BERKELEY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 CALIFORNIA . 
 
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 XV- 
 
MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL 
 
PUBLISHED BY 
 
 JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS, GLASGOW, 
 ^ttblishm to the Stmberstte. 
 
 MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD., LONDON. 
 New York., - Macmillan and Co. 
 London, - Simpkin, Hamilton and Co. 
 Cambridge, Macmillan and Bowes. 
 Edinburgh, - Douglas and Foulis. 
 
 MDCCCXCVI. 
 
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 <yvui 
 
 fl^JcLjL. 
 
Memoir of 
 
 John Nichol 
 
 Professor of English Literature in the 
 University of Glasgow 
 
 By 
 
 Professor Knight 
 
 St. Andrews 
 
 Glasgow 
 James MacLehose and Sons 
 
 $ttblt0her0 tcr the Emtocraitg 
 1896 
 
PA/75" 
 
 NssXf 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introduction, ix 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 Early Years ; " Leaves from my Life," .... 3 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Later Youth: Life at the Observatory, and as a Student 
 
 in the University of Glasgow, 100 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Student Life at Oxford, 124 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Oxford; and "The Old Mortality," 137 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Later Years at Oxford, 153 
 
 415 
 
vi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Early Academic Life in Glasgow, 174 
 
 A. Election to the Chair of English Literature 
 
 in the University of Glasgow, - - 174 
 
 B. Testimony of his Students, 181 
 
 C. Candidature for other Chairs, - - - 187 
 
 D. "The New Speculative Society," 193 
 
 E. University Extension Lectures, 196 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Later Life in Glasgow, 200 
 
 A. Episodes during the occupancy of the Chair 
 
 of English Literature, 200 
 
 B. Political Views; His Personality; The Reviewers, 210 
 
 C. His Attitude towards Religion, - - - 214 
 
 D. Resignation of the Chair of English Literature 
 
 in Glasgow, 222 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Literary Work, 227 
 
 A. "Hannibal": an Historical Drama, - - -231 
 
 B. Tables of History, Literature and Art, - - 236 
 
 C. Primer on English Composition ; and Questions 
 
 and Exercises on English Composition,- - 241 
 
 D. Byron, 242 
 
 E. The "Death of Themistocles," and other Poems, 246 
 
 F. Burns, - 252 
 
 G. American Literature, 255 
 
 H. Bacon, 259 
 
 I. Carlyle, - - - - 265 
 
CONTENTS. vii 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 1'AGE 
 
 Vacation Resorts and Rambles, 271 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 Life in London, 283 
 
 A. 1890, 283 
 
 B. His Portrait, 287 
 
 C. Episodes, 296 
 
 D. The Close, ^ 304 
 
 Appendix 
 
 A List of John Nichol's Writings, .... 308 
 
 Index, 3IO 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Portrait of Professor Nichol, 1871, - - - Frontispiece 
 
 Portrait of Professor Nichol, 1869, - - - facing p. 200 
 
 View of the Observatory, Glasgow, ... 32 
 
 Group of Members of "The Old Mortality," 
 
 Oxford, 144 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 It has fallen to me, as senior literary executor of the 
 late Professor Nichol, to write his Memoir, bringing into it 
 the story of his academic career, and his work as a 
 man of letters. 
 
 In the collection and arrangement of biographical 
 material I have been greatly indebted to Mr. Pringle Nichol, 
 who has sent me the very interesting record of his father's 
 early years, written in the year 1861, and called "Leaves 
 from my Life." This chapter, the work of Nichol's young 
 manhood, seems to me to be almost unique in modern 
 autobiography. His son has also supplied me with a 
 narrative of events in his father's life while a student at 
 Glasgow, and with various facts as to the movements of 
 the Nichol household after they settled in Glasgow, as 
 well as of their last years in London. He has sent me a 
 chronicle of some vacation rambles, with many interesting 
 letters, and an account of the closing days. Most of 
 the last section of Chapter XL was originally written by 
 him. 
 
 I am also greatly indebted for facts, letters, and suggestions 
 to Professor Nichol's sister, Mrs. Jack, 10 The College, 
 Glasgow. 
 
 Estimates of the man, of his character and work, have 
 reached me from many quarters. The contributions of old 
 friends at Oxford and Glasgow, such as Professor Dicey, 
 Sheriff Mackay, Mr. Berkley, and Dr. Macleod along with 
 what has been written by later friends, such as Principal 
 Ward and Dr. Grindrod have supplied much. The 
 letters of fellow-collegians, Drs. Brown and Mackennal, 
 
 b 
 
x MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 of students who were also friends, Professor MacCormick 
 and Mr. Dunn, and of Nichol's former teachers, Professor 
 Lushington and the late Master of Balliol, have added 
 more. 
 
 I desire, here and now, to express my thanks to all who 
 have contributed to make the Memoir less unworthy than 
 it would have been without their aid. 
 
 A contemporary, who has written one delightful bio- 
 graphy, said to me the other day : " I have made many 
 enemies by telling the simple truth." It is often as desir- 
 able, however, to leave things unsaid as to say them, in the 
 memoirs of a literary man ; and the question which a 
 biographer has constantly to ask himself, in reference to 
 an incident or a letter, is : Will this be a real mirror of 
 character, or of achievement? and will its publication be of 
 any use to posterity? My own idea of biography is that 
 its writer should collect facts impartially, and let these facts 
 speak for themselves. But, when materials are abundant, 
 and derived from many quarters, it seems more courteous 
 to the contributors as well as better for the subject of the 
 biography to print reminiscences in the form in which they 
 were originally written, than to weave them, as some have 
 suggested, into a monological record of the life. I do not 
 believe in the value and interest, or even in the justice, of 
 such composite work ; however generous it is of writers 
 to sink their own individuality, and allow their contribu- 
 tions to be used at discretion. When many traverse the 
 same ground, and repeat the same story, excision becomes 
 necessary : and this is often a very difficult task, as no 
 contributor can know what others have written ; but, in 
 the case of our common friend, I rejoice that all have had 
 but one desire, viz., that there should be as adequate a 
 memorial as is now possible of the man and his work, and 
 that what they have sent should be utilized accordingly. 
 
 The list of Nichol's correspondents is remarkable ; he 
 knew so many of the distinguished men of his time. But 
 it is a matter for great regret that so few of his own letters 
 survive. Some of his most intimate correspondents, such 
 as William Sellar, A. W. Ward, and A. C. Swinburne, 
 destroyed all they received, while his letters to the late 
 
INTRODUCTION. xi 
 
 Master of Balliol and there were hundreds of them 
 were sent to the funeral pyre, with the rest of his cor- 
 respondence, after Jowett's death. In most of the cases in 
 which letters to myself are printed, I have not thought it 
 necessary to indicate to whom they were addressed. Nichol 
 was a brilliant letter-writer, and many of his briefest 
 notes contained more than allusion to matters of passing 
 interest. 
 
 It was my original intention to combine in this volume 
 a sketch of the career of Nichol's father John Pringle 
 Nichol the distinguished Professor of Astronomy in the 
 University of Glasgow, devoting two chapters to him ; one 
 to his Life, and another to his Correspondence. This 
 plan, however, has been abandoned, on the advice of the 
 family. They regret, as much as anyone can, that no life of 
 the Glasgow Professor of Astronomy has been written, but 
 they think that it would be inexpedient to combine a sketch 
 of both men in a volume specially devoted to the son. A 
 brief notice of the father may, however, be included in this 
 introduction. 
 
 He was a native of Forfarshire, and was originally 
 destined for the Church. After receiving at Brechin the 
 customary education of the Grammar Schools of Scotland, 
 he went to King's College, Aberdeen, where he distinguished 
 himself in Mathematics and Physics. After his Arts 
 curriculum ended, there followed the Divinity Hall lectures, 
 and his ' license ' as a preacher ; but, although he appeared 
 several times in a Scottish pulpit, he soon discovered that 
 his true vocation was educational work. 
 
 He became successively headmaster at Hawick, Cupar, 
 and Montrose. While in Montrose Academy he began a 
 correspondence with John Stuart Mill which lasted till Mill's 
 death. The elder Mill (Historian of India) and Naussau 
 Senior recommended him to the Chair of Political Economy 
 in the College de France, long held by M. Say. To this he 
 was not elected ; but shortly afterwards he was nominated 
 by the Crown as Regius Professor of Astronomy in the 
 University of Glasgow. At the Observatory, in the west of 
 the city, he carried on his astronomical observations, and 
 gave free lectures to all students interested in his subject. 
 
xii MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 The old house at the Observatory became the chosen 
 rendezvous of many an ardent youth, whom he helped in 
 other directions as well as in science. His career was re- 
 markable, and his power as a lecturer of rare brilliance and 
 simplicity was universally acknowledged. In the series of 
 letters in this volume, entitled " Leaves from my Life " in 
 which the son gives an account of his own early years we 
 have a more vivid picture of the father than could be given 
 by any one else. It is obvious that the Professor of 
 Astronomy had a most powerful influence over his son ; 
 and that this influence extended far beyond the house- 
 hold. 
 
 The writer of a brief sketch of him in Memoirs and 
 Portraits of One Hundred Glasgow Men (1886) says: 
 " There are many who still remember the crowded hall in 
 which they first ' learned his great language, caught his 
 clear accents,' as the scene of their entrance into a world of 
 thought of the very existence of which they had been 
 ignorant. He combined, as few have done, the exactness 
 and precision of a man of science with the power of an 
 accomplished orator. Hence his lectures were works of art, 
 calculated at once to exercise and enlighten the intellect, 
 quicken the imagination, and move the heart. . . . As 
 the lecture proceeded, with alternations of lucid exposition 
 and stirring appeal, it was evident that the seeming ease and 
 calm of the speaker were but the covering of suppressed 
 excitement of a finely-strung organism, of an enthusiasm of 
 science and humanity openly displayed in the thrilling 
 perorations, the most striking of which might be compared 
 with the eloquence of such masters of English prose as De 
 Quincey or Ruskin. That the lecturer's magnetic influence 
 was not wholly due to the grandeur of his theme, was 
 manifested by the fact that when he spoke rather of minute 
 processes than general results the attention was as close and 
 the interest almost as keen as when he led his listeners into 
 realms of illimitable space. Since the day when Chalmers 
 delivered his sermons in the Tron Church no public speaker 
 north of the Tweed had so enchained his hearers. One 
 who was himself a most accomplished lecturer was wont to 
 say that all that the people of Scotland knew of astronomy 
 
INTRODUCTION. xiii 
 
 they had learnt from Thomas Chalmers and John Pringle 
 Nichol." 
 
 He had a large circle of friends and correspondents, 
 among whom were John Stuart Mill, George Combe, 
 Herschel, Sir G. B. Airy, James Nasmyth, Samuel Brown, 
 Longfellow, Wordsworth, Lloyd Garrison, Sumner, and De 
 Quincey. Unfortunately Professor Nichol's letters to these 
 friends have not been preserved, except two to the last 
 named, which have already been published in the Memorials 
 of De Quincey. 
 
 In a correspondence, which lasted from 1833 till Nichol's 
 death, he and Mill discussed questions in Philosophy and 
 Economy, which were further developed in Mill's published 
 works. In these letters he also entered fully into the 
 literary and political interests of his time. It is hoped 
 that they may yet be published, but they do not find 
 their natural place in a volume dealing with the life of 
 his son. 
 
 The estimates of Nichol the younger which were formed 
 by his numerous friends will come out in the pages which 
 follow. He is happily characterized, in many a letter and 
 memorial-notice. Of his attainments as a literary man, 
 and his achievements as a writer of books, there is abundant 
 evidence. He was a scholar, a poet, a critic, and a 
 philosopher ; and the wide area over which his efforts 
 ranged is perhaps an explanation both of their rare merit, 
 and their necessary limitations. 
 
 I assign him a high place amongst the poets of his 
 day ; and I do not think that his lyrics and sonnets have 
 met with due recognition. There are also unpublished 
 poems which reach, me judice, quite as high, if not a 
 higher, level than anything he gave to the world ; but, in 
 deference to the opinions and wishes of those with whom 
 the decision rested, only a few of them are printed in 
 this Memoir. 
 
 What comes out so strongly in connection with his 
 Poems, his familiar Letters, and the Journal now published, 
 is the light they cast on the character of the man, in 
 relation to his family, his parents, his wife, and his children. 
 
xiv MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 It is a familiar fact that many a valiant fighter in the 
 literary arena whose blood is shed in those controversial 
 feuds, which everyone may witness is the most gentle of 
 men within the precincts of the domestic circle ; but how 
 this came out in Nichol's poems, letters, and journal will 
 be a revelation to those who read them. 
 
 The combination of the poet and the critic was as striking 
 in him, as it was in Matthew Arnold, and Russell Lowell; 
 or, as it now is, in Mr. Swinburne. I think, however, that 
 he was greater as a critic, than as a poet. His Glasgow 
 and his Oxford training, in classical Literature and in 
 Philosophy, perhaps confirmed the original bent of his 
 nature in the former direction. Many of his friends agreed 
 in assigning him a place as an oral critic {i.e. in conver- 
 sational discussion even more than in his writings) above 
 that of the majority of his contemporaries. The late Pro- 
 fessor William Sellar said to me, over and over again, that 
 he knew no man with whose critical opinions whether 
 expressed in writing, or in conversation he was more in 
 sympathy. Another of his friends, the late Mr. George 
 Wilson of Dalmarnock with whom, in his estimate of 
 Burns, he had much in common said the same thing. 
 Many of Mr. Sellar's letters to Nichol are remarkable, 
 and would have formed an important item in the 
 memorial sketch which Nichol once thought of writing of 
 his friend, as a man of letters and as Professor of Latin 
 in the University of Edinburgh. 
 
 After reading an anonymous review of his book on the 
 Roman Poets which had been written by Nichol unknown 
 to the author Professor Sellar wrote: "The review is much 
 the best of anything I have read. The resume of the early 
 writers is exactly what I think of them ; but it is put in 
 a much more nervous and hitting-the-nail-on-the-head style 
 than I could have put it." 
 
 In all his criticism he was forcible, often brilliant, and 
 almost invariably just. Although full of personal pre- 
 judices, he put these aside, when he sat down to the 
 serious work of criticism : and this quality of justice is 
 the most important of all to a reviewer. 
 
 He had a marvellously rapid insight into both the strong 
 
INTRODUCTION. xv 
 
 and the weak points of anything he read, whether in prose 
 or verse ; and the merits of any book he undertook to 
 review were sure to be signalized as fairly as its defects 
 were pointed out. As Dr. Grindrod happily puts it, with 
 respect to books written by personal friends he adopted 
 the wise rule of letting them alone if he could not praise 
 them. "He was too honest a critic to praise, and too good 
 a friend to damn a bad book ; but, to those who had faith 
 in his judgment, his praise was as good a warrant of success, 
 as his blame was of failure. It is the very opposite with 
 many critics." 
 
 In a letter received in 1889, after referring to "the 
 Mutual Admiration Society's pet author of six lbs. weight 
 of well-written commonplace," he adds, " At worst for both 
 
 of us ' there remaineth a rest.' Let be on the throne 
 
 of criticism, and Midas prefer Pan-Demos to the Muse, or 
 tuft-hunters make her groves into caves of refuge for popular 
 mediocrity, we can still walk the Links and ascend the 
 Hills. . . . Ere this is over I shall be driven to make 
 a Bible of Gulliver's Fourth Voyage. . . . You must 
 revisit our glimpses at more leisure, ere we finally follow 
 the swallows." 
 
 The following, written two years earlier, discloses some- 
 thing of his own literary work. " I don't expect to share 
 your own opinion of your Biography. My experience is 
 generally misery in the first writing of a book that has 
 to deal with facts, it is like paving ; and something like 
 enjoyment in rewriting, which is like polishing the 
 stones." 
 
 He often said that he could not possibly carry on two 
 or more kinds of literary work simultaneously. He had 
 to devote himself, with single-minded and single-hearted 
 concentration, to one work at a time : and this doubtless 
 accounts for the success of his monographs. 
 
 In addition to his critical insight I think that John Nichol 
 was one of the very best prose-writers of his day. Putting 
 aside the validity of his judgments, and looking on his 
 Essays in Criticism merely as contributions to literary Art, 
 it would be difficult for any one to excel their best passages, 
 and still more difficult to match his more sustained efforts 
 
xvi MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 as a whole. From an artistic point of view, his youthful 
 autobiography is most admirable work. 
 
 Many of his obiter dicta, as expressed in his familiar 
 letters to his friends, are delightful, even when these friends 
 disagreed with them from root to branch. Of Wordsworth 
 he wrote to me : " I consider him to be, at his best, the 
 greatest English poet of this century ; at his worst, one of 
 the most uninteresting pipes through which the Empyrean 
 has chosen to blow its messages to earth." 
 
 One reason why many letters, and fragments of letters, 
 from Nichol's friends and correspondents are published in 
 this Memoir, is that so many of his own letters, even the 
 most interesting and original ones, have been destroyed. 
 Another reason is, that the letters which were addressed to 
 him are a very significant mirror of what he himself was, 
 and they disclose the width of his sympathies as well as the 
 range of his literary acquaintanceships. It may not be, in- 
 appropriate to give a list of some of his correspondents, so 
 large and varied was the circle into which he entered, and 
 with which he became intimate. They included John S. 
 Mill, Frederick D. Maurice, William L. Garrison, Sydney 
 Dobell, Alexander Smith, Henry W. Longfellow, A. C. 
 Swinburne, Theodore Watts, J. R. Green, Thomas Hill 
 Green, G. R. Luke, Edward Lushington, Louis Kossuth, 
 William B. Scott, Dante and William Rossetti, James Mar- 
 tineau, Goldwin Smith, William Sellar, B. Jowett, Edward 
 Caird, D. L. Newman, Dr. John Brown, Henry T. Smith, 
 Lionel A. Tollemache, Thomas Arnold, P. G. Hamerton, 
 John Skelton, Moncure Conway, Benjamin J. Williams, A. 
 W. Ward, James Bryce, A. V. Dicey, J. Hutcheson Stirling, 
 J. M. Ross, W. Pulsford, Henry Crosskey, Frances Power 
 Cobbe, Mrs. Lynn Linton, William Sharp, H. D. Rawnsley, 
 Birkbeck Hill, ^Eneas Mackay, John Morley, George Gil- 
 fillan, John W. Hales, Alexander Ireland, John Tyndall, 
 Lord Houghton, Lord Lytton, R. Buchanan, and a score of 
 others. As many as sixty-three letters of the late Master 
 of Balliol to him exist. Some of them, the most important 
 ones, will be published in the forthcoming Life of the 
 Master. Some others are published, in whole or in part, 
 in this Memoir. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xvii 
 
 The letters of friends and correspondents which have 
 been preserved all of which I have examined with care 
 disclose much of Nichol's personality. This applies 
 especially to those of Dr. John Brown (the author of Rab 
 and his Friends), Alexander Smith, William B. Scott, the 
 late Master of Balliol, and Lord Lytton. 
 
 These letters give a very vivid portraiture, not only of 
 the man to whom they were addressed, but also of their 
 writers ; and this is, to a certain extent, a compensation 
 for the loss of his own letters. I should add that, in the 
 case of many letters, the want of date, especially where 
 the post office imprint is undecipherable on the envelope, 
 makes it extremely difficult to assign them to their proper 
 place. When will literary people learn that " Thursday " 
 is an insufficient date to their letters! or that the "25th" 
 is quite misleading, without a clue to the month and 
 year ! 
 
 It is only right that I should say that there are many 
 letters to him from friends, both dead and living, not 
 one tithe of which can be utilized in this Memoir, but 
 which are intrinsically very remarkable. Several of those 
 from Professor William Sellar are not only weighted 
 with acute criticism, but sparkle with literary grace. It 
 is a matter of deep regret that those from the late Pro- 
 fessor Lushington cannot be printed in full in this volume. 
 They are so interesting a reflection of the character of a 
 remarkable Scottish University Professor. 
 
 I may here add that in the career of a distinguished 
 man, even the testimonials written in his behalf when a 
 candidate for important posts, have at times a literary 
 value : and that many more addressed to Nichol than those 
 published in this book are an index to the character both 
 of the writer and the recipient. 
 
 The courtesy of the literary executors of the late Master 
 of Balliol, in allowing the letters bearing specially on 
 Nichol to be printed in this volume, must be specially 
 acknowledged. Mr. Evelyn Abbot has been very kind in 
 this matter. I had all the letters of his Master to Nichol 
 transcribed. Mr. Abbot went over them, and made a 
 selection of those which should appear in the memoirs of 
 
xviii MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Jowett, and those which might be utilized in this book. 
 The same remark applies to the action of the Dowager 
 Lady Lytton, and her daughter Lady Betty Balfour, in 
 connection with the publication of the late Lord Lytton's 
 letters to Nichol. 
 
 Personally I regret, as much as Mr. Ward does, that 
 Nichol's class-lectures leading up to an extended History 
 of English Literature have not seen, and cannot now see, 
 the light of day ; but I cordially assent to the decision 
 of my co-trustees that they should not be published. I 
 regard their judgment as teachers of the subject as final. 
 Doubtless the progress of critical work, devoted to special 
 sections of our English Literature, rapidly superannuates 
 the very best discussions of the class-room as every teacher 
 knows. Besides, much of the best part of Nichol's lectures 
 to his students was utilized by him afterwards in his 
 literary work in his Burns, his Bacon, his Byron, his 
 Carlyle, and in the articles on the Scottish Poets which 
 he contributed to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. In addition 
 to this, much of his success as a lecturer was due to the 
 electric force, the vis vivida, of his own personality, and 
 to the glamour of his reading and recitation ; while a 
 great deal that he said in his class as is the case with 
 every professor of original mind and faculty was the 
 inspiration of the hour or the moment, and perished 
 with it. 
 
 Principal Ward writes of this : 
 
 " Many of us had hoped that Nichol would live to arrange 
 the substance of his University lectures the work of many 
 years of labour into an organically constructed history of 
 our National Literature. There was room for such work, 
 even though, to adopt the words of Mr. Jusseraud in the 
 preface to his own welcome addition to the list, ' Many 
 other histories of English Literature might have preceded 
 it, and many more were soon to follow it.' But the truth, 
 I suppose, is, that in conception, if not always in execu- 
 tion, a magnum opus at whatever epoch of an author's 
 or an artist's life it may actually be begun and carried 
 out is really the companion of his career, not the con- 
 solation of its close. Nichol had some lesser tasks to 
 
INTRODUCTION. xix 
 
 finish before he could turn to the larger work which we 
 thought he could still accomplish. Had he survived to 
 write a History of English Literature, a philosophic basis 
 would after all have been more likely to be chosen by him 
 than a historical one. ... I am glad to think that a literary 
 memorial of his work will not be wanting; but, in no case, 
 would there be any fear of his name being forgotten in 
 either of the Universities which he adorned, or overlooked 
 in the annals of a Literature, into the very heart of which 
 his own spirit entered." 
 
 When all is said, I believe that Nichol's contribution 
 to the literary criticism of the nineteenth century will rank 
 as high as that of any of his co-mates. I cannot com- 
 pare him with living contemporaries ; but, beside those 
 already named Arnold and Lowell, to mention only two 
 of the illustrious dead he holds a position that is dis- 
 tinctively his own. He may shed less of the pure white 
 light of dispassionate criticism, on the problems and the 
 men he deals with, than others who are seated in the 
 inner circle ; but, the fiery radiance and many-sided colour 
 which he threw into almost all his work, never dazzles his 
 reader, but always interests and instructs him. 
 
 As a college tutor in Classics and Philosophy, his 
 reputation and success at Oxford was greater than that of 
 any other ' coach.' All the best men of his time read 
 with him, or tried to do so ; and their subsequent successes 
 in " the schools " abundantly justified their choice of 
 preceptor. 
 
 In this connection I may also put on record how, 
 towards the close of his career his old interest in the work 
 of the successful ' coach ' surviving he offered, in the most 
 generous way, to become the voluntary tutor (for a few 
 summer months) of the son of one of his friends, who 
 was going up to compete for an entrance scholarship at 
 Oxford. 
 
 Nichol inherited, and further developed, the Carlyleian 
 hatred of shams. ' Unrealities ' and ' unveracities ' of all 
 sorts were abhorrent to him ; but this constitutional anger, 
 directed against everything unreal, was tempered as all 
 
xx MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 were aware who knew him well by the most thorough 
 sympathy with all goodness, and a rare appreciation of 
 excellence, when it appeared in unwonted forms. " A 
 powerful hater, yet the staunchest friend," aptly described 
 him from his boyhood to the close. A contribution to an 
 estimate of his character will be found in these pages, from 
 a political antagonist at College, whom he fought with all the 
 ardour of a perfervid Scot viz. Dr. Donald Macleod yet, 
 after leaving the University, in December, 1889, he wrote 
 from Rothesay : " Nor can I omit to acknowledge the 
 chivalrous companionship of one of my old co-mates by the 
 Molendinar, whilom firm, but ever genial antagonist, later 
 editor, ally, and friend Dr. Donald Macleod." 
 
 It may not be an insignificant item in a volume such 
 as this, that it gives an opportunity for the publication of 
 letters from literary men, which might never otherwise see 
 the light : their " lives " having been either already written, 
 or not ever likely to be so. 
 
 It also incidentally discloses some things as to University 
 life, both at Glasgow and Oxford, its nature and condi- 
 tions, its relative advantages and disadvantages, which may 
 be instructive to the present generation. 
 
 It is interesting to see how, after a time notwithstand- 
 ing his brilliant success as a tutor Oxford did not satisfy 
 him ; how, in later years, when the drawbacks of academic 
 life in Scotland pressed upon him, he wished to return to 
 Oxford, as a Fellow in one of the Colleges; and how, finally, 
 he longed for the great Metropolis, with its absolute freedom 
 from all conventional ties, and wrote : " I have come here 
 ten years too late." 
 
 It will be seen from what follows that Nichol did much 
 beyond the academic groove to which his special and 
 more important work was confined. He shed lustre on his 
 University, by his manifold literary labours ; but his 
 academic success in Glasgow was enhanced by what he 
 undertook, and achieved, beyond the College precincts. He 
 was, e.g., the real pioneer of that University-Extension- 
 Lecture- System in Scotland ; a scheme which has done so 
 much for our large urban centres, and indirectly for the 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxi 
 
 Scottish Universities themselves. It has been greatly 
 matured and developed, throughout the kingdom, since 
 Nichol started it ; but there are hundreds who look back 
 to his extra-academical lectures from Alderley Edge to 
 Cheltenham, and from Dundee to Penzance as their first 
 initiation into the wide realm of English literary culture. 
 
 This memorial of my friend cannot be a continuous 
 eulogy : and to show the errors of misconstruction into 
 which he fell as to the actions rather than the character, 
 of others many instances might be quoted. It is a curious 
 thing that literary men are more prone, than politicians or 
 lawyers are, to misconstrue the most innocent actions of 
 their acquaintances and friends ; and so, a chance remark, 
 or unintentional act, becomes 
 
 The little rift within the lute, 
 
 That by and by may make the music mute. 
 
 For example, Nichol entirely misconstrued the character 
 and actions of a colleague, one of the best and ablest of 
 men, who happened to succeed where he failed ; and in 
 many of his letters there comes out the strong satiric sting 
 of unforgetable loss, and its consequences to himself. Never- 
 theless, in later days, and long before that colleague had 
 passed 
 
 To where beyond these voices there is peace, 
 
 Nichol became just, in his appreciation of the man, and of 
 his many-sided work. 
 
 Some of Nichol's most intimate friends believe that he has 
 written nothing which is an adequate mirror of the man him- 
 self, his large, vivid, and many-sided personality; and that 
 neither his two volumes of poetry, nor his philosophical and 
 critical works, give any indication of the riches of his nature. 
 This is doubtful, but he often said to others that the life 
 of a man of action would have been as congenial to him as 
 that of a litterateur. I do not believe that he could ever 
 have succeeded as a politician. While he possessed the 
 insight and energy, he lacked the calmness, reserve and 
 indifference to criticism, which are so essential to politi- 
 cal success. The intense life he led, with a physical frame 
 
xxii MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 not strong, would have prevented him from ever being a 
 success at the Bar, or in the House of Commons. I well 
 remember how, even as a mountaineer, he failed, from causes 
 purely physical. He would have been a greater failure in 
 Parliament, had he entered it, than John S. Mill was, or 
 than any other literary man has ever been. 
 
 It is curious to find that, as in the case of many other 
 men, Nichol's enduring fame will rest, not on what he most 
 desired, but on his work as a University Professor and 
 Lecturer, and as a critic of Books. In the class-room his 
 Oxford training in Classics and Philosophy led him to deal 
 with English Literature at its foundations, i.e. in relation to 
 those other aspects of national life and development which a 
 well-educated scholar knows. One who has been a brilliant 
 philosophical coach could not fail to make his lectures on 
 English Literature philosophical from first to last. They 
 were grounded in Philosophy, and yet were wholly detached 
 from its bias, and never were influenced by its technicalities. 
 Calmness, vividness, directness, breadth, and candour were 
 features which characterized all he did from his chair ; and 
 while seeking to inform his students with the best results of 
 the literary history of England, his ulterior aim was to make 
 them wise men, to educate their characters by bringing them 
 into contact with " the true, the beautiful, and the good," in 
 Literature. 
 
 His numerous students must feel that he taught them 
 many things besides the canons of criticism. I cannot 
 believe that any ingenuous spirit could fail to read beneath 
 the literary presentation of fact or theory, and to imbibe 
 all unconsciously by means of it, the deeper lessons of 
 thoroughness, of tolerance, of charity, of courtesy, of honesty, 
 and true humility. I think that his moral qualities of head 
 and heart were greater than his intellectual insight, or his 
 learning. His gift of style was perhaps supreme amongst 
 his intellectual attainments. Mentally he was very agile, too 
 active at times, because his rapid insight induced him to 
 misconstrue what the sober judgment of the future led him 
 to appraise more accurately. In conversation he was often 
 too impulsive. This was probably due to the early, even 
 precocious, development of his mind. In youth he awoke to 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxiii 
 
 a realization that he was " not on the roll of common men," 
 and, although that never induced conceit, or developed 
 selfishness, it led him at times into an eager pronouncement 
 of himself, of his views, etc., which interfered with the repose 
 of his own nature, and with judicial calm in his apprecia- 
 tion of other men. 
 
 I have received many testimonies to Nichol from his 
 friends and acquaintances, too numerous to quote. The 
 following is from Mr. Swinburne. 
 
 The Pines, Putney Hill, S.W., 
 October 28, 1894. 
 
 My dear Sir, I have no letters of my late and very 
 dear old friend, Mr. Nichol, which I could supply for the 
 purpose of publication or selection. As to my estimate of 
 his character and powers, I need not tell one who knew 
 him as well as I did, that I never met, or can meet, a 
 more loyal and constant and altogether manlier man. He 
 was the trustiest of friends, as we know, and I am certain 
 that none but the meanest of mankind would deny that 
 he was the fairest of fighters, and the most gallant of 
 antagonists. 
 
 I have more than once before now done what justice I 
 could to the author of Hannibal and the critical bio- 
 grapher of Byron. Of his work on Bacon I do not presume 
 to speak ; of his work on Burns I need not there can be 
 but one opinion of its excellence among Englishmen as (I 
 should suppose) among Scotchmen. Yours very truly, 
 
 A. C. Swinburne. 
 
 Looking back through the vista of many years to the 
 ending of a life, which left the world barer and poorer for 
 many, the quality which perhaps most distinguished Nichol 
 from other men was his supreme loyalty. I agree with 
 Dr. Mackennal, who says : " He was loyal to his ideals and 
 his obligations, loyal to Truth, loyal to his friends, and 
 he was so always and unmistakably. He was full of pre- 
 judices and vehemencies, and these he wore not ' lightly as 
 a flower,' but as badge and blazonry, which called on you 
 to rank yourself alongside of him, or to attack him. But 
 
xxiv MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 underneath the excesses which were so patent was a deep 
 and reverent candour." 
 
 It is much for those of us who still survive to have this 
 great memory of loyal steadfastness, of disinterested service, 
 and of courage in the life-long battle for what our friend 
 believed to be the cause of the right and the true. To 
 my mind none of our contemporaries has striven, more 
 consistently or courageously, after a unification both in 
 theory and in practice of the promises of the True, the 
 Beautiful, and the Good. 
 
 Let others hail the rising sun, 
 
 I bow to those whose course is run. 
 
 W. K. 
 
 June, 1896. 
 
MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 EARLY YEARS, 1833-1851. 
 "LEAVES FROM MY LIFE." 
 
 [The following pages, entitled " Leaves from my Life," 
 were written by John Nichol in the form of letters to his 
 wife shortly after their marriage. They were not, as he 
 himself states, composed with a view to publication, but 
 they contain material too valuable to be neglected, revealing 
 as they do what in almost all cases is most accept- 
 able the youthful environment, and the influences which 
 shaped the character, of a distinguished man. Nor, after 
 careful revision and considerable curtailment, do they contain 
 anything to the publication of which their writer would 
 have objected. 
 
 In reading these pages, where as not unfrequently 
 happens past events and persons are referred to in the 
 present tense, it should be remembered that they were 
 written in 1861.] 
 
 Biarritz, May 10th, 1861. 
 My Dearest Wife, 
 
 I used to wile away the hours of last summer 
 and winter by writing to you, and my delight was in your 
 answers. Now we are together you know all I am doing, 
 a great part of what I am thinking, and the need for those 
 letters is over. The future that bright future which we 
 were always talking and writing about has realized itself, 
 what more is there to say? Yet I liked to send, and you 
 say you liked to receive, my messages ; why, after all, 
 should they cease? I have thought of something to write 
 
6 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 word or a look of his was generally enough to ensure 
 obedience. His wife, of more fiery temper and perhaps 
 keener intellect, for she was one of the cleverest of women, 
 was no match for the quiet authority of his eye. All I 
 have learnt makes me proud that this John Nichol was 
 my grandfather, for I believe him to have been one of the 
 unobtrusive great men of the world. 
 
 He had seven children, of whom the eldest was my 
 father. I am not writing his life now. It is not needful 
 in these memorials of myself that I should tell how his 
 mind was first developed, how and when his peculiar 
 talents were first manifested. The genius of the school at 
 Brechin, he went, at an early age, to inaugurate his career 
 as a teacher in the capacity of schoolmaster of Dun. From 
 thence he was sent to the University of Aberdeen. His 
 geniality, love of companionship, and a certain want of 
 patient resolution which attended him through life, led 
 him to pass a large portion of each session in what is 
 perhaps improperly called idleness. Those rambles on the 
 hills, those long days of boating on the Don, may have 
 added some years to his brief life ; and when the time 
 came when the tree had to be shown by its fruits his 
 offering was always the richest. I have heard that at 
 college he got every prize that he ever tried for. He 
 brought away with him the fame of the best mathematician 
 who had been known there for many a year. Had he 
 gone to Cambridge, a first wranglership and all the rest 
 would have doubtless awaited him, but I know not whether 
 I ought to regret that he went instead to be head-master 
 of Hawick Grammar School. 
 
 There are people still at Hawick who can tell stories 
 of the thin handsome youth who astonished every one by 
 his brilliancy, and interested all the ladies by his weak 
 health and poetic fancies. Exactly when or how he left 
 the Borders I cannot tell. I know of him next still pro- 
 secuting his studies for the Church of Scotland, yet 
 accepting the position of editor of the Fife Herald, the 
 property of Mr. Tullis of Auchmuty. 
 
 Let us return, and take a view of this other family 
 whom we previously dismissed with an enumeration. There 
 
EARLY YEARS. 7 
 
 was my grandfather, who, along with his brother, my 
 granduncle, still surviving in Edinburgh, the sole remnant 
 of his generation, had his two paper mills near Markinch, 
 and lived in the old house at Auchmuty, superintending 
 them. George, the eldest son, was settled in Cupar, 
 managing the newspaper and overseeing the warehouse, 
 The other two sons, William and Robert, were just leaving 
 the University of St. Andrews. The former has carried 
 out his destiny of succeeding to the Mills ; the latter was 
 the genius of the family, and having carried off all the 
 prizes of his time, was thinking, I believe, of entering the 
 medical profession. 
 
 Great hopes were formed of him, never to be fulfilled. 
 A rapid fever cut short this high promise, and he is only 
 a faint image among my earliest recollections, a spare- 
 built, dark young man, with a face which reminds me of 
 the portraits one sees of Robert Burns, playing, to my 
 delight, on a great violoncello which he was much in love 
 with. My father had some difficulty, I believe, in keeping 
 on good terms with George Tullis, who was apt to 
 be overbearing and surly, but he made friends with the 
 other boys. William was sharpening his maiden pen over 
 radical pamphlets, and my father was horrifying the 
 landed interest of Fife by revolutionary articles in the 
 Herald; while Robert and he talked, walked, and speculated 
 together on the poetry of science. He made friends, too, 
 with all the girls, pretty little Christina, and beautiful Alice, 
 and tall Jane. The two latter were leaving, the first was 
 just entering, school ; but she was over now and then on 
 holidays to see them all, and to be fascinated like the 
 rest by the talk and the grace of the young editor. How 
 strange it would be to follow the threads of the history of 
 those three girls ! Christina going for her last year at 
 school, and bidding good-bye to her brother William, and 
 meeting another William, and falling in love at first sight, 
 and being engaged a few months after, and being married. 
 How well I remember that marriage ! Alice falling in 
 love too, and fancying her love returned, and finding a 
 rival in her own sister ; then her marriage, and the end 
 of that how strange ! 
 
8 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 My father liked them all, but it was Jane he loved, and 
 after a year or two it was Jane he married ; and I know 
 they lived together very happily during those two years 
 and a half that passed before I knew anything about 
 them. He was Rector of the Academy of Montrose. 
 When dining out one afternoon in some friend's house by 
 the shore, the news came to him that he must hasten 
 home and see this baby who had just stepped upon the 
 stage. That was the 8th of September, 1833, my dear, 
 a great many years ago, and here my first letter ends. 
 
 Biarritz, May 14th. 
 
 My experience inclines me to indulge the fancy that the 
 scenery of our earliest years leaves an impression on 
 the mind which, however vague, is indelible, as the colour 
 the flower takes from the soil on which it grows. What 
 is it that has put that sound of waves into the sea-shell ? 
 Perhaps " it remembers its august abodes, and murmurs as 
 the ocean murmurs there." I am never brought into pre- 
 sence of the sea or the mountains, without feeling how 
 truly Wordsworth has named them the two great voices 
 of liberty ; without a thrill of exultation, as if I were 
 brought back to an earlier and a grander world. All 
 things else pass, but these are the same : the waves roll 
 round their shores with the same eternal surge, and the 
 hills rise up to greet the stars by night, and the sun by 
 day, with the same majestic calm. Perhaps I feel this 
 more because I was born by the shore of the sea, and 
 reared under the shadow of the Grampians ; yet I cannot, 
 from my earliest recollections, recall any features of 
 Montrose. Those three first years have passed and left 
 no sign, unless it be a faint image of the brain, half like 
 a dream, of my nurse dancing before me while I sat, a 
 baby on a chair. I have a vague impression of Barnachom 
 Cottage, where J. P. Nichol and his wife and their little 
 one spent the summer of 1836. My father had again 
 fallen into bad health, and had to resign his position as 
 Rector in Montrose. Old people whom I saw there last 
 winter told me stories of him, and how few expected his 
 
EARLY YEARS. 9 
 
 life would last, he looked so thin and worn. The same 
 illness, and circumstances connected with it, brought about 
 a change in his religious views ; his mind was turned 
 away from the Church of Scotland, after he had been for 
 some years a licentiate and preached several sermons, and 
 became more and more exclusively directed into the paths 
 of Literature and Science. In the spring of 1837 my 
 father delivered a course of lectures on Astronomy, before 
 the Philosophical Institution of Edinburgh, which combined 
 with his mathematical reputation, the fame of some articles 
 written in Taits Magazine, the vigour of his political 
 articles, and his influence with some of the leading 
 politicians of the time, to gain for him the appointment 
 to the chair of Astronomy in Glasgow. 
 
 It may have been during this visit to Edinburgh, but 
 it was probably later, that my father and my uncle in 
 some freak resolved to take me, almost an infant, to the 
 theatre. What an extraordinary revelation it was to me 
 of a wonderful bright world, of which I was for the time 
 permitted to be a spectator ! All behind the curtain was 
 to me then much more real than that other drama, which 
 goes on before it, appears to me now. Great ladies and 
 knights, and trumpets and music, and the paste and tinsel 
 all seemed to me so real. It was a dangerous experiment, 
 and nearly ended in disturbing the equanimity of the more 
 enlightened spectators ; for as we had taken a box we were 
 in a conspicuous position, and my feelings, which were 
 keen enough then, and vigorous in their expression, proved 
 too much for my decorum. At the most exciting parts of 
 the play it was Ivanhoe I burst into ejaculations only 
 half suppressed ; and when the Templar, my horror, was 
 proceeding in the course of nature to beat the old Jew, I 
 stretched out my fist and cried, " You villain." I was only 
 with difficulty quieted by the assurance that it would all 
 come right. 
 
 I have just a few disconnected recollections of our house 
 at Glasgow, in the old College Court, during the first six 
 months. It stood next to Blackburn's, near the entrance. 
 I took possession of the large nursery at the top of the 
 house, and arranged my toys in it, and prepared to rule 
 
IO MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 with undivided sway over my little kingdom. The rooms 
 below were only open to me now and then, and I walked 
 through them with a more modest step. My father's study 
 and my mother's room the red room were specially sacred. 
 Well I recollect one afternoon stealing into the latter, and 
 looking in amazement at her watch, standing in its case 
 on the table with the mirror in it. If I could get into 
 that old house, all covered over with cobwebs though it 
 is likely to be, I could lay my hand on the very corner 
 where my father used to be sitting in his round study 
 chair, when I was called to account for misconduct and 
 sentenced to an hour's imprisonment. Ah, what tears were 
 shed on those occasions ! 
 
 I had not seen my mother for some days, and there 
 was a mysterious silence in the house soon after we were 
 established in it. One evening, when I was lying in bed, 
 my father came to me and whispered I can remember it 
 as it were yesterday " John, you've got a little sister." 
 I have had few things to say about the previous years, 
 but it seems in my dim recollection as if I had lived a 
 whole forgotten life previous to that event. I did not 
 appreciate its full import, but in the morning I was led 
 in to get a peep of the starry stranger, who was destined 
 to exert so great an influence on my future. She lay 
 smiling in her tiny cradle as I said when asked about 
 her "just like a little pea." I saw her, and my mother, 
 only to bid good-bye. Good Dr. Samuel Clarke had 
 pronounced that, owing to some childish ailment I had at 
 the time, my remaining in the house might be fatal to 
 the child, and I was hurried away in the coach to 
 Edinburgh to spend a month there with my Aunt Jane 
 and her mother. They lived in a house at Lauriston, and 
 I have a vivid impression of the walks I used to have 
 with aunt about the meadows and along by the rows 
 then more green and open than now between Heriot's and 
 Donaldson's Hospital. I remember my grandmother Nichol 
 sitting stiff and stately on her arm-chair, a grand-looking 
 old lady, in spite of the paralysis which kept her fastened 
 there, just like the picture Hutchison painted with a skill 
 he afterwards lost, but subject to fits of violent ill-temper 
 
EARLY YEARS. II 
 
 which made poor Jane unhappy, and set me a bad example. 
 My great playmate was my uncle William ; he must have 
 been about twenty-five, full of life and promise. My 
 delight was to stand on his shoulders while he marched 
 with me round the room, springing and singing as was his 
 fashion with his own children afterwards ; or, better still, 
 to throw the pillows about, an initiation into the theory 
 of projectiles, which proved to have been premature, and 
 became rather dangerous in course of time. 
 
 I must have enjoyed this visit, yet I grew home-sick 
 ere its close. I rejoiced when the term of my banishment 
 drew near, for the cords that bound me to the guardian 
 angel of my early life were already drawn fast and strong. 
 
 " Great was the longing that I had 
 To see my mother." 
 
 Nothing of the journey home comes back to me except 
 the end of it, and that is fixed in my heart forever. I 
 had been among friends, but it was a strange land, where 
 she was not towards whom the tide of my love was set. 
 I see it yet the Beatific Vision of that Return the first 
 coming home from wandering. There she was standing 
 clothed in light, waiting for me in the porch. I would 
 give most things to live that moment over again. My 
 emotion was manifested in a way then common with me. 
 I was asked a thousand questions, and got a thousand 
 kisses ; but I only took her hand in silence, and wept 
 for joy. 
 
 There is a mist in my mind over the year that must 
 have followed this return, as if that ray of heavenly light 
 had left the space dark around it. I cannot recall my 
 second introduction to the little sister, nor anything but 
 the vaguest impression of a trip to London that we had 
 about this time, and that is a sort of dream of the Zoo- 
 logical Gardens, and another phantom of St. Paul's, and 
 a memory of disappointment because my mother and Aunt 
 Alice would not allow me to ascend the dome. 
 
12 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 Biarritz, May 15th. 
 
 The view from our windows in the College at Glasgow 
 was by no means calculated to enliven the fancies of a 
 child : on the one hand, the dull, silent court, with the 
 gloomy, covered fountain in the midst of it ; on the other, 
 the High Street, with its continual squalor and filth, where 
 scenes of cruelty and crime were the only events. On 
 one occasion I remember its making a dismal effort after 
 gaiety ; it was when the Queen's marriage brought tawdry 
 flags to the casements, and bands of boys, with kettle- 
 drums, marched along the pavement. Again, I recollect 
 watching a long train of carriages moving along with all 
 the solemn pomp of funeral pageantry, when the remains 
 of Sir Daniel Sandford were followed to the tomb by 
 the whole procession of his colleagues. The deaths of 
 my two grandfathers, which must have occurred during 
 those early years, have left no impression on my mind. I 
 have only a vague reminiscence of a gloom cast over the 
 house by my grandmother Nichol's release from her weary 
 bondage. An event of another sort is more distinctly 
 preserved for me. My Aunt Christina, my mother's youngest 
 sister, was married in our house to my father's youngest 
 brother, William. I remember the assembling of the guests, 
 the beautiful white bride, the handsome bridegroom, the 
 pulling off the glove, and my own sense of importance at 
 being present on so great an occasion. My taste for finery 
 displayed itself in the choice of a dress to be worn on 
 that day. Several tartans were brought, and I would have 
 that with the brightest colours a great scarlet and black 
 check, with a gleaming, gay sash. Attired in this, I was 
 as proud as a peacock, or a young lady coming out for 
 the first time at a county ball. I could not be accused of 
 carelessness about dress in those days. Another great bustle 
 about this time was on the occasion of the first meeting of 
 the British Association in Glasgow. I recollect the tickets 
 being coined ; and great pieces of card for labelling the 
 specimens which I kept long afterwards, with the huge 
 A's, and B's, and C's marked on them, for building houses 
 with and the tables laid out with strange maps and models ; 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 13 
 
 and the learned men who walked about the courts, and often 
 came to call on my father. I met one in the lobby one 
 day, and, catching hold of his coat, asked very unceremoni- 
 ously, "Who are you?" It was the worthy old Principal 
 Macfarlane. 
 
 I don't know what it is in the throats of little children 
 that makes one make one sound, another another. My 
 little sister, as soon as she could articulate distinctly, kept 
 saying " Nan ! Nan !" as if declaring that by this and no 
 other name she should be known. I am not sure that she 
 is not known to me best by that name to this day ; for 
 many years she was known by no other. Well, Nan was 
 growing up into a tiny angel, with a round face, rosy 
 cheeks, and large, staring eyes, and a cataract of bright, 
 golden hair that fell around her head as she laughed and 
 she was almost always laughing. For Nan would never sit 
 still ; she was in those days the image of light, and the 
 representative of perpetual motion. It is strange how long 
 it was before I came to appreciate Nan, with her bright 
 eyes. I was always quarrelling with my tiny rival. That 
 she should have half of all my toys, and claim half of all 
 the attention that used to be mine, was still a heart-burn 
 to my selfish jealousy. When I grew a little older I grew 
 meditative, quiet, fond of reading, while she long fled from 
 the sight of a book. Yet she was gradually stealing into 
 my heart, and I only found how fast a hold she had of 
 it when we went to Germany in 1840. Meanwhile at 
 home, in the nursery, she was my sole companion, and 
 there we had many a famous hour together. My imagina- 
 tion here began to revel in delights : all our games and 
 amusements were turned into stories. The love of stories 
 first brought me over the toils of learning to read. The 
 ABC was made possible to me by the aid of the usual 
 pictures ; but the syllables, which I used to learn on my 
 mother's knee, were so many instruments of torture. I 
 lingered over them long, and rebelled against them obstin- 
 ately ; my memory was detestable, my mispronunciation 
 inveterate. My progress at first appeared hopeless, till I 
 began to make out enough to read the stories and follow 
 their events. Then, as if I had suddenly leapt a bar, I 
 
14 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 plunged into reading with a rapidity which astonished every- 
 body. I could hardly ever be brought to spell, but now 
 I would read all day. Pictures first lured me on, and then 
 I made out the sense, my mother reading aloud the hard 
 words and passages now and then. The first book which 
 made a distinct impression on my mind was read aloud 
 to me during an illness. Some people say they don't like 
 the Pilgrim's Progress ; it took me captive at once and for 
 ever. I longed for the hour of the day when I should 
 have my chapters read to me ; I begged for a few more 
 when the reader was weary ; I cried when the book was 
 done, and went on imagining new and ever new adventures 
 for Christian and Christiana and my favourite, Faithful. 
 " You won't be like Hopeful, I'm afraid," said my mother. 
 Another source of delight was opened for me by a present 
 of Grimm's Mdhrchen in English. My imaginations of the 
 Celestial City were henceforth incongruously blended with 
 fantasies of faery land. I read book after book about the 
 dwarfs and trolls and spirits of the air ; I believed in them 
 as firmly and with as little idea of allegory as I believed 
 in Bunyan. There was a Celestial City which I thought I 
 might see one day, and there was a faery land. Faeries 
 were around me, if I could only have eyes to see them. 
 I won't undertake to deny that I believe in them still. 
 If I was missing in those days, I was pretty sure to be 
 found in a corner reading a faery tale and I would cry 
 when I was told to leave it and come to dinner or in 
 the nursery teaching Nan with her dolls to play at Great- 
 heart and Mercy, or building great brick houses for the 
 king of the faeries to come and live in. Those dolls were 
 an endless source of delight to me ; first, when they came 
 they had to be born, and we would play at the baby being 
 born ; then it had to be baptized ; then wedded ; then it 
 had a long and happy life to lead, and when its good 
 days were done it had to be respectably buried, not in 
 the foolish modern way, but like the great ladies and 
 gentlemen of long ago. I had seen in Flaxman's illustrations 
 to Homer the designs of the funerals of Patroclus and of 
 Hector : that was the way our dolls must have their rites 
 performed. So I built a little funeral pile of old bricks, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 15 
 
 and covered it with a black cloth, and laid the old dolls, 
 one or two or more, solemnly on the top of it, and set 
 fire to it all, and set other new dolls round to join in the 
 lamentation, and watch the wax running down as they 
 blazed away. 
 
 When I was sent to school, as I was in 1839, it did 
 not interfere with all this : my tasks and my amusement 
 went on together. My first teacher was a pretty good 
 one, though three parts humbug. He taught us from the 
 Moral Class Book and the Rudiments of Science, pretending 
 to more science than he knew. He used to ask the boys 
 absurdly difficult questions, and tell them to go home for 
 the answers. I remember one : " Why is the rainbow only 
 an arch when it is the reflection of the sun?" My father 
 was of course the only one of the parents who could solve 
 the problem, and I was supplied with a demonstration, which 
 I could not understand. As to my progress generally, I 
 believe it was satisfactory. I only remember that we were 
 ranged in benches, and that I was generally at the top 
 of the bench on five days in the week, but always got to 
 the bottom on Mondays, when we had to learn paraphrases 
 off by heart. There are people to be found who say that 
 memory is an affair of practice and education ; it is one part 
 dependent on practice and education, nine parts on birth : 
 the one part is about the extent to which any of our faculties 
 are in our hands. My memory was, is, and will be miser- 
 able. I never could, I can't, and never will be able to learn 
 things off by heart. My school-mates did not please me on 
 the whole, but they were not more rude or insolent than 
 school-boys generally are, and I used to enjoy one game 
 " Prison Bars" because I could run faster than any one else 
 of my age. I left school after six months' attendance to go 
 to Germany. 
 
 We must have had visitors sometimes : there is none I 
 remember so well as Annette Forbes, my second cousin, 
 to whom my father wrote a poem in blank verse, thirty-five 
 years ago, about the island of Jersey, where he went to visit 
 her. She was a very pretty girl twenty-two years ago, 
 when she gave me my first lesson in love ; and I used 
 to pull her long ringlets, and call it ringing the bell. On 
 
1 6 MEMOIR OF JOHN N1CH0L. 
 
 going away she found herself tied by several ropes to the 
 table ; and when she did go away, I felt very dull. My 
 second lesson was at Lasswade, where we went early, say 
 in April, 1840, I and my mother with Agnes. We were to 
 leave Nan there to be with Aunt Christina till we should 
 come back from our projected tour abroad. It was a 
 pleasant cottage she and uncle had taken there for the 
 summer months. I remember my delight in the fresh 
 country air, and the freedom of the fields after the dingy 
 day's walk with my satchel from the College Court to John 
 Street. There was aunt herself in her own pretty house, 
 and William again, and little Tiny the baby, and Margaret 
 Burton (a favourite servant of mine), the good-natured, fat 
 cook, whom I consulted on a great occasion. It arose as 
 follows. There was a next or near neighbour, to whose 
 garden I used to be asked, to pull strawberries and flowers. 
 He had a daughter, just two years older than myself, who 
 used to gather them with me, and who made me forget 
 all about the strawberries and flowers. If I pulled a berry 
 it was to place it between the red lips ; if I plucked a 
 rose, it was to offer it to the fair fingers of this little girl. 
 Well, I was in love, and she was mine for a delicious fort- 
 night. Our stolen interviews were sweet ; our stolen kisses 
 sweeter. I dreamt about her, and thought about her 
 incessantly. Was she only a coquette, or did she return 
 the sincerest of passions ? Suspense could be endured no 
 longer ; I must know the best or the worst. One evening 
 when her father and herself and a party of gentlemen 
 were supping at my uncle's, I slipped into the kitchen and 
 confided the secrets of my heart to the cook. " Propose 
 for her, propose for her at once," advised that disingenuous 
 woman ; " claim her hand from her father in front o' them 
 a'." No sooner said than done. The little maiden ran away 
 blushing ; the worthy circle stared and laughed. Alas, alas ! 
 I was not to have her till I was sixteen, by which time 
 I was sure my heart would be broken. 
 
EARLY YEARS. 1 7 
 
 Biarritz, May 16th. 
 
 The day came when we started for Germany my father, 
 my mother, and myself. Nan was left alone at Lasswade, 
 poor little thing, with melancholy eyes. " Me go too," she 
 said, looking up entreatingly into her mother's face. We 
 should be back in three months to bring pretty things 
 for her to play with ; meanwhile aunt would be very, very 
 kind. We went, I think, from Edinburgh to Glasgow, and 
 then to Liverpool, and then to London. We spent about 
 a week there. I must not fall into reflections on London ; 
 it would be antedating the thoughts of long after years. 
 I knew nothing of that mighty Babylon then. We lived 
 in a little street off the Strand, leading towards the river. 
 There was a balcony to the house ; and I recollect my 
 delight one afternoon when Punch and Judy established 
 themselves before our window, and my father gave them 
 a few pence, and they went through their performance 
 manfully, a performance I still like to witness. I have 
 stood before that box many a time. Only last autumn I 
 wandered for hours among the marionette booths in the 
 Champs Elysees, and found nothing finer. 
 
 I remember we paid a visit to the British Museum, 
 which only bewildered me, and to the India House to 
 call for J. S. Mill, whose Logic I think was hardly published 
 then ; he or some one else there showed us a number of 
 curious things. Another friend of my father's some man 
 of science or other, I cannot guess who gave me on 
 this occasion a present of the electrical machine over which 
 I have spent many an inquisitive hour. The traces that 
 remain to me of this residence are, you see, faint and few. 
 I have no memory of our embarkation. Light breaks upon 
 me next at Ostend. We had landed there in a room 
 very like ours at Dieppe, and my father said to me, 
 with a smile, " Now, you have crossed the sea." 
 
 We went to the Continent alone we three but our 
 friends, the Thomsons, had arranged to meet us on the 
 way ; they spent some considerable time with us on the 
 Rhine, so I had better explain who they were. 
 
 Leigh Hunt has written a book called The Old Court 
 
 B 
 
1 8 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Suburb, which, as I have not read it, I shall believe to be 
 excellent. Had I more leisure and a clearer memory, I 
 think I could write something about the Old College 
 Court. The dingy old place has for me some pleasant 
 associations. When I think of those who occupied that 
 court in the days when we first came to it, of those who 
 are its tenants now, and how few have passed from the 
 one list into the other, I am led to moralize after the 
 manner of Dr. Young, or, if that seem too ambitious, like 
 Dr. Harvey among the tombs. They came from various 
 quarters, figured there a little while, and disappeared. 
 When we first lived there, Hill had not begun to sound 
 forth his platitudes from the chair, nor Fleming, good 
 man, to pour out his ethical rhetoric, nor Jackson to 
 discuss " great general principles," nor the most illustrious 
 of the Thomsons to make new discoveries in electricity. 
 Old Macfarlane was presiding over " this venerable Uni- 
 versity " and making speeches which were still intelligible. 
 The medical faculty has been all recast. Not one of 
 the occupants of their chairs at that time remains. There 
 were Meikleham and Macgill, and others mere nominum 
 umbrae now. Ramsay was there, with a young wife and 
 a little girl, Carry ; she had a room full of pictures and 
 dolls that I used to go and play in now and then. 
 Lushington I remember coming, and there being some 
 bustle about his marriage. From the earliest time I can 
 recall I had the same feeling for him as I have now : 
 from the first, he " wore that weight of learning lightly, like 
 a flower " among pedants who wore heavily the little learn- 
 ing they had. Jackson's predecessor, Reid, was the successor 
 of old Dr. M'Turk. I remember him. Old Dr. M'Turk 
 was a bachelor of bachelors. Women and everything 
 connected with them, marriage in particular, were his pet 
 aversions. I believe he would rather have put his neck 
 into any noose than that of matrimony. His dogmatism 
 on this point was his pride and everybody else's jest. Yet 
 he must have been good-natured, for he was persuaded not 
 only to attend my aunt Christina's marriage, but to permit 
 a piece of the cake to be put on his plate. Oh, horrible ! 
 that piece of cake contained the ring. The old man, as 
 
EARLY YEARS. \g 
 
 I am told, shuddered, drew back his chair some distance 
 from the table, looked at his plate, shuddered again, then 
 took a fork, and holding it at arm's length, passed one 
 of the prongs through the ring and held it to his neighbour, 
 Mr. James Smith, saying, " There, take it." Poor old man, 
 he did not long survive this shock, but was carried to 
 his grave soon after the large new house, on the left hand 
 as you enter the court, had been built for him. His 
 successor in the tenancy of this house was Dr. James 
 Thomson. 
 
 Niebuhr, after examining a portion of the Fasti 
 Consulares, arrived at the conclusion, that the senatus 
 populusque Romanics had made a compact to elect every 
 year a member of the Fabian house to one of the highest 
 offices of state, so thickly are the records studded with 
 names of the Fabii. Some future Niebuhr of the New 
 Zealand Macaulay imagines, turning his attention to the 
 annals of Glasgow College, will undoubtedly arrive at the 
 conclusion that the leaders of that illustrious corporation 
 had, during the period of which I am writing, become 
 bound in a similar manner to the name of Thomson. 
 Members of that great gens literally filled one-half of the 
 chairs in the University. I will not venture to say how 
 many I have known. There was Tommy Thomson the 
 chemist ; William Thomson of Materia Medica ; Allen 
 Thomson of Anatomy, brother of the last ; Dr. James 
 Thomson of Mathematics ; William, his son, etc., etc. 
 Old Dr. James was one of the best of Irishmen, a good 
 mathematician, an enthusiastic and successful teacher, the 
 author of several valuable school books, a friend of my 
 father's, and himself the father of a large family, the 
 members of which have been prosperous in the world. 
 They lived near us in the court, and we made a pretty 
 close acquaintanceship with them all. Mrs. Thomson 
 had died before her husband came to Glasgow ; but 
 there were two daughters, both clever, good talkers 
 and sketchers, one of them very pretty ; and four sons, 
 in their order, James, William, John, and Robert, a 
 pleasant and happy group, now scattered far and wide. 
 Dr. James came originally from the North of Ireland, and 
 
20 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 to some extent combined the qualities of the two races 
 who are in that district fused together. He was laborious 
 and precise and acute, destitute of the inventive, but 
 largely endowed with the appreciative faculties. Good- 
 hearted, he was shrewdly alive to his interest without 
 being selfish, and would put himself to some trouble, and 
 even expense, to assist his friends. He was a stern 
 disciplinarian, and did not relax his discipline when he 
 applied it to his children, and yet the aim of his life was 
 their advancement. He was impressionable, if not im- 
 pressible, like the most of Irishmen, and was more tenacious 
 of his impressions than most. He was uniformly kind 
 to me, and I owe him nothing but gratitude. 
 
 Of the sons I liked James the best. He was crotchety 
 and apt to be sulky with those who would not enter into 
 his crotchets ; here, as far as I know, his faults end. He 
 was steadfast, straightforward, independent, quiet, unob- 
 trusive, with more Scotch than Irish blood in his veins, 
 and yet it ran warmly enough for his friends, and at a 
 later period I had the honour to be one of them. His 
 passion was engineering ; he was always on the eve of 
 inventing something that was going to revolutionize trade. 
 He used to show me lots of models, and often when we 
 were in Arran together he would walk out to try his 
 boats or his wheels on the streams, as a chemist goes to 
 make an experiment that will test the worth or worth- 
 lessness of years of toil, or the astronomer goes to look 
 for the star whose place he has predicted with the help 
 of a million figures. I believe some of those inventions 
 were excellent, but there was always some practical obstacle 
 which prevented their bringing to the inventor either the 
 fame or the fortune they merited. James was an idealist 
 in his way. 
 
 John was an assiduous and successful student of medicine, 
 and died of a fever caught during his attendance on the 
 hospital. He made friends with me when I was a very 
 little fellow, and, strange to say, my memories of that 
 friendship are pleasant, though the details I can recall 
 are mostly painful. I was a very timid child, that is to 
 say, ready to imagine or believe every sort of terror, and 
 
EARLY YEARS. 21 
 
 sure to dream about it night and day. John, who was 
 at that age when young men are apt to delight in 
 torturing timid children, used to torture me out of my 
 wits. 1 recollect yet, with a sort of shudder, his showing 
 me a box of ten guineas which he had got for a prize, 
 and saying, in an awful voice, " Do you know what I am 
 going to do with this money? I am going to buy a 
 large pot and boil you in it." The earnestness of his 
 manner convinced me at once that such was his intention. 
 I had not learnt to balance probabilities. By a gigantic 
 effort I extricated myself from his grasp, rushed across 
 the green, and burst with loud sobs into the house. 
 " Mother, mother," I screamed, " Johnny Thomson's going 
 to boil me in a pot." I was pacified for the moment, but 
 for a whole fortnight nothing could induce me to enter 
 the house where I used to be a daily visitor. Another 
 day I remember the same malicious John repeated, with 
 the same success, the trick which Margaret Burton had 
 practised on my unsophisticated heart. I used to cast 
 soft looks on Miss Thomson, the daughter of the other 
 Professor William, and, audacious libertine, on Miss Reid, 
 daughter of Church History. John informed me that my 
 affections were known, possibly returned, that I must 
 propose to one of them, and the sooner the better. "Ah, 
 here comes one across the green " (where we used to be 
 walking). Which it was I cannot tell, but I remember 
 being goaded to go down on my knees and kiss the hem 
 of her garment, and declare myself there and then. She 
 smiled, and said she would think about it. 
 
 Biarritz, May 27th. 
 
 There are hours when we think we have forgotten 
 everything ; the whole various past seems buried in the 
 dark valley ; but here and there, by some strange inspiration 
 of memory, the curtain is lifted and we catch the gleams 
 of dawn on the cottage and the height. There runs a 
 river, there a castle stands with ruined towers, yonder 
 smiles a mossy bank with children playing on it, and the 
 image of ourselves takes part in their games. Trivial 
 
22 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 things at unexpected moments recall those associations : a 
 cloud in the twilight, a hillside, a breath of wind across 
 the sea, the fragrance of a flower, are the spells which 
 serve in turn to unlock the sealed-up fountains. Eighteen 
 years had elapsed between my first and second visit to 
 the Continent, and yet when I sailed up the Elbe with 
 Agnes three years ago, the sights and sounds, the lights 
 twinkling through the trees, the German speech, the hotel, 
 the street, everything seemed to annihilate that lapse of 
 time ; the years rolled back as they say they do to drowning 
 men, and I was again with those loved long ago in that 
 little room at Ostend. A boy of seven, I do not remember 
 much of it, only those first impressions which come so 
 vividly to us all when we are placed in circumstances 
 altogether new. 
 
 To cross the Channel for the first time is a pleasure 
 which one can only have once in life. It would be 
 hard to say in what it consists ; but the men and their 
 manners, the houses with their balconies and quaint 
 old gables, the horses with their bells, the streets with 
 their gleaming cafes and rows of green trees, it is all 
 so different and there is a delight in the mere sense of 
 difference. There is something in the air, too, which 
 makes one feel light-hearted, and a greater freedom about 
 little things takes away all the restraint of strangeness ; we 
 become familiar at once in a new home. I have been 
 told that I ought not to have gone abroad so soon, before 
 I could appreciate the surprise ; but if I missed a great 
 deal, I magnified the rest with the wondering eyes of a 
 child, so that my gain was greater than my loss. The 
 bells, as they jingled along, made a sort of magic music 
 in my little ears ; the hotels, after that dark College Court, 
 seemed like old-fashioned palaces. I would not have been 
 astonished had I met Roland and his paladins coming 
 down the stairs. Those huge pictures on the walls, that my 
 tired critical eyes now pronounce so coarse and tawdry, 
 were the realization to me then of the Arabian Nights ; there 
 they were, the palms and the crystal fountains, and the 
 beautiful ladies and the warriors ready for the fight. 
 Then the table d'hote that was a feast for the gods spread 
 
EARLY YEARS. 23 
 
 out before the heroes nectar served by the hands of Hebe, 
 and drunk to the tunes of faery lands. What do I see now ? 
 a table, with greedy men and women round it, decked with 
 faded flowers and dressed dishes and sour wine, while a beggar 
 is blowing discord through a cracked bugle at the door. 
 
 The showman of memory pulls the string, and we 
 are at Bruges. I would like to go back there again, 
 and I feel I might do so without danger of disappoint- 
 ment. " Quaint old Flemish city," how we all loved you 
 in that sunny June, with your squares and towers of 
 ancient time, and windows carved with strange designs! A 
 city of old palaces, the staircases of the Earls of Flanders 
 lead up to the doorways of the inns, and the gateways 
 are crusted yet with armorial crests as when Artevelde 
 and the White Hoods came storming through them 
 from Ghent. It seemed to me then that I would never 
 reach the end of those old winding belfry stairs the view 
 how wonderful, how dizzy, and the bells how majestic 
 in their repose, how terrible in their motion ! I saw them 
 hanging there, with the great bell in their midst, room 
 enough for hide and seek within their enormous boles, 
 and trembled to think of the noise there would be 
 when the chimes began. Father and mother did not know 
 why I was so anxious to get down the stairs, but that 
 was the reason, for I thought the sound would drive me 
 out of the window. We had just set foot on the ground 
 when the " long, stern swell " arose Ems, Zwei, Drei 
 Never, forever ; Forever, never, with a deep voice to and fro. 
 I wonder if I would think those bells as big now? Have 
 you ever gone into a room that you had been in many 
 years before, and expected to find a very large room and 
 found it smaller than you expected ? I remember coming 
 back to a table once and saying to myself, " What has 
 happened to this table ? It reached to the top of my head, 
 and now it only comes up to my waist ; and the mantel- 
 piece, I could just touch it with my hands, and now !" 
 Ach, Gott ! how things change in this world! Once I 
 thought that when I was a great man I should get an 
 egg to breakfast that kept my hopes alive ; now the egg 
 is often hard to digest. 
 
24 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 We must have been at Ghent, but there is no picture 
 of it in my show-box. I had not begun to be a student 
 of history, nor to care about localizing the dwellings of 
 great men I had never heard of. We passed a night in 
 Brussels, and I have a dim recollection of a bright city, 
 with great shops, and magnificent saloons in the hotels, 
 and a fountain in the courtyard, and bands of music and 
 soldiers passing by. If there is not a fine Hotel de Ville 
 there I am mistaken ; for, if I do not remember, I have 
 dreamt about it. Liege and Aix-la-Chapelle, too, are 
 blanks. I only recall, with a vividness as of yesterday, our 
 driving in a chaise together, and mother saying, " We 
 have seen nothing yet quite equal to Bruges," and my 
 father, clapping his hands and answering with a smile, 
 " Wait till we come to the Rhine," and again, " Wait till 
 we come to the Rhine." 
 
 The Rhine flows on as it flowed long ago, when we 
 sailed together all three ; there is the same " exulting and 
 abounding river," the same grey walls " where ruin greenly 
 dwells " along the banks which bear the vine. But I 
 tremble to touch that fairy dream. I fear to break my 
 memories of that summer with a reality which those 
 memories help to transfigure. Things have changed since 
 then, my dearest : you are with me to fill the place of 
 those who will visit that stream no more ; but I have older 
 eyes and a harder heart, and the place itself is not all 
 the same. It must have lost half of its beauty in losing 
 all its repose. Sad to tell, that quiet route of ours has 
 become a thoroughfare for fashion and indolence. I expect 
 to find all the gentle places desecrated, and the mossy 
 banks trodden underfoot by throngs of geese and swine. 
 If anything prevents our retracing the steps of that journey, 
 I shall console myself with the thought that I can still 
 keep them as they are, shading themselves off and gilded 
 as they vanish by the rays of imagination. We drove to 
 Cologne. I had a glimpse of it on my route from Han- 
 over to Antwerp three years ago. It was night ; I saw 
 out of the dingy diligence the shadow of the great 
 cathedral on the river broad and deep that was all. 
 Long ago it seemed a grand old town, but almost all 
 
EARLY YEARS. 25 
 
 my other recollections are overpowered by that of its 
 chief glory. 
 
 It has been said that architecture, since the world began, 
 pursuing three great paths, has reached the end and crown 
 of each in three immortal works. The Temple of Carnac 
 at Thebes, the Parthenon, and the Cathedral of Cologne 
 show us at a glance what the East, and Greece, and the 
 North could do in stone. I have only seen the last ; that 
 is twenty-five years ago, and it remains to me, and will 
 remain for ever, a mystery and a wonder of magnificence. 
 I once stood in the churchyard of Salisbury with a fair 
 and wise young lady, and she remarked that she could feel 
 the elevating influence of the spire even when she did not 
 see it : Coleridge has in grander language expressed the 
 same fancy about Mont Blanc. The Cathedral of Cologne 
 is the Mont Blanc of architecture, and it gives an air 
 of sublimity to the whole town. You know the legend of 
 its building : it were doubtless easier to believe it the pro- 
 duct of no mortal hand ; but it was surely an archangel of 
 light that conceived that glorious front, so rich, so delicate, 
 and yet so gigantic. The unfinished tower alone seems to 
 connect it with the things of earth, and the efforts of man 
 ever aspiring beyond their accomplishment. Enter in 
 through the everlasting gates, and look on that choir 
 springing up as if to claim majestic kindred with the 
 skies arch soaring above arch, and frieze over frieze, look 
 till you are dizzy with sight, then glance along and see 
 the vista far before you like the avenues of some primaeval 
 wood, pillar on pillar, with base and cornice and groove 
 wrought into every lovely and phantastic form with which 
 stone is capable of being inspired, and wonder at the 
 mighty nave, and the great dome with its bastions and 
 turrets bristling like the populous pines of a forest ; 
 stand before the altar rich in gold and gems ; look again 
 above and see the streams of light that fall from saints 
 and kings and queens of crimson and azure, and flicker 
 over the marble floor ; or be there when the organ rolls 
 through the aisles like a sea, and mark how every single 
 beauty of sculpture or colour or music is subservient to 
 the unity which is the greatest feature of the whole 
 
26 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 see all this as I have done, and know that you have seen 
 enough of man's power to give you a hope of man's 
 immortality. 
 
 We stayed some little time at Bonn. We lodged near 
 the verge of the town, where we met the Thomsons, and 
 the younger boys and I used to make little paper boats 
 and let them sail far away over the roofs of the houses 
 of course each boat had its imaginary, sometimes its real 
 tenant, in the shape of a beetle or ant, and we watched 
 their destinies with more interest than friends in after life 
 commonly watch each other's. It was when we were here 
 that we went out for a day to the country, and saw a 
 village dance it was very pretty the old men sat and 
 smoked their pipes under the trees, the youths and maidens 
 went in a ring and made music and love together. From 
 Bonn, too, my father, with James and Willy Thomson, 
 went to walk for three days among the craters of the 
 district, and came home with their pockets full of specimens, 
 which James still preserves in his cabinet. 
 
 " It was upon a tranced summer night " that we sailed 
 round the corner of the Rhine which reveals the Sieben- 
 gebirge, and came gliding into the island of Nonnenwerth. 
 Clear and calm and fair the memory of that night comes 
 back to me from over all the years. One by one the peaks 
 appeared, and stood grandly above the quiet stream, in the 
 grey light which soon faded away beyond their purpling 
 crests. The moon stood out, a glorious crescent on the 
 ridge of Rolandseck, and a bright star led the host of 
 heaven over the brow of Drachenfels. The lights of 
 the little convent were twinkling through the trees, and 
 the boatmen were chanting their evensong as they came 
 and brought us to the shore, where we stepped hand in 
 hand together to live what seems to me like a dream of 
 the gates of heaven. If my summer on the Rhine is an 
 oasis in my life, Nonnenwerth is the oasis within the oasis, 
 the greenest and most beautiful spot amid the whole of 
 this enchanted ground. What were the fabled bowers of 
 bliss, and Hesperian gardens, and isles of palms to me, in 
 this my own Elysium, my fortnight's home of joy ? Non- 
 nenwerth is indeed a place where Peris exiled from Paradise 
 
EARLY YEARS. 27 
 
 might have been content to dwell. The " castled crag " 
 frowning on the wide and winding river the tower of 
 Roland rising with its romantic legend the banks "rich in 
 corn and wine " the village full of quiet Germans on the 
 opposite shore the rest of the seven hills with their long 
 waving line of blue ridges, made a fit setting for the island 
 gem. 
 
 The convent, in becoming an inn, had not at that 
 time quite ceased to be a convent, for sisters of charity 
 frequented it, and there was daily service in the little 
 chapel, rich in its stained glass windows. If I go there 
 again, I shall seek out that chapel, and fall before the altar, 
 and ask forgiveness for all the sins I have committed since 
 I wandered there, an innocent child. The inn, for so now 
 at least it must be called, had the island for a garden, 
 and there many a time, on delicious days of June, my 
 mother and I lost ourselves among the thickets, to be 
 guided back again by the fragrance of the roses blown 
 to us by the breeze. There we would sit and read the 
 Legends of the Rhine, or Childe Harold. I read 
 
 "But one thing want those banks of Rhine 
 Thy gentle hand," 
 
 and then I could read no more, for I thought of my 
 sister. There many a night would I chase the fireflies, 
 which clustered in swarms about the roots of the trees, 
 and made the green shades brilliant with their light. The 
 fireflies were an endless delight, for who could doubt they 
 were the fairies at last made visible to me to me who knew 
 and loved them so well, and spent half my days and many 
 hours of the nights in thinking over their adventures. 
 There was Nymphalin (for I was then reading and admir- 
 ing Bulwer), and Pippine, and the king of the faeries, and 
 the spirit of the stars, and the gnomes and the elves all 
 come to keep me company. In my imgination the 
 Pilgrim's Progress and Faeryland got fused together, and 
 I began to make in my mind a kingdom not of this 
 world, into which all the creations of poet or novelist 
 were afterwards to be admitted to join with the heroes 
 of real history, to play new parts in undiscovered lands. 
 
28 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Hildegart was there, then joined to her faithful lover ; for 
 I set all things right in my great world of dreams. 
 These dreams may last I will never quite surrender them 
 but this fortnight could not last for ever. We had been 
 on the peak of Drachenfels, and sat under Roland's ruined 
 tower, and seen other neighbouring towns and citadels I 
 have forgotten, when the dies atra arrived, and, with many 
 tears, I was torn away from the scenes amid which I would 
 willingly have dwelt forever. 
 
 The curtain rises for a moment over Coblenz : I recollect 
 the blue Moselle mingling its crystal waters with the great 
 stream, and the town and the bridge, and the grand solemn 
 rock, Ehrenbreitstein the broad stone of honour with its 
 row of cannon and looming bastion. It seemed a lurid- 
 looking place, more so even than the rock of St. Sebastian, in 
 my memory, and well deserving all that Byron says about it. 
 I remember too seeing the castles of the two brothers, and 
 reading Bulwer's version of the legend, and the Rat's tower, 
 about which I read Southey's ballad ; but my most vivid 
 recollection is of the Lureley, and strange to say it is a 
 painful one. I have said before that I was a timid 
 child, nothing frightened me more than loud noises : they 
 produced such an effect on my nerves that they made me 
 scream. This fear had spoiled my pleasure in the Belfry 
 of Bruges ; it rose to a height when I heard that they 
 were going to fire a cannon, to bring out the echoes of 
 the Lureley. I wished to see the rock, but I wished much 
 more to avoid hearing the sound, and signified my inten- 
 tion to retire to the cabin till it was over. As it turned 
 out, the loss of this view was not the only result of my 
 determination. My father, with the best wishes, sometimes 
 made mistakes in his management of me. Among other 
 theories he had one which he put into painfully severe 
 practice, that my foolish peculiarities should be eradicated 
 by force. When I had disappeared he followed me into 
 the cabin, and ordered me to ascend to the deck. I 
 refused to do so till the cannon had fired ; he tried to 
 drag me up, I clung to the seat, and, irritated, he ex- 
 claimed, " Then stay there all day," and I lost the whole 
 day's view, and felt guilty and miserable. 
 
EARLY YEARS. 29 
 
 We were on our way to Frankfort when this happened, 
 and there we spent the most considerable part of our time. 
 I remember our getting settled down somewhere into 
 comfortable lodgings up one or two stairs, and our meet- 
 ing the Thomsons again, and being tormented once more 
 by John, who said he had found that every one living in 
 Germany might be compelled to be a soldier unless he cut 
 off his right hand, and that I must take my choice ; but I 
 would consent to neither alternative, and only felt very 
 much on my guard against everybody, so much so that I 
 would by no means enter into the martial games of the 
 little boys, our neighbours, who wished to make me their 
 playfellow. My father went alone to Vienna by Ratisbon 
 and Passau, returning by Innsbruck and the Tyrol and 
 Munich. My mother and I stayed three months at Frank- 
 fort ; the Thomsons came often to see us, and we had 
 other varieties enough to prevent our feeling lonely. In 
 the forenoons I would read Byron or Bulwer or a fairy 
 tale, or, when virtue led me to severer toil, I would try 
 to get through some of the German in the Orbis Pictus, 
 or the Lives of Celebrated Men, till our German teacher 
 came and I prepared my list of nouns. Then I would run 
 down into the market with my kreutzer, and come up rich 
 in an enormous bunch of cherries. I built little houses of 
 books, and filled the great halls I made with toys and 
 dolls and fruit, and imagined marvels. In the afternoons 
 I went sometimes with J. T. to see the boys leaping off 
 the rafts into the Maine ; sometimes I went rambling with 
 mother by the towers and gates of the fine old town, 
 and watched her drawing those sketches, which, faint and 
 shadowy though they be, I would not exchange for all the 
 masterpieces in the Louvre or Luxembourg. Frankfort was 
 a pleasant place to live in then, whatever it may be now. 
 It had its romance old houses within, and green glades 
 without the walls ; and yet it was well furnished with all 
 things needful. I should be glad to return there and see 
 if the cherries taste as sweet as ever, if the environs are as 
 luxuriant as when we went out on an afternoon to see the 
 Prince of Homburg drive round his park, or the streets 
 as gay as when there was a rush of lights at night and a 
 
30 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 shout " The Czar, the Czar," and J. T. and I ran and saw 
 the great Nicholas ride by majestic in his open carriage. 
 I would like to see Dannecker's Ariadne again : nothing in 
 marble, Greek god or slave, ever impressed me so much. 
 I see her yet, riding on that huge tiger, " clothed on with 
 chastity " and most divinely fair, with the light from crimson 
 curtains falling on her glossy skin, and making it glow 
 with life. 
 
