only knows what will become of me in the business. patience, patience! by the bye, do you know a "massachusetts historical society," and a james bowdoin, seemingly of boston? in "vol. ii. third series" of their _collections,_ lately i met with a disappointment almost ludicrous. bowdoin, in a kind of dancing, embarrassed style, gives long-winded, painfully minute account of certain precious volumes, containing "notes of the long parliament," which now stand in the new york library; poises them in his assaying balance, speculates, prophesies, inquires concerning them: to me it was like news of the lost decades of livy. good heavens, it soon became manifest that these precious volumes are nothing whatever but a wretched broken old dead manuscript copy of part of our printed _commons journals!_ printed since , and known to all barbers! if the historical society desired it, any member of parliament could procure them the whole stock, _lords and commons,_ a wheelbarrowful or more, with no cost but the carriage. every member has the right to demand a copy, and few do it, few will let such a mass cross their door-threshold! this of bowdoin's is a platitude of some magnitude.--adieu, dear emerson. rest not, haste not; you have work to do. --t. carlyle lxxxvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, november, dear emerson,--about this time probably you will be reading a letter i hurried off for you by dr. russell in the last steamer; and your friendly anxieties will partly be set at rest. had i kept silence so very long? i knew it was a long while; but my vague remorse had kept no date! it behoves me now to write again without delay; to certify with all distinctness that i have safely received your letter of the th october, safely the bill for l it contained;--that you are a brave, friendly man, of most serene, beneficient way of life; and that i--god help me!-- by all means appoint this mr. clark to the honorary office of account-keeper--if he will accept it! by parker's list of questions from him, and by earlier reminiscences recalled on that occasion, i can discern that he is a man of lynx eyesight, of an all-investigating curiosity: if he will accept this sublime appointment, it will be the clearest case of elective affinity. accounts to you must be horrible; as they are to me: indeed, i seldom read beyond the _last_ line of them, if i can find the last; and one of the insupportabilities of bookseller accounts is that nobody but a wizard, or regular adept in such matters, can tell where the last line, and final net result of the whole accursed babblement, is to be found! by all means solicit clark;--at all events, do you give it up, i pray you, and let the booksellers do their own wise way. it really is not material; let the poor fellows have length of halter. every new bill from america comes to me like a kind of heavenly miracle; a reaping where i never sowed, and did not expect to reap: the quantity of it is a thing i can never bring in question.--for your english account with nickerson i can yet say nothing more; perhaps about newyear's-day the poor man will enable me to say something. i hear however that the pirate has sold off, or nearly so, his two-shillings edition of the _essays,_ and is preparing to print another; this, directly in the teeth of cash and double-entry book-keeping, i take to be good news. james is a very good fellow, better and better as we see him more. something shy and skittish in the man; but a brave heart intrinsically, with sound, earnest sense, with plenty of insight and even humor. he confirms an observation of mine, which indeed i find is hundreds of years old, that a stammering man is never a worthless one. physiology can tell you why. it is an excess of delicacy, excess of sensibility to the presence of his fellow-creature, that makes him stammer. hammond l'estrange says, "who ever heard of a stammering man that was a fool?" really there is something in that.--james is now off to the isle of wight; will see sterling at ventnor there; see whether such an isle or france will suit better for a winter residence. w.e. channing's _poems_ are also a kind gift from you. i have read the pieces _you had cut up for me:_ worthy indeed of reading! that poem _on death_ is the utterance of a valiant, noble heart, which in rhyme or prose i shall expect more news of by and by. but at bottom "poetry" is a most suspicious affair for me at present! you cannot fancy the oceans of twaddle that human creatures emit upon me, in these times; as if, when the lines had a jingle in them, a nothing could be something, and the point were gained! it is becoming a horror to me,--as all speech without meaning more and more is. i said to richard milnes, "now in honesty what is the use of putting your accusative _before_ the verb, and otherwise entangling the syntax; if there really is an image of any object, thought, or thing within you, for god's sake let me have it the _shortest_ way, and i will so cheerfully excuse the _omission_ of the jingle at the end: cannot i do without that!"--milnes answered, "ah, my dear fellow, it is because we have no thought, or almost none; a little thought goes a great way when you put it into rhyme!" let a man try to the very uttermost to _speak_ what he means, before _singing_ is had recourse to. singing, in our curt english speech, contrived expressly and almost exclusively for "despatch of business," is terribly difficult. alfred tennyson, alone of our time, has proved it to be possible in some measure. if channing will persist in melting such obdurate speech into music he shall have my true wishes,--my augury that it will take an enormous _heat_ from him!--another channing,* whom i once saw here, sends me a progress-of-the-species periodical from new york. _ach gott!_ these people and their affairs seem all "melting" rapidly enough, into thaw-slush or one knows not what. considerable madness is visible in them. _stare super antiquas vias:_ "no," they say, "we cannot stand, or walk, or do any good whatever there; by god's blessing, we will fly,--will not you!-- here goes!" and their _flight,_ it is as the flight of the unwinged,--of oxen endeavoring to fly with the "wings" of an ox! by such flying, universally practised, the "ancient ways" are really like to become very deep before long. in short, i am terribly sick of all that;--and wish it would stay at home at fruitland, or where there is good pasture for it. friend emerson, alone of all voices, out of america, has sphere-music in him for me,--alone of them all hitherto; and is a prophecy and sure dayspring in the east; immeasurably cheering to me. god long prosper him; keep him duly apart from that bottomless hubbub which is not, at all cheering! and so ends my litany for this day. -------- * the reverend william henry channing. -------- the cromwell business, though i punch daily at it with all manner of levers, remains immovable as ailsa crag. heaven alone knows what i shall do with it. i see and say to myself, it is heroical; troy town was probably not a more heroic business; and this belongs to thee, to thy own people,--must it be dead forever?--perhaps yes,--and kill me too into the bargain. really i think it very shocking that we run to greece, to italy, to &c., &c., and leave all at home lying buried as a nonentity. were i absolute sovereign and chief pontiff here, there should be a study of the old _english_ ages first of all. i will pit odin against any jupiter of them; find sea-kings that would have given jason a roland for his oliver! we are, as you sometimes say, a book-ridden people,--a phantom-ridden people.--all this small household is well; salutes you and yours with love old and new. accept this hasty messenger; accept my friendliest farewell, dear emerson. yours ever, t. carlyle lxxxviii. emerson to carlyle concord, december, my dear friend,--i have had two good letters from you, and it is fully my turn to write, so you shall have a token on this latest day of the year. i rejoice in this good will you bear to so many friends of mine,--if they will go to you, you must thank yourself. best when you are mutually contented. i wished lately i might serve mr. macready, who sent me your letter.--i called on him and introduced him to sam g. ward, my friend and the best man in the city, and, besides all his personal merits, a master of all the offices of hospitality. ward was to keep himself informed of macready's times, and bring me to him when there was opportunity. but he stayed but a few days in boston, and, ward said, was in very good hands, and promised to see us when he returns by and by. i saw him in hamlet, but should much prefer to see him as macready. i must try to entice mr. macready out here into my pines and alder bushes. just now the moon is shining on snow-drifts, four, five, and six feet high, but, before his return, they will melt; and already this my not native but ancestral village, which i came to live in nearly ten years ago because it was the quietest of farming towns, and off the road, is found to lie on the directest line of road from boston to montreal, a railroad is a-building through our secretest woodlands, and, tomorrow morning, our people go to boston in two hours instead of three, and, next june, in one. this petty revolution in our country matters was very odious to me when it began, but it is hard to resist the joy of all one's neighbors, and i must be contented to be carted like a chattel in the cars and be glad to see the forest fall. this rushing on your journey is plainly a capital invention for our spacious america, but it is more dignified and man-like to walk barefoot.--but do you not see that we are getting to be neighbors? a day from london to liverpool; twelve or eleven to boston; and an hour to concord; and you have owed me a visit these ten years. i mean to send with your january _dial_ a copy of the number for sterling, as it contains a review of his tragedy and poems, by margaret fuller. i have not yet seen the article, and the lady affirms that it is very bad, as she was ill all the time she was writing; but i hope and believe better. she, margaret fuller, is an admirable person, whose writing gives feeble account of her. but i was to say that i shall send this _dial_ for j.s. to your care, as i know not the way to the isle of wight. enclosed in this letter i send a bill of exchange for l s. d. payable by baring & co. it happens to represent an exact balance on munroe's books, and that slow mortal should have paid it before. i have not yet got to clark, i who am a slow mortal, but have my eye fixed on him. remember me and mine with kindest salutations to your wife and brother. ever yours, r.w. emerson lxxxix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, january, dear emerson, some ten days ago came your letter with a new draft of l and odd money in it: all safe; the draft now gone into the city to ripen into gold and silver, the letter to be acknowledged by some hasty response now and here. america, i say to myself looking at these money drafts, is a strange place; the highest comes out of it and the lowest! sydney smith is singing dolefully about doleful american repudiation, "_dis_owning of the soft impeachment"; and here on the other hand is an american man, in virtue of whom america has become definable withal as a place from which fall heavenly manna-showers upon certain men, at certain seasons of history, when perhaps manna-showers were not the unneedfulest things!--we will take the good and the evil, here as elsewhere, and heartily bless heaven. but now for the draft at the top of this leaf. one colman,* a kind of agricultural missionary, much in vogue here at present, has given it me; it is emerson's, the net produce hitherto (all but two cents) of _emerson's essays._ i enclose farther the bookseller's hieroglyph papers; unintelligible as all such are; but sent over to you for scrutiny by the expert. i gather only that there are some five hundred and odd of the dear-priced edition sold, some two hundred and odd still to sell, which the bookseller says are (in spite of pirates) slowly selling; and that the half profit upon the whole adventure up to this date has been l s. d. sterling,--equal, as i am taught, at $ . per pound sterling, to $ . , for which, all but the cents, here is a draft on boston, payable at sight. pray have yourself straightway _paid;_ that if there be any mistake or delay i may rectify it while time yet is.--i add, for the intelligence of the bookseller-papers, that fraser, with whom the bargain originally stood, was succeeded by nickerson; these are the names of the parties. and so, dear friend; accept this munificent sum of money; and expect a blessing with it if good wishes from the heart of man can give one. so much for that. --------- * the reverend henry colman. --------- did you receive a dumfries newspaper with a criticism in it? the author is one gilfillan, a young dissenting minister in dundee; a person of great talent, ingenuousness, enthusiasm, and other virtues; whose position as a preacher of bare old calvinism under penalty of death sometimes makes me tremble for him. he has written in that same newspaper about all the notablest men of his time; godwin, corn-law elliott and i know not all whom: if he publish the book, i will take care to send it you.* i saw the man for the first time last autumn, at dumfries; as i said, his being a calvinist dissenting minister, economically fixed, and spiritually with such germinations in him, forces me to be very reserved to him. ----------- * the sketches were published the next year in a volume under the title of _the gallery of literary portraits._ ----------- john sterling's _dial_ shall be forwarded to ventnor in the isle of wight, whenever it arrives. he was here, as probably i told you, about two months ago, the old unresting brilliantly radiating man. he is now much richer in money than he was, and poorer by the loss of a good mother and good wife: i understand he is building himself a brave house, and also busy writing a poem. he flings too much "sheet-lightning" and unrest into me when we meet in these low moods of mine; and yet one always longs for him back again: "no doing with him or without him," the dog! my thrice unfortunate book on cromwell,--it is a real descent to hades, to golgotha and chaos! i feel oftenest as if it were possibler to die one's self than to bring it into life. besides, my health is in general altogether despicable, my "spirits" equal to those of the ninth part of a dyspeptic tailor! one needs to be able to go on in all kinds of spirits, in climate sunny or sunless, or it will never do. the planet earth, says voss,--take four hexameters from voss: journeys this earth, her eye on a sun, through the heavenly spaces; joyous in radiance, or joyless by fits and swallowed in tempests; falters not, alters not, equal advancing, home at the due hour: so thou, weather-proof, constant, may, equal with day, march! i have not a moment more tonight;--and besides am inclined to write unprofitables if i persist. adieu, my friend; all blessings be with you always. yours ever truly, t. carlyle xc. emerson to carlyle concord, february, my dear carlyle,--i received by the last steamer your letter, and its prefixed order for one hundred and twenty-one dollars, which order i sent to ward, who turned it at once into money. thanks, dear friend, for your care and activity, which have brought me this pleasing and most unlooked for result. and i beg you, if you know any family representative of mr. fraser, to express my sense of obligation to that departed man. i feel a kindness not without some wonder for those good-natured five hundred englishmen who could buy and read my miscellany. i shall not fail to send them a new collection, which i hope they will like better. my faith in the writers, as an organic class, increases daily, and in the possibility to a faithful man of arriving at statements for which he shall not feel responsible, but which shall be parallel with nature. yet without any effort i fancy i make progress also in the doctrine of indifferency, and am certain and content that the truth can very well spare me, and have itself spoken by another without leaving it or me the worse. enough if we have learned that music exists, that it is proper to us, and that we cannot go forth of it. our pipes, however shrill and squeaking, certify this our faith in tune, and the eternal amelioration may one day reach our ears and instruments. it is a poor second thought, this literary activity. perhaps i am not made obnoxious to much suffering, but i have had happy hours enough in gazing from afar at the splendors of the intellectual law, to overpay me for any pains i know. existence may go on to be better, and, if it have such insights, it never can be bad. you sometimes charge me with i know not what sky- blue, sky-void idealism. as far as it is a partiality, i fear i may be more deeply infected than you think me. i have very joyful dreams which i cannot bring to paper, much less to any approach to practice, and i blame myself not at all for my reveries, but that they have not yet got possession of my house and barn. but i shall not lose my love for books. i only worship eternal buddh in the retirements and intermissions of brahma.--but i must not egotize and generalize to the end of my sheet, as i have a message or two to declare. i enclose a bill of exchange on the barings for thirty-six pounds; which is the sum of two recent payments of munroe and of little and brown, whereof i do not despair you shall yet have some account in booksellers' figures. i have got so far with clark as to have his consent to audit the accounts when i shall get energy and time enough to compile them out of my ridiculous journal. munroe begs me to say what possibly i have already asked for him, that, when the _history of cromwell_ is ready to be seen of men, you will have an entire copy of the manuscript taken, and sent over to us. then will he print a cheap edition such as no one will undersell, and secure such a share of profit to the author as the cheap press allows. perhaps only thirty or forty pounds would make it worth while to take the trouble. a valued friend of mine wishes to know who wrote (perhaps three years ago) a series of metaphysical articles in _blackwood_ on consciousness. can you remember and tell me? and now i commend you to the good god, you and your history, and the true kind wife who is always good to the eager yankees, and am yours heartily, --r.w. emerson xci. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, dear emerson,--till within five minutes of the limit of my time, i had forgotten that this was the d of the month; that i had a letter to write acknowledging even money! take the acknowledgment, given in all haste, not without a gratitude that will last longer: the thirty-six pounds and odd shillings came safe in your letter, a new unlooked-for gift. america, i think, is like an amiable family teapot; you think it is all out long since, and lo, the valuable implement yields you another cup, and another! many thanks to you, who are the heart of america to me. republishing for one's friend's sake, i find on consulting my bookseller, is out here; we have pirates waiting for every american thing of mark, as you have for every british; to the tender mercies of these, on both sides, i fancy the business must be committed. they do good too; as all does, even carrion: they send you _faster_ abroad, if the world have any use for you;--oftenest it only thinks it has. your _essays,_ the pirated _essays,_ make an ugly yellow tatter of a pamphlet, price s. d.; but the edition is all sold, i understand: and even nickerson has not entirely ceased to sell. the same pirate who pounced upon you made an attempt the other day on my poor _life of schiller,_ but i put the due spoke in his wheel. they have sent me lowell's _poems;_ they are bringing out jean paul's life, &c., &c.; the hungry _canaille._ it is strange that men should feel themselves so entirely at liberty to steal, simply because there is no gallows to hang them for doing it. your new book will be eagerly waited for by that class of persons; and also by another class which is daily increasing here. the only other thing i am "not to forget" is that of the _essay on consciousness_ in _blackwood._ the writer of those papers is one ferrier, a nephew of the edinburgh miss ferrier who wrote _marriage_ and some other novels; nephew also of professor wilson (christopher north), and married to one of his daughters. a man of perhaps five-and-thirty; i remember him in boyhood, while he was boarded with an annandale clergyman; i have seen him since manhood, and liked him well: a solid, square-visaged, dark kind of man, more like your theodore parker than any mutual specimen i can recollect. he got the usual education of an edinburgh advocate; but found no practice at the bar, nor sought any with due anxiety, i believe; addicted himself to logical meditations;--became, the other year, professor of universal history, or some such thing, in the edinburgh university, and lectures with hardly any audience: a certain _young_ public wanted me to be that professor there, but i knew better,--is this enough about ferrier? i will not add another word; the time being _past,_ irretrievable except by half-running! write us your book; and be well and happy always!* ------- * the signature has been cut off. ------- xcii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, august, dear emerson,--there had been a long time without direct news from you, till four days ago your letter arrived. this day i understand to be the ultimate limit of the american mail; yesterday, had it not been sunday, would have been the limit: i write a line, therefore, though in very great haste. poor sterling, even i now begin to fear, is in a very bad way. he had two successive attacks of spitting of blood, some three months ago or more; the second attack of such violence, and his previous condition then so weak, that the doctor as good as gave up hope,--the poor patient himself had from the first given it up. our poor friend has had so many attacks of that nature, and so rapidly always rallied from them, i gave no ear to these sinister prognostics; but now that i see the summer influences passing over him without visible improvement, and our good weather looking towards a close without so much strength added as will authorize even a new voyage to madeira;--i too am at last joining in the general discouragement; all the sadder to me that i shut it out so long. sir james clark, our best-accredited physician for such diseases, declares that life, for certain months, may linger, with great pain; but that recovery is not to be expected. great part of the lungs, it appears, is totally unserviceable for respiration; from the remainder, especially in times of coughing, it is with the greatest difficulty that breath enough is obtained. our poor patient passes the night in a sitting posture; cannot lie down: that fact sticks with me ever since i heard it! he is very weak, very pale; still "writes a great deal daily"; but does not wish to see anybody; declines to "see even carlyle," who offered to go to him. his only brother, anthony sterling, a hardy soldier, lately withdrawn from the army, and settled in this quarter, whom we often communicate with, is about going down to the isle of wight this week: he saw john four days ago, and brings nothing but bad news,--of which indeed this removal of his to the neighborhood of the scene is a practical testimony. the old father, a widower for the last two years, and very lonely and dispirited, seems getting feebler and feebler: he was here yesterday: a pathetic kind of spectacle to us. alas, alas! but what can be said? i say nothing; i have written only one note to sterling: i feel it probable that i shall never see him more,--nor his like again in this world. his disease, as i have from of old construed it, is a burning of him up by his own fire. the restless vehemence of the man, struggling in all ways these many years to find a legitimate outlet, and finding, except for transitory, unsatisfactory coruscations, none, has undermined its clay prison in the weakest point (which proves to be the lungs), and will make outlet _there._ my poor sterling! it is an old tragedy; and very stern whenever it repeats itself of new. today i get answer about alfred tennyson: all is right on that side. moxon informs me that the russell books and letter arrived duly, and were duly forwarded and safely received; nay, farther, that tennyson is now in town, and means to come and see me. of this latter result i shall be very glad: alfred is one of the few british or foreign figures (a not increasing number i think!) who are and remain beautiful to me;--a true human soul, or some authentic approximation thereto, to whom your own soul can say, brother!--however, i doubt he will not come; he often skips me, in these brief visits to town; skips everybody indeed; being a man solitary and sad, as certain men are, dwelling in an element of gloom,--carrying a bit of chaos about him, in short, which he is manufacturing into cosmos! alfred is the son of a lincolnshire gentleman farmer, i think; indeed, you see in his verses that he is a native of "moated granges," and green, fat pastures, not of mountains and their torrents and storms. he had his breeding at cambridge, as if for the law or church; being master of a small annuity on his father's decease, he preferred clubbing with his mother and some sisters, to live unpromoted and write poems. in this way he lives still, now here, now there; the family always within reach of london, never in it; he himself making rare and brief visits, lodging in some old comrade's rooms. i think he must be under forty, not much under it. one of the finest-looking men in the world. a great shock of rough dusty-dark hair; bright-laughing hazel eyes; massive aquiline face, most massive yet most delicate; of sallow-brown complexion, almost indian-looking; clothes cynically loose, free-and-easy;--smokes infinite tobacco. his voice is musical metallic,--fit for loud laughter and piercing wail, and all that may lie between; speech, and speculation free and plenteous: i do not meet, in these late decades, such company over a pipe!--we shall see what he will grow to. he is often unwell; very chaotic,--his way is through chaos and the bottomless and pathless; not handy for making out many miles upon. (o paper!) i trust there is now joy in place of pain in the house at concord, and a certain mother grateful again to the supreme powers! we are all in our customary health here, or nearly so; my wife has been in lancashire, among her kindred there, for a month lately: our swollen city is getting empty and still; we think of trying an autumn _here_ this time.--get your book ready; there are readers ready for it! and be busy and victorious! ever yours, t. carlyle my _history_ is frightful! if i live, it is like to be completed; but whether i shall live, and not rather be buried alive, broken-hearted, in the serbonian quagmires of english stupidity, and so sleep beside cromwell, often seems uncertain. erebus has no uglier, brutaler element. let us say nothing of it. let us do it, or leave it to the devils. _ay de mi!_ xciii. emerson to carlyle boston, september, my dear carlyle,--i have just learned that in an hour mr. wilmer's mail-bag for london, by the "acadia," closes, and i will not lose the occasion of sending you a hasty line: though i had designed to write you from home on sundry matters, which now must wait. i send by this steamer some sheets, to the bookseller john chapman,--proofsheets of my new book of essays. chapman wrote to me by the last steamer, urging me to send him some manuscript that had not yet been published in america, and he thought he could make an advantage from printing it, and even, in some conditions, procure a copyright, and he would publish for me on the plan of half-profits. the request was so timely, since i was not only printing a book, but also a pamphlet (an address to citizens of some thirteen towns who celebrated in concord the negro emancipation on st august last), that i came to town yesterday, and hastened the printers, and have now sent him proofs of all the address, and of more than half the book. if you can give chapman any counsel, or save me from any nonsense by enjoining on him careful correction, you shall. i looked eagerly for a letter from you by the last steamer, to give me exact tidings of sterling. none came; but i received a short note from sterling himself, which intimated that he had but a few more days to live. it is gloomy news. i beg you will write me everything you can relate of him, by the next mail. if you can learn from his friends whether the packet of his manuscripts and printed papers, returned by russell and sent by me through harnden's express to ventnor, arrived safely, it would be a satisfaction. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson xciv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, september, dear emerson,--there should a letter have come for you by that steamer; for i wrote one duly, and posted it in good time myself: i will hope therefore it was but some delay of some subaltern official, such as i am told occasionally chances, and that you got the letter after all in a day or two. it would give you notice, more or less, up to its date, of all the points you had inquired about there is now little to be added; except concerning the main point, that the catastrophe has arrived there as we foresaw, and all is ended. john sterling died at his house in ventnor on the night of wednesday, th september, about eleven o'clock; unexpectedly at last, and to appearance without pain. his sister-in-law, mrs. maurice; had gone down to him from this place about a week before; other friends were waiting as it were in view of him; but he wished generally to be alone, to continue to the last setting his house and his heart more and more in order for the great journey. for about a fortnight back he had ceased to have himself formally dressed; had sat only in his dressing-gown, but i believe was still daily wheeled into his library, and sat very calmly sorting and working there. he sent me two notes, and various messages, and gifts of little keepsakes to my wife and myself: the notes were brief, stern and loving; altogether noble; never to be forgotten in this world. his brother anthony, who had been in the isle of wight within call for several weeks, had now come up to town again; but, after about a week, decided that he would run down again, and look. he arrived on the wednesday night, about nine o'clock; found no visible change; the brave patient calm as ever, ready to speak as ever, --to say, in direct words which he would often do, or indirectly as his whole speech and conduct did, "god is great." anthony and he talked for a while, then took leave for the night; in few minutes more, anthony was summoned to the bedside, and at eleven o'clock, as i said, the curtain dropt, and it was all ended.--_euge!_ whether the american _manuscripts_ had arrived i do not yet know, but probably shall before this letter goes; for anthony is to return hither on tuesday, and i will inquire. our friend is buried in ventnor churchyard; four big elms overshadow the little spot; it is situated on the southeast side of that green island, on the slope of steep hills (as i understand it) that look toward the sun, and are close within sight and hearing of the sea. there shall he rest, and have fit lullaby, this brave one. he has died as a man should; like an old roman, yet with the christian bibles and all newest revelations present to him. he refused to see friends; men whom i think he loved as well as any,--me for one when i obliquely proposed it, he refused. he was even a little stern on his nearest relatives when they came to him: do i need your help to die? phocion-like he seemed to feel degraded by physical decay; to feel that he ought to wrap his mantle round him, and say, "i come, persephoneia; it is not i that linger!"--his sister-in-law, anthony's wife, probably about a month ago, while they were still in wight, had begged that she might see him yet once; her husband would be there too, she engaged not to speak. anthony had not yet persuaded him, when she, finding the door half open, went in: his pale changed countenance almost made her shriek; she stept forward silently, kissed his brow in silence; he burst into tears. let us speak no more of this.--a great quantity of papers, i understand, are left for my determination; what is to be done with them i will sacredly endeavor to do. i have visited your bookseller chapman; seen the proof-sheets lying on his table; taken order that the reprint shall be well corrected,--indeed, i am to read every sheet myself, and in that way get acquainted with it, before it go into stereotype. chapman is a tall, lank youth of five-and-twenty; full of good will, but of what other equipment time must yet try. by a little book of his, which i looked at some months ago, he seemed to me sunk very deep in the dust-hole of extinct socinianism; a painful predicament for a man! he is not sure of saving much copyright for you; but he will do honestly what in that respect is doable; and he will print the book correctly, and publish it decently, i saying _imprimatur_ if occasion be,--and your ever- increasing little congregation here will do with the new word what they can. i add no more today; reserving a little nook for the answer i hope to get two days hence. adieu, my friend: it is silent sunday; the populace not yet admitted to their beer- shops, till the respectabilities conclude their rubric- mummeries,--a much more audacious feat than beer! we have wet wind at northeast, and a sky somewhat of the dreariest:-- courage! a _little_ way above it reigns mere blue, and sunshine eternally!--t.c. _wednesday, october d._--the letter had to wait till today, and is still in time. anthony sterling, who is yet at ventnor, apprises me this morning that according to his and the governess's belief the russell manuscripts arrived duly, and were spoken of more than once by our friend.--on monday i received from this same anthony a big packet by post; it contains among other things all your letters to john, wrapt up carefully, and addressed in his hand, "emerson's letters, to be returned through the hands of carlyle": they shall go towards you next week, by mr. james, who is about returning. among the other papers was one containing seven stanzas of verse addressed to t. carlyle, th september; full of love and enthusiasm;--the friday before his death: i was visiting the old city of winchester that day, among the tombs of canutes and eldest noble ones: you may judge how sacred the memory of those hours now is! i have read your slavery address; this morning the first _half_- sheet, in proof, of the _essays_ has come: perfectly correct, and right good reading. yours ever, t. carlyle xcv. emerson to carlyle concord, september, my dear friend,--i enclose a bill of exchange for thirty pounds sterling which i procured in town today at $ each pound, or $ ; so high, it seems, is the rate at present, higher, they said, than for years. it is good booksellers' money from little and brown, and james munroe & co., in unequal proportions. if you wish for more accurate information and have a great deal of patience, there is still hope that you may obtain it before death; for i this day met e.p. clark in washington street, and he reported some progress in auditing of accounts, and said that when presently his family should return to town for the winter, he would see to the end of them, i.e. the accounts. i received with great satisfaction your letter of july, which came by a later steamer than it was written for, but gave me exact and solid information on what i most wished to know. may you live forever, and may your reports of men and things be accessible to me whilst i live! even if, as now in sterling's case, the news are the worst, or nearly so, yet let whatever comes for knowledge be precise, for the direst tragedy that is accurately true must share the blessing of the universe. i have no later tidings from sterling, and i must still look to you to tell me what you can. i dread that the story should be short. may you have much good to tell of him, and for many a day to come! the sketch you drew of tennyson was right welcome, for he is an old favorite of mine,--i owned his book before i saw your face;--though i love him with allowance. o cherish him with love and praise, and draw from him whole books full of new verses yet. the only point on which you never give precise intelligence is your own book; but you shall have your will in that; so only you arrive on the shores of light at last, with your mystic freight fished partly out of the seas of time, and partly out of the empyrean deeps. i have much regretted a sudden note i wrote you just before the steamer of september sailed, entreating you to cumber yourself about my proofsheets sent to the london bookseller. i heartily absolve you from all such vexations. nothing could be more inconsiderate. mr. chapman is undoubtedly amply competent to ordinary correction, and i much prefer to send you my little book in decent trim than in rags and stains and deformities more than its own. i have just corrected and sent to the steamer the last sheets for mr. chapman, who is to find english readers if he can. i shall ask mr. chapman to send you a copy, for his edition will be more correct than mine. what can i tell you better? why even this, that this house rejoices in a brave boy, now near three months old. edward we call him, and my wife calls him edward waldo. when shall i show him to you? and when shall i show you a pretty pasture and wood-lot which i bought last week on the borders of a lake which is the chief ornament of this town, called walden pond? one of these days, if i should have any money, i may build me a cabin or a turret there high as the tree- tops, and spend my nights as well as days in the midst of a beauty which never fades for me. yours with love, r.w. emerson xcvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, november, dear emerson,--by the clearest law i am bound to write you a word today, were my haste even greater than it is. the last american fleet or ship, about the middle of last month, brought me a draft for thirty pounds; which i converted into ready cash, and have here,--and am now your grateful debtor for, as of old. there seems to be no end to those boston booksellers! i think the well is dry; and straightway it begins to run again. thanks to you: --it is, i dare say, a thing you too are grateful for. we will recognize it among the good things of this rather indifferent world.--by the way, if that good clark _like_ his business, let him go on with it; but if not, stop him, poor fellow! it is to me a matter of really small moment whether those booksellers' accounts be ever audited in this world, or left over to the general day of audit. i myself shudder at the sight of such things; and make my bargain here so always as to have no trade with them, but to be _netto_ from the first. why should i plague poor clark with them, if it be any plague to him? the booksellers will never _know_ but we examine them! the very terror of clark's name will be as the bark of chained mastiff,-- and no need for actual biting! have due pity on the man. your english volume of _essays,_ as chapman probably informs you by this post, was advertised yesterday, "with a preface from me." that is hardly accurate, that latter clause. my "preface" consists only of a certificate that the book is correctly printed, and sent forth by a publisher of your appointment, whom therefore all readers of yours ought to regard accordingly. nothing more. there proves, i believe, no visible real vestige of a copyright obtainable here; only chapman asserts that he _has_ obtained one, and that he will take all contraveners into chancery,--which has a terrible sound; and indeed the act he founds on is of so distracted, inextricable a character, it may mean anything and all things, and no sergeant talfourd whom we could consult durst take upon him to say that it meant almost anything whatever. the sound of "chancery," the stereotype character of this volume, and its cheap price, may perhaps deter pirates,--who are but a weak body in this country as yet. i judged it right to help in that; and impertinent, at this stage of affairs, to go any farther. the book is very fairly printed, onward. at least to the essay _new england politics,_ where my "perfect-copy" of the sheets as yet stops. i did not read any of the proofs except two; finding it quite superfluous, and a sad waste of time to the hurried chapman himself. i have found yet but one error, and that a very correctable one, "narvest" for "harvest";--no other that i recollect at present. the work itself falling on me by driblets has not the right chance yet--not till i get it in the bound state, and read it all at once--to produce its due impression on me. but i will say already of it, it is a _sermon_ to me, as all your other deliberate utterances are; a real _word,_ which i feel to be such,--alas, almost or altogether the one such, in a world all full of jargons, hearsays, echoes, and vain noises, which cannot pass with me for _words!_ this is a praise far beyond any "literary" one; literary praises are not worth repeating in comparison. for the rest, i have to object still (what you will call objecting against the law of nature) that we find you a speaker indeed, but as it were a _soliloquizer_ on the eternal mountain-tops only, in vast solitudes where men and their affairs lie all hushed in a very dim remoteness; and only the man and the stars and the earth are visible,--whom, so fine a fellow seems he, we could perpetually punch into, and say, "why won't you come and help us then? we have terrible need of one man like you down among us! it is cold and vacant up there; nothing paintable but rainbows and emotions; come down, and you shall do life-pictures, passions, facts,--which _transcend_ all thought, and leave it stuttering and stammering! to which he answers that he won't, can't, and doesn't want to (as the cockneys have it): and so i leave him, and say, "you western gymnosophist! well, we can afford one man for that too. but--!--by the bye, i ought to say, the sentences are very _brief;_ and did not, in my sheet reading, always entirely cohere for me. pure genuine saxon; strong and simple; of a clearness, of a beauty--but they did not, sometimes, rightly stick to their foregoers and their followers: the paragraph not as a beaten ingot, but as a beautiful square _bag of duck-shot_ held together by canvas! i will try them again, with the book deliberately before me.--there are also one or two utterances about "jesus," "immortality," and so forth, which will produce wide-eyes here and there. i do not say it was wrong to utter them; a man obeys his own daemon in these cases as his supreme law. i dare say you are a little bored occasionally with "jesus," &c.,--as i confess i myself am, when i discern what a beggarly twaddle they have made of all that, what a greasy cataplasm to lay to their own poltrooneries;- -and an impatient person may exclaim with voltaire, in serious moments: "_au nom de dieu, ne me parlez plus de cet homme-la!_ i have had enough of him;--i tell you i am alive too!" well, i have scribbled at a great rate; regardless of time's flight!--my wife thanks many times for m. fuller's book. i sent by mr. james a small packet of _your_ letters--which will make you sad to look at them! adieu, dear friend. --t. carlyle xcvii. emerson to carlyle concord, december, my dear friend,--i have long owed you a letter and have much to acknowledge. your two letters containing tidings, the first of the mortal illness, and the second of the death of sterling, i had no heart to answer. i had nothing to say. alas! as in so many instances heretofore, i knew not what to think. life is somewhat customary and usual; and death is the unusual and astonishing; it kills in so far the survivor also, when it ravishes from him friendship and the most noble and admirable qualities. that which we call faith seems somewhat stoical and selfish, if we use it as a retreat from the pangs this ravishment inflicts. i had never seen him, but i held him fast; now i see him not, but i can no longer hold him. who can say what he yet is and will be to me? the most just and generous can best divine that. i have written in vain to james to visit me, or to send me tidings. he sent me, without any note, the parcel you confided to him, and has gone to albany, or i know not whither. i have your notes of the progress of my london printing, and, at last, the book itself. it was thoughtless in me to ask your attention to the book at all in the proof state; the printer might have been fully trusted with corrected printed pages before him. nor should chapman have taxed you for an advertisement; only, i doubt not he was glad of a chance to have business with you; and, of course, was too thankful for any preface. thanks to you for the kind thought of a "notice," and for its friendly wit. you shall not do this thing again, if i should send you any more books. a preface from you is a sort of banner or oriflamme, a little too splendid for my occasion, and misleads. i fancy my readers to be a very quiet, plain, even obscure class,--men and women of some religious culture and aspirations, young, or else mystical, and by no means including the great literary and fashionable army, which no man can count, who now read your books. if you introduce me, your readers and the literary papers try to read me, and with false expectations. i had rather have fewer readers and only such as belong to me. i doubt not your stricture on the book as sometimes unconnected and inconsecutive is just. your words are very gentle. i should describe it much more harshly. my knowledge of the defects of these things i write is all but sufficient to hinder me from writing at all. i am only a sort of lieutenant here in the deplorable absence of captains, and write the laws ill as thinking it a better homage than universal silence. you londoners know little of the dignities and duties of country lyceums. but of what you say now and heretofore respecting the remoteness of my writing and thinking from real life, though i hear substantially the same criticism made by my countrymen, i do not know what it means. if i can at any time express the law and the ideal right, that should satisfy me without measuring the divergence from it of the last act of congress. and though i sometimes accept a popular call, and preach on temperance or the abolition of slavery, as lately on the st of august, i am sure to feel, before i have done with it, what an intrusion it is into another sphere, and so much loss of virtue in my own. since i am not to see you from year to year, is there never an englishman who knows you well, who comes to america, and whom you can send to me to answer all my questions? health and love and joy to you and yours. --r.w. emerson xcviii. emerson to carlyle concord, january, my dear carlyle,--carey and hart of philadelphia, booksellers, have lately proposed to buy the remainder of our boston edition of your _miscellanies,_ or to give you a bonus for sanctioning an edition of the same, which they propose to publish. on inquiry, i have found that only thirteen entire sets of four volumes remain to us unsold; whilst we have copies of volume iii., and copies of volume iv., remaining. in replying to mr. carey, i proposed that, besides the proposed bonus, he should buy of me these old volumes, which are not bound but folded, at cents a volume, (monroe having roughly computed the cost at cents a volume,) but this he declines to do, and offers fifty pounds sterling for his bonus. i decided at once to accept his offer, thinking it a more favorable winding up of our account than i could otherwise look for; as mr. carey knows much better how to defend himself from pirates than i do. so i am to publish that his edition is edited with your concurrence. our own remaining copies of entire sets i shall sell at once to monroe, at a reduced price, and the odd volumes i think to dispose of by giving them a new and independent title-page. in the circumstances of the trade here, i think mr. carey's offer a very liberal one, and he is reputed in his dealings eminently just and generous. my friend william furness, who has corresponded with me on carey's behalf, has added now another letter to say that mr. carey wishes to procure a picture of mr. carlyle to be engraved for this edition. "he understands there is a good head by laurence, and he wishes to employ some london artist to make a copy of it in oil or water colors, or in any way that will suffice for the engraver; and he proposes to apply to mr. carlyle for permission through inman the american artist who is now in england." furness goes on to ask for my "good word" with you in furtherance of this design. well, i heartily hope you will not resist so much good nature and true love; for mr. furness and mr. griswold, and others who compose a sort of advising committee to mr. carey, are sincere lovers of yours. one more opportunity this crisis in our accounts will give to that truest of all carlylians, e.p. clark, to make his report. i called at his house two nights ago, in boston; he promised immediate attention, but quickly drew me aside to his "illustrations of carlyle," an endless train of books, and portfolios, and boxes of prints, in which every precious word of that master is explained or confirmed. affectionately yours, r.w. emerson xcix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, february, dear emerson,--by the last packet, which sailed on the d of the month, i forgot to write to you, though already in your debt one letter; and there now has another letter arrived, which on the footing of mere business demands to be answered. i write straightway; not knowing how the post-office people will contrive the conveyance, or whether it can be sooner than by the next steam ship, but willing to give them a chance. you have made another brave bargain for me with the philadelphia people; to all of which i can say nothing but _"euge! papae!"_ it seems to me strange, in the present state of copyright, how my sanction or the contrary can be worth l to any american bookseller; but so it is, to all appearance; let it be so, therefore, with thanks and surprise. the messrs. carey and lea distinguish themselves by the beauty of their editions; a poor author does not go abroad among his friends in dirty paper, full of misprints, under their guidance; this is as handsome an item of the business as any. as to the portrait too, i will be as "amiable" as heart could wish; truly it will be worth my while to take a little pains that the kind philadelphia editors do once for all get a faithful portrait of me, since they are about it, and so prevent counterfeits from getting into circulation. i will endeavor to do in that matter whatsoever they require of me; to the extent even of sitting two days for a crayon sketch such as may be engraved,--though this new sacrifice of patience will not be needed as matters are. it stands thus: there is no painter, of the numbers who have wasted my time and their own with trying, that has indicated any capability of catching a true likeness, but one samuel lawrence; a young painter of real talent, not quite so young now, but still only struggling for complete mastership in the management of colors. he does crayon sketches in a way to please almost himself; but his oil paintings, at least till within a year or two, have indicated only a great faculty still crude in that particular. his oil portrait of me, which you speak of, is almost terrible to behold! it has the look of a jotun, of a scandinavian demon, grim, sad, as the angel of death;--and the coloring is so _brick_ish, the finishing so coarse, it reminds you withal of a flayed horse's head! _"dinna speak o't."_ but the preparatory crayon-sketch of this, still in existence, is admired by some judges; poor john sterling bought it from the painter, and it is now here in the hands of his brother, who will readily allow any authorized person to take a drawing of it. lawrence himself, i imagine, would be the fittest man to employ; or your mr. ingham [inman], if he be here and a capable person: one or both of these might superintend the engraving of it here, and not part with the plate till it were pronounced satisfactory. in short, i am willing to do "anything in reason"! only if a portrait is to be, i confess i should rather avoid going abroad under the hands of bunglers, at least of bunglers sanctioned by myself. there is a portrait of me in some miserable farrago called _spirit of the age;_* a farrago unknown to me, but a portrait known, for poor lawrence brought it down to me with sorrow in his face; it professes to be from his painting; is a "lais _without_ the beauty" (as charles lamb used to say); a flayed horse's head without the spiritualism, good or bad,--and simply figures on my mind as a detestability; which i had much rather never have seen. these poor _spirit of the age_ people applied to me; i described myself as "busy," &c.; shoved them off me; and this monster of iniquity, resembling nothing in the earth or under it, is the result. in short, i am willing, i am willing; and so let us not waste another drop of ink on it at present!--on the whole, are not you a strange fellow? you apologize as if with real pain for "trouble" i had, or indeed am falsely supposed to have had, with chapman here; and forthwith engage again in correspondences, in speculations, and negotiations, and i know not what, on my behalf! for shame, for shame! nay, you have done one very ingenious thing; to set clark upon the boston booksellers' accounts: it is excellent; michael scott setting the devil to twist ropes of sand, "there, my brave one; see if you don't find work there for a while!" i never think of this clark without love and laughter. once more, _euge!_ chapman is fast selling your books here; striking off a new five hundred from his stereotypes. you are wrong as to your public in this country; it is a very pretty public; extends pretty much, i believe, through all ranks, and is a growing one,--and a truly _aristocratic,_ being of the bravest inquiring minds we have. all things are breaking up here, like swedish frost in the end of march; _gachis epouvantable._ deep, very serious eternal instincts, are at work; but as yet no serious word at all that i hear, except what reaches me from concord at intervals. forward, forward! and you do not know what i mean by calling you "unpractical," "theoretic." _ caeca corda!_ but i have no room for such a theme at present. ---------- * "a new spirit of the age. edited by r.h. horne." in two volumes. london, . ---------- the reason i tell you nothing about cromwell is, alas, that there is nothing to be told. i am day and night, these long months and years, very miserable about it,--nigh broken-hearted often. such a scandalous accumulation of human stupidity in every form never lay before on such a subject. no history of it can be written to this wretched, fleering, sneering, canting, twaddling, god- forgetting generation. how can you explain men to apes by the dead sea?* and i am very sickly too, and my wife is ill all this cold weather,--and i am sunk in the bowels of chaos, and scarce once in the three months or so see so much as a possibility of ever getting out! cromwell's own _letters and speeches_ i have gathered together, and washed clean from a thousand ordures: these i do sometimes think of bringing out in a legible shape;-- perhaps soon. adieu, dear friend, with blessings always. --t. carlyle poor sydney smith is understood to be dying; water on the chest; past hope of doctors. alas! --------- * the dwellers by the dead sea who were changed to apes are referred to in various places by carlyle. he tells the story of the metamorphosis, which he got from the introduction to sale's koran, in _past and present,_ book iii. ch. . --------- c. emerson to carlyle* concord, june , my dear friend,--i grieve to think of my slackness in writing, which suffers steamer after steamer to go without a letter. but i have still hoped, before each of the late packets sailed, that i should have a message to send that would enforce a letter. i wrote you some time ago of mr. carey's liberal proposition in relation to your _miscellanies._ i wrote, of course, to furness, through whom it was made to me, accepting the proposition; and i forwarded to mr. carey a letter from me to be printed at the beginning of the book, signifying your good-will to the edition, and acknowledging the justice and liberality of the publishers. i have heard no more from them, and now, a fortnight since, the newspaper announces the death of mr. carey. he died very suddenly, though always an invalid and extremely crippled. his death is very much regretted in the philadelphia papers, where he bore the reputation of a most liberal patron of good and fine arts. i have not heard from mr. furness, and have thought i should still expect a letter from him. i hope our correspondence will stand as a contract which mr. carey's representatives will feel bound to execute. they had sent me a little earlier a copy of mr. sartain's engraving from their water-color copy of laurence's head of you. they were eager to have the engraving pronounced a good likeness. i showed it to sumner, and russell, and theodore parker, who have seen you long since i had, and they shook their heads unanimously and declared that d'orsay's profile was much more like. --------- ** from the rough draft. --------- i creep along the roads and fields of this town as i have done from year to year. when my garden is shamefully overgrown with weeds, i pull up some of them. i prune my apples and pears. i have a few friends who gild many hours of the year. i sometimes write verses. i tell you with some unwillingness, as knowing your distaste for such things, that i have received so many applications from readers and printers for a volume of poems that i have seriously taken in hand the collection, transcription, or scription of such a volume, and may do the enormity before new year's day. fear not, dear friend, you shall not have to read one line. perhaps i shall send you an official copy, but i shall appeal to the tenderness of jane carlyle, and excuse your formidable self, for the benefit of us both. where all writing is such a caricature of the subject, what signifies whether the form is a little more or less ornate and luxurious? meantime, i think to set a few heads before me, as good texts for winter evening entertainments. i wrote a deal about napoleon a few months ago, after reading a library of memoirs. now i have plato, montaigne, and swedenborg, and more in the clouds behind. what news of naseby and worcester? ci. carlyle to emerson chelsea, august, dear emerson,--your letter, which had been very long expected, has been in my hand above a month now; and still no answer sent to it. i thought of answering straightway; but the day went by, days went by;--and at length i decided to wait till my insupportable burden (the "stupidity of two centuries" as i call it, which is a heavy load for one man!) were rolled off my shoulders, and i could resume the habit of writing letters, which has almost left me for many months. by the unspeakable blessing of heaven that consummation has now arrived, about four days ago i wrote my last word on _cromwell's letters and speeches;_ and one of the earliest uses i make of my recovered freedom is to salute you again. the book is nearly printed: two big volumes; about a half of it, i think, my own; the real utterances of the man oliver cromwell once more legible to earnest men. legible really to an unexpected extent: for the book took quite an unexpected figure in my hands; and is now a kind of life of oliver, the best that circumstances would permit me to do:-- whether either i or england shall be, in my time, fit for a better, remains submitted to the destinies at present. i have tied up the whole puritan paper-litter (considerable masses of it still unburnt) with tight strings, and hidden it at the bottom of my deepest repositories: there shall _it,_ if heaven please, lie dormant for a time and times. such an element as i have been in, no human tongue can give account of. the disgust of my soul has been great; a really _pious_ labor: worth very little when i have done it; but the best i could do; and that is quite enough. i feel the liveliest gratitude to the gods that i have got out of it alive. the book is very dull, but it is actually legible: all the ingenious faculty i had, and ten times as much would have been useful there, has been employed in elucidation; in saying, and chiefly in forbearing to say,--in annihilating continents of brutal wreck and dung: _ach gott!_--but in fact you will see it by and by; and then form your own conclusions about it. they are going to publish it in october, i find: i tried hard to get you a complete copy of the sheets by this steamer; but it proves to be flatly impossible;--perhaps luckily; for i think you would have been bothering yourself with some new bookseller negotiation about it; and that, as copyright and other matters now stand, is a thing i cannot recommend. --enough of it now: only let all my silences and other shortcomings be explained thereby. i am now off for the north country, for a snatch still at the small remnants of summer, and a little free air and sunshine. i am really far from well, though i have been riding diligently for three months back, and doing what i could to help myself. very glad shall i be, my friend, to have some new utterances from you either in verse or in prose! what you say about the vast _imperfection_ of all modes of utterance is most true indeed. let a man speak and sing, and do, and sputter and gesticulate as he may,--the meaning of him is most ineffectually shown forth, poor fellow; rather _indicated_ as if by straggling symbols, than _spoken_ or visually expressed! poor fellow! so the great rule is, that he _have_ a good manful meaning, and then that he take what "mode of utterance" is honestly the readiest for him.-- i wish you would take an american hero, one whom you really love; and give us a history of him,--make an artistic bronze statue (in good _words_) of his life and him! i do indeed.--but speak of what you will, you are welcome to me. once more i say, no other voice in this wide waste world seems to my sad ear to be _speaking_ at all at present. the more is the pity for us. i forbid you to plague yourself any farther with those philadelphia or other booksellers. if you could hinder them to promulgate any copy of that frightful picture by lawrence, or indeed any picture at all, i had rather stand as a shadow than as a falsity in the minds of my american friends: but this too we are prepared to encounter. and as for the money of these men,-- if they will pay it, good and welcome; if they will not pay it, let them keep it with what blessing there may be in it! i have your noble offices in that and in other such matters already unforgetably sure to me; and, in real fact, that is almost exactly the whole of valuable that could exist for me in the affair. adieu, dear friend. write to me again; i will write again at more leisure. yours always, t. carlyle cii. emerson to carlyle concord, september, my dear friend,--i have seen furness of philadelphia, who was, last week, in boston, and inquired of him what account i should send you of the new philadelphia edition. "has not mr. carey paid you?" he said.--no. "then has he not paid carlyle directly?" no, as i believe, or i should have heard of it.-- furness replied, that the promised fifty pounds were sure, and that the debt would have been settled before this time, if mr. carey had lived. so as this is no longer a three blind callenders' business of arabian nights, i shall rest secure. i have doubted whether the bad name which philadelphia has gotten in these times would not have disquieted you in this long delay. if you have ever heard directly from carey and hart, you will inform me. i am to read to a society in boston presently some lectures, --on plato, or the philosopher; swedenborg, or the mystic; montaigne, or the sceptic; shakespeare, or the poet; napoleon, or the man of the world;--if i dare, and much lecturing makes us incorrigibly rash. perhaps, before i end it, my list will be longer, and the measure of presumption overflowed. i may take names less reverend than some of these,--but six lectures i have promised. i find this obligation usually a good spur to the sides of that dull horse i have charge of. but many of its advantages must be regarded at a long distance. i have heard nothing from you for a long time,--so may your writing prosper the more. i wish to hear, however, concerning you, and your house, and your studies, when there is little to tell. the steamers come so fast--to exchange cards would not be nothing. my wife and children and my mother are well. peace and love to your household. --r.w. emerson ciii. emerson to carlyle concord, september, my dear friend,--i had hardly sent away my letter by the last steamer, when yours full of good news arrived. i greet you heartily on the achievement of your task, and the new days of freedom obtained and deserved. happiest, first, that you can work, which seems the privilege of the great, and then, also, that thereby you can come at the sweetness of victory and rest. yes, flee to the country, ride, run, leap, sit, spread yourself at large; and in all ways celebrate the immense benevolence of the universe towards you; and never complain again of dyspepsia, crosses, or the folly of men; for in giving you this potent concentration, what has been withholden? i am glad with all men that a new book is made, that the gentle creation as well as the grosser goes ever on. another month will bring it to me, and i shall know the secrets of these late silent years. welcome the child of my friend! why should i regret that i see you not, when you are forced thus intimately to discover yourself beyond the intimacy of conversation? but you should have sent me out the sheets by the last steamer, or a manuscript copy of the book. i do not know but munroe would have printed it at once, and defied the penny press. and slow time might have brought in his hands a most modest reward. i wrote you the other day the little i had to say on affairs. clark, the financial conscience, has never yet made any report, though often he promised. half the year he lives out of boston, and unless i go to his bank i never see his face. i think he will not die till he have disburdened himself of this piece of arithmetic. i pray you to send me my copy of this book at the earliest hour, and to offer my glad congratulations to jane carlyle, on an occasion, i am sure, of great peace and relief to her spirit. and so farewell. --r.w. emerson civ. carlyle to emerson chelsea, november, my dear emerson,--i have had two letters from you since i wrote any; the latest of them was lying here for me when i returned, about three weeks ago; the other i had received in scotland: it was only the last that demanded a special answer;--which, alas, i meant faithfully to give it, but did not succeed! with meet despatch i made the bookseller get ready for you a copy of the unpublished _cromwell_ book; hardly complete as yet, it was nevertheless put together, and even some kind of odious rudiments of a _portrait_ were bound up with it; and the packet inscribed with your address was put into wiley and putnam's hands in time for the mail steamer;--and i hope has duly arrived? if it have not, pray set the booksellers a-hunting. wiley and putnam was the carrier's name; this is all the indication i can give, but this, i hope, if indeed any prove needful, will be enough. one may hope you have the book already in your hands, a fortnight before this reaches you, a month before any other copy can reach america. in which case the parcel, _without_ any letter, must have seemed a little enigmatic to you! the reason was this: i miscounted the day of the month, unlucky that i was. sitting down one morning with full purpose to write at large, and all my tools round me, i discover that it is no longer the third of november; that it is already the _fourth,_ and the american mail-packet has already lifted anchor! irrevocable, irremediable! nothing remained but to wait for the th;--and now, as you see, to take time by the forelock,-- _queue,_ as we all know, he has none. my visit to scotland was wholesome for me, tho' full of sadness, as the like always is. thirty years mow away a generation of men. the old hills, the old brooks and houses, are still there; but the population has marched away, almost all; it is not there any more. i cannot enter into light talk with the survivors and successors; i withdraw into silence, and converse with the old dumb crags rather, in a melancholy and abstruse manner.--thank god, my good old mother is still there; old and frail, but still young of heart; as young and strong _there,_ i think, as ever. it is beautiful to see affection survive where all else is submitting to decay; the altar with its sacred fire still burning when the outer walls are all slowly crumbling; material fate saying, "_they_ are mine!"--i read some insignificant books; smoked a great deal of tobacco; and went moping about among the hills and hollow water-courses, somewhat like a shade in hades. the gospel which this world of fact does preach to one differs considerably from the sugary twaddle one gets the offer of in exeter-hall and other spouting-places! of which, in fact, i am getting more and more weary; sometimes really impatient. it seems to me the reign of cant and spoonyism has about lasted long enough. alas, in many respects, in this england i too often feel myself sorrowfully in a "minority of one";--if in the whole world, it amount to a minority of two, that is something! these words of goethe often come into my mind, _"verachtung ja nicht- achtung."_ lancashire, with its titanic industries, with its smoke and dirt, and brutal stupor to all but money and the five mechanical powers, did not excite much admiration in me; considerably less, i think, than ever! patience, and shuffle the cards! the book on cromwell is not to come out till the d of this month. for many weeks it has been a real weariness to me; my hope, always disappointed, that now is the last time i shall have any trade with it. even since i began writing, there has been an engraver here, requiring new indoctrination,--poor fellow! nay, in about ten days it _must_ be over: let us not complain. i feel it well to be worth _nothing,_ except for the little fractions or intermittent fits of pious industry there really were in it; and my one wish is that the human species would be pleased to take it off my hands, and honestly let me hear no more about it! if it please heaven, i will rest awhile still, and then try something better. in three days hence, my wife and i are off to the hampshire coast for a winter visit to kind friends there, if in such a place it will prosper long with us. the climate there is greatly better than ours; they are excellent people, well affected to us; and can be lived with, though of high temper and ways! they are the lord ashburtons, in fact; more properly the younger stratum of that house; partly a kind of american people,--who know waldo emerson, among other fine things, very well! i think we are to stay some three weeks: the bustle of moving is already begun. you promise us a new book soon? let it be soon, then. there are many persons here that will welcome it now. to one man here it is ever as an _articulate voice_ amid the infinite cackling and cawing. that remains my best definition of the effect it has on me. adieu, my friend. good be with you and your household always. _vale._ --t.c. cv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, january, dear emerson,--i received your letter* by the last packet three or four days ago: this is the last day of answering, the monthly packet sails towards you again from liverpool tomorrow morning; and i am in great pressure with many writings, elsewhither and thither: therefore i must be very brief. i have just written to mr. hart of philadelphia; his draft (as i judge clearly by the banker's speech and silence) is accepted, all right; and in fact, means _money_ at this time: for which i have written to thank him heartily. do you very heartily thank mr. furness for me;--furness and various friends, as transatlantic matters now are, must accept a _silent_ gratitude from me. the speech of men and american hero-worshipers is grown such a babblement: in very truth, _silence_ is the thing that chiefly has meaning,--there or here.... --------- * missing --------- to my very great astonishment, the book _cromwell_ proves popular here; and there is to be another edition very soon. edition with improvements--for some fifty or so of new (not _all_ insignificant) letters have turned up, and i must try to do something rational with them;--with which painful operation i am again busy. it will make the two volumes about _equal_ perhaps, --which will be one benefit! if any american possibility lie in this, i will take better care of it.--alas, i have not got one word with you yet! tell me of your lectures;--of all things. ever yours, t. carlyle we returned from hampshire exactly a week ago; never passed six so totally idle weeks in our lives.--better in health a little? perhaps. cvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, february, dear emerson,--one word to you before the packet sail;--on business of my own, once more; in such a state of _haste_ as could hardly be greater. the printers are upon me, and i have not a moment. contrary to all human expectation, this book on cromwell proves salable to mankind here, and a second edition is now going forward with all speed. the publication of the first has brought out from their recesses a _new_ heap of cromwell letters;--which have been a huge embarrassment to me; for they are highly unimportant for most part, and do not tend to alter or materially modify anything. some fifty or sixty new letters in all (many of them from printed books that had escaped me) the great majority, with others yet that may come in future time, i determine to print simply as an appendix; but several too, i think about twenty in all, are to be fitted into the text, chiefly in the early part of the first volume, as tending to bring some matters into greater clearness there. i am busy with that even now; sunk deep into the dust-abysses again!--of course i have made what provision i could for printing a supplement, &c. to the possessors of the first edition: but i find this second will be the _final_ standing edition of the book; decidedly preferable to the first; not to be touched by me _again,_ except on very good cause indeed. new letters, except they expressly contradict me, shall go at once into the back apartment, or appendix, in future. the printers have sent me some five or six sheets, they send me hitherto a sheet daily; but perhaps there are not above three or two in a perfect state: so i trouble you with none of them by this packet. but by next packet ( d of march), unless i hear to the contrary, i will send you all the sheets that are ready; and so by the following packets, till we are out of it;--that you, on the scene there, may do with them once for all whatsoever you like. if _nothing_ can be done with them, believe me i shall be very glad of that result. but if you can so much as oblige any honest bookseller of your or my acquaintance by the gift of them, let it be done; let pirates and ravenous bipeds of prey be excluded from participating: that of itself will be a comfortable and a proper thing!--you are hereby authorized to promulgate in any way you please, that the second edition will be augmented, corrected, as aforesaid; and that mr. (any son of adam you please to name) is, so far as i have any voice in the matter, appointed by me, to the exclusion of all and sundry others on what pretext soever, to print and vend the same to my american friends. and so it stands; and the sheets (probably near thirty in number) will be out with the march packet:-- and if nothing can come of it, i for one shall be very glad! the book is to be in three volumes now; the first ends at p. , vol. i.; the third begins at p. , vol. ii., of the present edition. what are you doing? write to me: how the lectures went, how all things went and go! we are over head and ears in anti-corn-law here; the aristocracy struck almost with a kind of horror at sight of that terrible millocracy, rising like a huge hideous frankenstein up in lancashire,--seemingly with boundless ready- money in its pocket, and a very fierce humor in its stomach! to me it is as yet almost uglier than the aristocracy; and i will not fire guns when this small victory is gained; i will recommend a day of fasting rather, that such a victory required such gaining. adieu, my friend. is it likely we shall meet in "oregon," think you? that would be a beautiful affair, on the part of the most enlightened nation! yours ever, t. carlyle cvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, march, dear emerson,--i must write you a word before this packet go, tho' my haste is very great. i received your two newspapers (price only twopence); by the same ship there came, and reached me some days later, a letter from mr. everett enclosing the _cromwell_ portions of the same printed-matter, clipt out by scissors; written, it appeared, by mr. everett's nephew; some of whose remarks, especially his wish that i might once be in new england, and see people "praying," amused me much! the cotton letter, &c., i have now got to the bottom of; birch's copy is in the museum here,--a better edition than i had. of "levered" and the other small american documents--alas, i get cartloads of the like or better tumbled down at my door, and my chief duty is to front them resolutely with a _shovel._ "ten thousand tons" is but a small estimate for the quantity of loose and indurated lumber i have had to send sounding, on each hand of me, down, down to the eternal deeps, never to trouble _me_ more! the jingle of it, as it did at last get under way, and go down, was almost my one consolation in those unutterable operations.--i am again over head and ears; but shall be out soon: never to return more. by this packet, according to volunteer contract, there goes out by the favor of your chapman a number of sheets, how many i do not exactly know, of the new edition: chapman first and chapman second (yours and mine) have undertaken to manage the affair for this month and for the following months;--many thanks to them both for taking it out of my hands. what you are to do with the article you already know. if no other customer present himself, can you signify to mr. hart of philadelphia that the sheets are much at his service,--his conduct on another occasion having given him right to such an acknowledgment from me? or at any rate, _you_ will want a new copy of this book; and can retain the sheets for that object.--enough of them. from mr. everett i learn that your boston lectures have been attended with renown enough: when are the lectures themselves to get to print? i read, last night, an essay on you, by a kind of "young scotland," as we might call it, in an edinburgh magazine; very fond of you, but shocked that you were antichristian:-- really not so bad. the stupidities of men go crossing one another; and miles down, at the bottom of all, there is a little veinlet of sense found running at last! if you see mr. everett, will you thank him for his kind remembrance of me, till i find leisure (as i have vainly hoped today to do) to thank him more in form. a dignified, compact kind of man; whom i remember with real pleasure. jargon abounds in our newspapers and parliament houses at present;--with which "the present editor," and indeed i think the public at large, takes little concern, beyond the regret of being _bored_ by it. the corn-laws are going very quietly the way of all deliriums; and then there will at least be one delirium less, and we shall start upon new ones. not a word more today, but my blessings and regards. god be with you and yours always. ever your affectionate, t. carlyle cviii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, dear emerson,--your two letters* have both come to hand, the last of them only three days ago. one word in answer before the packet sail; one very hasty word, rather than none. ----------- * missing. ---------- you have made the best of bargains for me; once again, with the freest contempt of trouble on my behalf; which i cannot sufficiently wonder at! apparently it is a fixed-idea of yours that the bibliopolic genus shall not cheat me; and you are decided to make it good. very well: let it be so, in as far as the fates will. certainly i will conform in all points to this wiley-and-putnam treaty, and faithfully observe the same. the london wileys have not yet sent me any tidings; but when they do, i will say your terms on the other side of the sea are the law to us, and it is a finished thing.--no sheets, i think, will go by this mid-month packet, the printer and bookseller were bidden not mind that: but by the packet of may d, i hope the second volume will go complete; and, if the printers make speed, almost the whole remainder may go by the june one. there is to be a "supplement to the first edition," containing all the new matter that is _separable:_ of this too the wileys shall have their due copy to reprint: it is what i could do to keep my faith with purchasers of the first edition here; but, on the whole, there will be no emulating of the second edition except by a reprint of the whole of it; changes great and small have had to introduce themselves everywhere, as these new letters were woven in.--i hope before may d i shall have ascertained whether it will not be the simplest way (as with my present light it clearly appears) to give the sheets direct to the wiley and putnam here, and let _them_ send them? in any case, the cargo shall come one way or other. furthermore,--yes, you shall have that sun-shadow, a daguerreotype likeness, as the sun shall please to paint it: there has often been talk of getting me to that establishment, but i never yet could go. if it be possible, we will have this also ready for the d of may. _provided_ you, as you promise, go and do likewise! a strange moment that, when i look upon your dead shadow again; instead of the living face, which remains unchanged within me, enveloped in beautiful clouds, and emerging now and then into strange clearness! has your head grown grayish? on me are "gray hairs here and there,"--and i do "know it." i have lived half a century in this world, fifty years complete on the th of december last: that is a solemn fact for me! few and evil have been the days of the years of thy servant,--few for any good that was ever done in them. _ay de mi!_ within late weeks i have got my horse again; go riding through the loud torrent of vehiculatory discords, till i get into the fields, into the green lanes; which is intrinsically a great medicine to me. most comfortless riding it is, with a horse of such _kangaroo_ disposition, till i do get to the sight of my old ever-young green-mantled mother again; but for an hour there, it is a real blessing to me. i have company sometimes, but generally prefer solitude, and a dialogue with the trees and clouds. alas, the speech of men, especially the witty-speech of men, is oftentimes afflictive to me: "in the wide earth," i say sometimes with a sigh, "there is none but emerson that responds to me with a voice wholly human!" all "literature" too is become i cannot tell you how contemptible to me. on the whole, one's blessedness is to do as oliver: work while the sun is up; work _well_ as if eternities depended on it; and then sleep,--if under the guano-mountains of human stupor, if handsomely _forgotten_ all at once, that latter is the handsome thing! i have often thought what w. shakespeare would say, were he to sit one night in a "shakespeare society," and listen to the empty twaddle and other long-eared melody about him there!--adieu, my friend. i fear i have forgotten many things: at all events, i have forgotten the inexorable flight of the minutes, which are numbered out to me at present. ever yours, t. carlyle i think i recognize the inspector of wild-beasts, in the little boston newspaper you send!* a small hatchet-faced, gray- eyed, good-humored inspector, who came with a translated lafontaine; and took his survey not without satisfaction? comfortable too how rapidly he fathomed the animal, having just poked him up a little. _ach gott!_ man is forever interesting to men;--and all men, even hatchet-faces, are globular and complete! --------- * this probably refers to a letter of mr. elizur wright's, describing a visit to carlyle. --------- cix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, dear emerson,--here is the _photograph_ going off for you by bookseller munroe of boston; the sheets of _cromwell,_ all the second and part of the last volume, are to go direct to new york: both parcels by the putnam conveyance. for putnam has been here since i wrote, making large confirmations of what you conveyed to me; and large proposals of an ulterior scope,--which will involve you in new trouble for me. but it is trouble you will not grudge, inasmuch as it promises to have some issue of moment; at all events the negotiation is laid entirely into your hands: therefore i must with all despatch explain to you the essentials of it, that you may know what wiley says when he writes to you from new york. mr. putnam, really a very intelligent, modest, and reputable- looking little fellow, got at last to sight of me about a week ago;--explained with much earnestness how the whole origin of the mistake about the first edition of _cromwell_ had lain with chapman, my own bookseller (which in fact i had already perceived to be the case); and farther set forth, what was much more important, that he and his partner were, and had been, ready and desirous to _make good_ said mistake, in the amplest, most satisfactory manner,--by the ready method of paying me _now_ ten percent on the selling-price of all the copies of _cromwell_ sent into the market by them; and had (as i knew already) covenanted with you to do so, in a clear, _bona-fide,_ and to you satisfactory manner, in regard to that first edition: in consequence of which you had made a bargain with them of like tenor in regard to the second. to all which i could only answer, that such conduct was that of men of honor, and would, in all manner of respects, be satisfactory to me. wherefore the new sheets of _cromwell_ should now go by _his_ package direct to new york, and the other little parcel for you he could send to munroe:--that as one consequence? "yes, surely," intimated he; but there were other consequences, of more moment, behind that. namely, that they wanted (the wiley & putnam house did) to publish certain other books of mine, the list of which i do not now recollect; under similar conditions: viz. that i was to certify, in a line or two prefixable to each book, that i had read it over in preparation for their printer, and did authorize them to print and sell it;--in return for which ten percent on the sale-price (and all manner of facilities, volunteered to convince even clark of boston, the lynx-eyed friend now busy for me looking through millstones, that all was straight, and said ten percent actually paid on every copy sold); this was putnam's offer, stated with all transparency, and in a way not to be misunderstood by either of us. to which i answered that the terms seemed clear and square and every way good, and such as i could comply with heartily,--so far as i was at liberty, but not farther. not farther: for example, there was hart of philadelphia (i think the wileys do not want the _miscellanies_), there were munroe, little and brown, &c.;-- in short, there was r.w. emerson, who knew in all ways how far i was free and not free, and who would take care of my integrity and interest at once, and do what was just and prudent; and to _him_ i would refer the whole question, and whatever he engaged for, that and no other than that i would do. so that you see how it is, and what a coil you have again got into! mr. putnam would have had some "letter," some "exchange of letters," to the effect above-stated: but i answered, "it was better we did not write at all till the matter was clear and liquid with you, and then we could very swiftly write,--and act. i would apprise you how the matter stood, and expect your answer, and bid you covenant with mr. wiley what you found good, prompt i to fulfil whatever _you_ undertook for me."--this _is_ a true picture of the affair, the very truest i can write in haste; and so i leave it with you-- _ach gott!_ if your photograph succeed as well as mine, i shall be almost _tragically_ glad of it. this of me is far beyond all pictures; really very like: i got laurence the painter to go with me, and he would not let the people off till they had actually made a likeness. my wife has got another, which she asserts to be much "more amiable-looking," and even liker!* o my friend, it is a strange phantasmagory of a fact, this huge, tremendous world of ours, life of ours! do you bethink you of craigenputtock, and the still evening there? i could burst into tears, if i had that habit: but it is of no use. the cromwell business will be ended about the end of may,--i do hope! you say not a word of your own affairs: i have vaguely been taught to look for some book shortly;--what of it? we are well, or tolerably well, and the summer is come: adieu. blessings on you and yours. --t.c. ---------- * the engraved portrait in the first volume of this correspondence is from a photograph taken from this daguerrotype. ---------- cx. emerson to carlyle concord, may, dear friend,--i daily expect the picture, and wonder--so long as i have wished it--i had never asked it before. i was in boston the other day, and went to the best reputed daguerreotypist, but though i brought home three transcripts of my face, the house- mates voted them rueful, supremely ridiculous. i must sit again; or, as true elizabeth hoar said, i must not sit again, not being of the right complexion which daguerre and iodine delight in. i am minded to try once more, and if the sun will not take me, i must sit to a good crayon sketcher, mr. cheney, and send you his draught.... good rides to you and the longest escapes from london streets. i too have a new plaything, the best i ever had,--a wood-lot. last fall i bought a piece of more than forty acres, on the border of a little lake half a mile wide and more, called walden pond,--a place to which my feet have for years been accustomed to bring me once or twice a week at all seasons. my lot to be sure is on the further side of the water, not so familiar to me as the nearer shore. some of the wood is an old growth, but most of it has been cut off within twenty years and is growing thriftily. in these may days, when maples, poplars, oaks, birches, walnut, and pine are in their spring glory, i go thither every afternoon, and cut with my hatchet an indian path through the thicket all along the bold shore, and open the finest pictures. my two little girls know the road now, though it is nearly two miles from my house, and find their way to the spring at the foot of a pine grove, and with some awe to the ruins of a village of shanties, all overgrown with mullein, which the irish who built the railroad left behind them. at a good distance in from the shore the land rises to a rocky head, perhaps sixty feet above the water. thereon i think to place a hut; perhaps it will have two stories and be a petty tower, looking out to monadnoc and other new hampshire mountains. there i hope to go with book and pen when good hours come. i shall think there, a fortnight might bring you from london to walden pond.--life wears on, and do you say the gray hairs appear? few can so well afford them. the black have not hung over a vacant brain, as england and america know; nor, white or black, will it give itself any sabbath for many a day henceforward, as i believe. what have we to do with old age? our existence looks to me more than ever initial. we have come to see the ground and look up materials and tools. the men who have any positive quality are a flying advance party for reconnoitring. we shall yet have a right work, and kings for competitors. with ever affectionate remembrance to your wife, your friend, --r.w. emerson cxi. emerson to carlyle concord, may, my dear friend,--it is late at night and i have postponed writing not knowing but that my parcel would be ready to go,--and now a public meeting and the speech of a rarely honest and eloquent man have left me but a span of time for the morning's messenger. the photograph came safely, to my thorough content. i have what i have wished. this head is to me out of comparison more satisfying than any picture. i confirm my recollections and i make new observations; it is life to life. thanks to the sun. this artist remembers what every other forgets to report, and what i wish to know, the true sculpture of the features, the angles, the special organism, the rooting of the hair, the form and the placing of the head. i am accustomed to expect of the english a securing of the essentials in their work, and the sun does that, and you have done it in this portrait, which gives me much to think and feel.* i was instantly stirred to an emulation of your love and punctuality, and, last monday, which was my forty-third birthday, i went to a new daguerreotypist, who took much pains to make his picture right. i brought home three shadows not agreeable to my own eyes. the machine has a bad effect on me. my wife protests against the imprints as slanderous. my friends say they look ten years older, and, as i think, with the air of a decayed gentleman touched with his first paralysis. however i got yesterday a trusty vote or two for sending one of them to you, on the ground that i am not likely to get a better. but it now seems probable that it will not get cased and into the hands of harnden in time for the steamer tomorrow. it will then go by that of the th. --------- * from emerson's diary, may , :--"in carlyle's head (photograph), which came last night, how much appears! how unattainable this truth to any painter! here have i the inevitable traits which the sun forgets not to copy, and which i thirst to see, but which no painter remembers to give me. here have i the exact sculpture, the form of the head, the rooting of the hair, thickness of the lips, the man that god made. and all the laurences and d'orsays now serve me well as illustration. i have the form and organism, and can better spare the expression and color. what would i not give for a head of shakespeare by the same artist? of plato? of demosthenes? here i have the jutting brow, and the excellent shape of the head. and here the organism of the eye full of england, the valid eye, in which i see the strong executive talent which has made his thought available to the nations, whilst others as intellectual as he are pale and powerless. the photograph comes dated april, , and he writes, 'i am fifty years old."' --------- i am heartily glad that you are in direct communication with these really energetic booksellers, wiley and putnam. i understood from wiley's letter to me, weeks ago, that their ambition was not less than to have a monopoly of your books. i answered, it is very desirable for us too; saving always the rights of mr. hart in philadelphia.--i told him you had no interest in munroe's _sartor,_ which from the first was his own adventure, and little and brown had never reprinted _past and present_ or _chartism._ the _french revolution, past and present, chartism,_ and the _sartor,_ i see no reason why they should not have. munroe and l. & b. have no real claims, and i will speak to them. but there is one good particular in putnam's proffer to you, which wiley has not established in his (first and last) agreement with me, namely, that you shall have an interest in what is already sold of their first edition of _cromwell._ by all means close with putnam of the good mind, exempting only hart's interest. i have no recent correspondence with wiley and putnam. and i greatly prefer that they should deal directly with you. yet it were best to leave an american reference open for audit and umpirage to the stanch e.p. clark of the new england bank. ever yours, r.w. emerson cxii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, june, dear emerson,--i have had two letters of yours, the last of them ( st may) only two days, and have seen a third written to wiley of new york. yesterday putnam was here, and we made our bargain,--and are to have it signed this day at his shop: two copies, one of which i mean to insert along with this, and give up to your or e.p. clark's keeping. for, as you will see, i have appointed clark my representative, economic plenipotentiary and factotum, if he will consent to act in that sublime capacity,-- subject always to your advice, to your control in all _ultra_- economic respects, of which you alone are cognizant of the circumstances or competent to give a judgment. pray explain this with all lucidity to mr. clark: and endeavor to impress upon him that it is (to all appearance) a real affair of business we are now engaged in; that i would have him satisfy his own sharp eyes (by such methods as he finds convenient and sufficient, by examination at new york or how he can) that the conditions of this bargain _are_ fairly complied with by the new york booksellers,--who promise "every facility for ascertaining _how many_ copies are printed," &c., &c.; and profess to be of the integrity of israelites indeed, in all respects whatever! if so, it may be really useful to us. and i would have mr. clark, if he will allow me to look upon him as my _man of business_ in this affair, take reasonable pains, be at any reasonable expense, &c. (by himself or by deputy) to ascertain that it is so in very fact! in that case, if something come of it, we shall get the something and be thankful; if nothing come of it, we shall have the pleasure of caring nothing about it.--i have given putnam two books (_heroes_ and _sartor_) ready, corrected; the others i think will follow in the course of next month;--f. _revolution_ waits only for an index which my man is now busy with. the _cromwell,_ supplement and all, he has now got,--published two days ago, after sorrowful delays. your copy will be ready _this afternoon,_--too late, i fear, by just one day: it will lie, in that case, for a fortnight, and then come. wiley will find that he has no resource but to reprint the book; he will reprint the supplement too, in justice to former purchasers; but this is the _final_ form of the book, this second edition; and to this all readers of it will come at last. we expect the daguerreotype by next steamer; but you take good care not to prepossess us on its behalf! in fact, i believe, the only satisfactory course will be to get a sketch done too; if you have any painter that can manage it tolerably, pray set about that, as the true solution of the business--out of the two together we shall make a likeness for ourselves that will do. let the lady wife be satisfied with it; then we shall pronounce it genuine!-- i envy you your forest-work, your summer umbrages, and clear silent lakes. the weather here is getting insupportable to us for heat. indeed, if rain do not come within two weeks, i believe we must wind up our affairs, and make for some shady place direct:--scotland is perhaps likeliest; but nothing yet is fixed: you shall duly hear.--directly after this, i set off for putnam's in waterloo place; sign his paper there; stick one copy under a cover for you, and despatch.--send me word about all that you are doing and thinking. be busy, be still and happy. yours ever, t. carlyle cxiii. emerson to carlyle concord, july, my dear carlyle,--i received by the last steamer your letter with the copy of the covenant with wiley and putnam, which seems unexceptionable. i like the english side of those men very well; that is, putnam seems eager to stand well and rightly with his fellow-men. wiley at new york it was who provoked me, last winter, to write him an angry letter when he declared his intention to reprint our new matter without paying for it. when he thought better of it, and came to terms, i had not got so far as to be affectionate, and have never yet resumed the correspondence i had with him a year ago, about my own books. i hope you found my letter to them, though i do not remember which, properly cross. i believe i only enumerated difficulties. i have talked with little and brown about their editions of _chartism,_ and _past and present;_ they have made no new sales of the books since they were printed on by the pirates, and say that the books lie still on their shelves, as also do a few copies of the london and boston edition of _french revolution._ i prayed them immediately to dispose of these things by auction, or at their trade sales, at whatever prices would sell them, and leave the market open for w. & p.; which they promise to do. to munroe i went, and learn that he has bought the stereotype- plates of the new york pirate edition of _sartor,_ and means to print it immediately. he is willing to stop if w. & p. will buy of him his plates at their cost. i wrote so to them, but they say no. and i have not spoken again with munroe. i was in town yesterday, and carried the copy of the covenant to e.p. clark, and read him your message. his bank occupies him entirely just now, for his president is gone to europe, and clark's duties are the more onerous. but finding that the new responsibilities delegated to him are light and tolerable, and, at any rate, involve no retrospection, he very cheerfully signified his readiness to serve you, and i graciously forbore all allusions to my heap of booksellers' accounts which he has had in keeping now --for years, i believe. he told me that he hopes at no distant day to have a house of his own,--he and his wife are always at board,--and, whenever that happens, he intends to devote a chamber in it to his "illustrations of mr. carlyle's writings," which, i believe, i have told you before, are a very large and extraordinary collection of prints, pictures, books, and manuscripts. i sent you the promised daguerrotype with all unwillingness, by the steamer, i think of june. on august, margaret fuller goes to england and the continent; and i shall not fail to write to you by her, and you must not fail to give a good and faithful interview to this wise, sincere, accomplished, and most entertaining of women. i wish to bespeak jane carlyle's friendliest ear to one of the noblest of women. we shall send you no other such. i was lately inquired of again by an agent of a huge boston society of young men, whether mr. carlyle would not come to america and read lectures, on some terms which they could propose. i advised them to make him an offer, and a better one than they had in view. joy and peace to you in your new freedom. --r.w.e. cxiv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, july, dear emerson,--since i wrote last to you, i think, with the wiley-and-putnam covenant enclosed,--the photograph, after some days of loitering at the liverpool custom-house, came safe to hand. many thanks to you for this punctuality: this poor shadow, it is all you could do at present in that matter! but it must not rest there, no. this image is altogether unsatisfactory, illusive, and even in some measure tragical to me! first of all, it is a bad photograph; no _eyes_ discernible, at least one of the eyes not, except in rare favorable lights then, alas, time itself and oblivion must have been busy. i could not at first, nor can i yet with perfect decisiveness, bring out any feature completely recalling to me the old emerson, that lighted on us from the blue, at craigenputtock, long ago,--_eheu!_ here is a genial, smiling, energetic face, full of sunny strength, intelligence, integrity, good humor; but it lies imprisoned in baleful shades, as of the valley of death; seems smiling on me as if in mockery. "dost know me, friend? i am dead, thou seest, and distant, and forever hidden from thee;--i belong already to the eternities, and thou recognizest me not!" on the whole, it is the strangest feeling i have:--and practically the thing will be, that you get us by the earliest opportunity some _living_ pictorial sketch, chalk- drawing or the like, from a trustworthy hand; and send _it_ hither to represent you. out of the two i shall compile for myself a likeness by degrees: but as for this present, we cannot put up with it at all; to my wife and me, and to sundry other parties far and near that have interest in it, there is no satisfaction in this. so there will be nothing for you but compliance, by the first fair chance you have: furthermore, i bargain that the _lady_ emerson have, within reasonable limits, a royal veto in the business (not absolute, if that threaten extinction to the enterprise, but absolute within the limits of possibility); and that she take our case in hand, and graciously consider what can and shall be done. that will answer, i think. of late weeks i have been either idle, or sunk in the sorrowfulest cobbling of old shoes again; sorrowfully reading over old books for the putnams and chapmans, namely. it is really painful, looking in one's own old face; said "old face" no longer a thing extant now!--happily i have at last finished it; the whole lumber-troop with clothes duly brushed (_french revolution_ has even got an index too) travels to new york in the steamer that brings you this. _quod faustum sit:_--or indeed i do not much care whether it be faustum or not; i grow to care about an astonishingly small number of things as times turn with me! man, all men seem radically _dumb;_ jabbering mere jargons and noises from the teeth outwards; the inner meaning of them,-- of them and of me, poor devils,--remaining shut, buried forever. if almost all books were burnt (my own laid next the coal), i sometimes in my spleen feel as if it really would be better with us! certainly could one generation of men be forced to live without rhetoric, babblement, hearsay, in short with the tongue well cut out of them altogether,--their fortunate successors would find a most improved world to start upon! for cant does lie piled on us, high as the zenith; an augean stable with the poisonous confusion piled so high: which, simply if there once could be nothing said, would mostly dwindle like summer snow gradually about its business, and leave us free to use our eyes again! when i see painful professors of greek, poring in their sumptuous oxfords over dead _greek_ for a thousand years or more, and leaving live _english_ all the while to develop itself under charge of pickwicks and sam wellers, as if it were nothing and the other were all things: this, and the like of it everywhere, fills me with reflections! good heavens, will the people not come out of their wretched old-clothes monmouth-streets, hebrew and other; but lie there dying of the basest pestilence,--dying and as good as dead! on the whole, i am very weary of most "literature":--and indeed, in very sorrowful, abstruse humor otherwise at present. for remedy to which i am, in these very hours, preparing for a sally into the green country and deep silence; i know not altogether how or whitherward as yet; only that i must tend towards lancashire; towards scotland at last. my wife already waits me in lancashire; went off, in rather poor case, much burnt by the hot town, some ten days ago; and does not yet report much improvement. i will write to you somewhere in my wanderings. the address, "scotsbrig, ecclefechan, n.b.," if you chance to write directly or soon after this arrives, will, likely, be the shortest: at any rate, that, or "cheyne row" either, is always sure enough to find me in a day or two after trying. by a kind of accident i have fallen considerably into american history in these days; and am even looking out for american geography to help me. jared sparks, marshall, &c. are hickory and buckskin; but i do catch a credible trait of human life from them here and there; michelet's genial champagne _froth,_--alas, i could find no fact in it that would stand handling; and so have broken down in the middle of _la france,_ and run over to hickory and jared for shelter! do you know beriah green?* a body of albany newspapers represent to me the people quarreling in my name, in a very vague manner, as to the propriety of being "governed," and beriah's is the only rational voice among them. farewell, dear friend. speedy news of you! --t. carlyle --------- * the reverend beriah green, president for some years of oneida institute, a manual-labor school at whitesboro, n.y. he was an active reformer, and a leading member of the national convention which met in philadelphia, december th, , to form the american antislavery society. he died in , seventy-nine years old. --------- cxv. emerson to carlyle concord, july, my dear friend,--the new edition of _cromwell_ in its perfect form and in excellent dress, and the copy of the appendix, came munificently safe by the last steamer. when thought is best, then is there most,--is a faith of which you alone among writing men at this day will give me experience. if it is the right frankincense and sandal-wood, it is so good and heavenly to give me a basketful and not a pinch. i read proudly, a little at a time, and have not yet got through the new matter. but i think neither the new letters nor the commentary could be spared. wiley and putnam shall do what they can, and we will see if new england will not come to reckon this the best chapter in her pentateuch. i send this letter by margaret fuller, of whose approach i believe i wrote you some word. there is no foretelling how you visited and crowded english will like our few educated men or women, and in your learned populace my luminaries may easily be overlooked. but of all the travelers whom you have so kindly received from me, i think of none, since alcott went to england, whom i so much desired that you should see and like, as this dear old friend of mine. for two years now i have scarcely seen her, as she has been at new york, engaged by horace greeley as a literary editor of his _tribune_ newspaper. this employment was made acceptable to her by good pay, great local and personal conveniences of all kinds, and unbounded confidence and respect from greeley himself, and all other parties connected with this influential journal (of , subscribers, i believe). and margaret fuller's work as critic of all new books, critic of the drama, of music, and good arts in new york, has been honorable to her. still this employment is not satisfactory to me. she is full of all nobleness, and with the generosity native to her mind and character appears to me an exotic in new england, a foreigner from some more sultry and expansive climate. she is, i suppose, the earliest reader and lover of goethe in this country, and nobody here knows him so well. her love too of whatever is good in french, and specially in italian genius, give her the best title to travel. in short, she is our citizen of the world by quite special diploma. and i am heartily glad that she has an opportunity of going abroad that pleases her. mr. spring, a merchant of great moral merits, (and, as i am informed, an assiduous reader of your books,) has grown rich, and resolves to see the world with his wife and son, and has wisely invited miss fuller to show it to him. now, in the first place, i wish you to see margaret when you are in special good humor, and have an hour of boundless leisure. and i entreat jane carlyle to abet and exalt and secure this satisfaction to me. i need not, and yet perhaps i need say, that m.f. is the safest of all possible persons who ever took pen in hand. prince metternich's closet not closer or half so honorable. in the next place, i should be glad if you can easily manage to show her the faces of tennyson and of browning. she has a sort of right to them both, not only because she likes their poetry, but because she has made their merits widely known among our young people. and be it known to my friend jane carlyle, whom, if i cannot see, i delight to name, that her visitor is an immense favorite in the parlor, as well as in the library, in all good houses where she is known. and so i commend her to you. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson cxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, december, dear emerson,--this is the th of the month, and it is a frightful length of time, i know not how long, since i wrote to you,--sinner that i am! truly we are in no case for paying debts at present, being all sick more or less, from the hard cold weather, and in a state of great temporary puddle but, as the adage says, "one should own debt, and crave days";--therefore accept a word from me, such as it may be. i went, as usual, to the north country in the autumn; passed some two extremely disconsolate months,--for all things distress a wretched thin-skinned creature like me,--in that old region, which is at once an earth and a hades to me, an unutterable place, now that i have become mostly a _ghost_ there! i saw ireland too on my return, saw black potato-fields, a ragged noisy population, that has long in a headlong baleful manner followed the _devil's_ leading, listened namely to blustering shallow- violent impostors and children of darkness, saying, "yes, we know _you,_ you are children of light!"--and so has fallen all out at elbows in body and in soul; and now having lost its _potatoes_ is come as it were to a crisis; all its windy nonsense cracking suddenly to pieces under its feet: a very pregnant crisis indeed! a country cast suddenly into the melting-pot,--say into the medea's-caldron; to be boiled into horrid _dissolution;_ whether into new _youth,_ into sound healthy life, or into eternal death and annihilation, one does not yet know! daniel o'connell stood bodily before me, in his green mullaghmart cap; haranguing his retinue of dupables: certainly the most _sordid_ humbug i have ever seen in this world; the emblem to me, he and his talk and the worship and credence it found, of all the miseries that can befall a nation. i also conversed with young ireland in a confidential manner; for young ireland, really meaning what it says, is worth a little talk: the heroism and patriotism of a new generation; welling fresh and new from the breasts of nature; and already poisoned by o'connellism and the _old_ irish atmosphere of bluster, falsity, fatuity, into one knows not what. very sad to see. on the whole, no man ought, for any cause, to speak lies, or have anything to do with _lies;_ but either hold his tongue, or speak a bit of the truth: that is the meaning of a _tongue,_ people used to know!--ireland was not the place to console my sorrows. i returned home very sad out of ireland;--and indeed have remained one of the saddest, idlest, most useless of adam's sons ever since; and do still remain so. i care not to _write_ anything more,--so it seems to me at present. i am in my vacant interlunar cave (i suppose that is the truth);--and i ought to wrap my mantle round me, and lie, if dark, _silent_ also. but, alas, i have wasted almost all your poor sheet first!-- miss fuller came duly as you announced; was welcomed for your sake and her own. a high-soaring, clear, enthusiast soul; in whose speech there is much of all that one wants to find in speech. a sharp, subtle intellect too; and less of that shoreless asiatic dreaminess than i have sometimes met with in her writings. we liked one another very well, i think, and the springs too were favorites. but, on the whole, it could not be concealed, least of all from the sharp female intellect, that this carlyle was a dreadfully heterodox, not to say a dreadfully savage fellow, at heart; believing no syllable of all that gospel of fraternity, benevolence, and _new_ heaven-on-earth, preached forth by all manner of "advanced" creatures, from george sand to elihu burritt, in these days; that in fact the said carlyle not only disbelieved all that, but treated it as poisonous cant,--_sweetness_ of sugar-of-lead,--a detestable _phosphorescence_ from the dead body of a christianity, that would not admit itself to be dead, and lie buried with all its unspeakable putrescences, as a venerable dead one ought!--surely detestable enough.--to all which margaret listened with much good nature; though of course with sad reflections not a few.*--she is coming back to us, she promises. her dialect is very vernacular,--extremely exotic in the london climate. if she do not gravitate too irresistibly towards that class of new-era people (which includes whatsoever we have of prurient, esurient, morbid, flimsy, and in fact pitiable and unprofitable, and is at a sad discount among men of sense), she may get into good tracks of inquiry and connection here, and be very useful to herself and others. i could not show her alfred (he has been here since) nor landor: but surely if i can i will,--that or a hundred times as much as that,--when she returns.--they tell me you are about collecting your poems. well, though i do not approve of rhyme at all, yet it is impossible emerson in rhyme or prose can put down any thought that was in his heart but i should wish to get into mine. so let me have the book as fast as may be. and do others like it if you will take circumbendibuses for sound's sake! and excuse the critic who seems to you so unmusical; and say, it is the nature of beast! adieu, dear friend: write to me, write to me. yours ever, t. carlyle -------- * miss fullers impressions of carlyle, much to this effect, may be found in the "memoirs of margaret fuller ossoli," boston, , vol. ii. pp. - . --------- cxvii. emerson to carlyle concord, january, my dear carlyle,--your letter came with a blessing last week. i had already learned from margaret fuller, at paris, that you had been very good and gentle to her;--brilliant and prevailing, of course, but, i inferred, had actually restrained the volleys and modulated the thunder, out of true courtesy and goodness of nature, which was worthy of all praise in a spoiled conqueror at this time of day. especially, too, she expressed a true recognition and love of jane carlyle; and thus her visit proved a solid satisfaction; to me, also, who think that few people have so well earned their pleasures as she. she wrote me a long letter; she has been very happy in england, and her time and strength fully employed. her description of you and your discourse (which i read with lively curiosity also) was the best i have had on that subject. i tried hard to write you by the december steamer, to tell you how forward was my book of poems; but a little affair makes me much writing. i chanced to have three or four items of business to despatch, when the steamer was ready to go, and you escaped hearing of them. i am the trustee of charles lane, who came out here with alcott and bought land, which, though sold, is not paid for. somebody or somebodies in liverpool and manchester* have proposed once or twice, with more or less specification, that i should come to those cities to lecture. and who knows but i may come one day? steam is strong, and liverpool is near. i should find my account in the strong inducement of a new audience to finish pieces which have lain waiting with little hope for months or years. ---------- * mr. alexander ireland, who had made the acquaintance of emerson at edinburgh, in , was his manchester correspondent. his memorial volume on emerson contains an interesting record of their relations. ---------- ah then, if i dared, i should be well content to add some golden hours to my life in seeing you, now all full-grown and acknowledged amidst your own people,--to hear and to speak is so little yet so much. but life is dangerous and delicate. i should like to see your solid england. the map of britain is good reading for me. then i have a very ignorant love of pictures, and a curiosity about the greek statues and stumps in the british museum. so beware of me, for on that distant day when i get ready i shall come. long before this time you ought to have received from john chapman a copy of emerson's poems, so called, which he was directed to send you. poor man, you need not open them. i know all you can say. i printed them, not because i was deceived into a belief that they were poems, but because of the softness or hardness of heart of many friends here who have made it a point to have them circulated.* once having set out to print, i obeyed the solicitations of john chapman, of an ill-omened street in london, to send him the book in manuscript, for the better securing of copyright. in printing them here i have corrected the most unpardonable negligences, which negligences must be all stereotyped under his fair london covers and gilt paper to the eyes of any curious london reader; from which recollection i strive to turn away. --------- * in the rough draft the following sentence comes in here "i reckon myself a good beginning of a poet, very urgent and decided in my bent, and in some coming millennium i shall yet sing." --------- little and brown have just rendered me an account, by which it appears that we are not quite so well off as was thought last summer, when they said they had sold at auction the balance of your books which had been lying unsold. it seems now that the books supposed to be sold were not all taken, and are returned to them; one hundred _chartism,_ sixty-three _past and present._ yet we are to have some eighty-three dollars ($ . ), which you shall probably have by the next steamer. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson cxviii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, march, dear emerson,--the steamer goes tomorrow; i must, though in a very dim condition, have a little word for you conveyed by it. in the miscellaneous maw of that strange steamer shall lie, among other things, a friendly _word!_ your very kind letter lay waiting me here, some ten days ago; doubly welcome, after so long a silence. we had been in hampshire, with the barings, where we were last year;--some four weeks or more; totally idle: our winter had been, and indeed still is, unusually severe; my wife's health in consequence was sadly deranged; but this idleness, these isle-of-wight sea- breezes, have brought matters well round again; so we cannot grudge the visit or the idleness, which otherwise too might have its uses. alas, at this time my normal state is to be altogether _idle,_ to look out upon a very lonely universe, full of grim sorrow, full of splendor too; and not to know at all, for the moment, on what side i am to attack it again!--i read your book of poems all faithfully, at bay house (our hampshire quarters); where the obstinate people,--with whom you are otherwise, in prose, a first favorite,--foolishly _refused_ to let me read aloud; foolishly, for i would have made it mostly all plain by commentary:--so i had to read for myself; and can say, in spite of my hard-heartedness, i did gain, though under impediments, a real satisfaction and some tone of the eternal melodies sounding, afar off, ever and anon, in my ear! this is fact; a truth in natural history; from which you are welcome to draw inferences. a grand view of the universe, everywhere the sound (unhappily _far of,_ as it were) of a valiant, genuine human soul: this, even under rhyme, is a satisfaction worth some struggling for. but indeed you are very perverse; and through this perplexed undiaphanous element, you do not fall on me like radiant summer rainbows, like floods of sunlight, but with thin piercing radiances which affect me like the light of the _stars._ it is so: i wish you would become _concrete,_ and write in prose the straightest way; but under any form i must put up with you; that is my lot.--chapman's edition, as you probably know, is very beautiful. i believe there are enough of ardent silent seekers in england to buy up this edition from him, and resolutely study the same: as for the review multitude, they dare not exactly call it "unintelligible moonshine," and so will probably hold their tongue. it is my fixed opinion that we are all at sea as to what is called poetry, art, &c., in these times; laboring under a dreadful incubus of _tradition,_ and mere "cant heaped balefully on us up to the very zenith," as men, in nearly all other provinces of their life, except perhaps the railway province, do now labor and stagger;--in a word, that goethe-and- schiller's _"kunst"_ has far more brotherhood with pusey-and- newman's _shovelhattery,_ and other the like deplorable phenomena, than it is in the least aware of! i beg you take warning: i am more serious in this than you suppose. but no, you will not; you whistle lightly over my prophecies, and go your own stiff-necked road. unfortunate man!-- i had read in the newspapers, and even heard in speech from manchester people, that you were certainly coming this very summer to lecture among us: but now it seems, in your letter, all postponed into the vague again. i do not personally know your manchester negotiators, but i know in general that they are men of respectability, insight, and activity; much connected with the lecturing department, which is a very growing one, especially in lancashire, at present;--men likely, for the rest, to _fulfil_ whatsoever they may become engaged for to you. my own ignorant though confident guess, moreover, is, that you would, in all senses of the word, _succeed_ there; i think, also rather confidently, we could promise you an audience of british aristocracy in london here,--and of british commonalty all manner of audiences that you liked to stoop to. i heard an ignorant blockhead (or mainly so) called --- bow-wowing here, some months ago, to an audience of several thousands, in the city, one evening,--upon universal peace, or some other field of balderdash; which the poor people seemed very patient of. in a word, i do not see what is to hinder you to come whenever you can resolve upon it. the adventure is perfectly promising: an adventure familiar to you withal; for lecturing is with us fundamentally just what it is with you: much prurient curiosity, with some ingenuous love of wisdom, an element of real reverence for the same: everywhere a perfect openness to any man speaking in any measure things manful. come, therefore; gird yourself together, and come. with little or no peradventure, you will realize what your modest hope is, and more;--and i, for my share of it, shall see you once again under this sun! o heavens, there _might_ be some good in that! nay, if you will travel like a private quiet person, who knows but i, the most unlocomotive of mortals, might be able to escort you up and down a little; to look at many a thing along with you, and even to open my long- closed heart and speak about the same?--there is a spare-room always in this house for you,--in this heart, in these two hearts, the like: bid me hope in this enterprise, in all manner of ways where i can; and on the whole, get it rightly put together, and embark on it, and arrive! the good miss fuller has painted us all _en beau,_ and your smiling imagination has added new colors. we have not a triumphant life here; very far indeed from that, _ach gott!_--as you shall see. but margaret is an excellent soul: in real regard with both of us here. since she went, i have been reading some of her papers in a new book we have got: greatly superior to all i knew before; in fact the undeniable utterances (now first undeniable to me) of a true heroic mind;--altogether unique, so far as i know, among the writing women of this generation; rare enough too, god knows, among the writing men. she is very narrow, sometimes; but she is truly high: honor to margaret, and more and more good-speed to her.--adieu dear emerson. i am ever yours, --t.c. cxix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, march, dear emerson,--yesterday morning, setting out to breakfast with richard milnes (milnes's breakfast is a thing you will yet have to experience) i met, by the sunny shore of the thames, a benevolent son of adam in blue coat and red collar, who thrust into my hand a letter from you. a truly miraculous son of adam in red collar, in the sunny spring morning!--the bill of seventeen pounds is already far on its way to dumfries, there to be kneaded into gold by the due artists: today is american post- day; and already in huge hurry about many things, i am scribbling you some word of answer.... the night _before_ milnes's morning, i had furthermore seen your manchester correspondent, ireland,--an old edinborough acquaintance too, as i found. a solid, dark, broad, rather heavy man; full of energy, and broad sagacity and practicality;--infinitely well affected to the man emerson too. it was our clear opinion that you might come at any time with ample assurance of "succeeding," so far as wages went, and otherwise; that you ought to come, and must, and would,--as he, ireland, would farther write to you. there is only one thing i have to add of my own, and beg you to bear in mind,--a date merely. _videlicet,_ that the time for lecturing to the london west-end, i was given everywhere to understand, is _from the latter end of april_ (or say april altogether) _to the end of may:_ this is a fixed statistic fact, all men told me: of this you are in all arrangements to keep mind. for it will actually do your heart good to look into the faces, and speak into minds, of really aristocratic persons,-- being one yourself, you sinner,--and perhaps indeed this will be the greatest of all the _novelties_ that await you in your voyage. not to be seen, i believe, at least never seen by me in any perfection, except in london only. from april to the end of may; during those weeks you must be _here,_ and free: remember that date. will you come in winter then, next winter,--or when? ireland professed to know you by the photograph too; which i never yet can.--i wrote by last packet: enough here. your friend cunningham has not presented himself; shall be right welcome when he does,--as all that in the least belong to you may well hope to be. adieu. our love to you all. ever yours, t. carlyle cxx. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear carlyle,--i have two good letters from you, and until now you have had no acknowledgment. especially i ought to have told you how much pleasure your noble invitation in march gave me. this pleasing dream of going to england dances before me sometimes. it would be, i then fancy, that stimulation which my capricious, languid, and languescent study needs. at home, no man makes any proper demand on me, and the audience i address is a handful of men and women too widely scattered than that they can dictate to me that which they are justly entitled to say. whether supercilious or respectful, they do not say anything that can be heard. of course, i have only myself to please, and my work is slighted as soon as it has lost its first attraction. it is to be hoped, if one should cross the sea, that the terror of your english culture would scare the most desultory of yankees into precision and fidelity; and perhaps i am not yet too old to be animated by what would have seemed to my youth a proud privilege. if you shall fright me into labor and concentration, i shall win my game; for i can well afford to pay any price to get my work well done. for the rest, i hesitate, of course, to rush rudely on persons that have been so long invisible angels to me. no reasonable man but must hold these bounds in awe:--i-- much more,--who am of a solitary habit, from my childhood until now.--i hear nothing again from mr. ireland. so i will let the english voyage hang as an afternoon rainbow in the east, and mind my apples and pears for the present. you are to know that in these days i lay out a patch of orchard near my house, very much to the improvement, as all the household affirm, of our homestead. though i have little skill in these things, and must borrow that of my neighbors, yet the works of the garden and orchard at this season are fascinating, and will eat up days and weeks, and a brave scholar should shun it like gambling, and take refuge in cities and hotels from these pernicious enchantments. for the present, i stay in the new orchard. duyckinck, a literary man in new york, who advises wiley and putnam in their publishing enterprises, wrote me lately, that they had $ for you, from _cromwell._ so may it be. yours, r.w.e. cxxi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, may, dear emerson,--....my time is nearly up today; but i write a word to acknowledge your last letter ( april), and various other things. for example, you must tell mr. thoreau (is that the exact name? for i have lent away the printed pages) that his philadelphia magazine with the _lecture_* in two pieces was faithfully delivered here, about a fortnight ago; and carefully read, as beseemed, with due entertainment and recognition. a vigorous mr. thoreau,--who has formed himself a good deal upon one emerson, but does not want abundant fire and stamina of his own;--recognizes us, and various other things, in a most admiring great-hearted manner; for which, as for _part_ of the confused voice from the jury bog (not yet summed into a verdict, nor likely to be summed till doomsday, nor needful to sum), the poor prisoner at the bar may justly express himself thankful! in plain prose, i like mr. thoreau very well; and hope yet to hear good and better news of him:--only let him not "turn to foolishness"; which seems to me to be terribly easy, at present, both in new england and old! may the lord deliver us all from _cant;_ may the lord, whatever else he do or forbear, teach us to look facts honestly in the face, and to beware (with a kind of shudder) of smearing _them_ over with our despicable and damnable palaver, into irrecognizability, and so _falsifying_ the lord's own gospels to his unhappy blockheads of children, all staggering down to gehenna and the everlasting swine's-trough for _want_ of gospels.--o heaven, it is the most accursed sin of man; and done everywhere, at present, on the streets and high places, at noonday! very seriously i say, and pray as my chief orison, may the lord deliver us from it.-- ---------- * on carlyle, published in _graham's magazine_ in march and april, . ---------- about a week ago there came your neighbor hoar; a solid, sensible, effectual-looking man, of whom i hope to see much more. so soon as possible i got him under way for oxford, where i suppose he was, last week;--_both_ universities was too much for the limits of his time; so he preferred oxford;--and now, this very day, i think, he was to set out for the continent; not to return till the beginning of july, when he promises to call here again. there was something really pleasant to me in this mr. hoar: and i had innumerable things to ask him about concord, concerning which topic we had hardly got a word said when our first interview had to end. i sincerely hope he will not fail to keep his time in returning. you do very well, my friend, to plant orchards; and fair fruit shall they grow (if it please heaven) for your grandchildren to pluck;--a beautiful occupation for the son of man, in all patriarchal and paternal times (which latter are patriarchal too)! but you are to understand withal that your coming hither to lecture is taken as a settled point by all your friends here; and for my share i do not reckon upon the smallest doubt about the _essential_ fact of it, simply on some calculation and adjustment about the circumstantials. of ireland, who i surmise is busy in the problem even now, you will hear by and by, probably in more definite terms: i did not see him again after my first notice of him to you; but there is no doubt concerning his determinations (for all manner of reasons) to get you to lancashire, to england;--and in fact it is an adventure which i think you ought to contemplate as _fixed,_--say for this year and the beginning of next? ireland will help you to fix the dates; and there is nothing else, i think, which should need fixing.-- unquestionably you would get an immense quantity of food for ideas, though perhaps not at all in the way you anticipate, in looking about among us: nay, if you even thought us _stupid,_ there is something in the godlike indifference with which london will accept and sanction even that verdict,--something highly instructive at least! and in short, for the truth must be told, london is properly your mother city too,--verily you have about as much to do with it, in spite of polk and q. victory, as i had! and you ought to come and look at it, beyond doubt; and say to this land, "old mother, how are you getting on at all?" to which the mother will answer, "thankee, young son, and you?"--in a way useful to both parties! that is truth. adieu, dear emerson; good be with you always. hoar gave me your _american_ poems: thanks. _vale et me ama._ --t. carlyle cxxii. emerson to carlyle concord, june, dear carlyle,--i have just got your friendliest letter of may , with its varied news and new invitations. really you are a dangerous correspondent with your solid and urgent ways of speaking. no affairs and no studies of mine, i fear, will be able to make any head against these bribes. well, i will adorn the brow of the coming months with this fine hope; then if the rich god at last refuses the jewel, no doubt he will give something better--to both of us. but thinking on this project lately, i see one thing plainly, that i must not come to london as a lecturer. if the plan proceed, i will come and see you,-- thankful to heaven for that mercy, should such a romance looking reality come to pass,--i will come and see you and jane carlyle, and will hear what you have to say. you shall even show me, if you will, such other men and women as will suffer themselves to be seen and heard, asking for nothing again. then i will depart in peace, as i came. at mr. ireland's "institutes," i will read lectures; and possibly in london too, if, when there, you looking with your clear eyes shall say that it is desired by persons who ought to be gratified. but i wish such lecturing to be a mere contingency, and nowise a settled purpose. i had rather stay at home, and forego the happiness of seeing you, and the excitement of england, than to have the smallest pains taken to collect an audience for me. so now we will leave this egg in the desert for the ostrich time to hatch it or not. it seems you are not tired of pale americans, or will not own it. you have sent our country-senator* where he wanted to go, and to the best hospitalities as we learn today directly from him. i cannot avoid sending you another of a different stamp. henry hedge is a recluse but catholic scholar in our remote bangor, who reads german and smokes in his solitary study through nearly eight months of snow in the year, and deals out, every sunday, his witty apothegms to the lumber-merchants and township-owners of penobscot river, who have actually grown intelligent interpreters of his riddles by long hearkening after them. they have shown themselves very loving and generous lately, in making a quite munificent provision for his traveling. hedge has a true and mellow heart,... and i hope you will like him. -------- * the hon. e. rockwood hoar. -------- i have seen lately a texan, ardent and vigorous, who assured me that carlyle's writings were read with eagerness on the banks of the colorado. there was more to tell, but it is too late. ever yours, r.w. emerson cxxiii. emerson to carlyle concord, july, dear carlyle,--in my old age i am coming to see you. i have written this day, in answer to sundry letters brought me by the last steamer, from mr. ireland and mr. hudson of leeds, that i mean in good earnest to sail for liverpool or for london about the first of october; and i am disposing my astonished household--astonished at such a somerset of the sedentary master --with that view. my brother william was here this week from new york, and will come again to carry my mother home with him for the winter; my wife and children three are combining for and against me; at all events, i am to have my visit. i pray you to cherish your good nature, your mercy. let your wife cherish it,--that i may see, i indolent, this incredible worker, whose toil has been long since my pride and wonder,--that i may see him benign and unexacting,-- he shall not be at the crisis of some over-labor. i shall not stay but an hour. what do i care for his fame? ah! how gladly i hoped once to see sterling as mediator and amalgam, when my turn should come to see the saxon gods at home: sterling, who had certain american qualities in his genius;--and now you send me his shade. i found at munroe's shop the effigy, which, he said, cunningham, whom i have not seen or heard from, had left there for me; a front face, and a profile, both--especially the first --a very welcome satisfaction to my sad curiosity, the face very national, certainly, but how thoughtful and how friendly! what more belongs to this print--whether you are editing his books, or yourself drawing his lineaments--i know not. i find my friends have laid out much work for me in yorkshire and lancashire. what part of it i shall do, i cannot yet tell. as soon as i know how to arrange my journey best, i shall write you again. yours affectionately, r.w. emerson cxxiv. carlyle to emerson rawdon, near leeds, yorkshire august, dear emerson,--almost ever since your last letter reached me, i have been wandering over the country, enveloped either in a restless whirl of locomotives, view-hunting, &c., or sunk in the deepest torpor of total idleness and laziness, forgetting, and striving to forget, that there was any world but that of dreams; --and though at intervals the reproachful remembrance has arisen sharply enough on me, that i ought, on all accounts high and low, to have written you an answer, never till today have i been able to take pen in hand, and actually begin that operation! such is the naked fact. my wife is with me; we leave no household behind us but a servant; the face of england, with its mad electioneerings, vacant tourist dilettantings, with its shady woods, green yellow harvest-fields and dingy mill-chimneys, so new and old, so beautiful and ugly, every way so _abstruse_ and _un_speakable, invites to silence; the whole world, fruitful yet disgusting to this human soul of mine, invites me to silence; to sleep, and dreams, and stagnant indifference, as if for the time one had _got_ into the country of the lotos-eaters, and it made no matter what became of anything and all things. in good truth, it is a wearied man, at least a dreadfully slothful and slumberous man, eager for _sleep_ in any quantity, that now addresses you! be thankful for a few half-dreaming words, till we awake again. as to your visit to us, there is but one thing to be said and repeated: that a prophet's chamber is ready for you in chelsea, and a brotherly and sisterly welcome, on whatever day at whatever hour you arrive: this, which is all of the practical that i can properly take charge of, is to be considered a given quantity always. with regard to lecturing, &c., ireland, with whom i suppose you to be in correspondence, seems to have awakened all this north country into the fixed hope of hearing you,--and god knows they have need enough to hear a man with sense in his head;--it was but the other day i read in one of their newspapers, "we understand that mr. emerson the distinguished &c. is certainly &c. this winter," all in due newspaper phrase, and i think they settled your arrival for "october" next. may it prove so! but on the whole there _is_ no doubt of your coming; that is a great fact. and if so, i should say, why not come at once, even as the editor surmises? you will evidently do no other considerable enterprise till this voyage to england is achieved. come therefore;--and we shall see; we shall hear and speak! i do not know another man in all the world to whom i can _speak_ with clear hope of getting adequate response from him: if i speak to you, it will be a breaking of my silence for the last time perhaps,--perhaps for the first time, on some points! _allons._ i shall not always be so roadweary, lifeweary, sleepy, and stony as at present. i even think there is yet another book in me; "exodus from houndsditch" (i think it might be called), a peeling off of fetid _jewhood_ in every sense from myself and my poor bewildered brethren: one other book; and, if it were a right one, rest after that, the deeper the better, forevermore. _ach gott!_-- hedge is one of the sturdiest little fellows i have come across for many a day. a face like a rock; a voice like a howitzer; only his honest kind gray eyes reassure you a little. we have met only once; but hope (mutually, i flatter myself) it may be often by and by. that hardy little fellow too, what has he to do with "semitic tradition" and the "dust-hole of extinct socinianism," george-sandism, and the twaddle of a thousand magazines? thor and his hammer, even, seem to me a little more respectable; at least, "my dear sir, endeavor to clear your mind of cant." oh, we are all sunk, much deeper than any of us imagines. and our worship of "beautiful sentiments," &c., &c. is as contemptible a form of long-ears as any other, perhaps the most so of any. it is in fact damnable.--we will say no more of it at present. hedge came to me with tall lank chapman at his side,--an innocent flail of a creature, with considerable impetus in him: the two when they stood up together looked like a circle and tangent,--in more senses than one. jacobson, the oxford doctor, who welcomed your concord senator in that city, writes to me that he has received (with blushes, &c.) some grand "gift for his child" from that traveler; whom i am accordingly to thank, and blush to,--jacobson not knowing his address at present. the "address" of course is still more unknown to _me_ at present: but we shall know it, and the man it indicates, i hope, again before long. so, much for that. and now, dear emerson, adieu. will your next letter tell us the _when?_ o my friend! we are here with quakers, or ex-quakers rather; a very curious people, "like water from the crystal well"; in a very curious country too, most beautiful and very ugly: but why write of it, or of anything more, while half asleep and lotos-eating! adieu, my friend; come soon, and let us meet again under this sun. yours, t. carlyle cxxv. emerson to carlyle concord, september, my dear carlyle,--the last steamer brought, as ever, good tidings from you, though certainly from a new habitat, at leeds, or near it. if leeds will only keep you a little in its precinct, i will search for you there; for it is one of the parishes in the diocese which mr. ireland and his friends have carved out for me on the map of england. i have taken a berth in the packet-ship "washington irving," which leaves boston for liverpool next week, october; having decided, after a little demurring and advising, to follow my inclination in shunning the steamer. the owners will almost take oath that their ship cannot be out of a port twenty days. at liverpool and manchester i shall take advice of ireland and his officers of the "institutes," and perhaps shall remain for some time in that region, if my courage and my head are equal to the work they offer me. i will write you what befalls me in the strange city. who knows but i may have adventures--i who had never one, as i have just had occasion to write to mrs. howitt, who inquired what mine were? well, if i survive liverpool, and manchester, and leeds, or rather my errands thither, i shall come some fine day to see you in your burly city, you in the centre of the world, and sun me a little in your british heart. it seems a lively passage that i am entering in the old dream world, and perhaps the slumbers are lighter and the morning is near. softly, dear shadows, do not scatter yet. knit your panorama close and well, till these rare figures just before me draw near, and are greeted and known. but there is no more time in this late night--and what need? since i shall see you and yours soon. ever yours, r.w.e. cxxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, october, my dear emerson,--your letter from concord, of the st of july, had arrived duly in london; been duly forwarded to my transient address at buxton in derbyshire,--and there, by the faithless postmaster, _retained_ among his lumber, instead of given to me when i called on him! we staid in buxton only one day and night; two newspapers, as i recollect, the postmaster did deliver to me on my demand; but your letter he, with scandalous carelessness, kept back, and left me to travel forwards without: there accordingly it lay, week after week, for a month or more; and only by half-accident and the extraordinary diligence and accuracy of our chelsea postman, was it recovered at all, not many days ago, after my wife's return hither. consider what kind of fact this was and has been for us! for now, if all have gone right, you are approaching the coast of england; chelsea and your fraternal house _hidden_ under a disastrous cloud to you; and i know not so much as whitherward to write, and send you a word of solution. it is one of the most unpleasant mistakes that ever befell me; i have no resource but to enclose this note to mr. ireland, and charge him by the strongest adjurations to have it ready for you the first thing when you set foot upon our shores.* ------------ * mr. ireland, in his recollections of emerson's visit to england, p. , prints carlyle's note to himself, enclosing this letter, and adds: "the ship reached liverpool on the d of october, and mr. emerson at once proceeded to manchester. after spending a few hours in friendly talk, he was 'shot up,' as carlyle had desired, to chelsea, and at the end of a week returned to manchester, to begin his lectures." --------- know then, my friend, that in verity your home while in england is _here;_ and all other places, whither work or amusement may call you, are but inns and temporary lodgings. i have returned hither a day or two ago, and free from any urgent calls or businesses of any kind; my wife has your room all ready;--and here surely, if anywhere in the wide earth, there ought to be a brother's welcome and kind home waiting you! yes, by allah!--an "express train" leaves liverpool every afternoon; and in some six hours will set you down here. i know not what your engagements are; but i say to myself, why not come at once, and rest a little from your sea-changes, before going farther? in six hours you can be out of the unstable waters, and sitting in your own room here. you shall not be bothered with talk till you repose; and you shall have plenty of it, hot and hot, when the appetite does arise in you. "no. great cheyne row, chelsea": come to the "london terminus," from any side; say these magic words to any cabman, and by night or by day you are a welcome apparition here,--foul befall us otherwise! this is the fact: what more can i say? i make my affidavit of the same; and require you in the name of all lares and penates, and household gods ancient and modern which are sacred to men, to consider it and take brotherly account of it!-- shall we hear of you, then, in a day or two: shall we not perhaps see you in a day or two! that depends on the winds and the chances; but our affection is independent of such. adieu; _au revoir,_ it now is! come soon; come at once. ever yours, t. carlyle extracts from emerson's diary october, "i found at liverpool, after a couple of days, a letter which had been seeking me, from carlyle, addressed to 'r.w.e. on the instant when he lands in england,' conveying the heartiest welcome and urgent invitation to house and hearth. and finding that i should not be wanted for a week in the lecture-rooms i came down to london on monday, and, at ten at night, the door was opened by jane carlyle, and the man himself was behind her with a lamp in the hall. they were very little changed from their old selves of fourteen years ago (in august), when i left them at craigenputtock. 'well,' said carlyle, 'here we are shoveled together again.' the floodgates of his talk are quickly opened, and the river is a plentiful stream. we had a wide talk that night until nearly one o'clock, and at breakfast next morning again. at noon or later we walked forth to hyde park and the palaces, about two miles from here, to the national gallery, and to the strand, carlyle melting all westminster and london into his talk and laughter, as he goes. here, in his house, we breakfast about nine, and carlyle is very prone, his wife says, to sleep till ten or eleven, if he has no company. an immense talker, and altogether as extraordinary in that as in his writing; i think, even more so; you will never discover his real vigor and range, or how much more he might do than he has ever done, without seeing him. my few hours discourse with him, long ago, in scotland, gave me not enough knowledge of him; and i have now at last been taken by surprise by him." "c. and his wife live on beautiful terms. their ways are very engaging, and, in her bookcase, all his books are inscribed to her, as they came from year to year, each with some significant lines." "i had a good talk with c. last night. he says over and over, for months, for years, the same thing. yet his guiding genius is his moral sense, his perception of the sole importance of truth and justice; and he, too, says that there is properly no religion in england. he is quite contemptuous about _'kunst,'_ also, in germans, or english, or americans;* and has a huge respect for the duke of wellington, as the only englishman, or the only one in the aristocracy, who will have nothing to do with any manner of lie." ---------- * see _english traits,_ ch. xvi.; and _life of sterling,_ part ii. ch. vii. "among the windy gospels addressed to our poor century there are few louder than this of art." ---------- the following sentences are of later date than the preceding:-- "carlyle had all the _kleinstadtlich_ traits of an islander and a scotsman, and reprimanded with severity the rebellious instincts of the native of a vast continent which made light of the british islands." "carlyle has a hairy strength which makes his literary vocation a mere chance, and what seems very contemptible to him. i could think only of an enormous trip-hammer with an 'aeolian attachment."' "in carlyle as in byron, one is more struck with the rhetoric than with the matter. he has manly superiority rather than intellectuality, and so makes good hard hits all the time. there is more character than intellect in every sentence, herein strongly resembling samuel johnson." "england makes what a step from dr. johnson to carlyle! what wealth of thought and science, what expansion of views and profounder resources does the genius and performance of this last imply! if she can make another step as large, what new ages open!" cxxvii. emerson to carlyle mrs. massey's, manchester, fenny place, fenny st. november , ah! my dear friend, all these days have gone, and you have had no word from me, when the shuttles fly so swiftly in your english loom, and in so few hours we may have tidings of the best that live. at last, and only this day for the first day, i am stablished in my own lodgings on english ground, and have a fair parlor and chamber, into both of which the sun and moon shine, into which friendly people have already entered. hitherto i have been the victim of trifles,--which is the fate and the chief objection to traveling. days are absorbed in precious nothings. but now that i am in some sort a citizen, of manchester, and also of liverpool (for there also i am to enter on lodgings tomorrow, at stafford street, islington), perhaps the social heart of this english world will include me also in its strong and healthful circulations. i get the best letters from home by the last steamers, and was much occupied in liverpool yesterday in seeing dr. nichol of glasgow, who was to sail in the "acadia," and in giving him credentials to some americans. i find here a very kind reception from your friends, as they emphatically are,--ireland, espinasse, miss jewsbury, dr. hodgson, and a circle expanding on all sides outward,--and mrs. paulet at liverpool. i am learning there also to know friendly faces, and a certain roscoe club has complimented me with its privileges. the oddest part of my new position is my alarming penny correspondence, which, what with welcomes, invitations to lecture, proffers of hospitality, suggestions from good swedenborgists and others for my better guidance touching the titles of my discourses, &c., &c., all requiring answers, threaten to eat up a day like a cherry. in this fog and miscellany, and until the heavenly sun shall give me one beam, will not you, friend and joy of so many years, send me a quiet line or two now and then to say that you still smoke your pipe in peace, side by side with wife and brother also well and smoking, or able to smoke? now that i have in some measure calmed down the astonishment and consternation of seeing your dreams change into realities, i mean, at my next approximation or perihelion, to behold you with the most serene and sceptical calmness. so give my thanks and true affectionate remembrance to jane carlyle, and my regards also to dr. carlyle, whose precise address please also to send me. ever your loving r.w.e. the address at the top of this note is the best for the present, as i mean to make this my centre. cxxviii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, november, dear emerson,--your book-parcels were faithfully sent off, directly after your departure: in regard to one of them i had a pleasant visit from the proprietor in person,--the young swedenborgian doctor, whom to my surprise i found quite an agreeable, accomplished secular young gentleman, much given to "progress of the species," &c., &c.; from whom i suppose you have yourself heard. the wandering umbrella, still short of an owner, hangs upon its peg here, without definite outlook. of yourself there have come news, by your own letter, and by various excerpts from manchester newspapers. _gluck zu!_-- this morning i received the enclosed, and send it off to you without farther response. mudie, if i mistake not, is some small bookseller in the russell-square region; pray answer him, if you think him worthy of answer. a dim suspicion haunts me that perhaps he was the republisher (or pirate) of your first set of _essays:_ but probably he regards this as a mere office of untutored friendship on his part. or possibly i do the poor man wrong by misremembrance? chapman could tell. i am sunk deep here, in effete manuscripts, in abstruse meditations, in confusions old and new; sinking, as i may describe myself, through stratum after stratum of the inane,-- down to one knows not what depth! i unfortunately belong to the opposition party in many points, and am in a minority of one. to keep silence, therefore, is among the principal duties at present. we had a call from bancroft, the other evening. a tough yankee man; of many worthy qualities more tough than musical; among which it gratified me to find a certain small under-current of genial _humor,_ or as it were _hidden laughter,_ not noticed heretofore. my wife and all the rest of us are well; and do all salute you with our true wishes, and the hope to have you here again before long. do not bother yourself with other than voluntary writing to me, while there is so much otherwise that you are obliged to write. if on any point you want advice, information, or other help that lies within the limits of my strength, command me, now and always. and so good be with you; and a happy meeting to us soon again. yours ever truly, t. carlyle cxxix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, november, dear emerson,--here is a word for you from miss fuller; i send you the cover also, though i think there is little or nothing in that. it contained another little note for mazzini; who is wandering in foreign parts, on paths unknown to me at present. pray send my regards to miss fuller, when you write. we hear of you pretty often, and of your successes with the northern populations. we hope for you in london again before long.--i am busy, if at all, altogether _inarticulately_ in these days. my respect for _silence,_ my distrust of _speech,_ seem to grow upon me. there is a time for both, says solomon; but we, in our poor generation, have forgotten one of the "times." here is a mr. forster* of rawdon, or bradford, in yorkshire; our late host in the autumn time; who expects and longs to be yours when you come into those parts. i am busy with william conqueror's _domesday book_ and with the commentaries of various blockheads on it:--ah me! all good be with you, and happy news from those dear to you. yours ever, t. carlyle ----------- * now the rt. hon. w e. forster, m.p. ----------- cxxx. emerson to carlyle fenny street, higher broughton, manchester december, dear carlyle,--i am concerned to discover that margaret fuller in the letter which you forwarded prays me to ask you and mrs. carlyle respecting the count and countess pepoli, who are in rome for the winter, whether they would be good for her to know?--that is pretty nearly the form of her question. as one third of the winter is gone, and one half will be, before her question can be answered, i fear, it will have lost some of its pertinence. well, it will serve as a token to pass between us, which will please me if it do not margaret.--i have had nothing to send you tidings of. yet i get the best accounts from home of wife and babes and friends. i am seeing this england more thoroughly than i had thought was possible to me. i find this lecturing a key which opens all doors. i have received everywhere the kindest hospitality from a great variety of persons. i see many intelligent and well-informed persons, and some fine geniuses. i have every day a better opinion of the english, who are a very handsome and satisfactory race of men, and, in the point of material performance, altogether incomparable. i have made some vain attempts to end my lectures, but must go on a little longer. with kindest regards to the lady jane, your friend, r.w.e. margaret fuller's address, if anything is to be written, is, care of maquay, pakenham & co., rome. cxxxi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, december, my dear emerson,--we are very glad to see your handwriting again, and learn that you are well, and doing well. our news of you hitherto, from the dim lecture-element, had been satisfactory indeed, but vague. go on and prosper. i do not much think miss fuller would do any great good with the pepolis,--even if they are still in rome, and not at bologna as our advices here seemed to indicate. madam pepoli is an elderly scotch lady, of excellent commonplace vernacular qualities, hardly of more; the count, some years younger, and a much airier man, is on all sides a beautiful _dilettante,_--little suitable, i fear, to the serious mind that can recognize him as such! however, if the people are still in rome, miss fuller can easily try: bid miss fuller present my wife's compliments, or mine, or even _yours_ (for they know all our domesticities here, and are very intimate, especially madam with _my_ dame); upon which the acquaintance is at once made, and can be continued if useful. this morning richard milnes writes to me for your address; which i have sent. he is just returned out of spain; home swiftly to "vote for the jew bill"; is doing hospitalities at woburn abbey; and i suppose will be in yorkshire (home, near pontefract) before long. see him if you have opportunity: a man very easy to _see_ and get into flowing talk with; a man of much sharpness of faculty, well tempered by several inches of "christian _fat_" he has upon his ribs for covering. one of the idlest, cheeriest, most gifted of fat little men. tennyson has been here for three weeks; dining daily till he is near dead;--setting out a poem withal. he came in to us on sunday evening last, and on the preceding sunday: a truly interesting son of earth, and son of heaven,--who has almost lost his way, among the will-o'-wisps, i doubt; and may flounder ever deeper, over neck and nose at last, among the quagmires that abound! i like him well; but can do next to nothing for him. milnes, with general co-operation, got him a pension; and he has bread and tobacco: but that is a poor outfit for such a soul. he wants a _task;_ and, alas, that of spinning rhymes, and naming it "art" and "high art," in a time like ours, will never furnish him. for myself i have been entirely _idle,_--i dare not even say, too abstrusely _occupied;_ for i have merely been _looking_ at the chaos even, not by any means working in it. i have not even read a book,--that i liked. all "literature" has grown inexpressibly unsatisfactory to me. better be silent than talk farther in this mood. we are going off, on saturday come a week, into hampshire, to certain friends you have heard me speak of. our address, till the beginning of february, is "hon. w.b. baring, alverstoke, gosport, hants." my wife sends you many kind regards; remember us across the ocean too;--and be well and busy till we meet. yours ever, t. carlyle last night there arrived no. of the _massachusetts review:_ beautiful paper and print; and very promising otherwise. in the introduction i well recognized the hand; in the first article too,--not in any of the others. _faustum sit._ cxxxii. emerson to carlyle ambleside, february, my dear carlyle,--i am here in miss martineau's house, and having seen a good deal of england, and lately a good deal of scotland too, i am tomorrow to set forth again for manchester, and presently for london. yesterday, i saw wordsworth for a good hour and a half, which he did not seem to grudge, for he talked freely and fast, and--bating his cramping toryism and what belongs to it--wisely enough. he is in rude health, and, though seventy-seven years old, says he does not feel his age in any particular. miss martineau is in excellent health and spirits, though just now annoyed by the hesitations of murray to publish her book;* but she confides infinitely in her book, which is the best fortune. but i please myself not a little that i shall in a few days see you again, and i will give you an account of my journey. i have heard almost nothing of your late weeks,--but that is my fault,--only i heard with sorrow that your wife had been ill, and could not go with you on your christmas holidays. now may her good days have come again! i say i have heard nothing of your late days; of your early days, of your genius, of your influence, i cease not to hear and to see continually, yea, often am called upon to resist the same with might and main. but i will not pester you with it now.--miss martineau, who is most happily placed here, and a model of housekeeping, sends kindest remembrances to you both. yours ever, r. w. emerson. --------- * "eastern life, past and present." --------- cxxxiii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, february, dear emerson,--we are delighted to hear of you again at first hand: our last traditions represented you at edinburgh, and left the prospect of your return hither very vague. i have only time for one word tonight: to say that your room is standing vacant ever since you quitted it,--ready to be lighted up with all manner of physical and moral _fires_ that the place will yield; and is in fact _your_ room, and expects to be accounted such.--i know not specially what your operations in this quarter are to be; but whatever they are, or the arrangements necessary for them, surely it is here that you must alight again in the big babel, and deliberately adjust what farther is to be done. write to us what day you are to arrive; and the rest is all already managed. jane has never yet got out since the cold took her; but she has at no time been so ill as is frequent with her in these winter disorders; she is now steadily improving, and we expect will come out with the sun and the green leaves,--as she usually does. i too caught an ugly cold, and, what is very uncommon with me, a kind of cough, while down in hampshire; which, with other inarticulate matters, has kept me in a very mute abstruse condition all this while; so that, for many weeks past, i have properly had no history,--except such as trees in winter, and other merely passive objects may have. that is not an agreeable side of the page; but i find it indissolubly attached to the other: no historical leaf with me but has them _both!_ reading does next to nothing for me at present, neither will thinking or even dreaming rightly prosper; of no province can i be quite master except of the _silent_ one, in such a case. one feels there, at last, as if quite annihilated; and takes up arms again (the poor goose-quill is no great things of a weapon to arm with!) as if in a kind of sacred despair. all people are in a sort of joy-dom over the new french republic, which has descended suddenly (or shall we say, _ascended_ alas?) out of the immensities upon us; showing once again that the righteous gods do yet live and reign! it is long years since i have felt any such deep-seated pious satisfaction at a public event. adieu: come soon; and warn us when. yours ever, t. carlyle cxxxiv. emerson to carlyle fenny st., manchester, march, thursday [ ] dear friend,--i hope to set forward today for london, and to arrive there some time tonight. i am to go first to chapman's house, where i shall lodge for a time. if it is too noisy, i shall move westward. but i hope you are to be at home tomorrow, for if i prosper, i shall come and beg a dinner with you,--is it not at five o'clock? i am sorry you have no better news to tell me of your health,--your own and your wife's. tell her i shall surely report you to alcott, who will have his revenge. thanks that you keep the door so wide open for me still. i shall always come in. ever yours, r.w.e. cxxxv. emerson to carlyle monday, p.m., june, dear carlyle,--mrs. crowe of edinburgh, an excellent lady, known to you and to many good people, wishes me to go to you with her. i tell her that i believe you relax the reins of labor as early as one hour after noon, and i propose one o'clock on thursday for the invasion. if you are otherwise engaged, you must send me word. otherwise, we shall come. it was sad to hear no good news last evening from jane carlyle. i heartily hope the night brought sleep, and the morning better health to her. yours always, r.w. emerson cxxxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, june, dear emerson,--we shall be very glad to become acquainted with mrs. crowe, of whom already by report we know many favorable things. brown (of portobello, edinburgh) had given us intimation of her kind purposes towards chelsea; and now on thursday you (please the pigs) shall see the adventure achieved. two o'clock, not one, is the hour when labor ceases here,--if, alas, there be any "labor" so much as got begun; which latter is often enough the sad case. but at either hour we shall be ready for you. i hope you penetrated the armida palace, and did your devoir to the sublime duchess and her luncheon yesterday! i cannot without a certain internal amusement (foreign enough to my present humor) represent to myself such a conjunction of opposite stars! but you carry a new image off with you, and are a gainer, you. _allons._ my papers here are in a state of distraction, state of despair! i see not what is to become of them and me. yours ever truly, t. carlyle my wife arose without headache on monday morning; but feels still a good deal beaten;--has not had "such a headache" for several years. cxxxvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, friday [ june, ] dear emerson,--i forgot to say, last night, that you are to dine with us on sunday; that after our call on the lady harriet* we will take a stroll through the park, look at the sunday population, and find ourselves here at five o'clock for the above important object. pray remember, therefore, and no excuse! in haste. yours ever truly, t. carlyle ------------- * lady ashburton ------------- cxxxviii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, december, dear emerson,--we received your letter* duly, some time ago, with many welcomes; and have as you see been too remiss in answering it. not from forgetfulness, if you will take my word; no, but from many causes, too complicated to articulate, and justly producing an indisposition to put pen to paper at all! never was i more silent than in these very months; and, with reason too, for the world at large, and my own share of it in small, are both getting more and more unspeakable with any convenience! in health we of this household are about as well as usual;--and look across to the woods of concord with more light than we had, realizing for ourselves a most mild and friendly picture there. perhaps it is quite as well that you are left alone of foreign interference, even of a letter from chelsea, till you get your huge bale of english reminiscences assorted a little. nobody except me seems to have heard from you; at least the rest, in these parts, all plead destitution when i ask for news. what you saw and suffered and enjoyed here will, if you had once got it properly warehoused, be new wealth to you for many years. of one impression we fail not here: admiration of your pacific virtues, of gentle and noble tolerance, often sorely tried in this place! forgive me my ferocities; you do not quite know what i suffer in these latitudes, or perhaps it would be even easier for you. peace for me, in a mother of dead dogs like this, there is not, was not, will not be,--till the battle itself end; which, however, is a sure outlook, and daily growing a nearer one. ---------- * the letter is missing, but a fragment of the rough draft of it exists, dated concord, october, . emerson had returned home in july, and he begins: "'t is high time, no doubt, long since, that you heard from me, and if there were good news in america for you, you would be sure to hear. all goes at heavy trot with us... i fell again quickly into my obscure habits, more fit for me than the fine things i had seen. i made my best endeavor to praise the rich country i had seen, and its excellent, energetic, polished people. and it is very easy for me to do so. england is the country of success, and success has a great charm for me, more than for those i talk with at home. but they were obstinate to know if the english were superior to their possessions, and if the old religion warmed their hearts, and lifted a little the mountain of wealth. so i enumerated the list of brilliant persons i had seen, and the [break in ms.]. but the question returned. did you find kings and priests? did you find sanctities and beauties that took away your memory, and sent you home a changed man with new aims, and with a discontent of your old pastures?" here the fragment ends. emerson's answer to these questions may be found in the chapter entitled "results," in his _english traits._ ---------- nay, there is another practical question,--but it is from the female side of the house to the female side,--and in fact concerns indian meal, upon which mrs. emerson, or you, or the miller of concord (if he have any tincture of philosophy) are now to instruct us! the fact is, potatoes having vanished here, we are again, with motives large and small, trying to learn the use of indian meal; and indeed do eat it daily to meat at dinner, though hitherto with considerable despair. question _first,_ therefore: is there by nature a _bitter_ final taste, which makes the throat smart, and disheartens much the apprentice in indian meal;--or is it accidental, and to be avoided? we surely anticipate the latter answer; but do not yet see how. at first we were taught the meal, all ground on your side of the water, had got fusty, _raw;_ an effect we are well used to in oaten and other meals but, last year, we had a bushel of it ground _here,_ and the bitter taste was there as before (with the addition of much dirt and sand, our millstones i suppose being too soft);-- whereupon we incline to surmise that there is, perhaps, as in the case of oats, some pellicle or hull that ought to be _rejected_ in making the meal? pray ask some philosophic miller, if mrs. emerson or you do not know;--and as a corollary this _second_ question: what is the essential difference between _white_ (or brown-gray-white) indian meal and _yellow_ (the kind we now have; beautiful as new guineas, but with an ineffaceable tastekin of _soot_ in it)?--and question _third,_ which includes all: how to cook _mush_ rightly, at least without bitter? _long_-continued boiling seems to help the bitterness, but does not cure it. let some oracle speak! i tell all people, our staff of life is in the mississippi valley henceforth;--and one of the truest benefactors were an american minerva who could teach us to cook this meal; which our people at present (i included) are unanimous in finding nigh uneatable, and loudly exclaimable against! elihu burritt had a string of recipes that went through all newspapers three years ago; but never sang there oracle of longer ears than that,--totally destitute of practical significance to any creature here! and now enough of questioning. alas, alas, i have a quite other batch of sad and saddest considerations,--on which i must not so much as enter at present! death has been very busy in this little circle of ours within these few days. you remember charles buller, to whom i brought you over that night at the barings' in stanhope street? he died this day week, almost quite unexpectedly; a sore loss to all that knew him personally, and his gladdening sunny presence in many circles here; a sore loss to the political people too, for he was far the cleverest of all whig men, and indeed the only genial soul one can remember in that department of things.* we buried him yesterday; and now see what new thing has come. lord ashburton, who had left his mother well in hampshire ten hours before, is summoned from poor buller's funeral by telegraph; hurries back, finds his mother, whom he loved much, already dead! she was a miss bingham, i think, from pennsylvania, perhaps from philadelphia itself. you saw her; but the first sight by no means told one all or the best worth that was in that good lady. we are quite bewildered by our own regrets, and by the far painfuler sorrow of those closely related to these sudden sorrows. of which let me be silent for the present;--and indeed of all things else, for _speech,_ inadequate mockery of one's poor meaning, is quite a burden to me just now! --------- * the reader of carlyle's _reminiscences,_ and of froude's volumes of his biography, is familiar with the close relations that had existed between buller and carlyle. ---------- neuberg* comes hither sometimes; a welcome, wise kind of man. poor little espinasse still toils cheerily at the oar, and various friends of yours are about us. brother john did send through chapman all the _dante,_ which we calculate you have received long ago: he is now come to town; doing a preface, &c., which also will be sent to you, and just about publishing.-- helps, who has been alarmingly ill, and touring on the rhine since we were his guests, writes to me yesterday from hampshire about sending you a new book of his. i instructed him how. adieu, dear emerson; do not forget us, or forget to think as kindly as you can of us, while we continue in this world together. yours ever affectionately, t. carlyle --------- * mr. ireland, in his _recollections,_ p. , gives an interesting account of mr. neuberg,--a highly cultivated german, who assisted carlyle in some of the later literary labors of his life. neuberg died in , and in a letter to his sister of that year carlyle says: "no kinder friend had i in this world; no man of my day, i believe, had so faithful, loyal, and willing a helper as he generously was to me for the last twenty or more years." ----------- cxxxix. emerson to carlyle boston, january, my dear carlyle,--here in boston for the day, though in no fit place for writing, you shall have, since the steamer goes tomorrow, a hasty answer to at least one of your questions.... you tell me heavy news of your friends, and of those who were friendly to me for your sake. and i have found farther particulars concerning them in the newspapers. buller i have known by name ever since he was in america with lord durham, and i well remember his face and figure at mr. baring's. even england cannot spare an accomplished man. since i had your letter, and, i believe, by the same steamer, your brother's _dante,_* complete within and without, has come to me, most welcome. i heartily thank him. 't is a most workmanlike book, bearing every mark of honest value. i thank him for myself, and i thank him, in advance, for our people, who are sure to learn their debt to him, in the coming months and years. i sent the book, after short examination, the same day, to new york, to the harpers, lest their edition should come out without prolegomena. but they answered, the next day, that they had already received directly the same matter;--yet have not up to this time returned my book. for the indian corn,--i have been to see dr. charles t. jackson (my wife's brother, and our best chemist, inventor of etherization), who tells me that the reason your meal is bitter is, that all the corn sent to you from us is kiln-dried here, usually at a heat of three hundred degrees, which effectually kills the starch or diastase (?) which would otherwise become sugar. this drying is thought necessary to prevent the corn from becoming musty in the contingency of a long voyage. he says, if it should go in the steamer, it would arrive sound without previous drying. i think i will try that experiment, shortly on a box or a barrel of our concord maize, as lidian emerson confidently engages to send you accurate recipes for johnny-cake, mush, and hominy. --------- * the _inferno_ of dante, a translation in prose by john carlyle; an excellent piece of work, still in demand. --------- why did you not send me word of clough's hexameter poem, which i have now received and read with much joy.* but no, you will never forgive him his metres. he is a stout, solid, reliable man and friend,--i knew well; but this fine poem has taken me by surprise. i cannot find that your journals have yet discovered its existence. with kindest remembrances to jane carlyle, and new thanks to john carlyle, your friend, --r.w. emerson ---------- * "the bothie of tober-na-vuolich." ---------- cxl. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, my dear emerson,--today is american postday; and by every rule and law,--even if all laws but those of cocker were abolished from this universe,--a word from me is due to you! twice i have heard since i spoke last: prompt response about the philadelphia bill; exact performance of your voluntary promise,--indian corn itself is now here for a week past.... still more interesting is the barrel of genuine corn ears,-- indian cobs of edible grain, from the barn of emerson himself! it came all safe and right, according to your charitable program; without cost or trouble to us of any kind; not without curious interest and satisfaction! the recipes contained in the precedent letter, duly weighed by the competent jury of housewives (at least by my own wife and lady ashburton), were judged to be of decided promise, reasonable-looking every one of them; and now that the stuff itself is come, i am happy to assure you that it forms a new epoch for us all in the maize department: we find the grain _sweet,_ among the sweetest, with a touch even of the taste of _nuts_ in it, and profess with contrition that properly we have never tasted indian corn before. millers of due faculty (with millstones of _iron_) being scarce in the cockney region, and even cooks liable to err, the ashburtons have on their resources undertaken the brunt of the problem one of their own surrey or hampshire millers is to grind the stuff, and their own cook, a frenchman commander of a whole squadron, is to undertake the dressing according to the rules. yesterday the barrel went off to their country place in surrey,-- a small bag of select ears being retained here, for our own private experimenting;--and so by and by we shall see what comes of it.--i on my side have already drawn up a fit proclamation of the excellences of this invaluable corn, and admonitions as to the benighted state of english eaters in regard to it;--to appear in _fraser's magazine,_ or i know not where, very soon. it is really a small contribution towards world-history, this small act of yours and ours: there is no doubt to me, now that i taste the real grain, but all europe will henceforth have to rely more and more upon your western valleys and this article. how beautiful to think of lean tough yankee settlers, tough as gutta-percha, with most occult unsubduable fire in their belly, steering over the western mountains, to annihilate the jungle, and bring bacon and corn out of it for the posterity of adam! the pigs in about a year eat up all the rattlesnakes for miles round: a most judicious function on the part of the pigs. behind the pigs comes jonathan with his all-conquering ploughshare,--glory to him too! oh, if we were not a set of cant-ridden blockheads, there is no _myth_ of athene or herakles equal to this _fact;_--which i suppose _will_ find its real "poets" some day or other; when once the greek, semitic, and multifarious other cobwebs are swept away a little! well, we must wait.--for the rest, if this skillful naturalist and you will make any more experiments on indian corn for us, might i not ask that you would try for a method of preserving _the meal_ in a sound state for us? oatmeal, which would spoil directly too, is preserved all year by kiln-drying the grain before it is ground,--parching it till it is almost _brown,_ sometimes the scotch highlanders, by intense parching, can keep their oatmeal good for a series of years. no miller here at present is likely to produce such beautiful meal as some of the american specimens i have seen:--if possible, we must learn to get the grain over in the shape of proper durable meal. at all events, let your friend charitably make some inquiry into the process of millerage, the possibilities of it for meeting our case;--and send us the result some day, on a separate bit of paper. with which let us end, for the present. alas, i have yet written nothing; am yet a long way off writing, i fear! not for want of matter, perhaps, but for redundance of it; i feel as if i had the whole world to write yet, with the day fast bending downwards on me, and did not know where to begin,--in what manner to address the deep-sunk populations of the theban land. any way my life is very _grim,_ on these terms, and is like to be; god only knows what farther quantity of braying in the mortar this foolish clay of mine may yet need!-- they are printing a third edition of _cromwell;_ that bothered me for some weeks, but now i am over with that, and the printer wholly has it: a sorrowful, not now or ever a joyful thing to me, that. the _stupor_ of my fellow blockheads, for centuries back, presses too heavy upon that,--as upon many things, o heavens! people are about setting up some _statue of cromwell,_ at st. ives, or elsewhere: the king-hudson statue is never yet set up; and the king himself (as you may have heard) has been _discovered_ swindling. i advise all men not to erect a statue for cromwell just now. macaulay's _history_ is also out, running through the fourth edition: did i tell you last time that i had read it,--with wonder and amazement? finally, it seems likely lord john russell will shortly walk out (forever, it is hoped), and sir r. peel come in; to make what effort is in him towards delivering us from the _pedant_ method of treating ireland. the _beginning,_ as i think, of salvation (if he can prosper a little) to england, and to all europe as well. for they will all have to learn that man does need government, and that an able- bodied starving beggar is and remains (whatever exeter hall may say to it) a _slave_ destitute of a _master;_ of which facts england, and convulsed europe, are fallen foundly ignorant in these bad ages, and will plunge ever deeper till they rediscover the same. alas, alas, the future for us is not to be made of _butter,_ as the platforms prophesy; i think it will be harder than steel for some ages! no noble age was ever a soft one, nor ever will or can be.--your beautiful curious little discourse (report of a discourse) about the english was sent me by neuberg; i thought it, in my private heart, one of the best words (for _hidden_ genius lodged in it) i had ever heard; so sent it to the _examiner,_ from which it went to the _times_ and all the other papers: an excellent sly little word. clough has gone to italy; i have seen him twice,--could not manage his hexameters, though i like the man himself, and hope much of him. "infidelity" has broken out in oxford itself,--immense emotion in certain quarters in consequence, virulent outcries about a certain "sterling club," altogether a secular society! adieu, dear emerson; i had much more to say, but there is no room. o, forgive me, forgive me all trespasses,--and love me what you can! yours ever, t. carlyle cxli. carlyle to emerson scotsbrig, ecclefechan, n.b., august, dear emerson,--by all laws of human computation, i owe you a letter, and have owed, any time these seven weeks: let me now pay a little, and explain. your _second_ barrel of indian corn arrived also perfectly fresh, and of admirable taste and quality; the very bag of new-ground meal was perfect; and the "popped corn" ditto, when it came to be discovered: with the whole of which admirable materials such order was taken as promised to secure "the greatest happiness to the greatest number"; and due silent thanks were tendered to the beneficence of the unwearied sender:--but all this, you shall observe, had to be done in the thick of a universal packing and household bustle; i just on the wing for a "tour in ireland," my wife too contemplating a run to scotland shortly after, there to meet me on my return. all this was seven good weeks ago: i hoped somewhere in my irish wayfarings to fling you off a letter; but alas, i reckoned there quite without my host (strict "host," called _time_), finding nowhere half a minute left to me; and so now, having got home to my mother, not to see my wife yet for some days, it is my _earliest_ leisure, after all, that i employ in this purpose. i have been terribly knocked about too,--jolted in irish cars, bothered almost to madness with irish balderdash, above all kept on dreadfully short allowance of sleep;--so that now first, when fairly down to rest, all aches and bruises begin to be fairly sensible; and my clearest feeling at this present is the uncomfortable one, "that i am not caliban, but a cramp": terribly cramped indeed, if i could tell you everything! what the other results of this irish tour are to be for me i cannot in the least specify. for one thing, i seem to be farther from _speech_ on any subject than ever: such masses of chaotic ruin everywhere fronted me, the general fruit of long-continued universal falsity and folly; and such mountains of delusion yet possessing all hearts and tongues i could do little that was not even _noxious,_ except _admire_ in silence the general "bankruptcy of imposture" as one there finds and sees it come to pass, and think with infinite sorrow of the tribulations, futile wrestlings, tumults, and disasters which yet await that unfortunate section of adam's posterity before any real improvement can take place among them. alas, alas! the gospels of political economy, of _laissez-faire,_ no-government, paradise to all comers, and so many fatal gospels,--generally, one may say, all the gospels of this blessed "new era,"--will first have to be tried, and found wanting. with a quantity of written and uttered nonsense, and of suffered and inflicted misery, which one sinks fairly dumb to estimate! a kind of comfort it is, however, to see that "imposture" _has_ fallen openly "bankrupt," here as everywhere else in our old world; that no dexterity of human tinkering, with all the parliamentary eloquence and elective franchises in nature, will ever set it on its feet again, to go many yards more; but that _its_ goings and currencies in this earth have as good as ceased for ever and ever! god is great; all lies do now, as from the first, travel incessantly towards chaos, and there at length lodge! in some parts of ireland (the western "insolvent unions," some twenty-seven of them in all), within a trifle of _one half_ of the whole population are on poor-law rations (furnished by the british government, l , a week furnished here, l , there, l there); the houses stand roofless, the lands unstocked, uncultivated, the landlords hidden from bailiffs, living sometimes "on the hares of their domain": such a state of things was never witnessed under this sky before; and, one would humbly expect, cannot last long!--what is to be done? asks every one; incapable of _hearing_ any answer, were there even one ready for imparting to him. "_blacklead_ these two million idle beggars," i sometimes advised, "and sell them in brazil as niggers,--perhaps parliament, on sweet constraint, will allow you to advance them to be niggers!" in fact, the emancipation societies should send over a deputation or two to look at _these_ immortal irish "freemen," the _ne plus ultra_ of their class it would perhaps moderate the windpipe of much eloquence one hears on that subject! is not this the most illustrious of all "ages"; making progress of the species at a grand rate indeed? peace be with it. waiting for me here, there was a letter from miss fuller in rome, written about a month ago; a dignified and interesting letter; requesting help with booksellers for some "history of the late italian revolution" she is about writing; and elegiacally recognizing the worth of mazzini and other cognate persons and things. i instantly set about doing what little seemed in my power towards this object,--with what result is yet hidden, and have written to the heroic margaret: "more power to her elbow!" as the irish say. she has a beautiful enthusiasm; and is perhaps in the right stage of insight for doing that piece of business well.--of other persons or interests i will say nothing till a calmer opportunity; which surely cannot be very long in coming. in four days i am to rejoin my wife; after which some bits of visits are to be paid in this north country; necessary most of them, not likely to be profitable almost any. in perhaps a month i expect to be back in chelsea; whither direct a word if you are still beneficent enough to think of such a castaway! yours ever, t. carlyle i got thoreau's book; and meant well to read it, but have not yet succeeded, though it went with me through all ireland: tell him so, please. too jean-paulish, i found it hitherto. cxlii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, july, my dear emerson, my friend, my friend,--you behold before you a remorseful man! it is well-nigh a year now since i despatched some hurried rag of paper to you out of scotland, indicating doubtless that i would speedily follow it with a longer letter; and here, when gray autumn is at hand again, i have still written nothing to you, heard nothing from you! it is miserable to think of:--and yet it is a fact, and there is no denying of it; and so we must let it lie. if it please heaven, the like shall not occur again. "ohone arooh!" as the irish taught me to say, "ohone arooh!" the fact is, my life has been black with care and toil,--labor above board and far worse labor below;--i have hardly had a heavier year (overloaded too with a kind of "health" which may be called frightful): to "burn my own smoke" in some measure, has really been all i was up to; and except on sheer immediate compulsion i have not written a word to any creature.-- yesternight i finished the last of these extraordinary _pamphlets;_ am about running off somewhither into the deserts, of wales or scotland, scandinavia or still remoter deserts;--and my first signal of revived reminiscence is to you. nay i have not at any time forgotten you, be that justice done the unfortunate: and though i see well enough what a great deep cleft divides us, in our ways of practically looking at this world,--i see also (as probably you do yourself) where the rock- strata, miles deep, unite again; and the two poor souls are at one. poor devils!--nay if there were no point of agreement at all, and i were more intolerant "of ways of thinking" than i even am,--yet has not the man emerson, from old years, been a human friend to me? can i ever forget, or think otherwise than lovingly of the man emerson? no more of this. write to me in your first good hour; and say that there is still a brother-soul left to me alive in this world, and a kind thought surviving far over the sea!--chapman, with due punctuality at the time of publication, sent me the _representative men;_ which i read in the becoming manner: you now get the book offered you for a shilling, at all railway stations; and indeed i perceive the word "representative man"' (as applied to the late tragic loss we have had in sir robert peel) has been adopted by the able- editors, and circulates through newspapers as an appropriate household word, which is some compensation to you for the piracy you suffer from the typographic letter-of-marque men here. i found the book a most finished clear and perfect set of _engravings in the line manner;_ portraitures full of _likeness,_ and abounding in instruction and materials for reflection to me: thanks always for such a book; and heaven send us many more of them. _plato,_ i think, though it is the most admired by many, did least for me: little save socrates with his clogs and big ears remains alive with me from it. _swedenborg_ is excellent in _likeness;_ excellent in many respects;--yet i said to myself, on reaching your general conclusion about the man and his struggles: "_missed_ the consummate flower and divine ultimate elixir of philosophy, say you? by heaven, in clutching at _it,_ and almost getting it, he has tumbled into bedlam,--which is a terrible _miss,_ if it were never so _near!_ a miss fully as good as a mile, i should say!" --in fact, i generally dissented a little about the _end_ of all these essays; which was notable, and not without instructive interest to me, as i had so lustily shouted "hear, hear!" all the way from the beginning up to that stage.--on the whole, let us have another book with your earliest convenience: that is the modest request one makes of you on shutting this. i know not what i am now going to set about: the horrible barking of the universal dog-kennel (awakened by these _pamphlets_) must still itself again; my poor nerves must recover themselves a little:--i have much more to say; and by heaven's blessing must try to get it said in some way if i live.-- bostonian prescott is here, infinitely _lionized_ by a mob of gentlemen; i have seen him in two places or three (but forbore speech): the johnny-cake is good, the twopence worth of currants in it too are good; but if you offer it as a bit of baked ambrosia, _ach gott!_-- adieu, dear emerson, forgive, and love me a little. yours ever, t. carlyle cxliii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, november, dear emerson,--you are often enough present to my thoughts; but yesterday there came a little incident which has brought you rather vividly upon the scene for me. a certain "mr. ---" from boston sends us, yesterday morning by post, a note of yours addressed to mazzini, whom he cannot find; and indicates that he retains a similar one addressed to myself, and (in the most courteous, kindly, and dignified manner, if mercy prevent not) is about carrying it off with him again to america! to give mercy a chance, i by the first opportunity get under way for morley's hotel, the address of mr. ---; find there that mr.--, since morning, _has been_ on the road towards liverpool and america, and that the function of mercy is quite extinct in this instance! my reflections as i wandered home again were none of the pleasantest. of this mr. --- i had heard some tradition, as of an intelligent, accomplished, and superior man; such a man's acquaintance, of whatever complexion he be, is and was always a precious thing to me, well worth acquiring where possible; not to say that any friend of yours, whatever his qualities otherwise, carries with him an imperative key to all bolts and locks of mine, real or imaginary. in fact i felt punished;--and who knows, if the case were seen into, whether i deserve it? what "business" it was that deprived me of a call from mr. ---, or of the possibility of calling on him, i know very well,--and ---, the little dog, and others know! but the fact in that matter is very far different indeed from the superficial semblance; and i appeal to all the _gentlemen_ that are in america for a candid interpretation of the same. "eighteen million bores,"--good heavens don't i know how many of that species we also have; and how with us, as with you, the difference between them and the eighteen thousand noble-men and non-bores is immeasurable and inconceivable; and how, with us as with you, the _latter_ small company, sons of the empyrean, will have to fling the former huge one, sons of mammon and mud, into some kind of chains again, reduce them to some kind of silence again,--unless the old mud-demons are to rise and devour us all? truly it is so i construe it: and if --- and the eighteen millions are well justified in their anger at me, and the eighteen thousand owe me thanks and new love. that is my decided opinion, in spite of you all! and so, along with ---, probably in the same ship with him, there shall go my protest against the conduct of ---; and the declaration that to the last i will protest! which will wind up the matter (without any word of yours on it) at this time.--for the rest, though --- sent me his pamphlet, it is a fact i have not read a word of it, nor shall ever read. my wife read it; but i was away, with far other things in my head; and it was "lent to various persons" till it died!--enough and ten times more than enough of all that. let me on this last slip of paper give you some response to the letter* i got in scotland, under the silence of the bright autumn sun, in my mother's house, and read there. -------- * this letter is missing. -------- you are bountiful abundantly in your reception of those _latter day pamphlets;_ and right in all you say of them;--and yet withal you are not right, my friend, but i am! truly it does behove a man to know the inmost resources of this universe, and, for the sake both of his peace and of his dignity, to possess his soul in patience, and look nothing doubting (nothing wincing even, if that be his humor) upon all things. for it is most indubitable there is good in all;--and if you even see an oliver cromwell assassinated, it is certain you may get a cartload of turnips from his carcass. ah me, and i suppose we had too much forgotten all this, or there had not been a man like you sent to show it us so emphatically! let us well remember it; and yet remember too that it is _not_ good always, or ever, to be "at ease in zion"; good often to be in fierce rage in zion; and that the vile pythons of this mud-world do verily require to have sun-arrows shot into them and red-hot pokers struck through them, according to occasion: woe to the man that carries either of these weapons, and does not use it in their presence! here, at this moment, a miserable italian organ-grinder has struck up the _marseillaise_ under my window, for example: was the _marseillaise_ fought out on a bed of down, or is it worth nothing when fought? on those wretched _pamphlets_ i set no value at all, or even less than none: to me their one benefit is, my own heart is clear of them (a benefit not to be despised, i assure you!)--and in the public, athwart this storm of curses, and emptyings of vessels of dishonor, i can already perceive that it is all well enough there too in reference to them; and the controversy of the eighteen millions _versus_ the eighteen thousands, or eighteen units, is going on very handsomely in that quarter of it, for aught i can see! and so, peace to the brave that are departed; and, tomorrow to fresh fields and pastures new!-- i was in wales, as well as scotland, during autumn time; lived three weeks within wind of st. germanus's old "college" (fourteen hundred years of age or so) and also not far from _merthyr tydvil,_ cyclops' hell, sootiest and horridest avatar of the industrial mammon i had ever anywhere seen; went through the severn valley; at bath stayed a night with landor (a proud and high old man, who charged me with express remembrances for you); saw tennyson too, in cumberland, with his new wife; and other beautiful recommendable and 'questionable things;--and was dreadfully tossed about, and torn almost to tatters by the manifold brambles of my way: and so at length am here, a much- lamed man indeed! oh my friend, have tolerance for me, have sympathy with me; you know not quite (i imagine) what a burden mine is, or perhaps you would find this duty, which you always do, a little easier done! be happy, be busy beside your still waters, and think kindly of me there. my nerves, health i call them, are in a sad state of disorder: alas, that is nine tenths of all the battle in this world. courage, courage!--my wife sends salutations to you and yours. good be with you all always. your affectionate, t. carlyle cxliv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, july, dear emerson,--don't you still remember very well that there is such a man? i know you do, and will do. but it is a ruinously long while since we have heard a word from each other;--a state of matters that ought immediately to _cease._ it was your turn, i think, to write? it was somebody's turn! nay i heard lately you complained of bad eyes; and were grown abstinent of writing. pray contradict me this. i cannot do without some regard from you while we are both here. spite of your many sins, you are among the most human of all the beings i now know in the world;-- who are a very select set, and are growing ever more so, i can inform you! in late months, feeling greatly broken and without heart for anything weighty, i have been upon a _life of john sterling;_ which will not be good for much, but will as usual gratify me by taking itself off my hands: it was one of the things i felt a kind of obligation to do, and so am thankful to have done. here is a patch of it lying by me, if you will look at a specimen. there are four hundred or more pages (prophesies the printer), a good many _letters_ and excerpts in the latter portion of the volume. already half printed, wholly written; but not to come out for a couple of months yet,--all trade being at a stand till this sublime "crystal palace" go its ways again.--and now since we are upon the business, i wish you would mention it to e.p. clark (is not that the name?) next time you go to boston: if that friendly clear-eyed man have anything to say in reference to it and american booksellers, let him say and do; he may have a copy for anybody in about a month: if _he_ have nothing to say, then let there be nothing anywhere said. for, mark o philosopher, i expressly and with emphasis prohibit _you_ at this stage of our history, and henceforth, unless i grow poor again. indeed, indeed, the commercial mandate of the thing (nature's little order on that behalf) being once fulfilled (by speaking to clark), i do not care a snuff of tobacco how it goes, and will prefer, here as elsewhere, my night's rest to any amount of superfluous money. this summer, as you may conjecture, has been very noisy with us, and productive of little,--the "wind-dust-ry of all nations" involving everything in one inane tornado. the very shopkeepers complain that there is no trade. such a sanhedrim of windy fools from all countries of the globe were surely never gathered in one city before. but they will go their ways again, they surely will! one sits quiet in that faith;--nay, looks abroad with a kind of pathetic grandfatherly feeling over this universal children's ball which the british nation in these extraordinary circumstances is giving it self! silence above all, silence is very behoveful! i read lately a small old brown french duodecimo, which i mean to send you by the first chance there is. the writer is a capitaine bossu; the production, a journal of his experiences in "la louisiane," "oyo" (_ohio_), and those regions, which looks very genuine, and has a strange interest to me, like some fractional odyssey or letter.* only a hundred years ago, and the mississippi has changed as never valley did: in older and stranger, looked at from its present date, than balbec or nineveh! say what we will, jonathan is doing miracles (of a sort) under the sun in these times now passing.--do you know _bartram's travels?_ this is of the seventies ( ) or so; treats of _florida_ chiefly, has a wondrous kind of floundering eloquence in it; and has also grown immeasurably _old._ all american libraries ought to provide themselves with that kind of book; and keep them as a kind of future _biblical_ article.-- finally on this head, can you tell me of any _good_ book on california? good: i have read several bad. but that too is worthy of some wonder; that too, like the old bucaniers, hungers and thirsts (in ingenuous minds) to have some true record and description given of it. ---------- * bossu wrote two books which are known to the student of the history of the settlement of america; one, "nouveaux voyages aux indes occidentales," paris, ; the other, "nouveaux voyages dans l'amerique septentrionale," amsterdam (paris), . ---------- and poor miss fuller, was there any _life_ ever published of her? or is any competent hand engaged on it? poor margaret, i often remember her; and think how she is asleep now under the surges of the sea. mazzini, as you perhaps know, is with us this summer; comes across once in the week or so, and tells me, or at least my wife, all his news. the roman revolution has made a man of him,--quite brightened up ever since;--and the best friend _he_ ever saw, i believe, was that same quack-president of france, who relieved him while it was still time. my brother is in annandale, working hard over _dante_ at last; talks of coming up hither shortly; i am myself very ill and miserable in the _liver_ regions; very tough otherwise,--though i have now got spectacles for small print in the twilight. _eheu fugaces,_--and yet why _eheu?_ in fact it is better to be silent.--adieu, dear emerson; i expect to get a great deal brisker by and by,--and in the first place to have a missive from boston again. my wife sends you many regards. i am as ever,-- affectionately yours, --t. carlyle cxlv. emerson to carlyle concord, july, my dear carlyle,--you must always thank me for silence, be it never so long, and must put on it the most generous interpretations. for i am too sure of your genius and goodness, and too glad that they shine steadily for all, to importune you to make assurance sure by a private beam very often. there is very little in this village to be said to you, and, with all my love of your letters, i think it the kind part to defend you from our imbecilities,--my own, and other men's. besides, my eyes are bad, and prone to mutiny at any hint of white paper. and yet i owe you all my story, if story i have. i have been something of a traveler the last year, and went down the ohio river to its mouth; walked nine miles into, and nine miles out of the mammoth cave, in kentucky,--walked or sailed, for we crossed small underground streams,--and lost one day's light; then steamed up the mississippi, five days, to galena. in the upper mississippi, you are always in a lake with many islands. "the far west" is the right name for these verdant deserts. on all the shores, interminable silent forest. if you land, there is prairie behind prairie, forest behind forest, sites of nations, no nations. the raw bullion of nature; what we call "moral" value not yet stamped on it. but in a thousand miles the immense material values will show twenty or fifty californias; that a good ciphering head will make one where he is. thus at pittsburg, on the ohio, the "iron" city, whither, from want of railroads, few yankees have penetrated, every acre of land has three or four bottoms; first of rich soil; then nine feet of bituminous coal; a little lower, fourteen feet of coal; then iron, or salt; salt springs, with a valuable oil called petroleum floating on their surface. yet this acre sells for the price of any tillage acre in massachusetts; and, in a year, the railroads will reach it, east and west.--i came home by the great northern lakes and niagara. no books, a few lectures, each winter, i write and read. in the spring, the abomination of our fugitive slave bill drove me to some writing and speech-making, without hope of effect, but to clear my own skirts. i am sorry i did not print whilst it was yet time. i am now told that the time will come again, more's the pity. now i am trying to make a sort of memoir of margaret fuller, or my part in one;--for channing and ward are to do theirs. without either beauty or genius, she had a certain wealth and generosity of nature which have left a kind of claim on our consciences to build her a cairn. and this reminds me that i am to write a note to mazzini on this matter; and, as you say you see him, you must charge yourself with delivering it. what we do must be ended by october. you too are working for sterling. it is right and kind. i learned so much from the new york _tribune,_ and, a few days after, was on the point of writing to you, provoked by a foolish paragraph which appeared in rufus griswold's journal, (new york,) purporting that r.w.e. possessed important letters of sterling, without which thomas carlyle could not write the life. what scrap of hearsay about contents of sterling's letters to me, or that i had letters, this paltry journalist swelled into this puff-ball, i know not. he once came to my house, and, since that time, may have known margaret fuller in new york; but probably never saw any letter of sterling's or heard the contents of any. i have not read again sterling's letters, which i keep as good lares in a special niche, but i have no recollection of anything that would be valuable to you. for the american public for the book, i think it important that you should take the precise step of sending phillips and sampson the early copy, and at the earliest. i saw them, and also e.p. clark, and put them in communication, and clark is to write you at once. having got so far in my writing to you, i do not know but i shall gain heart, and write more letters over sea. you will think my sloth suicidal enough. so many men as i learned to value in your country,--so many as offered me opportunities of intercourse,-- and i lose them all by silence. arthur helps is a chief benefactor of mine. i wrote him a letter by ward,--who brought the letter back. i ought to thank john carlyle, not only for me, but for a multitude of good men and women here who read his _inferno_ duly. w.e. forster sent me his penn pamphlet; i sent it to bancroft, who liked it well, only he thought forster might have made a still stronger case. clough i prize at a high rate, the man and his poetry, but write not. wilkinson i thought a man of prodigious talent, who somehow held it and so taught others to hold it cheap, as we do one of those bushel-basket memories which school-boys and school-girls often show,--and we stop their mouths lest they be troublesome with their alarming profusion. but there is no need of beginning to count the long catalogue. kindest, kindest remembrance to my benefactress, also in your house, and health and strength and victory to you. your affectionate, waldo emerson cxlvi. carlyle to emerson great malvern, worcestershire, august, dear emerson,--many thanks for your letter, which found me here about a week ago, and gave a full solution to my bibliopolic difficulties. however sore your eyes, or however taciturn your mood, there is no delay of writing when any service is to be done by it! in fact you are very good to me, and always were, in all manner of ways; for which i do, as i ought, thank the upper powers and you. that truly has been and is one of the possessions of my life in this perverse epoch of the world.... i have sent off by john chapman a copy of the _life of sterling,_ which is all printed and ready, but is not to appear till the first week of october.... along with the _sheets_ was a poor little french book for you,--book of a poor naval _mississippi_ frenchman, one "bossu," i think; written only a century ago, yet which already seemed old as the pyramids in reference to those strange fast-growing countries. i read it as a kind of defaced _romance;_ very thin and lean, but all _true,_ and very marvelous as such. it is above three weeks since my wife and i left london, (the printer having done,) and came hither with the purpose of a month of what is called "water cure"; for which this place, otherwise extremely pleasant and wholesome, has become celebrated of late years. dr. gully, the pontiff of the business in our island, warmly encouraged my purpose so soon as he heard of it; nay, urgently offered at once that both of us should become his own guests till the experiment were tried: and here accordingly we are; i water-curing, assiduously walking on the sunny mountains, drinking of the clear wells, not to speak of wet wrappages, solitary sad _steepages,_ and other singular procedures; my wife not meddling for her own behoof, but only seeing me do it. these have been three of the idlest weeks i ever spent, and there is still one to come: after which we go northward to lancashire, and across the border where my good old mother still expects me; and so, after some little visiting and dawdling, hope to find ourselves home again before september end, and the inexpressible glass palace with its noisy inanity have taken itself quite away again. it was no increase of ill-health that drove me hither, rather the reverse; but i have long been minded to try this thing: and now i think the result will be,--_zero_ pretty nearly, and one imagination the less. my long walks, my strenuous idleness, have certainly done me good; nor has the "water" done me any _ill,_ which perhaps is much to say of it. for the rest, it is a strange quasi-monastic--godless and yet _devotional_--way of life which human creatures have here, and useful to them beyond doubt. i foresee, this "water cure," under better forms, will become the _ramadhan_ of the overworked unbelieving english in time coming; an institution they were dreadfully in want of, this long while!--we had twisleton* here (often speaking of you), who is off to america again; will sail, i think, along with this letter; a semi-articulate but solid- minded worthy man. we have other officials and other _litterateurs_ (t.b. macaulay in his hired villa for one): but the mind rather shuns than seeks them, one finds solitary quasi- devotion preferable, and [greek], as pindar had it! ----------- * the late hon. edward twisleton, a man of high character and large attainments, and with a personal disposition that won the respect and affection of a wide circle of friends on both sides of the atlantic. he was the author of a curious and learned treatise entitled "the tongue not essential to speech," and his remarkable volume on "the handwriting of junius" seems to have effectually closed a long controversy. --------- richard milnes is married, about two weeks ago, and gone to vienna for a jaunt. his wife, a miss crewe (lord crewe's sister), about forty, pleasant, intelligent, and rather rich: that is the end of richard's long first act. alfred tennyson, perhaps you heard, is gone to italy with his wife: their baby died or was dead-born; they found england wearisome: alfred has been taken up on the top of the wave, and a good deal jumbled about since you were here. item thackeray; who is coming over to lecture to you: a mad world, my masters! your letter to mazzini was duly despatched; and we hear from him that he will write to you, on the subject required, without delay. browning and his wife, home from florence, are both in london at present; mean to live in paris henceforth for some time. they had seen something both of margaret and her d'ossoli, and appeared to have a true and lively interest in them; browning spoke a long while to me, with emphasis, on the subject: i think it was i that had introduced poor margaret to them. i said he ought to send these reminiscences to america,--that was the night before we left london, three weeks ago; his answer gave me the impression there had been some hindrance somewhere. accordingly, when your letter and mazzini's reached me here, i wrote to browning urgently on the subject: but he informs me that they _have_ sent all their reminiscences, at the request of mr. story; so that it is already all well.--dear emerson, you see i am at the bottom of my paper. i will write to you again before long; we cannot let you lie fallow in that manner altogether. have you got proper _spectacles_ for your eyes? i have adopted that beautiful symbol of old age, and feel myself very venerable: take care of your eyes! yours ever, t. carlyle cxlvii. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear carlyle,--i have not grown so callous by my sulky habit, but that i know where my friends are, and who can help me, in time of need. and i have to crave your good offices today, and in a matter relating once more to margaret fuller.... you were so kind as to interest yourself, many months ago, to set mazzini and browning on writing their reminiscences for us. but we never heard from either of them. lately i have learned, by way of sam longfellow, in paris, brother of our poet longfellow, that browning assured him that he did write and send a memoir to this country,--to whom, i know not. it never arrived at the hands of the fullers, nor of story, channing, or me;--though the book was delayed in the hope of such help. i hate that his paper should be lost. the little french _voyage,_ &c. of bossu, i got safely, and compared its pictures with my own, at the mississippi, the illinois, and chicago. it is curious and true enough, no doubt, though its indians are rather dim and vague, and "messieurs sauvages" good indians we have in alexander henry's _travels in canada,_ and in our modern catlin, and the best western america, perhaps, in f.a. michaux, _voyage a l'ouest des monts alleghanis,_ and in fremont. but it was california i believe you asked about, and, after looking at taylor, parkman, and the rest, i saw that the only course is to read them all, and every private letter that gets into the newspapers. so there was nothing to say. i rejoiced with the rest of mankind in the _life of sterling,_ and now peace will be to his manes, down in this lower sphere. yet i see well that i should have held to his opinion, in all those conferences where you have so quietly assumed the palms. it is said: here, that you work upon frederick the great?? however that be, health, strength, love, joy, and victory to you. --r.w. emerson cxlviii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, may, dear emerson,--i was delighted at the sight of your hand again. my manifold sins against you, involuntary all of them i may well say, are often enough present to my sad thoughts; and a kind of remorse is mixed with the other sorrow,--as if i could have _helped_ growing to be, by aid of time and destiny, the grim ishmaelite i am, and so shocking your serenity by my ferocities! i admit you were like an angel to me, and absorbed in the beautifulest manner all thunder-clouds into the depths of your immeasurable a ether;--and it is indubitable i love you very well, and have long done, and mean to do. and on the whole you will have to rally yourself into some kind of correspondence with me again; i believe you will find that also to be a commanded duty by and by! to me at any rate, i can say, it is a great want, and adds perceptibly to the sternness of these years: deep as is my dissent from your gymnosophist view of heaven and earth, i find an agreement that swallows up all conceivable dissents; in the whole world i hardly get, to my spoken human word, any other word of response which is authentically _human._ god help us, this is growing a very lonely place, this distracted dog- kennel of a world! and it is no joy to me to see it about to have its throat cut for its immeasurable devilries; that is not a pleasant process to be concerned in either more or less,-- considering above all how many centuries, base and dismal all of them, it is like to take! nevertheless _marchons,_--and swift too, if we have any speed, for the sun is sinking.... poor margaret, that is a strange tragedy that history of hers; and has many traits of the heroic in it, though it is wild as the prophecy of a sibyl. such a predetermination to _eat_ this big universe as her oyster or her egg, and to be absolute empress of all height and glory in it that her heart could conceive, i have not before seen in any human soul. her "mountain me" indeed:-- but her courage too is high and clear, her chivalrous nobleness indeed is great; her veracity, in its deepest sense, _a toute epreuve._--your copy of the book* came to me at last (to my joy): i had already read it; there was considerable notice taken of it here; and one half-volume of it (and i grieve to say only one, written by a man called emerson) was completely approved by me and innumerable judges. the rest of the book is not without considerable geniality and merits; but one wanted a clear concise narrative beyond all other merits; and if you ask here (except in that half-volume) about any fact, you are answered (so to speak) not in words, but by a symbolic tune on the bagpipe, symbolic burst of wind-music from the brass band;--which is not the plan at all!--what can have become of mazzini's letter, which he certainly did write and despatched to you, is not easily conceivable. still less in the case of browning: for browning and his wife did also write; i myself in the end of last july, having heard him talk kindly and well of poor margaret and her husband, took the liberty on your behalf of asking him to put something down on paper; and he informed me, then and repeatedly since, he had already done it,--at the request of mrs. story, i think. his address at present is, "no. avenue des champs elysees, a paris," if your american travelers still thought of inquiring.--adieu, dear emerson, till next week. yours ever, t. carlyle -------- * "the memoirs of margaret fuller ossoli." -------- cxlix. emerson to carlyle* concord, may [?], you make me happy with your loving thoughts and meanings towards me. i have always thanked the good star which made us early neighbors, in some sort, in time and space. and the beam is twice warmed by your vigorous good-will, which has steadily kept clear, kind eyes on me. -------- * from an imperfect rough draft. -------- it is good to be born in good air and outlook, and not less with a civilization, that is, with one poet still living in the world. o yes, and i feel all the solemnity and vital cheer of the benefit.--if only the mountains of water and of land and the steeper mountains of blighted and apathized moods would permit a word to pass now and then. it is very fine for you to tax yourself with all those incompatibilities. i like that thor should make comets and thunder, as well as iduna apples, or heimdal his rainbow bridge, and your wrath and satire has all too much realism in it, than that we can flatter ourselves by disposing of you as partial and heated. nor is it your fault that you do a hero's work, nor do we love you less if we cannot help you in it. pity me, o strong man! i am of a puny constitution half made up, and as i from childhood knew,--not a poet but a lover of poetry, and poets, and merely serving as writer, &c. in this empty america, before the arrival of the poets. you must not misconstrue my silences, but thank me for them all, as a true homage to your diligence which i love to defend... she* had such reverence and love for landor that i do not know but at any moment in her natural life she would have sunk in the sea, for an ode from him; and now this most propitious cake is offered to her manes. the loss of the notes of browning and of mazzini, which you confirm, astonishes me. --------- * margaret fuller. the break in continuity is in the rough draft. --------- cl. carlyle to emerson chelsea, june, dear emerson...... you are a born _enthusiast,_ as quiet as you are; and it will continue so, at intervals, to the end. i admire your sly low-voiced sarcasm too;--in short, i love the sternly-gentle close-buttoned man very well, as i have always done, and intend to continue doing!--pray observe therefore, and lay it to heart as a practical fact, that you are bound to persevere in writing to me from time to time; and will never get it given up, how sulky soever you grow, while we both remain in this world. do not i very well understand all that you say about "apathized moods," &c.? the gloom of approaching old age (approaching, nay arriving with some of us) is very considerable upon a man; and on the whole one contrives to take the very ugliest view, now and then, of all beautifulest things; and to shut one's lips with a kind of grim defiance, a kind of imperial sorrow which is almost like felicity,--so completely and composedly wretched, one is equal to the very gods! these too are necessary, moods to a man. but the earth withal is verdant, sun-beshone; and the son of adam has his place on it, and his tasks and recompenses in it, to the close;--as one remembers by and by, too. on the whole, i am infinitely solitary; but not more heavy laden than i have all along been, perhaps rather less so; i could fancy even old age to be beautiful, and to have a real divineness: for the rest, i say always, i cannot part with you, however it go; and so, in brief, you must get into the way of holding yourself obliged as formerly to a kind of _dialogue_ with me; and speak, on paper since not otherwise, the oftenest you can. let that be a point settled. i am not _writing_ on frederic the great; nor at all practically contemplating to do so. but, being in a reading mood after those furious _pamphlets_ (which have procured me showers of abuse from all the extensive genus stupid in this country, and not done me any other mischief, but perhaps good), and not being capable of reading except in a train and _about_ some object of interest to me,--i took to reading, near a year ago, about frederick, as i had twice in my life done before; and have, in a loose way, tumbled up an immense quantity of shot rubbish on that field, and still continue. not with much decisive approach to frederick's _self,_ i am still afraid! the man looks brilliant and noble to me; but how _love_ him, or the sad wreck he lived and worked in? i do not even yet _see_ him clearly; and to try making others see him--?--yet voltaire and he _are_ the celestial element of the poor eighteenth century; poor souls. i confess also to a real love for frederick's dumb followers: the prussian _soldiery._--i often say to myself, "were not _here_ the real priests and virtuous martyrs of that loud-babbling rotten generation!" and so it goes on; when to end, or in what to end, god knows. adieu, dear emerson. a blockhead (by mistake) has been let in, and has consumed all my time. good be ever with you and yours. --t. carlyle cli. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear friend,--as i find i never write a letter except at the dunning of the penny post,--which is the pest of the century,--i have thought lately of crossing to england to excuse to you my negligence of your injunction, which so flattered me by its affectionateness a year ago. i was to write once a month. my own disobedience is wonderful, and explains to me all the sins of omission of the whole world. the levity with which we can let fall into disuse such a sacrament as the exchange of greeting at short periods, is a kind of magnanimity, and should be an astonishing argument of the "immortality"; and i wonder how it has escaped the notice of philosophers. but what had i, dear wise man, to tell you? what, but that life was still tolerable; still absurdly sweet; still promising, promising, to credulous idleness;--but step of mine taken in a true direction, or clear solution of any the least secret,--none whatever. i scribble always a little,--much less than formerly,--and i did within a year or eighteen months write a chapter on fate, which--if we all live long enough, that is, you, and i, and the chapter--i hope to send you in fair print. comfort yourself--as you will--you will survive the reading, and will be a sure proof that the nut is not cracked. for when we find out what fate is, i suppose, the sphinx and we are done for; and sphinx, oedipus, and world ought, by good rights, to roll down the steep into the sea. but i was going to say, my neglect of your request will show you how little saliency is in my weeks and months. they are hardly distinguished in memory other than as a running web out of a loom, a bright stripe for day, a dark stripe for night, and, when it goes faster, even these run together into endless gray... i went lately to st. louis and saw the mississippi again. the powers of the river, the insatiate craving for nations of men to reap and cure its harvests, the conditions it imposes,--for it yields to no engineering,--are interesting enough. the prairie exists to yield the greatest possible quantity of adipocere. for corn makes pig, pig is the export of all the land, and you shall see the instant dependence of aristocracy and civility on the fat four legs. workingmen, ability to do the work of the river, abounded. nothing higher was to be thought of. america is incomplete. room for us all, since it has not ended, nor given sign of ending, in bard or hero. 't is a wild democracy, the riot of mediocrities, and none of your selfish italies and englands, where an age sublimates into a genius, and the whole population is made into paddies to feed his porcelain veins, by transfusion from their brick arteries. our few fine persons are apt to die. horatio greenough, a sculptor, whose tongue was far cunninger in talk than his chisel to carve, and who inspired great hopes, died two months ago at forty-seven years. nature has only so much vital force, and must dilute it, if it is to be multiplied into millions. "the beautiful is never plentiful." on the whole, i say to myself, that our conditions in america are not easier or less expensive than the european. for the poor scholar everywhere must be compromise or alternation, and, after many remorses, the consoling himself that there has been pecuniary honesty, and that things might have been worse. but no; we must think much better things than these. let lazarus believe that heaven does not corrupt into maggots, and that heroes do not succumb. clough is here, and comes to spend a sunday with me, now and then. he begins to have pupils, and, if his courage holds out, will have as many as he wants.... i have written hundreds of pages about england and america, and may send them to you in print. and now be good and write me once more, and i think i will never cease to write again. and give my homage to jane carlyle. ever yours, r.w. emerson clii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, may, dear emerson,--the sight of your handwriting was a real blessing to me, after so long an abstinence. you shall not know all the sad reflections i have made upon your silence within the last year. i never doubted your fidelity of heart; your genial deep and friendly recognition of my bits of merits, and my bits of sufferings, difficulties and obstructions; your forgiveness of my faults; or in fact that you ever would forget me, or cease to think kindly of me: but it seemed as if practically _old age_ had come upon the scene here too; and as if upon the whole one must make up one's mind to know that all this likewise had fallen silent, and could be possessed henceforth only on those new terms. alas, there goes much over, year after year, into the regions of the immortals; inexpressibly beautiful, but also inexpressibly sad. i have not many voices to commune with in the world. in fact i have properly no voice at all; and yours, i have often said, was the _unique_ among my fellow-creatures, from which came full response, and discourse of reason: the _solitude_ one lives in, if one has any spiritual thought at all, is very great in these epochs!--the truth is, moreover, i bought spectacles to myself about two years ago (bad print in candle- light having fairly become troublesome to me); much may lie in that! "the buying of your first pair of spectacles," i said to an old scotch gentleman, "is an important epoch; like the buying of your first razor."--"yes," answered he, "but not quite so joyful perhaps!"--well, well, i have heard from you again; and you promise to be again constant in writing. shall i believe you, this time? do it, and shame the devil! i really am persuaded it will do yourself good; and to me i know right well, and have always known, what it will do. the gaunt lonesomeness of this midnight hour, in the ugly universal _snoring_ hum of the overfilled deep-sunk posterity of adam, renders an articulate speaker precious indeed! watchman, what sayest thou, then? watchman, what of the night?-- your glimpses of the huge unmanageable mississippi, of the huge ditto model republic, have here and there something of the _epic_ in them,--_ganz nach meinem sinne._ i see you do not dissent from me in regard to that latter enormous phenomenon, except on the outer surface, and in the way of peaceably instead of _un_peaceably accepting the same. alas, all the world is a "republic of the mediocrities," and always was;--you may see what _its_ "universal suffrage" is and has been, by looking into all the ugly mud-ocean (with some old weathercocks atop) that now _is:_ the world wholly (if we think of it) is the exact stamp of men wholly, and of the _sincerest_ heart-tongue-and-hand "suffrage" they could give about it, poor devils!--i was much struck with plato, last year, and his notions about democracy: mere latter-day pamphlet _saxa et faces_ (read _faeces,_ if you like) refined into empyrean radiance and lightning of the gods!-- i, for my own part, perceive the use of all this too, the inevitability of all this; but perceive it (at the present height it has attained) to be disastrous withal, to be horrible and even damnable. that judas iscariot should come and slap jesus christ on the shoulder in a familiar manner; that all heavenliest nobleness should be flung out into the muddy streets there to jostle elbows with all thickest-skinned denizens of chaos, and get itself at every turn trampled into the gutters and annihilated:--alas, the _reverse_ of all this was, is, and ever will be, the strenuous effort and most solemn heart-purpose of every good citizen in every country of the world,--and will _reappear_ conspicuously as such (in new england and in old, first of all, as i calculate), when once this malodorous melancholy "uncle tommery" is got all well put by! which will take some time yet, i think.--and so we will leave it. i went to germany last autumn; not _seeking_ anything very definite; rather merely flying from certain troops of carpenters, painters, bricklayers, &c., &c., who had made a lodgment in this poor house; and have not even yet got their incalculable riot quite concluded. sorrow on them,--and no return to these poor premises of mine till i have quite left!--in germany i found but little; and suffered, from six weeks of sleeplessness in german beds, &c., &c., a great deal. indeed i seem to myself never yet to have quite recovered. the rhine which i honestly ascended from rotterdam to frankfort was, as i now find, my chief conquest the beautifulest river in the earth, i do believe; and my first idea of a world-river. it is many fathoms deep, broader twice over than the thames here at high water; and rolls along, mirror-smooth (except that, in looking close, you will find ten thousand little eddies in it), voiceless, swift, with trim banks, through the heart of europe, and of the middle ages wedded to the present age: such an image of calm _power_ (to say nothing of its other properties) i find i had never seen before. the old cities too are a little beautiful to me, in spite of my state of nerves; honest, kindly people too, but sadly short of our and your _despatch-of-business_ talents,--a really painful defect in the long run. i was on two of fritz's battle-fields, moreover: lobositz in bohemia, and kunersdorf by frankfurt on the oder; but did not, especially in the latter case, make much of that. schiller's death-chamber, goethe's sad court-environment; above all, luther's little room in the _wartburg_ (i believe i actually had tears in my eyes there, and kissed the old oak-table, being in a very flurried state of nerves), my belief was that under the canopy there was not at present so _holy_ a spot as that same. of human souls i found none specially beautiful to me at all, at all,--such my sad fate! of learned professors, i saw little, and that little was more than enough. tieck at berlin, an old man, lame on a sofa, i did love, and do; he is an exception, could i have seen much of him. but on the whole _universal puseyism_ seemed to me the humor of german, especially of berlin thinkers;--and i had some quite portentous specimens of that kind,--unconscious specimens of four hundred quack power! truly and really the prussian soldiers, with their intelligent _silence,_ with the touches of effective spartanism i saw or fancied in them, were the class of people that pleased me best. but see, my sheet is out! i am still reading, reading, most nightmare books about fritz; but as to writing,--_ach gott!_ never, never.--clough is coming home, i hope.--write soon, if you be not enchanted! yours ever, t. carlyle cliia. emerson to carlyle concord, august, my dear carlyle,--your kindest letter, whose date i dare not count back to,--perhaps it was may,--i have just read again, to be deeply touched by its noble tragic tone of goodness to me, not without new wonder at my perversity, and terror at what both may be a-forging to strike me. my slowness to write is a distemper that reaches all my correspondence, and not that with you only, though the circumstance is not worth stating, because, if i ceased to write to all the rest, there would yet be good reason for writing to you. i believe the reason of this recusancy is the fear of disgusting my friends, as with a book open always at the same page. for i have some experiences, that my interest in thoughts--and to an end, perhaps, only of new thoughts and thinking--outlasts that of all my reasonable neighbors, and offends, no doubt, by unhealthy pertinacity. but though rebuked by a daily reduction to an absurd solitude, and by a score of disappointments with intellectual people, and in the face of a special hell provided for me in the swedenborg universe, i am yet confirmed in my madness by the scope and satisfaction i find in a conversation once or twice in five years, if so often; and so we find or pick what we call our proper path, though it be only from stone to stone, or from island to island, in a very rude, stilted, and violent fashion. with such solitariness and frigidities, you may judge i was glad to see clough here, with whom i had established some kind of robust working-friendship, and who had some great permanent values for me. had he not taken me by surprise and fled in a night, i should have done what i could to block his way. i am too sure he will not return. the first months comprise all the shocks of disappointment that are likely to disgust a new-comer. the sphere of opportunity opens slowly, but to a man of his abilities and culture--rare enough here--with the sureness of chemistry. the giraffe entering paris wore the label, "eh bien, messieurs, il n'y a qu'une bete de plus!" and oxonians are cheap in london; but here, the eternal economy of sending things where they are wanted makes a commanding claim. do not suffer him to relapse into london. he had made himself already cordially welcome to many good people, and would have soon made his own place. he had just established his valise at my house, and was to come--the gay deceiver--once a fortnight for his sunday; and his individualities and his nationalities are alike valuable to me. i beseech you not to commend his unheroic retreat. i have lately made, one or two drafts on your goodness,--which i hate to do, both because you meet them so generously, and because you never give me an opportunity of revenge,--and mainly in the case of miss bacon, who has a private history that entitles her to high respect, and who could be helped only by facilitating her shakespeare studies, in which she has the faith and ardor of a discoverer. bancroft was to have given her letters to hallam, but gave one to sir h. ellis. everett, i believe, gave her one to mr. grote; and when i told her what i remembered hearing of spedding, she was eager to see him; which access i knew not how to secure, except through you. she wrote me that she prospers in all things, and had just received at once a summons to meet spedding at your house. but do not fancy that i send any one to you heedlessly; for i value your time at its rate to nations, and refuse many more letters than i give. i shall not send you any more people without good reason. your visit to germany will stand you in stead, when the annoyances of the journey are forgotten, and, in spite of your disclaimers, i am preparing to read your history of frederic. you are an inveterate european, and rightfully stand for your polity and antiquities and culture: and i have long since forborne to importune you with america, as if it were a humorous repetition of johnson's visit to scotland. and yet since thackeray's adventure, i have often thought how you would bear the pains and penalties; and have painted out your march triumphal. i was at new york, lately, for a few days, and fell into some traces of thackeray, who has made a good mark in this country by a certain manly blurting out of his opinion in various companies, where so much honesty was rare and useful. i am sorry never once to have been in the same town with him whilst he was here. i hope to see him, if he comes again. new york would interest you, as i am told it did him; you both less and more. the "society" there is at least self-pleased, and its own; it has a contempt of boston, and a very modest opinion of london. there is already all the play and fury that belong to great wealth. a new fortune drops into the city every day; no end is to palaces, none to diamonds, none to dinners and suppers. all spanish america discovers that only in the u. states, of all the continent, is safe investment; and money gravitates therefore to new york. the southern naphtha, too, comes in as an ingredient, and lubricates manners and tastes to that degree, that boston is hated for stiffness, and excellence in luxury is rapidly attained. of course, dining, dancing, equipaging, etc. are the exclusive beatitudes,--and thackeray will not cure us of this distemper. have you a physician that can? are you a physician, and will you come? if you will come, cities will go out to meet you. and now i see i have so much to say to you that i ought to write once a month, and i must begin at this point again incontinently. ever yours, r.w. emerson cliii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, september, dear emerson,--your letter came ten days ago; very kind, and however late, surely right welcome! you ought to stir yourself up a little, and actually begin to speak to me again. if we are getting old, that is no reason why we should fall silent, and entirely abstruse to one another. alas, i do not find as i grow older that the number of articulate-speaking human souls increases around me, in proportion to the inarticulate and palavering species! i am often abundantly solitary in heart; and regret the old days when we used to speak oftener together. i have not quitted town this year at all; have resisted calls to scotland both of a gay and a sad description (for the ashburtons are gone to john of groat's house, or the scottish _thule,_ to rusticate and hunt; and, alas, in poor old annandale a tragedy seems preparing for me, and the thing i have dreaded all my days is perhaps now drawing nigh, ah me!)--i felt so utterly broken and disgusted with the jangle of last year's locomotion, i judged it would be better to sit obstinately still, and let my thoughts _settle_ (into sediment and into clearness, as it might be); and so, in spite of great and peculiar noises moreover, here i am and remain. london is not a bad place at all in these months,--with its long clean streets, green parks, and nobody in them, or nobody one has ever seen before. out of la trappe, which does not suit a protestant man, there is perhaps no place where one can be so perfectly alone. i might study even but, as i said, there are noises going on; a _last_ desperate spasmodic effort of building,--a new top-story to the house, out of which is to be made one "spacious room" (so they call it, though it is under twenty feet square) where there shall be air _ad libitum,_ light from the sky, and no _sound,_ not even that of the cremorne cannons, shall find access to me any more! such is the prophecy; may the gods grant it! we shall see now in about a month;--then adieu to mortar-tubs to all eternity:--i endure the thing, meanwhile, as well as i can; might run to a certain rural retreat near by, if i liked at any time; but do not yet: the worst uproar here is but a trifle to that of german inns, and horrible squeaking, choking railway trains; and one does not go to seek this, _this_ is here of its own will, and for a purpose! seriously, i had for twelve years had such a sound-proof inaccessible apartment schemed out in my head; and last year, under a poor, helpless builder, had finally given it up: but chelsea, as london generally, swelling out as if it were mad, grows every year noisier; a _good_ builder turned up, and with a last paroxysm of enthusiasm i set him to. my notion is, he will succeed; in which case, it will be a great possession to me for the rest of my life. alas, this is not the kind of _silence_ i could have coveted, and could once get,--with green fields and clear skies to accompany it! but one must take such as can be had,--and thank the gods. even so, my friend. in the course of about a year of that garret sanctuary, i hope to have swept away much litter from my existence: in fact i am already, by dint of mere obstinate quiescence in such circumstances as there are, intrinsically growing fairly sounder in nerves. what a business a poor human being has with those nerves of his, with that crazy clay tabernacle of his! enough, enough; there will be all eternity to rest in, as arnauld said: "why in such a fuss, little sir?" you "apologize" for sending people to me: o you of little faith! never dream of such a thing nay, whom _did_ you send? the cincinnati lecturer* i had provided for with owen; they would have been glad to hear him, on the cedar forests, on the pigs making rattlesnakes into bacon, and the general adipocere question, under any form, at the albemarle street rooms;--and he never came to hand. as for miss bacon, we find her, with her modest shy dignity, with her solid character and strange enterprise, a real acquisition; and hope we shall now see more of her, now that she has come nearer to us to lodge. i have not in my life seen anything so tragically _quixotic_ as her shakespeare enterprise: alas, alas, there can be nothing but sorrow, toil, and utter disappointment in it for her! i do cheerfully what i can;--which is far more than she _asks_ of me (for i have not seen a prouder silent soul);--but there is not the least possibility of truth in the notion she has taken up: and the hope of ever proving it, or finding the least document that countenances it, is equal to that of vanquishing the windmills by stroke of lance. i am often truly sorry about the poor lady: but she troubles nobody with her difficulties, with her theories; she must try the matter to the end, and charitable souls must further her so far. --------- * mr. o.m. mitchell, the astronomer. --------- clough is settled in his office; gets familiarized to it rapidly (he says), and seems to be doing well. i see little of him hitherto; i did not, and will not, try to influence him in his choice of countries; but i think he is now likely to continue here, and here too he may do us some good. of america, at least of new england, i can perceive he has brought away an altogether kindly, almost filial impression,--especially of a certain man who lives in that section of the earth. more power to his elbow!--thackeray has very rarely come athwart me since his return: he is a big fellow, soul and body; of many gifts and qualities (particularly in the hogarth line, with a dash of sterne superadded), of enormous _appetite_ withal, and very uncertain and chaotic in all points except his _outer breeding,_ which is fixed enough, and _perfect_ according to the modern english style. i rather dread explosions in his history. a _big,_ fierce, weeping, hungry man; not a strong one. _ay de mi!_ but i must end, i must end. your letter awakened in me, while reading it, one mad notion. i said to myself: well, if i live to finish this frederic impossibility, or even to fling it fairly into the fire, why should not i go, in my old days, and see concord, yankeeland, and that man again, after all!--adieu, dear friend; all good be with you and yours always. --t. carlyle cliv. emerson to carlyle concord, march, my dear carlyle,--the sight of mr. samuel laurence, the day before yesterday, in new york, and of your head among his sketches, set me on thinking which had some pain where should be only cheer. for mr. laurence i hailed his arrival, on every account. i wish to see a good man whom you prize; and i like to have good englishmen come to america, which, of all countries, after their own, has the best claim to them. he promises to come and see me, and has begun most propitiously in new york. for you,--i have too much constitutional regard and ---, not to feel remorse for my short-comings and slow-comings, and i remember the maxim which the french stole from our indians,--and it was worth stealing,--"let not the grass grow on the path of friendship." ah! my brave giant, you can never understand the silence and forbearances of such as are not giants. to those to whom we owe affection, let us be dumb until we are strong, though we should never be strong. i hate mumped and measled lovers. i hate cramp in all men,--most in myself. and yet i should have been pushed to write without samuel laurence; for i lately looked into _jesuitism,_ a latter-day pamphlet, and found why you like those papers so well. i think you have cleared your skirts; it is a pretty good minority of one, enunciating with brilliant malice what shall be the universal opinion of the next edition of mankind. and the sanity was so manifest, that i felt that the over-gods had cleared their skirts also to this generation, in not leaving themselves without witness, though without this single voice perhaps i should not acquit them. also i pardon the world that reads the book as though it read it not, when i see your inveterated humors. it required courage and required conditions that feuilletonists are not the persons to name or qualify, this writing rabelais in . and to do this alone.--you must even pitch your tune to suit yourself. we must let arctic navigators and deepsea divers wear what astonishing coats, and eat what meats--wheat or whale-- they like, without criticism. i read further, sidewise and backwards, in these pamphlets, without exhausting them. i have not ceased to think of the great warm heart that sends them forth, and which i, with others, sometimes tag with satire, and with not being warm enough for this poor world;--i too,--though i know its meltings to-me-ward. then i learned that the newspapers had announced the death of your mother (which i heard of casually on the rock river, illinois), and that you and your brother john had been with her in scotland. i remembered what you had once and again said of her to me, and your apprehensions of the event which has come. i can well believe you were grieved. the best son is not enough a son. my mother died in my house in november, who had lived with me all my life, and kept her heart and mind clear, and her own, until the end. it is very necessary that we should have mothers,--we that read and write,--to keep us from becoming paper. i had found that age did not make that she should die without causing me pain. in my journeying lately, when i think of home the heart is taken out. miss bacon wrote me in joyful fulness of the cordial kindness and aid she had found at your hands, and at your wife's; and i have never thanked you, and much less acknowledged her copious letter,--copious with desired details. clough, too, wrote about you, and i have not written to him since his return to england. you will see how total is my ossification. meantime i have nothing to tell you that can explain this mild palsy. i worked for a time on my english notes with a view of printing, but was forced to leave them to go read some lectures in philadelphia and some western towns. i went out northwest to great countries which i had not visited before; rode one day, fault of broken railroads, in a sleigh, sixty-five miles through the snow, by lake michigan, (seeing how prairies and oak-openings look in winter,) to reach milwaukee; "the world there was done up in large lots," as a settler told me. the farmer, as he is now a colonist and has drawn from his local necessities great doses of energy, is interesting, and makes the heroic age for wisconsin. he lives on venison and quails. i was made much of, as the only man of the pen within five hundred miles, and by rarity worth more than venison and quails. greeley of the _new york tribune_ is the right spiritual father of all this region; he prints and disperses one hundred and ten thousand newspapers in one day,--multitudes of them in these very parts. he had preceded me, by a few days, and people had flocked together, coming thirty and forty miles to hear him speak; as was right, for he does all their thinking and theory for them, for two dollars a year. other than colonists, i saw no man. "there are no singing birds in the prairie," i truly heard. all the life of the land and water had distilled no thought. younger and better, i had no doubt been tormented to read and speak their sense for them. now i only gazed at them and their boundless land. one good word closed your letter in september, which ought to have had an instant reply, namely, that you might come westward when frederic was disposed of. speed frederic, then, for all reasons and for this! america is growing furiously, town and state; new kansas, new nebraska looming up in these days, vicious politicians seething a wretched destiny for them already at washington. the politicians shall be sodden, the states escape, please god! the fight of slave and freeman drawing nearer, the question is sharply, whether slavery or whether freedom shall be abolished. come and see. wealth, which is always interesting, for from wealth power refuses to be divorced, is on a new scale. californian quartz mountains dumped down in new york to be repiled architecturally along shore from canada to cuba, and thence west to california again. john bull interests you at home, and is all your subject. come and see the jonathanization of john. what, you scorn all this? well, then, come and see a few good people, impossible to be seen on any other shore, who heartily and always greet you. there is a very serious welcome for you here. and i too shall wake from sleep. my wife entreats that an invitation shall go from her to you. faithfully yours, r.w. emerson clv. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, dear emerson,--it was a morning not like any other which lay round it, a morning to be marked white, that one, about a week ago, when your letter came to me; a word from you yet again, after so long a silence! on the whole, i perceive you will not utterly give up answering me, but will rouse yourself now and then to a word of human brotherhood on my behalf, so long as we both continue in this planet. and i declare, the heavens will reward you; and as to me, i will be thankful for what i get, and submissive to delays and to all things: all things are good compared with flat want in that respect. it remains true, and will remain, what i have often told you, that properly there is no voice in this world which is completely human to me, which fully understands all i say and with clear sympathy and sense answers to me, but your voice only. that is a curious fact, and not quite a joyful one to me. the solitude, the silence of my poor soul, in the centre of this roaring whirlpool called universe, is great, always, and sometimes strange and almost awful. i have two million talking bipeds without feathers, close at my elbow, too; and of these it is often hard for me to say whether the so-called "wise" or the almost professedly foolish are the more inexpressibly unproductive to me. "silence, silence!" i often say to myself: "be silent, thou poor fool; and prepare for that divine silence which is now not far!"--on the whole, write to me whenever you can; and be not weary of well-doing. i have had sad things to do and see since i wrote to you: the loss of my dear and good old mother, which could not be spared me forever, has come more like a kind of total bankruptcy upon me than might have been expected, considering her age and mine. oh those last two days, that last christmas sunday! she was a true, pious, brave, and noble mother to me; and it is now all over; and the past has all become pale and sad and sacred;--and the all-devouring potency of death, what we call death, has never looked so strange, cruel and unspeakable to me. nay not _cruel_ altogether, let me say: huge, profound, _unspeakable,_ that is the word.--you too have lost your good old mother, who stayed with you like mine, clear to the last: alas, alas, it is the oldest law of nature; and it comes on every one of us with a strange originality, as if it had never happened before.-- forward, however; and no more lamenting; no more than cannot be helped. "paradise is under the shadow of our swords," said the emir: "forward!"-- i make no way in my prussian history; i bore and dig toilsomely through the unutterablest mass of dead rubbish, which is not even english, which is german and inhuman; and hardly from ten tons of learned inanity is there to be riddled one old rusty nail. for i have been back as far as pytheas who, first of speaking creatures, beheld the teutonic countries; and have questioned all manner of extinct german shadows,--who answer nothing but mumblings. and on the whole fritz himself is not sufficiently divine to me, far from it; and i am getting old, and heavy of heart;--and in short, it oftenest seems to me i shall never write any word about that matter; and have again fairly got into the element of the impossible. very well: could i help it? i can at least be honestly silent; and "bear my indigence with dignity," as you once said. the insuperable difficulty of _frederic_ is, that he, the genuine little ray of veritable and eternal that was in him, lay imbedded in the putrid eighteenth century, such an ocean of sordid nothingness, shams, and scandalous hypocrisies, as never weltered in the world before; and that in everything i can find yet written or recorded of him, he still, to all intents and purposes, most tragically _lies_ there;--and ought not to lie there, if any use is ever to be had of him, or at least of _writing_ about him; for as to him, he with his work is safe enough to us, far elsewhere.--pity me, pity me; i know not on what hand to turn; and have such a chaos filling all my earth and heaven as was seldom seen in british or foreign literature! add to which, the sacred entity, literature itself, is not growing more venerable to me, but less and ever less: good heavens, i feel often as if there were no madder set of bladders tumbling on the billows of the general bedlam at this moment than even the literary ones,--dear at twopence a gross, i should say, unless one could _annihilate_ them by purchase on those easy terms! but do not tell this in gath; let it be a sad family secret. i smile, with a kind of grave joy, over your american speculations, and wild dashing portraitures of things as they are with you; and recognize well, under your light caricature, the outlines of a right true picture, which has often made me sad and grim in late years. yes, i consider that the "battle of freedom and slavery" is very far from ended; and that the fate of poor "freedom" in the quarrel is very questionable indeed! alas, there is but one _slavery,_ as i wrote somewhere; and that, i think, is mounting towards a height, which may bring strokes to bear upon it again! meanwhile, patience; for us there is nothing else appointed.--tell me, however, what has become of your book on england? we shall really be obliged to you for that. a piece of it went through all the newspapers, some years ago; which was really unique for its quaint kindly insight, humor, and other qualities; like an etching by hollar or durer, amid the continents of vile smearing which are called "pictures" at present. come on, come on; give us the book, and don't loiter!-- miss bacon has fled away to _st. alban's_ (the _great_ bacon's place) five or six months ago; and is there working out her shakespeare problem, from the depths of her own mind, disdainful apparently, or desperate and careless, of all _evidence_ from museums or archives; i have not had an answer from her since before christmas, and have now lost her address. poor lady: i sometimes silently wish she were safe home again; for truly there can no madder enterprise than her present one be well figured. adieu, my friend; i must stop short here. write soon, if you have any charity. good be with you ever. --t. carlyle clvi. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear friend,--on this delicious spring day, i will obey the beautiful voices of the winds, long disobeyed, and address you; nor cloud the hour by looking at the letters in my drawer to know if a twelvemonth has been allowed to elapse since this tardy writing was due. mr. everett sent me one day a letter he had received from you, containing a kind message to me, which gave me pleasure and pain. i returned the letter with thanks, and with promises i would sin no more. instantly, i was whisked, by "the stormy wing of fate," out of my chain, and whirled, like a dry leaf, through the state of new york. now at home again, i read english newspapers, with all the world, and claim an imaginary privilege over my compatriots, that i revolve therein my friend's large part. ward said to me yesterday, that carlyle's star was daily rising. for c. had said years ago, when all men thought him mad, that which the rest of mortals, including the times newspaper, have at last got near enough to see with eyes, and therefore to believe. and one day, in philadelphia, you should have heard the wise young philip randolph defend you against objections of mine. but when i have such testimony, i say to myself, the high-seeing austerely exigent friend whom i elected, and who elected me, twenty years and more ago, finds me heavy and silent, when all the world elects and loves him. yet i have not changed. i have the same pride in his genius, the same sympathy with the genius that governs his, the old love with the old limitations, though love and limitation be all untold. and i see well what a piece of providence he is, how material he is to the times, which must always have a solo soprano to balance the roar of the orchestra. the solo sings the theme; the orchestra roars antagonistically but follows.--and have i not put him into my chapter of "english spiritual tendencies," with all thankfulness to the eternal creator,--though the chapter lie unborn in a trunk? 't is fine for us to excuse ourselves, and patch with promises. we shall do as before, and science is a fatalist. i follow, i find, the fortunes of my country, in my privatest ways. an american is pioneer and man of all work, and reads up his newspaper on saturday night, as farmers and foresters do. we admire the [greek], and mean to give our boys the grand habit; but we only sketch what they may do. no leisure except for the strong, the nimble have none.--i ought to tell you what i do, or i ought to have to tell you what i have done. but what can i? the same concession to the levity of the times, the noise of america comes again. i have even run on wrong topics for my parsimonious muse, and waste my time from my true studies. england i see as a roaring volcano of fate, which threatens to roast or smother the poor literary plinys that come too near for mere purpose of reporting. i have even fancied you did me a harm by the valued gift of antony wood;--which, and the like of which, i take a lotophagous pleasure in eating. yet this is measuring after appearance, measuring on hours and days; the true measure is quite other, for life takes its color and quality not from the days, but the dawns. the lucid intervals are like drowning men's moments, equivalent to the foregoing years. besides, nature uses us. we live but little for ourselves, a good deal for our children, and strangers. each man is one more lump of clay to hold the world together. it is in the power of the spirit meantime to make him rich reprisals,--which he confides will somewhere be done.--ah, my friend, you have better things to send me word of, than these musings of indolence. is frederic recreated? is frederic the great? forget my short-comings and write to me. miss bacon sends me word, again and again, of your goodness. against hope and sight she must be making a remarkable book. i have a letter from her, a few days ago, written in perfect assurance of success! kindest remembrances to your wife and to your brother. yours faithfully, r.w. emerson clvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, may, dear emerson,--last sunday, clough was here; and we were speaking about you, (much to your discredit, you need not doubt,) and how stingy in the way of letters you were grown; when, next morning, your letter itself made its appearance. thanks, thanks. you know not in the least, i perceive, nor can be made to understand at all, how indispensable your letters are to me. how you are, and have for a long time been, the one of all the sons of adam who, i felt, completely understood what i was saying; and answered with a truly _human_ voice,--inexpressibly consolatory to a poor man, in his lonesome pilgrimage, towards the evening of the day! so many voices are not human; but more or less bovine, porcine, canine; and one's soul dies away in sorrow in the sound of them, and is reduced to a dialogue with the "silences," which is of a very abstruse nature!--well, whether you write to me or not, i reserve to myself the privilege of writing to you, so long as we both continue in this world! as the beneficent presences vanish from me, one after the other, those that remain are the more precious, and i will not part with them, not with the chief of them, beyond all. this last year has been a grimmer lonelier one with me than any i can recollect for a long time. i did not go to the country at all in summer or winter; refused even my christmas at the grange with the ashburtons,--it was too sad an anniversary for me;--i have sat here in my garret, wriggling and wrestling on the worst terms with a task that i cannot do, that generally seems to me not worth doing, and yet _must_ be _done._ these are truly the terms. i never had such a business in my life before. frederick himself is a pretty little man to me, veracious, courageous, invincible in his small sphere; but he does not rise into the empyrean regions, or kindle my heart round him at all; and his history, upon which there are wagon-loads of dull bad books, is the most dislocated, unmanageably incoherent, altogether dusty, barren and beggarly production of the modern muses as given hitherto. no man of _genius_ ever saw him with eyes, except twice mirabeau, for half an hour each time. and the wretched books have no _indexes,_ no precision of detail; and i am far away from berlin and the seat of information;--and, in brief, shall be beaten miserably with this unwise enterprise in my old days; _and_ (in fine) will consent to be so, and get through it if i can before i die. this of obstinacy is the one quality i still show; all my other qualities (hope, among them) often seem to have pretty much taken leave of me; but it is necessary to hold by this last. pray for me; i will complain no more at present. general washington gained the freedom of america-- chiefly by this respectable quality i talk of; nor can a history of frederick be written, in chelsea in the year , except as _against_ hope, and by planting yourself upon it in an extremely dogged manner. we are all wool-gathering here, with wide eyes and astonished minds, at a singular rate, since you heard last from me! "balaklava," i can perceive, is likely to be a substantive in the english language henceforth: it in truth expresses compendiously what an earnest mind will experience everywhere in english life; if his soul rise at all above cotton and scrip, a man has to pronounce it all a _balaklava_ these many years. a balaklava now _yielding,_ under the pressure of rains and unexpected transit of heavy wagons; champing itself down into mere mud-gulfs,--towards the bottomless pool, if some flooring be not found. to me it is not intrinsically a new phenomenon, only an extremely hideous one. _altum silentium,_ what else can i reply to it at present? the turk war, undertaken under pressure of the mere mobility, seemed to me an enterprise worthy of bedlam from the first; and this method of carrying it on, _without_ any general, or with a mere sash and cocked-hat for one, is of the same block of stuff. _ach gott!_ is not anarchy, and parliamentary eloquence instead of work, continued for half a century everywhere, a beautiful piece of business? we are in alliance with louis napoleon (a gentleman who has shown only _housebreaker_ qualities hitherto, and is required now to show heroic ones, _or_ go to the devil); and under marechal saint-arnaud (who was once a dancing-master in this city, and continued a _thief_ in all cities), a commander of the playactor-pirate description, resembling a _general_ as alexander dumas does dante alighieri,--we have got into a very strange problem indeed!--but there is something almost grand in the stubborn thickside patience and persistence of this english people; and i do not question but they will work themselves through in one fashion or another; nay probably, get a great deal of benefit out of this astonishing slap on the nose to their self-complacency before all the world. they have not _done_ yet, i calculate, by any manner of means: they are, however, admonished in an ignominious and convincing manner, amid the laughter of nations, that they are altogether on the wrong road this great while (two hundred years, as i have been calculating often),--and i shudder to think of the plunging and struggle they will have to get into the approximately right one again. pray for them also, poor stupid overfed heavy-laden souls!--before my paper quite end, i must in my own name, and that of a select company of others, inquire rigorously of r.w.e. why he does not _give_ us that little book on england he has promised so long? i am very serious in saying, i myself want much to see it;--and that i can see no reason why we all should not, without delay. bring it out, i say, and print it, _tale quale._ you will never get it in the least like what _you_ wish it, clearly no! but i venture to warrant, it is good enough,--far too good for the readers that are to get it. such a pack of blockheads, and disloyal and bewildered unfortunates who know not their right hand from their left, as fill me with astonishment, and are more and more forfeiting all respect from me. publish the book, i say; let us have it and so have done! adieu, my dear friend, for this time. i had a thousand things more to write, but have wasted my sheet, and must end. i will take another before long, whatever you do. in my lonely thoughts you are never long absent: _valete_ all of you at concord! --t. carlyle clviii. emerson to carlyle concord, may, dear carlyle,--there is no escape from the forces of time and life, and we do not write letters to the gods or to our friends, but only to attorneys, landlords, and tenants. but the planes and platforms on which all stand remain the same, and we are ever expecting the descent of the heavens, which is to put us into familiarity with the first named. when i ceased to write to you for a long time, i said to myself,--if anything really good should happen here,--any stroke of good sense or virtue in our politics, or of great sense in a book,--i will send it on the instant to the formidable man; but i will not repeat to him every month, that there are no news. thank me for my resolution, and for keeping it through the long night.--one book, last summer, came out in new york, a nondescript monster which yet had terrible eyes and buffalo strength, and was indisputably american,--which i thought to send you; but the book throve so badly with the few to whom i showed it, and wanted good morals so much, that i never did. yet i believe now again, i shall. it is called _leaves of grass,_--was written and printed by a journeyman printer in brooklyn, new york, named walter whitman; and after you have looked into it, if you think, as you may, that it is only an auctioneer's inventory of a warehouse, you can light your pipe with it. by tomorrow's steamer goes mrs. --- to liverpool, and to switzerland and germany, by the advice of physicians, and i cannot let her go without praying you to drop your pen, and shut up german history for an hour, and extend your walk to her chambers, wherever they may be. _there's_ a piece of republicanism for you to see and hear! that person was, ten or fifteen years ago, the loveliest of women, and her speech and manners may still give you some report of the same. she has always lived with good people, and in her position is a centre of what is called good society, wherein her large heart makes a certain glory and refinement. she is one of nature's ladies, and when i hear her tell i know not what stories of her friends, or her children, or her pensioners, i find a pathetic eloquence which i know not where to match. but i suppose you shall never hear it. every american is a little displaced in london, and, no doubt, her company has grown to her. her husband is a banker connected in business with your ---, and is a man of elegant genius and tastes, and his house is a resort for fine people. thorwaldsen distinguished mrs. --- in rome, formerly, by his attentions. powers the sculptor made an admirable bust of her; clough and thackeray will tell you of her. jenny lind, like the rest, was captivated by her, and was married at her house. is not henry james in london? he knows her well. if tennyson comes to london, whilst she is there, he should see her for his "lays of good women." now please to read these things to the wise and kind ears of jane carlyle, and ask her if i have done wrong in giving my friend a letter to her? i could not ask more than that each of those ladies might appear to the other what each has appeared to me. i saw thackeray, in the winter, and he said he would come and see me here, in april or may; but he is still, i believe, in the south and west. do not believe me for my reticency less hungry for letters. i grieve at the want and loss, and am about writing again, that i may hear from you. ever affectionately yours, r.w. emerson clix. carlyle to emerson chelsea, july, dear emerson;--welcome was your letter to me, after the long interval; as welcome as any human letter could now well be. these many months and years i have been sunk in what disastrous vortexes of foreign wreck you know, till i am fallen sick and almost broken-hearted, and my life (if it were not this one interest, of doing a problem which i see to be impossible, and of smallish value if found doable!) is burdensome and without meaning to me. it is so rarely i hear the voice of a magnanimous brother man addressing any word to me: ninety-nine hundredths of the letters i get are impertinent clutchings of me by the button, concerning which the one business is, how to get handsomely loose again; what to say that shall soonest _end_ the intrusion,--if saying nothing will not be the best way. which last i often in my sorrow have recourse to, at what ever known risks. "we must pay our tribute to time": ah yes, yes;--and yet i will believe, so long as we continue together in this sphere of things there will always be a _potential_ letter coming out of new england for me, and the world not fallen irretrievably dumb.--the best is, i am about going into scotland, in two days, into deep solitude, for a couple of months beside the solway sea: i absolutely need to have the dust blown out of me, and my mad nerves rested (there is nothing else quite gone wrong): this unblest _life of frederick_ is now actually to get along into the printer's hand; --a good book being impossible upon it, there shall a bad one be done, and one's poor existence rid of it:--for which great object two months of voluntary torpor are considered the fair preliminary. in another year's time, (if the fates allow me to live,) i expect to have got a great deal of rubbish swept into chaos again. unlucky it should ever have been dug up, much of it!-- your mrs. --- should have had our best welcome, for the sake of him who sent her, had there been nothing more: but the lady never showed face at all; nor could i for a long time get any trace--and then it was a most faint and distant one as if by _double_ reflex--of her whereabout: too distant, too difficult for me, who do not make a call once in the six months lately. i did mean to go in quest (never had an _address_); but had not yet rallied for the enterprise, when mrs. --- herself wrote that she had been unwell, that she was going directly for paris, and would see us on her return. so be it:--pray only i may not be absent next! i have not seen or distinctly heard of miss bacon for a year and half past: i often ask myself, what has become of that poor lady, and wish i knew of her being safe among her friends again. i have even lost the address (which at any rate was probably not a lasting one); perhaps i could find it by the eye,--but it is five miles away; and my _non-plus-ultra_ for years past is not above half that distance. heigho! my time is all up and more; and chaos come again is lying round me, in the shape of "packing," in a thousand shapes!--browning is coming tonight to take leave. do you know browning at all? he is abstruse, but worth knowing.--and what of the _discourse on england_ by a certain man? shame! we always hear of it again as "out"; and it continues obstinately _in._ adieu, my friend. ever yours, t. carlyle clx. carlyle to emerson the gill, cummertrees, annan, n.b. august, dear emerson,--your letter alighted here yesterday;* like a winged mercury, bringing "airs from heaven" (in a sense) along with his news. i understand very well your indisposition to write; we must conform to it, as to the law of _chronos_ (oldest of the gods); but i will murmur always, "it is such a pity as of almost no other man!"--you are citizen of a "republic," and perhaps fancy yourself republican in an eminent degree: nevertheless i have remarked there is no man of whom i am so certain always to get something _kingly:_--and whenever your huge inarticulate america gets settled into _kingdoms,_ of the new model, fit for these ages which are all upon the _moult_ just now, and dreadfully like going to the devil in the interim,--then will america, and all nations through her, owe the man emerson a _debt,_ far greater than either they or he are in the least aware of at present! that i consider (for myself) to be an ascertained fact. for which i myself at least am thankful and have long been. --------- * it is missing now. --------- it pleases me much to know that this english [book], so long twinkling in our expectations and always drawn back again, is at last verily to appear: i wish i could get hold of my copy: there is no book that would suit me better just now. but we must wait for four weeks till we get back to chelsea,--unless i call find some trusty hand to extract it from the rubbish that will have accumulated there, and forward it by post. you speak as if there were something dreadful said of my own sacred self in that book: courage, my friend, it will be a most miraculous occurrence to meet with anything said by you that does me _ill;_ whether the immediate taste of it be sweet or bitter, i will take it with gratitude, you may depend,--nay even with pleasure, what perhaps is still more incredible. but an old man deluged for half a century with the brutally nonsensical vocables of his fellow-creatures (which he grows to regard soon as _rain,_ "rain of frogs" or the like, and lifts his umbrella against with indifference),--such an old gentleman, i assure you, is grateful for a word that he can recognize perennial sense in; as in this case is his sure hope. and so be the little book thrice welcome; and let all england understand (as some choice portion of england will) that there has not been a man talking about us these very many years whose words are worth the least attention in comparison. "post passing!" i must end, in mid-course; so much still untouched upon. thanks for sampson & co., and let them go their course upon me. if i can see mrs. --- about the end of september or after, i shall be right glad:--but i fear she will have fled before that?-- i am here in my native country, riding, seabathing, living on country diet,--uttering no word,--now into the fifth week; have had such a "retreat" as no la trappe hardly could have offered me. a "retreat" _without cilices,_ thistle-mattresses; and with _silent_ devotions (if any) instead of blockhead spoken ones to the virgin and others! there is still an excursion to the highlands ahead, which cannot be avoided;--then home again to _peine forte et dure._ good be with you always, dear friend. --t. carlyle clxi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, december, dear emerson,--i am really grieved to have hurt the feelings of mr. phillips;* a gentleman to whom i, on my side, had no feelings but those of respect and good will! i pray you smooth him down again, by all wise methods, into at least good-natured indifference to me. he may depend upon it i could not mean to irritate him; there lay no gain for me in that! nor is there anything of business left now between us. it is doubly and trebly evident those stereotype plates are not to him worth their prime cost here, still less, their prime cost plus any vestige of definite motive for me to concern myself in them:--whereupon the project falls on its face, and vanishes forever, with apologies all round. for as to that other method, that is a game i never thought, and never should think of playing at! you may also tell him this little biographical fact, if you think it will any way help. some ten or more years ago, i made a similar bargain with a new york house (known to you, and now i believe extinct): " " or something "percent," of selling price on the copies printed, was to be my return--not for four or five hundred pounds money laid out, but for various things i did, which gratis would by no means have been done; in fine, it was their own offer, made and accepted in due form; " percent on the copies printed." --------- * this refers to a proposed arrangement, which fell through, for the publication in america by messrs. phillips and sampson, of boston, of a complete edition of carlyle's works, to be printed from the stereotype plates of the english edition then in course of issue by messrs. chapman and hall. --------- and how many were "printed," thinks mr. phillips? i saw one set; dreadfully ugly books, errors in every page;--and to this hour i have never heard of any other! the amount remains zero net; and it would appear there was simply one copy "printed," the ugly one sent to myself, which i instantly despatched again somewhither! on second thought perhaps you had better _not_ tell mr. phillips this story, at least not in this way. _his_ integrity i would not even question by insinuation, nor need i, at the point where we now are. i perceive he sees in extraordinary brilliancy of illumination his own side of the bargain; and thinks me ignorant of several things which i am well enough informed about. in brief, make a perfect peace between us, o friend, and man of peace; and let the wampums be all wrapped up, and especially the tomahawks entirely buried, and the thing end forever! to you also i owe apologies; but not to you do i pay them, knowing from of old what you are to me. enough, enough! i got your book by post in the highlands; and had such a day over it as falls rarely to my lot! not for seven years and more have i got hold of such a book;--book by a real man, with eyes in his head; nobleness, wisdom, humor, and many other things, in the heart of him. such books do not turn up often in the decade, in the century. in fact i believe it to be worth all the books ever written by new england upon old. franklin might have written such a thing (in his own way); no other since! we do very well with it here, and the wise part of us _best._ that chapter on the church is inimitable; "the bishop asking a troublesome gentleman to take wine,"--you should see the kind of grin it awakens here on our best kind of faces. excellent the manner of that, and the matter too dreadfully _true_ in every part. i do not much seize your idea in regard to "literature," though i do details of it, and will try again. glad of that too, even in its half state; not "sorry" at _any_ part of it,--you sceptic! on the whole, write _again,_ and ever again at greater length: there lies your only fault to me. and yet i know, that also is a right noble one, and rare in our day. o my friend, save always for me some corner in your memory; i am very lonely in these months and years,--sunk to the centre of the earth, like to be throttled by the pythons and mudgods in my old days;--but shall get out again, too; and be a better boy! no "hurry" equals mine, and it is in permanence. yours ever, t. carlyle clxii. emerson to carlyle concord, may, my dear carlyle,--i see no way for you to avoid the americans but to come to america. for, first or last, we are all embarking, and all steering straight to your door. mr. and mrs. joseph longworth of cincinnati are going abroad on their travels. possibly, the name is not quite unknown to you. their father, nicholas longworth, is one of the founders of the city of cincinnati, a bigger town than boston, where he is a huge land lord and planter, and patron of sculptors and painters. and his family are most favorably known to all dwellers and strangers, in the ohio valley, as people who have well used their great wealth. his chief merit is to have introduced a systematic culture of the wine-grape and wine manufacture, by the importing and settlement of german planters in that region, and the trade is thriving to the general benefit. his son joseph is a well-bred gentleman of literary tastes, whose position and good heart make him largely hospitable. his wife is a very attractive and excellent woman, and they are good friends of mine. it seems i have at some former time told her that, when she went to england, she should see you. and they are going abroad, soon, for the first time. if you are in london, you must be seen of them. but i hailed even this need of taxing once more your often taxed courtesy, as a means to break up my long contumacy to-you-ward. please let not the wires be rusted out, so that we cannot weld them again, and let me feel the subtle fluid streaming strong. tell me what is become of _frederic,_ for whose appearance i have watched every week for months? i am better ready for him, since one or two books about voltaire, maupertuis, and company, fell in my way. yet that book will not come which i most wish to read, namely, the culled results, the quintessence of private conviction, a _liber veritatis,_ a few sentences, hints of the final moral you drew from so much penetrating inquest into past and present men. all writing is necessitated to be exoteric, and written to a human should instead of to the terrible is. and i say this to you, because you are the truest and bravest of writers. every writer is a skater, who must go partly where he would, and partly, where the skates carry him; or a sailor, who can only land where sails can be safely blown. the variations to be allowed for in the surveyor's compass are nothing like so large as those that must be allowed for in every book. and a friendship of old gentlemen who have got rid of many illusions, survived their ambition, and blushes, and passion for euphony, and surface harmonies, and tenderness for their accidental literary stores, but have kept all their curiosity and awe touching the problems of man and fate and the cause of causes,--a friendship of old gentlemen of this fortune is looking more comely and profitable than anything i have read of love. such a dream flatters my incapacities for conversation, for we can all play at monosyllables, who cannot attempt the gay pictorial panoramic styles. so, if ever i hear that you have betrayed the first symptom of age, that your back is bent a twentieth of an inch from the perpendicular, i shall hasten to believe you are shearing your prodigal overgrowths, and are calling in your troops to the citadel, and i may come in the first steamer to drop in of evenings and hear the central monosyllables. be good now again, and send me quickly--though it be the shortest autograph certificate of....* -------- * the end of this letter is lost. -------- clxiii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, june, dear emerson,--glad indeed i am to hear of you on any terms, on any subject. for the last eighteen months i have pretty much ceased all human correspondence,--writing no note that was not in a sense wrung from me; my one society the _nightmares_ (prussian and other) all that while:--but often and often the image of you, and the thoughts of old days between us, has risen sad upon me; and i have waited to get loose from the nightmares to appeal to you again,--to edacious time and you. most likely in a couple of weeks you would have heard from me again at any rate.--your friends shall be welcome to me; no friend of yours can be other at any time. nor in fact did anybody ever sent by you prove other than pleasant in this house, so pray no apologies on that small score.--if only these cincinnati patricians can find me here when they come? for i am off to the deepest solitudes discoverable (native scotland probably) so soon as i can shake the final tag rags of printer people off me;--"surely within three weeks now!" i say to myself. but i shall be back, too, if all prosper; and your longworths will be back; and madam will stand to her point, i hope. that book on friedrich of prussia--first half of it, two swoln unlovely volumes, which treat mainly of his father, &c., and leave him at his accession--is just getting out of my hands. one packet more of proofs, and i have done with it,--thanks to all the gods! no job approaching in ugliness to it was ever cut out for me; nor had i any motive to go on, except the sad negative one, "shall we be beaten in our old days, then?"--but it has thoroughly humbled me,--trampled me down into the _mud,_ there to wrestle with the accumulated stupidities of mankind, german, english, french, and other, for _all_ have borne a hand in these sad centuries;--and here i emerge at last, not _killed,_ but almost as good. seek not to look at the book,--nay in fact it is "not to be _published_ till september" (so the man of affairs settles with me yesterday, "owing to the political &c., to the season," &c.); my only stipulation was that in ten days i should be utterly out of it,--not to hear of it again till the day of judgment, and if possible not even then! in fact it is a bad book, poor, misshapen, feeble, _nearly_ worthless (thanks to _past_ generations and to me); and my one excuse is, i could not make it better, all the world having played such a game with it. well, well!--how true is that you say about the skater; and the rider too depending on his vehicles, on his roads, on his et ceteras! dismally true have i a thousand times felt it, in these late operations; never in any so much. and in short the business of writing has altogether become contemptible to me; and i am become confirmed in the notion that nobody ought to write,--unless sheer fate force him to do it;--and then he ought (if _not_ of the mountebank genus) to beg to be shot rather. that is deliberately my opinion,--or far nearer it than you will believe. once or twice i caught some tone of you in some american magazine; utterances highly noteworthy to me; in a sense, the only thing that is _speech_ at all among my fellow-creatures in this time. for the years that remain, i suppose we must continue to grumble out some occasional utterance of that kind: what can we do, at this late stage? but in the _real_ "model republic," it would have been different with two good boys of this kind!-- though shattered and trampled down to an immense degree, i do not think any bones are broken yet,--though age truly is here, and you may engage your berth in the steamer whenever you like. in a few months i expect to be sensibly improved; but my poor wife suffers sadly the last two winters; and i am much distressed by that item of our affairs. adieu, dear emerson: i have lost many things; let me not lose you till i must in some way! yours ever, t. carlyle p.s. if you read the newspapers (which i carefully abstain from doing) they will babble to you about dickens's "separation from wife," &c., &c.; fact of separation i believe is true; but all the rest is mere lies and nonsense. no crime or misdemeanor specifiable on either side; _unhappy_ together, these good many years past, and they at length end it.--sulzer said, "men are by nature _good._" "ach, mein lieber sulzer, er kennt nicht diese verdammte race," ejaculated fritz, at hearing such an axiom. clxiii.* carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, april, dear emerson,--long months ago there was sent off for you a copy of _friedrich_ of prussia, two big red volumes (for which chapman the publisher had found some "safe, swift" vehicle); and _now_ i have reason to fear they are still loitering somewhere, or at least have long loitered sorrow on them! this is to say: if you have not _yet_ got them, address a line to "saml. f. flower, esq, librarian of antiquarian society, _worcester,_ mass." (forty miles from you, they say), and that will at once bring them. in the devil's name! i never in my life was so near choked; swimming in this mother of dead dogs, and a long spell of it still ahead! i profoundly _pity myself_ (if no one else does). you shall hear of me again if i survive,--but really that is getting beyond a joke with me, and i ought to hold my peace (even to you), and swim what i can. your little touch of human speech on _burns'_* was charming; had got into the papers here (and been clipt out by me) before your copy came, and has gone far and wide since. newberg was to give it me in german, from the _allgemeine zeitung,_ but lost the leaf. adieu, my friend; very dear to me, tho' dumb. --t. carlyle (in such haste as seldom was).** --------- * emerson's fine speech was made at the celebration of the burns centenary, boston, january , . see his _miscellanies_ (works, vol. xi.), p. . ** the preceding letter was discovered in , in a little package of letters put aside by mr. emerson and marked "autographs." --------- clxiv. emerson to carlyle* concord, may, dear carlyle,--some three weeks ago came to me a note from mr. haven of worcester, announcing the arrival there of "king friedrich," and, after a fortnight, the good book came to my door. a week later, your letter arrived. i was heartily glad to get the crimson book itself. i had looked for it with the first ships. as it came not, i had made up my mind to that hap also. it was quite fair: i had disentitled myself. he, the true friend, had every right to punish me for my sluggish contumacy,-- backsliding, too, after penitence. so i read with resignation our blue american reprint, and i enclose to you a leaf from my journal at the time, which leaf i read afterwards in one of my lectures at the music hall in boston. but the book came from the man himself. he did not punish me. he is loyal, but royal as well, and, i have always noted, has a whim for dealing _en grand monarque._ the book came, with its irresistible inscription, so that i am all tenderness and all but tears. the book too is sovereignly written. i think you the true inventor of the stereoscope, as having exhibited that art in style, long before we had heard of it in drawing. ------- * this letter and the extract from the diary are printed from a copy of the original supplied to me by the kindness of mr. alexander ireland, who first printed a portion of the letter in his "ralph waldo emerson, a biographical sketch," london, . one or two words missing in the copy are inserted from the rough draft, which, as usual, varies in minor points from the letter as sent. -------- the letter came also. every child of mine knows from far that handwriting, and brings it home with speed. i read without alarm the pathetical hints of your sad plight in the german labyrinth. i know too well what invitations and assurance brought you in there, to fear any lack of guides to bring you out. more presence of mind and easy change from the microscopic to the telescopic view does not exist. i await peacefully your issue from your pretended afflictions. what to tell you of my coop and byre? ah! you are a very poor fellow, and must be left with your glory. you hug yourself on missing the illusion of children, and must be pitied as having one glittering toy the less. i am a victim all my days to certain graces of form and behavior, and can never come into equilibrium. now i am fooled by my own young people, and grow old contented. the heedless children suddenly take the keenest hold on life, and foolish papas cling to the world on their account, as never on their own. out of sympathy, we _make believe_ to value the prizes of their ambition and hope. my, two girls, pupils once or now of agassiz, are good, healthy, apprehensive, decided young people, who love life. my boy divides his time between cicero and cricket, knows his boat, the birds, and walter scott--verse and prose, through and through,-- and will go to college next year. sam ward and i tickled each other the other day, in looking over a very good company of young people, by finding in the new comers a marked improvement on their parents. there, i flatter myself, i see some emerging of our people from the prison of their politics. the insolvency of slavery shows and stares, and we shall perhaps live to see that putrid black-vomit extirpated by mere dying and planting. i am so glad to find myself speaking once more to you, that i mean to persist in the practice. be as glad as you have been. you and i shall not know each other on this platform as long as we have known. a correspondence even of twenty-five years should not be disused unless through some fatal event. life is too short, and, with all our poetry and morals, too indigent to allow such sacrifices. eyes so old and wary, and which have learned to look on so much, are gathering an hourly harvest,--and i cannot spare what on noble terms is offered me. with congratulations to jane carlyle on the grandeur of the book, yours affectionately, r.w. emerson extract from diary* here has come into the country, three or four months ago, a _history of frederick,_ infinitely the wittiest book that ever was written,--a book that one would think the english people would rise up in mass and thank the author for, by cordial acclamation, and signify, by crowning him with oakleaves, their joy that such a head existed among them, and sympathizing and much-reading america would make a new treaty or send a minister extraordinary to offer congratulation of honoring delight to england, in acknowledgment of this donation,--a book holding so many memorable and heroic facts, working directly on practice; with new heroes, things unvoiced before;--the german plutarch (now that we have exhausted the greek and roman and british plutarchs), with a range, too, of thought and wisdom so large and so elastic, not so much applying as inosculating to every need and sensibility of man, that we do not read a stereotype page, rather we see the eyes of the writer looking into ours, mark his behavior, humming, chuckling, with under-tones and trumpet-tones and shrugs, and long-commanding glances, stereoscoping every figure that passes, and every hill, river, road, hummock, and pebble in the long perspective. with its wonderful new system of mnemonics, whereby great and insignificant men are ineffaceably ticketed and marked and modeled in memory by what they were, had, and did; and withal a book that is a judgment day, for its moral verdict on the men and nations and manners of modern times. --------- * in the first edition, this extract was printed from the original diary; it is now printed according to the copy sent abroad. -------- and this book makes no noise; i have hardly seen a notice of it in any newspaper or journal, and you would think there was no such book. i am not aware that mr. buchanan has sent a special messenger to great cheyne row, chelsea, or that mr. dallas has been instructed to assure mr. carlyle of his distinguished consideration. but the secret wits and hearts of men take note of it, not the less surely. they have said nothing lately in praise of the air, or of fire, or of the blessing of love, and yet, i suppose, they are sensible of these, and not less of this book, which is like these. clxv. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear carlyle,--can booksellers break the seal which the gods do not, and put me in communication again with the loyalest of men? on the ground of mr. wight's honest proposal to give you a benefit from his edition,* i, though unwilling, allowed him to copy the daguerre of your head. the publishers ask also some expression of your good will to their work.... -------- * mr. o.w. wight of new york, an upright "able editor," who, had just made arrangements for the publication of a very satisfactory edition of carlyle's _miscellaneous essays._ -------- i commend you to the gods who love and uphold you, and who do not like to make their great gifts vain, but teach us that the best life-insurance is a great task. i hold you to be one of those to whom all is permitted, and who carry the laws in their hand. continue to be good to your old friends. 't is no matter whether they write to you or not. if not, they save your time. when _friedrich_ is once despatched to gods and men, there was once some talk that you should come to america! you shall have an ovation such, and on such sincerity, as none have had. ever affectionately yours, r.w. emerson i do not know mr. wight, but he sends his open letter, which i fear is already old, for me to write in: and i will not keep it, lest it lose another steamer. clxvi. carlyle to emerson chelsea, london, april, dear emerson,--it is a special favor of heaven to me that i hear of you again by this accident; and am made to answer a word _de profundis._ it is constantly among the fairest of the few hopes that remain for me on the other side of this stygian abyss of a _friedrich_ (should i ever get through it alive) that i _shall then_ begin writing to you again, who knows if not see you in the body before quite taking wing! for i feel always, what i have some times written, that there is (in a sense) but one completely human voice to me in the world; and that you are it, and have been,--thanks to you, whether you speak or not! let me say also, while i am at it, that the few words you sent me about those first two volumes are present with me in the far more frightful darknesses of these last two; and indeed are often almost my one encouragement. that is a fact, and not exaggerated, though you think it is. i read some criticisms of my wretched book, and hundreds of others i in the gross refused to read; they were in praise, they were in blame; but not one of them looked into the eyes of the object, and in genuine human fashion responded to its human strivings, and recognized it,--completely right, though with generous exaggeration! that was well done, i can tell you: a human voice, far out in the waste deeps, among the inarticulate sea-krakens and obscene monsters, loud-roaring, inexpressibly ugly, dooming you as if to eternal solitude by way of wages,-- "hath exceeding much refreshment in it," as my friend oliver used to say. having not one spare moment at present, i will answer to _you_ only the whole contents of that letter; you in your charity will convey to mr. wight what portion belongs to him. wight, if you have a chance of him, is worth knowing; a genuine bit of metal, too thin and ringing for my tastes (hammered, in fact, upon the yankee anvils), but recognizably of steel and with a keen fire- edge. pray signify to him that he has done a thing agreeable to me, and that it will be pleasant if i find it will not hurt _him._ profit to me out of it, except to keep his own soul clear and sound (to his own sense, as it always will be to mine), is perfectly indifferent; and on the whole i thank him heartily for showing me a chivalrous human brother, instead of the usual vulturous, malodorous, and much avoidable phenomenon, in transatlantic bibliopoly! this is accurately true; and so far as his publisher and he can extract encouragement from this, in the face of vested interests which i cannot judge of, it is theirs without reserve.... adieu, my friend; i have not written so much in the letter way, not, i think, since you last heard of me. in my despair it often seems as if i should never write more; but be sunk here, and perish miserably in the most undoable, least worthy, most disgusting and heart breaking of all the labors i ever had. but perhaps also not, not quite. in which case-- yours ever truly at any rate, t. carlyle no time to re-read. i suppose you can decipher. clxvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, january, dear emerson,--the sight of my hand-writing will, i know, be welcome again. though i literally do not write the smallest note once in a month, or converse with anything but prussian nightmares of a hideous [nature], and with my horse (who is human in comparison), and with my poor wife (who is altogether human, and heroically cheerful to me, in her poor weak state),--i must use the five minutes, which have fallen to me today, in acknowledgment, _du_e by all laws terrestrial and celestial, of the last book* that has come from you. -------- * "the conduct of life." -------- i read it a great while ago, mostly in sheets, and again read it in the finely printed form,--i can tell you, if you do not already guess, with a satisfaction given me by the books of no other living mortal. i predicted to your english bookseller a great sale even, reckoning it the best of all your books. what the sale was or is i nowhere learned; but the basis of my prophecy remains like the rocks, and will remain. indeed, except from my brother john, i have heard no criticism that had much rationality,--some of them incredibly irrational (if that matter had not altogether become a barking of dogs among us);--but i always believe there are in the mute state a great number of thinking english souls, who can recognize a thinker and a sayer, of perennially human type and welcome him as the rarest of miracles, in "such a spread of knowledge" as there now is:--one english soul of that kind there indubitably is; and i certify hereby, notarially if you like, that such is emphatically his view of the matter. you have grown older, more pungent, piercing;--i never read from you before such lightning-gleams of meaning as are to be found here. the finale of all, that of "illusions" falling on us like snow-showers, but again of "the gods sitting steadfast on their thrones" all the while,--what a _fiat lux_ is there, into the deeps of a philosophy, which the vulgar has not, which hardly three men living have, yet dreamt of! _well done,_ i say; and so let that matter rest. i am still twelve months or so from the end of my task; very uncertain often whether i can, even at this snail's pace, hold out so long. in my life i was never worn nearly so low, and seem to get _weaker_ monthly. courage! if i do get through, you shall hear of me, again. yours forever, t. carlyle clxviii. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear carlyle,--...i have to thank you for the cordial note which brought me joy, many weeks ago. it was noble and welcome in all but its boding account of yourself and your task. but i have had experience of your labors, and these deplorations i have long since learned to distrust. we have settled it in america, as i doubt not it is settled in england, that _frederick_ is a history which a beneficent providence is not very likely to interrupt. and may every kind and tender influence near you and over you keep the best head in england from all harm. affectionately, r.w. emerson clxix. emerson to carlyle* concord, december, my dear friend,--long ago, as soon as swift steamers could bring the new book across the sea, i received the third volume of _friedrich,_ with your autograph inscription, and read it with joy. not a word went to the beloved author, for i do not write or think. i would wait perhaps for happier days, as our president lincoln will not even emancipate slaves, until on the heels of a victory, or the semblance of such. but he waited in vain for his triumph, nor dare i in my heavy months expect bright days. the book was heartily grateful, and square to the author's imperial scale. you have lighted the glooms, and engineered away the pits, whereof you poetically pleased yourself with complaining, in your sometime letter to me, clean out of it, according to the high italian rule, and have let sunshine and pure air enfold the scene. first, i read it honestly through for the history; then i pause and speculate on the muse that inspires, and the friend that reports it. 't is sovereignly written, above all literature, dictating to all mortals what they shall accept as fated and final for their salvation. it is mankind's bill of rights and duties, the royal proclamation of intellect ascending the throne, announcing its good pleasure, that, hereafter, _as heretofore,_ and now once for all, the world shall be governed by common sense and law of morals, or shall go to ruin. --------- * portions of this and of the following letter of emerson have been printed by mr. alexander ireland in his "ralph waldo emerson: recollections of his visits to england," &c. london, . ---------- but the manner of it!--the author sitting as demiurgus, trotting out his manikins, coaxing and bantering them, amused with their good performance, patting them on the back, and rating the naughty dolls when they misbehave; and communicating his mind ever in measure, just as much as the young public can understand; hinting the future, when it would be useful; recalling now and then illustrative antecedents of the actor, impressing, the reader that he is in possession of the entire history centrally seen, that his investigation has been exhaustive, and that he descends too on the petty plot of prussia from higher and cosmical surveys. better i like the sound sense and the absolute independence of the tone, which may put kings in fear. and, as the reader shares, according to his intelligence, the haughty _coup d'oeil_ of this genius, and shares it with delight, i recommend to all governors, english, french, austrian, and other, to double their guards, and look carefully to the censorship of the press. i find, as ever in your books, that one man has deserved well of mankind for restoring the scholar's profession to its highest use and dignity.* i find also that you are very wilful, and have made a covenant with your eyes that they shall not see anything you do not wish they should. but i was heartily glad to read somewhere that your book was nearly finished in the manuscript, for i could wish you to sit and taste your fame, if that were not contrary to law of olympus. my joints ache to think of your rugged labor. now that you have conquered to yourself such a huge kingdom among men, can you not give yourself breath, and chat a little, an emeritus in the eternal university, and write a gossiping letter to an old american friend or so? alas, i own that i have no right to say this last,--i who write never. -------- * as long before as emerson wrote in his diary: "carlyle in his new book" (_past and present_), "as everywhere, is a continuer of the great line of scholars in the world, of horace, varro, pliny, erasmus, scaliger, milton, and well sustains their office in ample credit and honor." --------- here we read no books. the war is our sole and doleful instructor. all our bright young men go into it, to be misused and sacrificed hitherto by incapable leaders. one lesson they all learn,--to hate slavery, _teterrima causa._ but the issue does not yet appear. we must get ourselves morally right. nobody can help us. 't is of no account what england or france may do. unless backed by our profligate parties, their action would be nugatory, and, if so backed, the worst. but even the war is better than the degrading and descending politics that preceded it for decades of years, and our legislation has made great strides, and if we can stave off that fury of trade which rushes to peace at the cost of replacing the south in the _status ante bellum,_ we can, with something more of courage, leave the problem to another score of years,--free labor to fight with the beast, and see if bales and barrels and baskets cannot find out that they pass more commodiously and surely to their ports through free hands, than through barbarians. i grieved that the good clough, the generous, susceptible scholar, should die. i read over his _bothie_ again, full of the wine of youth at oxford. i delight in matthew arnold's fine criticism in two little books. give affectionate remembrances from me to jane carlyle, whom ---'s happiness and accurate reporting restored to me in brightest image. always faithfully yours, r.w. emerson clxx. carlyle to emerson chelsea, march, dear emerson,--this will be delivered to you by the hon. lyulph stanley, an excellent, intelligent young gentleman whom i have known ever since his infancy,--his father and mother being among my very oldest friends in london; "lord and lady stanley of alderley" (not of knowesley, but a cadet branch of it), whom perhaps you did not meet while here. my young friend is coming to look with his own eyes at your huge and hugely travailing country;--and i think will agree with you, better than he does with me, in regard to that latest phenomenon. at all events, he regards "emerson" as intelligent englishmen all do; and you will please me much by giving him your friendliest reception and furtherance,--which i can certify that he deserves for his own sake, not counting mine at all. probably _he_ may deliver you the vol. iv. of _frederic;_ he will tell you our news (part of which, what regards my poor wife, is very bad, though god be thanked not yet the worst);--and, in some six months, he may bring me back some human tidings from concord, a place which always inhabits my memory,--though it is so dumb latterly! yours ever, t. carlyle clxxi. emerson to carlyle concord, september, dear carlyle,--your friend, young stanley, brought me your letter now too many days ago. it contained heavy news of your household,--yet such as in these our autumnal days we must await with what firmness we can. i hear with pain that your wife, whom i have only seen beaming goodness and intelligence, has suffered and suffers so severely. i recall my first visit to your house, when i pronounced you wise and fortunate in relations wherein best men are often neither wise nor fortunate. i had already heard rumors of her serious illness. send me word, i pray you, that there is better health and hope. for the rest, the colonna motto would fit your letter, "though sad, i am strong." i had received in july, forwarded by stanley, on his flight through boston, the fourth volume of _friedrich,_ and it was my best reading in the summer, and for weeks my only reading: one fact was paramount in all the good i drew from it, that whomsoever many years had used and worn, they had not yet broken any fibre of your force:--a pure joy to me, who abhor the inroads which time makes on me and on my friends. to live too long is the capital misfortune, and i sometimes think, if we shall not parry it by better art of living, we shall learn to include in our morals some bolder control of the facts. i read once, that jacobi declared that he had some thoughts which--if he should entertain them--would put him to death: and perhaps we have weapons in our intellectual armory that are to save us from disgrace and impertinent relation to the world we live in. but this book will excuse you from any unseemly haste to make up your accounts, nay, holds you to fulfil your career with all amplitude and calmness. i found joy and pride in it, and discerned a golden chain of continuity not often seen in the works of men, apprising me that one good head and great heart remained in england,--immovable, superior to his own eccentricities and perversities, nay, wearing these, i can well believe, as a jaunty coat or red cockade to defy or mislead idlers, for the better securing his own peace, and the very ends which the idlers fancy he resists. england's lease of power is good during his days. i have in these last years lamented that you had not made the visit to america, which in earlier years you projected or favored. it would have made it impossible that your name should be cited for one moment on the side of the enemies of mankind. ten days' residence in this country would have made you the organ of the sanity of england and of europe to us and to them, and have shown you the necessities and aspirations which struggle up in our free states, which, as yet, have no organ to others, and are ill and unsteadily articulated here. in our today's division of republican and democrat, it is certain that the american nationality lies in the republican party (mixed and multiform though that party be); and i hold it not less certain, that, viewing all the nationalities of the world, the battle for humanity is, at this hour, in america. a few days here would show you the disgusting composition of the party which within the union resists the national action. take from it the wild irish element, imported in the last twenty-five year's into this country, and led by romish priests, who sympathize, of course, with despotism, and you would bereave it of all its numerical strength. a man intelligent and virtuous is not to be found on that side. ah! how gladly i would enlist you, with your thunderbolt, on our part! how gladly enlist the wise, thoughtful, efficient pens and voices of england! we want england and europe to hold our people stanch to their best tendency. are english of this day incapable of a great sentiment? can they not leave caviling at petty failures, and bad manners, and at the dunce part (always the largest part in human affairs), and leap to the suggestions and finger-pointings of the gods, which, above the understanding, feed the hopes and guide the wills of men? this war has been conducted over the heads of all the actors in it; and the foolish terrors, "what shall we do with the negro?" "the entire black population is coming north to be fed," &c., have strangely ended in the fact that the black refuses to leave his climate; gets his living and the living of his employers there, as he has always done; is the natural ally and soldier of the republic, in that climate; now takes the place of two hundred thousand white soldiers; and will be, as the conquest of the country proceeds, its garrison, till peace, without slavery, returns. slaveholders in london have filled english ears with their wishes and perhaps beliefs; and our people, generals, and politicians have carried the like, at first, to the war, until corrected by irresistible experience. i shall always respect war hereafter. the cost of life, the dreary havoc of comfort and time, are overpaid by the vistas it opens of eternal life, eternal law, reconstructing and uplifting society, --breaks up the old horizon, and we see through the rifts a wider. the dismal malthus, the dismal debow, have had their night. our census of , and the war, are poems, which will, in the next age, inspire a genius like your own. i hate to write you a newspaper, but, in these times, 't is wonderful what sublime lessons i have once and again read on the bulletin-boards in the streets. everybody has been wrong in his guess, except good women, who never despair of an ideal right. i thank you for sending to me so gracious a gentleman as mr. stanley, who interested us in every manner, by his elegance, his accurate information of that we wished to know, and his surprising acquaintance with the camp and military politics on our frontier. i regretted that i could see him so little. he has used his time to the best purpose, and i should gladly have learned all his adventures from so competent a witness. forgive this long writing, and keep the old kindness which i prize above words. my kindest salutations to the dear invalid! --r.w. emerson clxxii. carlyle to emerson cummertrees, annan, scotland, june, dear emerson,--though my hand is shaking (as you sadly notice) i determine to write you a little note today. what a severance there has been these many sad years past!--in the first days of february i ended my weary book; a totally worn-out man, got to shore again after far the ugliest sea he had ever swam in. in april or the end of march, when the book was published, i duly handed out a copy for concord and you; it was to be sent by mail; but, as my publisher (a _new_ chapman, very unlike the _old_) discloses to me lately an incredible negligence on such points, it is quite possible the dog may _not,_ for a long while, have put it in the post-office (though he faithfully charged me the postage of it, and was paid), and that the poor waif may never yet have reached you! patience: it will come soon enough,--there are two thick volumes, and they will stand you a great deal of reading; stiff rather than "light." since february last, i have been sauntering about in devonshire, in chelsea, hither, thither; idle as a dry bone, in fact, a creature sinking into deeper and deeper _collapse,_ after twelve years of such mulish pulling and pushing; creature now good for nothing seemingly, and much indifferent to being so in permanence, if that be the arrangement come upon by the powers that made us. some three or four weeks ago, i came rolling down hither, into this old nook of my birthland, to see poor old annandale again with eyes, and the poor remnants of kindred and loved ones still left me there; i was not at first very lucky (lost sleep, &c.); but am now doing better, pretty much got adjusted to my new element, new to me since about six years past,--the longest absence i ever had from it before. my work was getting desperate at that time; and i silently said to myself, "we won't return till _it_ is done, or _you_ are done, my man!" this is my eldest living sister's house; one of the most rustic farmhouses in the world, but abounding in all that is needful to me, especially in the truest, _silently_-active affection, the humble generosity of which is itself medicine and balm. the place is airy, on dry waving knolls cheerfully (with such _water_ as i never drank elsewhere, except at malvern) all round me are the mountains, cheviot and galloway (three to fifteen miles off), cumberland and yorkshire (say forty and fifty, with the solway brine and sands intervening). i live in total solitude, sauntering moodily in thin checkered woods, galloping about, once daily, by old lanes and roads, oftenest latterly on the wide expanses of solway shore (when the tide is _out!_) where i see bright busy cottages far off, houses over even in cumberland, and the beautifulest amphitheatre of eternal hills,--but meet no living creature; and have endless thoughts as loving and as sad and sombre as i like. my youngest brother (whom on the whole i like best, a rustic man, the express image of my father in his ways of living and thinking) is within ten miles of me; brother john "the doctor" has come down to dumfries to a sister (twelve miles off), and runs over to me by rail now and then in few minutes. i have books; but can hardly be troubled with them. pitiful temporary babble and balderdash, in comparison to what the silences can say to one. enough of all that: you perceive me sufficiently at this point of my pilgrimage, as withdrawn to _hades_ for the time being; intending a month's walk there, till the muddy semi-solutions settle into sediment according to what laws they have, and there be perhaps a partial restoration of clearness. i have to go deeper into scotland by and by, perhaps to try _sailing,_ which generally agrees with me; but till the end of september i hope there will be no london farther. my poor wife, who is again poorly since i left (and has had frightful sufferings, last year especially) will probably join me in this region before i leave it. and see here, this is authentically the way we figure in the eye of the sun; and something like what your spectacles, could they reach across the ocean into these nooks, would teach you of us. there are three photographs which i reckon fairly _like;_ _these_ are properly what i had to send you today,--little thinking that so much surplusage would accumulate about them; to which i now at once put an end. your friend conway,* who is a boundless admirer of yours, used to come our way regularly now and then; and we always liked him well. a man of most gentlemanly, ingenious ways; turn of thought always loyal and manly, though tending to be rather _winged_ than solidly ambulatory. he talked of coming to scotland too; but it seems uncertain whether we shall meet. he is clearly rather a favorite among the london people,--and tries to explain america to them; i know not if with any success. as for me, i have entirely lost count and reckoning of your enormous element, and its enormous affairs and procedures for some time past; and can only wish (which no man more heartily does) that all may issue in as blessed a way as you hope. fat--(if you know and his fat commonplace at all) amused me much by a thing he had heard of yours in some lecture a year or two ago. "the american eagle is a mighty bird; but what is he to the american peacock." at which all the audience had exploded into laughter. very good. adieu, old friend. yours ever, t. carlyle --------- * mr. moncure d. conway. --------- clxxiii. emerson to carlyle concord, january, dear carlyle,--is it too late to send a letter to your door to claim an old right to enter, and to scatter all your convictions that i had passed under the earth? you had not to learn what a sluggish pen mine is. of course, the sluggishness grows on me, and even such a trumpet at my gate as a letter from you heralding-in noble books, whilst it gives me joy, cannot heal the paralysis. yet your letter deeply interested me, with the account of your rest so well earned. you had fought your great battle, and might roll in the grass, or ride your pony, or shout to the cumberland or scotland echoes, with largest leave of men and gods. my lethargies have not dulled my delight in good books. i read these in the bright days of our new peace, which added a lustre to every genial work. now first we had a right to read, for the very bookworms were driven out of doors whilst the war lasted. i found in the book no trace of age, which your letter so impressively claimed. in the book, the hand does not shake, the mind is ubiquitous. the treatment is so spontaneous, self-respecting, defiant,--liberties with your hero as if he were your client, or your son, and you were proud of him, and yet can check and chide him, and even put him in the corner when he is not a good boy, freedoms with kings, and reputations, and nations, yes, and with principles too,--that each reader, i suppose, feels complimented by the confidences with which he is honored by this free-tongued, masterful hermes.--who knows what the [greek] will say next? this humor of telling the story in a gale,--bantering, scoffing, at the hero, at the enemy, at the learned reporters,--is a perpetual flattery to the admiring student,--the author abusing the whole world as mad dunces,--all but you and i, reader! ellery channing borrowed my volumes v. and vi., worked slowly through them,--midway came to me for volumes i., ii., iii., iv., which he had long already read, and at last returned all with this word, "if you write to mr. carlyle, you may say to him, that i _have_ read these books, and they have made it impossible for me to read any other books but his." 't is a good proof of their penetrative force, the influence on the new stirling, who writes "the secret of hegel." he is quite as much a student of carlyle to learn treatment, as of hegel for his matter, and plays the same game on his essence-dividing german, which he has learned of you on _friedrich._ i have read a good deal in this book of stirling's, and have not done with it. one or two errata i noticed in the last volumes of _friedrich,_ though the books are now lent, and i cannot indicate the pages. fort pulaski, which is near savannah, is set down as near charleston. charleston, south carolina, your printer has twice called charlestown, which is the name of the town in massachusetts in which bunker hill stands.--bancroft told me that the letters of montcalm are spurious. we always write and say ticonderoga. i am sorry that jonathan looks so unamiable seen from your island. yet i have too much respect for the writing profession to complain of it. it is a necessity of rhetoric that there should be shades, and, i suppose, geography and government always determine, even for the greatest wits, where they shall lay their shadows. but i have always 'the belief that a trip across the sea would have abated your despair of us. the world is laid out here in large lots, and the swing of natural laws is shared by the population, as it is not--or not as much--in your feudal europe. my countrymen do not content me, but they are susceptible of inspirations. in the war it was humanity that showed itself to advantage,--the leaders were prompted and corrected by the intuitions of the people, they still demanding the more generous and decisive measure, and giving their sons and their estates as we had no example before. in this heat, they had sharper perceptions of policy, of the ways and means and the life of nations, and on every side we read or heard fate-words, in private letters, in railway cars, or in the journals. we were proud of the people and believed they would not go down from this height. but peace came, and every one ran back into his shop again, and can hardly be won to patriotism more, even to the point of chasing away the thieves that are stealing not only the public gold, but the newly won rights of the slave, and the new muzzles we had contrived to keep the planter from sucking his blood. very welcome to me were the photographs,--your own, and jane carlyle's. hers, now seen here for the first time, was closely scanned, and confirmed the better accounts that had come of her improved health. your earlier tidings of her had not been encouraging. i recognized still erect the wise, friendly presence first seen at craigenputtock. of your own--the hatted head is good, but more can be read in the head leaning on the hand, and the one in a cloak. at the end of much writing, i have little to tell you of myself. i am a bad subject for autobiography. as i adjourn letters, so i adjourn my best tasks.... my wife joins me in very kind regards to mrs. carlyle. use your old magnanimity to me, and punish my stony ingratitudes by new letters from time to time. ever affectionately and gratefully yours, r.w. emerson clxxiv. emerson to carlyle concord, may, my dear carlyle,--i have just been shown a private letter from moncure conway to one of his friends here, giving some tidings of your sad return to an empty home. we had the first news last week. and so it is. the stroke long threatened has fallen at last, in the mildest form to its victim, and relieved to you by long and repeated reprieves. i must think her fortunate also in this gentle departure, as she had been in her serene and honored career. we would not for ourselves count covetously the descending steps after we have passed the top of the mount, or grudge to spare some of the days of decay. and you will have the peace of knowing her safe, and no longer a victim. i have found myself recalling an old verse which one utters to the parting soul,-- "for thou hast passed all chance of human life, and not again to thee shall beauty die." it is thirty-three years in july, i believe, since i first saw her, and her conversation and faultless manners gave assurance of a good and happy future. as i have not witnessed any decline, i can hardly believe in any, and still recall vividly the youthful wife, and her blithe account of her letters and homages from goethe, and the details she gave of her intended visit to weimar, and its disappointment. her goodness to me and to my friends was ever perfect, and all americans have agreed in her praise. elizabeth hoar remembers her with entire sympathy and regard. i could heartily wish to see you for an hour in these lonely days. your friends, i know, will approach you as tenderly as friends can; and i can believe that labor--all whose precious secrets you know--will prove a consoler,--though it cannot quite avail, for she was the rest that rewarded labor. it is good that you are strong, and built for endurance. nor will you shun to consult the awful oracles which in these hours of tenderness are sometimes vouchsafed. if to any, to you. i rejoice that she stayed to enjoy the knowledge of your good day at edinburgh, which is a leaf we would not spare from your book of life. it was a right manly speech to be so made, and is a voucher of unbroken strength,--and the surroundings, as i learn, were all the happiest,--with no hint of change. i pray you bear in mind your own counsels. long years you must still achieve, and, i hope, neither grief nor weariness will let you "join the dim choir of the bards that have been," until you have written the book i wish and wait for,--the sincerest confessions of your best hours. my wife prays to be remembered to you with sympathy and affection. ever yours faithfully, r.w. emerson clxxv. carlyle to emerson mentone, france, alpes maritimes january, my dear emerson,--it is along time since i last wrote to you; and a long distance in space and in fortune,--from the shores of the solway in summer , to this niche of the alps and mediterranean today, after what has befallen me in the interim. a longer interval, i think, and surely by far a sadder, than ever occurred between us before, since we first met in the scotch moors, some five and thirty years ago. you have written me various notes, too, and letters, all good and cheering to me,-- almost the only truly human speech i have heard from anybody living;--and still my stony silence could not be broken; not till now, though often looking forward to it, could i resolve on such a thing. you will think me far gone, and much bankrupt in hope and heart;--and indeed i am; as good as without hope and without fear; a gloomily serious, silent, and sad old man; gazing into the final chasm of things, in mute dialogue with "death, judgment, and eternity" (dialogue _mute_ on _both_ sides!), not caring to discourse with poor articulate-speaking fellow creatures on their sorts of topics. it is right of me; and yet also it is not right. i often feel that i had better be dead than thus indifferent, contemptuous, disgusted with the world and its roaring nonsense, which i have no thought farther of lifting a finger to help, and only try to keep out of the way of, and shut my door against. but the truth is, i was nearly killed by that hideous book on friedrich,--twelve years in continuous wrestle with the nightmares and the subterranean hydras;--nearly _killed,_ and had often thought i should be altogether, and must die leaving the monster not so much as finished! this is one truth, not so evident to any friend or onlooker as it is to myself: and then there is another, known to myself alone, as it were; and of which i am best not to speak to others, or to speak to them no farther. by the calamity of april last, i lost my little all in this world; and have no soul left who can make any corner of this world into a _home_ for me any more. bright, heroic, tender, true and noble was that lost treasure of my heart, who faithfully accompanied me in all the rocky ways and climbings; and i am forever poor without her. she was snatched from me in a moment,--as by a death from the gods. very beautiful her death was; radiantly beautiful (to those who understand it) had all her life been _quid plura?_ i should be among the dullest and stupidest, if i were not among the saddest of all men. but not a word more on all this. all summer last, my one solacement in the form of work was writing, and sorting of old documents and recollections; summoning out again into clearness old scenes that had now closed on me without return. sad, and in a sense sacred; it was like a kind of _worship;_ the only _devout_ time i had had for a great while past. these things i have half or wholly the intention to burn out of the way before i myself die:--but such continues still mainly my employment,--so many hours every forenoon; what i call the "work" of my day;--to me, if to no other, it is useful; to reduce matters to writing means that you shall know them, see them in their origins and sequences, in their essential lineaments, considerably better than you ever did before. to set about writing my own _life_ would be no less than horrible to me; and shall of a certainty never be done. the common impious vulgar of this earth, what has it to do with my life or me? let dignified oblivion, silence, and the vacant azure of eternity swallow _me;_ for my share of it, that, verily, is the handsomest, or one handsome way, of settling my poor account with the _canaille_ of mankind extant and to come. "immortal glory," is not that a beautiful thing, in the shakespeare clubs and literary gazettes of our improved epoch?--i did not leave london, except for fourteen days in august, to a fine and high old lady- friend's in kent; where, riding about the woods and by the sea- beaches and chalk cliffs, in utter silence, i felt sadder than ever, though a little less _miserably_ so, than in the intrusive babblements of london, which i could not quite lock out of doors. we read, at first, tennyson's _idyls,_ with profound recognition of the finely elaborated execution, and also of the inward perfection of _vacancy,_--and, to say truth, with considerable impatience at being treated so very like infants, though the lollipops were so superlative. we gladly changed for one emerson's _english traits;_ and read that, with increasing and ever increasing satisfaction every evening; blessing heaven that there were still books for grown-up people too! that truly is a book all full of thoughts like winged arrows (thanks to the bowyer from us both):--my lady-friend's name is miss davenport bromley; it was at wooton, in her grandfather's house, in staffordshire, that rousseau took shelter in ; and one hundred and six years later she was reading emerson to me with a recognition that would have pleased the man, had he seen it. about that same time my health and humors being evidently so, the dowager lady ashburton (not the high lady you saw, but a successor of mackenzie-highland type), who wanders mostly about the continent since her widowhood, for the sake of a child's health, began pressing and inviting me to spend the blade months of winter here in her villa with her;--all friends warmly seconding and urging; by one of whom i was at last snatched off, as if by the hair of the head, (in spite of my violent no, no!) on the eve of christmas last, and have been here ever since,-- really with improved omens. the place is beautiful as a very picture, the climate superlative (today a sun and sky like very june); the _hospitality_ of usage beyond example. it is likely i shall be here another six weeks, or longer. if you please to write me, the address is on the margin; and i will answer. adieu. --t. carlyle clxxvi. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, november, dear emerson,--it is near three years since i last wrote to you; from mentone, under the ligurian olive and orange trees, and their sombre foreign shadows, and still more sombre suggestings and promptings; the saddest, probably, of all living men. that you made no answer i know right well means only, "alas, what can i say to him of consolatory that he does not himself know!" far from a fault, or perhaps even a mistake on your part;--nor have i felt it otherwise. sure enough, among the lights that have gone out for me, and are still going, one after one, under the inexorable decree, in this now dusky and lonely world, i count with frequent regret that our correspondence (not by absolute hest of fate) should have fallen extinct, or into such abeyance: but i interpret it as you see; and my love and brotherhood to you remain alive, and will while i myself do. enough of this. by lucky chance, as you perceive, you are again to get one written letter from me, and i a reply from you, before the final silence come. the case is this. for many years back, a thought, which i used to check again as fond and silly, has been occasionally present to me,--of testifying my gratitude to new england (new england, acting mainly through one of her sons called waldo emerson), _by bequeathing to it my poor falstaf regiment, latterly two falstaf regiments of books,_ those i purchased and used in writing _cromwell,_ and ditto those on _friedrich the great._ "this could be done," i often said to myself; "this _could_ perhaps; and this would be a real satisfaction to me. but who then would march through coventry with such a set!" the extreme insignificance of the gift, this and nothing else, always gave me pause. last summer, i was lucky enough to meet with your friend c.e. norton, and renew many old massachusetts recollections, in free talk with [him]....; to him i spoke of the affair; candidly describing it, especially the above questionable feature of it, so far as i could; and his answer, then, and more deliberately afterwards, was so hopeful, hearty, and decisive, that--in effect it has decided me; and i am this day writing to him that such is the poor fact, and that i need farther instructions on it so soon as you two have taken counsel together. to say more about the infinitesimally small value of the books would be superfluous: nay, in truth, many or most of them are not without intrinsic value, one or two are even excellent as books; and all of them, it may perhaps be said, have a kind of _symbolic_ or _biographic_ value; and testify (a thing not useless) _on what slender commissariat stores_ considerable campaigns, twelve years long or so, may be carried on in this world. perhaps you already knew of me, what the _cromwell_ and _friedrich_ collection might itself intimate, that much _buying_ of books was never a habit of mine,--far the reverse, even to this day! well, my friend, you will have a meeting with norton so soon as handy; and let me know what is next to be done. and that, in your official capacity, is all i have to say to you at present. unofficially there were much,--much that is mournful, but perhaps also something that is good and blessed, and though the saddest, also the highest, the lovingest and best; as beseems time's sunset, now coming nigh. at present i will say only that, in bodily health, i am not to be called ill, for a man who will be seventy-four next month; nor, on the spiritual side, has anything been laid upon me that is quite beyond my strength. more miserable i have often been; though as solitary, soft of heart, and sad, of course never. publisher chapman, when i question him whether you for certain _get_ your monthly volume of what they call "the library edition," assures me that "it is beyond doubt":--i confess i should still like to be _better_ assured. if all is _right,_ you should, by the time this letter arrives, be receiving or have received your thirteenth volume, last of the _miscellanies._ adieu, my friend. ever truly yours, t. carlyle clxxvii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, january, dear emerson,--a month ago or more i wrote, by the same post, to you and to norton about those books for harvard college; and in late days have been expecting your joint answer. from norton yesternight i receive what is here copied for your perusal; it has come round by florence as you see, and given me real pleasure and instruction. from you, who are possibly also away from home, i have yet nothing; but expect now soon to have a few words. there did arrive, one evening lately, your two pretty _volumes_ of _collected works,_ a pleasant salutation from you--which set me upon reading again what i thought i knew well before:--but the letter is still to come. norton's hints are such a complete instruction to me that i see my way straight through the business, and might, by note of "bequest" and memorandum for the barings, finish it in half an hour: nevertheless i will wait for your letter, and punctually do nothing till your directions too are before me. pray write, therefore; all is lying ready here. since you heard last, i have got two catalogues made out, approximately correct; one is to lie here till the bequest be executed; the other i thought of sending to you against the day? this is my own invention in regard to the affair since i wrote last. approve of it, and you shall have your copy by book-post at once. "_approximately_ correct"; absolutely i cannot get it to be. but i need not doubt the pious purpose will be piously and even sacredly fulfilled;--and your catalogue will be a kind of evidence that it is. adieu, dear emerson, till your letter come. yours ever, thomas carlyle clxxviii. emerson to carlyle concord, january, * my dear carlyle,--'t is a sad apology that i have to offer for delays which no apology can retrieve. i received your first letter with pure joy, but in the midst of extreme inefficiency. i had suddenly yielded to a proposition of fields & co. to manufacture a book for a given day. the book was planned, and going on passably, when it was found better to divide the matter, and separate, and postpone the purely literary portion (criticism chiefly), and therefore to modify and swell the elected part. the attempt proved more difficult than i had believed, for i only write by spasms, and these ever more rare,--and daemons that have no ears. meantime the publication day was announced, and the printer at the door. then came your letter in the shortening days. when i drudged to keep my word, _invita minerva._ --------- * this letter is printed from an imperfect rough draft. --------- i could not write in my book, and i could not write a letter. tomorrow and many morrows made things worse, for we have indifferent health in the house, and, as it chanced, unusual strain of affairs,--which always come when they should not. for one thing--i have just sold a house which i once built opposite my own. but i will leave the bad month, which i hope will not match itself in my lifetime. only 't is pathetic and remorseful to me that any purpose of yours, especially, a purpose so inspired, should find me imbecile. heartily i delight in your proposed disposition of the books. it has every charm of surprise, and nobleness, and large affection. the act will deeply gratify a multitude of good men, who will see in it your real sympathy with the welfare of the country. i hate that there should be a moment of delay in the completing of your provisions,--and that i of all men should be the cause! norton's letter is perfect on his part, and needs no addition, i believe, from me. you had not in your first letter named _cambridge,_ and i had been meditating that he would probably have divided your attention between harvard and the boston public library,--now the richest in the country, at first founded by the gifts of joshua bates (of london), and since enriched by the city and private donors, theodore parker among them. but after conversation with two or three friends, i had decided that harvard college was the right beneficiary, as being the mother real or adoptive of a great number of your lovers and readers in america, and because a college is a seat of sentiment and cosmical relations. the library is outgrown by other libraries in the country, counts only , bound volumes in ; the several departments of divinity, law, medicine, and natural science in the university having special libraries, that together add some , more. the college is newly active (with its new president eliot, a cousin of norton's) and expansive in all directions. and the library will be relieved through subscriptions now being collected among the alumni with the special purpose of securing to it an adequate fund for annual increase. i shall then write to norton at once that i concur with him in the destination of the books to harvard college, and approve entirely his advices in regard to details. and so soon as you send me the catalogue i shall, if you permit, communicate your design to president eliot and the corporation. one thing i shall add to the catalogue now or later (perhaps only by bequest), your own prized gift to me, in , of wood's _athenae oxonienses,_ which i have lately had rebound, and in which every pen and pencil mark of yours is notable. the stately books of the new edition have duly come from the unforgetting friend. i have _sartor, schiller, french revolution,_ vols., _miscellanies,_ numbers , , , , ,--ten volumes in all, excellently printed and dressed, and full of memories and electricity. i have much to say, but of things not opportune at this moment, and in spite of my long contumacy dare believe that i shall quickly write again my proper letter to my friend, whose every word i watchfully read and remember. clxxix. carlyle to emerson melchet court, romsey, february, dear emerson,--three days ago i at last received your letter; with very great pleasure and thankfulness, as you may suppose. indeed, it is quite strangely interesting to see face to face my old emerson again, not a feature of him changed, whom i have known all the best part of my life. i am very glad, withal, to find that you agree completely with norton and myself in regard to that small harvard matter. this is not chelsea, as you perceive, this is a hospitable mansion in hampshire; but i expect to be in chelsea within about a week; once there, i shall immediately despatch to you one of the three catalogues i have, with a more deliberate letter than i at present have the means of writing or dictating. yours ever truly, t. carlyle clxxx. carlyle to emerson chelsea, february, dear emerson,--at length i have got home from those sumptuous tumults ("melchet court" is the dowager lady ashburton's house, whose late husband, an estimable friend of mine, and _half american,_ you may remember here); and i devote to ending of our small harvard business, small enough, but true and kindly,--the first quiet hour i have. your copy of the catalogue, which accompanies by book-post of today, is the correctest i could manage to get done; all the books mentioned in it i believe to be now here (and indeed, except five or six _tiny_ articles, have _seen_ them all, in one or other of the three rooms where my books now stand, and where i believe the insignificant trifle of "tinies" to be): all these i can expect will be punctually attended to when the time comes, and proceeded with according to norton's scheme and yours;--and if any more "tinies," which i could not even remember, should turn up (which i hardly think there will), these also will _class_ themselves (as _cromwelliana_ or _fredericana_), and be faith fully sent on with the others. for benefit of my _survivors_ and _representatives_ here, i retain an exact _copy_ of the catalogue now put into your keeping; so that everything may fall out square between them and you when the time shall arrive. i mean to conform in every particular to the plan sketched out by norton and you,--unless, in your next letter, you have something other or farther to advise:--and so soon as i hear from you that harvard accepts my poor widow's mite of a _bequest,_ i will proceed to put it down in due form, and so finish this small matter, which for long years has hovered in my thoughts as a thing i should like to do. and so enough for this time. i meant to write a longish letter, touching on many other points,--though you see i am reduced to _pencil,_ and "write" with such difficulty (never yet could learn to "dictate," though my little niece here is promptitude itself, and is so swift and legible,--useful here as a cheerful rushlight in this now sombre element, sombre, sad, but also beautiful and tenderly solemn more and more, in which she bears me company, good little "mary"!). but, in bar of all such purposes, publisher chapman has come in, with cromwell engravings and their hindrances, with money accounts, &c., &c.; and has not even left me a moment of time, were nothing else needed! vol. xiv. (_cromwell,_ i.) ought to be at concord about as soon as this. in our newspapers i notice your book announced, "half of the essays new,"--which i hope to get _quam primum,_ and illuminate some evenings with,--_so_ as nothing else can, in my present common mood. adieu, dear old friend. i am and remain yours always, --t. carlyle clxxxi. emerson to carlyle concord, march, my dear carlyle,--on receiving your letter and catalogue i wrote out a little history of the benefaction and carried it last tuesday to president eliot at cambridge, who was heartily gratified, and saw everything rightly, and expressed an anxiety (most becoming in my eyes after my odious shortcomings) that there should be no moment of delay on our part. "the corporation would not meet again for a fortnight:--but he would not wait,-- would call a special meeting this week to make the communication to them." he did so: the meeting was held on saturday and i have received this (monday) morning from him enclosed letter and record. it is very amiable and noble in you to have kept this surprise for us in your older days. did you mean to show us that you could not be old, but immortally young? and having kept us all murmuring at your satires and sharp homilies, will now melt us with this manly and heart-warming embrace? nobody could predict and none could better it. and you shall even go your own gait henceforward with a blessing from us all, and a trust exceptional and unique. i do not longer hesitate to talk to such good men as i see of this gift, and it has in every ear a gladdening effect. people like to see character in a gift, and from rare character the gift is more precious. i wish it may be twice blest in continuing to give you the comfort it will give us. i think i must mend myself by reclaiming my old right to send you letters. i doubt not i shall have much to tell you, could i overcome the hesitation to attempt a reasonable letter when one is driven to write so many sheets of mere routine as sixty-six (nearly sixty-seven) years enforce. i shall have to prate of my daughters;--edith forbes, with her two children at milton; ellen emerson at home, herself a godsend to this house day by day; and my son edward studying medicine in boston,--whom i have ever meant and still mean to send that he may see your face when that professional curriculum winds up. i manage to read a few books and look into more. herman grimm sent me lately a good one, goethe's _unterhaltungen_ with muller,--which set me on varnhagen and others. my wife sends old regards, and her joy in this occasion. yours ever, r.w. emerson p.s. mr. eliot took my rough counting of volumes as correct. when he sends me back the catalogue, i will make it exact.