 One evening in dewy autumn, there was a knock at the 
 door, and my father entered. He had returned in radiant 
 health and spirits from his long journey, with such ad- 
 ventures to narrate, such sights to tell of, as made us 
 alternately laugh and wonder in our joy. It was near 
 night, I remember, and I had just crept into my little bed, 
 when he brought me a little armful of presents, a Tyrolese 
 hat, and coins and books, and I lay and listened as they 
 talked of lands and people far, far away, and there was a 
 great gladness over all because he was home again. This 
 was the first of those meetings in my picture gallery, 
 where many more were to be afterwards framed and hung. 
 
 We went together to Heidelberg, the end of our course. 
 Heidelberg on the crystal Neckar ! by " many a tower and 
 turret, and many an ancient town," and many a winding 
 belt of ripening vines we came to thee ! Together we 
 wandered through the old castle, and saw the gigantic Tun, 
 and the chapel, and the wall hung with escutcheons ; and 
 we walked round the round tower and the colossal rampart, 
 and skirted the hillside together, with its dark green leafy 
 glades, and its feast of blaeberries. 
 
 Heidelberg ! where the romance of six long centuries 
 comes down and connects itself with the learning and 
 thought of this latest day, with the clear stream beneath 
 and the clear sky above, rising from the faery land of the 
 forest, and overarched by the faery land of the clouds 
 Turner, and Turner only, in that dream of his, has inter- 
 preted your mystery, and made your loveliness visible to 
 men. Old and new are blended in your great red granite 
 walls, which " a thousand battles have assailed in vain," 
 and time has only touched with ruin to make more 
 glorious. We passed through the square court with its 
 
EARLY YEARS. 3 1 
 
 relics, and out by the outer yard, and down the long 
 narrow street, and into the quaint old town, while the bells 
 of the horses those same bells that first saluted us at 
 Ostend were ringing as they pulled the little ships up the 
 current of the Neckar, and next morning we bade a long 
 adieu to Heidelberg. I often thought to go there as 
 a student, and dream beside the hyacinths that dream 
 beneath the trees, or spin my philosophic fancies under 
 the walls of the castle, till I had got rid of time, and got 
 back to the days of its glory but other fates were in 
 store for me. 
 
 We went home. I cried when we passed the old places 
 without stopping. I wished at least to see all my old 
 friends once more ; but we sailed on unceasingly. I have 
 only a vision of Rotterdam, with its Dutch gables and 
 swamps and continual canals ; then the curtain falls, and 
 there is darkness around the close of this journey, and of 
 the first epoch of my life. 
 
 Biarritz, May 31st. 
 
 Twenty years ago the Observatory stood alone on the 
 hill over which it still presides : a site selected as the 
 highest point between Glasgow and the Kilpatrick range, 
 and, as it then appeared, the least likely to be interfered 
 with by other buildings. I used to mount up the rising 
 ground on the College Green to the old Observatory, which 
 you may remember, and see my father with his fur cap 
 on winter nights peering through the tube of the old 
 telescope. I was alive to the wonders of the old tube. 
 I remember seeing Orion through it for the first time, and 
 Jupiter, and the moon. The experiments in the Natural 
 Philosophy class which my father taught before we went 
 to Germany, used to rivet my attention. I will not forget 
 coming into his study that dread study with the round 
 chair in it and seeing him hold a mass of flame in a 
 spoon, and throw it into his hand, and toss it into another, 
 as I fancied, by the help of the Devil himself. When I 
 came back from the Rhine, my own researches with the 
 electrical machine removed some of those wonders from the 
 
32 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 land of magic into that of discovery ; but my first shock 
 was a terror to me for a long time to come. 
 
 But I am retrogressing into a period which we have 
 closed. A few months' residence in the College after our 
 return from the Continent connects the two epochs, but I 
 was soon to enter into a new home and a new life. One 
 afternoon in the autumn of 1840, I and my father and 
 uncle William went to take what seemed to me a very 
 long walk into the country. We passed the outskirts of 
 the town then about Sauchiehall Street ; left behind a 
 few detached houses, which remain to recall the old days 
 of St. George's Road; crossed over the fields where Queen's 
 Crescent was afterwards erected ; and went on by an ill- 
 made narrow road that skirted the great black quarry ; 
 and reached a farm-house on Horslet Hill, and plunged 
 through ploughed fields to the top, where a crowd of 
 masons were planting the foundations of the future Dome. 
 " Miratur molem Aeneas " ; it seemed to me as if they were 
 preparing to build a city. I only remember my wonder, 
 and my weariness on drawing near home, and that I was 
 dragged along between my uncle's and my father's arms. 
 
 We all migrated to the Observatory in the spring of 
 1 841. I recollect the flitting, and the lading and unlading 
 of wagons, the damp on the new-built walls, the scrolls of 
 the masons which still adorned them, and the peculiar 
 odour of the new house. We were obliged to live in the 
 ground floor for some time, while the upper rooms were 
 being painted. I remember peeping into the dining-room 
 while it was getting its magnificent coating of oak, and 
 better still the evening after all was over, and the furniture 
 had got settled into its place, and the doors were thrown 
 open. How I danced through the room, gazing at the roof 
 that seemed so lofty, and marching with pride through the 
 spacious halls that were to give me shelter and inspiration 
 for so many years. The new house, now the old house, 
 on the hill, how grandly it stood there all alone nothing 
 near but the little farm in the valley, nothing to break the 
 view from the white battlements, with the long sweep of 
 upland to the south, the snowy mountains in the north, 
 the gleaming strip of the river beneath in the twilight, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 33 
 
 and the great city bathed in the morning sun or glittering 
 with a thousand lamps at night. About a mile off was 
 the village a village then, and not a dingy suburb where 
 our old gardeners used to lodge, and whither I used to 
 walk in the morning to bring the letters from the post, or 
 occasionally in the forenoons, with Agnes and our house- 
 maid, to fetch a basket full of fruit during that first summer, 
 before our own garden began to pour forth its abundance. 
 Our garden, what a delight was that ! here, over broad 
 green sward and winding walk, I was free to run about 
 alone, or in a world peopled only with my own fancies. 
 On the great stone circle there rose then the framework 
 of the immense fifty-feet telescope, rising with its double 
 ladders like the " mast of some great Ammiral," to a 
 height perilous on that hill of the winds ; for now and then 
 in March, when the terrible storms came, it fell with a 
 crash, and lay on the ground covering more roods than 
 Milton allots to the prince of the fallen angels. Between 
 the ladders there was a box swung, something like a cage, 
 in which the astronomer the bird of prey for the time 
 was lifted up to a giddy height, while looking in search of 
 his moons or stars through the gigantic tube which was 
 our boast, until Lord Breadalbane's bounty and the dis- 
 covery of a less cumbrous method of attaining a higher 
 power came to supersede it. Around this circle and about 
 this framework, I, and my cousin, and some young friends 
 used to disport ourselves ; and as we swung in the cage 
 and clambered to the supreme heights of the ladder, we 
 were admirals, commanders, conquerors in some great naval 
 fight, with our battle flag, in the shape of some audacious 
 handkerchiefs, flaunting from the peak of the great wooden 
 cone. Those were the days of the telescope's glory : in 
 after years, when the scaffolding was all taken to pieces, it 
 used to lie, a neglected hulk, along the ground beneath the 
 windows of the Transit Room. Sic transit! 
 
 All the plans about the new Observatory were laid on a 
 gigantic scale. To the west of the telescope, rose a building 
 covering a space of ground not much less than that 
 occupied by the house itself, but built entirely of wood, 
 and destined to be filled by magnetic instruments. It 
 
 c 
 
34 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 stood empty there for three or four years, the scene of 
 many a joyous holiday. Though the wooden house could 
 not attract iron, it attracted Agnes and myself as a fitting 
 theatre for our games ; hither we stole with my sword and 
 shield and belt and helmet, and with Agnes's dolls, toys 
 which we shared together. My sister was becoming by 
 degrees my constant companion and playmate, so that we 
 were in danger of becoming in reality, what we often were 
 in dress, I half a girl, and she half a boy. We were lords 
 together of all we surveyed in that large empty house. 
 About eighteen months after its erection, a great gale stove 
 in one of the western walls, and tilted the whole basement 
 to one side. The chance of magnetic observations became 
 diminished, but the mansion was only the fairer game for 
 us. We had two entrances to the great palace ; a swing hung 
 in the front, where I and my sister and cousins used to 
 disport ourselves, when we were wearied with some mock 
 battle or siege. Alas ! the affections which twined them- 
 selves about those walls have not even the remains of a 
 foundation to rest on now. I cannot even say, " That is 
 the door which Tommy came through when he was asked 
 to dinner, and there is the corner where Hector found 
 refuge with Achilles at his heels." The very traces of the 
 wooden house are effaced. The cabbages of our worthy 
 assistant were growing over them when I last beheld the 
 ground. 
 
 One morning in March 1845, we were all awakened 
 by the screaming of a terrible south-west wind, interrupted 
 only by the frequent whistling of falling slates and chimneys. 
 When we rose we found some of the windows threatened, 
 and had to barricade them. I remember my uncle Davidson, 
 who was with us at the time, rushing to the Green Room 
 and standing with all his weight and strength against the 
 shutter of the window there, which threatened to fly open 
 and let in wind enough to blow the roof off. The wind 
 rose, and tore the lead off the top of the house, and rolled 
 it up into long solid cylinders. About ten o'clock some 
 of us tried to go out and were carried off our feet. The 
 telescope and its stand fell with a crash ; the ropes had 
 torn up the enormous stones to which they were fastened, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 35 
 
 and hurled them yards in the air. About half-past ten 
 my father pointed from the parlour window towards 
 the magnetic house, " Look, look ! " The whole immense 
 fabric was in motion ; in another moment the sides gave 
 way as if they had been cannonaded ; the roof literally 
 darted into the air ; then the planks some in twos, some 
 in threes, some single were blown apart as if by the ex- 
 plosion of a mine, and sent whirling over the whole wide 
 field beyond the enclosure of the Observatory garden ; a 
 little more wind, and they might have been blown into 
 another world, and for aught I know some of the shreds 
 of that poor house may still be flying about over the 
 surface of this. Such was a Scottish hurricane. 
 
 Digging about the roots of the bushes in the garden, 
 or lazily raking the gravel, you might have seen old 
 Norman, our first gardener, and a character like the rest 
 of them. He had come from the north with the tide of 
 immigration that yearly sets to Glasgow, and in his accent 
 and manner bore very distinct traces of his Highland 
 origin. He was slow without being stupid, obstinate without 
 being disobliging, and combined a fair amount of shrewd- 
 ness with an ignorance which left his sense of wonder 
 unusually large. My father was the best story-teller I 
 ever knew. Many an afternoon, when he was in good 
 humour, he would set us all laughing with some of those 
 adventures, which were never recounted often enough to 
 become tiresome. Among those reminiscences few were 
 more graphic than those which related to old Norman ; 
 you must not ask me to tell you, for without some attempt 
 to imitate the look and voice they are nothing worth how 
 he received his first view of a nebula through the telescope; 
 how he condemned the moon's conduct in eclipsing the 
 sun, etc., etc. 
 
 His successor, old Matthew, was almost equally enter- 
 taining. A tall, sallow Scotchman, he had been a good 
 gardener once, but was rather passe when he came to 
 us ; and though he still preserved a keen eye for flowers, 
 little other work could be got of him ; when any digging 
 or trenching had to be done, he managed to find the 
 assistance of his stout sons, or other burly labourers 
 
36 MEMOIR OF JOHN N1CH0L. 
 
 indispensable. We called him by common consent the land- 
 surveyor. I think I see him yet stalking about the 
 shrubbery, and picking up a rose leaf here and there, with 
 the scent of a tea merchant for his samples, or bending 
 painfully to throw some hardy annual into the stiff soil, 
 or standing erect, full seven feet, and overseeing his 
 underlings. 
 
 The first assistant of my father's I remember at the 
 Observatory was a Mr. Mackenzie, a very worthy gentle- 
 man, with rather a narrow mind and a bad temper, who 
 lived with us for some time and, I fancy, gave his assistance 
 (for there was no regular fund for the purpose) in return 
 for his board. He was nervously timid, and the happi- 
 ness of his life was almost ruined by the solitary position 
 of our house. His preparations for burglary, as discovered 
 by one of our servants, were amusing ; under his pillow there 
 was placed a revolver, on the table a double-barrelled gun, 
 the kitchen poker was carried up to his room along with 
 the coal hatchet, and when both were placed so that his 
 hand could easily reach them, the worthy man could sleep. 
 He gave me some lessons in writing and the Greek alphabet, 
 just before he left, after which he became a vicar of 
 the English Church, baptized my aunt Christina's second 
 child, married, and died. 
 
 The next was a young licentiate of the Church of 
 Scotland, Mr. Leitch, who had distinguished himself by 
 the display of unusual mathematical talent, and attracted 
 my father's attention in the astronomy class. He did 
 all his work with an admirable perseverance, and a degree 
 of slowness almost exasperating. Some indolent people 
 alternate idleness with an amount of activity at times ; 
 others, like large bumble bees, never idle nor ever active, 
 drone through a good day's work every twenty-four hours. 
 Of this latter order Leitch was. I see him like a shadow 
 in the past, jotting down with slumberous accuracy the 
 records of the hygrometer, no morning was wet enough 
 to damp his ardour ; or noting the transit of the stars, 
 no night was cold enough to make him shiver; I hear him, 
 as we are discussing metaphysics together over the fireside 
 of Monimail, ask if I have any more " Latakia " ; I fancy 
 
EARLY YEARS. 37 
 
 him delivering his address as Principal of King's College, 
 Toronto, and the images are of the same substantial, excel- 
 lent man of this world and the next. There was one theme 
 on which he could and would descant with animation, and 
 that was the iniquity of the Roman Catholic Church. I 
 remember his attempts to impress on my mind a more 
 correct historical view of a lady, who was for some years 
 my great heroine of romance, Mary, Queen of Scots. He 
 was fond, too, of graphic illustrations, and endeavoured to 
 give me a vivid notion of the "very place where wicked 
 people go," by comparing the fire supposed to burn there 
 with that which had just taken the skin off one of my 
 fingers. Afterwards, though still orthodox, but " leaning 
 rather to liberal ways," his illustrations were on more 
 abstract lines, and at Monimail one of his efforts was to 
 draw from some discoveries he had been making about 
 his bees, an inference confirming the doctrine of the 
 Trinity. 
 
 But let us hasten to " sing the praises of Rollo the 
 brave." Mackenzie and Leitch were birds of passage ; they 
 rested at the Observatory, and went on their way rejoicing 
 or otherwise. John Rollo stayed with us to the last ; he 
 seemed to have become a part of the house, as regular 
 as the transit-room clock. I do not know how either 
 house or clock can go on without him. For eighteen 
 years he came at the fixed hour, took his notes, went to 
 his room, calculated like Babbage's machine till one o'clock, 
 went home to dinner, came up again, and dug at his 
 cabbages on his little plot of ground, "took the notices" 
 at three, went to his room the Lower Dome room and 
 calculated like Babbage's machine again till Polaris or some 
 other star shone out to demand his attention, or the moon 
 expressed a wish to see herself and be seen on the 
 Breadalbane mirror, after which he went home to his 
 energetic wife and child, at the gate-house near the Botanic 
 Gardens. A faithful servant, if there ever was one. After 
 all, he was much more curiously made than anything done 
 by Babbage. Only the calculating part of his mechanism 
 was put together like clockwork. He was a tolerable classic, 
 and used to assist me in old days in hammering over hard 
 
38 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 passages ; and on religious and social matters he had notions 
 of his own. 
 
 He was a sincere Baptist ; had been dipped deep 
 into the slough of prophecy. Many an awful book 
 he used to lend me, with the assurance that by the reading 
 of such he had been rescued from scepticism. " If I had 
 not been taught," he would tell me, with his peculiar voice, 
 " to see how those prophecies were all fulfilled, I would 
 certainly have become a freethinker, for I was of an 
 inquiring mind. Is it not remarkable how the French 
 turn out to be the Frogs?" He attributed almost all the 
 diseases of the time not so much to the use of ardent 
 spirits or animal food, though he abjured both, as to the 
 drinking of tea. Sometimes he lectured me on this 
 point with an energy that threatened to become frantic ; 
 he would rise from his seat and stamp on the ground, as 
 he stammered out denunciations of the poison. " Tea, tea," 
 he cried, "is the curse of this generation!" The great 
 theory in science which he is still labouripg to establish 
 is that all changes of the weather depend on the moon. 
 Many an hour has my good nature compelled me to listen 
 to his dissertations on this question, and many a sheet of 
 badly-written figures have I been made to glance at in 
 proof of a discovery, on the ground of which he was bold 
 enough to write cards of prediction for the weather of each 
 month in the year. His great social idea was non-resistance. 
 You might have knocked him down with impunity, and it 
 would be ungracious to say that his theory in this instance 
 was accommodated to his practice, for he was never afraid to 
 come up the hill at night unless there were some suspicious- 
 looking Irish in the neighbourhood, nor to walk in the 
 garden unless the dogs were loose. 
 
 Good man, let me say nothing harsh of you the associate 
 of so many years, constant amid so many trials and changes. 
 I would not like to look out from the windows of the 
 old house again without a hope of seeing your well-known 
 figure limp along the gravel, or your cap lying on the 
 bench, while you are popping your kind old head in at 
 the stand, to " take the notices." 
 
 From the garden let us pass into the nursery, where I 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 39 
 
 spent the nights of many years and a fair portion of the 
 days, sometimes reading from the time when it was only 
 Caleb or Frank to the evenings over Jahn's Horace and 
 Voss's Eclogues ; sometimes playing with Agnes alone, 
 or with her and other small friends. There many an 
 evening I have lain and listened to the croaking of the 
 frogs who came in hosts down the grating, and made 
 friends with each other and with me ; there often have we 
 trembled on Saturday afternoons after I had come home 
 from school, and thrown aside my books, when we were 
 in the midst of some long game, and a step approached 
 the door. Caleb Stukeley, in the romance of that name, 
 did not start more awkwardly when he heard the voice 
 of his father in the scene with the dangerous Emily, than 
 I did when my father surprised me " trifling away my 
 time" with my sister's dolls. Of him I shall have more 
 and more to say as this narrative runs on, and as I shall 
 sometimes have to dissent from his views, let me preface 
 all those poor criticisms by declaring that I have hardly 
 ever known a purer or a greater man. My first recollec- 
 tions of him at College and on the Rhine are almost all 
 sunny ; but you may not have forgotten his severity at 
 the Lureley rocks. Two or three instances of the exercise 
 of a similar discipline, which embittered some of my early 
 days at the Observatory, still cling to my memory. 
 
 Sometimes I was silently dogged on such occasions ; at 
 others, I would retire to my room and give myself over 
 to acid and malignant thoughts. I remember once being 
 bent on a ride on a pony, and crying because it was 
 refused, and then being told that had I not cried I would 
 have got it. This unwise admission made me wild with 
 rage, and I stormed about the house, with clenched fists 
 and streaming eyes, for a whole afternoon. But our most 
 serious differences soon begun to be about my task work. 
 My father thought that after I came home from the Rhine 
 I should put away childish things, and march on steadily 
 to meet the great destinies he had in store for me. He 
 forgot that, at the age of nine or ten, I was still a child, 
 and could not, if I would, assume the garb or the manners, or 
 appreciate the interests, of a man. Because I was precocious 
 
40 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 in some things, he forgot that I was, on that very account, 
 likely to be backward in others. But I must not anticipate; 
 my introduction at least, to study, was made sufficiently 
 fascinating. When I could read large books, my father 
 began by giving me the lives of great men in the form 
 of anecdotes; and, better still, gave me, from time to time, 
 a lecture himself on the great events of the world. I 
 remember nothing more delightful than those lectures. I 
 was all ear when each hour began, and all on fire with 
 excitement when it closed ; and I had heard how Leonidas 
 fought at Thermopylae, or Manlius kept the capitol, or 
 Napoleon stormed the bridge of Lodi. Each step in the 
 history was like the revelation of another sphere. I had, 
 day by day, that pleasure which in after life is the highest 
 and rarest of all, that of knowing something wholly new 
 and full of human interest. I hung on those lips, which 
 were as eloquent to teach a child the first rudiments of 
 knowledge, as to thrill the thousands of a crowded hall 
 with an enthusiasm like that of childhood. Sometimes 
 the lectures were not given, and once or twice I fell on 
 my knees to beg, and once at least succeeded in obtaining, 
 a lesson that was meant to be deferred. My teacher did 
 not realize how natural it was for the boy of nine years 
 old to run from the lecture room to the nursery, and 
 build Carthage again with his bricks, and lead Hannibal 
 across the Alps with the elephants of a Noah's ark, or march 
 Alexander against Darius by the help of dolls on the 
 carpet, or mock the thunders of Leipsic on the green, with 
 a brass cannon and a pennyworth of powder. 
 
 The library, my father's delight and pride, was mine 
 too, as I walked with wondering eyes through the spacious 
 hall, and glanced up to the stained glass windows on the 
 roof, or over the long lines of magnificent volumes that 
 lined every shelf, and lay piled in every cupboard, along 
 the sides of the room. The best editions of the best 
 authors in every language were there, gleaming in purple 
 and gold, from Laplace and Lagrange and Homer and 
 Newton, to Cervantes and Le Sage. How I used to glory 
 in getting down some of the grand folios Lavater or 
 Flaxman and gazing over their pictured pages. I 
 
EARLY YEARS. 41 
 
 remember a splendid copy of Don Quixote which used to 
 amuse me, and the illustrations of a gigantic Tasso, and 
 the rich binding of an Ariosto, and the Book of Archery \ 
 and Bulwer's Siege of Granada, which made me fall in love 
 with Leila and the Moors. There was a cupboard in the 
 north-west corner full of books especially my own, the 
 Orbis Pictus and the Pilgrim's Progress, Matho and Letters 
 from Palmyra history and fiction little gems of science 
 and romance. There were the works of Miss Edgeworth 
 and Mary Howitt tales in verse and tales in prose Edward 
 and his Little Friends, Sergeant Bell and his Raree Show, 
 Uncle Philip's Stories about Dogs, Stories about Christmas, The 
 Holiday Book, Grimm's Mdhrchen, in English, and the Faery 
 Mythology, and a host of faery tales all which I devoured, 
 and rushed unsatiated on the larger shelves without. There 
 I soon found new fuel for my growing imagination, ghost 
 stories which I should never have been allowed to read, 
 and which cost me many a wakeful night ; the Arabian 
 Nights, in which I revelled as in a new world of gorgeous 
 dreams ; and Scott's novels, which came seasonably to 
 connect my wandering fancies with a more real life. Turn- 
 ing to more substantial food, I passed from his romances 
 to his narratives of facts, and drew my first notions of 
 Scottish history from the Tales of a Grandfather. Linking 
 together the fancy pictures in Waverley and The Abbot 
 with the actual personages they represent, I became, as 
 before stated, a zealous votary of the fair Queen Mary 
 a devotion which it took ten years to shake; and a Jacobite, 
 worthy of a great-grandmother who saved the unhappy 
 Prince Edward's life in her wine cellar, and a great-grand- 
 father who paid the penalty of his mistaken patriotism 
 on an English scaffold. Turning towards science I read 
 through the Gallery of Nature, and got a notion of meteor- 
 ology enough to give me some interest in what was going 
 on around me, and a few ideas of geology to be developed 
 afterwards. At an early period I had been introduced to 
 a land more wonderful than that of history or science : 
 
 "Aus alten Marchen winkt es 
 Hervor mit weissen Hand 
 Da singt es und da klingt es 
 Von einem Zauberland." 
 
42 MEMOIR OF JOHN N1CH0L. 
 
 The first verses I remember reading were the paraphrases 
 and some hymns. I recollect the sort of pleasure I used to 
 derive from the rhythm, when there was rhythm in the lines, 
 and a habit I had of chanting in a monotonous way when 
 I was called upon to recite them. I read Childe Harold 
 on the Rhine, and it wrought on my fancy like a spell 
 here was another sort of faery land with a greater glow 
 than all. Before we came to the Observatory, my mother 
 used to read pieces of Wordsworth. I remember my delight 
 on hearing the Blind Highland Boy, and how I almost tired 
 her by my constant requests to hear it read over. About 
 the same time, my father read aloud to us Byron's Island 
 and Scott's Lord of the Isles. It was a double pleasure to 
 hear him read, and I think he read poetry better then 
 than more lately, when he himself grew to be less of a 
 poet. Those evenings inspired me with another life ; I 
 grew physically warm with delight, and the thrilling sense 
 and sound made my heart beat with the sort of rapture 
 which is reserved for early youth. My sense was, of course, 
 not awakened to appreciate the higher beauties of poetry 
 till many years after. Moore's Lalla Rookh was to me 
 perfect, especially the Fire-worshippers, which I still regard 
 with some affection, so impossible is it to forget our 
 earliest sympathies. Gray's Churchyard and Goldsmith's 
 Edwin and Angelina were, of course, favourites; but Words- 
 worth gradually displaced them all, and reigned supreme 
 in my mind down to a much later period. Curiously 
 enough I took a dislike to Burns ; his Scots Wha Hae 
 impressed me, but I was disgusted with Tarn o' Shanter 
 and The Jolly Beggars. Someone praised them, and I 
 said, " What, do you think that vulgar swearing man a 
 great poet ? " I was so delicate in those days I could 
 not bear a coarse word or allusion, an oath made me shrink 
 like a sensitive plant. My father said, " You will change 
 your opinion about Burns by and by " ; and so I did. As 
 soon, or sooner, the notes of my mother's piano lured me 
 into other realms still more glorious. Alive to every re- 
 finement of art, music had always been her peculiar 
 passion, and she soon sought to make me a partaker of 
 her joy. I have been told that before I could walk I 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 43 
 
 used to dance to the tunes of that piano, and keep time 
 with baby feet, with an accuracy which the narrators 
 of such events are apt to exaggerate. Certainly those 
 tunes are among my earliest memories ; and still, in the 
 quiet hours of summer evenings, they are wafted to me 
 from the distance, like notes of an Aeolian harp hung in 
 heaven, while the past leans over my shoulder and fills 
 my eyes with tears. The years roll back and restore 
 what they have stolen away ; I see her again who was my 
 morning and my evening star, touching those chords with her 
 taper fingers, while I am sitting entranced by the celestial 
 melodies of Beethoven, and Handel, and Mozart, or, still 
 farther back, listen to the voice so " low and sweet," singing 
 some song of sunny Italy, or Scotch Blue Bells, or of the 
 Better Land. 
 
 Old house then a new home old house on the hill, 
 how have my affections become twined round you ! From 
 those grand great battlements, for twenty years, I have 
 watched every glory of the earth and sky at morning, 
 noon, and night. Within those walls there is nothing 
 glorious I have not heard, nothing noble I have not 
 vainly dreamt of, nothing terrible I have not seen, nothing 
 strange I have not learnt to realize. You stand there 
 grandly alone, and yet, wherever I go, I will carry you 
 in my heart, a background of all my memories, ready to 
 come with them from darkness into light, till all the 
 present appears a dream, and I seem to waken again, and 
 move about in the far past of those half-forgotten days. 
 
 Biarritz, June 2nd. 
 
 My last letter must have wearied you with its length. 
 This one will be short by way of recompense. It will 
 begin by leading you back to still more distant days, and 
 bring you down ere it closes to the summer of two years 
 ago ; but it will be a letter of fragments, gathering together 
 a heap of scattered recollections. For a long period we 
 went almost every Christmas to Fifeshire, and almost every 
 summer to Arran. Thus early I grew familiar with the 
 sound of the two great voices of Liberty the mountains 
 
44 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 and the sea and to their ennobling influence I owe much 
 of the little strength and power that still remain to me. 
 I will try to recall, one by one, the memories, dim or 
 bright, of several successive visits to this single island 
 Arran, in which the grandeur and beauty of Scottish 
 scenery are so well concentrated. 
 
 I. The first is of our landing on the shore of Brodick. 
 A full quarter of a century has elapsed since then. I 
 can only recall the ferry-boat and the bleak beach, and 
 something of the shadow of the hills, and a disaster which 
 befel me. It was a cold evening, and I ran with the 
 servant, while my father and mother followed with the 
 luggage, up to the cottage which was to be our home for 
 a month, and sitting down on a stool that stood near the 
 fire, proceeded to warm my little hands. Unfortunately 
 the stool had only three legs, and my weight, leaning 
 forward, was enough to overset it. I fell right upon the 
 burning ribs, and before my cries brought a speedy rescue, 
 they left their impress in great bars of blisters across my 
 unhappy face. Perhaps I was partially stunned with terror, 
 for I do not remember the pain. I only recall, with a 
 distinctness as of yesterday, the soft touch of my mother's 
 hands as she bathed the wound. I would be burnt again 
 many times to feel once more that tender pressure. I was 
 blind for some weeks, but at last the bandages were taken 
 off, and my eyes opened unimpaired to the world in which 
 they were to see so many strange sights. 
 
 II. In the summer of the next or the following year 
 we went to Corrie, and I saw new wonders of the moun- 
 tains and the sea. We lived with the Douglasses, a good 
 family, who still come to take passengers from the steamer 
 and land them on that rocky coast. They had to assist 
 us in our toils both for livelihood and relaxation. Those 
 were different days ; Arran was little known, or, at least, 
 unfrequented ; and the salutary strictness by which the 
 proprietor has kept the island quiet was as yet uncalled 
 for. We went and literally found nobody there but the 
 natives ; for us alone the great hills frowned in their granite 
 glory, and the waves dashed among the trap dykes of 
 the shore. It was a glorious solitude, but not without its 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 45 
 
 disadvantages. There was no thoroughfare, no congress, 
 and consequently no market and no food ; oatmeal and 
 whisky, and a few vegetables from the garden, were all 
 we could get. The only refuge was the sea, and here 
 the proverbial indolence of the Highlanders was a stumbling- 
 block. Nobody could be got to fish for us. The Celtic 
 race has a sort of repugnance to this means of attaining 
 subsistence, which even hunger has not been found strong 
 enough to overcome. The people of Galway and Ross- 
 shire have been found starving by the beach of seas 
 swarming with fish. What they would not do to fill 
 their own mouths we could not expect them to do for 
 others. My father was obliged to hire a boat, and man it 
 with himself and Douglass and a boy, and go forenoon or 
 afternoon, as wind and tide permitted, to find to-morrow's 
 dinner. I used occasionally to accompany those expedi- 
 tions, when I remember watching the long lines as they 
 went trailing through the surge, and the great fish that 
 were every now and then dragged splashing and tumbling 
 into our boat. Our constant prey was a cargo of the 
 huge eels that infest those seas hideous monsters, how 
 they came up writhing and grinning with their ugly teeth 
 and eyes; how they kicked and wriggled in the boat, once 
 dangerously tearing up the very planks; how they used to 
 roll about on the sand indomitably refusing to die, till 
 their skins were taken off ugh ! and they were cut into 
 slices, and made into soup which was pronounced excellent, 
 but which I did not relish much. I can tell you we had 
 enough of the sea that summer. As for the mountains, 
 was I not carried up Goatfell itself on Douglass's back ? 
 I was very cold all the way, and very frightened when we 
 gained the top, and I saw the awful crags around me with 
 a sense that the world was toppling over, and very hungry 
 till I got settled behind a great big stone, and eagerly 
 devoured the chicken, which I am ashamed to confess I had 
 been longing for all the day. 
 
 III. The third time we went to Glen Sannox to renew 
 our fisheries, and led a life of yet more utter solitude, 
 beneath the shadow of yet darker hills, in the little house 
 at that time inhabited by the worthy Gaelic clergyman, 
 
46 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Dr. Mackay and his family, who were willing to let out 
 a few rooms in the summer. My father used to amuse 
 us by recounting how one day, when he and my mother 
 were discussing household matters, a messenger suddenly 
 rushed in to announce that Miss Helen Mackay had just 
 killed a calf. The good people had a farm, and we were 
 occasionally relieved from the necessity of dining off eel- 
 soup. Dr. Mackay used to preach in a church which had 
 a back entrance communicating with his kitchen, and Mrs. 
 Mackay used now and then to open the door, through 
 which a strong odour of a Highland cuisine came and 
 diffused itself over the congregation a strange congrega- 
 tion, largely supported by a troop of old women who used 
 to sit with huge mutches on their heads, and with their 
 bare feet resting on the bench in front, drank in eagerly 
 every word of the discourse. The worst of it was that their 
 admiration was not silent, but every now and then, when 
 the eloquence was more than usually stirring, it gave vent 
 to itself in yells so shrill and piercing, that I could not 
 be induced to return to the wild performance. 
 
 IV. The summer after our return from the Continent we 
 went along with aunt Christina to Lamlash. In that 
 quiet bay you have no idea of the savage beauties of 
 the more northern part of the island; but it has charms 
 of its own, sweet walks and drives which we were disposed 
 to enjoy to the full, and views from the high grounds of 
 the grey hills in the distance. I remember playing about 
 with our neighbour's children among the copses there, and 
 especially the rides we used to take together on a cart 
 which stood in the adjacent field. I recollect making 
 friends with some pretty little girls, and walking with them 
 to meet my father come by the steamer from somewhere 
 or other ; and sitting with my mother while she sketched 
 by the windows ; and aunt Christina read to us extracts 
 from Tristram Shandy, which her husband literally swore 
 by for several years, and I broke into one of my im- 
 moderate fits of laughter and was rebuked. I remember 
 many a quiet afternoon "sailing with her about the summer 
 waters," while my mother sat on the prow, and read 
 Oenone, or the Two Voices, or Landor's Pericles and Aspasia. 
 
EARLY YEARS. 47 
 
 The Thomsons were again, during part of the time at 
 least, our close companions. Sometimes we all went on 
 the bay together with rods and hooks, and here I caught 
 my first, and probably my last, fish. How clearly I 
 remember hearing Willy Thomson shout out, " Johnny 
 has caught a fish." A little thing it was, but I did not 
 relish the sport in those days when I made a gospel of 
 " Hart-Leap- Well." 
 
 I recall very distinctly an attempt we made to row to 
 Pladda, and how a storm came and drove us into Whiting 
 Bay, and how glad we all were to get safe home again. 
 On another occasion we i.e. Dr. James, and James and 
 William Thomson, and my father and mother and myself 
 started for Holy Island, expecting to get across and return 
 to the others, whom we had left behind, in about four hours. 
 The wind which blew us over rose so fast as we were 
 crossing that we began to feel uneasy, and, by the time 
 we got on shore, all chance of returning by the same 
 boat we came in was at an end. We were literally ship- 
 wrecked on the island, and when the steamer, to which 
 we made signals in vain, had passed, we began to think 
 over the possibility of remaining all night in the one little 
 house which redeems the place from desolation. At last 
 the storm slightly abated, and late in the evening some 
 fishermen who had seen our plight, or been sent to seek 
 us, came and brought us over in their sloop. I recollect 
 the moving of many lights, and the barking of dogs, and 
 the glad murmur of many voices, as we landed safe when 
 the stars were shining on the beach. 
 
 V. There comes a sort of break in my memory between 
 an earlier and a later period, during which we may have 
 made several visits to Arran, of which I can only recall 
 one, and that but faintly. It was to Brodick again. I 
 remember the castle amid the woods, and walking with 
 my mother up Glen Rosa, and seeing the moon set over 
 Ben Nuis, that most graceful of mountains. We went 
 to Glen Sannox with Nan, and she began to cry and say 
 she was frightened at those ugly hills. If she had not 
 learnt to distinguish between fear and awe, I had not 
 learnt confidence in, though I had confidence enough on, 
 
48 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 the sea. Was it on this occasion, certainly it was in Arran, 
 that my father tried to induce me to swim, by ordering me 
 to go into a pool which I thought deep enough to drown 
 me? I remonstrated, and then refused, and he, turning 
 round to my mother, said, * Come, let us leave a fellow 
 who is in his inmost nature a coward." He came to have 
 a different opinion. 
 
 VI. I had learnt something before my next visit to Arran. 
 It was the year before I went to Kelso, during which year 
 I had been attending the Natural History class at College, 
 and from lectures and books had attained a pretty fair 
 acquaintance with the leading facts of geology, and the 
 main features of the Scottish rocks. I came to Corrie 
 with my hammers to spend a fortnight by the beach and 
 among the hills, exploring the wonders of their formation. 
 During that fortnight I made the collection of specimens 
 from Arran rocks, which used to lie in the shelves of my 
 cabinet at the Observatory. I walked about on the shore 
 and examined the boulders, and found strange bits of stone 
 embedded in them on one occasion what I took to be a 
 yet undiscovered granite, bearing, in point of date and 
 character, the same relation to the old rough granite of 
 the Goatfell range as that does to the fine white rock of 
 Ben Vahran and the opposing coast of Ireland. I reached 
 the dykes and found specimens of greenstone and pitch- 
 stone, and the charred sandstone which is hardened by the 
 contact of the once fiery mass, and scooped into honeycomb 
 by the action of the ever-returning waves. I scrutinized 
 the caves and bore away innumerable conch shells and 
 trilobites, and bits of ancient pine. I scaled Am Binnein 
 and gathered the dark smoke crystals from the rock. 
 
 Another day I and young Robert Douglass started on 
 foot from Corrie, reached the summit and came down 
 upon Brodick, touching at the mill-dam by the way, and 
 breaking bits off the junction there in about three hours 
 after we had started. It was, properly speaking, my first 
 view from Goatfell, and I may live thirty years without 
 losing the impression of the moment when, after winding 
 up the steep cone, I first set foot upon the table-land 
 which crowns it. The day was beautifully clear, and we 
 
EARLY YEARS. 49 
 
 saw the whole Firth with Ailsa and the islands sparkling 
 like gems set in azure. The island of Rathlin and Ireland 
 bounded our view to the south-west, to the north-west 
 gleamed the Hebrides with their peaks, and to the east 
 the mountains of Argyleshire rose in their multitudinous 
 magnificence. But the most wonderful part of the sight, 
 that which, now that I have scaled a hundred hills and 
 seen the sun rise over a hundred miles of snowy Pyrenees, 
 still makes this view from Goatfell something unique 
 among my' memories, was the prospect which seemed to 
 lie right at our feet, where the terrific peaks that bound 
 the north of Glen Rosa and Glen Sannox were lifting 
 their emulous heads. It was as if some storm, terrible 
 beyond all human imagination and stirred up by " demons 
 down under the sea " to overwhelm us, had been by some 
 more mighty wizard's hand " frozen in a moment " into walls 
 and bars, and spikes, and hollow cairns of imperishable 
 granite. 
 
 VII. Weary of hard work one glorious day in August, I 
 was hanging my head on my desk, when my father entered 
 my study exclaiming, " It's no use this, John, you are 
 tired ; go off to Arran and ramble about the hills for 
 three days and come back strong." This was among , the 
 commands against which I sometimes remonstrated in my 
 zeal, but to which I always yielded. Away I went and 
 landed at Corrie, with my knapsack over my shoulders, 
 and a good staff in my hand. The hills gleamed over 
 the sea with the promise of an unclouded sky, and I 
 resolved to cross them at the head of Glen Sannox, and 
 fall down on Loch Ranza. I bathed in the clear waters, 
 and starting on my journey with a good heart went up 
 and up deeper among the gigantic heather, and under the 
 shadows of the solemn glen. Never shall I forget the hour 
 after I had gained the first terrace of the mountains towards 
 my right, when I rested and looked around me on the 
 scene. I have stood since then alone amid the blackness 
 of the Coolin hills, and seen the Hebrides gleaming far 
 in the solitary main, and watched the waves rolling in a 
 stormy sunset over the Bay of Biscay, and caught the 
 first gleam of morning over the Pyrenees ; but never on 
 
 D 
 
50 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 land or sea have I beheld anything to eclipse the memory 
 of that evening in Glen Sannox. Around me were the 
 ramparts of grey granite, vast, lonely, solemn like Eternity, 
 with their riven peaks just beginning to throw back the 
 first purple of the loveliest twilight I ever saw ; before me 
 was a slope of lichen, and an apparently impassable wall ; 
 behind me a deep sea of heather, and green fields, and 
 sheep far away, and the ocean fading into the sky in the 
 distance. No sound but the fall of a cataract over the 
 rocks broke the silence ; the very summer flies were hushed 
 to sleep, or banished from so deep a solitude : 
 
 " Ave Maria ! 'twas the hour of prayer." 
 
 This was my Church, that I told you of in a letter long 
 ago. Perhaps I am not sufficiently susceptible to religious 
 emotions, but at that hour, in that great Cathedral whose 
 aisles and pillars were reared by God's own hand, with 
 the valley for its pavement, and Heaven itself for its dome, 
 and the sunset over Chair Mohr for its altar-light, I felt 
 an irresistible summons to kneel to the Giver of all good, 
 and pray for a renewed heart, and ask Him to grant 
 me grace to live in a manner worthy of His wonderful 
 world. 
 
 On my way an adventure befell me, which you can only 
 appreciate when you know that, in point of Sabbath 
 observance, the people of Arran and Bute bear the same 
 relation to Scotland, that Scotland does to the rest of the 
 world. They are not a particularly moral people. If you 
 propose to marry a girl in one of those islands, you are 
 free to anticipate the nuptials by way of experiment. 
 Like the Welsh, they are no votaries of St. Anthony. 
 When you engage a servant, she will probably reserve to 
 herself the privilege of ' bundling.' But they have super- 
 stition enough to cover a multitude of sins, and on Sunday 
 they throw all their sanctimony into the scale of absolution. 
 A smile on that day is bad, a laugh sacrilegious. We 
 had a servant from the West, who wished to whip me for 
 jumping one forenoon in the nursery while the church 
 bells were ringing. The population of Rothesay came 
 with sticks and stones to pelt the passengers who came in 
 
EARLY YEARS. 5 1 
 
 the 'Emperor'; they tried to starve a tradesman who 
 took hold of the rope that was thrown on the pier from 
 a steamer on the boards of which no strict Presbyterian 
 will ever set his foot. It must have been a native of 
 Bute who was caught with a gimlet, boring a hole through 
 the hold, sanctifying, as he thought, his instrument to 
 holy ends an instrument in the hands of an avenging 
 Providence. The good folk of Arran would like to punish 
 Sunday-travelling with death. Conceive, then, the horror 
 of a worthy congregation which I encountered on the way 
 to the kirk that Sunday afternoon. There they came, 
 youths and maidens in their best attire, old men and old 
 women with mutches newly starched, on foot or jogging 
 along on donkeys by twos or threes, all talking Gaelic and 
 Staring at me. I only thought of the beautiful morning, 
 and the view I was to have from the hill, and how I should 
 find my way there. I must ask some one, but who would 
 understand me? Probably that respectable-looking man 
 walking along leisurely with a grandmother on each arm. 
 " Please, sir, can you tell me the way to the top of Ben 
 Vahran?" He stopped, he gazed, he looked at me for a 
 while in silence, a thrill of terror ran through the crowd. 
 At last, finding voice, he said solemnly, " Young man, this 
 is not a daay to go to the top of Ben Vahran." Infandum ! 
 I had addressed the minister in the very heart of his flock. 
 I said, " It is warm, but I will manage it," and made my 
 escape. Good man, I doubt not he was indebted to me 
 for the most impressive point in his sermon, as he described 
 a much hotter place, to which I was going as fast as my 
 legs could carry me. 
 
 On reaching Brodick, I thought of rest, and where to 
 get it. The inn was so full they would not even give me 
 a sofa. Every cottage was crammed. Must I, with my 
 blistered feet, walk eight miles more on to Corrie, and 
 then have to sleep on the beach after all ; or should I 
 climb Goatfell and get into the tent which seemed so 
 near and so brilliant ? Not a room, for love or money. 
 Yes, there was a charitable dame at last who had not, 
 and now perhaps had, and yet had not, a bed for me. 
 There was a gathering of dames, and a consultation, what 
 
52 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 could it mean ? the end was, " Come in." Here was at 
 last a good peat fire, warm water for my feet, and a good 
 plate of porridge and milk, what better to sleep upon ? 
 Bedtime came. I was shown out of doors, and asked to 
 ascend a ladder which, beginning on the ground, ended in 
 a loft. Too glad to get my head lain down anywhere, 
 I rushed up, and after being stunned by a blow from the 
 roof, looked round me ; there were four beds in the narrow 
 garret, ranged alongside of each other. A and B were 
 occupied by two boys. I was bidden lie down on C, and 
 D remained empty. Meanwhile I was too tired to sleep, 
 and although the candle was withdrawn, lay speculating 
 over the events of the day and the lodging for the night. 
 An hour or more may have passed, when the little trap- 
 door on the floor of the garret was reillumed by the light. 
 I lay still. By and by, in the glimmer, for the candle 
 was evidently left at the foot of the ladder, a head appeared. 
 I listened, breathing lightly ; the head listened, breathing 
 heavily ; it rose, it became a body, stopped again to listen ; 
 all was still, it ascended and stepped into the room. You 
 are prepared for a murder at least? From what I saw of 
 the lower part of the body, I was prepared for what I 
 heard the unlacing of stays, and the daughter of the 
 house lying down to sleep on bed D. Next 
 
 morning I took the steamer home, and got through a 
 great many chapters of my Tacitus thanks to three days 
 in Arran. . . . 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, June 6th. 
 
 About the year 1840, a company of gentlemen, who 
 resided in the fashionable quarters of the west of Glasgow, 
 dissatisfied with the principles or practice of the old 
 schools, determined to establish an institution which should 
 at once redeem the dignity of education, and serve as a 
 convenient seminary for their children, being situated near 
 their houses. Everything was to be taught here on a 
 more philosophical plan, nothing was to be learned by 
 rote, lessons in natural history were to assume a prominent 
 place in the curriculum, no child was ever to be flogged or 
 constrained, but regular marks were to be given for 
 
EARLY YEARS. 53 
 
 conduct, regularity, and industry ; and reports, which the 
 teachers, from their attendance on the playground and 
 class-room, would be well qualified to make, were to be 
 drawn up. 
 
 I may almost say I wasted six years in this school, 
 which, partly from something radically wrong in the idea, 
 still more from the unfortunate incompetence of the original 
 teachers, was an utter failure. It fell to pieces about the 
 year 1848, and I can see little ragged boys and girls 
 romping about in the grounds where I was initiated into 
 the world of strife. I entered the Western Academy in 
 the autumn, or rather the early winter of the year 1842 ; 
 my going there was prompted by some of the proprietors 
 who were friends of my father, and it was the nearest school 
 to the Observatory. I remember meeting at muster soon 
 after it opened, when our names were called over by the 
 masters assembled together. Let me enumerate them in 
 order. There was, first, Mr. Nelson, chief classical teacher 
 there for three years, a worthy gentleman, whom, with all 
 his errors, I continue to remember with feelings of respect, 
 mixed with affection. He was an excellent scholar and 
 a man of taste, but one of the worst of teachers. His 
 fashion was to take some difficult author and read with 
 his sonorous voice some very free and dignified translation, 
 which he was well pleased if we brought to him next day. 
 He never dreamt of asking us to explain a construction or 
 conjugate a verb, so that all he really did was to give us 
 a relish for the sound of Latin, and a trick of fine English. 
 I remember his giving a lecture at Partick once, on his 
 hero, Napoleon. I thought at the time it was very fine, 
 but I suspect it must have been rather florid. Good man, 
 with his portly figure and protuberant eyes, I wish I could 
 hear of his doing something better than teaching boys at 
 a village school. 
 
 Mr. George Gregg began life as an officer, and I believe 
 ended it as a showman. There was a period between, 
 during which he was head-master of English at the Western 
 Academy. A good-natured, tall, handsome man, he had a 
 weak head and a strong body. His knowledge was fair, 
 and his manners prepossessing. I remember some pleasant 
 
54 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 traits of his kindness, as his taking a lot of his boys through 
 on a trip to Edinburgh, and showing us all the sights, his 
 working out a sum for me which his brother had set as a 
 task, his coming to take tea with us and making himself 
 so agreeable that he won the good graces of my father, 
 who had previously thought him something of a humbug, 
 an opinion to which he reverted. His faults as a teacher 
 were general shallowness, fickle partialities, and a want of 
 dignity. He joined in our games in the yard, and used to 
 say that he knew how to forget the master in the play- 
 fellow ; he forgot that he did not know how to forget the 
 playfellow in the master. He at first joined with the other 
 masters in petting me, and afterwards, irritated I fancy by 
 my irregular attendance, threw me over in disgust. His 
 brother William, a better teacher and cleverer man, taught 
 us writing. 
 
 During my first year, I had to deal more directly with 
 the four assistants. A Mr. Hutchison taught us Latin in 
 a class which I, for the first two months, attended very ill. 
 He was a kind enough, ordinary man. Mr. Murray taught 
 us English. I remember conning over Reid's Lessons in 
 English Composition, and thinking I would never learn to 
 compose. Mr. Slack was our teacher of arithmetic, an 
 excellent young man, and a great admirer of Mr. Nelson. 
 In the playground I felt for the first time in a strange 
 land, where every man's hand was against me. I had lots 
 of battles, with various fortune. I remember no more but 
 that I often came off worst, and only got scolded at home 
 when I did. I only once in my life fought for amusement, 
 so that the sun often set upon my wrath. 
 
 I had some pleasant companions whom I liked to visit, 
 and who used to come to see me, but my associations 
 with the playground are mostly painful. My school days 
 have none of the happy memories that are generally 
 supposed to belong to that period of life, and of my school- 
 mates there are only one or two I should care either to see 
 or hear of more. I was always effeminate, and fond of quiet, 
 whereas a healthy schoolboy is the rudest and roughest of 
 beings. When they made too much noise about the swing, 
 I would drop my rope and wander to some quiet corner, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 55 
 
 and trace the map of Alexander's conquests, or, better still, 
 the design of some new faery land on the sand. Out of 
 those scrawls grew the imaginary map of a new world 
 that world of my childish dreams when all things were to 
 be made even. 
 
 During the first two or three months, I attended my 
 classes, owing to ill health or other causes, with great 
 irregularity and made very little progress. That Christmas 
 (1842) we went to Fife. 
 
 After Christmas I somehow or other took a great start. 
 My progress was taken as the promise of yet better things; 
 I was fired with the desire of retrieving myself, and ere 
 the session closed, I had taken the first place in all my 
 classes, in the geography so conspicuously that the silver 
 medal, usually given to the senior, was transferred to the 
 junior class, to be hung around my neck in presence 
 of some half hundred mammas and papas, with a long 
 speech about the infant prodigy. 
 
 Worthless, fatal prizes, how proud I was of them ! I 
 had heard of three as mine when I went to Mr. Murray, 
 " Who is to get the prize for English composition ? " "A 
 gentleman of the name of Nichol," was the answer. " Then 
 I will have four prizes," and I danced up to a big boy 
 intending to impress him with the intelligence ; he very 
 properly told me to go to the devil. I will have more to 
 say of prizes afterwards, meanwhile let me utter one word 
 of protest against them. For one boy that is stimulated 
 by such emulation to healthful work, ten are ruined by 
 being led to look at the guinea's stamp instead of the gold. 
 The holidays had come, but for a prodigy like me there 
 was no rest : exhausted as I really was I must remember 
 that the object of life was to " distinguish myself." We 
 had been offered a prize for an essay on " Great Britain " ; 
 mine must be something wonderful. I was given a book, 
 about the size of Johnson's Dictionary, on England and 
 her Colonies, and set to write an abstract of it some 
 fifty pages of my big half-text the labour of a whole 
 summer's vacation. I started in the Latin with my old 
 friends ; but some difficulty occurring about my hours, I was 
 put into a higher class with boys who had begun a year 
 
56 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 before me. I was first and second alternately ; on the 
 days when I was first my father would speak to me, when 
 I was second he would not, and on those days I used to 
 linger on the road home. Nelson was very partial to me, 
 and I easily carried off another prize that of arithmetic 
 with him. General views of geography delighted me, but the 
 details of cities and counties which we wanted in the higher 
 class, and never have wanted since, were too much for my 
 memory. I got no prize there, and as for my essay, Gregg 
 said he would give the prize to no other, but he could not 
 give it to me, the handwriting was so bad. 
 
 Another summer past, during which I remember reading 
 through the Gallery of Nature. Another winter came, 
 and I was pushed on still further in Latin, to write verses, 
 and read Cicero's Milo, and Plautus, and Juvenal. I had 
 learnt to translate without knowing more of the construction 
 than a boy of the first form at Rugby. Other things went 
 on as before, giving promise of another unhappy year, 
 when towards Christmas I fell ill of scarlet fever. It 
 seemed a slight attack, and we slighted it, so that I caught 
 cold. A little later, when we were at Lebanon visiting 
 aunt Alice, I had an attack of inflammation of the liver; 
 my health was evidently broken, I had to be withdrawn 
 from school, and my studies were utterly broken for two 
 whole years. 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, June 8th. 
 
 We went together to Ireland in the autumn of 1845 ; but 
 before I take you with me over the water, I wish to tell you 
 something more about our home, as it then was. And first, 
 let me introduce you to the friends of the little parlour of 
 the Observatory. Let us suppose my father sits there in 
 some sunny mood, reading aloud, while Nan sits at his feet, 
 and my mother and I are listening with eager eyes to a 
 chapter of history, or an essay of his own on mountain 
 ranges, or a speech he is to deliver next day about the 
 war, or on the national schools, or a book of The Excursion, 
 or a canto of the Revolt of Islam. I have not yet come 
 to the time when he exercised the greatest influence on 
 my life ; but my sense was even then opening to the 
 
EARLY YEARS. 57 
 
 appreciation of a head, which, for grasp and quickness of 
 apprehension, I have never seen equalled, and of a heart 
 as full of large capacities of love as the sky itself with 
 its stars. Tennyson speaks of " all subtilizing intellect, 
 all comprehensive tenderness," and in my father I recog- 
 nized the combination of qualities which make a man 
 noble and a woman lovely. Few have had opportunities 
 equal to mine of estimating the varied powers of that 
 massive mind. His eloquence, his vivacity, his grace were 
 known to all; but all did not know in how many directions 
 he turned that penetrating glance, over how many fields 
 he walked with that familiar step. During his life he 
 seemed to be less original than he was, simply because 
 he knew so much ; I have heard him say he loved poetry 
 too well to write verses ; perhaps he was too discursively 
 learned to be a great discoverer. In an age given up to 
 little rivalries, men are apt to judge each other by the 
 length they run along one narrow line, or the dust they 
 raise in the race. That very comprehensiveness, variety 
 of interest, and magnanimity which ought to have exalted, 
 will continue to obscure the fame of one of the age's most 
 conspicuous ornaments. Those who said that my father 
 was an artist rather than a man of science, forgot in how 
 many branches of science he was eminent. Among the 
 mathematicians of the time he has only one successor ; in 
 natural philosophy, history ancient and modern in geo- 
 logy, and among the speculations of social science, he was 
 almost equally at home. He had not that predominance 
 of the creative faculty which constitutes an artist, but he 
 understood everything and sympathized with all that he 
 understood. French was the only language beside his 
 own of which he was an absolute master ; but he knew 
 enough of the classics to catch their spirit, and to appre- 
 ciate the inquiries in which their works have been the 
 guides, and he knew more than enough of Germany to 
 make himself familiar with her reveries. Those who 
 called him an idealist were ignorant of the broad basis 
 of common-sense which lay at the foundation of all 
 he did or thought, and the intense practical bias 
 which made him seem to me not unfrequently to err on 
 
58 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 the other side, the side of men of the world. When a 
 question of policy arose between the advocacy of an 
 abstract good and the receiving of a more palpable though 
 more partial advantage, there was a gulf between my father 
 and men like Joseph Mazzini and John Mill ; to which I 
 was more fully alive because, on such occasions, my own 
 sympathies lay, and lie still, with them rather than with 
 him. In politics he was a temperate radical, verging, about 
 the close of his life, towards becoming a whig. In religion 
 he thought for himself, and, of course, arrived at his own 
 conclusions. In the domain of art and science he was a man 
 of culture; like Goethe, though on a somewhat smaller scale, 
 totus teres atque rotundus. There was nothing mean about 
 my father, no little vanity, no spite, no jealousy. He knew 
 how to live down the rancour of others, to forgive and 
 forget the most malignant injuries. But he was proud, 
 and his will, weak on the one side, was imperious on the 
 other. 
 
 Generous beyond the point of prudence, and sanguine 
 of impossible things, he had too little perseverance to lay 
 the foundation of even the most practicable of his distant 
 dreams. Easily depressed by a failure, he was as easily 
 elated by success, and while he protested against my want 
 of equanimity, he was ruffled by small accidents to a 
 degree that seemed inconsistent with his dignity. A purer 
 man never lived, a more unselfish one seldom, a more 
 affectionate one very rarely. Forgetting all the shadows 
 that sometimes came between us, I love to think of him 
 as he was when everything he thought was noble, and 
 everything he said was inspiring, and everything he did 
 was majestic. 
 
 The happiest inspirations of some of the ancient masters 
 have revealed to our senses a beauty belonging more to 
 heaven than earth. I can understand the ecstasy, the 
 reverie of holy aspirations, and the reverent worship which 
 are aroused in the hearts of good Catholics, when they 
 look up, as the organ sounds, to the blessed features, and 
 realize in that regard the ideal of female perfection ; for 
 those old pictures bring back to me something of the 
 feelings with which I used to regard my mother. Let us 
 
EARLY YEARS. 59 
 
 fancy her, too, sitting by that fireside with my father 
 following his voice and interpreting, as none other could, the 
 hidden thoughts that guided its modulations. She had only 
 a share of his intellectual power ; her mind, much more 
 subtle than that of most women, seemed sometimes to 
 lack material to work upon ; for she was withdrawn at an 
 early age from the genial tasks that compose a lady's 
 education to the sterner duties of life. Her weak health 
 afterwards combined with other occupations to prevent 
 her from becoming an extensive reader. Her knowledge 
 of history and science was only above that generally 
 possessed by wives of learned men, and her power of 
 language was limited. She had a passion for poetry 
 which led her to become familiar with all the master- 
 pieces of English verse, and a fine discrimination, which 
 enabled her to assign to each its proper rank. She 
 could paint well and sing sweetly ; but instrumental music 
 was the only art in which she showed anything like 
 genius. She did not care for the flatteries of society, and 
 had she tried to shine in conversation it is probable she 
 would have failed ; but I never knew a better critic of 
 men. She seemed, because she felt, cold to strangers, and 
 they did not know how accurately she was taking their 
 measure. People often came to see us, and went away 
 fascinated with my father's grace and brilliancy, without 
 having ever appreciated my mother's stronger, though 
 quieter, character. She was different from him in many 
 ways ; her pride, less lofty but more consistent, would not 
 allow her to appear gracious to those whom she disliked ; 
 she was too fond of independence to interchange many 
 favours, or incur any unnecessary debts. She desired " to 
 look the broad world in the face and owe not any man." 
 The warmest of friends, she held fast every heart she won, 
 but she was ready to distrust professions, and not very 
 ready to forgive real injuries ; no one was ever better 
 fitted to correct the errors of an over-sanguine judgment 
 by her own. More wise than clever, she gave me more 
 sage advice than I have ever seen in books, and all I 
 have seen of life has only served to confirm its excellence. 
 One of the best and greatest of those who have ever, in 
 
60 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 storm and sunshine, toiled through the earth, she ever 
 seemed less than she was. My father spoke at times 
 scornfully of the world ; but in his happier hours it " came 
 out a perfect round," and hope made it seem rich in 
 glorious promises. She saw it just as it was, rather a 
 cloudy land ; but her anchorage was firm beyond it. It 
 seemed to me as if my father had power to see all the 
 stars ; but my mother alone could hear the music they 
 made. His speech was melodious, like silver ; but her 
 silence was like gold, and when she spoke, her noble 
 words were clenched by noble deeds. She said to me, 
 " Be faithful," and lived like an emblem of Faith ; " Be 
 loving," and her love was deep as the sea ; " Be true," and 
 she was true as the eternal stars. 
 
 The laughing child that I did not understand, the girl 
 who lightened my sorrows by sharing them, the woman 
 of whom I am so proud, meet in the one reality my 
 sister. At the time of which I write, she had not shown 
 herself, or rather she was a sort of aery chrysalis not 
 yet entered into life. I had many faults to find, in my 
 blind impatience, with one whom I can write little of 
 now, simply because she has lost them all, or I have lost 
 the power to see them. She seemed restless, and frivolous, 
 and peevish at times ; but even then she seemed a creature 
 full of affection, and open to all beautiful inspirations. 
 It was long before she could be taught to read at all; still 
 later before she could be persuaded to run through a 
 serious book. I was happy when I had persuaded her 
 to finish even a faery tale. My father despaired of her 
 progress, and I joined in lamenting that she was likely to 
 do us so little credit. Foolish ! both. Neither the sage 
 nor the little bookworm knew that the child, who flew 
 like a butterfly from flower to flower, was gathering, from 
 nature and love, lessons " more true and deep " than any 
 the one could teach or the other learn. 
 
 I heard a bark. Is that Nell's bay ? Not yet ; it is 
 the Newfoundland, Austen, who fawns upon us. Were 
 our dogs not a part of our family ? Austen was the first 
 I remember ; a big, shaggy brute, who kept a valiant watch, 
 but grew morose after he had passed the meridian of life, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 6 1 
 
 and had to be banished. His temper was always unfor- 
 giving. I remember on one occasion he nearly killed a 
 dog that had offended him in Partick a full week before ; 
 but his great offence was the foul murder of a favourite cat, 
 who was nursing her kitten, and sat over it rather than 
 escape. Her kitten, fed carefully on spoon food, lived to 
 avenge her. Bill, preserved in infancy by his mother's 
 blood, saved in boyhood by speed of climbing and height 
 of tall fir-tree, or length of telescope-tube, became at once 
 the most intelligent, the most affectionate, the most valiant 
 of all his great though slandered race. He knew every 
 word that was said to him ; he screamed through the house 
 for weeks when his friends left it ; he came down daily to 
 meet me on my return from school. Beloved creature, how 
 tenderly you rubbed your sides against my legs ! He 
 chased every cat and dog in the neighbourhood out of their 
 senses, and fell at last fighting, I doubt not like Horatius 
 of old, " in facing fearful odds " for some great cause. Poor 
 Otto, Austen's successor, how you fled from Bill's great 
 claws ! graceful Otto, how you rushed and sprang on me 
 with your exquisite white arms ! ingenious Otto, how you 
 dug your stake from the deep soil, with those paws and that 
 long nose of yours, running away continually till we could 
 keep you no longer ! Mad Pluto followed an Irish im- 
 portation. Pluto foamed, broke his chain, and for aught I 
 know may to this day be spreading hydrophobia through 
 the country. 
 
 If a noble soul ever beat in a noble frame, it was in 
 yours, Clyde. You gave me many a chase when you were 
 young, but I have loved few men more. Great honest 
 brute ! I cannot believe that all that is left of so much 
 valour, so much devotion, so much majesty, lies under that 
 neglected mound. Hecate, too, my beautiful brown bitch, 
 who would follow me all round those walks, whom I would 
 have taken with me round the world, your death, untimely, 
 threw the first gloom over our home during the last 
 summer we were to meet within its walls as a family. 
 
62 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, June ioth. 
 
 I forget what month of 1845 it was when we set sail 
 for Ireland ; but I remember waking in the morning, and 
 walking on deck, and rinding the waves high, and getting 
 drenched with a storm of rain, and coming down to the 
 cabin, and getting a taste of sea-sickness, and being very 
 glad when we got into the calm waters of Belfast harbour. 
 We rushed quickly through that dingy town, and drove 
 to Drogheda in haste to catch the train for Dublin ; it 
 only reached so far in those days. I had my first glimpse 
 of the Emerald Isle, and my earliest view of Irish life ; but 
 there are only broken fragments of the journey in my 
 mind ; the rushing car, the brogue and wit of the driver 
 who was to get more money if he caught the train, and, 
 of course, managed to get the money though he missed 
 the train ; the fields greener than any I had dreamt of 
 before, and the bustle of the river at Drogheda. " Memory 
 remembers not " our flight through Dublin, or the journey 
 from thence to Waterford. From Waterford we had an 
 exquisite drive through the Vale of Avoca to Cork, where 
 my father arrived just in time to deliver his lectures. I 
 went with the rest of the crowded audience to be stirred 
 like them by those models of clear demonstration, and 
 roused by those impassioned bursts of eloquence. Cork 
 had its parties like other places ready to cut each other's 
 throats ; everything that befell was food to one or both. 
 I recollect my father's anger at a furious Orange paper 
 that exaggerated a passage from his lecture on ' Galileo ' 
 into an attack on ' Popery.' The lecturer, it wrote, 
 denounced in glowing terms the horrors of the Inquisition: 
 now the lecturer had done nothing of the kind, and had, 
 I thought, rather gone out of his way to avoid it ; but the 
 Orange editor could imagine as well as report. Yet Cork 
 is a pleasant place, and there are pleasant people to be 
 met with in and about it. We stayed in the town about 
 a month ; if we go there together, I shall certainly be able 
 to find our lodgings ; just where a little street runs into 
 a great one opposite a hatter's shop, whose huge, staring 
 sign 
 
EARLY YEARS. 63 
 
 FOGARTY 
 
 became as familiar to me as our friend's 
 Hotel d'Angleterre 
 
 TENU PAR CAMPAGNE 
 
 was to us from our little window at Biarritz. 
 
 Our residence was enlivened by our acquaintance which 
 in some instances deepened into friendship with two or 
 three intelligent families, and by the variety afforded by 
 some events, a few of which are worth recalling. Our 
 first evening was spent in the house of the secretary of 
 the institution for which my father lectured, Mr. Keeling, 
 a worthy middle-aged gentleman, whose main defect was 
 an inveterate habit of punning, and a partiality for his own 
 jokes which made him lead the laugh a little too loudly. 
 He lived there with his sister and two nieces, the Miss 
 Skillins, who played like two pretty sunbeams about the 
 house. I used to call and play chess with them often, 
 after that first evening when we sat together round the 
 table, and discussed politics and poetry, and the Wandering 
 Jew, over almonds and raisins. Mariana was there, the 
 fair brunette, and Susan, the beautiful blonde; and many a 
 day they sailed with us about the summer waters of Cove 
 and Monkstown, or up the course of the river which ran 
 in lake after lake among the green hills; or drove in cars 
 away to some sunny retreat of the shore, where we sat 
 and made a pic-nic party and endless fun. Old A. used 
 to be with us, the oldest of antiquarians, who electrified 
 himself into a long life, and was credulous enough to 
 believe any marvel. The Jenningses too would often join 
 us, a still more entertaining family. There was Tom, the 
 master of the house, with his great strong head and hands, 
 and Edward, a pair of brothers like the Thorntons of 
 "North and South." 1 Mrs. Jennings was rather a stiff old 
 lady, and her daughter Mary seemed cast in the same 
 rough sterling mould, but Jane, my mother's own peculiar 
 friend, added to their warm-heartedness the versatility of a 
 more imaginative temper. She was as fond of mesmerism 
 as M'C. was of phrenology, and it played her as many tricks. 
 1 He is evidently referring to the Moores in Shirley. 
 
64 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 I remember her and my mother sitting opposite to each 
 other for hours, till Jane gave in and confessed that she 
 was being overcome by the very sleep she had hoped to 
 induce in her obstinate patient. I remember too seeing 
 some of the pranks of her inspired clairvoyante, who after- 
 wards turned out to be a clever impostor, so that when 
 the good lady ceased to be her dupe, it was at the cost of 
 half her faith. There too were often to be seen Mr. 
 Hincks, the talented young clergyman and his pretty sister, 
 whom I fell in love with and used to torment ; pulling her 
 long black ringlets under pretence that I meant to ring 
 the bell, and mistook the handle in my confusion. There 
 were other girls every traveller will tell you the women 
 of Cork are fascinating whose smiles made me happy, 
 and whose absence made me miserable. But our favourites 
 of all were the M'Swineys, Mr. and Mrs., and their 
 charming sister Alicia. Mr. M'Swiney was a great iron 
 merchant in Cork, a devout Catholic, and one of the most 
 excellent men I have ever known. Acute, upright, straight- 
 forward, gentle, and generous, he lived respected, and died 
 lamented by all who ever knew him. Mrs. M'Swiney 
 was just as kind and generous as her husband, whom she 
 loved as he deserved to be loved. Her sister lived with 
 them like a daughter ; for they had no other family. Alicia 
 Haynes was introduced to my father after his first lecture, 
 and soon attracted his notice as one of the most intelligent 
 girls he had ever met. She would have been good-looking 
 had she not worn blue spectacles to protect her weak eyes; 
 but you soon forgot the spectacles when you found yourself 
 in the company of an Irish Aspasia ; even at that early 
 age she was a literary lady in all respects but that of author- 
 ship, for she had read in English, French, and German, 
 enough to give her thoughts for a lifetime. You have met 
 Anna Deborah Richardson ; she and Miss Haynes are 
 similar ; their talk and their criticism is of the same high 
 order, only you must add to the latter the charm of music. 
 I am blending earlier and later memories, for when 
 I revisited Cork four summers ago I met her again, a 
 young girl no longer, but a woman saddened by the 
 sorrow of which twelve years had brought her a store, yet 
 
EARLY YEARS. 6$ 
 
 with the old enthusiasm mellowed by experience, and 
 enlarged by a still wider culture. Most of the others 
 came round us more or less changed, the M'Swineys 
 much as they used to be, and the Jenningses, Tom, and 
 Mary, and Jane, whose eyes seemed to want their bright- 
 ness as she missed her old friend, my mother. 
 
 At this time, and for many years after, I was a resolute 
 teetotaler. I was accordingly very enthusiastic when I was 
 introduced to Father Mathew, and found him ready to 
 welcome and to confirm my faith. He treated me with 
 extreme kindness, presented me with a silver medal and a 
 sash, and requested me to accompany a great procession of 
 the abstainers of the south of Ireland which was about 
 to take place. I have never repented my weary walk 
 that dusty summer's day, amid the confusion of flags and 
 drums, for I helped to swell the triumph of a good cause, 
 and do honour to the worthy man who led it. I saw 
 a great deal of Father Mathew : in his little room, where 
 there were strange scenes enacted, as wretches, half dead 
 with whisky, came crawling to take the pledge as a sort 
 of absolution ; on the platform, whence he sent his 
 powerful voice far over the stormy crowd ; in the quiet 
 convent, with his quiet nuns, when their voices chimed in 
 with the organ to vesper tunes. In all attitudes he 
 seemed to me a thoroughly sincere man, working out with 
 honest, though perhaps excessive, zeal, the beneficent 
 purpose to which he devoted a munificent life. Simple, 
 unaffected, frank, and generous, if he missed being a great 
 man he missed it very narrowly. As to the question itself, 
 I think now, though more dispassionately, much as I 
 thought then. Total abstinence is necessary to the well- 
 being of some, it will do good to many, and harm to 
 very few. Let each take his own way, remembering that 
 it is impossible for any one who has been the victim 
 of intemperance ever to become a moderate drinker, and 
 that example is better than precept. 
 
 From Cork we went for a fortnight to Dr. Barter's hydro- 
 pathic establishment at Blarney. Never was there a sweeter 
 spot than that where the little haven, since grown into larger 
 proportions, was reared. On the end of the groves, almost 
 
 E 
 
66 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 within sight of the famous castle, it stands on a gentle 
 slope, from which runs a rivulet through a perfect faery land 
 of foliage. Here we lived, and bathed and wandered by 
 rock and stream and dell ; reading Gerald Griffin's poems, 
 going on pic-nic parties under the trees, making the woods 
 melodious with notes that mocked the singing of the 
 birds; golden days, so full of health and hope, came back 
 to me like echoes when I trod those walks again, and 
 found them sad because they had been sweet. 
 
 We returned to town again when it was alive with a 
 great excitement ; flags flaunted from every window, bands 
 " with banner and bugle and fife " marched through the 
 streets. Dan O'Connell was free, and was coming in 
 triumph to Cork. From the balcony of Mr. Keeling's 
 window we sat and watched the great procession as it 
 came winding mile after mile along, with all the emblems 
 of all the trades ; the tailors with their Adam and Eve, 
 and the shoemakers prouder of King Cophetua's car; with 
 all the arms of all the cities ; with all the sound and 
 show that Repeal could muster; and it seemed as if it 
 would never be done, till a shouting rent the sky, and 
 the street grew dense with heads, as the car of the Irish 
 Conqueror bore him along in triumph, and swayed to 
 and fro in the surge of all Ireland pressing to hail it. 
 I have seen plenty of processions since, but never one 
 like this ; if this was not an honest man, he at least 
 knew how to set a nation on fire. It is my last 
 memory of Ireland in 1845, unless it be the image of 
 Miss Haynes watching from the pier the vessel which 
 bore my mother and me on our way homeward bound. 
 
 There was some thought of sending me to school 
 again in the autumn of 1845 after we returned, but I 
 fell ill of a gastric fever which made my friends decide 
 against the project, and I was left to pursue my studies 
 much as inclination directed me. I was cured of this 
 illness by hydropathy, which proved itself powerful against 
 fever. I recovered rapidly and took to reading, in a 
 desultory way, large numbers of books, of which novels 
 and poetry made up a considerable proportion. Innocently 
 enough in one way, but to the peril of my common sense 
 
EARLY YEARS. 67 
 
 and the waste of my time, I ran through almost the whole 
 works of Eugene Sue and Alexander Dumas. The thrilling 
 scenes and deep laid plots, and rapid events of the Mysteries 
 of Paris, and the Wandering Jew, and the Count of Monte 
 Christo, and Matilda, and the Commander of Malta, and the 
 Isle of France, and the Queen's Maids, and the Three 
 Musketeers, and others whose names would fill a page, 
 filled my head with a set of new characters and fancies. I 
 lived half my life in a world of unhealthy, because unreal 
 romance, and had such a surfeit of novels that I fell sick of 
 them and turned to history and poetry, and light literature 
 of a higher stamp. I read through Scott's Napoleon, studying 
 the battles carefully on the map, a possession which I 
 was proud of when I had acquired it, and which I have 
 never entirely lost. I read more poetry ; the more abstract 
 parts of Wordsworth, Tintern Abbey, the Ode, Intimations of 
 Immortality, and The Excursion ; Milton, the whole ; Mrs. 
 Browning, then Miss Barrett, and the minor poems of Ten- 
 nyson ; the first reading of Locksley Hall is not a thing to be 
 forgotten. I dipped into the prose poetry of Germany, and 
 read in translations considerable portions of Richter and 
 Schiller, including in particular the Autobiography of Jean 
 Paul, The Death of an Angel, and other pieces; these with 
 my mother The Robbers, Don Carlos, The Bride of Messina, 
 William Tell, and Mary Stuart. I was beginning to take 
 a delight in plays written and acted ; and no reward that 
 could be offered me was so great as being taken to the 
 theatre, on some night when Miss Faucit was going to act 
 Imogen, or Ariadne, or Mrs. Haller ; when Miss Cushman 
 was Lady Macbeth, or Mr. Macready was to appear as 
 Richelieu. This was a reward my father gave me now 
 and then ; my mother did not like my going so often as 
 I began to do; it seemed like a dangerous passion, and she 
 used to tempt me to stay at home by offering to play to me 
 alone some piece of glorious German music : a sonata of 
 Beethoven, or an act of Don Giovanni, an oratorio of Haydn, 
 or some of Mendelssohn's songs. Perhaps she had rather an 
 extreme aversion to the theatre, but it went along with a 
 sort of repugnance to gas-light and tinsel, and false excite- 
 ment of all sorts ; she bade me seek my inspiration from the 
 
68 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 hillsides and the morning air, from noble books and self- 
 renunciation. 
 
 During the session of 1845-46 I attended the class of 
 Natural History in the University. To good Dr. William 
 Cowper, antiquated and absurd as he was in his manner, and 
 limited as his knowledge of geology must have been, I owe 
 my introduction to the first science which I studied with 
 anything like zeal or success. His introductory lectures 
 on mineralogy were excellent, and I acquired during my 
 attendance on them a certain amount of skill in the 
 inspection of crystals and precious stones. My notes on the 
 atomic theory and the description of the most important 
 minerals, still remain to show with how much attention I 
 followed his old-fashioned dissertations. One morning, it 
 was rumoured, some years before, he had come into the class 
 room with tears in his eyes, and said he had been obliged to 
 give up the Wernerian theory of the formation of the rocks. 
 This was long after Hutton's discovery in Glen Tilt had, in 
 the eyes of all intelligent geologists, decided the question in 
 his favour, and may serve as an indication of the extent to 
 which the worthy doctor had gone along with the more 
 recent speculations of the science which he professed to teach. 
 Still he made his theme interesting, and set my mind 
 working on a track along which, with the help of my father's 
 additional instruction and encouragement, I advanced for a 
 considerable distance, and might, had circumstances permitted, 
 have advanced still further. I read through Bakewell and 
 Mantell and Ansted, and studied Lyell, and revised the 
 Gallery of Nature, and pored over maps and models, and 
 began to break stones as I went along the road, and to 
 examine with a critical eye the specimens my father had 
 accumulated, in order to arrange and catalogue them. I 
 wrote two long essays, one on " Meteoric Stones," the other 
 on the " Glacier and Diluvial Theories," for the class, and made 
 a list of all the crystals in the museum. A prize was offered 
 for this work and for the essays, and I was ridiculously 
 sulky because I did not get one of them, in competition 
 with men twice my age ; but I was rewarded by my father's 
 delight at my new ambition. During the two following 
 summers my ardour did not slacken. I was presented 
 
EARLY YEARS. 69 
 
 with a fine set of hammers, and carried them with me 
 everywhere. My old friend, James Thomson, was ready 
 to aid me in the formation of the cabinet, which remains 
 as the solid result of my labours, and reinforced with 
 granites from Norway, and shells from the Isle of Wight, 
 and lava and pumice from Auvergne and the Rhine, it 
 grew to what it is one of the most complete collections 
 of certain classes of rock that I have seen. I showed so 
 much enthusiasm and so much perseverance in the first 
 study I had found really congenial, the science both in its 
 practical and speculative side allured me so strongly, that 
 my father was willing to depart from the plan he had 
 formed regarding me, and went the length of suggesting 
 to his old friend, Andrew Ramsay, that I might be glad 
 if he could find for me some situation in connection with 
 the geological survey. The answer was that none were 
 likely to be vacant for a considerable time, and the scheme 
 was abandoned. A turn of the scale the other way, and 
 I might have been at this moment hammering about hills, 
 hale and strong, and sinking shafts, and drawing up reports 
 about coal and iron. 
 