--i sent you last week a little book by book-post. clxxxii. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, march, my dear emerson,--the day before yesterday, i heard incidentally of an unfortunate mail steamer, bound for america, which had lost its screw or some essential part of it; and so had, instead of carrying its letters forward to america, been drifting about like a helpless log on the shores of ireland till some three days ago, when its letters and passengers were taken out, and actually forwarded, thither. by industrious calculation, it appears probable to us here that my letter to you may have been tumbling about in that helpless steamer, instead of getting to concord; where, if so, said letter cannot now arrive till the lingering of it have created some astonishment there. i hastily write this, however, to say that a letter was duly forwarded a few days after yours [of january ] arrived,-- enclosing the _harvard catalogue,_ with all necessary _et ceteras;_ indorsing all your proposals; and signifying that the matter should be authentically completed the instant i should hear from you again. i may add now that the thing is essentially completed,--all signed and put on paper, or all but a word or two, which, for form's sake, waits the actual arrival of your letter. i have never yet received your book;* and, if it linger only a few days more, mean to provide myself with a copy such as the sampson and low people have on sale everywhere. i had from norton, the other day, a very kind and friendly letter. this is all of essential that i had to say. i write in utmost haste. but am always, dear emerson, yours sincerely, t. carlyle -------- * "society and solitude." -------- clxxxiii. carlyle to emerson chelsea, april, dear emerson,--the day before yesterday your welcome letter came to hand, with the welcome news in it; yesterday i put into my poor document here the few words still needed; locked everything into its still repository (your letter, president eliot's, norton's, &c., &c.); and walked out into the sunshine, piously thankful that a poor little whim, which had long lain fondly in my heart, had realized itself with an emphasis i could never hope, and was become (thanks to generous enthusiasm on new england's part) a beautiful little fact, lying done there, so far as i had to do with it. truly your account of matters threw a glow of _life_ into my thoughts which is very rare there now; altogether a gratifying little transaction to me,--and i must add a surprising, for the enthusiasm of good-will is evidently great, and the occasion is almost infinitesimally small! well, well; it is all finished off and completed,--(you can tell mr. eliot, with many thanks from me, that i did introduce the proper style, "president and fellows," &c., and have forgotten nothing of what he said, or of what he _did_);--and so we will say only, _faustum sit,_ as our last word on the subject;--and to me it will be, for some days yet, under these vernal skies, something that is itself connected with the spring in a still higher sense; a little white and red-lipped bit of _daisy_ pure and poor, scattered into time's seedfield, and struggling above ground there, uttering _its_ bit of prophecy withal, among the ox-hoofs and big jungles that are everywhere about and not prophetic of much!-- one thing only i regret, that you _have_ spoken of the affair! for god's sake don't; and those kindly people to whom you have,- -swear them to silence for love of me! the poor little _daisy_kin will get into the newspapers, and become the nastiest of cabbages:--silence, silence, i beg of you to the utmost stretch of your power! or is the case already irremediable? i will hope not. talk about such things, especially penny editor's talk, is like vile coal-smoke filling your poor little world; silence alone is azure, and has a _sky_ to it.--but, enough now. the "little book" never came; and, i doubt, never will: it is a fate that seems to await three fourths of the books that attempt to reach me by the american post; owing to some _informality in wrapping_ (i have heard);--it never gave me any notable _regret_ till now. however, i had already bought myself an english copy, rather gaudy little volume (probably intended for the _railways,_ as if _it_ were a book to be read there), but perfectly printed, ready to be read anywhere by the open eye and earnest mind;-- which i read here, accordingly, with great attention, clear assent for most part, and admiring recognition. it seems to me you are all your old self here, and something _more._ a calm insight, piercing to the very centre; a beautiful sympathy, a beautiful _epic_ humor; a soul peaceably irrefragable in this loud-jangling world, of which it sees the ugliness, but _notices_ only the huge new _opulences_ (still so anarchic); knows the electric telegraph, with all its vulgar botherations and impertinences, accurately for what it is, and ditto ditto the oldest eternal theologies of men. all this belongs to the highest class of thought (you may depend upon it); and again seemed to me as, in several respects, the one perfectly human voice i had heard among my fellow-creatures for a long time. and then the "style," the treatment and expression,--yes, it is inimitable, best--emersonian throughout. such brevity, simplicity, softness, homely grace; with such a penetrating meaning, _soft_ enough, but irresistible, going down to the depths and up to the heights, as _silent electricity_ goes. you have done _very well;_ and many will know it ever better by degrees.--only one thing farther i will note: how you go as if altogether on the "over-soul," the ideal, the perfect or universal and eternal in this life of ours; and take so little heed of the frightful quantities of _friction_ and perverse impediment there everywhere are; the reflections upon which in my own poor life made me now and then very sad, as i read you. ah me, ah me; what a vista it is, mournful, beautiful, _unfathomable_ as eternity itself, these last fifty years of time to me.-- let me not forget to thank you for that _fourth_ page of your note; i should say it was almost the most interesting of all. news from yourself at first hand; a momentary glimpse into the actual household at concord, face to face, as in years of old! true, i get vague news of you from time to time; but what are these in comparison?--if you _will,_ at the eleventh hour, turn over a new leaf, and write me letters again,--but i doubt _you won't._ and yet were it not worth while, think you? [greek]-- will be here _anon._--my kindest regards to your wife. adieu, my ever-kind old friend. yours faithfully always, t. carlyle clxxxiv. emerson to carlyle concord, june, my dear carlyle,--two* unanswered letters filled and fragrant and potent with goodness will not let me procrastinate another minute, or i shall sink and deserve to sink into my dormouse condition. you are of the anakim, and know nothing of the debility and postponement of the blonde constitution. well, if you shame us by your reservoir inexhaustible of force, you indemnify and cheer some of us, or one of us, by charges of electricity. -------- * one seems to be missing. -------- your letter of april came, as ever-more than ever, if possible-- full of kindness, and making much of our small doings and writings, and seemed to drive me to instant acknowledgment; but the oppressive engagement of writing and reading eighteen lectures on philosophy to a class of graduates in the college, and these in six successive weeks, was a task a little more formidable in prospect and in practice than any foregoing one. of course, it made me a prisoner, took away all rights of friendship, honor, and justice, and held me to such frantic devotion to my work as must spoil that also. well, it is now ended, and has no shining side but this one, that materials are collected and a possibility shown me how a repetition of the course next year--which is appointed--will enable me partly out of these materials, and partly by large rejection of these, and by large addition to them, to construct a fair report of what i have read and thought on the subject. i doubt the experts in philosophy will not praise my discourses;-- but the topics give me room for my guesses, criticism, admirations and experiences with the accepted masters, and also the lessons i have learned from the hidden great. i have the fancy that a realist is a good corrector of formalism, no matter how incapable of syllogism or continuous linked statement. to great results of thought and morals the steps are not many, and it is not the masters who spin the ostentatious continuity. i am glad to hear that the last sent book from me arrived safely. you were too tender and generous in your first notice of it, i fear. but with whatever deductions for your partiality, i know well the unique value of carlyle's praise. many things crowd to be said on this little paper. though i could see no harm in the making known the bequest of books to cambridge,--no harm, but sincere pleasure, and honor of the donor from all good men,--yet on receipt of your letter touching that, i went back to president eliot, and told him your opinion on newspapers. he said it was necessarily communicated to the seven persons composing the corporation, but otherwise he had been very cautious, and it would not go into print. you are sending me a book, and chapman's homer it is? are you bound by your arabian bounty to a largess whenever you think of your friend? and you decry the book too. 't-is long since i read it, or in it, but the apotheosis of homer, in the dedication to prince henry, "thousands of years attending," &c., is one of my lasting inspirations. the book has not arrived yet, as the letter always travels faster, but shall be watched and received and announced. but since you are all bounty and care for me, where are the new volumes of the library edition of carlyle? i received duly, as i wrote you in a former letter, nine volumes,--_sartor; life of schiller;_ five vols. of _miscellanies; french revolution;_ these books oddly addressed to my name, but at _cincinnati,_ massachusetts. whether they went to ohio, and came back to boston, i know not. two volumes came later, duplicates of two already received, and were returned at my request by fields & co. with an explanation. but no following volume has come. i write all this because you said in one letter that mr. chapman assured you that every month a book was despatched to my address. but what do i read in our boston newspapers twice in the last three days? that "thomas carlyle is coming to america," and the tidings cordially greeted by the editors; though i had just received your letter silent to any such point. make that story true, though it had never a verisimilitude since thirty odd years ago, and you shall make many souls happy and perhaps show you so many needs and opportunities for beneficent power that you cannot be allowed to grow old or withdraw. was i not once promised a visit? this house entreats you earnestly and lovingly to come and dwell in it. my wife and ellen and edward e. are thoroughly acquainted with your greatness and your loveliness. and it is but ten days of healthy sea to pass. so wishes heartily and affectionately, r.w. emerson clxxxv. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, september, dear emerson,--your letter, dated june, never got to me till about ten days ago; when my little niece and i returned out of scotland, and a long, rather empty visit there! it had missed me here only by two or three days; and my highly _in_felicitous selectress of letters to be forwarded had left _it_ carefully aside as undeserving that honor,--good faithful old woman, one hopes she is greatly stronger on some sides than in this literary-selective one. certainly no letter was forwarded that had the hundredth part of the right to be so; certainly, of all the letters that came to me, or were left waiting here, this was, in comparison, the one which might _not_ with propriety have been left to lie stranded forever, or to wander on the winds forever!-- one of my first journeys was to chapman, with vehement _rebuke_ of this inconceivable "cincinnati-massachusetts" business. _stupiditas stupiditatum;_ i never in my life, not even in that unpunctual house, fell in with anything that equaled it. instant amendment was at once undertaken for, nay it seems had been already in part performed: "ten volumes, following the nine you already had, were despatched in field & co.'s box above two months ago," so chapman solemnly said and asseverated to me; so that by this time you ought actually to have in hand nineteen volumes; and the twentieth (first of _friedrich_), which came out ten days ago, is to go in field & co.'s box this week, and ought, not many days after the arrival of this letter, to be in boston waiting for you there. the _chapman's homer_ (two volumes) had gone with that first field packet; and would be handed to you along with the ten volumes which were overdue. all this was solemnly declared to me as on affidavit; chapman also took extract of the massachusetts passage in your letter, in order to pour it like ice-cold water on the head of his stupid old chief-clerk, the instant the poor creature got back from his rustication: alas, i am by no means certain that it will make a new man of him, nor, in fact, that the whole of this amendatory programme will get itself performed to equal satisfaction! but you must write to me at once if it is not so; and done it shall be in spite of human stupidity itself. note, withal, these things: chapman sends no books to america _except_ through field & co.; he does not regularly send a box at the middle of the month; but he does "almost monthly send one bog"; so that if your monthly volume do not start from london about the th, it is due by the very _next_ chapman-field box; and if it at any time don't come, i beg of you very much to make instant complaint through field & co., or what would be still more effectual, direct to myself. my malison on all blockheadisms and torpid stupidities and infidelities; of which this world is full!-- your letter had been anxiously enough waited for, a month before my departure; but we will not mention the delay in presence of what you were engaged with then. _faustum sit;_ that truly was and will be a work worth doing your best upon; and i, if alive, can promise you at least one reader that will do his best upon your work. i myself, often think of the philosophies precisely in that manner. to say truth, they do not otherwise rise in esteem with me at all, but rather sink. the last thing i read of that kind was a piece by hegel, in an excellent translation by stirling, right well translated, i could see, for every bit of it was intelligible to me; but my feeling at the end of it was, "good heavens, i have walked this road before many a good time; but never with a cannon-ball at each ankle before!" science also, science falsely so called, is--but i will not enter upon that with you just now. the visit to america, alas, alas, is pure moonshine. never had i, in late years, the least shadow of intention to undertake that adventure; and i am quite at a loss to understand how the rumor originated. one boston gentleman (a kind of universal undertaker, or lion's provider of lecturers i think) informed me that _"the cable"_ had told him; and i had to remark, "and who the devil told the cable?" alas, no, i fear i shall never dare to undertake that big voyage; which has so much of romance and of reality behind it to me; _zu spat, zu spat._ i do sometimes talk dreamily of a long sea-voyage, and the good the sea has often done me,--in times when good was still possible. it may have been some vague folly of that kind that originated this rumor; for rumors are like dandelion-seeds; and _the cable_ i dare say welcomes them all that have a guinea in their pocket. thank you for blocking up that harvard matter; provided it don't go into the newspapers, all is right. thank you a thousand times for that thrice-kind potential welcome, and flinging wide open your doors and your hearts to me at concord. the gleam of it is like sunshine in a subterranean place. ah me, ah me! may god be with you all, dear emerson. yours ever, t. carlyle clxxxvi. emerson to carlyle concord, october, my dear carlyle,--i am the ignoblest of all men in my perpetual short-comings to you. there is no example of constancy like yours, and it always stings my stupor into temporary recovery and wonderful resolution to accept the noble challenge. but "the strong hours conquer us," and i am the victim of miscellany,-- miscellany of designs, vast debility, and procrastination. already many days before your letter came, fields sent me a package from you, which he said he had found a little late, because they were covered up in a box of printed sheets of other character, and this treasure was not at first discovered. they are,--_life of sterling; latter day pamphlets; past and present; heroes;_ vols. _cromwell's letters and speeches._ unhappily, vol. ii. of _cromwell_ is wanting, and there is a duplicate of vol. v. instead of it. now, two days ago came your letter, and tells me that the good old gods have also inspired you to send me chapman's homer! and that it came--heroes with heroes--in the same enchanted box. i went to fields yesterday and demanded the book. he ignored all,--even to the books he had already sent me; called osgood to council, and they agreed that it must be that all these came in a bog of sheets of dickens from chapman, which was sent to the stereotypers at cambridge; and the box shall be instantly explored. we will see what tomorrow shall find. as to the duplicates, i will say here, that i have received two: first, the above-mentioned vol. ii. of _cromwell;_ and, second, long before, a second copy of _sartor resartus,_ apparently instead of the vol. i. of the _french revolution,_ which did not come. i proposed to fields to send back to chapman these two duplicates. but he said, "no, it will cost as much as the price of the books." i shall try to find in new york who represents chapman and sells these books, and put them to his credit there, in exchange for the volumes i lack. meantime, my serious thanks for all these treasures go to you,--steadily good to my youth and my age. your letter was most welcome, and most in that i thought i read, in what you say of not making the long-promised visit hither, a little willingness to come. think again, i pray you, of that ocean voyage, which is probably the best medicine and restorative which remains to us at your age and mine. nine or ten days will bring you (and commonly with unexpected comfort and easements on the way) to boston. every reading person in america holds you in exceptional regard, and will rejoice in your arrival. they have forgotten your scarlet sins before or during the war. i have long ceased to apologize for or explain your savage sayings about american or other republics or publics, and am willing that anointed men bearing with them authentic charters shall be laws to themselves as plato willed. genius is but a large infusion of deity, and so brings a prerogative all its own. it has a right and duty to affront and amaze men by carrying out its perceptions defiantly, knowing well that time and fate will verify and explain what time and fate have through them said. we must not suggest to michel angelo, or machiavel, or rabelais, or voltaire, or john brown of osawatomie (a great man), or carlyle, how they shall suppress their paradoxes and check their huge gait to keep accurate step with the procession on the street sidewalk. they are privileged persons, and may have their own swing for me. i did not mean to chatter so much, but i wish you would come out hither and read our possibilities now being daily disclosed, and our actualities which are not nothing. i shall like to show you my near neighbors, topographically or practically. a near neighbor and friend, e. rockwood hoar, whom you saw in his youth, is now an inestimable citizen in this state, and lately, in president grant's cabinet, attorney-general of the united states. he lives in this town and carries it in his hand. another is john m. forbes, a strictly private citizen, of great executive ability, and noblest affections, a motive power and regulator essential to our city, refusing all office, but impossible to spare; and these are men whom to name the voice breaks and the eye is wet. a multitude of young men are growing up here of high promise, and i compare gladly the social poverty of my youth with the power on which these draw. the lowell race, again, in our war yielded three or four martyrs so able and tender and true, that james russell lowell cannot allude to them in verse or prose but the public is melted anew. well, all these know you well, have read and will read you, yes, and will prize and use your benefaction to the college; and i believe it would add hope, health, and strength to you to come and see them. in my much writing i believe i have left the chief things unsaid. but come! i and my house wait for you. affectionately, r.w. emerson clxxxvia. emerson to carlyle concord, april, my dear friend,--i fear there is no pardon from you, none from myself, for this immense new gap in our correspondence. yet no hour came from month to month to write a letter, since whatever deliverance i got from one web in the last year served only to throw me into another web as pitiless. yet what gossamer these tasks of mine must appear to your might! believe that the american climate is unmanning, or that one american whom you know is severely taxed by lilliput labors. the last hot summer enfeebled me till my young people coaxed me to go with edward to the white hills, and we climbed or were dragged up agiocochook, in august, and its sleet and snowy air nerved me again for the time. but the booksellers, whom i had long ago urged to reprint plutarch's _morals,_ claimed some forgotten promise, and set me on reading the old patriarch again, and writing a few pages about him, which no doubt cost me as much time and pottering as it would cost you to write a history. then an "oration" was due to the new england society in new york, on the th anniversary of the plymouth landing,--as i thought myself familiar with the story, and holding also some opinions thereupon. but in the libraries i found alcoves full of books and documents reckoned essential; and, at new york, after reading for an hour to the great assembly out of my massy manuscript, i refused to print a line until i could revise and complete my papers;--risking, of course, the nonsense of their newspaper reporters. this pill swallowed and forgotten, it was already time for my second "course on philosophy" at cambridge,--which i had accepted again that i might repair the faults of the last year. but here were eighteen lectures, each to be read sixteen miles away from my house, to go and come,--and the same work and journey twice in each week,--and i have just got through the doleful ordeal. i have abundance of good readings and some honest writing on the leading topics,--but in haste and confusion they are misplaced and spoiled. i hope the ruin of no young man's soul will here or hereafter be charged to me as having wasted his time or confounded his reason. now i come to the raid of a london bookseller, hotten, (of whom i believe i never told you,) on my forgotten papers in the old _dials,_ and other pamphlets here. conway wrote me that he could not be resisted,--would certainly steal good and bad,--but might be guided in the selection. i replied that the act was odious to me, and i promised to denounce the man and his theft to any friends i might have in england; but if, instead of printing then, he would wait a year, i would make my own selection, with the addition of some later critical papers, and permit the book. mr. ireland in manchester, and conway in london, took the affair kindly in hand, and hotten acceded to my change. and that is the next task that threatens my imbecility. but now, ten days ago or less, my friend john m. forbes has come to me with a proposition to carry me off to california, the yosemite, the mammoth trees, and the pacific, and, after much resistance, i have surrendered for six weeks, and we set out tomorrow. and hence this sheet of confession,--that i may not drag a lengthening chain. meantime, you have been monthly loading me with good for evil. i have just counted twenty-three volumes of carlyle's library edition, in order on my shelves, besides two, or perhaps three, which ellery channing has borrowed. add, that the precious chapman's _homer_ came safely, though not till months after you had told me of its departure, and shall be guarded henceforward with joy. _wednesday, , chicago._--arrived here and can bring this little sheet to the post-office here. my daughter edith forbes, and her husband william h. forbes, and three other friends, accompany me, and we shall overtake mr. forbes senior tomorrow at burlington, iowa. the widow of one of the noblest of our young martyrs in the war, col. lowell,* cousin [nephew] of james russell lowell, sends me word that she wishes me to give her a note of introduction to you, confiding to me that she has once written a letter to you which procured her the happiest reply from you, and i shall obey her, and you will see her and own her rights. still continue to be magnanimous to your friend, --r.w. emerson --------- * charles russell lowell, to be remembered always with honor in company with his brother james jackson lowell and his cousin william lowell putnam,--a shining group among the youths who have died for their country. --------- clxxxvii. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, june, dear emerson,--your letter gave me great pleasure. a gleam of sunshine after a long tract of lowering weather. it is not you that are to blame for this sad gap in our correspondence; it is i, or rather it is my misfortunes, and miserable inabilities, broken resolutions, etc., etc. the truth is, the winter here was very unfriendly to me; broke ruinously into my sleep; and through that into every other department of my businesses, spiritual and temporal; so that from about new-year's day last i have been, in a manner, good for nothing,--nor am yet, though i do again feel as if the beautiful summer weather might perhaps do something for me. this it was that choked every enterprise; and postponed your letter, week after week, through so many months. let us not speak of it farther! note, meanwhile, i have no disease about me; nothing but the gradual decay of any poor digestive faculty i latterly had,--or indeed ever had since i was three and twenty years of age. let us be quiet with it; accept it as a mode of exit, of which always there must be _some_ mode. i have got done with all my press-correctings, editionings, and paltry bother of that kind: vol. will embark for you about the middle of this month; there are then to follow ("uniform," as the printers call it, though in smaller type) a little volume called _general index;_ and three more volumes of _translations from the german;_ after which we two will reckon and count; and if there is any _lacuna_ on the concord shelf, at once make it good. enough, enough on that score. the hotten who has got hold of you here is a dirty little pirate, who snatches at everybody grown fat enough to yield him a bite (paltry, unhanged creature); so that in fact he is a symbol to you of your visible rise in the world here; and, with conway's vigilance to help, will do you good and not evil. glad am i, in any case, to see so much new spiritual produce still ripening around you; and you ought to be glad, too. pray heaven you may long _keep your right hand_ steady: you, too, i can perceive, will never, any more than myself, learn to "write by dictation" in a manner that will be supportable to you. i rejoice, also, to hear of such a magnificent adventure as that you are now upon. climbing the backbone of america; looking into the pacific ocean too, and the gigantic wonders going on there. i fear you won't see brigham young, however? he also to me is one of the products out there;--and indeed i may confess to you that the doings in that region are not only of a big character, but of a great;--and that in my occasional explosions against "anarchy," and my inextinguishable hatred of _it,_ i privately whisper to myself, "could any friedrich wilhelm, now, or friedrich, or most perfect governor you could hope to realize, guide forward what is america's essential task at present faster or more completely than 'anarchic america' herself is now doing?" _such_ "anarchy" has a great deal to say for itself,--(would to heaven ours of england had as much!)--and points towards grand _anti_-anarchies in the future; in fact, i can already discern in it huge quantities of anti-anarchy in the "impalpable-powder" condition; and hope, with the aid of centuries, immense things from it, in my private mind! good mrs. --- has never yet made her appearance; but shall be welcome whenever she does. did you ever hear the name of an aged, or elderly, fantastic fellow-citizen of yours, called j. lee bliss, who designates himself o.f. and a.k., i.e. "old fogey" and "amiable kuss"? he sent me, the other night, a wonderful miscellany of symbolical shreds and patches; which considerably amused me; and withal indicated good-will on the man's part; who is not without humor, in sight, and serious intention or disposition. if you ever did hear of him, say a word on the subject next time you write. and above all things _write._ the instant you get home from california, or see this, let me hear from you what your adventures have been and what the next are to be. adieu, dear emerson. yours ever affectionately, t. carlyle mrs. --- sends a note from piccadilly this new morning (june th); _call_ to be made there today by niece mary, card left, etc., etc. promises to be an agreeable lady. did you ever hear of such a thing as this suicidal finis of the french "copper captaincy"; gratuitous attack on germany, and ditto blowing-up of paris by its own hand! an event with meanings unspeakable,--deep as the. _abyss._-- if you ever write to c. norton in italy, send him my kind remembrances. --t. c. (with about the velocity of engraving--on lead!)* --------- * the letter was dictated, but the postscript, from the first signature, was written in a tremulous hand by carlyle himself. --------- clxxxviii. emerson to carlyle concord, june, my dear carlyle,--'t is more than time that you should hear from me whose debts to you always accumulate. but my long journey to california ended in many distractions on my return home. i found varioloid in my house... and i was not permitted to enter it for many days, and could only talk with wife, son, and daughter from the yard.... i had crowded and closed my cambridge lectures in haste, and went to the land of flowers invited by john m. forbes, one of my most valued friends, father of my daughter edith's husband. with him and his family and one or two chosen guests, the trip was made under the best conditions of safety, comfort, and company, i measuring for the first time one entire line of the country. california surprises with a geography, climate, vegetation, beasts, birds, fishes even, unlike ours; the land immense; the pacific sea; steam brings the near neighborhood of asia; and south america at your feet; the mountains reaching the altitude of mont blanc; the state in its six hundred miles of latitude producing all our northern fruits, and also the fig, orange, and banana. but the climate chiefly surprised me. the almanac said april; but the day said june;--and day after day for six weeks uninterrupted sunshine. november and december are the rainy months. the whole country, was covered with flowers, and all of them unknown to us except in greenhouses. every bird that i know at home is represented here, but in gayer plumes. on the plains we saw multitudes of antelopes, hares, gophers,-- even elks, and one pair of wolves on the plains; the grizzly bear only in a cage. we crossed one region of the buffalo, but only saw one captive. we found indians at every railroad station,--the squaws and papooses begging, and the "bucks," as they wickedly call them, lounging. on our way out, we left the pacific railroad for twenty-four hours to visit salt lake; called on brigham young--just seventy years old--who received us with quiet uncommitting courtesy, at first,--a strong-built, self-possessed, sufficient man with plain manners. he took early occasion to remark that "the one-man-power really meant all- men's-power." our interview was peaceable enough, and rather mended my impression of the man; and, after our visit, i read in the descret newspaper his speech to his people on the previous sunday. it avoided religion, but was full of franklinian good sense. in one point, he says: "your fear of the indians is nonsense. the indians like the white men's food. feed them well, and they will surely die." he is clearly a sufficient ruler, and perhaps civilizer of his kingdom of blockheads ad interim; but i found that the san franciscans believe that this exceptional power cannot survive brigham. i have been surprised--but it is months ago--by a letter from lacy garbett, the architect, whom i do not know, but one of whose books, about "design in architecture," i have always valued. this letter, asking of me that americans shall join englishmen in a petition to parliament against pulling down ancient saxon buildings, is written in a way so wild as to suggest insanity, and i have not known how to answer it. at my "saturday club" in boston i sat at dinner by an english lord,--whose name i have forgotten,--from whom i tried to learn what laws parliament had passed for the repairs of old religious foundations, that could make them the victims of covetous architects. but he assured me there were none such, and that he himself was president of a society in his own county for the protection of such buildings. so that i am left entirely in the dark in regard to the fact and garbett's letter. he claims to speak both for ruskin and himself. i grieve to hear no better account of your health than your last letter gives. the only contradiction of it, namely, the power of your pen in this reproduction of thirty books,--and such books,-- is very important and very consoling to me. a great work to be done is the best insurance, and i sleep quietly, notwithstanding these sad bulletins,--believing that you cannot be spared. fare well, dear friend, r.w. emerson clxxxix. emerson to carlyle concord, september, my dear carlyle,--i hope you will have returned safely from the orkneys in time to let my son edward w.e. see your face on his way through london to germany, whither he goes to finish his medical studies,--no, not finish, but prosecute. give him your blessing, and tell him what he should look for in his few days in london, and what in your prussia. he is a good youth, and we can spare him only for this necessity. i should like well to accompany him as far as to your hearthstone, if only so i could persuade you that it is but a ten-days ride for you thence to mine,--a little farther than the orkneys, and the outskirts of land as good, and bigger. i read gladly in your letters some relentings toward america,--deeper ones in your dealing with harvard college; and i know you could not see without interest the immense and varied blossoming of our possibilities here,--of all nationalities, too, besides our own. i have heard from mrs. --- twice lately, who exults in your kindness to her. always affectionately, yours, r.w. emerson cxc. emerson to carlyle baltimore, md., january, my dear carlyle,--i received from you through mr. chapman, just before christmas, the last rich instalment of your library edition; viz. vols. iv.-x. _life of friedrich;_ vols. l-iii. _translations from german;_ one volume general index; eleven volumes in all,--and now my stately collection is perfect. perfect too is your victory. but i clatter my chains with joy, as i did forty years ago, at your earliest gifts. happy man you should be, to whom the heaven has allowed such masterly completion. you shall wear your crown at the pan-saxon games with no equal or approaching competitor in sight,--well earned by genius and exhaustive labor, and with nations for your pupils and praisers. i count it my eminent happiness to have been so nearly your contemporary, and your friend,--permitted to detect by its rare light the new star almost before the easterners had seen it, and to have found no disappointment, but joyful confirmation rather, in coming close to its orb. rest, rest, now for a time; i pray you, and be thankful. meantime, i know well all your perversities, and give them a wide berth. they seriously annoy a great many worthy readers, nations of readers sometimes,--but i heap them all as style, and read them as i read rabelais's gigantic humors which astonish in order to force attention, and by and by are seen to be the rhetoric of a highly virtuous gentleman who _swears._ i have been quite too busy with fast succeeding _jobs_ (i may well call them), in the last year, to have read much in these proud books; but i begin to see daylight coming through my fogs, and i have not lost in the least my appetite for reading,--resolve, with my old harvard professor, "to retire and read the authors." i am impatient to deserve your grand volumes by reading in them with all the haughty airs that belong to seventy years which i shall count if i live till may, . meantime i see well that you have lost none of your power, and i wish that you would let in some good eckermann to dine with you day by day, and competent to report your opinions,--for you can speak as well as you can write, and what the world to come should know... affectionately, r.w. emerson cxci. carlyle to emerson cheyne row, chelsea, april, dear emerson,--i am covered with confusion, astonishment, and shame to think of my long silence. you wrote me two beautiful letters; none friendlier, brighter, wiser could come to me from any quarter of the world; and i have not answered even by a sign. promptly and punctually my poor heart did answer; but to do it outwardly,--as if there had lain some enchantment on me,-- was beyond my power. the one thing i can say in excuse or explanation is, that ever since summer last, i have been in an unusually dyspeptic, peaking, pining, and dispirited condition; and have no right hand of my own for writing, nor, for several months, had any other that was altogether agreeable to me. but in fine i don't believe you lay any blame or anger on me at all; and i will say no more about it, but only try to repent and do better next time. your letter from the far west was charmingly vivid and free; one seemed to attend you personally, and see with one's own eyes the _notabilia,_ human and other, of those huge regions, in your swift flight through them to and from. i retain your little etching of brigham young as a bit of real likeness; i have often thought of your transit through chicago since poor chicago itself vanished out of the world on wings of fire. there is something huge, painful, and almost appalling to me in that wild western world of yours;--and especially i wonder at the gold-nuggeting there, while plainly every gold-nuggeter is no other than a criminal to human society, and has to _steal_ the exact value of his gold nugget from the pockets of all the posterity of adam, now and for some time to come, in this world. i conclude it is a bait used by all-wise providence to attract your people out thither, there to build towns, make roads, fell forests (or plant forests), and make ready a dwelling-place for new nations, who will find themselves called to quite other than nugget-hunting. in the hideous stew of anarchy, in which all english populations present themselves to my dismal contemplation at this day, it is a solid consolation that there will verily, in another fifty years, be above a hundred million men and women on this planet who can all read shakespeare and the english bible and the (also for a long time biblical and noble) history of their mother country,--and proceed again to do, unless the devil be in them, as their forebears did, or better, if they have the heart!-- except that you are a thousand times too kind to me, your second letter also was altogether charming.... do you read ruskin's _fors clavigera,_ which he cheerily tells me gets itself reprinted in america? if you don't, _do,_ i advise you. also his _munera pulveris,_ oxford-_lectures_ on art, and whatever else he is now writing,--if you can manage to get them (which is difficult here, owing to the ways he has towards the bibliopolic world!). there is nothing going on among us as notable to me as those fierce lightning-bolts ruskin is copiously and desperately pouring into the black world of anarchy all around him. no other man in england that i meet has in him the divine rage against iniquity, falsity, and baseness that ruskin has, and that every man ought to have. unhappily he is not a strong man; one might say a weak man rather; and has not the least prudence of management; though if he can hold out for another fifteen years or so, he may produce, even in this way, a great effect. god grant it, say i. froude is coming to you in october. you will find him a most clear, friendly, ingenious, solid, and excellent man; and i am very glad to find you among those who are to take care of him when he comes to your new country. do your best and wisest towards him, for my sake, withal. he is the valuablest friend i now have in england, nearly though not quite altogether the one man in talking with whom i can get any real profit or comfort. alas, alas, here is the end of the paper, dear emerson; and i had still a whole wilderness of things to say. write to me, or even do not write, and i will surely write again. i remain as ever your affectionate friend, t. carlyle in november, , emerson went to england, and the two friends met again. after a short stay he proceeded to the continent and egypt, returning to london in the spring of . for the last time carlyle and he saw each other. in may, emerson returned home. after this time no letters passed between him and carlyle. they were both old men. writing had become difficult to them; and little was left to say. carlyle died, eighty-five years old, on the th of february, . emerson died, seventy-nine years old, on the th of april, . ------------- [illustration: aunt delight's school.] peter parley's own story. _from the personal narrative of the late samuel g. goodrich_, ("_peter parley_.") with illustrations. new york: published by sheldon & company, broadway, cor. worth st, . entered according to act of congress, in the year , by the heirs of s. g. goodrich, in the clerk's office of the district court of the united states, for the southern district of new york. electrotyped by smith & mcdougal, & berkman st. printed by c. s. westcott & co., john st. contents. chapter i. page birth and parentage--the old house--ridgefield--the meeting-house--parson mead--keeler's tavern--the cannon-ball--lieutenant smith chapter ii. the new house--high ridge--nathan kellogg's spy-glass--the shovel--the black patch in the road--distrust of british influence--old chich-es-ter--aunt delight--return after twenty years chapter iii. ridgefield society--trades and professions--chimney-corner courtships--domestic economy--dram-drinking--family products--molly gregory and church music--travelling artisans--festival of the quilts--clerical patronage--raising a church--the retired tailor and his farm chapter iv. habits of the people--their costume--amusements--festivals-- marriages--funerals--dancing--winter sports--my two grandmothers--mechanical genius--importance of whittling--pigeons--sporting adventures chapter v. death of washington--jerome bonaparte and miss patterson--sunday travelling--oliver wolcott--timothy pickering--american politeness quite natural--locomotion--public conveyances--my father's chaise chapter vi. the upper and lower classes of ridgefield--master stebbins and his school--what is a noun?--deacon benedict and his man abijah--my latin acquirements--family worship--widow bennett--the temple of dagon chapter vii. the clergy of fairfield--a laughing parson--the three deacons chapter viii. mat olmstead, the town wit--the salamander hat--solar eclipse--the old hen and the philosopher--lieutenant smith--extraordinary meteor--fulton and his steam-boat--granther baldwin and his wife--sarah bishop and her cave chapter ix. farewell to home--danbury--my new vocation--my brother-in-law-- his conversations with lawyer hatch--clerical anecdotes chapter x. new haven--distinguished men--whitney's cotton-gin--durham--my grandmother's indian puddings--in search of a doctor--return to danbury--the cold friday--factory workmen--mathematics chapter xi. arrival at hartford--my occupation there--restlessness--my friend george sheldon chapter xii. war with england--in the army--my uncle's advice-- campaigning--on the march--our military costume--my first soldier's supper chapter xiii. new london--our military reputation--sent with a letter--british cannon-balls--out of harm's way--an alarm--on guard--take a prisoner--strange emotions--my left-hand chum--a grateful country chapter xiv. effects of war in new england--personal experience--news of peace--illuminations--confessions chapter xv. evil effects of night study--commencement of a literary career--thoughts on dancing--new york--saratoga--death of my uncle--become a bookseller--cold summer--t'other side of ohio chapter xvi. marriage--walter scott--byron--sidney smith's taunt--publication of original american works--mrs. sigourney chapter xvii. domestic troubles--sketch of brainard--aunt lucy's back-parlor--the fall of niagara--death of brainard chapter xviii. my first visit to europe--hurricane--arrival at liverpool-- london--travel on the continent--return to bristol--interview with hannah more--design in travelling--visit to ireland and scotland chapter xix. the edinburgh lions--literary celebrities--jeffrey in the forum--sir walter at the desk--riding with scotch ladies--beautiful scenery--a scotch mist chapter xx. blackwood--the general assembly--sir walter scott--mr. and mrs. lockhart--origin of "tam o'shanter"--last words of scott chapter xxi. en route for london--"the laird o'cockpen"--localities of legendary fame--difference between english and american scenery chapter xxii. london again--jacob perkins and his steam-gun--dukes of wellington, sussex, and york--british ladies at a review--house of commons and its orators--catalani--distinguished foreigners--edward irving compared to edmund kean--byron lying in state chapter xxiii. return to the united states--boston and its worthies--business operations--ackermann's forget-me-not the parent of all other annuals--the american species--their decline chapter xxiv. "the token"--n. p. willis and nathaniel hawthorne--comparison between them--lady authors--publishers' profits--authors and publishers chapter xxv. i become an author--his real name a profound secret--how it was divulged--great success--illness--the doctors disagree--english imitations--conduct of a london bookseller--objections to parley's tales--mother goose chapter xxvi. children my first patrons--a visit to new orleans--feelings of humiliation--the mice eat my papers--a wrong calculation chapter xxvii. i make a speech--lecture on ireland--politics--personal attacks--become a senator--the "fifteen gallon law"--a pamphlet in its favor--"my neighbor smith"--a political career unprofitable chapter xxviii. am appointed u. s. consul to paris--louis xviii.--a few jottings upon french notabilities--cure for hydrocephalus--unsettled state of things in paris chapter xxix. louis philippe and the revolution--list of grievances--the mob at the madeleine--barricades--"down with guizot!"--the fight commenced--flight of the king and queen--scene in the chamber of deputies--sack of the tuileries chapter xxx. after the revolution--"funeral of the victims"--the constituent assembly--paris in a state of siege--cavaignac--louis napoleon chosen president chapter xxxi. the author's duties as consul--aspect of things in paris--louis napoleon's designs--the nd of december, --the new reign of terror complete--louis napoleon as emperor--out of office--return to new york--conclusion chapter xxxii. the death of peter parley illustrations. aunt delight (_frontispiece_) making maple sugar deacon olmstead first adventure on the sea the cold friday whittling peter parley's own story. chapter i. birth and parentage--the old house--ridgefield--the meeting-house--parson mead--keeler's tavern--the cannon-ball--lieutenant smith. in the western part of the state of connecticut is a small town named ridgefield. this title is descriptive, and indicates the general form and position of the place. it is, in fact, a collection of hills, rolled into one general and commanding elevation. on the west is a ridge of mountains, forming the boundary between the states of connecticut and new york; to the south the land spreads out in wooded undulations to long island sound; east and north, a succession of hills, some rising up against the sky and others fading away in the distance, bound the horizon. in this town, in an antiquated and rather dilapidated house of shingles and clapboards, i was born on the th of august, . my father, samuel goodrich, was minister of the congregational church of that place, and there was no other religious society and no other clergyman in the town. he was the son of elizur goodrich, a distinguished minister of the same persuasion at durham, connecticut. two of his brothers were men of eminence--the late chauncey goodrich of hartford, and elizur goodrich of new haven. my mother was a daughter of john ely, a physician of saybrook, whose name figures, not unworthily, in the annals of the revolutionary war. i was the sixth child of a family of ten children, two of whom died in infancy, and eight of whom lived to be married and settled in life. my father's annual salary for the first twenty-five years, and during his ministry at ridgefield, averaged four hundred dollars a-year: the last twenty-five years, during which he was settled at berlin, near hartford, his stipend was about five hundred dollars a-year. he was wholly without patrimony, and owing to peculiar circumstances, which will be hereafter explained, my mother had not even the ordinary outfit when they began their married life. yet they so brought up their family of eight children, that they all attained respectable positions in life, and at my father's death he left an estate of four thousand dollars. these facts throw light upon the simple annals of a country clergyman in connecticut, half-a-century ago; they also bear testimony to the thrifty energy and wise frugality of my parents, and especially of my mother, who was the guardian deity of the household. ridgefield belongs to the county of fairfield, and is now a handsome town, as well on account of its artificial as its natural advantages; with some two thousand inhabitants. it is fourteen miles from long island sound, of which its many swelling hills afford charming views. the main street is a mile in length, and is now embellished with several handsome houses. about the middle of it there is, or was, some forty years ago, a white, wooden meeting-house, which belonged to my father's congregation. it stood in a small grassy square, the favorite pasture of numerous flocks of geese, and the frequent playground of school-boys, especially on sunday afternoons. close by the front door ran the public road, and the pulpit, facing it, looked out upon it on fair summer sundays, as i well remember by a somewhat amusing incident. in the contiguous town of lower salem dwelt an aged minister, by the name of mead. he was all his life marked with eccentricity, and about those days of which i speak, his mind was rendered yet more erratic by a touch of paralysis. he was, however, still able to preach, and on a certain sunday, having exchanged with my father, he was in the pulpit and engaged in making his opening prayer. he had already begun his invocation, when david p----, who was the jehu of that generation, dashed by the front door upon a horse, a clever animal, of which he was but too proud--in a full, round trot. the echo of the clattering hoofs filled the church, which, being of wood, was sonorous as a drum, and arrested the attention, as well of the minister as the congregation, even before the rider had reached it. the minister was fond of horses, almost to frailty; and, from the first, his practised ear perceived that the sounds came from a beast of bottom. when the animal shot by the door, he could not restrain his admiration; which was accordingly thrust into the very marrow of his prayer "we pray thee, o lord, in a particular and peculiar manner--_that's a real smart critter_--to forgive us our manifold trespasses, in a particular and peculiar manner," &c. i have somewhere heard of a traveller on horseback, who, just at eventide, being uncertain of his road, inquired of a person he chanced to meet, the way to barkhamstead. "you are in barkhamstead now," was the reply. "yes, but where is the centre of the place?" "it hasn't got any centre." "well, but direct me to the tavern." "there ain't any tavern." "yes, but the meeting-house?" "why didn't you ask that afore? there it is, over the hill!" so, in those days, in connecticut, as doubtless in other parts of new england, the meeting-house was the great geographical monument, the acknowledged meridian of every town and village. even a place without a centre, or a tavern, had its house of worship; and this was its point of reckoning. it was, indeed, something more. it was the town-hall, where all public meetings were held for civil purposes; it was the temple of religion, the pillar of society, religious, social, and moral, to the people around. it will not be considered strange, then, if i look back to the meeting-house of ridgefield, as not only a most revered edifice, but as in some sense the starting-point of my existence. here, at least, linger many of my most cherished remembrances. a few rods to the south of this there was, and still is, a tavern, kept in my day by squire keeler. this institution ranked second only to the meeting-house; for the tavern of those days was generally the centre of news, and the gathering-place for balls, musical entertainments, public shows, &c.; and this particular tavern had special claims to notice. it was, in the first place, on the great thoroughfare of the day, between boston and new york; and had become a general and favorite stopping-place for travellers. it was, moreover, kept by a hearty old gentleman, who united in his single person the varied functions of publican, postmaster, representative, justice of the peace, and i know not what else. he, besides, had a thrifty wife, whose praise was in all the land. she loved her customers, especially members of congress, governors, and others in authority who wore powder and white top-boots, and who migrated to and fro in the lofty leisure of their own coaches. she was, indeed, a woman of mark; and her life has its moral. she scoured and scrubbed, and kept things going, until she was seventy years old; at which time, during an epidemic, she was threatened with an attack. she, however, declared that she had not time to be sick, and kept on working; so that the disease passed her by, though it made sad havoc all around her, especially with more dainty dames who had leisure to follow the fashion. besides all this, there was an historical interest attached to keeler's tavern; for, deeply imbedded in the north-eastern corner-post, there was a cannon-ball, planted there during the famous fight with the british in . it was one of the chief historical monuments of the town, and was visited by all curious travellers who came that way. little can the present generation imagine with what glowing interest, what ecstatic wonder, what big, round eyes, the rising generation of ridgefield, half a century ago, listened to the account of the fight, as given by lieutenant smith, himself a witness of the event and a participator in the conflict, sword in hand. this personage, whom i shall have occasion again to introduce to my readers, was, in my time, a justice of the peace, town librarian, and general oracle in such loose matters as geography, history, and law; then about as uncertain and unsettled in ridgefield, as is now the longitude of lilliput. he had a long, lean face; long, lank, silvery hair; and an unctuous, whining voice. with these advantages, he spoke with the authority of a seer, and especially in all things relating to the revolutionary war. the agitating scenes of that event, so really great in itself, so unspeakably important to the country, had transpired some five-and-twenty years before. the existing generation of middle age had all witnessed it; nearly all had shared in its vicissitudes. on every hand there were corporals, serjeants, lieutenants, captains, and colonels, no strutting fops in militia buckram, raw blue and buff, all fuss and feathers, but soldiers, men who had seen service and won laurels in the tented field. every old man, every old woman, had stories to tell, radiant with the vivid realities of personal observation or experience. some had seen washington, and some old put; one was at the capture of ticonderoga under ethan allen; another was at bennington, and actually heard old stark say, "victory this day, or my wife molly is a widow!" some were at the taking of stony point, and others in the sanguinary struggle of monmouth. one had witnessed the execution of andré, and another had been present at the capture of burgoyne. the time which had elapsed since these events had served only to magnify and glorify these scenes, as well as the actors, especially in the imagination of the rising generation. if perchance we could now dig up and galvanize into life a contemporary of julius cæsar, who was present and saw him cross the rubicon, and could tell us how he looked and what he said, we should listen with somewhat of the greedy wonder with which the boys of ridgefield listened to lieutenant smith, when of a saturday afternoon, seated on the stoop of keeler's tavern, he discoursed upon the discovery of america by columbus, braddock's defeat, and the old french war; the latter a real epic, embellished with romantic episodes of indian massacres and captivities. when he came to the revolution, and spoke of the fight at ridgefield, and punctuated his discourse with a present cannon-ball, sunk six inches deep in a corner-post of the very house in which we sat, you may well believe it was something more than words--it was, indeed, "action, action, glorious action!" how little can people now-a-days comprehend or appreciate these things! chapter ii. the new house--high ridge--nathan kellogg's spy-glass--the shovel--the black patch in the road--distrust of british influence--old chich-es-ter--aunt delight--return after twenty years. my memory goes distinctly back to the year , when i was four years old. at that time a great event happened--great in the narrow horizon of childhood: we removed from the old house to the new house! this latter, situated on a road tending westward and branching from the main street, my father had just built; and it then appeared to me quite a stately mansion and very beautiful, inasmuch as it was painted red behind and white in front: most of the dwellings thereabouts being of the dun complexion which pine-boards and chestnut-shingles assume, from exposure to the weather. long after, having been absent twenty years, i revisited this my early home, and found it shrunk into a very small and ordinary two-story dwelling, wholly divested of its paint, and scarcely thirty feet square. this building, apart from all other dwellings, was situated on what is called high ridge, a long hill, looking down upon the village, and commanding an extensive view of the surrounding country. from our upper windows, this was at once beautiful and diversified. on the south, as i have said, the hills sloped in a sea of undulations down to long island sound, a distance of some fourteen miles. this beautiful sheet of water, like a strip of pale sky, with the island itself, more deeply tinted, beyond, was visible in fair weather, for a stretch of sixty miles, to the naked eye. the vessels, even the smaller ones, sloops, schooners, and fishing-craft, could be seen, creeping like insects over the surface. with a spy-glass--and my father had one bequeathed to him by nathan kellogg, a sailor, who made rather a rough voyage of life, but anchored at last in the bosom of the church, as this bequest intimates--we could see the masts, sails, and rigging. it was a poor, dim affair, compared with modern instruments of the kind; but to me, its revelations of an element which then seemed as beautiful, as remote, and as mystical as the heavens, surpassed the wonders of the firmament. to the west, at a distance of three miles, lay the undulating ridge of hills, cliffs, and precipices already mentioned, and which bear the name of west mountain. they are some five hundred feet in height, and from our point of view had an imposing appearance. beyond them, in the far distance, glimmered the peaks of the highlands along the hudson. these two prominent features of the spreading landscape--the sea and the mountain, ever present, yet ever remote--impressed themselves on my young imagination with all the enchantment which distance lends to the view. i have never lost my first love. never, even now, do i catch a glimpse of either of these two rivals of nature, such as i first learned them by heart, but i feel a gush of emotion as if i had suddenly met with the cherished companions of my childhood. in after days, even the purple velvet of the apennines and the poetic azure of the mediterranean, have derived additional beauty to my imagination from mingling with these vivid associations of my childhood. it was to the new house, then, thus situated, that we removed, as i have stated, when i was four years old. on that great occasion, everything available for draught or burden was put in requisition; and i was permitted, or required, i forget which, to carry the _peel_, as it was then called, but which would now bear the title of "shovel." birmingham had not then been heard of in those parts, or at least was a great way off; so this particular utensil had been forged expressly for my father by david olmstead, the blacksmith, as was the custom in those days. i recollect it well, and can state that it was a sturdy piece of iron, the handle being four feet long, with a knob at the end. as i carried it along, i doubtless felt a touch of that consciousness of power which must have filled the breast of samson as he bore off the gates of gaza. i recollect perfectly well to have perspired under the operation, for the distance of our migration was half-a-mile, and the season was summer. one thing more i remember: i was barefoot; and as we went up the lane which diverged from the main road to the house, we passed over a patch of earth blackened by cinders, where my feet were hurt by pieces of melted glass and metal. i inquired what this meant, and was told that here a house was burned down by the british troops already mentioned, and then in full retreat, as a signal to the ships that awaited them in the sound, where they had landed, and where they intended to embark. this detail may seem trifling; but it is not without significance. it was the custom in those days for boys to go barefoot in the mild season. i recollect few things in life more delightful than, in the spring, to cast away my shoes and stockings, and have a glorious scamper over the fields. many a time, contrary to the express injunctions of my mother, have i stolen this bliss; and many a time have i been punished by a severe cold for my disobedience. yet the bliss then seemed a compensation for the retribution. in these exercises i felt as if stepping on air; as if leaping aloft on wings. i was so impressed with the exultant emotions thus experienced, that i repeated them a thousand times in happy dreams; especially in my younger days. even now these visions sometimes come to me in sleep, though with a lurking consciousness that they are but a mockery of the past; sad monitors of the change which time has wrought upon me. as to the black patch in the lane, that, too, had its meaning. the story of a house burned down by a foreign army seized upon my imagination. every time i passed the place i ruminated upon it, and put a hundred questions as to how and when it happened. i was soon master of the whole story, and of other similar events which had occurred all over the country. i was thus initiated into the spirit of that day, and which has never wholly subsided in our country; inasmuch as the war of the revolution was alike unjust in its origin, and cruel as to the manner in which it was waged. it was, moreover, fought on our own soil; thus making the whole people share, personally, in its miseries. there was scarcely a family in connecticut whom it did not visit, either immediately or remotely, with the shadows of mourning and desolation. the british nation, to whom this conflict was a foreign war, are slow to comprehend the popular dislike of england, here in america. could they know the familiar annals of our towns and villages--burn, plundered, sacked--with all the attendant horrors, for the avowed purpose of punishing a nation of rebels, and those rebels of their own kith and kin: could they be made acquainted with the deeds of those twenty thousand hessians, sent hither by king george, and who have left their name in our language as a word signifying brigands, who sell their blood and commit murder for hire: could they thus read the history of minds and hearts, influenced at the fountains of life for several generations, they would perhaps comprehend, if they could not approve, the habitual distrust of british influence, which lingers among our people. about three-fourths of a mile from my father's house, on the winding road to lower salem, which i have already mentioned, and which bore the name of west lane, was the school-house where i took my first lessons, and received the foundations of my very slender education. i have since been sometimes asked where i graduated: my reply has always been, "at west lane." generally speaking, this has ended the inquiry; whether, because my questioners have confounded this venerable institution with "lane seminary," or have not thought it worth while to risk an exposure of their ignorance as to the college in which i was educated, i am unable to say. the site of the school-house was a triangular piece of land, measuring perhaps a rood in extent, and lying, according to the custom of those days, at the meeting of four roads. the ground hereabouts--as everywhere else in ridgefield--was exceedingly stony; and, in making the pathway, the stones had been thrown out right and left, and there remained in heaps on either side, from generation to generation. all around was bleak and desolate. loose, squat stone walls, with innumerable breaches, inclosed the adjacent fields. a few tufts of elder, with here and there a patch of briers and pokeweed, flourished in the gravelly soil. not a tree, however, remained; save an aged chestnut, at the western angel of the space. this, certainly, had not been spared for shade or ornament, but probably because it would have cost too much labor to cut it down; for it was of ample girth. at all events, it was the oasis in our desert during summer; and in autumn, as the burrs disclosed its fruit, it resembled a besieged city; the boys, like so many catapults, hurled at it stones and sticks, until every nut had capitulated. two houses only were at hand: one, surrounded by an ample barn, a teeming orchard, and an enormous wood-pile, belonging to granther baldwin; the other was the property of "old chich-es-ter;" an uncouth, unsocial being, whom everybody, for some reason or other, seemed to despise and shun. his house was of stone, and of one story. he had a cow, which every year had a calf. he had a wife--dirty and uncombed, and vaguely reported to have been brought from the old country. this is about the whole history of the man, so far as it is written in the authentic traditions of the parish. his premises, an acre in extent, consisted of a tongue of land between two of the converging roads. no boy, that i ever heard of, ventured to cast a stone, or to make an incursion into this territory, though it lay close to the school-house. i have often, in passing, peeped timidly over the walls, and caught glimpses of a stout man with a drab coat, drab breeches, and drab gaiters, prowling about the house; but never did i discover him outside of his own dominion. i know it was darkly intimated he had been tarred and feathered in the revolutionary war; but as to the rest, he was a perfect myth. the school-house itself consisted of rough, unpainted clapboards, upon a wooden frame. it was plastered within, and contained two apartments, a little entry, taken out of a corner for a wardrobe, and the school-room proper. the chimney was of stone, and pointed with mortar, which, by the way, had been dug into a honeycomb by uneasy and enterprising penknives. the fireplace was six feet wide and four feet deep. the flue was so ample and so perpendicular, that the rain, sleet, and snow fell directly to the hearth. in winter, the battle for life with green fizzling fuel, which was brought in lengths and cut up by the scholars, was a stern one. not unfrequently the wood, gushing with sap as it was, chanced to go out, and as there was no living without fire, the thermometer being ten or twenty degrees below zero, the school was dismissed, whereat all the scholars rejoiced aloud, not having the fear of the schoolmaster before their eyes. it was the custom at this place to have a woman's school in the summer months, and this was attended only by young children. it was, in fact, what we now call a primary or infant school. in winter, a man was employed as teacher, and then the girls and boys of the neighborhood, up to the age of eighteen, or even twenty, were among the pupils. it was not uncommon, at this season, to have forty scholars crowded into this little building. i was about six years old when i first went to school. my teacher was aunt delight, that is delight benedict, a maiden lady of fifty, short and bent, of sallow complexion and solemn aspect. i remember the first day with perfect distinctness. i went alone--for i was familiar with the road, it being that which passed by our old house. i carried a little basket, with bread and butter within, for my dinner, and this was covered over with a white cloth. when i had proceeded about half way, i lifted the cover, and debated whether i would not eat my dinner then. i believe it was a sense of duty only that prevented my doing so, for in those happy days i always had a keen appetite. bread and butter were then infinitely superior to _pâté de foie gras_ now; but still, thanks to my training, i had also a conscience. as my mother had given me the food for dinner, i did not think it right to convert it into lunch, even though i was strongly tempted. i think we had seventeen scholars--boys and girls--mostly of my own age. among them were some of my after-companions. i have since met several of them--one at savannah and two at mobile--respectably established, and with families around them. some remain, and are now among the grey old men of the town: the names of others i have seen inscribed on the tombstones of their native village. and the rest--where are they? the school being assembled, we were all seated upon benches, made of what were called _slabs_--that is, boards having the exterior or rounded part of the log on one side: as they were useless for other purposes, these were converted into school-benches, the rounded part down. they had each four supports, consisting of straddling wooden legs set into augur-holes. our own legs swayed in the air, for they were too short to touch the floor. oh, what an awe fell over me, when we were all seated and silence reigned around! the children were called up one by one to aunt delight, who sat on a low chair, and required each, as a preliminary, "to make his manners," which consisted of a small, sudden nod. she then placed the spelling-book--which was dilworth's--before the pupil, and with a buck-handled penknife pointed, one by one, to the letters of the alphabet, saying, "what's that?" if the child knew his letters, the "what's that?" very soon ran on thus:-- "what's that?" "a." "'stha-a-t?" "b." "sna-a-a-t?" "c." "sna-a-a-t?" "d." &c. i looked upon these operations with intense curiosity and no small respect, until my own turn came. i went up to the schoolmistress with some emotion, and when she said, rather spitefully, as i thought, "make your obeisance!" my little intellects all fled away, and i did nothing. having waited a second, gazing at me with indignation, she laid her hand on the top of my head, and gave it a jerk which made my teeth clash. i believe i bit my tongue a little; at all events, my sense of dignity was offended, and when she pointed to a, and asked what it was, it swam before me dim and hazy, and as big as a full moon. she repeated the question, but i was doggedly silent. again, a third time, she said, "what's that?" i replied: "why don't you tell me what it is? i didn't come here to learn you your letters." i have not the slightest remembrance of this, for my brains were all a wool-gathering; but as aunt delight affirmed it to be a fact, and it passed into a tradition in my family, i put it in. what immediately followed i do not clearly remember, but one result is distinctly traced in my memory. in the evening of this eventful day the schoolmistress paid my parents a visit, and recounted to their astonished ears this my awful contempt of authority. my father, after hearing the story, got up and went away; but my mother, who was a careful disciplinarian, told me not to do so again! i always had a suspicion that both of them smiled on one side of their faces, even while they seemed to sympathize with the old lady on the other; still, i do not affirm it, for i am bound to say of both my parents, that i never knew them, even in trifles, say one thing while they meant another. i believe i achieved the alphabet that summer, but my after progress, for a long time, i do not remember. two years later i went to the winter school at the same place, kept by lewis olmstead--a man who made a business of ploughing, mowing, carting manure, &c., in the summer, and of teaching school in the winter; with a talent for music at all seasons, wherefore he became chorister upon occasion, when, peradventure, deacon hawley could not officiate. he was a celebrity in ciphering, and squire seymour declared that he was the greatest "arithmeticker" in fairfield county. all i remember of his person is his hand, which seemed to me as big as goliath's, judging by the claps of thunder it made in my ears on one or two occasions. the next step of my progress which is marked in my memory, is the spelling of words of two syllables. i did not go very regularly to school, but by the time i was ten years old i had learned to write, and had made a little progress in arithmetic. there was not a grammar, a geography, or a history of any kind in the school. reading, writing, and arithmetic were the only things taught, and these very indifferently--not wholly from the stupidity of the teacher, but because he had forty scholars, and the custom of the age required no more than he performed. i did as well as the other scholars, certainly no better. i had excellent health and joyous spirits; in leaping, running, and wrestling i had but one superior of my age, and that was stephen olmstead, a snug-built fellow, smaller than myself, and who, despite our rivalry, was my chosen friend and companion. i seemed to live for play: alas! how the world has changed since then! after i had left my native town for some twenty years, i returned and paid it a visit. among the monuments that stood high in my memory was the west lane school-house. unconsciously carrying with me the measures of childhood, i had supposed it to be thirty feet square; how had it dwindled when i came to estimate it by the new standards i had formed! it was in all things the same, yet wholly changed to me. what i had deemed a respectable edifice, as it now stood before me was only a weather-beaten little shed, which, upon being measured, i found to be less than twenty feet square. it happened to be a warm summer day, and i ventured to enter the place. i found a girl, some eighteen years old, keeping a ma'am school for about twenty scholars, some of whom were studying parley's geography. the mistress was the daughter of one of my schoolmates, and some of the boys and girls were grandchildren of the little brood which gathered under the wing of aunt delight, when i was an abecedarian. none of them, not even the schoolmistress, had ever heard of me. the name of my father, as having ministered to the people of ridgefield in some bygone age, was faintly traced in their recollection. as to peter parley, whose geography they were learning, they supposed him to be a decrepit old gentleman hobbling about on a crutch, a long way off, for whom, nevertheless, they had a certain affection, inasmuch as he had made geography into a story-book. the frontispiece picture of the old fellow, with his gouty foot in a chair, threatening the boys that if they touched his tender toe he would tell them no more stories, secured their respect, and placed him among the saints in the calendar of their young hearts. "well," thought i, "if this goes on, i may yet rival mother goose!" i hope the reader will not imagine that i am thinking too little of his amusement and too much of my own, if i stop a few moments to note the lively recollections i entertain of the joyousness of my early life, and not of mine only, but that of my playmates and companions. in looking back to those early days, the whole circle of the seasons seems to me almost like one unbroken morning of pleasure. i was of course subjected to the usual crosses incident to my age, those painful and mysterious visitations sent upon children--the measles, mumps, whooping-cough, and the like; usually regarded as retributions for the false step of our mother eve in the garden; but they have almost passed from my memory, as if overflowed and borne away by the general drift of happiness which filled my bosom. among these calamities, one monument alone remains--the small-pox. it was in the year , as i well remember, that my father's house was converted into a hospital, or, as it was then called, a "pest-house," where, with some dozen other children, i was inoculated for this disease, then the scourge and terror of the world. the lane in which our house was situated was fenced up, north and south, so as to cut off all intercourse with the world around. a flag was raised, and upon it were inscribed the ominous words, "[hand symbol pointing right] small-pox." my uncle and aunt, from new haven, arrived with their three children. half-a-dozen others of the neighborhood were gathered together, making, with our own children, somewhat over a dozen subjects for the experiment. when all was ready, like noah and his family, we were shut in. provisions were deposited in a basket at a point agreed upon, down the lane. thus we were cut off from the world, excepting only that dr. perry, the physician, ventured to visit us. as to myself, the disease passed lightly over, leaving, however, its indisputable autographs on various parts of my body. were it not for these testimonials, i should almost suspect that i had escaped the disease, for i only remember, among my symptoms and my sufferings, a little headache, and the privation of salt and butter upon my hasty-pudding. my restoration to these privileges i distinctly recollect: doubtless these gave me more pleasure than the clean bill of health which they implied. several of the patients suffered severely, and among them my brother and one of my cousins. but although there is evidence that i was subject to the usual drawbacks upon the happiness of childhood, these were so few that they have passed from my mind; and those early years, as i look back to them, seem to have flowed on in one bright current of uninterrupted enjoyment. chapter iii. ridgefield society--trades and professions--chimney-corner courtships--domestic economy--dram-drinking--family products--molly gregory and church music--travelling artisans--festival of the quilts--clerical patronage--raising a church--the retired tailor and his farm. let me now give you a sketch of ridgefield and of the people, how they lived, thought, and felt, at the beginning of the present century. it will give you a good idea of the rustic life of new england fifty years ago. from what i have already said, you will easily imagine the prominent physical characteristics and aspect of my native town: a general mass of hills, rising up in a crescent of low mountains, and commanding a wide view on every side. the soil was naturally hard, and thickly sown with stones of every size. the fields were divided by rude stone walls, and the surface of most of them was dotted with gathered heaps of stones and rocks, thus clearing spaces for cultivation, yet leaving a large portion of the land still encumbered. the climate was severe, on account of the elevation of the site, yet this was perhaps fully compensated by its salubrity. yet, despite the somewhat forbidding nature of the soil and climate of ridgefield, it may be regarded as presenting a favorable example of new england country life and society at the time i speak of. the town was originally settled by a sturdy race of men, mostly the immediate descendants of english emigrants, some from milford. their migration over an intervening space of savage hills, rocks and ravines, into a territory so uninviting, and their speedy conversion of this into a thriving and smiling village, bear witness to their courage and energy. at the time referred to, the date of my earliest recollection, the society of ridgefield was exclusively english. i remember but one irishman, one negro, and one indian in the town. the first had begged and blarneyed his way from long island, where he had been wrecked; the second was a liberated slave; and the last was the vestige of a tribe which dwelt of yore in a swampy tract, the name of which i have forgotten. we had a professional beggar, called jagger, who had served in the armies of more than one of the georges, and insisted upon crying, "god save the king!" even on the th of july, and when openly threatened by the boys with a gratuitous ride on a rail. we had one settled pauper, mrs. yabacomb, who, for the first dozen years of my life, was my standard type for the witch of endor. nearly all the inhabitants of ridgefield were farmers, with the few mechanics that were necessary to carry on society in a somewhat primeval state. even the persons not professionally devoted to agriculture had each his farm, or at least his garden and home lot, with his pigs, poultry, and cattle. the population might have been , comprising two hundred families. all could read and write, but in point of fact, beyond the almanac and watts' psalms and hymns, their literary acquirements had little scope. there were, i think, four newspapers, all weekly, published in the state: one at hartford, one at new london, one at new haven, and one at litchfield. there were, however, not more than three subscribers to all these in our village. we had, however, a public library of some two hundred volumes, and, what was of equal consequence, the town was on the road which was then the great thoroughfare, connecting boston with new york; and hence we had means of intelligence from travellers constantly passing through the place, which kept us acquainted with the march of events. if ridgefield was thus rather above the average of connecticut villages in civilization, i suppose the circumstances and modes of life in my father's family were somewhat above those of most people around us. we had a farm of forty acres, with four cows, two horses, and some dozen sheep, to which may be added a stock of poultry, including a flock of geese. my father carried on the farm, besides preaching two sermons a-week, and visiting the sick, attending funerals, solemnizing marriages, &c. he laid out the beds and planted the garden; pruned the fruit-trees, and worked with the men in the meadow in hay-time. he generally cut the corn-stalks himself, and always shelled the ears; the latter being done by drawing them across the handle of the frying-pan, fastened over a wash-tub. i was sometimes permitted, as an indulgence, to share this favorite employment with my father. with these and a few other exceptions, our agricultural operations were carried on by hired help. it was the custom in new england, at the time i speak of, for country lawyers, physicians, clergymen, even doctors of divinity, to partake of these homespun labors. in the library of the athenæum, at hartford, is a collection of almanacs, formerly belonging to john cotton smith--one of the most elegant and accomplished men of his time--a distinguished member of congress, judge of the superior court, and several years governor of the state; in looking it over, i observed such notes as the following, made with his own hand: "cut my barley," "began rye harvest," "planted field of potatoes," &c.: thus showing his personal attention to, if not his participation in, the affairs of the farm. nearly all the judges of the superior court occasionally worked in the field, in these hearty old federal times. but i returned to ridgefield. the household, as well as political, economy of those days lay in this,--that every family lived as much as possible within itself. money was scarce, wages being about fifty cents a-day, though these were generally paid in meat, vegetables, and other articles of use--seldom in money. there was not a factory of any kind in the place.[ ] there was a butcher, but he only went from house to house to slaughter the cattle and swine of his neighbors. there was a tanner, but he only dressed other people's skins. there was a clothier, but he generally fulled and dressed other people's cloth. all this is typical of the mechanical operations of the place. even dyeing blue a portion of the wool, so as to make linsey-woolsey for short gowns, aprons, and blue-mixed stockings--vital necessities in those days--was a domestic operation. during the autumn, a dye-tub in the chimney corner--thus placed so as to be cherished by the genial heat--was as familiar in all thrifty houses as the bible or the back-log. it was covered with a board, and formed a cosy seat in the wide-mouthed fireplace, especially of a chill evening. when the night had waned, and the family had retired, it frequently became the anxious seat of the lover, who was permitted to carry on his courtship, the object of his addresses sitting demurely in the opposite corner. some of the first families in connecticut, i suspect, could their full annals be written, would find their foundations to have been laid in these chimney-corner courtships. being thus exposed, the dye-tub was the frequent subject of distressing and exciting accidents. among the early, indelible incidents in my memory, one of the most prominent is turning this over. nothing so roused the indignation of thrifty housewives, for, besides the stain left upon the floor by the blue, a most disagreeable odor was diffused by it. to this general system of domestic economy our family was not an exception. every autumn, it was a matter of course that we had a fat ox or a fat cow ready for slaughter. one full barrel was salted down; the hams were cut out, slightly salted, and hung up in the chimney for a few days, and thus became "dried" or "hung beef," then as essential as bread. pork was managed in a similar way, though even on a larger scale, for two barrels were indispensable. a few pieces, as the spare-ribs, &c., were distributed to the neighbors, who paid in kind when they killed their swine. mutton and poultry came in their turn, all from our own stock, except when on thanksgiving-day some of the magnates gave the parson a turkey. this, let me observe, in those good old times, was a bird of mark; no timid, crouching biped, with downcast head and pallid countenance, but stalking like a lord, and having wattles red as a "banner bathed in slaughter." his beard was long, shining, and wiry. there was, in fact, something of the native bird still in him, for though the race was nearly extinct, a few wild flocks lingered in the remote woods. occasionally, in the depth of winter, and towards the early spring, these stole to the barnyard, and held communion with their civilized cousins. severe battles ensued among the leaders for the favors of the fair, and as the wild cocks always conquered, the vigor of the race was kept up. our bread was made of rye, mixed with indian meal. wheat bread was reserved for the sacrament and company; a proof not of its superiority, but of its scarcity and consequent estimation. all the vegetables came from our garden and farm. the fuel was supplied by our own woods--sweet-scented hickory, snapping chestnut, odoriferous oak, and reeking, fizzling ash--the hot juice of the latter, by the way, being a sovereign antidote for the earache. these were laid in huge piles, all alive with sap, on the tall, gaunt andirons. the building of a fire, a real architectural achievement, was always begun by daybreak. there was first a back-log, from fifteen to four-and-twenty inches in diameter, and five feet long, imbedded in the ashes; then came a top log, then a fore stick, then a middle stick, and then a heap of kindlings, reaching from the bowels down to the bottom. above all was a pyramid of smaller fragments, artfully adjusted, with spaces for the blaze. friction matches had not then been invented. so, if there were no coals left from the last night's fire, and none to be borrowed from the neighbors, resort was had to flint, steel, and tinder-box. often, when the flint was dull, and the steel soft, and the tinder damp, the striking of fire was a task requiring both energy and patience. if the pile on the andirons was skilfully constructed, the spark being applied, there was soon a furious stinging smoke; but the forked flame soon began to lick the sweating sticks above, and by the time the family had arisen, and assembled in the "keeping-room," there was a roaring blaze, defying the bitter blasts of winter, which found abundant admittance through the crannies of the doors and windows. to feed the family fire in those days, during the severe season, was fully one man's work. but to go on with our household history. sugar was partially supplied by our maple-trees. these were tapped in march, the sap being collected, and boiled down in the woods. this was wholly a domestic operation, and one in which all the children rejoiced, each taking his privilege of tasting, at every stage of the manufacture. the chief supply of sugar, however, was from the west indies. [illustration: making maple-sugar.] rum was largely consumed, but our distilleries had scarcely begun. a half-pint of it was given as a matter of course to every day laborer, more particularly in the summer season. in all families, rich or poor, it was offered to male visitors as an essential point of hospitality, or even good manners. women--i beg pardon--ladies, took their schnapps, then named "hopkins' elixir," which was the most delicious and seductive means of getting tipsy that has been invented. crying babies were silenced with hot toddy. every man imbibed his morning dram, and this was esteemed temperance. there is a story of a preacher, about those days, who thus lectured his parish: "i say nothing, my beloved brethren, against taking a little bitters before breakfast, and after breakfast; especially if you are used to it. what i contend against is, this dramming, dramming, dramming, at all hours of the day. there are some men who take a glass at eleven o'clock in the forenoon, and at four in the afternoon. i do not purpose to contend against old-established customs, my brethren, rendered respectable by time and authority; but this dramming, dramming, is a crying sin in the land." as to brandy, i scarcely heard of it, so far as i can recollect, till i was sixteen years old, and, as an apprentice in a country store, was called upon to sell it. cider was the universal table beverage. brandy and whisky soon after came into use. i remember, in my boyhood, to have seen a strange zigzag tin tube, denominated a "still," belonging to one of our neighbors, converting, drop by drop, certain innocent liquids into "fire-water." but, in the days i speak of, french brandy was confined to the houses of the rich, and to the drug-shop. wine, in our country towns, was then almost exclusively used for the sacrament. there was, of course, no baker in ridgefield; each family not only made its own bread, cakes, and pies, but its own soap, candles, butter, cheese, and the like. the manufacture of linen and woollen cloth was no less a domestic operation. cotton--that is, raw cotton--was then wholly unknown among us at the north, except as a mere curiosity, produced somewhere in the tropics; but whether it grew on a plant, or an animal, was not clearly settled in the public mind. we raised our own flax, rotted it, hackled it, dressed it, and spun it. the little wheel, turned by the foot, had its place, and was as familiar as if it had been a member of the family. how often have i seen my mother, and my grandmother, too, sit down to it--though this, as i remember, was for the purpose of spinning some finer kind of thread--the burden of the spinning being done by a neighbor of ours, sally st. john. by the way, she was a good-hearted, cheerful old maid, who petted me beyond my deserts. i grieve to say, that i repaid her partiality by many mischievous pranks; for which i should have been roundly punished, had not the good creature forgiven and concealed my offences. i did, indeed, get fillipped for catching her foot one day in a steel-trap; but i declare that i was innocent of malice prepense, inasmuch as i had set the trap for a rat, instead of the said sally. nevertheless, the verdict was against me; not wholly on account of my misdemeanor in this particular instance, but because, if i did not deserve punishment for that, i had deserved it, and should deserve it for something else; and so it was safe to administer it. the wool was also spun in the family; partly by my sisters, and partly by molly gregory, daughter of our neighbor, the town carpenter. i remember her well as she sang and spun aloft in the attic. in those days, church-singing was the only one of the fine arts which flourished in ridgefield, except the music of the drum and fife. the choir was divided into four parts, ranged on three sides of the meeting-house gallery. the tenor, led by deacon hawley, was in front of the pulpit, the bass to the left, and the treble and counter to the right; the whole being set in motion by a pitch-pipe, made by the deacon himself, who was a cabinet-maker. molly took upon herself the entire counter, for she had excellent lungs. the fuguing tunes, which had then run a little mad, were her delight. in her solitary operations aloft i have often heard her send forth, from the attic windows, the droning hum of her wheel, with fitful snatches of a hymn, in which the bass began, the tenor followed, then the treble, and, finally, the counter--winding up with irresistible pathos. molly singing to herself, and all unconscious of eavesdroppers, carried on all the parts thus:-- _bass._ "long for a cooling-- _tenor._ "long for a cooling-- _treble._ "long for a cooling-- _counter._ "long for a cooling stream at hand, and they must drink or die!" the knitting of stockings was performed by the women of the family in the evening, and especially at tea-parties. this was considered a moral, as well as an economical, employment; for people held, with dr. watts, that "satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do." satan, however, dodged the question: for if the hands were occupied the tongue was loose; and it was said that, in some families, he kept them well occupied with idle gossip. at all events, pianos, chess-boards, graces, battledoors and shuttlecocks, with other safety-valves of the kind, were only known by the hearing of the ear, as belonging to some such vanity fair as new york or boston. the weaving of cloth--linen as well as woollen--was performed by an itinerant workman, who came to the house, put up his loom, and threw his shuttle, till the season's work was done. the linen was bleached and made up by the family; the woollen cloth was sent to the fuller to be dyed and dressed. twice a-year, that is, in the spring and autumn, the tailor came to the house and made a stock of clothes for the male members; this was called "whipping the cat." mantuamakers and milliners came, in their turn, to fit out the female members of the family. there was a similar process as to boots and shoes. we sent the hides of the cattle--cows and calves we had killed--to the tanner, and these came back in assorted leather. occasionally a little morocco, then wholly a foreign manufacture, was bought at the store, and made up for the ladies' best shoes. amby benedict, the travelling shoemaker, came with his bench, lapstone, and awls, and converted some little room into a shop, till the household was duly shod. he was a merry fellow, and threw in lots of singing gratis. he played all the popular airs upon his lapstone--as hurdygurdies and hand-organs do now. carpets were then only known in a few families, and were confined to the keeping-room and parlor. they were all home-made: the warp consisting of woollen yarn, and the woof of lists and old woollen cloth, cut into strips, and sewed together at the ends. coverlids generally consisted of quilts, made of pieces of waste calico, sewed together in octagons, and quilted in rectangles, giving the whole a gay and rich appearance. this process of quilting generally brought together the women of the neighborhood, married and single; and a great time they had of it, what with tea, talk, and stitching. in the evening the men were admitted; so that a quilting was a real festival, not unfrequently leading to love-making and marriage among the young people. this reminds me of a sort of communism or socialism, which prevailed in our rural districts long before owen or fourier was born. at ridgefield we used to have "stone bees," when all the men of a village or hamlet came together with their draught cattle, and united to clear some patch of earth of stones and rocks. all this labor was gratuitously rendered, save only that the proprietor of the land furnished the grog. such a meeting was always, of course, a very social and sociable affair. when the work was done, gymnastic exercises--such as hopping, wrestling, and foot-racing--took place among the athletic young men. my father generally attended these celebrations as a looker-on. it was, indeed, the custom for the clergy of the olden time to mingle with the people, even in their labors and their pastimes. for some reason or other, it seemed that things went better when the parson gave them his countenance. i followed my father's example, and attended these cheerful and beneficial gatherings. most of the boys of the town did the same. i may add that, if i may trust the traditions of ridgefield, the cellar of our new house was dug by a "bee" in a single day, and that was christmas. house-raising and barn-raising, the framework being always of wood, were done in the same way by a neighborly gathering of the people. i remember an anecdote of a church-raising, which i may as well relate here. in the eastern part of the state, i think at lyme, or pautipaug, a meeting-house was destroyed by lightning. after a year or two the society mustered its energies, and raised the frame of another on the site of the old one. it stood about six months, and was then blown over. in due time another frame was prepared, and the neighborhood gathered together to raise it. it was now proposed by deacon hart that they should commence the performances by a prayer and hymn, it having been suggested that perhaps the want of these pious preliminaries on former occasions had something to do with the calamitous results which attended them. when all was ready, therefore, a prayer was made, and the chorister of the place gave out two lines of the hymn, thus:-- "if god to build the house deny, the builders work in vain." this being sung, the chorister completed the verse thus, adapting the lines to the occasion:-- "unless the lord doth shingle it, it will blow down agin!" i must not fail to give you a portrait of one of our village homes, of the middle class, at this era. i take as an example that of our neighbor, j. b., who had been a tailor, but having thriven in his affairs, and being now some fifty years old, had become a farmer. it was situated on the road leading to salem, there being a wide space in front occupied by the wood-pile, which in these days was not only a matter of great importance, but of formidable bulk. the size of the wood-pile was, indeed, in some sort an index to the rank and condition of the proprietor. the house itself was a low edifice, forty feet long, and of two stories in front; the rear being what was called a _breakback_--that is, sloping down to a height of ten feet; this low part furnishing a shelter for garden tools and various household instruments. the whole was constructed of wood, the outside being of the dun complexion assumed by unpainted wood, exposed to the weather for twenty or thirty years, save only that the roof was tinged of a reddish brown by a fine moss that found sustenance in the chestnut shingles. to the left was the garden, which in the productive season was a wilderness of onions, squashes, cucumbers, beets, parsnips, and currants, with the never-failing tansy for bitters, horseradish for seasoning, and fennel for keeping old women awake in church time. the interior of the house presented a parlor with plain, whitewashed walls, a home-made carpet upon the floor, calico curtains at the window, and a mirror three feet by two against the side, with a mahogany frame: to these must be added eight chairs and a cherry table, of the manufacture of deacon hawley. the "keeping" or sitting-room had also a carpet, a dozen rush-bottom chairs, a table, &c. the kitchen was large--fully twenty feet square, with a fireplace six feet wide and four feet deep. on one side it looked out upon the garden, the squashes and cucumbers climbing up and forming festoons over the door; on the other it commanded a view of the orchard, embracing first a circle of peaches, pears, and plums; and beyond, a wide-spread clover-field, embowered with apple-trees. just by was the well, with its tall sweep, the old oaken bucket dangling from the pole. the kitchen was, in fact, the most comfortable room in the house; cool in summer, and perfumed with the breath of the garden and the orchard: in winter, with its roaring blaze of hickory, it was a cosy resort, defying the bitterest blasts of the season. here the whole family assembled at meals, except when the presence of company made it proper to serve tea in the parlor. the bed-rooms were all without carpets, and the furniture was generally of a simple character. the beds, however, were of ample size, and well filled with geese feathers, these being deemed essential for comfortable people. i must say, by the way, that every decent family had its flock of geese, of course, which was picked thrice a-year, despite the noisy remonstrances of both goose and gander. the sheets of the bed, though of home-made linen, were as white as the driven snow. indeed, the beds of this era showed that sleep was a luxury, well understood and duly cherished by all classes. the cellar, extending under the whole house, was by no means the least important part of the establishment. in the autumn, it was supplied with three barrels of beef and as many of pork, twenty barrels of cider, with numerous bins of potatoes, turnips, beets, carrots, and cabbages. the garret, which was of huge dimensions, at the same time displayed a labyrinth of dried pumpkins, peaches, and apples, hung in festoons upon the rafters, amid bunches of summer savory, boneset, fennel, and other herbs, the floor being occupied by heaps of wool, flax, tow, and the like. the barn corresponded to the house. it was a low brown structure, having abundance of sheds built on to it, without the least regard to symmetry. it was well stocked with hay, oats, rye, and buckwheat. six cows, one or two horses, three dozen sheep, and an ample supply of poultry, including two or three broods of turkeys, constituted its living tenants. the farm i need not describe in detail, but the orchard must not be overlooked. this consisted of three acres, covered, as i have said, with apple-trees, yielding abundantly--as well for the cider-mill as for the table, including the indispensable winter apple-sauce--according to their kinds. i think an apple orchard in the spring is one of the most beautiful objects in the world. how often have i ventured into uncle josey's ample orchard at this joyous season, and stood entranced among the robins, blackbirds, woodpeckers, bluebirds, jays, and orioles,--all seeming to me like playmates, racing, chasing, singing, rollicking, in the exuberance of their joy, or perchance slily pursuing their courtships, or even more slily building their nests and rearing their young. the inmates of the house i need not describe, further than to say that uncle josey himself was a little deaf, and of moderate abilities; yet he lived to good account, for he reared a large family, and was gathered to his fathers at a good old age, leaving behind him a handsome estate, a fair name, and a good example. his wife, who spent her early life at service in a kitchen, was a handsome, lively, efficient woman, and a universal favorite in the neighborhood. this is the homely picture of a ridgefield farmer's home half a century ago. there were other establishments more extensive and more sumptuous in the town, as there were others also of an inferior grade; but this was a fair sample of the houses, barns, and farms of the middle class. footnote: [ ] i recollect, as an after-thought, one exception. there was a hatter who supplied the town; but he generally made hats to order, and usually in exchange for the skins of foxes, rabbits, muskrats, and other chance peltry. i frequently purchased my powder and shot from the proceeds of skins which i sold him. chapter iv. habits of the people--their costume--amusements--festivals-- marriages--funerals--dancing--winter sports--my two grandmothers--mechanical genius--importance of whittling--pigeons--sporting adventures. you will now have some ideas of the household industry and occupations of the country people in connecticut, at the beginning of the present century. their manners, in other respects, had a corresponding stamp of homeliness and simplicity. in most families, the first exercise of the morning was reading the bible, followed by a prayer, at which all were assembled, including the servants and helpers of the kitchen and the farm. then came the breakfast, which was a substantial meal, always including hot viands, with vegetables, apple-sauce, pickles, mustard, horseradish, and various other condiments. cider was the common drink for laboring people: even children drank it at will. tea was common, but not so general as now. coffee was almost unknown. dinner was a still more hearty and varied repast--characterised by abundance of garden vegetables; tea was a light supper. the day began early: the breakfast hour was six in summer and seven in winter; dinner was at noon--the work-people in the fields being called to their meals by a conchshell winded by some kitchen triton. tea was usually taken about sundown. in families where all were laborers, all sat at table, servants as well as masters--the food being served before sitting down. in families where the masters and mistresses did not share the labors of the household or the farm, the meals of the domestics were taken separately. there was, however, in those days a perfectly good understanding and good feeling between the masters and servants. the latter were not irish: they had not as yet imbibed the plebeian envy of those above them, which has since so generally embittered and embarrassed american domestic life. the terms "democrat" and "aristocrat" had not got into use: these distinctions, and the feelings now implied by them, had indeed no existence in the hearts of the people. our servants, during all my early life, were generally the daughters of respectable farmers and mechanics in the neighborhood, and, respecting others, were themselves respected and cherished. they were devoted to the interests of the family, and were always relied upon and treated as friends. in health they had the same food, in sickness the same care, as the masters and mistresses or their children. at the period of my earliest recollections, men of all classes were dressed in long, broad-tailed coats, with huge pockets; long waistcoats, breeches, and hats with low crowns and broad brims: some so wide as to be supported at the sides with cords. the stockings of the parson, and a few others, were of silk in summer and worsted in winter; those of the people were generally of wool. women dressed in wide bonnets, sometimes of straw and sometimes of silk; and gowns of silk, muslin, gingham, &c., generally close and short-waisted, the breast and shoulders being covered by a full muslin kerchief. girls ornamented themselves with a large white vandike. on the whole, the dress of both men and women has greatly changed; for at ridgefield, as at less remote places, the people follow, though at a distance, the fashions of paris. the amusements were then much the same as at present, though some striking differences may be noted. books and newspapers were then scarce, and were read respectfully, and as if they were grave matters, demanding thought and attention. they were not toys and pastimes, taken up every day, and by everybody, in the short intervals of labor, and then hastily dismissed, like waste paper. the aged sat down when they read, and drew forth their spectacles, and put them deliberately and reverently upon the nose. even the young approached a book with reverence, and a newspaper with awe. how the world has changed! the two great festivals were thanksgiving and "training-day;" the latter deriving, from the still lingering spirit of the revolutionary war, a decidedly martial character. the marching of the troops, and the discharge of gunpowder, which invariably closed the exercises, were glorious and inspiring mementoes of heroic achievements upon many a bloody field. the music of the drum and fife resounded on every side. a match between two rival drummers always drew an admiring crowd, and was in fact one of the chief excitements of the great day. tavern-haunting, especially in winter, when there was little to do, for manufactures had not then sprung up to give profitable occupation during this inclement season, was common even with respectable farmers. marriages were celebrated in the evening, at the house of the bride, with a general gathering of the neighborhood, and were usually finished off by dancing. everybody went, as to a public exhibition, without invitation. funerals generally drew large processions, which proceeded to the grave. here the minister always made an address suited to the occasion. if there were anything remarkable in the history of the deceased, it was turned to religious account in the next sunday's sermon. singing-meetings, to practise church music, were a great resource for the young in winter. dances at private houses were common, and drew no reproaches from the sober people present. balls at the taverns were frequented by the young; the children of deacons and ministers attended, though the parents did not. the winter brought sleighing, skating, and the usual round of indoor sports. in general, the intercourse of all classes was kindly and considerate, no one arrogating superiority, and yet no one refusing to acknowledge it where it existed. you would hardly have noticed that there was a higher and a lower class. such there were, certainly; for there must always and everywhere be the strong and the weak, the wise and the foolish. but in our society these existed without being felt as a privilege to one, which must give offence to another. it may serve in some degree to throw light upon the manners and customs of this period, if i give you a sketch of my two grandmothers. both were widows, and were well stricken in years when they came to visit us at ridgefield, about the year - . my grandmother ely was a lady of the old school, and sustaining the character in her upright carriage, her long, tapering waist, and her high-heeled shoes. the customs of louis xv.'s time had prevailed in new york and boston, and even at this period they still lingered there in isolated cases. it is curious enough, that at this time the female attire of a century ago is revived; and every black-eyed, stately old lady, dressed in black silk, and showing her steel-grey hair beneath her cap, reminds me of my maternal grandmother. my other grandmother was in all things the opposite; short, fat, blue-eyed, and practical; a good example of a hearty country dame. i scarcely knew which of the two i liked the best. the first sang me plaintive songs, told me stories of the revolution--her husband, col. ely, having had a large and painful share in its vicissitudes--she described gen. washington, whom she had seen; and the french officers, lafayette, rochambeau, and others, who had been inmates of her house. she told me tales of even more ancient date, and recited poetry, generally ballads, which were suited to my taste. and all this lore was commended to me by a voice of inimitable tenderness, and a manner at once lofty and condescending. my other grandmother was not less kind, but she promoted my happiness and prosperity in another way. instead of stories, she gave me bread and butter: in place of poetry, she fed me with apple-sauce and pie. never was there a more hearty old lady: she had a firm conviction that children must be fed, and what she believed she practised. i can recollect with great vividness the interest i took in the domestic events i have described. the operations of the farm had no great attractions for me. ploughing, hoeing, digging, seemed to me mere drudgery, imparting no instruction, and affording no scope for ingenuity or invention. mechanical operations, especially those of the weaver and carpenter, on the contrary, stimulated my curiosity, and excited my emulation. thus i soon became familiar with the carpenter's tools, and made such windmills, kites, and perpetual motions, as to win the admiration of my playmates, and excite the respect of my parents; so that they seriously meditated putting me apprentice to a carpenter. up to the age of fourteen, i think this was regarded as my manifest destiny. it was a day of great endeavors among all inventive geniuses. fulton was struggling to develop steam navigation; and other discoverers were seeking to unfold the wonders of art as well as of nature. it was, in fact, the very threshold of the era of steam-boats, railroads, electric telegraphs, and a thousand other useful discoveries, which have since changed the face of the world. in this age of excitement, perpetual motion was the great hobby of aspiring mechanics. i pondered and whittled intensely on this subject before i was ten years old. despairing of reaching my object by mechanical means, i attempted to arrive at it by magnetism, my father having bought me a pair of horse-shoe magnets in one of his journeys to new haven. i should have succeeded, had it not been a principle in the nature of this curious element, that no substance will intercept the stream of attraction. i tried to change the poles, and turn the north against the south; but there, too, nature had headed me, and of course i failed. a word, by the way, on the matter of whittling. this is generally represented as a sort of idle, fidgety, frivolous use of the penknife, and is set down, by foreigners and sketchers of american manners, as a peculiar characteristic of our people. no portrait of an american is deemed complete, unless with penknife and shingle in hand. i feel not the slightest disposition to resent even this, among the thousand caricatures that pass for traits of american life. for my own part, i can testify that, during my youthful days, i found the penknife a source of great amusement, and even of instruction. many a long winter evening, many a dull, drizzly day, in spring, and summer, and autumn--sometimes at the kitchen fireside, sometimes in the attic, sometimes in a cosy nook of the barn, sometimes in the shelter of a neighboring stone wall, thatched over with wild grape-vines--have i spent in great ecstasy, making candle-rods, or some other simple article of household goods, for my mother; or in perfecting toys for myself and my young friends; or perhaps in attempts at more ambitious achievements. this was not mere waste of time; mere idleness and dissipation. i was amused: that was something. some of the pleasantest remembrances of my childhood carry me back to the scenes i have just indicated; when, in happy solitude, absorbed in my mechanical devices, i listened to the rain pattering upon the roof, or the wind roaring down the chimney: thus enjoying a double bliss, a pleasing occupation, with a conscious delight in my sense of security from the rage of the elements without. nay more; these occupations were instructive: my mind was stimulated to inquire into the mechanical powers, and my hand was educated to mechanical dexterity. if you ask me why it is that this important institution of whittling is indigenous among us, i reply that, in the first place, our country is full of a great variety of woods, suited to carpentry, many of them easily wrought, and thus inviting boyhood to try its hands upon them. in the next place, labor is dear; and therefore even children are led to supply themselves with toys, or perchance to furnish some of the simpler articles of use to the household. this dearness of labor, moreover, furnishes a powerful stimulant to the production of labor-saving machines; and hence it is--through all these causes co-operating one with another--that steam-navigation, the electric telegraph, the steam-reaper, &c., &c., are american inventions: hence it is that, whether it be at the world's fair at london or paris, we gain a greater proportion of prizes for useful inventions than any other people. that is what comes of whittling! i must add, that in these early days i was a nimrod, a mighty hunter; first with a bow and arrow, and afterwards with the old hereditary firelock, which snapped six times and went off once. the smaller kinds of game were abundant. the thickets teemed with quails;[ ] partridges drummed in every wood; the gray squirrel--the most picturesque animal of our forests--enlivened every hickory copse with his mocking laugh, his lively gambols, and his long, bushy tail. the pigeons, in spring and autumn, migrated in countless flocks; and many lingered in our woods for the season. everybody was then a hunter; not, of course, a sportsman: for the chase was followed more for profit than for pastime. game was, in point of fact, a substantial portion of the supply of food at certain seasons of the year. all were then good shots, and my father was no exception: he was even beyond his generation in netting pigeons. this was not deemed a reproach at that time in a clergyman; nor was he the only parson that indulged in these occupations. one day, as i was with him on west mountain, baiting pigeons, we had seduced a flock of three or four dozen down into the bed where they were feeding; my father and myself lying concealed in our bush-hut, close by. suddenly, whang went a gun into the middle of the flock! out we ran in great indignation; for at least a dozen of the birds were bleeding and fluttering before us. scarcely had we reached the spot, when we met parson m----, of lower salem, who had thus unwittingly poached upon us. the two clergymen had first a squabble, and then a good laugh; after which they divided the plunder and then parted. the stories told by wilson and audubon as to the amazing quantity of pigeons in the west, were realized by us in connecticut half-a-century ago. i have seen, in the county of fairfield, a stream of these noble birds pouring at brief intervals through the skies, from the rising to the setting sun. of all the pigeon tribe, this of our country--the passenger pigeon--is the swiftest and most beautiful. at the same time, it is unquestionably superior to any other for the table. all the other species of the eastern, as well as the western continent, which i have tasted, are soft and flavorless in comparison. i can recollect no sports of my youth which equalled in excitement our pigeon hunts, which generally took place in september and october. we usually started on horseback before daylight, and made a rapid progress to some stubble-field on west mountain. the ride in the keen, fresh air, especially as the dawn began to break, was delightful. the gradual encroachment of day upon the night filled my mind with sublime images: the waking up of a world from sleep, the joyousness of birds and beasts in the return of morning, and my own sympathy in this cheerful and grateful homage of the heart to god, the giver of good--all contributed to render these adventures most impressive upon my young heart. my memory is still full of the sights and sounds of those glorious mornings: the silvery whistle of the wings of migrating flocks of plover, invisible in the gray mists of dawn; the faint murmur of the distant mountain torrents; the sonorous gong of the long-trailing flocks of wild geese, seeming to come from the unseen depths of the skies--these were among the suggestive sounds that stole through the dim twilight. as morning advanced, the scene was inconceivably beautiful: the mountain sides, clothed in autumnal green, and purple, and gold, rendered more glowing by the sunrise--with the valleys covered with mists, and spreading out like lakes of silver; while on every side the ear was saluted by the mocking screams of the red-headed woodpecker, the cawing of congresses of crows; and, finally, the rushing sound of the pigeons, pouring like a tide over the tops of the trees. by this time of course our nets were ready, and our flyers and stool-birds on the alert. what moments of ecstasy were these, and especially when the head of the flock--some red-breasted old father or grandfather--caught the sight of our pigeons, and turning at the call, drew the whole train down into our net-bed! i have often seen a hundred, or two hundred of these splendid birds, come upon us, with a noise absolutely deafening. sometimes our bush-hut, where we lay concealed, was covered all over with pigeons, and we dared not move a finger, as their red, piercing eyes were upon us. when at last, with a sudden pull of the rope, the net was sprung, and we went out to secure our booty--often fifty, and sometimes even a hundred birds--i felt a fulness of triumph which words are wholly inadequate to express! up to the age of eight years i was never trusted with a gun. whenever i went forth as a sportsman on my own account, it was only with a bow and arrow. my performances as a hunter were very moderate. in truth, i had a rickety old gun, that had belonged to my grandfather, and though it perhaps had done good service in the revolution, or further back in the times of bears and wolves, it was now very decrepit, and all around the lock seemed to have the shaking palsy. occasionally i met with adventures, half serious and half ludicrous. once, in running my hand into a hole in a hollow tree, some twenty feet from the ground, being in search of a woodpecker, i hauled out a blacksnake. at another time, in a similar way, i had my fingers pretty sharply nipped by a screech-owl. my memory supplies me with numerous instances of this kind. as to fishing, i never had a passion for it: i was too impatient. i had no enthusiasm for nibbles, and there were too many of these in proportion to the bites. i perhaps resembled a man by the name of bennett, who joined the shakers of new canaan about these days, but soon left them, declaring that the spirit was too long in coming--"he could not wait." nevertheless, i dreamed away some pleasant hours in angling in the brooks and ponds of my native town. i well remember, that on my eighth birthday i went four miles to burt's mills, carrying on the old mare two bushels of rye. while my grist was being ground i angled in the pond, and carried home enough for a generous meal. now all these things may seem trifles, yet in a review of my life i deem them of some significance. this homely familiarity with the more mechanical arts was a material part of my education: this communion with nature gave me instructive and important lessons from nature's open book of knowledge. my technical education, as will be seen hereafter, was extremely narrow and irregular. this defect was at least partially supplied by the commonplace incidents i have mentioned. the teachings, or rather the training of the senses, in the country--ear and eye, foot and hand, by running, leaping, climbing over hill and mountain, by occasional labor in the garden and on the farm, and by the use of tools, and all this in youth--is sowing seed which is repaid largely and readily to the hand of after-cultivation, however unskilful it may be. this is not so much because of the amount of knowledge available in after-life, which is thus obtained--though this is not to be despised--as it is that healthful, vigorous, manly habits and associations, physical, moral, and intellectual, are thus established and developed. footnote: [ ] the american quail is a species of partridge, in size between the european quail and partridge. the _partridge_ of new england is the _pheasant_ of the south, and the _ruffed grouse_ of the naturalists. chapter v. death of washington--jerome bonaparte and miss patterson--sunday travelling--oliver wolcott--timothy pickering--american politeness quite natural--locomotion--public conveyances--my father's chaise. the incidents i have just related occurred about the year --some a little earlier and some a little later. among the events of general interest that happened near this time i remember the death of washington, which took place in , and was commemorated all through the country by the tolling of bells, funeral ceremonies, orations, sermons, hymns, and dirges, attended by a mournful sense of his loss, which seemed to cast a pall over the entire heavens. in ridgefield the meeting-house was dressed in black, and we had a discourse pronounced by a mr. edmonds, of newtown. the subject, indeed, engrossed all minds. lieutenant smith came every day to our house to talk over the event, and to bring us the proceedings in different parts of the country. among other papers he brought us a copy of the _connecticut courant_, which gave us the particulars of the rites and ceremonies which took place in hartford in commemoration of the great man's decease. the celebrated hymn, written for the occasion by theodore dwight, sank into my mother's heart--for she had a constitutional love of things mournful and poetical--and she often repeated it, so that it became a part of the cherished lore of my childhood. i give you these scenes and feelings in some detail, to impress you with the depth and sincerity of this mourning of the american nation, in cities and towns, in villages and hamlets, for the death of washington. i have already said that ridgefield was on the great thoroughfare between boston and new york, for the day of steamers and railroads had not dawned. even the mania for turnpikes, which ere long overspread new england, had not yet arrived. the stage-coaches took four days to make the trip of two hundred miles between the two great cities. in winter, during the furious snow-storms, the journey was often protracted to seven, eight, or ten days. with such public conveyances, great people--for even then the world was divided into the great and little, as it is now--travelled in their own carriages. about this time--it must have been in the summer of --i remember jerome bonaparte coming up to keeler's tavern with a coach and four, attended by his young wife, miss patterson of baltimore. it was a gay establishment, and the honeymoon sat happily on the tall, sallow stripling and his young bride. you must remember that napoleon was then filling the world with his fame: at this moment his feet were on the threshold of the empire. the arrival of his brother in the united states of course made a sensation. his marriage, his movements, all were gossipped over from maine to georgia, the extreme points of the union. his entrance into ridgefield produced a flutter of excitement even there. a crowd gathered around keeler's tavern to catch a sight of the strangers, and i was among the rest. i had a good look at jerome, who was the chief object of interest, and the image never faded from my recollection. half a century later, i was one evening at the tuileries, amid the flush and the fair of louis napoleon's new court. among them i saw an old man, taller than the mass around--his nose and chin almost meeting in contact, while his toothless gums were "munching the airy meal of dotage and decrepitude." i was irresistibly chained to this object, as if a spectre had risen up through the floor and stood among the garish throng. my memory travelled back--back among the winding labyrinths of years. suddenly i found the clue: the stranger was jerome bonaparte! ah, what a history lay between the past and present--a lapse of nearly fifty years. what a difference between him then and now! then he was a gay and gallant bridegroom; now, though he had the title of king, he was throneless and sceptreless--an invalid governor of invalids--the puppet and pageant of an adventurer, whose power lay in the mere magic of a name. about this time, as i well remember, oliver wolcott passed through our village. he arrived at the tavern late on saturday evening, but he called at our house in the morning, his family being connected with ours. he was a great man then; for not only are the wolcotts traditionally and historically a distinguished race in connecticut, but he had recently been a member of washington's cabinet. i mention him now only for the purpose of noting his deference to public opinion, characteristic of the eminent men of that day. in the morning he went to church, but immediately after the sermon he had his horses brought up, and proceeded on his way. he, however, had requested my father to state to his people, at the opening of the afternoon service, that he was travelling on public business, and though he regretted it, he was obliged to continue his journey on the sabbath. this my father did, but deacon olmstead, the jeremiah of the parish, shook his white locks, and lifted up his voice against such a desecration of the lord's day. some years after, as i remember, lieutenant-governor treadwell arrived at keeler's tavern on saturday evening, and prepared to prosecute his journey the next morning, his daughter, who was with him, being ill. this same deacon olmstead called upon him, and said, "sir, if you thus set the example of violation of the sabbath, you must expect to get one vote less at the next election!" the governor was so much struck by the appearance of the deacon, who was the very image of a patriarch or a prophet, that he deferred his departure till monday. although great people rode in their own carriages, the principal method of travelling was on horseback. many of the members of congress came to washington in this way. i have a dim recollection of seeing one day, when i was trudging along to school, a tall, pale, gaunt man, approaching on horseback, with his plump saddlebags behind him. i looked at him keenly, and made my obeisance, as in duty bound. he lifted his hat, and bowed in return. by a quick instinct, i sat him down as a man of mark. in the evening, lieutenant smith came to our house and told us that timothy pickering had passed through the town! he had seen him, and talked with him, and was vastly distended with the portentous news thereby acquired, including the rise and fall of empires for ages to come, and all of which he duly unfolded to our family circle. before i proceed, let me note, in passing, a point of manners then universal, but which has now nearly faded away. when travellers met on the highway, they saluted each other with a certain dignified and formal courtesy. all children were regularly taught at school to "make their manners" to strangers; the boys to bow, and the girls to courtesy. it was something different from the frank, familiar, "how are you, stranger?" of the far west; something different from the "_bon jour, serviteur_," of the alps. our salute was more measured and formal; respect to age and authority being evidently an element of this homage, which was sedulously taught to the young. for children to salute travellers was, in my early days, as well a duty as a decency. a child who did not "make his manners" to a stranger on the high-road was deemed a low fellow; a stranger who refused to acknowledge this civility was esteemed a _sans culotte_, perhaps a favorer of jacobinism. but i must return to locomotion. in ridgefield, in the year , there was but a single chaise, and that belonged to colonel bradley, one of the principal citizens of the place. it was without a top, and had a pair of wide-spreading, asinine ears. that multitudinous generation of travelling vehicles, so universal and so convenient now--such as top-wagons, four-wheeled chaises, tilburies, dearborns, &c., was totally unknown. even if these things had been invented, the roads would scarcely have permitted the use of them. physicians who had occasion to go from town to town went on horseback; all clergymen, except perhaps bishop seabury, who rode in a coach, travelled in the same way. my father's people, who lived at a distance, came to church on horseback; their wives and daughters being seated on pillions behind them. in a few cases--as in spring-time, when the mud was bottomless--the farm wagon was used for transporting the family. in winter it was otherwise, for we had three or four months of sleighing. then the whole country was a railroad, and gay times we had. oh! those beautiful winters, which would drive me shivering to the fireside now: what vivid delight have i had in their slidings and skatings, their sleddings and sleighings! one thing strikes me now with wonder, and that is, the general indifference in those days to the intensity of winter. no doubt, as i have said before, the climate was then more severe; but, be that as it may, people seemed to suffer less from it than at the present day. nobody thought of staying at home from church because of the extremity of the weather. we had no thermometers, it is true, to frighten us with the revelation that it was twenty-five degrees below zero. the habits of the people were simple and hardy, and there were few defences against the assaults of the seasons. the houses were not tight; we had no stoves, no lehigh or lackawanna coal; yet we lived, and comfortably, too: nay, we even changed burly winter into a season of enjoyment. i have said that, in the year , there was but a single chaise in ridgefield; and this was brought, i believe, from new haven. there was not, i imagine, a coach, or any kind of pleasure-vehicle--that crazy old chaise excepted--in the county of fairfield, out of the two half-shire towns. such things, indeed, were known at new york, boston, and philadelphia; for already the government had laid a tax upon pleasure conveyances: but they were comparatively few in number, and were mostly imported. in there was but one public hack in new haven, and but one coach; the latter, belonging to pierpoint edwards, was a large, four-wheeled vehicle, for two persons, called a chariot. in the smaller towns there were no pleasure vehicles in use throughout new england. about that time there came to our village a man by the name of jesse skellinger, an englishman, and chaisemaker by trade. my father engaged him to build him a chaise. a bench was set up in our barn, and certain trees of oak and ash were cut in our neighboring woods. these were sawed and seasoned, and shaped into wheels and shafts. thomas hawley, half blacksmith, and half wheelwright, was duly initiated, and he cunningly wrought the iron necessary for the work. in five months the chaise was finished, with a standing top; greatly to the admiration of our family. what a gaze was there, as this vehicle went through ridgefield street upon its first expedition! this was the beginning of the chaise-manufactory in ridgefield, which has since been a source of large revenue to the town. skellinger was engaged by elijah hawley, who had formerly done something as a wagon-builder; and thus in due time an establishment was founded, which for many years was noted for the beauty and excellence of its pleasure vehicles. chapter vi. the upper and lower classes of ridgefield--master stebbins and his school--what is a noun?--deacon benedict and his man abijah--my latin acquirements--family worship--widow bennett--the temple of dagon. ridgefield, as well as most other places, had its up-town and down-town; terms which have not unfrequently been the occasion of serious divisions in the affairs of church and state. in london this distinction takes the name of west end and the city. the french philosophers say that every great capital has similar divisions; west end being always the residence of the aristocracy, and east end of the _canaille_. ridgefield, being a village, had a right to follow its own whim; and therefore west lane, instead of being the aristocratic end of the place, was really rather the low end. it constituted, in fact, what was called _down-town_, in distinction from the more eastern and northern section, called _up-town_. in this latter portion, and about the middle of the main street, was the up-town school, the leading seminary of the village; for at this period it had not arrived at the honors of an academy. at the age of ten years i was sent here, the institution being then, and for many years after, under the charge of master stebbins. he was a man with a conciliating stoop in the shoulders, a long body, short legs, and a swaying walk. he was at this period some fifty years old, his hair being thin and silvery, and always falling in well-combed rolls over his coat-collar. his eyes were blue, and his dress invariably of the same color. breeches and knee-buckles, blue-mixed stockings, and shoes with bright buckles, seemed as much a part of the man as his head and shoulders. on the whole, his appearance was that of the middle-class gentleman of the olden time; and he was, in fact, what he seemed. this seminary of learning for the rising aristocracy of ridgefield was a wooden edifice, thirty by twenty feet, covered with brown clapboards, and, except an entry, consisted of a single room. around, and against the walls, ran a continuous line of seats, fronted by a continuous writing-desk. beneath were depositories for books and writing materials. the centre was occupied by slab seats, similar to those of west lane. the larger scholars were ranged on the outer sides, at the desks; the smaller fry of abecedarians were seated in the centre. the master was enshrined on the east side of the room, and, regular as the sun, he was in his seat at nine o'clock, and the performances of the school began. according to the catechism, which we learned and recited on saturday, the chief end of man was to glorify god and keep his commandments; according to the routine of this school, one would have thought it to be reading, writing, and arithmetic, to which we may add spelling. from morning to night, in all weathers, through every season of the year, these exercises were carried on with the energy, patience, and perseverance of a manufactory. master stebbins respected his calling: his heart was in his work; and so, what he pretended to teach, he taught well. when i entered the school, i found that a huge stride had been achieved in the march of mind since i left west lane. webster's spelling-book had taken the place of dilworth, which was a great improvement. the drill in spelling was very thorough, and applied every day to the whole school. i imagine that the exercises might have been amusing to a stranger, especially as one scholar would sometimes go off in a voice as grum as that of a bull-frog, while another would follow in tones as fine and piping as those of a peet-weet. the blunders, too, were often very ludicrous; even we children would sometimes have tittered, had not such an enormity been certain to have brought out the birch. as to rewards and punishments, the system was this: whoever missed, went down; so that perfection mounted to the top. here was the beginning of the up and down of life. reading was performed in classes, which generally plodded on without a hint from the master. nevertheless, when zeek sanford--who was said to have "a streak of lightning in him"--in his haste to be smart, read the th verse of the nd chapter of the acts,--"now when they heard this, they were _pickled_ in their heart,"--the birch stick on master stebbins's table seemed to quiver and peel at the little end, as if to give warning of the wrath to come. when orry keeler--orry was a girl, you know, and not a boy--drawled out in spelling, "k--o--n, _kon_, s--h--u--n--t--s, _shunts_, konshunts," the bristles in the master's eyebrows fidgeted like aunt delight's knitting-needles. occasionally, when the reading was insupportably bad, he took a book, and himself read as an example. master stebbins was a great man with a slate and pencil, and i have an idea that we were a generation after his own heart. we certainly achieved wonders in arithmetic, according to our own conceptions, some of us going even beyond the rule of three, and making forays into the mysterious regions of vulgar fractions. but, after all, penmanship was master stebbins's great accomplishment. he had no pompous lessons upon single lines and bifid lines, and the like. the revelations of inspired copy-book makers had not then been vouchsafed to man. he could not cut an american eagle with a single flourish of a goose-quill. he was guided by good taste and native instinct, and wrote a smooth round hand, like copper-plate. his lessons from a to &, all written by himself, consisted of pithy proverbs and useful moral lessons. on every page of our writing-books he wrote the first line himself. the effect was what might have been expected--with such models, patiently enforced, nearly all became good writers. beyond these simple elements, the up-town school made few pretensions. when i was there, two webster's grammars and one or two dwight's geographies were in use. the latter was without maps or illustrations, and was, in fact, little more than an expanded table of contents, taken from morse's universal geography--the mammoth monument of american learning and genius of that age and generation. the grammar was a clever book, but i have an idea that neither master stebbins nor his pupils ever fathomed its depths. they floundered about in it, as if in a quagmire, and after some time came out pretty nearly where they went in, though perhaps a little confused by the din and dusky atmosphere of these labyrinths. let me here repeat an anecdote, which i have indeed told before, but which i had from the lips of its hero, a clergyman, of some note thirty years ago, and which well illustrates this part of my story. at a village school, not many miles from ridgefield, he was put into webster's grammar. here he read, "_a noun is the name of a thing--as horse, hair, justice_." now, in his innocence, he read it thus: "_a noun is the name of a thing--as horse-hair justice_." "what, then," said he, ruminating deeply, "is a noun? but first i must find out what a horse-hair justice is." upon this he meditated for some days, but still he was as far as ever from the solution. now, his father was a man of authority in those parts, and, moreover, he was a justice of the peace. withal, he was of respectable ancestry, and so there had descended to him a stately high-backed settee, covered with horse-hair. one day, as the youth came from school, pondering upon the great grammatical problem, he entered the front door of the house, and there he saw before him his father, officiating in his legal capacity, and seated upon the old horse-hair settee. "i have found it!" said the boy to himself, greatly delighted--"my father is a horse-hair justice, and therefore a noun!" nevertheless, it must be admitted that the world got on remarkably well in spite of this narrowness of the country schools. the elements of an english education were pretty well taught throughout the village seminaries of connecticut, and, i may add, of new england. the teachers were heartily devoted to their profession: they respected their calling, and were respected and encouraged by the community. they had this merit, that while they attempted little, that, at least, was thoroughly performed. i went steadily to the up-town school for three winters; being occupied during the summers upon the farm, and in various minor duties. i was a great deal on horseback, often carrying messages to the neighboring towns of reading, wilton, weston, and lower salem, for then the post routes were few, and the mails, which were weekly, crept like snails over hill and valley. i became a bold rider at an early age: before i was eight years old i frequently ventured to put a horse to his speed, and that, too, without a saddle. a person who has never tried it, can hardly conceive the wild delight of riding a swift horse, when he lays down his ears, tosses his tail in air, and stretches himself out in a full race. the intense energy of the beast's movements, the rush of the air, the swimming backward of lands, houses, and trees, with the clattering thunder of the hoofs--all convey to the rider a fierce ecstasy, which, perhaps, nothing else can give. about this period, however, i received a lesson, which lasted me a lifetime. you must know that deacon benedict, one of our neighbors, had a fellow living with him named abijah. he was an adventurous youth, and more than once led me into tribulation. i remember that on one occasion i went with him to shoot a dog that was said to worry the deacon's sheep. it was night, and dark as egypt, but bige said he could see the creature close to the cow-house, behind the barn. he banged away, and then jumped over the fence, to pick up the game. after a time he came back, but said not a word. next morning it was found that he had shot the brindled cow; mistaking a white spot in her forehead for the dog, he had taken a deadly aim, and put the whole charge into her pate. fortunately her skull was thick and the shot small, so the honest creature was only a little cracked. bige, however, was terribly scolded by the deacon, who was a justice of the peace, and had a deep sense of the importance of his duties. i came in for a share of blame, though i was only a looker-on. bige said the deacon called me a "parsnip scrimmage," but more probably it was a _particeps criminis_. but to proceed. one day i was taking home from the pasture a horse that belonged to some clergyman--i believe dr. ripley, of greensfarms. just as i came upon the level ground in front of jerry mead's old house, bige came up behind me on the deacon's mare--an ambling brute with a bushy tail and shaggy mane. as he approached he gave a chirrup, and my horse, half in fright and half in fun, bounded away, like tam o'shanter's mare. away we went, i holding on as well as i could, for the animal was round as a barrel. he was no doubt used to a frolic of this sort, although he belonged to a doctor of divinity, and looked as if he believed in total depravity. when he finally broke into a gallop he flew like the wind, at the same time bounding up and down with a tearing energy, quite frightful to think of. after a short race he went from under me, and i came with a terrible shock to the ground. the breath was knocked out of me for some seconds, and as i recovered it with a gasping effort, my sensations were indescribably agonizing. greatly humbled and sorely bruised, i managed to get home, where the story of my adventure had preceded me. i was severely lectured by my parents, which, however, i might have forgotten, had not the concussion made an indelible impression on my memory, thus perpetuating the wholesome counsel. when i was about twelve years old, a man by the name of sackett was employed to keep a high-school, or, as it was then called, an academy. here i went irregularly for a few weeks, and at a public exhibition i remember to have spoken a piece, upon a stage fitted up in the meeting-house, entitled "charles chatterbox." this was the substance of my achievements at sackett's seminary. the narrowness of my father's income, and the needs of a large family, induced him to take half-a-dozen pupils to be fitted for college. this he continued for a series of years. it might seem natural that i should have shared in these advantages; but, in the first place, my only and elder brother, charles a. goodrich--now widely known by his numerous useful publications--had been destined for the clerical profession, partly by his own predilection, partly by encouragement from a relative, and partly, too, from an idea that his somewhat delicate constitution forbade a more hardy career. to this may doubtless be added the natural desire of his parents that at least one of their sons should follow the honored calling to which father, grandfather, and great-grandfather had been devoted. hence he was put in training for college. the expenses to be thus incurred were formidable enough to my parents, without adding to them by attempting anything of the kind for me. and, besides, i had manifested no love of study, and evidently preferred action to books. moreover, it must be remembered, that i was regarded as a born carpenter, and it would have seemed tempting providence to have set me upon any other career. so, with perfect content on my part, from the age of twelve to fourteen, i was chiefly employed in active services about the house and farm. i could read, write, and cipher; this was sufficient for my ambition, and satisfactory to my parents, in view of the life to which i was apparently destined. nevertheless, though my school exercises were such as i have described, i doubtless gathered some little odds and ends of learning about those days, beyond the range of my horn-books. i heard a good deal of conversation from the clergymen who visited us, and, above all, i listened to the long discourses of lieutenant smith upon matters and things in general. my father, too, had a brother in congress, from whom he received letters, documents, and messages, all of which became subjects of discussion. i remember, further, that out of some childish imitation, i thumbed over corderius and erasmus--the first latin books, then constantly in the hands of my father's pupils. i was so accustomed to hear them recite their lessons in virgil, that _tityre, tu patulæ recubans sub tegmine fagi_-- and _arma_, arms--_virumque_, and the man--_cano_, i sing, were as familiar to my ears as _hillery, tillery, zachery zan_, and probably conveyed to my mind about as much meaning. even the first lesson in greek-- <en>, in--<archê>, the beginning--<ên>, was--<ho logos>, the word-- was also among the cabalistic jingles in my memory. all this may seem nothing as a matter of education; still, some years after, while i was an apprentice in hartford, feeling painfully impressed with the scantiness of my knowledge, i borrowed some latin school-books, under the idea of attempting to master that language. to my delight and surprise, i found that they seemed familiar to me. thus encouraged, i began, and bending steadily over my task at evening, when my day's duties were over, i made my way nearly through the latin grammar and the first two books of virgil's _Ã�neid_. in my poverty of knowledge, even these acquisitions became useful to me. from the age of twelve to fifteen, though generally occupied in the various tasks assigned me, i still found a good deal of time to ramble over the country. whole days i spent in the long, lonesome lanes that wound between ridgefield and salem, in the half-cultivated, half-wooded hills that lay at the foot of west mountain, and in the deep recesses of the wild and rugged regions beyond. i frequently climbed to the tops of the cliffs and ridges that rose one above another; and having gained the crown of the mountain, cast long and wistful glances over the blue vale that stretched out for many miles to the westward. i had always my gun in hand, and though not insensible to any sport that might fall in my way, i was more absorbed in the fancies that came thronging to my imagination. thus i became familiar with the whole country around, and especially with the shaded glens and gorges of west mountain. i must add that these had, besides their native, savage charms, a sort of fascination from being the residence of a strange woman, who had devoted herself to solitude, and was known under the name of "the hermitess." this personage i had occasionally seen in our village; and i frequently met her as she glided through the forests, while i was pursuing my mountain rambles. i sometimes felt a strange thrill as she passed; but this only seemed to render the recesses where she dwelt still more inviting. i have no doubt that i inherited from my mother a love of the night side of nature; not a love that begets melancholy, but an appetite that found pleasure in the shadows, as well as the lights, of life and imagination. eminently practical as she was--laborious, skilful, and successful in the duties which providence had assigned her, as the head of a large family, with narrow means--she was still of a poetic temperament. her lively fancy was vividly set forth by a pair of the finest eyes i have ever seen; dark and serious, yet tender and sentimental. these bespoke, not only the vigor of her conceptions, but the melancholy tinge that shaded her imagination. sometimes, indeed, the well of sadness in her heart became full, and it ran over in tears. these, however, were like spring showers; brief in duration, and afterwards brightening to all around. she was not the only woman who has felt better after a good cry. it was, in fact, a poetic, not a real sorrow, that thus excited her emotions; for her prevailing humor abounded in wit and vivacity, not unfrequently taking the hue of playful satire. nevertheless, her taste craved the pathetic, the mournful; not as a bitter medicine, but a spicy condiment. her favorite poets were king david and dr. watts: she preferred the dirge-like melody of windham to all other music. all the songs she sang were minors. you will gather, from what i have said, that my father not only prayed in his family night and morning, but before breakfast, and immediately after the household was assembled he always read a chapter in the sacred volume. it is recorded in our family bible, that he read it through, in course, thirteen times in the space of about five-and-twenty years. he was an excellent reader, having a remarkably clear, frank, hearty voice; so that i was deeply interested, and thus early became familiar with almost every portion of the old and new testament. the practice of family worship, as i before stated, was at this time very general in new england. in ridgefield, it was not altogether confined to the strictly religious; to clergymen, deacons, and church members. it was a custom which decency hardly allowed to be omitted. no family was thought to go on well without it. there is a good story which well describes this trait of manners. somewhere in vermont, in this golden age, there was a widow by the name of bennett. in consequence of the death of her husband, the charge of a large farm and an ample household devolved upon her. her husband had been a pious man, and all things had prospered with him. his widow, alike from religious feeling and affectionate regard for his memory, desired that everything should be conducted as much as possible as it had been during his lifetime. especially did she wish the day to begin and close with family worship. now, she had a foreman on the farm by the name of ward. he was a good man for work, but he was not a religious man. in vain did the widow, in admitting his merits at the plough, the scythe, and the flail, still urge him to crown her wishes, by leading in family prayer. for a long time the heart of the man was hard, and his ear deaf to her entreaties. at last, however, wearied with her importunities, he seemed to change, and, to her great joy, consented to make a trial. on a bright morning in june--at early sunrise--the family were all assembled in the parlor, men and maidens, for their devotions. when all was ready, ward, in a low, troubled voice, began. he had never prayed, or at least not in public, but he had heard many prayers, and possessed a retentive memory. after getting over the first hesitancy, he soon became fluent, and taking passages here and there from the various petitions he had heard--presbyterian, methodist, universalist, and episcopalian--he went on with great eloquence, gradually elevating his tone and accelerating his delivery. ere long his voice grew portentous, and some of the men and maids, thinking he was suddenly taken either mad or inspired, stole out on their toes into the kitchen, where, with gaping mouths, they awaited the result. the widow bennett bore it all for about half an hour; but at last, as the precious time was passing away, she lost patience, and sprang to her feet. placing herself directly in front of the speaker, she exclaimed, "ward, what do you mean?" as if suddenly relieved from a nightmare, he exclaimed, "oh dear, ma'am, i'm much obliged to you; for somehow i couldn't wind the thing off." i must not pass over another incident having reference to the topic in question. under the biblical influence of those days my father's scholars built a temple of the philistines, and when it was completed within and without, all the children round about assembled, as did the gazaites of old. the edifice was chiefly of boards, slenderly constructed, and reached the height of twelve feet; nevertheless, all of us got upon it, according to the th chapter of judges. the oldest of the scholars played samson. when all was ready, he took hold of the pillars of the temple, one with his right hand and one with his left. "let me die with the philistines!" said he, and bowing himself, down we came in a heap! strange to say, nobody but samson was hurt, and he only in some skin bruises. if you could see him now--dignified even to solemnity, and seldom condescending to any but the gravest matters--you would scarcely believe the story, even though i write it and verify it. nevertheless, if he must have played, he should have taken the part of samson, for he is one of the most gifted men i have ever known. chapter vii. the clergy of fairfield--a laughing parson--the three deacons. before i complete my narrative so far as it relates to ridgefield, i should state that in the olden time a country minister's home was a ministers' tavern, and therefore i saw at our house, at different periods, most of the orthodox or congregational clergymen belonging to that part of the state. my father frequently exchanged with those of the neighboring towns, and sometimes consociations and associations were held at ridgefield. thus, men of the clerical profession constituted a large portion of the strangers who visited us. i may add that my lineage was highly ministerial, from an early period down to my own time. the pulpit of durham, filled by my paternal grandfather, continued in the same family one hundred and twenty-six consecutive years. a short time since we reckoned among our relations, not going beyond the degree of second cousin, more than a dozen ministers of the gospel, and all of the same creed. as to the clergy of fairfield county, my boyish impressions of them were, that they were of the salt of the earth; nor has a larger experience altered my opinion. if i sometimes indulge a smile at the recollection of particular traits of character, or more general points of manner significant of the age, i still regard them with affection and reverence. i need not tell you that they were counsellors in religious matters, in the dark and anxious periods of the spirit, in times of sickness, at the approach of death. they sanctified the wedding, not refusing afterward to countenance the festivity which naturally ensued. they administered baptism, but only upon adults who made a profession, or upon the children of professors. i may add that, despite their divinity, they were sociable in their manners and intercourse. the state of the church was no doubt first in their minds, but ample room was left for the good things of life. those who came to our house examined my brother in his greek and latin, and i went out behind the barn to gather tansy for their morning bitters. they dearly loved a joke, and relished anecdotes, especially if they bore a little hard upon the cloth. the following will suffice as a specimen of the stories they delighted in. once upon a time there was a clergyman--the rev. dr. t----, a man of high character, and distinguished for his dignity of manner. but it was remarked that frequently as he was ascending the pulpit stairs he would smile, and sometimes almost titter, as if beset by an uncontrollable desire to laugh. this excited remark, and at last scandal. finally, it was thought necessary for some of his clerical friends, at a meeting of the association, to bring up the matter for consideration. the case was stated, the rev. dr. t---- being present. "well, gentlemen," said he, "the fact charged against me is true, but i beg you to permit me to offer an explanation. a few months after i was licensed to preach i was in a country town, and on a sabbath morning was about to enter upon the services of the church. at the back of the pulpit was a window, which looked out upon a field of clover, then in full bloom, for it was summer. as i rose to commence the reading of the scriptures, i cast a glance into the field, and there i saw a man performing the most extraordinary evolutions--jumping, whirling, slapping in all directions, and with a ferocious agony of exertion. at first i thought he was mad; but suddenly the truth burst upon me--he had buttoned up a bumblebee in his pantaloons! i am constitutionally nervous, gentlemen, and the shock of this scene upon my risible sensibilities was so great, that i could hardly get through the services. several times i was upon the point of bursting into a laugh. even to this day, the remembrance of this scene, through the temptation of the devil, often comes upon me as i am ascending the pulpit. this, i admit, is a weakness, but i trust it will rather excite your sympathy and your prayers than your reproaches." it may be amusing, perhaps profitable, to give here a few sketches of the remarkable characters of ridgefield, at the opening of the present century. some were types of their time; others, however eccentric, were exemplifications of our race and our society, influenced by peculiar circumstances, and showing into what fashions this stuff of humanity may be wrought. they are still prominent in my recollection, and seem to me an essential part of the social landscape which encircled my youth. i begin with the three deacons of my father's parish. first was deacon olmstead, full threescore years and ten at the opening of the present century. his infancy touched upon the verge of puritanism--the days of increase and cotton mather. the spirit of the puritans lived in his heart, while the semblance of the patriarchs lingered in his form. he was fully six feet high, with broad shoulders, powerful limbs, and the august step of a giant. his hair was white, and rolled in thin curls upon his shoulders; he was still erect, though he carried a long cane, like that of father abraham in the old pictures, representing him at the head of his kindred and his camels, going from the land of haran to the land of canaan. indeed, he was my personification of the great progenitor of the hebrews; and when my father read from the twelfth chapter of genesis, how he and lot and their kindred journeyed forth, i half fancied it must be deacon olmstead under another name. [illustration: deacon olmstead.] deacon olmstead was in all things a noble specimen of humanity--an honor to human nature, a shining light in the church. i have spoken of him as having something grand about him, yet i remember how kindly he condescended to take me, a child, on his knee, and how gently his great brawny fingers encircled my infant hand. i have said he was wise; yet his book-learning was small, though it might have been as great as that of abraham, or isaac, or jacob. he knew, indeed, the bible by heart, and that is a great teacher. he had also lived long, and profited by observation and experience. above all, he was calm, just, sincere, and it is wonderful how these lamps light up the path of life. i have said he was proud, yet it was only toward the seductions of the world: to these he was hard and stern: to his god he was simple, obedient, and docile as a child: toward his kindred and his neighbor, toward the poor, toward the suffering, though not so soft, he was sympathetic as a sister of charity. i must now present a somewhat different portrait--that of deacon john benedict. he was a worthy old man, and enjoyed many claims to respect. he was not only a deacon, but a justice of the peace; moreover, he was the father of aunt delight, of whom i desire ever to speak with reverence. she, not being a beauty, was never married, and hence, having no children of her own, she combed and crammed the heads of other people's children. in this way she was eminently useful in her day and generation. the deacon respected the law, especially as it was administered in his own person. he was severe upon those who violated the statutes of the state, but one who violated the statutes of deacon john benedict committed the unpardonable sin. he was the entire police of the meeting-house on sunday, and not a boy or girl, or even a bumblebee, could offend without condign punishment. nevertheless, the deacon is said, in one case--rather before my time--to have met his match. there was in the village a small, smart, nervous woman, with a vigorous clack, which, once set going, was hard to stop. one day she was at church, and having carried her dinner of mince-pie in a little cross-handled basket, she set it down under the seat. in the midst of sermon-time a small dog came into the pew, and getting behind her petticoats, began to devour the pie. she heard what was going on, and gave him a kick. upon this the dog backed out with a yelp, taking with him the dinner-basket, hung about his neck, across the pew into the broad aisle. "oh dear!" said the woman, in a shrill voice, "the dog's got my dinner! there! i've spoken loud in meeting-time! what will deacon benedict say? why! i'm talking all the time. there it goes agin! what shall i du?" "hold your tongue!" said the deacon, who was in his official seat, fronting the explosion. these words operated like a charm, and the nervous lady was silent. the next day deacon john appeared at the house of the offender, carrying a calf-bound volume in his hand. the woman gave one glance at the book, and one at the deacon. that was enough: it spoke volumes, and the man of the law returned home, and never mentioned the subject afterward. deacon hawley was very unlike either of his two associates whom i have described. he was younger, and of a peculiarly mild and amiable temper. his countenance wore a tranquil and smooth expression. his hair was fine and silky, and lay, as if oiled, close to his head. he had a soft voice, and an ear for music. he was a cabinet-maker by trade, a chorister by choice, and a deacon by the vote of the church. in each of these things he found his place, as if designed for it by nature. in worldly affairs as well as spiritual, deacon hawley's path was straight and even: he was successful in business, beloved in society, honored in the church. exceedingly frugal by habit and disposition, he still loved to give in charity, though he did not talk of it. when he was old, his family being well provided for, he spent much of his time in casting about to find opportunities of doing good. once he learned that a widow, who had been in good circumstances, was struggling with poverty. he was afraid to offer money as charity, for fear of wounding her pride--the more sensitive, perhaps, because of her change of condition. he therefore intimated that he owed a debt of fifty dollars to her late husband, and wished to pay it to her. "and how was that?" said the lady, somewhat startled. "i will tell you," said the deacon. "about five-and-twenty years ago, soon after you were married, i made some furniture for your husband--to the amount of two hundred dollars. i have been looking over the account, and find that i rather overcharged him in the price of some chairs--that is, i could have afforded them at somewhat less. i have added up the interest, and here, madam, is the money." the widow listened, and as she suspected the truth, the tears came to her eyes. the deacon did not pause to reply, but laid the money on the table and departed. the term _deacon_ is associated in many minds with a sort of affectation, a cant in conversation, and an i-am-holier-than-thou air and manner. i remember deacon c----, who deemed it proper to become scriptural, and talk as much as possible like isaiah. he was in partnership with his son laertes, and they sold crockery and furniture. one day a female customer came, and the old gentleman being engaged, went to call his son, who was in the loft above. placing himself at the foot of the stairs, he said, attuning his voice to the occasion, "la-ar-tes, descend--a lady waits!" deacon c---- sought to signalize himself by a special respect to the ways of providence; so he refused to be insured against fire, declaring that if the lord wished to burn down his house or his barn he should submit without a murmur. he pretended to consider thunder, and lightning, and conflagrations as special acts of the almighty, and it was distrusting providence to attempt to avert their effects. deacon hawley had none of these follies or frailties. though a deacon, he was still a man; though aspiring to heaven, he lived cheerily on earth; though a christian, he was a father, a neighbor, and, according to his rank in life, a gentleman, having in all things the feelings and manners appropriate to each of those relations. chapter viii. mat olmstead, the town wit--the salamander hat--solar eclipse--the old hen and the philosopher--lieutenant smith--extraordinary meteor--fulton and his steam-boat--granther baldwin and his wife--sarah bishop and her cave. another celebrity in ridgefield, whom i must not forget, was matthew olmstead, or mat olmstead, as he was usually called; he was a day laborer, and though his specialty was the laying of stone fences, he was equally adroit at hoeing corn, mowing, and farm-work in general. he was rather short and thick-set, with a long nose, a little bulbous in his latter days; with a ruddy complexion, and a mouth shutting like a pair of nippers, the lips having an oblique dip to the left, giving a keen and mischievous expression to his face: qualified, however, by more of mirth than malice. this feature was indicative of his mind and character; for he was sharp in speech, and affected a crisp, biting brevity, called dry wit. he had also a turn for practical jokes, and a great many of these were told of him; to which, perhaps, he had no historical claim. the following is one of them, and is illustrative of his manner, even if it originated elsewhere. on a cold, stormy day in december, a man chanced to come into the bar-room of keeler's tavern, where mat olmstead and several of his companions were lounging. the stranger had on a new hat of the latest fashion, and still shining with the gloss of the iron. he seemed conscious of his dignity, and carried his head in such a manner as to invite attention to it. mat's knowing eye immediately detected the weakness of the stranger; so he approached him, and said,-- "what a very nice hat you've got on! pray who made it?" "oh, it came from new york," was the reply. "well, let me take it," said mat. the stranger took it off his head, gingerly, and handed it to him. "it is a wonderful nice hat," said matthew; "and i see it's a real salamander!" "salamander?" said the other. "what's that?" "why, a real salamander hat won't burn!" "no? i never heard of that before: i don't believe it's one of that kind." "sartain sure; i'll bet you a mug of flip of it." "well, i'll stand you!" "done: now i'll just put it under the fore-stick?" "well." it being thus arranged, mat put the hat under the fore-stick into a glowing mass of coals. in an instant it took fire, collapsed, and rolled into a black, crumpled mass of cinders. "i du declare," said mat olmstead, affecting great astonishment, "it ain't a salamander hat arter all! well, i'll pay the flip!" yet wit is not always wisdom. keen as this man was as to things immediately before him, he was of narrow understanding. he seemed not to possess the faculty of reasoning beyond his senses. he never would admit that the sun was fixed, and that the world turned round. i remember, that when the great solar eclipse of was approaching, he with two other men were at work in one of our fields, not far from the house. the eclipse was to begin at ten or eleven o'clock, and my father invited the workmen to come up and observe it through some pieces of smoked glass. they came, though mat ridiculed the idea of an eclipse--not but the thing might happen; but it was idle to suppose it could be foretold. while they were waiting and watching, my father explained the cause and nature of the phenomenon. mat laughed with that low, scoffing chuckle, with which a woodcock, safe in his den, replies to the bark of a besieging dog. "so you don't believe this?" said my father. "no," said mat, shaking his head; "i don't believe a word of it. you say, parson goodrich, that the sun is fixed, and don't move?" "yes, i say so." "well: didn't you preach last sunday out of the th chapter of joshua?" "yes." "and didn't you tell us that joshua commanded the sun and moon to stand still?" "yes." "well: what was the use of telling the sun to stand still if it never moved?" this was a dead shot, especially at a parson, and in the presence of an audience inclined, from the fellowship of ignorance, to receive the argument. being thus successful, mat went on,-- "now, parson goodrich, let's try it again. if you turn a thing that's got water in it bottom up, the water'll run out, won't it?" "no doubt." "if the world turns round, then, your well will be turned bottom up, and the water'll run out!" at this point my father applied his eye to the sun, through a piece of smoked glass. the eclipse had begun: a small piece was evidently cut off from the rim. my father stated the fact, and the company around looked through the glass, and saw that it was so. mat olmstead, however, sturdily refused to try it, and bore on his face an air of supreme contempt; as much as to say "you don't humbug me!" but ignorance and denial of the works of god do not interrupt their march. by slow and invisible degrees, a shade crept over the landscape. there was no cloud in the sky; but a chill stole through the atmosphere, and a strange dimness fell over the world. it was mid-day, yet it seemed like the approach of night. all nature seemed chilled and awed by the strange phenomenon. the birds, with startled looks and ominous notes, left their busy cares and gathered in the thick branches of the trees, where they seemed to hold counsel one with another. the hens, with slow and hesitating steps, set their faces toward their roosts. one old hen, with a brood of chickens, walked along with a tall, halting tread, and sought shelter upon the barn-floor, where she gathered her young ones under her wings, continuing to made a low sound, as if saying, "hush, my babes, lie still and slumber." i well remember this phenomenon--the first of the kind i had ever witnessed. though occupied by this seeming conflict of the heavenly bodies, i recollect to have paid some attention to the effect of the scene upon others. mat olmstead said not a word; the other workmen were overwhelmed with emotions of awe. at length, the eclipse began to pass away, and nature slowly returned to her equanimity. the birds came forth, and sang a jubilee, as if relieved from some impending calamity. the hum of life again filled the air; the old hen with her brood gaily resumed her rambles, and made the leaves and gravel fly with her invigorated scratchings. the workmen, too, having taken a glass of grog, returned thoughtfully to their labors. "after all," said one of the men, as they passed along to the field, "i guess the parson was right about the sun and the moon." "well, perhaps he was," said mat; "but then joshua was wrong." * * * * * this incident of the total eclipse was, many years later, turned to account in parley's magazine, in the following dialogue between peter parley and his children: _parley._ come, john, you promised to write something for this number of the magazine; is it ready? _john._ well--* * *--not exactly. _jane._ oh, mr. parley--'tis ready--he read it all to me, and it's real good, if anybody could understand it. _p._ bring it here, john. (_john comes up gingerly, and gives mr. parley a piece of paper._) _john._ there 'tis--but you mustn't read it aloud. _all the children._ yes, yes, read it! read it! go ahead! _p._ well, i'll read it--it looks pretty good. now let all be perfectly still. (_parley reads._) the old hen and the philosopher: a fable. part i. reflections of a hen with chickens during an eclipse of the sun. "craw * * * craw * * * craw! what's the matter with my eyes? it looks very dark, for a clear summer's day. i must be getting old, for it ain't more than ten o'clock, and it seems exactly like sundown. craw * * * craw * * * craw! why, it's getting cold. it seems as chill as evening. cut, cut, cudawcut! what can be the matter? why, the sun is going to bed before it's fairly got up. cur--r-r-r-r-r! well, after all, it may be only a fit of the vapors--or my gizzard may be put out of order by that toad i ate yesterday. i thought, then, i should pay dear for it. cur--r-r-r-r-r? here chicks--come under my wings! i'm going to take a nap. come along--nip, dip, pip, rip--come into your featherbed, my little dearies! there! don't stick your noses out--be still now--i'm going to sing a song. hush, my chickies--don't you peep-- hush, my children--go to sleep! now the night is dark and thick-- go to sleep each little chick! * * * * * fiddle-de-dee--i can't sleep, and the chickens are as lively as bed-bugs. cut--cut--cu--daw--cut! what on airth is the matter! the sun has got put out, right up there in the sky, just like a candle. well--never did i see or hear of such a thing afore! and now it's night in the middle of the day! what will come next? why, i expect i shall walk on my head, and fly with my claws! it ain't half fair, to shave an old hen and chickens out of their dinner and supper in this way. however, it's too dark for decent people to be abroad. so, my chicks, we must get into the coop and go to rest. cur--r-r-r-r--it's very queer indeed. how thankful i am that i don't make day and night, and get the world into such a scrape as this. come in! come in, chicks! it ain't our affair. come along--there--you rowdies! you ain't sleepy, and i don't wonder at it. but hens and chickens must go to bed when the lamp is put out. cur--r-r-r-r-r." part ii. reflections of a philosopher upon a blade of grass. here is a leaf, which we call a blade of grass. there are myriads like it in this field; it seems a trifle; it seems insignificant. but let me look at it with my glass. how wonderful is its texture! it seems woven like network, and nothing can exceed the beauty of its structure. and yet every blade of grass is like this. it exceeds all human art in the delicacy of its fabric, yet it grows here out of the ground. _grows!