 My father introduced me to Euclid, and soon thought 
 he had discovered that I had no aptitude for mathematics, 
 because I crept where he flew. Under more patient hands, 
 I afterwards acquired, with average facility, more than the 
 average amount of knowledge in that science. It was very 
 easy for me to take the first place in my class at College, 
 but my father was never shaken in his early impression, 
 which, judging by a high standard, I believe to have been 
 a correct one. I got Euclid at my fingers' ends, and 
 mastered equations, plane, and some branches of spherical 
 trigonometry, and conic sections, and the binomial theorem, 
 and dipped with interest into analytical geometry, and 
 acquired considerable facility in working out the problems 
 within the range of those elementary branches ; but I knew 
 very little of the calculus, and nothing of many of those 
 infinitely complex operations in which every scientific astro- 
 nomer is continually involved. I knew the instruments at 
 the Observatory, their uses, and the way to use them. I 
 knew my father's books, and attended many courses of his 
 
70 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 lectures, popular and scientific. I was familiar with most 
 of those facts and theories concerning the earth, and moon, 
 and stars, which a large audience came to learn, for twenty- 
 successive weeks, in the Merchants' Hall. Without that 
 power which could at will arrest and make wonder the eyes 
 of his hearers ; without that grace which gave to his speak- 
 ing the charm of a perfect actor ; without that fire of 
 eloquence which raised me into another world every time 
 I heard it, I could have delivered most, as I was once 
 constrained to deliver one, of my father's lectures to a 
 disappointed audience. I could follow the minute explana- 
 tion of the planetary perturbation which one winter drove 
 most of his students away, while Jack and Smith and I 
 sat taking notes. But I never was, and it may be ques- 
 tioned if I was capable of becoming, an astronomer. I 
 only knew enough of the science to know its difficulty, 
 and had attained but the first step of wisdom in arriving 
 at a due sense of my ignorance. Yet many a glorious 
 night we spent together in that dome watching the shadows 
 creep up the sides of Tycho, straining our sight to see the 
 fields under the Apennines green as with waving corn ; 
 marking the changes in an aery comet, or the steadfast 
 glories of the Lyre ; watching the Pleiades, " like a swarm 
 of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid," the snows gathering 
 about the poles of the red planet Mars, or the winds 
 blowing across the belt of Jupiter ; or gazing till our eyes 
 grew dim on the fathomless abysses of Orion blazing from 
 a past eternity on the world. Many a night when the 
 clouds came chasing over the sky have I walked with him 
 on that roof, while the furnace fires were looming over 
 heaven, and the lights of the city seemed to dazzle the 
 distance, while pacing to and fro till Hesperus brightened 
 through the rifts of rain, we have felt our hearts drawn 
 together and our souls raised upward by the stars. 1 
 
 1 For a poetical expression of the feelings with which this letter 
 concludes, see the verses "From the Old Home," in The Death of 
 Themistodes and other Poems" (MacLehose, 1881). 
 
EARLY YEARS. 7 1 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, June 12. 
 
 This work is hanging on my hands, and I must not linger 
 in its accomplishment ; but I am tired to-night, and I will 
 ask you to accept a couple of pages instead of a long letter. 
 It will suffice if I content myself with narrating, instead of 
 attempting to describe, the events of the following year. 
 In the autumn of 1846 I was sent back to the Western 
 Academy, which, conducted by new masters and under a 
 new regime, was struggling too late to retrieve its ruined 
 fortunes. Nelson had been supplanted by a Mr. Middleton, 
 a pleasant, shrewd man of the world, a good scholar and 
 able teacher, who used, in the hours of recreation, to give 
 some of his senior students lessons in fencing without 
 losing any of the dignity which was natural to him, and 
 always insured respect. Gregg had yielded to Charles 
 William Connon, a man of remarkable acuteness and 
 power, who gave promise of more distinction than circum- 
 stances mainly the pressure of a large family have 
 enabled him to attain. If any one could have saved the 
 Western Academy, Connon could. He was already known 
 as the author of the best English grammar I have ever 
 seen, and he taught as clearly and as well as he wrote. 
 He was a scholar and a gentleman ; his strong Aberdonian 
 accent did not mar the effect of a manner which fitly 
 expressed the underlying emotions and energetic will of a 
 strong mind. To a knowledge of Latin, French, and 
 German, far above the average of that possessed by pro- 
 fessing teachers, he added a familiarity with the best 
 authors of his own tongue whether in verse or prose, 
 which excited the admiration of all who were able to test 
 it. In literature he had an excellent taste ; in life a little 
 more polish might have added to his power. In school 
 I learnt more English from him than from any other ; at 
 home, both at the Observatory, where he was a frequent 
 visitor, and in his own house, where I was boarded for 
 a fortnight during the absence of my family, I learnt at 
 least as much in lessons of good sense and tact. 
 
 Middleton had meanwhile been dragging me over the 
 coals in Latin. I had returned after my illness almost 
 
72 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 entirely ignorant of the rudiments, and had to begin ground- 
 ing myself in it again. I felt ill at ease when I turned back 
 from Plautus and Juvenal to Cornelius Nepos and Adam's 
 grammar. I did not take kindly to the work, and my 
 progress was as slow as my task was painful. Meanwhile 
 the younger Gregg, who, along with Slack, was retained 
 to remind me of former times, once more essayed the 
 difficult problem of teaching me to write. I have often 
 thought that some strange mixture of incapacity and per- 
 versity made it impossible for me to be taught anything. 
 Teacher after teacher, year after year, was employed to 
 instruct me in English, Latin, Greek, writing, and dancing, 
 and one after another they gave up the effort in despair. 
 My better genius came to me by the side of my solitary 
 desk, and by degrees I came to read Tacitus and Plato, 
 to write, to dance, and to compose pretty tolerably. Old 
 Korner, who, with his military manners and humour and 
 manly brusqueness, continues to carry my good wishes, was 
 my first teacher in German, and there, too, I staggered along 
 step by step. My father did not send me to Detruc or 
 Havet, for he said I would pick up French afterwards, by 
 force of circumstances. Unfortunately for me Middleton left 
 before the year was over, and I was handed over to Connon 
 to try his patience on Virgil which I translated freely, and 
 Mair's exercises which I mangled sadly. Good man, I 
 remember his quite losing his temper over a paper I 
 brought him one day with the sentence, " Syria vastat^j 
 est." " If you ever go to college," I hear him exclaiming, 
 " if you ever go to college, don't tell them I taught you." 
 As it turned out, I may be permitted to doubt if the 
 information would have done much harm to Mr. Connon : 
 but I did him little credit in those days. 
 
 I meant to tell you more about my walks out from 
 school that year, and how I used to meet Lushington, and 
 had a long discussion with De Quincey, that wonderful old 
 man, whose wanderings and mishaps during his residence 
 with us will serve for a separate episode. 1 I am resolved 
 to finish this epoch with my two pages. About this time 
 
 1 There is unfortunately no further reference in these pages to De 
 Quincey's visits to the Observatory. 
 
EARLY YEARS. 73 
 
 my grandmother died and other clouds gathered around us. 
 My father began to despair of me. The Western Academy 
 had failed. When Connon had left there was no hope 
 there. As a last resort he bethought himself of his old 
 friend, Mr. Fergusson of Kelso ; and thither I was sent 
 away to breathe for a year the atmosphere of a strange 
 land, and fight my way alone in the outer world. 
 
 BagnEres de Bigorre, June 13. 
 
 Near the confluence of the Teviot and the Tweed, within 
 hearing of the broad, rushing river, in the very flower of 
 the rich Border land, lies the little town of Kelso. It has 
 many attractions, a good climate, an admirable situation 
 and pleasant streets, a fine square, a green, and the ruins 
 of an old abbey, which, less graceful than Melrose, and less 
 extensive than Dryburgh, has yet the advantage of greater 
 height and more tolerable preservation. There are as many 
 beautiful walks round Kelso as there are near any town I 
 know in Scotland ; one may ramble away among the rising 
 grounds between it and Jedburgh, or saunter up the stream 
 to Floors or old Roxburgh Castle, when the sun throws 
 a lazy heat over the luxurious banks, or wander by the 
 side of the waters when they are sparkling beneath the 
 moon, and murmuring melodious music. I came in the 
 coach with my mother in September, 1847, to prove how 
 little external nature can do to make man happy when his 
 fellows will not leave him alone in her society. I came to 
 pass the most miserable thank Heaven it was the last of 
 the miserable years of my school time. 
 
 There is one association connected with my memory of 
 Kelso which I like to return to, but it stands alone. My 
 teacher, Mr. Fergusson, was one of the most excellent men 
 who ever lived in this world, and passed away from it 
 comparatively unknown. A good Latin and Greek, and a 
 profound German scholar, he carried about with him, on 
 matters of history and physical geography, learning enough 
 to have endowed two professors' chairs. To this he added 
 a genius for teaching, and an amount of zeal which lost 
 itself in the barbarian swamp of that picturesque, but un- 
 
74 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 civilized, little town. The qualities of his mind which were 
 called into exercise in the Grammar School of Kelso were 
 more closely connected with his character than his intellect ; 
 promptitude, accuracy, and decision of a will almost savage 
 in its energy these were required to constrain the attention 
 and quell the turbulence of his " young barbarians " of the 
 Border. There was no room here for that large and liberal 
 growth of thought which showed itself to my father and a 
 few choice friends, 1 still less for any gush from that well of 
 tenderness, which I afterwards found lying deep and calm 
 beneath his ferocity. John Fergusson was known to all 
 the neighbourhood as a man of sterling worth, of rigid 
 integrity, and manly strength. Whether he had any of 
 those womanly virtues which are required to make a man 
 perfect, nobody knew where nobody could appreciate them; 
 whether his thoughts on those mysteries which lie round 
 our life were deep or shallow no one cared to ask, for 
 they had never puzzled themselves with questions which 
 they were incapable of understanding. Fergusson might be 
 a bad man at bottom (it was remarked that he read German 
 books on Sundays), but he could compel the stupidest boy 
 to learn something, and he could tame the wildest ; so in 
 his own house he got the stupidest and wildest to teach 
 and tame. When I think of such a noble life so employed, 
 it seems to me even a sadder thing than the sight of one 
 of the most graceful scholars of the day, drilling his ragged 
 squad in the alphabet and primer, at the Grammar School 
 of Govan. 
 
 The kindness with which Fergusson treated me, and it 
 was generally extreme, stood alone, and unfortunately some 
 of my defects were those which he was the least disposed 
 to regard with indulgence. I was intellectually inaccurate, 
 he was the reverse. I was disposed to be sentimental in 
 my tastes, he despised sentiment. I was unsocial in my 
 habits, he thought that one of man's first duties in life was 
 to learn to associate with his fellows in every sphere ; and 
 he did not see how completely I had fallen out of my 
 sphere. Add to this that I was reserved, timid, and bore 
 malice, whereas he was frank and bold, and resented 
 1 Mr. Fergusson was a friend and correspondent of Carlyle's. 
 
EARLY YEARS. 75 
 
 every injury at the moment ; that I was weak and he was 
 strong ; and you will believe that even his kindness was 
 often tried by my moodiness and eccentricity, that his great, 
 grey, hollow eyes flashed now and then with something 
 like contempt on the boy who, as he phrased it, wished to 
 go through life tied to his mother's apron-strings. Perhaps 
 he did not always know how to deal with a nature so 
 peculiar, and yet he treated me in a peculiar way, and the 
 only happy hours I ever spent in Kelso, besides those when 
 I stole out steathily to wander by the river-side, were 
 those which I used to spend every evening alone with my 
 master in his study. If he ever acted unjustly towards 
 me, it was because he was misled by a credulity which was 
 frequently imposed upon. Mr. Fergusson was unfortunately 
 unmarried, and the internal care of his establishment de- 
 volved to some extent on his housekeeper. Again I am 
 restrained, by thoughts that ought to lay many enmities, 
 from saying all I think about this woman. She and her 
 master are alike beyond the reach of criticism ; his truth, 
 his integrity, his noble-mindedness, are covered by the 
 same mould which buries her meanness and malice, and 
 ought to bury their memory. His partiality was the only 
 cause I could assign for her hatred of me : she told the 
 other boys that I was a parlour boarder ; that I was a 
 " gowk " whom Mr. Fergusson was obliged to pet because 
 my father insisted upon it; that I looked down upon them 
 because they were farmers, not good enough to associate 
 with a professor's son. 
 
 I remember as it were yesterday one day after dinner, 
 when I had given vent to some uncontrollable smiles, called 
 forth by some absurd remark of the old lady's, and more 
 absurd gesture of a senior boarder who had found out my 
 weakness for humour and played upon it, Fergusson bade 
 me wait when all were gone, and poured upon me a 
 torrent of invective the more intense that he hesitated to 
 let it find its usual relief in the lash. Mrs. T. was pacing 
 the room in triumph as he was accusing me of per- 
 versity and thanklessness, while I stood with my hand on 
 the door with thoughts too bitter for tears, saying to 
 myself, even he is turned against me. 
 
y6 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 The persecutions of a large day school are limited, and 
 akin to those we must be prepared to encounter and live 
 down in later life. There good boys grow up into the 
 friends of manhood, and the brutal ones, who have ceased 
 to strike us, and laugh before our faces, only cheat us, and 
 laugh behind our backs. But there is no limit to the 
 torments which may be inflicted upon a sensitive child in 
 a small boarding school. 
 
 When I went back to visit my master at Kelso at the 
 age of twenty-three, with the weight of ten years later on 
 my brow, and saw the urchins of that time pass from the 
 dining-room into the playground, I wondered how ten years 
 before I could have been such a martyr to beings so 
 insignificant. I found it impossible to conceive of myself 
 as I was, when I first came there to the most painful of 
 all solitudes, that of a mind obliged to wrestle with a crowd 
 without sympathy. We wrought, we played, we walked 
 together, and yet at work, at play, in the room where we 
 slept, in the hall where we studied, I was equally alone. 
 Among a dozen boarders who were surely unfortunate 
 specimens even of that exceptional school, there was not 
 one I could trust, not one who would give me a word of 
 encouragement. They hated me because I was petted, 
 because I was comparatively refined, because I knew more ; 
 above all, they hated me because I was unlike them. 
 When Mr. Fergusson told me that he would protect me 
 against the older boys, but that I must hold my own 
 ground against the smaller ones, he did not know how they 
 were all bound together against the one unhappy object of 
 their aversion, how I had to contend against numbers from 
 the first, how the biggest boy had promised to protect the 
 smallest against my retaliation, how the smallest was 
 pledged to shield the biggest from detection when he 
 injured me. My hand was veritably against every man's, 
 and every man's hand was against mine. The only thing 
 I can admire on looking back upon them is their inveterate 
 ingenuity. At school, or in the playground, or in the house, 
 nothing that malice could devise was neglected to make 
 me miserable. If I lost a place in the class, where I was 
 still toiling against the misfortunes of my previous educa- 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 77 
 
 tion, there was a smile of satisfaction on every face ; if I 
 got to the top, an event which became frequent towards 
 the close of the year, every one was ready to sacrifice his 
 own interest to get me down again. If I won a game, it 
 spoiled the pleasure of the sport. If I had a favourite toy, 
 some one would break it. If I was known to love a solitary 
 walk, another would intrude upon it. My work was 
 ridiculed, my rest broken, my favourite books smeared with 
 grease in my absence. The most cowardly boy was goaded 
 by promises of reward and impunity to insult me. 
 
 Mrs. T. said I was always fighting : in truth I ought to 
 have fought much oftener, but when I did, it was always 
 against odds. I cannot dwell on the details of a brutality 
 which left me with a feeling of hatred, that it is even now 
 difficult for me to overcome. But I will tell you one 
 incident which will save me from the charge of exaggeration, 
 and which, with numbers similar to it, might be gathered to 
 show that the shield which Mr. Thomas Hughes so much 
 admires has another side. I had often protested against 
 bird-nesting, and when alone in my company some of the 
 boys had affected to feel the force of my arguments ; but 
 they conspired to read me a lesson which should kill or 
 cure my mawkishness. One day I was sitting alone how 
 delightful it was to be alone ! in the school- room, reading 
 one of the Border Tales, when the boarders entered to show 
 me of what stuff some of those Border bandits whom I was 
 apt to admire were made. They had with them several 
 bags which they brought into the room, locking the door 
 and taking the key as they entered. They opened the 
 bags, which were full of young birds newly fledged, these, 
 while they were fluttering about the walls of the room, they 
 battered to death one by one with their satchels, and 
 shaking the mutilated fragments in my face, passed out 
 with shouts of laughter, to dissipate all morbid thoughts 
 in the exhilaration of some other manly sport. 
 
 The actors in those scenes would have laughed at strong 
 words used to characterize their deeds, and I need not use 
 them now : but, you ask, where was our master's vigilance 
 at the time? I never saw anything objectionable done in 
 his presence, but he relegated us, during the greater part 
 
y% MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 of the day, to the care of his assistant, a young man who 
 was preparing to be a clergyman, and did not trouble him- 
 self much about our muscular Christianity. Mr. Fergusson 
 liked to sit, after school hours were over, in his own study, 
 and write at his translation of Von Roon. When any 
 misdeeds came to his ears if any of the boarders were 
 caught smoking, or being out after hours, or breaking into 
 gardens he punished them with the tawse or dog whip ; 
 but it was more difficult for him to make those discoveries 
 when the culprits were bound together by the league of self- 
 defence which unites most schoolboys. It is a good custom 
 never to tell tales out of school, but I would not consent, 
 as the others had done, to perjure myself by declarations of 
 ignorance when I could not evade inquiry, and this was 
 another source of heart-burning and persecution. 
 
 Among the scholars of the day school there were some 
 kinder spirits, as dear old Billy Graham, who took my part 
 and gave me encouragement ; but the greater number of 
 them were like rude people speaking a strange tongue, who 
 laugh at us because they cannot laugh with us. My little 
 peculiarities irritated them, my teetotalism, which I would 
 not have surrendered for all the persecutions of all the 
 schools in England, was a source of incessant ridicule. I 
 remember well on the day when we were for the last time 
 all assembled together, and Mrs. T. had served out to each 
 of us a glass of whisky toddy, how one of the boarders 
 rose and said, " Good health to you all but teetotal John." 
 I have hated to be called by my first name ever since the 
 liberties they took with it. This was the last stab, and 
 it rankled in my heart long after I had bidden adieu to 
 that wild crew. I went away at the end of the year with 
 a fair knowledge of Latin, mathematics, geography, and 
 German, with an esteem for my master which time could 
 only strengthen, and a spirit still unbroken for the trials 
 of the year, which had taken from me all peace and good- 
 will, could not shake my love of truth, nor my contempt 
 for those who were mortified because they could not shake 
 it. I had gained wisdom by that bitter knowledge of the 
 world, but I had lost much of the innocence which I 
 brought with me from home, and I carried away with me 
 
EARLY YEARS. 79 
 
 feelings of hostility which ran sour in the current of my 
 blood for long years. Richter says somewhere, "Every man 
 when he thinks of his mother ought to feel that all women 
 are sacred." The thought of those school-mates of mine 
 has made all school-boys hateful. 1 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, June 15. 
 
 I came home home, word so full of tenderness, reality 
 so full of love, a dwelling-place, a rest where cluster the 
 associations of many years, a sound that is so often " sad, 
 because it hath been sweet." I came from Kelso to the 
 Observatory, never to quit it for so long again until I left 
 it for ever. In my notes of the period, for my journal had 
 started the fancy of making notes, I find the record of a 
 number of visitors whose company enlivened still more the 
 first weeks of my return. There was Mrs. Thomson, my 
 kind friend from Haymount, with her daughter Robina, 
 whose poetical fame had reached my ears without our 
 being able to meet. She was not a beauty, but a pleasant, 
 intellectual girl, who read a great deal and wrote verses. 
 
 My own first attempt in this direction was in the shape 
 of some lines which I had written on my father's return 
 from America where he had been lecturing during my 
 year at Kelso ; they were said to be promising, but not 
 equal to Robina's. She has since married without becom- 
 ing a poetess. Before the summer was over that summer 
 spent in joyful idleness Mr. Fergusson came to see us 
 and inquire about my plans. The awful question about 
 my return was being agitated ; should I go back to Kelso 
 or should I go to College? I was taken to Ramsay, 
 and examined by him for the first time. " He will be," 
 he answered, " in the middle of my junior class." The 
 affair looked ominous ; if I went back to the Tweed-side 
 I wished to go and get regular lessons in boxing ; but 
 
 1 This letter concludes with extracts from a journal kept by Mr. Nichol 
 while at school at Kelso. Some of these are sufficiently remarkable as 
 coming from the pen of a boy of fourteen, but they are, for the most part, 
 the record of the daily details and distresses of school-boy life, and, as 
 such, it would be superfluous to present them to the public. 
 
80 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 that too seemed absurd. I entreated to be allowed to go 
 to College. I would try and get above the middle of 
 the class. I suspect what decided the question was Mr. 
 Fergusson himself. He was willing that I should come 
 back to him, or stay, as was thought advisable ; he rather 
 thought I should come back, but there was one point 
 on which he had made up his mind. Mr. Fergusson 
 was as proud as Don Quixote, whose figure he recalled 
 to life again ; if he thought people were disposed to 
 slight him he got very angry. Something had occurred 
 before the end of the Kelso session, to make my father 
 doubt if he could come to the examination as he had 
 promised to do ; upon which my master wrote that if 
 he did not come, his, Fergusson's shadow, which was 
 certainly the longest and thinnest I ever saw, would 
 never again darken the door of the Observatory. Such 
 a command was imperative ; my father came. 
 
 But his pride took other forms, which reminded one of 
 that type of chivalry in his most generous aspirations. 
 When the time came for paying my board and teaching, 
 Fergusson declared that he would not take a sou, that he 
 would take it as an insult if another word was said on 
 the subject. There was no moving him from a deter- 
 mination which he seemed to have formed from the first ; 
 all we could do was to give him as many maps and books 
 as he would take, and of course I could not be sent back 
 to Abbey Bank. 
 
 My father took counsel with Ramsay as to the best use 
 that could be made of the two months which intervened 
 between then and the opening of the College session, and 
 Ramsay recommended that I should read Latin with Mr. 
 William Fulton, teacher of the Parish School of Govan. 
 Agnes went with me over the water every morning 
 before breakfast during those months, to get some intro- 
 ductory lessons in the language, and when Missy, as the 
 good man called her, had said her lesson, I sat down and 
 read my Tibullus and Ovid. I cannot call Fulton a very 
 good teacher ; he was not at any rate the sort of man 
 I most wanted, for though accurate enough himself, he did 
 not contribute much to my accuracy. He would correct 
 
EARLY YEARS. 8 1 
 
 my prose exercises in a lazy way, without explaining the 
 reason of corrections in themselves excellent; he heard me 
 read, and when my translation was inaccurate or inelegant 
 he substituted one of his own, which was a model of ele- 
 gance, without letting me know whether I had offended 
 against grammar or against taste ; often when we came 
 upon a favourite passage, he would anticipate my attempt 
 altogether by his own masterpiece. Afterwards, when 
 Ramsay had finished the drill which Fergusson had begun, 
 and I knew what to expect, and what to seek, from those 
 mornings and evenings at Govan, I gained more from 
 Fulton, as I was longer with him, than from any other 
 teacher. Fulton was a sort of private tutor to me during 
 six whole years of my College course ; as regularly as I 
 went to Ramsay and Lushington during the winter, I went 
 to Fulton during the summer, and while he was getting 
 the fee of a village schoolmaster, he took as much interest 
 in me as any Oxford coach can do in his favourite pupil. 
 He taught me to write Latin verses fluently, and to catch 
 the ring of Greek hexameters ; he taught me to translate 
 with ease and elegance ; during those thousand and one 
 nights while we sat together, he led me up through the 
 range of the classics from Ovid to Plato, and brought me 
 by degrees to love the singers and the sages of Greece 
 and Rome. I read on fast and far myself at last, but if 
 any one else kindled the fire of that enthusiasm it was 
 William Fulton. My walks from the Observatory to Govan 
 were always pleasant ; they were to me in the summer 
 what the march to College was in winter; but every time I 
 draw near the ferry now my mind runs back to the autumn 
 of 1848, and the early mornings there with Agnes, when 
 we crossed the river in the great dingy boats, and said 
 our lessons, and went to get the letters from the post, and 
 climbed up the hill together. It was the pleasant time of 
 flowers, the early spring to her, and even then the spring 
 of life to me. 
 
 Meanwhile I was busy over English books. My father 
 had brought home a mass of American books, among 
 them a lot of novels, poems, and histories, which I seized 
 upon and read, by stealth or openly according as they 
 
 F 
 
82 MEMOIR OF JOHN NJCHOL. 
 
 were gay or grave. I remember my delight over Haw- 
 thorne and his Mosses, a partiality which only grew more 
 intense as my powers of appreciation grew keener. Long- 
 fellow had given my father a beautiful copy of his works, 
 and I read those through for the first time. Bryant and 
 Lowell too, pleased me. Among larger works I read 
 almost all Prescott carefully, with maps, and was so much 
 interested in the Conquest of Mexico that it took me away 
 from my games with Agnes, which my studies never did. 
 We renewed those games as of old, only as our minds 
 grew, more imagination and, if I may use the expression, 
 more literature entered into them. The show-box was no 
 longer degraded into a coach ; it was exalted into a theatre, 
 with its curtain and its scenery. We had elaborate 
 marionettes for serious and burlesque representations 
 made of cork and cashou nuts, ridiculous, delightful figures 
 which we christened mannikins. They represented gnomes, 
 ghouls, and elfish spirits of all sorts, and played parts of 
 their own in fantasies. We found it best to keep these 
 entertainments in our own hands, nor do I know any sort 
 of amusement which I have found more attractive than the 
 manufacturing and managing of marionettes. 
 
 Dancing, whether it be called a recreation or a task, 
 was part of our employment in those days. We had a 
 class, formed of ourselves and some of the neighbouring 
 families, to be taught in the hall by a neat little 
 lady, Miss Reynolds. Some summers before I went to 
 Kelso, my father came home from Leeds, and astonished 
 us all by an account of a little girl whom he had met 
 there. This little girl played the most difficult music 
 with exquisite taste and marvellous power; she sang with 
 intense feeling and sweetness, read wise books, thought 
 wise thoughts, said pretty things, and looked herself, when 
 she pleased, very fascinatingly pretty. Such intelligence 
 could not fail to rouse our eagerness mine especially to 
 see and judge for ourselves of this prodigy. We invited 
 her to come with her mother and spend some weeks at 
 
 the Observatory and they came. E was and did all 
 
 that was reported. She was clever, almost beautiful ; if 
 she had had large eyes she would have been perfectly so ; 
 
EARLY YEARS. 83 
 
 well read, a good German and French scholar, and at the 
 age of fourteen possessed of many accomplishments, besides 
 a genius for music which was the more admirable that it 
 brought no conceit along with it. You have seen some of 
 little E.'s letters which she continued to write me for whole 
 ten years after this visit. I liked to get them. I doubt 
 if any other handwriting made my heart beat so fast as 
 hers, when I saw it on the mantelpiece of the Kelso dining- 
 room, for I remembered our games, our long days' rambles 
 in the woods, her sweet songs like the birds', her smiles 
 like the sun among the leaves, her tears as she turned 
 away her little head, when I pressed her hand that day 
 we parted, and the midsummer's dream was done. When 
 I came home from Kelso, her parents were settled in 
 
 Glasgow, and E was more fascinating than ever now 
 
 that the summer of sweet sixteen had added to her 
 bloom, and her passion for music had grown absorbing, 
 without allowing her thirst for more general knowledge 
 to be quenched. They were frequent visitors at the Ob- 
 servatory, and we often went to visit them. E and 
 
 I grew great friends ; after she left Glasgow we corre- 
 sponded with each other during six years. 
 
 Dancing has led me to E. ; a note which I find about 
 a sermon which I wrote at this time leads me to touch 
 on my religion. Without speculating on the more subtle 
 causes which lead one to adopt this or that form of faith, 
 it will be admitted that we all take our earliest impressions 
 of the world and the way it is ruled, of our duties in it, 
 and of the God who made it and us, from those with 
 whom we are brought into earliest contact ; it will be ad- 
 mitted, too, that neither change of circumstance, nor move- 
 ment of thought, in after life will avail to efface entirely 
 the influence of those impressions they lie still beneath 
 all things like the memories of early love we may renounce 
 our old allegiance, the old worship with its forms has a 
 place in our heart whether we recognize it or no. These 
 facts, which all are aware of and many appreciate, should 
 lead to tolerance, and help us to make allowance for 
 differences. I first learnt religion, as most of us learn it, 
 from my mother. Were we taught nothing, it is possible 
 
84 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 that some mysterious influences, like those which seem at 
 a great crisis in life to act for us, would sometime compel 
 us to bend the knee in adoration of an unseen power; 
 but we would have no name for that vague impression. 
 
 My mother taught me to think of God, and of the good 
 He gave us, and the gratitude we owed Him ; she read 
 to me of Him who lived on earth after God's own image, 
 and bade me believe His promises and obey His precepts. 
 This was the sum of my early religion ; and it were 
 abundantly enough for us all if we could carry just so 
 much through life with us. But just as when some 
 precious thing grows less and rarer it is covered with 
 ornaments, so our faith, which is so volatile that it threatens 
 to escape as like a vapour, is enclosed and cased round 
 with ceremonies and the details of doctrine. We hold by 
 those, and think that when they are stolen from us by 
 argument or experience all is lost ; and all is lost when 
 we have transferred our worship to the crystal vase from 
 the precious flower within it ; from the gem to the casket. 
 The doctrines of Presbyterianism, the Scotch ideas of 
 plenary inspiration, Sabbath worship, and other later 
 exaggerations and interpretations, in some measure wove 
 themselves around my primary belief in a celestial city. 
 I became an orthodox, though a mild, Calvinist. We 
 went, my mother and I, from the time when I could 
 follow a sermon, to church regularly on Sundays. Our 
 first clergyman was a Mr. Paisley. I remember him vaguely, 
 an excellent, earnest man of a dark complexion ; I always 
 enjoyed his sermons, and never liked to miss them. It 
 was so pleasant, when my mother and I walked up together 
 through the avenue, to discuss together the text and his 
 interpretation of it. I recollect my first thought of scep- 
 ticism being started by one lecture of a course he was 
 giving on Samuel, when he came to the controversy 
 between the priest and Saul on the subject of the Amale- 
 kites, and my admiration went strongly in behalf of the 
 generous king, and my pity was great for Agag. The 
 questions I asked my mother were not carried far, because 
 I found she shared my feeling ; and I was left with a 
 vague notion that there were some things in the Old 
 
EARLY YEARS. 85 
 
 Testament we could not understand. I have known a 
 good orthodox old lady admit that she would not like to 
 have done as Jael did. 
 
 In coming into contact with the speculations of others, 
 still more in studying history, I had found that it was 
 impossible for me to accept a religion on the ground of 
 tradition ; the controversial books I read, and those were 
 numerous, as Froude's and Newman's and Greg's, accom- 
 panied, rather than directed, the current of my thoughts. 
 I had to seek my way alone, and grope about for faith 
 amid troubled waters, and wander without it in the valley 
 of the shadow of death. 1 
 
 Bagnres, June 16. 
 
 On the 1st of November, 1848, I entered the University 
 of Glasgow as a student, full of all manner of confused 
 hopes and ideas, most of which were to be disappointed, 
 many of which were to be realized, some of which were 
 to be surpassed. It was a great step forward ; I was 
 brought, in the courts of the College, into contact with 
 life more as it really is. I found there a microcosm of 
 that mixture of characters, and variety of pursuits, and 
 shifting of scenery, which make up the world. It was 
 later, by three or four years, that I came to know the new 
 society, and form an important member of its movement, 
 so I will defer my impressions of Glasgow student life till 
 the beginning of the next epoch of my own. Meanwhile 
 I tried to forget the painful memories of Kelso in asso- 
 ciation with a few of those whom I met, as active in the 
 field of knowledge, and in every way as good, or better, 
 than myself. Even during the first year of my attendance 
 I had several pleasant companions ; students, who begin to 
 feel themselves young men, put off in a great measure the 
 absurdity, the brutality, and the childishness of school-boys. 
 I had no persecutions at Glasgow College, for at first I 
 
 1 There follows in this place a series of descriptive criticisms of the 
 various pastors attended by Nichol during his boyhood. These sketches 
 and criticisms, sometimes laudatory, are always characteristically frank 
 and pungent. 
 
86 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 was pleased to follow, and afterwards able to lead, my 
 comrades in the classes and out of them. 
 
 On the mornings of this my first, and during four other, 
 sessions of attendance on the College, I had to leave home 
 at half-past six, in order to arrive in time for my class at 
 half-past seven. It was a fair hour's walk from the 
 Observatory to the College, and it was pitch dark when 
 I started off in the winter, and the ground was sometimes 
 covered thickly with snow. I had to find my way down 
 the hill as best I could, and it was often a difficult matter. 
 Besides securing that I came into the class with open eyes, 
 indeed, I was often half-asleep when I left the house, 
 those walks did me a world of good in giving me strength, 
 habits of early rising, and a disposition to defy the weather. 
 
 The Junior Latin, to which I came in the mornings, 
 engaged most of my attention this year. The fashion of 
 teaching a class in a Scotch University is something un- 
 known in England. You must fancy from one to two 
 hundred young men ranged together in a large class-room 
 on benches where their places are marked. First the 
 catalogue is called ; every one who is present answers 
 " adsum," and those who do not answer have afterwards 
 to give an account of their absence. Then, if it is a lec- 
 turing class, the professor delivers his lecture ; if not, or 
 if it is an hour for examination, he calls upon one or 
 other of the students to answer questions, read a passage 
 from the lesson appointed, comments on his performance, 
 and asks his neighbours, first in the bench and then in 
 the class, to correct his errors. 
 
 I do not think the system of the students voting on the 
 prizes is a good one ; they generally try to be fair, but it 
 is hard for lads of their inexperience to weigh evidence on 
 classical or logical merit, on the ground of examinations held 
 during a long session. I have only known one or two 
 instances of favouritism, but it is not uncommon for a 
 student who has laboured with zeal and ability, during nine- 
 tenths of a session, to be ousted by a rival, who steps 
 forward with a good memory to put on a spurt, and make 
 a brilliant display, at the end. The worst effect is on the 
 competitors themselves, who are exposed to two evils ; the 
 
EARLY YEARS. 87 
 
 first is an intellectual one. There is an art of getting prizes 
 which I, who have got enough to be admitted to count 
 on the matter, hold to be the most contemptible of all arts. 
 Boys just cropping up into men are easily imposed upon. 
 A loud voice will go a great way, perfect effrontery still 
 further ; let a student bawl out an answer, right or wrong, 
 to every question that is asked, and in the junior classes 
 he will be sure to get a prize. More than this, he may 
 from tutors, or old students, or careful attention, soon get 
 to know what sort of questions are likely to be asked on 
 each day's lesson, and come crammed, like a turkey ready 
 for eating, with little more real knowledge of the subject 
 than that animal in that state possesses, but with every 
 possible answer to every possible question. In one of the 
 classes of Greek I knew a very stupid man, who, in spite 
 of his being a very bad scholar, resolved to take the first 
 prize in the class, and did it. His plan was to bring 
 every day about twenty closely-written pages to the lecture, 
 with all the words copied from the dictionary having any 
 relation to the words in the lesson. When anything was 
 asked, he roared out one of those words, and was as likely 
 to be right as wrong. 
 
 The moral evil is much greater. Nothing annoyed me 
 more during my attendance on the classes than the spirit 
 of rivalry, which was ever apt to exceed the limits of 
 good-humoured emulation. Young men, who might have 
 been at once zealous students and pleasant companions, 
 became a burden to themselves and a nuisance to others, 
 when they were infected by this spirit. Competition, it 
 may be said, is the very law of life ; we should be pre- 
 pared in time to meet what we must meet in the world, 
 and accustom ourselves to the jar of one of those wheels 
 which are essential to its movement. We leave school 
 and college to enter upon other and more serious rivalries. 
 But it seems to me that just because this is an inevitable 
 evil, having its roots in the imperfections of human nature, 
 it is unnecessary and impertinent to anticipate or hasten 
 its results. Let the eyes of young men be directed towards 
 a goal of excellence, but let them be taught that merit 
 is not to be measured by the degree in which they make 
 
88 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 it appear that they have outstripped others, running in the 
 same course. At a time when life tends to become more 
 and more a mere race, all the efforts of educationists 
 should be turned to enforce considerations of patience and 
 magnanimity. There is more power in honest rest, believe 
 me, than in half the palms. All those objections bear 
 with double force on the prizes given in the classes, and 
 voted on by the students. I have known the spirit of 
 competition lead, now and then, to the most disgusting 
 displays of a puerile ambition, distorted into malignity. 
 They do not apply equally to prizes, awarded by the 
 University for essays written by competitors who do not 
 know each other ; they apply still less to such a system 
 of class lists as at Oxford a system which, in spite of its 
 ambiguities, I should be disposed, with a few modifications, 
 to retain. The jealousy which I found so rife there, arose 
 from causes which have not their source in details and 
 regulations, but flow from the spirit of the place, and the 
 selfishness which it fosters. During my first session at 
 Glasgow, I remained a spectator of contests into which, as 
 my entrance on the course was premature, I was not 
 expected to enter. Even my father bade me regard this 
 year as a preparatory one, nor do I think I abused his 
 indulgence. To the work of the Latin class, at least, I 
 devoted myself with all the attention of which I was 
 capable, and made so much way that, although I did not 
 obtain a prize, I was voted for among the candidates of 
 the year. In the Greek, which I began this year with 
 the alphabet, I was less fortunate. It is a painful fact 
 that I have never been able to learn Greek. I have 
 spent more years over this study than on anything else 
 I ever acquired years enough to have made me a master 
 of any of the arts. It has cost me more toil and more 
 torture than all my other studies put together, and yet it is 
 the one of all in which I have attained the least degree of 
 proficiency. The reasons for this are, first, that I began ill 
 and late ; secondly, that I ought never to have begun at all. 
 You must have gathered, from expressions I have 
 already let fall, that my belief in the power of education 
 is very limited. When Dr. Johnson said that a man of 
 
EARLY YEARS. 89 
 
 talent might do whatever he liked, he was further from 
 the truth than if he had inverted the proposition. We get 
 nine-tenths at birth ; the other tenth is added. We come 
 into the world wonderful machines of mind and matter, 
 made for a certain work ; if we are set to other work, the 
 machine may break, it will not accomplish. Where there 
 is any real power it is nature's, and all we can do against 
 it is to stifle it. Practice in the work we are made for 
 makes the result more perfect ; no care is lost in that 
 field. We can do nothing without some labour at starting, 
 but no toil against the grain will make it cease to be 
 against the grain. Hence the rule about trouble : the more 
 trouble you take in what you can do, the better you will 
 do it ; the longer I hang over this page the more readable 
 it will be ; but, of different things, that which you can do 
 most easily you can do best. I have spent days over 
 Greek for every hour I have spent over philosophy ; but 
 where my treasure was there was my heart also, and there 
 only, even in the prize lists, was my success. Whether it 
 was altogether owing to that same wretched memory, which 
 sent me to the bottom of my class on paraphrase days in 
 the infant school, or whether there combined with this a 
 certain want of patience, and what Bacon calls anticipatio 
 in contradistinction to interpretatio veri, whatever was 
 the cause, the fact was that in learning languages, ancient 
 or modern, I have always had to struggle with a repug- 
 nance so intense, that it has appeared to me the sign of 
 an incapacity. Had I been asked fifteen years ago what 
 my vocation was, I would have given the same answer 
 that I am ready to reiterate to-day not to learn languages. 
 My vocation that for which the machine was made may 
 have been Science, it may have been Art, it may have 
 been Law, it may be what I have at last in some degree 
 made it, the pursuit of Philosophy ; but it was not to 
 learn Latin and Greek, and the time I have wasted in 
 accomplishing the one feat, and attempting the other, only 
 proves that I am right in adhering to the verdict which 
 I formed long ago, when I began to know myself better 
 than others knew me. When my father determined that 
 I should become a great linguist, it was in the course of 
 
90 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 his plan, but it was a sentence to years of effort nearly- 
 thrown away. Fifteen, working off and on, made me at 
 last a fair Latin scholar. But I would have done well to 
 have followed in the track of Sir Samuel Romilly, who 
 writes in the autobiography which was set before me as 
 a model, " Greek I found too difficult for me, and gave 
 it up." 
 
 At a time of life when most youths find it hard to master 
 the rudiments of any language, I opened the grammar 
 of that language, which is at once the most magnificent 
 and the most complex that ever grew up and took shape, 
 under the hands of human ingenuity. I began this pre- 
 posterous task under the auspices of one whom I esteem 
 and almost love, but who was at once one of the best, and 
 one of the worst, teachers I ever knew. No good student 
 of Lushington's senior class failed to add to his reverence 
 for the nobility of the man, an equal sense of gratitude to 
 the scholar, who led him so gracefully through the higher 
 walks of a literature only matched by our own ; but the 
 most zealous of his advocates will tell you that he was 
 not made to teach the rudiments, and that if any one took 
 away more from his junior class than he brought with him, 
 it was because his private studies were pursued with a zeal 
 that got no stimulus from the good professor's sleepy hour. 
 
 Ramsay with his clear, resonant voice, with his vigilance, 
 activity, and precision, would have been at home where 
 Lushington was at sea ; he, with his accurate activity, was 
 the very man to drill boys just passing into men. He 
 told us that his hair stood on end when we made a false 
 quantity. He made us write prose sentences according to 
 the rules of grammar, and counted the errors in our verse 
 on his fingers. He told us that punctuality was the greatest 
 of the minor virtues, if it was a minor virtue, and that when 
 we offered indisposition as an excuse for absence, we must 
 say whether it was mental or bodily. He was a shrewd 
 man, with sharp little eyes, and a vein of dry humour ; 
 it almost struck me he would have made a good actor. 
 He used to act admirably in the class when he leant 
 forward on his desk, and pretended to get into a rage, and 
 his renderings of the Aulularia and Miles Gloriosus were 
 
EARLY YEARS. 9 1 
 
 inimitable. He was scholar enough to be a first rate 
 expositor of Persius and Juvenal, a sufficient antiquarian 
 to write some good articles in Smith, and comment on 
 Cicero's speeches, and become an able editor of the De 
 Cluentio. I attended the Junior Latin for two years, start- 
 ing in the second by competing for the first prize ; I 
 worked hard and steadily during the whole session, but, 
 towards its close, when we had about one thousand lines 
 of verse to say off by heart, some of my competitors 
 managed to make a great show, and I was only offered 
 the fifth prize, a position I did not choose to accept. The 
 following year vindicated my indignation : my former 
 opponents sunk into the background in the Senior where 
 we read Horace and Tacitus and if I was only third 
 in rank, I followed worthier rivals in a year when I 
 might well have been excused if I had remained without 
 distinction. 
 
 As to the Greek, I must say in justice to those who 
 were bent on my acquisition of the language, that they 
 spared neither pains nor expense in affording me every 
 possible assistance. During the spring of the first winter, 
 a tutor was called to aid me, a senior student, and some- 
 thing of a character. We used to call him alternately 
 Lord Bacon and Aristophanes from his continual quota- 
 tions of those authors, and his half-rustic simplicity 
 contrasted strangely with the learned sound of his name. 
 If he did not do me much good, it was mainly my own 
 fault. I would or could not learn the vert) that accursed 
 Greek verb and he was easily led into discussing ancient 
 history and geography, and speculations about antiquities 
 and etymology, which were not to the purpose. My father 
 unwittingly combined to keep me back ; for, not content 
 that my knowledge should be thorough, he resolved it 
 should be profound, and bought for me and made me 
 read, and sometimes make long abstracts of, books I could 
 not to this day understand. To please him I have toiled, 
 summer after summer, through Funcius, and Sanctius' 
 Minerva; Hoogeveen, de particulis Graecorum, and Schaefer, 
 de stylo linguae latinae ; I have analyzed Grotius on pro- 
 nouns, and somebody's comparative tables of the particles 
 
92 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 of the Indo-Germanic tongue, and dipped deep into 
 Bopp and Popp and Grimm, and laboured prematurely at 
 Max Miiller, and read right through Heaven help me ! 
 Donaldson's Cratylus, and even made myself believe that 
 the Varronianus was interesting. Meanwhile my second 
 year at Lushington's proved as useless as the first ; it 
 grieved me that the professor whom above all others I 
 liked, should alone have cause to complain of my negligence : 
 remonstrances, tasks, were all in vain, and, while my father 
 wished to make me a second Hermann, I could not con- 
 jugate r'&nfu. 
 
 The first step I made towards a very partial knowledge 
 of the language was in the year 1850-1851, when I 
 was placed under the very dry, but very able, hands of 
 Mr. James Browning. He re-ground me in the grammar 
 with a little more success. Later, I went to him in the 
 summer mornings and read Sophocles ; when I went after- 
 wards to Lushington's " Provectiores " and Senior, I had got 
 at least a knack of translation ; poetry and history were 
 helping me to the language which could not help me to 
 history and poetry ; but many a weary day and night, I 
 hung over the pages of that grammar in convulsive and 
 ineffectual efforts, and Greek still hung like a loadstone 
 round my neck. If I were proud of my other successes, 
 the question "How are you getting on with your Greek?" 
 was enough to damp my ardour, and cast a gloom over my 
 hopes. When the time came for me to go to Oxford, I 
 suffered agonies over the irregular verbs, and though 
 Harvey's stout hand pulled me through, I had out my list 
 of them for the third or fourth time, and studied them 
 for the first and second hundredth; at every examination 
 they haunted me like injured ghosts. I got to be able 
 to read that strange tongue at last ; but I understood 
 Plato first and then translated him ; and it is not many 
 years ago since Jowett interrupted me in some meta- 
 physical subtilty with the exclamation, " Study the particle 
 av" " Sweet Mistress Ann," I wooed you long, without 
 love, and so I wooed you in vain. 
 
 My success in those branches of natural science to 
 which I had an opportunity of devoting a share of time 
 
EARLY YEARS. 
 
 93 
 
 and attention, emboldens me to think that I had some 
 capacity for such researches. During my first session, I 
 attended the experimental course of the Natural Philosophy, 
 taught by the young Mr., now the famous Dr. William 
 Thomson. The lectures which I heard were on Electricity 
 and Magnetism. I took careful notes, read, thought, and 
 made experiments on subjects which interested me intensely. 
 I was regularly examined during the course, and gave in 
 my name for a series of special examinations at the end. 
 The result was that I got one of the two prizes which 
 were offered at the close of the year, and made my first 
 appearance on the platform on the ist of May, under the 
 auspices of my old playfellow's brother. I remember his 
 handing the prize to me with the phrase, " A very young, 
 but very ardent, natural philosopher." " You would be 
 ardent," my mother said to me on my way home, " in 
 everything that interested you." I was sent besides to the 
 anatomical course of Dr. Allen Thomson, one of the 
 clearest lecturers to whom I have ever listened. It was 
 a good idea, and, whatever way I turn myself, I shall 
 never have cause to regret the time I gave to the study 
 of one of the most universally interesting of sciences. I 
 devoted myself with zeal to the early part of the course, 
 made elaborate notes, drew diagrams, and spent hours in 
 the Museum, so that I have still a notion of the main 
 features of the human skeleton. 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, June 18. 
 
 If I were to choose, out of the years which I spent in 
 the Observatory, a portion of one to live over again, my 
 choice would fall on the summer months of 1849. It 
 is the period to which, if I had to pass through it again 
 with power to look before and after, I would add, and 
 from which I would take the least. I believe that a 
 variety of circumstances combined to make that summer 
 among the happiest of my life. There must have been a 
 purer air than usual blowing over our hill, that brought to 
 us all, and to me in particular, more than our usual share 
 of health and spirits. I had no weight hanging over my 
 
94 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 head, no heart-burning, no regrets. I seemed to walk 
 with a freer step, to lie down to a deeper rest, and rise to 
 a more open day. Great events enkindling our sympathies, 
 made our blood run faster in our veins ; the year was full 
 of hope, and its tumults were sufficiently far away to let 
 us contemplate the storm in tranquillity. I was left at 
 leisure, unvexed, uninterrupted, unconstrained, to mark out 
 a great study, and to achieve an important work. And after 
 all is said, is it not this above all things else that makes 
 life happy? When we are ill and idle, or enslaved, the 
 very air is full of poisonous thoughts. Give us health 
 and let each sunset see the day's work done, man's curse 
 has become man's glory, and we are masters of the 
 world. 
 
 All June and July, I remember, Agnes and I continued 
 our visits to Govan in the morning ; afterwards I went 
 alone, and it was my delight to walk down there in the 
 long summer afternoon, when the plain was full of mists, 
 and the air of pleasant sounds. My work was over, and 
 I, evening after evening, rambled slowly up again, loitering 
 in the garden among the strawberries, and losing myself 
 in reveries while I pulled the delicious fruit, till the cool 
 shades and the cattle driving home reminded me that 
 night was near. 
 
 Fulton and I read at Ovid. It may have been a bit 
 of the Fasti, or the love-letter of some Grecian dame, 
 or the elegy on a parrot, or the dirge on the death of 
 Albius Tibullus ; and he led me to appreciate the sweet- 
 ness, the tenderness, and the melody of that poet 
 enough in himself to make a golden age that graceful 
 lover whom our Milton loved, with whom I have spent as 
 many and as pleasant hours as with any of our English 
 bards. Sometimes when our task was done, we wandered 
 about the fields together among the new-mown hay, or 
 by the riverside " a large navigable river passable only 
 by ships " watching the steamers come up with their 
 summer crowds, while he talked, and I listened to the 
 mellow old man's pleasant gossip, mixed with the lines 
 which we had been reading, and which kept making music 
 in his head. " Castra sequentur alii, Protesilaus amet." 
 
EARLY YEARS. 95 
 
 But I have been beginning with the end of the day ; 
 you must imagine me when breakfast was over walking 
 away to my room, and sitting down resolutely with my 
 books, to read and take notes. In my study, with the 
 great maps on the walls, and my desk before me, I 
 spent most of the forenoons of that summer, during 
 which I set myself a great task and accomplished it, to 
 master the History of Rome. Do not attempt many things 
 but much ; do not read many books, but possess a few 
 great ones. There is no better rule for a student, no 
 surer guide in the path of self-culture. In proportion as 
 I have followed it, I have found my time well spent, 
 and my efforts fruitful ; in proportion as I have wan- 
 dered from it, I have lost my way, and built houses 
 upon the sand. Singleness of purpose is as much the 
 test of power in the intellectual, as singleness of heart 
 is the test of purity in the moral, world. But we must 
 remember the proverb, " Nothing great is easy " ; and 
 nothing demands a stronger strain of will, than the sacrifice 
 and concentration involved in devoting oneself to follow 
 out an aim. 
 
 It is, therefore, impossible to pursue, with the steadfast- 
 ness essential to success, any object which we do not 
 naturally desire to attain any goal other than that which 
 we have ourselves set before ourselves. What I could 
 not do in order to learn Greek grammar, I did in 
 order to become familiar with the annals of a people 
 whose greatness I recognized, and of whose paramount 
 influence over the world I was well aware. I have 
 always had a passion for history, and from the time 
 when, in my boyish fancies, I followed Napoleon over 
 the Alps to Marengo, and heard the cannon greet the 
 sun of Austerlitz, to the day, long after, when I closed 
 the last volume of Gibbon, I have spent few happier 
 hours than those which I devoted during that summer 
 to the History of Rome. Novels, romances, reviews, were 
 thrown aside; I read, I thought, I dreamt of Rome ; 
 the biographies over which I refreshed myself when I 
 was tired of sieges and battles, and the change of laws 
 and the strife of the forum, were the lives of her mighty 
 
96 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 men ; my books of travels were Dennis's Etruria, and 
 White's Excursions in the Abruzzi, for they taught me 
 more about the fall of Veii, and the stubborn Samnite 
 war ; my tales were of Roman lovers and Roman traitors ; 
 my antiquities were concerned with the Praetor, and 
 Censor, and Consul Romanus ; with the Seven Hills, and 
 their Jove's temple on the Capitol ; with the offices and 
 the insignia, the ramparts, and the ruins, of the Eternal 
 City. My orator was the author of the Catilines, my poets 
 were Tibullus and Ovid. The heroes of my imagination 
 were Spurius Cassius and Appius Caecus, and Licinius, 
 and Pontius Telesinus, and Pyrrhus, and the Gracchi, with 
 Caesar and Hannibal far above them all. 
 
 When I went back to my games, from the study of 
 Arnold, and Niebuhr, and Smith, and Michelet, it was to 
 range my bricks in the order of the field at Regillus, or 
 Sentinum, or Cannae, or Metaurus, and fight over on the 
 carpet those fights which determined the destinies of the 
 world. It was a glorious summer spent with the mighty 
 deeds of mighty men, when my head was clear and my 
 blood ran free, letting me know what life was then, and 
 what it yet may be. 
 
 Day after day meanwhile, tidings came from a remote 
 corner of Europe, of events going on before the eyes of men, 
 as great, as rich in heroes, and nearly as wide in their issues 
 as any of those about which I was reading. It was the 
 year of the great Hungarian and Italian wars. No romance 
 of history, from Syracuse to Mexico, was ever more full of 
 interest than that Hungarian campaign. I have been, of 
 later years, thrown much into the society of men younger 
 than myself, and found it difficult to make them realize 
 the breathless interest with which the friends of liberty in 
 Europe watched every phase of that momentous struggle. 
 One year has seldom seen a sight like that of two nations 
 suddenly springing to life, and demanding to be free ; 
 never has the next followed up such a victory by such a 
 tragic close. This is not the place or time to write a 
 history of those events, or the men who were the leaders 
 in them. My feeling regarding the wars remains as it was 
 when I ran every morning through the woods to the village, 
 
EARLY YEARS. 97 
 
 to catch the first tidings from the East. My veneration 
 for their chiefs grows only, as I grow in power to appreciate 
 their greatness. One word only for those and their name 
 is legion who condemn them and their efforts, because 
 they did not succeed. By every right reckoning they did 
 succeed. Kossuth and Mazzini both struck at a monstrous 
 evil the Austrian rule and they broke it. The triumph 
 of the Triumvirs was none the less eminent, that France 
 came in and stifled the resurrection of Rome in her ashes, 
 and brought back over Italy an oppression so ridiculous, 
 that the very hands which came to destroy the whole 
 have been compelled to save a part, lest the whole 
 should finish what it had again begun the breaking of 
 its chains. 
 
 The genius of the Magyar chief was none the less 
 transcendent that Russia came with her myrmidons to 
 re-instal the decrepitude of the Hapsburgs upon a tottering 
 throne, and over the necks of a people maddened by 
 brutalities, more unbearable because inflicted by imbecile 
 hands. History already begins to vindicate the revolutions 
 of a year, which the violence of two continental nations, 
 and the indifference of English statesmen, alone prevented 
 from being the most glorious of this century. 
 
 Since then I have known both Kossuth, of whom I 
 shall have much to say, and Mazzini, whom I met for 
 the first time in a London drawing-room in 1850, when 
 he was fresh from the fall of Rome, and looked as you 
 have seen him in the old pictures, still young, with raven 
 hair and great, wonderful eyes. Eight years passed and I 
 met him again, when he looked an old man, with grey beard 
 and hair, and a furrowed brow, beneath which the wonder- 
 ful eyes were still glowing, lit with the light of that 
 genius which has half redeemed Italy amidst her throngs 
 of foes. Those who know Mazzini love him, while Kossuth 
 is more a man to venerate; but I have never seen either 
 of them, without longing that they had known her who 
 knew so well to appreciate all greatness, who, from her 
 watch-tower in the north, followed with so breathless an 
 interest every change of their fortunes, and with a sadness 
 almost unto death mourned their fall. My mother, with 
 
 G 
 
98 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 a tenderness beyond that of women, had a lion heart, and 
 I believe she would have been almost willing to have sent 
 those who were nearest to her to come back like the 
 Spartan, with their shield or on it, after fighting for a 
 cause she held so sacred. 
 
 My mother was never very strong, but she seldom 
 seemed to be seriously ill. Both she and my father had 
 lately begun to be anxious about a pain which she felt 
 more and more frequently. During the autumn of 1850 
 they consulted one of the most eminent of our Glasgow 
 physicians. He saw the danger to which our ordinary 
 doctor had been blind. A few weeks afterwards they 
 went to Edinburgh to see the famous Dr. Simpson. It 
 was at the beginning of the session when they went, and 
 I tried to drown my terror in study, but in vain, it haunted 
 me night and day. 1 
 
 Promises of recovery came from Edinburgh, and when 
 they returned to us it was with good hope that we slowly 
 drove up the hill together, the hill we were to drive 
 slowly down together four months afterwards. 
 
 You will not ask me to turn over the dark pages of 
 that winter which seared my soul for ever. 
 
 At last there came a morning of March when the 
 wind was blowing through heaven, when I was shaken 
 from a feverish sleep to see the end. The eighteenth 
 morning of March ! It comes back and back, and leaves 
 the same dark memories ; miserable morning, that took 
 away more than half my life, and left me to drift on 
 starless through a desolated world. Nay, rather, blessed 
 morning that took her away from sorrow, that made an 
 end of all her pain, that answered the longings of a life 
 of faith. . . . 
 
 I have had many trials since, but never one which 
 
 1 In another letter, the last but one of this autobiography of his youth, 
 Nichol relates his University career during the year 1850-51, and men- 
 tions the prizes he gained, and the books he read during that time. 
 In this letter he speaks also of a journey to England with his father, and 
 of a meeting with Mazzini in the British Museum. The University prizes 
 were of no essential importance, and there is nothing said of Mazzini 
 beyond the fact of his having met him. 
 
EARLY YEARS. 99 
 
 made me desolate like that, when I moved about calm 
 and cold and shed no tears. I have work to do in 
 the world, but it often seems little worth. I have other 
 duties now, and new relations, and one at least as near 
 as she whom I lost, 
 
 " But my soul from out that shadow which lies floating on the floor, 
 Shall be lifted nevermore." 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 LATER YOUTH, 1851-54. 
 
 LIFE AT THE OBSERVATORY, AND AS A STUDENT IN THE 
 UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW. 
 
 With his mother's death, the consecutive autobiography 
 of the previous chapter comes to a close. But with the 
 aid of early letters and of a Journal, kept in some detail 
 while Nichol was a student at Glasgow and at Oxford, 
 it has been found possible to tell the story of his life 
 during the next ten years largely in his own words. 
 For the years 1851-53, the material is scanty, as no 
 Journal was kept, and the letters are few. There is little, 
 however, of importance to relate in regard to these years. 
 Nichol continued to distinguish himself in his various classes, 
 and as the writer of " University prize-essays." He was 
 ambitious, and his father was ambitious for him. He 
 worked hard far too hard both at Glasgow, and at 
 Oxford, as he himself in after life admitted ; with the 
 inevitable result, in the case of one who was never really 
 robust, of permanent injury to his health and nervous 
 system. His intellectual exertions were by no means 
 limited by the idea of University distinction, as the 
 following extract from a letter to his sister, then at 
 school in England, will show. 
 
 " Another note dear Agnes, but I promise you this 
 shall be followed without fail by a letter (yet after all 
 my notes are longer than father's). Last time, too, I sent 
 you a piece of good news, and now I have obeyed one 
 of your injunctions. 
 
 "I actually have made a whole clean copy of my verses 
 
LATER YOUTH. 101 
 
 on ' Ailsa Craig ' * for you. You had better give it to 
 Mr. R. as an essay, and then all Nottingham will be filled 
 with news of the ' wonderful genius of a small girl.' 
 There's conceit for you ! But I fear it's a mistake to 
 suppose that the rhymes would do you so much credit 
 after all. My estimate is, I hope, not very high ; but 
 give me your critical opinion of its faults, not mere praise. 
 I should like the judgment of some one who knew 
 nothing about the author, but this would not be very easy 
 to get, as such a person would probably stick half way. 
 
 " I think the general plan and meaning is good and 
 true at least, and some of the stanzas at the end tolerable, 
 but the great bulk bears tokens of the hurry with which it 
 was got up. That is not the way to write poetry. Whether 
 I may ever do that fairly or not I cannot tell, but hope 
 to come nearer it at any rate than in these Spenserians. 
 
 " I am much delighted with Smith's volume, which has 
 now come out. I have read it through, and found much 
 of the purest poetry there. But I shall tell you more of 
 it hereafter." 
 
 The Smith referred to in this letter was Alexander 
 Smith, the author of A Life Drama, and afterwards 
 librarian to the University of Edinburgh. Nichol had 
 made his acquaintance about this time, and the " two 
 authors remained close friends till Smith's death in 
 1867. In the meantime life at the Observatory flowed 
 tranquilly on, with little external incident. The gloom 
 which the death of Professor J. Pringle Nichol's first wife 
 had cast upon the household was brightened both for the 
 husband and the children by Professor Nichol's marriage, 
 in July, 1853, with Miss Elizabeth Pease of Darlington, 
 a lady whose life has been devoted, from first to last, to 
 works of noble benevolence, and to the furtherance of 
 many righteous causes. Miss Pease's name, and that of 
 her father, the late Joseph Pease, were well-known in 
 connection with the great Anti-Slavery movement of those 
 days, with the efforts of the friends of British India, and 
 
 1 This poem appeared in the Glasgow University Album, published 
 in 1854. 
 
102 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 with the cause of Free Trade. During her husband's life- 
 time she was the affectionate and devoted friend of his 
 family, and after his death she continued to share all their 
 joys and sorrows with equal interest and love. She still 
 lives at Edinburgh, in honoured old age. 
 
 On September 8th, 1853, Nichol wrote in a letter to 
 his sister : 
 
 " . . . Now I think I have joked long enough. 
 This is a most serious time for me, and twenty years is 
 a very serious space to look back upon. General 
 reflections are not of much use. I hope mine have been 
 special. This is a great part, in all probability, of my mortal 
 life. We all trust that word is necessary, my dearest 
 sister ; that there is an immortal life, of which twenty 
 years is a very small proportion, verily no proportion at 
 all. But it is now and here, to-day and to-morrow this 
 year, and as many as God pleases that I shall walk 
 here it is now I must prepare to go with you and father, 
 and join my mother there. And verily I must climb long 
 and faster in the next cycle before I can be ready to join her. 
 To you at every important epoch of my life I will look 
 for direction and aid. Towards another I will gaze, who 
 watches just as closely with ' sweetest eyes were ever seen.' 
 I have had trials and difficulties heretofore, but they ought 
 to have nerved me, and I have given way. I have 
 had advantages almost unparalleled, and have in the 
 strength of them gone not half the way that many 
 have reached without them. I have, knowing it all the 
 time, sinned again and again against my conscience, and 
 broken through my resolutions. This truly is crime 
 that must be redeemed in some way or other, and the 
 quicker the better. My intellect, my physical frame, and 
 my soul alike demand a total reform, before any but 
 those whose eyes are shaded by love can rank me 
 among the noble of the earth. Thanks, dear, for your 
 quotation ; believe that I shall try to act upon these 
 beautiful good thoughts, and trust that I remain, 
 
 "Your Brother." 
 
LATER YOUTH. 103 
 
 In reading the closing sentences of this letter one 
 must remember that the writer was a boy of twenty 
 years, and one whose practice came much nearer to his 
 ideal than does that of most young men of his age ; 
 also that an " examination of conscience " on the part 
 of a gifted young Scotchman of the middle of the nine- 
 teenth century would tend to be more scrupulous than 
 may seem altogether reasonable to our present fin-de-siecle 
 morality. 
 
 In the next month of the same year he wrote to his 
 sister in a similar strain : 
 
 " Well, dear Agnes, I promised to write you a long letter 
 to-day, and ought, yet it may not be so long as you or 
 I would wish, as I have just finished scribbling to father 
 till it draws latish. I have been sending him a confession 
 of sins, which I generally find it my painful duty to do at 
 this season of the year, this terminus of summer, when I 
 have to review and generally, or too often, find myself 
 wanting. The present year weighs in the balance a good 
 deal lighter even than usual. 
 
 " Reasons are many, but excuses none. I ought not to 
 have been unsettled, because things were moving rather 
 confusedly around me. What is a man worth if those 
 circumstances over which he has no control are to sway 
 him this way and that like the wind? to-day boasting 
 of its southern warmth, to-morrow again right ' in the 
 east.' We must all mould the clay of time by our own 
 wills for ourselves, if we mean to shape a course in the 
 world at all, or do anything more than speak of valiant 
 deeds, sitting muffled in flannel in an arm-chair. There is 
 a great debt resting on my shoulders from the mis-spent 
 past ; it seems a very heavy load. But I will never begin 
 to carry it up the hill sooner than to-day. I have written 
 this motto in my diary, ' Look not ever mournfully into 
 the past ; it comes not back. Wisely improve the present ; 
 it is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future without 
 fear, and with a manly heart.' It is not altogether true, 
 for the past ever and anon comes up ; and, touching one 
 on the shoulder, and looking in one's face, comes to aid 
 
104 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 as well as to sadden. 1 Above all, it comes up with well- 
 known vanished forms in all its old glory, transfigured, free 
 from its former taints, to bless for evermore ; but for the 
 present it must advance, and not retard. 
 
 Trusting to-morrow and loving to-day, 
 Toiling and temperate wend thee thy way, 
 
 is a watchword which I have coined for myself; and the 
 more I act upon it the purer, I believe, will my religion 
 become. 
 
 " That, my dearest sister, is another matter, a very grave 
 and serious matter, which each of us must decide for himself. 
 It is with heartfelt pleasure I hear of your interests and 
 questions. Questions on these subjects are put soon by 
 all earnest minds. One great truth is far too often lost 
 sight of that the answers to such questions must come 
 very much out of the great silence of one's own soul, and 
 the still Infinite sent to the soul and to the Universe by 
 God. Points of real religion cannot very well in any days, 
 now or in those of old Palestine, be settled over a tea-table. 
 In prattle they are rather apt to be forgotten altogether, 
 and the mere forms dilated on. These may do in their 
 place, and are conversational so far though even then with 
 reverence but unhappy is the man, and the mind, which 
 makes up Religion of them. 
 
 " You will form your own judgment on doctrines here- 
 after; the bases, on which you and I and all in common 
 may rest, seem chiefly and greatly to be ; a belief in our 
 being children to whom a kind Father in infinite mercy 
 has revealed, through Christ above all, and somewhat also 
 through far-seeing men, portions of his glory ; children 
 who are afflicted that they may be purified, tempted that 
 they may be tried, parted in tears on this shore in order 
 that they may unite for ever in starry joy on that, seeing 
 now dimly as through a glass, but living in the assurance 
 that faith, hope, and charity here will lead them after 
 
 1 Compare Hannibal, Act I., Scene vii. : 
 
 Then leaning o'er my shoulder, steals the Past, 
 So sunny, yet so sad and full of tears, 
 That the dim Present fades into a dream. 
 
LATER YOUTH. 105 
 
 death to see Him as He is. How little of this is touched 
 by the metaphysical discussions on ' fixed fate, free will, 
 foreknowledge absolute,' with which men so vainly fill 
 each other's ears. 
 
 "If we are frail, allowance is made for our frailty, and 
 each one of us can, if he chooses, carve his destiny on 
 high. Doubt on these truths, false and evil, seems most 
 to haunt uncelestial minds. Doubt on minor points un- 
 affecting these may fix the bounds of faith as it can, 
 without disturbing our life and hope and love. 
 
 " This can I say now, and no farther ; all farther is minor 
 matter, and may occupy me at various times. On such 
 I would have you influenced by your own heart and reason 
 only. It seems to be strange that I should be able to 
 give instruction at any time to one so much greater than 
 myself, yet I believe I can, and will, more and more delight 
 to hold with you the highest, dearest converse ; to you and 
 father I turn, and will return, when dinned with foolish 
 noises." 
 
 The following experience is chronicled in another letter 
 of about the same date : " As to the theatre, I hoped to 
 see Miss Faucit as Desdemona, which was advertised for 
 Thursday, but lo ! and behold (and listen to me stamping !) 
 next day appears, ' In consequence of the numerous ob- 
 jections made to the representation of Othello, Miss Faucit 
 will appear as Mrs. Beverley in The Gamester! Horrible 
 idiots ! Even Bowdler's Shakespeare, it seems, is not proper 
 enough for the respectability of Glasgow ! " 
 
 On the subject of " the rights of women," he wrote : 
 " There is certainly no sign of civilization which has a 
 more intimate connection with the moral condition of any 
 nation, than the position which women hold in their society. 
 I deprecate, as much as any one can, the subjection which 
 even in Greece and Rome not to speak of Egypt and 
 the East prevented the noblest faculties of most of their 
 females from finding their due field of expansion, and 
 made instances like Aspasia, Cornelia, and Zenobia rare ; 
 but neither can I yet, on the other hand, admit the simi- 
 larity rather than equality of occupation advocated by the 
 
106 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 ultra-changers in America. ... By the by, among the many 
 interesting historical facts connected with the subject, there 
 is a noticeable contrast between the comparative carelessness 
 with which the most refined classic nations treated their 
 women, and the respect, almost amounting to reverence, in 
 which they were held by the rudest Gothic nations ; indi- 
 cating, in those uncivilized peoples, an element of moral 
 strength which fitted them well to subdue the world, and 
 which has materially influenced the whole tone of modern 
 civilization. This feeling of true gallantry it was which 
 threw a softening light over the rough age of chivalry; and 
 in the nations of Europe, it is curious to remark, women 
 are held in respect almost in exact proportion to the infusion 
 of this Teutonic element. In England they have, as we 
 all know well, both rights and wrongs. I do not reckon 
 among the former that misused sense of the word gallantry, 
 which is so well depicted by Lamb in one of his Essays 
 of Elia (read it, if you can). Read over also Hood's Song 
 of the Shirt, and think of the Scarlet Letter, in reference 
 to the wrongs of women. Think of The Princess as a 
 very true statement of their proper position." 
 
 In 1854 he wrote in his Diary; 
 
 " July 1st. I am at home again, and glad that my 
 father has resolved to take the chair at Kossuth's meeting. 
 It will do good. . . . We have got several answers to 
 our invitations ; it is curious to see the different views 
 various people take. Some are, though anxious to see a 
 show, afraid to compromise themselves. Others respect 
 Kossuth, but cannot approve of his politics. Sages ! It 
 is with no ordinary feelings of excitement that I expect a 
 man whom I still regard as the foremost on this earth, 
 with whom I would willingly have fought in his heroic 
 struggle, with whom I would willingly renew it. 
 
 " July 3rd. About three o'clock Kossuth arrived at the 
 Caledonian station, where my father and I had been for 
 some time waiting to receive him. There was such a crowd 
 that we had some difficulty in getting into the carriages. 
 We dined at four, after which our guests retired to rest 
 for a while. Our evening reception turned out very well. 
 
LATER YOUTH. \oj 
 
 There were altogether about one hundred persons present, 
 many of the most respectable gentlemen of the town, 
 others not so. The noisy democratic committee presented 
 itself as a most unsatisfactory specimen of the liberalism 
 of Glasgow. 
 
 " July 4th. Joshua, had he been alive, would have made 
 the sun stand still to-day. Oratory like this may well 
 lead nations, as by an enchanter's wand, to do the hero's 
 will. Kossuth's forenoon speech was but an introduction 
 to the other, and yet it contained some of the most 
 glorious appeals ever uttered. I cannot describe the 
 entrancement of his great speech in the evening. None 
 present ever before listened to eloquence and reason 
 so wonderful. ' The Bourbon will never rouse a spirit 
 any more. The Hapsburg may rouse a spirit, but .it 
 will be the spirit of assassinated nations, and violated 
 oaths, and liberty rising to break her crimson chains.' 
 Would that our hall were often to re-echo such shouts 
 as those which rang through it, when the whole vast 
 concourse rose at once and with the acclaim of myriad 
 voices acknowledged their king. This forenoon some 
 are beginning to read his speech, and find it incontro- 
 vertible ; they scarce know whether he is ' going to do 
 or not ' ; they rather suspect he is, and feel annoyed that 
 they have held back so long. One of the best of these 
 time-servers called to-day, anxious to show him through 
 the Exchange, and get him to dine at his house. 
 Humph ! Two days ago he said to the chairman, ' You 
 won't appear on the platform with that man, will you ? ' 
 \ That man ' fortunately declined his invitation. This 
 afternoon the governor and his suite, with Madame 
 Kossuth, left for a trip to the Highlands ; they are to 
 return on Monday." 
 
 Shortly afterwards Nichol wrote in his Diary : 
 
 " A letter from Kossuth, just such as regards himself 
 as I should have expected him to write. He has, with all 
 the other characteristics of greatness, that true humility 
 which only accompanies the loftiest spirits. It would take 
 whole days to tell all the good he has done to me. I 
 
108 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC 'HO L. 
 
 recollect him above all as a quiet man, who would walk 
 through England without looking on any one to say, 
 ' I am a prince.' Let others talk ; in general he rests 
 and thinks, yet at first sight you see something in those 
 eyes that makes you look again. Some spell hovers 
 around that ample brow. Look again ; you will not 
 find a head like that in palaces ; the stamp of Empire 
 is on it ; the crown of a monarch that God alone can 
 give. That man was never second to another, let him 
 look as modest as he can. But he interposes a word 
 here (listen ! you will not care to forget it), probably in 
 dissent from some acknowledged aphorism ; however 
 startled, you feel he has authority to say it. Some babbler 
 is ready to argue fluently ; these mild melancholy eyes 
 are lit with a flash of contempt, and the man of words 
 shrinks into his shell. In public or private, before 
 thousands, or, what is often much harder, before one, 
 let Kossuth speak and he triumphs. How practical he 
 is ! in this too fitted to rule : yet again how gentle ! one 
 is drawn within the circle of reverence to that of love. 
 ' Ah ! what a child I would be,' said he once tenderly, 
 ' you do not know how I should like to live quietly 
 with my wife away from noisy life, near streams and 
 hills, and play all day long with my children.' Feeling 
 misfortunes keenly, he bears them as great men do ; yet 
 there is a gloom burnt into his soul. ' I love your wild 
 mountains now, for the dear sunshine of old makes me 
 very sad.' " 
 
 A pathetic interest, in addition to that of the subject, 
 attaches to these notes of youthful hero-worship. Nichol's 
 last contribution to literature was an article on " Louis 
 Kossuth," which appeared in Macmillaris Magazine (June, 
 1894), when its author was already stricken by the 
 malady from which he never recovered. 1 
 
 In the course of his future life, Nichol was frequently 
 the advocate of unpopular causes, and his defence of them 
 was certainly not less fervent from the fact of their being 
 
 1 As will be seen in a subsequent chapter, Nichol visited Kossuth in 
 his old age at Turin. 
 
LATER YOUTH. 109 
 
 unpopular. During the American Civil War he threw him- 
 self, in the press and on the platform alike, into the cause 
 of the North, with an energy and ardour which ran strongly 
 counter to the prevailing sentiment of his Glasgow 
 townsmen. This brought on him a resentment, the extent 
 of which he possibly exaggerated, but of which he was 
 never, and in no wise, ashamed. The following is signifi- 
 cant, as showing that his sympathies were already awakened 
 and pronounced on behalf of the American slaves : 
 
 "September 17th. Heard a lecture from Parker 
 Pillsbury ; he is a downright noble-minded philanthropist, 
 speaking boldly, though rudely, from his heart. His 
 discourse was terribly wanting in method and climax, a 
 defect which the emphasis and power of some passages 
 barely redeemed. With much that was old, and to me 
 not very conclusive, regarding the ' fathomless ' distinction 
 between man and brute, I got much stirring intelligence 
 regarding the prohibition of education to the slaves, 
 and the doctrines in which their minds are steeped by the 
 sycophantic priests of Protestantism in America. 
 Brown writes me that Mackennal is to stay at Hackney 
 College. How we shall miss him at election time ! 
 
 "September 25th. Last night I went with Palmer to 
 attend a Polish meeting. The speeches were rather anti- 
 government than anything else, except indeed Crosskey's, 
 which was rather rhetorical, yet in many parts really rose 
 into eloquence. Altogether he contrived to strike a 
 key-note in the audience, and was cheered to the roof. 
 His sermon on ' St. Paul ' last Sunday was admirable." 
 
 A few notes of his miscellaneous reading at this time 
 may be of interest : 
 
 " Maurice on Sacrifice," he wrote, " is near the root of 
 the matter. I am not prepared to say how far this most 
 worthy man who in his whole bearing and discourse is 
 nearer to an incarnation of the spirit of reverence than 
 any I have seen is consistent in the position he holds 
 regarding plenary inspiration, the thirty-nine articles, etc., 
 or even how far he is throughout consistent with himself; 
 but I am conscious that he has caught a firmer grasp of 
 
1 10 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 the mainspring of Christianity, and the source of its 
 vitality, than any other of our teachers, unless indeed 
 Carlyle. But Maurice has a better temper, and though 
 not a deeper, yet a more overpowering Charity ; and 
 also perhaps a more constantly present humility. He 
 proclaims with all the earnestness that Religion demands, 
 that self-sacrifice is its centre, the act by which we are to 
 bring ourselves back to God, after which his mercy is 
 ready to pardon ; that it is this act which is symboled 
 forth by all the old altars, whether of Abel, of Abraham, 
 or of Agamemnon ; that this is what reached its culmination, 
 and received its seal, in the blood of Christ ; that this was 
 a self-sacrifice of God ; a bending down of Himself to 
 take us home. There is something indeed in this idea 
 of divine power to keep man from sin. The ordinary 
 view is different. But the love of this spirit surely is 
 what leads us to sympathize with the brave deeds of 
 all time in Athenian gaol, or Gothic glade, or Crimean 
 swamp ; it is only with renunciation that life, properly 
 speaking, can be said to begin." 1 
 
 " Read Companions of my Solitude how exquisite the 
 style ! how delicate the thought ! handling the most 
 perilous of themes with the most perfect purity. There 
 is philosophy in it, and yet more charity; it reminds me 
 at times of Eckermann's conversations with Goethe. 
 
 " Kingsley's Alexandrian Lectures are at once concise 
 and comprehensive, but not very original ; and here, as 
 elsewhere, in straining to establish his own view, he gives 
 scant justice to those who stand not on opposite, but on 
 different, ground. Curiously this same error pervades 
 Shelley's letters, genial and loving and manly though they 
 are. He can allow nothing great out of Greece, and 
 looks down with unfair contempt on Goth and Jew alike." 
 
 Nichol's power of literary expression, though naturally 
 ripening with advancing years, had early attained an unusual 
 
 1 To understand the development of Nichol's views on Religion, what 
 comes out in these youthful notes must be compared with his later opinions, 
 stated in the seventh chapter of this book. 
 
LATER YOUTH. Ill 
 
 degree of maturity ; in a volume of verse, printed privately 
 in 1854, there are several whole poems, and frequent de- 
 tached passages and lines, which he did not think unworthy 
 to incorporate in volumes given to the public many years 
 after, where they are hardly distinguishable from the work 
 of his later life. In this year, too, he organized and edited 
 the Glasgow University Album, a volume written mainly by 
 the students, with a preface by himself, and dedicated to 
 Alfred Tennyson. In reference to it Nichol's father wrote 
 to De Quincey as follows : 
 
 Observatory, Glasgow, 16th April, 1854. 
 
 My dear De Quincey, . . . As to John's Album, 
 he had many thanks to offer you for your kindness. But 
 he felt from the first that he could not ask you to take any 
 specific trouble on his account, and the publication besides 
 could not wait. He will send you a copy one of these days. 
 His productions are signed J.N., E., and Basalt. 
 He was obliged to put in more from his own pen than he 
 cared to acknowledge. Pray read them, and tell me what 
 you think of them. I rather like Isis, Psammenitus, and 
 the Ode from Catullus. You will find in the same volume 
 a brief appeal to yourself concerning Kant. Don't imagine 
 that / have any pretensions to enter on controversy with 
 you on such a matter; but I think it would be well if so 
 important a matter in philosophical history were set at 
 rest. Do, therefore, take up the question again ; and, by 
 authorities, set it at rest. 
 
 Are you coming to Glasgow? If so, you will not forget 
 the Observatory. Say to Miss Florence and Miss Emily 
 that Mrs. Nichol and I should be very glad if they could 
 find occasion to make this a resting-place on their way to 
 Tipperary. Ever very affectionately yours, 
 
 J. P. Nichol. 
 
 The labour which Nichol spent on this volume was in 
 after years chiefly valued by him as having been the means 
 of introducing him to Sydney Dobell. At his request 
 the suggestion probably came from their common friend, 
 Alexander Smith Mr. Dobell sent a poem to the volume, 
 which its editor found unsuitable, and wrote giving the poet 
 
112 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 his reasons for its non-insertion. The correspondence, in 
 appearance so inauspiciously begun, resulted in a friendship 
 which remained close and unshaken till Mr. Dobell's death 
 in 1874. 
 
 As his father mentions in his letter to De Quincey, 
 Nichol had to write more for this Album than he desired, 
 and he was by far the largest contributor to its pages. His 
 contributions were Psammenitus, Verses (signed E.), Isis 
 Celata, Notes on the Functions of the Imagination, Nuptial 
 Ode from Catullus, Reflections Anti-Moore, In Memoriam 
 (J. G.), and Stanzas from an Address to Ailsa Craig (signed 
 Basalt). His father contributed the last article, on De 
 Quincey versus Kant. The volume was remarkable in many 
 ways. Poets, such as Alexander Smith, as well as Nichol ; 
 scholars, such as Mr. D. B. Monro, the present head of 
 Oriel College, Oxford ; future divines, such as Professor 
 Eadie, Dr. Brown, and Dr. Mackennal ; and literary men, 
 such as Dr. Ross, all contributed to it. In Psammenitus 
 and the Stanzas from an Address to Ailsa Craig, we have 
 more than a foreboding of Nichol's future work as a poet. 
 
 Although it was never republished by himself, a few 
 stanzas from the latter are worthy of reproduction here. 
 
 STANZAS FROM AN ADDRESS TO AILSA CRAIG. 
 
 What means it ? Is there, far from mortal eye, 
 
 A quiet haven for the human soul? 
 What powers contend, in earth and sea and sky, 
 'Mid storm and strife with whom shall be the mastery ? 
 
 Thou dost not answer little canst thou reck ; 
 
 Amid the surgings of eternity, 
 Thou too art but a mote the merest speck, 
 
 In the great stream. Above, once rolled the sea ; 
 Wait yet a while, thou shalt no longer be. 
 
 Then, other shores and other crags shall rise, 
 While o'er thy head the waves are seething free : 
 Thy form, that now the change of time defies, 
 Is transient as the bird that round thee fluttering flies. 
 
 Yet there is rest, although thou know'st it not, 
 A purpose gleaming through the march of things, 
 
 With which, all Change, in every age, is fraught. 
 Of this, the music of the ocean sings, 
 This, 'mid the tempest and the thunder, rings, 
 
LATER YOUTH. 113 
 
 To mark the mind's advance they all combine, 
 And tell how soul ascends on soaring wings. 
 
 Almighty mind, 
 By whom the earth and stars were first designed, 
 
 Who holds them in the hollow of His hand ; 
 With Him the universe is intertwined, 
 
 He deems the giant hills as grains of sand, 
 
 And grasps what thy historians fail to understand. 
 
 Such are the daring heights the soul ascends, 
 
 In contemplating nature symphonies 
 Harmonious ring around me such as sends 
 
 Some deep-toned organ down the aisles, or breeze 
 
 Thridding a way among the rustling trees. 
 
 During a visit to Edinburgh in the spring of 1855, 
 Nichol alludes to one of his earliest interviews with Mr. 
 Dobell : " Called with A. Smith on Dobell at Granton. 
 Few persons I have met have such an atmosphere of 
 freshness and purity about them. I always leave his society 
 the better for having been in it." 
 
 While in Edinburgh he notes : " Went with Agnes 
 and Palmer to the Swedenborgian Temple, where we 
 listened to a short, heart-felt discourse, happily embodying 
 many of the peculiar doctrines of that sect. They are 
 a queer mystical people, all given to sentiment, which is 
 a good guide when tempered by love ; genuine tran- 
 scendentalists, but too fond of allegory. It is instructive 
 to learn the tenets of these various sects, and know in 
 what the many races of mankind have comfort. There 
 must be truth at the root of all their creeds. Each 
 age and nation has a one-tuned song to sing, some 
 choral chaunt in Time's great Cathedral, embodying their 
 belief in the Invisible, faith in God and his manifold 
 works. I wonder what view of creation the inhabitants 
 of Jupiter, or the sunny Mercureans, now illustrate and 
 expound." 
 
 The friends of his student days at Glasgow, their mutual 
 enthusiasms and pursuits, are described by Nichol in a 
 
1 14 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 notice of the late James Brown of Paisley, which he wrote 
 for Good Words, January, 1891 : 
 
 "We were students together" {i.e. Brown and himself) " in 
 the Logic Class of Glasgow University, then conducted by 
 the late Professor Robert Buchanan, who initiated into Philo- 
 sophy and inspired with a love of Letters so many young 
 men, at a time when English Literature, as a distinct study, 
 was recognized only in the northern metropolis. Brown's 
 unusual capacity in thought, as in expression, soon made 
 him prominent among his fellows. None of us in those 
 days wrote very well ; for Scotch students had not learnt 
 to distinguish between the styles proper to a sermon and 
 an essay. We rushed over reams of paper, as we spoke 
 at our juvenile clubs, perorating, exhorting, and dogmatizing 
 in a shoal of metaphors. Buchanan did his best to throw 
 reins on our exuberance, but his sometimes caustic criticisms 
 were softened by the kindly admission that without early 
 flowers there can be no later fruits. Most of us had a great 
 deal, perhaps too much, to say, and shared the belief in 
 our duty to reform the world. 
 
 " The circle within the circle of those who had views in 
 common the associated group of which Brown was one 
 of the most conspicuous members was especially pervaded 
 by the idea of a mission to infuse a higher tone into the 
 Rectorial Elections, the conduct or misconduct of which 
 (for we were always defeated) brought us still closer 
 together. We were all, or thought ourselves to be, keen 
 'Radicals' ; believing in the 'people,' 'progress,' 'free educa- 
 tion,' ' wider suffrage,' ' rights of man,' ' rights of women,' 
 etc., etc. beliefs which some of the few survivors have 
 preserved, while others (be it said without offence) have 
 considerably modified them. At the same time, with 
 whatever degree of consistency, we were flaming ' hero- 
 worshippers ' ; and fought and fell in championing as our 
 nominees, in succession, John Wilson, Alfred Tennyson, 
 and Thomas Carlyle. For the last, in 1854, our energies 
 and eloquences secured sixty votes, ' under penalties ' of 
 being publicly held up as ' Deists,' ' Atheists,' and 
 ' Pantheists.' Young men are wiser now, and believe much 
 
LATER YOUTH. 115 
 
 less ; but we were ridiculously in earnest, and, perhaps, 
 there is no reason to be ashamed of having been once 
 enlisted in a troop of boy-fanatics, looking for neither 
 pension, nor place, nor popularity. To the firm-knit clique 
 that gathered in public about the Molendinar, and met in 
 closer conclave in the Observatory, there belonged several 
 who have made at least honourable names. 
 
 "Among our leading spirits, the man of most native genius 
 was John Service, the humorous mentor of our extravagances, 
 in later life a man who firmly kept faith in a soul of good- 
 ness even in things evil. Robert Lambie, foremost medical 
 student of his time, was our President till he went abroad, 
 dying afterwards at sea. Our readiest writer was John M. 
 Ross, later the fine Saxon and English scholar and critic, of 
 the High School of Edinburgh. He, with Andrew Buchanan, 
 Jun. cut off in the early bloom of professional success 
 and Brown himself were our poets, and supplied the verse 
 pasquinades with which the devotees of the ' Coal-Hole ' 
 pelted the supple insinuators of the Janitor's lodge. x Our 
 legal lights were Joseph Dixon, equally well-known to his 
 intimates as a rarely learned Shakesperean critic ; Benjamin 
 Williams, afterwards Q.C. and M.P. for Carmarthen ; and 
 George Palmer, most brilliant of Welsh wits, who sailed 
 from Plymouth for an Australian career in the ' perfidious ' 
 London. Our great scholar was George Rankine Luke, 
 at once the purest and most commanding spirit among 
 his contemporaries, whose drowning in the Isis, in 1862, 
 buried from Christ Church, Oxford, one who might have 
 been among her most illustrious Deans. Closely associated 
 with the last was our philosopher in chief, Edward Caird, 
 who, with Drs. Mackennal, and Finlayson, 2 is sole survivor 
 among those prominent in that sanguine old High Street 
 College band. On the edge (because not technically a 
 student) was the poet Alexander Smith, than whom a 
 kindlier Scot ne'er lived, and who in our northern verse 
 
 1 This allusion, obscure to later generations, obviously refers to the 
 different local headquarters of the rival Liberal and Conservative 
 Associations. 
 
 2 This was, as already stated, written in 1891. Dr. Finlayson died 
 in 1893. A memorial volume on him has since appeared. 
 
Il6 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 has left no successor. ' Friends, countrymen, and lovers, 
 amid havocs of death, and political partition, there has 
 never been any severing of our regard, nor dimming 
 under autumn skies of our memories of the spring- 
 time 
 
 When all the world was young, lad, 
 
 And all the trees were green." 
 
 To the above list of Nichol's College friends should be 
 added the name of Donald Macleod, at present Moderator of 
 the Church of Scotland, and William Jack, now Professor of 
 Mathematics in Glasgow University, who afterwards became 
 his brother-in-law. These were, however, staunch Conserva- 
 tives, and therefore their names do not appear among those 
 of " the firm-knit clique," who composed the Glasgow 
 University Liberal Association. Henry Crosskey, afterwards 
 Dr. Crosskey of Birmingham, so well and widely known as a 
 geologist, a preacher, and a politician, was although not a 
 student, and a few years his senior one of Nichol's intimates 
 during his Glasgow years, and afterwards. Robert Flint 
 now the distinguished Professor of Divinity in the Edin- 
 burgh University, and previously the occupant of a Chair 
 of Philosophy at St. Andrews D. B. Monro, and many 
 others who have since risen to eminence, were amongst his 
 associates. A young German poet, Adolph Hain, whose 
 brief life gave promise of literary distinction, was also a 
 member of the Observatory circle. 
 
 Dr. Donald Macleod has supplied the following pleasant 
 reminiscence of Nichol's College days : 
 
 "John Nichol was junior to me at the University; but 
 in consequence of our being somewhat prominent members 
 of each of the political factions which fought the battle at 
 the election of Rector, 1 we were thrown a good deal into 
 contact at that time generally very adverse contact. He 
 bore then, as always, the stamp of a certain quality of 
 genius, poetic and philosophic, and characteristically he had 
 ' the love of loves and hate of hates.' His father, the 
 Professor of Astronomy, was certainly the most eloquent 
 
 1 The Rector of a Scottish University is elected by the matriculated 
 students, and represents them in the University Court. 
 
LATER YOUTH. 117 
 
 lecturer I ever listened to. Well do I remember the thrills 
 of awe and admiration in which he held us spell-bound, so 
 that, like St. Paul, we sometimes could not tell whether it 
 was in the body or out of the body ' that we were raised to 
 magnificent visions of the universe, as he unfolded the 
 Nebular Hypothesis, then less familiar than it is now. 
 John was, in many respects like his father, brilliant and 
 forceful. I recollect how it was his habit to come frequently 
 to College, even in cold winter mornings, dressed in a thin 
 swallow-tailed evening coat, worn under his red gown. His 
 hair was long, and he carried himself with no lack of con- 
 sciousness of his talents and of the promise of his youth. He 
 was recognized by us all as a man of exceptional gifts who 
 had probably a career before him. He was then, as always, 
 but more markedly than in later years, when there came 
 the almost pathetic mellowing of experience, a being of 
 passionate intensity, rendering him, as I sometimes knew 
 to my cost, intolerant of opposition, and causing those to 
 resent his aggressiveness who only saw the fierceness of his 
 zeal, and knew not the warmth of his heart and the 
 nobility of his aims. Owing to our political relationships 
 there were perhaps few of his fellow-students who fell more 
 under the strokes of his wrath than I did, but I can say 
 with truth that I never misunderstood him. I recollect 
 especially how wildly sensitive he was when, during the 
 heat of the election, our side issued lampoons in doggerel, 
 in which he often came in for a full share of playful cari- 
 cature. He had no patience with such methods. He was 
 too fearfully in earnest to pardon indulgences in fun. Most 
 of us, I fear, acted more from the love of excitement, and 
 1 the humours of the fair,' and with the determination that 
 our side should win, than from any profound convictions 
 as to the vital character of the principles involved in the 
 contest. With Nichol it was the reverse : it was all a 
 matter of conscience and of ' fell ' earnestness, and his 
 passions burned into a white heat over the political or 
 literary merits of the respective candidates. 
 
 " I can never forget his debut as a speaker at one of our 
 election meetings. It was held in the Greek class-room, 
 sacred with all who were then students from its association 
 
Il8 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 with Lushington. The chair was filled by a native of 
 Glasgow, whose local accent was in strong evidence. The 
 room was crammed ; showers of peas were flying, and the 
 fulness of the young life found vent in party shouts, 
 badinage, and rounds of ' Kentish fire.' Nichol's speech 
 was regarded as the coming feature of the evening, and 
 was perhaps dreaded by some of us as likely to have no 
 small effect upon votes. At last the Chairman rose and 
 announced that ' Mr. Nichol ' (but, more Glasguensi, he 
 elided the harder consonant and made it Mr. Nihil) will 
 address the meeting.' John stepped to the front, his 
 swallow-tail coat tightly buttoned across his chest, his eye 
 flashing, and, tossing back his hair, was about to com- 
 mence, when a medical student shouted imitating the 
 Chairman ' Mr. Nihil will now address the meeting, 
 ex nihilo nihil fit /' It was fatal. A roar of unquench- 
 able laughter ensued. The speaker stood indignant, defiant, 
 but the effect of the pun proved ruinous. Even after silence 
 was restored, his most earnest points were discounted by 
 the spirit which the joker had aroused." 
 
 Another characterization of Nichol in these delightful 
 student-days, by one of his classmates, the Rev. A. 
 Mackennal, now at Bowdon near Manchester, will be 
 welcomed by all who knew him. 
 
 "I first knew him in October, 1852, when the election 
 for the Lord Rectorship took place : Sir Archibald 
 Alison's two years of office had ended ; and the Conser- 
 vative Club put up Lord Eglinton as candidate. No 
 Liberal Association was then existent in the University ; 
 the old association had died out in debt and discourage- 
 ment ; ' we were always beaten,' Nichol has written of 
 the College Liberals. The senior students, in the Divinity 
 and Law Schools, were mostly Conservatives ; not many 
 of the Medicals troubled themselves with College life in 
 general ; it was on the Arts men, the Juniors, that the 
 brunt of the contests fell. The nomination of Lord 
 Eglinton who was better known as a sporting than as an 
 academical personage seemed so incongruous that it was 
 not hard to rally the young Liberals in opposition. We 
 formed ourselves into a new Liberal Association, nominated 
 
LATER YOUTH. 1 19 
 
 the Duke of Argyll for Rector, assumed responsibility for 
 the unpaid printing bill of the old association ; and for a 
 fortnight the College courts rang with public speeches and 
 personal debate, and were strewn with electioneering squibs. 
 We polled a majority of votes ; but of the four ' nations ' * 
 into which the matriculated students are divided, three 
 voted for Lord Eglinton ; so we were beaten. 
 
 " The Liberal Association, however, became very lively. 
 The repeal of the University Theological Tests was then a 
 burning question ; and we held a meeting to demand their 
 abolition. A Debating Society, called ' the Zetetic,' was 
 constituted, not on a political basis, but consisting mainly 
 of Liberals ; and we discussed ' Education, National or 
 Voluntary,' and similar questions. A Temperance Society 
 was formed, also non-political, but under the same impulse 
 of youthful reforming energy. Into all these movements 
 Nichol threw himself with ardour. 
 
 " At the beginning of the next session the Liberal 
 Association determined on an unusual course. The office 
 of Rector was an annual one ; but by a gracious custom 
 the sitting Rector was elected for a second year without 
 a contest. We opposed Lord Eglinton's re-election, not 
 on personal or political grounds, but to resent what we 
 regarded as a breach of electoral etiquette the year before. 
 Men of eminence were not consulted as to their nomin- 
 ation : the honour was conferred on them spontaneously by 
 the students. It was a natural inference that no man 
 should be approached by the supporters of his opponent 
 with a view to his withdrawal. The Conservative Club 
 had so approached the Duke of Argyll in 1852; and had 
 published some words of his reply, which lost us many 
 votes. We therefore determined to contest the Chair at 
 the end of the first year. Some suspected, Nichol among 
 them, that a Conservative nomination would have gratified 
 the Duke of Argyll more than a Liberal nomination ; so 
 we did not propose him again, but brought forward Alfred 
 
 1 In the Glasgow Rectorial Elections at that time, the successful 
 candidate required not only to have a majority of the votes of the 
 students as a whole, but a majority in the four ' Nations,' into which 
 the entire body of the students was divided. 
 
120 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Tennyson. The fight was, however, hopeless from the 
 beginning. The opposition to Lord Eglinton was too in- 
 vidious. The Professors disapproved of what they looked 
 on as a needless disturbance of class work. Fearing that 
 the Conservative Club might do with the Laureate as they 
 had done with the Duke, we explained the etiquette of 
 the position to Tennyson, and asked him to communicate 
 with no one until the election was over. He wrote, in 
 guarded language, intimating that, if it were practicable, he 
 would rather we withdrew him ; and Professor Lushington, 
 his brother-in-law, in equally guarded language, concurred 
 with the suggestion. A large majority of votes was cast 
 for Lord Eglinton ; but owing to the system of voting by 
 ' nations ' Tennyson was near being elected. Two nations 
 were for him, two for Lord Eglinton ; in one of these 
 latter nations there was a tie, and the presiding Professor 
 voted for the status quo. 
 
 " The final casting-vote of the Principal was also for the 
 occupant of the Chair. Tennyson's letter, acknowledging 
 one in which the result was communicated to him, will 
 show how he felt. 
 
 " Saturday, Nov. 18th, '53. 
 
 " Dear Sir, I have just returned from a visit in Kent 
 and received yours of the 16th, wherein you inform me 
 that the Earl of Eglinton has been re-elected Lord Rector 
 of your University. 
 
 " Pray, present my warmest thanks to all those of your 
 brother-students who have given me their votes. 
 
 " I am sure I do not err in asserting that there is no 
 man on British ground whom you could have pitched 
 upon, as a candidate for your Lord Rectorship, who would 
 have been more grateful than I am to yourself and your 
 party for your kindness in proposing me for that high 
 office, and for your subsequent exertions in my favour. 
 However, and though I am aware that it will seem a little 
 strange to you, I cannot but confess that I felt a kind of 
 relief in learning that the College had adhered to its 
 custom of re-electing the Rector of the former year ; and 
 though it may seem still stranger, I would fain request you 
 
LATER YOUTH. 121 
 
 (if I could hope that my wish as to this matter might have 
 any weight among you) not to re-propose me next year, 
 but to pass by one who is so essentially not a public man 
 in character, whatever he may chance to be in name, and 
 to raise to the honour of your Lord Rectorship some other 
 who would not only gratify you by his presence at 
 Glasgow, but, it may be, delight and elevate you by his 
 oratory. Renewing my thanks to all, I remain, my dear 
 Sir, yours obligedly, A. TENNYSON. 
 
 " Out of our intimacy with John Nichol came the great 
 privilege of friendship with his father, the Professor of 
 Astronomy. Once a fortnight during the first of these two 
 sessions, once a month during the second, we met on 
 Saturday evenings at the Observatory. Dr. Nichol gene- 
 rally joined us at a long sitting for tea, and frequently 
 looked in on us as we discussed literature, politics, and 
 theology in the library. We had grown warm over the 
 points of Calvinism one evening when he entered. ' What 
 has been the subject of your conversation ? ' he asked. 
 Ross, who always leaned to Calvinism, jerked out : ' Oh ! one 
 of our number has been giving us all Dr. Channing's 
 arguments.' ' Indeed,' said the Professor, and the light in 
 his eye softened from its depths, ' and which is Dr. Chan- 
 ning among you ? ' 
 
 " Dr. Nichol was known to be a friend of Kossuth and 
 Mazzini ; his sympathies and those of Mrs. Nichol were 
 strongly with the Anti-Slavery party in the United States. 
 He did not repress, he encouraged, our zeal for those 
 who in Hungary and Austria, and France and Italy, 
 and America, were for personal freedom, and our tendencies 
 toward a liberal theology; but he gave dignity and breadth 
 to our discussions. Alexander Smith was frequently with 
 us, and an interesting young German, Adolf Hain, who 
 had been forced by his liberal sympathies out of his own 
 land and university, and had come to teach in Glasgow. 
 
 " Of course literature had a large place in our interests. 
 I was going one day into the Greek class-room, when 
 Nichol put a book into my hands, saying : ' Here, read 
 this and tell me what you think of it' It was a volume 
 of Mrs. Browning's, open at The Rhyme of the Duchess 
 
122 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 May. I read no Greek that hour, but I made acquaint- 
 ance with Duchess May, and the Vision of Poets, and 
 Lady Geraldine 's Courtship. At the conversazione of the 
 Liberal Association in 1854, Alexander Smith spoke on 
 1 Liberalism in Literature ' ; Adolf Hain on ' Liberalism in 
 the German Universities ' ; but Nichol's own address was 
 the most remarkable. For forty minutes he read to us a 
 paper full of melody and of aspiration. His theme was 
 really Liberalism in life ; I have forgotten the title. ' Linked 
 sweetness long drawn out/ said Ross, when it was over. 
 ' A Spiritualist's sermon,' was the reply. Nichol was some- 
 what of an ascetic at that time ; zealous for the discipline 
 which should keep the mind fit for pure thought, and the 
 body for strenuous action. When he was in Oxford, he 
 told me, he was the only teetotaller in the University. 
 There is an inscription in a copy of Emerson's Essays, 
 with Carlyle's ' Preface,' which he gave Brown, reprobating 
 the ' damnable habit of smoking.' Another fellow-student 
 spoke to him of having taken opium by way of fitting him- 
 self to write an essay. Nichol was infuriated. ' Promise 
 me,' he broke out, ' that you won't do that again, or I'll 
 never speak to you any more.' 
 
 " The Liberalism which these fresh souls applauded and 
 nourished in one another, was not the moribund Whiggery 
 of the day ; it was not merely a political creed, still less 
 was it partizanship ; it was an enthusiastic confidence in 
 freedom of thought, of speech, and of action. Many 
 were surprised, indeed he was surprised himself, that he 
 should be found toward the end of his life in the Conser- 
 vative ranks ; but those who knew him can understand 
 the account he gave of the change. Liberty of thought 
 and speech was secured, the Universities were thrown open, 
 education had become national, Bradlaugh was allowed to 
 sit in Parliament. And, in the meantime, it seemed to 
 him that, both in England and abroad, the principle of 
 subordination was more in need of reinforcement than that 
 of liberty. He joined what he thought was the unpopular 
 party. ' Minorities are always in the right,' he was fond 
 of saying. He was never a democrat ; he believed in 
 a natural aristocracy, not necessarily of intellect or of 
 
LATER YOUTH. 
 
 123 
 
 culture any more than of position, but an aristocracy of 
 character." 
 
 A hitherto unpublished poem by Nichol, written while 
 he was still at the Observatory, may close this chapter. 
 
 AN AURORA. 
 
 Beneath me rested all the weary town 
 
 Wrapped in the evening shadows ; while I stood 
 A watcher on the castled heights that crown 
 A waving dusk of wood. 
 
 A watcher of the stars that crowding came 
 
 To glorify the darkness of the night, 
 I saw the northern heavens all in flame 
 With ever changing light. 
 
 While all around the bright Aurora lay 
 
 Fringes of long black cloud, 
 A ring of night beneath another day 
 Like dawn above a shroud. 
 
 From either side the whirling streamers ran, 
 
 Great tents and banners marched across the sky ; 
 They clashed and mingled in the central van, 
 Then seemed to fade and die. 
 
 Then flashed again as if a signal flew 
 
 To rouse celestial powers to war's alarms ; 
 A mystic summons brought to sudden view 
 A thousand hosts in arms. 
 
 The terror deepened, and the battle raged 
 More fiercely in the armaments of fire ; 
 Columns of light with shafts of light engaged, 
 And hurled their lances higher. 
 
 Till when the wondrous fight was lost or gained, 
 
 The crimson squadrons crossed with emerald bars, 
 Waved their vast wings, and flickered out ; then reigned 
 Deep silence with the stars. 
 
 I listened till I heard a clarion blown 
 
 From the far city, toward the farther west ; 
 The furnace fires like blazing keeps alone, 
 Flared through night's sable vest. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD 1855-1857. 
 
 IN April, 1855, Nichol left Glasgow, and entered as a 
 Commoner of Balliol College, Oxford. The Glasgow Snell 
 Exhibition was conferred on him in the following year. 
 
 " In leaving Glasgow," he wrote, " I wish I had carried 
 away more from my converse with the society there, many 
 arguments I have had with my fellow-students suggesting 
 topics it would be pleasing to recall. Much is gained even 
 in the interchange of thought between equals, for no two 
 men are quite alike, and where there is difference there is 
 interest. I am more unfortunate when I have forgotten 
 what I have learnt from minds in which mine could swim 
 as in a tide of wisdom." 
 
 At this time he was over twenty-one years of age, 
 so that he went up to Oxford, like the majority of Scotch 
 students, considerably later than the average Englishman 
 does. Late matriculation in the English Universities a 
 custom which its Universities' curriculum renders almost 
 necessary for those who have already taken a Scottish 
 degree has its obvious disadvantages. These Nichol felt 
 to the full. He had to pass " Smalls " and " Moderations," 
 after having in Glasgow been already trained in Philosophy 
 and the higher Literature; and, old as he was for his years, 
 he found himself thrown into the society of men who, in 
 all intellectual interests, were relatively mere boys. For 
 a short time, however, the novelty of his surroundings 
 interested and amused him. On first getting into his 
 quarters at Balliol, he wrote, " My room here is small, but 
 cheerful on the whole ; unfortunately there are some noisy 
 
STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD. 125 
 
 persons on the stair. I must just be as indifferent to their 
 din as possible. I like the teachers that I have to do 
 with. I was well received by Woolcombe, with whom I 
 came in contact first. He appears benevolent, though a 
 divine. . . . With Riddell, an exceedingly modest, pleasant 
 person, I am reading Aeschines contra Ctesiphon, which 
 makes a good supplement to my former study of the De 
 Corona. Palmer is at the ' Histories ' of Tacitus, an equally 
 appropriate continuation of the ' Annals.' He is the cate- 
 chetical lecturer at present. Jowett is, I think, the best 
 of them all ; certainly the wisest. He took me to-day to 
 some broad meadow on the eastern side of the town, and 
 tried to find out what I was ; found out a good deal not 
 much to his satisfaction, and told me a great deal of truth. 
 I assumed more than natural opposition in my arguments 
 to. a\r]6>j e^erdteiv." 
 
 This was the beginning of a friendship which continued 
 unbroken till Jowett's death ; and the two last sentences 
 give a suggestive picture in miniature of both the men. 
 During the early years of their acquaintance the late 
 Master of Balliol was, as is well known, the victim of 
 a most unworthy persecution, by the High Church party 
 in the University, on account of his religious opinions. 
 It was in itself sufficient to arouse the enthusiasm of one 
 who was ever eager to enter the arena of controversy ; 
 and to do so by preference on behalf of what was, or 
 appeared to be, the weaker side. " Ah, you never knew 
 Jowett in his prime, when he was fighting the world," 
 Nichol used to say to the undergraduates of a younger 
 generation, when he was speaking of the teacher whom he 
 always regarded with reverent affection, even when he 
 could not assent to some of his ideals. 1 
 
 Part of a letter from one of his earliest friends now the 
 Master of Balliol may here be quoted. It was written from 
 Oxford, and from the Union, to Nichol then resident in 
 Glasgow. 
 
 " Ichabod ! I am sorry to tell you that the enemy hath 
 prevailed again, and Jowett is as far from his salary as 
 
 1 See in The Death of Themistocles and other Poems, the two sonnets 
 entitled "The Teacher" and "Crowned." 
 
126 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 ever. Again an even vote, which is equivalent to rejec- 
 tion. 
 
 " How I wish you had been up to hear Stanley's noble 
 sermon on Sunday last, with its picture of Oxford as it 
 is, and as it might be, and above all to hear his eloquent 
 tribute to our dear friend. I hope it will soon be pub- 
 lished ; and if it is, before I leave, I will send you a copy. 
 The University turned out to hear it better than I have 
 ever seen it do before. I said to Jowett after, ' who 
 will sing us battle songs any more ? ' ' We must carry on 
 the fight though,' said he, looking as pertinacious, and as 
 saintly-wicked as usual." 
 
 Shortly after the last extract made from his Journal 
 Nichol wrote : " I have no more notes of this time except of 
 my trip to Salisbury. The ' couleur de rose ' soon faded ; 
 and / began to know Oxford, and to hate it." 
 
 This expression of distaste for his new environment 
 vehemently underscored in the original MS. certainly did 
 not apply to the later period of his Oxford undergraduate 
 days ; but, while it remained true, its author would seem 
 to have received at least occasional sympathy from a 
 quarter where he might hardly have expected to find it. 
 Walking one day with Jowett near Oxford, they discussed 
 the University and its system, its merits and defects ; 
 when Jowett, suddenly flinging his stick on the ground 
 before him, exclaimed, " I hate the place." In later years 
 Nichol sometimes startled younger auditors with this anec- 
 dote, although he probably never recalled it to the recollec- 
 tion of the Master. 
 
 The maturer experience, and general coolness of tem- 
 perament, which belong to a teacher often control the 
 effervescence of a pupil's youthful enthusiasm. In the 
 autobiographical sketch of his early years Nichol re- 
 lated in what circumstances he was advised to " study 
 the particle aV Another instance of the cold academic 
 douche may be found sufficiently amusing to be added 
 here. Nichol was one of the earliest in his generation to 
 discover the philosophical merits of the poetry of Browning, 
 and he seems at this period of his life to have been 
 addicted to proselytism on the subject. " At wine " with 
 
STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD. 1 27 
 
 Jowett one evening, he broke forth in praise of the poet. 
 He waxed eloquent over his psychological subtlety, the 
 vigour of his dramatic characterization, etc. His host and 
 teacher heard him patiently, then quietly remarked, " Tom 
 Moore is a greater poet than Browning ! " which brought 
 the discussion to a somewhat chilling close. Years after- 
 wards, while his opinion of Browning had certainly not 
 risen in the interval, he recalled this conversation to the 
 Master of Balliol, whose estimate of Browning's merits had 
 risen very considerably. The reply came, brief and un- 
 perturbed, " Did I say that ? " 
 
 In the meantime Nichol at Oxford regretted Glasgow, 
 and his Glasgow friends ; and his Glasgow friends regretted 
 him, as the following extracts from letters addressed to 
 him by George Palmer, the brilliant Welsh fellow- student, 
 who died young, will suffice to show : 
 
 " My dear Friend, Pleasant memories of old times have 
 come upon me this week accountably enough. An evening 
 with Ross, the gaunt and impetuous Liberal, could not fail 
 to do this. Sitting around his quiet fire we spent a very 
 merry evening, though now and then our laughter was 
 silenced into the bass-tone, while indulging in speculations 
 about the vexed questions of Philosophy and Religion. A 
 feeling of discontentment, of sorrow indeed, was all the 
 while weaving itself into the train of thought. I could 
 not help thinking of the time and circumstances which 
 brought me to know some of my best friends, of the 
 impossibility of having these times over again. Two years 
 ago perhaps this very night, we were sitting up at that 
 now sullen, silent Observatory, a ring of happy souls, 
 ' turning to mirth all things of earth.' But now there is no 
 more young enthusiasm, no more happy re-unions. You are 
 gone to old England, and I see no prospect of your return." . . . 
 
 And again, 
 
 " But even now I wait the day of your return, when a 
 happy re-union will give to affection a new strength. What 
 would have become of me had I not had the ineffable 
 fortune of connecting myself with you on my coming to 
 Glasgow, and of maturing by a firmer connection that 
 well-timed friendship, none can tell." 
 
128 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 On June 1st, 1855, Nichol wrote in his Journal: 
 " Time wears on, with its swift pinions, here as elsewhere ; 
 and little by little I grow assimilated to the new world 
 that surrounds me, and the ways of it. Fortitude and 
 perseverance must bear me on through the difficulties and 
 discouragements of an altered position of life; and make 
 me forget the fall I am sensible of, in coming from a 
 region where I was at least well known, to one where my 
 existence and action are mainly matters of indifference. 
 Let me take to heart all profitable lessons of humility, yet 
 never be my inheritance resigned for any weakness that 
 effort may overcome. Thus feeling, and asking strength in 
 prayer, there is ascension for me yet, in the store of the 
 future. ... I listen to the gorgeous and full swell of 
 the organ, as it rises and falls with the choral chaunt 
 through my window on this quiet afternoon, and the music 
 carries back my spirit to old times. Ah ! by my love to 
 those old days not yet decayed, nay, all immoveable to 
 the meadows and suns of the past, the streams of old and 
 the friends that smiled beside them chaunting now beyond 
 the deep waters, and loitering in ampler fields may I 
 make the future from this hour more worthy of their memory. 
 Gathering up the experience of my weakness, the 
 recollection of my constant falls, let me not forget what I 
 have done, and felt of the noble and true, when my heart 
 was purer than now, 
 
 And power was with me in the night 
 To face the darkness." 
 
 When he returned to Glasgow for the summer vacation, 
 he wrote : 
 
 " Much remains as I left it, here, and in the city. 
 The Observatory has not been burnt down by the fire 
 no, nor even have the green grasses been charred, as I 
 apprehended but it stands, grey and stately, destined to 
 outlive us all. The garden is fair, putting on its brightest 
 robes, with lilac and laburnum blooming in luxuriant rows, 
 and the song of larks above proclaims a holiday. Clyde, 
 the great old dog, is fond as ever, but getting staid and 
 staider as he sinks, poor dog, into his quiet old age. 
 
STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD. 129 
 
 Shall I speak of human things, and say how well and 
 beaming is my father, how kind Elizabeth, 1 how sweet my 
 sister's smile? Much too that lived and breathed around 
 me is now no more, or but a solemn memory of the 
 past. Those years do not depart alone, but each retires 
 arm in arm with some cherished friend. Terrible and 
 sudden was the death of Dr. J. Couper, one whom, among 
 the Professors, I at once respected and admired, as few 
 others : quiet and gentle, why was there none to heal 
 him whose kind hand has healed so many ? But sadder 
 yet, and more mysterious to me, was the departure of one 
 whom the world stood in sore need of, young, vigorous, 
 wise, and honest in all noble thought and deed ; rarely 
 have I met one so universally admired and respected as 
 Robert Lambie. Once only before has such a vacancy 
 been made in the intimate circle of my friends. Ah ! last 
 year, Hain gone too, and we talked metaphysics together." 
 
 In October, Nichol was again in Oxford for the 
 Michaelmas term, and wrote : " Woolcombe's lecture to- 
 day nearly killed me. Really he is a kind man, but to 
 the most distressing extent devoid of all notions of order, 
 method, or subordination of little things to great. We 
 were reading those glorious chapters of St. John about 
 the Last Supper ; he spent the whole hour in enforcing 
 the necessity of recollecting how often certain words were 
 to be met with. What an idolatry this is ! I had to rest 
 for a considerable time to-day reading Addison. 
 I have sent off my rambling review of Maud, the amuse- 
 ment of more hours than I could well spare. I have 
 also finished the first two volumes of The Spectator. What 
 a delightful thing it must have been to have had one of 
 those delectable papers laid on one's table every morning, 
 fresh from the hand of the sage quiet gossip, who sat 
 smoking in his little garret hard by." 
 
 Sir William Rowan Hamilton was one of Nichol's 
 
 I.e. Mrs. E. P. Nichol, for, with her consent and approval, he always 
 addressed his father's second wife by her Christian name, as a token 
 of affection ; the word " mother " being, as she fully understood, sacred 
 to her who was with him no longer. 
 
 I 
 
130 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 father's friends, and became, on the occasion of his visits 
 to the Observatory, a friend of the son also. During his 
 undergraduate years at Oxford he kept up a correspondence 
 with Sir W. R. Hamilton, but the majority of these letters 
 have reference to scientific subjects, and in one of them 
 Nichol modestly disclaims any special knowledge of science. 
 
 The following, however, has a wider interest : 
 
 Ball. Coll., Dec. ist, 1855. 
 Dear Sir William Hamilton, If it appears ungrateful 
 that I should even now answer your last letter to me 
 shortly and inadequately, I trust you will not refuse to 
 believe that I read it with admiration and thankfulness, 
 thankfulness for the spur of a noble example, and the picture 
 set before me of the rich rewards of a pure life. Purity 
 of thought and deed is the only true receipt for keeping 
 the heart young ; how many high souls are shrivelled by 
 the absence of this into dry despair and listlessness ! 
 Blessed are they whose spirits soar on their own free wings 
 above the baser vices of the world, and happy too are 
 they who with weak hearts, like myself, have been guarded 
 safe from the worst of them, by no merit of their own, 
 but by kindly fate or the inspiration of some divine presence. 
 You would perceive, I dare say, that I did not send you 
 that review of Tennyson's beautiful poem from any con- 
 ception that it was satisfactory or complete as a review ; 
 but rather because I have made it the occasion of expressing 
 some of my own mental experience, which I thought you 
 ought to know, as a small return for the frank confidence 
 with which you have entrusted me. I think you under- 
 stood this, especially from the portion of Aubrey de Vere's 
 letter which you have enclosed, alluding as it does to the 
 1 beautiful vision ' with which all lives worth living have 
 been somewhile brightened, most of them, alas ! to be 
 saddened by its withdrawal, oh ! not for ever, nor unto a 
 vague divine glory, but to reappear with its human love 
 beyond the stars. I have expressed my sympathy before 
 with much that your friend has written ; his words here 
 too are beautiful, but I must dare to say his thoughts are 
 far from mine. This is a theme on which I am in nowise 
 
STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD. 131 
 
 fit to dwell, but do you recollect a grand passage of De 
 Quincey's, in which he tells of the agony with which, 
 when a child, shortly after his sister's death, hearing a 
 clergyman solemnly pronounce the dread words, " And we 
 shall all be changed," he cried out, " Oh ! no, no ! " I 
 have loved the old man for that ever since ; for the 
 conception of change passing over the things we love is 
 one of the horrors that haunt me, till I too call out, " Oh ! 
 no, no ! " Yet even the stars have a majestic progress : why 
 may not the souls of the great departed advance for ever 
 in the Empyrean ? The solution surely is that we too 
 must never cease running the race that is before us, so 
 that we fall not out of sight of their glory. 
 Time runs quickly, and in another fortnight I shall be 
 again in the " Starry Tower." I am so fond of it, that I 
 am ever sorrowful when I leave it. How unfortunate it 
 is to have such a cat's attachment to places ! I am slow 
 of taking root, and am not yet so fixed to old Balliol 
 as to feel it a home of mine. I generally carry the same 
 caution to an extreme in forming new friends, and it is 
 a long time before I can bring myself to any interchange 
 of confidence. Therefore the more grateful is a certain 
 glaring exception to this psychological law of mine. Leaving 
 you with this enigma, I remain, yours affectionately, 
 
 John Nichol. 
 
 On the last day of the year 1855 the Crimean war 
 was not yet wholly over. Nichol wrote in his Diary : 
 " The year which has sped away into the eternities of the 
 past has been a broken and struggling, yet not altogether 
 unprofitable, one. I sit by the flickering fireside while it 
 dies, with thoughts into which the sounds of revelry cannot 
 intrude, for it is a solemn thing this border-land, this passing 
 of the old months into the record of bygone time. Of the 
 broken lights and shapes amid which we have moved, how 
 many will remain with an abiding influence on our lives ? 
 Of the faces that have flashed across our path, how many 
 will glide away forgotten, while others haunt our memory 
 with a spell ? . . . The chimes are ringing now, and the 
 year is gone. Ah, well-a-day, adieu ! . . . It has had 
 
132 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 its seedtime and its harvest for nations and for men, its 
 plans long laid and battles bravely won, its heroic triumphs 
 and its dark defeats, its joys and sorrows by the camp 
 fire and by the hearth at home. The future is clouded 
 with mist, and we know not what shall be nay, not 
 the issues of an unborn day. . . . May the great God, 
 whose hand is over all, who lifteth up and casteth down, 
 point to the leaders of our people the path of honour and 
 justice ; and may He, who only can, inspire them with the 
 energy to walk in that way, whether it be lined with the 
 artillery of hostile ranks, or overhung by the olive branches 
 of a prosperous peace. May He give also strength to my 
 weakness to pursue patiently the path now clearing before 
 me, holding in all weather fast by the truth, dismissing 
 the clouds of doubt and fear, and treading down passion, 
 and envy, and sloth." 
 
 There is little to record in regard to the year 1856. 
 Previous to passing " Moderations," Nichol found his work 
 at Oxford irksome, and as yet he had not created for himself 
 a sympathetic circle of friends. " Oh, it is weary here," he 
 wrote in February, " in the winter nights when one is ill. 
 Health is a blessing above all things in a stranger land. 
 In a circle where love lives and reigns, there is a foolish 
 luxury even in the very fact of weakness, one is so 
 soothed by the touch of tender hands and the solicitude 
 of all around. Sometimes it seems almost worth while to 
 be ill in order to be nursed well again by those companions, 
 but here my fire and my book are my best companions. 
 I gaze at the one, and memories of home make me sad; 
 memories golden-tinged with the recollection of earlier and 
 brighter days. I cannot say whence it came, but there flitted 
 an image before me of a gentle boy with flaxen locks, 
 kneeling before the figure of her the divine one while 
 she gazed into his eyes with hers, and I forgot all else. 
 Oh, foolish me ! why need I ask for another ideal in life 
 than this ; enough for weary years is that inspiration, 
 would it but keep present before me. And have I not a 
 fair resemblance of her still to worship and to guard ? 
 This she left me, is it not enough to do ? And he too, 
 
STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD. 1 33 
 
 Apollo, with his stately calm above a heart of love, shall 
 this example of strength, where he has been strong, not 
 lure me onward ? " The last sentence refers to his father. 
 
 The following (April, 1856) records his impression of a 
 first meeting with Carlyle whose critical biography in the 
 " English Men of Letters " Series was the last considerable 
 work of his life. " I have seen him at length, and hardly, 
 as is the case with most of our idols would I choose to 
 un-see him again, this grand sullen Diogenes. I called, 
 and, as a friend was waiting for him, we three walked 
 out together along some of the quietest London streets, 
 listening to a torrent of the purest Carlylese. Some things 
 he said in the same savage way, half coarse, half sublime, 
 in which he writes, that I would fain hope are sad 
 exaggerations of a sad truth. Is the conclusion then to 
 which this majestic mind has come, after all, only that the 
 age is presided over by Bedlam, or is it not a melan- 
 choly proof that a hero may tell of deliverance from the 
 'Everlasting No,' and yet fall into it again himself? I 
 left very sorrowful. I expected a calmer man, and one 
 from whose presence more of consolation could be drawn." 
 
 Nichol continued in a manner which shows that he had 
 for the moment caught the Carlylese infection. " Yet why 
 should we be daunted by the gloom even of our pro- 
 foundest prophets ? Beyond them and above them all are 
 the pole-stars shining, and thither, oh ! thither tend our 
 toil and struggle, our woes and pains. Pray that they 
 shine on thee, thou weary one, and thou art strong again." 
 
 Writing to Sir William Rowan Hamilton about this 
 time, he says : 
 
 " I must not delay longer returning to you the letter 
 of Aubrey de Vere you so kindly sent me, with the 
 assurance that it has increased the admiration I had pre- 
 viously conceived for him from several of his graceful 
 poems. There is one sentence in the letter, which among 
 others beautiful and true, expresses well a thought I have 
 often dimly felt : ' We live in a world of shadows, but 
 they are cast down from unseen realities.' It is in pro- 
 portion surely as we feel this that we have faith and 
 
134 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 strength to live nobly and well ; when we forget this, as 
 we often do, and believe for a season in shadows alone, 
 then we despair, and faint, and fall. Among the many 
 things for which we have need to exercise that divinest 
 privilege of prayer is the belief in reality. I heard some 
 fine music in the street the other day, drowned for the 
 most part by the din of carts and cars, but giving indica- 
 tion ever and anon of its undercurrent of rich melody ; 
 and fantastically enough, yet the thought gave me comfort, 
 I thought it was so in our lives." 
 
 Nichol attended, and occasionally spoke at, the Oxford 
 University Union debates ; and, in a letter to the last-named 
 correspondent, expressed indignation at a motion proposed 
 at a meeting of the Union : " That the widespread influence 
 of the writings of Alfred Tennyson is the main cause of 
 the present debased state of English poetry." This was 
 probably meant as a stroke of humour ; but, with his 
 Northern intensity, Nichol did not realize that these Union 
 debates were not always conducted, forty years ago, with 
 that " high seriousness " which was a Scottish ideal. 
 
 In December, 1856, he contributed a criticism of 
 Sydney Dobell's poetry, and of George Macdonald's Within 
 and Without, to the Oxford and Cambridge Magazine. The 
 article was entitled, " Recent Poems and Plays." 
 
 As a record of the earlier months of 1857, the following 
 extracts from his Journal, in reference to various subjects, 
 may be quoted : 
 
 " Gibbon's account of himself is one of the most 
 charming pieces of literary autobiography I have ever read. 
 It gives one a vivid idea of the strength, grace, and free 
 spirit of the great historian. ' Every man who rises above 
 the common level has received two educations : the first 
 from his teachers ; the second, more personal and import- 
 ant, from himself.' Perhaps the most remarkable feature in 
 Gibbon's career is the immense preponderance of this latter 
 education, and hence the full claim he has to think for 
 himself what he has learned for himself, and the weight 
 of the blow he strikes at that dull University which would 
 have taught him not to think at all. He impresses me at 
 
STUDENT LIFE AT OXFORD. 135 
 
 first sight as among the most massive of men, and after 
 this prelude I stand at the commencement of his great 
 work, like the spectator in a drama before the folds of 
 the curtain, when some rich overture has foreshadowed a 
 tragedy of depth and power." 
 
 " Heard Thackeray on George III. Had I not expected 
 more, I had not been disappointed ; as it was, those artistic 
 dissolving views seem to want a centre. They are the 
 after-dinner talk of a man of genius." 
 
 A little later, on the same theme : " Thackeray has 
 been lecturing here. I went, as he had advertised George 
 IV.; it was again George III. Yet it bears a second 
 hearing well. Many of those pictures are inimitable, and 
 the end is very grand. The audience behaved with con- 
 siderable vulgarity, laughing loudly at the mere jokes, and 
 not appreciating his eloquence. His sarcastic allusions to 
 the ante-Reform system excited much smothered indig- 
 nation. ' When Selwyn could not be troubled to contest 
 Sutherland, he had a quiet borough of his own.' ' I have 
 told them to elect myself,' etc. ' Beastly ridicule,' broke 
 in a good old Tory behind me. His praise of the middle 
 classes roused the great anger of little men, and the 
 reception, though not actually rude, showed that he had 
 come to Oxford." 
 
 The note which follows this animadverting on Scotch 
 students who, on coming to an English University, fancy 
 that, on touching such superior soil, they must strive to 
 show that they were " to the manner born " is perhaps, 
 even now, not altogether out of date. 
 
 " Some of our newly-imported ' Snell ' men have sud- 
 denly found out a wondrous hidden virtue in the haunts 
 of Isis, a power which asserts itself in a generally exalting 
 influence, an efficacy of culture passing from Dons as they 
 limp through ' Quad,' or dandies as they paddle canoes 
 about the Cherwell. The new way in which this rare 
 Oxonian or English genius is developed seems to be mainly 
 in the exquisite curl of the lip, or the superior dignity 
 of the sneer. There is some hope even for mediocre 
 honesty, in making some inroad upon the most stubborn 
 orthodoxy of the Scottish student ; but it would require 
 
136 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 the years of Methuselah, joined to the wisdom of Solomon, 
 to shame those starched pieces of buffoonery out of their 
 strut and their slang." 
 
 " A crisis in our fortunes has passed like a dream. 
 England is again all stirred by elections. My father has 
 been requested to stand for Newcastle, and again as one 
 of the new members for Glasgow. Some such chance as 
 this I have long anticipated, and cannot deny that I 
 looked forward to the possibility of a change in the course 
 of his career with mingled feelings, in which pride and 
 pleasure predominated. He would have found himself in 
 a more congenial sphere, with powers of wider beneficence, 
 and have won a yet more enduring name, even in the 
 memories of this stubborn land." 
 
 The Professor of Astronomy for reasons partly financial, 
 and partly connected with his state of health decided 
 not to accept either invitation. As he had barely more 
 than two years to live from this date, his refusal, in 
 spite of his son's legitimate disappointment, had in any 
 case little ultimate importance. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY." 
 
 A MOST interesting reminiscence of Nichol's Oxford days 
 is supplied by A. V. Dicey, Vinerian Professor of Law at 
 Oxford. His knowledge of the man, and his apprecia- 
 tion of his character and work, are alike remarkable. 
 He writes : 
 
 " I first made John Nichol's acquaintance in the autumn 
 of 1854, when he came up to Balliol. Our acquaintance 
 soon ripened into an intimate friendship, which continued 
 till the day of his death. 
 
 " He came up to Oxford a year or two older than most 
 of his contemporaries. He had, moreover, at that time 
 a greater experience of life than generally falls to the lot 
 of an undergraduate ; and there seemed to the rest of us, 
 and I think to himself, to be a greater difference in age 
 between him and young men who, like myself and Swin- 
 burne, were more or less his University contemporaries, 
 than in reality existed. I was rather surprised at the 
 time of his death to find how nearly of the same age 
 we were. Upon this point I specially insist, because, in 
 my judgment, it influenced the whole of Nichol's career, 
 certainly at Oxford, and to a considerable extent through- 
 out his life. 
 
 " As I think of Nichol when I first knew him, I am 
 more and more struck by two traits which distinguished 
 him from all his University companions and friends. 
 
 " The first is that at the age when he came up to 
 Oxford his intellectual and moral capacities were fully 
 developed. I do not like to say that he was precocious, 
 
138 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 because the term ' precocity ' conveys an idea of imma- 
 turity, and therefore can hardly be treated as an 
 expression of praise, and I do not the least wish to imply 
 that Nichol's talents were in any way prematurely or 
 imperfectly developed. What I do mean to assert is, that 
 as a writer, a thinker, or a teacher, he possessed, say at 
 23 or 24, every quality by which he was distinguished in 
 later life. To appreciate what this means one must have 
 had some experience with regard to the writing of young 
 men. The average power of producing articles written in 
 tolerable English has, I am convinced, greatly increased 
 in Oxford during the last thirty years. But, even now, the 
 most promising young men hardly ever are masters of 
 anything which can be called a style ; and Nichol 
 certainly wrote a clear and forcible style when he began 
 his University career. 
 
 " The second trait, closely connected with the first, was 
 the power of influencing his friends and companions. 
 There never was a man who made more of friendship. 
 He threw himself with zeal one might almost say with 
 passion into the interests of his friends. Though sen- 
 sitive, he was not reserved, with those at anyrate to 
 whom he was bound by ties of affection or intimacy. He 
 talked with freedom of his own opinions and convictions, 
 and he elicited confidence in return. During my career at 
 College, and for a considerable number of years after I 
 left College, there was no one with whom I interchanged 
 thoughts more freely, and the same thing might be said of 
 each of the circle of friends whom Nichol gathered round 
 him at Balliol. While he was a companion in sympathy, 
 he occupied among men of his own University standing, 
 something also of the position of a teacher. He was, as 
 I have already pointed out, both in years and in character, 
 older than his associates. He knew, with more or less 
 intimacy, persons of eminence such as Mill, and especially 
 Mazzini. He was, as was proved in later life, an extremely 
 good teacher. Though I never read with him, I gained a 
 great deal of instruction in logic from conversations with 
 Nichol. 
 
 " But the real source of his influence was, I am con- 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY:' 139 
 
 vinced, to be found much less in his intellectual powers 
 than in the full and early development of his character. 
 Throughout his life an opinion was with Nichol always a 
 conviction, and for all his convictions he was at any 
 moment prepared to do battle. This energy, combined 
 with conspicuous honesty, had the greatest influence on his 
 friends. He had moreover, as I have intimated, a special 
 capacity for cultivating friendships and for forming social 
 unions. There were at Balliol a certain number of us, 
 such for example as G. R. Luke, T. H. Green, and 
 Swinburne, who were united by a common intimacy 
 with Nichol. This connection might have come to 
 very little if he had not, after his manner, united us 
 together in an essay-reading society, called owing to 
 an almost accidental joke about the ill health of some 
 of its members the ' Old Mortality.' For myself I may 
 say that at least half of the pleasure and interest of 
 my College life is due to the existence of the ' Old 
 Mortality.' We met during term time once a week, read 
 essays, and discussed every topic, religious or political, 
 which interested us, and gradually formed a set of friends 
 united in the main by their sympathies and by their 
 opinions. The formation of the society was wholly due to 
 Nichol, and if the names and careers of its members, 
 many of whom are now dead, be studied, it will be found 
 that he showed rare sagacity in bringing together men 
 suited to form what I may call a College Club. I do 
 not know that the essays read, or the discussions which 
 followed, were on an average either better or worse than 
 the writings or the conversation read or heard in other 
 essay societies ; but I am certain that very few small 
 bodies the ' Old Mortality ' consisted originally of seven 
 persons ever exerted a more lasting or more beneficial 
 influence on its members ; and Nichol was the centre as 
 well as the creator of the body. Very rarely do you find 
 a young man who was so bent on giving expression to 
 the feelings and convictions of himself and his associates. 
 He stimulated social gatherings. He induced us to join in 
 editing a magazine, which, though it contained one or two 
 good articles by himself, by Swinburne, and by Luke, 
 
1 40 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 naturally enough had not a long life. We attempted to 
 increase its circulation by reporting and commenting upon 
 the Debates of the Union. Why I know not, the Union 
 of that day objected to having its debates reported, and 
 made the reporting of them morally impossible. The 
 cause, I incline to think, was one characteristic of Nichol, 
 and I must in fairness add, of the ' Old Mortality ' ; we 
 could not keep ourselves to the functions of impartial 
 reporters. The accounts of the debates were, if my 
 memory does not deceive me, more or less defences of 
 speakers with whom we sympathized, and attacks on 
 Conservatives to whom we were opposed. However this 
 may have been, the one thing which any one should bear 
 in mind who wishes to appreciate Nichol's career as a 
 young man, is his capacity for influencing his friends and 
 impressing upon them his own convictions. 
 
 " Three political topics especially interested Nichol and 
 all the circle of which he was the centre the cause of 
 foreign nationalities, and especially of Italy, the crimes of 
 Louis Napoleon, and the abolition of University Tests, as 
 well as all restrictions on the freedom of opinion. In 
 virtue of the strength of our opinions or feelings on these 
 topics, which were the subject of daily, I might almost 
 say of hourly, discussion, we considered ourselves advanced 
 Radicals, not to say Republicans. 
 
 " As to foreign politics, Nichol was an ardent believer in 
 Mazzini, and was, as he remained to the end of his life, 
 an admirer of Kossuth. In common with most of us, 
 except T. H. Green, he sympathized with the Crimean War, 
 but thought it ought to have been turned into a systematic 
 and revolutionary attack on Russia. He believed that 
 England might have interposed for the protection of 
 Hungary, and had, at that period of his life at any rate, 
 no sympathy whatever with the foreign policy of the 
 Manchester school. 
 
 " As regards Louis Napoleon we were all agreed. I see 
 little reason to think we were wrong in our general estimate 
 of the Emperor; but there is something amusing as I lock 
 back upon them, in the youthful vehemence of our denun- 
 ciations, and in our constantly repeated and constantly 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY:' 141 
 
 disappointed hopes of his downfall. No one of us had 
 the sagacity to perceive the strength of his hold on the 
 French people. 
 
 " With regard to University Tests we were certainly 
 dealing with a matter, I may now say an abuse, with which 
 we were well acquainted, and in the removal of which we 
 had a real and personal interest. Between 1854 and 
 1874, while a man could take his degree and become a 
 B.A. without signing any test, it was impossible for him 
 to become an M.A., and therefore, with one or two 
 rare exceptions, to hold a fellowship, without signing the 
 Articles of the Church of England. At that time, any 
 man who did well in the schools, that is to say got 
 a first-class, had fair ground for hoping that he might 
 obtain a fellowship, and to become the Fellow of a 
 College was the natural object of every young man's 
 ambition. We most of us were ardent believers in 
 freedom of thought, and certainly without any leanings 
 towards strict orthodoxy. Whether rightly or not, we nearly 
 all of us in effect, with the exception of Nichol, treated the 
 signature of the Articles as a way of stating that we were 
 members of the Church of England, and did not belong 
 to any other body. Nichol from the first, with character- 
 istic boldness and decision, declined to have anything to 
 do with the signature of tests. He did not become an 
 M.A. till they were abolished ; he thereby sacrificed all 
 chance of a fellowship. 
 
 " Several things make this adherence to his own convic- 
 tion of what was right specially creditable. His knowledge 
 and his literary power would, if he had stood for fellow- 
 ships, have made his election at some College or other 
 a certainty. He specially appreciated the dignity and 
 influence of a fellow's position ; and, though he dis- 
 believed in some of its doctrines, he certainly had no 
 dislike to the Church of England. He was entirely 
 without sympathy with any form of dissent, unless it were 
 Unitarianism, and would, I believe, at the end of his life 
 rather have belonged to the Church of England than to 
 any other religious body. His determination to follow out 
 his own path in this matter was one of the things which 
 
1 42 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 most legitimately, I consider, increased his influence with 
 his friends, and earned for him the respect of older men 
 than himself. 
 
 " During his College career, Nichol would, I conceive, 
 have described himself as in the main a disciple of John 
 Mill. I can remember even now his intense delight in 
 Mill's Liberty, and his pleasure in finding that I then 
 sympathized with him in his admiration for the terms in 
 which Mill has dedicated the book to his wife. It is, 
 however, right to add that then, as always, he had a 
 far greater admiration for Carlyle than I could share, 
 and gradually became less and less in sympathy with 
 Mill, except indeed on the subject of the American War. 
 He was, as you probably know, an ardent supporter of 
 the North, and my sympathy with him on this subject 
 was in later years a great bond of union between us. 
 
 " Nichol, I rather conceive, had before he came up to 
 Oxford acquired the character of a Radical at Glasgow, 
 and we should all of us have been much astonished had 
 any one questioned the Radicalism either of himself or of 
 the ' Old Mortality.' Yet, as I look back on Nichol even 
 as a young man, I doubt whether his Radicalism, I might 
 almost say his interest in politics generally, was anything 
 like so deep as he and we supposed. 
 
 " On many political topics he was really indifferent. 
 He was certainly not a fervent believer in the extension 
 of the suffrage, in vote by ballot, or in Disestablish- 
 ment. As all his friends know, his dislike and distrust 
 of the Free Church was sometimes so vehemently ex- 
 pressed as to have a touch of absurdity. Nor were 
 he or most of his associates keenly interested in the 
 sort of social movements to which now so much of the 
 benevolence and zeal of young men and women is de- 
 voted. He was a strict political economist, and a rigid 
 Malthusian. Certainly no form of Radicalism was at 
 any time of his life less to his taste than the Glad- 
 stonian Radicalism, which has prevailed from 1870 to the 
 present time. I do not think he would have opposed the 
 Disestablishment of the Irish Church, but it gave him no 
 pleasure. I dwell upon this because I am convinced that 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY: 7 143 
 
 with Nichol, as with most other men, a consistency, not 
 perhaps of opinion but of feeling, ran through his whole 
 life. But this line of thought leads me too far away from 
 Nichol in his College days. It is a pleasure to recall 
 the strength of his feelings, his genial and generous 
 appreciation of his friends, and the immense influence 
 which, owing to these qualities, he exerted over men not 
 much younger than himself. The only two men among 
 his associates who in this matter at all equalled him 
 were G. R. Luke and T. H. Green ; and it was one of 
 Nichol's services to us all that he formed the Society 
 which linked himself, Green, Luke, and a few others, in- 
 dissolubly together." 
 
 In these Oxford days Nichol's charm as a conversationalist 
 was known to all his friends. It was bright, trenchant, 
 genial, incisive ; with perhaps occasionally just a slight 
 soupqon of that bitterness which his disappointments in 
 later life, with men and things, imparted to some of his 
 future literary judgments. But, as a tutor at Oxford, he 
 had no rival in his time. One of his pupils, who obtained 
 a first in Greats, wrote to him from Oxford in 1868 . . . 
 " I am very conscious of two people's influence in the 
 Examination. Your ' History of Philosophy ' and some 
 lectures on Aristotle, by a tutor at Univ., with whom I 
 read in summer." 
 
 The bugbear " Moderations " being passed, Nichol made 
 many friends in Oxford, who remained friends throughout 
 life. In various pages of his " Journal " he referred to his 
 first acquaintance with Albert V. Dicey, Algernon C. Swin- 
 burne, George Rankine Luke, Birkbeck Hill, and others. 
 
 In June, 1857, he wrote: "I have succeeded in settling 
 upon a distinct basis a Society which I originated towards 
 the close of the last term of my residence here. We have 
 weekly meetings for the purpose of reading either extracts 
 from some of our standard authors, or some original essay. 
 This is followed by an hour or two of conversation and 
 criticism upon the subject started in the theme. It may 
 prove useful in cultivating our taste, as well as helping us 
 to make more definite our opinions on some of those vexed 
 
144 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 questions, whether of Art or of Social Science, which are 
 continually recurring. Its usefulness and perpetuity will 
 depend entirely on the amount of judgment shown in the 
 subjects which are selected, the power displayed in arranging 
 them, and the manner in which our conversations are con- 
 ducted. There is abundant material for selection in many 
 fields, which will afford at once instruction and entertain- 
 ment ; and if there are not many among us who have such 
 a command over the English language as to write a really 
 good essay, there are many questions to which one or 
 other of us have devoted some special attention, and the 
 discussion of which may prove interesting to all. I will 
 do my best to let it maintain the standard which I am 
 anxious it should keep up." 
 
 As this Society already referred to by Mr. Dicey 
 attained a position almost unique in Oxford, both from its 
 aims and aspirations, and from the number of distinguished 
 men who belonged to it, the official record of its founda- 
 tion, and the minutes of its meetings which bear upon its 
 originator and founder, may be quoted in this chapter. 
 
 The account of its origin is written in a hand which is 
 certainly not Nichol's, and it suggests a boyish exuberance 
 of high spirits which he did not share. It is as follows : 
 
 " A history of the institution of ' Old Mortality.' In the 
 year of grace MDCCCLVL, in the month of November : 
 Whereas a company of scholars and students of the 
 University of Oxford was assembled for purposes of sober 
 and intellectual pastime in the rooms of one John Nichol 
 of Balliol College : It was proposed by the said John 
 Nichol to the company aforesaid, that a society be insti- 
 tuted from among the present students of Balliol College 
 and others their friends and comrades in the University of 
 Oxford, for the purpose of affording one another such 
 intellectual pastime and recreation as should seem most 
 suitable and agreeable to the members of the same ; and 
 that the society should consist of such members of the 
 present company as should be willing to enrol themselves 
 therein without delay, and with the power of adding to 
 their number as should seem fit. And whereas the said 
 proposal was joyfully and gladly received and consented 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY." 145 
 
 unto by the majority of the company then present, the 
 following gentlemen, students of the University of Oxford, 
 did signify their consent to join, and were presently en- 
 rolled into the society aforesaid, viz. : Mr. Albert Venn 
 Dicey, Balliol ; Mr. George B. Hill, Pembroke ; Mr. John 
 .Nichol, Balliol; Mr. Algernon S. Grenfell, Balliol; Mr. 
 George Rankine Luke, Balliol ; Mr. Algernon C. Swinburne, 
 Balliol. And whereas, after much bethinking themselves 
 as to how the said society should be styled and entitled, 
 the name of ' Old Mortality ' was suggested as appropriate, 
 from the following weighty considerations : That every 
 member of the aforesaid society was, or had lately been, 
 in so weak and precarious a condition of bodily health as 
 plainly and manifestly to instance the great frailties, and 
 so to speak, mortality of this our human life and consti- 
 tution this name therefore was afterwards formally adopted 
 by a law of the society as its future style and title. 
 
 " The society then proceeded on the ensuing Saturday to 
 the ordinary business for which it had been instituted, in 
 the listening to a passage from a modern English author, 
 publicly read before the society by one of the members 
 aforesaid. But whereas from the unforeseen absence from 
 ill-health of the original proposer and founder of the said 
 society, which absence lasted until the end of the next term 
 thereafter ensuing, no full meeting of the society was con- 
 vened until the 2nd of May, 1857, the formal rules and 
 regulations of the society were not till then drawn up and 
 presented to the same ; but after that, in the intervening 
 space, without the drawing up of such rules meetings had 
 been held, and two new members had been admitted, viz., 
 Mr. Reginald Broughton, Balliol ; Mr. Robert S. Wright, 
 Balliol ; it was deemed expedient on the return of the 
 said Mr. John Nichol at the first aforesaid general meeting 
 of the society, which took place on the 2nd of May, in the 
 rooms of the aforesaid Mr. John Nichol, to propose to the 
 society's consideration and votes the following fourteen 
 rules and regulations, which were accordingly passed by 
 the society." 
 
 The only one of the " fourteen rules and regulations " of 
 the Society now worth citing is that which states " that 
 
146 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 this society have for its object the stimulating and pro- 
 moting of the interchange of thought among its members, 
 on the more general questions of Literature, Philosophy, 
 and Science, as well as the diffusion of a correct knowledge 
 and critical appreciation of our standard English authors." 
 
 The minutes of the society's meetings, in which its 
 founder's name occurs, are as follows : 
 
 "Saturday, May 2nd, 1857. Mr. John Nichol in the 
 chair. After private business, till a late hour, an essay was 
 read by Mr. Nichol, viz., an Essay in Defence of Suicide, 
 by David Hume. Discussion on the subject took place for 
 some time, but no vote was passed." 
 
 " Saturday, May 1 6th, 1857. Mr. George Luke in the 
 chair. After private business, extracts were read by Mr. Luke 
 comparing instances of the fanatical revival of Communism 
 from Robertson's Charles V.\ the Anabaptists of Munster ; 
 Robertson's History of America; the first Puritan settlement 
 at New Plymouth. Mr. Nichol expressed his opinions at 
 very considerable length, and some discussion ensued, but 
 no vote was passed." 
 
 " Saturday evening, November 7th. Mr. Nichol, of Balliol, 
 in the chair. Mr. Bryce, of Trinity, proposed by Mr. Luke, 
 and seconded by Mr. Nichol, was unanimously elected 
 a member of the society. Mr. Nichol then proceeded to 
 read an essay on Wycliffe, considered as a reformer. 
 Discussion followed on the subject of the essay." 
 
 "Saturday, 15th January, 1858. Mr. Nichol, of Balliol, 
 in the chair. He read a short essay on the character ot 
 Cicero as a statesman." 
 
 ' Saturday, February 1 3th. Mr. Nichol, of Balliol, in the 
 chair. A series of extracts were read to illustrate the 
 peculiar merits of the great English satirists. They were 
 chosen from the Dunciad of Pope, Dryden's Absalom and 
 Achitophel, and Byron's Don fuan, and accompanied with 
 some remarks on their distinctive characteristics. A dis- 
 cussion followed, in which a variety of opinions were passed 
 on the poets generally and their rank as satirists; Mr. 
 Swinburne, among others, recording his decided preference 
 for Dryden, Mr. Broughton admiring the variety and 
 rich humour of the extracts from Byron, while Mr. 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY." 147 
 
 Dicey found most congenial the brilliant antitheses of 
 Pope." 
 
 "Saturday, October, 1858. Meeting in Mr. Nichol's 
 rooms. Mr. Green, of Balliol, in the chair. 1 Mr. Holland, 
 of Magdalen, proposed by Mr. Dicey, seconded by Mr. 
 Nichol, was elected a member of the society." 
 
 " Saturday, December, 1858. This meeting was held in 
 Mr. Green's rooms. Mr. Nichol, of Balliol, in the chair." 
 
 " Mr. Nichol read an essay on ' The danger of unduly 
 exalting Strength and Success, with particular reference to 
 the tone of feeling pervading Carlyle's history of Frederick 
 of Prussia.' The origin and dangerous consequences of 
 the idea that might is right were traced and displayed with 
 great force and copiousness of illustration. In the discus- 
 sion which followed general agreement with the sentiments 
 of the essay, as well as great admiration of its style, was 
 expressed by most of the members present." 
 
 In the last list of the members of the " Old Mortality " 
 Society, which is given in the book that belonged to Mr. 
 Nichol, the name of yEneas Mackay, afterwards Professor 
 of Law at Edinburgh, and now Sheriff of Fife, is the only 
 one to be added to those already mentioned. But the 
 " Old Mortality " continued to exist for some time after its 
 founder had left Oxford, including, in later years, among 
 many others, the present Master of Balliol, Mr. W. H. 
 Pater, Mr. Nettleship, Mr. Bywater, now Regius Professor 
 of Greek, and Mr. Berkley. 
 
 A very interesting photograph of the original group of 
 the " Old Mortality " exists. Mr. Dicey writes : " The 
 society, on the whole, justified itself by the subsequent 
 career of its members. By those who were either original 
 members, or were elected during its earlier years, at least 
 seven Professorships, one place in the Cabinet, one Judge- 
 ship, and two headships of Colleges have been filled. The 
 tendency of the O. M. towards professorial positions is 
 marked, and, I think, might have been anticipated by any 
 older man of experience who had intimately known the 
 society and its members." 
 
 1 Mr. T. H. Green had been in the meantime elected a member of 
 the society. 
 
148 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Mr. Luke wrote to Nichol on Feb. 14, 1857. 
 
 Balliol College, Oxford. 
 
 My Dear Nichol, . . . The " Old Mortality " is in a 
 most shocking state of vigour. I suspect all its ailments have 
 settled upon your head. Hooraay ! Hooooray ! ! . 
 
 Dicey says something about your going in for honours 
 in Moderations. You would have been quite safe for a 
 first, if you had been strong ; and if you still think of it 
 you might make out the reading for it yet. But is it 
 worth your while ? It is no honour at all ; it is very 
 laborious ; and any sacrifice that you might make of 
 time or strength for it would tell against you in Greats, 
 where really both profit and distinction can be gained i.e. 
 as Oxford things go and besides the subject is a more 
 congenial one to a Scot. Dicey tells me that he thinks 
 you should only go in for a pass, and I most entirely 
 agree with him. You will have had all the profit of the 
 reading, and neither lost nor gained in point of credit ; 
 unless your having read for a class lifts you into an 
 Honorary 4th, which men here look upon as " cheesey." 
 
 How are your friends at home ? How is Lushington ? 
 Caird is at St. Andrews enjoying it delivered from St. 
 Rollox and the Glasgow Divinity Hall. . . . Yours 
 very truly, G. R. LUKE. 
 
 The Rev. W. Berkley, one of the members of the " Old 
 Mortality," writes thus from Navestock Vicarage, Romford, 
 Essex : 
 
 " John Nichol was well known some thirty-five years ago 
 as the most successful coach for Greats of his day, especially 
 in Philosophy. It was in this capacity that I first made 
 his acquaintance, when reading for my degree in i860, and 
 it would be difficult to overestimate the value of his assist- 
 ance. What was most characteristic of him was his much 
 wider knowledge of Modern Philosophy, derived at first 
 hand from German sources. Plato and Aristotle have, from 
 time immemorial, been the centres of Oxford study : with 
 strong traditions inherited from the Schoolmen. Kant and 
 Hegel were new names to most of us, and we got our first 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTAL/TV." 
 
 149 
 
 introduction to them from Nichol. His strong Scotch logic 
 too was no ordinary force, at a time when Mansel's Bampton 
 lectures waged the war of orthodoxy with the sword of Sir 
 W. Hamilton. 
 
 " My own recollection of Nichol, as an intimate personal 
 friend, is however much more closely bound up with the 
 foundation of the ' Old Mortality ' and the earlier days of 
 its existence. It was a speculative club that had its origin 
 in Balliol, and Nichol was its founder. When elected in 
 i860 I can recall the initial ceremony of introduction with 
 the reading out of its constitution. This included the 
 explanation of its title O. M. as descriptive of the ' physical 
 infirmity of all its original members.' It was certainly not 
 an athletic society ; but I do not myself recall any excep- 
 tional feebleness of body, though its strength lay rather in 
 the speculative sphere. And though its origin was Balliol, 
 no College had any preference afterwards. Its being's end 
 and aim was philosophical discussion, and certainly its 
 mental atmosphere was very keen. Those who stay on at 
 the University after taking their degree must remember the 
 sudden sense of blank, when all undergraduate friends of 
 former days seem suddenly to disappear. Then one feels 
 the value of a society like the O. M., which is a sort of 
 second birth into a new Oxford. I remained in residence 
 for three years, and I think the O. M. voted its own 
 decease some years later. 
 
 " So much I recall of John Nichol, as my coach for 
 Greats, as the founder and inspiring spirit of the O. M., 
 and generally as one of the leaders of the young Oxford 
 party, when we fought for the abolition of religious tests, 
 and the endowment of the Greek Chair, which the 
 country clergy came up each year to refuse to Professor 
 Jowett. 
 
 "I must add one other word, the contrast between Jowett 
 and Nichol. I do not, of course, compare the two in mental 
 calibre. Jowett was a man of genius, and made the same kind 
 of impression, though on a smaller circle, as J. H. Newman 
 on the generation before. A few words in his printed works, 
 or by way of criticism on one's own essay written for 
 him, or perhaps a chance remark in a walk, might live on 
 
150 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 and fructify. His most characteristic influence was as a 
 solver or minimizer of dogma. Now the type of Nichol's 
 mind was the very opposite : he was as dogmatic as the 
 Shorter Catechism, or (for that matter) the Westminster 
 Confession, though his dogmas were very different. His 
 dogmas were his Philosophy. I am not sure that he was 
 not rather impatient of a Philosophy that could not, or 
 would not, cast itself into fixed forms, in which to be 
 adjudicated upon. Jowett found truth everywhere, any- 
 where, by the intuition of guessing. Maurice seemed always 
 to find it in the great Creeds and Confessions, though read- 
 ing into them a meaning which seemed to most the very 
 opposite of their own. Now Nichol spent his whole energy 
 in drawing out clearly the lines of his philosophic faith ; 
 but this, be it always remembered, with an enthusiasm for 
 free discussion (whether in theology or politics) which was 
 perhaps his most distinctive feature. 
 
 " In that spirit he organized the O. M. I have since 
 belonged to many societies, lay or clerical, but none has 
 the same fascination for my memory as the 'Old Mortality.' 
 I remember it was said of Pater that his speculative 
 imagination seemed to make the lights burn blue. T. H. 
 Green preached Hegel, with the accent of a Puritan. And 
 what solemnity of authority could resist the edge of Dicey's 
 epigram ? 
 
 " In those days there were no married fellows, which was 
 one reason why Nichol was not a fellow, but stayed on 
 as a private tutor. In his house there was the grace and 
 sweetness of lady-presence ; how sweet and graceful those 
 only know who knew Mrs. Nichol." 
 
 Sheriff Mackay writes of the Oxford days as follows : 
 
 " I read Logic with him one or probably two terms, in 
 preparing for the final schools and found him a brilliant 
 tutor, equally at home in Aristotle, Plato, Bacon, and Mill. 
 His teaching was distinguished by clearness and precision, 
 but most of all by emphasis : the power of putting into 
 the pupil what he had himself acquired. I came to know 
 him better in the ' Old Mortality ' Society, of which he 
 was, I believe, the founder ; though Luke, T. H. Green the 
 
OXFORD: AND THE "OLD MORTALITY." 151 
 
 philosopher, Swinburne the poet, and A. V. Dicey, were 
 amongst the original members. They were all at Balliol, 
 but the society was disposed to welcome recruits from 
 other Colleges, of whom J . remember best James Bryce 
 of Trinity, T. H. Holland, and J. Payne of Magdalen, 
 Walter Pater (afterwards Fellow of Brasenose), and Hoole, 
 a student of Christ Church. The ' Old Mortality ' did 
 not differ from the many similar societies which spring up 
 in all universities between men of kindred tastes. It did 
 not swear allegiance to any master dead or living, although 
 most of the Balliol men, and indeed all the others also, 
 had felt the influence of Jowett, who was then the chief 
 intellectual power in Oxford, stimulating every one to do 
 his best, and criticizing from an armoury which seldom failed, 
 the weak points in his pupils. But if the ' Old Mortality ' 
 had any special distinction from other societies, it was the 
 absence of cliquishness and the admission of complete free- 
 dom of discussion. In all its discussions Nichol was the 
 readiest and most frequent speaker, always well informed, 
 always decided, and saved from dogmatism by bursts of 
 humour which enabled him generally to see the other side 
 of any subject. I specially remember his own essays on 
 Carlyle, of whom he was a warm, but even then a dis- 
 criminating, admirer." 
 
 The present Master of Balliol wrote : 
 
 " By some of the members of this society its meetings 
 are remembered as the very salt of their university life. 
 The free discussion of everything in heaven or earth, the 
 fresh enjoyment of intellectual sympathy, the fearless inter- 
 communion of spirits, the youthful faith that the key of 
 truth lies very near to our hands, give a unique zest 
 and charm to those meetings of students with students, 
 before the inevitable parting of the ways of manhood has 
 come. And I think that, at least to the older members of 
 the Old Mortality Society, it is impossible to think of it apart 
 from the image of Nichol as one who gave impetus and 
 direction to the debates, who broke the ice and kindled the 
 fire of controversy by the impetuous freedom of his own 
 utterance. The great contest of North and South in the 
 
152 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 United States was then beginning, and Nichol and Green 
 showed themselves from the first well informed as to the 
 nature of the struggle, and zealously maintained the justice of 
 the Northern cause. They were, I think, among the first 
 in this country to recognize the genius for democratic 
 leadership which lay hid under the rough exterior and 
 Yankee humour of Lincoln." 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 
 
 Two letters, one descriptive of a voyage to Ireland, the 
 other of an excursion in Skye, addressed to William Jack, 
 then an undergraduate at Cambridge, may be added to 
 the previous record of Nichol's life at Oxford. The first 
 is as follows : 
 
 " Agnes and I got pitched, in going from Liverpool to 
 Cork, in a stupid screw built for deck passengers. Let me 
 warn you against taking ladies by that route; but on 
 landing I found consolation in the sight of old friends 
 and the memories of many years ago. Have you ever 
 visited the native shores of your Irish friend ? If not, 
 ' there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio.' 
 When you go, don't mince matters by the half-civilized 
 Belfast or Dublin approach ; cast aside all fear, arm your- 
 self with a good revolver, and plunge in medias res into 
 the midst of Paddydom, in the regions of the south-west 
 wind. There are lakes and bays more luxuriant than 
 England dreams of, the long range of the great Atlantic, 
 pigs in all their glory, sunny isles in sunny seas, deep 
 dark valleys with the voice of pines and cataracts, and 
 overhanging crags and hills whose steep ascent rivals the 
 ridges of our Scotch glens. There are glorious echoes at 
 every turn, and guides who make you pay for them. Fine 
 old legends, and finer yarns of yesterday's spinning about 
 castles and cliffs, and who knows what ! There are the 
 finest ragamuffins in the world ; men of a romantic Spanish 
 complexion, oval features, and fascinating expression, living 
 in mud cabins without windows or chimneys, clad in tatters 
 
154 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 and swarming with fleas ; they are moreover the greatest 
 liars on the face of the earth. Then the women ! Won- 
 derful is the beauty of these ' peasant girls with bright 
 black eyes, and hands which offer early flowers,' yea which 
 run screaming after your cars insisting that you shall take 
 early flowers for sixpence apiece, who follow you every- 
 where, who mob you in the glens and track you up the 
 mountains with bog-oak and goats' milk, and cheap lace 
 and poteen, with blessings or curses for your honour 
 according as your honour gives them halfpence or does 
 not give them halfpence, for they are beggars to the back- 
 bone, and the daughters of beggars. Poor Ireland, and yet 
 a richer land never lay beneath the sun, waiting to bless 
 the efforts of honest toil." 
 