_ what does that mean? what makes it grow? has it life? it must have life, or it could not grow. and what is that life? it cannot think; it cannot walk; who makes it grow then? who made this blade of grass? it was not man; it is not the beast of the field. it is god who made it! and is god here in the field, all around me--in every blade of grass, in every leaf, and stem, and flower? it must be so, indeed. how full of instruction is every thing around us, if we use the powers we possess! * * * * * _moral._ some people believe, that birds and beasts have minds and souls as well as human beings; but we see that the most stupendous wonder of nature excited in one of the most intelligent and civilized of birds, only a queer sort of surprise, expressed in the words cut--cut--cu--dawcut! at the same time it appears that a single blade of grass opens to the philosopher a sublime strain of thought, teaching the profound lesson that god is everywhere! is there not a gulf as wide as eternity, between the human soul and animal instinct? * * * * * _all the children._ bravo, bravo--john! _parley._ well, john--that'll do for a boy. i shan't insert it as my own, you know; people will say, it's good for john smith, only fourteen years old; but for peter parley--why, it's too ridiculous, altogether. at any rate--john--the moral is good--and if people do laugh at the article, you just say to 'em--_keep your tongue between your teeth, till you do better, and you won't speak for a year_! there's nothing like showing a proper spirit upon occasions of importance. * * * * * to return to mat olmstead. notwithstanding his habitual incredulity, he had still his weak side, for he was a firm believer in ghosts: not ghosts in general, but in two that he had seen himself. these were of enormous size, white, and winged like angels. he had seen them one dark night as he was going to his house, which was situated in a lonesome lane that diverged from the high road. it was very late, and mat had spent the evening at the tavern, like tam o'shanter; like him, he "was na fou, but just had plenty." well, mat olmstead's two angels turned out to be a couple of white geese, which he had startled into flight as he stumbled upon them quietly snoozing in the joint of a rail fence! it has often appeared to me that mat olmstead was a type, a representative of a class of men not very rare in this world of ours. it is not at all uncommon to find people, and those who are called strong-minded, who are habitual unbelievers in things possible and probable--nay, in things well established by testimony--while they readily become the dupes of the most absurd illusions and impositions. dr. johnson, it is stated, did not believe in the great earthquake of lisbon in , until six months after it had happened, while he readily accepted the egregious deception of the cock lane ghost. in our day we see people, and sharp ones, too, who reject the plainest teachings of common sense, sanctioned by the good and wise of centuries, and follow with implicit faith some goose of the imagination, like joe smith or brigham young. these are mat olmsteads, a little intoxicated by their own imaginations, and in their night of ignorance and folly they fall down and worship the grossest and goosiest of illusions. i now turn to a different character, lieutenant, or, as we all called him, _leftenant_ smith, who has been already introduced to you. he was a man of extensive reading and large information; he was also some sixty years old, and had stored in his memory the results of his own observation and experience. he read the newspapers and conversed with travellers, affected philosophy, and deemed himself the great intelligencer of the town: he dearly loved to dispense his learning, asking only in return attentive listeners; and he liked discussion, provided the talk was all left to himself. he was equal to all questions: with my father, he dilated upon such high matters as the purchase of louisiana; lewis and clarke's exploring expedition; the death of hamilton in the duel with aaron burr; the attack of the leopard on the chesapeake; fulton's attempts at steam navigation, and the other agitating topics of those times, as they came one after another. i have an impression now that lieut. smith, after all, was not very profound; but to me he was a miracle of learning. i listened to his discussions with very little interest, but his narratives engaged my whole attention. these were always descriptive of actual events, for he would have disdained fiction: from them i derived a satisfaction that i never found in fables. the travels of mungo park, his strange adventures and melancholy death, which about those days transpired through the newspapers, and all of which lieut. smith had at his tongue's end, excited my interest and my imagination, even beyond the romances of sinbad the sailor and robinson crusoe. in the year an event occurred, not only startling in itself, but giving exercise to all the philosophical powers of lieut. smith. on the morning of the th of december, about daybreak, i had arisen, and was occupied in building a fire, this being my daily duty; suddenly the room was filled with light, and, looking up, i saw through the window a ball of fire, nearly the size of the moon, passing across the heavens from north-west to south-east. it was at an immense height, and of intense brilliancy. having passed the zenith, it swiftly descended toward the earth: while still at a great elevation it burst, with three successive explosions, into fiery fragments. the report was like three claps of rattling thunder in quick succession. my father, who saw the light and heard the sounds, declared it to be a meteor of extraordinary magnitude. it was noticed all over the town, and caused great excitement. on the following day the news came that huge fragments of stone had fallen in the adjacent town of weston, some eight or ten miles south-east of ridgefield. it appeared that the people in the neighborhood heard the rushing of the stones through the air, as well as the shock when they struck the earth. one, weighing two hundred pounds, fell on a rock, which it splintered; its huge fragments ploughing up the ground around to the extent of a hundred feet. this meteor was estimated to be half-a-mile in diameter, and to have travelled through the heavens at the rate of two or three hundred miles a minute. on this extraordinary occasion the lieutenant came to our house, according to his wont, and for several successive evenings discoursed to us upon the subject. i must endeavor to give you a specimen of his performances. "i have examined the subject, sir," said he, addressing my father, "and am inclined to the opinion that these phenomena are animals revolving in the orbits of space between the heavenly bodies. occasionally, one of them comes too near the earth, and rushing through our atmosphere with immense velocity, takes fire and explodes!" "this is rather a new theory, is it not?" said my father. "it appears that these meteoric stones, in whatever country they fall, are composed of the same ingredients: mostly silex, iron, and nickel: these substances would make rather a hard character, if endowed with animal life, and especially with the capacity of rushing through space at the rate of two or three hundred miles a minute, and then exploding?" "these substances i consider only as the shell of the animal, sir." "you regard the creature as a huge shell-fish, then?" "not necessarily a fish; for the whole order of nature, called _crustacea_, has the bones on the outside. in this case of meteors, i suppose them to be covered with some softer substance; for it frequently happens that a jelly-like matter comes down with meteoric stones. this resembles coagulated blood; and thus what is called bloody rain or snow has often fallen over great spaces of country. now, when the chemists analyze these things--the stones, which i consider the bones; and the jelly, which i consider the fat; and the rain, which i consider the blood--they find them all to consist of the same elements; that is, silex, iron, nickel, &c. none but my animal theory will harmonise all these phenomena, sir." "but," interposed my father, "consider the enormous size of your aërial monsters. i recollect to have read only a short time since, that in the year , about one o'clock in the afternoon, the inhabitants of several towns of normandy, in france, heard noises in the sky, like the peals of cannon and musketry, with a long-continued roll of drums. looking upward, they saw something like a small cloud at an immense elevation, which soon seemed to explode, sending its vapor in all directions. at last a hissing noise was heard, and then stones fell, spreading over a country three miles wide by eight miles long. no less than two thousand pieces were collected, weighing from one ounce to seventeen pounds. that must have been rather a large animal, eight miles long and three miles wide!" "what is that, sir, in comparison with the earth, which kepler, the greatest philosopher that ever lived, conceived to be a huge beast?" "yes; but did he prove it?" "he gave good reasons for it, sir. he found very striking analogies between the earth and animal existences: such as the tides, indicating its breathing through vast internal lungs; earthquakes, resembling eructations from the stomach; and volcanoes, suggestive of boils, pimples, and other cutaneous eruptions." "i think i have seen your theory set to verse." saying this, my father rose, and bringing a book, read as follows,-- "to me things are not as to vulgar eyes-- i would all nature's works anatomize: this world a living monster seems to me, rolling and sporting in the aërial sea: the soil encompasses her rocks and stones, as flesh in animals encircles bones. i see vast ocean, like a heart in play, pant systole and diastole every day. the world's great lungs, monsoons and trade-winds show-- from east to west, from west to east they blow. the hills are pimples, which earth's face defile, and burning etna an eruptive boil. on her high mountains living forests grow, and downy grass o'erspreads the vales below: from her vast body perspirations rise, condense in clouds and float beneath the skies." my father having closed the book, the profound lieutenant, who did not conceive it possible that a thing so serious could be made the subject of a joke, said,-- "a happy illustration of my philosophy, sir, though i cannot commend the form in which it is put. if a man has anything worth saying, sir, he should use prose. poetry is only proper when one wishes to embellish folly or dignify trifles. in this case it is otherwise, i admit; and i am happy to find so powerful a supporter of my animal theory of meteors. i shall consider the subject, and present it for the consideration of the philosophic world." one prominent characteristic of this philosopher was, that when a great event came about, he fancied that he had foreseen and predicted it from the beginning. now, about this time fulton actually succeeded in his long-sought application of steam to navigation. the general opinion of the country had been, all along, that he was a monomaniac, attempting an impossibility. he was the standing theme of cheap newspaper wit, and a god-send to orators who were hard run for a joke. lieutenant smith, who was only an echo of what passed around him during the period of fulton's labors, joined in the current contempt; but when the news came, in october, , that he had actually succeeded--that one of his boats had steamed at the rate of five miles an hour against the current of the hudson river--then, still an echo of the public voice, did he greatly jubilate. "i told you so! i told you so!" was his first exclamation, as he entered the house, swelling with the account. "well, and what is it?" said my father. "fulton has made his boat go, sir! i told you how it would be, sir. it opens a new era in the history of navigation. we shall go to europe in ten days, sir." now, you will readily understand, that in these sketches i do not pretend to report with literal precision the profound discourses of our ridgefield _savant_; i remember only the general outlines, the rest being easily suggested. my desire is to present the portrait of one of the notables of our village--one whom i remember with pleasure, and whom i conceive to be a representative of the amiable, and perhaps useful race of fussy philosophers to be found in most country villages. from the town oracle i turn to the town miser. granther baldwin, as i remember him, was threescore years and ten--perhaps a little more. he was a man of middle size, thin, wiry, and bloodless, and having his body bent forward at a sharp angle with his hips, while his head was thrown back over his shoulders, giving his person the general form of a reversed letter z. his complexion was brown and stony; his eye grey and twinkling, with a nose and chin almost meeting like a pair of forceps. his hair, standing out with an irritable friz, was of a rusty gray. he always walked and rode with restless rapidity. at church, he wriggled in his seat, tasted fennel, and bobbed his head up and down and around. he could not afford tobacco, so he chewed, with a constant activity, either an oak chip or the roots of elecampane, which was indigenous in the lane near his house. on sundays he was decent in his attire, but on week-days he was a beggarly curiosity. it was said that he once exchanged hats with a scarecrow, and cheated scandalously in the bargain. his boots--a withered wreck of an old pair of whitetops--dangled over his shrunken calves and a coat in tatters fluttered from his body. he rode a rat-tailed, ambling mare, which always went like the wind, shaking the old gentleman merrily from right to left, and making his bones, boots, and rags rustle like his own bush-harrow. familiar as he was, the school-boys were never tired of him, and when he passed, "there goes granther baldwin!" was the invariable ejaculation. i must add, in order to complete the picture, that in contrast to his leanness and activity, his wife was very fat, and, either from indolence or lethargy, dozed away half her life in the chimney-corner. she spent a large part of her life in cheating her husband out of fourpence-ha'pennies, of which more than a peck were found secreted in an old chest at her death. it was the boast of this man that he had risen from poverty to wealth, and he loved to describe the process of his advancement. he always worked in the cornfield till it was so dark that he could see his hoe strike fire. when in the heat of summer he was obliged occasionally to let his cattle breathe, he sat on a sharp stone, lest he should rest too long. he paid half-a-dollar to the parson for marrying him, which he always regretted, as one of his neighbors got the job done for a pint of mustard-seed. on fast-days he made his cattle go without food as well as himself. he systematically stooped to save a crooked pin or a rusty nail, as it would cost more to make it than to pick it up. such were his boasts--or at least, such were the things traditionally imputed to him. he was withal a man of keen faculties; sagacious in the purchase of land, as well as in the rotation of crops. he was literally honest, and never cheated any one out of a farthing, according to his arithmetic, though he had sometimes an odd way of reckoning. it is said that in his day the law imposed a fine of one dollar for profane swearing. during this period, granther baldwin employed a carpenter who was notoriously addicted to this vice. granther kept a strict account of every instance of transgression, and when the job was done, and the time came to settle the account, he said to the carpenter,-- "you've worked with me thirty days, i think, mr. kellogg?" "yes, granther," was the reply. "at a dollar a-day: that makes thirty dollars, i think?" "yes, granther." "mr. kellogg, i am sorry to observe that you have a very bad habit of taking the lord's name in vain." "yes, granther." "well, you know that's agin the law." "yes, granther." "and there's a fine of one dollar for each offence." "yes, granther." "well--here's the account i've kept, and i find you've broken the law twenty-five times; that is, sixteen times in april, and nine in may. at a dollar a time, that makes twenty-five dollars--don't it?" "yes, granther." "so, then, twenty-five from thirty leaves five; it appears, therefore, that there is a balance of five dollars due to you. how'll you take it, mr. kellogg? in cash, or in my way--say in 'taters, pork, and other things?" at this point the carpenter's brow lowered, but with a prodigious effort at composure he replied,-- "well, granther, you may keep the five dollars, and i'll take it out in _my_ way--that is, in swearing!" upon this he hurled at the old gentleman a volley of oaths, too numerous and too profane to repeat. one sketch more, and my gallery of eccentricities is finished. men hermits have been frequently heard of, but a woman hermit is of rare occurrence. nevertheless, ridgefield could boast of one of these among its curiosities. sarah bishop was, at the period of my boyhood, a thin, ghostly old woman, bent and wrinkled, but still possessing a good deal of activity. she lived in a cave, formed by nature, in a mass of projecting rocks that overhung a deep valley or gorge in west mountain, about four miles from our house. the rock, bare and desolate, was her home, except that occasionally she strayed to the neighborhood villages; seldom being absent more than one or two days at a time. she never begged, but received such articles as were given to her. she was of a highly religious turn of mind, and at long intervals came to our church, and partook of the sacrament. she sometimes visited our family--the only one thus favored in the town--and occasionally remained overnight. she never would eat with us at the table, nor engage in general conversation. upon her early history she was invariably silent; indeed, she spoke of her affairs with great reluctance. she neither seemed to have sympathy for others, nor to ask it in return. if there was any exception, it was only in respect to the religious exercises of the family: she listened intently to the reading of the bible, and joined with apparent devotion in the morning and evening prayer. my excursions frequently brought me within the wild precincts of her solitary den. several times i have paid a visit to the spot, and in two instances found her at home. a place more desolate, in its general outline, more absolutely given up to the wildness of nature, it is impossible to conceive. her cave was a hollow in the rock, about six feet square. except a few rags and an old basin, it was without furniture; her bed being the floor of the cave, and her pillow a projecting point of the rock. it was entered by a natural door about three feet wide and four feet high, and was closed in severe weather only by pieces of bark. at a distance of a few feet was a cleft, where she kept a supply of roots and nuts, which she gathered, and the food that was given her. she was reputed to have a secret depository, where she kept a quantity of antique dresses; several of them of rich silks, and apparently suited to fashionable life: though i think this was an exaggeration. at a little distance down the ledge there was a fine spring of water, near which she was often found in fair weather. there was no attempt, either in or around the spot, to bestow upon it an air of convenience or comfort. a small space of cleared ground was occupied by a few thriftless peachtrees, and in summer a patch of starveling beans, cucumbers, and potatoes. up two or three of the adjacent forest-trees there clambered luxuriant grape-vines, highly productive in their season. with the exception of these feeble marks of cultivation, all was left ghastly and savage as nature made it. the trees, standing upon the tops of the cliff, and exposed to the shock of the tempest, were bent and stooping towards the valley: their limbs contorted, and their roots clinging, as with an agonized grasp, into the rifts of the rocks upon which they stood. many of them were hoary with age, and hollow with decay; others were stripped of their leaves by the blasts; and others still, grooved and splintered by the lightning. the valley below, enriched with the decay of centuries, and fed with moisture from the surrounding hills, was a wild paradise of towering oaks, and other giants of the vegetable kingdom, with a rank undergrowth of tangled shrubs. in the distance, to the east, the gathered streams spread out into a beautiful expanse of water called long pond. a place at once so secluded and so wild was, of course, the chosen haunt of birds, beasts and reptiles. the eagle built her nest and reared her young in the clefts of the rocks; foxes found shelter in the caverns; and serpents revelled alike in the dry hollows of the cliffs and the dark recesses of the valley. the hermitess had made companionship with these brute tenants of the wood. the birds had become so familiar with her, that they seemed to heed her almost as little as if she had been a stone. the fox fearlessly pursued his hunt and his gambols in her presence. the rattlesnake hushed his monitory signal as he approached her. such things, at least, were entertained by the popular belief. it was said, indeed, that she had domesticated a particular rattlesnake, and that he paid her daily visits. she was accustomed--so said the legend--to bring him milk from the villages, which he devoured with great relish. it will not surprise you that a subject like this should have given rise to one of my first poetical efforts; the first verses, in fact, that i ever published. i gave them to brainard, then editor of the mirror, at hartford; and he inserted them, probably about the year . the facts in respect to this nun of the mountain were, indeed, strange enough, without any embellishment of fancy. during the winter she was confined for several months to her cell. at that period she lived upon roots and nuts, which she had laid in for the season. she had no fire; and, deserted even by her brute companions, she was absolutely alone. she appeared to have no sense of solitude, no weariness at the slow lapse of days and months. when spring returned, she came down from her mountain a mere shadow; each year her form more bent, her limbs more thin and wasted, her hair more blanched, her eye more colorless. at last, life seemed ebbing away, like the faint light of a lamp sinking into the socket. the final winter came; it passed, and she was not seen in the villages around. some of the inhabitants went to the mountain, and found her standing erect, her feet sunk in the frozen marsh of the valley. in this situation, being unable to extricate herself, she had yielded her breath to him who gave it! the early history of this strange personage was involved in some mystery. so much as this, however, was ascertained, that she was of good family, and lived on long island. during the revolutionary war, in one of the numerous forays of the british soldiers, her father's house was burned, and she was infamously treated. desolate in fortune, blighted at heart, she fled from human society, and for a long time concealed her sorrows in the cavern which she had accidentally found. her grief--softened by time, perhaps alleviated by a veil of insanity--was at length so far mitigated, that, although she did not seek human society, she could endure it. she continued to occupy her cave till the year or , when she departed in the manner i have described; and we may hope, for a brighter and happier existence. chapter ix. farewell to home--danbury--my new vocation--my brother-in-law--his conversations with lawyer hatch--clerical anecdotes. in the autumn of the year , a sudden change took place in my prospects. my eldest sister had married a gentleman by the name of cooke, in the adjacent town of danbury. he was a tradesman, and being in want of a clerk, offered me the place. it was considered a desirable situation by my parents, and, overlooking my mechanical aptitudes, they accepted it at once, and at the age of fifteen i found myself installed in a country store. this arrangement gratified my love of change; and at the same time, as danbury was a much more considerable town than ridgefield, going to live there naturally suggested the idea of advancement, especially as i was to exchange my uncertain prospects for a positive profession. however, i little comprehended what it meant to say, "farewell to home:" i have since learned its significance. in thus bidding adieu to the paternal roof, we part with youth for ever. we part with the spring-tide of life, which strews every path with flowers, fills the air with poetry, and the heart with rejoicing. we part with that genial spirit which endows familiar objects--brooks, lawns, play-grounds, hill-sides--with its own sweet illusions; we bid adieu to this and its fairy companionships. even if, in after life, we return to the scenes of our childhood, they have lost the bloom of youth, and in its place we see the wrinkles of that age which has graven its hard lines upon our hearts. farewell to home implies something even yet more serious: we relinquish, and often with exultation, the tender care of parents, in order to take upon ourselves the responsibilities of independence. what seeming infatuation it is, that renders us thus impatient of the guidance of those who gave us being, and makes us at the same time anxious to spread our untried sails upon an untried sea, to go upon a voyage which involves all the chances, evil as well as good, of existence! and yet it is not infatuation--it is instinct. we cannot always be young; we cannot all remain under the paternal roof. the old birds push the young ones from the nest, and force them to a trial of their wings. it is the system of nature that impels us to go forth and try our fortunes, and it is a kind providence, after all, which endues us with courage for the outset of our uncertain career. i was not long in discovering that my new vocation was very different from what i had expected, and very different from my accustomed way of life. my habits had been active, my employments chiefly in the open air. i was accustomed to be frequently on horseback, and to make excursions to the neighboring towns. i had also enjoyed much personal liberty, which i failed not to use in rambling over the fields and forests. all this was now changed. my duties lay exclusively in the store, and this seemed now my prison. from morning to night i remained there, and, as our business was not large, i had many hours upon my hands with nothing to do but to consider the weariness of my situation. my brother-in-law was always present, and being a man of severe aspect and watchful eyes, i felt a sort of restraint, which, for a time, was agonizing. i had, consequently, pretty sharp attacks of homesickness; a disease which, though not dangerous, is one of the most distressing to which suffering humanity is exposed. this state of misery continued for some weeks, during which time i revolved various plans of escape from my confinement: such as stealing away at night, making my way to norwalk, getting on board a sloop, and going as cabin-boy to the west indies. i believe that a small impulse would have set me upon some such mad expedition. by degrees, however, i became habituated to my occupation, and as my situation was eligible in other respects, i found myself ere long reconciled to it. the father and mother of my brother-in-law were aged people, living with him in the same house, and as one family. they were persons of great amiability and excellence of character: the former, colonel cooke, was eighty years of age, but he had still the perfect exercise of his faculties, and though he had ceased all business, he was cheerful, and took a lively interest in passing events. never have i seen a more pleasing spectacle than this reverend couple, at the age of fourscore, both smoking their pipes in the evening, with two generations of their descendants around them. my brother-in-law was a man of decided character, and his portrait deserves a place in these annals. he had graduated at yale college, and had been qualified for the bar; but his health was feeble, and therefore, chiefly for occupation, he succeeded to the store which his father had kept before him. being in easy circumstances, he made no great efforts in business. though, as i have said, he was of stern aspect, and his manners were somewhat cold and distant, his character was that of a just and kind man. in business he treated people respectfully, but he never solicited custom: he showed, but never recommended his goods. if his advice were asked, he offered it without regard to his own interest. he gave me no instructions, but left me to the influence of his example. he was of a religious turn of mind, not merely performing the accustomed duties of a christian, but making devotional books a large part of his study. perhaps he was conscious of failing health, and already heard the monitory voice of that disease which was ere long to terminate his career. nevertheless, he was not insensible to the pleasures of cultivated society, and however grave he might be in his general air and manner, he was particularly gratified with the visits of a man, in all things his opposite, moses hatch, then a leading lawyer in danbury. this person was a frequent visitor to the store, and the long winter which commenced soon after i entered upon my apprenticeship was not a little enlivened by his conversations with my master. it frequently happened during the deep snows, that the day passed without a single customer, and on these occasions lawyer hatch was pretty sure to pay us a visit. it was curious to see these two men, so opposite in character, attracted to each other as if by contradiction. my brother-in-law evidently found a pleasant relaxation in the conversation of his neighbor, embellished with elegant wit and varied learning, while the latter derived equal gratification from the serious, manly intellect of his friend. in general the former was the talker, and the latter the listener; yet sometimes the conversation became discussion, and a keen trial of wit _versus_ logic ensued. the lawyer always contended for victory; my brother-in-law for the truth. the precise form of these conversations has vanished from my mind, but some of the topics remain. i recollect long talks about the embargo, non-intercourse, and other jeffersonian measures, which were treated with unsparing ridicule and reproach; anecdotes and incidents of napoleon, who excited mingled admiration and terror; with observations upon public men, as well in europe as america. i remember also a very keen discussion upon berkeley's theory of the ideality of nature, mental and material, which so far excited my curiosity, that, finding the "minute philosopher" by that author, in the family library, i read it through with great interest and attention. the frequent references to shakespeare in these conversations led me to look into his works, and, incited by the recommendations of my sister, i read them through, somewhat doggedly, seeking even to penetrate the more difficult and obscure passages. it frequently happened that my master, owing to the influence of disease, was affected with depression of spirits; and the lawyer's best wit and choicest stories were expended without even exciting a smile. not discouraged, but rather stimulated by such adversity, he usually went on, and was pretty sure at last to strike the vein, as moses did the water in the rock, and a gush of uncontrollable laughter was the result. i remember in one instance, mr. cooke sat for a long time, looking moodily into the fire, while squire hatch went on telling stories, chiefly about clergymen, of which he had a great assortment. i will endeavor to give you a sketch of the scene. "i know not why it is so," said the lawyer; "but the fact is undeniable, that the most amusing anecdotes are about clergymen. the reason perhaps is, that incongruity is the source of humorous associations; and this is evidently the most frequent and striking in a profession which sets apart its members as above the mass of mankind, in a certain gravity of character and demeanor, of which the black coat is the emblem. a spot upon this strikes every eye, while a brown coat, being the color of dirt, hides rather than reveals what is upon its surface. thus it is, as we all know, that what would be insipid as coming from a layman, is very laughable if it happens to a parson. i have heard that on a certain occasion, as the rev. j---- m---- was about to read a hymn, he saw a little boy sitting behind the chorister in the gallery, who had intensely red hair. the day was cold, and the little rogue was pretending to warm his hands by holding them close to the chorister's head. this so disconcerted the minister, that it was some minutes before he could go on with the services." the only effect of this was, that my master drew down one corner of his mouth. "i have heard of another clergyman," said the lawyer, "who suffered in a similar way. one day, in the very midst of his sermon, he saw deacon b---- fast asleep, his head leaning back on the rail of the pew, and his mouth wide open. a young fellow in the gallery above, directly over him, took a quid of tobacco from his mouth, and taking a careful aim, let it drop plump into the deacon's mouth. the latter started from his sleep, and went through a terrible paroxysm of fright and choking before he recovered." mr. cooke bit his lip, but was silent. lawyer hatch, although he pretended to be all the while looking into the fire, got a quick side-glance at the face of his auditor, and continued,-- "you know the rev. dr. b----, sir? well, one day he told me, that as he was on his way to new haven he came to the house of one of his former parishioners, who, some years before, had removed to that place. as he was about to pass it, he remembered that this person had died recently, and he thought it meet and proper to stop and condole with the widow. she met him very cheerfully, and they had some pleasant chat together. "'madam,' said he, after a time, 'it is a painful subject--but you have recently met with a severe loss.' "she instantly applied her apron to her eyes, and said,-- "'oh yes, doctor; there's no telling how i feel.' "'it is indeed a great bereavement you have suffered.' "'yes, doctor; very great, indeed.' "'i hope you bear it with submission?' "'i try tu; but oh, doctor, i sometimes feel in my heart--goosy, goosy gander, where shall i wander?'" the lawyer glanced at the object of his attack, and seeming to see a small breach in the wall, he thought it time to bring up his heavy guns. he went on,-- "there's another story about this same dr. b----, which is amusing. some years ago he lost his wife, and after a time he began to look out for another. at last he fixed his mind upon a respectable lady in a neighboring town, and commenced paying her his addresses. this naturally absorbed much of his time and attention, and his parish became dissatisfied. the deacons of the church held several conferences on the subject, and it was finally agreed that deacon becket, who had the grace of smooth speech, should give the reverend doctor a hint of what they deemed his fearful backsliding. accordingly, the next sabbath morning, on going to church, the deacon overtook the parson, and the following dialogue ensued,-- "'good morning, dr. b----.' "'good morning, deacon becket.' "'well, doctor, i'm glad to meet you; for i wanted to say to you as how i thought of changing my pew!' "'indeed! and why so?' "'well, i'll tell you. i sit, as you know, clear over the backside of the meeting-house; and between me and the pulpit there's judy vickar, molly warren, experience pettibone, and half-a-dozen old maids, who sit with their mouths wide open, and they catch all the best of your sarmon; and when it gets to me, it's plaguy poor stuff!'" my brother-in-law could hold out no longer: his face was agitated for a moment with nervous spasms; and then, bending forward, he burst into a round, hearty laugh. the lawyer--who made it a point never to smile at his own jokes--still had a look upon his face as much as to say, "well, sir, i thought i should get my case." it may be easily imagined that i was greatly interested by these conversations and discussions; and always felt not a little annoyed, if perchance, as sometimes happened, i was called away in the midst of a good story, or a keen debate, to supply a customer with a gallon of treacle, or a paper of pins. i know not if this disgusted me with my trade; but it is very certain that i conceived for it a great dislike, nearly from the beginning. never, so far as i can recollect, did i for one moment enter heartily into its spirit. i was always, while i continued in it, a mere servile laborer; doing my duty, perhaps, yet with a languid and reluctant heart. however, i got through the winter; and when the summer came, mr. cooke nearly gave up personal attention to business in consequence of ill health; and we had a new clerk, who was older than myself, and took the responsible charge of the establishment. he was an excellent merchant, and to me was a kind and indulgent friend. he afterwards settled in troy, where he is still living, in the enjoyment of an ample fortune, and in excellent reputation as a father, friend, christian, and neighbor; the natural fruit of good sense, good temper, and good conduct. chapter x. new haven--distinguished men--whitney's cotton-gin--durham--my grandmother's indian puddings--in search of a doctor--return to danbury--the cold friday--factory workmen--mathematics. in the summer of i made a short tour with my brother-in-law and my sister, for the health of the former. this, to me, was a grand expedition; for among other places we visited was new haven, then a sort of jerusalem in my imagination; a holy place containing yale college, of which dr. dwight was president. besides all this, one of my uncles and some of my cousins lived there; and, better still, my brother was there, and then a member of the college. ah, how my heart beat when we set out! such was the vividness of my perceptions, that i could fill a book with recollections of that short, simple journey; the whole circuit not exceeding one hundred and twenty miles. i was duly impressed with the beauty of new haven; for then, as now, it was celebrated for a rare union of rural freshness and city elegance. i have recently, in passing through it, had a transient view of its appearance; and may safely affirm that, after pretty large observation in the old world as well as in the new, i know of no town or city more inviting; especially to one whose judgment is cultivated by observation and study, and whose feelings are chastened by reflection and experience. there is something of the activity and bustle of commerce in a part of the town, and at one point, all the spasm of a railway station. in other portions of the place, and over three-fourths of its area, there is the quietude and repose proper to a seat of learning. here the houses seem suited to the city, each with a garden breathing the perfumes of the country. at the period of the visit i am describing, new haven had not one-half its present population; and many of the institutions which now adorn it did not exist. the college, however, was then as now, a leading literary institution in the country. to me it was an object of special reverence, as my grandfather and his five sons had all graduated there. my brother and two of my cousins were at this time among its inmates. of course, i looked with intense curiosity at the several buildings that belonged to it. many things here excited my admiration. i looked with particular interest--i may add, with some degree of envy--at the students, who seemed to me the privileged sons of the earth. several were pointed out as promising to be the master-spirits of their age and generation; in some cases, i have since seen these anticipations fulfilled. next to the college i visited the bay, and for the first time actually stood upon the shore of that living sea which, through my whole childhood, had spread its blue bosom before me in the distant horizon. a party of three or four of us took a boat, and went down toward the entrance of the bay, landing on the eastern side. from this point the view was enchanting; it was a soft summer afternoon, and the sea only breathed upon by light puffs of wind that came from the west. i looked long, and with a species of entrancement, at its heaving and swelling surface: i ran my eye far away, till it met the line where sky and wave are blended together: i followed the lulling surf as it broke, curling and winding, among the mimic bays of the rocky shore. it was a spectacle, not only full of beauty in itself, but to me it was a revelation and a fulfilment of the thousand half-formed fancies which had been struggling in my longing bosom from very childhood. [illustration: first adventure on the sea.] our party was so occupied with our contemplations, that we had scarcely noticed a thunder-storm, which now approached and menaced us from the west. we set out to return, but before we had got half across the bay it broke full upon us. the change in the aspect of the sea was fearful: all its gentleness was gone; and now, black and scowling, it seemed as if agitated by a demon, threatening everything with destruction that came within its scope. by a severe struggle we succeeded in reaching long walk, though not without risk. while staying at new haven, i met many distinguished men; as the house of my uncle, elizur goodrich, was frequented by all the celebrities of the place. among these was eli whitney, the inventor of the cotton-gin, a machine for combing out the seeds from the cotton in its raw state, to which america may almost be said to owe her cotton trade. whitney's first gin was made in , at which time almost the whole of our raw material was imported. the results of his invention may be estimated by the fact, that while in only one million pounds of cotton were produced in the united states, the product of the year exceeded fourteen hundred millions! we saw the original model of mr. whitney's gin at his gun-factory, which was situated in a wild, romantic spot, near the foot of east rock, and about two miles distant from new haven. having spent about a week at new haven, we proceeded to durham, an old-fashioned, sleepy town, of a thousand inhabitants. it is chiefly remarkable for the distinguished men it has produced--the chaunceys, celebrated in the annals of new england, and, i may add, in those of the country at large; the wadsworths, no less noted in various commanding stations, military and civil, public and private; the lymans, renowned in the battlefield, the college, the pulpit, and the senate; the austins--father and son--to whose talent and enterprise texas owes her position as a member of the union. to this list of remarkable names, i trust i may add that of the goodriches, without the imputation of egotism, for historical justice demands it. at the time i visited the place, nearly all the family had long since left it. my grandfather, dr. goodrich, died in , but my grandmother was living, as well as her daughter, mrs. smith, wife of rev. david smith, the clergyman of the place, who had succeeded to my grandfather's pulpit. i trust i have all due respect for my paternal grandmother, who has already, by the way, been introduced to your notice. she was now quite lame, but active, energetic, and alive to everything that was passing. she welcomed me heartily, and took the best care of me in the world, lavishing upon me, without stint, all the treasures of her abundant larder. as to her indian puddings--alas, i shall never see their like again! a comfortable old body she was in all things, and, as i have before remarked, took a special interest in the welfare of the generation of descendants rising up around her. when she saw me eating with a good appetite, her benignant grandmotherly face beamed like a lantern. as to my uncle and aunt smith, i may remark that they were plain, pious people, the former worthily filling the pulpit of my grandfather, and enjoying a high degree of respect, alike from his position and character. besides attending to his parochial duties, he prepared young men for college. among his pupils were several persons who attained distinction. as a man, he was distinguished for his cheerful, frank, friendly manners: as a preacher, he was practical, sincere, and successful. i must mention a story of him, among my pulpit anecdotes. as sometimes happens, in a congregation of farmers during midsummer, it once chanced that a large number of his people, even the deacons in the sacramental seat, fell asleep in the very midst of the sermon. the minister looked around, and just at this moment, the only person who seemed quite awake was his eldest son, david, sitting in the pew by the side of the pulpit. pausing a moment, and looking down upon his son, he exclaimed, in a powerful voice: "david, wake up!" in a moment the whole congregation roused themselves, and long did they remember the rebuke. during our stay at durham, my brother-in-law was so ill as to need the advice of a skilful physician. accordingly, i was dispatched on horseback to middletown, a distance of eight or ten miles, for dr. o----, then famous in all the country round about. on my way i met a man of weather-beaten complexion and threadbare garments, mounted on a lean and jaded mare. beneath him was a pair of plump saddlebags. he had all the marks of a doctor, for then men of his profession traversed the country on horseback, carrying with them a collection of pills, powders, and elixirs, equivalent to an apothecary's shop. instinct told me that he was my man. as i was about to pass him i drew in my breath, to ask if he were dr. o----, but a sudden bashfulness seized me: the propitious moment passed, and i went on. on arriving at the house of dr. o----, i learned that he had gone to the village in the south-western part of the town, six or eight miles off. "there!" said i to myself, "i knew it was he: if i had only spoken to him!" however, reflection was vain. i followed to the designated spot, and there i found that he had left about half an hour before, for another village in the central part of the town. i gave chase, but he was too quick for me, so that i was obliged to return to durham without him. "ah!" i thought, "how much trouble a little courage would have saved me!" in fact, i took the incident to heart, and have often practised to advantage upon the lesson it suggested; which is, never to let a doctor, or anything else, slip, for the want of asking an opportune question. at length we departed from durham, and took our way homeward, through a series of small towns, arriving at last at woodbury. the week of our sojourn here flew on golden wings with me. the village itself was after my own heart. it lies in a small tranquil valley, its western boundary consisting of a succession of gentle acclivities, covered with forests; that on the east is formed of basaltic ledges, broken into wild and picturesque forms, rising sharp and hard against the horizon. through the valley, in long serpentine sweeps, flows a stream, clear and bright, now dashing and now sauntering; here presenting a rapid, and there a glassy pool. in ancient times it was bordered by cities of the beaver; it was now the haunt of a few isolated and persecuted muskrats. in the spring and autumn, the wild ducks, in their migrations, often stooped to its bosom for a night's lodging. at all seasons it was renowned for its trout. in former ages, when the rivers, protected by the deep forests, ran full to the brim, and when the larger streams were filled to repletion with shad and salmon, this was sometimes visited by enterprising individuals of their race, which shot up cataracts, and leaped over obstructing rocks, roots, and mounds, impelled by instinct to seek places remote from the sea, where they might deposit their spawn in safety. in those days, i imagine, the accidents and incidents of shad and salmon life often rivalled the adventurous annals of marco polo or robinson crusoe. there was about this little village a singular union of refinement and rusticity, of cultivated plain and steepling rock, of blooming meadow and dusky forest. the long, wide street, saving the highway and a few stray paths here and there, was a bright, grassy lawn, decorated with abundance of sugar-maples, which appeared to have found their paradise. such is the shape of the encircling hills and ledges that the site of the village seemed a sort of secluded happy valley, where everything turns to poetry and romance. and this aptitude is abundantly encouraged by history; for here was once the favored home of a tribe of indians. all around--the rivers, the hills, the forests--are still rife with legends and remembrances of the olden time. a rocky mound, rising above the river on one side, and dark forests on the other, bears the name of "pomperaug's castle;" a little to the north, near a bridle-path that traversed the meadows, was a heap of stones, called "pomperaug's grave." to the east i found a wild ledge, called "bethel rock." and each of these objects has its story. it was a great time, that happy week--for let it be remembered that for a whole year i had been imprisoned in a country store. what melody was there in the forest echoes then! ah! i have since heard catalani, and garcia, and pasta, and sontag, and grisi; i have even heard "the swedish nightingale;" nay, in france and italy--the very home of music and song--i have listened to the true nightingale, which has given to jenny lind her sweetest and most appropriate epithet; but never, in one or all, have i heard such music as filled my ears that incense-breathing morn, when i made a foray into the wilds of woodbury! we returned to danbury after a tour of some five or six weeks. the succeeding autumn and winter presented no peculiar incident--with a single exception. there was, if i rightly remember, in the month of february, a certain "cold friday," which passed down to succeeding generations as among the marvels of the time. it had snowed heavily for three days, and the ground was covered three feet deep. a driving wind from the north-east then set in, and growing colder and colder, it became at last so severe as to force everybody to shelter. this continued for two days, the whole air being filled with sleet, so that the sun, without a cloud in the sky, shone dim and grey as through a fog. the third day the wind increased, both in force and intensity of cold. horses, cattle, fowls, sheep, perished in their coverings. the roads were blocked up with enormous drifts; the mails were stopped, travelling was suspended; the world, indeed, seemed paralyzed, and the circulation of life to be arrested. [illustration: the cold friday.] on the morning of this third day, which was the ominous and famous friday, word was brought to my sister that a poor family, about two miles off, to whom she had long been a kind friend, was in danger of starvation. she knew no fear, and tolerated no weakness. a thing that ought to be done, was to be done. therefore, a sack was filled with bread, meat, candles, and a pint of rum: this was lashed around my waist. the horse was brought to the door--i mounted and set off. i knew the animal well, and we had enjoyed many a scamper together. he was, indeed, after my own heart--clean limbed, with full, knowing eyes, and small, pointed sensitive ears. he had a cheerful walk, a fleet, skimming trot, a swift gallop, and all these paces we had often tried. i think he knew who was on his back; but when we got to the turning of the road, which brought his nostrils into the very tunnel of the gale, he snorted, whirled backward, and seemed resolved to return. i, however, brought him steady to his work, gave him sharp advice in the ribs, and showed him that i was resolved to be master. hesitating a moment, as if in doubt whether i could be in earnest, he started forward; yet so keen was the blast, that he turned aside his head, and screamed as if his nostrils were pierced with hot iron. on he went, however, in some instances up to the saddle in the drift, yet clearing it at full bounds. in a few minutes we were at the door of the miserable hut, now half buried in a snow-drift. i was just in time. the wretched inmates--a mother and three small children--without fire, without food, without help or hope, were in bed, poorly clothed, and only keeping life in their bodies by a mutual cherishing of warmth, like pigs or puppies in a similar extremity. the scene within was dismal in the extreme. the fireplace was choked with snow, which had fallen down the chimney: the ill-adjusted doors and windows admitted alike the drift and the blast, both of which swept across the room in cutting currents. as i entered, the pale, haggard mother comprehend at a glance that relief had come, burst into a flood of tears. i had no time for words. i threw them the sack, remounted my horse, and, the wind at my back, i flew home. one of my ears was a little frost-bitten, and occasionally, for years after, a tingling and itching sensation there reminded me of my ride; which, after all, left an agreeable remembrance upon my mind. danbury is a handsome town, chiefly built on a long, wide street, crossed near the northern extremity by a small river, a branch of the housatonic, which, having numerous rapids, affords abundance of mill-sites in its course. at this crossing there were two extensive hat-factories, famous over the whole country. nearly all the workmen in these establishments, of whom there were several hundred at the time i am describing, were foreigners, mostly english and irish. a large part of the business of our store was the furnishing of rum to these poor wretches, who bought one or two quarts on saturday night and drank till monday, and frequently till tuesday. a factory workman of those days was thought to be born to toil, and to get drunk. philanthropy itself had not then lifted its eye or its hopes above this hideous malaria of custom. it is a modern discovery that manufacturing towns may rise up, where comfort, education, morals, and religion, in their best and happiest exercise, may be possessed by the toiling masses. a few words more, and i have done with danbury. the health of my brother-in-law gradually failed, and at last, as winter approached, he took to his room, and finally to his bed. by almost insensible degrees, and with singular tranquillity of mind and body, he approached his end. it was a trait of his character to believe nothing, to do nothing, by halves. having founded his faith on christ, christianity was now, in its duties, its promises, and its anticipations, as real as life itself. he was afflicted with no doubts, no fears. with his mind in full vigor, his strong intellect vividly awake, he was ready to enter into the presence of his god. the hour came. he had taken leave of his friends, and then, feeling a sense of repose, he asked to be left alone. they all departed save one, who sat apart, listening to every breath. in a few moments she came and found him asleep, but it was the sleep that knows no waking! i continued in the store alone for several months, selling out the goods, and closing up the affairs of the estate. i had now a good deal of time to myself, and thumbed over several books, completing my reading of shakspeare, to which i have already alluded. it happened that we had a neighbor over the way, a good-natured, chatty old gentleman, by the name of ebenezer white. he had been a teacher, and had a great taste for mathematics. in those days it was the custom for the newspapers to publish mathematical questions, and to invite their solution. master white was sure to give the answer first. in fact, his genius for mathematics was so large, that it left rather a moderate space in his brain for common sense. he was, however, full of good feeling, and was now entirely at leisure. indeed, time hung heavy on his hands, so he made me frequent visits, and in fact lounged away an hour or two of almost every day at the store. i became at last interested in mathematics, and under his good-natured and gratuitous lessons i learned something of geometry and trigonometry, and thus passed on to surveying and navigation. this was the first drop of real science that i ever tasted--i might almost say the last, for though i have since skimmed a good many books, i feel that i have really mastered almost nothing. chapter xi. arrival at hartford--my occupation there--restlessness--my friend george sheldon. i now enter upon a new era in my life. early in the summer of , i took leave of danbury, and went to hartford. on my arrival there, i was installed in the dry-goods store of c. b. k----, my father having made the arrangement some weeks before. my master had no aptitude for business, and spent much of his time away, leaving the affairs of the shop to an old clerk, by the name of jones, and to me. things went rather badly, and he sought to mend his fortune by speculation in merino sheep--then the rage of the day. a ram sold for a thousand dollars, and a ewe for a hundred. fortunes were made and lost in a day during this mania. my master, after buying a flock and driving it to vermont, where he spent three months, came back pretty well shorn--that is, three thousand dollars out of pocket! this soon brought his affairs to a crisis, and so in the autumn i was transferred to the dry-goods store of j. b. h----. my new employer had neither wife nor child to take up his time, so he devoted himself sedulously to business. he was, indeed, made for it--elastic in his frame, quick-minded, of even temper, and assiduous politeness. he was already well established, and things marched along as if by rail. for a time we had another clerk, but he was soon dismissed, and i was the only assistant; my master, however, seldom leaving the shop during business hours. had the capacity for trade been in me, i might now have learned my business. i think i may say that i fulfilled my duty, at least in form. i was regular in my hours, kept the books duly journalized and posted. i never consciously wronged arithmetic to the amount of a farthing. i duly performed my task at the counter. yet, in all this i was a slave: my heart was not in my work. my mind was away; i dreamed of other things; i thought of other pursuits. and yet i scarcely knew all this. i had certainly no definite plan for the future. a thousand things floated before my imagination. every book i read drew me aside into its own vortex. poetry made me poetical; politics made me political; travels made me truant. i was restless, for i was in a wrong position; yet i asked no advice, for i did not know that i needed it. my head and heart were a hive of thoughts and feelings, without the regulating and sedative supremacy of a clear and controlling intelligence. i was then eighteen years of age. i had been sufficiently educated for my station. my parents had now removed from ridgefield to berlin, a distance of but eleven miles from my present residence, so that i had easy and frequent communication with them. my uncle, chauncey goodrich, then a senator of the united states, lived in an almost contiguous street, and while in the city, always treated me with the kindness and consideration which my relationship to him naturally dictated. in general, then, my situation was eligible enough; and yet i was unhappy. the truth is, i had now been able to sit in judgment upon myself--to review my acquirements, to analyze my capacities, to estimate my character, to compare myself with others, and to see a little into the future. the decision was painful to my ambition. i had all along, unconsciously, cherished a vague idea of some sort of eminence, and this, unhappily, had nothing to do with selling goods or making money. i had lived in the midst of relations, friends, and alliances, all of which had cultivated in me trains of thought alien to my present employment. my connections were respectable--some of them eminent, but none of them rich. all had acquired their positions without wealth, and i think it was rather their habit to speak of it as a very secondary affair. brought up under such influences, how could i give up my heart to trade? it was clear, indeed, that i had missed my vocation. full of this conviction, i besought my parents to allow me to quit the store, and attempt to make my way through college. whether for good or ill, i know not, but they decided against the change, and certainly on substantial grounds. their circumstances did not permit them to offer me any considerable aid, and without it they feared that i should meet with insuperable difficulties. i returned to the store disheartened at first, but after a time my courage revived, and i resolved to re-educate myself. i borrowed some latin books, and with the aid of george sheldon, an assistant in a publisher's establishment, and at this time my bosom friend, i passed through the latin grammar, and penetrated a little way into virgil. this was done at night, for during the day i was fully occupied. at the same time i began, with such light and strength as i possessed, to train my mind, to discipline my thoughts, then as untamed as the birds of the wilderness. _i sought to think_--to think steadily, to acquire the power of forcing my understanding up to a point, and make it stand there and do its work. i attempted to gain the habit of speaking methodically, logically, and with accumulating power, directed to a particular object. i did all this as well by study as by practice. i read locke on the understanding and watts on the mind. i attempted composition, and aided myself by blair's rhetoric. this was a task; for not only was my time chiefly occupied by my daily duties, but it was a contest against habit--it was myself against myself; and in this i was almost unaided and alone. i was to lay aside the slipshod practice of satisfying myself with impressions, feelings, guesses; in short, of dodging mental labor by jumping at conclusions. i was, indeed, to learn the greatest of all arts, that of reasoning--of discovering the truth; and i was to do this alone, and in the face of difficulties, partly founded in my mental constitution, and partly also in my training. i did not at first comprehend the extent of my undertaking. by degrees i began to appreciate it: i saw and felt, at last, that it was an enormous task, and even after i had resolved upon it, again and again my courage gave way, and i ceased my efforts in despair. still i returned to the work by spasms. i found, for instance, that my geography was all wrong: asia stood up edgewise in my imagination, just as i had seen it on an old smoky map in lieutenant smith's study; africa was in the south-east corner of creation, and europe was somewhere in the north-east. in fact, my map of the world was very chinese in its projection. i knew better, but still i had thus conceived it, and the obstinate bump of locality insisted upon presenting its outlines to my mind according to this arrangement. i had similar jumbles of conception and habit as to other things. this would not do; so i re-learned the elements of geography; i revised my history, my chronology, my natural history, in all of which i had caught casual glimpses of knowledge. what i read i read earnestly. i determined to pass no word without ascertaining its meaning, and i persevered in this, doggedly, for five-and-twenty years. my friend sheldon was of inestimable service to me in my studies. possessing advantages over me in age, experience, and education, he made many rough places smooth to my stumbling feet. especially when, during my early efforts in thinking, my mind was assailed with doubts as to the truth of the christian religion, his clear intelligence and sincere faith did much to help me through my difficulties. chapter xii. war with england--in the army--my uncle's advice--campaigning--on the march--our military costume--my first soldier's supper. during my residence at hartford war was declared against great britain. for some time connecticut held aloof from all participation in the struggle. but when, in , our own territory was threatened, all feeling vanished before the instinct of self-preservation, and the strong feeling of animosity which then raged against england. anticipating this state of things, the state government had made preparations for the emergency. as it was midsummer--a period when the husbandmen could ill afford to leave their farms--orders were sent by governor smith to dispatch at once the companies of militia from the larger towns to the defence of new london and the neighboring country. at that time i belonged to an artillery company, and this was among those ordered to the coast. i received a summons at four o'clock in the afternoon to be ready to march next day at sunrise. i went at once to consult my uncle--who, by the way, was at that time not only mayor of the city, but lieutenant-governor of the state. he had a short time before promised to make me one of his aids, and perhaps thought i should expect him now to fulfill his engagement. he soon set that matter at rest. "you must, of course, go," said he. "we old federalists cannot shelter our nephews when there is a question of defending our own territory." "ought i not to consult my parents?" said i. "i will go down and see them to-morrow," he replied. "certainly, then, i shall go. i wish to go. my only feeling is, that my mother may have some anxiety." "i will see her to-morrow. you may be at ease on that subject. be ready to march at sunrise, according to your orders. i will come and see you before you start." the next morning, while it was yet dark, he came, gave me some letters of introduction, and also supplied me with ten dollars--a welcome addition to my light purse. after a little advice he said,--"i have only one thing to add: if you come to a fight, _don't run away till the rest do_. goodby!" the next morning, june , , about sunrise, the whole company, nearly sixty in number, mounted in wagons, departed. at sunset we were on the heights two miles back of new london. no provision had been made for us, and so we went supperless to bed in a large empty barn. i scarcely closed my eyes, partly because it was my first experiment in sleeping on the floor, and partly because of the terrific snoring of a fellow-soldier by my side. never have i heard such a succession of choking, suffocating, strangling sounds, as issued from his throat. i expected that he would die, and, indeed, once or twice i thought he was dead. strange to say, he got up the next morning in excellent condition, and seemed, indeed, to feel better for the exercise. this man became quite a character before the campaign was over: he got the title, of Ã�olus, and as he could not be tolerated in the barracks, he was provided with a tent at a good distance, where he blew his blast without restraint. at the close of the campaign he was the fattest man in the company. i was glad to see the daylight. the weather was fine, and as the sun came up we saw the british fleet--some half-dozen large ships of war--lying off the mouth of the thames. they seemed very near at hand, and for the first time i realized my situation--that of a soldier who was likely soon to be engaged in battle. i said nothing of my emotions: indeed, words were unnecessary. i watched the countenances of my companions as they first caught a view of the black and portentous squadron, and i read in almost every face a reflection of my own feelings. we were, however, not all sentimentalists. there were among us, as doubtless in all such companies, a supply of witty, reckless gallios, who gave a cheerful turn to our thoughts. we soon dispersed among the inhabitants, scattered over the neighboring hills and valleys, for breakfast. like hungry wolves we fell upon the lean larders, and left famine behind. of course every one offered to pay, but not one person would accept a farthing: we were, indeed, received as protectors and deliverers. it was something, after all, to be soldiers! with our stomachs fortified, and our consciousness flattered, we came cheerfully together. at ten o'clock we were mustered, and began our march all in our best trim: cocked hats, long-tailed blue coats, with red facings, white pantaloons, and shining cutlasses at our sides. our glittering cannon moved along with the solemnity of elephants. it was, in fact, a fine company--all young men, and many from the best families in hartford. as we entered new london the streets presented some confusion, for the people were still removing back into the country, as an attack was daily expected. a few military companies were also gathering into the town. we were, however, not wholly overlooked: women put their heads out of the windows and smiled their gratitude as we passed along. men stopped and surveyed us with evident signs of approbation. it was a glorious thing to belong to such a company! at last we came to a halt in one of the public squares. then there was racing and chasing of aids-de-camp for four mortal hours, during which our martial pride drooped a little in the broiling sun. at four o'clock in the afternoon we were transported across the thames to the village of groton, and took up our quarters in a large house on the bank of the river, vacated for our use. two immense kettles--the one filled with junks of salt beef, and the other with unwashed potatoes--were swung upon the kitchen trammels, and at six o'clock in the evening we were permitted each to fish out his dinner from the seething mass. that was my first soldier's supper; and, after all, it was a welcome meal. chapter xiii. new london--our military reputation--sent with a letter--british cannon-balls--out of harm's way--an alarm--on guard--take a prisoner--strange emotions--my left-hand chum--a grateful country. new london is situated on the western bank of the river thames, three miles from its mouth. it has now ten or twelve thousand inhabitants, but at the time i am speaking of there were not more than four thousand. the entrance to the river is broad, and affords a fine harbor. this is defended by fort trumbull on the western side of the river, half a mile below the city. it contained a garrison of six or seven hundred soldiers during the war of . opposite to new london is the village of groton, the main street running along the river bank; on an eminence some hundred rods from the river, and commanding a view of the surrounding country, including the harbor and the islands which lie scattered near it in the sound, is the site of fort griswold. the old fort is now in ruins, but in my time it was in tolerable repair. our company, as well as other portions of the militia, labored upon it, and strengthened it, as well by completing its works as by erecting a small redoubt upon the south-eastern side. to the defence of the latter, in case of attack, the hartford company was assigned. the officers of our company were rigid disciplinarians, and accordingly we were drilled for about four hours each day. we soon gained much reputation for our martial exercises and our tidy appearance. many people came over from new london to witness our performances, among whom were often persons of distinction. on sundays we marched two miles to church, and being in our best guise, caused quite a sensation. men and women, boys and girls, streamed along at our flanks, often in a broiling sun, yet always with admiring looks. after a morning drill we were generally at leisure for the rest of the day, taking our turns, however, on guard, and in other occasional duties. most of the soldiers gave up their rations of mess beef and potatoes, and lived on their own resources. we formed ourselves into a general club for a supply of fresh fish. every day three of us went out fishing, and generally returned with a half-bushel basket full of various kinds, among which the blackfish or tataug, now so greatly esteemed, was always abundant. i was employed by the captain to keep his journal of our proceedings, and sometimes i was dispatched to new london, or to some one of the officers along the line, with a letter or a parcel. i remember that on one occasion h. a----, my special companion, and myself, were sent with a letter to an officer who commanded a small picket on the eastern shore, near the mouth of the river; that is, at point groton. it was a distance of some three miles. the weather was pleasant, and our route lay along the shore of the stream, which opens into a wide bay as it meets the sound. as we approached the southern point of the shore we found ourselves quite near to the british squadron. one of the vessels, which we knew as the "acasta"--for we had learned all their names--was under full sail in a light wind, and coming up toward the shore. she was already so near that we could see the men, and note every movement on the deck. while we were admiring the beautiful appearance of the ship, we suddenly saw several white puffs issue from her sides and uncoil themselves into volumes of smoke. then came a deafening roar; a moment after, and in the very midst of it, there were wild howls in the air above our heads. at a little distance beyond the ground was ploughed up, scattering the soil around, and the top of one of the forest trees, of which a few were scattered here and there, was cut asunder and fell almost at our feet. we understood the joke in an instant, and so did the lieutenant who commanded the picket. he was the object of the attack, and the broadside of the "acasta," sending its shot over our heads, had hurled one or two balls crashing through the roof of the little fish-hut which he and his men occupied. in less than five minutes they were seen trotting off at a round pace, with their cannon jerking right and left over the rough ground behind them. several other shots were fired, but the party escaped in safety. my companion and myself ensconced ourselves behind the rocks, and though it was grave sport we enjoyed it exceedingly. we could trace the cannon-balls as they flew by, looking like globes of mist twinkling through the air. several of them passed close over our heads, and grooved the earth in long trenches at our sides. the noise they made as they rose high in the air was a strange mixture, between a howl and a scream. after having thus showed her teeth and made a great noise the frigate returned to her anchorage, and all was quiet. i hope i shall not degrade myself as a soldier in your eyes by confessing that this was the only battle in which i was engaged during this glorious war! i must, however, mention one circumstance which tried the souls of our company. on a certain saturday a large accession to the british force arrived in the bay, the whole number of vessels of all kinds amounted to fourteen. this looked very much like an attack, and accordingly there was a feverish anxiety among the inhabitants of new london and the vicinity, and a general bustle in the army from groton point to allyn's mountain. a large body of militia was set to work upon fort griswold. our company was drilled in the little redoubt which we were to defend, and every preparation was made to give the enemy a warm reception. the general idea was, that a landing of british troops would be made on the eastern side, and that we should take the brunt of the first attack. the sun set in clouds, and as the evening advanced bursts of thunder, attended by flashes of lightning, muttered along the distant horizon. our company was admonished to sleep on their arms. everything wore a rather ominous appearance. there were no signs of cowardice in the men, but they looked thoughtful; and when the wit of the company let off some of his best jokes--which would ordinarily have set the whole corps in a roar--he was answered by a dead silence. it chanced that i was that night on guard. my turn came at ten o'clock. taking my gun, i paced the bank of the river in front of our barracks. i had received orders to let nothing pass by land or water. it was intensely dark, but at frequent intervals thin flashes of lightning sprang up against the distant sky behind dark rolling masses of clouds. gradually the lights in the streets and windows of new london, stretching in a long line on the opposite side of the river, were extinguished one by one; a few remaining, however, as sentinels, indicating anxiety and watchfulness. the sounds on all sides were at last hushed, "and left the world to darkness and to me." more than half of my two-hours' watch had passed when i heard the dip of oars and the flapping of waves against the prow of a boat. i looked in the direction of the sounds, and at last descried the dusky outline of a small craft stealing down the river. i cried out,--"boat ahoy! who goes there?" my voice echoed portentously in the silence, but no answer was given, and the low, black, raking apparition glided on its way. again i challenged, but there was still no reply. on went the ghost! i cocked my gun. the click sounded ominously on the still night air. i began to consider the horror of shooting some fellow-being in the dark. i called a third time, and not without avail. the rudder was turned, the boat whirled on her heel, and a man came ashore. according to my orders i marshalled him to the guard-room, and gave notice of what had happened to the captain. the man was only a fisherman going home, but he was detained till morning. so, you see, i can boast that i made one prisoner. my watch was soon over, and returning to my station i laid down to sleep. all was soon quiet, and i was buried in profound repose, when suddenly there was a cry in the main barrack-room overhead,--"alarm! alarm!" "alarm! alarm!" was echoed by twenty voices, attended by quick, shuffling sounds, and followed by a hurried rush of men down the staircase. a moment after the guard in front discharged his musket, and was answered by a long line of reports up and down the river, from the various sentinels, extending for half-a-dozen miles. then came the roll of drums and the mustering of the men. several of our company had been out to see what was going on: they came back saying that the enemy was approaching! j. m---- distinctly heard the roar of cannon, and positively saw the flash of muskets. b. w---- found out that the attack had already begun upon our southern pickets. nobody doubted that our time had come! in a very few minutes our company was drawn up in line, and the roll was called. it was still dark, but the faint flash gave us now and then a glimpse of each other's faces. i think we were a ghostly-looking set, but it was, perhaps, owing to the blueish complexion of the light. j. s----, of west hartford, who marched at my left shoulder--usually the lightest-hearted fellow in the company--whispered to me,--"goodrich, i'd give fifty dollars to be at west division!" for myself, i felt rather serious, and asked a certain anxious feeling in my stomach,--"what's to be done?" johnson, our captain, was a man of nerve and ready speech. when the roll was finished, he said in a clear, hearty tone,--"all right, my good fellows! every man at his post!" these few words--which were, however, more politic than true, for one fellow was taken with sudden colic, and could not be got out--were electrical. we were ready to take our places in the redoubt. messengers were now sent to the two neighboring posts to inquire into the state of facts. word was brought that the first alarm came from our barracks! the matter was inquired into, and it turned out that the whole affair was originated by a corporal of ours, who, in a fit of nightmare, jumped up and cried,--"alarm! alarm!" our martial ardor soon reconciled itself to this rather ludicrous denouement, though several persons, who had been somewhat chapfallen, became suddenly inflated with courage, which signalized itself with outbursts of "hang the british!" "they're a pack of sneaking cowards, after all!" and the like. the next morning was fresh and fair. the skirmishing thunder-gusts of the night had cleared the air, and even distant objects seemed near at hand. before us lay the whole british fleet, still and harmless, in the glassy bay. my lefthand chum, j. s----, who, in the dark hour, would have given fifty dollars to be at west division, was now himself again. "come on here, you black old ramilies!" said he, dashing the doubled fist of his right hand into the palm of his left: "come on here, you black-hearted british bull-dogs, and we'll do your business for you!" our period of service was brief. in about six weeks from the time of our departure we were dismissed, and returned to our homes. thus closed my military career, so far as relates to active service. the remembrances of my first and last campaign are, on the whole, pleasant. there were feelings of fraternity established between the members of the company which have continued to this day. my country has not been unmindful of my services; for i have received two land-warrants, giving me a title to some hundred and sixty acres, with the fresh virgin soil of the far west upon them. say not that republics are ungrateful! chapter xiv. effects of war in new england--personal experience--news of peace--illuminations--confessions. i remember perfectly well the universal state of anxiety and depression which prevailed in new england during the latter part of the war. the acts of government, the movements of fleets and armies, furnish no idea of the condition of society in its daily life. let me give you a few items as indications of the embarrassments, vexations, and privations which the war had brought unto every man's house and home. such a thing as silver or gold money was almost unknown. the chief circulation consisted of bills of suspended banks, or what were called "facilities;" that is, bank notes, authorized by the legislature of connecticut, redeemable in three years after the war. these were at fifteen to twenty-five per cent. discount compared with specie. banks issued notes of fifty, twenty-five, and twelve-and-a-half cents. barbers issued bills payable in shaving, and various institutions adopted a similar course. the whole mass acquired the title of "rag-money," "shin-plasters," &c.: a large portion of it was notoriously worthless, either as being counterfeit, or issued by irresponsible parties, yet it generally passed without scrutiny. i had personal experience of the universal depression. in the summer of i was out of my time, and cast about for some employment. i went to new york for this object, but found not the slightest encouragement. after some reflection i established a manufactory of pocket-books, in connection with one of my friends, who furnished the capital. the greatest difficulty was to find the materials. i made expeditions to boston, charlestown, providence, &c., and was not able to obtain over fifty pieces of morocco fit for the purpose. in december i went to new york, and was more successful. i made a considerable purchase, and dispatched my goods by the carrier. pretty well content with my success, i had gone in the evening to a concert at the city hotel. while listening to the music there was a murmur in the streets. soon the door of the concert-room was thrown open, and in rushed a man all breathless with excitement. he mounted on a table, and swinging a white handkerchief aloft, cried out,-- "peace! peace! peace!" the music ceased: the hall was speedily vacated. i rushed into the street, and oh, what a scene! it was on the evening of saturday, the th of february, , that the news of the treaty of peace reached new york. in half-an-hour after broadway was one living sea of shouting, rejoicing people. "peace! peace! peace!" was the deep, harmonious, universal anthem. the whole spectacle was enlivened by a sudden inspiration. somebody came with a torch: the bright idea passed into a thousand brains. in a few minutes thousands and tens of thousands of people were marching about with candles, lamps, torches, making the jubilant street appear like a gay and gorgeous procession. the whole night broadway sang its song of peace. we were all democrats--all federalists! old enemies rushed into each other's arms: every house was in a revel: every heart seemed melted by a joy which banished all evil thought and feeling. nobody asked, that happy night, what were the terms of the treaty: we had got peace--that was enough! i moved about for hours in the ebbing and flowing tide of people, not being aware that i had opened my lips. the next morning i found that i was hoarse from having joined in the exulting cry of "peace! peace!" the next day, sunday, all the churches sent up hymns of thanksgiving for the joyous tidings. i set out in the stage-coach on monday morning for connecticut. all along the road the people saluted us with swinging of hats and cries of rejoicing. at one place, in a rather lonesome part of the road, a schoolmaster came with the whole school at his heels to ask us if the news was true. we told him it was; whereupon he tied his bandanna pocket-handkerchief to a broom, swung it aloft, and the whole school hosannaed, "peace! peace!" at all our stopping-places the people were gathered to rejoice in the good tidings. at one little tavern i looked into a room, by chance, the door being open, and there i saw the good-wife, with a chubby boy in her lap--both in a perfect gale of merriment--the child crying out, "peath! peath!" oh, ye makers of war, reflect upon this heartfelt verdict of the people in behalf of peace! we arrived at new haven in the evening, and found it illuminated: the next day i reached hartford, and there also was a grand illumination. the news spread over the country, carrying with it a wave of shouts and rejoicings. boston became clamorous with pealing bells; the schools had a jubilee; the blockaded shipping, rotting at the dilapidated wharves, got out their dusty buntings, and these, ragged and forlorn, now flapped merrily in the breeze. at night the city flamed far and wide--from beacon street down the bay, telling the glorious tale even unto cape cod. so spread the news over the country, everywhere, carrying joy to every heart--with, perhaps, a single exception. at washington, the authors of the war peeped into the dispatches, and found that the treaty had no stipulations against the orders in council, paper blockades, and impressments, which were the pretexts for the war. all that could be maintained was, that we had made war, charging the enemy with very gross enormities, and we had made peace, saying not one word about them! so the war was ended. let us be frank, and confess the truth: the war, in the aspects in which history thus presents it, was disgraceful to the authors of it: it was, in many respects, disastrous to the country; and yet it has left us some wholesome lessons. it has shown the danger and folly of plunging a great country into a national conflict for narrow and selfish purposes, because, under such circumstances, the people will be divided, and it will be a partisan, and not a patriotic war; it has put on record another instance in which war has been declared in boasting, and ended precisely where it began, after years of violence, sorrow, and bloodshed. it has shown, also--in connection with subsequent events--the superiority of peace to war, even in obtaining the ends of justice; for let it be remembered that daniel webster extorted from great britain, by the force of argument, that which the sword could not achieve. chapter xv. evil effects of night study--commencement of a literary career--thoughts on dancing--new york--saratoga--death of my uncle--become a bookseller--cold summer--t'other side of ohio. i have told you that my apprenticeship terminated in the summer of . previous to that time i had made some advances in the study of the french language, under m. value, or, to give him his title, the count value. this person had spent his early life in paris, but afterward migrated to st. domingo, where he owned a large estate. in the insurrection of he escaped only with his life. with admirable cheerfulness and serenity he devoted himself to teaching french and dancing, as means of support. he settled for a time at new haven, where, at the age of seventy, he was captivated by a tall, red-haired schoolmistress of twenty, whom he married. the count finally established himself at hartford, and i became one of his pupils. i pursued my studies with considerable assiduity, and to practise myself in french, i translated chateaubriand's rené. one of my friends had just established a newspaper at middletown, and my translation was published there. about this time my health was feeble, and my eyes became seriously affected in consequence of my night studies. unaware of the danger, i persevered, and thus laid the foundation of a nervous weakness and irritability of my eyes, which has since been to me a rock ahead in the whole voyage of life. from that time i have never been able to read or write without pain. as if by a kind of fatality, i seemed to be afterwards drawn into a literary career, for which i was doubly disqualified--first by an imperfect education, and next by defective eyesight. oh! what penalties have i paid for thus persisting in a course which seems to have been forbidden to me by providence. after a long and laborious life, i feel a profound consciousness that i have done nothing well; at the same time, days, months, nay years, have i struggled with the constant apprehension that i should terminate my career in blindness! how little do we know, especially in the outset of our existence, what is before us! it is well that we do not know, for the prospect would often overwhelm us. in the autumn of , as already stated, i established, in company with a friend, a pocket-book factory at hartford; but the peace put a speedy termination to that enterprise. we came out of it with a small loss, and my kind-hearted partner pocketed this, "for he had money, and i had none." he forgave me, and would have done the same had the deficit been more considerable, for he was a true friend. early in the following spring, i made an arrangement to go to paris as a clerk in the branch of the importing house of richards, taylor & wilder, of new york. about a month afterwards the news came that napoleon had suddenly returned from elba, and as business was prostrated by that event, my engagement failed. for nearly a year, my health continued indifferent, and my eyes in such a state that i was incapable of undertaking any serious business. i spent my time partly at berlin, and partly at hartford. i read a little, and practised my french with value and his scholars. i also felt the need of disciplining my hands and feet, which about these days seemed to me to have acquired a most absurd development, giving me a feeling of great embarrassment when i entered into company. i therefore took lessons in dancing, and, whether i profited by it or not as to manners, i am persuaded that this portion of my education was highly beneficial to me in other points of view. as many good people have a prejudice against dancing, i am disposed to write down my experience on the subject. in the winter, our good old teacher had weekly cotillion parties, for the purpose of improving his scholars. the young men invited the young women, and took them to these gatherings, and after the exercises conducted them home again. i know this will sound strange to those who only understand metropolitan manners at the present day; but i never knew an instance, in my own experience or observation, in which the strictest propriety was departed from. these parties took place in the evening: they began at eight o'clock, and continued till ten or eleven--sometimes till twelve. the company consisted entirely of young persons, from fifteen to twenty years of age: they included the children of the respectable inhabitants, with a number of young ladies from the boarding-schools. some of these i have since seen the wives of bishops, senators, and governors of states--filling the first stations to which women can aspire in this country, and i am satisfied that these hartford parties, under the auspices of our amiable and respected old teacher, were every way refining and elevating: not only did they impart ease of manner, but, as i think, purity of sentiment. in the spring of i paid a visit to new york, and having letters of introduction to oliver wolcott and archibald gracie, i called on these gentlemen. my lodgings were at the city hotel, situated on the western side of broadway, between thames and cedar streets, the space being now occupied by warehouses. it was then the chief hotel of new york, and was kept by a model landlord, named jennings, with a model bar-keeper by the name of willard. the latter was said never to sleep night or day, for at all hours he was at his post, and never forgot a customer, even after an absence of twenty years. it was late in the spring, and mr. gracie called for me and took me to his country seat, occupying a little promontory on the western side of hurlgate, a charming spot. contiguous to it were the summer residences of many of the leading citizens of new york. here i spent a fortnight very agreeably. mr. gracie was at this period distinguished alike on account of his wealth, his intelligence, and his amiable and honorable character. never have i witnessed anything more charming--more affectionate, dignified, and graceful, than the intercourse of the family with one another. not many years after, mr. gracie lost his entire fortune by the vicissitudes of commerce, but his character was beyond the reach of accident. he is still remembered with affectionate respect by all those whose memories reach back to the times in which he flourished, and when it might be said, without disparagement to any other man, that he was the first merchant in new york. early in the ensuing summer, my uncle, chauncey goodrich, being in bad health, paid a visit to saratoga and ballston for the benefit of the waters, and i accompanied him. we soon returned, however, for it was now apparent that he had a disease of the heart, which was rapidly tending to a fatal result. experiencing great suffering at intervals, he gradually yielded to the progress of his malady, and at last, on the th of august, , while walking the room, and engaged in cheerful conversation, he faltered, sank into a chair, and instantly expired. "his death," says the historian, "was a shock to the whole community. party distinctions were forgotten, under a sense of the general calamity; and in the simple but expressive language which was used at his funeral, 'all united in a tribute of respect to the man who had so long been dear to us, and done us so much good.'" to me, the loss was irreparable; leaving, however, in my heart a feeling of gratitude that i had witnessed an example of the highest intellectual power united with the greatest moral excellence, and that, too, in one whose relationship to me enforced and commended its teachings to my special observance. alas, how little have i done in life that is worthy of such inspiration! not long after this, my friend george sheldon, who had established himself as a bookseller and publisher, invited me to become his partner, and this i did early in the year . we pursued the business for nearly two years, during which time we published, among other works, scott's family bible, in five volumes quarto--a considerable enterprise for that period in a place like hartford. in the autumn of i had gone to berlin, for the purpose of making a short excursion for the benefit of my health, when a messenger came from hartford, saying that my partner was very ill, and wished me to return. i immediately complied, and on entering the room of my friend i found him in a high fever, his mind already wandering in painful dreams. as i came to his bedside he said,--"oh, take away these horrid knives, they cut me to the heart!" i stooped over him and said,-- "there are no knives here; you are only dreaming." "oh, is it you?" said he. "i am glad you have come. do stay with me, and speak to me, so as to keep off these dreadful fancies." i did stay by him for four days and nights; but his doom was sealed. his mind continued in a state of wild delirium till a few minutes before his death. i stood gazing at his face, when a sudden change came over him: the agitated and disturbed look of insanity had passed--a quiet pallor had come over his countenance, leaving it calm and peaceful. he opened his eyes, and, as if waking from sleep, looked on me with an aspect of recognition. his lips moved, and he pronounced the name of his wife: she came, with all the feelings of youth and love--ay, and of hope, too, in her heart. she bent over him: he raised his feeble and emaciated arms and clasped her to his heart: he gave her one kiss, and passed to another life! the summer of was probably the coldest that has been known in this century. in new england--from connecticut to maine--there were severe frosts in every month. the crop of indian corn was almost entirely cut off: of potatoes, hay, oats, &c., there was not, probably, more than half the usual supply. the means of averting the effects of such a calamity--now afforded by railroads, steam navigation, canals, and other facilities of intercommunication--did not then exist. the following winter was severe, and the ensuing spring backward. at this time i made a journey into new hampshire, passing along the connecticut river, in the region of hanover. it was then june, and the hills were almost as barren as in november. i saw a man at orford who had been forty miles for a half-bushel of indian corn, and paid two dollars for it! along the seaboard it was not difficult to obtain a supply of food, although every article was dear. in the interior it was otherwise: the cattle died for want of fodder, and many of the inhabitants nearly perished from starvation. the desolating effects of the war still lingered over the country, and at last a kind of despair seized upon some of the people. in the pressure of adversity many persons lost their judgment, and thousands feared or felt that new england was destined, henceforth, to become a part of the frigid zone. at the same time, ohio--with its rich soil, its mild climate, its inviting prairies--was opened fully upon the alarmed and anxious vision. as was natural under the circumstances, a sort of stampede took place from cold, desolate, worn-out new england, to this land of promise. i remember very well the tide of emigration through connecticut on its way to the west, during the summer of . some persons went in covered wagons--frequently a family consisting of father, mother, and nine small children, with one at the breast--some on foot, and some crowded together under the cover, with kettle, gridirons, feather-beds, crockery, and the family bible, watts's psalms and hymns, and webster's spelling book--the lares and penates of the household. others started in ox-carts, and trudged on at the rate of ten miles a-day. in several instances i saw families on foot--the father and boys taking turns in dragging along an improvised hand-wagon, loaded with the wreck of the household goods--occasionally giving the mother and baby a ride. many of these persons were in a state of poverty, and begged their way as they went. some died before they reached the expected canaan; many perished after their arrival, from fatigue and privation; and others from the fever and ague, which was then certain to attack the new settlers. it was, i think, in , that i published a small tract, entitled, "t'other side of ohio," that is, the other view, in contrast to the popular notion that it was the paradise of the world. it was written by dr. hand, a talented young physician of berlin, who had made a visit to the west about this time. it consisted mainly of vivid but painful pictures of the accidents and incidents attending this wholesale migration. the roads over the alleghanies, between philadelphia and pittsburg, were then rude, steep, and dangerous, and some of the more precipitous slopes were consequently strewn with the carcases of wagons, carts, horses, oxen, which had made ship-wreck in their perilous descents. the scenes on the road--of families gathered at night in miserable sheds, called taverns--mothers frying, children crying, fathers swearing, were a mingled comedy and tragedy of errors. even when they arrived at their new homes, along the banks of the muskingum, or the scioto, frequently the whole family--father, mother, children--speedily exchanged the fresh complexion and elastic step of their first abodes, for the sunken cheek and languid movement, which mark the victim of intermittent fever. the instances of homesickness, described by this vivid sketcher, were touching. not even the captive israelites, who hung their harps upon the willows along the banks of the euphrates, wept more bitter tears, or looked back with more longing to their native homes, than did these exiles from new england; mourning the land they had left, with its roads, schools, meeting-houses; its hope, health, and happiness! two instances, related by the traveller, i must mention. he was one day riding in the woods, apart from the settlements, when he met a youth some eighteen years of age, in a hunting-frock, and with a fowling-piece in his hand. the two fell into conversation. "where are you from?" said the youth, at last. "from connecticut," was the reply. "that is near the old bay state?" "yes." "and have you been there?" "to massachusetts? yes, many a time." "let me take your hand, stranger. my mother was from the bay state, and brought me here when i was an infant. i have heard her speak of it. oh, it must be a lovely land! i wish i could see a meeting-house and a school-house, for she is always talking about them. and the sea--the sea--oh, if i could see that! did you ever see it, stranger?" "yes, often." "what, the real, salt sea--the ocean--with the ships upon it?" "yes." "well," said the youth, scarcely able to suppress his emotion, "if i could see the old bay state and the ocean, i should be willing then to die!" in another instance the traveller met, somewhere in the valley of the scioto, a man from hartford, by the name of bull. he was a severe democrat, and feeling sorely oppressed with the idea that he was no better off in connecticut under federalism than the hebrews in egypt, joined the throng and migrated to ohio. he was a man of substance, but his wealth was of little avail in a new country, where all the comforts and luxuries of civilization were unknown. "when i left connecticut," said he, "i was wretched from thinking of the sins of federalism. after i had got across byram river, which divides that state from new york, i knelt down and thanked the lord for that he had brought me and mine out of such a priest-ridden land. but i've been well punished, and i'm now preparing to return; when i again cross byram river, i shall thank god that he has permitted me to get back again!" chapter xvi. marriage--walter scott--byron--sidney smith's taunt--publication of original american works--mrs. sigourney. early in the year i was married to the daughter of stephen rowe bradley, of westminster, vermont. thus established in life, i pursued the business of bookseller and publisher at hartford for four years. my vocation gave me the command of books, but i was able to read very little--my eyes continuing to be so weak that i could hardly do justice to my affairs. however, i dipped into a good many books, and acquired a considerable knowledge of authors and their works. during the period in which scott had been enchanting the world with his poetry--that is, from to --i had shared in the general intoxication. the lady of the lake delighted me beyond expression, and even now, it seems to me the most pleasing and perfect of metrical romances. these productions seized powerfully upon the popular mind, partly on account of the romance of their revelations, and partly also because of the simplicity of the style, and the easy flow of the versification. everybody could read and comprehend them. one of my younger sisters committed the whole of the lady of the lake to memory, and was accustomed of an evening to sit at her sewing, while she recited it to an admiring circle of listeners. all young poets were inoculated with the octo-syllabic verse, and newspapers, magazines, and even volumes, teemed with imitations and variations inspired by the "wizard harp of the north." not only did scott himself continue to pour out volume after volume, but others produced set poems in his style, some of them so close in their imitation as to be supposed the works of scott himself, trying the effect of a disguise. at last, however, the market was overstocked, and the general appetite began to pall with a surfeit, when a sudden change took place in the public taste. it was just at this point that byron produced his first canto of childe harold's pilgrimage. scott speedily appreciated the eclipse to which his poetical career was doomed by the rising genius of byron. he now turned his attention to prose fiction, and in july, , completed and published waverley, which had been begun some eight or ten years before. guy mannering came out the next year, and was received with a certain degree of eagerness. the antiquary, black dwarf, old mortality, rob roy, and the heart of mid-lothian, followed in quick succession. i suspect that never, in any age, have the productions of any author created in the world so wide and deep an enthusiasm. this emotion reached its height upon the appearance of ivanhoe in , which, i think, proved the most popular of these marvellous productions. at this period, although there was a good deal of mystery as to their authorship, the public generally referred them to scott. he was called the "great unknown"--a title which served to create even an adventitious interest in his career. the appearance of a new tale from his pen caused a greater sensation in the united states than did some of the battles of napoleon, which decided the fate of thrones and empires. everybody read these works; everybody--the refined and the simple--shared in the delightful dreams which seemed to transport them to remote ages and distant climes, and made them live and breathe in the presence of the stern covenanters of scotland, the gallant bowmen of sherwood forest, or even the crusaders in palestine, where coeur de lion and saladin were seen struggling for the mastery! i can testify to my own share in this intoxication. i was not able, on account of my eyes, to read these works myself, but i found friends to read them to me. to one good old maid--heaven bless her!--i was indebted for the perusal of no less than seven of these tales. of course, there were many editions of these works in the united states, and among others, i published an edition, i think, in eight volumes, octavo--including those which had appeared at that time. about this time i began to think of trying to bring out original american works. it must be remembered that i am speaking of a period prior to . at that date, bryant, irving, and cooper, the founders of our modern literature, had just commenced their literary career. neither of them had acquired a positive reputation. halleck, percival, brainard, longfellow, willis, were at school--at least, all were unknown. the general impression was that we had not, and could not have, a literature. it was the precise point at which sydney smith had uttered that bitter taunt in the edinburgh review--"who reads an american book?" it proved to be that "darkest hour just before the dawn." the successful booksellers of the country were for the most part the mere reproducers and sellers of english books. it was positively injurious to the commercial credit of a bookseller to undertake american works, unless they might be morse's geographies, classical books, school-books, devotional books, or other utilitarian works. nevertheless, about this time, i published an edition of trumbull's poems, in two volumes, octavo, and paid him a thousand dollars and a hundred copies of the work, for the copyright. i was seriously counselled against this by several booksellers--and, in fact, trumbull had sought a publisher in vain for several years previous. there was an association of designers and engravers at hartford, called the "graphic company," and as i desired to patronize the liberal arts there, i employed them to execute the embellishments. for so considerable an enterprise, i took the precaution to get a subscription, in which i was tolerably successful. the work was at last produced, but it did not come up to the public expectation, or the patriotic zeal had cooled, and more than half the subscribers declined taking the work. i did not press it, but putting a good face upon the affair, i let it pass, and--while the public supposed i had made money by my enterprise, and even the author looked askance at me in the jealous apprehension that i had made too good a bargain out of him--i quietly pocketed a loss of about a thousand dollars. this was my first serious adventure in patronizing american literature. about the same period i turned my attention to books for education and books for children, being strongly impressed with the idea that there was here a large field for improvement. i wrote, myself, a small arithmetic, and half-a-dozen toy-books, and published them anonymously. i also employed several persons to write school histories, and educational manuals of chemistry, natural philosophy, &c., upon plans which i prescribed--all of which i published; but none of these were very successful at that time. some of them, passing into other hands, are now among the most popular and profitable school-books in the country. it was before this period that miss huntly, now mrs. sigourney, was induced to leave her home in norwich, and make hartford her residence. this occurred about the year . ere long she was the presiding genius of our social circle. i shall not write her history, nor dilate upon her literary career, yet i may speak of her influence in this new relation--a part of which fell upon myself. mingling in the gayeties of our social gatherings, and in no respect clouding their festivity, she led us all toward intellectual pursuits and amusements. we had even a literary coterie under her inspiration, its first meetings being held at mr. wadsworth's. i believe one of my earliest attempts at composition was made here. the ripples thus begun, extended over the whole surface of our young society, producing a lasting and refining effect. it could not but be beneficial thus to mingle in intercourse with one who has the faculty of seeing poetry in all things and good everywhere. few persons living have exercised a wider influence than mrs. sigourney. no one that i now know can look back upon a long and earnest career of such unblemished beneficence. chapter xvii. domestic troubles--sketch of brainard--aunt lucy's back-parlor--the fall of niagara--death of brainard. in , clouds and darkness began to gather around my path. by a fall from a horse, i was put upon crutches for more than a year, and a cane for the rest of my life. ere long death entered my door, and my home was desolate. i was once more alone--save only that a child was left me, to grow to womanhood, and to die a youthful mother, loving and beloved. my affairs became embarrassed, my health failed, and my only hope of renovation was in a change of scene. before i give you a sketch of my experience and observations abroad, i must present the portrait of my friend brainard. he came to hartford in february, , to take the editorial charge of the connecticut mirror. he was now twenty-six years old, and had gained some reputation for wit and poetical talent. one day a young man, small in stature, with a curious mixture of ease and awkwardness, of humor and humility, came into my office, and introduced himself as mr. brainard. i gave him a hearty welcome, for i had heard very pleasant accounts of him. as was natural, i made a complimentary allusion to his poems, which i had seen and admired. a smile, yet shaded with something of melancholy, came over his face as he replied,-- "don't expect too much of me; i never succeeded in anything yet. i never could draw a mug of cider without spilling more than half of it!" i afterwards found that much truth was thus spoken in jest. this was, in point of fact, precisely brainard's appreciation of himself. all his life, feeling that he could do something, he still entertained a mournful and disheartening conviction that, on the whole, he was doomed to failure and disappointment. there was sad prophecy in this presentment--a prophecy which he at once made and fulfilled. we soon became friends, and, at last, intimates. i was now boarding at "ripley's"--a good old-fashioned tavern, over which presided major ripley, respected for revolutionary services, an amiable character, and a long continental queue. in the administration of the establishment he was ably supported by his daughter, aunt lucy--the very genius of tavern courtesy, cookery, and comfort. here brainard joined me, and we took rooms side by side. thus, for more than a year, we were together, as intimate as brothers. he was of a child-like disposition, and craved constant sympathy. he soon got into the habit of depending upon me in many things, and at last--especially in dull weather, or when he was sad, or something went wrong with him--he would creep into my bed, as if it were his right. at that period of gloom in my own fortunes, this was as well a solace to me as to him. after my return from europe we resumed these relations, and for some months more we were thus together. i cannot do better than sketch a single incident, which will give you some insight into brainard's character. the scene opens in miss lucy's little back-parlor--a small, cosy, carpeted room, with two cushioned rocking-chairs, and a bright hickory fire. it is a chill november night, about seven o'clock of a friday evening. the mirror--brainard's paper--is to appear the next morning. the week has thus far passed, and he has not written for it a line. how the days have gone he can hardly tell. he has read a little--dipped into byron, pored over the last waverly novel, and been to see his friends; at all events, he has got rid of the time. he has not felt competent to bend down to his work, and has put it off till the last moment. no further delay is possible. he is now not well; he has a severe cold. miss lucy, who takes a motherly interest in him, tells him not to go out, and his own inclinations suggest the charms of a quiet evening in the rocking chair, by a good fire--especially in comparison with going to his comfortless office, and drudging for the press. he lingers till eight, and then suddenly rousing himself, by a desperate effort, throws on his cloak and sallies forth. as was not uncommon, i go with him. a dim fire is kindled in the small franklin stove in his office, and we sit down. brainard, as was his wont, especially when he was in trouble, falls into a curious train of reflections, half comic and half serious. "would to heaven," he says, "i were a slave! i think a slave, with a good master, has a good time of it. the responsibility of taking care of himself--the most terrible burden of life--is put on his master's shoulders. madame roland, with a slight alteration, would have uttered a profound truth. she should have said--'oh, liberty, liberty, thou art a humbug!' after all, liberty is the greatest possible slavery, for it puts upon a man the responsibility of taking care of himself. if he goes wrong, why, he's condemned! if a slave sins, he's only flogged, and gets over it, and there's an end of it. now, if i could only be flogged, and settle the matter that way, i should be perfectly happy. but here comes my tormentor." the door is now opened, a boy with a touselled head and inky countenance enters, saying curtly--"copy, mr. brainard!" "come in fifteen minutes!" says the editor, with a droll mixture of fun and despair. [illustration: whittling.] brainard makes a few observations, and sits down at his little narrow pine table--hacked along edges with many a restless penknife. he seems to notice the marks, and pausing a moment, says,-- "this table reminds me of one of my brother william's stories. there was an old man in groton, who had but one child, and she was a daughter. when she was about eighteen, several young men came to see her. at last she picked out one of them, and desired to marry him. he seemed a fit match enough, but the father positively refused his consent. for a long time he persisted, and would give no reason for his conduct. at last he took his daughter aside, and said--'now, sarah, i think pretty well of this young man in general, but i've observed that he's given to whittling. there's no harm in that, but the point is this: he whittles and whittles, and never makes nothing! now, i tell you, i'll never give my only daughter to such a feller as that!' whenever bill told this story, he used to insinuate that this whittling chap, who never made anything, was me! at any rate, i think it would have suited me exactly." some time passed in similar talk, when, at last, brainard turned suddenly, took up his pen, and began to write. i sat apart, and left him to his work. some twenty minutes passed, when, with a smile on his face, he got up, approached the fire, and taking the candle to light his paper, read as follows:-- "the falls of niagara. "the thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain, while i look upwards to thee. it would seem as if god pour'd thee from his 'hollow hand,' and hung his bow upon thy awful front; and spoke in that loud voice that seem'd to him who dwelt in patmos for his saviour's sake, 'the sound of many waters;' and had bade thy flood to chronicle the ages back, and notch his cent'ries in the eternal rocks!" he had hardly done reading when the boy came. brainard handed him the lines--on a small scrap of coarse paper--and told him to come again in half-an-hour. before this time had elapsed, he had finished and read me the following stanza:-- "deep calleth unto deep. and what are we that hear the question of that voice sublime? oh! what are all the notes that ever rung from war's vain trumpet by thy thundering side? yea, what is all the riot man can make, in his short life, to thy unceasing roar? and yet, bold babbler, what art thou to him who drown'd a world, and heap'd the waters far above its loftiest mountains? a light wave, that breathes and whispers of its maker's might." these lines having been furnished, brainard left his office, and we returned to miss lucy's parlor. he seemed utterly unconscious of what he had done. i praised the verses, but he thought i only spoke warmly from friendly interest. the lines went forth, and produced a sensation of delight over the whole country. almost every exchange paper that came to the office had extracted them. even then he would scarcely believe that he had done anything very clever. and thus, under these precise circumstances, were composed the most suggestive and sublime stanzas upon niagara that were ever penned. brainard had never, as he told me, been within less than five hundred miles of the cataract, nor do i believe that, when he went to the office, he had meditated upon the subject. the reader will see, from the circumstances i have mentioned, that i know the history of most of brainard's pieces, as they came out, from time to time, in his newspaper. nearly all of them were occasional--that is, suggested by passing events, or incidents in the poet's experience. early in the year i persuaded brainard to make a collection of his poems, and have them published. at first his lip curled at the idea, as being too pretentious. he insisted that he had done nothing to justify the publication of a volume. gradually he began to think of it, and, at length, i induced him to sign a contract authorizing me to make arrangements for the work. he set about the preparation, and at length--after much lagging and many lapses--the pieces were selected and arranged. when all was ready, i persuaded him to go to new york with me to settle the matter with a publisher. one anecdote, in addition to those already before the public, and i shall close this sketch. brainard's talent for repartee was of the first order. on one occasion, nathan smith, an eminent lawyer, was at ripley's tavern, in the midst of a circle of judges and lawyers attending the court. he was an episcopalian, and at this time was considered by his political adversaries--unjustly, no doubt--as the paid agent of that persuasion, now clamoring for a sum of money from the state, to lay the foundation of a "bishops' fund." he was thus regarded somewhat in the same light as o'connell, who, while he was the great patriot leader of irish independence, was, at the same time, liberally supported by the "rint." by accident, brainard came in, and smith, noticing a little feathery attempt at whiskers down his cheeks, rallied him upon it. "it will never do," said he; "you cannot raise it, brainard. come, here's sixpence--take that, and go to the barber's and get it shaved off! it will smooth your cheek, and ease your conscience." brainard drew himself up, and said with great dignity--as smith held out the sixpence on the point of his forefinger--"no, sir, you had better keep it for the bishops' fund!" in brainard's editorial career--though he was negligent, dilatory, sometimes almost imbecile, from a sort of constitutional inertness--still a train of inextinguishable light remains to gleam along his path. many a busy, toiling editor has filled his daily columns for years, without leaving a living page behind him; while brainard, with all his failings and irregularities, has left a collection of gems which will be cherished to immortality. and among all that he wrote idly and recklessly, as it might seem--there is not a line that, "dying, he could wish to blot." his love of parents, of home, of kindred, was beautiful indeed; his love of nature, and especially of the scenes of his childhood, was the affection of one never weaned from the remembrance of his mother's breast. he was true in friendship, chivalrous in all that belonged to personal honor. i never heard him utter a malignant thought--i never knew him to pursue an unjust design. at the early age of eight-and-twenty, with a submissive spirit, he resigned himself to death, and in pious, gentle, cheerful faith, he departed on the th of september, . chapter xviii. my first visit to europe--hurricane--arrival at liverpool--london--travel on the continent--return to bristol--interview with hannah more--design in travelling--visit to ireland and scotland. it was on the th of november, , that i set sail in the "canada," captain macy, on my first visit to europe. i have now before me four volumes of notes made during my tour; which i might, perhaps, have ventured to publish when they were fresh; but since that period the world has been inundated with tales of travels, i shall therefore only indulge in a rapid outline of my adventures, and a few sketches of men and things, which may perchance be of interest to the reader. our voyage was, as usual at that season of the year, tempestuous. as we approached the british islands we were beset by a regular hurricane. on the th of december, the captain kindly informed us that we were almost precisely in the situation of the "albion," the day before she was wrecked on the rocky headland of kinsale, at the south-east extremity of ireland; an event which had spread a general gloom throughout the united states. as night set in we were struck by a squall, and with difficulty the vessel was brought round, so as to lie to. the storm was fearful; and the frequent concussions of the waves upon the ship, sounding like reports of artillery, made her reel and stagger like a drunken man. the morning came at last, and the weather was fair, but our deck was swept of its boats, bulwarks, and hen-coops. our old cow in her hovel, the covering of the steerage, and that of the companion-way, were saved. the next morning we took a pilot, and on the th of december entered the dock at liverpool. i had suffered fearfully by sea-sickness, and had scarcely strength to walk ashore. i felt such horror--such disgust of the sea--that i could easily have pledged myself never to venture upon it again. however, this all passed away like a dream: my strength revived; and even my constitution, shattered by long suffering, seemed to be renovated. with the return of health and spirits, my journey to london was delightful. though it was december, the landscape was intensely green, while the atmosphere was dark as twilight. and this was england! oh, what emotions filled my breast as i looked on kenilworth, warwick, and lichfield, and at last on london! i remained in the latter place about a month, and then went to paris. in april i visited switzerland and a portion of germany, and followed the rhine to cologne. thence i travelled through flanders and holland, and taking a sloop at rotterdam, swung down the maese, and in may reached london again. i soon after departed for bristol, taking salisbury and stonehenge on my way. having reached that city, and seen its sights, i hired a post-coach, and went to barley-wood, some ten miles distant. hannah more was still living there! the house was a small thatched edifice--half cottage and half villa--tidily kept, and garnished with vines and trellises. its site was on a gentle hill, sloping to the south-east, and commanding a charming view over the undulating country around, including the adjacent village of wrington, with a wide valley sloping to the bristol channel; the latter sparkling in the distance, and bounded by the welsh mountains in the far horizon. behind the house, and on the crown of the hill, was a small copse, threaded with neat gravel walks, and at particular points embellished with objects of interest. in one place there was a little rustic temple, with this motto--"_audi, hospes, contemnere opes_;" in another, there was a stone monument, erected to the memory of bishop porteus, who had been a particular friend of the proprietor of the place. a little further on i found another monument, with this inscription: "_to john locke, born in this village, this monument is erected by mrs. montague, and presented to hannah more._" from this sequestered spot an artificial opening was cut through the foliage of the trees, giving a view of the house--about a mile distant--in which locke was born! mrs. more was now seventy-nine years of age, and was very infirm, having kept her room for two years. she received me with great cordiality, and mentioned several americans who had visited her, and others, with whom she had held correspondence. her mind and feelings were alive to every subject that was suggested. she spoke very freely of her writings and her career. i told her of the interest i had taken, when a child, in the story of the shepherd of salisbury plain; upon which she recounted its history, remarking that the character of the hero was modelled from life, though the incidents were fictitious. her tract, called village politics, by will chip, was written at the request of the british ministry, and two million copies were sold the first year, she showed me copies of coelebs in search of a wife--the most successful of her works--in french and german; and a copy of one of her sacred dramas, moses in the bulrushes, on palm-leaves, in the cingalese tongue; it having been translated into that language by the missionary school at ceylon. she showed me also the knife with which the leaf had been prepared, and the scratches made in it to receive the ink. she expressed a warm interest in america, and stated that wilberforce had always exerted himself to establish and maintain good relations between great britain and our country. i suggested to her that, in the united states, the general impression--that of the great mass of the people--was that the english were unfriendly to us. she said it was not so. i replied that the americans all read the english newspapers, and generally the products of the british press; that feelings of dislike, disgust, animosity, certainly pervaded most of these publications; and it was natural to suppose that these were the reflections of public opinion in great britain: at all events, our people regarded them as such, and hence inferred that england was our enemy. she expressed great regret at this state of things, and said all good people should strive to keep peace between the two countries: to all which i warmly assented. my interview with this excellent lady was, on the whole, most gratifying. regarding her as one of the greatest benefactors of the age--as, indeed, one of the most remarkable women that had ever lived--i looked upon her not only with veneration, but affection. besides, i felt that i owed her a special debt; and my visit to her was almost like a pilgrimage to the shrine of a divinity. when i left america, i had it in mind to render my travels subservient to a desire i had long entertained of making an improvement in books for the young. i had sought in london, france, and germany, for works that might aid my design. it is true i had little success; for while scientific and classical education was sedulously encouraged on the continent, as well as in england, it seemed to be thought that dilworth and mother goose had done all that could be done. in this interview with mrs. more i had the subject still in mind; and discerning by what she had accomplished the vast field that was open, and actually inviting cultivation, i began from this time to think of attempting to realize the project i had formed. it is true that, in some respects, the example i had just contemplated differed from my own scheme. hannah more had written chiefly for the grown-up masses; whereas my plan was to begin further back--with the children. her means, however, seemed adapted to my purpose: her success, to encourage my attempt. she had discovered that truth could be made attractive to simple minds. fiction was, indeed, often her vehicle; but it was not her end. the great charm of these works, which had captivated the million, was their verisimilitude. was there not, then, a natural relish for truth in all minds; or, at least, was there not a way of presenting it, which made it even more interesting than romance? did not children love truth? if so, was it necessary to feed them on fiction? could not history, natural history, geography, biography, become the elements of juvenile works, in place of fairies and giants, and mere monsters of the imagination? these were the inquiries that from this time filled my mind. taking leave of barley-wood and its interesting occupant, i traversed wales, and embarking at holyhead, passed over to ireland. having seen dublin, with the extraordinary contrasts of sumptuousness in some of its streets and edifices, with the fearful squalidness and poverty in others, i passed on to the north; and after visiting the giant's causeway returned to belfast, and embarked in a steamboat for greenock. thence i proceeded toward dumbarton, and in the early evening, as i approached the town in a small steamer, i realized in the distance before me the scene of the song,-- "the sun has gone down o'er the lofty ben lomond, and left the red clouds to preside o'er the scene." on the morrow i went to loch lomond, crossing the lake in a steamboat; thence on foot to callender; and spent two days around loch katrine, amid the scenery of the lady of the lake. with a copy of that poem in my hand, which i had bought of a countryman on the borders of loch lomond, i easily traced out the principal landmarks of the story: "ellen's isle," nearly in the middle of the lake; on the northern shore, "the silver strand," where the maiden met fitz-james; far to the east, benain, rearing its "forehead fair" to the sky; to the south, the rocky pyramid called "roderick's watchtower;" and still beyond, the "goblin's cave." leaving the lake, i passed through the trosachs, a wild, rocky glen, and the scene of the most startling events in the poem. at last i came to coilantogle ford, where the deadly struggle took place between the two heroes of the poem--roderick and fitz-james. finally, i went to the borders of loch achray, a placid sheet of water, beautiful by nature, but still more enchanting through the delightful associations of poetic art. "the minstrel came once more to view the eastern ridge of benvenue, for, ere he parted, he would say farewell to lovely loch achray. where shall he find, in foreign land, so lone a lake, so sweet a strand!" * * * * * but i must forbear. i have pledged myself not to weary my reader with descriptions of scenery, and especially with that which is familiar to every one. i will try not to sin again: at least till i get out of scotland. having spent two days in this region of poetry and romance, i left for glasgow, and at last reached edinburgh. chapter xix. the edinburgh lions--literary celebrities--jeffrey in the forum--sir walter at the desk--riding with scotch ladies--beautiful scenery--a scotch mist. edinburgh was then decidedly the literary metropolis of the three kingdoms; not through the amount of its productions, but their superiority. i had several letters of introduction; among them one to blackwood; another to constable; another to miss y----. the latter proved fortunate. her father was a writer to the signet; an elderly gentleman of excellent position, and exceedingly fond of showing off "auld reekie." well, indeed, might he be; for of all the cities i have seen, it is, in many respects, the most interesting. i am told it is gloomy in winter; but now it was summer. and in these high latitudes, nature makes ample amends in this season for the gloom and inclemency of the winter. the day after delivering my letters, mr. y---- called on me, and showed me the lions of the town. many of them--all, indeed--were interesting; but i pass them by, and shall only linger a short time at the court of sessions, which is the supreme civil court of scotland. this, with the high court of justiciary--the supreme criminal court--forms the college of justice, and constitutes the supreme tribunal of scotland. their sessions are held in the old parliament house, situated in the centre of the old town. we entered a large gothic hall, opening, as i observed, into various contiguous apartments. here i saw a considerable number of persons, mostly lawyers and their clients; some sauntering, some meditating, some gathered in groups and conversing together. there was a large number of people distributed through the several apartments, and in the grand hall there was a pervading hum of voices, which rose and rumbled, and died away amid the groinings of the roof above. among the persons in this hall, a man some thirty years of age, tall and handsome, dressed in a gown, but without the wig, attracted my particular attention. he was walking apart, and there was a certain look of coldness and haughtiness about him. nevertheless, for some undefinable reason, he excited in me a lively curiosity. "who is that gentleman?" said i, to my guide. "that large, noble-looking person, with a gown and wig? that is cranstoun, one of our first lawyers, and the brother-in-law of dugald stuart." "no: that person beyond, and to the left? he is without a wig." "oh, that's cockburn; a fiery whig, and one of the keenest fellows we have at the bar." "yes: but i mean that younger person near the corner." "oh, that small, red-faced, freckled man? why, that's moncrief; a very sound lawyer. his father, sir harry moncrief, is one of the most celebrated divines in scotland." "no, no; it is that tall, handsome, proud-looking person, walking by himself." "oh, i see: that's lockhart, sir walter scott's son-in-law. would you like to know him?" "yes." and so i was introduced to a man who, at that time, was hardly less an object of interest to me than scott himself. though a lawyer by profession, he had devoted himself to literature, and was now in the very height of his career. peter's letters to his kinsfolk, valerius, and other works, had given him a prominent rank as a man of talent; and, besides, in , he had married the eldest daughter of the "great unknown." my conversation with him was brief at this time, but i afterwards became well acquainted with him. my guide now led me into one of the side-rooms, where i saw a judge and jury, and a lawyer addressing them. the latter was a very small man, without gown or wig, apparently about forty years of age, though he might be somewhat older. he was of dark complexion, with an eye of intense blackness, and almost painfully-piercing expression. his motions were quick and energetic, his voice sharp and penetrating; his general aspect exciting curiosity rather than affection. he was speaking energetically, and as we approached the bar my conductor said to me, in a whisper, "jeffrey!" we paused, and listened intently. the case in itself seemed dry enough: something, i believe, about a _stoppage in transitu_. but jeffrey's pleading was admirable; clear, progressive, logical. occasionally, in fixing upon a weak point of his adversary, he displayed a leopard-like spring of energy, altogether startling. he seized upon a certain point in the history of the case, and insisted that the property in question rested at that period in the hands of the defendant's agent, for at least a fortnight. this he claimed to be fatal to his adversary's plea. having stated the facts, with a clearness which seemed to prove them, he said, turning with startling quickness upon his antagonist,--"now, i ask my learned brother to tell me, what was the state of the soul during that fortnight?" to a jury of scotch presbyterians, familiar with theological metaphysics, this allusion was exceedingly pertinent and effective. we passed into another room. three full-wigged judges were seated upon a lofty bench, and beneath them, at a little table in front, was a large man, bent down and writing laboriously. as i approached, i caught a side-view of his face. there was no mistaking him: it was sir walter himself! was it not curious to see the most renowned personage in the three kingdoms sitting at the very feet of these men: they the court, and he the clerk? they were indeed all "lords," and their individual names were suggestive to the ear: one was robertson, son of the historian of charles v.; another was gillies, brother of the renowned grecian scholar of that name; another, mackenzie, son of the author of the man of feeling. these are high titles; but what were they to the author of waverley? mr. y---- introduced me to him at once, breaking in upon his occupation with easy familiarity. as he arose from his seat, i was surprised at his robust, vigorous frame. he was very nearly six feet in height, full-chested, and of a farmer-like aspect. his complexion seemed to have been originally sandy, but now his hair was grey. he had the rough, freckled, weather-beaten skin of a man who is much in the open air; his eye was small and grey, and peering out keenly and inquisitively from beneath a heavy brow, edged with something like grey, twisted bristles: the whole expression of his face, however, was exceedingly agreeable. he greeted me kindly, the tone of his voice being hearty, yet with a very decided scotch accent. a few commonplace remarks, and one or two inquiries as to my acquaintance with american literary men, was all that passed between us on this occasion; but subsequently, as will be seen, i was more highly favored. one morning i found a note at my hotel, from miss y----, inviting me to breakfast. i went at ten, and we had a pleasant chat. she then proposed a ride, to which i acceded. she was already in her riding-habit; so without delay we went forth, calling first upon mrs. russell. she led us into another room, and there, on the floor, in a romp with her two boys, was francis jeffrey! think of the first lawyer in scotland, the lawgiver of the great republic of letters throughout christendom, having a rough-and-tumble on the floor, as if he were himself a boy! let others think as they will, i loved him from that moment; and ever after, as i read his criticisms, cutting and scorching as they often were, i fancied that i could still see a kind and genial spirit shining through them all. at least it is certain that, behind his editorial causticity, there was in private life a fund of gentleness and geniality which endeared him to all who enjoyed his intimacy. i was now introduced to him, and he seemed a totally different being from the fierce and fiery gladiator of the legal arena, where i had before seen him. his manners were gentle and gentlemanly: polite to the ladies and gracious to me. we found mrs. russell in a riding-dress, and prepared to accompany us in our excursion. taking leave of mr. jeffrey, we went to the stable, and having mounted, walked our steeds gently out of the town by holyrood, and to the east of arthur's seat, leaving portobello on the left. we rode steadily, noting a few objects as we passed, until at last, reaching an elevated mound, we paused, and the ladies directed my attention to the scenes around. we were some two miles south of the town, upon one of the slopes of the braid hills. what a view was before us! the city, a vast smoking hive, to the north; and to the right, arthur's seat, bald and blue, seeming to rise up and almost peep into its streets and chimneys. over and beyond all was the sea. the whole area between the point where we stood and that vast azure line, blending with the sky, was a series of abrupt hills and dimpling valleys, threaded by a network of highways and byways; honeycombed in spots by cities and villages, and elsewhere sprinkled with country seats. it is an unrivalled scene of varied beauty and interest. the natural site of edinburgh is remarkable, consisting of three rocky ledges, steepling over deep ravines. these have all been modified by art; in one place a lake has been dried up, and is now covered with roads, bridges, tenements, gardens, and lawns. the sides of the cliffs are in some instances covered with masses of buildings, occasionally rising tier above tier--in one place presenting a line of houses a dozen stories in height! the city is divided by a deep chasm into two distinct parts: the old town, dark and smoky, and justifying the popular appellation of "auld reekie;" the other, the new town, with the fresh architecture and the rich and elaborate embellishments of a modern city. nearly from the centre of the old town rises the castle, three hundred and eighty feet above the level of the sea; on one side looking down almost perpendicularly, two hundred feet into the vale beneath; on the other, holding communication with the streets by means of a winding pathway. in the new town is calton hill, rich with monuments of art and memorials of history. from these two commanding positions the views are unrivalled. but i forget that i have taken you to the braid hills. my amiable guides directed my attention to various objects--some far and some near, and all with names familiar to history, or song, or romance. yonder mass of dun and dismal ruins was craigmillar castle, once the residence of queen mary. nearly in the same direction, and not remote, is the cliff, above whose bosky sides peer out the massive ruins of roslin castle; further south are glimpses of dalkieth palace, the sumptuous seat of the duke of buccleuch; there is the busy little village of lasswade, which takes the name of "gandercleugh" in the tales of my landlord; yonder winds the esk, and there the galawater--both familiar in many a song; and there is the scenery of the gentle shepherd, presenting the very spot where that inimitable colloquy took place between peggy and her companion jenny,-- "gae farer up the burn to habbie's how where a' the sweets o' spring an' summer grow: between twa birks, out o'er a little linn, the water fa's and makes a singan din: a pool, breast deep, beneath as clear as glass, kisses wi' easy whirls the bordering grass. we'll end our washing while the morning's cool, and when the day grows hot we'll to the pool, there wash oursels--it's healthful now in may, an' sweetly caller on sae warm a day." while we were surveying these scenes the rain began to fall in a fine, insinuating mizzle; soon large drops pattered through the fog, and at last there was a drenching shower. i supposed the ladies would seek some shelter; not they: accustomed to all the humors of this drizzly climate, and of course defying them. they pulled off their green veils, and stuffed them into their saddle-pockets: then chirruping to their steeds, they sped along the road, as if mounted on broomsticks. i was soon wet through, and so, doubtless, were they. however, they took to it as ducks to a pond. on we went, the water--accelerated by our speed--spouting in torrents from our stirrups. in all my days i had never such an adventure. and the coolness with which the ladies took it, that was the most remarkable. indeed, it was provoking; for as they would not accept sympathy, of course they could not give it, though my reeking condition would have touched any other heart than theirs. on we went, till at last, coming to the top of the hill, we suddenly cropped out into the sunshine, the shower still scudding along the valley beneath us. we continued our ride, getting once more soaked on our way, and again drying in the sun. at last we reached home, having made a circuit of fifteen miles. scarcely a word was said of the rain. i saw the ladies to their residences, and was thankful when i found myself once more in my hotel. as a just moral of this adventure, i suggest to any american, who may ride with scotch ladies around edinburgh, not to go forth in his best dress-coat, and pantaloons without straps. chapter xx. blackwood--the general assembly--sir walter scott--mr. and mrs. lockhart--origin of "tam o'shanter"--last words of scott. i delivered my letter of introduction to blackwood, and he treated me very kindly. i found him an exceedingly intelligent and agreeable gentleman. the magazine which bears his name was then in its glory, and of course a part of its radiance shone on him. he was a man of excellent judgment in literary matters, and his taste, no doubt, contributed largely to the success of the magazine. of course i was gratified at receiving from him a note, inviting me to dine with him the next day. his house was on the south of the old town, nearly two miles distant. the persons present were such as i should myself have selected: among them lockhart and james ballantyne. i sat next the latter, and found him exceedingly agreeable and gentlemanlike. he was a rather large man, handsome, smooth in person and manner, and very well dressed. it must be remembered, that at this time scott did not acknowledge that he was the author of the waverley novels, nor did his friends. perhaps the mystery was even promoted by them; for, no doubt, it added to the interest excited by his works. however, the veil was not closely preserved in the circle of intimacy. ballantyne said to me, in the course of a conversation which turned upon the popularity of authors, as indicated by the sale of their works,--"we have now in course of preparation forty thousand volumes of scott's poems and the works of the author of waverley:" evidently intimating the identity of their authorship. the next day i went to st. giles's church, to see the general assembly, then holding its annual session there. this body consisted of nearly four hundred members, chosen by different parishes, boroughs, and universities. the sessions are attended by a commissioner appointed by the crown, but he is seated outside of the area assigned to the assembly, and has no vote, and no right of debate. he sits under a canopy, with the insignia of royalty, and a train of gaily-dressed pages. he opens the sessions in the name of the king, the head of the church: the moderator then opens it in the name of the lord jesus christ, _the only true head of the church_! it appears that the scotch, in bargaining for a union with england, took good care to provide for their religious independence, and this they still jealously preserve. the aspect of the assembly was similar to that of the house of commons, though somewhat graver. i observed that the debates were often stormy, with scraping of the floor, laughing aloud, and cries of "hear, hear!" the members were, in fact, quite disorderly, showing at least as little regard for decorum as ordinary legislatures. sir walter scott once remarked, in my hearing, that it had never yet been decided how many more than six members could speak at once! the persons here pointed out to me as celebrities were dr. chalmers, the famous pulpit orator; dr. cook, the ecclesiastical historian; and dr. baird, principal of the university. the first of these was now at the height of his fame. he had already begun those reforms which, some years later, resulted in a disruption of the scottish church. a few days after the dinner at mr. blackwood's i dined with mr. lockhart. besides the host and hostess, there were present sir walter scott, his son, charles scott, mr. blackwood, and three or four other persons. at dinner i sat next sir walter. everything went off pleasantly, with the usual ease, hospitality, and heartiness of an english dinner. after the ladies had retired the conversation became general and animated. byron was the engrossing topic. sir walter spoke of him with the deepest feeling of admiration and regret. a few weeks before, on the receipt of the news of his death, he had written an obituary notice of him, in which he compared him to the sun, withdrawn from the heavens at the very moment when every telescope was levelled to discover either his glory or his spots. lockhart and blackwood both told stories, and we passed a pleasant half hour. the wine was at last rather low, and our host ordered the servant to bring more. upon which scott said, "no, no, lokert"--such was his pronunciation of his son-in-law's name--"we have had enough: let us go and see the ladies." and so we gathered to the parlor. mrs. lockhart spoke with great interest of washington irving, who had visited the family at abbotsford. she said that he slept in a room which looked out on the tweed. in the morning, when he came down to breakfast, he was very pale, and being asked the reason, confessed that he had not been able to sleep. the sight of the tweed from his window, and the consciousness of being at abbotsford, so filled his imagination, so excited his feelings, as to deprive him of slumber. our lively hostess was requested to give us some music, and instantly complied--the harp being her instrument. she sang scotch airs, and played several pibrochs, all with taste and feeling. her range of tunes seemed inexhaustible. her father sat by, and entered heartily into the performances. he beat time vigorously with his lame leg, and frequently helped out a chorus, the heartiness of his tones making up for some delinquencies in tune and time. often he made remarks upon the songs, and told anecdotes respecting them. when a certain pibroch had been played, he said it reminded him of the first time he ever saw miss edgeworth. there had come to abbotsford a wild gaelic peasant from the neighborhood of staffa, and it was proposed to him to sing a a pibroch common in that region. he had consented, but required the whole party present to sit in a circle on the floor, while he should sing the song, and perform a certain pantomimic accompaniment, in the centre. all was accordingly arranged in the great hall, and the performer had just begun his wild chant, when in walked a small but stately lady, and announced herself as miss edgeworth! mrs. lockhart asked me about the american indians, expressing great curiosity concerning them. i told the story of one who was tempted to go into the rapids of the niagara river, just above the falls, for a bottle of rum. this he took with him, and having swam out to the point agreed upon, he turned back and attempted to regain the land. for a long time the result was doubtful: he struggled powerfully, but in vain; inch by inch he receded from the shore; and at last, finding his doom sealed, he raised himself above the water, wrenched the cork from the bottle, and putting the latter to his lips, yielded to the current, and thus went down to his doom. sir walter then said that he had read an account of an indian, who was in a boat, approaching a cataract; by some accident it was drawn into the current, and the savage saw that his escape was impossible. upon this he arose, wrapped his robe of skins around him, seated himself erect, and, with an air of imperturbable gravity, went over the falls. "the most remarkable thing about the american indians," said blackwood, "is their being able to follow in the trail of their enemies, by their footprints left in the leaves, upon the grass, and even upon the moss of the rocks. the accounts given of this seem hardly credible." "i can readily believe it, however," said sir walter. "you must remember that this is a part of their education. i have learned at abbotsford to discriminate between the hoof-marks of all our neighbors' horses, and i taught the same thing to mrs. lockhart. it is, after all, not so difficult as you might think. every horse's foot has some peculiarity, either of size, shoeing, or manner of striking the earth. i was once walking with southey--a mile or more from home--across the fields. at last we came to a bridle-path leading towards abbotsford, and here i noticed fresh hoof-prints. of this i said nothing; but pausing, and looking up with an inspired expression, i said to southey,--'i have a gift of second sight: we shall have a stranger to dinner!' "'and what may be his name?' was the reply. "'scott,' said i. "'ah, it is some relation of yours,' he said; 'you have invited him, and you would pass off, as an example of your scottish gift of prophecy, a matter previously agreed upon!' "'not at all,' said i. 