 In Nichol's Journal, where a more detailed descriptive 
 account of this tour is given, there is the following account 
 of a Sunday morning spent at Limerick : 
 
 " In the forenoon we went to mass. The chapel is a 
 comparatively poor one, and the service seemed meaning- 
 less to an uninitiated mind and eye, save those notes 
 worthy of Grisi that were chanted from some sweet silvery 
 voice above. But behind ! O heavens, what a spectacle ! 
 There are a thousand poor people crowded together to 
 gaze on these ceremonies in the firm belief that, when 
 that priest's robe is lifted, the mystery of their hearts is 
 unveiled, that on the breaking of that wafer depends the 
 salvation of their souls. Would we who are not Catholics 
 were half as faithful, would we were half as much in 
 earnest as these ragged creatures who are counting their 
 beads, and shuddering and beating their breasts, as these 
 hard men who will, in some rude town of the Shannon, 
 shed torrents of tears when a band of stupid monks 
 passes by." 
 
 The second of the two letters is as follows : 
 
 " Observatory, 3rd Sept., 1857. 
 
 " My Dear Jack, Did you ever experience, after some 
 days' continuous walking, a certain difficulty in sitting still ? 
 It seems natural that a certain number of miles should be 
 gone over before dinner, and I keep pacing the hall to 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 1 55 
 
 the detriment of this letter of yours. Swinburne has been 
 with me for a fortnight or so, and we have just returned 
 from a trip to Skye. Shall I again undertake the office 
 of a guide-book, and tell you something about it? Well, 
 we have been little more than a week away, and it seems 
 a couple of months at least. You might persuade me 
 that I have been round the Cape and back again, so 
 utterly have we felt ourselves in strange lands of heather 
 and sea, and hills and perpetual Gaelic. You know the 
 sail to Oban, how grand it is. Beyond the point of Ard- 
 namurchan it is grander still, a wider ocean and higher 
 mountains stretch behind long reefs of barren rock ; the 
 Coolin hills, the mountains of Rum, and the crags of Eig, 
 form a complete amphitheatre of magnificence. In Skye 
 itself certainly the most wonderful spectacles are the bay 
 of Scavaig, and the head of Coruisk. Imagine a deeper 
 Glen Sannox, hemmed in by more tremendous crags, jet 
 black and lowering, with a bluish-grey lake like Acheron 
 beneath them, with the floating mists like dread phantoms 
 of evil spirits around it, and you have a faint idea of 
 Coruisk. The splintered shafts of the Coolin hills seem to 
 rise right from the entrance of the bay. It is best seen 
 as we saw it from a boat lying a little way from the 
 landing, but at every turn there is some new sublimity. 
 "We climbed Blaven, the highest peak in Skye, 1 with no 
 great danger. But, if you are ever in the north of Skye, 
 don't try to get up Quiraing without a guide. Crosskey 
 and I succeeded, but we were very glad to get down again 
 with cartloads of stones accompanying us. Our 
 
 farthest point was Uig, a city of farms. Crosskey and I 
 came tumbling into it at night about eleven, having walked 
 from the Storr ! Swinburne had gone on before by the 
 main road to secure beds, but how to find the inn was the 
 mystery. We asked every passer-by in the dark, but they 
 were mostly girls, who ran away scared, shouting, " No 
 English." After much labour we alighted on the inn. It 
 looked like a stable, or rather a byre. We got in, however, 
 and found Swinburne waiting for us. . Meanwhile, 
 
 bear in mind a good impression of the shed-inn at Uig. 
 1 This is not correct. Sgurr-nan-Gillean is higher 
 
156 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 We had cream and butter, and ham and eggs, yea lamb 
 chops and tea, which I defy any house in London to show 
 up on silver plate. We slept well and fared well, and 
 next day left in a dog-cart for Portree. We had some 
 accidents, but on the whole the sky(e) favoured us miracu- 
 lously. Swinburne says we ran a Muck once or twice, 
 and were like to have made a Mull of the affair, but on 
 the whole it was a Rum go! The desecrated and insulted 
 islands will yet arise in judgment against him. We had 
 only one wet day, and that gave us an opportunity of testing 
 the hospitality of the natives. We went into a gentle- 
 man's house to inquire the way to a yacht towards which 
 we were bent, and he would not let us away till next 
 morning when the weather was fine. I had barely an 
 introduction to him, but this sort of generosity is not 
 uncommon here. On the other hand, guides and boatmen 
 have their wits well sharpened by tourist corruption, and 
 ' the cry of the children ' is something to be heard along the 
 road, though not to the same extent as in Ireland." 
 
 After 1857 Nichol's Journal was less carefully kept, and 
 the letters of his that are preserved and available are scarce. 
 He says of the year 1858: 
 
 "I kept no journal of this year; my letters are scattered 
 among the various persons to whom they were addressed. 
 I was weary of recounting the same round of incident, and 
 doubtful of the good effect of the self analysis fostered by 
 a transcript of my changeful moods. Yet it was the most 
 important year of my residence at Oxford. I had got over 
 the work I found uninteresting, and found myself suddenly 
 in pleasant and familiar fields, when I passed from con- 
 jugating verbs to following arguments, from writing Greek 
 prose and Latin verse to the intelligent study of Thucydides 
 and Plato. I had to repeat what I had done five years 
 before at Glasgow, when my aim was not to write 
 like the Greeks and Romans, but to understand their history 
 and illustrate their thought. ... I did not return in the 
 Easter vacation of this year, but stayed at Oxford, with 
 the interruption of a week spent with some friends in 
 Kent, from the middle of January till near the close of June. 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 
 
 157 
 
 " From Jowett I got every assistance in my studies of Plato 
 and Greek philosophy that one, whose genius for Philosophy 
 was only matched by his genius for teaching, could give. 
 He gave me advice, assistance, encouragement, like the 
 wisest of instructors and the best of friends. To him, 
 and to the lectures of W. L. Newman, I owe all I was 
 really taught at Oxford. I speak of tutorial instruction. 
 I had striking lights thrown upon certain important points 
 of history by Professor Vaughan, whose successor is as 
 eloquent without being equally original. Max Miiller's 
 lectures were so full of talent that they almost gave me an 
 interest in Philology, and Mr. Philips led me again over my 
 old favourite ground in his class-room, and I went to seek 
 fossils with him on his excursion days. The criticisms of 
 Matthew Arnold as Professor of Poetry went along with 
 his Merope to give me a much lower opinion of him than 
 I used to have. When I came to know Greek better I 
 found him little more than an exquisite imitator. He 
 knows Sophocles, but it is to the exclusion of Shakespeare, 
 and his judgment is as much reactionary and partial as 
 that of Rossetti and the pre-Raphaelites. They both move 
 back, only in different directions. 1 I gave my opinion on 
 this and some other subjects more at length in a series of 
 literary and political papers which I edited during those 
 two terms, and which from the exceptional character of the 
 views advocated by myself and the circle of my friends 
 made some talk in Oxford. These Undergraduate Papers 
 were the organ of the ' Old Mortality ' as far as it thought 
 fit to make itself public. I wrote several articles, as 'Louis 
 Napoleon,' 'Wycliffe,' 'Love and Marriage,' 'Locke,' 'Merope,' 
 'Mazzini,' which amused my leisure hours. The magazine 
 fell, but our literary evenings were continued as briskly as 
 ever, and it was now for the first time that I began to feel 
 myself one of a circle similar to that which had so often 
 met over supper at our Noctes Ambrosianae at Glasgow. 
 
 1 Nichol ultimately entertained a much higher opinion of Matthew 
 Arnold than is here expressed ; but it may be noted that a similar 
 view in regard to Arnold's lectures as Professor of Poetry was taken by 
 Mr. Swinburne at this time, in an article entitled "Modern Hellenism," 
 contributed to Undergraduate Papers. 
 
158 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 These terms were out of sight the most agreeable I had 
 spent at Oxford." 
 
 The following sentence, from a letter written to his 
 sister in April, supplements what is written in his Journal 
 in reference to his Oxford teachers : " I get to know more 
 and more of Newman, and like him, next to Jowett, better 
 than any one else I have met here among my seniors. 
 He has besides more enthusiasm than Jowett, and wider, 
 though not deeper, sympathies." 
 
 In the autumn of 1858, Nichol took his sister to Hil- 
 desheim, in Hanover ; where she went, for a few months, to 
 study Music and German. 
 
 He wrote to her from Oxford in November : 
 
 "Winter has set in here too. The moon looks like a shin- 
 ing plate of ice to-night, and to-morrow it will be chill 
 and misty till the sun breaks out at noon. If the cold is 
 as great in proportion with you it must be intense indeed. 
 I have from what you tell me, and those at home, a very 
 complete idea of your new life. I should feel very dull 
 indeed if I could not form some picture of it at the different 
 hours of the day. . . . One thing my trip has taught me, 
 that the rapid motion we are accustomed to in this rapid 
 land does not suit with the Continent. It seems absurd 
 to say so, but the genius of the land there is leisurely, 
 and it is a mistake to strive against it. As to the outward 
 details of my life here, I am more comfortable than usual, 
 being left to attend what I please, and work at what I 
 prefer. No one made any opposition to the plan of my 
 staying at home next term, and only coming back to take 
 my degree. I have secured my rooms here for the summer. 
 Swinburne will step into my place when I am away, and 
 withdraw to make room for me again when I return. 
 
 " Meanwhile I am working at History and Philosophy, and 
 writing essays for Jowett. I have taken two to him of 
 some length, and he has been pleased to express his 
 approval pretty emphatically. He told me I should easily 
 have got a first class, had I gone in this time ; and I accept 
 the compliment without reflection, for I am sure he is 
 wrong ! I may not get it next time. . . . Jlavra pel, 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 1 59 
 
 everything flows, is the motto of one of the old sages I 
 have been reading about. I am thinking now when I 
 quote it of the changes here, and the various courses those 
 of us who have wrought and thought together are about 
 to take. Three of my friends have left this term, Grenfell, 
 Hill, and Dr. Atkinson. I see their faces no more, and I 
 feel the blank. Dicey has entered at Lincoln's Inn, as 
 my father wished me to do this autumn. Luke, Broughton, 
 and Green will take their degree along with me, they will 
 get their fellowships in time, and I shall follow my path 
 'to New Americas, or wheresoever God wills.'" 
 
 On a Sunday in February, 1859, he wrote to her 
 again from the Observatory : 
 
 " It is a gentle evening, with sunshine and summer 
 sounds ; the birds think it is spring, the sun is so balmy 
 and clear. Yesterday there was rain and clouds and 
 wind, now it is all bright and beautiful. The town is 
 lying quietly beneath, with its church towers and bells ; 
 the hills with their white peaks are glittering beyond, 
 under wreaths of purple and violet. . . . Yes, it is 
 pleasant to write, whether in letters to those who love 
 us, or in measured music to ourselves with nothing to say. 
 Then the thoughts that come do not seem to come from 
 earth, they come faster, freer, more deliciously : they run 
 away with us ; we do not run after them. It is only 
 when they have left their record that we find, as if it were 
 a wonder, that we have had something to say. Where has 
 it come from ? I know. From our hearts where it has 
 been kept prisoner so long, shut up in bolts and bars, 
 chained down by weariness and anxiety. Only now and 
 then these bars are loosened, and the long captive fancies, 
 the half stifled loves, take wing ; and it is they who fly 
 away with us, over hill top and valley. This is the 
 meaning of inspiration ; it is an opening of the heart, so 
 that it may speak out boldly what it feels. Some hearts, 
 like mine, are seldom opened. Others are always open, 
 and have no time to gather up any treasures. Others, the 
 grand ones, are open too ; but there flows through them 
 such a stream of being, they know and feel so much, 
 that they are like a perpetual spring of living water. 
 
160 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 There is a foundation for you, for a whole theory of 
 poetry ! . . . 
 
 " Crosskey gave us a pleasant sermon this forenoon. He 
 said among other things : ' I sometimes think we 
 should never have known God had we not been bound 
 together in families. We do not know how close are the 
 links that bind the members of a family together till one 
 of them is broken. I never heard of a son or daughter 
 in a family being lost or having gone astray, without being 
 told at the same time that it was the favourite child.' There 
 seemed to me in that remark something very touching and 
 very true : he was touched himself, and his voice assumed 
 a sweeter tone as he said it. These things do more good 
 in a sermon than the most exact logic, or the most subtle 
 metaphysics, which I am afraid would be too prevalent in 
 my preaching, were I a preacher. I cannot often speak to 
 men in that way : I am too much afraid of them, their 
 general harshness and the wrinkled sneer,' which is alike 
 deadly to themselves, and to those who might otherwise do 
 them some good. It is a sort of cowardice, this excessive 
 shyness, and yet it is hard to escape from it. The exteriors 
 of men are so terribly cold ; and yet there is in the hardest 
 some well of tenderness, could one but reach it. E. tells 
 me in one of her letters that I do not show myself as I am 
 for a long time, that she is sure few people can know me, 
 for I wear ' a mask of Scotch coldness, and reserve, and 
 precision,' that it is impossible for most people to see 
 through. 
 
 " I am half inclined to think it true, for I feel the wish often 
 to wear such a mask, and perhaps I may have succeeded 
 rather too well. ... I can do without that sort of love, 
 my child. I must do without it, if I follow the long road 
 over cold grey stones to the craggy heights that my father 
 points out for me ; but I cannot do without a share of 
 freedom, and the sense of living to some more purpose 
 than I have lived during the past six years of my man- 
 hood. Manhood with the tasks of boyhood ! that is near 
 an end. Come what may, that is near an end. Mean- 
 while one more effort, to be followed, as is most likely, 
 by one more failure. Never fear. I will stand that, like 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. l6l 
 
 a rock that has long been beaten by the salt sea, one 
 buffet more will matter little ; the sunshine of love 
 is above the poor cliff still, and the green moss grows 
 over it, and a little spring of song that bubbles up once in 
 a year, and is sweet to the rock itself, though no one 
 knows it is there." 
 
 The " one more effort " referred to in the foregoing 
 letter was his examination for the " final schools," which 
 had to be taken in June. He had still some thoughts 
 of going to the Bar, a career which his father considered 
 desirable for him; and in November, 1859, he was 
 admitted a member of Gray's Inn. But, for various 
 reasons, an academical life was thought more suitable ; 
 and to obtain a first class in the " finals " at Oxford was 
 of great importance to him. Ill-health during the spring 
 made him extremely nervous as to the result of the 
 examination ; and to encourage him the Master of Balliol 
 wrote as follows : 
 
 Mrs. Cottle's Lodgings, 
 Clevedon, near Bristol, April 14. 
 
 My dear Nichol, Most men's chance of getting a first 
 class depends on how much they read during the last two 
 months. I think yours depends on how little. Shall I 
 add some prescriptions for you : 
 
 (1) Never to read more than five or six hours a day, 
 and to get all the exercise and relaxation that you possibly 
 can. (2) Never to sit up after twelve. (3) To learn a few 
 lines of Cicero by heart, and to copy out carefully a page 
 of Greek, say the definitions of Aristotle, or some difficult 
 places in Plato, every day. If you neglect No. 1 and 2 
 you will come to no good end. 
 
 I, and those who know you and Oxford, have no doubt 
 of your obtaining a first class. Or, perhaps, I should say 
 hardly any, for the doubt is only about your health. 
 
 This is an old story between us ; but it is necessary to 
 repeat it once more, for the last time, when you have so 
 much need of health and nerves. The papers that you 
 have done for me in Philosophy and History show me that 
 you know far more than enough to get a first class, and 
 
 L 
 
1 62 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 your translations were often excellent. But you may lose 
 all power of putting things into form, by bad health and 
 spirits. Ever your sincere friend, B. Jowett. 
 
 Mrs. Gilbank's, Chestnut Hill, Keswick. 
 My dear Nichol, . . . Should you break down in 
 health which I rather fear shut up your books, and go for 
 three weeks, or a month to the Highlands. I think you can 
 spare a month even if you go up this time. I have 
 little doubt of your success. When you are ill, or depressed, 
 you have a morbid desire to work. . . . You have 
 sufficient ability to do anything you can want, and more 
 than sufficient, if you will only acquire the power of 
 sympathy, and sociability with others ; not with a clique 
 merely, or a few warm and attached friends, but with men 
 in general, of all ranks and sorts. . . . Ever yours, 
 
 B. Jowett. 
 
 Clevedon, until Wednesday. 
 
 My dear Nichol, . . . About the theological exam- 
 ination I hardly know what to say. The reasons that I 
 gave before seem to be good still. But if you think that 
 the employment of a fortnight in getting up Divinity will 
 unsettle you, and endanger your first class, I cannot urge 
 you to pass it. . . . One ought not to have the springs 
 of the will cut away by the nerves. But then comes the 
 difficulty : it is not an ecstatic effort of the will that is 
 wanted, but just quietness and peace and a trust in some- 
 thing beyond, even amid suffering and painful self-conscious- 
 ness. To which I must add though it is a sad anti- 
 climax air, and exercise, and regular hours. You certainly 
 estimate yourself much lower than I, or any of your 
 friends, would. . . . Ever yours, in haste, B. JOWETT. 
 
 Two other letters from the Master of Balliol may follow 
 these : 
 
 Address, Oxford, Dec. 28. 
 
 My dear Nichol, ... I would advise you also to 
 take endless pains about " style," and write and re-write, 
 not twice, but five or six times. I don't mean, of course, 
 ordinary lectures, but anything which is to appear as a 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 163 
 
 finished composition with your name. Perfect simplicity 
 and connection of style is an acquisition quite invaluable, 
 and worth any money or pains especially in your position. 
 ... In haste, ever most truly yours, B. Jowett. 
 
 Balliol College. 
 My dear Nichol, ... I don't think that I disagree 
 with you really much about style. I chiefly mean that 
 style is an endless interminable study, and that great strict- 
 ness in taste is the first duty of a professsor. ... I am, 
 ever yours, B j WETT. 
 
 On May 1 6th, Nichol wrote in his diary : " By Birming- 
 ham to Oxford. Received with all kindness by my friends. 
 Luke, Swinburne, Dicey, Grenfell, and others came to see 
 me, and read to me when I could bear reading. I could 
 hardly bear to read anything myself. Tried a little of 
 Thirlwall and some Thucydides, but to little purpose. Dr. 
 Symonds, finding that I must be examined, did what he 
 could. Jowett, in walks and talks, tried to reassure me; 
 and exaggerate my chances of success." 
 
 On 7th June, after the examination, he wrote, " To 
 Cumnor with Swinburne. Edgar Poe, and green leaves. 
 Chaucer in the evening. Jowett sends for me, to his inner 
 room ; rest on the sofa. Shouts without announce Riddell 
 and the Class List. 1st Class Green, Luke, Nichol ('Old 
 Mortality '), Warner, and Warre. Dull misery for three 
 days. No use. Must to London to hear ' Don Giovanni,' 
 and visit and make love and dance." 
 
 He went to London ; meeting, among others, Mazzini 
 twice, and paying a second call on Carlyle, thus chronicled : 
 " To Chelsea. Surly reception by Thomas, and Mrs. C. ; 
 I won't go there again till I am asked." 
 
 The later part of the summer was spent in Scotland ; 
 resting, and walking in the Highlands. Of one of these 
 excursions, he wrote : " The walk was enlivened by troops 
 of the native peasantry, in long lines and holiday dress, 
 flocking to the great yearly communion. W. F. and I 
 went to attend a service. Horrid high Calvinistic Free 
 Churchism. I admired the Gaelic sermon with its drawling 
 
1 64 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 notes much more ; because I could not understand it ! I 
 admired the congregation, because I could understand the 
 religious feeling which brought them there youth, and 
 manhood, and the last steps of age to participate in the 
 blessings of a Sacrament in which they believe. I admired, 
 above all, the hymn ; the low chant, and then the long 
 chime, which fell on the ear like notes of wandering music 
 from an vEolian harp, set in the amphitheatre of those 
 rocks, a harp of which every string was a human voice, 
 and every echo a human aspiration." 
 
 With his Oxford undergraduate career, just brought to a 
 satisfactory conclusion and resting in the old home he 
 loved so well the immediate future, at any rate, may well 
 have looked bright to Nichol. But the shadow was once 
 more about to descend upon the family at the Observatory. 
 His father's health had for some years been much weak- 
 ened, and on the 1 9th of September, after a short last illness, 
 he died at Rothesay, at the age of fifty-five, of congestion 
 of the brain. It was for Scotland a great public loss, which 
 was long felt ; for his wife and children it was a sorrow 
 never to be forgotten. 
 
 Great personal sorrows should not, as a rule, be brought 
 before the gaze of the general public. Almost everyone 
 knows that the profoundest things in life its " bitter, 
 forlorn farewells" are, each of them, his or her own to 
 endure in silence whether it be a silence from which the 
 sufferer emerges with existence ennobled, or with life turned 
 to ashes ; and yet a letter, written by Nichol to his father's 
 widow, may find a place here, sent as it was to one who 
 had always striven to supply the place of a mother to 
 her husband's now entirely orphaned children, and one 
 whose tenderness was, on their part, reciprocated by an 
 ever-reverent affection. It was addressed to Mrs. E. P. 
 Nichol, on her arrival at Huntly Lodge, Edinburgh : 
 
 "51 St. Giles', 
 " Oxford, May 3rd, i860. 
 
 " My dear Elizabeth, This will find you on your arrival 
 at your new home. I will think of you all to-morrow, a 
 strange day in our history ; for, when I remember that you 
 are leaving the Observatory, I feel that I am severed from 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 165 
 
 it, by the loosening of the last link that has till now still 
 bound me to it. It is the symbol of my breaking off from 
 all my past life, and passing into a new world. What has 
 been will remain in memory for ever, but those scenes and 
 associations can only be parts henceforth of an unforgotten 
 past. I cannot think that I am to address this to you 
 at home, and not in our ' old home.' I will never realize 
 it till I come back, and not to that hill top. 
 
 "Yet it is all very true what we have said to each other 
 so often. The Observatory, without the presence of the 
 one who inspired it, would always have had a deeper gloom 
 resting over it from the very contrast. May those recollec- 
 tions now avail only to solemnize us, without arresting 
 the energies of thought and action, which with returning 
 health and hope may find a new employment in new 
 spheres and conditions of life. May God bless you, and 
 my dear sister, in Huntly Lodge ! Surely there is some- 
 thing beyond these clouds, a sun to shine upon us all ; 
 and I look forward, as well as linger over, what has been, 
 when I offer you my welcome to your new home." 
 
 During the year i860 Nichol resided partly in London 
 as he still half-intended to join the English Bar, and was 
 " keeping his terms " and partly in Oxford. Almost 
 immediately after taking his B.A. degree (he consistently 
 refused, as Mr. Dicey has indicated, to proceed to the 
 M.A. degree, until religious tests were abolished), he began 
 to make for himself a considerable reputation, as one of 
 the most successful "coaches" for the philosophical side of 
 the Final Honours Schools, that the University had known 
 for long, a reputation which followed him years after he 
 had severed all direct connection with Oxford. His 
 recreations during this year of sorrow, fought down by 
 toil, were chiefly found in an excursion to Paris and the 
 south of France, in the company of Mr. A. V. Dicey, and in 
 a visit to his life-long friends, Mr. and Mrs. Sydney Dobell, 
 then living at Niton, in the Isle of Wight. But a new hope 
 and inspiration were finding their way into his heart a hope 
 and inspiration which gave birth to the following poem, 
 written on the ninth anniversary of his mother's death : 
 
1 66 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 To J. S. B. 
 
 Again with mournful memories rife, 
 And phantom hosts that haunt the soul, 
 Dawns the funereal day that stole 
 
 From me the fairer half of life. 
 
 Nine years have passed : with double gloom 
 This morning comes ; a deeper shade 
 Hangs on the hills since I have paid 
 
 A double tribute to the tomb. 
 
 " He loves and chastens," let us sing, 
 Amid the mazes of His will, 
 The seasons with their sorrows still 
 
 Their unsuspected blessings bring. 
 
 When all my heaven was hung with shrouds 
 I longed to sleep a dreamless sleep, 
 Then came a Voice from out the deep, 
 
 A star gleamed through the rifted clouds. 
 
 From the dark veil the mystic Hand 
 That came to take was stretched to give, 
 And gentler music bade me live 
 
 With sunshine in a promised land. 
 
 New hope inspired my failing breath ; 
 On me descended like a dove 
 God's greatest gift, the crown of Love 
 
 The only counter-charm of Death. 
 
 Now the long winter of the skies 
 
 Is crossed by gleams of coming spring; 
 Peace after storms, the church bells ring, 
 
 The weary ship in harbour lies. 
 
 The tide of evil days is spent, 
 I have a solace for my woes, 
 And deep through all my being flows 
 
 An undercurrent of content. 
 
 With a new gladness intertwined, 
 My grief is softened for a while; 
 The radiance of thy Sabbath smile 
 
 Makes this a Sabbath in my mind. 
 
 March 18, i860. 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 167 
 
 Another unpublished poem, which he named Epilogue, 
 in a MS. volume of verse, may follow this one : 
 
 EPILOGUE. 
 
 My task is done if so I may 
 Christen the echo of a thought 
 From lake and hill and river caught 
 
 The weaving of an idle lay. 
 
 So ceasing, if I deemed an hour 
 
 Had been made sweeter by the sound, 
 If your too gentle eyes have found 
 
 Among those tangled weeds a flower, 
 
 I'd praise my voice, I'd praise the lute 
 I played upon and made you smile, 
 Though all the critic world the while 
 
 Should wish my lips for ever mute. 
 
 I only wrote what love revealed : 
 
 If nothing yet has wholly drowned 
 
 The aching of an ancient wound 
 That closed when first our love was sealed. 
 
 Forget it and forgive the wrong, 
 
 Forget the foolish fancies there, 
 
 And in the winter deign to wear 
 The autumn roses of my song. 
 
 My evening star the old grey walls 
 
 Are steeped in sunset tower and town ; 
 Even as I write the sun is down, 
 
 And moonlight on the paper falls. 
 
 Through shifting light and changing scene 
 Our course runs onward to its close ; 
 But in the twilight of repose 
 
 Our love will keep our memories green. 
 
 Fair through th' autumnal years of life, 
 Mornings of childhood gleam again ; 
 Sweeter the hill and stream and plain 
 
 Where first I wandered with my wife. 
 
 My task is o'er our holiday 
 
 Across the pleasant summer hours 
 
 I throw a votive wreath of flowers, 
 One lingering look and go my way. 
 
1 68 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 His deeper thoughts and emotions during this year are 
 expressed in letters written to her who was soon to become 
 his wife. It would be an offence against the sanctities 
 of life to quote at length from a correspondence so utterly 
 private, but, for the sake of carrying on the narrative, a 
 few extracts may be given from passages which admit of 
 publication : 
 
 To J. S. B. 
 
 " I had a long talk with Kossuth the other forenoon ; 
 he seems to be in tolerably good spirits.. I have heard 
 from a friend, who will be very angry that I do not appear 
 at Florence this spring, that Mazzini has just returned to 
 London. I shall certainly call and spend an evening with 
 him and renew our disputes, and be scolded for premature 
 scepticism, and like him better than ever. You do not do 
 him justice. Right or wrong in his views, he is one of the 
 purest, most upright, and most fascinating men I have ever 
 met. His fault is that he is more of a poet than a states- 
 man, a thinker acting out his thought with a fiery energy 
 too regardless of the necessary modifications which politics 
 impose upon abstract principles." 
 
 To the Same. 
 
 " .... I have finished the book I spoke of, Haw- 
 thorne's Transformation, and think it in some respects his 
 greatest work. Reading it has been to me a great delight. 
 I have read so many books lately with which I have been 
 only half satisfied that I was afraid I had lost my faculty 
 of appreciation, and was lapsing into that painful mood of 
 indifference which takes nil admirari for its motto. But I 
 am again reassured by the impression I have received from 
 this wonderful romance. There are so many talented novels 
 written nowadays that we are apt to weary of the best 
 of them. I struggle through most of those I read, and 
 arrive at the end with the satisfactory sense of having 
 accomplished a task. I rushed through Hawthorne's in an 
 afternoon ; when I had closed it I felt as if I had bid 
 adieu to a wise and eloquent friend who had left me richer 
 for his converse. I do not know what the reviews will say 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 169 
 
 about Transformation ; probably they will censure the plot 
 as improbable and fantastic, and set off their censure by 
 some commonplaces about the beauty of the style. 
 
 " It may be a false taste of mine, but I confess to a very 
 limited relish for those exceedingly probable stories, like 
 Miss Austen's, whose whole merit consists in the accurate 
 portraiture of characters we may meet, of events which may 
 happen every day, and the graphic transcription of talk we 
 may hear at every tea table. Commonplace and bombast 
 are the Scylla and Charybdis of novelists, and I dislike 
 the one as much as the other. Hawthorne entirely avoids 
 either extreme; his style is perfectly classic, and his manner 
 chaste ; and if his thought and incident lead us into a land 
 of wonders, it is none the less intensely real. I cannot 
 understand what sort of experience of life those critics (so 
 plentiful in England) have had, who are constantly decrying 
 what they term improbabilities. I have no reason to 
 suppose that my own has been peculiarly romantic, and 
 yet it has brought me again and again into contact with 
 scenes and events as wonderful as any to be found in 
 romances. It is when we look on the surface of life only 
 that we lose sight of its wonder. There is much on the 
 surface that is interesting and instructive, much that affords 
 room for critical examination and keen satire, such as 
 Thackeray's. But the prerogative of a poet is the power 
 of seeing far beneath to the secret springs of thought and 
 action, the perplexities that are too subtle for outward 
 expression, and the mesmeric influences of one mind on 
 another. 
 
 " The special characteristic of Hawthorne is this subtle 
 power : writing in prose, he is yet more a poet than any- 
 thing else. Whether I regard their marvellous revelations 
 of character, or the imaginativeness of their descriptions 
 and the suggestive wisdom of their reflections, I cannot 
 help thinking there is as much poetry in The Scarlet Letter, 
 or Transformation, as in the Idylls of the King. Most 
 people would think this very absurd. I cannot agree with 
 them any more than I can persuade your father to think 
 Browning a greater poet than his wife, or my Italian friend 
 to admit that Byron was a very small man in comparison 
 
I JO MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 with Shakespeare. In matters of taste we must each after all 
 judge very much for ourselves. If I teach Rhetoric to a 
 class, I shall have to teach them that not very much of it 
 can be taught. All I can say is there are passages in 
 those novels which have thrilled me more, and which I 
 have felt to be truer and deeper, than almost any others 
 in our recent literature." 
 
 To the Same. 
 
 "... To-night I have good news, which both you and 
 your father will like to hear. I had six pupils reading 
 with me for the final examination. The class list has just 
 come out; the first class contains six names, and four of 
 them are my pupils ; all I expected to succeed, and one 
 more ; they are as follows, Berkley, Latham, E. C. Boyle, 
 Butler-Johnstone ! Hurrah ! 
 
 " Edmondes, the only other who expected high honours, 
 has a second. I have not been so much pleased by 
 University news since I got my own class. The whole 
 four men are especially favourites of mine. The first 1 is 
 the cleverest of the four, and really an original meta- 
 physician ; the second is a poet in a sense, for he got the 
 Newdegate some years ago ; the other two you know 
 something of." 
 
 On the ioth of April, 1861, John Nichol was married 
 to Jane Stewart Bell, eldest daughter of Henry Glassford 
 Bell, advocate afterwards Sheriff of Lanarkshire by his 
 marriage with his first wife, Sophia Stewart, only child of 
 Captain Stewart of Shierglas, Glengarry. It was, as Nichol 
 always acknowledged, the most fortunate event of his life. 
 The lady who accepted him as her husband was lovely in 
 face, a woman of rare intelligence, and utterly without a 
 thought of self; a strength to her husband, when he sought 
 her counsel for the guidance of life ; and a refuge in 
 which he found shelter from the storms of the world. 
 Many a student knows many more, probably, do not 
 know how much of the kindness and forbearance they 
 
 1 The Rev. W. Berkley, now Vicar of Navestock, one of " The Old 
 Mortality." See pp. 148-150. 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 171 
 
 received at the hands of their Professor was due in the 
 first place, to the promptings of her comprehensive and 
 ever-compassionate charity. For the rest, for what concerns 
 Mrs. Nichol herself, all those who loved her which means 
 all who knew her will understand the feeling of her 
 children that silence only is adequate to honour the memory 
 of one, with whose passing away something irrecoverable 
 has gone out of their lives. In spite of her bountiful 
 gifts of humour, and rich human sympathy, those who 
 loved her always felt that much of her charm was due 
 to the fact that her personality seemed to shed the fragrance 
 of " a garden enclosed " a garden whose most perfect 
 flowers could not fully open on this earth. 
 
 Three children, a son and two daughters, were born of 
 the marriage. 
 
 They made their wedding-tour in Switzerland, and the 
 Pyrenees. In the autumn, Nichol re-commenced " coaching " 
 at Oxford. 
 
 The following spring was saddened for both husband 
 and wife by the death, by drowning in the Isis, of their 
 friend Mr. George Rankine Luke, then fellow and tutor of 
 Christ Church. Nichol wrote a brief estimate of his friend's 
 character and intellect in a now defunct quarterly magazine, 
 The Museum, to which he occasionally contributed. 
 
 Two poems, hitherto unpublished, addressed to Mrs. 
 Nichol, will appropriately conclude this chapter. The first 
 was addressed to her before their marriage, and to the 
 second which is as fine as anything he ever wrote it 
 would be difficult to find a parallel. 
 
 I. 
 Move her mind in dreams this night 
 
 To remember me ; 
 Spirits, in your tranquil flight, 
 O'er her bend and whisper light, 
 
 ' Well, he loveth thee.' 
 
 Stars, upon your heavenly hest, 
 
 Lend an influence meet ; 
 Fairies, on your aery quest, 
 Mingle with her maiden rest 
 
 Visions wild and sweet. 
 
172 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 Let her gentler fancies dwell 
 
 With the tuneful spheres ; 
 Angels, as ye guard her well, 
 Speak of one who wakes, and tell 
 The story of his fears. 
 
 From thy azure throne above 
 
 Stars and angels set, 
 
 God, O let thy elder Love, 
 
 Her diviner spirit move 
 
 To redeem me yet ! 
 
 Observatory, Glasgow, 
 January, i860. 
 
 II. 
 
 My love, my love, the golden hours 
 Have come at last for you and me ; 
 
 Fresh fragrance floats above the flowers, 
 A morning glory o'er the sea. 
 
 The breeze long lingering comes, and brings 
 
 The feeling of a new delight, 
 It comes with healing on its wings 
 
 To chase the shadows of the night. 
 
 Our honeymoon they say is o'er, 
 And yet our walks are sweet as ever ; 
 
 Whether we watch the purple shore, 
 Or ramble by the winding river. 
 
 The noontide in a sultry clime 
 
 Burns fiercely on the silent sands ; 
 
 The cool of evening is the time 
 When song-birds sing in southern lands. 
 
 Thus, though my passion grows more calm, 
 That feverish pulse that throbs and dies, 
 
 Still from your lips I gather balm, 
 And inspiration from your eyes. 
 
 The world moves onward, but our love 
 Grows deeper, stronger, day by day, 
 
 Draws clearer accents from above, 
 And leads us by a nobler way. 
 
LATER YEARS AT OXFORD. 173 
 
 My honeymoon they say is o'er ; 
 
 My happy years are but begun, 
 With thee to gleam a star before 
 
 My path, till all my work is done. 
 
 Good night, my love, good night. 
 
 The song that the sea is singing 
 Is gentle and soft to-night ; 
 
 The lustre the stars are flinging 
 On the bay is tender and bright ; 
 
 The bark like a bird is springing 
 Along the waves to-night, 
 
 And a tune in my head keeps ringing 
 That makes my heart more light ; 
 
 Good night, my love, good night. 
 
 May, 1861. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 
 
 A. ELECTION TO THE CHAIR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 
 IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW. 
 
 After a time Nichol became very weary of the routine of 
 Collegiate life at Oxford. So far as the talk in the Common 
 Rooms was confined to the work of pupils, just as one 
 of his correspondents put it " as the masters of schools 
 talk about the boys they have flogged during the day," it 
 had no interest for him. The dulness of official respecta- 
 bility was always abhorrent to him, and he longed for 
 what he thought with the memory of his Glasgow student 
 days would be the freer life of a University Professor in 
 Scotland. The intellectual atmosphere of Oxford at that 
 particular time was somewhat soporific ; and there is 
 abundant evidence in his letters that, rightly or wrongly, 
 what he considered its limitations, its airyfiedness, its in- 
 difference to any culture which transcended the treadmill 
 round of " smalls " or " greats," was distasteful to him. 
 He was an eminent " Oxford Man," but he valued the wide 
 experience of life obtained by contact with the larger 
 centres of civilization far more highly than the erudition 
 that is acquired in academic tunnels of any sort. No one 
 understood better than John Nichol did the value of life 
 at Oxford, both for the scholarly undergraduate, and for 
 the successful College tutor for a few years after graduation ; 
 but he did not care to live on, so engrossed with the 
 details of classical learning, as to become almost necessarily 
 ignorant of the vast realms of culture which surround it, or lie 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 175 
 
 outside of it. To go back from that Oxford, which he loved 
 so well and admired so much, to the old Observatory in 
 Glasgow was, to him, like passing from the torpor of 
 Mediaevalism to the stir of the sixteenth century. 
 
 How strange it is that " times go by turns." He after- 
 wards wished to return from that larger centre of industrial 
 and commercial activity, in which he had laboured long and 
 successfully, to the semi-mediaeval quiet which Oxford 
 still supplies. 
 
 In the year 1859 (although the published date is i860) 
 there was " printed for private circulation " a noteworthy little 
 book, which Nichol modestly but felicitously called Fragments 
 of Criticism. It had three sections, the first being devoted 
 to " Ancient Philosophy," the second to " Modern Litera- 
 ture," and the third to " Biographical Sketches." The first, 
 which dealt with various aspects of the Greek Philosophy 
 and its leaders, was to a large extent a resume" of his 
 Oxford lectures, in those days when he was so brilliant a 
 tutor and " coach." The second was partly reprinted from 
 the Oxford and Cambridge Magazine, Undergraduates' Papers, 
 and the Westminster Review. It dealt with Carlyle, Sydney 
 Dobell, Matthew Arnold, Mrs. Browning, and Tennyson. 
 The third went back to Greek and Roman antiquity, 
 and ended with an estimate of De Quincey and of 
 Carlyle ; the last paper being a remarkable anticipation of 
 his own maturer book on Carlyle, for the " English Men 
 of Letters " series. It was issued with a view to his 
 candidature for a chair of Philosophy or Literature, or 
 both combined ; but, although it had a publisher's imprint, 
 it was not offered for sale. 
 
 In December, 1859, he became a candidate for the 
 chair of Logic and English Literature in St. Andrews, 
 long held and adorned by Professor Spalding. He wrote to 
 a friend from Oxford, " I believe the position would exactly 
 suit me ; and, from the support I have already met with, 
 it seems I have some chance of success." 
 
 Mr. G. R. Luke, his great friend at Balliol who had 
 been a Snell Exhibitioner, an Ireland Scholar, and a first- 
 class man in Literae Humaniores wrote of him thus : 
 
 "He has been more open than any man I have ever 
 
176 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 known to every kind of intellectual interest ; he has taken 
 nothing superficially. He has carried into a wide range of 
 studies unvarying soundness of judgment, and the most 
 admirable thoroughness of investigation. . . . Besides 
 his comprehensive grasp of specially philosophic subjects, 
 the singularly philosophic spirit of fairness, and of patient 
 and unprejudiced discussion, with which he comes to 
 every question, is the admiration of all who know him. 
 He adds to his great knowledge of the sub- 
 ject an unusual capacity for communicating it, unrivalled 
 powers of elucidating what is intricate, and of illustrating 
 what is uninteresting or obscure. Not the least of Mr. 
 Nichol's qualifications for a high educational office is his 
 estimable personal character, his courage and honesty, his 
 open sympathies, his enthusiasm for all that is great and 
 good, and his rare magnanimity of temper. Interested in 
 nothing so much as in the good name of our Scottish 
 Universities, I strongly hope that Mr. Nichol will be elected 
 to a chair which he will fill with incomparable ability." 
 
 Mr. A. C. Swinburne wrote : 
 
 " Personally, I have to add, that I never received such 
 valuable help in the study of Logic as that which, in a 
 space of time necessarily short, I derived from his instruc- 
 tions. No one, I suppose, could be long in the more 
 intimate society of Mr. Nichol without appreciating his 
 steady grasp and comprehension of all matters connected 
 with Mental Science, aud his very rare power of imparting 
 knowledge simply, clearly, and thoroughly." 
 
 The late Master of Balliol, Mr. Henry Nettleship, Mr. 
 Donald Crawford, the Hon. Lionel A. Tollemache, and 
 many others, wrote strongly in his favour. 
 
 He did not succeed ; and the successful candidate 
 John Veitch was afterwards, first his rival (again success- 
 ful) for the chair of Logic and Rhetoric in the University 
 of Glasgow, and afterwards his colleague in that University 
 for more than twenty years. They were each distinguished 
 men, in very different ways. Both of them were philo- 
 sophers and poets, as well as literary critics ; and while 
 they did not always harmonize on matters academic or 
 literary, political, religious or social, there was a deep under- 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. \yy 
 
 current of appreciation on each side, beneath the surface 
 differences with which the public became acquainted. 
 
 His old college friend, Robert Flint, now Professor of 
 Theology in the University of Edinburgh, wrote to him 
 from Aberdeen : 
 
 " Let a Professorship fall to you just now or not, the 
 talents you have received in the way of parental inheritance, 
 when put out to usury, will do good service to the world ; 
 and I am certain that the doing of any real work for your 
 Country is its best reward. The Professorship, and other 
 things status and success will come before long." 
 
 His correspondent chaffed him for his admiration for 
 Keats, and his " unfairness to De Quincey " ; but added that 
 " it would be a great blessing to students of Philosophy in 
 our Universities to have as their teacher one who could 
 interpret the great Systems of the Past to them, in so 
 truthful and stimulating a manner, as you would." 
 
 Another correspondent wrote : " I thought all along that 
 Veitch was pretty sure of the chair of Logic in St. Andrews ; 
 but there will be one here (i.e. Aberdeen) shortly to be 
 filled up, where I should imagine that your chance would 
 be much better. Dr. M'Cosh and Mr. A. Bain are, I 
 believe, already applicants ; but I fancy there will be no 
 very strong liking for either. 1 sincerely believe that you are 
 better qualified than they are ; and in regard to ' Rhetoric ' 
 very much so indeed. I trust that you will try, and that 
 you will succeed." 
 
 It was probably a good thing for Nichol that he did 
 not get either a fellowship or a professorship at Oxford. 
 His election to the English Literature chair in the Uni- 
 versity of Glasgow, in April 1862 a chair which he filled 
 for a quarter of a century was far more helpful to his future 
 life-work than a career at Oxford would have been. 
 
 To be wafted by a favouring breeze into an academic haven 
 is usually the very worst thing for a distinguished under- 
 graduate ; while to become a Don in the thirties is often a 
 calamity to a large-brained and intellectually many-sided man. 
 
 On his election to the Glasgow chair he was congratu- 
 lated by many friends. A letter from the late Auditor of 
 
 M 
 
178 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 the Court of Session in Edinburgh, Mr. John Hunter of 
 Craigcrook who lived as a sort of literary Maecenas, in 
 Lord Jeffrey's old suburban haunt may be quoted : 
 
 " Allow me to offer my cordial congratulations on your 
 appointment to the Glasgow chair. I have had the greatest 
 possible anxiety, I may almost say unhappiness, from the 
 doubts and fears which have from time to time arisen on 
 this subject ; and the relief and pleasure to find that all 
 has gone right are doubly delightful to me. It is very 
 gratifying, too, to be able to say that, among all the doubtful 
 words that have been flying about, I have never heard one 
 as to your being of all the applicants for the chair the only 
 man that truly deserved to succeed." 
 
 The period in John Nichol's career, in which he did his 
 best work, and with which his distinctive services to Scot- 
 land will be permanently associated, is now reached. His 
 election to its new chair of English Literature in 1862 
 was a significant event in the academic history of the 
 University of Glasgow ; and it would be difficult to exag- 
 gerate its results, which influenced the whole future of the 
 University for many a year. 
 
 His interest in his students, his devotion to them, and 
 his constant work for them, are evidenced in many a letter 
 he received, when they were afterwards fighting their way, 
 either in the sphere of Letters, or Journalism, or Law, or 
 the Church. 
 
 The following is from one who is now a Scottish school- 
 inspector : " Elation or humiliation depended on a word 
 from you. I remember how kind you were, and forbore 
 to ridicule my bombastic effusions. My style was then 
 at the effervescent stage. How indulgently you hinted the 
 fact ! how delicate the incision with which you tapped 
 my dropsical essays ! " 
 
 Another writes : "If I have gained in knowledge, if my 
 views have been broadened, if my love for literature has 
 been deepened, I owe all this to you." 
 
 More than one now distinguished student wrote to him, 
 signing himself, " your most affectionate servant," and pour- 
 ing out gratitude in unmeasured terms for the stimulus of 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 179 
 
 his lectures. One wrote of " a flood of recollections of those 
 good days, during which I grew." Professor MacCallum, 
 now of Sydney, wrote so late as 1892: "Hegel, Caird, 
 You, and Carlyle you four are the warp and the woof 
 of my intellectual life. I beat out thin and vend your 
 gold, and am proud to be your interpreter to the lads 
 doomed to my care." 
 
 Recalling the delightful cameraderie of College days, 
 when the freshman {Scottice bejant) delights to show himself 
 a person of importance, by nimble-witted satire of his 
 teachers (with no malice, or any kind of arriere pense'e behind 
 his chaff), it is wonderful to find how little the Glasgow 
 students could find for criticism in Nichol. They were open- 
 eyed enough to diagnose weaknesses. What Scottish 
 student, who is worth his salt, is not ? But his weaknesses 
 could not be satirized so easily as those of other men. Ir\ 
 fact he as professor was himself a master of kindly satire, as 
 his students knew ; and there are many delightful stories 
 " afloat" as to his class-room. One only I may recall in 
 passing. Nichol's class met at four o'clock p.m. ; and he once 
 got a most abject letter of apology for non-attendance on 
 the previous day from a student, who wished to be excused, 
 "because I was the victim of insomnia at that hour!" 
 
 Of the Glasgow period of his career, Dr. A. W. Ward, 
 the Vice-Chancellor of Victoria University, writes : 
 
 "When I was at Glasgow in 1864, Nichol was suffering 
 from a terrible anxiety, the force of which will be appreciated 
 by all who are aware of the effect exercised upon him by his 
 wife's death in 1 894. She was at that earlier date so seriously 
 ill that all regular work had become to him a physical, as well 
 as a moral, impossibility ; and, at his request, I undertook to 
 read his lectures, during two or three weeks, to the English 
 Literature class. It was his habit to write out his lectures 
 with the utmost care a very good habit, I think, when the 
 subject of instruction is one in which the manner should, 
 so far as possible, accommodate itself to the matter; and no 
 opportunity should be lost of bringing home to the minds 
 of students the dignity of the study in which they are 
 engaged. Accordingly, he grudged no labour in revising 
 his courses, and the particular lectures of which they were 
 
180 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 composed, at all events during those earlier years of his 
 tenure of his chair, in which I had knowledge of his 
 processes of work. It must not be forgotten that he was 
 the first to fill the chair in question at Glasgow, and that 
 its fortunes not merely as to the popularity of the subject, 
 but also as to the position and dignity which it would 
 vindicate to itself among the studies of the University 
 very largely depended upon his conduct of its work. 
 
 " Nichol, it was no secret, had hoped to take his seat 
 among the professors of the University, of which his father 
 had been so conspicuous an ornament, as the occupant of a 
 chair of traditional renown, and as the teacher of a science 
 in which he had proved himself an expert at Oxford, as 
 well as at home. But the gods, with whom this was not 
 his last quarrel, had willed it otherwise ; and his revenge 
 was to teach English Literature with an effectiveness un- 
 surpassed at all events in his own day. In his lectures 
 the Professor of Literature and the Professor of Rhetoric 
 may have each claimed his share, but neither asserted it to 
 the detriment of the other. His material, accumulated with 
 remarkable assiduity, was digested and arranged with even 
 more remarkable care and skill ; exposition and criticism, 
 in both of which he excelled, balanced or harmoniously 
 pervaded one another ; and his common sense was robust 
 enough (though the adjective was one in which I remember 
 his prohibiting me from indulging) to prevent him from 
 giving way to the infirmity of subtle critics, and dis- 
 tinguishing all too nicely between the ' author ' and ' the 
 man.' As for execution and style, not only passages or 
 perorations, but many lectures as a whole, shone like the 
 polished corners of the temple. The consequence was that, 
 to judge even from my own experience as a substituted 
 reader, Nichol's University lectures were unmistakeably 
 effective ; and when, as was at least once my good fortune, 
 I heard him lecture to his class himself, I was delighted 
 by the sympathy, in both graver and lighter moments, 
 between him and his hearers. Perhaps it is only fair that 
 I should incidentally acknowledge the special promptitude 
 of Scottish students in welcoming the wit and wisdom, or 
 the efforts in either direction, of their teachers. 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. i8r 
 
 " I have known few distinguished alumni of Oxford over 
 whose ways of thought the influence of that University 
 was to all appearance less potent. What first interested me 
 in him was the reflected influence of Carlyle, then perhaps 
 at the height of his sway over aspiring British minds ; 
 and, in a less degree, that of Robert Browning. The genius 
 of Browning, Nichol was, both as a writer and as a lecturer 
 and his pen was already active, when I first became 
 acquainted with him one of the first to proclaim, and to 
 popularize ; nor were his early lectures on the then but half- 
 discovered poet and thinker, surpassed either in breadth 
 of sympathy or in precision of judgment by any of his 
 maturest critical essays. As to Carlyle, Nichol's literary 
 tastes, and his conceptions of much that lies beyond the 
 domain either of letters or of taste, were long mastered by 
 the great writer, with whose nature his own had, for better 
 and for worse, not a few affinities." 
 
 Nichol lived to write a critical estimate of Carlyle, which 
 will be referred to in a subsequent chapter. 
 
 During his wife's serious illness the following letter was 
 received by Nichol from the Master of Balliol : 
 
 Balliol, Feb. 12. 
 My dear Nichol, . . . Will you give my kindest 
 regards to your wife, and say that I have no doubt she 
 has inward peace and happiness, and can rest in the will 
 of God, whatever that may be. But for your sake, and 
 that of her children, she must also try to get well ; there 
 is a want of faith in losing hope even during the long 
 weariness which illness unavoidably occasions. I look 
 forward to seeing her next Term at Oxford, where she 
 will have such a welcome as no one ever had before ; 
 and she has more than two months in which to recover 
 perfectly. Ever yours affectionately, B. Jowett. 
 
 B. TESTIMONY OF HIS STUDENTS. 
 
 I have received numerous estimates of Nichol's influence 
 and power as a lecturer ; and from these I make one or 
 two selections. 
 
1 82 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Professor M'Cormick writes : 
 
 " Before our present entrance examination had set a 
 standard of preliminary knowledge for students entering 
 graduating classes, for the first two years of his curriculum 
 the student who had not had the advantage of a high school 
 education was sadly handicapped ; and it was frequently 
 the case that one who was unrecognized for a while, by dint 
 of steady work and superior powers, toward the end of his 
 course succeeded in overtopping his fellows who were the 
 prize-takers in the earlier classes. 
 
 " The English and Moral Philosophy classes, taken usually 
 in their last year, were regarded among the more earnest 
 students as the apex of their University course, to which 
 the rest was a preparation. They learned from the accounts 
 given by the seniors among their acquaintances to look 
 forward in this way to their final session. And I have 
 never met with any whose memory of it in later life does 
 not outdo their expectation. 
 
 " I may speak for the moment of the English and Moral 
 Philosophy classes together ; for, to a Glasgow student, the 
 names of John Nichol and Edward Caird are inseparably 
 linked. It is not only that their classes were taken in the 
 same year ; it is also that their methods and influence 
 were in many respects complementary. . . . Nichol's 
 lectures, on the other hand, resembled a series of lightning 
 flashes, darting and momentary. A sentence, it might be 
 a phrase, opened out a new vista ; the reading of a verse 
 added to it an indefinite richness of suggestion; a criticism 
 of character or life, casually dropt, burned into our 
 memories, to be often quoted in after years. But these 
 were seldom followed up by comment or explanation. 
 They were left to make their own impression, which 
 naturally varied with each student in proportion to his 
 culture and width of reading. To get the full benefit of 
 Nichol's class one had to have a fair knowledge of English 
 Literature and History, as well as of Classics ; for the Pro- 
 fessor was apt to forget, in the wealth of his own learning, 
 the ignorance of his pupils. Analogies or contrasts were 
 brought from anywhere and everywhere in illustration of 
 his subject : and it was naturally the few in the class who 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 183 
 
 were able at all times to follow him. Yet, though the effect 
 was often bewildering to the poorer-equipped among us, the 
 result even for those was undoubtedly beneficial. Besides 
 what we managed to assimilate, we came away with an 
 impatient sense of our own ignorance : our horizon had 
 been widened ; we felt a fresher and richer appreciation of 
 what we had already read, and a restless impulse to read 
 more. This was probably the most usual and the most 
 lasting effect of Nichol's teaching. 
 
 " It must not be understood, of course, that positive 
 information was neglected or under-rated ; but the course 
 of an author's life, and the succession of his works, were 
 but the skeleton of his lecture. Nichol's aim was to 
 supplement the text-book with what it could not give 
 us. There was little note-taking in his class I speak 
 just now of the hours in which he lectured, not of 
 those which he devoted to the examination of some 
 special work. The student soon realized that to watch 
 the lecturer was part of his education. His flashing eye 
 and changing expression often gave his words half their 
 meaning. There was no gesticulation, and nothing theatrical 
 in his oratory. This reserve added to its impressiveness. 
 For his effects he relied mainly upon a voice rich, 
 flexible, and sonorous, which he managed without a 
 suspicion of artifice. He was the best reader of prose or 
 poetry I have ever listened to. There are passages in 
 Malory, Raleigh, Shakespeare, Swift, Jeremy Taylor, Sidney 
 Smith, Charles Lamb, Thackeray to take a few examples 
 that occur to me at the moment which an old student of 
 Nichol's cannot re-read without recalling his tones and 
 accent. The involuted periods of Paradise Lost, and the 
 pointed couplets of MacFlecknoe, were equally within his 
 compass ; and in such over-running rhymed lines as those 
 of Herrick's Daffodils, or of Keats' Ode to a Grecian Urn, 
 he had a most felicitous way of stressing the rhyme without 
 pausing on it. Nichol's reading was always a justification 
 of the poet's rhythm, and was worth volumes on English 
 prosody. To his better students it was an inspiration to 
 which they owe much of their enjoyment of literature in 
 later life : even the dullest, if he read the Loss of the Royal 
 
1 84 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 George or Ye Mariners of England, will hear again the high 
 strung intensity and nervous timbre of Nichol's recitation. 
 
 " The secret of Nichol's marvellous power lay in his 
 complex and many-sided personality. It was this we 
 carried away with us from his lectures, whatever might be 
 his subject. Criticism, he often said, was but an indirect 
 method of expressing one's own opinions. And, whether 
 his text were Shakespeare, Milton, or Wordsworth, it 
 was above all the impression of Nichol himself that was 
 left upon us. I have said ' many-sided,' for there was no 
 great author with the spirit of whose work he failed to 
 lead us to enter into sympathy ; and he was always care- 
 ful to make us appreciate his excellences before criticising 
 his defects. It was only after arousing our interest and 
 enthusiasm, that he attempted to guide it by his subtilty 
 and soundness of judgment. His fairness and impartiality 
 were convincing to us ; and the only point, so far as I can 
 remember, on which some of his old students might differ 
 from him now, is his estimate of the eighteenth century 
 school of poetry, and of Byron who inherited much of its 
 rhetoric. These his love of precision and perspicuity 
 may have ranked too highly. He had an artist's love 
 of form, and antipathy to what was vague in poetry ; and 
 his warnings against ' the sense swooning into nonsense ' of 
 the minor followers of Shelley were expressed with vigour. 
 
 " Nichol's interest in his subject lay naturally more on 
 the aesthetic than on the philological side. He conscienti- 
 ously gave his senior class a dozen or more lectures at the 
 beginning of the session on the history of the English 
 Language. But his heart was evidently not in it ; and he 
 was as glad as his students to have them over and get to 
 literature. In the latter he aimed rather at giving a 
 survey of a wide field, and dwelling only upon the greater 
 authors, than at specializing with minuteness on a single 
 period. . . . Another characteristic, rarely found in a 
 temperament such as Nichol's, was his love of order. His 
 book-shelves and writing-tables were models of tidiness. 
 Whether in his college work or in the practical affairs of 
 life, he was the most methodical of men. And his natural 
 capacity for the mastery and management of details would 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 185 
 
 have brought him success in business or in law. . . . He 
 attempted, so far as the limits of the course allowed, to 
 give the student some idea of the development and suc- 
 cessive streams of tendency in our Literature as a whole, 
 and at the same time a more exact knowledge of certain 
 periods of which he treated with more detail." 
 
 Another student, now a distinguished journalist, writes : 
 " Nichol treated his students as gentlemen, both in his 
 discipline, and his manner of lecturing ; there was no 
 vexatious enforcement of law and order, but any real in- 
 decorum was sternly suppressed. It must be owned that 
 the professor did not ' suffer fools gladly.' I have some- 
 times seen him wither up a dullard with a satirical word. 
 But, on the other hand, he was most generous of praise 
 and encouragement, wherever he seemed to discern ability; 
 and a successful student was in some danger of having his 
 head turned by the terms of his certificate. Nor did the 
 encouragement stop here, for when a good essay had been 
 given in, the writer would sometimes be advised to try 
 his luck with the Magazines, and be furnished with a letter 
 of introduction to an editor. The prize-winners were 
 always asked to dine at the professor's house, and I have 
 very pleasant memories of the brilliance of his conversa- 
 tion and his genial courtesy as a host. Occasionally the 
 class afforded us a glimpse of a real live poet. One day 
 in my year a little large-headed gentleman walked in 
 behind the professor, and took his seat beside him in the 
 rostrum. The whisper soon went round that it was Swin- 
 burne, who at that time was on a visit to Nichol, and at 
 the end of the lecture there were cries for a speech from 
 the poet ; but all we got was a smile and a bow." 
 
 Mr. Dunn, the Scottish School-inspector already referred 
 to, sends me the following : 
 
 " I never knew a professor on better terms with his 
 class. Lushington we regarded with a holy awe, as a sort 
 of Olympian jove ; but, while we regarded Nichol with 
 profound respect, there was a deeper note of humanity in 
 our relations with him. He was a sort of Apollo, more 
 approachable, a kind of literary ^vyoTrofX'KOs. You felt 
 
1 86 MEMOIR OF JOHN N1CH0L. 
 
 that he took a personal interest in you, if you showed any 
 real capacity. He used to invite his best men to breakfast. 
 These were pleasant meetings. The talk was easy, frank, 
 playful, and our shyness was overcome by his cordial 
 affability. I remember on one occasion the origin of the 
 College term ' gyp ' was discussed, and his delight was 
 great when the Greek word yu^s, a vulture, was suggested. 
 
 " No man seemed to take a loftier view of human nature 
 than he did. He willingly gave credit for good motives. 
 His keen analysis moved upon a high plane. I could give 
 illustrations from my own experience of his generous con- 
 sideration and noble interpretation of character, but they 
 would be out of place. I never heard him utter a censorious 
 word, except for meanness. His antipathies, as well as his 
 sympathies, were strong; but his antipathies were the result 
 of perceived, or imagined, conflicts with high ideals of personal 
 or public conduct. I should say that he regarded hypocrisy 
 as the cardinal sin, whether it appeared as a low-class 
 religiosity, or as a political sentimentality. 
 
 " He was essentially a bright spirit in his critical estimates, 
 in his personal judgments, and in his literary and political 
 aspirations. He had stripped himself of prejudice to give 
 clearer outline, and more luminous saliency, to principle. 
 His memory is enshrined within my inmost heart as one 
 of the noblest men whom I have ever encountered ; and 
 his influence was no less great in educating character and 
 feeling, than in educating the taste and the intellect. . . ." 
 
 Another of Nichol's pupils, the Rev. William Thomson, 
 writes : 
 
 " Nichol's eyes were remarkable. They changed with 
 his moods. Sometimes they danced with mirth ; some- 
 times, not so often, they glared angrily. When he 
 discovered students cribbing, or doing anything illegitimate 
 no matter what he was really angry ; and showed it 
 unmistakably in his manner his eyes, his voice, gestures, 
 etc. When he was pleased with any one's work, he was 
 charming. His censure was keen and incisive, and his 
 good opinion was considered well worth having. He was 
 the most interesting viva voce examiner I have ever met. 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 187 
 
 He set himself to find out what a man knew. He had a 
 singular felicity in drawing out backward men who were 
 rather nervous and shy. . . . Many of his best sayings 
 were uttered in an informal way when questioning the 
 class. His humour was known to all. He once gave a 
 student a second-class certificate, indicating that some of 
 his work was first-class. The student came to see if 
 Nichol would not give him a first-class. Nichol said, 
 'Would you rather have a poor first than a good second?' 
 The student answered, ' I would rather be a doorkeeper 
 in the house of the Lord, than dwell in the tents of sin.' 
 Nichol at once gave in ! 
 
 " The last lecture delivered to the junior class in 
 1887-8 was on Thackeray. The Degree Examinations 
 were near. Nichol quoted the passage about Pendennis 
 being plucked ; and when he came to ' those infernal 
 mathematics ' the class became tumultuous, and not a few 
 secretly winced. . . . When he quoted, in his last lecture, 
 the following session (March, 1889), ' O, my comrades, I 
 have drunk many a merry bout with you, and have always 
 found Vanity of Vanities written on the bottom of the 
 cup,' his voice was troubled, though it did not break. 
 
 " Nichol did not preach much to us, but so far as he 
 did, he laid stress not on the Epicurean, but the Christian 
 view of life. He often quoted, 'violent delights have 
 violent ends,' and said we must not be passion's slaves, 
 but masters of ourselves, if we would realize the dignity 
 of human nature. He warned us against the excesses of 
 Stoicism and Epicurism alike. Though a Hellenist in 
 many ways, he knew that ' above the violets of the Acro- 
 polis ' it was right to ' rear the blossoms of Paradise, the 
 
 plants and flowers of light.'" 
 
 I 
 
 C. CANDIDATURE FOR OTHER CHAIRS. 
 
 Nichol's success in the chair of English Literature in 
 Glasgow had, from the first, been great. During two 
 winter sessions his professional work had been most 
 stimulating to the students, and fruitful of the best results to 
 the University. But his early academic love for Philosophy 
 so dominated his nature, that he became a candidate for the 
 
1 88 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 chair of Logic and Rhetoric in the University, when it was 
 vacant in 1864 by the resignation of Professor Buchanan. 
 
 Many of his old Oxford students wrote to him, saying 
 that although his wide acquaintance with English Literature, 
 and his great power of criticism, made him most valuable in 
 the chair which he was the first to occupy in Glasgow 
 Mental Philosophy was the department in which he was 
 most fitted to excel. Hence they very warmly supported 
 his candidature for the chair of Logic and Rhetoric. 
 
 It was in these terms, e.g. that Thomas Hill Green, 
 Fellow of Balliol, wrote in reference to his candidature : 
 
 " Two questions may naturally be asked as to a candi- 
 date for such a post Will he be an efficient teacher? and 
 is he likely to add anything of permanent value to the 
 literature of his subject? Both these questions may be 
 answered emphatically in Mr. Nichol's favour. Of his 
 powers as a teacher he can get abundant evidence from 
 Oxford, where he was more esteemed as a tutor than any 
 man of his time, and where, of many subjects that he taught 
 well, he was always reckoned to teach Logic the best. That 
 he will in time if placed in a suitable position produce a 
 work on Logic, of a kind new in the English language, I 
 have a strong personal conviction. He is thoroughly master 
 of the old systems, without being bound by them ; he is also 
 acquainted with those new views of the science, which have 
 been promulgated and discussed during the last forty years 
 on the Continent, but have as yet found no interpreter in 
 England. Combining with this knowledge a keen interest 
 in the subject, and a remarkable power of statement, he is 
 more likely to supply some of the existing defects in the 
 English literature of Logic than any one that I know." 
 
 Frederick Denison Maurice, who had taken great interest 
 in him when he went up as a freshman to Oxford, wrote 
 to him thus : 
 
 Dear Mr. Nichol, I enclose you a testimonial which, 
 whatever its worth, is the expression of a very honest 
 opinion. I was not the least prepared for such an Essay 
 as you sent me ; * but, independently of the evidence it 
 affords of your own fitness for the Logic, or any chair, I 
 1 Possibly the Essay on Greek Ethics. 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 189 
 
 most heartily thank you for the instruction it has given 
 me, and for the hints specially valuable to an old gossip 
 of the way in which a series of important facts, very 
 difficult to condense, may be brought into the shortest 
 reasonable and most agreeable narrative. Very truly yours, 
 
 F. D. Maurice. 
 
 Professor William Thomson, now Lord Kelvin, wrote 
 to one of the electors in the University Court : 
 
 " I am not quite sure that Nichol's printed testimonials 
 represent so strongly as they might the impression which 
 we have formed of his energy and usefulness as a professor. 
 
 " He has just the qualities that his father wanted in this 
 respect, and I believe he is not at all behind his father 
 in intellectual ability and genius. I do feel very strongly 
 that we want something elevating and impressive in a Chair 
 of Philosophy; and that, I believe, we should have from 
 Nichol much more and better than from any of the other 
 candidates. He is, I believe, of a thoroughly conscientious 
 mind, a hard-working, duty-loving man, and a thorough 
 gentleman in his feelings. 
 
 " I know that some people are afraid of his theological 
 views. I am quite convinced that, if any dissatisfaction 
 were felt at first, it would quickly wear away. The safest 
 man in a Chair of Philosophy is the man who will best 
 check the tendency to Materialism, that is the one strong 
 anti-religious influence of the day ; and I believe that this 
 tendency will be much more effectively opposed by a man 
 of power and high views like Nichol, than by any man of 
 less ability; and, whatever Nichol's theological views may 
 be, I am perfectly convinced that they will not, in his 
 teaching of Philosophy any more than in his present position 
 (I mean not at all) come into collision, directly or indirectly, 
 with the convictions of his students, or in any way exercise 
 an injurious influence on his teaching." 
 
 Albert Dicey, James Bryce, and many others of his 
 contemporaries testified to Nichol's pre-eminent qualifications 
 for this chair ; but he was not successful in his application. 
 
 Three letters from the late Master of Balliol addressed to 
 Nichol at this time may be quoted : 
 
ipo MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Balliol College, January 18. 
 
 My dear Nichol, ... I hope you will not allow 
 yourself to become the most miserable and contemptible of 
 all characters, a disappointed man. There is no class that 
 the world has less sympathy for than those who are full 
 of sympathy for themselves, if I may use the expression. 
 And disappointment is quite unnatural at your age. You 
 have no reason for it except ill-health, and that I hope is 
 now passing away. With your abilities, if you take the 
 right means, and throw yourself a little more into life, there 
 are many paths open to you. 
 
 Your kindness leads you to think that I have done more 
 for you than I have. I know, from long experience, that 
 I can do hardly anything for others. But they can do 
 much for themselves. . . . 
 
 Eccentricity is a difficult thing to correct ; we never see 
 it ourselves, and persons who are familiar with us hardly 
 observe it. It is often mistaken for character; but eccen- 
 tricity is a mere blind weakness, character is strength. . . . 
 Some would speak also of humility " not thinking of our- 
 selves more highly than we ought to think " as the reverse 
 of isolation, and " of casting all our care upon Him who 
 careth for us " as the opposite of that anxious temper of 
 mind in which ill-health often makes us indulge. I believe 
 firmly in these things, and feel that I have need of them. If 
 they ever occur to you, I would strongly urge you not to 
 cast them aside as without meaning or profit, for sometimes 
 (notwithstanding all the self-deception there is in the world 
 about Religion) they may be the springs of a new life. 
 . . . Believe me, your sincere friend, B. Jowett. 
 
 ASKRIGG, BEDALE, YORKSHIRE, July 2$, 1 864. 
 
 My dear Nichol, ... In about a fortnight I am 
 going to start on The Republic again, and shall then fill 
 up, as far as I can, interweaving your suggestions with 
 my own. The load of the book is a terrible burden to 
 me. I suppose this world was meant for a place of work, 
 and that we were meant to be at work in it. 
 
 I hope you are going to have a good rest. You have 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 191 
 
 great elasticity, but you may snap some day. Besides this, 
 eternal overwork spoils the spring. . . . Ever yours 
 affectionately, B. Jowett. 
 
 I am very much interested about Green's x election at St. 
 Andrews. Will you help him to the utmost of your power ? 
 
 Balliol College (Post Mark), October 29, 1864. 
 
 My dear Nichol, . . . Green's failure is a great 
 disappointment. He is doing very well here with a class 
 of pupils. 
 
 I think that persons who take up an independent line 
 cannot expect to succeed in early life, and if at all only 
 by great energy and force of character. Do not let us 
 choose the stronger part, and find ourselves unequal to it. 
 The sooner men like yourself and Green get to acquiesce 
 in this, and look forward to some higher good, the better. 
 . . . Ever yours affectionately, B. JOWETT. 
 
 Two years after this, in 1866 while still Professor of 
 English Literature at Glasgow Nichol became a candidate 
 for the chair of Moral Philosophy in the same University, 
 then vacant by the resignation of Professor Fleming. 
 His testimonials were again most remarkable. 
 
 In this case also he was unsuccessful. Edward Caird 
 was elected, one of his earliest and best friends, and a 
 friend to the last. 
 
 The following letters, bearing on this period, are equally 
 honourable to Caird, and to Jowett, and to all concerned : 
 
 Freshwater (by return of post), afterwards Oxford. 
 
 My dear Nichol, I have had a letter from Caird about 
 the Professorship of Moral Philosophy. . . . He appears 
 to think . . . that the chances are against you, or rather 
 that success is hopeless. This grieves me deeply : I feel 
 that on every ground very much. 
 
 I have told him that, under the circumstances, I thought 
 that he had better stand. . . . 
 
 *Mr. T. H. Green, along with many others, was a candidate for 
 the St. Andrews Chair of Logic, when it became vacant by Professor 
 Veitch's election to Glasgow. 
 
192 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 He says : " I would rather have no professorship, while 
 the world standeth, than do anything unkind towards 
 Nichol." And this is quite true, as you and I well know 
 Ever yours affectionately, B. JOWETT. 
 
 Balliol College, May 31, 1866. 
 
 My dear Nichol, ... I like your feeling of rejoicing 
 about Caird's election. I am sure that he is faithful to 
 you, and will be always a true friend. . . . Ever yours 
 affectionately, B. JOWETT. 
 
 These disappointments passed ; and life passing with 
 them Nichol now addressed himself with renewed vigour 
 to the work of the English Literature chair. He formed 
 many new friendships, both legal and clerical, in Glasgow 
 and elsewhere, and consolidated old ones with men outside 
 the University circle. 
 
 Of this period of his life Dr. Donald Macleod writes : 
 " I did not see much of Nichol since College days 
 until many years afterwards, when we found ourselves 
 well over middle life, and settled in Glasgow. We then 
 came to know one another better than we did at College. 
 Our views on many subjects had approximated: and a warm 
 friendship ensued. I learned to recognize fully what I had 
 always believed, that the note of aggressiveness in manner, 
 which was misunderstood by so many, was chiefly the 
 result of extreme sensitiveness. Indeed his manner was 
 often his worst enemy. The slightest suspicion of insincerity 
 or bigotry, Philistinism or unfairness roused his passion, 
 and he would at once pillory the unfortunate object with 
 invective of his choicest phrasing. But he was at heart 
 tender as a woman and exceedingly appreciative of kindness, 
 honest as steel and never flinching from the utterance of 
 his convictions, however unpopular he knew them to be : 
 the more unpopular perhaps, the more did he delight to 
 express them. His faults were those which spring from 
 temperament. His nerves were all as it were exposed 
 lying on the surface, and he could not help feeling any 
 friction intensely. Noise was agony to him. The crowing 
 of cocks, the barking of dogs, the screaming of railway 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 193 
 
 engines, especially the demoniacal din caused by the trans- 
 atlantic invention named ' the American devil ' an instru- 
 ment of torture used on the Clyde to rouse workmen in 
 the morning were favourite subjects for his finely pointed 
 objurgations. Among some crisply written papers which 
 he contributed at my request to Good Words there was a 
 most original one on ' Jabber ' being a description of his 
 sufferings at a German ( Bad ' from the ceaseless cataract 
 of gutturals and the loudness of the voices to which he had 
 to submit. To my amusement and his own, several Germans, 
 who knew not his peculiarity, resented the realism of his 
 picture, and sent me their irate remonstrances. 
 
 " I cannot but confess my painful conviction that John 
 Nichol never received the recognition in Scotland or else- 
 where which he deserved. He may have been himself 
 somewhat to blame for this as he never cared to court 
 popular favour and perhaps sometimes needlessly offended 
 sensibilities by the strength of his language when advocating 
 a cause. But we have had few more brilliant minds in 
 recent years, or few finer critics. Had his health been more 
 robust, his own literary achievements would have been 
 greater than even the substantial successes which he won." 
 
 D. "THE NEW SPECULATIVE SOCIETY." 
 
 In 1867 Nichol and I were busy trying to organize a 
 society of philosophically-minded men, who would meet 
 periodically to discuss the questions of supremest interest 
 to all of us. The idea was suggested by the some- 
 what parallel work already done by " The Metaphysical 
 Society," founded in London, and which included amongst 
 its members Tennyson, Martineau, Stanley, Huxley, Tyndall, 
 Gladstone, Manning, and a score of others. 1 From the first 
 we wished to have a large infusion of the scientific element, 
 
 1 It is to be hoped that the history of that " Metaphysical Society " 
 in London will yet be written. Many of the important papers read to 
 it were afterwards published in The Contemporary Review, when it was 
 under the editorship of Mr. Knowles (who was secretary of the Society), 
 and afterwards in The Nineteenth Century. It had a short, but very 
 brilliant, career. 
 
 N 
 
194 MEMOIR OF JOHN N1CH0L. 
 
 while desirous that the philosophic or speculative should be 
 dominant. After much correspondence, and many pre- 
 liminary arrangements, we asked some forty gentlemen 
 in various professions academic, legal, clerical, medical, 
 literary, and civic to meet in Edinburgh, to consider the 
 possibility of the formation of such a society. There was 
 a great deal of discussion as to the name under which it 
 should be known. The proposal that it should be called 
 " The New Speculative " was opposed at first, but finally 
 agreed to. 
 
 The first regular meeting of the society was held in 
 Nichol's house in South Park Terrace, Hillhead, Glasgow, 
 and many persons attended Professor Thomson (now 
 Lord Kelvin), Professor Edward Caird, Sir Archibald 
 Campbell (now Lord Blythswood), Mr. Campbell-Banner- 
 man, the Rev. H. Crosskey, Dr. Pulsford, Sheriff Clark, 
 George Wilson, and others. It was a very interesting 
 gathering. I can recall the speeches of many of the 
 members. It seemed to Nichol and us all that such a 
 gathering of speculative men was a real gain to the 
 esoteric circle then possible in Scotland. We published no 
 Transactions, and our work was not much noised abroad ; 
 but our society was somewhat like the Aberdeen one of 
 last century, of which Thomas Reid afterwards professor 
 in Glasgow University was the chief representative ; or, 
 perhaps, it might be more appropriately compared to the 
 Amsterdam society of a century earlier, of which Spinoza 
 was the central figure. It met originally in Edinburgh and 
 Glasgow, during alternate months of the winter University 
 session ; but afterwards as it was found difficult for busy 
 professional men to travel far to attend meetings it 
 divided itself into three independent branches, the Glasgow, 
 the Edinburgh, and the St. Andrews, the last of them 
 meeting alternately at St. Andrews and Dundee. 
 
 Many important subjects were discussed at our meetings, 
 and papers were read, which were afterwards published in 
 the more important Reviews. At the inaugural meeting 
 of the society, Professor Edward Caird read the first paper. 
 But Nichol had the entire credit of the work which " the 
 New Speculative " did, for without him it would never have 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 195 
 
 been heard of. Such societies do not last long, and I 
 think they should be dissolved, as soon as the chief part 
 of what they undertake to do has been done ; just as our 
 Shakespeare, Chaucer, Wordsworth, and Browning societies 
 should wind themselves up, before they become super- 
 annuated. Alas ! many a member of the New Speculative 
 has now "joined the majority"; but all who still survive 
 have most pleasant memories of its meetings, discussions, 
 and good fellowship. We owed this almost entirely to 
 John Nichol. 
 
 As already stated, the aim of the New Speculative was 
 partly to bring old friends together for the discussion and 
 consideration of the deeper problems of human thought 
 and interest, men who were of necessity separated from 
 each other by professional work in distant places ; partly, 
 to form an academic bond of union between the east and 
 the west of Scotland, and to minimize that rivalry which 
 has no educational warrant between Edinburgh and Glas- 
 gow. The society did not realize so much, in the latter 
 direction, as Nichol desired that it should ; but every one 
 who became a member of it, and took part in its discussions, 
 felt that he owed a great deal to it. 
 
 Curiously enough, Nichol asked his friend John Stuart 
 Mill to join the society ! Mill replied : 
 
 "August 17, 1867. With respect to the projected society 
 for the encouragement of free inquiry and discussion, those 
 who live in Scotland are the best judges of the value and 
 seasonableness of the proposal. So far as I can presume to 
 judge, I should think such a society very desirable ; but I 
 feel some doubt whether my temporary connection with 
 one of the Scottish Universities 1 would prevent it from 
 being thought a kind of intrusion in me to occupy so 
 prominent a position in it as you propose. Perhaps you 
 will allow me to suspend any positive answer at present, and 
 will, in the meantime, inform me of the reception which 
 the project meets with, and the progress it makes towards 
 realization." 
 
 1 Mill was then Lord Rector of the University of St. Andrews. 
 
1 96 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 E. UNIVERSITY EXTENSION LECTURES. 
 
 Although it was before the days of " University Exten- 
 sion," either in England or in Scotland, John Nichol prepared 
 the way for it, as much as any man did, by the lectures he 
 delivered in Scotland, and in many of the English provincial 
 towns, on literary and philosophical subjects. I owe my 
 first knowledge of him to his having lectured in Dundee 
 in the capacity of an informal University Extension Lecturer 
 in the year 1866. 
 
 As a lecturer to extra-academical audiences he had a 
 singularly magnetic power of rousing sympathy, and what 
 is a much rarer gift of leading his audience to the study 
 of the subjects on which he had discoursed to them. I saw 
 this on the first occasion on which we met, more than a 
 quarter of a century ago, and tributes have reached me from 
 the most opposite quarters to the same effect. In Chelten- 
 ham his success was as great as it had been at Manchester 
 and Alderley, or at Bristol, Gloucester, and Penzance. 
 
 The following appraisal of his work as a lecturer is sent 
 by a common friend Dr. Charles Grindrod, of Malvern 
 who helped Nichol very specially in his Tables of History 
 and Literature: 
 
 " His special qualities were better shown in his Lectures, 
 than either in his Writings, or his Conversation. His was 
 that peculiar temperament in which deep feeling seems 
 incapable of showing itself, except on rare occasions. Ex- 
 cept when startled by some exceptional incident, or excited 
 by congenial intercourse, he seldom showed the wealth of 
 feeling which lay deep down within him ; and he almost 
 resented the display of a similar emotion in others. Nor, 
 as is the case with most literary men of the same tempera- 
 ment, did he often show it in his writings. In his lectures, 
 however, it came out. The well-rounded sentences, instinct 
 with literary art, were eloquent with the finest passion of 
 poetry, and gave life to the descriptions of the mighty 
 dead and their undying works, in a way that stamped 
 these lectures as something quite apart from the common 
 run of uninspired discourses or discussions." 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 
 
 197 
 
 A further characterization of him by his friend Dr. 
 Grindrod may be added here : 
 
 "This undercurrent of feeling proved itself also in private 
 friendship. No truer friend, no stauncher comrade in any 
 need, ever lived than John Nichol. It is true that he often 
 accompanied his acts of friendship with the sarcasm of the 
 cynic, but he never failed to fulfil a promise. He was not 
 unlike the son in the parable, who said he would not, but 
 did. It was his habit to promise little, and to do much. 
 