'i assure you that, till this moment, i never thought of such a thing.' "when we got home, i was told that mr. scott, a farmer living some three or four miles distant, and a relative of mine, was waiting to see me. southey looked astounded. the man remained to dinner, and he was asked if he had given any intimation of his coming. he replied in the negative: that, indeed, he had no idea of visiting abbotsford when he left home. after enjoying southey's wonder for some time, i told him that i saw the tracks of mr. scott's horse in the bridle-path, and inferring that he was going to abbotsford, easily foresaw that we should have him to dinner." presently the conversation turned upon burns. scott knew him well. he said that tam o'shanter was written to please a stonecutter, who had executed a monument for the poet's father, on condition that he should write him a witch-story in verse. he stated that burns was accustomed in his correspondence, more especially with ladies, to write an elaborate letter, and then send a copy of it to several persons; modifying local and personal passages to suit each individual. he said that of some of these letters he had three or four copies, thus addressed to different persons, and all in the poet's handwriting. the evening passed in pleasant conversation, varied by the music of mrs. lockhart's voice and harp; and some amusing imitations by a gentleman of the party, till twelve o'clock. it will readily be supposed that my eye often turned upon the chief figure in this interesting group. i could not for a moment forget his presence; though nothing could be more unpretending and modest than his whole air and bearing. the general effect of his face was that of calm dignity; and now, in the presence of children and friends, lighted by genial emotions, it was one of the pleasantest countenances i have ever seen. when standing or walking, his manly form, added to an aspect of benevolence, completed the image; at once exciting affection and commanding respect. his manners were quiet, unpretending, absolutely without self-assertion. he appeared to be happy, and desirous of making others so. he was the only person present who seemed unconscious that he was the author of waverley. his intercourse with his daughter was most charming. she seemed quite devoted to him; watching his lips when he was speaking, and seeking in everything to anticipate and fulfil his wishes. when she was singing, his eye dwelt upon her; his ear catching and seeming to relish every tone. frequently, when she was silent, his eye rested upon her, and the lines came to my mind,-- "some feelings are to mortals given, with less of earth in them than heaven: and if there be a human tear from passion's dross refined and clear, a tear so limpid and so meek it would not stain an angel's cheek: 'tis that which pious fathers shed upon a duteous daughter's head!" eight years later, when i was again in london, scott was on his death-bed at abbotsford. overburdened with the struggle to extricate himself from the wreck of his fortunes, his brain had given way, and the mighty intellect was in ruins. on the morning of the th he woke from a paralytic slumber; his eye clear and calm, every trace of delirium having passed away. lockhart came to his bedside. "my dear," he said, "i may have but a moment to speak to you. be a good man: be virtuous; be religious: be a good man. nothing else will give you any comfort when you are called upon to lie here!" these were almost the last words he spoke; he soon fell into a stupor, which became the sleep of death. so he died, with all his children around him. "it was a beautiful day," says his biographer; "so warm, that every window was wide open; and so perfectly still, that the sound of all others most delicious to his ear--the gentle ripple of the tweed over its pebbles--was distinctly audible, as we knelt around the bed; and his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes!" chapter xxi. en route for london--"the laird o'cockpen"--localities of legendary fame--difference of english and american scenery. early in june i set out for london. my route led me through the village of dalkeith, and the possessions of the duke of buccleuch, which extended for thirty miles on both sides of the road. we were constantly meeting objects which revived historical or poetic reminiscences. among these was cockpen, the scene of the celebrated ballad; and as i rode by the whole romance passed before my mind. i fancied that i could even trace the pathway along which the old laird proceeded upon his courtship, as well as the residence of "the penniless lass wi' a lang pedigree;" who was so daft as to reject his offer, although "his wig was well powthered and as gude as new; his waistcoat was red, and his coat it was blue; a ring on his finger, a sword and cocked hat-- and wha could refuse the laird wi' a' that?" we crossed the galawater and the ettrick, and travelled along the banks of the tweed. we passed abbotsford on our left; and further on saw the eildon hills, "cleft in three" by the wondrous wizard, michael scott; as duly chronicled in the lay of the last minstrel. we proceeded along the banks of the teviot, a small limpid stream, where barefooted lassies were washing, as in the days of allan ramsay. we saw netherby hall, and a little beyond cannobie lea, the scenes of the song young lochinvar. all these, and many more localities of legendary fame, were passed in the course of a forenoon's progress in the stage-coach. one day's journey brought me to carlisle: thence i travelled through the lake district, looking with delight upon windermere, rydal, grassmere, helvellyn, derwentwater, and skiddaw. then turning eastward, i passed over a hilly and picturesque country, to the ancient and renowned city of york. having lingered, half entranced, amid its antiquities, and looked almost with worship upon its cathedral--the most beautiful i have ever seen--i departed, and soon found myself once more in london. as i shall not return to the subject again, i must say a few words as to the impression england makes upon the mind of an american traveller. i have visited this country several times within the last thirty years, and i shall group my impressions in one general view. the whole may be summed up in a single sentence, which is, that england is incomparably the most beautiful country in the world! i do not speak of it in winter, when encumbered with fogs; when there is "no sun, no moon, no morn, no noon, no dusk, no dawn--no proper time of day; no sky, no earthly view, no distance looking blue; no road, no street, no t'other side the way!" i take her, as i do any other beauty who sits for her portrait, in her best attire; that is, in summer. the sun rises here as high in june as it does in america. vegetation is just about as far advanced. the meadows, the wheat-fields, the orchards, the forests are in their glory. there is one difference, however, between the two countries; the sun in england is not so hot, the air is not so highly perfumed, the buzz of the insects is not so intense. everything is more tranquil. with us, all nature, during summer, appears to be in haste: as if its time was short; as if it feared the coming frost. in england, on the contrary, there seems to be a confidence in the seasons, as if there were time for the ripening harvests; as if the wheat might swell out its fat sides, the hop amplify its many-plaited flowers, the oats multiply and increase their tassels; each and all attaining their perfection at leisure. in the united states, the period of growth of most vegetables is compressed into ten weeks; in great britain, it extends to sixteen. if we select the middle of june as a point of comparison, we shall see that in america there is a spirit, vigor, energy in the climate, as indicated by vegetable and animal life, unknown in europe. the air is clearer, the landscape is more distinct, the bloom more vivid, the odors more pungent. a clover-field in america, in full bloom, is by many shades more ruddy than the same thing in england: its breath even is sweeter: the music of the bees stealing its honey is of a higher key. a summer forest with us is of a livelier green than in any part of great britain; the incense breathed upon the heart, morning and evening, is, i think, more full and fragrant. and yet, if we take the summer through, this season is pleasanter in england than with us. it is longer, its excitements are more tranquil, and, being spread over a larger space, the heart has more leisure to appreciate them, than in the haste and hurry of our american climate. there is one fact worthy of notice, which illustrates this peculiarity of the english summer: the trees there are all of a more sturdy, or, as we say, _stubbed_ form and character. the oaks, the elms, the walnuts, beeches, are shorter and thicker, as well in the trunks as the branches, than ours. the leaves are thicker, the twigs larger in circumference. i have noticed particularly the recent growths of apple-trees, and they are at once shorter and stouter than in america. this quality in the trees gives a peculiarity to the landscape: the forest is more solid and less graceful than ours. if you will look at an english painting of trees, you notice the fact i state, and perceive the effect it gives, especially to scenes of which trees constitute a prevailing element. all over europe, in fact, the leaves of the trees have a less feathery appearance than in america; and in general the forms of the branches are less arching, and, of course, less beautiful. hence it will be perceived that european pictures of trees differ in this respect from american ones: the foliage in the former being more solid, and the sweep of the branches more angular. but it is in respect to the effects of human art and industry that the english landscape has the chief advantage over ours. england is an old country, and shows on its face the influences of fifteen centuries of cultivation. it is, with the exception of belgium, the most thickly-settled country of europe. it is under a garden-like cultivation; the ploughing is straight and even, as if regulated by machinery; the boundaries of estates consist, for the most part, of stone mason-work, the intermediate divisions being hedges, neatly trimmed, and forming a beautiful contrast to our stiff stone walls and rail fences. in looking from the top of a hill over a large extent of country, it is impossible not to feel a glow of delight at the splendor of the scene: the richness of the soil, its careful and skilful cultivation, its green, tidy boundaries chequering the scene, its teeming crops, its fat herds, its numberless and full-fleeced sheep. nor must the dwellings be overlooked. i pass by the cities and the manufacturing villages, which, in most parts, are visible in every extended landscape; sometimes, as in the region of manchester, spreading out for miles, and sending up wreaths of smoke from a thousand tall, tapering chimneys. i am speaking now of the country; and here are such residences as are unknown to us. an english castle would swallow up a dozen of our wood or brick villas. the adjacent estate often includes a thousand acres; and these, be it remembered, are kept almost as much for ornament as use. think of a dwelling that might gratify the pride of a prince, surrounded by several square miles of wooded park, and shaven lawn, and winding stream, and swelling hill; and all having been for a hundred, perhaps five hundred years, subjected to every improvement which the highest art could suggest! there is certainly a union of unrivalled beauty and magnificence in the lordly estates of england. we have nothing in america which at all resembles them. and then there is every grade of imitation of these high examples scattered over the whole country. the greater part of the surface of england belongs to wealthy proprietors, and these have alike the desire and the ability to give an aspect of neatness, finish, and elegance, not only to their dwellings and the immediate grounds, but to their entire estates. the prevailing standard of taste thus leads to a universal beautifying of the surface of the country. even the cottager feels the influence of this omnipresent spirit: the brown thatch over his dwelling, and the hedge before his door, must be neatly trimmed: the green ivy must clamber up and festoon his windows; and the little yard in front must bloom with roses and lilies, and other gentle flowers, in their season. so much for the common aspect of england as the traveller passes over it. the seeker after the picturesque may find abundant gratification in devonshire, derbyshire, westmoreland, though wales and scotland, and parts of ireland, are still more renowned for their beauty. so far as combinations of nature are concerned, nothing in the world can surpass some of our own scenery; as along the upper waters of the housatonic and the connecticut, or among the islands of lake george, and a thousand other places: but these lack the embellishments of art and the associations of romance or song, which belong to the rival beauties of british landscapes. i confine these remarks to a single topic, the aspect of england as it meets the eye of an american traveller. the english do not and cannot enjoy the spectacle as an american does; for they are born to it, and have no experience which teaches them to estimate it by common and inferior standards. having said so much on this subject, i shall not venture to speak of english society: of the lights and shadows of life beneath the myriad roofs of towns and cities. the subject would be too extensive; and besides, it has been abundantly treated by others. i only say, in passing, that the english people are the best studied at home. john bull, out of his own house, is generally a rough customer: here, by his fireside, with wife, children, and friends, he is generous, genial, gentlemanly. there is no hospitality like that of an englishman, when you have crossed his threshold. everywhere else he will annoy you. he will poke his elbow into your sides in a crowded thoroughfare; he will rebuff you if, sitting at his side in a railway-carriage, you ask a question by way of provoking a little conversation: he carries at his back a load of prejudices, like the bundle of christian in the pilgrim's progress; and, instead of seeking to get rid of them, he is always striving to increase his collection. if he becomes a diplomat, his great business is to meddle in everybody's affairs; if an editor, he is only happy in proportion as he can say annoying and irritating things. and yet, catch this same john bull at home, and his crusty, crocodile armor falls off, and he is the very best fellow in the world: liberal, hearty, sincere,--the perfection of a gentleman. chapter xxii. london again--jacob perkins and his steam-gun--dukes of wellington, sussex, and york--british ladies at a review--house of commons and its orators--catalani--distinguished foreigners--edward irving compared to edmund kean--byron lying in state. london, when i first knew it, was not what it is now. its population has at least doubled since . at that time charing cross was a filthy, triangular thoroughfare, a stand for hackney-coaches, a grand panorama of show-bills pasted over the surrounding walls, with the king's mews in the immediate vicinity: this whole area is now the site of trafalgar square. this is an index of other and similar changes that have taken place all over the city. at the present day, london not only surpasses in its extent, its wealth, its accumulations of all that belongs to art, the extent of its commerce, the vastness of its influence, all the cities that now exist, but all that the world has before known. king george iv. was then on the throne, and though he was shy of showing himself in public, i chanced to see him several times, and once to advantage, at ascot races. for more than an hour his majesty stood in the pavilion, surrounded by the duke of wellington, the duke of york, the marquis of anglesea, and other persons of note. but for the star on his left breast, and the respect paid to him, he might have passed as only an over-dressed and rather sour old rake. i noticed that his coat sat very close and smooth, and was told that he was trussed and braced by stays. it was said to be the labor of at least two hours to prepare him for a public exhibition. he was a dandy to the last. the wrinkles of his coat, after it was on, were cut out by the tailor, and carefully drawn up with the needle. he had the gout, and walked badly. i imagine there were few among the thousands gathered to the spectacle who were really less happy than his majesty--the monarch of the three kingdoms. i saw the duke of wellington not only on this, but on many subsequent occasions. i think the portraits give a false idea of his personal appearance. he was really a rather small, thin, insignificant-looking man, unless you saw him on horseback. he then seemed rather stately, and in a military dress, riding always with inimitable ease, he sustained the image of the great general. at other times i never could discover in his appearance anything but the features and aspect of an ordinary, and certainly not prepossessing, old man. i say this with great respect for his character, which, as a personification of solid sense, indomitable purpose, steady loyalty, and unflinching devotion to a sense of public duty, i conceive to be one of the finest in british history. at this period our countryman, jacob perkins, was astonishing london with his steam-gun. he was certainly a man of extraordinary genius, and was the originator of numerous useful inventions. at the time of which i write, he fancied that he had discovered a new mode of generating steam, by which he was not only to save a vast amount of fuel, but to obtain a marvellous increase of power. so confident was he of success, that he told me he felt certain of being able, in a few months, to go from london to liverpool with the steam produced by a gallon of oil. such was his fertility of invention, that while pursuing one discovery others came into his mind, and, seizing upon his attention, kept him in a whirl of experiments, in which many things were begun, and comparatively nothing completed. though the steam-gun never reached any practical result, it was for some time the admiration of london. i was present at an exhibition of its wonderful performances in the presence of the duke of sussex, the duke of wellington, and other persons of note. the purpose of the machine was to discharge bullets by steam, instead of gunpowder, and with great rapidity--at least a hundred a minute. the balls were put in a sort of tunnel, and by working a crank back and forward, they were let into the chamber of the barrel one by one, and expelled by the steam. the noise of each explosion was like that of a musket; and when the discharges were rapid, there was a ripping uproar, quite shocking to tender nerves. the balls--carried about a hundred feet across the smithy--struck upon an iron target, and were flattened to the thickness of a shilling piece. the whole performance was indeed quite formidable, and the duke of sussex seemed greatly excited. i stood close to him; and when the bullets flew pretty thick, and the discharge came to its climax, i heard him say to the duke of wellington, in an under-tone,--"wonderful, wonderful--wonderful! wonderful, wonderful--wonderful! wonderful, wonderful--wonderful!" and so he went on, without variation. it was, in fact, a very good commentary upon the performance. having spoken of the duke of sussex, i must say a few words of his brother, the duke of york, whom i had seen at ascot. he was there interested in the race, for he had entered a horse by the name of moses, for one of the prizes. some person reflected upon him for this. his ready reply was, that he was devoted to _moses and the profits_. despite his disgrace in the flanders campaign, and his notorious profligacy, he was still a favorite among the british people. there was about him a certain native honorableness and goodness of heart, which always existed, even in the midst of his worst career. i saw the duke on another occasion, at a cavalry review on hounslow heath. the duke of wellington was among the spectators. he was now in military dress, and mounted on a fine chestnut-colored horse. his motions were quick, and frequently seemed to indicate impatience. several ladies and gentlemen on horseback were admitted to the review, and within the circle of the sentries stationed to exclude the crowd. i obtained admission by paying five shillings; for i learned that in england money is quite as mighty as in america. the privileged group of fair ladies and brave men, gathered upon a grassy knoll to observe the evolutions of the soldiers, presented an assemblage such as the aristocracy of england alone can furnish. those who imagine that this is an effeminate generation, should learn that both the men and women belonging to the british nobility, taken together, are without doubt the finest race in the world. one thing is certain, these ladies could stand fire; for although the horses leaped and pranced at the discharges of the troops, their fair riders seemed as much at ease as if upon their own feet. their horsemanship was indeed admirable, and suggested those habits of exercise and training, to which their full rounded forms and blooming countenances gave ample testimony. the performances consisted of various marches and counter-marches--sometimes slow, and sometimes quick--across the extended plain. the evolutions of the flying-artillery excited universal admiration. when the whole body--about four thousand horse--rushed in a furious gallop over the ground, the clash of arms, the thunder of hoofs, the universal shudder of the earth--all together created more thrilling emotions in my mind, than any other military parade i ever beheld. i have seen eighty thousand infantry in the field; but they did not impress my imagination as forcibly as these few regiments of cavalry at hounslow heath. one incident gave painful effect to the spectacle. as the whole body were sweeping across the field, a single trooper was pitched from his horse and fell to the ground. a hundred hoofs passed over him, and trampled him into the sod. on swept the gallant host, as heedless of their fallen companion as if only a feather had dropped from of their caps. the conflict of cavalry in real battle, must be the most fearful exhibition which the dread drama of war can furnish. on this occasion both the king and the duke of york were present; so that it was one off universal interest. about fifty ladies on horseback rode back and forth over the field, on the flanks of the troops, imitating their evolutions. i have been often at the house of commons; but i shall now only speak of a debate, in july, , upon the petition, i believe, of the city of london, for a recognition of the independence of some of the south american states. canning was then secretary of foreign affairs, and took the brunt of the battle made upon the ministry. sir james mackintosh led, and brougham followed him, on the same side. i shall not attempt to give you a sketch of the speeches: a mere description of the appearance and manner of the prominent orators will suffice. sir james, then nearly sixty years old, was a man rather above the ordinary size; and with a fine, philanthropic face. his accent was decidedly scotch, and his voice shrill and dry. he spoke slowly, often hesitated, and was entirely destitute of what we call eloquence. there was no easy flow of sentences, no gush of feeling, no apparent attempt to address the heart or the imagination. his speech was a rigid lecture, rather abstract and philosophical; evidently addressed to the stern intellect of stern men. he had a good deal of gesture, and once or twice was boisterous in tone and manner. his matter was logical; and occasionally he illustrated his propositions by historical facts, happily narrated. on the whole he made the impression upon my mind that he was a very philosophical, but not very practical, statesman. brougham's face and figure are familiar to every one; and making allowance for added years, there is little change in his appearance since the time of which i speak. he had abundance of words, as well as ideas. in his speech on the occasion i describe, he piled thought upon thought, laced sentence within sentence, mingled satire and philosophy, fact and argument, history and anecdote, as if he had been a cornucopia, and was anxious to disburden himself of his abundance. in all this there were several hard hits, and canning evidently felt them. as he rose to reply, i took careful note of his appearance; for he was then, i imagine, the most conspicuous of the british statesmen. he was a handsome man, with a bald, shining head, and a figure slightly stooping in the shoulders. his face was round, his eye large and full, his lips a little voluptuous: the whole bearing a lively and refined expression. in other respects, his appearance was not remarkable. his voice was musical; and he spoke with more ease and fluency than most other orators of the house of commons; yet even he hesitated, paused, and repeated his words, not only in the beginning, but sometimes in the very midst of his argument. he, however, riveted the attention of the members; and his observations frequently brought out the ejaculation of "hear, hear," from both sides of the house. brougham and mackintosh watched him with vigilant attention; now giving nods of assent, and now signs of disapprobation. of course, i visited the house of lords, paying two shillings and sixpence for admittance. the general aspect of the assembly was eminently grave and dignified. lord eldon was the chancellor--a large, heavy, iron-looking man--the personification of bigoted conservatism. he was so opposed to reforms, that he shed tears when the punishment of death was abolished for stealing five shillings in a dwelling-house! when i saw him, his head was covered with the official wig: his face sufficed, however, to satisfy any one that his obstinacy of character was innate. while i was here, a committee from the house of commons was announced; they had brought up a message to the lords. the chancellor, taking the seals in his hands, approached the committee, bowing three times, and they doing the same. then they separated, each moving backward, and bowing. to persons used to such a ceremony, this might be sublime; to me it was ludicrous: and all the more so, on account of the ponderous starchness of the chief performer in the solemn farce. there was a somewhat animated debate while i was present, in which lords liverpool, lauderdale, harrowby and grey participated; yet nothing was said or done that would justify particular notice at this late day. a great event happened in the musical world while i was in london--the appearance of catalani at the italian opera, after several years of absence. the opera was _le nozze di figaro_. i had never before seen an opera; and could not, even by the enchantments of music, have my habits of thought and my common sense so completely overturned and bewitched, as to see the whole business of life--intrigue, courtship, marriage, cursing, shaving, preaching, praying, loving, hating--done by singing, instead of talking, and yet feel that it was all right and proper. it requires both a musical ear and early training fully to appreciate and feel the opera. madame catalani was a large handsome woman; a little masculine and past forty. she was not only a very clever actress, but was deemed to have every musical merit--volume, compass, clearness of tone, surpassing powers of execution. her whole style was dramatic; bending even the music to the sentiments of the character and the song. i could appreciate, uninstructed as i was, her amazing powers; though, to say the truth, i was quite as much astonished as pleased. pasta and garcia, both of whom i afterwards heard, gave me infinitely greater pleasure; chiefly because their voices possessed that melody of tone which excites sympathy in every heart; even the most untutored. madame catalani gave the opera a sort of epic grandeur--an almost tragic vehemence of expression; pasta and garcia rendered it the interpreter of those soft and tender emotions, for the expression of which god seems to have given music to mankind. it was, no doubt, a great thing to hear the greatest cantatrice of the age; but i remember madame catalani as a prodigy, rather than as an enchantress. on the occasion i am describing, she sang, by request, "rule britannia" between the acts; which drew forth immense applause, in which i heartily joined: not that i liked the words, but that i felt the music. it was about this time that a great attraction was announced at one of the theatres; nothing less than the king and queen of the sandwich islands, who had graciously condescended to honor the performance with their presence. they had come to visit england, and pay their homage to george the fourth; hence the government deemed it necessary to receive them with hospitality, and pay them such attentions as were due to their rank and royal blood. the king's name was kamehamaha; but he had also the sub-title or surname of rhio-rhio: which, being interpreted, meant dog of dogs. canning's wit got the better of his reverence, and so he profanely suggested that, if his majesty was a dog of dogs, what must the queen be? however, there was an old man about the court, who had acquired the title of poodle, and he was selected as a fit person to attend upon their majesties. they had their lodgings at the adelphi hotel, and might be seen at all hours of the day, looking at the puppet-shows in the streets with intense delight. of all the institutions of great britain, punch and judy evidently made the strongest and most favorable impression upon the royal party. they were, i believe, received at a private interview by the king at windsor: everything calculated to gratify them was done. i saw them at the theatre, dressed in a european costume, with the addition of some barbarous finery. the king was an enormous man--six feet three or four inches; the queen was short, but otherwise of ample dimensions. besides these persons, the party comprised five or six other members of the king's household. they had all large, round, flat faces, of a coarse, though good-humored expression. their complexion was a ruddy brown, not very unlike the american indians; their general aspect, however, was very different. they looked with a kind of vacant wonder at the play, evidently not comprehending it; the farce, on the contrary, seemed greatly to delight them. it is sad to relate that this amiable couple never returned to their country; both died in england--victims either to the climate, or to the change in their habits of living. among the prominent objects of interest in london at this period was edward irving, then preaching at the caledonian chapel, cross street, hatton garden. he was now in the full flush of his fame; and such was the eagerness to hear him, that it was difficult to get admission. people of all ranks--literary men, philosophers, statesmen, noblemen, persons of the highest name and influence, with a full and diversified representation of the fair sex--crowded to his church. i was so fortunate as to get a seat in the pew of a friend, a privilege which i appreciated all the more when i counted twenty coroneted coaches standing at the door, some of those who came in them not being able to obtain even an entrance into the building. the interior was crowded to excess; the aisles were full; and even fine ladies seemed happy to get seats upon the pulpit stairway. persons of the highest title were scattered here and there, and cabinet ministers were squeezed in with the mass of common humanity. mr. irving's appearance was very remarkable. he was over six feet in height, very broad-shouldered, with long, black hair hanging in heavy, twisted ringlets down upon his shoulders. his complexion was pallid, yet swarthy; the whole expression of his face, owing chiefly to an unfortunate squint, was half-sinister and half-sanctified, creating in the minds of the beholder a painful doubt whether he was a great saint or a great sinner. there was a strange mixture of saintliness and dandyism in the whole appearance of this man. his prayer was affected--strange, quaint, peculiar in its phraseology, yet solemn and striking. his reading of the psalm was peculiar, and a fancy crossed my mind that i had heard something like it, but certainly not in a church. i was seeking to trace out a resemblance between this strange parson and some star of drury lane or covent garden. suddenly i found the clue: edward irving in the pulpit was imitating edmund kean upon the stage! and he succeeded admirably--his tall and commanding person giving him an immense advantage over the little, insignificant, yet inspired actor. he had the tones of the latter, his gestures, his looks even, as i had often seen him in richard the third and shylock. he had evidently taken lessons of the renowned tragedian, but whether in public or private is not for me to say. in spite of the evident affectation, the solemn dandyism, the dramatic artifices of the performer--for, after all, i could only consider the preacher as an actor--the sermon was very impressive. the phraseology was rich, flowing, redundant, abounding in illustration, and seemed to me carefully modelled after that of jeremy taylor. some of the pictures presented to the imagination were startling, and once or twice it seemed as if the whole audience was heaving and swelling with intense emotion, like a sea rolling beneath the impulses of a tempest. considered as a display of oratorical art, it was certainly equal to anything i have ever heard from the pulpit; yet it did not appear to me calculated to have any permanent effect in enforcing christian truth upon the conscience. the preacher seemed too much a player, and too little an apostle. the after-thought was, that the whole effect was the result of stage trick, and not of sober truth. the character and career of edward irving present a strange series of incongruities. he was born in scotland in ; he became a preacher, and acquired speedy notoriety, as much by his peculiarities as his merits. he attracted the attention of dr. chalmers, and through his influence was for a time assistant-minister in the parish of st. john's, at glasgow. from this place he was called to the caledonian chapel, where i heard him. his fame continued to increase; and having published a volume of discourses, under the quaint title, for the oracles of god, four orations: for judgment to come, an argument in nine parts: three large editions of the work were sold in the space of six months. wherever he preached crowds of eager listeners flocked to hear him. his eccentricities increased with his fame. he drew out his discourses to an enormous length, and on several occasions protracted the services to four hours! he soon became mystical, and took to studying unfulfilled prophecy as the true key to the interpretation of the scriptures. from this extravagance he passed to the doctrine that christians, by the power of faith, can attain to the working of miracles, and speaking with unknown tongues, as in the primitive ages. such at last were his vagaries, that he was cut off from communion with the scottish church; in consequence, he became the founder of a sect which continues to the present time in england, bearing the title of "irvingites." worn out with anxiety and incessant labors, he died at glasgow, while on a journey for his health, in , at the early age of forty-two. one more event i must notice--the arrival in london of the remains of lord byron, and their lying in state previous to interment. his body had been preserved in spirits, and was thus brought from greece, attended by five persons of his lordship's suite. having been transferred to the coffin, it lay in state at the house of sir edward knatchbull, where such were the crowds that rushed to behold the spectacle, that it was necessary to defend the coffin with a stout wooden railing. when i arrived at the place the lid was closed. i was told, however, that the countenance, though the finer lines had collapsed, was so little changed as to be easily recognised by his acquaintances. the general muscular form of the body was perfectly preserved. the aspect of the scene, even as i witnessed it, was altogether very impressive. the coffin was covered with a pall, enriched by escutcheons wrought in gold. on the top was a lid, set round with black plumes. upon it were these words,-- "george gordon noel byron. born in london, d january, . died at missolonghi, april th, ." at the head of the coffin was an urn containing the ashes of his brain and heart: this being also covered with a rich pall, wrought with figures in gold. the windows were closed, and the darkened room was feebly illumined by numerous wax tapers. and this was all that remained of byron! what a lesson upon the pride of genius, the vanity of rank, the fatuity of fame,--all levelled in the dust, and, despite the garnished pall and magnificent coffin, their possessor bound to pass through the same process of corruption as the body of a common beggar! chapter xxiii. return to the united states--boston and its worthies--business operations--ackermann's "forget-me-not" the parent of all other annuals--the american species--their decline. having made a hurried excursion to paris and back to london, i departed for liverpool, and thence embarked for the united states, arriving there in october, . i remained at hartford till october, , and then removed to boston, with the intention of publishing original works, and at the same time of trying my hand at authorship--the latter part of my plan, however, known only to myself. at that time boston was recognized as the literary metropolis of the union--the admitted athens of america. edward everett had established the north-american review, and though he had now just left the editorial chair, his spirit dwelt in it, and his fame lingered around it. r. h. dana, edward t. channing, george bancroft, and others, were among the rising lights of the literary horizon. society was strongly impressed with literary tastes, and genius was respected and cherished. the day had not yet come when it was glory enough for a college professor to marry a hundred thousand dollars of stocks, or when it was the chief end of a lawyer to become the attorney of an insurance company, or a bank, or a manufacturing corporation. a boston imprint on a book was equal to a certificate of good paper, good print, good binding, and good matter. and while such was the state of things at boston, at new york the harpers, who till recently had been mere printers in dover street, had scarcely entered upon their career as publishers; and the other shining lights in the trade, at the present time, were either unborn, or in the nursery, or at school. what a revolution do these simple items suggest, wrought in the space of thirty years! the sceptre has departed from judah: new york is now the acknowledged metropolis of american literature, as well as of art and commerce. nevertheless, if we look at boston literature at the present time, as reflected in its publishing lists, we shall see that the light of other days has not degenerated; for since the period of which i speak, prescott, longfellow, hawthorne, whipple, holmes, lowell, hilliard, have joined the boston constellation of letters. it cannot interest the reader to hear in detail my business operations in boston at this period. it will be sufficient to say that, among other works, i published an edition of the novels of charles brockden brown, with a life of the author, furnished by his widow, she having a share of the edition. i also published an edition of hannah more's works, and of mrs. opie's works: these being, i believe, the first complete collections of the writings of these authors. in i published sketches by n. p. willis, his first adventure in responsible authorship. the next year i issued the commonplace book of prose, the first work of the now celebrated dr. cheever. this was speedily followed by the commonplace book of poetry, and studies in poetry, by the same author. in i published a first, and soon after a second, volume of the legendary, designed as a periodical, and intended to consist of original pieces in prose and verse, principally illustrative of american history, scenery, and manners. this was edited by n. p. willis, and was, i believe, his first editorial engagement. among the contributors were halleck, miss sedgwick, miss francis, mrs. sigourney, willis, pierpont, and other popular writers of that day. it was kindly treated by the press, which generously published, without charge, the best pieces in full, saving the reading million the trouble of buying the book and paying for the chaff, which was naturally found with the wheat. despite this courtesy, the work proved a miserable failure. the time had not come for such a publication. at the present day, with the present accessories and the present public spirit, i doubt not that such an enterprise would be eminently successful. the first work of the annual kind, entitled the forget-me-not, was issued by the ackermanns of london, in the winter of , while i was in that city. it was successfully imitated by carey and lea at philadelphia, in a work entitled the atlantic souvenir, and which was sustained with great spirit for several years. in i commenced and published the first volume of the token, which i continued for fifteen years; editing it myself, with the exception of the volume for , which came out under the auspices of mr. willis. in , the atlantic souvenir ceased; and after that time, by arrangement with the publishers, its title was added to that of the token. the success of this species of publication stimulated new enterprises of the kind, and a rage for them spread over europe and america. the efforts of the first artists and the best writers were at length drawn into them; and for nearly twenty years every autumn produced an abundant harvest of diadems, bijous, amaranths, bouquets, hyacinths, amulets, talismans, forget-me-nots, &c. under these seductive titles they became messengers of love, tokens of friendship, signs and symbols of affection, and luxury and refinement; and thus they stole alike into the palace and the cottage, the library, the parlor, and the boudoir. the public taste grew by feeding on these luscious gifts, and soon craved even more gorgeous works of the kind; whence came heath's book of beauty, lady blessington's flowers of loveliness, bulwer's pilgrims of the rhine, butler's leaflets of memory, christmas with the poets, and many others of similar design and execution. many of the engravings of these works cost dollars each, and many a piece of poetry dollars a page. on several of these works the public spent , dollars a-year! at last the race of annuals drew near the end of its career, yet not without having produced a certain revolution in the public taste. their existence had sprung, at least in part, from steel-engraving, which had been invented and introduced by our countryman, jacob perkins. this enabled the artist to produce works of greater delicacy than had ever before been achieved; steel also gave the large number of impressions which the extensive sales of the annuals demanded, and which could not have been obtained from copper. these works scattered gems of art far and wide, making the reading mass familiar with fine specimens of engraving; and not only cultivating an appetite for this species of luxury, but exalting the general standard of taste all over the civilized world. and thus, though the annuals, by name, have perished, they have left a strong necessity in the public mind for books enriched by all the embellishments of art. hence we have illustrated editions of byron, rogers, thomson, cowper, campbell, and others; including our own poets, bryant, halleck, sigourney, longfellow, read, &c. wood-engraving, which since then has risen into such importance, has lent its potent aid in making books one of the chief luxuries of society, from the nursery to the parlor. in comparison with many of these works, the token was a very modest affair. the first year i offered prizes for the best pieces in prose and poetry. the highest for prose was awarded to the author of some passages in the life of an old maid. a mysterious man, in a mysterious way, presented himself for the money, and, giving due evidence of his authority to receive it, it was paid to him; but who the author really was never transpired, though i had, and still have, my confident guess upon the subject. even the subsequent volumes, though they obtained favor in their day, did not approach the splendor of the modern works of a similar kind. nevertheless, some of the engravings, from the designs of allston, leslie, newton, cole, inman, chapman, fisher, brown, alexander, healy, and others, were very clever, even compared with the finest works of the present day. the literary contributions were, i believe, equal, on the whole, to any of the annuals, american or european. here were inserted some of the earliest productions of willis, hawthorne, miss francis (now mrs. child), miss sedgwick, mrs. hale, pierpont, greenwood, and longfellow. several of these authors first made acquaintance with the public through the pages of this work. it is a curious fact that the latter, longfellow, wrote prose, and at that period had shown neither a strong bias nor a particular talent for poetry. the token was continued annually till , when it finally ceased. the day of annuals had, indeed, passed before this was given up; and the last two or three years it had only lingered out a poor and fading existence. as a matter of business, it scarcely paid its expenses, and was a serious drawback upon my time and resources for fifteen years; a punishment, no doubt, fairly due to an obstinate pride, which made me reluctant to abandon a work with which my name and feelings had become somewhat identified. chapter xxiv. "the token"--n. p. willis and nathaniel hawthorne--comparison between them--lady authors--publishers' profits--authors and publishers. i may here say, with propriety, a few words more as to the contributors for the token. the most prominent writer for it was n. p. willis; his articles were the most read, the most admired, the most abused, and the most advantageous to the work. i published his first book; and his two first editorial engagements were with me: hence the early portion of his literary career fell under my special notice. he had begun to write verses very early; and while in college, before he was eighteen, he had acquired an extended reputation, under the signature of "roy." in , when he was just twenty years old, i published his volume, entitled sketches. it elicited quite a shower of criticism, in which praise and blame were about equally dispensed: at the same time the work sold with a readiness quite unusual for a book of poetry at that period. it is not calculated to establish the infallibility of critics, to look over these notices at the present day: many of the pieces which were then condemned have now taken their places among the acknowledged gems of our literature; and others, which excited praise at the time, have faded from the public remembrance. one thing is certain, everybody thought willis worth criticising. he has been, i suspect, more written about than any other literary man in the history of american literature. some of the attacks upon him proceeded, no doubt, from a conviction that he was a man of extraordinary gifts, and yet of extraordinary affectations; and the lash was applied in kindness, as that of a schoolmaster to a beloved pupil's back; some of them were dictated by envy; for we have had no other example of literary success so early, so general, and so flattering. that mr. willis made mistakes in literature and life, at the outset, may be admitted by his best friends; for it must be remembered that, before he was five-and-twenty, he was more read than any other american poet of his time; and besides, being possessed of an easy and captivating address, he became the pet of society, and especially of the fairer portion of it. since that period, his life, on the whole, has been one of serious, useful, and successful labor. his reputation as a poet has hardly advanced, and probably the public generally regard some of his early verses as his best. as an essayist, however, he stands in the first rank; distinguished for a keen sagacity in analyzing society, a fine perception of the beauties of nature, and an extraordinary talent for endowing trifles with interest and meaning. as a traveller, he is among the most entertaining, sagacious, and instructive. his style is certainly peculiar, and is deemed affected, tending to an excess of refinement, and displaying an undue hankering for grace and melody; sometimes sacrificing sense to sound. this might once have been a just criticism, but the candid reader of his works now before the public will deem it hypercritical. his style is suited to his thought; it is flexible, graceful, musical, and is adapted to the playful wit, the piquant sentiment, the artistic descriptions of sea, earth, and sky, of which they are the vehicle. in the seeming exhaustlessness of his resources, in his prolonged freshness, in his constantly-increasing strength, mr. willis has refuted all the early prophets, who regarded him only as a precocity, destined to shine a few brief years and fade away. as to his personal character, i need only say, that from the beginning he had a larger circle of steadfast friends than almost any man within my knowledge. there has been something in his works which has made women generally both his literary and personal admirers. for so many favors he has given the world an ample return; for, with all his imputed literary faults--some real and some imaginary--i regard him as having contributed more to the amusement of society than almost any other of our living authors. it is not easy to conceive of a stronger contrast than is presented by comparing nathaniel hawthorne with n. p. willis. the former was for a time one of the principal writers for the token, and his admirable sketches were published side by side with those of the latter. yet it is curious to remark, that everything willis wrote attracted immediate attention, and excited ready praise, while the productions of hawthorne were almost entirely unnoticed. the personal appearance and demeanor of these two gifted young men, at the early period of which i speak, was also in striking contrast. willis was slender, his hair sunny and silken, his cheeks ruddy, his aspect cheerful and confident. he met society with a ready and welcome hand, and was received readily and with welcome. hawthorne, on the contrary, was of a rather sturdy form, his hair dark and bushy, his eyes steel-grey, his brow thick, his mouth sarcastic, his complexion stony, his whole aspect cold, moody, distrustful. he stood aloof, and surveyed the world from shy and sheltered positions. there was a corresponding difference in the writings of these two persons. willis was all sunshine and summer, the other chill, dark, and wintry; the one was full of love and hope, the other of doubt and distrust; the one sought the open daylight--sunshine, flowers, music--and found them everywhere; the other plunged into the dim caverns of the mind, and studied the grisly spectres of jealousy, remorse, despair. i had seen some anonymous publication which seemed to me to indicate extraordinary powers. i inquired of the publishers as to the writer, and through them a correspondence ensued between me and "n. hawthorne." this name i considered a disguise, and it was not till after many letters had passed that i met the author, and found it to be his true title, representing a very substantial personage. at this period he was unsettled as to his views: he had tried his hand in literature, and considered himself to have met with a fatal rebuff from the reading world. his mind vacillated between various projects, verging, i think, toward a mercantile profession. i combated his despondence, and assured him of triumph, if he would persevere in a literary career. he wrote numerous articles, which appeared in the token: occasionally an astute critic seemed to see through them, and to discover the mind that was in them; but in general they passed without notice. such articles as "sights from a steeple," "sketches beneath an umbrella," the "wives of the dead," the "prophetic pictures," now universally acknowledged to be productions of extraordinary depth, meaning, and power,--extorted hardly a word of either praise or blame, while columns were given to pieces since totally forgotten. i felt annoyed, almost angry, indeed, at this. i wrote several articles in the papers, directing attention to these productions, and finding no echo of my views, i recollect to have asked john pickering, a gentleman in whose critical powers i had great confidence, to read some of them, and give me his opinion of them. he did as i requested; his answer was that they displayed a wonderful beauty of style, with a sort of second-sight, which revealed, beyond the outward forms of life and being, a sort of spirit-world, somewhat as a lake reflects the earth around it and the sky above it; yet he deemed them too mystical to be popular. he was right, no doubt, at that period; but, ere long, a large portion of the reading world obtained a new sense--how, or where, or whence, is not easily determined--which led them to study the mystical, to dive beneath and beyond the senses. hawthorne was, in fact, a kind of wordsworth in prose: less kindly, less genial toward mankind, but deeper and more philosophical. his fate was similar: at first he was neglected, at last he had worshippers. in i recommended mr. hawthorne to publish a volume, comprising his various pieces, which had appeared in the token and elsewhere. he consented, but as i had ceased to be a publisher, it was difficult to find any one who would undertake to bring out the work. i applied to the agent of the stationers' company, but he refused; until at last i relinquished my copyrights on such of the tales as i had published to mr. hawthorne, and joined a friend of his in a bond to indemnify them against loss; and thus the work was published by the stationers' company, under the title of twice-told tales, and for the author's benefit. it was deemed a failure for more than a year, when a breeze seemed to rise and fill its sails, and with it the author was carried on to fame and fortune. among the most successful of the writers for the token was miss francis, now mrs. child. i have not seen her for many years, but i have many pleasant remembrances of her lively conversation, her saucy wit, her strong good sense, and her most agreeable person and presence. to rev. f. w. p. greenwood i was indebted not only for some of the best contributions, but for excellent counsel and advice in my literary affairs. he was a man of genius, gentle manners, and apostolic dignity of life and character. to mr. pierpont i was indebted for encouragement and sympathy in my whole career, and for some of the best poems which appeared in the work i am noticing. i remember once to have met him, and to have asked him to give me a contribution for the token. he stopped and said, reflectingly, "i had a dream not long ago, which i have thought to put into verse. i will try, and if i am successful you shall have it." a few days after he gave me the lines, now in all the gem-books, beginning,-- "was it the chime of a tiny bell that came so sweet to my dreaming ear-- like the silvery tones of a fairy's shell, that he winds on the beach so mellow and clear, when the winds and the waves lie together asleep, and the moon and the fairy are watching the deep-- she dispensing her silvery light, and he his notes, as silvery quite, while the boatman listens and ships his oar, to catch the music that comes from the shore? hark! the notes on my ear that play are set to words; as they float, they say, 'passing away, passing away!'" next to willis, mrs. sigourney was my most successful and liberal contributor: to her i am indebted for a large part of the success of my editorial labors in the matter now referred to. to miss sedgwick, also, the token owes a large share of its credit with the public. to b. b. thacher, also among the good and the departed; to mrs. osgood, to john neale, a. h. everett, mr. longfellow, h. t. tuckerman, epes and john sargent, miss leslie, j. t. fields, o. w. holmes--to all these, and to many others, i owe the kind remembrance which belongs to good deeds, kindly and graciously bestowed. it is not to be supposed that in a long career, both as bookseller and editor, i should have escaped altogether the annoyances and vexations which naturally attach to these vocations. the relation of author and publisher is generally regarded as that of the cat and the dog, both greedy of the bone, and inherently jealous of each other. the authors have hitherto written the accounts of the wrangles between these two parties, and the publishers have been traditionally gibbeted as a set of mean, mercenary wretches, coining the heart's blood of genius for their own selfish profits. great minds, even in modern times, have not been above this historical prejudice. the poet campbell is said to have been an admirer of napoleon because he shot a bookseller. nevertheless, speaking from my own experience, i suspect, if the truth were told, that, even in cases where the world has been taught to bestow all its sympathy in behalf of the author, it would appear that while there were claws on one side there were teeth on the other. my belief is, that where there have been quarrels there have generally been mutual provocations. i know of nothing more vexatious, more wearisome, more calculated to beget impatience, than the egotisms, the exactions, the unreasonableness of authors, in cases i have witnessed. that there may be examples of meanness, stupidity, and selfishness in publishers, is indisputable. but, in general, i am satisfied that an author who will do justice to a publisher will have justice in return. i could give some curious instances of this. a schoolmaster came to me once with a marvellously clever grammar; it was sure to overturn all others. he had figured out his views in a neat hand, like copper-plate. he estimated that there were always a million of children at school who would need his grammar; providing for books worn out, and a supply for new comers, half-a-million would be wanted every year. at one cent a copy for the author--which he insisted was exceedingly moderate--this would produce to him five thousand dollars a year; but if i would publish the work, he would condescend to take half that sum annually, during the extent of the copyright--twenty-eight years! i declined, and he seriously believed me a heartless blockhead. he obtained a publisher at last, but the work never reached a second edition. every publisher is laden with similar experiences. i once employed a young man to block out some little books to be published under the nominal authorship of solomon bell: these i remodelled, and one or two volumes were issued. some over-astute critic announced them as veritable _peter parleys_, and they had a sudden sale. the young man who had assisted me, and who was under the most solemn obligations to keep the matter secret, thought he had an opportunity to make his fortune; so he publicly claimed the authorship, and accused me of duplicity! the result was that the books fell dead from that hour; the series was stopped; and his unprinted manuscripts, for which i had paid him, became utterly worthless. a portion i burnt, and a portion still remain amidst the rubbish of other days. in other instances i was attacked in the papers, editorially and personally, by individuals who were living upon the employment i gave them. i was in daily intercourse with persons of this character, who, while flattering me to my face, i knew to be hawking at me in print. these i regarded and treated as trifles at the time; they are less than trifles now. one thing may be remarked, that, in general, such difficulties come from poor and unsuccessful writers. they have been taught that publishers and booksellers are vampires, and naturally feed upon the vitals of genius; assuming--honestly, no doubt--that they are of this latter class, they feel no great scruple in taking vengeance upon those whom they regard as their natural enemies. my editorial experience also furnished me with some amusing anecdotes. an editor of a periodical once sent me an article for the token, entitled la longue-vue; the pith of the story consisted in a romantic youth's falling in love with a young lady, two miles off, through a telescope! i ventured to reject it; and the token for that year was duly damned in the columns of the offended author. in judging of publishers one thing should be considered, and that is, that two-thirds of the original works issued by them are unprofitable. an eminent london publisher once told me, that he calculated that out of ten publications four involved a positive, and often a heavy, loss; three barely paid the cost of paper, print, and advertising; and three paid a profit. nothing is more common than for a publisher to pay money to an author, every farthing of which is lost. self-preservation, therefore, compels the publisher to look carefully to his operations. one thing is certain, he is generally the very best judge as to the value of a book, in a marketable point of view: if he rejects it, it is solely because he thinks it will not pay, not because he despises genius. happily, at the present day, the relations between these two parties--authors and publishers--are on a better footing than in former times. indeed, a great change has taken place in the relative positions of the two classes. nothing is now more marketable than good writing, whatever may be its form--poetry or prose, fact or fiction, reason or romance. starving, neglected, abused genius, is a myth of bygone times. if an author is poorly paid, it is because he writes poorly. i do not think, indeed, that authors are adequately paid, for authorship does not stand on a level with other professions as to pecuniary recompense, but it is certain that a clever, industrious, and judicious writer may make his talent the means of living. chapter xxv. become an author--his real name a profound secret--how it was divulged--great success--illness--the doctors disagree--english imitations--conduct of a london bookseller--objections to parley's tales--mother goose. though i was busily engaged in publishing various works, i found time to make my long-meditated experiment in the writing of books for children. the first attempt was made in , and bore the title of the tales of peter parley about america. no persons but my wife and one of my sisters were admitted to the secret: for, in the first place, i hesitated to believe that i was qualified to appear before the public as an author; and, in the next place, nursery literature had not then acquired the respect in the eyes of the world it now enjoys. it is since that period that persons of acknowledged genius--scott, dickens, lamartine, mary howitt, in europe; and todd, gallaudet, abbott, miss sedgwick, mrs. child, and others, in america--have stooped to the composition of books for children and youth. i published my little book, and let it make its way. it came before the world untrumpeted, and for some months seemed not to attract the slightest attention. suddenly i began to see notices of it in the papers all over the country, and in a year from the date of its publication it had become a favorite. in i published the tales of peter parley about europe; in , parley's winter evening tales; in , parley's juvenile tales, and parley's asia, africa, sun, moon, and stars. about this time the public guessed my secret. mrs. sarah j. hale, to whom i am indebted for many kind offices in my literary career, first discovered and divulged it; yet i could have wished she had not done me this questionable favor. though the authorship of the parley books has been to me a source of some gratification, you will see, in the sequel, that it has also subjected me to endless vexations. i shall not enter into the details of my proceedings at this busy and absorbed period of my life. i had now obtained a humble position in literature, and was successful in such unambitious works as i attempted. i gave myself up almost wholly for about four years--that is, from to --to authorship, generally writing fourteen hours a-day.--a part of the time i was entirely unable to read, and could write but little, on account of the weakness of my eyes. in my larger publications i employed persons to block out work for me: this was read to me, and then i put it into style, generally writing by dictation, my wife being my amanuensis. thus embarrassed, i still, by dint of incessant toil, produced five or six volumes a-year, most of them small, but some of larger compass. in the midst of these labors--that is, in the spring of --i was suddenly attacked with symptoms which seemed to indicate a disease of the heart, rapidly advancing to a fatal termination. in the course of a fortnight i was so reduced as not to be able to mount a pair of stairs without help, and a short walk produced palpitation of the heart, so violent, in several instances, as almost to deprive me of consciousness. there seemed no hope but in turning my back upon my business, and seeking a total change of scene and climate. in may i embarked for england, and after a few weeks reached paris. i here applied to baron larroque, who, assisted by l'herminier--both eminent in the treatment of diseases of the heart--subjected me to various experiments, but without the slightest advantage. at this period i was obliged to be carried upstairs, and never ventured to walk or ride alone, being constantly subject to nervous spasms, which often brought me to the verge of suffocation. despairing of relief here, i proceeded to london, and was carefully examined by sir benjamin brodie. he declared that i had no organic disease; that my difficulty was nervous irritability; and that whereas the french physicians had interdicted wine, and required me to live on a light vegetable diet, i must feed well upon good roast beef, and take two generous glasses of port with my dinner! thus encouraged, i passed on to edinburgh, where i consulted abercrombie, then at the height of his fame. he confirmed the views of dr. brodie, in the main; and, regarding the irregularity of my vital organs as merely functional, still told me that, without shortening my life, it would probably never be wholly removed. he told me of an instance in which a patient of his, who, having been called upon to testify before the committee of the house of commons, in the trial of warren hastings, from mere embarrassment had been seized with palpitation of the heart, which, however, continued till his death, many years after. even this sombre view of my case was then a relief. four-and-twenty years have passed since that period, and thus far my experience has verified dr. abercombie's prediction. these nervous attacks pursue me to this day: yet i have become familiar with them; and, regarding them only as troublesome visitors, i receive them patiently and bow them out as gently as i can. after an absence of six months i returned to boston, and, by the advice of my physician, took up my residence in the country. i built a house at jamaica plain, four miles from the city, and here i continued for more than twenty years. my health was partially restored, and i resumed my literary labors, which i continued steadily, from to , with a few episodes of lecturing and legislating, three voyages to europe, and an extensive tour to the south. it would be tedious and unprofitable, were i even to enumerate my various works, produced from the beginning to the present time. i may sum up the whole in a single sentence: i am the author and editor of about one hundred and seventy volumes, and of these seven millions have been sold! i have said, that however the authorship of parley's tales has made me many friends, it has also subjected me to many annoyances. when i was in london, in , i learned that mr. tegg, a prominent publisher there, had commenced the republication of parley's tales. i called upon him, and found that he had one of them actually in the press. the result of our interview was a contract, in which i engaged to prepare several of these works, which he agreed to publish, allowing me a small consideration. four of these works i prepared on the spot, and after my return to america prepared and forwarded ten others. some time after, i learned that the books, or at least a portion of them, had been published in london, and were very successful. i wrote several letters to mr. tegg on the subject, but could get no reply. ten years passed away, and being in pressing need of all that i might fairly claim as my due, i went to london, and asked him to render me an account of his proceedings under the contract. i had previously learned, on inquiry, that he had indeed published four or five of the works, as we had agreed, but, taking advantage of these, which passed readily into extensive circulation, he proceed to set aside the contract, and to get up a series of publications upon the model of those i had prepared for him, giving them in the title-pages the name of parley, and passing them off, by every artifice in his power, as the genuine works of that author. he had thus published over a dozen volumes, which he was circulating as peter parley's library. the speculation, as i was told, had succeeded admirably; and i was assured that many thousand pounds of profit had been realized thereby. to my request for an account of his stewardship the publisher replied, in general terms, that i was misinformed as to the success of the works in question; that, in fact, they had been a very indifferent speculation; that he found the original works were not adapted to his purpose, and he had consequently got up others; that he had created, by advertising and other means, an interest in these works, and had thus greatly benefited the name and fame of parley; and, all things considered, he thought he had done more for me than i had for him: therefore, in his view, if we considered the account balanced, we should not be very far from a fair adjustment. to this answer i made a suitable reply, but without obtaining the slightest satisfaction. the contract i had made was a hasty memorandum, and judicially, perhaps, of no binding effect on him. and besides, i had no money to expend in litigation. a little reflection satisfied me that i was totally at his mercy: a fact of which his calm and collected manner assured me he was even more conscious than myself. the discussion was not prolonged. at the second interview he cut the whole matter short, by saying,--"sir, i do not owe you a farthing: neither justice nor law requires me to pay you anything. still, i am an old man, and have seen a good deal of life, and have learned to consider the feelings of others as well as my own. i will pay you four hundred pounds, and we will be quits! if we cannot do this, we can do nothing." in view of the whole case, this was as much as i expected, and so i accepted the proposition. i earnestly remonstrated with him against the enormity of making me responsible for works i never wrote, but as to all actual claims on the ground of the contract i gave him a receipt in full, and we parted. it is not to be supposed that the annoyances arising from the falsification of the name of parley, which i have just pointed out, have been the only obstacles which have roughened the current of my literary life. not only the faults and imperfections of execution in my juvenile works--and no one knows them so well as myself--have been urged against them, but the whole theory on which they are founded has been often and elaborately impugned. it is quite true, that when i wrote the first half-dozen of parley's tales i had formed no philosophy upon the subject: i simply used my experience with children in addressing them. i followed no models, i put on no harness of the schools, i pored over no learned examples. i imagined myself on the floor with a group of boys and girls, and i wrote to them as i would have spoken to them. at a later period i had reflected on the subject, and embodied in a few simple lines the leading principle of what seemed to me the true art of teaching children,--and that is, to consider that their first ideas are simple and single, and formed of images of things palpable to the senses; and hence that these images are to form the staple of lessons to be communicated to them. the teacher's lesson. i saw a child, some four years old, along a meadow stray; alone she went, uncheck'd, untold, her home not far away. she gazed around on earth and sky, now paused, and now proceeded; hill, valley, wood, she passed them by unmarked, perchance unheeded. and now gay groups of roses bright in circling thickets bound her-- yet on she went with footsteps light, still gazing all around her. and now she paused, and now she stooped, and plucked a little flower; a simple daisy 'twas, that drooped within a rosy bower. the child did kiss the little gem, and to her bosom press'd it; and there she placed the fragile stem, and with soft words caressed it. i love to read a lesson true from nature's open book-- and oft i learn a lesson new from childhood's careless look. children are simple, loving, true-- 'tis god that made them so; and would you teach them?--be so, too, and stoop to what they know. begin with simple lessons, things on which they love to look; flowers, pebbles, insects, birds on wings-- these are god's spelling-book! and children know his a b c, as bees where flowers are set; wouldst thou a skilful teacher be? learn then this alphabet. from leaf, from page to page, guide thou thy pupil's look; and when he says, with aspect sage, "who made this wondrous book?" point thou with reverend gaze to heaven, and kneel in earnest prayer that lessons thou hast humbly given may lead thy pupil there! from this commencement i proceeded, and came to the conclusion that in feeding the mind of children with facts, we follow the evident philosophy of nature and providence; inasmuch as these had created all children to be ardent lovers of things they could see and hear, and feel and know. thus i sought to teach them history, and biography, and geography, and all in the way in which nature would teach them,--that is, by a large use of the senses, and especially by the eye. i selected as subjects for my books things capable of sensible representation, such as familiar animals, birds, trees; and of these i gave pictures, as a starting-point. the first line i wrote was, "here i am; my name is peter parley;" and before i went further, gave an engraving representing my hero, as i wished him to be conceived by my pupils. before i began to talk of a lion, i gave a picture of a lion; my object being, as you will perceive, to have the child start with a distinct image of what i was about to give an account of. thus i secured his interest in the subject, and thus i was able to lead his understanding forward in the path of knowledge. these views, of course, led me in a direction exactly opposite to the old theories in respect to nursery-books, in two respects. in the first place, it was thought that education should, at the very threshold, seek to spiritualize the mind, and lift it above sensible ideas, and to teach it to live in the world of imagination. a cow was very well to give milk, but when she got into a book she must jump over the moon; a little girl going to see her grandmother was well enough as a matter of fact, but to be suited to the purposes of instruction she must end her career by being eaten up by a wolf. my plan was, in short, deemed too utilitarian, too materialistic, and hence it was condemned by many persons, and among them the larger portion of those who had formed their tastes upon the old classics, from homer down to mother goose! this was one objection; another, was that i aimed at making education easy--thus bringing up the child in habits of receiving knowledge only as made into pap, and of course putting it out of his power to relish and digest the stronger meat, even when his constitution demanded it. on these grounds, and still others, my little books met with opposition, sometimes even in grave quarterlies, and often in those sanctified publications, entitled "journals of education." in england, at the period that the name of parley was most current--both in the genuine as well as the false editions--the feeling against my juvenile works was so strong among the conservatives, that an attempt was made to put them down by reviving the old nursery-books. in order to do this, a publisher in london reproduced these works, employing the best artists to illustrate them, and bringing them out in all the captivating luxuries of modern typography. nay, such was the reverence at the time for the old favorites of the nursery, that a gentleman of the name of halliwell expended a vast amount of patient research and antiquarian lore in hunting up and setting before the world the history of these performances, from "hey diddle diddle" to "a farmer went trotting upon his grey mare-- bumpety, bumpety, bump!" to all this i made no direct reply; i ventured, however, to suggest my views in the following article inserted in merry's museum for august, . dialogue between timothy and his mother. _timothy._ mother! mother! do stop a minute, and hear me say my poetry! _mother._ your poetry, my son? who told you how to make poetry? _t._ oh, i don't know; but hear what i have made up. _m._ well, go on. _t._ now don't you laugh; it's all mine. i didn't get a bit of it out of a book. here it is! "higglety, pigglety, pop! the dog has eat the mop; the pig's in a hurry, the cat's in a flurry-- higglety, pigglety--pop!" _m._ well, go on. _t._ why, that's all. don't you think it pretty good? _m._ really, my son, i don't see much sense in it. _t._ _sense?_ who ever thought of _sense_, in poetry? why, mother, you gave me a book the other day, and it was all poetry, and i don't think there was a bit of sense in the whole of it. hear me read. [_reads._] "hub a dub! three men in a tub-- and how do you think they got there? the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker, they all jumped out of a rotten potato: 'twas enough to make a man stare." and here's another. "a cat came fiddling out of a barn, with a pair of bagpipes under her arm; she could sing nothing but fiddle cum fee-- the mouse has married the humblebee-- pipe, cat--dance, mouse-- we'll have a wedding at our good house!" and here's another. "hey, diddle, diddle, the cat and the fiddle, the cow jumped over the moon-- the little dog laughed to see the craft, and the dish ran after the spoon." now, mother, the book is full of such things as these, and i don't see any meaning in them. _m._ well, my son, i think as you do; they are really very absurd. _t._ absurd? why, then, do you give me such things to read? _m._ let me ask you a question. do you not love to read these rhymes, even though they are silly? _t._ yes, dearly. _m._ well, you have just learned to read, and i thought these jingles, silly as they are, might induce you to study your book, and make you familiar with reading. _t._ i don't understand you, mother; but no matter. "higglety, pigglety, pop! the dog has eat the mop; the pig's in a hurry--" _m._ stop, stop, my son. i choose you should understand me. _t._ but, mother, what's the use of understanding you? "higglety, pigglety, pop!" _m._ timothy! _t._ ma'am? _m._ listen to me, or you will have cause to repent it. listen to what i say? i gave you the book to amuse you, and improve you in reading, not to form your taste in poetry. _t._ well, mother, pray forgive me. i did not mean to offend you. but i really do love poetry, because it is so silly! "higglety, pigglety, pop!" _m._ don't say that again, timothy! _t._ well, i won't; but i'll say something out of this pretty book you gave me. "doodledy, doodledy, dan! i'll have a piper to be my good man-- and if i get less meat, i shall get game-- doodledy, doodledy, dan!" _m._ that's enough, my son. _t._ but, dear mother, do hear me read another. "we're all in the dumps, for diamonds are trumps-- the kittens are gone to st. paul's-- the babies are bit, the moon's in a fit-- and the houses are built without walls." _m._ i do not wish to hear any more. _t._ one more; one more, dear mother! "round about--round about-- maggoty pie-- my father loves good ale, and so do i." don't you like that, mother? _m._ no; it is too coarse, and unfit to be read or spoken. _t._ but it is here in this pretty book you gave me, and i like it very much, mother. and here is a poem, which i think very fine. "one-ery, two-ery, ziccary zan, hollow bone, crack a bone-- ninery ten: spittery spat, it must be done, twiddledum, twiddledum, twenty-one, hink, spink, the puddings--" _m._ stop, stop, my son. are you not ashamed to say such things? _t._ ashamed? no, mother. why should i be? it's all printed here as plain as day. ought i to be ashamed to say any thing that i find in a pretty book you have given me? just hear the rest of this. "hink, spink, the puddings--" _m._ give me the book, timothy. i see that i have made a mistake; it is not a proper book for you. _t._ well, you may take the book; but i can say the rhymes, for i have learned them all by heart. "hink, spink, the puddings--" _m._ timothy, how dare you! _t._ well, mother, i won't say it, if you don't wish me to. but mayn't i say-- "higglety, pigglety, pop!" _m._ i had rather you would not. _t._ and "doodledy, doodledy, dan"--mayn't i say that? _m._ no. _t._ nor "hey, diddle, diddle?" _m._ i do not wish you to say any of those silly things. _t._ dear me, what shall i do? _m._ i had rather you would learn some good, sensible things. _t._ such as what? _m._ watts's hymns, and original hymns. _t._ do you call them sensible things? i hate 'em. "doodledy, doodledy, dan!" _m._ [_aside._] dear, dear, what shall i do? the boy has got his head turned with these silly rhymes. it was really a very unwise thing to put a book into his hands, so full of nonsense and vulgarity. these foolish rhymes stick like burs in his mind, and the coarsest and vilest seem to be best remembered. i must remedy this mistake; but i see it will take all my wit to do it. [_aloud._] timothy, you must give me up this book, and i will get you another. _t._ well, mother, i am sorry to part with it; but i don't care so much about it, as i know all the best of it by heart. "hink, spink, the puddings stink"-- _m._ timothy, you'll have a box on the ear, if you repeat that! _t._ well, i suppose i can say, "round about--round about-- maggoty pie--" _m._ you go to bed! _t._ well, if i must, i must. good-night, mother! "higglety, pigglety, pop! the dog has eat the mop; the cat's in a flurry, the cow's in a hurry, higglety, pigglety, pop!" good-night, mother! i trust, that no one will gather from this that i condemn rhymes for children. i know that there is a certain music in them that delights the ear of childhood. nor am i insensible to the fact that in mother goose's melodies, there is frequently a sort of humor in the odd jingle of sound and sense. there is, furthermore, in many of them, an historical significance, which may please the profound student who puzzles it out; but what i affirm is, that many of these pieces are coarse, vulgar, offensive, and it is precisely these portions that are apt to stick to the minds of children. and besides, if, as is common, such a book is the first that a child becomes acquainted with, it is likely to give him a low idea of the purpose and meaning of books, and to beget a taste for mere jingles. with these views, i sought to prepare lessons which combined the various elements suited to children--a few of them even including frequent, repetitious rhymes--yet at the same time presenting rational ideas and gentle kindly sentiments. will you excuse me for giving you one example--my design being to show you how this may be done, and how even a very unpromising subject is capable of being thus made attractive to children. the toad's story. oh, gentle stranger, stop, and hear poor little hop just sing a simple song, which is not very long-- hip, hip, hop. i am an honest toad, living here by the road; beneath a stone i dwell, in a snug little cell, hip, hip, hop. it may seem a sad lot to live in such a spot-- but what i say is true-- i have fun as well as you! hip, hip, hop. just listen to my song-- i sleep all winter long, but in spring i peep out, and then i jump about-- hip, hip, hop. when the rain patters down, i let it wash my crown, and now and then i sip a drop with my lip: hip, hip, hop. when the bright sun is set, and the grass with dew is wet, i sally from my cot, to see what's to be got, hip, hip, hop. and now i wink my eye, and now i catch a fly, and now i take a peep, and now and then i sleep: hip, hip, hop. and this is all i do-- and yet they say it's true, that the toady's face is sad, and his bite is very bad! hip, hip, hop. oh, naughty folks they be, that tell such tales of me, for i'm an honest toad, just living by the road: hip, hip, hop! these were my ideas in regard to first books--toy-books--those which are put into the hands of children to teach them the art of reading. as to books of amusement and instruction, to follow these, i gave them parley's tales of travels, of history, of nature and art, together with works designed to cultivate a love of truth, charity, piety, and virtue, and i sought to make these so attractive as to displace the bad books to which i have already alluded--the old monstrosities, puss in boots, jack the giant-killer, and others of that class. a principal part of my machinery was the character of peter parley--a kind-hearted old man, who had seen much of the world, and, not presuming to undertake to instruct older people, loved to sit down and tell his stories to children. beyond these juvenile works, i prepared a graduated series upon the same general plan, reaching up to books for the adult library. it is true that occasionally i wrote and published a book aside from this, my true vocation: thus i edited the token, and published two or three volumes of poetry. but, out of all my works, about a hundred and twenty are professedly juvenile; and forty are for my early readers advanced to maturity. it is true that i have written openly, avowedly, to attract and to please children; yet it has been my design at the same time to enlarge the circle of knowledge, to invigorate the understanding, to strengthen the moral nerve, to purify and exalt the imagination. such have been my aims: how far i have succeeded, i must leave to the judgment of others. one thing i may perhaps claim, and that is, my example and my success have led others, of higher gifts than my own, to enter the ample and noble field of juvenile instruction by means of books; many of them have no doubt surpassed me, and others will still follow surpassing them. i look upon the art of writing for children and youth, advanced as it has been of late years, still as but just begun. chapter xxvi. children my first patrons--a visit to new orleans--feelings of humiliation--the mice eat my papers--a wrong calculation. if thus i met with opposition, i had also my success, nay, i must say, my triumphs. my first patrons were the children themselves, then the mothers, and then, of course, the fathers. in the early part of the year i made a trip from boston to the south, returning by the way of the mississippi and the ohio. i received many a kind welcome under the name of the fictitious hero whom i had made to tell my stories. sometimes, it is true, i underwent rather sharp cross-questioning, and frequently was made to feel that i held my honors by a rather questionable title. i, who had undertaken to teach truth, was forced to confess that fiction lay at the foundation of my scheme! my innocent young readers, however, did not suspect me: they had taken all i had said as positively true, and i was, of course, peter parley himself. "did you really write that book about africa?" said a black-eyed, dark-haired girl of some eight years old, at mobile. i replied in the affirmative. "and did you really get into prison there!" "no; i was never in africa." "never in africa?" "never." "well, then, why did you say you had been there?" on another occasion--i think at savannah--a gentleman called upon me, introducing his two grandchildren, who were anxious to see peter parley. the girl rushed up to me, and kissed me at once. we were immediately the best friends in the world. the boy, on the contrary, held himself aloof, and ran his eye over me, up and down, from top to toe. he then walked round, surveying me with the most scrutinizing gaze. after this he sat down, and during the interview took no further notice of me. at parting he gave me a keen look, but said nothing. the next day the gentleman called and told me that his grandson, as they were on their way home, said to him,-- "grandfather, i wouldn't have anything to do with that man; he ain't peter parley." "how do you know that?" said the grandfather. "because," said the boy, "he hasn't got his foot bound up, and he don't walk with a crutch!" on my arrival at new orleans i was kindly received, and had the honors of a public welcome. the proceedings were gratifying to me; and, even if they stood alone, would make amends for much misunderstanding and opposition. hitherto i have spoken chiefly of the books i have written for children, the design of which was as much to amuse as to instruct them. these comprise the entire series called parley's tales, with many others, bearing parley's name. as to works for education--school-books, including readers, histories, geographies, &c., books for popular reading, and a wilderness of prose and poetry admitting of no classification--it is unnecessary to recount them. this is the closing chapter of my literary history, and i have little indeed to say, and that is a confession. in looking at the long list of my publications, in reflecting upon the large numbers that have been sold, i feel far more of humiliation than of triumph. if i have sometimes taken to heart the soothing flatteries of the public, it has ever been speedily succeeded by the conviction that my life has been, on the whole, a series of mistakes, and especially in that portion of it which has been devoted to authorship. i have written too much, and have done nothing really well. i know, better than any one can tell me, that there is nothing in this long catalogue that will give me a permanent place in literature. a few things may struggle upon the surface for a time, but--like the last leaves of a tree in autumn, forced at length to quit their hold and drop into the stream--even these will disappear, and my name and all i have done will be forgotten. a recent event, half-ludicrous and half-melancholy, has led me into this train of reflection. on going to europe in i sent my books and papers to a friend, to be kept till my return. among them was a large box of business documents--letters, accounts, receipts, bills paid, notes liquidated--comprising the transactions of several years, long since passed away. shortly after my return to new york, in preparing to establish myself and family, i caused these things to be sent to me. on opening the particular box just mentioned, i found it a complete mass of shavings, shreds, fragments. my friend had put it carefully away in the upper loft of his barn, and there it became converted into a universal mouse-nest! the history of whole generations of the mischievous little rogues was still visible; beds, galleries, play-grounds, birth-places, and even graves, were in a state of excellent preservation. several wasted and shrivelled forms of various sizes--the limbs curled up, the eyes extinct, the teeth disclosed, the long, slender tails straight and stiffened--testified to the joys and sorrows of the races that had flourished there. on exploring this mass of ruins, i discovered here and there a file of letters eaten through, the hollow cavity evidently having been the happy and innocent cradle of childhood to these destroyers. sometimes i found a bed lined with paid bills, and sometimes the pathway of a gallery paved with liquidated accounts. what a mass of thoughts, of feelings, cares, anxieties, were thus made the plunder of these thoughtless creatures! in examining the papers i found, for instance, letters from n. p. willis, written five-and-twenty years ago, with only "dear sir" at the beginning, and "yours truly" at the end. i found epistles of nearly equal antiquity from many other friends--sometimes only the heart eaten out, and sometimes the whole body gone. for all purposes of record, these papers were destroyed. i was alone, for my family had not yet returned from europe: it was the beginning of november, and i began to light my fire with these relics. for two whole days i pored over them, buried in the reflections which the reading of the fragments suggested. absorbed in this dreary occupation, i forgot the world without, and was only conscious of bygone scenes which came up in review before me. it was as if i had been in the tomb, and was reckoning with the past. how little was there in all that i was thus called to remember, save of care, and struggle, and anxiety; and how were all the thoughts, and feelings, and experiences, which seemed mountains in their day, levelled down to the merest grains of dust! a note of hand--perchance of a thousand dollars--what a history rose up in recollection as i looked over its scarcely legible fragments!--what clouds of anxiety had its approaching day of maturity cast over my mind! how had i been, with a trembling heart, to some bank-president--he a god, and i a craven worshipper--making my offering of some other note for a discount, which might deliver me from the wrath to come! with what anxiety have i watched the lips of the oracle, for my fate was in his hands! a simple monosyllable--yes or no--might save or ruin me. what a history was in that bit of paper!--and yet it was destined only to serve as stuffing for the beds of vermin. i ought, no doubt, to have smiled at all this; but i confess it made me serious. nor was it the most humiliating part of my reflections. i have been too familiar with care, conflict, disappointment, to mourn over them very deeply, now that they were passed. the seeming fatuity of such a mass of labors as these papers indicated, compared with their poor results, however it might humble, could not distress me. but there were many things suggested by these letters, all in rags as they were, that caused positive humiliation. they revived in my mind the vexations, misunderstandings, controversies of other days; and now, reviewed in the calm light of time, i could discover the mistakes of judgment, of temper, of policy, that i had made. i turned back to my letter-book; i reviewed my correspondence; and i came to the conclusion that in almost every difficulty which had arisen in my path, even if others were wrong, i was not altogether right: in most cases, prudence, conciliation, condescension, might have averted these evils. thus the thorns which had wounded me and others too, as it seemed, had generally sprung up from the seeds i had sown, or had thriven upon the culture my own hands had unwisely bestowed. at first i felt disturbed at the ruin which had been wrought in these files of papers. hesitating and doubtful, i consigned them one by one to the flames. at last the work was complete; all had perished, and the feathery ashes had leaped up in the strong draught of the chimney and disappeared for ever. i felt a relief at last; i smiled at what had happened; i warmed my chill fingers over the embers; i felt that a load was off my shoulders. "at least," said i in my heart, "these things are now passed; my reckoning is completed, the account is balanced, the responsibilities of those bygone days are liquidated; let me burden my bosom with them no more!" alas, how fallacious my calculation! a few months only had passed, when i was called to contend with a formidable claim which came up from the midst of transactions to which these extinct papers referred, and against which they constituted my defence. as it chanced, i was able to meet and repel it by documents which survived; but the event caused me deep reflection. i could not but remark that, however we may seek to cover our lives with forgetfulness, their records still exist, and these may come up against us when we have no vouchers to meet the charges which are thus presented. who, then, will be our helper? chapter xxvii. make a speech--lecture on ireland--politics--personal attacks--become a senator--the "fifteen-gallon law"--a pamphlet in its favor--"my neighbor smith"--a political career unprofitable. the first public speech i ever made was at st. albans, in england, in the year , at a grand celebration of the passing of the reform bill; having accompanied thither sir francis vincent, the representative in parliament of that ancient borough. more than three thousand people, men, women, and children, gathered from the town and the vicinity, were feasted at a long table, set out in the principal street of the place. after this feast there were various sports, such as donkey-races, climbing a greased pole, and the like. at six o'clock, about one hundred and fifty of the gentry and leading tradesmen and mechanics sat down to a dinner, sir francis presiding. the president of the united states was toasted, and i was called upon to respond. entirely taken by surprise, for not a word had been said to me upon the subject, i made a speech. i could never recall what i said: all i remember is a whirl of thoughts and emotions as i rose, occasional cries of "hear, hear!" as i went on, and a generous clapping of hands as i concluded. whether this last was because i really made a good hit, or from another principle-- "the best of graham's speeches was _his last_"-- i am totally unable to say. my next public appearance was in a lecture at the tremont temple, in boston; my subject being "ireland and the irish." although my discourse was written, and pretty well committed to memory, yet for several days before the time appointed for its delivery arrived, when i thought of my engagement, my heart failed me. when the hour came i went to the door of the room, but on seeing the throng of persons collected i felt that my senses were deserting me: turning on my heel, i went out, and going to an apothecary's, fortified myself with some peppermint lozenges. when i got back, the house was waiting with impatience. i was immediately introduced to the audience by dr. walter channing, and stepping upon the platform, began. after the first sentence, i was perfectly at my ease. i afterwards delivered this lecture more than forty times. in the autumn of there was a large evening party at jamaica plain, at the house of mrs. g----, the lady-patroness of the village. among the notable men present was daniel webster, whom i had frequently seen, but to whom i was now introduced for the first time. he spoke to me of many things, and at last of politics, suggesting that the impending presidential election involved most important questions, and he deemed it the duty of every man to reflect upon the subject, and to exert his influence as his conscience might dictate. since my residence in massachusetts, a period of nearly eight years, i had been engrossed in my business, and had never even voted. just at this time i was appointed, without any suggestion of my own, one of the delegates to the whig convention to nominate a person to represent us, the ninth congressional district, in congress. this was to take place at medway, at the upper end of the district. i went accordingly, and on the first ballot was the highest candidate, save one--mr. hastings, of mendon. i declined, of course, and he was unanimously nominated. the canvass that ensued was a very animated one, mr. van buren being the democratic candidate for the presidency. he was considered as the heir-apparent of the policy of gen. jackson, and had, indeed, promised, if elected, to walk in the footsteps of his illustrious predecessor. without the personal popularity of that remarkable man, he became the target for all the hostility which his measures had excited. he was, however, elected, but to be overwhelmed with a whirlwind of discontent and opposition four years after. the candidate for congress in our district, in opposition to mr. hastings, was alexander h. everett, who had been hitherto a conspicuous whig, and who had signalized himself by the ability and bitterness of his attacks on general jackson and his administration. he had singled out mr. van buren, for especial vehemence of reproach, because, being secretary of state at the time, mr. everett was superseded as minister to spain without the customary courtesy of an official note advising him of the appointment of his successor. to the amazement of the public in general, and his friends in particular, on the th of january, , mr. everett delivered an oration before the democracy of salem, in which--ignoring the most prominent portion of his political life--he came out with the warmest eulogies upon general jackson and his administration! about the first of may, the precise period when it was necessary, in order to render him eligible to congress in the ninth district, he took up his residence within its precincts, and, as was easily foreseen, was the democratic candidate for congress. the whig district committee, of which i was one, and charles bowen (mr. everett's publisher), another, issued a pamphlet, collating and contrasting mr. everett's two opinions of general jackson's policy, and especially of mr. van buren--the one flatly contradicting the other, and, in point of date, being but two or three years apart. this was circulated over the towns of the district. it was a terrible document, and mr. everett felt its force. one of them was left at his own door in the general distribution. this he took as a personal insult, and meeting bowen, knocked him over the head with his umbrella. bowen clutched him by the throat, and would have strangled him but for the timely interference of a bystander. i had been among mr. everett's personal friends, but he now made me the object of special attack. in a paper, which then circulated a good deal in the district, i was severely lashed under the name of peter parley, not because i was a candidate for office, but because i was chairman of the whig district committee. i recollect that one day some rather scandalous thing came out against me in the editorial columns of this journal, and feeling very indignant, i went to see the editor. i did not know him personally, but from occasionally reading his paper i had got the idea that he was a very monster of violence. he was not at the office, but such was my irritation and impatience that i went to his house. i rang, and a beautiful black-eyed girl, some eight years old, came to the door. i asked if mr. h---- was in? "mother," said the child, in a voice of silver, "is father at home?" at this moment another child, and still younger, its bullet-pate head all over curls, came to the door. then a mild and handsome woman came, and to my inquiry she said that her husband was out, but would return in a few moments. my rage was quelled in an instant. "so," said i to myself, "these children call that man father, and this woman calls him husband. after all, he cannot be such a monster as i have fancied him, with such a home." i turned on my heel and went away, my ill-humor having totally subsided. some two years after i told him this anecdote, and we had a good-humored laugh over it. both of us had learned to discriminate between political controversy and personal animosity. the attacks made upon me during this canvass had an effect different from what was intended. i was compelled to take an active part in the election, and deeming the success of my party essential to my own defence, i naturally made more vigorous efforts for that object. mr. everett was defeated by a large majority, and the whig candidate triumphed. at the same time i was chosen a member of the legislature for roxbury-jamaica plain, where i resided, being a parish of that town. the next year i was a candidate for the senate, in competition with mr. everett, and was elected. in this manner i was forced into politics, and was indebted mainly to opposition for my success. during the ensuing session of the legislature, the winter of - , the famous "fifteen-gallon law" was passed--that is, a law prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors in less quantities than fifteen gallons. the county i represented was largely in favor of the measure, and i voted for it, though i was by no means insensible to the agitation it was certain to produce. i had determined not to be a candidate for re-election, and therefore considered myself free to engage in the discussion which preceded the next election, and which, of course, mainly turned upon this law. among other things, i wrote a little pamphlet, entitled five letters to my neighbor smith, touching the fifteen-gallon jug, the main design of which was to persuade the people of massachusetts to make the experiment, and see whether such a restraint upon the sale of intoxicating drinks would not be beneficial. this was published anonymously, and my intention was to have the authorship remain unknown. it, however, had an enormous sale--a hundred thousand copies--in the course of a few months, and curiosity soon found me out. now in the village of jamaica plain i had a neighbor, though not by the name of smith--a rich liquor-dealer, who did his business in boston--a very respectable man, but a vehement opposer of the "fifteen-gallon law." as the election approached, the citizens of the state were drawn out in two parties--those in favor of prohibition on the one side, and the men in favor of free liquor on the other. my neighbor was the wealthiest, the most respectable, and the most influential of the latter. he insisted, that by "my neighbor smith" i meant him; and though i had said nothing disagreeable of that personage, but on the contrary, had drawn his portrait in very amiable colors, he held that it was a malicious personal attack. in vain did i deny the charge, and point to the fact that the residence, character, and qualities of my fictitious hero were inapplicable to him. anxious to be persecuted, he insisted upon it that he was persecuted. at the county convention, which took place some two months prior to this election, i declined being a candidate. the members present, however, clearly discerning the gathering storm, refused to release me, and i was forced to accept the nomination. the election was to take place on monday, in november. on the saturday previous there was issued in boston a pamphlet, entitled the cracked jug, a personal and political attack upon me, written with great malice and some ability. it was scattered, like snow-flakes, all over the country; and was, i suspect, the sunday reading of all the tipplers and taverners of the country. the bar-room critics esteemed it superior to anything which had appeared since the letters of junius, and, of course, considered me annihilated. on monday, election-day, my family were insulted in the streets of jamaica plain, and as i went into the town hall to cast my vote i heard abundance of gibes cast at me from beneath lowering beavers. the result was, that there was no choice of senators in the county. the election, when the people had thus failed to fill their places, fell upon the legislature, and i was chosen. the storm gradually passed away. the "fifteen-gallon law" was repealed, but it nearly overturned the whig party in the state, which, being in the majority, was made responsible for it. i deemed it necessary to reply to my neighbor smith's cracked jug, and he rejoined. what seemed at the time a deadly personal struggle, was, ere long, forgotten; neither party, i believe, carrying, in his character or his feelings, any of the scars inflicted during the battle. both had, in some sort, triumphed; both, in some sort, been beaten; both could, therefore, afford to return to the amicable relations of village neighborhood. in the autumn of the whigs nominated william henry harrison as the candidate for the presidency, in opposition to mr. van buren. he had held various civil and military trusts, in which he had displayed courage, wisdom, and patriotism. his personal character was eminently winning to the people, being marked with benevolence and simplicity. he had long retired from public life, and for several years had lived as a farmer on the "north bend" of the ohio, near cincinnati. the democrats ridiculed him as drinking hard cider and living in a log cabin. the masses, resenting this as coming from those who, having the government spoils, were rioting in the white house on champagne, took these gibes, and displayed them as their mottoes and symbols upon their banners. they gathered in barns, as was meet for the friends of the farmer of north bend, using songs and speeches as flails, threshing his enemies with a will. the spirit spread over mountain and valley, and in every part of the country men were seen leaving their customary employments to assemble in multitudinous conventions. many of these gatherings numbered twenty thousand persons. during this animated canvass i was not a candidate for office, yet i took part in the great movement, and made about a hundred speeches in massachusetts and connecticut. everybody, then, could make a speech, and everybody could sing a song. orators sprang up like mushrooms, and the gift of tongues was not more universal than the gift of music. from this period i have taken no active part in politics. in reviewing the past, while duly appreciating the honor conferred by the confidence bestowed upon me by the citizens who gave me their suffrages, i still regard my political career as an unprofitable, nay, an unhappy episode, alien to my literary position and pursuits, and every way injurious to my interests and my peace of mind. it gave me painful glimpses into the littleness, the selfishness, the utter quackery of a large portion of those politicians who lead, or seem to lead, the van of parties; and who, pretending to be guided by patriotism, are usually only using principles and platforms as means to carry them into office. as some compensation for this, it has also led me to a conviction that the great mass of the people are governed by patriotic motives, though even with these i have often noted curious instances in which the public interests were forgotten in a desire to achieve some selfish end. chapter xxviii. an appointed u.s. consul to paris--louis xviii.--a few jottings upon french notabilities--cure for hydrocephalus--unsettled state of things in paris. in the autumn of , i went with my family to paris, partly for literary purposes, and partly also to give my children advantages of education, which, in consequence of my absorbing cares for a series of years, they had been denied. here they remained for nearly two years, while i returned home to attend to my affairs, spending the winters, however, with them. toward the close of i removed to new york, to execute certain literary engagements. these completed, i went, in december , to washington, taking my family with me. here we remained for three months, when, having received the appointment of united states consul to paris, i returned to new york, and, after due preparation, sailed on the th of april, , to enter upon the official duties which thus devolved upon me. about the middle of april, , i arrived in paris, and soon after took charge of the consulate there. i have frequently been in this gay city, and i now propose to gather up my recollections of it, and select therefrom a few items which may fill up the blank that yet remains in my story. i first visited paris in january, , as i have told you. at the time i first arrived here, this city was very different from what it now is. louis xviii. was upon the throne, and had occupied it for nine years. during this period he had done almost nothing to repair the state of waste and dilapidation in which the allies had left it. these had taken down the statue of napoleon on the column of the place vendôme, and left its pedestal vacant; the king had followed up the reform and erased the offensive name of the exiled emperor from the public monuments, and put his own, louis xviii., in their place; he had caused a few churches to be repaired, and some pictures of the virgin to be painted and placed in their niches. but ghastly mounds of rubbish, the wrecks of demolished edifices; scattered heaps of stones at the foot of half-built walls of buildings,--destined never to be completed,--these and other unsightly objects were visible on every hand, marking the recent history of napoleon, overthrown in the midst of his mighty projects, and leaving his name and his works to be desecrated alike by a foreign foe and a more bitter domestic adversary. the king, louis xviii., was a man of good sense and liberal mind, for one of his race; but he was wholly unfit to administer the government. he was a sort of monster of obesity, and, at the time i speak of, having lost the use of his lower limbs, he could not walk, and was trundled about the palace of the tuileries in a wheelchair. i have often seen him let down in this, through the arch in the south-eastern angle of the palace, into his coach; and on returning from his ride, again taken up; and all this more like a helpless barrel of beef than a sovereign. had the allies intended to make legitimacy at once odious and ridiculous, they could not better have contrived it than by squatting down this obese imbecile extinguisher upon the throne of france, as the successor of napoleon! the parisians are, however, a philosophic race: as they could not help themselves, they did not spend their lives like children, in profitless poutings. they had their jokes, and among these, they were accustomed to call louis dix-huit, "_louis des huîtres_"--a tolerable pun, which was equivalent to giving him the familiar title of "oyster louis." deeming it their birthright to have three or four hours of pleasure every day, whoever may be in power, they still frequented the promenades, the boulevards, and the theatres. i cannot, perhaps, do better than transcribe a few passages from the hasty jottings i made at the time:-- "february .--went to a meeting of the société philomatique, composed of members of the institute; saw fourier, the famous geometrician and physician: thénard, a famous chemist, associated with gay-lussac: poisson, one of the first mathematicians in europe; and géoffroy st. hilaire, a zoologist, second only to cuvier. "the proceedings were conducted with order and simplicity, forming a striking contrast to the pompous declamation i heard in london, at the society of arts, upon hatching eggs. "february .--went to a meeting of the institute, held in the hôtel mazarin: one hundred and fifty members present; arago president. he is tall, broad-shouldered, and imposing in appearance, with a dark, swarthy complexion, and a black, piercing eye. lamarck, the famous writer on natural history--old, infirm, blind--was led in by another member, a distinguished entomologist, whose name i have forgotten: fontaine, the architect; tall, homely, and aged: gay-lussac, a renowned chemist, under forty, active, fiery in debate: cuvier, rather a large man, red face, eyes small, very near-sighted; eyes near together and oddly appearing and disappearing; features acute, hair grey, long, and careless: he spoke several times, and with great pertinency and effect; lacroix, the mathematician: laplace, the most famous living astronomer; tall, thin, and sharp-featured--reminded me of the portraits of voltaire; he is about seventy-five, feeble, yet has all his mental faculties. "the principal discussion related to gasometers, the police of paris having asked the opinion of the institute as to the safety of certain new kinds, lately introduced. the subject excited great interest, and the debate was quite animated. thénard, gay-lussac, girard, laplace, cuvier, and others, engaged in the debate. nearly all expressed themselves with great ease and even volubility. they were occasionally vehement, and when excited several spoke at once, and the president was obliged often to ring his bell to preserve order. "it was strange and striking to see so many old men, just on the borders of the grave, still retaining such ardor for science as to appear at a club like this, and enter with passion into all the questions that came up. such a spectacle is not to be seen elsewhere on the earth. the charms of science generally fade to the eye of threescore and ten: few passions except piety and avarice survive threescore. it is evident, in studying this association, that the highest and most ardent exercises of the mind are here stimulated by the desire of glory, which is the reward of success. one thing struck me forcibly in this assembly, and that was, the utter absence of all french foppery in dress among the members. their attire was plain black, and generally as simple as that of so many new england clergymen. "in the evening went to the théâtre français, to see talma in the celebrated tragedy of 'sylla,' by jouy. do not well understand the french, but could see that the acting is very masterly. in the passionate parts there was a display of vigor, but at other times the performance was quiet and natural, without any of the stage exaggeration i am accustomed to. most of the scenes were such as might actually take place under the circumstances indicated in the play. talma is said to resemble napoleon in person: he certainly looked very much like his portraits. his hair was evidently arranged to favor the idea of resemblance to the emperor. he is a very handsome man, and comes up to my idea of a great actor. "february .--went to see a new comedy by casimir delavigne, 'l'ecole des vieillards.' talma and mademoiselle mars played the two principal parts. the piece consisted of a succession of rather long dialogues, without any change of scenery. talma is inimitable in the character of a refined but somewhat imbecile man, who has passed the prime of life; and mademoiselle mars is, beyond comparison, the most graceful and pleasing of actresses. i am struck with the strict propriety, the refinement even, of the manners of the audience. "february st.--went to the hospital of la charité. saw laennec, with his pupils, visiting the patients. he makes great use of the stethoscope, which is a wooden tube applied to the body, and put to the ear; by the sound, the state of the lungs and the vital organs is ascertained. it is like a telescope, by which the interior of the body is perceived, only that the ear is used instead of the eye. it is deemed a great improvement. laennec is the inventor, and has high reputation in the treatment of diseases of the chest. he has learned to ascertain the condition of the lungs by thumping on the breast and back of the patient, and putting the ear to the body at the same time. "the whole hospital was neat and clean; bedsteads of iron. french medical practice very light; few medicines given; nursing is a great part of the treatment. "same day, went to hôtel dieu, a medical and surgical hospital. saw dupuytren and his pupils visiting the patients. he holds the very first rank as a surgeon. his operations are surprisingly bold and skilful. edward c----, of philadelphia, who is here studying medicine, told me a good anecdote of him. he has a notion that he can instantly detect hydrocephalus in a patient from the manner in which he carries his head. one day, while he was in the midst of his scholars at the hospital, he saw a common sort of man standing at a distance, among several persons who had come for medical advice. dupuytren's eye fell upon him, and he said to his pupils,--'do you see yonder that fellow that has his hand to his face, and carries his head almost on his shoulder? now, take notice: that man has hydrocephalus. come here, my good fellow!' "the man thus called came up. 'well,' said dupuytren, 'i know what ails you; but come, tell us about it yourself. what is the matter with you?' "'i've got the toothache!' was the reply. "'take that,' said dupuytren, giving him a box on the ear; 'and go to the proper department and have it pulled out!'" i was again in paris in the summer of . great changes had taken place since . louis xviii. was dead; charles x. had succeeded; and, after a brief reign, had been driven away by the revolution of the "three glorious days." louis philippe was now on the throne. on the th of july, and the two following days, we saw the celebration of the event which had thus changed the dynasty of france. it consisted of a grand fête, in the champs elysées, closed by a most imposing military spectacle, in which eighty thousand troops, extending from the arc de triomphe to the place vendôme, marched before the admiring throng. louis philippe was himself on horseback as commander-in-chief, and such was his popularity among the masses, that, in many instances, i saw men in blouses rush up and grasp his hand, and insist upon shaking it. sixteen years after i saw him hustled into a cab, and flying from the mob for his life--his family scattered, and he but too happy to get safe to england in the disguise of a sailor! as i have said, i established my family in paris in ; that winter and the following i was also there. i remember that on a certain monday in february, , i went up to see our countrywoman, the marchioness lavalette, to arrange with her about an introduction she had promised me to guizot. she was not at home, but as i was coming down the hill from the place st. george, i met her in her carriage. she asked me to walk back to her house, and i did so. i observed that she was much agitated, and asked her the cause. "we are going to have trouble!" said she. "i have just been to the chambers: the ministry have determined to stop the meeting of the liberals to-morrow; the proclamation is already being printed." "well, and what then?" said i. "another 'three glorious days!'" to this i replied that i conceived her fears groundless, that louis philippe appeared to me strong in the confidence of the people; that he was noted for his prudence and sagacity; that guizot, his prime minister, was a man of great ability; that the whole cabinet, indeed, were distinguished for their judgment and capacity. the lady shook her head and rejoined,-- "i know paris better than you do. we are on the eve of an earthquake!" soon after this i took my leave. what speedily ensued may best be told in another chapter, by a few extracts from a letter i addressed to a friend in boston at the time. chapter xxix. louis philippe and the revolution--list of grievances--the mob at the madeleine--barricades--"down with guizot!"--the fight commenced--flight of the king and queen--scene in the chamber of deputies--sack of the tuileries. paris, march th, . it may be well to state a few particulars as to the political condition of france at the moment of the revolt. louis philippe commenced his career under fair auspices, and for a time everything promised a happy fulfilment of what seemed his duty and his destiny. but by degrees a great change came over the monarch; the possession of power seduced his heart, and turned his head; and forgetting his pledges, and blind to his true interest, he set himself to building up a dynasty that should hand down his name and fame to posterity. it seemed, at a superficial glance, that he might realize his dream. he had acquired the reputation of being the most sagacious monarch of his time. he had improved and embellished the capital; on all sides his "image and superscription" were seen in connection with works of beauty and utility. france was happier than the adjacent countries. the famine and the pestilence, that had recently desolated neighboring states, had trod more lightly here. the king was blessed with a large family. these had all reached maturity, and were allied to kings and queens, princes and princesses. the upholders of the crown in the parliament were men whose names alone were a tower of strength. peace reigned at home, and the army abroad had just succeeded in achieving a signal triumph over an enemy that had baffled them for years. such was the outward seeming of affairs: but there were threatening fires within which might at any moment produce a conflagration. many thinking people were profoundly disgusted with the retrograde tendency of the government. although the march of despotism had been cautious and stealthy, the people generally began to feel the tyranny to which they had become subjected. among these grievances were the constant increase of the national debt, and consequent increase of taxation, with the restraints put upon the liberty of the press and of speech. by a law of some years' standing the people were prohibited from holding stated meetings of more than twenty persons without license; and _reform banquets_, or meetings for the discussion of public affairs--of which about seventy had been held in different parts of the kingdom within the last year--were now pronounced illegal by the ministry. finally, a determination to suppress one of them, about to be held in the twelfth ward of paris, was solemnly announced by the ministry in the chamber of deputies. it is material to bear in mind, that there are always in this metropolis at least one hundred thousand workmen who live from day to day upon their labor, and who, upon the slightest check to trade, are plunged into poverty, if not starvation. at the moment of which we are speaking, this immense body of men, with their families, were suffering sorely from the stagnation of business in the capital. there were not less than two hundred thousand persons who, for the space of three months, had hardly been able to obtain sufficient food to appease the cravings of hunger. how easy to stir up these people to rebellion!--how natural for them to turn their indignation against the king and his government! the "opposition" members seized the occasion now afforded them to excite these discontented masses against the ministry; and the latter, by their rashness, did more than their enemies to prepare the mind and set the match to the train. the crisis was now at hand. the "opposition" deputies declared their intention to attend the proposed meeting; and in spite of the threats of the ministry, the preparations for the banquet went vigorously on. a place was selected in the champs elysées, and a building was in progress of erection for the celebration. the programme of the same was announced; the toast for the occasion was published; the orator, o. barrot, selected. the day was fixed: an ominous day for tyranny, an auspicious one for human freedom. it was the d of february, the birthday of washington! whether it has received a new title to its place in the calendar of liberty, must be left for the decision of time. the evening of the st came, and then proclamations were issued, by the co-operation of the ministry and the police prohibiting the banquet. this act, though it had been threatened, still fell like a thunderbolt upon the people. it was known that an immense military force had been quietly assembled in paris and the vicinity--eighty thousand troops, with artillery and ample munitions--and that the garrisons around the tuileries had been victualled as if for a siege. but it had not been believed that an attempt to stifle the voice of the people, so bold as this, would really be made. yet such was the fact. the leaders of the "opposition" receded from their ground; and it was announced, in the papers of the d, that the banquet, being forbidden by the government, would not take place. the morning of this day was dark and drizzly. i had anticipated some manifestation of uneasiness, and at half-past nine o'clock went forth. groups of people were reading the proclamations posted up at the corners of the streets, but all was tranquil. i walked along the boulevards for a mile yet saw no symptoms of the coming storm. the designated place of meeting for the banquet was the square of the madeleine. this is at the western extremity of the boulevards, and near the great central square called the place de la concorde, a point communicating directly with the chamber of deputies, the champs elysées, the gardens of the tuileries, &c. at eleven o'clock, a.m., a dark mass was seen moving along the boulevards towards the proposed place of meeting. this consisted of thousands of workmen from the faubourgs. in a few moments the entire square of the madeleine was filled with these persons, dressed almost exclusively in their characteristic costume, which consists of a blue tunic, called _blouse_--a garment which is made very much in the fashion of our farmers' frocks. the opening scene of the drama had now begun. the mass rushed and eddied around the madeleine, which, by the way, is the finest church and the finest edifice in paris. such was the threatening aspect of the scene, that the shops were all suddenly shut, and the people around began to supply themselves, with bread and other food, for "three days." in a few moments the avalanche took its course down the rue royale, swept across the place de la concorde, traversed the bridge over the seine, and collected, in swelling and heaving masses, in the place, or square, before the chamber of deputies. this building is defended in front by a high iron railing. the gate of this was soon forced, and some hundreds of the people rushed up the long flight of steps, and, pausing beneath the portico, struck up the song of the "marseillaise"--a song, by the way, interdicted by law on account of its exciting character. the crowd here rapidly increased: shouts, songs, cries filled the air. east and west, along the quays, and through the streets behind the chamber, came long lines of students from the various schools. standing upon one of the pillars of the bridge, i commanded a view of the whole scene. it was one to fill the heart with the liveliest emotions. a hundred thousand people were now collected, seeming like an agitated sea, and sending forth a murmur resembling the voice of many waters. from the southern gate of the tuileries now issued two bodies of troops--one, on horseback, coming along the northern quay. these were the municipal guard, a magnificent corps, richly caparisoned, and nobly mounted. being picked men, and well paid, they were the chief reliance of the government, and for that very reason were hated by the people. the other body of troops were infantry of the line, and, crossing the pont royal, came along the southern bank of the river. both detachments approached the multitude, and crowding upon them with a slow advance, succeeded at last in clearing the space before the chamber. the greater part of the throng recrossed the bridge, and spread themselves over the place de la concorde. this square, perhaps the most beautiful in the world, is about five acres in extent. this vast area was now crowded with an excited populace, mainly of the working classes. their number constantly augmented, and bodies of troops, foot and horse, arrived from various quarters, till the square was literally covered. the number of persons here collected in one mass was over one hundred thousand. at the commencement, the mob amused themselves with songs and shouts; but in clearing the space before the chamber, and driving the people across the bridge, the guards had displayed great rudeness. they pressed upon the masses, and one woman was crushed to death beneath the hoofs of the horses. pebbles now began to be hurled at the troops from the square. dashing in among the people, sword in hand, the cavalry drove them away; but as they cleared one spot, another was immediately filled. the effect of this was to chafe and irritate the mob, who now began to seize sticks and stones, and hurl them in good earnest at their assailants. while this petty war was going on, some thousands of the rioters dispersed themselves through the champs elysées, and began to build barricades across the main avenue. the chairs, amounting to many hundreds, were immediately disposed in three lines across the street. benches, trellises, boxes, fences--every movable thing within reach--were soon added to the barricades. an omnibus passing by was captured, detached from the horses, and tumbled into one of the lines. the flag was taken from the panorama near by, and a vast procession paraded through the grounds, singing the "marseillaise," the "parisienne," and other patriotic airs. meanwhile, a small detachment of foot guards advanced to the scene of action; but they were pelted with stones, and took shelter in their guard-house. this was assailed with a shower of missiles, which rattled like hail upon its roof. the windows were dashed in, and a heap of brush near by was laid to the wall, and set on fire. a body of horse guards soon arrived, and dispersed the rioters; but the latter crossed to the northern side of the champs elysées, attacked another guard-house, and set it on fire. a company of the line came to the spot, but the mob cheered them, and they remained inactive. the revel proceeded, and, in the face of the soldiers, the people fed the fire with fuel from the surrounding trees and fences, sang their songs, cracked their jokes, and cried "down with guizot!" "vive la réforme!" &c. in these scenes the boys took the lead, performing the most desperate feats, and inspiring the rest by their intrepidity. a remarkable air of fun and frolic characterized the mob--jokes flew as freely on all sides as stones and sticks. such was the course of events the first day, so far as they fell under my own observation. it appears from the papers that similar proceedings, though in some cases of a more serious character, took place elsewhere. great masses of people gathered at various points. they made hostile demonstrations before the office of foreign affairs, crying out, "down with guizot!" some person called for the minister. "he is not here," said one; "he is with the countess lieven,"--a remark which the _habitués_ of paris will understand as conveying a keen satire. at other points a spirit of insubordination was manifested. bakers' shops were broken open, armories forced, and barricades begun. everywhere the hymn of the "marseillaise" and "mourir pour la patrie" were sung--often by hundreds of voices, and with thrilling effect. the rappel for calling out the national guard was beaten in several quarters. as night closed in, heavy masses of soldiery, horse and foot, with trains of artillery, were seen at various points. the place du carrousel was full of troops, and at evening they were reviewed by the king and the dukes of nemours and montpensier. six thousand soldiers were disposed along the boulevards from the madeleine to the porte st. martin. patrols were seen in different quarters during the whole night. about twelve tranquillity reigned over the city, disturbed only in a few remote and obscure places by the building of barricades, the arrest of rioters, and one or two combats, in which several persons were killed. such was the first day's work--the prelude to the drama about to follow. wednesday, the d, was fair, with dashes of rain at intervals, as in our april. i was early abroad, and soon noticed that companies of national guards were on duty. only regular troops had been called out the day before--a fact which showed the distrust of the national guards entertained by the king. this was remarked by the latter, and was doubtless one of the causes which hastened the destruction of the government. at nine o'clock i passed up the boulevards. most of the shops were shut, and an air of uneasiness prevailed among the people. at the porte st. denis there was a great throng, and a considerable mass of troops. barricades were soon after erected in the streets of st. denis, cléry, st. eustache, cadran, &c. several fusilades took place between the people at these points and the soldiers, and a number of persons were killed. some contests occurred in other quarters during the morning. at two o'clock the boulevards, the rues st. denis, st. martin, montmartre, st. honoré--in short, all the great thoroughfares--were literally crammed with people. bodies of horse and foot, either stationary or patrolling, were everywhere to be seen. it was about this time that some officers of the national guard ordered their men to fire, but they refused. in one instance four hundred national guards were seen marching, in uniform, but without arms. it became evident that the soldiers generally were taking part with the people. this news was carried to the palace, and count molé was called in to form a new ministry. he undertook the task, and orders were immediately given to spread the intelligence of this through the city. meanwhile the riot and revel went on in various quarters. the police were active, and hundreds of persons were arrested and lodged in prison. skirmishes took place, here and there, between the soldiers and the people; long processions were seen, attended by persons who sang choruses, and shouted "down with guizot!" "vive la réforme!" about four o'clock the news of the downfall of the guizot ministry was spread along the boulevards. the joyful intelligence ran over the city with the speed of light. it was everywhere received with acclamations. the people and the troops, a short time before looking at each other in deadly hostility, were seen shaking hands, and expressing congratulations. an immense population--men, women, and children--poured into the boulevards, to share in the jubilation. large parties of the national guard paraded the streets, the officers and men shouting "vive la réforme!" and the crowd cheering loudly. bands of five hundred to fifteen hundred men and boys went about making noisy demonstrations of joy. on being met by the troops, they divided to let them pass, and immediately resumed their cries and their songs. toward half-past six o'clock in the evening an illumination was spoken of, and many persons lighted up spontaneously. the illumination soon became more general, and the populace, in large numbers, went through the streets, calling, "light up!" numerous bands, alone or following detachments of the national guards, went about, shouting "vive le roi!" "vive la réforme!" and singing the "marseillaise." at many points, where barricades had been erected, and the people were resisting the troops, they ceased when they heard the news of the resignations, and the troops retired. "it is all over!" was the general cry; and a feeling of relief seemed to pervade every bosom. there can be no doubt that, but for a fatal occurrence which soon after took place, the further progress of the revolt might have been stayed. many wise people now say, indeed, that the revolution was all planned beforehand; they had foreseen and predicted it: and from the beginning of the outbreak everything tended to this point. the fact is unquestionably otherwise. the "opposition," with their various clubs and societies distributed through all classes in paris, and holding constant communication with the workmen or blousemen, no doubt stood ready to take advantage of any violence on the part of the government which might justify resistance; but they had not anticipated such a contingency on the present occasion. it is not probable that the molé ministry, had it been consummated, would have satisfied the people; but the king had yielded; guizot, the special object of hatred, had fallen, and it was supposed that further concessions would be made, as concession had begun. but accident, which often rules the fate of empires and dynasties, now stepped in to govern the course of events, and give them a character which should astonish the world. in the course of the evening a large mass of people had collected on the boulevard, in the region of guizot's office--the hôtel des affaires etrangères. the troops here had unfortunately threatened the people, by rushing at them with fixed bayonets, after the announcement of the resignation of the ministry, and when a good feeling prevailed among all classes. this irritated the mob, and was partly, no doubt, the occasion of the large gathering in this quarter. for some reason, not well explained, a great many troops had also assembled here and in the vicinity. at ten o'clock, the street from the madeleine to the rue de la paix was thronged with soldiers and people. there was, however, no riot and no symptom of disorder. at this moment a collection of persons, mostly young men, about sixty in number, came along the boulevard, on the side opposite to the soldiers and the foreign office. it is said that the colonel anticipated some attack, though nothing of the kind was threatened. it appears that the soldiers stood ready to fire, when one of their muskets went off, and wounded the commander's horse in the leg. he mistook this for a shot from the crowd, and gave instant orders to fire. a fusilade immediately followed. twenty persons fell dead, and forty were wounded. the scene which ensued baffles description. the immense masses dispersed in terror, and carried panic in all directions. the groans of the dying and the screams of the wounded filled the air. shops and houses around were turned into hospitals. "we are betrayed! we are betrayed!"--"revenge! revenge!" was the cry of the masses. from this moment the doom of the monarchy was sealed. the leaders of the clubs, no doubt, took their measures for revolution. an immense waggon was soon brought to the scene of the massacre; the dead bodies were laid on it, and flaring torches were lighted over it. the ghastly spectacle was paraded through the streets, and the mute lips of the corpses doubtless spoke more effectively than those of the living. large masses of people, pale with excitement and uttering execrations upon the murderers, followed in the train of the waggon, as it passed through the more populous streets of the city, and especially in those quarters inhabited by the lower classes. the effect was such as might have been anticipated. at midnight the barricades were begun, and at sunrise the streets of paris displayed a network of fortifications from the place st. george to the church of notre dame, which set the troops at defiance. more than a thousand barricades, some of them ten feet in height, were thrown up during that memorable night; yet such were the suddenness and silence of the operations, that most of the inhabitants of the city slept in security, fondly dreaming that the tempest had passed, and that the morning would greet them in peace. on thursday, the decisive day, the weather was still mild and without rain, though the sky was dimmed with clouds. at eleven in the morning i sallied forth. i cannot express my astonishment at the scene. the whole boulevard was a spectacle of desolation. from the rue de la paix to the rue montmartre--the finest part of paris, the glory of the city--every tree was cut down, all the public monuments reduced to heaps of ruins, the pavements torn up, and the entire wreck tumbled into a succession of barricades. every street leading into this portion of the boulevard was strongly barricaded. such giant operations seemed like the work of enchantment. but my wonder had only begun. at the point where the rue montmartre crosses the boulevard, the entire pavement was torn up, and something like a square breastwork was formed, in which a cannon was planted. the whole space around was crowded with the populace. as i stood for a moment surveying the scene, a young man, about twenty, passed through the crowd, and stepping upon the carriage of the cannon, cried out, "down with louis philippe!" the energy with which this was spoken sent a thrill through every bosom; and the remarkable appearance of the youth gave additional effect to his words. he was short, broad-shouldered, and full-chested. his face was pale, his cheek spotted with blood, and his head, without hat or cap, was bound with a handkerchief. his features were keen, and his deep-set eye was lit with a spark that seemed borrowed from a tiger. as he left the throng he came near me, and i said, inquiringly, "down with louis philippe?" "yes!" was his reply. "and what then?" said i. "a republic!" was his answer; and he passed on, giving the watchword of "down with louis philippe!" to the masses he encountered. this was the first instance in which i heard the overthrow of the king and the adoption of a republic proposed. in pursuing my walk, i noticed that the population were now abundantly supplied with weapons. on the two first days they were unarmed; but after the slaughter at the foreign office they went to all the houses and demanded weapons. these were given, for refusal would have been vain. an evidence of the consideration of the populace, even in their hour of wrath, is furnished by the fact, that in all cases where the arms had been surrendered, they wrote on the doors in chalk, "_armes données_"--arms given up; so as to prevent the annoyance of a second call. it might seem a fearful thing to behold a mob, such as that of paris, brandishing guns, fowling-pieces, swords, cutlasses, hatchets, and axes; but i must say that i felt not the slightest fear in passing among their thickest masses. some of them, who had doubtless never handled arms before, seemed a little jaunty and jubilant. the _gamins_--the leaders in riots, rows, and rebellions--were swarming on all sides, and seemed to feel a head taller in the possession of their weapons. i saw several of these unwashed imps strutting about with red sashes around the waist, supporting pistols, dirks, cutlasses, &c.; yet i must state that over the whole scene there was an air of good-breeding, which seemed a guarantee against insult or violence. i may also remark here, that during the whole three days i did not observe a scuffle or wrangle among the people; i did not hear an insulting word, nor did i see a menace offered, save in conflicts between the soldiers and the populace. i can add, that i did not see a drunken person during the whole period, with the single exception which i shall hereafter mention. i took a wide circuit in the region of the rue montmartre, the bourse, the rue vivienne, st. honoré, and the palais royal. everywhere there were enormous barricades and crowds of armed people. soon after--that is, about twelve o'clock--i passed the southern quadrangle of the palais royal, which, lately the residence of the brother of the king of naples, was now attacked and taken by the populace. the beautiful suite of rooms was richly furnished, and decorated with costly pictures, statues, bronzes, and other specimens of art. these were unsparingly tumbled into the square and the street, and consigned to the flames. at the distance of one hundred and fifty feet from the front of the palais royal was the château d'eau, a massive stone building occupied as a barrack, and at this moment garrisoned by one hundred and eighty municipal guards. in most parts of the city, seeing that the troops fraternized with the people, the government had given them orders not to fire. these guards, however, attacked the insurgents in and about the palais royal. their fire was returned, and a desperate conflict ensued. the battle lasted for more than an hour, the people rushing in the very face of the muskets, of the guard, as they blazed from the grated windows. at last the barrack was set on fire, and the guard yielded, though not till many of their number had fallen, and the rest were nearly dead with suffocation. the château d'eau is now a mere ruin, its mottled walls giving evidence of the shower of bullets that had been poured upon it. no sooner had the château d'eau surrendered, than the flushed victors took their course towards the tuileries, which was near at hand; shouting, singing, roaring, they came like a surge, bearing all before them. the place du carrousel was filled with troops; but not a sword was unsheathed--not a bayonet pointed--not a musket or a cannon fired. there stood, idle and motionless, the mighty armament which the king had appointed for his defence. how vain had his calculations proved! for, alas! they were founded in a radical error. the soldiers would not massacre their brethren, to sustain a throne which they now despised. but we must now enter the tuileries. for several days previous to the events we have described, some anxiety had been entertained by persons in and about the palace. the king, however, had no fears. he appeared in unusual spirits; and, if any intimation of danger was given, he turned it aside with a sneer or a joke. even so late as wednesday, after he had called upon count molé to form a new ministry, he remarked that he was so "firmly seated in the saddle, that nothing could throw him off." molé soon found it impossible, with the materials at hand, to construct a ministry. thiers was then called in; and, after a long course of higgling and chaffering on the part of the king, it was agreed that he and barrot should undertake to carry on the government. this was announced by them in person, as they rode through the streets on thursday morning. these concessions, however, came too late. the cry for a republic was bursting from the lips of the million. the abdication of the king was decreed, and a raging multitude were demanding this at the very gates of the palace. overborne by the crisis, the king agreed to abdicate in favor of the duke de nemours. some better tidings were brought him, and he retracted what he had just done. a moment after it became certain that the insurgents would shortly burst into the palace. in great trepidation, the king agreed to resign the crown in favor of his grandson, the young count de paris; yet, still clinging to the hope, he shuffled and hesitated before he would put his name to the act of abdication. this, however, was at last done, and the king and queen, dressed in black, and accompanied by a few individuals who remained faithful in this trying moment, passed from the tuileries to the place de la concorde, through the subterranean passage constructed many years previously for the walks of the infant king of rome. they here entered a small, one-horse vehicle, and, after a rapid and successful flight, landed safely at dover, in england. meanwhile, the mob had seized the royal carriages, fourteen in number, and made a bonfire of them, near the celebrated arch in the place du carrousel. soon after, they forced the railing at several points, and came rushing across the square toward the palace. scarcely had the various members of the royal family time to escape on one side of the building, when the mob broke in at the other. i have not time to follow the adventures of these several individuals. we cannot but sympathize with them in their misfortunes; but we may remark, that the fall of the orleans dynasty was not broken by a single act of courage or dignity on the part of any one of the family. their flight seemed a vulgar scramble for mere life. even the king was reduced to the most common place disguises--the shaving of his whiskers, the change of his dress, the adopting an "alias!" i may add here, that they have all escaped; and while everybody seems glad of this, there is no one behind who mourns their loss. none are more loud in denouncing the besotted confidence of the king than his two hundred and twenty-five purchased deputies, who were so loyal in the days of prosperity. a short time after the king and queen had passed the place de la concorde i chanced to be there. in a few moments odillon barrot appeared from the gate of the tuileries, and, followed by a long train of persons, proceeded to the chamber of deputies. it was now understood that the king had abdicated, and that thiers and barrot were to propose the count de paris as king, under the regency of his mother, the duchess of orleans. the most profound emotion seemed to occupy the immense multitude. all were hushed into silence by the rapid succession of astonishing events. after a short space the duchess of orleans, with her two sons, the count de paris and the duke de chartres, were seen on foot coming toward the chamber, encircled by a strong escort. she was dressed in deep mourning, her face bent to the ground. she moved across the bridge, and passing to the rear of the building, entered it through the gardens. shortly after this the duke de nemours, attended by several gentlemen on horseback, rode up, and also entered the building. the scene that ensued within is said to have presented an extraordinary mixture of the solemn and the ludicrous. the duchess being present, barrot proceeded to state the abdication of the king, and to propose the regency. it was then that lamartine seemed to shake off the poet and philosopher, and suddenly to become a man of action. seizing the critical moment, he declared his conviction that the days of monarchy were numbered; that the proposed regency was not suited to the crisis; and that a republic alone would meet the emergency and the wishes of france. these opinions, happily expressed and strenuously enforced, became decisive in their effect. several other speeches were made, and a scene of great confusion followed. a considerable number of the mob had broken into the room, and occupied the galleries and the floor. one of them brought his firelock to his shoulder, and took aim at m. sauzet, the president. entirely losing his self-possession, he abdicated with great speed, and disappeared. in the midst of the hubbub a provisional government was announced, and the leading members were named. some of the more obnoxious deputies were aimed at by the muskets of the mob, and skulking behind benches and pillars, they oozed out at back-doors and windows. a blouseman came up to the duke de nemours, who drew his sword. the man took it from him, broke it over his knee, and counselled his highness to depart. this he did forthwith, having borrowed a coat and hat for the purpose of disguise. a call was made for the members of the provisional government to proceed to the hôtel de ville. the assembly broke up, and the curtain fell upon the last sitting of the chamber of deputies--the closing scene of louis philippe's government. it was about three o'clock in the afternoon that i retraced my steps toward the tuileries. the place de la concorde was crowded with soldiers, and fifty cannon were ranged in front of the gardens. yet this mighty force seemed struck with paralysis. long lines of infantry stood mute and motionless, and heavy masses of cavalry seemed converted into so many statues. immediately before the eyes of those soldiers was the palace of the tuileries in full possession of the mob, but not a muscle moved for their expulsion! passing into the gardens, i noticed that thousands of persons were spread over their surface, and a rattling discharge of fire-arms was heard on all sides. looking about for the cause of this, i perceived that hundreds of men and boys were amusing themselves with shooting sparrows and pigeons, which had hitherto found a secure resting-place in this favorite resort of leisure and luxury. others were discharging their muskets for the mere fun of making a noise. proceeding through the gardens, i came at last to the palace. it had now been, for more than an hour, in full possession of the insurgents. all description fails to depict a scene like this. the whole front of the tuileries, one-eighth of a mile in length, seemed gushing at doors, windows, balconies, and galleries, with living multitudes--a mighty beehive of men, in the very act of swarming. a confused hubbub filled the air, and bewildered the senses with its chaotic sounds. at the moment i arrived the throne of the king was borne away by a jubilant band of revellers; and, after being paraded through the streets, was burned at the place de la bastille. i entered the palace, and passed through the long suites of apartments devoted to occasions of ceremony. a year before i had seen these gorgeous halls filled with the flush and the fair--kings, princes, and nobles--gathered to this focal point of luxury, refinement, and taste from every quarter of the world. how little did louis philippe, at that moment, dream of "coming events!" how little did the stately queen--a proud obelisk of silk, and lace, and diamonds--foresee the change that was at hand! i recollected well the effect of this scene upon my own mind, and felt the full force of the contrast which the present moment offered. in the very room where i had seen the pensive and pensile princess de joinville and the duchess de montpensier--the latter then fresh from the hymeneal altar, her raven hair studded with diamonds like evening stars--whirling in the mazy dance, i now beheld a band of creatures like calibans, gambolling to the song of the "marseillaise!" on every side my eye fell upon scenes of destruction. passing to the other end of the palace, i beheld a mob in the chambers of the princesses. some rolled themselves in the downy beds, others anointed their shaggy heads with choice pomatum, exclaiming, "dieu! how sweet it smells!" one of the _gamins_, grimed with gunpowder, blood, and dirt, seized a tooth-brush, and placing himself before a mirror, seemed delighted at the manifest improvement which he produced upon his ivory. on leaving the palace, i saw numbers of the men drinking wine from bottles taken from the well-stocked cellars. none of them were positively drunk. to use the words of "tam o'shanter," "they were na fou, but just had plenty"--perhaps a little more. they flourished their guns and pistols, brandished their swords, and performed various antics, but they offered no insult to any one. they seemed in excellent humor, and made more than an ordinary display of french _politesse_. they complimented the women, of whom there was no lack; and one of them, resembling a figure of pan, seized a maiden by the waist, and both rigadooned merrily over the floor. leaving this scene of wreck, confusion, and uproar, i proceeded toward the gate of the gardens leading into the rue de rivoli. i was surprised to find here a couple of ruthless-looking blousemen, armed with pistols, keeping guard. on inquiry, i found that the mob themselves had instituted a sort of government. one fellow, in the midst of the devastation in the palace, seeing a man put something into his pocket, wrote on the wall, "death to thieves!" the draconian code was immediately adopted by the people, and became the law of paris. five persons, taken in acts of robbery, were shot down by the people, and their bodies exposed in the streets, with the label of "thief" on their breast. thus order and law seemed to spring up from the instincts of society, in the midst of uproar and confusion, as crystals are seen shooting from the chaos of the elements. three days had now passed, and the revolution was accomplished. the people soon returned to their wonted habits; the provisional government proceeded in its duties; the barricades disappeared; and in a single week the more obtrusive traces of the storm that had passed had vanished from the streets and squares of paris. chapter xxx. after the revolution--"funeral of the victims"--the constituent assembly--paris in a state of siege--cavaignac--louis napoleon chosen president. it is not my design to enter into the history of the revolution in detail, but i may sketch a few of the prominent events which followed. for this purpose, i make an extract from an account i have elsewhere given:-- for several weeks and months paris was a scene of extraordinary excitement. the provisional government had announced that they would provide the people with labor. consequently, deputations of tailors, hatters, engravers, musicians, paviors, cabinet-makers, seamstresses, and a multitude of other trades and vocations, flocked in long lines to the hôtel de ville to solicit the favor of the government. vast crowds of people perpetually haunted this place, and, in one instance, a raging multitude came thundering at the doors, demanding that the blood-red flag of the former revolution should be the banner of the new republic! it was on this occasion that lamartine addressed the people, and with such eloquence as to allay the storm which threatened again to deluge france in blood. the members of the government were so besieged and pressed by business, that for several weeks they slept in the hôtel de ville. they proceeded with a bold hand to announce and establish the republic. in order to make a favorable impression upon the people, they decreed a gorgeous ceremony at the foot of the column of july, on sunday, february th, by which they solemnly inaugurated the new republic. all the members of the provisional government were present on horseback; there were sixty thousand troops and two hundred thousand people to witness the spectacle. another still more imposing celebration took place on the th of march. this was called the "funeral of the victims." after religious ceremonies at the madeleine, the members of the government, with a long train of public officers and an immense _cortège_ of military, proceeded to the july column, conducting a superb funeral-car, drawn by eight cream-colored horses. this contained most of the bodies of those slain in the revolution--about two hundred and fifty. these were deposited in the vault of the column, with the victims of the revolution of . nothing can adequately portray this spectacle. a tri-colored flag was stretched on each side of the boulevards, from the madeleine to the july column--a distance of three miles. as this consisted of three strips of cloth, the length of the whole was eighteen miles! the solemn movement of the funeral procession, the dirge-like music, the march of nearly a hundred thousand soldiers, and the sympathizing presence of three hundred thousand souls, rendered it a scene never surpassed and rarely equalled, either by the magnificence of the panorama or the solemn and touching sentiments excited. still other spectacles succeeded; and in the summer four hundred thousand people assembled in the champs elysées to witness the presentation of flags to the assembled national guards, eighty thousand being present. such scenes can only be witnessed in paris. events proceeded with strange rapidity. a constituent assembly was called by the provisional government to form a constitution. the members were elected by ballot, the suffrage being universal--that is, open to all frenchmen over twenty-one. the election took place in april, and on the th of may the first session was held, being officially announced to the assembled people from the steps of the chamber of deputies. on the th of may a conspiracy was disclosed, the leaders of which were raspail, barbès, sobrier, caussidière, blanqui, flotte, albert, and louis blanc--the two last having been members of the provisional government. caussidière was prefect of police. the assembly proceeded in the work of framing a constitution, administering the government in the mean time. on the th of june a terrific insurrection broke out, promoted by the leaders of various factions, all desiring the overthrow of the republic which had been inaugurated. cavaignac, who was minister of war, was appointed dictator, and paris was declared in a state of siege. the insurgents confined their operations chiefly to the faubourgs of st. jacques and st. antoine. they got possession of these, and formed skilful and able plans of operation, which had for their ultimate object the surrounding of the city and getting possession of certain important points, including the chamber--thus securing the government in their own hands. cavaignac proceeded to attack the barricades, thus clearing the streets one by one. the fighting was terrible. for four days the battle continued, the sound of cannon frequently filling the ears of the people all over the city. night and day the inhabitants were shut up in their houses, ignorant of all, save that the conflict was raging. the women found employment in scraping lint for the wounded. all paris was a camp. the windows were closed; the soldiers and sentinels passed their watchwords; litters, carrying the dead and wounded, were borne along the streets; the tramp of marching columns and the thunder of rushing cavalry broke upon the ear! at last the conflict was over; the insurgents were beaten--cavaignac triumphed. but the victory was dearly purchased. between two and three thousand persons were killed, and among them no less than seven general officers had fallen. the insurgents fought like tigers. many women were in the ranks, using the musket, carrying the banners, rearing barricades, and cheering the fight. boys and girls mingled in the conflict. the national guards who combated them had equal courage and superior discipline. one of the garde mobile--hyacinthe martin, a youth of fourteen--took four standards from the tops of the barricades. his gallantry excited great interest, and cavaignac decorated him with the cross of the legion of honor. he became a hero of the day; but--sad to relate!--being invited to fêtes, banquets, and repasts, his head was turned, and he was soon a ruined profligate. the leaders in this terrific insurrection were never detected. it is certain that the movement was headed by able men, and directed by skilful engineers. the masses who fought were roused to fury by poverty and distress--by disappointment at finding the national workshops discontinued, and by stimulating excitements furnished by socialist clubs and newspapers. it is computed that forty thousand insurgents were in arms, and eighty thousand government soldiers were brought against them. it may be considered that this struggle was the remote but inevitable result of the course of the provisional government in adopting the doctrine of obligation, on the part of the state, to supply work and wages to the people, and in establishing national workshops in pursuance of this idea. still, it may be said, on the other hand, that nothing but such a step could have enabled the provisional government to maintain itself during three months, and give being to an organized assembly from which a legitimate government could proceed. the constitution was finished in the autumn, and promulgated on the th of november, . on the th of december following, the election of president took place, and it appeared that louis napoleon bonaparte had five million out of seven million votes. he was duly inaugurated about a week after the election, and entered upon the high duties which thus devolved upon him. chapter xxxi. the author's duties as consul--aspect of things in paris--louis napoleon's designs--the nd of december, --the new reign of terror complete--louis napoleon as emperor--out of office--return to new york--conclusion. i now come to the period of , when i entered upon the consulate. of the space during which i was permitted to hold this office i have no very remarkable personal incidents to relate. the certifying of invoices, and the legalizing of deeds and powers of attorney, are the chief technical duties of the american consul at paris. if he desires to enlarge the circle of his operations, however, he can find various ways of doing it. as, for instance, in supplying the wants of distressed poles, hungarians, italians, and others, who are martyrs to liberty, and suppose the american heart and purse always open to those who are thus afflicted; in answering questions from notaries, merchants, lawyers, as to the laws of the different american states upon marriage, inheritance, and the like; in advising emigrants whether to settle in iowa, or illinois, or missouri, or texas; in listening to inquiries made by deserted wives as to where their errant husbands may be found, who left france ten, or twenty, or thirty years ago, and went to america, by which is generally understood st. domingo or martinique. a considerable business may be done in lending money to foreigners, who pretend to have been naturalized in the united states, and are, therefore, entitled to consideration and sympathy: it being, of course, well understood that money lent to such persons will never be repaid. some time and cash may also be invested in listening to the stories and contributing to the wants of promising young american artists, who are striving to get to italy to pursue their studies--such persons usually being graduates of the london school of artful dodgers. some waste leisure and a good deal of postage may be disposed of in correspondence with ingenious americans, inventors and discoverers: as, for instance, with a man in arkansas or minnesota, who informs you that he has contrived a new and infallible method of heating and ventilating european cities, and wishes it brought to the notice of the authorities there, it being deemed the duty of the american consul to give attention to such matters. these monotonies are occasionally diversified by a letter from some unfortunate fellow-countryman who is detained at mazas or clichy, and begs to be extricated; or some couple who wish to be put under the bonds of wedlock; or some enterprising wife, all the way from tennessee, in chase of a runaway husband; or some inexperienced but indignant youth who has been fleeced by his landlord. such are the duties which devolve upon the american consul at paris, the incidents alluded to having come under my notice while i was there in that capacity. i must now speak of certain public events which transpired at that period, and which will ever be regarded as among the most remarkable in modern history. i have told you how louis napoleon, in consequence of the revolution of , became president of the republic. when i arrived in paris, in april, , he was officiating in that capacity, his residence being the little palace of the elysée bourbon, situated between the faubourg st. honoré and the champs elysées. the national assembly, consisting of seven hundred and fifty members, held their sessions at the building called the chamber of deputies. the government had been in operation somewhat over two years. to the casual observer, the external aspect of things was not very different from what it had been under the monarchy of louis philippe. it is true that the palace of the tuileries was vacant; no royal coaches were seen dashing through the avenues; the public monuments everywhere proclaimed "liberty, equality, fraternity." but still, the streets were filled with soldiers as before. armed sentinels were stationed at the entrances of all the public buildings. the barracks were, as usual, swarming with soldiers, and large masses of horse and foot were training at the champ de mars and at satory. martial reviews and exercises were, indeed, the chief amusement of the metropolis. the president's house was a palace, and all around it was bristling with bayonets. it was obvious that, whatever name the government might bear, military force lay at the bottom of it; and if to-day this might be its defence, to-morrow it might also be its overthrow. it is now ascertained that louis napoleon, from the beginning, had his mind fixed upon the restoration of the empire. in accepting the presidency of the republic, and even in swearing fidelity to the constitution, he considered himself only as mounting the steps of the imperial throne. in order to prepare the nation for the revolution which he meditated, louis napoleon caused agitating and alarming rumors to be circulated of a terrible plot, planned by the democrats, republicans, and socialists of france, the object of which was to overturn the whole fabric of society, to destroy religion, to sweep away the obligations of marriage, to strip the rich of their property, and make a general distribution of it among the masses. other conspiracies, having similar designs, were said to exist in all the surrounding countries of europe, and the time was now near at hand when the fearful explosion would take place. the police of france, subject to the control and direction of the president, were instructed to discover evidences of this infernal plot, and they were so successful, that the public mind was filled with a vague but anxious apprehension that society was reposing upon a volcano, which might soon burst forth and overwhelm the whole country in chaos. the national assembly acted in a manner to favor these schemes of the presidents. they were divided into four or five factions, and spent their time chiefly in angry disputes and selfish intrigues. a portion of them were monarchists; and, though they had acquired their seats by pledges of devotion to the republic, they were now plotting its overthrow; a part being for the restoration of the orleanists, and a part for the bourbons. another faction was for louis napoleon, and actively promoted his schemes. by the constitution he was ineligible for a second term, and his friends were seeking the means of overcoming the difficulty, and giving him a re-election, by fair means or foul. the liberals were divided into several shades of opinion--some being republicans, after the model of general cavaignac; some being democrats, like victor hugo; and some socialists, after the fashion of pierre leroux. in such a state of things there was a vast deal of idle debate, while the substantial interests of the country seemed, if not totally forgotten, at least secondary to the interests of parties, and the passions and prejudices of individuals. i remember that on a certain monday evening, the st of december, , i was present at the elysée, and was then first introduced to louis napoleon. i found him to be an ordinary-looking person, rather under size, but well formed, and with a dull expression of countenance. the room was tolerably full, the company consisting, as is usual in such cases, of diplomats, military officers, and court officials, with a sprinkling of citizens, in black coats. i was forcibly struck by the preponderance of soldiers in the assembly, and i said several times to my companions that it seemed more like a camp than a palace. the whole scene was dull; the president himself appeared preoccupied, and was not master of his usual urbanity; general magnan walked from room to room with a ruminating air, occasionally sending his keen glances around, as if searching for something which he could not find. there was no music--no dancing. that gayety which almost always pervades a festive party in paris was wholly wanting. there was no ringing laughter--no merry hum of conversation. i noticed all this, but i did not suspect the cause. at eleven o'clock the assembly broke up, and the guests departed. at twelve, the conspirators, gathered for their several tasks, commenced their operations. about four in the morning the leading members of the assembly were seized in their beds, and hurried to prison. troops were distributed at various points, so as to secure the city. when the light of day came, proclamations were posted at the corners of the streets, announcing to the citizens that the national assembly was dissolved; that universal suffrage was decreed; that the republic was established! such was the general unpopularity of the assembly, that the first impression of the people was that of delight at its overthrow. throughout the first day the streets of paris were like a swarming hive, filled with masses of people, yet, for the most part, in good-humor. the second day they had reflected, and began to frown, but yet there was no general spirit of revolt. a few barricades were attempted, but the operators were easily dispersed. the third day came; and although there was some agitation among the masses, there was evidently no preparation, no combination for general resistance. as late as ten o'clock in the forenoon i met one of the republicans whom i knew, and asked him what was to be done. his reply was,-- "we can do nothing; our leaders are in prison; we are bound hand and foot. i am ready to give my life at the barricades, if with the chance of benefit; but i do not like to throw it away. we can do nothing!" soon after this i perceived heavy columns of troops--some four thousand men--marching through the rue de la paix, and then proceeding along the boulevards towards the port st. denis. these were soon followed by a body of about a thousand horse. i was told that similar bodies were moving to the same point through other avenues of the city. in a short time the whole boulevard, from the rue de la paix to the place de la bastille, an extent of two miles, was filled with troops. my office was on the boulevard des italiens, and was now fronted by a dense body of lancers, each man with his cocked pistol in his hand. except the murmur of the horses' hoofs, there was a general stillness over the city. the side-walks were filled with people; and though there was no visible cause for alarm, yet there was still a vague apprehension which cast pallor and gloom upon the faces of all. suddenly a few shots were heard in the direction of the boulevard montmartre, and then a confused hum, and soon a furious clatter of hoofs. a moment after, the whole body of horse started into a gallop, and rushed by as if in flight; presently they halted, however, wheeled slowly, and gradually moved back, taking up their former position. the men looked keenly at the houses on either side, and pointed their pistols threateningly at all whom they saw at the windows. it afterward appeared, that when the troops had been drawn out in line and stationed along the boulevard, some half-dozen shots were fired into them from the tops of buildings and from windows: this created a sudden panic; the troops ran, and, crowding upon others, caused the sudden movement i have described. in a few moments the heavy, sickening sound of muskets came from the porte st. denis. volley succeeded volley, and after some time the people were seen rushing madly along the pavements of the boulevard, as if to escape. the gate of our hôtel was now closed, and, at the earnest request of the throng that had gathered for shelter in the court of the hôtel, i put out the "stars and stripes"--the first and last time that i ever deemed it necessary. the dull roar of muskets, with the occasional boom of cannon, continued at intervals for nearly half-an-hour. silence at last succeeded, and the people ventured into the streets. about four in the afternoon i walked for a mile along the boulevard. the pavements were strewn with the fragments of shattered windows, broken cornices, and shivered doorways. many of the buildings, especially those on the southern side of the street, were thickly spattered with bullet-marks, especially around the windows. one edifice was riddled through and through with cannon-shot. frequent spots of blood stained the sidewalk, and along the boulevard montmartre, particularly around the doorways, there were pools like those of the shambles; it being evident that the reckless soldiers had shot down in heaps the fugitives who, taken by surprise, strove to obtain shelter at the entrances of the hôtels upon the street. the morning came, and the triumph of the reign of terror was complete. what was enacted in paris was imitated all over france. nearly every department was declared in a state of siege; revolt was punished with death, and doubt or hesitation with imprisonment. forty thousand persons were hurried to the dungeons, without even the form or pretence of trial. all over the country the press was silenced, as it had been in paris; save only a few obsequious prints, which published what was dictated to them. these declared that all this bloodshed and violence were the necessary result of the socialist conspiracy, which threatened to overturn society; happily, as they contended, louis napoleon, like a beneficent providence, had crushed the monster, and he now asked the people to ratify what he had done, by making him president for ten years. in the midst of agitation, delusion, and panic, the vote was taken, and louis napoleon was elected by a vote of eight millions of suffrages! the nominal republic thus established soon gave way to the empire; the president reached the imperial throne, and now stands before the world as napoleon iii.! since his acquisition of a throne louis napoleon has conducted the government with ability, and he has certainly been seconded by fortune. he married a lady who has shed lustre upon her high position by her gentle virtues and gracious manners. he engaged in the eastern war, and triumphed. he has greatly improved and embellished the capital, and made paris the most charming city in the world: nowhere else does life seem to flow on so cheerfully and so tranquilly as here. he has gradually softened the rigors of his government; and though some noble spirits still pine in exile, he has taken frequent advantage of opportunity to diminish the number. the people of france, at the present time, appear to be satisfied with the government, and, no doubt, a large majority, could the question be proposed to them, would vote for its continuance. * * * * * in the summer of , i was politely advised from the state department that president pierce had appointed my successor in the consulate. thus, having held the place a little over two years, on the st of august, , i was restored to the privileges of private-citizen life. as i had various engagements which forbade me immediately to leave france, i hired a small house at courbevoie, which i made my residence till my departure for america. in the autumn of i set out with my family for a short tour in italy. in all my wanderings i had never visited this famous country; and as i was not likely ever to have another opportunity, i felt it to be a kind of duty to avail myself of a few unappropriated weeks to accomplish this object. after visiting florence, rome, and naples, we returned to paris. tarrying there for a short time, for the purpose of seeing the international exhibition of , we finally left europe in october, and in the next month found a new home in new york. * * * * * i have now come to my farewell. leave-takings are in general somewhat melancholy, and it is best to make them as brief as possible. mine shall consist of a single train of thought, and that suggestive of cheerful rather than mournful feelings. like a traveller approaching the end of his journey, i naturally cast a look backward, and surveying the monuments which rise up in the distance, seek to estimate the nature and tendency of the march of events which i have witnessed, and in which i have participated. one general remark appears to me applicable to the half century over which my observation has extended; which is, that everywhere there has been improvement. i know of no department of human knowledge, no sphere of human inquiry, no race of men, no region of the earth, where there has been retrogression. on the whole, the age has been alike fruitful in discovery, and in the practical, beneficial results of discovery. science has advanced with giant strides; and it is the distinguishing characteristic of modern science that it is not the mere toy of the philosopher, nor the hidden mystery of the laboratory, but the hard-working servant of the manufactory, the workshop, and the kitchen. on every hand are the evidences of improvement. what advances have been made in agriculture; in the analysis of soils, the preparation of manures, the improvement of implements, from the spade to the steam-reaper; in the manufacture of textile fabrics by the inventions of jacquard and others in weaving, and innumerable devices in spinning; in the working of iron--cutting, melting, moulding, rolling, shaping it like dough, whereby it is applied to a thousand new uses; in commerce and navigation, by improved models of ships, improved chronometers, barometers, and quadrants--in chain-pumps and wheel-rudders; in printing, by the use of the steam-press, throwing off a hundred thousand impressions instead of two thousand in a day; in microscopes, which have revealed new worlds in the infinity of littleness, as well as in telescopes, which have unfolded immeasurable depths of space before hidden from the view. how has travelling been changed, from jolting along at the rate of six miles an hour over rough roads in a stage-coach, to putting one's self comfortably to bed in a steamboat and going fifteen miles an hour; or sitting down in a railway-carriage to read a novel, and before you have finished it to find yourself two hundred miles away! and in the moral world, the last fifty years appear to me to have shown an improvement, if not as marked, yet as certain and positive, as in the material world. everywhere, as i believe, the standard of humanity is more elevated than before. if in some things, with the increase of wealth and luxury, we have degenerated, on the whole there has been an immense advance, as well in technical morals as in those large humanities which aim at the good of all mankind. in looking at the political condition of our country, there are no doubt threatening clouds in the sky and mutterings of ominous thunders in the distance. i have, however, known such things before; i have seen the country shaken to its centre by the fierce collision of parties, and the open assaults of the spirit of disunion. but these dangers passed away. within my memory, the states of the union have been doubled in number, and the territory of the union has been trebled in extent. this i have seen; and as such has been the fact, so may be, and so i trust will be, the future. farewell! chapter xxxii. the death of peter parley. _from the london welcome guest._ friend of my youth! delightful instructor of my early days! thou kindly soul, who labored so patiently to expand my unopened mind, and inspire it with a becoming interest in the world in which it had but lately awakened! benevolent traveller, who led my innocence gently by the hand through all the countries of the earth, and chatted intelligibly with me of their strangely varying customs, their wonderful histories, their diverse climates, and productions, and capacities! thou that, in the first budding of my young ideas, pointed out to me the glories of the starry night, and the marvels of the vasty deep; that couldst sympathize with my untaught childhood, and adapt thy immeasurable learning to its little wants, and powers, and likings, and intertwine thy omniscient narrative with absorbing adventures that enthralled its whole soul, and thrilled its wondering bosom, and upraised the hairs that as yet but thinly covered its tender pate! may my right hand forget its cunning, thou large-hearted benefactor, if i permit thee to pass away into hades all unheralded! that stingy paragraph in a print that is read to-day and handed into oblivion to-morrow, is no meed worthy of thee, peter parley. thou meritest a more bounteous memorial. thy name is known far and wide; and countless eyes, as they read in these pages that thou hast entered the land of shadows, shall be dimmed with grateful recollection. if it may be allowed a copy of the welcome guest to journey beyond the postal arrangements of this world, and to meet the disembodied eyes of the other one, i wish that the concession may be made to this current number, and that it may be placed in peter parley's hands, as he sits in honor amid his new fellows. then shall his gentle shade rejoice to know that we, his children, who used to gather around his knees, so to say, when he was still in the flesh, many long years since, are not ungrateful for his care of us, but cherish a most fond remembrance of it! it was but last may the hand that had written so pleasantly and so usefully grew chill, and the pen fell from its unnerved grasp. no fresh travels of peter parley shall we have reported to us. whatever his journeyings may not be--however weirdly novel, and thrilling, and strange--we cannot hope for any record of them. no sojourner in that land has ever yet returned to give us his account of it. no pencillings by the way, no fine descriptions of landscape or people, no notes of its ways and manners, ever reach us from the other side of the dividing river. so peter parley will observe and record for us never again. which of peter parley's numerous writings did you give the preference to, my reader? there was a capital story about a sailor boy in the _tales of the sea_, if you remember. to me that young crusoe endeared the whole volume. i confess the facts with which every page was stored have escaped me somewhat; but oh! how well i recollect the sailor boy! do you remember that picture which served as the frontispiece of the _tales of the stars_? there was old peter himself, with a crowd of us--his curly-headed darlings--all round him. the stars, if my memory serves me, are shining with unwonted brightness upon the interesting group, and upon a celestial globe which occupies the left side of the scene. if my memory serves me, i say; but ay me! the lapse of many years has much impaired it, i fear, and the vision i call before me of that primeval period, is somewhat a broken and fragmentary one. i cannot stay to mention all the members of the library with which peter parley and our governess, acting with a sweet consent, supplied us. there were some pleasant passages in the _tales of animals_. i still vividly remember the panther and the lion, which appeared upon that stage. i cannot say why i remember them above all others, any more than i can say why many things connected with my early youth have remained in my memory, whilst a thousand other incidents of equal importance have vanished utterly from it. all i know is, that i especially remember the panther and the lion in mr. parley's famous zoological work. but, in my opinion, peter parley's most triumphant effusion--his _chef d'oeuvre_--the work on which his fame will undoubtedly rest in the judgment of an admiring posterity of infants--the _ne plus ultra_ of his great powers, in which the astonishing grace of his style reaches its highest perfection, and his knowledge is surpassed only by the facility and the kindliness with which he imparts it--his crowning effort is--need i name it? shall i not be accused of penning truisms? of course i mean his _travels through europe, asia, africa, and america_. let that be a red-lettered day in my calendar when i entered upon those travels. blessed be the dear maternal hand that gave them to me! once more, standing by _her_ side--the kind hand the while, i doubt not, smoothing my roughened locks, the gentle tongue patiently helping my tardy utterance--i spell out the opening chapters. gather round me now, o pleasant company, into which i was then introduced. be seated again at thy round table, o parley! with those delightful guests around thee, and let me listen to thy wonderful stories. be present with me, ye shades. if, o pluto! thou hast them in thy keeping, i pray thee to grant them a brief furlough, that i may know them once more. come, o jenkins! bravest of men; come in that pea-green jacket, in which thou presentest thyself to the astonished parley at the end of the travels in europe. 'tis a bleak night, and parley, resting by his blazing fire from all his continental labors, thinks, good soul! of his absent friends, and of course of thee, jenkins. presently a knock is heard at the door, and parley, answering it--he kept no lounging john thomases in his unostentatious establishment--beholds a pea-green jacket. enters the jacket, and shakes itself. wonders the simple parley, not having the remotest idea, you know, who this intruding garment is. can it be?--yes of course, it is--jenkins. is not that a grand _denouement_? i say the recognition of orestes by electra, in the greek play, so much bragged about by the scholiasts and that lot, is not fit to hold a candle to it, to speak metaphorically. is it not jenkins that i see in asia, defending himself stoutly, in the midst of an arid plain, against a mounted arab? the child of the desert is urging his barb straight upon the brave fellow. hard by may be seen a small fire of sticks, which our hungry but injudicious friend has kindled, with a view to cooking him a mutton chop, or some such dainty. my wishes are for thy welfare, jenkins! my blessings on thy valor, incomparable man! that is leo, i think, that i see in such a heartrending condition on board, or rather on the boards of yonder wreck, while the omnipresent genius of peter parley is being tossed in wave-blankets some little way off. yes, i know him; that _is_ leo. parley, the chivalrous parley, saves his life upon that occasion, and earns his lasting gratitude. i doubt whether leo's character will bear investigation; he comes to great grief in the end. but i like him for his grateful services to his deliverer; and i like him for the mysterious air there is about him, and for his thrilling adventures. he wanders all over the world in a black mantle, nobody knows why; at least i do not, and have no desire to know. i suppose he found a secret satisfaction in roaming everywhere inside that cloak, and that is enough for me. there are three pictures in the whole work that i feel an intense interest in; and one has to do with leo. it is when he escapes from that prison built into the lake; just as the prisoner of chillon would have been overjoyed to escape, had he had the knack and vigor of our hero. the particular scene of the act which the delightful artist (what was _his_ name? which are his pictures in the national gallery?) has been good enough to delineate, is our jack shepherd holding on to his prison-window by the only remaining bar. of course he is accompanied by the cloak, which the breezes of the night are swelling into a globular form. some dozen feet below the cloak, sparkles in the moonlight the water, into which the fugitive proposes to drop, as soon as the artist has done with him. 'tis a dismal prospect for thee, leo. may the daughters of the lake bear up thy chin! i have a fond belief that he is not to be drowned at present. we are only in asia now, and we shall want him many a time yet in the other two quarters. who is that sailor i see crouching on that bank? above his head is a most truculent-looking tiger; below him is an infuriated crocodile. do you talk to me of dramatic effect, aristarchus, in those tomes you are always maudling over? i defy you and your tribe, sirrah, to produce me a situation so breath-stopping, so blood-chilling, so every way effective, as the opening scene of asia. that is a good hit in the winter's tale, by a play-wright called shakspeare, when "exit antigonus, pursued by a bear." but can it be compared--i appeal to all unprejudiced infants--with that first chapter of our second expedition? was ever a mortal in so dire an extremity? scylla and charybdis, to my mind, are a joke to it. but parley rescues him, and without any of your _dei ex machina_; though, if there ever was a knot that seemed to require a deity's fingers for its unravelling, this surely was it. of course, he rescues him; for it is not parley's way, whatever other people may do, to hurl his valiant souls prematurely into hades, and make them a prey to dogs and vultures. i have said that there were three pictures in the travels that especially entranced me, and i have mentioned one of them. now for the other two. the first represents the famous parley himself, the english herodotus, playing with a spider in that unwholesome dungeon at tripoli. poor parley! he had his little troubles now and then. there can be no doubt that he is in a tremendous scrape at this time. but his genial temper is unruffled; he makes friends at once with his tiny fellow-tenant, and i dare say is, even now, meditating some tales of insects for your and my benefit. he reminds me rather of goldsmith, making observations for his history of the earth and animated nature. there is the same innocence, the same benignity, the same childish look of innocence about him. i have no doubt the spider is become much attached to him. i lisp out my good wishes for thee, thou even-minded captive. i place my small palm upon thy unkempt head, and bless thee. we are not kept long in suspense about him. a night soon arrives when leo's cloak insinuates itself into his cell, and a voice is heard in its folds saying, "follow me," and parley follows, even as st. peter followed the angel, and they reach a wharf, and fire a pistol, and a boat pulls in to the shore, and they embark in it, and parley is once more a free man, and addresses himself afresh to his travels. my last wood-cut portrays this indefatigable wanderer a second time oppressed by the hard fates. he is in america this time, and by some misfortune (a great good fortune to me and to you, my young brethren and sisters of the nursery) has been made the prey of an indian tribe. _me miserum!_ the savages have tied him to a tree. there are those hands that have guided that immortal pen through europe, asia, and africa, corded stringently to a _triste lignum_ in america! there he stands, denuded of his raiment, and with a writhing expression all over him; for the sportive innocents of the tribe are amusing their leisure hours by shooting their youthful arrows at him. yes; they are making a target of poor p. p. o! my fellow-students, think what this great heart suffers for us! during all that agony he is gathering information for our benefit, is writing for us another incomparable chapter, is taking stock of yonder wigwams. but the page is growing indistinct before me, and i hear voices saluting me from the nursery, not as a child, but as a veteran. can it be? no; impossible! and peter parley and his brave company recede mournfully to their land, wherever it is, and my hair is a trifle grey, or that mirror lies. farewell, my good peter. fare ye well, my stout jenkins, my mysterious leo, and all ye other fine fellows. i rejoice to have met you once more, and to have spent a pleasant hour with you, and talked over our old companionship. the end. * * * * * transcriber's notes: obvious typographical errors have been repaired. _underscores_ surround italicized text. p. : words surrounded <as shown here> are transliterated from the greek script. produced from scanned images of public domain material from the internet archive.) _english men of letters_ _prescott_ [illustration: image of the book's cover] _english men of letters_ william hickling prescott by harry thurston peck new york the macmillan company london: macmillan & co., ltd. _all rights reserved_ copyright, , by the macmillan company. set up and electrotyped. published may, . norwood press j. s. cushing & co.--berwick & smith co. norwood, mass., u.s.a. to william archibald dunning _amicitiÆ causa_ prefatory note for the purely biographical portion of this book an especial acknowledgment of obligation is due to the valuable collection of prescott's letters and memoranda made by his friend george ticknor, and published in as part of ticknor's _life of w. h. prescott_. all other available sources, however, have been explored, and are specifically mentioned either in the text or in the footnotes. h. t. p. columbia university, march , . contents chapter i page the new england historians chapter ii early years chapter iii the choice of a career chapter iv success chapter v in mid career chapter vi the last ten years chapter vii "ferdinand and isabella"--prescott's style chapter viii "the conquest of mexico" as literature and as history chapter ix "the conquest of peru"--"philip ii." chapter x prescott's rank as an historian index _prescott_ william hickling prescott chapter i the new england historians throughout the first few decades of the nineteenth century, the united states, though forming a political entity, were in everything but name divided into three separate nations, each one of which was quite unlike the other two. this difference sprang partly from the character of the population in each, partly from divergent tendencies in american colonial development, and partly from conditions which were the result of both these causes. the culture-history, therefore, of each of the three sections exhibits, naturally enough, a distinct and definite phase of intellectual activity, which is reflected very clearly in the records of american literature. in the southern states, just as in the southern colonies out of which they grew, the population was homogeneous and of english stock. almost the sole occupation of the people was agriculture, while the tone of society was markedly aristocratic, as was to be expected from a community dominated by great landowners who were also the masters of many slaves. these landowners, living on their estates rather than in towns and cities, caring nothing for commerce or for manufactures, separated from one another by great distances, and cherishing the intensely conservative traditions of that england which saw the last of the reigning stuarts, were inevitably destined to intellectual stagnation. the management of their plantations, the pleasures of the chase, and the exercise of a splendid though half-barbaric hospitality, satisfied the ideals which they had inherited from their tory ancestors. horses and hounds, a full-blooded conviviality, and the exercise of a semi-feudal power, occupied their minds and sufficiently diverted them. such an atmosphere was distinctly unfavourable to the development of a love of letters and of learning. the southern gentleman regarded the general diffusion of education as a menace to his class; while for himself he thought it more or less unnecessary. he gained a practical knowledge of affairs by virtue of his position. as for culture, he had upon the shelves of his library, where also were displayed his weapons and the trophies of the chase, a few hundred volumes of the standard essayists, poets, and dramatists of a century before. if he seldom read them and never added to them, they at least implied a recognition of polite learning and such a degree of literary taste as befitted a virginian or carolinian gentleman. but, practically, english literature had for him come to an end with addison and steele and pope and their contemporaries. the south stood still in the domain of letters and education. not that there were lacking men who cherished the ambition to make for themselves a name in literature. there were many such, among whom gayarré, beverly, and byrd deserve an honourable remembrance; but their surroundings were unfavourable, and denied to them that intelligent appreciation which inspires the man of letters to press on to fresh achievement. an interesting example is found in the abortive history of virginia undertaken by dr. william stith, who was president of william and mary college, and who possessed not only scholarship but the gift of literary expression. the work which he began, however, was left unfinished, because of an utter lack of interest on the part of the public for whom it had been undertaken. dr. stith's own quaint comment throws a light upon contemporary conditions. he had laboured diligently in collecting documents which represented original sources of information; yet, when he came to publish the first and only volume of his history, he omitted many of them, giving as his reason:-- "i perceive, to my no small surprise and mortification, that some of my countrymen (and those too, persons of high fortune and distinction) seemed to be much alarmed, and to grudge, that a complete history of their own country would run to more than one volume, and cost them above half a pistole. i was, therefore, obliged to restrain my hand, ... for fear of enhancing the price, to the immense charge and irreparable damage of such generous and publick-spirited gentlemen."[ ] the southern universities were meagrely attended; and though the sons of wealthy planters might sometimes be sent to oxford or, more usually, to princeton or to yale, the discipline thus acquired made no general impression upon the class to which they belonged. in fact, the intellectual energy of the south found its only continuous and powerful expression in the field of politics. to government and statesmanship its leading minds gave much attention, for only thus could they retain in national affairs the supremacy which they arrogated to themselves and which was necessary to preserve their peculiar institution. hence, there were to be found among the leaders of the southern people a few political philosophers like jefferson, a larger number of political casuists like calhoun, and a swarm of political rhetoricians like patrick henry, hayne, legaré, and yancey. but beyond the limits of political life the south was intellectually sterile. so narrowing and so hostile to liberal culture were its social conditions that even to this day it has not produced a single man of letters who can be truthfully described as eminent, unless the name of edgar allan poe be cited as an exception whose very brilliance serves only to prove and emphasise the rule. in the middle states, on the other hand, a very different condition of things existed. here the population was never homogeneous. the english royalists and the dutch in new york, the english quakers and the germans in pennsylvania and the swedes in delaware, made inevitable, from the very first, a cosmopolitanism that favoured variety of interests, with a resulting breadth of view and liberality of thought. manufactures flourished and foreign commerce was extensively pursued, insuring diversity of occupation. the two chief cities of the nation were here, and not far distant from each other. wealth was not unevenly distributed, and though the patroon system had created in new york a landed gentry, this class was small, and its influence was only one of many. comfort was general, religious freedom was unchallenged, education was widely and generally diffused. the large urban population created an atmosphere of urbanity. even in colonial times, new york and philadelphia were the least provincial of american towns. they attracted to themselves, not only the most interesting people from the other sections, but also many a european wanderer, who found there most of the essential graces of life, with little or none of that combined austerity and rawness which elsewhere either disgusted or amused him. we need not wonder, then, if it was in the middle states that american literature really found its birth, or if the forms which it there assumed were those which are touched by wit and grace and imagination. franklin, frozen and repelled by what he thought the bigotry of boston, sought very early in his life the more congenial atmosphere of philadelphia, where he found a public for his copious writings, which, if not precisely literature, were, at any rate, examples of strong, idiomatic english, conveying the shrewd philosophy of an original mind. charles brockden brown first blazed the way in american fiction with six novels, amid whose turgid sentences and strange imaginings one may here and there detect a touch of genuine power and a striving after form. washington irving, with his genial humour and well-bred ease, was the very embodiment of the spirit of new york. even professor barrett wendell, whose critical bias is wholly in favour of new england, declares that irving was the first of american men of letters, as he was certainly the first american writer to win a hearing outside of his own country. and to these we may add still others,--freneau, from whom both scott and campbell borrowed; cooper, with his stirring sea-tales and stories of indian adventure; and bryant, whose early verses were thought to be too good to have been written by an american. and there were also drake and halleck and woodworth and paine, some of whose poetry still continues to be read and quoted. the mention of them serves as a reminder that american literature in the nineteenth century, like english literature in the fourteenth, found its origin where wealth, prosperity, and a degree of social elegance made possible an appreciation of belles-lettres. far different was it in new england. there, as in the south, the population was homogeneous and english. but it was a puritan population, of which the environment and the conditions of its life retarded, and at the same time deeply influenced, the evolution of its literature. one perceives a striking parallel between the early history of the people of new england and that of the people of ancient rome. each was forced to wrest a living from a rugged soil. each dwelt in constant danger from formidable enemies. the roman was ready at every moment to draw his sword for battle with faliscans, samnites, or etruscans. the new englander carried his musket with him even to the house of prayer, fearing the attack of pequots or narragansetts. the exploits of such half-mythical roman heroes as camillus and cincinnatus find their analogue in the achievements credited to miles standish and the doughty captain church. early rome knew little of the older and more polished civilisation of greece. new england was separated by vast distances from the richer life of europe. in rome, as in new england, religion was linked closely with all the forms of government; and it was a religion which appealed more strongly to men's sense of duty and to their fears, than to their softer feelings. the roman gods needed as much propitiation as did the god of jonathan edwards. when a great calamity befell the roman people, they saw in it the wrath of their divinities precisely as the true new englander was taught to view it as a "providence." in both commonwealths, education of an elementary sort was deemed essential; but it was long before it reached the level of illumination. like influences yield like results. the roman character, as moulded in the republic's early years, was one of sternness and efficiency. it lacked gayety, warmth, and flexibility. and the new england character resembled it in all of these respects. the historic worthies of old rome would have been very much at ease in early massachusetts. cato the censor could have hobnobbed with old josiah quincy, for they were temperamentally as like as two peas. it is only the romans of the empire who would have felt out of place in a new england environment. horace might conceivably have found a smiling _angulus terrarum_ somewhere on the lower hudson, but he would have pined away beside the nashua; while to ovid, beacon street would have seemed as ghastly as the frozen slopes of tomi. and when we compare the native period of roman literature with the early years of new england's literary history, the parallel becomes more striking still. in new england, as in rome, beneath all the forms of a self-governing and republican state, there existed a genuine aristocracy whose prestige was based on public service of some sort; and in new england, as in rome, public service had in it a theocratic element. in civil life, the most honourable occupation for a free citizen was to share in this public service. hence, the disciplines which had a direct relation to government were the only civic disciplines to be held in high consideration. such an attitude profoundly affected the earliest attempts at literature. the two literary or semi-literary pursuits which have a close relation to statesmanship are oratory and history--oratory, which is the statesman's instrument, and history, which is in part the record of his achievements. therefore, at rome, a line of native orators arose before a native poet won a hearing, and therefore, too, the annalists and chroniclers precede the dramatists. in new england it was much the same. almost from the founding of the massachusetts bay colony, there were men among the colonists who wrote down with diffusive dulness the records of whatever they had seen and suffered. governor william bradford composed a history of new england; and thomas prince, minister of the old south church, compiled another work of like title, described by its author as told "in the form of annals." hutchinson prepared a history of massachusetts bay; and many others had collected local traditions, which seemed to them of great moment, and had preserved them in books, or else in manuscripts which were long afterwards to be published by zealous antiquarians. cotton mather's curious _magnalia_, printed in , was intended by its author to be history, though strictly speaking it is theological and is clogged with inappropriate learning,--latin, greek, and hebrew. the parallel between early rome and early massachusetts breaks down, however, when we consider the natural temperament of the two peoples as distinct from that which external circumstances cultivated in them. underneath the sternness and severity which were the fruits of puritanism, there existed in the new england character a touch of spirituality, of idealism, and of imagination such as were always foreign to the romans. under the repression of a grim theocracy, new england idealism still found its necessary outlet in more than one strange form. we can trace it in the hot religious eloquence of edwards even better than in the imitative poetry of mrs. bradstreet. it is to be found even in such strange panics as that which shrieked for the slaying of the salem "witches." time alone was needed to bring tolerance and intellectual freedom, and with them a freer choice of literary themes and moods. the new england temper remained, and still remains, a serious one; yet ultimately it was to find expression in forms no longer harsh and rigid, but modelled upon the finer lines of truth and beauty. the development was a gradual one. the new england spirit still exacted sober subjects of its writers. and so the first evolution of new england literature took place along the path of historical composition. the subjects were still local or, at the most, national; but there was a steady drift away from the annalistic method to one which partook of conscious art. in the writings of jared sparks there is seen imperfectly the scientific spirit, entirely self-developed and self-trained. his laborious collections of historical material, and his dry but accurate biographies, mark a distinct advance beyond his predecessors. here, at least, are historical scholarship and, in the main, a conscientious scrupulosity in documentation. it is true that sparks was charged, and not quite unjustly, with garbling some of the material which he preserved; yet, on the whole, one sees in him the founder of a school of american historians. what he wrote was history, if it was not literature. george bancroft, his contemporary, wrote history, and was believed for a time to have written it in literary form. to-day his six huge volumes, which occupied him fifty years in writing, and which bring the reader only to the inauguration of washington, make but slight appeal to a cultivated taste. the work is at once too ponderous and too rhetorical. still, in its way, it marks another step. up to this time, however, american historians were writing only for a restricted public. they had not won a hearing beyond the country whose early history they told. their themes possessed as yet no interest for foreign nations, where the feeble american republic was little known and little noticed. the republican experiment was still a doubtful one, and there was nothing in the somewhat paltry incidents of its early years to rivet the attention of the other hemisphere. "america" was a convenient term to denote an indefinite expanse of territory somewhere beyond seas. a london bishop could write to a clergyman in new york and ask him for details about the work of a missionary in newfoundland without suspecting the request to be absurd. the british war office could believe the river bronx a mighty stream, the crossing of which was full of strategic possibilities. as for the american people, they interested europe about as much as did the boers in the days of the early treks. even so acute an observer as talleyrand, after visiting the united states, carried away with him only a general impression of rusticity and bad manners. when napoleon asked him what he thought of the americans, he summed up his opinion with a shrug: _sire, ce sont des fiers cochons et des cochons fiers_. tocqueville alone seems to have viewed the nascent nation with the eye of prescience. for the rest, petty skirmishes with indians, a few farmers defending a rustic bridge, and a somewhat discordant gathering of planters, country lawyers, and drab-clad tradesmen held few suggestions of the picturesque and, to most minds, little that was significant to the student of politics and institutional history. there were, however, other themes, american in a larger sense, which contained within themselves all the elements of the romantic, while they closely linked the ambitions of old europe with the fortunes and the future of the new world. the narration of these might well appeal to that interest which the more sober annals of england in america wholly failed to rouse. there was the story of new france, which had for its background a setting of savage nature, while in the foreground was fought out the struggle between englishmen and frenchmen, at grips in a feud perpetuated through the centuries. there was the story of spanish conquest in the south,--a true romance of chivalry, which had not yet been told in all its richness of detail. to choose a subject of this sort, and to develop it in a fitting way, was to write at once for the old world and the new. the task demanded scholarship, and presented formidable difficulties. the chief sources of information were to be found in foreign lands. to secure them needed wealth. to compare and analyse and sift them demanded critical judgment of a high order. and something more was needed,--a capacity for artistic presentation. when both these gifts were found united in a single mind, historical writing in new england had passed beyond the confines of its early crudeness and had reached the stage where it claimed rank as lasting literature. rightly viewed, the name of william hickling prescott is something more than a mere landmark in the field of historical composition. it signalises the beginning of a richer growth in new england letters,--the coming of a time when the barriers of a puritan scholasticism were broken down. prescott is not merely the continuator of sparks. he is the precursor of hawthorne and parkman and lowell. he takes high rank among american historians; but he is enrolled as well in a still more illustrious group by virtue of his literary fame. chapter ii early years to the native-born new englander the name of prescott has, for more than a century, possessed associations that give to it the stamp of genuine distinction. those who have borne it have belonged of right to the true patriciate of their commonwealth. the prescotts were from the first a fighting race, and their men were also men of mind; and, according to the times in which they lived, they displayed one or the other characteristic in a very marked degree. the pioneer among them on american soil was john prescott, a burly puritan soldier who had fought under cromwell, and who loved danger for its own sake. he came from lancashire to massachusetts about twenty years after the landing of the _mayflower_, and at once pushed off into the unbroken wilderness to mark out a large plantation for himself in what is now the town of lancaster. a half-verified tradition describes him as having brought with him a coat of mail and a steel helmet, glittering in which he often terrified marauding indians who ventured near his lands. his son and grandson and his three great-grandsons all served as officers in the military forces of massachusetts; and among the last was colonel william prescott, who commanded the american troops at bunker hill. later, he served under the eye of washington, who personally commended him after the battle of long island; and he took part in the defeat of burgoyne at saratoga--a success which brought the arms of france to the support of the american cause. in times of peace as well, the prescotts were men of light and leading. their names are found upon the rolls of the massachusetts general court, of the governor's council in colonial days, of the continental congress, and of the state judiciary. one of them, oliver prescott, a brother of the revolutionary warrior, who had been bred as a physician, made some elaborate researches on the subject of that curious drug, ergot, and embodied his results in a paper of such value as to attract the notice of the profession in europe. it was translated into french and german, and was included in the _dictionnaire des sciences médicales_--an unusual compliment for an american of those days to receive. most eminent of all the prescotts in civil life, however, before the historian won his fame, was william prescott,--the family names were continually repeated,--whose career was remarkable for its distinction, and whose character is significant because of its influence upon his illustrious son. william prescott was born in , and, after a most careful training, entered harvard, from which he was graduated in . admitted to the bar, he won high rank in his profession, twice receiving and twice declining an appointment to the supreme court of the state. his widely recognised ability brought him wealth, so that he lived in liberal fashion, in a home whose generous appointments and cultivated ease created an atmosphere that was rare indeed in those early days, when narrow means and a crude provincialism combined to make new england life unlovely. prescott was not only an able lawyer, the worthy compeer of dexter, otis, and webster--he was a scholar by instinct, widely read, thoughtful, and liberal-minded in the best sense of the word. his intellectual conflicts with such professional antagonists as have just been named gave him mental flexibility and a delightful sanity; and though in temperament he was naturally of a serious turn, he had both pungency and humour at his command. no more ideal father could be imagined for a brilliant son; for he was affectionate, generous, and sympathetic, with a knowledge of the world, and a happy absence of puritan austerity. he had, moreover, the very great good fortune to love and marry a woman dowered with every quality that can fill a house with sunshine. this was catherine hickling, the daughter of a prosperous boston merchant, afterward american consul in the azores. as a girl, and indeed all through her long and happy life, she was the very spirit of healthful, normal womanhood,--full of an irrepressible and infectious gayety, a miracle of buoyant life, charming in manner, unselfish, helpful, and showing in her every act and thought the promptings of a beautiful and spotless soul. it was of this admirably mated pair that william hickling prescott, their second son, was born, at salem, on the th of may, . the elder prescott had not yet acquired the ample fortune which he afterward possessed; yet even then his home was that of a man of easy circumstances,--one of those big, comfortable, new england houses, picturesquely situated amid historic surroundings.[ ] here young prescott spent the first twelve years of his life under his mother's affectionate care, and here began his education, first at a sort of dame school, kept by a kindly maiden lady, miss mehitable higginson, and then, from about the age of seven, under the more formal instruction of an excellent teacher, mr. jacob newman knapp, quaintly known as "master knapp." it was here that he began to reveal certain definite and very significant traits of character. the record of them is interesting, for it shows that, but for the accident which subsequently altered the whole tenor of his life, he might have grown up into a far from admirable man, even had he escaped moral shipwreck. many of his natural traits, indeed, were of the kind that need restraint to make them safe to their possessor, and in these early years restraint was largely lacking in the life of the young prescott, who, it may frankly be admitted, was badly spoiled. his father, preoccupied in his legal duties, left him in great part to his mother's care, and his mother, who adored him for his cleverness and good looks, could not bear to check him in the smallest of his caprices. he was, indeed, peculiarly her own, since from her he had inherited so much. by virtue of his natural gifts, he was, no doubt, a most attractive boy. handsome, like his father, he had his mother's vivacity and high spirits almost in excess. quick of mind, imaginative, full of eager curiosity, and with a tenacious memory, it is no wonder that her pride in him was great, and that her mothering heart went out to him in unconscious recognition of a kindred temperament. but his school companions, and even his elders, often found these ebullient spirits of his by no means so delightful. the easy-going indulgence which he met at home, and very likely also the recognised position of his father in that small community, combined to make young prescott wilful and self-confident and something of an _enfant terrible_. he was allowed to say precisely what he thought, and he did invariably say it on all occasions and to persons of every age. in fact, he acquired a somewhat unenviable reputation for rudeness, while his high spirits prompted him to contrive all sorts of practical jokes--a form of humour which seldom tends to make one popular. moreover, though well-grown for his age, he had a distaste for physical exertion, and took little or no part in active outdoor games. naturally, therefore, he was not particularly liked by his school companions, while, on the other hand, he attained no special rank in the schoolroom. although he was quick at learning, he contented himself with satisfying the minimum of what was required--a trait that remained very characteristic of him for a long time. of course, there is no particular significance in the general statement that a boy of twelve was rude, mischievous, physically indolent, and averse to study. yet in prescott's case these qualities were somewhat later developed at a critical period of his life, and might have spoiled a naturally fine character had they not been ultimately checked and controlled by the memorable accident which befell him a few years afterward. in , the elder prescott suffered from a hemorrhage from the lungs which compelled him for a time to give up many of his professional activities. five years after this he removed his home to boston, where the practice of his profession would be less burdensome, and where, as it turned out, his income was very largely increased. the change was fortunate both for him and for his son; since, in a larger community, the boy came to be less impressed with his own importance, and also fell under an influence far more stimulating than could ever have been exerted by a village schoolmaster. the rector of trinity church in boston, the rev. dr. john s. gardiner, was a gentleman of exceptional cultivation. as a young man he had been well trained in england under the learned dr. samuel parr, a latinist of the ciceronian school. he was, besides, a man possessing many genial and very human qualities, so that all who knew him felt his personal fascination to a rare degree. he had at one time been the master of a classical school in boston and had met with much success; but his clerical duties had obliged him to give up this occupation. thereafter, he taught only a small number of boys, the sons of intimate friends in whom he took a special and personal interest. his methods with them were not at all those of a typical schoolmaster. he received his little classes in the library of his home, and taught them, in a most informal fashion, english, greek, and latin. he resembled, indeed, one of those ripe scholars of the renaissance who taught for the pure love of imparting knowledge. much of his instruction was conveyed orally rather than through the medium of text-books; and his easy talk, flowing from a full mind, gave interest and richness to his favourite subjects. such teaching as this is always rare, and it was peculiarly so in that age of formalism. to the privilege of dr. gardiner's instruction, young prescott was admitted, and from it he derived not only a correct feeling for english style, but a genuine love of classical study, which remained with him throughout his life. it may be said here that he never at any time felt an interest in mathematics or the natural sciences. his cast of mind was naturally humanistic; and now, through the influence of an accomplished teacher, he came to know the meaning and the beauty of the classical tradition. under gardiner, prescott's indifference to study disappeared, and he applied himself so well that he was rapidly advanced from elementary reading to the study of authors so difficult as Æschylus. his biographer, mr. ticknor, who was his fellow-pupil at this time, has left us some interesting notes upon the subject of prescott's literary preferences. it appears that he enjoyed sophocles, while horace "interested and excited him beyond his years." the pessimism of juvenal he disliked, and the crabbed verse of persius he utterly refused to read. under private teachers he studied french, italian, and spanish,--a rather unusual thing for boys at that time,--and he reluctantly acquired what he regarded as the irreducible minimum of mathematics. it was decided that he should be fitted to enter the sophomore class in harvard, and to this end he devoted his mental energies. like most boys, he worked hardest upon those studies which related to his college examination, viewing others as more or less superfluous. he did, however, a good deal of miscellaneous reading, opportunities for which he found in the boston athenæum. this institution had been opened but a short time before, and its own collection of books, which to-day numbers more than two hundred thousand, was rather meagre; but in it had been deposited some ten thousand volumes, constituting the private library of john quincy adams, who was then holding the post of american minister to russia. at a time when book-shops were few, and when books were imported from england with much difficulty and expense, these ten thousand volumes seemed an enormous treasure-house of good reading. prescott browsed through the books after the fashion of a clever boy, picking out what took his fancy and neglecting everything that seemed at all uninteresting. yet this omnivorous reading stimulated his love of letters and gave to him a larger range of vision than at that time he could probably have acquired in any other way. it is interesting to note the fact that his preference was for old romances--the more extravagant the better--and for tales of wild and lawless adventure. an especial favourite with him was the romance of _amadis de gaule_, which he found in southey's somewhat pedestrian translation, and which appealed intensely to prescott's imagination and his love of the fantastic. his other occupations were decidedly significant. his most intimate friend at this time was william gardiner, his preceptor's son; and the two boys were absolutely at one in their tastes and amusements. both of them were full of mischief, and both were irrepressibly boisterous, playing all sorts of tricks at evening in the streets, firing off pistols, and in general causing a good deal of annoyance to the sober citizens of boston. in this they were like any other healthy boys,--full of animal spirits and looking for "fun" without any especial sense of responsibility. something else, however, is recorded of them which seems to have a real importance, as revealing in prescott, at least, some of those mental characteristics which in his after life were to find expression in his serious work. the period was one when the thoughts of all men were turned to the napoleonic wars. the french and english were at grips in spain for the possession of the peninsula. wellington had landed in portugal and, marching into spain, had flung down the gage of battle, which was taken up by soult, masséna, and victor, in the absence of their mighty chief. the american newspapers were filled with long, though belated, accounts of the brilliant fighting at ciudad rodrigo, almeida, and badajoz; and these narratives fired the imagination of prescott, whose eagerness his companion found infectious, so that the two began to play at battles; not after the usual fashion of boys, but in a manner recalling the _kriegspiel_ of the military schools of modern germany. pieces of paper were carefully cut into shapes which would serve to designate the difference between cavalry, infantry, and artillery; and with these bits of paper the disposition and manoeuvring of armies were indicated, so as to make clear, in a rough way, the tactics of the opposing commanders. not alone were the napoleonic battles thus depicted, but also the great contests of which the boys had read or heard at school,--thermopylæ, marathon, leuctra, cannæ, and pharsalus. some pieces of old armour, unearthed among the rubbish of the athenæum, enabled the boys to mimic in their play the combats of amadis and the knights with whom he fought. side by side with these amusements there was another which curiously supplemented it. as prescott and his friend went through the streets on their way to school, they made a practice of inventing impromptu stories, which they told each other in alternation. if the story was unfinished when they arrived at school, it would be resumed on their way home and continued until it reached its end. it was here that prescott's miscellaneous reading stood him in good stead. his mind was full of the romances and histories that he had read; and his quick invention and lively imagination enabled him to piece together the romantic bits which he remembered, and to give them some sort of consistency and form. ticknor attaches little importance either to prescott's interest in the details of warfare or to this fondness of his for improvised narration. yet it is difficult not to see in both of them a definite bias; and we may fairly hold that the boy's taste for battles, coupled with his love of picturesque description, foreshadowed, even in these early years, the qualities which were to bring him lasting fame. all these boyish amusements, however, came to an end when, in august, , prescott presented himself as a candidate for admission to harvard. harvard was then under the presidency of the rev. dr. john thornton kirkland, who had been installed in office the year before prescott entered college. president kirkland was the first of harvard's really eminent presidents.[ ] under his rule there definitely began that slow but steady evolution, which was, in the end, to transform the small provincial college into a great and splendid university. kirkland was an earlier eliot, and some of his views seemed as radical to his colleagues as did those of eliot in . lowell has said of him, somewhat unjustly: "he was a man of genius, but of genius that evaded utilisation." it is fairer to suppose that, if he did not accomplish all that he desired and attempted, this was because the time was not yet ripe for radical innovations. he did secure large benefactions to the university, the creation of new professorships on endowed foundations, and the establishment of three professional schools. president kirkland, in reality, stood between the old order and the new, with his face set toward the future, but retaining still some of the best traditions of the small college of the past. it is told of him that he knew every student by name, and took a very genuine interest in all of them, helping them in many quiet, tactful ways, so that more than one distinguished man in later life declared that, but for the thoughtful and unsolicited kindness of dr. kirkland, he would have been forced to abandon his college life in debt and in despair. kirkland was a man of striking personal presence, and could assume a bearing of such impressive dignity as to verge on the majestic, as when he officially received lafayette in front of university hall and presented the assembled students to the nation's guest. the faculty over which he presided contained at that time no teacher of enduring reputation,[ ] so that whatever personal influence was exerted upon prescott by his instructors must have come chiefly from such intercourse as he had with dr. kirkland. it is of interest to note just how much of an ordeal an entrance examination at harvard was at the time when prescott came up as a candidate for admission. the subjects were very few in number, and would appear far from formidable to a modern freshman. dalzel's _collectanea groea minora_, the greek testament, vergil, sallust, and several selected orations of cicero represented, with the greek and latin grammars, the classical requirements which constituted, indeed, almost the entire test, since the only other subjects were arithmetic, "so for as the rule of three," and a general knowledge of geography. the curriculum of the college, while prescott was a member of it, was meagre enough when compared with what is offered at the present time. the classical languages occupied most of the students' attention. sallust, livy, horace, and one of cicero's rhetorical treatises made up the principal work in latin. xenophon's _anabasis_, homer, and some desultory selections from other authors were supposed to give a sufficient knowledge of greek literature. the freshmen completed the study of arithmetic, and the sophomores did something in algebra and geometry. other subjects of study were rhetoric, declamation, a modicum of history, and also logic, metaphysics, and ethics. the ecclesiastical hold upon the college was seen in the inclusion of a lecture course on "some topic of positive or controversial divinity," in an examination on doddridge's lectures, in the reading of the greek testament, and in a two years' course in hebrew for sophomores and freshmen. indeed, hebrew was regarded as so important that a "hebrew part" was included in every commencement programme until --three years after prescott's graduation. in place of this language, however, while prescott was in college, students might substitute a course in french given by a tutor; for as yet no regular chair of modern languages had been founded in the university. the natural sciences received practically no attention, although, in , a chair of natural history had been endowed by subscription. an old graduate of harvard has recorded the fact that chemistry in those days was regarded very much as we now look upon alchemy; and that, on its practical side, it was held to be simply an adjunct to the apothecary's profession. a few years later, and the harvard faculty contained such eminent men as josiah quincy, judge joseph story, benjamin peirce, the mathematician, george ticknor, and edward everett, and the opportunities for serious study were broadened out immensely. but while prescott was an undergraduate, the curriculum had less variety and range than that of any well-equipped high school of the present day. a letter written by prescott on august d, the day after he had passed through the ordeal of examination, is particularly interesting. it gives, in the first place, a notion of the quaint simplicity which then characterised the academic procedure of the oldest of american universities; and it also brings us into rather intimate touch with prescott himself as a youth of fifteen. at that time a great deal of the eighteenth-century formality survived in the intercourse between fathers and their sons; and especially in the letters which passed between them was there usually to be found a degree of stiffness and restraint both in feeling and expression. yet this letter of prescott's might have been written yesterday by an american youth of the present time, so easy and assured is it, and indeed, for the most part, so mature. it might have been written also to one of his own age, and there is something deliciously naïve in its revelation of prescott's approbativeness. the boy evidently thought very well of himself, and was not at all averse to fishing for a casual compliment from others. the letter is given in full by ticknor, but what is here quoted contains all that is important:-- "boston, august rd. "dear father:--i now write you a few lines to inform you of my fate. yesterday at eight o'clock i was ordered to the president's and there, together with a carolinian, middleton, was examined for sophomore. when we were first ushered into their presence, they looked like so many judges of the inquisition. we were ordered down into the parlour, almost frightened out of our wits, to be examined by each separately; but we soon found them quite a pleasant sort of chaps. the president sent us down a good dish of pears, and treated us very much like gentlemen. it was not ended in the morning; but we returned in the afternoon when professor ware [the hollis professor of divinity] examined us in grotius' _de veritate_. we found him very good-natured; for i happened to ask him a question in theology, which made him laugh so that he was obliged to cover his face with his hand. at half past three our fate was decided and we were declared 'sophomores of harvard university.' "as you would like to know how i appeared, i will give you the conversation _verbatim_ with mr. frisbie when i went to see him after the examination. i asked him,'did i appear well in my examination?' answer. 'yes.' question. 'did i appear _very_ well, sir?' answer. 'why are you so particular, young man? yes, you did yourself a great deal of credit.' i feel today twenty pounds lighter than i did yesterday.... love to mother, whose affectionate son i remain, "wm. hickling prescott." prescott entered upon his college life in the autumn of this same year ( ). we find that many of those traits which he had exhibited in his early school days were now accentuated rather sharply. he was fond of such studies as appealed to his instinctive tastes. english literature and the literatures of greece and rome he studied willingly because he liked them and not because he was ambitious to gain high rank in the university. to this he was more or less indifferent, and, therefore, gave as little attention as possible to such subjects as mathematics, logic, the natural sciences, philosophy, and metaphysics, without which, of course, he could not hope to win university honours. nevertheless, he disliked to be rated below the average of his companions, and, therefore, he was careful not to fall beneath a certain rather moderate standard of excellence. he seems, indeed, to have adopted the horatian _aurea mediocritas_ as his motto; and the easy-going, self-indulgent philosophy of horace he made for the time his own. in fact, the ideal which he set before himself was the life of a gentleman in the traditional english meaning of that word; and it was a gentleman's education and nothing more which he desired to attain. to be socially agreeable, courteous, and imbued with a liberal culture, seemed to him a sufficient end for his ambition. his father was wealthy and generous. he was himself extremely fond of the good things of life. he made friends readily, and had a very large share of personal attractiveness. under the circumstances, it is not to be wondered at if his college life was marked by a pleasant, well-bred hedonism rather than by the austerity of the true new england temperament. the prescotts as a family had some time before slipped away from the clutch of puritanism and had accepted the mild and elastic creed of channing, which, in its tolerant view of life, had more than a passing likeness to episcopalianism. prescott was still running over with youthful spirits, his position was an assured one, his means were ample, and his love of pleasure very much in evidence. we cannot wonder, then, if we find that in the early part of his university career he slipped into a sort of life which was probably less commendable than his cautious biographers are willing to admit. mr. ticknor's very guarded intimations seem to imply in prescott a considerable laxity of conduct; and it is not unfair to read between the lines of what he has written and there find unwilling but undeniable testimony. thus ticknor remarks that prescott "was always able to stop short of what he deemed flagrant excesses and to keep within the limits, though rather loose ones, which he had prescribed to himself. his standard for the character of a gentleman varied, no doubt, at this period, and sometimes was not so high on the score of morals as it should have been." prescott is also described as never having passed the world's line of honour, but as having been willing to run exceedingly close to it. "he pardoned himself too easily for his manifold neglect and breaches of the compacts he had made with his conscience; but there was repentance at the bottom of all." it is rather grudgingly admitted also that "the early part of his college career, when for the first time he left the too gentle restraints of his father's house, ... was the most dangerous period of his life. upon portions of it he afterwards looked back with regret." there is a good deal of significance, moreover, in some sentences which prescott himself wrote, long afterwards, of the temptations which assail a youth during those years when he has attained to the independence of a man but while he is still swayed by the irresponsibility of a boy. there seems to be in these sentences a touch of personal reminiscence and regret:-- "the university, that little world of itself ... bounding the visible horizon of the student like the walls of a monastery, still leaves within him scope enough for all the sympathies and the passions of manhood.... he meets with the same obstacles to success as in the world, the same temptations to idleness, the same gilded seductions, but without the same power of resistance. for in this morning of life his passions are strongest; his animal nature is more sensible to enjoyment; his reasoning faculties less vigorous and mature. happy the youth who in this stage of his existence is so strong in his principles that he can pass through the ordeal without faltering or failing, on whom the contact of bad companionship has left no stain for future tears to wash away." just how much is meant by this reluctant testimony can only be conjectured. it is not unfair, however, to assume that, for a time, prescott's diversions were such as even a lenient moralist would think it necessary to condemn. the fondness for wine, which remained with him throughout his life, makes it likely that convival excess was one of his undergraduate follies; while the flutter of a petticoat may at times have stirred his senses. no doubt many a young man in his college days has plunged far deeper into dissipation than ever prescott did and has emerged unscathed to lead a useful life. yet in prescott's case there existed a peculiar danger. his future did not call upon him to face the stern realities of a life of toil. he was assured of a fortune ample for his needs, and therefore his easy-going, pleasure-loving disposition, his boundless popularity, his handsome face, his exuberant spirits, and his very moderate ambition might easily have combined to lead him down the primrose path where intellect is enervated and moral fibre irremediably sapped. one dwells upon this period of indolence and folly the more willingly, because, after all, it reveals to us in prescott those pardonable human failings which only serve to make his character more comprehensible. prescott's eulogists have so studiously ignored his weaknesses as to leave us with no clear-cut impression of the actual man. they have unwisely smoothed away so much and have extenuated so much in their halting and ambiguous phrases, as to create a picture of which the outlines are far too faint. apparently, they wish to draw the likeness of a perfect being, and to that extent they have made the subject of their encomiums appear unreal. one cannot understand how truly lovable the actual prescott was, without reconstructing him in such a way as to let his faults appear beside his virtues. moreover, an understanding of the perils which at first beset him is needed in order to make clear the profound importance of an incident which sharply called a halt to his excesses and, by curbing his wilful nature, set his finer qualities in the ascendant. it is only by remembering how far he might have fallen, that we can view as a blessing in disguise the blow which fate was soon to deal him. in the second (junior) year of his college life, he was dining one day with the other undergraduates in the commons hall. during these meals, so long as any college officers were present, decorum usually reigned; but when the dons had left the room, the students frequently wound up by what, in modern student phrase, would be described as "rough-house." there were singing and shouting and frequently some boisterous scuffling, such as is natural among a lot of healthy young barbarians. on this particular occasion, as prescott was leaving the hall, he heard a sudden outbreak and looked around to learn its cause. missiles were flying about; and, just as he turned his head, a large hard crust of bread struck him squarely in the open eye. the shock was great, resembling a concussion of the brain, and prescott fell unconscious. he was taken to his father's house, where, on recovering consciousness, he evinced extreme prostration, with nausea, a fluttering pulse, and all the evidences of physical collapse. so weak was he that he could not even sit upright in his bed. for several weeks unbroken rest was ordered, so that nature, aided by a vigorous constitution, might repair the injury which his system had sustained. when he returned to cambridge, the sight of the injured eye (the left one) was gone forever. oddly enough, in view of the severity of the blow, the organ was not disfigured, and only through powerful lenses could even the slightest difference be detected between it and the unhurt eye. dr. james jackson, who attended prescott at this time, described the case as one of paralysis of the retina, for which no remedy was possible. this accident, with the consequences which it entailed, was to have a profound effect not only upon the whole of prescott's subsequent career, but upon his character as well. his affliction, indeed, is inseparably associated with his work, and it must again and again be referred to, both because it was continually in his thoughts and because it makes the record of his literary achievement the more remarkable. incidentally, it afforded a revelation of one of prescott's noblest traits,--his magnanimity. he was well aware of the identity of the person to whom he owed this physical calamity. yet, knowing as he did that the whole thing was in reality an accident, he let it be supposed that he had no knowledge of the person and that the mishap had come about in such a way that the responsibility for it could not be fixed. as a matter of fact, the thing had been done unintentionally; yet this cannot excuse its perpetrator for never expressing to prescott his regret and sympathy. years afterwards, prescott spoke of this man to ticknor in the kindest and most friendly fashion, and once he was able to confer on him a signal favour, which he did most readily and with sincere cordiality. prescott returned to the university in a mood of seriousness, which showed forth the qualities inherited from his father. hitherto he had been essentially his mother's son, with all her gayety and mirthfulness and joy of life. henceforth he was to exhibit more and more the strength of will and power of application which had made his father so honoured and so influential. not that he let his grave misfortune cloud his spirits. he had still the use of his uninjured eye, and he had recovered from his temporary physical prostration; but he now went about his work in a different spirit, and was resolved to win at least an honourable rank for scholarship. in the classics and in english he studied hard, and he overcame to some extent his aversion to philosophy and logic. mathematics, however, still remained the bane of his academic existence. for a time he used to memorise word for word all the mathematical demonstrations as he found them in the text-books, without the slightest comprehension of what they meant; and his remarkable memory enabled him to reproduce them in the class room, so that the professor of mathematics imagined him to be a promising disciple. this fact does not greatly redound to the acumen of the professor nor to the credit of his class-room methods, and what followed gives a curious notion of the easy-going system which then prevailed. prescott found the continual exertion of his memory a good deal of a bore. to his candid nature it also savoured of deception. he, therefore, very frankly explained to the professor the secret of his mathematical facility. he said that, if required, he would continue to memorise the work, but that he knew it to be for him nothing but a waste of time, and he asked, with much _naïveté_, that he might be allowed to use his leisure to better advantage. this most ingenuous request must have amused the gentleman of whom it was made; but it proved to be effectual. prescott was required to attend all the mathematical exercises conscientiously, but from that day he was never called upon to recite. for the rest, his diligence in those studies which he really liked won him the respect of the faculty at large. at graduation he received as a commencement honour the assignment of a latin poem, which he duly declaimed to a crowded audience in the old "meeting-house" at cambridge, in august, . this poem was in latin elegiacs, and was an apostrophe to hope (_ad spem_), of which, unfortunately, no copy has been preserved. at the same time, prescott was admitted to membership in the phi beta kappa, from which a single blackball was sufficient to exclude a candidate. his father celebrated these double honours by giving an elaborate dinner, in a pavilion, to more than five hundred of the family's acquaintances. prescott had now to make his choice of a profession; for to a new englander of those days every man, however wealthy, was expected to have a definite occupation. very naturally he decided upon the law, and began the study of it in his father's office, though it was evident enough from the first that to his taste the tomes of blackstone made no very strong appeal. he loved rather to go back to his classical reading and to enlarge his knowledge of modern literature. indeed, his legal studies were treated rather cavalierly, and it is certain that had he ever been admitted to the bar, he would have found no pleasure in the routine of a lawyer's practice. fate once more intervened, though, as before, in an unpleasant guise. in january, , a painful inflammation appeared in his right eye--the one that had not been injured. this inflammation increased so rapidly as to leave prescott for the time completely blind. nor was the disorder merely local. a fever set in with a high pulse and a general disturbance of the system. prescott's suffering was intense for several days; and at the end of a week, when the local inflammation had passed away, the retina of the right eye was found to be so seriously affected as to threaten a permanent loss of sight. at the same time, symptoms of acute rheumatism appeared in the knee-joints and in the neck. for several months the patient's condition was pitiable. again and again there was a recurrence of the inflammation in the eye, alternating with the rheumatic symptoms, so that for sixteen weeks prescott was unable to leave his room, which had to be darkened almost into blackness. medical skill availed very little, and no doubt the copious blood-letting which was demanded by the practice of that time served only to deplete the patient's strength. through all these weary months, however, prescott bore his sufferings with indomitable courage, and to those friends of his who groped their way through the darkness to his bedside he was always cheerful, animated, and even gay, talking very little of his personal affliction and showing a hearty interest in the concerns of others. when autumn came it was decided that he should take a sea voyage, partly to invigorate his constitution and partly to enable him to consult the most eminent specialists of france and england. first of all, however, he planned to visit his grandfather, mr. thomas hickling, who, as has been already mentioned, was american consul at the island of st. michael's in the azores, where it was thought the mildness of the climate might prove beneficial. prescott set out, on september th of the same year ( ), in one of the small sailing vessels which plied between boston and the west african islands. the voyage occupied twenty-two days, during which time prescott had a recurrence both of his rheumatic pains and of the inflammatory condition of his eye. his discomfort was enhanced by the wretchedness of his accommodations--a gloomy little cabin into which water continually trickled from the deck, and in which the somewhat fastidious youth was forced to live upon nauseous messes of rye pudding sprinkled with coarse salt. cockroaches and other vermin swarmed about him; and it must have been with keen pleasure that he exchanged this floating prison for the charming villa in the azores, where his grandfather had made his home in the midst of groves and gardens, blooming with a semi-tropical vegetation. mr. hickling, during his long residence at st. michael's, had married a portuguese lady for his second wife, and his family received prescott with unstinted cordiality. the change from the bleak shores of new england to the laurels and myrtles and roses of the azores delighted prescott, and so appealed to his sense of beauty that he wrote home long and enthusiastic letters. but his unstinted enjoyment of this hesperian paradise lasted for little more than two short weeks. he had landed on the th of october, and by november st he had gone back to his old imprisonment in darkness, living on a meagre diet and smarting under the blisters which were used as a counter-irritant to the rheumatic inflammation. as usual, however, his cheerfulness was unabated. he passed his time in singing, in chatting with his friends, and in walking hundreds of miles around his darkened room. he remained in this seclusion from november to february, when his health once more improved; and two months later, on the th of april, , he took passage from st. michael's for london. the sea voyage and its attendant discomforts had their usual effect, and during twenty-two out of the twenty-four days, to which his weary journey was prolonged, he was confined to his cabin. on reaching london his case was very carefully diagnosed by three of the most eminent english specialists, dr. farre, sir william adams, and mr. (afterward sir) astley cooper. their verdict was not encouraging, for they decided that no local treatment of his eyes could be of any particular advantage, and that the condition of the right eye would always depend very largely upon the general condition of his system. they prescribed for him, however, and he followed out their regimen with conscientious scrupulosity. after a three months' stay in london, he crossed the channel and took up his abode in paris. in england, owing to his affliction, he had been able to do and see but little, because he was forbidden to leave his room after nightfall, and of course he could not visit the theatre or meet the many interesting persons to whom mr. john quincy adams, then american minister to england, offered to present him. something he saw of the art collections of london, and he was especially impressed by the elgin marbles and raphael's cartoons. there was a touch of pathos in the wistful way in which he paused in the booksellers' shops and longingly turned over rare editions of the classics which it was forbidden him to read. "when i look into a greek or latin book," he wrote to his father, "i experience much the same sensation as does one who looks on the face of a dead friend, and the tears not infrequently steal into my eyes." in paris he remained two months, and passed the following winter in italy, making a somewhat extended tour, and visiting the most famous of the italian cities in company with an old schoolmate. thence he returned to paris, where once more he had a grievous attack of his malady; and at last, in may of , he again reached london, embarking not long after for the united states. before leaving england on this second visit, he had explored oxford and cambridge, which interested him extremely, but which he was glad to leave in order to be once more at home. chapter iii the choice of a career prescott's return to his home brought him face to face with the perplexing question of his future. during his two years of absence this question must often have been forced upon his mind, especially during those weary weeks when the darkness of his sick-room and the lack of any mental diversion threw him in upon himself and left him often with his own thoughts for company. even to his optimistic temperament the future may well have seemed a gloomy one. half-blind and always dreading the return of a painful malady, what was it possible for him to do in the world whose stir and movement and boundless opportunity had so much attracted him? must he spend his years as a recluse, shut out from any real share in the active duties of life? little as he was wont to dwell upon his own anxieties, he could not remain wholly silent concerning a subject so vital to his happiness. in a letter to his father, written from st. michael's not long before he set out for london, he broached very briefly a subject that must have been very often in his thoughts. "the most unpleasant of my reflections suggested by this late inflammation are those arising from the probable necessity of abandoning a profession congenial with my taste and recommended by such favourable opportunities, and adopting one for which i am ill qualified and have but little inclination. it is some consolation that this latter alternative, should my eyes permit, will afford me more leisure for the pursuit of my favourite studies. but on this subject i shall consult my physician and will write you his opinion." apparently at this time he still cherished the hope of entering upon some sort of a professional career, even though the practice of the law were closed to him. but after the discouraging verdict of the london specialists had been made known, he took a more despondent view. he wrote:-- "as to the future, it is too evident i shall never be able to pursue a profession. god knows how poorly i am qualified and how little inclined to be a merchant. indeed, i am sadly puzzled to think how i shall succeed even in this without eyes." it was in this uncertain state of mind that he returned home in the late summer of . the warmth of the welcome which he received renewed his buoyant spirits, even though he soon found himself again prostrated by a recurrence of his now familiar trouble. his father had leased a delightful house in the country for his occupancy; but the shade-trees that surrounded it created a dampness which was unfavourable to a rheumatic subject, and so prescott soon returned to boston. here he spent the winter in retirement, yet not in idleness. his love of books and of good literature became the more intense in proportion as physical activity was impossible; and he managed to get through a good many books, thanks to the kindness of his sister and of his former school companion, william gardiner, both of whom devoted a part of each day to reading aloud to prescott,--gardiner the classics, and miss prescott the standard english authors in history, poetry, and belles-lettres in general. these readings often occupied many consecutive hours, extending at times far into the night; and they relieved prescott's seclusion of much of its irksomeness, while they stored his mind with interesting topics of thought. it was, in reality, the continuation of a system of vicarious reading which he had begun two years before in st. michael's, where he had managed, by the aid of another's eyes, to enjoy the romances of scott, which were then beginning to appear, and to renew his acquaintance with shakespeare, homer, and the greek and roman historians. from reading literature, it was a short step to attempting its production. pledging his sister to secrecy, prescott composed and dictated to her an essay which was sent anonymously to the _north american review_, then a literary fledgling of two years, but already making its way to a position of authority. this little _ballon d'essai_ met the fate of many such, for the manuscript was returned within a fortnight. prescott's only comment was, "there! i was a fool to send it!" yet the instinct to write was strong within him, and before very long was again to urge him with compelling force to test his gift. but meanwhile, finding that his life of quiet and seclusion did very little for his eyes, he made up his mind that he might just as well go out into the world more freely and mingle with the friends whose society he missed so much. after a little cautious experimenting, which apparently did no harm, he resumed the old life from which, for three years, he had been self-banished. the effect upon him mentally was admirable, and he was now safe from any possible danger of becoming morbidly introspective from the narrowness of his environment. he went about freely all through the year , indulging in social pleasures with the keenest zest. his bent for literature, however, asserted itself in the foundation of a little society or club, whose members gathered informally, from time to time, for the reading of papers and for genial yet frank criticism of one another's productions. this club never numbered more than twenty-four persons, but they were all cultivated men, appreciative and yet discriminating, and the list of them contains some names, such as those of franklin dexter, theophilus parsons, john ware, and jared sparks, which, like prescott's own, belong to the record of american letters. for their own amusement, they subsequently brought out a little periodical called _the club-room_, of which four numbers in all were published,[ ] and to which prescott, who acted as its editor, made three contributions, one of them a sort of humorous editorial article, very local in its interest, another a sentimental tale called "the vale of allerid," and the third a ghost story called "calais." they were like thousands of such trifles which are written every year by amateurs, and they exhibit no literary qualities which raise them above the level of the commonplace. the sole importance of _the club-room's_ brief existence lies in the fact that it possibly did something to lure prescott along the path that led to serious literary productiveness. one very important result of his return to social life was found in his marriage, in , to miss susan amory, the daughter of mr. thomas c. amory, a leading merchant of boston.[ ] the bride was a very charming girl, to whom her young husband was passionately devoted, and who filled his life with a radiant happiness which delighted all who knew and loved him. his naturally buoyant spirits rose to exuberance after his engagement. he forgot his affliction. he let his reading go by the board. he was, in fact, too happy for anything but happiness, and this delight even inspired him to make a pun that is worth recording. prescott was an inveterate punster, and his puns were almost invariably bad; but when his bachelor friends reproached him for his desertion of them, he laughed and answered them with the vergilian line,-- "_omnia vincit amor et nos cedamus amori_"-- a play upon words which thackeray independently chanced upon many years later in writing _pendennis_, and _à propos_ of a very different miss amory. it is of interest to recall the description given by mr. ticknor of prescott as he appeared at the time of his marriage (may , ) and, indeed, very much as he remained down to the hour of his death. "my friend was one of the finest looking men i have ever seen; or, if this should be deemed in some respects a strong expression, i shall be fully justified ... in saying that he was one of the most attractive. he was tall, well formed, manly in his bearing but gentle, with light brown hair that was hardly changed or diminished by years, with a clear complexion and a ruddy flash on his cheek that kept for him to the last an appearance of comparative youth, but above all with a smile that was the most absolutely contagious i ever looked on.... even in the last months of his life when he was in some other respects not a little changed, he appeared at least ten years younger than he really was. and as for the gracious sunny smile that seemed to grow sweeter as he grew older, it was not entirely obliterated even by the touch of death." after prescott had been married for about a year, the old question of a life pursuit recurred and was considered by him seriously. without any very definite aim, yet with a half-unconscious intuition, he resolved to store his mind with abundant reading, so that he might, at least in some way, be fitted for the career of a man of letters. hitherto, in the desultory fashion of his boyhood, he had dipped into many authors, yet he really knew nothing thoroughly and well. in the classics he was perhaps best equipped; but of english literature his knowledge was superficial because he had read only here and there, and rather for the pleasure of the moment than for intellectual discipline. he had a slight smattering of french, sufficient for the purposes of a traveller, but nothing more. of italian, spanish, and german he was wholly ignorant, and with the literatures of these three languages he had never made even the slightest acquaintance. conning over in a reflective mood the sum total of his acquisitions and defects, he came to the conclusion that he would undertake what he called in a memorandum "a course of studies," including "the principles of grammar and correct writing" and the history of the north american continent. he also resolved to devote one hour a day to the latin classics. some six months after this, his purpose had expanded, and he made a second resolution, which he recorded in the following words:-- "i am now twenty-six years of age, nearly. by the time i am thirty, god willing, i propose with what stock i have already on hand to be a very well read english scholar; to be acquainted with the classical and useful authors, prose and poetry, in latin, french, and italian, and especially in history--i do not mean a critical or profound acquaintance. the two following years i may hope to learn german, and to have read the classical german writers; and the translations, if my eye continues weak, of the greek." to this memorandum he adds the comment that such a course of study would be sufficient "for general discipline"--a remark which proves that he had not as yet any definite plan in undertaking his self-ordered task. for several years he devoted himself with great industry to the course which he had marked out. he went back to the pages of blair's rhetoric and to lindley murray's grammar, and he read consecutively, making notes as he read, the older masters of english prose style from roger ascham, sidney, bacon, and raleigh down to the authors of the eighteenth century, and even later. in latin he reviewed tacitus, livy, and cicero. his reading seems to have been directed less to the subject-matter than to the understanding and appreciation of style as a revelation of the writer's essential characteristics. it was, in fact, a study of psychology quite as much as a study of literature. passing on to french, he found the literature of that language comparatively unsympathetic, and he contrasted it unfavourably with the english. he derived some pleasure from the prose of montaigne and bossuet, and from corneille and molière; but, on the whole, french poetry always seemed to him too rigid in its formal classicism to be enjoyable. side by side with his french reading, he made the acquaintance of the early english ballad-poetry and the old romances, and, in , he took up italian, which appealed to him intensely, so that he read an extraordinary amount and made the most voluminous notes upon every author that interested him, besides writing long criticisms and argumentative letters to his friend ticknor, full of praises of petrarch and dante, and defending warmly the real existence of laura and the genuineness of dante's passion for beatrice. for dante, indeed, prescott conceived a most enthusiastic admiration, which found expression in many a letter to his friend. the immediate result of his italian studies was the preparation of some articles which were published in the _north american review_--the first on italian narrative poetry (october, ). this was the beginning of a series; since, nearly every year thereafter, some paper from his pen appeared in that publication. one article on italian poetry and romance was originally offered to the english _quarterly review_ through jared sparks, and was accepted by the editor; but prescott, growing impatient over the delay in its appearance, recalled the manuscript and gave it to the _north american_. these essays of prescott were not rated very highly by their author, and we can accept his own estimate as, on the whole, a just one. they are written in an urbane and agreeable manner, but are wholly lacking in originality, insight, and vigour; while their bits of learning strike the more modern reader as old fashioned, even if not pedantic. this literary work, however, slight as may be its intrinsic merit, was at least an apprenticeship in letters, and gave to prescott a useful training in the technique of composition. in , something of great moment happened in the course of prescott's search for a life career. he had, in accordance with the resolution already mentioned, taken up the study of german; but he found it not only difficult but, to him, uninteresting. after several months he became discouraged; and though he read on, he did so, as he himself has recorded, with no method and with very little diligence or spirit. just at this time mr. george ticknor, who had been delivering a course of lectures in harvard on the subject of spanish literature, read over some of these lectures to prescott, merely to amuse him and to divert his mind. the immediate result was that prescott resolved to give up his german studies and to substitute a course in spanish. on the first day of december, , he employed a teacher of that language, and commenced a course of study which was to prove wonderfully fruitful, and which ended only with his life. he seems to have begun the reading of spanish from the very moment that he took up the study of its grammar, and there is an odd significance in a remark which he wrote down only a few days after: "i snatch a fraction of the morning from the interesting treatise of m. jossé on the spanish language and from the _conquista de mexico_, which, notwithstanding the time i have been upon it, i am far from having conquered." the deadening effects of german upon his mind seem to have endured for a while, since at christmas time he was still pursuing his studies with a certain listlessness; and he wrote to bancroft, the historian, a letter which contained one remark that is very curious when we read it in the light of his subsequent career:-- "i am battling with the spaniards this winter, but i have not the heart for it as i had for the italians. _i doubt whether there are many valuable things that the key of knowledge will unlock in that language._" another month, however, found him filled with the joy of one who has at last laid his hand upon that for which he has long been groping. he expressed this feeling very vividly in a letter quoted by mr. ticknor:-- "did you never, in learning a language, after groping about in the dark for a long while, suddenly seem to turn an angle where the light breaks upon you all at once? the knack seems to have come to me within the last fortnight in the same manner as the art of swimming comes to those who have been splashing about for months in the water in vain." spanish literature exercised upon his mind a peculiar charm, and he boldly dashed into the writing of spanish even from the first. ticknor's well-stored library supplied him with an abundance of books, and his own comments upon the castilian authors in whom he revelled were now written not in english but in spanish--naturally the spanish of a beginner, yet with a feeling for idiom which greatly surprised ticknor. even in after years, prescott never acquired a faultless spanish diction; but he wrote with clearness and fluency, so that his spanish was very individual, and, in this respect, not unlike the latin of politian or of milton. up to this time prescott had been cultivating his mind and storing it with knowledge without having formed any clear conception of what he was to do with his intellectual accumulations. at first, when he formed a plan of systematic study, his object had been only the modest one of "general discipline," as he expressed it. as he went on, however, he seems to have had an instinctive feeling that even without intention he was moving toward a definite goal. just what this was he did not know, but none the less he was not without faith that it would ultimately be revealed to him. looking back over all the memoranda that he has left behind, it is easy now to see that his drift had always been toward historical investigation. his boyish tastes, already described, declared his interest in the lives of men of action. his maturer preferences pointed in the same direction. it has heretofore been noted that, in , when he marked out for himself his first formal plan of study, he included "the compendious history of north america" as one of the subjects. while reading french he had dwelt especially upon the chroniclers and historians from froissart down. in spanish he had been greatly attracted by mariana's _historia de españa_, which is still one of the castilian classics; and this work had led him to the perusal of mably's acute and philosophical _Étude de l'histoire_. he himself long afterward explained that still earlier than this he had been strongly attracted to historical writing, especially after reading gibbon's _autobiography_, which he came upon in . even then, he tells us, he had proposed to himself to become an historian "in the best sense of the term." about he jotted down the following in his private notes:-- "history has always been a favourite study with me and i have long looked forward to it as a subject on which i was one day to exercise my pen. it is not rash, in the dearth of well-written american history, to entertain the hope of throwing light upon this matter. this is my hope." nevertheless, although his bent was so evidently for historical composition, he had as yet received no impulse toward any especial department of that field. in october, , we find him making this confession of his perplexity: "i have been so hesitating and reflecting upon what i shall do, that i have in fact done nothing." and five days later, he set down the following: "i have passed the last fortnight in examination of a suitable subject for historical composition." in his case there was no need for haste. he realised that historical research demands maturity of mind. "i think," he said, "thirty-five years of age full soon enough to put pen to paper." and again: "i care not how long a time i take for it, provided i am diligent in all that time." it is clear from one of the passages just quoted, that his first thought was to choose a distinctively american theme. this, however, he put aside without any very serious consideration, although he had looked into the material at hand and had commented upon its richness. his love of italian literature and of italy drew him strongly to an italian theme, and for a while he thought of preparing a careful study of that great movement which transformed the republic of ancient rome into an empire. again, still with italy in mind, he debated with himself the preparation of a work on italian literature,--a work (to use his own words) "which, without giving a chronological and minute analysis of authors, should exhibit in masses the most important periods, revolutions, and characters in the history of italian letters." further reflection, however, led him to reject this, partly because it would involve so extensive and critical a knowledge of all periods of italian literature, and also because the subject was not new, having in a way been lately treated by sismondi. prescott makes another and very characteristic remark, which shows him to have been then as always the man of letters as well as the historian, with a keen eye to what is interesting. "literary history," he says, "is not so amusing as civil." the choice of a spanish subject had occurred to him in a casual way soon after he had taken up the study of the spanish language. in a letter already quoted as having been written in december of , he balances such a theme with his project for a roman one:-- "i have been hesitating between two topics for historical investigation--spanish history from the invasion of the arabs to the consolidation of the monarchy under charles v., or a history of the revolution of ancient rome which converted the republic into an empire.... i shall probably select the first as less difficult of execution than the second." he also planned a collection of biographical sketches and criticisms, but presently rejected that, as he did, a year later, the roman subject; and after having done so, the mists began to clear away and a great purpose to take shape before his mental vision. on january , , he wrote a long memorandum which represents the focussing of his hitherto vague mental strivings. "cannot i contrive to embrace the _gist_ of the spanish subject without involving myself in the unwieldy barbarous records of a thousand years? what new and interesting topic may be admitted--not forced--into the reigns of ferdinand and isabella? can i not indulge in a retrospective picture of the constitutions of castile and aragon--of the moorish dynasties and the causes of their decay and dissolution? then i have the inquisition with its bloody persecutions; the conquest of granada, a brilliant passage; the exploits of the great captain in italy; ... the discovery of a new world, my own country.... a biography will make me responsible for a limited space only; will require much less reading; will offer the deeper interest which always attaches to minute developments of character, and the continuous, closely connected narratives. the subject brings me to a point whence [modern] english history has started, is untried ground, and in my opinion a rich one. the age of ferdinand is most important.... it is in every respect an interesting and momentous period of history; the materials authentic, ample. i will chew upon this matter and decide this week." long afterward (in ) prescott pencilled upon this memorandum the words: "this was the first germ of my conception of _ferdinand and isabella_." on january th, after some further wavering, he wrote down definitely: "i subscribe to the _history of the reign of ferdinand and isabella_." opposite this note he made, in , the brief but emphatic comment,--"a fortunate choice." from this decision he never retreated, though at times he debated with himself the wisdom of his choice. his apparent vacillation was due to a return of the inflammation in his eye. for a little while this caused him to shrink back from the difficulties of his spanish subject, involving as it did an immense amount of reading; and there came into his head the project of writing an historical survey of english literature. but on the whole he held fast to his original resolution, and soon entered upon that elaborate preparation which was to give to american literature a masterpiece. in his final selection of a theme we can, indeed, discern the blending of several currents of reflection and the combination of several of his earlier purposes. though his book was to treat of two spanish sovereigns, it nevertheless related to a reign whose greatest lustre was conferred upon it by an italian and by the discovery of the western world. thus prescott's early predilection for american history his love for italy, and his new-born interest in spain were all united to stimulate him in the task upon which he had now definitely entered. chapter iv success dr. johnson, in his rather unsympathetic life of milton, declares that it is impossible for a blind man to write history. already, before prescott began historical composition, this dictum had been refuted by the brilliant french historian, augustin thierry, whose scholarly study of the merovingian period was composed after he had wholly lost his sight.[ ] moreover, prescott was not wholly blind, for at times he could make a cautious use of the right eye. nevertheless, the task to which he had set himself was sufficiently formidable to deter a less persistent spirit. in the first place, all the original sources of information were on the other side of the atlantic. nowhere in the united states was there a public library such as even some of our smaller cities now possess. prescott himself, moreover, had at this time done comparatively little special reading in the subject of which he proposed to write; and the skilled assistance which he might easily have secured in europe was not to be had in the united states. finally, though he was not blind in the ordinary sense, he could not risk a total loss of sight by putting upon his remaining eye the strain of continuous and fatiguing use. in spite of all these obstacles and discouragements, however, he began his undertaking with a touch of that stoicism which, as thomas hughes has somewhere said, makes the anglo-saxon find his keenest pleasure in enduring and overcoming. prescott had planned to devote a year to preliminary studies before putting pen to paper. the work which he then had in mind was intended by him to be largely one of compilation from the works of foreign writers, to be of moderate size, with few pretensions to originality, and to claim attention chiefly because the subject was still a new one to english readers. he felt that he would be accomplishing a great deal if he should read and thoroughly digest the principal french, spanish, and italian historians--mariana, llorente, varillas, fléchier, and sismondi--and give a well-balanced account of ferdinand and isabella's reign based upon what these and a few other scholarly authorities had written. but the zeal of the investigator soon had him in its grip. scarcely had the packages of books which he had ordered from madrid begun to reach his library than his project broadened out immensely into a work of true creative scholarship. his year of reading now appeared to him absurdly insufficient. it had, indeed, already been badly broken into by one of his inflammatory attacks; and his progress was hampered by the inadequate assistance which he received. a reader, employed by him to read aloud the spanish books, performed the duty valiantly but without understanding a single word of spanish, very much as milton's daughters read greek and hebrew to their father. thinking of his new and more ambitious conception of his purpose and of the hindrances which beset him, prescott wrote: "travelling at this lame gait, i may yet hope in five or six years to reach the goal." as a matter of fact, it was three years and a half before he wrote the opening sentence of his book. it was ten years before he finished the last foot-note of the final chapter. it was nearly twelve years before the book was given to the public. some account of his manner of working may be of interest, and it is convenient to describe it here once for all. in the second year, after he had begun his preliminary studies, he secured the services of a mr. james english, a young harvard graduate, who had some knowledge of the modern languages. this gentleman devoted himself to prescott's interests, and henceforth a definite routine of study and composition was established and was continued with other secretaries throughout prescott's life. mr. english has left some interesting notes of his experiences, which admit us to the library of the large house on bedford street, where the two men worked so diligently together. it was a spacious room in the back of the house, lined on two sides with books which reached the ceiling. against a third side was a large green screen, toward which prescott faced while seated at his table; while behind him was an ample window, over which a series of pale blue muslin shades could be drawn, thus regulating the illumination of the room according to the state of prescott's eye and the conditions of the weather. at a second window sat mr. english, ready to act either as reader or as amanuensis when required. allusion has been made from time to time to prescott's written memoranda and to his letters, which, indeed, were often very long and very frequent. it must not be thought that in writing these he had to make any use of his imperfect sight. the need of this had been obviated by an invention which he had first heard of in london during his visit there in . it was a contrivance called "the noctograph," meant for the use of the blind. a frame like that of a slate was crossed by sixteen parallel wires fastened into the sides and holding down a sheet of blackened paper like the carbon paper now used in typewriters and copying-machines. under this blackened paper was placed a sheet of plain white note-paper. a person using the noctograph wrote with a sort of stylus of ivory, agate, or some other hard substance upon the blackened paper, which conveyed the impression to the white paper underneath. of course, the brass wires guided the writer's hand and kept the point of the stylus somewhere near the line.[ ] of his noctograph prescott made constant use. for composition he employed it almost altogether, seldom or never dictating to a scribe. obviously, however, the instrument allowed no erasures or corrections to be made, and the writer must go straight forward with his task; since to go back and try to alter what had been once set down would make the whole illegible. hence arose the necessity of what irving once described as "pre-thinking,"--the determination not only of the content but of the actual form of the sentence before it should be written down. in this pre-thinking prescott showed a power of memory and of visualisation that was really wonderful. to carry in his mind the whole of what had been read over to him in a session of several hours,--names, dates, facts, authorities,--and then to shape his narrative, sentence by sentence, before setting down a word, and, finally, to bear in mind the whole structure of each succeeding paragraph and the form in which they had been carefully built up--this was, indeed, an intellectual and literary achievement of an unusual character. of course, such a power as this did not come of itself, but was slowly gained by persistent practice and unwearied effort. his personal memoranda show this: "think closely," he writes, "gradually concentrating the circle of thought." and again: "think continuously and closely before taking up my pen. make corrections chiefly in my own mind." and still again: "never take up my pen until i have travelled over the subject so often that i can write almost from memory." but in , the time had not yet come for composition. he was hearing books read to him and was taking copious notes. how copious these were, his different secretaries have told; and besides, great masses of them have been preserved as testimony to the minute and patient labour of the man who made and used them. as his reader went on, prescott would say, "mark that!" whenever anything seemed to him especially significant. these marked passages were later copied out in a large clear hand for future reference. when the time came, they would be read, studied, compared, verified, and digested. sometimes he spent as much as five days in thus mastering the notes collected for a single chapter. then at least another day would be given to reflection and (probably) to composition, while from five to nine days more might go to the actual writing out of the text. this power of prescott's increased with constant exercise. later, he was able to carry in his head the whole of the first and second chapters of his _conquest of peru_ (nearly sixty pages) before committing them to paper, and in preparing his last work, _philip ii._, he composed and memorised the whole fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of book ii., amounting to seventy-two printed pages. prescott had elaborated a system of his own for the regulation of his daily life while he was working. this system was based upon the closest observation, extending over years, of the physical effect upon him of everything he did. the result was a regimen which represented his customary mode of living. rising early in the morning, he took outdoor exercise, except during storms of exceptional severity. he rode well and loved a spirited horse, though sometimes he got a fall from letting his attention stray to his studies instead of keeping it on the temper of his animal. but, in the coldest weather, on foot or in the saddle, he covered several miles before breakfast, to which he always came back in high spirits, having, as he expressed it, "wound himself up for the day." after a very simple breakfast, he went at once to his library, where, for an hour or so, he chatted with mrs. prescott or had her read to him the newspapers or some popular book of the day. by ten o'clock, serious work began with the arrival of his secretary, with whom he worked diligently until one o'clock, for he seldom sat at his desk for more than three consecutive hours. a brisk walk of a mile or two gave him an appetite for dinner, which was served at three o'clock, an hour which, in the year , was not regarded as remarkable, at least in massachusetts. this was a time of relaxation, of chat and gossip and family fun; and it was then that prescott treated himself to the amount of wine which he had decided to allow himself. his fondness for wine has been already casually mentioned. to him the question of its use was so important, that once, for two years and nine months, he recorded every day the exact amount that he had drunk and the effect which it had had upon his eye and upon his general health. a further indulgence which followed after dinner was the smoking of a mild cigar while his wife read or talked to him. then, another walk or drive, a cup of tea at five, and finally, two or more industrious hours with his secretary, after which he came down to the library and enjoyed the society of his family or of friends who happened in. this, it will be seen, was not the life of a recluse or of a casaubon, though it was a life regulated by a wise discretion. to adjust himself to its routine, prescott had to overcome many of his natural tendencies. in the first place, he was, as has been already noted, of a somewhat indolent disposition; and a steady grind, day after day and week after week, was something which he had never known in school or college. even now in his maturity, and with the spurring of a steady purpose to urge him on, he often faltered. his memoranda show now and then a touch of self-accusation or regret. "i have worked lazily enough, or rather have been too busy to work at all. ended the old year very badly." "i find it as hard to get under way, as a crazy hulk that has been boarded up for repairs." how thoroughly he conquered this repugnance to hard work is illustrated by a pathetic incident which happened once when he was engaged upon a bit of writing that interested him, but when he was prevented by rheumatic pains from sitting upright. prescott then placed his noctograph upon the floor and lay down flat beside it, writing in this attitude for many hours on nine consecutive days rather than give in. he tried some curious devices to penalise himself for laziness. he used to persuade his friends to make bets with him that he would not complete certain portions of writing within a given time. this sort of thing was a good deal of a make-believe, for prescott cared nothing about money and had plenty of it at his disposal; and when his friends lost, he never permitted them to pay. he did a like thing on a larger scale and in a somewhat different way by giving a bond to his secretary, mr. english, binding himself to pay a thousand dollars if within one year from september, , prescott should not have written two hundred and fifty pages of _ferdinand and isabella_. this number of pages was specified, because prescott dreaded his own instability of purpose, and felt that if he should once get so far as two hundred and fifty pages, he would be certain to go on and finish the entire history. other wagers or bonds with mr. english were made by prescott from time to time, all with the purpose of counteracting his own disposition to _far niente_. his settled mode of life also compelled him in some measure to give up the delights of general social intercourse and the convivial pleasures of which he was naturally fond. there were, indeed, times when he did let his work go and enjoyed a return to a freer life, as when in the country at pepperell he romped and rollicked like a boy; or when in boston, he was present at some of the jolly little suppers given by his friends and so much liked by him. but on the whole, neither his health nor the arduous researches which he had undertaken allowed him often to break the regularity of his way of living. nothing, indeed, testifies more strikingly to his naturally buoyant disposition than the fact that years of unvarying routine were unable to make of prescott a formalist or to render him less charming as a social favourite. in his study he was conspicuously the scholar, the investigator; elsewhere he was the genial companion, full of fun and jest, telling stories and manifesting that gift of personal attractiveness which compelled all within its range to feel wholly and completely at their ease. no writer was ever less given to literary posing. it is, indeed, an extraordinary fact that although prescott was occupied for ten whole years in preparing his _ferdinand and isabella_, during all that time not more than three persons outside of his own family knew that he was writing a book. his friends supposed that his hours of seclusion were occupied in general reading and study. only when a formal announcement of the history was made in the _north american review_ in , did even his familiar associates begin to think of him as an author. the death of prescott's little daughter, catherine, in february, , did much to drive him to hard work as a relief from sorrow. she was his first-born child, and when she died, she was a few months over four years of age,--a winsome little creature, upon whom her father had lavished an unstinted affection. she alone had the privilege of interrupting him during his hours of work. often she used to climb up to his study and put an end to the most profound researches, greatly, it is recorded, to the delight of his secretary, who thus got a little moment of relief from the deciphering of almost undecipherable scrawls. her death was sudden, and the shock of it was therefore all the greater. years afterward, prescott, in writing to a friend who had suffered a like bereavement, disclosed the depths of his own anguish: "i can never suffer again as i then did. it was my first heavy sorrow, and i suppose we cannot twice feel so bitterly." his labour now took on the character of a solace, and perhaps it was at this time that he formed the opinion which he set down long after: "i am convinced that intellectual occupation--steady, regular, literary occupation--is the true vocation for me, indispensable to my happiness." and so his preparation for _ferdinand and isabella_ went on apace. prescott no longer thought it enough to master the historians who had already written of this reign. he went back of them to the very _quellen_, having learned that the true historical investigator can afford to slight no possible source of information,--that nothing, good, bad, or indifferent, can safely be neglected. the packets which now reached him from spain and france grew bulkier and their contents more diversified. not merely modern tomes, not merely printed books were there, but parchments in quaint and crabbed script, to be laboriously deciphered by his secretary, with masses of black-letter and copies of ancient archives, from which some precious fact or chance corroboration might be drawn by inquisitive industry. the sifting out of all this rubbish-heap went on with infinite patience, until at last his notes and memoranda contained the substance of all that was essential. prescott had given a bond to mr. english pledging himself to complete by september, , two hundred and fifty printed pages of the book. yet it was actually not until this month had ended that the first line was written. on october , , after three months devoted to reviewing his notes for the opening chapter, he took his noctograph and scrawled the initial sentence. a whole month was consumed in finishing the chapter, and two months more in writing out the second and the third. from this time a sense of elation filled him, now that all his patient labour was taking concrete form, and there was no more question of putting his task aside. his progress might be, as he called it, "tortoise-like," but he had felt the joy of creation; and the work went on, always with a firmer grasp, a surer sense of form, and the clearer light which comes to an artist as his first vague impressions begin under his hand to take on actuality. there were times when, from illness, he had almost to cease from writing; there were other times when he turned aside from his special studies to accomplish some casual piece of literary work. but these interruptions, while they delayed the accomplishment of his purpose, did not break the current of his interest. the casual pieces of writing, to which allusion has just been made, were oftenest contributions to the _north american review_. one of them, however, was somewhat more ambitious than a magazine article. it was a life of charles brockden brown, which prescott undertook at the request of jared sparks, who was editing a series of american biographies. this was in , and the book was written in two weeks at nahant. it certainly did nothing for prescott's reputation. what is true of this is true of everything that he wrote outside of his histories. in his essays, and especially in his literary criticisms, he seemed devoid of penetration and of a grasp upon the verities. his style, too, in all such work was formal and inert. he often showed the extent of his reading, but never an intimate feeling for character. he could not get down to the very core of his subject and weigh and judge with the freedom of an independent critic. his life of brown will be found fully to bear out this view. in it prescott chooses to condone the worst of brown's defects, and he gives no intimation of the man's real power. prescott himself felt that he had been too eulogistic, whereas his greatest fault was that the eulogy was misapplied. sparks mildly criticised the book for its excess of generalities and its lack of concrete facts. how thoroughly prescott prepared himself for the writing of his book reviews may be seen in the fact that, having been asked for a notice of condé's _history of the arabs in spain_, he spent from three to four months in preliminary reading, and then occupied nearly three months more in writing out the article. in this particular case, however, he felt that the paper represented too much labour to be sent to the _north american_, and therefore it was set aside and ultimately made into a chapter of his _ferdinand and isabella_. it was on the th of june, , that his history was finished, and he at once began to consider the question of its publication. three years before, he had had the text set up in type so far as it was then completed; and as the work went on, this private printing continued until, soon after he had reached the end, four copies of the book were in his hands. these printed copies had been prepared for several reasons. first of all, the sight of his labour thus taking concrete form was a continual stimulus to him. he was still, so far as the public was concerned, a young author, and he felt all of the young author's joy in contemplating the printed pages of his first real book. in the second place, he wished to make a number of final alterations and corrections; and every writer of experience is aware that the last subtle touches can be given to a book only when it is actually in type, for only then can he see the workmanship as it really is, with its very soul exposed to view, seen as the public will see it, divested of the partial nebulosity which obscures the vision while it still remains in manuscript. finally, prescott wished to have a printed copy for submission to the english publishers. it was his earnest hope to have the book appear simultaneously in england and america, since on the other side of the atlantic, rather than in the united states, were to be found the most competent judges of its worth. but the search for an english publisher was at first unsuccessful. murray rejected it without even looking at it. the longmans had it carefully examined, but decided against accepting it. prescott was hurt by this rejection, the more so as he thought (quite incorrectly, as he afterward discovered) that it was southey who had advised the longmans not to publish it. the fact was that both of the firms just mentioned had refused it because their lists were then too full to justify them in undertaking a three-volume history. prescott, for a time, experienced some hesitation in bringing it out at all. he had written on the day of its completion: "i should feel not only no desire, but a reluctance to publish, and should probably keep it by me for emendations and additions, were it not for the belief that the ground would be more or less occupied in the meantime by abler writers." the allusion here is to a history of the spanish arabs announced by southey. but what really spurred prescott on to give his book to the world was a quiet remark of his father's, in which there was something of a challenge and a taunt. "the man," said he, "who writes a book which he is afraid to publish is a coward." "coward" was a name which no true prescott could endure; and so, after some months of negotiation and reflection, an arrangement was made to have the history appear with the imprint of a newly founded publishing house, the american stationers' company of boston, with which prescott signed a contract in april, . by the terms of this contract prescott was to furnish the plates and also the engravings for the book, of which the company was to print copies and to have five years in which to sell them--surely a very modest bargain. but prescott cared little for financial profits, nor was he wholly sanguine of the book's success. on the day after signing the contract, he wrote: "i must confess i feel some disquietude at the prospect of coming in full bodily presence before the public." and somewhat earlier he had written with a curious though genuine humility:-- "what do i expect from it, now it is done? and may it not be all in vain and labour lost, after all? my expectations are not such, if i know myself, as to expose me to any serious disappointment. i do not flatter myself with the idea that i have achieved anything very profound, or, on the other hand, that will be very popular. i know myself too well to suppose the former for a moment. i know the public too well, and the subject i have chosen, to expect the latter. but i have made a book illustrating an unexplored and important period, from authentic materials, obtained with much difficulty, and probably in the possession of no one library, public or private, in europe. as a plain, veracious record of facts, the work, therefore, till some one else shall be found to make a better one, will fill up a gap in literature which, i should hope, would give it a permanent value,--a value founded on its utility, though bringing no great fame or gain to its author. "come to the worst, and suppose the thing a dead failure, and the book born only to be damned. still, it will not be all in vain, since it has encouraged me in forming systematic habits of intellectual occupation, and proved to me that my greatest happiness is to be the result of such. it is no little matter to be possessed of this conviction from experience." but prescott had received encouragement in his moods of doubt from jared sparks, at that time one of the most scientific american students of history. sparks had read the book in one of the first printed copies, and had written to prescott, in february, : "the book will be successful--bought, read, and praised." and so finally, on christmas day of ,--though dated upon the title-page,--the _history of the reign of ferdinand and isabella_ was first offered for sale. it was in three volumes of about four hundred pages each, and was dedicated to his father. only five hundred copies of the book had been printed as a first edition, and of these only a small number had been bound in readiness for the day of publication. the demand for the book took both author and publishers by surprise. this demand came, first of all, and naturally enough, from prescott's personal friends. one of these, a gentleman of convivial habits, and by no means given to reading, rose early on christmas morning and waited outside of the bookshop in order to secure the first copy sold. literary boston, which was also fashionable boston, adopted the book as its favourite new year's present. the bookbinders could not work fast enough to supply the demand, and in a few months the whole of the copies, which it had been supposed would last for at least five years, had been sold. other parts of the country followed boston's lead. the book was praised by the newspapers and, after a little interval, by the more serious reviews,--the _north american_, the _examiner_, and the _democratic review_, the last of which published an elaborate appreciation by george bancroft. meanwhile, prescott had succeeded in finding a london publisher; for in may, mr. richard bentley accepted the book, and it soon after appeared in england. to the english criticisms prescott naturally looked forward with interest and something like anxiety. american approval he might well ascribe to national bias if not to personal friendship. therefore, the uniformly favourable reviews in his own country could not be accepted by him as definitely fixing the value of what he had accomplished. in a letter to ticknor, after recounting his first success, he said:-- "'poor fellow!'--i hear you exclaim by this time,--'his wits are actually turned by this flurry in his native village,--the yankee athens.' not a whit, i assure you. am i not writing to two dear friends, to whom i can talk as freely and foolishly as to one of my own household, and who, i am sure, will not misunderstand me? the effect of all this--which a boy at dr. gardiner's school, i remember, called _fungum popularitatem_--has been rather to depress me, and s---- was saying yesterday, that she had never known me so out of spirits as since the book has come out." what he wanted most was to read a thoroughly impartial estimate written by some foreign scholar of distinction. he had not long to wait. in the _athenoeum_ there soon appeared a very eulogistic notice, written by dr. dunham, an industrious student of spanish and portuguese history. then followed an admirably critical paper in the _edinburgh review_ by don pascual de gayangos, a distinguished spanish writer living in england. highly important among the english criticisms was that which was published in the _quarterly review_ of june, , from the pen of richard ford, a very accurate and critical spanish scholar. mr. ford approached the book with something of the _morgue_ of a true british pundit when dealing with the work of an unknown american;[ ] but, none the less, his criticism, in spite of his reluctance to praise, gave prescott genuine pleasure. ford found fault with some of the details of _ferdinand and isabella_, yet he was obliged to admit both the sound scholarship and literary merit of the book. on the continent appeared the most elaborate review of all in a series of five articles written for the _bibliothèque universelle de genève_, by the comte adolphe de circourt. the comte was a friend of lamartine (who called him _la mappemonde vivante des connaissances humaines_) and also of tocqueville and cavour. few of his contemporaries possessed so minute a knowledge of the subject which prescott treated, and of the original sources of information; and the favourably philosophical tone of the whole review was a great compliment to an author hitherto unknown in europe. still later, sincere and almost unqualified praise was given by guizot in france, and by lockhart, southey, hallam, and milman, in england. indeed, as mr. ticknor says, although these personages had never before heard of prescott, their spirit was almost as kindly as if it had been due to personal friendship. the long years of discouragement, of endurance, and of patient, arduous toil had at last borne abundant fruit; and from the time of the appearance of _ferdinand and isabella_, prescott won and held an international reputation, and tasted to the full the sweets of a deserved success. chapter v in mid career after the publication of _ferdinand and isabella_, its author rested on his oars, treating himself to social relaxation and enjoying thoroughly the praise which came to him from every quarter. of course he had no intention of remaining idle long, but a new subject did not at once present itself so clearly to him as to make his choice of it inevitable. for about eighteen months, therefore, he took his ease. his correspondence, however, shows that he was always thinking of a second venture in the field of historical composition. his old bent for literary history led him to consider the writing of a life of molière--a book that should be agreeable and popular rather than profound. yet spain still kept its hold on his imagination, and even before his _ferdinand and isabella_ had won its sure success, he had written in a letter to ticknor the following paragraph:-- "my heart is set on a spanish subject, could i compass the materials: viz. the conquest of mexico and the anterior civilisation of the mexicans--a beautiful prose epic, for which rich virgin materials teem in simancas and madrid, and probably in mexico. i would give a couple of thousand dollars that they lay in a certain attic in bedford street." this purpose lingered in his mind all through his holidays, which were, indeed, not wholly given up to idleness, for he listened to a good deal of general reading at this time, most of it by no means of a superficial character. ever since his little daughter's death, prescott had felt a peculiar interest in the subject of the immortality of the soul, and had read all of the most serious treatises to be found upon that subject. he had also gone carefully through the gospels, weighing them with all the acumen which he had brought to bear upon his castilian chronicles. this investigation, which he had begun with reference to the single question of immortality, broadened out into an examination of the whole evidential basis of orthodox christianity. in this study he was aided by his father, who brought to it the keen, impartial judgment of an able lawyer. of the conclusions at which he ultimately arrived, he was not wont to talk except on rare occasions, and his cast of mind was always reverential. he did, however, reject the doctrines of his puritan ancestors. he held fast to the authenticity of the gospels, but he found in these no evidence to support the tenets of calvinism. now, in his leisure time, he read over various works of a theological character, and came to the general conclusion that "the study of polemics or biblical critics will tend neither to settle principles nor clear up doubts, but rather to confuse the former and multiply the latter." prescott's whole religious creed was, in fact, summed up by himself in these words: "to do well and act justly, to fear and to love god, and to love our neighbour as ourselves--in these is the essence of religion. for what we can believe, we are not responsible, supposing we examine candidly and patiently. for what we do, we shall indeed be accountable. the doctrines of the saviour unfold the whole code of morals by which our conduct should be regulated. who, then, whatever difficulties he may meet with in particular incidents and opinions recorded in the gospels, can hesitate to receive the great religious and moral truths inculcated by the saviour as the words of inspiration? i cannot, certainly. on these, then, i will rest." in april, , prescott took the first step toward beginning a study of the mexican conquest. he wrote to madrid in order to discover what materials were available for his proposed researches. at the same time he began collecting such books relating to mexico as could be obtained in london. securing personal letters to scholars and officials in mexico itself, he wrote to them to enlist their interest in his new undertaking. by the end of the year it became evident that the wealth of material bearing upon the conquest was very great, and a knowledge of this fact roused in prescott all the enthusiasm of an historical investigator who has scented a new and promising trail. only one thing now stood in the way. this was an intimation to the effect that washington irving had already planned a similar piece of work. this bit of news was imparted to prescott by mr. j. g. cogswell, who was then in charge of the astor library in new york, and who was an intimate friend of both prescott and irving. mr. cogswell told prescott that irving was intending to write a history of the conquest of mexico, as a sort of sequel, or rather pendant, to his life of columbus. of course, under the circumstances, prescott felt that, in courtesy to one who was then the most distinguished american man of letters, he could not proceed with his undertaking so long as mr. irving was in the field. he therefore wrote a long letter to irving, detailing what he had already done toward acquiring material, and to say that mr. cogswell had intimated that irving was willing to relinquish the subject in his favour. "i have learned from mr. cogswell that you had originally proposed to treat the same subject, and that you requested him to say to me that you should relinquish it in my favour. i cannot sufficiently express to you my sense of your courtesy, which i can very well appreciate, as i know the mortification it would have caused me if, contrary to my expectations, i had found you on the ground.... i fear the public will not feel so much pleased as myself by this liberal conduct on your part, and i am not sure that i should have a right in their eyes to avail myself of it. but i trust you will think differently when i accept your proffered courtesy in the same cordial spirit in which it was given." to this letter irving made a long and courteous reply, not only assuring prescott that the subject would be willingly abandoned to him, but offering to send him any books that might be useful and to render any service in his power. the episode affords a beautiful instance of literary and scholarly amenities. the sacrifice which irving made in giving up his theme was as fine as the manner of it was graceful. prescott never knew how much it meant to irving, who had already not only made some study of the subject, but had sketched out the ground-plan of the first volume, and had been actually at work upon the task of composition for a period of three months. but there was something more in it than this. writing to his nephew, pierre irving, who was afterward his biographer, he disclosed his real feeling with much frankness. "i doubt whether mr. prescott was aware of the extent of the sacrifice i made. this was a favourite subject which had delighted my imagination ever since i was a boy. i had brought home books from spain to aid me in it, and looked upon it as the pendant to my columbus. when i gave it up to him i, in a manner, gave him up my bread; for i depended upon the profits of it to recruit my waning finances. i had no other subject at hand to supply its place. i was dismounted from my _cheval de bataille_ and have never been completely mounted since. had i accomplished that work my whole pecuniary situation would have been altered."[ ] there was no longer any obstacle in prescott's way, and he set to work with an interest which grew as the richness of the material revealed itself. there came to him from madrid, books, manuscripts, copies of official documents, and all the _apparatus criticus_ which even the most exacting scholar could require. the distinguished historian, navarrete, placed his entire collection of manuscripts relating to mexico and peru at the disposal of his american _confrère_. the spanish academy let him have copies of the collections made by muñoz and by vargas y ponce--a matter of some five thousand pages. prescott's friend, señor calderon, who at this time was spanish minister to mexico, aided him in gathering materials relating to the early aztec civilisation. don pascual de gayangos, who had written the favourable notice in the _edinburgh review_, delved among the documents in the british museum on behalf of prescott, and caused copies to be made of whatever seemed to bear upon the mexican conquest. a year or two later, he even sent to prescott the whole of his own collection of manuscripts. in spain very valuable assistance was given by mr. a. h. everett, at that time american minister to the spanish court, and by his first secretary of legation, the south carolinian who had taken his entrance examination to harvard in prescott's company, and who throughout his college life had been a close and valued friend. a special agent, dr. lembke,[ ] was also employed, and he gave a good part of his time to rummaging among the archives and libraries. prescott's authorship of _ferdinand and isabella_, however, was the real touchstone which opened all doors to him, and enlisted in his service enthusiastic purveyors of material in every quarter. in spain especially, the prestige of his name was very great; and more than one traveller from boston received distinguished courtesies in that country as being the _conciudadano_ of the american historian. mr. edward everett hale, whose acquaintance with prescott was very slight, relates an experience which is quite illustrative:-- "i had gone there [to madrid] to make some studies and collect some books for the history of the pacific, which, with a prophetic instinct, i have always wanted to write. different friends gave me letters of introduction, and among others the gentlemen of the spanish embassy here were very kind to me. they gave me four such letters, and when i was in madrid and when i was in seville it seemed as though every door flew open for me and every facility was offered me. it was not until i was at home again that i came to know the secret of these most diligent civilities. i still had one of my embassy letters which i had never presented. i read it for the first time, to learn that i was the coadjutor and friend of the great historian prescott through all his life, that i was his assistant through all his historical work, and, indeed, for these reasons, no american was more worthy of the consideration of the gentlemen in charge of the spanish archives. it was certainly by no fault of mine that an exaggeration so stupendous had found its way to the spanish legation. somebody had said, what was true, that prescott was always good to me, and that our friendship began when he engaged me as his reader. and, what with translating this simple story, what with people's listening rather carelessly and remembering rather carelessly, by the time my letters were drafted i had become a sort of 'double' of mr. prescott himself. i hope that i shall never hear that i disgraced him."[ ] actual work upon the _conquest_ began early in , though not at first with a degree of progress which was satisfactory to the investigator. by may, however, he had warmed to his work. he went back to his old rigorous regime, giving up again all social pleasures outside of his own house, and spending in his library at least five hours each day. his period of rest had done him good, and his eyesight was now better than at any time since it first became impaired. after three months of preliminary reading he was able to sketch out the plan of the entire work, and on october , , he began the actual task of composition. he found the introduction extremely difficult to write, for it dealt with the pre-historic period of mexico, obscured as it was by the mist of myth and by the contradictory assertions of conflicting authorities. "the whole of that part of the story," wrote prescott, "is in twilight, and i fear i shall at least make only moonshine of it. i must hope that it will be good moonshine. it will go hard with me, however, but that i can fish something new out of my ocean of manuscripts." he had hoped to dispose of his introduction in a hundred pages, and to finish it in six months at the most. it actually extended to two hundred and fifty pages, and the writing of it took nearly eighteen months. one interruption occurred which he had not anticipated. the success of _ferdinand and isabella_ had tempted an unscrupulous publisher to undertake an abridgment of that book. to protect his own interests prescott decided to make an abridgment of his own, and thus to forestall the pirate. this work disheartened and depressed him, but he finished it with great celerity, only to find that the rival abridgment had been given up. a brief stay upon the sea-coast put him once more into working condition, and from that time he went on steadily with the _conquest_, which he completed on august , , not quite four years from the time when he began the actual composition. his weariness was lightened by the confidence which he felt in his own success. he knew that he had produced a masterpiece. naturally, he now had no trouble in securing a publisher and in making very advantageous terms for the production of the book. it was brought out by the harpers of new york, though, as before, prescott himself owned the plates. his contract allowed the harpers to publish five thousand copies for which they paid the author $ , with the right of publishing more copies if required within the period of one year and on the same general terms. an english edition was simultaneously brought out by bentley in london, who purchased the foreign copyright for £ . three spanish translations appeared soon after, one in madrid in and two in mexico in . a french translation was published in paris, by didot in , and a german translation, in leipzig, by brockhaus in . a french reprint in english appeared in paris soon after bentley placed the london edition upon the market. no historical work written by an american has ever been received with so much enthusiasm alike in america and in europe. within a month, four thousand copies were disposed of by the harpers, and at the end of four months the original edition of five thousand had been sold. the reviewers were unanimous in its praise, and an avalanche of congratulatory letters descended upon prescott from admirers, known and unknown, all over the civilised world. _ferdinand and isabella_ had brought him reputation; the _conquest of mexico_ made him famous. honours came to him unsought. he was elected a member of the french institute[ ] and of the royal society of berlin. he had already accepted membership in the royal spanish academy of history at madrid and in the royal academy of sciences in naples. harvard conferred upon him the degree of doctor of laws. perhaps nothing pleased him more, however, than a personal letter from humboldt, for whom prescott had long entertained a feeling of deep admiration. this eminent scholar, at that time the president of the royal society of berlin, in which body niebuhr, von raumer, and ranke had been enrolled, wrote in french a letter of which the following sentences form a part:-- "my satisfaction has been very great in studying line by line your excellent work. one judges with severity, with perhaps a bias towards injustice, when he has had a vivid impression of the places, and when the study of ancient history with which i have been occupied from preference has been pursued on the very soil itself where a part of these great events took place. my severity, sir, has been disarmed by the reading of your _conquest of mexico_. you paint with success because you have _seen_ with the eyes of the spirit and of the inner sense. it is a pleasure to me, a citizen of mexico, to have lived long enough to read you and to speak to you of my appreciation of the kind expressions with which you have done honour to my name.... were i not wholly occupied with my _cosmos_, which i have had the imprudence to print, i should have wished to translate your work into the language of my own country." while gathering the materials for the _conquest of mexico_, prescott had felt his way toward still another subject which his mexican researches naturally suggested. this was the conquest of peru. much of his mexican reading had borne directly upon this other theme, so that the labour of preparation was greatly lightened. moreover, by this time, he had acquired both an accurate knowledge of sources and also great facility in composition. hence the only serious work which was necessary for him to undertake as a preliminary to composition was the study of peruvian antiquities. this occupied him eight months, and proved to be far more troublesome to him and much less satisfactory than the like investigation which he had made with reference to the aztecs. however, after the work had been commenced it proceeded rapidly,--so rapidly, in fact, as to cause him a feeling of half-comical dismay. he began to write on the th of august, , and completed his task on november , . during its progress he made a note that he had written two chapters, amounting in all to fifty-one printed pages, in four days, adding the comment, "i never did up so much yarn in the same time. at this rate peru will not hold out six months. can i finish it in a year? alas for the reader!" no doubt he might have finished it in a year had certain interruptions not occurred. the first of these was the death of his father, which took place on december th, not long after he had begun the book. his brother edward had died shortly before, and this double affliction affected very deeply so sensitive a nature as prescott's. to his father, indeed, he owed more than he could ever express. the two had been true comrades, and had treated one another with an affectionate familiarity which, between father and son, was as rare in those days as it was beautiful. judge prescott's generosity had made it possible for the younger man to break through all the barriers of physical infirmity, and not only to win fame but also the happiness which comes from a creative activity. they understood each other very well, and in many points they were much alike both in their friendliness and in their habits of reserve. one little circumstance illustrates this likeness rather curiously. fond as both of them were of their fellows, and cordial as they both were to all their friends, each wished at times to be alone, and these times were when they walked or rode. therefore, each morning when the two men mounted their horses or when they set out for a walk, they always parted company when they reached the road, one turning to the right and the other to the left by a tacit understanding, and neither ever thought of accompanying the other. sometimes a friend not knowing of this trait would join one of them to share the ride or walk. whenever such a thing as this took place, that particular route would be abandoned the next day and another and a lonelier one selected. a further interruption came from the purchase of a house on beacon street and the necessity of arranging to leave the old mansion on bedford street. the new house was a fine one, overlooking the mall and the common; and the new library, which was planned especially for prescott's needs, was much more commodious than the old one. but the confusion and feeling of unsettlement attendant on the change distracted prescott more than it would have done a man less habituated to a self-imposed routine. "a month of pandemonium," he wrote; "an unfurnished house coming to order; a library without books; books without time to open them." it took prescott quite a while to resume his methodical habits. his old-time indolence settled down upon him, and it was some time before his literary momentum had been recovered. moreover, he presumed upon the fairly satisfactory condition of his eye and used it to excess. the result was that his optic nerve was badly over-taxed, "probably by manuscript digging," as he said. the strain was one from which his eye never fully recovered; and from this time until the completion of the _peru_, he could use it in reading for only a few minutes every day, sometimes perhaps for ten or fifteen, but never for more than thirty. as this is the last time that we shall mention this subject, it may be said that for all purposes of literary work prescott was soon afterward reduced to the position of one who was actually blind. what had before been a merely stationary dimness of vision became a slowly progressive decay of sight, or, to express it in medical language, amblyopia had passed into amaurosis. he followed rigorously his oculist's injunctions, but in the end he had to face the facts unflinchingly; and a little later he recorded his determination to give up all use of the eye for the future in his studies, and to be contented with preserving it for the ordinary purposes of life. the necessity disheartened him. "it takes the strength out of me," he said. nevertheless, neither this nor the fact that his general health was most unsatisfactory, caused him to abandon work. he could not bring himself to use what he called "the coward's word, 'impossible.'" and so, after a little time, he went on as before, studying "by ear-work," and turning off upon his noctograph from ten to fifteen pages every day. he continued also his outdoor exercise, and, in fact, one of the best-written chapters of the _conquest of peru_--the last one--was composed while galloping through the woods at pepperell. on november , , the _conquest of peru_ was finished. like the preceding history, it was published by the harper brothers, who agreed to pay the author one dollar per copy and to bring out a first edition of seventy-five hundred copies. this, mr. ticknor says, was a more liberal arrangement than had ever before been made with an historical writer in the united states. the english copyright was purchased by bentley for £ . prescott's main anxiety about the reception which would be given to the _conquest of peru_ was based upon his doubts as to its literary style. neither of his other books had been written so rapidly, and he feared that he might incur the charge of over-fluency or even slovenliness. yet, as a matter of fact, the chorus of praise which greeted the two volumes was as loud and as spontaneous as it had been over his _mexico_. prescott now stood so firmly on his feet as to look at much of this praise in a somewhat humorous light. the approbation of the _edinburgh review_ no longer seemed to him the _summa laus_, though he valued it more highly than the praise given him by american periodicals, of which he wrote very shrewdly: "i don't know how it is, but our critics, though not pedantic, have not the businesslike air, or the air of the man of the world, which gives manliness and significance to criticism. their satire, when they attempt it--which cannot be often laid to their door--has neither the fine edge of the _edinburgh_ nor the sledgehammer stroke of the _quarterly_. they twaddle out their humour as if they were afraid of its biting too hard, or else they deliver axioms with a sort of smart, dapper conceit, like a little parson laying down the law to his little people.... in england there is a far greater number of men highly cultivated--whether in public life or men of leisure--whose intimacy with affairs and with society, as well as books, affords supplies of a high order for periodical criticism." as for newspaper eulogies, he remarked: "i am certainly the cause of some wit and much folly in others." his latest work, however, brought him two new honours which he greatly prized,--an election to the royal english society of literature, and the other an invitation to membership in the royal society of antiquaries. the former honour he shared with only one of his fellow-countrymen, bancroft; the latter had heretofore been given to no american. prescott now indulged himself with a long period of "literary loafing," as he described it, broken in upon only by the preparation of a short memoir of john pickering, the antiquarian and scholar, who had been one of prescott's most devoted friends. this memoir was undertaken at the request of the massachusetts historical society. it has no general interest now, but is worthy of note as having been the only one of prescott's works which he dictated to an amanuensis. prescott had an aversion to writing in this way, although he had before him the example of his blind contemporary, thierry. like alphonse daudet, he seems to have felt that what is written by hand comes more directly from the author's inner self, and that it represents most truly the tints and half-tones of his personality. that this is only a fancy is seen clearly enough from several striking instances which the history of literature records. scott dictated to lockhart the whole of _the bride of lammermoor_. thackeray dictated a good part of _the newcomes_ and all of _pendennis_, and even _henry esmond_, of which the artificial style might well have made dictation difficult. prescott, however, had his own opinion on the subject, and, with the single exception which has just been cited, he used his noctograph for composition down to the very end, dictating only his correspondence to his secretary. his days of "literary loafing" allowed him to enjoy the pleasures of friendship which during his periods of work were necessarily, to some extent, intermitted. no man ever had more cordially devoted friends than prescott. he knew every one who was worth knowing, and every one was attracted by the spontaneous charm of his manner and his invincible kindliness. never was a man more free from petulance or peevishness, though these defects at times might well have been excused in one whose health was such as his. he presented the anomaly of a dyspeptic who was still an optimist and always amiable. mr. john foster kirk, who was one of his secretaries, wrote of him:-- "no annoyance, great or small, the most painful illness or the most intolerable bore, could disturb his equanimity, or render him in the least degree sullen, or fretful, or discourteous. he was always gay, good-humoured, and manly. he carried his kindness of disposition not only into his public, but into his private, writings. in the hundreds of letters, many of them of the most confidential character, treating freely of other authors and of a great variety of persons, which i wrote at his dictation, not a single unkind or harsh or sneering expression occurs. he was totally free from the jealousy and envy so common among authors, and was always eager in conversation, as in print, to point out the merits of the great contemporary historians whom many men in his position would have looked upon as rivals to be dreaded if not detested." bancroft the historian has added his testimony to the greatness of prescott's personal charm. "his countenance had something that brought to mind the 'beautiful disdain' that hovers on that of the apollo. but while he was high-spirited, he was tender and gentle and humane. his voice was like music and one could never hear enough of it. his cheerfulness reached and animated all about him. he could indulge in playfulness and could also speak earnestly and profoundly; but he knew not how to be ungracious or pedantic." no wonder then that his friends were legion, comprising men and women of the most different types. dry and formal scholars such as jared sparks; men of the world like lord carlisle; nice old ladies like maria edgeworth and the octogenarian miss berry, walpole's friend; women of fashion like lady lyell, lady mary labouchère, and the duchess of sutherland; spanish hidalgos like calderon de la barca; smooth politicians like caleb cushing; and intense partisans like charles sumner,--all agreed in their affectionate admiration for prescott. his friendship with sumner was indeed quite notable, since no men could have been more utterly unlike. sumner was devoid of the slightest gleam of humour, and his self-consciousness was extreme; yet prescott sometimes poked fun at him with impunity. thus, writing to sumner about his phi beta kappa oration (delivered in ), he said:-- "last year you condemned wars _in toto_, making no exception even for the wars of freedom. this year you condemn the _representation_ of war, whether by the pencil or the pen. marathon, salamis, bunker hill, the retreat from moscow, waterloo, great and small, are _all_ to be blotted from memory equally with my own wild skirmishes of barbarians and banditti. lord deliver us! where will you bring up? if the stories are not to be painted or written, such records of them as have been heedlessly made should by the same rule be destroyed. i laugh; but i fear you will make the judicious grieve. but fare thee well, dear sumner. whether thou deportest thyself _sana mente_ or _mente insana_, believe me always truly yours." but sumner's arrogance and egoism were always in abeyance where prescott was concerned, and even their lack of political sympathy never marred the warmth of their intercourse. prescott, in fact, cared very little about contemporary politics. he had inherited from his fighting ancestors a sturdy patriotism, but his loyalty was given to the whole country and not to any faction or party. his cast of mind was essentially conservative, and down to he would no doubt have called himself an old-line whig. he was always, however, averse to political discussion which, indeed, led easily to personalities that were offensive not only to prescott's taste but to his amiable disposition. his friend parsons said of him: "he never sought or originated political conversation, but he would not decline contributing his share to it; and the contribution he made was always of good sense, of moderation, and of forbearance." prescott's detachment with regard to politics was partly due, no doubt, to the nature of the life he led, which kept him isolated from the bustle of the world about him; yet it was probably due still more to a lack of combativeness in his nature. motley once said of him that he lacked the capacity for _sæva indignatio_. this remark was called forth by prescott's tolerant view of philip ii. of spain, who was in motley's eyes little better than a monster. one might fairly, however, give it a wider application, and we must regard it as an undeniable defect in prescott that nothing external could strike fire from him. thus, when his intimate friend sumner had been brutally assaulted in the senate chamber by the southern bully, brooks, prescott wrote to him: "you have escaped the crown of martyrdom by a narrow chance, and have got all the honours, which are almost as dangerous to one's head as a gutta-percha cane." there is a tameness about this sentence which one would scarcely notice had sumner merely received a black eye, but which offends one's sense of fitness when we recall that sumner had been beaten into insensibility, and that he never fully recovered from the attack. again, when, in , boston was all ablaze over the capture of a fugitive slave, when the city was filled with troops and muskets were levelled at the populace, prescott merely remarked to an english correspondent: "it is a disagreeable business." to be sure, he also said, "it made my blood boil," but the general tone of the letter shows that his blood must have boiled at a very low temperature. nevertheless, he seems to have been somewhat stirred by the exciting struggle which took place over kansas between the free-soil forces and the partisans of slavery. hence, in , he cast his vote for frémont, the first republican candidate for the presidency. but, as a rule, the politics of the sixteenth century were his most serious concern, and in the very year in which he voted for frémont, he wrote: "i belong to the sixteenth century and am quite out of place when i sleep elsewhere." it was this feeling which led him to decline a tempting invitation to write a history of the modern conquest of mexico by the american army under general scott. the offer came to him in ; and both the theme itself and the terms in which the offer was made might well have attracted one whose face was set less resolutely toward the historic past. his comment was characteristic. "i had rather not meddle with heroes who have not been under ground two centuries at least." it is interesting to note that the subject which prescott then rejected has never been adequately treated; and that the brilliant exploits of scott in mexico still await a worthy chronicler. it was natural that a writer so popular as prescott should, in spite of his methodical life, find his time encroached upon by those who wished to meet him. he had an instinct for hospitality; and this made it the more difficult for him to maintain that scholarly seclusion which had been easy to him in the days of his comparative obscurity. his personal friends were numerous, and there were many others who sought him out because of his distinction. many foreign visitors were entertained by him, and these he received with genuine pleasure. their number increased as the years went by so that once in a single week he entertained, at pepperell, señor calderon, stephens the central american traveller, and the british general harlan from afghanistan. sir charles lyell, lady lyell, lord carlisle, and dickens were also visitors of his. it was as the guest of prescott that thackeray ate his first dinner in america.[ ] visitors of this sort, of course, he was very glad to see. not so much could be said of the strangers who forced themselves upon him at nahant, where swarms of summer idlers filled the hotels and cottages, and with well-meaning but thoughtless interest sought out the historian in the darkened parlour of his house. "i have lost a clear month here by company," he wrote in , "company which brings the worst of all satieties; for the satiety from study brings the consciousness of improvement. but this dissipation impairs health, spirit, scholarship. yet how can i escape it, tied like a bear to a stake here?" prescott's favourite form of social intercourse was found in little dinners shared with a few chosen friends. these affairs he called "cronyings," and in them he took much delight, even though they often tempted him to an over-indulgence in tobacco and sometimes in wine.[ ] one rule, however, he seldom broke, and that was his resolve never to linger after ten o'clock at any function, however pleasant. an old friend of his has left an account of one especially convivial occasion to which prescott had invited a number of his friends. the dinner was given at a restaurant, and the guests were mostly young men and fond of good living. the affair went off so well that, as the hour of ten approached, no one thought of leaving. prescott began to fidget in his chair and even to drop a hint or two, which passed unnoticed, for the reason that prescott's ten o'clock rule was quite unknown to his jovial guests. at last, to the surprise of every one, he rose and made a little speech to the company, in which he said that he was sorry to leave them, but that he must return home. "but," he added, "i am sure you will be very soon in no condition to miss me,--especially as i leave behind that excellent representative"--pointing to a basket of uncorked bottles which stood in a corner. "then you know you are just as much at home in this house as i am. you can call for what you like. don't be alarmed--i mean on _my_ account. i abandon to you, without reserve, all my best wines, my credit with the house, and my reputation to boot. make free with them all, i beg of you--and if you don't go home till morning, i wish you a merry night of it." it is to be hoped that prescott was not quite accurately reported, and that he did not speak that little sentence, "don't be alarmed," which may have been characteristic of a new englander, but which certainly would have induced a different sort of guests to leave the place at once. if he did say it, however, it was somewhat in keeping with the tactlessness which he occasionally showed. the habit of frank speech, which had made him a nuisance as a boy, never quite left him, and he frequently blurted out things which were of the sort that one would rather leave unsaid. his wife would often nod and frown at him on these occasions, and then he would always make the matter worse by asking her, with the greatest innocence, what the matter was. mr. ogden records an amusing instance of prescott's _naïveté_ during his last visit to england. conversing about americanisms with an english lady of rank, she criticised the american use of the word "snarl" in the sense of disorder. "why, surely," cried prescott, "you would say that your ladyship's hair is in a snarl!" which, unfortunately, it was--a fact that by no means soothed the lady's temper at being told so. there was a certain boyishness about prescott, however, which usually enabled him to carry these things off without offence, because they were obviously so natural and so unpremeditated. his boyishness took other forms which were more generally pleasing. one evidence of it was his fondness for such games as blindman's buff and puss-in-the-corner, in which he used to engage with all the zest of a child, even after he had passed his fiftieth year, and in which the whole household took part, together with any distinguished foreigners who might be present. another youthful trait was his readiness to burst into song on all occasions, even in the midst of his work. in fact, just before beginning any animated bit of descriptive writing he would rouse himself up by shouting out some ballad that had caught his fancy; so that strangers visiting his house would often be amused when, from the grave historian's study, there came forth the sonorous musical appeal, "o give me but my arab steed!" boyish, too, was his racy talk, full of colloquialisms and bits of yankee dialect, with which also his personal correspondence was peppered. even though his rather prim biographer, ticknor, has gone over prescott's letters with a fine-tooth comb, there still remain enough of these doric gems to make us wish that all of them had been retained. it is interesting to find the author of so many volumes of stately and ornate narration letting himself go in private life, and dropping into such easy phrases as "whopper-jawed," "cotton to," "quiddle," "book up," "crack up," "podder" (a favourite word of his), and "slosh." he retained all of a young man's delight in his own convivial feats, and we find him in one of his letters, after describing a rather prolonged and complicated entertainment, asking gleefully, "am i not a fast boy?" his yankee phrases were the hall-mark of his yankee nature. old england, with all its beauty of landscape and its exquisite finish, never drove new england from his head or heart. thus, on his third visit to england, he wrote to his wife: "i came through the english garden,--lawns of emerald green, winding streams, light arched bridges, long lines stretching between hedges of hawthorn all flowering; rustic cottages, lordly mansions, and sweeping woods--the whole landscape a miracle of beauty." and then he adds: "i would have given something to see a ragged fence, or an old stump, or a bit of rock, or even a stone as big as one's fist, to show that man's hand had not been combing nature's head so vigorously. i felt i was not in my own dear, wild america." prescott was a true yankee also in the carefulness of his attention to matters of business. he did not value money for its own sake. his father had left him a handsome competence. he spent freely both for himself and for his friends; but none the less, he made the most minute notes of all his publishing ventures and analysed the publishers' returns as carefully as though he were a professional accountant. this was due in part, no doubt, to a natural desire to measure the popularity of his books by the standard of financial success. he certainly had no reason to be dissatisfied. up to the time of his death, of the _ferdinand and isabella_ there had been sold in the united states and england nearly eighteen thousand copies; of the _conquest of mexico_, twenty-four thousand copies; and of the _conquest of peru_, seventeen thousand copies--a total, for the three works, of nearly sixty thousand copies. when we remember that each of these histories was in several volumes and was expensively printed and bound, and that the reading public was much smaller in those days than now, this is a very remarkable showing for three serious historical works. since his death, the sales have grown greater with the increase of general readers and the lapse of the american copyright prescott made excellent terms with his publishers, as has already been recorded, and if a decision of the house of lords had been favourable to his copyright in england, his literary gains in that country would have been still larger.[ ] his liking for new england country life led him to maintain in addition to his boston house, at beacon street, two other places of residence. one was at nahant, then, as now, a very popular resort in summer. there he had an unpretentious wooden cottage of two stories, with a broad veranda about it, occupying an elevated position at the extremity of a bold promontory which commanded a wide view of the sea. nahant is famous for its cool--almost too cool--sea-breeze, which even in august so tempers the heat of the sun as to make a shaded spot almost uncomfortably cold. this bracing air prescott found admirably tonic, and beneficial both to his eye and to his digestion, which was weak. on the other hand, the dampness of the breeze affected unfavourably his tendency to rheumatism, so that he seldom spent more than eight weeks of the year upon the sea-shore. he found also that the reflection of the sun from the water was a thing to be avoided. therefore, he most thoroughly enjoyed his other country place at pepperell, where his grandmother had lived. the plain little house, known as "the highlands," and shaded by great trees, seemed to him his truest home. here, more than elsewhere, he threw off his cares and gave himself up completely to his drives and rides and walks and social pleasures. the country round about was then well wooded, and prescott delighted to gallop through the forests and over the rich countryside, every inch of which had been familiar to him since his boyhood days. he felt something of the english landowner's pride in remembering that his modest estate had been in the possession of his family for more than a century and a half--"an uncommon event," he wrote, "among our locomotive people." behind the house was a lovely shaded walk with a distant view of mount monadnock; and here prescott often strolled while composing portions of his histories before committing them to paper. beyond the road stood a picturesque cluster of oak trees, making a thick grove which he called "the fairy grove," for in it he used to tell his children the stories about elves and gnomes and fairies which delighted them so much. it was the death of his parents that led him in the last years of his own life to abandon this home which he so dearly loved. the memories which associated it with them were painful to him after they had gone. he missed their faces and their happy converse, and so, in , he purchased a house on lynn bay, some five or six miles distant from his cottage at nahant. here the sea-breeze was cool but never damp; while, unlike nahant, the place was surrounded by green meadow-land and pleasant woods. this new house was much more luxurious than the cottages at nahant and pepperell, and he spent at lynn nearly all his summers during his last five years. he added to the place, laying out its grounds and tastefully decorating its interior, having in view not merely his own comfort but that of his children and grandchildren, who now began to gather about him. his daughter elizabeth, who was married in to mr. james lawrence of boston, occupied a delightful country house near by. one memorial of prescott long remained here to recall alike the owner of the place and the work to which his life had been devoted. this was a large cherry tree, which afforded the only shade about the house when he first took possession of it. the state of his eye made it impossible for him to remain long in the sunshine; and so, in his hours of composition, he paced around the circle of the shade afforded by this tree, carrying in his hand a light umbrella, which he raised for a moment when he passed that portion of the circle on which the sunlight fell. he thus trod a deep path in the turf; and for years after his death the path remained still visible,--a touching reminder to those friends of his who saw it. chapter vi the last ten years while prescott was still engaged in his mexican and peruvian researches, and, in fact, even before he had undertaken them, another fascinating subject had found lodgement in his mind. so far back as , only a few months after the publication of _ferdinand and isabella_, he had said: "should i succeed in my present collections, who knows what facilities i may find for making one relative to philip the second's reign--a fruitful theme if discussed under all its relations, civil and literary as well as military." and again, in , he reverted to the same subject in his memoranda. could he have been sure of obtaining access to the manuscript and other sources, he might at that time have chosen this theme in preference to the story of the mexican conquest. he knew, however, that nothing could be done unless he were able to make a free use of the spanish archives preserved at simancas. to this ancient town, at the suggestion of cardinal ximenes, the most precious historical documents relating to spanish history had been removed, in , by order of charles v. the old castle of the admiral of castile had been prepared to receive them, and there they still remained, as they do to-day, filling some fifty large rooms and contained in some eighty thousand packages. it has been estimated that fully thirty million separate documents of various kinds are included in this remarkably rich collection,--not only state papers of a formal character, but private letters, secret reports, and the confidential correspondence of spanish ambassadors in foreign countries.[ ] such a treasure-house of historical information scarcely exists elsewhere; and prescott, therefore, wrote to his friends in madrid to learn whether he might hope for access to this spanish vatican. in , however, he made the following memorandum: "by advices from madrid this week, i learn that the archives of simancas are in so disorderly a state that it is next to impossible to gather material for the reign of philip ii." his friend, arthur middleton, cited to him the instance of a young scholar who had been permitted to explore these collections for six months, and who had found that the documents of a date prior to the year were "all thrown together without order or index." furthermore, prescott's agent in spain, dr. lembke, had incurred the displeasure of the government, which expelled him from the country. prescott was, therefore, obliged for the time to put aside the project of a history of philip ii., and he turned instead to the study of the mexican conquest. nevertheless, with that quiet pertinacity which was one of his conspicuous traits, he still kept the theme in mind, and let it be known to his friends in paris and london, as well as in madrid and elsewhere, that all materials bearing upon the career of philip ii. were much desired by him. these friends responded very zealously to his wishes. in paris, m. mignet and m. ternaux-compans allowed dr. lembke to have their important manuscript collections copied. in london, prescott's correspondent and former reviewer, don pascual de gayangos, searched the documents in the british museum and a very rich private collection owned by sir thomas philips. he also visited brussels, where he found more valuable material, and later, having been appointed professor of arabic in the university of madrid ( ), he used his influence on behalf of prescott with very great success. many noble houses in spain put at his disposal their family memorials. the national library and other public institutions offered whatever they possessed in the way of books and papers. two years later, this indefatigable friend spent some weeks at simancas, where he unearthed many an interesting _trouvaille_. even these sources, however, were not the only ones which contributed to prescott's store of documents. ferdinand wolf in vienna, and humboldt and ranke in berlin, also aided him, and secured additional material, not only in austria and prussia, but in tuscany. his collection grew apace; so that, long before he was ready to take up the subject of philip ii., he possessed over three hundred and seventy volumes bearing directly upon the reign of that monarch, while his manuscript copies, which he caused to be richly bound, came to number in the end some thirty-eight huge folios. these occupied a position of special honour in his library, and were playfully called by him his seraglio. thus, in , when about to take up his fourth important work, he was already richly documented. his health, however, was unsatisfactory. he had now some ailments that had become chronic,--dyspepsia and a urethral complication, which often caused him intense suffering. it was not until july , , that he began to write the first chapter of _philip ii._ at nahant. he makes the laconic note: "heavy work, this starting. i have been out of harness too long.... the business of fixing thought is incredibly difficult." he continued writing at pepperell, and at his home in boston, until he had regained a good deal of his old facility. his physical strength, however, was waning, and he could no longer continue to work with his former regularity and method. he lost flesh, and was threatened for a while with deafness, the fear of which was almost too much for even his inveterate cheerfulness. in february, , he wrote: "increasing interest in the work is hardly to be expected, considering it has to depend so much on the ear. as i shall have to depend more and more on this one of my senses as i grow older, it is to be hoped that providence will spare me my hearing. it would be a fearful thing to doubt it." his depression finally became so great that he suspended for a time his labours and made a short visit to washington, where he was received with abundant hospitality. he was entertained by president taylor, by sir henry bulwer, the british minister, by webster, and by many other distinguished persons; but he became more and more convinced that a complete change was necessary to restore his health and spirits; and so, on may d of the same year, he sailed from new york for liverpool, where he arrived on the d of june. prescott's stay in england was perhaps the most delightful episode in his life. his biographer, mr. ticknor, speaks of it as "the most brilliant visit ever made to england by an american citizen not clothed with the prestige of official station." the assertion is quite true, since the cordiality which lowell met with in that country was, in part, at any rate, due to his diplomatic rank, while general grant was essentially a political personage who was, besides, personally commended to all foreign courts by his successor in office, president hayes. but prescott, with no credentials save his reputation as a man of letters and his own charming personality, enjoyed a welcome of boundless cordiality. it was not merely that he was a literary celebrity and was received everywhere by his brothers of the pen,--he became the fashion and was unmistakably the lion of the season. from the moment when he landed at liverpool he found himself encircled by friends. the attentions paid to him were never formal or perfunctory. he was admitted to the homes of the greatest englishmen, and was there made free of that delightful hospitality which englishmen reserve for the chosen few. no sooner had he reached london than he was showered with cards of invitation to the greatest houses, and with letters couched in terms of personal friendship. sir charles lyell, his old acquaintance, welcomed him to london a few hours after his arrival. the american minister, mr. abbott lawrence,[ ] begged him to be present at a diplomatic dinner. in company of the lyells he was taken at once to an evening party where he met lord palmerston, then premier, and other members of the ministry. lord carlisle greeted him in a fashion strangely foreign to english reserve, for he threw his arms around prescott, making the historian blush like a great girl. it would be tedious to recount the unbroken series of brilliant entertainments at which prescott was the guest of honour. his letters written at this time from england are full of interesting and often amusing bits of description, and they show that even his exceptional social honours were very far from turning his head. in fact, he viewed the whole thing as a diverting show, except when the warmth of the personal welcome touched his heart. through it all he was the self-poised american, never losing his native sense of humour. he made friends with sir robert peel, who, at their first meeting, addressed him in french, having taken him for the french dramatist m. scribe! he chatted often with the duke of wellington, and described him in a comparison which makes one smile because it is so yankee-like and bostonese. "in the crowd i saw an old gentleman, very nicely made up, stooping a good deal, very much decorated with orders, and making his way easily along, as all, young and old, seemed to treat him with deference. it was the duke--the old iron duke--and i thought myself lucky in this opportunity of seeing him.... he paid me some pretty compliments on which i grew vain at once, and i did my best to repay him in coin that had no counterfeit in it. he is a striking figure, reminding me a good deal of colonel perkins in his general air." prescott attended the races at ascot with the american and swedish ministers, was the guest of sir robert peel, and was presented at court--a ceremony which he described to mrs. prescott in a very lively letter. "i was at lawrence's, at one, in my costume: a chapeau with gold lace, blue coat, and white trousers, begilded with buttons and metal,--a sword and patent leather boots. i was a figure indeed! but i had enough to keep me in countenance. i spent an hour yesterday with lady m. getting instructions for demeaning myself. the greatest danger was that i should be tripped up by my own sword.... the company were at length permitted one by one to pass into the presence chamber--a room with a throne and gorgeous canopy at the farther end, before which stood the little queen of the mighty isle and her consort, surrounded by her ladies-in-waiting. she was rather simply dressed, but he was in a field marshal's uniform, and covered, i should think, with all the orders of europe. he is a good-looking person, but by no means so good-looking as the portraits of him. the queen is better-looking than you might expect. i was presented by our minister, according to the directions of the chamberlain, as the historian of ferdinand and isabella, in due form--and made my profound obeisance to her majesty, who made a very dignified curtesy, as she made to some two hundred others who were presented in like manner. i made the same low bow to his princeship to whom i was also presented, and so bowed myself out of the royal circle, without my sword tripping up the heels of my nobility.... lord carlisle ... said he had come to the drawing-room to see how i got through the affair, which he thought i did without any embarrassment. indeed, to say truth, i have been more embarrassed a hundred times in my life than i was here. i don't know why; i suppose because i am getting old." somewhat later, while prescott was a guest at castle howard, where the queen was also entertained, he had something more to tell about her. "at eight we went to dinner all in full dress, but mourning for the duke of cambridge; i, of course, for president taylor! all wore breeches or tight pantaloons. it was a brilliant show, i assure you--that immense table with its fruits and flowers and lights glancing over beautiful plate and in that superb gallery. i was as near the queen as at our own family table. she has a good appetite and laughs merrily. she has fine eyes and teeth, but is short. she was dressed in black silk and lace with the blue scarf of the order of the garter across her bosom. her only ornaments were of jet. the prince, who is certainly a handsome and very well made man, wore the garter with its brilliant buckle round his knee, a showy star on his breast, and the collar of a foreign order round his neck. "in the evening we listened to some fine music and the queen examined the pictures. odd enough the etiquette. lady carlisle, who did the honours like a high-bred lady as she is, and the duchess of sutherland, were the only ladies who talked with her majesty. lord carlisle, her host, was the only gentleman who did so unless she addressed a person herself. no one can sit a moment when she chooses to stand. she did me the honour to come and talk with me--asking me about my coming here, my stay in the castle, what i was doing now in the historic way, how everett was and where he was--for ten minutes or so; and prince albert afterwards a long while, talking about the houses and ruins in england, and the churches in belgium, and the pictures in the room, and i don't know what. i found myself now and then trenching on the rules by interrupting, etc.; but i contrived to make it up by a respectful 'your royal highness,' 'your majesty,' etc. i told the queen of the pleasure i had in finding myself in a land of friends instead of foreigners--a sort of stereotype with me--and of my particular good fortune in being under the roof with her. she is certainly very much of a lady in her manner, with a sweet voice." at oxford, prescott was the guest of the bishop, the well-known wilberforce, popularly known by his sobriquet of "soapy sam." the university conferred upon the american historian the degree of d.c.l. in spite of the fact that he was a unitarian. this circumstance was known and caused some slight difficulty, but possibly the degree given to everett, another unitarian, some years before in spite of great opposition, was regarded as having established a precedent; and oxford cherishes the cult of precedent. at the bishop's house, however, prescott shocked a lady by telling her of his creed. he wrote to ticknor: "the term [unitarian] is absolutely synonymous in a large party here with infidel, jew, mohammedan; worse even, because regarded as a wolf in sheep's clothing." the lady, however, succeeded in giving prescott a shock in return; for when he happened to mention dr. channing, she told him that she had never even heard the man's name--a sort of ignorance which to a bostonian was quite incomprehensible. prescott's account of the university ceremonial is given in a letter to mr. ticknor. "lord northampton and i were doctorised in due form. we were both dressed in flaming red robes (it was the hottest day i have felt here), and then marched out in solemn procession with the faculty, etc., in their black and red gowns through the public streets.... we were marched up the aisle; professor phillimore made a long latin exposition of our merits, in which each of the adjectives ended, as southey said in reference to himself on a like occasion, in _issimus_; and amidst the cheers of the audience we were converted into doctors." prescott was much pleased with this oxford degree, which rightly seemed to him more significant than the like honours which had come to him from various american colleges. "now," said he, "i am a _real_ doctor." in the same letter he gives a little picture of lord brougham during a debate in the house of lords. brougham was denouncing baron bunsen for his course in the schleswig-holstein affair,--bunsen being in the house at the time. "what will interest you is the assault made so brutally by brougham on your friend bunsen. i was present and never saw anything so coarse as his personalities. he said the individual [bunsen] took up the room of two ladies. bunsen _is_ rather fat as also madame and his daughter--all of whom at last marched out of the gallery, but not until eyes and glasses had been directed to the spot to make out the unfortunate individuals, while lord brougham was flying up and down, thumping the table with his fists and foaming at the mouth till all his brother peers, including the old duke, were in convulsions of laughter. i dined with bunsen and madame the same day at ford's." prescott met both disraeli and gladstone, and, among other more purely literary men, macaulay, lockhart, hallam, thirlwall, milman, and rogers. of macaulay he tells some interesting things. "i have met him several times, and breakfasted with him the other morning. his memory for quotations and illustration is a miracle--quite disconcerting. he comes to a talk like one specially crammed. yet you may start the topic. he told me he should be delivered of twins on his next publication, which would not be till ' .... macaulay's first draught--very unlike scott's--is absolutely illegible from erasures and corrections.... he tells me he has his moods for writing. when not in the vein, he does not press it.... h---- told me that lord jeffrey once told him that, having tripped up macaulay in a quotation from _paradise lost_, two days after, macaulay came to him and said, 'you will not catch me again in the _paradise_.' at which jeffrey opened the volume and took him up in a great number of passages at random, in all of which he went on correctly repeating the original. was it not a miraculous _tour d'esprit_? macaulay does not hesitate to say now that he thinks he could restore the first six or seven books of the _paradise_ in case they were lost." still again, prescott expresses his astonishment at macaulay's memory. "macaulay is the most of a miracle. his _tours_ in the way of memory stagger belief.... his talk is like the laboured, but still unintermitting, jerks of a pump. but it is anything but wishy-washy. it keeps the mind, however, on too great a tension for table-talk." writing of samuel rogers, who was now a very old man, he records a characteristic little anecdote. "i have seen rogers several times, that is, all that is out of the bedclothes. his talk is still _sauce piquante_. the best thing on record of his late sayings is his reply to lady----, who at a dinner table, observing him speaking to a lady, said, 'i hope, mr. rogers, you are not attacking me.' 