 " If there be such a vice as over-honesty, Nichol had that 
 vice, and it stood in the way of his career. Moreover, he 
 could never bring himself to the habit of stooping a little 
 in order to get through a door. Nor could he conform to 
 the maxim of ' being all things to all men.' He was, 
 indeed, one of the least adaptable of men. Of an extremely 
 irritable temperament, he used to attack, with often need- 
 less vigour, men and things, institutions and causes, which 
 he thought were open to censure." 
 
 Principal Ward writes : 
 
 " Nichol lectured in a wide variety of localities, extending 
 as far south as Penzance (for which place I remember 
 he had a particular kindness), in connection with organi- 
 zations now more or less gathered under the wings of 
 the ' University Extension ' movement, of which, in point 
 of fact, he was one of the forerunners. He was remark- 
 ably popular as a lecturer, although now and then deemed 
 rather exacting on the powers of those who sat at his 
 feet. But, apart from the fact that, though never lengthy, 
 he was occasionally inclined to be long, I am by no means 
 sure that he was mistaken in the belief on which he 
 acted, that for popular audiences the stimulative method is 
 the best. The fire of his commendation, and the vigour 
 of his attack, were such as to excite in the most stolid 
 listener a desire either to agree with him, or to find 
 reasons for quarrelling with his censures. If a popular 
 lecturer sends his audience to their texts, he has not 
 laboured in vain; and of this at least I am certain that 
 Nichol never spared pains, and always lectured at high 
 pressure. 
 
198 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 " He was in many respects, though not perhaps in all, 
 a born orator, as his distinguished father is said to have 
 been before him. He lacked, indeed, the persuasiveness of 
 manner which might have stood him in good stead at the 
 Bar I do not say, or in the Pulpit where it is difficult 
 to fancy Nichol in any age of the Kirk. But he had that 
 passion of the genuine sort which seems to consume him 
 who possesses, or who is possessed by it. And he had 
 imagination ; indeed, he had too much of it for everyday life 
 where words, like other wares, have to be weighed in the 
 scales of caution and self-interest but not too much for the 
 electrical moments of oratory, when the loves and hatreds 
 of the mind may be allowed to flash forth their native 
 fire. That Nichol could give such luminous expression to 
 the feelings of sympathy and antipathy of which his mind 
 was full, may be ascribed to the rhetorical element in him ; 
 that he could conceive them so intensely, cherish them so 
 closely, and vent them in and out of season, with so con- 
 vinced a disdain of all demurrers, was due partly to the 
 perfect truthfulness, and partly to the unfaltering courage 
 of his nature, partly also to its poetic vein. As to this 
 last, one of his friends who is also one of the finest 
 living critics of poets and poetry has written with such 
 force, and at such length, that I prefer to be silent." 
 
 Although it has no connection with the subject of this 
 chapter, a letter, written by Nichol to his sister in 1868, 
 may end it chronologically : 
 
 June 10th, 1868. 
 . . . Your verdict on the Spanish Gipsy so excited Jane 
 that she ordered me to buy a copy for her. We all, myself 
 especially, are infinitely disappointed in the book. I 
 object to it on three grounds : ( 1 ) The simplest, the verse 
 is poor, i.e. the blank verse mediocre at best, and the songs 
 contemptible. (2) The story is unnatural (as much as any 
 of Miss Braddon's) and the characters, with the single 
 exception of the insignificant Juan, repulsive. Don Silva 
 is a somewhat noble-minded fool, but the great failure is 
 Zarca, who ought to have been great to make the story 
 possible. He is a blustering brute. (3) The moral is bad. 
 
EARLY ACADEMIC LIFE IN GLASGOW. 199 
 
 and all the more vicious that it shows itself under the 
 guise of superfine metaphysical morality. This moral is 
 that self-immolation is in itself a virtue; a remnant of 
 mediaevalism utterly contradicted by the Greek, which I 
 come to think the soundest morality for well-educated men. 
 I quite agree with the implicit censure of Silva ; no man 
 should quit his post, or his duty, for any gipsy under the 
 sun. I denounce the implicit approval of Fedalma. What 
 woman with a soul or body would run away from a man 
 she loved, and to whom she owed everything, because an 
 ugly old gipsy jumped through her window, and said he 
 was her father? 
 
 The two points I like in the book are the description 
 of Fedalma dancing (especially the fine pose plastique of 
 the tambourine suspended in the air at the singing of 
 vespers ; it reminds me of a Pompeian statue : how many 
 a time in the Pyrenees have I seen the peasant girls on 
 the mountains drop on their knees at the sound of those 
 vespers !) and the hanging of the Inquisitor. I suppose 
 Zarca was right there, though I should certainly have 
 burned him. 
 
 I am angry at the book, and can't conceive how you 
 should prefer it to Aurora Leigh, which, though teeming 
 with atrocities that have no counterpart in the Spanish. 
 Gipsy, gives both in the story and in the best passages 
 evidence of being written by a poet, which Miss Evans 
 has emphatically proved herself not to be. I wish I were 
 sitting beside you with the book; I could point to whole 
 pages of pure prose, with here and there an attempt to 
 pass into poetry over the bridge of misty metaphysics. I 
 admit of course that there are some very beautiful passages, 
 and a few grand lines, but I insist on it that the whole 
 is a failure, and however trumpeted for the year, will never 
 take root beyond it. Upon the whole I rather prefer 
 the unpretentious Spanish Student with its really beautiful 
 song of the summer night ! which reminds me to say that 
 I have just heard from Longfellow, at Bowness, that in 
 consequence of my letter he will put off visiting Glasgow 
 till Jane is well. . . . 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 
 
 A. EPISODES DURING THE OCCUPANCY OF THE CHAIR OF 
 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 
 
 In 1872, when the Oxford Chair of Logic became vacant, 
 Nichol thought of leaving Glasgow, and returning to Oxford. 
 Many of his friends, and one distinguished head of a College, 
 thought that he was by far the best person to fill the chair; 
 but this friend dissuaded him from becoming a candidate, 
 as he was not known to the Oxford Convocation. He 
 urged him at the same time most pathetically to take 
 more care of himself physically, or he would break down 
 altogether. " I am convinced that one requires enormous 
 health for literary pursuits" wrote the Master of Balliol. 
 
 In the same year he was asked to accept a lucrative offer 
 to go to a distant colony. All his friends dissuaded him 
 from the idea of expatriation. One important writer, 
 and head of a College, wrote to him, " There are very few 
 men in England upon whom the future of English Letters 
 more directly depends than upon yourself. Whether you 
 meet with full recognition is a matter of transitory import- 
 ance; whether you permanently associate your name with 
 our highest Literature, original and critical, is the real 
 question." 
 
 It was, of course, impossible for a man like Professor 
 Nichol to emigrate, at his time of life, to a country where 
 he would have had to begin his career anew. As a rule, 
 it is as great a mistake for one, who has grown old in 
 literary service in a Mother-Country, to expatriate himself 
 

LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 201 
 
 from it at the close of his life or even in the mid-time of 
 his days as it is for a man who has gone to the Colonies 
 in his youth, or his young manhood, to return to the 
 old Land twenty years afterwards, in order that he may 
 try to do his best work there. A colonist can achieve 
 success, only when he identifies himself with the com- 
 munity into which he enters, and it takes many years for 
 the identification to be thorough. 
 
 In 1873 tne University of St. Andrews conferred on 
 Nichol the honorary degree of LL.D. 
 
 Among the many letters which he received from Mr. 
 Jowett, the following may here find a place : 
 
 Balliol College, January 5th, 1875. 
 
 My dear Nichol, Tell me about yourself. How are you 
 prospering? I hope that you reserve time to yourself for 
 solid writing upon Literature or History. Some of those 
 projects of which we have often talked should be reaching 
 maturity now. 
 
 You will retort, what am I doing? Finishing up the new 
 edition of Plato, which will be a much better book than the 
 last, and will contain some hundred pages of new stuff. 
 Still I am not satisfied at being a translator only, and hope 
 to do something more. I give up visiting ; and begin to 
 devote myself to writing, and the rest which it requires. 
 I sometimes think that I have set but a bad example to 
 my pupils in this matter. ... I remain, dear Nichol, 
 ever yours sincerely, B. JOWETT. 
 
 The following letter from Robert Browning refers to a 
 proposal that he should be nominated for the Lord Rector- 
 ship at Glasgow University. Until about twenty years ago, 
 that office was filled up by the students on strictly political 
 grounds, the rival clubs being Liberal and Conservative. 
 About the year 1870, however, a third club called "the 
 Independent" was started. Its aim was to elect the 
 Rector from academical, rather than from political, con- 
 siderations. This club approached Robert Browning in 
 1876, and Alfred Tennyson in 1880. 
 
202 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 19 Warwick Crescent, W., 
 
 London, December 16th, 1876. 
 
 Dear Professor Nichol, I have written to Mr. Wellwood, 
 after an interval of a week : for I really found it hard to 
 reply at once, in the only way I was able, to what I feel 
 very hard to refuse, however certain I am that my un- 
 fittingness for the honour obliges me to do so. You may 
 not know that the same offer was made to me some years 
 ago, six I believe. I am sure I feel as much gratitude 
 to the students, if not as their goodness and sympathy 
 deserve, at least as their cordiality will require. And let 
 me thank you exceedingly, dear Professor Nichol, for play- 
 ing the intermediary as you have so kindly done. How 
 strange ! I arrived at Glasgow one dark autumn evening 
 seven years since passed a few hours of the next day in 
 seeing the town, and its memorable places, and then left 
 without making acquaintance with a single inhabitant : and 
 from Glasgow comes all this care about me ! Pray believe 
 me ever, dear Professor Nichol, yours truly, 
 
 Robert Browning. 
 
 In reference to the invitation to Tennyson in 1880, Mr. 
 Lushington wrote to Nichol : 
 
 Park House, 
 Maidstone, June 7, 1880. 
 
 My dear Nichol, You probably know by this time that 
 the Independent's invitation has been declined. I am much 
 grieved at this result, and have done what I could to prevent 
 it. But the declarations which assailed him from all sides 
 that it could not help being a party candidature (from which 
 he was always resolved to keep aloof) carried it against 
 what I could say. I am afraid this is partly due to a 
 mistake of the students, in the first instance, not having 
 sufficiently made manifest as he commissioned them to do 
 that he stood on purely literary grounds. In their circular 
 there were phrases which were obviously poking at the 
 opposite side, which gave colour to the plea that the contest 
 must take the form of political antagonism. If, without any 
 notice of adverse tendencies, the circular had only in 
 general terms described Mr. T.'s writings as inspired with 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW, 203 
 
 noble and patriotic feeling it might have been different ; 
 but I can hardly wonder that this unfortunate oversight 
 added force to the arguments of those who opposed his 
 consenting at all to enter the lists. . . . 
 
 To tell you a private fancy of my own, if I were a 
 Conservative student I would be inclined to think of the 
 Duke of Marlborough, a man who in a high and trying post 
 has won praise from all sides, and, as far as I know, has not 
 been charged with any errors. But no doubt there are 
 many who know much more about probable outlooks in 
 such cases than I do, so I may dream my dream while 
 others have ovk ovap aXX inrap ecrOXov. Ever yours sincerely, 
 
 E. L. L. 
 
 In 1878 Nichol was asked to give advice as to the consti- 
 tution of a College to be founded at Aberystwith. One of 
 his friends, who was deeply interested in the founding of 
 that College, corresponded with him as to its ideal; and 
 wished to know what Nichol thought as to the relative 
 advantages of a Constitution framed after the Scottish or 
 the English model. In his answer Nichol wrote of the special 
 excellence of the Scottish system, as its Universities were 
 open to the poorest of the poor, and were attended by 
 the sons of crofters ; but were also open to, and were 
 occasionally attended by, some of the richest in the land : 
 so that peer and peasant might know each other as 
 classmates in the same University. 
 
 This same correspondent, who was a lawyer and an M.P., 
 and an old Oxford co-mate, wished much to find Nichol 
 beside him in the House of Commons. It is very doubtful, 
 however, if parliamentary life would have suited him. Very 
 few constituencies would have welcomed him, however highly 
 recommended by party-leaders, and nightly attendance in an 
 Assembly, which Mr. Augustine Birrell lately described (to 
 the House itself) as " the paradise of bores," would have 
 tried a temperament so nervous and high-strung as his was. 
 
 The following is a letter to him, from Mr. B. T. Williams, 
 in which the writer tried to induce him to think of migrating 
 to Aberystwith: 
 
204 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 House of Commons, June 6th, 1878. 
 
 My dear Nichol, There is to be a meeting of the Council 
 of the University College of Wales on the 14th inst. We 
 intend talking over the election of a new Principal, and 
 taking a step in that direction. ... I believe if you 
 come to a conclusion in favour of moving to Aberystwith 
 there would be no difficulty in getting you elected. But 
 we shall want you for some time to undertake a great work, 
 and to bring to a successful result a noble effort. You have 
 above all men known to me the energy, and the brains, 
 and the sentiment, for it. We should have no difficulty 
 about tempting you with a larger salary. I remain, my 
 dear Nichol, most truly yours, B. T. WILLIAMS. 
 
 He was not tempted, however, to move from Glasgow 
 to Aberystwith. 
 
 During the winter of 1878, Mr. Swinburne paid a visit 
 to Nichol at Glasgow. A letter to John Service at Inch, 
 refers to this visit. 
 
 14 MONTGOMERIE CRESCENT, 
 January 26, 1878. 
 
 My dear Service, Swinburne is spending some time with 
 us, and my wife says she thinks that in his present mild 
 mood he may even face the Church, at least as repre- 
 sented by the incumbent of Soul-seat, and that he might 
 peradventure be plucked from the burning ! 
 
 With this object of more than Russian Christianity, and 
 far more than Gladstonian philanthropy, could you, and 
 would you, make an errand here next week, and drop in to 
 convert the heathen at the above address. We can give 
 you a bed any night after Wednesday ; but I should 
 especially urge Thursday any time before seven as some 
 ingenuous souls, named students, are to meet " the poet," 
 commonly supposed of mischief, on the evening of that date. 
 I am also asking James Brown, who, possibly with fear and 
 trembling, wishes the encounter. Yours ever in haste, 
 
 J. Nichol. 
 
 Several friends gathered at Montgomerie Crescent on this 
 occasion to meet Mr. Swinburne. One of them, who was 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 20 5 
 
 specially struck by his humour, afterwards wrote, "He is one 
 of the finest talkers of sense, and certainly the best talker 
 of nonsense, I have ever met with." 
 
 This, from the writer, was his highest possible praise. 
 
 The following letter was sent by Nichol to his friend, 
 John Skelton. 
 
 14 MONTGOMERIE CRESCENT, 
 
 Glasgow, August 4, 1881. 
 
 The accompanying volume of Swinburne's was entrusted 
 to me by him to give to you, though he did not think 
 himself sufficiently introduced to write your name upon it. 
 Its condition, cut and read, requires the apology that my 
 own copy had crossed me on the way to London, and 
 was lying here on my return. S. offered me another to 
 read on the way home, which I accepted on condition that 
 he would name some one on whom I should afterwards 
 bestow it. If you have another copy already, perhaps you 
 will find some one to whom to pass it on. 
 
 Some say it is S.'s best work. I am not sure of that. 
 It has splendid lines. He is flourishing in health. . . . 
 Ever yours truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 To the Same. 
 
 14 MONTGOMERIE CRESCENT, KELVINSIDE, 
 
 Glasgow, June 15, 1882. 
 
 My dear Sir, Many thanks for your kind letter just 
 received. Besides Swinburne's address it will show you how 
 excited he is about his Mary, and how glad he will be to 
 have any light from you on the subject. We were talking of 
 some of your books especially Meg which I saw on his 
 shelves, when I was in London in April ; and, being a North 
 of England man, he appreciates them even where it requires 
 some Scotch to do so e.g. he understands Burns ; whereas 
 I have, as he says, only " almost persuaded him " to like 
 Byron. Ever yours truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 The mention of Mr. Swinburne in these letters makes 
 the insertion of two sonnets, addressed by him to Nichol 
 
206 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 in May, 1881, appropriate here. The "hallowed name of 
 Luke," refers, of course, to their mutual Oxford friend, 
 who was drowned in the Isis in 1862. 
 
 TO JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 I. 
 
 Friend of the dead, and friend of all my days 
 Even since they cast off boyhood, I salute 
 The song saluting friends whose songs are mute 
 With full burnt-offerings of clear spirited praise. 
 That since our old young years our several ways 
 
 Have led through fields diverse of flower and fruit 
 Yet no cross wind has once relaxed the root 
 We set long since beneath the sundawn's rays, 
 The root of trust whence towered the trusty tree, 
 Friendship this only and duly might impel 
 My song to salutation of your own ; 
 More even than praise of one unseen of me 
 And loved the starry spirit of Dobell, 
 
 To mine by light and music only known. 
 
 II. 
 
 But more than this what moves me most of all 
 To leave not all unworded and unsped 
 The whole heart's greeting of my thanks unsaid 
 
 Scarce needs this sign, that from my tongue should fall 
 
 His name whom sorrow and reverent love recall, 
 The sign to friends on earth of that dear head 
 Alive, which now long since untimely dead 
 
 The wan grey waters covered for a pall. 
 
 Their trustless reaches dense with tangling stems 
 Took never life more taintless of rebuke, 
 
 More pure and perfect, more serene and kind, 
 
 Than when those clear eyes closed beneath the Thames, 
 And made the now more hallowed name of Luke 
 Memorial to us of morning left behind. 
 
 May 1 88 1. AC. Swinburne. 
 
 The crash of the City of Glasgow Bank affected Nichol 
 much. He was a trustee for a shareholder. It did not 
 daunt his spirit, but it distracted his energies in many ways. 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 207 
 
 Few persons can now realize the social agonies which the 
 collapse of that Bank involved. But Nichol was bright, 
 and, even humorous, throughout all the sad time. Proposals 
 were started by his friends to buy his Library, and present 
 it to him again. To one correspondent he wrote: 
 
 "We are going to march to gaol, singing noble songs, 
 and in the recesses of our dungeons, where ' we may not 
 stain with grief the memory of so great a fall, we shall 
 converse on this world a mad one and the next, like 
 the dying Girondists. Yours, till then ! J. N." 
 
 To another he wrote : 
 
 " Spero meliora, but the liquidators cannot, as some hope, 
 touch my income or fees ; and I can easily get a loan 
 on the books I must keep for use. Some of my friends 
 some summer, some winter, some both (and these only 
 do I prize) are agitating themselves needlessly in this 
 matter. * It was not ordained by Nature,' says Carlyle, 
 that you should be happy.' It was not ordained, say I, 
 that I should have a fine Library; but it was ordained 
 that I should be perfectly free." 
 
 Another correspondent who had written to him in a 
 rather gushing manner under his misfortunes, and spoke of 
 him as " the most Christian man " of all concerned in the 
 sad transaction, received the curt rejoinder : " The Lord 
 forgie ye for leein' ! " As it turned out in the sequel, 
 thanks to the honourable conduct of the relatives for whom 
 he was trustee, Nichol suffered little direct loss through the 
 failure of this Bank. 
 
 In 1885 the newly-established Merton Chair of English 
 Literature at Oxford led him to think of again migrating 
 to the South. In Glasgow he had to deliver 160 lectures 
 annually to his two classes ; at Oxford there would 
 be only 42. On the other hand, by going to Oxford 
 he would lose his pension as a Scotch Professor ; so he 
 was not desirous of a change. But the late Master of 
 Balliol, and other Oxford friends, advised him to stand ; 
 and he did so. The emoluments of the two chairs were 
 nearly equal, but the Oxford one was free from fluctuations, 
 
208 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 and as his life had been harassed in many ways, he resolved 
 to make a last experiment in " candidature." 
 
 It called forth the warm and spontaneous homage of 
 many friends. Mr. Lushington, and most of his colleagues, 
 gave evidence of his success as a professor at Glasgow, of 
 his power as a lecturer and teacher, even when dealing 
 with a class of 300 students, and of the inspiring influence 
 of his work. Others bore testimony to his rare com- 
 bination of literary and academic merit. 
 
 He did not obtain the Oxford chair, and he felt the loss 
 of it somewhat keenly. But a return to his old surround- 
 ings in the South would probably have been less successful, 
 and less joyous to him than he imagined. It is very hard 
 for a man who has lived for a third of a century in an 
 atmosphere so different, academically and socially as are 
 Oxford on the one hand, and Glasgow or any other 
 Scottish University on the other to transplant himself 
 successfully, at the close of his life, from the one to the 
 other. I think all his friends were glad that he did not 
 go to Oxford at that time. The following letter indicates 
 one phase at least of the feeling which existed in Glasgow: 
 
 61 St. Vincent Street, 
 
 Glasgow, April 7th, 1885. 
 
 My dear Mr. Nichol, I have just returned from London 
 where I had been for some eight days. When there, my 
 son mentioned that you were likely to leave Glasgow and 
 go to Oxford. On my return I asked if you had been 
 offered Oxford, or whether it was a post for which you must 
 make an application he said it was. Then, I said, I hope 
 Mr. Nichol will not get the place. I sincerely hope some- 
 body else will ! This is one way of showing one's friendship 
 . it is my way I hope you will, even if it be practically 
 within your grasp, refuse to accept. Glasgow hath need 
 of thee, and I hope in Glasgow you will remain. 
 
 I think if you heard what I so often hear about the 
 esteem in which so many hold you, you would hesitate about 
 leaving a place where you are so much wanted ; and where, 
 if people only knew you better, they would love you more. 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 209 
 
 Glasgow needs the best man. Oxford might be satisfied 
 with a second or a third. 
 
 The only one thing that makes me hesitate a little is 
 whether your health and that means enjoyment of life 
 might not be better in the south, but even this is so un- 
 certain that I don't think it worth the risk. One thing 
 you may be sure of wherever you may go you have my 
 heartiest wish for your happiness ; and my hope that, what- 
 ever decision you may come to, the new friends that may 
 gather round you, if in a new place, will be as devoted and 
 as steadfast as those you leave behind. 
 
 This letter was half written when you happened to call. 
 Your coming in has spoiled it all ! Ever yours very 
 sincerely, JAS. MACLEHOSE. 
 
 Nichol replied to his publisher and friend shortly after- 
 wards thus, 
 
 LlTTLEWOOD, CARRICK, 
 
 Lochgoil, May 30th, 1885. 
 Dear Mr. MacLehose, You, and the very few friends who 
 feel with you, will be more or less glad to hear that the 
 Oxford chair has been given to a Professor of Philology 
 at Gottingen (v. Heine and " Belinda " for the character- 
 istics of that University). . . . One thing is clear, I cannot 
 work any more as I have been doing for the last twenty- 
 five years. Ever yours sincerely, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 But the loneliness of a Scottish University Professor of the 
 type of Professor Nichol after many years of service have 
 passed, and he has been exposed to " the slings and arrows 
 of outrageous fortune" is a very curious fact. I have no 
 doubt that it led Nichol to resign his Glasgow chair, at 
 the earliest convenient opportunity. 
 
 To one of his correspondents he wrote : "As I doubt 
 if you have ever been, intellectually, so much alone as I, 
 it is open to question if you can readily understand my 
 gratitude for your sympathy. I hope this does not sound 
 like Joseph Surface ! " 
 
 " The worst of misfortune," he added, " is that it invites 
 insult." 
 
 o 
 
210 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 " Were I a person of property, I would shake the dust 
 of the whole yelling island off my feet, and die, as Jacques 
 Bonhomme or Hans Sachs, quietly in some corner of the 
 Pyrenees, or the Thuringen Wald." 
 
 B. POLITICAL VIEWS HIS PERSONALITY THE REVIEWERS. 
 
 Some reference must be made to Nichol's political views 
 and actions. He started as an advanced Liberal, but he 
 was never a zealot : and when the party, into which he 
 was born, and with which he allied himself heroically 
 at first in his student days, broke away from what he 
 regarded as the policy of right reason, his affection not only 
 cooled, but he went (by slow degrees it should be remem- 
 bered) to the other side. The alliance between the Liberal 
 Unionist and the Conservative parties delighted him. It was 
 an alliance which in his judgment brought not only brain, 
 but also backbone, to the Government which accomplished 
 it. He was specially enthusiastic over the services which 
 Mr. Goschen rendered to the country. He wrote to me, 
 after comparing his speeches and his work with those of 
 Lord Hartington and Mr. A. J. Balfour both of whom he 
 admired and honoured " he is the Rock of the Union." 
 It is well known that the most curious anomalies develop 
 themselves, within University circles, on political matters. 
 During the Franco-Prussian War, and the struggle in 
 America between the North and the South, prominent men 
 at Oxford and Cambridge "took sides" quite unexpectedly 
 in such a way and with such keenness, as almost led 
 to a temporary suspense of personal friendship. Nichol 
 differed from many an old and dear friend on political 
 matters, and expressed his difference in words which his 
 biographer need not record. He need only mention the fact 
 as an academic object-lesson. 
 
 Nichol cordially endorsed what his friend William Sellar 
 wrote to him, so far back as February, 1871 : "Liberals 
 must join with the Conservatives and liberalize them, and 
 make them the really national and rational party, instead 
 of the party of the country gentlemen." That exactly ex- 
 pressed Nichol's own views. 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 211 
 
 In the broader lines of national sympathy he was 
 curiously Scoto-American and Scoto-German. He did not 
 do perfect justice to the French nation, and perhaps less 
 to the Italian. He abhorred the military ambitions of the 
 Continental powers ; but perhaps he failed to see that the 
 aim of some at least while ground down under a terrible 
 taxation has not been so much an aggressive policy of con- 
 quest, as the possession of a " new-found-land " to colonize. 
 
 No estimate of John Nichol as a man could be complete 
 without some reference to his conversational powers. Over 
 and over again we used to talk " from eve to dewy dawn," 
 and I always found new treasures of wit and wisdom 
 flashing out at every turn. But it was not its manifold 
 knowledge, and rare suggestiveness, that made Nichol's 
 conversation so delightful ; it was its courtesy. There have 
 been many brilliant academical talkers egoists at heart 
 whose conversation has always had a curious tendency to 
 come round to themselves : their works, their achievements, 
 or want of achievement, or at least of recognition. Nichol's 
 conversation, like that of his friend Sellar, had none of 
 this. It was eagerly sympathetic of others, and funda- 
 mentally appreciative of their work. 
 
 Another thing to be noted is the extraordinary impression 
 which some of his casual remarks made upon youthful 
 listeners. One correspondent wrote to him : " By the way, 
 
 's expression, about Truth being a Gothic superstition, 
 
 came out in a curious way, in our family the other day. 
 
 , who is very observant, must have heard you telling 
 
 it ; and, when remonstrated with about exaggeration in 
 narrative, added, ' Oh, I thought it had been shown that 
 Truth was a Scandinavian myth ' ! " 
 
 His unpremeditated speeches were occasionally great 
 successes. On one occasion he was asked to move a vote 
 of thanks to a lecturer on an academical theme. It was a 
 time of keen political excitement ; and, although called upon 
 at a moment's notice, he made a long speech, splenetic but 
 not rash, the reception of which vividly recalled the old 
 days of his undergraduate College oratory. Writing of it 
 
212 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 he said, " I felt like the old hunting hack, that, hearing the 
 bay of hounds, carried the cab and its contents over the 
 hedge ! " 
 
 His sense of humour was as great as his satire was happy ; 
 and sympathy with the humorous side of life was quite as 
 strong in him as in any of his contemporaries. 
 
 Dr. Grindrod thinks that "his appreciation of humour, 
 with the exception of satire in which he excelled was 
 keener than his expression of it, either in conversation or 
 in writing. Yet he was often very witty, when in company 
 that suited him ; and he had something of Johnson's power 
 of crushing an opponent, by making just the right reply 
 to him. 
 
 " Satire, besides giving him his strongest flight, was per- 
 haps Nichol's stumbling-stone. It sometimes led him astray, 
 by the temptation of opportunity in his otherwise just 
 estimate of men and their works. Tennyson has some- 
 where called satire the ' fume of little minds.' It is more 
 truly the fume of disappointed minds ; and Nichol was 
 justly disappointed, for he had a right to a higher place 
 in the world of letters than was always accorded him." 
 
 A curious incident once occurred at Malvern, where he 
 had lived many years before for hydropathic treatment. 
 He was visiting his physician-friend, who is in the habit of 
 receiving patients who require mental as well as bodily cure. 
 When he arrived, his friend was absent ; and Nichol was 
 ushered into a room, where a somewhat talkative patient 
 was reading. The latter at once began to enter into a 
 miscellaneous and too familiar conversation, which all 
 Nichol's friends will at once understand his resenting. He 
 remained silent, and afterwards looked at this gentleman 
 with a series of somewhat indignant glances. By and by 
 the latter rose ; and, leaving the room, met the doctor 
 (Nichol's friend) entering, and remarked to him, "Very 
 serious case, sir. You've got a very bad patient waiting 
 for you, sir. He won't speak a word! He only glares!" 
 
 He was, unfortunately, under the impression that there 
 was a special " cabal " against him in the London literary 
 reviewing cliques. I know that he was wrong in his esti- 
 mate of the " Savile gang," as he called it ; but, on the 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 
 
 213 
 
 other hand, a quite extraordinary amount of evidence has 
 reached me in the letters of his most distinguished corre- 
 spondents and friends as to the way in which the reception 
 of some of his books was pre -judged. They were " criticized, 
 before they were read," by being handed on for review to 
 those who entertained a personal animus against him. I 
 am quite well aware that jealousy is an element to be 
 reckoned with in every phase of our complicated modern 
 life ; but I had no idea of the extent to which its permeating 
 poison could extend in Literature, until I perused this 
 correspondence. 
 
 Some of Nichol's most distinguished friends have written 
 to him details, which fully justify his antipathy to " the 
 book-reviewers." 
 
 These disappointments often gave rise to temporary bitter- 
 ness of feeling, but they never made him a pessimist. They 
 made him satiric, but not cynical. If he was occasionally 
 morbid, and unhinged by attack, living for a time in an 
 atmosphere of shade, the clouds soon dispersed, and he was 
 again a breather of the sweet air, and a rejoicer in the 
 sunlight. 
 
 The habit, into which many literary men fall, of not 
 dating their letters, has been a source of much trouble 
 to me in writing this Memoir. Over and over again it 
 has been a sort of conundrum to find out to what month, 
 or even to what year, a letter belongs; even the envelopes 
 containing no information ! For want of a better clue, I 
 assign the two following letters from the Master of Balliol 
 to this period. 
 
 Professor Jowett wrote: 
 
 Oxford, December 15, [ ]. 
 
 My dear Nichol, It grieves me that you should think 
 the world to be in a conspiracy against you. Indeed they 
 are not. But the truth is that you speak out your opinions, 
 (few people have the courage to do so, or the energy), and 
 other people attack you in return. You are greatly respected, 
 and have gained in the respect of others, as years have gone 
 on. I really fear that this restless feeling will interfere with 
 
214 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 your success in Literature, which might be very great; not- 
 withstanding the mosquitoes, and other insects, which swarm 
 in the newspapers. 
 
 I am not an optimist, but I wish to take the world as it 
 is, and do the best I can. I thankfully acknowledge that 
 my outward circumstances during the last thirteen years 
 have been very happy, and that therefore I ought to do all 
 I can for others ; and indeed yours have not been unhappy as 
 the world goes ; and I feel convinced that you might do so 
 much, if, getting rid of painful thoughts and antagonisms, 
 you would devote yourself to Literature. If you are not 
 careful, the feeling will grow upon you, and become un- 
 controllable. Ever yours, B. Jowett. 
 
 Again : 
 
 My dear Nichol, I cannot help writing to assure you 
 that nothing which happens to you is indifferent to me, 
 and I think that I would do anything to promote your 
 interests. 
 
 You and I are in the same difficulty. We can look 
 for no external help, but must fashion our lives for our- 
 selves, and that ought to unite us. If opportunities don't 
 come, we must look at life calmly, and make them. It is 
 no use complaining of having public opinion against us. 
 We have challenged that, although perhaps undesignedly, 
 and now we must fight it out, and make a place for 
 ourselves. You know as well as I do that to have written 
 a good book is worth a great deal more, both in real use- 
 fulness and in distinction, than to have gained many 
 Professorships. . . . Don't fall into the mistake that I 
 have made during the last ten years of being too much 
 of a drudge, and getting nothing done. Mais nous chan- 
 gerons tout cela. ... In haste, ever yours affectionately, 
 
 B. Jowett. 
 
 C. HIS ATTITUDE TOWARDS RELIGION. 
 
 In previous chapters incidental reference has been made 
 to Nichol's views on Religion. These inevitably underwent 
 a change, as his life developed; and it is a curious study 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 21 5 
 
 to his friends to trace their evolution, through many years of 
 vicissitude. His interest in religious, rather than theological 
 problems, was great ; but it was the philosophical side 
 both of Religion and Theology not the ecclesiastical 
 that chiefly attracted him. 
 
 In the pages of his Journal, and in some of his letters 
 to his sister, his religious opinions are incidentally dis- 
 closed : and the changes experienced, and recorded, in his 
 later years were due to a process of normal growth and 
 orderly development. 
 
 The following letter to the Rev. T. C. Finlayson goes 
 back to his early years : 
 
 Observatory, 
 Glasgow, September 18, 1856. 
 
 Dear Finlayson, I hear that you have got into some 
 difficulty, in consequence of the candid expression in your 
 Hall of convictions regarding one of the most important 
 aspects of our Religion, with which I most cordially sym- 
 pathize. I do not know whether to congratulate you more 
 on the independence which has led you to give a bold 
 utterance of those feelings, or to lament that you are sur- 
 rounded by men who can so little comprehend or appreciate 
 them. 
 
 I need not say how sufficient is the confidence of Truth 
 to bear one over the cavilling of misunderstanding and 
 bigotry, but I trust that no overt act of your own will assist 
 in placing you in a false position. 
 
 I have been told that after certain comments made by 
 the professor on your discourse you voluntarily struck your 
 name off the list of theological students. Now, however 
 presumptuous it may appear for me who am without the 
 sphere of your Hall, and in consequent ignorance of its 
 details to express a decided opinion, I cannot avoid thinking 
 that it is in all cases a mistake to assume a responsibility, 
 which had much better rest on the shoulders of the authori- 
 ties themselves. | 
 
 I do not know if you have chanced to see M'Naught's 
 book on Inspiration, or his pamphlet on his expulsion from 
 
2l6 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 the Liverpool Debating Society for difference of opinion. 
 This owes its entire force to the fact that he refused to 
 withdraw from the association of men who had no right 
 to expel him. They are left to bear the odious burden 
 of an illegal act. There are many instances in which great 
 public benefit has arisen from a course like this ; compara- 
 tively few, I believe, from simple resignation. With any 
 other reasons you may have for leaving the Hall, I have 
 of course nothing to do ; but so far as I am acquainted 
 with the facts of this case, I do think you would strengthen 
 your cause far more by patient resistance, than by any 
 attitude of defiance. I know you will excuse this liberty 
 as it can only have one object. And believe me, yours 
 sincerely, JOHN NlCHOL. 
 
 In 1862 the editor of The Spectator to which he had 
 occasionally contributed wrote to him thus : 
 
 " I have long been intending to write to you heartily 
 for your welcome and most interesting letter. To find any 
 interest taken in Theology is rare now, at least amongst 
 men who have entered life, and not entered the clerical 
 profession. To me it is, and always has been, a real study, 
 and one of the profoundest interest; and I am almost 
 amazed at the indifference of men in general to it. 
 
 " I do believe in the Incarnation, little as I dare to rest 
 on mere textual evidence. It is to me a great central 
 illumination to History and to Life, but beyond this I see 
 little that is intelligent in orthodoxy. I fear Maurice is 
 going to give up his living (though not to leave the 
 Church) in consequence chiefly of Dr. Lushington's judg- 
 ments. It will be a severe blow to many clergymen in the 
 English Church, who will after this feel uncomfortable in 
 their position. . . . Little as I understand his worship of 
 the text of Scripture, he seems to me the deepest of the 
 theologians, as Jowett is the deepest of the thinkers much 
 more than a thinker, of course, but still with less of what 
 one may call the sense of the infinite and eternal than 
 Maurice." 
 
 In a letter written to John Service, then minister of Inch, 
 in 1876, Nichol said: 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 217 
 
 " I like your sermons better than any of the modern 
 school I have read, at least that I can recollect, with 
 the exception of one or two of Channing and Mar- 
 tineau; for, though not so eloquent in the popular sense 
 as Robertson's, they seem to me more definite. I admit 
 this may arise from the fact that Robertson seems to me 
 still to believe some incredible things, whereas I see no 
 evidence that you do, or at least that you feel certain of 
 them. On the other hand, you are not too aggressive. 
 The book is indubitably remarkable, and must advance your 
 position ; but I think that a congregation wishing to hear 
 you preach might resent your resting on it alone, and 
 refusing to show face. I can quite understand your feeling, 
 but one must ' stoop to conquer ' in this country, or dwell 
 apart, pleasing no forms of men and contemplating few. 
 I doubt if that is healthy ; if I had lived all my past life by 
 your lake, I might end it there ! " 
 
 Service replied : 
 
 Hamilton. 
 
 Dear Nichol, I have now for so long a time been in 
 the habit of counting you among the chief goods with which 
 the gods have provided me in this life, that whether you 
 turn critic upon me, or turn Turk I mean Jingo does not 
 matter. I am content, so long as you do not, like riches, 
 take to yourself wings, and flee away to a better world, or 
 a better climate. But that means, of course, that I would 
 rather have your good than your bad opinion in the matter 
 of sermons, even though sermons are not the same as songs. 
 It is like nobody so much as it is like yourself to find 
 good even in sermons. Ever yours, John Service. 
 
 And again : 
 
 Dear Nichol, If there were a homoeopathy and an 
 allopathy of criticism, I should much prefer the infinitesimal 
 dose of approbation from one particular practitioner to a 
 prodigious bolus from anybody else. This has been said 
 before, and need hardly be said again. It never occurs to 
 me that my audience in Hyndland is few, when I see in 
 it a person with regard to whom a young lady on Sunday 
 afternoon had some inquiries to make. She was sure she 
 
218 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 had seen him in church pretty often. She had an idea 
 too that he was not a common sort of person. And she 
 was anxious to know who he was. I had great difficulty 
 in identifying the man, until she told me that he was the 
 most restless of human beings, at anyrate of seat-holders ! 
 Yours ever, J. SERVICE. 
 
 Nichol wrote to Service as follows : 
 
 14 M0NTG0MERIE CRESCENT, KELVINSIDE, 
 
 Glasgow, November 20, 1881. 
 My dear Service, If I did not know your aversion to 
 be pelted with praise, and that there is in my poor un- 
 weeded garden little but parsnips to throw, I would say 
 that your sermon to-day is not likely to be soon forgotten 
 by any of the far too few if fit who heard it. ... Let 
 us discover, and colonize, an unknown island ; but, before 
 going, you give forth your theology, and I my philosophy, or 
 rather my " social statics." Meanwhile I must put in " a 
 mild remonstrance" title of one of Milton's most furious 
 pieces of cursing against your half deification of Richard 
 Cobden. ... I quite believe Cobden to have been not 
 only an honest and indefatigable, but a self-sacrificing man, 
 and admit that he was the main-spring of a great practical 
 reform ; yet beyond cheap bread by which alone we do 
 not live his views were limited. Like Bright, he was a 
 practical materialist, with no thirst or apparent need for any 
 draught of the diviner air, that inspires for instance the 
 career of Mazzini, or John Newman, or yourself. I do not, 
 therefore, think it fair to set him so far above men like 
 Thirlwall, or Colenso, or Jowett to take different types of 
 Episcopal, or other, divines. His dictum, that there was 
 more utility in a single sheet of The Times than in all 
 Thucydides, seems to me to stamp him and his party with 
 an unconquerable narrowness, only half condoned by their 
 earnest philanthropy; and, if it be so (for the narrowness 
 or blindness may be only mine) I should regret that you, 
 who have a chance, which I (through " evil behaviour " and 
 " ill-usage " combined) have lost, of being remembered among 
 the thinkers of your time, should ignore the fact. Yours 
 ever, J. NiCHOL. 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW, 219 
 
 It is necessary that I should add to this what he wrote to 
 me in 1879 : 
 
 " There are two conclusions at which I have arrived fairly, 
 if not finally: (1) If there is any Immortality intelligible, 
 i.e. which can be a motive to us, it must be through trans- 
 migration ; (2) if there is a Being ruling the Universe, and 
 having consciousness of individual creatures on it, he is 
 either morally indifferent or imperfectly potent. An omni- 
 potent beneficence is flatly contradicted by the facts of the 
 Universe every hour. Mill has not wrought out this as he 
 might have done, even he being afraid that it would bring 
 him to grapple publicly with some moral problems of 
 which he was rather shy ; but he has indicated his opinion 
 in all the papers published after his death. In the face 
 of these moral problems, what words can express the 
 tomfooleries of the pseudo-liberality of some of our modern 
 ' heretics.' Ever yours, J. NlCHOL." 
 
 The following letters may be added as bearing on this 
 subject : 
 
 To Mrs. E. P. Nichol. 
 
 14 MONTGOMERIE CRESCENT, May 24, '82. 
 
 My dear Elizabeth, I have delayed thanking you for the 
 copy of Wool-man till we should, as we have now done, read 
 it quite through. It is finer than I had imagined from the 
 copious extracts by which I was previously acquainted with 
 it an extraordinary book, quite the most beautiful record 
 of a religious and philanthropical enthusiast I ever met 
 with the source of its beauty being the lovely character of 
 the man, in some respects like the child in The Story with- 
 out an End, in others ultra-sensible, almost keenly shrewd. 
 
 At first one gets now and then tired of the continual repeti- 
 tions about " having slaves," " drawings," " open mind," etc., 
 but the quaint phraseology becomes almost pleasant when 
 one finds it to be so genuine ; as is, I suspect, only possible 
 in an early age. After the charming chapters about the 
 journey to the Indians, every page is delightful, and, even 
 to those far from the writer's supernatural faith, instructive. 
 What charity, even to slave-holders and unbelievers, pervades 
 
220 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 the whole ! and (save a few trivialities) what wisdom ! Like 
 all enthusiasts, conspicuously the less charitable abolitionists, 
 Woolman wants the sense of proportion, and does not 
 sufficiently discriminate between matters great and matters 
 small. He is also infected with the objection to amuse- 
 ments entertained by some of his persuasion ; but if all were 
 like him I could even dispense with pianos. I am sorry 
 for the poor juggler, p. 209 (who was very likely working 
 hard for his living), but with all other hard worked people 
 Woolman has a sympathy only possible to those of com- 
 paratively feeble frame. 
 
 It is infinitely refreshing to read him on over-toil, after 
 leaving a sturdy cherub like Jowett, who thinks one should 
 always be doing. Woolman is like a Christ in speaking of 
 the poor tailors, labourers at unhealthy trades, post-boys, 
 hard driven animals and men: he has a sense, almost like 
 Hawthorne's, of the need we all have save " busy-bodies " 
 the thirst and longing we have for " Rest." " Come unto 
 me, all ye that labour and are heavy-laden, and I will 
 give you Rest." All toiling and suffering, all goaded and 
 ever-worried things should bless his memory. With incisive 
 foresight he perceives the great danger of his denomination 
 the love of wealth and esteem and in all he says about 
 the hurry and wrestle and scramble for it, or for yet more 
 evanescent popular or social approbation, (motives that 
 yearly seem to me more contemptible), I cordially concur. 
 
 I never read a religious book of so much modesty, and 
 (old and hard as I am) could not finish it without many 
 tears. I shall quote the passage about the dream, on p. 264, 
 as equal in beauty to anything in Bunyan. If any one could 
 make me believe in special providences Woolman would. 
 Alas ! my knowledge of history, and more, my own experi- 
 ence of life is too strong the other way ; but I agree with 
 almost all he says of the relation of man to man. He seems 
 to have been happy in some respects, and not to have met 
 with many liars, thieves, hypocrites, or quacks ; and so does 
 not quite realize the occasional need of flogging scoundrels 
 as his Master flogged them out of the temple or of making 
 war upon them, with the sword He came to bring. But his 
 practical views as upon " superfluities," etc., are so true and 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 22 1 
 
 well put (N. B. his language is queer but never out of real 
 good taste) that I hope to act more on some of them 
 which is a tribute ! I have been " drawn " to " relieve my 
 mind," I fear to your fatigue ; but Lamb was right, and 
 you have done a good work in this reprint. . . . Ever 
 yours affectionately, JOHN NlCHOL. 
 
 The following is from his old colleague and friend, 
 Lushington : 
 
 Park House, Maidstone, June 29, 1884. 
 
 My dear Nichol, I must to some extent demur to your 
 adverse criticism of Maurice. He does not seem to me 
 muddle-headed. Up to a certain point he always enters 
 with the whole zeal for truth and fairness which belonged 
 to him, into the best aspects of every opposite opinion, 
 drawing out its strongest points in the fullest light ; then 
 proceeds to supplement its more imperfect sides by applying 
 his own solution. If asked, How do you know this solution 
 is right? he can but say I have accepted it from one who 
 declared it 1800 years ago, and find its truth confirmed by 
 all history, by all movements of my own soul, by all 
 instincts of the prophetic soul of the wide world through the 
 ages, and this is confirmation enough of its Tightness to me. 
 His own purity and nobleness of spirit was such that any 
 scheme of dogma which he conscientiously held, must have 
 to him only its best and most ennobling influence, and could 
 not lead to bigotry or narrowness as he saw the best of all 
 opposed views. His own doctrine revealed to him its best, 
 fused with his own goodness of soul. His own orthodoxy 
 was generous to the most unorthodox. You say he became 
 quite orthodox ; to me he seems always to have been so, 
 though his rare candour towards others made many fancy 
 him not so. 
 
 What rather distresses me in his letters is the con- 
 stantly recurring self-depreciation, which has something 
 morbid in it, but I am certain that it is genuine and not 
 affected. A humorous friend of mine used to say, " M.'s 
 sermons always turn me into a heretic. He begins with 
 setting forth the heresy in such bright colours that they 
 fully convince one it must be right. By that time, the air 
 
222 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 of the church, and his own melodious voice compel sleepi- 
 ness. I fade away into unconscious states. I awake an 
 unconverted heretic, having lost the balancing arguments 
 corrective of the first heretical triumph, which should have 
 set my orthodoxy on its feet again." The only case where 
 he seems to me to have fallen short of his wonted charity 
 was Mansel's. I regretted this at the time, though no 
 doubt there was some provocation. The book I tax with 
 both a nimiety, as S. T. C. phrased it, and a paucity ; what 
 he did is often not clearly set forth. He worked immensely 
 at Christian socialism, etc. What his work was I do not 
 learn possibly others more acquainted with such matters 
 at the time might read it out better. 
 
 Well, here is a satiety or (nimiety) for you, about a man 
 for whom I have a loving admiration, though I was neither 
 a disciple, nor ever very intimate, though I often experienced 
 his kindness. Ever yours sincerely, E. L. L. 
 
 When, later in the same year, Lushington was elected 
 Rector of the University of Glasgow, he wrote to Nichol as 
 follows : 
 
 Park House, Maidstone, Nov. 20, 1884. 
 
 My dear Nichol, The day of doom has past, and folded 
 me in the toils of necessity, fxkya SovXelas ydyya/uov, as 
 Aeschylus hath it there is no help for it now, but that I 
 must learn eiKwv avdyKy rflSe Kaivlaai tyyov. The labour will 
 at least be sweetened by the thought of how surpassingly 
 kind and generous were the wishes urged upon me by so 
 many friends to welcome me among them and if the fuss 
 and trouble of acting the pnrcop is over, if life enough is 
 left in me to enjoy the meeting with colleagues and friends 
 of many years, I shall enjoy it most thoroughly. Ever 
 yours sincerely, E. L. LUSHINGTON 
 
 D. RESIGNATION OF THE CHAIR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 
 
 IN GLASGOW. 
 
 In 1889 Nichol resigned the University Chair which he 
 had adorned for twenty-seven years. Many things conspired 
 to induce him to take the step. He thought that he had 
 then done all he could well do, in a Scottish University : 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 223 
 
 and the atmosphere of turmoil which he so often breathed 
 became increasingly distressing to him. 
 
 In some of his letters belonging to this period there is 
 a tone of underground sadness at the limitations of his 
 life in Glasgow " this perpetual teaching of roughs, and 
 wrangling with senates." " I am in a sort of low-fever, just 
 able to rise, and read novels, and dine, and go to bed." Again, 
 he wrote of the " growing rowdyism of the semi-barbarians, 
 which will send me to Gartnavel." 
 
 As indicated in a previous chapter, Nichol's relations 
 with his students, in his best days, were enthusiastic ; and 
 his work with them, and for them, was as effective as it 
 was in the case of any of his University colleagues. But 
 times change ; and, in later years, his hold over his class 
 was not so thorough as it had been. For his own peace 
 of mind it might have been better had he retired from 
 the toilsome labours of his Chair at an earlier date. I am 
 sure that he would never have endorsed the saying of a 
 distinguished University Principal : " The Scottish student 
 is an ingrate " ; because he had a quite remarkable experi- 
 ence of the affectionate sympathy, and the admiration 
 amounting to homage of the pupils of his earlier years. 
 But he also knew of terrible instances of ingratitude, and 
 of attacks made upon him through the press, by those to 
 whom he had in simple justice to assign a lower place than 
 they expected to occupy in the class lists. 
 
 The dictum quoted above is quite erroneous. There are 
 " ingrates " amongst students, as in every other class of 
 society ; and some of those, whom he benefited, did very 
 unworthy things to Nichol. Nevertheless, the heart of the 
 Scottish student is usually as good, as his interest is keen, and 
 his receptivity eager ; and there have been few professors in 
 any University Scottish, English, or American within the 
 present century, to whom students look back with greater 
 admiration, and with a sense of more profound and life-long 
 indebtedness, than to Professor Nichol. 
 
 From others of his letters, I gather that one reason of his 
 wish to leave Glasgow was the difficulty of guiding a class 
 of students who were " infected by the hostility of the news- 
 paper mob to their Masters," as he put it. 
 
224 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 There is no doubt that his decision was a wise one. 
 He had lost something of the power of his young manhood 
 for work in this particular groove. At the close of the 
 University session of 1888-9, ne went over to France, and 
 spent a short time in Paris at the Embassy. Afterwards, 
 Lord Lytton wrote to him : 
 
 4th May, 1889. 
 
 My dear Professor Nichol, I am indeed thankful to 
 know that you were not altogether disgusted with your 
 too short visit to us. For, though I heartily enjoyed the 
 few moments of it I was free to spare finding your con- 
 verse as suggestive and sympathetic as your writings yet 
 to myself the visit was not all a satisfying one for I had 
 but one satisfactory chat with you ; and there were a 
 thousand things I had wished to say, and ask. However, 
 this little glimpse you have had of it will have enabled 
 you to perceive, and I hope commiserate, the extent to 
 which my life here is rushed and fussed how very little 
 of it belongs to myself, or is under my own control, and 
 how incompatible are all its conditions with any sort of 
 rational quiet. Ever most faithfully yours, LYTTON. 
 
 P.S. I am in some ways sorry for myself that you are 
 giving up your chair at Glasgow, as it will break the 
 closest link between me and the University. But I have 
 a feeling that for you the change will prove beneficial in 
 many ways, as well as pleasant in itself that, untethered, 
 your mind will work more freely and that, should you 
 care to seek them again in professorial work, you will find 
 elsewhere more congenial pastures. Made virtutis esto, 
 
 L. 
 
 His friend, and master Jowett wrote to him on July 
 20, 1889 : 
 
 Balliol College. 
 
 My dear Nichol, It interested me to hear of your 
 resignation, remembering your appointment. I think that 
 you are right, not because you have failed, but because 
 you have succeeded in a very remarkable manner. For a 
 few years longer the success might have been maintained ; 
 but it is better that you should have rest, and leisure for 
 
LATER LIFE IN GLASGOW. 225 
 
 writing, and that you should leave off without a decline in 
 the numbers of your hearers. 
 
 I think that you may find writing a great pleasure and 
 relief. You have been storing up, during the last thirty 
 years, what should now be transferred to another form. I 
 hope that you will not begin at once, but take a tour, 
 and have some other refreshment. The best part of life, 
 and that in which you will distinguish yourself most, is 
 before you. Believe me, ever yours most sincerely, 
 
 B. JOWETT. 
 
 His old friend and ex-colleague, Mr. Lushington, wrote 
 to him about the loss which the University had sustained ; 
 and added " few things which do not directly concern myself 
 can interest me more than the appointment to your chair, 
 and Jebb's." 
 
 Nichol wrote many letters in support of the candidate 
 he wished to succeed him. When Professor Bradley was 
 appointed, Professor Sellar wrote to Nichol. 
 
 " I think the appointment a very good one, not only 
 for Glasgow, but for Scotland. Our ' nature's raw material ' 
 is very fair, but wants refining, and wants purging of its 
 provincial dross, its love of rhetoric, and admiration of bad 
 models ; and this refining it gets from contact with such 
 minds as those of Lushington, Butcher, Jebb, etc., and it very 
 soon gets to admire them, and to unlearn its admiration 
 for the native models of the Boanerges type. I remember 
 
 , now an Oxford professor, writing an essay, in 
 
 which, in comparing ancient with modern writers, he rather 
 gave the palm to Dr. Guthrie over Demosthenes. If 
 Oxford has done nothing else for him, it must have cured 
 him of weighing men in that trutina." 
 
 Although Nichol had given up his Professorial Chair, he 
 kept his house at Montgomerie Crescent, Glasgow, for some 
 time. In autumn he paid some visits in Scotland ; and in 
 winter went to the Riviera, to escape the cold of the north. 
 He returned to Glasgow in the summer of 1890. 
 
 On June 13, 1890, Mr. Lushington wrote to him from 
 Park House, Maidstone : 
 
226 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 " My dear Nichol, For some time past I had imagined 
 you like a QeS>v 7raf? fxaKaptav, Sea, Xa/nTrporarov ftaivcov 
 afipwg aiO'epos, on the range of some blissful Riviera, gazing 
 on bays of the peacock's neck in hue, inspired with elysian 
 dreams ; and, after all, you seem to inhabit the smoke and 
 stir of that dim spot which mortals call ' Glasgow.' What 
 A169 oucra had noised you in these skyey latitudes I cannot 
 say ; but such a rumour came, and I unsuspiciously believed 
 it. But, though my fancy has been forced to transfigure 
 your surroundings, my message may be spoken, apart from 
 circumambient clouds and the azure world, based on earth 
 not air. There is a picture of me here, considered good by 
 most who saw it. . . ." 
 
 He offered Nichol a copy of this reproduction, which 
 was gratefully accepted, and the rest of his letter refers 
 to it. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 LITERARY WORK. 
 
 During his life in Glasgow, in addition to the singularly- 
 efficient discharge of his duties as University Professor, 
 Nichol took part in many public causes ; and, although 
 not a " publicist " in the sense in which such a University- 
 man as the late Principal Tulloch was he contributed much 
 to many a public cause by his ever ready and effective 
 pen. The articles which he wrote for the daily press, on the 
 questions of the hour, would form a little volume by them- 
 selves. They were always deft, and trenchant, and full of 
 literary acumen. 
 
 These contributions to the newspapers were amongst 
 the best things Nichol ever wrote, notably his " In Me- 
 moriam " notices. The columns of The Glasgow Herald 
 were always open to him ; and the articles written, not 
 only " off the reel," but under the intensest feelings of 
 sorrowful appreciation the perfervidum ingenium of the 
 Scot inspiring them were always welcomed and admired. 
 Similar contributions were made by him to the Manchester 
 Guardian, one of the most literary of English provincial 
 newspapers. Written in haste, and often under intense 
 excitement, they drew from him at the time " the deepest 
 that was in him." They were specially characteristic, 
 because they were superlatively just. 
 
 Nothing could be finer than his estimate of the late Master 
 of Balliol, after his death in 1893, with its vivid insight and 
 penetrating appraisal. I have read a letter to him from a 
 great friend of Jowett, and his own friend a man greatly 
 distinguished as a philosophical divine, now full of years 
 
228 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 and honour who wrote of Nichol's article as by far the 
 best that was written. It must have recalled its Master 
 most vividly to many a Balliol man. The whispering gal- 
 leries of memory were never more subtilely audible, at 
 once suggestive and commemorative of the past. As an 
 obituary notice, it was almost perfect of its kind. 
 
 After Tennyson's death, he wrote the critical part of 
 a long memoir of the Laureate for The Manchester Guardian. 
 That, too, was an admirable piece of work. 
 
 It is a somewhat sad reflection that fragments of 
 criticism, as fine as anything which the age can produce 
 are often of necessity mere ephemerae. They are written 
 for the day, or for the week ; and they are forgotten when 
 that day and week are gone. Nevertheless, they may have 
 contained more wisdom than the books which live for a 
 year, or a generation. 
 
 It was not only in these wonderfully beautiful and 
 pathetic obituary notices of his friends, however, that 
 Nichol's power as an appraiser was seen. He used also 
 to write critical estimates of books on philosophy and 
 classical literature, not only to the newspapers, but to the 
 quarterly and monthly magazines. It is impossible for me 
 to break the seal of anonymity, and to speak of these 
 articles in detail ; but no one, whom he felt it his duty to 
 condemn, ever found him indulging in commonplace satire 
 or ignorant abuse. He was the most generous of critics. 
 This is how one of those whom he criticized wrote to 
 him afterwards : " Your article is all I expected it to be 
 candid, generous, able, well-informed ; much the most 
 thorough and elaborate criticism which any writing of mine 
 has yet received." 
 
 In reference to one of these reviews, Dr. John Brown 
 wrote : 
 
 23 Rutland Street, 
 
 Edinburgh, Saturday. 
 My dear Poet and Aristarch, You didn't send me The 
 Herald, but I got it, and read the review with admiration 
 great ; but materiam superabat opus your review is too 
 good, too rich for the book reviewed. It is powerful but 
 tiresome, and hardly justifies itself; we must squeeze out 
 
LITERARY WORK. 229 
 
 the whey next time. You speak of Byron as the greatest 
 poet of this century. Now if you put Wordsworth in last 
 century, then this may stand, though I would put in a plea 
 for Scott ; but if you set B. before W., then I must apply to 
 the Court of Session for an interdict against such blasphemy. 
 ... I send some uncouth lines by an unknown poet. 1 
 It is his first, and will probably be his last effort. It 
 is remarkable for the number of monosyllabic words in 
 it, especially in " their thoughts." Yours, and Pulchra's, 
 ever truly, J. BROWN. 
 
 In August, 1874, Nichol received news "to my consterna- 
 tion and distress," as he writes in his journal, " of the death 
 of my dear friend, Sydney Dobell." He went up to 
 Gloucestershire, in order to be present at the funeral in 
 Painswick Cemetery, a ceremony commemorated in the 
 sonnet beginning 
 
 Fling lilies lightly on the laureate bier, 
 
 Where rests the garment of a soul as white, etc. 
 
 For Dobell, as for Longfellow, and as in earlier days 
 for G. R. Luke, Nichol always felt not merely intellectual 
 admiration but spiritual reverence. Of Dobell's personality 
 he wrote: "His real fascination lay in the incommunicable 
 beauty of a character in which masculine and feminine 
 elements, strength and tenderness, were almost uniquely 
 blended. . . . His loyalty to friendship that half- 
 forgotten virtue of an earlier age has never been surpassed. 
 He was chivalrous to an extreme, and this sometimes led his 
 judgment astray on behalf of fallen causes, with a lofty yet 
 gracious mannerism which recalled the ideal of a Castilian 
 knight. . . . Of practical well-doing towards the poor, of 
 encouragement to the young and all who were struggling for 
 a recognition of their merits, he was never weary; for of the 
 jealousy which is one of the main blots of our literature, he 
 had not a tinge. . . . To live with him a few days was 
 to breathe a serener air. An old chronicler writes of Sir 
 Philip Sidney, It pleased God that he should be born on 
 
 1 There were some printed lines on Arran generally, and Loch Ranza 
 in particular. 
 
230 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 earth as a sample of ancient virtue.' His friends will be 
 pardoned for venturing to apply these words to Sydney 
 Dobell." 
 
 The sentences just quoted are taken from the "In 
 Memoriam " sketch of Dobell's life and writings, which 
 Nichol wrote for the complete edition of his poems, published 
 by Smith, Elder & Co., in 1875. In the following year he 
 contributed an " Introductory Note " to the posthumous 
 prose fragments of his poet-friend, issued by the same 
 publishers ; and his personal reminiscences and literary 
 advice were of great assistance in the preparation of the 
 Life and Letters of Sydney Dobell (Smith, Elder & Co., 
 1878). 
 
 This work was, in a true sense, a labour of love ; but 
 Nichol felt himself abundantly compensated for the time 
 and pains, which out of a busy life he had bestowed 
 on it. He was rewarded by the satisfaction of knowing 
 that he had done his best towards helping the public to 
 realize what manner of man his friend was. He was 
 also rewarded by the affectionate gratitude of Mrs. 
 Sydney Dobell, who still lives, and warmly appreciates all 
 that his friend did in memory of her husband. 
 
 In reference to the " In Memoriam " sketch, Nichol 
 
 received the following from the Author of Rab and his 
 
 Friends : 
 
 23 Rutland Street, 
 
 Edinburgh, April 8, [ ]. 
 
 My dear Professor Nichol, Let me thank you for this 
 beautiful book and for your rich tribute to your friend 
 you have " truthed it in love." I never did justice to 
 Dobell, he was too good for me too high strung it was 
 like living in the air on Mont Blanc, too rarified for my 
 lungs. But he was a true poet, as few now-a-days are. He 
 was made of it. If poetry is the flower of thought and passion 
 and feeling having in it, at its base, the seeds of the 
 future, then was his garden all flowers ; for weeds have 
 flowers and he never weeded his garden and will, I fear, be 
 therefore " strangled in his waste fertility." Yours is indeed 
 nobly, simply, honestly done; and the little bit about J. B. is 
 
LITERARY WORK. 23 1 
 
 too pleasant perhaps for his good. How the book brings 
 back the dead ! I think your words on him as a poet are 
 excellent like an interlocutor the truth, the whole truth, 
 and nothing but the truth. I have not yet read your 
 American article in the Encyclopaedia Britannica it is 
 horrible to have it immersed in a quarto. I saw it strongly 
 praised. Thanks again, and with regards to the oval eyes, 
 and yourself, I am, yours ever truly, J. BROWN. 
 
 In this chapter Nichol's most important literary works 
 are referred to seriatim. But his Leaves, privately printed 
 in 1854, his articles on the Scottish Poets in the Encyclopaedia 
 Britannica, and his pamphlets, are not discussed so fully as 
 his books. In an appendix, page 308, a list of all his 
 writings, with their full titles, will be found. 
 
 A. HANNIBAL, AN HISTORICAL DRAMA. 
 
 In the year 1873 Nichol's Hannibal, an Historical 
 Drama, was published. He dedicated it to the memory 
 of his father. 
 
 Amongst modern English efforts dealing with histori- 
 cal drama, Hannibal is in many ways remarkable. It is 
 individual, and unborrowed. It has rare vividness. The 
 men and the women of Rome and Carthage are repro- 
 duced with an accuracy of delineation, which makes them 
 live and move amongst us now, modernized, and yet 
 not so transformed as to lose their ancient individuality. 
 Hannibal is not brought before us in the pages of 
 the historians, as he is in this modern drama. In the 
 historians, although his figure looms grandly, he is seen 
 through the mist of Roman misrepresentation. Perhaps 
 in Arnold's History of Rome we have the best historical 
 presentment of him, in the Rugby headmaster's descrip- 
 tion of the Second Punic War, and its hero; but 
 it required a student of Livy and Polybius at first 
 hand who was also a poet with the divining inward eye 
 to do full justice to this great historical figure of the ancient 
 world, to rearrange and adjust the facts of his career, 
 small and great, in due order and harmonious proportion. 
 
 It was impossible, from the nature of the theme 
 
232 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 chosen, that Hannibal could be a play for the stage. The 
 area was too vast for an acting drama ; and the passion 
 portrayed was not individual, but national. In fact, between 
 such mighty opposites as "Delenda est Roma" and "Delenda 
 est Carthago," individuality vanishes. Had Aeschylus 
 written a drama on the wars of the Titans, with their new 
 gods of Olympus, he would perhaps have failed ; but, 
 consummate master that he was, isolating Prometheus from 
 his brethren, he succeeded. 
 
 The late Master of Balliol wrote thus to Nichol: 
 " I read the poem with very great pleasure. You were 
 quite right in leaving off where you did. There is still too 
 much hurry or succession in its scenes, which interfere with 
 its repose. But the impression which I received upon the 
 whole was that the poem was a very fine one, and that it 
 was a great distinction to have written it." 
 
 The following is part of a letter from Dr. John Brown, 
 of Edinburgh. The author of Rab and his Friends was a 
 remarkable letter-writer. Far too few of his epistles have 
 as yet been published, and this one casts quite as inter- 
 esting a light on the writer as on its recipient : 
 
 " Hannibal is great ; great in conception and in execution, 
 in body and in spirit. The men and women live and 
 breathe. The great time is bodied forth quite marvellously, 
 and there is a sustained elevation and power throughout. 
 It reads as if it had been written at a heat, without any 
 marks of haste, no joinings, no weak bits. 
 
 "If I had more hope, more brain, more heart, I could 
 enjoy it still more. Let me thank you for the rousing 
 you have given me. 
 
 " There are three things, I think, I would like otherwise ; 
 but I say this tentatively, for I think it too often is an 
 impertinence to meddle with the head and handiwork of 
 genius. I desiderate (ist) the relief of humour, of occasional 
 pleasantry, such as crops up in the deepest tragedy of real 
 life, and often intensifies it. (2nd) The absence of the pre- 
 sence of Fulvia. It distresses me beyond the right limits 
 of pity and terror. It is the same feeling of distress that 
 
LITERARY WORK. 233 
 
 comes over one in reading Philip van Artevelde when he 
 marries (that is, doesn't marry) that second woman. Maybe 
 I am quite wrong in this ; but I would rather continue to 
 believe in Hannibal's fidelity to Imilce. (3rd) Why did you 
 not end with his death? Of course it was long after, but 
 it is the true end of all ; the forlorn, broken-hearted, im- 
 paired outcast at bay, and ending it all alone. 
 
 " Now, are you angry ? No. You may at least know 
 what one not often knows all my mind, what I dislike 
 as well as what I like; and you may easily gather the pro- 
 portion of the one to the other ! . . . Sellar is great 
 on Hannibal. I want him to review it for the Saturday. 
 It is exquisitely printed and bound. The patriot tells his 
 whole story a man with a heart, as well as a brain and 
 hand. Ever yours, fu' o' sairiousness/ J. Brown." 
 
 To this letter Nichol replied, but I have not seen the 
 answer. On receiving it, Brown wrote : 
 
 My dear Poet, It was good in you to take my 
 remarks as you did. You must have sweet blood in your 
 pericardia. If you promise to finish Hannibal, I'll more 
 than forgive his being left meanwhile alive. I feel now 
 that you are right about Fulvia. It is more real though 
 less sentimental. Only she is just a little bit too flagrant. 
 Yours, and Pulchra's, ever, J. B. 
 
 From America Longfellow wrote acknowledging the 
 receipt of a copy of Hannibal: 
 
 Cambridge, Dec. 12, 1872. 
 
 My dear Professor, I have received your new book, and 
 have read it with deep interest from beginning to end ; 
 too rapidly I know, but I could not stop. It is excellent, 
 and full of power and beauty. The verse gleams like armour, 
 and the little arrow-flights of song sing through the pages. 
 Well done ! I cordially congratulate you on this work. 
 
 Strangely enough, just as I finished the reading, I took 
 up an English catalogue, and my eye fell on this adver- 
 tisement "Hannibal in Italy ; an Historical Drama, by 
 Wm. Forsyth," to be published by Longman, Green & Co. 
 
 I have often noticed this duality in literature. W r hat is 
 it? Are thoughts in the atmosphere like a miasma or a 
 
234 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 perfume? Years ago, when I published Outre-Mer, a title 
 one would think not likely to occur to two persons at once, 
 a French writer in Paris came out also with an Outre-Mer, 
 describing his adventures in America ! I am rejoiced to 
 see that your friend Jowett has been chosen Master of 
 Balliol. When you write to him, I beg you to present 
 my kind regards and remembrances. 
 
 With cordial greetings to Mrs. Nichol, and renewed 
 congratulations to yourself. I am, yours always, 
 
 Henry W. Longfellow. 
 
 Principal Ward writes : 
 
 " I saw a great deal of Nichol's Hannibal in the various 
 stages of its growth, and, though I never thought that it 
 would conquer for him the place among our poets to which 
 he aspired with so noble an ambition, I deeply regret that 
 he should, so to speak, have broken up the materials for the 
 completing by means of a Second Part elaborated with the 
 same care as the First, a tragedy of no common power and 
 dignity. Yet perhaps he was right in his decision; for 
 Nichol was incapable of publishing anything into which 
 he had not put his whole strength ; and when the time 
 came for writing the Second Part of Hannibal he knew 
 that the requisite elasticity of mind was no longer at his 
 command." 
 
 Lord Lytton, in the following letter, written sixteen years 
 after the publication of Hannibal, describes the poem as 
 panoramic rather than strictly dramatic. He was perhaps 
 right. 
 
 Knebworth, 4th Nov., 1888. 
 
 My dear Professor Nichol, 1 have just finished your 
 Hannibal. My impressions of the work are very mixed, 
 and I find it difficult to explain, or even to record them 
 intelligibly, without entering into all sorts of details, for 
 which time fails me just now. 
 
 I may say at once that, given this type of poem (to 
 which no writer has yet reconciled me) the merits of the 
 poem, as regards quality of workmanship, appear to me very 
 great indeed. The verse is full of dignity and sweetness 
 never trivial, never bombastic, and equally free from con- 
 
LITERARY WORK. 235 
 
 ventionality and affectation. The music and the magic of 
 association which can be produced from a felicitous manage- 
 ment of proper names are here in a high degree. All the 
 descriptive passages I think beautiful as such ; some of 
 them most beautiful. And the poem abounds in pregnant 
 aphorisms, whilst throughout the whole of it there is a 
 literary aroma which has a charm of its own, difficult to 
 define. But I should have probably read the poem 
 with more enjoyment had I read it years ago before 
 forming sundry theories about " drama," which, right or 
 wrong, have become rigid in my own mind. I can't 
 attempt to set them forth. But nearly all the poems which 
 our English poets, when they write them, call poetic dramas, 
 or historical dramas, appear to me to be no dramas at all, 
 but the productions of a hybrid act not satisfactory in its 
 effects. 
 
 Your Hannibal has nothing about it that I should call 
 dramatic the nearest approach in it to the dramatic 
 treatment of a situation is the death of Archimedes but 
 it is not really dramatic, nor is the death of Fulvia. You 
 would doubtless say the same yourself, and add that it 
 was not your aim to be dramatic in the sense I probably 
 mean, but rather panoramic ; in short, that what you wanted 
 to produce was a great picture gallery, illustrating, by a 
 succession of picturesque scenes, the struggle between Rome 
 and Carthage, with Hannibal as the central figure, and that 
 this you have done. But, acknowledging - this, I should 
 still object that a very long poem all written in dialogue 
 and divided, as if it were a drama, or meant to be one, 
 into scenes and acts has no raison d'etre in art if it is 
 not dramatic. For in that case it must be diffuse, and 
 lacking in the intensity which should belong to poetry 
 whatever the form of it. The effects aimed at might be 
 better attained by a different method ; moreover there is 
 something irritating in any work of imagination, which 
 assumes in a meaningless way the external forms, without 
 conforming to the real constructive principles, of a very 
 definite and difficult art. No English poet would think 
 of writing a sonnet with the same sublime unconsciousness 
 of the rules special to the art he works on, that all our 
 
236 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 English poets exhibit when they attempt to write a drama. 
 . . . Forgive these jerky attempts to explain in haste 
 why, in a certain sense, I have admired your Hannibal more 
 than I have enjoyed it. You see I am a man perverted 
 by a theory. Yours very faithfully, Lytton. 
 
 In a letter written a few weeks later, on November 29th, 
 Lord Lytton reverted to his friend's poem : 
 
 Paris, 29th Nov., 1888. 
 There is a line of your Hannibal which has been 
 haunting me in the strangest way, and I am sure you 
 will be surprised when I tell you what it is. For it is 
 not one of the many pregnant lines, either of reflection or 
 description, with which the poem abounds. Here it is, 
 however : 
 
 The last star melts where Inarime's ridge. 1 
 
 There is something in the sound of these words, and 
 the melancholy fall of the line, which in some mysterious 
 way stirs a long dim train of old associations in me, and 
 always brings back to me the vision of some mountain 
 landscape seen at daybreak, which I must have watched in 
 Italy when I was a boy, with peculiar feelings, of which 
 the vision conjured up by the verse sets moving all the 
 ghosts. How curious these sensations are. The song in 
 The Tempest beginning 
 
 Come unto these yellow sands 
 has just the same effect upon me. 
 
 Apropos of the Tempest, I am going to-morrow evening 
 to see it acted in French by puppets at a marionette theatre, 
 some of the actors from the Francais speaking the parts ! 
 Very faithfully yours, LYTTON. 
 
 B. TABLES OF HISTORY, LITERATURE AND ART. 
 
 One of the most useful things that Professor Nichol ever 
 did was the construction of a series of chronological tables 
 of European History, Literature, Science, and Art, which 
 were first published in 1877. I may be pardoned for 
 
 1 See Hannibal, Act ill., sc. vi., 1. 1. 
 
LITERARY WORK. 237 
 
 mentioning the origin of the idea. In his first visit to me 
 in Dundee in 1866, I showed him a series of thirty tables, 
 each sheet representing a century, and each subdivided into 
 a hundred squares ; so that every year had a square to itself. 
 I gave ten to the centuries B.C., and twenty to those which 
 were A.D. These large sheets I had filled up as best I could, 
 with my limited historical knowledge, (1) with the date 
 of the first publication of all the great philosophical books in 
 the history of the world, (2) with the year of issue of the 
 chief contributions to art and literature, and (3) with the 
 most important memoranda as to the Universities of Europe. 
 They were fastened together in a long continuous roll 
 with a cloth hinge between each, and were so arranged 
 that the thirty sheets could be hung on a wall in three 
 sections, one devoted to antiquity, and the other two to our 
 modern period. I well remember Nichol's delight in seeing 
 them, and scanning them. He could not of course go over 
 so large a programme in detail ; but his eye fastened, in an 
 instant, on some errors of date which he pointed out to 
 me. He was fascinated with the idea ; and asked me, 
 if I was not going to publish such a philosophical and 
 literary chart, if I would let him do so, with addenda. 
 As I had prepared my work chiefly as an aid to my 
 own studies, and with no thought of publication, I gladly 
 concurred. In a very short time he produced these "Tables," 
 which were a special contribution to literary, scientific, 
 artistic, and political history. 
 
 A prominent Oxford tutor and literary reviewer wrote 
 to him : "Your tables will be always kept on a little mov- 
 able bookcase close to my elbow. Had I had it earlier it 
 would have saved much time, and a great deal of jumping 
 up from my chair to go in search of books." He indicated 
 three mistakes to be corrected in the next edition ; and 
 urged his old friend to come and visit him in Oxford, and 
 to " talk not of Mr. Gladstone and Ireland ; but of old 
 times, old friends, old books, and old scenes." 
 
 It was, of course, quite impossible to be entirely accurate in 
 these " Tables," especially, e.g. in matters relating to Egypt. 
 Many Egyptologists objected to his chronology, but that 
 was inevitable. In the columns referring to Art there were 
 
238 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 numerous questions open to debate. But there is no doubt 
 that, in argument and plan, it was itself a work of art. Other 
 efforts in the same direction had been very poor, and some 
 very ponderous. 
 
 One who is in the habit of sending post cards to his 
 friends (written more easily and swiftly in rhyme than 
 he writes prose!) addressed him thus: 
 
 Thanks for the marvellous book of all the sages 
 
 Who've lived these later sixteen hundred ages. 
 
 I, who before have only guessed at dates, 
 
 What time Dalbrida lived, when Bells began 
 
 To ring out music from the Lateran, 
 
 But oh ! one blot, one blunder I have found 
 
 That makes me feel the whole grand book unsound; 
 
 Amongst the men of literature and mind, 
 
 Thy name, good Nichol, can I nowhere find. 
 
 Mr. W. B. Scott wrote to him from Penkill, Ayrshire : 
 " The Book of Tables is one of the most seductive of 
 time-killers. One takes it up for five minutes, and spends 
 hours ; dates have such a fascination." 
 
 It was a bit of admirable work to try to exhibit the 
 relations of Literature to History, as Nichol attempted it in 
 the successive editions of this work, each edition being an 
 improvement on the preceding ones. The edition of 1888 
 was almost perfect in form. The toil which he underwent in 
 preparing these Tables was great, although many portions 
 of the work were delegated to others ; but Nichol's own 
 labour was like that of a lexicographer or bibliographer. 
 
 He tried to indicate the literary position of this, that, 
 and the other author in these Tables, by using a different 
 type in mentioning their names. It is impossible that 
 posterity will ratify all his verdicts ; but I think that, in 
 the vast majority of cases, his critical intuition will be 
 found to have been accurate. Over and over again we 
 
 discussed the position he had assigned to , and , 
 
 and ; and when asked to reconsider it, while always 
 
 open to friendly suggestion, he usually reverted to his 
 original judgment. In the revision of those tables, he 
 obtained great assistance from his chief publishing firm in 
 Glasgow, and from those members of it who had been his 
 
LITERARY WORK. 239 
 
 own pupils. To them, just before the publication of the 
 second edition, he wrote, November 18, 1883, when return- 
 ing his first proofs : " I breathe more freely that I shall see 
 no more of these spectres till they are published. . . . 
 The day after publication we must dine here to drink the 
 health of all the ghosts." In the preparation of the third 
 edition, published in 1888, he got great help from Dr. 
 Charles Grindrod of Malvern, who revised, recast, and 
 added to his column on Art. 
 
 To show the practical use of such a series of tables 
 of European History, Literature, and Art, it is enough to 
 mention that they are so constructed as to bring out the 
 correlations of political and literary history, and to exhibit 
 on a visible extended chart the contemporary elements 
 that have entered into the stream of European civilization, 
 whether social or scientific, ecclesiastical or civil, political, 
 artistic, or literary. Each century in those I constructed 
 in 1864 was divided into separate years, with one 
 hundred squares on each table. This not only necessitated 
 a large number of tables, but very many of them were 
 almost blank, as few notable events could be chronicled 
 during several centuries. Mr. Nichol's plan was a vast 
 improvement. To divide the earlier epochs of European 
 History {i.e. from 200 A.D. to the time of the Norman 
 Conquest) by centuries; that which followed, till 1350, by 
 half-centuries; the years from 1350 to 1500, by periods 
 of twenty-five years; those from 1500 to 1790 by decades; 
 and from the latter date to the present time by periods of 
 five years, was exceedingly wise. Many of the connecting 
 links in the earlier periods are now lost for ever. Not only 
 have the " ravages of time " obliterated them, but were 
 they now recoverable their value to posterity would be slight, 
 except as an exhibition of the continuity of an ever 
 evolving world-process. 
 
 These Tables are of the greatest use to the student 
 of the progress of civilization. Opening them by chance, 
 the seventh (dealing with the first half of the sixteenth 
 century) shows at a glance that, in its second decade, 
 while the Reformation was advancing in Germany, Charles 
 V. ruling in Spain, Francis I. in France, Cortez was 
 
240 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 in Mexico ; in the same decade the battle of Flodden 
 was fought, Wolsey was Cardinal and Lord Chancellor, 
 the first original English romance (More's Utopia) was 
 published, Machiavelli and Luther were both in the 
 mid-time of their power, Copernicus was busy with his 
 great discoveries, Paracelsus occupied with his occult re- 
 search, and Raphael achieving success in Art. By a clever 
 use of different colours what belongs to one country is 
 distinguished from the rest ; and by differences in type the 
 editor's opinion of the relative importance of men and things 
 is indicated. There cannot be a doubt that to see the pro- 
 gress of humanity, from the commencement of our modern 
 era, thus pictorially unfolded in all its various aspects what- 
 ever errors may have crept into it is of the very greatest 
 service to a student. Such Tables could only have been 
 compiled by a man whose critical power, as well as learning, 
 was great. 
 