'attacking you!' he said, 'why, my dear lady----, i have been all my life defending you.' wit could go no further." prescott was the guest of the duke of sutherland at trentham and at stafford house. he was invited to lord lansdowne's, the duke of northumberland's, the duke of argyle's, and to lord grey's, and he describes himself in one letter as up to his ears in dances, dinners, and breakfasts. this sort of life, with all its glitter and gayety, suited prescott wonderfully well, and his health improved daily. he remarked, however: "it is a life which, were i an englishman, i should not desire a great deal of; two months at most; although i think, on the whole, the knowledge of a very curious state of society and of so many interesting and remarkable characters, well compensate the bore of a voyage. yet i am quite sure, having once had this experience, nothing would ever induce me to repeat it, as i have heard you say it would not pay." some little personal notes and memoranda may also be quoted. "everything is drawn into the vortex, and there they swim round and round, so that you may revolve for weeks and not meet a familiar face half a dozen times. yet there is monotony in some things--that everlasting turbot and shrimp sauce. i shall never abide a turbot again." "do you know, by the way, that i have become a courtier and affect the royal presence? i wish you could see my gallant costume, gold-laced coat, white inexpressibles, silk hose, gold-buckled patent slippers, sword and chapeau. am i not playing the fool as well as my betters?" "a silly woman ... said when i told her it was thirty years since i was here, 'pooh! you are not more than thirty years old.' and on my repeating it, she still insisted on the same flattering ejaculation. the bishop of london the other day with his amiable family told me they had settled my age at forty.... so i am convinced there has been some error in the calculation. ask mother how it is. they say here that gray hair, particularly whiskers, may happen to anybody even under thirty. on the whole, i am satisfied that i am the youngest of the family." writing to his daughter from alnwick castle, the seat of the duke of northumberland, prescott gave a little instance of his own extreme sensibility. a great number of children were being entertained by the duke and duchess. "as they all joined in the beautiful anthem, 'god save the queen,' the melody of the little voices rose up so clear and simple in the open courtyard that everybody was touched. though i had nothing to do with the anthem, some of my _opera tears_,[ ] dear lizzie, came into my eyes, and did me great credit with some of the john and jennie bulls by whom i was surrounded." when he left alnwick:-- "my friendly hosts remonstrated on my departure, as they had requested me to make them a long visit; and 'i never say what i do not mean,' said the duke, in an honest way. and when i thanked him for his hospitable welcome, 'it is no more,' he said, 'than you should meet in every house in england.' that was hearty." the letters written by prescott while in europe are marked also by evidences of the beautiful affection which he cherished for his wife, of whom he once said, many years after their marriage: "contrary to the assertion of la bruyère--who somewhere says that the most fortunate husband finds reason to regret his condition at least once in twenty-four hours--i may truly say that i have found no such day in the quarter of a century that providence has spared us to each other." in the letters written by him during this english visit, there remain, even after the ruthless editing done by ticknor, passages that are touching in their unaffected tenderness. thus, from london, june , :-- "why have i no letter on my table from home? i trust i shall find one there this evening, or i shall, after all, have a heavy heart, which is far from gay in this gayety." and the following from antwerp, july , :-- "dear susan, i never see anything beautiful in nature or art, or hear heart-stirring music in the churches--the only place where music does stir my heart--without thinking of you and wishing you could be by my side, if only for a moment." when prescott returned from this, his last visit to europe, he found himself at the very zenith of his fame. in every respect, his position was most enviable. the union of critical approval with popular applause--a thing which is so rare in the experience of authors--had been fairly won by him. his books were accepted as authoritative, while they were read by thousands who never looked into the pages of other historians. even a volume of miscellaneous essays[ ] which he had collected from his stray contributions to the _north american_, and which had been published in england by bentley in , had succeeded with the public on both sides of the atlantic. he had the prestige of a very flattering foreign recognition, and his friendships embraced some of the best-known men and women in great britain and the united states. it may seem odd that the letters and other writings of his contemporaries seldom contain more than a mere casual mention of him; but the explanation of this is to be found in the disposition of prescott himself. as a man, and in his social intercourse outside of his own family, he was so thoroughly well-bred, so far from anything resembling eccentricity, and so averse from literary pose, as to afford no material for gossip or indeed for special comment. in this respect, his life resembled his writings. there was in each a noticeable absence of the piquant, or the sensational. he pleased by his manners as by his pen; but he possessed no mannerisms such as are sometimes supposed to be the hall-marks of originality. hence, one finds no mass of striking anecdotes collected and sent about by those who knew him; any more than in his writing one chances upon startling strokes of style. prescott, however, had his own very definite opinions concerning his contemporaries, though they were always expressed in kindly words. to irving he was especially attracted because of a certain likeness of temperament between them. his sensitive nature felt all the _nuances_ of irving's delicate style, especially when it was used for pathetic effects. "you have read irving's _memoirs of miss davidson_," he once wrote to miss ticknor. "did you ever meet with any novel half so touching? it is the most painful book i ever listened to. i hear it from the children and we all cry over it together. what a little flower of paradise!" yet he could accurately criticise his friend's productions.[ ] longfellow was another of prescott's associates, and his ballads of the sea were favourites. mr. t. w. higginson quotes prescott as saying that _the skeleton in armor_ and _the wreck of the hesperus_ were the best imaginative poetry since coleridge. of byron he wrote, in , some sentences to a friend which condense very happily the opinion that has finally come to be accepted. indeed, prescott shows in his private letters a critical gift which one seldom finds in his published essays--a judgment at once shrewd, clear-sighted, and sensible. "i think one is apt to talk very extravagantly of his [byron's] poetry; for it is the poetry of passion and carries away the sober judgment. it defies criticism from its very nature, being lawless, independent of all rules, sometimes of grammar, and even of common sense. when he means to be strong he is often affected, violent, morbid.... but then there is, with all this smoke and fustian, a deep sensibility to the sublime and beautiful in nature, a wonderful melody, or rather harmony, of language, consisting ... in a variety--the variety of nature--in which startling ruggedness is relieved by soft and cultivated graces." probably the most pungent bit of literary comment that prescott ever wrote is found in a letter of his addressed to bancroft,[ ] who had sent him a copy of carlyle's _french revolution_. the clangour and fury of this book could hardly fail to jar upon the nerves of so decorously classical a writer as prescott. "i return you carlyle with my thanks. i have read as much of him as i could stand. after a very candid desire to relish him, i must say i do not at all. the french revolution is a most lamentable comedy and requires nothing but the simplest statement of facts to freeze one's blood. to attempt to colour so highly what nature has already over-coloured is, it appears to me, in very bad taste and produces a grotesque and ludicrous effect.... then such ridiculous affectations of new-fangled words! carlyle is ever a bungler in his own business; for his creations or rather combinations are the most discordant and awkward possible. as he runs altogether for dramatic or rather picturesque effect, he is not to be challenged, i suppose, for want of refined views. this forms no part of his plan. his views, certainly, so far as i can estimate them, are trite enough. and, in short, the whole thing ... both as to _forme_ and to _fond_, is perfectly contemptible." of thackeray, prescott saw quite a little during the novelist's visit to america in - , and several times entertained him. he did not greatly care for the lectures on the english humorists, which, as thackeray confided to prescott, caused america to "rain dollars." "i do not think he made much of an impression as a critic, but the thackeray vein is rich in what is better than cold criticism." thackeray on his side expresses his admiration for prescott in the opening sentences of _the virginians_, though without naming him:-- "on the library wall of one of the most famous writers of america, there hang two crossed swords, which his relatives wore in the great war of independence. the one sword was gallantly drawn in the service of the king; the other was the weapon of a brave and humane republican soldier. the possessor of the harmless trophy has earned for himself a name alike honoured in his ancestor's country and his own, where genius like his has always a peaceful welcome." this little tribute pleased prescott very much, and he wrote to lady lyell asking her to get _the virginians_ and read the passage, which, as he says, "was very prettily done." on the whole, however, he seems to have preferred dickens to thackeray, being deceived by the very superficial cynicism affected by the latter. but in fiction, his prime favourites were always scott and dumas, whose books he never tired of hearing read. thus, in mature age, the tastes of his boyhood continued to declare themselves; and few days ever passed without an hour or two devoted to the magic of romance. during the winter following his return from europe, which he spent in boston, he found it difficult to settle down to work again, and not until the autumn did he wholly resume his life of literary activity. after doing so, however, he worked rapidly, so that the first volume of _philip ii._ was completed in april, . it was very well received, in fact, as warmly as any of his earlier work, and the same was true of the second volume, which appeared in . prescott himself said that he was "a little nervous" about the success of the book, inasmuch as a long interval had elapsed since the publication of his _peru_, and he feared lest the public might have lost its interest in him. the result, however, showed that he need not have felt any apprehension. within six months after the second volume had been published, more than eight thousand copies were sold in the united states, and probably an equal number in england. moreover, interest was revived in prescott's preceding histories, so that nearly thirty thousand volumes of them were taken by the public within a year or two. there was the same favourable consensus of critical opinion regarding _philip ii._, and it received the honour of a notice from the pen of m. guizot in the _edinburgh review_. in bringing out this last work prescott had changed his publishers,--not, however, because of any disagreement with the messrs. harper, with whom his relations had always been most satisfactory, and of whom he always spoke in terms of high regard. but a boston firm, messrs. sampson, phillips and company, had made him an offer more advantageous than the harpers felt themselves justified in doing. in another sense the change might have been fortunate for prescott, inasmuch as the warehouse of the harpers was destroyed by fire in . in this fire were consumed several thousand copies of prescott's earlier books, for which payment had been already made. prescott, however, with his usual generosity, permitted the harpers to print for their own account as many copies as had been lost. in england his publishing arrangements were somewhat less favourable than hitherto. when he had made his earlier contracts with bentley, it was supposed that the english publisher could claim copyright in works written by a foreigner. a decision of the house of lords adverse to such a view had now been rendered, and therefore mr. bentley could receive no advantage through an arrangement with prescott other than such as might come to him from securing the advance sheets and from thus being first in the field. as a matter of fact, _philip ii._ was brought out in four separate editions in great britain. in germany it was twice reprinted in the original and once in a german translation. a french version was brought out in paris by didot, and a spanish one in madrid. prescott himself wrote:-- "i have received $ , for the _philip_ and the other works the last six months.... from the tone of the foreign journals and those of my own country, it would seem that the work has found quite as much favour as any of its predecessors, and the sales have been much greater than any other of them in the same space of time." later, writing to bancroft, he said:-- "the book has gone off very well so far. indeed, double the quantity, i think, has been sold of any of my preceding works in the same time. i have been lucky, too, in getting well on before macaulay has come thundering along the track with his hundred horse-power." while engaged in the composition of _philip ii._, prescott had undertaken to write a continuation of robertson's _history of charles v._ he had been asked to prepare an entirely new work upon the reign of that monarch, but this seemed too arduous a task. he therefore rewrote the conclusion of robertson's book--a matter of some hundred and eighty pages. this he began in the spring of , and finished it during the following year. it was published on december , , on which day he wrote to ticknor: "my _charles the fifth_, or rather robertson's with my continuation, made his bow to-day, like a strapping giant with a little urchin holding on to the tail of his coat."[ ] at about the same time prescott prepared a brief memoir of mr. abbott lawrence, the father of his daughter's husband. this was printed for private distribution. during the year which followed, prescott's health began steadily to fail. he suffered from violent pains in the head; so severe as to rob him of sleep and to make work of any kind impossible. he still, however, enjoyed intervals when he could laugh and jest in his old careless way, and even at times indulge in the pleasant little dinners which he loved to share with his most intimate friends. on february th, however, while walking in the street, he was stricken down by an apoplectic seizure, which solved the mystery of his severe headaches. when he recovered consciousness his first words were, "my poor wife! i am so sorry for you that this has come upon you so soon." the attack was a warning rather than an instant summons. after a few days he was once more himself, except that his enunciation never again became absolutely clear. serious work, of course, was out of the question. he listened to a good deal of reading, chiefly fiction. he was put upon a very careful regimen in the matter of diet, and wrote, with a touch of rueful amusement, of the vegetarian meals to which he was restricted: "i have been obliged to exchange my carnivorous propensities for those of a more innocent and primitive nature, picking up my fare as our good parents did before the fall." improving somewhat, he completed the third volume of _philip ii._; not so fully as he had intended, but mainly putting together so much of it as had already been prepared. the book was printed in april, , and the supervision of the proof-sheets afforded him some occupation, as did also the making of a few additional notes for a new edition of the _conquest of mexico_. the summer of he spent in pepperell, returning to boston in october, in the hope of once more taking up his studies. he did, in fact, linger wistfully over his books and manuscripts, but accomplished very little; for, soon after the new year, there came the end of all his labours. on january th, his health was apparently in a satisfactory condition. he listened to his secretary, mr. kirk, read from one of sala's books of travel, and, in order to settle a question which arose in the course of the reading, he left the library to speak to his wife and sister. leaving them a moment later with a laugh, he went into an adjoining room, where presently he was heard to groan. his secretary hurried to his side, and found him quite unconscious. in the early afternoon he died, without knowing that the end had come. prescott had always dreaded the thought of being buried alive. his vivid imagination had shown him the appalling horror of a living burial. again and again he had demanded of those nearest him that he should be shielded from the possibility of such a fate. therefore, when the physicians had satisfied themselves that life had really left him, a large vein was severed, to make assurance doubly sure. on the last day of january he was buried in the family tomb, in the crypt of st. paul's. men and women of every rank and station were present at the simple ceremony. the legislature of the state had adjourned so that its members might pay their tribute of respect to so distinguished a citizen. the historical society was represented among the mourners. his personal friends and those of humble station, whom he had so often befriended, filled the body of the church. before his burial, his remains, in accordance with a wish of his that was well known, had been carried to the room in which were his beloved books and where so many imperishable pages had been written. there, as it were, he lay in state. it is thus that one may best, in thought, take leave of him, amid the memorials and records of a past which he had made to live again. chapter vii "ferdinand and isabella"--prescott's style the _history of ferdinand and isabella_ is best regarded as prescott's initiation into the writing of historical literature. it was a _prolusio_, a preliminary trial of his powers, in some respects an apprenticeship to the profession which he had decided to adopt. when he began its composition he had published nothing but a few casual reviews. he had neither acquired a style nor gained that self-confidence which does so much to command success. no such work as this had as yet been undertaken by an american. how far he could himself overcome the peculiar difficulties which confronted him was quite uncertain. whether he had it in him to be at once a serious investigator and a maker of literature, he did not know. therefore, the _ferdinand and isabella_ shows here and there an uncertainty of touch and a lack of assured method such as were quite natural in one who had undertaken so ambitious a task with so little technical experience. in the matter of style, prescott had not yet emancipated himself from that formalism which had been inherited from the eighteenth-century writers, and which americans, with the wonted conservatism of provincials, retained long after englishmen had begun to write with naturalness and simplicity. even in fiction this circumstance is noticeable. at a time when scott was thrilling the whole world of english readers with his vivid romances, written hastily and often carelessly, in a style which reflected his own individual nature, cooper was producing stories equally exciting, but told in phraseology almost as stilted as that which we find in _rasselas_. this was no less true in poetry. the great romantic movement which in england found expression in byron and shelley and the exquisitely irregular metres of coleridge had as yet awakened no true responsive echo on this side of the atlantic. among the essay-writers and historians of america none had summoned up the courage to shake off the addisonian and johnsonian fetters and to move with free, unstudied ease. irving was but a later goldsmith, and bancroft a yankee gibbon. the papers which then appeared in the _north american review_, to whose pages prescott himself was a regular contributor, give ample evidence that the literary models of the time were those of an earlier age,--an age in which dignity was supposed to lie in ponderosity and to be incompatible with grace. prescott's nature was not one that had the slightest sympathy with pedantry. no more spontaneous spirit than his can be imagined. his joyousness and gayety sometimes even tended toward the frivolous. yet in this first serious piece of historical writing, he imposed upon himself the shackles of an earlier convention. just because his mood prompted him to write in an unstudied style, all the more did he feel it necessary to repress his natural inclination. therefore, in the text of his history, we find continual evidence of the eighteenth century literary manner,--the balanced sentence, the inevitable adjective, the studied antithesis, and the elaborate parallel. women are invariably "females"; a gift is a "donative"; a marriage does not take place, but "nuptials are solemnized"; a name is usually an "appellation"; a crown "devolves" upon a successor; a poet "delivers his sentiments"; a king "avails himself of indeterminateness"; and so on. a cumbrous sentence like the following smacks of the sort of english that was soon to pass away:-- "fanaticism is so far subversive of the most established principles of morality that under the dangerous maxim 'for the advancement of the faith all means are lawful,' which tasso has rightly, though perhaps undesignedly, derived from the spirits of hell, it not only excuses but enjoins the commission of the most revolting crime as a sacred duty."[ ] and the following:-- "casiri's multifarious catalogue bears ample testimony to the emulation with which not only men but even females of the highest rank devoted themselves to letters; the latter contending publicly for the prizes, not merely in eloquence and poetry, but in those recondite studies which have usually been reserved for the other sex."[ ] the style of these sentences is essentially the style of the old _north american review_ and of eighteenth-century england. the particular chapter from which the last quotation has been taken was, in fact, originally prepared by prescott for the _north american_, as already mentioned,[ ] and was only on second thought reserved for a chapter of the history. the passion for parallel, which had existed among historical writers ever since the time of plutarch, was responsible for the elaborate comparison which prescott makes between isabella and elizabeth of england.[ ] it is worked out relentlessly--isabella and elizabeth in their private lives, isabella and elizabeth in their characters, isabella and elizabeth in the selection of their ministers of state, isabella and elizabeth in their intellectual power, isabella and elizabeth in their respective deaths. prescott drags it all in; and it affords evidence of the literary standards of his countrymen at the time, that this laboured parallel was thought to be the very finest thing in the whole book. if, however, prescott maintained in the body of his text the rigid lapidary dignity which he thought to be appropriate, his natural liveliness found occasional expression in the numerous foot-notes, which at times he wrote somewhat in the vein of his private letters from pepperell and nahant. the contrast, therefore, between text and notes was often thoroughly incongruous because so violent. this led his english reviewer, mr. richard ford,[ ] to write some rather acrid sentences that in their manner suggest the tone which, in our days, the _saturday review_ has always taken with new authors, especially when they happen to be american. wrote mr. ford of prescott:-- "his style is too often sesquipedalian and ornate; the stilty, wordy, false taste of dr. channing without his depth of thought; the sugar and sack of washington irving without the half-pennyworth of bread--without his grace and polish of pure, grammatical, careful anglicism. we have many suspicions, indeed, from his ordinary quotations, from what he calls in others 'the cheap display of school-boy erudition,' and from sundry lurking sneers, that he has not drunk deeply at the pierian fountains, which taste the purer the higher we track them to their source. these, the only sure foundations of a pure and correct style, are absolutely necessary to our transatlantic brethren, who are unfortunately deprived of the high standing example of an order of nobility, and of a metropolis where local peculiarities evaporate. the elevated tone of the classics is the only corrective for their unhappy democracy. moral feeling must of necessity be degraded wherever the multitude are the sole dispensers of power and honour. all candidates for the foul-breathed universal suffrage must lower their appeal to base understandings and base motives. the authors of the united states, independently of the deteriorating influence of their institutions, can of all people the least afford to be negligent. far severed from the original spring of english undefiled, they always run the risk of sinking into provincialisms, into patavinity,--both positive, in the use of obsolete words, and the adoption of conventional village significations, which differ from those retained by us,--as well as negative, in the omission of those happy expressions which bear the fire-new stamp of the only authorised mint. instances occur constantly in these volumes where the word is english, but english returned after many years' transportation. we do not wish to be hypercritical, nor to strain at gnats. if, however, the authors of the united states aspire to be admitted _ad eundem_, they must write the english of the 'old country,' which they will find it is much easier to forget and corrupt than to improve. we cannot, however, afford space here for a _florilegium yankyense_. a professor from new york, newly imported into england and introduced into real _good_ society, of which previously he can only have formed an abstract idea, is no bad illustration of mr. prescott's _over-done_ text. like the stranger in question, he is always on his best behaviour, prim, prudish, and stiff-necky, afraid of self-committal, ceremonious, remarkably dignified, supporting the honour of the united states, and monstrously afraid of being laughed at. some of these travellers at last discover that bows and starch are not even the husk of a gentleman; and so, on re-crossing the atlantic, their manner becomes like mr. prescott's _notes_; levity is mistaken for ease, an un-'pertinent' familiarity for intimacy, second-rate low-toned 'jocularities' (which make no one laugh but the retailer) for the light, hair-trigger repartee, the brilliancy of high-bred pleasantry. mr. prescott emulates dr. channing in his text, dr. dunham and mr. joseph miller in his notes. judging from the facetiæ which, by his commending them as 'good,' have furnished a gauge to measure his capacity for relishing humour, we are convinced that his non-perception of wit is so genuine as to be organic. it is perfectly allowable to rise occasionally from the ludicrous into the serious, but to descend from history to the bathos of balderdash is too bad--_risu inepto nihil ineptius_." this passage, which is an amusing example of an overflow of high tory bile, does not by any means fairly represent the general tone of ford's review. prescott had here and there indulged himself in some of the commonplaces of republicanism such as were usual in american writings of that time; and these harmlessly trite political pedantries had rasped the nerves of his british reviewer. to speak of "the empty decorations, the stars and garters of an order of nobility," to mention "royal perfidy," "royal dissimulation," "royal recompense of ingratitude," and generally to intimate that "the people" were superior to royalty and nobility, roused a spirit of antagonism in the mind of mr. ford. several of prescott's semi-facetious notes dealt with rank and aristocracy in something of the same hold-cheap tone, so that ford was irritated into a very personal retort. he wrote:-- "these pleasantries come with a bad grace from the son, as we learn from a full-length dedication, of 'the _honourable_ william prescott, _ll.d._' we really are ignorant of the exact value of this titular potpourri in a _soi-disant_ land of equality, of these noble and academic plumes, borrowed from the wing of a professedly despised monarchy." although ford's characterisation of prescott's style had some basis of truth, it was, of course, grossly exaggerated. throughout the whole of the _ferdinand and isabella_, one is conscious of a strong tendency toward simplicity of expression. many passages are as easy and unaffected as any that we find in an historical writer of to-day. reading the pages over now, one can see the true prescott under all the starch and stiffness which at the time he mistakenly regarded as essential to the dignity of historical writing. in fact, as the work progressed, the author gained something of that ease which comes from practice, and wrote more and more simply and more after his own natural manner. what is really lacking is sharpness of outline. the narrative is somewhat too flowing. one misses, now and then, crispness of phrase and force of characterisation. prescott never wrote a sentence that can be remembered. his strength lies in his _ensemble_, in the general effect, and in the agreeable manner in which he carries us along with him from the beginning to the end. this first book of his, from the point of view of style, is "pleasant reading." its movement is that of an ambling palfrey, well broken to a lady's use. nowhere have we the sensation of the rush and thunder of a war-horse. ford's strictures made prescott wince, or, as mr. ticknor gently puts it, "disturbed his equanimity." they caused him to consider the question of his own style in the light of ford's very slashing strictures. in making this self-examination prescott was perfectly candid with himself, and he noted down the conclusions which he ultimately reached. "it seems to me the first and sometimes the second volume afford examples of the use of words not so simple as might be; not objectionable in themselves, but unless something is gained in the way of strength or of colouring it is best to use the most simple, _unnoticeable_ words to express ordinary things; _e.g._ 'to send' is better than 'to transmit'; 'crown descended' better than 'devolved'; 'guns fired' than 'guns discharged'; 'to name,' or 'call,' than 'to nominate'; 'to read' than 'peruse'; 'the term,' or 'name,' than 'appellation,' and so forth. it is better also not to encumber the sentence with long, lumbering nouns; as,'the relinquishment of,' instead of 'relinquishing'; 'the embellishment and fortification of,' instead of 'embellishing and fortifying'; and so forth. i can discern no other warrant for master ford's criticism than the occasional use of these and similar words on such commonplace matters as would make the simpler forms of expression preferable. in my third volume, i do not find the language open to much censure." he also came to the following sensible decision which very materially improved his subsequent writing:-- "i will not hereafter vex myself with anxious thoughts about my style when composing. it is formed. and if there be any ground for the imputation that it is too formal, it will only be made worse in this respect by extra solicitude. it is not the defect to which i am predisposed. the best security against it is to write with less elaboration--a pleasant recipe which conforms to my previous views. this determination will save me trouble and time. hereafter what i print shall undergo no ordeal for the style's sake except only the grammar." some other remarks of his may be here recorded, though they really amount to nothing more than the discovery of the old truth, _le style c'est l'homme_. "a man's style to be worth anything should be the natural expression of his mental character.... the best undoubtedly for every writer is the form of expression best suited to his peculiar turn of thinking, even at some hazard of violating the conventional tone of the most chaste and careful writers. it is this alone which can give full force to his thoughts. franklin's style would have borne more ornament--washington irving could have done with less--johnson and gibbon might have had much less formality, and hume and goldsmith have occasionally pointed their sentences with more effect. but, if they had abandoned the natural suggestions of their genius and aimed at the contrary, would they not in mending a hole, as scott says, have very likely made two?... originality--the originality of nature--compensates for a thousand minor blemishes.... the best rule is to dispense with all rules except those of grammar, and to consult the natural bent of one's genius." thereafter prescott held to his resolution so far as concerned the first draft of what he wrote. he always, however, before publication, asked his friends to read and criticise what he had written, and he used also to employ readers to go over his pages with great minuteness, making notes which he afterwards passed upon, rejecting most of the suggestions, but nevertheless adopting a good many. from the point of view of historical accuracy, _ferdinand and isabella_ is a solid piece of work. the original sources to which prescott had access were numerous and valuable. discrepancies and contradictions he sifted out with patience and true critical acumen. he overlooked nothing, not even those "still-born manuscripts" whose writers recorded their experiences for the pure pleasure of setting down the truth. ford very justly said, regarding prescott's notes: "of the accuracy of his quotations and references we cannot speak too highly; they stamp a guarantee on his narrative; they enable us to give a reason for our faith; they furnish means of questioning and correcting the author himself; they enable readers to follow up any particular subject suited to their own idiosyncrasy." it is only in that part of the book which relates to the arab domination in spain that prescott's work is unsatisfactory; and even there it represents a distinct advance upon his predecessors, both french and spanish. at the time when he wrote, it would, indeed, have been impossible for him to secure greater accuracy; because the arabic manuscripts contained in the escurial had not been opened to the inspection of investigators; and, moreover, a knowledge of the language in which they were written would have been essential to their proper use. in default of these sources, prescott gave too much credence to casiri, and especially to condé's history which had appeared not long before, but which had been hastily written, so that it contained some serious misstatements and inconsistencies. condé, although he professed to have gone to the original records in arabic, had in reality got most of his information at second hand from cardonne and marmol. hence, prescott's chapters on the arabs in spain, although they appear to the general reader to represent exact and solid knowledge, are in fact inaccurate in parts. in other respects, however, the most modern historical scholarship has detected no serious flaws in _ferdinand and isabella_. such defects as the book possesses are negative rather than positive, and they are really due to the author's cast of mind. prescott, was not, and he never became, a philosophical historian. his gift was for synthesis rather than for analysis. he was an industrious gatherer of facts, an impartial judge of evidence, a sympathetic and accurate narrator of events. he could not, however, firmly grasp the underlying causes of what he superficially, observed, nor penetrate the very heart of things. his power of generalisation was never strong. there is a certain lack also, especially in this first one of his historical compositions, of a due appreciation of character. he describes the great actors in his drama,--ferdinand, isabella, columbus, ximenes, and gonsalvo de cordova,--and what he says of them is eminently true; yet, somehow or other, he fails to make them live. they are stately figures that move in a majestic way across one's field of vision; yet it is their outward bearing and their visible acts that he makes us know, rather than the interplay of motive and temperament which impelled them. his taste, indeed, is decidedly for the splendid and the spectacular. kings, princes, nobles, warriors, and statesmen crowd his pages. perhaps they satisfied the starved imagination of the new englander, whose own life was lived amid surroundings antithetically prosaic. certain it is, that, in dwelling upon a memorable epoch, he omitted all consideration of a stratum of society which underlay the surface which alone he saw. a few more years, and the fifteenth-century _picaro_, the common man, the trader, and the peasant were destined to emerge from the humble position to which the usages of chivalry had consigned them. the invention of gunpowder and the use of it in war soon swept away the advantage which the knight in armour had possessed as against the humble foot-soldier who followed him. the discovery of america and the opening of new lands teeming with treasures for their conquerors roused and stimulated the consciousness of the lower orders. before long, the man-at-arms, the musketeer, and the artilleryman attained a consequence which the ordinary fighting man had never had before. after these had gone forth as adventurers into the new world, they brought back with them not only riches wrested from the helpless natives whom they had subdued, but a spirit of freedom verging even upon lawlessness, which leavened the whole stagnant life of europe. then, for the first time, such as had been only pawns in the game of statesmanship and war became factors to be anxiously considered. even literature then takes notice of them, and for the first time they begin to influence the course of modern history. a philosophical historian, therefore, would have looked beyond the _ricos hombres_, and would have revealed to us, at least in part, the existence and the mode of life of that great mass of swarming humanity with which the statesman and the feudal lord had soon to reckon. as it was, however, prescott saw the obvious rather than the recondite. within the field which he had marked out, his work was admirably done. he delineated clearly and impartially the events of a splendid epoch wherein the kingdoms of castile and aragon were united under two far-seeing sovereigns, and wherein the power of spanish feudalism was broken, the prestige of france and portugal brought low, the moors expelled, and spain consolidated into one united kingdom from the pyrenees to the mediterranean, while a new and unknown world was opened for the expansion and enrichment of the old. he well deserved the praise which a spanish critic and scholar[ ] gave him of having written in a masterly manner one of the most successful historical productions of the century in which he lived. chapter viii the "conquest of mexico" as literature and as history regarded simply from the standpoint of literary criticism, the _conquest of mexico_ is prescott's masterpiece. more than that, it is one of the most brilliant examples which the english language possesses of literary art applied to historical narration. its theme is one which contains all the elements of the romantic,--the chivalrous daring which boldly attempts the seemingly impossible, the struggle of the few against overwhelming odds, the dauntless heroism which never quails in the presence of defeat, desertion, defiance, or disaster, the spectacle of the forces of one civilisation arrayed against those of another, the white man striving for supremacy over the red man, and finally, the true faith in arms against a bloody form of paganism. in prescott's treatment of this theme we find displayed the conscious skill of the born artist who subordinates everything to the dramatic development of the central motive. the style is prescott's at its best,--not terse and pointed like macaulay's, nor yet so intimately persuasive as that of parkman, but nevertheless free, flowing, and often stately--the fit instrument of expression for a sensitive and noble mind. finally, in this book prescott shows a power of depicting character that is far beyond his wont, so that his heroes are not lay figures but living men. we need not wonder, then, if the _conquest of mexico_ has held its own, as literature, and if to-day it is as widely read and with the same breathless interest as in the years when the world first felt the fascination of so great a literary achievement. when we come to analyse the structure of the narrative, we find that one secret of its effectiveness lies in its artistic unity. prescott had studied very carefully the manner in which irving had written the story of columbus, and he learned a valuable lesson from the defects of his contemporary. in a memorandum dated march , , he set down some very shrewd remarks. "have been looking over irving's _columbus_ also. a beautiful composition, but fatiguing as a whole to the reader. why? the fault is partly in the subject, partly in the manner of treating it. the discovery of a new world ... is a magnificent theme in itself, full of sublimity and interest. but it terminates with the discovery; and, unfortunately, this is made before half of the first volume is disposed of. all after that event is made up of little details,--the sailing from one petty island to another, all inhabited sailing from one petty island to another, all inhabited by savages, and having the same general character. nothing can be more monotonous, and, of course, more likely to involve the writer in barren repetition.... irving should have abridged this part of his story, and instead of four volumes, have brought it into two.... the conquest of mexico, though very inferior in the leading idea which forms its basis to the story of columbus, is, on the whole, a far better subject; since the event is sufficiently grand, and, as the catastrophe is deferred, the interest is kept up through the whole. indeed, the perilous adventures and crosses with which the enterprise was attended, the desperate chances and reverses and unexpected vicissitudes, all serve to keep the interest alive. on my plan, i go on with cortés to his death. but i must take care not to make this tail-piece too long." this is a bit of very accurate criticism; and the plan which prescott formed was executed in a manner absolutely faultless. never for a moment is there a break in the continuity of its narrative. never for a moment do we lose sight of the central and inspiring figure of cortés fighting his way, as it were, single-handed against the intrigues of his own countrymen, the half-heartedness of his followers, the obstacles of nature, and the overwhelming forces of his indian foes, to a superb and almost incredible success. everything in the narrative is subordinated to this. every event is made to bear directly upon the development of this leading motive. the art of prescott in this book is the art of a great dramatist who keeps his eye and brain intent upon the true catastrophe, in the light of which alone the other episodes possess significance. to the general reader this supreme moment comes when cortés makes his second entry into mexico, returning over "the black and blasted environs," to avenge the horrors of the _noche triste_, and in one last tremendous assault upon the capital to destroy forever the power of the aztecs and bring guatemozin into the possession of his conqueror. what follows after is almost superfluous to one who reads the story for the pure enjoyment which it gives. it is like the last chapter of some novels, appended to satisfy the curiosity of those who wish to know "what happened after." in nothing has prescott shown his literary tact more admirably than in compressing this record of the aftermath of conquest within the limit of some hundred pages. the superiority of the _conquest of mexico_ to all the rest of prescott's works is sufficiently proved by one unquestioned fact. though we read his other books with pleasure and unflagging interest, the _conquest of mexico_ alone stamps upon our minds the memory of certain episodes which are told so vividly as never to be obliterated. we may never open the book again; yet certain pages remain part and parcel of our intellectual possessions. in them prescott has risen to a height of true greatness as a story-teller, and masterful word-painter. of these, for example, is the account of the burning of the ships,[ ] when cortés, by destroying his fleet, cuts off from his wavering troops all hope of a return home except as conquerors, and when, facing them, in imminent peril of death at their hands, his manly eloquence so kindles their imagination and stirs their fighting blood as to make them shout, "to mexico! to mexico!" another striking passage is that which tells of what happened in cholula, where the little army of spaniards, after being received with a show of cordial hospitality, learn that the treacherous aztecs have laid a plot for their extermination.[ ] "that night was one of deep anxiety to the army. the ground they stood on seemed loosening beneath their feet, and any moment might be the one marked for their destruction. their vigilant general took all possible precautions for their safety, increasing the number of sentinels, and posting his guns in such a manner as to protect the approaches to the camp. his eyes, it may well be believed, did not close during the night. indeed, every spaniard lay down in his arms, and every horse stood saddled and bridled, ready for instant service. but no assault was meditated by the indians, and the stillness of the hour was undisturbed except by the occasional sounds heard in a populous city, even when buried in slumber, and by the hoarse cries of the priests from the turrets of the _teocallis_, proclaiming through their trumpets the watches of the night."[ ] here is true literary art used to excite in the reader the same fearfulness and apprehension which the spaniards themselves experienced. the last sentence has a peculiar and indescribable effect upon the nerves, so that in the following chapter we feel something of the exultation of the castilian soldier when morning breaks, and cortés receives the cholulan chiefs, astounds them by revealing that he knows their plot, and then, before they can recover from their thunderstruck amazement, orders a general attack upon the indians who have stealthily gathered to destroy the white men. the battle-scene which follows and of which a part is quoted here, is unsurpassed by any other to be found in modern history. "cortés had placed his battery of heavy guns in a position that commanded the avenues, and swept off the files of the assailants as they rushed on. in the intervals between the discharges, which, in the imperfect state of the science in that day, were much longer than in ours, he forced back the press by charging with the horse into the midst. the steeds, the guns, the weapons of the spaniards, were all new to the cholulans. notwithstanding the novelty of the terrific spectacle, the flash of fire-arms mingling with the deafening roar of the artillery as its thunders reverberated among the buildings, the despairing indians pushed on to take the places of their fallen comrades. "while this fierce struggle was going forward, the tlascalans, hearing the concerted signal, had advanced with quick pace into the city. they had bound, by order of cortés, wreaths of sedge round their heads, that they might the more surely be distinguished from the cholulans. coming up in the very heat of the engagement, they fell on the defenceless rear of the townsmen, who, trampled down under the heels of the castilian cavalry on one side, and galled by their vindictive enemies on the other, could no longer maintain their ground. they gave way, some taking refuge in the nearest buildings, which, being partly of wood, were speedily set on fire. others fled to the temples. one strong party, with a number of priests at its head, got possession of the great _teocalli_. there was a vulgar tradition, already alluded to, that on removal of part of the walls the god would send forth an inundation to overwhelm his enemies. the superstitious cholulans with great difficulty succeeded in wrenching away some of the stones in the walls of the edifice. but dust, not water, followed. their false god deserted them in the hour of need. in despair they flung themselves into the wooden turrets that crowned the temple, and poured down stones, javelins, and burning arrows on the spaniards, as they climbed the great staircase which, by a flight of one hundred and twenty steps, scaled the face of the pyramid. but the fiery shower fell harmless on the steel bonnets of the christians, while they availed themselves of the burning shafts to set fire to the wooden citadel, which was speedily wrapt in flames. still the garrison held out, and though quarter, _it is said_, was offered, only one cholulan availed himself of it. the rest threw themselves headlong from the parapet, or perished miserably in the flames. "all was now confusion and uproar in the fair city which had so lately reposed in security and peace. the groans of the dying, the frantic supplications of the vanquished for mercy, were mingled with the loud battle-cries of the spaniards as they rode down their enemy, and with the shrill whistle of the tlascalans, who gave full scope to the long-cherished rancour of ancient rivalry. the tumult was still further swelled by the incessant rattle of musketry and the crash of falling timbers, which sent up a volume of flame that outshone the ruddy light of morning, making altogether a hideous confusion of sights and sounds that converted the holy city into a pandemonium." this spirited description, which deserves comparison with livy's picture of the rout at cannæ, shows prescott at his best. in it he has shaken off every trace of formalism and of leisurely repose. his blood is up. the short, nervous sentences, the hurry of the narrative, the rapid onrush of events, rouse the reader and fill him with the true battle-spirit. of an entirely different _genre_ is the account of the entrance of the spanish army into mexico as montezuma's guest, and of the splendid city which they beheld,--the broad streets coated with a hard cement, the intersecting canals, the inner lake darkened by thousands of canoes, the great market-places, the long vista of snowy mansions, their inner porticoes embellished with porphyry and jasper, and the fountains of crystal water leaping up and glittering in the sunlight. memorable, too, is the scene of the humiliation of montezuma when, having come as a friend to the quarters of the spaniards, he is fettered like a slave; and that other scene, no less painful, where the fallen monarch appears upon the walls and begs his people to desist from violence, only to be greeted with taunts and insults, and a shower of stones. but most impressive of all and most unforgettable is the story of the _noche triste_--the spanish army and their indian allies stealing silently and at dead of night out of the city which but a short time before they had entered with so brave a show. "the night was cloudy, and a drizzling rain, which fell without intermission, added to the obscurity. the great square before the palace was deserted, as, indeed, it had been since the fall of montezuma. steadily, and as noiselessly as possible, the spaniards held their way along the great street of tlacopan, which so lately had resounded with the tumult of battle. all was now hushed in silence; and they were only reminded of the past by the occasional presence of some solitary corpse, or a dark heap of the slain, which too plainly told where the strife had been hottest. as they passed along the lanes and alleys which opened into the great street, or looked down the canals, whose polished surface gleamed with a sort of ebon lustre through the obscurity of night, they easily fancied that they discerned the shadowy forms of their foe lurking in ambush and ready to spring on them. but it was only fancy; and the city slept undisturbed even by the prolonged echoes of the tramp of the horses and the hoarse rumbling of the artillery and baggage-trains. at length, a lighter space beyond the dusky line of buildings showed the van of the army that it was emerging on the open causeway. they might well have congratulated themselves on having thus escaped the dangers of an assault in the city itself, and that a brief time would place them in comparative safety on the opposite shore. but the mexicans were not all asleep. "as the spaniards drew near the spot where the street opened on the causeway, and were preparing to lay the portable bridge across the uncovered breach, which now met their eyes, several indian sentinels, who had been stationed at this, as at the other approaches to the city, took the alarm, and fled, rousing their countrymen by their cries. the priests, keeping their night-watch on the summit of the _teocallis_, instantly caught the tidings and sounded their shells, while the huge drum in the desolate temple of the war-god sent forth those solemn tones, which, heard only in seasons of calamity, vibrated through every corner of the capital. the spaniards saw that no time was to be lost.... before they had time to defile across the narrow passage, a gathering sound was heard, like that of a mighty forest agitated by the winds. it grew louder and louder, while on the dark waters of the lake was heard a plashing noise, as of many oars. then came a few stones and arrows striking at random among the hurrying troops. they fell every moment faster and more furious, till they thickened into a terrible tempest, while the very heavens were rent with the yells and warcries of myriads of combatants, who seemed all at once to be swarming over land and lake!" what reader of this passage can forget the ominous, melancholy note of that great war drum? it is one of the most haunting things in all literature--like the blood-stained hands of the guilty queen in _macbeth_, or the footprint on the sand in _robinson crusoe_, or the chill, mirthless laughter of the madwoman in _jane eyre_. one other splendidly vital passage is that which recounts the last great agony on the retreat from mexico. the shattered remnants of the army of cortés are toiling slowly onward to the coast, faint with famine and fatigue, deprived of the arms which in their flight they had thrown away, and harassed by their dusky enemies, who hover about them, calling out in tones of menace, "hasten on! you will soon find yourselves where you cannot escape!" "as the army was climbing the mountain steeps which shut in the valley of otompan, the vedettes came in with the intelligence that a powerful body was encamped on the other side, apparently awaiting their approach. the intelligence was soon confirmed by their own eyes, as they turned the crest of the sierra, and saw spread out, below, a mighty host, filling up the whole depth of the valley, and giving to it the appearance, from the white cotton mail of the warriors, of being covered with snow.... as far as the eye could reach, were to be seen shields and waving banners, fantastic helmets, forests of shining spears, the bright feather-mail of the chief, and the coarse cotton panoply of his follower, all mingled together in wild confusion and tossing to and fro like the billows of a troubled ocean. it was a sight to fill the stoutest heart among the christians with dismay, heightened by the previous expectation of soon reaching the friendly land which was to terminate their wearisome pilgrimage. even cortés, as he contrasted the tremendous array before him with his own diminished squadrons, wasted by disease and enfeebled by hunger and fatigue, could not escape the conviction that his last hour had arrived."[ ] but it is not merely in vivid narration and description of events that the _conquest of mexico_ attains so rare a degree of excellence. here, as nowhere else, has prescott succeeded in delineating character. all the chief actors of his great historic drama not only live and breathe, but they are as distinctly differentiated as they must have been in life. cortés and his lieutenants are persons whom we actually come to know in the pages of prescott, just as in the pages of xenophon we come to know clearchus and the adventurous generals who, like cortés, made their way into the heart of a great empire and faced barbarians in battle. the comparison between xenophon and prescott is, indeed, a very natural one, and it was made quite early after the appearance of the _ferdinand and isabella_ by an english admirer, mr. thomas grenville. calling upon this gentleman one day, mr. everett found him in his library reading xenophon's _anabasis_ in the original greek. mr. everett made some casual remark upon the merits of that book, whereupon mr. grenville holding up a volume of _ferdinand and isabella_ said, "here is one far superior."[ ] xenophon's character-drawing was done in his own way, briefly and in dry-point; yet clearchus, proxenus, and menon are not more subtly distinguished from each other than are cortés, sandoval, and alvarado. cortés is very real,--a bold, martial figure, the ideal man of action, gallant in bearing and powerful of physique, tireless, confident, and exerting a magnetic influence over all who come into his presence; gifted also with a truly spanish craft, and not without a touch of spanish cruelty. sandoval is the true knight,--loyal, devoted to his chief, wise, and worthy of all trust. alvarado is the reckless man-at-arms,--daring to desperation, hot-tempered, fickle, and passionate, yet with all his faults a man to extort one's liking, even as he compelled the aztecs to admire him for his intrepidity and frankness. over against these three brilliant figures stands the melancholy form of montezuma, around whom, even from the first, one feels gathering the darkness of his coming fate. he reminds one of some hero of greek tragedy, doomed to destruction and intensely conscious of it, yet striving in vain against the decree of an inexorable destiny. one recalls him as he is described when the head of a spanish soldier had been cut off and sent to him. "it was uncommonly large and covered with hair; and, as montezuma gazed on the ferocious features, rendered more horrible by death, he seemed to read in them the dark lineaments of the destined destroyers of his house. he turned from it with a shudder, and commanded that it should be taken from the city, and not offered at the shrine of any of his gods."[ ] the contrast between this dreamy, superstitious, half-hearted, and almost womanish prince and his successor guatemozin is splendidly worked out. guatemozin's fierce patriotism, his hatred of the spaniards, his ferocity in battle, and his stubborn unwillingness to yield are displayed with consummate art, yet in such a way as to win one's sympathy for him without estranging it from those who conquered him. a touch of sentiment is delicately infused into the whole narrative of the conquest by the manner in which prescott has treated the relations of cortés and the indian girl, marina. here we find interesting evidence of prescott's innate purity of mind and thought, for he undoubtedly idealised this girl and suppressed, or at any rate passed over very lightly, the truth which bernal diaz, on the other hand, sets forth with the blunt coarseness of a foul-mouthed old soldier.[ ] no one would gather from prescott's pages that marina had been the mistress of other men before cortés. nor do we get any hint from him that cortés wearied of her in the end, and thrust her off upon one of his captains whom he made drunk in order to render him willing to go through the forms of marriage with her. in prescott's narrative she is lovely, graceful, generous, and true; and the only hint that is given of her former life is found in the statement that "she had her errors."[ ] to his readers she is, after a fashion, the heroine of the conquest,--the tender, affectionate companion of the conqueror, sharing his dangers or averting them, and not seldom mitigating by her influence the sternness of his character. another instance of prescott's delicacy of mind is found in the way in which he glides swiftly over the whole topic of the position which women occupied among the aztecs, although his spanish sources were brutally explicit on this point. there were some things, therefore, from which prescott shrank instinctively and in which he allowed his sensitive modesty to soften and refine upon the truth. the mention of this circumstance leads one to consider the much-mooted question as to how far the _conquest of mexico_ may be accepted as veracious history. is it history at all or is it, as some have said, historical romance? are we to classify it with such books as those of ranke and parkman, whose brilliancy of style is wholly compatible with scrupulous fidelity to historic fact, or must we think of it as verging upon the category of romances built up around the material which history affords--with books like _ivanhoe_ and _harold_ and _salammbô_? in the years immediately following its publication, prescott's great work was accepted as indubitably accurate. his imposing array of foot-notes, his thorough acquaintance with the spanish chronicles, and the unstinted approval given to him by contemporary historians inspired in the public an implicit faith. then, here and there, a sceptic began to raise his head, and to question, not the good faith of prescott, but rather the value of the very sources upon which prescott's history had been built. as a matter of fact, long before prescott's time, the reports and narratives of the conquerors had in parts been doubted. as early as the eighteenth century lafitau, the jesuit missionary, in a treatise published in ,[ ] had discussed with great acuteness some questions of american ethnology in a spirit of scientific criticism; and later in the same century, james adair had gathered valuable material in the same department of knowledge.[ ] even earlier, the spanish jesuit, josé de acosta, had published a treatise which exhibits traces of a critical method.[ ] again, robertson, in his _history of america_ (a book, by the way, which prescott had studied very carefully), shows an independence of attitude and an acumen which find expression in a definite disagreement with much that had been set down by the spanish chroniclers. such criticism as these and other isolated writers had brought to bear was directed against that part of the accepted tradition which relates to the aztec civilisation. prescott, following the notices of las casas, herrera, bernal diaz, oviedo, cortés himself, and the writer who is known as the _conquistador anonimo_, had simply weighed the assertions of one as against those of another, striving to reconcile their discrepancies of statement and following one rather than the other, according to the apparent preponderance of probability. he did not, however, perceive in these discrepancies the clue which might have guided him, as it subsequently did others, to a clearer understanding of the actual facts. therefore, he has painted for us the mexico of montezuma in gorgeous colours, seeing in it a great empire, possessed of a civilisation no less splendid than that of western europe, and exhibiting a political and social system comparable with that which europeans knew. the magnificence and wealth of this fancied empire gave, indeed, the necessary background to his story of the conquest. it was a stage setting which raised the exploits of the conquerors to a lofty and almost epic altitude. the first serious attempt directly to discredit the accuracy of this description was made by an american writer, mr. robert a. wilson. wilson was an enthusiastic amateur who took a particular interest in the ethnology of the american indians. he had travelled in mexico. he knew something of the indians of our western territory, and he had read the spanish chroniclers. the result of his observations was a thorough disbelief in the traditional picture of aztec civilisation. he, therefore, set out to demolish it and to offer in its place a substitute based upon such facts as he had gathered and such theories as he had formed. after publishing a preliminary treatise which attracted some attention, he wrote a bulky volume entitled _a new history of the conquest of mexico_.[ ] in the introduction to this book he declares that his visit to mexico had shaken his belief "in those spanish historic romances upon which mr. prescott has founded his magnificent tale of the conquest of mexico." he adds that the despatches of cortés are the only valuable written authority, and that these consist of two distinct parts,--first, "an accurate detail of adventures consistent throughout with the topography of the region in which they occurred"; and second, "a mass of foreign material, apparently borrowed from fables of the moorish era, for effect in spain." "it was not in great battles, but in a rapid succession of skirmishes, that he distinguished himself and won the character ... of an adroit leader in indian war." wilson endeavours to show, in the first place, that the aztecs were simply a branch of the american indian race; that their manners and customs were essentially those of the more northern tribes; that the origin of the whole race was phoenician; and that the spanish account of early mexico is almost wholly fabulous. writing of the different historians of the conquest, he mentions prescott in the following words:-- "a more delicate duty remains,--to speak freely of an american whose success in the field of literature has raised him to the highest rank. his talents have not only immortalised himself--they have added a new charm to the subject of his histories. he showed his faith by the expenditure of a fortune at the commencement of his enterprise, in the purchase of books and mss. relating to 'america of the spaniards.' these were the materials out of which he framed his two histories of the two aboriginal empires, mexico and peru. at the time these works were written he could not have had the remotest idea of the circumstances under which his spanish authorities had been produced, or of the external pressure that gave them their peculiar form and character. he could hardly understand that peculiar organisation of spanish society through which one set of opinions might be uniformly expressed in public, while the intellectual classes in secret entertain entirely opposite ones. he acted throughout in the most perfect good faith; and if, on a subsequent scrutiny, his authorities have proved to be the fabulous creations of spanish-arabian fancy, he is not in fault. they were the standards when he made use of them--a sufficient justification of his acts. 'this beautiful world we inhabit,' said an east indian philosopher, 'rests on the back of a mighty elephant; the elephant stands on the back of a monster turtle; the turtle rests upon a serpent; and the serpent on nothing.' thus stand the literary monuments mr. prescott has constructed. they are castles resting upon a cloud which reflects an eastern sunrise upon a western horizon." this book appeared in the year of prescott's death, and he himself made no published comment on it. a very sharp notice, however, was written by some one who did not sign his name, but who was undoubtedly very near to prescott.[ ] the writer of this notice had little difficulty in showing that wilson was a very slipshod investigator; that he was in many respects ignorant of the very authorities whom he attempted to refute; and that as a writer he was very crude indeed. some portions of this paper may be quoted, mainly because they sum up such of mr. wilson's points as were in reality important. the first paragraph has also a somewhat personal interest. "directly and knowingly, as we shall hereafter show, he has availed himself of mr. prescott's labours to an extent which demanded the most ample 'acknowledgment.' no such acknowledgment is made. but we beg to ask mr. wilson whether there were not other reasons why he should have spoken of this eminent writer, if not with deference, at least with respect. he himself informs us that 'most kindly relations' existed between them. if we are not misinformed, mr. wilson opened the correspondence by modestly requesting the loan of mr. prescott's collection of works relating to mexican history, for the purpose of enabling him to write a refutation of the latter's history of the conquest. that the replies which he received were courteous and kindly, we need hardly say. he was informed, that, although the constant use made of the collection by its possessor for the correction of his own work must prevent a full compliance with this request, yet any particular books which he might designate should be sent to him, and, if he were disposed to make a visit to boston, the fullest opportunities should be granted him for the prosecution of his researches. this invitation mr. wilson did not think fit to accept. books which were got in readiness for transmission to him he failed to send for. he had, in the meantime, discovered that 'the american standpoint' did not require any examination of 'authorities.' we regret that it should also have rendered superfluous an acquaintance with the customs of civilised society. the tone in which he speaks of his distinguished predecessor is sometimes amusing from the conceit which it displays, sometimes disgusting from its impudence and coarseness. he concedes mr. prescott's good faith in the use of his materials. it was only his ignorance and want of the proper qualifications that prevented him from using them aright 'his non-acquaintance with indian character is much to be regretted.' mr. wilson himself enjoys, as he tells us, the inestimable advantage of being the son of an adopted member of the iroquois tribe. nay, 'his ancestors, for several generations, dwelt near the indian agency at cherry valley, on wilson's patent, though in cooperstown village was he born.' we perceive the author's fondness for the inverted style in composition,--acquired, perhaps, in the course of his long study of aboriginal oratory. even without such proofs, and without his own assertion of the fact, it would not have been difficult, we think, to conjecture his familiarity with the forms of speech common among barbarous nations.... "mr. wilson ... has found, from his own observation,--the only source of knowledge, if such it can be called, on which he is willing to place much reliance,--that the ojibways and iroquois are savages, and he rightly argues that their ancestors must have been savages. from these premises, without any process of reasoning, he leaps at once to the conclusion, that in no part of america could the aboriginal inhabitants ever have lived in any other than a savage state. hence he tells us, that, in all statements regarding them, everything 'must be rejected that is inconsistent with well-established indian traits.' the ancient mexican empire was, according to his showing, nothing more than one of those confederacies of tribes with which the reader of early new england history is perfectly familiar. the far-famed city of mexico was 'an indian village of the first class,'--such, we may hope, as that which the author saw on his visit to the massasaugus, where, to his immense astonishment, he found the people 'clothed, and in their right minds.' the aztecs, he argues, could not have built temples, for the iroquois do not build temples. the aztecs could not have been idolaters or offered up human sacrifices, for the iroquois are not idolaters and do not offer up human sacrifices. the aztecs could not have been addicted to cannibalism, for the iroquois never eat human flesh, unless driven to it by hunger. this is what mr. wilson means by the 'american standpoint'; and those who adopt his views may consider the whole question settled without any debate." ... "if, at mr. wilson's summons, we reject as improbable a series of events supported by far stronger evidence than can be adduced for the conquests of alexander, the crusades, or the norman conquest of england, what is it, we may ask, that he calls upon us to believe? his scepticism, as so often happens, affords the measure of his credulity. he contends that cortés, the greatest spaniard of the sixteenth century, a man little acquainted with books, but endowed with a gigantic genius and with all the qualities requisite for success in warlike enterprises and an adventurous career, had his brain so filled with the romances of chivalry, and so preoccupied with reminiscences of the spanish contests with the moslems, that he saw in the new world nothing but duplicates of those contests,--that his heated imagination turned wigwams into palaces, indian villages into cities like granada, swamps into lakes, a tribe of savages into an empire of civilised men,--that, in the midst of embarrassments and dangers which, even on mr. wilson's showing, must have taxed all his faculties to the utmost, he employed himself chiefly in coining lies with which to deceive his imperial master and all the inhabitants of christendom,--that, although he had a host of powerful enemies among his countrymen, enemies who were in a position to discover the truth, his statements passed unchallenged and uncontradicted by them,--that the numerous adventurers and explorers who followed in his track, instead of exposing the falsity of his relations and descriptions, found their interest in embellishing the narrative." of course wilson's book was unscientific to a degree, with its phoenician theories, its estimate of spanish sources of information, and its assorted ignorance of many things. its author, had, however, stumbled upon a bit of truth which no ridicule could shake, and which proved fruitful in suggestion to a very different kind of investigator. this was mr. lewis henry morgan, an important name in the history of american ethnological study. as a young man morgan had felt an interest in the american indian, which developed into a very unusual enthusiasm. it led him ultimately to spend a long time among the iroquois, studying their tribal organisation and social phenomena. he embodied the knowledge so obtained in a book entitled _the league of the iroquois_,[ ] a truly epoch-making work, though the author himself was at the time wholly unaware of its far-reaching importance. this book described the forms of government, the social organisation, the manners and the customs of the iroquois, with great accuracy and thoroughness. seven years later, morgan happened to fall in with a camp of ojibway indians, and found to his astonishment that their tribal customs were practically identical with those of the iroquois. while this coincidence was fresh in his mind, morgan read wilson's iconoclastic book on mexico. the suggestion made by wilson that the aztec civilisation was essentially the same as that of the northern tribes of red indians did much to crystallise the hypothesis which has now been definitely established as a fact. those who do not care to read a long series of monographs and several large volumes in order to arrive at a knowledge of what recent ethnologists hold as true of ancient mexico may find the essence of accepted doctrine somewhat divertingly set forth in a paper written by mr. morgan in criticism of h. h. bancroft's _native races of the pacific states_. mr. morgan's paper is entitled "montezuma's dinner."[ ] in it the statement is briefly made that the aztecs were simply one branch of the same red race which extended all over the american continent; that their forms of government, their usages, and their occupations were not in kind different from those of the iroquois, the ojibways, or any other of the north american indian tribes. these institutions and customs found no analogues among civilised nations, and could not, in their day, be explained in terms intelligible to contemporary europeans. hence, when the spaniards under cortés discovered in mexico a definite and fully developed form of civilisation, instead of studying it on the assumption that it might be different from their own, they described it, as mr. a. f. bandelier has well said, "in terms of comparison selected from types accessible to the limited knowledge of the times."[ ] thus, they beheld in montezuma an "emperor" surrounded by "kings," "princes," "nobles," and "generals." his residence was to them an imperial palace. his mode of life showed the magnificent and stately etiquette of a european monarch, with lords-in-waiting, court jesters, pages, secretaries, and household guards. in narrating all these things, the first spanish observers were wholly honest, although in their enthusiasm they added many a touch of literary colour. their records are paralleled by those of the english explorers who, in new england, thought they had found "kings" among the pequods and narragansetts, and who, in virginia, viewed powhatan as an "emperor" and pocahontas as a "princess." that the spaniards, like the english, wrote in ignorant good faith, rather than with a desire to deceive, is shown by the fact that they actually did record circumstances which even then, if critically studied, would have shown the falsity of their general belief. thus, as mr. bandelier points out, the spaniards tell of the aztecs that they had great wealth, reared great palaces, and acquired both scientific knowledge and skill in art, while in mechanical appliances they remained on the level of the savage, using stone and flint for tools and weapons, making pottery without the potter's wheel, and weaving intricate patterns with the hand-loom only. equally inconsistent are the statements that the aztecs were mild, gentle, virtuous, and kind, and yet that they sacrificed their prisoners with the most savage rites, made war that they might secure more sacrificial victims, viewed marriage as a barter, and regarded chastity as a restraint.[ ] still further inconsistencies are to be found in the spanish accounts of the aztec government. montezuma, for instance, is picturesquely held to have been an absolute ruler, one whose very name aroused awe and veneration throughout the whole extent of his vast dominions; and yet it is recorded that while still alive he was superseded by guatemozin; and even acosta notes that there was a council without whose consent nothing of importance could be done. in fact, under the solvent of mr. morgan's criticism, the gorgeous aztec empire of cortés and prescott shrinks to very modest proportions. montezuma is transformed from an hereditary monarch into an elective war-chief. his dominions become a territory of about the size of the state of rhode island. his capital appears as a stronghold built amid marshes and surrounded by flat-roofed houses of _adobe_; while his "palace" is a huge communal-house, built of stone and lime, and inhabited by his gentile kindred, united in one household. the magnificent feast which the spaniards describe so lusciously,--the throned king served by beautiful women and by stewards who knelt before him without daring to lift their eyes, the dishes of gold and silver, the red and black cholulan jars filled with foaming chocolate, the "ancient lords" attending at a distance, the orchestra of flutes, reeds, horns, and kettle-drums, and the three thousand guards without--all this is converted by morgan into a sort of barbaric buffet-luncheon, with montezuma squatting on the floor, surrounded by his relatives in breech-clouts, and eating a meal prepared in a common cook-house, divided at a common kettle, and eaten out of an earthen bowl. one need not, however, lend himself to so complete a disillusionment as mr. morgan in this paper seeks to thrust upon us. still more recent investigations, such as those of brinton, mcgee, and bandelier, have restored some of the prestige which cortés and his followers attached to the early mexicans. while the aztecs were very far from possessing a monarchical form of government, and while their society was constituted far differently from that of any european community, and while they are to be studied simply as one division of the red indian race, they were scarcely so primitive as mr. morgan would have us think. they differed from their more northern kindred not, to be sure, in kind, but very greatly in degree. though we have to substitute the communal-house for the palace, the war-chief for the king, and the tribal organisation for the feudal system, there still remains a great and interesting people, fully organised, rich, warlike, and highly skilled in their own arts. in architecture, weaving, gold and silver work, and pottery, they achieved artistic wonders. their instinct for the decorative produced results which justified the admiration of their conquerors. their capital, though it was not the immense city which the spaniards saw, teeming with a vast population, was, nevertheless, an imposing collection of mansions, great and small, whose snowy whiteness, standing out against the greenery and diversified by glimpses of water, might well impress the imagination of european strangers. if the communal-houses lacked the "golden cupolas" of disraeli's oriental fancy, neither were they the "mud huts" which wilson tells of. if montezuma was not precisely an occidental charles the fifth, neither is he to be regarded as an earlier sitting bull. so far, then, as we have to modify prescott's chapters which describe the mexico of cortés, this modification consists largely in a mere change of terminology. following the spanish records, he has accurately reproduced just what the spaniards saw, or thought they saw, in old tenochtitlan. he has looked at all things through their eyes; and such errors as he made were the same errors which they had made while they were standing in the great _pueblo_ which was to them the scene of so much suffering and of so great a final triumph. when prescott wrote, there lived no man who could have gainsaid him. his story represents the most accurate information which was then attainable. as mr. thorpe has well expressed it: "no historian is responsible for not using undiscovered evidence. prescott wrote from the archives of europe ... from the european side. if one cares to know how the old world first understood the new, he will read prescott." even morgan, who goes further in his destructive criticism than any other authoritative writer, admits that prescott and his sources "may be trusted in whatever relates to the acts of the spaniards, and to the acts and personal characteristics of the indians; in whatever relates to their weapons, implements and utensils, fabrics, food and raiment, and things of a similar character." only in what relates to their government, social relations, and plan of life does the narrative need to be in part rewritten. it is but fair to note that prescott himself, in his preliminary chapters on the aztecs, is far from dogmatising. his statements are made with a distinct reserve, and he acknowledges alike the difficulty of the subject and his doubts as to the finality of what he tells. even in his descriptive passages, he is solicitous lest the warm imagination of the spanish chroniclers may have led them to throw too high a light on what they saw. thus, after ending his account of montezuma's household and the aztec "court," drawn from the pages of bernal diaz, toribio, and oviedo, he qualifies its gorgeousness in the following sentence:[ ] "such is the picture of montezuma's domestic establishment and way of living as delineated by the conquerors and their immediate followers, who had the best means of information; too highly coloured, it may be, by the proneness to exaggerate which was natural to those who first witnessed a spectacle so striking to the imagination, so new and unexpected." and in a foot-note on the same page he expressly warns the student of history against the fanciful chapters of the spaniards who wrote a generation later, comparing their accounts with the stories in the _arabian nights_. putting aside, then, the single topic of aztec ethnology and tribal organisation, it remains to see how far the rest of prescott's history of the conquest has stood the test of recent criticism. here one finds himself on firmer ground, and it may be asserted with entire confidence that prescott's accuracy cannot be impeached in aught that is essential to the truth of history. his careful use of his authorities, and his excellent judgment in checking the evidence of one by the evidence of another, remain unquestioned. in one respect alone has fault been found with him. his desire to avail himself of every possible aid caused him to procure, often with great difficulty and at great expense, documents, or copies of documents, which had hitherto been inaccessible to the investigator. so far he was acting in the spirit of the truly scientific scholar. but sometimes the very rarity of these new sources led him to attach an undue value to them. here and there he has followed them as against the more accessible authorities, even when the latter were altogether trustworthy. in this we find something of the passion of the collector; and now and then in minor matters it has led him into error.[ ] thus, in certain passages relating to the voyage of cortés from havana, prescott has misstated the course followed by the pilot, as again with regard to the expedition from santiago de cuba[ ]; and he errs because he has followed a manuscript copy of juan diaz, overlooking the obviously correct and consistent accounts of bernal diaz and other standard chroniclers. there are similar though equally unimportant slips elsewhere in his narrative, arising from the same cause. none of them, however, affects the essential accuracy of his text. his masterpiece stands to-day still fundamentally unshaken, a faithful and brilliant panorama of a wonderful episode in history. those who are inclined to question its veracity do so, not because they can give substantial reasons for their doubt, but because, perhaps, of the romantic colouring which prescott has infused into his whole narrative, because it is as entertaining as a novel, and because he had the art to transmute the acquisitions of laborious research into an enduring monument of pure literature. chapter ix "the conquest of peru"--"philip ii." the _conquest of peru_ was, for the most part, written more rapidly than any other of prescott's histories. much of the material necessary for it had been acquired during his earlier studies, and with this material he had been long familiar when he began to write. the book was, indeed, as he himself described it, a pendant to the _conquest of mexico_. had the latter work not been written, it is likely that the _conquest of peru_ would be now accepted as the most popular of prescott's works. unfortunately, it is always subjected to a comparison with the other and greater book, and therefore, relatively, it suffers. in the first place, when so compared, it resembles an imperfect replica of the _mexico_ rather than an independent history. the theme is, in its nature, the same, and so it lacks the charm of novelty. the exploits of pizarro do not merely recall to the modern reader the adventurous achievements of cortés, but, as a matter of fact, they were actually inspired by them. thus, pizarro's march from the coast over the andes closely resembles the march of cortés over the cordilleras. his seizure of the inca, atahualpa, was undoubtedly suggested to him by the seizure of montezuma. the massacre of the peruvians in caxamarca reads like a reminiscence of the massacre of the aztecs by alvarado in mexico. the fighting, if fighting it may be called, presents the same features as are found in the battles of cortés. so far as there is any difference in the two narratives, this difference is not in favour of the later book. if pizarro bears a likeness to cortés, the likeness is but superficial. his soul is the soul of cortés _habitans in sicco_. there is none of the frankness of the conqueror of mexico, none of his chivalry, little of his bluff good comradeship. pizarro rather impresses one as mean-spirited, avaricious, and cruel, so that we hold lightly his undoubted courage, his persistency, and his endurance. moreover, the peruvians are too feeble as antagonists to make the record of their resistance an exciting one. they lack the ferocity of the aztec character, and when they are slaughtered by the white men, the tale is far more pitiful than stirring. even prescott's art cannot make us feel that there is anything romantic in the conquest and butchery of a flock of sheep. the outrages perpetrated upon an effeminate people by their spanish masters form a long and dreary record of robbery and rape and it is inevitably monotonous. another fundamental defect in the subject which prescott chose was thoroughly appreciated by him. "its great defect," he wrote in , "is want of unity. a connected tissue of adventures ... but not the especial interest that belongs to the _iliad_ and to the _conquest of mexico_." in another memorandum (made in ) he calls his subject "second rate,--quarrels of banditti over their spoils." this criticism is absolutely just, and it well explains the inferiority of the story of peru when we contrast it with the book which went before. up to the capture of the inca there is no lack of unity; but after that, the stream of narration filters away in different directions, like some river which grows broader and shallower until at last in a multitude of little streams it disappears in dry and sandy soil. the fault is not the fault of the writer. it is inherent in the subject. nowhere has prescott written with greater skill. it is only that no display of literary art can give dignity and distinction to that which in itself is unheroic and sometimes even sordid. the one passage which stands out from all the rest is that which sets before us the famous incident at panama, when pizarro, at the head of his little band of followers, mutinous, famished, and half-naked, still boldly scorns all thought of a return. "drawing his sword he traced a line with it on the sand from east to west. then, turning towards the south, 'friends and comrades!' he said, 'on that side are toil, hunger, nakedness, the drenching storm, desertion, and death; on this side ease and pleasure. there lies peru with its riches; here, panama and its poverty. choose, each man, what best becomes a brave castilian. for my part, i go to the south.' so saying, he stepped across the line." here is an heroic event told with that simplicity which means effectiveness. this is the one page in the _peru_ where the narrator makes us thrill with a sense of what, in its way, verges upon moral sublimity. as to the historical value of the book, it stands in much the same category as the _conquest of mexico_. all that relates to the actual history of the conquest is told with the same accurate regard for the original authorities which prescott always showed, and for this part of the narrative, the original authorities are worthy of credence. the preliminary chapters on peruvian antiquities are less satisfactory even than the corresponding portions of the other book. prescott found them very hard to write. he was conscious that the subject was a formidable one. he did the best he could and all that any one could possibly have done at the time in which he wrote. even now, after the elaborate explorations and researches of bandelier, markham, baessler, cunow, and others, the social and political relations of the peruvians are little understood. much has been learned of their art and of the monuments which they have left behind; but of their institutional history the records still remain obscure. the modern student, however, discovers many indications that they, too, like the aztecs, were of the red race, and that their government was based upon the clan system; so that even the inca himself, like the mexican war-chief, was merely the elected executive of a council of the gentes. here, as in mexico, the spaniards carelessly described in terms of europe the institutions which they found, and made no serious attempt to understand them. even the account of the peruvian religion which prescott gives, in accordance with the statements of the early catholic missionaries, needs considerable modification.[ ] the spanish chroniclers whom prescott followed describe the peruvians as united under a great monarchy,--an "empire,"--the head of which, the inca, was an hereditary and absolute ruler, whose person was sacred in that he was divine and the sole giver of law. the system was, therefore, a theocratic one, with the chief priest appointed by the inca. there was a nobility, but the great offices of state were filled by the members of the imperial family. the rule of the inca extended over a vast territory, and of it he was the supreme lord, having his wives from among the virgins of the sun, the fifteen hundred beautiful maidens who abode in the palace of the sun in cuzco. over the wonderful system of roads which intersected the empire, the couriers of the inca passed back and forth with the commands of their master, to which all gave heed. the peruvian religion was strongly monotheistic in that it recognised the unity, and preëminence of a supreme deity. recent investigation has left practically nothing of this interesting fiction which has been repeated by hundreds of writers with every possible magnificence of detail. there was no "empire" of peru. the indians of the coast governed themselves, though they sometimes paid tribute to the cuzco indians. there was, however, no homogeneous nationality. in the valley of cuzco there was a tribe known as the inca, perhaps seventy thousand souls in all, who were locally divided into twelve clans, each having its own government, and dwelling in its own village or ward; for it was a combination of these twelve villages which made up the whole settlement collectively styled cuzco. a council of the twelve clans chose a war-chief whom some of the other tribes called "inca," but who was not so called by his own people. he was not an hereditary chief; he could be deposed; he had no especial sanctity. the virgins of the sun were something very different from virgins. the road system of the peruvians really constituted no system at all. the nobles were not nobles. the religion was not monotheistic, but embodied the worship not only of sun, moon, and stars, but of rocks, mountains, stone idols, and a variety of fetishes. metal-work, pottery, weaving, and building were the chief arts of the peruvians; but in them all, quaintness, utility, and permanence were more conspicuous than beauty.[ ] disregarding, however, all questions of peruvian archæology, we may accept the judgment passed upon the _conquest of peru_ by one of the most eminent of modern investigators, sir clements markham, who, as a young man, knew prescott well, and to whom the reading of this book proved to be an inspiration in his chosen field. long after prescott's death, and speaking with the fuller knowledge of the subject which he had acquired, he declared of the peru: "it deservedly stands in the first rank as a judicious history of the conquest." the _history of the reign of philip ii._ remains an unfinished work. its subject, of course, provokes a comparison with the two brilliant histories by motley,--_the rise of the dutch republic and the history of the united netherlands_. the interest in this comparison lies in the view which each of the historians has taken of the gloomy philip. the contrasted temperaments of the two writers are well indicated in a letter which motley sent to prescott after the first volume of _philip ii._ had appeared. he wrote:-- "i can vouch for its extraordinary accuracy both of narration and of portrait-painting. you do not look at people or events from my point of view, but i am, therefore, a better witness to your fairness and clearness of delineation and statement. you have by nature the judicial mind which is the _costume de rigueur_ of all historians.... i haven't the least of it--i am always in a passion when i write and so shall be accused, very justly perhaps, of the qualities for which byron commended mitford, 'wrath and partiality.'" the two men, indeed, approached their subject in very different fashion. in motley, rigidly scientific though he was, there are always a touch of emotion, a love of liberty, a hatred of oppression. he once wrote to his father that it gratified him "to pitch into the duke of alva and philip ii. to my heart's content." prescott, on the other hand, was more detached, partly because he was by nature tolerant and calm; and it may be also because his protracted spanish studies had given him unconsciously the spanish point of view. he even came at last to adopt this theory himself, and he wrote of it in a humorous way. thus to lady lyell, he declared:-- "if i should go to heaven ... i shall find many acquaintances there, and some of them very respectable, of the olden time.... don't you think i should have a kindly greeting from good isabella? even bloody mary, i think, will smile on me; for i love the old spanish stock, the house of trastamara. but there is one that i am sure will owe me a grudge, and that is the very man i have been making two good volumes upon. with all my good nature, i can't wash him even into the darkest french grey. he is black and all black.... is it not charitable to give philip a place in heaven?" again, he styles philip one "who may be considered as to other catholics what a puseyite is to other protestants." and elsewhere he confesses to "a sneaking fondness for philip." it was very like him, this hesitation to condemn; and it recalls a memorandum which he made while writing his _peru_: "never call hard names à la southey." hence in a letter of his to motley, who had sent him a copy of the _dutch republic_,--a letter which forms an interesting complement to motley's note to him, he wrote:-- "you have laid it on philip rather hard. indeed, you have whittled him down to such an imperceptible point that there is hardly enough of him left to hang a newspaper paragraph on, much less five or six volumes of solid history as i propose to do. but then, you make it up with your own hero, william of orange, and i comfort myself with the reflection that you are looking through a pair of dutch spectacles after all." prescott's _philip ii_. raised no such questions of accuracy as followed upon the publications of the mexican and peruvian histories. as in the case of the _ferdinand and isabella_, the sources were unimpeachable, first-hand, and contained the more intimate revelations of incident and motive. there were no archæological problems to be solved, no obscure racial puzzles to perplex the investigator. the reign of philip had simply to be interpreted in the light of the revelations which philip himself and his contemporaries left behind them--often in papers which were never meant for more than two pairs of eyes. how complete are these revelations, one may learn from a striking passage written by motley, who speaks in it of the abundant stores of knowledge which lie at the disposal of the modern student of history. "to him who has the patience and industry, many mysteries are thus revealed, which no political sagacity or critical acumen could have divined. he leans over the shoulder of philip the second at his writing-table, as the king spells patiently out, with cipher-key in hand, the most concealed hieroglyphics of parma, or guise, or mendoza.... he enters the cabinet of the deeply pondering burghleigh, and takes from the most private drawer the memoranda which record that minister's unutterable doubtings; he pulls from the dressing-gown folds of the stealthy, soft-gliding walsingham the last secret which he has picked from the emperor's pigeon-holes or the pope's pocket.... he sits invisible at the most secret councils of the nassaus and barneveldt and buys, or pores with farnese over coming victories and vast schemes of universal conquest; he reads the latest bit of scandal, the minutest characteristic of king or minister, chronicled by his gossiping venetians for the edification of the forty."[ ] all this material and more was in prescott's hands, and he made full use of it. his narrative, moreover, was told in a style which was easy and unstudied, less glowing than in the _mexico_, but even better fitted for the telling of events which were so pregnant with good and ill to succeeding generations. in the pages of _philip ii._ we have neither the somewhat formal student who wrote of ferdinand and isabella, nor the romanticist whose imagination was kindled by the reports of cortés. rather do we find one who has at last reached the highest levels of historical writing, and who with perfect poise develops a noble theme in a noble way. the only criticism which has ever been brought against the book has come from those who, like thoreau, regard literary finish as a defect in historical composition. the author of walden seemed, indeed, to single out prescott for special animadversion in this respect, and his rather rasping sentences contain the only jarring notes that were sounded by any contemporary of the historian. thoreau, writing of the colonial historians of massachusetts, such as josselyn, remarked with a sort of perverse appreciation: "they give you one piece of nature at any rate, and that is themselves, smacking their lips like a coach-whip,--none of those emasculated modern histories, such as prescott's, cursed with a style." if style be really a curse to an historian, then prescott remained under its ban to the very last. as a bit of vivid writing his description of the battle of lepanto was much admired, and irving thought it the best thing in the book. a bit of it may be quoted by way of showing that prescott in his later years lost nothing of his vivacity or of his fondness for battle-scenes. first we see the turkish armament moving up to battle against the allied fleets:-- "the galleys spread out, as usual with the turks, in the form of a regular half-moon, covering a wider extent of surface than the combined fleets, which they somewhat exceeded in number. they presented, indeed, as they drew nearer, a magnificent array, with their gilded and gaudily-painted prows, and their myriads of pennons and streamers fluttering gayly in the breeze; while the rays of the morning sun glanced on the polished scimitars of damascus, and on the superb aigrettes of jewels which sparkled in the turbans of the ottoman chiefs.... the distance between the two fleets was now rapidly diminishing. at this solemn moment a death-like silence reigned throughout the armament of the confederates. men seemed to hold their breath, as if absorbed in the expectation of some great catastrophe. the day was magnificent. a light breeze, still adverse to the turks, played on the waters, somewhat fretted by the contrary winds. it was nearly noon; and as the sun, mounting through a cloudless sky, rose to the zenith, he seemed to pause, as if to look down on the beautiful scene, where the multitude of galleys moving over the water, showed like a holiday spectacle rather than a preparation for mortal combat." then we have the two fleets in the thick of combat:-- "the pacha opened at once on his enemy a terrible fire of cannon and musketry. it was returned with equal spirit and much more effect; for the turks were observed to shoot over the heads of their adversaries. the moslem galley was unprovided with the defences which protected the sides of the spanish vessels; and the troops, crowded together on the lofty prow, presented an easy mark to their enemy's balls. but though numbers of them fell at every discharge, their places were soon supplied by those in reserve. they were enabled, therefore, to keep up an incessant fire, which wasted the strength of the spaniards; and, as both christian and mussulman fought with indomitable spirit, it seemed doubtful to which side victory would incline.... "thus the fight raged along the whole extent of the entrance to the gulf of lepanto. the volumes of vapour rolling heavily over the waters effectually shut out from sight whatever was passing at any considerable distance, unless when a fresher breeze dispelled the smoke for a moment, or the flashes of the heavy guns threw a transient gleam on the dark canopy of battle. if the eye of the spectator could have penetrated the cloud of smoke that enveloped the combatants, and have embraced the whole scene at a glance, he would have perceived them broken up into small detachments, separately engaged one with another, independently of the rest, and indeed ignorant of all that was doing in other quarters. the contest exhibited few of those large combinations and skilful manoeuvres to be expected in a great naval encounter. it was rather an assemblage of petty actions, resembling those on land. the galleys, grappling together, presented a level arena, on which soldier and galley-slave fought hand to hand, and the fate of the engagement was generally decided by boarding. as in most hand-to-hand contests, there was an enormous waste of life. the decks were loaded with corpses, christian and moslem lying promiscuously together in the embrace of death. instances are recorded where every man on board was slain or wounded. it was a ghastly spectacle, where blood flowed in rivulets down the sides of the vessels, staining the waters of the gulf for miles around. "it seemed as if a hurricane had swept over the sea and covered it with the wreck of the noble armaments which a moment before were so proudly riding on its bosom. little had they now to remind one of their late magnificent array, with their hulls battered, their masts and spars gone or splintered by the shot, their canvas cut into shreds and floating wildly on the breeze, while thousands of wounded and drowning men were clinging to the floating fragments and calling piteously for help." had prescott lived, his history of philip ii. would have been extended to a greater length than any of his other books--probably to six volumes instead of the three which are all that he ever finished. it is likely, too, that this book would have constituted his surest claim to high rank as an historian. he came to the writing of it with a mind stored with the accumulations of twenty years of patient, conscientious study. he had lost none of his charm as a writer, while he had acquired laboriously that special knowledge and training which are needed in one who would be a master of historical research. _philip ii._ shows on every page the skill with which information drawn from multifarious sources can be massed and marshalled by one who is not only documented but who has thoroughly assimilated everything of value which his documents contain. no better evidence of prescott's thoroughness is needed than the tribute which was paid to him by motley, who had diligently gleaned in the same field. he said; "i am astonished at your omniscience. nothing seems to escape you. many a little trait of character, scrap of intelligence, or dab of scene-painting which i had kept in my most private pocket, thinking i had fished it out of unsunned depths, i find already in your possession."[ ] and we may well join with motley in his expression of regret that so solid a piece of historical composition should remain unfinished. writing from rome to mr. william amory soon after prescott's death, motley said:-- "i feel inexpressibly disappointed ... that the noble and crowning monument of his life, for which he had laid such massive foundations, and the structure of which had been carried forward in such a grand and masterly manner, must remain uncompleted, like the unfinished peristyle of some stately and beautiful temple on which the night of time has suddenly descended."[ ] chapter x prescott's rank as an historian in forming an estimate of prescott's rank among american writers of history, one's thought inevitably associates him with certain of his contemporaries. the spanish subjects which he made his own invite a direct comparison with irving. his study of the sombre philip compels us to think at once of motley. the broadly general theme of his first three books--the extension of european domination over the new world--brings him into a direct relation to francis parkman. the comparison with irving is more immediately suggested by the fact that had prescott not entered the field precisely when he did, the story of cortés and of the mexican conquest would have been written by irving. how fortunate was the chance which gave the task to prescott must be obvious to all who are familiar with the writings of both men. it has been said that in irving's hands literature would have profited at the expense of history; but even this is too much of a concession, irving, even as a stylist, was never at his best in serious historical composition. his was not the spirit which gladly undertakes a work _de longue haleine_, nor was his genial, humorous nature suited to the gravity of such an undertaking. his fame had been won, and fairly won, in quite another field,--a field in which his personal charm, his mellow though far from deep philosophy of life, and his often whimsical enjoyment of his own world could find spontaneous and individual expression. the labour of research, the comparison of authorities, the long months of hard reading and steady note-taking, were not congenial to his nature. he moved less freely in the heavy armour of the historian than in the easy-fitting modern garb of the essayist and story-teller. the best that one can say of the style of his _granada_, his _columbus_, and his _washington_ is that it is smooth, well-worded, and correct. it shows little of the real distinction which we find in many of his shorter papers,--in that on westminster abbey, for example, and on english opinion of america; while the peculiar flavour which makes his account of little britain so delightful is wholly absent. on the purely historical side, the two men are in wholly different classes. irving resembled livy in his use of the authorities. such sources as were ready to his hand and easy to consult, he used with conscientious care; but those that were farther afield, and for the mastery of which both time and labour were demanded, he let alone. thus, his history of columbus was prepared in something less than two years, in which period both his preliminary studies and the actual composition were completed. yet this book was the one over which he took the greatest pains, and for which he made his only serious attempt at something like original investigation. his _mahomet_ was confessedly written at second hand; while in his _washington_ he followed in the main such records and already published works as were convenient. in the _granada_ he only plays with history, and ascribes the main portion of the narrative to a mythical ecclesiastic, "the worthy fray antonio agapida," in whose lineaments we may not infrequently detect a strong family resemblance to the no less worthy diedrich knickerbocker. in the letter which irving wrote to prescott, relinquishing to him the subject of cortés, he lets us see quite plainly the very moderate amount of reading which he had been doing.[ ] he had dipped into solis, bernal diaz, and herrera, using them, so he said, "as guide-books." upon the basis of this reading he had sketched out the entire narrative, and had fallen to work upon the actual history with the intention of "working up" other material as he went along. when we compare these easy-going methods with the scientific thoroughness of prescott, his ransacking, by agents, of every important library in europe, his great collection of original documents, the many years which he gave to the study of them, and the conscientious judgment with which he weighed and balanced them, we cannot fail to see how much the world has gained by irving's act of generous self-abnegation. it is only fair to add that he himself, at the time when prescott wrote to him, was beginning to doubt whether he had not undertaken a task unsuited to his inclinations and beyond his powers. "ever since i have been meddling with the theme," he said, "its grandeur and magnificence had been growing upon me, and i had felt more and more doubtful whether i should be able to treat it _conscientiously_,--that is to say, with the extensive research and thorough investigation which it merited." professor jameson hazards the conjecture[ ] that irving's real importance in the development of american historiography is not at all to be discerned in the serious works which have just been mentioned, but rather in his quaintly humorous picture of new york under the dutch, contained in the pretended narration of diedrich knickerbocker, and published as early as . there can be no doubt that, as professor jameson says, this book did much to excite both interest and curiosity concerning the dutch régime. "very likely the great amount of work which the state government did for the historical illustration of the dutch period, through the researches of mr. brodhead in foreign archives, had this unhistorical little book as one of its principal causes." here, indeed, is only one more illustration of the fact that the work which one does in his natural vein and in his own way is certain not only to be his best, but to exercise a genuine influence in spheres which at the time were quite beyond the writer's consciousness. something has already been said concerning prescott in his relationship to motley as an historian. a brief but more explicit comparison may be added here. the diligence and zeal of the investigator both men shared on even terms. the only advantage which motley possessed was the opportunity, denied to prescott, of prosecuting his own researches, of discovering his own materials, and of visiting and living in the very places of which he had to write, instead of working largely through the eyes and brains of other men. this was a very real advantage; for the inspiration of the search and of the scenes themselves gave a keen stimulus to the ambition of the scholar and a glow to the imagination of the writer. one attaches less importance to motley's academic training; for while it was broader than that of prescott, and comprised the valuable teaching which was given him in the two great universities of berlin and göttingen, we cannot truthfully assert that prescott's equipment was inferior to that of his contemporary. indeed, _ferdinand_ and _isabella_ and _philip ii._ can better stand the test of searching criticism than motley's _dutch republic_. motley is, indeed, the most "literary" of all the so-called "literary historians". in the glow and fervour of his narrative he is unsurpassed. he feels all the passion of the times whereof he writes, and he makes the reader feel it too. he has, moreover, a power of drawing character which prescott seldom shows and which, when he shows it, he shows in less degree. motley writes with the magnetism of a great pleader and with something also of the imagination of a poet. unlike prescott, he understands the philosophy of history and delves beneath the surface to search out and reveal the hidden causes of events. yet first and last and all the time, he is a partisan. he is pleading for a cause far more than he is seeking for impartial truth. in this respect he resembles mommsen, whose _römische geschichte_ is likewise in its later books a splendid piece of partisanship. motley is an american and a protestant, and therefore he is eloquent for liberty and harsh toward what he views as superstition. william the silent is his hero just as cæsar is mommsen's, and he hates tyranny as mommsen hated the insolence of the roman _junkerthum_. this vivid feeling springing from intensity of conviction makes both books true masterpieces, nor to the critical scholar does it greatly lessen their value as historical compositions. yet in each, one has continually to check the writer, to modify his statements, and to make allowance for his very individual point of view. in reading prescott, on the other hand, nothing of the sort is necessary. he is free from the passion of politics, his judgment is impartial, and those who read him feel, as an eminent scholar has remarked, that they are listening to a wise and learned judge rather than to a skilful advocate. even in the sphere of characterisation, prescott is more sound than motley, even though he be not half so forceful. re-reading many of the portraits which the latter has drawn for us in glowing colours, the student of human nature will perceive that they are quite impossible. take, for instance motley's philip and compare it with the philip whom prescott has described for us. the former is not a man at all. he is either a devil, or a lunatic, or it may be a blend of each. indeed, motley himself in conversation used to describe him as a devil, though he once remarked, "he is not my head devil." everywhere philip is depicted in the same sable hues, without a touch of light to relieve the blackness of his character. on the other hand, prescott shows us one who, with all his cruelty, his hypocrisy, and his superstition, is still quite comprehensible because, after all, he remains a human being. prescott discovers and records in him some qualities of which motley in his sweeping condemnation takes no heed. we see a philip scrupulously faithful to his duty as he understands it, bearing toil and loneliness, patient to his secretaries, gracious to his petitioners, whom he tries to set at ease, generous in his patronage of art, and putting aside all his coldness and reserve while watching the progress of his favourite architects and builders. these things and others like them count perhaps for very little in one sense; yet in another they bring out the fact that prescott viewed his subject in the clear light of historic truth rather than in the glare of fiery prejudice. there are some who would rate parkman above prescott. they speak of him as more truly an american historian because the topic which he chose--the development of new france--has a direct bearing upon the national history of the united states. this, however, is at once to limit the word "american" in a thoroughly unreasonable way, and also to allow the choice of theme to prejudice one's judgment of the manner in which that theme is treated. parkman, to be sure, has merits of his own, some of which are less discernible in prescott. for picturesqueness, as for accuracy, both men are on a level. there is a greater freshness of feeling in parkman, a sort of open air effect, which is redolent of his actual experience of the great plains and the far western mountains in the days which he passed among the indian tribes. this cannot be expected of one whose physical infirmities confined him to the limits of his library. but, on the other hand, prescott chose a broader field, and he made that field more thoroughly his own. these two--prescott and parkman--must take rank not far apart. between them, they have divided, so to speak, the early history of the american continent in the sphere which lies beyond the bounds of purely anglo-saxon conquest. disciples of the dismal school of history often yield a very grudging tribute to the enduring merit of what prescott patiently achieved. yet in their own field he met them upon equal terms and need not fear comparison. though self-trained as an historical investigator, his mastery of his authorities has hardly been excelled by those whose merit is found solely in their gift for delving. the evidence of his thoroughness, his judgment, and his critical faculty is to be seen in the documentary treasures of his foot-notes. he did not, like mommsen, write a brilliant narrative and leave the reader without the ready means of verifying what he wrote. he has, to use his own words, "suffered the scaffolding to remain after the building has been completed." those who sneer at his array of testimony are none the less unable to impeach it. though historical science has in many respects made great advances since his death, his work still stands essentially unshaken. he had the historical conscience in a rare degree; one feels his fairness and is willing to accept his judgment. if he seems to lack a special gift for philosophical analysis, the plan and scope of his histories did not contemplate a subjective treatment. what he meant to do, he did, and he did it with a combination of historical exactness and literary artistry such as no other american at least, has yet exhibited. without the humour of irving, or the fire of motley, or the intimate touch of parkman, he is superior to all three in poise and judgment and distinction; so that on the whole one may accept the dictum of a distinguished scholar[ ] who, in summing up the merits which we recognise in prescott, declares them to be so conspicuous and so abounding as to place him at the head of all american historians. index a academy, royal spanish, , . adair, james, . adams, dr. c. k., quoted, . adams, john quincy, library of, ; absence in europe, , , ; professor at harvard, ; minister to england, . adams, sir william, . albert, prince, , . amory, thomas c., . amory, william, letter to, . athenæum, boston, , , . aztecs, , , , , , ; as viewed by wilson, - ; morgan's view of, - ; later opinions regarding, - . b bancroft, george, ; letters to, , , ; reviews _ferdinand and isabella_, ; honour conferred on, ; quoted, ; estimate of, . bancroft, h. h., quoted, , . bandelier, a. f., , , ; quoted, , , . bentley, richard, , , , , , . bradford, governor william, . brougham, lord, prescott's description of, , . brown, charles brockden, novels of, ; _life of_, , . bunsen, baron, , . byron, lord, prescott's estimate of, ; as exponent of romanticism, ; quoted, . c calderon de la barca, señor, , . carlisle, lord, prescott's friendship with, , , , , . carlyle, thomas, prescott's comment on, . channing, w. e., , , , . _charles v._, _history of_, , . circourt, comte adolphe de, . _club-room_, edited by prescott, . cogswell, j. g., , . condé, _history of the arabs in spain_, , . cooper, sir astley, . cortés, hernan, , , ; quoted, ; attack on cholulans, , ; retreat from mexico, , ; character of, , , , ; compared with pizarro, , . cashing, caleb, . d dante, prescott's admiration for, . daudet, alphonse, . dexter, franklin, . diaz, bernal, , ; quoted, . dickens, charles, entertained by prescott, ; preferred by him to thackeray, . dumas, alexandre, . dunham, dr. s.p., , . e edwards, jonathan, , . english, james, prescott's secretary, , , , , , . everett, a. h., . everett, edward, , . f farre, dr., . _ferdinand and isabella_, beginnings of, , ; progress, - ; completion and publication, - ; success of, - , , , ; style of, , ; historical accuracy, , , , . ford, richard, criticises _ferdinand and isabella_, ; his ridicule of prescott's style, - ; prescott's reply, , ; quoted, , . franklin, benjamin, ; style of, . g gardiner, rev. dr. john s., , . gardiner, william, , , , . gayangos, don pascual de, reviews _ferdinand and isabella_, , ; aids prescott, , , . grenville, thomas, quoted, . guatemozin, character of, , ; successor of montezuma, , . guizot, m., reviews _philip ii._, . h hale, edward everett, quoted, , . hallam, henry, praises _ferdinand and isabella_, ; prescott's acquaintance with, . harper brothers, publish _conquest of mexico_, , ; publish _conquest of peru_, ; prescott's generosity to, . harvard college, faculty of, in , , , ; entrance examinations, ; curriculum, , ; methods, , , ; confers degree upon prescott, . hickling, thomas, , , . higginson, mehitable, . higginson, t. w., . hughes, thomas, quoted, . humboldt, baron alexander von, , . i irving, washington, characteristics of, ; quoted, ; correspondence regarding _conquest of mexico_, - ; praised by prescott, ; compared to goldsmith, ; style of, , ; his _columbus_ criticised by prescott, ; comment on _philip ii._, ; compared with prescott, - , . j jackson, dr. james, . jameson, prof. j. f., quoted, _n._, _n._, . jeffrey, lord, . johnson, dr. samuel, quoted, ; style of, , . k kirk, john foster, prescott's secretary, , , . kirkland, rev. dr. john thornton, , . knapp, jacob newman, . l la bruyère, quoted, . lafitau, père, . lawrence, abbott, , ; memoir of, . lawrence, james, , . lembke, dr. j. b., prescott's agent in spain, , , . linzee, hannah, . longfellow, henry w., prescott's admiration for, . lowell, james russell, , , . lyell, lady, entertained by prescott, ; letter to, , . lyell, sir charles, , . lynn, prescott's house at, , . m macaulay, lord, anecdotes of, , ; style of, , . marina, . markham, sir clements, judgment of prescott's _peru_, . massachusetts historical society, , , , , . mather, cotton, his _magnalia_, . _mexico_, _conquest of_, preparations for, - ; four years of work on, - ; publication and success of, - , ; estimate of, - . middle states, literature in the, - . middleton, arthur, ; aids prescott in spain, , . mommsen, theodor, as a partisan compared with motley, , ; compared with prescott, . montezuma, described by prescott, , ; spaniards' view of, - . morgan, lewis henry, indian researches of, , , , ; quoted, . motley, j. l., quoted, , , , , , , ; compared with prescott, - , . n nahant, prescott's cottage at, , , . navarrete, m. f., , . new england, literature in, - ; historians of, - . noctograph, description of, . northumberland, duke of, entertains prescott, , . o ogden, rollo, quoted, , . oxford university, ; confers degree on prescott, , . p parkman, francis, style of, , ; compared with prescott, , . parr, dr. samuel, . parsons, theophilus, ; quoted, . peabody, dr. a. p., _harvard reminiscences_, _n._ peel, sir robert, . peirce, benjamin, . pepperell, prescott's home at, , . _peru_, _conquest of_, memorising of parts of, ; composition and publication, , , , , ; estimate of, - . peruvians, - . phi beta kappa, . _philip ii._, prescott's memorising of parts, ; obstacles in way, - ; preparations for, , ; two volumes completed, , , ; third volume, ; estimate of, - ; compared with _dutch republic_, . pickering, john, memoir of, . pizarro, francisco, ; character of, ; quoted, . poe, edgar allan, . prescott, catherine hickling, parentage and character, , ; rearing of son, . prescott, colonel william, , , . prescott, john, . prescott, oliver, . prescott, susan amory, , ; marriage to prescott, , ; character, ; letters to, , , . prescott, william, birth and career, ; characteristics of, , , ; home, , ; illness of, ; removal to boston, , ; quoted, ; death, . prescott, william hickling, literary importance of, ; birth of, ; his first teachers, ; traits as a boy, , ; prepares for college, , ; his tastes in reading, , ; amusements, , , ; candidate for harvard, ; letter to father about examination, , ; enters college, ; his studies and ideals, ; love of pleasure, ; laxity of conduct, , , ; accident, ; loss of eye, ; effect on character, ; magnanimity, ; returns to college, ; dislike for mathematics, ; commencement poem, , ; election to phi beta kappa, ; studies law, ; second illness and temporary blindness, , ; sails for azores, , ; third illness, ; first visit to london, , ; visits paris and italy, , ; returns to england, ; sails for home, ; anxiety regarding career, , ; vicarious reading, , ; first attempts at composition, , , ; marriage, , ; resolves to become a man of letters, ; studies languages, , , ; interest in spanish, , ; drift toward historical composition, , ; perplexity in choosing subject, , , ; decides upon _ferdinand and isabella_, , ; difficulties of task, , ; time of preparation and composition, , , , ; his methods, of work, , , , , ; his memory, , , , ; his mode of life, , , , ; death of daughter, , , ; contributes to periodicals, , ; completes _ferdinand and isabella_, ; search for publisher, , ; terms of contract, ; success of book, , , , , , ; criticisms, , , ; theological studies and beliefs, , ; begins mexican researches, , , , ; correspondence with irving, ; writes _conquest of mexico_, , ; contract with the harpers, , ; honours conferred upon, , ; writes _conquest of peru_, , , ; reception of book, , ; death of father, ; opinion of american critics, ; period of inactivity, , ; political views, , ; entertainment of friends, , , ; his boyish ways, ; his tactlessness, ; his yankeeisms, ; preparations for _philip_ _ii._, , , , ; his boston residence, , ; the homestead at pepperell, , ; his cottage at nahant, , ; cottage at lynn, , ; third visit to england, , - ; presented at court, ; his sensibility, ; at zenith of his fame, , ; his opinions of contemporary writers, , , , ; completes two volumes of _philip ii._, , , ; rewrites conclusion of robertson's _charles v._, , ; health fails, ; completes third volume of _philip ii._, ; death, ; his burial, , ; style and accuracy of _ferdinand and isabella_, - ; criticised by ford, , , ; his place as an historian, - . q quincy, josiah, , . r raumer, friedrich von, . _review_, _edinburgh_, notices of prescott's books, , , , . _review_, _english quarterly_, , , . _review, north american_, prescott's contributions to, , , , ; its notices of prescott's books, , . robertson, william, , . rogers, samuel, , . s scott, general winfield, , . scott, sir walter, , , , ; a favourite of prescott's, , ; quoted, . shepherd, dr. w.r. _n._ simancas, archives at, , . southern states, literature in the, - . southey, robert, , ; praises _ferdinand and isabella_, ; quoted, . sparks, jared, , ; estimate of, , ; encourages prescott, , , , . stith, dr. w., quoted, . story, judge joseph, . sumner, charles, prescott's friendship with, , , . t talleyrand, quoted, . thackeray, w. m., , ; entertained by prescott, , ; tribute to prescott, , . thierry, augustin, , . thoreau, henry d., quoted, , . ticknor, george, , , ; quoted, , , , , , , , , , ; letters to, , , , , , ; reads to prescott, . tocqueville, alexis de, , . v victoria, queen, , . w ware, john, . wars, napoleonic, . wellington, duke of, , . wendell, prof. barrett, . wilson, j. grant, quoted, n. wilson, robert a., criticises prescott's _conquest of mexico_, , ; reply to, - . x xenophon, prescott compared with, , . * * * * * english men of letters edited by john morley cloth. mo. price, cents, each =addison.= by w. j. courthope. =bacon.= by r. w. church. =bentley.= by prof. jebb. =bunyan.= by j. a. froude. =burke.= by john morley. =burns.= by principal shairp. =byron.= by prof. nichol. =carlyle.= by prof. nichol. =chaucer.= by prof. a. w. ward. =coleridge.= by h. d. traill. =cowper.= by goldwin smith. =defoe.= by w. minto. =de quincey.= by prof. masson. =dickens.= by a. w. ward. =dryden.= by g. saintsbury. =fielding.= by austin dobson. =gibbon.= by j. cotter morison. =goldsmith.= by william black. =gray.= by edmund gosse. =johnson.= by leslie stephen. =hume.= by t. h. huxley. =keats.= by sidney colvin. =lamb.= by alfred ainger. =landor.= by sidney colvin. =locke.= by prof. fowler. =macaulay.= by j. cotter morison. =milton.= by mark pattison. =pope.= by leslie stephen. =scott.= by r. h. hutton. =shelley.= by j. a. symonds. =sheridan.= by mrs. oliphant. =sir philip sidney.= by j. a. symonds. =southey.= by prof. dowden. =spenser.= by r. w. church. =sterne.= by h. d. traill. =swift.= by leslie stephen. =thackeray.= by a. trollope. =wordsworth.= by f. w. h. myers. new volumes cloth. mo. price, cents net =george eliot.= by leslie stephen. =william hazlitt.= by augustine birrell. =matthew arnold.= by herbert w. paul. =john ruskin.= by frederic harrison. =john greenleaf whittier.= by thomas w. higginson. =alfred tennyson.= by alfred lyall. =samuel richardson.= by austin dobson. =robert browning.= by g. k. chesterton. =crabbe.= by alfred ainger. =fanny burney.= by austin dobson. =jeremy taylor.= by edmund gosse. =rossetti.= by arthur c. benson. =maria edgeworth.= by the hon. emily lawless. =hobbes.= by leslie stephen. =adam smith.= by francis w. hirst. =thomas moore.= by stephen gwynn. =sydney smith.= by george w. e. russell. =william cullen bryant.= by william a. bradley. =william hickling prescott.= by harry thurston peck. english men of letters edited by john morley three biographies in each volume cloth. mo. price, $ . , each =chaucer.= by adolphus william ward. =spenser.= by r. w. church. =dryden.= by george saintsbury. =milton.= by mark pattison, b.d. =goldsmith.= by william black. =cowper.= by goldwin smith. =byron.= by john nichol. =shelley.= by john addington symonds. =keats.= by sidney colvin, m.a. =wordsworth.= by f. w. h. myers. =southey.= by edward dowden. =landor.= by sidney colvin, m.a. =lamb.= by alfred ainger. =addison.= by w. j. courthope. =swift.= by leslie stephen. =scott.= by richard h. hutton. =burns.= by principal shairp. =coleridge.= by h. d. traill. =hume.= by t. h. huxley, f.r.s. =locke.= by thomas fowler. =burke.= by john morley. =fielding.= by austin dobson. =thackeray.= by anthony trollope. =dickens.= by adolphus william ward. =gibbon.= by j. cotter morison. =carlyle.= by john nichol. =macaulay.= by j. cotter morison. =sidney.= by j. a. symonds. =de quincey.= by david masson. =sheridan.= by mrs. oliphant. =pope.= by leslie stephen. =johnson.= by leslie stephen. =gray.= by edmund gosse. =bacon.= by r. w. church. =bunyan.= by j. a. froude. =bentley.= by r. c. jebb. published by the macmillan company fifth avenue, new york footnotes: [ ] quoted by jameson: _historical writing in america_, p. , boston, . [ ] this house was long ago demolished. its site is now occupied by plummer hall, containing a public library. [ ] a very interesting appreciation of president kirkland is given by dr. a. p. peabody in his _harvard reminiscences_ (boston, ). [ ] john quincy adams was titularly professor of rhetoric, but he had been absent for several years on a diplomatic mission in europe. [ ] the first number appeared in february, ; the last in july of the same year. [ ] her mother had been miss hannah linzee, whose father, captain linzee, of the british sloop-of-war _falcon_, had tried by heavy cannonading to dislodge colonel william prescott from the redoubt at bunker hill. the swords of the two had been handed down in their respective families, and now found a peaceful resting-place in young prescott's "den," where they hung crossed upon the wall above his books. [ ] professor jameson mentions two other contemporary instances,--karl szaynocha and prescott's florentine correspondent, the marquis gino capponi. [ ] prescott owned two noctographs, but did nearly all of his writing with one, keeping the other in reserve in case the first should suffer accident. one of these two implements is preserved in the massachusetts historical society. [ ] see ch. vii. [ ] _life of irving_, . p. (new york, ). [ ] lembke was a german, the author of a work on early spanish history, and a member of the spanish historical academy. prescott mentions him in his letter to irving. "this learned theban happens to be in madrid for the nonce, pursuing some investigations of his own, and he has taken charge of mine, like a true german, inspecting everything and selecting just what has reference to my subject. in this way he has been employed with four copyists since july, and has amassed a quantity of unpublished documents. he has already sent off two boxes to cadiz." [ ] hale, _memories of a hundred years_, ii. pp. , (new york, ). [ ] in place of navarrete, deceased. prescott received eighteen ballots out of the twenty that were cast. [ ] wilson, _thackeray in america_, i. pp. , (new york, ). [ ] meaning, of course, that he took more wine than was good for his eye. [ ] see p. . [ ] for an interesting account of simancas and the archives, see a paper by dr. w. r. shepherd, in the _reports of the american historical association for _ (washington, ). [ ] the father of mr. james lawrence, who afterward married prescott's daughter elizabeth. see p. . [ ] alluding to the fact that he always shed tears at the opera. [ ] the english title of this book was _critical and historical essays_. it contained twelve papers and also the life of charles brockden brown already mentioned (p. ). the american edition bore the title _biographical and critical miscellanies_. it has been several times reprinted, the last issue appearing in philadelphia in . [ ] _infra_, p. . [ ] november , . [ ] nearly seven thousand copies of this book had been taken up before the end of the following three years. [ ] p. . [ ] p. . [ ] _supra_, p. . [ ] iii. pp. - . [ ] in the _british quarterly review_, lxiv ( ). [ ] don pascual de gayangos. [ ] i. pp. - . ed. by kirk (philadelphia, ). [ ] for a revision of prescott's narrative here in its light of later research, see bandelier, _the gilded man_, pp. - (new york, ). [ ] ii. p. . [ ] ii. pp. - . [ ] everett, memorial address, delivered before the massachusetts historical society ( ). [ ] ii. p. . [ ] _mujer entremetida y desembuelta_ (diaz). [ ] i. p. . [ ] _moeurs des sauvages américains comparées aux moeurs des premiers temps_ (paris, ). lafitau had lived as a missionary among the iroquois for five years, after which he returned to france and spent the rest of his life in teaching and writing. [ ] _the history of the american indians_ (london, ). [ ] h_istoria natural y moral de las indias_ (seville, ). [ ] philadelphia, . [ ] _atlantic monthly_, iii, pp. - and pp. - . [ ] new york, . [ ] _north american review_, cxxii, pp. - ( ). [ ] _the romantic school of american archæology._ a paper read before the new york historical society, february , (new york, ). [ ] bandelier, _op. cit._, p. . [ ] ii. p. . [ ] "though remarkably fair and judicious in the main, mr. prescott's partiality for a certain class of his material is evident. to the copies from the spanish archives, most of which have been since published with hundreds of others equally or more valuable, he seemed to attach an importance proportionate to their cost. thus, throughout his entire work, these papers are paraded to the exclusion of the more reliable, but more accessible standard authorities."--h. h. bancroft, _history of mexico_, i. p. , _note_. [ ] i. pp. , . [ ] brinton, _myths of the new world_, p. (philadelphia, ). [ ] see the section by markham on "the inca civilisation in peru," in winsor, _a narrative and critical history of america_, vol. i. (boston, ); and an interesting summary of the results of eleven years researches by bandelier in a paper entitled "the truth about inca civilisation," published in h_arper's magazine_ for march, . [ ] motley, _history of the united netherlands_, i. p. . [ ] quoted by ogden, _prescott_, p. . [ ] cited by r. c. winthrop, address before the massachusetts historical society, june , . [ ] letter of january , . [ ] _historical writing in america_, pp. - . [ ] dr. c. k. adams. thomas carlyle * * * * * famous scots series _the following volumes are now ready_:-- thomas carlyle. by hector c. macpherson. allan ramsay. by oliphant smeaton. hugh miller. by w. keith leask. john knox. by a. taylor innes. robert burns. by gabriel setoun. the balladists. by john geddie. richard cameron. by professor herkless. sir james y. simpson. by eve blantyre simpson. thomas chalmers. by professor w. garden blaikie. james boswell. by w. keith leask. tobias smollett. by oliphant smeaton. fletcher of saltoun. by g. w. t. omond. the blackwood group. by sir george douglas. norman macleod. by john wellwood. sir walter scott. by professor saintsbury. kirkcaldy of grange. by louis a. barbé. robert fergusson. by a. b. grosart. james thomson. by william bayne. mungo park. by t. banks maclachlan. david hume. by professor calderwood. * * * * * thomas carlyle by hector c macpherson famous scots series published by oliphant anderson & ferrier edinburgh and london the designs and ornaments of this volume are by mr joseph brown, and the printing from the press of messrs turnbull & spears, edinburgh. second edition completing seventh thousand. preface to the second edition of the writing of books on carlyle there is no end. why, then, it may pertinently be asked, add another stone to the carlylean cairn? the reply is obvious. in a series dealing with famous scotsmen, carlyle has a rightful claim to a niche in the temple of fame. while prominence has been given in the book to the scottish side of carlyle's life, the fact has not been lost sight of that carlyle owed much to germany; indeed, if we could imagine the spirit of a german philosopher inhabiting the body of a covenanter of dyspeptic and sceptical tendencies, a good idea would be had of thomas carlyle. needless to say, i have been largely indebted to the biography by mr froude, and to carlyle's _reminiscences_. after all has been said, the fact remains that froude's portrait, though truthful in the main, is somewhat deficient in light and shade--qualities which the student will find admirably supplied in professor masson's charming little book, "carlyle personally, and in his writings." to the professor i am under deep obligation for the interest he has shown in the book. in the course of his perusal of the proofs, professor masson made valuable corrections and suggestions, which deserve more than a formal acknowledgment. to mr haldane, m.p., my thanks are also due for his suggestive criticism of the chapter on german thought, upon which he is an acknowledged authority. i have also to express my deep obligations to mr john morley, who, in the midst of pressing engagements, kindly found time to read the proof sheets. in a private note mr morley has been good enough to express his general sympathy and concurrence with my estimate of carlyle. _edinburgh, october ._ contents page chapter i early life chapter ii craigenputtock--literary efforts chapter iii carlyle's mental development chapter iv life in london chapter v holiday journeyings--literary work chapter vi rectorial address--death of mrs carlyle chapter vii last years and death of carlyle chapter viii carlyle as a social and political thinker chapter ix carlyle as an inspirational force thomas carlyle chapter i early life 'a great man,' says hegel, 'condemns the world to the task of explaining him.' emphatically does the remark apply to thomas carlyle. when he began to leave his impress in literature, he was treated as a confusing and inexplicable element. opinion oscillated between the view of james mill, that carlyle was an insane rhapsodist, and that of jeffrey, that he was afflicted with a chronic craze for singularity. jeffrey's verdict sums up pretty effectively the attitude of the critics of the time to the new writer:--'i suppose that you will treat me as something worse than an ass, when i say that i am firmly persuaded the great source of your extravagance, and all that makes your writings intolerable to many and ridiculous to not a few, is not so much any real peculiarity of opinion, as an unlucky ambition to appear more original than you are.' the blunder made by jeffrey in regard both to carlyle and wordsworth emphasises the truth which critics seem reluctant to bear in mind, that, before the great man can be explained, he must be appreciated. emphatically true of carlyle it is that he creates the standard by which he is judged. carlyle resembles those products of the natural world which biologists call 'sports'--products which, springing up in a spontaneous and apparently erratic way, for a time defy classification. the time is appropriate for an attempt to classify the great thinker, whose birth took place one hundred years ago. towards the close of the last century a stone-mason, named james carlyle, started business on his own account in the village of ecclefechan, dumfriesshire. he was an excellent tradesman, and frugal withal; and in the year he married a distant kinswoman of his own, janet carlyle, who died after giving birth to a son. in the beginning of he married one margaret aitken, a worthy, intelligent woman; and on the th of december following a son was born, whom they called thomas, after his paternal grandfather. this child was destined to be the most original writer of his time. little thomas was early taught to read by his mother, and at the age of five he learnt to 'count' from his father. he was then sent to the village school; and in his seventh year he was reported to be 'complete' in english. as the schoolmaster was weak in the classics, tom was taught the rudiments of latin by the burgher minister, of which strict sect james carlyle was a zealous member. one summer morning, in , his father took him to annan academy. 'it was a bright morning,' he wrote long years thereafter, 'and to me full of moment, of fluttering boundless hopes, saddened by parting with mother, with home, and which afterwards were cruelly disappointed.' at that 'doleful and hateful academy,' to use his own words, thomas carlyle spent three years, learning to read french and latin, and the greek alphabet, as well as acquiring a smattering of geometry and algebra. it was in the academy that he got his first glimpse of edward irving--probably in april or may --who had called to pay his respects to his old teacher, mr hope. thomas's impression of him was that of a 'flourishing slip of a youth, with coal-black hair, swarthy clear complexion, very straight on his feet, and except for the glaring squint alone, decidedly handsome.' years passed before young carlyle saw irving's face again. james carlyle, although an austere man, and the reverse of demonstrative, was bound up in his son, sparing no expense upon the youth's education. on one occasion he exclaimed, with an unwonted outburst of glee, 'tom, i do not grudge thy schooling, now when thy uncle frank owns thee to be a better arithmetician than himself.' early recognising the natural talent and aptitude of his son, he determined to send him to the nearest university, with a view to thomas studying for the ministry. one crisp winter's morning, in , found thomas carlyle on his way to edinburgh, trudging the entire distance--one hundred miles or so. he went through the usual university course, attended the divinity classes, and delivered the customary discourses in english and latin. but tom was not destined to 'wag his head in a pulpit,' for he had conscientious objections which parental control in no way interfered with. referring to this vital period of his life, carlyle wrote: 'his [father's] tolerance for me, his trust in me, was great. when i declined going forward into the church (though his heart was set upon it), he respected my scruples, my volition, and patiently let me have my way.' carlyle never looked back to his university life with satisfaction. in his interesting recollections mr moncure conway represents carlyle, describing his experiences as follows:--'very little help did i get from anybody in those years, and, as i may say, no sympathy at all in all this old town. and if there was any difference, it was found least where i might most have hoped for it. there was professor ----. for years i attended his lectures, in all weathers and all hours. many and many a time, when the class was called together, it was found to consist of one individual--to wit, of him now speaking; and still oftener, when others were present, the only person who had at all looked into the lesson assigned was the same humble individual. i remember no instance in which these facts elicited any note or comment from that instructor. he once requested me to translate a mathematical paper, and i worked through it the whole of one sunday, and it was laid before him, and it was received without remark or thanks. after such long years, i came to part with him, and to get my certificate. without a word, he wrote on a bit of paper: "i certify that mr thomas carlyle has been in my class during his college course, and has made good progress in his studies." then he rang a bell, and ordered a servant to open the front door for me. not the slightest sign that i was a person whom he could have distinguished in any crowd. and so i parted from old ----.' professor masson, who in loving, painstaking style has ferreted all the facts about carlyle's university life, sums up in these words: 'without assuming that he meant the university described in _sartor resartus_ to stand literally for edinburgh university, of his own experience, we have seen enough to show that any specific training of much value he considered himself to owe to his four years in the arts classes in edinburgh university, was the culture of his mathematical faculty under leslie, and that for the rest he acknowledged merely a certain benefit from being in so many class-rooms where matters intellectual were professedly in the atmosphere, and where he learned to take advantage of books.' as carlyle put it in his rectorial address of , 'what i have found the university did for me is that it taught me to read in various languages, in various sciences, so that i go into the books which treated of these things, and gradually penetrate into any department i wanted to make myself master of, as i found it suit me.' in , carlyle obtained the mathematical tutorship at annan. out of his slender salary of £ or £ he was able to save something, so that he was practically independent. by and by james carlyle gave up his trade, and settled on a small farm at mainhill, about two miles from ecclefechan. thither thomas hied with unfeigned delight at holiday time, for he led the life of a recluse at annan, his books being his sole companions. edward irving, to whom carlyle was introduced in college days, was now settled as a dominie in kirkcaldy. his teaching was not favourably viewed by some of the parents, who started a rival school, and resolved to import a second master, with the result that carlyle was selected. irving, with great magnanimity, gave him a cordial welcome to the 'lang toon,' and the two annandale natives became fast friends. the elder placed his well-selected library at the disposal of the younger, and together they explored the whole countryside. short visits to edinburgh had a special attraction for both, where they met with a few kindred spirits. on one of those visits, carlyle, who had not cut off his connection with the university, called at the divinity hall to put down his name formally on the annual register. in his own words: 'old dr ritchie "not at home" when i called to enter myself. "good!" answered i; "_let the omen be fulfilled_."' carlyle's studies in kirkcaldy made him eager to contribute to the fulfilment of the omen. among the authors which he read out of the edinburgh university library was gibbon, who pushed carlyle's sceptical questionings to a definite point. in a conversation with professor masson, carlyle stated that to his reading of gibbon he dated the extirpation from his mind of the last remnant that had been left in it of the orthodox belief in miracles. in the space of two years, carlyle and irving 'got tired of schoolmastering and its mean contradictions and poor results.' they bade kirkcaldy farewell and made for edinburgh,--irving to lodge in bristo street, 'more expensive rooms than mine,' naively remarks carlyle, where he gave breakfasts to 'intellectualities he fell in with, i often a guest with them. they were but stupid intellectualities, etc.' as for their prospects, this is what carlyle says: 'irving's outlooks in edinburgh were not of the best, considerably checkered with dubiety, opposition, or even flat disfavour in some quarters; but at least they were far superior to mine, and indeed, i was beginning my four or five most miserable, dark, sick, and heavy-laden years; irving, after some staggerings aback, his seven or eight healthiest and brightest. he had, i should guess, as one item several good hundreds of money to wait upon. my _peculium_ i don't recollect, but it could not have exceeded £ . i was without friends, experience, or connection in the sphere of human business, was of shy humour, proud enough and to spare, and had begun my long curriculum of _dyspepsia_ which has never ended since!'[ ] carlyle's intention was to study for the bar, if perchance he could eke out a livelihood by private teaching. he obtained one or two pupils, wrote a stray article or so for the 'encyclopædias'; but as he barely managed to pay his way, he speedily gave up his law studies. he was at this time--the winter of --'advancing,' as he phrases it, 'towards huge instalments of bodily and spiritual wretchedness in this my edinburgh purgatory.' it was about a couple of years thereafter ere carlyle went through what he has described as his 'spiritual new birth.' when carlyle was in diligent search for congenial employment, a certain captain basil hall crossed his path, to whom edward irving had given lessons in mathematics. the 'small lion,' as he calls the captain, came to carlyle, and wished the latter to go out with him 'to dunglas,' and there do 'lunars' in his name, he looking on and learning of carlyle 'what would come of its own will.' the said 'lunars' meanwhile were to go to the admiralty, 'testifying there what a careful studious captain he was, and help to get him promotion, so the little wretch smilingly told me.' carlyle adds: 'i remember the figure of him in my dim lodging as a gay, crackling, sniggering spectre, one dusk, endeavouring to seduce me by affability in lieu of liberal wages into this adventure. wages, i think, were to be smallish ("so poor are we"), but then the great playfair is coming on visit. "you will see professor playfair." i had not the least notion of such an enterprise on these shining terms, and captain basil with his great playfair _in posse_ vanished for me into the shades of dusk for good.'[ ] when private teaching would not come carlyle's way, he timorously aimed towards 'literature.' he had taken to the study of german, and conscious of his own powers in that direction, he applied in vain to more than one london bookseller, proposing a complete translation of schiller. irving not only did his utmost to comfort carlyle in his spiritual wrestlings, but he tried to find him employment. the two friends continued to make pleasant excursions, and in june irving brought carlyle to haddington, an event which was destined to colour all his subsequent life; for it was then and there he first saw jane welsh, a sight, he acknowledged, for ever memorable to him. 'in the ancient county town of haddington, july , , there was born,' wrote thomas carlyle in , 'to a lately wedded pair, not natives of the place but already reckoned among the best class of people there, a little daughter whom they named _jane baillie welsh_, and whose subsequent and final name (her own common signature for many years) was _jane welsh carlyle_, and now so stands, now that she is mine in death only, on her and her father's tombstone in the abbey kirk of that town. july th, ; i was then in my sixth year, far away in every sense, now near and infinitely concerned, trying doubtfully after some three years' sad cunctation, if there is anything that i can profitably put on record of her altogether bright, beneficent and modest little life, and her, as my final task in this world.'[ ] the picture was never completed by the master-hand; the 'effort was too distressing'; so all his notes and letters were handed over to a literary executor. at the time of carlyle's introduction to miss welsh, she was living with her widowed mother. her father, dr john welsh, came of a good family, and was a popular country physician. her mother was grace welsh of capelgill, and was reckoned a beautiful, but haughty woman. their marriage took place in , and their only child, jane, was born, as we have seen, the year following. her most intimate friend, miss geraldine jewsbury, tells us that miss welsh had 'a graceful and beautifully-formed figure, upright and supple, a delicate complexion of creamy white, with a pale rose tint in the cheeks, lovely eyes full of fire and softness, and with great depths of meaning.' she had a musical voice, was a good talker, extremely witty, and so fascinating in every way that a relative of hers told miss jewsbury that every man who spoke to her for five minutes felt impelled to make her an offer of marriage. be that as it may, it _is_ certain that miss jane welsh had troops of suitors in and around the quiet country town. she always spoke of her mother with deep affection and great admiration. her father she reverenced, and he was the only person during her girlhood who had any real influence over her. this, then, was the young lady of whom thomas carlyle carried back to edinburgh a sweet and lasting impression. they corresponded at intervals, and thomas was permitted to send her books occasionally. edward irving used to live in dr welsh's house when he taught in the local school, and he led jeannie--a winsome, wilful lass--to take an interest in the classics. she entertained a girlish passion for the handsome youth, and there can be little doubt that they would have ultimately been married, were it not that the eldest daughter of a kirkcaldy parson, miss martin, had 'managed to charm irving for the time being,' and an engagement followed. before carlyle had drifted into edinburgh he had, of course, heard of the fame of francis jeffrey. he heard him once speaking in the general assembly 'on some poor cause.' jeffrey's pleading seemed to carlyle 'abundantly clear, full of liveliness, free flowing ingenuity.' 'my admiration,' he adds, 'went frankly with that of others, but i think it was hardly of very deep character.' when carlyle was in the 'slough of despond,' he bethought him of jeffrey, this time as editor of the _edinburgh review_. he resolved to try the 'great man' with an actual contribution. the subject was a condemnation of a new french book, in which a mechanical theory of gravitation was elaborately worked out by the author. he got 'a certain feeble but enquiring quasi-disciple' of his own to act as amanuensis, from whom he kept his ulterior purpose quite secret. looking back through the dim vista of seven-and-forty years, this is what carlyle says of that anxious time: 'well do i remember those dreary evenings in bristo street; oh, what ghastly passages and dismal successive spasms of attempt at "literary enterprise"!... my "review of pictet" all fairly written out in george dalgliesh's good clerk hand, i penned some brief polite note to the great editor, and walked off with the small parcel one night to his address in george street. i very well remember leaving it with his valet there, and disappearing in the night with various thoughts and doubts! my hopes had never risen high, or in fact risen at all; but for a fortnight or so they did not quite die out, and then it was in absolute zero; no answer, no return of ms., absolutely no notice taken, which was a form of catastrophe more complete than even i had anticipated! there rose in my head a pungent little note which might be written to the great man, with neatly cutting considerations offered him from the small unknown ditto; but i wisely judged it was still more dignified to let the matter lie as it was, and take what i had got for my own benefit only. nor did i ever mention it to almost anybody, least of all to jeffrey in subsequent changed times, when at anyrate it was fallen extinct.'[ ] carlyle's star was, however, in the ascendant, for in he became tutor to the two sons of a wealthy lady, mrs charles buller, at a salary of £ a year. it was through irving that this appointment came. the young lads boarded with 'a good old dr fleming' in george square, whither carlyle went daily from his lodgings at[ ] moray street, pilrig street. the bullers finally returned to london, carlyle staying at his father's little homestead of mainhill to finish a translation of 'wilhelm meister.' he followed the bullers to london, where he resigned the tutorship in the hope of getting some literary work. irving introduced him to the proprietor of the _london magazine_, who offered carlyle sixteen guineas a sheet for a series of 'portraits of men of genius and character.' the first was to be a life of schiller, which appeared in that periodical in - . mr boyd, the edinburgh publisher, accepted the translation of 'wilhelm meister.' 'two years before,' wrote carlyle in his _reminiscences_, 'i had at length, after some repulsions, got into the heart of "wilhelm meister," and eagerly read it through; my sally out, after finishing, along the vacant streets of edinburgh, (a windless, scotch-misty saturday night), is still vivid to me. "grand, surely, harmoniously built together, far-seeing, wise, and true: when, for many years, or almost in my life before, have i read such a book?"' a short letter from goethe in weimar, in acknowledgment of a copy of his 'wilhelm meister,' was peculiarly gratifying to carlyle. carlyle was not happy in london; dyspepsia and 'the noises' sorely troubled him. he was anxious to be gone. to the surprise of irving--who was now settled in the metropolis--and everybody else, he resolutely decided to return to annandale, where his father had leased for him a compact little farm at hoddam hill, three miles from mainhill, and visible from the fields at the back of it. 'perhaps it was the very day before my departure,' wrote carlyle, 'at least it is the last i recollect of him [irving], we were walking in the streets multifariously discoursing; a dim grey day, but dry and airy;--at the corner of cockspur street we paused for a moment, meeting sir john sinclair ("statistical account of scotland" etc.), whom i had never seen before and never saw again. a lean old man, tall but stooping, in tartan cloak, face very wrinkly, nose blue, physiognomy vague and with distinction as one might have expected it to be. he spoke to irving with benignant respect, whether to me at all i don't recollect.' carlyle shook the dust of london from off his feet, and by easy stages made his way northwards. arrived at ecclefechan, within two miles of his father's house, while the coach was changing horses, carlyle noticed through the window his little sister jean earnestly looking up for him. she, with jenny, the youngest of the family, was at school in the village, and had come out daily to inspect the coach in hope of seeing him. 'her bonny little blush and radiancy of look when i let down the window and suddenly disclosed myself,' wrote carlyle in , 'are still present to me.' on the th of may , he established himself at hoddam hill, and set about 'german romance.' his brother alick managed the farm, and his mother, with one of the girls, was generally there to look after his comforts. during the intervening years, carlyle's intimacy with miss jane welsh gradually increased, with occasional differences. she had promised to marry him if he could 'achieve independence.' carlyle's idea was that after their marriage they should settle upon the farm of craigenputtock, which had been in the possession of the welsh family for generations, and devote himself to literary work. by and by miss welsh accepted his offer of marriage, but not until she had acquainted him of the irving incident. the wedding took place on the th of october , and the young couple took up housekeeping in a quiet cottage at comely bank, edinburgh. of his life at this period, the best description is given by carlyle himself, in a letter to mrs basil montague, dated christmas day :-- 'in spite of ill-health i reckon myself moderately happy here, much happier than men usually are, or than such a fool as i deserve to be. my good wife exceeds all my hopes, and is, in truth, i believe, among the best women that the world contains. the philosophy of the heart is far better than that of the understanding. she loves me with her whole soul, and this one sentiment has taught her much that i have long been vainly at the schools to learn.... on the whole, what i chiefly want is occupation; which, when the times grow better, or my own genius gets more alert and thorough-going, will not fail, i suppose, to present itself.... some day--oh, that the day were here!--i shall surely speak out those things that are lying in me, and give me no sleep till they are spoken! or else, if the fates would be so kind as to shew me--that i had nothing to say! this, perhaps, is the real secret of it after all; a hard result, yet not intolerable, were it once clear and certain. literature, it seems, is to be my trade, but the present aspects of it among us seem to me peculiarly perplexed and uninviting.'[ ]here, as in undertone, we discover what professor masson calls the constitutional sadness of carlyle--a sadness which, along with indifferent health, led him to be impatient at trifles, morbid, proud, and at times needlessly aggressive in speech and demeanour. these traits, however, in the early years of married life were not specially visible; and on the whole the comely bank period may be described as one of calm happiness. carlyle's forecast was correct. literature was to be his trade. in the following spring came a letter to carlyle from procter (barry cornwall), whom he had met in london, offering to introduce him formally to jeffrey, whom he certified to be a 'very fine fellow.' one evening carlyle sallied forth from comely bank for jeffrey's house in george street, armed with procter's letter. he was shown into the study. 'fire, pair of candles,' he relates, 'were cheerfully burning, in the light of which sate my famous little gentleman; laid aside his work, cheerfully invited me to sit, and began talking in a perfectly human manner.' the interview lasted for about twenty minutes, during which time jeffrey had made kind enquiries what his visitor was doing and what he had published; adding, 'we must give you a lift,' an offer, carlyle says, which in 'some complimentary way' he managed to jeffrey's satisfaction to decline. jeffrey returned carlyle's call, when he was captivated by mrs carlyle. the intimacy rapidly increased, and a short paper by carlyle on jean paul appeared in the very next issue of the _edinburgh review_. 'it made,' says the author, 'what they call a sensation among the edinburgh buckrams; which was greatly heightened next number by the more elaborate and grave article on "german literature" generally, which set many tongues wagging, and some few brains considering, _what_ this strange monster could be that was come to disturb their quiescence and the established order of nature! some newspapers or newspaper took to denouncing "the mystic school," which my bright little woman declared to consist of me alone, or of her and me, and for a long while after merrily used to designate us by that title.' mrs carlyle proved an admirable hostess; jeffrey became a frequent visitor at comely bank, and they discovered 'mutual old cousinships' by the maternal side. jeffrey's friendship was an immense acquisition to carlyle, and everybody regarded it as his highest good fortune. the _literati_ of edinburgh came to see her, and 'listen to her husband's astonishing monologues.' to carlyle's regret, jeffrey would not talk in their frequent rambles of his experiences in the world, 'nor of things concrete and current,' but was 'theoretic generally'; and seemed bent on converting carlyle from his 'german mysticism,' back merely, as the latter could perceive, into 'dead edinburgh whiggism, scepticism, and materialism'; 'what i felt,' says carlyle, 'to be a forever impossible enterprise.' they had long discussions, 'parryings, and thrustings,' which 'i have known continue night after night,' relates carlyle, 'till two or three in the morning (when i was his guest at craigcrook, as once or twice happened in coming years); there he went on in brisk logical exercise with all the rest of the house asleep, and parted usually in good humour, though after a game which was hardly worth the candle. i found him infinitely witty, ingenious, sharp of fence, but not in any sense deep; and used without difficulty to hold my own with him.' jeffrey did everything in his power to further carlyle's prospects and projects. he tried to obtain for him the professorship of moral philosophy at st andrews university, vacated by dr chalmers. testimonials were given by irving, brewster, buller, wilson, jeffrey, and goethe. they failed, however, in consequence of the opposition of the principal, dr nicol. to carlyle, doubtless, the most memorable incidents of the edinburgh period was his correspondence with goethe. the magnetic spell thrown over carlyle by goethe will ever remain a mystery. between the two men there was no intellectual affinity. one would have expected goethe the pagan to have repelled carlyle the puritan, unless we have recourse to the philosophy of opposites, and conclude that the tumultuous soul of carlyle found congenial repose in the greek-like restfulness of goethe. the great german had been deeply impressed by the profound grasp which carlyle was displaying of german literature. after reading a letter which he had received from walter scott, goethe remarked to eckermann: 'i almost wonder that walter scott does not say a word about carlyle, who has so decided a german tendency that he must certainly be known to him. it is admirable in carlyle, that, in his judgment of our german authors, he has especially in view the _mental and moral core_ as that which is really influential. carlyle is a _moral force of great importance_; there is in him much for the future and we cannot foresee what he will produce and effect.' footnotes: [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. i. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. i. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. pp. , . [ ] now spey street. [ ] masson's 'edinburgh sketches and memories,' pp. - . chapter ii craigenputtock--literary efforts carlyle was feeling the force of scott's remark that literature was a bad crutch--his prospects being far from bright. the carlyles had been a little over eighteen months at comely bank, when their extensive circle of friends were surprised to hear of their intended withdrawal to craigenputtock. efforts were made to dissuade carlyle from pursuing what at the time appeared a suicidal course. he was the intimate associate of the brilliant jeffrey; he was within the charmed circle of edinburgh reviewers; he had laid the foundation of a literary reputation. outwardly all seemed well with carlyle; but 'the step,' himself says, 'had been well meditated, saw itself to be founded on irrefragable considerations of health, _finance_, &c., &c., unknown to bystanders, and could not be forborne or altered.' next to his marriage with miss welsh, carlyle's retirement to the howling wilds of craigenputtock at that juncture was the most momentous step in his long life. he was conscious of his own powers, and he clearly discerned how those powers could best be utilised and developed. hence his determination to bid adieu to edinburgh. and in that resolve he was fortified by the loyal support of his wife. jeffrey promised to visit the carlyles at craigenputtock as soon as they got settled. meanwhile, they stayed a week at his own house in moray place, after their furniture was on the road, and they were waiting till it should arrive and 'render a new home possible amid the moors and the mountains.' 