 One of the most distinguished scientific men in the 
 country wrote to him, on receipt of them : " I have learned 
 from them very easily much that I have often wanted to 
 know. They will be most useful to a great many people, 
 of very varied pursuits." A classical authority in Oxford, 
 not often lavish of praise, wrote : " I shall draw the 
 attention of all my historical friends to it as a book they 
 may safely recommend to their pupils. It is an excellent 
 idea, excellently worked out ; and that is saying a great 
 deal, for I know by experience how hard it is to get 
 a mass of facts of this kind into a compact synoptic 
 form." An historian wrote of them as " a most convenient 
 treasury of reference." In a letter written in January, 
 1877, Nichol said: "They have consumed most of my 
 leisure during the last two years, I hope not wholly in 
 vain." This referred to the first edition. His subsequent 
 labours were much greater, and justify his own remark in 
 the preface to the last edition, 1888, that it was a task 
 " more properly belonging to an Academy " than to an 
 individual. The preface to the last edition is a model of 
 conciseness and good taste. 
 
LITERARY WORK. 24 1 
 
 C. PRIMER ON ENGLISH COMPOSITION, AND QUESTIONS 
 AND EXERCISES ON ENGLISH COMPOSITION. 
 
 In 1879 Nichol contributed a small book on English 
 Composition to the " Literature Primers," edited by J. R. 
 Green. Comparing this booklet with the more elaborate 
 treatises on the same subject in our modern English 
 literature, from Blair's and Campbell's downwards, it has 
 undoubted merits of its own. After a definition of the 
 general laws of style, etc., he deals with the characteristics 
 of " accuracy and purity," " clearness and precision," 
 " strength and grace," and then of " versification." It is 
 admirable in every way. One enthusiastic literary friend 
 wrote : " The Primer will be the death of the series. 
 That's what will happen. Nobody will have the cheek 
 to follow you, boiled down into one hundred small pages. 
 The quintessence of epigrams will be a new thing in those 
 days. . . ." 
 
 To one who wishes to attain a good English style, or 
 rather to avoid the pitfalls of provincialism and inaccuracy, 
 it is useful from first to last ; " a piece of tight work- 
 manship," said Dr. John Brown. As there are few things 
 that Scots students need more to be taught than a 
 good style, the book was specially opportune. Some have 
 only taught style, as the drunk Helot taught sobriety; but no 
 student of this little book, if he masters its first principles 
 with care, can miss his way through the labyrinths of a 
 vitiated style. 
 
 In connection with style, it is perhaps worth mentioning 
 that one of Nichol's correspondents writes that, at a great 
 academic function, seated between two bishops, the question 
 of style was started ; and a volume referred to, which had 
 been issued by a book-maker, containing the opinions of 
 half-a-dozen good writers and two hundred bad ones, who 
 had all been asked, "how they had acquired their style?" 
 One of the Bishops a friend of Nichol's said : " I was 
 not aware that I had a style. If I have, I must owe it 
 to the fact that I have written two sermons a week for 
 seventeen years ! " The Bishop in question was a humorist 
 of whom delightful stories remain to be told. 
 
 Q 
 
242 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL, 
 
 Although out of its exact chronological order, it may 
 be best to refer here to the corresponding Primer, entitled 
 Questions and Exercises on English Composition, which 
 Professor Nichol prepared, after the resignation of his chair, 
 along with William S. M'Cormick, now Professor at St. 
 Andrews and Dundee, and which was published in 1890. 
 
 This second Primer was arranged very much under 
 the same heads as the earlier one, and was " designed to 
 exemplify and elucidate its rules." One interest of this 
 little book is that it gives a partial mirror of the work done 
 in the classes of English Literature in the University of 
 Glasgow for twenty-seven years, as the questions are largely 
 drawn from papers set on the subject to these classes. It 
 will be found as useful a guide to the literary student as 
 the earlier Primer. The following is an extract from its 
 preface : " The whole history of our race has been an 
 almost unique blending of various elements, and to ignore 
 any of these elements would be to belie that history. The 
 early Christianization of our island which brought in the 
 first stock of Latin words, the Conquest which introduced 
 the second, the Crusades of the Middle Ages, and the 
 Commerce of later times, have been like arms linking us to 
 wider worlds of thought and action ; and to amputate any 
 one of them would be treason to the speech of Chaucer, of 
 Shakespeare, and of Bacon." 
 
 D. BYRON. 
 
 In the year 1880 Nichol contributed a monograph on 
 Byron to the " English Men of Letters " series, edited by 
 Mr. John Morley. 
 
 It is impossible to give a detailed critical estimate of this 
 book, but this may be said of it that fairness and generous- 
 ness in the appraisal of the man, and his work are its 
 dominant notes. So much had been previously written 
 about Byron that it was a very hard matter to know what 
 should, and what should not, be said ; especially as to Don 
 Juan. The book had to be written so as to meet the 
 requirements of the Series ; and this, perhaps, accounts 
 for the somewhat inadequate treatment of Childe Harold. 
 I know that, after being finished according to his own 
 
LITERARY WORK. 243 
 
 ideal, it was sent back to the author, and was cut down, so 
 as to fit into the limits originally prescribed. Its original 
 extent, however, was only an illustration of the fertility of 
 mind that always demanded more space than could be 
 granted to it, alike in literary and academic matters. 
 
 Every reader of Nichol's Byron must feel that the man 
 lives before him in these vivid pages ; the man with his 
 weaknesses and defects, and the manifold surroundings of 
 his life, which were alien to the development of the highest 
 qualities. The radical insincerity of the poet of an in- 
 sincere age had never been unfolded before in the same 
 way. We have the dark shadows, the lurid lights, and the 
 lonelinesses of his life; while, at the same time, his great 
 underlying humanity is drawn for posterity, in a bold Rem- 
 brandt style of literary portraiture. We see the terrible 
 egoism of the poet that was lessening with age, along with 
 the stormful grandeur, and the mighty torrent-rush of his 
 genius. This is a book which is neither a eulogy, nor an 
 apology, nor a condemnation. It is an honest, sterling, 
 and sympathetically-just criticism ; and the contrast of 
 such a book, and such an estimate, with the 
 
 Obscenaeque canes, importunaeque volucres, 
 
 who either snarl or scream at their contemporaries, and 
 their immediate predecessors, is very striking. 
 
 Mr. Swinburne wrote : 
 
 " Almost thou persuadest me to be a Byronite. I 
 congratulate you most cordially and sincerely in having 
 provided the very best and most effective, as well as 
 sufficient, Apologia for another man that ever was made, 
 as far as I know or can judge. I am especially gratified 
 by the moderation of tone with which you speak of Southey 
 and Leigh Hunt. I agree with every word you have said 
 as to their anti-Byronic demonstrations ; but I was, as you 
 know, apprehensive that you would be carried so much 
 me judice too far, as to provoke a reaction in the reader's 
 mind against your estimate. 
 
 " Of course, I take the book not as a judge's summing 
 up, but as the advocacy of the best counsel who has ever 
 
244 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 yet spoken for the defence. Otherwise, I should be not 
 ' almost,' but quite ' persuaded,' as above." 
 
 The late Master of Balliol wrote to him ; 
 
 Oxford, Oct. 28 [1880]. 
 
 My dear Nichol, The night before last I staid up late 
 reading your Life of Byron, and I thought I would write 
 to tell you how much I liked it. It is an excellent piece 
 of biography, and probably as near as we can get to the 
 truth. The style is very good, except here and there where 
 it seems to remind me of the " tempestuous " character of 
 the writer (please not to be offended) ; also some anti- 
 theses I noticed which seemed to be of sound rather than 
 sense. But these are very small matters. I think it a 
 capital piece of work, and find that it is generally appre- 
 ciated. Swinburne, whom I saw last week, was loud in his 
 praises of it, and seemed to agree in the moral estimate of 
 Lord Byron's character. 
 
 The great difficulty in writing a poet's life is, that, more 
 than other men, he is not to be trusted about himself. 
 He can imagine anything, and then " makes such a sinner 
 of his memory to credit his own." I forget whether I ever 
 told you of an excellent old woman whom I knew, lady's 
 maid to Lady Byron, at the time of the separation. Her 
 name was Sally Walker. She was left in charge of the 
 house, and used to show it after the break-up. She said 
 that American ladies and gentlemen and others used to 
 complain, " How wrong it was of my lady not to live 
 with my lord, when he wrote such beautiful verses to her." 
 But I used to say to them, " Lord Byron could write 
 verses about anything without feeling them a bit." Sally 
 Walker was a saint of the right sort, for whose memory I 
 have a great respect. She either knew nothing, or would 
 not tell, about the scandals. She said that Lord Byron's 
 lameness could be observed when he walked, but did not 
 amount to deformity. What a touching thing is the manner 
 in which it affected his mind. . . . Ever yours, 
 
 B. Jowett. 
 
 The following letter from William Bell Scott to Nichol, 
 
LITERARY WORK. 245 
 
 in reference to his Byron, has a special bibliographical 
 interest from its reference to Byron's prose Fragment'. 
 
 92 Cheyne Walk, 
 Chelsea, 21st October, 1882. 
 
 My dear Nichol, It is so long since we met, and that 
 was so hurried a meeting, you may well have a vague idea 
 of my identity even when you look at my signature. I 
 have heard of you, and seen what you have done too, 
 however ; and, living in a quiet country house in Ayrshire 
 lately, I read your Life of Byron, among other things, and 
 conceived the idea of writing you on a small but interesting 
 matter alluded to there. The book is so admirable a resume', 
 that a small flaw is easily discernible, and this little matter 
 I have had my attention drawn to by possessing both the 
 " Vampire " publication of Polidori, and the first edition of 
 Mazeppa, both published in 18 19, shortly after the period 
 in Switzerland, when the Shelleys and Byron and Polidori 
 proposed to write a tale on a supernatural subject each, 
 which resulted in the Frankenstein of Mrs. S. 
 
 Well, Polidori, who was a poor foolish creature, tried 
 his hand, and produced the Vampire, which the Rossettis 
 know to have been his. You say that it was published 
 as by Byron, along with a narrative of his abode in the 
 island of Mityline. But it was not published as Byron's ; 
 no name is attached to the pamphlet, nor ever was. Byron, 
 however, was wrongly informed that such a story had ap- 
 peared with his name, and wrote a letter protesting his 
 innocence, which letter I have seen. He was just then 
 preparing to publish Mazeppa; and at the end of that 
 volume he printed a prose story, of remarkable interest and 
 ability, as far as it goes, for it is only a Fragment, and has 
 no other name. This has been supposed to be his con- 
 tribution to the scheme contrived in Switzerland ; and as 
 the imperfect story has never been reprinted, nor as far 
 as I have observed has it ever been noticed by cleric or 
 laic man, woman, or child I think a little note regarding 
 it would be worth giving if you have a chance. The 
 Fragment is only in the first edition of Mazeppa, I 
 think. 
 
246 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 I spend the summer and autumn in Ayrshire now-a-days. 
 If I ever find myself in Glasgow, might I look in upon 
 you, after all these eons of ages ? My dear Nichol, I am 
 very sincerely yours, William Bell Scott. 
 
 Since many authors and critical judges have given to 
 Byron a supreme place in the great hierarchy of the nine- 
 teenth century poets of England, and since Goethe, amongst 
 the greater German authors and critics, has placed him so 
 high even introducing him into Faust allegorically it is 
 well that the English world has had an eminently just and 
 sober estimate of his genius by one whose special literary 
 characteristic was that of fair-mindedness. Byron was first 
 preposterously idolized, then unduly depreciated and abused; 
 and after the pendulum of literary criticism had oscillated 
 (as usual) from side to side, he was slowly understood, his 
 faults condemned, and his merits duly appreciated. In the 
 estimate of him which Nichol has given to posterity, fair- 
 ness of judgment, candour, and discriminative impartiality 
 are the most conspicuous features. 
 
 A well-known critic writes of the Byron : 
 " It is an excellent portrayal of the best side of the 
 poet's character, while not sparing the more cloudy side, 
 with which perhaps Nichol sympathized. The chivalry of 
 Byron's final act his gift of life for the awakening spirit 
 of buried Greece reads, and stirs one, as tragedy does." 
 
 E. THE DEATH OF THEMISTOCLES, AND OTHER POEMS. 
 
 In 1 88 1 Nichol issued another volume of verse, The 
 Death of Themistodes and other Poems. I think this was 
 his chief contribution to the Poetical Literature of his 
 country. As a historical drama, and a reproduction of the 
 spirit of the time, Themistodes is better than Hannibal was ; 
 and its conclusion, from the lines 
 
 No will of ours averts the appointed close, 
 I grope my path, as bound for some dim bourne 
 Where all the oracle's conjecture fails, 
 Uncertain but unfearing, 
 
LITERARY WORK. 247 
 
 has the pathetic dignity of a farewell, seldom reached in 
 
 literature. 
 
 Let my bones rest in their own Attic soil, 
 Where the winds loiter about Salamis, 
 
 could have been written by few. 
 
 No subject could be more fascinating to a philosophic 
 student of Human Nature, and of History who was also a 
 poet intent on the dramatic treatment of the springs of 
 action than the character of Themistocles. It is not a drama, 
 in the ordinary sense ; and its author justly calls it " a 
 dramatic fragment." It is a semi-biographical and descriptive 
 narrative, an analysis of character and motive, much more 
 than a drama ; and Nichol's management of his theme has 
 much in common with the way in which Browning used 
 to deal with some of his although the mode of treatment 
 is different. 
 
 That the great democratic champion of Greece should 
 have attracted him, as he did, is not surprising. Nichol 
 started life as an extreme liberal, and only by degrees be- 
 came conservative, and the character of Themistocles had 
 always fascinated him. The drama carries one far into the 
 heart of the Greek world ; and re-embodies it, with many 
 " modern touches here and there." The working out of the 
 dialogue is singularly accurate and elaborate. If, as a living 
 critic remarked, one would have liked to have seen the 
 excellence of the Attic constitution safe-guarded a little, the 
 generosity of the royal hero is finely and unobtrusively 
 brought out. The character of Themistocles is so diffi- 
 cult to estimate quite as difficult as that of another 
 European figure-head, whom Nichol subsequently dealt with, 
 viz., Lord Bacon that it is a real service that he took 
 up the problem of a close appraisal of the great victor of 
 Salamis, and tried to interpret him anew. He has certainly 
 succeeded in these pages in giving us some of the great 
 object-lessons of History as to the problem of Democracy 
 versus Aristocracy and Monarchy. He has shown the evils 
 of the hydra-headed tyranny of the demos, the uneducated 
 mob ; and he has also shown that the despotic will of a 
 tyrannus may be often worse than the unreasoning fervour 
 of the plebs. 
 
248 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 There is much in it that Landor might have written, 
 much also that is kindred to the genius of Clough. As a 
 nineteenth-century study of an ancient period, and of a great 
 Greek figure, it is complex (just because it is modern); 
 but, at the same time, it is simple and direct in its inmost 
 spirit. In finish it is quite classical. Has its picture of 
 Athens been surpassed by any modern writer? One 
 special feature of the drama is that it is not the work 
 of a professional writer of verses, but the production of an 
 academic teacher of large, vigorous, active, and combative 
 life : and so the poetry comes up out of the rock of 
 character and experience. 
 
 His old colleague and friend, Professor Lushington, wrote 
 of Themistocles : 
 
 " The exceeding sadness of the story does much to 
 interfere with the pleasure of reading it as a whole, 
 though not with the grace and vigour of your treatment 
 of it. That, after such achievements, such a life should have 
 come to such a close, seems to me one of the most painful 
 pictures that history can show. It seems, to take a legend- 
 ary parallel, a Merlin yielding to a Vivian, and the Forest's 
 echo might come from Mephistopheles. You have done the 
 best that can be done to make his memory still appeal to 
 sympathy by a halo of nobleness." 
 
 Mr. Lushington adds a critical remark on Nichol's making 
 the word " world " dissyllabic. " No doubt Burns and earlier 
 writers might do so ; but the British world is not the Anglo- 
 Saxon werelt in all respects. Change sways both words 
 and peoples." 
 
 Of this volume Nichol wrote to his publisher :. 
 
 December 24th, 1880. 
 
 My dear Sir, It is uphill work at Christmas all the 
 best wishes of which I send you rubbing up those old 
 and new pieces of plate. 
 
 I enclose one I had forgotten in the table of contents, but 
 wish inserted. You must not fail to see that fiddle when 
 you go to Genoa. I have stupidly forgot whether it was in 
 the Doria or Pallavicina palace, and therefore do not say. 
 
LITERARY WORK. 249 
 
 I wish the volume to be as various as I can make it 
 both in theme, feeling, and metre, for I complain of a terrible 
 monotony of sentimentalism in most recent collections. 
 Yours very truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 A g ain > January 10th, 1881. 
 
 Dear Mr. MacLehose, You have probably not been 
 surprised to get nothing sent from London. I was living 
 with two poets, and had to listen to them alternately ! 
 
 It is in the shorter poems of this volume, however, in 
 the " Pictures by the Way," the lyrics, and the sonnets 
 " In Memoriam," that its chief charm lies. These are a 
 singular revelation of character, of attitude, of purpose, and 
 of tendency. They disclose various relations to that vast 
 keyboard of humanity, which Nichol knew so well ; and show 
 the range of his sympathies, as well as of his insight. The 
 " In Memoriam " sonnets, and all the poems " From the Old 
 Home " are pure gold, without alloy. Madonna Mia and 
 Donna Vera will live in our literature, and will delight 
 posterity, long after the things of this hour are forgotten. 
 
 Nichol's power of re-awakening, and of giving definite ex- 
 pression to, those vague thoughts and feelings that used 
 to be experienced long ago, but become lost in the after- 
 toil and tempest of life, was conspicuous. There is a 
 wonderful freshness in this book of his ; it is the creation 
 of a mind and heart, that never could grow old. His sonnets 
 on Garrison and Longfellow were hailed far and wide in 
 America. " Others," wrote W. B. Scott, " rouse me like 
 the sound of a trumpet." 
 
 His sonnet on his father is one of the finest utterances 
 of filial piety in our literature, and the one on Carlyle 
 beginning : 
 
 Sirius has ceased from out our firmament, 
 
 struck the keynote of all his future appraisal of him. 
 
 The minor poems in that volume of 1881 are not 
 diamonds in the rough. They are polished brilliants ; and 
 almost each of them totus, teres, atque rotundus. 
 
250 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 I have a special interest in several of them, as I accom- 
 panied Nichol in some of his Swiss mountaineering in 
 
 1873- 
 
 He was most unfortunate in having bad weather for 
 his chief Alpine excursions, but he was an excellent 
 mountaineer. We crossed together through the Bernese 
 Oberland, from Grindelwald to the Grimsel Hospice, by 
 the Stralech pass, under the Finsteraarhorn, and rested 
 for a couple of hours on a narrow ledge of rock, in front 
 of the great giants of that region. I can never forget his 
 enthusiasm over that expedition, or the excellence of his 
 work as a rock climber. 
 
 Nichol dedicated Themistocles to his uncle, Mr. Tullis 
 of Rothes, his profound regard, nay his extraordinary 
 affection, for whom ought to be duly recorded in these 
 pages. Mr. Tullis was a remarkable man, an old alumnus 
 of St. Andrews, and afterwards a liberal patron of the 
 University. He was a politician and political economist, 
 somewhat of the school of Carlyle ; although, nullius 
 addictus jurare in verba magistri, he could hardly be 
 said to belong to any school. Nichol often said to me 
 that his uncle had " taught him much." 
 
 I went to Rothes to meet him at Mr. Tullis's house, and 
 well remember not only the first visit, but many subse- 
 quent ones. At Rothes there was an atmosphere of repose, 
 and of subsequent mental restoration. It was a delightful 
 place to visit, by any one who was wearied with work 
 or worry ; the host being so strong, yet so courteous and 
 gentle. Mr. Tullis was specially interested in Political 
 Economy, was an ardent follower of the doctrines of 
 Adam Smith as to international tariffs, and of reciprocity as 
 opposed to the unilateral free-trade of what used to be 
 called the " Manchester school " of Messrs. Bright and 
 Cobden; and for many years, while I lectured on Political 
 Economy, as well as on Moral Philosophy in the University, 
 he gave a prize to the best student in the class. 
 
 The following are selected from letters of acknowledg- 
 ment received by Nichol, in reference to his Themistocles. 
 Mr. Swinburne wrote : 
 
LITERARY WORK. 25 1 
 
 The Pines, March 29th, [1881]. 
 
 My dear Nichol, I add a postscript to my letter of 
 yesterday, with a word of cordial thanks for your new book, 
 and congratulation on its appearance. You never wrote 
 better than in some of the " Simonidea," as Landor called 
 his poems on the dead. Their fulness of noble, and thought- 
 ful, and manly beauty may not attract, or affect the notice 
 or the notices, of " the reptile press," but must command 
 the sympathy and admiration of all worthier readers. There 
 is much else to praise and to enjoy in the book, but this 
 is what strikes me first and most in it. I am delighted 
 to see announced a volume of Critical Essays, and proud to 
 see my name among the subjects : a name like enough, it 
 seems, to be submerged for the present, under the hail of 
 Russo-Radical indignation, and spectatorial contempt. 
 Yours ever, A. C. Swinburne. 
 
 His friend Longfellow wrote as follows : 
 
 Cambridge, May 22, 188 1. 
 
 My dear Professor, Accept my very cordial and sincere 
 thanks for your kind remembrance, and for the beautiful 
 book you have sent me. 
 
 I have read it with great interest and delight. The story 
 of Themistocles is fine and vigorous, and overflowing with 
 classic lore. Still, the Pictures by the Way, and the other 
 lyrics, come nearer to me, and charm me more. 
 
 Need I say how deeply I am touched by the friendly 
 lines addressed to me, or rather devoted to me and my 
 surroundings ? No ; I need not say it ; but only assure 
 you that I respond to the kind feeling and good fellowship 
 that suggested them. 
 
 Particularly pleasant to me are the Swiss poems ; 
 bringing back romantic memories. The Hebrews were 
 right in having no present tense in their grammar. The 
 present is so fugitive ; only the past and future seem 
 permanent. 
 
 How often I recall your flying visit here, and your hospit- 
 able home in Glasgow, and the distinguished guests I met 
 at your table. I hope that you and your family are all well, 
 and that you are not wearing yourself out with overwork. 
 
252 MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 Carlyle seems to me a man who, for the sake of work, 
 defrauded himself of his happiness. Your sonnet upon him 
 is very striking. I greatly regret some parts of the 
 Reminiscences. 
 
 Remember me kindly to your family, and believe me. 
 Always yours sincerely, HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 One of his most intimate and delightful correspondents 
 wrote to him in reference to these Poems : 
 
 " I am old enough to like them better than those of 
 
 , and ; because they don't require your growing 
 
 a new inner consciousness to enjoy them ! and that is a 
 process one cannot do after 35!" 
 
 F. BURNS. 
 Professor Nichol was asked to write a critical essay on 
 " The career and genius of Burns," to accompany the large 
 library edition of his works, which was published at Edin- 
 burgh by Mr. Paterson, under the editorship of Mr. Scott 
 Douglas. It was not printed in the place originally in- 
 tended ; but was issued by itself in 1882, to all subscribers 
 to the " works," under the title Robert Burns : a Summary 
 of his Career and Genius. Within the compass of seventy 
 pages it gives as just a portraiture of the man, and as 
 keen a critical estimate of his genius, as exists. He follows 
 the very natural division of Burns's career into seven 
 periods. (1) The Alloway period; (2) the Mount Oli- 
 phant period; (3) the Lochlea or Tarbolton period; (4) 
 the Mossgiel period ; (5) the Edinburgh period ; (6) the 
 Ellisland period ; and (7) the Dumfries period. He 
 deals deftly with previous critical estimates, and explains 
 what we owe to Burns, what he has done for the poetical 
 literature of his country, as had never been done before. 
 The charm of its pure classical English had a fascination 
 for many readers, apart from the subject. In brilliance it 
 was greater than the Byron; and its critical judgments did 
 not dim the lustre of its genuine enthusiasm. 
 
 The late Master of Balliol wrote to him : 
 " It exactly expresses my view of him. It is full of 
 excellent criticism. If I were to find fault as I used to 
 
LITERARY WORK. 253 
 
 do thirty years ago I would say it bristles too much ; 
 but I am surprised at the great knowledge, and command 
 of facts, which it contains. Why give a thought to these 
 little people, mosquitoes, or whatever name they are to be 
 called, of the and the " [critical reviewers]. 
 
 Another correspondent, Dr. Henry Crosskey, wrote : 
 " It seems to me the noblest piece of work yet done for 
 Burns ; and should he ever come across you in any strange 
 land, he will be bound to welcome you, as one who read the 
 secrets of his heart. Although a parson and an Englishman, 
 I always feel towards Burns, as he felt when he wrote of 
 Miss Baillie : 
 
 The Deil he couldna scaith thee, 
 
 Or aught that wad belang thee ; 
 He'd look into thy bonnie face, 
 
 And say, ' I canna wrang thee.' 
 
 And your essay is to me so valuable, as not only healthy 
 and sound in criticism, but as making the reader conscious 
 in every page of the unutterable charm of his genius. Any 
 one can moralize ; but to recognize the mighty spirit, clothed 
 with just that raiment of flesh and blood, is another matter. 
 Are your satires set to the same tune ? " 
 
 Mr. Swinburne wrote : 
 
 " My dear Nichol, I congratulate you with all my heart 
 on having done more for Burns, as you had already done 
 more for Byron, than all the rest of the students or 
 champions of either poet together. In this instance, as you 
 know, I am personally (si quid id est) more in sympathy 
 more altogether at one with you than in the former case ; 
 as, in spite of the first cantos of Don Juan, and even 
 of the ever glorious Vision of Judgment, I have always 
 regarded, and shall always regard, Burns as beyond all 
 comparison the greater poet, as well as the nobler fellow of 
 the two. 
 
 " To tell you that your monograph is a model would be 
 an impertinence on the part of your ' old junior.' Like 
 the Byron, it is far above anything else I ever read on the 
 subject." 
 
254 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Mr. Lushington wrote : 
 
 Kenbank, Dalry, 
 Galloway, Oct. n, 1882. 
 
 My dear Nichol, I read with much sympathetic interest 
 your Burns which you kindly sent me, as also your earlier 
 biography of Byron strange how nearly the two names, 
 in some pronunciations, as the two destinies, approach to 
 each other. I remember, before going to Cambridge, at a 
 great country house, I met Hobhouse, who spoke of Lord 
 Birrn the mention of him I think referred merely to some 
 trial of skill in pistol-shooting between a Greek captain, 
 Lord B., and Hobhouse himself a slight but abiding 
 glimpse in memory, as distinct to me now as the record 
 of Shelley's two little children (who were under the charge 
 of a lady at Hanwell) on whom I, being probably about 
 aet. eight, set eyes of boyish admiration. Yours sincerely, 
 
 E. L. L. 
 
 It is the union of sympathy with impartial criticism that 
 gives this book its value. So many a previous writer on 
 our national poet, realizing the "mighty mass of manhood," 
 have gone on to regret that he was not this, or not that, 
 that he had not been different in certain tendencies, or 
 directions ; forgetting the unity of Human Nature ; and 
 that Burns's imagination, his fancy, his patriotism, and 
 multitudinous energy could not have been what they were 
 without his passions. What a spirit it was, cradled among 
 beasts of the old Scottish stall ; how incisive, strong, pro- 
 found ; how tender and how true ! But indiscriminate 
 praise does no good ; and Nichol's was a needed supplement 
 to Carlyle's less restrained eulogy. 
 
 Mr. William B. Scott wrote : 
 
 92 Cheyne Walk, 
 Chelsea, nth November, 1882. 
 
 My dear Nichol, Your essay on Burns seems to me the 
 completest resume, and compactest inferential disquisition 
 on the nature of the poet that has been done. Some ten 
 years ago I was asked by an Edinburgh publishing firm 
 to illustrate Burns by a series of etchings ; and, when 
 
LITERARY WORK. 255 
 
 these were going on, I was asked to extend my labours 
 to editing the work. The firm was that of Fullarton & Co., 
 who had already an edition edited by Hogg. In the course 
 of doing this, I confess I came to the conclusion that the 
 moral nature of Burns was of the lowest clay. His satire on 
 the Scottish Kirk almost at the same time that he was 
 standing in penance on its floor; his swearing to Highland 
 Mary (and I came to the conclusion he pledged troth to the 
 poor creature to get over her there and then) at the very 
 time he was bound to Jean Armour, appeared to me so 
 bad that one dare not characterize plainly the man who 
 could be guilty of such actions. 
 
 I have not yet finished your essay, but it appears to me 
 its only defect is too high an appreciation of the man. 
 Very sincerely yours, WILLIAM BELL SCOTT. 
 
 G. AMERICAN LITERATURE. 
 
 The preparation of his volume on American Literature 
 occupied Nichol at intervals for many years. He began it 
 in the spring of 1861, when he delivered a course of lectures 
 on " American Poetry," to the Philosophical Institution of 
 Edinburgh ; but the design of writing it was only matured 
 after a visit which he paid to the United States in 1865. 
 On his return he wrote an article for The North British 
 Review on " Lowell," and another on " Emerson," meaning 
 to add a third on " Hawthorne." His being asked to write 
 the article on " American Literature " for the Encyclopaedia 
 Britannica in 1875 led him to mature his purpose further. 
 A few years later, in 1879, he gave a course of lectures 
 on the same subject at Cheltenham, and afterwards others 
 in Edinburgh. He then modified his original plan of issuing 
 his account of American literature in lecture-form ; and, 
 falling back on the Encyclopaedia article, expanded it, so as 
 to include a full account of the literature of the States, 
 from the commencement of its history to the present time. 
 The volume was issued by Messrs. Adam & Charles Black 
 in 1882. A second revised edition was published in 1885. 
 
 Here again, as in his other works, justice and generosity 
 are the dominant notes. He displayed surprising acquaint- 
 
256 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 ance with historical detail in marshalling his facts, and the 
 vis vivida shewn in their interpretation is extraordinary. 
 His criticism is thorough and searching ; especially that 
 on Hawthorne, Emerson, Thoreau, and Whitman. Of course 
 he could not escape from errors altogether, and these were 
 soon pointed out, and most of them corrected in the second 
 edition. Some of his juvenile enthusiasm as for writers 
 such as Fenimore Cooper was doubtless excessive. But it 
 is when dealing with the major men such as Hawthorne 
 and Emerson that he is at his best ; not when review- 
 ing the dei minorum gentium. I rank his estimate of 
 Hawthorne as the best in his book. The chapter on 
 the American humorists is specially excellent, and more 
 particularly his remarks on the " characteristics " of 
 Transatlantic humour. It was not to be expected that the 
 book would be welcomed so much in America, as in this 
 country ; although the verdict of the higher criticism there 
 was very just in its appreciation, and that of individual 
 literary men and women still more so. But as a guide to 
 the average literary Briton, who wishes to know what is 
 most worth reading in American literature, it leaves little 
 to be desired. To intermix so much of the history of 
 America with his literary criticism was an excellent idea, 
 which might have been extended in the earlier chapters. 
 That the emigrants of the Mayflower are passed over (and 
 also Penn), and that the Puritan element is almost ignored, 
 was perhaps natural on the writer's part ; but many of 
 his readers have regretted the omission. 
 
 In 1883 Nichol had an offer made to him to have a 
 part of this book translated into German. He objected to 
 its dismemberment, and he also wished to see a sample 
 of the translation, which seems never to have been sent 
 to him. 
 
 His friend Principal Ward writes : " He had made this 
 particular field of study his own, and surveyed it without 
 the desire generally due to partial ignorance of ex- 
 aggerating its heights and depths. He was also a deeply 
 interested student of American politics, into which indeed, 
 at the critical period of the struggle between North and 
 South, he entered heart and soul." 
 
LITERARY WORK. 257 
 
 Lord Lytton wrote to him : 
 
 Knebworth, Stevenage, 
 
 Herts., October 6, 1888. 
 
 Dear Professor Nichol, I owe you a long letter, or, 
 at any rate, a letter on a good many topics, about which 
 I should like to chat with you at length, did time allow ; 
 but I have been for the last three weeks, and still am, in 
 only a slightly less degree, beset with almost as many 
 hindrances to either reading or writing as poor Hastings, 
 in Rowe's (still poorer ?) play of Jane Shore, when, on his 
 way to execution, he exclaims " I have business that would 
 become an ass, and not a minute's time to do it in ! " 
 
 But last night, or rather in the small hours of this 
 morning, I finished your historical sketch of American 
 literature; and I am too full of it to delay writing to you 
 about it. The subject of it is one in which I was interested 
 beforehand, and as it is treated most conveniently in 
 compartments, some of them with titles which attracted me 
 more than others, I fancied that I should do less injustice 
 to it by desultory reading. But the book has interested me 
 so keenly that, having once opened it, intending only to dip 
 into it, I could not lay it down till I had got to the end 
 of it. It is a long time since any novel has interested me 
 half as much, or kept me at a stretch so long on the alert. 
 I have been up with it all night. 
 
 It is delightfully written, and the style, at once dignified 
 and entertaining, never bores or fatigues. Your critical 
 verdicts though perhaps one or two of them are rather 
 more favourable than mine would be are all marked by 
 a rare impartiality and conscientious determination to be 
 just; and of your general principles of criticism, and the' 
 pregnant aphorisms in which they are packed, I can only 
 say that I wish we had more of them inter alia, " Descrip- 
 tion is the pony on which beginners learn to ride" is 
 delicious. That which has the greatest personal interest to 
 me is the chapter on the orators. 
 
 That part of your book, however, which I have read with 
 the completest and liveliest satisfaction, is its reference to 
 the Civil War, and the character and causes of that great 
 
 R 
 
258 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 conflict. To this day I am persuaded that in your know- 
 ledge of these you represent a very small minority of our 
 countrymen ; and that not one Englishman in a hundred, 
 or even in a thousand, understands the A B C of the case. 
 The event itself, as regards contemporary English opinion 
 about it, was an alarming revelation of the incapacity of 
 English politicians to understand even the most elementary 
 conditions of any foreign situation. Gladstone's total ignor- 
 ance of the facts, and misconceptions of the forces in action, 
 were most characteristic of the man. It is quite refreshing 
 to me to come across such utterances as yours on this 
 subject, for they are indicative of habitual ways of forming 
 opinion on political phenomena, which are certainly not 
 common. The American Civil War, I think, makes a very 
 good test-object for trying political lenses. Every word of 
 what you say about it is absolutely true ; and although 
 your allusions to it are necessarily cursory, they are of a 
 kind which could not have been made by any writer not 
 thoroughly well informed of what he writes about. 
 
 Your book has interested me by its criticisms, not only 
 of the writers I know, but also of many others of some 
 of whom I know nothing {e.g., Brockden, Brown, and 
 Thoreau), whilst with the rest I am but very slightly 
 acquainted. Among the last come the American humourists. 
 But I am greatly pleased to find by your review of them 
 that, if I knew them better, my impressions of them would 
 in all probability remain unaltered. Only two of them 
 gave me any pleasure, and that not much Artemus 
 Ward and Bret Harte. The former has a genial unpreten- 
 tious oddity which I enjoy; and the latter, genuine pathos, 
 though I think it runs in a thin vein which does not reach 
 very far. Mark Twain is antipathetic to me, and Hans 
 Breitmann odious. These American humourists, however, 
 such as they are, appear to me to represent the most 
 thoroughly national and original department of American 
 literature. There is not an echo of Europe in any one of 
 them. By the way, in your notice of the minor American 
 writers there is one I miss. Do you know anything of the 
 short tales of O'Brien ? One feels they could not have been 
 written if Hawthorne, Poe, and Hoffmann had not gone 
 
LITERARY WORK. 259 
 
 before ; but I have read them with a good deal of pleasure, 
 and think the best of them very curious and striking. 
 The Last Room, for instance, and The Golden Ingot impressed 
 me greatly. Yours very truly, LYTTON. 
 
 When, in the course of the year 1888, Nichol wrote 
 and issued a pamphlet on University Reform, he sent a 
 copy to Lord Lytton, who replied to him thus : 
 
 British Embassy, 
 Paris, 18th October, 1888. 
 
 My dear Professor Nichol, ... I have read with 
 the greatest interest your admirable paper on University 
 Reform. It deals with a subject on which I feel that 
 your Rector ought to be much better instructed than I 
 am, and with which I should certainly have endeavoured 
 to make myself thoroughly conversant if I were now tak- 
 ing any part in parliamentary life ; but my avocations 
 abroad (which I did not anticipate when put in nomination 
 for the Rectorship), unavoidably render me a roi faineant 
 in the tenure of that office. I am glad, however, to find 
 that my previous impressions so far as they went about 
 the Scotch Universities Bill were in accordance with the 
 views so powerfully set forth in your masterly paper. 
 . . . Yours very faithfully, LYTTON. 
 
 Again, at a later date : 
 
 ". . . To all you say about our critical press I can 
 only reply a qui le dites vous ? . . . The fact is the 
 English literature and English criticism of our time belongs 
 entirely to the Bourgeoisis and the Bourgeoisie hates what- 
 ever is not Bourgeois. . . ." 
 
 H. BACON. 
 
 When organizing a series of " Philosophical Classics for 
 English Readers" in the year 1879, I at first asked 
 Professor Nichol to write a volume on J. S. Mill. He 
 agreed to undertake it, but said, " I do not think I could 
 write of him without expressing, at least indirectly, my 
 sympathy with his theological views, which it seems to me 
 
260 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 have never had justice done to them." He then said that 
 he preferred Bacon, as "much safer." "I have a distinct 
 theory on the subject of his philosophy, and some knowledge 
 of physics to help me, which could give no offence. I would, 
 of course, criticise the man as a whole." 
 
 I gave him Bacon, knowing that he had a wide knowledge 
 of the period, and a view of his own as to the character 
 of the man, as well as his philosophy. It was years before 
 the work was ready, as Nichol's time was fully occupied in 
 different ways. This was in some respects unfortunate, as 
 other writers on the subject were in the field ; and he was 
 anticipated by Dean Church and Professor Gardiner. 
 
 It would be a long story and quite useless to tell it 
 now how the book grew in its writer's hands, -and how 
 impossible he found it to compress his materials into one 
 volume of the Series. When I agreed to give two volumes 
 to Bacon considering the peculiar position in which he 
 stood to his predecessors, contemporaries, and successors, 
 and that he was, more than any one else in the list of 
 modern philosophers (not excepting Leibnitz), a man of 
 action and affairs, a distinguished publicist, and a great lawyer, 
 as well as a philosopher and man of letters I was met by 
 appeals for a similar extension of space by other writers 
 for their special philosopher. That, however, could not be 
 granted; and it is mentioned here only to explain how it 
 came about that after much discussion and delay Nichol 
 was allowed two volumes, the first to be devoted especially, 
 though not exclusively, to the man, and the second to 
 his philosophy. 
 
 The introductory chapter of the first book, in which he 
 deals with Bacon's age and surroundings, is a masterly bit of 
 work. The relations in which the great Chancellor stood 
 to his contemporaries are nowhere so fairly stated. These 
 relations, as well as Bacon's own character, had been often 
 discussed by partizans, without being looked at judicially ; 
 and the baseness of the man, allied to his greatness, had 
 never been brought out in the same way. 
 
 The standard of public action in that period was quite 
 other than it became in later times. Practices were 
 resorted to, and methods adopted, which later standards 
 
LITERARY WORK. 26 1 
 
 have greatly modified, if not reversed. Dissimulation was 
 almost universal, adulation scarcely less so. Intrigues and 
 hypocrisy were rampant ; and there is no doubt that the 
 worst defects in Bacon's character were defects which apper- 
 tained to his age and time. It is not fair to judge him by 
 the canons of the nineteenth century : and in the estimate 
 which Nichol passes on the main facts of his career he will 
 very seldom be found, by competent students, to be far from 
 the truth of what he has discussed. A want of nobility 
 and generosity, with an occasional subserviency and flattery, 
 were conjoined in Bacon with the keenest intelligence, and 
 great legal and political sagacity. 
 
 Nichol's estimate is almost a justification of Pope's indict- 
 ment, " the wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind." Even 
 those who agree with a recent critic in characterizing Bacon 
 as " a magnificent humbug," will admit that they can 
 learn much from these pages. The judgment for which 
 the Chancellor appealed to posterity was never meted out 
 with more judicial impartiality, and the book shows more 
 concentrated thought than any previous work of Nichol's. 
 The subject fascinated him. He thought Bacon the most 
 interesting subject in the whole range of possible biography. 
 
 Macaulay's brilliant essay had repelled him, mainly be- 
 cause of the indiscriminate way in which praise and 
 censure were distributed. Macaulay sacrificed the truth of 
 the narrative of Bacon's life, and set aside judicial im- 
 partiality. The result was a series of meteoric epigrams, 
 and mere picturesqueness of diction. A critic, who is 
 ignorant of metaphysics, is quite unable to appraise the 
 work of a philosopher; and with all the brilliance of 
 Macaulay's essay on Bacon, it must be described as the 
 production of a literary connoisseur who was a charlatan 
 in philosophy. 
 
 But it is in his ethical judgments on the conduct of 
 Bacon throughout his career justice combined with tolerance 
 that the chief merit of Nichol's book will be found. There 
 perhaps never was a man who more clearly saw, and more 
 sincerely approved the meliora, than the great Chancellor did, 
 while obliged by his relations to the Court (or the favourites 
 of the Court) to follow the deteriora. It is a somewhat 
 
262 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 parallel case to that of Seneca toward Nero and Tegellinus ; 
 Seneca was a much smaller man than Bacon, and more 
 pedantic ; but Goethe, perhaps, under similar circumstances, 
 might have acted as Bacon did. 
 
 It is impossible thoroughly to like Bacon, he had so little 
 heart ; and, if we compare him with another of the ancients, 
 he was much inferior to Cicero, in his want of Ovfxos ; but, 
 after all, we have far more compassion for him than dislike 
 or indignation. Perhaps it was a more difficult thing to 
 be a perfectly honest politician under a Henry VIII. and 
 a James I., than under King Caucus ; although, under the 
 former, men were dishonest in a more dignified way ! 
 
 Let us admit, however, all that can be brought forward 
 against the reputation of Lord Verulam. Who but he ever 
 gathered together the wisdom of the past, reopened it, and 
 bequeathed it in so lucid and memorable a way? The 
 manner in which Nichol has given us a true and im- 
 partial picture of the man under many lights and shadows, 
 and has at the same time presented the greatness of the 
 debt which the modern world owes to him as the inaugu- 
 rator of a new method, gives to these two little volumes 
 a unique value to posterity. 
 
 No estimate of Bacon would be tolerable without a corre- 
 sponding estimate of his age, with its manifold and conflict- 
 ing tendencies, political as well as literary. He was one of 
 those rare spirits, at the dawn of a new era, full of impulses 
 which turned at once forwards and backwards a period of 
 multitudinous forces, seething together, and stimulating each 
 other who nevertheless tended steadily onwards, and gave 
 a new expression to his " Zeitgeist." 
 
 The following letters refer to Nichol's work on Bacon : 
 To W. B. Scott he wrote : 
 
 14 MONTGOMERIE CRESCENT, KELVINSIDE, 
 
 Glasgow, May 11, 1888. 
 My dear Scott, Cap in hand, my humblest apologies for 
 being again constrained to postpone my prospect doubly 
 alluring in this fulfilment of the " Promise of May " of 
 spending a few days with you. ... I cannot, or will 
 not, allow the " angel of the house " to have on her hands at 
 
LITERARY WORK. 263 
 
 once two invalids one doubtless a model of patience, but 
 the other a melancholy example of the reverse. Besides, I 
 am bi-daily sending off to Blackwood flitches of " Bacon," 
 taking care always to exalt the " lovely " Democracy of 
 Morris, Madox Brown, Minto, Lord Randolph, and yourself. 
 Precious room, as I told " Topsy," there will be for any form 
 of Art, when Bottom, Snug, Snout, and Starveling are 
 our rulers. Shakespeare knew what he was about ; you 
 don't. . . . Excuse the fact that a man who has only 
 aching gums must bite, if at all, with his pen. If you have 
 glanced at my pamphlet, which has led me into a bore of 
 correspondence, you will have found it as mild as milk and 
 water, or as myself. Yours ever sincerely, 
 
 J. NlCHOL. 
 
 From Glenburn House, Rothesay, Bute, he wrote, on 
 June 13, 1888: 
 
 I don't know if you have ever been here, but you will 
 recognize the address of one of those Hydropathic Institu- 
 tions which I am wont to call Lunatic Asylums as 
 a signal of distress. This is about the time when I hoped 
 to have come to you at St. Andrews according to your 
 suggestion on the Goschen day MS. in hand. I have 
 never had a day's health or really good day's work 
 since. . . . Next Monday I hope to get home again 
 and resume the work against which the gods or devils 
 seem hitherto to have been fighting not in vain. I shall say 
 nothing of its special difficulties till it is done. The delay, 
 now for about the tenth time, exasperates me beyond words ; 
 but on this occasion it must matter less to Blackwood, as 
 there is, I understand, no publishing in midsummer, and he 
 cannot fail to have it in time for the issue of " the Fall." If 
 you are at St. Andrews, or within hail of where we chance 
 to be, I shall come to see you, when the thing is being 
 printed ; sooner I should feel like Macbeth meeting Banquo's 
 ghost, " Oh, never say I didn't do it ! " I do not know 
 whether to wish Spinoza to rush in as a shield, or to con- 
 gratulate myself, if I am not absolutely the last. It is 
 curious that the two laggarts are the two in many respects 
 most opposite. Yours ever, J. NlCHOL. 
 
264 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Of his Bacon, Lord Lytton wrote to him as follows : 
 
 Hotel Barnina Samadin, 
 
 Engadine, 21st August, 1888. 
 
 Dear Professor Nichol, My letter from Royat will have 
 assured you how flattered I felt on receiving there your 
 work upon Bacon as a gift. But I have now to thank 
 you for the charm I have found in it as a book. I read it 
 on my way hither, and could not stop reading it till I had 
 reached the end. I have since re-read many parts of it 
 which specially fascinated me ; and, but for a passing attack 
 of ill-health which prevented me from writing, you would 
 sooner have received this grateful record of my impressions. 
 I have always thought it must be much more difficult to 
 succeed in the composition of a short biography than in that 
 of a long one : and especially difficult must it be to give 
 force and freshness to a biographical portrait on a reduced 
 scale, when the subject of it has been repeatedly treated 
 before upon a large scale ; but whatever the difficulties of 
 such a task, you seem to me to have accomplished it with a 
 singular success". Of the larger biographies of Bacon, 
 Spedding's is the only one I have read ; but his elaborate 
 work leaves yours, to my mind, distinctly original ; whilst 
 at the same time its originality is on no point attained by a 
 paradoxical or partizan treatment of the subject. Your 
 portrait of Bacon, moreover, though sketched so lightly and 
 rapidly, I find much the more living of the two. 
 
 With due allowance for epigrammatic exaggeration, I think 
 the description of Bacon as " the meanest and wisest of 
 mankind " will always hold good, in so far at least as the 
 shabbiness of his conduct, though not in itself exceptional, 
 stands in an exceptional relation to the greatness of his 
 mind. Intellectually he differed so much from the ordinary 
 courtiers of his time, that there is the appearance of a lusus 
 naturae in the fact that morally he differed from them so 
 little. But this superficial enigma, so fascinating to the 
 rhetoric of Macaulay, disappears in your vividly natural 
 presentation of his character as the type of the superior 
 parvenu the able man whose main aim in life is to get on 
 and your admirable exposition of the necessary relation 
 
LITERARY WORK. 265 
 
 between such a man with such an aim, and such a milieu as 
 the Court of James the First. I suspect that it is by the 
 persistent employment of their second-rate qualities only 
 that even first-rate men " get on," and one wonders what 
 Bacon might have been, had he been born noble, with great 
 inherited wealth. 
 
 The style of your book is, if I may say so without pre- 
 sumption, delightful. It differs, and to me most pleasingly, 
 from the general type of those small biographies of famous 
 persons, which have become so important a department of 
 Contemporary Literature, in the fact that it is not a critical 
 essay, or series of such essays on a biographical text, but a 
 bona-fide consecutive biographical narrative, the movement 
 of which, instead of being interrupted, is always advanced 
 with increasing interest by the illustrative force of the 
 suggestive criticism of character that grows out of and 
 accompanies its unsuspended progress. Macaulay's Bacon 
 is a monster, Spedding's a miracle yours, a man. The 
 idem velle et idem nolle de republica must always be a bond 
 of sympathy between the writers and readers of history, and 
 I cannot help adding that the lively satisfaction with which 
 I have read your book is enhanced by my complete sym- 
 pathy with the tone of many remarks in which you glance 
 from past to present political questions. Pray believe me, 
 with renewed thanks, gratefully and sincerely yours, 
 
 Lytton. 
 
 In a letter which has not been preserved Nichol objected 
 to the use of the word parvenu in the above letter, and 
 Lord Lytton replied on the 6th October : " Your objection 
 is perfectly just. The ordinary sense of the word is wholly 
 different from what I meant. Of course, in that sense, 
 Bacon was no more a parvenu than Walsingham or Cecil. 
 All I meant to imply was that he might have been a greater 
 man, if he had not had to pass the greater part of his life in 
 making his way to a great position by all available means." 
 
 I. CARL YLE. 
 
 NlCHOL'S last work was his Carlyle, published in 1892. 
 Perhaps it is his best. 
 
266 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Many of those who had been helped to " new departures " 
 by Carlyle were pained by the volumes which his greatest 
 friend and confrere published. Professor Lushington, after 
 perusing the four volumes which Froude gave to the 
 world, wrote that he " would read no more." Certainly, it 
 amazes one to see how the gloomier aspects of Carlyle's 
 married life were there and then made prominent. At the 
 same time, it is curious how absorbing to the average 
 reader the littlenesses of so great a man can be. " I think 
 it difficult," adds the same writer, " to find a more candid 
 and appreciative review of his writings, or a more generous- 
 hearted and sympathizing recognition of his greatness than 
 your book contains. A great deal touching Mrs. Carlyle, 
 notably the near chance of their separation, was quite new to 
 me. The whole version is (what Carlyle recklessly called 
 ' The Starry Heaven,') a sad sight. Let us hope that it is 
 now soothed and sweetened into everlasting peace." 
 
 It is difficult to estimate the real merit of one who has 
 been for many years a contemporary, until he is seen in 
 the perspective of the future, when lesser verdicts fall aside, 
 and the greater and juster ones remain. But there is little 
 doubt that posterity will recognize that justice scrupulous 
 justice is the dominant quality of Nichol's estimate of 
 Carlyle. This feature, I think, eclipses its picturesqueness. 
 
 He wrote to me in August, 1891 : "I know quite what 
 I have to say about his Books indeed, have already said 
 most of it ; but the difficulty of dealing fairly, yet not 
 dully, with the Life and Character seems to increase. I write 
 more slowly than ever, being older and weaker, and cannot 
 get on at all if I allow myself in the course of any work to 
 be seriously interrupted by another. It is not the time that 
 a irapepyov takes ; but it throws me off the track, on which 
 if I do not keep ruthlessly, I shall never get to the end." 
 
 A prominent literary critic of the day who used to hate 
 Carlyle pronounced it " a most masterly and splendid piece 
 of work, a noble ' Apologia.' If it has not actually recon- 
 verted me to faith in the Old Enemy, it has at least made 
 me reconsider sundry of my points of objection to the man 
 and his doctrine, ' not without results,' to speak in his own 
 dialect. I am delighted by your generous justice to Froude; 
 
LITERARY WORK. 267 
 
 but ' generous justice ' is the keynote of the whole book. 
 With regard to Byron, as you know, I thought and still 
 think you rather generous and partial than just ; but here 
 these two prime critical qualities are in exquisite equilibrium." 
 Another veteran in Philosophy and Literature Dr. 
 James Martineau wrote to him that he had " lingered 
 over the first third of the book with more than literary 
 admiration, with the interest of awakened memories of 
 life sixty years ago, when, and since when, many of 
 the figures grouped by you on your pages the Butlers, 
 Jeffrey, Brougham, J. S. Mill, Mrs. Taylor, Emerson, 
 Margaret Fuller, as well as the Carlyles were familiar 
 to me, all in personal converse, and some in long- 
 continued relations. The annual visits of Mr. and Mrs 
 Carlyle to her Welsh relatives in Liverpool renewed my 
 delightful intercourse with them through a large portion of 
 the twenty-five years of my life there. In London I 
 respected his increasing love of seclusion ; but now and 
 then he asked me to join his afternoon stroll upon Cheyne 
 Walk. Though at times his talk was characteristic, and 
 very often cynical, its humour and pathos always seemed 
 to me deeper than its bitterness. I agree essentially with 
 your estimate both of the prophet himself and of Mr. 
 Froude's mode of dealing with his trust as literary executor." 
 
 Mr. Froude, however, wrote to Nichol from Woodcot, 
 Kingsbridge, South Devon, on July 31, 1892 : 
 
 I read it (the Carlyle) eagerly on its arrival, and 
 found it a pleasant contrast to the shriekings of women 
 and womanish men, with which my ears have been so long 
 deafened. I can pay you no higher compliment than in 
 saying that it would have pleased Carlyle himself. 
 
 I do not make out whether you knew him personally; 
 but, whether you did or did not, you have formed a more 
 correct judgment of him than any other person who has 
 hitherto written upon him. 
 
 In time, no doubt, the world will think of him as you 
 do; but never, in my experience, has the clamour of tongues 
 been more absurd than in what has been said and written 
 about him in the last ten years. 
 
268 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 I must thank you for what you have said about my 
 own share in the business. A few sensible words come 
 in season after such a tempest of abuse. You yourself seem 
 to think that perhaps Carlyle might, towards the end, have 
 expressed a wish that the memoir of his wife should not 
 be published. I have only to say that from 1891, when 
 he placed it in my hands, to his death, he never said one 
 word to me that implied such a wish, although he knew 
 that I thought that it ought to be published. 
 
 My own opinion was and is, that the writing it was the 
 most characteristic and honourable thing that he ever did 
 in his life, and that so it will be hereafter regarded. 
 
 But I have not been careful to defend myself, nor ever 
 shall be. Yours faithfully, J. A. FROUDE. 
 
 3 Strathmore Gardens, 
 Bognor, Sussex, August, 14th, 1892. 
 
 Dear MacLehose, I have now a number of letters like 
 the three enclosed, which return at your convenience, not 
 anonymous, but unfortunately not public. Froude's is of 
 value to me, as we have no personal acquaintance. 
 
 Froude's mistake was putting in too much of Mrs. 
 Carlyle's Journal and a number of domestic details. I am 
 very far from bored by reassuring letters, being rather 
 tired of the abuse of the London weeklies. Ever yours 
 truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 Nichol's Carlyle will live as the most vivid, truthful, and 
 discriminative bit of criticism, given to the world in short 
 compass, since the sage of Chelsea passed away. 
 
 Mrs. M'Cunn, a daughter of Professor Sellar, wrote to him: 
 " The first result of the coming of your book was to 
 spread dispeace in this household. My husband and I 
 almost quarrelled for the possession of it. He finally carried 
 it off, and nearly finished it at a sitting, and then had 
 to hear much of it over again ; for, when sentences and 
 epigrams, and strokes of wit and luminous judgment 
 delighted me, I insisted on reading them aloud to him. 
 I never read pages more full of life. One winced at some 
 of your judgments of Carlyle, but nowhere can one read 
 
LITERARY WORK. 269 
 
 more splendid and generous tributes to his entire dis- 
 interestedness, his fearlessness, and his magnificent powers." 
 
 Professor M'Cunn wrote to Nichol afterwards : 
 
 " My selfishness in monopolizing the book, when it came, 
 was, I admit, shameless. The one point on which I had the 
 impudence to differ was in respect of imputed jealousy 
 of contemporaries. That he flung many a missile at them 
 (from a peculiarly well-stocked armoury) is certain. But 
 the motive, as seems to me, was not jealousy, but rather 
 the desire to ' take men down ' a characteristic far from 
 admirable, I dare say, though Scotch ; but found often 
 enough when there is no great tincture of jealousy. Had 
 it been jealousy in his case, one might expect to find it 
 most in regard to men whose work was nearest his own 
 in kind. It is not so. He is too impartially aggressive 
 to make it possible to think so. It appears to me that 
 he went to London in the mood of a man ready to suspect 
 that established reputations were either hollow or exag- 
 gerated. One may lament this. It was not amiable ; 
 although, without it, he would never have been the 
 invaluable satirist and social censor that he is. But the 
 tendency being there, it was it and not anything so personal, 
 or so small, as jealousy that set him upon that life-long 
 task of throwing projectiles. Of course, he sometimes 
 showed taste bad enough in the selection of his target ; but 
 even in some of his worst assaults {e.g. his remarks on 
 Newman), is he not far removed from jealousy ? " 
 
 As to the remark which Carlyle made on Newman's 
 brain, it is worth remembering that Carlyle was a real 
 humourist; and while his sentence was exceedingly unjust 
 and erroneous if taken in all the sobriety of a prosaic 
 statement he would doubtless himself afterwards laugh at 
 his own exaggeration, and this may justify us in saying 
 there was no malice in it at all. 
 
 One of Nichol's correspondents a philosopher wrote 
 to him thus : " I wish you had said more about Carlyle's 
 relation to Fichte. I cannot but think that he really owed 
 more, at least in a direct way, to him than to Goethe, 
 whom he admired as his opposite, but from whom he 
 did not absorb influences so freely as from Fichte, who 
 
270 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 was his like. The coincidences in Fichte's Characteristics 
 of the Present Age especially are very marked." 
 
 There is no doubt that the literary finish of Nichol's 
 Carlyle suffered from its being one of a Series, as very 
 often the writer loses something which he might have 
 gained by independent literary production, and is at the 
 same time cramped as to the treatment of his theme. He 
 could have written a much greater book on Carlyle, if he 
 had a perfectly free hand. Probably his estimate will not 
 be endorsed by posterity as it stands. To judge by the 
 fate of great men in the past, differences in popular estimate 
 and in critical appreciation will last for ever. If we go 
 back to Rome, and take Cicero as an example, there is 
 a certain class of men who will always admire him, another 
 class who will always disparage him. These differences 
 arise from constitutional and temperamental causes. Time 
 only can decide how far any man's work will live ; and 
 the twentieth century will assign Carlyle's permanent posi- 
 tion in the literature of his country, in a way in which the 
 nineteenth century cannot. One of Nichol's correspondents 
 (a very old friend) wrote to him about Carlyle : " My 
 anticipations are unfavourable to his immortality. If we 
 ever meet in the Elysian Fields, our debts can there be 
 paid. I am prepared to give you 2 to 1, to be paid in 
 2 1 00 A.D." This correspondent adds, " Ten times as many 
 copies of Macaulay's Essays are read by English people 
 throughout the world, as of any book of Carlyle's." 
 
 Nichol's picture of the heroic years of Carlyle's life, of 
 his struggles with adversity and an unrecognizing public, 
 is admirable. It is excellent alike in its condensation and 
 its fulness, in what it omits and in what it includes. Its 
 author's literary style is maturer than it was in his earlier 
 books, more crisp, incisive, and epigrammatic. If it be 
 thought that more allowance might have been made for 
 some things that Carlyle said than has been done by his 
 biographer, it must be remembered that the critical eye 
 of the writer was always steadily directed to the subject 
 he had to discuss, and that no larger literary problem as to 
 one's own contemporaries has required discussion in our time. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 VACATION RESORTS AND RAMBLES. 
 
 In the autumn of 1865 Nichol crossed the Atlantic for 
 the first and only time. The American Civil War had just 
 come to an end, and he saw with keen interest many 
 of the leading personalities in the States, and some of 
 the battle-fields connected with that struggle during the 
 course of which his sympathies had been so ardent on the 
 side of the North. He was then full of admiration and hope 
 for most things American, as a few extracts from letters 
 written to his wife during his tour in the States will 
 show. In later life, his feelings towards the Western 
 Republic were, in some respects, less cordial ; but for 
 individual men, and for Longfellow in particular, he always 
 cherished the same affection and respect. 
 
 He wrote : 
 
 " N ah ant, nr. Boston, September 10th, 1865. 
 
 " I am here by the beautiful sea-shore of New England, 
 spending three days with Longfellow, who is the most 
 delightful man in the whole world. He received me with 
 the utmost cordiality, said he had heard of my arrival in 
 the country, and sent a message inviting me to come to 
 him. He cherishes affectionate remembrances of my father, 
 and seems to have known by report something of myself. 
 We get on most pleasantly, walking about the delicious 
 lanes, and talking in the fresh coast air. Of course I came 
 to the hotel, and only meant to call for him with a note 
 of introduction, which I found quite unnecessary. I sleep 
 here at the inn a quiet wayside inn like one of those he 
 
272 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 writes about as his cottage is filled by himself and his 
 children, 
 
 Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra, 
 And Edith with golden hair, 
 
 with whom I found him playing croquet on the lawn, as I 
 walked through his meadow. But he makes me spend all 
 the day with him, and has insisted upon my coming to 
 him at Cambridge when I return to Boston. Best of all, 
 he will come to us when he visits Scotland, which he has 
 never yet done, and means some day to do. I have told 
 him that you will be so happy to see him won't you? 
 He says his only difficulty is about leaving his children 
 behind. This should confirm me in my feeling that we 
 ought not to leave ours for all the rupees in India. 1 He 
 has taken so much kind interest in my affairs that I have 
 told him of this. He immediately asked what you said 
 about it. I do not think he would have done anything 
 that his wife did not wish the dear man, with his grand 
 sweet face, and flowing grey hair. I have found some 
 one to love, and try to imitate, and will be the better 
 of it ever after. We were talking of the wrangling and 
 jealousies of literary men. He said the true plan is to let 
 all the fighting be on one side ; and he is right. He said 
 when he was attacked in the papers none of his friends 
 knew of it if he made no answer." 
 
 After a few sentences about the heat in Boston, the 
 letter continues : 
 
 " On Monday I went to Concord and called for Emer- 
 son ; he immediately sent for my bag from the inn, and 
 made me stay with him. In his company I spent a very 
 pleasant day. He and his family, a wife, two daughters, 
 and a son, are all that his greatest admirers could wish. 
 On Tuesday night I returned here ; on Wednesday I went 
 about town making calls. Wendell Phillips and Garrison 
 are out of town, so I can only hope to see them when I 
 return on the thirtieth of this month. I saw Mrs. Chap- 
 man, and was very much charmed with her ; she desires to 
 
 x An educational appointment in one of the Indian Universities, for 
 which Nichol had thought of applying, is here referred to. 
 
VACATION RESORTS AND RAMBLES. 273 
 
 be remembered to Mrs. Nichol. 1 Yesterday I went to 
 Worcester, and heard Charles Sumner deliver a great speech. 
 I am invited to attend a dinner of the great literary club 
 of the North, when I return here on the 30th. I shall 
 spend a few days in Boston, and then go on to Longfellow 
 at Cambridge. I have taken and paid for my passage home 
 in the Cuba, which sails from Boston on the 1 ith of October." 
 
 " Petersburg, Virginia (undated). 
 
 " I am tired, having travelled since I wrote to you nearly 
 incessantly ; from Newport to New York is a long journey, 
 from New York to Baltimore a longer, from Baltimore to 
 Petersburg the longest. I started from Baltimore yesterday, 
 and ran down the Chesapeake Bay, when I had an oppor- 
 tunity of seeing an American boat race. To-day we sailed 
 up the James river, staying a short time at Fortress 
 Monro, where I went as near as possible to the walls where 
 Jefferson Davis is still in durance awaiting his trial. To- 
 day, or rather this evening, I have been round a great part 
 of the fortifications, and seen the mine which Grant blew 
 up on the rebels. I had an old soldier with me (they 
 abound here) who explained everything, and I carried away 
 with me some bullets and other relics, which I shall bring 
 home. These are very interesting reminiscences of great 
 events, and to-morrow I hope to see to equal advantage the 
 fortifications around Richmond itself. The whole country 
 here is one vast ruin broken houses, broken fortunes, and 
 broken-down looking people meet one at every corner. 
 Everything I hear in the South, explicitly or implicitly, 
 confirms everything I have heard in the North. Davis 
 seems to be very generally hated by both sections of the 
 people, and he may be hanged without exciting any dis- 
 turbance. All I said at home now seems to me too mild in 
 praise of the Northern, in dispraise of the Southern cause." 
 
 "Washington, Sunday, Sept. 24th, 
 
 " So far, though not very far, I am safe on my way home- 
 ward having passed unscathed, except by the mosquitoes, 
 which were pretty savage, through the late capital and 
 
 1 Mrs. E. P. Nichol, of Huntly Lodge, Edinburgh. 
 S 
 
274 MEMOIR OF JOHN N1CH0L. 
 
 citadel of the late rebel domain. Richmond is hot, and 
 save that the streets are broad and the view from the high 
 parts of the city extensive, not very interesting. I did not 
 care to stay there more than a day, during which I walked 
 about a good deal, and saw most of what is to be seen, 
 the fortifications, which are all made of earth heaped up 
 into hills ; the Dutch gap ; and the ruins of the large part 
 of the town, which has been burnt. All around in Virginia 
 there is the same prevalent desolation, the punishment of 
 her crimes. I am told that one might ride on a saddle- 
 horse for twelve months and not see all the earthworks 
 and battlefields. Yesterday, after leaving the train, we had 
 a very fine sail up the Potomac. It is a beautiful river, 
 finer, I think, than the James, as the banks are almost 
 equally rich and more elevated. Some time before arriving 
 here we passed Mount Vernon, Washington's delightful 
 home, treasured with a national pride common to North and 
 South. On the way I had some interesting talk with a 
 black missionary, who was returning to Philadelphia after a 
 residence of six months as teacher and preacher in the 
 Carolinas. He tells me that the blacks are very ignorant, 
 scarce a tenth of them can read or write; but they are ready 
 to learn more, he thinks, from one of their own colour than 
 from a white. They are still inclined to distrust the whites, 
 and no wonder. While this gentleman was talking to me, 
 we being in the cabin, he was ordered by the steward of 
 the vessel to move to the steerage, blacks not being allowed 
 among the cabin passengers. The steward told me, apolo- 
 getically, that they were obliged to adopt this regulation 
 as they had so many Southern passengers. 
 
 " Here, this city being directly under the eye of the 
 Government, no such distinctions prevail, and, as far as I 
 can see, every effort is being made to establish a legal 
 equality between the races ; but society lags behind the law 
 here, as in England and most civilized countries. 
 
 " Washington is a strange town laid out to be a city of 
 palaces, it is in the main a city of hovels ; a few grand 
 marble temples and brick huts between. The Capitol is 
 perhaps the most magnificent building I have ever seen, 
 though St. Paul's and Cologne Cathedral are both more 
 
VACATION RESORTS AND RAMBLES. 275 
 
 majestic. The Capitol has much the same relation to St. 
 Paul's that Milan has to Cologne. There are many other 
 fine buildings, the offices of state, for instance, are much 
 finer than ours in London. In spite, however, of the grand 
 breadth of the streets, I do not much affect Washington. 
 There is an atmosphere of unrealized and unrealizable 
 ambition about it, which brings into stronger relief than 
 perhaps anywhere else the weak side of the American 
 character." 
 
 "Longfellow's Study, 
 
 " Cambridge, October 3rd. 
 
 " I wrote to you last from Washington, which I was 
 obliged to leave after all without seeing Mr. Seward. I 
 called at his office on the morning of the day I had planned 
 to leave, and found him inaccessible in the midst of some 
 pressing business. He sent a very polite invitation to me 
 to come to his house in the evening, but as by remaining 
 another day I should have missed Philadelphia altogether, 
 I could not wait. I enjoyed Philadelphia very much after 
 Washington ; it is a clean, quiet, restful place, with a number 
 of pleasant people in it. I was especially delighted with 
 the Motts, to whom I was introduced by Mrs. Nichol's 
 letter. They are in every respect attractive, and I fell in 
 love in different ways with three of them at once grand- 
 mother, daughter, and grand- daughter. I talked theology 
 with the first, literature with the second, and looked at the 
 third. I am going to Weymouth in answer to a very kind 
 invitation from Miss Weston, who is now out there with 
 Mrs. Chapman. There I shall meet for the second time 
 Wendell Phillips and Garrison, whom I at last saw yesterday, 
 and with whom I was much delighted. They and others 
 assure me I could make an indefinite sum by lecturing here, 
 if I came out in winter. The fee is one hundred dollars a 
 lecture for first-rate lecturers all over the country, and I am 
 told a course might be arranged by which one might travel 
 lecturing for thirty nights in succession, so making 500. . . 
 
 " Longfellow protests against my going to New York, but 
 I am really afraid of making my visit a visitation. This 
 is a most beautiful house, just such a home as he should 
 
276 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 have, with one sad blank ; fortunately his children prevent 
 it from being desolate. I like him better and better, the 
 more I see of him. We have long talks and walks, and in 
 the evening sometimes I read one of my lectures which he 
 seems to enjoy. The club dinner the other night was delight- 
 ful. I got into a long talk with Holmes, and found him 
 an excellent conversationalist. America is far better than 
 I dreamt of in almost every respect, especially Boston. I 
 would give my left hand to leave Glasgow and come here, 
 but at present there is no opening. I must publish a book in 
 England and get it made known here. Every one I meet in 
 society is sympathetic, literary or metaphysical, refined be- 
 yond the refinement of Englishmen, not to say of Scotchmen, 
 and in the van of the world, not tugging at the rear. Above 
 all there is no Free Church. My church is dominant in New 
 England. We are going this afternoon to dine with Dr. 
 Howe, whose wife assailed me fearfully with metaphysics 
 the other day. She has actually read all through Kant ! 
 I am rather alarmed at the idea of dining with her. I am 
 to have Longfellow's brother, and his son, as my companions 
 in the Cuba. Is not that a pleasant chance? Kiss the 
 children and believe me, in spite of all the attractions here, 
 impatient to be home." 
 
 The following of which the beginning is lost, is an 
 interesting comment both on Carlyle, on Emerson, and on 
 Longfellow : 
 
 " With no greater knowledge or culture, and only slightly 
 greater force, Carlyle thinks himself entitled to behave like 
 a bear to any one who comes to see him, unless he has a 
 fame like his own, or a title : for Carlyle, though a very 
 great thinker, is both in writing and speaking a little of a 
 bully. Emerson is a true poet, both in prose and verse, 
 a teacher who teaches without seeming to know it, leading 
 rather than driving, and full of the amenities of life. He 
 has been the acknowledged master of American prose for 
 nearly twenty years, but he still looks a young man, and 
 is really modest without affecting it. 
 
 " Meanwhile do not fancy that I falter in my allegiance 
 to Longfellow ; he is still to me the dearest of them all, 
 
VACATION RESORTS AND RAMBLES. 277 
 
 lovely in life and soul ; for, as we gathered from his verse, 
 the terms which are in general reserved for women, seem 
 most properly applied to him ; but, as he is the best, I am 
 inclined to think Emerson the greatest, of living Americans. 
 Did I tell you that I saw Hawthorne's old manse, and sailed 
 up the Assabeth with Emerson's son ? The little river de- 
 serves all Hawthorne's praises, as it flows along with a 
 scarcely perceptible motion, mirroring every leaf and flower 
 that overhangs its beautiful quiet banks." 
 
 The foregoing extracts from letters written by Nichol 
 during his American tour, have been printed, because 
 of the interest attaching to the period at which he 
 visited that country, and the eminent men of letters whose 
 personal acquaintance he made during his stay. But in an 
 age that has no lack of descriptive writing of every kind 
 about scenery and places, it would be superfluous, even were 
 the material available, to enter into detail in regard to his 
 wanderings on the European Continent. He was frequently 
 abroad, and, in his earlier years, was something of an 
 Alpine climber. He used to relate, with pardonable 
 self-satisfaction, how one of his mountain guides once 
 lamented that a great athlete had been lost in him. He 
 knew also, more or less well, Western Germany, Brittany, 
 the south of France ; and, on British soil outside of' his 
 native country, the south and west of England, parts of 
 Wales, and the Channel Islands, to which in 1876 he paid 
 a visit along with his friend Swinburne. 
 
 The six months' vacation, which the Scottish University 
 system allows to its students and teachers, was made* use of 
 by Nichol sometimes as a complete holiday; more often as 
 a means of devoting himself to purely literary work. In 
 the former case, he went abroad for the greater part of 
 the summer ; in the latter, he used to rent a house on the 
 coast or in some country district of Scotland, where, in 
 the intervals of work, he would walk and talk with the 
 friends who came to visit him in his holiday retreat. In 
 his summer residence, especially when any work was 
 to be done, he sought quiet above all things. Few 
 who knew him well do not also know the little group 
 
278 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 of houses, silently overwatched by the ruins of Carrick 
 Castle, at the entrance to Loch Goil. From 1879 onwards, 
 during many years, in one or other of these houses 
 he spent the greater portion of his summer holiday. 
 There he was visited, from time to time, by most of his 
 Scotch, and by many of his English, friends. There, 
 too, The Death of Themistocles was written in its entirety; 
 and several of his books such as Burns, American 
 Literature, Byron were, in great measure, composed or 
 revised. 
 
 The following letters, to Mr. John Skelton, and to 
 Dr. Brown of Paisley, were written from this summer 
 home : 
 
 Carrick, 
 Lochgoil, October 21, 1880. 
 
 Dear Mr. Skelton, Your Crookit Meg arrived here a 
 post after your letter. She was detained by a breeze the 
 wrong way on the loch ; but ran in brightly last night, 
 and behaves herself charmingly under fire of reading. 
 Many thanks for a pleasant evening after a fair day's work. 
 
 I have run down here to escape from all noises but those 
 of the lapping waters, and found a sea-bird's nest I would 
 never wish to leave. . . . Yours very truly, 
 
 J. NlCHOL. 
 
 Littlewood, Carrick, 
 Lochgoil, 19th August, 1883. 
 
 My dear Brown, I have just returned from an expedi- 
 tion to the English Lakes, where I was no more fortunate 
 on Hellvellyn with Edward Caird than on Lochnagar with 
 my girls. It was a storm of hail and sleet that nearly blew 
 us over the rocks. 
 
 We are now settled here till October 8, and I am over- 
 whelmed in work, having just sent off proof of an article 
 on the Scotch Universities likely, as usual, to make me 
 friends ! being busy with a second edition of the American 
 Literature with ditto of my Tables, and being dunned by 
 Knight for his Bacon (my third and last biography in B.), 
 and by MacLehose for his Miscellaneous Essays, and by 
 
VACATION RESORTS AND RAMBLES. 279 
 
 Rivington for the first volume of English Literature, which 
 will include the early Scotch period. Therefore, though I 
 would have been glad to have been of any service to you 
 about Ross's book, it is quite impossible. Two years ago 
 I placed in his hands (on his asking me for suggestions 
 about the book) a long and somewhat elaborate "Essay on 
 Early Scotch Literature," published as an introduction to 
 Lindsay twelve years ago in the English Text Society's 
 Series. 
 
 You should certainly find this among Ross's books 
 or papers. Tell me if you don't, and I shall send you a 
 loan of my only remaining copy the first time I am in 
 Glasgow. It is minute on Lindsay, a powerful polemical 
 writer, scarcely a poet, and embraces a fair statement of 
 what I have to say on the rest from Barbour to Drummond. 
 I could not add to this without going into greater detail 
 than I at present find possible about Douglas's often fine, 
 but frequently careless, and generally diffuse translation. 
 Some of his introductions are remarkably rich, even over- 
 laden in their imagery and marked by the keen sense of 
 natural scenery that is a prevailing note of Scotch verse- 
 makers ; but our only Pre-Reformation poets were James I. 
 and Dunbar. They begin the protest against Puritanism 
 that has been maintained by all the true Scotch poets, not 
 more than six in all ever since. Douglas must, however, be 
 credited with the first serious attempt to translate a classic 
 poet, in our island ; for, as some one said, Caxton's Siege 
 of Troy no more resembles Virgil than the Devil St. 
 Augustine. . . . Ever yours sincerely, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 In earlier days Moffat in Dumfriesshire and Braemar 
 in Aberdeenshire were favourite summer resorts, as in 
 later years was Crieff in Perthshire. In Crieff his book 
 on Bacon was written. And, associated as it was with 
 his old student life at Glasgow, he never quite lost his 
 fondness for Rothesay, where he wrote once, " the sea, 
 lapping round the shores of our old Atlantis, brings back 
 sad yet sweetest memories of the long, long past," and 
 where or rather at Ascog, near it in 1872, part of 
 Hannibal took its final form. 
 
28o MEMOIR OF JOHN NIC HO L. 
 
 He visited Italy twice, along with his wife and children ; on 
 the first occasion going as far south as Sicily. His second 
 period of travel in this country was marked by an incident 
 which, as it is outside the experience of the average tourist, 
 may be briefly referred to. He had for some time carried 
 a sword-stick, whether acquired by accident, or as a species 
 of toy, or as a symbol of his own inherent pugnacity, it 
 is impossible now to decide. One day he was in a shop 
 in Naples, with his daughters, and, wishing to examine a 
 possible purchase, took it in his hands, at the same time 
 giving one of his daughters his stick to hold. To pass the 
 time, she amused herself with drawing it out and in, so as 
 to show an inch or two of the naked steel. They left the 
 shop, and before they had gone more than a few steps down 
 the street, Nichol felt a hand laid on his shoulder, and, 
 turning round, found himself confronted by two gendarmes, 
 and by the accusation of having conspired against the life 
 and limb of King Humbert's lieges. At first the minions 
 of the law seemed bent on taking him straight to gaol, 
 but they were ultimately prevailed upon to let him proceed, 
 in custody, to his hotel where they slept the night to watch 
 over him. So that, for the first and last time in his life, 
 Nichol enjoyed the experience of being conducted to his 
 residence, and into the presence of his wife, between two 
 policemen his two daughters solemnly, or perhaps not alto- 
 gether solemnly, marching behind, and a gathering of inter- 
 ested and irreverently-jocular gamins bringing up the rear. 
 Next day he was taken to the police court, where, he used 
 to say, he remembered the grin of brotherly welcome with 
 which he was saluted by a manacled and murderous-looking 
 malefactor. The whole incident (from one point of view 
 it might seem to have stepped out of one of Offenbach's 
 Opera-Bouffes) had, in spite of its comic elements, a serious 
 side, and in the case of an utterly unknown man, might 
 have had gravely disagreeable consequences. Nichol was 
 strongly advised by various English acquaintances made in 
 Naples to bolt from the country, but he characteristically 
 preferred to face and fight the matter out. Fortunately, 
 his friend Mr. Bryce, then under-secretary for foreign affairs, 
 telegraphed at once to Rome ; another friend, Mr. Jacob 
 
VACATION RESORTS AND RAMBLES. 28 1 
 
 Bright, gave him an introduction to the English ambassador 
 there, Sir Savile Lumley ; and, after much worry and some 
 expense, the tragi-comedy terminated in the form of a 
 trial at Naples, which acquitted Nichol of the charge of 
 belonging to the criminal classes. 
 
 He was angry for a time, and the whole experience did not 
 increase the restrained admiration which his Scandinavian 
 temperament always felt for the dwellers in the South of 
 Europe ; although it did not affect his fondness for continental 
 travel. When he resigned his Glasgow chair it was for some 
 time a moot point with him whether to live abroad, or to 
 buy or build a house, in which to pass the evening of his 
 days, in the loved seclusion and quietude of Carrick. Ulti- 
 mately, however, he decided to establish himself in London. 
 
 The following cock-crow story, from the Rev. Canon 
 Rawnsley, is worth reproduction: 
 
 Crosthwaite Vicarage, 
 Keswick, March 2, 1896. 
 
 I shall never forget the visit Nichol paid me at Wray on 
 Windermere after his visit to Edward Caird in Patterdale. 
 For he gave me the most grotesque account of how the 
 Patterdale cock had been dealt with. The bird of dawn, 
 it appears, abounds in that valley. You will recall how 
 Wordsworth, when he was on tramp with his sister Dorothy 
 thereabout, noticed it as he leaned upon the bridge at the 
 foot of Brother's Water, and described the sounds of the 
 bright spring day, when while the " waters were flowing, 
 and the cattle were lowing, and the sheep boy whistling, 
 anon, anon " the cocks were all " crowing." Poor Nichol 
 had not been prepared for this, and came down to break- 
 fast on the first morning after his arrival, with cock-crow 
 on the brain. You remember how agitated and nervous 
 he would become, when he was distressed by harsh sounds 
 or hard sayings ; and that the plague was pronounced 
 incurable by the landlady nearly sent him into a fit. 
 
 Caird, ever calm and kind, determined that something 
 must be done. Nichol at once offered substantial reward 
 for every head of a cock that should be brought him 
 
282 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 before nightfall. But the Patterdalians value fresh-laid 
 eggs exceedingly, and no heads appeared. 
 
 A solemn procession was then made to sundry farms, 
 where they were told " they hed cocks for certain, but they 
 newer crawed nowt, not as they cud hear hooiiver" . . . 
 Nichol was however persistent, and showed that the nature of 
 this nuisance, if not likely to bring the owners within reach of 
 serious litigation, would certainly afford matter for a letter 
 to the Press with probable ruin for Patterdale. " We come 
 here for rest, and you give us a cock to crow at us from 
 night to morning, a cock that has a hundred other cocks 
 to answer him, a cock that gets on peoples' brains and 
 drives them mad ! " 
 
 The fervour of the professor, and the solemn assent of 
 his friend, the philosopher who explained that sleep was 
 really a vital necessity for his invalid companion had the 
 effect of softening not the voices of the cock-a-doodles, 
 but the hearts of their owners. And it was forthwith 
 agreed that, as soon as the cows were milked, the cocks 
 should be hunted up each evening, and put into the inmost 
 recesses of the barn-steadings. There they might crow, 
 but their sound would, at least, be hushed, and the 
 professor would only hear them as in a dream. Rewards 
 were to be given, at the end of the visit, but woe to the 
 owner of the unhunted cock. It was a simple but satis- 
 factory remedy. The professor found peace, and sleep, in 
 Patterdale. I can hear him tell the story now, but cannot 
 reproduce the inimitable humour, and the fierce flashing of 
 his wrath, as he anathematized the bird of dawn whom he 
 spoke of as the bird of the devil. 
 
 The rest of his visit was taken up with wandering to 
 Wordsworth's school-boy haunts at Hawkhead, and with 
 talk about the poets, as was his wont. I gathered that 
 he felt he had not done his best work in poetry ; and that 
 he wished much for strength, and health, and quiet, to do 
 more. These never came to him. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 LIFE IN LONDON. 
 A. i8go. 
 
 JOHN Nichol spent the years 1889 and 1 890 mostly in Scot- 
 land, and in the south of France, including a few days in 
 North Italy. At Turin, he saw once more, after a long 
 interval, his old friend Louis Kossuth. In the autumn of 
 1890 he settled definitely in London with his family, taking, 
 in the first instance, a furnished house in Redcliffe Gardens, 
 South Kensington. With the exception of a lecture on 
 Carlyle, delivered to the members of an Ethical Society in 
 Essex Street Hall, he made no public appearance while 
 residing at Redcliffe Gardens. The subject selected for this 
 lecture indicated that his book on Carlyle was beginning 
 to take shape. 
 
 He was now past the age when men care, as a rule, to 
 make many new friends or acquaintances ; but, on coming 
 to London, he had the opportunity of renewing personal 
 intercourse with a considerable number whom he had 
 partially lost sight of, through distance, or other causes, or 
 whom he had known less well before. Among these friends 
 were James Bryce, Briton Riviere, W. P. Ker, Mrs. Lynn 
 Linton, and Mrs. Von Glehn. The last-named had, as 
 Miss Bradley, in the old days of his lectures to ladies, 
 attracted his attention as a brilliant essayist. Occasionally 
 there came a visit to Putney, and talks with Mr. Swinburne 
 and Mr. Theodore Watts at " The Pines." During these 
 months he paid the last of many visits to Balliol ; and 
 save for a short interview when the late Master was in 
 
284 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 London, in September. 1893 had his final sight of his old 
 teacher. A still older teacher, Mr. Lushington, now also 
 passed away, was seen at a somewhat later date at his 
 home near Maidstone. 
 
 The following is the last letter that Nichol received 
 from Jowett : 
 
 Balliol College, Aug. 31st, 1893. 
 
 My dear Nichol, Will you write a line and tell me 
 how you are, and how Mrs. Nichol is, and what you are 
 doing? It is now nearly three years since we parted at the 
 Crieff Railway Station, and I have had no authentic tidings 
 of you since. For more than a year I had a set of Plato 
 waiting for you ; but, having received no answer to a letter 
 which I wrote asking you to come here, I did not send 
 it. (Shall I send it now?) But I cannot forget your old 
 affection and attachment, and, if I never saw you and Mrs. 
 Nichol again, should always have it lying at the bottom 
 of my heart. 
 
 You may have heard of a dangerous illness which I had 
 about two years ago. I got over that (though I have a 
 tendency to suffer from relapses of it). However, I mean 
 to brush it off, and, please God, to live for a few years 
 longer. 
 
 I hope you have not given up literary projects. The 
 last one which I have seen, Bacon, appeared to me very 
 successful, and I hear the Carlyle well spoken of. What 
 a turmoil of passion that life was. Yet he gave expression 
 to some element of our age which was needed. I am told 
 that Popitsnovteff, the Russian Emperor's ecclesiastical 
 adviser, is a great reader and admirer of him. 
 
 It seems a long time, and things and people have changed 
 how many of our friends ? since I first came to see 
 you at the Observatory in Glasgow, and afterwards at 
 Moffat, very many times since in Montgomery Crescent. I 
 cannot myself complain of old age. It has left me still 
 many friends, and the recollections of many others who are 
 gone, which have a great comfort and pleasure in them. 
 I no longer go so far as Scotland, but you and Mrs. Nichol 
 will, I hope, come to see me again at Balliol, and talk over 
 old times. 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 285 
 
 I have read lately a book which has greatly delighted 
 me : Captain Mahan's Influence of Sea Power on Histoiy, 
 and on the Napoleonic Powers especially. The book is 
 American, and yet quite faultless in point of taste ; it is 
 also perfectly impartial, and shows immense knowledge of 
 the subject. It touches the " whereabouts " of the future 
 in war, not altogether a pleasant contemplation for Eng- 
 land. Do get it, and read it you will pass a fortnight 
 very pleasantly in doing so. 
 
 The only other book that I have been reading is Grant 
 Duff's account of Renan a very good and kindly book, 
 though not considerable. Renan must have been a much 
 greater and better man than we are accustomed to think 
 him in England. But then he has fallen under an Ecclesi- 
 astical Ban. I don't like these ecclesiastical bans. They 
 make me think, as I get older, that the power of the Church 
 has increased, and (in England) is increasing, and ought to 
 be diminished. 
 
 I said that this was the " only other book," but I now 
 remember another well worth reading. C. H. Pearson on 
 National Character is very instructive, I think, though 
 crotchety, like the author of it. It is one of the meta- 
 physical books about Politics an aspect of the science 
 which, though I have not much fancy for it, seems to be 
 coming over the world. 
 
 With most kind regards to Mrs. Nichol. Believe me, 
 ever yours, B. Jowett. 
 
 Is your kind good stepmother (who used to keep a 
 terrific mastiff) still living? If she is, I should wish to be 
 remembered to her. 
 
 In London, as in Glasgow, and at his holiday resorts, 
 Nichol was acutely susceptible to physical influences. As 
 years went on he felt the terrible strain of " the pandemo- 
 nium of noise ; " barrel organs, the barking of dogs, the 
 street cries, all inflicted positive pain upon him. He had 
 been driven from one pleasant place by what he called 
 " a perfect hurricane of cocks," interfering with his work 
 alike by day and night. The charm of his old retreat at 
 Carrick was its perfect peacefulness, broken only by the 
 
286 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 lapping of the waters and the cry of the sea-fowl. In 
 town he felt the winter frosts acutely. In one letter he 
 wrote : " London to-day should be erecting temples to the 
 great god Thaw. Long life to him, and more power, who 
 uncloses our long-sealed lips, and makes possible the 
 utterance of our long frozen brains." 
 
 During these late London years he was asked to go to 
 Liverpool to lecture to its University College. He went, 
 and gave a singularly noble address on " The teaching of 
 English Literature in our Universities, and its relation to 
 Philology." It was delivered under great physical weak- 
 ness. He was scarcely able to travel, or to stand up to 
 lecture ; but he was not the man to cancel an engagement, 
 unless prostrate by infirmity. The address is full of life and 
 seriousness, touched all through with humanity, vehemens, 
 pressus, et instans sibi. 
 
 I have no doubt that his experience of the preference of a 
 philologist to a man of letters in the English Literature 
 Chair at Oxford some time previously, gave rise to a good 
 deal that was said in this address. To vindicate Philology as 
 superior to Literature seemed to him as monstrous as it would 
 be for the builder of a house to insist that before the joiners and 
 carpenters began work they must have a scientific knowledge 
 of Botany or Forestry. What he felt essential in the work of 
 every class devoted to English Literature was teaching, (i) 
 as to what was most worth knowing, and (2) as to how best 
 to know it. 
 
 The Liverpool lecture was a valuable contribution 
 to a subject of supreme interest. Greek and Latin had 
 been, in certain quarters, as all men knew, underrated as 
 Literature, and made more of as a linguistic discipline. 
 At the English Universities this was partly due to the 
 exigencies of the examination-system. But Nichol saw 
 that to teach English (or any) Literature, chiefly with a view to 
 secure " firsts " in the examination list, was as bad as is the 
 work of the modern " crammer " for other Universities. 
 These terrible " crammers," whose work has often been so 
 pernicious to the real student, were his detestation. 
 
 There is no doubt that much might be said in defence 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 287 
 
 of Language versus Literature by a partizan, because some 
 persons have been known to write books on subjects 
 belonging to a literary realm, in which they would them- 
 selves have been " ploughed " by an ordinary examiner. If 
 sound scholarship is wanted, a knowledge of Language is a 
 prime necessity, as radical as is a knowledge of Mathematics 
 to Physics, or of Anatomy to Surgery. At the same time, 
 to test the merits of an English scholar by his acquaintance 
 with out-of-the-way minutiae belonging to the literature 
 of the thirteenth century, is as bad and futile as it would 
 be to decide the claims of a philosophical theologian, as 
 an expert in that science, solely by his capacity to digest 
 the radishes of Arabic analysis in the morning, and in 
 the evening to dine on Hebrew roots. Every one knows 
 the value of linguistic study, if it does not extinguish 
 literary knowledge, and appreciation. If it is made the 
 one end of culture, the student becomes a pedant, " dry- 
 as-dust." 
 
 Nichol was hardly able to get through the strain of the 
 delivery of this lecture, and of the succeeding ceremonial 
 in Glasgow, when he was presented with his portrait by 
 old students and friends. 
 
 B. HIS PORTRAIT. 
 
 After he had been some time Professor-Emeritus, his 
 old students, his former-colleagues, and other friends, 
 considered it a right as well as a graceful thing to present 
 him with his portrait, and asked him to sit to an eminent 
 artist. The proposal was met by very many with enthu- 
 siasm, and Mr. Orchardson, R.A., was selected for the work. 
 It is needless to print the long list of subscribers, although it 
 was a remarkable evidence of the esteem in which Professor 
 Nichol was held by many hundreds of his contemporaries. 
 The portrait was painted, shortly after he had settled at 
 Redcliffe Gardens, South Kensington. The sittings, to which 
 he had looked forward with some fear that they might 
 be irksome, proved on the contrary thanks to the artist's 
 gifts, both as talker and listener a source of much enjoy- 
 ment; and the picture, when completed, was one of Mr. 
 Orchardson's most successful efforts. 
 
288 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 It was presented to Nichol at a meeting in the Ran- 
 dolph Hall, Glasgow, on the 25th November, 1891 Prin- 
 cipal Caird presiding. No one present on that November 
 afternoon could doubt the gratification which Nichol felt 
 in the hearty and widespread desire to do him honour. 
 
 After the formalities of presentation were ended, Nichol 
 made a speech in reply, which his friends will be glad 
 to possess in full. He said : 
 
 " My friends, students, and colleagues, I have often been 
 publicly hissed, but I never remember on those occasions to 
 have felt much ashamed of myself. I am ashamed to-day ; 
 not only because I have listened to expressions of praise 
 which I have not merited, but because in some instances I 
 feel that I have failed to appreciate the amount of kindliness 
 entertained towards me. There are few things harder than 
 adequately to acknowledge kindness, save by attempting 
 some action worthy of it, and that is rarely done. The 
 difficulty in my instance is many times multiplied by the 
 fact that my benefactors are so numerous. I must ask you 
 to credit me, in these days when speeches are apt to be 
 received with an often not unjust suspicion I ask you to 
 credit me with so much sincerity as to believe that the in- 
 timation of your generous resolve to present this picture 
 came to me equally as a gratification and a surprise. I never 
 before, for obvious reasons, thought of myself in the light 
 of a possible presentee. The best I ever hoped from my 
 countrymen, from the majority of whom I have often dared 
 to differ, was to be forgiven. Now I find that a number of 
 them, in far excess of my deserts, have paid me a high com- 
 pliment. 
 
 " Some here present must have been concerned in what 
 has been referred to as ' the conspiracy ' from the first 
 conception of it. When I heard of it being in process, 
 I ventured, in a letter to the secretary, to deprecate the form 
 which your kindness has taken. But Mr. MacLehose 
 and others were inexorable. The arrangements of the 
 committee had been made so quietly, not to say secretly, 
 and the names of my friends enlisted with such careful 
 discretion, that when I received the list I felt that I had 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 289 
 
 never been more surprised seldom as gratified in my 
 life. The conspirators, by happy inspiration, so managed 
 matters as to make every stage in the process pleasant. 
 
 " About nine months ago I was travelling in an under- 
 ground train with a gentleman, notable for his sagacity and 
 finesse, who has the habit of always pointing his remarks 
 and often putting questions. He asked me where I was 
 going. I told him to a studio, and, strange as it might 
 appear, to be painted, and I named the artist. My critical 
 friend said he had heard of what Mr. Campbell has referred 
 to as ' this business,' and added that the painter was wont 
 to complain of having all the talking with his subjects or 
 objects to do himself. ' He won't have that to do in your 
 case,' he had just time to say before I left the carriage. I 
 am not quite sure how it was meant, because we had been 
 talking politics, and on opposite sides. But I know that Mr. 
 Orchardson's conversation was so bright, and his fund of 
 anecdote which often recalled to my mind the lamented 
 Sir Daniel Macnee so various, that the hours that I had 
 looked forward to as purgatorial were always too short, and 
 I regretted when these Attic forenoons came to an end. I 
 consider it a high compliment to have been allowed to 
 occupy so much of the time of a man of such versatile 
 genius. 
 
 " But I have more to do here with the conspirators than 
 with the chief actor in this benevolent execution. Despite 
 of all the kind exaggerations of this afternoon, I still fail to 
 see on what grounds my head and shoulders have been so 
 artistically taken off, save that I have spent a long time 
 between the banks of the Molendinar and the Kelvin, and 
 done work there, some of it ' indifferent honest,' a deal of it 
 fighting against things, some of which may have been good, 
 but all of which I thought were bad. This is not the place 
 for controversy, but I am in nowise penitent for having so 
 often expressed my belief that, although the chief concern 
 of a teacher is with his scholars and his scholarship, he 
 is on no account called upon to consider himself debarred 
 from taking an interest, and, if he can, playing a part, i.e. 
 from exercising all the rights of a citizen, in the community 
 by which he is environed, or the State to which he be- 
 
290 MEMOIR OF J.OHN NICHOL. 
 
 longs. On the contrary, it seems to me that his service 
 to the Muses ought to render him only the more fit to 
 contend with the Idols of the Market Place. I do not 
 wish to trench on dangerous ground ; but during these years 
 I have known three of those Idols esteemed ' high above 
 the rest ' by ' overwhelming majorities ' in this second city 
 of the Empire. One of these was practically extinguished 
 on the great field of Gettysburg. He was an American. 
 Another was blotted out at Sedan. He was a Frenchman. 
 The third reminds me of Herodotus when he refers to ' one 
 whom I must not name.' He is not by any means blotted 
 out ; and I cannot tell you to what country he belongs, 
 because his nationality is of so peculiar a nature that it 
 varies with his geographical position. 
 
 " On my retirement, which I regret to have found no 
 reason to feel premature, I was, in length of service, the 
 senior professor in the Senate with the exception of Sir 
 William Thomson and Professor Grant : by ancestry and 
 pupilage I am junior only to the former, my father having 
 been appointed to the Chair of Astronomy in the year 1836, 
 among his competitors being Thomas Carlyle. I ought to 
 know something about the University. But this is not the 
 time to attempt to estimate what that great Institution has 
 done for the West of Scotland or to balance the chances 
 and changes of fortune which affect it for better or for worse. 
 Its authorities have been accommodating to the expressions 
 of public opinion of which we have heard so much : and I 
 trust they will have their reward. 
 
 " My connection with this University, as a student from 
 1 848- 1 8 54, and as a teacher from 1 861- 1889, has lasted 
 over most of my life, and left behind it inevitably lasting 
 and various impressions. After my student days I was, 
 thirty years ago, returned here, as a bad penny, from 
 another Alma Mater, to attempt to inaugurate a new 
 subject not always very easy to teach. The difficulties 
 I think have been exaggerated ; but they have appeared 
 to some minds so insurmountable that it has been 
 asserted, imperiously if not authoritatively, that English 
 cannot be taught at all. On the controversy now so 
 rife in connection with the English Universities I only 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 29 1 
 
 venture at present to make one or two remarks. It seems 
 to me that the arguments, especially of the chief opponent 
 of the recognized and regulated study of English Literature, 
 hang upon a few premises which are all demonstrably false. 
 The first of these is that the main object, almost the sole 
 object of a University, is to examine. The question of the 
 relation of the examiner to education is difficult and com- 
 plex ; but I suppose almost every one here will agree with 
 me that a University is such precisely because it has other 
 and higher objects than mere examination. 
 
 " The second presumption is that it is impossible to examine 
 on any subject in which there is not practically complete 
 agreement of opinion. Putting aside the slight on University 
 examiners, I would ask, if that is so, on what subject above 
 the reach of the dame or common school is it possible to 
 examine at all ? You could, of course, still examine in 
 arithmetic, and euclid, and upon the elements of grammar ; 
 but the moment you begun to theorize, even about grammar, 
 you would find yourself in a world of often pretty keen 
 controversy. This almost absurdly negative argument as- 
 sumes another form, when it is alleged that the knowledge 
 and mastery of our own language is too fine a subject to 
 be taught. Is it finer, we may ask, than the arts of music 
 or of painting ? You cannot, it has been said, ' hammer,' 
 1 drive,' or ' grind ' into a man the niceties of English 
 style ; our Universities cannot manufacture Arnolds and 
 Ste.-Beuves. Who ever imagined that they could ? It is 
 a platitude to say that genius is an inheritance or a gift; 
 but the capacity to utilize it may almost indefinitely be 
 increased by careful culture. We cannot manufacture 
 Carlyles or Froudes, Hegels or Newtons ; but the due 
 appreciation of their works is often the result of training 
 and of time. 
 
 " The remaining assumption in the series of misconceptions 
 to which I have been referring is that there is no possible 
 standard of Taste. Fully to discuss this point would lead 
 us into a metaphysical argument; but it is only necessary 
 to appeal to History to show that while there may be end- 
 less differences of opinion about our contemporaries, there 
 is very little divergence as regards our great authors when 
 
292 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 they have been sufficiently far removed from us to enable 
 us to judge of their works apart from the mists and frolics 
 of the mannerisms of the day. There are some of our 
 so-called critics, for example, who prefer Walt Whitman 
 to either Longfellow or Lowell ; others who regard Lewis 
 Morris as a greater poet than William Morris and so 
 forth. But no one now prefers Ben Jonson to Shakespeare; 
 or Cleveland and Davenant to Milton ; or Klopstock's 
 Messiah to Heine's songs, all which preferences have been 
 notable in the past. 
 
 " Leaving this debatable ground, it is now my duty and 
 my privilege to offer my heartfelt thanks to those of my 
 colleagues, who have throughout my whole course of teach- 
 ing here sometimes an uphill one given me as much 
 encouragement as I had any claim to. From my best 
 students I have every year received such support and 
 sympathy, that I have expressed my sense of it on every 
 opportunity, and cannot weary you, especially in this hour 
 of dusk, with the ten times told tale of how they have re- 
 sponded to my exhortation to think mainly of their work, 
 and in a very minor degree of its often precarious rewards. 
 
 " Many of the most distinguished of these students are now 
 scattered abroad, literally from Gades to Ganges, from 
 Dunedin to Chicago, teaching not only the graces of the 
 English tongue, but training students of every hue to 
 appreciate the beauty, and the sublimity, and the wisdom 
 of our classics, and so spreading the best part of our 
 Empire over the globe. Their success as teachers must 
 depend largely on the natural gifts of speech, of command, 
 and of sympathy. Half the task of the teacher is to know 
 his subject ; but his inspiration is dramatic power, the power 
 of sincerely entering into the minds of his pupils, and 
 vividly realizing their circumstances. Others of the group, 
 deservedly conspicuous in the pursuit of their professions, 
 well understand that there is no profession in which the 
 careful study of English composition, and some familiarity 
 with the thought and style of our leading authors, is not, 
 quite apart from the pleasure it adds to life, a source of 
 practical gain. It is, for instance, well known to lawyers 
 that mistakes, constantly arising from simple clumsiness, 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 293 
 
 have been the source of some of the most apparently 
 interminable and expensive suits at law. 
 
 " Had this gift been made by my students alone, it would 
 have had a value to me not easy to estimate ; but, half 
 in rebuke, half in exhortation, it has a wider source. I 
 am about to ask leave to re-convey the picture which has 
 been presented to me ; but the list which I hold here in 
 my hand I will never give away. I shall keep it and 
 cherish it to the end of my life. To single out from the 
 names here recorded those of the men to whom I am most 
 indebted, would be invidious. Some are more prominent 
 in the world, some closer to myself than others ; but they 
 are all my friends, many of whom have stood by my side, 
 amid all differences of opinion, through good report and 
 ill. There are among them old teachers whose instruction 
 and guidance I shall never find it possible to forget ; there 
 are fellow students of the past, compeers and competitors 
 without rivalry ; physicians whose healing hand has soothed 
 hours of depression ; lawyers who have helped me over 
 banking shoals ; and clergymen as genial as they have been 
 true. To have been admitted to the confidence of so many 
 large-minded men ought to soften, if not wholly remove, 
 the asperities of bygone fights. If I may be permitted 
 any special reference, it must be mainly confined to those 
 who have been, in the short interval of the last two years, 
 removed alike from the reach of praise or blame. 
 
 " This list contains the name of one of the best friends 
 that I or any man ever had, whose position and deserved 
 celebrity in our literature have been referred to already 
 this afternoon; but I cannot forbear adding my own 
 tribute of affection and regret to the memory of one of the 
 broadest and most graceful scholars ever sent from this 
 University to the South. During the last ten years he was 
 my most sympathetic literary and political associate, and 
 our intimacy had gone on increasing till I felt towards 
 William Sellar almost as towards an elder brother. An- 
 other name is that of one whose death was more especially 
 a loss to this city a leading member of our University 
 Court a Glasgow man in a sense, but of fine and various 
 culture, the owner of a princely library the contents of 
 
294 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 which he read above all a man of generous sympathies 
 and comprehensive grasp, as well as practical power and 
 strength of will, Dr. A. B. M'Grigor. This day is over- 
 shadowed by a more recent cloud. Only half an hour 
 before coming into this room, I was almost stunned by 
 the intelligence of the sudden death of the predecessor 
 to the gentleman whom you are about to inaugurate 
 to-morrow. 
 
 " Lord Lytton was, like our present Lord Rector, one of 
 those men of rare versatility, who unite in themselves powers 
 and capacities generally far apart; he was a poet as well as 
 a statesman, a diplomatist and a writer of romance. I can 
 speak of him emphatically as one of the most careful and 
 kindly critics, whether for reproof, instruction, or encourage- 
 ment, I have ever been fortunate enough to meet. On the 
 other hand, to those whose special interests are centred in 
 Education, the danger has been averted of an even gloomier 
 loss. It is only some six weeks ago since one of the 
 greatest teachers who ever lived seemed to be passing from 
 us. Fortunately he is restored to be a source of light, 
 wisdom, and loving-kindness, let us hope, for many years 
 to come. I refer, of course, to the Master of Balliol. I 
 cannot resist a closing reference to another of our Rectors, 
 the sole nominee I have known elected to that high office 
 with unopposed acclaim, that of an older master to me than 
 even Mr. Jowett Professor Lushington, clarum et venerabile 
 nomen a scholar at home alike among the inscriptions 
 of the Acropolis and the Pyramids, whose gentle grace alone 
 could avail to disarm the awe of his learning. 
 
 " Mr. Principal, my gratitude seems to take the form often 
 attributed to that quality, when I close by requesting 
 another favour. I venture to ask you, and my recent 
 colleagues, for the sake of the artist, whose fame is secured 
 in London where reputations are not readily made for 
 the sake of the artist, if not on my own unworthy account 
 to receive this picture within the walls of the Institution 
 where I have had the honour of introducing a subject for 
 which there was an urgent need, and which may, under 
 happier auspices, advance to great conclusions, an Institu- 
 tion in which I have spent many pleasant and some anxious 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 295 
 
 hours. I request the acceptance of the picture by the 
 University." 
 
 The following letter to Mr. Skelton refers amongst other 
 things to the portrait : 
 
 14 MONTGOMERIE CRESCENT, KELVINSIDE, 
 
 Glasgow, June 18 (Waterloo Day), 1890. 
 
 Dear Mr. Skelton, I had your Arcadian Summer in 
 our Chalet Mimosa, beautiful and comfortless, during an 
 Arcadian winter at Valescure, near St. Raphael, on the 
 Riviera. But I was lazy and gouty for the last of which 
 ailments I found my great good remedy at Aix-les-Bains 
 and find myself now on return here, for three months 
 flitting, before leaving "for good" or "ill," still your debtor 
 for an acknowledgment of your gift. The little book seems 
 to me one of the best of your r61e i.e. a quaint and 
 unique "blend" better than either Talisker or Long John 
 (which has got over all Aix) of humour, subtle satire, and 
 perfect picture-painting. A propos, I find your name among 
 the victims of a worse than gunpowder plot, which I would 
 certainly have undermined had I known in time, to paint, 
 draw, quarter, and hang me. Indeed I would rather be 
 tatooed, it is cheaper and easier (an Irish landlord, the 
 other day, showed me his arm permanently marked for 1, 
 with a figure of Gladstone, and behind a well-aimed and I 
 trust sharp-pointed boot), and I have groaned under the 
 Portrait mania. It is worse than that for Japanese Art. 
 But it were a gross compliment, did I not feel gratified at 
 the list of names of friends, whom I am proud to think 
 such, collected under this vile persuasion. 
 
 I have remonstrated with the "promoters" by every quota- 
 tion I can muster, as " We will proceed no further in this 
 business"; but they reply, "Give us the brushes." On one 
 condition I, however, insist that there is to be no City of 
 Glasgow Bank " call," which would be hard on many of 
 my good old students, in the matter; but that I must "sit" 
 if at all, to some young rising artist, and only for a cod's 
 head and shoulders. I am in a whirl of preparations for 
 Exodus, dividing the books I can no longer command, etc , 
 and also preparing for printing at last the series of my 
 
296 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Lectures, which a London publisher has demanded. I come 
 home from the Riviera, as ignorant of what has been going 
 on in Letters, as " Rip Van W." In politics everything is 
 risky. These Parnellites and their friends " we are not 
 ruled by murderers, but only by their friends " think of 
 nothing but of upsetting everything. The next "yell" will 
 be falsetto-patriotic, against the cession of Heligoland, by 
 which really we should lose nothing ; but the new emperor 
 is a casket, whether of gold, silver, or lead is yet to be 
 seen. Ever yours, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 C. EPISODES. 
 
 Professor Sellar's death in 1890 was a great shock to 
 Nichol. They were the closest friends. Writing at that 
 time to a member of the family, he said : 
 
 " I feel benumbed, as I have never been by any event (out- 
 side my own small circle) since the death of Mr. Luke at 
 Oxford, and have no words at all to write to your mother. 
 Words are mere vapour, save to say that one of my very few 
 links with Scotland is snapped ; and its skies grown colder 
 since the friend, who, on matters public and private, most 
 closely sympathized with me is gone." 
 
 Again, writing to me from London, on November 1 8, 1 890, 
 and referring to the death of our common friend, James 
 Brown of Paisley, he spoke of it as breaking " my last link 
 to the pristine days, when he and I fought for Tennyson 
 and Carlyle for our Rectors, and in days when Con- 
 servatism was in the popularis aura of the college helped 
 to carry over their heads tournament-Eglinton and the 
 Duke of Argyll." He characterized Brown, and added : 
 
 " These constant funerals remind me of a remark on one 
 of Webster's or Ford's plays, to the effect that, at the close, 
 there were not enough people left alive on the stage to 
 decently bury the dead. 
 
 " We are walking in the twilight, in a thinned land, and 
 should keep close together." 
 
 On the death of another friend, William Bell Scott, in 
 1 89 1, he wrote : 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 297 
 
 32 Redcliffe Gardens, 
 South Kensington, S.W., January 26, 1891. 
 
 Dear Miss Boyd, William Scott was a man of as un- 
 doubted genius as his brother, and in some respects of a 
 stronger character; but with, if possible, less about him to 
 attract the mob which both of them, with no easily assumed 
 affectation, but with equal sincerity, disdained. How he 
 reconciled this attitude with his pronounced democracy I 
 found it hard to understand. It was as if Coriolanus had 
 been elected a Tribune of the People. Yet there was much 
 of the same apparent contradiction in the minds of Byron 
 and Shelley. 
 
 The grief of a great personal loss is at first benumbing, 
 like the terrible frost. Later we ask what can be done to 
 commemorate in some fitting way the gracious kindliness 
 and marked originality of a mind in some ways unique: and 
 I trust the task may be undertaken by some of Scott's artist 
 friends, who alone are qualified to pronounce on his artistic 
 work. You, who have done more for him than perhaps any 
 one else, would be best qualified, if your strength avails, for 
 the task. All I can do is to add to the expression of my 
 sense of another blank among my elder friends, my thanks 
 for the days of sunshine which two years ago your hospitality 
 permitted me to pass at Penkill. Ever yours gratefully, 
 
 J. NiCHOL. 
 
 In a letter written to me during the same month, he 
 describes the terrific fog, and other miseries, which led 
 him to escape from England for a time : 
 
 " To see if Sterne was right in thinking ' they manage 
 these things better in France' (by the way, he only 
 heard this said), I got out of the dismal swamp or 
 tunnel of the fog in crossing the Channel, and found 
 myself at the North Pole. The cold was even keener, but 
 there was a gleam of sun, in which my friends, including 
 those at the Embassy, gave me cordial welcome ; and I 
 had as pleasant a week as one can have while shivering. 
 But, to avoid the weariness of the Calais and Boulogne 
 routes, and to let my son see St. Ouen, I was weak enough 
 to return by Rouen and Dieppe on Friday 16th, the coldest 
 
298 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 night of the year on the Channel : and so frozen, that since 
 my return, I have been laid up with a touch of gastric 
 fever. However, I have kept clear of ' crossing the bar ' 
 not that I fear it, but I want a few years' more work 
 and am allowed to walk for a little in this balmy spring. 
 I trust it may not prove a Vivian. 
 
 " I am more and more persuaded that I have come here 
 ten years too late ; a decade ago I could have . . . but 
 now I suspect I am not equal to it, and shall end by retiring 
 to the country whether to England, or Scotland, or France 
 and thence writing some anonymous work, that I shall 
 strain every nerve to make both interesting and honest." 
 
 The following was to his friend, John Skelton : 
 
 32 Redcliffe Gardens, 
 South Kensington, S.W., January 24, 1891. 
 
 Dear Mr. Skelton, On returning from a run to frozen 
 Paris, I found a week since another of your charming 
 pastorals of the sea, but I am only now sufficiently thawed 
 even to send these meagre thanks. I wonder if Johnson's 
 Breezy Langton spoke as you write : it is, after our fogs and 
 dirty London snows, like a dip in the fresh brine. You 
 must have been told how easy it is to turn your descriptive 
 prose into verse. For example, I transcribe on the reverse 
 several lines almost word for word from the early pages a 
 work of three minutes * for curiosity, protesting that I much 
 
 1 From summer isles, across a summer sea, 
 
 Through lanes of liquid light, from shore to shore, 
 These breeze-born pages bring afresh to me 
 
 The cliffs and crags and surging tides of yore. 
 I hear the curlew's wail, the heron's cry, 
 
 The splash of seals, the beat of viewless wings, 
 Breaking the stillness of the earth and sky 
 
 With northern minstrelsy of magic strings. 
 To the inland marsh the grey-lag flaps his way, 
 
 The waves are swirling round the eider's nest ; 
 And ' Darkest England ' wakens with the lay 
 
 Where the White Eagle speeds the parting guest. 
 
 Not that of the canting quack ; but that in which, for eight 
 
 weeks, we have scarcely either lived or moved or had our being. 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 299 
 
 prefer the good prose to the poor verse. Indeed, for the 
 last two months I have been able to write nothing but a few 
 letters, save a short notice of that " kindly Scot " James 
 Brown, in Good Words, almost useless under a statute of 
 limitations that have made the notice like a nut between 
 nut-crackers. I seem to have been existing, not living, in a 
 tunnel, the only ray of light being the fine modern comedy 
 of Parnell's " O Shewn cum dignitate." I am collecting 
 subscriptions for a white marble statue of the lady to be set 
 in Hyde Park. I have only arranged a few of the com- 
 mandments of the New Decalogue. 
 
 Thou shalt have no other gods but me. . . . 
 
 Thou shalt dishonour thy Fatherland. 
 
 Thou shalt steal. 
 
 Thou shalt bear false witness. 
 
 Thou shalt do all manner of murder. 
 
 But thou shalt not be found in a fire-escape. 
 Ever yours truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 In the spring of 1891, Nichol removed with his family 
 to Hampstead, and remained in this quarter of London 
 for about a year. He lectured once or twice, by invita- 
 tion, in various parts of London. But his chief work 
 at this time was his Carlyle, in connection with which 
 he became an active and prominent member of the Carlyle 
 Society, whose president, Dr. Eugene Oswald, he had known 
 for some years. He addressed the Society several times on 
 Carlyle, or on subjects connected with him, and took 
 frequent part in its debates. At this time, also, he was 
 persuaded to join the Devonshire Club, composed partly of 
 " Gladstonians," partly of Liberal-Unionists. He felt qualms 
 of conscience at the idea of being ranked even among the 
 latter as a " Liberal," so much had his political opinions 
 changed since his youth ; or, as he would have preferred to 
 express it, so rapidly had the world progressed downhill 
 since then. It was the first time that he had belonged to a 
 Club, since the days of the Oxford Union, for he had never 
 cared to join any. He was much dependent on sympathy, 
 was fond of conversation, and, in certain respects, decidedly 
 social. But he never cared about mere acquaintances, a 
 
300 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 relationship which necessarily involves a certain amount 
 of tolerance for conventions, and trivialities of talk. He 
 was not really capable of supporting solitude, but he pre- 
 ferred that to the society of any but his more or less 
 intimate friends, or persons whom he found genuinely 
 interesting. Hence his almost life-long ignorance of clubs 
 and club-life. He was, in no sense, "a man of the 
 world." 
 
 For recreation he indulged, during these London years, 
 in a considerable amount of theatre-going, of which he 
 was always fond. In the autobiography of his earlier 
 days he has himself related how, when he was taken 
 as a child to see Ivanhoe acted, he shook his fists at 
 the Templar, who was torturing the Jew, and called out 
 ** You villain." To a very considerable extent, something 
 of this childish feeling remained in the man. He went to 
 the theatre, as he read a novel, not so much to admire 
 good acting, or the skilful construction of dialogue or plot, 
 as to sympathize with the hero and the heroine ; and, above 
 all, perhaps, to denounce the weak and wicked characters in 
 the play. 1 He never could have understood the saying of 
 Keats that the true artist "has as much delight in conceiv- 
 ing an Iago as an Imogen." He detested Iagos, even 
 imaginary ones, too heartily, and never thought of them but 
 to consign them to the lowest depths of the Inferno. He 
 permitted himself, indeed, on occasion, an almost Dantesque 
 license of condemnatory language, in regard to persons or 
 things he found hateful, a tendency to picturesque verbal 
 ferocity which certainly did not diminish with the lapse of 
 years ; but when, for instance, he spoke of wishing to see 
 "hanged," or "blown from the mouth of cannon," or hurled 
 " from the Tarpeian rock," any eminent statesman whom he 
 conceived to be ruining his country, those who knew him 
 best, knew that had the opportunity actually offered itself 
 he would have been the first to stay the executioner's hand; 
 as he was, in fact, often the first to laugh after giving 
 utterance to any exceptional violence of phrase. 
 
 1 Mr. Theodore Watts, in an article which appeared in the Athenaeum 
 shortly after Nichol's death, uses the suggestive phrase, " his brave 
 boyishness." 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 
 
 301 
 
 To his old student friend, and publisher, he wrote 
 
 5 Hampstead Hill Gardens, 
 London, N.W. (January, 1892). 
 
 Dear MacLehose, The weather here is wolfish, but we 
 are above most of the fog, and the so-called influenza 
 present king of terrors seems more of a fever than a 
 cold. There is certainly something very tragic in the royal 
 death. Tu Marcellus en's ; of course everyone is recalling 
 Byron's lines on the Princess Charlotte. Manning dying 
 on the same day, almost at the same hour, was impres- 
 sive. Ever yours truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 Of the later years of his life Dr. Mackennal writes : 
 "After the summer of 1854 we seldom met. Nor did 
 we write each other frequently. But the old intimacy 
 continued. When we did meet it was on the old terms of 
 absolute frankness ; and, amid many divergences of opinion,, 
 with a complete understanding of each other's integrity. 
 Almost to the last we could laugh aloud with and at one 
 another ; we used no measure in our speech ; we were 
 not afraid of paradox ; we could leap over large spaces in 
 argument in our readiness to catch each other's meaning. 
 We seemed to be moving on the surface of things, but 
 our real converse was deep down where politics and ethics 
 and religion spring from one source. We were not afraid 
 of grave talk. ' I am a Christian,' Nichol said to me in one 
 of our last talks ; and he went on to add that he was a 
 Unitarian, and that his father had been the same. 1 In a 
 letter I got from him, not many weeks before he died, he 
 referred very sadly to the loss of his Balliol friends, Jowett 
 and Pater and Symonds; to the absence also of all the old 
 Glasgow circle except myself, from whom he felt divided 
 by ' a great gulf,' so that he had been even afraid to send 
 me his Life of Carlyle. The reference was to my sympathy 
 
 1 This may mislead. Nichol and I discussed religious problems 
 continually. It would have been as accurate had he called himself a 
 Catholic, as a Unitarian. Neither he, nor his father, ever belonged to 
 the Unitarian community. But he had intense sympathy with, and 
 admiration for, its representative leader and genius, Dr. Martineau, and 
 there were few men whom he more profoundly revered in his later days. 
 
302 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 with General Booth's social scheme, as well as to my 
 advocacy of the Home Rule policy; and, of course, it 
 touched me deeply. He wished me to call on him in 
 London, if before my next visit he had not ' gone to 
 Woking ' ; and I was looking forward to the visit with 
 mingled feelings. I was sure that the friendship would 
 prove itself firm, and that our sympathies would reveal 
 themselves as essentially the same, notwithstanding the 
 divergence in many of our opinions, but I dreaded seeing 
 the old friend who had sent me so sorrowful a letter. 
 Neither my confidence nor my fear found the opportunity 
 of realization ; the next thing was the announcement of 
 his death. Our meeting is deferred to the 'all-reconciling 
 world.' " 
 
 In the spring of 1892 Nichol again changed his quarters, 
 and took a lease of No. 1 1 Stafford Terrace, Kensington, 
 a home destined to be, for both husband and wife, their 
 last on earth. Comparatively quiet summer quarters were 
 found at Bognor in Sussex, where Nichol finally finished his 
 Carlyle. While at Bognor, he was invited to be present at 
 the Shelley centenary celebration at Horsham ; and there, on 
 being asked to propose a vote of thanks to the chairman, 
 made a speech which, considering that it was composed 
 entirely on the spur of the moment, was recognized by all 
 present to be strikingly eloquent. This, his last impromptu 
 speech in public, contained, with much else, the following 
 characteristic utterance : 
 
 "Another lesson (of Shelley's life) is that it is better to 
 have wild ideas than no ideas at all. This is true in no 
 other country so much as in England, where the tendency is 
 to acquiesce in everything, even in our days to acquiesce in 
 lawlessness. Much is made of common-sense ; but, if I may 
 say so, there is a kind of common-sense which tends to 
 timidity, and even to dishonesty a kind of common-sense 
 which often wants to be seized by the shoulders, and shaken 
 out of itself." 
 
 The following letter to Mrs. William Sellar refers to 
 a speech delivered in Essex in defence of a Unionist 
 candidate : 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 303 
 
 Stafford Terrace, 
 Kensington, W., July 22, 1892. 
 
 Dear Mrs. Sellar, My first direct contact with the veri- 
 table Hodge, I can attest. I spoke to the creature in 
 Essex being for once, thank heaven, on the winning side 
 and found him a turnip with a mixture of gin and beer 
 inside ; so that, standing under the platform, he could not, 
 after much striving, smoke his pipe. But he can or could 
 with enough energy on the part of the Conservatives be 
 managed ; and if I had only leave to shoot half the . . . 
 in Scotland, and three-fourths of the bog-trotters in Ire- 
 land ; and to hang all the Irish . . . and to decimate 
 the Welsh dissenting . . . , life in Great Britain might 
 yet be worth living ! 
 
 The little brochure I send with a " wae " feeling : for the 
 man whom I most wished to read it can no more see us, 
 or any of our works, save perhaps in some far glimpses, 
 of which I have no certainty, but refuse to pronounce 
 impossible. Ever yours truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 To Mr. Robert MacLehose he wrote : 
 
 11 Stafford Terrace, 
 Kensington, W., November 7th, 1892. 
 
 Dear MacLehose, I was at Lushington's on the 5th, 
 when the practically fatal news about Tennyson came. 
 We have doubtless lost our greatest poet since Wordsworth 
 died ; but, as usual in the hubbub of acclaim, and the host 
 of "intimate friends" that seem to issue from the great 
 man's corpse v. Georgic IV. genesis of the bees I feel 
 like Cordelia in looking over my modest verdicts in the 
 Manchester Guardian. Ever yours truly, J. NlCHOL. 
 
 In the autumn of 1892 Nichol's Carlyle was published. 
 In the following spring he went with his wife to Aix-les-Bains 
 and Switzerland, their last visit to the Continent together. 
 The latter part of the summer was again spent at Bognor. 
 Returning to Stafford Terrace he had, as already mentioned, 
 a final glimpse of Jowett ; and Nichol was one of the 
 
304 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 numerous mourners, who gathered early in October in 
 Balliol College Chapel, to pay their final tribute to its 
 Master. 
 
 In the months of November and December of this year, 
 he delivered a series of weekly lectures, six in number, 
 in the Parish Hall, Kensington, in aid of the District 
 Nurses' Association, a charity presided over by Lady 
 Mary Glyn. These lectures, on English poets of this 
 Century, from Wordsworth to Tennyson, were partially 
 rewritten and revised from lectures given in Glasgow, 
 and elsewhere. " Very kindly audiences," as he character- 
 ized them, came out to listen to them. It was a satis- 
 faction for him to know that his efforts had, in some 
 degree, helped the funds of an Association, in which 
 before the course was finished he felt a profound personal 
 interest. 
 
 D. THE CLOSE. 
 
 Towards the close of November, Mrs. Nichol never 
 robust, and always specially susceptible to chills became 
 very seriously ill from influenza. For a time she seemed to 
 rally, but a relapse followed. On the 9th January, 1894, 
 she died. 
 
 It was difficult for his friends to imagine what Nichol 
 would make of existence, bereft of the human guardian-angel, 
 the wings of whose spirit had sheltered him during more 
 than half his life. 
 
 In January, 1894, he wrote to a friend : 
 
 " It is not possible for me to write much, but your letters 
 the tenderest I have received among a host command a 
 word of gratitude ; and it is this. I am certain that no man 
 ever had such a wife as mine, and I doubt if any one ever 
 had such a friend as you have proved to me, in this ex- 
 tremity, for I am now almost utterly alone." 
 
 He attempted to gather himself together ; he delivered 
 a long-promised lecture on " Bacon's Key to Nature " to the 
 Royal Institution in Albemarle Street in the following 
 
LIFE IN LONDON. 
 
 30S 
 
 February his last appearance in public. He wrote his 
 reminiscences of Kossuth, which appeared in Macmillan's 
 Magazine in the following June his last published utter- 
 ance. He went to the country, and then to Paris, for 
 change ; he was to some extent solaced, and encouraged 
 to live and work, by the sympathy of his friends in 
 London and Scotland ; among those not already mentioned 
 being Mr. Leslie Stephen, with whom his acquaintance 
 now ripening into friendship had hitherto been mainly 
 literary, and the venerable Dr. James Martineau. But he 
 felt that his life was now shipwrecked ; and when, what at 
 first seemed merely a chill developed more serious symp- 
 toms, he hardly feared, more than he hoped, that the illness 
 might be his last. 
 
 He dictated a letter to an intimate friend : 
 " I am still desecrating the summer, looking at grey walls 
 and chimneys and wearying to death, for which,- having (as 
 you appreciate) now comparatively little to leave, I some- 
 times long. This is not my constant mood. . . I have 
 lived in the presence of great examples. . . Our old circle 
 is indeed dwindling." 
 
 For weeks it wore on, till it became more and more 
 evident that not all the skill and care of Dr. Walter Tyrrell 
 could save him from the internal malady, the development 
 of which had perhaps been hastened by the blow which 
 fell on him at the beginning of the year. When not far 
 from the end, he dictated a letter to a friend, full of 
 humorous brightness : 
 
 " I can't say much of last night. They may patch me 
 up, so that I can finish what I was at. Yet, if I go much 
 further on the road, I shall feel like Cleanthes, and that the 
 most natural thing for me now is to follow my ' pilot ' and 
 cross the bar." 
 
 Throughout his whole life he accepted, with clear-eyed 
 courageous manfulness, all gravely serious troubles, though 
 he was apt to fret over trifles. 
 
 Towards the end he dictated the following from his 
 sick-room : 
 
 u 
 
306 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 " I need not trouble you with details. I am well nursed, 
 and like being occasionally read to. I confess to being 
 afraid of perforation, and its horrors ; and I hope, if necessary, 
 they will give me enough anodyne. Too much pain makes 
 one undignified. As for death, I have little, and yearly 
 less, to fear. Are you coming up soon ? I should like 
 to be sure of shaking hands with you once again." 
 
 To his sister, who had come from Scotland to watch 
 at his bedside, he said, pointing to a photograph of his 
 wife, " I am going to her." As the weeks advanced, a 
 change of air was recommended as a last resource, and in 
 September he was taken down to Brighton. But he 
 returned weaker than ever on the I ith October, 1894 
 his mind clear and fearless to the end he breathed his 
 last. He had always desired cremation for his body, and 
 his wishes were fulfilled when, on October 15 th, it was 
 taken to Woking. There, after the English Service had 
 been read in the presence of his children and a few 
 intimate friends the coffin was committed to the flames. 
 It was his recorded desire that his ashes should rest as 
 near as possible to the mortal remains of his wife, in the 
 Grange Cemetery, Edinburgh. And, in this respect also, 
 his wishes were fulfilled. 
 
 Once, talking to his sister, he had suggested, half in 
 jest, half in earnest, that there might appropriately be 
 inscribed over his memorial stone, " Here he rests who 
 never rested " {Hie quiescit qui nunquam quievif). There 
 is no text, or quotation, on the stone inscribed to his 
 memory ; but, had there been one, an appropriate memorial 
 might have been found in a verse of one of the Vesper 
 Psalms of the Catholic Church : In memoria aeterna erit 
 Justus; ab auditione mala non timebit. " Eternal remem- 
 brance" has perhaps little meaning in this hurrying age, 
 but none of his friends, and few of the students who 
 heard the bright-eyed, high-souled lecturer in the English 
 Literature Class-room at Gilmorehill, will forget, during their 
 own lives and these will influence the lives of others what 
 they owe to one who " loved justice and hated iniquity " 
 all the days of his life. 
 
3n dBemortam 
 
 JOHN NICHOL. 
 " I must follow my pilot it is best so." 
 
 When to its bath of purifying flame 
 We gave his body tenderly, we turned, 
 And with fine gold the silver ash inurned 
 
 Saying, 'This ash shall ever be the same, 
 
 But that fierce spirit Death can never tame ; 
 Still for the light beyond him he shall yearn, 
 Still of the truth above him he shall learn, 
 
 Till he has reached the bourn from whence he came.' 
 
 And as we spake, in cloudland far away 
 
 We saw a fiery galleon westward steer 
 With some bright angel glorious at the helm, 
 
 We felt, with such a pilot standing near, 
 No cloud of doubt, no night can overwhelm 
 The ship whose haven is the fuller Day ! 
 
 H. D. R. 
 
 U 2 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 A LIST OF JOHN NICHOL'S WRITINGS. 
 
 Leaves. Privately printed. Edinburgh, 1854. 
 
 Fragments of Criticism. Privately printed. Edinburgh, i860. 
 
 An Inaugural Address to the English Literature Class in Glasgow 
 
 University. Glasgow: MacLehose, 1862. 
 Address on National Education. Delivered in the City Hall, 
 
 Glasgow, on 6th April, 1869. MacLehose, 1869. 
 A Sketch of the Early History of Scottish Poetry. London : Triibner 
 
 & Co., 187 1. 
 Hannibal. An Historical Drama. Glasgow: MacLehose, 1873. 
 Tables of European Literature and History, A.D. 200 1876. 
 
 Glasgow: MacLehose, 1876 (fourth edition, revised to date, 
 
 1888). 1 
 Tables of Ancient Literature and History, B.C. 1500 A.D. 200. 
 
 Glasgow: MacLehose, 1877. 
 Primer of English Composition. London: Macmillan & Co., 1879. 
 Byron. "English Men of Letters." London: Macmillan & Co., 
 
 1880. 
 The Death of Themistocles, and other Poems. Glasgow : MacLehose, 
 
 1881. 
 Robert Burns. A Summary of his Career and Genius. Edinburgh : 
 
 Paterson, 1882. 
 American Literature. An Historical Review, 1620-1880. Edinburgh: 
 
 A. & C. Black, 1882 (second edition, revised, 1885). 
 University Reform. Glasgow: MacLehose, 1888. 
 Francis Bacon. In the " Philosophical Classics for English Readers." 
 
 Edinburgh: Blackwood, Vol. 1., The Life, 1888. Vol. il, 
 
 The Philosophy, 1889. 
 
 1 In the fourth edition, Tables on American Literature and History were added. 
 
APPENDIX. 309 
 
 Questions and Exercises on English Composition. London : Macmillan 
 
 & Co., 1890. 
 The Teaching of English Literature in our Universities, and its 
 
 relation to Philology. An Inaugural Address. Printed by desire 
 
 of the Senate of University College, Liverpool. Liverpool : 
 
 F. & E. Gibbons, 1891. 
 Carlyle. In " English Men of Letters." London : Macmillan & 
 
 Co., 1892. 
 He also wrote an Introductory Notice and Memoir for the 
 collected edition of Sydney Dobell's Poems, which appeared in 
 1875 (London: Smith, Elder & Co.), and an Introductory Note 
 for Dobell's Thoughts on Art, Philosophy, and Religion a selection 
 from his unpublished prose writings which the above-named 
 firm issued in the following year. Nichol was also the author 
 of the articles on Dunbar, Lyndesay, Swift, and Dobell, in Ward's 
 English Poets (Macmillan). He contributed at various times to 
 The Glasgow University Album (1854 and 1869), The Oxford and 
 Cambridge Magazine, Undergraduate Papers, The Encyclopaedia 
 Britannica, The Dictionary of National Biography, The Westminster 
 Review, The North British Review, The Fortnightly Review, Good 
 Words, Macmillaris Magazine, and to other works of reference 
 and various periodicals ; while he wrote frequently in the columns 
 of newspapers, both English and Scotch. During the period of his 
 professorship he often contributed to The Glasgow Herald. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Abbot, Evelyn, xvii. 
 
 Abersytwith, College of, 203. 
 
 Alexandrian Lectures, Kingsley, 1 10. 
 
 Alison, Sir Archibald, 118. 
 
 American Civil War, 109, 142, 151 seq., 
 257 seq., 271. 
 
 American Literature, 255 seq., 278. 
 
 Argyll, Duke of, 120. 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, 157; references to 
 his works, 1 57. 
 
 Arran, early visits to, 43 seq. ; Sabbath- 
 keeping in, 50, 51. 
 
 Ascog, 279. 
 
 Atkinson, Dr., 159. 
 
 Auchmuty, 7. 
 
 Aurora Leigh, 199. 
 
 Austen, Jane, 169. 
 
 Avoca, Vale of, 62. 
 
 Bacon, Lord, 247, 260 seq. 
 
 Bacon; Philosophical Classics for Eng- 
 lish Readers, 259 seq., 278, 279, 284. 
 
 Bagneres de Bigorre, 52, 56, 62, 71, 73, 
 79, 93- 
 
 Bain, Professor A., 177. 
 
 Balfour, A. J., 210. 
 
 Balfour, Lady Betty, xviii. 
 
 Balliol College, 124, 131, 144, *$i 
 283, 304. 
 
 Baltimore, 273. 
 
 Barnachom Cottage, 8. 
 
 Belfast, 62, 153. 
 
 Bell, Henry Glassford, 170. 
 
 Bell, Jane Stewart, wife of John Nichol, 
 150, 168, 170, 179, 304; letters to, 
 168 seq. 
 
 Berkeley, Rev. W., ix., 147, 148, 170. 
 
 Biarritz, 3. 8, 12, 17, 21, 31, 43, 63. 
 
 Blarney, 65, 66. 
 
 Bognor, 302, 303. 
 
 Bonn, 26. 
 
 Boston, 272, 276. 
 
 Bradley, Professor A. C. , 225. 
 
 Braemar, 279. 
 
 Breadalbane, Lord, 33. 
 
 Brechin, 6. 
 
 Breitmann, Hans, 258. 
 
 Bright, Jacob, 280. 
 
 Bright, John, 218. 
 
 British Association, 12. 
 
 Broughton, Reginald, 145, 146, 159. 
 
 Brown, James, D.D., ix., 109, 1 12, 
 
 114, 204, 296 ; letter to, 278. 
 Brown, John, M.D., 232, 241 ; letters 
 
 from, 228, 230, 232, 233. 
 Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 67, 121. 
 Browning, James, 92. 
 Browning, Robert, 126, 169, 18 1 ; 
 Glasgow Rectorial Election and, 201 ; 
 letter from, 202. 
 Bruges, 23 ; belfry of, 23, 28. 
 Brussels, 24. 
 Bryant, W. C, 82. 
 
 Bryce, James, 146, 151, 189, 280, 283. 
 Buchanan, Andrew, Jun., 115. 
 Buchanan, Robert, Professor of Logic, 
 
 114, 187. 
 Bulwer, Sir E. L. 27 seq., 4 1. 
 Burns, Robert, 42, 252, 255. 
 Burns, Robert: a Summary of his 
 
 Career and Genius, 252 seq., 278. 
 Byron, Lord, references to his works, 
 
 27, 28, 42, 229, 245. 
 Byron: English Men of Letters, 242 
 
 seq., 253, 267, 278. 
 By water, Professor, 147. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 311 
 
 Caird, Edward, 115, 147, 148, 182, 191, 
 
 192, 194, 278, 281 ; letter from, 125 ; 
 
 on " Old Mortality," 151. 
 Caird, Principal, 288. 
 Campbell, Sir Archibald (Lord Blyths- 
 
 wood), 194. 
 Campbell, Colin, D.D., 289. 
 Campbell-Bannerman, H., 194. 
 Carlyle: English Men of Letters, 175, 
 
 265 seq., 283, 284, 299, 302, 303. 
 Carlyle Society, The, 299. 
 Carlyle, Jane Welsh, 266. 
 Carlyle, Thomas, 110, 114, 181, 276; 
 
 meetings with, 133, 163; references 
 
 to his works, 147 ; sonnet on, 249, 
 
 252 ; Froude's life of, 266. 
 Carrick Castle, 278, 285. 
 Channing, Rev. Dr., 121, 217. 
 Chapman, Mrs., 272, 275. 
 Clark, Sheriff, 194. 
 Clarke, Dr. Samuel, 10. 
 Cobden, Richard, 218. 
 Coblenz, 28. 
 
 Cologne, 24 ; cathedral, of, 25. 
 Companions of my Solitude, I IO. 
 Concord, 272. 
 
 Connon, Charles William, 7 1 seq. 
 Cooper, Fenimore, 256. 
 Cork, 62 seq. 
 
 Couper, Professor J., 129. 
 Cowper, Professor William, 68. 
 Crawford, Donald, 176. 
 Crieff, 279. 
 
 Crimean War, 131, 140. 
 Crosskey, Henry, D.D., 109, 1 16, 160, 
 
 194 ; letter from, 253. 
 
 Davis, Jefferson, 273. 
 
 Death of Themistocles and other Poems, 
 
 70, 125, 246 seq., 278. 
 De Quincey, Thomas, 72, m, 112, 
 
 131. 177- 
 Devonshire Club, The, 299. 
 
 Dicey, A. V., ix., 137, 143. M4 l 4S> 
 147, 148, 150, 151, 159, 163, 165, 
 189. 
 
 Dixon, Joseph, 115. 
 
 Dobell, Sydney, ill, 112, 113, 134, 
 165, 229. 
 
 Dobell, Mrs. Sydney, 165, 230. 
 
 Douglas, Gavin, 279. 
 
 Douglas, Scott, 252. 
 
 Drachenfels, 26. 
 
 Drogheda, 62. 
 
 Dublin, 62. 
 
 Duff, Grant, Penan, 285. 
 
 Dumas, Alexander, 67. 
 
 Dunbar, William, 279. 
 
 Dun, 6. 
 
 Dunn, Mr., x., 178, 185. 
 
 Eadie, Rev. Dr., 112. 
 
 Eglinton, Lord, 118, 119, 120. 
 
 Ehrenbreitstein, 28. 
 
 Elbe, The, 22. 
 
 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 256, 276, 277 ; 
 
 Nichol's visit to, 272. 
 Essays ofElia, 106. 
 Etruria, Dennis, 96. 
 Excursions in the Abruzzi, White, 96. 
 
 Faucit, Helen, 105. 
 
 Fergusson, John, 73 seq. 
 
 Fife Herald, 6, 7. 
 
 Finlayson, T. C, D.D., 115; letter 
 
 to, 215. 
 Fleming, Professor, 18. 
 Flint, Robert, D.D., 116, 177. 
 Forbes, Annette, 15. 
 Forbes, Jane, wife of John Nichol, sen. , 
 
 5, 10, 12. 
 Fragments of Criticism, 175. 
 Frankfort, 29. 
 Froude, James Anthony, 266 ; letter 
 
 from, 267. 
 Fulton, William, schoolmaster, 80, 81, 
 
 94. 
 
 Gallery of Nature, 41, 56, 68. 
 Garrison, Lloyd, 249, 272, 275. 
 Ghent, 24. 
 Gibbon, Edward, 134; History oj 
 
 Rome, 95. 
 Glasgow University Album, 10 1, III, 
 
 112. 
 Glehn, Mrs. Von, 283. 
 Glyn, Lady Mary, 304. 
 Goatfell, 45 ; view from, 48, 49. 
 Goschen, G. T., 210. 
 Govan, Parish School of, 80 ; walks to, 
 
 81, 94- 
 Grant, Professor Robert, 290. 
 Green, Thomas Hill, 139, 140, 143, 
 
 147, 150, 152, 159, 188, 191. 
 
312 
 
 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Gregg, George, schoolmaster, 53, 71. 
 Gregg, William, schoolmaster, 54, 72. 
 Grenfell, Algernon S., 145, 159, 163. 
 Griffin, Gerald, poems of, 66. 
 Grindrod, Charles, M.D., ix.,xv., 196, 
 212, 239. 
 
 Hain, Adolf, 116, 121, 122, 129. 
 Hamilton, Sir William Rowan, 129 ; 
 
 letters to, 130, 133. 
 Hannibal, 104, 231 sea., 246, 279. 
 Harte, Bret, 258. 
 Hartingdon, Lord, 210. 
 Hawick Grammar School, 6. 
 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 82, 106, 220, 
 
 256, 258, 277 j Transformation, 168 
 
 sea. 
 
 Haynes, Alicia, 64, 66. 
 
 Heidelberg, 30, 31. 
 
 Hildesheim, 158. 
 
 Hill, Birkbeck, 143, 145, 159. 
 
 Hill, Professor, 18. 
 
 Holland, T. H., 147, 151. 
 
 Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 276. 
 
 Howe, Dr., 276. 
 
 Hungarian Wars, 96 sea., 140. 
 
 Hunt, Leigh, 17, 243. 
 
 Hunter, John, of Craigcrook, 178 ; 
 
 letter from, 178. 
 Hutchison, Mr., schoolmaster, 54. 
 
 Ireland, visits to, 56, 62 sea, 153 seq. 
 Italian Wars, 96 seq. 
 
 Jack, Agnes. See Nichol, Agnes. 
 
 Jack, Professor, 70, 116, 153; letters 
 to. 153, 154. 
 
 Jackson, Professor, 18. 
 
 James I., 279. 
 
 Jebb, Professor, 225. 
 
 Jennings, Jane, 63 seq. 
 
 Jenningses, The, 63 seq. 
 
 Jowett, Benjamin, x., xi., 92, 125 seq., 
 149 seq., 151, 157, 158, 163, 176, 
 200, 207, 283, 294, 301, 304 ; letters 
 from, 161 seq., 181, 190^., 201, 213, 
 214, 224, 232, 244, 252, 284. 
 
 Keats, John, 177. 
 Keeling, Mr., 63, 66. 
 Kelso, 73 ; its Abbey, 73. 
 Ker, Professor W. Paton, 283. 
 
 Knight, Professor William, 237, 250, 
 259 seq., 278; letters to, 219, 263, 
 266, 297. 
 
 Kossuth, Louis, 97, 121, 140, 168,283, 
 305 ; visit to Glasgow, 106 seq. 
 
 Lambie, Robert, 115, 129. 
 
 Lass wade, 16, 17. 
 
 Lauriston, 10. 
 
 Leitch, Mr., assistant at Observatory, 
 
 36. 
 Life and Letters of Sydney Dobell, 230. 
 Limerick, 154. 
 Lincoln, Abraham, 152. 
 Lindsay, Sir David, 279. 
 Linton, Mrs. Lynn, 283. 
 London, visits to, II, 17, 163; life in, 
 
 283 seq., 286, 299 seq. 
 Longfellow, Henry W., 5, 82, 229, 276; 
 
 sonnet on, 249 ; visit to Glasgow, 
 199, 251 ; Nichol's visit to, 271, 273, 
 
 275 ; letters from, 233, 251. 
 Lowell, James Russell, 82. 
 Luke, George Rankine, 115, 139, 143, 
 
 145, 14, 159, 163, 171, 175, 206, 
 
 229, 296 ; letter from, 148. 
 Lureley, The, 28. 
 Lushington, E. L. , Professor of Greek, 
 
 x., xvii., 18, 72, 81, 90, 120, 185, 
 
 208, 222, 225, 284, 294 ; letters from, 
 
 202, 221, 222, 225, 226, 248, 254, 
 
 266. 
 Lytton, Lady, xviii. 
 Lytton, Lord, 224, 294 ; letters from, 
 
 224, 234, 236, 257, 259, 264. 
 
 MacCallum, Professor, Mungo, letter 
 from, 179. 
 
 Macfarlane, Principal, 13, 18. 
 
 Macgill, Professor, 18. 
 
 Mackay, yEneas, ix., 147, 150. 
 
 Mackay, Rev. Mr., 46. 
 
 Mackennal, Rev. Dr., ix., xxiii., 109, 
 
 112, 115, 118, 301. 
 Mackenzie, Mr., assistant at Observatory, 
 
 36. 
 MacLehose, James, letter from, 208 ; 
 
 letters to, 209, 248, 249. 
 
 MacLehose, Robert, letters to, 268, 303. 
 
 Macleod, Donald, D.D., ix., xx., 116, 
 192. 
 
 Macnee, Sir Daniel, 289. 
 
 M'Cormick, Professor, 182, 242. 
 
 M'Cosh, James, 177. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 313 
 
 M'Cunn, Florence, letter from, 268. 
 
 M'Cunn, Professor, letter from, 269. 
 
 M'Grigor, Alexander B., 294. 
 
 M'Swineys, The, 64, 65. 
 
 M'Turk, Professor, 18. 
 
 Mahan, Captain, Influence of Sea Power 
 
 on History, 285. 
 Mdhrchen, Grimm, 14, 41. 
 Markinch, 7. 
 
 Marlborough, Duke of, 203. 
 Martineau, James, D.D., 217, 301, 
 
 305 ; letter from, 267. 
 Mathew, Father, 65. 
 Maurice, F. D., 109, no, 150, 216, 
 
 221 ; letter from, 188. 
 Meikleham, Professor, 18. 
 Mazzini, Joseph, 58, 97, 98, 121, 138, 
 
 140, 163, 168, 218. 
 " Metaphysical Society," The, 193. 
 Middleton, Mr., schoolmaster, 71. 
 Mill, John S., xi., 17, 58, 138, 142, 
 
 219, 259 ; letter from, 195. 
 Moffat, 279. 
 
 Monro, D. B., 112, 116. 
 Monro, Fortress, 273. 
 Montrose, 8. 
 Moore, Thomas, 127. 
 Mount Vernon, 274. 
 Muller, Professor Max, 157. 
 Murray, Mr., schoolmaster, 54. 
 
 Naples, incident at, 280. 
 
 Napoleon, Louis, 140. 
 
 Nelson, Mr., schoolmaster, 53, 71. 
 
 Nettleship, Henry, 147, 176. 
 
 Newman, J. H., 149, 218. 
 
 Newman, W. L., 157, 158. 
 
 " New Speculative Society," The, 193 
 seq. 
 
 Nichol, Agnes, wife of Professor Jack, 
 ix., 10, 13, 16, 17, 22, 33, 34, 47, 
 56, 60, 80 seq., 94, 113, 129, 132, 
 I 53> 158, 306; letters to, 100, 102, 
 103, 158, 159, 198. 
 
 Nichol, Elizabeth. See Pease, Elizabeth. 
 
 Nichol, Jane. See Tullis, Jane. 
 
 Nichol, Jane, 10, II. 
 
 Nichol, Jane S. See Bell, Jane Stewart. 
 
 Nichol, John, birth of, 8 ; early years, 
 8 seq. ; birth of his sister, 10 ; early 
 education, 13 seq., 28, 39, 40 seq., 
 48; school, in John Street, 15; at 
 
 the Western Academy, 53 seq., 7 1 seq. ; 
 at Kelso, 73 seq. ; foreign travel visits 
 to Germany, 15, 17 seq., 22 seq., 158, 
 277 ; to France, 165, 171, 224, 277, 
 283, 297 ; to Switzerland, 171, 250, 
 303 ; to the Riviera, 225 ; to Italy, 
 108, 280, 283 ; the Observatory, 32 
 seq., 40 seq., 56 seq., 93 seq., 1 1 5, 
 121, 128, 131, 164 ; early impressions 
 of literature, 41, 42, 46, 66 seq., 81 seq., 
 121 ; holiday resorts Arran, 43 seq., 
 50, 51 ; Ireland, 56, 62 seq., 163 seq.; 
 the Highlands, 153 seq., 163 seq., 
 279 ; the English Lakes, 278, 281 
 seq. ; on prizes, 55, 86 seq. ; studies 
 classical, 56, 71 seq., 80 seq., 88 seq., 
 94 ; geological, 68, 69 ; astronomical, 
 69, 70 ; historical, 95 seq. ; philoso- 
 phical, 148, 180, 187 seq. ; character- 
 istics, xiv. seq., 59, 67, 82, 117, 122, 
 137 seq., 143, 150, 160, 184 seq., 192, 
 197, 211 seq., 281 seq., 286, 300, 305 ; 
 religious opinions and sympathies, 83 
 seq., 102 seq., 109 seq., 113, 132, 141, 
 189, 219, 301, 214 seq. ; University 
 career at Glasgow, 85 seq., 100 seq., 
 113 seq. ; at Oxford, 124 seq., 129, 
 132, 137 seq., 140, 143 seq., 148 seq., 
 156 seq., 163, 171, 176; educa- 
 tion, theories concerning, 88 seq.; 
 American civil war, 109, 142, 152, 
 256, 271 ; political opinions and 
 sympathies, 114 seq., 117, 122 seq., 
 210 seq., 301 seq. ; University tests, 
 119, 140^., 165 ; " Old Mortality," 
 139 seq., 171, 176 ; his marriage, 
 170 ; chair of Logic in St. Andrews, 
 175 ; Professor of English litera- 
 ture in Glasgow, xxii., 177, 178 
 seq., 182 seq., 223; chairs of Logic 
 and Moral Philosophy in Glasgow, 
 187 seq., 191; "New Speculative 
 Society," 193 seq. ; Aberystwith 
 College, 203 seq. ; Merton Chair 
 of English, 207 seq. ; London re- 
 viewers, 212, 213 ; resignation of 
 professorship, 222; visit to America, 
 271 seq. ; life in London, 283 seq., 
 286, 299^.; presentation of portrait, 
 287 seq. ; last illness and death, 305 
 seq. 
 
 Contributions to Macmillan' s Maga- 
 zine, 108, 305 ; Glasgozu University 
 Album, 101, in ; Good Words, 114, 
 193 ; Oxford and Cambridge Maga- 
 zine, 134, 175; Undergraduate Papers, 
 157, 175 ; The Museum, 171 ; West- 
 minster Review, 175 ; North British 
 Review, 255. 
 
 to Newspapers, Glasgow Herald, 
 
 227, 228 ; Manchester Guardian, 227, 
 
 228, 303. 
 
3H 
 
 MEMOIR OF JOHN NICHOL. 
 
 Nichol, John, Contributions to Encyclo- 
 pedia Britannica, xviii., 231, 255. 
 
 Poems hitherto unpublished, 166, 
 167, 171, 172, 206. 
 
 Essays, 259, 279. 
 
 Letters to Mrs. Jack, 100, 102, 103, 
 158, 159, 198 ; Sir W. R. Hamilton, 
 130, 133 5 Professor Jack, 153, 154 ; 
 Miss J. S. Bell, 168, 169, 170; Rev. 
 John Service, D.D., 204, 217, 218; 
 John Skelton, 205, 278, 295, 298 ; 
 James MacLehose, 209, 248, 249 ; 
 Rev. T. C. Finlayson, D.D., 215 ; 
 Professor Knight, 219, 263, 266, 297 ; 
 Mrs. E. P. Nichol, 164, 219 ; W. B. 
 Scott, 262 ; Robert MacLehose, 268, 
 303 ; Rev. James Brown, D.D., 278 ; 
 Miss Boyd, 297 ; Mrs. Sellar, 303 ; 
 American letters, 271 seq. 
 
 Nichol, John, sen., 5, 6. 
 
 Nichol, J. P., xi. seq., 129, 133 ; 
 Early years of, 6 ; Rector of Mon- 
 trose Academy, 8 ; Professor of 
 Astronomy in University of Glas- 
 gow, 9 ; characteristics, 56 seq. ; his 
 friends, xiii. 58 ; his lectures, 9, 62, 
 70, 117; visit to America, 79; second 
 marriage, ioi; political sympathies, 
 121 ; invited to stand as Member for 
 Parliament, 136 ; death of, 164 ; 
 sonnet on, 249 ; letter from, in. 
 
 Nichol, Pringle, ix. 
 
 Nichol, William, 11, 12, 16, 32. 
 
 Nonnenwerth, 26. 
 
 Observatory, The, 31 seq., 40 seq., 56, 
 93 seq., 128, 131, 159, 164; assistants 
 at, 36 seq.; dogs, 60 seq., 128; friends 
 at, 115, UI. 
 
 Observatory, Old Glasgow, 31. 
 
 O'Connell, Daniel, 66. 
 
 "Old Mortality," 139 seq., 142, 143 
 seq., 149 seq. 
 
 Orbis Pictus, The, 29, 41. 
 
 Orchardson, W., 2; R.A., 287, 289. 
 
 Ostend, 17, 22. 
 
 Oswald, Dr. Eugene, 299. 
 
 Oxford, 124 seq., 129, 132, 137 seq., 
 156 seq., 163; lectures at, 125, 157; 
 Scotch students at, 135; Union de- 
 bates, 140. 
 
 Paisley, Rev. Mr., 84. 
 
 Palmer, George, 113, 115 ; letter from, 
 127. 
 
 Pater, Walter H., 147, 150, 151, 301. 
 
 Payne, J., 151. 
 
 Pearson, C. H., National Character. 
 285. 
 
 Pease, Elizabeth, wife of J. P. Nichol, 
 101, 129, 164, 273, 275, 285 ; letters 
 to, 164, 219. 
 
 Pease, Joseph, IOI. 
 
 Penzance, 197. 
 
 Philadelphia, 275. 
 
 Phillips, Wendell, 272, 275. 
 
 Pilgrim's Progress, 14, 27, 41. 
 
 Pillsbury, Parker, 109. 
 
 Polidori, The Vampire, 245. 
 
 Potomac, The, 274. 
 
 Prescott, W. H. ; his works, 82. 
 
 Primer on English Composition, 241. 
 
 Pulsford, William, D.D., 194. 
 
 Questions and Exercises on English 
 Composition, 242. 
 
 Ramsay, Sir Andrew, 69. 
 Ramsay, Professor William, 18, 79, 80, 
 81, 90 seq. 
 
 Rawnsley, Rev. Canon, 281. 
 
 Reid, Professor, 18. 
 
 Rhine, The, 24, 26. 
 
 Richardson, Anna Deborah, 64. 
 
 Richmond, 273, 274. 
 
 Richter, Jean Paul, 67. 
 
 Riviere, Briton, 283. 
 
 Robertson, Rev. Frederick, 217. 
 
 Rolandseck, 26. 
 
 Rollo, John, 37. 
 
 Ross, John M., 112, 115, 121, 127, 279. 
 
 Rossetti, D. G., 157, 245. 
 
 Rothes, 250. 
 
 Rothesay, 279. 
 
 Rotterdam, 31. 
 
 Sandford, Sir Daniel, 12. 
 
 Sauchiehall Street, 32. 
 
 Schiller, works of, 67. 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, references to his 
 
 works, 41, 42, 67. 
 Scott, William Bell, 238, 244, 249, 296; 
 
 letters from, 245, 254 ; letter to, 262. 
 Sellar, Professor, x., xiv., xvii., 210, 
 
 211, 233, 293, 296; letter from, 225. 
 Sellar, Mrs., letter to, 303. 
 Senior, Nassau W., xi. 
 Service, John, D.D., 115, 216; letters 
 
 to, 204, 217, 218; letter from, 217. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 315 
 
 Shelley, Mrs., Frankenstein, 245. 
 Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 1 10, 302. 
 Siebengebirge, The, 26. 
 Skelton, John, letters to, 205, 278, 295, 
 
 298. 
 Skillins, The Miss, 63. 
 Skye, visit to, 153, 154 sea. 
 Slack, Mr., schoolmaster, 54, 72. 
 Smith, Agnes, wife of Mr. Tullis, 5. 
 Smith, Alexander, 101, III, 112, 113, 
 
 115, 121, 122. 
 
 Southey, Robert, 243. 
 
 Spalding, Professor, 175. 
 
 " Spanish Gipsy," The, 198 sea. 
 
 Stanley, Arthur Penrhyn, 126. 
 
 Stephen, Leslie, 305. 
 
 Stewart, Captain of Shierglas, 1 70. 
 
 Stewart, Sophia, 170. 
 
 St. George's Road, 32. 
 
 Sue, Eugene, 67. 
 
 Sumner, Charles, 273. 
 
 Swinburne, Algernon C, x., 137, 139, 
 143, 145, 146, 151, 155, 157, 158, 
 163, 176, 204, 205, 244, 277, 283; 
 letters from, xxiii., 243, 251, 253. 
 
 Symonds, J. A., 301. 
 
 Tables of History, Literature and Art, 
 196, 236 sea. 
 
 Tait's Magazine, 9. 
 
 Tennyson, Alfred, Lord, 111 ; references 
 to his works, 67, 106, 129, 130; 
 Glasgow Rectorial Election, 114, 120, 
 201, 202 ; death, 303. 
 
 Thackeray, W. M., 5, 169, The Four 
 Georges, 135. 
 
 Thomson, Professor Allen, 19, 93. 
 
 Thomson, James, Professor of Mathe- 
 matics, 17, 19, 47. 
 
 Thomson, James, Professor of Civil 
 Engineering, 19, 20, 26, 47, 69. 
 
 Thomson, John, 19, 20, 21, 29. 
 
 Thomson, Mrs., Haymount, 79. 
 
 Thomson, Robert, 19. 
 
 Thomson, Robina, 79. 
 
 Thomson, Thomas, Professor of Chem- 
 istry, 19. 
 
 Thomson, William, Professor of Materia 
 
 Medica, 19, 21. 
 Thomson, Rev. William, 186. 
 Thomson, Sir William (Lord Kelvin), 
 
 18, 19, 26, 47, 93, 189, 194, 290. 
 
 Tollemache, Hon. Lionel A., 176. 
 
 Tullis, Alice, 7, 11, 56. 
 
 Tullis, Christina, wife of William 
 
 Nichol, 7, 12, 16, 46. 
 Tullis, George, 7. 
 Tullis, Jane, wife of J. P. Nichol, 5, 7, 
 
 8, 43, 84, 121, 132 ; characteristics, 
 
 58 sea., 67, 98. 
 Tullis, Mr., of Auchmuty, 5, 6, 7. 
 Tullis, Robert, 7. 
 Tullis, William, 7, 250. 
 Turin, 108, 203. 
 Twain, Mark, 258. 
 Tyrrell, Walter, M.D., 305. 
 
 Undergraduate Papers, 157, 175. 
 
 University Extension Lectures, xx. 
 169 sea. 
 
 University of Glasgow, Old College 
 Court of, 9, 12, 18 ; College Green, 
 31 ; student life at, 85 sea. ; system 
 of teaching, 86 ; Rectorial Elections, 
 114, 116, 117 sea., 201 seq. ; Liberal 
 Association of, 118 seq., 122. 
 
 Vaughan, Professor, 157. 
 Veitch, Professor, 176, 191. 
 Vere, Aubrey de, 130., 133. 
 Virginia, 274. 
 
 Ward, Principal A. W., ix., x., xviii., 
 
 179, 197, 234, 256. 
 Ward, Artemus, 258. 
 Washington, 273 seq. ; its Capitol, 274. 
 Waterford, 62. 
 Watts, Theodore, 283, 300. 
 Western Academy, The, 52 seq., 71 seq. 
 Weston, Miss, 275. 
 Whitman, Walt, 256. 
 
 Williams, Benjamin T., 115, 203 ; 
 letter from, 204. 
 
 Wilson, George, xiv., 194. 
 
 Wilson, John, 114. 
 
 Within or Without, George Macdonald, 
 134- 
 
 Woo/man, Life of j 219 seq. 
 
 Wordsworth, references to, xvi., 8, 42, 
 67, 229, 303. 
 
 Wright, Robert S., 145. 
 "Zetetic," The, 119. 
 
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