'of our history at craigenputtock,' says carlyle, 'there might a great deal be written which might amuse the curious; for it was in fact a very singular scene and arena for such a pair as my darling and me, with such a life ahead.... it is a history i by no means intend to write, with such or with any object. to me there is a _sacredness_ of interest in it consistent only with _silence_. it was the field of endless nobleness and beautiful talent and virtue in her who is now gone; also of good industry, and many loving and blessed thoughts in myself, while living there by her side. poverty and mean obstruction had given origin to it, and continued to preside over it, but were transformed by human valour of various sorts into a kind of victory and royalty: something of high and great dwelt in it, though nothing could be smaller and lower than very many of the details.'[ ] the jeffreys were not slow in appearing at craigenputtock. their 'big carriage,' narrates the humorous host, 'climbed our rugged hill-roads, landed the three guests--young charlotte ("sharlie"), with pa and ma--and the clever old valet maid that waited on them; ... but i remember nothing so well as the consummate art with which my dear one played the domestic field-marshal, and spread out our exiguous resources, without fuss or bustle; to cover everything with a coat of hospitality and even elegance and abundance. i have been in houses ten times, nay, a hundred times, as rich, where things went not so well. though never bred to this, but brought up in opulent plenty by a mother that could bear no partnership in housekeeping, she, finding it become necessary, loyally applied herself to it, and soon surpassed in it all the women i have ever seen.'[ ] of mrs carlyle's frankness her husband gives this amusing glimpse: 'one day at dinner, i remember, jeffrey admired the fritters or bits of pancake he was eating, and she let him know, not without some vestige of shock to him, that she had made them. "what, you! twirl up the frying-pan, and catch them in the air?" even so, my high friend, and you may turn it over in your mind!' when the jeffreys were leaving, 'i remarked,' says carlyle, that they 'carried off our little temporary paradise; ... to which bit of pathos jeffrey answered by a friendly little sniff of quasi-mockery or laughter through the nose, and rolled prosperously away.' the carlyles in course of time visited the jeffreys at craigcrook, the last occasion being for about a fortnight. carlyle says it was 'a shining sort of affair, but did not in effect accomplish much for any of us. perhaps, for one thing, we stayed too long, jeffrey was beginning to be seriously incommoded in health, had bad sleep, cared not how late he sat, and we had now more than ever a series of sharp fencing bouts, night after night, which could decide nothing for either of us, except our radical incompatibility in respect of world theory, and the incurable divergence of our opinions on the most important matters. "you are so dreadfully in earnest!" said he to me once or oftener. besides, i own now i was deficient in reverence to him, and had not then, nor, alas! have ever acquired, in my solitary and mostly silent existence, the art of gently saying strong things, or of insinuating my dissent, instead of uttering it right out at the risk of offence or otherwise.' then he adds: 'these "stormy sittings," as mrs jeffrey laughingly called them, did not improve our relation to one another. but these were the last we had of that nature. in other respects edinburgh had been barren; effulgences of "edinburgh society," big dinners, parties, we in due measure had; but nothing there was very interesting either to _her_ or to me, and all of it passed away as an obliging pageant merely. well do i remember our return to craigenputtock, after nightfall, amid the clammy yellow leaves and desolate rains with the clink of alick's stithy alone audible of human.'[ ] it was during his first two years' residence at craigenputtock that carlyle wrote his famous essay on burns; but his principal work was upon german literature, especially upon goethe. his magazine writings being his only means of support, and as he devoted much time to them, it is not surprising that financial matters worried him. about this time jeffrey, to whom doubtless he confided his trouble, generously offered to confer upon him an annuity of £ , which carlyle declined to accept. jeffrey repeated the offer on two subsequent occasions, with a like result. carlyle in his _reminiscences_ says that he could not doubt but jeffrey had intended an act of real generosity; and yet carlyle penned the ungracious remark, that 'perhaps there was something in the manner of it that savoured of consciousness and of screwing one's self up to the point; less of god-like pity for a fine fellow and his struggles, than of human determination to do a fine action of one's own, which might add to the promptitude of my refusal.' it is not surprising, therefore, to find carlyle suspecting that jeffrey's feelings were cooling towards him. jeffrey had powers of penetration as well as the friend whom he was anxious to assist. by the month of february , carlyle's finances fell so low that he had only £ in his possession, and expected no more for months. then he borrowed £ from jeffrey, as his 'pitiful bits of periodical literature incomings,' as he puts it, 'having gone awry (as they were liable to do), but was able, i still remember with what satisfaction, to repay punctually within a few weeks'; adding, 'and this was all of pecuniary chivalry _we_ two ever had between us.' the chivalry was all on the one side--of jeffrey. the outcome of his labours at craigenputtock, in addition to the fragmentary articles already referred to, was the essays which form the first three volumes of the 'miscellanies.' they appeared chiefly in the _edinburgh review_, the _foreign review_, and _fraser's magazine_. jeffrey's resignation of the editorship of the 'review' was a great disappointment to carlyle, because it stopped a regular source of income. german literature, of which carlyle had begun a history, not being a 'marketable commodity,' he cut it up into articles. 'my last considerable bit of _writing_ at craigenputtock,' says carlyle, 'was "sartor resartus"; done, i think, between january and august ; (my sister margaret had died while it was going on). i well remember where and how (at templand one morning) the _germ_ of it rose above ground. "nine months," i used to say, "it had cost me in writing." had the perpetual fluctuation, the uncertainty and unintelligible whimsicality of review editors not proved so intolerable, we might have lingered longer at craigenputtock, perfectly left alone, and able to do _more_ work, beyond doubt, than elsewhere. but a book did seem to promise some _respite_ from that, and perhaps further advantages. teufelsdröckh was ready; and (first days of august) i decided to make for london. night before going, how i still remember it! i was lying on my back on the sofa in the drawing-room; she sitting by the table (late at night, packing all done, i suppose); her words had a guise of sport, but were profoundly plaintive in meaning. "about to part, who knows for how long; and what may have come in the interim!" this was her thought, and she was evidently much out of spirits. "courage, dearie, only for a month!" i would say to her in some form or other. i went next morning early.'[ ] jeffrey, who was by that time lord advocate, carlyle found much preoccupied in london, but willing to assist him with murray, the bookseller. jeffrey, with his wife and daughter, lived in jermyn street in lodgings, 'in melancholy contrast to the beautiful tenements and perfect equipments they had left in the north.' 'if,' says carlyle, 'i called in the morning, in quest perhaps of letters (though i don't recollect much troubling _him_ in that way), i would find the family still at breakfast, ten a.m. or later; and have seen poor jeffrey emerge in flowered dressing-gown, with a most boiled and suffering expression of face, like one who had slept miserably, and now awoke mainly to paltry misery and bother; poor official man! "i am made a mere post-office of!" i heard him once grumble, after tearing open several packets, not one of which was internally for himself.'[ ] mrs carlyle joined her husband on the st of october , and they took lodgings at ampton street, gray's inn lane, with a family of the name of miles, belonging to irving's congregation. jeffrey was a frequent visitor there, and sometimes the carlyles called at jermyn street. carlyle says that they were at first rather surprised that jeffrey did not introduce him to some of his 'grand literary figures,' or try in some way to be of help to one for whom he evidently had a value. the explanation, carlyle thinks, was that he himself 'expressed no trace of aspiration that way'; that jeffrey's 'grand literary or other figures' were clearly by no means 'so adorable to the rustic hopelessly germanised soul as an introducer of one might have wished.' besides, jeffrey was so 'heartily miserable,' as to think carlyle and his other fellow-creatures happy in comparison, and to have no care left to bestow upon them. here is a characteristic outburst in the 'reminiscences': 'the beggarly history of poor "sartor" _among the blockheadisms_ is not worth my recording or remembering--least of all here! in short, finding that whereas i had got £ (if memory serve) for "schiller" six or seven years before, and for "sartor," at least _thrice_ as good, i could not only _not_ get £ , but even get no murray, or the like, to publish it on half-profits (murray, a most stupendous object to me; tumbling about, eyeless, with the evidently strong wish to say "yes and no"; my first signal experience of that sad human predicament); i said, "we will make it no, then; wrap up our ms.; wait till this reform bill uproar abate."'[ ] on tuesday, january th, , carlyle received tidings of the death of his father. he departed on the sunday morning previous 'almost without a struggle,' wrote his favourite sister jane. it was a heavy stroke for carlyle. 'natural tears,' he exclaimed shortly afterwards, 'have come to my relief. i can look at my dear father, and that section of the past which he has made alive for me, in a certain sacred, sanctified light, and give way to what thoughts rise in me without feeling that they are weak and useless.' carlyle determined that the time till the funeral was past (friday) should be spent with his wife only. all others were excluded. he walked 'far and much,' chiefly in the regent's park, and considered about many things, his object being to see clearly what his calamity meant--what he lost, and what lesson that loss was to teach him. carlyle considered his father as one of the most interesting men he had known. 'were you to ask me,' he said, 'which had the greater natural faculty,' robert burns or my father, 'i might, perhaps, actually pause before replying. burns had an infinitely wider education, my father a far wholesomer. besides, the one was a man of musical utterance; the other wholly a man of action, even with speech subservient thereto. never, of all the men i have seen, has one come personally in my way in whom the endowment from nature and the arena from fortune were so utterly out of all proportion. i have said this often, and partly _know_ it. as a man of speculation--had culture ever unfolded him--he must have gone wild and desperate as burns; but he was a man of conduct, and work keeps all right. what strange shapeable creatures we are!'[ ] nothing that the elder carlyle undertook to do but he did it faithfully, and like a true man. 'i shall look,' said his distinguished son, 'on the houses he built with a certain proud interest. they stand firm and sound to the heart all over his little district. no one that comes after him will ever say, "here was the finger of a hollow eye-servant." they are little texts for me of the gospel of man's free will. nor will his deeds and sayings in any case be found unworthy--not false and barren, but genuine and fit. nay, am not i also the humble james carlyle's work? i owe him much more than existence; i owe him a noble inspiring example (now that i can read it in that rustic character). it was he _exclusively_ that determined on _educating_ me; that from his small hard-earned funds sent me to school and college, and made me whatever i am or may become. let me not mourn for my father, let me do worthily of him. so shall he still live even here in me, and his worth plant itself honourably forth into new generations.'[ ] one of the wise men about ecclefechan told james carlyle: 'educate a boy, and he grows up to despise his ignorant parents.' his father once told carlyle this, and added: 'thou hast not done so; god be thanked for it.' when james carlyle first entered his son's house at craigenputtock, mrs carlyle was greatly struck with him, 'and still farther,' says her husband, 'opened my eyes to the treasure i possessed in a father.' the last time carlyle saw his father was a few days before leaving for london. 'he was very kind,' wrote carlyle, 'seemed prouder of me than ever. what he had never done the like of before, he said, on hearing me express something which he admired, "man, it's surely a pity that thou should sit yonder with nothing but the eye of omniscience to see thee, and thou with such a gift to speak."' in closing his affectionate tribute, carlyle exclaims: 'thank heaven, i know and have known what it is to be a _son_; to _love_ a father, as spirit can love spirit.' the last days of march found the carlyles back at craigenputtock. a new tenant occupied the farm, and their days were lonelier than ever. meanwhile 'sartor resartus' was appearing in _fraser's magazine_. the editor reported that it 'excited the most unqualified disapprobation.' nothing daunted, carlyle pursued the 'noiseless tenor of his way,' throwing off articles on various subjects. finding that mrs carlyle's health suffered from the gloom and solitude of craigenputtock, they removed to edinburgh in january . jeffrey was absent in 'official regions,' and carlyle notes that they found a 'most dreary contemptible kind of element' in edinburgh. but their stay there was not without its uses, for in the advocates' library carlyle found books which had a great effect upon his line of study. he collected materials for his articles upon 'cagliostro' and the 'diamond necklace.' at the end of four months, the carlyles were back again at craigenputtock. august was a bright month for thomas carlyle, for it was then that ralph waldo emerson visited him at his rural retreat. the carlyles thought him 'one of the most lovable creatures' they had ever seen, and an unbroken friendship of nearly fifty years was begun. as winter approached, carlyle's prospects were not very bright, and he once more turned his eyes towards london, where the remainder of his life was to be spent. before following him thither, it may be well to turn from the outer to the inner side of carlyle's life, and study the forces which went to the making of his unique personality. footnotes: [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. pp. , . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. pp. , . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. i. p. . [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. i. p. . chapter iii carlyle's mental development through all the material struggles carlyle's mind at craigenputtock was gradually shaping itself round a theory of the universe and man, from which he drew inspiration in his future life work. through his contributions to magazines and reviews there is traceable an original vein of thought and feeling which had its origin in the study of german literature. carlyle's studies and musings took coherent, or, as some would say incoherent, shape in _sartor resartus_,--a book which appropriately was written in the stern solitude of craigenputtock. in order to acquire an adequate understanding of carlyle as a thinker, attention has to be paid to the two dominating influences of his mental life--his early home training and german literature. in regard to the former, ancestry with carlyle counts for much. he came of a sturdy covenanting stock. carlyle himself has left a graphic description of the religious environment of the burghers, to which sect his father belonged. the congregation, under the ministry of a certain john johnston, who taught carlyle his first latin, worshipped in a little house thatched with heath. of the simple faith, the stern piety and the rugged heroism of the old seceders, carlyle himself has left a photograph: 'very venerable are those old seceder clergy to me now when i look back.... most figures of them in my time were hoary old men; men so like evangelists in modern vesture and poor scholars and gentlemen of christ i have nowhere met with among protestant or papal clergy in any country in the world.... strangely vivid are some twelve or twenty of those old faces whom i used to see every sunday, whose names, employments or precise dwellingplaces i never knew, but whose portraits are yet clear to me as in a mirror. their heavy-laden, patient, ever-attentive faces, fallen solitary most of them, children all away, wife away for ever, or, it might be, wife still there and constant like a shadow and grown very like the old man, the thrifty cleanly poverty of these good people, their well-saved coarse old clothes, tailed waistcoats down to mid-thigh--all this i occasionally see as with eyes sixty or sixty-five years off, and hear the very voice of my mother upon it, whom sometimes i would be questioning about these persons of the drama and endeavouring to describe and identify them.' and what a glimpse we have into the inmost heart of the primitive covenanting religion in the portrait drawn by carlyle of old david hope, the farmer who refused to postpone family worship in order to take in his grain. david was putting on his spectacles when somebody rushed in with the words: 'such a raging wind risen will drive the stooks into the sea if let alone.' 'wind!' answered david, 'wind canna get ae straw that has been appointed mine. sit down and let us worship god.' far away from the simple covenanting creed of his father and mother carlyle wandered, but to the last the feeling of life's mystery and solemnity remained vivid with him, though fed from quite other sources than the bible and the _shorter catechism_. much has been said of carlyle's father, but it is highly probable that to his mother he owed most during his early years. the temperament of the covenanter was of the non-conductor type. men like james carlyle were essentially stern, self-centred, unemotional. fighting like the jews, with sword in one hand and trowel in the other, they had no time for cultivating the softer side of human nature. ready to go to the stake on behalf of religious liberty, they exercised a repressive, not to say despotic, influence in their own households. with them education meant not the unfolding of the individual powers of the children, but the ruthless crushing of them into a theological mould. religion in such an atmosphere became loveless rather than lovely, and might have had serious influences of a reactionary nature but for the caressing tenderness of the mother. with a heart which overflowed the ordinary theological boundaries, the mother in many sweet and hidden ways supplied the emotional element, which had been crushed out of the father by a narrow conception of life and duty. carlyle's experience may be judged from his references to his parents. he always speaks of his father with profound respect and admiration; towards his mother his heart goes forth with a devotion which became stronger as the years rolled on. carlyle's love of his mother was as beautiful as it was sacred. long after carlyle had parted with the creed of his childhood, his heart tremulously responded to the old symbols. his system of thought, indeed, might well be defined as calvinism minus christianity. had carlyle not come into contact with german thought, he would probably have jogged along the path of literature in more or less conventional fashion. in fact, nothing is more remarkable than the comparatively commonplace nature of carlyle's early contributions to literature. germany touched the deepest chords of his nature. with german ideas and emotions his mind was saturated, and _sartor resartus_ was the outcome. to that book students must go for a glance into carlyle's mind while he was wrestling with the great mysteries of existence. in june , as mr froude tells us, took place what may be called carlyle's conversion--his triumph over his doubts, and the beginning of a new life. to understand this phase of carlyle's life, we must pause for a little to consider german literature, whence carlyle derived spiritual relief and consolation. what, then, was the nature of the message of peace which germany, through kant, fichte, and goethe, brought to the storm-tossed soul of carlyle? when carlyle began to think seriously, two antagonistic conceptions of life, the orthodox and the rationalist, were struggling for mastery in the field of thought. the orthodox conception, into which he had been born, and with which his father and mother had fronted the eternities, had given way under the solvent of modern thought. carlyle's belief in christianity as a revelation seems to have dropped from him without much of a struggle, somewhat after the style of george eliot. his mental tortures appear to have arisen from spiritual hunger, from an inability to fill the place vacated by the old beliefs. had he lived fifty years earlier, carlyle would have been invited to find salvation in the easy-going, drawing-room rationalism of hume and gibbon, or to content himself with the ecclesiastical placidity known as moderatism. much had occurred since the arm-chair philosophers of edinburgh taught that this was the best possible world, and that the highest wisdom consisted in frowning upon enthusiasm and cultivating the comfortable. the french revolution had revolutionised men's thoughts and feelings. there had been revealed to man the inadequacy of the old deistical or mechanical philosophy, which, spreading from england to france, had done so much to hasten the revolutionary epoch. carlyle could find no spiritual sustenance in the purely mechanical theory of life which was offered as the substitute for the theory of the churches. there was another theory, which had its rise in germany, and to which carlyle clung when he could no longer keep hold of the supernatural. in transcendentalism, carlyle found salvation. what are the leading conceptions of the german form of salvation? the answer to this will give the key to _sartor resartus_, and to carlyle's whole mental outlook. in the eyes of thinkers like carlyle, the great objection to christianity was the breach it made between the natural and the supernatural. between them there was a great gulf which could only fitfully and temporarily be bridged by the miraculous. students who were being inoculated with scientific ideas of law and order, were bewildered by a theory of life which had no organic relation to the great germinal ideas of the day. in their desire to abolish the supernatural, the french thinkers constructed a theory of nature in which everything, from the movements of solar masses to the movements of the soul, were interpreted in terms of matter. by adopting a mechanical view of the universe, the french thinkers robbed nature of much of its charm, and stunted the emotions on the side of wonder and admiration. the world was reduced to a vast machine, man himself being simply a temporary embodiment of material particles in a highly complex and unique form. instead of being what it was to the greeks, a temple of beauty, the universe to the materialist resembled a prison in which the walls gradually closed upon the poor wretch till he was crushed under the ruins. goethe has left on record the impression made upon him by the materialistic view of life. as he says, 'the materialistic theory, which reduces all things to matter and motion, appeared to me so grey, so cimmerian, and so dead that we shuddered at it as at a ghost.' _sartor resartus_ is studded with vigorous protests against the mechanical view of nature and man. just as distasteful to carlyle, and equally mechanical in spirit, was the deistical conception of nature as a huge clock, under the superintendence of a divine clock-maker, whose duty consisted in seeing that the clock kept good time and was in all respects thoroughly reliable. the germans attacked the problem from the other side. they did not abolish the supernatural with the materialists, or seek it in another world with the theologians; they found the supernatural in the natural. to the materialists, kant, fichte, schelling, hegel and goethe had one reply:--reduce matter to its constituent atoms, they argued, and you never seize the principle of life; it evades you like a spirit; in this principle everything lives and moves and has its being. german philosophy from kant has been occupied in attempts to trace the spiritual principle in the great process of cosmic evolution. in poetry, goethe attempted to represent this as the energising principle of life and duty. the spiritual cannot be weighed in the scales of logic; it refuses to be put upon the dissecting-table. as a consequence, the truth of things is best seen by the poet. the owl-like logic-chopper, from his mechanical and utilitarian standpoint, sees not the divine vision. this has been called pantheism. call it what we please, it is contradictory to deism and materialism, and is the root thought of _sartor resartus_, which may be taken as carlyle's confession of faith. a few extracts will justify the foregoing analysis. the transcendental view of nature is expressed by carlyle thus:--'atheistic science babbles poorly of it with scientific nomenclature, experiments and what not, as if it were a poor dead thing, to be bottled up in leyden jars, and sold over counter; but the native sense of man in all times, if he will himself apply his sense, proclaims it to be a living thing--ah, an unspeakable, god-like thing, towards which the best attitude for us, after never so much science, is awe, devout prostration and humility of soul, worship, if not in words, then in silence.' here, again, is a passage quite hegelian in its tone: 'for matter, were it never so despicable, is spirit; the manifestation of spirit, were it never so honourable, can it be more? the thing visible, nay, the thing imagined, the thing in any way conceived as visible, what is it but a garment, a clothing of the higher celestial invisible, unimaginable, formless, dark with excess of bright.' the defects of carlyle, and they are many, take their root in his speculative view of the universe--a view which demands careful analysis if the student hopes to understand carlyle's strength and weakness. it is not meant that carlyle's mind remained anchored to the philosophic idealism of _sartor_. in later days he professed contempt for transcendental moonshine, but his contempt was for the form and jargon of the schools, not for the spirit, which dominated carlyle to the end. after carlyle passed the early poetic stage, his views took more and more an anthropomorphic mould, till in many of his writings he seems practically a theist. but at root carlyle's thought was more pantheistical than deistical. what, then, is the german conception of the ultimate reality? the german answer grew out of an attempt to get rid of the difficulties propounded by hume. hume, the father of all the empiricists, in giving logical effect to berkeleyism, concluded that just as we know nothing of the outer world beyond sense impressions, so of the inner world of mind we know nothing beyond mental impressions. we can combine and recombine these impressions as we choose, but from them we cannot deduce any ultimate laws, either of the world or of mind. hume would not sanction belief in causation as a universal law. all that could be said was that certain things happened in a certain manner so frequently as to give rise to a law of expectation. but this is not to solve, but to evade the problem? we are still driven to ask, what is matter? what is motion? what is force? how do we get our knowledge of the material world, and is that knowledge reliable? these are wide questions that cannot be adequately handled here. it was a favourite argument of comte and his followers, that man's first conceptions of nature were necessarily erroneous, because they were anthropomorphic. theology was, therefore, dethroned without ceremony. but science is as anthropomorphic as theology. we have no guarantee that the great facts of nature are as we think them. we talk of force, but our idea of force is taken from experiences which may have no counterpart in nature. it is well known, for example, that the secondary qualities of objects, colour, &c., do not exist in nature. our personality is so inextricably mixed with the material universe that it is impossible to formulate a philosophy like naturalism, which makes mind a product of nature, and which sharply defines the provinces of the two. but what naturalism fails to do, idealism or transcendentalism promises to perform. idealism is simply materialism turned upside down. the only difference between the evolution of spencer and of hegel is that the one puts matter, the other mind, first. for all practical purposes, it signifies little whether mind is the temporary embodiment of an idea, or the temporary product of a highly specialised form of matter. in either case, man has no more freedom than the bubble upon the surface of the stream. we may discourse of the bubble as poetically or as practically as we please, the result is the same--absorption in the universal. hegelianism as much as naturalism leaves man a prisoner in the hands of fate. the only difference is, that while naturalism puts round the prisoner's neck a plain, unpretentious noose, hegelianism adds fringes and embroidery. if there is no appeal from nature's dread sentence, the less poetry and embroidery there is about the doleful business the better. in _sartor resartus_, carlyle talks finely but vaguely, of the peace which came over his soul when he discovered that the universe was not mechanical but divine. the peace was not of long duration. what consolation carlyle derived from idealism did not appear in his life. what a contrast between the poetic optimism of _sartor_ and the heavily-charged pessimism of old age, when carlyle, with wailing pathos, exclaims that god does nothing. carlyle's life abundantly illustrates the fact that whenever it leaves cloudland, idealism sinks into scepticism more bitter and gloomy than the unbelief of naturalism. carlyle approached the question of the ultimate reality from the wrong standpoint. he had no reasoned philosophic creed. a poet, he had the poetic dread of analysis, and his spirit revolted at the spectacle of nature on the dissecting-table. he waged a life-long warfare against science. as the present writer has elsewhere remarked:--'carlyle never could tolerate the evolution theory. he always spoke with the utmost contempt of darwin, and everything pertaining to the development doctrines. it is somewhat startling to find that carlyle was an evolutionist without knowing it. the antagonism between carlyle and spencer disappears on closer inspection. when carlyle speaks of the universe as in very truth the star-domed city of god, and reminds us that through every crystal and through every grass blade, but most through every living soul, the glory of a present god still beams, he is simply saying in the language of poetry what spencer says in the language of science, that the world of phenomena is sustained and energised by an infinite eternal power. evolution is as emphatic as carlyle on the absolute distinction between right and wrong. carlyle and all the german school confront the evolutionary ethics with the kantian categorical imperative. surely the evolutionists in the matter of an imperative out-rival the intuitionalists, when, in addition to the dictates of conscience, they can call as a witness and sanction to morality the testimony of all-embracing experience. in his famous saying, might is right, carlyle was unconsciously formulating one aspect of evolutionary ethics. carlyle did not mean anything so silly as that brute force and ethical sanctions are identical; what he meant was that in the long run righteousness will prove the mightiest force in the universe. what is this but another version of the spencerian doctrine of the survival of the fittest, which, in the most highly evolved state of society, will mean the survival of the best? in the highest social state the only might that will survive will be the might which is rooted in right. carlyle's contemptuous attitude towards science is deeply to be deplored. he waged bitter warfare against the evolution theory, quite oblivious of the fact that by means of it there was revealed a deeper insight into the power behind nature, and into the ethical constitution of the universe, than ever entered into the minds of transcendental philosophers.' it is taken for granted that carlyle's thoughts have no organic unity. he is looked upon as a stimulating, but confused, writer, as a thinker of original, but incoherent, power. true, he has not a logical mind, and pays no deference to the canons of the schools or the market-place. but there is a method in carlyle's apparent caprice. when analysed, his thoughts are discovered to have unity. his transcendentalism embraces the ethic as well as the cosmic side of life. in the sphere of morals, as of science, his writings are one long tumultuous protest against the mechanical philosophy and the utilitarian theory of morals. from his essay on voltaire we take the following:--'it is contended by many that our mere love of personal pleasure or happiness, as it is called, acting in every individual with such clearness as he may easily have, will of itself lead him to respect the rights of others, and wisely employ his own.... without some belief in the necessary eternal, or, which is the same thing, in the supra mundane divine nature of virtue existing in each individual, could the moral judgment of a thousand or a thousand thousand individuals avail us'? more picturesquely, carlyle denounces the utilitarian system in these words: 'what then? is the heroic inspiration we name virtue but some passion, some bubble of the blood, bubbling in the direction others profit by? i know not; only this i know. if what thou namest happiness be our true aim, then are we all astray. with stupidity and sound digestion, man may front much. but what in these dull, unimaginative days are the terrors of conscience to the diseases of the liver? not on morality, but on cookery, let us build our stronghold: there, brandishing our frying-pan as censer, let us offer sweet incense to the devil, and live at ease on the fat things _he_ has provided for his elect'! the exponent of such a theory of ethics will have a natural distaste for the rational or calculating side of conduct. he will depreciate the mechanical, and give undue emphasis to the inspirational. his heroes will be not men of placid temperament, methodical habits, and utilitarian aims, but men of mystical and passionate natures, spasmodic in action, and guided by ideas not easily justified at the bar of utility. just as in the sphere of speculative thought, he has profound contempt for the diderots and voltaires, with their mechanical views of the universe, so in practical affairs carlyle has contempt for the men who endeavour to further their aims by appealing to commonplace motives by means of commonplace methods. specially opposed is he to the tendency of the age to rely for progress, not upon appeals to the great elemental forces of human nature, but upon organisations, committees, and all kinds of mechanism. in his remarkable essay, 'signs of the times,' we have ample verification of our exposition. after talking depreciatingly of the mechanical tendency of the prevailing philosophies, carlyle comments upon the mechanical nature of the reforming agencies of civilisation. the intense egoism of his nature rebels against any kind of socialism or collectivism. he says: 'were we required to characterise this age of ours by any single epithet, we should be tempted to call it, not a heroical, devotional, philosophical, or heroic age, but, above all, the mechanical age. it is the age of machinery in every outward and inward sense of that word.... men are grown mechanical in head and heart, as well as in hand. they have lost faith in individual endeavour, and in natural force of any kind.... we may trace this tendency in all the great manifestations of our time: in its intellectual aspect, the studies it most favours, and its manner of conducting them; in its practical aspects, its politics, art, religious work; in the whole sources, and throughout the whole current of its spiritual, no less than its material, activity.' with carlyle the secrets of nature and life were discoverable, not so much by the intellect as by the heart. the man with the large heart, rather than the clear head, saw furthest into the nature of things. the history of german thought is strewn with the wreck of systems based upon the carlylian doctrine of intuition. schelling and hegel showed the puerility to which great men are driven when they started to construct science out of their own intuitions, instead of patiently and humbly sitting down to study nature. tyndall has left on record his gratitude to carlyle. tyndall had grip of the scientific method, and was able to allow carlyle's inspiration to play upon his mind without fear of harm; but how many waverers has carlyle driven from the path of reason into the bogs of mysticism? carlyle's impatience with reasoning and his determination to follow the promptings of _a priori_ conceptions gave his system of ethics a one-sided cast, and made him needlessly aggressive towards what in his day was called utilitarianism, but what has now come to be known as evolutionary ethics. what is the chief end of man considered as a moral agent? the answer of the christian religion is as intelligible as it is comprehensive. man's duty consists in obeying the laws of god revealed in nature and in the bible. but apart from revelation, where is the basis of ethical authority? debarred from accepting the christian view, and instinctively repelled from utilitarianism, carlyle found refuge in the fichtean and similar systems of ethics. by substituting blessedness for happiness as the aim of ethical endeavour, carlyle endeavoured to preserve the heroic attitude which was associated with supernaturalism. in his view, it was more consistent with human dignity to trust for inspiration to a light within than painfully to piece together fragments of human experience and ponder the inferences to be drawn therefrom. in his 'data of ethics,' herbert spencer shows the hollowness of carlyle's distinction between blessedness and happiness. as spencer puts it: 'obviously the implication is that blessedness is not a kind of happiness, and this implication at once suggests the question, what mode of feeling is this? if it is a state of consciousness at all, it is necessarily one of three states--painful, indifferent, or pleasurable.... if the pleasurable states are in excess, then the blessed life can be distinguished from any other pleasurable life only by the relative amount or the quality of its pleasures. it is a life which makes happiness of a certain kind and degree its end, and the assumption that blessedness is not a form of happiness lapses.... in brief, blessedness has for its necessary condition of existence increased happiness, positive or negative in some consciousness or other; and disappears utterly if we assume that the actions called blessed are known to cause decrease of happiness in others as well as in the actor.' to german philosophy and literature carlyle owed his critical method, by which he all but revolutionised criticism as understood by his edinburgh and london contemporaries. carlyle began his apprenticeship with the edinburgh reviewers, in whose hand criticism never lost its political bias. apart from that, criticism up till the time of carlyle was mainly statical. the critic was a kind of literary book-keeper who went upon the double-entry system. on one page were noted excellences, on the other defects, and when the two columns were _totalled_ the debtor and creditor side of the transaction was set forth. where, as in the cases of burns and byron, genius was complicated with moral aberration, anything like a correct estimate was impossible. the result was that in scotland criticism oscillated between the ethical severity of the pulpit and the daring laxity of free thought. as the edinburgh reviewers could not afford to set the clergy at defiance, they had to pay due respect to conventional tastes and standards. carlyle faced the question from a different standpoint. he introduced into criticism the dynamic principle which he found in the germans, particularly in goethe. in contemplating a work of art, the germans talk much of the importance of seizing upon the creative spirit, what hegel called the idea. the thought of goethe and hegel, though differently expressed, resolves itself into the conception of a life principle which shapes materials into harmony with innate forms. in the sphere of life the determining factors are the inner vitalities, which, however, are susceptible to the environment. the critic who would realise his ideal does not go about with literary and ethical tape-lines: he seeks to understand the spirit which animated the author as shewn in his works and his life, and then studies the influence of his environment. that this is a correct description of carlyle's critical method is evidenced by his own remarks in his essay on burns. he says: 'if an individual is really of consequence enough to have his life and character recorded for public remembrance, we have always been of opinion that the public ought to be made acquainted with all the springs and relations of his character. how did the world and man's life from his particular position represent themselves to his mind? how did co-existing circumstances modify him from without: how did he modify these from within?' this attention to the inner springs of character gives the key to carlyle's critical work. how fruitful this was is seen in his essay on burns. he steered an even course between the stern moralists, whose indignation at the sins of burns the man blinded them to the genius of burns the poet, and the flippant bohemians, who thought that by bidding defiance to the conventionalities and moralities burns proved his title to the name of genius, and whose voices are yet unduly with us in much spirituous devotion and rhymeless doggerel at the return of each th of january. while laying bare the springs of burns' genius, carlyle, with unerring precision, also puts his finger on the weak point in the poet's moral nature. so faithfully did carlyle apply his critical method that he may be considered to have said the final word about burns. when goethe spoke of carlyle as a great moral force he must have had in his mind the ethical tone of carlyle's critical writing--a tone which had its roots in the idea that judgment upon a man should be determined, not by isolated deviations from conventional or even ethical standards, but by consideration of the deep springs of character from which flow aspirations and ideals. in his _heroes and hero-worship_ carlyle elaborates his critical theory thus: 'on the whole, we make too much of faults; the details of the business hide the real centre of it. faults? the greatest of faults, i should say, is to be conscious of none. readers of the bible above all, one would think, might know better. who is called there "the man according to god's own heart?" david, the hebrew king, had fallen into sins enough--blackest crimes--there was no want of sins. and thereupon the unbelievers sneer and ask: is this your man according to god's heart? the sneer, i must say, seems to me but a shallow one. what are faults? what are the outward details of a life, if the inner secret of it, the remorse, temptations, true, often-baffled, never-ended struggle of it, be forgotten?... the deadliest sin, i say, were that same supercilious consciousness of no sin: that is death.... david's life and history, as written for us in those psalms of his, i consider to be the truest emblem ever given of a man's moral progress and warfare here below.' this canon faithfully applied enabled carlyle to invest with a new and living interest large sections of literary criticism. burns, johnson, cromwell and others of like calibre, were rescued by carlyle from the hands of pedants and pharisees. to readers wearied with the facile criticism of conventional reviewers, it was a revelation to come into contact with a writer like carlyle, who not only gave to the mind great inspirational impetus, but also a larger critical outlook; it was like stepping out of a museum, or a dissecting-room into the free, fresh, breezy air of nature. moreover, carlyle's interest in the soul is not of an antiquarian nature; he studies his heroes as if they were ancestors of the carlyle family. he broods over their letters as if they were the letters of his own flesh and blood, and his comments resemble the soliloquisings of a pathos stricken kinsman rather than the conscious reflections of a literary man. it is noteworthy that carlyle's critical powers are limited by his sympathies. his method, though suggestive of scientific criticism, is largely influenced by the personal equation. face to face with writers like scott and voltaire, he flounders in helpless incompetency. he tries scott, the writer of novels, by purely puritan standards. because there is in scott no signs of soul-struggles, no conscious devotion to heroic ends, no introspective torturings, carlyle sets himself to a process of belittling. so with voltaire. carlyle's failure in this sphere was due to the fact that he overdid the ethical side of criticism and became a pulpiteer; he was false to his own principle of endeavouring to seize the dominant idea. because scott and voltaire were not dominated by the covenanting idea, carlyle dealt with them in a tone of disparagement. carlyle admired goethe, but he certainly made no attempt to cultivate goethe's catholicity. let us not fall into carlyle's mistake, and condemn him for qualities which were incompatible with his temperament. after all has been said, english literature stands largely indebted to carlyle the critic. chapter iv life in london mrs carlyle entered heartily into her husband's proposal to remove to london. 'burn our ships!' she gaily said to him one day (_i.e._, dismantle our house); 'carry all our furniture with us'; which they accordingly did. 'at sight of london,' carlyle wrote, 'i remember humming to myself a ballad-stanza of "johnnie o' braidislea," which my dear old mother used to sing, "for there's seven foresters in yon forest; and them i want to see, see, and them i want to _see_ (and shoot down)!" carlyle lodged at ampton street again; but presently did 'immense stretches of walking in search of houses.' he found his way to chelsea and there secured a small old-fashioned house at (now numbered ) cheyne row, at a rent of £ a year. mrs carlyle followed in a short time and approved of his choice. they took possession on the th june , and carlyle recounts the 'cheerful gipsy life' they had there 'among the litter and carpenters for three incipient days.' leigh hunt was in the next street 'sending kind, _un_practical messages,' dropping in to see them in the evenings. when in london on a former occasion, carlyle became acquainted with john stuart mill, and the intimacy was kept alive by correspondence to and from craigenputtock. it was through mill's letters that carlyle's thoughts were turned towards the french revolution. when he returned to london, mill was very useful to him, lending him a fine collection of books on that subject. mill's evenings in cheyne row were 'sensibly agreeable for most part,' remarks carlyle. 'talk rather wintry ("sawdustish," as old sterling once called it), but always well-informed and sincere.' carlyle was making rapid progress with the first volume of his _french revolution_. stern necessity gave a spurt to his pen, for in february he notes that 'some twenty-three months' had passed since he earned a single penny by the 'craft of literature.' the volume was completed and he lent the only copy to mill. the ms. was unfortunately burnt by a servant-maid. 'how well do i still remember,' writes carlyle in his _reminiscences_, 'that night when he came to tell us, pale as hector's ghost.... it was like _half_ sentence of death to us both, and we had to pretend to take it lightly, so dismal and ghastly was _his_ horror at it, and try to talk of other matters. he stayed three mortal hours or so; his departure quite a relief to us. oh, the burst of sympathy my poor darling then gave me, flinging her arms round my neck, and openly lamenting, condoling, and encouraging like a nobler second self! under heaven is nothing beautifuller. we sat talking till late; '_shall_ be written again,' my fixed word and resolution to her. which proved to be such a task as i never tried before or since. i wrote out "feast of pikes" (vol. ii.), and then went at it. found it fairly _impossible_ for about a fortnight; passed three weeks (reading marryat's novels), tried, cautious-cautiously, as on ice paper-thin, once more; and in short had a job more like breaking my heart than any other in my experience. jeannie, alone of beings, burnt like a steady lamp beside me. i forget how much of money we still had. i think there was at first something like £ , perhaps £ , to front london with. nor can i in the least remember where we had gathered such a sum, except that it was our own, no part of it borrowed or _given us_ by anybody. "fit to last till _french revolution_ is ready!" and she had no misgivings at all. mill was penitently liberal; sent me £ (in a day or two), of which i kept £ (actual cost of house while i had written burnt volume); upon which he bought me "biographie universelle," which i got bound, and still have. wish i could find a way of getting the now much macerated, changed, and fanaticised john stuart mill to take that £ back; but i fear there is no way.'[ ] carlyle went diligently to work at the _french revolution_. some conviction he had that the book was worth something. once or twice among the flood of equipages at hyde park corner, when taking his afternoon stroll, he thought to himself, 'perhaps none of _you_ could do what i am at!' but generally his feeling was, 'i will finish this book, throw it at your feet, buy a rifle and spade, and withdraw to the transatlantic wildernesses, far from human beggaries and basenesses!' 'this,' he says, 'had a kind of comfort to me; yet i always knew too, in the background, that this would not practically do. in short, my nervous system had got dreadfully irritated and inflamed before i quite ended, and my desire was _intense_, beyond words, to have done with it.' then he adds: 'the _last_ paragraph i well remember writing upstairs in the drawing-room that now is, which was then my writing-room; beside _her_ there in a grey evening (summer, i suppose), soon after tea (perhaps); and thereupon, with her dear blessing on me, going out to walk. i had said before going out, "what they will do with this book, none knows, my jeannie, lass; but they have not had, for a two hundred years, any book that came more truly from a man's very heart, and so let them trample it under foot and hoof as _they_ see best!" "pooh, pooh! they cannot trample that!" she would cheerily answer; for her own approval (i think she had read always regularly behind me) especially in vol. iii., was strong and decided.' mrs carlyle was right. no critic or clique of critics could trample the _french revolution_. a month before the completion of the first book of the _french revolution_, carlyle wrote in his journal: 'my first friend edward irving is dead. i am friendless here or as good as that.' in a week or two thereafter he met southey, whom he describes as a 'lean, grey-white-headed man of dusky complexion, unexpectedly tall when he rises and still leaner then--the shallowest chin, prominent snubbed roman nose, small carelined brow, huge brush of white-grey-hair on high crown and projecting on all sides, the most vehement pair of faint hazel eyes i have ever seen--a well-read, honest, limited (straitlaced even), kindly-hearted, most irritable man. we parted kindly, with no great purpose on either side, i imagine, to meet again.'[ ] later on carlyle admits to his brother john that his prospects in london were not brightening; which fact left him gloomy and morose. during his enforced leisure after the destruction of the first book of the _french revolution_, carlyle saw more of his friends, among whom he numbered john sterling, fresh from cambridge and newly ordained a clergyman. sterling was of a 'vehement but most noble nature,' and he was one of the few who had studied _sartor resartus_ seriously. he had been also caught by the radical epidemic on the spiritual side. although dissenting from much of what carlyle taught, sterling recognised in him 'a man not only brilliantly gifted, but differing from the common run of people in this, that he would not lie, that he would not equivocate, that he would say always what he actually thought, careless whether he pleased or offended.' he introduced carlyle to his father, who was then the 'guiding genius' of the _times_, and who offered carlyle work there on the usual conditions. 'carlyle,' says froude, 'though with poverty at his door, and entire penury visible in the near future, turned away from a proposal which might have tempted men who had less excuse for yielding to it. he was already the sworn soldier of another chief. his allegiance from first to last was to _truth_, truth as it presented itself to his own intellect and his own conscience.' on the th of february carlyle wrote to his brother john: 'i positively do not care that periodical literature shuts her fist against me in these months. let her keep it shut for ever, and go to the devil, which she mostly belongs to. the matter had better be brought to a crisis. there is perhaps a finger of providence in it.... my only new scheme, since last letter, is a hypothesis--little more yet--about national education. the newspapers had an advertisement about a glasgow "educational association" which wants a man that would found a normal school, first going over england and into germany to get light on that matter. i wrote to that glasgow association afar off, enquiring who they were, what manner of man they expected, testifying myself very friendly to their project, and so forth--no answer as yet. it is likely they will want, as jane says, a "chalmers and welsh" kind of character, in which case _va ben, felice notte_. if otherwise, and they (almost by miracle) had the heart, i am the man for them. perhaps my name is so heterodox in that circle, i shall not hear at all.'[ ] carlyle also remarks, in the same letter, that john stuart mill is very friendly: 'he is the nearest approach to a real man that i find here--nay, as far as negativeness goes, he _is_ that man, but unhappily not very satisfactory much farther.' not long thereafter carlyle met wordsworth. 'i did not expect much,' he said in a letter, 'but got mostly what i expected. the old man has a fine shrewdness and naturalness in his expression of face, a long cumberland figure; one finds also a kind of _sincerity_ in his speech. but for prolixity, thinness, endless dilution, it excels all the other speech i had heard from mortals. a genuine man, which is much, but also essentially a small, genuine man.' early in october carlyle started for his old home. his mother-in-law had arrived on a visit at cheyne row, and remained there with her daughter during carlyle's absence in scotland. he returned improved in health and spirits. nothing came of the national education scheme. carlyle was not a person to push himself into notice, remarks froude; and his friends did not exert themselves for him, or they tried and failed; 'governments, in fact, do not look out for servants among men who are speculating about the nature of the universe. then, as always, the doors leading into regular employment remained closed.' shortly after his return from the north, he was offered the editorship of a newspaper at lichfield. this was unaccepted for the same reason that weighed with him when he refused a post on the _times_. in the following summer money matters had become so pressing that carlyle wrote the article on mirabeau, now printed among the _miscellanies_, for mill's review, which brought him £ . mrs carlyle's health began to suffer, and a visit to annandale became imperative. she returned 'mended in spirits.' writing of her arrival in london, she said: 'i had my luggage put on the backs of two porters, and walked on to cheapside, when i presently found a chelsea omnibus. by-and-bye the omnibus stopped, and amid cries of "no room, sir; can't get in," carlyle's face, beautifully set off by a broad-brimmed white hat, gazed in at the door like the peri "who, at the gate of heaven, stood disconsolate." in hurrying along the strand, his eye had lighted on my trunk packed on the top of the omnibus, and had recognised it. this seems to me one of the most indubitable proofs of genius which he ever manifested.' on the nd of january carlyle wrote to his mother: 'the book [_french revolution_] is actually done; all written to the last line; and now, after much higgling and maffling, the printers have got fairly afloat, and we are to go on with the wind and the sea.' but no money could be expected from the book for a considerable time. meanwhile, miss harriet martineau (who had introduced herself into cheyne row), and miss wilson, another accomplished friend, thought that carlyle should begin a course of lectures in london, and thereby raise a little money. carlyle, it seems, gave 'a grumbling consent.' nothing daunted, the ladies found two hundred persons ready each to subscribe a guinea to hear a course of lectures from him. the end of it was that he delivered six discourses on german literature, which were 'excellent in themselves, and delivered with strange impressiveness,' and £ went into his purse. in the summer the _french revolution_ appeared. the sale at first was slow, almost nothing, for it was not 'subscribed for' among the booksellers. alluding to the criticisms which appeared, carlyle said: 'some condemn me, as is very natural, for affectation; others are hearty, even passionate, in their estimation; on the whole, it strikes me as not unlikely that the book may take some hold of the english people, and do them and itself a little good.' he was right. other historians have described the revolution: carlyle reproduces the revolution. he approaches history like a dramatist. give him, as in the french revolution, a weird, tragic, awe-inspiring theme, and he will utilise his characters, scenes, and circumstances in artistic subordination to the central idea. carlyle might be called a subjective dramatist--that is to say, his own spirit, thoughts, and reflections get so mixed up with the history that it is difficult to imagine the one without the other. every now and then the dramatist interrupts the tragedy to interject his own reflections; in the history the carlylean philosophy plays the part of a greek chorus. as an example of carlyle's genius for a dramatic situation, take his opening of the great drama with the death scene of louis xv. who does not feel, in reading that scene, as if the furies were not far off? who does not detect in the grotesque jostling of the comedy and tragedy of life premonitions of the coming storm? 'but figure his thought, when death is now clutching at his own heart-strings; unlooked for, inexorable! yes, poor louis, death has found thee. no palace walls or lifeguards, gorgeous tapestries or gilt buckram of stiffest ceremonial could keep him out; but he is here, here at thy very life-breath, and will extinguish it. thou, whose whole existence hitherto was a chimera and scenic show, at length becomest a reality; sumptuous versailles bursts asunder, like a dream, into void immensity: time is done, and all the scaffolding of time falls wrecked with hideous clangour round thy soul: the pale kingdoms yawn open; there must thou enter, naked, all unking'd, and await what is appointed thee!... there are nods and sagacious glances, go-betweens, silk dowagers mysteriously gliding, with smiles for this constellation, sighs for that: there is tremor, of hope or desperation, in several hearts. there is the pale, grinning shadow of death, ceremoniously ushered along by another grinning shadow, of etiquette; at intervals the growl of chapel organs, like prayer by machinery; proclaiming, as in a kind of horrid diabolic horse-laughter, _vanity of vanities, all is vanity!_' at every stage in the narrative, the reader is impressed with the dramatic texture of carlyle's mind. no dramatic writer surpasses him in the art of producing effects by contrasts. in the midst of a vigorous description of the storming of the bastille, he rings down the curtain for a moment in order to introduce the following scene of idyllic beauty: 'o evening sun of july, how, at this hour, thy beams fall slant on reapers amid peaceful woody fields; on old women spinning in cottages; on ships far out in the silent main; on balls at the orangerie of versailles, where high-rouged dames of the palace are even now dancing with double-jacketed hussar officers;--and also on this roaring hell-porch of a hotel-de-ville!' equally effective is carlyle in rendering vivid the doings of the individual actors in the drama. for photographic minuteness and startling realism what can equal the following:--'but see camille desmoulins, from the café de foy, rushing out, sibylline in face; his hair streaming, in each hand a pistol! he springs to a table: the police satellites are eyeing him; alive they shall not take him, not they alive him alive. this time he speaks without stammering:--friends! shall we die like hunted hares? like sheep hounded into their pinfold; bleating for mercy, where is no mercy, but only a whetted knife? the hour is come, the supreme hour of frenchman and man; when oppressors are to try conclusions with oppressed; and the word is, swift death, or deliverance forever. let such hour be _well_-come! us, meseems, one cry only befits: to arms! let universal paris, universal france, as with the throat of the whirlwind, sound only: to arms!--"to arms!" yell responsive the innumerable voices; like one great voice, as of a demon yelling from the air: for all faces wax fire-eyed, all hearts burn up into madness. in such, or fitter words does camille evoke the elemental powers, in this great moment--"friends," continues camille, "some rallying-sign! cockades; green ones--the colour of hope!"--as with the flight of locusts, these green tree-leaves; green ribands from the neighbouring shops: all green things are snatched, and made cockades of. camille descends from his table; "stifled with embraces, wetted with tears;" has a bit of green riband handed him; sticks it in his hat. and now to curtius' image-shop there; to the boulevards; to the four winds, and rest not till france be on fire!' as a historical work, the _french revolution_ is unique. it is precisely the kind of book isaiah would have written had there been a like revolution in the jewish kingdom; and just as we go to isaiah, not for sociological guidance, but for ethical inspiration, so we turn to the _french revolution_ when the mind and heart are in a state of torpor in order to get a series of shocks from the carlylean electric battery. from a historian a student expects light as well as heat, guidance as well as inspiration. it is not enough to have the great french explosion vividly photographed before his eyes; it is equally necessary to know the causes which led to the catastrophe. here, as a historian, carlyle is conspicuously weak. his habit of looking for dramatic situations, his passion for making commonplace incidents and commonplace men merely the satellites of commanding personalities, in a word, his theory that history should deal with the doings of great men, prevents carlyle from dwelling upon the politico-economic side of national life. so absorbed is he in painting the revolution, that he forgets to explain the revolution. we have abundance of vague declamations against shams in high places, plenty of talk about god's judgments, in the style of the hebrew prophets, but of patient diagnosis, there is none. as mr morley puts it in his luminous essay on carlyle: 'to the question whether mankind gained or lost by the french revolution, carlyle nowhere gives a clear answer; indeed, on this subject more than any other, he clings closely to his favourite method of simple presentation, streaked with dramatic irony.... he draws its general moral lesson from the revolution, and with clangorous note warns all whom it concerns from king to church that imposture must come to an end. but for the precise amount and kind of dissolution which the west owes to it, for the political meaning of it, as distinguished from its moral or its dramatic significance, we seek in vain, finding no word on the subject, nor even evidence of consciousness that such word is needed.' had carlyle, in addition to his genius as a historical dramatist, possessed the patient diagnosing power of the writers and thinkers whom he derided, his _french revolution_ would have taken its place in historical literature as an epoch-making book. as it stands, the reader who desires to have an intelligible knowledge of the subject, is compelled to shake himself free of the carlylean mesmerism, and have recourse to those writers whom carlyle, under the opprobrious names of 'logic-choppers' and 'dry-as-dusts,' held up to public ridicule. footnotes: [ ] _reminiscences_, vol. ii. pp. - . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. p. . chapter v holiday journeyings--literary work carlyle was so broken down with his efforts upon the _french revolution_ that a trip to annandale became necessary. he stayed at scotsbrig two months, 'wholly idle, reading novels, smoking pipes in the garden with his mother, hearing notices of his book from a distance, but not looking for them or caring about them.' autumn brought carlyle back to cheyne row, when he found his wife in better health, delighted to have him again at her side. she knew, as froude points out, though carlyle, so little vain was he, had failed as yet to understand it, that he had returned to a changed position, that he was no longer lonely and neglected, but had taken his natural place among the great writers of his day. he sent bright accounts of himself to scotsbrig. 'i find john sterling here, and many friends, all kinder each than the other to me. with talk and locomotion the days pass cheerfully till i rest and gird myself together again. they make a great talk about the book, which seems to have succeeded in a far higher degree than i looked for. everybody is astonished at every other body's being pleased with this wonderful performance.'[ ] carlyle did nothing all the winter except to write his essay on sir walter scott. his next task was to prepare for a second course of lectures in the spring on 'heroes.' the course ended with 'a blaze of fire-works--people weeping at the passionately earnest tone in which for once they heard themselves addressed.' the effort brought carlyle £ after all expenses had been paid. 'a great blessing,' he remarked, 'to a man that had been haunted by the squalid spectre of beggary.' carlyle had no intention of visiting scotland that autumn, but having received a pressing invitation from old friends at kirkcaldy, he took steamer to leith in august. while at kirkcaldy he crossed to edinburgh and called on jeffrey. 'he sat,' says carlyle, 'waiting for me at moray place. we talked long in the style of literary and philosophic clitter-clatter. finally it was settled that i should go out to dinner with him at craigcrook, and not return to fife till the morrow.' they dined and abstained from contradicting each other, carlyle admitting that jeffrey was becoming an amiable old fribble, 'very cheerful, very heartless, very forgettable and tolerable.' on his return to london, equal to work again, carlyle found all well. he was gratified to hear that the eighth edition of the _french revolution_ was almost sold, and that another would be called for, while there were numerous applications from review editors for articles if he would please to supply them. mill about this time asked him to contribute a paper on cromwell to the _london and westminster review_. carlyle agreed, and was preparing to begin when the negotiations were broken off. mill had gone abroad, leaving a mr robertson to manage the _review_. robertson coolly wrote to say that he need not go on with the article, 'for he meant to do cromwell himself.' carlyle was wroth, and that incident determined him to 'throw himself seriously into the history of the commonwealth, and to expose himself no more to cavalier treatment from "able editors."' but for that task he required books. then it was that the idea of founding a london library occurred to him. men of position took up the matter warmly, and carlyle's object was accomplished. 'let the tens of thousands,' says mr froude, 'who, it is to be hoped, "are made better and wiser" by the books collected there, remember that they owe the privilege entirely to carlyle.' one of carlyle's new acquaintances was monckton milnes, who asked him to breakfast. carlyle used to say that if christ were again on earth milnes would ask him to breakfast, and the clubs would all be talking of the 'good things' that christ had said. he also became familiar with mr baring, afterwards lord ashburton, and his accomplished wife, who in course of time exercised a disturbing influence over the carlyle household. it would not tend to edification to dwell upon the domestic misunderstandings at cheyne row; besides, are not they to be found detailed at great length in froude's _life_, the _reminiscences_, and _letters and memorials_? although carlyle was taking life somewhat easy, he was making preparations for his third course of lectures, his subject being the 'revolutions of modern europe.' they did not please the lecturer, but the audiences were as enthusiastic as ever, and he made a clear gain of £ . about this time emerson was pressing him to go to boston on a lecturing tour. but carlyle thought better of it. more important work awaited him in london. 'all his life,' says froude, 'he had been meditating on the problem of the working-man's existence in this country at the present epoch.... he had seen the glasgow riots in . he had heard his father talk of the poor masons, dining silently upon water and water-cresses. his letters are full of reflections on such things, sad or indignant, as the humour might be. he was himself a working-man's son. he had been bred in a peasant home, and all his sympathies were with his own class. he was not a revolutionist; he knew well that violence would be no remedy; that there lay only madness and deeper misery. but the fact remained, portending frightful issues. the reform bill was to have mended matters but the reform bill had gone by and the poor were none the happier. the power of the state had been shifted from the aristocracy to the mill-owners, and merchants, and shopkeepers. that was all. the handicraftsman remained where he was, or was sinking, rather, into an unowned arab, to whom "freedom" meant freedom to work if the employer had work to offer him conveniently to himself, or else freedom to starve. the fruit of such a state of society as this was the sansculottism on which he had been lecturing, and he felt that he must put his thoughts upon it in a permanent form. he had no faith in political remedies, in extended suffrages, recognition of "the rights of man," etc.--absolutely none. that was the road on which the french had gone; and, if tried in england, it would end as it ended with them--in anarchy, and hunger, and fury. the root of the mischief was the forgetfulness on the part of the upper classes, increasing now to flat denial, that they owed any duty to those under them beyond the payment of contract wages at the market price. the liberal theory, as formulated in political economy, was that every one should attend exclusively to his own interests, and that the best of all possible worlds would be the certain result. his own conviction was that the result would be the worst of all possible worlds, a world in which human life, such a life as _human_ beings ought to live, would become impossible.'[ ] he wrote to his brother when his lectures were over: "guess what immediate project i am on; that of writing an article on the working-classes for the "quarterly." it is verily so. i offered to do the thing for mill about a year ago. he durst not. i felt a kind of call and monition of duty to do it, wrote to lockhart accordingly, was altogether invitingly answered, had a long interview with the man yesterday, found him a person of sense, good-breeding, even kindness, and great consentaneity of opinion with myself on the matter. am to get books from him to-morrow, and so shall forthwith set about telling the conservatives a thing or two about the claims, condition, rights, and mights of the working order of men." when the annual exodus from london came, the carlyles went north for a holiday. they returned much refreshed at the end of two months. his presence, moreover, was required in london, as _wilhelm meister_ was now to be republished. he set about finishing his article for the "quarterly," but as he progressed he felt some misgiving as to its ever appearing in that magazine. "i have finished," he wrote on november , , "a long review article, thick pamphlet, or little volume, entitled "chartism." lockhart has it, for it was partly promised to him; at least the refusal of it was, and that, i conjecture, will be all he will enjoy of it." lockhart sent it back, 'seemingly not without reluctance,' saying he dared not. mill was shown the pamphlet and was 'unexpectedly delighted with it.' he was willing to publish it, but carlyle's wife and brother insisted that the thing was too good for a magazine article. fraser undertook to print it, and before the close of the year _chartism_ was in the hands of the public. the sale was rapid, an edition of a thousand copies being sold immediately. 'chartism,' froude narrates, was loudly noticed: "considerable reviewing, but very daft reviewing." men wondered; how could they choose but wonder, when a writer of evident power stripped bare the social disease, told them that their remedies were quack remedies, and their progress was progress to dissolution? the liberal journals, finding their "formulas" disbelieved in, clamoured that carlyle was unorthodox; no radical, but a wolf in sheep's clothing. yet what he said was true, and could not be denied to be true. "they approve generally," he said, "but regret very much that i am a tory. stranger tory, in my opinion, has not been fallen in with in these later generations." again a few weeks later (february ): "the people are beginning to discover that i am not a tory. ah, no! but one of the deepest, though perhaps the quietest, of all the radicals now extant in the world--a thing productive of small comfort to several persons. they have said, and they will say, and let them say." his final course of lectures now confronted him, and these he entitled _heroes and hero worship_. he tells his mother (may , ): 'the lecturing business went off with sufficient _éclat_. the course was generally judged, and i rather join therein myself, to be the bad _best_ i have yet given. on the last day--friday last--i went to speak of cromwell with a head _full of air_; you know that wretched physical feeling; i had been concerned with drugs, had awakened at five, etc. it is absolute martyrdom. my tongue would hardly wag at all when i got done. yet the good people sate breathless, or broke out into all kinds of testimonies of goodwill.... in a word, we got right handsomely through.' that was carlyle's last appearance as a public lecturer. he was now the observed of all observers in london society; but he was weary of lionising and junketings. 'what,' he notes in his journal on june , , 'are lords coming to call on one and fill one's head with whims? they ask you to go among champagne, bright glitter, semi-poisonous excitements which you do not like even for the moment, and you are sick for a week after. as old tom white said of whisky, "keep it--deevil a ever i'se better than when there's no a drop on't i' my weam." so say i of dinner popularity, lords and lionism--keep it; give it to those that like it.' carlyle was much refreshed at this period by visits from tennyson. here is what he says of the poet: 'a fine, large-featured, dim-eyed, bronze-coloured, shaggy-headed man is alfred; dusty, smoky, free and easy, who swims outwardly and inwardly with great composure in an inarticulate element of tranquil chaos and tobacco smoke. great now and then when he does emerge--a most restful, brotherly, solid-hearted man.' in a note to his brother john on september , , he says: 'i have again some notions towards writing a book--let us see what comes of that. it is the one use of living, for me. enough to-day.' the book he had in view was _cromwell_. journalising on the day after christmas he laments--'oliver cromwell will not prosper with me at all. i began reading about that subject some four months ago. i learn almost nothing by reading, yet cannot as yet heartily begin to write. nothing on paper yet. i know not where to begin.' at the end of the year mrs carlyle wrote: 'carlyle is reading voraciously, preparatory to writing a new book. for the rest, he growls away much in the old style. but one gets to feel a certain indifference to his growling; if one did not, it would be the worse for one.' a month or two later, carlyle writes: 'think not hardly of me, dear jeannie. in the mutual misery we often are in, we do not know how dear we are to one another. by the help of heaven, i shall get a little better, and somewhat of it shall abate. last night, at dinner, richard milnes made them all laugh with a saying of yours. "when the wife has influenza, it is _a slight cold_--when the man has it, it is, &c., &c."' writing to sterling he exclaims, 'i shall verily fly to craigenputtock again before long. yet i know what solitude is, and imprisonment among black cattle and peat bogs. the truth is, we are never right as we are. "oh, the devil burn it"! said the irish drummer flogging his countryman; "there's no pleasing of you, strike where one will."' milnes prevailed on carlyle, instead of flying to the bleak expanse of craigenputtock, to accompany him to his father's house at fryston, in yorkshire, whence he sent a series of affectionate and graphic letters to mrs carlyle. being so far north, he took a run to dumfriesshire to see his mother, who had been slightly ailing. he was back in london, however, in may, but not improved in mind or body. it was a hot summer, and the carlyles went to scotsbrig, and took a cottage at newby, close to annan. by the end of september, carlyle was back in cheyne row. his latest hero still troubled him. 'ought i,' he asks, 'to write now of oliver cromwell?... i cannot yet see clearly.' carlyle at one time had a hankering after a scottish professorship, but the 'door had been shut in his face,' sometimes contemptuously. he was now famous, and the young edinburgh students, having looked into his lectures on heroes, began to think that, whatever might be the opinions of the authorities and patrons, they for their part must consider lectures such as these a good exchange for what was provided for them. a 'history chair' was about to be established. a party of them, represented by a mr dunipace, presented a requisition to the faculty of advocates to appoint carlyle. when asked his consent to be nominated, carlyle replied: 'accept my kind thanks, you and all your associates, for your zeal to serve me.... ten years ago such an invitation might perhaps have been decisive of much for me, but it is too late now; too late for many reasons, which i need not trouble you with at present.' a very severe blow now fell upon mrs carlyle, who received news from templand that her mother had been struck by apoplexy, and was dangerously ill. although unfit for travelling, she caught the first train from euston square to liverpool, but at her uncle's house there she learnt that all was over. mrs carlyle lay ill in liverpool, unable to stir. after a while she was able to go back to london, where carlyle joined her in the month of may. it was on his return journey that he paid a visit to dr arnold at rugby, when he had an opportunity, under his host's genial guidance, to explore the field of naseby. his sad occupations in scotland, and the sad thoughts they suggested, made carlyle disinclined for society. he had a room arranged for him at the top of his house, and there he sate and smoked, and read books on cromwell, 'the sight of naseby having brought the subject back out of "the abysses."' meanwhile he had a pleasant trip to ostend with mr stephen spring rice, commissioner of customs, of which he wrote vivid descriptions. on october , , carlyle wrote in his journal: 'for many months there has been no writing here. alas! what was there to write? about myself, nothing; or less, if that was possible. i have not got one word to stand upon paper in regard to oliver. the beginnings of work are even more formidable than the executing of it.' but another subject was to engross his attention for a little while. the distress of the poor became intense; less in london, however, than in other large towns. 'i declare,' he wrote to his mother early in january , 'i declare i begin to feel as if i should not hold my peace any longer, as if i should perhaps open my mouth in a way that some of them are not expecting--we shall see if this book were done.' on the th he wrote: 'i hope it will be a rather useful kind of book.' he could not go on with cromwell till he had unburdened his soul. 'the look of the world,' he said, 'is really quite oppressive to me. eleven thousand souls in paisley alone living on threehalfpence a day, and the governors of the land all busy shooting partridges and passing corn-laws the while! it is a thing no man with a speaking tongue in his head is entitled to be silent about.' the outcome of all his soul-burnings and cogitations was _past and present_, which appeared at the beginning of april. the reviewers set to work, 'wondering, admiring, blaming, chiefly the last.' carlyle then undertook several journeys, chiefly in order to visit cromwellian battlefields, the sight of which made the oliver enterprise no longer impossible. he found a renovated house on his return, and mrs carlyle writing on november th, describes him as 'over head and ears in cromwell,' and 'lost to humanity for the time being.' six months later, he makes this admission in his journal--'my progress in "cromwell" is frightful. i am no day absolutely idle, but the confusions that lie in my way require far more fire of energy than i can muster on most days, and i sit not so much working as painfully looking on work.' four months later, when _cromwell_ was progressing slowly, carlyle suffered a severe personal loss by the death of john sterling. 'sterling,' says froude, 'had been his spiritual pupil, his first, and also his noblest and best. consumption had set its fatal mark upon him.' carlyle drowned his sorrow in hard work, and in july the end of _cromwell_ was coming definitely in sight. in his journal under date august th, is to be found this entry: 'i have this moment _ended_ oliver; hang it! he is ended, thrums and all. i have nothing more to write on the subject, only mountains of wreck to burn. not (any more) up to the chin in paper clippings and chaotic litter, hatefuller to me than most. i _am_ to have a swept floor now again.' and thus the herculean labours of five years were ended. his desire was to be in scotland, and he made his way northwards by the usual sea route to annan and scotsbrig. he did not remain long away, and upon his return _cromwell_ was just issuing from the press. it was received with great favour, the sale was rapid, and additional materials came from unexpected quarters. in february a new edition was needed in order to insert fresh letters of oliver according to date; a process, carlyle said 'requiring one's most excellent talent, as of shoe-cobbling, really that kind of talent carried to a high pitch.' when completed, carlyle presented a copy of it to the prime minister, sir robert peel, a step he never took before or after with any of his writings,--a compliment which peel gracefully acknowledged. carlyle's plans for the summer of were, a visit to his mother and a run across to ireland. charles gavan duffy of the _nation_ newspaper saw him in london in consequence of what he had written in _chartism_ about misgovernment in ireland. he had promised to go over and see what the 'young ireland' movement was doing. on the st of august he left scotsbrig, and landed in due course at belfast, where he was to have been met by john mitchel and gavan duffy and driven to drogheda. he missed his two friends through a mistake at the post-office, and hurried on by railway to dublin. he met them at dundrum, and was there entertained at a large dinner-party. next day he dined at mitchel's. his stay was remarkably short. he took steamer at kingstown, and in the early morning of september th 'he was sitting smoking a cigar before the door of his wife's uncle's house in liverpool till the household should awake and let him in.' in june carlyle relates that they had a flying visit from jeffrey. 'a much more interesting visitor than jeffrey was old dr chalmers, who came down to us also last week, whom i had not seen before for, i think, five-and-twenty years. it was a pathetic meeting. the good old man is grown white-headed, but is otherwise wonderfully little altered--grave, deliberate, very gentle in his deportment, but with plenty too of soft energy; full of interest still for all serious things, full of real kindliness, and sensible even to honest mirth in a fair measure. he sate with us an hour and a half, went away with our blessings and affections. it is long since i have spoken to so _good_ and really pious-hearted and beautiful old man.' in a week or two chalmers was suddenly called away. 'i believe,' wrote carlyle to his mother, 'there is not in all scotland, or all europe, any such christian priest left. it will long be memorable to us, the little visit we had from him.' early in , the jew bill was before parliament, and the fate of it doubtful, narrates mr froude. baron rothschild wrote to ask carlyle to write a pamphlet in its favour, and intimated that he might name any sum which he liked to ask as payment. froude enquired how he answered. 'well,' he said, 'i had to tell him it couldn't be; but i observed, too, that i could not conceive why he and his friends, who were supposed to be looking out for the coming of shiloh, should be seeking seats in a gentile legislature.' froude asked what the baron said to that. 'why,' said carlyle, 'he seemed to think the coming of shiloh was a dubious business, and that meanwhile, etc., etc.' on february , , carlyle wrote in his journal: 'chapman's money [chapman & hall were his publishers] all paid, lodged now in the dumfries bank. new edition of "sartor" to be wanted soon. my poor books of late have yielded me a certain fluctuating annual income; at all events, i am quite at my ease as to money, and that on such low terms. i often wonder at the luxurious ways of the age. some £ , i think, is what has accumulated in the bank. of fixed income (from craigenputtock) £ a year. perhaps as much from my books may lie fixed amid the huge fluctuation (last year, for instance, it was £ : the year before, £ ; the year before that, about £ ; this year, again, it is like to be £ ; the next perhaps nothing--very fluctuating indeed)--some £ in all, and that amply suffices me. for my wife is the best of housewives; noble, too, in reference to the property, which is _hers_, which she has never once in the most distant way seemed to know to be hers. be this noted and remembered; my thrifty little lady--every inch a lady--ah me! in short, i authentically feel indifferent to money; would not go this way or that to gain more money.'[ ] the revolution of february th at paris surprised carlyle less than most of his contemporaries, as it confirmed what he had been saying for years. he did not believe, we are told, in immediate convulsion in england; but he did believe that, unless england took warning and mended her ways, her turn would come. the excitement in london was intense, and leading men expressed themselves freely, but carlyle's general thoughts were uttered in a lengthy letter to thomas erskine of linlathen, for whom he entertained a warm regard. on march he met macaulay at lord mahon's at breakfast; 'niagara of eloquent commonplace talk,' he says, 'from macaulay. "very good-natured man"; man cased in official mail of proof; stood my impatient fire-explosions with much patience, merely hissing a little steam up, and continued his niagara--supply and demand; power ruinous to powerful himself; _im_possibility of government doing more than keep the peace; suicidal distraction of new french republic, etc. essentially irremediable, commonplace nature of the man; all that was in him now gone to the tongue; a squat, thickset, low-browed, short, grizzled little man of fifty.' one of the few men carlyle was anxious to see was sir robert peel. he was introduced by the barings at a dinner at bath house. carlyle sat next to peel, whom he describes as 'a finely-made man of strong, not heavy, rather of elegant, stature; stands straight, head slightly thrown back, and eyelids modestly drooping; every way mild and gentle, yet with less of that fixed smile than the portraits give him. he is towards sixty, and, though not broken at all, carries, especially in his complexion, when you are _near_ him, marks of that age; clear, strong blue eyes which kindle on occasion, voice extremely good, low-toned, something of _cooing_ in it, rustic, affectionate, honest, mildly persuasive. spoke about french revolutions new and old; well read in all that; had seen general dumouriez; reserved seemingly by nature, obtrudes nothing of _diplomatic_ reserve. on the contrary, a vein of mild _fun_ in him, real sensibility to the ludicrous, which feature i liked best of all.... i consider him by far our first public man--which, indeed, is saying little--and hope that england in these frightful times may still get some good of him. n.b.--this night with peel was the night in which berlin city executed its last terrible battle, ( th of march to sunday morning the th, five o'clock.) while we sate there the streets of berlin city were all blazing with grape-shot and the war of enraged men. what is to become of all that? i have a book to write about it. alas! we hear of a great chartist petition to be presented by , men. people here keep up their foolish levity in speaking of these things; but considerate persons find them to be very grave; and indeed all, even the laughers, are in considerable secret alarm.'[ ] at such a time carlyle knew that he, the author of _chartism_, ought to say something. foolish people, too, came pressing for his opinions. not seeing his way to a book upon 'democracy,' he wrote a good many newspaper articles, chiefly in the _examiner_ and the _spectator_, to deliver his soul. even fonblanque and rintoul (the editors), remarks froude, friendly though they were to him, could not allow him his full swing. 'there is no established journal,' complained carlyle, 'that can stand my articles, no single one they would not blow the bottom out of.' on july occurs this entry in his journal: 'chartist concern, and irish repeal concern, and french republic concern have all gone a bad way since the march entry--april (immortal day already dead), day of chartist monster petition; , special constables swore themselves in, etc., and chartism came to nothing. riots since, but the leaders all lodged in gaol, tried, imprisoned for two years, etc., and so ends chartism for the present. irish mitchel, poor fellow! is now in bermuda as a felon; letter from him, letter to him, letter to and from lord clarendon--was really sorry for poor mitchel. but what help? french republic _cannonaded_ by general cavaignac; a sad outlook there.'[ ] carlyle's _cromwell_ had created a set of enthusiastic admirers who were bent on having a statue of the great protector set up. carlyle was asked to give his sanction to the proposal. writing to his mother, he said: 'the people having subscribed £ , for a memorial to an ugly bullock of a hudson, who did not even pretend to have any merit except that of being suddenly rich, and who is now discovered to be little other than at heart a horse-coper and dishonest fellow, i think they ought to leave cromwell alone of their memorials, and try to honour him in some more profitable way--by learning to be honest men like him, for example. but we shall see what comes of all this cromwell work--a thing not without value either.'[ ] 'ireland,' says froude, 'of all the topics on which carlyle had meditated writing, remained painfully fascinating. he had looked at the beggarly scene, he had seen the blighted fields, the ragged misery of the wretched race who were suffering for other's sins as well as for their own. since that brief visit of his, the famine had been followed by the famine-fever, and the flight of millions from a land which was smitten with a curse. those ardent young men with whom he had dined at dundrum were working as felons in the docks at bermuda. gavan duffy, after a near escape from the same fate, had been a guest in cheyne row; and the story which he had to tell of cabins torn down by crowbars, and shivering families, turned out of their miserable homes, dying in the ditches by the roadside, had touched carlyle to the very heart. he was furious at the economical commonplaces with which england was consoling itself. he regarded ireland as "the breaking-point of the huge suppuration which all british and all european society then was."'[ ] carlyle paid a second visit to ireland. he was anxious to write a book on the subject. he noted down what he had seen, and 'then dismissed the unhappy subject from his mind,' giving his manuscript to a friend, which was published after his death. the th of august found carlyle among his 'ain folk' at scotsbrig, and this was his soliloquy: 'thank heaven for the sight of real human industry, with human fruits from it, once more. the sight of fenced fields, weeded crops, and human creatures with whole clothes on their back--it was as if one had got into spring water out of dunghill puddles.' mrs carlyle had also gone to scotland, and 'wandered like a returned spirit about the home of her childhood.' of her numerous lively letters, room must be found for a characteristic epistle to her brother-in-law, john carlyle. his translation of dante's _inferno_ was just out, and her uncle's family at auchtertool manse, in fife, where she was staying, were busy reading and discussing it. 'we had been talking about you,' she says, 'and had sunk silent. suddenly my uncle turned his head to me and said, shaking it gravely, "he has made an awesome plooster o' that place." "who? what place, uncle?" "whew! the place ye'll maybe gang to, if ye dinna tak' care." i really believe he considers all those circles of your invention. walter [a cousin, just ordained] performed the marriage service over a couple of colliers the day after i came. i happened to be in his study when they came in, and asked leave to remain. the man was a good-looking man enough, dreadfully agitated, partly with the business he was come on, partly with drink. he had evidently taken a glass too much to keep his heart up. the girl had one very large inflamed eye and one little one, which looked perfectly composed, while the large eye stared wildly, and had a tear in it. walter married them very well indeed; and his affecting words, together with the bridegroom's pale, excited face, and the bride's ugliness, and the poverty, penury, and want imprinted on the whole business, and above all fellow-feeling with the poor wretches then rushing on their fate--all that so overcame me that i fell crying as desperately as if i had been getting married to the collier myself, and, when the ceremony was over, extended my hand to the unfortunates, and actually (in such an enthusiasm of pity did i find myself) i presented the new husband with a snuff-box which i happened to have in my hand, being just about presenting it to walter when the creatures came in. this unexpected _himmelsendung_ finished turning the man's head; he wrung my hand over and over, leaving his mark for some hours after, and ended his grateful speeches with, "oh, miss! oh, liddy! may ye hae mair comfort and pleasure in your life than ever you have had yet!" which might easily be.' carlyle was full of wrath at what he considered the cant about the condition of the wage-earners in manchester and elsewhere, and his indignation found vent in the _latter-day pamphlets_. froude once asked him if he had ever thought of going into parliament, for the former knew that the opportunity must have been offered him. 'well,' he said, 'i did think of it at the time of the "latter-day pamphlets." i felt that nothing could prevent me from getting up in the house and saying all that.' 'he was powerful,' adds froude, 'but he was not powerful _enough_ to have discharged with his single voice the vast volume of conventional electricity with which the collective wisdom of the nation was, and remains charged. it is better that his thoughts should have been committed to enduring print, where they remain to be reviewed hereafter by the light of fact.'[ ] the printing of the _pamphlets_ commenced at the beginning of , and went on month after month, each separately published, no magazine daring to become responsible for them. when the _pamphlets_ appeared, they were received with 'astonished indignation.' 'carlyle taken to whisky,' was the popular impression--or perhaps he had gone mad. '_punch_,' says froude, 'the most friendly to him of all the london periodicals, protested affectionately. the delinquent was brought up for trial before him, i think for injuring his reputation. he was admonished, but stood impenitent, and even "called the worthy magistrate a windbag and a sham." i suppose it was thackeray who wrote this; or some other kind friend, who feared, like emerson, "that the world would turn its back on him." he was under no illusion himself as to the effect which he was producing.'[ ] amid the general storm, carlyle was 'agreeably surprised' to receive an invitation to dine with peel at whitehall gardens, where he met a select company. 'after all the servants but the butler were gone,' narrates carlyle, 'we began to hear a little of peel's quiet talk across the table, unimportant, distinguished by its sense of the ludicrous shining through a strong official _rationality_ and even seriousness of temper. distracted _address_ of a letter from somebody to queen victoria; "the most noble george victoria, queen of england, knight and baronet," or something like that. a man had once written to peel himself, while secretary, "that he was weary of life, that if any gentleman wanted for his park-woods a hermit, he, etc.", all of which was very pretty and human as peel gave it us.'[ ] carlyle was driven home by the bishop of oxford, 'soapy sam' wilberforce, whom he had probably met before at the ashburton's. the bishop once told froude that he considered carlyle a most eminently religious man. 'ah, sam,' said carlyle to froude one day, 'he is a very clever fellow; i do not hate him near as much as i fear i ought to do.' carlyle and peel met once more, at bath house, and there, too, he was first introduced to the duke of wellington. writing at the time, carlyle said: 'i had never seen till now how beautiful, and what an expression of graceful simplicity, veracity, and nobleness there is about the old hero when you see him close at hand.... except for dr chalmers, i have not for many years seen so beautiful an old man.' carlyle intended, some time or other, writing a 'life of sterling,' but meanwhile he accepted an invitation to visit south wales. thence he made his way to scotsbrig. on the th september , he 'parted sorrowfully with his mother.' when he reached london, the autumn quarterlies were reviewing the _pamphlets_, and the 'shrieking tone was considerably modified.' 'a review of them,' says froude, 'by masson in the _north british_ distinctly pleased carlyle. a review in the _dublin_ he found "excellently serious," and conjectured that it came from some anglican pervert or convert. it was written, i believe, by dr ward.' after a few more wanderings, carlyle set about the _life of sterling_, and on april , , he informs his mother: 'i told the doctor about "john sterling's life," a small, insignificant book or pamphlet i have been writing. the booksellers got it away from me the other morning, to see how much there is of it, in the first place. i know not altogether myself whether it is worth printing or not, but rather think it will be the end of it whether or not. it has cost little trouble, and need not do much ill, if it do no great amount of good.' another visit had to be paid to scotsbrig, where he read the "life of chalmers." 'an excellent christian man,' he said. 'about as great a contrast to himself in all ways as could be found in these epochs under the same sky.' when he got back to cheyne row, he took to reading the "seven years' war," with a view to another book. he determined to go to germany, and on august , , carlyle embarked 'on board the greasy little wretch of a leith steamer, laden to the water's edge with pig-iron and herrings.' the journey over, he set to work on 'frederick,' but was driven almost to despair by the cock-crowing in his neighbourhood. writing to mrs carlyle, he says: 'i foresee in general these cocks will require to be abolished, entirely silenced, whether we build the new room or not. i would cheerfully shoot them, and pay the price if discovered, but i have no gun, should be unsafe for hitting, and indeed seldom see the wretched animals.' he took refuge at the ashburton's house, the grange, but on the th of december, news came that his mother was seriously ill, and could not last long. he hurried off to scotsbrig, and reached there in time to see her once more alive. in his journal, this passage is to be found under date january , : 'the stroke has fallen. my dear old mother is gone from me, and in the winter of the year, confusedly under darkness of weather and of mind, the stern final epoch--_epoch of old age_--is beginning to unfold itself for me.... it is matter of perennial thankfulness to me, and beyond my desert in that matter very far, that i found my dear old mother still alive; able to recognise me with a faint joy; her former _self_ still strangely visible there in all its lineaments, though worn to the uttermost thread. the brave old mother and the good, whom to lose had been my fear ever since intelligence awoke in me in this world, arrived now at the final bourn.... she was about years of age, and could not with advantage to any side remain with us longer. surely it was a good power that gave us such a mother; and good though stern that took her away from amid such grief and labour by a death beautiful to one's thoughts. "all the days of my appointed time will i wait till my change come." this they heard her muttering, and many other less frequent pious texts and passages. amen, amen! sunday, december , --a day henceforth for ever memorable to me.... to live for the shorter or longer remainder of my days with the simple bravery, veracity, and piety of her that is gone: that would be a right learning from her death, and a right honouring of her memory. but alas all is yet _frozen_ within me; even as it is without me at present, and i have made little or no way. god be helpful to me! i myself am very weak, confused, fatigued, entangled in poor _worldlinesses_ too. newspaper paragraphs, even as this sacred and peculiar thing, are not indifferent to me. weak soul! and i am fifty-eight years old, and the tasks i have on hand, frederick, &c., are most ungainly, incongruous with my mood--and the night cometh, for me too is not distant, which for her is come. i must try, i must try. poor brother jack! will he do his dante now? for him also i am sad; and surely he has deserved gratitude in these last years from us all.'[ ] when he returned to london, carlyle lived in strict seclusion, making repeated efforts at work on what he called 'the unexecutable book,' _frederick_. in the spring of , tidings reached carlyle of the death of professor wilson. between them there had never been any cordial relation, says froude. 'they had met in edinburgh in the old days; on carlyle's part there had been no backwardness, and wilson was not unconscious of carlyle's extraordinary powers. but he had been shy of carlyle, and carlyle had resented it, and now this april the news came that wilson was gone, and carlyle had to write his epitaph. 'i knew his figure well,' wrote carlyle in his journal on april ; 'remember well first seeing him in princes street on a bright april afternoon--probably --exactly forty years ago.... a tall ruddy figure, with plenteous blonde hair, with bright blue eyes, fixed, as if in haste towards some distant object, strode rapidly along, clearing the press to the left of us, close by the railings, near where blackwood's shop now is. westward he in haste; we slowly eastward. campbell whispered me, "that is wilson of the _isle of palms_," which poem i had not read, being then quite mathematical, scientific, &c., for extraneous reasons, as i now see them to have been. the broad-shouldered stately bulk of the man struck me; his flashing eye, copious, dishevelled head of hair, and rapid, unconcerned progress, like that of a plough through stubble. i really liked him, but only from the distance, and thought no more of him. it must have been fourteen years later before i once saw his figure again, and began to have some distant straggling acquaintance of a personal kind with him. glad could i have been to be better and more familiarly acquainted; but though i liked much in him, and he somewhat in me, it would not do. he was always very kind to me, but seemed to have a feeling i should--could--not become wholly his, in which he was right, and that on other terms he could not have me; so we let it so remain, and for many years--indeed, even after quitting edinburgh--i had no acquaintance with him; occasionally got symptoms of his ill-humour with me--ink-spurts in _blackwood_, read or heard of, which i, in a surly, silent manner, strove to consider _flattering_ rather.... so far as i can recollect, he was once in my house (comely bank, with a testimonial, poor fellow!), and i once in his, de quincey, &c., a little while one afternoon.'[ ] on september , , carlyle breaks out in his journal: '"the harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved."' what a fearful word! i cannot find how to take up that miserable "frederick," or what on earth to do with it.' he worked hard at it, nevertheless, for eighteen months, and by the end of may , the first instalment was all in type. froude remarks that a fine critic once said to him that carlyle's friedrich wilhelm was as peculiar and original as sterne's tristram shandy; certainly as distinct a personality as exists in english fiction. carlyle made a second journey to germany. shortly after his return, the already finished volumes of _frederick_ appeared, and they met with an immediate welcome. the success was great; copies were sold at the first issue, and a second were disposed of almost as rapidly, and a third followed. mrs carlyle's health being unsatisfactory, carlyle took a house for the summer at humbie, near aberdour in fife. they returned to cheyne row in october, neither of them benefited by their holiday in the north. while many of carlyle's intimate friends were passing away, he formed ruskin's acquaintance, which turned out mutually satisfactory. on the rd april , carlyle writes to his brother john: 'friday last i was persuaded--in fact had unwarily compelled myself, as it were--to a lecture of ruskin's at the institution, albemarle street. lecture on tree leaves as physiological, pictorial, moral, symbolical objects. a crammed house, but tolerable to me even in the gallery. the lecture was thought to "break down," and indeed it quite did "_as a lecture_"; but only did from _embarras des richesses_--a rare case. ruskin did blow asunder as by gunpowder explosions his leaf notions, which were manifold, curious, genial; and, in fact, i do not recollect to have heard in that place any neatest thing i liked so well as this chaotic one.'[ ] _frederick_ was progressing, though slowly, as he found the ore in the german material at his disposal "nowhere smelted out of it." the third volume was finished and published in the summer of ; the fourth volume was getting into type; and the fifth and last was finished in january . 'it nearly killed me,' carlyle writes in his journal, 'it, and my poor jane's dreadful illness, now happily over. no sympathy could be found on earth for those horrid struggles of twelve years, nor happily was any needed. on sunday evening in the end of january ( ) i walked out, with the multiplex feeling--joy not very prominent in it, but a kind of solemn thankfulness traceable, that i had written the last sentence of that unutterable book, and, contrary to many forebodings in bad hours, had actually got done with it for ever.' in england it was at once admitted, says froude, that a splendid addition had been made to the national literature. 'the book contained, if nothing else, a gallery of historical figures executed with a skill which placed carlyle at the head of literary portrait painters.... no critic, after the completion of _frederick_, challenged carlyle's right to a place beside the greatest of english authors, past or present.' the work was translated instantly into german, calling forth the warmest appreciation. footnotes: [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. p. . [ ] froude's "life in london," vol. i. pp. - . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. pp. - . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. p. . [ ] ibid., vol. i. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. i. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . [ ] ibid., vol. ii. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. pp. - . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. pp. - . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . chapter vi rectorial address--death of mrs carlyle after a round of holiday visits, including one to annandale, the carlyles settled down once more at cheyne row in the summer of . 'the great outward event of carlyle's own life,' observes froude, 'scotland's public recognition of him, was now lying close ahead. this his wife was to live to witness as her final happiness in this world.' here is an eloquent passage from the same pen: 'i had been at edinburgh,' writes froude, 'and had heard gladstone make his great oration on homer there, on retiring from office as rector. it was a grand display. i never recognised before what oratory could do; the audience being kept for three hours in a state of electric tension, bursting every moment into applause. nothing was said which seemed of moment when read deliberately afterwards; but the voice was like enchantment, and the street, when we left the building, was ringing with a prolongation of cheers. perhaps in all britain there was not a man whose views on all subjects, in heaven and earth, less resembled gladstone's than those of the man whom this same applauding multitude elected to take his place. the students too, perhaps, were ignorant how wide the contradiction was; but if they had been aware of it they need not have acted differently. carlyle had been one of themselves. he had risen from among them--not by birth or favour, not on the ladder of any established profession, but only by the internal force that was in him--to the highest place as a modern man of letters. in _frederick_ he had given the finish to his reputation; he stood now at the summit of his fame; and the edinburgh students desired to mark their admiration in some signal way. he had been mentioned before, but he had declined to be nominated, for a party only were then in his favour. on this occasion, the students were unanimous, or nearly so. his own consent was all that was wanting.'[ ] this consent was obtained, and carlyle was chosen rector of edinburgh university. but the address troubled him. he resolved, however, as his father used to say, to 'gar himself go through with the thing,' or at least to try. froude says he was very miserable, but that mrs carlyle 'kept up his spirits, made fun of his fears, bantered him, encouraged him, herself at heart as much alarmed as he was, but conscious, too, of the ridiculous side of it.' she thought of accompanying him, but her health would not permit of the effort. both huxley and tyndall were going down, and tyndall promised mrs carlyle to take care of her husband. on monday morning, the th of march, , carlyle and his wife parted. 'the last i saw of her,' he said, 'was as she stood with her back to the parlour door to bid me good-bye. she kissed me twice, she me once, i her a second time.' they parted for ever. edinburgh was reached in due course, and what happened there had best be told by an eye-witness, professor masson. 'on the night following carlyle's arrival in town,' he says, 'after he had settled himself in mr erskine of linlathen's house, where he was to stay during his visit, he and his brother john came to my house in rosebery crescent, that they might have a quiet smoke and talk over matters. they sat with me an hour or more, carlyle as placid and hearty as could be, talking most pleasantly, a little dubious, indeed, as to how he might get through his address, but for the rest unperturbed. as to the address itself, when the old man stood up in the music hall before the assembled crowd, and threw off his rectorial robes, and proceeded to speak, slowly, connectedly, and nobly raising his left hand at the end of each section or paragraph to stroke the back of his head as he cogitated what he was to say next, the crowd listening as they had never listened to a speaker before, and reverent even in those parts of the hall where he was least audible,--who that was present will ever forget that sight? that day, and on the subsequent days of his stay, there were, of course, dinners and other gatherings in carlyle's honour. one such dinner, followed by a larger evening gathering, was in my house. then, too, he was in the best of possible spirits, courteous in manner and in speech to all, and throwing himself heartily into whatever turned up. at the dinner-table, i remember, lord neaves favoured us with one or two of his humorous songs or recitatives, including his clever quiz called "stuart mill on mind and matter," written to the tune of "roy's wife of aldivalloch." no one enjoyed the thing more than carlyle; and he surprised me by doing what i had never heard him do before,--actually joining with his own voice in the chorus. "stuart mill on mind and matter, stuart mill on mind and matter," he chaunted laughingly along with lord neaves every time the chorus came round, beating time in the air emphatically with his fist. it was hardly otherwise, or only otherwise inasmuch as the affair was more ceremonious and stately, at the dinner given to him in the douglas hotel by the senatus academicus, and in which his old friend sir david brewster presided. there, too, while dignified and serene, carlyle was thoroughly sympathetic and convivial. especially i remember how he relished and applauded the songs of our academic laureate and matchless chief in such things, professor douglas maclagan, and how, before we broke up, he expressly complimented professor maclagan on having "contributed so greatly to the hilarity of the evening."'[ ] the most graphic account of carlyle's installation as lord rector is that by alexander smith, the author of 'a life drama,' 'summer in skye,' &c., &c., whose lamented death took place a few months after that event. 'curious stories,' he wrote, 'are told of the eagerness on every side manifested to hear mr carlyle. country clergymen from beyond aberdeen came to edinburgh for the sole purpose of hearing and seeing. gentlemen came down from london by train the night before, and returned to london by train the night after. nay, it was even said that an enthusiast, dwelling in the remote west of ireland, intimated to the officials who had charge of the distribution, that if a ticket should be reserved for him, he would gladly come the whole way to edinburgh. let us hope a ticket _was_ reserved. on the day of the address, the doors of the music hall were besieged long before the hour of opening had arrived; and loitering about there on the outskirts of the crowd, one could not help glancing curiously down pitt street, towards the "lang toun of kirkcaldy," dimly seen beyond the forth; for on the sands there, in the early years of the century, edward irving was accustomed to pace up and down solitarily, and "as if the sands were his own," people say, who remember, when they were boys, seeing the tall, ardent, black-haired, swift-gestured, squinting man, often enough. and to kirkcaldy, too, ... came young carlyle from edinburgh college, wildly in love with german and mathematics; and the schoolroom in which these men taught, although incorporated in provost swan's manufactory, is yet kept sacred and intact, and but little changed these fifty years--an act of hero-worship for which the present and other generations may be thankful. it seemed to me that so glancing fife-wards, and thinking of that noble friendship--of the david and jonathan of so many years agone--was the best preparation for the man i was to see, and the speech i was to hear. david and jonathan! jonathan stumbled and fell on the dark hills, not of gilboa, but of vanity; and david sang his funeral song: "but for him i had never known what the communion of man with man means. his was the freest, brotherliest, bravest human soul mine ever came in contact with. i call him, on the whole, the best man i have ever, after trial enough, found in this world, or now hope to find." 'in a very few minutes after the doors were opened, the large hall was filled in every part; and when up the central passage the principal, the lord rector, the members of the senate, and other gentlemen advanced towards the platform, the cheering was vociferous and hearty. the principal occupied the chair, of course; the lord rector on his right, the lord provost on his left. when the platform gentlemen had taken their seats, every eye was fixed on the rector. to all appearance, as he sat, time and labour had dealt tenderly with him. his face had not yet lost the country bronze which he brought up with him from dumfriesshire as a student, fifty-six years ago. his long residence in london had not touched his annandale look, nor had it--as we soon learned--touched his annandale accent. his countenance was striking, homely, sincere, truthful--the countenance of a man on whom "the burden of the unintelligible world" had weighed more heavily than on most. his hair was yet almost dark; his moustache and short beard were iron-grey. his eyes were wide, melancholy, sorrowful; and seemed as if they had been at times a-weary of the sun. altogether, in his aspect there was something aboriginal, as of a piece of unhewn granite, which had never been polished to any approved pattern, whose natural and original vitality had never been tampered with. in a word, there seemed no passivity about mr carlyle; he was the diamond, and the world was his pane of glass; he was a graving tool, rather than a thing graven upon--a man to set his mark on the world--a man on whom the world could not set _its_ mark.... the proceedings began by the conferring of the degree of ll.d. on mr erskine of linlathen--an old friend of mr carlyle's--on professors huxley, tyndall, and ramsay, and on dr rae, the arctic explorer. that done, amid a tempest of cheering and hats enthusiastically waved, mr carlyle, slipping off his rectorial robe--which must have been a very shirt of nessus to him--advanced to the table, and began to speak in low, wavering, melancholy tones, which were in accordance with the melancholy eyes, and in the annandale accent with which his play-fellows must have been familiar long ago. so self-centred was he, so impregnable to outward influences, that all his years of edinburgh and london life could not impair, even in the slightest degree, _that_. the opening sentences were lost in the applause, and when it subsided, the low, plaintive, quavering voice was heard going on: "your enthusiasm towards me is very beautiful in itself, however undeserved it may be in regard to the object of it. it is a feeling honourable to all men, and one well known to myself when in a position analogous to your own." and then came the carlylean utterance, with its far-reaching reminiscence and sigh over old graves--father's and mother's, edward irving's, john sterling's, charles buller's, and all the noble known in past time--and with its flash of melancholy scorn. "there are now fifty-six years gone, last november, since i first entered your city, a boy of not quite fourteen--fifty-six years ago--to attend classes here, and gain knowledge of all kinds, i knew not what--with feelings of wonder and awe-struck expectation; and now, after a long, long course, this is what we have come to.... there is something touching and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see the third generation, as it were, of my dear old native land, rising up, and saying: well, you are not altogether an unworthy labourer in the vineyard. you have toiled through a great variety of fortunes, and have had many judges." and thereafter, without aid of notes, or paper preparation of any kind, in the same wistful, earnest, hesitating voice, and with many a touch of quaint humour by the way, which came in upon his subject like glimpses of pleasant sunshine, the old man talked to his vast audience about the origin and function of universities, the old greeks and romans, oliver cromwell, john knox, the excellence of silence as compared with speech, the value of courage and truthfulness, and the supreme importance of taking care of one's health. "there is no kind of achievement you could make in the world that is equal to perfect health. what to it are nuggets and millions? the french financier said, 'alas! why is there no sleep to be sold?' sleep was not in the market at any quotation." but what need of quoting a speech which by this time has been read by everybody? appraise it as you please, it was a thing _per se_. just as, if you wish a purple dye, you must fish up the murex; if you wish ivory, you must go to the east; so if you desire an address such as edinburgh listened to the other day, you must go to chelsea for it. it may not be quite to your taste, but, in any case, there is no other intellectual warehouse in which that kind of article is kept in stock.'[ ] another eye-witness, mr moncure d. conway, says: 'when carlyle sat down there was an audible sound, as of breath long held, by all present; then a cry from the students, an exultation; they rose up, all arose, waving their arms excitedly; some pressed forward, as if wishing to embrace him, or to clasp his knees; others were weeping; what had been heard that day was more than could be reported; it was the ineffable spirit that went forth from the deeps of a great heart and from the ages stored up in it, and deep answered unto deep.' immediately after the delivery of the address, tyndall telegraphed to mrs carlyle this brief message, 'a perfect triumph.' that evening she dined at forster's, where she met dickens and wilkie collins. they drank carlyle's health, and to her it was 'a good joy.' it was carlyle's intention to have returned at once to london, but he changed his mind, and went for a few quiet days at scotsbrig. when tyndall was back in london mrs carlyle got all the particulars of the rectorial address from him, and was made perfectly happy about it. numberless congratulations poured in upon mrs carlyle, and for saturday, april st, she had arranged a small tea-party. in the morning she wrote her daily letter to carlyle, and in the afternoon she went out in her brougham for a drive, taking her little dog with her. when near victoria gate, hyde park, she put the dog out to run. 'a passing carriage,' says froude, 'went over its foot.... she sprang out, caught the dog in her arms, took it with her into the brougham, and was never more seen alive. the coachman went twice round the drive, by marble arch down to stanhope gate, along the serpentine and round again. coming a second time near to the achilles statue, and surprised to receive no directions, he turned round, saw indistinctly that something was wrong, and asked a gentleman near to look into the carriage. the gentleman told him briefly to take the lady to st. george's hospital, which was not yards distant. she was sitting with her hands folded in her lap _dead_.'[ ] at the hour she died carlyle was enjoying the 'green solitudes and fresh spring breezes' of annandale, 'quietly but far from happily.' about nine o'clock the same night his brother-in-law, mr aitken, broke the news to him. 'i was sitting in sister jean's at dumfries,' carlyle wrote a fortnight after, 'thinking of my railway journey to chelsea on monday, and perhaps of a sprained ankle i had got at scotsbrig two weeks or so before, when the fatal telegrams, two of them in succession, came. it had a kind of _stunning_ effect upon me. not for above two days could i estimate the immeasurable depths of it, or the infinite sorrow which had peeled my life all bare, and in a moment shattered my poor world to universal ruin. they took me out next day to wander, as was medically needful, in the green sunny sabbath fields, and ever and anon there rose from my sick heart the ejaculation, "my poor little woman!" but no full gust of tears came to my relief, nor has yet come. will it ever? a stony "woe's me, woe's me!" sometimes with infinite tenderness and pity, not for myself, is my habitual mood hitherto.'[ ] on monday morning carlyle and his brother john set off for london. on the wednesday he was on his way to haddington with the remains, his brother and john forster accompanying him. at p.m. on thursday the funeral took place. 'in the nave of the old abbey kirk,' wrote her disconsolate husband, 'long a ruin, now being saved from further decay, with the skies looking down on her, there sleeps my little jeannie, and the light of her face will never shine on me more.' when mr conway saw him on his return to cheyne row, carlyle said, 'whatever triumph there may have been in that now so darkly overcast day, was indeed _hers_. long, long years ago, she took her place by the side of a poor man of humblest condition, against all other provisions for her, undertook to share his lot for weal or woe; and in that office what she has been to him and done for him, how she has placed, as it were, velvet between him and all the sharp angularities of existence, remains now only in the knowledge of one man, and will presently be finally hid in his grave.' as he touchingly expressed it in the beautiful epitaph he wrote, the 'light of his life' had assuredly 'gone out.' universal sympathy was felt for the bereaved husband, and he was very much affected by 'a delicate, graceful, and even affectionate' message from the queen, conveyed by lady augusta stanley through his brother john. one who knew mrs carlyle intimately thus speaks of her: 'her intellect was as clear and incisive as his, yet altogether womanly in character; her heart was as truthful, and her courage as unswerving. she was a wife in the noblest sense of that sacred name. she had a gift of literary expression as unique as his; as tender a sympathy with human sorrow and need; as clear an eye for all conventional hypocrisies and folly; as vivid powers of description and illustration; and also, it must be confessed, when the spirit of mockery was strong upon her, as keen an edge to her flashing wit and humour, and as scornful a disregard of the conventional proprieties. but she was no literary hermaphrodite. she never intellectually strode forth before the world upon masculine stilts; nor, in private life, did she frowardly push to the front, in the vanity of showing she was as clever and considerable as her husband. she longed, with a true woman's longing heart, to be appreciated by him, and by those she loved; and, for her, all extraneous applause might whistle with the wind. but if her husband was a king in literature, so might she have been a queen. her influence with him for good cannot be questioned by any one having eyes to discern. and if she sacrificed her own vanity for personal distinction, in order to make his work possible for him, who shall say she did not choose the nobler and better part?'[ ] on the other hand, carlyle was too exacting, and when domestic differences arose he abstained from paying those little attentions which a delicate and sensitive woman might naturally expect from a husband who was so lavish of terms of endearment in the letters he wrote to her when away from her side. 'even with that mother whom he so dearly loved,' observes mrs ireland, 'the intercourse was mainly composed of a silent sitting by the fireside of an evening in the old "houseplace," with a tranquillising pipe of tobacco, or of his returning from his long rambles to a simple meal, partaken of in comparative silence; and now and then, at meeting or parting, some pious and earnest words from the good soul to her son.'[ ] and it never occurred to carlyle to act differently with his wife, who was pining for his society. in addition to all that, we have froude's brief but accurate diagnosis of carlyle's character. 'if,' he wrote, 'matters went well with himself, it never occurred to him that they could be going ill with any one else; and, on the other hand, if he was uncomfortable, he required everybody to be uncomfortable along with him.' there was a strong element of selfishness in that phase of carlyle's nature; and throughout his letters and journal he appears wholly wrapt up in himself and in his literary projects, without even a passing allusion to the courageous woman who had shared his lot. now and again we alight upon a passage where special mention is made of her efforts, but these have all a direct or indirect bearing upon _his_ work, _his_ plans, _his_ comforts.[ ] carlyle never fully realised what his wife had been to him until she was suddenly snatched from his side. and this was his testimony: 'i say deliberately, her part in the stern battle, and except myself none knows how stern, was brighter and braver than my own.' in one of those terrible moments of self-upbraiding the grief-stricken husband exclaims: 'blind and deaf that we are; oh, think, if thou yet love anybody living, wait not till death sweep down the paltry little dust-clouds and idle dissonances of the moment, and all be at last so mournfully clear and beautiful, _when it is too late_!' in a pamphlet quoted by mrs ireland we have a pathetic picture of carlyle in his lonely old age. a mr swinton, an american gentleman on a visit to this country, went to see the grave of mrs carlyle. in conversation the grave-digger said: 'mr carlyle comes here from london now and then to see this grave. he is a gaunt, shaggy, weird kind of old man, looking very old the last time he was here.' 'he is eighty-six now,' said i. 'ay,' he repeated, 'eighty-six, and comes here to this grave all the way from london.' and i told him that carlyle was a great man, the greatest man of the age in books, and that his name was known all over the world; but he thought there were other great men lying near at hand, though i told him their fame did not reach beyond the graveyard, and brought him back to talk of carlyle. 'mr carlyle himself,' said the gravedigger softly, 'is to be brought here to be buried with his wife. ay, he comes here lonesome and alone,' continued the gravedigger, 'when he visits the wife's grave. his niece keeps him company to the gate, but he leaves her there, and she stays there for him. the last time he was here i got a sight of him, and he was bowed down under his white hairs, and he took his way up by that ruined wall of the old cathedral, and round there and in here by the gateway, and he tottered up here to this spot.' softly spake the gravedigger, and paused. softer still, in the broad dialect of the lothians, he proceeded:--"and he stood here awhile in the grass, and then he kneeled down and stayed on his knees at the grave; then he bent over and i saw him kiss the ground--ay, he kissed it again and again, and he kept kneeling, and it was a long time before he rose and tottered out of the cathedral, and wandered through the graveyard to the gate, where his niece was waiting for him." this is the epitaph composed by carlyle, and engraved on the tombstone of dr john welsh in the chancel of haddington church:-- 'here likewise now rests jane welsh carlyle, spouse of thomas carlyle, chelsea, london. she was born at haddington, th july , only daughter of the above john welsh, and of grace welsh, capelgill, dumfriesshire, his wife. in her bright existence she had more sorrows than are common; but also a soft invincibility, a clearness of discernment, and a noble loyalty of heart which are rare. for forty years she was the true and ever-loving helpmate of her husband, and, by act and word, unweariedly forwarded him as none else could, in all of worthy that he did or attempted. she died at london, st april , suddenly snatched away from him, and the light of his life as if gone out.' footnotes: [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . [ ] masson's 'carlyle personally and in his writings,' pp. - . [ ] alexander smith's 'sketches and criticisms,' pp. - . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . [ ] larkin's 'carlyle and the open secret of his life,' pp. - . [ ] 'life of jane welsh carlyle,' pp. - . [ ] after reading the above estimate in the proof sheets, professor masson writes to me as follows:-- 'may i hint that, in the passage about his character and domestic relations, you seem hardly to do justice to the depths of real kindness and tenderness in him, and the actual _couthiness_ of his manner and fireside conversation in his most genial hours? he was delightful and loveable at such hours, with a fund of the raciest scottish humour.' this is a side of carlyle's nature which would naturally be hidden from the general reader, and from mr froude. it is easy to imagine how carlyle's genial humour, frozen at its source in the company of the solemnly pessimistic froude, should be thawed by the presence of 'a brither scot.' chapter vii last years and death of carlyle in presence of the pathetically tragic spectacle of carlyle in his old age, who can have the heart to enter into his domestic life and weigh with pedantic scales the old man's blameworthiness? carlyle survived his wife fifteen years. his brother john, himself a widower, was anxious that they should live together, but it was otherwise arranged. john returned to scotland, and carlyle remained alone in cheyne row. he was prevailed on to visit ripple court, near walmer, and on his return to london he wrote, 'my home is very gaunt and lonesome; but such is my allotment henceforth in this world. i have taken loyally to my vacant circumstances, and will try to do my best with them.' carlyle's first public appearance after his sore bereavement was as chairman of the eyre committee as a protest against governor eyre's recall. 'poor eyre!' he wrote to a correspondent, 'i am heartily sorry for him, and for the english nation, which makes such a dismal fool of itself. eyre, it seems, has fallen suddenly from £ a year into almost zero, and has a large family and needy kindred dependent on him. such his reward for saving the west indies, and hanging one incendiary mulatto, well worth the gallows, if i can judge.' carlyle accepted a pressing invitation to stay with the ashburtons at mentone, and on the nd of december he started thither with professor tyndall. he was greatly benefited in health, and at intervals made some progress with his _reminiscences_. he returned to london in march, and on the th of april he writes in his journal: 'idle! idle! my employments mere trifles of business, and that of dwelling on the days that culminated on the st of last year.' about this time his thoughts were directed to the estate of craigenputtock, of which he became absolute owner at his wife's death. all her relations on the father's side were dead, and as carlyle thought that it ought not to lapse to his own family, he determined to leave it to the university of edinburgh, 'the rents of it to be laid out in supporting poor and meritorious students there, under the title of "the john welsh bursaries." her name he could not give, because she had taken his own. therefore he gave her father's.' on june nd, he writes in his journal: 'finished off on thursday last, at three p.m. th of june, my poor _bequest_ of craigenputtock to edinburgh university for bursaries. all quite ready there, forster and froude as witnesses; the good professor masson, who had taken endless pains, alike friendly and wise, being at the very last objected to in the character of "witness," as "a party interested," said the edinburgh lawyer. i a little regretted this circumstance; so i think did masson secretly. he read us the deed with sonorous emphasis, bringing every word and note of it home to us. then i signed; then they two--masson witnessing only with his eyes and mind. i was deeply moved, as i well might be, but held my peace and shed no tears. _tears_ i think i have done with; never, except for moments together, have i wept for that catastrophe of april , to which whole days of weeping would have been in other times a blessed relief.... this is my poor "sweetheart abbey," "cor dulce," or new abbey, a sacred casket and _tomb_ for the sweetest "heart" which, in this bad, bitter world, was all my own. darling, darling! and in a little while we shall _both_ be at rest, and the great god will have done with us what was his will.'[ ] when the tories were preparing to 'dish the whigs' over the reform bill, carlyle felt impelled to write a pamphlet, which he called _shooting niagara, and after_. it was his final utterance on british politics. proof sheets and revisions for new editions of his works engrossed his attention for some time. he went annually to scotland, and devoted a great deal of time on his return to chelsea to the sorting and annotating of his wife's letters. early in the queen expressed a wish, through dean stanley, to become personally acquainted with carlyle. the meeting took place at westminster deanery: 'the queen,' carlyle said, 'was really very gracious and pretty in her demeanour throughout; rose greatly in my esteem by everything that happened; did not fall in any point. the interview was quietly very mournful to me; the one point of real interest, a sombre thought: "alas! how would it have cheered her, bright soul, for my sake, had she been there!"' when carlyle was in constant expectation of his end, he--in june --brought to mr froude's house a large parcel of papers. 'he put it in my hands,' says froude. 'he told me to take it simply and absolutely as my own, without reference to any other person or persons, and to do with it as i pleased after he was gone. he explained, when he saw me surprised, that it was an account of his wife's history, that it was incomplete, that he could himself form no opinion whether it ought to be published or not, that he could do no more to it, and must pass it over to me. he wished never to hear of it again. i must judge. i must publish it, the whole, or part--or else destroy it all, if i thought that this would be the wiser thing to do.'[ ] three years later carlyle sent to froude his own and his wife's private papers, journals, correspondence, reminiscences, and other documents. 'take them,' he said to froude, 'and do what you can with them. all i can say to you is, burn freely. if you have any affection for me, the more you burn the better.' mr froude burnt nothing, and it was well, he says, that he did not, for a year before his death he desired him, when he had done with the mss., to give them to his niece. 'the new task which had been laid upon me,' writes froude in his biography of carlyle, 'complicated the problem of the "letters and memorials." my first hope was, that, in the absence of further definite instructions from himself, i might interweave parts of mrs carlyle's letters with his own correspondence in an ordinary narrative, passing lightly over the rest, and touching the dangerous places only so far as was unavoidable. in this view i wrote at leisure the greatest part of "the first forty years" of his life. the evasion of the difficulty was perhaps cowardly, but it was not unnatural. i was forced back, however, into the straighter and better course.' the outcome of it all is too well-known to call for recapitulation here. in february , the emperor of germany conferred upon carlyle the order of merit which the great frederick had himself founded. he could not refuse it, but he remarked, 'were it ever so well meant, it can be of no value to me whatever. do thee neither ill na gude.' ten months later, mr disraeli, then premier, offered him the grand cross of the bath along with a pension. carlyle gracefully declined both. upon his th birthday, carlyle was presented with a gold medal from scottish friends and admirers, and with a letter from prince bismarck, both of which he valued highly. his last public act was to write a letter of three or four lines to the _times_, which he explains to his brother in this fashion: 'after much urgency and with a dead-lift effort, i have this day [ th may ] got issued through the _times_ a small indispensable deliverance on the turk and dizzy question. dizzy, it appears, to the horror of those who have any interest in him and his proceedings, has decided to have a new war for the turk against all mankind; and this letter hopes to drive a nail through his mad and maddest speculations on that side.' froude tells us that carlyle continued to read the bible, 'the significance of which' he found 'deep and wonderful almost as much as it ever used to be.' the bible and shakespeare remained 'the best books' to him that were ever written. the death of his brother john was a severe shock to carlyle, for they were deeply attached to each other. when he bequeathed craigenputtock to the university of edinburgh, john carlyle settled a handsome sum for medical bursaries there, to encourage poor students. 'these two brothers,' froude remarks, 'born in a peasant's home in annandale, owing little themselves to an alma mater which had missed discovering their merits, were doing for scotland's chief university what scotland's peers and merchants, with their palaces and deer forests and social splendour, had, for some cause, too imperfectly supplied.' in the autumn of , carlyle became very infirm; in january he was visibly sinking; and on the th of february , he passed away in his eighty-fifth year. in accordance with his expressed wishes, they buried him in the old kirkyard of ecclefechan with his own people. at his death carlyle's fame was at its zenith. a revulsion of feeling was caused by the publication of froude's _life of carlyle_ and the _reminiscences_. in regard to the former, great dissatisfaction was created by the somewhat unflattering portrait painted by froude. was froude justified in presenting to the public carlyle in all grim realism? the answer to this depends upon one's notions of literary ethics. the view of the average biographer is that he must suppress faults and give prominence to virtues. the result is that the majority of biographies are simply expanded funeral sermons; instead of a life-like portrait we have a glorified mummy. boswell's _johnson_ stands at the head of biographies; but, if boswell had followed the conventional method, his book would long since have passed into obscurity. it is open to dispute whether froude has not overdone the sombre elements in carlyle's life. readers of professor masson's little book, which shows carlyle in a more genially human mood, have good reason to suspect that froude has given too much emphasis to the rembrandtesque element in carlyle's life. in the main, however, froude's conception of biography was more correct than that of his critics. in dealing with the reputation of a great man it is not enough to consider the feelings of contemporaries; regard should be had to the rights of posterity. in his usual forcible manner johnson goes to the heart of this question when he says in the _rambler_:--'if the biographer writes from personal knowledge, and makes haste to gratify the public curiosity, there is danger lest his interest, his fear, his gratitude, or his tenderness overpower his fidelity, and tempt him to conceal, if not to invent. there are many who think it an act of piety to hide the faults or failings of their friends, even when they can no longer suffer by their detection; we therefore see whole ranks of characters adorned with uniform panegyric and not to be known from one another, but by extrinsic and casual circumstances. if we have regard to the memory of the dead, there is yet more respect to be paid to knowledge, to virtue, and to truth.' when johnson's own biography came to be written, boswell, in spite of the expostulation of friends, resolved to be guided closely by the literary ethics of his great hero. in reply to hannah more who begged that he would mitigate some of the asperities of johnson, boswell said, 'he would not cut off his claws, nor make a tiger a cat, to please anybody.' some critics have insinuated that froude took a curious kind of pleasure in smirching the idol. the insinuation is as unworthy as it is false. froude had resolved to paint carlyle as he was, warts and all, and all that can be said is that in his anxiety to avoid the charge of idealism he has given the warts undue prominence. footnotes: [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. p. . [ ] froude's 'life in london,' vol. ii. pp. - . chapter viii carlyle as a social and political thinker in his essay on carlyle, mr john morley utters a protest against the habit of labelling great men with names. after making every allowance for the waywardness of the men of intuitive and poetic insight, it remains true that between the speculative and the practical sides of a great thinker's mind there is a potent, though subtle, connection. for those who take the trouble of searching, there is discoverable such a connection between the speculative ideas of carlyle and his practical outlook upon civilisation. given a thinker who lays stress upon the emotional side of progress, and we have a thinker who will take for heroes men of mystical tendencies, of strong dominating passions, a thinker who will value progress not by the increase of worldly comfort, but by the increase in the number of magnetic, epoch-making personalities. naturally, we hear carlyle remark that the history of the world is at bottom the history of its great men. carlyle's fanatical adoption of intuitionalism has told banefully upon his work in sociology. trusting to his inner light, to what we might call mystical quakerism, carlyle has dispensed with a rational theory of progress. before a sociological problem, his attitude is not that of the patient thinker, but of the hysterical prophet, whose emotions find outlet in declamatory denunciation. like the prophets of old, carlyle tends towards pessimism. his golden age is in the past. when _past and present_ appeared, many earnest-minded men, captivated by the style and spirit of the book, hailed carlyle as a social reformer. as an attempt to solve the social problem, _past and present_ is not a success. carlyle could do no more than tell the modern to return to the spirit of the feudal period, when the people were led by the aristocracy. it showed considerable audacity on carlyle's part to come to the interpretation of history with no theory of progress, no message to the world beyond the vaguely declamatory one that those nations will be turned into hell which forget god. of what value is such writing as this, taken from the introduction to his _cromwell_?:--'here of our own land and lineage in english shape were heroes on the earth once more, who knew in every fibre and with heroic daring laid to heart that an almighty justice does verily rule this world, that it is good to fight on god's side, and bad to fight on the devil's side! the essence of all heroism and veracities that have been or will be.' this is simply a reproduction of jewish theocratic ideas; indeed, except for the details, carlyle might as readily have written a life of moses as of cromwell. in the eyes of carlyle, human life was what it was to bunyan, a kind of pilgrim's progress; only in the carlylean creed it is all battle and no victory, all valley of humiliation and no delectable mountain. naturally, where no stress is laid upon collective action, where individual reason is depreciated, progress is associated with the rise of abnormal individualities, men of strong wills like cromwell and frederick. with rousseau, carlyle appears to look upon civilisation as a disease. in one of his essays, _characteristics_, he goes near the roussean idea when he declaims against self-consciousness, and deliberately gives a preference to instinct. the uses of great men are to lead humanity away from introspection back to energetic, rude, instinctive action. when humanity will not listen to the voice of the prophets, it must be treated to whip and scorpion. it never dawned upon carlyle that the highest life, individual and collective, has roots in physical laws, that politico-economic forces must be reckoned with before social harmony can be reached. just as carlyle's idealism drove him into opposition to the utilitarian theory of morals, so it drove him into opposition to the utilitarian theory of society. out of his idealistic way of looking upon life there flowed a curious result. as early as _sartor resartus_ we find carlyle anticipating the evolutionary conception of society. spencer has familiarised us with the idea that society is an organism. the idea which he received from the germans that nature is not a mere mechanical collection of atoms, but the materialised expression of a spiritual unity--that idea carlyle extended to society. as he puts it in _sartor resartus_: 'yes, truly, if nature is one, and a living indivisible whole, much more is mankind, the image that reflects and creates nature, without which nature were not.... noteworthy also, and serviceable for the progress of this same individual, wilt thou find his subdivisions into generations. generations are as the days of toilsome mankind; death and birth are the vesper and the matin bells, that summon mankind to sleep, and to rise refreshed for new advancement. what the father has made, the son can make and enjoy; but has also work of his own appointed him. thus all things wax and roll onwards.... find mankind where thou wilt, thou findest it in living movement, in progress faster or slower; the phoenix soars aloft, hovers with outstretched wings, filling earth with her music; or as now, she sinks, and with spheral swan-song immolates herself in flame, that she may soar the higher and sing the clearer.' philosophies of civilisation have a tendency to beget fatalism. bent upon watching the resistless play of general laws, philosophers, in their admiration of the products, are apt to ignore the frightful suffering and waste involved in the process. society being an organism, a thing of development, the duty of thinkers is to demonstrate the nature of sociological laws, and allow them free scope for operation. to this is due much of the apparent hardness of eighteenth century political speculation, which, beginning with the french physiocratic school, culminated in the works of adam smith, ricardo, bentham, and the two mills. with those thinkers, the one palpable lesson of the past was the duty of abstaining from interference with the general process of social development. give man liberty, said the utilitarian radicals, and he will work out his own salvation: from the play of individual self-interest, social harmony will result. carlyle is frequently thought of as a conservative force in politics. in some respects he was more radical than the benthams and the mills. his deeper ideal conception of society intensified his dissatisfaction with society as it existed. in fact, to carlyle's attack upon those institutions, beliefs and ceremonies which had no better basis than mere unreasoning authority, most of the radicalism of the early 'forties' was due. conceive what effect language like this must have had upon thoughtful, high-souled young men: 'call ye that a society, where there is no longer any social idea extant; not so much as the idea of a common home, but only of a common overcrowded lodging-house? where each, isolated, regardless of his neighbour, turned against his neighbour, clutches what he can get, and cries "mine!" and calls it peace because, in the cut-purse and cut-throat scramble, no steel knives, but only a far cunninger sort, can be employed? where friendship, communion, has become an incredible tradition; and your holiest sacramental supper is a smoking tavern dinner, with cook for evangelist? where your priest has no tongue but for plate-licking; and your high guides and governors cannot guide; but on all hands hear it passionately proclaimed: _laissez faire_; leave us alone of your guidance, such light is darker than darkness; eat your wages and sleep. thus, too, must an observant eye discern everywhere that saddest spectacle: the poor perishing, like neglected, foundered draught-cattle, of hunger and overwork; the rich, still more wretchedly, of idleness, satiety, and overgrowth. the highest in rank, at length, without honour from the lowest; scarcely, with a little mouth-honour, as from tavern-waiters who expect to put it in the bill. once sacred symbols fluttering as empty pageants, whereof men grudge even the expense; a world becoming dismantled: in one word, the church fallen speechless, from obesity and apoplexy; the state shrunken into a police-office, straitened to get its pay!' it was when suggesting a remedy that carlyle's idealistic radicalism parted company with utilitarian radicalism. failing to see that society was in a transition period, a period so well described by herbert spencer as the movement from militarism to industrialism, in which there was a severe conflict of ideals, opinions, and interests, carlyle sought for the remedy in a return to a form of society which had been outgrown. there was surely something pathetically absurd in the spectacle of a great teacher endeavouring to cure social and political diseases by preaching the resuscitation of puritanism at a time when the intellect of the day was parting company with theocratic conceptions. equally absurd was it to offer as a remedy for social anarchy the despotism of ambitious rulers at a time when society was suffering from the effects of previous despotism. equally irrelevant was the attempt in _past and present_ to get reformers to model modern institutions on those of the middle ages. carlyle's remedy for the evils of liberty was a return to the apron-strings of despotism. carlyle, in fact, forgot his conception of society as a developing organism; he endeavoured to arrest progress at the autocratic stage, because of his ignorance of the laws of progress and his lack of sympathy with democratic ideas. still, the value of carlyle's political writings should not be overlooked. the utilitarian radicals laid themselves open to the charge of intellectual superstition. they worshipped human nature as a fetish. lacking clear views of social evolution, they overlooked the relativity of political terms. ignorant of the conception of human nature to which spencer has accustomed us, the old radicals treated it as a constant quantity which only needed liberty for its proper development. in their eagerness to discard theology, they discarded the truth of man's depravity which finds expression in the creed of the churches. we have changed all that. we now realise the fact that political institutions are good or bad, not as they stand or fall when tested by the first principles of a rationalistic philosophy, but as they harmonise or conflict with existing phases of human nature. if in the sphere of industrialism carlyle as a guide is untrustworthy, great is his merit as an inspirer. his influence was needed to counteract the cold prosaic narrowness of the utilitarian teaching. he called attention to an aspect of the economic question which the utilitarian radicals ignored, namely, the inadequacy of self-interest as a social bond. to carlyle is largely due the higher ethical conceptions and quickened sympathies which now exist in the spheres of social and industrial relationships. unhappily his implicit faith in intuitionalism led him to deride political economy and everything pertaining to man's material life. much there was in the writings of the economists to call for severe criticism, and if carlyle had treated the subject with discrimination he would have been a power for good; but he chose to pour the vials of his contempt upon political economy as a science, and upon modern industrial arrangements, with the result that many of the most intelligent students of sociology have been repelled from his writings. in this respect he contrasts very unfavourably with mill, who, notwithstanding the temptations to intellectual arrogance from his one-sided training, with quite a chivalrous regard for truth, was ever ready to accept light and leading from thinkers who differed from him in temperament and methods. there may be conflicting opinions as to which of the two men was intellectually the greater, but there can be no doubt that mill dwelt in an atmosphere of intellectual serenity and nobility far removed from the foggy turbulence in which carlyle lived, moved, and had his being. between the saintly apostle of progress and the barbaric representative of reaction there was a great gulf fixed. as was natural, the _latter-day pamphlets_ were treated as a series of political ravings. for that estimate carlyle himself was largely responsible. he deprived himself of the sympathy of intelligent readers by the violence of his invective and the lack of discrimination in his abuse. much of what carlyle said is to be found in mill's _representative government_, said, too, in a quiet, rational style, which commands attention and respect. mill, no more than carlyle, was a believer in mob rule. he did not think that the highest wisdom was to be had by the counting of heads. thinkers like mill and spencer did not deem it necessary to pour contempt on modern tendencies. they suggested remedies on the lines of these tendencies. they did not try to put back the hands on the clock of time; they sought to remove perturbing influences. much of the evil has arisen from men trying to do by political methods what should not be done by these methods. carlyle's idea that government should do this, that, and the other thing has wrought mischief, inasmuch as it has led to an undue belief in the virtues of government interference. his writings are largely responsible for the evils he predicted. it is curious to notice how, with all his belief in individualism, carlyle, in political matters, was unconsciously driven in the direction of socialism. get your great man, worship him, and render him obedience--such was the carlylean recipe for modern diseases. suppose the great man found, how is he to proceed? in these democratic days, he can only proceed by ruling despotically with the popular consent; in other words, there will follow a regime of paternalism and fraternalism, the practical outcome of which would be socialism. carlyle himself never suspected how childish was his conception of national life. he wrote of his great man theory as if it was a discovery, whereas the most advanced races had long since passed through it, and those which were not advanced were precisely those which had not been able to shake themselves free of paternal despotism. on this point the criticism of the late professor minto goes to the heart of the matter: 'carlyle's doctrines are the first suggestions of an earnest man, adhered to with unreasoning tenacity. as a rule, with no exception, that is worth naming, they take account mainly of one side of a case. he was too impatient of difficulties, and had too little respect for the wisdom and experience of others to submit to be corrected: opposition rather confirmed him in his own opinion. most of his practical suggestions had already been made before, and judged impracticable upon grounds which he could not, or would not, understand. his modes of dealing with pauperism and crime were in full operation under the despotism of henry vii. and henry viii. his theory of a hero-king, which means in practice an accidentally good and able man in a series of indifferent or bad despots, had been more frequently tried than any other political system; asia at this moment contains no government that is not despotic. his views in other departments of knowledge are also chiefly determined by the strength of his unreasoning impulses.' in his interesting _recollections_ mr espinasse states that during the time that carlyle was writing on the labour question, not a single blue-book was visible on his table! to carlyle's influence must be traced much of the sentimental treatment of social and industrial questions which has followed the unpopularity of political economy. it is only fair to carlyle to note, that at times he had qualms as to the superiority of his paternal theory of government over laissez faire. in one place he admits that even frederick could not have superintended the great emigration movement to such good effect as was done by the spontaneous efforts of nature. in the social sphere carlyle was false to his doctrine of spontaneity. in his early essays he was perpetually condemning mechanical interference with society, and contending that free play should be given to the dynamic agencies. untrue to himself and his creed, carlyle in his later books was constantly denouncing government for neglecting to apply mechanical remedies for social diseases. in his view, the duty of a ruler was not to work in harmony with social impulses, but to cut and carve institutions in harmony with the ideas of great men. puritanism under cromwell failed because it was forgotten that society is an organism, not a piece of clay, to be moulded according to the notions of heroic potters. strictly speaking, _frederick_ and _cromwell_ should be classed with the _latter day pamphlets_. in the _pamphlets_ carlyle declaims against democratic methods, and in _frederick_ and _cromwell_ we are presented with incarnations of autocratic methods. of all the critics of carlyle, no one has surpassed mr morley in indicating the mischievous effects which flow from the elevation of mere will power and emotional force into guides in social and political questions. as mr morley says: 'the dictates of a kind heart are of superior force to the maxims of political economy; swift and peremptory resolution is a safer guide than a balancing judgment. if the will works easily and surely, we may assume the rectitude of the moving impulse. all this is no caricature of a system which sets sentiment, sometimes hard sentiment, above reason and method. in other words, the writer who in these days has done more than anybody else to fire men's hearts with a feeling for right, and an eager desire for social activity, has, with deliberate contempt, thrust away from him the only instruments by which we can make sure what right is, and that our social action is effective. a born poet, only wanting perhaps a clearer feeling for form and a more delicate spiritual self-possession to have added another name to the illustrious band of english singers, he has been driven by the impetuosity of his sympathies to attack the scientific side of social questions in an imaginative and highly emotional manner.' had carlyle confined himself to description of social, industrial, and political diseases, he would have had an unsullied reputation in the sphere of spiritual dynamics, but flaws immediately appeared when he endeavoured to prescribe remedies. many of his remedies were too vague to be of use; where they were specific, they were so quixotic as to be useless. his proposals for dealing with labour and pauperism never imposed on any sensible man on this side of cloud-land. chapter ix carlyle as an inspirational force it is the misfortune of the critic, the historian, and the sociologist to be superseded. in the march of events the specialist is fated to be left behind. the influence of the inspirationalist is ever-enduring. as the present writer has elsewhere said:--carlyle has been called a prophet. the word in these days has only a vague meaning. probably carlyle earned the name in consequence of the oracular and denunciatory elements in his later writings. then, again, the word prophet has come to be associated with the thought of a foreteller of future events. a prophet in the true sense of the word is not one who foretells the future, but one who revives and keeps alive in the minds of his contemporaries a vivid sense of the great elemental facts of life. why is it that the bible attracts to its pages men of all kinds of temperament and all degrees of culture? because in it, especially in the psalms, job, and the writings of isaiah and his brother prophets, serious people are brought face to face with the great mysteries, god, nature, man, death, etc.--mysteries, however, which only rush in upon the soul of man in full force on special occasions, in hours of lonely meditation, or by the side of an open grave. in the hurly-burly of life the sense of what carlyle calls the immensities, eternities, and silences, become so weak that even good men have sorrowfully to admit that they live lives of practical materialism. as arnold puts it: "each day brings its petty dust our soon-choked souls to fill, and we forget because we must, and not because we will." the mission of the hebrew prophet was by passionate utterance to keep alive in the minds of his countrymen a deep, abiding sense of life's mystery, sacredness, and solemnity. what isaiah did for his day, carlyle did for the moderns. in the whole range of modern literature, it is impossible to match carlyle's magnificent passages in _sartor resartus_, in which, under a biographical guise, he deals with the great primal emotions, wonder, awe, admiration, love, which form the warp and woof of human life. nothing can be finer than the following rebuke to those mechanical scientists who imagine that nature can be measured by tape-lines, and duly labelled in museums:-- 'system of nature! to the wisest man, wide as is his vision, nature remains of quite _infinite_ depth, of quite infinite expansion; and all experience thereof limits itself to some few computed centuries and measured square-miles. the course of nature's phases, on this our little fraction of a planet, is partially known to us; but who knows what deeper courses these depend on; what infinitely larger cycle (of causes) our little epicycle revolves on? to the minnow every cranny and pebble, and quality and accident, of its little native creek may have become familiar: but does the minnow understand the ocean tides and periodic currents, the trade-winds, and monsoons, and moon's eclipses; by all which the condition of its little creek is regulated, and may, from time (_un_miraculously enough), be quite overset and reversed? such a minnow is man; his creek this planet earth; his ocean the immeasurable all; his monsoons and periodic currents the mysterious course of providence through Æons of Æons. we speak of the volume of nature: and truly a volume it is,--whose author and writer is god.' agree or disagree with carlyle's views of the ultimate reality as we may, there can be nothing but harmony with the spirit which breathes in the following:-- 'nature? ha! why do i not name thee god? art not thou the "living garment of god"? o heavens, is it in very deed, he, then, that ever speaks through thee; that lives and loves in thee, that lives and loves in me? 'fore-shadows, call them rather fore-splendours, of that truth, and beginning of truths, fell mysteriously over my soul. sweeter than dayspring to the shipwrecked in nova zembla; ah! like the mother's voice to her little child that strays bewildered, weeping in unknown tumults; like soft streamings of celestial music to my too-exasperated heart, came that evangel. the universe is not dead and demoniacal, a charnel-house with spectres; but godlike, and my father's!' the mystery and fleetingness of life with its awful counterpart death, are the commonplaces of every hour, but who but carlyle has rendered them with such inspirational power? 'generation after generation takes to itself the form of a body; and forth-issuing from cimmerian night, on heaven's mission appears. what force and fire is in each he expends: one grinding in the mill of industry; one hunter-like climbing the giddy alpine heights of science; one madly dashed to pieces on the rocks of strife, in war with his fellow:--and then the heaven-sent is recalled; his earthly vesture falls away, and soon even to sense becomes a vanished shadow. thus, like some wild-flaming, wild-thundering train of heaven's artillery, does this mysterious mankind thunder and flame, in long-drawn, quick-succeeding grandeur, through the unknown deep. thus, like a god-created, fire-breathing spirit-host, we emerge from the inane; haste stormfully across the astonished earth; then plunge again into the inane. earth's mountains are levelled, and her seas filled up, in our passage; can the earth, which is but dead and a vision, resist spirits which have reality and are alive? on the hardest adamant some footprint of us is stamped in; the last rear of the host will read traces of the earliest van. but whence?--o heaven, whither? sense knows not; faith knows not; only that it is through mystery to mystery, from god and to god. 'we _are such stuff_ as dreams are made of, and our little life is rounded with a sleep?' a fervid perception of the evanescence and sorrows of life is the root of carlyle's pathos, which is unsurpassed in literature. it leads him to some beautiful contrasts between childhood and manhood, positively idyllic in their charm. 'happy season of childhood!' exclaims teufelsdröckh: 'kind nature, that art to all a bountiful mother; that visitest the poor man's hut with auroral radiance; and for thy nurseling hast provided a soft swathing of love and infinite hope, wherein he waxes and slumbers, danced-round (_umgäukelt_) by sweetest dreams! if the paternal cottage still shuts us in, its roof still screens us; with a father we have as yet a prophet, priest and king, and an obedience that makes us free. the young spirit has awakened out of eternity, and knows not what we mean by time; as yet time is no fast-hurrying stream, but a sportful sunlit ocean; years to the child are as ages; ah! the secret of vicissitude, of that slower or quicker decay and ceaseless down-rushing of the universal world-fabric, from the granite mountain to the man or day-moth, is yet unknown; and in a motionless universe, we taste, what afterwards in this quick-whirling universe is forever denied us, the balm of rest. sleep on, thou fair child, for thy long rough journey is at hand! a little while, and thou too shalt sleep no more, but thy very dreams shall be mimic battles; thou too, with old arnauld, must say in stern patience: "rest? rest? shall i not have all eternity to rest in?" celestial nepenthe! though a pyrrhus conquer empires, and an alexander sack the world, he finds thee not; and thou hast once fallen gently, of thy own accord, on the eyelids, on the heart of every mother's child. for, as yet, sleep and waking are one: the fair life-garden rustles infinite around, and everywhere is dewy fragrance, and the budding of hope; which budding, if in youth, too frostnipt, it grow to flowers, will in manhood yield no fruit, but a prickly, bitter-rinded stone fruit, of which the fewest can find the kernel.' carlyle's pathos touches its most sombre mood when he is dwelling upon the common incidents of daily life as painted on the background of eternity. in his '_cromwell_,' he breaks forth in a beautiful meditation while dealing with a commonplace reference in one of the letters of cromwell:--'mrs st john came down to breakfast every morning in that summer visit of the year , and sir william said grave grace, and they spake polite devout things to one another, and they are vanished, they and their things and speeches,--all silent like the echoes of the old nightingales that sang that season, like the blossoms of the old roses. o death! o time!' severe comment has been made upon carlyle's attitude towards science. there was this excuse for his contemptuous attitude--science in its early days fell into the hands of dryasdusts. so absorbed were these men in analysing nature, that they missed the sense of mystery and beauty which is the essence of all poetry and all religion. in the hands of the dryasdusts, nature was converted into a museum in which everything was duly labelled. during the mania for analysis, it was forgotten that there is a great difference between the description and the explanation of phenomena. in _sartor resartus_ carlyle rescues science from the grip of the pedant and restores it to the poet. 'wonder, is the basis of worship; the reign of wonder is perennial, indestructible in man; only at certain stages (as the present), it is, for some short season, a reign _in partibus infidelium_.' that progress of science, which is to destroy wonder, and in its stead substitute mensuration and numeration, finds small favour with teufelsdröckh, much as he otherwise venerates these two latter processes. 'shall your science,' exclaims he, 'proceed in the small chink-lighted, or even oil-lighted, underground workshop of logic alone; and man's mind become an arithmetical mill, whereof memory is the hopper, and mere tables of sines and tangents, codification, and treatises of what you call political economy, are the meal? and what is that science, which the scientific head alone, were it screwed off, and (like the doctor's in the arabian tale) set in a basin to keep it alive, could prosecute without shadow of a heart,--but one other of the mechanical and menial handicrafts, for which the scientific head (having a soul in it) is too noble an organ? i mean that thought without reverence is barren, perhaps poisonous; at best, dies like cookery with the day that called it forth; does not live, like sowing, in successive tilths and wider-spreading harvests, bringing food and plenteous increase to all time.' * * * * * 'the man who cannot wonder, who does not habitually wonder (and worship), were he president of innumerable royal societies, and carried the whole _mécanique céleste_ and _hegel's philosophy_, and the epitome of all laboratories and observatories with their results, in his single head,--is but a pair of spectacles behind which there is no eye. let those who have eyes look through him, then he may be useful.' in the sphere of ethics, carlyle's influence has been inspirational in the highest sense. to a generation which had to choose between the ethics of a conventional theology and the ethics of a cold, prosaic utilitarianism, carlyle's treatment of the whole subject of duty came as a revelation. if in the sphere of social relationships he did not contribute to the settlement of the theoretic side of complex problems, he did what was equally important--he roused earnest minds to a sense of the urgency and magnitude of the problem, awakened the feeling of individual responsibility, and quickened the sense of social duty which had grown weak during the reign of _laissez faire_. if carlyle had no final message for mankind, if he brought no gospel of glad tidings, he nevertheless did a work which was as important as it was pressing. in the form of a modern john the baptist, the chelsea prophet with not a little of the wilderness atmosphere about him, preached in grimly defiant mood to a pleasure-loving generation the great doctrines which lie at the root of all religions--the doctrines of repentance, righteousness, and retribution.